\~n ^o>§ 
 
 
 si^nj 
 
 %\zn 
 
 
 s 
 
 ^OJITVJ-JO^' 
 
 
 
 Fri 
 
 \IN0-3WV 
 
 
 
 
 
 ^UIBRAR 
 
 
 IIVEM//J 
 
 ^/OJIIVJJO^ ^UONVSOl^ 
 
 
 MIFOMfc 
 
 
 ^ v ^-Advyan-^'' 
 
 ,X\\E I'NIYERS/a 
 
 
 
 
 
 tfOdlTVD JO 
 
 
 
 <rii3DNY-sm^ 
 
 *vlOSANCEl£j> 
 
 %main(i-3V\* 
 
 -^t-LIBRARYQf -s 
 
 ^ojitvj-jo^ 
 
 1°% 
 
 n# 
 
 AMEUNIVER^/a 
 
 <Til30NV-S01^ 
 
 vS:lOSANCELfj> 
 
 "%13AIN(l3ttV 
 
 A-0F-CA1IF(% 
 
 ^?A«vaan^ 
 
 4 
 
 
 «AUIBRAK 
 
 ^UIBRARYO, 
 
 ^fOJIlVJHO^ 
 
 ^fOJIlVJ-JO^ 
 
 'VERS//> 
 
 , o 
 <Til33NV-S01^ 
 
 iFCAUFOJfo 
 
 
 ^OFCALIFO/?^ 
 
 ^AavaaiH^ ^Aavaan^ 
 
 ^EUNIVERVa 
 
 <rii]DNV-S01^ 
 
 
 ,ivfpr/> 
 
 v.lfK Aumrr 
 
 .vA\:.IIRtJADV/0^
 
 
 "%3AINn3\\V 
 
 Vsng §vsn 
 
 ^d/OdmOdO^ 
 
 ^KMITCHO^ 
 
 ,\\tfUNIVERS/A 
 >- 
 
 ^TilJONVSOl^ 
 
 vvlOSANCELfj> 
 o 
 
 ^/Sa3MNfl-3\\V 
 
 ^OFCAilFO/?^ ^OFCAIIFO/?^ 
 
 vr 
 
 y 0AHvaaii-# y 0Aavaaii^ 
 
 ^■LIBRARYQr 5AUIBRARY0/T 
 
 ^/Odiivj-do^ ^/odiivj-do^ 
 
 ^EUNIVERS/a 
 
 <fJ13'JNV'S0^ v 
 
 v^lOS-ANCElfj^ 
 
 o 
 
 "%J3AIN(13\W 
 
 <0F-CALIF(% 
 
 ^0F-CALIF(% 
 
 * ,— M * £? v> . — 
 
 •^AHYaam^ ^AavaaiRv^ 
 
 ^\E WWW/A 
 
 ^>AOSANGEtfj> 
 
 <Til^NVS01^ %MAINI13\\V 
 
 IVERtov 
 
 o 
 <fJ133NVS01 
 
 vvlOS-ANCELfj> 
 
 MNIHWV 
 
 -MI-LIBRARY^ 
 
 ^UIBRARYQ^ 
 
 ^OdllVJdO^ 
 
 \oi\mi^ 
 
 wu-univers//. 
 
 N VlOSANCElfj> 
 
 o 
 
 ^OFCALIFO/?^ 
 
 ^OF-CALIFOfy* 
 
 <Tii30NV ^/muNiidvW^ y 0Aavaaii#- y 0AavaaiH^ 
 
 ^LIBRARY/?/ ^UIRRARYQ^ 
 
 ^/OdllVJ 
 
 ^odir 
 
 ^EUNIVERS//, 
 
 oscVOS ANCElfj> 
 
 <T?13 
 
 '^{JdAINd 3\W 
 
 ^OFCALIFO/?^ 
 
 _ — _ 
 
 \LIF(% 
 
 IVERS/a. 
 
 WElfj^, 
 
 ^ y oxwm\n^ ^ y omm\\ 
 
 /y mm 3\w N 
 
 tUf i KJivfDr/, 
 
 Mfflfr 
 
 ukVIIRIMPY/O,. 
 
 .uMIRBARY/O/
 
 PRESIDENT McCOSH'S WORKS. 
 
 5 vols. Svo. Uniform. $10. 
 
 A NEW AND NEAT EDITION, AT REDUCED PRICES. 
 
 Namely : 
 
 I. 
 
 MM Ml I'HOD OF THE DIVINE GOVERNMENT. 8vo 
 
 I OO. 
 
 "It is refreshing to read a work so distinguished for originality and soundness of thinking, 
 especially as coming from an author of our own country." — Sir William Hamilton. 
 
 II. 
 
 TYPICAL FORMS AND SPECIAL ENDS IN CREATION. 
 
 Svo. S2.00. 
 
 " It is alike comprehensive in its range, accurate and minute in its details, original in its 
 structure, and devout and spirited in its tone and tendency." 
 
 III. 
 
 THE INTUITIONS OF THE MIND. New and improved 
 
 n. Svo. $2 oo. 
 " Never was such a work so much needed as in the present day. It is the only scientific 
 work adapted to counteract the school of Mill, Bain, and Herbert Spencer, which is so steadily 
 prevailing among the students of the present generation." — London Quarterly Review, 
 April, 1865. 
 
 IV. 
 
 A DI I ENCE OF FUNDAMENTAL TRUTH. Being an Ex- 
 amination of Mr. J. S. Mill's Philosophy. Svo. $2.00. 
 
 ••The spirit of these discussions is admirable. Fearless and courteous, McCosh never 
 hesitates to bestow praise when merited, nor to attack a heresy wherever found." — Congrega- 
 tional Review. 
 
 V. 
 
 IIII-; SCOTTISH PHILOSOPHY: Biographical, Expository, 
 Critical. Svo. $2.00. 
 
 "President McCosh's elaborate work upon the 'Scottish Philosophy' cannot fail to be 
 warmly welcomed by every student of Speculative Science." — New Englanaer. 
 
 DR. McCOSH'S OTHER WORKS. 
 LAWS OF DISCURSIVE THOUGHT. Being a Text-book of 
 
 nal Logic. i2tno. 31.50. 
 
 ' I hesitate not to dec'are that Dr. McCosh's work is the best text-book of logic in the 
 English language." — Dr. L'lrici, in Zeitschrift fur Philosophic (1876). 
 
 CHRISTIANITY AND POSITIVISM. A Series of Lectures to 
 
 the Times on Natural Theology and Apologetics. i2mo. S175. 
 
 IDEAS IX NATURE OVERLOOKED BY DR. TYNDALL 
 
 I an Examination of Dr. Tyndall's Belfast Address. i2mo. Cloth, 50 cts. 
 
 J UK DEVELOPMENT HYPOTHESIS: Is it Sufficient? 
 
 75 cents. 
 
 ROBERT CARTER AND BROTHERS, 
 
 NEW YORK.
 
 AN EXAMINATION 
 
 OF 
 
 MR. J. S. MILL'S PHILOSOPHY: 
 
 DEFENCE OF FUNDAMENTAL TRUTH. 
 
 BY 
 
 JAMES McCOSH, LL.D., 
 
 PRESIDENT OF THE COLLEGE OF NEW JERSEY, PRINCETON. 
 
 SECOND EDITION, WITH ADDITIONS. 
 
 NEW YORK: 
 ROBERT CARTER AND BROTHERS, 
 
 530 Broadway. 
 I880.
 
 I ^07 
 
 PREFACE TO SECOND EDITION. 
 
 IN reading lately the Memoirs } Letters^ and Remains ol 
 Alexis De Tocqueville, who has speculated so profoundly 
 on the causes and consequences of national character, I was 
 much struck with the following : — 
 
 " The ages in which metaphysics have been most cultivated, have 
 in general been those in which men have been most raised above 
 themselves. Indeed, though I care little for the study, I have always 
 been struck by the influence which it has exercised over the things 
 which seem least connected with it, and even over society in general. 
 I do not think that any statesmen ought to be indifferent as to 
 whether the prevailing metaphysical opinions be materialistic or 
 not. Condillac, I have no doubt, drove many people into material- 
 ism, who had never read his book ; for abstract ideas, relating to 
 human nature, penetrate at last, I know not how, into public 
 morals." 
 
 Had De Tocqueville's studies run in that direction, it would 
 not have been difficult for him to unfold the causes of the phe- 
 nomena which he has so carefully noted. These phenomena 
 are three in number. First, a taste for philosophic specula- 
 tion is a mark of an elevated age. It is the sign of a time 
 which believes that there is as much above the surface of the 
 earth, and beneath it, as there is on it; and is seeking suc- 
 cessfully or unsuccessfully to gauge the height of the heavens, 
 in order to draw down influences from it ; or to penetrate the 
 ground in the hope of discovering mines from which unseen 
 wealth may be dug. The age which comprised Socrates, 
 
 215190
 
 iv PSEFAOS TO SECOND EDITION. 
 
 Plato, and Aristotle, in Greece ; the age of Cicero in Rome, 
 the seventeenth century in France, England, and Holland; 
 tin* last part of the eighteenth and the first part of the nine- 
 teenth cent mies in Scotland and in Germany, have been the 
 peculiarly philosophic ages of these countries, and have been 
 the times of deepest and brightest thought in all departments 
 of literature and science. Whatever may be said against the 
 age in which we live, it is clear that it is one in which the 
 deepest speculative questions are discussed ; and it is char- 
 acterized by high literary attainment and boundless scientific 
 and political enthusiasm. The second fact noticed is, that 
 metaphysics exercise a mighty influence on the things least 
 connected with them, in fact over society in general. This 
 can be accounted for. Men's deep and abiding convictions, 
 — religious, ethical, and philosophic, — when they have 
 such, or the restlessness gendered in hearts emptied .of all 
 credences, and with pretended satisfactions rushing in on 
 every side to fill the vacuum, exert a far greater power over 
 them and their age, than outward circumstances or floating 
 impulses. De Tocqueville recommends statesmen carefully 
 to watch the philosophy of their day, which is always sowing 
 seed to produce fruit for good or for evil in the age that fol- 
 lows. I may -add that the fx*iends of religion should also 
 guard those springs out of which the streams of action flow. 
 For De Tocqueville tells us, thirdly, that a materialistic phi- 
 losophy penetrates into public, and I may add private, morals ; 
 and this among persons who never looked into a work on 
 metaphysics. He refers specially to the Sensational philoso- 
 phy of France, which exercised so fatal an influence on 
 French character and politics, in the latter half of last 
 century, giving a direction to public sentiment which culmi- 
 nated in the mad excesses of the French Revolution, and 
 then sank into the stagnant indifference of the first Empire. 
 When we look from this point, we see that we have dark 
 days and fearful conflicts before us in France and in England : 
 for we have a prevailing philosophy of quite as earthward a 
 character and tendency as that of Condillac and the Encyclo-
 
 PREFACE TO SECOND EDITION. V 
 
 p&dists ; with qualities fitted to stimulate a wild enthusiasm ; 
 entertained by earnest and able men eager to propagate their 
 opinions, supporting each other in important literary organs, 
 and at the present moment buoyed up by the hopes of victory. 
 Happily we have in this country (it is different, I fear, under 
 the new Empire in France) many forces — unfortunately 
 unconnected and distracted — to meet this, both in the hiofh- 
 toned philosophy which still lingers among us, and in a fer- 
 vent religion widely spread, and fitted, I think, to keep the 
 materialistic psychology from attaining to so great a sway as 
 it reached in last century, and may still reach in this, on the 
 continent. But the contest in England is a very serious one 
 —the religious public being quite unaware of its importance, 
 and not likely to be aroused till they see the practical effects, 
 when it is too late to avert them. Thinking men, however, 
 feel that they have a part to act in this crisis. I introduce 
 my readers to one of the skirmishes of the great warfare. 
 
 In May, 1865, Mr. Mill published an Examination of 
 Sir William Hamilton's Philosophy, in which he unfolds 
 principles fitted, as I think, to undermine fundamental truth. 
 In the beginning of the following year, I published this work 
 as a reply. In the third edition of his work, published in 
 1867, Mr. Mill replied to his critics, including myself. I 
 place in Appendix II. to this edition my answer to Mr. Mill's 
 strictures. The combatants are now brought to very close 
 quarters. We now see clearly what are the questions at 
 issue. The Appendix may be regarded as forming a sort 
 of resume of the whole controversy, not so far as it relates to 
 Hamilton, but as it bears on what is far more important, — 
 the fundamental truth which Mr. Mill has assailed.
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER L 
 
 PAOI 
 
 Introduction — Sib William Hamilton and Mb. Mill, . . 7 
 
 CHAPTER IL 
 The Method of Investigation, 31 
 
 CHAPTER IIL 
 Mb. Mill's Admissions, 95 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 Sensations, 79 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 Mind, Pebsonalitt, Personal Identitt, Substance, . . 88 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 Bodt, 112 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 The Phtbiolooy of the Senses, 159
 
 viii CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 MmoBT, Association of Ideas, Belief, and Unconscious 
 
 Ml.NTAL OrERATIONS, 187 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 ,Ii d G mi n r or Comparison 215 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 Relativity of Knowledge, ... .... 231 
 
 CHAPTER XL 
 Man's Power of Conception as a Test of Truth, . . . 251 
 
 CHAPTER XIL 
 Self-Evidence and Necessity, the Tests of Intuition, . . 259 
 
 CHAPTER XIH. 
 Causation, 274 
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 The Logical Notion, 286 
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 Logical Judgment, . 305 
 
 CHAPTER XVI. 
 Reasoning 318 
 
 CHAPTER XVII. 
 
 Secondary Logic ; or Thought as Directed to Particular 
 
 Classes of Objects, 339 
 
 (
 
 CONTENTS. ix 
 
 CHAPTER XVIII. 
 Logical Discussions : The Province of Logic, . . . 350 
 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 What is Truth 1 Criteria of Truth, 372 
 
 CHAPTER XX. 
 Utilitarianism, . 385 
 
 CHAPTER XXL 
 Natural Theologt, 415 
 
 APPENDIX. 
 
 L Sir William Hamilton's Philosophy, 483 
 
 II. Reply to Mr. Mill's Strictures in his Third Edition, . 435
 
 AN" EXAMINATION" 
 
 MR. J. S. MILL'S PHILOSOPHY. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 INTRODUCTION — SIR W. HAMILTON AND MR. MILL. 
 
 IF any one competent to offer an opinion on such 
 a subject were asked, Who are the most influen- 
 tial philosophic thinkers of Britain, in this the third 
 quarter of the nineteenth century"? he would at 
 once and unhesitatingly name Sir William Hamilton 
 and Mr. John Stuart Mill. For the last twenty or 
 thirty years the former has had great authority in 
 Scotland, and considerable power in Oxford and 
 among the Dissenting colleges of England; has 
 been much admired in the United States of Amer- 
 ica ; has been favorably known in France, and heard 
 of even in Germany, where few British metaphysi- 
 cians attain a name. Mr, Mill has qualities which 
 specially recommend him to the English mind, and 
 of late years he has got a firm hold of the rising 
 thought of Oxford and Cambridge, where young 
 minds, in the recoil from the attempt to impose the 
 mediaaval forms upon them, have taken refuge in
 
 8 INTIiODUCTIOm 
 
 the Empiricism and Utilitarianism so lucidly ex- 
 pounded by him; while writers bred at the great 
 English Universities have, in certain portions of the 
 London press, been constantly and apparently sys- 
 tematically quoting him, or referring to him, as pos- 
 sibly the only philosopher known to them, or at 
 least appreciated by them. It should be added that 
 he is known in France as the English representa- 
 tive of their own Positive School; and his clear 
 logical expositions have been esteemed by not a 
 few in Germany, anxious to escape from the inex- 
 tricable toils of Kant and Fichte, Schelling and 
 Hegel. 
 
 These favo men are alike in the greatness of their 
 intellectual power, and in the range of their attain- 
 ments. But they differ widely in their peculiar 
 mental endowments and predilections, in the man- 
 ner in which they have been trained, and the 
 influences under which their opinions have been 
 formed. Hamilton is known to have received a 
 thoroughly complete collegiate education in classics 
 and philosophy ; to have afterwards had his logical 
 powers sharpened by the study of law, and his ex- 
 tensive information widened by his researches when 
 Professor of History ; while his pursuits were made 
 finally to centre in mental science by his appoint- 
 ment as Professor of Logic and Metaphysics in the 
 University of Edinburgh. Receiving his early col- 
 lege training in Glasgow, where the influence of 
 Reid was predominant, he retained through life a
 
 HAMILTON AND MILL. 9 
 
 profound reverence for the common-sense philoso- 
 pher. Completing his academic education at Ox- 
 ford, he fell under the sway of Aristotle, and found 
 in him much that was congenial to his own intel- 
 lectual nature, and was led to study his philosophy 
 not only in his own writings, but in the pages of 
 his commentators, and in ' the modification of his 
 logic constructed by the schoolmen. In the course 
 of his multifarious reading he could not but fall in 
 with constant references to Emmanuel Kant as a 
 profound thinker, and, as he entered upon the study 
 of his works, could not but be impressed with the 
 vast logical power of the German metaphysician. 
 These three, Reid, Aris totle, and Kant, are _the_men 
 who have exerc ised the greatest infl uence on the 
 studies and the thoughts of the Scottish philosopher. 
 But in his vast and rare reading he delighted to 
 find truth scattered like gold dust in the pages of 
 forgotten writers of all ages and countries, and, 
 rejoicing in the discovery, he often magnified its 
 value as he hastened to bring it forth to the public 
 view in an age and country which seemed to him 
 greatly deficient in scholarship. 
 
 His intellectual features stand out very promi- 
 nently. A discerning eye might have seen from 
 the beginning that his independent and impetuous 
 mind would impel him to follow a course of his 
 own; and that, while probably destined to lead, he 
 would not be led — certainly would not be driven 
 by others. He is evidently moved by a strong
 
 10 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 internal appetency to master all learning, and he 
 spent his life in accumulating stores which, after all, 
 fell immeasurably beneath his high ambition. Along 
 with this he has a masterly capacity of retention 
 and power of arrangement. His skill in seizing the 
 opinions of the men of all ages and coimtries : the 
 ancient Greeks, the philosophic fathers of the 
 Church, the schoolmen, the thinkers of the age of 
 the Revival of Letters, — such as Scaliger, and of 
 the continental metaphysicians from the days of 
 Descartes to about the year 1830, has never been 
 equalled by any British philosopher. His powers of 
 logical analysis, generalization, and distribution are 
 scarcely surpassed by those of Aristotle or Thomas 
 Aquinas or Kant. I have to add, that while he has 
 also superior powers of observation, he has, like most 
 metaphysicians, often overridden and overwhelmed 
 them by logical processes, and hastened by dissec- 
 tion, division, and criticism to construct prematurely 
 a completed system of philosophy — such as is to 
 be built up, only as systems of physical science are 
 formed, by the careful inductions of successive in- 
 quirers conducting their work through successive 
 ages. In this respect he has imbibed the spirit of 
 Kant, and has not followed the examples set by the 
 more cautious school of Reid and Stewart. 
 
 His manner and style are very decided and very 
 marked. Any man of sharp discernment could 
 easily recognize him at a great distance, and detect 
 him under the most rigid incognito. To some ears
 
 HAMILTON AND MILL. 11 
 
 his nomenclature may sound uncouth and crabbed, 
 being; coined out of the Greek or borrowed from the 
 Germans; but these persons forget that chemistry 
 and geology and anatomy have all been obliged to 
 create a new terminology, in order to embody the 
 distinctions which they have established. Hamilton 
 is certainly without the power of poetical or orator- 
 ical amplification for which Brown and Chalmers of 
 the same University were distinguished ; and he is 
 deficient hi the aptness of illustration hi which such 
 writers as Paley and Whately excel ; still his man- 
 ner of writing has attractions of its own. His 
 phraseology, if at times it sounds technical or pe- 
 dantic, is always carefully explained and defined, 
 and is ever scholarlike in its derivation and artic- 
 ulate in its meaning. His style is never loose, never 
 tedious, never dull ; it is always clear, always terse, 
 always masculine, and at times it is sententious, 
 clinching, and apothegmatic. In reading his works, 
 the reader need entertain no fear of being led into 
 a Scotch mist, or being met by a fog from the 
 German Ocean. Not unfrequently dogmatic, at 
 times oracular, resolute in holding by his opinions 
 when attacked, and on certain occasions, as in his 
 assaults on Luther, Brown, Whately, and De Mor- 
 gan, giving way to undue severity and passion, he is 
 ever open, manly, and sincere. He uses a sharp 
 chisel and strikes his hammer with a decided blow, 
 and his ideas commonly stand out before us like a 
 clean cut statue standing firmly on its pedestal be-
 
 12 IN TR OD UCTION. 
 
 tween us and a clear sky. Indeed, we might with 
 justice describe his style as not only accurate, but 
 even beautiful in a sense, from its compression, its 
 compactness, its vigor, and its point. His thoughts, 
 weighty and solid as metal, are ever made to shine 
 with a metallic lustre. At the places at which his 
 speculations are the most abstract and his words the 
 baldest, he often surprises us by an apt quotation 
 from an old and forgotten author ; or a sudden light 
 is thrown upon the present topic by rays coming 
 from a hundred points. If we have not the flowers 
 or the riches, we are at the same time without the 
 sultriness of a tropical climate ; and in the arctic re- 
 gion to which he carries us, if the atmosphere feels 
 cold at times, it is always healthy and bracing, and 
 the lights in the sky have a bright and scintillating 
 lustre. 
 
 ^ Mr. Mill's characteristics are of a different kind. 
 It is understood that he received no collegiate 
 education : but it is clear that he has been instruct- 
 ed with care, and I should suppose upon a system, 
 in the various branches even of academic learning. 
 If not so technically erudite as Hamilton, it is 
 evident that he is well acquainted with the various 
 departments of physical science ; that he is exten- 
 sively read in all historical and social questions ; 
 and that he is competently conversant with the 
 opinions of philosophers and logicians in different 
 ages. His thinking has many of the qualities of 
 a self-educated man : that is, it is fresh and indepen-
 
 HAMILTON AND MILh. 13 
 
 dent, but, at the same time, it is often exclusive and 
 angular, in consequence of its not being rubbed and 
 polished and adjusted by being placed alongside of 
 the philosophic and religious wisdom of the great 
 and good men of the past. Taught to think for 
 himself from his boyhood, he has prepared opinions 
 on all subjects ; he has published many of these in 
 his writings, and has evidently many more to ad- 
 vance in due time, as circumstances may seem to 
 require, and the world is able to bear them. He 
 received, I rather think, his first intellectual im- 
 pulse from his own father, of whom he always 
 speaks with profound reverence, — a circumstance 
 creditable alike to the father and the son. But Mr. 
 James Mill, though a clear and independent, was by 
 no means (so I think) a comprehensive or jorofound 
 thinker. The title of his philosophical work, Anal- 
 ysis of the Phenomena of the Human Mind, indi- 
 cates its character and its contents ; it is an analysis 
 of the operations of the mind into as few elements 
 as possible, and preceded by no careful observation 
 of the nature and peculiarities of the mental phe- 
 nomena which he seeks to decompose. One so 
 
 « 
 
 trained could not but have his attention drawn to 
 the speculations of Dr. Thomas Brown, who, largely 
 following the Sensational School of France, had 
 shown his ingenuity in deriving the complex phe- 
 nomena of the mind from a few ultimate laws. Like 
 the older Mr. Mill (in this respect, unlike Dr. 
 Brown), the younger Mr. Mill delights to trace ideas
 
 14 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 to sensations; like Brown and James Mill, he rep- 
 resents all our mental states as "feelings," and like 
 them he generates our ideas by means of sugges- 
 tion or association. 
 
 These are evidently Mr. Mill's immediate prede- 
 cessors in ps}-chology. In historical speculation he 
 was early seized with an admiration of the general 
 principles of the philosophy of M. Auguste Comte, 
 who was becoming known to a select few at the 
 time when the character of the young Englishman 
 was being formed; and M. Littre claims Mr. John 
 Mill as the first who gave " a public adhesion to the 
 method of the positive philosophy." Not that he 
 has followed the foimder of the Positive School in 
 every respect ; in particular, he has been prevented 
 by his adherence to his father's metaphysics from 
 following M. Comte in his denunciations of all at- 
 tempts , to study the human mind by consciousness. 
 But jnewas led by the influence of thfe/teaefcer to 
 
 regard it as impossible for the mind to rise to first 
 or final causes, or to know the nature of things; 
 
 Liw ■■■■iibib Trim n- n — —rtTrrTini— iinwiiwiMrt— !■ ~" ' " M 7 
 
 and to adopt his favorite method of procedure, 
 which is by deduction from an hypothesis, which he 
 endeavors to show explains all the phenomena. 
 Though a fairly informed man in the history of 
 philosophy, he has attached himself to a school 
 which thinks it has entirely outstripped the past ; 
 and so he has no sympathy with, and no apprecia- 
 tion of, the profound thoughts of the men of former 
 times: these are supposed to belong to the theo-
 
 HAMILTON AND MILL. 15 
 
 logical or metaphysical ages, which have forever 
 passed away in favor of the positive era which has 
 now dawned upon our world. Bred thus in a rev- 
 olutionary school of opinion, his predilections are 
 hi all things in favor of those who are given to 
 change, and agahist those who think that there is 
 immutable truth, or who imagine that they have 
 discovered it. His expressed admiration of Cole- 
 ridge may seem to contradict this statement, but it 
 does so only in appearance, for he has no partiality 
 for any of the favorite principles of that defender of 
 transcendental reason ; it is clear that he delights in 
 him chiefly because his speculations have been act- 
 ing as a solvent to melt down the crystallized philo- 
 sophical and theological opinions of England. The 
 school of Comte has hitherto had no analyst of the 
 mind (the founder of it was a phrenologist, and 
 studied the mind through the brain) ; and Mr. Mill 
 may be regarded as, for the present, the recognized 
 metaphysician of the school, and wil^ioldj^s jplare 
 till he is superseded by the more comprehensive 
 system, and the bolder specidative grasp of-Jfo. 
 Herbert Spenc er. 
 
 With an original clearness of intellectual appre- 
 hension, his whole training lias disposed him towards 
 distinct enunciations and practical rcsidts. Engaged 
 for many years in a public office, he has acquired 
 habits which enable him to understand the business 
 of life and the condition of society. He is partic- 
 ularly fitted to excel in the exposition of those
 
 1 6 INTR OD UCT10N. 
 
 media axiomata upon which, according to Bacon. 
 K depend the business and fortune of mankind." 
 With an English love of the concrete, he has a 
 French skill in reducing a complex subject into 
 simple elements, and a French clearness of expres- 
 sion. He is ever able to bring out his views in 
 admirable order, and his thoughts lie in his style 
 like pebbles at the bottom of a transparent stream, 
 so that we see thefr shape and color without no- 
 ticing the medium through which we view them. 
 I have to add, that in his love of the clear, and his 
 desire to translate the abstract into the concrete, he 
 often misses the deepest properties of the objects 
 examined by him ; and he seems to me far better 
 fitted to co-ordinate the facts of social science than 
 to deal with the first principles of fundamental 
 philosophy. As to his spirit, there are evidences of 
 a keen fire, of enthusiasm, perhaps of passion, burn- 
 ing within, but the surface is ever still and ever 
 green. 
 
 These two eminent men, whose systems evidently 
 stood all along so widely apart from each other, 
 have now been brought into violent collision by the 
 publication of Mill's Examination of Sir William 
 Hamilton's Philosophy. Such a collision was inev- 
 itable. Hamilton wa^ the ablest and most learned, 
 I do not think the wisest or most consistent, d^ 
 fender of intuitive or a priori truth in our countrv 
 in the past age. It was felt to be absolutely neces- 
 sary, in these circumstances, by the British section
 
 HAMILTON AND MILL. 17 
 
 of the school of M. Comte, that the fundamental 
 positions of Hamilton should be removed out of the 
 way of the advancing deductiyft prpph-ieisrn I 
 rejoice that the attack has been made by Mr. Mill 
 himself, so that we see all t ha t can be advanced by 
 jh& flp.nfpst. represent ative nf thr r-rparjg ntial o r 
 sensational philosophy in our age and country. It 
 is to be hoped that the formidable assault will be 
 met by some disciple of Hamilton who has caught 
 the spirit and who understands the system of his 
 master. As the result, the student of philosophy 
 will be in circumstances to decide what he should 
 receive with gratitude, and what he should refuse 
 or reject with regret, in the philosophy of the last 
 of the great Scottish metaphysicians. 
 
 In the title of his work, Mr. Mill announces it as 
 an examination of " the principal philosophical ques- 
 tions discussed in his writings;" and in his intro- 
 ductory remarks he declares, " My subject, therefore, 
 is not Sir W. Hamilton, but the questions which Sir 
 W. Hamilton discussed." It is this circumstance 
 which makes the work so important in the view of 
 the students of mental science generally, and which 
 has induced me to review it. In examining his 
 opponent, Mr. Mill has taken the opportunity of 
 developing his own philosophic system, and has put 
 us in a position to judge of its principles and re- 
 sults. It is true that we had the germs of that 
 system embedded in his treatise on Logic, and ger- 
 minating there. No doubt he is continually telling 
 2
 
 18 INTEODTJCTIOK. 
 
 us in that work that he avoids metaphysics, but 
 there is a metaphysical system underlying and run- 
 ning throughout all the deeper discussions. He re- 
 fers, and evidently adheres fo a lar^e extent, to a. 
 K(Mis;i tion:il theory of the origin of our ideas in 
 his chapter, a Of the Things denoted by Names 
 
 he~ see ks to undermine all intuitive truth in his 
 
 — ■* . "" ' ,i- *■ ' - i n i ——'«"—- — — — '■ - 
 
 chapters on " Demonstration " and " Causation ; " 
 and he has exposed with a special zest the errors of 
 the a priori school in his book on " Fallacies." He 
 has thus been preparing those who have studied his 
 logic for accepting his metaphysics. In these cir- 
 cumstances I rejoice that in his recent work he has 
 furnished us with the means of thoroughly esti- 
 mating his theory of the mind, of which we had 
 only hints and glimpses in his logical treatise. It 
 is this theory which I profess to examine in this 
 volume. 
 
 In performing this special task it is not necessary 
 to enter into the controversy between Mill and 
 Hamilton. For more important questions than the 
 merits of the individuals have been started. I cer- 
 tainly do not feel that it is a duty devolving on me 
 to offer a defence of the philosophy of Hamilton. 
 Since the year 1854, when I reviewed his doctrines 
 of the " Relativity of Knowledge " and of u Causa- 
 tion," in an appendix to the fourth edition of my 
 work on the Method of the Divine Government, I 
 have been opposing certain of his favorite principles. 
 I offered my strictures with excessive reluctance, as
 
 HAMILTON AND MILL. 19 
 
 feeling a profound reverence for the vast erudition 
 and logical power of the Edinburgh professor, and 
 cherishing a lively gratitude for the services he had 
 rendered to philosophy in refuting old and widely- 
 received errors and establishing important truth. 
 I advanced my criticisms while he was yet alive, 
 and I have continued them in articles in reviews, 
 and in my work on The Intuitions of the Mind, while 
 his reputation was at its greatest height, and his 
 disciples were indignant at any attempt to dispute 
 the infallibility of their master. 
 
 Hamilton, as it appears to me, was never able to 
 weld into a consistent whole the realistic matter he 
 got from Reid with the subjective forms he took 
 from Kant. In his review of M. Cousin, he took up 
 a negative position, which did not leave him free to 
 follow thoroughly the positive revelations of con- 
 sciousness. In his Discussions he developed a the- 
 ory of causation which prevented him from rising 
 from the phenomena of the world to a belief in the 
 existence of Deity ; and he expounded a doctrine 
 as to the relativity of knowledge which makes us 
 perceive objects under forms, and with additions im- 
 posed by the perceiving mind, which landed him 
 avowedly in a system of nescience. Kafft is claimed, 
 with some truth, by M. Littre as in fact a precursor 
 of the school of Comte. I have felt all alone; that 
 Hamilton adopted principles from the Critical Phi- 
 losophy which made it impossible for him to stand 
 up for the trustworthiness of our faculties and the
 
 20 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 reality of things, which yet as a follower of Eeid he 
 seemed to be establishing. I declared openly and 
 repeatedly, and in a number of places, that the ad- 
 missions lie made would sooner or later be followed 
 to their logical consequences ; that without meaning 
 it, he was preparing the way for a nihilist philos- 
 ophy; and that it would be seen that he had not 
 left himself ground from which successfully to repel 
 the attacks of scepticism. When Dr. Mansel pub- 
 lished his famous Bampton Lectures, On the Limits 
 of Religious Thought, notwithstanding my great 
 reverence for his erudition, his acuteness, and his 
 high character, I immediately opposed his applica- 
 tion of Hamilton's doctrine of the unconditioned to 
 our knowledge of God and of good and evil, which I 
 represented as being fraught with disastrous logical 
 consequences. As having anticipated Mr. Mill in 
 many of his objections to Hamilton's philosophy, 
 and having advanced others against doctrines which 
 Mr. Mill applauds and turns to his own uses, and 
 believing it to be impossible to defend fundamental 
 truth from the positions assumed by Hamilton, I 
 feel that it is not for me to propose to defend the 
 philosophy of the Scottish metaphysician from the 
 assaults of Mr. Mill. 1 
 
 At the same time, I cannot give my adherence to 
 many of the objections which have been taken by 
 his new opponent. Notwithstanding incongruities 
 
 1 I have placed in an Appendix to tions I have taken to Sir William 
 this volume a summary of the objec- Hamilton's Philosophy.
 
 HAMILTON AND MILL. 21 
 
 in some parts of his system, he has furnished more 
 valuable contributions to speculative philosophy 
 than any other British writer in this century. No 
 man has ever done more in clearing the literature 
 of philosophy of commonplace mistakes, of thefts 
 and impostures. He has shown that it is dangerous 
 to quote without consulting the original, or to adopt 
 without examination the common traditions in phi- 
 losophy ; that those who borrow at second-hand will 
 be detected, and that those who steal without ac- 
 knowledgment will sooner or later be exposed. He 
 seems to experience a delight in stripping modern 
 authors of their borrowed feathers, and pursuing sto- 
 len goods from one literary thief to another, and 
 giving them back to their original owner. More 
 than any other Englishman, Scotchman, or Irishman, 
 for the last two centuries, he has wiped away the 
 reproach from British philosophy that it is narrow 
 and insular. For years past ordinary authors have 
 seemed learned, and for years to come will seem 
 learned, by drawing from his stores. In incidental 
 discussions, in foot-notes, and notes on foot-notes, he 
 has scattered nuts which it will take many a scholar 
 many a day to gather and to crack. It will be long 
 before the rays which shine from him will be so 
 scattered and diffused through philosophic literature, 
 — as the sunbeams are through the atmosphere, — 
 that they shall become common property, and men 
 will cease to distinguish the focus from which they 
 have come. By his admirable powers of division
 
 22 INTRODUCTION 
 
 and subdivision lie has placed the philosophic sys- 
 tems of various ages and countries into appropriate 
 compartments, which enable us at once to see the 
 form and the nature of each. Mr. Mill regrets that 
 he " did not write the history of philosophy." I am 
 not sure whether the Scottish professor had all the 
 qualifications necessary for such a work; whether, 
 in particular, he could always enter sympathetically 
 into the spirit of the times in which the philosopher 
 lived, and whether he could have given us an easy 
 and continuous narrative. But every student should 
 be grateful to him for what he has actually per- 
 formed; for arranging under proper heads, and stat- 
 ing, always with admirable brevity, and commonly 
 with unimpeachable accuracy, the opinions of philos- 
 ophers, ancient and modern, on most of the topics 
 of speculative interest which still continue to be ag- 
 itated. Looking to his original contributions to phi- 
 losophy, his defence of the principles of common 
 sense is characterized at once by extensive learning, 
 by unsurpassed logical acumen and consummate 
 judgment. His immediate theory of sense-percep- 
 tion, if it does not remove all difficulties, appears to 
 me to be more consistent than any other with the 
 facts both of psychology and of physiology. His 
 logic is too Kantian in its manner and spirit, and 
 will require to be carefully sifted; but I believe it is 
 the most important addition made in our day to the 
 analytic of the laws of thought. I am persuaded 
 that his distribution of the mental faculties, given in
 
 HAMILTON AND MILL. 23 
 
 the second volume of his 3fetaphysics, is upon the 
 whole the best we yet have, and any one who would 
 improve it must make extensive use of it. Nor is it 
 to be forgotten that he has introduced fresh topics 
 into British philosophy, and has always thrown light 
 upon them even when he has not succeeded in set- 
 tling them. 
 
 I am sure Mr. Mill means to be a just critic of his 
 rival. But from having attached himself to a nar- 
 row and exclusive school of philosophy and of his- 
 tory, he is scarcely capable of comprehending, he is 
 certainly utterly incapable of appreciating, some of 
 Hamilton's profounder discussions. It could be shown 
 that not a few of the alleged inconsistencies of Han; 
 ilton arise from misapprehensions on the part of his 
 critic. I have observed that some of the supposed 
 contradictions are merely verbal, and originate in his 
 using a phrase in its usual acceptation, perhaps to a 
 promiscuous class in one place, and employing it in 
 a more technical sense after explanation in another. 
 Nor is it to be forgotten that the writings published 
 by himself appeared in the form of articles in re- 
 views, and of notes and appendices to works edited 
 by him; and that his Lectures, which contain his 
 complete system, though carefully edited by Profes- 
 sors Mansel and Veitch, had not the advantage of 
 being reduced to thorough consistency by himself 
 It has to be added, that, being willing to take a 
 thought that struck him as true or important from 
 any quarter, he was not always able to join the ma-
 
 24 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 terials he had gathered into a harmonious structure. 
 Hence his philosophy takes the appearance of a 
 squared and diamonded mosaic, in which it is not al- 
 ways easy to discover the unity of the plan. But I 
 verily believe that Hamilton had after all a complete 
 system, which, with some hiatuses and incongruities, 
 and some fatal errors adopted from Kant, is, as a 
 whole, consistent, and contains valuable truth. His 
 critic, from his training and sectarian predilections, 
 is incapacitated for forming a due estimate of many 
 of his higher excellences, and everywhere examines 
 him from his own standpoint, which is very narrow, 
 and by his own experiential system, which is lament- 
 ably defective. But I leave the work of defending 
 Hamilton to his pupils and disciples, and I rejoice to 
 believe that in many points, and these very impor- 
 tant ones, their defence will be triumphantly suc- 
 cessful. 
 
 In that curious retribution which we often discov- 
 er in the affairs of this world, we find that those who 
 are severe in judging others, may come in the end 
 to be severely judged themselves. 1 The late Sir W. 
 Hamilton was often harsh, at times I think unjust 
 (not intentionally) in his censures on those who had 
 
 1 Have we an illustration of this in are examined from the standpoint of 
 
 the manner in which Plato, who is M. Comte, Mr. Mill, and Professor 
 
 supposed to have treated the Sophists Bain ! Is there no living Archer But- 
 
 with injustice, is himself treated in his ler among British scholars to defend 
 
 turn by Mr. Grote, in his Plato and Plato's high aspirations, and to show 
 
 the other Companions of Socrates 1 The that he had glimpses of great verities 
 
 exposition of the Search Dialogues in which have never disclosed themselves 
 
 that able and learned work is admira- to the view of the ancient Sophists or 
 
 ble, but the positive doctrines of Plato modern Positivists i
 
 HAMILTON AND MILL. 2o 
 
 possession, of the philosophic ear of the country at 
 the time when he was forcing himself into public 
 notice in opposition to the spirit of the age. In say- 
 ing so, I do not refer so much to his able and manly, 
 though not altogether successful, criticism of M. 
 Cousin, or to his non-recognition of any special merit 
 in Mr. James Mill (of which his son complains), so 
 much as to the censorious manner in which he refers 
 to Dr. Brown and Archbishop Whately, who, if not 
 very profound or erudite, were certainly fresh, acute, 
 and honest thinkers. He has now been repaid for 
 all this in his own coin, by one who has a great ad- 
 miration of Whately, and who has sprung from the 
 school of Brown and Mill, and who writes as if he 
 had public wrongs to avenge, and an accumulation 
 of accepted errors to scatter. The time will come, 
 I doubt not, when the avenger may himself have to 
 suffer for the excess of punishment he has inflicted. 
 But I beg to say that this is not the spirit in which I 
 have written this review. I have really no pleasure 
 in exposing the inconsistencies, the misunderstand- 
 ings, and mistakes, to be found in Mr. Mill's Exami- 
 nation, or any of his other works. Acuter minds, 
 or more pugnacious spirits, or earnest souls irritated 
 as they see the evils which must arise from the prev- 
 alence of a philosophy which undermines funda- 
 mental truth, will, I suspect, rejoice to do this, and 
 may be tempted to do it in excess. But I have no 
 personal antipathies to gratify, no wrongs to avenge. 
 The deepest feeling which I entertain towards Mr.
 
 26 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 Mill is that of admiration of his talents, and grati- 
 tude for the clear exposition which he has given of 
 many important principles. 1 My aim in this work is 
 simply to defend a portion of primary truth which 
 has heen assailed by an acute thinker who has ex- 
 tensive influence in England. 
 
 Some of his admirers claim for Mr, Mill, that he is 
 the genuine philosophical descendant of Locke. I 
 acknowledge that in some respects he resembles our 
 great English metaphysician. He is like him in his 
 clearness of thought and diction. Both are careful 
 to avoid, as far as possible, abstruse arguments and 
 technical phrases. Both have a name in other de- 
 partments as well as mental philosophy, — Locke 
 having thought profoundly on political questions, 
 and Mr. Mill having given us one of the best works 
 we have on political economy. Both have written 
 on toleration or liber ty, and defended views in ad- 
 vance of those generally entertained in their own 
 times. I am inclined further to admit that Mr. Mill 
 has quite as much influence in our day in England 
 as Locke had in his. But with these points of like- 
 ness there are important points of difference. Locke 
 had an originality, a shrewdness, a sagacity, and a 
 high-principled wisdom and caution which have not 
 been equalled by the later speculator. Locke avows 
 
 1 Simply to illustrate this, I may corresponding professors in Cork and 
 
 mention that the part of his Logic Galway, has a place in the examina- 
 
 which treats of induction has a place tion for the Bachelor's and Master's 
 
 in my college classes, and on my rec- degree in the Queen's University in 
 
 ommendation, joined to that of the Ireland.
 
 HAMILTON AND MILL. 27 
 
 extreme enough views in opposing the doctrines of 
 professed metaphysicians, but he is saved by his . 
 crowning sense, and his religious convictions, ac- 
 quired in Puritan thnes, from taking up positions 
 adverse to the sound sense of mankind. Vehement 
 enough hi opposing a do ctrine of in nate ideas sup- 
 posed to be held by philosophers, and laboring in 
 vain to derive all our ideas from sensation and re- 
 flection, we do not find him falling back on such ex- 
 treme positions as those of Mr. Mi ll, when he en- 
 dcavors to draw our higher ideas out of sensation by 
 means of associ ation, and maintains that we can 
 know nothing of mind except that it is a series of 
 
 ■-■ " "" "**••* • — ~inr~"lrrTfinwwT»Tiivr«nnnfr«m«tii ifiriiBiiMjiMMl— w>n 
 
 sensation s , aware of i tself, or of matter, except that 
 it is a possibility of sensations. I believe that Locke 
 abandoned, without knowing it, some important fun- 
 damental truths ; but he resolutely held by many 
 others, as that man has high faculties working on the 
 original materials, and that in particular he has an 
 intuitive knowledge " which is irresistible, and, like 
 bright sunshine, forces itself immediately to be per- 
 ceived, as soon as ever the mind turns its view that 
 way, and leaves no room for hesitation, doubt, or ex- 
 amination, but the mind is presently filled with the 
 clear light of it." (Essay, B. iv. c. 2.) Mr. J. S. Mill 
 is the successor and the living representative of an 
 important British school, but it is that of Ilobbes, of 
 Hartley, of Priestley, of David Hume, and of James 
 Mill. I have studiously left Thomas Brown out of 
 this list, because, while adopting much from Hume,
 
 28 JXTIiODUCTION. 
 
 he carefully separates from him on the subject of in- 
 tuition, maintaining that we have original and irre- 
 sistible beliefs in our personal identity, and in causa- 
 tion. It will be seen as we advance how close the 
 philosophy of Mr. J. S. Mill comes to that of Hume. 
 1 rather think Mr. Mill is scarcely aware himself of 
 the extent of the resemblance, as he seems to have 
 wrought out his conclusions from data supplied him 
 to some extent by Brown, but to a greater extent 
 by Mr. James Mill, both of whom drew much from 
 the Treatise of Human Nature. But even on the 
 supposition that Mr. Mill is the Locke of the nine- 
 teenth century, it would be necessary to examine 
 and correct his views. For while the Essay on the 
 Human Understanding evolved much truth, and ex- 
 ercised, upon the whole, a healthy influence, it con- 
 tained very grave defects and errors, which issued in 
 very serious consequences both in France and in this 
 country ; in the former landing speculation in a mis- 
 erable sensationalism, and in the latter originating 
 the wire-drawn attempts to fashion all our ideas out 
 of one or two primitive sources by means of associ- 
 ation. I have already intimated that I believe the 
 errors of Mr. Mill to be far more numerous and fun- 
 damental than those of Locke ; and should his sen- 
 sational and nescient system come to be adopted, it 
 will be followed, both in theory and in practice, with 
 far more fatal results than any that ensued from 
 the combined idealistic and realistic philosophy ex- 
 pounded in Locke's great work.
 
 HAMILTON AND MILL. 29 
 
 Among a considerable portion even of the read- 
 ing and thinking people of England, there is a 
 strong aversion to all professedly metaphysical spec- 
 ulation, — which they regard as a net of sophistry 
 spread out to catch them. But in avoiding an 
 avowed and elaborate discussion of fundamental 
 truth, it often happens that they are taken in by a 
 plausible smartness, which is really metaphysics, but 
 bad metaphysics, — treating every profound subject 
 in a superficial way. In this respect some of our 
 countrymen act very much like those excessively 
 cautious and suspicious persons to be met with in 
 the world, who are so afraid of everybody cheating 
 them, that they become the dupes of those more de- 
 signing;; schemers who are ever warning them against 
 the dishonesty of others. There are readers of 
 Hobbes, who, on perceiving how free he is from 
 mysticism, and how readily he seems to explain all 
 our ideas by sensation, and all our actions by selfish- 
 ness, are tempted to think that this man who speaks 
 so clearly and dogmatically must be speaking truly. 
 They are about as wise as the excessively far-sighted 
 individuals who so easily account for all extraordi- 
 nary actions on the simple principle that all mankind 
 are fools, or rogues, or madmen! The Englishman 
 is thus often led astray by a deception which pre- 
 tends to be simplicity itself. I abhor as much as 
 any man the introduction of metaphysics into the 
 discussion of commonplace or practical subjects. 
 But there is another error, quite as common, and to
 
 80 +KTBODUCTION. 
 
 be equally dreaded, and that is the introduction of 
 superficial metaphysics furtively, by those who would 
 gain your confidence by telling you that they avoid 
 metaphysics. If we are to have metaphysics, let 
 them avow that they are metaphysics, and let the 
 investigation be conducted scientifically and system- 
 atically. By all means let us have clear metaphys- 
 ics, just as we would wish to have clear mathemat- 
 ics and clear physics. But clearness to the extent 
 of transparency is of no value, provided it be at- 
 tained, as in the case of the French sensational 
 school, only by omitting all that is high or deep in 
 man's nature. I certainly do not look on Mr. Mill 
 as a superficial writer. On the contrary, on subjects 
 on which he has not been led to follow Mr. James 
 Mill or M. Comte, his thoughts are commonly as solid 
 and weighty as they are clearly expressed. But, 
 speaking exclusively of his philosophy of first prin- 
 ciples, I believe he is getting so ready an acceptance 
 among many for his metaphysical theories, mainly 
 because, like Hobbes and Condillac, he possesses a 
 delusive simplicity which does not account for, but 
 simply overlooks, the distinguishing properties of 
 our mental nature.
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 THE METHOD OF INVESTIGATION. 
 
 M COUSIN brings it as a charge against Locke, 
 • that in his Essay on the Human Understand- 
 ing, he treats of the origin of ideas before inquir- 
 ing into their nature. Locke thus announces his 
 method: "1st. 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." 
 (Introd. s. 3.) Upon this, his French critic remarks 
 that there are here " two radical errors in regard to 
 method : 1st. Locke treats of the origin of ideas 
 before having sufficiently studied these ideas. 2<11 v. 
 He does more, he not only puts the question of the 
 origin of ideas before that of the inventory of ideas, 
 but he entirely neglects this last question." (Lec- 
 tures on Locke, ii.) M. Cousin seems to lay down ;m 
 important principle here, and to be so far justified in 
 blaming the English philosopher for neglecting it. 
 In order to be able to settle the very difficult ques- 
 tion of the origin of our ideas, we must begin, and, I 
 
 (31)
 
 82 THE METHOD OF INVESTIGATION. 
 
 believe, end, with a careful inspection of their pre- 
 cise nature. In the very passage in which Locke 
 proclaims his mode of procedure, he speaks of in- 
 quiring into the original of those ideas which a man 
 " observes, and is conscious to himself." The obser- 
 vation by consciousness should certainly precede any 
 attempt to furnish a theoretical decomposition of 
 ideas. I am convmced that hi the construction of 
 his theory, that all our ideas are derived from sensa- 
 tion and reflection, Locke did not patiently and com- 
 prehensively contemplate all that is in certain of the 
 deepest and most characteristic ideas of the human 
 mind. I do not ground this charge so much on the 
 fact that he treats, in the First Book, of the Origin 
 of Ideas, before coming, in the Second Book, to dis- 
 cuss the Nature of Ideas, as on the circumstance that 
 in the Second Book he is obliged to overlook some 
 of the profoundest properties of our ideas, in order 
 to make them fit into his preconceived system. But 
 we find Mr. Mill justifying Locke, and condemning 
 Cousin. " I accept the question as M. Cousin states 
 it, and I contend that no attempt to determine what 
 are the direct revelations of consciousness can be 
 successful or entitled to regard, unless preceded by 
 what M. Cousin says ought to follow it, — an inqui- 
 ry into the origin of our acquired ideas." {Exam. 
 p. 145.) 
 
 Mr. Mill at this place examines Sir W. Hamilton's 
 constant appeals to consciousness. Sir William would 
 often settle by consciousness alone questions which I
 
 THE METHOD OF INVESTIGATION. 33 
 
 suspect must be solved by a more complicated and 
 difficult process. It is thus, for instance, — that is, 
 by an appeal to consciousness, — that he would de- 
 termine that we know immediately an external or 
 material world. In language often of terrible se- 
 verity, he charges Brown, and nearly all philoso- 
 phers, with disregarding consciousness : " But it 
 is thus manifestly the common interest of every 
 scheme of philosophy to preserve intact the in- 
 tegrity of consciousness. Almost every scheme of 
 philosophy is only another mode in which this 
 integrity has been violated." (Metaphysics, vol. i. 
 p. 283.) Mr. Mill shows successfully (as I think) 
 that the question between Hamilton and his oppo- 
 nents is often not one of the testimony of conscious- 
 ness, but of the interpretation of consciousness: 
 ;; We have it not in our power to ascertain, by 
 any direct process, what consciousness told us at 
 the time when its revelations were in their prim- 
 itive purity. It only offers itself to our inspection 
 as it exists now, when these original revelations 
 are overlaid and buried under a mountainous heap 
 of acquired notions and perceptions." (pp. 145, 
 146.) Mr. Mill then goes on to explain his own 
 method, which he calls the Psychological: "And 
 here emerges the distinction between two differ- 
 ent methods of studying ihe problems of meta- 
 physics, forming the radical difference between 
 the two great schools into which metaphysicians 
 are fundamentally divided. One of these I BhaU 
 3
 
 34 THE METHOD OF INVESTIGATION. 
 
 call for distinction the Introspective method, the 
 other the Psychological." He rejects the Intro- 
 spective method: "Introspection can show us a 
 present helief or conviction, attended with a great- 
 er or less difficulty in accommodating the thoughts 
 to a different view of the subject; but that this 
 belief or conviction or knowledge, If we call it so, 
 is intuitive, no mere introspection can ever show." 
 He therefore resorts to the other method : " Being 
 unable to examine the actual contents of our con- 
 sciousness until our earliest, which are necessarily 
 our most firmly knit associations, those which are 
 most intimately interwoven with the original data 
 of consciousness, are fully formed, we cannot study 
 the original elements of mind in the facts of our 
 present consciousness. Those original elements can 
 only come to light as residual phenomena, by a 
 previous study of the modes of generation of the 
 mental facts which are confessedly not original, — 
 a study sufficiently thorough to enable us to apply 
 its results to the convictions, beliefs, or supposed 
 intuitions which seem to be original, and deter- 
 mine whether some of them may not have been 
 generated in the same modes, so early as to have 
 become inseparable from our consciousness before 
 the time at which memory commences. This mode 
 of ascertaining the original elements of mind I call 
 Psychological, as distinguished from the simply 
 Introspective mode." (pp. 147, 148.) These quota- 
 tions furnish a sufficiently clear view of his account
 
 THE METHOD OF INVESTIGATION. 35 
 
 of the two methods, and of his reasons for rejecting 
 the one and adopting the other. 
 
 I have long been of opinion, and I have en- 
 deavored to show elsewhere, 1 that Sir William Ham- 
 ilton's use of " consciousness " is very unsatisfactory. 
 He avows that he employs the phrase in two dis- 
 tinct senses or applications. First, he has a gen- 
 eral consciousness, discussed largely in the first 
 volume of his Metaphysics. This he tells us can- 
 not be defined (vol. i. p. 158); "but it comprehends 
 all the modifications, all the phenomena of the 
 thinking subject." (p. 183.) "Knowledge and belief 
 are both contained under consciousness." (p. 191.) 
 Again, " consciousness is co-extensive with our cog- 
 nitive faculties ; " " our special faculties of knowl- 
 edge are only modifications of consciousness." (p. 
 207.) He shows that consciousness implies discrim- 
 ination, judgment, and memory, (pp. 202-206.) This 
 is wide enough ; still he imposes a limit, for con- 
 sciousness " is an immediate, not a mediate knowl- 
 edge." (p. 202.) Already, as it seems to me, in- 
 consistencies are beginning to creep in ; for whereas 
 he had before told us that consciousness includes 
 "all the phenomena of the thinking subject," now 
 he so modifies it as to exclude " mediate knowl- 
 edge," which is surely a modification of the think- 
 ing subject. Throughout these passages he uses the 
 phrase in the wide, loose sense given to the German 
 
 1 Particularly in a review of Hamilton's Metaphysict in tlie Dublin University 
 
 Magazine for August, 1859.
 
 36 THE METIIOD OF INVESTIGATION. 
 
 ]>t wusstsein by the school of Wolf. He stoutly main* 
 tains, what no one will deny, that this general con- 
 sciousness is not a special faculty; but when he 
 comes to draw out a list of mental pow r ers, in the 
 second volume of his Jletajihysics, he turns to the 
 Scottish use of the phrase, and he includes among 
 them a special faculty which he calls consciousness, 
 but to which, for distinction's sake, he prefixes self, 
 and designates it self-consciousness It is the office 
 of this special faculty to " afford us a knowledge of 
 the phenomena of our minds." (vol. ii. p. 192.) It is 
 an inevitable result of using the phrases in such am- 
 biguous senses, that we are ever in danger of pass- 
 ing inadvertently from the one meaning to the 
 other, and making affirmations in one sense which 
 hold good only in another. Hamilton is ever ap- 
 pealing to consciousness, as Locke did to idea, as 
 Brown did to suggestion, and as Mr. Mill does to 
 association, but without our being always sure that 
 the various affirmations are made in the same sense 
 of the term. His appeal to consciousness, both in 
 establishing some of his own positions and in sum- 
 marily setting aside those of his opponents, is often 
 far too rapid and dogmatic. He represents the prin- 
 ciples of common sense as being emphatically " facts 
 of consciousness," whereas they are not so any more 
 specially than our acquired and derived beliefs, 
 which are equally under consciousness. In fact, 
 these principles are not before the consciousness as 
 principles. The individual manifestations are of
 
 THE METHOD OF INVESTIGATION. 37 
 
 course before the consciousness (though not more 
 so than any other mental exercise), but not the 
 principles themselves, which are derived from the 
 individual exercises by a reflex process of abstrac- 
 tion and generalization. Consciousness cannot de- 
 cide directly which of our convictions are intuitive. 
 Consciousness reveals only the present state of 
 mind, and it cannot say whether it is original or 
 derived. That state is probably a very complex 
 one, and may embrace secondary beliefs mixed up 
 with the primary ones ; and if we are to separate 
 these and fix on the true primitive convictions, we 
 must subject the whole to a process of analysis. 
 Again, consciousness can reveal to us only the sin- 
 gular, only the present state as an individual per- 
 ception ; but in psychology, as in every other science, 
 we are in search of the principle, and if we would 
 gather the law out of the particulars, we must gen- 
 eralize. In order, then, to the discovery even of an 
 " intuitive principle," there must be what Bacon calls 
 "the necessary rejections and exclusions," or what 
 Dr. Whewell calls the " decomposition of facts," and 
 then the co-ordination of the facts into a law by 
 induction. In order, then, to the construction of 
 metaphysics, more is required than a simple exer- 
 cise of consciousness or introspection ; there is need 
 of discursive processes to work the facts into a sci- 
 ence. 1 It is of the utmost moment to remove these 
 
 1 I may he permitted to mention that hit rules in The Intuitions of the Mind, 
 I have fully wrought out these caution- Part First. 

 
 38 THE METHOD OF INVESTIGATION. 
 
 misapprehensions out of the way, as Mr. Mill, with 
 his usual acuteness, has taken advantage of them; 
 and after he has shown that introspection cannot 
 do everything, he leaves upon us the impression that 
 it can do nothing. 
 
 But consciousness, after all, is the main instru- 
 ment in determining what are first principles. Let 
 us endeavor to ascertain its precise province. The 
 method followed by Mr. Mill in his psychology (and 
 also in his political economy) is evidently what he 
 calls the deductive, and which he represents in Iris 
 Logic (B. iii. chap. xi. sect, i.) as consisting of three 
 operations : " The first one of direct induction ; the 
 second of ratiocination ; and the third of verifica- 
 tion." Now, of these three steps the first and the 
 third are, properly speaking, inductive ; they depend 
 entirely on observed facts. In physical science the 
 agent of observation is the senses, aided, it may be, 
 by artificial instruments, and corrected by careful 
 methods as enjoined by modern accuracy. In men- 
 tal science the observing agent is consciousness. 
 We bend back the mental eye, and observe what is 
 passing within as it passes. As this is often a very 
 difficult and delicate operation, more particularly 
 when thought is rapid and feeling intense, we must 
 resort to other operations, but in which conscious- 
 ness is still the main instrument. We must by 
 memory bring up the past as much as possible in its 
 entirety, and notice all that is in it. Not only so ; 
 in order to correct the narrowness of our personal
 
 THE METHOD OF INVESTIGATION. 39 
 
 observations, we must look to external quarters ; we 
 must gather what are the convictions of other men 
 from their deeds, ever passing under our notice, and 
 as recorded in history ; and from their conversation 
 and their writings, as the expression of human 
 thought and sentiment. This may not be introspec- 
 tion in the narrow sense of the term ; still it is in- 
 spection of the soul of man, and it may be referred 
 in a general way to self-consciousness, for it is by 
 what we feel within ourselves that we are enabled 
 upon evidence to comprehend the experience of 
 others. 
 
 But let it be observed that consciousness, under- 
 stood in this enlarged sense, has to take the first 
 step, and the final step in the process. It has to ob- 
 serve and gather the original facts which suggest 
 the law. It has again to collect and notice the veri- 
 fying facts which establish the law. In comparison 
 with these, the intermediate step, the ratiocination, 
 is a subordinate and a dependent one. If the com- 
 mencing and closing inductions are conducted im- 
 properly, the reasoning which issues from them or 
 leads to them will only bind the blunders more 
 closely together. Thus, if in the original observa- 
 tions part of the light has been obstructed, conse- 
 quential deductions will only widen the shadow, — 
 as the mistake of a wrong datum is only increased 
 by multiplying it. We see this strikingly illustrated 
 in most of our rational systems of philosophy, — as 
 for instance, in that of Spinoza, who began with an
 
 40 THE METHOD OF INVESTIGATION. 
 
 ill-observed account of substance, and ended in the 
 bogs of a horrid pantheism. Again, if in the final 
 observations the facts are mutilated in order to fit 
 tfiem into an ingenious hypothesis, the error is 
 thereby confirmed, and the system-builders feel 
 themselves justified in adhering the more resolutely 
 to a creation of their own minds. We see this ex- 
 hibited in the history of most of those systems of 
 empiricism which, as Bacon characterizes them, leap 
 and fly at once from particular facts to universal 
 principles, which are supposed to explain all the 
 phenomena, and can easily get instances quoted to 
 support them, found by " a vague and ill-built " ob- 
 servation. 
 
 In conducting this work of observation by con- 
 sciousness, there is a constant temptation to over- 
 sight, to hasty conclusions and distorted representa- 
 tions. In physical investigation there is less room 
 for conscious or unconscious deception, as modern 
 research insists on having the phenomena weighed 
 or measured in some way: that we cannot apply 
 such a corrective to the alleged facts of conscious- 
 ness, constitutes one of the disadvantages under 
 which psychology labors. No doubt, we have im- 
 mediate access at once to the facts as being in our 
 minds, — and this seems to entitle every man to be 
 a metaphysician ; but, from the impossibility of em- 
 ploying a numerical test, there is room for great 
 looseness in the observation and inaccuracy in the 
 statement, and these issue in augmented errors m
 
 THE METHOD OF INVESTIGATION. 41 
 
 the results reached by deduction. In these circum- 
 stances, there is great need in mental science of in- 
 tellectual shrewdness, to keep us from mistaking one 
 fact for another, and still greater need of high 
 moral qualities, such as a spirit of self-restraint and 
 caution, of integrity and candor. In particular, 
 great pains must be adopted to guard against taking a 
 part, and overlooking and rejecting the rest, because 
 it may not fit into a preconceived theory to which 
 the individual may have committed himself. In 
 order to secure this we must as it were go round 
 the mental phenomena and view them on all sides, 
 and in all their aspects, both in our own minds and 
 in those of others. We must mark their various 
 properties, adding none and subtracting none, les- 
 sening none and magnifying none, disguising none 
 and correcting none, but making each stand out in 
 its own form, in its proper action, and with its 
 natural accompaniments. We ought, as Hamilton 
 expresses it, to exhibit each "in its individual in- 
 tegrity, neither distorted nor mutilated, and in its 
 relative place, whether of pre-eminence or subordi- 
 nation." (Appendix to Beid's Works, p. 747.) Till 
 this careful and candid observation has been com- 
 pleted, we are not at liberty to begin to analyze or 
 theorize. When we venture on these processes, all 
 we can do is to dissect the concrete, to generalize 
 the individual, or find out the producing cause. But 
 the errors will only multiply upon us in these steps it 
 we have not commenced with accurate observations.
 
 42 TUB METHOD OF INVESTIGATION'. 
 
 Sir W. Hamilton says, " Philosophy is wholly de- 
 pendent on consciousness." (Beid's Works, p. 746.) 
 This is going too far, as philosophy cannot be con- 
 structed without discursive processes. But Mr. Mill 
 has committed a for more serious error, when he 
 says that "Locke was therefore right in believing 
 that the origin of our ideas is the main stress of the 
 problem of mental science, and the subject which 
 must first be considered in forming the theory of 
 the mind." (p. 147.) M. Cousin seems to me to be 
 altogether right when he lays it down as a rule, that 
 in psychology we must begin with a painstaking 
 inquiry into the actual nature of our ideas. Mr. 
 Mill has thus reversed the order of things, placing 
 that which is first last, and that which is last first, — 
 putting the theory of ideas before the observation 
 of the ideas, which evidently holds out great temp- 
 tations to him to determine their nature by his 
 theory. 
 
 Not that we are precluded from making an in- 
 quiry into the origin of ideas. This is a very fair 
 subject of investigation, provided always that we 
 acknowledge its difficulties and its uncertainties, and 
 proceed in a cautious manner and in the proper 
 method. But even here the main agent must be 
 consciousness, in the sense which has been ex- 
 plained, that is, as giving us directly a knowledge 
 of our own mental operations, and indirectly an 
 acquaintance with those of others. In order to the 
 successfid resolution of ideas into their originals, we
 
 THE 2IETH0D OF INVESTIGATION. 43 
 
 have two objects, or classes of objects, to look at. 
 We have, first, to consider the ideas or convictions 
 which we would seek to account for, and, secondly, 
 the elements into which we would resolve them. 
 The first of these operations must be done by con- 
 sciousness exclusively. Even in the other and more 
 complicated and perplexing inquiry, introspection 
 must be the main agent. No doubt it is possible 
 that some light may be thrown on the origin of cer- 
 tain ideas by the brain and nerves, and in this phys- 
 iological investigation the instruments must be the 
 eye and the microscope. But no unconscious action 
 can account for conscious ideas. The attempt to 
 explain ideas must always proceed by deriving the 
 more complex from the simpler mental phenomena. 
 But in the determination of the precise nature of 
 the simpler mental affections, we are again thrown 
 back on consciousness. Suppose that the attempt 
 be, as in the school of Mr. Mill, to get our ideas 
 from sensations, and associations of sensation, we 
 must begin to determine what sensations are, and 
 what the laws of association are, by the internal 
 sense. I am quite willing to adopt Mr. Mill's psy- 
 chological method, but only on the condition that 
 we take introspection as our main instrument of 
 observation. 
 
 Mr. Mill tells us that "the proof that any of the 
 alleged Universal Beliefs or principles of Common 
 Sense are affirmations of consciousness, supposes two 
 things, — that the beliefs exist, and that they can-
 
 44 THE METHOD OF INVESTIGATION. 
 
 not possibly have been acquired." (p. 147.) I have 
 no objection to accept these two conditions, with an 
 explanation of the one and a correction of the 
 other. 
 
 As to the first rule, there are some points which 
 consciousness can settle at once. It lets us know 
 what is our present idea or conviction. This is alto- 
 gether competent to it, this in fact is its office ; its 
 revelations carry their own evidence with them, and 
 from them there is no appeal. This is admitted by 
 Mr. Mill : " Introspection can show a present belief 
 or conviction." "If consciousness tells me that I 
 have a certain thought or sensation, I assuredly 
 have that thought or sensation." (p. 141.) Now, in 
 the mature mind there are a vast number and 
 variety of ideas and convictions. We have percep- 
 tions, apprehensions, and beliefs, about matter and 
 mind, about time and space, about things changing 
 and things abiding, about the near and the remote, 
 the past and the future, about activity and efficiency, 
 about priority and succession, about cause and effect, 
 about right and wrong, eternity and immensity. 
 Now, it is the office of consciousness to reveal all 
 that is in these ideas, and psychology should begin 
 with attending to its revelations. Mr. Mill refers 
 particularly to the alleged universal beliefs. The 
 word "belief" is unfortunately a very vague one, 
 and may stand for a number of very different men- 
 tal affections. When I am speaking of first or in- 
 tuitive principles, I use the term to signify our
 
 THE METHOD OF INVESTIGATION. 45 
 
 conviction of the existence of an object not now 
 present, and thus I distinguish "primitive faith" 
 from "primitive knowledge," in which the object is 
 present. But however wide we may make the ap- 
 plication of the phrase, it does not embrace all that 
 is before consciousness. Thus we are capable of 
 immediate knowledge ; we have such in every ex- 
 ercise of self-consciousness, and I maintain also in 
 all perception through the senses. The mind, also, 
 is ever pronouncing judgments, declaring, for in- 
 stance, that things agree, or that they differ, or that 
 this change indicates a cause. We have not only 
 intellectual operations, we form moral perceptions, 
 and pronounce moral judgments, — as when we 
 decide that kindness is a virtue and cruelty a sin. 
 If we would construct a science of psychology, we 
 must survey carefully these apprehensions, beliefs, 
 and decisions. If we would establish or dis-establish 
 any metaphysical point, we must view, firstly and 
 finally, and all throughout, what is in the mind's 
 notion and conviction. Or if, what is more to our 
 present review, we would resolve am' idea into sim- 
 pler elements, we must determine all that is in the 
 idea by a searching introspection. Consciousness 
 has thus not only to settle that certain ideas or 
 beliefs, or convictions "exist," bul ascertain for us 
 all that is in them. Now, it has been repeatedly 
 brought as a charge against the school to which Mr. 
 Mill belongs, that, so far as the deeper notions and 
 beliefs of the mind are concerned, the v have never
 
 
 46 THE METIIOD OF INVESTIGATION. 
 
 carefully observed, weighed, and measured the 
 phenomenon which they seek to explain by means 
 of such elements as sensations. I believe that this 
 accusation is just, and I hope to substantiate it in 
 the course of this review. 
 
 Mr. Mill's second rale of proof can be admitted 
 only with a restriction. I allow that it is not so 
 easy a matter as Sir W. Hamilton imagines to de- 
 termine what is a first principle ; and that this can- 
 not be clone by an immediate introspection. But is it 
 not demanding too much to require that we are not 
 to accept any beliefs as universal till it has been 
 shown "that they cannot possibly have been ac- 
 quired" ? The burden of proof seems rather to he 
 on those who maintain they are acquired. Were 
 any man of science to affirm that hydrogen is not 
 an element, chemists would be quite prepared to 
 listen to him, but they would insist, as a condition 
 of their giving a positive assent, that he should de- 
 compose the substance, and until this is accom- 
 plished they would continue to regard hydrogen as 
 at least provisionally an elementary body. On a 
 like principle, we should be quite ready to attend to 
 Mr. Mill when he maintains that he can resolve our 
 idea of moral good into simpler elements, but until 
 he brings forward his components, and shows them 
 to be quite sufficient to produce the result, we may 
 surely be allowed to hold that our sense of duty is 
 an ultimate principle. 
 
 But instead of thus throwing the onus probanrfi
 
 THE METHOD OF INVESTIGATION. 47 
 
 from one side to another, I think it better to avow 
 broadly that the question is not to be settled by 
 possibilities or impossibilities, by may be or cannot 
 be, but by the ordinary rules of evidence. On the 
 one hand, persons are not to be allowed to imagine 
 that they have resolved an alleged fundamental idea 
 into something else, unless they can explain all that 
 is in the idea by means of some principle competent 
 to produce the idea with all its peculiarities. On 
 the other hand, we are not to assume a conviction 
 to be ultimate till it has been tried by clear and 
 sufficient tests. Such tests, I believe, can be had. 
 Almost all philosophers have appealed to them. We 
 shall find Mr. Mill implicitly admitting them. We 
 shall be able, I hope, to reach a precise expression 
 of them as we advance. Following these general 
 principles, the following rules of proof may help at 
 once to guide and guard inquiry : — 
 
 I. JVo one is to be allowed to imagine that he has 
 made a success/id resolution into simpler elements, of 
 an idea, belief, or conviction, unless he can explain 
 all that is in the mental phenomenon. It is necessary 
 to enunciate this rule, from the circumstance that it 
 has so often been violated. Eobbes, and the sensa- 
 tional school of France, were able to derive all our 
 ideas from sensation, simply by refusing to look at 
 and to weigh such ideas as those which we have of 
 substance and power, moral good and infinity, so 
 different from mere .sensitive affections. It has been
 
 48 THE METHOD OF INVESTIGATION. 
 
 shows again and again against Hume, that all our 
 ideas are not copies of inrpressions, — that we have 
 convictions of the existence of things, of personal 
 identity, and of power, which cannot be traced to 
 impressions, whatever be the meaning attached to 
 that vague phrase. I am convinced Mr. Mill has 
 been guilty of like oversights, when he would draw 
 all our ideas, even those we have of mind and body, 
 extension, personal identity, causation, and moral 
 obligation, from sensations, and associations of sen- 
 sations : he can appear to himself and his admirers 
 to be successful, solely by not noticing the charac- 
 teristic qualities of these profound and peculiar 
 ideas. In these dissections, this school of mental 
 anatomists destroys the life, and then declares that 
 it never existed. Mr. Mill defines mind as a series 
 of sensations : we shall see that the phenomenon to 
 be explained is the consciousness of self; that even 
 in sensation we are conscious of self. He describes 
 our conviction of personal identity as a series of 
 sensations, with the mind being aware of itself as a 
 series : I shall show that we know in consciousness 
 a present self and in memory a past self, and that 
 in comparing the two we declare them to be the 
 same. He makes body the possibility of sensations : 
 it will be proven, that in his hypothetical explana- 
 tion, he utterly fails to render any account of that 
 idea of externality which we attach to matter. He 
 resolves our idea of extension into length of time, 
 and length of time he makes identical with a series
 
 THE METHOD i .* INVESTIGATION. 49 
 
 of muscular sensations : It will not be difficult to 
 establish the essential diffe fence of the three phenom- 
 ena which are thus confounded. In treating of 
 ethical questions, he shows that we might be led to 
 do good by motives derived from pleasure and pain : 
 but he has failed to account for the very peculiar 
 ideas involved in such phrases as " duty," " ought," 
 " obligation," " sin," and " reproach." 
 
 It has been resolutely maintained by the pro- 
 foundest philosophers of all ages, that there are 
 certain convictions in the mind which have the 
 characters of self-evidence and necessity. These 
 constitute the " residual phenomena," which cannot 
 be explained by a gathered experience, and to ac- 
 count for which we must call in a new cause. We 
 know, or believe, or judge so and so, on the bare 
 contemplation of the objects ; we must do so, we can- 
 not do otherwise. Mr. Mill has looked at this men- 
 tal phenomenon, and has endeavored to account 
 for it in accordance with his general theory by two 
 principles, which it can be shown miss, and utterly 
 fail to account for, the peculiarities of our convic- 
 tion. We may here look at these for a moment, ;is 
 illustrating the importance of our rule, reserving the 
 more thorough discussion of them to future ch;i pi ers. 
 
 It is alleged by the whole school, that our belief 
 in certain general principles, supposed to be ulti- 
 mate, can be accounted for by experience. Bui (lie 
 word "experience" is a very uncertain one, and 
 may cover a number of very different mental oo 
 
 4
 
 50 THE METIIOD OF INVESTIGATION. 
 
 tions and affections. Everything that has been 
 within our consciousness, all that we have seen or 
 felt, may be said in a vague general sense to have 
 fallen under experience. In this sense our intuitions 
 of sense and consciousness, our original beliefs and 
 primitive judgments, all come within our expe- 
 rience. But thus understood, experience can ex- 
 plain nothing, can be the cause of nothing. The 
 thing experienced may, but not the experience, 
 that is, the mere consciousness or feeling. As to 
 the thing experienced, it should not be called ex- 
 perience ; and as to what it may produce, we must 
 determine this by looking at the nature of the thing, 
 and not at our experience of it. But there is a 
 sense, and this a very important one, in which ex- 
 perience can furnish us with a principle, and this 
 may be mistaken for an intuitive one. Thus we 
 have observed, not once, or twice, or thrice, or ten 
 times, but a hundred, a thousand times, that our 
 friends have been in the habit of speaking the truth, 
 and we expect them to do so in time to come as 
 they have done in time past. There have been met- 
 aphysicians who regarded our trust in testimony as 
 an original instinct of our nature. But it is surely 
 quite competent for persons to attempt to show that 
 the conviction can be explained by an early, a 
 lengthened, and a uniform observation ; and they 
 may be allowed to be successful when they have 
 proven that the experience is capable of producing 
 the conviction entertained. Let it be observed, that
 
 THE METHOD OF INVESTIGATION. 51 
 
 when thus employed experience means an induction 
 of instances to establish a general rule or law. And 
 I take this opportunity of stating, that when I have 
 occasion to refer to this power of experience, I call 
 it a gathered experience, to distinguish it from a mere 
 individual feeling. I admit freely that a gathered 
 experience can generate a strong conviction, such as 
 the trust we put in testimony, and our belief in the 
 uniformity, or rather uniformities, of nature ; that is, 
 it will account for all the marks of our convictions 
 on these subjects, for their gradual formation, for 
 their extent and their limits, — as when we allow 
 that our friends may at times commit mistakes in 
 their testimony, or that there may have been mirac- 
 ulous occurrences in the midst of the regularities 
 of nature. But then, it is said that there are, and I 
 hope to show that there are, convictions of a very 
 different nature, which are as strong in early youth, 
 and in early stages of society, as in later life and in 
 more advanced communities, and which allow of no 
 limitation or exception. As examples, we may give 
 mathematical axioms, as that two straight lines can- 
 not enclose a space, and moral maxims, as that in- 
 gratitude for favors deserves reprobation. Our con- 
 victions of this description .spring up on the bare 
 contemplation of the objects, and need not a wide 
 collection of instances ; and their necessity and uni- 
 versality cannot be accounted for by a gathered ex- 
 perience. The school to which Mr. Mill belongs 
 explains the phenomena only by failing to distin-
 
 52 THE METHOD OF INVESTIGATION. 
 
 guish between two sorts of convictions, and neglect- 
 ing to mark the characteristics of those which an- 
 nounce themselves as self-evident, necessary, and 
 universal. 
 
 But Mr. Mill has another principle, by which he 
 thinks he can explain the necessity and the unlimit- 
 ed expectation ; this is the law of the association of 
 ideas. When we have often thought of two things 
 together, the idea of the one comes invariably, in 
 the end necessarily, to call up the other. Thus Mar- 
 tinus Scriblerus, having never seen a lord mayor 
 without his fur gown and gold chain, could never 
 think of a lord mayor without also thinking of his 
 appendages. But here again Mr. Mill has missed 
 the characteristic of the mental phenomenon. " If 
 we find it impossible by any trial to separate two 
 ideas, we have all the feeling of necessity the mind 
 is capable of." (p. 264.) But this is to confound two 
 things which are very different, the association of 
 two ideas, so that the one calls up the other, with 
 the judgment, which declares that the two things 
 are necessarily related. When he heard the lord 
 mayor named, Martin could not but think of his 
 gown and chain; but he did not therefore decide 
 that the mayor and his wig had always been to- 
 gether, that they would always be together, that it 
 had never been otherwise, and could not be other- 
 wise. The laws of association may account for the 
 rise of one idea along with another, or immediately 
 after another, but they do not come near explaining
 
 THE METHOD OF INVESTIGATION. 53 
 
 the self-evidence and necessity of certain cognitions, 
 beliefs, and judgments which may rise on the 
 contemplation of single objects perceived for the 
 first time, or on the immediate comparison of two 
 objects. 
 
 II. In resolving an alleged fundamental idea or 
 conviction into certain elements, we must assume only 
 known elements, and we must not ascribe to them 
 more tlian can be sliown to be in them. To illustrate 
 what I mean : It is quite competent to any one to 
 attempt to explain chemical action by mechanical 
 causes, or vital action by mechanical and chemical 
 forces. But if he understand the problem which he 
 hopes to solve, and grapple with it fairly, he must 
 not give to mechanical action, or mechanical and 
 chemical action combined, more than is in them. 
 The whole attempt would be denounced as a mere 
 pretence if he gave a chemical affinity to the me- 
 chanical power, or a power of assimilation and ab- 
 sorption to the mechanical and chemical action. 
 Now we are surely entitled to impose a like restric- 
 tion upon the analyst of the human mind. It is 
 perfectly competent to him to attempt to resolve 
 such convictions as those of identity, causation, and 
 moral good into any other principle. But we can 
 require of him to specify the principle, to prove that 
 it actually works in tha mind, to unfold its nature 
 and its laws, and to show from its ascertained action 
 that it is quite sufficient to produce the conviction
 
 54 THE METHOD OF INVESTIGATION. 
 
 In particular, he must not be allowed, when he starts 
 with an element, to add new properties to suit his 
 purpose as he goes along. Or if he does so, he must 
 formally announce the introduction of the new 
 power, specify its nature, and honestly avow it to be 
 a new element. 
 
 This is a rule which has been habitually neglected 
 by that school of metaphysicians who delight to 
 reduce all the operations of the mind to a very few 
 principles. Locke succeeded, to his own satisfaction, 
 in deriving all our ideas from sensation and reflec- 
 tion, but it has been shown by distinguished philos- 
 ophers, British and Continental, that in accounting 
 thus for such ideas as substance, and time, and 
 power, he changed, without perceiving it, the sensa- 
 tions and reflex perceptions into something entirely 
 different. It can be proven that Mr. Mill is ever 
 falling into a like error. The operation by which 
 he derives all our ideas and beliefs from a few ele- 
 ments, is a sort of jugglery, in which he alters the 
 elements without its being discovered ; and it may 
 be added, that in the product which he shows, he 
 has not the real phenomenon which he professes to 
 have explained. 
 
 The main elements which he employs are sensa- 
 tions and associations of sensation. But he works 
 up sensations into convictions of mind and body, of 
 space and time, of personality and personal identity, 
 of infinity and obligation to do good, which are not 
 contained in the nature of sensations, and which
 
 THE METHOD OF INVESTIGATION. 55 
 
 could be imparted to them only by a new power 
 superinduced, which power would require to have a 
 place allotted to it in his system, and its laws enun- 
 ciated, and its significance estimated. Again, it will 
 be shown that Mr. Mill has made an unwarrantable 
 use and application of the laws of association. These 
 are the laws of the succession of our ideas, and 
 nothing more. Give us two ideas, and place these 
 two ideas together in the mind, and association will 
 tend to bring them up once more in union. But it 
 is not the office of association to give us the ideas 
 which must first be furnished to it. We shall see 
 that Mr. Mill is forever giving to association a 
 power, which does not belong to it, of generating 
 new ideas by an operation in which we see sensa- 
 tions go in, and a lofty idea coming out, solely by 
 the idea being surreptitiously introduced, without 
 any person being expected to notice it. The pro- 
 cess carried on by this whole school of analysts is 
 like that of the alchemists, who, when they put 
 earth into the retort, never could get anything but 
 earth, and could get gold only by introducing some 
 substance containing gold. The philosopher's stone 
 of this modern psychology is of the same character 
 as that employed in mediaeval physics. If we put in 
 only sensations, as some do, we have never anything 
 but sensations, and a "dirt philosophy," as it lias 
 been called, is the product. If we get gold (as cer- 
 tainly Mr. Mill docs at times), it is because it has
 
 56 THE METHOD OF INVESTIGATION. 
 
 been quietly introduced by the person who triumph- 
 antly exhibits it. 
 
 m. Tests may be furnished to try intuitive truths. 
 From the days of Aristotle down to the present 
 time, it has been asserted that there are first truths, 
 the support of other truths, while they themselves 
 require no support. Profound thinkers have sys- 
 tematically or incidentally been striving to give us 
 the marks of such truths. Amidst considerable dif- 
 ference of nomenclature and confusion of thought 
 and statement (such as we might expect in the first 
 efforts to catch and express the exact truth in so 
 difficult an investigation), there has been all along a 
 wonderfully large amount of agreement in the cri- 
 teria fixed on. These have been such as self-evidence, 
 necessity, and universality. Some have fixed on one, 
 and some on another of these, as their favorite test- 
 ing principle, and have overlooked the others. 
 Some have emploj^ed two, overlooking the third. 
 But these three are, in fact, the tests which, in a 
 loose or more stringent form, have been announced 
 or applied by the great bod}^ of deep and earnest 
 thinkers. It could be shown that Aristotle had at 
 least glimpses of all of them. In modern times, 
 Locke formally propounded the self-evidence, refer- 
 ring incidentally from time to time to the necessity 
 and universality. Reid was in the way of referring, 
 not always in a very clear or satisfactory way, to all 
 the three. Leibnitz brought out prominently the
 
 THE METHOD OF INVESTIGATION. 57 
 
 necessity ; and Kant, followed by Sir TV. Hamilton, 
 conjoined necessity and universality, — all three 
 overlooking the self-evidence, in consequence of their 
 keeping away very much from realities, and dwell- 
 ing among mental forms. 1 We shall find Mr. Mill 
 employing all of them, without, however, fully ap- 
 prehending their character or seeing their signifi- 
 cance. 
 
 As we proceed, we shall gather these tests into 
 heads, and establish their validity, and give them 
 their proper expression. We shall show that asso- 
 ciation of ideas, which is supposed to work such 
 wonders, cannot give these characters to any appre- 
 hension or proposition. No experiential or derived 
 truth can stand any one, or at least the whole, of 
 these tests. A general truth discovered by a gather- 
 ed experience, as that night succeeds day, cannot be 
 said to be self-evident. Nor can it be represented 
 as having any necessity in thought, for we can easily 
 apprehend it to be otherwise. Nor can it be de- 
 scribed as universal, for the time may come when, in 
 consequence of a change of mundane arrangements, 
 the day or the night may cease. 
 
 Following out these principles, I mean, in discuss- 
 
 I ing the questions started by Mr. Mill, to proceed in 
 
 i the following method : — 
 
 (1.) I allow him to try his power of analysis, ac- 
 cording to his psychological method, on all alleged 
 
 1 These tests will be consided, infra, review of them will be found in Tht 
 Chap. xii. A historical ami critical fntuitiona of the Mind, Part i.H.ii.o. 3
 
 58 THE METHOD OF INVESTIGATION. 
 
 fundamental truth, without reserving any exception. 
 This is what Sir W. Hamilton would not have done, 
 as he regarded consciousness as deciding the whole 
 question at once, and authoritatively and conclusive- 
 ly. I hold that consciousness has a most important 
 part to act. It has to disclose to us what are the 
 ideas and convictions in the mind when it begins to 
 reflect, and what is the precise nature of the ele- 
 ments into which we would resolve them. But I 
 admit that in the mature man all is not intuitive 
 that is spontaneous and apparently instantaneous. 
 And so I freely permit Mr. Mill to attempt to de- 
 compose any idea into simpler composites. But as 
 he does so, I claim the right to sit by and watch 
 him, lest he unconsciously change the elements in 
 the process; and at the close I carefully inquire 
 whether he has explained all the characteristics of 
 the idea and conviction. 
 
 (2.) When he fails, as I believe it will be found 
 that he does fail, in regard to certain mental prin- 
 ciples, then I hold that these principles which the 
 acute intellect of Mr. Mill cannot decompose, may 
 be regarded as elementary, at least provisionally so ; 
 that is, till some abler man (which is not likely to 
 happen) makes the attempt and succeeds. 
 
 (3.) I bring the alleged first truths to the test ot 
 self-evidence, necessity, and universality, and when 
 they can stand these criteria, I pronounce them con 
 clusively to be original and primary and funda 
 mental.
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 MR. MILL'S ADMISSIONS. 
 
 THE common impression regarding Mr. Mill's 
 philosophy is that it needs no intuitive prin- 
 ciples ; that the author of it does not presuppose or 
 allow that there is anything innate in the mind. 
 Some of his admirers give him credit for weaving a 
 rich fabric without any material except sensations, 
 and with no machinery except experience. Mr. 
 Mill's cavils against those who support fundamental 
 truth, and the manner in which he expounds his 
 own system, are fitted to leave this impression. He 
 begins the construction of his theory with sensa- 
 tions ; he goes on to fashion them into various forms 
 by association of sensations ; he allows among the 
 series of sensations a memory of the past, an expec- 
 tation of the future, and a power of observing co- 
 existences and successions, resemblances and differ- 
 ences between sensations ; and he makes the mind 
 as it advances receive powerful aid from the artificial 
 instrumentality of language. These seem, at least 
 to a cursory observer, to constitute the matter and 
 the agency by which he ingeniously constructs the 
 
 (59)
 
 60 MB. MILL'S ADMISSIONS. 
 
 ideas, many of them so grand and far-ranging, which 
 the mind of man is capable of forming. But while 
 these seem to be the original furniture of the mind 
 and the sum of the assumptions he has to make, we 
 find if we look more carefully that in rearing his 
 fabric he is ever and anon calling in other principles, 
 some of them openly and avowedly, and others un- 
 consciously and furtively ; and that these form when 
 placed together a huge but ill-fashioned and in- 
 congruous body of what are in fact, whatever he 
 may call them, intuitive principles or metaphysical 
 truth. 
 
 It will be found, indeed, that the mental analysts, 
 whose ambition it has been to reduce the original 
 capacities of the mind to a very small number, have 
 been obliged to bring in a vast body of assumptions 
 and new elements as they advance. Locke satisfied 
 himself that he had derived all our ideas from sensa- 
 tion and reflection, but then he called in faculties to 
 work upon the materials thus furnished ; he finds 
 ideas " suggested " as these powers operate ; he 
 gives an important function to " intuition," and sup- 
 poses the mind capable of discovering a necessary " 
 relations. Even Hume, who of all metaphysicians 
 is disposed to make fewest admissions, remarks in 
 criticising Locke, " I should desire to know what can 
 be meant by asserting that self-love, or resentment 
 of injuries, or passion between the sexes, is not in- 
 nate." ( Works, vol. iv. p. 23.) The Sensational 
 School made all our ideas transformed sensations ;
 
 ME. MILL'S ADMISSIONS. 61 
 
 but in order to get such ideas as those of personal 
 identity, power, and duty, they quietly gave the 
 transforming act a power of transmuting one thing 
 into another. I am now to show how many prin- 
 ciples Mr. Mill has been obliged to call in, as he goes 
 along, in order to explain the actual phenomena of 
 the mind on his hypothesis. I must give consider- 
 able extracts in order to do justice at once to his 
 views and my argument. The admissions are no 
 doubt candidly made, and they are always clearly 
 stated. Our readers must judge as to how far they 
 affect the apparent simplicity and modify the logical 
 consistency of his system. As I may have occasion 
 to refer to them in the course of the discussion, I 
 number and designate them by the letters of the 
 Greek alphabet. 
 
 a. There is an immediate and intuitive knowledge. 
 His language is express. " We do know some things 
 immediately and intuitively." (p. 126.) 
 
 /I From the truths known by intuition, others are 
 inferred. " Truths are known to us in two ways ; 
 some are known directly and of themselves, and 
 some through the medium of other truths. The 
 former are the subject of intuition or consciousness, 
 the latter of inference. The truths known by intui- 
 tion are the original premises from which all others 
 are inferred." (Logic, Introd. § 4.) 
 
 y. Reasoning carries us back to intuition, from 
 which it derives its ultimate premises. He thus fol- 
 lows up the passage hist quoted : " Our assent to the
 
 62 MR. MILL'S ADMISSIONS. 
 
 conclusion being grounded upon the truth of the 
 premises, we never could arrive at any knowledge 
 by reasoning, unless something could be known an- 
 tecedently to reasoning." And in the work more 
 immediately under review : " Unless, therefore, we 
 knew something immediately, we could not know 
 anything mediately, and consequently could not 
 know anything at all." (p. 126.) Elsewhere he says 
 First Principles cannot be proven : " To be incapable 
 of proof by reasoning is common to all first prin- 
 ciples : of our knowledge as well as of our con- 
 duct." ( Utilitarianism, p. 51.) 
 
 These statements are very satisfactory as to the 
 existence of intuition, and the place occupied by it, 
 and the purpose served by it. He does not in these 
 passages state the grounds on which he admits in- 
 tuition, nor the tests by which he would try it. 
 These, however, may come out incidentally as we 
 advance. Let us inquire what he represents as ex- 
 ercises of intuition. 
 
 d. Consciousness is a form of intuition. This is 
 implied throughout, and will be shown to be so by 
 the passages quoted under other heads. 
 
 e. Whatever consciousness reveals is to be received. 
 " According to all philosophers the evidence of con- 
 sciousness, if only we can obtain it pure, is con- 
 clusive." (p. 126.) "If consciousness tells me that I 
 have a certain thought or sensation, I assuredly have 
 that thought or sensation." (p. 141.) 
 
 £. Consciousness and intuitive convictions are ar-
 
 ME. MILL'S ADMISSIONS. 63 
 
 biters from which there is no appeal. " The verdict 
 of consciousness, or, in other words, our immediate 
 and intuitive conviction, is admitted on all hands to 
 be a decision without appeal." (p. 127.) 
 
 tj. The truth revealed by consciousness rests on its 
 oic?i evidence. "All the world admits, with our au- 
 thor, that it is impossible to doubt a fact of internal 
 consciousness. To feel, and not to know that we 
 feel, is an impossibilit}^. But Sir William Hamilton 
 is not satisfied to let this truth rest on its own evi- 
 dence. He wants a demonstration of it. As if it 
 were not sufficiently proved by consciousness itself, 
 he attempts to prove it by a reductio ad absurdwn." 
 (p. 132.) He then criticises, I think justly, Sir Wil- 
 liam Hamilton's proof, which he says carries us 
 " round a long circuit to return to the point from 
 which we set out." " He has deduced the trust- 
 worthiness of consciousness from the veracity of the 
 Deity ; and the veracity of the Deity can only be 
 known from the evidence of consciousness." (p. 138.) 
 Mr. Mill himself would have the truth " rest on its 
 own evidence." I rejoice in this appeal. For 
 what is this ultimate test but that of Self-Evidence, 
 so often enunciated, or at least referred to and im- 
 plied in the writings of profound thinkers, from Aris- 
 totle downwards, and among others, very expressly 
 by Locke ? Nothing can be clearer or more satis- 
 factory than Mr. Mill's language : "We know intui- 
 tively what we know by its own evidence, — by di- 
 rect apprehension of the fact."
 
 64 MB. MILL'S ADMISSIONS. 
 
 &. It is impossible to doubt or deny the facts made 
 known by consciousness. " A real fact of conscious- 
 ness cannot be doubted or denied." (p. 134.) What 
 is this but the other famous test of first truths, the 
 test of Necessity appealed to by Plato, Aristotle, 
 Leibnitz, Kant, and so many other profound thinkers 
 of ancient and modern times ? Already, then, we 
 have the two tests of Self-Evidence and Necessity 
 sanctioned. In the passage quoted under last head 
 he had, as most philosophers have done, mixed them 
 up together as being intimately connected. " It is 
 impossible to doubt a fact of internal consciousness. 
 To feel, and not to know that we feel, is an impos- 
 sibility : " and so he would have the truth " rest on 
 its own evidence." The law of necessity is repeatedly 
 appealed to. " The facts which cannot be doubted 
 are those to which the word consciousness is by most 
 philosophers confined ; the facts of internal con- 
 sciousness; the mind's own acts and affections. 
 What we feel, we cannot doubt that we feel. It is 
 impossible for us to feel, and to think perhaps that 
 we feel not, or to feel not, and think perhaps that 
 we feel." (p. 132.) Sir William Hamilton has no 
 where made a more decisive use of the law of neces- 
 sity and principle of contradiction than Mr. Mill has 
 done in these passages. 
 
 i. No man ever doubted of the facts of conscious- 
 ness. " Consciousness in the sense usually attached 
 to it by philosophers, consciousness of the mind's 
 own feelings and operations, cannot, as our author
 
 MIL MILL'S ADMISSIONS. 65 
 
 truly says, be disbelieved. The inward fact, the feel- 
 ing in our minds, was never doubted, since to do so 
 would be to doubt that we feel what we feel." (p. 
 141.) As in a passage previously quoted, the tests 
 of self-evidence and necessity were joined, so hi this 
 the tests of Necessity and Universality (universality 
 of conviction) are combined, and the universality is 
 traced to the necessity. The fact " was never doubt- 
 ed," since to do so would be to doubt that we feel what 
 we feel, which is represented as impossible. We thus 
 find the tests of intuition, as I cursorily sketched them 
 in last chapter, and mean to unfold them more fully 
 in a future chapter, employed by Mr. Mill, and in the 
 very logical order in which I have placed them. He 
 makes an appeal to self-evidence ; the truth " rests 
 on its own evidence." He tests this by the principle 
 that " to feel, and not to know that we feel, is an 
 impossibility." And now we find him appealing to 
 catholicity or common consent, and founding it on 
 necessity : the fact " was never doubted," since it 
 " cannot be disbelieved." 
 
 x. In arguing with the sceptic we are entitled to call 
 in the assurance of immediate knowledge as a test. 
 "I put to him (the sceptic) the simplest case conceiv- 
 able of immediate knowledge, and ask, if we ever 
 feel anything ? If so, then, at the moment of feel- 
 ing, do we know that we feel ? Or if he will not 
 call this knowledge, will he deny that we have a 
 feeling, we have at least some sort of assurance, or 
 conviction, of having it? This assurance or con- 
 
 6
 
 66 MR. MILL'S ADMISSIONS. 
 
 viction is what other people mean by knowledge. If 
 he dislikes the word, I am willing, in discussing with 
 him, to employ some other. By whatever name this 
 assurance is called, it is the test to which we bring 
 all our convictions." (p. 126.) This passage has not 
 the logical power of some of Hamilton's arguments, 
 but it is altogether after his manner. I have quoted 
 it to show, that Mr. Mill thinks himself justified in 
 appealing to the assurance of consciousness as an 
 ultimate and decisive test. 
 
 h The revelations of consciousness, together with 
 what can he inferred from them, constitute the sum of 
 our knowledge. "What consciousness directly re- 
 veals, together with what can be legitimately in- 
 ferred from its revelations, composes, by universal 
 admission, all that we know of the mind, or indeed 
 any other thing." (p. 107.) I do not admit that this 
 statement is correct, unless he make consciousness 
 synonymous with intuition, and include the senses 
 and our primitive beliefs, which also contribute, and 
 this largely, to what we know. I quote it to show 
 how deep a place our author allots to the revelations 
 of consciousness. 
 
 These admissions all relate to Consciousness, the 
 word being used, however, now in a wider and now 
 in a narrower sense ; sometimes being coextensive 
 with intuition, as when (see L.) he speaks of " con- 
 sciousness, or in other words, immediate and intuitive 
 conviction;" and in other passages meaning (see t.) 
 " consciousness of the mind's own feelings and opera-
 
 MB. MILL'S ADMISSIONS. 67 
 
 tions." In the heads that follow, his admissions re- 
 late to facts it may be attested by consciousness, but 
 not beyond it. 
 
 [i. We may be sure of what we see as well as of 
 what we feel. "What one sees or feels, whether 
 bodily or mentally, one cannot but be sure that one 
 sees or feels." (Logic, In trod. § 4.) This is a satis- 
 factory statement, but he afterwards detracts from it 
 by observing that we often suppose that we see what 
 we do not see, and he is evidently doubtful whether 
 we see anything beyond ourselves. This topic will 
 require to be carefully examined in a future chapter. 
 Meanwhile I bring forward the statement to show, 
 that if it can be proven that we do intuitively see 
 external objects, and that our intuitions of external- 
 ity and extension are not resolvable into anything 
 simpler, then we must be prepared to grant that the 
 objects exist. Speaking elsewhere of the " first 
 premises of our knowledge," he says, that "being 
 matters of fact, they may be the subject of a direct 
 appeal to the faculties which judge of fact, namely, 
 our senses and our internal consciousness." ( Utilita- 
 rianism, p. 51.) 
 
 v. We know existence, and make assertions about 
 existence. Thus he places existence among his cate- 
 gories, and does not attempt to resolve it into any- 
 thing else. " Besides the propositions which assert 
 sequence or Co-existence, there are some which 
 assert simple existence," etc. (Logic, B. I. v. § 5, G.) 
 
 £. We are capable of experiencing and knowing
 
 68 MR. MILL'S ADMISSIONS. 
 
 sensations. We need not produce passages or refer- 
 ences to prove this, for the evidence of it runs 
 throughout his works. 
 
 o. Pleasure and pain are what we feel tJiem to be, 
 and nothing else. Speaking of these, he says of 
 Hamilton, that "he is not so much the dupe of 
 words as to suppose that they are anything else 
 than what we feel them to be." (p. 479.) 
 
 n. Extension is an essential part of the concept of 
 body. "The truth is, that the condition of space 
 cannot be excluded ; it is an essential part of the 
 concept of body, and of every kind of bodies." (p. 
 327.) This is not an adequate statement, but it im- 
 plies that man has at least one necessary concept as 
 to body, and I shall endeavor to show that this can- 
 not be resolved into sensation or association. 
 
 i). There is evidently an ultimate fact in memory. 
 " Our belief in the veracity of Memory is evidently 
 ultimate : no reason can be given for it which does 
 not presuppose the belief, and assume it to be well- 
 grounded." (p. 174.) This statement appears in a 
 foot-note, 1 and our author does not even try to show 
 
 1 Mr. Mill makes the admission answer (as they most certainly will) 
 frankly and candidly, but he was driv- that they do include past experience as 
 en to it by a criticism of Dr. Ward : — well as present, then again I deny 
 " I would ask of these philosophers their allegation, that they build their 
 (those who build wholly upon Expe- philosophy wholly on experience, 
 rience), do they mean by ' experience' " How can you even guess what your 
 the experience of the present moment, past experience has been 1 By trust- 
 or do they include past experience ing memory. But how do you prove 
 also ? If they say the former, I reply that those various intuitive judgments, 
 it is obviously false that they do in any which we call acts of memory, can 
 sense build their philosophy wholly or rightly be trusted ? So far from this 
 chiefly on experience. But if they being provable by past experience, it
 
 MB. MILL'S ADMISSIONS. 
 
 69 
 
 how it fits into his system. The justification of the 
 principle will fall under our notice under another 
 head. Meanwhile I call attention to the admission. 
 He declares that memory carries with it its own 
 veracity, and that our belief in that veracity is " ul- 
 timate," and " evidently ultimate." I shall endeavor 
 to show that the full facts of memory are not em- 
 braced in this brief statement. But there is much 
 stated, and there is more implied. He here concedes 
 fully that there is a " veracity " in at least one other 
 faculty of the mind besides internal consciousness, 
 that there is a " belief" that can be trusted, and that 
 this belief is "ultimate," is in fact "evidently ul- 
 
 must be in each case assumed and taken 
 for granted before you can have any 
 cognizance whatever of your past ex- 
 perience." " As it is most desirable 
 to bring this point quite clearly home, 
 I will cite and apply a passage in 
 which Mr. Stuart Mill states his own 
 philosophical doctrine. ' There is no 
 knowledge a priori ; no truths cog- 
 nizable by the mind's inward light, and 
 grounded on intuitive evidence. Sen- 
 sation and the mind's consciousness 
 of its own acts are not only the ex- 
 clusive sources, but the soli-' materials 
 of our knowledge.' Let us test, then, 
 by these principles an act of memory. 
 I am at this moment comfortably 
 warm; but I call to mind with great 
 clearness the fact, that a short time 
 ago I was very cold. What datum 
 does ' Benaation ' give me 3 Simply 
 that I am now warm. What datum 
 does 'consciousness' give? that I 
 have the present impression of having 
 been cold a short time ago. Jiut both 
 these data are altogether wide of the 
 mark. The question which I would 
 earnestly beg Mr. Mill to ask himself 
 
 is this : — What is my ground for be- 
 lieving that I was cold a short timo 
 ago 1 ' I have the present impression 
 of having been cold a short time ago ; ' 
 this is one judgment. 'I was cold 
 a short time ago ; ' this is a to- 
 tally distinct and separate judg- 
 ment. There is no necessary, nor 
 even any probable, connection be- 
 tween these two judgments, — no 
 ground whatever for thinking that the 
 truth of one follows from the truth of 
 the other, — except upon the hypoth- 
 esis that my mind is so constituted as 
 accurately to represent past facts. I3ut 
 how will either 'sensation' or ' con- 
 Bciousness,' or the two combined, in 
 any way Buffice for the establishment 
 of any sucli proposition?" (On Na- 
 tureand Grace, I860, pp. 20-28.) The 
 Philosophical Introduction is the work 
 of a mind of extraordinary acuteness, 
 
 and bus unfolded many important 
 
 philosophical truths. Published at the 
 same time as the first, edition of my 
 work on Tin Intuitions of the Mind, 
 
 both I >r. Ward and mvi-elf have noticed 
 curious coincidences in the two works.
 
 70 ME. HILL'S ADMISSION'S. 
 
 tiniate." He who allows so much might have in- 
 quired whether there may not be other beliefs of the 
 same kind, and equally veracious, involved in the 
 exercise of other faculties of the mind. Mr. Mill is 
 constantly and terribly severe in his strictures on the 
 Intuitive School of Philosophy ; but it is clear he 
 himself belongs to an intuitive school, without know- 
 ing or at least avowing it. Admitting an intuitive 
 consciousness and an ultimate belief, he makes no 
 attempt to show how far they modify his empirical 
 philosophy, and he enters upon no scientific investi- 
 gation of the nature, the laws, or the mode of oper- 
 ation of these elements of our nature. 
 
 o\ The mind, whatever it be, is aware of itself, is 
 aware of itself as a series of feelings, is aware of Or 
 self as %)ast and present. The statements he makes 
 are very curious : " Our notion of Mind, as well as 
 of Matter, is the notion of a permanent something, 
 contrasted with the perpetual flux of the sensations 
 and other feelings or mental states which we refer 
 to it." (p. 205.) "If we speak of the Mind as a se- 
 ries of feelings, we are obliged to complete the state- 
 ment by calling it a series of feelings which is aware 
 of itself as past and future." Again, if but a series 
 of feelings, it " can be aware of itself as a series." 
 (pp. 212, 213.) I shall have to subject this language 
 to a sifting examination in the two next chapters, 
 where it will be shown that it does not fairly or fully 
 embody the facts of which we are conscious. I quote 
 it at present to show that Mr. Mill is obliged to
 
 MB. MILL'S ADMISSIONS. 71 
 
 allow that there is something permanent in mind, 
 and that the mind is in a sense aware of itself and 
 of this permanence. 
 
 The above seem to be very much of the nature 
 of those first or original principles which the Intui- 
 tive School of Metaphysicians, to which Mr. Mill is 
 so much opposed, are in the way of putting forward. 
 Those that I am now to state seem to be of the 
 nature of laws or faculties operating in the mind. 
 No doubt, as we are ever being told, we prove that 
 they exist by observation. But while it is by ex- 
 perience we discover them and learn their nature, 
 they must operate prior to our experience, and in- 
 dependent of it. 
 
 r. There is a native law of expectation. He tells 
 us that the psychological method which he adopts 
 u postulates, first, that the human mind is capable of 
 Expectation. In other words, that after having had 
 actual sensations, we are capable of forming the con- 
 ception of Possible sensations ; sensations which we 
 are not feeling at the present moment, but which we 
 might feel, and should feel if certain conditions were 
 present, the nature of which conditions we have, in 
 many cases, learnt by experience." (p. 190.) Almost 
 all metaphysicians have postulated, that the mind 
 has a capacity and a tendency which prompt it to 
 look forward from the past and present to the future. 
 They have done so because internal observation 
 shows that there must be some such principle, and 
 they have endeavored to give the proper expression
 
 72 ME. MILL'S ADMISSIONS. 
 
 of it : some describing it (unfortunately, as I think) 
 as an expectation that the future will resemble the 
 past ; others (also unfortunately, as I think) as a be- 
 lief in the uniformity of nature ; by others, more 
 philosophically, as a belief in the identity of self and 
 of other objects, together with a conviction that the 
 same agents, acting as a cause, will produce the 
 same effects. But it does not concern us at present 
 to inquire what is the accurate and adequate expres- 
 sion of the law (this discussion will be taken up as 
 we advance) ; only, I may remark, that Mr. Mill's 
 version seems to me to be about the most defective 
 and confused I have met with, experience being the 
 arbiter, for he makes a series of feelings, each one 
 of which must pass away before another appears, 
 expect something of itself. It is satisfactory, how- 
 ever, to find him granting that there is such a law ; 
 and surely he cannot object to others making a like 
 postulate, and endeavoring to give an account of it 
 which they regard as being more in accordance with 
 our conscious experience. 
 
 v . There are original laws of association. The 
 psychological theory " postulates, secondly, the laws 
 of the Association of Ideas." Then follows an 
 enumeration of these laws. It is unnecessary to 
 give it at this place ; it will subsequently fall under 
 our notice and review. It does not seem to me to 
 be the best in our language ; and we shall find that 
 he enormously exaggerates the power of association. 
 I refer to it at present to show that he is admitting
 
 MB. MILL'S ADMISSIONS. 73 
 
 at this place a new law, or rather group of laws 
 operating in the mind. 
 
 (p. The mind can form very lofty ideas as to the 
 Infinite and the Absolute. In this respect he adopts 
 deeper and in some respects juster views than those 
 of Hamilton. " Something infinite is a conception 
 which, like most of our complex ideas, contains a 
 negative element, but which contains positive ele- 
 ments also. Infinite space, for instance : is there 
 nothing positive in that? The negative part of 
 this conception is the absence of bounds. The posi- 
 tive are, the idea of space, and of space greater than 
 any finite space, so of infinite duration," etc. Again, 
 " Absolute, in reference to any given attribute, sig- 
 nifies the possession of that attribute in finished per- 
 fection and completeness. A being absolute in 
 knowledge, for example, is one who knows, in the 
 literal meaning of the term, everything. Who will 
 pretend that this conception is negative or unmean- 
 ing to us ? " (pp. 45, 47.) This is a very just account, 
 so far as it goes, of our apprehension of the infinite 
 and perfect 1 — a better phrase than the absolute. 
 Mr. Mill does not say that this conception implies 
 any intuitive capacity ; in fact, he neglects to tell us 
 how it is formed. Whether ultimate or not, it is 
 acknowledged that the mind has such a conception; 
 and Mr. Mill, if he account for it on his psychological 
 
 1 1 hare "endeavored to show [Intui- Deity, and that we regard thai thing 
 
 twns of the Mind, I't. n. I>. ii. c. 8) as (l.) ever exceeding our widest 
 
 that we hare a positive notion of some image or notion, and (2.) such thai 
 
 tiling as infinite, say Bpace, or time, or nothing can be added to it
 
 74 MB. MILL'S ADMISSIONS. 
 
 theory, will require to bring in something much 
 deeper than the sensations and associations of sensa- 
 tion, from which he seems to draw our ideas. 
 
 We have yet to look at some other laws which 
 look excessively like the first or ultimate truths, 
 which metaphysicians of the Intuitive School have 
 been in the way of enunciating and employing. 
 
 %. Beliefs are ultimate when no reason can he given 
 for them which does not imply their existence and 
 veracity. I have already (see o.) given the passage 
 which authorizes this law. After stating that belief 
 in the veracity of memory is evidently ultimate, he 
 acids, " No reason can be given for it which does not 
 presuppose the belief, and assume it to be well ground- 
 ed." After announcing this principle, he might have 
 been expected to inquire whether it does not sanc- 
 tion other cognitions and beliefs, such as those which 
 we have of the externality and extension of bodies, 
 and the existence of time and of an abiding self. It 
 can be shown that every attempt to derive these 
 from other elements presupposes the ideas and the 
 convictions. 
 
 y. Tliert are truths implied in other truths neces- 
 sarily, and according to an ultimate laic, interned or 
 external. He is speaking of logical Proprium, and 
 of its being involved in the attribute which the 
 name ordinarily or specially connotes ; and he affirms, 
 that " whether a Proprium follows by demonstration 
 or by causation, it follows necessarily ; that is to 
 say, it cannot hut follow consistently with some law
 
 ME. MILL'S ADMISSIONS. 75 
 
 which we regard as a part of the constitution either 
 of our thinking faculty or of the universe." {Logic, 
 B. i. c. vii. § 7.) As I understand this statement, it 
 implies that when a Proprium follows by demonstra- 
 tion, it does so according to a law which is part of 
 the " constitution " of our " thinking faculty." The 
 language reminds us of that of Reid and Hamilton. 
 o). Any assertion which conflicts with the Funda- 
 mental Laws of Thought is to us unbelievable, and 
 this may very possibly proceed from the native struc- 
 ture of the mind. His language is very remarkable. 
 He is speaking of the three Fundamental Laws of 
 Thought, — those of Identity, Contradiction, and 
 Excluded Middle, and he thus comments upon them : 
 " Whether the three so-called Fundamental Laws are 
 laws of our thoughts by the native structure of the 
 mind, or merely because we perceive them to be 
 universally true of observed phenomena, I will not 
 positively decide ; but they are laws of our thoughts, 
 now and invincibly so. They may or may not be 
 capable of alteration by experience, but the condi- 
 tions of our existence deny to us the experience 
 which would be required to alter them. Any asser- 
 tion, therefore, which conflicts with one of these 
 laws, — any proposition, for instance, which asserts 
 a contradiction, though it were on a subject wholly 
 removed from the sphere of our experience, is to us 
 unbelievable. The belief in such a proposition is, in 
 the present constitution of nature, impossible as a 
 mental fact." (p. 418.) The language is cautious
 
 76 MB. MILL'S ADMISSIONS. 
 
 and hesitating. It is evident that he would fain ex- 
 plain the incapacity of believing contradictory prop- 
 ositions by his favorite law of association. We shall 
 see as we advance that this law cannot explain our 
 peculiar conviction, but meanwhile it is interesting 
 to notice that he will not decide whether these 
 fundamental principles may not be "laws of our 
 thoughts by the native structure of the mind." The 
 hesitation implies a doubt of the whole system of 
 empiricism. 
 
 Some of my readers, in looking at these passages 
 thus brought into convenient (or inconvenient) jux- 
 taposition, may require to be assured that I have not 
 taken them from Hamilton's works, instead of the 
 Examination of Hamilton and other works of Mr. 
 Mill. And were it not that in the expression of 
 them they have not the homeliness and depth of 
 Reid, nor the clinching logical grasp of Hamilton, 
 they might be mistaken for utterances of the two 
 great Scottish metaphysicians. I have allowed Mr. 
 Mill to speak for himself. All that I have done is 
 to cull out the scattered statements as to ultimate 
 truth, and present them in relievo, that students of 
 philosophy may mark their significance. I mean to 
 refer to them from time to time in the coining dis- 
 cussion ; but I do not make use of them simply as 
 concessions by Mr. Mill. I would not think it worth 
 while employing a mere argumentum ad hominem. 
 I feel no pleasure in pointing out real or seeming
 
 MB. MILL'S ADMISSIONS. 77 
 
 incongruities in the metaphysical system of an emi- 
 nent thinker, who, in other departments, such as polit- 
 ical economy and inductive logic, has done so much 
 to advance knowledge. I employ these admissions 
 because they contain important truth, not always in 
 the best form, but capable of being fully vindicated, 
 
 Mr. Mill, I believe, would urge that many of the 
 admissions thus made are not separate and distinct 
 from each other, and that several of them might be 
 included under one head. Be it so, it is nevertheless 
 of advantage to have them spread out in the several 
 shapes in which they are presented, the more so that 
 some of these imply very important principles with 
 far-looking results. 
 
 The first principles thus avowed in the course of 
 his exposition should have had a formal place allot- 
 ted them in the system, say at the commencement 
 or the close. Had this been done, it would have ut- 
 terly destroyed the apparent simplicity, and I believe 
 also the symmetry of his system, which would have 
 been seen to be a very complex and heterogeneous 
 one. Seemingly a continuation of the philosophies 
 of Hobbes, Cond iliac, and Hume, it contains as many 
 assumptions as are demanded by the Scottish meta- 
 physicians, who appeal to fundamental laws of 
 thought, or by the German metaphysicians, who 
 stand up for a priori forms. 
 
 It will not be difficult to show, as we proceed to 
 take up one special topic after another, that these 
 admissions logically imply vastly more than is con-
 
 78 MB. MILL'S ADMISSIONS. 
 
 ceded in the metaphysical system constructed. In 
 particular, it will be proven that they are made on 
 avowed or implied principles, such as those of the 
 veracity of consciousness, and of ultimate beliefs, 
 such as those of self-evidence, necessity, and univer- 
 sality, which require that vastly more be conceded. 
 
 Already it is clear that the question between Mr. 
 Mill and the school he opposes cannot be said to be 
 one as to the existence of intuition. I am not sure 
 that any judicious defender of fundamental truth 
 would demand or postulate a greater number of first 
 principles than those allowed by the most influential 
 opponent of necessary truth in our day. The ques- 
 tion is not one as to the reality, but as to the nature 
 and significance of ultimate truth. 
 
 Of this I am sure, that the pressing philosophical 
 want of our day is an exposition, with an enumera- 
 tion and classification of the intuitions of the mind 
 which, we have seen, must be admitted even by 
 those who are supposed to deny them. It is time 
 that those who allow them incidentally should be 
 required to avow them openly and formally, and 
 give a separate place to them. A flood of light will 
 be thrown on metaphysics, and a world of logomachy 
 between rival schools scattered, when we have an 
 earnest attempt, by one competent for the work, to 
 unfold the laws of our intuitions and their mode of 
 operation.
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 SENSATIONS. 
 
 IN the school to which Mr. Mill has attached him- 
 self, there is a perpetual reference to Sensation. 
 Those who look into their works with the view of 
 discovering the deeper properties or higher affections 
 of the mind, are wearied by the everlasting recur- 
 rence of the word, and by the perpetual obtrusion 
 of the thing denoted by it. 1 Some members of the 
 school seem to be incapable of comprehending any- 
 thing but matter, and the sensations excited by mat- 
 ter. I bring, no such charge against Mr. Mill. He 
 is clearly capable of mounting into a higher and 
 more spiritual region. But even he is often dragged 
 down to the dust of the earth by the weight of the 
 theory which he has undertaken to support. As we 
 
 : The mental sciences elevate those School, and that they be kept from bo 
 
 who study them in proportion as they setting their questions, as to encourage 
 
 exhiliit the higher faculties and ideas the reading only of the winks ol 
 
 of the mind. This leads me to remark, writers hclon^ing to that school. In 
 
 that in the Competitive Examinations those departments in which the men- 
 
 wliieh now exercise so great an in- tal BCiences have a place, they are 
 
 fluence on the studies of our young surely meant to stimulate and to lest 
 
 men, care should he taken that the a different order of tastes and talents 
 
 Examiners in Morals should not be from those called forth by the physical 
 
 taken mainly from the Sensational and physiological sciences.
 
 80 SENSATIONS. 
 
 are threatened with a revival, under a new and dis- 
 guised, and somewhat more elevated form, of the 
 Sensational system which wrought such mischief in 
 France at the end of last century, it is essential that 
 we inquire what sensation is, and settle what it can 
 do, and what it cannot do. In other words, let us, 
 with the internal sense as our informant, look care- 
 fully at the original matter out of which Mr. Mill 
 draws our higher ideas, with the view of determining 
 whether the seed is fitted to yield such fruit. 
 
 What, then, is Sensation ? It is allowed on all 
 hands that it cannot be positively defined. This 
 arises from its being a simple quality, and there is 
 nothing simpler into which to resolve it. All we 
 can do in the way of unfolding its nature, is to bid 
 every man consult his consciousness when any bodily 
 object is affecting his senses or sensibility. But while 
 we cannot furnish an affirmative definition, we can 
 offer some explanations to remove misapprehensions, 
 and some decided denials to oppose accepted errors. 
 
 It should be understood that the word is employed 
 to denote an affection of the conscious mind (what- 
 ever that may be), and not of the mere bodily frame. 
 It should further be borne in mind that it does not 
 include that knowledge of bodily objects, of their 
 externality and extension, which is now denoted by 
 the phrase " sense-perception." It is of special im- 
 portance to press attention to the circumstance that 
 sensation is not a separately existing object like this 
 stone, this tree, or this bird, but is an attribute of
 
 SENSATIONS. 81 
 
 an object. At this point we are coming in collision 
 with Mr. Mill. Elsewhere (Logic, B. I. c. hi.) he has 
 an ingenious distribution of namable things or real- 
 ities into substances, attributes, and feelings, the last 
 of course including sensations. " Substances are not 
 all that exist : attributes, if such things are to be 
 spoken of, must be said to exist, — feelings certainly 
 exist." " Feelings, or states of consciousness, are as- 
 suredly to be counted among realities, but they can 
 not be reckoned among substances or attributes." 
 This distribution of realities, especially this separa- 
 tion of feelings from substances or attributes, seems 
 to me to be curious : I have not met with it else- 
 where. It is favorable to Mr. Mill's purpose, which 
 we did not so well know when we had only his work 
 on Logic, but with which we are now made fully ac- 
 quainted by the fuller exposition of his views in the 
 Examination of Hamilton : that purpose being to 
 banish, to as great a distance as possible, substance 
 and attribute, and leave only feelings. We are not 
 yet sufficiently advanced, in these discussions, to 
 deal with the confused metaphysics of substance and 
 attribute. The present topic is sensation, and sensa- 
 tion I maintain is an affection, that is an attribute, 
 of the conscious mind. 
 
 But Mr. Mill tells us that " the sensations are all 
 of which I am directly conscious." (Logic, B. I. c. iii. 
 § 7.) This mode of representing our conscious states 
 was introduced by Hume, who derived his sceptical 
 conclusions from it. He maintained that we are 
 
 6
 
 82 SENSATIONS. 
 
 conscious only of impressions and ideas, the ideas 
 being merely fainter impressions. Hume took care 
 never to enter into any explanation as to what he 
 meant by " impression ; " whether it implies, as it 
 should do if it has any meaning, a thing impressing 
 and a thing impressed. The doctrine of the school 
 of Mill is that we are conscious merely of feelings, 
 and among these, the first and all along the main 
 place is given to sensation. Now, in opposition to 
 these defective statements, I maintain that we are 
 conscious, not of a mere impression, but of a thing 
 impressed, not of sensation apart, but of self as sen- 
 tient. On hearing this statement, metaphysicians 
 will be disposed to ask with amazement, perhaps with 
 scorn, " What ! are we really then conscious of 
 self?" And they will tell us that the child has 
 never said to itself, " This is I." If they think it 
 worth while going any further, they may then in 
 condescension, or compassion towards our ignorance, 
 explain to us that the Ego is a metaphysical notion, 
 the product of advanced reflection. But I disarm 
 all this at once, by allowing that we are never con- 
 scious of a self, apart from self as sentient, or as 
 engaged in thinking, willing, or some other opera- 
 tion. And I balance this statement by another, that 
 we are just as little conscious of the sensation, or 
 the impression, or the thought, or volition apart from 
 self. The child has never said to itself, " This is I ; " 
 but just as little has it said, " This is an impression ;" 
 "This is a sensation." We are in fact conscious of
 
 SENSATIONS. 83 
 
 both in one concrete act ; ever conscious of self in 
 its present affection, conscious of self as affected. 
 Mr. Mill uses language which implies this when he 
 says (§4) that " sensations are states of the sentient 
 mind ; " and everybody employs like expressions if 
 he does not happen to be upholding a special theory. 
 He who leaves out either of these elements is not 
 giving a correct interpretation of consciousness. 
 We may, by abstraction, separately contemplate the 
 two, and important intellectual purposes are served 
 by such a process. Each of the things we thus dis- 
 tinguish in thought has a real existence ; the one as 
 much as the other : the sensation or feeling has an 
 existence, but so has also the self. Not that either 
 has a separate existence, or an independent exist- 
 ence, or an existence out of the other. As the one 
 is an abstract, so is also the other. If you call the 
 one, say the self, a metaphysical entity, you should 
 in consistency describe the other, the sensation, as in 
 the same sense a metaphysical entity. The correct 
 statement is that we are conscious of the sensation as 
 a sensation of self, and of the self as under sensation. 
 And as we can never be conscious of the self, except 
 as sentient or otherwise affected, so we can never be 
 conscious of a sensation except as a sensation of a 
 sentient self. It is high time, when physiologists 
 and metaphysicians are drawing such perverted con- 
 clusions, to put this seemingly insignificant and yet 
 really important limitation upon the common state- 
 ment.
 
 84 SENSATIONS. 
 
 I am quite willing that Mr. Mill should apply the 
 sharp razor of his Psychological Method to sensation. 
 I have called in consciousness to declare what is in 
 sensation, but I do not allow consciousness to decide 
 at once, and without further inquiry, that sensations 
 are and must be primary and elementary. I freely 
 allow the mental analyst to put them in his crucible, 
 and to try if he can decompose them. No such at- 
 tempt has been made ; I believe no such attempt 
 will ever be made. Mr. Mill and his school acknowl- 
 edge that they are unresolvable and ultimate. I am 
 glad to have one element allowed, — it may prepare 
 the way for the admission of others on the same title. 
 In particular, the self (I will show in next chapter) 
 may turn out to be quite as unresolvable as the sen- 
 sations of self. 
 
 As so much is made of sensations by this whole 
 school of philosophy, we must be careful to inquire 
 what is really embraced in them, and not allow any- 
 thing to be drawn from them which is not truly in 
 them. It is necessary in these times to utter even 
 such a truism as this, that a sensation is a sensation, 
 and is nothing more. A sensation is not a thing ex- 
 tended, is not extension, is not space. A sensation 
 being only momentarily under consciousness, is not 
 the same as time, which has a past and a future. A 
 sensation is not matter or body, which is extended 
 and occupies space. A sensation may be preceded 
 by resistance, but is not itself resistance, which im- 
 plies one body opposing the movement of another.
 
 SENSATIONS. 85 
 
 It is important even to make the further statement, 
 that we are conscious of many other mental acts and 
 affections which are not identical with sensations. 
 A sensation is not memory, say the remembrance of 
 my reading Mr. Mill's book at a particular time. A 
 sensation is not expectation, the expectation which 
 I cherish that truth will in the end prevail over error. 
 A sensation is not an imagination, as when I paint a 
 glorious ideal of beauty or of virtue. A sensation 
 is not judgment, even when that judgment is about 
 sensation, as when I decide that the sensations pro- 
 duced by a noise are not so pleasant as those excited 
 by music. Certainly, sensation is not reasoning, as 
 when I argue that mere sentient affections cannot 
 yield our higher ideas and deeper convictions. Sen- 
 sation is not even the same as emotion, as when I 
 fear that the sensational philosophy is to prevail for 
 a time in this country. A sensation is something far 
 lower than sentiment or affection, as when I would 
 love God and my neighbors, — even those from 
 whom I differ in most important points. A sensa- 
 tion is not a volition, as when I resolve to do my 
 best to oppose prevailing error, — even when coun- 
 tenanced by influential names. 
 
 But may not sensation be the cause of something 
 else ? I can answer this question only after giving 
 an explanation. In ordinary mundane action, an 
 effect is always the result of the operation of more 
 than one agent or antecedent. "A man," says Mr. 
 Mill, "takes mercury, goes out of doors, and catches
 
 86 SEXSATIONS. 
 
 cold. We say, perhaps, that the cause of his taking 
 cold was exposure to the air. . . . But to be accurate, 
 we ought to say that the cause was exposure to the 
 air while under the effect of mercury." (Logic, B. m. 
 c. v. § 3.) I agree with this doctrine of Mr. Mill (it 
 will be expounded more fully in chapter xiii. of this 
 treatise), and I would apply it to the supposed causa- 
 tive influence of sensations. Sensation may be one 
 of the antecedents which go to make up the cause, 
 but it cannot, properly speaking, be a cause in itself; 
 it is a condition or occasion, and can produce an 
 effect only when conjoined with some other agent. 
 A sensation may be the occasion of something else, — 
 say of a violent derangement of a bodily organ ; but 
 that derangement is not the sensation, and in ac- 
 counting for it we must look not merely to the sen- 
 sation, but the properties of the organ affected. A 
 sensation may, in like manner, be the occasion of a 
 new thought arising, but the thought should not be 
 confounded with the sensation ; the sensation is not 
 even the cause of the thought. Such a sensation in 
 a plant (supposing it to be capable of feeling), such 
 a sensation in one of the lower animals, would give 
 rise to no such thought. The sensation can origin- 
 ate the thought only by stirring up a mental ca- 
 pacity in the soul, which mental potency is to be 
 regarded as the main element in the complex cause. 
 And yet this essential element is inexcusably, cul- 
 pably overlooked by the Sensational School, when 
 they derive all our thoughts from sensations. They
 
 SENSATIONS. 87 
 
 make the mere auxiliary or stimulating condition 
 the producing power, as if, to use a homely illustra- 
 tion, we should make the setting of the pointer, 
 which roused the attention of the sportsman, the 
 cause of the killing of the bird shot by him. The 
 mind of man, consciousness being the witness, does 
 entertain a vast variety of ideas, some of them of a 
 very elevating character, such as those we entertain 
 of God, and good, and eternity. I doubt whether 
 these are the product of sensations in any sense. Of 
 this I am sure, that they do not proceed from sen- 
 sations except when sensations are employed and 
 moulded by lofty mental faculties, which faculties, 
 and not the sensations, are the main agents in the 
 production of the effect ; and they should have their 
 nature, laws, and modes of action unfolded by any 
 one who would give us a correct theory of our men- 
 tal operations. 
 
 By insisting on such points as these, we lay an 
 effectual arrest on those rash speculations of our day 
 which derive man's loftiest ideas from so low and 
 subordinate an agent as sensation.
 
 CHAPTER Y. 
 
 MIND, PERSONALITY, PERSONAL IDENTITY, SUBSTANCE. 
 
 MR MILL admits fully the veracity of conscious- 
 ness and the reality of the facts attested by it 
 (see tf, e, 17.) But his view of the objects of which 
 it is cognizant is very defective. It seems to be de- 
 rived, through Mr. James Mill and Dr. Thomas 
 Brown, from Hume and the Sensational School of 
 France. Condillac, and those who followed him, 
 designated all the states of the mind by the words 
 ftentir and sensibilite, which conveniently embraced 
 two such different things as sensations excited by out- 
 ward objects, and mental emotions, such as hope and 
 fear. We have no such pliable word in our tongue, 
 and Brown, who caught so much of the French spirit, 
 had to adopt a narrower phrase when he habitually 
 represents all states of mind as Feelings : thus he 
 speaks of "feelings of relation" and "feelings of 
 approbation," both of which imply judgment, Mr. 
 James Mill says, " In the very word feeling, all that 
 is implied in the word consciousness is involved." 
 And now we find Mr. J. S. Mill declaring "a feeling 
 and a state of consciousness are, in the language of 
 
 (.88)
 
 MIND, PERSONALITY, ETC. 89 
 
 philosophy " [that is, in the philosophy of Thomas 
 Brown and James Mill], " equivalent expressions : 
 everything is a feeling of which the mind is con- 
 scious j everything which it feels, or, in other words, 
 which forms a part of its own sentient existence." 
 Again, "Feeling, in the proper sense of the term, is 
 a genus of which Sensation, Emotion, and Thought 
 are the subordinate species." [Logic, B. i. c. hi. § 3.) 
 Of course Mr. Mill is at liberty to choose his own 
 nomenclature, and use it in the signification he thinks 
 fit to attach to it. But others have an equal liberty 
 to reject it and give their reasons. It seems to me 
 an unwarrantable use of the phrase to make Feel- 
 ings embrace Thought, and I may add Volition ; and 
 those who so use it will be found, in spite of them- 
 selves, and of all explanations, understanding the 
 word in its habitual and proper signification ; and 
 when all other ideas and resolutions are spoken of 
 as " feelings," the impression will be left that they 
 are part of our sentient and (at best) emotional 
 nature. 
 
 Mr. Mill claims the liberty of examining all the 
 facts of consciousness, and of resolving them if he 
 can into simpler elements. I freely grant him this 
 power. Our sensations, he grants, arc simple and 
 original But I have argued that when we are con- 
 scious of a sensation, we are always conscious of self 
 as sentient. Now I am quite ready to allow Mr. 
 Mill or any other to reduce the self to something 
 more elementary. But I am sure no components,
 
 90 MIND, PERSONALITY, 
 
 which did not contain self, could give us self. Surely 
 our perception of self could not be given by mere 
 sensations, that is, by sensations in which self is not 
 mixed up. We are as conscious of the self as of 
 the sensation ; and the sensation could as little give 
 us the self as the self could give the sensation. It 
 should not be forgotten that this self appears in all 
 our other mental exercises, — thus showing that it 
 is more essential than our very sensations; it is 
 found in our memories, beliefs, imaginations, judg- 
 ments, emotions, and volitions. We are conscious 
 of these not separately or as abstracts ; but of 
 self as remembering, self as believing, self as imag- 
 ining, self as judging, self as under feeling, self as 
 willing. 
 
 This self is what I call a Person. Thus under- 
 stood, it is altogether correct to say that we are con- 
 scious of ourselves as persons. Not that we are 
 conscious of personality as a separate thing ; we are 
 conscious in one concrete act of this person as sen- 
 tient, or as thinking, or resolving. I believe that the 
 infant, that the child, does not separate the two. 
 Even the mature man seldom draws the distinction 
 unless, indeed, he be addicted to reflection, or has to 
 speak of the ego and the non ego. It is only on our 
 remembering the self, and finding it necessary to dis- 
 tinguish between the various states of self, and on 
 our discovering that there are other conscious beings 
 besides ourselves, that we ever think of forming to 
 ourselves the abstraction personality, or taking the
 
 PERSONAL IDENTITY, SUBSTANCE. 91 
 
 trouble to affirm that we are the same persons to- 
 day as we were yesterday, or that we are different 
 from all other persons. 
 
 So much for our consciousness of our present self, 
 or of ourselves as persons. The truth now evolved 
 enables us to develop the exact psychological nature 
 of our conviction of personal identity. In all our 
 waking moments we have a consciousness of a 
 present self. But in every exercise of memory we 
 have a remembrance of a past self. We remember 
 the event as in past time. We remember it as an 
 experience of self. Thus, in remembering that we 
 visited the London Exhibition, we recollect not mere- 
 ly the Exhibition, but ourselves as seeing it. True, 
 this recollection of ourselves may be very faint in 
 comparison with that of the brilliant objects wit- 
 nessed ; and, from laws of memory to be afterwards 
 referred to, it may very much disappear ; still it is 
 there wrapt up in one concrete act with the image 
 of the external things. In this remembrance of 
 ourselves we have more than a recollection of a past 
 thought or a past feeling, say of the feeling we had 
 when visiting the Exhibition ; we remember the feel- 
 ing as a feeling of self. Here, as in so many other 
 cases which will come under our notice, Mr. Mill has 
 failed to apprehend and unfold nil that is in the fact 
 of consciousness. "The feeling I had yesterday," is 
 his account (Logic, I>. i. c. iii. § 2), a is gone never to 
 return; what 1 have to-day is another feeling ex- 
 actly like the former, but still distinct from it." This
 
 92 3IIXD, PERSONALITY, 
 
 is not the correct statement. What I had yesterday 
 was a conscious self under one affection, say grief; 
 what I have to-day is also a conscious self under, it 
 may be, a like affection of grief, or it may be under 
 a different affection, say joy. Having thus a past 
 self brought up by memory, and a present self un- 
 der consciousness, we compare them and affirm that 
 they are the same. This is simply the expression of 
 the fact falling under the eye of consciousness. Let 
 Mr. Mill, if he choose, try his sharp analysis upon it. 
 If he does so, he will find the edge of his instrument 
 bent back as he would cut it. It is a rock, itself 
 needing no support, but fitted to act as a foundation. 
 It is a self-evident truth, attained by the bare con- 
 templation of the objects ; and no one can be made 
 to come to any other decision, or to allow that he 
 is a different person now from what he was when 
 he recollects himself at some given instant in the 
 past, 
 
 We see what is meant by personality and persona] 
 identity. We can express both these, without wrap- 
 ping them in that awful mystery in which the}^ have 
 so often been made to appear. Personality is the 
 self of which we are conscious in every mental act. 
 Personal identity is the sameness of the conscious 
 self as perceived at different times. The phrases do 
 not point to some unknown essence, apart from or 
 behind the known thing. They simply designate an 
 essential, an abiding element of the thing known. 
 As the personality and personal identity appear, we
 
 PERSONAL IDENTITY, SUBSTANCE. 93 
 
 are entitled to insist that they be brought out to 
 view and expressed in every proper science of psy- 
 chology. One of Aristotle's definitions of the soul 
 is "that (tovto) by which we live, and feel, and un- 
 derstand." 1 Some have charged him with intro- 
 ducing an unmeaning phrase when he mentions not 
 only certain qualities of the soul, but a that by which 
 we exercise the qualities. But Aristotle was far too 
 comprehensive and accurate a thinker to omit the 
 tovto, by which, no doubt, he meant to designate a 
 thing, an existence, or rather a thing having exist- 
 ence, and capable of living, feeling, understanding. 
 As we advance, we shall see that Mr. Mill is obliged 
 to use similar phrases to denote the permanent thing 
 that abides, amid the changes of attribute or ex- 
 ercise. In ordinary circumstances, no doubt, our at- 
 tention is directed most forcibly to the changing 
 element, to the action and new manifestation, and 
 may allow the other, which is ever the same, to fall 
 very much into what Mr. Mill calls " obliviscence." 
 But it is the office of the careful psychologist to ob- 
 serve it; to bring it out from the shade in which it 
 lies; and to give this conscious self, this remembered 
 self, this identical Belf, the same place in his system 
 as it has in the mind of man. 
 
 We are now in circumstances to judge of Mr. 
 Mill's account of mind, and his psychological theory 
 of the nature and genesis of the idea we form of it. 
 
 1 'H ipvxh & e tovto C> ^(~)/iev,Kal alada- %6yo( Ttr uv ely kcu Mor, uTCk' oi \ i/'i 
 vdpeda, K.a.1 diavoiofiiOa npOTug ware nal ib vnonti/irfov. — De Anima, 11 . 2.
 
 94 MIND, PEESONALITY, 
 
 In framing these he has neglected to look carefully 
 and patiently at the actual facts of consciousness, 
 both in regard to the idea and conviction, and the 
 elements out of which he would fashion it. He ac- 
 knowledges that mind involves some sort of notion 
 of what Kant calls Perdurability. He begins, indeed, 
 by telling us that " we neither can know nor imagine 
 it, except as represented by the succession of mani- 
 fold feelings which metaphysicians call by the name 
 of states or modifications of mind." (p. 205.) I have 
 put in italics the words which Mr. Mill uses, must 
 use, to express the facts ; the words which correspond 
 to the toT'to of Aristotle. He goes on to say, " It is 
 nevertheless true that our notion of Mind, as well as 
 of Matter, is the notion of a permanent something 
 contrasted with the perpetual flux of the sensations 
 and other feelings or mental states which we refer to 
 it; a something which we figure as remaining the 
 same, while the particular feelings through which it 
 reveals its existence change." This is an inadequate 
 account of the idea and conviction entertained by us 
 in mature life. We do not refer the mental states 
 to it, we know it in a particular state. We do not 
 figure self as remaining the same, we judge or de- 
 cide the conscious self of to-day to be the same as 
 the conscious self of yesterday remembered by us. 
 It does not reveal itself through feelings, we know 
 it as feeling, the one being as immediate as the other. 
 Nevertheless his account, though confused and 
 never exactly hitting the facts, is a very remarkable
 
 PERSONAL IDENTITY, SUBSTANCE. 9o 
 
 one. We must look at it carefully: — "Besides 
 present feelings, and possibilities of present feeling, 
 there is another class of phenomena to be included 
 in an enumeration of the elements making up our 
 conception of mind. The thread of consciousness, 
 which composes the mind's phenomenal life, consists 
 not only of present sensations, but likewise in part 
 of memories and expectations. Now, what are 
 these ? In themselves, they are present feelings, 
 states of present consciousness, and in that respect 
 not distinguished from sensations. They all, more- 
 over, resemble some given sensations or feelings, of 
 which we have previously had experience. But 
 they are attended with the peculiarity, that each of 
 them involves a belief in more than its own exist- 
 ence. A sensation involves only this : but a remem- 
 brance of sensation, even if not referred to any 
 particular date, involves the suggestion and belief 
 that a sensation, of which it is a copy or representa- 
 tion, actually existed in the past : and an expectation 
 involves the belief, more or less positive, that a sen- 
 sation or other feeling to which it directly refers, 
 will exist in the future. Nor can the phenomena in- 
 volved in these two states of consciousness be ade- 
 quately expressed, without saying, that the belief 
 they include is, that I myself formerly had, or that I 
 myself, and no other, shall hereafter have, the sensa- 
 tions remembered or expected. The fact believed is, 
 that the sensations did actually form, or will here- 
 after form, part of the self-same scries of states, or
 
 96 3IIXD, FEBSONALITY, 
 
 threads of consciousness, of which the remembrance 
 or expectation of those sensations is the part now 
 present. If, therefore, we speak of the mind as a 
 series of feelings, we are obliged to complete the 
 statement by calling it a series of feelings which is 
 aware of itself as past and future: and we are re- 
 duced to the alternative of believing that the Mind, 
 or Ego, is something different from any series of 
 feelings or possibilities of them, or of accepting the 
 paradox, that something which ex hypothesi is but a 
 series of feelings, can be aware of itself as series." 
 (pp. 212, 213.) This surely is an excessively round 
 about and far-fetched account of a very clear fact, in 
 order to suit it to an empirical theory. Making the 
 mind " a thread of consciousness," " a series of feel- 
 ings," he is obliged to give to this thread or series a 
 set of attributes, such as that it is aware of itself, in 
 order to make it even in appearance embrace the 
 obvious phenomena. He prefaces the above by an 
 acknowledgment that " the theory has intrinsic diffi- 
 culties [they are those stated] which it seems to me 
 beyond the power of metaphysical analysis to re- 
 move." The intrinsic difficulties are very much the 
 creation of the theorist. We decline certainly being 
 shut up to the position, that the mind is " a series of 
 feelings aware of itself," for if thus aware of itr 
 self, it is more than a series; the genuine fact 
 is that the mind is aware of itself as abiding. 
 But as little do we consent to take the other 
 alternative, that the mind is something differ-
 
 TEBSONAL IDENTITY, SUBSTANCE. 97 
 
 ent from the series of feelings ; it is an abiding ex- 
 istence with a series of feelings. 
 
 He adds, " the truth is, we are here face to face 
 with that final inexplicability at which, as Sir Wil- 
 liam Hamilton observes, we inevitably arrive when 
 we reach ultimate facts." As finding himself shut 
 up to such an issue, he should have exercised more 
 patience in dealing with those who, like Reicl, Kant, 
 and Hamilton, have been painfully striving to give 
 an adequate account of these ultimate facts. If he 
 says they are beyond investigation or expression, I 
 meet him with a direct denial. The operations are 
 within consciousness, and we can observe and co- 
 ordinate them. The fact is, Mr. Mill himself has 
 been trying to unfold them, but has given a very in- 
 sufficient and perplexed rendering. " The true in- 
 comprehensibility perhaps is, that something which 
 has ceased, or is not yet in existence, can still be in 
 a manner present : that a series of feelings, the in- 
 finitely greater part of which is past or future, can 
 be gathered up, as it were, into a single present con- 
 ception, accompanied by a belief of reality. I think, 
 by far the wisest thing we can do, is to accept the 
 inexplicable fact, without any theory as to liow it 
 takes place." This is a most circuitous and inade- 
 quate, I believe, indeed, an inaccurate statement of 
 the fact. That which has ceased to exist is not 
 present; it is the remembrance, which is a very dil- 
 ferent thing, that is present. The future is not 
 gathered into the present; we at the present antic- 
 
 7
 
 98 MUTD, PERSONALITY, 
 
 ipate the future. We cannot, of course, give a 
 theory of the production of an ultimate fact, but we 
 can state it correctly, and even, I believe, seize and 
 express its law. 
 
 Let us inquire what he makes of the fact accord- 
 ing to his Psychological Method. We shall find him 
 accumulating statements which bring in new ideas, 
 without his being able to reduce them even to an 
 apparently consistent system, or to resolve them into 
 simpler elements. " The belief I entertain that my 
 mind exists, when it is not feeling, nor thinking, nor 
 conscious of its own existence, resolves itself into a 
 belief of a Permanent Possibility of these states. 
 If I think of myself as in dreamless sleep, or in the 
 sleep of death, and believe that I, or in other words 
 my mind, is or will be existing through these states, 
 though not in conscious feeling, the most scrupulous 
 examination of my belief will not detect in it any 
 fact actually believed, except that my capability of 
 feeling is not in that interval permanently destroyed, 
 and is suspended only because it does not meet with 
 the combination of outward circumstances which 
 w r ould call it into action : the moment it did meet 
 with that combination it would revive, and remains, 
 therefore, a Permanent Possibility." (p. 205.) It 
 could be shown that at this place we are brought 
 very nearly to the doctrine of Hume, who represents 
 the mind as " a bundle or collection of different per- 
 ceptions," to which we are led, by certain tendencies, 
 to give a fictitious identity. (See Works, vol. i. pp.
 
 PERSONAL IDENTITY, SUBSTANCE. 99 
 
 S18-334.) But we have here to do not with Hume 
 but with Mr. Mill, who represents mind as a series 
 of feelings, with a belief of the permanent possibility 
 of its states. It is admitted, then, that there is more 
 than feelings, more than even a series of feelings, 
 there is belief. Surely Mr. Mill might have inquired 
 more particularly mto the nature of this belief, and 
 he might then have seen that it is quite as note- 
 worthy a phenomenon and quite as essential to the 
 mind as the very feelings themselves • he might have 
 found that it is quite as " ultimate " as the belief 
 in the veracity in memory is acknowledged to be 
 (see q.) ; or rather he might have found it involved 
 in that ultimate belief. 
 
 Observe how mental attributes are growing in 
 number, without an attempt to reduce them to sim- 
 pler elements. He seems to allow that they cannot 
 be resolved into sensation. " They are attended 
 with the peculiarity that each of them involves a 
 belief in more than its own present existence. A 
 sensation involves only this." There is a " belief," a 
 " permanent " something. Mark that we have now 
 Time. He has stolen in imperceptibly (time always 
 does so), but we should notice hi in now that he is 
 in; and we are entitled to ask liim what he is and 
 whence he has come; and he is far too important a 
 personage to allow himself to be dismissed at our 
 wish. It is a permanent poes ibility, we decide that 
 there may be things in this enduring time. Observe 
 what we have now gathered together. We have
 
 100 3IIXD, PEBSOJTALITY, 
 
 sensations ; we have a series of sensations ; we have 
 a belief; we have a belief in time; a belief in time 
 as permanent; and of possibilities in time. These 
 are evidently different from each other, conscious- 
 ness being witness. The belief is not the same as 
 the sensations, or the series of sensations. The per- 
 manence is not identical with the belief. The possi- 
 bility is different from the permanent. I know no 
 philosopher who has called in so many unresolved 
 instincts to account for our convictions of memory 
 and personal identity as Mr. Mill has done. His 
 psychological method is multiplying, instead of di- 
 minishing, ultimate elements. His system, so far 
 from being simple, is in reality very complex ; and 
 its apparent simplicity arises merely from his never 
 summing up, or distinctly enunciating, the original 
 principles he is obliged to postulate and assume. 
 
 But I would not have objected to his system 
 merely because of its complexity, provided it hod 
 embraced all the phenomena. But I deny that be 
 has noticed, or stated correctly, the facts of conscious- 
 ness. No doubt there is a belief; but it is a belief 
 in my past existence, conjoined with a knowledge 
 of my present existence. There is time, an idea of 
 time, and a conviction of the reality of time ; but it 
 is in the form of a belief that I existed in time past. 
 There is more than a belief, there is an immediate 
 decision, that the present self known is the same with 
 the past self remembered. There is more than an 
 idea of mere possibility, there is the assurance that
 
 PEMSONAL IDENTITY, SUBSTANCE. 101 
 
 I did exist at a particular time, and that I who then 
 existed do now exist. I acknowledge that I have 
 no intuitive certainty that I existed every moment 
 of a dreamless sleep. I have intuitive assurance that 
 I existed when I fell asleep, and that I exist now 
 when I have awoke, and I am led by the ordinary 
 rules of evidence to believe that I existed in the in- 
 terval. Here it is that Mr. Mill's permanent possi- 
 bility of feeling comes in : I believe that had I been 
 awakened sooner, I should have been consciously 
 active as I now am. But these very possibilities all 
 proceed on an hituitive remembrance of self, and an 
 intuitive decision as to the identity of self. 
 
 Mr. Mill labors to prove that his psychological 
 theory leaves the doctrines that our fellow-men exist, 
 and that God exists, and that the soul is immortal, 
 where it found them. For we look on other people's 
 minds as but a series of feelings like our own ; and 
 we may regard the Divine Being as " a series of the 
 Divine thoughts and feelings prolonged throughout 
 eternity ; " and our immortal existence to be "a suc- 
 cession of feelings prolonged to eternity." (p. 207— 
 211.) Now we are not yet in a position to inquire 
 (which is the all-important question) whether Mr. 
 Mill's theory admits of the usual arguments for the 
 existence of our fellow-men, and of God, and of an 
 immortal life ; or whether, if it cannot adopt the old 
 arguments, it furnishes new ones. But before leav- 
 ing our present subject I may remark, that tin; com- 
 mon doctrine, which 1 believe to be the true one,
 
 102 MIND, PERSONALITY, 
 
 and which I have endeavored to enunciate philosoph- 
 ical! v, is much more in accordance with our cher- 
 ished convictions and sentiments than the subtle one 
 defended by Mr. Mill. As believing that I myself 
 am more than a series of feelings, that I have a per- 
 manent existence amid all mutations, I can, on evi- 
 dence being adduced of their existence, take the 
 same view of my fellow-men, of my friends, and my 
 family ; that is, I can look upon them as having not 
 only a permanent possibility of feelings, but a perma- 
 nent personality, round which my affections may clus- 
 ter and which leads me to treat them as responsible 
 beings like myself. He says elsewhere (Logic, B. m. 
 c. xxiv. § 1) : "My belief that the Emperor of China 
 exists is simply my belief that if I were transported 
 to the imperial palace, or some other locality in Pekin, 
 I should see him. My belief that Julius Coesar ex- 
 isted is my belief that I should have seen him if I 
 had been present in the field of Pharsalia, or the 
 senate-house at Rome." This is to reverse the 
 proper order of things, and to confuse all our con- 
 ceptions. Looking on ourselves as persons with a 
 permanent being, on evidence produced of their ex- 
 istence, we take the same view of the Emperor of 
 China and Julius Cassar, and thus believe that if we 
 were in Pekin we should see the one, and that if we 
 had been in the battle of Pharsalia we should have 
 seen the other. The picture presented of the Divine 
 Being, in this new philosophy, will appear to the 
 great body of mankind to be unattractively bare
 
 PEBSONAL IDENTITY, SUBSTANCE. 103 
 
 and unmeaning, or rather in the highest degree 
 shadowy, uncertain, and evanishing; and they will 
 rejoice when they are invited to contemplate Him 
 instead as Jehovah, I am that I am, the independent 
 and self-existent One. I am not inclined to urge 
 our conviction of personality and personal identity 
 as in itself a proof of our immortality ; but in con- 
 structing the cumulative argument, and cherishing 
 the hope of a life beyond the grave, I feel it satisfac- 
 tory to regard myself, I believe on sufficient evidence, 
 not as a permanent possibility of feeling, but a per- 
 manent being, the same in the world to come as in 
 this. 
 
 We may now combine the results which we have 
 reached. In every conscious act we know an exist- 
 ing thing, which when we begin to reflect we learn 
 to call self, manifesting itself in some particular way 
 which we are taught to regard as an attribute. 
 Again, in all remembrance, we recollect self as exer- 
 cising some particular attribute in time past, and we 
 know self as now remembering ; and on comparing 
 the two we decide that they arc the same. This is 
 a bare statement of the facts, as they daily present 
 themselves. I defy Mr. Mill, or any other mental 
 analyst, to reduce these facts of consciousness to 
 fewer or simpler elements. In all consciousness, T 
 have a knowledge of self ;is ;i person ; in nil remem- 
 brance, a recollection of self as a person; and in 
 the comparison of the two a perception of their 
 identity.
 
 104 JlfIA r D, PERSONALITY, 
 
 And let it be observed, that both in the conscious 
 self and the recollected, we have the self perceived 
 by us as operating in a great number of ways, with 
 thoughts and emotions hi infinite variety. We come, 
 too, to discover (in a way which will come under our 
 notice below) that there are other beings besides 
 ourselves, who have the same personality and iden- 
 tity, and the like incalculable number and diversity 
 of ideas, wishes, and feelings. As we begin to re- 
 flect on all this, and as we would speak about it, and 
 make ourselves intelligible, we find it convenient to 
 have a word to denote that which abideth in us, and 
 is the same in us and in others. We have such a 
 word in Substance, and we say that " mind is a sub- 
 stance." In saying so, we mean nothing more than 
 tins, that in us and in others there is (1.) an exist- 
 ing thing; (2.) operating; (3.) with a permanence. 
 But in saying this, we say much, that is, we make a, 
 statement full of meaning. By multiplying words 
 of description or explanation we should only con- 
 fuse and perplex the subject, which may be clearly 
 discerned if only we look steadily at it, and weigh 
 the several parts which make up the indissoluble 
 whole. 
 
 And here I feel myself called on to state that no 
 doctrine of modern philosophy, not even the ideal 
 theory, or theory of representative ideas, so con- 
 demned by Reid and exposed by Hamilton, has 
 wrought such mischief in speculation as that of 
 Locke in regard to substance. His statements on this
 
 PEBSONAL IDENTITY, SUBSTANCE. 105 
 
 subject are unsatisfactory throughout, and when 
 they were attacked by Stillingfleet, he defended 
 them by a sparring and fencing unworthy of such 
 a lover -of truth ; he employed himself in repelling 
 the objections of his opponent, instead of seeking to 
 make his own views clearer. " So that if any one 
 will examine himself concerning the 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, as are 
 capable of producing simple ideas in us." [Essay, B. 
 II. c. xxiii. § 2.) In the controversy he affirms and 
 re-affirms that he does not deny the existence of 
 substance, or that we have an idea of it, and is very 
 indignant with Stillingfleet for saying, that lie 
 does. But he makes it to be " the support," but 
 a unknown " support, of qualities. As the support 
 was something unknown, Berkeley in the next age 
 did a good service to philosophy by discarding it 
 altogether, so far as matter is concerned. But in the 
 succeeding age the avenger came, and Hume took 
 away the unknown substratum from mind, as Berke- 
 ley had done from body. Reid rushed in to save 
 fundamental truth ; but he did not show his usual 
 shrewdness and wisdom when he retained Locke's 
 "substratum," and argued so tenaciously that the 
 known quality intuitively suggests an unknown sub- 
 stance. We should have been saved a world of con- 
 fused and confusing controversy If Reid, when aban- 
 doning Locke's Li idea/' had also rejected his " un-
 
 106 MIND, PERSONALITY, 
 
 known support of qualities." Kant met the Scottish 
 sceptic in a still more unsatisfactory manner, when 
 he allowed that by the outward senses and by the 
 internal consciousness we perceive only the phenom- 
 enon, and then referred us to some noumenon beyond. 
 In the schools which have ramified from Kant, the 
 question has ever since been, Is there merely a 
 phenomenon, or is there a noumenon also ? Sir 
 William Hamilton in this, as in so many other topics, 
 has endeavored to combine Eeid and Kant. He 
 identifies the phenomenon of the German, with the 
 quality of the British, philosophy; he argues that 
 the quality implies the substance, and the phenom- 
 enon the noumenon, but makes the substratum or 
 noumenon unknowable. Mr. Mill takes much direct- 
 ly or indirectly from Hume ; he favors in Kant all 
 that is destructive; he allows to Hamilton all his 
 negative positions : and so we find him building on 
 the miserably defective views which they have given 
 of substance. " As our conception of body is that 
 of an unknown exciting cause of sensations, so our 
 conception of mind is that of an unknown recipient or 
 percipient of them, and not of them alone, but of all 
 our other feelings. As body is the mysterious some- 
 thing which excites the mind to feel, so mind is the 
 mysterious something which feels and thinks." [Logic, 
 B. i. c. iii. § 8.) He finds no great difficulty, as 
 Hume had done before him, in putting aside this un- 
 known and mysterious something. And it is high 
 time, I think, that those metaphysicians who defend
 
 PEBSONAL IDENTITY, SUBSTANCE. 107 
 
 radical truth should abandon this unknown and un- 
 knowable substratum or noumenon, which has ever 
 been found a foundation of ice, to those who would 
 build upon it. Sir William Hamilton having handed 
 over this unknown thing to faith, Mr. Herbert Spen- 
 cer has come after him, and consigned religion to it 
 as to its grave, — and there, it may safely be said, it 
 will disturb no one, not even by sending out a ghost 
 from its gloomy chambers. 
 
 We never know quality without knowing sub- 
 stance, just as we cannot know substance without 
 knowing quality. Both are known in one concrete 
 act. We may, however, separate them in thought. 
 In contemplating any given object, such as the think- 
 ing self, we may distinguish between the " thinking " 
 which changes, and the " existence " which abideth. 
 As both are known in the concrete, so both may be 
 said to have an existence, not an independent exist- 
 ence, but an existence in, or in connection with, each 
 other. The one always implies the other ; that is, the 
 thinking always implies a thinking existence, and 
 the thinking existence is always exercised in some 
 thought. Mr. Mill gets a momentary glimpse of this 
 doctrine, but does not follow it out. " We can no 
 more imagine a substance without attributes, than 
 we can imagine attributes without a substance." 
 (Logic, B. i. c. iii. § 6.) Taking this view, we cannot 
 without protest allow persons to speak of substance 
 as being something unknown, mysterious, lying far 
 down in a depth below all human inspection. The
 
 108 MIND, TEBSONALITT. 
 
 substance is known, quite as much as the quality. 
 True, the substance is never known alone, or apart 
 from the quality, but as little is the quality known 
 alone, or apart from a substance. Each should have 
 its place, its proper place, neither less nor more, in 
 every system of the human mind. 
 
 Much the same may be said of " phenomenon " and 
 " noumenon," which, however, have a still more mys- 
 terious meaning than " quality " and " substance." 
 Phenomenon means an appearance, but ajDpearance 
 is an abstract from a concrete ; we never see an ap- 
 pearance apart from a thing appearing. It is the 
 object appearing to the subject seeing it. If the 
 phrase is to be retained in philosophy, let us under- 
 stand what is meant by it. Let us not as we employ 
 it deceive ourselves by imagining that we have, or 
 can have, an appearance apart from a thing appear- 
 ing. A phenomenon is a thing manifesting itself to 
 us, as a quality is a thing in action or exercise. As 
 to the " noumenon," it is not so easy to determine 
 what can be meant by it. If it signifies the thing 
 perceived by the mind, this is neither less nor more 
 than the phenomenon. If it means a thing per- 
 ceived by no mind, I allow that there are certainly 
 things existing not perceived by the human mind, 
 but then these things may be perceived by other 
 minds, — I suppose must certainly be perceived by 
 the Divine Mind. But if the noumenon means 
 something- acting; as the ground of the thing; mani- 
 festing itself, or behind it as a support, I declare that
 
 PEBSONAL IDENTITY, SUBSTANCE. 109 
 
 we have no evidence of there being such a thing, 
 and I can see no purpose, philosophical or practical, 
 to be served by it in the way of hypothesis or other- 
 wise. Here Mr. Mill seems to me altogether right : 
 " This unknown something is a supposition without 
 evidence." But I abandon it, because we have a 
 known something ; in the case of mind a thing ex- 
 isting, acting, and permanent. 
 
 But then it is said we do not know the thing in 
 itself (Ding an sich). It is high time to insist on 
 knowing what is meant by this phrase, taken from 
 Kant, and with which of late years so many meta- 
 physicians have been conjuring. It cannot be al- 
 lowed to play a part any longer till it explains itself 
 It seems full of meaning, and yet I believe that if 
 we prick it, it will be found to be emptiness. I un- 
 derstand what is meant by the thing ; it is the ob- 
 ject existing. But what is meant by in itself? I 
 acknowledge no itself beside, or besides, or beyond 
 the thing. I confess to be so stupid, as not to be 
 able to form any distinct idea of what is meant by 
 the tiling in itself. If it mean that the tiling, the 
 whole tiling, is within the thing, I have about as 
 clear a notion of what is signified as I have of the 
 whale that swallowed itself. If it mean that there 
 is a thing, in addition to the thing as it manifests it- 
 self, and as it exorcises property, I allow that, for 
 aught I know, there may be many such things. My 
 knowledge of the thing, of all things, nay, of any
 
 110 MIND, FEBSONALITY, 
 
 one tiling, is confessedly limited. As to what may 
 be beyond the phenomenon, the thing as it appears 
 to me, and to others who may report to me, I ven- 
 ture to say nothing, as I can know nothing about it. 
 But believing that no other man knows anything 
 about it any more than I do, I protest against its 
 being represented as being a support of the thing 
 known, or hi any way essential to it. Though I 
 were to get new faculties and know that great un- 
 known, I am not sure that it would make the thing 
 known the least clearer, in any way more mysterious 
 or less mysterious than it now is. As it is confessed- 
 ly unknown, I can trace no relation of dependence, 
 or of anything else between it and the known. 
 Lying as it does in the region of darkness which 
 compasses the land of light, I think it best to leave 
 it there. 
 
 We are thus brought to the doctrine which com- 
 mends itself to our first thoughts, that we know 
 self immediately as existing, as in active operation, 
 and with a permanence. This primitive knowledge 
 furnishes a nucleus round which we may gather 
 other information, by experience and by reasoning, 
 till we come at last to clothe mind with qualities so 
 many and varied that it is difficult to classify them. 
 I confess I grudge the school of Comte the epithet 
 " Positive." It is a title which they have no right to 
 appropriate to their crude system, which observes 
 only the more superficial facts in these two wondrous
 
 PEBSONAL IDENTITY, SUBSTANCE. Ill 
 
 worlds of mind and matter. I have in these two 
 last chapters stated what I believe to be true positive 
 doctrine in regard to mind, that is, the expression 
 of the facts without addition or omission or hy- 
 pothesis.
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 BODY. 
 
 W 
 
 / E have now to face a more perplexing subject, 
 the idea and conviction which we have in re- 
 gard to an external world, the way in which we reach 
 these, and the objective reality involved in thern. 
 In this border country there has been a war for ages 
 in the past, and there is likely to be a war for ages 
 in the future. There are real difficulties in the in- 
 quiry, arising from the circumstance that conscious 
 mind and unconscious matter are so different, — 
 while yet they have an evident mutual relation, and 
 also from the apparent deception of the senses ; and 
 speculators have gathered an accumulation of imag- 
 inary ones by their refined and elaborate specula- 
 tions, so that now there are not only the original 
 obstacles in the wa}^, but a host of traditional feuds. 
 I cling to the conviction that there is a doctrine of 
 natural realism, which, if only we could seize and 
 express it, will be found encompassed with fewer 
 difficulties than any far-fetched or artificial system. 
 
 Sir William Hamilton has given us a very elabor- 
 ate classification of the theories of sense-perception 
 
 (11 2^1
 
 BODY. 113 
 
 It is not needful to follow him in this treatise. But 
 in order to correct errors and prepare the way for a 
 fair discussion, it may serve some good purposes to 
 look at the account given, of the steps involved, by 
 the three British metaphysicians who have given the 
 greatest attention to the subject. To begin with 
 Dr. Thomas Reid. According to him, there is, first, 
 an action or affection of the organism ; there is, next, 
 a sensation in the mind ; thirdly, this sensation, as a 
 sign, suggests intuitively an external object. The 
 two points on which he dwells chiefly are, first, that 
 there is no idea between the external object and the 
 mind perceiving; and, secondly, that we reach a 
 belief in the external world intuitively, and not by 
 any process of reasoning. " This conviction is not 
 only irresistible, but it is immediate ; that is, it is 
 not by a train of reasoning and argumentation that 
 we come to be convinced of the existence of what 
 we perceive." ( Works, p. 259.) I believe that he 
 has established his two points successfully, and in 
 doing so he has rendered immense service to philos- 
 ophy. Dr. Thomas Brown gives a different account 
 of the operation. There is first, as in the other 
 theory, — indeed in all theories, — an affection of the 
 bodily frame; secondly, a sensation in the mind ; and 
 thirdly, a reference of that to an external object as 
 the cause. He calls in two general mental laws to 
 give us the reference. The fust is an intuitive law 
 of cause and effect, which impels us when we dis- 
 cover an effect to look for a cause. We have a sen-
 
 114 BODY. 
 
 sation of resistance, of which we discover no cause 
 within the mind, and therefore we look for it beyond 
 the mind. The second law, of which he makes large 
 use, is that of suggestion, which connects sensations, 
 so that one becomes representative of others. 
 
 Sir William Hamilton and Mr. Mill are forever 
 criticising these two doctrines, but it may be doubted 
 whether either has given a clear and correct exposi- 
 tion of them. Hamilton, when he commenced his 
 edition of Reid, thought that philosopher's views 
 were the same as his own (we shall see wherein 
 they differ immediately) ; as he advances, he sees 
 that this is not the case ; and he nowhere gives us 
 a precise account of Reid's theory, which, whether 
 well founded or not, is consistent and easily under- 
 stood. As to Brown, Hamilton is forever carping at 
 him, as if he had a cherished determination to re- 
 move his system out of the way, as one that opposed 
 the reception of his own. The circumstance that 
 neither Reid's theory nor Brown's theory would 
 quite fit into his compartments, is a proof that Ham- 
 ilton's classification of theories, though distinguished 
 by great logical power, is not equal to the diversities 
 of human conception and speculation. He clearly 
 does injustice to Brown, by insisting on making him 
 an idealist — he makes him a cosmothetic idealist. 
 Now there is no idea in Brown's system, as there 
 was in the older theories. He made great use of 
 sensation, and was in great difficulties w r hen he at- 
 tempted to show r how, from this sensation, we could
 
 BODY. 115 
 
 infer an external world ; but the sensation is an ex- 
 isting, and not an imaginary thing like the idea; 
 and the sensation was held by him to be an effect, 
 but not at all a representative, of an external and 
 extended object. Mr. Mill, in criticising Hamilton's 
 criticism, would make Reid an idealist, (p. 177.) This 
 is obviously a mistake. Reid did call in a sensation 
 as a sign, but it was not supposed to be representa- 
 tive, that is, to bear any resemblance or analogy like 
 the old idea to the external object. All that is as- 
 serted of it is that we are conscious of it, which we 
 are not of the idea, and that it suggests a belief in 
 an external object intuitively, and by the appoint- 
 ment of Him who gave us our constitution. Mill 
 represents Reid and Brown as holding substantially 
 the same doctrine : " The difference between them is 
 extremely small, and, I will add, unimportant." 
 (p. 175.) Reid held that we never could reason 
 from the sensation within to the extended object 
 without. Brown labors to show that the whole pro- 
 cess is one of ordinary inference, proceeding always 
 on the intuitive law of cause and effect, aided by the 
 association of ideas. But Mr. Mill tells us that 
 "Brown also thinks that we have, on the occasion o p 
 certain sensations, an instantaneous conviction of an 
 outward object." (p. 164.) I am surprised at such a 
 statement from one who has imbibed so much from 
 Brown, who so clearly represents the process as in- 
 volving inference. We find everywhere such pas- 
 sages as the following: * Perception, then, even in
 
 116 BODY. 
 
 that class of feelings by which we learn to consider 
 ourselves as surrounded by substance, extended and 
 resisting, is only another name, as I have said, for 
 the result of certain associations and inferences that 
 How from other more general principles of the mind." 
 (Lectures, xxvi.) I call the theory of Brown (which 
 is taken from the Sensational School of France) the 
 Inferential, as distinguished from the Ideal theory 
 on the one hand, and the Intuitive theory on the 
 other. 
 
 Hamilton's doctrine differs both from that of Reid 
 and Brown. It is, that there is first an action of 
 the organism, and, secondly, a simultaneous sensation 
 and perception. He labors particularly to show that 
 sense-perception being evoked, there is nothing be- 
 tween it and the object, no sensation, no idea ; but 
 that we gaze at once on the object, in fact are con- 
 scious of it, conscious at one and the same time of the 
 ego and the non ego. Between this and Brown's doc- 
 trine there is an irreconcilable difference. Brown 
 makes the process one of inference, implying, no 
 doubt, an intuition, but an intuition of a general cha- 
 racter bearing on all other mental operations. Hamil- 
 ton makes the perception primitive and original and 
 immediate. Hamilton also differs from Beid, but the 
 point is not so important. Reid makes the sensation 
 precede the perception ; whereas Hamilton, in accord- 
 ance, I think, with the revelations of consciousness, 
 makes them contemporaneous. Both make the opera- 
 tion intuitive and not inferential. This doctrine of
 
 BODY. 117 
 
 Hamilton is not without its difficulties. It leaves many 
 points unexplained, — perhaps they are ultimate and 
 cannot be explained, — possibly they are so simple 
 that they do not need explanation. It does not pro- 
 fess to show how the preceding organic affection is 
 connected with the mental perception. Perhaps the 
 human faculties cannot clear up the subject. Pos- 
 sibly the question itself may be unmeaning, for there 
 may be no how to ask about, no connection except 
 this, that the cognitive mind is so constituted as to 
 know the bodily frame with which it is so intimately 
 connected. This doctrine, as it is the most simple, 
 seems to me to be upon the whole the most truth- 
 like, that has yet been propounded. It does not pro- 
 fess to clear up all mysteries, but it embraces the 
 acknowledged facts, and it starts no hypotheses. I 
 regret the dogmatism which the author displays in 
 asserting it. I do not agree with him in thinking 
 that it can be established at once by an appeal to 
 consciousness. But embracing as it does only facts, 
 I am inclined to adhere to it, till some facts not con- 
 tained in it be ascertained by physiology or psychol- 
 ogy, or the two combined. I am certainly not dis- 
 posed to abandon it for so hypothetical a doctrine as 
 that adopted by Mr. Mill and elaborated by Professor 
 Bain. 
 
 In the mature man we find certain ideas, beliefs, 
 and, I would add, judgments. J readily allow all of 
 these to be subjected to an analysis. Mr. Mill is 
 quite justified in declaring that "we are not at
 
 118 BODY. 
 
 liberty to assume that every mental process which 
 is now as unhesitating and rapid as intuition was in- 
 tuition at its outset." (p. 144.) At present we have 
 to look at the ideas and convictions which we enter- 
 tain in regard to the external world. I allow at 
 once that " we have no means of now ascertaining 
 by direct evidence, whether we were conscious of 
 outward and extended objects when we first opened 
 our eyes to the light." (p. 147.) I am willing, there- 
 fore, to consider Mr. Mill's theory of the genesis of 
 our apprehension and belief. His theory seems to 
 be, that we can get them by means of sensations and 
 associations of sensation. "All we know of objects 
 is the sensations they give us, and the order of the 
 occurrence of these sensations." " Of the outward 
 world we know and can know absolutely nothing, 
 except the sensations we experience from it." (Logic, 
 B. i. c. hi. § 7.) The result reached by him is, that 
 " matter may be defined a permanent possibility of 
 sensations." (p. 198.) He does not commit himself, 
 but he is not averse to the idea that " the non ego 
 altogether may be but a mode in which the mind 
 represents to itself the possible modifications of the 
 ego." (p. 189.) 
 
 In the discussion which is forced upon us by this 
 doctrine, which at first sight seems so strange, there 
 are two points to be specially attended to : First, is 
 Mr. Mill's account of the ideas and convictions which 
 we have concerning body correct ? Under this head 
 our appeal must be to consciousness. I believe that
 
 BODY. 119 
 
 it declares that Mr. Mill, in his analysis, commonly 
 leaves out the main element. A second question 
 has to be answered, Does Mr. Mill's hypothesis ex- 
 plain all that is in our apprehension and belief? In 
 answering this question we must be careful not to 
 allow him to do, what Mr. Crosse and M. Pouchet 
 are suspected of having done in professing to estab- 
 lish the doctrine of spontaneous generation by ex- 
 periment. Mr. Crosse is alleged to have had the 
 germs of the acari produced by him in his carelessly 
 cleaned vessels ; and M. Pouchet to have had the 
 germs from which he derived animals in the putres- 
 cent matter. Certain it is, that when other persons 
 performed the same experiments as Mr. Crosse, tak- 
 ing care to exclude all organized bodies, no animals 
 were produced ; and M. Pasteur maintains that, if 
 you allow him to destroy the germs in the putres- 
 cent fluid, no life will appear. Now, we must keep 
 a strict watch on Mr. Mill, lest he be guilty of a like 
 oversight in deriving all our ideas and convictions 
 from so few germs. As we do so, we shall find that 
 in order to prop up the theory, which he pro- 
 fesses to rear on so narrow a basis, lie is obliged to 
 add buttress after buttress in the shape of new ideas 
 and implied faculties. In particular, we sliall find 
 him guilty of a very grave logical mistake: lie is 
 ever assuming, without perceiving it, the idea which 
 he professes to explain. In admitting the veracity 
 of memory, he himself lays down a most important 
 principle, that we should assume the belief "for
 
 120 BODY. 
 
 which no reason can be given which does not pre- 
 suppose the belief, and assume it to be well-ground- 
 ed." We shall find that in unfolding his theory of 
 the genesis of our ideas of body he neglects this 
 rule, and without being aware of it, assumes the 
 'deas of Externality, and Resisting Force, and Ex- 
 tension, which he is seeking to generate and explain 
 hy a circuitous process. Let us look at these ideas 
 in the order now mentioned. 
 
 (1.) What is implied in Externality ? Mr. Mill says 
 we are aware of ourselves as a series. If I were 
 inclined to adopt this representation, I would say 
 that by externality we mean a something without 
 and beyond the series. But I have objected to this 
 account as inadequate. I have endeavored to show 
 that in all mental action, even in sensation, there is 
 a perception of self as existing; that in memory 
 there is a remembrance of self, and that we proclaim 
 the present self and the remembered self identical. 
 Now, by an external object I mean a thing existing, 
 but not this self, a thing different from this perma- 
 nent and identical self. I believe that our first per- 
 ceptions of externality are derived from things ap- 
 prehended as extended, as having a direction and 
 stretching away in space. But as this involves ex- 
 tension, the consideration of it falls under next head. 
 For the present we must look at externality simply 
 as denoting an existing thing, different from, and not 
 part of, the ego known by self-consciousness. Mr. 
 Mill admits that every man comes to entertain some
 
 BODY. 121 
 
 such apprehension. "I consider them (the sensa- 
 tions) to be produced by something not only exist- 
 ing independently of my will, but external to my 
 bodily organs and my mind." (Logic, B. I. c. iii. § 7.) 
 I am here to examine his account of the generation 
 and the nature of this idea and conviction. I have 
 found great difficulty in handling the subject, owing 
 to the gossamer character of the theory, which is 
 far too subtle and ingenious to be solid or true. 
 
 In conducting this whole discussion, we must be 
 on our guard against being misled by an ambiguity 
 in the use of the phrase " outward world." It may 
 mean the world out of the conscious mind, — this 
 I venture to call the extra-mental world ; or it may 
 mean the world beyond the body, — this, for dis- 
 tinction's sake, I call the extra-organic world. I 
 am not sure that Mr. Mill, or Mr. Bain who helps 
 •him to develop his system, have escaped the perplex- 
 ities thus arising. I insist that they are not at lib- 
 erty to assume the existence of the bodily frame, 
 and then and thus account for the idea of a world 
 beyond. Assuming only a series of sensations 
 aware of itself, they must thence generate something 
 exterior. 
 
 Mr. Mill thus gets the idea of externality : — "1 
 see a piece of white paper on a table. I go into .'in- 
 other room, and though I have ceased to see it, I 
 am persuaded the paper is still there. I no longer 
 have the sensations which if gave me; but I believe 
 that when I again place myself in the circumstances
 
 122 BODY. 
 
 in which I had those sensations, that is, when I go 
 into the room, I shall again have them ; and further, 
 that there has been no intervening moment at which 
 this would not have been the case. Owing to this 
 law of my mind, my conception of the world at any 
 given instant consists, in only a small proportion, of 
 present sensations. The conception I form of the 
 world existing at any moment comprises, along with 
 the sensations I am feeling, a countless variety of 
 possibilities of sensation." (p. 192.) I wish Mr. Mill 
 would employ language consistent with his theory, 
 and we should then be in a position to judge 
 whether he is building it up fairly. As yet we know 
 nothing of "white paper," "a room," "another 
 room ; " least of all can we be aware of being placed 
 in " circumstances : " all which certainly imply the 
 very externality he is seeking to gender. We may 
 believe that Mr. Mill does not forget, but it is neces- 
 sary to warn his readers against forgetting, that we 
 have yet only one sensation succeeding another. 
 He refers to " a law of mind." The law he postu- 
 lates is, " that the human mind is capable of Expect- 
 ation. In other words, that after having had actual 
 sensations, we are capable of forming the conception 
 of possible sensations." (p. 190.) It is one of the 
 many postulates he is ever making. His assumptions 
 are far from being the fewest and the simplest fitted 
 to explain the phenomena. If he had postulated 
 that in every act of sense-perception we apprehend 
 a something external, the facts would have been ex-
 
 BODY. 123 
 
 plained much more satisfactorily. But let us go on 
 with his explication. He calls attention to the cir- 
 cumstance, that " the sensations are joined in 
 groups," so that " we should have, not some one sen- 
 sation, but a great and even an indefinite number 
 and variety of sensations, generally belonging to 
 different senses, but so linked together that the 
 presence of one announces the possible presence, at 
 the same instant, of any or all the rest." (p. 194.) 
 But let it be observed that we do not yet know that 
 the sensations belong to different senses, or come 
 from different parts of the body, and the groups of 
 sensations can no more give us externality than the 
 individual sensations. But then "we also recognize a 
 fixed order in our sensations." We have not yet 
 cause and effect, but we have " an order of succes- 
 sion which, when ascertained by observation, gives 
 rise to the ideas of cause and effect." " Whether we 
 are asleep or awake, the fire goes out, and puts an 
 end to one particular possibility of warmth and light. 
 Whether we are present or absent, the corn ripens 
 and brings a new possibility of food." I have again 
 to remind Mr. Mill's readers that we do not yet know 
 that we have bodies to sleep or wake ; the sleeping 
 and waking, the fire and the corn, are all in us as 
 sensations. The "present" and the "absent" slip 
 in very dexterously ; but. as yet we know do place 
 at which we are present, or from which we may be 
 absent. The incipient cause and effect arc as yet 
 mere antecedence and consequence within the mind
 
 124 BODY. 
 
 " When this point has been reached, the Permanent 
 Possibilities in question have assumed such unlike- 
 ness of aspect, and such difference of position rel- 
 atively to us, from any sensations, that it would be 
 contrary to all we know of the constitution of human 
 nature that they should not be conceived as, and 
 believed to be, at least as different from sensations 
 as sensations are from one another." (p. 196.) Still, 
 all is within the thread of consciousness. But then 
 it is said there is something in our " constitution " 
 that makes us believe the possibilities to be different 
 from sensations. I am glad of an appeal to our con- 
 stitution, in which there is more, I believe, than Mr. 
 Mill has unfolded. Yet I fear that the actual appeal 
 is in no way complimentary. Our constitution 
 makes us believe this " possibility " of sensations to 
 be different from the sensations. But Mr. Mill does 
 not say, and would not say, that our constitution is 
 right in all this, or that there is any reality corre- 
 sponding to the belief. I am not quite sure to what 
 law of our constitution he refers. If it be his favorite 
 principle of association of sensations, it is clear that 
 it cannot help him, for the associated sensations are 
 all in the mind ; and if a train of sensations could 
 give us (which, I believe, it cannot) what is not in 
 the ideas, it must be in virtue of some power in the 
 train which is not unfolded. If he mean the ten- 
 dency, on which he dwells so much elsewhere, to give 
 an external reality to things within, I admit that 
 there is such a tendency in loose thinking ; but then
 
 BODY. 125 
 
 it is in minds that have already reached a knowledge 
 of something outward, and it is for Mr. Mill to show, 
 which would be difficult, that it could exist in a mind 
 that as yet had no idea of externality. I cannot see 
 that by either process Mr. Mill has got the concep- 
 tion of an outward world, and I am sure that neither 
 process would justify our belief in the reality of 
 such a world. A belief generated by an accidental 
 or fatalistic association might be error quite as 
 readily as truth, and the disposition to give an ex- 
 ternal embodiment to internal feelings is avowedly 
 illusory. Already we see those flaws in the founda- 
 tion which render the whole structure insecure, and 
 make it impossible for man to be certain that he can 
 reach any truth beyond the consciousness of the 
 present sensation. 
 
 Our author now crosses at one leap the Avicles: 
 gulf of all. " We find that they (possibilities of 
 sensation) belong as much to other human or sen- 
 tient beings as ourselves." " The world of possible 
 sensations, succeeding one another .according tc 
 laws, is as much in other beings as in me ; it has 
 therefore an existence outside me ; it is an external 
 world." But where in the procession of internal 
 feelings which has passed before us can other human 
 beings come in? "I conclude that other human 
 beings have feelings like me; because, first, tliey 
 have bodies like me, which I know in my own case 
 to be the antecedent condition of feelings ; and be- 
 cause, secondly, they exhibit the acts and oilier out-
 
 126 BODY. 
 
 ward signs which in my own case I know by expe- 
 rience to be caused by feelings." Doubtless, if we 
 had got our bodily frames as out of ourselves, the 
 argument might have been conclusive. He tells us 
 that we observe bodies which do not call up sensa- 
 tions in our consciousness ; and since they do not do 
 so in my consciousness, I infer that they do it out 
 of my consciousness. The inference might be legit- 
 imate, provided we had otherwise got an apprehen- 
 sion of things out of and beyond the consciousness. 
 All reasoning is usually said to be from what we 
 know ; but in this inference we have in the conclu- 
 sion what is not in the premises. Or, if we take 
 Mr. Mill's theory of reasoning, that it is from partic- 
 ulars to particulars, by some sort of registered ob- 
 servation, the argument is seen to be equally falla- 
 cious; for we have no register of objects out of 
 ourselves to authorize us to infer that these possibili- 
 ties constitute an external world. I am not at all 
 sure that Mr. Mill (p. 207) has cause to condemn 
 Reid, when he maintains that a like position taken 
 by Hume lands us in a system of solitary egoism, or, 
 as Mr. Mill expresses it, that " the non ego altogether 
 may be but a mode in which the mind represents 
 to itself the possible modifications of the ego." I 
 am convinced that it is not by such a process, that 
 babies come to believe in the existence of those who 
 nurse them and are round about them. So far as I 
 can see, Mr. Mill has never logically got out of the 
 shell of the ego ; nor can I see how any one can get
 
 BODY. 127 
 
 out of it, except by means of an original impulse. 
 ] suspect that in Mr. Mill's belief of the existence 
 of his fellow-men, for whose benefit he has written 
 so many able volmnes, there is involved a spontane- 
 ous step more convincing than his reflex logic. 
 
 The conclusion reached is : " Matter may be de- 
 fined, a permanent possibility of sensation." (p. 198.) 
 We shall not be in circumstances thoroughly to ex- 
 amine this definition till we have fully unfolded, in 
 the next two heads, the nature of our perceptions 
 of Resistance and Extension, which enter essentially 
 into our apprehension of Matter. Considered as an 
 account even of Externality it is defective. I believe, 
 indeed, that it is the only result which Mr. Mill can 
 reach from his induction or his premises. It should 
 be observed that he does not, as some would expect 
 him, define matter the Cause of sensations. Mr. 
 Mill says what he means, and means what he says, 
 when he describes Matter as the Possibility, not the 
 cause of sensations. Dr. Brown, by help of in- 
 genuity and twisting, could reach a cause, for be 
 called in an intuitive conviction, which impels us 
 when we discover a phenomenon to look for a cause ; 
 and when, as in the case of certain sensations, we 
 cannot get a cause within, we arc driven to seek it 
 without. His theory, however, was after all defect- 
 ive, for it makes matter, as a cause, unknown, whereas 
 we know matter, as we shall see forthwith, as resist- 
 ing our effort, and as extended. But Mr. Mill cannot 
 be sure, and does not profess to be sure, that he has
 
 128 BODY. 
 
 reached matter even as an unknown cause. For our 
 sensations have no discoverable causes within the 
 mind ; and as we have no sensitive experience of 
 sensations having causes, and no original conviction 
 constraining us to seek for a cause, it is quite con- 
 ceivable that they have no causes. But do these 
 " possibilities " amount to the idea, which we have, 
 of an outward world ? So far as we have gone, we 
 do not seem to be beyond the " series of feelings," 
 for the idea we have got is simply of possibilities of 
 sensation. Mr. Mill thinks that " both philosophers 
 and the world at large, when they think of matter, 
 conceive it really as a Permanent Possibility of Sen- 
 sation." (p. 200.) 2 The "permanence" is really an 
 important element, presupposing the idea of time, 
 and of the past and the future ; all of which carry 
 us into a region high above sensation, and imply 
 mental faculties with an extensive capacity and wide 
 range. But not even with this addition does the 
 description come up to the reality, I mean mental 
 reality. Mr. Mill says that these " Permanent Pos- 
 sibilities " are now " conceived as, and believed to 
 be, as different from sensations as sensations are 
 
 1 Mr. Mill (p. 200) admits that the from our observation that every ex- 
 majority of philosophers fancy that perience has a cause ; it is thus that 
 matter is something more, and that we are led to suppose that things have 
 the world at large, if asked the qucs- a substantive reality. As I do not 
 tion, would undoubtedly agree with stand up for a substance different from 
 the philosophers. But then he ac- the thing known, I do not require to 
 counts for this " imaginary concep- examine this theory. In future ehap- 
 tion," as he calls it, by two tendencies ters his defective view of the compar- 
 of the mind, — one derived from our ative power of the mind and of causa- 
 obfeervat'on of differences, the other tion will be subjected to criticism.
 
 BODY 129 
 
 from one another." (p. 196.) It should be observed 
 that the sensations thus discovered to be different, 
 are all sensations in the " series of feelings " or 
 " thread of consciousness." But our apprehension 
 of an outward world is of something, not only differ- 
 ing from the sensations as one sensation differs from 
 another, but different from the self, which, as we 
 have found in last chapter, we know as sentient. 
 We apprehend the material object as an existing 
 thing, — quite as much as the self, but distinct from 
 the seE 1 It never has been shown how the ego, by 
 reasoning or any other logical process, can give the 
 non ego. I must therefore look on the ego as having 
 a capacity of discovering the non ego, directly or 
 indirectly. Mr. Mill has utterly failed to rear up the 
 actual mental idea and conviction from the postu- 
 lated materials. Till such time as a mean can be 
 
 1 Professor Bain reaches the con- so we contradict ourselves." (p. 385.) 
 
 elusion : " It is quite true that the ob- Again, " we are incapable of discuss- 
 
 ject of consciousness, which wc call ing the existence of an independent 
 
 Externality, is still a mode of self in material world ; the very act is a con- 
 
 the most comprehensive sense, but not tradiction." (p. 379.) At this point 
 
 in the usual restricted sense of ' self ' extreme sensationalism and extreme 
 
 and 'mind,' which are names for the idealism, Mr. Bain and Mr. Ferrier, 
 
 subject to the exclusion of the object." meet and are one ; it would be a con- 
 
 (Senscs und Intellect ', p. 381.) We are tradiction to speak of the one as inde- 
 
 accustomed to say that "light exists pendent of the other; they are joined 
 
 as independent fact, with or without in this philosophy of identity, which 
 
 any eyes to see it. But if we consider transcends thai of Begel himself! lSut 
 
 the case fairly, we shall see that this joking aside, it is easy to represent 
 
 assertion errs not simply in being be- the doctrine which affirms the exist- 
 
 yond any evidence that we can have, ence of independent objects out of the 
 
 bat also in being a self-contradiction, mind so as to make it contradictory ; 
 
 We are affirming that to have an ex- but there is no contradiction in the 
 
 istence out of our minds which we doctrine when correctly stati'd. < M 
 
 cannot know but as in our minds, course, knowledge is in a mind, but it 
 
 In words, wc assert independent ex- maybe of an existence "out of our 
 
 istence, while in the very act of doing minds." 
 
 9
 
 130 BODY. 
 
 pointed out by which we can reach the outward 
 world as an existence, I cling to the belief that the 
 self is endowed with a capacity of immediately know- 
 ine not onlv the self, but the not-self. 
 
 But it will be necessary to review Mr. Mill's theory 
 of the genesis of our idea of Matter more carefully. 
 We shall find it throughout a series of assumptions, 
 no one of which admits of proof, and some of which 
 can be disproven. Often do I wish, as I examine it, 
 that Sir William Hamilton had been still alive to 
 brush away by his sweeping logic the ingenuities 
 which are employed to support it. " Our concep- 
 tion of Matter," says Mr. Mill, " comes ultimately to 
 consist of Resistance, Extension, and Figure, together 
 with miscellaneous powers of exciting other sensa- 
 tions." (p. 219.) There is a palpable omission here, 
 for it omits those powers (specially mentioned by 
 Locke, Essay, B. n. c. ii. § 23), by which one body 
 operates upon another ; " thus the sun has a power 
 to make wax white, and fire to make lead fluid." It 
 is enough for us here to examine Mr. Mill's theory 
 of the production of the idea of Resistance and of 
 Extension. 
 
 (2.) We have certainly an idea of Resistance and 
 a belief in it, In the mature man it becomes a per- 
 ception, and a conviction of an object out of the 
 body, or in the body, resisting an effort to move a 
 member of the body. In next chapter I will give 
 some account of the sense which reveals the resist- 
 ing object ; for the present we are examining Mr
 
 BODY. 131 
 
 Mill's theory. (See pp. 219-21.) " Resistance is only 
 another name for a sensation of our muscular frame, 
 combined with one of touch." It should be remarked 
 that this language is not meant to imply that we 
 have a muscle, or that we have skin ; the resistance 
 and the touch must yet be considered as sensations 
 in the mind. " When we contract the muscles of 
 our arm, either by an exertion of will or by an in- 
 voluntary discharge of our spontaneous nervous ac- 
 tivity, the contraction is accompanied by a state of 
 sensation, which is different according as the locomo- 
 tion, consequent on the muscular contraction, con- 
 tinues freely or meets with an impediment. In the 
 former case the sensation is that of motion through 
 empty space." We shall see that we seem to have 
 no sensation of motion in empty space. When our 
 muscular effort is not opposed by anything without 
 the body, what we have is a feeling of tension, or of 
 one muscle resisting another. But let this pass, as 
 having no special connection with our present dis- 
 cussion. He goes on to say, that if we will to exert 
 our muscular force, and the exertion is accompanied 
 by the usual muscular sensation, but the expected 
 sensation of locomotion does not follow, we have 
 what is called the feeling of resistance, or, in other 
 words, of muscular motion, and that feeling is the 
 fundamental element in the notion of matter. He 
 shows how "skin sensations of simple contact in- 
 variably accompany the muscular sensations of resist- 
 ance ; " how our sensations of touch " become rep
 
 132 BODY. 
 
 resentattve of the sensations of resistance with which 
 they habitually coexist ; " and " our idea of matter 
 as a resisting cause of miscellaneous sensations is 
 now constituted." Every one knows that the mus- 
 cular sense and touch combine, to give us the knowl- 
 edge of matter as a resisting object. But does Mr. 
 Mill's account come fully up to the facts falling un- 
 der the eye of consciousness ? Does his theory ex- 
 plain the facts ? Both questions must be answered 
 in the negative. In touch, as we shall see in next 
 chapter, we localize, I believe intuitively, our sensa- 
 tions in a given direction, and at a given point in 
 the surface of the body. Again, in the exercise of 
 the locomotive energy, accompanied by muscular 
 sensation, we have a sense of a member of our body 
 which we will to move, of which member we must 
 have some idea, otherwise we could not form a voli- 
 tion regarding it ; and we have a perception of this 
 member in motion, resisted by a body out of our 
 frame. Mr. Mill's theory does not yield all of these, — 
 I rather think not even any one of these thoroughly. 
 It takes no notice of the volition which moves the 
 member, for this would introduce an element above 
 sensations. It is not consistent with that idea of a 
 member of the body, which is necessary to the voli- 
 tion ; for the theory to be consistent must presup- 
 pose that we have yet no knowledge of our bodily 
 frame. There can yet be no apprehension of motion 
 in space, for as yet we have no idea of space. The 
 idea is not even of resistance, properly speaking, for
 
 BODY. 133 
 
 we have no idea of a resisting object. So far as we 
 have gone we have only sensations differing from 
 each other in feeling or in intensity, and sensations 
 coexisting, and sensations succeeding each other, and 
 sensations the signs of other sensations. 
 
 (3.) The mature man has also an idea of Extension 
 and a belief in Extended objects. We have an appre- 
 hension and a conviction of our bodies as extended, 
 and of other bodies as extended, that is, as occupying 
 space, as being contained in space, as being of a cer- 
 tain spatial form, and as being movable in space. 
 Can the sensation and association theory account 
 for the generation of this mental phenomenon ? I 
 believe it breaks down both psychologically and 
 physiologically. 
 
 At this point Mr. Mill hands us over to his friend 
 Professor Bain, who, in The Senses and the Intellect, 
 has elaborated into a minute system the general 
 statements scattered throughout Mr. Mill's Logic. 
 Beginning Avith Feelings, he goes on to Thought, 
 making its fundamental attributes to be Conscious- 
 ness of Difference, Consciousness of Agreement, and 
 Rctentiveness ; and he builds up his system mainly 
 out, A Feelings by means of the laws of Association 
 by Contiguity and Resemblance. I cannot in a work 
 like this, devoted to a different individual, review 
 Mr. Bain's theories. But I beg to ask whether wo 
 ever have Feeling without some perception of an 
 object, say self, as feeling? Feelings, even such as 
 joy or pain, are mere abstracts separated from our
 
 134 BODY. 
 
 consciousness of self, as rejoicing or in distress. A 
 proper psychological system should begin with the 
 concrete perception; and not with a quality separated 
 from it. So much for his foundation. And as to his 
 mode of building, it will be shown to be altogether 
 unsatisfactory, in the strictures we have to offer on 
 such subjects as Association of Ideas, Comparison, 
 and Relativity of Knowledge, as treated by Mr. Mill. 
 Mr. Bain has received great praise for combining 
 physiology with psychology. It is true that in his 
 introduction, and in various parts of his work, he has 
 given an account of the anatomy and physiology of 
 the brain and nerves and organs of movement. But 
 there is a mighty gap, which he can scarcely be said 
 to have tried to fill up, between these unconscious 
 parts and the conscious thoughts and feelings of 
 mind proper. The most valuable part of his work 
 is that in which he describes, more minutely than 
 had ever been done before, the feelings excited by 
 muscular and nervous action, accounting, I think, so 
 far successfully, for many of our spontaneous and 
 supposed instinctive movements. But he is out of his 
 proper region when he comes to deal with the pecu- 
 liar operations and the higher ideas of the mind. 
 With a fine capacity for observing bodily affections, 
 and an undoubted vigor and tenacity of intellect in 
 dealing with material facts, he seems to be unfitted 
 for realizing fully pure mental or spiritual phenom- 
 ena, as falling simply under the eye of conscious- 
 ness. He makes as much use of nerve-forces as
 
 BODY. 135 
 
 Hartley did of vibrations, and seems to identify con- 
 scious feelings with them, making the current and 
 the consciousness two sides of one thing. Even 
 when he is professedly treating of Emotions, Thoughts, 
 and Volitions, he has great difficulty in rising above 
 nerve affections ; and when he does make the at- 
 tempt, it is immediately to fall back to his old level 
 of sensations. He is to be constantly watched when 
 he would draw our higher ideas of necessary truth, 
 of beauty, and of moral good from sensitive affec- 
 tions variously associated. It could be shown, that 
 in treating of our intellectual and moral and volun- 
 tary operations, while apparently proceeding in so 
 matter of fact a manner, he is continually passing, 
 without seeing it, from unconscious to conscious ac- 
 tion, from bodily sensations to mental ideas, and ad- 
 vancing hypotheses as to the influence of nervous 
 and muscular action, which could be shown to be 
 true only by their explaining all the mental facts 
 revealed by consciousness ; and this he cannot be 
 said to have attempted, as consciousness is seldom 
 consulted, even formally or professedly. There is 
 proof of all this in his theory of what constitutes 
 our idea of extension and its mode of growth. 
 
 In the earlier editions of his Logic (B. i c. iii. § 7), 
 Mr. Mill had described Brown as showing clearly 
 that the notions of extension and figure are derived 
 "from sensations of touch, combined with sensations 
 of a class previously too little adverted to by meta- 
 physicians, — those which have their seat in the
 
 136 BODY. 
 
 muscular frame." He adds, characteristically. " Who- 
 ever wishes to be more particularly acquainted with 
 this admirable specimen of metaphysical analysis, 
 may consult the first volume of Brown's Lectures or 
 Mill's Anahj sis of the Mind." The thought has 
 germinated, and in his later editions he is able to re- 
 fer to Mr. Alexander Bain and Mr. Herbert Spencer 
 as folio win g- out the investigation. Mr. Bain has 
 certainly taken up the idea, and ridden it to exhaus- 
 tion, I should say to death. 
 
 " We may accede," says Professor Bain, as quoted 
 by Mr. Mill (p. 226), "to the assertion sometimes 
 made, that the properties of space might be con- 
 ceived or felt in the absence of an external world, or 
 any other matter than that composing the body of 
 the percipient being ; for the body's own movements 
 in empty space would suffice to make the very same 
 impressions on the mind as the movements excited 
 by outward objects. A perception of length, or 
 height, or speed, is the mental impression or state of 
 consciousness accompanying some mode of muscular 
 movement, and this movement may be generated 
 from within as well as from without." In criticising 
 this theory, so cloudy in its outline, we are placed in 
 difficulties, in consequence of its not being clear 
 whether Mr. Mill and Mr. Bain assume the existence 
 of the bodily frame as a material object, in the com- 
 mon acceptation, as implying objective existence and 
 extension, or, even in their own sense, as " the mere 
 possibility of sensations." Are they accounting for
 
 BODY. 137 
 
 the extra-mental world, including the bodily frame ? 
 or simply for the extra-organic world ? In most 
 places Mr. Bain seems to posit the body as a reality. 
 In the passage quoted, he speaks of the matter com- 
 posing " the body of the percipient being," as if he 
 needed it to explain our idea of " the properties of 
 space." He talks of a movement being " generated 
 from within," which cannot mean within the mind, 
 which is a mere series of feelings ; it must mean 
 within the body, which is quietly assumed. The 
 whole plausibility, I had almost said intelligibility, 
 certainly the expressibility, of the theory lies in its 
 being supposed that there is a body, and even an 
 extended body. He derives all from nerve-currents 
 which imply space, and motion in space, and he con- 
 structs the idea of extension by a sweep of the hand, 
 or a sweep of the eye, or a volume of feeling, which, 
 if taken metaphorically, explain nothing, and if 
 taken literally, that is, as actualities, imply space and 
 motion in space. But if the body is assumed as 
 known immediately, then there is admitted a vast 
 body of intuition, of which he should have measured 
 the amount, and acknowledged the significance. Or 
 if it be said that the bodily frame is assumed as an 
 hypothesis, the answer is obvious. If it explains, as 
 he thinks (I do not), the whole facts, then the hypoth- 
 esis is rendered probable, and he must adhere to 
 it ; for the author of an hypothesis cannot be allowed 
 to employ it to reach a conclusion and then abandon 
 it; on the contrary, he must keep by it and all
 
 133 BODY. 
 
 its Logical consequences. On whatever ground as- 
 sumed, it is clear that when assumed there is little 
 left to call for explanation. After we have got our 
 own bodies, with " matter " composing them, capable 
 of taking a "sweep," and of having "a movement 
 generated within," it can be no difficult matter to 
 conceive of other bodies being extended, and in mo- 
 tion, and resisting our movement. 
 
 But in this discussion I must in all fairness sup- 
 pose that he does not assume the existence of the 
 bodily frame. 1 His business is to show, on his theory, 
 how our conception in regard to body is generated. 
 As he attempts to do so, I am entitled, after this 
 statement, to take care that he does not assume sur- 
 reptitiously what he professes to produce by a pro- 
 cess. He has as yet got nothing but a series of feel- 
 ings, with a possibility of sensations coming no one 
 
 1 Since writing the above, I find Mr. visional assumption is eventually 
 
 Herbert Spencer saying of Mr. Mill : proved true by its agreement with 
 
 " If, knowing more than his own facts ; for in these cases the facts with 
 
 states of consciousness, he declines which it is found to agree are facts 
 
 to acknowledge anything beyond con- known in some other way than 
 
 sciousness until it is proved, he may through the hypothesis : a calculated 
 
 go on reasoning forever without get- eclipse of the moon serves as a verifi- 
 
 ting any further; since the perpetual cation of the hypothesis of gravitation, 
 
 elaboration of states of consciousness because its occurrence is observable 
 
 ont of states of consciousness can without taking for granted the hypoth- 
 
 never produce anything more than esis of gravitation. But when the 
 
 states of consciousness. If, contrari- external world is postulated, and it is 
 
 wise, he postulates external existence, supposed that the validity of the pos- 
 
 and considers it as merely postulated, tulate may be shown by the explana- 
 
 then the whole fabric of his argument, tion of mental phenomena which it 
 
 standing upon this postulate, has no furnishes, the vice is that the process 
 
 greatsr validity than the postulate of verification is itself possible only 
 
 gives it, minus the possible invalidity by assuming the thing to be proved." 
 
 of the argument itself. The case _1 Art., Mill v. Hamilton, in The 
 
 must not be confounded with those Fortnightly Review, No.V. 
 cases in which an hypothesis or pro-
 
 BODY. 139 
 
 can tell from what quarter. I cannot allow him, in 
 order that he may ingeniously get more, to employ a 
 supposed body with a " sweep " and " contractions." 
 " When a muscle," says Mr. Bain, as quoted by 
 Mr. Mill (see pp. 222-24), "begins to contract, or a 
 limb to bend, we have a distinct sense how far the 
 contraction and the bending are carried ; there is 
 something in the special sensibility that makes one 
 mode of feeling for half contraction, another for 
 three-fourths, and another for total contraction." 
 " If the sense of degrees of range be thus admitted 
 as a genuine muscular determination, its functions in 
 outward perception are very important. The at- 
 tributes of extension and space fall under its scope. 
 In the first place, it gives the feeling of linear ex- 
 tension, inasmuch as this is measured by the sweep 
 of a limb or other organ moved by the muscles. 
 The difference between six inches and eighteen 
 inches is expressed to us by the different degrees of 
 contraction of some one group of muscles ; those, 
 for example, that flex the arm, or, in walking, those 
 that flex or extend the lower limb. The inward 
 impression corresponding to the outward fact of six 
 inches in length, is an impression arising from the 
 continued shortening of a muscle, — a true muscular 
 sensibility. It is the impression of a muscular efibrt 
 having a certain continuance; a greater length pro- 
 duces a greater continuance (or a more rapid move- 
 ment), and in consequence, an increased feeling of 
 expended power. The discrimination of length in
 
 140 BODY. 
 
 any one direction includes extension in any direc- 
 tion." This reads very like assuming an extended 
 bodily arm taking a sweep, and thus giving us the 
 idea of extension. Of course Ave understand, on re- 
 flection, that the sweep is only a sensation in the 
 " series of feelings," but when we understand this, 
 we see how far we are from having the idea of ex- 
 tension produced. 
 
 In explanation of the theory, Mr. Mill says, " Mr. 
 Bain recognizes two principal kinds or modes of 
 discriminative sensibility in the muscular sense : the 
 one corresponding to the degree of intensity of the 
 muscular effort, — the amount of energy put forth ; 
 the other corresponding to the duration, — the 
 longer or shorter continuance of the same effort. 
 The first makes us acquainted with degrees of resist- 
 ance, which we estimate by the intensity of the mus- 
 cular energy required to overcome it. To the second 
 we owe, in Mr. Bain's opinion, our idea of extension." 
 I have already commented on the defects in Mr. 
 Mill's account of our apprehension of resistance. 
 We have here to consider the theory of the genesis 
 of the idea of extension. It is referred to the con- 
 tinuance of a sensation. 
 
 And here it is proper to state, that some deny the 
 existence of such a sensation as arising when the 
 arm sweeps through empty space. E. H. Weber had 
 come, in 1852, to the conclusion: — "Of the volun- 
 tary motion of our limbs we know originally nothing. 
 We do not perceive the motion of our muscles by
 
 BODY. 141 
 
 their own sensations, but attain a knowledge of them 
 only when perceived by another sense. The muscles 
 most under our control are those of the eye and the 
 voice, which perform motions microscopically small, 
 yet we have no consciousness of the motion. We 
 move the diaphragm voluntarily against the heavy 
 pressure of the liver, etc., yet with as little conscious- 
 ness of the motion. It follows that the motions of 
 our limbs must be observed by sight or touch in 
 order to learn that they move, and in what direc- 
 tion." Mr. Abbot quotes this passage in his Sight and 
 Touch (p. 71), and he adds, "The more recent re- 
 searches of Aubert and Kammler not only confirm 
 this result, but tend further to prove that there is 
 not in the muscles any sense whatever of their con- 
 traction." " Accordingly, they remark that the fric- 
 tion of our clothing is a considerable aid in judging 
 of our motions, especially if it is close fitting. 
 When wearing boots, etc., with which we are not 
 familiar, we are less certain of our judgments, 
 and this is the more noticeable in riding, as the eye 
 does not then control our judgment." The question 
 is for physiologists to settle. I am not satisfied that 
 the Germans referred to can have established their 
 point. But until there is a more thorough deter- 
 mination of the exact function of the nerves attached 
 to the muscles, it is preposterous to found a huge 
 metaphysical theory on our muscular sensations 
 when the arm moves in empty space. 
 
 My opinion on such a subject is of no value, but
 
 142 BODY. 
 
 I am disposed to think that we have a sense of the 
 contraction of at least some of our muscles, and of 
 its continuance. 1 On the supposition that we have 
 a sense of resistance, which seems established, the 
 muscles of our arm, being always in a state of more 
 or less tension, must feel the resistance offered by 
 one muscle to another. Dr. Kirkes says that the 
 muscles " possess sensibility by means of the sensi- 
 tive nerve-fibres distributed in them. The amount 
 of common sensibility in muscles is not great." 
 " But they have a peculiar sensibility, or at least a 
 peculiar modification of common sensibility, which 
 is shown in that their nerves can communicate to 
 the mind an accurate knowledge of their states and 
 position when in action." {Phys., p. 530, 5th ed.) We 
 may, therefore, know the contractions. But let us 
 take along with us the full facts. The sense of touch- 
 proper, as we shall see in next chapter, always refers 
 the sensations to the points in the skin at which 
 the nerves terminate ; and the muscular sense merely 
 intimates that one organ is resisting another. In that 
 " sweep of the arm," of which Mr. Bain makes 
 so much, there is implied, first, a direction of 
 the points of sensation in the skin ; secondly, a mus- 
 cular resistance ; and, I rather think, thirdly, an ex- 
 perience to enable us to combine the two. There is, 
 
 1 Mr. H. Lewes thinks he has dem- tributed to the muscular sense." (Brit. 
 
 onstrated the existence of the Mus- Assoc , 1859.) We require a more 
 
 cular Sense. He skinned a frog, and thorough investigation of the relations, 
 
 thus made it insensible to external and differences, of the precise func- 
 
 impressions, and found it " to mani- tions of the nerves of touch-proper 
 
 fest all those phenomena usually at- and the muscular sense
 
 BODY. 143 
 
 I suspect, a farther element. In whatever way it 
 may begin, the continuance of the experimental 
 bending of the arm, which Mr. Bain employs, must 
 be done by the will. But a vague directionless effort 
 will not move a limb, still less continue to move it 
 in a certain way. The volition to continue the sweep 
 of the arm implies a contemplated end, or some idea 
 of the arm, and a belief in its existence, and, I should 
 think, in its extension. It thus appears that it is to 
 reverse the proper order of things, to make the con- 
 tinuance of " the sweep of the arm " constitute or 
 give us the idea of extension. In the very move- 
 ment we have an idea of an extended arm by touch- 
 proper or feeling ; as we move the arm, we become 
 acquainted with the resistance of one felt member 
 by another ; and in order to the continuance of the 
 voluntary sweep, there must be some apprehension, 
 more or less vague, of the limb which we continue 
 to move. 
 
 There are many serious physiological difficulties in 
 the way of accepting this muscular theory. The 
 extent of a sweep of the arm does not depend mere- 
 ly on the amount of force put forth ; nor does it de- 
 pend solely on the continuance of the effort : it de- 
 pends also on the proportionate length of the two 
 arms of the lever on which the muscle operates. 
 For instance, the biceps muscle of the arm is inserted 
 an inch below the elbow-joint, whilst the distance 
 from the point of insertion to the end of the limb 
 may be sixteen inches. When the muscle contracts
 
 144 BODY. 
 
 to a cert a in extent, the rapidity of the movement at 
 the extremity will be sixteen times as great as it 
 would have been if the insertion had been at the 
 extremity; and, on the other hand, the force em- 
 ployed by the muscle has been sixteen times as great 
 as would have been required if the insertion had 
 been at the extremity. A. large amount of force is 
 thus expended in order to secure the great advantage 
 of rapidity of movement. It is clear, therefore, that 
 neither the intensity nor the extent of contraction 
 can give us the amount of motion in the part on 
 which the muscle operates ; and, that while the mus- 
 cular sense may inform us of the intensity, and ex- 
 tent of the intensity, and extent of the contraction 
 of the fibres of a muscle, it can give us no information 
 of the extent of the movement of our limbs, till 
 after long experience applied to each limb. " It is 
 doubtful," says Dr. Kirkes (Phys., p. 646), "how far 
 the extent of muscular movement is obtained from 
 sensations in the muscles themselves. The sensation 
 of movement attending the motions of the hand is 
 very slight ; and persons who do not know that the 
 action of particular muscles is necessary for the pro- 
 duction of given movements, do not suspect that the 
 movement of the fingers, for example, depends on 
 action in the forearm." Mr. Abbot has pressed some 
 of the difficulties (Sight and Touch, p. 70): "Let us 
 suppose a blind man trying to get the notion of dis- 
 tance from the motion of his hand. He finds a cei- 
 tain sweep of the hand brings it into contact with a
 
 BODY. 145 
 
 desk ; the distance of which, therefore, is represented 
 by that effort. But it requires a greater effort to 
 reach the eyes or the nose; and distance being 
 = locomotive effort, it is demonstrated that the nose 
 extends beyond the desk. The top of the head must 
 be conceived as more remote, and the back farthest 
 of all. In general, when we refer distances to the 
 eye, as we habitually do, objects four inches from the 
 eye must appear farther from us than those at 
 twelve. This is another novelty. But again, since 
 the hand moves in curves, and cannot without con- 
 siderable effort be made to move in a straight line, 
 it is also demonstrated that an epicycloid is shorter 
 than a right line between the same points." 
 
 But, after all, the question is to be decided by 
 psychological rather than physiological considera- 
 tions. The phenomenon to be explained is our idea 
 of extension, and consciousness will require to be 
 consulted. The theory was started by Brown, and 
 Hamilton had thus examined it (Append., Reid's 
 Works, p. 8G9) : " The notion of Time or succession 
 being supposed, that of longitudinal extension is 
 given in the succession of feelings which accompanies 
 the gradual contraction of a muscle ; the notion of 
 this succession constitutes ij) so facto the notion of a 
 certain length ; and the notion of this length " 
 (he quietly takes for granted) " is the notion of 
 longitudinal extension sought. The paralogism 
 here is transparent. Length is an ambiguous 
 
 term ; and it is length in space, extensive length, 
 10
 
 146 BODY. 
 
 and not length in time protensive, whose notion it is 
 the problem to solve." Mr. Mill (p. 227) quotes this 
 language, and tries to avoid the argument by urging 
 that the " assertion of Brown, and of all who hold 
 the Psychological theory, is that the notion of length 
 in space, not being in our consciousness originally, is 
 constructed by the mind's laws out of the notion of 
 length in time. The argument is not, as Sir William 
 Hamilton fancied, a fallacious confusion between two 
 different meanings of the word length, but an iden- 
 tification of them as one." This statement is cer- 
 tainly sufficiently clear, but it crowns the absurdity. 
 " When we say that there is a space between A and 
 B, we mean that some amount of these muscular 
 sensations must intervene ; and when we say the 
 space is greater or less, we mean that the series of 
 sensation (amount of muscular effort being given) is 
 longer or shorter." "Now this, which is unques- 
 tionably the mode in which we become aware of sen- 
 sation, is considered by the psychologists in question 
 to he extension." I need not repeat that what is here 
 represented as unquestionable, has been questioned 
 physiologically. But we are now discussing the 
 psychological question. 
 
 We have here three different phenomena, — con- 
 sciousness being the witness. We have — (1.) Series 
 of Muscular Sensations; (2.) Length of Time; (3.) 
 Length of Space. These three may have relations 
 one to another, but they are surely diverse from one 
 another. Mr. Mill explains that he does not draw
 
 BODY. 147 
 
 the one from the other, which would be preposterous 
 enough, but he declares them identical, which is ab- 
 surd in the extreme. It matches the doctrine of 
 Hegel, justly regarded as the reductio ad dbsurdum 
 of his whole philosophy, that all things are one. 
 Hegel lessened the absurdity of this statement by 
 another, that all things are different ; but Mr. Mill has 
 no such explanation to offer, for he declares musular 
 sensations, time, and space to be identical, without 
 a difference. Mr. Mill gives a scanty enough account 
 of the faculties of the mind, but he acknowledges 
 that we possess a power of discerning differences. 
 If we can trust our capacities at all, they declare 
 that the three things under consideration are as 
 different as any one thing can be from any other. 
 
 A series of muscular sensations and length of time 
 are surely different. They are different in them- 
 selves, and we can conceive an animated being, say a 
 lobster, to have a succession of sensations, and yet 
 no idea of time. Again, series of muscular sensations 
 and extension are not the same. The series of feel- 
 ings excited as I pass my hand over a table is not 
 the same as the yard square which is the size of the 
 table. Curious consequences would seem to follow 
 from this doctrine of identity. If, in the next at- 
 tempt with the same series of sensations, my hand 
 passed over a table two yards long, tlie theory would 
 identify the time with two yards, as before it did 
 with one : and as Mr. Mill admits the law of identity 
 (see w.), or, that things which are identical with the
 
 118 BODY. 
 
 same thing are identical with one another, it would 
 make one yard, which is the same with a series of 
 sensations, identical with two yards, which is iden- 
 tical with the same series of sensations. To represent 
 this otherwise. The length of time taken by us to 
 travel between London and Paris does not merely 
 help us (as every one admits) to estimate the length 
 of way when we have an idea of the rate at which 
 we are travelling (as the thermometer measures heat 
 for us), but is the very same with the length of the 
 way ; and as we travel it in a longer or shorter time, 
 or with more or fewer sensations, so is the length of 
 way actually longer or shorter at different times. 
 If we draw back from such consequences by appeal- 
 ing to a different measure, would not this show that 
 we had unfortunately taken the wrong rule ? But, 
 after all, I will not positively affirm that such con- 
 sequences follow, for the doctrine is one that baffles 
 all reasoning because it sets aside the first premises 
 of reasoning. Mr. Abbot says very properly, " In- 
 deed the obvious differences between the two ideas 
 are so great, that a philosopher who has neglected 
 them can scarcely be convinced by more abstruse 
 considerations. Thus, muscular effort has degrees, — 
 its parts are not equal ; extension does not admit of 
 degrees, — its parts are equal. Extension has three 
 dimensions, muscular effort only one. The parts of 
 extension are co-existent ; those of muscular effort 
 are successive." Finally, length of time and length 
 of space are not the same. As well might we iden-
 
 BODY. 149 
 
 tify colors with smells, sounds with shapes, sweet 
 with sour, light with darkness, love with hatred, 
 virtue with vice, Mr. Mill with Sir William Hamilton, 
 as identify extension with duration. 
 
 Mr. Mill's attempt to get support to his hypothesis 
 from the sense of sight is, if possible, still more un- 
 successful. He is obliged to suppose that in vision 
 we have originally only a sensation of color, and 
 that the idea of an extended surface is given by, or 
 rather is identical with, the time occupied by the 
 muscular sensations as we move the eye. Sir Wil- 
 liam Hamilton, in reviewing Berkeley, had noticed 
 the doctrine that the eye gives us only color, and his 
 criticism has commonly been regarded as amounting 
 almost to a demonstration : " All parties are, of 
 course, at one in regard to the fact that we see color. 
 Those who hold that we see extension, admit that 
 we see it only as colored ; and those who deny us 
 any vision of extension make color the exclusive ob- 
 ject of sight. In regard to this first position all are 
 therefore agreed. Nor are they less harmonious in 
 reference to the second ; that the power of perceiv- 
 ing color involves the power of perceiving the differ- 
 ences of colors. By sight we, therefore, perceive 
 color, and discriminate one color, that is, one colored 
 body, — one sensation of color, from another. This 
 is admitted. A third position will also be denied by 
 none, that the colors discriminated in vision are, or 
 may be, placed side by side in immediate juxtaposi- 
 tion ; or one may limit another by being superin-
 
 150 BODY. 
 
 duced partially over it. A fourth position is equally 
 indisputable ; that the contrasted colors, thus bound- 
 ing each other, will form by their meeting a visible 
 line, and that, if the superinduced color be sur- 
 rounded by the other, this line will return upon it- 
 self, and thus constitute the outline of a visible 
 figure. These four positions command a peremptory 
 assent ; they are all self-evident. But their admis- 
 sion at once explodes the paradox under discussion " 
 (that extension cannot be cognized by sight alone). 
 " And thus : A line is extension in one dimension, — 
 length ; a figure is extension in two, — length and 
 breadth. Therefore the vision of a line is a vision 
 of extension in length ; the vision of a figure, the 
 vision of extension in length and breadth." {Mvt&ph. 
 vol. ii. p. 167.) 
 
 Mr. Mill acknowledges, " I cannot make the answer 
 to this argument as thorough and conclusive as I 
 could wish." (p. 239.) His attempts to lessen its 
 force are exceedingly weak and palpably insufficient. 
 He calls attention to the circumstance that the eye 
 - does not cognize visible figure by means of color 
 alone, but by all those motions and modifications of 
 the muscles connected with the eye, which have so 
 great a share in giving us our acquired perceptions 
 of sight." Be it so, the demonstration remains un- 
 touched, that we take in figure when we take in 
 color. He says, that an eye immovably fixed " gives 
 a full and clear vision of but a small portion of 
 space." The admission is sufficient for our purpose.
 
 BODY. 151 
 
 He throws us once more on Mr. Bain, who tells us, 
 " When we look at a circle, say one-tenth of an inch 
 in diameter, the eye can take in the whole of it with- 
 out movement." The tenth of an inch is as good 
 as a whole inch, or a foot, or a yard. In the tenth 
 of an inch is extension with a boundary, and may 
 be a measure to aid us in ascertaining the extent we 
 can take in by the sweep of the eyes. Mr. Mill ad- 
 mits " a rudimentary conception must be allowed ; 
 for it is evident that even without moving the eye 
 we are capable of having two sensations of color at 
 once, and that the boundary which separates the 
 colors must give some specific affection of sight," 
 He would lessen the significance of this admission in 
 a very unworthy manner : " But to confer on these 
 discriminative impressions the name which denotes 
 our matured and perfected cognition of extension, 
 or even to assume that they have anything in com- 
 mon with it, seems to be going beyond evidence." 
 No one maintains that our primary vision of a sur- 
 face by the eye comes up to our perfected cognition 
 of extension ; still it is a surface, and it has a bound- 
 ary. and therefore it has something in common with 
 it. Mr. Bain tells us, " We may still, however, see 
 very strong grounds for maintaining the presence of 
 a muscular element, even in this instance." !><■ it 
 so ; the demonstration of Hamilton holds good, that 
 in the two colors in this space, whether with or with- 
 out the aid of the muscles, we have lines and spaces. 
 But he adds, " In the second place, the essential im-
 
 152 BODY. 
 
 port of visible form is something not attainable 
 without the experience of moving the eye. If we 
 looked at a little round spot, we should know an 
 optical difference between it and a triangular spot ; 
 and we should recognize it as identical with another 
 round spot," And then, subjecting the fact to his 
 theory instead of forming his theory from the facts, 
 he tells us, " We mean by a round form something 
 which would take a given sweep of the eye to com- 
 prehend it." I suppose this is what he means by the 
 import of form, that it is the time spent in muscular 
 action (!), which I rather think might be the same 
 for a square, or a triangle, or an oval, of a certain 
 size, as for a circle. I really cannot understand how 
 we should optically know the difference of the figures, 
 unless we perceived them as figures. In spite of all 
 these perverted attempts at the resolution of them 
 into something else, there still remains the surface 
 and the boundary perceived by the eye. 
 
 Failing utterly in the psychological analysis, Mr. 
 Bain and Mr. Mill (p. 232) fall back on a statement 
 of Platner, which Sir William Hamilton had copied 
 into his Lectures without knowing what to make of 
 it. "In regard to the visionless representation of 
 space or extension, the attentive observation of a 
 person born blind, which I formerly instituted in the 
 year 1785, and again in relation to the point in ques- 
 tion, have continued for three whole weeks, — this 
 observation, I say, has convinced me that the sense 
 of touch by itself is altogether incompetent to afford
 
 BODY. 153 
 
 us the representation of extension and space, and is 
 not even cognizant of local exteriority ; in a word, 
 that a man deprived of sight has absolutely no per- 
 ception of an outer world beyond the existence of 
 something effective, different from his own feeling of 
 passivity, and in general only of the numerical diver- 
 sity, — shall I say of impressions or of things ? In 
 fact, to those born blind, time serves instead of space. 
 Vicinity and distance means in their mouths nothing 
 more than the shorter or longer time, the smaller or 
 greater number of feelings which they find necessary 
 to attain from some one feeling to another. That a 
 person blind from birth employs the language of 
 vision, — that may occasion considerable error ; and 
 did, indeed, at the commencement of my observa- 
 tions, lead me wrong ; but, in point of fact, he knows 
 nothing of things as existing out of each other ; and 
 (this in particular I have very clearly remarked) if 
 objects, and the parts of his body touched by them, 
 did not make different kinds of impressions on his 
 nerves of sensation, he would take everything ex- 
 ternal for one and the same. In his own body he 
 absolutely did not discriminate head and foot at all 
 by their distance, but merely by the difference of 
 the feelings (and his perception of such differences 
 was incredibly fine) which he experienced from the 
 one and from the other, and, moreover, through time. 
 In like manner, in external bodies, he distinguished 
 their figure merely by the varieties of impressed 
 feelings ; inasmuch, for example, as the cube by its
 
 154 BODY. 
 
 angles affected his feelings differently from the 
 sphere." 
 
 Let it be observed of this account, that it is largely 
 theoretical, by one who believed with Kant, that 
 there were a priori forms of space and time in the 
 mind, and that these were brought forth empirically 
 only by the sense of sight. Platner does not give 
 us the facts to enable us to judge for ourselves ; he 
 favors us only with his conclusions. His observations 
 carry us as far back as 1785, when the distinction 
 between touch-proper and the muscular sense was 
 not established. Later physiological research has 
 shown that, in the case of the blind, as in all others, 
 touch-proper makes us localize the affections of our 
 bodily frame, and that the muscular sense gives us 
 " something effective, different from our feeling of 
 passivity : " we may add, different from our felt 
 bodily frame. It has been proven, by later and fully 
 detailed researches, that those born blind know their 
 own body as extended by the common sensations of 
 feeling, and know extra-organic objects by the resist- 
 ance offered to their muscular efforts. Even Mr. 
 Mill is obliged to modify and explain Platner's state- 
 ment (p. 233): — "But Platner, though unintention- 
 ally, puts a false color on the matter when he says 
 that his patient had no perception of extension ; he 
 had conceptions of extension after his own manner ; " 
 in fact, " all that is meant by persons who see." 
 "Without this explanation the statement of Platner 
 would be fatal to the theory of Mill, who makes us
 
 BODY. 155 
 
 get our knowledge of extension from the muscular 
 feelings, and not as Platner, whose avowed aim is to 
 get it from sight. With this explanation it can help 
 neither side, for it puts those who see in the same 
 position as the blind, and those who see will be ad- 
 mitted by all to have "a perception of an outer 
 world " by the sense of touch. I believe that Plat- 
 ner may be right when he says that " local exterior- 
 ity," that is, objects out of the body, may not be 
 given by touch-proper or feeling ; but this is certainly 
 given by the muscular sense in the case of the blind, 
 as in that of the seeing. When he speaks of time 
 serving instead of space to those born blind, and 
 that vicinity and distance means only shorter or 
 longer time, or the smaller or greater number of 
 feelings which they find necessary to attain from 
 some one feeling to another, I believe he was led 
 astray by not distinguishing between our apprehen- 
 sion of space and the measure of space. The idea 
 of members of the body localized is given most 
 probably by all the senses. But the actual measure- 
 ment of space is always a subsequent process, im- 
 plying comparison and a standard. I believe that 
 in all of us the succession of our feelings, of our 
 muscular feelings, but also of our mental ideas and 
 feelings as well, is one means of helping us to 
 measure (not only time, but) space ; we measure it 
 in a loose way, by the feelings we have experienced 
 in passing over it in travelling, or by a member of 
 our body. Those born blind must be specially de-
 
 156 BODY. 
 
 pendent on such a measure. Those who see have a 
 natural measure provided in the surface which falls 
 under the perception of the eye. Those born blind 
 have such a measure in the surface of the body given 
 by touch, and in the effort of the locomotive energy 
 reported by the muscular sense. We shall see in 
 next chapter that a very different account from that 
 of Platner is given by later German physiologists. 1 
 
 As the result of these discussions, it appears that 
 we have ideas and convictions of externality, of 
 resistance to the energy of self, and of extension, 
 that cannot be resolved into any elements which do 
 not imply them. But do these subjective apprehen- 
 sions and beliefs imply corresponding objective real- 
 ities ? This is the old question of metaphysics. To 
 treat it historically, logically, and critically would 
 
 1 In order to be able to form an in- of each. When their head, and their 
 telligent opinion on these subjects, I legs, and their arms were pricked ex- 
 put myself in communication with the actly alike, they at once showed us the 
 Rev. J. Kinghan, who for twenty seat of sensation, and knew the points 
 years has been connected with the In- to be out of each other. I moved 
 stitution for the Blind in Belfast, first their hand first over a book seven 
 as assistant, and now as Principal, inches long, and then over a desk four- 
 He declares that he has never found teen inches long, occupying the same 
 anything, in all his teaching of the time with each process, and they at 
 blind, or intercourse with them, to con- once declared that the latter was much 
 firm Platner's statement. Those longer than the former. We allowed 
 born blind cannot have the visual idea a boy to feel round a room with which 
 of space, but thev have, he says, a he was unacquainted, and he at once 
 very clear notion of figure and dis- declared its shape. One of these 
 tance got directly from the sense of children was a girl of the age of eight, 
 touch. With his aid I have experi- just entered the Institution, so igno- 
 mented with very young children born rant that she did not know the meaning 
 blind. I put two small pieces of wood, of angle or corner or point, calling the 
 one triangular and the other square, corners of the figures " little heads " 
 under the palm of the hand, and with- She said the square had two little 
 out being allowed to move the hand heads and two little heads, but was 
 over it, they at once told us the shape not sure that two and two make four.
 
 BODY. 157 
 
 require a separate volume. Fortunately it is not 
 necessary here to enter upon the wide question. 
 Mr. Mill grants that there is an assurance which is 
 " a test to which we may bring all our convictions " 
 (see x.), and that " we may be sure of what we see 
 as well as what we feel " (see fi). Following these 
 admitted principles, I do not see that Mr. Mill can 
 object to the reality of an extended world, provided 
 always that it be shown that our ideas as to exter- 
 nality and extension cannot be resolved into simpler 
 elements. The conviction we entertain as to an ex- 
 ternal world is of the nature of a primitive percep- 
 tion, and not a derivative idea. We perceive objects 
 out of ourselves resisting us and extended. This 
 perception, like that of consciousness, is self-evident : 
 we seem to look at once on the object. It is also 
 necessary : no doubt we can imagine it to be other- 
 wise, but we cannot be made to judge or believe 
 that our hand is not an extended object. It is uni- 
 versal : all men entertain it and act upon it. Inge- 
 nious objections may be urged against all this, but 
 they are such as are advanced not only against all 
 truth, but against all inquiry, and proceed upon a 
 universal scepticism, which Mr. Mill, who professes to 
 be a lover of truth, does not avow. 
 
 These same considerations justify us in looking 
 upon body as a substance. It will be remembered 
 that I do not stand up for an unknown substratum 
 beneath the known thing. Whatever is known as 
 existing, as acting, and having permanence, I regard
 
 158 BODY. 
 
 as a substance. Mind is a substance, as it can be so 
 characterized. But we have seen that we know 
 body as an existence, in operation, and with, as Mr. 
 Mill allows, a permanence ; it is therefore a sub- 
 stance. It is vastly more than a " possibility ; " it 
 is an actuality. It is more than a possibility of 
 a sensations ; " it has an existence even as the sensa- 
 tions have ; and a body is known not only as giving 
 sensations, but as capable of acting on other bodies 
 in a variety of ways, which it is the office of physical 
 science to classify and to reduce to laws. By adher- 
 ing to these simple principles we are made to feel 
 that we are out of the region of phantoms and in 
 the land of realities.
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 THE PHYSIOLOGY OP THE SENSES. 
 
 THERE is an impression among many that Mr. 
 Mill's theory has the support of physiology, and 
 this is strengthened by the anatomical and physio- 
 logical details which constitute so large a portion of 
 Mr. Bain's work. But I cannot discover that either 
 has found a basis, or even a starting-point, for their 
 general theory of the mind, or for their particular 
 theory of the manner in which we reach the idea 
 of an extended world, in any ascertained phenomena 
 of our bodily frame. Their speculations receive 
 no aid from physiology, and must stand or fall by 
 their psychological merits or demerits. The phys- 
 iology of the senses is still in a very uncertain con- 
 dition, and, whatever it may do in ages to come, can 
 as yet throw little light on strictly mental action, 
 except, indeed, in the way of correcting premature 
 hypotheses. It may be profitable to look at some 
 of the later researches into the senses conducted by 
 eminent physiologists, especially in Germany. We 
 shall find that they give no sanction to the hypoth- 
 esis of Mr. Mill and Mr. Bain, and seem to favor a the- 
 ory of a very different character. In the sketch that 
 
 (159)
 
 160 THE rnYSIOLOGY OF THE SENSES. 
 
 follows, I have made free use of the great works on 
 physiology which have been published in our coun- 
 try, and still more particularly of the admirable his- 
 torical, critical, and expository summary by Wundt, 
 in his Beitrage zur TJieorie der Shine swahrnehmung 
 
 Toucn. 
 
 The scientific investigation of this sense may be 
 said to have commenced with the researches of J 
 Miiller and E. H. Weber. The general result reached 
 by Miiller is, that " every point in which a nerve- 
 fibre ends is represented in the sensorium as a space- 
 particle." ( Wundt, Theor. Sinneswahr.) There are 
 disputes as to how the general law should be stated, 
 but we have a fact here which has not been and 
 cannot be set aside. The nerves of touch proper, 
 setting out from the base of the brain, tend towards 
 the periphery of the body. They reach the skin 
 each at a determined point : there is a special aggre- 
 gation of these points in the mid-finger and the tip 
 of the tongue. Now, wherever the nerve terminates, 
 there the sensation is felt : thus, if we prick a nerve 
 which reaches the mid-finger, the pain is localized at 
 the point where the nerve terminates. If we stretch 
 or pinch the ulnar nerve, by pushing it from side to 
 side, or compressing it with the fingers, the shock is 
 felt in the parts to which its ultimate branchlets are 
 distributed, namely, in the palm and back of the 
 hand, and in the fourth and fifth fingers. " Accord-
 
 THE PHYSIOLOGY OF THE SENSES. 161 
 
 ing as the pressure is varied, the pricking sensation 
 is felt by turns in the fourth finger, in the fifth, in 
 the palm of the hand, or in the back of the hand j 
 and both on the palm and on the back of the hand 
 the situation of the pricking sensation is different, 
 according as the pressure on the nerve is varied ; 
 that is to say, according as different fibres or fasciculi 
 of fibres are more pressed upon than others. The 
 same will be found to be the case in irritating the 
 nerve in the upper arm." (Miiller's Physiology, by 
 Baly, p. 740.) So strong is this tendency to localize 
 the sensation at the extremities of the nerves, that 
 when an arm or leg is amputated the person has still 
 the feeling of the lost limb. Mliller has collected a 
 number of such cases. (lb., pp. 746, 747.) "A stu- 
 dent, named Schmidts, from Aix, had his arm am- 
 putated above the elbow thirteen years ago ; he has 
 never ceased to have sensations as if in the fingers. 
 I applied pressure to the nerves in the stump ; and 
 M. Schmidts immediately felt the whole arm, even 
 the fingers, as if asleep." " A toll-keeper in the 
 neighborhood of Halle, whose right arm had been 
 shattered by a cannon-ball in battle, above the elbow, 
 twenty years ago, and afterwards amputated, has 
 still, in 1838, at the time of changes of the weather, 
 distinct rheumatic pains, which seem to him to exist 
 in the whole arm ; and though removed long ago, 
 the lost part is at those times felt as if sensible to 
 draughts of air. This man also completely confirmed 
 
 our statement, that the sense of the integrity of the 
 n
 
 162 THE PHYSIOLOGY OJf THE SENSES. 
 
 limb was never lost." When there is a change made 
 artificially in the peripheral extremities of nerves, 
 the sensations are still felt as if in the original spots. 
 " When, in the restoration of a nose, a flap of skin is 
 turned down from the forehead and made to unite 
 with the stump of the nose, the new nose thus formed 
 has, as long as the isthmus of skin by which it main- 
 tains its original connections remains undivided, the 
 same sensations as if it were still on the forehead ; 
 in other words, when the nose is touched, the patient 
 feels the impression in the forehead. This is a fact 
 well known to surgeons, and was first observed by 
 Lisfranc." (lb., p. 748.) 
 
 No doubt it is possible to ascribe all this to ex- 
 perience and the association of ideas. We first, it is 
 said, find by observation that a certain sensation 
 originates in a particular part of the body, and the 
 same sensation ever after suggests the part. But the 
 facts, as a whole, w r ill not submit to this explanation. 
 It is difficult to see how the phenomena quoted can 
 be thus accounted for. For surely an experience of 
 thirteen or twenty years might have been sufficient 
 to change the associations acquired at an earlier date, 
 and to place the persons under the influence of new 
 ones, provided always that the original ones had not 
 been instinctive or native. In the case of the trans- 
 ference of the flap of skin, Miiller says, " When the 
 communication of the nervous fibres of the new nose 
 with those of the forehead is cut off by division of 
 the isthmus of skin, the sensations are of course no
 
 THE PHYSIOLOGY OF THE SENSES. 163 
 
 longer referred to the forehead; the sensibility of 
 the nose is at first absent, but is gradually developed." 
 This language implies that the old reference to the 
 forehead ceased in spite of the old association when 
 the isthmus was cut ; and that the new reference 
 to the nose was occasioned by the sensibility of the 
 nerve, according to the physiological law, which 
 makes us ascribe the sensation to the extremity of 
 the nerve. It is not easy to see how experience 
 could give us the ready localization of the sensation, 
 more particularly when the feeling is within the 
 body, and in a part which has never fallen under the 
 senses of touch or sight. It is hard to believe that 
 the instantaneous voluntary drawing back of a limb 
 when wounded, and the shrinking of the frame when 
 boiling liquid is poured down the throat, can proceed 
 from an application of an observed law as to the seat 
 of sensations. From a very early age, and long be- 
 fore they give any evidence of knowing distance 
 beyond their bodies, or having any other acquired 
 perceptions, children will indicate that they know at 
 least vaguely the seat of the pain felt by them; if 
 a child is wounded in the arm, it will not hold out 
 its foot. But the question seems to be set at rest by 
 a physiological fact, thus stated by Dr. Baly: — 
 " Professor Valentin (Tlepertor. far Anat. and Phy- 
 siol, 1836, p. 330) has observed, that individuals who 
 are the subjects of congenital imperfection, or ;il> 
 sence of the extremities, have, nevertheless, flic in- 
 ternal sensations of such limbs in their perfect state.
 
 1G4 THE rirYSIOLOGT OF the senses. 
 
 A girl aged nineteen years, in whom the metacarpal 
 bones of the left hand were very short, and all the 
 bones of the phalanges absent, — a row of imper- 
 fectly organized wart-like projections representing 
 the fingers, — assured M. Valentin that she had con- 
 stantly the internal sensation of a palm of the hand, 
 and five fingers on the left side as perfect as on the 
 right. When a ligature was placed round the stump, 
 she had the sensation of ' formication ' in the hand 
 and fingers; and pressure on the ulnar nerve gave 
 rise to the ordinary feeling of the third, fourth, and 
 fifth fingers being asleep, although these fingers did 
 not exist. The examination of three other indi- 
 viduals gave the same results." (lb., p. 747). 1 
 
 Muller maintains, that in this way we get a knowl- 
 edge of the greater number of the parts of our body, 
 and in all the dimensions of space ; and that when 
 our body comes into collision with another body, if 
 the shock be sufficiently strong, the sensation of our 
 body to a certain depth is awakened, and there 
 arises a sensation of the contusion in the whole 
 dimensions of the cube. He thus makes the knowl- 
 edge not only of the third dimension of space, but 
 of our own body, to depend on an original disposi- 
 tion (Anlage). He carries this doctrine so far as to 
 hold that as the nerves of all the senses are extended 
 over the frame, so there is a representation of space 
 
 1 Mr. Mill refers (p. 246) to a case was unable to localize the feeling. 
 
 given liim by Hamilton from Maine de The case is valueless, as evidently th6 
 
 Biran, of a person who had lost the functions of the nervous apparatus 
 
 power of the motor nerves, hut who, were deranged, 
 though still alive to the sense of pain,
 
 TEE PETSIOLOGT OF TEE SENSES. 165 
 
 given not only by touch and sight, but also by taste 
 and smell, — the sense of hearing alone not giving 
 us a perception of space, because it does not perceive 
 its special extension. "The first idea of a body 
 having extension, and occupying space, arises in our 
 mind from the sensation of our own corporeal ex- 
 tension. This consciousness of our own corporeal 
 existence is the standard by wilich we estimate in 
 our sense of touch the extension of all resisting 
 bodies." (Physiology, p. 1081.) Wundt says (p. 2), 
 "These views, if they are not always carried out 
 with such consistency, are in their essential funda- 
 mental positions still acknowledged at this day by 
 most physiologists." 
 
 It is interesting to notice that a like doctrine was 
 held on independent grounds by two of the greatest 
 psychologists of this century, — by M. Saisset in 
 France, and Sir William Hamilton in this country. 
 The former dwells on the localization of our sensa- 
 tions in their various organic seats. (See Art. " Sens" 
 in Diet des Sciences PJdlos.) The latter says that 
 " an extension is apprehended in the apprehension 
 of the reciprocal externality of all sensations," and 
 that " in the consciousness of sensations relatively 
 localized and reciprocally external, we have a veri- 
 table apprehension, and consequently an immediate 
 perception of the affected organism, as extended, di- 
 vided, figured," etc. ( App. Reid's Works, pp. 884, 885. ) ] 
 
 i It is interesting to find D. Stewart companied with a perception of tho 
 sayinp, "It is characteristical of all local situation of thek exciting causes." 
 sensations of touch, that tl>ey are ac- {Elan., vol. iii. p. 310.)
 
 166 THE PHYSIOLOGY OF THE SENSES. 
 
 I confess that I have a great partiality for this doc- 
 trine. Even the sense of hearing, if it does not 
 yield the extension of our frame, may give a direc- 
 tion to the sound heard in the ear. The conclusion 
 is the result of accurate physiological research, and 
 it seems to me to clear up most of the psychological 
 difficulties connected with the senses, and to favor a 
 metaphysical realism which enables us to stand up 
 for the veracity of our original sense-perceptions, 
 which are mainly of the body as affected. It sup- 
 poses that when the soul is roused into consciousness 
 by an affection of the nerves, it gives a direction and 
 a localization to its sensations, and as it feels simul- 
 taneously a number of sensations from different 
 members of the body, it feels them to be out of each 
 other, and related in respect of direction ; and as 
 sensations accumulate and succeed each other, it 
 gives a sensation, or rather perception, of our ca- 
 pacity of being affected at very different points of 
 the periphery, and consequently of a volume. When 
 in a tepid bath we have not only a pleasant sensa- 
 tion (which is all that Mr. Bain allows), we have a 
 feeling of the frame as affected over the whole sur- 
 face. But let not this statement be misunderstood. 
 No one means to affirm that we have as yet a repre- 
 sentation or image in the mind of the external con- 
 figuration of the body, and of its several parts, such 
 as we reach when we come to feel them with the 
 hand or see them in a mirror. This is a subsequent 
 attainment made by a gathered experience through
 
 THE PHYSIOLOGY OF THE SENSES. 167 
 
 the combination of various senses; and we are often 
 in perplexity from the difficulty of uniting the in- 
 tuitive with the acquired knowledge, as when we 
 know that the pain in toothache is in a certain direc- 
 tion, and yet are in doubts as to what tooth corre- 
 sponds externally to the internal localization. But 
 as the ground of the whole, we have a localized per- 
 ception of points, and of different points and direc- 
 tions, in our bodily frame, which, I may add, is felt 
 to be ours by the command which our efforts have 
 over it, and the sensations of which it is felt to be 
 the seat. Some parts of this general view seem to 
 me to be established by physiological arguments, and 
 the theory as a whole is vastly better fitted to meet 
 and account for our idea of extension than the base- 
 less hypothesis sanctioned by Mr. Mill. 
 
 The curious experimental researches of Weber 
 seem to confirm the general doctrine that Touch 
 Proper or Feeling is very specially, as the Germans 
 represent it, a space-giving organ. His experiments 
 were conducted by means of a pair of compasses 
 sheathed with cork, with which he touched the skin 
 while the eyes were closed, in order to determine 
 how close the points of the compasses might be 
 brought to each and still be felt as two bodies. The 
 distance between the points necessary to indicate 
 different sensations was found to vary in different 
 parts of the body, from one-half Parisian line on the 
 tip of the tongue to thirty Parisian lines on the back 
 of the body, thus showing the sensitiveness of the
 
 169 THE PHYSIOLOGY OF THE SENSES. 
 
 one part to be sixty times finer than that of the 
 other part The capability of discerning the differ- 
 ence of sensation is somewhat different in different 
 individuals, but it is said that their relative propor- 
 tion in different parts of the body remains tolerably 
 constant in the same individual. The researches 
 seem to imply that the sense of touch indicates to 
 us, in a way which cannot be the result of a gathered 
 experience, both points of space and intervals of 
 space, always within and not beyond the bodily 
 frame. The points must be perceived immediately, 
 and an interval or line between is either perceived 
 immediately, or is necessitated in mathematical 
 thought by the comparison of the different points. 
 
 Weber regards the skin as a sort of mosaic of 
 circles or compartments, w T hich in different positions 
 have different magnitudes and shapes, and that each 
 has its own capacity of sensation. The theory sug- 
 gested by Fick is thus stated by Dr. Carpenter : 
 " Each nerve-fibril breaks up into a pencil of fine 
 filaments at the periphery, which are distributed 
 over a certain space, perhaps on the average about 
 1.25 of an inch in diameter. An impression made 
 upon any one of these filaments conveys the same 
 sensation to the sensorium, providing no other nerve 
 be distributed to the same space ; but this hardly 
 ever occurs, and hence compound sensations arise by 
 which our perception of the precise spot of the skin 
 touched by a point is accurately determined. It is 
 obvious that the closer these ' sensory circles ' are,
 
 THE PHYSIOLOGY OF THE SENSES. 169 
 
 and the more intimately the branches of different 
 nerves are intercalated with one another, the greater 
 will be the sense of locality of that part ; or, in other 
 words, the greater will be the facility with which 
 minute differences in the precise spot touched will 
 be appreciated." [Hum. Phys., p. 611.) The subject 
 has been keenly discussed in Germany. According 
 to George, movement is the source of all objective 
 consciousness. If by objective consciousness is meant 
 not that of our bodily frame, but of something be- 
 yond, I believe the doctrine is correct. We discover 
 extra-organic objects by the resistance offered to our 
 movement. Fortlage ascribes our intuition of body 
 to the restraint laid on our impulse (Triebhemmung). 
 It is thus, no doubt, we know the existence of ob 
 jects beyond our bodies, but already in touch we 
 have an apprehension of our frames as extended. 
 Lotze has observed much, and speculated more on 
 this whole subject. He says that when two object 
 points come into perception through two excitations 
 of the nerves, the consciousness of their spatial near- 
 ness to one another is not given ; and he starts the 
 hypothesis that this is furnished by a third nerve- 
 process, which he calls "place indicators." Meissner 
 has sought to bring Lotze's hypothesis into unison 
 with physiological and anatomical researches. He 
 thinks he has discovered "touch-corpuscles," which 
 he represents as the actual touch-organs. These are 
 found specially in the hand and the foot, and they at 
 once give us bodies without us as objects, apart from
 
 170 THE PHYSIOLOGY OF THE SENSES. 
 
 the sensation of pressure. These researches and dis- 
 cussions all proceed on the idea that our knowledge 
 of an extended world is obtained not exclusively by 
 a sweep of the hand, but by some special provision 
 in the sense of touch proper or feeling. 
 
 The admitted conclusions are thus stated by 
 Wundt (pp. 64, 65): "With every single sensation 
 (Emjyfindung) is connected involuntarily the repre- 
 sentation of the place at which it occurs. As soon 
 as there are two contemporaneous sensations in the 
 perception ( Wahrnehmwig), there is thence given a 
 dim representation of the extent of the skin which 
 the impressions embrace, whereby the impressions 
 are immediately conceived as spatially separated. 
 But about the magnitude of their separation in space 
 nothing determinate can yet be declared, as that rep- 
 resentation is for this purpose altogether indistinct. 
 It is usually only when one is first led through an 
 internal or external impulse to resolve upon an esti- 
 mation by measure, that there is raised a clear image 
 of the entire parts of the body and of the points 
 touched, and thereby is first given the determinate 
 representation of the interspace which lies between 
 the impressions." He then explains, that, in regard 
 to the distance which is to be found between two 
 impressions, the soul, in that it perceives two different 
 sensations of place ( Ortsempfindungen), is compelled 
 to put an interspace between them, and to represent 
 this out of the like experience through sight or the 
 muscular sense.
 
 £HE PHYSIOLOGY OF THE SENSES. 171 
 
 Muscular Sense. 
 
 Sir Charles Bell established the great truth, that 
 the nerves of sensation differ from those of motion. 
 From his physiological researches, and the ingenious 
 psychological speculations of his contemporary, Dr. 
 Thomas Brown, has proceeded the very general ac- 
 knowledgment in this country of the existence ;f a 
 Muscular Sense to be distinguished from Touch 
 Proper. Physiologically the Muscular Sense consists 
 of a Motor nerve, under the control of the will, going 
 out from the brain and moving the muscle attached 
 to it, and of a Sensor nerve going back to the brain 
 and giving intimation of the motion. Psychologi- 
 cally this sense serves as important purposes as either 
 touch proper or sight. It may be doubted whether, 
 apart from this endowment, we should have a sense 
 or knowledge of any object beyond our bodily frame. 
 Feeling, or the skin-sense as it has been called, seems 
 to give us merely the periphery of our bodies ; and 
 when we become cognizant of an extra-organic ob- 
 ject, as when on pressing the palm of the hand on 
 a table we feel a surface, I believe there is a combi- 
 nation of the two senses of touch proper giving us a 
 sense of the surface of the hand, and of the muscular 
 sense giving a knowledge of an outward object re- 
 sisting this surface. " If we lay our hand upon a 
 table, we become conscious, on a little reflection, 
 that we do not feel the table, but merely that part 
 of our skin which the table touches." (Muller,
 
 17:2 THE mYSIOLOGY OF THE SENSES. 
 
 p. 1081.) Even as to the colored surface falling under 
 the eye, it is doubtful whether we should place it 
 certainly out and beyond our organism without the 
 concurrence of the muscular sense and a gathered 
 experience. The boy born blind, whose eye was 
 couched by Cheselden, said that objects at first 
 seemed " to touch his eyes as what he felt did his 
 skin." In a like case operated upon, and recorded 
 by Home, objects seemed at first to touch the eye. 
 The expressions are somewhat vague, but it is clear 
 that the objects were felt as having a close relation- 
 ship to the eye, and were not known as being at a 
 distance. It is certain that it is mainly and most 
 effectually (if not exclusively) by the muscular sense 
 that we obtain an apprehension, or rather knowledge, 
 of an object beyond our bodily frame, and indepen- 
 dent of it. Dr. Carpenter, with his usual sound judg- 
 ment, declares that it is probably on the sensations 
 communicated through this sense that " the idea of 
 the material world, as something external to our- 
 selves, chiefly rests; but that this idea is by no 
 means a logical deduction from our experience of 
 these sensations, being rather an instinctive or intui- 
 tive perception directly excited by them." (Hum. 
 Phys., p. 612.) 
 
 I cannot do better than quote once more from 
 Wimdt, who gives us the result of German research 
 (p. 427.) "The first acts of sense-perception are 
 grounded on the operation of the Muscular Sense 
 [that is, so far as objects beyond the body are con-
 
 THE PHYSIOLOGY OF THE SENSES. 173 
 
 cernecl]. When we move our members we come 
 upon external resistances. We observe that these 
 resistances sometimes give way before our pressure ; 
 but we find at the same time that this takes place 
 with very different degrees of facility, and that in 
 order to put different bodies in motion we must ap- 
 ply very different degrees of muscular force ; but to 
 every single degree of the contraction-force there 
 corresponds a determinate degree in intensity of the 
 muscular sensations. With these muscular sensa- 
 tions, the sensations of the skin which cover our 
 members of touch so continually mingle, that the 
 intensity of these touch-sensations goes parallel to 
 the intensity of the accompanying muscular sensa- 
 tions. We succeed in this way in connecting the 
 degree of intensity of the muscular sensations in a 
 necessary manner with the nature of the resistances 
 which set themselves against our movement." 
 
 Vision. 
 
 The eye is a more complicated structure than any 
 of the other organs of sense, and there are more dis- 
 putes as to the functions and operations of its parts 
 than in regard to those of any of the other senses. 
 On some points, however, there is a pretty general 
 agreement among the scientific, physiologists in 
 Germany, who have devoted so much attention to 
 the subject; and these are sufficient for our purpose, 
 being opposed to the hypothesis supported by Mr. 
 Mill and Mr. Bain.
 
 174 THE PHYSIOLOGY OF THE SENSES. 
 
 It seems to be admitted on all hands, that by the 
 c \ e we have immediately a perception of space in 
 two dimensions, or of a surface. In stating the 
 views of Miiller, Wundt says (p. 95), " We can per- 
 ceive spatial extension and the relation in position 
 of outward objects only so far as we have a spatial 
 sensation of our own retina and the relative position 
 of its single points. As the retina spreads itself in 
 a surface, the images of objects obtain upon it only 
 two dimensions. But this disadvantage, under which 
 sight labors as compared with feeling, is compensated 
 by the body's own movements, by means of which 
 we can view successively the one object from different 
 stand-points. As regards the sense of sight, the per- 
 ception (Anschauung) of the third dimension is 
 through a judgment, and so Miiller calls it a repre- 
 sentation ( VorsteUung), while he designates the in- 
 tuition of surface as a sensation." "The grand 
 principle of the theory of Miiller, that the percep- 
 tion of a surface is a sensation, and that the percep- 
 tion of depth on the other hand is a representation 
 formed through judgment, is to this day the univer- 
 sally received one, and the researches remain settled, 
 although this department since that time has been 
 enriched by a great many new facts, and although 
 this principle, so far as certain matters of fact are 
 concerned, does not seem to be sufficient." The in- 
 sufficiency does not relate to the original discern- 
 ment of a surface by the eye, which seems to be ac- 
 knowledged on all hands, but to the provision in the
 
 THE PHYSIOLOGY OF THE SENSES. 175 
 
 eye itself for discovering the three dimensions of 
 space. " The perception of superficial space, which 
 goes before all representations of space, and makes 
 the same possible, is bound up in the sense of sight 
 so intimately with the pure sensation, that there ia 
 nowhere in the consciousness any act lying in the 
 middle between the sensation and its perception in 
 the form of space." (p. 145.) It should be added 
 that Waitz and Lotze are opposed as to whether the 
 chief importance should be attached to the sensible 
 or motor factors : Waitz ascribing the greater value 
 to the sensation ; and Lotze, to the motor element. 
 Wundt (p. 104) says that all observation shows that 
 both exercise an influence at the same time. 
 
 So much for our perception of a superficies by the 
 eye. But there is a provision in the organ of sight 
 for giving us space in three dimensions, and for dis- 
 covering the distance of objects. This can be clone 
 even by the single eye, not immediately with every 
 perception, as may be done by the two eyes, but by 
 a succession of perceptions. This is accomplished in 
 the case of a single eye by its power of accommo- 
 dating itself to different distances. Much attention 
 has been given of late years to the nature of the 
 accommodation-mechanism by Helmholtz and others. 
 The accommodation seems originally to be involun- 
 tary and unconscious, but is brought under our notice 
 by the attached muscular feeling. So far as this 
 means is concerned, the determination of distance 
 by one eye is confined within very narrow limits;
 
 176 THE PHYSIOLOGY OF THE SENSES. 
 
 but there is a great help to it in the movement of 
 the ball of the eye, of which intimation is given by 
 the attached muscles. But by far the most important 
 provision in the visual organ for discovering the 
 third dimension of space is to be found in binocular 
 vision, that is, in the convergence of the axis, accord- 
 ing as the objects are near, and in the different as- 
 pect of the object falling under each eye. Wundt 
 again supplies us with an excellent summary : " The 
 measurements which we are able to bring out by 
 means of our senses which give us the intuition of 
 space show this remarkable difference between the 
 two, that the eye as the sense operating in the dis- 
 tance measures space according to all the four dimen- 
 sions ; whereas sensations by the skin, which are 
 effected only by the immediate contact of the 
 outward object with the surface of the skin, 
 are all disposed only over one surface. The per- 
 ception of the third dimension of space through 
 the sense of sight is, however, so far as can be proven 
 by experience, a mediate one derived from the move- 
 ments of the muscles of the eye (partly of the ex- 
 ternal, which move the apple of the eye ; partly of 
 the internal, which regulate the accommodation- 
 mechanism). These measurements of distance de- 
 pend on nothing but the estimation of the muscular 
 sensations accompanying the movements, and there- 
 fore the perception is accomplished only by means 
 of a lengthened experience and practice, and hence 
 arise the great uncertainty and incompleteness of
 
 THE PHYSIOLOGY OF THE SENSES. 177 
 
 all measurements of that kind. Originally all spatial 
 sense-intuitions are of surfaces ; depth for the eye 
 comes forth gradually out of the surface ; the sense 
 ever penetrates deeper and deeper into boundless 
 space, its circle of vision widening as the visual circle 
 of its experience extends." (p. 29.) 
 
 That the eye is immediately cognizant of direction 
 and superficial figure is proven by the reported 
 cases of persons born blind, but who acquired eye- 
 sight by means of a surgical operation. The best 
 reported case is that of Dr. Franz of Leipzig (Phil. 
 Trans, of Roy. Soc. 1841), and I shall quote from it 
 at considerable length. The youth had been born 
 blind, and was seventeen years of age when the ex- 
 periment was wrought which gave him the use of 
 one eye. When the eye was sufficiently restored to 
 bear the light, " a sheet of paper on which two strong 
 black lines had been drawn, the one horizontal, the 
 other vertical, was placed before him at the distance 
 of about three feet. He was now allowed to open 
 the eye, and after attentive examination he called 
 the lines by their right denominations." " The out- 
 line in black of a square, six inches in diameter, 
 within which a circle had been drawn, and within 
 the latter a triangle, was, after careful examination, 
 recognized and correctly described by him." " At 
 the distance of three feet, and on a level with the 
 eye, a solid cube and a sphere, each of four inches 
 diameter, were placed before him." "After atten- 
 tively examining these bodies, he said he saw a quad- 
 
 12
 
 178 THE PHYSIOLOGY OF THE SENSES. 
 
 rangular and a circular figure, and after some con« 
 sid oration be pronounced the one a square and the 
 other a disc. His eye being then closed, the cube 
 was taken away and a disc of equal size substituted 
 and placed next to the sphere. On again opening 
 his eye he observed no difference in these objects, 
 but regarded them both as discs. The solid cube 
 was now r placed in a somewhat oblique position be- 
 fore the eye, and close beside it a figure cut out of 
 pasteboard, representing a plane outline prospect of 
 the cube when in this position. Both objects he 
 took to be something like flat quadrates. A pyramid 
 placed before him with one of its sides towards his 
 eye he saw as a plain triangle. This object was now 
 turned a little so as to present two of its sides to 
 view, but rather more of one side than of the other : 
 after considering and examining it for a long time, 
 he said that this was a very extraordinary figure ; 
 it was neither a triangle, nor a quadrangle, nor a 
 circle ; he had no idea of it, and could not describe 
 it ; 'in fact,' said he, ' I must give it up.' On the con- 
 clusion of these experiments, I asked him to describe 
 the sensations the objects had produced ; whereupon 
 he said, that immediately on opening his eye he had 
 discovered a difference in the two objects, the cube 
 and the sphere, placed before him, and perceived 
 that they were not drawings ; but that he had not 
 been able to form from them the idea of a square 
 and a disc until he perceived a sensation of what he 
 saw in the points of his fingers, as if he really touched
 
 THE PHYSIOLOGY OF THE SENSES. 179 
 
 the objects. When I gave the three bodies (the 
 sphere, cube, and pyramid) into his hand, he was 
 much surprised he had not recognized them as such 
 by sight, as he was well acquainted with mathemat- 
 ical figures by his touch." These observations show 
 that the eye takes in surface and superficial figure 
 at once, but cannot immediately discern solidity. If 
 the persons have the use of both eyes, they would 
 observe the difference between a disc and a solid, 
 but they would not be able to say, till they feel it, 
 that the latter is a solid. It requires to be added, 
 that persons who have their sight thus given them 
 require observation and thought to reconcile the in- 
 formation they had got from touch with that which 
 they are now receiving from sight, — just as persons 
 who have learned two languages, say German and 
 French, require practice to enable them readily to 
 translate the one into the other. In the case reported 
 by Cheselden, the boy, " upon being told what things 
 were whose form he before knew from feeling, said 
 he would carefully observe that he might know them 
 again." Dr. Carpenter tells us of a boy of four years 
 old, upon whom the operation for congenital cataract 
 had been very successfully performed, that " he con- 
 tinued to find his way about his father's house rather 
 by feeling with his hands, as he had been formerly 
 accustomed to do, than by his newly acquired sense 
 of sight, being evidently perplexed rather than as- 
 sisted by the sensations which he had derived through 
 it. But when learning a new locality, he employed
 
 180 THE rUYSIOLOGY OF THE SENSES. 
 
 his sight, and evidently perceived the increase of 
 facility which he derived from it." [Man. of Phys. 
 p. 593.) 
 
 All the recorded cases show that there is also a 
 process of reasoning and experience in the discovery 
 of distance. Mr. Abbot (p. 150) gives the following 
 account of the observations of Trinchinetti : — "He 
 operated at the same time on two patients (brother 
 and sister), eleven and ten years old respectively. 
 The same day, having caused the boy to examine an 
 orange, he placed it about one metre from him, and 
 bade him try to take it. The boy brought his hand 
 close to his eye [quasi a contatto del suo occhio), and 
 closing his fist, found it empty, to his great surprise. 
 He then tried again a f( vV inches from his eye, and 
 at last, in this tentative way, succeeded in taking the 
 orange. When the same experiment was tried with 
 the girl, she also at first attempted to grasp the 
 orange with her hand very near the eye (collet mano 
 assai vici?ia all' occhio), then, perceiving her error, 
 stretched out her forefinger and pushed it in a 
 straight line slowly until she reached the object," 
 Other patients have been observed (by Janin and 
 Duval) to move their hands in search of objects in 
 straight lines from the eye. Trinchinetti "regards 
 these observations as indicating a belief that visible 
 objects were in actual contact with the eye." It is 
 clear that the eye gives direction to the object, but 
 does not apprehend distance immediately. Franz 
 says of his patient, that " if he wished to form an
 
 THE PHYSIOLOGY OF THE SENSES. 181 
 
 estimate of " the distance of objects from his own 
 person, or of two objects from each other, without 
 moving from his place, he examined the objects from 
 different points of view by turning his head to the 
 right and to the left." 
 
 The German physiologists have paid great atten- 
 tion to the case of persons born blind, and the con- 
 clusions reached do not correspond with those of 
 Platner. "As respects persons born blind," says 
 "YVundt (p. 60), " who are not supported by the accom- 
 panying and preceding experience of the sense of 
 sight, the perception of the sensation of place takes 
 place after a much more tedious and laborious man- 
 ner. The blind man receives the representation of 
 his body wholly through h's own touch. While he 
 touches with the finger or hand different parts of 
 his body, there arise in the muscles of the arm just 
 as many different muscular feelings. These become 
 to him a measure of different distances. Thus he 
 receives from the mutual spatial position of single 
 points a representation of his skin-surface, and while 
 at the same time, at every point, the Quale of the 
 sensation corresponding to the same imprints itself, 
 he is placed in a position also to declare the place 
 where are to be found the impressions which work 
 from without." 
 
 This is more fully explained (p. 31) : "The repre- 
 sentation of the third dimension can also be awakened 
 in the person born blind, but this only through a 
 long series of conclusions, in which the changing
 
 L82 TUK PHYSIOLOGY OF THE SENSES. 
 
 impressions of the sense of feeling, and the muscular 
 sensations of the entire self-moving body, work to- 
 gether. As the person seeing remains in his place, 
 and lets the objects in a manner come towards him, 
 while he, at his will, opens his eyes to the far or the 
 near ; so must the blind person, when he would dis- 
 cover the outer world, go and seek out the objects 
 which remain to him in unchangeable rest." " The 
 person seeing accommodates only his eye, the blind 
 man his whole body, to the objects." 
 
 It does not concern us in this discussion to inquire 
 what truth there is in the Berkeleyan theory of 
 vision. If the above conclusions be trustworthy, as 
 I believe they are, they show it can be accepted only 
 with important modifications. Berkeley was posi- 
 tively mistaken in arguing that the eye is percipient 
 only of color, and not of extension. He was further 
 guilty of an oversight in not attending to the very 
 special provision in the organs of vision for enabling 
 us, always by experience, to discover the third dimen 
 sion of space, and distance. It is firmly established 
 that a surface is ever presented to the eye, and is 
 perceived immediately; and this surface supplies a 
 measure to us in all our other visual perceptions. It 
 is now proven that there is a beautiful teleological 
 apparatus in each eye, and still more in the rela- 
 tive position of the two eyes, whereby we can dis- 
 cover the solidity and estimate the distances of 
 bodies. 1 
 
 1 Thus far there is truth in Abbot's Sight and Touch,
 
 THE PHYSIOLOGY OF THE SENSES. 183 
 
 As the result of this criticism, conducted on the 
 Psychological Method, we find ourselves entitled to 
 adhere to a certain body of intuitive truth respecting 
 both mind and matter. Instead of looking on mind 
 as a mere " series of feelings," we apprehend it as 
 an abiding existence, with various properties which 
 evolve themselves from day to day in our experience. 
 Instead of regarding matter as a " possibility," we 
 contemplate it as having a permanent being, with 
 diverse forms of activity, which are ever manifesting 
 themselves to our senses. On this intuitive truth 
 we build others by a gathered observation, and as 
 we do so we feel that they are laid on a foundation 
 which cannot be shaken. 
 
 Some object to this realistic doctrine, whether as 
 held by the world at large or by professed metaphy- 
 sicians, that it is contradicted by the established 
 truths of modern physical science, which shows that 
 light and heat are not substances, but vibrations in 
 an ether, and that all the other physical forces are 
 correlated with them. But these discoveries of recent 
 science are all consistent with a doctrine of natural 
 realism, when the same is properly expounded. Our 
 senses afford us primarily a knowledge of the affec- 
 tions of our bodily frame, these affections being al- 
 ways localized. Such information is given us by 
 touch, by sight, and probably also by smell, taste, 
 and hearing. Then, by the muscular sense, we conic 
 to know objects resisting the movement of our local- 
 ized organs, and external to these organs. In these
 
 184 tue rnrsiOLOGY of the senses. 
 
 operations, and especially in muscular resistance, wh 
 know motion and force, that is, we are sensible of a 
 limb moving in consequence of an effort, and being 
 stayed by an extended object with a resisting force. 
 This is all we know primarily of matter by the senses, 
 and it has not been set aside by any doctrine of 
 modern physical science. 
 
 I have no partiality for the distinction between the 
 Primary and Secondary Qualities of bodies. In fact, 
 as has often been acknowledged, the secondary qual- 
 ities, such as heat and smell, are not so much proper- 
 ties of matter as felt affections of our organism, which 
 may indeed imply an external cause, but with which 
 they are not to be identified. We can, however, 
 specify the qualities of body which are primarily or 
 intuitively known. These seem to be Externality, 
 Resisting Force, and Extension, together, I think, 
 with Motion in Space. All besides, such as temper- 
 ature, odors, tastes, and sounds, are mere affections 
 of our organism, giving notice of changes in our 
 bodily frame. Lotze says that our sense of pressure 
 and of temperature is not an object, but a condition 
 which the incitement in the parts of the skin brings 
 forth. Meissner, following out the same doctrines, 
 says that they are not sensations {JEmpfindungen), 
 but feelings, in so far as they do not stand in relation 
 directly and immediately to an object, but are a 
 condition of the subject, our own selves. Even color 
 itself, though more objective, is felt merely, as in the 
 seen surface, standing in relation to our eye, and we
 
 THE PHYSIOLOGY OF THE SENSES. 185 
 
 can say nothing more of it than that it affects us in 
 a particular manner. 
 
 Taking this view of matter, we see that we have 
 first an original or hituitive knowledge. To this we 
 are ever adding by observation, by generalization, 
 and by deduction. But then, in the rapidity of 
 thought and the hurry of life, our observations are 
 often loose, our generalizations too wide, and our 
 reasonings hasty. Hence the errors into which we 
 are led, which, however, are not to be charged on 
 our senses, but upon the judgments we have super- 
 induced upon the information which they furnish. 
 It cannot be shown that our intuitive perceptions, 
 being those that have the sanction of Him who made 
 us, ever do deceive us, or that they are contradicted 
 by any established truth of science. 1 
 
 Adopting these views of our original perceptions, 
 we see how we have a confirmation of their trust- 
 worthiness in the circumstance that the different 
 senses yield the same testimony. I am persuaded, 
 indeed, that our conviction rests primarily, and all 
 along most firmly, on the assurance we have as to 
 the veracity of each sense (see a). Still it is possible 
 to get verifications even of our intuitions and dem- 
 onstrations, — thus land-measuring and astronomy 
 corroborate our geometrical deductions. It is cer- 
 
 1 I have endeavored to show that (2.) That between Sensation and 
 
 the difficulties connected with the aj>- Perception; (•"».) That between the 
 
 parent deception of the senses can ho Objects intuitively Perceived ; all of 
 
 removed by attending to three dis- them being extra-mental, hut some of 
 
 tinctions : — (1.) That between our them o\bo extra-organic. — (Intuitions, 
 
 Original and Acquired Perceptions; l't. II. 1$. II. c. i. \ 3.)
 
 186 THE PHYSIOLOGY OF THE SENSES. 
 
 tainly satisfactory to find that, in their original 
 depositions, the senses, which are so far independent 
 witnesses, thoroughly concur. Thus both touch and 
 sight give us surfaces, which a little experience 
 enables us to discover to be identical. It is probable 
 that all the senses give us direction outward. It is 
 certain that they all give us information directly or 
 indirectly of external objects ; and thus each in its 
 own way prepares us for looking out upon and esti- 
 mating a world which, beginning at self as a centre, 
 extends as far into space as the eye, aided by the 
 telescope, can penetrate.
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 MEMORY, ASSOCIATION OF IDEAS, BELIEF, AND UNCONSCIOUS 
 MENTAL OPERATIONS. 
 
 THE faculty of Memory has not received any very 
 special consideration in the writings of Mr. Mill. 
 When we turn to the account given by his prede- 
 cessors in the school, we find it defective, in fact, as 
 is usual with them, overlooking the main element. 
 Our recollections are represented as " revived sensa- 
 tions." The statement might be allowed to pass in 
 common conversation, or in loose literature, but can- 
 not be accepted from a metaphysician. There may 
 be a revival not merely of our sensations, but of 
 our mental operations generally, of our thoughts, 
 our emotions, — of our very recollections. And in 
 every exercise of memory there is more than a re- 
 vival of our experience. As the new and the essen- 
 tial element, there is a belief that we have had the 
 experience, and that the event has been before us, 
 in time past. All this being matter of constant con- 
 sciousness, we seldom notice it, just as we pay no at- 
 tention to the bodies which we ever see falling to 
 the ground. But as it was the falling apple, which 
 ordinary men thought beneath their regard, which 
 
 (187)
 
 1S8 MEMORY, ASSOCIATION OF 
 
 seemed to Newton (if the common story is to be 
 credited) the phenomenon to be weighed, and which 
 actually furnished the key to the explanation of the 
 path of the moon and planets in their orbits; so it 
 is in the familiar facts of our consciousness that the 
 psychologist finds the means of clearing up the 
 more complex laws of our mental nature. In par- 
 ticular, every one who would dive into the deeper 
 mysteries of mind must specially estimate what is 
 involved in memory, which is quite as important 
 a faculty as even sensation in our mental consti- 
 tution. 
 
 In memory, let it be observed, we are beyond the 
 territory of immediate knowledge, with the object 
 before us : we are now in the region of Faith. We 
 believe in the existence of an object not now present ; 
 in that, say, of a departed friend never again to be 
 met with in this world. We believe that this friend 
 lived, and that we had frequent intercourse with him, 
 in time past, I call this the Recognitive Power of 
 Memory, to distinguish it from the mere reproductive, 
 the recalling and imagining power. What we thus 
 experience, what we are conscious of, cannot be 
 called " a revived sensation " without giving the re- 
 vival much that was not in the sensation. We have 
 now not only Faith in its rudiments, we have Time 
 in all its significance. No doubt it appears first in 
 the concrete mixed up with other things ; but so do 
 all our ideas, so do our very sensations. It comes in 
 the form of an event believed to have happened in
 
 IDEAS, BELIEF, ETC. 189 
 
 time past. But it is there in the mind, consciousness 
 being witness; and we have only to abstract the 
 time from the event to have the abstract idea of 
 time, — just as we have the idea of sensation by 
 separating in thought the sentient from the self-sen- 
 tient. Time thus reached has quite as real an 
 existence as the very sensation which may have 
 been conjoined with our original perception of the 
 event. 
 
 Mr. Mill, in language already quoted {.wjyra, pp. 
 68, 94), admits the existence of the belief involved 
 in memory, and asserts its veracity and ultimate 
 veracity. Our memories and expectations are present 
 feelings, but each of them involves a belief in more 
 than its own existence. A remembrance involves 
 " the belief that a sensation, of which it is a copy or 
 representation, actually existed in the past ; " and an 
 expectation involves the belief, " that a sensation or 
 other feeling to which it directly refers will exist in 
 the future ; " and the belief the two include is, "that 
 I myself formerly had, or that I myself and no other 
 shall hereafter have, the sensations remembered or 
 expected." He is fond, as we shall immediately see, 
 of ascribing most of our convictions, beliefs, and 
 judgments to association of ideas. Mr. James A! ill 
 had declared broadly, " that wherever the name 
 Belief is applied, there is a case of the indissoluble 
 association of ideas ; " and that " no instance can be 
 adduced in which anything besides an indissoluble 
 association can be shown in belief." (Analysis, p. 281.)
 
 100 MEMORY, ASSOCIATION' OF 
 
 But his son has been obliged to modify this doctrine, 
 and to allow that there is an "ultimate" belief prior 
 to association, and independent of it. I am sure that 
 he is right in calling in such a belief. But I am also 
 sure that he should have called in other beliefs 
 equally independent of association; and we shall 
 have to supply his deficiencies as we advance by 
 showing how wide is the domain of faith. Mean- 
 while let us observe how much is involved in the 
 faith of memory and expectation. We have seen in 
 last chapter that the senses directly or indirectly 
 open to us the distant and the remote, till our minds 
 are lost in the immensity of space. Now we see 
 time stretching away into the past and the future, 
 till it goes out into eternity. And it is interesting 
 to notice, that while these ultimate beliefs, like the 
 senses, carry with them their own evidence, they are 
 ever meeting with corroborations. We remember a 
 field, a dell, a cottage which we once visited ; we 
 have not seen it for many years, but as we now go 
 back to it, we find it as we have been picturing it in 
 our minds. These confirmations of our lower faiths 
 help us to put a more implicit trust in our higher 
 natural beliefs, which may not admit of any confirm- 
 ation by sense. Already, in this belief of memory 
 and expectation, we have the beginnings and the 
 rudiments of that faith in the unseen, which in 
 its higher flights carries us so far beyond ourselves, 
 and lifts us as on wings high above this world. 
 
 The subject of Association of Ideas, which is inti-
 
 IDEAS, BELIEF, ETC. 191 
 
 mately connected with Memory, has long engaged 
 the attention of British metaphysicians. It is re- 
 ferred to by Hobbes, who was evidently aware of 
 what Aristotle had written. It was employed by 
 Locke to explain certain anomalies and eccentricities 
 of mind and character. Its importance in accountr 
 ing for ordinary mental action was first brought out 
 fully by Francis Hutcheson, who showed in particular 
 how it helped to create secondary affections. Some 
 of its properties had a prominence given them by 
 Hume, who used it to help his sceptical purposes by 
 explaining by it many of the beliefs usually ascribed 
 to reason. A fuller and a juster account of it than 
 any previously published was given by Turnbull (the 
 preceptor of Reid) in his Moral Philosophy. Hart- 
 ley speculated upon it in an empirical and peculiarly 
 Anglican manner, identifying association with vibra- 
 tions in the nerves. All the Scottish metaphysicians, 
 including Reid, Beattie, and Stewart, discoursed upon 
 it with greater or less fulness. But as universal at- 
 tention was called to it, its power and significance 
 came to be greatly exaggerated. This was certainly 
 done by Alison when, passing far beyond the more 
 sober views entertained on the same subject by Hutch- 
 eson and Beattie, he sought to account by this one 
 principle for all the phenomena of beauty. Brown 
 drew back from so extreme a position, and maintained 
 that there was excited by beautiful objects a class of 
 feelings which could not be resolved into association 
 of ideas nor anything else. But in his mental phys-
 
 192 ME MOBY, ASSOCIATION OF 
 
 iology suggestion plays a very important, I would 
 say the principal, part. He treats of our intellectual 
 operations under the heads of Simple and Kelative 
 Suggestion, and indulges in an excess of ingenuity 
 in making these two faculties manufacture so many 
 of our ideas. Mr. James Mill followed, and carrying 
 out a hint thrown out by Brown, that all our asso- 
 ciate feelings could be reduced to " a fine species of 
 proximity" (Lecture xxxv.), resolved all suggestion 
 into the one law of contiguity; and abandoning 
 Brown, who stood up for intuitive beliefs, and adher- 
 ing to Hume, accounted for our very beliefs and 
 judgments by association. The time for a reaction 
 had now come. Artists never favored Alison's reduc- 
 tion of beauty to association. New and profound 
 ideas were introduced into English metaphysics by 
 Coleridge, and through the taste stimulated by him 
 and others for German speculation. But the recoil 
 was actually called forth by Sir James Mackintosh's 
 Dissertation on Ethical Science, which at once created 
 the opposition of our higher moralists to the attempt 
 made by him to manufacture our idea of moral good 
 by means of association. Sir W. Hamilton, who 
 belongs to this period, devoted his penetrating intel- 
 lect to the more thorough expression of the laws of 
 the reproduction of our ideas, and has thrown not a 
 little light on the subject, at the same time keeping 
 the principle in its own place. Some of us had 
 hoped that this tendency to exaggerate the power 
 and importance of association had enjoyed its day,
 
 IDEAS, BELIEF, ETC. 193 
 
 and was now past forever. But the wheel of specu- 
 lative opinion seems to have come round to the posi- 
 tion it had an age ago ; and we find association of 
 ideas occupying in the writings of the younger Mill 
 and Mr. Bain as high a place as it ever had in the 
 works of Alison and Brown, of Mackintosh and the 
 older Mill, — or, we may add, as it had two ages 
 earlier still in the philosophy of Hume and of Hart- 
 ley. There is evidently clear room for a new dis- 
 cussion of the whole subject. Of late it has been 
 taken up by the German metaphysicians generally ; 
 and the School of Herbart, in particular, has been 
 seeking to give a mathematical expression to the 
 laws of the succession of our ideas. I should like 
 to see the results of the investigations of the British 
 School, — especially of Hamilton, and of the later 
 German metaphysicians, wrought out into a consist- 
 ent system. 
 
 Mr. Mill can scarcely be said to have added much 
 to our knowledge of the laws of association. He 
 specially dwells on two points, and he exaggerates 
 and distorts both. The first is what he calls the Law 
 of Inseparable Association. " Associations produced 
 by contiguity become more certain and rapid by rep- 
 etition. When two phenomena have been very 
 often experienced in conjunction, and have not in 
 any single instance occurred separately, either in ex- 
 perience or in thought, there is produced between 
 them what has been called Inseparable Association; 
 by which is not meant that the association must in- 
 
 13
 
 104 MEMOKT, ASSOCIATION OF 
 
 evitably Last to the end of life, that no subsequent 
 experience or process of thought can possibly avail 
 to dissolve it, but only that, as long as no such ex- 
 perience or process of thought has taken place, the 
 association is irresistible, it is impossible for us to 
 think the one thing disjoined from the other." 
 (p. 191.) We have here an important truth, which 
 was much dwelt upon by our author's father. It 
 can scarcely be raised to the dignity of a law; it 
 results from higher laws. According to the fre- 
 quency with which two ideas have been together, so 
 will be the tendency of the one to recall the other. 
 When they have often been associated, the one will 
 bring up the other, not only without an act of will 
 on our part, but it may be in opposition to our ut- 
 most efforts. Thus there are painful recollections 
 which we would fain be rid of, but they cleave to us 
 with horrid pertinacity, because conjoined with ob- 
 jects which are forever pressing themselves on our 
 notice. The only way of dissolving such a combina- 
 tion is by forming a new one, — as in chemistry we 
 dissolve a compound by bringing to bear upon it 
 another substance, which having a strong affinity to 
 one of the elements, draws it away from that with 
 which it is now united. It is thus we break up an 
 old set of associations by forming new ones, say by a 
 change of scene or society. 
 
 So far we have a well-known operation, according 
 to a well-known law. But let us understand precisely 
 what is involved. We shall find that Mr. Mill has
 
 IDEAS, BELIEF, ETC. 195 
 
 bo stretched the law as to make it embrace an en- 
 tirely different phenomenon. It is implied that two 
 ideas having been together, the one will never cast 
 up without the other tending to follow. But this 
 does not require that we judge or decide that there 
 is, and still less that there must be, some relation 
 between them in the nature of things, or discerned 
 by the mind. On the contrary, we may see them to 
 be utterly discrepant, and wish that we could only 
 break the links that join them in the chain of asso- 
 ciation. Thus there is a lovely spot where we once 
 saw a foul act committed, and ever since, as we pass 
 it, the whole scene rushes into our mind j but we 
 never think or conclude that there is any necessary 
 or even natural connection between the place and 
 the deed. Mr. Mill has slipped in a word very dex- 
 terously, when he says, " It is impossible for us ever 
 to think the one disjoined from the other." This is 
 true only when by " think " we understand " having 
 the idea of." It is a fact that the one idea recalls the 
 other, but we do not therefore think the one to be 
 joined to the other, either in the nature of things, 
 or according to the laws of thought. 
 
 We have here come to one of the gravest errors 
 into which Mr. Mill has fallen in his theory of the 
 operations of the mind. It is that of making the 
 association of ideas usurp the province of judgment, 
 which declares that two ideas or objects have a rela- 
 tion. I admit that the two, suggestion and judg- 
 ment or comparison, often coincide and co-operate,
 
 196 MEMORY, ASSOCIATION OF 
 
 and accomplish most important ends as they do so. 
 Things that have a natural connection are often pre- 
 sented to us together; they are thus brought under 
 the law of association, and they are henceforth often 
 recalled at the same time. In this way the associa- 
 tion of ideas may lead to a hasty belief, not founded 
 on a careful comparison of facts. I believe that 
 much of what is usually reckoned understanding or 
 judgment contains little else than an association of 
 ideas. The so-called "thought" of the lower ani- 
 mals, of children, and even of men of mature 
 years, consists mainly in ideas succeeding each other 
 in a train determined by outward circumstances or 
 by habit. It has to be added, that association of 
 ideas often essentially aids us in forming a mature 
 judgment, by bringing things that have a positive 
 relation into juxtaposition, whereby we are enabled 
 to discover the connection. As the association helps 
 the judgment, so the judgment, when it once con- 
 nects the two things, creates an association of ideas, 
 whereby the one tends to bring up the other, and 
 thereby we may be led to discover further relations, 
 real or imaginary. But the actual comparison of 
 two ideas or objects, and the predication of their 
 agreement or disagreement, is always an operation 
 different from, and should be regarded as higher 
 than, the mere alliance of them by an accidental asso- 
 ciation in our minds. The psychologist, instead of 
 confounding, should be careful to distinguish them. 
 Philosophy should aim at delivering us as much as
 
 IDEAS, BELIEF, ETC. 197 
 
 possible from the power of accidental conjunctions, 
 and bringing us under the habitual influence of a 
 judicial temper of mind, which looks to the nature 
 of things. Mr. Mill has done as much as within him 
 lies to degrade human intelligence, by grounding 
 belief" on association, when he should have led us to 
 seek for a deeper foundation hi the mind's capacity 
 of discerning realities and their relations. This is a 
 subject which will come more fully before us when 
 we consider Comparison. 
 
 Mr. Mill makes great use of another peculiarity of 
 association, which had been much dwelt on by 
 Brown. " When impressions have been so often ex- 
 perienced in conjunction, that each of them calls up 
 readily and instantaneously the ideas of the whole 
 group, these ideas sometimes melt and coalesce into 
 one another, and appear not several ideas but one." 
 (Logic, B. vi. c. iv. § 3.) Thus far we have a correct 
 statement. When ideas have often been in com- 
 pany, they flow together so spontaneously, and in 
 the end so rapidly, that we cannot stay or even 
 watch them in their course. As thus having no at- 
 tention bestowed on them, some, or perhaps the 
 whole, pass away into oblivion, according to a law 
 to be immediately unfolded. Possibly we do not 
 declare them to be one, — I rather think we make 
 no declaration about them at all ; but we do not, we 
 cannot, distinguish them one from another. And 
 when high feeling mingles with them, there may be 
 produced upon our nervous organism a combined
 
 198 MEMORY, ASSOCIATION OF 
 
 result of a peculiar, perhaps of an intense, kind, 
 which may abide when the mental ideas and emo- 
 tions are gone. 
 
 But Mr. Mill goes much further than this. "When 
 many impressions or ideas are operating in the mind 
 together, there sometimes takes place a process of a 
 similar kind to chemical combination." (Logic, B. yi. 
 c. iv. § 3.) This he explains, " The effect of concurring 
 causes is not always precisely the sum of the effects 
 of those causes when separate, nor even always an 
 effect of the same kind with them ; " thus water, the 
 product, differs in its qualities from its two elements,- 
 oxjrgen and hydrogen. We must be very careful 
 here to ascertain the precise facts, to guard against 
 exaggerating them, or allowing them to be turned 
 to illegitimate purposes. Let it be observed, that in 
 chemical action we have always two substances, 
 each with many properties known and unknown : 
 we bring them into a certain relation to each other ; 
 an action takes place very much of an unknown char- 
 acter, but implying the operation of electricity, or of 
 one of the correlated forces of the universe ; the 
 result is the formation of water, which possesses 
 properties different from the oxygen, and the hydro- 
 gen, and the energy exerted in producing the 
 changes, but which is always capable of being re- 
 solved into the same old elements with the same 
 measure of energy. Now the question is, is there an 
 analogous operation produced by the association of 
 ideas ? I have admitted that, as the result of long
 
 IDEAS, BELIEF, ETC. 199 
 
 and repeated conjunction, ideas, each, it may be, 
 with its own peculiar feeling, succeed each other 
 with incalculable rapidity, so that we cannot distin- 
 guish between them ; and that they may coalesce in 
 a result. Show the mother a plaything which be- 
 longed to a deceased child, and what a rush of re- 
 membrances and attached emotions will spring up, 
 which she is not only not inclined, but not able, to 
 analyze. But is there anything in all this like 
 chemical action ? There is a mighty torrent, but it 
 appears to me that in the confluence there is noth- 
 ing after all but the individual ideas with their cor- 
 responding feelings. There may be new associa- 
 tions, but there does not seem to be a new idea. 
 Some of the ideas may pass away on the instant 
 never to be recalled, whereas others may bulk 
 largely before the mind, and leave their observed or 
 abiding consequences. But in the agglomeration 
 there seems to be nothing but the ideas, the feel- 
 ings, and their appropriate impressions, coalescing ; 
 there is no new generation, no generation of an idea 
 not in the separate parts of the collection. 
 
 In particular, it is altogether unwarrantable out 
 of mere associated sensations to draw those lofty ideas 
 which the mind can form as to substance and quality, 
 cause and effect, moral good and moral obligation. 
 Let us observe with care what is implied in the pro- 
 duction of a new body by chemical composition. 
 There is one element with its properties, and 
 another element with its properties, a mutual ac-
 
 200 ME3IORY, ASSOCIATION OF 
 
 tion in which there is potential energy expended, 
 and a new product with its properties. And this 
 mutual action we reckon a wonderful action of 
 bodies ; we distinguish it from mechanical action ; 
 we call it by the name of chemical affinity, and we 
 seek to determine its laws. But let us suppose that 
 instead of two elementary bodies we have two sen- 
 sations, say of two colors, or two smells, or two 
 sounds, and that these have been often together, so 
 that the one always comes up immediately after the 
 other ; I ask, whether we have any ground to believe 
 that these would of themselves generate a third thing 
 different from the two ? If they do, it must be by 
 some causal power in the sensations, or out of the 
 sensations, in the mind or out of the mind ; and it is 
 the business of the psychologist not to overlook this 
 power, not to confound it with the mere association 
 of old ideas, but to separate it from them carefully, 
 diligently to observe it, and endeavor to discover its 
 laws, — as the chemist seeks to find the law of 
 elementary affinity. I can discover no evidence that 
 two sensations succeeding each other will ever be 
 anything else than two sensations, or that two re- 
 membered sensations will ever be anything else than 
 two remembered sensations. When a further pro- 
 duct appears, such as the idea of power, or the idea 
 of the good, it cannot be the effect of a mere sensa- 
 tion, except in the sense above explained (p. 85), of 
 an occasion, implying a co-operative capacity in the 
 mind, such as a judgment or a power of discerning
 
 IDEAS, BELIEF, ETC. 201 
 
 moral good, — which capacity should be noted as 
 carefully as the sensations. In short, the laws of as- 
 sociation are the mere laws of the succession of our 
 ideas and attached feelings, and can generate no 
 new idea, without a special inlet from without or 
 capacity within. Association cannot give a man born 
 blind the least idea of color, and as little can it pro- 
 duce any other idea. By mixing the colors of yel- 
 low and blue, the hand could produce green ; but 
 give a person the idea of yellow and the idea of 
 blue, and from the two he could not manufacture 
 the idea of green ; still less could he from these sen- 
 sations, or any others, form such ideas as those of 
 time or potency. 
 
 There are two points in regard to the association 
 of ideas which require to be cleared up. The first 
 is the precise and ultimate expression of the law, 
 that things which are related, in particular, that 
 things which are like suggest each other. This 
 law, under one form or other, has appeared in nearly 
 every classification of the laws of the succession of 
 our mental states from the time of Aristotle down- 
 wards. Mr. Mill puts the law in the form, " Similar 
 phenomena tend to be thought of together." (p. 190.) 
 1 believe that other related things do also suffeest 
 
 D DO 
 
 each other; but let this pass. The unsettled ques- 
 tion is, must the relation be seen by the mind before 
 the law operates ? I see a portrait, and it at once 
 suggests the original. I have never seen the two 
 together; I see the portrait for the first time, the 
 
 y
 
 202 MEMOEY, ASSOCIATION OF 
 
 original is not present, and yet it is immediately 
 called up. It can scarcely be alleged in such a case 
 that I first discover the resemblance, and then have 
 the idea of the original, for until the idea of the 
 original springs up I cannot discover the resem- 
 blance. Is the law then to take this form, that like 
 suggests like before the likeness is observed ? This 
 is a topic on which Hamilton often pondered, and he 
 has advanced some subtle considerations which are 
 perhaps not sufficiently reduced to a consistent 
 system. Mr. Mill severely criticises Hamilton, but 
 has not himself sounded the depths of the subject, 
 which requires to be further cleared up before we 
 have an ultimate expression of the laws of associa- 
 tion. In endeavoring to explicate it, we must ever 
 keep a firm hold of the distinction between th- 
 observation of relations, which is an act of compari- 
 son, and the mere suggestion of one thing by 
 another. We shall see that the school of Mr. Mill 
 has perseveringly confounded them. 
 
 The other point requiring further elucidation re- 
 lates to the Secondary Laws of Suggestion, as they 
 have been called by Brown, or the Law of Prefer- 
 ence, as it has been called by Hamilton. To explain 
 what this means : suppose that the idea now before 
 the mind has been associated with a great number 
 of others, according to the laws of contiguity and 
 correlation; the question arises, why among these 
 ideas does it go after one rather than another ? I 
 met with a dozen people at a dinner ; what makes
 
 IDEAS, BELIEF, ETC. 203 
 
 me think of some one of them rather than the 
 others ? Many references had been previously, 
 made to the facts bearing on this subject, but the 
 first enumeration of Secondary Laws, as different 
 from the Primary, was made by Brown, whose ar- 
 rangement though clear was defective in logical 
 reduction. I am sure there are two Laws of Prefer- 
 ence which have a powerful influence. One of these 
 is the law of native taste and talent. We go after 
 the ideas which have the deepest interest to our 
 natural faculties. Some, for instance, have a great 
 tendency to observe resemblances, and among possi- 
 ble associations they will find likenesses, analogies, 
 and affinities coming up most strongly and frequently 
 Some have constitutionally certain strong appeten- 
 cies or passions, and their thoughts will tend towards 
 the corresponding objects. The mother with a 
 strong love of offspring will find every topic started 
 and event occurring, suggesting possible perils or en- 
 joyments to her children. I need not dwell on this, 
 as it has no special reference to our present discus- 
 sion, which certainly the other has. 
 
 I call it the Law of Mental Energy. Those ideas 
 are brought up most readily and frequently on 
 which we have bestowed the greatest amount of 
 mental force. Every mind seems to be endowed 
 with a certain amount of power, and, according to 
 the power expended on an idea, so is it remembered 
 for a greater length of time, and so is it suggested 
 more easily and frequently. It may be an energy
 
 204 MEMOBT, ASSOCIATION OF 
 
 of sensation, as when the idea has been very pleas- 
 urable or very painful. It may be an energy of in- 
 telligence, as when we have devoted one or several 
 of our faculties, eagerly or for a length of time, to 
 a given object. It may be an energy of emotion, as 
 when a lively hope or an anxious fear has collected 
 round a particular event. Or it may be an energy of 
 will, as when we have given earnest attention to a sub- 
 ject. Of course, the ideas, when they appear, always 
 come up according to such Primary Laws as those 
 of contiguity and correlation ; but the Law of Energy 
 shows why, among a variety of objects which it 
 might follow, the mind takes one rather than 
 another. It is thus we explain that Law of Insep- 
 arable Association on which Mr. Mill dwells so much : 
 the ideas have been together, and much energy 
 having been expended on them in their frequent 
 combination, they come up together, and they come 
 up often. Much the same effects as are produced by 
 frequent occurrence follow from a very strong energy 
 being exerted only for a brief period, only, may be, 
 for a few minutes or moments. A strong sensation, 
 as that of an avalanche, heard, it may be, only once 
 in our lives, may leave a life-long impression of itself. 
 We can never forget the moment when, after long 
 search and toil in some branch of research, a glorious 
 thought burst on our view like the sun, and threw a 
 flood of light on all surrounding objects. A terrible 
 convulsion of fear will imprint itself on our souls for 
 life, and be renewed by every correlated circum-
 
 IDEAS, BELIEF, ETC. 205 
 
 stance. An acute sorrow will burn itself into the 
 soul, and leave a wound which a thousand circum- 
 stances will tend to open, — thus the widow can 
 never pass the spot where her husband was thrown 
 out of a carriage and killed in her presence, without 
 having the whole scene with its nervous agitations 
 revived. 
 
 This train of thought and observation opens to us 
 what I regard as a very deep and fundamental law 
 of memory in its recalling power. I believe we are 
 momentarily conscious of every sensation, idea, 
 thought, or emotion of the mind. But it is merci- 
 fully provided that many of our mental states are 
 never reproduced : they are happily allowed to pass 
 away into forgetfulness, at least they cannot be 
 brought up in ordinary circumstances, — though 
 there are curious recorded instances of their reap- 
 pearing in extraordinary positions. We should cer- 
 tainly be in a pitiable condition if every tick of the 
 clock in the room in which we sit, if every act of 
 will put forth in moving our limbs, if every passing 
 thought in our day dreams or our night dreams, 
 came up as readily as our more important cogitations, 
 which have engaged and engrossed much thought 
 and attention. While we are conscious (so it ap- 
 pears to me) of every mental operation, it seems to 
 be necessary that a certain amount of mental force 
 should be expended in order to our having the capac- 
 ity to recall it. Very possibly this mental law may 
 be connected with a physiological one, with what has
 
 206 ME MOBY, ASSOCIATION OF 
 
 been called by Dr. Carpenter "unconscious cerebra- 
 tion." I am inclined to think that our conscious 
 mental affections tend to produce an unconscious 
 brain a flee t ion, and that the concurrence of the 
 brain thus affected is necessary in order to memory, 
 or the reproduction of an idea. Now, a certain 
 amount of mental force may be necessary to produce 
 the cerebration, without which there can be no rec- 
 ollection. Whether from purely mental or cerebral 
 causes, or as I think from the two combined, it looks 
 as if the recalling of ideas requires that they should 
 first have been in the consciousness with a certain 
 amount of force or vividness. Many ideas which 
 have been in the mind never reappear, and those 
 which do, come forth, according to the power or prero- 
 gative we have imparted to them, — like the stars, 
 which do not all show themselves, — for otherwise 
 the sky would be one blazing concave, but which, 
 when they do appear, come out according to their 
 nearness to us and their magnitude. 
 
 It is by this broader and deeper principle that I 
 account for what Mr. Mill chooses to call the Law of 
 Obliviscence. I agree with Sir William Hamilton in 
 thinking that there may be more than one object 
 before the mind at one time. Suppose that there 
 are five objects before the eye, I believe that we 
 could notice all of them. But our apprehension of 
 all and each is so spread and dissipated, is so faint 
 and vague, that the chance is, that no one of them 
 ever presents itself to the mind at any future time.
 
 IDEAS, BELIEF, ETC. 207 
 
 But let one of them be of a very brilliant color, or 
 let it have a large amount of attention centred upon 
 it for a special end, or suppose that it had created 
 an interest in itself in time past so that it now 
 awakens lively feeling, that object will be found to 
 have so imprinted itself on the mind, that it will re- 
 main when others pass into obliviscence. " After 
 reading," says Mr. Mill (p. 260), "a chapter of a 
 book, when we lay down the volume do we remem- 
 ber to have been individually conscious of the printed 
 letters and syllables which have passed before us ? 
 Could we recall, by any effort of mind, the visible 
 aspect presented by them, unless some unusual cir- 
 cumstance has fixed our attention upon it during the 
 perusal? Yet each of these letters and syllables 
 must have been present to us as a sensation for at 
 least a passing moment, or the sense could not have 
 been conveyed to us. But the sense being the only 
 thing in which we were interested, — or, in excep- 
 tional cases, the sense and a few of the words or 
 sentences, — we retain no impression of the separate 
 letters and syllables." By the same principle, we 
 account for the facts which of late years have been 
 commonly ascribed to Unconscious Mental Action. 
 
 Mr. Mill has done essential service to philosophy 
 by opposing the tide which, both in Germany and in 
 Britain, has been flowing too strongly in favor of this 
 theory. And yet I am not sure that he has appre- 
 hended all that is in the facts supposed to favor the 
 doctrine.
 
 208 mi:moht, association of 
 
 (1.) I hold that the soul, from the very first, is en- 
 dowed with certain powers or tendencies. Even 
 matter has capacities which lead to action, and to 
 changes of state wdien the needful conditions are 
 fulfilled ; and much more must the soul have original 
 properties, which come forth in operation according 
 to the law imposed on them. But in these primary 
 endowments there is no action, conscious or uncon- 
 scious ; there is simply a capacity of action. Some 
 of the German philosophers who support the theory 
 confound these a priori powers or regulative prin- 
 ciples of the mind, of which w r e are certainly not 
 conscious, with the actions that proceed from them, 
 and of which we are conscious. 
 
 (2.) The mind by action is ever acquiring and lay- 
 ing up power, capacity, tendency. We have some- 
 thing analogous in physical nature. In the geolog- 
 ical ages, the plants by drinking in the sunbeams 
 acquired a stock of power, which went down with 
 them into the earth as they sank into it, which abides 
 in the coal which they helped to form, and is now 
 ready to burst out in heat and flame in our fires, and 
 supply mechanical power to our steam-engines. 
 There seems to be a like laying up of pow r er in the 
 mind ; of intellectual, and, I may add, of moral or 
 immoral power, — the result of continued mental 
 action. When we have done an act, w r e have a 
 greater capacity, along with a tendency to do it 
 again. Thus it is that we are, all our lives long, and 
 on every day of them, acquiring powders, tendencies,
 
 IDEAS, BELIEF, ETC. 209 
 
 dispositions, habits, inclinations, which are to abide 
 with us for years, — perhaps forever. This is one 
 of the regulating principles in the reproduction of 
 our mental states generally, and particularly in the 
 association of ideas. What is done, and especially 
 what is done repeatedly, leaves its trace on the soul, 
 and may appear in deeds long, long after. Ideas which 
 have been together simultaneously or in immediate 
 succession, have the property and the tendency 
 to come up together, and this in proportion to 
 the mental energy which has been expended in pro- 
 ducing them, and under this to the frequency with 
 which they have been together. This is one of the 
 elements which gives its beneficent and its awful 
 power to habit. But let it be carefully observed, 
 that in all this we have not come in sight of uncon- 
 scious mental action. We were conscious of every 
 step of the actual operations of the mind, and we 
 were responsible for them throughout. Those who 
 support the theory mistake the unconscious acquired 
 power for unconscious acts. 
 
 (3.) The mind by action may affect the structure 
 of the brain, or the forces, — mechanical, chemical, 
 vital, — operating in it, and in the nervous system. 
 Materialistic physiologists represent high mental 
 capacity as resulting from a large or finely con- 
 structed brain. The more probable theory is, that a 
 nicely adapted and a finely strung cerebral structure 
 results from high mental capacity and activity. It 
 is not the casket which forms the jewel, but it is the 
 
 14
 
 210 MEMORY, ASSOCIATION OF 
 
 jewel that determines the size and shape of the 
 casket ; or, to use a better illustration in such a con- 
 nection, it is the kernel that determines the form of 
 the husk. The finely organized brain thus produced 
 may, in man and the lower animals, tend to go 
 down by the ordinary laws of transmission from 
 parent to offspring. It is thus, that in certain of the 
 West India Islands, by examining the heads of the 
 negroes on a plantation, a hatter can tell at what 
 age their forefathers were transplanted from Africa, 
 — the brain being larger in those families whose an- 
 cestors have been longest in contact with civilized 
 men. It is thus, that in our own country, the aver- 
 age size of the heads of the educated classes is larger 
 than that of the uneducated. But in this, the actual 
 action of the mind is conscious throughout. It is only 
 the organic product of which we are unconscious. 
 
 This is not the place to work out these principles 
 to their results. They imply important and far- 
 ranging consequences, — mental and organic. But 
 these are not the doctrines defended by those whose 
 opinions I am here reviewing. Not satisfied with 
 native endowments, and acquired powers, and bodily 
 effects, which are unconscious, they insist on the ex- 
 istence of actual operations which are unaccompanied 
 with consciousness. They are not agreed among 
 themselves as to what is the nature of this action. 
 The theory was introduced into modern speculation 
 by Leibnitz, who connected it with the essential ac- 
 tivity of his monads. It was eagerly seized by cer-
 
 IDEAS, BELIEF, ETC. 211 
 
 tain of the pantheistic speculators of Germany, who 
 maintained that the Divine Idea awakes to conscious- 
 ness according to certain laws. As held in the 
 present day, it takes two different, I should say in- 
 consistent, forms. According to a numerous school 
 in Germany, which may be held as represented by 
 the younger Fichte, the unconscious mental action 
 is thought, and thought of the highest kind : the 
 thought which in the bee constructs the cells on 
 mathematical principles ; which bursts out in the 
 highest products of genius, artistic, literary, and 
 philosophic, and gives birth even to inspiration. The 
 theory under this form seems to me to be fanciful in 
 the highest degree. As to animal instincts, they are 
 clearly to be traced to original or inherited proper- 
 ties, obeying laws not yet determined. And as to 
 genius, it is to be explained by far different principles. 
 We account for it by high mental endowment, often 
 stimulated into intense action by a peculiar nervous 
 temperament. We have no evidence, that, prior to 
 Bacon composing the Novum Organum, or Shak- 
 speare writing Hamlet, there was any mental opera- 
 tion below consciousness. There were lofty gifts in 
 both, and also a training and experience which left 
 their permanent effects ; but when these came forth 
 into action, I apprehend that the illustrious authors 
 were quite conscious of them, though they might 
 not have been able or disposed to furnish a metaphys- 
 ical analysis of them. 
 
 The theory of Hamilton is of a more sober char-
 
 •21 2 MEMOBY, ASSOCIATION OF 
 
 acter, but seems to be equally devoid of evidence to 
 support it, The class of facts on which he rests his 
 opinion are misapprehended. "When we hear the 
 distant murmur of the sea, what are the constituents 
 of the total perception of which we are conscious ? " 
 (Metctph., vol. i. p. 351.) He answers that the mur- 
 mur is a sum made up of parts, and that if the noise 
 of each wave made no impression in our sense, the 
 noise of the sea, as the result of these impressions, 
 could not be realized. a But the noise of each sev- 
 eral wave at the distance, we suppose, is inaudible ; 
 we must, however, admit that they produce a cer- 
 tain modification beyond consciousness on the per- 
 cipient object." He speaks of our perception of a 
 forest as made up of impressions left by each leaf, 
 which impressions are below consciousness. There 
 is an entire misapprehension of the facts in these 
 statements, and this, according to Hamilton's own 
 theory of the object intuitively perceived. The mind 
 is not immediately cognizant of the sound of the 
 sea, or of its several waves, — nor of the trees of 
 the forest and their several leaves. All that it knows 
 intuitively is an affection of the organism. The im- 
 pression made by the distant object is on the organ- 
 ism ; and when the action is sufficiently strong, the 
 mind is called into exercise, and, from the perceived 
 affections, argues or infers the peculiar nature of the 
 distant cause. In this class of phenomena there is 
 no proof of a mental operation of which we are un- 
 conscious.
 
 IDEAS, BELIEF, ETC. 213 
 
 Hamilton explains, by supposed unconscious acts, 
 a class of mental phenomena with which we are all 
 familiar. We walk in a " brown study " from a 
 friend's house to our home : there must have been 
 many mental acts performed on the way, but they 
 cannot be recalled. The question is, were they ever 
 before the consciousness ? Dugald Stewart maintains 
 that they were for the time, but that we cannot rec- 
 ollect them. Notwithstanding: the acute remarks 
 of Hamilton, I adhere to the explanation of Stewart. 
 I do so on the general princijDle, that in propounding 
 an hypothesis to explain a phenomenon, we should 
 never call in a class of facts, of whose existence we 
 have no other proof, when we can account for the 
 whole by facts known on independent evidence. 
 Hamilton tells us, " When suddenly awakened during 
 sleep (and to ascertain the fact, I have caused my- 
 self to be roused at different seasons of the night), I 
 have always been able to observe that I was in the 
 middle of a dream ; " but, he adds, that he was often 
 scarcely certain of more than the fact that he was 
 not awakened from an unconscious state, and that 
 we are often not able to recollect our dreams. He 
 represents it as a peculiarity of somnambulism, that 
 we have no recollection when we awake of what has 
 occurred during its continuance. (Vol. i. pp. 320-322.) 
 Every one will admit that we are often conscious of 
 states at the time, which we either do not remember 
 at all, or more probably cannot remember, except 
 for a very brief period after we have experienced
 
 214 MEMORY, ASSOCIATION OF IDEAS. 
 
 thorn. We have thus an established order of facts 
 BufBcient to explain the whole phenomena, and do 
 not require to resort to alleged facts of which we 
 have and can have no direct evidence. We walk 
 home of an evening from a place at a distance con- 
 versing as we go along with a friend. In order to 
 our reaching our dwelling, there must have been a 
 number of mental acts to enable us to thread our 
 way, along possibly a very perplexed road. Next 
 morning we remember the topics gone over in the 
 conversation, but have entirely and forever forgot 
 the acts of will implied in guiding our steps. But I 
 venture to affirm that at the time we were conscious 
 of both, that we were conscious even of the volitions 
 that brought us safely to our home, and that we 
 should have seen this and acknowledged it, and re- 
 membered it, had there been anything to call our 
 attention to it at the time. The reason why the one 
 is remembered while the other is forgotten, is to be 
 found in the circumstance, that the conversation ex- 
 cited our interest, whereas the walk, as being the 
 result of long acquired habit, called forth no feeling, 
 and so passed into oblivion.
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 JUDGMENT OR COMPARISON. 
 
 IN this chapter I have to point out first, a grave 
 defect, and then a still graver error. 
 There is no part of the psychology of the school 
 to which Mr. Mill belongs in which their defects are 
 so evident as in their account of the Judging, Com- 
 parative, or Correlative capacity. They may have 
 been misled in part by Brown, who joined in one 
 suggestion and relation, under a faculty which he 
 called Relative Suggestion, whose function it is at 
 once to discover relations and suggest objects accord- 
 ing to relations. Brown was wrong, I think, in allow- 
 ing two such diverse functions to one power ; but it 
 is justice to him to say that he has given a compre- 
 hensive view of the relations which the mind of man 
 can discover. He has a generic and a specific divis- 
 ion. He has first a grand twofold division into Co- 
 existence and Succession. Under the first he em- 
 braces Position, Resemblance or Difference, Propor- 
 tion, Degree, Comprehension ; and under the second, 
 Causal and Casual Priority. The later members of 
 the school, such as Mr. James Mill, Mr. J. S. Mill and 
 
 (215)
 
 210 JZWOMEXT OR COMPARISON. 
 
 Mr. Bain, have been lessening the number, and low- 
 ering the importance of the relations which can be 
 discovered by our faculties, and thus narrowing our 
 mental powers, so as to enable them the more readily 
 to account for the phenomena of the mind by sensa- 
 tions and association. Mr. James Mill does speak of 
 Relative Terms, but contrives to get them without 
 calling in a special faculty of Comparison. Mr. J. S. 
 Mill, after specifying 1st, Feelings, 2d, Minds, and 3d, 
 Bodies, as included among namable things, men- 
 tions, " 4th and last, the Successions and Co-exist- 
 ences, the Likenesses and Unlikenesses between feel- 
 ings or states of consciousness." In explanation, he 
 tells us, " Those relations, when considered as subsist- 
 ing between other things, exist in reality only be- 
 tween the states of consciousness which those things, 
 if bodies, excite, if minds, either excite or experience." 
 [Logic, B. i. c. iii. § 15.) This statement is quite in 
 accordance with his general theory as he has now 
 developed it. As we know originally only feelings 
 or states of consciousness, so the relations we dis- 
 cover can only be between feelings and possibilities 
 of feeling. No doubt most people imagine that in 
 comparing Julius Cassar, Charlemagne, and Napoleon 
 Bonaparte ; and in comparing or contrasting Louis 
 Napoleon with Augustus, Comte with Hobbes, and 
 Mill with Hume, we are comparing things out of our 
 states of consciousness : but the new philosophy cor- 
 rects this vulgar error, and in doing so is consistent 
 with itself, — whether it be consistent with our in-
 
 JUDGMENT OB COMPARISON. 217 
 
 tuitive assurances or no. To complete the simplicity 
 of the reduction, Mr. Bain tells us, in reviewing 
 Grote's Plato (Macmillan's Magazine, July, 1865), 
 " These two facts, Cognizance of Difference and Cog- 
 nizance of Agreement, can be shown to exhaust the 
 essence of knowledge, and both are requisites. All 
 that we can know of a gold ring is summed up in its 
 agreement with certain things, round things, small 
 things, gold things, etc., and its differences from 
 others, squares, oblong, silver, iron," etc. 
 
 I maintain that this account of man's power of 
 correlation is far too narrow, — consciousness being 
 the witness and arbiter. Profound thinkers have 
 given a much wider sweep to the intellect. I have 
 quoted the enumeration by Brown, and I have pre- 
 sented below the classifications of such thinkers as 
 Locke, Hume, and Kant. 1 I ask the reader to look 
 at them, and to decide for himself whether they can 
 all be reduced to agreement and disagreement. Mr. 
 Mill gives a place to co-existences and successions. 
 In this he is surely right : for when I say that Shak- 
 speare and Cervantes died the same year, and that 
 the ancient epic poets, Homer and Virgil, lived be- 
 fore the modern ones, Dante and Milton, I indicate 
 
 1 Locke specifies Cause and Effect, II. Quality, containing Reality, Nega- 
 Time, Place, Identity and Diversity, tion, Limitation. III. Relation, con- 
 Proportion and Moral Relatione [Es- taining Inherence and Subsistence, 
 my, B. ii. c. xxxvii). Iluinc men- Causality and Dependence, Comma- 
 tions Resemblance, Identity, Space nity of Agent and Patient. IV. Mo- 
 and Time, Quantity, Dr^t-ec, Con- dality, containing Possibility and Im- 
 trariety, Cause and Effect. Kant's possibility, Existence and Non-Exisfr 
 categories arc, — I. Quantity, con- tence, Necessity and Con tingence. 
 
 taining Unity, Plurality, Totality.
 
 218 JUDGMENT OR COMPARISON. 
 
 more than an agreement in the former case and a 
 disagreement in the latter, — I intimate the point 
 of relation, which is that of Time, — a relation, I 
 may add, the significance of which has not been 
 estimated by Mr. Mill. When I say that one figure 
 before my eyes is a disc, and another a solid, I declare 
 more than a difference or co-existence, — I declare that 
 the two differ in respect of their occupation of space. 
 Again, when I affirm that oxygen is one of the ele- 
 ments of water, I predicate a relation of part and 
 whole, and imply one of composition, which is surely 
 more than agreement, or co-existence, or succession. 
 The same may be said of other relations, such as 
 that of quantity, when I maintain that Chimborazo 
 is higher than Mont Blanc ; and of active property, 
 when I declare that the sun attracts the earth, and 
 that oxygen combines wdth hydrogen to form water. 1 
 We are now in a position to discover and expose 
 what is perhaps the most fatal error in the whole 
 theory : it consists in ascribing to association the 
 functions of judgment. Mr. James Mill thus sums 
 up a statement : " We have now then explored those 
 states of Consciousness which we call Belief in ex- 
 istences : Belief in present existences ; Belief in past 
 existences; and Belief in future existences. We 
 have seen that, in the most simple cases, Belief con- 
 sists in sensation alone, or ideas alone ; in the more 
 
 1 I have arranged the Relations as tity, Resemblance, Active Property, 
 those of Identity and Difference, and Cause and Effect. — Intuitions, P 
 Whole and Parts, Space, Time, Quan- II. B. m. c. i.
 
 JUDGMENT OR COMPARISON. 219 
 
 complicated cases, in sensation, ideas, and association, 
 combined ; and in no case of belief has any other 
 ingredient been found." As to Propositions, he says 
 they are either of general names or particular names. 
 Of the former he says, " They are all merely verbal ; 
 and the Belief is nothing more than recognition of 
 the coincidence, entire or partial, of two general 
 names." As to the latter, he says, " Propositions re- 
 lating to individuals may be expressions either of 
 past or future events. Belief in past events, upon 
 our own experience, is memory ; upon other men's 
 experience, is Belief in testimony ; both of them re- 
 solved into association. Belief in future events is 
 the inseparable association of like consequents with 
 like antecedents." {Analysis, pp. 290, 307, 308.) I 
 am not sure whether the son would adopt the whole 
 of this statement: he has been obliged to admit that 
 memory yields an ultimate belief, which is not the 
 result of association. But his theory in the main 
 coincides with that of the father. It is admitted 
 that there is an original consciousness of sensations, 
 and that there is a memory of sensations, which can- 
 not be resolved into anything simpler. It is further 
 postulated that there is an association of sensations 
 according to contiguity and agreement, and that there 
 is an expectation of sensations. Out of these, as I 
 understand, spring our judgments (if indeed we have 
 the power of judging) and our beliefs, which imply, 
 and can imply nothing more than contiguity or 
 agreement in the sensations. I charge this doctrine
 
 2'20 JUDGMENT OH COMPARISON. 
 
 with stripping man of the capacity of judging of the 
 actual relations of things ; and making all our beliefs, 
 except those involved in sensations, and the memory 
 of them, to be the creation of circumstances, and 
 capable of being changed only by circumstances with 
 their conjunctions and correspondencies, which, for 
 anything we can ever know, may be altogether for- 
 tuitous or fatalistic. 
 
 The defects of the theory commence in the account 
 given of the matter with which the mind starts : this 
 is supposed to be merely sensations. But the fatal 
 consequences do not become evident till we see what 
 must be the explanation rendered of the mind's 
 capacity of Judgment. I have endeavored in this 
 treatise to meet and stop the error at its inlet, that 
 so we may be preserved from the issues. I have 
 shown that the mind starts with an original stock 
 of knowledge and belief. In sense-perception it 
 knows objects, with an existence, external to self, 
 extended, and capable of resistance and of motion. 
 In self-consciousness it knows self as an existing 
 thing, sentient, or knowing, or remembering, or 
 believing, or judging, or resolving, or entertaining 
 moral or other sentiments. In memory we remem- 
 ber ourselves and the event in the past, and thus 
 have a continuous and identical self, with the impor- 
 tant element of time. And now we can compare all 
 these, and discover relations among them. By this 
 further faculty the domain of our knowledge is indef- 
 initely extended : in fact our acquaintance with an
 
 JUDGMENT OK COUfPABISON. 221 
 
 object is very vague and very limited till we have 
 detected its connections with other things. But 
 what I wish specially noticed is, that the comparison 
 is not between mere " feelings or states of conscious- 
 ness," but between things, without us as well as 
 within us. I compare self in one state, say under 
 sensation, with self in another state, say recollecting 
 or resolving. I compare one extended object 
 with another, and declare the one to be larger than 
 the other. I compare events remembered, and de- 
 clare that they happened at different times. I com- 
 pare my very comparisons, and discover further, it 
 may be more recondite, proportions and harmonies, 
 till we link all nature within and without us in a 
 series of uniformities. And let it be observed, that 
 our judgments throughout are judgments as to real- 
 ities. As being cognizant of extended objects in 
 perception by the senses, on noticing two extended 
 objects, say St. Paul's and its door, we declare the 
 one to be greater than the other ; and our judgment 
 is about things, and not about sensations, or the 
 mere possibilities of sensation. On seeing two per- 
 sons on our right hand and two persons on our left 
 hand, we declare them to be four, as soon as we un- 
 derstand what "two" and \x\v.\t '•lour" mean. We 
 remember our school days and our college days, and 
 we declare the one to be prior to the oilier. Our 
 comparisons in such cases are of things, and our 
 judgments upon things, and not on mere feelings, or 
 mere possibilities of feeling. Circumstances have
 
 222 JUDGMENT Oli COMPAEISON. 
 
 not produced the judgments, nor can circumstances 
 change or modify them. In all circumstances I de- 
 cide that the house is larger than its door ; that two 
 and two make four; and that an event which oc- 
 curred when we were ten years old must be prior to 
 one which happened when we were twenty. 
 
 I admit that association tends to produce action, 
 independent of judgment upon a comparison of the 
 things. When things have often been together in 
 the mind, we go spontaneously from the one to the 
 other ; and if action be needed to secure the second, 
 we will be disposed to exert it. As Mr. Bain, in un- 
 folding the nature of our Beliefs, expresses it {Emot. 
 and Will, p. 579), 1 " An animal sees the water that 
 it drinks, and thereby couples in its mind the prop- 
 erty of quenching thirst with the visible aspect. 
 After this association has acquired a certain degree 
 of tenacity, the sight of water at a distance suggests 
 the other fact, so that, from the prospect, the animal 
 realizes to some degree the satisfying of that craving. 
 The sight of water to the thirsty animal, then, in- 
 spires the movements preparatory to actual drinking ; 
 the voluntary organs of locomotion are urged by 
 the same energetic spur on the mere distant sight, 
 as the organs of lapping and swallowing under the 
 feeling of relief already commenced. This is the 
 state of mature conviction as to the union of the 
 two natural properties of water." I reckon this as 
 
 1 Mr. Bain admits Intuitive Beliefs, born energy of the brain gives faith, 
 but then they deceive us. " The in- and experience scepticism," p. 582.
 
 JUDGMENT OB COMPABISON. 223 
 
 a case mainly of association, and not of judgment 
 I do allow that association tends to make us form 
 judgments. When two objects have been often 
 brought together, we are led to discover a resem- 
 blance, real or imaginary, between them. But ad- 
 mitting all this freely, I maintain that the mind has 
 a power of judgment, upon the bare contemplation 
 of objects, and apart altogether from the association 
 of instances. On the simple consideration of two 
 straight lines, I am sure they cannot enclose a space. 
 I have only to hear of a case of ingratitude for favors 
 to declare it to be bad and blameworthy. 
 
 While the two, association and comparison, often 
 help each other, yet they are never the same. The 
 one may exist without the other ; and the one doe& 
 not increase nor decrease with the other. In many 
 cases there is a strong and inseparable association 
 without the judgment perceiving any relation, nay, 
 where it would declare that there is no connection 
 in the nature of things. Thus the letter A natur- 
 ally suggests the letter B, because they have come 
 so often together in our repetition of the alphabet ; 
 yet no one thinks that the two have in them- 
 selves any bonds of union. It so happens that, when 
 the name St. Patrick is brought up, I always associate 
 with it the legend I heard in my youth about 
 the saint swimming from Donaghadee to Portpatrick, 
 with his head in his teetli ; yet the frequency of 
 the conjunction has not been able to convince me of 
 the possibility of the act. Often have the numbers
 
 --[ JUDGMENT OR COMPARISON. 
 
 17 and 20 been together in my mind, from the ac- 
 cident of their having been printed together on a 
 card on which I had frequent occasion to look; but 
 it has never occurred to me that the two must have 
 a necessary connection. It thus appears that fre- 
 quency of association cannot of itself generate a 
 judgment with its attached belief. On the other 
 hand, a judgment declaring that there is a connec- 
 tion does not imply that there has been a frequent 
 association. Comparatively seldom have 17 -J- 20 
 been conjoined in my mind with 37, — certainly not 
 so frequently as 17 has been associated with 20, — 
 and yet, on the bare contemplation of 17 -f- 20, I de- 
 clare them to be equal to 37, and cannot be made 
 to decide otherwise. If I hear that Peter Jones 
 robbed his master John Smith, who trusted him, I 
 declare that Peter Jones deserves punishment, and 
 this though I never heard of Peter Jones before. 
 
 Mr. Mill is prepared to carry out his principles 
 to consequences, which seem to me a reductio ad 
 absurdum of the principles. He tells us (p. 69) that 
 " the reverse of the most familiar principles of geom- 
 etry might have been made conceivable, even to our 
 present faculties, if these faculties had co-existed 
 with a totally different constitution of external na- 
 ture," and quotes at length, in proof of this, from 
 Essays by a Barrister, in which it is said, — " There 
 is a world in which, whenever two pairs of things 
 are either placed in proximity or are contemplated 
 together, a fifth thing is immediately created and
 
 JUDGMENT OB COMl'AEISON. 225 
 
 brought within the contemplation of the mind en- 
 gaged in putting two and two together. This is 
 surely neither inconceivable, for we can readily con- 
 ceive the result by thinking of common puzzle tricks, 
 nor can it be said to be beyond the power of Omnip- 
 otence. Yet in such a world surely two and two 
 would make five." This certainly would be the 
 result on Mr. Mill's theory. But such consequences 
 can be admitted only by those who deny the mind 
 all power of knowing the nature of things. Those 
 of us who stand up for a power of independent judg- 
 ment, that is, a judgment founded on the perception 
 of things, cannot allow such conclusions. Were we 
 placed in a world in which two pairs of things were 
 always followed by a fifth thing, we might be dis- 
 posed to believe that the pairs caused the fifth thing, 
 or that there was some prearranged disposition of 
 things producing them together ; but we could not 
 be made to judge that 2 -|- 2 = 5, or that the fifth 
 tiling is not a different thing from the two and the 
 two. On the other supposition put, of the two pairs 
 always suggesting a fifth, we should explain their 
 recurrence by some law of association, but we would 
 not confound the 5 with the 2 -|- 2, or think that the 
 two pairs could make five. 
 
 The same ingenious gentleman supports (lie theory 
 by another illustration, and receives the sanction of 
 Mr. Mill. " It would also be possible to put a case 
 of a world in which two lines would be universally 
 supposed to include a space. Imagine a man who 
 
 15
 
 226 JUDGMENT OH COMPABISON. 
 
 had never had any exjDerience of straight lines 
 through the medium of any sense whatever, suddenly 
 placed upon a railway stretching out on a perfectly 
 straight line to an indefinite distance in each direc- 
 tion He would see the rails, which would be the 
 first straight lines he had ever seen, apparently meet- 
 ing, or at least tending to meet, at each horizon ; and 
 he would thus infer, in the absence of all other ex- 
 perience, that they actually did enclose a space when 
 produced far enough." Now I allow that this person, 
 as he looked one way, would see a figure presented 
 to the eye of two straight lines approaching nearer 
 each other ; and that as he looked the other way 
 he would see a like figure. But I deny that in com- 
 bining the two views he would ever decide that 
 the four lines seen, the two seen first and the 
 two seen second, make only two straight lines. 
 Tn uniting the two perceptions in thought, he 
 would certainly place a bend or a turn some- 
 where, possibly at the spot from which he took 
 the two views. He would continue to do so till he 
 realized that the lines seen on either side did not in 
 fact approach nearer each other. Or to state the 
 whole phenomenon with more scientific accuracy : 
 Intuitively, and to a person who had not acquired 
 the knowledge of distance by experience, the two 
 views would appear to be each of two lines approach- 
 ing nearer another ; but without his being at all cog- 
 nizant of the relation of the two views, or of one 
 part of the lines being farther removed from him
 
 JUDGMENT OB COMPABISON. 227 
 
 than another. (See supra, pp. 160-168.) As expe- 
 rience told him that the lines receded from him on 
 each side, he would contrive some means of com- 
 bining his observations, probably in the way above 
 indicated ; but he never could make two straight 
 lines enclose a space. 
 
 The same remarks apply, mutatis mutandis, to a 
 third case advanced by the Barrister. Thomas Reid, 
 who was a man of humor and addicted to mathe- 
 matics, amused himself and relieved a dry discussion 
 by drawing out a " Geometry of Visibles " ( Works, p. 
 147), in which he exhibits the conclusions which 
 could be deduced from the supposed perceptions of 
 sight. He proceeds upon the Berkeleyan doctrine 
 of vision, and supposes that by sight we could have 
 " no conception of a third dimension " of space ; and 
 that a person with sight, but without touch, would 
 see length and breadth, but could have no idea of 
 thickness, or of the distinction of figures into planes 
 and curves. Such a one, he thinks, might be driven 
 by geometry to the conclusion that " every right line 
 being produced will at last return into itself ; " that 
 " any two right lines being produced will meet in 
 two points ; " and that " two or more bodies may 
 exist in the same place." But these inferences can 
 be deduced only by denying to vision functions 
 which belong to it, and ascribing to it others which 
 are not intuitive or original. We have seen that 
 the eye takes in intuitively a colored surface, .and if 
 there be two colors on the surface, divided by a
 
 228 J V J h; Mi: XT on COMPARISON. 
 
 curve line, we at once have the perception of a 
 curve. Again, by binocular vision we have, if not 
 intuitively, at least by an easy process of experience 
 and inference, space in the third dimension. It is 
 further to be borne in mind, that in our acquired per- 
 ceptions we lay down rules which may help us in 
 common cases, but which, not being absolutely cor- 
 rect, may lead into error when improperly applied 
 to other cases ; as when we argue from the crooked 
 image presented to the eye that there is a crooked 
 stick corresponding to it in the water. Proceeding 
 on such assumptions as these, it is possible to show 
 that we are landed in the consequences so graphi- 
 cally pointed out by Reid. But the consequences 
 are not legitimate, because they are drawn from a 
 misapprehension of the precise nature of our intui- 
 tive perceptions in vision. There is and can be no 
 evidence that a person with the sense of sight, but 
 without the sense of touch, would draw them. I 
 hold that the very vision of two straight lines would 
 prevent us from being led to declare that they could 
 meet at two points. Upon the bare contemplation 
 of the lines, whether made known by sight or touch 
 we at once reject all such conclusions, however in- 
 geniously constructed from premises which have not 
 the sanction of our constitution. 
 
 When such consequences are allowed and defend- 
 ed, we see how ominous is this conjunction in the 
 philosophic firmament of the School of Comte with 
 that of Hume. The philosophy thus generated
 
 JUDGMENT OB COMFABISON. 229 
 
 places truth, that is, a knowledge of the nature of 
 things, beyond the reach of human faculties ; which 
 commence with they know not what, and close, 
 after a laborious process, with results which may 
 have as little reality as a succession of dissolving 
 views. Stripping us of a power of independent 
 judgment, it leaves us the servants, I should rather 
 say the slaves, of circumstances, with their conjunc- 
 tions and correspondences, which may all be the 
 issue of blind chance or dead mechanism, — cer- 
 tainly without our being able to say that they are 
 not. Along with independence, I fear there is also 
 taken away all responsibility, of judgment and 
 belief, — except, indeed, such accountability as we 
 may require of a horse or a dog when we associate 
 its vices with a lash, simply to prevent the animal 
 from doing the deed again. I am persuaded that 
 such a creed must exercise, whether the persons are 
 or are not aware of it, whether they do or do not 
 confess it, a deadening influence on those who 
 actually believe it and come under its sway ; and if 
 ever it should be accepted in its results (I say re- 
 sults, for its processes are too subtle to be grasped 
 by the rough hands of the common people), and its 
 appropriate sentiments diffused, in a community, the 
 consequences would be as fatal as those which flowed 
 in the end of last century in France, from the prev- 
 alence of the Sensational Philosophy, when it gave 
 a wrong direction to the great political upheaval, 
 and helped to degrade the national character.
 
 280 JUDGMENT OR COMPARISON. 
 
 We can avoid these issues only by maintaining 
 that man is so constituted as to know originally 
 Bomething of the reality of things, and to be capable 
 of rising to an acquaintance with their relations 
 Association may help us to form a reasonable judg- 
 ment — and it is a happy circumstance when it does 
 so ; but whether we are or are not so aided, we 
 should be taught that it is our duty to found our 
 beliefs on a previous judgment, in which we look to 
 the nature of things as the same can be discovered 
 by us. One end, no doubt, of a good training is to 
 encompass us with profitable associations in the 
 family, in the social circle, and in the community ; 
 with associations originating in the highest senti- 
 ments, and sanctioned by the common conscience 
 and the universal reason of the men of former ages. 
 But it is a still higher end of the highest education 
 to raise us above all hereditary and casual associa- 
 tion of times or circumstances, and to constrain us 
 to base our beliefs on an inspection of realities and 
 actualities. Every youth should be taught that he 
 is endowed with an inherent power of discernment, 
 which he is not at liberty to lay aside in any circum- 
 stances, and for the proper use of which he is respon- 
 sible.
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 RELATIVITY OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 WHEN Professor Ferrier propounded the theory 
 that one's self mixes as an integral and essen- 
 tial part with our knowledge of every object, and Sir 
 William Hamilton unfolded his doctrine of the rela- 
 tivity of knowledge, I felt constrained to declare 
 that there were views prevalent in metaphysical 
 speculation which were working as much mischief 
 as the ideal theory had clone in the days of Berkeley ; 
 and I ventured to affirm that if Professor Ferrier's 
 speculations were not regarded as a reductio ad 
 dbsurdum of the whole style of thinking, " the next 
 phenomenon appearing in the philosophic firmament 
 must be a Hume or a Fichte." (Meth. of Div. Gov- 
 ern., 4th Edit, App. pp. 536-539.) In now holding 
 that this fear has been realized, it is not needful to 
 maintain that Mr. Mill is in every respect like either 
 the great Scottish sceptic or the great German 
 idealist, any more than to assert that these two are 
 like each other. Mr. Mill is not so original a thinker 
 as Hume, nor does he like him profess scepticism. 
 He does not possess the speculative genius of Fichte, 
 
 (231)
 
 282 BELATTTITY OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 and he defends his system in a much more sober 
 manner. But it can be shown that his philosophy 
 comes very nearly to the positions taken up by Hume, 
 when Hume is properly understood ; and in main- 
 taining that mind is a series of feelings aware of 
 itself, and that matter is a possibility of sensations, 
 he has reached conclusions quite as visionary as 
 those of Fichte. As Hume brought out fully the 
 results lying in the Philosophy of Berkeley — as 
 one of the offshoots of the philosophy of Locke, and 
 as Fichte carried to their logical consequences cer- 
 tain of the fundamental principles of Kant, so Mr. 
 Mill, and we may add Mr. Herbert Spencer, are pur- 
 suing to their proper issues the doctrine floating in 
 nearly all our later metaphysics, that we can know 
 nothing of the nature of things. 
 
 Mr. Bain speaks complacently of " the great doc- 
 trine called the Relativity of Knowledge, which has 
 risen by slow degrees to its present high position in 
 philosophy." But unfortunately — I should rather 
 say fortunately — no two defenders of the doctrine 
 have agreed as to the sense in which they hold it ; 
 in fact I can see no point in which they meet except 
 the Comtian position, that the knowledge of the 
 actual nature of things is beyond the reach of man. 
 Mr. Mill remarks very properly (p. 5), that the 
 phrase " relativity of knowledge " admits of a great 
 variety of meanings, and that when a philosopher 
 lays great stress upon the doctrine, " it is necessary 
 to cross-examine his writings, and compel them to
 
 BELATIVITY OF KNOWLEDGE. 283 
 
 disclose in which of its many degrees of meaning he 
 understands the phrase." 
 
 There is a doctrine sometimes passing by this 
 name, which will recommend itself to all sober 
 thinkers: who will admit — (1.) that we can know 
 objects only so far as we have faculties of knowl- 
 edge ; (2.) that we can know objects only under the 
 aspects presented to the faculties; and (3.) that our 
 faculties are limited in number and in range, so that 
 not only do we not know all objects, we do not know 
 all about any one object. These positions have 
 been disputed by none except some of the Alexan- 
 drian Neo-Platonists in ancient times, and a few 
 German defenders of the Absolute Philosophy in 
 modern times. A doctrine embracing these posi- 
 tions has been known and acknowledged under such 
 designations as that of " the limited knowledge of 
 man," and should not be expressed by so ambiguous 
 a phrase as " the relativity of knowledge," which is 
 applied to a very different theory. That theory has 
 of late years assumed four different forms. 
 
 I. There is the form given to it by Sir W. Hamil- 
 ton. He thus unfolds it (Metaph. i. 148): "Our 
 knowledge is relative, — 1st, because existence is 
 not cognizable absolutely and in itself, but only in 
 special modes; 2r/, because these modes can be 
 known only if they stand in a certain relation to 
 our faculties." Mr. Mill thus comments : "Whoever 
 can find anything more in these statements than 
 that we do not know .ill about a thing, but only so
 
 2?A RELATIVITY OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 much as wo are capable of knowing, is more ingen- 
 ious or more fortunate than myself." But surely it 
 is desirable to have even this much allowed and 
 clearly enunciated ; only I think it unfortunate that 
 two such inexplicable phrases as " absolutely " and 
 "in itself " should have been introduced. Sir Wil- 
 liam gives a third reason, and here the error appears. 
 " 3d, Because the modes, thus relative to our facul- 
 ties, are presented to and known by the mind only 
 under modifications determined by these faculties 
 themselves." This doctrine is thoroughly Kantian 
 in itself and in its logical consequences. It makes 
 the mind look at things, but through a glass so cut 
 and colored that it gives a special shape and hue to 
 every object. "Suppose that the total object of 
 consciousness in perception is = 12 ; and suppose 
 that the external reality contributes 6, the material 
 sense 3, and the mind 3, — this may enable you 
 to form some rude conjecture of the nature of the 
 object of perception." 1 (Metaph. ii. p. 129.) This 
 doctrine very much neutralizes that of natural 
 realism, which Hamilton seems, after the manner of 
 Reid, to be so strenuously defending. To suppose 
 that in perception or cognition proper we mix 
 elements derived from our subjective stores, is to 
 unsettle our whole convictions as to the reality of 
 
 1 Sir William Hamilton has used that he had some means of satisfying 
 
 very unguarded language as to hu- himself that he held by the reality of 
 
 man nescience; but I have reason to things. There is a point here on 
 
 believe that he thought himself misun- which it is hoped some of his pupils 
 
 derstood, and I am inclined to think may be able to throw light.
 
 BELATIVITY OF KNOWLEDGE. 235 
 
 things; for if the mind acids three things, why 
 not thirty things, why not three hundred, till we are 
 landed in absolute idealism, or in the dreary flat 
 into which those who would float in that empty 
 space are sure in the end to fall, that is, absolute 
 scepticism. By assuming this middle place between 
 Reid and Kant, this last of the great Scottish met- 
 aphysicians has been exposed to the fire of the 
 opposing camps of idealism and realism, and it 
 will be impossible for the school to continue to 
 hold the position of their master. 
 
 It required no great shrewdness to foresee the 
 logical consequences that would be drawn, and so I 
 take no credit for resolutely opposing the doctrine 
 from the time of its publication. It should be al- 
 lowed that sensations, feelings, impressions, associate 
 themselves with our knowledge, but every man of 
 sound sense easily separates them ; and it should not 
 be difficult for the philosopher to distinguish between 
 them, to distinguish between our intuition of a tooth 
 and the pain of toothache, between the perception 
 of a landscape and the aesthetic emotions which it 
 calls up. Following the spontaneous convictions of 
 assurance and certitude in the mind (see x.), which 
 all but the sceptic allow speculatively, and which 
 even the sceptic must actually proceed upon in de- 
 fending his scepticism, we should hold, — (1.) that 
 we know the very thing :is appearing, and not a 
 mere appearance without a thing to appear; and 
 (2.) that our knowlcflL;"' is correct so far as it goes,
 
 236 RELATIVITY OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 and is not modified by the subjective forms of the 
 mind. I have been striving in these chapters to 
 show that we immediately know a self and extended 
 objects beyond. But we have the same grounds for 
 affirming that our knowledge is correct as for assert- 
 ing that we have knowledge. In the event of man's 
 intuitive knowledge being mistaken or fallacious in 
 any point, it is certain he could never discover it to 
 be so with his present faculties. Our perceptions of 
 sense, consciousness, and intuitive reason all combine 
 in a consistent result, and we must receive the whole 
 or reject the whole. Hamilton declares that "no at- 
 tempt to show that the data of consciousness are 
 (either in themselves or in their necessary conse- 
 quences) mutually contradictory, has yet succeeded." 
 "An original, universal, dogmatic subversion of 
 knowledge has hitherto been found impossible." ( App. 
 to Reid's Works, p. 746.) That there should be such 
 consistency in intuitive truth that the acutest human 
 intellects have not been able to detect a contradic- 
 tion, is not the primary proof, but is a confirmation 
 of its truth. That there should be such consistency 
 in total error, or in a mixture of truth and error, is 
 scarcely believable : we could account for it only on 
 the supposition that it was produced by a mischievous 
 deity, who wished so to deceive us that we could 
 never discover the deception, — a supposition con 
 tradicted by the circumstance that the whole con- 
 stitution of our minds and of things is fitted to im- 
 press us with the importance of veracity, showing
 
 BELATIVITY OF KNOWLEDGE. 237 
 
 that the Creator and Ruler of our world is a God of 
 Truth. 
 
 II. Mr. Mill has enunciated the doctrine in a second 
 form, and accepts it as expressing " a real and im- 
 portant law of our mental nature. This is, that we 
 only know anything by knowing it as distinguished 
 from something else ; that all consciousness is of dif- 
 ference ; that two objects are the smallest number 
 required to constitute consciousness ; that a thing is 
 only seen to be what it is by contrast with what it 
 is not." (p. 6.) He tells that the employment of the 
 phrase to express this meaning is sanctioned by high 
 authorities, and he mentions Mr. Bain, " who habit- 
 ually uses the phrase ' relativity of knowledge ' in 
 this sense." It is quite true that the doctrine, that 
 all knowledge consists in comparison, has appeared 
 again and again in speculative philosophy ; but as 
 destroying the simplicity of our mental operations, 
 and reversing the order of nature, it has wrought 
 only mischief. 
 
 The mind, as I apprehend, begins its intelligent 
 acts with knowledge, and, we may add, with beliefs, 
 and then it can go on to compare the things known 
 and believed in,and thereby widens the domain both 
 of knowledge and belief. It commences, we may 
 suppose, with a perception, — which is knowledge, — 
 of an external object, and a consciousness, — which 
 is knowledge, — of self as perceiving the object. 
 Then it remembers, and in doing so has a belief in 
 +he object which has been perceived. In all this
 
 288 BELATIY1TY OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 there is no comparison, but having this, the mind 
 can forthwith institute a comparison and pronounce 
 a judgment. Thus, having a knowledge of body in 
 the concrete, the mind can then, when a purpose is 
 to be served by it, declare that body exists, and that 
 it is extended; and having a knowledge of self, it 
 can assert that it exists, and that it is under grief or 
 joy, — as our experience may be at the time. Re- 
 membering an event as happening in time past, it 
 can declare that the event is real, and the time real. 
 But while such judgments are involved in our pri- 
 mary cognitions, I rather think that they come in 
 later life : the child, I rather think, as knowing its 
 own existence and never doubting it, is not at the 
 trouble of asserting it. But the child, on perceiving 
 two objects successively, or it may be simultaneously, 
 delights to discover a relation between them. Such 
 judgments follow so immediately on the cognitions, 
 that it is not necessary to distinguish them from one 
 another except in scientific psychology. But if meta- 
 physicians lay down an opposite doctrine, and draw 
 consequences from it, it is absolutely necessary to 
 correct the statement. 
 
 I suppose Mr. Mill would represent the mind as 
 beginning with sensations. We have then a sensa- 
 tion. Is there comparison in this ? I cannot discover 
 that there is. No doubt, upon another sensation 
 rising up, we may compare the one with the other 
 and discover an agreement or difference. But in 
 order to this comparison there is memory; and
 
 RELATIVITY OF KNOWLEDGE. 239 
 
 memory, in recalling the sensation, must bring it up 
 prior to the comparison. But Mr. Mill may say that 
 we have two sensations simultaneously, — say a sen- 
 sation of resistance by one sense, and a sensation of 
 color by another, and we declare them at once to 
 agree or to differ. But could we not have the sen- 
 sation of resistance or the sensation of color though 
 each came alone ? Even when they come simulta- 
 neously, we are able to compare them, because we 
 know so much of each. We ever proceed on a sup- 
 posed knowledge of the objects when we compare 
 and decide. When I say that 2 -j- 2 = 4, it is be- 
 cause I know what is meant by the terms. If I say 
 Ben Nevis is a few feet higher than Ben Macdhui, it 
 is because I know somewhat of the height of each 
 mountain. If I say that Aristotle's Induction was 
 not the same as Bacon's ; that Comte's Positive 
 Method differs essentially from Bacon's Inductive 
 Method ; that Locke was not a follower of Ilobbes ; 
 that Condillac had no right to proclaim himself a 
 disciple of Locke ; that Reicl met Hume in a more 
 sagacious manner than Kant did ; that Brown vainly 
 endeavored to combine the Sensational School of 
 France with the British Association School and the 
 School of Reid ; and that a good Inductive Logic 
 must combine certain principles of Whewell with 
 those of Mill, — I do so because I think I know 
 something of the philosophic systems of which I 
 speak, and am thus able to compare or to contrast 
 them.
 
 240 BELATIYITY OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 But Mr, Mill may refer me to the philosophy of 
 Hamilton, which dot-lares that in the very first act 
 of consciousness we discover the relation of the ego 
 and the ?w?i ego. My readers, however, will have 
 soon by this time that I am not bound to follow 
 Hamilton, who, in fact, though without meaning it, 
 prepared the way for a farther doctrine from which 
 he would have turned aw 7 ay w T ith the strongest aver- 
 sion. I believe that in our conscious sense-percep- 
 tions w r e know both the self and the not-self in one 
 concrete act ; and of course we have in all this the 
 materials for a judgment ; but I doubt much whether 
 the infant actually pronounces the judgment. But 
 then it is said that our knowledge of the object is 
 an apprehension of the relation of the object or sen- 
 sation to the perceiving mind. Now r , I believe that 
 a relation is formed in the very act of knowledge. 
 But my knowledge does not consist in the percep- 
 tion of the relation ; on the contrary, the relation 
 may arise simply from the knowledge. I apprehend 
 the President of the United States of America ; as I 
 do so, I have constituted a relation between myself 
 and him ; but there may have been no previous re- 
 lation ; and if I declare the relation, it is by a con- 
 sequent and subsequent act. I strive to rise to a 
 contemplation of the Divine Being; there is no 
 doubt a relation of my mind to the object viewed ; 
 but the relation consists in my contemplation. When 
 the Divine Being looks down on His works and pities 
 those who suffer, it is not because the Creator in all
 
 BELATLVIT1 OF KNOWLEDGE. 241 
 
 this is dependent on His creatures ; the viewing of 
 them by Him with regard and commiseration consti- 
 tutes the particular and interesting relation. It is 
 high time to lay an arrest on that style of represent- 
 ation, so frequent in the present age, which would 
 make us perceive a relation before perceiving the 
 things related, and make the very Divine knowledge, 
 so far as we can comprehend it, depend on creature 
 relations. 
 
 I take exception, on like grounds, to another part 
 of the same doctrine : " That a thing is only seen to 
 be what it is by contrast with what it is not." I ad- 
 mit that where we can discover contrasts, our notions 
 are rendered more distinct and vivid. But I cannot 
 allow that we should not have known a sensation, 
 say the feeling of a lacerated limb, to be painful, un- 
 less we had contrasted it with a pleasurable one ; on 
 the contrary, I maintain that in order to contrast the 
 two, we must have experienced them in succession. 
 I cannot believe that we should never have known 
 body as extended, unless we had previously known 
 something as unextended ; or that no one could 
 know and appreciate moral good unless he had been 
 acquainted with moral evil. 
 
 The doctrine I am expounding in this volume 
 makes the relations to be in the things compared, 
 and not the creation of the mind as it compares 
 them. The opposite doctrine reverses the order of 
 the mind's procedure, and, logically followed out, un- 
 settles the foundation of knowledge. It makes us 
 
 16
 
 242 RELATIVITY OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 discover relations between things in themselves un- 
 known, and it leaves us standing on a bridge of 
 which we do not know that it has a support at either 
 end. If we know a thing only in relation to another 
 thing, and this only in relation to some other thing, 
 as we thus ever chase the thing without catching it, 
 we are made to feel as if we had only a series of 
 strings put into our hands, at which we have to pull 
 forever without their bringing anything but other 
 strings. 
 
 Mr. Mill's theory obliges him to accept the special 
 doctrine I am now examining in its very lowest 
 form. The school of Kant, both in its German and 
 British modifications, supposes that the mind has a 
 rich furniture of forms and categories, out of which 
 can be fashioned an ideal world of a very lofty 
 character. But the school of Mill, admitting no a 
 priori elements, and limiting the comparative capaci- 
 ties of the mind, can furnish no such glorious crea- 
 tion. Mr. Mill gives us the power of discovering 
 only the relations of co-existence and succession, 
 and of resemblance and difference. He says that 
 " equality is but another word for the exact resem- 
 blance, commonly called identity, considered an 
 subsisting between things in respect of their quan- 
 tity." And then, in explaining what is implied in 
 quantity, "When we say of two things that they 
 differ in quantity, just as when we say they differ in 
 quality, the assertion is always grounded upon a 
 difference in the sensations w r hich thev excite"
 
 BELATIVITT OF KNOWLEDGE. 243 
 
 {Logic, B. i. c. iii. § 11, 12) : thus making us know 
 nothing of either quality or quantity or number, 
 except as denoting agreements in the sensations 
 forming the series which we call mind. Mr. Bain 
 goes down to a still lower level, when he tells us, in 
 a passage already quoted (p. 217), that cognizance 
 of difference and cognizance of agreement exhaust 
 the essence of knowledge ; that all we can know of 
 a ring is its agreement with certain things, and its 
 differences from other things ; which other things, of 
 course, can be known only as they agree with, or 
 differ from, yet other things. Knowledge can have 
 no resting-place when driven from one thing to 
 another in this shuttlecock process. It falls through, 
 by being placed between such instabilities. The 
 way to „ meet all this, and put knowledge on its 
 proper basis, is by showing that we have an original 
 knowledge of self, and of objects, such as a ring, be- 
 yond self; and that, proceeding on this, we are able 
 to discover not only resemblances and differences, 
 but various other important relations, which enable 
 us to combine every one thing known with others as 
 also known in a compact structure, in which every 
 one part binds all the others, and helps to support 
 the whole. 
 
 III. Mr. Mill would especially apply the phrase, 
 u relativity of knowledge," to a third doctrine, being, 
 in fact, his own theory of the mind. " Our knowl- 
 edge of objects, and even our fancies about objects, 
 consist of nothing but the sensations they excite, or
 
 2-U RELATIVITY OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 which we imagine them exciting in ourselves." 
 '• This knowledge is merely phenomenal." " The 
 object is known to us only in one special relation, 
 namely, as that which produces, or is capable of 
 producing, certain impressions on our senses ; and 
 all that we really know is these impressions." " This 
 is the Doctrine of the Relativity of Knowledge to 
 the knowing mind, in the simplest, purest, and, as I 
 think, the most proper acceptation of the words." 
 (pp. 7-14.) I confess I can see no propriety in 
 applying to such a theory a phrase which had been 
 appropriated by Sir William Hamilton, or by some 
 of us who had criticised him, to a different doctrine. 
 I do not see that it has any right to claim the title 
 of " knowledge," or that it can get " relations," when 
 it has no things to bring into relation. The theory 
 is simply that we know sensations, and possibilities 
 of sensations, while we cannot be said to know what 
 sensations are. But I have no interest in giving 
 the phrase any one special application rather than 
 another ; I believe it to be vague and ambiguous 
 — in fact, not used by any two philosophers, I rather 
 think by no one philosopher, at different places, in 
 one and the same sense ; and I think it should be 
 altogether banished from speculation. And as to 
 the doctrine to which Mr. Mill would specially 
 apply it, I need not enter upon the consideration of 
 it here, as I have been examining it all through- 
 out this volume. But there is a fourth form 
 of the general theory, defended by an illustrious
 
 BELATIVITY OF KNOWLEDGE. 245 
 
 member of the same school, which demands a 
 notice. 
 
 IV. Mr. Grote, in his exposition of Plato's philoso- 
 phy (Art. Thecetetus), has developed a theory of rela- 
 tivity, which he ascribes to the Sophists, at least 
 to Protagoras, and which he himself is prepared to 
 accept. It is the doctrine of Homo Mensura, which, 
 construed in its true meaning, is said to be, " Object 
 is implicated with, limited or measured by, Subject ; 
 a doctrine proclaiming the relativeness of all objects 
 perceived, conceived, known or felt — and the 
 omnipresent involution of the perceiving, conceiv- 
 ing, knowing, or feeling, Subject : the Object vary- 
 ing with the Subject. 'As things appear to me, 
 so they are to me ; as they appear to you, so they 
 are to you.' This theory is just and important if 
 rightly understood and explained." (Vol. ii. p. 335.) 
 " So far as the doctrine asserts essential fusion and 
 implication between Subject and Object, with actual 
 multiplicitity of distinct subjects — denying the 
 reality either of absolute and separate Subject, or of 
 absolute and separate Object — I think it true and 
 instructive." (p. 340.) Proceeding on this general 
 doctrine, he reaches another : " What is Truth to 
 one man, is not truth, and is often Falsehood, to 
 another; that which governs the mind as infallible 
 authority in one part of the globe, is treated with 
 indifference or contempt elsewhere. Each man's 
 belief, though in part determined by the same causes 
 as the belief of others, is in part also determined by
 
 W6 BELATIVITY OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 causes peculiar to himself. When a man speaks of 
 Truth he means what he himself (along with others, 
 or singly, as the case may be) believes to be Truth ; 
 unless he expressly superadds the indication of some 
 other persons believing in it." (p. 3G0.) 
 
 I have looked from time to time into the Platonic 
 and Aristotelian discussions on the subject, but I 
 confess I have never been able to discover what was 
 the precise philosophy of the Sophists, or whether 
 indeed they had a philosophy, or whether they were 
 anything more than instructors of youth, professing 
 to teach wisdom — without knowing w^hat w T isdom 
 is. So far as any of them, such as Protagoras, had 
 a philosophic system, I think it probable that they 
 meant it to be that which has been elaborated by 
 the British Section of the school of Comte. But I 
 have here to do not with the Greek Sophists, but 
 with Mr. Grote. I am surprised to find him repeat- 
 ing the juggle, which has so often been exposed, 
 arising from the ambiguity of the phrase " Subject 
 and Object." No doubt, if you use the terms as cor- 
 relative, meaning by " subject " the niind contemplat- 
 ing an object, and by "object" a thing contemplated, 
 then the subject implies the object, and the object 
 the subject, as the husband implies the w T ife, and 
 the wife the husband. But as we cannot argue 
 from the husband implying the wife that every 
 man has a wife, or from the wife implying a hus- 
 band that every woman has a husband, so Ave cannot 
 argue from the mere existence of a mind that there
 
 RELATIVITY OF KNOWLEDGE. 247 
 
 must be an external thing to think about, nor from 
 the bare existence of an object or thing that there 
 must be a mind to think about it. As to the allega- 
 tion that the subjective mind necessarily mixes its 
 own shapes and colors with the things known, I 
 have already examined it when discussing the first 
 form of the theory of relativeness. There is, there 
 can be no proof advanced in its behalf — that is to 
 show that the mirror does not correctly reflect the 
 object presented to it. We have the same grounds 
 for believing in the accuracy of our primitive knowl- 
 edge as we have for believing in the existence either 
 of the subject or the object. 
 
 But the fatal part of the doctrine lies in the asser- 
 tion, that truth varies with the individual, and with 
 the circumstances in which he may be placed : a 
 tenet which, if held by the Sophists, deserves all the 
 reprobation heaped upon it by Socrates, Plato, and 
 Aristotle, — and, I may add, that the defence of it, 
 in the further light we now enjoy, is worse than the 
 original offence. By truth, I mean what philosophers 
 in general have understood by it, — the conformity 
 of our ideas to things. There is no truth where 
 there is no correspondence of our notions to realities. 
 I admit that human knowledge never comes up to 
 the extent of things. I allow that human knowledge 
 is often partial, that is, is only partly correct, and 
 may have error mixed up with it. But truth, so far 
 as it is truth, is the agreement of thoughts with 
 things. To illustrate this, I will not trouble the
 
 248 BE1.ATIYITY OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 school with transcendental or religious truth. I ap- 
 peal to judgments pronounced on more common 
 and familiar affairs. Were any one to affirm that 
 there never had been such a country as ancient 
 Greece, such a man as Socrates, or such a sect as the 
 Sophists ; that Queen Victoria is incapable of cher- 
 ishing the memory of departed friends, that Louis 
 Napoleon is a man of guileless transparency and 
 openness of character, or that President Lincoln was 
 a man given to crooked and dishonest policy ; that 
 Mr. Grote was utterly illiterate, had never written, 
 and could not write a history of Greece, and had 
 never been favorable to vote by ballot, — I would 
 say of this person, not that he had got what is truth 
 to himself, but that he had not reached truth at all. 
 Were I to allow myself to think that a certain Lon- 
 don banking-house of high repute is on the point of 
 bankruptcy, and that those who manage it are a 
 band of rogues and robbers, I should in the very 
 act be guilty not only of error but of sin ; and I am 
 sure that were I to give expression to such a thought, 
 I should be justly exposed to punishment. 
 
 Mr. Grote represents his doctrine as forming the 
 basis of the principle of toleration, and the opposite 
 doctrine as fostering intolerance, (p. 3G2.) I reverse 
 this account, and declare that the person who avows 
 that he cannot distinguish between truth and error, 
 is not in circumstances to exercise the virtue of tol- 
 erance ; for he has not discovered an error which he 
 is bound to tolerate ; and Mr. Grote's principle would
 
 RELATIVITY OF KNOWLEDGE. 249 
 
 lead him to refuse toleration, if ever he did reach 
 positive truth. The principle of toleration, as I un- 
 derstand it, is, that I am bound to tolerate what I 
 believe, what I may know, to be error ; that the 
 power of punishing error as error has not been put 
 into my hands, has in fact been mercifully withheld 
 from me by One who claims to be Himself the 
 Judge. I am quite sure that there is a God who 
 rules this world in justice and love, and yet I feel 
 that I must bear even with the " fool who says in 
 his heart, There is no God." This is my idea of 
 toleration, which I reckon a much deeper and juster 
 one than that held by those who say that truth 
 varies with the individual, the age, and the circum- 
 stances. 
 
 But then Mr. Grote tells us "no infallible objective 
 mark, no common measure, no canon of evidence, re- 
 cognized by all, has yet been found." (p. 360.) I 
 admit freely that we cannot obtain what a certain 
 school calls an absolute criterion of truth ; for I admit 
 that the word " absolute " is about the most unintel- 
 ligible in the language, whether as used by those 
 who favor or oppose the doctrine it is employed to 
 designate. I allow, further, that it is in vain to 
 search for any one criterion which will settle for us 
 what is truth in all matters. But we have tests 
 quite sufficient to determine for us what is truth and 
 what is error in many matters, both speculative and 
 practical; these I shall endeavor to unfold in a future 
 chapter. (See xix.) I have intuitive evidence of my
 
 250 RELATIVITY OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 own existence ; and evidence from testimony of the 
 existence of India, which I never saw ; and evidence 
 from induction and deduction of the existence of 
 the law of gravitation, — and I declare of any one 
 who denies any of these that he is in error, and this 
 however strong his beliefs may be. To believe with- 
 out evidence, and not to believe when we have 
 evidence, may both be sinful when our belief or un- 
 belief involve duties which we owe to ourselves, to 
 our fellow-men, and to God.
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 man's power of conception as a test op truth. 
 
 THE word " conceive," with its derivatives " con- 
 ceivable" and "inconceivable," is one of the 
 most ambiguous in the philosophic nomenclature of 
 this country. When I say I cannot conceive the dis- 
 tance of a star which requires hundreds of thousands 
 of years to transmit its light to our earth, I use the 
 term in the sense of " image " or " represent." When 
 I affirm that I have a conception of the animal king- 
 dom, I mean that I have a general notion of beings 
 possessing animation. When I declare that I cannot 
 conceive that God should be unjust, I signify that I 
 cannot so believe or decide. These three senses are 
 at once seen not to be the same when the difference 
 is pointed out. We cannot easily imagine the dis- 
 tance of a fixed star, but we decide on the evidence 
 produced, or believe on the authority of astronomers, 
 that it is at the distance it is said to be. We cannot 
 image the class "animal kingdom," for it includes 
 innumerable objects, yet we can intellectually think 
 about it, that is, about objects possessing the com- 
 mon attribute of animal life. We cannot be made 
 
 (201)
 
 262 MAN'S rOWEE OF CONCEPTION 
 
 to decide or believe that Cleopatra's Needle should 
 be in Paris and Egypt at the same time, yet with 
 some difficulty we can simultaneously image it in 
 both places. 
 
 It could easily be shown that the phrase is used 
 in all these senses in philosophy, as well as in our 
 current literature. " By conception," says Stewart 
 (Elem. c. iii.), " I mean that power of the mind which 
 enables us to form a notion of an absent object of 
 perception." Sir William Hamilton professes to use 
 the word in the same sense as the German Begriff, 
 that is, for the general notion formed by an indefinite 
 number of objects being joined by the possession of 
 a common attribute. With or without avowing it 
 philosophers have also employed it in the third sense. 
 Hamilton often explains conceive by "construe in 
 thought," which must denote an act of judgment ; 
 he must employ it in this sense when he says it is 
 inconceivable that space should have limits. Dr. 
 Whewell's arguments in favor of necessary truth are 
 valid only when he uses it in the signification of 
 judging, as when he says, "we cannot conceive 
 reasoning to be merely a series of sensations." (Phil 
 Ind. Sciences, i. 44.) 
 
 The question arises, and must now be settled, in 
 which of these senses, or in what other, is the word 
 employed when man's power or impotency of con- 
 ception is supposed to be a test of truth. It is clear 
 that it cannot be employed in the first-mentioned 
 sense Man's capability of imaging an object is no
 
 AS A TEST OF TRUTH. 253 
 
 proof of its existence : I can picture a hobgoblin 
 without supposing it to be a reality. Man's inca- 
 pacity to image or represent an object is no proof of 
 its non-existence ; a blind man cannot have an idea 
 of color, but this does not prove even to him that 
 color has no existence. Nor can it be used in the 
 second signification above intimated. I can form a 
 notion of a class of mermaids without being con- 
 vinced that mermaids were ever seen by any human 
 being. In these senses of the words there is much 
 conceivable by man which has no existence, much 
 inconceivable by man which has an existence. Con- 
 ceivability and inconceivability can be employed as 
 a test of truth only in the third meaning of the 
 term, as signifying " construe in thought " (whatever 
 that may mean), judge or decide. 
 
 Both the defenders and opposers of intuitive truth 
 have been in the way of going from the one of 
 these meanings to the other. Hamilton uses the 
 phrase both in the first and third of these significa- 
 tions without perceiving that they are not the same ; 
 and it is very much because of this ambiguity that 
 he is able to make it appear that there is a contra- 
 diction in human thought. He says, on the one 
 hand, that we cannot conceive space or time as 
 without bounds; which must mean, when properly 
 interpreted, that we must always give a boundary 
 in the image we form of it. But then he tells us, on 
 the other hand, that we are altogether unable to 
 conceive space or time as bounded ; that is, when
 
 254 MANS POWEB OF CONCEPTION 
 
 rightly understood, we cannot be made to judge or 
 decide that it lias bounds. He has constructed a set 
 of opposed propositions as to space, time, and 
 infinity, the seeming contradiction arising very 
 much from the double signification of the word 
 "conceive." (See Art. on "Unconditioned" in Dis- 
 missions.) But the philosopher who has made the 
 most frequent use of the impossibility of conceiving 
 the opposite as a test of truth is Dr. Whewell. He 
 tells us that necessary truths are those "in which 
 we cannot, even by an effort of imagination, or in a 
 supposition, conceive the reverse of that which is as- 
 serted." Necessary truths are those of which we can- 
 not distinctly conceive the contrary." (Phil. Ind. Sc, 
 i. 55, 59.) The phrase "imagination" and the 
 phrase " distinctly " might lead us to think that by 
 "conceive" we are to understand " image," yet we 
 must attach a different meaning to it when he tells 
 us more accurately of necessary truths that we 
 "see" them — which must mean "judge" them — 
 " to be true by thinking about them, and see that 
 they could not be otherwise." (lb., p. 20.) But so 
 loosely does he use this test, that he declares that 
 laws acknowledged to be discovered by experiment, 
 such as the laws of motion and of chemical affinity, 
 are such that it is inconceivable that they should 
 not be true. "For how, in fact, can we conceive 
 combinations otherwise than as definite in kind and 
 quantity ? " " We cannot conceive a world in which 
 this should not be the case." (lb., i 400.) When
 
 AS A TEST OF TRUTH. 255 
 
 the defenders of fundamental truth fall into such 
 ambiguity of phraseology, and apply their test so 
 unsatisfactorily, there is some excuse for those who 
 criticise and oppose them when they take advantage 
 of their mistakes. 
 
 I say " some excuse," for I cannot allow that this 
 is an entire justification of Mr. Mill when he uses 
 the word, as I shall show he does, in so many differ- 
 ent senses; and when, in criticising Hamilton and 
 Whewell, he employs it in a way they would not 
 have allowed. Mr. Mill is aware that, when Sir 
 William Hamilton is wishing; to bring: out his full 
 meaning, he uses such phrases as "think," and 
 "construe in thought:" and Dr. Whewell, while he 
 also uses the word " think," is careful to represent 
 Conceptions as modifications of Fundamental Ideas, 
 which he enumerates and classifies. Mr. Mill always 
 employs the phrase in a vague manner, and often in 
 more than one signification. He must use it in the 
 sense of " image " or " picture " when he says, " We 
 cannot conceive a line without breadth ; we can 
 form no mental picture of such a line." {Logic, B. n. 
 c. v. § 1.) This is all true, but it is also true that 
 we can form an abstract notion of such a line. 
 He states that Dr. Wlicwell's idea of necessary truth 
 is "a proposition, the negation of which is not 
 only false, but inconceivable." But then, in criticis- 
 ing this test, he uses the word in quite a different 
 sense : "When we have often seen and thought two 
 things together, and have never in one instance
 
 256 MANS POWER OF CONCEPTION 
 
 either seen or thought of them separate, there is, by 
 the primary law of association, an increasing diffi- 
 culty, which in the end becomes insuperable, of con- 
 ceiving the two things apart." (lb., § 6.) It is clear 
 that while Dr. Whewell uses the phrases as applica- 
 ble to a proposition declared to be true, Mr. Mill 
 employs it in the sense of mental pictures joined by 
 association. This is one other instance of an am- 
 phiboly, which we have noticed before, and which 
 will require to be noticed again in examining Mr. 
 Mill's attempt to explain necessity of thought by 
 association of ideas. 
 
 He tells us, " The history of science teems with 
 inconceivabilities which have been conquered, and 
 supposed necessary truths, which have first ceased 
 to be thought necessary, then to be thought 
 true, and have finally come to be deemed im- 
 possible." (p. 150.) And then he gives us once 
 more his famous case of persons not being able 
 to conceive of antipodes, being "merely the effect 
 of a strong association." But let us understand 
 precisely in what sense our forefathers had a diffi- 
 culty in conceiving the existence of antipodes. It is 
 evident that they could have little difficulty in 
 imagining to themselves a round globe with persons 
 with their feet adhering to it all around. Their 
 difficulty lay in deciding it to be true ; and the 
 difficulty was increased by the very vividness of the 
 picture of men, as they would have said, with their 
 feet upward and their head downward. It is clear
 
 AS A TEST OF TBUTK 257 
 
 that Mr. Mill, when he applies it to such a case, 
 must be using the word in the sense of "judge " and 
 " believe." But let us understand on what ground 
 our ancestors felt a difficulty in yielding their judg- 
 ment and belief. Not because of any supposed 
 intuition or necessary truth, — I am not aware that 
 they ever appealed to such; not even because of a 
 strong association : but because the alleged fact 
 seemed contrary to a law of nature established by 
 observation. A gathered experience seemed to 
 show that there was an absolute up and down, and 
 that heavy bodies tended downwards, and thus, and 
 not on any a priori grounds, did they argue that 
 there could not be antipodes, as persons so situated 
 would fall away into a lower space. As a narrow 
 experience had created the difficulty, so it could 
 remove it by giving us a view of the earth as a 
 mass of matter, causing human beings to adhere 
 to it over its whole surface. And such a case 
 does not in the least tend to prove, that truths 
 which are seen to be truths at once, and without 
 a gathered experience, could ever be set aside by a 
 further experience : that a conscious intelligent 
 being could be made to regard himself as non-exist- 
 ing; that he could believe himself as having been 
 in existence before he existed ; or that he could be 
 led to allow that two straight lines might enclose 
 a space in the constellation Orion. 
 
 It is in the highest degree expedient, at the stage 
 to which mental science has come, that the word 
 
 17
 
 258 MAN'S POWER OF CONCEPTION. 
 
 1 conceive,' and its derivatives, should be abandoned 
 altogether in such a connection ; as being fitted to 
 confuse our ideas and mislead our judgments. The 
 greatest and wisest philosophers have not appealed 
 to the possibility or impossibility of conception as 
 tests of truth or falsehood, but have pointed to other 
 and clearer and more decisive criteria} 
 
 1 The printing of this work had pro- lief" (i. 303.) But he himself con- 
 
 ceeded thus far, when I observed that tinues to take advantage of the am- 
 
 Mr. M., in 6th edition of Logic, just biguity, which is greater than he yet 
 
 published, has been obliged, in defend- sees. I have been laboring for yeara 
 
 ing himself against Mr. Spencer, to to make metaphysicians perceive the 
 
 notice that " conceive " might signify ambiguity. 
 " to have an idea " or " to have a be-
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 SELF-EVIDENCE AND NECESSITY THE TESTS OP INTUITION. 
 
 M 1 
 
 E. MILL freely admits the existence and the 
 veracity of intuitive perceptions. But he has 
 lot inquired into their nature, their mode of opera- 
 tion, their laws, their tests, or their limits. What he 
 has failed to do must be undertaken by others ; and 
 in the process it will be seen that intuition has quite 
 as important a place in the mind as sensation, asso- 
 ciation, or any of Mr. Mill's favorite principles, and 
 that it must be embraced and have a distinct place 
 allotted to it in a sufficient theory of our mental 
 operations. 
 
 Our intuitions are all of the nature of perceptions, 
 in which we look on objects known or apprehended : 
 on separate objects, or on objects compared with one 
 another. Sometimes the objects are present, and we 
 look on them directly, by the senses and self-con- 
 sciousness. In other cases tbey are not present, but 
 still we have an apprehension of them, and our con- 
 victions, whether beliefs or judgments, proceed upon 
 this apprehension. A very different account has 
 often been given of them. According to Locke, the 
 
 (259)
 
 200 SELF-EVIDENCE AND NECESSITY 
 
 mind in intuition looks at ideas, and not at things. 
 According to the theory elaborated by Kant, and so 
 far adopted by Hamilton, it is possessed of a priori 
 forms, which it imposes on objects. Such views are 
 altogether indefensible, and have in fact hindered the 
 ready reception of the true doctrine. Making our 
 intuitions mere ideas or forms in the mind, they have 
 very much separated them from realities. The in- 
 tuitions I stand up for are all intuitions of things. 
 In opposition to M. Comte and his school in all its 
 branches, I hold that man is so constituted as to 
 know somewhat of things, and the relations of things. 
 What we know of things, with their relations, on the 
 bare inspection or contemplation of them, constitutes 
 the body of intuitive truth, and the capacity to dis- 
 cover it is called intuition. Taken in this sense, the 
 exercise of intuition is not opposed to experience, 
 but is in fact an experience : only it is not a gathered 
 experience ; it is a singular experience at the basis 
 of all collected experiences. 
 
 Our intuitive perceptions are all, in the first in- 
 stance, individual or singular. Thus, by the external 
 senses, we observe an extended and colored surface 
 before us, or by the internal consciousness we ex- 
 perience ourselves in a certain state of thought and 
 feeling. Our very intuitive judgments or com- 
 parisons are singular. On finding that a particular 
 rod, A, is of the same length as another rod, B, and 
 that B is of the same length as a third rod, C, we at 
 once declare that A is equal to C. But we can gen-
 
 TEE TESTS OF INTUITION. 261 
 
 eralize these intuitive judgments, and then they be- 
 come maxims or axioms. We see that what is true 
 of the rods A, B, C, would also be of the rods D, E, 
 F, or of any other objects found equal to one an- 
 other, and we feel ourselves entitled to declare that 
 " things which are equal to the same thing are equal 
 to one another." As the generalization is the result, 
 not of an intuitive, but a discursive process, it is 
 possible that error may creep into it, that the gener- 
 alized expression of our original perceptions may be 
 mutilated or exaggerated. But on the supposition 
 that the generalization has been properly conducted, 
 the maxim is as certain as the individual perception 
 is allowed to be. 
 
 By standing up for this distinction between what we 
 may call our spontaneous and our generalized intui- 
 tions, we can answer an objection urged against the 
 existence of necessary truth by Mr. Mill. " The very 
 fact that the question is disputed, disproves the 
 alleged impossibility. Those against whom it is 
 needful to defend the belief which is affirmed to be 
 necessary, are unmistakable examples that it is not 
 necessary." (p. 150.) But what is the dispute ? It 
 is commonly not as to the belief, but simply as to 
 whether it is intuitive, which, as Mi-. Mill knows and 
 asserts, is not to be settled by intuition. Take only 
 one example : the sums of equals are equals; there 
 is no dispute as to the truth of tins. What Mr. 
 Mill's school objects to is, thai it should Im- represent- 
 ed as intuitive. But again, what the upholders of
 
 262 SELF-EVIDENCE AND NECESSITY 
 
 necessary truth maintain is, not that every man must 
 hold speculatively by intuitive truth, that is, hold by 
 it in the generalized form given it by philosophers; 
 but that all believe in, and spontaneously act upon, 
 their individual primitive perceptions. It is quite 
 possible for Mr. Mill to maintain that the law of 
 cause and effect is not necessary or universal, and 
 that there may be a phenomenon without a cause in 
 the Dog-star; but meanwhile it will be found that 
 on any given occurrence presenting itself, he will 
 look for something as producing it. 
 
 If we look carefully into the nature of the intui- 
 tive perceptions of the mind, they will be found to 
 be of three kinds. Some of them are of the nature 
 of Primitive Cognitions : the object is now present, 
 and we look upon it. It is thus we are conscious of 
 self as existing in a particular state. This being 
 self-evident, we cannot be made to regard ourselves 
 as non-existent, and not in that particular state. In 
 other exercises our intuitions are of the nature of 
 Primitive Beliefs ; the object is not present, but we 
 contemplate it, and discover that it is of such a na- 
 ture. It is thus that we believe of space, that it 
 does not cease when our eye is no longer able to 
 follow it : this appears from the very nature of space ; 
 and having such a conviction, we cannot be made to 
 believe that space, at the point at which it ceases to 
 be invisible, should come to a termination. Again, 
 some of our intuitions are of the nature of Primitive 
 Judgments, in which by bare inspection we discover
 
 THE TESTS OF INTUITION. 263 
 
 relations between things apprehended. Thus we are 
 told first of one man that he died at the age of fifty, 
 and then of another man that he died at the age of 
 fifty, and we at once declare that the two men died 
 at the same age ; and this being evident from the 
 contemplation of the things, we cannot be made to 
 decide otherwise. 
 
 The truth reached by intuition in these its three 
 forms is of course limited, — is confined, indeed, 
 within very stringent boundaries. It is narrowed, 
 first of all by the original inlets, which are the out- 
 ward and inward senses ; and secondly, by the limiir 
 ed capacity of man to discover what is involved in 
 this primitive stock. What intuition may do of itself 
 is best seen in mathematical demonstration, in 
 which every step taken is seen to be true at once, 
 on the bare contemplation of the figures or num- 
 bers, and by which we reach a body of truth of im- 
 mense scientific value. But the main Service of in- 
 tuition consists in its furnishing a point from which 
 experience may start, and a foundation on which to 
 build. Our original perceptions lie at the basis of all 
 our acquired ones. I allow that our acquired ones, 
 obtained by a gathered experience, carry us far be- 
 yond our primitive perceptions. But in fact intui- 
 tions, for example those of sense and consciousness, 
 mingle with all our mental operations, and upon 
 them we must fall back in the last resort, when 
 required to specify the ground on which experience 
 rests.
 
 264 SELF-EVIDENCE AND NECESSITY 
 
 Keeping these explanations and distinctions in 
 view, it should not be difficult to find tests of intui- 
 tion. The primary mark I hold to be Self-Evidence. 
 The evidence is in the objects, and is discerned by 
 the mind on the bare contemplation of them. From 
 the mere inspection of consciousness we perceive 
 self in some action or under some affection. From 
 the simple apprehension of 2 -|- 2 we see that it 
 makes 4. And wherever there is Self-Evidence there 
 will also be Necessity. But let us observe carefully 
 what this necessity consists in. It is not a fatalistic 
 necessity imposed upon us from without, and for any- 
 thing we know in an arbitrary manner. It is neces- 
 sity arising solely from the nature of things as the 
 same is perceived by the mind. 1 This conviction of 
 necessity may assume two forms, a positive and a 
 negative. On the bare contemplation of 2 -|- 2 I see 
 that it must make 4 : this is the positive form. I 
 am further constrained to decide that it cannot be 
 otherwise, that 2 — |— 2 cannot be 3, or 5, or any other 
 number : this is the negative form. These two forms 
 depend on each other, or rather they both depend 
 on the Self-Evidence ; and we may in argument of 
 
 1 Mr. Herbert Spencer, following in meanings, he is completely fettered by 
 
 this respect Sir William Hamilton, them. Their indestructibility is the 
 
 stands up for Necessity as a test of proof to him that his consciousness is 
 
 ultimate truth, but overlooks Self- imprisoned within them." (Fortn. Rev. 
 
 Evidence, the evidence in the thing No. v.) I have given a more pleasant 
 
 looked at. " No matter what he calls account of them. The necessity is 
 
 these indestructible relations [of Con- not a fetter or a prison, but a convic- 
 
 sciousness, using consciousness in a tion arising from an immediate per- 
 
 very vague and perverted sense], no ception of the nature of the thing, 
 matter what he supposes to be their
 
 THE TESTS OF INTUITION. ' 265 
 
 any kind employ the one or other as may suit our 
 purpose. And as is the nature of the original per- 
 ception, so is the precise nature of the conviction of 
 necessity. "We have seen that our intuitions may be 
 of the nature of cognitions, of beliefs, or of judg- 
 ments ; and whatever the intuition be, we must ad- 
 here to it, and cannot be made to give our assent to 
 the opposite. Thus, if our intuition be a cognition 
 of an object as existing, we cannot be made to ac- 
 knowledge it as non-existing : if I know self as think- 
 ing, I cannot be made to allow that it is not thinking. 
 Again, if our intuition be a belief, such as that I saw 
 a particular person yesterday, I cannot be made to 
 believe that I did not see him. The same is true of 
 our judgments : deciding that two straight lines can- 
 not enclose a space, I cannot be made to allow that 
 they can form a closed figure. Thus understood, 
 the necessity of conviction (and not the mere inca- 
 pacity of conceiving) becomes a criterion of funda- 
 mental truth, clear and certain, and not difficult of 
 application. 
 
 To these some have added Universality. But the 
 phrase has been used in two different significations. 
 As employed by some, it means the universality of 
 flic truth. In this sense the universality is involved 
 in the necessity; we cannot be made to believe that 
 two straight lines should enclose a space al any lime 
 or in any world. Thus understood, flic test of uni- 
 versality is not, different from that of necessity; but 
 as presenting the conviction under a very important
 
 266 SELF-EVIDENCE AND NECESSITY 
 
 aspect, it may often be usefully employed in deter- 
 mining whether a truth is intuitive. But Univer- 
 sality may also mean being entertained by all men. 
 This property of intuitive truth may be more appro- 
 priately designated by Catholicity or Common Con- 
 sent. This quality does belong to all primary truth, 
 and where it is found it may be regarded as a pre- 
 sumption that the truth is intuitive. But it is not 
 a proof; for it may spring not so much from any in- 
 born principle as from the uniformity to be found 
 in the experience of all men. All men expect that 
 the sun will rise to-morrow, not from any intuitive 
 principle, but from the gathered observations of the 
 past carried forward to the future. 
 
 These two then, Self-Evidence, and Necessity with 
 implied Universality, are the decisive tests of intui- 
 tive truth. All intuitive truths possess these charac- 
 teristics ; no others do. The question now to be 
 discussed is, Can these marks be produced by Asso- 
 ciation of Ideas, or by Experience, the two princi- 
 ples from which Mr. Mill gets all our general con- 
 victions ? 
 
 (1.) "As for the feeling of necessity, or what is 
 termed a a necessity of thought, it is of all mental 
 phenomena positively the one which an inseparable 
 association is the most evidently competent to gen- 
 erate." (p. 299). In answer to this it can be shown, 
 in the first place, that in many cases of immediate 
 and necessary conviction we have not two ideas to 
 be associated. This holds of our primitive cognitions
 
 THE TESTS OF INTUITION. 267 
 
 and primitive beliefs. Take the consciousness which 
 the infant has of a sensation, or rather of self as 
 sentient. Here we cannot point to two objects which 
 have been often together : we have only one object, 
 the sentient self as existing, and we cannot be made 
 to know it as not existing or not sentient. Again, I 
 remember that I was under a peculiar sensation of 
 pain two days ago : I never had the same feeling be- 
 fore ; the object is one, and there has been no repe- 
 tition, and therefore no association can have been 
 formed ; and yet I have the most perfect assurance 
 that I existed two days ago under that sensation, 
 and I cannot be made to believe otherwise. These 
 are cases of intuition allowed by Mr. Mill (see «, q), 
 but in which association cannot generate the con- 
 viction. 
 
 In other cases, I admit that there is a combination 
 of two ideas or two objects, that is, those in which 
 we institute a comparison or pronounce a judgment. 
 But even in such the judgment is pronounced not 
 in consequence of the mere association, but on a 
 comparison of the things brought together. What 
 Mr. Mill means by the feeling of necessity, which 
 can be generated by his examples, is evident from 
 his examples. " Many persons who have been fright- 
 ened in childhood can never be alone in the dark 
 without irrepressible terrors. Many a person is un- 
 able to revisit a particular place, or think of a partic- 
 ular event, without recalling acute feelings of grief 
 or reminiscences of suffering." (p. 2G5.) This is a
 
 208 SELF-EVIDENCE AND NECESSITY 
 
 very glaring example of mistaking the point to be 
 proven. Mr. Mill is aware what those who hold 
 necessary truth mean by it. "Necessary," says Mr. 
 Mill, "according to Kant's definition, is, that of which 
 the negation is impossible." But the necessity which 
 he looks at and accounts for is of a very different 
 character; it is not a necessity of conviction, of 
 belief, or judgment, but is a mere association of two 
 ideas or thoughts, so that the one never comes up 
 without the other. He explains his meaning : 
 " When an association has acquired the character of 
 inseparability, — when the bond between the two 
 has been thus firmly riveted, not only does the idea 
 called up by the association become, in our con- 
 sciousness, inseparable from the idea which suggested 
 it, but the facts or phenomena answering to those 
 ideas come at last to seem inseparable in existence : 
 things which we are unable to conceive apart, appear 
 incapable of existing apart." (p. 191.) The word 
 " conceive " has here come in with all its ambiguity, 
 and the two things denoted by it, having an idea, 
 and judging or deciding, are here represented as 
 being one. But the two are very different. The 
 fright in childhood may long continue to raise up 
 terror, but cannot of itself create conviction ; as 
 may be seen in the case of multitudes who expe- 
 rience the fear but have never believed in ghosts. 
 When Pascal was crossing a bridge in a carriage, 
 the two leaders took fright and plunged into the 
 Seine ; the shock broke the traces, and the carriage
 
 THE TESTS OF INTUITION. 269 
 
 remained on the brink of the precipice ; ever after 
 he felt as if there was an abyss on his left hand, and 
 had a chair placed there to tranquillize his mind. 
 But this association, while it raised the painful idea, 
 did not convince his judgment that there was act- 
 ually a river ever running at his left hand. I never 
 pass a particular spot without being reminded of a 
 youthful companion whom I met there for the last 
 time before his removal from this world ; but this 
 association of my friend and the spot has not con- 
 vinced me that the two have any real connection. 
 The mother never thinks of a particular church-yard 
 without remembering that her boy sleeps there ; 
 but she does not therefore think that her child will 
 be there forever ; on the contrary, she may firmly 
 believe that he will rise again. 
 
 (2.) Just as little can experience, I mean a 
 gathered experience, create the self-evidence and 
 its consequent necessity. A truth reached by an 
 accumulation of instances cannot be self-evident, for 
 the evidence is collected from the uniformity of 
 many, perhaps of innumerable cases. Neither is it 
 accompanied with any conviction of necessity. We 
 do not affirm o'f a general law thus discovered that 
 the opposite of it is impossible, and we allow that 
 there may be exceptions. Some persons are so 
 situated that they see crows daily, and they have 
 never seen them with any other color than black; 
 they have sufficient evidence of the general law 
 that crows are of this color, and when the idea of a
 
 270 SELF-EVIDENCE AND NECESSITY 
 
 crow comes up before them, it will always be in a 
 Bable hue: but it is not self-evident that crows 
 are black; and they do not decide that they must 
 be of this color, or that there cannot possibly be 
 white crows in any other world which God has 
 made. 
 
 We have seen, in a former chapter, that the mind 
 is endowed with a capacity of observing relations. 
 Some of these are discovered by a process of length- 
 ened observation. It is thus we know that all mat- 
 ter attracts other matter, and that the elements of 
 bodies have certain chemical affinities which can be 
 expressed in numerical proportions. But there are 
 other relations which can be discerned immediately. 
 In saying so, I do not affirm that they are noticed 
 independently of things compared ; I mean that 
 they are discovered on the contemplation, the bare 
 contemplation, of the objects, and without a gathered 
 experience or an induction of instances. Thus, on 
 comparing my conscious self of the present moment 
 with the remembered self of yesterday, I at once, 
 and without any mediate proof, declare an identity 
 of person. A triangle being a figure with three 
 angles, I need no experiments to convince me that 
 one of the angles being a part is less than the whole, 
 and that the three angles make up the whole. I 
 may never have tried whether I could enclose a 
 space by two straight lines : I do not require to try 
 it, for I see it at once ; and I would declare of any 
 apparent or professed attempt to make them form a
 
 THE TESTS OF INTUITION. 271 
 
 closed figure, that it must involve some deception, 
 and that the two lines cannot be straight. 
 
 Mr. Mill derives what are usually reckoned intui- 
 tive truths by "simple enumeration without a 
 known exception ; " a method which Bacon declares 
 to be "puerile" and useless, as the next instance 
 may prove an exception. " The principles of num- 
 ber and geometry are duly and satisfactorily proved 
 by that method alone, nor are they susceptible of 
 any 'other proof." (Logic, B. in. c. xxi. § 2.) This 
 makes the evidence for mathematical axioms the 
 same in kind as that which the Hindu has for water 
 being always liquid; as that which we have for 
 crows being black all over the universe ; and for the 
 alternation of day and night continuing forever. 
 We see now how he should be obliged in logical 
 consistency to maintain that two and two may make 
 five in other worlds. I meet this by showing that 
 there is an essential difference between the two 
 classes of cases. In the one we see nothing in the 
 nature of things to necessitate the law; we adhere 
 to it simply on the ground of the number of instan- 
 ces, and we can readily be made to believe that 
 the law is limited in range, and that there are ex- 
 ceptions. But in the other class the relation is in 
 the very nature of the things; we discover it at 
 once by looking at the things ; we believe it to hold 
 wherever the things exist, and we cannot be made 
 to decide otherwise. In order to account for the 
 conviction of necessity and universality which
 
 272 SELF-EVIDENCE AND NECESSITY 
 
 attaches to mathematical truth, Mr. Mill refers to 
 the circumstance that geometrical curves .admit of 
 being distinctly painted in the imagination, so that 
 we have "mental pictures of all possible combina- 
 tions of lines and angles." (Logic, B. n. c. v. § 5.) 
 But what, I ask, makes he of algebraic demonstra- 
 tions, where there can be no such painting of the 
 imagination, while yet there is the same necessity ? 
 And I call attention to the circumstance that men- 
 tal pictures do not constitute an accumulation of in- 
 stances, or tend in the least to bring the case under 
 the law of simplex enumeratio. They do, however, 
 serve a purpose. They enable us to perceive more 
 clearly the nature of the objects, and to conceive the 
 "possible combinations of angles and figures," so 
 that we see the certainty and necessity of the truth. 
 Supposing, he says that two straight lines after 
 diverging could again converge, "we can transport 
 ourselves thither in imagination, and can frame a 
 mental image of the appearance which one or both 
 the lines must present at that point, which we may 
 rely upon as being precisely similar to the reality." 
 The clearness of the image does help us, but it is 
 simply in the way of giving us an apprehension of 
 the " reality," and thus enabling us to pronounce a 
 judgment on which we may " rely." 
 
 By means of these tests we can without much 
 difficulty distinguish between truths which are intui- 
 tive, and truths which are reached by a gathered 
 experience. We have seen that Mr. Mill proceeds
 
 THE TESTS OF INTUITION. 273 
 
 on these criteria. (See rj, &, i.) And if any one will 
 take the trouble to look back upon the chapter in 
 which I have collected his " Admissions," he will see 
 that Self-Evidence, and Necessity with Universality, 
 cover, sanction, and justify all the intuitive princi- 
 ples he has avowed. But as not following out these 
 criteria consequentially, he rejects as intuitive, and 
 labors to establish otherwise, truths which can stand 
 these tests quite as clearly and decisively as those 
 acknowledged by him. Hence the heterogeneous 
 character of his theory, which looks as if it stood 
 altogether on sensation, and was reared by associa- 
 tion, but requires to be buttressed on all sides by in- 
 tuition to keep it from falling. It is only by logi- 
 cally carrying out these tests that we can construct 
 a consistent system of philosophy, in which we give 
 to intuition what belongs to intuition, and to expe- 
 rience what belongs to experience. Let us now in- 
 quire whether our conviction as to causation can 
 stand the tests of intuition. 
 
 18
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 CAUSATION. 
 
 ON this subject a much sounder doctrine than 
 that entertained by most metaphysicians has 
 been laid down by Professor Bain, who, however, 
 has neglected to unfold all that is in the mental 
 phenomenon which he has noticed. "As regards 
 muscular exertion, there is a notable specialty, a 
 radical difference in kind, signified by such phrases 
 as i the sense of power,' ' the feeling of energy put 
 forth,' * the experience of force or resistance.' This 
 is an ultimate phase of the human consciousness, and 
 the most general and fundamental of all our con- 
 scious states. By this experience [observe, not a 
 gathered experience] we body forth to ourselves a 
 notion of force or power." He believes that " the 
 combined movements of locomotion are original or 
 instinctive." (Senses and Intell, pp. 98, 267.) Here, 
 then, we have a perception, original and intuitive, of 
 things exercising power. We are immediately con- 
 scious of power exerted, and we find it producing an 
 effect. Again, things become known to us as exer- 
 cising power upon us, and we know the effect as 
 
 (274)
 
 CAUSATION. 275 
 
 proceeding from a cause. This perception of power 
 exercised by us, and upon us, is the primary cogni- 
 tion of things on which all our judgments as to 
 causation are founded. Our knowledge both of self 
 and of external objects is of things effecting and 
 being effected. 
 
 Mr. Mill tells us, in his Logic, that he has no in- 
 tention of entering into the merits of the question 
 of causation " as a problem of transcendental meta- 
 physics." And yet in his logical treatment of the 
 subject he is ever introducing, I think unfortunately, 
 metaphysical speculations. In the discussion he has 
 confounded (in this respect like some of the Scottish 
 metaphysicians) the principle of causation with that 
 of the uniformity of nature. When we say that na- 
 ture is uniform, we mean that nature constitutes a 
 course or system ; that there is in it a determinate 
 number of agents, or rather a fixed amount of ener- 
 gy, actual or potential, operating according to laws, 
 and in an arranged constitution. That there is an 
 invariable uniformity in nature, is discovered by a 
 long experience. It is certainly not an obvious truth 
 forced upon us by an early and easy observation. 
 Judging by first appearances, it looks as if nature 
 often acted unsystematically, or was swayed by in- 
 fluences out of its sphere. The mother finds her 
 child in health to-day, sick to-morrow, better the 
 third day, and dead the next ; so far from showing 
 a uniformity, it seems rather to indicate a change of 
 agency, springing either from an unknown fatality
 
 276 CAUSATION. 
 
 or the will of a supernatural being. It is only as 
 the result of long and patient research, conducted 
 independently in the various departments of nature 
 and of history, that we reach the reasonable convic- 
 tion that there is a fixed system constituted amidst 
 these seeming irregularities. 
 
 Now it is, in fact, of this uniformity of nature that 
 Mr. Mill is treating in his chapter on the " Evidence 
 of Universal Causation." He is right in saying of it, 
 " There must have been a time wdien the universal 
 prevalence of that law throughout nature could not 
 have been affirmed in the same confident and un- 
 qualified manner as at present." He is further right, 
 so far as the uniformity of nature is concerned, when 
 he says that the reasons for our reliance on it " do 
 not hold in circumstances unknown to us, and beyond 
 the possible range of our experience. In distant 
 parts of the stellar regions, where the phenomena 
 may be entirely unlike those with which we are ac- 
 quainted, it would be folly to affirm confidently that 
 this general law prevails, any more than those spec- 
 ial ones which we have found to hold universally on 
 our own planet. The uniformity in the succession 
 of events, otherwise called the law of causation, must 
 be received not as a law of the universe, but of that 
 portion of it only which is within the range of our 
 means of sure observation, with a reasonable degree 
 of extension to adjacent cases." In this passage he 
 identifies " the uniformity in the succession of events" 
 with " the law of causation." But these are not the
 
 CAUSATION. 277 
 
 same. It is quite conceivable that there may be 
 worlds in which there is a universal causation, and 
 yet no self-contained system of natural causes. Some, 
 or many, or in fact all of the phenomena might be 
 produced by agents acting from above or beyond the 
 phenomena themselves, — say by the Divine Being, 
 or angels, or demons. In such a world spring might 
 follow winter one year, and be prevented from fol- 
 lowing it the next by the action of a supra-mundane 
 influence ; and no one would be able from the past 
 to anticipate the future. In this state of things there 
 would be no uniformity of physical agencies, and yet 
 there would be an invariable causation. Now the 
 grand metaphysical question is not about the uni- 
 formity of nature, but about the relation of cause 
 and effect. There is a momentary discovery of the 
 difference of the two, and yet a studious identifica- 
 tion of them in the following passage : " There was a 
 time when many of the phenomena of nature must 
 have appeared altogether capricious and irregular, 
 not governed by any laws, nor steadily consequent 
 upon any causes. Such phenomena, indeed, were 
 commonly in that early stage of human knowledge 
 ascribed to the direct intervention of the will of 
 some supernatural being, and therefore still to a 
 cause." 
 
 It is admitted that the great body of mankind, 
 whether they are or are not persuaded of the exist- 
 ence of a uniform system of nature, believe as to 
 every effect, as to every new thing produced, or
 
 27 S CAUSATION. 
 
 change upon an old thing, that it must have had a 
 cause, whether natural or supernatural. The ques- 
 tion is, Is this belief intuitive? 
 
 This conviction can stand the tests of intuition. 
 On the bare contemplation of a new phenomenon, 
 that is, of a new thing appearing, of a thing which 
 did not exist before, we declare that it has had a 
 producing cause. It certainly appears in very early 
 life, before there can be a lengthened or wide obser- 
 vation or enumeration of instances. It is strong in 
 very primitive states of society, long before mankind 
 had observed an invariable uniformity in the occur- 
 rence of natural phenomena. It can be shown that 
 it is necessary and universal. Mr. Mill indeed tells 
 us, " I am convinced that any one accustomed to ab- 
 straction and analysis, who will fairly exert his facul- 
 ties for the purpose, will, when his imagination has 
 once learned to entertain the notion, find no difficul- 
 ty in conceiving that in some one for instance of the 
 many firmaments into which sidereal astronomy now 
 divides the universe, events may succeed one another 
 at random, without any fixed law ; nor can anything 
 in our experience or in our mental nature constitute 
 a sufficient, or indeed any, reason for believing that 
 this is nowhere the case." The phrase, " fixed law," 
 here employed, is ambiguous ; it may mean a mere 
 natural or physical law, such as that of attraction. 
 And I acknowledge at once that it is quite possible 
 to apprehend and to believe that there may be worlds 
 in which new phenomena, or changes on old phenom-
 
 r? 
 
 CAUSATION. 279 
 
 ena, may be produced, without the operation of that 
 law of gravitation which seems to act everywhere in 
 our mundane system. But the real question is, would 
 not the mind insist, and this according to " a fixed 
 law " of our " mental nature," that the event must 
 have a cause in an agent physical or spiritual ? We 
 may observe that the old misleading phrase, " con- 
 ceive," is once more casting up. I admit we can 
 have the idea of, that is, image to ourselves, a new 
 phenomenon without any necessary precedent. But 
 I hold that we cannot be made to judge, decide, or 
 believe, that in any firmament there could be a new 
 event, — say a world springing into being with no 
 cause to produce it. 
 
 The mental phenomenon, the conviction and its 
 attached necessity, Mr. Mill would explain by the as- 
 sociation of ideas. But then, in order to save himself 
 from obvious and pressing difficulties, he is obliged to 
 lay down very stringent precautions as to when asso- 
 ciation can generate a feeling of necessity. In order 
 to produce the inseparable association, the phenom- 
 enon must be " so closely linked in our experience, 
 that we never perceive the one without at the same 
 time, or the immediately succeeding moment, per- 
 ceiving the other." Again, "No frequency of con- 
 junction between two phenomena will create an in- 
 separable association if counter associations are being 
 created all the while." (p. 200.) By help of these 
 two principles he tries to avoid the objection which 
 migbt be urged to his mode of accounting for ihc
 
 280 CAUSATION. 
 
 conviction of necessity. But he is seen to be involved 
 in hopeless perplexities when these laws are ap- 
 plied to causation. For neither of them would allow 
 the necessary conviction to be formed as to cause 
 and effect from mere experience. For it is not the 
 case that we never perceive a cause without perceiv- 
 ing an effect, or that we never observe an effect with- 
 out also observing a cause. On the contrary, the 
 effects of causes operating, and the causes of effects 
 falling under our notice, are very often concealed 
 from us. Of how few of the occurrences happening 
 in the circle of our experience, or in the times in 
 which we live, are we able to estimate the conse- 
 quences ? In a large proportion of the physical ef- 
 fects which come under our notice, the cause is not 
 discovered at the time, and is only found out in the 
 end by a process of elaborate experiment, fitted to 
 distract instead of aiding association; and in the case 
 of a large number of the occurrences of our personal 
 experience, or recorded in history, we never do rise 
 to the discovery of the causes. Again, as to the oth- 
 er precautionary rule, we find that in the case of 
 cause and effect there is a constant formation of 
 " counter associations " by reason of the complexity 
 of the conditions which meet in the cause, and of inci- 
 dents which attach themselves to the effect, and of 
 the combination of each of these with a host of con- 
 comitant circumstances to disturb the formation of an 
 inseparable association. A friend dies : no doubt there 
 has been a physical cause of the occurrence, but how
 
 CAUSATION. 281 
 
 many things prevent us from discovering or even in- 
 quiring about it; and finding little satisfaction in the 
 contemplation, we dwell rather on the regard we had 
 for the dej)arted, on his excellent qualities, on the loss 
 we have suffered; or, if we think of what led to it, we 
 prefer referring the whole to the appointment of God. 
 That amidst all these complications, and in spite of 
 appearances to the contrary, mankind should ever 
 have clung to the belief that there is a cause, natural 
 or supernatural, to every event, is a proof that the 
 conviction is deeply seated in our nature. 
 
 When Mr. Mill confines his attention to the physi- 
 cal and logical nature of causation, he throws light 
 upon the subject. " The statement of the cause is 
 incomplete unless in some shape or other we intro- 
 duce all the conditions." " In practice, that particu- 
 lar condition is usually styled the cause, whose share 
 in the matter is superficially the most conspicuous, 
 or whose requisiteness to the production of the effect 
 we happen to be insisting upon at the moment." 
 " The real cause of the phenomenon is the assem- 
 blage of all the conditions." There is new and im- 
 portant truth in this statement. But I am not sure 
 that Mr. Mill has got a full view of the facts. In 
 material nature there is always need of the ad ion 
 of two or more agents in order to an effect. If a 
 ball moves in consequence of another striking it. 
 there is need of the one ball as well as the other, 
 and the cause, properly speaking, consists of the two 
 in a relation to each other. But not only is fchero a
 
 1^2 CAUSATION. 
 
 duality or plurality in the cause, there is the same 
 (Mr. Mill has not noticed it) in the effect. The effect 
 consists not merely of the one ball, the ball struck 
 and set in motion, but also of the other ball which 
 struck it, and which has now lost part of its momen- 
 tum. By carrying out this doctrine, we can deter- 
 mine what is meant by " condition " and " occasion " 
 when the phrases are applied to the operation of 
 causation. When we speak of an agent requiring a 
 "condition," an "occasion," or "circumstances," hi 
 order to its action, we refer to the other agent or 
 agents required, that it may produce a particular 
 effect. Thus that fire may burn, it is necessary to 
 have fuel, or a combustible material. In order that 
 my will may move my arm, it is needful to have 
 the concurrence of a healthy motor nerve. So 
 much for the dual or plural agency in the cause. 
 But there is a similar complexity in the effect, and 
 we need a like phrase to designate the part of it 
 which we do not require to consider at the time. 
 Thus the steam which has raised a certain weight 
 has expended meanwhile a certain amount of force ; 
 but persons striving merely to have the weight 
 raised care nothing for the other, and may call it 
 " incidental ; " which incidental part, however, may 
 be the essential element in the view of the engineer 
 who requires to generate the steam. In the proper 
 enunciation of the cause and the effect — the invari- 
 able and unconditional cause and effect — there 
 should be a statement of all the concurring antece-
 
 CAUSATION. 283 
 
 dents, and all the involved consequents, including 
 the conditions in the cause, and the incidents in the 
 effect. 
 
 By carrying out this doctrine consistently, we are 
 able to give (which Mr. Mill has not done) its 
 proper place to the " Agent " and " Patient ; " the 
 distinction between which has been noticed in some 
 form or other by most philosophers from the time of 
 Aristotle. The agent and patient are certainly not 
 to be identified with the cause and effect ; but they 
 are to be found in the cause, that is, in the assem- 
 blage of circumstances necessary in order to the 
 production of the effect. These circumstances or 
 agencies must concur, in short, must operate on 
 each other, in order to action and change. Thus, in 
 order to the production of water, there must be both 
 oxygen and hydrogen ; the two act on each other 
 according to their nature and laws ; and both are 
 changed and appear in the product. That which 
 we consider as acting may be called the Agent; that 
 which we regard as acted on may be considered as 
 the Patient. It should be observed and remembered, 
 that the agent under one aspect is always a patient 
 under another, and the patient may also be viewed 
 as an agent ; for that which acts is always acted on, 
 and that which is acted on always acts; and action 
 is always equal to reaction. The account now given 
 enables us to settle a question which has often been 
 started, but never determined satisfactorily. The 
 question is, Is the effect always posterior in time to
 
 284 CAUSATION. 
 
 the cause, or may it not be contemporaneous ? The 
 answer is. that the complex effect always follows the 
 complex cause ; but that the concurrent agents which 
 constitute the cause may be regarded as acting on 
 each other simultaneously. The oxygen and the 
 hydrogen influence each other contemporaneously, 
 and are followed by the production of water as the 
 effect. 
 
 The reader may compare the statement now 
 offered with that given by Mr. Mill in his chapter 
 u Of the Law of Universal Causation." Mr. Mill has 
 not seen that as the cause consists in an assemblage 
 of conditions, so the effect consists in an assemblage 
 of consequences. In the agents concurring in the 
 cause there is a real distinction between agent and 
 patient, whereas he says the distinction vanishes on 
 examination, or rather is found to be merely verbal. 
 He has discussed, but avowedly does not know how 
 to settle, the question as to whether the cause pre- 
 cedes the effect. He has also noticed the circum- 
 stance, that in some cases when the cause ceases, the 
 effect also seems to cease, whereas in others the 
 effect appears to remain ; but he has not been able 
 to give a full explanation of the phenomenon. The 
 effect remains when the assemblage of circumstan- 
 ces which constitute the cause abides. It is thus a 
 book remains on the table as long as the table is in 
 a position to uphold it. It is thus oxygen and hy- 
 drogen abide in water till an element with a 
 stronger affinity with one of them succeeds in draw-
 
 CAUSATION. 285 
 
 ing it off. In other cases the concurrence of agencies 
 acting as the cause is ever liable to be broken up, 
 and the effect ceases when the complex cause has 
 disappeared. It is thus that the book is upheld in 
 my hand only so long as I stretch out my arm: 
 thus that the room is illuminated by clay only so 
 long as the sun shines, and by night only so long as 
 the lamp continues to burn. In all cases a change 
 implies a new agent, or a new concurrence of 
 agencies. 
 
 But we are now in the heart of our author's logi- 
 cal discussions. Mr. Mill's Logic has never been sub- 
 jected to a careful review on the part either of his 
 supporters or opponents. It deserves such an exam- 
 ination because of its excellences, and it requires it 
 because of its errors, which many students are ac- 
 cepting along with the truths. I undertake this 
 review in the immediately succeeding chapters.
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 THE LOGICAL NOTION. 
 
 FORMAL Logic is usually represented as dealing 
 with the Notion, Judgment, and Reasoning. 
 Mr. Mill lias no separate exposition of the Notion. 
 He treats instead, of Names : as if Names did not 
 stand for Thoughts, the nature of which should have 
 been previously investigated. This is surely a defect 
 in an elaborate Logical Treatise. In his controver- 
 sial work he has given us his theory of the Notion 
 or Conception. It will be necessary to examine it. 
 
 The Notions, that is, apprehensions of things, 
 which the mind can entertain, are of three sorts : — 
 First, There is the Singular Concrete Notion, such as 
 Homer, Virgil, Dante, Milton, this man, this dog, that 
 daisy, that book. This notion is singular, as it em- 
 braces a single object. It is concrete, as it contem- 
 plates the object as possessing an aggregate of quali- 
 ties. The consideration of the nature of this notion 
 does not, properly speaking, come under Formal 
 Logic, which has to do only with Discursive Thought ; 
 that is, thought in which there is a process from some- 
 thing given or allowed to something founded upon it. 
 
 (286)
 
 THE LOGICAL NOTION. 287 
 
 It is furnished to us by intuition, primarily by the 
 senses and consciousness, and does not imply any logi- 
 cal operation. But then it comes into Logic when it 
 is combined with the abstract and general notion in 
 the proposition and argument. Thus, when we say, 
 " Locke was an independent thinker," the subject is 
 a singular concrete notion compared with a general 
 notion in the predicate. Logic, therefore, cannot 
 overlook this notion, but it may hand over the 
 special discussion of its origin and validity to psychol- 
 ogy or metaphysics. Mr. Mill gives us a correct 
 enough account of it, though he does not specially 
 investigate its nature : " A concrete name is a name 
 which stands for a thing." (B. I. c. h. 4.) 
 
 Second, There is the Abstract Notion. It is the 
 apprehension of a part of an object as a part, say of 
 the head of a horse as the head of a horse. More 
 technically it is the apprehension of an attribute 
 " An abstract name is a name which stands for an 
 attribute of a thing." (lb.) In this latter sense the 
 part cannot exist separate from the whole : thus 
 transparency cannot exist apart from a transparent 
 object, such as glass or ice. But though an abstract 
 quality cannot exist apart from an object, it is not to 
 be regarded as a nonentity or a fiction of the mind. 
 Rationality cannot exist apart from a rational being, 
 but it has a real existence in a rational being, such 
 as man. 
 
 On account of the defective view which he takes 
 of the intellectual faculties of man, Mr. Mill has not
 
 288 THE LOGICAL NOTION. 
 
 been able to furnish an adequate account of the 
 Abstract Notion. Speaking of the notion of length 
 without breadth, " According to what appears to me 
 the sounder opinion, the mind cannot form any such 
 notion ; it cannot conceive length without breadth." 
 (B. i. c. viii. 7.) And in his recent work, "The ex- 
 istence of Abstract Ideas — the conception of the 
 class qualities b}^ themselves, and not as embodied 
 in an individual — is effectually precluded by the 
 law of Inseparable Association." (p. 314.) The 
 ambiguous word " conceive " has once more cast up 
 without his telling us in what sense he employs it. 
 I should say that in these passages he uses it in the 
 sense of " image," in which signification the state- 
 ment is true. I believe that length cannot exist 
 except in an extended object which has also breadth, 
 and I am sure that I can image length only in an 
 extended object. He adds, that the mmd " can only, 
 in contemplating objects, attend to their length, ex- 
 clusively of their other sensible qualities, and so 
 determine what properties may be predicated of 
 them in virtue of their length alone." This is not a 
 sufficiently comprehensive account of the Abstract 
 Notion; but it implies that there is more than a 
 mere image. If we inquire carefully into its nature, 
 we shall find that as a thought it implies not only 
 attention but a comparative act. We apprehend the 
 attribute to be an attribute of the concrete object, 
 thus comparing the part and whole. This apprehen- 
 sion is the Abstract Notion, and we can compare the
 
 THE LOGICAL NOTION. 289 
 
 attribute apprehended with other attributes, or with 
 concrete objects of various kinds, and make affirma- 
 tions or denials. Thus, on perceiving a cone of 
 sugar as a concrete object, we can in abstract 
 thought fix on the figure, and from the contempla- 
 tion of it we might by a further abstraction fix on 
 the conic sections, and by a process of reasoning 
 evolve their properties. In all this we should be 
 dealing, not with mere hypotheses, but abstracted 
 realities ; and the conclusions we reach will be found 
 true of all cones, and of all sections of the cone, 
 including the elliptic figures in which the planets 
 move. 1 
 
 Third, There is the general Notion, such as man, 
 poet, animal. We are so constantly forming notions 
 of this sort, that it should not be difficult to evolve 
 the processes involved in it. The two first steps 
 are, — (1.) that we observe a resemblance among 
 objects; (2.) that we fix on the points of resem- 
 blance. The first is accomplished by the mind's 
 power of perceiving agreements, and the second 
 by an operation of abstraction. No absolute rule 
 can be laid down as to which of these processes 
 is the prior. I believe that in most cases there 
 
 1 Regarding Lo<_ricas the Science of nished — I. The Abstract Quality im- 
 
 the Laws of Discursive Thought, a- plies a Concrete Object. II. When 
 
 above defined, the Abstract Notion i> the Concrete Object i- real the Al>- 
 
 clearly embraced in it, as in it we siract Quality taken from it, is also 
 
 draw an attribute out of the concrete real. III. When the Abstract is n 
 
 object given, and we must endeavor Quality, it is not to be regarded as 
 
 to nnfold the Laws of Thought in- havingan independent exi tence; ita 
 
 volved in it. The following may serve existence is in a Concrete Object, 
 provisonally till n better li^t lie for- 
 
 19
 
 200 THE LOGICAL NOTION. 
 
 is first a perception more or less vague of a like- 
 ness, and then the separate consideration of the 
 points of likeness. But in other cases we seem 
 rather to fix primarily on an attribute, and conjoin 
 by it all the objects which we discover to possess 
 it. Thus, in zoology the naturalist fixes on the 
 possession of a backbone, and makes it the bond 
 of a class of animals. But there is more in gen- 
 eralization than either or than both of these steps. 
 (3.) The consummating step is, that we constitute 
 a class which embraces all the objects possessing 
 the common attribute or attributes. Till this step 
 is taken there is no generalization. When this 
 step is taken the general notion is formed. Let 
 it be observed that there is here an operation be- 
 yond the other two. In the first step we must 
 have observed or contemplated more or fewer ob- 
 jects, and perceived them to resemble each other; 
 still the number was limited. In the second step 
 we fixed on a quality or qualities common to the 
 objects noticed. But in the final step the number 
 of objects is indefinite, and must include not 
 merely those we have observed and compared, but 
 all others possessing the mark or marks fixed on. 
 On seeing only half a dozen red deer I may have 
 been forcibly struck with their resemblance, and 
 may have been able to fix on their points of like- 
 ness, — such as their shape and their noble antlers. 
 But when I take the decisive step and form the 
 class red deer, that class must include not only
 
 THE LOGICAL NOTION. 20] 
 
 those I have seen, but all others with that form 
 of body and horns ; not only these six deer, bu+ 
 all other deer now living, and all deer that ever 
 lived or shall live ; not only so, but all imagina- 
 ble deer, the deer sung of by all the poets, and the 
 deer that may be created by the ever active imagi- 
 nation. A notion is not general unless it embraces 
 all the objects possessing the mark or marks fixed 
 on. Now this consummating step has not been no- 
 ticed, or at least has not had its appropriate place 
 allotted to it, by most psychologists and logicians. 
 Dr. Brown dwells very fondly on the feeling of re- 
 semblance, as he calls it (he should have said the 
 observation of the relation of resemblance), but 
 takes no notice of the all-important act by which the 
 species is made to embrace all the objects having 
 the resemblance. This specially intellectual stej> 
 was from time to time before the mind of Hamilton, 
 as when he says, that " concepts have only a poten- 
 tial, not an actual, universality; that is, they are 
 only universal, inasmuch as they may be applied to 
 any of a certain class of objects." But with an oc- 
 casional glimpse of the truth, he loses sight of it 
 immediately after, and he talks of a mysterious 
 "synthesis in consciousness," wherein "the qualities, 
 which by comparison are judged similar, and by 
 attention are constituted into an exclusive object of 
 thought, — these are already, by this process, identi- 
 fied in consciousness; for ihvy are only judged sim- 
 ilar, inasmuch as they produce in us indiscernible
 
 202 THE LOGICAL NOTION. 
 
 effects." {Logic, Loot, viii.) His whole exposition is 
 confused and unsatisfactory, and it issues in his find- 
 in"- a contradiction in the general notion. He loses 
 his consistency and clearness in endeavoring to 
 find some sort of reconciliation between nominalism 
 ind conceptualism. Mr. Mill has unfolded no ele- 
 ments in the general notion except the attribute 
 and the name. " We create an artificial association 
 between those attributes (to which we wish to de- 
 vote our exclusive attention) and a certain combina- 
 tion of articulate sounds, which guarantees to us 
 when we hear the sound, or see the written charac- 
 ters corresponding to it, there will be raised in the 
 mind an idea of some object possessing those attri- 
 butes, in which idea those attributes alone will be 
 suggested vividly to the minds, our consciousness of 
 the remainder of the concrete idea being faint." 
 " The association of that particular set of attributes 
 with a given word is what keeps them together in 
 the mind by a stronger tie than that with which 
 they are associated with the remainder of the con- 
 crete image." (p. 322.) There is a great oversight 
 here. There is no reference to the discovery of re- 
 semblances among objects as constituting the com- 
 mencement of the whole process. He ascribes to 
 the name what is done by the possession of com- 
 mon qualities. "For a class is absolutely nothing 
 but an indefinite number of individuals denoted by 
 a general name. The name given to them in com- 
 mon is what makes them a class." But what
 
 THE LOGICAL NOTION. 293 
 
 makes the name applicable to the indefinite number 
 of objects? What enables us, when we discover a 
 new object, to say whether it is or is not entitled to 
 the name? The answer to these questions will force 
 us to look beyond the name to the like attributes in 
 the objects, as making the objects pass under the 
 same name, as enabling us to understand what is 
 denoted by the name, as being the meaning of the 
 name, and, in fact, constituting the bond which joins 
 the objects in a class. There is a passage in which 
 he has a glimpse of the consummating step, and 
 indeed of the whole process. "The only mode in 
 which any general name 'has a definite meaning, 
 is by being a name of an indefinite variety of things, 
 namely, all things known or unknown, past, present, 
 or future, which possess certain attributes." [Logic, i. 
 v. 3.) This language does point to something else 
 than the name as bringing together "the indefinite 
 number of individuals in the class : " it points to the 
 possession of " certain attributes " in the " indefinite 
 variety of things;" and it implies, though it does 
 not just state, that the class must include all the 
 objects possessing these attributes. This account, 
 consequentially followed out, makes the common 
 notion embrace three elements: objects resembling 
 each other; points of resemblance; and the inclu- 
 sion of all objects having these points. But Mr. 
 Mill habitually loses sight of some of these essentia] 
 characteristics, and ever falls back upon the attribute 
 and tht. name. This omission in (lie theory of the
 
 294 THE LOGICAL NOTION. 
 
 notion comes out in positive error in the account of 
 the judgment and reasoning. 
 
 According to the exposition now given, the Class- 
 Notion always includes both objects and attributes, 
 objects having a resemblance, and common attri- 
 butes possessed by them. So far as it embraces 
 objects, it is said to have Extension. So far as it 
 contains attributes, it is said to have Comprehension 
 or Intension. This distinction was indicated in the 
 Port-Royal Logic, and was enunciated in several 
 logical works published in the end of the seven- 
 teenth and the beginning of the eighteenth cen- 
 tury 1 . It has been elaborated with great care, at 
 times with an excess of refinement, by Sir Wil- 
 liam Hamilton. That every general notion should 
 have both these aspects, follows from the ac- 
 count I have given of its formation and constitu- 
 tion. In every General Notion there must be 
 objects compared; this constitutes the Extension 
 There must also be marks to bring the object* 
 together under one head; this is Comprehension 
 The former is got by observation and comparison 
 the latter by abstraction. We see that as the on< 
 rises the other falls, and that as the one falls the 
 other rises. As we multiply the marks or attributes, 
 there must be fewer objects possessing them. As 
 
 1 In particular, I have found it in a an Introduction to Logic (2d edit., 
 
 Compend of Logic, prepared and 1722) by Gershora Carmichael of Glas- 
 
 printed (there is no evidence of its gow University ; and again in a Com- 
 
 having been published) for use of the pend of Logic by Francis Hutcheson, 
 
 Scottish Universities, by order of a which was used in Glasgow College 
 
 l';irli:imentary Commission, 1795 ; in till towards the close of last century.
 
 THE LOGICAL NOTION. 295 
 
 we multiply the objects, they must have fewer com- 
 mon marks. Hence the rule, that the greater the 
 Extension, the less the Comprehension ; and the 
 greater the Comprehension, the less the Extension. 
 
 Upon this distinction the remark is, " that the Ex- 
 tension is not anything intrinsic to the concept ; it 
 is the sum of all the objects, in our concrete images 
 of which the concept is included : but the compre- 
 hension is the very concept itself; for the concept 
 means nothing but our mental representation of the 
 sum of the attributes composing it." (p. 333.) It is 
 clear that of the three constituents of common 
 notions he gives the chief, or rather exclusive, place 
 to the attributes. a All men, and the class man, are 
 expressions which point to nothing but attributes; 
 they cannot be interpreted except in comprehen 
 sion." (p. 363.) In opposition to this, I maintain 
 that the Extension of the notion is quite as impor- 
 tant an aspect of it as the Comprehension ; that 
 every common notion may be interpreted in Exten- 
 sion as well as Intension ; that in the class there 
 must be objects to combine as well as attributes to 
 combine them; and that a mental representation 
 must be inadequate which does not embrace the 
 objects as well as the sum of the attributes possessed 
 by them. The Universal Notion is of objects possess- 
 ing common attributes, the notion including all the 
 objects possessing t lie attributes. We see here, in Mr. 
 Mill's logical doctrine, a taint at the fountain, which 
 will be found running through the whole stream.
 
 29G THE LOGICAL NOTION. 
 
 " General concepts, therefore, we have, properly 
 Bpeaking, none." "I consider it nothing less than 
 a misfortune that the words Concept, General No- 
 tion, or any other phrase to express the supposed 
 mental modification corresponding to a class name, 
 should ever have been invented. Above all, I hold 
 that nothing but confusion ever results from intro- 
 ducing the term Concept into Logic; and that 
 instead of the Concept of a class, we should always 
 speak of the signification of a class name." (pp. 321, 
 331.) But surely it is desirable to have a word to 
 express the "mental modification" when we con- 
 template a "class," and Conception or General No- 
 tion seems appropriate enough. I also think it 
 desirable to have a phrase to denote, not the " signi- 
 fication of a class name," but the thing signified by 
 the class name ; and the fittest I can think of is 
 Concept. Mr. Mill would replace Abstract and 
 General Idea by " the connotation of the class name." 
 I reckon the epithet " connotation " a very good one 
 for some purposes. It was used by the schoolmen ; 
 it was a favorite one with Mr. James Mill ; and has 
 had a clear meaning attached to it. " A connotativ 
 term is one which denotes a subject and implies ai, 
 attribute." Thus, " white " is connotative ; " it de- 
 notes all things white, as snow, paper, the foam of 
 the sea, etc. ; and implies, or, as it was termed by 
 the schoolmen, connotes the attribute whiteness." 
 But while " connotative " is an expressive enough 
 epithet, applied to certain predicates, it does not
 
 THE LOGICAL NOTION. 297 
 
 bring out what is contained in the class-notion. 
 " Horse/' for example, is a general notion, embrac- 
 ing an indefinite number of objects ; but all this is 
 not expressed by applying the phrase " connotative." 
 " It denotes a subject ; " but what is the subject ? 
 This question is left unanswered. It can be answered 
 only by saying that it consists of all the objects 
 possessing the attributes ; and as to the phrase " sig- 
 nification of the class name," it leaves it unsettled 
 what the thing signified is. I am inclined to think 
 that the words Conception and Concept serve a 
 good purpose ; they express the signification of the 
 class name. 1 
 
 The General Notion being formed in the way ex- 
 plained, we fix it and preserve it, and think of it by 
 means of a Sign. The Sign may be one or other of 
 two sorts. Lauding the founder of his School, Mr. 
 Mill says, " It is a doctrine of one of the most fertile 
 thinkers of modern times, Auguste Comte, that, 
 besides the logic of signs, there is a logic of images, 
 and a logic of feelings. In many of the familiar 
 processes of thought, and especially in uncultured 
 minds, a visual image serves instead of a word." (p. 
 329.) Omitting the consideration of the logic of 
 feelings as not coming specially before us, the doc- 
 trine attributed to Comte as so " fertile " a thinker 
 
 1 Tho following arc some of the Real. III. The Reality in tlic Uni- 
 
 Laws of Thought involved in tlic (lin- versnl consists in the possession of 
 
 era] Notion: — I. The Universal im- common attributes by nil the objects 
 
 plies Singulars. II. When the Sin- embraced in it. 
 tjnlars are Keal tlic Universal is also
 
 293 THE LOGICAL NOTION. 
 
 was long ago proclaimed by Aristotle, and has floated 
 ever since, in a more or less correct form, in logic 
 and speculative philosophy. According to Aristotle, 
 a notion is not the same as a phantasm, but it is 
 never found without a phantasm. 1 The expression 
 of Mr. Mill is much more loose. He talks of a 
 " logic of images ; " whereas it is not a logic, but a 
 notion entertained by means of an image. He 
 speaks of the image being a " visual sensation " and 
 " visual appearance ; " whereas it may be a phantasm 
 by any of the senses, — it may be of a smell, or a 
 taste, or a touch, or a sound. 
 
 I believe that the General Notion is kept before 
 the mind primarily by the phantasm. In every 
 such notion the objects are indefinite — are innu- 
 merable ; and so the human mind (whatever angelic 
 minds may do) cannot image them all ; but it images 
 one as a sign of the others. The attribute, or aggre- 
 gate of attributes, cannot be imaged apart from 
 objects, but we labor to fashion an object which 
 may give prominence to the one attribute, if there 
 be only one, or combine them if there be many. 
 This, I am persuaded, is the original and spontaneous 
 agency by which we carry with us and compare our 
 concepts. Mr. Mill has a glimpse of this, and noth- 
 ing more, when he says that " in uncultured minds a 
 visual image serves instead of words." The more 
 
 1 Distinguishing bptween Notions, iiolaei tov fifj <bavTaau.aTa elvat, t) oiSi 
 voriuara, and ipavTaa/xara, Aristotle ravra tpavrdrj/iara, aX?.' ovk avev <pav. 
 says (see Arum. m. 7), Nof/fiara rail Tuofiaruv.
 
 THE LOGICAL NOTION. 299 
 
 correct expression would be, that in cultured minds 
 the word often comes to serve the purpose of the 
 image and to supersede it. I believe we naturally 
 resort to the image ; but the image is always felt to 
 be inadequate. Hence the common remark, that 
 we cannot have an adequate idea, that is, in the 
 sense of image, of a class. Suppose the notion to be 
 " quadruped : " when we think about the class, we 
 may, and do commonly, image some sort of beast with 
 four limbs ; but if the limbs be those of a horse, they 
 cannot be those of a dog, and if they be those of a 
 dog, they cannot be those of the horse ; and if they 
 be different from either, they cannot be those either 
 of the horse or the dog. All this does not prove 
 that we cannot in thought form a general notion, or 
 that we cannot legitimately employ it in judgment 
 and reasoning ; it merely shows that the image, as 
 being single, is not equal to the indefinite number 
 of objects, and, as being concrete, cannot be identi- 
 cal with the attribute, which is abstract. The fact 
 is, the image, or, as I prefer calling it with Aristotle, 
 the phantasm, is a mere sign, — one for the many, 
 that one being as far as possible a type of the many. 
 The mind spontaneously forms such representations, 
 and delights to do so ; and when it can have them, 
 the thinking is rendered much more vivid and 
 pleasant, and is more readily accompanied with ex- 
 citement and emotion. 
 
 But when the generalizations are very high, when 
 the abstractions are very refined, and the common
 
 300 THE LOGICAL NOTION. 
 
 attributes are very numerous, or not very definitely 
 fixed, it becomes all but impossible to construct a 
 phantasm which will represent the class. We can 
 form a pretty fair representative image of quadru- 
 ped, but what phantasm could stand for such com- 
 plex notions as civilization, liberty, politics, art, and 
 science? In striving to compass such notions, we 
 naturally resort to artificial symbols, particularly 
 language. If there be a word suitable to express 
 the thought, it wiH employ it ; if there be not, it 
 wiH labor to invent one. But so far from images 
 serving instead of words, the words serve our pur- 
 pose as being images. It has been remarked by 
 metaphysicians that most names were originally of 
 individual objects. An individual object, or the 
 image of it, was first taken to represent the class ; 
 and then the name of the individual, as a sound or 
 a written character addressed to the eye, was used 
 as a briefer and more convenient symbol. The ad- 
 vantage of such verbal signs, which are always, be it 
 remarked, in a sense phantasms addressed to the eye 
 or ear, is that they do not distract us with the 
 peculiarities of individual objects, and allow us in 
 thinking to proceed only on the common qualities of 
 objects. All this renders the notion less lively and 
 emotional, — unless indeed by those who resort to 
 word-painting to raise up a phantasm, — but at the 
 same time better fitted for the .conducting of rigid 
 thought. The most perfect artifical signs for the 
 limited end in view are those employed in algebra.
 
 THE LOGICAL NOTION. 301 
 
 in which meaningless letters denote quantities known 
 or unknown, and we can employ them according to 
 the settled laws of reasoning in quantity without 
 thinking of what they stand for, till we reach the 
 result, when we translate the sign into what it signi- 
 fies. When we lose siorht for the time foi? what the sign 
 stands for, this is what constitutes, properly speak- 
 ing, Symbolical Thought. But it is always to be 
 understood that the sign does stand for a notion, 
 and has always a tacit reference to it ; that we can 
 predicate of the sign only what we could legiti- 
 mately predicate of the notion ; and that in pass- 
 ing it on from premises to conclusion in a chain of 
 reasoning, we must be sure that we proceed on 
 principles which are applicable to the thing signified. 
 And in order to determine whether we are or are 
 not making a proper predication, we can always, 
 and should often, require that the sign should be 
 translated into the notion, and the notion com- 
 pared with the thing. 1 
 
 A distinction of some importance may be drawn 
 between two kinds of Concepts. In the one the 
 class is determined by a single attribute, or by it 
 
 1 The following are some of the Notion. IV. In order to determine 
 
 Laws of Thought involved in the use whether we are making a proper pred 
 
 of Si<;ns as Instruments of Thought: ication as to the Sign, we may de- 
 
 — I. Every Logical Term stands for a mand at anytime thai the Notion be 
 
 Notion, which may be a Singular Con- substituted for it. V In order to 
 
 crete, an Abstract, or a Universal, determine whether we are making ;\ 
 
 II. According as it stands for one or proper predication as to the Notion, we 
 other of these, so is if to be interpreted, musl inquire what is the nature of tha 
 
 III. We can predicate of the Sign Things from which it has been formed 
 only what mighl be predicated of the
 
 BOS THE LOGICAL NOTION. 
 
 fcher with the attributes implied in it. Such 
 are the classes designated by adjectives, as gener- 
 ous faithful, virtuous, — pointing to one quality 
 of an object, along with those that may be involved 
 in that quality. It is to these phrases that the 
 epithet " connotative " is specially applicable; they 
 denote an attribute, and connote objects possessing 
 it. In other cases the Comprehension of the class 
 consists of an aggregate of attributes. Thus, we 
 cannot fix on any one attribute of the class Man, 
 and derive all the others from it. Rationality is 
 one quality, but he has many others : 
 
 " Men define a man 
 The creature who stands frontward to the stars, 
 The creature who looks inward to himself, 
 The tool-wright, laughing creature. 'Tis enough; 
 We'll say instead the inconsequent creature man, 
 For that's his specialty. What creature else 
 Conceives the circle, and then walks the square ? " 
 
 The one kind of notions I would be inclined to call, 
 when it is necessary to draw the distinction between 
 them, the Generalized Abstract, because in it we 
 seize on a single quality, and put all the objects 
 possessing it into a class. The other I call the 
 Generalized Concrete, because in it we bring to- 
 gether, by certain resemblances, individuals with 
 their aggregate of qualities. It was to the latter 
 that the schoolmen appropriated the phrase Species ; 
 I think they would scarcely have applied it to the 
 Generalized Abstract such as "rational" or "irra
 
 THE LOGICAL NOTION. 303 
 
 tional." The Generalized Concrete evidently in- 
 cludes all natural classes, such as reptiles, fishes, 
 birds, mammals, in the animal kingdom, and rosa- 
 cea, cruciferae, solanaceas in the vegetable kingdom ; 
 the objects embraced in these have all a number of 
 common qualities. 
 
 It is of importance to keep these distinctions in 
 view in considering the nature of Definition. In 
 defining the Generalized Abstract Notion, we have 
 only to bring out the one common quality, and the 
 work is completed. But in attempting to define 
 the Generalized Concrete, we cannot fix on any one 
 quality as being the essential one ; and it often 
 happens that the common attributes are so numer- 
 ous, that it would be vain and presumptuous to 
 attempt to specify all of them. Thus, no one can 
 tell what are the properties embraced in horse, dog, 
 metal, mineral. It fortunately, I believe providen- 
 tially, happens that we have in nature classes called 
 Kinds, the nature of which has been so well ex- 
 pounded by Mr. Mill. In these, one of the Marks is 
 an invariable accompaniment, and therefore a sign 
 of the others ; and in specifying it we have truly 
 fixed the significates of the notion, that is, comprised 
 all the objects embraced in it and excluded others. 
 Thus it is a good definition to say, " Man is a rational 
 animal," for all his other special attributes are con- 
 joined with rationality. If we call the attribute 
 fixed on the Differentia, the others may be repre- 
 sented as Propria, if we wish to retain, alter amend-
 
 304 THE LOGICAL NOTION. 
 
 ing it, the distinction of Porphyry between Differen- 
 tia and Proprium. 
 
 Mr. Mill has offered some valuable remarks on 
 Definition, but from overlooking the distinction 
 between the Extension and Comprehension of a 
 Notion, he has not given us a thoroughly scientific 
 account of the logical process. Sir William Hamil- 
 ton is right in saying, after older logicians, that it 
 is effected according to the Comprehension of a 
 Notion; that is, it reflectively brings out the Marks 
 by which those who spontaneously formed the con- 
 cept combined the objects. From overlooking Ex- 
 tension Mr. Mill has omitted Division, a subject 
 which ought to be discussed in all logical treatises. 
 Logical Division proceeds according to the Exten- 
 sion of a Notion, and spreads out the co-ordinate 
 species of a genus, according to marks added, so that 
 the species exclude one another, and together make 
 up the genus.
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 LOGICAL JUDGMENT. 
 
 THERE is no part of Logic which has greater need 
 of being thoroughly cleared up than that which 
 relates to Judgment. In particular, first, what pre- 
 cisely are the things compared, and in regard to 
 which the affirmation or denial is made ? In the 
 common logical treatises we are said to compare 
 two notions and declare their agreement or disagree- 
 ment. Mr. Mill has made an important correction 
 of this statement: "Propositions (except when the 
 mind itself is the subject treated of) are not asser- 
 tions respecting our ideas of things, but assertions 
 respecting the things themselves. In order to be- 
 lieve that gold is yellow, I must indeed have the 
 idea of gold and the idea of yellow, and something 
 having reference to these ideas must take place hi 
 my mind ; but my belief has not reference to the 
 ideas, it has reference to the things." {Logic, i. v. 1.) 
 "Do we never judge or assert anything but our 
 mere notions of things? Do we not make judg- 
 ments and assert propositions respecting actual 
 things?" (p. 346.) There is truth here. But is the 
 
 20 (305)
 
 S06 LOGICAL JUDGMENT. 
 
 whole truth Bel forth? The judgment is pronounced 
 in regard to objects, but then, it must be of objects 
 of which we have a notion. The judgment is not 
 pronounced of our notions as mental phenomena, 
 but neither can it be of things of which we have 
 had no notion, — of such we can make no predica- 
 tion. He tells us again and again, "The judgment 
 is concerning the fact, not the concept." But then 
 he is obliged to allow, " that in order to believe that 
 gold is 3'ellow, I must, indeed, have the idea of 
 gold, and the idea of yellow, and something hav- 
 ing reference to these ideas must take place in my 
 mind ; " and he adds, that in order to believe, " a 
 previous mental conception of the facts is an indis- 
 pensable condition." I ask, should not this indispen- 
 sable condition have a place in the full statement of 
 the nature of propositions ? There is a sentence in 
 which he has got at least a momentary view of the 
 correct doctrine : " The real object of belief is not 
 the concept, or any relation of the concept, but the 
 fact conceived." (p. 348.) Yes, the facts conceived 
 are what we compare. If we could get philosophers 
 to reserve the word " concention " for the mental 
 
 L 
 
 operation, and apply the word a concept " exclusively 
 and consistently, not to the mental product, as Ham- 
 ilton does, but to the things conceived, then the 
 proper account of Judgment, when we have a class- 
 notion, would be, the act in which we compare two 
 concepts. This account embraces the full mental 
 operation, and throws us back first upon the notions
 
 LOGICAL JUDGMENT. 307 
 
 that we may judge of them, and these throw us 
 back on the things from which .the notions have 
 been formed. 
 
 This leads me to notice another misapprehension 
 of our author's. Here, as all throughout his Logic, 
 he makes us look to names rather than to thoughts. 
 But surely Locke has shown, in that third book 
 of his Essay, which Mr. Mill so commends, that 
 names should ever carry us back to ideas, which 
 ideas, as Bacon had previously shown, should ever 
 carry us back to things. Logic has to do primarily 
 with Thought as employed about Things, and with 
 Names only secondarily and incidentally, as being 
 the expression of Thoughts. It is thus only that we 
 can employ the laws of thought, which are fixed, to 
 enable us to examine and correct language, which is 
 variable. But Mr. Mill reverses this order, and 
 makes Logic deal primarily with the proposition 
 or expression, and not with the judgment or com- 
 parison, (p. 357.) 
 
 But the important and unsettled question is, 
 What is the precise relation between the two Con- 
 cepts or Terms in Judgment? When it is said to 
 be an agreement or disagreement, the language is 
 far too vague for philosophic purposes. Sir William 
 Hamilton vacillates in the account given by him. 
 His common representation is that the relation is 
 one of whole and parts. "We may articulately 
 define a judgment or proposition to be the product 
 of that act by which we pronounce, that, of two
 
 30S LOGICAL JUDGMENT. 
 
 notions thought as subject and as predicate, the one 
 does or does not constitute a part of the other, 
 either in the quantity of extension or in the quan- 
 tity of comprehension." {Logic, I. p. 229.) In other 
 places the relation seems rather to be spoken of as 
 one of equality, and he would interpret "all men 
 are mortal" as "all men = some mortals." Again, 
 he seems to make the relation one of identity; for 
 he says that the law of identity " is the principle of 
 all logical affirmation and definition" (lb. p. 80), 
 and he speaks of the two notions being " conceived 
 as one." (lb. p. 227.) 
 
 It is not very easy, amidst Mr. Mill's criticisms of 
 others, to find his own theory. He tells us, "Ex- 
 istence, Co-existence, Sequence, Causation, Resem- 
 blance, one or other of these, is asserted or denied in 
 every proposition without exception." But then he 
 explains away the affirmations and denials as to Ex- 
 istence and Causation ; for Existence, that is, nou- 
 menon, is unknown and unknowable, and Causation 
 is unconditional sequence. There remain only three 
 relations, and the judgment is a recognition of a re- 
 lation "of a succession, a co-existence, or a simili- 
 tude between facts." (p. 353.) But he has a way of 
 still further reducing the number of relations. For 
 propositions which assert a resemblance, such as 
 "this color is like that color," "might with some 
 plausibility be brought within the description of an 
 affirmation of sequence, by considering it as an as- 
 sertion that the simultaneous contemplation of the
 
 LOGICAL JUDGMENT. 309 
 
 two colors is followed by a specific feeling, termed 
 the feeling of resemblance." And as to the allega- 
 tion that the propositions of which the predicate 
 is a general name, affirm or deny resemblance, he 
 says, that what is declared is the possession of " cer- 
 tain common peculiarities," " and those peculiarities 
 it is which the terms connote, and which the prop- 
 ositions consequently assert, not the resemblance." 
 {Logic, i. v. 6.) By this subtle but not satisfactory 
 process, in which, as usual, he reaches simpli city 
 by overlooking the peculiarities of the phenomenon, 
 he makes proj30sitions to declare " that a certain attri- 
 bute is either part of a given set of attributes, or in- 
 variably co-exists with them." (p. 361.) His final 
 reduction is thus expressed : " Propositions in which 
 the concept of the predicate is part of the concept 
 of the subject, or, to express ourselves more phil- 
 osophically, in which the attributes connoted by 
 the predicate are part of those connoted by the 
 subject, are a kind of Identical Propositions : they 
 convey no information, but at most remind us of 
 what, if we understood the word which is the sub- 
 ject of the proposition, we knew as soon as the 
 word is pronounced. Propositions of this kind are 
 either definitions, or parts of definitions. These 
 judgments are analytical: they analyze the conno- 
 tation of the subject-name, and predicate separably 
 the different attributes which the name asserts col- 
 lectively. All other affirmative judgments are syn- 
 thetical, and affirm that some attribute, or set of
 
 310 LOGICAL JUDGMENT. 
 
 attributes, is, not a part of those connoted by the 
 subject-name, but an invariable accompaniment of 
 them." (p. 359.) This analysis accords thoroughly 
 with Mr. Mill's psychological theory, and helps to 
 prop it. It makes all judgments relate to attributes, 
 and simply to proclaim either an identity, or co- 
 existence among them, — which attributes are in 
 the end sensations, or possibilities of sensation. But 
 it is not in accordance with the revelations of con- 
 sciousness, which show us that the mind pronounces 
 judgments not as to abstract attributes, but as to 
 things with attributes; and not only of identity 
 and co-existence, but of whole and parts, of resem- 
 blance, of space, of quantity, and active property. 
 (See supra, pp. 217, 218.) 
 
 Much clearness, as it appears to me, may be in- 
 troduced into this subject by distinguishing three 
 classes of judgments, corresponding to three classes 
 of notions: 
 
 (1.) There are judgments in which the objects 
 compared are Singular Concretes; as when by the 
 eye I see two marbles and judge them to be of 
 the same size, or by the ear hear two sounds and de- 
 clare one of them to be louder than the other. In 
 the order of time these are the first judgments pro- 
 nounced by the mind. It is by a succession of them, 
 that is, by observing resemblances among a number 
 of individual objects that we form the General No- 
 tion. It is to these, as I understand his doctrine, 
 that Dr. Mansel applies the term Psychological Judg-
 
 LOGICAL JUDGMENT. 311 
 
 inents. (Proleg. Log., p. Go.) I have already ex- 
 pressed my opinion, that the relations which the 
 mind can perceive among objects are very numerous 
 and diversified, — much more so than Mr. Mill sup- 
 poses. What is the nature and what the best class- 
 ification of these comparisons ; these are very im- 
 portant questions in psychology, but do not specially 
 fall under the science which treats of discursive 
 thought. 
 
 (2.) There are judgments in which we compare 
 Abstracts, by which I do not mean mental states or 
 modifications, but things abstracted. For example, 
 " Honesty is the best policy," where both " honesty " 
 and " the best policy " are Abstracts, being neither 
 Singular Concretes on the one hand, nor Common 
 Concepts on the other, that is, they do not denote 
 separately existing things, such as " this man," nor 
 an indefinite number of objects, like "man." Under 
 this fall all definitions such as " Logic is the science 
 of the laws of thought." Here both the subject, 
 " Logic," and the predicate, " the science of the laws 
 of thought," are not independently existing things 
 on the one hand, nor do they embrace indefinite ob- 
 jects on the other. In this same class I place judg- 
 ments regarding space, time, and quantity, such as 
 "the zenith is the point of the visible hemisphere 
 directly over the head of the observer;" "mid-day is 
 12 o'clock in the day;" and " 2 -f 2 = 4." Here both 
 the terms are abstract. We never met with such 
 separate things as 2 -j- 2 or 4 ; nor can we describe
 
 312 LOGICAL JUDGMENT. 
 
 either 2 — |— 2 or 4 as a class embracing objects : in 
 fact we cannot say of such abstract notions that 
 they have Extensions. 
 
 In all such judgments the relation is one of iden- 
 tity or of equality. The judgments are convertible 
 or substitutive ; that is, Ave can change the position 
 of the terms, or substitute the one for the other, 
 without any change ; in fact we can make either 
 term the subject or the predicate, as may suit our 
 purpose. Thus we reverse the order given above, 
 and say, " the science of the laws of thought is logic ; " 
 " the point of the visible hemisphere directly over 
 the head of the observer is the zenith;" "12 o'clock 
 in the day is mid-clay ; " and " 4 = 2 — f- 2." Great 
 clearness is introduced into this part of Logic by 
 separating these judgments, in which we compare 
 Abstracts, from those in which we compare Singu- 
 lars or Concepts. 
 
 (3.) A more important, but a more complicated, 
 class of judgments remains for consideration. It 
 consists of those in which there is an attributive, 
 and in fact, or by implication, a Concept or a class- 
 notion. This language requires to be explained. 
 When we say, " this cow ruminates," we have ab- 
 stracted an attribute and ascribed it to the animal. 
 In this proposition the subject is singular. But in 
 judgments of this kind the subject may be a class- 
 notion ; thus we say, u cows ruminate," meaning that 
 the whole class do so. A judgment of this descrip- 
 tion is called attributive. One of the terms is, prop-
 
 LOGICAL JUDGMENT. 313 
 
 erly speaking, the subject, and the other the predi- 
 cate. And the terms cannot be converted simply; 
 in other words, the predicate cannot be made the 
 subject without limitation. Because all cows possess 
 the attribute of rumination, we cannot say all rumi- 
 nating; things are cows. 
 
 All Attributive judgments are judgments in Com- 
 prehension, but they may also be made judgments 
 in Extension. For we may reckon " ruminant " as a 
 class embracing not only the cow but other animals, 
 such as the sheep and the deer. It will be admitted 
 that this is always possible. On the other hand, I 
 do not affirm that this is always done. In by far 
 the greater number of propositions the primary and 
 uppermost sense is in comprehension. Thus, when 
 we say " larks sing," we probably mean not that larks 
 are among the class of singing birds, but that they 
 have the capacity of singing. But we may always 
 interpret in Extension the proposition which is pri- 
 marily in Comprehension. This follows from the ac- 
 count given in last chapter, of the mutual relation 
 and dependence of the two. When we have a mark, 
 we may always form a class, embracing the objects 
 possessing the mark. The mind in its discursive 
 operations tends to go on from Comprehension to 
 Extension. When the predicate of a proposition is 
 a verb, as in the example just given, the thought is 
 in Comprehension. But then we have also adjec- 
 tives and common norne as predicates Wlim we 
 say the "man hoards mono}/" ihe thought is in
 
 314 LOGICAL JUDGMENT. 
 
 Comprehension j but we also say that "he is penuri- 
 ous." and the thought is rising to Extension; and 
 when we say " he is a miser," the thought is in Ex- 
 trusion as well as Comprehension, for we have es- 
 tablished a class, "miser," to which we refer the 
 individual. Mr. Mill seems to get a momentary 
 view of this ; for while he holds that all judgments 
 (except where both the terms are proper names) 
 are really judgments in Comprehension, he allows 
 that " it is customary, and the natural tendency of 
 the mind, to express most of them in terms of Ex- 
 tension." The "tendency" to do this must surely 
 proceed from some law of thought as applied to 
 things ; and the possibility of doing it surely implies 
 an intimate relation between the Comprehension and 
 the Extension. In not a few propositions the upper- 
 most thought is in Extension. Thus, when the 
 young student of Natural History is told that " the 
 crocodile is a reptile," his idea is of a class, of which 
 he may afterwards learn the marks. As in the other 
 cases, the mind tends to generalize the attribute, 
 and make the proposition one in Extension, so in 
 this case it should go on to translate the idea in Ex- 
 tension into one in Comprehension. That proposi- 
 tions can always be interpreted in both ways, is a 
 clear evidence of the indissoluble connection of the 
 operations. 
 
 It appears then that in all judgments belonging to 
 this head the relation is always one of Comprehen- 
 sion, and may also and always be one of Extension
 
 LOGICAL JUDGMENT. 315 
 
 likewise. This cannot be said of the second class, or 
 those in which we compare mere Abstracts. We 
 cannot call such attributive ; thus there would be no 
 propriety in saying that 4 is an attribute of 2 — j— 2. 
 Nor can such judgments be intelligently explained 
 in Extension. At this point we see that Sir William 
 Hamilton has fallen into error, from looking merely, 
 in his Logic, to the Conception or General Notion, 
 and overlooking the Abstract Notion. He makes 
 all logical propositions capable of being interpreted 
 both in Extension and Comprehension. But when 
 we affirm that 4 X 4 = 16, we have no General No- 
 tion, and the phrases Extension and Comprehension 
 are not applicable. In all cases, however, in which 
 the predicate is a formed class-notion or Concept, 
 the proposition should be interpreted both ways. 
 Not only so, but when the predicate is merely attri- 
 butive, it is still possible to interpret the proposition 
 in both ; and we shall see in next chapter that in 
 reasoning its uppermost meaning is always in Ex- 
 tension rather than Comprehension. 
 
 At this point we see the error of Mr. Mill, as at 
 the other we saw that of Sir William Hamilton. 
 Mr. Mill maintains that "the supposed meaning in 
 Extension is not a meaning at all, until interpreted 
 by the meaning in Comprehension ; that all concepts 
 and general names which enter into propositions re- 
 quire to be construed in Comprehension, and that 
 their Comprehension is 11k; whole of their meaning." 
 Again, '•' The Extension of a concept is not, like the
 
 316 LOGICAL JUDGMENT. 
 
 Comprehension, intrinsic and essential to the con- 
 < • . • j » t ; it is ;m external and wholly accidental relation 
 of the concept, and no contemplation or analysis 
 of the concept itself will tell us anything about it." 
 (pp. 362, 364.) There is an accumulation of mis- 
 takes in this statement, all arising from the inade- 
 quate view taken by him of the elements involved 
 in the General Notion. We have seen that in the 
 General Notion there are objects as well as attri- 
 butes; objects to combine as well as attributes to 
 combine them. In all propositions falling under 
 this head the Extension has quite as distinct a mean- 
 ing (it connotes objects) as the Comprehension 
 (which denotes attributes) ; and both are "intrinsic 
 and essential to the concept." Extension is in- 
 volved in every concept, and should always be 
 noticed when w^e are using the concept, and brought 
 out into distinct view when we analyze it. Even in 
 cases in which the primary sense of the predicate is 
 attributive, we may also turn it into a class-notion and 
 explain it in extension ; and w r e shall see that we 
 always do so think it when we use the proposition 
 as a premise in an argument. 
 
 Looking upon all judgments of this class as having 
 both Extension and Comprehension, w r e can obtain 
 from any given proposition a set of what have been 
 called by Kant Syllogisms of the Understanding, and 
 by Hamilton Immediate Inferences, or what I call 
 Implied or Transposed Judgments. Thus, the judg- 
 ment being given, " All men are responsible," we
 
 LOGICAL JUDGMENT. 317 
 
 can by Extension derive such judgments as the fol- 
 lowing : that man is a species in the genus responsi- 
 ole ; that some responsible beings are men ; that any 
 one man is responsible ; that it is not true that no 
 men are responsible ; or that some men are not 
 responsible; that men of genius are responsible 
 with their genius ; and that God who calls men to 
 account is calling to account responsible beings. 
 Again, by Comprehension we can say, that responsi- 
 bility should always accompany our notion of man ; 
 that responsibility exists, being found in man who 
 really exists ; that no man is irresponsible ; that ir- 
 responsible beings cannot be men ; and since respon- 
 sibility is to God, man being responsible is responsi- 
 ble to God. These implied judgments bring us to 
 the very verge of mediate reasoning. By subalter- 
 nation we declare that all men being responsible, 
 some men are responsible : there is but a step 
 between this and mediate reasoning, in which we 
 argue that all men being responsible, the New 
 Zealanders who are men, that is, some men, arc re- 
 sponsible. These Transposed Judgments appeared 
 in the old Logic under the heads of Opposition and 
 Conversion ; and in the New Analytic they have been 
 drawn out fully in Archbishop Thomson's Laws of 
 Thought (p. hi., where, however, they are not drawn 
 by Extension and Comprehension). It is a defeel in 
 Mr. Mill's work, professedly A System of Logic, 
 Ratiocinative ami Inductive, that it does not discuss 
 such topics.
 
 CHAPTER XVI. 
 
 REASONING. 
 
 IN order that they may reason, and reason validly, 
 it is not necessary that persons be logicians. 
 Man reasons spontaneously. The logician reflects 
 upon the natural operation, and seeks to unfold its 
 nature and its laws ; and he strives also to lay down 
 rules fitted to guide and guard us as we reason. 
 The grand question to be determined in scientific 
 logic is, what is the regulating principle of sponta- 
 neous ratiocination ? On this subject there is a 
 general agreement, and yet considerable diversity 
 of opinion, among logicians. Almost all admit that 
 the principle (when the conclusion is affirmative) 
 may be expressed, "Things which agree with one 
 and the same agree with one another." But this 
 form is too vague, for it does not specify the nature 
 of the agreement. And so logicians have endeavored 
 to make the statement more definite. According to 
 the Dictum of Aristotle, the things must agree in 
 being both under some higher class or genus. The 
 form has sometimes been put, " Things are the same 
 which are the same with a third." Mr. Mill expresses 
 
 (318)
 
 SEASONING. 319 
 
 it, " Things which co-exist with the same co-exist 
 with one another." The distinctions which have 
 been drawn in the two last chapters in regard to the 
 Notion and Judgment will be found, if followed out, 
 to throw light on some of these points. 
 
 First, There are simple cases of reasoning in 
 which the terms are Singular or Abstract : — 
 
 Thomas a Kempis was the author of the " Imitation of Christ ; " 
 Gerson was not Thomas a Kempis ; 
 .*. Gerson was not the author of the " Imitation of Christ" 
 
 Or the unfigured syllogism of Hamilton : — 
 
 Sulphate of iron is copperas ; 
 Sulphate of iron is not sulphate of copper ; 
 ••. Sulphate of copper is not copperas. 
 
 In the same class may be placed all reasoning in 
 which the propositions are definitions or substitutive : 
 as, u Logic is the science of the laws of thought • 
 Ethics is the science of the laws of our moral nature ; 
 therefore Logic is not Ethics." Under this head I 
 put all quantitative reasoning ; as, " A = B ; B = C ; 
 therefore A = C." In such examples none of the 
 notions is properly a class-notion or attributive. As 
 none of them has quantity or extension, so we can- 
 not speak of a minor or major term, or of a minor 
 or major premise. The division into figures has no 
 place; for, as any one will at ence see on trial, the 
 middle term may be made, ;is we olease, the subject 
 or the predicate of either premise. The regulating 
 principle in all such cases is either, ft Things are the
 
 820 IiEASONING. 
 
 Bame which are same with a third," or" Things which 
 are equal to the same are equal to one another." 
 Much confusion is avoided by alloting reasoning of 
 this description to a separate head. As there is no 
 class-notion the Dictum cannot be the regulating 
 principle. 
 
 Second, There is more complex reasoning in 
 which there is an attributive predicate or a class- 
 notion. In this the old Aristotelian Dictum remains, 
 after all discussion, the fundamental regulating prin- 
 ciple : " Whatever is predicated of a class may be 
 predicated of all the members of the class." No 
 other proposed Dictum has lived beyond the age of 
 its inventor. I am convinced that the same fate 
 awaits that propounded by our author. (Logic, 
 n. i-iv.) 
 
 The " really fundamental axiom of ratiocination," 
 as announced by him, is, " Things which co-exist with 
 the same thing, co-exist with one another ; " and " a 
 thing which co-exists with another thing, with which 
 other a third thing does not co-exist, is not co- 
 existent with that third thing." But the phrase 
 " co-exist," if limited to co-existence in respect of 
 time or space, does not include most important cases 
 of reasoning ; and if widened beyond this, it becomes 
 meaningless. When we argue that the man hav- 
 ing committed murder deserves punishment, the 
 premises and the conclusion have reference, not to 
 space or time, but to far different relations. When 
 we infer from A being equal to B, and B to C, that
 
 BEASONING. Z'll 
 
 A is equal to C, we are not making affirmations 
 about co-existence. In explanation, he tells us (p. 
 203, foot-note, 6th ed.), " the co-existence meant is 
 that of being jointly attributes of the same subject." 
 This statement is still vague, and is not adequate, 
 for it does not specify what is " the same subject," 
 and it does not bring out that the attribution in- 
 volves Extension : but it contains partial truth, and 
 it has a meaning, which we can examine. 
 
 This new Dictum gives him the following univer- 
 sal formula : — 
 
 Attribute A is a mark of Attribute B ; 
 A given object has the mark A ; 
 . . The given object has the attribute B. 
 
 But what does this first premise mean when we 
 translate it from abstractions into concrete realities ? 
 As there cannot be an Attribute existing separately 
 or apart from objects, it must mean, " Whatever 
 objects have the attribute A have the attribute B." 
 And what is this but the major premise of the old 
 syllogistic formula? The second premise requires 
 an explanation. " A given object has the mark A : " 
 this object may be one object or a class of objects. 
 In order to give the formula a meaning, we must 
 interpret it, " Whatever individual or class has the 
 attribute A has the attribute B ; a given object or 
 class C has the attribute A; therefore it lias the 
 attribute B." The new Dictum and new Syllogistic. 
 formula are just bad versions of the old ones. I 
 call them bad versions, for the phrase "co-exist" 
 
 21
 
 822 BEASONING. 
 
 does not bring out the precise relation of the terms 
 on which the thought proceeds; and the phrase, 
 " Attribute A," requires to be interpreted in order to 
 have a relevant signification. 
 
 But he has given us another form, which he repre- 
 sents as *• an universal type of the reasoning process. 
 We find it resolvable in all cases into the following 
 elements : Certain individuals have a given attri- 
 bute ; an individual or individuals resemble the for- 
 mer in certain other attributes ; therefore they re- 
 semble them also in the given attribute." (lb. II. in. 
 7.) It may be observed that the phrase "co-exist" 
 has disappeared, and another and equally vague one 
 has taken its place ; it is a " resemblance " in certain 
 attributes, and in other attributes. It is allowed 
 that this is not " conclusive from the mere form of 
 the expression." By itself it would sanction falla- 
 cious reasoning quite as readily as valid. "All men 
 have immortal souls ; the brutes resemble them in 
 certain attributes (as instincts and bodily organs) ; 
 the}' must also have immortal souls." We shall see 
 immediately that Mr. Mill allows that the syllogism 
 is an admirable test of the validity of reasoning, 
 which, it is conceded, this alleged "universal type " 
 is not. It wants the essential testing- element, the 
 general rule that guarantees the conclusion, and 
 which in the syllogistic formula is embodied in the 
 major premise, — the necessity of which is pressed 
 on us by the Dictum. 
 
 But may there not be reasoning hi Comprehen-
 
 REASONING. 323 
 
 sion as well as in Extension? In answering this 
 question it should be admitted fully, that reasoning 
 in Extension may always be translated into reason- 
 ing in Comprehension. The reason of this is very 
 obvious : it follows from the account given of the 
 nature of the Concept. Extension always implies 
 Comprehension ; that is, the objects in the class are 
 joined in the class by the possession of common 
 marks : 
 
 He who has intelligence and free agency is responsible ; 
 Man has intelligence and free agency ; 
 .-. Man is responsible. 
 
 This reasoning in Extension may be put in Com- 
 prehension : 
 
 Responsibility is an attribute of all who have intelligence and free 
 
 agency ; 
 Intelligence and free agency is an attribute of man ; 
 .•. Responsibility is an attribute of man. 
 
 Mr. Mill maintains that all reasoning is in Com- 
 prehension, and not in Extension. " All propositions 
 into which general names enter, and consequently 
 all reasonings, are in Comprehension only. Proposi- 
 tions and reasonings may be written in Extension, 
 but they are always understood in Comprehension." 
 (p. 363.) I have granted that, so far as propositions 
 are concerned, spontaneous thought is chiefly in 
 Comprehension. In simple affirmation and denial, 
 we commonly mean to do nothing more than decline 
 or deny that an object or class of objects has or has
 
 32 t REASONING. 
 
 not a certain attribute, but without turning the predi- 
 cate into a class-notion, or inquiring whether there 
 may or may not be other objects, which have or have 
 not the same attribute. When we say that "the 
 horse is warm-blooded," we may be looking exclu- 
 sively to the attribute, without caring, at the time, 
 whether there are other warm-blooded animals. 
 But it seems to be different in regard to reasoning, 
 the uppermost thought in which is always hi Ex- 
 tension. It seems to me to be so when, not know- 
 ing whether the horse is or is not warm-blooded, 
 we call in a middle concept, and argue "that the 
 horse being a mammal, and all mammals being 
 warm-blooded, the horse must be so." Here we 
 place the horse in the class mammal, and mammals 
 among warm-blooded animals, and thus reach the 
 conclusion. Again, to take an example of negative 
 reasoning (falling naturally into the second figure) ; 
 When we argue that " the rat, not bringing forth its 
 young by eggs, is not a reptile," we find in thought 
 that the class rats, not being in the class of animals 
 which bring forth their young by eggs, cannot be in 
 the class reptiles, which always bring forth their 
 young by eggs. Here, as in all other cases, we un- 
 derstand the attributive terms — such as bringing 
 forth their young by eggs — as class-notions in order 
 to draw a conclusion. This is seen very clearly 
 when we have to determine whether our conclusion 
 should be universal or particular; that is, of the 
 whole class, or a part. We argue (in the third
 
 SEASONING. 325 
 
 figure) that " as the connection of soul and body, 
 though incomprehensible, is yet to be believed, that 
 therefore — not all things, but — some things to be 
 believed are incomprehensible ; " and how do we 
 reach this conclusion ? Because in thought we have 
 made a class of " things to be believed," and found 
 that in this class are things incomprehensible. 1 
 
 Such considerations convince me that our sponta- 
 neous reasoning is in Extension. I allow that Sir W. 
 Hamilton has furnished a valuable contribution to 
 Logic by exhibiting the forms of reasoning in Com- 
 prehension. But I look on these as secondary and 
 derived, and not entitled to the same primary rank 
 as those in Extension. Most logicians — teachers 
 and taught — have shrunk from his 108 Modes as 
 being an oppressive burden on the mind, both on its 
 memory and its intellectual apprehension. I am in- 
 clined to think that all the purposes of Logic will be 
 accomplished by retaining the old forms of reasoning 
 in Extension, and showing how, when any end is to 
 be served, they can be turned into the forms of 
 Comprehension. As to Mr. Mill, he has got a partial 
 and imperfect view of reasoning in Comprehension, 
 but has not taken the trouble of showing us how his 
 theory is adequate to explain the processes of spon- 
 taneous reason iug. 
 
 He utters an emphatic denial regarding the syl- 
 logistic form and its rules, that they are not " the 
 
 1 Mr. Kidd, in liis very able work, conception of a class is present ill 
 A Delineation of the Primary Prind- every instance of reasoning." 
 pies of licuioiiuiij, shows, p. 121, " Tlio
 
 826 BEASONWG. 
 
 form and the rules according to which our reason- 
 ings are necessarily, or even usually, made." But all 
 wise logicians have allowed that in spontaneous 
 reasoning persons have not before them the Dictum 
 of Aristotle, and still less the modes and figures of 
 the syllogism. The former of these is the regula- 
 tive principle of reasoning, and the latter are ex- 
 pressions constructed to test the validity of ratioci- 
 nation. What I maintain is that the mind in all 
 reasoning grasps the three notions, that is, things 
 apprehended, and the relation between them. We 
 see a new kind of leaf that never fell under our 
 view before, and we notice that it is netted in its 
 veins, and we infer that the plant on which it grew 
 must be dicotyledonous : we do so on the principle, 
 gathered probably from botanical books, that all 
 netted-veined plants are dicotyledons ; and we see 
 the relation of " this plant, having netted leaves, and 
 being dicotyledonous." But we do not enounce the 
 Dictum, nor do we spread out major, minor, and 
 conclusion. We leave all this to logicians, who 
 construct a reflex science out of a spontaneous 
 process. 
 
 He makes two most important admissions in favor 
 of the syllogistic analysis. One is that all reasoning 
 can be reduced to the formula of the syllogism ; and 
 the other, that this formula is admirably fitted to ex- 
 pose invalid reasoning. The value of the syllogistic 
 form, and of the rules of using it correctly, is said to 
 consist " in their furnishing us with a mode hi which
 
 BEAbOMWG. 327 
 
 those reasonings may always be represented, and 
 which is admirably calculated, if they are inconclu- 
 sive, to bring their inconclusiveness to light." But I 
 ask, how does it happen that all our reasoning can 
 be reduced to this form ? How is it that it comes 
 to test so admirably the conclusiveness and inclusive- 
 ness of all reasoning? It is surely strange that 
 there is a rule to which all reasoning is conformable, 
 and which acts as a criterion of all reasoning;, and 
 yet is not the natural law of reasoning. I believe 
 that all arguments can be made to take this form, 
 because it is the right one. I believe it is a crucial 
 test of the soundness or unsoundness of all argu- 
 ments, because it is the law of thought, springing 
 from the mental constitution with which our Maker 
 has endowed us. 
 
 I suppose Mr. Mill would account for the conform- 
 ableness of all reasoning to the syllogistic form, and 
 for its aptness to act as a test, by saying that, though 
 all reasoning is naturally in Comprehension, it can 
 be represented in Extension. But if this be so, it 
 would show, I think, that propositions and reasoning 
 must, contrary to what Mr. Mill alleges, have a 
 meaning in Extension as well as in Comprehension. 
 And if reasoning be naturally in Comprehension, 
 we should expect that formulae drawn out on that 
 principle must be better fitted than those derived 
 from Extension to exhibit the validity or invalid- 
 ity of arguments. Mr. Mill has, unfortunately, not 
 favored us with a development of the forms of rea-
 
 32S EEASONWG. 
 
 soiling according to Comprehension. We are there- 
 fore not in a position to say whether these would or 
 would not be superior, as a means of testing infer- 
 ence, to those furnished in the old Logic. I am con- 
 vinced that such forms, constructed even by so clear 
 a thinker as Mr. Mill, would have a more artificial, 
 a more twisted and translated look, and would be 
 far less fitted to expose fallacies in reasoning. I 
 rather think that we should have to translate them 
 back into Extension before we could fully recognize 
 their meaning. Looking upon reasoning as proceed- 
 ing naturally by classification, rather than attribu- 
 tion, I maintain that the great body of logicians, 
 from Aristotle downwards, have acted properly in 
 drawing out their formulas according to Extension, 
 and that it is when they are thus drawn out that 
 they are most easily understood and readily applied. 
 Mr. Mill has made a most important admission (p. 
 429): — "The propositions in Extension, being, in 
 this sense, exactly equivalent to the judgments in 
 Comprehension, served quite as well to ground forms 
 of ratiocination upon : and as the validity of the 
 forms was more easily and conveniently shown 
 through the concrete conception of comparing classes 
 of objects, than through the abstract one of recogniz- 
 ing co-existence of attributes, logicians were per- 
 fectly justified in taking the course which, in any 
 case, the established forms of language would doubt- 
 less have forced upon them." The two circumstances, 
 that the validity of the forms is more easily and con
 
 REASONING. 329 
 
 veniently shown by comparing "classes," and that 
 the established forms of language, which are ex- 
 pressions of the natural processes of the mind, would 
 have forced an expression according to classes on 
 logicians, is surely a presumption, if not a proof, that 
 the forms in extension are the development of spon- 
 taneous thought. 
 
 " I believe that, in point of fact, when drawing in- 
 ferences from our personal experience, and not from 
 maxims handed down to us by books or tradition, we 
 much oftener conclude from particulars to particulars 
 directly, than through the intermediate agency of any 
 general proposition." Now, nearly all philosophers 
 have allowed that the mind begins its observations 
 with particulars, or, to use a better phrase, singulars. 
 Having observed a number of individuals, it can 
 reach a general conclusion ; but it is only by a pro- 
 cess which the logician should fully unfold. Having 
 observed or heard that crows everywhere are black, 
 we conclude that the crow which we hear, without 
 seeing, is black. But we can argue thus only on the 
 condition that the induction is such as to justify the 
 general proposition that all crows are black. The 
 syllogism is so admirable a means of bringing to 
 light the inconclusiveness of fallacious reasoning, 
 just because it requires the general proposition to 
 be expressed in one of the premises. 
 
 "All inference is from particulars to particulars ; 
 general propositions are merely registers of such in- 
 ferences already 1 lade, and short formula 1 Cor mak-
 
 330 REASONING. 
 
 in--- more." lie thinks that the error of the syllo- 
 gistic theory arises from not distinguishing between 
 "the interring part and the registering part, and 
 ascribing to the latter the functions of the former." 
 Now 1 admit that the general proposition may be 
 the record or register of a previous induction. And 
 if there has been reasoning in the process of induc- 
 tion by which this has been reached, there must 
 have been a prior general proposition got by an ear- 
 lier induction, or given by intuition. But in any 
 given argument we do not look to the previous ac- 
 cumulation of particulars, but to the register em- 
 bodied in a general proposition. The general prop- 
 osition is certainly no part of the inference, but it 
 is an essential part of the assumption from which 
 we infer the conclusion, and should therefore have a 
 distinct place allotted to it in the premises. Mr. 
 Mill has a partial view of the truth when he says 
 (lb. c. iv.), "In drawing this inference, we conform 
 to a formula which we have adopted for our guid- 
 ance in such operations, and which is a record of the 
 criteria by which we thought we had ascertained 
 that we might distinguish when the inference could 
 and when it could not be drawn." In any given 
 argument, as an argument, all that we have to do is 
 to look to this register, or record, or general prop- 
 osition. If doubts arise as to its accuracy, we mu*t 
 go back on the processes by which we reached it ; 
 and if there be reasoning in the processes, we must 
 test them in the same way. But our record being
 
 SEASONING. 331 
 
 settled, the general proposition in which it is an- 
 nounced is implied in the argument, and should 
 therefore have a place in the formula of reasoning. 
 We have already noticed that " universal type of the 
 reasoning process," according to which we find that 
 " certain individuals have a given attribute, and that 
 an individual or individuals resemble the former in 
 certain attributes, and therefore resemble them in 
 the given attribute." We remarked upon the vague- 
 ness of this type as leaving us in doubt as to what 
 are the "certain attributes" which entitle us to 
 infer the presence of the " given attribute." It is 
 the general proposition embodied in the major prem- 
 ise, which spreads out the rules which, when we 
 take the minor premise along with it, entitles us 
 to draw the conclusion. 
 
 But it is asked, if all reasoning implies a major 
 proposition, where do we get our first major, that 
 with which we start? Aristotle did not overlook 
 this question, and he answered it. He tells us again 
 and again that the beginning of demonstration can- 
 not be demonstration, and that all demonstration 
 carries us back to Intuitive Reason (vovg, see Anal. 
 Post., i. 3, 22, 23). In certain acts of reasoning, 
 primitive perceptions, such as "the effect has a 
 cause," give us the one proposition, and ordinary 
 observation the other, and the two necessitate the 
 conclusion. But in far the greater number of argu- 
 ments the general proposition is the result of a 
 gathered observation. The criteria of these gath-
 
 332 REASONING. 
 
 ered or inductive general laws will come under our 
 notice in next chapter. 
 
 " The child, who, having burnt his fingers, avoids 
 to thrust them again into the fire, has reasoned or 
 interred, though he has never thought of the general 
 maxim, Fire burns. He knows from memory that 
 he has been burnt, and on this evidence believes, 
 when he sees a candle, that if he puts his finger 
 into the flame of it, he will be burnt again. He 
 believes this in every case which happens to arise ; 
 but without looking, in each instance, beyond the 
 present case. He is not generalizing ; he is infer- 
 ring a particular from particulars. In the same way, 
 also, brutes reason." " Not only the burnt child, but 
 the burnt dog dreads the fire." I am inclined to 
 think that in these cases, that of the child and the 
 clog, the process is very much one of the association 
 of ideas and feelings. The fire and the sensation 
 have been together, and upon the fire presenting 
 itself there is a tendency to a feeling which causes 
 shrinking. There is really no conclusion from ob- 
 served, from remembered, from gathered particulars. 
 Should the fire only once have burnt the child, it 
 will turn away from it, possibly without remember- 
 ing the previous case, certainly without an induction 
 of particulars, or an inference from them. 
 
 I have called attention to the circumstances that 
 while Judgment and Association are not the same, 
 they do yet conspire in their action, (pp. 195, 196, 
 222, 223.) I have now to apply this remark to
 
 SEASONING. 333 
 
 reasoning and suggestion. Inference is not to be 
 confounded with mere association. In all reasoning 
 there is comparison, there is the perception of a 
 relation between things about which we reason. 
 Thus we argue, " A deer, being horned, is ruminant." 
 Here the mind grasps the three concepts and their 
 relation : " deer," " being horned," " are among rumi- 
 nant animals." Unless there be a positive percep- 
 tion of the connection of the things, there is no rea- 
 soning. Herein is argument at once distinguished 
 from association, which does not imply any connec- 
 tion between the things which have been together 
 in the mmd, any comparison, or any observed rela- 
 tion. But while the two mental operations are not 
 the same, association greatly helps reasoning. In 
 all inference there is a discovered relation, and the 
 related things may often have been together, and 
 thus the one tends to suggest the others. Some 
 think that it is a native law of the mind that cor- 
 related things, such as like things, and cause and 
 effect, call up each other. However we may ac- 
 count for it, whether from things being oft en 
 together or an original tendency, correlated things 
 come up simultaneously, altogether independent of 
 our observing the relation. Indeed, it is often the 
 circumstance that they have come up together 
 which invites or constrains us to notice the connec- 
 tion. Now all this helps us to conduct the operation 
 of reasoning. Thus fire suggests the burning sensa- 
 tion, and we collect cases till we reach the general
 
 334 BEASONWG. 
 
 truth that fire burns, and then the process may 
 become one of inference. It is in this way we are 
 to account for the readiness, the rapidity, and for 
 what is often called the unconsciousness of the 
 reasoning process. The laws of association call up 
 correlated objects, and the mind perceives the cor- 
 relation and draws the inference. Thus "deer" sug- 
 gests "horned;" and having heard that horned 
 animals are ruminant, "horned" suggests "rumi- 
 nant ; " and perceiving the class relation of the 
 terms, we draw the conclusion that horned animals 
 are ruminant. 
 
 I believe that very much of what some regard as 
 reasoning in the brute creatures arises from mere 
 association, without the relation of the things being 
 discovered. In like manner the laws of suggestion 
 operate in children to excite fears and expectations, 
 before there are those observed relations which 
 must enter into reasoning. All our lives we act on 
 impulses produced by mere association, without any 
 accompanying argument. A loud noise will raise up 
 fear, without our having inferred that it proceeds 
 from a cause implying danger. The person who has 
 been seriously hurt by a horse or dog can never look 
 on a horse or dog without a feeling of tremor. In 
 such mental action I admit that there is no class- 
 notion, no general proposition, no regulating princi- 
 ple of Extension. But just as little is there an in- 
 duction of particulars, or attribution, or reasoning 
 in Comprehension ; there is no such process as
 
 BEASOmNG. 335 
 
 "Attribute A being a mark of Attribute B, and C 
 having the mark A." But then it is one ami of in- 
 tellectual teaching, and one very special end of 
 Logic, to raise us above the animal state and the 
 infant state ; to keep us from being driven along 
 passively by mere casual associations ; and train the 
 mind to look narrowly into the relations of things 
 that pass before it, and of which it must have some 
 conception, that it may thereby reach sound conclu- 
 sions which can be justified. In all such processes 
 of real reasoning, it will be found that there is a 
 general proposition involved, and this should have a 
 place in the formula which systematizes the sponta- 
 neous operation. 
 
 But Mr. Mill tells us that "in every syllogism 
 considered as an argument to prove the conclusion, 
 there is a petitio principii." But did any one ever 
 maintain that the syllogism is " an argument to 
 prove the conclusion ? " It has usually been repre- 
 sented as the form to which the argument can be 
 reduced. The petitio prinelpii is a fallacious mode 
 of reasoning; but the syllogism cannot with any 
 possible propriety be represented as a mode of 
 reasoning, valid or fallacious, for it is not reasoning, 
 but the formula of reasoning. I suppose Mr. Mill 
 meant to affirm that all reasoning in syllogistic form 
 involves a petitio. If so, then he is caught in 
 inextricable toils, for he admits that all rea- 
 soning can be reduced to syllogistic form, which 
 seems to imply that it involves a begging of the
 
 336 SEASONING. 
 
 question. The petitio prindpii is a fallacy in which 
 one of the premises is either the same as the con- 
 clusion, or depends upon it. But in reasoning, ac- 
 cording to the syllogistic analysis, the conclusion 
 follows, not from one of the premises, but from the 
 two, or rather from the relations between the things 
 compared and the premises. It is when the rela- 
 tions predicated in the two propositions are brought 
 before the mind that we see the force of the infer- 
 ence. We wish to determine — what we are not 
 expressly told in the gospels — whether the Baptist 
 was a priest : give us only one premise, as, that " the 
 Baptist was the son of a priest," or, that " the sons 
 of priests were priests, and we can infer nothing ; 
 but place the two together, and the conclusion 
 is necessitated. The one of these premises is a 
 particular fact, the other is a general proposition, and 
 both are necessary to the validity of the conclusion. 
 Both premises are, in the reasoning, assumptions — 
 they must be given or granted ; but neither of them 
 is an assumption of the conclusion ; the two are as- 
 sumptions which warrant the conclusion. As to 
 whether the assumptions are or are not warranted, this 
 is to be determined by a previous investigation, to be 
 tested by the criteria of induction, intuition, or rea- 
 soning. And it should be forever pressed on Mr. 
 Mill, that the objections he brings against the Dic- 
 tum of Aristotle are quite as applicable to his own. 
 " Things which co-exist with one and the same thing 
 co-exist with one another ; " this is quite as much a
 
 BEASOmJVG. 337 
 
 truism as the old Dictum, while it is much more 
 vague ; and reasoning proceeding upon it must be 
 quite as liable to the charge of being a begging of 
 the question, as reasoning according to the syllogis- 
 tic formula. 
 
 It should not be omitted that Mr. Mill does not 
 enter upon any special consideration of the nature 
 of Conditional Reasoning, whether Hypothetical or 
 Disjunctive. This is a great defect in a work which 
 professes to give us a full Logic of Inference. There 
 are very important questions started as to the regu- 
 lating principle of Conditional Arguments, and these 
 should be discussed in every logical treatise worthy 
 of these advanced times. He tells us, in his "Ex- 
 amination of Hamilton," that a Hypothetical Judg- 
 ment is " a judgment concerning judgments ; " but 
 he does not attempt to enounce the principle which 
 connects the "judgment " with the "judgments " with 
 which it is concerned. He further lets us know that 
 he looks on a Disjunctive Judgment as compounded 
 of two or more Hypotheticals, but he does not in- 
 form us what is the relation of these Hypotheticals 
 to one another, (pp. 454, 455.) I confess I should 
 like to see his attributive theory of reasoning tried 
 by its application to Conditional, and specially to 
 Disjunctive reasoning. When wc argue that "the 
 season when a particular event took place not hav- 
 ing been spring, summer, or autumn, must have 
 been winter," we seem to proceed on the principle 
 of Division, which is made according to the Exten- 
 
 22
 
 338 BE A SONIN O. 
 
 sion and not the Comprehension of a concept. But 
 I allude to these topics here, not in order to discuss 
 them, but to show that as Mr. Mill has avoided the 
 discussion, he cannot be said to furnish a full system 
 of Logic.
 
 CHAPTER XVII. 
 
 SECONDARY LOGIC J OR THOUGHT AS DIRECTED TO PARTICU- 
 LAR CLASSES OF OBJECTS. 
 
 I AM inclined to justify Mr. Mill in introducing into 
 the science other topics besides those treated 
 of in what we may call Primary Logic. The effort 
 made by certain purists to exclude such matters as 
 Demonstration, Induction, and Evidence generally, 
 must fail, and ought to fail. It is of vast moment 
 to have these subjects discussed in a scientific man- 
 ner, and Logic is the field for the discussion ; and 
 our definitions of the science are too narrow if they 
 exclude them, and should be so widened as to give 
 them an acknowledged place. In treating of such 
 topics, or at least two of them, Induction and Evi- 
 dence, our author occupies a far more distinguished 
 place than he does in Formal Logic. Still, even in 
 this department, his work, while possessed of great 
 merits, may be charged with grave errors, springing, 
 I believe, from his mistaken views of fundamental 
 truth. 
 
 I have commented already (Chap, xii.) on his ac- 
 count of Necessary Truth generally. His defective 
 appreciation of intuition has led him to an enone- 
 
 f339)
 
 310 SEC02TDABY LOGIC. 
 
 uus exposition of the nature and office of Mathe- 
 matical Definitions and Axioms. (Logic, n. v.-vii.) 
 Definitions are represented as hypotheses, and the 
 necessity of the truths derived from them consists 
 in the relation between the supposition and the con- 
 clusions drawn from it. " Axioms are experimental 
 truths; generalizations from observation. The prop- 
 osition, Two straight lines cannot enclose a space — 
 or in other words, Two straight lines which have 
 once met, do not meet again, but continue to di- 
 verge — is an induction from the evidence of our 
 senses." 
 
 I reckon these views as radically erroneous. Defi- 
 nitions are Abstracts, that is, things abstracted from 
 known concrete realities. ' A line is length without 
 breadth,' that is, we consider the length without 
 regarding the breadth. ' A superficies has breadth 
 and length without depth,' that is, in all reasoning 
 we agree to look to the length and breadth without 
 taking the depth into account. But Mr. Mill tells 
 us "there exist no real things exactly conformable 
 to the definition ; " there exist no lines without 
 breadth, no surfaces without depth. I admit that 
 there can be no such lines or surfaces with a sepa- 
 rate or independent existence. But still they have 
 a reality; they have a reality in extended objects — 
 which have, besides, length and breadth. Man's 
 mind is so constituted that he can think about 
 them, and draw deductions from them. But he tells 
 us, " A line, as defined by geometers, is wholly in-
 
 SECOND ABY LOGIC. 341 
 
 conceivable," where the word that covers so much 
 confusion appears once more, and in his latest edi- 
 tion. We certainly cannot image such a line, but 
 we can image an extended object, and think about 
 its length. I believe that all further mathematical 
 truths are derived from Definitions. But when I 
 say so, I do not mean that they are obtained from 
 ideas in the mind, but from things abstracted from 
 concrete realities, and having a reality in existing 
 concrete objects. As there is a reality in the things 
 defined, so there is also a reality in all the conclu- 
 sions logically drawn from them. The deductions 
 derived two thousand years ago from the definition 
 of the ellipse, are found to be realized in the plane- 
 tary bodies, so far as they move in elliptic orbits. 
 I cannot see how this should follow, unless the thing 
 defined had been a reality. 
 
 Mr. Mill thinks that demonstrative truths follow 
 from Postulates and not Definitions. We postulate 
 that there may be a line with length without 
 breadth, and get deductions from our assumptions. 
 True, in all deduction the premises are assumptions, 
 but in mathematical definitions the assumptions are 
 abstracted realities. Here, as in so many other de- 
 partments, his acuteness has given him a partial 
 view of the truth, and be says that "our reasonings 
 are grounded upon matters of fact in our defini- 
 tions." When 1 say that mathematical demonstra- 
 tion is founded upon definitions, 1 mean upon the 
 matters of fact or things defined, which no doubt
 
 342 SECONDARY LOGIC. 
 
 are postulated, but postulated as realities, giving us 
 corresponding realities in all legitimate deductions 
 from them. To support his confused theory, he is 
 obliged to give a twofold view of definitions. The 
 definition of a triangle, he says, obviously comprises 
 not one but two propositions perfectly distinguisha- 
 ble. The one is, " There may exist a figure bound- 
 ed by three straight lines;" and the other, "this 
 figure may be termed a triangle." But there is 
 no advantage secured, in the way of clearing our 
 thoughts or otherwise, by drawing such a distinction ; 
 for demonstration relates throughout not to the word, 
 but the thing, a figure bounded by three straight lines. 
 He argues that definitions, as such, are the premises 
 only in the reasonings which relate to words, and 
 that if we take any other view, "we might argue 
 correctly from true premises, and arrive at a false 
 conclusion." Thus let the definition be, " A dragon 
 is a serpent breathing flame ; " out of this we may 
 carve the following syllogism : " A dragon is a thing 
 which breathes flame ; but a dragon is a serpent : 
 therefore, some serpents breathe flame," — " in which 
 both premises are true, and yet the conclusion 
 false." But surely the premises are here true or 
 false according to what we understand as to the 
 objects compared. If we are speaking throughout 
 of imaginary things, the conclusion is true in the 
 same sense as the premises are. If we are speak- 
 ing of actually existing things, both the premises 
 and the conclusion are false. After what I have
 
 SECOND AMY LOGIC. 343 
 
 said in regard to necessary truth (Chap, xii.), it is 
 not necessary to dwell on his theory of Mathemati- 
 cal Axioms. They are represented as mere general- 
 izations of an outward experience. I believe, indeed, 
 that in the axiom in its generalized form there must 
 be generalization. But they are not generalizations 
 of an outward or sensible experience. On the bare 
 contemplation of a whole object, say a table, we 
 declare it to be larger than a part of it, say its leg. 
 I do so at once on the mere sight or thought of the 
 object as known to me, and not from any induction 
 of particulars falling under my experience in time 
 past. Perceiving that I would do the same in every 
 like case, I may generalize the judgment and put it 
 in the form of an axiom, that " the whole is greater 
 than its part." But this general truth is not the 
 generalization of a lengthened experience ; it is not 
 reached by our having observed a thousand times or 
 ten thousand times that a whole thing is greater 
 than a part of the same thing : we see it at once on 
 the bare inspection of any one thing ; our convic- 
 tion could not be made stronger by multiplying ex- 
 amples ; and we cannot allow that there should be 
 an exception. I may have observed of ten thousand 
 plants with netted leaves, that they have all sprung 
 from two seed-lobes, and I feel justified in laying 
 down the general rule, that u netted-leaved plants 
 are dicotyledonous;" but the law is reached by a 
 gathered experience. I do not assert that it can 
 have no exceptions; and when I learn that there is
 
 344 SECOXDAIiT LOGIC. 
 
 a tribe of plants (including Arum, etc.) which have 
 netted loaves, mid yet spring from one seed-lobe, I 
 may wonder at the fact, but I do not say that it 
 is impossible. But the mind having discovered, 
 from its knowledge of the nature of things, that the 
 whole is greater than a part, I cannot be made to 
 allow that there is anywhere an exception. To 
 apply these remarks to mathematical truth: In 
 proceeding with its demonstrations, the mind pro- 
 nounces its judgments immediately on the objects 
 defined being presented to it, and it does not need 
 the axiom in its generalized form; indeed it feels 
 the force of the reasoning quite as clearly before as 
 after the maxim is announced. In learning geome- 
 try, the beginner seems to discover the truth of the 
 axiom from the judgment pronounced in a given 
 case, rather than to recognize the validity of the 
 argument in the particular example by the maxim. 
 Still the axiom is the expression of the regulating 
 principle of reasoning, and it serves important pur- 
 poses to enunciate it at the commencement of the 
 demonstration. It is one of the greatest defects of 
 Mr. Mill's work on Logic, that in consequence of 
 mistaking the nature and functions of definitions 
 and axioms, he has not been able to give a correct 
 account of the Method employed hi Demonstration. 
 That Method I call the Joint Dogmatic and Deduc- 
 tive. I call it Dogmatic, for it begins with assump- 
 tions, with truths not proven, with truths perceived 
 by intuition; and I call it Deductive, for it draws
 
 SECONDARY LOGIC. 345 
 
 other truths from its assumptions. The criteria of 
 its assumptions are the tests of intuitive truth, that 
 is, Self-Evidence and Necessity; the criteria of its 
 deductions are the forms of reasoning. 
 
 Mr. Mill's Book on Induction is far the most valu- 
 able part of his Logic ; it contains the best exposi- 
 tion which we have of the Method of Induction in 
 our own or in any other language. His Canons of 
 Causes are a great improvement upon the Preroga- 
 tive Instances of Bacon, and are an advance upon 
 the rules proposed by Sir J. Herschel. But, whi 1 ^ 
 he has admirably expounded the functions of Pre- 
 rogative Instances or Canons in physical science, he 
 does not seem to see what is the precise logical pur- 
 pose, that is, the purpose in thought, served by them. 
 Induction consists of two parts : the gathering of 
 individual facts, which, however numerous, must 
 always be limited ; and the derivation from them of 
 a law announced in a general proposition. In the 
 first of these there is no special exercise of reason- 
 ing ; the whole is the work of observation and trained 
 sagacity. But in the derivation of the law from 
 the scattered and incomplete facts there is inference. 
 Now, what is it that justifies the inference ? If there 
 be any truth in the Aristotelian or syllogistic analy- 
 sis, there must be a general principle involved, 
 which, when the reasoning is put in syllogistic, form, 
 becomes the major premise Now, such rules as 
 these, involved in the Prerogative Instances of Ba- 
 con, and the Canons of Mr. Mill, are the general
 
 34G SECONDARY LOGIC. 
 
 propositions which supply the major premise; and the 
 particular set of facts give us the minor premise ; and 
 the two necessitate the conclusion. I drank brandy 
 on Monday, Wednesday, and Saturday, and had a 
 headache the succeeding mornings; I drank no 
 brandy on Sunday, Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday, 
 and had no headache on the following days. When 
 I conclude that my drinking brandy was the cause 
 of the headache, I have, as my major premise, such 
 a general proposition as the Canon of Difference : 
 "If, in comparing cases in which the effect takes 
 place with other cases in which it does not take 
 place, we find the latter to have every antecedent in 
 common with the former except one, that one cir- 
 cumstance is the cause, or a part of the cause ; " and 
 as my minor premise, the facts as constituting such 
 a case ; and the conclusion follows syllogistically. 
 The excellence of Mr. Mill's Canons is, that they are 
 the simplest and most complete yet enunciated of 
 the general principles which guide us in rising from 
 the collection of individual facts to the causes. Had 
 Mr. Mill clearly perceived that there is reasoning in 
 all induction, he w^ould have been prevented from re- 
 versing the natural order by representing the rea- 
 soning process as an induction. 
 
 But the discovery of causes is not the sole end of 
 science. In some departments the object is to re- 
 solve the compounds of nature into their elements. 
 This is one of the main ends sought in chemistry, 
 and also in psychology. There should, therefore,
 
 SECOND ARY LOGIC. 
 
 34*7 
 
 be Canons of Composition 1 as well as Canons of 
 Causes. 
 
 In another important group of sciences^ those 
 called the Classificatory by Dr. Whewell, the end 
 sought is not the discovery of Causes or of Com- 
 position, but of Classes ; that is, Natural Classes. 2 I 
 mention these things to show that, while Mr. Mill 
 has given us the best exposition we yet have of the 
 Logic of Induction, he has by no means completed 
 
 1 In the absence of an attempt by 
 any Logician to supply them, we may 
 give the folowing : — ( 1 .) We have de- 
 composed a compound when we have 
 decomposed it in separation from all 
 other substances. (2.) Having found 
 the elements of a compound in one 
 case, we have found them in all. A 
 caution requires to be added, that the 
 elements reached are to be regarded 
 as such merely provisionally. The 
 first rule theoretically guards against 
 a mistake, which is difficult to avoid in 
 practice. The second shows that one 
 decisive experiment may settle the 
 whole question of the decomposition 
 of a substance. Hence it is that in 
 Chemistry we may not require a large 
 induction, such as is necessary in Nat- 
 ural History and many departments 
 of Natural Philosophy. As Chemis- 
 try did not exist in the days of Bacon, 
 
 he does not seem to have contemplated 
 the possibility of so rapid a method of 
 reaching a law; and his rules a.s to the 
 necessity of a wide induction, and the 
 gradual rising from particulars to mi- 
 nor, middle, and major axiom do not, 
 apply to this science, at least in its 
 present advanced stage, — though I 
 rather think they did at its earlier 
 stages, before the nature of chemical 
 affinity bad been ascertained The cau- 
 tion guards us against concluding, 
 when we have reached certain compo- 
 
 nents, we must have got the ultimate 
 elements Every chemist allows that 
 these sixty elements are to be esteemed 
 such, merely till there has been a suc- 
 cessful decomposition of them. 
 
 2 The following Canons of Classes 
 may serve till better are furnished : — 
 (1.) We have found the resemblance 
 among the objects in many and varied 
 cases. (2.) We must be in circum- 
 stances to .say that if there be excep- 
 tions we should most probably have 
 fallen in with them. These two rules 
 will prevent us from drawing rash gen- 
 eralizations from a few cases, or cases 
 confined to a limited region. But in 
 order to determine whether the class is 
 or is not a Natural Class, we require a 
 more important rule. (.3.) The class 
 may be regarded as a natural one when 
 it is one of Kinds ; that is, when tlio 
 possession of one mark is a sign of a 
 number of others. Thus we may 
 reckon Mammal as a Natural Class; 
 for though founded on the single cir- 
 cumstance of the animals belonging to 
 it Buckling their young, it is found that 
 this characteristic is a Bign of others, 
 
 — as, that they are warm-blooded, and 
 
 thai their hear) has four compartments. 
 Such Orders as Rannnculacen, Cruci- 
 feree, Rosacea?, are obviously Natural 
 for the plants included in each 
 have a number of resembling points.
 
 348 SECONDARY LOGIC. 
 
 the investigation. Much remains to be done by 
 other men and by other ages. 
 
 There has been an important discussion between 
 Dr. Wtewell and Mr. Mill as to whether we may 
 now expect more from the Method of Induction or 
 of Deduction. Mr. Mill maintains that in most de- 
 partments of science our hope of discovery lies more 
 in Deduction than in the Induction of Bacon. On 
 the other hand, Dr. Whewell holds that, whatever 
 may be the case with the social sciences, in the 
 physical sciences discoveries may be expected to be 
 made in time to come, as they have been in time 
 past, by a patient induction. Much confusion has 
 crept into this controversy from the circumstance 
 that these two eminent men have not come to an 
 agreement as to what is involved in the processes 
 about which they dispute. According to Mr. Mill, 
 the Deductive Method consists of three operations : 
 the first, one of direct induction ; the second of 
 ratiocination ; and the third of verification. (Logic, 
 in. xi.) Now of these three steps, the first, the di- 
 rect induction of particulars, and also the third, the 
 verification by facts, are essentially inductive ; they 
 consist in collecting facts, with the view of deter- 
 mining the law of the facts. What Mr. Mill calls 
 Deductive, I am inclined to designate the Joint In- 
 ductive and Deductive Method. In those depart- 
 ments of science which are yet in their infancy, we 
 must trust mainly to a careful collection of facts, 
 and allow the facts to suggest the law, at which we
 
 btiCONDABY LOGIC. 349 
 
 may not jet be able even to guess. But in ad- 
 vanced sciences in which laws have been established, 
 and are ready to form the general or major proposi- 
 tion, advances may be expected mainly from the 
 combination of Deduction with Induction. Dr. Whe- 
 well and Mr. Mill have both done much to unfold 
 the steps of this Joint Method. But much yet re- 
 mains to be done, by showing what is the separate 
 province of each, and how they may be combined 
 so as best to yield the wished-for results in the dif- 
 ferent departments of science.
 
 CHAPTER XVIII. 
 
 LOGICAL DISCUSSIONS : THE PROVINCE OF LOGIC. 
 
 IN this country Formal Logic is dealt with in four 
 different ways at this present time. 
 
 I. By some it is reckoned antiquated and ex- 
 ploded, and never referred to without a sneer. 
 Though these persons are not likely to attend to me, 
 or favor me with an answer, yet I beg to ask them 
 whether it would not be very desirable to have a Logic 
 to unfold the laws of thought, and direct thought in 
 its various walks — in which it is so apt to err ? If 
 they can be induced to reply candidly in the affirma- 
 tive, I would then invite them to look into what 
 earnest and able thinkers have done ; and I would 
 show them how the Aristotelian Logic has cast up 
 again and again, in spite of all efforts to suppress it ; 
 and that no other Logic has stood longer than a 
 single age : in particular, no one now sets any value 
 on the attempts that were made to construct a 
 logical science by the school of Locke and the 
 school of Condillac. 
 
 IL There are those who accept the Aristotelian 
 Logic without criticism or modification. Most of 
 
 (350)
 
 LOGICAL DISCUSSIONS. 351 
 
 these are inclined to accept it in the form in which 
 it is put by Wnately, who, by his new and fresh 
 illustrations and examples, threw such life into the 
 bones which had become dry. The mastering of 
 Whately's Elements is certainly a most profitable 
 gymnastic to all young men, and is fitted to exer- 
 cise a salutary influence upon their intellectual 
 habits, which is likely to continue with them all 
 their lives. But those who have a taste for the 
 study ought not to content themselves with such an 
 elementary exposition ; they should go on to make 
 themselves acquainted with the discussions in our 
 day in regard to logical forms ; and neither young 
 nor advanced students must be allowed to forget 
 that we have now a Logic of Induction quite as 
 important as the Logic of Deduction. 
 
 III. There is a British modification of the Logic 
 of Kant which has able supporters, the leader hav- 
 ing been Sir W. Hamilton, who has had able and 
 learned fellow-workers in Dr. Mausel and Archbishop 
 Thomson. The Logic of this school has many excel- 
 lences. It has allotted a distinct and intelligible 
 province to the science, which is described us that of 
 the Laws of Thought. It has so defined the depart- 
 ment as to make it embrace the Concept and the 
 Judgment, as well as Reasoning. Sir W. Ham- 
 ilton has revived the distinction between the Ex- 
 tension and Comprehension of the Concept, and has 
 evolved and applied it in. a more scientific manner 
 than was ever done before. Not satisfied with the
 
 352 LOGICAL DISCUSSIONS: 
 
 Dictum of Aristotle as the one and universal regulat- 
 ing principle of reasoning, the school is seeking to 
 enunciate a wider Canon, and important minor rules 
 derived from it. It has successfully shown that 
 reasoning may be put in the form of comprehension as 
 well as Extension. It has subjected all the forms of 
 reasoning, Categorical and Conditional, to a sifting 
 examination, which has introduced greater scientific 
 accuracy into the technicalities of Primary Logic. 
 With unsurpassed acuteness and erudition, Dr. Man 
 sel has introduced us to important Aristotelian and 
 scholastic distinctions. Archbishop Thomson has 
 given us an admirable chapter on Language as the 
 instrument of thought, has clearly expounded the 
 distinction between Substitutive and Attributive 
 Judgments (though he has not seen what is 
 the precise nature of the forms), and drawn 
 out a comprehensive scheme of Immediate Infer- 
 ences. 
 
 But on the other hand the Logic of the school is 
 tainted throughout with the false metaphysics of 
 Kant, and should not be accepted without important 
 explanations and modifications. It proceeds all 
 along on the principle that there are subjective 
 forms in the mind itself, which impose on objects as 
 we think about them, much that is not in the objects 
 themselves. From this general error there arise 
 several particular ones. 
 
 (1.) The school represent Logic as an a priori 
 science. Now this doctrine cannot be allowed without
 
 THE PROVINCE OF LOGIC: 353 
 
 an important explanation which changes the whole 
 theory. It is all true that the mind in logical 
 thought proceeds according to native principles. 
 But the principles, as general rules, are not before 
 consciousness. It is upon the bare inspection and 
 comprehension of the case before it that the mind 
 proceeds in the exercises of thought. It being un- 
 derstood that a crocodile is a reptile, and that all 
 reptiles bring forth their young by eggs, we at once 
 conclude that the crocodile must do so ; but without 
 having consciously before us the Dictum, that what- 
 ever is predicated of a class may be predicated of all 
 that is contained in the class. It needs objects to 
 call the native capacities of the mind into exercise. 
 Not only so, but the exercises are always individual. 
 It is by a process of generalization that we derive 
 the general law from the individual cases; and as 
 there may be oversights and inaccuracies in the 
 generalization, so there may be discussions and 
 disputes about the expression of the general law. 
 The laws of thought may be in the mind a priori, 
 but we cannot discover and unfold them ct priori. 
 In order to find the general principles of logical 
 thought, and to construct a science of Logic, there 
 must be a careful and extensive observation of 
 thought as directed to objects, and various classes of 
 objects. 
 
 (2.) Kant represents Logic as "making abstrac- 
 tion of all content of the cognition of the understand- 
 ing and of the difference of objects, and having to do 
 
 23
 
 354 LOGICAL DISCUSSIONS: 
 
 only with the form of thought." Sir W. Hamilton 
 makes a like statement: "Logic is conversant with 
 the form of thought to the exclusion of the matter." 
 (Logic, i. 15.) Now this account contains both a 
 truth and an error. It is quite true that Logic does 
 not look to the objects of thought, but to thought : 
 but it is equally true that thought must be employed 
 about objects. If Logic, then, considers thought, it 
 must consider thought as employed about objects, — 
 only it considers the thought and not the objects. 
 Taking this view, we see that we are warranted 
 (though, perhaps, Kant was not according to his 
 principles) in adopting the division of the science, 
 which we shall explain further on in this chapter, 
 into Universal and Particular Logic. 
 
 (3.) From the same mistaken view of thought, 
 the whole school represent the Notion or Concep- 
 tion as being formed by the mind, according to a 
 priori laws, not altogether independent of objects, 
 but imposing on objects what is not in them. Ham- 
 ilton speaks of " an act of thought as the recogni- 
 tion of a thing as coming under a concept;" and 
 again, " Thought is a knowledge of a thing through 
 a concept or general notion, or of one notion 
 through another." (lb. p. 43.) This language pro- 
 ceeds on the idea that there is a concept prior to the 
 thing, above the thing, and ready to be imposed 
 upon it, so as to shape and color it. But surely the 
 correct statement is not that thought is through a 
 concept, but that a concept is a thought formed
 
 THE PROVINCE OF LOGIC. 355 
 
 on the contemplation of things. The General No- 
 tion is fashioned by the mind on the apprehension 
 of objects, by putting together the objects, real or 
 potential, having common properties. 
 
 (4.) The whole Kantian school omits the Abstract 
 Notion in the construction of logical science. Sir 
 W. Hamilton, indeed, gives a brief but correct ac- 
 count of it in his Jfetajihysics (Lect. xxxv.), showing 
 that it implies comparison, and that " there is noth- 
 ing necessarily connected with generalization in ab- 
 straction." But in his Logic, the laws which he lays 
 down apply only to the Concept or General Notion. 
 This omission not only leads to a defective account 
 of Simple Apprehension in the first part of Formal 
 Logic, but makes him overlook a class of judgments 
 and a species of reasoning in which the terms are 
 abstract. 
 
 (5.) In consequence of neglecting to give the Ab- 
 stract Notion a separate place, Sir W. Hamilton and 
 Archbishop Thomson have been led to represent 
 every Notion as having Extension and Comprehen- 
 sion. Now, those are properties exclusively of the 
 General Notion. The Abstract Notion, say tranquil- 
 lity, cannot be said to have Extension, for it denotes 
 not objects, but an attribute. 
 
 (6.) In a previous chapter I have shown thai Sir \V. 
 Hamilton has not unfolded Cully nor accurately the 
 nature and the relations of the things compared in 
 Logical Judgment. He represents the comparison 
 as between two conceptions or concepts as mental
 
 356 LOGICAL DISCUSSIONS: 
 
 products, whereas it is between concepts as things 
 conceived. He vacillates in the account which he 
 gives of the relation discovered between the con- 
 cepts, speaking of it at times as being identity, at 
 other times as that of whole and parts, and in some 
 places as equality. 
 
 (7.) One of Sir W. Hamilton's supposed improve- 
 ments in Formal Logic, consists in his insisting that 
 the predicate should always be quantified ; that is, 
 declared to be either universal or particular. Thus 
 the proposition, "All men are mortal," he w r ould 
 write, " All men are some mortals." He defends this 
 on the general principle, that whatever is in thought 
 should be unfolded in the statement which professes 
 to express thought, I admit the principle, but I do 
 not admit that it requires the predicate to be quan- 
 tified. For I have endeavored to show that in by 
 far the greater number of propositions the upper- 
 most thought is in Comprehension, and we do not 
 think at all of the Extension. When we say " The 
 dog barks," we mean that the dog is engaged in the 
 act of barking, and we may not think of a class 
 of barking animals ; w r e certainly do not trouble 
 ourselves with inquiring wmether there are or are 
 not other animals that bark. Even in propositions 
 in which the Extension is in the thought, we do not 
 always settle whether the subject is or is not co- 
 extensive with the predicate. Thus, when we say 
 " Man is rational," we may not have determined 
 whether there are or are not other rational beings
 
 THE PROVINCE OF LOGIC. 357 
 
 besides man. It is sufficient to lead us to form the 
 judgment that man has the attribute rationality, or 
 that he is in the class rational, whether this class in- 
 clude other beings or not. I hold that in the vast 
 majority of propositions the predicate is not quanti- 
 fied in thought. I urge, further, in opposition to the 
 doctrine, that in those propositions in which the 
 terms are abstract, the predicate, properly speaking, 
 has no quantity or extension, for it is not a class- 
 notion. When we say that 3x3 = 9, neither sub- 
 ject nor predicate has an indefinite number of ob- 
 jects embraced in it. I admit that in reasoning, 
 when the predicate is known to be distributed, we 
 can convert the subject into the predicate, and the 
 predicate into the subject, without any change, and 
 draw a conclusion which we should not otherwise be 
 entitled to do. Thus when we have it demonstrated, 
 both that " all equilateral triangles are equiangular," 
 and that " all equiangular triangles are equilateral," 
 we can, upon a given triangle being found equilate- 
 ral, declare it to be equiangular. Such cases are 
 worthy of special .notice, and might have a separate 
 place allotted them in logical treatises, but, being so 
 limited, should not be allowed to change the whole 
 analytic of reasoning. 
 
 (8.) The new Canon of Reasoning adopted by the 
 school is very vague. It is ilius stated in the Out- 
 lines of the Laws of Thought: "The agreement 
 or disagreement of one conception with another is 
 ascertained by a third conception, inasmuch as Hi is
 
 358 LOGICAL DICUSSIONS : 
 
 wholly or by the same part, agrees with both, or with 
 only one of the conceptions to be compared." (§ 93.) 
 Now. the phrase "agree" is not explicit; it does not 
 specify what the concepts agree or do not agree in. 
 This defect may be remedied by distinguishing be- 
 tween those cases in which the terms are singular or 
 abstract, and those in which one at least is general. 
 In the former the regulating principle is "things 
 which are the same with, or equal to, one and the 
 same thing, are the same with, or equal to, one 
 another." In the latter, in which we have a general 
 conception, the main regulating principle is, I believe, 
 the Dictum, which the founder of Logic propounded. 
 While this is the main law of thought, I am con- 
 vinced that there may be others involved, such as 
 that of whole and parts, and of division in all dis- 
 junctive reasoning. A thorough analytic of logical 
 forms should unfold all these laws, and give each its 
 separate place. 
 
 (9.) Sir W. Hamilton places reasoning in Compre- 
 hension on the same level as reasoning in Exten- 
 sion, or rather he gives it a prior and higher posi- 
 tion. I have stated my reasons for thinking that rea- 
 soning is primarily in Extension. It may, indeed, 
 always be translated into the forms of Comprehen- 
 sion, and it is desirable that students should know 
 how to do this, and do it when any purpose is to be 
 served by it. But it is not necessary to burden the 
 mind with the numerous modes which appear when 
 we insist on always quantifying the predicate, and
 
 THE PROVINCE OF LOGIC. 359 
 
 join on the same footing reasoning in Comprehen- 
 sion and reasoning in Extension. 
 
 IV. There is a large class who accept implicitly 
 the Logic of Mr. Mill. 1 These consist chiefly of 
 persons who are disgusted with the scholastic Logic 
 as being so abstract and technical, and are not pre- 
 pared to give their adherence to the Kantian refor- 
 mation, as they feel that its forms keep us too far 
 removed from things. Now, I rejoice to proclaim 
 that there are remarks, as true and important as 
 they are fresh, scattered throughout Mr. Mill's 
 treatise. In Book First he has many useful observa- 
 tions on Naming, which make us regret the more 
 that they are indissolubly mixed up with sensational 
 metaphysics. His Book on Induction is by far the 
 most valuable part of his work, though it is much 
 injured by doubtful speculations as to the nature of 
 our belief in causation. 2 There are practical lessons 
 of much utility conveyed in his Book on Fallacies, 
 only it is to be regretted that in pointing out with 
 so much keenness and relish the errors of the old 
 philosophy, he leaves unnoticed the still more glaring 
 fallacies of the nescience and association schools. 
 
 1 I should here have referred to the eussion. Students would feci it to '"■ 
 
 very able attempt of Prof. De Morgan tv great advantage to have his 1 k on 
 
 and the late Prof. Boole to give as a Induction in a Beparate form, and 
 
 mathematical theory of reasoning, with the discussions on Intuitions left 
 
 But it would take us altogether out of out. This would leave them at 
 
 our present line of thought to discuss liberty to gel their Formal Logic 
 
 it thoroughly, and I think it better not elsewhere, aud to resort to his coju- 
 
 to enter upon it. plete work when they want to know 
 
 2 I regret to sec that in the later edU his theory of the mind and his other 
 tions Mr. Mill is crowding his work Opinions. 
 
 with still more of metaphysical dis-
 
 360 LOGICAL DISCUSSIONS: 
 
 His closing Book is very defective as a full Logic of 
 the mental and social sciences, more particularly in 
 not estimating what is involved in man's essential 
 freedom ; but is of value as the commencement of a 
 discussion which must grow in interest and impor- 
 tance. I propose to sum up the defects of the work 
 as gathered from the survey taken in the last four 
 chapters. 
 
 (1.) He denies that Logic is entitled to be 
 regarded as a separate science. " So far as it is a 
 science at all, it is a part or branch of Psychology ; 
 differing from it on the one hand as a part differs 
 from the whole, and on the other, as an Art differs 
 from a Science." (p. 388.) Now, there is no doubt 
 that Logic is closely connected with Psychology, is 
 in fact largely dependent on it for some of its 
 elementary truths. The same may be said of 
 Metaphysics, or the science of the laws of intuition ; 
 of ^Esthetics, or, as I prefer calling it, Kalology, the 
 science of the laws of the Feelings ; and Ethics, the 
 science of the laws of our motive and moral nature. 
 It is no doubt one part of the office of Psychology 
 to gather from an observation of the operations of 
 the mind the laws of discursive thought, as it is also to 
 find out the laws of our immediate perceptions, of 
 our emotional and moral nature. But having ascer- 
 tained that there are such laws, and shown how they 
 act in the mind, it does not seek in a special way to 
 formalize them, to inquire into their relation to 
 external things, or to apply them to scientific or
 
 THE PBOVINCE OF LOGIC. 361 
 
 practical ends. Psychology leaves all this very ap- 
 propriately to the other mental sciences, which are 
 no doubt her daughters, but have their separate 
 households, where they are married to their different 
 objects, each with its own alliances. In particular, 
 Logic strives to give a strictly scientific form and 
 expression to the mode of the mind's procedure in 
 apprehending, judging, and reasoning, and in gather- 
 ing laws and cause ; and from these it draws rules 
 for the guidance of thought in its various walks of 
 investigation. Logic has the proper characteristics 
 of a science ; it is systematized truth, systematized 
 natural truth. 
 
 (2.) He does not give its proper place to the ele- 
 ment of thought. No doubt he has done great ser- 
 vice to the study, by calling our attention to the 
 objects of thought, which the scholastic and Kantian 
 logicians had very much declined to look at. But 
 Logic has not to do with things as things. This it 
 leaves to other, and what have been called material, 
 or real, or what in such a connection might be called 
 objective, sciences. Logic has to do not with objects, 
 but with thought as employed about objects. If 
 this distinction is not kept constantly in view, the 
 logician is ever tempted to mix up physical or psy- 
 chological questions with those that properly belong 
 to Logic. 
 
 (3.) He makes Logic treat of Names, Propositions, 
 and Arguments, and not, as our more philosophical 
 logicians make it, with Simple Apprehension, .Indg-
 
 3G2 LOGICAL DISCUSSIONS.- 
 
 merit, and Reasoning. Every one allows that Appre 
 hensions may be expressed in Names, Judgment in 
 Propositions, and Reasoning in Arguments, and that 
 Logic should look to these incidentally as the ex- 
 pression of thought. But the science should deal 
 primarily and throughout with the laws of thought, 
 always as applied to things, leaving the laws of lan- 
 guage to a special department of science now being 
 formed. It is to be remembered, that as a term 
 may consist of one word, or twenty words, we 
 cannot by merely looking at words so much as 
 know what the term is ; and that we cannot make 
 an intelligent predication in a proposition without 
 knowing the meaning of the terms : all which shows 
 that Logic should expound thought rather than 
 names. Nor is it to be forgotten that the laws of 
 thought constitute the fixed element, while the 
 names or phrases differ not only in their sound, but 
 in what they express and embrace in different 
 languages. And then the forms of language are 
 often defective, and not unfrequently erroneous, and 
 need to be amended by the invariable and, I believe, 
 unerring laws of thought ; which we should endeavor 
 so to analyze and formalize as to aid the advancing 
 Science of Language, — which will again, as it makes 
 progress, greatly help the Science of Thought. 
 
 (4.) In looking at language instead of thought, 
 he has given a very imperfect account of the topics 
 usually expounded in the first part of Formal Logic, 
 that which deals with Simple Apprehension. Instead
 
 THE PROVINCE OF LOGIC. 363 
 
 of examining the various classes of apprehensions, 
 and carefully distinguishing them, he confines his 
 own attention and that of his readers to the name 
 and its connotation, without regard to the notion 
 which the name expresses, or bringing out accurately 
 what things, or aspects of things, the notion em- 
 braces in its different forms.. 
 
 Owing to his defective psychology, he has no ade- 
 quate idea of the capacity of the mind to discover 
 relations among things, and he has failed to give us 
 a full or accurate exposition of the relation of the 
 two apprehensions in logical Judgment. He makes 
 us look not at the act of comparison, which is surely 
 the primary and main element, but at the attribute 
 connoted, overlooking, in the General Notion, the 
 class of objects combined by the attribute, and the 
 mental concept combining them. 
 
 (5.) The error goes up into his analysis of reason- 
 ing, and makes him give a very partial exhibition of 
 the process, in which he sees only the attribute, and 
 overlooks the general conception and general prop- 
 osition, which are involved in the validity of the 
 inference. 
 
 (6.) Mr. Mill has given us the most valuable con- 
 tribution since the days of Bacon to one important 
 department of Logic, that which I reats of Induc- 
 tion. But still there are very grave mistakes in his 
 exposition of the topics that fall under Particular <>r 
 Secondary Logic. These spring from liis erroneous 
 theory of Demonstration, more particularly of the
 
 3G4 LOGICAL DISCUSSION'S: 
 
 nature, functions, and value of mathematical defini- 
 tions and axioms ; from his mixing false metaphysics 
 with his logical exposition of causation; from his 
 not seeing that the discovery of the Decomposition 
 of compounds and of Natural Classes are among the 
 cuds aimed at in science, and requiring Special 
 Canons : and finalty, from an imperfect view of the 
 nature of the phenomena of the mind, which it is 
 the office of Psychology to co-ordinate, and for the 
 aid of which Logic should furnish a method. 
 
 It now only remains to gather from this discussion 
 what is the Province of the science of Logic. It 
 has to do with thought: but what is meant by 
 thought in such an application ? It must evidently 
 be so explained as not to include the motive ex- 
 ercises of the mind, and to exclude intuition, in 
 which we perceive objects or truths at once, and 
 which has always been allotted to Metaphysics. By 
 thought, in the technical sense in which the word is 
 used in Logic, is meant Discursive Thought, in which 
 we proceed from something given or allowed to 
 something else derived from it. It implies a process, 
 which must have laws. In order to construct the 
 science of Logic, we must endeavor to gather the 
 laws of thought, by a careful observation of the 
 operations of thought. 
 
 Kant has a twofold division of the science, as 
 Logic of the universal or of the particular use of 
 the understanding. "The first contains the abso-
 
 THE PBOVINCE OF LOGIC. 365 
 
 lutely necessary laws of thought, without which no 
 use whatever of the understanding is possible, and 
 gives laws therefore to the understanding, without 
 regard to the difference of objects on which it may 
 be employed. The Logic of the particular use of 
 the understanding contains the laws of correct think- 
 ing upon a particular class of objects." [Kritih of 
 Pare Reason, Meiklejohn's trans., p. 46.) This lan- 
 guage is not unexceptionable, more particularly as 
 pointing to laws independent of the observation of 
 objects ; and it is doubtful whether Kant, in consist- 
 ency with his account of the science, which makes 
 abstraction of all content of the cognition, that is, 
 of all relation of cognition to its object" (lb. p. 49), 
 could adopt such a division. But if we take the 
 proper view of thought, as always engaged with ob- 
 jects, then we can accept and justify the arrange- 
 ment. We have, first, a Universal, or, as I prefer 
 calling it, a Primary Logic (identical with what is 
 commonly designated Formal Logic), conversant 
 with the laws of thought, not independent of objects, 
 but vjhatever be the objects. We have, second ly, 
 a Particular, or, as I would call it, Secondary Logic, 
 considering the operations of thought as directed to 
 particular classes of objects, say to intuitive percep- 
 tions, as in demonstration; and the collection of 
 scattered facts, external or internal, as in hid net ion. 
 Under the first head Logic treats of Simple Appre- 
 hension, Judgment, and Reasoning, which, no doubt, 
 all look to objects, but are the same for all objects.
 
 86(i LOGICAL DISCUSSIONS: 
 
 It lias to consider, first, our apprehensions. Some of 
 these are of objects singular and concrete, what we 
 may call Percepts, as being immediately perceived 
 by the mind. Some of them, again, are of Abstracts, 
 or parts considered as parts of a whole, more par- 
 ticularly of attributes of objects. Others are of Con- 
 cepts, or of things having common attributes, and 
 joined in a class which embraces all the objects pos- 
 sessing the attributes. All Concepts have both Ex- 
 tension and Comprehension. Logic does not deal 
 immediately with the formation of Percepts, which 
 are intuitive ; but it evolves the laws involved in the 
 construction of Abstracts and Concepts. In Judg- 
 ment we compare two of these Percepts, Abstracts, 
 or Concepts. This process also has laws, such as, 
 when the things compared are Abstracts the relation 
 is one of identity or of equivalence ; and, when 
 there is a general notion, the relation is both of Com- 
 prehension and Extension. There are also laws in- 
 volved in Eeasoning, in which we compare two of 
 our apprehensions by means of a third. These are 
 derived very much from the nature of the apprehen- 
 sions compared. Thus, in cases in which we com- 
 pare Abstracts, the regulating principle is that of 
 identity or equality, " things which are the same 
 with a third, or equal to a third, are the same with, 
 or equal to one another." But when there is a class- 
 notion involved — and there is so wherever there 
 is attribution, — then we must proceed according 
 to the class-notion, and the regulating principle is,
 
 THE PROVINCE OF LOGIC. 367 
 
 "whatever is predicated of a class may be predi- 
 cated of all that is contained in that class." While 
 these are the main ruling principles involved in all 
 cases of reasoning, there may also be other princi- 
 ples implied in all cases, or in special cases. Thus 
 the principle of whole and parts is involved when 
 we include an individual in a class, or a species in a 
 genus. The Comprehension of the Notion is to be 
 taken along with us, when we translate reasoning in 
 Extension, so as to make Comprehension the upper- 
 most thought. A principle of Division, that the co- 
 ordinate sub-classes must make up the class, is in- 
 volved in all Disjunctive Reasoning : thus when we 
 argue that this man, being either a knave or a fool, 
 and not being a fool, must be a knave, it is implied 
 that knave and fool make up the class to which this 
 man must belong. 
 
 Taking this view of Logic, we do not separate it 
 so entirely from realities as the scholastic logicians 
 did, and as the Kantian logicians still do. It has 
 not, indeed, to do with things directly. Many of 
 Mr. Mill's discussions would lead us to think that it 
 has, and we are thus involved in questions which 
 can be settled only by the sciences — material or men- 
 tal — which deal with objects. Logic has to do not 
 with objects, but with thought as directed to objects. 
 This account makes it quite competent for Logic to 
 consider not only Apprehension, Judgment, and 
 Reasoning, which are the same for all objects but 
 also Thought as directed to particular classes of ob-
 
 308 LOGICAL DISCUSSIONS: 
 
 jects. The great body of thinkers in modern times 
 have felt that Logic ought to embrace other topics 
 besides those treated of in Formal Logic; in par- 
 ticular that it ought not to exclude the Method of 
 investigation propounded by Bacon. The exposition 
 I have given makes it include not only Induction 
 but other modes of discovering truth. 
 
 It may consider thought as proceeding in the way 
 of Demonstration. Here all that is assumed in start- 
 ing, and all that is assumed throughout, must be seen 
 to be true intuitively. The Method of Investigation 
 is what I call the Joint Dogmatic and Deductive. 
 It is Dogmatic, in that it assumes ; but then it should 
 assume only what is seen to be true on the bare con- 
 templation of the nature of objects. It is Deductive, 
 in that it derives other truths from these assump- 
 tions by a process of reasoning. But this Method is 
 applicable only within a very limited range, only so 
 far as we have an immediate intuition of the nature 
 of things. In most walks of investigation Demon- 
 stration is not available. What we have before us 
 are individual and scattered facts, falling under the 
 senses or the consciousness. It is out of these that 
 we must gather the law. So far as we observe and 
 co-ordinate the facts with the view of rising to their 
 law, whether this be a class or a cause, or the consti- 
 tution of compound objects, the Method pursued is 
 the Inductive. In this process we gather the facts 
 and tabulate them, and, without " anticipating " na- 
 ture, we allow the facts to suggest the law, which is
 
 THE PROVINCE OF LOGIC. 369 
 
 accepted only when it embraces and explains all the 
 facts. But as science advances, by this method we 
 reach laws which may be regarded as at least pro- 
 visionally established, and we inquire — in certain 
 departments with the powerful aid of Mathematics 
 — what consequences would follow from these laws ? 
 Another, and a very powerful Method, now becomes 
 applicable. I call it the Joint Inductive and De- 
 ductive, in which we inquire what results must fol- 
 low from certain supposed laws, and then compare 
 these with facts got by observation or experiment. 
 In all our advanced sciences this must now be the 
 principal mode of investigation. 
 
 I am inclined to think that Whately is right when 
 he represents Logic as both a Science and an Art. 
 It is a science, inasmuch as it is a systematized body 
 of natural truth. It is reared by the observation 
 and co-ordination of the spontaneous operations of 
 discursive thought. But it may also become an art, 
 or a body of precepts drawn out to enable us to 
 accomplish a particular end, that is, to think cor- 
 rectly, and expose confused thought or invalid rea- 
 soning. It should aim at nothing less than the 
 discovery of the laws of thought operating in the 
 mind as it contemplates objects. When we have 
 accurately apprehended and expressed them, we 
 may then apply them to test and correct actual 
 thought. For this purpose we may derive from 
 them rules, and put these in various formula', which 
 admit of a ready and useful application to our every- 
 
 24
 
 370 LOGICAL DISCUSSIONS: 
 
 day thinking, and to scientific investigation. In par- 
 ticular, Logic is of great use in clearing our notions; 
 it shows what notions are singular and what universal ; 
 what concrete and what abstract ; and guards us 
 against using a general term as if it were a singular 
 concrete. It cannot tell us what judgments are true 
 and what false (this must be done by the depart- 
 ments of knowledge which deal with objects), but it 
 tells us what is the precise relation between the Per- 
 cepts, Abstracts, and Concepts compared, and thus 
 places our notions in such a light that we are better 
 able to say whether a given proposition is true or 
 false. Again, the syllogistic analysis lets us see that 
 in reasoning we have to look to the relation of three 
 notions, Percepts, Abstracts, or Concepts; and that 
 when one of the notions is a Concept, we always 
 n£ed by implication a general proposition ; and the 
 formula? derived from this analysis unfold the various 
 possible forms of reasoning, and enable us to test 
 our own inferences and those of others. In the 
 Secondary (but not less important) Logic, there 
 can be tests laid down, such as those of self-evi- 
 dence, necessity, and catholicity, sufficient to decide 
 readily and certainly what truths are intuitive, and so 
 entitled to become assumptions in Demonstration ; 
 while the processes of deduction from intuitive truth 
 may all be tested by the syllogism. The Canons of 
 Causes enunciated by Mr. Mill settle for us, when we 
 are entitled to argue that we have discovered the 
 cause of a given phenomenon ; and I hope that in
 
 THE PBOVINCE OF LOGIC. 371 
 
 due time we shall have Canons of Decomposition 
 and Canons of Classes, to determine when Ave have 
 reached the elementary constitution of bodies (pro- 
 visionally), and when we have discovered natural 
 classes. We have already some Canons of Historical 
 Investigation to aid us in finding whether the evi- 
 dence is sufficient to establish the alleged facts, and 
 these Canons should be adopted into Logic, and 
 made as succinct and comprehensive as possible. 
 Logic has thus a wide and most important field as 
 an art ; it furnishes guiding rules and tests in every 
 path of inquiry. It is thus fulfilling some of the 
 old pretensions made in its behalf. I do not like the 
 phrase, " Art of Thinking," for men think spontane- 
 ously, without any science or art ; but Logic supplies 
 rules to guard against confused and erroneous think- 
 ing. It is in a special sense the " Science of Method ; * 
 that is, of the Method to be pursued in discovering 
 scientific and historical truth. It is the " Science of 
 Sciences," not because superior to other departments 
 of knowledge, but because it supplies rules to guide 
 and guard in every other science.
 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 WHAT IS TRUTH? CRITERIA OF TRUTH. 
 
 IT is very evident that Mr. Mill has a pleasure in 
 seeing himself and his opinions reflected in the 
 convictions and writings of young men. On the 
 other side, the youth who give themselves up to his 
 guidance seem as if they could look only straight 
 before them in the path in which he leads them, and 
 as if they were incapable of taking a comprehensive 
 view of things lying on either side. As, however, 
 they will be obliged to do so sooner or later, it might 
 be as well if they now stopped for a little, in order 
 to look round them and inquire whither he is lead- 
 ing, and where he is to leave them ? What have we 
 left us according to this new philosophy ? We have 
 sensations; we have a series of feelings aware 'of it- 
 self, and permanent, or rather prolonged; and we 
 have an association of sensations, and perceived re- 
 semblances, and possibilities of sensations. The 
 sensations and associations of sensation generate 
 ideas and beliefs, which do not, however, either in 
 themselves or their mode of formation, guarantee 
 any reality. We have an idea of an external mate- 
 
 (372)
 
 CBITEBIA OF TBUTH. 373 
 
 rial world ; but Mr. Mill does not affirm that there is 
 such a world, for there are laws of the series of feel- 
 ings which would produce the idea, whether the 
 thing existed or not; and our belief in it may be 
 overcome, — just as our natural belief in the sun 
 rising is made to give way before the scientific con- 
 viction that it is the earth that moves. He thinks 
 he is able by a process of inference to reach the 
 existence of other beings besides ourselves. But 
 the logic of the process is very doubtful. I believe 
 that neither Mr. Mill nor any other has been able to 
 show how from sensations, individual or associated, 
 we could ever legitimately infer the existence of any- 
 thing beyond. What he claims to have found is, 
 after all, only other " series of feelings." 
 
 But have we not, it is said, a body of scientific 
 truth, for which Mr. Mill has done as much as any 
 living man, by showing how it may be best arranged? 
 I acknowledge that in the view of those who believe 
 in the reality of things, and who further believe in 
 a God who made and arranged, and still upholds 
 them, this systematized truth is a glorious body, — 
 like the sun itself, with a central solidity which 
 keeps it firm, while it holds other bodies circling 
 round it, and with a gloriously illuminated atmos- 
 phere, scattering light and heat all around. But 
 what is all this when interpreted in philosophic ac- 
 curacy? It is simply possibilities of sensations, com- 
 ing in groups, and in regular succession, and with re- 
 semblances which can be noticed. And is this the
 
 374 WHAT IS TEUTH? 
 
 sum of what has been gained by the highest science 
 of the nineteenth century ? As we contemplate it, 
 do we not feel as if the solid heart of truth and the 
 radiating light were both gone, and as if we had 
 left only a series of systematic vibrations in an un- 
 known ether? Does this satisfy the convictions and 
 the longings of man ? Does not the intelligence de- 
 clare that it has something deeper than this ? Does 
 not the heart crave for something higher than this ? 
 And when the youths, who are led on so pleasantly 
 by the clear enunciations of Mr. Mill, stop at any 
 time to inquire what he has given them, must they 
 not feel that they are, after all, in darkness, with 
 only a camera obscura displaying figures before 
 them, always according to sternly scientific laws? 
 If they are satisfied with this, are they not in the 
 act abnegating the deeper capacities, and refusing 
 to follow the higher aspirations of their souls, which, 
 for want of proper exercise, will become dry, and 
 shrunk, and withered ? And if they are not satis- 
 fied, — as our higher minds will certainly not be, — 
 how piteous must be the wail of disappointment and 
 anguish coming from the depths of their bosoms, as 
 they crave for truth on the one hand, and feel that 
 they can never catch it on the other ? I do fear for 
 the consequences, when our promising youths awake, 
 and in despair of attaining truth, are tempted to 
 plunge into deeper and yet deeper darkness. For- 
 tunately such a state of things — the deeper instincts 
 of human nature being so strong — cannot continue
 
 CRITERIA OF TRUTH. 375 
 
 for any length of time; and however lamentable 
 may be the experience and history of individuals, 
 the hour of thickest darkness will be found to excite 
 the cry for the returning light. 
 
 " By nature," says Aristotle, " man is competently 
 organized for truth ; and truth in general is not 
 beyond his reach." Truth is usually defined as 
 the agreement of our ideas, or apprehensions, with 
 things. Profound thinkers have assumed, or labored 
 to prove, that, on the one hand, man has ideas ; that, 
 on the other hand, there are things ; and that man 
 can reach ideas which correspond with things. Let 
 us inquire what view must be taken of truth by 
 those who follow out Mr. Mill's system to its conse- 
 quences ? 
 
 Mr. Mill acknowledges that we have ideas. But 
 he takes great pains to show that these originate in 
 sensations, and grow out of sensations, according to 
 the laws of the association of sensations. I am not 
 sure whether he acknowledges the existence of ma- 
 terial things out of, and independent of, sensations. 
 He often uses language which seems to imply that 
 he does; but his system all tends the other way; 
 This is certain, that even if body exists we can never 
 know anything of it, except as "the possibility of 
 sensations." All that we know of objects is the sen- 
 sations which they give us, and the order of the oc- 
 currence of those sensations. "There is not the 
 slightest reason for believing that what we call the 
 sensible qualities of the object are a type of any-
 
 37G WHAT IS TRUTH? 
 
 tiling inherent in itself, or bear any affinity to its 
 own nature. A cause does not, as such, resemble its 
 effects ; an east wind is not like the feeling of cold, 
 nor is heat like the steam of boiling water: why then 
 should matter resemble our sensations ? " (Logic, I. 
 m. 7.) Then as to the internal world : all that we 
 know of it is a series of feelings, w T ith a prolongation 
 in time, which again is identical w T ith a series of 
 muscular sensations. (Supra, p. 145.) I suppose he 
 would further say, — though I do not remember any 
 passage in which he does say it, — that we do not 
 know what is the nature of these sensations. As 
 things are thus unknown, and must be unknown with 
 our present faculties, and in the condition in which we 
 are placed, so man seems to be precluded from reach- 
 ing any truth beyond the consciousness of present 
 sensations, and the possibility of other sensations. 
 But some have defined truth as the accordance, 
 not of our own ideas with things, but of our 
 ideas with one another. This is a view which 
 I do not think worth the pains of defending. It 
 is quite compatible with the existence of a uni- 
 versal system of delusion and deception, provided 
 always that this system were consistent with itself. 
 Give a mathematician such a false assumption as 
 that matter attracts other matter inversely ac- 
 cording to the distance (and not the square of 
 the distance), and he might construct from it an 
 imaginary world, every part of which would be in 
 agreement with every other, but no part in accord
 
 CBITEBIA OF TRUTH. 377 
 
 ance with the reality of things. It is imaginable 
 that the truth which man discovers is all of this 
 description: a consistency between an unfounded 
 hypothesis, and the results following from it accord- 
 ing to the laws of our idea. Some ideal philoso- 
 phers would be content with such a view of truth. 
 But then they think that this consistency is given 
 by the laws of reason, and that man can actually 
 reach truth, not it may be in congruity with phe- 
 nomenal things, but, with the principles of reason — 
 some of them would say absolute and eternal reason. 
 But truth thus understood is, according to our 
 author's system, quite as much beyond the reach of 
 man as truth in the other sense. For any accord- 
 ance that there may be between our ideas might be 
 produced, not by independent reason, or consequen- 
 tial reasoning, but by the association of ideas, by the 
 laws of contiguity or resemblance. When two phe- 
 nomena have been very often experienced in con- 
 junction, and have not, in any single instance, oc- 
 curred separately, either in experience or in thought : 
 "When the bond between the two ideas has thus 
 been firmly riveted, not only does the idea, called up 
 by association, become, in our consciousness, insep- 
 arable from the idea which suggested it, but the facts 
 or phenomena answering to these ideas come at last 
 to seem inseparable in existence : things which we 
 are unable to conceive apart appear incapable of ex- 
 isting apart." (p. 191.) Thus 2 and 2 having been 
 associated in our experience with 4, wc give them a
 
 378 WHAT IS TBUTH? 
 
 relation in the nature of things; but if 2 and 2 had 
 been followed by the appearance of 5, we should 
 have had a like assurance of 2 -f- 2 and 5 being 
 equal. Truth in Mr. Mill's philosophy is not even 
 a logical or rational consistency between ideas ; it 
 can be nothing more than an accordance of our 
 ideas with sensations, and laws of the association of 
 sensation ; which sensations come we know not 
 whence, and are associated by resemblances, exist- 
 ing we know not how, or, more frequently, by con- 
 tiguity, implying no relation of reason, no con- 
 nection in the nature of things, and very possibly 
 altogether fortuitous, or absolutely fatalistic. 
 
 We see now the issues in which the doctrine of 
 the relativity of knowledge, as held by Mr. Mill, 
 lands us. The geometrical demonstrations of Euclid 
 and Apollonius and Newton may hold good only 
 within our experience, and "a reasonable distance 
 beyond." The mathematics taught in Cambridge 
 may differ in their fundamental principles from those 
 taught in the corresponding university of the planet 
 Jupiter ; where two and two may make five, where 
 two straight lines may enclose a space, and where 
 the three angles of a triangle may be more than 
 two right angles. Mr. Mill is exceedingly indignant 
 at Dr. Mansel for maintaining that the Divine 
 morality is not to be measured by human morality, 
 declaring that " it is simply the most morally perni- 
 cious doctrine now current." (p. 90.) But I can dis- 
 cover no ground on w T hich the rebuker can stand, in
 
 CBITEBIA OF TRUTH. 379 
 
 pronouncing such a judgment on Dr. Mansel's appli- 
 cation of the doctrine of the relativity of knowledge. 
 Any one with half the acuteness of Dr. Mansel could 
 show that if two and two may make five, it is also 
 supposable that lying may be a virtue, and veracity 
 a vice, in other worlds; and that God (if there be 
 a God) may commend deceit in the constellation of 
 the Plough, even as He encourages truthfulness in 
 our world ; and this doctrine, I rather think, is quite 
 as " morally pernicious " as any now current, and 
 certainly much more so than that entertained by Dr. 
 Mansel, who holds resolutely (whether consistently 
 or not) by an absolute morality, which does not 
 change with times or circumstances. 1 
 
 Some represent Mr. Mill as falling back upon the 
 position of Berkeley. And I suppose we may reckon 
 Mr. Mill as favoring all the negative statements of 
 Berkeley ; but he has discarded all those grand 
 views and elevating sentiments which render his 
 system so attractive to certain minds. No consistent 
 thinker can stay at the place taken up by the Irish 
 metaphysician ; he had to give way before the 
 Scotch one, — who used the arguments against the 
 independent existence of matter, to undermine our 
 
 1 " We can point to a doctrine forth there as right. " (London Quarterly 
 
 which cannot be less morally perni- Review, Jan. 1866.) A very able con- 
 
 cious than Mr. Mansel's, than which trilnilor to thai periodical has nnlici- 
 
 nonc indeed can be more morally pur- pated Mr. Mill in many of his objec- 
 
 nicious." "If in .-omc other world tiona to Hamilton's philosophy, bal 
 
 two and two may make live ; in some rejects Mr. Mill's philosophy as a sub" 
 
 other world what wc regard as virtue stimu-. 
 may be vice, and our wrong may come
 
 880 WHAT IS TRUTH ? 
 
 belief in the independent existence of mind. 1 Our 
 author's system, both in its premises and conclusion, 
 has many striking analogies to that of Hume. Does 
 the one begin with sensations, these are very much the 
 same as the impressions of the other. The later meta- 
 physician is only following the elder, in laboring to 
 show we get our ideas out of sensations and impres- 
 sions, by means of association. They concur in not 
 knowing very well what to make of time and space ; 
 but neither allows them any separate reality. Both 
 hold that there is no such thing as substance ; that 
 all we can know of mind is, that it is a bundle of 
 states or a series of feelings, to which we give some 
 sort of unity or permanence, not justifiable by reason 
 or any higher principle ; and that body is an un- 
 known something, from which we suppose we get 
 our sensations. Both deny that we have any intui- 
 tive conviction as to cause and effect; and both 
 make the relation between these to consist in invari 
 
 1 Some are looking with extreme ception of things and necessary truth ? 
 anxiety to the course which the pupils Or, abandoning the position taken by 
 of Hamilton may adopt at this crisis Hamilton, and defended by him in 
 in the history of philosophic thought, many a brave fight, are they to be- 
 lt is clear, from their published writ- take themselves to the lines occupied 
 jngs, that Dr. Cairns and Dr. Calder- by Kant or by Berkeley, and which 
 wood will be prepared to defend have been found so utterly untenable t 
 natural realism, and the veracity of If they take the latter course, it will be 
 our native convictions. But what line seen by every shrewd observer that 
 is to be taken by those who occupy they cannot stand one hour before the 
 chairs of philosophy, and have students keen play of Mr. Mill's musketry, or 
 under them ? I am convinced that Mr. Spencer's heavy artillery. Those 
 they cannot now stand where their illus- of their pupils who may try to stand 
 trious master endeavored to stand, — on the sliding-scale, will only thereby 
 halfway between Reid and Kant — be made to fall more rapidly to the 
 between realities and forms. Are base — where the school of Mill will 
 they to fall back on an intuitive per- welcome them.
 
 CBITEBIA OF TBUTH. 381 
 
 able or unconditional conjunction, within the limits 
 of experience. Both admit some sort of original 
 power : Hume stands up for innate instincts ; and 
 Mr. Mill for an ultimate belief in memory ; and it 
 should be added that neither knows very well what 
 to make of these inborn principles. Both derive 
 our motives originally from sensations of pleasure 
 and pain ; and both, it is well known, were clear 
 and eloquent expounders of the utilitarian theory of 
 morals. Nor is it unworthy of being mentioned, 
 that both point not unobscurely to changes, which 
 they think ought to be made, in the marriage rela- 
 tion. It should be admitted that with these promi- 
 nent points of correspondence there are also points 
 of difference. Hume's account of the relations which 
 the mind of man can discover is much more com- 
 prehensive than that of Mill. On the other hand, it 
 is pleasant to find that the writer of this century 
 assumes a higher moral tone than the writer of 
 the last; both, however, concurring in overlooking 
 or despising the special Christian graces. But the 
 main difference lies in this, that Hume discovers 
 flagrant contradictions in human intelligences; 
 whereas the other maintains that the most certain 
 principles reached by us, being all the product of 
 circumstances, might have to give way before new 
 circumstances or in other conditions. Hume had to 
 say, that "the intense view of these manifold contra- 
 dictions and imperfections in human reason lias SC 
 wrought upon me and heated my brain, that 1 am
 
 882 WHAT IS TliUTH? 
 
 ready to reject all belief and reasoning, and can 
 look upon no opinion even as more probable or likely 
 than another." The modern author is saved from all 
 such contradictions; for if one set of experiences 
 si lowed him that hvo and two make four, and another 
 that two and two make five, he would proclaim both 
 true in the different conditions. The consequence 
 is, that the one is an avowed sceptic or professed 
 pyrrhonist, — at least in many parts of his writings, — 
 delighting to play off one dogmatist against another ; 
 whereas the other is a supporter of the doctrines of 
 nescience and relativity, holding that we can never 
 reach truths which may not be modified or set aside 
 in other times and circumstances. I am not sure 
 which of the issues is the more blank : I rejoice that 
 I do not feel myself required to make a choice be- 
 tween them. 
 
 I hold that human intelligence begins with truth, 
 and if it proceeds properly it ends with truth ; which 
 may at times be mysterious, but never contradictory ; 
 which may be indefinitely enlarged, but cannot be 
 upturned or reversed. In the course of these dis- 
 cussions we have gathered the means of trying the 
 supposed verities proffered for our acceptance. There 
 is to us no one absolute criterion of all truth ; but 
 there are tests of the various kinds of truth, both 
 of those with which we start, and of those which we 
 reach in our progress. Of Intuition itself we have 
 tests in self-evidence, necessity, and universality. 
 Of Reasoning we have stringent tests in the forms
 
 CBITERIA OF TRUTH. 383 
 
 of the syllogism. By these two combined we can 
 try Demonstration, which consists in a union of in- 
 tuition and deduction. We have tests, too, of truths 
 reached in physical, in psychological, and in histor- 
 ical investigation, by the Collection of Facts. These 
 are to be found in the Canons of Induction and in 
 the Canons of Verification ; which we may confi- 
 dently expect to be more and more perfected in 
 their formalization and expression as the separate 
 departments of knowledge make progress. 
 
 It is admitted that these criteria demand that we 
 leave unanswered many questions which the ques- 
 tioning mind of man can put. Whatever alleged 
 truth cannot stand such tests should be regarded as 
 unsettled, and allowed to lie for the present in the 
 land of darkness. As we use the criteria we shall be 
 led to see that there are very stringent limits set to 
 man's power of acquiring knowledge. But we shall 
 see at the same time how wide is the field of inquiry, 
 and even of certainty, thrown open to us. Geology 
 can carry us back in the history of our earth to 
 periods removed from us by millions of years. As- 
 tronomy, aided by mathematics, lets us know of the 
 existence of bodies millions of miles away ; and, 
 aided by chemistry, gives us an insight into the com- 
 position of the atmosphere of a body so far removed 
 from us as the sun. Nor is it to be forgotten tli.it, 
 by the observation of the evidences of design in 
 nature, combined with the principle of cause and 
 effect, and our moral convictions, we can rise to a
 
 38-1 WHAT IS TEUTH? 
 
 most reasonable belief in the existence of an Al- 
 mighty and All-Perfect God. Man should ever claim 
 this wide field as an inheritance, and allow no one, 
 on any pretence, to deprive him of it. And having 
 such an inheritance he should be glad and grateful, 
 — the more so as, attending always to the tests ap- 
 pointed to guide and guard, he can indefinitely widen 
 and extend his possessions.
 
 CIIAPTEB, XX. 
 
 UTILITARIANISM. 
 
 IN specifying the influences under which Mr. Mill's 
 opinions were formed, I might have referred to 
 Jeremy Bentham and his utilitarian theory, as hav- 
 ing not a little swayed the opinions of the young 
 thinker, either directly, or indirectly through his 
 father, who was a friend of Bentham's. But in this 
 treatise I meant to look more to Mr. Mill's general 
 philosophic system than his specially ethical views ; 
 and however eminent as a jurist, Bentham had no 
 name as a metaphysician. Our author's philosophy 
 is essentially a combination of that of Mr. James 
 Mill and of M. Comte, — however, the utilitarianism 
 of the older Mill and of Bentham thoroughly fits 
 into the system. It would require a volume instead 
 of a chapter to discuss historically, psychologically, 
 and ethically the utilitarian theory. We can touch 
 here only on a few points intimately connected with 
 f he preceding discussions. 
 
 I. Can Mr. Mill's psychological theory account for 
 the peculiar idea and conviction which we have in 
 regard to moral good and evil ? He admits that the 
 25 (386)
 
 386 TJTILITABIANISM. 
 
 mature man in the advanced stages of society has a 
 I conscience and moral ideas : let us inquire how he 
 generates them. And first, let us try to ascertain 
 what he makes the original motive powers or springs 
 of action in the mind of man. " The utilitarian doc- 
 trine is, that happiness is desirable, and the only 
 ff^rng rlr ^nrnhlPj f<s an end." (p . 51.) It is clear that 
 he makes, as every other philosopher does, the desire 
 nf pprso nal pleasu re a pirjinaryinotive to action. 
 ' But I am not sure whether he makes the" desire" of 
 promoting the happiness of other beings also an 
 originating appetence in man. There are passages 
 which look as if he did, or at least wished to be re- 
 garded as doing so. In rearing his theory he is 
 ever appealing to u the social feelings of mankind ; " 
 and he maintains with Bentham, that man is urged 
 to the " greatest happiness " principle both " by in- 
 terest and sympathy." (pp. 45, 47.) " The idea of 
 the pain of another is naturally painful ; the idea of 
 the pleasure of another is naturally pleasure." (Dls. 
 p. 137.) I am sure that the great British moralists, 
 who lived at the beginning of last century, have 
 succeeded in demonstrating that man is not in his 
 nature and constitution an utterly selfish being, but 
 is capable of being swayed by a desire to promote 
 the welfare of others; and the arguments of Shaftes- 
 bury, Hutcheson, and Butler have been repeated 
 and strengthened by the Scottish school of philoso- 
 phers generally, including Reid, Stewart, and Brown, 
 and by M. Cousin, and the Eclectic school of France.
 
 UTILITARIANISM. 387 
 
 But these writers have shown that the same facts 
 and arguments which lead us to admit an original 
 principle of sympathy, require us also to call in a 
 cognitive and a motive moral power. 
 
 He allows as a psychological fact that virtue may 
 become "a good in itself, without looking to any 
 end beyond it," and that the mind is not hi a right 
 state unless it love virtue "as a thing desirable in 
 itself." (p. 53.) In indignantly repelling the ob- 
 jections of Dr. Sedgwick, he maintains, " It is a fact 
 in human nature that we have moral judgments and 
 moral feelings. We judge certain actions and dis- 
 positions to be right, others wrong : this we call ap- 
 proving and disapproving them. We have also feel- 
 ings of pleasure in the contemplation of the former 
 class of actions and dispositions, — feelings of dis- 
 like and aversion to the latter ; which feelings, as 
 everybody must be conscious, do not exactly resem- 
 ble any other of our feelings of pain or pleasure. 
 Such are the phenomena; concerning their reality 
 there is no dispute." He then seeks to account for 
 the phenomena by his famous principle of the chem- 
 istry of the association of ideas. " The only color 
 for representing our moral judgments as the result 
 of a peculiar part of our nature, is that our feelings 
 of moral approbation and disapprobation are really 
 peculiar feelings. But is it not notorious that pe- 
 culiar feelings, unlike any others we have experi- 
 ence of, are created by association every day?" (Dis. 
 pp. 139, 140.) He instances the desire of power, the
 
 388 UTILITARIANISM. 
 
 feelings of ambition, of envy, of jealousy, and of the 
 miser towards his gold. Now, as to some of these 
 appetencies, I believe them to be natural. We see 
 them working strongly in certain individuals, show- 
 ing that they are elements of their inborn character. 
 "We see them descending hereditarily from father or 
 mother, to son or daughter or grandchild ; and we 
 find them stronger in certain families and races than 
 in others. As the love of power is a native appe- 
 tence by which men may be swayed, surely the con- 
 science and the felt obligation to do that which is 
 right may be the same. 
 
 But our present question is one not so much of 
 mere appetency or desires as of moral perceptions, 
 judgments, and sentiments. I grant that persons 
 may be led by mere prudence to attend to the du- 
 ties of an outward morality, and by a kindly dispo- 
 sition to relieve distress, altogether irrespective of a 
 moral sense. But there is a very special obligation 
 felt in regard to those actions which we call moral, 
 and which does not bear on other parts of our con- 
 duct ; we are convinced that we ought to attend to 
 them, and that if we neglect to do so our conduct is 
 blameworthy. Whence the very peculiar and pro- 
 found ideas denoted by the phrases "obligation," 
 " ought," " blameworthy." '^^e_th^_perception of 
 cons cience, tha tj^c^ii^is-a^sin. __Take the _CQuv:i ction, 
 that wej tre not at liberty to tel l a lie w hen we might 
 be tempted to do so. Take the judgment, that the 
 person who has com mitted the, act __is__ guilty, con-
 
 UTILITABIANISM. 389 
 
 demnable, punishable. Take the feeling of remorse, 
 which rises when we contemplate ourselves as having 
 told a falsehood. We have here a series of mental 
 phenomena quite as real and quite as worthy of 
 being looked at, as our very sensations, or beliefs 
 of the reality of the past in memory, or our expecta- 
 tion of the future. I am convinced that as these last 
 are admitted to be ultimate (see o, o, t), so are the 
 others also. "This instinct," says Isaac Taylor, 
 "flushes in the cheek of every sensitive child, and 
 it prevails over the laborious sophistications of the 
 philosopher. This belief is cherished as an inestima- 
 ble jewel by the best and purest of human beings ; 
 and it is bowed to in dismay by the foulest and the 
 worst ; its rudiments are a monition of eternal truth, 
 whispered in the ear of infancy ; its articulate an- 
 nouncements are a dread fore-doom ringing in the 
 ears of the guilty adult. You say you can bring 
 forward a hundred educated men, who, at this time, 
 will profess themselves to be no believers in a moral 
 system ; but I will rebut their testimony by the 
 spontaneous and accordant voices of as many mil- 
 lions of men as you may please to call for on the 
 other side." 
 
 I have already examined the general theory which 
 generates a new idea by means of an association of 
 sensations, and have shown how little truth there is 
 in it. (pp. 195-201.) Give us mere sensations. Bay of 
 sounds, or colors, or forms, or of pleasure and pain, 
 and they will never be anything else in the repro- 
 
 \
 
 390 UTILITARIANISM 
 
 duction of them than the ideas of sounds, colors, 
 forms, pleasures, or pains, — unless, indeed, there be 
 some new power introduced, and this new element 
 in itself, or in conjunction with the sensations, be 
 fitted to produce a new idea, and that very idea. In 
 none of its applications is the theory seen to fail so 
 utterly, as in the attempt thus to produce our moral 
 perceptions. Provided we once had the ideas, the 
 laws of association might show how they could be 
 brought up again ; how in the reproduction certain 
 parts might sink into shadow and neglect, while 
 others came forth into prominence and light ; and 
 how the whole feeling, by the confluence of different 
 ideas, might be wrought into a glow of intensity ; 
 but the difficulty of generating the ideas, such ideas, 
 ideas so full of meaning, is not thereby surmounted. 
 The idea I have of pain is one thing, and the idea I 
 have of deceit, that it is morally evil, condemnable, 
 deserving of pain, is an entirely different thing — 
 our consciousness being witness. On the supposition 
 that there is a chemical power in association to cre- 
 ate such ideas as those of duty and merit, sin and 
 demerit, this chemical power would be a native 
 moral power ; not the product of sensations, but 
 a power above them, and adapted to transmute 
 them from the baser into the golden substance. 
 
 It will be needful at this place to correct a misap- 
 prehension into which Mr. Mill has fallen. He rep- 
 resents the intuitive school of morals as holding 
 that " the principles of morals are evident a priori"
 
 TJTILITABIANISM. 391 
 
 (p. 3.) Now I admit that influential members of 
 the school have used lang;uaa;e fitted to warrant this 
 statement. But there are others, and these the 
 wisest defenders of intuition, who have given a 
 different account. Our intuitions are perceptions of 
 individual objects or individual truths ; and in order 
 to reach an axiom or " principle of morals," there is 
 need of a discursive process of generalization. Our 
 author makes the intuitive agree with the inductive 
 school, in holding that " the morality of an indi- 
 vidual action is not a question of direct perception, 
 but of the application of law to an individual case." 
 The proper account is that the law is generalized 
 out of our direct perceptions. On the bare contem- 
 plation of an ungrateful spirit, the conscience at 
 once declares it to be evil, apart from the conscious 
 apprehension or application of any general principle. 
 The enunciation of the law is a reflective and not 
 a spontaneous process, and is undertaken when 
 we wish to construct a code of morals or a science 
 of ethics. This representation saves the intuitive 
 theory of morals from many of the specious ob- 
 jections urged against a, different version. Our 
 moral intuitions are not a priori forms, which the 
 mind imposes on objects, but immediate perceptions 
 of qualities in certain objects, that is, in the volun- 
 tary dispositions and actions of intelligent beings. 
 Taking this view of them, I believe they can stand 
 the tests which settle what truth is intuitive. They 
 are self-evident: on the simple apprehension of dis-
 
 302 UTILITAIilANISM. 
 
 interested love we declare it to be good and com- 
 mendable. They may be described, if we properly 
 explain the statement, as necessary : give us a cor- 
 rect representation of a deed of intentional deceit 
 for a selfish end, and we condemn, and cannot be 
 made to commend it. They have, in a sense, even 
 catholic consent in their favor : all men will condemn 
 deceit if it is properly laid before them, but the 
 deceit may be so painted as that we do not see 
 its true nature, and then we give our approval, — 
 not of the deceit, but of its accompaniments. Man- 
 kind can be so deceived as to give diverse judgments 
 on moral actions, only by the blinding influence of 
 sin, disguising and distorting the real nature of 
 things. 
 
 II. Does utilitarianism embrace sufficient sanctions 
 to induce us to approve virtue and condemn vice ? 
 Our author labors to show that the motives usually 
 supposed to lead to virtue are left untouched by this 
 theory. But this is not the question, the main ques- 
 tion ; and if any defender of a 'priori morals had 
 been guilty of such an ignoratio elenchi, we can con- 
 ceive that the acute logician would have exposed it 
 with extraordinary zest. The question is not about 
 sanctions which other systems may employ, but it is, 
 Does utilitarianism contain within itself a body of 
 motives, or motive powers, fitted to lead to virtuous 
 conduct? If it does not, if it is obliged to make us 
 look elsewhere for motives, then it is without one of 
 the essential constituents of an adequate theory of
 
 UTILITABIANISM. 393 
 
 morals. Utilitarianism bids us seek to promote the 
 greatest happiness of the greatest number. "But 
 why should I strive to attain this end ? " asks the 
 inquiring youth. Practically, and in reference to 
 his future conduct, theoretically, and as interested in 
 the science of ethics, he insists on a reply. " Why 
 should I give up my immediate ease and comfort and 
 expected enjoyments, and restrain my strong native 
 impulses and indulged habits in order to look after 
 others, who may be quite able to look after them- r 
 selves ? " " Or why, at the best, may I not content 
 myself with attending to the feelings and immediate 
 wishes of the few persons in my family or circle, 
 with whose welfare my own is bound up, or of the 
 single person to whom I am attached?" As he 
 presses these questions he will not be satisfied to be 
 told that other ethical systems have sanctions, and 
 that utilitarianism leaves them where it found them. 
 But let us look at those sanctions with which it is 
 said the theory does not meddle. We may find, as 
 to some of the guaranties or sureties to which we 
 are referred, that their credit is undermined, and 
 that they are rendered bankrupt, by the principles 
 of the new philosophy. Mr. Mill tells us, that if 
 persons believe that there is a God, they may still 
 have the motives derived from their religion to in- 
 duce them to practise morality. This starts the 
 question, what religion has our author's system left 
 us? It is clear that utilitarianism deprives us of 
 one of the arguments which has been felt by pro-
 
 394 UTILITABIANISM. 
 
 found thinkers to carry the greatest weight, that 
 derived from the moral law in the heart arguing a 
 moral lawgiver. Nor is it to be forgotten, that our 
 greatest moralists have not been in the way of 
 appealing first to the Divine power or will, as a 
 motive to lead us to do good, but have rather sought, 
 by the principles of an independent morality, to 
 show that we ought to obey God. We may om't 
 entering further into this inquiry at present, as the 
 whole subject of the relation of Mr. Mill's philoso- 
 phy to natural theology will come to be discussed 
 in next chapter. But we must look here at some 
 ot'ier sanctions which it is supposed utilitarianism 
 has left untouched. 
 
 "The internal sanction of duty, whatever our 
 standard of duty may be, is one and the same, a 
 feeling in our own mind ; a pain more or less intense 
 attendant on violation of duty, which in properly 
 cultivated moral natures rises, in the more serious 
 cases, into shrinking from it as an impossibility ; " 
 and " the ultimate sanction, therefore, of all morality 
 (external motives apart) being a subjective feeling 
 in our own minds," he thinks that utilitarianism has 
 as powerful a sanction as any other theory can have, 
 (pp. 40, 41.) But it is not fair to represent those 
 who hold the opposite theory as making the ultimate 
 appeal, standard, and sanction, to be in " feeling," in 
 mere " subjective feeling," a " feeling of pain " at- 
 tendant on the violation of duty. It cannot be said 
 to consist in " feeling," except we use the phrase in
 
 TJTILITABIANISM. 395 
 
 so wide and loose a sense as to include all mental 
 operations, and the native principles of action from 
 which they spring. It should not be represented as 
 a mere " subjective feeling," for it points to and im- 
 plies an objective reality, a real good and evil in the 
 voluntary acts of intelligent beings, independent of 
 our sense of it, being in fact the object to which the 
 sense looks. Still less should it be regarded as a 
 mere " feeling of pain : " it has been shown again 
 and again, by moralists, that the feeling of pain rises 
 in consequence of a prior perception of the evil of 
 sin. According to our most esteemed moralists, the 
 mind, in looking at moral good and evil, is exercis- 
 ing a higher attribute than mere feeling or emotion. 
 By some it is represented as a Sense looking to and 
 discerning a moral quality — as the eye discerns 
 color and surface. More frequently it is described 
 as Reason, or as analogous to Reason, and the Moral 
 Reason, which perceives at once the good and the evil, 
 and distinguishes between them, declaring the doing 
 of the one and the avoiding of the other to be obliga- 
 tory on all intelligent beings, and the one to be 
 of good desert and rewardable, and the other of evil 
 desert and punishable; and the feeling of pleasure 
 or pain is the consequent and not the essence of the 
 conviction. 
 
 But then the feeling, which is the essence of con- 
 science, is " all encrusted over with collateral associa- 
 tions, derived from sympathy, from love, and still 
 more from fear; from all the forms of religious feel-
 
 396 UTILITARIANISM. 
 
 ing ; from the recollections of childhood and of all 
 our past life ; from self-esteem, desire of the esteem 
 of others, and occasionally even self-abasement." 
 "Its binding force consists in the existence of a 
 mass of feeling, which must be broken through in 
 order to do what violates our standard of right, and 
 which, if we do nevertheless violate that standard, 
 will probably have to be encountered afterwards in 
 the form of remorse." (p. 41.) He reckons this com- 
 plicated feeling as furnishing quite as strong a sanc- 
 tion, and one quite as likely not to be violated, as 
 that which might be awakened by a distinct moral 
 faculty. Now, I concede at once, that other and 
 secondary motives may and should gather and cling 
 round our primary conviction of duty, to aid and 
 strengthen it. But meanwhile, as the centre, and in 
 the last resort, as the support of them, there should 
 be recognized obligations of morality. The intelli- 
 gent youth, when he comes to rise beyond his educa- 
 tional beliefs, and to think for himself, will not be 
 satisfied with the mere existence of the mass of 
 feeling ; he will ask, Is it justifiable, is it binding ? 
 If satisfied on this point, then he will feel himself 
 called on to encourage all these associations, and to 
 live under their influence. But if not satisfied, if 
 taught they have no obligation in reason or the 
 nature of things, then why should he not uncoil 
 them, as he does some other hereditary preposses- 
 sions; or even if he should be inclined to retain 
 them, will they not be apt to give way before the
 
 UTILITARIANISM. 397 
 
 strong and seductive temptations which are ever 
 assailing him ? Let it be observed of many of these 
 associations which have been gathered, and senti- 
 ments which have been gendered, that they have 
 been generated in individuals, or grown up in a 
 state of society, entertaining and cherishing the be- 
 lief that there is an independent rule of duty. 
 Such, for example, are our "religious feelings;" 
 such, too, our " remorse ; " such our " self-abase- 
 ment," — they arise mainly from the promptings of 
 a conscience, which carries with it its own authority 
 and its own sanctions. Remove the support which 
 bears them — as the stake bears up the vine — and 
 they will speedily fall, or rather will never rise to 
 any height. Let the school beware lest, in striving 
 to destroy the inborn sense and native perceptions 
 of good and evil, they be not doing as much as 
 within them lies to cut down the tree that has borne 
 the fruit; or, to use a still more familiar image, 
 to kill the hen that has laid the golden eggs. And 
 as to the "recollections of childhood and of our past 
 lives," and the feelings of " sympathy " and " self- 
 esteem," and " the desire of the esteem of others," 
 these can foster virtuous sentiment and lead to vir- 
 tuous conduct only where there is a high moral and 
 religious standard in the family, and in the commu- 
 nity, and may tend the opposite way in other states 
 of society; as, for instance, that which existed in 
 ancient Rome in the decline of the empire, or among 
 the educated classes in France in the age before the
 
 398 TJTILITAEIANISM. 
 
 Revolution, or which may be found in certain circles 
 in Paris at this present time. The vessel, which 
 is sailing along gracefully with its present structure, 
 may be speedily dissolved and its crew wrecked, 
 when a magnet (to refer to a well-known fable) has 
 been applied, which draws out the bolts that kept 
 the parts together. 
 
 I deny that the two kinds of sanction are on the 
 same footing and of equal strength. The one sort 
 is derived from a mere agglomeration of feelings, 
 which are generated by associations created inde- 
 pendently of our "choice, and mainly by outward con- 
 tiguities. Some of these, such as those mentioned 
 by Mr. Mill, may be laudable, and may tend to 
 promote virtuous conduct. But others, though aris- 
 ing from like associations, produced by the same cir- 
 cumstances, may be of an opposite character. Such 
 are the fears which spring from a degraded super- 
 stition with its horrid ceremonials ; such are the 
 animal lusts that may grow up along with a purer 
 love ; such are the jealousy, malice, and envy gen- 
 dered by the rivalries of trade and fashion; such 
 are the expectation"? excited when large pleasure 
 and profit to ourselves or others may be had by one 
 bold deed of selfishness; and such is the despair 
 awakened when there has been a failure in the 
 favorite ends of a man's life. These feelings, grow- 
 ing from the same root of associations and circum- 
 stances, will tend to moral evil as the others do 
 to good; and surely it is of moment to have a
 
 TJTILITABIANISM. 399 
 
 moral obligation above either, and calling on us 
 while we allow the one to disallow the other. How 
 vastly inferior must be the sanction supplied by this 
 conglomeration of associations to that which the 
 higher moral theory furnishes, when it declares that 
 certain affections, such as gratitude, and love, and 
 justice, are themselves good, and that certain other 
 affections, such as ingratitude and malice and deceit, 
 are evil in their very nature ; that the mind is or- 
 ganized to discern the distinction between good and 
 evil, just as it discovers the difference between truth 
 and error ; that the moral power by which it does 
 this is not only in the mind, but claims to be su- 
 preme there ; that it implies and points to a God 
 who is the guardian of the law, and will call every 
 man to account for the deeds done in the body, 
 wnether they have been good or evil. 
 
 III. Does utilitarianism furnish a sufficient test of 
 virtuous acts and of virtuous motives ? It tells us 
 that a good deed is one tenuing to promote the 
 greatest happiness of the greatest number. But in 
 the complicated affairs of this world, the most far- 
 sighted cannot know for certain what may be the 
 total consequences of any one act; and the great 
 body of mankind feel as if they were looking out on 
 a tangled forest, and need a guide to direct them. 
 Utilitarian moralists, like Bentham, may draw out 
 schemes of tendencies For us; but the specific rules 
 have no obliging authority, and, even when under- 
 stood and appreciated, are difficult of application,
 
 400 UTILITARIANISM. 
 
 and are ever bringing us into cross avenues into 
 which we may be led by self-deceit. With no other 
 standard than ultimate tendency, the timid will ever 
 be afraid to act as never clearly seeing their way, 
 while the bold will ever be tempted at critical junc- 
 tures, and in order to gain ends which are dear to 
 them, and which they have identified with the good 
 of their country, — as when Julius Caesar crossed 
 the Rubicon, and Louis Napoleon ventured on his 
 coup d'etat, — to commit crimes in the name of 
 virtue. I am aware that on any theoretical system 
 men will commit sin ; but on this system they will 
 commit crimes of the highest order, and justify 
 themselves as they do so, on the ground of the 
 great advantages to be secured by themselves and 
 others. Vr 
 
 Mr. Mill's defence of the theory proceeds on the 
 principle, that there may be a distinction drawn be- 
 tween the virtuousness of the act and the virtuous- 
 ness of the agent. " He who saves a fellow-creature 
 from drowning does what is morally right, whether 
 his motive be duty, or the hope of being paid for 
 his trouble; he who betrays the friend that trusts 
 him is guilty of a crime, even if his object be to 
 serve another friend to whom he is under greater 
 obligations." (p. 26.) The test of a virtuous act is 
 beneficial tendency, but what is the test of the vir- 
 tuous motive ? Is it, too, beneficial tendency ? Is 
 the agriculturist who improves the soil, so as to 
 make it feed more men and cattle than it did before,
 
 UTILITABIANISM. 401 
 
 or the master manufacturer who sets up a large 
 public work which gives food to thousands, necessa- 
 rily virtuous, and this in proportion to the good 
 done, and though in the depths of his heart he may 
 be influenced by no other consideration than the 
 love of gain ? We do run a considerable risk in 
 these times of the prevalence of a cosmopolitanism, 
 originating in a deeper selfishness, and prosecuted in 
 a spirit of self-righteousness, and going on to over- 
 whelm and supersede the gentler and the humbler 
 private and domestic virtues, which our fathers so 
 valued before utilitarianism was heard of. But Mr. 
 Mill is too wise a man to make beneficial tendency 
 a test of excellence in the agent. " The motive has 
 nothing to do with the morality of the action, 
 though much with the worth of the agent." He 
 tells us that it is a misapprehension of the utilitarian 
 mode of thought to conceive it as implying so wide 
 a generality as the world or morality at large, and 
 he says of M. Comte, that " he committed the error 
 which is often, but falsely, charged against the whole 
 class of utilitarian moralists : he required that the 
 test of conduct should also be the exclusive motive 
 to it." (Comte and Posit, p. 138.) It is not very 
 clear what constitutes a virtuous agent, according !<> 
 our author. The following statement is sufficiently 
 vague, and yet it is the clearest I can find on a 
 point which should not be left in uncertainty for a 
 moment: "The great majority of good actions are 
 intended not for the benefit of the world, but for
 
 402 VTILITABIANISM. 
 
 that of individuals, of which the good of the world 
 is made up : and the thoughts of the most virtuous 
 man need not on these occasions travel beyond the 
 particular persons concerned, except so far as is 
 necessary to assure himself that in benefiting them 
 he is not violating the rights, that is, the legitimate 
 and authorized expectations, of any one else." (p. 
 27.) There is some truth here, but it is surely far 
 from being the full truth. The impelling motive of 
 an action entitled to be called virtuous is love, lead- 
 ing us to perform that which is right ; that is, ac- 
 cording to moral law, the law of God. The love 
 is a well-spring ready to burst forth, and the law 
 is the channel provided in which the stream may 
 flow. Without the love, there is no virtue; and 
 without the love regulated by law, there is no 
 virtue — in the agent. It is to the credit of M. 
 Comte that, separating himself from cold utilita- 
 rianism, he reckoned love as of the essence of ex- 
 cellence : but it is an evidence of the narrowness 
 and bigotry which so distinguished him, that he 
 does not see that he has derived this principle from 
 Christianity, which he represents as deriving all 
 its motives from the selfish fear of hell and hope 
 of heaven. 
 
 And what makes an action sinful according to 
 this philosophy? It is still more difficult to find 
 what is the answer to that question. Sin is quite 
 as much a fact of consciousness and of our moral 
 nature as even virtue. "Thou shalt not kill;"
 
 TTTILITABIANISM. 403 
 
 u Thou shalt not commit adultery ; " " Thou shalt not 
 steal ; " " Thou shalt not bear false witness," — these 
 laws are clear, and the violation of them is sin ac- 
 cording to Scripture, and according to conscience. 
 But what is sin according to utilitarianism ? It is 
 acknowledged not to be the mere omission to look 
 to the general good. What then does it consist hi ? 
 Mr. Mill speaks of "reproach" being one of the 
 checks on evil ; but when is reproach justifiable ? 
 Not knowing what to make of sin, the system pro- 
 vides no place for repentance. The boundary line 
 between moral good and evil is drawn so uncertainly, 
 that persons will ever be tempted to cross it without 
 allowing that they have done so, — the more so that 
 they are not told what they should do when they 
 have crossed it. 
 
 IV. Does utilitarianism embrace all the virtues? 
 In answering this question, it should at once be 
 allowed that the system contains an important body 
 of truth ; it errs only so far as it professes to embrace 
 and unfold the whole of morals. It is a duty devolv- 
 ing on all to promote the happiness of their fel- 
 lows. So far as the system recommends this, it can 
 have nothing erroneous, — it should be added that 
 it has nothing original. But even at this point, 
 where it is supposed to be strongest, it is found to 
 fail when we narrowly examine it. For whence can 
 utilitarianism draw its motive and obligation to con- 
 strain us to look after the general happiness ? He 
 says, "No reason can be given why the general hap-
 
 404 UTILITABIANISM. 
 
 piiiess is desirable, except that each person, so far as 
 he believes it to be attainable, desires his own hap- 
 piness." (p. 52.) But it would need more acuteness 
 than even Mr. Mill is possessed of to show that this 
 principle requires us to promote the best interests 
 of others. It is proper to refer to this here ; but 
 I need not dwell upon it, as I have urged it under 
 another head. 
 
 Utilitarianism has a special merit in all questions 
 of jurisprudence. The reason can be given. The 
 end of legislation is not the maintenance of the law 
 of God, but the promotion of the interests of the 
 nation. But even in this department a higher 
 morality has a place, though only a negative one. 
 The governing power is not entitled to enact what 
 is in itself sinful, on the pretence of adding to the 
 pleasures of the community. The people of this 
 country are right in their religious and moral in- 
 stincts when they declare that on no pretence what- 
 ever should the Government take upon itself the 
 licensing of places of prostitution, even on the pre- 
 tence of regulating them, and restraining the evils 
 that flow from them. Nor is the magistrate at lib- 
 erty to punish an act unless it be sinful ; for example, 
 he would not be justified in punishing a person, who, 
 without meaning it, had brought infectious disease 
 into a city, whereby ten thousand inhabitants had 
 perished ; whereas he would be required to inflict 
 a penalty for the theft of a very small sum from a 
 rich man who never felt the loss. Why the differ-
 
 UTILITABIANISM. 405 
 
 ence ? Plainly because the former act is not a sin, 
 that is, implied no evil disposition, whereas the other 
 does. But while the civil government should punish 
 only when sin has been committed, and has thus to 
 look to the moral law, it does not punish sin as sin, 
 but as inflicting injustice on others, and injurious to 
 the best interests of society. The utilitarian theory, 
 as developed by Bentham, has, consequentially and 
 historically, been the means of alleviating the harsh- 
 ness of our penal code, and giving a more benignant 
 aspect to legislation generally. 
 
 Mr. Mill has given a contribution to public ethics 
 in his treatise on Liberty. The work is stimulating 
 in its spirit, but at the same time far from being 
 satisfactory in its results. It might have been ex- 
 pected in a renewed discussion on such a subject, 
 after all that has been written during the last two 
 centuries, that we should have had some principles 
 laid down to guide us as to the moral limits to be 
 set to the expression of sentiment, and the attempt 
 to create a public feeling against what we believe to 
 be evil. A gentleman, let me suppose, settles in my 
 neighborhood, of polite manners, of cultivated mind, 
 and apparently of general beneficence. But he has 
 a wife and a mistress, and maintains that he is justi- 
 fied in having both, and might allowably have more. 
 What is to be my demeanor towards hiiri ? Ami 
 to ask him to my house, and introduce him to my 
 sons and my daughters? Am I never to apeak against 
 him and his conduct, never to warn my family against
 
 406 UTILITARIANISM. 
 
 being influenced by his example ? Am I to hasten 
 to elect him to places of honor and trust in the par- 
 ish or in the town ? Or, if I decline thus to coun- 
 tenance him, am I to be declared intolerant ? Rising 
 beyond such personal to public questions, am I not 
 to protest against a public evil, and seek to create a 
 public sentiment against it ? If I am not at liberty 
 to do this, Mr. Mill is laying clown a doctrine of lib- 
 erty which is interfering with my liberty. Such 
 questions as these start points, on which many anx- 
 ious to cultivate a spirit, not only of toleration, but 
 what is far higher, of charity, are anxious to have 
 light, which is not vouchsafed in this treatise. 
 
 The spirit which it is fitted to engender is that of 
 u individualism ; " and when it has had time to pro- 
 duce its proper fruits, it will be found to have raised 
 up a body of young men who reckon it a virtue to 
 be peculiar in their opinions, and rather commenda- 
 ble to be eccentric. The spirit of hero-worship pro- 
 duced indirectly by German pantheism, and directly 
 by the writings of Carlyle, has happily lost its sway 
 over our young men, and is now to be found, in some 
 of the remains of it, only among literary gentlemen 
 of respectable middle age. But we are sure to be 
 flooded in the coming generation w r ith something 
 still more intolerable, in ambitious youths each af- 
 fecting to strike out a path of his own, in opinion 
 and sentiment, speculative, practical, and religious. 
 This spirit, as it runs to excess, will be quite as de- 
 leterious, and will be more foolish and offensive than
 
 TJTILITABIANISM. 407 
 
 the old habit >f subjection to authority or reverence 
 for the great. The genuine temper is not a prostra- 
 tion before antiquity or before genius on the one 
 hand ; but just as little is it a love of novelty or a 
 love of change on the other : it is a love of inde- 
 pendence, which, believing that truth in all impor- 
 tant matters is attainable, sets out earnestly in 
 search of it ; not rejecting the old because it is old, 
 or accepting the new because it is new, but willing 
 to take light from whatever quarter it may come. 
 
 While giving to utility an important place, I deny 
 that it is the only thing to be looked at as a good, 
 as a test, or as a standard. Take the duties we owe 
 to God, the love and reverence we should cherish 
 towards Him, and the worship we should pay Him 
 in private and in public. Surely man's moral nature 
 justifies him in holding that there are such duties: 
 but on what foundation can utilitarianism rest them ? 
 Is it on beneficial tendency to the individual or 
 to society? So far as the individual is concerned, 
 the salutary influence is produced on his spirit only 
 when he pays the service, because it is right. If he 
 is constrained to render it from any other motive, 
 it will rather chafe and irritate, and end in unbelief 
 and rebellion. And as to worship paid to God 
 merely for the good of the community, it is the 
 very consummation of public hypocrisy — which in 
 the end would deceive no one. The defenders of 
 the utilitarian theory, in the form given to it by 
 Bentham, have never attempted to build upon it
 
 408 TJTILITABIANISM. 
 
 a code of religious duties. I believe that any at- 
 tempt of this description would only show that 
 the foundation was not broad or deep enough to 
 bear such a superstructure. The same may be said 
 of not a few of the duties we owe to our fellow- 
 men. Take gratitude for undeserved favors. I 
 would not choose to found it on the mere desire 
 to promote our own happiness or that of the person 
 from whom the benefit has come: in order, .to. be 
 a virtue, it must spring from a sense of the duty 
 we owe to the benefactor. 
 
 There are symptoms of a renewed attempt being 
 made in our age to construct a morality without 
 a godliness. I speak of it as a renewed attempt, for 
 it has been tried before. In the second century, 
 when Paganism was losing its hold of educated 
 minds, and young Christianity was advancing with 
 such rapid strides, an attempt was made by the Neo- 
 Platonic School of Alexandria to construct a the- 
 ology, and, by the Stoic School of Rome a morality, 
 higher than that of the Bible. Every student of 
 history knows how these schemes were soon seen to 
 terminate in a humiliating failure. The Neo-Platonic 
 ecstasy evaporated into empty air, and the Stoic 
 self-sufficiency hardened into offensive pride ; and 
 neither offered any effectual resistance to the tri- 
 umphant march of a religion suited in every way to 
 the wants of man's nature. Analogous projects have 
 been devised and are being recommended in our day. 
 For some time past the God of the Bible has been
 
 UTILITARIANISM. 409 
 
 represented as not sufficiently pure — as being too 
 anthropomorphic; and mystic thinkers have sought 
 to picture to us a God of a more spiritual and ethe- 
 real character. This style of thinking in Germany 
 has issued from, or culminated in, a shadowy panthe- 
 ism, which, followed to its logical and practical con- 
 sequences — as it will be in this country — must 
 identify God with the evil as well as with the good, 
 or in fact make evil only a form of good. And now 
 it looks as if we are to have persons presenting 
 to us a morality higher and broader than that of the 
 New Testament. 
 
 After speaking in very exalted terms of the doc- 
 trines and precepts of Christ, Mr. Mill asserts " that 
 many essential elements of the highest morality are 
 among the things which are not provided for, nor in- 
 tended to be provided for, in the recorded deliver- 
 ances of the Founder of Christianity, and which 
 have been entirely thrown aside in the system of 
 ethics erected on the basis of those deliverances by 
 the Christian church. And this being so, I think it 
 a great error to persist in attempting to find in 
 the Christian doctrine that complete rule for our 
 guidance, which its author intended to sanction and 
 enforce, but only partially to provide." "I believe 
 that other ethics than any which can be evolved 
 from exclusively Christian sources, must exist side 
 by side with Christian ethics to produce the moral re- 
 generation of mankind." (Liberty, pp. 91-92.) Now, 
 it may be admitted that the precepts of the Word
 
 410 UTILITARIANISM. 
 
 of God do not contain specific directions as to what 
 mankind should do in the infinitely varied positions 
 in which they may be placed. The Christian system 
 first shows the sinner how he may be delivered from 
 the burden of past sin, which so weighs him down 
 in his efforts after regeneration. It then furnishes 
 motives to induce him to perform the duties which 
 devolve upon him. It enjoins, as the regulating 
 principle of our conduct, love to God and love to 
 man. It lays down many and varied precepts as to 
 how we should feel and what we should do, in very 
 many and varied situations, and supplies numerous 
 warnings against evil, and examples of good. Speak- 
 ing as unto wise men, it leaves the rest to ourselves, 
 to the motives which it has called forth, and the 
 royal law of love, which is its grand moving and 
 ruling principle. 
 
 Mr. Mill is not very specific as to what he sup- 
 poses the code of Christian morality to be deficient 
 in. He complains of our "discarding those secular 
 standards (as, for want of a better name, they may 
 be called) which heretofore co-existed with and 
 supplemented the Christian ethics." But I believe 
 this has been provided for in such passages as these, 
 scattered everywhere : " Whatsoever things are true, 
 whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are 
 just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things 
 are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report ; if 
 there be any virtue, and if there be any praise, think 
 on these things." Narrow Christians may have over-
 
 UTILITARIANISM. 411 
 
 looked some of these graces and virtues ; but in 
 order to correct them, we do not require to go be- 
 yond the Scriptures themselves. He fixes on one 
 department of duty which he supposes to be neglect- 
 ed in the Word of God, and that is the duty we owe 
 to the State : " In the purely Christian ethics, that 
 grand department of duty is scarcely noticed or ac- 
 knowledged." I am amazed, I confess, at this charge. 
 The history of ancient Israel, recorded in the Old 
 Testament, exhibits the most fervent patriotism in 
 every page. How nobly does it burst forth in the 
 exclamation of the Psalmist, "If I forget thee, 
 Jerusalem," etc. Paul has caught the same spirit: 
 " Brethren, my heart's desire and prayer for Israel is, 
 that they might be saved." We find it burning and 
 flaming in the bosom of our Lord himself: "0 Jeru- 
 salem, Jerusalem, how often would I have gathered 
 thy children together, even as a hen gathereth her 
 chickens under her wings, but ye would not." The 
 Word of God requires obedience from the subject : 
 " Render therefore to all their dues ; tribute to whom 
 tribute is clue, custom to whom custom, fear to whom 
 fear, honor to whom honor." But he adds, " It is 
 essentially a doctrine of passive obedience ; it incul- 
 cates submission to all authorities thought estab- 
 lished, who indeed are not to be actively obeyed 
 when they command what religion forbids, but who 
 are not to be resented, fur less rebelled against, for any 
 amount of wrong to ourselves." I admit that the 
 Bible does not give minute rules as to when subjects
 
 412 UTILITARIANISM. 
 
 may claim the right to refuse obedience, — nor do I 
 know of any moral code that does. But it prescribes 
 the function of governors : " A minister of God to 
 thee for good, sent for the punishment of evil-doers, 
 and for the praise of them that do well." I do be- 
 lieve that Christians are not at liberty to rebel 
 merely because of wrong done to themselves per- 
 sonally. But when the governor commands what is 
 evil in itself when the government ceases to fulfil 
 its proper office, Christians have thought themselves 
 entitled, always with excessive reluctance, to resist, 
 and have drawn their warrant from the Word of 
 God. So at least thought the Huguenots of France, 
 and the Puritans of England, and the Covenanters of 
 Scotland, and the Bishops at the Revolution Settle- 
 ment ; and their descendants, who have inherited 
 the blessings secured through them, have been 
 proud of the example they set. 
 
 Mr. Mill and his school have, unfortunately, not 
 drawn out this code of morality, which is to be purer 
 and nobler than the Christian. But we may gather 
 what it would be from occasional statements. With 
 perhaps some few additions, it would probably be 
 such as we find in the Meditations of Marcus Aure- 
 lius Antoninus, the Roman emperor who so rigorously 
 opposed the progress of Christianity. Mr. Mill says 
 of his writings, that " they are the highest ethical 
 product of the ancient mind," and that they " differ 
 scarcely perceptibly, if they differ at all, from the 
 most characteristic teachings of Christ." (lb. p. 49.)
 
 UTILITARIANISM. 413 
 
 Surely Mr. Mill forgets that Jesus began his public 
 teaching by "preaching the gospel of the kingdom 
 of God, and saying, The time is fulfilled, and the 
 kingdom of God is at hand : repent ye, and believe 
 the gospel" (Mark i. 14, 15); that the first beati- 
 tude and the second beatitude in the Sermon on the 
 Mount are, "Blessed are the poor in spirit;" "Blessed 
 are they that mourn ; " and the prayer commanded 
 is that of the publican, " God, be merciful to me a 
 sinner." I have met with no such injunctions, no 
 such spirit, in the Meditations of Antoninus. This 
 work of the heathen emperor was much read by the 
 moral school of divines last century; and the pre- 
 cepts enjoined were those they recommended. We 
 know the result. The self-righteous system, whether 
 recommended by the stoic moralists in ancient times, 
 or by the rationalists of last century, was favorably 
 #\3garded by a few persons belonging to the middle 
 class, mostly in comfortable worldly circumstances, 
 and not in a position to be much in fear of poverty, 
 or the deeper trials of life. In them it produced or 
 favored a spirit of self-sufficiency and pride, which 
 tended to make their characters hard and unlovely, 
 and exposed them often to grievous falls, from which 
 it could not lift them. And as to the great body of 
 the people of all classes, but especially the poor, the 
 tried and the unfortunate, they turned away from it 
 with loathing, as not adapted to their wants and cir- 
 cumstances, pretending, as it did, to keep up by their 
 own strength those who felt that they needed higher
 
 414 UTILITARIANISM. 
 
 support^ and providing no means of raising the 
 lapsed or comforting the mourner. I do not allow 
 that it would be an elevation of morality to set aside 
 the peculiar Christian graces of penitence, meekness, 
 and humility, and to substitute for them a sense of 
 honor, a sense of our own merits, and a spirit of self 
 sufficient independence.
 
 CHAPTER XXI. 
 
 NATURAL THEOLOGY. 
 
 THE School of M. Comte, both in its French and 
 British departments, is essentially a Sect, sepa- 
 rated from other philosophies, and with very narrow 
 sympathies. It has been made so partly by the cir- 
 cumstance that its adherents were at first few, and 
 had to meet not only with opposition but with con- 
 tempt from the leading metaphysicians of the age ; 
 but it is so essentially, because it has cut itself off 
 from the streams which flow down from the past, 
 and, like a pool, it has no connection with anything 
 beyond itself. Though no longer a small body, and 
 though by their intellectual power and perseverance 
 they have compelled their opponents to respect 
 tli em, the disciples have still the exclnsiveness of a 
 sect : they read one another, they quote one another, 
 and they criticise one another ; they are incapable 
 of appreciating any other philosophy. The two arti 
 cles of their creed, and the two points that unite 
 them, are the theory of nescience, and that of the 
 steps by which knowledge has made progress. I 
 
 415
 
 416 NATURAL THEOLOGY. 
 
 have been examining the first all throughout this 
 work. Before I close I must notice the other. 
 
 The famous law of sociology, as developed by M. 
 Comte, is about as rash a generalization as was ever 
 made by a Presocratic physiologist, a mediaeval 
 schoolman, or a modern German speculator. It 
 realizes the description given by Bacon of empiri- 
 cists, who are represented as rising at once from 
 a limited observation of facts to the highest and 
 widest generalizations. The theory contains a small 
 amount of truth which it has misunderstood and 
 perverted. In the early ages of the world, and in 
 simple states of society at all times, mankind are in- 
 clined to see God or the gods as acting without any 
 secondary instrumentality, in operations which are 
 found subsequently to take place according to natu- 
 ral law. The reason of this is very simple and very 
 obvious, and has often been noticed : it is that man- 
 kind are prompted by the native principle of causa- 
 tion to seek for a cause to every event, while they 
 have not so large an experience as to enable them 
 to discover the uniformity in the cosmos. This state 
 of society constitutes what M. Comte calls the Theo- 
 logical Era ; which, however, does not imply that 
 men are more disposed to see God in his works, and 
 to worship, love, and obey him, than in other ages ; 
 but simply that they believe him to act or interpose 
 by a free operation, independent of all physical 
 causation. 
 
 As observation widens and intelligence advances,.
 
 NATUBAL THEOLOGY. 417 
 
 men learn to abstract and generalize upon the phe- 
 nomena of nature. They are apt to do so in the 
 first instance — as being the easiest method — by 
 mere mental force or inward cogitation. Not hav- 
 ing learned to perform experiments, they cannot dis- 
 tinguish between the various subtle powers and ele- 
 ments which operate in nature, nor to make what 
 Bacon calls the necessary "rejections and exclu- 
 sions." Generalizing the obvious facts, they repre 
 sent the sun and stars as moving daily round tht 
 earth, and, as they find they cannot thus explain the 
 whole phenomena, they give a special motion to the 
 moon and planets, and call in eccentrics and epicy- 
 cles. Or, abstracting what seems common in the 
 obvious operations of earthly agents, they represent 
 the components of the universe as being the fiery, 
 the aerial, the aqueous, and the solid powers ; and 
 speak of certain bodies being in their very nature 
 light and others heavy. This is what is called the 
 Metaphysical Era. Not that mankind are then in- 
 clined to cultivate metaphysics in any proper sense 
 of the term, or more than any other department of 
 inquiry; but simply that they hasten to grasp the 
 operations of nature within and without them by 
 mental acts, and have not learned — what it required 
 a Bacon to tell us — that investigation must proceed 
 gradually, and by means of enlarged observation 
 and careful experiment, So far from being in any 
 peculiar sense a metaphysical age, it sou-lit to pene- 
 trate into all the departments of nature, and inquired 
 
 27
 
 418 NATUBAL THEOLOGY. 
 
 into the origin and structure of the universe, and the 
 movements of the celestial bodies. It did enter upon 
 metaphysical subjects, but it was as it rushed into 
 physiological and astrological speculations ; and it 
 discussed them all in the same spirit. The Presocratic 
 schools, for example, did inquire into the nature of 
 knowing and being, and the human soul ; but it was 
 as they inquired into the primary principle or ele- 
 ments of the universe. They satisfied themselves 
 with a few common observations, and then proceed- 
 ed to apply thought to them. In pure metaphysical 
 questions they distinguished hi a rude way between 
 Sensation and Reason, and when this division was 
 found insufficient, they called in a vague intermedi- 
 ate principle called Opinion or Faith. Such ages 
 have no special title to be called the Metaphysical 
 Era : they treat physics and metaphysics in the same 
 undistinguishing and uncertain manner. Nor are 
 they to be regarded as necessarily non-theological 
 ages. No doubt there were curious questions started, 
 which could not be settled, as to the relation be- 
 tween these rapidly generalized and abstract powers, 
 and the gods who ruled in heaven. There were thus 
 stirred theological questions which tended to under- 
 mine the old superstitions, and to prepare the way 
 for a better era. It was at this time — " the fulness 
 of time " — that Christianity was introduced as a 
 seed into a soil ploughed to receive it. 
 
 In the natural advancement of intelligence, es- 
 pecially after the great awakening of thought in the
 
 NATUBAL THEOLOGY. 419 
 
 sixteenth century, it was felt that the old methods 
 were waxing old, and must soon vanish away. These 
 methods are happily described by Bacon as the " Ra- 
 tional " so presumptuous, the " Empirical " so narrow, 
 and the " Superstitious " which made religion accom- 
 plish what could be done only by science. At this 
 time there appeared such men as Galileo practising 
 careful experiment, and Bacon himself to expound 
 the general principles of the true mode of pro- 
 cedure — of which method the Positive Philosophy 
 is merely a monstrous outgrowth. This Era should 
 be called the Inductive. It may be quite as meta- 
 physical as the previous ones, only it will conduct 
 the investigations in a new spirit and mode, that is, 
 according to the Method of Induction. This new 
 spirit (though the method was not yet properly un- 
 derstood) sprang up in the seventeenth century, and 
 was fostered by such men as Descartes, who taught 
 us to look into the mind to discover its opera! ions, 
 and by Locke, who appealed to experience. Since 
 that time an inductive mental science, distracted 
 from time to time by an ambitious a priori, or bv 
 a narrow empirical philosophy, has run parallel to 
 physical science. Nor is this era necessarily an un- 
 theological one. Never were questions of divinity 
 discussed so keenly as in the ages when the induc- 
 tive spirit sprang up, and was applied to tin 1 study 
 of the human mind. And 1 believe that there is as 
 much, and as intense, religious feeling in our country 
 at this present time as there ever was in any country
 
 420 NATURAL THEOLOGY. 
 
 since man .appeared on the earth ; and sooner or 
 later there will be a tremendous reaction against the 
 present attempt to deaden the religious instincts 
 among our young men by a cold unbelief. No doubt 
 educated men cannot now see the constant interpo- 
 sitions of God which were noticed in early ages; 
 but it is because they take an enlarged and enlight- 
 ened view of the course of nature, which they re- 
 gard as ordered by God in infinite wisdom, and as 
 the expression of His will, and not requiring to 
 be interfered with. It is all true that men with a, 
 proud and self-dependent spirit may now find it 
 easier to disbelieve in a personal God, and to hand 
 over the universe to unconscious natural law. But 
 the truth is, persons who do not like to retain a pure 
 and holy God in their hearts, had at all times an 
 outlet. That outlet was furnished in ancient times 
 by superstition, which degraded the Divine character, 
 and in modern times by infidelity, which denies His 
 existence or His constant operation. 
 
 It is a pleasant circumstance to reflect upon, that 
 nearly all the great philosophers of ancient and 
 modern times have been anxious to show that their 
 systems favor religion. There is every reason to be- 
 lieve that the Ionian physiologists recognized the 
 Divine existence and the Divine agency : certainly 
 Anaxagoras, who seems to have been the greatest 
 of them, allotted the all-important place in his 
 system to the Divine Intelligence. The founder of 
 the Eleatic School, Xenophanes. while he ridiculed
 
 NATTJBAL THEOLOGY. 421 
 
 the popular mythology, represented God as the es- 
 sential existence. We know little of the Pythago- 
 rean system, but it is clear that it had a Zeus as the 
 centre of the order which it delighted to unfold. 
 The two great truths which Socrates held by firmly, 
 amidst his doubts and his love of dialectic, were the 
 providence of God, and the tendency of virtue in 
 the government of God to promote happiness. 
 When Plato rises above the intellectual gj^mnastic 
 which he is so delighted to exercise, it is to merge 
 his philosophy in a theology in which the God is 
 represented as forever contemplating eternal ideas, 
 and developing all things according to them. Even 
 Aristotle, cold though he be in his references to 
 divine subjects, falls back on God as the principle 
 and ground of all things. In the Stoic system there 
 was a fiery deity, who pervaded all nature, and con- 
 tinued unchanged amidst the periodical conflagra- 
 tion of all things. Cicero wishes everywhere to be 
 thought a pure theist; and the later Latin Stoics, 
 such as the philosophic emperor, were more religious 
 than the Greek founders of the school. Mediaeval 
 scholasticism consisted essentially in the application 
 of Logic to Theology. In the reaction of the six- 
 teenth and seventeenth centuries, philosophic think- 
 ers delighted to show that their systems could bear 
 up and confirm true religion. Bacon excluded final 
 causes from physics, but gave them and formal 
 causes a place in the higher field of metaphysics, 
 which stand next to and support theology at the
 
 4 k 22 NATURAL THEOLOGY. 
 
 apex of the pyramid. Descartes maintained that 
 the mind has an idea of the infinite and perfect, 
 -which implies the existence of an infinitely perfect 
 Being. Locke wrote much on religious subjects, and 
 in the Fourth Book of his Essay, he shows that his 
 system leads to a reasonable belief in the existence 
 of a spiritual Being. The founders of the German 
 School, Leibnitz and Kant, embraced the existence 
 of God as essential parts of then philosophies, and 
 in this they were followed by the ideal pantheists, 
 Fichte, Schelling, and Hegel. The Scottish School, 
 from Hutcheson to Hamilton, including Brown, has 
 been at great pains to expound and defend the great 
 truths of natural religion. 
 
 It is surely an ominous circumstance, that in this 
 the nineteenth century there should arise a system 
 of philosophy, supported by very able men, and with 
 very extensive ramifications and applications, espe- 
 cially in social science, but which contains within it 
 no argument for the Divine existence, or sanctions 
 to religion. The founder of the school was an 
 avowed, indeed a rabid, atheist ; and 1 am not aware 
 that any of his French followers have made any pro- 
 fession of religion, — most of them are favorers of 
 a materialism, which does not admit of a spiritual 
 God. 1 The British branch of the school seems, with 
 one accord, and evidently on a system, to decline 
 uttering any certain sound on the subject; they cer- 
 
 1 A vigorous opposition is being of- M. Cousin, M. Eemusat, and M. 
 fcred to the prevailing Materialism by Janet (see his Material isme Content' 
 a number of able French writers, as porain).
 
 NATURAL THEOLOGY. 423 
 
 tainly do not pretend that their philosophy, em- 
 bracing though it does, all mental, moral, and social 
 problems, requires us to believe in the existence of 
 God, in the immortality of the soul, or a day of 
 judgment. Mr. Mill's method of dealing with the 
 subject is uniform, and evidently designed. Though 
 fond of uttering opinions on most other topics, he 
 declines saying what are his convictions, or whether 
 he has any convictions, in regard to religious truth. 
 He satisfies himself with declaring, that if you believe 
 in the existence of God, or in Christianity, I do not 
 interfere with you. He does not pretend that his 
 philosophy does of itself give any aid or sanction to 
 religion ; but if we can get evidence otherwise, he 
 assures us that he does not disturb us. 
 
 Without saying that it has convinced him, he 
 speaks with great respect of the argument from de- 
 sign in favor of the Divine existence, and advises us 
 to stick by it, rather than resort to a 'priori proof. 
 The advice is a sound one. The greater number, 
 even of metaphysicians, are in doubts whether there 
 has ever been an a priori argument constructed by 
 Anselm, by Descartes, by Leibnitz, or by Clarke, 
 which can of itself prove the existence of God, apart 
 from the observation of the traces of wisdom and 
 goodness in the Divine workmanship. The reaction 
 against the argument from final cause, which lias 
 been fostered by the German metaphysics for the 
 last age, is far from being a wise or a, healthy spirit 
 and sentiment. The proof from design is that which
 
 4:24 NATURAL THEOLOGY. 
 
 ever comes home with most force to the unsophisti- 
 cated mind. 
 
 But the important question is not about our au- 
 thor's personal predilections and convictions, but is, — 
 Does his philosophy undermine the arguments for 
 the existence of Deity, and the immortality of the 
 soul, and a day of accounts ? It is clear that many 
 of the old proofs cannot be advanced by those who 
 accept his theory. The argument from catholic con- 
 sent can have no value on such a system. That 
 derived from the moral faculty in man, so much in- 
 sisted on by Kant and Chalmers, is no longer avail- 
 able when it is allowed that the moral law has no 
 place in our constitution, and that our moral senti- 
 ments are generated by inferior feelings and associ- 
 ated circumstances. But then, he tells us, that the 
 Design argument "would stand exactly where it 
 does." (p. 210.) I doubt much whether this is the 
 case. I see no principles left by Mr. Mill sufficient 
 to enable us to answer the objections which have 
 been urged against it by Hume. Kant is usually 
 reckoned as having been successful in showing, that 
 the argument from design involves the principle of 
 cause and effect. We see an order and an adapta- 
 tion in nature, which are evidently effects, and we 
 look for a cause. Has Mr. Mill's doctrine of causa- 
 tion left this proof untouched ? Suppose that we 
 allow to him that there is nothing in an effect which 
 of itself implies a cause ; that even when we know 
 that there is a cause, no light is thereby thrown on
 
 NATURAL THEOLOGY. 425 
 
 the nature of that cause ; that the causal relation is 
 simply that of invariable antecedence within the 
 limits of our experience ; and that beyond our ex 
 perience there may be events without a cause, — I 
 fear that the argument is left without a foundation. 
 And there are other questions pressing on our notice, 
 and demanding an answer. Can God be shown to 
 be infinite on the principles of this philosophy ? If 
 so, what are these principles? If God exists as a 
 designer, is He also a moral governor? Will He 
 call His creatures to account, and reward those who 
 do good, and punish those who do evil ? Is this 
 world the only world to us, or is there another ? It 
 is clear that the argument drawn from the abiding, 
 the substantial, and spiritual nature of the soul is 
 entirely cut off by a philosophy which makes mind 
 a mere series of feelings. The more convincing ar- 
 gument from God's justice calling His responsible 
 creatures to account, can have little or no force in a 
 system which admits no independent morality. 
 
 I should like, I confess, to have the proof and the 
 doctrine of natural religion drawn out according to 
 this philosophy. The argument for the being of a 
 God founded on any native principles is unavailable, 
 but we are allowed to weigh the d, posteriori evi- 
 dence. It is conceivable that the adherents of the 
 system may thread their way through the series of 
 feelings and possibilities of sensations, and as they 
 do so discover truces of what, if done by man, would 
 be reckoned design and beneficence : but whether
 
 426 NA1UBAL THEOLOGY. 
 
 these phenomena within our experience entitle us to 
 argue that there is a Being beyond who has caused 
 them, is a question in regard to which some are wait- 
 in g for light to come from the head of the school 01 
 some other quarter. Those who believe that an 
 effect of itself implies a cause, have no hesitation in 
 concluding that the design in nature implies a de- 
 signer ; and those who look on man as having a 
 moral nature, and constrained by inward principles 
 to believe in infinity, can clothe the designer with 
 moral and infinite perfections. But there are not a 
 few, both of those who oppose and those who sup- 
 port Mr. Mill, who cannot see that his system war- 
 rants us in reaching any such result. And there is 
 the more puzzling inquiry, whether there is proof 
 that the thread or prolonged throb of consciousness 
 exists after its external bodily conditions or possibili- 
 ties have been evidently dissolved by death. These 
 are questions which some of our youths, who have 
 committed themselves to this philosophy, are sporting 
 with in utter levity, and which are wringing the 
 hearts of others till feelings more bitter than tears 
 burst from them : and what are they to do, in this 
 transition state, with the old undermined and the 
 new not yet constructed ? 
 
 I have carefully refrained throughout this work 
 from urging any argument from consequences, or 
 from religious considerations, against the philosophy 
 I am examining. I have, to the best of my ability, 
 and with an anxious desire to reason fairly, met my
 
 NATTJBAL THEOLOGY. 427 
 
 distinguished opponent on the ground of conscious' 
 ness, and of legitimate inference from it. But neither 
 he nor I, neither those who follow nor those who op- 
 pose him, can avoid looking at the results. Scepti- 
 cism, as Hume delights to show, can produce no mis- 
 chief in the common secular affairs of life, because 
 there man is ever meeting with circumstances which 
 keep him right in spite of his principles or want of 
 principles. But it is very different in those questions 
 which fall to be discussed in higher ethics and theol- 
 ogy. A man will not be tempted by any sophistry to 
 doubt the connection of cause and effect when he is 
 thirsty and sees a cup of water before him ; in such a 
 case he will at once put forth his hand and take it, 
 knowing that the beverage will refresh him. But he 
 may be led by a wretched sophistry to deny the neces- 
 sary relation of cause and effect when it would lead 
 him upward from God's works to God himself, or to 
 seek assurance and peace in him. Hence the import- 
 ance of not allowing fundamental truth to be assailed : 
 not because the attack will sway any one in the 
 common business of life, but because it may hold 
 back and damp our higher aspirations, moral and 
 religious. I put no question as to the religious con- 
 victions of its supporters; but I may surely ask — 
 What is the religion left us by the new philosophy? 
 
 M. Comte provided a religion and a worship for 
 his followers. He had no God, but he had a "Grand 
 Etre," in Collective Bumanity, or "the continuous 
 resultant of all the forces capable of voluntarily con-
 
 428 NATURAL THEOLOGY. 
 
 curring in the universal perfectioning of the world," 
 — being in fact a deification of his system of science 
 and sociology. In the worship he enjoined he has 
 nine sacraments, and a priesthood, and public honors 
 to be paid to the Collective Humanity ; but with no 
 public liberty of conscience, or of education, in sacred 
 or indeed in any subjects. The religious observances 
 were to occupy two hours every day. Mr. Mill tells 
 us, "Private adoration is to be addressed to Col- 
 lective Humanity in the persons of worthy individual 
 representatives, who may be either living or dead, 
 but must in all cases be women ; for women, be- 
 ing the sexe aimant, represent the best attribute of 
 humanity, that which ought to regulate all human 
 life, nor can Humanity possibly be symbolized in any 
 form but that of a woman. The objects of private 
 adoration are the mother, the wife, and the daughter, 
 representing severally the past, the present, and the 
 future, and calling into active exercise the three so- 
 cial sentiments, — veneration, attachment, and kind- 
 ness. We are to regard them, whether dead or alive, 
 as our guardian angels, l les vrais anges gardiens.' If 
 the last two have never existed, or if, in the particu- 
 lar case, any of the three types is too faulty for the 
 office assigned to it, their place may be supplied by 
 some other type of womanly excellence, even by one 
 merely historical. (Comte and Posit, p. 150.) The 
 Christian religion surely does not suffer by being 
 placed alongside this system, which is one of the 
 two new religions which this century has produced,
 
 NATUBAL THEOLOGY. 429 
 
 — the other being Mormonism. The author clung 
 more and more fondly to this faith and ceremonial 
 as he advanced in years. His English followers are 
 ashamed of it, and ascribe it to his lunac} r , — as if 
 he had not been tinged with madness (as his poor 
 wife knew, all his life), and as if his whole system 
 had not been the product of a powerful but constitu- 
 tionally diseased intellect. 
 
 He denounces his English followers, because they 
 did not adopt his moral and social system ; he char- 
 acterizes the conversion of those who have adopted 
 his positivity and rejected his religion as an abor- 
 tion ; and declares that it must proceed from im- 
 potence of intellect, or insufficiency of heart, com- 
 monly from both ! (Polit. Posit, tome I. pref. p. xv. ; 
 m. p. xxiv.) There is a basis of wisdom in this com- 
 plaint. All history shows that man is a religious, 
 quite as certainly as he is a feeling, and a rational 
 being. But what has the British School provided 
 to meet man's religious wants ? As yet they have 
 furnished nothing. But Mr. Mill, who always weighs 
 his words, and who is too skilful a dialectician to say 
 more than he means, evidently points to something 
 which is being hatched, and may some day burst 
 forth. While he has the strongest objection to the 
 system of politics and morals set forth in the Poli- 
 tique Positive, he thinks "it has superabundantly 
 shown the possibility of giving to the service of hu- 
 manity, even without the belief in a Providence, 
 both the psychological power and (lie social efficacy
 
 430 NATTJBAL THEOLOGY. 
 
 of a religion : making it take hold of human life, 
 and color all thought, feeling, and action, in a 
 manner of which the greatest ascendency ever ex- 
 ercised by any religion may be but a type and fore- 
 taste." ( Util, p. 48.) More specifically in his latest 
 work he says, that " though conscious of being in an 
 extremely small minority," — a circumstance which 
 is sure to catch those " individualists " who are bent 
 on appearing original — "we venture to think that 
 a religion may exist without belief in a God, and 
 that a religion without a God may be, even to Chris- 
 tians, an instructive and profitable object of contem- 
 plation." (Comte and Posit, p. 133.) He tells us, 
 that in order to constitute a religion, there must 
 be "a creed or conviction," "a belief or set of be 
 liefs," "a sentiment connected with this creed," and 
 a "cultus." I confess I should like excessively to 
 see this new religion, with its creed and its cultus, 
 fully developed. It would match the theologies, 
 with their ceremonial observances, projected by doc- 
 trinaires in the heat of the French Revolution. 
 There is no risk of the British School setting up 
 a religion and a worship so superbly ridiculous as 
 that of M. Comte, but I venture to predict that 
 when it comes, it will be so scientifically cold, and 
 so emotionally blank, as to be incapable of gathering 
 any interest around it, of accomplishing any good — 
 or, I may add, inflicting any evil. 
 
 Leaving the religion to develop itself in the future, 
 let us ascertain what we have without it in the phil-
 
 NATTJBAL THEOLOGY. 431 
 
 osophic system. Within, we have a prolonged series 
 of feelings ; without, we have a possibility of sensa- 
 tions ; both regulated by the most unbending laws 
 of necessity, within the limits of experience and a 
 reasonable distance beyond ; and beyond that beyond, 
 — if there be such, — a land of darkness and eternal 
 silence. This is the cold region into which thought, 
 as it moves on in its orbit, has brought us, in the 
 third quarter of the nineteenth century. And is 
 this, then, wiiat is left us after all the dialectic con- 
 flicts, and as the result of all the scientific discoveries 
 of the last two thousand five hundred years that 
 have elapsed since reflective thought was awakened ? 
 We know how keenly some patriotic and high-minded 
 Frenchmen feel when they are obliged to contem- 
 plate the present state of their country, and to con- 
 fess how great the humiliation implied in the bloody 
 revolutions through which they have passed, ending 
 in a military despotism, which restrains on all hands 
 liberty of thought and action. I am sure that alike 
 feeling will rise up in many noble and hopeful minds 
 when they are made to see that all these discussions, 
 philosophic and religious, in the past, that all these 
 throes and convulsions of opinion and sentiment 
 have left us only a series of feelings and a possibility 
 of sensations, beginning we know not with what, 
 and carrying us we know not whither, — :ill (hat we 
 are sure of being, that the Bensations and feelings 
 are conveyed along pleasantly or unpleasantly, and 
 ranged into companies suitably or unsuitably, and
 
 432 NATURAL THEOLOGY. 
 
 our very beliefs generated, by a fatalistic law of con- 
 tiguity and resemblance. Some may be content 
 with this lot, as being caught in the toils and despair- 
 ing of an escape : but there will be others, — I ven- 
 ture to say nobler and better, — who feel that they 
 must be delivered from this mental bondage at all 
 hazards, and will hasten to attempt it even at the 
 risk of new conflicts and new revolutions. It should 
 not after all be so difficult for humble and sincere 
 men to escape from this net which sophistry would 
 weave around them. Let them follow those intui- 
 tions and ultimate beliefs, the existence and the 
 veracity of which Mr. Mill has acknowledged, — 
 while he has declined to pursue them to their con- 
 sequences ; let them gather around them a body of 
 acquired observations with their appropriate senti- 
 ments ; and, as they do so, they will reach a body 
 of truth, practical, scientific, and religious, sufficient 
 to stay the intellect and satisfy the heart, — while 
 what still remains unknown will only incite to fur- 
 ther explorations, and lead to new discoveries.
 
 APPENDIX. 
 
 I. 
 
 Sir W. Hamilton's Philosophy. — See p. 20. 
 
 I have taken exception to certain doctrines of Hamilton in the Method of 
 Divine Government (m. d. g.) ; in the North British Review, Nos. liv. and lix. 
 (n. b. e.) ; in Dublin University Magazine, Aug. 1859 (d. tr. M.) ; in Intuitions 
 of the Mind (i. m.) ; in Supernatural in Relation to Natural (s. N.) ; in Appen- 
 dix to Stewart's Outlines (s. o.) ; and now in this work (d. f. t.) 
 
 1. His Method. — n.b.r. liv. 427; i.m. 96; d.p.t. 42. 
 
 2. His ambiguous use of Consciousness. — n.b.r. liv. 428 ; 
 
 d.u.m. 159, 160; i.m. 96; d.f.t. 32-38. 
 
 3. His omission among the Reproductive Powers (Metaph 
 
 vol. ii.), of the Recognitive Power by which we believe 
 the remembered event to have fallen under our notice in 
 time past. — d.u.m. 160; d.f.t. 188. 
 
 4. His view of Time and Space. — n.b.r. liv. 429; i.m. 178, 
 
 179. 
 
 5. His doctrine of Unconscious Mental Operations. — d.u.m. 161, 
 
 162; d.f.t. 211-214. 
 
 6. His unsatisfactory way of appealing to Faith without ex- 
 
 plaining its nature. — n.b.r. lix. 150, 151 ; i.m. 168-173 ; 
 s.n. 355. 
 
 7. His view of all Knowledge implying Comparison. — i.m. 207- 
 
 210; d.f.t. 237. 
 
 8. His defective view of the Relations which the mind can 
 
 discover. — d.u.m. 162, 163 ; i.m. 211. 
 
 9. His doctrine of the Relativity of Knowledge. — m.d.O. 536- 
 
 539 ; N.H. it. liv. 428-429 ; d.u.m. 163, 164; i.m. 109,340- 
 341 ; s.o. 132 ; d.f.t. 233-237. 
 10. His doctrine of Nescience. — m.d.g. 520 ; n.b.r. liv. 430— 
 431 • i.m. 342-345 ; d.f.t. 234. 
 
 (433)
 
 434 APPENDIX. 
 
 11. His defective doctrine as to our idea of the Infinite. — m.d.g. 
 
 534; n.b.r. liv. 430, lix. 150, 154, 156; i.m. 193-197; 
 S.N. 141. 
 
 12. His axiom that truth lies between two extremes. — i.m. 304, 
 
 338. 
 
 13. His doctrine of Substance. — i.m. 146, 148. 
 
 14. His doctrine of Causation. — m.d.g. 529, 530; n.b.r. liv. 
 
 430; d.u.m. 164. 
 
 15. The application by Dr. Mansel of the doctrine of Relativity 
 
 to Moral Good and Evil. — n.b.r. lix. 157; s.N. 356, 
 357. 
 
 16. His view of the Theistic Argument. — m.d.g. 520 ; n.b.r. liv 
 
 431, lix. 152 ; s.N. 355 ; s.O. 140.
 
 II. 
 
 REPLY TO MR. MILL'S STRICTURES IN HIS THIRD EDITION. 
 
 Article I. Mr. Mill's Philosophic Predecessors, (p. 14.) 
 
 I require, before entering on the discussion, to refer to 
 one or two personal matters, these fortunately not involving 
 any offensive personal feeling. I had spoken of Hobbes, 
 Hartley, Hume, and Brown as Mr. Mill's philosophic ances- 
 tor^jmd_o f_Mr. JameaJVlill^ nd M. Comte as havin g had 
 influence on the young thinker, and of M. jComte ^as having 
 led him to regard it as " impossible for the mind to rise to 
 first or final causes, or to know the nature of things" {Ex- 
 amination of Mill's Philosophy, p. 8). I did so, because 
 M. Comte, the great defender of that doctrine, had ex- 
 pounded his views before Mr. Mill had published anything. 
 But Mr. Mill tells U3 : "The larger half of my /System of 
 ■Logic, including all its fundamental doctrines, was written 
 before I had seen the 'Le Cours de Philosophic Positive.' 
 That work was indebted to M. Comte for many valuable 
 thoughts, but a short list would exhaust the chapters, and 
 even the pages which contain them " (p. 2G7). I suppose he 
 means to include not merely his System of Logic, but the 
 fuller exposition which we have in some of his other works, 
 in which he has expounded doctrines identical with those 
 held by M. Comte, and usually fathered upon him. He as- 
 sures us, however, in regard to the general doctrine of Nesci- 
 ence, as I call it, he was familiar with it " before I was out 
 of my boyhood, from the teachings of my father. Ever since 
 the days of Hume, that doctrine has been the general property 
 of the philosophic world. From the time of Brown, it lias 
 entered into popular philosophy." This statement does not 
 differ essentially from mine, only it ascribes less to M. < 'omte,
 
 43 G APPENDIX. 
 
 and more to Mr. James Mill, who is represented as teaching 
 the doctrine to his son from boyhood. I leave this statement 
 without comment, except thfil I must protest against r epre- 
 Benting Brown, who argued tor the existence jof Hod- from 
 the t races of design, as discarding either __firslL.or_ linal 
 can -es. 
 
 Mr. Mill admits (p. 319) "Dr. M'Cosh's work is unim- 
 peachable in respect of candor and fairness." I accept the 
 compliment. I did intend to act fairly tow*ards my distin- 
 guished opponent ; and carefully abstained from quibbling 
 and captiousness, when strongly tempted to indulge in it by 
 what seemed the severe criticism of Mr. Hamilton. Esteem- 
 ing moral higher than intellectual qualities (so deified by 
 Buckle and others of the school), I value this testimony 
 higher than I would have done a laudation of my abilities. 
 But the compliment is followed by a charge, that " he can- 
 not be relied on for correctly apprehending the maxims and 
 tendencies of a philosophy different from his own," and he 
 complains that "he has not been able, even a little way, into 
 the mode of thought he is combating" (p. 250). All I 
 have to say here is, that if I have not been able to do so, it 
 must be owing to some hebetude of intellect ; for I was 
 reared in favorable circumstances for understanding the sys- 
 tem and its tendencies. Albeit some years younger than 
 Mr. Mill, I was brought up intellectually in a position not 
 so widely different from those in which he was trained. The 
 first professor of mental science who impressed me favorably, 
 which he did by his cool intellectual power, was Mr. James 
 Mylne of Glasgow University, who following Destutt de 
 Tracey, derived all our ideas from sensation, memory, and 
 judgment. The first metaphysical work I read with admi- 
 ration, was the Lectures of Thomas Brown. At a prema- 
 turely early age, I had perused the philosophic works of 
 Hume. I read James Mill's Analysis at the time it came 
 out, and also Sir James Mackintosh's Dissertation, in which 
 he attempts to resolve conscience into the association of ideas. 
 All along, indeed, I had a suspicion that the refined analysis
 
 MB. MILL'S PHILOSOPHIC PREDECESSORS. 437 
 
 of these writers was far too subtile, and that they must be 
 overlooking some of the deepest and most characteristic 
 phenomena of the mind. Still, these were the men (not 
 to speak of ancient philosophers) for whom, in my juvenile 
 years, I had an admiration, rather than towards Reid, or 
 even Stewart or Locke ; and I believe I entered a good way 
 into their modes of thought and their systems. But on ma- 
 ture and independent reflection, I had found my way out 
 of their subtilties, and this before I knew anything of Ham- 
 ilton, who turned the tide in public sentiment. At a time 
 when the Philosophie Positive was known to few in this 
 country, I read it with care, and I saw at once that it would 
 come to be a power in this century, quite equal to Hobbes 
 in the seventeenth and of Hume in the eighteenth centuries ; 
 and I noticed it in my first published work (Method of Di- 
 vine Government, B. II. c. ii., Note D). On my first 
 reading Mill's Logic, which was not for some time after its 
 publication, I saw that the philosophy in which I had been 
 brought up was involved throughout. The literary work on 
 which I was engaged at the time when Mill's Examination 
 of Hamilton came out, was an expository and critical ac- 
 count of Hume's philosophy for this Review, and intended to 
 find a place in a contemplated work on the Scottish philoso- 
 phy ; and tiie book came out in time to enable me to bring 
 out in a set of foot-notes, the curious correspondence between 
 the philosophy of Hume and that of Mill. I mention these 
 things, to show that I should be quite prepared to enter a 
 considerable way into Mr. Mill's mode of thought. But by 
 painful cogitation I had wrought myself out of it, and be- 
 lieved I had discovered the fundamental fallacies of the whole 
 philosophy. The one qualification which I possessed for the 
 task of examining Mr. Mill, lay in my having been trained 
 in much the same school, and havin g risen above it; and I 
 thought it right to give to the world, with an application to 
 the very able work which appeared, the arguments which had 
 convinced myself, and which I had expounded for years to 
 my college classes.
 
 438 APPENDIX. 
 
 Mr. Mill is often alleging against those who oppose him, 
 that they are not able to place themselves " at the point of 
 view of a theory different " from their own. But has Mr. Mill 
 never put to himself the question, " May I not have fallen into 
 the sin I have laid to the charge of my opponents? Have I 
 ever thoroughly entered into and sympathized with that high- 
 Bouled philosophy which was introduced by Plato, which was 
 continued by men like Augustine, Anselm, Descartes, Cud- 
 worth, Leibnitz, Jacobi, and Kant, and Cousin ; and in a 
 lower key, by Aristotle, Buffier, Reid, Stewart, and Hamil- 
 ton?" I admire greatly the ability, dialectic and deductive, 
 of Mr. Mill. It is peculiarly a clear, a penetrating under- 
 standing ; but it is not distinguished by wide sympathies and 
 philosophic comprehensiveness. He does admire Plato and 
 Coleridge ; but it is because the former had so much of the 
 search-spirit and the undermining dialectic ; and because the 
 latter was dissolving the old philosophy and theology of Brit- 
 ain. I am convinced that he has seen so many contradic- 
 tions in Hamilton, because he could not always take into 
 view the full sweep of his massive, but at times ill-constructed 
 system. When he commends an opponent, as he does Ham- 
 ilton often and Mansel at times, it is when he sees they are 
 travelling towards the point which he himself has reached. 
 It is surely conceivable that he may have been so filled with 
 his own system, inherited from a beloved father, and cher- 
 ished resolutely at the time when the tide was all against him, 
 and that it may now bulk so largely before his eyes, as to 
 make him to some extent incapable of appreciating, or even 
 thoroughly comprehending, those who look on things from 
 a different point of view. 
 
 I do believe, that, because of my philosophic experience, 
 I am able, at least, to look at both sides of the question. I 
 claim to understand the "maxims" of this philosophy, — ex- 
 cept, indeed, that I confess to a difficulty in apprehending 
 how, on his principles, he reaches the idea of extension, or 
 a reasonable conviction of the existence of his fellow-men. 
 Possibly I may be able to judge of the " tendencies " of it
 
 RESEMBLANCE TO CONDILLAC. 439 
 
 as coolly and impartially as those who have constructed it. 
 He has himself characterized the Sensational philosophy of 
 France, as " the shallowest set of doctrines which Avere ever 
 passed off upon a cultivated age as a complete psychological 
 system, the ideology of Condillac and his school ; a system 
 which affected to resolve all the phenomena of the human 
 mind into sensation, by a process which essentially consisted 
 in merely calling all states of mind however heterogeneous 
 by that name" (Discuss, vol. i. p. 410). But Condillac, 
 as a philosophic thinker, a scholar, and a writer, was equal 
 to Mr. Mill, and was quite as acute in arguing against 
 Descartes and Malebranche, as Mill is against Whewell 
 and Hamilton, and had much the same kind of influence 
 in France a hundred years ago that Mr. Mill is now ex- 
 ercising in England. I am convinced that Condillac had no 
 idea that any evil consequences would follow from his phil- 
 osophic theories. Most of his works were written for the 
 purpose of training a prince of Parma : he believes that 
 there is a God ; " that the laws which reason prescribes to 
 us are the laws which God has imposed on us ; and that it 
 is here that the morality of actions is completed. There is, 
 therefore, a natural law ; that is to say, a law which has its 
 foundation on the will of God " ( Truite des Animaux, 
 c. vii.) . I admit that the two systems, that of Condillac and 
 that of Mill, are not the same; but it could be shown that 
 they have a much closer correspondence in themselves, and 
 in their logical and practical consequences, than Mr. Mill 
 will be disposed to allow. Both derive our ideas from 
 sensation ; but Mr. Mill takes credit for adding association, 
 and says we <iat our ideas from sensation by association. I>ut 
 it can be shown that Condillac had not overlooked associa- 
 tion. I find Dugald Stewart remarking, "Condillao's earliest 
 work appeared three years before the publication of 'Hart- 
 ley's Theory.' It is entitled 'Essai sur VOrigine dea Con- 
 naissn iters Humaine, Ouvrage oil Von r6dait d un eeul 
 principe tout ce qui concerne Ventendement humnin.'' This 
 seul principe is the association of ideas. The account which
 
 440 APPENDIX. 
 
 both authors give of the transformation of sensations into 
 ideas is substantially the same" (Dissert., P. ii., S. 6). 
 But the truth is, both had been anticipated by Hutcheson, 
 who had expounded the general doctrine, and by Hume, who 
 had used the doctrine of associations to account for beliefs 
 supposed to be innate. Certain it is, that Condillac speaks 
 of association of ideas which are the effect of a foreign im- 
 pression : " Celles-la sont souvent si bien cimente"es, qu'il 
 nous est impossible de les ddtruire." "En g£n6ral les im- 
 pressions que nous e'prouvons dans differentes circonstances 
 nous font lier des idees que nous ne sommes plus maitres de 
 se*parer." Mr. Mill will, I believe, be astonished to find 
 here his father's law of Inseparable Association. Not only 
 so, but he accounts by this law, like Mr. Mill, for what is 
 supposed to be inne ou naturel (see " Connaissances Hum.," 
 c. ix.). I doubt much whether Mr. Mill is entitled to as- 
 sume such airs in denouncing the sensational school of 
 France. His ideas, generated out of sensation by associa- 
 tion, do not differ so widely after all from the "transformed 
 sensations " of Condillac. Both philosophies, when we trace 
 them sufficiently far down, are found to rest on nothing more 
 solid than sensations with their associations ; only Mr. 
 Mill is driven at times to bring in something inexplicable, of 
 which nothing can be known. Let Mr. Mill's philosophy 
 have as long time to work. as that of Condillac had, from 
 the middle of last century to the French Revolution, and 
 
 [ through^ the imperial s way of Bonaparte, and I— helieve that 
 " s ensation plus association " will not be f ound to have any 
 more elevating effect on prevailing thought and sentiment 
 
 I tha n " transform ed sensations " JiacL4__finly__I cherish tho 
 hope that in this country the tendency will be counteracted 
 by the higher philosophy . and theology still abiding among; 
 us.
 
 HIS GENESIS OF MIND. 441 
 
 Article II. Mr. Mill's Theory of Mind. (pp. 88-111.) 
 
 It falls in with the order of my examination to begin with 
 his account of mind, which he had resolved into " a series of 
 feelings with a background of possibilities of feeling," re- 
 quiring the farther statement that it is " a series aware of 
 itself as past and future." He had acknowledged that this 
 "reduces us to the alternative of believing that the Mind, 
 or Effo, is something different from any series of feelings or 
 possibilities of them, or of accepting the paradox that some- 
 thing which, ex hypothesis is but a series of feelings, can be 
 aware of itself as a series ; " that his theory on this subject 
 has "intrinsic difficulties, and that he is here face to face 
 with a final inexplicability." Now he has told us (Logic, 
 III. iv. 1), that "the question, What are the laws of na- 
 ture ? may be stated thus : what are the fewest and simplest 
 assumptions which, being gi'anted, the whole existing order 
 of nature would result?" Now I believe that the single and 
 simple assumption to be made on this subject is, that in 
 every conscious act there is a knowledge of self as acting, 
 and in every remembrance of a past experience of self, as 
 having had the experience. Here we are face to face with 
 a final fact, which needs no explicability. But Mr, Mill 
 will not state it thus, and he is flitting round and round the 
 point without alighting on it. lie affirms that there "is no 
 ground for believing that the Ego is an original presenta- 
 tion of consciousness." Now I admit that an abstract Ego 
 is not given in self-consciousness; but the concrete Ego is; 
 that is, the Ego as thinking, feeling, pr in some other act. 
 He allows, in his new edition, that he docs not profess to 
 have adequately accounted for the belief in mind. Let us 
 see how he seeks to bear up his theory in the Appendix 
 which he has added : — 
 
 " The fact of recognizing a sensation, of being reminded of it, 
 and, as we say, remembering that it lias been felt before, is the 
 simplest and most elementary fact of memory; and the inexplicable
 
 442 APPENDIX. 
 
 tie or law, the organic union (as Professor Masson calls it), which 
 connects the present consciousness with the past one, of which it 
 reminds me, is as near, I think, as we can get to a positive con- 
 ception of Self. That there is something real in this tie, real as 
 the sensations themselves, and not a mere product of the laws of 
 thought, without any fact corresponding to it, I hold to be un- 
 dubitable." " Whether we are directly conscious of it in the act 
 of remembrance, as we are of succession in the fact of having 
 successive sensations, or whether, according to the opinion of Kant, 
 we are not conscious of self at all, but are compelled to assume it 
 as a necessary condition of memory, I do not undertake to decide. 
 But this original element, which has .no community of nature with 
 any of the things answering to our names, and to which we cannot 
 give any name but its own peculiar one without implying some 
 false or ungrounded theory, is the Ego or Self. As such, I ascribe 
 a reality to the Ego — to my own mind — different from that real 
 existence as a Permanent Possibility, which is the only reality I 
 acknowledge in matter." " We are forced to apprehend every part 
 of the series as linked with the other parts by something in com- 
 mon, which is not the feelings themselves any more than the succes- 
 sion of the feelings is the feelings themselves ; and as that which is 
 the same in the first as in the second, in the second as in the third, 
 in the third as in the fourth, and so on, must be the same in the 
 first and in the fiftieth, this common element is a permanent ele- 
 ment. But beyond this, we can affirm nothing of it except the 
 states of consciousness themselves." — (pp. 256, 257.) 
 
 There are plenty of assumptions and admissions in this pas- 
 sage, far more than the defender of intuitive psychology is 
 obliged to make. There is an "original element," to which 
 he ascribes a " reality," and a real existence ; a " permanent 
 element," something common to the feelings, "which is not 
 the feelings themselves, ; " the same in the first and fiftieth 
 state of consciousness, and to which we can give no other 
 name than the Ego, or Self. Now what is this but the per- 
 manent mind or Ego of the metaphysicians, with its various 
 modifications, revealed by consciousness? I certainly do not 
 stand up for the doctrine of Kant, according to whom we are 
 not conscious of self, but are required to assume it as a con- 
 dition. I prefer a much simpler doctrine, — that we are
 
 HIS THEORY OF MIND. 443 
 
 conscious of self in every mental act, conscious of self erriev- 
 ing in every feeling of grief, of self remembering in every 
 act of memory. Admit this clearly and frankly, and I am 
 satisfied. But I am satisfied because in this we have two 
 great truths, — that man knows, and that he knows real exist- 
 ence, that is, self, as existing. But the disciple of the doc- 
 trine of Nescience — that is, of the doctrine that we can know 
 nothing of the nature of things — ever draws back from such 
 a plain statement, as inconsistent with his favorite theory ; 
 and he talks instead of an "inexplicable tie," or "law," or 
 "organic union," or " link to connect the facts," — language 
 which is metaphorical at the best, and never does express the 
 fact, which is a very simple one, though full of meaning. 
 
 We are here at the place where Mr. Mill is in greatest 
 difficulties, and feels himself to be so. He tells us that "the 
 one fact which the Psychological Theory cannot explain, is 
 the fact of Memory (for Expectation I hold to be, psycho- 
 logically and logically, a consequence of Memory)." I have 
 shown, I think, that he is for ever assuming, without per- 
 ceiving it, other primordial facts ; and that there are other 
 facts equally entitled to be regarded as primordial, and, on 
 the same ground, " no reason can be given for it which does 
 not presuppose the belief, and assume it to be well grounded." 
 But let us specially inquire, What is involved in the assump- 
 tion of memory? I had objected, that Mr. Mill was not 
 able to give an account of (he genesis of the idea which, as 
 consciousness attests, we have of Time. Let us look at the 
 account lie now gives of the idea (p. 247), and then we shall 
 be prepared to look at the way in which he generates it. lie 
 tells us that by Time is to be " understood an indefinite suc- 
 cession of successions." This does not make the matter 
 clearer; the more so, as he has no things to succeed each 
 other except sensations, which are only for the moment. 
 " The only ultimate facts or primitive elements in Time are 
 Before and After, which (the knowledge of opposites being 
 one) involve the notion of Neither before nor after — i.e., 
 simultaneous." 1 do not look on this account as a correct oi.e
 
 •Ill APPENDIX. 
 
 of the tacts of our experience. We get the idea of Time as a 
 primitive fact in memory : we remember every event as hap- 
 pening in time past, and can then abstract the time from the 
 event. I certainly do not give in to the principle that 
 '' the knowledge of opposites is one," for I hold that the 
 knowledge of opposites is the knowledge of opposites, — 
 that is, of things opposed ; and I do not allow that Before 
 and After are opposites : they are rather continuous. But 
 we are more interested to inquire, What account does he 
 a'ive of our idea and conviction as to this infinite Succes- 
 sion of Successions ; this Before, and After, and Simul- 
 taneous? His answering is hesitating, and it is unsatis- 
 factory, ft brings out the weak points of the theory, and 
 the awkwardness of the attempt made to bolster it up. He 
 admits, " I have never pretended to account by association 
 for the idea of Time." " Neither do I decide whether that 
 inseparable attribute of our sensations is annexed to them by 
 the laws of the mind or given in the sensations ; nor whether, 
 at this great height of abstraction, the distinction does not 
 disappear." He admits that Time is the inseparable attribute 
 of our sensations. He admit? that we have the idea. We 
 ask, Whence it comes? Let us look at the alternatives be- 
 tween which he hesitates. Our idea of Time " may be given 
 in the sensations themselves." Observe how he is giving to 
 the sensations a new and a totally diverse element, in the 
 very manner of the school of Condillac. An idea implying 
 indefinite successiveness, — a Before and an After, — all given 
 in sensations, which we thought were confined to the pres- 
 ent ! ! Surely this beats anything found in the " shallowest 
 set of doctrines ever passed off upon a cultivated age," and 
 f ' which consisted in merely calling all states of mind, how- 
 ever heterogeneous, by that name," — that is, the name of 
 sensations. If he take the other alternative, then he is giv 
 ing to the mind the power of generating in the course of its 
 exercise, a totally new idea — a view utterly inconsistent with 
 his own empirical theory, and the very view of Leibnitz, who 
 makes intellectus ij)se a source of ideas. No wonder that he
 
 HIS THEORY OF BCDY. 445 
 
 seems unwilling to be fixed on either horn, find would fain 
 mount up into some height of abstraction, where the distinc- 
 tion may disappear. But the facts do not lie in any great 
 height of abstraction, but in the low level of our every-day 
 consciousness, and can be expressed only by giving sensation 
 its proper place, and time its proper place, both being 
 equally primordial facts. 
 
 Article III. Mr. Milts Theory of Body. (pp. 112-158.) 
 
 I now come to a more perplexing subject, in which I admit 
 there is room for difference of opinion, though no room for 
 that of Mr. Mill ; that is, the idea and the conviction which 
 we have in regard to Body. As the conclusion of his subtile 
 disquisitions, he had defined Matter as the Permanent, Possi- 
 bility of Sensation. In the added Appendix, he declares 
 clearly that there is no proof that we perceive it by our 
 senses, or that the notion and belief of it come to us by an 
 original law of our nature ; and that " all we are conscious 
 of, may be accounted for without supposing that wo perceive 
 Matter by our senses, and that the notion and belief may 
 have come to us by the laws of our constitution, without 
 being a revelation of any objective reality." 
 
 lie admits (p. 245) that his opponents have referred his 
 theory to the right test, in aiming to show that "its attempt 
 to account for the belief in matter implies or requires that the 
 belief should always exist as a condition of its own produc- 
 tion. Tin; objection is true, if conclusive." But he adds, 
 "They are not very particular about the proof of its truth ; 
 they one and all think their ease made out, if I employ in 
 any part of the exposition the language of common life." I 
 deny for myself that I have tried to make out my case by such 
 an argument. I have indeed expressed a wish that he would 
 "employ language consistent with his theory, ami we should 
 then he in a position to judge whether he is building it up 
 fairly." I believe that any plausibility possessed by it ie de- 
 rived from his expressing it in common language, which
 
 446 APPENDIX. 
 
 enables him to introduce, surreptitiously and unconsciously, 
 the ideas wrapt up in it. When he and Mr. Bain speak of 
 "a sweep of the arm," and "a movement of the eye," it is 
 difficult for others, perhaps even for themselves, to think of 
 the arm and the eye as mere momentary sensations, as uncx- 
 tended, and as not moving in space. I was convinced that 
 if the theory were only expressed in language not implying 
 extension in the original sensation, its insufficiency would at 
 once be seen. He has now, in a long appendix, labored to 
 construct his theory in language consistent with it. and the 
 baldness of it at once appears. 
 
 My objection proceeded on a far deeper principle than the 
 language employed by Mr. Mill. I appealed to conscious- 
 ness, not as Hamilton would have done, to settle the whole 
 question at once, but to testify to a matter of fact, which Mr. 
 Mill would admit to fall immediately under its cognizance. 
 Consciousness declares that we have now an idea of some- 
 thing extended ; extended on three dimensions, — length, 
 breadth, and depth ; and, I may add, of extended objects 
 moving in space. It is admitted, then, that we have this 
 idea, and I defy Mr. Mill to revolve this idea into any ele- 
 ment allowed by him, — in fact, into any element not involv- 
 ing extension. He tells us that the whole variety of the facts 
 of nature, as we know it, is given in the mere existence of 
 our sensations, and in the laws or order of their succession. 
 But from which of these does he get extension ? Surely not 
 from mere sensation, which, as not being extended, cannot 
 give what it does not possess. As certainly not from laws 
 or order in successive sensations, which, as they do not pos- 
 se— it individually, cannot have it in their cumulation, any 
 more than an addition of zeros could give us a positive num- 
 ber. We have one more primordial fact, not only not ac- 
 counted for by his theory, but utterly inconsistent with it. 
 
 "We must examine his account of matter a little more 
 narrowly. It is a possibility of sensations. Whence this 
 dark background of possibilities which he cannot get rid of, 
 which he cannot get behind, to which, indeed, he cannot get
 
 HIS THEORY OF BODY. 447 
 
 ap? To account for the phenomena, he says, thev come in 
 groups, and by rigid laws of causation. Whence these co- 
 existing groups and unvariable successions? Do thev come 
 in obedience to mental laws, say, to the laws of association ? 
 These laws are represented by him as being contiguity and 
 resemblance. Do these create the groups and successions? 
 I scarcely think that Mr. Mill will assert that they do. I 
 remember when travelling in the midst of a group of sensa- 
 tions called the Alps, thinking only of my wretchedly wet 
 condition, I was suddenly startled by a group and succession 
 of sensations such as I had never experienced before, and 
 which I referred to an avalanche falling a mile off. Whence 
 this effect? It was not produced by any volition of mine. 
 Surely, Mr. Mill will not argue that it was produced by con- 
 tiguity or resemblance, or any of the known laws of associa- 
 tion. Whence, then? If he says something within me, 
 then I say we have here a set of laws of a very curious and 
 complex character, unnoticed by the theorist. But it can be 
 shown that the facts cannot be explained by laws within me. 
 The law of cause and effect is, that the same co-exi>tin<>- 
 agencies are followed by the same consequences. But I 
 might be under the same group of sensations as I was when 
 the avalanche fell, without the sounds which I heard Follow- 
 ing. Does not this require us to posit something out of t he 
 series of sensations to account for the phenomena in the 
 series ; and this something obeying laws Independent alto- 
 gether of our sensations and associations. If we once posit 
 such an external, extra serial agency, we cannot withdraw it 
 when it becomes inconvenient; we must go on with it, we 
 must inquire into all that is involved in it hv the laws of in- 
 duction. This vras the argument that convinced Brown, — 
 wlio, however, called in to guarantee it an intuitive convic- 
 tion of cause and effect, that there must he an external world. 
 \\ hether the argument is convincing, on the supposition that 
 the belief in causation is not intuitive, I will not take it upon 
 myself to say. I am not sure; that the infant mind could 
 arrive, in the midst of such complications, at a knowledge of
 
 448 APPENDIX. 
 
 the law of cause and effect. Finding many sensations not 
 following from any law in the mind, it could not, I believe, 
 reach a law of invariable succession. But then, it is said, it 
 would refer them to something out of the mind. But with 
 an experience only of something in the mind, how could it 
 argue any thing out of the mind, of which outness it has as 
 vet no idea in the sensations or order of sensations ? Would 
 it not, in fact, be shut up in the shell of the Ego, and find in 
 that Ego most of its sensations without a cause? Or rather, 
 would not an infant mind, endowed with only the powers 
 allowed by Mr. Mill, speedily become extinguished? But if 
 it could live, and discover the law of cause and effect, as Mr. 
 Mill thinks, that law seems to require us to believe in an 
 external something, obevin^ laws of co-existence and succes- 
 sion independent of the series of sensations, and we should 
 have to take this with all its logical consequences. This 
 gives us Matter not as a possibility of sensations, but an ex- 
 ternal something obeying laws of co-existence and succession, 
 and the cause of sensations in us. 
 
 The theory would, after all, be utterly inadequate, for it 
 would not account for the most prominent thing in our con- 
 ception of matter ; namely, that it is extended, which we could 
 never argue, or apprehend, or even imagine, if we knew it 
 merely as the cause of unextended sensations. I therefore 
 reject it entirely. But the consequences I have sketched in 
 last paragraph follow, if we adopt the theory. Under this 
 view, I was entitled to point out an oversight in Mr. Mill's 
 account of the properties of matter, which he represents as 
 being resistance, extension, and figure ; thus omitting, I said, 
 those powers mentioned by Locke, by which one body oper- 
 ates upon another. " Thus the sun has a power to make wax 
 white, and fire to make lead fluid." When I said so, I had 
 entered a good way, notwithstanding his insinuation to the 
 contrary, into the cloud of Mr. Mill's mode of thought, — 
 farther, perhaps, than I was welcome. He now, in replying 
 to me (p. 248), is obliged to talk of one group of possibili- 
 ties of sensations, "destroying or modifying another such
 
 EIS THEORY OF BODY. 449 
 
 group ; " and this certainly not by laws of sensation or asso- 
 ciation, but by laws acting independently of any discoverable 
 cause in the series which constitutes mind. We have now 
 got, by logical consequence, from Mr. Mill's theory, a con- 
 siderably complicated view of Matter, as a group of causes 
 obeying laws of co-existence and unconditional succession, 
 and one group influencing another, or destroying it, and all 
 independent of any volitions of mine, or laws in my mind. 
 The idea is, after all, inadequate, as it does not include exten- 
 sion ; but it is certainly utterly inconsistent with his theory, 
 that the notion and belief of Matter " may have come unto us 
 by the laws of our constitution, without being a revelation of 
 any objective reality." 
 
 This is confirmed by the language he uses in answering 
 Mr. O. Hanlon. He admits " that there is a sphere beyond 
 my consciousness;" and "the laws which obtain in my con- 
 sciousness also obtain in the sphere beyond it." This, of 
 course, refers to our conviction as to there being other minds 
 as well as our own (p. 253). I am not sure that his argu- 
 ment for the existence of such minds-is conclusive. 
 
 " I am aware, by experience, of a group of Permanent Possi- 
 bilities of Sensation, which I call my body, and which my expe- 
 rience shows to be an universal condition of every part of my thread 
 of consciousness. I am also aware of a great number of other 
 groups, rcsemhling the one that I call my body, but which have no 
 connection, such as that has, with the remainder of my thread of 
 consciousness. This disposes me to draw an inductive inference, 
 that those other groups are connected witli other threads of con- 
 sciousness, as mine is with my own. If the evidence stopped here, 
 tin; inference; would lie but an hypothesis, reaching only to the 
 inferior degree of inductive evidence called Analogy. The evidence, 
 however, does not stop here; lor, having made the supposition that 
 real feelings, though not experienced by myself, lie behind these 
 phenomena of my own consciousness, which, from the resemblance 
 to my body, I call other human bodies. I find that my subsequent 
 consciousness pre.-eiits those very sensations, of speech heard, of 
 movements and other outward demeanor seen, and so forth, which, 
 being the effects or consequents of actual feelings in my own case, 
 
 2'J
 
 450 APPENDIX. 
 
 I should expect to follow upon those other hypothetical feelings, if 
 they really exist: and thus the hypothesis is verified. It is thus 
 proved inductively, that there is a sphere beyond my consciousness : 
 i.e.. that there are other consciousnesses beyond it; for there exists 
 no parallel evidence in regard to matter." 
 
 Now, I am not sure that an infant mind, with only the 
 furniture allowed by Mr. Mill, and without a knowledge 
 direct or by legitimate inference of body, and apart from an 
 intuitive law of cause and effect, could conduct such a pro- 
 cess. The actual attainments of every mature mind show, 
 by a legitimate inference, that there must be more capacities 
 and inlets of ideas than Mr. Mill supposes. But, passing 
 this, let us examine the legitimacy of the process. There is 
 first the difficulty, already urged, of getting out of the sensa- 
 tions which have no outness, to the conception of an " outer 
 sphere." Then, is it not conceivable that the notion and 
 belief in regard to other people's mind may have come to us 
 by the laws of our constitution, without implying any objec- 
 tive reality? And if so, are we not, by the law of parcimony, 
 shut up to a solitary egoism as the more philosophical theory ? 
 that is, I may look on myself as a series of sensations aware 
 of itself, with possibilities of sensation in groups and succes- 
 sions, among which I place what would be called, in the lan- 
 guage I employ, my fellow-creatures. No doubt, another 
 hypothesis may be made, and seems to have its verifications ; 
 but the simple hypothesis, which explains all by the laws of 
 my constitution, is to be preferred, if it explains the phe- 
 nomena of other people's minds, as I believe it to do quite as 
 satisfactorily as it does our notion ot and belief in Matter. 
 If we draw back from this, and stand upon the hypothesis 
 and verification, then I urge that a like process requires me 
 to postulate, that these groups of possibilities in my body 
 and beyond it have an objective reality independent of me, 
 and obeying laws of their own, and not laws of my constitu- 
 tion. Of the conceivable conclusions reached, Mr. Mill's 
 seem to me the most hesitating and incongruous. He must, 
 I suspect, either logically remain for ever within the sphere
 
 EXPERIMENTAL CASES. 451 
 
 of the Fgo, with possibilities he knows not what ; or, if he 
 once go beyond it, he must include not only other minds, 
 but material objects following laws independent of our sub- 
 jective constitution or perceptions. 
 
 Article IV. Experimental Physiological Cases, (pp. 152-180.) 
 
 We have now to look at the attempts which Mr. Mill has 
 made to turn aside the force of the reported experimental 
 cases which I had urged against him. To prove that the eye 
 is immediately cognizant, not merely of color, but of surface, 
 I had adduced the case reported by Dr. Franz, of Leipsic, 
 which Mr. Mill seems never to have heard of before, though 
 it was given in the Transactions of the Royal Society for 
 1841. A youth born blind had his sight restored at the age 
 of seventeen ; and when a sheet of paper, on which two strong 
 black lines had been drawn, the one horizontal and the other 
 vertical, was placed before him at the distance of about three 
 feet, on opening his eye, "after attentive examination, he 
 called the lines by their right denominations." What? asks 
 Mr. Mill. It is clear he called them horizontal and vertical, 
 having got the terms by his mathematical education, and 
 knowing what were the things by the sense of touch. Mr. 
 Mill allows (pp. 287-290) that this case, if fairly reported, 
 would require a considerable modification of his doctrine, and 
 that it looks like an experimental proof , that something which 
 admits of being called extension "may be perceived by sight 
 at the very first use of the eyes." But he tries to throw 
 doubts on the accuracy of the report, evidently because it runs 
 counter to his theory. It is a suspicious circumstance, he says, 
 that the youth knew a cube and a sphere placed before him 
 not to he drawings, of which he could have no idea, — as if 
 he could not have had some idea, of what persons seeing meant 
 by drawings, through tin; descriptions which they hail given. 
 And if there be any truth in the case at all, it is clear that 
 the youth perceived at once vertical and horizontal lines, 
 squares, circles, triangles, and the difference between the
 
 452 APPENDIX. 
 
 cube and the sphere. Mr. Nunneley's case proves the same 
 thing : the hoy could at once perceive " the differences in the 
 shape of objects," though he could not tell, as to the cube and 
 the sphere, which was which. It appears that, in this case, it 
 was some time before the boy could identify his perceptions 
 of touch with those of sight. This is in accordance with what 
 I have stated. The youth in Dr. Franz's case could do it 
 more rapidly than the boy in Nunneley's case, because the 
 former had a mathematical training ; but even he required 
 examination and consideration, so that the two cases exactly 
 correspond. There is nothing odd in the circumstance that 
 Franz's youth could not form, from what he saw, "the idea 
 of a square and disc, until he perceived a sensation of what he 
 saw in the points of his fingers, as if he really touched the 
 object ; " for it was thus he identified the perceptions which 
 he was now receiving with those which he formerly had. Mr. 
 Mill will only admit after all, that, though the youth is re- 
 ported as seeing lines, circles, triangles, yet this "does not 
 prove that we perceive extension by sight, but only that we 
 have discriminative sensations of sight corresponding to all 
 the diversities of superficial extension ; " — as if Hamilton 
 had not demonstrated that discriminate sensations of color 
 imply the perception of bounding lines, and therefore of 
 figure. I do not know if the history of speculative philosophy 
 affords a more startling case of the determination of a theorist 
 not to found his theory on facts, but to twist the facts to suit 
 his theory, which he is determined to adhere to at all hazards. 
 This may be the proper place for referring to the now 
 famous case of Platner, which both Hamilton and Mill have 
 been using, but which in fact helps neither, and perplexes 
 both. Platner, without giving a detail of the facts, comes to 
 the conclusion that " touch is altogether incompetent to afford 
 us the representation of extension and space, and is not even 
 cognizant of local exteriority," and that a person born blind 
 could have no idea of extension. These observations do not 
 agree with those of any other person I am acquainted with. 
 Mr. Mill was obliged to say, that Platner " had put a false
 
 EXPERIMENTAL CASES. 453 
 
 color on the matter, when he says his patient had no percep- 
 tion of extension." He now tells us that he does not agree 
 with Platner, that " the notions of figure and distance come 
 originally from sight" (p. 280). But if Platner's case dues 
 not prove this, it proves nothing. I believe it does prove 
 nothing. It is quite inconsistent with the simple experiments, 
 which, with the aid of Mr. Kinghan, I wrought on young 
 children born blind. I have an idea that Platner was led 
 astray by not distinguishing between the idea of extension, 
 which is original both to sight and touch, with the power of 
 measuring it, which is acquired. Mr. Mill admits all that I 
 claim, and all that Platner denies, "that a person born blind 
 can acquire, by a mere gradual process, all that is in our 
 notion of space, except the visible picture," that is, the color 
 in the picture. 
 
 To show that we intuitively know our bodily frame as 
 extended, by the sense of touch, I had quoted at length from 
 the cases adduced by Miiller. According to that illustrious 
 physiologist, we localize our affections received by the senses ; 
 and the law of our nature is, that, in touch or feeling, we 
 place the sensation at the spot where the nerve normally ter- 
 minates. It is thus, I believe, that we acquire a knowledge 
 of our frame as having one part out of another, and as ex- 
 tended. All this I hold to be original and intuitive, — so 
 strongly so, that persons who have their limbs cut off, have, 
 ten or twenty years after, a sense of the integrity of the limb. 
 Mr. Mill says he can explain this by association of ideas. I 
 deny that he can; for surely such a length of time was suffi- 
 cient to destroy the old association, which had nothing to 
 keep it alive, and to create a new one. He tells me, that, 
 according to my theory, the; pain should have been felt in the 
 stump. I believe, on the contrary, that, after so long an 
 experience without a limb, this should have been the case, 
 according to .Mr. Mill's theory. My theory — no, not my 
 
 theory, but Midler's — is, that there is an original law which 
 leads us to localize the affection at the spot where the nerve 
 in its healthy and proper action terminates. When, in the
 
 454 APPENDIX. 
 
 restoration of a nose, a flap of skin is turned down from the 
 forehead, and made to unite with the stump of the nose, the 
 new nose thus formed has, as long as the isthmus of skin by 
 which it maintains its connections remains undivided, the same 
 sensations as if it were still in the forehead. This, Mr. Mill 
 says, should not be, according to my theory ; and there is a 
 good deal of self-complacent chuckling over me, as if my 
 facts overthrew my theory. This implies a misunderstanding 
 of the facts. According to the law, as I have expounded it, 
 as long as the nerve is imbedded in the isthmus of skin taken 
 from the forehead, it should be felt in the forehead. Mr. Mill 
 takes care not to quote the further fact, that is, " when the 
 communication of the nervous fibres of the new nose with 
 those of the forehead is cut off by the division of the isthmus 
 of skin, the sensations are of course no longer referred to the 
 forehead ; the sensibility of the nose is at first absent, but is 
 gradually developed." According to the association theory, 
 the affection should have been felt in the forehead, not till 
 the isthmus was cut, but till the old association Avas gone ; and 
 this, according to Mr. Mill, might not have been for twenty 
 years. Be it observed, that, when the flesh is cut off from the 
 forehead, and the nerve comes to have its normal position in 
 the nose, the sensation is felt there. My theory is thus sim- 
 ply the expression of the facts. But whatever doubt there 
 may be about these phenomena, there can be none about 
 other facts which I have adduced. Whatever dispute there 
 may be as to cases in which there has been an association 
 formed between a limb once existing but now lost, there can 
 be none as to persons who never had the limb, and in whose 
 case the association could not have been formed, but who are 
 reported as having a sense of it. Professor Valentin men 
 tions cases which I have quoted, which show, "that individu- 
 als who are the subjects of congenital imperfection, or the 
 absence of the extremities, have, nevertheless, the internal 
 sensations of such limbs in their perfect state." It is curious 
 that Mr. Mill has taken no notice of these decisive cases 
 which I have adduced as setting the whole question at rest.
 
 EXPERIMENTAL CASES. 455 
 
 Mr. Mill dilates on two cases, to which I have referred with- 
 out attaching much importance to them. The shrinking of 
 the frame when boiling liquid is poured down the throat, 
 seems to show that we localize the pain at a spot of which 
 we cannot know the site by touch or experience. Mr. Mill 
 thinks the action purely automatic (p. 303). Now I am 
 disposed to think that there may be an action of the will di- 
 rected to the seat of sensation. I believe that at a very early 
 age, and long before they have any acquired perceptions of 
 locality, they will indicate vaguely the seat of the pain. My 
 instance may not be the best, it is rather negative : " if a child 
 is wounded in the arm, it will not hold out the foot." This 
 should not be construed as meaning that the infant will sys- 
 tematically hold out its foot ; for this would suppose that it 
 has much more knowledge than it can yet have of mother or 
 doctor watching it. But at an early age, there are apparently 
 voluntary movements which enable the mother and doctor 
 to discover the seat of the pain. I agree with Mr. Mill, 
 ''there are some difficulties, not yet completely resolved, re- 
 specting the localization of our internal pains, for the solution 
 of which we need more careful and intelligent observation of 
 infants." The question is set at rest, not by such a ensr, 
 which I am prepared to abandon, if disprove!), without 
 the least injury to my argument, but by the fact reported 
 by Professor Valentin, which Mr. Mill has declined to 
 notice.* 
 
 * In afoot-note I had uttered a sentence in regard to a case quoted by Mill from 
 Hamilton, who gets it from Maine de Biran, who takes it from a report of [ley Regit 
 in regard to a patient, who, though he retained a sense of pain, had lost the power 
 of localizing the feeling. I pronounced the case " valueless, as evidently the functions 
 of the nervous app:i i ranged." Mr. Mill allows that this single case is 
 
 7i. it conclusive (p. 295); ami with this I would have been satisfied, had he not gone 
 on to argue from it that '• localization doee not depend on tin' same conditions with 
 the sensations themselves." lie it so: in the normal state, the nerves localize the 
 feeling. " The patient, as In- gradually recovered the use oi hi limbs, gradually 
 recovered tin- power of localizing his -> n ation " I 'l" nol attach much importance 
 to the following reports of the experience of insane pei onsj but they are worthy 
 of being mentioned, as showing how intimately our abiding perception of our 
 bodily frame is bound up with the $kin aenu andil localizing tendency. " i woman," 
 who-.- . ,i e i qu ".I till-, "had complete ana the ia "i the surface .if the skin: she 
 
 believed that the devil had carried Off her Imdv. A soldier who was severely
 
 ALG APPENDIX. 
 
 Mr. Mill thinks that the eye originally gives us only color 
 and not extension*. He does not allow — though the cases 
 now adduced seem to prove it — that we have original per- 
 ceptions of our bodily frame as affected. How, then, ac- 
 cording to him, do we get the idea of extension? Following 
 Dr. Brown, he thinks that we get it by the sweep of the 
 arm in space ; and he quotes, with approbation, Professor 
 Bain's method of working out this hypothesis. In my Exam- 
 ination of Mill, I endeavored to meet this by psychological 
 considerations, and showed that a sweep of the arm or leg, 
 considered merely as a group of sensations without exten- 
 sion, could not give us the idea of extension. I was not 
 aware then that a German metaphysician, in examining the 
 theory of Brown, had entirely disproved it by an experi- 
 mental case. According to this theory, a person born without 
 arms or legs could have no idea of space ; but Schopen- 
 hauer has brought forward the case of Eva Lauk, an 
 Esthonian girl fourteen years old, born without arms or legs, 
 but who, according to her mother, had developed herself 
 intellectually quite as rapidly as her brothers and sisters, and 
 without the use of limbs had reached a correct judgment con- 
 senting the magnitude and distance of visible objects quite 
 as quickly as they.* Such a fact as this undermines the 
 theory of the mode in which we gain our idea of extension, 
 and with it the whole philosophic superstructure which Mill 
 and Bain have been rearing with such labored and ill-spent 
 ingenuity. The cases adduced by Miiller, and that reported 
 by Franz, show how it is we get our idea of extension ; 
 we get it by the immediate perception of our bodily frame in 
 
 ■wounded at the battle of Austerlitz considered himself dead from that time ; if he 
 were asked how he was, he invariably replied, that 'Lambert no longer lives; a 
 Ciinnon-ball carried him away at Austerlitz. What you see here is not Lambert, 
 but a badly imitated machine,' — which he failed not to speak of as it. The 
 sensibility of his skin was lost." — Maudsley: Physiology and Pathology of the 
 Mind, p. 242. 
 
 * My attention was called to this case by Mr. Bleeck, in his Mr. J. S. Mill's 
 Psychological Thtory. It is quoted by Schopenhauer in his Die Welt als Wille, vol 
 ii. c. 4, and is taken from Frorieps Neue Notizen aus dem Gebiete de.r Natur, July 
 1S38.
 
 ASSOCIATION NOT A SOURCE OF IDEAS. 457 
 
 feeling, and, by means of the eye perceiving the colored and 
 extended surface before it. There is an impression anions 
 many that somehow Mr. Mill and Mr. Bain have physiology 
 on their side. I confidently affirm that their peculiar philoso- 
 phy is not supported by a single reported case, and that most 
 of the reported cases are entirely against them. 
 
 Article V. Can Association generate New Ideas? (pp. 190-207, 
 
 218-224.) 
 
 I now turn to the discussion of a point of perhaps greater 
 importance than any other started by Mr. Mill's philosophy. 
 It relates to the power of association to generate new ideas, 
 and to produce belief, — in fact, to take the place of judg- 
 ment or the comparison of things. It is, perhaps, the most 
 fatal of all the errors in Mr. Mill's speculations. It was on 
 this account I dwelt so much on it, — more than any other 
 of Mr. Mill's critics. 
 
 The two principal elements out of which Mr. Mill gen- 
 erates all our ideas, are se nsation and association. I h ave 
 found fault with him for never telling us what is involved in 
 sensation. We have seen in this paper that he is not sure 
 whether time may not be involved in it, — a view which 
 would entirely change its nature. He never sees what is 
 really involved in sensation, which is never Felt except a sen- 
 sation of self. But I have a still greater complaint against 
 him for never telling us precisely what association can do, 
 an I what it cannot do. lie everywhere ascribes to it, in lan- 
 guage derived from material action, a chemical power : two 
 ideas coming together may generate a third, different from 
 cither of the original ones. This is making association a source 
 of new ideas. in other words, he gives to mere association 
 a powerwhich the a priori philosophers have given to the 
 intellect ; and surely with much more, justice, for even on the 
 
 supposition that association is the occasion of the new idea, 
 
 the new idea must proceed from some mental capacity joined 
 with association. Mr. Mill does not render anv account of
 
 458 APPENDIX. 
 
 the law, and the limit of this power, supposed to he in asso- 
 ciation. It is a chemical power, but then the chemist can tell 
 us what is the nature and the law of the chemical power ; 
 he says, Put one proportion of oxygen and another proportion 
 of hydrogen in a certain relation, and water is the product. 
 But .Mr. Mill never ventures to express any such definite law ; 
 he leaves every thing vague and loose. He finds certain pecul- 
 iar ideas in the mind, such as those we have in regard to beauty 
 and moral good ; and he satisfies himself with saying that they 
 are generated by sensations and ideas, which have in them- 
 selves no such qualities. I see no reason which he has for 
 claiming for his system of generalizing ideas out of sensation 
 by associations, such a superiority over Condillac's . "jtrans- 
 formed sensa tions ." 
 
 I have denied that association is ever a source of new ideas. 
 I have admitted that as the issue of " long and repeated con- 
 junction, ideas, each it may be with its own peculiar feeling, 
 succeed each other with incalculable rapidity, so that we can- 
 not distinguish between them, and that they may coalesce in 
 a result." " But in the agglomeration there seems to be 
 nothing but the ideas, the feelings, and their appropriate im- 
 pressions coalescing ; there is no new generation — no gen- 
 eration of an idea, nor in the separate parts of the collection." 
 At this point Mr. Mill meets me (pp. 342—3). He is obliged 
 to concede that " facts in the case of ideas cannot be appealed 
 to, for they are the very matter disputed." It clears the 
 ground very much to have this admission. It is implied that 
 there are new ideas generated by the action of the mind ; and 
 Mr. Mill ascribes to association what our profounder philoso- 
 phers have ascribed to the intellect, — making their case more 
 parallel to that of the chemists, who give to their elements a 
 chemical power quite different from the mechanical. Not 
 able to get proof from ideas, he says, "There are abundant 
 instances in sensation." 
 
 "I had thought," he says, "that such an experiment as 
 that of the wheel with seven colors, in which seven sensa- 
 tions following one another very rapidly, become, or at least
 
 ASSOCIATION NOT A SOURCE OF IDEAS. 459 
 
 generate one sensation, and that one totally different from 
 any of the seven sufficiently proved the possibility of what 
 Dr. M'Cosh denies ; but he writes as if he had never heard 
 of the experiment ; " and he refers to the ribbon of light pro- 
 duced by waving rapidly a luminous body. Now, it so hap- 
 pens that I had produced the ring when a boy, by a lighted 
 piece of paper; in my college days, I had seen the experi- 
 ment of the seven colors ; and in my mature life, I have 
 seen a wheel in rapid motion appearing stationary when 
 made visible by instantaneous electric light. But I looked 
 on these as experiments, not in regard to mental states, but 
 simply about light, and the way in which it affects our bodily 
 organs. The wheel under electric light looks stationary, not 
 as the result of successive sensations of motion, for we have 
 not been percipient of the motion, but because we see it only 
 for the instant. In the ribbon of flaming color, the impres- 
 sion produced by each of the rays lingers for a certain short 
 time, till the impression produced by those that rapidly fol- 
 low mixes with it, and the figure on the retina becomes a 
 continuous circle. In the same way with the seven colors, 
 the organic affections mingle and become one, and are trans- 
 mitted as one to the mind, which ceases to have a sensation 
 of the seven colors, and has the sensation of one. This is 
 not a case of seven separate mental sensations generating a 
 new one. As long as the wheel with the seven colors ro- 
 tates slowly, so that there is time for the one set of rays to 
 disappear from the retina before the other overtakes them, 
 there are seven sensations, but no eighth generated by the 
 seven. If the wheel is seen by instantaneous light, seven 
 colors are seen, but no eighth. Mr. Mill has stated the 
 facts precisely in an analogous case furnished by the sense 
 of hearing (p. 618) : " When a number of sounds in per- 
 fect harmony strike the ear simultaneously, we have but a 
 single impression, — we perceive but one mass of sound." 
 Mr. Mill was bound to produce a case of two or more sep- 
 arate mental affections producing a new one never before ex- 
 perienced ; and lie has produced simply a case of the blending
 
 460 APPENDIX. 
 
 of rays of light in retinal or nervous action. Again facta 
 fail him, and he is left with a baseless hypothesis. 
 
 Article VI. Impossibility of reaching Positive Truth. 
 (pp. 224-230.) 
 
 This brings us to the consideration of the now notorious 
 examples which he adduces of the most certain principles of 
 arithmetic and geometry being believable in other circum- 
 stances : that is, in the possibility of our believing that 2 -J- 2 
 may be 5 ; that parallel lines may meet ; that any two right 
 lines being produced will meet at two points ; and that two 
 or more bodies may exist in the same place. These cases are 
 taken from Essaijs by a Barrister, who did not profess to be 
 a metaphysician, who did not know what to make of them, 
 except that he thought they were fitted to lessen our assurance 
 of the cei'tainty of objective truth. Mr. Mill now makes the 
 following singular addition to his statement of the two first of 
 these cases : " Hardly any part of the present volume has been 
 so maltreated by so great a number of critics, as the illustra- 
 tions here quoted from an able and highly instructed contem- 
 porary thinker ; which, as they were neither designed by their 
 author, nor cited by me, as any thing more than illustrations, 
 I do not deem it necessary to take up space by defending. 
 When a selection must be made, one is obliged to consider 
 what one can best spare" (p. 87). This is surely far from 
 satisfactory. Does, or does he not, give up the cases? If 
 he does, he should have said so in all honesty, and nobody 
 would have thought the less of him. But he seems still in- 
 clined to retain them as illustrations, but does not think it 
 necessary to defend them. I do hold, that Mr. Mill's prin- 
 ciples do lead to these consequences, which have staggered se 
 many, and made them review the principles which lead to 
 such results, — implying that man can reach no truth which 
 might not be falsehood in other circumstances. But as Mr. 
 Mill does not care to defend them, I do not feel that I am 
 called to continue my assault.
 
 EIS DOCTRINE OF RELATIVITY. 461 
 
 "The geometry of visibles has been noticed only by Dr. 
 M'Cosh, who rejects it as founded on the erroneous doctrine 
 (as he considers it), that we cannot perceive by sight the 
 third dimension of space." This is not a full statement of 
 the ground of my rejection. My language is, " These infer- 
 ences can be deduced only by denying to vision functions 
 which belong to it, and ascribing to it others which are not 
 intuitive or original." I hold it to be one of the functions of 
 sight to give us a right line and a curved line. Such cases 
 as those of Franz clearly show, that by sight alone we can 
 perceive two straight lines ; and, having once seen them, we 
 never could be made to believe that they could meet at two 
 points and enclose a space ; or that a straight line being con- 
 tinued could return itself again. Those who see colors must 
 perceive the boundaries of colors, and these being often curved, 
 would give us the idea of a curved line ; and I am sure they 
 would be obliged to look on a straight line returning into 
 itself as a curve, and not a right line. So much for his deny- 
 ing to vision functions which belong to it, which was my main 
 argument. But again, he ascribes to it functions which are 
 not intuitive or original : for I hold that it is not the function 
 of vision, but of touch, to reveal to us impenetrability; and 
 a creature with sight, but not touch (even if it could live or 
 reason at all), could argue nothing as to bodies either pene- 
 trating, or not penetrating, each other, or passing through 
 each other, " without having undergone any change by this 
 penetration." 
 
 In looking at these acknowledged consequences, I had ven- 
 tured to point out the dangerous tendency of a doctrine which 
 strips man of the power of reaching positive truth, and of 
 pronouncing judgment on the reality of things. Because 1 
 have done so, he represents me as " preaching ; " but preach- 
 ing to one who is "already converted," "an actual missionary 
 of the same doctrine." I am here tempted to remark, that 
 Mr. Mill himself " preaches" at times, as in those passages in 
 which he charges Dr. Mansel's doctrines as being " simply 
 the most morally pernicious doctrine now current," and hurla
 
 462 APPENDIX. 
 
 at him that tremendous passage, " I will call no being good 
 who is not what I mean when I apply that epithet to my fel- 
 low-creatures ; and if such a being can sentence me to hell, 
 for not so calling him, to hell I will go." My preaching on 
 this occasion has evidently had some effect ; it has hit a point 
 in which Mr. Mill seems to be sensitively tender. I am con- 
 vinced that he has never seriously weighed the logical and 
 practical tendency of his doctrine of nescience ; it looks as if 
 there are times when he is unwilling to look at the conse- 
 quences. He tells us that, in his Logic, he has been instruct- 
 ing his readers to form their belief exclusively on evidence. 
 But did he never hear a preacher waxing longest and loudest 
 on the points of his doctrine which he felt to be the weakest 
 and most vulnerable? In regard to ordinary mundane mat- 
 ters, Mr. Mill is very careful to bid us look for evidence ; but 
 the evidence, in the last resort, is found to be baseless, thus 
 rendering the whole superstructure insecure in the estimation 
 of all who are bent on looking beneath the surface. He cor- 
 rects Mr. Grote when he seems to say, that truth is to every 
 man what seems truth to him ; but his own doctrine is equally 
 unsatisfactory when we follow it to its foundation. " We 
 grant," he says, "that, according to the philosophy which we 
 hold in common with Mr. Grote, the fact itself, if knowable 
 to us, is relative to our perceptions, to our senses, or our 
 internal consciousness ; and our opinion about the fact is so 
 too : but the truth of the opinion is a question of relation 
 between these two relatives, one of which is an objective stan- 
 dard for the other" (Dissert., vol. ii. art. Grote's Plato). 
 That is, we are to have witnesses ; but our conviction, nay, 
 truth itself, leans on the deposition of witnesses, each of which 
 supports the other, but each of which may be a liar. The 
 earnest and logical mind is made to feel that in all matters 
 bearing on the depths of philosophy, and the heights of reli- 
 gion, and fitted to bear it up above this cold earth, it has 
 nothing left on which to lean.
 
 AMBIGUITY OF THE WORD CONCEIVE. 463 
 
 Article VII. Ambiguity of the word Conceive, (pp. 251-258.) 
 
 In ray 'Examination I had been at great pains to point out 
 the ambiguity in the word " conceive," and the paronymoua 
 words "conception," "conceivable," and "inconceivable." It 
 is of essential importance, if we would avoid senseless logo- 
 machy, to determine the meaning in which we employ the 
 phrase when we use man's power of conception as a test of 
 necessary truth, or his incapacity of conception as a test 
 of error. I distinguished three senses of the word : (1) image 
 in the phantasy, as when we picture Mont Blanc; (2) the 
 generalized notion, as "mountain;" (3) native cognition, 
 belief, or judgment, in regard to objects ; and I showed that 
 it is only when used in the third sense that it can be legiti- 
 mately employed as a test of truth. I showed that it was not 
 in this sense that Antipodes were supposed by our fathers to 
 be inconceivable, but because they seemed to be contrary 
 to experience, — a prepossession which gave way before far- 
 ther experience. I am not aware that any one ever objected 
 to Antipodes on the ground of a native cognition, belief, or 
 judgment. I charged Mr. Mill with taking advantage, of 
 course unconsciously, of the ambiguity of the phrase. Any 
 apparent success which he may have had, in explaining neces- 
 sity of conception by association, arises solely from his show- 
 ing how one image suggests another, — how, for instance, 
 darkness suggests ghosts, or a precipice the danger of falling. 
 I was quite aware that Mr. Mill, in answering Hamilton, had 
 shown that the phrase had several meanings; but then, I 
 asserted, that he himself was led astray, and was leading 
 astray his readers, by the ambiguity. As my work was 
 passing through the press, I observed that, in the sixth 
 edition of his Logic (I. pp. 303-306), lately published, he 
 had charged Mr. Spencer as deriving " no little advantage " 
 from the ambiguity, and alleges (hat the popular use of the 
 word "sometimes creeps in with its associations, and prevent 
 him from maintaining a cleat separation between the two." 
 I simply noticed this in a foot-note,, and added, that Mr. Mill
 
 4G4 APPENDIX. 
 
 "continues to take advantage of the ambiguity, which is 
 greater than he yet sees." Mr. Mill thinks this "curious" 
 (p. 88). The note was hastily written, and I admit my 
 moaning was not so clear as I have now endeavored to make 
 it. 
 
 Article VIII. Mr. Mill's Logical Views, (pp. 286-371.) 
 
 The only subject remaining to be discussed is his defence 
 of his own logical views, and his criticism of mine. He is 
 pleased to say (p. 388), that "the chapter of Dr. M'Cosh, 
 headed the ' Logical Notion,' contains much sound philoso- 
 phy." But he complains of "the persistent impression which 
 the author keeps up, that I do disagree with him." Now, I 
 believe that our views do disagree, and I was anxious to point 
 out the mistakes in a work which is of such value and influ- 
 ence as Mr. Mill's Lome. Mr. Mill is a nominalist, and 
 looks at the name, its denotation, and connotation, instead of 
 the mental exercise; whereas, I am a conceptualist (though, 
 certainly, not in the sense in which many are), and have 
 labored to bring out the process of mind involved in the 
 notion, judgment, and reasoning. 
 
 We differ in regard to the General Notion, or Common 
 Term. I hold, that every such notion or term has both exten- 
 sion and comprehension, or intension, — that is, both objects 
 and attributes, — whereas, he looks solely at the comprehen- 
 sion, or the attributes. I had said, that I think it desirable 
 to have a phrase to denote the class of things comprised in 
 the general notion, and that the best word I can think of is 
 Concept. In opposition to this, he says the word "class" 
 is sufficient. But the word class is rather significant of an 
 objective arrangement, existing independent of my notice of 
 it, — say, of the class Rosacea?, which had an existence in 
 nature before naturalists had observed it, or given a name to 
 it. He admits, that, in order to belief, " a previous mental 
 conception of the facts is an indispensable condition," and 
 "that the real object of belief is the fact conceived." Now,"
 
 HIS LOGICAL VIEWS. 465 
 
 the word Concept stands with me, not for the class, but for 
 the class conceived, and is the best I can think of. He has a 
 glimpse of the truth when he speaks of extension (p. 421) 
 "as a name for the aggregate of objects possessing the attri- 
 butes included in the concept." He tells us (p. 372), "that 
 concepts cannot be thought as being universal, but only as 
 being part of the thought of an individual." Here, again, 
 conceive, or " think," used in the sense of image ; whereas, 
 it should be employed in the sense of judge. A concept is 
 a notion of an indefinite number of objects (extension) pos- 
 sessing common properties (comprehension), the notion being 
 such as to include all objects possessing the common proper- 
 ties. It is thus emphatically universal. 
 
 We differ, also, in regard to Abstract Notions. "It is 
 evident that the existence of abstract ideas — the conception 
 of the class qualities by themselves, and not as embodied in 
 an individual — is effectually precluded by the law of insepa- 
 rable association." I acknowledge, that, in the sense of 
 " imaging," we cannot have a conception of an attribute apart 
 from a concrete object. But, in the sense of "think of," we 
 can apprehend a part as a part, an attribute as an attribute ; 
 and this is what I mean by abstraction. I think it of great 
 moment to distinguish between the abstract and general 
 notions, which the Kantian logicians, German and British, 
 — departing from certain older logicians, — everywhere con- 
 found. " Rationality" is an abstract term, denoting an attri- 
 bute, and is different from "man," which is a general notion 
 connecting objects. By drawing this distinction, and carry- 
 ing it out consequentially, we throw light on logical judg- 
 ment, and settle some of the questions discussed in the present 
 
 day. There are, I hold, judgments in which we < ipare 
 
 mere abstracts, and in which there is no general notion in- 
 volved. Such judgments are always convertible or substitu- 
 tive (called equipollent by certain older Logicians), — that, is, 
 we can turn the subject into the predicate, and the predicate 
 
 into the BUDJect, Without any change, which we cannot do 
 
 in comparing universal notions. Because "men are mortals," 
 
 30
 
 466 APPENDIX. 
 
 wo cannot say, therefore, "mortals are men ; " but if "honesty 
 is the best policy," we can say, " the best policy is honesty," 
 because both terms are abstract. 
 
 I have represented Numbers as Abstract Notions, and the 
 judgments involving them as being convertible in conse- 
 quence. Thus 3X3 being 9, we can say, 9 is 3 X 3. But 
 Mr. Mill says that the terms are general. "The objects em- 
 braced in 9 are nine apples, nine marbles, nine hours, nine 
 miles, and all the other aggregations of which 9 can be predi- 
 cated. Every numeral is the name of a class, and a most 
 comprehensive class, consisting of things of all imaginable 
 qualities." Now, it was a disadvantage under which I la- 
 bored in criticising Mr. Mill's " Formal Logic," that I was 
 not able to expound my own views with sufficient fulness. 
 But I have all along explained to my college classes that the 
 same phrase may stand for an abstract and a general notion. 
 I hold, that numerals, 1, 2, 3, are primarily abstract qualities 
 of things, — a quality of that one thing, of these two things, 
 or three things. It is because they are so that the propo- 
 sitions comparing them are convertible. But, then, we very 
 often turn abstract names into general ones (as we also do 
 general ones into abstract ones), and we do speak of 1, 2, 3 
 as standing for a class. We so employ them when we say, 
 "3X3 make 9," which we can only convert by saying, 
 " some things making 9 are 3 X 3," — for 6 — |— 3 also make 9. 
 There is surely a profound distinction here, with far-reaching 
 consequences ; but this is not the place for the further devel- 
 opment of it. 
 
 As not seeing that Extension, as well as Comprehension, 
 is involved in all our general notions, and so in all our judg- 
 ments involving general notions, Mr. Mill has not been able 
 to give a clear account of the Proposition. He says (p. 420) , 
 "all men," and the "class men," are "expressions which 
 point to nothing but attributes ; they cannot be interpreted 
 except in comprehension." Now, I have admitted that in the 
 greater number of propositions the uppermost thought and 
 sense are in comprehension, and I am represented as "having
 
 E1S LOGICAL VIEWS. 467 
 
 partially just conceptions on the subject." But I hold that, 
 in all judgments of the kind he is speaking of, there is thought 
 in extension, and that they can be interpreted in extension, 
 and have a meaning in extension. When I say, "Gorillas 
 are not men," I mean, are not included in the class men ; 
 and in many other propositions the uppermost thought is in 
 extension. Of course, as the one implies the other, the prop- 
 osition has also a meaning in comprehension. 
 
 This is the proper place for correcting a misapprehension 
 of Mr. Mill's, as to what constitutes the principle of identity, 
 which, he thinks, should be expressed thus (p. 466) : "What- 
 ever is true in one form of words, is true in every other form 
 of words which convey the same meaning." He applies this 
 to what " Kant terms Conclusions of the Understanding, and 
 Dr. M'Cosh, Implied or Transposed Judgments." "They 
 are not conclusions, nor fresh acts of judgment, but the 
 original expressed in other words." But this is not an ade- 
 quate account. The law of identity requires that the relation 
 of the things compared should be considered the same, not 
 merely under different expressions, but in different circum- 
 stances, positions, and forms. It being given us that "all 
 men have a conscience," we are sure it cannot be true that 
 "no man has a conscience," or that "some men have not a 
 conscience." These are not the same propositions expressed 
 in other words ; they would be felt to be true and implied, 
 though not expressed in words at all. 
 
 There is one other logical point in which Mr. Mill and I 
 differ theoretically. I hold that in reasoning there is always 
 thought in Extension ; always a general principle involved, 
 constituting the major premises when the argument is fully 
 unfolded. In his own Formula, there is a major premise : 
 "Attribute A is a mark of attribute B," which means, when 
 properly interpreted, "Whatever object possesses attribute A 
 has also attribute B," clearly a proposition involving Exten- 
 sion ; nay, actually thought of in Extension. It is only 
 when we have such a generalized maxim that the particular 
 case constituting the minor premise warrants the conclusion.
 
 468 APPENDIX. 
 
 w The gorilla cannot speak ; " this cannot give us the conclu- 
 sion, "the gorilla is not a man," unless we proceed on the 
 general principle that " all beings placed in the class man are 
 possessed of speech." So far as our views bear on the prac- 
 tical evolution of logical formula?, I believe Mr. Mill and I 
 are at one. W r e both think that the old logical formula?, 
 which are in Extension, may be allowed to keep the place 
 which they have had for ages ; and we both think that Sir W. 
 Hamilton has done good service to logic by showing us how, 
 when any good purpose is to be served by it, we may turn 
 reasoning in Extension into the form of reasoning in Com- 
 prehension. I cannot agree with him, however, when he 
 gives as a reason for allowing the reasoning in Extension to 
 remain, that "concrete language, requiring for its formation a 
 lower degree of abstraction, was earliest formed, took posses- 
 sion of the field, and is still the most familiar" (p. 484). I 
 am not sure that thought in Extension is more concrete than 
 thought in Comprehension. I hold that reasoning is sponta- 
 neously in Extension, and that it is thus that the forms 
 assumed this shape, took possession of the field, and are still 
 most familiar. When we argue that " the Red Indians are 
 responsible because they are human beings," we put the major 
 in the form, "human beings are responsible," not because 
 " responsible " is more concrete than " possessing responsi- 
 bility," but because we must have a general law, and put " all 
 human beings in the class of beings possessing responsibility." 
 The premises as propositions may be thought of primarily in 
 Comprehension, — the Extension, however, being always in- 
 volved ; but in reasoning, the Extension involved must be 
 actually thought of in order to give us the major proposition. 
 The formula in Extension, in the ordinary syllogistic analysis, 
 is thus the expression, not of artificial, but of spontaneous 
 reasoning.
 
 MR. MILL'S OMISSIONS. 469 
 
 Article IX. Mr. MilVs Omissions. 
 
 I have now faced Mr. Mill at all the points in which he ha>- 
 seen fit to meet me.* But I cannot close the discussion with- 
 out referring to the points at which he has not deigned to 
 meet me. I had said a good deal about his mode of pro- 
 cedure, and criticised his "Psychological Method," showing 
 how it should be adopted only with important explanations 
 and modifications ; in particular, that we are at liberty to 
 proceed on this method only on the condition that we care- 
 fully look at all that is in the idea, and that we explain it all 
 by the theory. Again, I had shown that Mr. Mill, while 
 seeming to explain all our ideas by sensation and association, 
 had been obliged to call in as many assumed metaphysical 
 principles as Reid and Hamilton. I had collected his admis- 
 sions into heads ; I had shown that they are utterly inconsis- 
 tent with his apparently association theoiy ; and that, if 
 logically followed out, they must carry him much farther 
 than he is disposed to go. On none of these points does he 
 oiFer a word of explanation. I had criticised his doctrine of 
 causation, showing that what he explains by experience is not 
 our conviction as to cause and effect, but in the uniformity of 
 nature. I had reviewed with considerable care his very 
 defective account of mathematical axioms and definitions, 
 and of demonstration. I had examined his <;encsi.s of our 
 idea of moral good, and his whole utilitarian theory. I had 
 invited him to say whether he thinks a conclusive argument 
 for the existence of God could be constructed on his prin- 
 ciples. It is curious that, while he has seen fit to meet me 
 
 * I am glad ho has called attention (p. 70) to my complaint of the vagueness <>f 
 the distinction between knowledge ami faith. Be acknowledges that the distinction, 
 as drawn by mi', agrees with the cases to which I have applied it, mid savs that 
 every definition of belief must include the e ca es. Hut, then, he sees a difficulty in 
 carrying il through the entire region <>t' thought I am satisfied, if it holds good 
 in the region in whicb I have employed it, thai I , in re rard t" primitive cognitions in 
 which the objects are present, and primitive beliefs, in winch we are convinced of 
 their existence, though they are not pre-ent. i',nt even in other regions, it calls 
 attention to the circumstance thai in our very scientific knowledge there is belie! 
 
 Uivolved, — always, however, witli Other mental exercises, BUch as judgment.
 
 470 APPENDIX. 
 
 on other points, some of them in no way essential to my argu- 
 ment, he has not noticed these all-important criticisms. I 
 am perhaps not justified in arguing that my positions must 
 therefore be unassailable; but it will, at least, be allowed 
 that, since no attack has been made upon them by my acute 
 opponent, I am not required, for the present, to offer any 
 further defence.
 
 
 UNIVERSITl OF CALIFORNIA LIBRARY 
 
 Los Angeles 
 
 ini i 
 
 •01 
 
 * N^^ ? 
 
 ^Aavaaii-^ "^udnvsoi^ ^uainmwv 
 
 -< 
 
 .^E-UNIVERS/a 
 
 "^TJUONV-SOl^ 
 
 v> vlOS-ANCElfj> 
 
 "%3AIN!V3^ 
 
 ^UiBRARYQ^ ^UIBRARYQ^ 
 
 ^/OJIIVDJO^ 
 
 \oi\m-i^ 
 
 <A\\E-UNIVERS/a 
 
 <TiUONV-S01^ 
 
 vvlDS-ANCELFjrx 
 
 "%3AINIHHV 
 
 ^.OFCALIFO/?^ 
 
 ^0FCAUF(% 
 
 ^AHvaaiH^ ^ABvaan-^ 
 
 ^•LIBRARY^ ^LIBRARYQt 
 
 ^/OJITVDJO^ ^OJIIVD-JO^ 
 
 .^E-UNIVERS 1 //, 
 
 o 
 <T?i30NV-S01^ 
 
 ^dOS-ANCElfj^, 
 
 "%3AINn-3\fc 
 
 ^OF-CAllFOfy* 
 
 .^0F-CALIF(% 
 
 y tfAavaaiH^ ^Aavaaii-^ 
 
 ^EUNIVERS//, 
 
 ^lOSANGElfj^ 
 
 <Til30NVS01^ 
 
 "%i3AINll 3V\V 
 
 5ME-UNIVERJ/A 
 
 <Til30NVS01^ 
 
 vvlOSANGElfjV, 
 
 %a3AINn-3WV 
 
 <$HIBRARY0/r ^UIBRARYQ? 
 
 s. 
 
 %03I1VDJ0^ 
 
 -%HI1V3:I0 V 
 
 .^EUNIVERS//, 
 
 ^lOSANCElfj> 
 
 ^OFCALIF0% ^OF-CALIFO^ 
 
 %3Dnv-soi^ ^Aa3AiNa-3^ N y tfANvaarH^ y 0AHvnaitt^
 
 ^/OJITVOJO^ 
 ^OF-CALIF(% 
 
 <Tii30NVS01^ 
 
 ,^EUNIVER% 
 
 
 3 1158 00283 4132 
 
 y 0A«V8an-l^ <Tii30NVS01^ %MAINn-3lW 
 
 
 ^m\m 
 
 ^E-LIBRARY^- 
 
 fMti 
 
 
 001057 096 8 
 
 SOUTHPBMD^S y of Ca '''fornia 
 
 <$UIBRl 
 
 5JWK OCT 2 7 2003 
 
 *» 
 
 -3 
 
 ^ 
 
 s 
 
 
 1 1 
 
 ^aojil 
 
 *A 
 
 aof-w 
 
 ■S 
 
 
 £ 
 
 y 0AH' 
 
 2? 
 
 *< 
 
 ^10? 
 o 
 
 "% 
 
 T O 
 
 
 
 
 O uL 
 
 o 
 
 
 
 
 01