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SaMda, ON OOTOBER 16th, 1872, BT |(»|ft in^ FBOnSSSDR OF LOGIC, MSTAPEnTSIOS AKIX BTSIOS. jiTirnni'iii KIN08T0K: PKIMTBD BY WltUAM BAIX.IB. , 1W9. jji-. ., I V Cfet ^clafiott of f |Uosojr|^ to Sidtm. AN INAUGURAL LECTURE DELIVERED IN THE CONVOCATION HALL OF Queen's University, iS:ingston, Sanada, ON OCTOBER 16tu, 1872, BT |o^n m^isoK. p. ^., PROFESSOR OF LOGIC, METAPHYSICS AND ETHICS. \ KINGSTON: PRINTED BY WILLIAM BAILIE. 1872. I , Jt d-f ■> i;ul. ■:> iidbiJij #»#. » ;•♦ •lORONIO* '^ '•' i;LIBRARY* . ■ <^ . '/ f«* THE RELATION OF PHILOSOPHY TO SCIENCE. The object of an introductory lecture is to indicate, in a general way, the uphore and limits of the Science which has afterwards to be treated in a detailed and systematic manner. We cannot at present be expected to give more than a vague idea of the topics afterwards to be discussed at length, and may, therefore, seem occasionally to be deficient in that definiteness ami accuracy of thought, which are all-importsmt in a teacher of Philosophy. With the view of obviating, as far as possible, the diffi- culties that unavoidably lie in our way, we propose to discuss, as fully as time will allow, the relation of Phil- osophy to the Special Sciences ; a course which will, by the force of contrast, throw into bolder relief the nature of those problems with which we shall be afterwards oc- cupied. Truth, from its very nature, is a complete unity, and if it could be proved that the results of one department of human enquiry directly contradict those of another, the whole edifice of knowledge must fall to the ground.* For such a disharmony would imply that there is something in the nature of intelligence itself which precludes it from ever attaining to truth. If equal evidence can be brought to shew that what may be proved in one way may be equally disproved in another, we should bo forced to take refuge in the unwelcome conclusion that we are the sport of a desire for knowledge that can only lead to irremediable disappointment. It IB, therefore, matter of some surprise that most — we might almost say all — of those scientific men who have spoken of the relation of Philosophy to Science, maintain that there is an absolute opposition between these two spheres of knowledge. One of the most eminent living Biologists of England deliberately asserts, and enforces with all the ability for which he is distinguished, the startling proposition, that Philosophy no loss certainly leads to Idealism than Science to Materialism. "Follow out the teaching of the one," says Mr. Huxley, " to its legitimate conclusions, and you are forced to admit that matter is a mode of mind ; accept the results of the other, and you cannot deny the inference that mind is a mode of matter." That Science inevitably leads to absolute Materialism, or the position that man is simply the pro- duct of the forces of nature, Mr. Huxley endeavours to prove upon scientific principles. In all organisms, whether vegetable or animal, there is one common basis of life out of which they spring and which Is identical in all, whether it is regarded from the point of view of form, of function or of substantial composition. This physical basis of life, or protoplasm, as it has been called, is found upon analysis to be composed of water, carbonic acid and ammonia. The composition of these in certain propor- tions gives rise to life, and he'ice life is due solely to chemical elements. Moreover; as thought or conscious- ness is dependent upon life, and life upon material ele- ments, it, too, is ultimately resolvable into forces of nature. The conclusion, therefore, to which our author comes is that the most rigid scientific demonstration leads us to believe that man is of the same nature with the ground on which he treads. Let us hear Mr. Huxley's own words : " It may seem a small thing to admit that the dull vital actions of a fungus or a forarainifer are the pro- perties of their protoplasm, and are the direct results of the nature of the matter of which they are compos d. But if, as I have endeavoured to prove to you, their pro- r 's r toplasm is essentially identical with, and most re^^dily converted into, that of any animal, I can discover no logical halting-place between the admission that such is the case, and the further concession that all vital action may, with equal propriety, be said to be the result of the molecular forces of the protoplasm which displays it. And if so, it must be true, in the same sense and to the same extent, that the thoughts to which I am now giving ut- terance, and your thoughts regarding them, are the ex- pression of molecular changes in that matter of life which is the source of our other vital phenomena." This is the scientific or materialistic side of the theory : philosophy conducts ns by a different path to exactly the opposite conclusion. Having led us into " the slough of Materialism," as he aptly calls it, Mr. Huxley would ex- tricate us from it by showing that an inspection of con- sciousness leads ns with equal certainty to the Idealistic position that matter is dependent upon mind. The ex- ternal world, he says, is only known to us as states of our consciousness, and all knpwledge is made up of such states. Some of these we attribute to self and some to not-self, but in either case we never get beyond our own consciousness. By Philosophy we are thus taught a dif- ferent lesson from that inculcated by Science. Between the two there is an irreconcilable contradiction, and we can only say, that as we neither know what matter nor what mind is in itself^ but only as it presents itself to tM, there is probably some method of reconciling their an- tagonistic deliverances, if the limitations of human thought did not prevent us from ever discovering it. It does not belong to our province to enter into the scientific question raised by Mr. Huxley — whether, namely, life is the mere product of chemical composition ; and we shall content ourselves with remarking that, whether true or false, the theory has not yet been proven. Approach- ing the problem from a purely philosophical point of view, we shall endeavour to show, that even if it were /( 6 ectablished, as a matter of fact^ that life is evolved from matter, the inference that thought la resolvable into ma- terial foroea is utterly untenable. There is nothing new in the assertion of an absolute opposition l)etween Philosophy and Science, Thought api Nature, Reason and Experience : it is, as Mr. Huxley candidly admits, simply the philosophy of David Hume, adjusted to the advances of modern science ; and trans- formed, we may add, from a Scepticism into a Dogma- tism. The contradiction here expressed is that which forms the special problem of Philosophy, and has de- manded solution tVom the very dawn of speculation. So soon as man has satisfied his material wants, the sense of a contradiction between what Mentis and what u^ between the outer world of sense and the inner world of thought, begins to break upon his mental vision ; and he awakes to the consciousness that there is an unexplored, supra- sensual realm, transcending all that he has hitherto known. At au early period in the history of a nation this perception of a region higher than the phenomenal world expresses itself in the half-unconscious revelations of poetry, and in the proverbial sayings of men gifted with more than average insight ; it is at a late period in the history of thought that it seeks to embody itself in that systematic knowledge which constitutes philosophy. The whole history of philosophy is a record of repeated at- tempts to give an adequate solution of the problem to which we have referred. The earliest philosophers were unable to give any satisfactory reply, because they aimed at what was beyond the reach of the human intellect ; at- tempting too much they ended by gaining nothing. They vainly strove to answer the question. What is the origin of all things \ and it was only when Socrates directed his attention to man himself, seeking to discover the essential nature of thought, that philosophy entered upon its pro- per task ; and although this point of view was after- wards obscured and lost, it has been recovered in modern 1 1 • I ' times, and phUoBophy plncod upon a Becnre foundation. Thi8 roBuU has not l>een effo(;ted in a day ; it has been tlio hIow and gradual growth of all modem ftystema of philos- ophy. Now, therefore, that it has been so emphatically declared that Philosophy and Science stand to each other in the position of irreconcilable enemies, the question as to how, by availing ourselves of the wisdom of the past, the contradiction between the phenomenal and the ideal, the world of nature and the world of thought, is to be recon- ciled, has become an all-important one. It is no solution of the difficulty to be told that it is insoluble ; in this way the claim of reason to be heard may be suppressed for a time, but it will inevitably force itself again upon our notice and refuse to be dismissed. To give an adequate reply to this fundamental question would require the un- folding of n complete philosophy, and we must content ourselves with indicating in outline the solution we deem the only adequate one. Those who tell us that Science and Pliilosophy lead to directly opposite conclusions, tacitly assume that both are oo-orditiate, and that the results of the one are not less ultimate than those of the other. Science leads to Materialism, Philosophy to Idealism, and we must ac- cept the deliverances of each as of equal value. But is this assumption tenable? or does not the .pparent an- tagonism between the two spheres of knowh • ge arise from regarding them as co-ordinate, when in reality the one is subordinate to the other and finds its final justification in it ? It will be our duty in the sequel to show that the latter is the true alternative : that a clear conception of the legitimate sphere of each will break down the hard opposition which is supposed to subsist between them, and that the asserted materiality of mind results from push- ing the boundary of science beyond its proper limits. The special sciences are, from their very nature and method of investigation, limited in their range, an ^ hence can never give more than a limited explanation even of 9 the daee of objects which form thdir province. They did- cover truth, but it w only relative truth. Their object-mat- ter is the phenomenal, and whatever advances they may make, they must ever be restricted to the phenomenal. Thus fi^r our scientific men are right in saying that know- ledge is limited to phenomena, and that of things in their real essence we have no knowledge ; for, properly viewed, thie phenomenal worid means one side of knowledge taken in abstraction from the other. Now, — not to insist upon thci evident fact that each of the sciences is restricted to a particular and limited sphere of inv». stigation— even if we view all the special sciences in relation to each other and as constitutiug one organic whole, we can only discover relative truth, and we are therefore debarred from rising higher than phenomena, and, consequently, from finding an ultimate explanation. The starting point of science is the world as it appears in ordinary consciousness — the world as independent of thought and made up of a collec- tion of individual and independent things, — and however great its discoveries may be it never abandons this point of view. But in so conceiving the world. Science has made one great abstraction : it has abstracted entirely from self-consciousness or thought, and in so doing it has implicitly assumed the materiality of the mind. For if the world is absolutely independent of thought, the latter must be purely passive in its apprehension of know- ledge, and have no existence except in so far as it is acted upon from without. This, however, is merely another way of saying tliat the mind is material, for this propo- sition can have no other intelligible meaning than that all modes of consciousness are transformed forces of nature. It is very easy, therefore, for Mr. Huxley and others to shew that the method of science leads to the conclusion that mind is a manifestation of matter, for this is merely an explicit statement of that which is taken for granted at the outset. Thus we learn at once the proper sphere of science, and the necessity of a branch of knowledge which i shall transcend it and carrj up its generalizations into a higher unity. Unassailable so long ae it keeps within its legitimate sphere, science inevitably falls into error when it seeks to bring consciousness, as well as the phenomenal world, within its grasp. While it keeps within the range of the material world, its materialism is just, for it is dealing with the material ; when it applies to thought the same method it adopts in regard to nature, it necessarily falls into grave error. Mr. Huxley, therefore, commits a vital mistake when he assumes that the conclusions of science are as ultimate in their nature as those of a true philosophy ; for, to be so, they must explain not naturt alone, but also self-consciousness. The failure of science to reach ultimate truth arises, then, we may say, ft'om its assuming external nature at the beginning ; for its very method implies the independ- ent existence, or — ^what is the same thing — the absolute truth of the outer or phenomenal world. Now it is here where science fails that philosophy triumphs. To the question. What is Nature ? philosophy is not content to answer with science, " There are such and such laws of nature," or even, " All material things are indissolubly united together." An ultimate explanation must tell ub not only what are the forms or laws of a thing, but what it is in itself f in its essence, in its truth. Carry up your generalization of facts as far as you please, conceive na- ture as a congeries of laws, or, if you will, as a correla- tion of forces, and we must still ask. What is this unity of forces or laws? What is nature itself? and what is its relation to . intelligence ? It is only by an appeal to philosophy or pure thought that any adequate answer can be given to such enquiries. Philosophy, unlike the special sciences, does not deal with a particular section of knowledge, but with the essential nature of all knowledge, and hence it aims at revealing ultimate or necessary truth. The statement that knowledge is limited to the phenom-' enal is true only when applied to common conscionsnesi 10 \ li and to science ; it is the special business of philosophy to transcend the world of phenomena and to disclose the world of real being, by a discovery of the true bond of connection between thought and nature. From the primary assumption of the absolute independ- ence of the outer world flow other assumptions which essentially belong to the scientific method. Having ab- stracted from self-consoiousness and thus virtually asserted that it is capable of arriving at the highest truth attain' able by man, Scietice necessarily takes for granted a num- ber of logical notions, without subjecting them to a pro- cess of criticism. It seems to be merely enquiring into the laws of nature and to be quite passive in its presence, while it is really guided and controlled by categories which are the common stock of the age to which it be- longs. These categories it finds in common conscious- ness; it does not think of enquiring into their origin and testing their validity ; nor, indeed, has it, as science, a perception that any such investigation is needed. Start- ing,, as it does, with the opposition of subject and object, and concentrating its attention upon the objective world alone^ it is the victim of the natural illusion that the cate- gories it brings to nature it extracts from it. It makes continual use of such fnndamental notions as heing^forcey cause amd effect^ w'ithout dreaming of making them an object of special inquiry. Such notions lie at the basis of all thought, and constitute "the diamond net" wliich en- velopes all the material of thought and gives it order, co- herence and consistency. The assumption of these cate- gories is at once the strength and the weakness of science : its strength, because without them it could not make a single step in advance ; its weakness, because it is led to overlook their true origin and nature. So soon as we seek to discover, prove and concatenate these notions, we see that they must be referred to thought >nd npt to nature^ to the inner and not to the outer world ; and thus the need of a science which shall exhibit the necessary re- \ 11 • lation and interdependence of the fundamental notions that underlie all thought and being — the science of Zo^tc, the first department of Philosophy — dearlj manifests it- self to bur minds. It niay seem, at first sight, to be of little moment whether we say that these categories belong to nature or to thought ; and in one sense this is true. Speaking in an external way, we may say that they belong to both ; it is not less true that the category of causality^ for in- stance, is evolved by thought than that it is manifested in nature. From another point of view, however, it is of the last importance which of these alternatives we ac^ cept ; for if these notions pertain to the external world alone — to Nature taken in abstraction from Thought — the mind becomes the mere sport of impressions acting from without, and is therefore materialised. Here again the imperfection of the view which would co-ordi- nate science and philosophy, regarding them as two par- allel lines that never meet, becomes apparent. For it is m;l and chemical forces, it may in one way be subsumed under the notion of cause, but it is only in BO far as it is viewed as mechanical or chemical — only in so far as we abstract from what is diitinative of it, viz. its vitality — that this is legitimate. When we wish to designate what is essential to it as an organism, we have, explicitly or implicitly, to leave the notion of causality b6> hind and employ a higher notion. We have already said that sensation aa sensation be- longs to life and not to thought. A mere sensation is but an affection of the nervous organism, and exists in the animal without implying a oQUftcimmneMa of its exist- ence. The animal is in complete unity with its sensa- tions, and has no power of abstracting from them ; it is afiected by them for a moment, and then they vanish foir ever. It is the power of abstracting from sensation, and making it an object of consciousness that distinguiehes n^an from the animals, and renders hiin capable of thought. £v6n, therefore, if it could be proved, by the scientific method^ that life depends upon a due proportion of cer« tain chemical elements, and consciousness upon life, it would not follow that consciousness is a mode of matter. For consciousness includes the mechanical, chemical and vital forces, while it adds an element of its own higher than either. The notion of causality, which we found to be imperfect even when applied to the organic world, be- comes much more inadequate when we reach the higher irealm of consciousness. It is by abstracting from what is characteristic of it, that the dynamical philosophers are enabled to give plausibility to the theory that the phe- nomena of consciousness are but transformed material forces. It may seem, indeed, that little is gained by pointing out that the notions employed by the physicist in the explanation of nature are imperfect ; for is it not a fact, it may be said, that consciousness is depend^ ent upon life, and life on matter, and how then 18 can it still be held that consciousneM is not a mode of matter ? But the answer is simple : as the conclusion that mind is material is based upon an imperfect use of categories, the whole conclusion is thereby vitiated. Na- ture is undoubtedly rational, but not to itself; it is only in so far as it is brought within the dominion of thought that it renders up its meaning, and the whole pro- gress of thought is a history of the discovery and the deepening of categories. Now these categories science, from its assumptive character, can never prove, and hence its explanations, while relatively true, are not final. In its search for unity, it fails to perceive that no absolute unity can be obtained by simply leaving out all differ- ence, and fixing upon agreement alone, for the differences arc not less essential than he agreements. When, there- lore, it asks, What are the points of agreement between consciousness, lite, chemical action and mechanical forced it overlooks the fact that it has, by asking the question in this way, virtually auvmed the identity of the highest with the lowest sphere ; for what is common to the two extremes can only be that which is distinctive of the low- est. If, as we have shown, the various spheres of the universe form an ascending series, in which each higher realm includes while it transcends the lower, we can only adequately explain the highest by gradually descending to the lowest. To make consciousness dependent upon matter is to reason in a circle; for matter has no meaning apart from consciousness. The bearing of the«a considerations upon the general question of the relation of Philosophy to Science will be readily anticipated. The dynamical theory of the world, which attempts to reduce all phenomena to manifesta- tions of the " persistence of force," is found to be partial and imperfect, and to be inapplicable so soon as we at- tempt to apply it to the inorganic world. Legitimate when put forward in explanation of dead, inert matter, it totally fails when applied to animal organisms, with their * ^ *_=. 19 wondrous power of continuons adjustment to external circumstances, and their indefinite power of preserving that unity in the midst of diversity which constitutes their life. And when we leave the phenomena of life and scinsation, and seek to account by the scientific method for the phenomena of consciousness and thought, the imper- fection of the scientific method becomes glaringly appar- ent. Its plausibility depends upon the assumption that pure sensation and thought are identical, whereas the one completely transcends the other ; for, properly speaking, sensation does not belong to thought but to life. When, therefore, conscionsness is viewed as a bundle of sensa- tions, not only is its true nature overlooked, but the pos- sibility of knowledge is destroyed. This will be best shown by a summary of the sensational philosophy. Locke, like our scientific men, starts with the as- sumption of an external world, complete in itself, and com* posed of an infinite number of distinct and individual things. Hence thought or consciousness is regarded as a tabula rasa on which the world writes. When we ask, firom this point of view, how we come to have the knowledge we possess, we obtain a wrong answer, because we have asked a wrong question. For if the mind is purely passive, all its knowledge must be got, as Locke held, from sensation, for this is merely another way of say- ing that all knowledge comes from without. But as a sen- sation is a perfectly immediate, simple affection, and con- tains nothing but itself, it was easy for Bishop Berkeley to show that Locke, in distinguishing between the prim- ary and the secondary qualities of body — the former being regarded as existing in the external world in the same form as in sensation, and the latter as present only in ua — laid down an untenable position. For as a sensa- tion exists only as it is known, to speak of an external world beyond sensation is to make a gratuitous assump- tion. The external world of individual things, therefore, with which Locke started, has disappeared and left be' ao hind only a sorios of sensations belonging to tlio subject. All existence is now reduced to self and states of self; the olyjective world, just l)ecaiise it was assumed to bo ob- jective or self-dependent, has converted itself into a subjective world of sensations. Moreover, if, in the act of knowledge, the knowing self is purely passive, as Locke maintained, ii also must be built up, if it exist at all, out of pure sensations. This is, however, but another way of assorting that self i» this series of sensations — the conclu- sion deduced by Hume from the philosophy of Locke. All knowledge is thus reduced to a thread of sensations following each other in time. Hume did not, like his follower, Mr. John Stuart Mill, maintain this position dogmatically ; but he asserted with perfect justice that it was the legitimate result of the Lockean philosophy. We have thus seen that Empiricism, starting with an external world, seemingly independent, ends with conceiving know- ledge as a series of sensations without a self to know them and without an object in which they can be known, It is the contrast between what Sensationalism intended to do, and what it really did, that constitutes the Scepticism of Hume. The fact to be explained was a permanent «nd oljeotive world ; the theory propounded to explain this world converted it, instead, into a serxGi of suhjective, fleeting, simple sensations. It is this contradiction be- tween theory and reality that Hume signalised when he spoke of the absolute opposition between common sense and reason, and which makes liis philosophy one of the bitterest sarcasms on human knowledge that has ever been enunciated. It is this contradiction, in another form, that defies the solution of our modern Physicists. It may seem that Hume, in reducing the philosophy of Locke to a series of sensations following each other in tinne and spread out in apace, had brought it to its utmost simplicity. But Empiricism has a still " lower deep ;" for there are two fundamental notions which Hume vorld of permanent and co-exist- ing objects. It is, however, of more importance to ob- serve that it is quite in harmony with the Sensational theory to attempt this reduction, and to regard space as generated out of a temporal succession of sensations. We are thus left with nothing in the universe except a series of impressions^ and it will not be difficult to shew tliat even this series is dpomed to disappear before the te^t of criticism. Sensations, from their very nature, are incap- able of mutual relation. The very idea of a sensation is that it is simple, individual, and contains nothing but it- self ; and hence it no sooner gives place to another im- pression than it must vanish into non-existence. It can- not exist in relation to andther sensation, because relation implies (Comparison, and comparison could only takff place if it were capable, as it evidently is not;, of objecti- fying itself and then relating itself to another sensation. Thus, even the " series," which is always tacitly assum- ed by the Empiricist, involves aM 9,88umption he is npt warranted in raajciug — the assumption of the niutual re- lation of different senaations. We are thus compelled tp speak of knowledge as a number of disconnected and in- dividual impr^spirnp, existing out of relation to ^ach II 23 other, and therefore out of time ; and hence Time, aa well as Space, has disappeared. It does not mend the matter to say, with Mr. Mill, that the sensations are related by aagociatioriy for as individual they cannot relate them- selves. Here then we lose the last hold upon the world of reality, for as consciousness can only exist as a relation, and the sensations are ex hypothesi out of all relation, they cease to exist ; Nature and Thought alike disappear, ^' And, like an unsubstantial pageant faded, Leave not a wrack behind." Absolute Nihilism, then, is the legitimate and demon- strable result of Empiricism. Starting with the absolute independence of nature, and therefore virtually with the assumption that con.' iousness is entirely dependent upon the material world, it tries to build up the external world and the world of thought out of sensation. The disastrous result of this mode of procedure we have already seen : knowledge is brought into conflict with itself, and finally accomplishes its own destruction. Where then is the fallacy of Sensationalism — for fallacy there must be — to be found ? It lies in this, that the essential activity of thought has been overlooked. When it is said that nature and thought are evolved out of pure sensations, it is erroneously as- sumed that sensation in consciousness and sensation out of consciousness — or, otherwise, that life and thought — are convertible. But reflection upon the nature of thought makes the fallacy of such a view obvious. A sensation, as soon as I think it, becomes more than a sensation. In doing so I transform what was before a particular into a universal. As a thinking being I have the power of ab- stracting from all modes of consciousness and concentrat- ing my attention solely upon myself, the being who thinks. In all the varying operations of thought, there- fore, the Ego or Self remains as the permanent factor. And, further, this abstract self, while it seems to be per- fectly simple and immediate, is in reality universal, for , as well ) matter ated by e them- le world relation, relation, sappear, ded, demon* absolute with the snt upon al world ieastrouB ly seen : d finally le fallacy e found ? ight has thought ously ae- on out of ght — are thought snsation, ion. In ir into a sr of ab- icentrat- ng who it, there* ; factor. be per- »rBal, for • 23 each thinking being, like myself, is a self, and for this very reason capable of thought. Now, this self, which is common to all intelligences, it not, like a sensation, per- fectly simple ; for, from the very fact that it can make it- self its own object, it contains distinction or difference within itself And just because I can think away from all my particular states, I am capable of having some- thing as an object of thought ; in the very act of appre- hending self I apprehend a not-self. Hence the two are inseparably united, and in apprehending an object, I bring it under the dominion of thought, and infuse into it the universality or permanence that belongs to thought. Spirit, therefore, in virtue of Thought, destroys the as- sumed independence of Nature and assimilates it to itself. The permanence which we ascribe to the outer world is thu5 produced by the activity of thought, instead of being, as is assumed by the Empiricist, />(M«tv«2y imprinted upon the mind ; what we call experience or objectivity, is real- ly the product of the universalising power of reason. This exhibition of pure thought or the Ego, as the only possible explanatioT. of objectivity is what the great Ger- man philosopher, Kant, designates, in his somewhat barbaric terminology, " the synthetical unity of Apper- ception (self-consciousness)." The process, that is, by which experience is gradually built up is essentially » synthesis^ and the great imperfection of Locke, leading, as it did, to the Scepticism of Hume, was in regarding it as a mere analysis. We have before us, says Locke, ex- perience, full-formed and complete in itself, and the only object of philosophy is to analyse it into its component elements. It was thus overlooked that all analysis im- plies a prior synthesis, and hence that no explanation of knowledge can be adequate which bases itself upon an- alysis alone. To Kant, on the other hand, experience was the result of the synthetical power of self-conscioue- ness. Starting, like Locke, with sensation as one element of knowledge, he held that this of itself can never gener- 24 ate experience, atid that thd other elethent is sapplied by thought. Experience is the product of two factors, the otie a posteriori^ or given frttm vbithouti, the other a priori^ or suppliied from within. Thought for its part has, as the essential and necessary heritage of its nature, the faculty of forming judgments, and in doing so it employd such fundamental notions or categor-' ies, as Unity, Reality, Negation, Cailse and Effect. Into these categories thought cannot Jtt< differentiate itself, for they belong to its own inner nature, and to think is to em- ploy them, fience, also, they are uni'Oersal and necesmry notions, for otherwise we should have the contradiction of that which belongs to the vei-y essence of thought being limited and contingent. We have thus, on the one hand, a groundwork of sensations, and on the other haina, fielf-consciousness radiating into a nnmber of necessary notions. Neither separately can give knowledge, for th6 sensations are nothing uhtil they are thought, or, as Kant expresses it, " sensations are hlind ;" and thought cannot COttie into exercise without the aid of the sensations, for as the categories are mere relations^ thought c&a only use them when it has got something to relate^ or, in the word6 of Kant, " the categories are void.'''' But now, if thought bring the sensations into relation with the cate- gories, shall we not then have knowledge? Yes, an- swers Kant, but for one thing : that experience is only possible, on the one hand as a succession of mental states, and on the other hand in the form of objects lying out- side of each other ; in other words, to complete our theory of knowledge we require to account for Space and Time, which are the conditions of all external or internal exper- ience. Whether then do space and time belong to Thought or to Nature ? Evidently to the former, is the answer, for they are necessary and universal, and neces* sity and universality are the criteria by which we dis- cover what belongs to self-consciousness or is a priori. We can now explain how experience is possible. Thought plied by factors, le other for its Itage of and in categor-' t. Into ;8elf', for is to em- eceMary adiction tliought the one Br h^nd, ecessary , for the as Kant t cannot ions, for can only p, in the t now, if the cate- Yes, an- } is only al states, ing out- ir theory id Time, al exper- jlong to ir, is the d neces- we dis- f priori. riiought S5 differentiates itself into the categories, and, by means of the universal perceptive forms of Space and Time, gathers up into itself the sensatione which form the material of knowledge. Thus we get a world with objects extended in space and existing in time, and viewed under a variety of necessary relations. To Kant, therefore, knowledge is essentially a synthesis, and a synthesis which is only pos- sible because self-consciousness is the universal that lies at the basis of every experience, and reduces it to a unity. Kant has the honour of effecting a complete revolution in philosophy. Instead of attempting to explain thought by experience, he accounts for experience by thought. It is, therefore, with perfect justice that he regards himself as having done for philosophy what Copeniicus accomplished for astronomy. Copernicus, when he found that the mo- tions of the stars could not be explained by assuming them to revolve round the spectator, tried the effect of making the spectator revolve, and the stars remain at rest. Similarly, Kant, finding that Locke's assumption of the absolute passivity of the mind led to the complete overthrow of knowledge, was led to adopt the theory that the mind is essentially active^ and was thus enabled to explain the fact of experience. He has, therefore, simply followed the method in which all great discoveries have been made — viz., by setting up a theory and re- garding it as true or false according as it does or does not account for the facts it has to explain. To Kant, then, belongs the high merit of pointing out the method which a true Metaphysic must adopt ; but he has not himself followed out that method to its ultimate results. An ultimate explanation of knowledge must, as he perceived, be based upon the act.'vity of self-conscious- ness in all its manifestations, for any other su;^po8ition leads to Scepticism and, by an easy path, to Nihilism. But in the " Critique of Pure Reason" there is this es- sential imperfection, that it does not tell us how or why thought or self-consciousness developes itself into the in- I 26 finite variety of experience. Thought, the Categories, the forms of Space and Time, and a groundwork of Sen- sations, are all, somehow or other^ necessary to constitute experience, but when we ask why this is so, Kant has no satisfactory answer to give. TTAy, we may ask, does thought differentiate itself into categories, and what is their number, relative importance and interconnection ? TTAy, again, has thought two and only two pure percep- tions — those of Space and Time? TTAy, finally, does thought, by means of its categories and pure perceptions, transform sensations into experience ? A proper answer to these questions will give a true system of Metaphysic. To this conception of Metaphysic as the science which deals with the ultimate ground or reason of things, it may be objected that it is a purely supposititious know- ledge. There are, it has been said, ultimate truths which, as ultimate, are incomprehensible and unthinkable, and which, therefore, from tneir very nature, cannot be proven. We know that they are, we cannot tell why they are ; for to do so would be to resolve them into a higher notion ; which, ex hypothesis is impossible. But this objection arises from a false notion of what proof is. "We prove an a priori truth when we shew that it belongs to the essential nature of thought, and consequently that without it thought is impossible. The problem of Meta- physic is not simply to find unities in Nature per se^ or in Thought per se, but to shew how, from the very nature of the case, the former must be resolved into the latter, and that only in this way can an ultimate unity that em- braces both be obtained. To do this in a strictly systematic way is at present impossible, as it would require the unfold- ing of a complete system of metaphysic. We must, there- fore, content ourselves with shewing that, looking at thought as a whole, and as displayed in the history of the race, it must necessarily pass through certain stages, cul- minating in ultimate truth. We say must^ for it can be proven that thought is essentially /^za^eo^ec in its nature* 9t does it i.e.f that it is impelled on irom one stage to another by the inner necessity of its own nature. These stages we shall briefly indicate, premising thai they are not to be found by a mere inspection of the individual conscious- ness, but by an examination of the universal conscious- ness of mankind. The individual may stop at the first or some succeeding stage, without going through the whole cycle of thought ; only in the infinite possibilities of the race is the full stature of the perfect man to be found. The first and lowest stage of thought is that of the Sensuous Consciousness / the peculiarity of which is, not that in it alone the outer world affects the mind through the senses, but that reflection is at its minimum, and hence the object known and the person knowing it are each regarded as simple, immediate and individual. Whether the mind is filled with a number of external im- pressions or of internal feelings, it accepts either, with- out any enquiry into their real source or validity ; thought is so little active, that it seems entirely passive. A num- ber of sensations, supplied by the various senses, arise in consciousness, and seem to constitute all the truth attain- able by man. "We, who are at a later stage in the de- velopment of humanity, easily perceive that this was an illusion but it never occurred to those sunk in the sensuous stage of thought to question the truth of what appeared in their consciousness. If they had been capable of ask- ing themselves, " What certainty have we that our im- mediate knowledge is real ?" the only answer they could have given would 1 ive been : "Wo know it is real because it isy because we feel it to be real." But here, the mere existence in consciousness of anything is regarded, or would have been regarded if those at this lowest stage of thought had been capable of interrogating themselves, as a proof of reality and objectivity : the two senses of the word " being" — that of a mere predicate, and that of a developed experience of the objective world — being as li 28 yet inseparably interwoven with eadi other. It is in this identification of what is in consciousness and what is in reality, that the great imperfection of the philosophy of Berkeley consists. The lowest stage of consciousness is formalised, und in this, rather than in his denial of an ex- ternal world, the great imperfection of his system is to be found. " There is," Berkeley maintains, " an absolute identity of sensation and the conscious self; the eeae of things consists in their percipi — sensation and existence are synonymous ;" and hence, because he deals with pure sensations alone, he fails to shew how 'objectivitfy, since it is not to be accounted for from without, comes into consciousness at :all. This first form of consciousness may be illustrated by the infancy of the race. The savage is dominated by the in- dividual sensations which come and vanish from his con- sciousness like shadows. Like a child, he only sees or hears what comes directly before his notice. He has no interest in the external world apart from its subserving his material wants, and hence, when not engaged in hunt- ing or fishing, or in war, he passes his time in a listless indolence, allowing impressions to move through his con- scioupncss without an effort to retain them, compare them, and investigate into their source. Moreover, as he has no evidence for the reality of his impressions except that they ar^i that th^y pass through his mind, be is a prey to all kinds of superstitious terrors; even his rudimentary ideas of rel^ion contributing to people the -world with invisible enemies. As the only evidence he has for the objectivity of his, ideas is the mere ikct of their existence in conscious* ness, reality and fiction, the world revealed by his sensea and the world conjured up by his terrors, are to him in- distinguishable. It is diJBficult for us who have advanced beyond this£rst crude stage of thought to divest ourselves of our acquired notions, find to put ourselves at the point of view of those who knew of UQthing beyond it ; but it may assist us In 2d doing BO if we compare it with analagous- states of our own consciouane&Su In what, for instance, consists the illasion by which, in dreams, fancies seem realities if not in this, that we assume, without reflection, the validity of what passes through our minds, simply because it does pass through our minds ? When we emerge from this realm of unreality the spell is destroyed, because we find, by comparing our fancies with facts we have established by numberless relations to thought, that the former are de- void of the reality or objectivity of the latter. And so the victim of spectral illusions^ in which imagination pro- jects images that, at first sight, wear all the semblance of truth, may satisfy himself of their deceptive nature by employing the test of other senses besides sight, and thus converting his uncriticised impressions into definite know- ledge. These illustrations may make more apparent the imperfection of the sensuous consciousness, and the logical necessity by which thought is impelled to a higher stage. The mind cannot rest satisfied with taking merely indi- vidual things, out of relation to each other, for in doing so it hsfi, unknown to itself, implicitly related them ; it naturally and necessarily regards reality, not as a chaos of isolated impressions, but as forming a cosmos in which each thing contains relations within itself, and is related to other things. Thought, excited to greater ac- tivity, reflects more carefully upon the objects presented to it, and discovers that they contain mauy qualities, and must therefore be expressed by manifold predicates. This second stage of thought may be called Observation. The simple belief in the truth of any phenomenon that arises in consciousness has now given place to deliberate reflection upon individual objects and upon their mutual relations. Mediate has been substituted for immediate knowledge, experience for sensuous certitude. Higher' categories are applied to objects than mere being. The observing consciousuess advance beyond the fleeting im- pjpessions of sense to things ip.jblieir concrete reality. On^ I 30 the one hand, it views objects as composed of varions qual- ities— snch as solidity y extermon^Jigurey — and on the other, it soon discovers that it must view them in relation to each other, i.e.y as manifestations of such notions as uvityy plurality y cause arid effect. The plant I see, for example, may be viewed as a concrete object, made up of root, stem and leaves ; or again, it may Itu regarded as a unity, a plurality or a totality — as a plant, as possessed of certain definite parts, or as an object that is at once one and many ; or finally, it may be referred to the category of causality, since it depends for its existence upon situation, soil and moisture. By the observing consciousness we thus come to regard things as possessed of various qualities, a'l gathered up into classes, and as interconnected with each other. Common consciousness, and the special sciences in so far as they merely generalise groups of phenomena from observation, belong to this phase of thought, and di£fer only in the greater or less accuracy of their results. At this stage in the development of thought we have, then, an objective world, which is composed of individual things mutually related to each other, and which seems to be entirely independent of the knowing subject. To common consciousness and to science, natur6 has no deeper meaning than this ; but to a philosophy explan- atory of it the further question must be asked, " What is the relation of the objective world to thought /" This is the question to which the "Critique of Pure Reason" seeks to give an answer. Eant assumed the world as it presents itself to ordinary consciousness, and, in the limited extent we have mentioned, to the special sciences, and, by a critical enquiry into the ground of experience, was forced to deny that absolute dualism between thought and nature, which led to Hume's Scepticism, and which has resulted in modern Materialism. Kature or experience, he argued, cannot be accounted for except on the supposition that thought brings a large contribution of its own to assist in 81 producing and completing it. Neither in thought alone, nor ii. nature alone, can we find that permanence and objectivity which is assumed both by common conscious- ness and by science, but can not be proven by either ; only by the union of the two^by an orderly interblend- ing of a priori and a posteriori trntha — can this be ef- fected. As, therefore, the philosophy of Berkeley, and of all Sensationalists, interprets the first phase of con- sciousness, the deeper meaning of the second is revealed in the Metaphysical system of Kant. Thought is, however, capable of a still further advance than that which is attained by the observing conscious- ness. It rises above that conception of the world which regards it as a congeries of objects, possessed of differ- ent qualities, or grouped together into classes, or re- lated to each other by universal notions ; for the very idea of a correlation between facts leads to a more intimate relation than that as yet attained. Thus thought is, by its own nature, impelled to seek higher unities than it has hitherto found, and ends with conceiv- ing the world as a system of laws. This stage of thought is the Understanding. The phenomena of nature are now transmuted by the action of thought into exemplifi- cations of necessary laws, and thus half-subjective gener- alizations are raised to objective truths. Science, in so far as it is not a loose grouping of facts, but a collection of laws, belongs to this stage of thought. The special sciences, while they are still limited to the observation and classification of facts, belong to the observing con- sciousness ; when they carry their inductions so far as to find the laws that regulate phenomena, they have come within the range of the Understanding. The advance from the one stage to the other thus consists in finding greater permanence or objectivity in nature, in finding that it is not governed by caprice but by reason. The philosophical consideration of this mode of thought reveals truth higher than that which is discovered by da those who assume the absolute independence ot nature, and therefore the passivity of thought in its presence. It is true that the great object of scientific men is to elimi- nate all that is subjective, and to interpret nature from itself alone. But this, when examined more closely, only means that we must exclude our individual fancies or opinions and hold only that to be a law of nature which all intelligences or universal thought would recognise to be true ; for law in its true sense means an insepar- able unity, an indissoluble connection, of distinct relations. The Understanding, therefore, has penetrated into the inner soul of Nature and found it to be rational. What, however, is overlooked by those at this stage of thought is that in discovering the laws or necessities of Nature, we have at the sa.me time found that it is a manifestation of Thoiight or Beason — the thought, not of this or that in- telligence, but that which is participated in by all. And thus, in another way, we come back to our original state- ment that the special sciences are not fully conscious of the truth they reveal, because of the dualism they as- sume between nature and intelligence. Viewed from the higher platform of philosophy, the lesson taught us by the progress of science is the continuous discoveiy of a greater and greater unity between Thought and Nature ; and, although Science does not perceive that in mastering nature it is at the same time revealing the thought latent in it, its unchecked progress is a prophecy of ultimate triumph — the reduction of the whole external world to a system of laws — the revelation of the absolute rationality of the universe. The progress of thought has been, as it still is, an ever greater assimilation of nature into itself, and thus to philosophy Thought and Nature are found to be but obverse sides of the same shield. We have occupied so much time with the logical and metaphysical sides of Philosophy, that we can only add a few words on the contradiction which it is the office of Ethics to solve — ^that, namely, of Freedom and Necessity. 8d The irifetapbysicftl theory which reduce* the nature of man to a bundle of eensations, naturally leads to the ethical theory that he is the slave of uncontrollable feelings and desires against whit^h he is powerless. For if the ac- tions of man are entirely due to natural impluses, any given action will be determined by that impulse which preponderates at the moment ; and hence Hume but ex- pressed in clear terms the result of this view when he said, in his incisive way, that " Reason is and must be the slave of the patisions.'^ It in no way mends the mat- ter to explain that the basis of duty is to be found in the bappinej'S of the majority ; for althongli this idea, when systematically carried out, »i<«y lead to a course of con- duct vhat will harmonize with the dictates of duty, it can- not serve as a substantial ba^ii^ upon which a eyatem of Ethics may be reared. The ultimnte ground of action is pleasure, and no adequate reason cati be given by th^ Utilitarian why the individual may not act in accordance M^Ith h's depraved tastes, if they are depraved, whether his conduct will contribute to the happiness or misery of otliei-s. We do not obtain more satisfaction, but rather less, by in- terrogating any ofthe Ancient Philosophers; for, as they had no appreciation of tiie glorious destiny to which tnati is reserved, they wore uoccnscious that any reply was needed. Man was by them regarded not aa man, bnt as a member of the Si ate ; and hence the sole method ot elevating him was by adding to his natural Advantages the endowments and privileges of the few. Aristotle^i ideal ol' humanity, the magnanimous man, is a Gf-eek citizen, ix>»«?e:scd of the highest honours the State cato confer upon him, and conscious that he is worthy of them ; courageous, honest, cultured ; contemptuous t^ the applause of the common mitss of men, but pleased with the approbation of the more refined ; borh of a good family, and prosperous in bis Worldly afiairs; askin'g favours of no one^ or only with the greatest reluctance^ 84 but rejoicing to confer benofite upon othera. Such an ideal, it i» evident, in only uttHinable by tiie privileged few, but by tluit few may be realised with comparative eat^e. Now ChriBtianity, by recognising all men as equal in the sight of God, broke down the middle wall of par- tition between master and servant, cultured and uncul- tured, and contemplated man simply as man ; while, in setting' up an ideal of infinite purity, which embodied the essential nature of the human Spirit, it destroyed the solf-righteousnesB of the Ancients and substituted an infinite despair of perfection by showing that '' after wo have done all we are unprofitable servants." Christi- anity, therefore, in unveiling the infinite possibilities of humanity, and demanding their realization, necessarily implied the freedom of man, for only as free can he work out his high destiny. How is this demand to be reconciled with the fetters of necessity by which he seems to bo en- chained ? Much unnecessary confusion has been introduced into this question by the way in which human liberty has been conceived. Freedom, it has been held by the ma- jority of Moralists, can only exist if we can act independ- ently of motives, and even in opposition to them. It requires very little consideration to see that if this is the only possible conception of freedom, man is a slave to the most absolute necessity. He finds himself at his birtli restricted by position, circumstances and many other relations to others, which he cannot by any eff^ort shake off; He cannot, further, perform the most trivial, aict without having some motive for it, simply because hei Tfi a rational being and not a mere animal. Freedotn,. therefore, in the sense of exemption from all external in- fluences and restraints, is a mere figment of the brain, in- Tented by a scholastic subtlety and felt to be absurd by the common sense of mankind. But there is a truer and higher way in which freedom may be conceived, which at once Biecures moral re6pon3ibility, and allows for the iiifluencee of Booioty upon the individual. Tho highest freftdofn is not tliat in which we act without motireii.— -for that would he mere caprice — but tltat in which our ao* tion is reguhvted hy tho iiighest laws of our nature. Tha profligate man, who itt under the dominion of sense, tlie capricious man, who is tossed to and fro by every wind of passion, and the wilful man whose only motives are to act in opposition to motives, seem to themselves to be free, but in the light of reason they are in the hardest bond- age. He, on the other hand, who regulates all his action! by eternal principles of duty, may seem to be bound by the chains of necessity, but he really enjoys the highest liberty. For he is not subject to any external necessity, but only to the inner necessity of his own nature, in obey- ing which he purifies and strengthens his will and 1)6; comes a master where others are slaves. . .mj The possibility of working out one's freedom through seeming necessity, may be seen in all the relations into which man is brought. At first every one is under ap- parent bondage to his superiors in the family relation, but in reality this is the means by which a measure of free* dom is attained. It is true that he must render implicit obedience to those in authority over him, but in so doing he learns to free himself from an undue accentuation of his own individual desires, and to seek his freedom whore alone it can be found — in the subordination of his own will to the good of others. By and by he is liberated from the restrictions of the family, but he finds that he has only thrown off one yoke to take upon himself another and a heavier burden ; he is now a citizen — a member of the State — and as such he not only enjoys the rights of $ citizen, but is also bound down by the duties of his new relation, which hold him as by adamantine chains. Here^' again, he is free in so far as ho voluntarily and cheerfully; discharges his duties ; he is a slave if he attempts tO' avoid them and to throw them upon others. He cannot,, further, be a member of the state without being more * ■*>' 36 than this ; for a state is but ofte of the cotnmnnity of na- tions, and be who is a member of the one is a member of the other also. He alone, therefore, is free who recog>- nises in every man of whatever country or position that humanity which unites the race by the bonds of a common brotherhood, and who freely discharges the dnties he owes to all. He is enslaved who shuts his eyes God," and Duty, the voice of God speaking in the inner- most depths of our moral nature, agree in pointing up- wards to the Great Being whose essence they unfold. And thus the assurance which Religion gives to the in- dividual man of the existence of a Supreme Being whom he must reverence and love. Philosophy endorses and supports. The fundamental notions with which it is the office of Logic to deal may not inappropriately be termed the plan of the universe as it existed in the Divine mind before the creation of the world ; the long but sure path, by which Metaphysic ascends from the inorganic world to the world of living beings, and thence to the realm first of individual consciousness, and next of universal thought, at last terminates and loses itself in the all-em- bracing glory of God ; and the highest lesson that Ethics has to teach is that only by unity with the divine nature, only by the elevation of his individual will to the high standard of duty, can man enter into the glorious liber- ty wherewith the truth makes free. I should have preferred closing tliis lecture without making any reference to the feelings awakened within me upon the present occasion, did I not think it but just — not to use a stronger word — to express my public thanks for the honour which has been done me by my appoint- ment to the chair of Philosophy in this University. Knowing the eminent success which has attended the labours of my predecessors, I feel that my position is a peculiarly arduous one ; but this I may be permitted to say, that as the study of philosophy has been to me a source of exquisite pleasure in the past, so nothing could now give me more intense satisfaction than to be assured that I shall be in the future a successful teacher of Philosophy in Queen's University.