I I I DISCUSSIOI^S PHILOSOPHY AND LITERATURE, EDUCATION AND UNIVERSITY REFORM. D 1 S C^ U S S 1 N S ON PHILOSOPHY AND LITERATURE, KDUCATION AND UNIYEllSITY REFORM. CHIEFLY FROM THE EDIXUURGH REVIEW; CORRECTED, VINDICATED, ENLARGED. I N N O T E S A N D A P P E N D 1 C E S. SIR WILLIAM HAMILTON, BART " Truth, like a torch, the more it's shook it shines." LONDON: L O N (J M A K, IJ P. O W N, ®^3E4?e^=^- I. APPENDIX, PHILOSOPHICAL. (A.) Conditions of the Thinkable systematised ; Alphabet OF Human Thought, 577 (B.) Philosophical Testimonies to the limitation of our Knowledge, from the limitation of our Faculties, ... 601 32J II. APPENDIX, LOGICAL. (A.) Of Syllogism, its Kinds, Canons, Notations, &e., 614 (B.) On Affirmation and Negation, — on Propositional Forms, — ox Breadth and Depth, — ox Syllogistic, and Syllogistic Notation, 621* .. 38 iSI III. APPENDIX, EDUCATIONAL. (A.) Academical Patronage and Eegulation, in reference to the University of Edinburgh, 621 X CONTENTS. B.) The Examination and Honours for a Degree in Arts, DURING Centuries established in the University op LouvAiN, 645 (C.) On A Reform of the English Universities: with especial reference to Oxford ; and limited to the Faculty of Arts, 651 Addenda, 743 Corrigenda, 747 Index, 749 <^^^-o>^iCfXr>'=3^--^ PHILOSOPHY. T.-PHILOSOPHY OF THE UNCONDITIONED. IN REFERENCE TO COUSIN'S DOCTRINE OF THE INFINITO- ABSOLUTE. ^^^ (October, 1829.) Cours de Fhilosophie. Far M. Victor Cousin, Professeur de Philosophie a la Faculte des Lcttres de Paris. — Introdvction a VHistoire de la Philosojihie. 8vo. Paris, 1828. The delivery of these Lectures excited an unparalleled sensation in Paris. Condemned to silence during the reign of Jesuit ascen- dency, M. Cousin, after eight years of honourable retirement, not exempt from persecution, had again ascended the Chair of Philo- * [Translated into French, by M. Peisse ; into Italian, by S. Lo Gatto : also in Cross's Selections from the Edinburgh Review. This article did not originate with myself. I Avas requested to write it by my friend, the late accomplished Editor of the Review, Professor Napier. Personally, I felt averse from the task. I was not unaware, that a discussion of the leading doctrine of the book would prove unintelligible, not only to " the general reader," but, with few exceptions, to our British metaphysi- cians at large. But, moreover, I was still farther disinclined to the under- taking, because it would behove me to come forward in overt opposition to a certain theory, which, hoAvever powerfully advocated, I felt altogether unable to admit ; whilst its author, M. Cousin, was a philosopher for whose genius and character I already had the warmest admiration, — an admiration which every succeeding year has only augmented, justified, and confirmed. Nor, in saying tliis, need I make any reservation. For I admire, even where I dissent ; and were M. Cousin's speculations on the Absolute utterly abo- lished, to him would still remain the honour, of doing more himself, and of contributing more to what has been done by others, in the furtherance of an enlightened philosophy, than any other living individual in France — I might say in Europe. Mr Napier, however, was resolute ; it was the first lunnber A 2 PHILOSOPHY OF THE UNCONDITIONED. sopliy ; and the splendour with Avliich he recommenced his acade- mical career, more than justified the expectation which his recent celebrity as a writer, and the memory of his earlier prelections, had inspired. Two thousand auditors listened, all with admira- tion, many with enthusiasm, to the eloquent exposition of doc- trines intelligible only to the few ; and the oral discussion of phi- losophy awakened in Paris, and in France, an interest unexampled since the days of Abelard. The daily journals found it necessary to gratify, by their earlier summaries, the impatient curiosity of the public ; and the lectures themselves, taken in short-hand, and corrected by the Professor, propagated weekly the influence of his instruction to the remotest provinces of the kingdom. Nor are the pretensions of this doctrine disproportioned to the attention which it has engaged. It professes nothing less than to be the complement and conciliation of all philosophical opinion ; and its author claims the glory of placing the key-stone in the arch of science, by the discovery of elements hitherto unobserved among the facts of consciousness. Before proceeding to consider the claims of M. Cousin to origi- nality, and of his doctrine to truth, it is necessary to say a few words touching the state and relations of philosophy in France. After the philosophy of Descartes and Malebranche had sunk into obhvion, and from the time that Condillac, exaggerating the too partial principles of Locke, had analysed all knowledge into sensation, Sensuahsm, (or, Vnore correctly, Sensuism,) as a psycho- logical theory of the origin of our cognitions, became, in France, of the Keview under his direction ; and the criticism was hastily written. In this country the reasonings were of course not understood, and naturally, for a season, declared incomprehensible. Abroad, in France, Germany, Italy, and latterly in America, the article has been rated higher than it deserves. The illustrious thinker, against one of whose doctrines its argument is direct- ed, was the first to speak of it in terms which, though I feel their generosity, I am ashamed to quote. I may, however, state, that maintaining always his opinion, M. Cousin, (what is rare, especially in metaphysical discussions,) declared, that it was neither unfairly combated nor imperfectly under- stood In connection with this criticism, the reader should compare what M. Cousin has subsequently stated in defence and illustration of his sys- tem, in his Preface to the new edition of the Introduction a PHistoire de la Philosophies and Appendix to the fifth lecture {CEuvres, Serie II. Tome i. pp. vii. ix., and pp. 112-129 ;) — in his Preface to the second edition, and his Advertisement to the third edition of the Fragments Philosophiques {Q^uvres, S. III. T. iv.)— and in his Prefatory Notice to the Pensees de Pascal {(Euvres, S. IV. T. i.) — On the other hand, M. Peisse has ably advocated the coun- terview, in his Preface and Appendix to the Fragments de Philosophic, (Src] PHILOSOPHY IN FRANCK ; AND IN SCOTLAND. not only the dominant, bnt almost the one exclusive opinion. It was believed that reality and truth were limited to experience, and experience was limited to the sphere of sense ; while the very highest laculties of mind Avere deemed adequately explained when recalled to perceptions, elaborated, purified, sublimated, and transformed. From the mechanical relations of sense with its object, it was attempted to solve the mysteries of will and intel- ligence ; the philosophy of mind was soon viewed as correlative to the physiology of organisation. The moral nature of man was at last formally abolished, in its identification with his physical : mind became a reflex of matter ; thought a secretion of the brain. A doctrine so melancholy in its consequences, and founded on principles thus partial and exaggerated, could not be permanent : a reaction was inevitable. The recoil, which began about twenty years ago, has been gradually increasing ; and now it is perhaps even to be apprehended, that its intensity may become excessive. As the poison was of foreign growth, so also has been the antidote. The doctrine of Condillac was, if not a corruption, a development, oi'igi- of the doclrine of Locke ; and, in returning to a better philosophy, the French are still obeying an impulsion communicated from without. This impulsion may be traced to two difterent sources, — to the philosophy of Scotland, and to the philosophy of Germany. In Scotland, a philosophy had sprung up, Avhich, though pro- fessing, equally with the doctrine of Condillac, to build only on experience, did not, like that doctrine, hmit experience to the felations of sense and its objects. Without vindicating to man more than a relative knowledge of existence, and restricting the science of mind to an observation of the fact of consciousness, it, lowever, analysed that fact into a greater number of more import- mt elements than had been recognised in the school of Condillac. [t showed that phaenomena were revealed in thought which could lot be resolved into any modification of sense, — external or inter- lal. It proved that intelhgencc supposed principles, which, as he conditions of its activity, can not be the results of its opera- ion ; that the mind contained knowleges, which, as primitive, iniversal, necessary, are not to be explained as generalizations rom the contingent and individual, about which alone all expe- ■ience is conversant. The phfenomena of mind were thus distin- guished from the phajnomena of matter ; and if the impossibility )f materialism were not demonstrated, there was, at least, demon- itrated the impossibility of its proof. This philosophy, and still more the spirit of this philosophy. PHILOSOPHY OF THE UNCONDITIONED. jliefomi' ioi fiirereis was calculated to exert a salutary influence on the French. And such an influence it did exert. For a time, indeed, the truth operated in silence ; and Eeid and Stewart had already modified the philosophy of France, before the French were content to acknowledge themselves their disciples. In the works of Dege- rando and Laromiguiere, may be traced the influence of Scottish speculation ; but it is to Eoyer-Collard, and, more recently, to Jouftroy, that our countrymen are indebted for a full acknow- ledgment of their merits, and for the high and increasing esti- mation in which their doctrines are now held in France. M.j Royer-Collard, whose authority has, in every relation, been exert- 1 ^\^^ ed only for the benefit of his country, and who, once great as a ' ^^ professor, is now not less illustrious as a statesman, in his lectures, advocated with distinguished abiUty the principles of the Scottish school ; modestly content to follow, while no one was more entitled to lead. M. Joufi'roy, by his recent translation of the works of Dr Reid, and by the excellent preface to his version of Mr Dugald Stewart's " Outhnes of Moral Philosophy," has likewise power fully co-operated to the establishment, in France, of a philosophy equally opposed to the exclusive Sensualism of Condillac, and to the exclusive Rationalism of the new German school. Germany may be regarded, latterly at least, as the metaphysi cal antipodes of France. The comprehensive and original geniui of Leibnitz, itself the idejal abstract of the Teutonic character, had reacted powerfully on the minds of his countrymen ; and Rational ism, (more properly InteUectuaUsm,*) has, from his time, always remained the favourite philosophy of the Germans. On the prin ciple of this doctrine, it is in Reason alone that truth and reahtj are to be found. Experience aff'ords only the occasions on whicl intelligence reveals to us the necessary and universal notions o which it is the complement ; and these notions constitute at one * [On tlie modern commutation of Intellect or Intelligence (Nov?, Meiii Intellectus, Verstand), and Reason (Ao'yo?, Ratio, Vernunfi), see Dissei tations on Reid, pp. 6G8, 6G9, 693. (This has nothing to do with the cor fusion of Reason and Reasoning.) Protesting, therefore, against the abus' I historically emploj' the terms as they Avere employed by the philosophc here commemorated. This unfortimatc reversal has been propagated to tl Fi-ench philosophy, and also adopted in England by Coleridge and his fo lowers.— I may here notice that I use the term Understanding, not for tl noetic faculty, intellect proper, or place of principles, but for the dianoei or discursive faculty, in its widest signification, for the faculty of relatio' or comparison ; and thus in the meaning in which Verstand is now employ bv the Germans. In this sense I have been able to be uniformly consisteni «Idi!k ietliaki wiicanoE itlaliTt w ptajiiy and M-x iiiiiii;(oi jective ui Tins i^ pk.diesf; Kbls m teeodi I tmi,llifC Mi k J k bvatini! r ir!' ■" tlll'V lift 'I. And lie trutti iiiodiied 'litent to »i Deje- 'f5(0ttis!l ently, to ackttow- jiiig esti- nee, M, en exert Teat as a lectDres, Scottisli f entitled mh of li'Dogald se power' iliilosopliy le, and to netapliysi' nal jenins PHILOSOPHY IN GERMANY. 5 the foundation of all reasoning, and the guarantee of our whole knowledge of reality. Kant, indeed, pronounced the philosophy of Rationalism a mere fabric of delusion. He declared that a science of existence w^as beyond the compass of our faculties ; that pure reason, as purely subjective,* and conscious of nothing but * In the ])hilosophy of miud, subjective denotes what is to be referred to the thinking subject, the Ego ; objective what belongs to the object of thought, the Non-Ego. — It may be safe, perliaps, to say a few words in vindication of our employment of these terms. By the Greeks the word vicoKilf^ivov was equivocally employed to express cither the object of hnoio- ledge^ (the materia circa quam^) or the subject of existence, (the materia in qua.) The exact distinction of subject and object was first made by the schoolmen ; and to the schoolmen the vulgar languages are principally indebted for what precision and analytic subtilty they possess. Tliese cor- relative terms correspond to the first and most important distinction in philosophy ; they embody the original antithesis in consciousness of self and not-self, — a distinction which, in fact, involves the whole science of mind ; for psychology is nothing more than a determination of the sub- jective and the objective, in themselves, and in their reciprocal relations. Thus significant of the primary and most extensive analysis in philoso- phy, these terms, in their substantive and adjective forms, passed from the schools into the scientific language of Telesius, Campanella, Berigardus, Gassendi, Descartes, Spinosa, Leibnitz, Wolf, &c. Deprived of these terms, the Critical philosophy, indeed the whole philosophy of Germany, would be a blank. In this country, though familiarly employed in scien- tific language, even subsequently to the time of Locke, the adjective Meter, nad forms seem at length to have dropt out of the English tongue. That 1 te'oiw!- these words waxed obsolete was perhaps caused by the ambiguity which ,,^ jl^jvs had gradually crept into the signification of the substantives. Object, ,|jj_ besides its proper signification, came to be abusively applied to denote ^..motive, end, final cause (a meaning not recognised by Johnson). This w' .innovation was probably borrowed from the French, in whose language the i>onvtac' yyord had been similarly corrupted after the commencement of the last cen- 1 notions tury (Diet, de Trevoux, voce Objet.) Subject in English, as sujet in French, uteatoncfhad been also perverted into a synonyme for object, taken in its proper meaning, and had thus returned to the original ambiguity of the correspond- ^-, j/ffljing term in Greek. It is probable that the logical applic;ition of the word ^^^^^{subject of attribution or predication) facilitated or occasioned this confusion. '^^Illidiftonfu using the terms, therefore, we think that an exi)lanation, but no apology, j]jpjl)U(is required. The distinction is of paramount importance, and of infinit*; 'iliilosophei application, not only in ]ihilosophy proper, but in grammar, rhetoric, criti- .,„.,(eiitoftcism, ethics, politics, jurisprudence, theology. It is adequately expressed 'ml his f" ^y "*^ other terms ; and if these did not already enjoy a prescriptive right, '^,^,jf(,fttias denizens of the language, it cannot be denied, that, as strictly analogical, ' , ^^ijjjel they would be well entitled to sue out their naturalization. — [Not that . q[ iilatioi these terms were formerly always employed in the same signification and ■ .^jjp](yf contrast which they now obtain. For a history of these variations, see Dis- ,lv consists"'! PHILOSOPHY OF THE UNCONDITIONED. itself, was therefore unable to evince the reality of aught beyond the phsenomena of its personal modifications. But scarcely had the critical philosopher accompHshed the recognition of this im- portant principle, the result of which was, to circumscribe the field of speculation by narrow bounds ; than from the very dis- ciples of his school there arose philosophers, who, despising the contracted hmits, and humble results, of a philosophy of obser- vation, re-estabhshed, as the predominant opinion, a bolder and more uncompromising Rationahsm than any that had ever pre- viously obtained for their countrymen the character of philosophic visionaries — " Gens ratione ferox, et meutem pasta chimffiris."* (•' Minds fierce for reasou, and on fancies fed.'') Founded by Fichte, but evolved by Schelling, this doctrine regards experience as unworthy of the name of science : because, as only of the phaenomenal, the transitory, the dependent, it is only of that which, having no reality in itself, cannot be esta- blished as a vahd basis of certainty and knowledge. Philosophy j must, therefore, either be abandoned, or we must be able to seize ; the One, the x\bsolute, the Unconditioned, immediately and in' itself. And this they profess to do by a kind of intellectual vision.^ In this act, reason, soaring not only above the world of sertations on Reid, p. 806, sq. — Since this article was written, the words have in this coimtry re-euteved on then- ancient rights; they are now in common use.] * [This line, which was quoted fi-om memory, has, I find, in the original, "furens;" therefore translated — "Minds mad with reasoning — and fancy- j fed." The author certainly had in his eye the " ratione iusanias" of Terence, j It is fi'oni a satyi'e by Abraham Remi, who, in the former half of the seven-! teenth centmy, was Professor Royal of Eloquence in the University of] Paris ; and it referred to the disputants of the Irish College in that illustrious! school. The " Hibernian Logicians" were, indeed, long famed over the continent of Europe, for their acuteness, pugnacity, and barbarism ; as is recorded by Patin, Bayle, Le Sage, and many others. The learned Menage was so delighted Avith the verse, as to declare, that he would give his best benefice (and ho enjoyed some fat ones) to have written it. It applies, not only with real, but with verbal, accuracy to the German Rationalists; who in Philosophy (as Aristotle has it), " in making reason omnipotent, show their OAvn impotence of reason," and in Theology (as Charles II. said of Isaac Yossius), — " believe every thing but the Bible."] t " \_lnteUectuelle Anschauunyy — This is doubly wrong. — 1°, In gram- matical rigour, the word in German ought to have been " intellectua/e." 2°, In philosophical consistency the intuition ought not to have been called* by its authors (Fichte and Schelling) intellectual. For, though this cauecij be, inj COUSINS PHILOSOPHY. 7 sense, but beyond the sphere of personal consciousness, boldly places itself at the very centre of absolute being, with which it claims to be, in fact, identified ; and thence surveying existence in itself, and in its relations, unveils to us the nature of the Deity, and explains, from first to last, the derivation of all created things. M. Cousin is the apostle of Rationalism in France, and we are wilhng to admit that the doctrine could not have obtained a more eloquent or devoted advocate. For philosophy he has suffered ; to her niinisti'y he has consecrated himself — devoted without reserve his life and labours. Neither has he approached the sanctuary with unwashed hands. The editor of Proclus and Descartes, the translator and interpreter of Plato, and the pro- mised expositor of Kant, will not be accused of partiality in the choice of his pursuits ; while his two works, under the title of Philosophical Fragments, bear ample evidence to the learning, elegance, and distinguished ability of their author. Taking him all in all, in France M. Cousin stands alone : nor can we contem- plate his character and accomplishments, without the sincerest admiration, even ^vhile we dissent from the most prominent prin- ciple of his philosophy. The development of his system, in all its points, betrays the influence of German speculation on his opi- nions. His theory is not, however, a scheme of exclusive Rationalism ; on the contrary, the peculiarity of his doctrine consists in the attempt to combine the philosophy of experience, and the philosophy of pure reason, into one. The following is a concise statement of the fundamental positions of his system : Reason, or intelhgeuce, has three integrant elements, affording three regulative principles, which at once constitute its nature, and govern its manifestations. These three ideas severally sup- pose each other, and, as inseparable, are equally essential and equally primitive. They are recognised by Aristotle and by Kant, in their several attempts to analyse intelligence into its principles ; but though the categories of both philosophers com- prise all the elements of thought, in neither list are these elements naturally co-arranged, or reduced to an ultimate simplicity. fact, absolutely more correct, yet relatively it is a blunder ; for the intuition, as intended by them, is of their higher faculty, the Reason (Vcrnunft), and not of their loAvcr, the Understanding or Intellect (Verstand). In modern Gennan Philosophy, Verstand is always translated by Intellectus; and this again corresponds to Nov,'.] 8 PHILOSOPHY OF THE UNCONDITIONED. The first of these ideas, elements, or laws, though funda- mentally one, our author variously expresses, by the terms unity, identity, substance, absolute cause, the infinite, pure thought, &c. ; (we would briefly call it the unconditioned.) The second, he denominates plurality, difference, phaenomenon, relative cause, the finite, determined thought, &c. ; (we would style it the con- ditioned.) These two elements are relative and correlative. The first, though absolute, is not conceived as existing absolutely in itself; it is conceived as an absolute cause, as a cause which can- not but pass into operation ; in other words, the first element must manifest itself in the second. The two ideas are thus con- nected together as cause and effect ; each is only realised through the other ; and this their connexion, or correlation, is the third inte- grant element of intelligence. Reason, or intelligence, in which these ideas appear, and which, in fact, they make up, is not individual, is not ours, is not even human ; it is absolute, it is divine. What is personal to us, is our free and voluntary activity ; what is not free and not voluntary, is adventitious to man, and does not constitute an integrant part of his individuality. Intelligence is conversant Avith truth ; truth, as necessary and universal, is not the creature of my volition ; and reason, which, as the subject of truth, is also universal and necessary, is consequently impersonal. We see, therefore, by a light which is not ours, and reason is a revelation of God in man. The ideas of which we are 'conscious, belong not to us, but to ab- solute intelligence. They constitute, in truth, the very mode and manner of its existence. For consciousness is only possible under plurality and difference, and intelligence is only possible through consciousness. The divine nature is essentially comprehensible. For the three ideas constitute the nature of the Deity ; and the very nature of ideas is to be conceived. God, in fact, exists to us, only in so far as he is known ; and the degree of our knowledge must always determine the measure of our faith. The relation of God to the universe is therefore manifest, and the creation easily un- derstood. To create, is not to make something out of nothing, for this is contradictory, but to originate from self. We create so often as we exert our free causality, and something is created by us, when something begins to be by virtue of the free cau- sality which belongs to us. To create is, therefore, to cause, not with nothing, but with the very essence of our being — with our COUSIN'S PHILOSOPHY. force, our will, our personality. The divine creation is of the same character. God, as he is a cause, is able to create ; as he is an absolute cause, he cannot but create. In creating the uni- verse, he does not di'aw it from nothing ; he draws it from him- self. The creation of the universe is thus necessary ; it is a manifestation of the Deity, but not the Deity absolutely in him- self ; it is God passing into activity, but not exhausted in the act. The universe created, the principles which determined the creation are found still to govern the worlds of matter and mind. Two ideas and their connection explain the intelligence of God ; two laws in their counterpoise and correlation explain the material universe. The law of Expansion is the movement of unity to variety ; the law of Attraction is the return of variety to unity. In the world of mind the same analogy is apparent. The study of consciousness is psychology. Man is the microcosm of existence ; consciousness, within a narrow focus, concentrates a knowledge of the universe and of God ; psychology is thus the abstract of all science, human and divine. As in the external world, all phaenomena may be reduced to the two great laws of Action and Ileaction ; so, in the internal, all the facts of conscious- ness may be reduced to one fundamental fact, comprising in like manner two principles and their correlation ; and these principles are again the One or the Infinite, the Many or the Finite, and the Connection of the infinite and finite. In every act of consciousness we distinguish a Self or E(jo, and something different from self, a Non-ego ; each limited and modi- fied by the other. These, together, constitute the finite element. But at the same instant when we are conscious of these existences, plural, relative, and contingent, we are conscious likewise of a superior unity in which they are contained, and by which they are explained ; — a unity absolute as they are conditioned, sub- stantive as they are phsenomenal, and an infinite cause as they are finite causes. This unity is God. The fact of consciousness is thus a complex phaenomenon, comprehending three several terms : 1°, The idea of the Ego and Non-ego as Finite ; 2", The idea of something else as Infinite ; and, 3", The idea of the Rela- tion of the finite element to the infinite. These elements are revealed in themselves and in their mutual connexion, in every act of primitive or Spontaneous consciousness. They can also be reviewed by Eeflection in a voluntary act ; but here reflection distinguishes, it does not create. The three ideas, the throe 10 PHILOSOPHY OF THE UNCONDITIONED. categories of intelligence, are given in the original act of instinc- tive apperception, obscurely, indeed, and without contrast. Ee- flection analyses and discriminates the elements of this primary synthesis ; and as will is the condition of reflection, and will at the same time is personal, the categories, as obtained through reflection, have consequently the appearance of being also personal and subjective. It was this personality of reflection that misled Kant : caused him to overlook or misinterpret the fact of spon- taneous consciousness ; to individuahse intelligence ; and to collect under this personal reason all that is conceived by us as necessary and universal. But as, in the spontaneous intuition of reason, there is nothing voluntary, and consequently nothing personal ; and as the truths which inteUigence here discovers, come not from ourselves ; we have a right, up to a certain point, to impose these truths on others as revelations from on high : while, on the con- trary, reflection being wholly personal, it would be absurd to im- pose on others, what is the fruit of our individual operations. Spontaneity is the principle of religion ; reflection of philosophy. Men agree in spontaneity ; they diff*er in reflection. The former is necessarily veracious ; the latter is naturally delusive. The condition of Reflection is separation : it illustrates by dis- tinguishing ; it considers the different elements apart, and while it contemplates one, it necessarily throws the others out of view. Hence, not only the possibility, but the necessity, of error. The primitive unity, supposing no distinction, admits of no error ; reflection in discriminating the elements of thought, and in con- sidering one to the exclusion of others, occasions error, and a variety in error. He who exclusively contemplates the element of the Infinite, despises him who is occupied with the idea of the Finite ; and vice versa. It is the wayward development of the various elements of intelligence, which determines the imperfec- tions and varieties of individual character. Men under this partial and exclusive development, are but fragments of that humanity which can only be fully realised in the harmonious evolution of all its principles. What Reflection is to the individual. History is to the human race. The difference of an epoch consists exclu- sively in the partial development of some one element of intelli- gence in a prominent portion of mankind ; and as there are only three such elements, so there are only three grand epochs in the history of man. A knowledge of the elements of reason, of their relations and COUSIN'S PHILOSOPHY. 11 of their laws, constitutes not merely Philosophy, but is the con- dition of a History of Philosophy. The history of human reason, or the history of philosophy, must bo rational and philosophic. It must be philosophy itself, with all its elements, in all their relations, and under all their laws, represented in striking cha- racters by the hands of time and of history, in the manifested progress of the human mind. The discovery and enumeration of all the elements of intelligence enable us to survey the progress of speculation from the loftiest vantage ground ; it reveals to us the laws by which the development of reflection or philosophy is determined ; and it supplies us with a canon by which the ap- proximation of the different systems to the truth may be finally ascertained. And what are the results ? Sensualism, Idealism, Scepticism, Mysticism, are all partial and exclusive views of the elements of intelligence. But each is false only as it is incomplete. They are all true in what they affirm ; all erroneous in what they deny. Though hitherto opposed, they are, consequently, not incapable of coahtion ; and, in fact, can only obtain their con- summation in a powerful Eclecticism, — a system which shall com- prehend them all. This Eclecticism is realised in the doctrine previously developed; and the possibihty of such a cathohc philosophy Avas first afforded by the discovery of jM. Cousin, made so long ago as the year 1817, — " that consciousness con- tained many more phasnomena than had previously been sus- pected." The present course is at once an exposition of these principles, as a true theory of philosophy, and an illustration of the mode in which this theory is to be applied, as a rule of criticism in the history of philosophical opinion. As the justice of the appli- cation must be always subordinate to the truth of the principle, we shall confine ourselves exclusively to a consideration of M. Cousin's system, viewed absolutely in itself. This, indeed, we are afraid will prove comparatively irksome ; and, therefore, solicit indulgence, not only for the unpopular nature of the chs- cussion, but for the employment of language which, from the total neglect of these speculations in Britain, will necessarily appear abstruse — not merely to the general reader. Now, it is manifest that the whole doctrine of M. Cousin is involved in the proposition, — that the (Jncomlitioned, the Abso- lute, the Injinitc, is immediately knoicn in consciousness, and this by difference., ■plurality., and relation. The nnronditionorl, as an 12 PHILOSOPHY OF THE UNCONDITIONED. original element of knowledge, is the generative principle of his system, but common to him with others ; whereas the mode in which the possibihty of this knowledge is explained, affords its discriminating peculiarity. The other positions of his theory, as deduced from this assumption, may indeed be disputed, even if the antecedent be allowed ; but this assumption disproved, every consequent in his theory is therewith annihilated. The recogni- tion of the absolute as a constitutive principle of intelligence, our author regards as at once the condition and the end of philosophy ; and it is on the discovery of this j)rinciple in the fact of conscious- ness, that he vindicates to himself the glory of being the founder of the new eclectic, or the one catholic, philosophy. The determi- nation of this cardinal point will thus briefly satisfy us touching the claim and character of the system. To explain the nature of the problem itself, and the sufficiency of the solution propounded by M. Cousin, it is necessary to premise a statement of the opinions which may be entertained regarding the Unconditioned, as an immediate object of knowledge and of thought. These opinions may be reduced to four. — 1°, The Uncon- ditioned is incognisable and inconceivable ; its notion being only negative of the conditioned, which last can alone be positively known or conceived. — 2°, It is not an object of knowledge ; but its notion, as a regulative principle of the mind itself, is more than a mere negation of ,the conditioned. — 3°, It is cognisable, but not conceivable ; it can be known by a sinking back into identity with the absolute, but is incomprehensible by conscious- ness and reflection, which are only of the relative and the dif- ferent. — 4°, It is cognisable and conceivable by consciousness and reflection, under relation, difference, and plurality. The first of these opinions we regard as true ; the second is held by Kant ; the third by Schelling ; and the last by our author. 1. In our opinion, the mind can conceive, and consequently can know, only the limited, and the conditionally limited. The uncon- ditionally unlimited, or the Infinite, the unconditionally hmited, or the Absolute, cannot positively be construed to the mind ; they can be conceived, only by a thiiikmg away from, or abstraction of, those very conditions under which thought itself is reahsed ; consequently, the no don of the Unconditioned is only negative, — negative of the conceivable itself. For example, on the one hand we can positively conceive, neither an absolute whole, that is, a I REVIEWER'S DOCTRINE UE THE UNCONDITIONEn. 13 whole so great, that wc cannot also conceive it as a relative part of a still (greater whole ; nor an absolute part, that is, a part so small, that wc cannot also conceive it as a relative whole, divisible into smaller parts. On the other hand, we cannot positively repre- sent, or realise, or construe to the mind (as here understanding and imagination coincide *), an infinite whole, for this could only be done by the infinite synthesis in thought of finite wholes, which would itself require an infinite time for its accomplishment ; nor, for the same reason, can we follow out in thought an infinite divi- sibility of parts. The result is the same, whether we apply the process to limitation in space, in time, or in degree. The uncon- ditional negation, and the unconditional affirmation of limitation ; in other words, the injiniie and the absolute, properly so called,] are thus equally inconceivable to us. * [The Understanding, thought proper, notion, concept, &c., may coincide or not with Imagination, representation proper, image, &c. The two facul- ties do not coincide in a general notion ; for we cannot represent Man or Horse in an actual image without individualising the universal ; and thus contradiction emerges. But in the individual, say, Socrates or Bucephalus, they do coincide ; for I see no valid gi'ound why we should not thijik^ in the strict sense of the word, or conceive the individuals which we represent. In like manner there is no mutual contradiction between the image and the concept of the Infinite or Absolute, if these be otherwise possible ; for there is not necessarily involved the incompatibility of the one act of cognition with the other.] t It is right to observe, that though we are of opinion that the terms, Infinite and Absolute, and Unconditioned, ought not to be confounded, and accurately distinguish them in the statement of our own view ; yet, in speaking of the doctrines of those by whom they are indifferently employed, we have not thought it necessary, or rather we have found it impossible, to adhere to the distinction. The Unconditioned in our use of language denotes the genus of which the Infinite and Absolute are the species. [The term Absolute is of a twofold (if not threefold) ambiguit}', correspond- ing to the double (or treble) signification of the word in Latin. 1. Absolutum means what is freed or loosed; in which sense the Absolute will be what is aloof from relation, comparison, limitation, condition, depen- dence, &c., and thus is tantamount to to d'KohvTr^v of the lower Greeks. In this moaning the Absolute is not opposed to the Infinite. 2. Absolntum xmaws finished, perfected, completed ; in which sense the Ab- solute will be what is out of relation, &c., as finished, perfect, complete, total, and tluis coiTcsponds to to '67,ou and to teAs/ov of Aristotle. In this acceptation, — and it is that in which for myself I exclusively use it,— the Absolute is diametrically opposed to, is contradictory of, the Infinite. Besides these two meanings, there is to be noticed the use of the word, for the most part in its adverbial form ; — uhsohitely (absolute) in the sense of 14 PHILOSOPHY OF THE UNCONDITIONED. As the conditionally limited (which we may briefly call the conditioned) is thus the only possible object of knowledge and of positive thought — thought necessarily supposes conditions. To think is to condition ; and conditional limitation is the fundamental law of the possibility of thought. For, as the greyhound cannot outstrip his shadow, nor (by a more appropriate simile) the eagle - ip-- outsoar the atmosphere in which he floats, and by which alone he life of may be supported; so the mind cannot transcend that sphere of | ?f "" limitation, within and through which exclusively the possibihty of thought is realised. Thought is only of the conditioned ; because, as we have said, to think is simply to condition. The absolute is conceived merely by a negation of conceivabihty ; and all that we know, is only known as " won from the void and formless infinite.'" How, indeed, it could ever be doubted that thought is only of the conditioned, may well be deemed a matter of the profoundest admiration. Thought cannot transcend consciousness ; conscious- ness is only possible under the antitliesis of a subject and object of thought, known only in correlation, and mutually limiting each other ; while, independently of this, all that we know either of subject or object, either of mind or matter, is only a knowledge in each of the particular, of the plural, of the different, of the modified, of the phsenomenal. We admit that the consequence of this doctrine is, — that philosophy, if viewed as more than a science of the conditioned, is impossible. Departing from the particular, we admit, that we can never, in our highest generalisations, rise above the finite ; that our knowledge, whether of mind or matter, can be nothing more than a knowledge of the relative manifesta- tions of an existence, which in itself it is our highest wisdom to recognise as beyond the reach of philosophy, — in the language of St Austin, — " cognoscendo ignorari, et ignorando cognosci." The conditioned is the mean between two extremes, — two incon- ditionates, exclusive of each other, neither of which can he con- ceived as possible, but of which, on the principles of contradiction and excluded middle, one tmist be admitted as necessary. On this opinion, therefore, reason is shown to be weak, but not deceitful. simply, siinpliciter, x'TrT^Zg), that is, considered in and for itself — considered not in relation. This holds a similar analogy to the two former meanings of Absolute, which the Indefinite (j6 xooigtov) does to the Infinite {t6 xtthqo!/). It is subjective as they are objective ; it is in our thought as they are in their own existence. This application is to be discounted, as here irrelevant.] ^Iliiiitet I KANTS DOCTRINK OF THE UNCONDITIONED. rhc mind is not represented as conceiving two propositions sub- versive of each otlicr, as equally possible ; but only, as unable to understand as possible, eitber of two extremes ; one of which, however, on the ground of their mutual repugnance, it is compelled to recognise as true. We are thus taught the salutary lesson, ;hat the capacity of thought is not to be constituted into the moa- ure of existence ; and are warned from recognising the domain )f our knowledge as necessarily co-extensive with the horizon of )ur faith. And by a wonderful revelation, we are thus, in the irery consciousness of our inability to conceive aught above the rela- ;ive and finite, inspired with a belief in the existence of something inconditioned beyond the sphere of all comprehensible reality.* 2. The second opinion, that of Kant, is fundamentally the same IS the preceding. Metaphysic, strictly so denominated, the phi- osophy of Existence, is virtually the doctrine of the unconditioned, ^'rom Xenophanes to Leibnitz, the infinite, the absolute, the un- ;onditioned, formed the highest principle of speculation ; but from he dawn of philosophy in the school of Elea until the rise of the .Kantian philosophy, no serious attempt was made to investigate he nature and origin of this notion (or notions) as a psychological )haBnomenon. Before Kant, philosophy was rather a deduction rom principles, than an inquiry concerning principles them- elves. At the head of every system a cognition figured, which he philosopher assumed in conformity to his vicAvs ; but it was arely considered necessary, and more rarely attempted, to .scertain the genesis, and determine the domain, of this notion r judgment, previous to application. In his first Critique, Kant ndertakes a regular survey of consciousness. He professes Jeiiitolo analyse the conditions of human knowledge, — to mete out limits, — to indicate its point of departure, — and to deter- line its possibihty. That Kant accomplished much, it would e prejudice to deny ; nor is his service to philosophy the less, I incoo- k c» M» Oiitte ;eeitfiJ. iiijiilered jv are in * [True, therefore, arc the decharations of a pions philosophy : — ■'■' A God nderstood would be no God at all ; " — "To think that God is, as we can link him to be, is blasphemy."— The Divinity, in a certain sense, is ivealed ; in a certain sense is concealed : He is at once known and unknown, ut the last and highest consecration of all true religion, must be an altar -Ayi/utTTu Qsu — " To tlte unknown and unknowable God.'''' In this consum- lation, nature and revelation, paganism and Christianity, are at one : and om either source the testimonies are so numerous that I must refrain om quoting any. — Am I wi'ong in thinking, that ]\I. Cousin would not pudiate this doctrine ?] 16 PHILOSOPHY OF THE UNCONDITIONED. j that his success has been more decided in the subversion of error than in the estabhshment of truth. The result of his examination was the abohtion of the metaphysical sciences, — of rational psy- chology, ontology, speculative theology, &c., as founded on mere petitiones principioriim. Existence is revealed to us only under specific modifications, and these are known only under the con- ditions of our faculties of knowledge. •' Things in themselves," Matter, Mind, God, — all, in short, that is not finite, relative, and phenomenal, as bearing no analogy to our faculties, is beyond the verge of our knowledge. Philosophy was thus restricted to the observation and analysis of tlie phaenomena of consciousness ; and what is not explicitly or implicitly given in a fact of conscious- ness, is condemned, as transcending the sphere of a legitimate speculation. A knowledge of the unconditioned is declared impos- sible; either immediately, as a notion, or mediately, as an inference. A demonstration of the absolute from the relative is logically absurd ; as in such a syllogism we must collect in the conclusion what is not distributed in the premises : And an immediate know- ledge of the unconditioned is equally impossible. — But here we think his reasoning complicated, and his reduction incomplete. We must explain ourselves. While we regard as conclusive, Kant's analysis of Time and Space into conditions of thought, we cannot help viewing his deduction of the " Categories of Understanding," and the " Ideas of speculative Reason," as the work of a great but perverse inge- nuity. The categories of understanding are merely subordinate forms of the conditioned. Why not, therefore, generahse the Conditioned — Existence conditioned, as the supreme category, or categories, of thought ? — and if it were necessary to analyse this form into its subaltern applications, why not develope these imme- diately out of the generic principle, instead of preposterously, and by a forced and partial analogy, deducing the laws of the under- standing from a questionable division of logical propositions ? Why distinguish Reason ( Vernunji) from Understanding ( Ver- stand), simply on the ground that the former is conversant about,; or rather tends towards, the unconditioned ; when it is sufliciently; apparent, that the unconditioned is conceived only as the negation of the conditioned, and also that the conception of contradictories' is one? In the Kantian philosophy both faculties perform the same function, both seek the one in the many ; — the Idea (Idee) is only the Concept {Begriff) sublimated into the inconceivable ; KANTS DOCTRINE OF THE INCONDITIONEI). 17 Reason only the Understanding which has " overleaped itself." Kant has clearly sliown, that the idea of the nnconditioned can have no objective reality, — that it conveys no knowledge, — and that it involves the most insolnble contradictions. But he ought to have sliown that the unconditioned had no objective application, because it had, in fact, no subjective affirmation, — that it afforded no real knowledge, because it contained nothing even conceiv- able, — and that it is self-contradictory, because it is not a notion, either simple or positive, but only a fasciculus of negations — negations of the conditioned in its opposite extremes, and bound together merely by the aid of language and their common cha- racter of incomprehensibility. And while he appropriated Reason as a specific faculty to take cognisance of these negations, hypos- tatised as positive, under the Platonic name of Ideas ; so also, as a pendant to his deduction of the categories of Understanding from a logical division of propositions, he deduced the classifica- tion and number of these ideas of Reason from a logical division of syllogisms. — Kant thus stands intermediate between those who view the notion of the absolute as the instinctive affirmation of an enceutric intuition, and those who regard it as the factitious nega- tive of an eccentric generalisation. Were we to adopt from the Critical Philosophy the idea of analysing thought into its fundamental conditions, and were we to carry the reduction of Kant to what we think its ultimate sim- pUcity, we would discriminate thought into positive and negative, according as it is conversant about the conditioned or uncondi- tioned. This, however, would constitute a logical, not a psycho- logical distinction ; as positive and negative in thought are known at once, and by the same intellectual act. The twelve Categories of the Understanding would be thus included under the former ; Ml the three Ideas of Reason under the latter ; and to this intent the contrast between understanding and reason would disappear. tioEi: Finally, rejecting the arbitrary limitation of time and space to j • the sphere of sense, we would express under the formula of — The Conditioned in Time and Space — a definition of the conceivable, and an enumeration of the three categories of thought.* jtii The imperfection and partiality of Kant's analysis are betrayed in its consequences. His doctrine leads to absolute scepticism. * [See Appendix I., for a more matured view of these categories or con- ditions of thought.] B 18 PHILOSOPHY OF THE UNCONDITIONED. Speculative reason, on Kant's own admission, is an organ of mere delusion. The idea of the unconditioned, about which it is con- versant, is shown to involve insoluble contradictions, and yet to be the legitimate product of intelligence. Hume has well observed, " that it matters not whether we possess a false reason, or no reason at all." If " the Hght that leads astray, be light from heaven," what are we to believe ? If our intellectual nature be perfidious in one revelation, it must be presumed deceitful in all ; nor is it possible for Kant to establish the existence of God, Free- will, and Immortality, on the presumed veracity of reason, in a practical relation, after having himself demonstrated its mendacity in a speculative. Kant had annihilated the older metaphysic, but the germ of a more visionary doctrine of the absolute, than any of those refuted, was contained in the bosom of his own philosophy. He had slain the body, but had not exorcised the spectre of the absolute ; and this spectre has continued to haunt the schools of Germany even to the present day. The philosophers were not content to aban- don their metaphysic ; to hmit philosophy to an observation of phaenomena, and to the generalisation of these phsenomena into laws. The theories of ,Bouterweck, (in his earher works,) of Bardili, of Reinhold, of Fichte, of Schelling, of Hegel, and of sundry others, are just so many endeavours, of greater or of less ability, to fix the absolute as a positive in knowledge ; but the absolute, like the water in' the sieves of the Danaides, has always hitherto run through as a negative into the abyss of nothing. 3. Of these theories, that of Schelling is the only one in regard to which it is now necessary to say any thing. His opinion constitutes the third of those enumerated touching the knowledge of the absolute ; and the following is a brief statement of its prin- cipal positions : — While the lower sciences are of the relative and conditioned, Philosophy, as the science of sciences, must be of the absolute — the unconditioned. Philosophy, therefore, supposes a science of the absolute. Is the absolute beyond our knowledge ? — then is philosophy itself impossible. But how> it is objected, can the absolute be known? The ab- solute, as unconditioned, identical, and one, cannot be cognised under conditions, by difference and plurality. It cannot, there- fore, be known, if the subject of knowledge be distinguished from the object of knowledge ; in a knowledge of the absolute, exist- SCIIELLING'S DOCTRINE OP THE UNCONDITIONED. IS) ence and knowledge must be identical ; the absolute can only bo known, if adequately known, and it can only be adequately known, by the absolute itself. But is this possible? We are wholly ignorant of existence in itself: — the mind knows nothing, except in parts, by quality, and difference, and relation ; consciousness supposes the subject contradistinguished from the object of thought; the abstraction of this contrast is a negation of consciousness ; and the negation of consciousness is the annihilation of thought itself. The alternative is therefore unavoidable : — either finding the abso- lute, we lose ourselves ; or retaining self and individual conscious- ness, we do not reach the absolute. All this Schelhng frankly admits. He admits that a knowledge of the absolute is impossible, in personality and consciousness : ho admits that, as the understanding knows, and can know, only by consciousness, and consciousness only by difference, we, as con- scious and understanding, can apprehend, can conceive only the conditioned ; and he admits that, only if man be himself the in- finite, can the infinite be known by him : " Xec sentire Denm, nisi qui pars ipse Deonuii est ; " * ("Xonecan feel God, who shares not in the Godhead.") * [This line is from Manilius. Bat as a statement of Schelling's doctrine it is inadequate ; for on his doctrine the deit}' can be Ivnown onl}- if fully known, and a full knowledge of deity is possible only to the absolute deity — that is, not to a sharer in the Godhead. Manilius has likewise another (poeti- cally) laudable line, of a similar, though less exceptionable, puii^ort : — " Exemplumque Dei quisque est in imagine parva ; " (" Each is himself a miniature of God.") For we should not recoil to the opposite extreme ; and, though man be not identical with the Deity, still is he " created in the image of God." It is, in- deed, only through an analogy of the human with the Divine nature, that we are percipient and recipient of Divinity. As St Prosper has it : — " Xemo possidet Deum, nisi qui possidetur a Deo." — So Seneca ; — " In unoquoque virorum bonorum habitatDeus." — So Plotinus -• — " Virtue tending to consum- mation, and irradicated in the soul by moral wisdom, reveals a God ; but a God destitute of true virtue is an empty name." — So Jacobi: — " From the enjo}'ment of virtue springs the idea of a virtuous ; from the enjoyment of free- dom, the idea of a free ; from the enjoyment of life, the idea of a living ; from the enjoyment of the divine, the idea of a godlike^ — and of a God."— So Goethe : — " Waer nicht das Auge sonncnhaft, Wie koennten wir das Licht erblicken ? Lebt' nicht in uns dos Gottes eigne Kraft, Wie koennte uns das Goettliches cntzuecken ?" So Kant and many others. (Tlius morality and religion, necessity and 20 PHILOSOPHY OF THE UNCONDITIONED. But Schelling contends that there is a capacity of knowledge above consciousness, and higher than the understanding, and that this knowledge is competent to human reason, as identical ivith the Absolute itself. In this act of knowledge, which, after Fichte, he calls the Intellectual Intuition, there exists no distinction of subject and object, — no contrast of knowledge and existence ; all difference is lost in absolute indifference, — all plurality in absolute unity. The Intuition itself, — Reason, — and the Absolute are identified. The absolute exists only as known by reason, and reason knows only as being itself the absolute. This act (act!) is necessarily ineffable : " The vision and the faculty divine," to be known, must be experienced. It cannot be conceived by the understanding, because beyond its sphere ; it cannot be described, because its essence is identity, and all description supposes discri- mination. To those who are unable to rise beyond a philosophy of reflection, Schelhng candidly allows that the doctrine of the absolute can appear only a series of contradictions ; and he has at least the negative merit of having clearly exposed the impossibi- lity of a philosophy of the unconditioned, as founded on a know- ledge by difference, if he utterly fails in positively proving the possibility of such a philosophy, as founded on a knowledge in identity, through an absorption into, and vision of, the absolute. Out of Laputa or the Empire it would be idle to enter into an articulate refutation of a theory, which founds philosophy on the annihilation of consciousness, and on the identification of the un- conscious philosopher with God. The intuition of the absolute is manifestly the work of an arbitrary abstraction, and of a self- delusive imagination. To reach the point of indifference, — by abstraction we annihilate the object, and by abstraction we annihi- late the subject, of consciousness. But what remains? — Nothing. " Nil conscimus nobis." We then hypostatise the zero; we bap- tize it with the name of Absolute ; and conceit ourselves that we i! atheism, rationally go together.)— The Platonists and Fathers have indeed finely said, that " God is the soul of the soul, as the soul is the soul of the body." " Vita Aninofe Dens est; ha2c Corporis. Hac fugiente, Solvitur hoc ; perit hajc, destituente Deo." These verses are preserved to us from an ancient poet by John of Salis- bury, and they denote the comparison of Avhich Buchanan has made so admi- rable a use in his Calvini Epicediitm .] i SCHELLING'S DOCTRINE OF THE UNCONDITIONED. Jl contemplate absolute existence, \Ylien we only speculate absolute privation.* This truth lias been indeed virtually confessed by tlie two most distinguished followers of Schelling. Ilegel at last abandons the intuition, and regards " i^iire or undetermined exis- tence'' as convertible with "pure nothing;" whilst Oken, if he adhere to the intuition, intrepidly identifies the Deity or Absolute with zero. God, he makes the iSTothing, the Nothing, he makes God; " And Naught, Is ev'rjthiug, and ev'i7tliiiig is Xaught." f Nor does tlie negative chinifera prove less fruitful than the posi- tive ; for Schelhng has found it as difficult to evolve the one into the many, as his disciples to deduce the universe and its contents from the first self-affirmation of the " primordial Nothing." "^liri homines ! Ni/iil esse aliquid statuantve negentve ; Quodque negant statuunt, quod statuiuitque negant." To Schelhng, indeed, it has been impossible, without gratuitous * [The Infinite and Absohite are only the names of two counter imbecilli- ties of the himiau mind, transmuted into properties of the nature of things, — of two subjective negations, converted into objective afBniiations. We tire our- selves, either in adding to, or in taking from. Some, more reasonably, call the thing uufinishable — infinite ; others, less rationally, call it finislied — absolute. But in both cases, the metastasis is in itself irrational. Xot, however, in the highest degi-ee : for the subjective contradictories Avere not at tirst objectified by the same philosophers ; and it is the crowning irrationality of the Infinito- absolutists, that they have not merely accepted as objective what is only sub- jective, but quietly assumed as the same, what are not only ditferent but con- flictive not only confiictive, but repugnant. Seneca (Ep. 118) has given the true genealogy of the original fictions ; but at his time the consummative union of the two had not been attempted. " Ubi animus aliquid diu protiUit, et magnitudinem ejus sequendo lassatus est, infinitum coepit vocari. Eodem raodo, aliquid dilBculter secari cogitavimus, novissime, cresceute clifBcultate, insecabile inventum est."] t [From the Rejected Addresses. Their ingenious authors have embodied a jest in the very words by which Oken, in sober seriousness, propounds tiie first and gi-eatest of philosophical traths. Jacobi for Neeb ?) might well say, that, in reading this last consummation of German speculation, he did not know whetiier lie were standing on iiis liead or his feet. The book in which Oken so ingeniously deduces the All from the Nothing, has, I see, been lately translated into Englisli, and published by the Ray Society (I tliink). The statement of the paradox is, indeed, somewhat softened in the second edition, from which, I presume, the version is made. Not that Oken and Hegel arc original even in the absurdity. For as Varro riglit truly .^^aid :— '' Nihil tarn absurde dici potest, quod non dicatur ab aliquo phiI().sopiiorum ; " so the Intuition of God = the Absolute, = the Nothing, we find asserted by the lower Platonists, by tlie Buddliists. and by Jacob Boehme.] 22 PHILOSOPHY OF THE UNCONDITIONED. and even contradictory assumptions, to explain the deduction of the finite from the infinite. By no salto mortale has he been able to clear the magic circle in which he had enclosed himself. Unable to connect the unconditioned and the conditioned by any natural correlation, he has variously attempted to account for the phre- nomenon of the universe, either by imposing a necessity of self- manifestation on the absolute, i. e. by conditioning the uncon- ditioned ; or by postulating a fall of the finite from the infinite, i. e. by beggmg the very fact which his hypothesis professed its exclusive ability to explain. — The veil of Isis is thus still unwith- drawn ; * and the question proposed by Orpheus at the dawn of speculation will probably remain unanswered at its setting : — " nZ; OS fiot h rt rcc ■xclvt 'iarxt y-at x^^i; iKuarov; " (•' How can I think each, separate, and all, one?") In hke manner, annihilating consciousness in order to recon- struct it, Schelling has never yet been able to connect the faculties conversant about the conditioned, with the faculty of absolute knowledge. One simple objection strikes us as decisive, although we do not remember to have seen it alleged. " We awaken," says Schelling, " from the Intellectual Intuition as from a state of death ; we awaken by Reflection, that is, through a compulsory return to ourselves." f ^^'e cannot, at the same moment, be in the intellectual intuition and in common consciousness ; we must therefore be able to connect them by an act of memory — of recol- lection. But how can there be a remembrance of the absolute and its intuition ? As out of time, and space, and relation, and difference, it is admitted that the absolute cannot be construed to the understanding ? But as remembrance is only possible under the conditions of the understanding, it is consequently impossible to remember anything anterior to the moment when we awaken into consciousness ; and the clairiwyance of the absolute, even granting its reahty, is thus, after the crisis, as if it had never been. We defy all solution of this objection. * [Isis appears as the ^gypto-Grecian symbol of the Unconditioned. (Jlati — 'Iff/flt — Ovaioe,: "Ivstov, — yvuatz, tow ovrag. Plut. I. et O.) In the temple of Athene-Isis, at Sais, on the fane there stood this sublime inscrip- tion : I AJI ALL THAT WAS, AND IS, KSD SHALL BE ; NOR MT VEIL, HAS IT BEEN WITHDRAWN BY MORTAL. ("'Ey^y il^i TcSiv to ysyovoj, y-al 6u^ ku\ iuo^uivou, kccI to'j i/^ou Tri-TrM'j o0^ei( ttu t In Fiohte's u. Niethhammcr's Phil. Jouni. vol. iii. p. 214. COUSINS DOCTRINi: OF TlIK rNCONDlTlONEI) 23 4. What has now been stated may in sonic degree enable the reader to apprehend the relations in which onr author stands, both to those who deny and to those who admit a knowledge of the absolute. If we compare the philosopliy of Cousin with tiie philosophy of Schelling, we at once perceive that the former is a disciple, though by no means a servile disciple of the latter. The scholar, though enamoured with his master's system as a whole, is sufficiently aware of the two insuperable difficulties of that theory. He saw, that if he pitched the absolute so high, it was impossible to deduce from it the relative; and he felt, probably, that the Intellectual Intuition — a stumbling-block to himself — would be arrant foolishness in the eyes of his countrymen. — Cousin and Schelling agree, that as philosophy is the science of the unconditioned, the unconditioned must be within the compass of science. They agree that the unconditioned is known, and immediately known : and they agree that intelligence, as com- petent to the unconditioned, is impersonal, infinite, divine. — But while they coincide in the fact of the absolute, as known, they are diametrically opposed as to the mode in which they attempt to realize this knowledge ; each regarding, as the climax of contra- diction, the manner in wliich the other endeavours to bring human reason and the absolute into proportion. According to Schelling, Cousin's absolute is only a relative ; according to Cousin, Schel- ling's knowledge of the absolute is a negation of thought itself. Cousin declares the condition of all knowledge to be plurality and difference ; and Schelling, that tlie condition, under which alone a knowledge of the absolute becomes possible, is indifference and unity. The one thus denies a notion of the absolute to conscious- ness ; whilst the other affirms that consciousness is implied in every act of inteUigence. Truly, we must view each as triuniphant over the other ; and the result of this mutual neutralisation is, — that the absolute, of which both assert a knowledge, is for us incognisable.* * [" Quod genus hoc pugnte, qua victor victus uterque ! " is still lurtlior exhibited in the mutual refutation of the two great apostles of the Absolute, in Germany, — Schelliug and Hegel. They were early friends,— contemporaries at tlie same university, — occupiers of the same bursal room, (college chums,) — Ilegel, somewhat tlie elder man, was some- what the younger philosopher, — and they were joint editors of the journal in which their then common doctrine was at first promulgated. So far all was in unison ; but now they separated, locally and in opinion. Both, indeed, stuck to the Absolute, but each regarded the way in which the other pro- 24 PHILOSOPHY OF THE UNCONDITIONED. In these circumstances, we might expect our author to have stated the difficulties to which his theory was exposed on the one side and on the other ; and to have endeavoured to obviate the objections, both of his brother absolutists, and of those who alto- gether deny a philosophy of the unconditioned. This he has not done. The possibility of reducing the notion of the absolute to a negative conception is never once contemplated ; and if one or two allusions (not always, perhaps, correct) are made to his doctrine, the name of Schelling does not occur, as we recollect, in the whole compass of these lectures. Difficulties, by which either the doc- trine of the absolute in general, or his own particular modification of that doctrine, may be assailed, are either avoided, or solved only by still greater. Assertion is substituted for proof ; facts of consciousness are alleged, which consciousness never knew ; and paradoxes, that baffle argument, are promulgated as intuitive truths, above the necessity of confirmation. With every feeling of respect for M. Cousin as a man of learning and genius, we must regard the grounds on which he endeavours to establish his doctrine as assumptive, inconsequent, and erroneous. In vindicat- ing the truth of this statement, we shall attempt to show : — in the first place, that M. Cousin is at fault in all the authorities he quotes in favour of the opinion, that the absolute, infinite, uncon- ditioned, is a primitive notion, cognisable by our intellect ; in the second, that his argument to prove the correality of his three ideas fessed to reach it, as absurd. Hegel derided the Intellectual Intuition of Schelling, as a poetical i:)lay of fancy ; Schelling derided the Dialectic of Hegel, as a logical play with words. Both, I conceive, were right; but neither fully right. If Schelling's Intellectual Intuition Avere poetical, it was a poetry transcending, in fact abolishing, human imagination. If Hegel's Dialectic were logical, it was a logic, outraging that science and the condi- tions of thought itself. Hegel's whole philosophy is indeed founded on two errors ; — on a mistake in logic, and on a violation of logic. In his dream of disproving the law of Excluded Middle (between two Contradictories), he inconceivably mistakes Contraries for Contradictories ; and in positing pure or absolute existence as a mental datum, immediate, intuitive, and above proof, (though, in truth, this be palpably a mere relative gained by a process of abstraction,) he not only mistakes the fact, but violates the logical law which prohibits us to assume the principle which it behoves us to prove. On these two fundamental errors rests Hegel's dialectic ; and Hegel's dialectic is the ladder by which he attempts to scale the Absolute. — The peculiar doctrine of these two illustrious thinkers is thus to me only another manifestation of an occurrence of the commonest in human speculation ; it is only a sophism of relative self-love, victorious over the- absolute love of truth; — " Quod volunt sapiunt, et nolunt sapere qufe vera sunt."] to k\i ttieooe •ate tlie ii'j altfj. 1111} Dot i«etoa ktriDe, le whole k k- Mm f solved tiictsof w; am] ntiiiiive ■ feeliiij nios, n Uh ■inJicat- -in tlie ities lie , uncoil- ; in tlie eeideai 'i(m «■ i\m i fit; but al,it™ jHegd'i km& i OB t% Jreani*' orif5),lif iJalion irocesit iivwhiti Ontte iliirtriK -mtioiifi «opliit» _" !>■: (COUSIN ON THE CATEGORIES OF AHISTOTLE AND KANT.) -J". proves directly the reverse; in the tfiird. that the conditions under which alone he allows intelligence to be possible, neces- sarily exclude the possibility of a knowledge, not to say a con- ception, of the absolute ; and in the fourth, that the absolute, as defined by him, is only a relative and a conditioned. In the Jirst place, then, M. Cousin supposes that Aristotle and Kant, in their several categories, equally proposed an analysis of the constituent elements of intelligence ; and lie also supposes that each, like himself, recognised among these elements the notion of the infinite, absolute, unconditioned. In both these sup- positions we think him wrong. It is a serious error in a historian of philosophy to imagine that, in his scheme of categories, Aristotle proposed, like Kant, an analysis of the elements of human reason." It is just, how- ever, to mention, that in this mistake M. Cousin has been pre- ceded by Kant himself. But the ends proposed by the two phi- losophers were diftercnt, even opposed. In their several tables : — Aristotle attempted a synthesis of things in their multiplicity, — classification of objects real, but in relation to thought ; — Kant, an analysis of mind in its unity, — a dissection of thought, pure, but in relation to its objects. The predicaments of Aristotle are thus objective, of things as understood ; those of Kant subjective, of the mind as understanding. The former are results a poste- riori — the creations of abstraction and generalisation ; the latter, anticipations a priori — the conditions of those acts themselves. It is true, that as the one scheme exhibits the unity of thought diverging into plurality, in appliance to its objects, and the other, exhibits the multiplicity of these objects converging towards unity by a collective determination of the mind ; while, at the same time, language usually confounds the subjective and objective under a common term ; — it is certainly true, that some elements in the one table coincide in name with some elements in the other. This coincidence is, however, only equivocal. In reality, the whole Kantian categories must be excluded from the Aristotelic list, as entia rationis, as notiones secundce — in short, as determi- nations of thought, and not genera of real things ; while the several elements would be specially excluded, as jHirtial, privative, transcendent, &c. But if it would be unjust to criticise the cate- gories of Kant in whole, or in part, by the Aristotelic canon, what must we think of Kant, who, after magnifying the idea of invcsti- 26 PHILOSOPHY OF THE UNCONDITIONED. gating the forms of pure intellect as worthy of the mighty genius of the Stagirite, proceeds, on this false hypothesis, to hlame the execution, as a kind of patcli work, as incomplete, as confounding derivative with simple notions ; nay, even, on the narrow prin- ciples of his own Critique, as mixing the forms of pure sense with the forms of pure understanding ? * — If M. Cousin also were correct in his supposition that Aristotle and his followers had viewed his categories as an analysis of the fundamental forms of thought, he would find his own reduction of the elements of rea- son to a double principle anticipated in the scholastic division of existence into ens per se and ens per accidens. Nor is our author correct in thinking that the categories of Aristotle and Kant are complete, inasmuch as they are co-exten- sive with his own. — As to the former, if the Infinite were not excluded, on what would rest the scholastic distinction of ens cate- goricum and ens transcendens ? The logicians require that pre- dicamental matter shall he of a limited and finite nature ;t God, as infinite, is thus excluded : and while it is evident from the whole context of his book of categories, that Aristotle there only contemplated a distribution of the finite, so, in other of his works, he more than once emphatically denies the infinite as an object not only of knowledge, but of thought ; — to ocTrst^ov xyuuarov fi etTcu^ov j — TO oL-TTii^ov ovrs vo/irov^ ours uiaS'iiTov.^ — But if Aristotle thus re- gards the Infinite as beyond the compass of thought, Kant views it as, at least, beyond the sphere of knowledge. If jM. Cousin indeed employed the term category in relation to the Kantian philosophy in the Kantian acceptation, he would be as erroneous in regard to Kant as he is in regard to Aristotle ; but we presume that he wishes, under that term, to include not only the " Cate- * See the Critik d. r. V. and the Prolegouieua. t [M. Peisse, in a note here, quotes the common logical law of categorical entities, well and briefly expressed in the following verse : — " Entia per sose, Jinita, realia, tota." He likewise justly notices, that nothing is included in the Aristotelic categories but what is susceptible of definition, consequently of analysis] t Phys. L iii. c. 10, test. 6G, c. 7, text. 40. See also Metaph. L. ii. c, 2, text. 11. Analyt. Post. L. i. c. 20, text. 39— et alibi.— [Aristotle's defini- tion of the Infinite^ (of the eivet^ov in contrast to the do^iarav) — "• that of which there is always something beyond,'' may be said to be a definition only of the Indefinite. This I shall not gainsay. But it was the only Infinite which he contemplated ; as it is the only Infinite of which we can form a notion.] it; a UK i mi- t!i- :. i-vCISf 1 lerv I" reaiiiT ; COUSIN'S DOCTRINE OF THE UNCONDITIONED. '27 ^ories of Understanding." but the " Ideas of Reason."* But Ivant limits knowledge to experience, and experience to the cate- gories of the understanding, which, in reality, are only so many brms of the conditioned; and allows to the notion of the uncon- iitioned (corresponding to the ideas of reason) no objective eality, regartling it merely as a regulative principle in the irrangement of our thoughts. — As M. Cousin, however, holds that he unconditioned is not only suhjectively conceived, but objectively 'cnoivn ; he is thus totally wrong in regard to the one philosopher, md wrong in part in relation to the other. In the second place, our author maintains that the idea of the nfinite, or absolute, and the idea of the finite, or relative, are jqually real, because the notion of the one necessarily suggests he notion of the other. Correlatives certainly suggest each other, but correlatives may, 3r may not, be equally real and positive. In thought contradictories lecessarily imply each other, for the knowledge of contradictories s one. But the reality of one contradictory, so far from guaran- eeing the reality of the other, is nothing else than its negation. Thus every positive notion (the concept of a thing by what it is) suggests a negative notion (the concept of a thing by what it is not) ; md the highest positive notion, the notion of the conceivable, is lot without its corresponding negative in the notion of the incon- leivable. But though these mutually suggest each other, tlie )ositive alone is real ; the negative is only an abstraction of :he other, and in the highest generality, even an abstraction Df thought itself. It therefore behoved M. Cousin, instead jf assuming the objective correality of his two elements on ;he fact of their subjective correlation, to have suspected, on this k^ery ground, that the reality of the one was inconsistent with the reality of the other. In truth, upon examination, it will be found ihat his two primitive ideas are nothing more than contradictory * [" Tlie Categories of Kant are simple forms or frames (schemata) of the Understanding ( Verstand) imder wliich, an object to be known, nuist be necessarily thought. — Kant's Ideas, a Avord which he expressly borrowed from Plato, are concepts of the Reason ( Verniinft) ; whose objects tran- scending the sphere of all experience actual or possible, consequently do not 'all under the categories, in other words, are positively unknowable. These liiflifcdcas are God, Matter, Soul, objects which, considered out of relation, or in their transcendent reality, are so many phases of the Absolute.'' — M. Peisse.] 28 PHILOSOPHY OF THE UNCONDITIONED. relatives. Those, consequently, of their very nature, imply each other in thought ; but they imply each other only as affirmation and negation of the same. "We have already shown, that though the Conditioned (condi- tionally limited) be one, Avhat is opposed to it as the Unconditioned, is plural : that the unconditional negation of limitation gives one unconditioned, the Infinite ; as the unconditional affirmation of limi- tation affords another, the Absolute. This, while it coincides with the opinion, that the Unconditioned in either pliasis is inconceivable, is repugnant to the doctrine, that the unconditioned (absoluto-in- finite) can be positively construed to the mind. For those who, with M. Cousin, regard the notion of the unconditioned as a posi- tive and real knowledge of existence in its all-comprehensive unity, and who consequently employ the terms Absolute, Infinite, Unconditioned, as only various expressions for the same identity, are imperatively bound to prove that their idea of the One corres- ponds — either with that Unconditioned we have distinguished as the Absolute, — or with that Unconditioned toe have distinguished as the Infinite, — or that it includes both, — or that it excludes both. This they have not done, and, we suspect, have never attempted to do. Our author maintains, that the unconchtioned is knoAvn under the laws of consciousness ; and does not, like Schelling, pretend to an intuition of existence beyond the bounds of space and time. Indeed, he himself expres'sly predicates the absolute and infinite of these forms. Time is only the image or the concept of a certain correlation of existences — of existence, therefore, pro tanto, as conditioned. It is thus itself only a form of the conditioned. But let that pass. — Is, then, the Absolute conceivable of time ? Can we conceive time as unconditionally limited? AYe can easily represent to ourselves time under any relative limitation of commencement and termina- tion ; but we are conscious to ourselves of nothing more clearly, than that it Avould be equally possible to think without thought, as to construe to the mind an absolute commencement, or an absolute termination, of time ; that is, a beginning and an end, beyond which, time is conceived as non-existent. Goad imagination to the utmost, it still sinks paralysed within the bounds of time ; and time survives as the condition of the thought itself in which we annihilate the universe : " Sur les mondcs (k'truits Ic Temps dort immobile." COUSINS DOCTRINE or TIIK UNCONDITIONED. 20 But if the Absolute be inconceivable of this foi-m, is the Infinite more comprehensible ? Can avc imagine time as unconditionally unlimited ? — We cannot conceive the infinite regress of time ; for such a notion could only be realized by the infinite addition in thought of finite times, and such an addition would, itself, require an eternity for its accomplishment. If wc dream of effecting this, we only deceive ourselves by substituting the indefinite for the in- ■""' finite, than which no two notions can be more opposed. The negation of the commencement of time involves likewise the affir- mation, that an infinite time has at every moment already run ; that is, it implies the contradiction, that an infinite has been com- F"*' pleted. — For the same reasons we are unable to conceive an infi- *'^' nite progress of time ; while the infinite regress and the infinite progress, taken together, involve the triple contradiction of an ufinite concluded, of an infinite commencing, and of two infinites, '^* not exclusive of each other. Space, like time, is only the intuition or the concejjt of a cer- tain correlation of existence — of existence, therefore, pro tanto, IS conditioned. It is thus itself only a form of the conditioned. '"P'f^ But apart from this, thought is equally powerless in realizing a lotion either of the absolute totality, or of the infinite immensity, of pace. — And Avhile time and space, as wholes, can thus neither be :onceived as absolutely limited, nor as infinitely unhmited ; so their Darts can be represented to the mind neither as absolutely indivi- hial, nor as divisible to infinity. The universe cannot be imagined IS a whole, which may not also be imagined as a part ; nor an itom be imagined as a part, which may not also be imagined as a i^hole. The same analysis, with a similar result, can be applied to ause and effect, and to substance and phcenomenon. These, lowever, may both be reduced to the law itself of the conditioned.* The Conditioned is, therefore, that only which can be positively onceived ; the Absolute and Infinite are conceived only as nega- ions of the conditioned in its opposite poles. Now, as we observed, M. Cousin, and those who confound the ibsolute and infinite, and regard the Unconditioned as a positive nd indivisible notion, must show that this notion coincides either, ", with the notion of the Absolute, to the exclusion of the in- inite ; or 2°, with the notion of the Infinite, to the exclusion •* Soo Appendix I. for the applications of tliat doctriuo. 30 PHILOSOPHY OF THE UNCONDITIONED. ii variety • it of the absolute ; or 3°, that it includes both as true, carrying them up to indifference ; or 4°, that it excludes both as false. The last two alternatives are impossible, as either would be subversive of the highest principle of inteUigence, which asserts, that of two contradictories, both cannot, but one must, be true. It only, therefore, remains to identify the unity of the Uncondi- tioned with the Infinite, or with the Absolute — with either, to the exclusion of the other. But while every one must be intimately conscious of the impossibility of this, the very fact that our author and other philosophers a priori have constantly found it necessary to confound these contradictions, sufficiently proves that neitheri|{!!M< u" term has a right to represent the unity of the unconditioned, to the prejudice of the other. The Unconditioned is, therefore, not a positive concept ; nor has it even a real or intrinsic unity ; for it only combines the Absolute and the Infinite, in themselves contradictory of each, other, into a unity relative to us by the negative bond of their^teatw inconceivability. It is on this mistake of the relative for the irre-| and mm spective, of the negative for the positive, that M. Cousin's theoryi faraiiuDi. is founded : And it is not diflicult to understand how the mistake originated. This reduction of M. Cousin's two ideas of the Infinite and Finite to one positive conception and its negative, implicitly anni- liilates also the third idea, devised by him as a connection between his two substantive idea's ; and which he marvellously identifies with the relation of cause and effect. Yet before leaving this part of our subject, we may observe, that the very simplicity of our analysis is a strong presumption in favour of its truth. A plurality of causes is not to be postu- lated, where one is sufficient to account for the phaenomena (£nti(^ fc non sunt multiplicanda prcBter necessitatem) : and ]\I. Cousin, in supposing three positive ideas, where only one is necessary, brings , the rule of parsimony against his hypothesis, even before its unsoundness may be definitely brought to hght. In the third place, the restrictions to which our author subjects intelligence, divine and human, implicitly deny a knowledge even a concept — of the absolute, both to God and man. — " Thdi h-. condition of intelligence," says M. Cousin, " is difference; and a act of knowledge is only possible where there exists a plurality of terms. Unity does not suffice for conception ; variety is neces sary ; nay more, not only is variety necessary, there must likc^jHiraQiff,,, i4 t; COUSIN'S DOCTRINE OF THE UNCONDITIONED. tvise subsist an intimate relation between the principles of unity md variety ; without which, the variety not being perceived by :he unity, the one is as if it could not perceive, and the other as f it could not be perceived. Look back for a moment into your- '» true selves, and you will find, that what constitutes intelligence in om* feeble consciousness, is, that there arc there several terms, of totlil-vhich the one perceives the other, of which the other is perceived itimateli ly the first : in this consists self-knowledge, — in this consists self- jomprehension, — in this consists intelligence : intelligence without wessiiri ;onsciousness is the abstract possibility of intelligence, not intelli- iieitlifl rence in the act ; and consciousness implies diversity and diflfer- ioDtd, timce. Transfer all this from human to absolute intelligence ; — that to say, refer the ideas to the only intelligence to which they noftan belong. You have thus, if I may so express myself, the life jines tl )f absolute intelligence ; you have this intelligence Avitli the com- ofejfl )lete development of the elements which are necessary for it to of thei )e a true intelligence ; you have all the momenta whose relation tlieirn md motion constitute the reality of knowledge." — In all this, so as human intelligence is concerned, we cordially agree ; for a e iiiistatl^ore complete admission could not be imagined, not only that a nowledge, and even a notion, of the absolute is impossible for an, but that we are unable to conceive the possibility of such a aninowledge, even in the Deity, without contradicting our human abetwM onceptions of the possibihty of intelligence itself. Our author, leni lowever, recognises no contradiction ; and, without argument or xplanation, accords a knowledge of that which can only be known r obsenftnder the negation of all diiference and plurality, to that which fi the better to the ivorse, or from the worse to the better. "eofoi (^ third possibihty, that both states are equal, as contradictory in ' ^ tself, and as contradicted by onr author, it is not necessary to "^^'«*» consider. " ™"?' The first supposition must be rejected. The necessity in this aDsolutelj ;g^g determines God to pass from the better to the worse ; that ""^ s, operates to his partial annihilation. The power which compels ruth.oDJ] iiis niust be external and hostile, for nothing operates willingly to tor it 1 j^ Q^j^ deterioration; and, as superior to the pretended God, is k, eicep ither itself the real deity, if an intelligent and free cause, or a it, a Demi negation of all deity, if a blind force or fate. The second is equally inadmissible : — that God, passing into the tkefon niverse, passes from a state of comparative imperfection, into MOD ai state of comparative perfection. The divine nature is identical ) of botl rith the most perfect nature, and is also identical with the frst stihitam ause. If the first cause be not identical with the most perfect ature, there is no God, for the two essential conditions of his ex- yabsoht itence are not in combination. Now, on the present supposition, maiiitaiii lie most perfect nature is the derived ; nay the universe, the cro- ons of tk tion, the '/iv6/k.£uov, is, in relation to its cause, the real, the actual, coBditioii le ovTcoi ov. It would also be the divine, but that divinity sup- iStratioDi) oses also the notion of cause, while the universe, ex hypothesi, is ly an effect. It is no answer to these difficulties for M. Cousin to say, that nonentitMie Deity, though a cause which cannot choose but create, is not ioguisliiii! owever exhausted in the act ; and though passing with all the iMiiot bi emcnts of his being into the universe, that he remains entire in liis issibMt ssence, and with all the superiority of the cause over the effect, he dilemma is unavoidable : — Either the Deity is independent of )eitjto le universe for his being or perfection ; on which alternative our ^fitli tl ithor must abandon his theory of God, and the necessity of crea- jjntalpoi on : Or the Deity is dependent on his manifestation in the uni- otJstim Jrse for his being or perfection; on which alternative, his doc- jj, freatdi ine is assailed by the difficulties previously stated. •(IjjDeit) The length to which the preceding observations have extended. 3G PHILOSOPHY OF THE UNCONDITIONED. prevents us from adverting to sundry other opinions of our author, which we conceive to be equally unfounded. — For example, (to say nothing of his proof of the impersonality of intelligence, because, forsooth, truth is not subject to our will), what can be conceived i more self-contradictory than his theory of moral liberty f Divor- cing liberty from intelligence, but connecting it with personality, he defines it to be a cause which is determined to act by its proper energy alone. But (to say nothing of remoter difficulties) how liberty can be conceived, supposing always a plurality of modes ofi activity, without a knowledge of that plurality ; — how a faculty can resolve to act by preference in a particular manner, and not determine itself by final causes ; — how intelligence can influence a blind power without operating as an efficient cause ; — or how, id fine, morality can be founded on a liberty which, at best, onlyj escapes necessity by taking refuge with chance: — these are pro- blems which M. Cousin, in none of his works, has stated, and which we are confident he is unable to solve. After the tenor of our previous observations, it is needless to say^ that we regard M. Cousin's attempt to establish a general peace among philosophers, by the promulgation of his Eclectic theory, as a failure. But though no converts to his Unconditioned, and view ing with regret what we must regard as the misapplication of his distinguished talents, we cannot disown a strong feeling of interesi i and admiration for those qualities, even in their excess, which hav( betrayed him, with so rnany other aspiring philosophers, into i pursuit which could only end in disappointment ; — we mean hig love of truth, and his reliance on the powers of man. Not tOS' despair of philosophy is " a last infirmity of noble minds." Th« stronger the intellect, the stronger the confidence in its force;! the more ardent the appetite for knowledge, the less are we pre- pared to canvass the uncertainty of the fruition. " The wish is parent to the thought." Loath to admit that our science is a1^ best the reflection of a reality we cannot know, we strive to penei trate to existence in itself ; and what we have laboured intensely; to attain, we at last fondly beheve we have accomplished. But like Ixion, we embrace a cloud for a divinity. Conscious only of, — conscious only in and through, limitation, we think to compre^: hend the infinite ; and dream even of establishing the science — thf nescience of man, on an identity with the omniscience of God. It il this powerful tendency of the most vigorous minds to transcend tli€|i most fiii kM OUR HIGHEST WISDOM IS A LEARNED IGNORANCE. SI sphere of our faculties, which makes a •' learned ignorance " the most difficult acquirement, perhaps, indeed, the consummation, of knowledge. In the words of a forgotten, hut acute philosopher: — " Magna, iinmo maxima pars sapientice est, — qucedam cbquo aniuio nescire velle." * [ " Infixitas ! Lnfinitas ! Hie mundus est infinitas. Secare mens at pergito, lnlinit. 43 ' " labour ; \ve are nut aware that any adequate attempt has yet been made to subject them, in whole or in part, to an enhghtencd and ' ma impartial criticism. The radical inconsistencies which they involve, '^calnjin every branch of their subject, remain undeveloped; their un- "Nii acknowledged appropriations are still lauded as original ; their 'i^fe sea endless mistakes, in the history of philosophy, stand yet uncor- rected ; and their frequent misrej^resentations of other philo- sophers continue to mislead. * In particular, nothing has more convinced us of the general neglect, in this country, of psycholo- gical science, than that Dr Brown's ignorant attack on Reid, and, through Kcid, confessedly on Steivart, has not long since been i-opellcd ; — except, indeed, the general belief that it was triumphant. In these circumstances, we felt gratified, as we said, with the l>rescnt honourable testimony to the value of Dr Ileid's specula- t ions in a foreign country ; and have deemed this a seasonable i)pi)ortunity of expressing our own opinion on the subject, and of again vindicating, we trust, to that philosopher, the well-earned reputation of which he has been too long defrauded in his own. If we are not mistaken in our view, we shall, in fact, reverse the marvel, and retort the accusation ; in proving that Dr Brown himself is guilty of that " series of wonderful misconceptions," of which he so confidently arraigns his predecessors. " Tin-pc est doctori, cum culpa redarguit ipsuui." This, however, let it be recollected, is no point of merely per- * Wc shall, in the sequel, afford samples of these " incousistencies," "mistakes," "misrepresentations," — but not of Brown's "appropriations." To complete the cycle, and vindicate our assertion, we may here adduce one specimen of the way in which discoveries have been lavished on him, in consequence of his omission (excusable, peiliaps, in the circumstances) to ad- vertise his pupils when he was not original. — Brown's doctrine of General- ization^ is identical with that commonbj taught by philosophers — not Scot- tish ; and, among these, by authors, with whose works his lectures prove him to have been well acquainted. But if a writer, one of the best informed of those who, in this country, have of late cultivated this branch of philo- sophy, could, among other expressions equally encomiastic, speak of Brown's return to the vulgar opinion, on such a point, as of " a discovery^ ^x. which will^ in all future ages^ he regarded as one of the tnost important steps ever made in metaphysical science ; " how incompetent must ordinary readers be to place Brown on his proper level, — how desirable would have been a critical examination of his Lectures to distribute to him his own, and to estimate his property at its true value : [See Diss, on Reid, pp. 868, 8G9, alibi.] 44 PHILOSOPHY OF PERCEPTION. sonal concernment. It is true, indeed, that either Reid accom- phshed nothing, or the science has retrograded under Brown. But the question itself regards the cardinal point of metaphysical: philosophy ; and its determination involves the proof or the refu-i tation of scepticism. The subject we have undertaken can, with difficulty, be com- pressed within the limits of a single article. This must stand our excuse for not, at present, noticing the valuable accompaniment to Reid's Essays on the Intellectual Powers, in the Fragments of M. Royer-CoUard's Lectures, which are appended to the third and fourth volumes of the translation. A more appropriate occasion for considering these may, however, occur, when the first volume, containing M. Jouffroy's Introduction, appears ; of wliich, from other specimens of his ability, we entertain no humble expec- tations. " Reid," says Dr Brown, " considers his confutation of the ideal system as involving almost everything which is truly his. Yet there are few circumstances connected with the fortune of modern philosophy, that appear to mc more wonderful, than that a mind like Dr Reid's, so learned in the history of metaphysical science, should have conceived, that on this point, any great merit, at least any merit of originality, was justly referable to him particularly. Indeed, the only circumstance which appears to me wonderful, is, that the claim thus made by him should have been so readily and generally admitted." {Led. xxv. p. 155.) Dr Brown then proceeds, at great length, to show : 1°, That Reid, in his attempt to overthrow what he conceived " the com- mon theory of ideas," wholly misunderstood the catholic opinion, which was, in fact, identical with his own ; and actually attri- buted to all philosophers " a theory which had been universally, or, at least, almost universally, abandoned at the time he wrote ;" and, 2°, That the doctrine of perception, which Reid so absurdly fancies he had first established, aff'ords, in truth, no better evi- dence of the existence of an external world, than even the long abandoned hypothesis which he had taken such idle labour to refute. In every particular of this statement, Dr Brown is completely, and even curiously, wrong. He is out in his prelusive flourish, — out in his serious assault. Reid is neither " so learned in the history of metaphysical science" as he verbally proclaims, nor so sheer an ignorant as he would really demonstrate. Estimated by CHARACTER OF BROWN'S ATTACK. 45 aught above a very vulgar standard, Rcid's knowledge of Philo- sophical opinions was neither extensive nor exact; and Mv Stew- art was himself too competent and candid a judge, not fully to acknowledge the deficiency.* But Keid's merits as a thinker are too high, and too securely established, to make it necessary to claim for his reputation an erudition to which he himself advances no pretension. And, be his learning what it may, his critic, at least, has not been able to convict him of a single error ; while Dr Brown himself rarely opens his mouth upon the older authors, without betraying his absolute unacquaintance with the matters on which he so intrepidly discourses. — Nor, as a speculator, does Reid's superiority admit, we conceive, of doubt. With all admi- ration of Brown's general talent, we do not hesitate to assert, that, in the points at issue between the two philosophers, to say nothing of others, he has completely misapj^rehended Beid's phi- losophy, even in its fundamental position, — the import of the sceptical reasoning, — and the significance of the only argument by which that reasoning is resisted. But, on the other hand, as Reid can only be defended on the ground of misconception, the very fact, that his great doctrine of perception could actually be reversed by so acute an intellect as Brown's, would prove that there must exist some confusion and obscurity in his own deve- lopment of that doctrine, to render such a misinterpretation possible. Nor is this presumption wrong. In truth, Reid did not generahse to himself an adequate notion of the various possi- ble theories of perception, some of which he has accordingly con- founded : Wilde his error of commission in discriminating con- sciousness as a special faculty, and his error of omission in not discriminating intuitive from representative knowledge, — a dis- tinction without which his peculiar philosophy is naught, — have contributed to render his doctrine of the intellectual fiicultics prolix, vacillating, perplexed, and sometimes even contradictory. Before proceeding to consider the doctrine of perception in relation to the points at issue between Reid and his antagonist, it is therefore necessary to disintricato the question, by relieving it of these two errors, bad in themselves, but worse in the con- fusion which they occasion ; for, as Bacon truly observes, — " citius emergit Veritas ex errore quam ex confusione." And, first, of consciousness. * (Dissertation, &c. Part ii. p. 197.) [In my foot notes to Reid will be found abundant evidence of this deficiency.] 46 PHILOSOPHY OF PERCEPTION. Aristotle, Desctirtes, Locke, and philosophers in general, have regarded Consciousness, not as a particular faculty, but as the universal condition of intelhgence. Reid, on the contrary, fol- lowing, probably, Hutcheson, and followed by Stewart, Royer- Collard, and others, has classed consciousness as a co-ordinate faculty with the other intellectual powers ; distinguished from them, not as the species from the individual, but as the individual from the individual. And as the particular faculties have each their peculiar object, so the peculiar object of consciousness is, the operations of the other faculties themselves, to the exclusion of the objects about which these operations are conversant. This analysis we regard as false. For it is impossible : in the first place, to discriminate consciousness from all the other cogni- tive faculties, or to discriminate any one of these from conscious- , ness ; and, in the second, to conceive a faculty cognisant of the ' various mental operations, without being also cognisant of their ■ several objects. I We know; and We know that we know: — these propositions,! ''''" logically distinct, are really identical; each implies the other. We know {i. e. feel, perceive, imagine, remember, &c.) only as we i ' 1*^ knovj that we thus know ; and we know that we know, only as we j ^*^^' know in some particular manner, (i. q. feel, perceive, &c.) So true Tl a is the scholastic brocard : — " Non sentimus nisi sentiamus nos * sentire; non sentimus nos sentire nisi sentiamus." — The attempt to analyse the cognition / know, and the cognition / knoiv that I know, into the separate energies of distinct faculties, is therefore vain. But this is the analysis of Reid. Consciousness, which the formula / know that I know adequately expresses, he views as a i power specifically distinct from the various cognitive faculties ; - 1 comprehended under the formula I know, precisely as these facul- K ties are severally contradistinguished from each other. But here . 1 the parallel does not hold. I can feel without perceiving, I can n perceive without imagining, I can imagine without remember- ing, I can remember without judging (in the emphatic significa- ; ^:^.^ tion), I can judge without willing. One of these acts does not '»?" immediately suppose the other. Though modes merely of the same indivisible subject, they are modes in relation to each other, really distinct, and admit, therefore, of psychological discrimina- tion. But can I feel without being conscious that I feel ? — can I jJ 'p:- remember, without being conscious that I remember ? or, can I B i»5 be conscious, without being conscious that I perceive, or imagine, ■ ■''^iK*^ r CONSCIOUSNESS NOT A SPECIAL FACULTY. 47 or reason. — tliat I energise, in short, in sonic determinate mode, which Reid wonld view as the act of a facnlty specifically different ''^''Ji tii ifrom conscionsness ? That this is impossible, Reid himself admits. " Unde," says Tertullian, — " nnde ista tormenta crucianda? sim- pHcitatis ct suspendendas veritatis ? Quis mihi exhibebit sensum non intelligentem se sentire ? "' — But if, on the one hand, con- sciousness be only realised under specific modes, and cannot therefore exist apart from the several faculties in cumulo ; and if, on the other, these faculties can all and each only be exerted under the condition of consciousness ; consciousness, consequently, is not one of the special modes into which our mental activity may be resolved, but the fundamental form, — the generic condition of them all. Every intelligent act is thus a modified consciousness ; and consciousness a comprehensive term for the complement of our cognitive energies. But the vice of Dr Reid's analysis is further manifested in his arbitrary limitation of the sphere of consciousness ; proposing to it the various intellectual operations, but excluding their objects. ''■ I am conscious," he says, " of perception, but not of the object I perceive : I am conscious of memory, but not of the object I remember." The reduction of consciousness to a particular faculty entailed this limitation. For, once admitting consciousness to be cogni- sant of objects as of operations, Reid could not, without absurdity, degrade it to the level of a special power. For thus, in the first place, consciousness coextensive with all our cognitive faculties, would yet be made co-ordinate with each : and, in the second, two faculties would be supposed to be simultaneously exercised about the same object, to the same intent. But the alternative which Reid has chosen is, at least, equally untenable. The assertion, that we can be conscious of an act of knowledge, without being conscious of its object, is virtually suicidal. A mental operation is only what it is, by relation to its object ; the object at once determining its existence, and specify- ing the character of its existence. But if a relation carmot be comprehended in one of its terms, so we cannot be conscious of an operation, without being conscious of the object to which it exists only as correlative. For example, We are conscious of a perception, says Reid, but are not conscious of its object. Yet how can we be conscious of a perception, that is, how can we know that a perception exists, — that it is a perception, and not anotlui- :.RoT9. '•'■jrdDiit ^ed hi "(lifidui ave ead «o/(| -intlii er cogji mm toftli of U )fii(m & other Ivasi Sotrnf 'm m attemf! vtkl lierefe liiclilk 'ws as ) faculte sefacul Stttkit ff, I a iiembfi- ipififa- \m il oftk I dtk )riii]iDa- -fafll r.fan! 48 PHILOSOPHY OF PERCEPTION. mental state, — and that it is the perception of a rose, and of nothing but a rose ; unless this conscioimiess involve a knowledge (or consciousness) of the object, which at once determines the existence of the act, — specifies its kind, — and distinguishes its indi- viduality ? Annihilate the object, you annihilate the operation; annihilate the consciousness of the object, you annihilate the con- sciousness of the operation. In the greater number indeed of our cognitive energies, the two terras of the relation of knowledge exist only as identical; the object admitting only of a logical dis- crimination from the subject. I imagine a Hippogryph. The Hippogryph is at once the object of the act and the act itself. Abstract the one, the other has no existence : deny me the con- sciousness of the Hippogryph, you deny me the consciousness of the imagination ; I am conscious of zero ; I am not conscious at all. A diflUculty may here be started in regard to two faculties, — Memory and Perception. Memory is defined by Reid " an immediate knowledge of the past; " and is thus distinguished from consciousness, which, Avith all philosophers, he views as "an immediate knowledge of the present." We may therefore be conscious of the act of memory as present, but of its object as past, consciousness is impossible. And certainly, if Reid's definition of memory be admitted, this inference cannot be disallowed. But memory is not an immediate knowledge of the past ; an immediate knowledge of the past is a contradiction in terms. This is manifest, whether we look from the act to the object, ov from the object to the act. — To be known immediately, an object must be known in itself; to be known in itself, it must be known as actual, now existent, jyresent. But the object of memory is past — not present, not now existent, not actual; it cannot therefore be known in itself. If known at all, it must be known in something different from itself ; i. e. mediately ; and memory as an " immediate knoicledge of the past,''' is thus impossi- ble. — Again : memory is an act of knowledge ; an act exists only as present ; and a present knowledge can be immediately cogni- sant only of a present object. But the object known in memory \%past; consequently, either memory is not an act of knowledge at all, or the object immediately known is present ; and the past, • if known, is known only through the medium of the present ; on either alternative memory is not " an immediate knowledge of the past.^' Thus, memory, like our other faculties, affords only ani: isliesitsi Jideedofd 'fbofflej mi ^eactitsi me the Uties; impossil mitted, liffiind CONSCIOUSNESS. AD iiumeduite knowledge of the present ; and, like them, is nothing more than consciousness variously modified.* In regard to Perception : Reid allows an immediate knoivledge o/'the ait'ections of the subject of thought, mind, or self, and an ^^ P^ratit ijntnediate knoidcdge o/thc qualities of an object really different from self — matter. To the foi-mcr, he gives the name of con- sciousness, to the latter, that of perception. Is consciousness, as an immediate knowledge, purely sidrjective, not to be discri- logicalii minated from perception, as an immediate knowledge, really objective ? — A logical difference we admit ; a psychological we deny. Relatives are known only together : the science of opposites is one. Subject and object, mind and matter, are known only in correlation and contrast, — and by the same common act : while knowledge, as at once a synthesis and an antithesis of both, may be indiffei'ently defined an antithetic synthesis, or a synthetic antithesis of its terms. Every conception of self, necessarily Wgeoft involves a conception of not-self: every perception of what is dif- ferent from me, implies a recognition of the percipient subject in contradistinction from the object perceived. In one act of ofmei knowledge, indeed, the object is the prominent element, in an- tlier the subject ; but there is none in which either is known out of relation to the other. The immediate knowledge which Reid allows of things different from the mind, and the immediate knowledge of mind itself, cannot therefore be split into two dis- loflk/i tinct acts. In perception, as in the other faculties, the same indi- visible consciousness is conversant about both terms of the rela- tion of knowledge. Distinguish the cognition of the subject from the cognition of the object of perception, and you either annihilate I be boi ehoB /, BotI .Dotactu al,iti iaf«ly;a iiisinipoj eiisteoi is boflei idtliepi jdgeofi Is odIt The only parallel we know to this misconception of Reid's is the opiniou on which Fromondus animadverts. " In primis di.splicet nobis plurimorum recentiorum philosopliia, qui scnsuum intcriorum operationes, ut phantasia- tionem, meraorationem, et reminiscentiam, circa imagines, recenter aut oliiii spiiitibus vel cerebro impressas, versari negant ; sed proxime circa objecta guoeforis sunt. Ut cum quis meminit se vidisse leporem currenteni ; memo- ria, inquiunt, non intuetur et attingit imaginem leporis in cerebro asserva- tam, sed sohim leporem ipsum qui cursu trojirJebnt campum, &c. &c.' {Philnsophia Christiana de Anima. Lovanii. 1649. L. ili. c. 8. art. 8.) Who the advocates of this opinion were, we are ignorant ; but more than suspect that, as stated, it is only a misrepresentation of the Cartesian doc- trine, then on the ascendant. [Lord Monboddo has, however, a doctrine of tlif sort.] r.O PHILOSOPHY OF PERCEPTION. the relation of knowledge itself, which exists only in its terms' being comprehended together in the unity of consciousness ; or you must postulate a higher faculty, which shall again reduce to one, the two cognitions you have distinguished ; — that is, you are at last compelled to admit, in an unphilosophical complexity, that common consciousness of subject and object, which you set out with denying in its philosophical simplicity. Consciousness and immediate knowledge are thus terms universally convertible ; and if there be an immediate knowledge of things external, there is consequently the consciousness of an outer tvorld. * Reid's erroneous analysis of consciousness is not perhaps of so much importance in itself, as from causing confusion in its consequences. Had he employed this term as tantamount to immediate knowledge in general, whether of self or not, and thus distinctly expressed what he certainly [?] taught, that mind and matter are both equally known to us as existent and in them- selves ; Dr Brown could hardly have so far misconceived his doc- trine, as actually to lend him the very opinion which his whole philosophy was intended to refute, viz. that an immediate, and consequently a real, knowledge of external things is impossible. But this by anticipation. * How correctly Aristotle reasoned on this subject, may be seen from the following passage : — " When we perceive {»ladotu6fii6»''' — the Greeks, per- haps fortmiately, had no special term for conscioustiess) — " when we perceive that we see, hear, &c. it is necessary, that by sight itself avc perceive that we see, or by another sense. If by another sense, then this also must be a sense of sight, conversant equally about the object of sight, colour. Conse- quently, there must either be two senses of the same object, or every sense must be percipient of itself. Moreover, if the sense percipient of sight be different from sight itself, it follows, either that there is a regress to infinity, or Ave must admit, at last, some sense percipient of itself; but if so, it is more reasonable to admit this in the original sense at once." (De Anima, L. iii, c. 2. text. 136.) Here Aiistotle ought not to be supposed to mean that every sense is an independent faculty of perception, and, as such, con- scious of itself. Compare De Som. et Vi(j. c. 2. and Probl. (if indeed his) sect. xi. § ,33. His older commentators — Alexander, Themistius, Simplicius — follow their master. Philoponus and Michael Ephesius desert his doctrine, and attribute this self- consciousness to a peculiar faculty which they call Attention (to 'Tr^oaix.rtx.ov.) This is the earliest example we know of this false analysis, which, when carried to its last absurdity, has given us con- sciousness, and attention, and reflection, as distinct powers. Of the school- men, satius est silere, quam parum dicere. Nemesius, and Plutaichus of Athens preserved by Philoponus, accord this reflex consciousness to intellect as opposed to sense. Plato varies in his Theaetetus and Charmides. REPRESENTATIVE AND PRESENTATIVE KNOWLEDGE. 51 This leads us to the second error, — the non-distinction of repre- scntative from presentative or intuitive knowledge.* The reduction of consciousness to a special faculty involved this confusion. For haecies of Avicenna and the Arabians, in the ideas of* Descartes and Leibnitz, in the p/ice- nomena of Kant, and in the external states of Dr Brown. It mediately determined the hierarchical gradation of facidties or souls of the Aristotelians, — the vehicidar media of the Platonists, — the theories of a common intellect of Alexander, Themistius, Averroes, Cajetanus, and Zabarella, — the vision in the deity of jMallebranche, — and the Cartesian and Leibnitian doctrines of assistance, and predetermined harmony. To no other origin is to be ascribed the refusal of the fact of consciousness in its primitive duality; and the unitarian systems of identity, materialism, ideal- ism, are the result. But however universal and omnipotent this principle may have been, Reid was at once too ignorant of opinions, to be much in danger from authority, and too independent a thinker, to accept so baseless a fancy as a fact. " Mr Norris," says he, '• is the only author I have met with who professedly puts the question, Whether material things can be perceived by us immediately f BROWN'S ARGUMENT DISPROVED. Gl He has offered four arguments to show that they cannot. First, Material obiects are without the mind, and therefore there can be no union between the object and the percipient. Answer — This argument is Lime, until it is shown to be necessary, that in perception there should bo an union between the object and the [urcipient. Second, material objects are disproportioned to the nihid, and removed from it by the whole diameter of Being. — This ai-oument I cannot answer, because / do not understand it." Essa>/s, I. P. p. 202.) The principle, that the relation of knowledge implies an ana- logy of existence, admitted without examination in almost every school, but which Reid, with an ignorance wiser than know- ledtje, confesses he does not understand ; is nothino; more than an irrational attempt to explain, what is, in itself, inexplicable. How the similar or the same is conscious of itself, is not a whit loss inconceivable, than how one contrary is immediately perci- |dent of another. It at best only removes our admitted ignorance by one step back ; and then, in place of our knowledge simply originating from the incomprehensible, it ostentatiously departs from the absurd. The slightest criticism is sufficient to manifest the futility of that hypothesis of representation, which Brown would substitute fur Reid's presentative perception; — although this hypothesis, under various modifications, be almost coextensive with the his- tory of philosophy. In fact, it fulfils none of the conditions of a t'riitimate hypothesis. In the frst place, it is umiecessary. — It cannot show, that the fact of an intuitive perception, as given in consciousness, ought not to be accepted ; it is unable therefore to vindicate its own necessity, in order to explain the possibility of our knowledge of external things. — That Ave cannot show forth, hoiu the mind is capable of knowing something different from self, is no reason to doubt that it is so capable. Every hoio (S/oV/) rests ultimately on a that ih-t) ; every demonstration is deduced from something yicen and indemonstrable ; all that is comprehensible, hangs from some revealed fact, which we must believe as actual, but, cannot construe to the reflective intellect in its possibility. In conscious- ness, — in the original spontaneity of intelligence (vol;, locuf prin- cipiorum), are revealed the primordial facts of our intelligent na- ture. Consciousness is the fountain of all comprehensibility and illustration : but as such, cannot be itself illustrated or couipre- 62 PHILOSOPHY OF PERCEPTION. liondcJ. To ask how any fact of consciousness is possible, is to ask how consciousness itself is possible ; and to ask how consciousness is possible, is to ask how a being intelligent like man is possible, Could we answer this, the Serpent had not tempted Eve by an hyperbole: — "We should be as Gods." But as we did not create ourselves, and are not even in the secret of our creation ; we must take our existence, our knowledge upon trust: and that philosophy is the only true, because in it alone can truth be real- ised, which does not revolt against the authority of our natural beliefs. " The voice of Nature is the voice of God." To ask, therefore, a reason for the possibihty of our intuition of external things, above the fact of its reality, as given in our perceptive consciousness, betrays, as Aristotle has truly said, an inibecilitij of the reasoning princijile itself : — " Toj^tov ^vituv Aoyw, dCpivrccg rvjv al'rj&'/iaiti^ xppuartx rig lari hixvoixg.'''' The natural realist, who accepts this intuition, cannot, certainly, explain it, because, as ultimate, it is a fact inexplicable. Yet, with Hudibras : — " lie knows wliafs what ; aud that's as high As metaphysic wit can fly." Bat the hypothetical realist — the cosmothetic idealist, who rejects a consciousness of aught beyond the mind, cannot require of the natural realist an explanation of how such a consciousness is pos- sible, until he himself shall have explained, what is even less con- ceivable, the possibility 'of representing (i. e. of knowing) the unknown. Till then, each founds on the incomprehensible ; but the former admits the veracity, the latter postulates the falsehood of that principle, which can alone confer on this incomprehensi- S '•''■ ble foundation the character of truth. The natural realist, whose 8 ™'' watcliword is — The facts of consciousness, the whole facts, and nothing but the facts, has therefore naught to fear from his anta- gonist, so long as consciousness cannot be explained nor redar- gued from without. If his system be to fall, it f;ills only with philosophy ; for it can only be disproved, by proving the menda- city of consciousness — of that faculty, M ^ " Quffi nisi sit veri, ratio qiioque falsa fit omnis ;" (" Which unless true, all reason turns a lie.") This leads us to the second violation of the laws of a legitimate hypothesis ; — the doctrine of a representative perception annihi- lates itself in subverting the universal edifice of knowledge. — Belying the testimony of consciousness to our immediate perception y REPRESENTATION ISM NOT A LEGITIMATE HYPOTHESIS. (53 of an outer world, it belies the veracity of consciousness alto- gether. But the truth of consciousness, is the condition of the possibility of all knowledge. The first act of hypothetical reahsni, is thus an act of suicide ; philosophy, thereafter, is at best but an enchanted corpse, awaiting only the exorcism of the sceptic, to lolapse into its proper nothingness. — But of this we shall have i iceasion to treat at large, in exposing Brown's misprision of the argument from common sense. In the third place, it is the condition of a legitimate hypothe- sis, that the fact or facts for which it is excogitated to account, be not themselves hxjpothetiQal. — But so far is the principal fact, which the hypothesis of a representative perception is proposed to explain, from being certain ; its reality is even rendered pro- blematical by the proposed explanation itself. The facts, about which this hypothesis is conversant, are two ; — the fact of the mental mocli/ication, and the fact of the material reality. The problem to be solved is their connection ; and the hypothesis of i-i presentation is advanced, as the ratio of their correlation, in supposing that the former as knoion is vicarious of the latter as existing. There is however here a see -saw between the hypothe- sis and the fact : the fact is assumed as an hypothesis : and the hypothesis explained as a fact; each is established, each is expounded, by the other. To account for the possibility of an unknown external world, the hypothesis of representation is devised; and to account for the possibility of representation, we imagine the hypothesis of an external world. Nothing could be more easy than to demonstrate, that on this supposition, the fact 01 the external reality is not only petitory but improbable. This, however, we are relieved from doing, by Dr Brown's own admis- sion, that " the sceptical argument for the non-existence of an exter- nal world, as a mere play of reasoning, admits of no rejjly ;'' and we shall afterw^ards prove, that the only ground on which he attempts to vindicate this existence, (tlie ground of our natural belief in its reality,) is one, not competent to the hypothetical realist. We shall see, that if this belief be true, the liypothesis itself is superseded ; if false, that there is no fact for the hypo- tliesis to explain. In i\iQ fourth place, a legitimate hypothesis must account for the pha^nomenon, about which it is conversant, adequately and without violence, in all its dependencies, relations, and pecuhari- ties. — But the hypothesis in question, only accomplishes its end, PHILOSOPHY OF PERCEPTION. — nay only vindicates its utility, by a mutilation, or, more pro- perly, by the destruction and re-creation, of the very phasnomenon for the nature of which it would account. The entire phsenomenon to be explained by the supposition of a representative perception, is the fact, given in consciousness, of the immediate knowledge or intuition of an existence different from self . This simple phseno- menon it hews down into two fragments ; — into the existence and the intuition. The existence of external things, which is given only through their intuition, it admits ; the intuition itself, though the ratio cognoscendi, and to us therefore the ratio essendi of j their reality, it rejects. But to annilijlate what is prior and con- stitutive in the phsenomenon, is, in truth, to annihilate the phae- nomenon altogether. The existence of an external world, which the hypothesis proposes to explain, is no longer even a truncated fact of consciousness ; for the existence given in consciousness, necessarily fell with the intuition on which it reposed. A repre- sentative perception, is therefore, an hypothetical explanation of a supposititious fact : it creates the nature it interprets. And I in this respect, of all the varieties of the representative hypothe- sis, the third, or that which views in the object known a modifi- cation of thought itself, most violently outrages the phgenome- non of consciousness it would explain. And this is Brown's. The Jirst, saves the pligenomenon of consciousness in so far as it preserves always the numerical, if not always the substantial, dif- ference between the object perceived and the percipient mind. The second, does not violate at least the antithesis of the object perceived and the percipient act. But in the third or simplest form of representatian, not only is the object known, denied to be itself the reality existing, as consciousiiess attests ; — this object revealed as not-self, is identified with the mental ego ; — nay, even, though given as permanent, with the transient energy of thought itself. In the fifth place, the fact, which a legitimate hypothesis is devised to explain, must he within the sphere of experience. — The fact, however, for which that of a representative perception accounts (the existence of external things), transcends, ex hypo- thesi, all experience ; it is the object of no real knowledge, but a bare ens rationis — a mere hyperphysical chimsera. In the sixth and last place, an hypothesis itself is probable in proportion as it works simply and naturally ; that is in propor- tion as it is dependent on no subsidiary hypothesis, and as it ilj^,,^ REPRESENTATIONISM NOT A LEGITLMATE HYPOTHESIS. Gj involves iiotliiug, petitory, occult, supernatural, as an element of its explanation. In this respect, the doctrine of a representative perception is not less vicious than in others. To explain at all, it must not only postulate subsidiary hypotheses, but subsidiary iiiiracles. — The doctrine in question attempts to explain the know- h'dge of an unlcnown world, by the ratio of a representative per- ception : but it is impossible by any conceivable relation, to apply the ratio to the facts. The mental modification, of which, on the doctrine of representation, wc are exclusively conscious in percep- tion, either represents (i. e. alfords a mediate knoAvledge of) a real external world, or it does not. (We say only the reality; to include all systems from Kant's, who does not pi^edicate even an existence in space and time of things in themselves, to Locke's, who supposes the transcendent reality to resemble its idea, at least in the primary qualities.) Now, the latter alternative is an affir- mation of absolute Idealism ; we have, therefore, at present only ro consider the former. And here, the mind either knows the reahty of what it represents, or it does not. — On the prior alter- native, the hypothesis under discussion would annihilate itself, in iinnihilating the ground of its utility. For as the end of repre- ^entation is knowledge ; and as the hypothesis of a representative perception is only required on the supposed impossibility of that presentative knowledge of external things, which consciousness affirms : — if the mind is admitted to be cognisant of the outer 1 eality in itself, previous to representation, the end towards which tlie hypothesis was devised as a mean, has been already accom- plished ; and the possibility of an intuitive perception, as given in consciousness, is allowed. Nor is the hypothesis only absurd, as superfluous. It is worse. For the mind would, in this case, be supposed to know before it knew ; or, like the crazy Pentheus, to see its objects double, — (" Et solcm gcminura et duplices se ostendere Thebas ") : and, if these absurdities be eschewed, then is the identity of mind 'Hid self, — of consciousness and knowledge, abolished ; and my iitellect knows, what / am not conscious of it knowing! — The other alternative remains: — that the mind is 6^/«6?/?/ determined to represent, and truly to represent, the reality which it does not Icnow. And here the mind either blindly determines itself, or is blindly determined by an extrinsic and intelligent cause. — The former lemma is the more philosophical, in so far as it assumes nothing hyperphysical ; but it is otherwise utterly irrational, in E 66 PHILOSOPHY OF PERCEPTION. as much as it would explain au effect, by a cause wholly inade- quate to its production. On this alternative, knowledge is sup- posed to be tlie effect of ignorance, — intelligence of stupidity, — life of death. We are necessarily ignorant, ultimately at least, of the mode in which causation operates ; but we know at least, that no effect arises without a cause — and a cause proportionate to ii existence. — The absurdity of this supposition has accordingly- constrained the profoundest cosmothetic ideahsts, notwithstanding their rational abhorrence of a supernatural assumption, to em- brace the second alternatiAe. To say nothing of less illustrious schemes, the systems of Divine Assistance, of a Pre-established Harmony, and of the Vision of all things in the Deity, are only so many subsidiary hypotheses, — so many attempts to bridge, by supernatural machinery, the chasm between the representation and the reality, which all human ingenuity had found, by natural means, to be insuperable. The hypothesis of a representative perception, thus presupposes a miracle to let it work. Dr Brown, indeed, rejects as unphilosophical, those hyperphysical subsidies. But he only saw less clearly than their illustrious authors, the necessity which required them. It is a poor philosophy that eschews the Deus ex machina, and yet ties the knot which is only soluble by his interposition. It is not unphilosophical to assume a miracle, if a miracle be necessary ; but it is unphilosophical to originate the necessity itself. And here the hypothetical realist cannot pretend, that tlie difficulty is of nature's, not of his creation. In fact it only arises, because ho has closed his eyes upon the light of nature, and refused the guidance of consciousness : but having swamped himself in following the ignis fatiais of a theory, lie has no right to refer its private absurdities to the imbecility of human reason ; or to generahse his own factitious ignorance, by a Quarts turn est quod nescimus ! The difficulty of the problem Dr BrowD^ has not perceived ; or perceiving, has not ventured to state, — far less attempted to remove. He has essayed, indeed, to cut the knot, which he was unable to loose; but we shall find, in the sequel, that his summary postulate of the reality of an external world, on the ground of our belief in its existence, is, in his hands, of all unfortunate attempts, perhaps the most unsuccessful. The scheme of Natural Realism (which it is Reid's honour to ! have been the first, among not forgotten philosophers, virtually and intentionally, at least, to embrace) is thus the only system, on which the truth of consciousness and the possibility of knowledge Bl^ HISTORICALLY, llEID RIGHT, BROWN WRONG. 07 can be vindicated ; whilst the Ilypotlietical Realist, in his eft'ort to be " wise above knowledge," like the dog in the ft^ble, loses the substance, in attempting to realize the shadow. " Les hom- ines," (says Leibnitz, with a truth of which he was not himself aware,) — " les hommes clierchent ce qii'ils savent, et ne savent pas ce qiiils cherchent." That the doctrine of an iatuitive perception is not without its ditHculties, we allow. But these, do not affect its possibility ; and may in a great measure be removed by a more sedulous examina- tion of the pha^nomena. The distinction of perception proper from sensation proper, in other words, of the objective from the subjective in this act, Reid, after other philosophers, has already turned to good account; but his analysis would have been still more successful, had he discovered the law which universally ii-overns tlieir manifestation: — That Perception and Sensation, the objective and subjective, thoiujh both ahuays co-existent, are • divays in the inverse ratio of each other. But on this matter we cannot at present enter. [See Diss. p. 876-885,] Dr Brown is not only wrong in regard to Reid's own doctrine ; he is wrong, even admitting his interpretation of that philosopher to be true, in charging him with a " series of wonderful miscon- ceptions," in regard to the opinions universally prevalent touching the nature of ideas. We shall not argue the case upon the higher (jround, that Reid, as a natural realist, could not he philosophically out, in assailing the hypothesis of a representative perception, even though one of its subordinate moditications might be mis- taken by him for another ; but shall prove that, supposing Reid t(» have been like Brown, an hypothetical realist, under the third form of a representative perception, he was not historically wrong in attributing to philosophers in general, (at least, after the decline of the Scholastic philosophy,) the first or second variety of the hypothesis. Even on this loicer ground, Brown is fated to be unsuccessful ; and if Reid be not always correct, his antagonist has failed in convicting him even of a single inaccuracy, Wc shall consider Brown's charge of misrepresentation in detail. It is always unlucky to stumble on the threshold. The para- graph (Lect, xxvii,) in which Dr Brown opens his attack on Reid, contains more mistakes than sentences ; and the etymological dis- cussion it involves, supposes as true, what is not simply false, but diametrically opposite to the truth, — Among other errors : — In the first place, the term " idea" was never employed in any system, 68 PHILOSOPHY OF PERCEPTION. previous to the age of Descartes, to denote " little images derived from objects without," In the second, it was never used in any philosophy, prior to the same period, to signify the immediate object of perception. In the third, it was not applied by the " Peripatetics or Schoolmen," to express an object of human thouglit at all.* In ihefo^irth, ideas (taking this term for species) * The history of the word idea seems completely unknowu. Previous to the age of Descartes, as a philosophical term, it was employed exclusively by the Platonists, — at least exclusively in a Platonic meaning ; and this meaning was precisely the reverse of that attributed to tlie word by Dr Brown ; — the idea loas not an object of perception, — the idea ivas not derived . from without. — In the schools, so far from being a current psychological expression, as he imagines, it had no other application than a theological. Neither, after the revival of letters, was the term extended by the Aristo- telians even to the objects of intellect. Melanchthon, indeed (who was a kind of semi Platouist) uses it on one occasion as a synonyme for notion, or intelligible species {De Anima, p. 187, ed. 1565) ; but it was even to this solitary instance, we presume, that Julius Scaliger alludes (Z)e Subtilitate, vi. 4), when he castigates such an application of the Avord as neoteric and abusive. " 3Ielanch." is on the margin. Goclenius also probably founded his usage on Melanchthon. — We should have distinctly said, that previous to its employment by Descartes himself the expression had never been used as a comprehensive term for the immediate objects of thought, had we not i in remembrance the Historia Animce HumancE of our countryman David Buchanan. This work, originally written in French, had for some years been privately circulated previous to its publication at Paris in 1636. Here we find the word idea familiarly employed, in its most extensive significa-^ tion, to express the objects, 'not only of intellect proper, but of memory, imagination, sense ; and this is the earliest example of such an employment. For the Discourse on Method in which the term is usurped by Descartes in an equal latitude, was at least a year later in its publication— viz. in June 1637. Adopted soon after also by Gassendi, the word under such imposing patronage gradually won its way into general use. In England, however, Locke may be said to have been the first who naturalized the term in its Cartesian universality. Hobbes employs it, and that historically, only once or twice; Henry More and Cudworth are very chary of it, even when treat- ing of the Cartesian philosophy ; Willis rarely iises it ; while Lord Herbert, Reynolds, and the English philosophers in general, between Descartes and Locke, do not apply it psychologically at all. When in common language employed by Milton and Dryden, after Descartes, as before him, by Sidney, Spenser, Shakspeare, Hooker, &c. the meaning is Platonic. Our Lexico- graphers are ignorant of the difference. The fortune of this word is curious. Employed by Plato to express the real forms of the intelligible world, in lofty contrast to the unreal images of the sensible ; it was lowered by Descartes, who extended it to the objects of i our consciousness in general. When, after Gassendi, the school of Condillac u had analyzed our highest faculties into our lowest, the idea was still more ; liidt," IfWDJ la a' km' ftfe i\ HISTORICALLY, RKID RIGHT, BRO\YN WRONC. (l!) wore not " in all the dark ages of the scholastic followers of Ai-istotlc," regarded as " little images derived from wit Jiout ;" for a numerous party of the most illustrious schoolmen rejected species, not only in the intellect, hut in the sense. In the Jifth, "pAa?i- tasm " in •'' the old philosophy," was not the " external cause of perception, '' but the internal ohject of imagination. In the sixth, the term " shadowy film " which here and elsewhere ho con- stantly uses, shows that Dr Brown confounds the matterless spe- cies of the Peripatetics with the corporeal effluxions of Democritus and Epicurus : — " Qua?, quasi membrance^ summo de cortice rerum Dereptfe, volitant ultro citroque per auras." Dr Brown, in short, only fails in victoriously estabhshing against Reid the various meanings in which " the old writers " employed the term idea, by the petty fact, — that the old writers did not employ the term idea at all. Nor does the progress of the attack belie the omen of its out- set. We shall consider the philosophers quoted by Brown in chronological order. Of three of these only, (Descartes, Arnauld, Locke,) were the opinions particularly noticed by Reid ; the others, (Hobbes, Le Clerc, Crousaz,) Brown adduces as examples of Eeid's general misrepresentation. Of the greater number of the philosophers specially criticised by Reid, Brown prudently says nothing. Of these, the first is Descartes ; and in regard to him, Dr Brown, not content with accusing Reid of simple ignorance, contends, " that the opinions of Descartes are precisely opposite to the representations which he has given of them." (Lect. xxvii. p. 172.) — Now Reid states, in regard to Descartes, that this pliilosopher appears to place the idea or representative object in perception, sometimes in the mind, and sometimes in the brain ; and he acknowledges that while these opinions seem to him con- tradictory, he is not prepared to pronounce which of them their deeply degi'aded from its high original. Lilie a fallen angel, it Avas relegated from the sphere of divine intelligence, to the atmospliere of human sense ; till at last Idcohgie (more correcth' Idealogie), a word which could only ju-oper/i/ suggest an a priori scheme, deducing our knowledge from the intellect, has in France become the name peculiarly distinctive of that philosoi)iiy of mind which exclusively derives our knoMdedge from the senses. — Word and thing, ideas have been the crux pldJusopltunmi, since Aristotle sent them packing (x«'e£rw<7«> iliui) to the present day. 70 PHILOSOPHY OF PERCEPTION. m author held, if he did not indeed hold both together. " Des- cartes," he says, " seems to have hesitated between the two opinions, or to haA^e passed from one to the other." On any alternative, however, Reid attributes to Descartes, either the first ; or the second form of representation. Now here Ave must recol- lect, that the question is not whether lleid be rigorously right, but -whether he be inexcusably ivrong. Dr Brown accuses him of the most ignorant misrepresentation, — of interpreting an author, whose perspicuity he himself admits, in a sense " exactly the reverse" of truth. To determine what Descartes' doctrine of perception actually is, would be difhcult, perhaps even impossible ; but in reference to the question at issue, certainly superfluous. It here suffices to show, that his opinion on this point is one mooted among his disciples ; and that Brown, wholly unacquaint- ed with the difficulties of the question, dogmatizes on the basis of a single passage — nay, of a passage in itself irrelevant. Eeid is justified against Brown, if the Cartesian Idea be proved, either a material image in the brain, or an immaterial representa- tion in the mind, distinct from the percipient act. By those not possessed of the key to the Cartesian theory, there are many pass- ages * in the writings of its author, which, taken by themselves, might naturally be construed to import, that Descartes supposed the mind to be conscious of certain motions in the brain, to which, as well as to the modifications of the intellect itself, he applies the terms image and idea. Reid, who did not understand the Carte- sian philosophy as a system, was puzzled by these superficial am- biguities. Not aware that the cardinal point of that system is, — that mind and body, as essentially opposed, are naturally to each other as zero, and that their mutual intercourse can only be supernaturally maintained by the concourse of the Deity ; f Reid * Ex. gr. De Pass. § 35, — a passage stronger than any of those noticed by De la Forge. t That the theory of Ocms/owa/Cfrases is necessarily involved in Descartes' doctrine of Assistance, and that his explanation of the connexion of mind and body reposes on that theory, it is impossible to doubt. For while he rejects all physical influence in the communication and conservation of mo- j tion between bodies, which he refers exclusively to the ordinary concourse of God, {Princ. P. II. Art. 3G etc.) ; consequently, he deprives conflicting bodies of all proper efficiency, and reduces them to the mere occasional causes of this phfenomenon. But a fortiori, he must postulate the hypothesis, which he found necessary in explaining the intercourse of things substantially the same, to account for the recipi'ocal action of two substances, to hitn, of ij HrSTORI(\\LIA', RKIi) RUniT, BROWN WRONd. 71 attributed to Descartes the possible opinion, that the soul is immediately cognisant of material images in the brain. But in the Cartesian theory, mind is only conscious of itself ; the aiFec- I tions of body may, by the law of union, be the proximate occa- sions, but can never constitute the immediate objects, of knowledge. "*^jl Reid, however, supposing that nothing could obtain the name of image, which did not represent a prototype, or the name of idea which was not an object of thought, thus misinterpreted Des- cartes ; who applies, abusively indeed, these terms to the occasion of perception, {i. e. the motion in the sensorium, unknown in itself and resembling nothing), as well as to the object of thought, {i. e. the representation of Avhich we are conscious in the mind itself.) In the Leibnitio-Wolfian system, ttco elements, both also deno- minated ideas, are in like manner accurately to be contra-distin- guished in the process of perception. The idea in the brain, and the idea in the mind, are, to Descartes, precisely what the " ma- terial idea," and the " sensucd idea,'' are to the Wolfians. In both philosophies, the two ideas are harmonic modifications, cor- relative and co-existent ; but in neither, is the organic affection or material idea an object of consciousness. It is merely the unknown and arbitrary condition of the mental representation ; and in the hypotheses both of Assistance and of Pre-established Harmony, the presence of the one idea implies the concomitance of the other, only by virtue of the hyperphysical determination. Had lieid, in fact, not limited his study of the Cartesian system to the wri- tings of its founder, the twofold application of the term idea, by Descartes, could never have seduced him into the belief, that so monstrous a solecism had been committed by that illustrious thinker. By De la Forge, the personal friend of Descartes, the verbal ambiguity is, indeed, not only noticed, but removed ; and that admirable expositor applies the term " corporeal species" to the affection in the brain, and the terms " idea," " intellectual notion," to the spiritual representation in the conscious mind. — {De V Esprit, c. ] 0.) But if Reid be wrong in his supposition, that Descartes admit- so incompatible a nature^ as mind and body. De la Forge, Geulinx, Mal- lebranche, Cordemoi, and other disciples of Descartes, only explicitly evolve what the writings of their master implicitly contain. We may observe, though we cannnot stop to prove, that Tennemann is wrong in denying De la Forge to be even an advocate, far less the first articulate ex])Ositor, of the doctrine of Occasional ( 'aitses. 72 PHILOSOPHY OF PERCEPTION. ted a consciousness of ideas in the brain ;* is he on the other alter- native wrong, and inexcusably wrong, in holding that Descartes supposed ideas in the mind, not identical icith their perceptions'^ Mallebranche, the most illustrious name in the school after its founder, (and who, not certainly with less ability, may be suppo- sed to have studied the writings of his master, with far greater attention than either Reid or Brown,) ridicules, as " contrary to common sense and justice" the supposition that Descartes had rejected ideas in " the ordinary acceptation,'" and adopted the hypothesis of their being representations, not really distinct from their perception. And while " he is as certain as he possibly can be in such matters," that Descartes had not dissented from the general opinion, he 'taunts Arnauld with resting his paradoxical interpretation of that philosopher's doctrine " not on any passages of his Metaphysic contrary to the common opinion," but on his own arbitrary limitation of " the ambiguous term perception^ {Rep. au Livre des Idees, passim; Arnauld, CEuv. xxxviii. pp. 388, 389.) That ideas are "fou7id in the mind, not formed by it," and consequently, that in the act of knowledge the representation is really distinct from the cognition proper, is strenuously asserted as the doctrine of his master by the Cartesian lloell, in the contro- versy he maintained with the Anti-Cartesian De Yries. (Roelli Dispp. ; De Tries De Ideis innatis.) — But it is idle to multiply proofs. Brown's charge of ignorance falls back upon himself; and Reid may lightly bear the reproach of " exactly reversing" the notorious doctrine of Descartes, when thus borne, along with him, by the profoundest of that philosopher's disciples. Had Brown been aware, that the point at issue between him and Reid, was one agitated among the followers of Descartes themselves, he could hardly have dreamt of summarily deter- mining the question by the production of one vulgar passage from tne writings of that philosopher. But we are sorely puzzled to account for his hallucination, in considering this passage per- tinent. Its substance is fully given by Reid in his exposition of the Cartesian doctrine. Every iota it contains, of any relevancy, is adopted by Mallebranche ; — constitutes, less precisely indeed, his famous distinction of perception [idee) from sensation {senti- * Keid's eiTor on this point is however surpassed by that of jNI. Kojer- Collard, who represents the idea in the Cartesian doctrine of perception as exchisivehj sitnate in the bi'ain — {CEuires de Reid, III. p. 334). HISTORICALLY, REID RIGHT, BROWN WRONG. 73 merit) : and Mallebranclic is one of the two modern pliilosopliers, admitted by Brown to have held the hypothesis of representation in its first, and, as he says, its most " erroneoits" form. But principles that coalesce, even with the hypothesis of ideas distinct from mind, are not, a fortiori, incompatible with the hypothesis, of ideas distinct only from the perceptive act. — We cannot, how- ever, enter on an articulate exposition of its irrelevancy. To adduce Hobbes, as an instance of Reid's misrepresentation of the " common doctrine of ideas," betrays, on the part of Brown, a total misapprehension of the conditions of the question ; — or he forgets that Hobbes was a materialist. — The doctrine of represen- tation, under all its modifications, is properly subordinate to the doctrine of a spiritual principle of thought ; and on the supposi- tion, all but universally admitted among philosophers, that the relation of knowledge implied the analogy of existence, it was mainly devised to explain the possibility of a knowledge by an immaterial subject, of an existence so disproportioned to its nature, as the qualities of a material object. Contending, that an imme- diate cognition of the accidents of matter, infers an essential iden- tity of matter and mind. Brown himself admits, that the hypothesis of representation belongs exclusively to the doctrine of dualism (Lect. XXV. pp. 159, 160) ; whilst Rcid, assaihng the hypothesis of ideas, only as subverting the reality of matter, could hardly regard it as parcel of that scheme, which acknowledges the reality of nothing else. — But though Hobbes cannot be adduced as a competent witness against Reid, he is however valid evidence against Brown. Hobbes, though a materialist, admitted no knowledge of an external world. Like his friend Sorbiere, he was a kind of material idealist. According to him, we know nothing of the qualities or existence of any outward reality. All that we know is the " seeming," the " apparition," the " aspect," the " phcenomenon," the "phantasm," within ourselves; and this subjective object, of which we are conscious, and which is con- sciousness itself, is nothing more than the " agitation " of our internal organism, determined by the unknown " motions," which are supposed, in like manner, to constitute the world without. Perception he reduces to sensation. Memory and imagination are faculties sp>ecifically identical with sense, differing from it simply in the degree of their vivacity ; and this difference of intensity, with Hobbes as wdth Hume, is the only discrimination 74 PHILOSOPHY OF PERCEPTION. between our dreaming and our waking thoughts,— A doctrine of perception identical with Reid's ! In regard to Arnauld, the question is not, as in relation to the others, whether Reid conceives him to maintain a form of the ideal theory which he rejects, but whether Reid admits Arnaidd's opinion on perception and his own to be identical. — " To tliesc authors," says Dr Brown, " whose opinions, on the subject of perception, Dr Reid has misconceived, I may add one, whom even he himself allows to have shaken of the ideal system, and to have considered the idea and the perception, as not distinct, but the same, a modification of the mind and nothiiig more. I allude to the celebrated Jansenist writer, Arnaukl, who maintains this doctrine as expressly as Dr Reid himself, and makes it the foundation of his argument in his con- troversy with Mallebranche." (Lecture xxvii. p. 173.) — If this statement be not untrue, then is Dr Brown's intei'pret.i- tion of Reid himself correct. A representative perception, under its third and simplest modification, is held by Arnauld as by Brown ; and his exposition is so clear and articulate, that all essential misconception of his doctrine is precluded. In these circumstances, if Reid avow the identity of Arnauld's opinion and his own, this avowal is tantamount to a declaration that his pecu- liar doctrine of perception is a scheme of representation ; whereas, on the contrary, if he signalise the contrast of their two opinions, he clearly evinces the radical antithesis, — and his sense of tlie radical antithesis, — of the doctrine of intuition, to every, even tlie simplest form of the hypothesis of representation. And this last he does. It cannot be maintained, that Reid admits a pliilosopher to hold an opinion convertible witli his, whom he states : — " to profess tlie doctrine, universally received, that we perceive not material things immediately, — that it is their ideas, which are the immediate objects of our thoughts, — and that it is in the idea of every thing, that we perceive its properties.'' This fundamental contrast being established, we may safely allow, that the radical misconception, which caused Reid to overlook the difiPerence of our presentative and representative faculties, caused him likewise to believe, that Arnauld had attempted to unite two contradictory theories of perception. Not aware, that it was possible to maintain a doctrine of perception, in which the idea was not really distinguished from HISTORICALLY, REII) RIGHT, BROWN WRONG. 75 its cognition, and yet to hold that the niiud had no innncdiatc knowledge of external things: Keid snpposes, in the />\fi place, that Arnauld, in rejecting the hypothesis of ideas, as representa- tive entities, really distinct from the contemplative act of percep- tion, coincided with himself in viewing the material reality, as the immediate object of that act ; and, in the second, that Arnauld again deserted this opinion, when, with the philosophers, he main- tained, that the idea, or act of the mind representing the external reality, and not the external reality itself, was the immediate object of perception. But Arnauld's theory is one and indivi- sible ; and, as such, no part of it is identical with Reid's. Reid's confusion, here as elsewhere, is explained by the circumstance, that he had never speculatively conceived the possibiHty of the simplest modification of the representative hypothesis. lie saw no medium between rejecting ideas as something different from thought, and the doctrine of an immediate knowledge of the material object. Neither does Arnauld, as Reid supposes, ever assert against Mallebranche, " that we perceive external things immediately," that is, in themselves.* Maintaining that all our perceptions are modifications essentially representative, Arnauld everywhere avows, that he denies ideas, only as existences distinct from the act itself of perception.-]- Reid was therefore wrong, and did Arnauld less than justice, in viewing his theory " as a weak attempt to reconcile two inconsis- tent doctrines : " he was wrong, and did Arnauld more than justice, in supposing, that one of these doctrines is not incompa- tible with his own. The detection, however, of this error only tends to manifest more clearly, how just, even when under its influence, was Reid's appreciation of the contrast, subsisting between his own and Arnauld's opinion, considered as a ivhole ; * This is perfectly clear from Arnauld's own uniform statements ; and it is justly observed by INLallebranche. in his Pwph/ to the Treatise On True and false Ideas, (p. 123, orig. edit.) — that, " in reality, according to M. Arnauld, ?/-e do not perceive bodies, wa perceive only ourselves^ t Oeuvres t. xxxviii. pp. 187, 198, 199, 389. et passim. It is to be recol- lected tiiat Descartes, Mallebranche, Arnaidd, Locke, and philosophers in general before Reid, employed the term Perception as coextensive with Con- sciousness. — By Leibnitz, Wolf, and their followers, it was used in a peculiar sense, — as equivalent to Representation or Idea proper, and as contradis- tinguished from Apperception, or consciousness. Keid^ limitation of tlie term, though the gi-ounds on which it is defended are not of the strongest, is convenient, and has Iteon very generally admitted. 76 PHILOSOPHY OF PERCEPTION. S and exposes more glaringly Brown's general misconception of Reid's philosophy, and his present gross misrepresentation, in affirming that the doctrines of the two philosophers were identi- cal, and by Reid admitted to be the same. Nor is Dr Brown more successful in his defence of Locke. Supposing always, that ideas were held to be something dis- tinct from their cognition, Reid states it, as that philosopher's opinion, " that images of external objects were conveyed to the brain ; but whether he thought with Descartes [erratitm for Dr Clarke ?] and Newton, that the images in the brain are perceived by the mind, there present, or that they are imprinted on the mind itself, is not so evident." This, Dr Brown, nor is he origi- nal in the assertion, pronounces a flagrant misrepresentation. Not only does he maintain, that Locke never conceived the idea to be substantially different from the mind, as a material image in the brain ; but, that he never supposed it to have an existence apart from the mental energy of which it is the object. Locke, he asserts, like Arnauld, considered the idea perceived and the percipient act, to constitute the same indivisible modification of the conscious mind. We shall see. In his language, Locke is, of all philosophers, the most figura- tive, ambiguous, vacillating, various, and even contradictory ; — as has been noticed by Reid, and Stewart, and Brown himself, — indeed, we believe, by every author who has had occasion to comment on this philosopher. The opinions of such a writer are not, therefore, to be assumed from isolated and casual expres- sions, which themselves require to be interpreted on the general analogy of his system ; and yet this is the only ground on which Dr Brown attempts to establish his conclusions. Thus, on the matter under discussion, though really distinguishing, Locke ver- bally confounds, the objects of sense and of intellect, — the opera- tion and its object, — the objects immediate and mediate, — the object and its relations, — the images of fancy and the notions of the understanding. Consciousness is converted with Perception, — Perception with Idea, — Idea with Ideatum, and with Notion, Conception, Phantasm, Representation, Sense, Meaning, &c. Now, his language identifying ideas and perceptions, appears conformable to a disciple of Arnauld ; and now it proclaims him a follower of Digby, — explaining ideas by mechanical impulse. and the propagation of material particles from the external reality to the brain. The idea would seem, in one passage, an organic HISTORICALLY, REID RIGHT, BROWN WRONG. 77 ;iifeeti(jn, — the mere occasion of a spiritual representation ; in another, a representative image, in the brain itself. In employ- ing thus inditferently the language of every hypothesis, may we not suspect, that he was anxious to be made responsible for none ? One, however, he has formally rejected : and that is the very opinion attributed to him by Dr Brown, — that the idea, or object of consciousness in perception, is only a modification of the mind itself. We do not deny, tliat Locke occasionally employs expressions, which, in a writer of more considerate language, would imply the identity of ideas with the act of knowledge ; and, under the circumstances, we should have considered suspense more rational than a dogmatic confidence in any conclusion, did not the follow- ing passage, which has never, we believe, been noticed, appear a positive and explicit contradiction of Dr Brown's interpretation. It is from Locke's Examination of Mallebranche's Opinion, which, as subsequent to the pubhcation of the Essay, must be lield authentic, in relation to the doctrines of that work. At the same time, the statement is articulate and precise, and possesses all the authority of one cautiously made in the course of a pole- mical discussion. Mallebranche coincided with Arnauld, and consequently with Locke, as interpreted by Brown, to the extent of supposing, that sensation proper is nothing but a state or modi- fication of the mind itself; and Locke had thus the opportunity of expressing, in regard to this opinion, his agreement or dissent. An acquiescence in the doctrine, that the secondary qualities, of which we are conscious in sensation, are merely mental states, by no means involves an admission that the primary qualities of \vhich we are conscious in perception, are nothing more, Mallc- l)ranche, for example, affirms the one and denies the other. But if Locke be found to ridicule, as ho does, even the opinion which merely reduces the secondary qualities to mental states, a fortiori, and this on the principle of his own jyhilosoj:>hy, he must be held to reject the doctrine, which would reduce not only the non- resembling sensations of the secondary, but even the resembling, and consec[uently extended, ideas of the primary qualities of matter, to modifications of the immaterial unextcnded mind. In these circumstances, the following passage is superfluously con- clusive against Brown, and equally so, whether we coincide or not in aU the principles it involves. — " But to examine their doc- trine of modification a little farther. Different sentiments (sensa- 78 PHILOSOPHY OF PERCEPTION. tions) are different modifications of the mind. The mind, or soul, that perceives, is one immaterial indivisible substance. Now I see the white and black on this paper, I hear one singing in the next room, I feci the warmth of the fire I sit by, and I taste an apple I am eating, and all this at the same time. Now, I ask, take modification for what you please, can the same unextended, indi- visible substance have different, nay, inconsistent and opposite [as these of luhite and black must be) modifications at the same timef Or must we suppose distinct parts in an indivisible substance, one for black, another for white, and another for red ideas, and so of the rest of those infinite sensations, which we have in sorts and degrees ; all which ive can distinctly perceive, and so are distinct ideas, some whereof are opposite, as heat and cold, which yet a man may feel at the same time ? I was ignorant before, how sensation was performed in us : this they call an explanation of it ! Must I say now I understand it better ':' If this be to cure one's igno- rance, it is a very slight disease, and the charm of two or three insignificant words will at any time remove it ; probatum est" (Sec. 39.) — This passage, as we shall see, is correspondent to the doctrine held on this point by Locke's personal friend and philo^ sophical follower, Le Clerc. (But, what is curious, the supposi- tions which Locke here rejects, as incompatible with the spiritua- lity of mind, are the very facts, on which Ammonius Ilcrmise, Phi- loponus, and Condillac, among many others, found their proof of the immateriality of the thinking subject.) But if it be thus evident, that Locke held neither the third form of representiition, that lent to him by Brown, nor even the second; it follows, that Reid did him anything but injustice, in supposing him to maintain, that ideas are objects, either in the brain, or in the mind itself. Even the more material of these alternatives has been the one generally attributed to him by his critics,* and the one adopted fi-om him by his disciples.f Nor is this to be deemed an opinion too monstrous to be entertained by so enlightened a philosopher. It w^as, as we shall see, the com- mon opinion of the age ; the opinion, in particular, held by the * To refer only to the^^Vs^ and last of his regular critics :— see Solid Philo- so]>hy asserted against the Fancies of the Ideists, by J. S. [John Sergeant.] | Lond. 1697, p. 161, — a very curious book, absolutely, we may say, unknown and Cousin, Coiirs de Philosophic, t. ii. 1829 ; pp. 830, 357, 325, 365— tlie most important work on Locke since the Nouveaux Essais of Leibnitz. t Tuckkr's Liqht of Nature, i. pp. 15, 18, ed. 2. ^ ■11 HISTORICALLY, RLIU RIGHT, liROWxN \VRONG. lit "fsoil most illustrious of his countrymen and contemporaries — by New- ^"^'Jst ton, Clarke, Willis. Hook, &c.* The English psychologists have "leia indeed been generally very mechanical. Map|l j)r Brown at length proceeds to consummate his imagined vic- '^Mal tory, by " that most decidve evidence, found not in treatises read «<^ial only by a few, but in the popular elementary works of science of the time, the (jeneral text books of schools and colleges." He quotes, however, only two : — the Pneumatology of Lc Clcrc, and the Logic of Crousaz. " Le Clerc," says Dr Brown, " in his chapter on the nature of ideas, gives the history of the opinions of philosophers on this subject, and states among them the very doctrine which is most forcibly and accurately opposed to the ideal system of perception. ' Alii putant ideas et perceptiones idaarum easdem esse, licet rela- tionibus differant. Idea, uti consent, proprie ad objectum refer- tur, quod mens considerat ; — perceptio, verc ad mentem ipsam quae pcrcipit : sed duplex ilia relatio ad unam modificationem mentis pertinct. Itaque, secundum hosce philosophos, nullse sunt, proprie, loquendo, idca3 a mente nostra distinctse.' What is it, I may ask, which Dr Reid considers himself as having added to this verij philosophical view of perception? and if he added nothing, it is surel}^ too much to ascribe to him the merit of detecting errors, the counter statement of which had long formed a pari of the elementary loorksofthe school.'" In the first place, Dr Reid certainly " added " nothing " to * On the opinion of Newton and Clarke, see Des Maizeaux's Recueil, i. pp. 7, 8, 9, 15, 22, 75, 127, 169, &c. — Genovesi notices the crudity of Newton's doctrine, " Mentem in cerebro prajsidere atque in eo, suo scilicet sensorio, rerura imcujines cernere." — On Willis, see his work Ue Anirna Brutorum, p. (J4, alibi, ed. 1672. — On Hook, see his Led. on Light., § 7. — We know not whether it has been remarked that Locke's doctrine of particles and impulse, is precisely that of Sir Kenelm Digby ; and if Locke adopts one part of so ^Toss an hypothesis, what is there imj)robal)le in his adoption of the other ^ — that the ol)ject of perception is, " a material participation of tiie bodies that work on the outward organs of the senses," (Digby, Treatise of Bodies, c. 32.) As a specimen of the mechanical explanations of mental pluenomena then considered satisfactory, we quote Sir Kenelmls theory of memory. — " Out of which it followeth, that the little similitudes which are in the caves of the brain, wheeling and swimming about, almost in such sort as you see in the washing of currants or rice by the winding about and circular turning of the cook's hand, divers sorts of bodies do go their course for a pretty- while; so that the most ordinary objects cannot but present themselves quickly," tic. &c. (ibidem.) so PHILOSOPHY OF PERCEPTION. - tliis very philosophical view of perception/' but he exploded it altogether. In the second, it is false, either that this doctrine of perception " had long formed part of the elementary xvorks of the schools," or that Le Clerc affords any countenance to this assertion. On the contrary, it is virtually stated by him to be the novel paradox of a single pliilosopher ; nay to carry the blunder to hyperbole, it is already, as such a singular opinion, discussed and referred to its author by Beid himself Had Dr Brown proceeded from the tenth paragraph, which he quotes, to the fourteenth, which he coidd not have read, he would have found, that the passage ex- tracted, so far from containing the statement of an old and familiar dogma in the schools, was, neither more nor less, than a state- ment of the contemporary hypothesis of — Antony Arnauld ! and of Antony Arnauld alone ! ! In the third place, from the mode in which he cites Le Clerc, his silence to the contrary, and the general tenor of his statement, Dr Brown would lead us to beheve, that Le Clerc himself coincides in " this very philosophical view of perception." So far, how- ever, from coinciding with Arnauld, he pronounces his opinion to bo false ; controverts it upon very solid grounds ; and in deliver- ing his own doctrine touching ideas, though sufficiently cautious in telling us what they are, he has no hesitation in assuring us, among other things which they cannot be, that they are not mo- difications or essential stdtes of mind. " Non est (idea sc.) modi- ficatio aut essentia moitis : nam prajterquam quod sentimus ingeus esse discrimen inter ideae perceptionem et sensationem ; quid habet mens nostra simile monti, aut innumeris ejusmodi ideis?" — {Pneumat. sect. i. c. 5. § 10.) On all this no observation of ours can be either so apposite or authoritative, as the edifying reflections with which Dr Brown himself concludes his vindication of the philosophers against Reid. Brown's precept is sound, but his example is instructive. One word we leave blank, which the reader may himself supply. — " That a mind so vigorous as that of Dr shoidd have been capable of the series of misconceptions which we have traced, may seem loonderful, and truly is so ; and equally, or rather still more iconderfid, is the general admission of his merit in this respect. \m ^' I trust it will impress you with one important lesson — to consult '!« ,^ tlie opinions of authors in their own ivorks, and not in the works of l those tvho profess to give a faithful account of them. From my own 'ki- te v> i Ke. I km \%^ a % HISTORICAI^LY, REID RIGHT, BROWN WRONG. 81 experience I can most truly assure you, that there is scarcely an instance in ivhich I have found the vieiu I had received of them to he faithfd. There is usually something more, or some- thing less, which modifies the general result ; and by the various additions and subtractions thus made, so much of the spirit of the original doctrine is lost, that it may, in some cases, be considered as having made a fortunate escape, if it he not at last 7^epresented as directly opposite to what it is" (Lect. xxvii. p. 175.) The cause must, therefore, be unconditionally decided in favour of Reid, even on that testimony, which Brown triumphantly pro- duces in court, as " tlie most decisive evideiice " against him : — here then we might close our case. To signalize, however, more completely the whole character of the accusation, we shall call a few witnesses ; to prove, in fact, nothing more than that Brown's own " most decisive evidence " is not less favourable to himself, than any other that might be cited from the great majority of the learned. Mallebranche, in his controversy with Arnauld, everywhere assumes the doctrine of ideas, really distinct from their perception, to be the one " commonly received ;" nor does his adversary ven- ture to dispute the assumption. {Rep. au Livre des Idees. — Arnauld, (Euv. t. xxxviii. p. 388.) Leibnitz, on the other hand, in answer to Clarke, admits, that the crude theory of ideas held by this philosopher, ivas the com- mon. " Je ne demeure point d'accord des notions vulgaires, comme si les Images des choses etoient transportees, par les organes, jusqu'a I'ame. Cette notion de la Philosophic Vtdgaire n'est point intelligible, comme les nouveaux Cartesiens I'ont assez montre. L'on ne sauroit expliquer comment la substance imma- terielle est aifectee par la matiere: et soutenir une chose non intelligible la-dessus, c'est recourir a la notion scholastique chime- rique de je ne sai quelles especes intentionelles inexpliquable, qui passent des organes dans I'ame." {Opera, II. p. 161.) Nor does Clarke, in reply, disown this doctrine for himself and others, — {Ihid. p. 182 ) Brucker, in his Historia Philosophica Doctrince de Ideis (1723), speaks of Arnauld's hypothesis as a " peculiar opinion," rejected by " philosophers in general (plerisque eruditis)," and as not less untenable than the paradox of JSfallebranche. — (P. 248.) Dr Brown is fond of text-hooks. Did we condescend to those 1 PHILOSOPHY OF PERCEPTION. I of ordinary authors, we could adduce a cloud of witnesses against him. As a sample, we shall quote only three, but these of the very highest authority. Christian Thomasius, though a reformer of the Peripatetic and Cartesian systems, adopted a grosser theory of ideas than either. In his Introductio ad Philosophiam aidicam, (1702,) he defines thought in general, a mental discourse " about images, by the Illation of external bodies^ and through the organs of sense, stamped in the substance of the brain." (c. 3. § 29. See also his Inst. Jurispr. Div. L. i. c. 1,, and Introd. in Phil, ration. c. 3.) S'GrAvesande, in his Introductio ad Philosophiam, (1736,) though professing to leave undetermined, the positive question concerning the origin of ideas, and admitting that sensations are " nothing more than modifications of the mind itself ; " makes no scruple, in determining the negative, to dismiss, as absurd, the hypothesis, which would reduce sensible ideas to an equal sub- jectivity. " Mentem ipsam has Ideas efficere, et sibi ipsi repre- sentare res, quar^um his solis Ideis cognitionem acquirit, nulla modo concipi potest. Nulla inter causam et efi'ectum relatio daretur." (§§ 279, 282.) Genovesi, in his Elementa Metaphysicce, (1748.) lays it down as a fundamental position of philospohy, that ideas and the act cognitive of ideas are distinct (" Prop. xxx. Idem et Percep- tiones non videntur esse ppsse una eademque res ") ; and he ably refutes the hypothesis of Arnauld, which he reprobates as a paradox, unworthy of that illustrious reasoner. {Pars II. p. 140.) Voltaire's Dictionnaire Philosophique may be adduced as re- presenting the intelligence of the age of Heid himself. " Qu'est ce qu'une Idee ? — C'est une Image qui se j^eint dans mon cerveau. — Toutes vos pensees sont done des images.^ — Assurement," &c. (voce Idee.) What, in fine, is the doctrine of the two most numerous schools of modern pliilosophy — the Leibnitian and Kantian?* Both * Leibnitz; — Opera, Dutensii, torn. ii. pp. 21, 23, 33, 214, pars ii. pp. , 137, 145, 146. (Euvres Philos. par Raspe, pp. 66, 67, 74, 96, ets. Wolf; —Psychol. Rat. § 10, ets. Psychol. Emp. § 48. Kant— C/7V/A d. r. V. p. ' 376. ed. 2. Anthropohgie^ § 5. With one restriction, Leibnitz's doctrine is ' that of the lower Platouists, who maintained that the soul actually contains representations of every possible substance and event in the world during HISTORICALLY, REID RIGHT, BROWN WRONG. 83 maintain that tlic mind involves representations of wliicli it is not, and never may be, conscious ; that is, both maintain the second form of the hypothesis, and one of the two that Rcid understood and professedly assailed. [This statement requires qualification.] In Crousaz, Dr Brown has actually succeeded in finding one example (he might have found twenty), of a philosopher, before Reid, holding the same theory of ideas with Arnauld and him- self.* The reader is now in a condition to judge of the correctness of Brown's statement, " that with the exception of Mallcbranche and Berkeley, who had peculiar and very erroneous notions on the subject, all the philosophers whom Dr Reid considered him- self as opposing," (what ! Newton, Clarke, Hook, Norris, Porter- field, &c. ? — these, be it remembered, all severally attacked by Reid, Bron-n has neither ventured to defend, nor to acknowledge that he could not,) " would, if they had been questioned by him, have admitted, before they heard a single argument on his part, the revolution of the great year ; although these cognitive reasom are not elicited into consciousness, unless the reality, thus represented, be itself brought within the sphere of the sensual organs. (Plotimis, Enn. V. lib. vii. cc. 1, 2, 3.) * In speaking of this author, Dr Brown, who never loses an opportunity to depreciate Reid, goes out of his way to remark, " that precisely the same distinction of sensations and perceptions., on which Dr Reid founds so much, is stated and enforced in the difterent works of this ingenious -nTiter," and expatiates on this conformity of the two philosophers, as if he deemed its detection to be something new and curious. Mr Stewart had already noticed it in his Essays. But neither he nor Bro^vn seem to recollect, that Crousaz only copies Mallebranche, re et verbis., and that Reid had himself expressly assigned to that philosopher the merit oi first recognising the distinction. This is incon-ect. But M. Royer Collard {Reid, (Euvres t. iii. p. .329) is still more inaccm-ate in thinking that Mallebranche and Leibnitz (Leibnitz !) were perhaps the only philosophers before Reid, who had discriminated perception from sensation. The distinction was established by Des Cartes ; and after Mallebranche, but long before Reid, it had become even common ; and so far is Leibnitz fi-om having any merit in the matter, his criticism of IMalle- brance shows, that with all his learning he was strangely ignorant of a dis- crimination then familiar to philosophers in general, which may indeed be traced under various appellations to the most ancient times. [A contribu- tion towards this history, and a reduction of the qualities of matter to three classes, under the names of Primary, Secundo-primary, and Secondary, is given in the Supplementary Dissertations appended to Reid's Works (p. 825- 875.)] 84 PHILOSOPHY OF PERCEPTION. that their opinions luith respect to ideas ivere precisely the same as his oivn." (Lect. xxvii. p. 174.) We have thus vindicated our original assertion : — Brown has NOT SUCCEEDED IN CONVICTING ReID, EVEN OF A SINGLE ERROR. Brown's mistakes regarding the opinions on perception, enter- tained by Reid and the philosophers, are perhaps, however, even less astonishing, than his total misconception of the purport of Hume's reasoning against the existence of matter, and of the argument by which Reid invalidates Hume's sceptical conclusion. We shall endeavour to reduce the problem to its simplicity. Our knowledge rests ultimately on certain facts of conscious- ness, which as primitive, and consequently incomprehensible, are given less in the form of cognitions than of beliefs. But if con- sciousness in its last analysis — in other words, if our primary experience, be a faith ; the reality of our knowledge turns on the veracity of our constitutive beliefs. As ultimate, the quality of these beliefs cannot be inferred ; their truth, however, is in the first instance to be presumed. As given and possessed, they must stand good until refuted ; '•' neganti incumhit probatio." It is not to be presumed, that InteUigence gratuitously annihilates itself; — that Nature operates in vain ; — that the Author of nature creates only to deceive. Axol (pyjfii'^ovar Qsav vv ri iarl x.xl oivry!." But though the truth of our instinctive faiths must in the first instance be admitted, their falsehood may subsequently be esta- blished : this however only through themselves — only on the ground of their reciprocal contradiction. Is this contradiction proved, the edifice of our knowledge is undermined ; for " no lie is of the truth." Consciousness is to the philosopher, what the Bible is to the theologian. Both are professedly revelations of divine truth ; both exclusively supply the constitutive principles of knowledge, and the regulative principles of its construction. To both we must resort for elements and for laivs. Each may be disproved, but disproved only by itself. If one or other reveal facts, which, as mutually repugnant, cannot but be false, the authenticity of that revelation is invalidated ; and the criticism which signalizes this self-refutation, has, in either case, been able to convert assurance into scepticism, — " to turn the truth of God into a lie," " Et \io\&r(t fidem primarn., et convellere tota Fnndameuta quibus nixatur vita sahisque " — Lucr. yi BROWN'S MISCONCEPTION OF SCEPTICISM. 85 As psychology is only a developed consciousness, that is, a scientific evolution of the facts of which consciousness is the gua- rantee and revelation : the positive philosopher has thus a primary presumption in favour of the elements out of which his system is constructed ; whilst the sceptic, or negative philosopher, must be content to argue back to the falsehood of these elements, from the impossibihty which the dogmatist may experience, in combining them into the harmony of truth. For truth is one ; and the end of philosophy is the intuition of unity. Scepticism is not an ori- ginal or independent method ; it is the correlative and consequent of dogmatism ; and so far from being an enemy to truth, it arises only from a false philosophy, as its indication and its cure. '• Alte dubitat, qui altius credit." The sceptic must not himself establish, but from the dogmatist accept, his principles ; and his conclusion is only a reduction of philosophj- to zero, on the hypo- thesis of the doctrine from which his premises are borrowed. — Are the principles which a particular system involves, convicted of contradiction ; or, are these principles proved repugnant to others, which, as facts of consciousness, every positive philosophy must admit ; there is established a relative scejjticism, or the con- clusion, that philosophy, in so far as rcahsed in this system, is groundless. — Again, are the principles, wliich, as facts of conscious- ness, philosophy in general must comprehend, found exclusive of each other ; there is established an absolute scejjticism ; — the im- possibility of all philosophy is involved in the negation of the one criterion of truth. Our statement may be reduced to a dilemma. Either the facts of consciousness can be reconciled, or they cannot. If they cannot, knowledge absolutely is impossible, and every system of philosophy therefore false. If they can, no system which supposes their inconsistency can pretend to truth. As a legitimate sceptic, Hume could not assail the foundations of knowledge in themselves. His reasoning is from their subse- quent contradiction to their original falsehood ; and his premises, not established by himself, are accepted only as principles univer- sally conceded in the previous schools of philosophy. On the assumption, that what was thus unanimously admitted by philo- sophers, must be admitted of philosophy itself, his argument against the certainty of knowledge was triunqjhant. — Philosophers agreed in rejecting certain primitive beliefs of consciousness as false, and in usurping others as true. If consciousness, however, were confessed to yield a lying evidence in one pai-ticular, it could 86 PHILOSOPHY OF PERCEPTION. not be adduced as a credible witness at all : — " Falsus in uno, /alms in omnibus." But as the reality of our knowledge neces- sarily rests on the assumed veracity of consciousness, it thus rests on an assumption implicitly admitted by all systems of philosophy to be illegitimate. " Faciunt^ nee, intelligendo, ut nihil intelliyant ! ""^ Eeid (like Kant) did not dispute Hume's inference, as deduced from its antecedents. He allowed his scepticism, as relative, to be irrefragable; and that philosophy could not be saved from absolute scepticism, unless his conceded premises could be dis- allowed, by refuting the principles universally acknowledged by modern philosophers. This he applied himself to do. He sub- jected these principles to a new and rigorous criticism. If his analysis be correct, (and it was so, at least, in spirit and inten- tion), it proved them to be hypotheses, on which the credulous sequacity of philosophers, — " philosophorum credula natio " — had bestowed the prescriptive authority of self-evident truths ; and showed, that where a genuine fact of consciousness had been sur- rendered, it had been surrendered in deference to some ground- less assumption, which, in reason, it ought to have exploded. Philosophy was thus again reconciled with Nature ; consciousness was not a bundle of antilogies ; certainty and knowledge were not evicted from man. All this Dr Brown completely misunderstands. He compre- hends neither the reasoning of scepticism, in the hands of Hume, nor the argument from common sense, in those of Reid. Retro- grading himself to the tenets of that philosophy, whose contra- dictions Hume had fairly developed into scepticism, he appeals against this conclusion to the argument of common sense ; albeit that argument, if true, belies his hypothesis, and if his hypothesis be true, is belied by it. Hume and Reid he actually represents as maintaining precisely the same doctrine, on precisely the same grounds ; and finds both concurring with himself, in advocating ' that very opinion, which the one had resolved into a negation of \ all knowledge, and the other exploded as a baseless hypothesis. \ Our discussion, at present, is limited to a single question, — to ! the truth or falsehood of consciousness in assuring us of the reality j t of a material world. In perception, consciousness gives, as an ultimate fact, a belief of the hioidedge of the existence of something different from self As ultimate, this behef cannot be reduced to a higher principle ; neither can it be truly analysed into a ARGUMENT FROM COMMON SENSE. 87 double element. We only believe that this something exists, bo- cause we believe that we knoiu (arc conscious of) this something as existing ; the belief of the existence is necessarily involved in the belief of the hiotoledge of the existence. Both arc original, or neither. Docs consciousness deceive us in the latter, it neces- sarily deludes us in the former ; and if the former, though a fact of consciousness, be false ; the latter, because a fact of conscious- ness, is not true. The beliefs contained in the two propositions : — V, I believe that a material world exists ; T , I believe that I immediately know a material ivorld existing, (in other words, I believe that the external reality itself is th« object of which I am conscious in perception) ; — though distinguished by philosophers, are thus virtually identical. The belief of an external world, was too powerful, not to com- pel an acquiescence in its truth. But the philosophers yielded to nature, only in so far as to coincide in the dominant result. They falsely discriminated the belief in the existence, from the belief in the knowledge. With a few exceptions, they held fast by the truth of the first ; but, on grounds to which it is not here necessary to advert, they concurred, with singular unanimity, in abjuring the second. The object of which we are conscious in perception, could only, they exphcitly avowed, be a representative image present to the mind ; — an image which, they implicitly confessed, we are necessitated to regard as identical with the unknown reality itself. Man, in short, upon the common doctrine of philosophy, was doomed by a perfidious nature to realize the fable of Nar- cissus ; he mistakes self for not-self, " corpus putat esse quod umbra est." To carry these principles to their issue was easy ; and scepti- cism in the hands of Hume was the result. The absolute veracity of consciousness was invalidated by the falsehood of one of its facts ; and the belief of the knowledge, assumed to be delusive, was even supposed in the belief of the existence, admitted to be true. The uncertainty of knowledge in general, and in particu- lar, the problematical existence of a material world, were thus legitimately established. — To confute this reduction on the con- ventional ground of the philosophers, Reid saw to be impossible ; and the argument which he opposed, was, in fact, immediately subversive of the dogmatic principle, and only mediately of the sceptical conclusion. This reasoning was of very ancient appli- 88 PHILOSOPHY OF PERCEPTION. cation, and had been even long familiarly known by the name of the argument from Common Seme. [See Diss., 742 — 803.] To argue from common sense is nothing more than to render available the presumption in favour of the original facts of con- sciousness, — that what is bi/ nature necessarili/ believed to be, j truly IS. Aristotle, in whose philosophy this presumption obtained the authority of a principle, thus enounces the argument : — " What appears to all, that we affirm to be ; and he who rejects this belief, will, assuredly, advance nothing better worthy of cre- dit." {Eth. Nic. L. X. c. 2.) As this argument rests entirely on a presumption ; the fundamental condition of its validity is, that this presumption be not disproved. The presumption in favour of the veracity of consciousness, as we have already shown, is redargued by the repugnance of the facts themselves, of which consciousness is the complement ; as the truth of all can only be vindicated on the truth of each. The argument from common sense, therefore postulates, and founds on the assumption — that OUR ORIGINAL BELIEFS BE NOT PROVED SELF-CONTRADICTORY. The harmony of our primary convictions being supposed, and not redargued, the argument from common sense is decisive against every deductive inference not in unison with them. For as every conclusion is involved in its j)remises, and as these again must ultimately be resolved into some original behef ; the conclu- sion, if inconsistent with the primary phaenomena of consciousness, must, ex hypothesi, be inconsistent with its premises, i. e. be logi- cally false. On tliis ground, our con^actions at first hand, peremp- torily derogate from our convictions at second. " If we know and beheve," says Aristotle, " through certain original principles, we must know and beheve these with paramount certainty, for the very reason that we know and believe all else through them;" and he elsewhere observes, that our approbation is often rather to be accorded to what is revealed by nature as actual, than to what can be demonstrated by philosophy as possible : — " ll^oakx.iii) ov "hil TrivTot roi; §/« tZv "koyuv^ oCKha. 7^ciKh»x,ig y.ci.'h'hov to7j (fluivofiivoig."* " Novimus certissima scientia, et clamante conscientia," (to apply the language of Augustine, in our acceptation,) is thus a proposi- * Jacobi (Werhe, II. Von: p. 11, ets.) following Fries, places Aiistotle at ^ _ the head of that absurd majority of philosophers, who attempt to demon- ' A strafe eveiy thing. This would not have been more suhlimehj false, had it ; I been said of the German Plato himself. | BROWN IMPOTENT AGAINST THE SCEPTIC. 89 tion, either absolutely true or absolutely false. The argument from common sense, if not omnipotent, is powerless : and in the hands of a philosopher by Avhora its postulate cannot be allowed, its em- nloymcnt, if not suicidal, is absurd.- — This condition of non-con- tradiction is unexpressed by Reid. It might seem to him too ovi- tlently included in the very conception of the argument to require .nouncement. Dr Brown has proved that he was wrong. Yet IJeid could liardly have anticipated, that his Avhole philosophy, in relation to the argument of common sense, and that argument itself, were so to be mistaken, as to be actually interpreted by contraries. — These principles established, we proceed to their appli- cation. Dr BroAvn's error, in regard to Reid's doctrine of perception, involves the other, touching the relation of that doctrine to Hume's :B " £Jssai/ on the Academical or Sceptical Philosophy,'" from which Dr Brown quotes. In that essay, pre- vious to the quotation, Hume shows, on the admission of philoso- phers, that our belief in the knowledge of material things, as im- possible isfcdse ; and on this admission, he had irresistibly esta- bUshed the speculative absurdity of our belief in the existence of an external world. In the passage, on the contrary, which Dr Brovfn particdly extracts, he is showing that this idealism, which' in theory must be admitted, is in application impossible. Specu-' lation and practice, nature and philosophy, sense and reason, be- lief and knowledge, thus placed in mutual antithesis, give, as their * [This is spoken too absolutely. Reid I think was coiTect in the aim ■ of his philosophy ; but in the execution of his pui-pose he is often at fault, , often confused, and sometimes even contradictory. I have endeavoured to point out and to con-ect these imperfections in the edition which I have not yet finished of his works.] BROWN IMPOTENT AGAINST THE SCEPTIC. 93 result, the uncertainty of every principle ; and the assertion of this uncertainty is — Scepticism. This result is declared even in the sentence, with the preliminary clause of Avhich, Dr Brown ibruptly terminates his quotation. But allowing Dr Brown to be correct in transmuting the scep- tical nihihst into a dogmatic reahst ; he would still be wrong (on the supposition that Hume admitted the truth of a belief to be convertible with its invincihiliti/) in conceiving, on the one hand, that Hume could ever acquiesce in the same inconsequent con- I'lusion with himself; or, on the other, that he himself could, without an abandonment of his system, acquiesce in the legitimate conclusion. On this supposition, Hume could only have arrived at a similar result with Reid ; there is no tenable medium between the natural realism of the one and the sceptical nihilism of the other. — " Do you follow," says Hume in the same essay, " the instincts and propensities of nature in assenting to the veracity of -cnse?" — I do, says Dr Brown. (Lect. xxviii. p. 176. alibi.) — • But these," continues Hume, " lead you to believe that the vert/ />erception or sensible image is the external object. Do you dis- '■laim this principle in order to embrace a more rational opinion, that the perceptions are only representations of something exter- nal?" — It is the vital principle of my system, says Brown, that the mind knows nothing beyond its own states (Lectt. passim) ; philosopliical suicide is not my choice ; I must recall my admis- sion, and give the lie to this natural belief., — " You here," pro- eeds Hume, " depart from your natural propensities and more -bvious sentiments; and yet are not able to satisfy your reason, which can never find any convincing argument from experience to prove, that the perceptions are connected with any external objects." — I allow, says Brown, that the existence of an external world cannot be proved by reasoning, and that the sceptical argu- ment admits of no logical reply. (Lect. xxviii. p. 175.) — " But" I we may suppose Hume to conclude) " as you truly maintain that the confutation of scepticism can be attempted only in two ways fibid.), — either by showing that its arguments are inconclusive, or l)y opposing to them, as paramount, the evidence of our natural Ijcliefs, — and as you now, voluntarily or by compulsion, abandon both; you are confessedly reduced to the dilemma, cither of acquiescing in the conclusion of the sceptic, or of refusing your assent upon no ground whatever. Pyrrhonism or absurdity ? — choose your horn." 11 94 PHILOSOPHY OF PERCEPTION. Were the scepticism into which Dr Brown's philosophy is thus analysed, confined to the negation of matter, the result would be comparatively unimportant. The transcendent reality of an outer world, considered absolutely, is to us a matter of supreme indifference. It is not the idealism itself that we must deplore ; but the mendacity of consciousness which it involves. Conscious- ness, once convicted of falsehood, an unconditional scepticism, in regard to the character of our intellectual being, is the melan-J choly, but only rational, result. Any conclusion may now witbi impunity be drawn against the hopes and dignity of human na- ture. Our Personality, our Immateriality, our Moral Liberty, have| no longer an argument for their defence. " Man is the dream oi! a shadow ; " God is the dream of that dream. Dr Brown, after the best philosophers, rests the proof of cm) personal identity, and of our mental individuality, on the grouoc! of beliefs, which, as " intuitive, universal, immediate, and irre-' sistible," he not unjustly regards as " the internal and never- ceasing voice of our Creator, — revelations from on high, omnipo tent [and veracious] as their author." To him this argument is. however incompetent, as contradictory. What we know of self or person, we know, only as given irj consciousness. In our perceptive consciousness there is revealecj as an ultimate fact a self and a not-self; each given as indepen' dent — each known only in antithesis to the other. No belief v. more "intuitive, universal, immediate, or irresistible," than tba. this antithesis is real and known to be real ; no belief therefore i;; more true. If the antithesis be illusive, self and not-self, subjecl 1) and object, /and Thou are distinctions without a difference; ami consciousness, so far from being " the internal voice of our Creaj tor," is shown to be, like Satan, " a liar from the beginning.'' The reality of this antithesis in different part^ of his philosophy D:; Brown affirms and denies. — In establishing his theory of percepi tion, he articulately denies, that mind is conscious of aught beyon(* itself; virtually asserts, that what is there given in consciousnes' as not-self, is only a phsenomenal illusion, — a modification of seli which our consciouness determines us to believe the quality c something numerically and substantially different. Like Narcis; sus again, he must lament, — j " Ille ego sum sensi, sed me mea fallit imagoy \ After this implication in one part of his system that our belie BROWN IMPOTENT AGAINST THE SCEPTIC. 05 in the distinction of self and not-self is nothing more than the deception of a lying consciousness ; it is startling to find him, in others, appealing to the beliefs of this same consciousness as to " revelations from on high ; " — nay, in an especial manner alleg- j ing "as the voice of our Creator," this very faith in the dis- tinction of self and not-self, through the fallacy of which, and of which alone, he had elsewhere argued consciousness of false- hood. On the veracity of this mendacious belief, Dr Brown establishes his proof of our personal identity. (Lect. xii. — xv.) Touching the object of perception, when its evidence is inconvenient, this helief is quietly passed over as incompetent to distinguish not-self from self; in the question regarding our personal identity, where its testimony is convenient, it is clamorously cited as an inspired witness, exclusively competent to distinguish self from not-self. Yet, why, if, in the one case, it mistook self for not-self, it may not, in the other, mistake not-self for self, would appear a problem not of the easiest solution. The same belief, with the same inconsistency, is again called in to prove the individuality of mind. (Lect. xcvi.) But if we iv,. are fallaciously determined, in perception, to believe what is sup- fff,; .posed indivisible, identical, and one, to be plural and different jki jand incompatible, (self = self 4- not-self) ; how, on the authority iplifj I of the same treacherous conviction, dare we maintain, that the ,j.i \pJicenomencd nnity of consciousness affords a guarantee of the real Simplicity of the thinking principle ? The materialist may now rontcnd, without fear of contradiction, that selfis, only an illusive I'licenomenon ; that our consecutive identity is that of the Delphic ^hip, and our present unity merely that of a system of co-ordinate jjjjjj, .activities. To explain the phoenomenon, he has only to suppose, xj, I as certain theorists have lately done, an organ to tell the lie of our personality ; and to quote as authority for the lie itself, the perfidy of consciousness, on which the theory of a representative perception is founded. On the hypothesis of a representative perception, there is, in vj^ I fact, no salvation from materialism, on the one side, short of ^'^ j idealism — scepticism — nihilism, on the other. Our knowledge of mind and matter, as substances, is merely relative ; they are I known to us only in their qualities ; and we can justify the postu- g I lation of two different substances, exclusively on the supposition of 96 PHILOSOPHY OF PERCEPTION. the incompatibility of the double series of phsenomena to coinhere in one. Is this supposition disproved ? — the presumption against dualism is again decisive. " Entities are not to he multiplied with- out necessity;'' — "A plurality of principles is not to be assimied luhere the phcenomena can be explained by one.'' In Brown's theory of per-i ception, he abolishes the incompatibility of the two series ; and yet his argument, as a dualist, for an immaterial principle of thought, proceeds on the ground, that this incompatibility subsists. (Lect. xcvi. pp. 646, 647.) This philosopher denies us an immediate: knowledge of aught beyond the accidents of mind. The accidentsi which we refer to body, as known to us, are only states or modi- fications of the percipient subject itself; in other words, the qua- lities we call material, are known by us to exist, only as they are known by us to inhere in the same substance as the qualities we de-i nominate mental. There is an apparent antithesis, but a real identity. On this doctrine, the hypothesis of a double principle losing its necessity, becomes philosophically absurd ; and on the law of parsimony, a psychological unitarianism, at best, is esta- blished. To the argument, that the qualities of the object are so repugnant to the qualities of the subject of perception, that they cannot be supposed the accidents of the same substance ; the uni- tarian — whether materialist, idealist, or absolutist — has only to! reply : that so far from the attributes of the object, being exclu- sive of the attributes of the subject, in this act ; the hypothetical dualist himself establishes, as the fundamental axiom of his philo-l sophy of mind, that the object known is universally identical tvithl the subject hloiving. The materialist may now derive the subject' from the object, the idealist derive the object from the subject, the absolutist sublimate both into indifference, nay, the nihihst subvert the substantial reality of either ; — the hypothetical realist so far from being able to resist . the conclusion of any, in fact accords their assumptive premises to all. The same contradiction would, in like manner, invalidate every presumption in favour of our Liberty of Will. But as Di Brown throughout his scheme of Ethics advances no argument in support of this condition of our moral being, which his philosophy otherwise tends to render impossible, we shall say nothing of this consequence of hypothetical realism. So much for the system, which its author fondly imagines " allows to the sceptic no resting-place for his foot, — no fidcrun BROWN IMPOTENT AGAINST THE SCEPTIC. 97 for the instrument he uses:" so iiiucli for the doctrine which Brown would substitute for Reid's ; — nay, which he even supposes Reid himself to have maintained. " Scilicet, hoc totum falsa ratione UECErxcM est ! "* * [In this criticism I have spoken onh' of Dr Brown's mistakes, and of these, only with reference to his attack on Reid. On his appropriating to himself the observations of others, and in particular those of Destutt Tracy, I have said nothing, though an enumeration of these would be necessary to place Brown upon his proper level. That, however, would require a sepa- rate discussion.] III.-JOHNSON'S TRANSLATION OF TENNEMANN'S MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY. (October, 1832.) A Manual of the History of Philosophy ; translated from the German of Tennemann. By the Eev. Arthur Johnson, MA., late Fellow of Wadham College. 8vo. Oxford : 1832. We took up this translation with a certain favourable prepos- session, and felt inclined to have said all we conscientiously could in its behalf ; but alas ! never were expectations more completely disappointed, and we find ourselves constrained exclusively to condemn, where we should gladly have been permitted only to applaud. We were disposed to regard an English version of Tenne- mann's minor History of Philosophy — his " Grundriss,'' as a work of no inconsiderable utility — if competently executed : but in the present state of philosophical learning in this country wejHil were well aware, that few were adequate to the task, and of those mi few we hardly expected that any one would be found so disinte-Bi rested, as to devote himself to a labour, of which the credit JB a stood almost in an inverse proportion to the trouble. Few Mi works, indeed, would prove more difficult to a translator. ABi complete mastery of the two languages, in a philological sense, was not enough. There was required a comprehensive acquaint- ance with philosophy in general, and, in particular, an intimate knowledge of the philosophy of Kant. Tennemann was a Kan- tian ; he estimates all opinions by a Kantian standard ; and the language which he employs is significant only as understood pre- cisely in a Kantian application. In stating this, we have no inten- tion of disparaging the intrinsic value of the work, which, in truth, with all its defects, we highly esteem as the production of THNXKMANN'S -MANlIAl, OF THE HISTORY OF PlllLoSol'II V. iMj ;i sober, accurate, and learned mind. Every liistorian of j)hilo- sophy must have his system, by reference to wliicli he criticises the opinions of other thinkers. , Eclecticism, as opposed to syste- matic philosophy, is without a meaning. For either tlic choice of doctrines must be determined by some principle, and that prin- ciple then constitutes a system ; or the doctrines must be arbitra- rily assumed, -which would bo the negation of philosophy alto- gether. (We think therefore, that M. Cousin, in denominating his scheme distinctively the eclectic, has committed an act of injustice on himself.) But as it was necessary that Tennemann should be of some school, — should have certain opinions, — we think it any thing but a disadvantage that he was of the Kantian. The Cri- tical Philosophy is a comprehensive and liberal doctrine ; and wliatevcr diftcrcnce ma}' subsist with regard to its positive con- clusions, it is admitted, on all hands, to constitute, by its negative, a great epoch in the history of thought. An acquaintance with a system so remarkable in itself, and in its influence so decisive of the character of subsequent speculation, is i^ow a matter of neces- sity to all who would be supposed to have crossed the threshold of philosophy. The translation of a work of merit hke the pre- sent, ought not therefore to be less acceptable to the English i-eader, because written in the spirit and language of the Kantian system ; — provided, he be enabled by the translator to understand it. But wdiat does this imply ? Not merely that certain terms in the German should be rendered by certain terms in the Eng- lish ; for t'ew philosophical words are to be found in the latter, which suggest the same analyses and combinations of thought as those embodied in the technical vocabulary of the former. The language of German philosophy has sometimes three or four rxpressions, precisely distinguishing certain generahzations or iljstractions ; where we possess only a single word, comprehensive if the whole, or, perhaps, several, each vaguely applicable to all r any. In these circumstances a direct translation was impos- -iljle. The translator could only succeed by coming to a specitic understanding with his reader. He behoved, in the first place, iloarly to determine the value of the principal terms to be ren- '•■rcd ; wliich could only bo accomplished through a sufficient 'xposition of that philosophy whose pecidiar analyses these terms adequately expressed. In the second place, it was incumbent on him to show in what respects the approximating English term was not exactly equivalent to the original ; ai.d precisely to define 100 JOHNSON'S TRANSLATION OF TENNEMANN'S the amplified or restricted sense, in which, by accommodation to the latter, the former was in his translation specially to be under- stood. At the same time it must be remembered, that the Grundriss of Tennemann was not intended by its author for an independent treatise. It is merely a mammal or text-hook ; that is, an outline of statements to be filled np, and fully illustrated in lectures ; — a text-book also for the use of students, who, from their country and course of education, were already more or less famihar with the philosophy of the German schools. In translating tliis work as a system intended to be complete per se, and in favour of a public unlearned in philosophical discussion, and utterly ignorant of German metaphysics, a competent translator would thus have found it necessary, in almost every paragraph, to supply, to amplify, and to explain. M. Cousin, indeed, when he condescen- ded to translate this work, (we speak only from recollection and a rapid glance,) limited himself to a mere translation. But by him the treatise was intended to be only subordinate to the history of speculation delivered in his lectures ; and was address- ed, among his countrymen, to a numerous class of readers, whose study of philosophy, and of German philosophy, he had himself powerfully contributed to excite. The fact, indeed, of a French ; translation by so able an interpreter, was of itself suflacient to ; render a simple version of the work into another European tongue nearly superfluous; and we were prepared to expect, that, if translated into English, something more would be attempted, than what had been already so Avell executed in a language with which every student of philosophy is familiar. It was, therefore, with considerable interest, that we read the' announcement of an English translation, by a gentleman distin- guished for learning among the Tutors of Oxford ; whose compa-! rative merit, indeed, had raised him to several of the most; honourable and important ofiices in the nomination of the two; " Venerable Houses." Independently of its utility, we hailed thej publication as a symptom of the revival, in England, of a taste fori philosophical speculation ; and this more especially, as it emanated! from that University in which, (since its legal constitution had; been subverted, and all the subjects taught reduced to the capa-' city of one self-elected teacher,) Psychology and Metaphysics, as' beyond the average comprehension of the College Fellows, haci remained not only untaught, but their study discouraged, if no MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF PHILOSolMIY. Kil formally proscribed. A glance at Mr Johnson's preface contirnied us in onr prepossessions. Wo were there, indirectly, indeed, but confidently, assured of his intimate acquaintance with pliilosophy in general, and German philosophy in particular ; nor were we allowed to remain ignorant of the translator's consciousness that he might easily have become the rival of his author. " As far," he says, " as it appeared possible, I have preserved the technical expressions of my author, subjoining for the most part an expla- nation of their meaning, for the benefit of those Eno-hsh readers who may not have plunged into the profound abyss of German metaphy- sics; " — the expositor himself having of course so plunged. " When- ever," he adds, " it has appeared to mo that an observation of my author was of a nature impossible to be apprehended by any but a scholar long familiar with the disputes of the German lecture- rooms, I have endeavoured to express the sense of it in other words;" — necessarily implying that the interpreter himself was thus familiar. And again : — " There are parts of Tennemann, which on this account I had much rather have composed anew than translated, particularly the Introduction." The examination of a few paragraphs of the work, however, proved the folly of our expectations. We found it to be a bare translation ; and one concenti-ating every possible defect. We discovered, in the Jirst place, that the translator was but superfi- cially versed in the German language ; — in the second, that he was wholly ignorant even of the first letter in the alphabet of German I'hilosophy ; — in the third, that he was almost equally unac- ([uainted with every other philosophy, ancient and modern ; — in t\\o fourth, that he covertly changes every statement of his author ^vhich he may not like ; — in the_^/i, that he silently suppresses very section, sentence, clause, word he is suspicious of not under- standing ; — and in the sixth, that he reviles, without charity, the uj i philosophy and philosophers he is wholly incapable of apjn-ccia- ting. — Instead of being of the smallest assistance to the student of philosophy, the work is only calculated to impede his progress, if not at once to turn him from the pursuit. From beginning to end, all is vague or confused, unintelligible or erroneous. We do not mean to insinuate that it was so intended, (albeit the thouglit certainly did strike us,) but, in point of fact, this translation is admi- rably calculated to turn all metaphysical speculation into con- tempt. From the character of the work, from the celebrity of its author and of its French translator, and even from the 102 JOHNSON'S TRANSLATION OF TENNEMANN'S academical eminence of Mr Johnson himself, his version would f be probably one of the first books resorted to by the English student, for information concerning the nature and progress of philosophical opinions. But in proportion as the inquirer were capable of thinking, would philosophy, as here delineated, appear to liim incomprehensible ; and in proportion as he respected his source of information, would he either despair of his own capacity for the study, or be disgusted with the study itself. It is, indeed, by reason of the serious injury which this translation might occa- sion to the cause of philosophy in this country, that we find it imperative on us, by annihilating its authority, to deprive it of the power to hurt. But let us be equitable to the author while executing justice on his work, This translation is by no means to be taken as a test of the general talent or accomplishment of the translator. He has certainly been imprudent, in venturing on an undertaking, for which he was qualified, neither by his studies, nor by the character of his mind. That he should ever conceive himself so qualified, furnishes only another proof of the present abject state of philosophical erudition in this country ; for it is less to be ascribed to any overweening presumption in his powers, than td the lamentable lowness of the standard by which he rated their sufliciency. What Mr Johnson has executed ill, there arc prob- ably not six individuals in the British empire avIio could perform well. — But to the proof of our assertions. That Mr Johnson, though a quondam Professor of ancieni Saxon, is still an under-graduate in modern German, will, with- out special proof, bo suflliciently apparent in the course of oui criticism. Of his ignorance of the Kantian philosophi/, in the language o:j which the work of Tennemann is written, every page of th< translation bears an)ple witness. The peculiarities of this lanl guage arc not explained ; nay, the most important sections of tb original, from which, by a sagacious reader, these might hav been partially divined, are silently omitted, or professedly sup pressed as unintelligible. (E. g. § 41.) Terms in the origina correlative and opposed, are, not only not translated by term also correlative and opposed, but confounded under the sam expression, and, if not rendered at random, translated by the rul of contraries. To take, for example, the mental operations anj their objects : Tn a few pages we have examined, we find amonj MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY. Ki.! other errors, Verniin/t (lleason), though strictly used in its proper -jonitioation as opposed to Verstaiui, rendered sometimes by • Reason," but more frequently by " Understanding" or "In- tellect ; " and Verstand (Understanding), in like manner, speci- ally used in opposition to Vernunft, translated inditterently by • Understanding " or " Reason," * Vorstellunourcc : " Idealism is used to denote the theory which asserts the I'eality of our ideas, | and from these argues the reality of exter- * By the time he is half through the work, our translator seems to have iH'corae aware that the Kantians " make a broad distinctiou between tlie I iKJcrstandin;,' and Reason." The discovery, however, had no beneficial ttt'ect on his translation. t It will be seen tliat we do not on)ploy Conception in tlie meaning attached to it by Mr Stewart. t The stoutest sceptic never doubted that we are really conscious of what we are con.scious, — he never doubted the subjective reality of our ideas : the doubt would annihilate itself. 104 JOHNSON'S TRANSLATION OF TENNEMANN'S nal objects.* Pantheism is the opinion that all nature partakes of the divine essence." | — To this head we may refer the author's continual translation of Philosoplde by " Moral Philosophy," which he tells us is convertible with Metaphysics in general ; his use of the word " Experimentahsra " for Empirism, Philosophy of Experience or of Observation ; to say nothing of the incorrect- ' ness and vacillation of his Avhole technical language criticised by any standard. — Under this category may be also mentioned the numerous and flagrant errors in philosophical history. For ex- ample, Joseph Priestley {als Physiker heruehmte) is called " the celebrated Physician;" and Ancillon {pere), thus distinguished from his son, the present Prussian prime minister, himself a dis- tinguished philosopher, is converted from a Calvinist pastor, to a Catholic priest — " Father Ancillon." But lest we should be supposed to have selected these defects, Ave shall vindicate the rigid accuracy of our strictures by a few extracts. We annex to each paragraph a literal translation, not such, assuredly, as we should off'er, were we to attempt a com- plete version of the original, but such as may best enable the English reader to compare Mr Johnson and Tennemann together. We find it convenient to make our observations in the form of liotes : in these we pass over much that is imperfect, and can notice only a few of the principal mistakes. We cannot, of course, hope to be fully understood except by those who have some acquaintance with Germah philosophy. — We shall first quote paragraphs from the Introduction. Jofwsoris Versio7i, § 1. — " A history of philosophy, to be coraplete,t de- mands a preliminary enquiry respecting the character of this science, as well as respecting its subject-matter, || its form and object ; ^ and also its extent * We had always imagined the proving the roality of external objects to be the negation of Idealism — Realism. t Pantheism, however, is the veiy denial of such participation ; it asserts that " all nature" and the " divine essence" are not two, one partaking of tlio other, but one and the same. t " Complete," inaccurate ; original, Zweckmaessir/e. II "Subject-matter;" origiual, Inhalt, i. e. contents, the complement of objects. Subject or Subject-matter is the materia subjecta or in qua ; and if employed for the object, materia ofjjecta or rirca quam, is always an abuse of philosophical language, though with us unfortunately a very common one. But to commute these terms in the translation of a Kantian Treatise, where subject and object, sul)jective and objective, are accurately conti-adistinguished, and where the distinction forms, in fact, the very cardinal point on which the whole philosophy turns, is to convert light into darkness, order into chaos. 1 "Object;" original, Zirerh, end, aim. scope. The unphilosophical MANUAL OK THE HISTORY OF PinLOSOPHV. lo.-, or comprebcnsiveuess, its mctliod, its importance, and the difteront ways in which it may be treated. All these particulars, with the bibliography be- longing to it, will form, together with some previous observations on the progress of philosophical research,* the subject of a general introduc- tion." Literal Translation, § 1. — " The history of philosophy, if liaiidled in con- formity to the end in vicAv, presupposes an inquiry toncliing the conception of the science, conjoining a view of its contents, form, and end, as also of its compass, method, importance, and the various modes in which it may be treated. These objects, along with the history and literature of the history of philosophy, combined with some preparatory observations on tlie progress of the philosophizing reason, afford the contents of a general introduction to the history of philosophy." Johnson's Version, § 2. — " The human mind has a tendency to attenijit to enlarge the bounds of its knowledge, and gradually to aspire to a clear development of the laws and relations of nature, and of its own operations f At first it does nothing more than obey a blind desire, Avithout accounting to Itself sufficiently for this instinctive impulse of the understanding,^ and ■without knowing the appropriate means to be employed, or the distance by which it is removed fi'om its object. Insensibly this impulse becomes more deliberate, and regulates itself in proportion to the progress of the under- standing, II which gradually becomes better acquainted with itself. Such a deliberate impulse is what we call philosophy. 1 abuse of the term object for end is a comparatively recent innovation in the English and French languages. Culpable at all times, on the present occa- -i.iu it is e(iually inexcusable as the preceding. * ■' Philosophic research." The translation is a vague and unmeaning \ trsiou of a precise and significant original — pliilosophirende Vernunft. (See §2.) t This sentence is mangled and wholly misunderstowl. " The end of ]iliilosophy," says Trismegistus, '' is the intuition of unity ; " and to this ten- dency of speculation towards the absolute — to the intensive completion in iiiity, and not to the extensive enlargement to infinity, of our knowledge, iImi's Tennemann refer. The latter is not pliilosophy in his view at all. In the translation, Vernunft (Reason), the faculty of the absolute in Kant's -\stem, and here used strictly in that sense, is diluted into " Mind ;" and iIm- four grand Categories are omitted, according to which reason endeavours tu carry up the knowledge furnished througli the senses and understanding, into the unconditioned. X "Understanding;'" just the reverse — "Keason;" original, Vernunft. I lie author and his translator are in these terms, always at cross-puiposes. • Instinctive impulse of the understanding" is also wrong in itself, and «\rong as a translation. The whole sentence, indeed, as will be seen from I'iu- version, is one tissue of error. II " Understanding ; " the same error ; "Reason." The whole sentence is ill rendered. % " Philosophy ;" das Philosopfnren, not philosophy vaguely, but precisely, lOG JOFINSON'S TRANSLATION OF TENNEMANN'S Literal Translation, § 2.—" Man, through the teudeucy of his Reason (Vernimft), strives after a systematic completion (VoUeudung) of his know- ledge considered in Quantity, Quality, Relation and Modality, and conse- quently endeavours to raise himself to a science of the ultimate principles and laws of Nature and Libert!/, and of their mutual relations. To this he is at first impelled by the blind feeling of a want ; he forms no adequate appre- ciation of the problem thus proposed by reason ; and knows not by what way, through what means, or to what extent, the end is to be attained. By degrees his eftbrts become more reflective, and this in proportion to the gra- dual development of the self- consciousness of reason. This reflective eftbrt we denominate the act of philosophizing." Johnson's Version, § 3. — " Thereupon arise various attempts to appro xi mate this mental object of the understanding,* attempts more or less differ ing in respect of their principles, their methods, their consequences,! theli* extent, and, in general, their peculiar objects. In all these attempts, (which take the name of Philosophic Si/stems, when they present themselves in scientific form, and the value of which is proportionate to the degree of intelligence manifested by each particular philosopher,) we trace the gra- dual development of the human understanding,^ according to its pecidiar la>vs." Literal Translation, § 3. — " Out of this efi"ort arise the various attempts oi thinkers to approximate to this Idea of reason, or to realize it in thought attempts more or less difi'ering from each other in principle, in method, in logical consequence, in result, and in the comprehension and general cha- racter of then" objects. In these attempts (which, when they present them- selves in a form scientifically complete, are denominated philosophic sijstetns. and possess a value, varying in proportion to the pitch of intellectual culti- vation, and to the point of view of the several speculators) the thinking rea- son developes itself in conformity to its peculiar laws." Johnson's Version, § 4. — " But the development of human reason is itsel subject to external conditions, and is sometimes seconded, sometimes retarded, or suspended, according to the different impressions it receive from without." II IJteral Translation, § -4. — " But the development of human reason doe? not take place Avithout external excitement ; it is consequently dependent upon external causes, in as much as its activity through the ditferen' direction given it from without, is now promoted in its eftbrts, now checket and held back." Jolmson's Version, § 5. — "To give an account of the diflerent works pro philosophic act — philosophizing. — Streben here, and before, is also absurdl; translated "impulse;" a " deliberate impulse ! " a round square ! * " Object of the Understanding;" the opposite again; original. Idee de Vernunft. t " Consequences ; " wrong ; Consequenz. X " Understanding," usual blunder for Reason, and twice in this §. It i so frequent in the sequel, that Ave cannot afi'ord to notice it again. Thj whole paragraph is in other respects mutilated, and inaccurately rendered. II wrangled and incorrect. MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY. I07 duccd by the uiulerstaiuliug, thus in the progress of improvement, and "'"'^favoured or impeded by external circumstances, is, in fact, to compose a his- ry of ijliilosophy."* Literal Translation, § 5. — " An account of tlie manifold ettorts made to "Vealize that Idea of reason (§ 2) in Matter and Form, (in other words, to luiiig philoso])hy as a science to bear,) etibrts arising from the development "f reason, and promoted or held in check by external causes- -constitutes, in tact, the History of Philosophy." Jolmson's Version, § 6. — " The subject-matter f of the history of pliilo- -"jiliy, is bdth external and internal. The internal or immediate embraces, 1 . The etforts continually made by the understanding to attain to a percep- lion of the first principles of the great objects of its pursuit, (§ 2,) with iiKuiy incidental details relating to the subject of investigation, the degree of ardour or remissness which from time to time have prevailed ; with the iiiriuonce of external causes to interest men in such pursuits, or the absence uf them. X 2. The etfects of philosophy, or the views, methods, and systems it has originated ; effects varying with the energies out of Avhich they sprang. In these we see the understanding avail itself of materials perpetually accu- tiiJI mulating towards constituting philosophy a science, or rules and principles for collecting materials to form a scientific whole ; or finally, maxims relat- ing to the method to be pursued in such researches. || 3. And lastly: We observe the development of the understanding as an instrument of philosophy, that is to say, the progress of the understanding towards researches in Avhich it depends solely on itself; in other words, its gradual progress towards the highest degree of independence ; a progress which may be observed in indi- viduals, in nations, and in the whole race of man."Tf Literal Translation, § 6. — " The matter about which the history of philo- sophy is conversant, is consequently both internal and external The internal or proximate matter, comprehends, in the first place, the continued applica- tion of reason to the investigation of the ultimate principles and laws of Na- ture and Liberty ; for therein consists the act of jjhilosophising (§ 2). And here arc to be observed gi-eat diflTerences in regard to subject and object — to the extensive application and intensive force of the philosophising energy — to internal aims and motives (whether generous or interested) — as likewise to external causes and occasions. It comprehends, secondly, the products ffertil of the pliilosopliising act, in other words, pliilosopltic views, methods, and sys- iniis, (§ 3,) which are as manifold as the efforts out of which they spring. Through these reason partly obtains materials becoming gradually purer, for pliilosophy as science, partly rules and princii)les by which to bind up these materials into a scientific whole, partly, in fine, maxims for our procedure . in the search after philosophy. Thirtlly, it comprehends the development of *i * Mangled and incon-ect. t " Subject-matter ; " Stoff, matter, or object- matter : see note on § 1. t The whole sentence execrable in all respects ; we cannot criticise it in detail. II In this sentence there are nine errors, besides imperfections. f In this sentence, what is siiffered to remain is worse treated than what i- tlirown nut. 108 JOHNSON'S TRANSLATION OF TENNEMANX'S reason, as the instrument of philosophy, i e. the cxcit.ation of reason to spontaneous inquiry, in conformity to determined laws through internal in- clination, and external occasion, and herein the gradual progress manifested by individuals, n-itions, and the thinking portion of mankind. This there- fore constitutes an important anthropological phasis of the history of philo sophy." Johnson's Version, § 7. — " The external matter consists in the causes, events, and circumstances which have influenced the development of philo- sophic reason, and the nature of its productions. To this order of facts belong : 1. The individual history of philosophers, that is to say, the degr the proportion, and the direction of their intellectual powers ; the sphere of their studies and their lives, the interests which swayed them, and even their moral characters.* 2. The influence of external causes, that is to say, character and the degree of mental cultivation prevalent in the countries to which they belonged ; the prevailing spiiit of the times ; and, to descend still farther, the climate and properties of the country ; its institutions, reli giou and language. f 3. The influence of individuals in consequence of the admiration and imitation they have excited, by their doctrines or example; an influence which betrays itself in the matter as Avell as in the manner of their schools." J (Bacon, Locke, Leibnitz.) Literal Translation, § 7. — " The external matter consists in those causes, events, and circumstances, which have exerted an influence on the develop- ment of the philosophising reason, and the complexion of its productions. To this head belong, in the first place, the individual genius of the philo- sopher, i. e. the degree, the mutual relation, and the direction of his intellec- tual faculties, dependent thereon his sphere of view and operation, and the interest with which it inspires him, and M'ithal even his moral character. In the second place, the influence of external causes on individual genius, such as the character and state of cultivation of the nation, the dominant spirit of the age, and less proximately the climate and natural qualities of the country, education, political constitution, religion, and language. In the third place, tlic efi'ect of individual genius itself (through admiration and imitation, pre- cept and example) on the interest, the direction, the particular objects, the kind and method of the subsequent speculation — an influence variously modi- fied in conformity to intellectual character, to the consideration and celebrity of schools established, to writings, their form and their contents." (Bacon, Locke, Leibnitz.) Johnson's Version, § 9. — " History in general is distinguished, when pro perly so called, from Annals, Memoirs, &c., by its form : i. e. by the com' bination of its incidents, and their circumstantial development." || * In this sentence there are four inaccuracies. t In this sentence there are two omissions, one essential to the meaning, and one inaccuracy. t Compare the literal version ! II " Circumstantial development ; pragimttische Ihirste.llung. No word occurs more frequently in the historical and philosophical literature of Ger- many and Holland, than pragmatisch, or pragmaticus, and Pragmatismus. So far from pragmatisch being tantamount to " circumstantial," and opposed (see MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF PHILOSOFHV. Klf) Literal Traiit>ktt!vn, § 9. — " Histoiy, lu the stricter signification, is distin- iiislied by reference to its /ci/vw, from mere annals, memoirs, &c., tbrough till' concatenation of events, and their scientific exposition,'" [/'. e. nnder the relation of causes and effects.] Passing now to the body of the book : — we shall first take a paragraph from the account of Aristotle's philosophy, in which an Oxford Tutor and Examining Master may be supposed at home. With the exception, however, of four popular treatises, we sus- 'f?tII V. in Literal Trannhition, § 145. — " rsvoholopy is iiitk'btod to Aristotlo for ii> first, though still imperfect, scientific treatment upon tiie jiriuciples of exjje- rience, although with these he has likewise combined sundry speculative views. The soul is the efficient principle of life (life taken in its most exten- sive signification) — the primitive form of every physical body susceptible of animation, /. e. of one organically constituted His re- marks are especially interesting on the manifestation of our cognitive encr- ^es, /. e. on the Senses, — on the Common Sense, the first approach to a clear indication of Consciousness, (die erste deutlichere Andeutung des Bewusst- geyns)— on Imagination, Reminiscence, and Memory. The Perceptive and ■^•H^ Imaginative act (Anschauen) is an apprehension of the forms of objects; and Thought, again, an apprehension of the forms of those forms which se and Imagination presuppose. Hence a passive and an active hiteUect or rndcrstanditig. To the latter belongs indestructibility (immortality without consciousness and recollection.^ Thought is, indeed, a faculty dis- tinct from the corporeal powers, infused into man fi'om Avithout, and analo- gous to the element of the stars Pleasure is the result of the perfect exertion of a power ; — an exertion by which again the power it- -elf is perfected. The noblest pleasures originate in Reason. Practical lleason. Will, is, according to Aristotle, and on empirical principles, deter- mined by notions [of the Understanding], without a higher ideal principle [of Reason properly so called.] " We conclude our extracts by a quotation from the chapter on Kant. Jo/insoiis Version, § ,373. — " His (Kant's) attention being awakened by the Scepticism of Hume, he was led to remark the very different degree of cer- tainty belonging to the deductions of Moral Philosophy,* and the conclusions "f ^Mathematics ; and to speculate upon the causes of this difference. Meta- physics, of course, claimed his regard ; but he Avas led to believe, that as yet the very threshold of the science had not been passed. An examination of rlie different philosophical systems, and particularly of the jejune Dogmatism of Wolf, led him to question whether, antecedently to any attempt at Dog- matic philosophy, it might not be necessary to investigate the jjossibilitij of I'liilosophical knowledge, and he concluded that to this end an inquiry into the different sources of information,! and a critical examination of their 'inn of a power" is here intended to denote, both subjectively the full and ce play of the faculty in opposition to its languid exercise or its too intense excitement, and objectively, the presence of all conditions, with the absence of all impediments, to its highest spontaneous energy. Aristotle's doctrine [of Pleasure, though never yet duly appreciated, is one of the most imi)ortant Igeneralizations in his whole philosophy. The end of the section is otherwise much mutilated. * " Moral Philosophy ; " Philosophie. Thrice in this §. t " Infonnation ; " Erkenntnisse. The version is incoirect ; even Know- ledge does not adequately express the original, both because it is not also (plural, and because it is of a less emphatically subjective signification. Coc/- m'tions would be the best translation, could we venture also on the verb xifinize as a version of Erkennen. V12 JOHNSON'S TRANSLATION OF TENNEMANN'S origin and employment, were necessary ; in which respect he proposed to complete the task undertaken by Locke. He laid down, in the tirst place, that Moral Philosophy and Mathematics are, iu their origin, hitellectual ^ sciences.* Intellectual knowledge is distinguished from experimental by its qualities of necessity and universality. On the possibility of intellectual know- ledge depends that of the philosophical sciences.f These are either synthetic or analytic ; the latter of which methods is dependent on the first. J What then is the principle of synthetical a priori knowledge in contradistinction to experimental ; which is founded on observation ? The existence of a priori knowledge is deducible from the mathematics, as well as from the testimony of common sense ; || and it is with such knowledge that metaphysics are chiefly conversant. A science, therefore, which may investigate with strict- ness the possibility of such knowledge, and the principles of its employment and application, is necessary for the dii-ection of the human mind, and of the highest practical utility. Kant pm-sued this course of inquiry, tracing a broad line of distinction between the provinces of Moral Philosophy and the Mathematics, and investigating more completely than had yet been done, the faculty of knowledge. 1 He remarked that synthetical a priori knowledge) imparts a formal character to knowledge iu general, and can only be grounded in laws aflfecting the Individual, and in the consciousness which he has of the harmony and unison of his faculties.** lie then proceeds to analyse the p * " Intellectual sciences ;" rationale oder Vernunft-Wissenchaften. Intd- lectus or Intellekt is, in the language of German philosophers, synonymous with Verstand, Understanding. The translator therefore here renders, as ht usually does, one term of the antithesis by the other. The same capital error is repeated in the two following sentences. t " Philosophical sciences ; " — philosophische Erkenntisse, philosophic know ledges or cognitions. This and the follov.ing errors would have been avoidei by an acquaintance Avith the first elements of the critical philosophy. X " The latter of which methods is dependent on the first." These fev words contain two great mistakes. In the first iilace. there is no refereno in the original to any S3'nthetic and analytic methods., but to Kant's thine celebrated distinction of synthetic and awaXyXio, cognitions or judgments, a dis tinction fi-om which the critical philosophy departs. In the second, there i nothing to excuse the error that analytic cognitions are founded on synthetic Analytic cognitions are said bj' Tennemann to rest on the pi-imary law ( thought, /. e. on the principle of contradiction. (See Critik d. r. V. p. 18i ets.) — The present is an example of the absm-dity of translating this wor without an explanatory amplification. The distinction of analytic and syt, thetic judgments is to the common reader wholh' unintelligible from thecori text. II " Common sense." Kant was not the philosoiiher to appeal to commc sense Die gemeine Erkenntniss is common knowledge, in opposition ii mathematical. (See Crit. d. r. V. Einl. § 5.) ^ This sentence is inaccurately rendered, and not duly connected with tl next. ** This sentence is incomprehensible to aU ; but its absurdity can be dul appreciated only by those Avho know something of the Kantian philosophyi! MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY. n.-? ticulars of our knowledge, and discriminates between its elementary parts so often confounded in practice, with a view to ascertain the true nature of each species : the characteristics of necessity and universality which behuig to n priori knowledge being his leading principles."* Literal Translation^ % SSL — "Awakened by the scepticism of Hume, Kant directed his attention on the striking ditference in the result of meditation in Mathematics and in Philosophy, and upon the causes of this difference. Metaphysic justly attracted his consideration, but he was convinced that its tlireshold had yet been hardly touched. Reflection, and a scrutiny of the various philosophical systems, especially of the shallow dogmatism of the Wolfian school, suggested to him the thought, that, previous to all dogmatical procedure in philosophy, it was necessary, first to investigate the jwssibility of a philosophical hnoivledge ; and that to this end, an inquiry into the different sources of our knowledge, — into its origin, — and its emploj^ment, (in other words. Criticism.) was necessary. Thus did he propose to accomplish the work which had been commenced by Locke. Philosophy and mathe- matics, he presupposed to be, in respect of their origin, rational sciences, or sciences of reason. Rational knowledge is distinguished li-om empirical by its character of necessity and universality. With its possibility stands or falls the possibility of philosophical knowledge, which is of two kinds — synthetic aud analytic. The latter rests on the fundamental law of thought ; but ichat is the principle of synthetic knoidedye a priori^ as contrasted with empirical, of which perception is the source? That such knowledge exists, is guaranteed by the truth of mathematical, aud even of common knowledge, and the effort nf reason in metaphysic is mainly directed to its realization. There is there- fore a science of the highest necessity and importance, which investigates, on principles, the possibility, the foundation, and the employment of such knowledge. Kant opened to himself the way to this inquiiy, by taking a -trict line of demarkation between philosophy and mathematics, and by a more profound research into the cognitive faculties than had hitherto been brought to bear ; w^hilst his sagacity enabled him to divine, that synthetic knowledge a /)?vb?v' coincides with the form of our knowledge, and can only be grounded in the laws of the several faculties which co-operate in the cog- nitive act. Then, in order fully to discover these forms of knowledge, ac- rording to the guiding principles of universality and necessity, he undertook a dissection of knowledge, and distinguished [in reflection] what in reality is only presented combined, for the behoof of scientific knowledge." Johnson's Version. § 375 . . . "The laws of ethics are superior to the empiri- cal and determinable free-will which we enjoy in matters of practice, and as- sume an imperative character, occupying the chief place in practical philosophy. This categorical principle becomes an absolute law of universal obligation, giving to our conduct an ultimate end and spring of action ; whicli is not to be considered as a passion or affection, but as a moral sense of respect for law." Literal Translation, § 38S. . . . "The Moral Law, as opposed to an empi- rically determined volition, appears under the character of a Categorical Im- * The same observation is tnie of this sentence and of the following sec- tion, which we leave without note or comment. II 114 JOHNSON'S TRANSLATION OF TENNEMANN'S perative^ (absolute Ought [uiiconditioual duty],) and takes its place at the very summit of practical philosophy. This imperative, as the universal rule of eveiy rational will, prescribes with rigorous necessity an imiversal con- formity to the laiv [of duty']; and thereby establishes the supreme absolute end and motive of conduct, which is not a pathological feeling, [blind and mechanical,] but a reverence for the law [of duty, rational and free]." That Mr Johnson makes no scruple of violating the good faith of a translator, is a serious accusation — but one unfortunately j true. This, indeed, is principally shown, in the history of those philosophers whose speculations are unfavourable to revealed reli- gion. — Speaking of Hume, Tennemann says : — " On the empirical principles of Locke, he investigated with a profoundly penetrating genius the nature of man as a thinking, and as an active being. This led him through a train of consequent reasoning to the scep- tical result that, &c And in these investigations of j Hume, philosophical scepticism appeared with a terrific force, pro- fundity (Grundlichkeit), and logical consequence, such as had never previously been witnessed, and at the same time in a form of! greater precision, perspicuity and elegance." Thus rendered by Mr Johnson : — " Taking the experimental principles of Locke as the foundation of his system, he deduced from them many acute but specious conclusions respecting the nature and condition oi man, as a reasonable agent. He was led on by arguments, the fallacy of which is lost in their ingenuity, to the inference that. &c The investigations of Himie were recommended not only by a great appearance of logical argumentation, but bj! an elegance and propriety of diction, and by all those graces o; style which he possessed in so eminent a degree, and which mad«| his scepticism more dangerous than it deserved to be," — The sam(j tampering with the text we noticed in the articles on Hohbes an(: Lord Herbert of Cherhury. — We hardly attribute to intention whaj Mr Johnson says of Krug, that " he appears to add little to Kant* except a superior degree of obscurity." Krug is known to thos versed in German philosophy, not only as a very acute, but as . very lucid writer. In his autobiography, we recollect, he enu merates perspicuity as the first of his three great errors as a| author ; reverence for common sense, and contempt of cant, beinl the other two. Tennemann attributes to him " uncommon cleai| ness." As a specimen of our translator's contemptuous vituperation ( some illustrious thinkers, we shall quote his notes on Fichte an MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF PHIJ^OSOPHV. 115 iSchellinr/, of whose systems, it is almost needless to say, his trans- lation proves him to have understood nothing. After reversing in the text Avliat Tennemann asserts of Fichte's unmerited persecution, we have the following note : — " It is pain- ful to be the instrument of putting on record so much of nonsense ;uid so much of blasphemy as is contained in the pretended philo- sophy of Fichte ; the statement, however, will not be without its good, if the reader be led to reflect on the monstrous absurdities which men will believe at the suggestion of their own fancies, who have rejected the plain evidences of Christianity." [Fichte was, for his country and generation, an almost singularly pious Christian. He was even attacked by the theologians — for his orthodoxy.] — On Schelling's merits we have the following dignified decision : — •' The grave remarks of the author on this absurd theory, might jierhaps have been worthily replaced by the pithy criticism of Mr Hurchell, apud the Vicar of Wakefield, as applied to other absur- dities, videlicet — Fudge — Fudge — Fudge." But enough ! — We now take our leave of j\Ir Johnson, recom- mending to him a meditation on the excellent motto he has pre- fixed to his translation : — " Di£icih est in philosophia pauca esse ei nota, cui non sint aut pleraque ant omnia" IV.-LOGIC. IN REFERENCE TO THE RECENT ENGLISH TREATISES ON THAT SCIENCE* (April, 1833.) 1. Artis Logicm Rudimenta, with Illustrative Observations on ' each Section. Fourth edition, with Additions. 12mo. Ox- ford : 1828. 2. Elements of Logic. By Richard Whately, D.D., Principal of St Alban's Hall, and late Fellow of Oriel College, Oxford. Third edition, 8vo. London : 1829. 3. Introduction to Logic, from Dr Whately' s Elements of Logic. : By the Rev. Samuel Hinds, M.A., of Queen's College, and j Vice-Principal of St Alban's Hall, Oxford. 12mo. Oxford : j 1827. i 4. Outline of a New System of Logic, with a Critical Examina- ! tion of Dr Whately's " Elements of Logic,'' by George Bentham, Esq. 8vo. London : 1827. 5. An examination of some Passages in Dr Whately' s Elements \ of Logic. By George Cornewall Lewis, Esq., Student of I Christ Church. 8vo. Oxford : 1829. I 6. A Treatise on Logic on the Basis of Aldrich, with Illustrative] Notes by the Rev. John Huyshe, M.A., Brazen-nose College,' Oxford. 12mo. Second edition. Oxford: 1833. J 7. Questions on Aldrich's Logic, with References to the most] Popidar Treatises. 12nio. Oxford : 1829. j 8. Key to Questions on Aldrich' s Logic. 12mo. Oxford: 1829. i 9. Introduction to Logic. 12mo. Oxford : 1830. j 10. Aristotle's Philosophy. (An Article in Vol. iii. of the Seventh' I * [In French by M. Peisse ; in Italian by S. Lo Gatto ; in Cross's Selec-i tions.] FORTUNE OF LOGICAL STUDY IN GREAT BRITAIN. 117 Edition of the Encuclopcedia Britannica, now publishing.) By the Rev. Renn Dickson Hampden, M.A., late Fellow of Oriel College, Oxford. 4to. Edinburgh : 1832. Nothing, we think, affords a more decisive proof of the ob- lique and partial spirit in which philosophy has been cultivated in Britain, for the last century and a half, than the combined perver- sion and neglect, which Logic — the science of the formal laws of thought — has experienced during that period. Since the time, and principally, we suspect, through the influence of Locke, (who, as Leibnitz observed, "' sprevit logicam non intellexit,") no country has been so poor in this department of philosophy, Avhether we estimate our dialectical literature by its mass or by its quality. Loath to surrender the subject altogether, yet unable, from their own misconception of its nature, to vindicate to logic, on the pro- per ground, its paramount importance, as a science a j^^'iori, distinct, and independent : the few logical authors who appeared, endeavoured, on the one hand, by throwing out what belonged to itself, of an unpopular and repulsive character, to obviate disgust ; and, on the other, by interpolating what pertained to other branches of philosophy, — here a chapter of psychology, there a chapter of metaphysic, &c. — to conciliate to the declining study a broader interest than its own. The attempt was too irrational to succeed ; and served only to justify the disregard it was meant to remedy. This was to convert the interest of science (jEOEjfjwith the interest of amusement: — this was not to amplify logic, but to deform philosophy ; by breaking down their boundaries, ind running its several departments into each other. In the Universities, where Dialectic (to use that term in its uni- versality) once reigned " The Queen of Arts," the failure of the ■>tudy is more conspicuously remarkable. In those of Scotland, the Chairs of Logic have for generations taught any thing rather than the science which they nominally [n-ofess ; — a science, by the way, in which the Scots have not lat- terly maintained the reputation once estabhshed by them in all,* * " Les Escossois sont bons Philosophes," — pronounced the Dictator of Letters. — (Scaligerana Seciinda). — Servetus had previously testified to their character for logical subtillty : — " Dialecticis argutiis sibi blandiuntur." {Prcef. in Ptolem. Geogr. 1533.) [My learned friend, Mr James Broun of the Temple, shews me that the unhappy heretic had here only copied the words "f Erasmus, — a far higher authority. {Enc. Morice.y] — For a considerable 'ge, Oifoii LOGIC. and still retained in other departments of philosophy. To the philosophers, indeed, of our country, we must confess, that, in pei'iod, indeed, there was hardly to be found a continental University of any ■ note, without the appendage of a Scottish Professor of Philosophy. — [In the Key to Barclays Satyricon^ it is said of Cardinal Du Perron, under Henry IV. : — " Ejus solicitudine, in Gallia phu-es Scoti celebri nomine bonas artes professi • sunt, quam in ipsa Scotia foventur et aluutur a Rege." — Sir Thomas Urquhart : is less euphuistic than usual, in his diction ofthe following passage : — "There was a professor of the Scottish nation, within these sixteen years, in Somure, Avho spoke Greek with as great ease as ever Cicero did Latine, and could have expressed himself in it as Avell and as promptly as in any other language, ; [Urquhart refers to Johannes Camero, the celebrated theologian — and as he < himself calls him, the " bibliotheca movens"] ; yet the most of the Scottish' nation never having astricted themselves so much to the propriety of words as to the knowledge of things, [?] where there was one preceptor of languages , amongst them, there were above forty professors of philosophy. Nay, to so| high a pitch did the glory of the Scottish nation attaine over all the parts of ■' France, and for so long a time together continued in that attained height, by vertue of an ascendant, the French considered the Scots to have, above all nations, in matter of their subtlety in philosophical disceptatious, that there have not been, till of late, for these several ages together, any lord, gentleman, or other in all that country, who being desirous to have his son instructed ip the principles of philosophy, would intrust him to the discipline of any othei than a Scottish master ; of whom they were no less proud than Philip was of Aristotle, or TuUius of Cratippus. And if it occurred, as very often it did that a pretender to a place in any French university, having in his tendei' years been subferulary to sijme other kind of schooling, should enter intc competition with another aiming at the same charge and dignity, whos(' learning flowed from a Caledonian source, commonly the first was rejected and the other preferred ; education of youth in all grounds of literature unde: teachers of the Scottish nation being then held by all the inhabitants o France to have been attended, ccBteris paribus, with greater proficiency thai; any other manner of breeding subordinate to the documents of those of an' other country. Nor are the French the only men who have harboured thi good opinion of the Scots in behalf of their inward abilities, but many timei the Spaniards, Italians, Flerains, Dutch, Himgarians, Sweds, and Polonianj' have testified their being of the same mind, by the promotions whereimtci for their learning, they, in all those nations at several times, have attained. • (Jewel, 1652, Works, p. 258). — As in literature and philosophy, so inwaij Scots officers, in gi-eat numbers, and of distinguished merit, figured in tli. opposite armies of Gustavus and Ferdinand, — especially of the former; yvhom we find quoted in some of the subsequent treatises under :he name of Hill. (No. 1.) The success and ability of the Ele- 'iients prompted imitation and determined controversy. J\Ir Ben- bam (nephew of Mr Jeremy Bentham) published his Outline iikI Examination, in which Dr Whately is alternately the object if censure and encomium. (No. 4.) The pamphlet of Mr Lewis Iff ;on two points only) is likewise controversial. (No. 5). The — iPrincipal, as becoming, was abridged and lauded by his Vice No. 3); and the treatises of Mr Iluyshe and others, (Nos. 6, 7, 8, 9) are all more or less relative to Dr AVhately's, and all 1 many manifestations of the awakened spirit of logical pursuit. i be last decade, indeed, has done more in Oxford for the cause ■f this science than the whole hundred and thirty years pre- wtL ; ♦ [This addition of St Ambrose to the Litany, I took as recorded by Car- ilinalCusa.] 126 LOGIC. ceding ; * for since the time of Wallis and Aldricli, until the works under review, we recollect notliing on the subject which the University could claim, except one or two ephemeral tracts ; — the shallow Reflections of Edward Bentham, about the middle of the last century ; and after the commencement of the present, a couple of clever pamphlets in vindication of logic, and in extinc- tion of the logic of Ivett — which last also was a mooncalf of Alma JMater. * [Since that time, with a rise of the academical spmt, the study of logic has been still more zealously pursued in Oxford, and several resident mem- i bers of the University have published treatises on the science, of no ordinary ' merit. I may chronologically notice those of Mr Wooley, Mr Thomson, Mr . Chretien, and Mr Mansel. — To two of these gentlemen I am, indeed, under I personal obligations. — Mr Thomson^ in the second edition of his Laws ofi Thought, among other flattering testimonies of his favourable opinion, has 1 done me the honour of publishing the specimen wliich I had communicated J to him, of a scheme of Syllogistic Notation; and I regret to find, that this,^ circumstance has been the occasion of some injustice, both to him and to me. To him :— inasmucli, as he has been unfairly regarded as a mere expo sitor of my sj'stem ; to me : — inasmuch, as his objections to that system have been uufau-ly regarded as decisive. In point of fact, though we coin-i cide, touching the thoroughgoing quantification of the predicate in afiii'ma- tive propositions, we are diametrically opposed, touching the same quantifi- cation in negatives. But, while I am happy, in the one case, to receive even a partial confirmation of the doctrine, fi'om Mr Thomson's able and indepen-1 dent speculation ; I should be sorry, in the other, to subject, what I deem.; the truth to the uncanvassed" opinion of any human intellect. — To Mr Mamel] besides sundry gratifying expressions of approval, in his acute and learuetj Notes o7i the Rudimenta of Aldrich : I am indebted for valuable aid in thti detennination of a curious point in the history of logic. Instead of Fetru., Hispanus being a plagiari&t, andliis Summulae a translation fi'om the Greek | as supposed by Ehinger, Keckermann, Flaccius, J. A. Fabricius, Brucli.er,-i by all, in short, who, for the last two centuries and a half, have treated o\ the matter; it is now certain, that the " Sijnopsis Organi" published undej the name of Michael Psellus (the younger) is itself a mere garbled version ci tlie gi-eat logical text-book of the Avest, and, without any authority, capri, ciously fathered, by Ehinger, as an original work, on the illustrious Byzan, tine. I am now, in fact, able to prove :— that in the Augsburg Library, th; codex from which Ehinger printed, contained neither the title nor tb' ; author's name under which his publication appeared; and that in several ( the European libraries there are extant Greek manuscripts, identical wit the text of that publication, and professing to be merely copies of a transb: tion from the Latin original of Hispanus.— This detection enables us also 1 trace the TQ»fifiocr», "Ey^x-^i, x. r. A. of Blemmides and the Greeks to t\\ Barbara, Celarent, &c. of Hispanus and the Latins.] WOKKS REVIEWED. 127 It remains now to inquire : — At what value are we to rate these new logical publications ? — Before looking at their con- tents, and on a knowledge only of the general circumstances under which they were produced, wc had formed a presumptive estunate of what they were likely to perform ; and found our anticipation fully conlirmed, since we recently examined what they had actually accomplished. None of the works are the productions of inferior ability ; and though some of them propose only an humble end, they are all respectably executed. A few of them display talent rising far above mediocrity ; and one is the effort of an intellect of great natural power. But when we look from the capacity of the author to his acquirements, our judg- ment is less favourable. If the writers are sometimes original, their matter is never new. They none of them possess, — not to say a superfluous erudition on their subject, — even the necessary complement of information. Not one seems to have studied the logical treatises of Aristotle ; all are ignorant of the Greek Com- mentators on the Organon, of the Scholastic, llamist, Cartesian, Wolfian, and Kantian Dialectic. In none is there any attempt at the higher logical philosophy : we have no preliminary deter- mination of the fundamental laws of thought ; no consequent evolution, from these laws, of the system itself. On the con- trary, we find principle buried in detail ; inadequate views of the science ; a mere agglutination of its parts ; of these some wholly neglected, and others, neither the most interesting nor important, elaborated out of bounds; — and always, though in very different proportions, too much of the " shell," too httle of the " meat." They are rarely, indeed, wise above Aldrich. His partial views nf the order and comprehension of the science have determined theirs; his most egregious blunders are repeated; and sometimes when an attempt is made at a correction, either Aldrich is right, '>r a new error is substituted for the old. Even Dr Whately, who, in the teeth of every logician from Alexander to Kant, -peaks of " the boundless field within the legitimate limits of the -cience," " walks in the trodden ways," and is guiltless of ■ removing the ancient landmark." His work, indeed, never ti-anscends, and generally does not rise to, the actual level of the -cience ; nor, with all its abihty, can it justly pretend to more than a relative and local importance. Its most original and valu- able portion is but the insufticient correction of mistakes touching the nature of logic, long exploded, if ever harboured, among the 128 LOGIC. countrymen of Leibnitz, and only lingering among the disciples of Locke. An articulate proof of the accuracy of these conclusions, on all the works under consideration, would far exceed our limits. Nor is this requisite. It will be sufficient to review that work, in chief, to which most of the others are correlative, and whicli stands among them all the highest in point of origiiiahty and learning ; — and the rest occasionally, in subordination to that one. Nor in criticising Dv AVhately's Elements can we attempt to vin- dicate all or even the principal points of our judgment. To shovv the deficiencies in that work, either of principle or of detail, would, in the universal ignorance in this country of logical phi- losophy and of a high logical standard, require a preliminary exposition of what a system of this science ought to comprehend, far beyond our space, were we even to discuss these points to the exclusion of every other. We must, therefore, omitting imper- ^ fections, confine ourselves to an indication of some of Dr Whately'sj positive errors. This we shall attempt, " though the work," asi its author assures us, " has undergone, not only the close exami-jj nation of himself and several friends, but the severer scrutiny of determined opponents, without any material errors having been detected, or any considerable alteration found necessary." In doing this, nothing could be farther from our intention than any^ derogation from the merit of that eminent individual, whom, even when we differ most from his opinions, we respect, both as a very; shrewd, and (what is a rarer phsenomenon in Oxford) a very inde- pendent, thinker. The interest of truth is above all persona considerations; and as Dr Whately, in vindication of his owr practice, has well observed : — " Errors are the more carefully t(, be pointed out in proportion to the authority by which they ar<' sanctioned." " No mercy," says Lessing, " to a distinguishec author." This, however, is not our motto ; and if our " scrutiny'! be " severe," we are conscious that it cannot justly be atti'ibutec' to " determined opposition." We find matter of controversy even in the first page of th^ Elements, and in regard even to the first question of the doctrine — What is Logic? — Dr Whately very properly opens by . statement, if not a definition, of the nature and domain of logic * and in no other part of his work have the originality and correc to make us wonder that it sliould not have been remarked: viz. that -ic is a science as well as an cat. The universally prevailing error, that tiinian knowledge is divided into a number of parts, some of Avhich are arts \ ithout science, and others sciences without art, has been fully exposed by *Ir [Jeremy] Bentham in his Chrestomatliia. There also it has been showi^j liat there cannut exist a single art that has not its corresponding science, inr a single science which Ls not accompanied by some portion of art. The -' lioolmen, on the contrary, have, with extraordinary effort, endeavoured to ■ ive that logic is an art only, not a science ; and in that particular instance, r Whately is, I believe, one of the first who has ventured to contradii-t this tdunded assertion."— CO?, p. 12J In all this there is but one statement with which we can agree. Ae should certainly " wonder" with Mr Bentham, had any " so 'c'", jibvious and important fact " been overlooked by all Dr Whately "s '1 ' Predecessors ; and knowing something of both, should assuredly '" »e less disposed to presume a want of acuteness in the old logi- ,, ians, than any ignorance of their speculations in the new. In ^V he latter alternative, indeed, will be found a solution of the '-'• ' ■ wonder." Author and critic are equally in error. In the first place, looking merely to the nomenclature, both are istorically wrong. " Logic," says Dr Whately, " has been in '^""" \ene''''^l regarded merely as an art, and its claim to hold a place **' mong the .vrioire.o has been expressly deuiod." The reverse is I 130 LOGIC. true. The great majority of logicians have regarded logic as a science, and expressly denied it to be an art. This is the oldest as well as the most general opinion. — " The Schoolmen," says Mr Bentham, " have with extraordinary effort endeavoured to prove that logic is an art only." On the contrary, the Schoolmen have not only " with extraordinary effort," but with unexampled una- nimity laboured in proving logic to be exclusively a science ; and so far from " Dr Whately being " (with Mr Jeremy Bentham; " the first to contradict this ill-founded assertion," the paradox oj these gentlemen is only the truism of the world beside. This erroi is the more surprising, as the genus of logic is one of those vexec questions on which, as Ausonius has it, " omnis certat dialectica turba sophorum "; indeed, until latterly, no other perhaps stands so obtrusively for ward during the whole progress of the study. — Plato and th Platonists considered dialectic as a science ; but witli them dialoc tic was a real not a formal discipline, and corresponded rather t the metaphysic than to the logic of the Peripatetics. — Logic is nc defined by Aristotle. — His Greek followers, (and a considerabl body of the most eminent dialecticians since the revival of letters ; deny it to he either science or art. — The Stoics in general viewej it as a science. — The Arabian and Latin Schoolmen did the .saw} In this opinion Thomist and Scotist, Realist and Nominalist, coi; curred ; an opinion adopted, almost to a man, by the Jesuij Dominican, and Franciscan Cursualists. — From tlie restoration il letters, however, and especially during the latter part of the si:| teenth century, so many Aristotelians, with the whole body .' Ramists, (to whom were afterwards to be added a majority of tl; Cartesians, and a large proportion of the Eclectics,) maintaim' that it was an art; that the error of Sanderson may be perha^ excused in attributing this opinion to " almost all the more rece; authors" at his time. Alono; with these, however, (so far is ]' Whately from having " brought to view this important fact, ov(| looked by all his predecessors,") there was a very considerali party who anticipated the supposed novelty of this author defining logic by the double genus of art and science.* — In t schools of Wolf and Kant, logic again obtained the name of scienX: * To make reference to these would be de trop ; we count above a do;' logicians of this class in our own collection. But independently of the olir and less familiar authors, Mr Jeremy Bentham and Dr Whately have 3 claim (the latter makes none) to originality in this observation. Even ii LOGIC— WHAT ? 131 But, — to look beneath tlie name, — as Dr Whately and his cri- tic are wrong in imagining that there is any novelty in the obser- vation, they arc equally mistaken in attributing to it the smallest importance. The question never concerned logic itself, but merely the meaning of the terms by which it should be delined. The old logicians, (however keenly they disputed whether logic were IX science or an art, — or neither, — or both, — a science speculative, 6r a science practical, — or at once speculative and practical,) — never dreamt that the controversy possessed, in so far as logic was concerned, more than a verbal interest.* In regard to the essential nature of logic they were at one ; and contested only, what was the comprehension of these terms in philosophical pix)- priety, or rather what was the true interpretation of their Aristo- telic dctinitions. Many intelligent thinkers denounced, with Vives, the whole problem as frivolous. '* Qufestioni locum dedit misera lionionymia," says Mark Duncan, among a hundred others. The most strenuous advocates of the several opinions regularly admit, tliat unless the terms are taken in the peculiar signification for which they themselves contend, that all and each of their adver- -aries may be correct ; while, at the same time, it was recognised (lu all hands, that these terms were vulgarly employed in a vague nr general acceptation, under Avhich every opinion might be con- sidered right, or rather no opinion could be deemed wrong. The jireparatory step of the discussion was, therefore, an elimination last respectable writer on logic in the British Empire, previous to these gen- tlemen, Dr Richard Kirwan, whose popular and able volumes were published ill 1807, defines logic as art and science ; and this in terms so similar to those fif Dr Whately, that we cannot hesitate in believing that this author had his predecessor's definition (which we shall quote) immediately in view. •' Logic is both a science and an art ; it is a science inasmuch as, by analys- ing the elements, principles, and structure of arguments, it teaches us how to discover their truth or detect their fallacies, and point out the sources of such errors. It is an art, inasmuch as it teaches now to arrange arguments in such manner, that their truth may be most readily perceived, or their falsehood detected." (Vol. i. p. \.) * Father Buffier is unjust to the old logicians, but he places the matter on its proper footing in reference to the new. — " Si la logique est une science. Oni et non ; selon I'idee qu'il vous plait d'attacher au nom de science, &c. Si la logique est un art. Encore un fois, oui et non ; II plait aux logiciens de disputer si la logique est, on n'est pas un art; et il ne leur plait pas tonjours d'avouer ni d'euseigrier a Icurs disciples, que c'est unc pure ou pnerlle question de nom." (Cours des Srienrcs, (Logique,) p. 887.^ 132 LOGIC. of these less precise and appropriate significations, wliicli, as thoy , could at best only afford a remote genus and difference, were : wholly incompetent for the purposes of a definition. But what the older logicians rejected as a useless truism, the recent embrace as a new and important observation. — In regard to its novelty : — Do Dr Whately and Mr Bentham imagine that any previous logi- cian could ever have dreamt of denying that logic, in their accep- tation of the terms, was at once an art and a science ? Let theiH i look into almost any of the older treatises, and they will find this : explicitly admitted, even when the terms Art and Science are employed in senses far less vague and universal than is done by ! them.— As to its importarice : — Do they suppose that a more pre- ; cise and accurate conception of logic is thus obtained ? The con- ; trary is true. The term Science Dr Whately employs in its i widest possible extension, for any knowledge considered abso- ■ lutely, and not in relation to practice ; and in this acceptation every art in its doctrinal portion must be a science. Art he defines the application of knowledge to practice ; in which signi- fication, ethics, politics, religion, and all other practical sciences, must be art^. Art and Science are thus distended till they run together. As philosophical terms, they are now altogether worth- less ; too universal to define ; too vacillating between identity and \ difference, to distinguish. In fact, their application to logic, or j any other subject, is hereafter only to undefino, and to confuse ; expressing, as they do, not any essential opposition between the things themselves, but only the different points of view under which the same thing may be contemplated by us;- — every art being thus in itself also a science, every science in itself also an art. — This Mr Bentham thinks the correction of a universal) error, — the discovery of an important fact. If the question in' the hands of the old logicians be frivolous, what is it in those of the new ! * * Such is the most favourable interpretation we can give of Dr Whately's meaning. But the language in which this meaning is conveyed is most am- biguous and inaccurate. E. g. he says : — " A science is conversant about knowledge only.'''' (P. 56.) He cannot mean what the words express, that science has knowledge for its object-matter.^ for this is nonsense ; and the! words do not express, Avhat, from the context, we must presume he means,, that science has no end ulterior to the contemplative act of knowledge itself Dr Whately thus means by science what Aristotle meant by speculative science, but how different in the precision of their definitions ! Qiu^miJciji f^iu {i-xtaTT ^urii) Ti'Aoi ahijdiioi.- % ^oiKx iKViq S' f^yov ; — or, as Averroes has it, Ver specula- I LOGIC— WHAT ? 133 So niucli for the genus, now for the object-matter. — Of Dr "Whately's Elements, Mr Hinds says, and tliat emphati- cally : — " This treatise disjvlays — and it is the only one that has clearly done so — the true nature and use of logic ; so that it may be approached, no longer as a dark, curious, and merely speculative study ; such as one is apt, in fancy, to class with astrology and alchemy." (Pref. p. viii.) These arc strong words. We are disposed to admit that Dr Whatcly, though not right, is perhaps not far wrong with regard to the " true nature and use of logic;" — that he "dearly displays" that nature and use, is palpably incorrect ; and that his is " the only treatise which has clearly done so," is but another proof, that assertion is often in the inverse ratio of knowledge. We shall not dwell on what we conceive a very partial concep- tion of the science, — that Dr Whately makes the process of reasonhuf not merely its principal, but even its adequate object ; those of simple apprehension and judgment being considered not in themselves as constituent elements of thuught, but simply as subordinate to argumentation. In this view logic is made con- Ivertible with syllogistic. This view, which may be allowed, in so tivam scimus ut sciamus ; per practicam schmis lit operenmr. — In like manner, Dr Whately gives, without being aware of it, two very diiferent definitions of the term Art. In one place (p. 1) it is said, " that logic may be called the art .if reasoning, while, considered in reference to the practical rules, it furnishes tn secure the mind from error in its deductions." This is evidently the Ata,- f.zKTtx.'}] xa^l; ■TT(>^oi.y^a,i:uv of the Greek interpreters, the logka docens {qu(s tradit jircpxepta) of the Arabian and Latin schools. Again, in another (p. 56) it is >:iid, tliat " an art is the application of knowledge to practice.^'' If words have iiiiy meaning, this definition (not to wander from logic) suits only the Atx- /.-.y-iK'^ iv xZ'^''-^ "«' yvf^voidict, 'K^oLy^etruv of the Greek, the lofjica utens (qiicB iititur prcpccptis) of the Latin Aristotelians. The L. docens., and tlie L. ittens, are, however, so far from being convertible, that, by the great majority ol lihilosoi)hers, they have been placed in diiferent genera. The Greek logi- I ians denied the L. docens to be either science or art, regarding it as an iustrunient, not a part of philosophy ; the L. titens, on the contrary, they admttted to be a science, and a part of philosophy, but not separable and distinct. The Latins, on the contrary, held in general the L. docens to be a science, and part of philosophy ; the L. utens as neither, but only an in- •^trinneiit. Some, however made the docens a science, the idens an art ; while by others this opinion was reversed, &:c. These distiuctions are not to bo confounded with the /mre and applied logics of a more modem ]>liilo- -uphy. 134 LOGIC. • far as it applies to the logic contained in the Aristotelic treatises now extant, was held by several of the Arabian and Latin school- men : borrowed from them by the Oxford Crackanthorpe, it was adopted by Wallis : and from Walhs it passed to Dr Whately. But, as applied to logic, in its own nature, this opinion has been long rejected, on grounds superfluously conclusive, by the im- mense majority even of the Peripatetic dialecticians : and not a single reason has been alleged by Dr Whately to induce us to waver in our behef, that the laws of thowjht, and not the laws of rea^sonimj. constitute the adequate object of the science. This error, which we cannot now refute, would, however, be of compa- ratively Httle consequence, did it not, — as is notoriously the case in Dr Whately's Elements, — induce a perfunctory consideration of the laws of those faculties of thought ; these being viewed as only- subsidiary to the process of reasoning. In regard to the " clearness" with which Dr Whately •' dis* ^ plays the true nature and use of logic," we can only say, that^ : after aU om* consideration, we do not yet clearly apprehend what his notions on this point actually are. In the very pas- sages where he formally defines the science, we find him indistinct, ambiguous, and even contradictory ; and it is only \ by applying the most favourable interpretation to his words that we are able to allow him credit for any thing like a correct opinion. He says, that •■ the most appropriate office of logic (as science) is that of instituting an analysis of the i^rocess of the mind in M^ reasoning," (p. 1 :) and again, that " the process (operation) <^^9 reasoning is alone the appropriate province of logic." (Pp. 13, 140.) — The process or operation of reasoning is thus the object- ^^ matter about which the science of logic is conversant. Xow, ajflii definition which merely afiSrms that logic is the science which has 9 F» the process of reasoning for its object, is not a definition of this science at all ; it does not contain the diflerential quahty by which logic is discriminated from other sciences ; and it does not prevent j the most erroneous opinions (it even suggests them) from being taken up in regard to its nature. Other sciences, as psychology and metaphysic, propose for their object (among the otlier facul- ties) the operation of reasoning, but this considered in its real' nature : logic, on the contrary, has tlie same for its object, but only in its formal capacity ; in fact, it has, in propriety of speech, nothing to do with the process or operation, but is conversant only I LOGIC— WHAT ? 135 with its laws. Dr Whately's definition, is thorotore, not only incompetent, but delusive. It would confound logic and psycho- logy and metapliysic, and occasion those very misconceptions in regard to the nature of logic which other passages of the Elements, indeed the general analogy of his work, show that it was not his intention to sanction. But Dr Whately is not only ambiguous ; he is contradictory. We have seen, that, in some places, he makes the process of rea- soning the adequate object of logic ; what shall we think when vo tind, that, in others, he states that the total or adequate object 'f logic is langiuuje ? But, as there cannot be two adequate ibjects, and as language and the operation of reasoning arc not he same, there is therefore a contradiction. " In introducing," ^ >ays, " the mention of language, previously to the definition of _io, I have departed from established practice, in order that it nay be clearly understood, that logic is entirely conversant about anguage ; a truth which most writers on the subject, if indeed hey were fully aware of it themselves, have certainly not taken lue care to impress on their readers." * (P. 56.) And again : — ■ Logic is wholly concerned in the use of language." (P. 74.) The term logic (as also dialectic) is of ambiguous deriva- ion. It may either be derived from A6yo; (hlixdero;), reason, r our intellectual faculties in general ; or from A6yo; (-^go- . .d;), speech or language, by which these are expressed. The aeuce of logic may, in like manner, be viewed either : — V, as j-dequately and essentially conversant about the former, (the nternal y^oyo;, verbum mentale,) and partially and accidentally bout the latter, (the external >^6yo;, verbum oris ;) or, 2°, as ade- jiuately and essentially conversant about the latter, partially and [ccidentally about the former. ' The first opinion has been held by the great majority of logi- ians, ancient and modern. The second, of which some traces laay be found in the Greek commentators of Aristotle, and in the acre ancient Nominalists during the middle ages, (for the later 'iolastic Nominahsts, to whom this doctrine is generally, but ely, attributed, held in reality the former opinion,) was only illy developed in modern times by philosophers, of whom Hobbes * Almost all logiciaus, however, impress upon their readers, that logic is iiut, indeed, entirely, but) partially and secondarily occuiiied with language - the vehicle of thought, about -nhich last it is adequately and primarily ■iiversant. 13(5 LOGIC. il may be regarded as tlie principal. In making the analysis of the operation of reasoning tlie appropriate oj^ce of logic, Dr Whalely adopts the first of these opinions ; in making logic entirely con- versant about language, he adopts the second. We can hardly, however, believe that he seriously entertained this last. It is expressly contradicted by Aristotle, {Analyt. Post. i. 10, § 7) ; it involves a psychological hypothesis in regard to the absolute de- pendence of the mental faculties on language, once and again refuted, which we are confident that Dr Whately never could sanction ; and, finally, it is at variance with sundry passages of the Elements, where a doctrine apparently very different is advanced. But, be his doctrine what it may, precision and perspicuity are not the qualities we should think of applying j i to it. But if the Vice-Principal be an incompetent judge of what the Principal has acliieved, he is a still more incompetent reporter of what all other logicians have not. If he had read even a hun- dredth part of the works it behoved him to have studied, before being entitled to assert that Dr AVhately's " treatise is the only one that has clearly displayed the true use and nature of logic," he has accomplished what not one of his brother dialecticians of Oxford has attempted. But the assertion betrays itself : -x-xi/roT^ftoi ti/x»6ux. To any one on a level with the literature of this science, the statement must appear supremely ridiculous, — that the no- tions held of the nature and use of logic in the Kantian, not to say the Wolfian school, are less clear, adequate, and correct, than those promulgated by Dr Whately. — A general survey, indeed,; of the history of opinions on this subject Avould prove, that views essentially sound were always as frequent, as the carrying oi, these views into elfect was rare. Many, speculatively, recognised principles of the science, which almost none practically applied tc regulate its constitution. — Even the Scholastic logicians display in general, more enlightened and profound conceptions of th( nature of their science than any recent logician of this country In their multifarious controversies on this matter, the diversity o their opinions on subordinate points is not more remarkable, thai their unanimity on principal. All their doctrines admit of favourable interpretation ; some, indeed, for truth and precision have seldom been equalled, and never surpassed. Logic they al discriminated from psychology, metaphysic, &c. as a rational, no a real. — as a formal, not a material science. — The few Avho hcl' I LOGIC— WHAT ? U7 tiie adequate object of logic to be thiiujit in general, held t]\U, however, under the qualiHcation, that things in general were con- t isidercd by logic only as they stood under the general forms of thought imposed on them by the intellect, — quatenns secxindis latentionihiis snhstabant. — Those who maintained this object to be the higher processes of thought, (three, two, or one,) carefully ex- jilained, tliat the intellectual operations were not, in their own nature, proposed to the logician, — that belonged to the psycholo- liist, — but only in so far as they were dirigible, or the subject of laws. The proivimate end of logic was thus to analyze the canons nf thought ; its remote, to apply these to the intellectual acts. — Those, again, (and they formed the great majority,) who saw tliis object in second notions,* did not allow that logic was con- cerned with these second notions abstractly and in themselves, l^that was the province of metaphysic.) but only in concrete as [applied to first ; that is, only as they were the instruments and regulators of thought. — It would require a longer exposition than * The distinction (which we owe to the Arabians) oi first and second notions, (notiones, conceptus, intentiones, intellecta prima et secunda), is necessary to be iinown, not only on its own account, as a highly philosophical determination, but as the condition of any understanding of the scholastic pliilosoi)hy, old and new, of which, especially the logic, it is almost the Alpha and Omega. Yet, strange to say, the knowledge of this famous distinction has been long lost in " the (once) second school of the church." — Aldrich's definition is altogether inadequate, if not positively erroneous. Mr Hill and Dr VMiately, tullowed by Mr Huyshe and the author of Questions on Logic, &c., miscon- I live Aldrich, who is their only authorit}', if Aldricli understood himself, and tlonnder on from one error to another, without even a glimpse of the light. (/////, pp. 30—33; Whately, pp. 173—175; Huyslie, pp. 18, 19; Questions, pp. 10, 11, 71.) (Of a surety, no calumny could be more unfounded, as now applied to Oxford, than the " clamour,'''' of which Dr Whately is apprehen- '^ive, — '' the clamour against confining the human mind in the trammels of the -1 nooLMEN !") — The matter is worth some little illustration ; we can spare IK me, and must content ourselves with a definition of the terms.— A 7?r.s/ notion is the concept of a thing as it exists of itself, and independent of any Hperation of thought ; as, John, Man, Animal, &c. A second notion is the concept, not of an object as it is in reality, but of the mode under which it is thought hg the mind; as, Individual, Species, Genus, &c. The former is the concept of a thing, — reed, — immediate, — direct: the latter the concept of a ' "iicept.—fortnal, — mediate, — refiex. For elucidation of this distinction, and ii- applications, it is needless to make references. The subject is copiously neated by several authors in distinct treatises, but will l)e foinid coniiictcntly ' xphiiuod in almost all the older systems of logic and philosophy. 138 LOGIC. we can afford, to do justice to these opinions, — especially to the last. When properly understood, they will be found to contain, in principle, all that has been subsequently advanced of any value in regard to the object-matter and scope of logic. Nothing can be more meagre and incorrect than Dr Whately's sketch of the History of Logic. This part of his work, indeed, is almost wholly borrowed from the poverty of xildrich. As specimens : — Archytas,* by Whately as by Aldrich, is set down as in- ventor of the Categories ; and this now exploded opinion is advan- ced without a suspicion of its truth. The same unacquaintance with philosophical literature and Aristotelic criticism is manifested by every recent Oxford writer who has alluded to the subject. We may refer to the Excerpta ex Organo, in usum Academicm Juventutis, — to the Oxonia Purgata of Dr Tatham, — to Mr Hill's Notes on Aldrich, — to Mr Husyshe's Logic, — and to the Philosophy of Aristotle by Mr Hampden. This last, even makes the Stagirite derive his moral system from the Pythagoreans ; although the forgery of the fragments preserved by Stobaeus, under the name of Theages, and other ethical writers of that school, has now been for half a century fully established. They stand likewise without an obelus in Dr Gaisford's respectable edition of the Florilegium. [The physical treatises, also, as those under the names of Ocellus Lucanus and Timaus Locrius, are of the same character ; they are comparatively recent fabrications.] Aristotle would be, indeed, the sorriest plagiary on record, were the thefts believed of him by his Oxford votaries not false only, but ridiculous. By Aldrich it is stated, as on indisputable evi- * [On Archytas, I may refer the reader to three excellent monographs : by Navarrus (Copenhagen, 1820) ; by Hartenstein (Leipsic, 1833) ; and by Gruppe (Berlin, 18i0). — The Metaphysical, Physical, and Ethical frag- ments, written in the Doiic dialect, and bearing the name of Pythagorean philosophers, are all, to a critical reader, obtrusively spurious, and on all, ■ this note has been superfluously branded by the German critics and histo- rians of philosophj^ for above half a century. Mciners began, and nearly , accomplished, the exposition. Instead of Plato and Aristotle stealing their ' philosophies from the Pythagoreans, and their thefts remaining, by a; mii-acle, for centuries, unknown, and even unsuspected ; the forgers of these ; more modern treatises have only impudently translated the doctrines of the two philosophers into their supposititious Doric. Their non-exposure, at the! time, is the strongest proof of the languid literature of the decline.] HISTORY or LOGIC. IH!) donee, that, wliile in Asia, he received a great part of liis j»liiluso- jiliy from a learned Jew ; * and this silly and long derided fable even stands unconti-adicted in the Compendium to the present (lay : while, by the Oxford writers at large, he is still supposed to have stolen his Categories and Ethics (to say nothing of his |ihysical doctrines) from the Pythagoreans. What would Schlcier- iiiacher or Creuzer think of this ! In discriminating AristotWs merits in regard to logic, Dr Whately, wc are sorry to say, is vague and incorrect. " Xo science can be expected to make any considerable progress, wliicli is nut cultivated on right principles. - - Tlie greatest mistakes have always [prevailed respecting the nature of logic ; and its province has, in consequence, jbeeu extended by many writers to subjects with Avhich it has no proper con- inexion. Indeed, with the exception of Aristotle, (who is himself not entirely lexempt from the errors in question,) hardly a writer on logic can be meii- |tioued who has clearly perceived, and steadily kept in view throughout, its jreal nature and object." (P. 2.) On the contrary, so far is Aristotle, — so far at least are his "gical treatises which still remain, (and these are, perhaps, few (I the many that are lost,) from meriting this comparative eulo- s'mm, that nine-tenths, — in fact, more than nineteen-twentieths, uf these treat of matters, which, if logical at all, can be viewed i- the objects, not of pi? re, but only of an applied logic; and we lave no hesitation in affirming, that the incorrect notions which lave prevailed, and still continue to prevail, in regard to the ■ nature and province of logic," are, without detraction from his lorits, mainly to be attributed to the example and authority of he Philosopher himself. — The book of Categories, as containing III objective classitication of real things, is metaphysical, not logi- al. The two books of Posterior Analytics, as solely conversant ibout demonstrative or necessary matter, transcend the limits of [he formal science ; and the same is true of the eight books of Topics, as wholly occupied with probable matter, its accidents 111(1 applications. Even the two books of the Prior Analytics, in vhich the pure syllogism is considered, are swelled with exti-a- "gical discussions. Such, for example, is the whole doctrine of he modality of syllogisms as founded on the distinction of pure, * [The Jews have even made Aristotle a native Israelite, — bom at Jeru- - in,— of the tribe of Benjamin,— and a Rabbi deep in the sacred books of > nation. (Sec fJnrtoloccii BiJiliothrrn Rnhbinirn, f. i. />. 471, w/.) ] 140 LOGIC. necessary, and contingent matter ; — the consideration of the real [ truth 07' falsehood of propositions, and the power so irrelevantly attributed to the syllogism of inferring a true conclusion from i false premises ; — the distinction of the enthymeme, through the i extraformal character of its premises, as a reasoning from signs J ;t and probabilities ; — the physiognomic syllogism, &c. &c. The same is true of the book On Enouncement ; and matters are even worse with that on Fallacies, which is, in truth, only a sequel of the Topics. If Aristotle, therefore, did more tban any other philosopher for the progress of the science ; he also did more than any other to overlay it with extraneous lumber, and to impede its development under a precise and elegant form JMany of his successors had the correctest views of tbe object and scope of logic : and even among the schoolmen there were minds who could have purified the science from its adventitious sediment, had they not been prevented from applying their principles to details, by the implicit deference then exacted to the precept and practice of Aristotle.* " It has been remarked," says Dr Whately, after Aldrich, " that the logical system is one of those few theories which have been begun and perfected by the same individual. The history of its discovery, as far as the main principles of the science are concerned, properly* commences and ends ^ith Aristotle." (P. 6.) — In so far as " the main principles of the science are concerned," this cannot be denied. It ought, however, to have been stated jJ^fc with greater qualification. x\ristotle left to his successors, mucli to reject, — a good deal to supply, — and the whole to simphfy, digest, and arrange. — In regard alone to the deficiencies : — If Dr; Whately and the other Oxford logicians are right, (we think* decidedly otherwise.) in adding the fourth syllogistic figure' (which, by the way, none of them, from Aldrich downwards, eveij hint to the under-graduates not to be of Aristotelic origin,) t\u\ Stagirite is wrong in recognising the exclusive possibility of th<; other three {Analyt. Pr. i. 23, § 1 ;) and so far his system caii ' * [M. Bartlielemy Saint- Ililaire, to wbom, amoiig many other valiiabl Aristotelic labom-s of high taleut, we owe au excellent French trau.slation cj « the Organon, with copious notes and introductions, has combated this opi uiou. (See the Preface to his first volume, especially pp. xvi — xx, cxlii. I still, however, remain unconvinced ; though I cannot now detail my rea sons. — Assuredly, I do not plead guilty to the eharge of disparaging tli jxcnius of Ai-istotle : revorenring liim as the Prime of Philnsophprs.'] IIISTOUY OF LOGIC. 141 hardly be affirmed by them to have been perfected by himself. To say nothing of the five moods subsequently added by Theo- jilirastus and Eudemus, the extensive and important doctrine of Impotheticals, — a doctrine, in a great measure, peculiar and indo- licndent, — was, probably, an original supplement by these philo- sophers ; previous to which, the logical system remained alto- gether defective. [This requires some addition, and some modifi- cation.] The following is Dr "Whately's sketch of the fortune of Logic, t'rom Aristotle down to the Schoolmen : — •• The writings of Aristotle were not only absolutely lost to the world for iliout two centuries, [many, if not most, were always extant,] but seem to ia\e been but little studied for a long time after their recovery. An art, iiiwever, of logic, derived from the principles traditionally preserved by his lisciples, seems to have been generally known, and to have been employed ly Cicero in his philosophical works ; but the pursuit of the science seems n liave been abandoned for a long time. Early in the Christian era the \ripatetic doctrines experienced a considerable revival ; and we meet with he names of Galeu and Porphyry as logicians ; but it is not till the fifth -ixth] century that Aristotle's logical works were translated into Latin by he celebrated Boethius. Not one of these seems to have made any con- iderable advances in developing the theory of reasoning. Of Galen's labours ittle is known ; and Porphyry's principal work is merely on the Predicahles. -Ve have little of the science till the revival of learning among the Arabians, )y whom Aristotle's treatises on this as well as on other subjects were agerly studied." (P. 7.) In this sketch, Dr Whately closely follows Aldrich ; and how itterly incompetent was Aldrich for a guide, is significantly hewn by his incomparable (but still uncorrected) blunder of con- t ounding Galen with Alexander of Aphrodisias ! " Circa annum 'hristi liO, interpretum princcps Galenus floruit, 'Elsjyjirijf, sive *]xpositor, Kctr sloped;/, dictus/' Galen, who thus flourished at nine '■ars old, never deserved, never received the title of Tlie Com- " iitator. This designation, as every tyro ought to know, was \clusively given to Alexander, the oldest tmd ablest of the Greek iterprcters of Aristotle, until it was afterwards divided with him y Avorroes. — The names of Theophrastus and Eudemus, the reat founders of logic after Aristotle, do not appear. — We say othing of inferior logicians, but the Aphrodisian and Ammonius fermice were certainly not less worthy of notice than Porphyry. — >f Galen's logical labours, some are preserved, and of others we now not a little from his own information and that of others. 1-1-2 LOGIC. AVhy is it not stated, here or elsewhere, thsit the fourth figure \ms been attributed to Galen, and on what (incompetent) authority ? — Nothing is said of the original logical treatises of Boethius, though his work on Hjpotheticals is the most copious we possess. — Had Dr AYhately studied the subject for himself, he would hardly have failed to do greater justice to the Greek logicians. What does he mean by saying, " we have little of the science till the revival of learning among the Arabians ?" Are Averroes and Avicenna so greatly superior to Alexander and Ammonius ? Dr Whately, speaking of the Schoolmen, says : — " It may be sufficient to observe, that their fault did not lie in their dili- gent study of logic, and the high value they set upon it, but in their utterly mistaking the true nature and object of the science ; and by the attempt to II n employ it for the purpose of physical discoveries, involving every subject in a mist of words, to the exclusion of sound philosophical investigation. Their errors may serve to account for the strong terms in which Bacon sometimes appears to censure logical pui'suits ; but that this censure was intended to bear against the extravagant perversions, not the legitimate cultivation, of j the science, may be proved from his own observations on the subject, in his Advancement of Learning P (P. 8.) It has been long the fashion to attribute every absurdity to the schoolmen ; it is only when a man of talent, like Dr Whately, follows the example, that a contradiction is worth while. The Schoolmen, (we except always such eccentric individuals as Ray- mond Lully,) had corrector notions of the domain of logic than those who now contemn them, without a knowdedge of their Avorks. They certainly did not " attempt to employ it for the purpose oi physical discoveries," We pledge ourselves to refute the accusa- tion, whenever any eifort is made to prove it ; till then, we mus ; be allowed to treat it as a groundless, though a common calumnyi Jiil — As to Bacon, we recollect no such reproach directed by hin||i««i either against logic or against the scholastic logicians. On th-j I lii contrary, '' Logic," he says, " does not pretend to invent sciencesjM lllii or the axioms of sciences, but passes it over with a cuique i; wJiJR sua arte credendmn." * And so say the Schoolmen ; and so sayBini Aristotle. * Advancement of Learning : — and similar statements, frequently occiu' i the De Argiimentis and Novum Orgamim. The censure of Bacon, most pe ^J! tinent to the point, is in the Orgamim^ Aph. 63. It is, however, directe- > not against the Schoolmen, but exclusively against Aristotle ; it does not r' ir -m probate any false theory of the nature and object of logic, but certain pra' j '?i tical misapplications of it ; and, at any rate, it unly shows that Bacon ga* v '-k MODALITY OF PROPOSITIONS AND SVLIXXJIS.MS. H:? We are not satisfied with Dv Whately's strictures on Locke, ]Vi(tts, &c., but cannot afford the space necessary to explain our \ lews. One mistake in relation to the former we shall correct, as it can be done in a few words. After speaking of Locke's ani- I'ladvcrsion on the syllogism, Dr Whately says : — " lie (Locke) [iiesently after inserts an encomium upon Aristotle, in which he is (■([ually unfortunate ; he praises him for the ' invention of syllo- gisms,' to which he certainly had no more claim than Linnaeus to Ithe creation of plants and animals, or Harvey," &c. (P. 19.) In ^ihejirst place, Locke's words arc, " invention of forms of argu- i Imentation," which is by no means convertible with " invention r jof syllogisms," the phrase attributed to him. But if syllogism j had been the word, in one sense it is right, in another wrong. i " Aristotle," says Dr GilHes, " invented the syllogism," &c. ; and I in that author's (not in Dr Whately's) meaning, this may be cor- : rectly affirmed. — But, in the second place, Dr Whately is wrong ) in thinking, that the word " invention" is used by Locke, in the • restricted sense in which it is now almost exclusively employed, as opposed to discovery. In Locke and his contemporaries, to say nothing of the older writers, to invent is currently used for to discover. An example occurs in the sentence of Bacon list quoted; and in this signification we may presume that • invention" is here employed by Locke, as it was also thus ■inploycd in French, by Leibnitz, in relation to this very passage I if Locke. But from the History, to proceed to the Science itself. Turning over a few pages, we come to an error not peculiar to I )r Whately, but shared with him by all logicians, — we mean the Modality of propositions and syllogisms ; in other words, the "■cessity, possihility, &c., of their matter, as an object of logical •onsideration. It has always been our wonder, how the integrity of logic has iiit long ago been purified from this metaphysical admixture. Kant, whose views of the nature and province of the science were •uliarly correct, and from whose acutencss, after that of Aris- rlo, every thing might have been expected, so far from ejecting lie Modahty of propositions and syllogisms, again sanctioned its lie name of Dialectic to Ontology. Aristotle did not corrupt physics by logic, lit by metaphysic. The Schoolmen have sins of their own to answer fur, !c this, imputed to them, tlioy did not commit. 144 LOGIC. right of occupancy, by deJucino; from it, as an essential element of logical science, tlie last of his four generic categories, or funda- mental forms of thought. Nothing, however, can be clearer, than that this modality is no object of logical concernment. Logic is a formal science ; it takes no consideration of real existence, or of its relations, but is occupied solely about that existence and those relations which arise through, and are regulated by, the condi- tions of thought itself. Of the truth or falsehood of propositions, in themselves, it knows nothing, and takes no account : all in logic may be held true that is not conceived as contradictory. In rea- soning, logic guarantees neither the premises nor the conclusion, but merely the consequence of the latter from the former ; for a syllogism is nothing more than the explicit assertion of the truth of one proposition, on the hypothesis of other propositions being true in which that one is implicitly contained. A conclusion may thus be true in reality (as an assertion,) and yet logically false (as \ an inference.) * But if truth or falsehood, as a material quality of propositions | and syllogisms be extralogical, so also is their modality. Neces- sity, Possibility, &c., are circumstances which do not affect the logical copula or the logical inference. They do not relate to the connexion of the subject and predicate of the antecedent and consequent as terms in thought, but as realities in existence ; they are metaphysical, not logical conditions. The syllogistic inference is always necessary ; is modified by no extraforraal condition ; and is efj[ually apodictic in contingent as in necessary matter. ! [In a certain sense, therefore, all logical inference is hypothetical^— \\j^q thetically necessary ; and the hypothetical necessity of logic stands opposec to absolute or simple necessity. The more recent scholastic philosopher have well denominated these two species, — the necessitas consequentice an( the tiecessitas consequentis. The former is an ideal ov formal necessity ; th inevitable dependence of one thought upon another, by reason of oin- intelli gent nature. The latter is a real or material necessity ; the inevitable de pendence of one thing upon another because of its own nature. The forme is a logical necessity, common to all legitimate consequence^ whatever be tli material modality of its objects. The latter is an extralogical necessity over and above the syllogistic inference, and wholly dependent on ti.e moHj ^ dality of the matter consequent. — This ancient distinction, modern philosCi^B ^ phers have not only overlooked but confounded. (See contrasted the dodi^^H "i trines of the Aphrodisian and of Mr Dugald Stewart, in Dissertations o^| •« Reid, p. 701 a, note *.)] 1^1 ^ MODALITY OF PROPOSITIONS AND SYLLOGISMS. H", If such introduction of metaphysical notions into logic bo once admitted, there is no limit to the intrusion. This is indeed sho^vn in the vacillation of Aristotle himself in regard to the number of the modes. In one passage {De Interp. c. 12, § 1), he enumerates four — the necessary, the impossible, the contingent, the possible ; a determination generally receiAod among logicians. In another (Ibid. § 9), he adds to these four modes two others, viz. the true, and, consequently, the false. Some logicians have accoi-dingly admitted, but exclusively, these six modes ; his Greek interpreters, however, very properly observe, (though they made no use of the observation), that Aristotle did not mean by these enumerations to limit the number of modes io four or six, but thought only of sig- nalising the more important. [In general, indeed, as I previously stated, he speaks only of the necessary and contingent. {Anal. passim.)] Modes may be conceived without end ; — as the certain^ the proboMe, the useful, the good, the jusl, — and what not ? All, however, must be admitted into logic if any are : the line of dis- tinction attempted to be drawn is futile. Such was the confusion and intricacy occasioned by the four or two modes alone, that the doctrine of modals long formed, not only the most useless, but the most difficult and disgusting branch of logic. It was, at once, the criterium et crux ingenioriim. " De modali non gustabit asinus," >aid the schoolmen ; " Be modali non gustabit logicus," say we. This subject was only perplexed because different sciences were confounded in it ; and modals ought to be entirely, on principle, (as they have been almost entirely in practice,) relegated from the domain of logic, and consigned to the grammarian and metaphy- sician. This was, indeed, long ago, obscurely perceived by a pro- found but now forgotten thinker. " Pronunciata ilia," says Vivos, •■ quibus additur modus, non dialecticam sod grammaticam quses- tionem habent." Ramus also felt the propriety of their exclusion, though equally unable to explicate its reasons.* * [M. Barthelemy Saint-Hilaire {Logique d^Aristote, T. I. Pre/, p. Ixv.) says : — " Thdophraste et Eudeme, dont on invoque rautorite, avaicnt com- battu sur plusieurs points la theorie de la modalite ; ils en avaicnt change quelques regies ; mais ils I'avaient admise comme partie intogrante de la theorie generale. Depuis eux, nul logicien n'a pretendu la siipi)rinier. M. Hamilton est jusqn'a present le seul, si Ton excepte Lanrentiiis Valla, au XV* siecle, qui ait propose ce retranchement." — Valla, -whose Dialectica I take shame for overlooking, certainly does reject modals, as a species of logical proposition ; but on erroneous grounds. He confounds formal with materia! necessity ; and alleges no valid reason for the retrenchment. The reduction K 146 LOGIC. Dr Whately has very correctly stated : — " It belongs exclusively to a syllogism, properly so called, (/. e. a valid argument, so stated that its conclusiveness is evident from the mere form of the expression,) that if letters, or any other unmeaning symbols, be substi- tuted for the several tenus, the validity of the argument shall still be evi- dent." (P. 37.) Here logic appears, in Dr Whately's exposition, as it is in truth, a distinct and self-sufficient science. What, then, are we to think of the following passages ? — " Should there be no sign at all to the common term, the quantity of the proposition, (which is called an Indefinite proposition,) is ascertained by the matter; i. e. the nature of the connection between the extremes, which is either Necessary, Impossible, or Contingent," &c., &c. (P. 64.) — " As it is evident, that the truth or falsity of any proposition (its quantity and qua- lity being knovni) must depend on the matter of it, we must bear in mind, that, in necessari/ matter all affirmatives are true^ and negatives false ; in impossible matter^ vice versa ; in contingent matter, all universals false, and \ particulars true : e. g. ' all islands, (or, some islands,) are siUTOunded by < water,' must be true, because the matter is necessary: to say ' no islands, or some — not^ &c., would have been false : again, ' some islands are fertile,' \ ' some are not fertile,' are both true, because it is Contingent Matter : put j ' a//,' or ' HO,' instead of ' some^ and the propositions "nill be fialse," el-c, &c. i (P. 67.) j In these passages, (which, it is almost needless to say, are only ' specimens of the common doctrine,) logic is reduced from an inde- pendent science to a scientific accident. Possible, impossible, neces- \ sari/^ and contingent matt'er, are terms expressive of certain lofty | generahsations from an extensive observation of real existence ; and j logic, inasmuch as it postulates a knowledge of these generahsa- ! tions, postulates its own degradation to a precarious appendage, — i to a fortuitous sequel, of all the sciences from which that knowledge ; must he borrowed. If in syllogisms, " unless unmeaning symbols ' can be substituted for the several terms, the argument is either unsound or sophistical;" — why does not the same hold good in' propositions, of which syllogisms are but the complement? But' of the Necessai'y and Contingent to the Apodictic and Problematic is modern, and, I think, eiTOncous. For all the neccssarij is not apodictic or demonstrable .-1 and the contingently by no means convertible with the doubtful or problematic ; There is here also a mixing of the subjective with the objective. In my view' modes are only material atfections of the predicate, or, it may be, of tht' subject ; and those which, from their generality, have been contemplated iij logic, may, I think, be reduced to the relation of genus and species, and thet: consecution, thereby, recalled to the utmost simplicity. — I agree with M) Mansel, (Pref. p. ii.), if I do not misapprehend him.] ' '. ARGUMENT = MIDDLE TEI{M. 147 A, and B, and C, know nothing of the necessary, impossible, ron- tingent. Is logic a formal science in one chapter, a real science in another ? Is it independent, as a constitntcd whole ; and yet dependent, in its constituent parts ? AVc cannot pass without notice Dr AVhately's employment of the term Argument. This word he defines, and professes to use in a "strict logical sense;" and gives us, moreover, under a dis- tinct head, a formal enumeration of its other various significations ) !in ordinary discourse. The true logical acceptation of the term, he, however, not only does not employ, but even absolutely over- ;. looks; while, otherwise, his list of meanings is neither well discri- s minated, nor at all complete. We shall speak only of tlie logical omission and mistake. Reasoning (or discourse) expressed in words is argument; and an argu- nt stated ctt full length., and in its regular form, is called a si/llogistn; the ' [third part of logic, therefore, treats of the syllogism. Every argument con- '; jsists of two parts; that which is proved; and that by means of irhich it is ;' Iproved," &c. And in a note on this : — " I mean, in the strict technical "' Jsense ; for, in popular use, the word Argument is often employed to denote P'' the latter of these two parts alone : e. g. this is an argument to prove so and i' so," &c. (P. 72.) Now, the signification, here (not quite correctly) given as the "popular use" of the term, is nearer to the "strict technical sense" than that which Ur Whately supposes to be such. In technical propriety argument cannot be used for argumentation, as he thinks, — but exclusively for its middle term. In this mean- ing the word (though not with uniform consistency) was employed by Cicero, Quintilian, Boethius, &c. ; it was thus subsequently jsed by the Latin Aristotelians, from whom it passed even to the Ramists ; * and this is the meaning which the expression always, prst and most naturally, suggests to a logician. Of the older dia- ecticians, Crackanthorpe is the only one we recollect, who uses, ind professes to use, the word not in its strict logical signification, ^' out with the vulgar as convertible with Reasoning. In vindicat- "7 ng his innovation, he, however, misrepresents his authorities, u, Sanderson is, if we remember, rigidly correct. The example of * Ramus, in his definitions, indeed, abusively extends tlie word to botli e other terms ; the middle he calls the tertium argumentum. Tin-oughout ; jis writings, however, — and the same is true of those of his friend Talanis, — rgumentum, without an adjective, is uniformly the word used for th*» middh- erm of a syllogism ; and in this he is followed hy the Ramists and Semi- lamists in general. 148 LOGIC. Crackanthorpe, and of some French Cartesians, may have seduced Wallis ; and Wallis's authority, with his own ignorance of logical- propriety, determined the usage oiAldrich — and of Oxford. — We say again Aldrich's ignorance ; and the point in question supphes a significant example. " Terminus tertius [says he] cui quses- tionis extrema comparantur, Aristoteli Argumentum, vulgo Me- dium." The reverse would be correct : — " Aristoteli Medium, vulgo Argumentum." This elementary blunder of the Dean, corrected by none, is repeated by nearly all his epitomators, expositors, and imitators. It stands in Hill (p. 118) — in Huyshe (p. 84) — in the Questions on Logic (p. 41) — and in the Key to the Questions (p. 101); and proves emphatically, that, for a cen- tury and a half, at least, the Organon (to say nothing of other logical works) could have been as little read in Oxford as the , Targum or Zendavesta. A parallel to this error is Dr Whately's statement, that " the Major Premiss is often called the Principle." (P. 25.) The major ji premise is often called the Projyosition ; never the Principle. A , principle may, indeed, be a major premise ; but we make bold ; to say, that no logician ever employed the term Principle as a : synonyme for major premise. i Speaking of the Dilemma, Dr Whately says : — " Most, if not all, writers on this point, either omit to tell, whether the Dilemma is a kind of conditional gr of disjunctive argument, or else refer it to the latter class, on account of its having one disjunctive pre- miss ; though it clearly belongs to the class of conditionals." (P. 100.) Most, if not all, logical writers, do not omit to tell this, but Dr Whately, we fear, has omitted to consult them ; and thej opinion he himself adopts, so far from being held by few or none, has been, in fact, long the catholic doctrine. For every one logi- cian, during the last century, who does not hold the dilemma tc^ be a conditional syllogism, we could produce ten who do. Dr Whately, — indeed all tlie Oxford logicians, — adopts tli(, inelegant division of the Hypothetical proposition and syllogisn into the Conditional and Disjunctive. This is wrong in itseli The name of the genus should not, without necessity, be con founded with that of a species.- But the terms Hypothetica and Conditional are in sense identical, differing only in the lar' guage from which they are taken. It is likewise wrong on tli score of authority : for the words have been used as synonymoi by those logicians who, independently of the natural identit IIYPOTIIICTICAL PROPOSITIONS AM) SYLLOGISMS. Wj of the terms, were best entitled to regulate tlieir conventional use. — Boethius, the first among the Latins who elaborated this [lart of logic, employs indifferently the terms hypotheticus, condi- tionalis, non simplex, for the genus, and as opposed to catego- ricus or s^implex; and this genus he divides into the Propositio vi Syllogismus conjunctivi (called also conjuncti, connexi, per con- ncxionem,) equivalent to Dr Whately's Conditionals; and into the Pi'opositio et Syllogismus disjunctivi (also disjuncti, per disjunc- tlonem.) Other logicians have employed other, none better, terms of distinction ; bnt, in general, all who had freed themselves of the scholastic slime, avoided the needless confusion to which we object. But, to speak now of Ilypotheticals in their Aristotelic mean- ing, Dr AVhately says : — '• Aldricli has stated, through a mistake, that Aristotle uttei'ly despised hypothetical syllogisms, and thence made no mention of them ; but he did indicate his intention to treat of them in some part of his work, which either tvas not completed by him according to his design, or else (in common with iiauy of his writings) has not come doAvn to ns." (P. 104.) Any ignorance of Aristotle on the part of Aldrich is con- •oivable, but in his censure Dr Whately is not himself correct. With the other Oxford logicians, he never suspects the IvT^y^oyiafiol I v'7:-oSiai6i! of Aristotle and our hypothetical syllogisms, not to )0 the same. In this error, which is natural enough, he is not vithout associates even of distinguished name. Those versed II Aristotelic and logical literature are, however, aware, that his opinion has been long, if not exploded, at least rendered xtremely improbable. AVe cannot at present enter on the sub- .oytay.6i sigro ccovvxtou, there is no ground of doubt, he only reason for hesitation arises from the passage, (Ancdyt. *r. i. 44, § 4,) in which it is said, that there are many other syl- 'i^isms concluding by hypothesis, and those the philosopher pro- lises to discuss. Of what nature these were, we have now Jio 150 LOGIC. means even of conjecture. If we judge from Aristotle's notion of hypothesis, and from the syllogisms he calls by that name, ^m- should infer that they had no analogy to the hypotheticals of Theophrastus ; * and it will immediately be seen, that a complete revolution in the nomenclature of this branch of logic was eifected subsequently to Aristotle. We may add, that no reliance is to be placed in the account given by Pacius of the Aristotelic doc- trine on this point : he is at variance with his own authorities, and has not attentively studied the Greek logicians. So far we state only the conclusions also of others. The fol- lowing observation, as farther illustrating this point, will probably surprise those best qualified to judge, by its novelty and paradox. It must appear, indeed, at first sight, ridiculous to talk, at the present day, of discoveries in the Organon. The certainty of the fact is, however, equal to its improbability. The term Categorical (KUTYiyoqiKo;), applied to proposition or syllogism, in contrast to Hypothetical (vTroderDco-), we find employed in all the writings ex- tant of the Peripatetic School, subsequent to those of its founder. In this acceptation it is universally applied by the interpreters of Aristotle, up to the Aphrodisian ; and previously to him, we cer- taily know that it was so used by Theophrastus and Eudemus. Now, no logician, we believe, ancient or modern, has ever re- marked, that it was not understood in this signification by the , philosopher himself.f The Greek commentators on the Organon, * []VI. Barthelemy Saint-Hilaire (Logique DWristote, T. I. Pref. p. Ix. sq. and T. IV. Top. i. 8, 9, notes) has done me the honour to controvert this opinion, and contends that the Hypothetical syllogisms of Aristotle, are the same with those which from Theophrastus have descended to us under that; - name. But however ingenious his arguments, to me they are not con-|' vincing ; and to say nothing of older authorities, he has also against him Di' Waitz, the recent and very able editor of the Organon in Germany. — I an now, indeed, more even than formerly, persuaded, that our hypotheticals an. not the reasonings from hypothesis of the father of logic ; for I think it cai be shewn, that our hypothetical and disjunctive sjilogisms are m\\j immedi (ife inferences, and not therefore entitled, in Aristotelic language, to the styL' of syllogisms at all.] t [M. Peisse, in his extensive logical reading, has found the followini; unexclusive, though merely incidental, observation by the thrice learn&: ■ dcrard John Vossius : — " Isusquam in Aristotele syllogismus categoricu npponitur hypothetico." (De Natura Artium, L. iv. c. 8, § 8 ) — I have als' met with an earlier authority, in Cardanus; but he states only that Axis fntle verv frequcntiv uses cntegoric for qffij-mative, not that lie always dodjBi'^l HYPOTHETICAL PROPOSITFONS AND SYL1,()G1S>1S. i.-,i indeed, once and again observe, in particular places, that the term categorical is there to be interpreted ajinnative ; but none lias made the general observation, that it was never applied by Aristotle in the sense in which it was exclusively usurped by themselves. But so it is. Throughout the Organon there is not to be found a single passage, in which categorical stands opposed to hypothetical, (11 vTrodiaiug) ; there is not a single passage in which it is not manifestly in the meaning of affirma- tive, as convertible with x«T« argument, that the O'rfirk intcrprrfrra rfifi tint firhiinulr'lqr thf term ciTt?^>}(: — 154 LOGIC. We proceed to consider a still more important subject — the nature of the Inductive inference ; and regret that we cannot " quoniam Jobaunes Grammaticns hie niiUam ejus mentionem facit ; et tarn ipse, quam Alesauder, superiori libro, explicautes definitionem svUogismi ab Aristotele traditam, ac tlistingiientes syllogisraiim ab argumentatione con- stante ex una propositioiie, noii vocant Iianc argumentationem cnt/ii/mema, sed syllogismura f/.ovoT^vjfifixrov.''^ (Comm. in Analyt. Pr. ii. 27, § 3.) — Pacius is completely wi-ong. — Philopouus, or rather Ammouius Hemiiae, on the place in question {Anal. Pr. ii. c. 27, § 3,) states, indeed, (as far as we recol- lect, for om- copy of his Commentary is not at hand,) nothing to the point. [On since referring to the passage, we find that too much had been conceded. M. Peisse, too, notices its uTelevancy.] The fallacy of such negative evi- dence is however shown in his exposition of the Posterior Analytics, where he says; — " 'Ej/^v^/i^tist 3s iiQ-zirui, cctto roi Kcc-roi'hifc'T^oe.uuu tu iX' Ivhiug s^uruvrut. — - Toioiroi Si siai H !li x,xi oi pnio^fKol avXhoyiufAol, ovg l v 6 v f^. '/j ft oe, t oe, 'h'iyof/.iw y.ccl yoL^ iv ey.styois H-fi ooKii yiyuiodcti S/os /t*'^? 'TT^OTXaiUi avXhoyiafiog, tu rviv krs^oiv yva^iftov omet» H ^ ifTTO ^iKocara:/, vj ruv tiK^octruv ■Trqoijrl&irs&a.i olov, n. t. A. - — Ato ovii OJ jl>(l/ roioiJTOt KV^i'u; avT^'hoytafiol, dXhoi to o'hO'j, priTOQix.ol av'h'hoyKjf^oi. 'E^ uy out jH ^ t4)j yuu^tf4,6'j lari to Trccooty^siTrofiivov, ovx, sariv s'ttI Toincav oiou rs rov o< ivdvfc^- H h fietrog yiyviadxt avXhoyiaf/M' x.x\ yxn -aou cctt kv-ov roi 0'j6f/.c/,To; dvh.y^oyiaf/.og ^k-\ avv&idiv ri'ju, 'Koyuv Ioiks (!riy.oi.iviiv O)aivio y^etl 6 avfi\pyi(pifi^fi» was used by the oldest commentators on Ailstotle in the modem signification, as a syllogism of one expressed premise ; and, 2°, That the av'K'Aoyiaff.o; fiO!/o?,vjfif<,ci~o; was not a term of the Ai'istotelian, but of the Stoical School. This appears clearly from Sextus Empiricus, (Inst. ii. § 167 ; ; Contra JNIath. viii. § 443 ; ed. Fabr.) Boethius, and all the later Greek logi cians, (A\ith the partial variation of Magentiuus and Pachymeres.) also' J i favom- the common opinion. Their authority is, however, of little weight, i and the general result of the argimient stands unaftected. — In these errors, it, jl j. is needless to say, that Pacius is followed by Corydaleus and Facciolati. 1 1 h^ [I may here annex a general statement of the various meanings in wliich the term Enthymeme has been employed; and though I cannot tarry to give INDL'CTIVE SYLLuGIS.M. I55 (.cho the praises that have been bestowed on Dr Whatoly's analysis of this process. We do not, indeed, know the logician articulate references to the books in which the several opinions are to he found, this I think will exhibit a far completer view of the multiform sig- iiitications of the word than is clsc^\■hcre to be found. These meanings may be first distributed into four categories, according as tlie word is employed to denote : — I. A thought or proposition in general; — II. -l proposition, part of a syllogism ; — III. .1 syllogism of some peculiar ntntter ; — IV. A syllogism of an unexpressed part. I. — ^Enthymeme denotes a thought or proposition : 1. Of any hind. — See Cicero, Dlonysius of Halicarnassns, Demetrius, Quin- tilian, Sopater, and one of the anonymous Scholiasts on Hermogenes. ;?. (f any hind, with its reason annexed. — See Aristotle, Quintilian. 3. Of imagination or feeling, as opposed to intellection. — Isocrates, Author of the Rhetoric to Alexander, the Hallcarnassiail. I , Inventive. — Xenophon. .1. Facetious, witty, antithetic. — Quintilian, Juvenal, Agellius. II. — Entliymeme denotes a proposition, part of a syllogism : 1. Any one proposition. — Held by Neocles (?) ; See Quintilian, Scholiast on Hennogenes, Greek author of the Prolegomena Statuum, Matthseus Cam- ariota. -. Conclusion of an Epichirema. — Hermogenes, Scholiast on Hermogenes, Piufus, Greek author of the Rhetorical Syuopticon, Maximus Planudes, (icorgius Pletho, M. Camariota. This category it is impossible always rigorously to distinguish from IV. HI. — Enthymeme denotes a syllogism of a certain matter: 1 . Rhetorical of any hind. — Aristotle, Curius Fortunatianus, Ilarpocratian, Scholiast on Hermogenes, M. Camariota. L'. From consequents, or from opposites — rejmgnants, contraries, dissimilars, ■sc. — Cicero, Quintilian, Hermogenes, Apsines, Julius Rufinianus. '.''. (Leaving that from consequents to be called Epichirema,) /)-o/« opposites alone. — Cornificius, Author of the Rhetoric to Herennius, Quintilian, Hermogenes, Apsines. ' From signs and likelihoods. — Aristotle's special doctrine. IV. — Enthjoiieme denotes a syllogism in ivhich there is unexpressed: — a) 1. One or two propositions.— So Victorinus in Cassiodorus. See also Cicero, Quintilian and Boethius. 1 1 ) One proposition ; and here : — * L'. Any proposition. — Held by Neocles (?) Quintilian, and the Greek author ^ of the Prolegomena Rhetorica ; see also Scholiast on Hermogenes and G. [ I Pletho. Aristotle and Demetrius allow this, as a frequent accident of ' I rhetorical syllogisms. •". Either premise. — This is the common doctrine of the Greek logicians, fol- lowing Alexander and Ammonius, and followed by the Arabians, and of the Schoolmen following Boethius, Cassiodorus, Isidore of Seville, and the Arabians. It is al^o the doctrine of the moderns. All these parties agree in fathering it on the Stagirite. I The major premise ; (the non-expression of tlif minor lieiiig allowed I" lofi LOGIC. Avho has clearly defined the proper character of dialectical induc- tion, and there are few who have not in the attempt been guilty of the grossest blunders. Aristotle's doctrine on this point, though meagre, is substantially correct ; but succeeding logicians, in attempting to improve upon their master, have only corrupted what they endeavoured to complete. As confusion is here a prin- cipal cause of error, we must simplify the question by some pre- liminary distinctions and exclusions. The term Induction (l^acywy.?) has been employed to denote three very different things : — 1"^,- The objective process of inves- tigating individual facts, as preparatory to illation ; — 2°, A mate- rial illation of the universal from the singular, warranted either by the general analogies of nature, or by special presumptions afforded by the object-matter of any real science ; — 3°. A formal illation of the universal from the individual, as legitimated solely by the laws of thought, and abstract from the conditions of this or that particular matter. That the Jirst of these, an inventive process or process of di covery, is beyond the sphere of a critical science, is manifest ; nor has Induction, in this abusive application of the term, been ever, arrogated to Logic. By logicians, however, the second and third. have been confounded into one, and, under every pliasis of rais-c conception, treated as a simple and purely logical operation.,' Yet nothing can be clearer than that these constitute two separate' operations, and that the second is not properly a logical processj at all. In logic, all inference is determined ratione formes, the! the common si/llogism.) —This is held by two Greek logicians, — Lee Mageiitinus aud Georgius Pachymeres. (By the way I may notice that: Saxius is wrong in carrying up the former to the seventh century ; for Lee' could not be older than the ninth, seeing that he quotes Psellus.) Th( same opinion I find maintained by Cai'daniis ; but on a misinterpretatioi of Averroes. 6. The conclusion. — The doctrine of Ulpian the commentator of Demosthenes of Minucianus, and of a Scholiast on Hermogenes. Though this, as ai' exclusive opinion, be not riglit, modern logicians are still farther wrong! in then- otherwise erroneous doctrine of Enthymeme, for not recognisin;; as a third order, the nou- expression of the conclusion; since this i an ellipsis of the very commonest in our practice of reasoning. Keeker: manuus, indeed, (ignorant of the ancient doctrine,) while admitting thi practice, expressly refuses to it the name of Entlnnneme. ^ 6. Two propositions. — This opinion might seem to be held by some of tli authorities under category 11. ] INDUCTIVE SYLLOGISM. \r~ conclusion being necessarily implied in the very conception of the premises. In this second Induction, on the contrary, the illation is effected vl materke, on grounds not involved in the notion of its antecedent. To take, for example, Dr Whately's instance : Tlio naturalist who, from the proposition — " Ox, sheep, deer, goat, (t. e. some horned animals,) ruminate," infers the conclusion— " All horned animals ruminate," may be warranted in this pro- cedure by the material probabiHties of his science ; but his illation is formally, is logically vicious. Here, the inference is not neces- sitated by the laws of thought. The some of the antecedent, as it is not thought, either to contain or to constitute, so it does not mentally determine, the all of the consequent ; and the reasoner must transcend the sphere of logic, if he would attempt to vindi- cate the truth of his conclusion. Yet, this, by the almost unani- mous consent of logicians, has been admitted into their science. Induction they have distinguished into perfect and imperfect ; according as the ivhole concluded was inferred from all, or from snine only, of its constituent parts. They thus involved them- selves in a twofold absurdity. For, on the one hand, they recog- nised the consequence of the Imperfect Induction to be legitimate, though, admitting it to be not necessarily cogent ; as if logic could infer with a degree of certainty inferior to the highest : and, on the other, they attempted to corroborate this imbecillity, ■ jby calling in real probabilities, — physical, psychological, meta- ' physical; which logic could neither, as a formal science, know, nor, as an apodictic science, take into account. This was a corol- lary of the fundamental error to which we have already alluded, —the non-exclusion of all material modality from the domain of logic. Thus, it was maintained, that, in necessary matter, the :i jlmperfect Induction was necessarily conclusive ; as if logic could be aware of what was necessary matter, — as if, indeed, this itself were not the frecpient point of controversy in the objective sciences, and did not, in fact, usually vary in them, as these same sciences advanced.* * [Thus, Sir Thomas Browne, expressing the doctrine of naturalists in ilic seventeenth century, declared it to be " impoasihk, that a qundniprd \should lay an egtj, or have the bill of a bird:' To tlic oldtT lofriciaiis, tliere- fore, this proposition was of impossible matter. Tiie subsequt-iit discovery of the Ornithorynchus Paradoxus has shoM-n to the naturalist that his twofold impossibility was possible, and the proposition is, consequently, to our re- cent logicians one of possible matter. — " Do(js bark:''' this nns erst ci\' nrces- 158 LOGIC. The two first processes to which the name of Induction has been given, being thus excluded, it remains only to say a few words in explanation of the third, — of that Induction, with which alone logic is concerned, but the nature of which has, by almost all logicians, been wholly misrepresented.* Logic does not consider things as they exist really and in themselves, but only the general forms of thought under which the mind conceives them ; in the language of the schools, logic is conversant, not about first, but about second, notions.^ Thus a logical inference is not determined by any objective relation of Causality subsisting between the terms of the premises and con- clusion, but solely by the subjective relation of Reason and Con- sequent, under which they are construed to the mind in thought.^ The notion conceived as determining, is the Reason ; the notion conceived as determined, is the Consequent ; and the relation between the two is the Consequence. Now, the mind can think two notions under the formal relation of consequence, only in one or other of two modes. Either the determining notion must be conceived as a whole, containing (under it), and therefore neces- sitating, the determined notion, conceived as its contained part or parts ; — or the determining notion must be conceived as the parts constituting, and, therefore, necessitating the determined notion conceived as their constituted whole. Considered, indeed, abso- lutely and in themselves, the whole and all the parts are identicaL Relatively, hoivever, to us, they are not ; for in the order thought, (and logic is only conversant with the laws of thought), the whole may be conceived first, and then by mental analysis separated into its parts ; or the parts may be conceived first, and I sary matter; — " dogs" were then " all dogs," and the inductive conclusion compulsory and universal. (Wolfii Logica, § 479.) Since an observation of the dogs of Labrador (I think), the proposition, as in our zoologies, so in oiu- logics, has fallen to contingent matter ; " dogs" are now " some dogs," and the inductive conclusion, petitory, particular, or false. And so on. But in logic, as in theology, — Variasse erroris est. * [What follows, on the logical doctrine of Induction, is, as it has gene- rally been admitted to be, I am convinced, true. I would, however, nou\ evolve it in somewhat diflferent language. Compare among others:—! Woollet/s Logic (p. 120, sq.) ; ManseVs Aldi'ich (App. p. 50, s^.)] ; t (See p. 137, note (*)• X [The logical relation of Reason and Consequent^ as more than a nierd corollary of the law oi Nun contradiction., in its three phases, is, I am confij dent of proving, erroneous.] INDUCTIVE SYLLOGIS-M. 159 tlien by mental synthesis collected into a whole. Logical infor- I'lice is thus of two and only of two, kinds : — it must proceed. titliery)-ow the whole to the parts, or from the parts to the ivhole ; and it is only nnder the character of a constituted or containing irhole, or of a constituting or contained part, that any thing can liecome the term of a logical argumentation. Befoi'e proceeding, we must, however, allude to the nature of tlie whole and part, about which logic is conversant. These ai'o not real or essential existences, but creations of the mind itself, in secondary operation on the primary objects of its knowledge. Things may be conceived the same, inasmuch as they are con- ceived the subjects of the same attribute, or collection of attri- butes, (i. e. of the same nature) : — inasmuch as they are conceived tlie same, they must be conceived as the parts constituent of and lontained under a ivhole : — and as they are conceived the same, (inly as they are conceived to be the subjects of the same nature, tliis common nature nmst be convertible with that whole. A logical 'i- universal whole is called a genus when its parts are thought as also containing wholes or species ; a species when its parts are thought as only contained parts or individuals. Genus and species are each called a class. Except the highest and the lowest, tlie same class may thus be thought, either as a genus, or as a species. Such being the nature and relations of a logical whole and parts, it is manifest what must be the conditions under which the two kinds of logical inference are possible. The one of these, the process from the whole to the parts, is Deductive reasoning, "r Syllogism proper); the other, the process from the parts to the whole, is Inductive reasoning. The former is governed by the rule : — What belongs {or does not belong) to the containing 1'hole, belongs {or does not belong) to each and all of the con- t'lined parts. The latter by the rule: — What belongs {or does not belong) to all the constituent parts, belongs {or does not belong) to the constituted whole. These rules exclusively determine all '"rmal inference; whatever transcends or violates them, traii- - (onds or violates logic. Both are equally absolute. It would jbe not less illegal, to infer by the Deductive syllogism an attri- bute, belonging to the whole, of something it was not conceived ko contain as a part ; than by the Inductive, to conclude of the wliole, what is not conceived as a predicate of all its constituent [•arts. In cither case, the consequent is not thought, as deter- 160 LOGIC. mined by the antecedent ; — the premises do not involve the con- clusion. The Deductive and Inductive processes are elements of logic equally essential. Each requires the other. The former is only possible through tlie latter; and the latter is only valuable as realizing the possibility of the former. As our knowledge com- mences with the apprehension of singulars, every class or univer- sal whole is consequently only a knowledge at second-hand. Deductive reasoning is thus not an original and independent pro- cess. The universal major proposition, out of which it developes the conclusion, is itself necessarily the conclusion of a foregone Induction, and, mediately or immediately, an inference, — a col- lection, from individual objects of perception, or self-consciousness. Logic, therefore, as a definite and self-sufficient science, must equally vindicate \he formal purity of the synthetic illation, by ' which it ascends to its wholes, as of the analytic illation, by which it re-descends to their parts. (See Note (*) p. 171.) j K ot only is the Deductive, thus, in a general way, dependent i for its possibility on the Inductive, syllogism ; the former is, j what has not been observed, — in principle and detail, — in whole, and in part, — in end and in means, — in perfection and imperfec-. tion, precisely a counterpart or inversion of the latter. The; attempts that have been made by almost every logician, except {pei^haps?) Aristotle,* to assimilate and even identity the two * [I said perhaps, for Aristotle in his doctrine of Induction, in fact, inipli-( cith' contradicts himself. In his development of the inductive process, he isj compelled to recognise, though he was not prepared to signalise, t/ie univer- sal quantijication of the predicate in affirmative propositions ; a quautificatioi which he elsewhere, once and again, explicitly condemns, as, in all cases absm-d. It was the detection of this his inconsistency, which first led me tr the conviction, that t\\Q predicate of an affirmative proposition jnay, formally \ or hy the laws of thougld., he universal; and from thence, again, to the coiij viction, (after this article was AVTitten), that the predicate in proposition}, both affirmative and negative, should be unexclusively quantified in logical Ian. guage, as it is in logical thought. ■ Here M. Peisse has the following note : — " This ' perhaps' is very right' for it is by no means certain that Aristotle gave to the Inductive syllogisr| a form absolutely independent. It is even more probable that he assimilate j it to the Deductive, since he appears to prescribe a conversion of the mine premise, in order to legitimate the universal conclusion, (An. Pr. II. 2,'' §4.) ; this in effect is to transform it into a syllogism of the first figure (i Barbara). It is even this passage which may have seduced subsequent log cians, admitting as it does, however, of a different inteqiretation." !: INDUCTIVE SYLLOGISM. KM [•(loesses, by reducing the Inductive syllogism to the schematic foprieties of the Deductive, — proceeding as they do on a total jiisconception of their analogy and dilferences, have contributed i» involve the doctrine of Logical Induction in a cloud of error lid confusion. The Inductive inference is equally independent, id. though far less complex, equally worthy of analysis as the L'ductive; it is governed by its own laws ; and, if judged aright, ;ust be estimated by its own standard. The correlation of the m processes is best exemplified by employing the same symbols i our ascent through an Inductive, and our re-descent through a 'eductive syllogism. Inductive. Deductive. X, y, z are A ; B is A ; X, y, z are (whole) B ; x, y, z are (under) B ; lorefore, B is A. Therefore, x, y, z are A. or or A contains x, y, z ; A contains B ; X, y, z constitute B ; B contains x, y, z ; rcfore, A contains B. Therefore, A contains x, y, z. iiese two syllogisms exhibit, each in its kind, the one natural i id perfect figure. This will be at once admitted of the Deduc- 76, which is in the first. But the Inductive, estimated, as it has iways been, by the standard of the Deductive, will appear a : onster. It appears, on that standard, only in the third figure ; * and - Aristotle, in expressing the extremes vaguely, as " the one'' and ^'■t/ie ot/ier,'' iinore accurate than the logicians, who astrict the recipi'ocating proposition 1 the minor premise. For his example is only of a single case. On the "trine, indeed, of a quantified predicate, the reciprocation maybe, [neither : inise, or in both.} i * We say— Induction appears a syllogism of the third figure, because, ]r wugh so held by logicians, it is not. [?] The mistake arose from the am- '"lity of the copula or substantive verb, which in different relations ex- •s either ^'■are contained under.,''' or " comtitute.'" Thus, taking Aristotle's Mnple:- i,i; iMan, horse, mule, are long-lived ; Man, horse, mule, are the trhole class of animals wanting bile ; jg JTherefore, the whole class of animals wanting bile arc long-lived. ie (Now here it is evident that the subject stands in a very different relation j(# tits predicate in the major and in the minor premise ; though in both cases jjf tp connexion is expressed by the same copula. In the former, the " are " J; ^presses that the predicate determines the subject as n contained pa rt ; in the Ijter, that the subject determines the predicate by constituting it a uhnle. Ex- ^„ l>citly thus : ir,2 LOGIC. then, contrary to the rule of that figure it has an universal con-- elusion.* {Analyt. Pr. i. 22, § 8). But when we look less par-i Long-lived — contains — Man, horse, mule ; Man, horse, mule, — constitute — Animal wanting bile ; Thei'efore, Long-lived — contains — Animal wanting bile. That the logicians have neglected to analyze the Inductive inference as ai independent process, and attempted to reduce it to the conditions of the De ductive ; is the cause or the effect of a primary deficiency in their technica language. They have no word to express the synthesis of a logical whok- T\ie, y^ovi\. constitute^ &c., which we have, fi'om necessity, emploved in thi sense, belongs properly to the relations of an Essential (Physical or Meta^ phj^sical) whole, and parts. [I would now express this somewhat difFertf ently ; though not varying in the doctrine itself.] ( * [It will be seen fi-om the tenor of the test, that by the year 1833, I ha! become aware of the eiTor in the doctrine of Ai'istotle and the logiciami Avhich maintains that the predicate in affirmative propositions could only I formally quantified as particidar ; nay, that Aristotle, by his practice in tli inductive syllogism, virtually contradicts the speculative precept which hi. over and over, expressly enounces for syllogism in general. It was no' however, for several years thereafter, that I made the second step ; by admi, ting in negcdive propositions a particular predicate. The doctrine of a thij roughgoiug quantification of the predicate, with its results, I have, howeve. publicly taught since the year 1840, at the latest. How this doctrine, wh(, applied, at once simplifies and amplifies the logic of propositions and of sjj logisms, it is not here requisite to state. (But see Appendix II.) I wonj only remark, in reference to certain recent misapprehensions, that my doj trine has, and could have, no novelty from a mere recognition, as possible, the eight prepositional iorm.s^—four affirmative and four negative ; — fern which I thus name and number : — Affirmative. Negative. i. Toto-total . All — is all — . Anj^ — is not any — ii. Toto-partial . All — is some — . Any — is not some— iii. Parti-total . Some — is all — . Some — is not any— iv. Parti-partial . Some — is some — . Some — is not some- Every system of logic necessarily contemplated all these ; for of these eveiy s temof the science expressly allowed some, and expressly disallowed the oth('. By Aristotle and logicians in general, of the Affirinative the even., of the 1- gative the odd, numbers are declared admissible, whilst the others are ovof rejected: — formally, at least, and of necessity ; forthuugh a universal quf tification of the predicate in affirmatives has been frequently recognised, i3 was by logicians recognised, (if not ignorantly,) as vi materia?, contingen , and therefoi'e extralogically ; nor am I aware of any previous attempt J prove, that, formally or by the laws of thought, even this proposition ha a right to claim its place in logic. It is not, therefore, on a mere enumeration oi e eight propositional forms, — far less is it on an ignorance of the ordinary ob - tion by logicians, — on a mistake of the meaning of the forms themselves, — d INDUCTIVE SYLLOGISM. W.i lally and more profoundly into the matter, our conclusion will bo M'v different. 1 a l)lindnessto the results of a thorougl) going quantificatloii of the predi- itc, that 1 Avoiild found any claim of novelty to my New Analytic. Yet on ii> groiuid it has been actually contested! — In general, I may say, that \ :ue of man}' partial manifestations of discontent witli the common doc- Inc, I know of no attempt to evince that the doctrine itself is radically ;rong. Various of these manifestations are recorded by Mr Baynes in his kcellent " Essay on the new Analytic of Logical Forms." i The thoroughgoing quantification of the predicate, in its appliance to ne- (itive propositions, has been demurred to by logicians well entitled to re- flect, who do not gainsay it in the case of affirmatives. But not only is lis application allowable, not only is it systematic, not only is it useful, — it even necessary. — For, to speak even of its very weakest form, that of parti- urtial negation, " Some — is not some — " ; this (to say nothing of its other ses) is the form, and the onh- form, which we naturally employ in dividing whole of any kind into parts : — " Some A is not some ^1." And is this form hat too inconsistently) to be excluded from logic — exempted fi-om demand ? I-But, again, to prove both the obnoxious propositions summarily, and at (ice :— what objection, apart from the arbitrary laws of our present logics, Im be taken to the following syllogism? — " All man is some animal; Any man is not (no man is) some animal ; Therefore, some animal is not some animal^ ary this syllogism of the third, to any other figui-e ; it will always be legiti- ate by nature, if illegitimate to unnatural art. Talcing it, however, as it is : -The negative minor, with its particular predicate, oflFends logical prejudice. lit it is a prepositional form, irrecusable, both as true in itself, and as ne- -). tive, the parts being conceived as constituting the whole, ip the determining notion ; whereas, in the Deductive, the pals being conceived as contained under the whole, are the detl- mined. But, in the second place, however apparently dissimilar .a figure and proportion may be the two syllogisms on this par ll standard, it will be found, if we ascend to a higher, that a c(^- mon general principle regulates a similar, nay, a one exclusje perfection in each. The perfection of figure in all syllogism lis this : — That the middle term shoxdd be the determined notiorM the proposition, the determining notion in the assumption. — In condition is realized in the first figure of the Deductive syllogii There the middle term is the subject (contained, determined :> tion) in the proposition or major premise ; and the predicate ((ji- taining, determining notion) in the minor premise or assumpto. — In like manner, in our Inductive syllogism, the middle teriife the subject (contained, determined notion) of the proposition, bl the constituent (determining notion) of the assumption. T!j, not only are the Inductive and Deductive syllogisms, in a genial sense, reversed processes ; the perfect figure of the one is ae exact evolution or involution of the perfect figure of the othei-^ The same analogy holds with their imperfections. Taking, i)r example, what logicians have in general given as the perfeed figure, but which is, in fact, an unnatural perversion of |he Inductive syllogism, {i. e. its reduction to the first figure, by m- verting the terms of the minor premise,) we shall find, lit its reversal into a Deductive syllogism affords, as we shid have anticipated, only a kindred imperfection (in the IjW figure.) i-' INDUCTIVE SYLLOGISM. KV. Inductive. Deductive. X, y, z are A ; B is A ; L I B is X, y, z ; B is X, y, z ; 'Therefore, B is A. Tlierefore, x, y, z are A. or or A contains x, y, z ; A contains B ; ill . X, y, z contain B ; x, y, z contain B ; uj, JTherefore, A contains B. Therefore, A contains x, y, z. |{ I We call this reduction of the Inductive syllogism an ttnnatural jDt, {perversion ; because, in the converted minor premise, the consti- (jj jtuent parts are perverted into a containing whole, and the con- ;]^ jtaining whole into a subject, contained under its constituent 4,. I parts. ,5. After these hints of what we deem the true nature of logical J jj 1 Induction, we return to Dr Whately ; whose account of this pro- I cess is given principally in the two following passages. I I The, Jirst: — " Logic takes no cognisance 0? Induction, fur instance, or of a fprion reasoning, &c., as distinct /t>;-;«A- of argument ; for when thrown into 'F I the syllogistic form, and when letters of the alphabet are substituted for the ta* ( terms, (and it is thus that an argiuiicnt is properly to be brought under the ifle i cognisance of logic,) there is no distinction betAveen them :— e. //. a ' Property ijjjj I which belongs to the ox, sheep, deer, goat, and antelope, belongs to all homed animals ; rumination belongs to these ; therefore to all.' This, which is an inductive argument, is e\adently a syllogism in Barbara. The essence of an inductive argument (and so of the other kinds which are dis- tinguished from it) consists not in the form of the arf/umcnt, but in the rela- tion which the subject-matter of the premisses bears to that of the conclusion." (P. 110.) — The second: — " Tn the process of reasoning by which we deduce, firom oiu" observation of certain known cases, an inference with respect to unknown ones, we are employing a syllogism in Barbara with the major pre- miss suppressed ; that being always substantially the same, as it asserts, that, ' what belongs to the individual or individuals we have examined, belongs to the whole class under which they come.' " (P. 216.) This agrees, neither with the Aristotelic doctrine, nor witli truth. We must presume, from his silence, that our author, in his analysis of the inductive process, was not aware of any essential i^i I deviation from the doctrine of Aristotle. This he does not seem to have studied, either in the Organon, or in any of its authentic expositors ; and notliing can be conceived more contradictoi-y, than the statements of the philosopher on this subject and those of Dr Whately. — Aristotle views the Inductive and tiie Deductive syllo- gisms as, in certain respects, similar in form ; in others, as diame- trically opposed. Dr Whately regarrls them asformnUy identical. 166 LOGIC. \ and only discriminated by a material difference, i. e. logically con- sidered, by no difference at all. — Aristotle regards the Deductive syllogism as the analysis of a logical whole into its parts, — as a descent from the (more) general to the (more) particular ; the Inductive as a synthesis of logical parts into a logical whole, — as an ascent from the (more) particular to the (more) general. Dr Whately, on the other hand, virtually annihilates the latter pro- cess, and identifies the Inductive with the Deductive inference. — Aristotle makes Deduction necessarily dependent on Induction; he maintains that the highest or most universal axioms wliich con- stitute the primary and immediate propositions of the former, are all conclusions previously furnished by the latter. Whately, on the contrary, implicitly asserts the independence of the syllogism proper, as he considers the conclusions of Induction to be only inferences evolved from a more universal major. — Aristotle recog- nises only a perfect Induction, i. e. an enumeration (actual or pre- sumed) of all the parts ; Whately only an imperfect, i. e. an enu- meration professedly only of some. — To Aristotle, Induction is a syllogism, apparently, of the third figure ; to Whately, a syllogism of the first. — If Whately be right, Aristotle is fundamentally wrong ; wrong in admitting Inductive reasoning within the sphere of logic at all ; wrong in discriminating Induction from Syllogism proper ; wrong in all the particulars of the contrast. But that the Philosopher is not in error is evident at once ; whereas the Archbishop's doctrine is palpably suicidal. On that doctrine, the Inductive reasoning is " a syllogism in Barbara, the major premiss being always substantially the same : — What belongs to the individual or individuals we have examined, belongs to the ivhole class under ivhich they come." \ Now, we ask : — In what manner do we obtain this major, in the evolution of which all Induction consists ? Here there are only \ f four possible answers. — 1°, This proposition, (like the dictum de omni et de nidlo, and the axiom of the convertibility of the luhole { and its parts,) it may be said is (analytically) self-evident, its nega- tion implying a contradiction. This answer is manifestly false. ^ For so far from being necessitated by the laws of thought, it is in ; opposition to them ; the whole of the consequent not being deter- ' mined in thought by the some of the antecedent. — 2°, It may be ' said, to be acquired by Induction. This, however, would be ' absurd ; inasmuch as Induction itself is, ex hypothesi, only pos- INDUCTIVE SYLLOGIS.M. IO7 sible, through and after the principle it is tliiis acUluccd to con- struct. This of the proposition as a whole. The same is also true of its parts, " Class " is a notion, itself the result of an Induction ; it cannot, therefore, he postulated as a pre-requisitc or element of that process itself. A similar remark applies to "property." — S", It may he said to be deduced front a higher axiom. What then is such axiom? That has not been declared. And if such existed, the same questions would remain to be answered regard- ing the higher proposition which are now required in relation to the lower. — 4°, It may be asserted to be (as Kant Avoukl say, synthetically) given as an idtimate principle of otir intellectual constitution. This will not do. In the Jirst place, if such princi})le exist, it only inclines, it does not necessitate. In the second, by [appealing to it, we should transcend our science, confound the I logical and formal with the metaphysical and material. In the \ third, we should thus attempt to prove a logical law from a psy- chological observation; i.e. establish an a priori, a necessary science on a precarious experience, — an experience admitteil per- fhaps by the disciples of Reid and Eoyer-Collard, but scouted by those of Gassendi and Locke.* Logicians, we already observed, have been guilty of a funda- mental error, in bringing the distinction of perfect and of imper- r'l-Ct Induction within the sphere of their science, as this distinction ] iroceeds on a material, consequently on an extralogical, difference, [n this error, however, Dr Whately exceeds all other logicians, recognising, as he does, exclusively, that Induction, which is only precariously valid, and valid only through an extralogical presump- tion. This common major premise, if stated as necessai'y, is (for- mally and materially) false ; if stated as probable, it is (formally) illegitimate, even if not (materially) untrue, both because an infe- rior degree of certainty is incompatible with an apodictic science, and because the amount of certainty itself must, if not capriciously assumed, be borrowed from evidence dependent on material con- ditions beyond the purview of a formal science, Dr Whately is not less unfortunate in refuting the opinions * "It is by induction that all axioms are known, snch as : — ' lliimjs that are equal to the same are equal to one another ; ' ' A whole is yreater than its parts;' and all other mathematical axioms." llui/she, \k 132. The sauK- doctrine is held by /////, p. 176.— Is such the Oxford Metaphysic? [This doctrine, the ingenious autiior of "The Regeneration of Metaphysics " (pp. 81, 104), chavgos also on Dr Whntcly.] 168 LOGIC. of other logicians touching Induction, than in estabhshing his own. " In this process," he says, " we are employing a syllogism in Barbara with the major premiss suppressed ; not the minor^ as Aldrich represents it. The instance he gives will sufficiently prove this : — ' This and that, and the other magnet, attract iron ; therefore so do all.' If this were, as he asserts, an enthymerae whose minor is suppressed, the only premise which we could supply to fill it up woidd be, ' all magnets are this, that, and the other ;' which is manifestly false." (P. 217.) Aldrich has faults sufficient of his own, without taking burden of the sins of others. He is here singly rej)rehended for saying ,„ only what, his critic seems not aware, had been said by all logi- I cians before him. The suppressed minor premise even obtained H in the schools the name of the Constantia ; and it was not until ' the time of Wolf * that a new-fangled doctrine, in this respect the I same as Whately's, in some degree superseded the older and cor- \ ^'" recter theory. " In the example of Aldrich," says our author, I * " the suppressed minor premiss, ' all magnets are this, that, and j the other,' is manifestly false.'" Why ? — Is it because the propo- '' sition affirms that a certain three magnets (" this, that, and the other ") are all magnets? Even admitting this, the objection is null. The logician has a perfect right to suppose this or any other material falsity for an example ; all that is required of him is, that his syllogism should be formally correct. Logic only ' proves on the hyjjotltcticql truth of its antecedents. As Magen- tinus notices, Aristotle's example of Induction is physiologically false ; but it is not on that account a whit the worse as a dialec- tical illustration. The objection is wholly extralogical. — But this is not, in fact, the meaning of the proposition. The words (in the \ original " hie, et ille, et iste magnes ") are intended to denote ! every several magnet. Aldrich borrows the instance from San- derson, by whom it is also more fully expressed : — " Iste magnes , trahit ferrum, et ille, et hie, et pariter se hahet in reliquis," &e. . — Perhaps, however, and this is the only other alternative, Dr ^ Whately thinks the assumption " manifestly false," on the ground \ that no extent of observation could possibly be commensurate i with " all magnets." This objection likewise Ues beyond the , [* I said generally " the time of Wolf; " for I recollected that some Ger- ' man logicians, prior to him, had held the same doctrine. It was however ; Wolf's authority Avhich rendered the innovation general. — M. Peisse has | here the following note : — " The germ of this doctrine is to be found in Gas- ; scndi. {Inst. Log. Pars iii. canon 11. Opera^ i. 113.")] \ INDUCTIVE PROCESS. 1,;., loinaiii of the science. The logician, qua logician, knows nothino- .t" material possibility and impossibihty. To him all is possible hat does not involve a contradiction in terms. At the same time, he present is merely the logical manner of wording the proposi- tion. The physical observer asserts on the analogy of his science, ^ This, that, the other magnet, &c., reijresent, all magnets i " vhich the logician accepting, brings under the conditions, and ranslates into tiie language of his—" This, that, the other mag- iiet, &c. are all magnets," i. e. are conceived as constituting the vhole — Magnet. Dr "Whately's errors relative to Induction are, however, sur- passed by those of another able writer, Mr Hampden, in rco-ard both to that process itself, and to the Aristotclic exposition of its lature ; — errors the more inconceivable, as he professes to have levoted peculiar attention to the subject, which he says, " de- serves a more particular notice, as throwing hght on Aristotle's yhole method of pliilosopliising, while it shows how far he ap- jroximated to the induction of modern philosophy." His words ire: — " To obtaiu an accm-ate notion of the being of anything, we require a iefinition of it. A tlefinitiou of the thing corresponds, in dialectic, with the ;ssential notion of it in metaphysics. This abstract notion, then, accord- ng to Ai-istotle, constituting the true scientific view of a thing — and all the •eal knowledge consequently of the properties of the thing depending on the •Ight limitation of this notion — some exact method of arriving at definitions ivhich should express these limitations, and serve as the principles of •ciences, became indispensable in such a system of philosophy. But in brder to attain such definitions, a process of induction was required, — not tnerely an induction of that kind, Avhich is only a peculiar form of syllogism, bnumerating all the individuals implied in a class instead of the whole class bollectively, but an induction of a philosophical character, and only diffeiing !from the induction of modern philosophy so far as it is employed about lan- guage. We shall endeavour to show this more fully. There are, then, two (kinds of induction treated of by Aristotle. The first, that of simple enume- ■ration." — (After explaining with ordinary accuracy the^Vs^, in fact the ouli/, ■species of induction, he proceeds :) — " But there is also a higher kind of induction employed by Aristotle, and pointed out by him exprtv-sly in its jsubserviency to the exact notions of things, by its leading to the right defini- jtions of them in words. As it appears that words, in a dialectical jioint of [view, are classes more or less comprehensive of obsenations on things, jit ia evident that we must gradually approximate towards a definition of jany individual notion, by assigning cla.ss within class, until we have inarrowed the extent of the expression as far as language will admit. i Annlyt. Post. ii. c. 18, § 21.) The first definitions of any object aro -lie. founded on some oV)vious rosemblancp which it exhibits compared 170 LOGIC. Avith other objects. This point of resemblance we abstract in thought, and it becomes, wlieu expressed in language, a genus or class, imder which Ave regard the object as included. A more attentive examination suggests to us less obvious points of resemblance between this object and some of those ; AA-ith Avhich Ave had classed it before. Thus earning on the analysis — and ■ by the power of abstraction giving an independent existence to those succes- 1 sive points of resemblance — we obtain subaltern genera or species, or subor- 1 diuate classes included in that original class Avith which the process of abstraction commenced. As these several classifications are relative to each ', other, and dependent on the class AA-ith Avhich Ave first commenced, the defi- ' nition of any notion requii-es a successive enumeration of the several classes' in the line of abstraction, and hence is said technically to consist of genus; i and differentia ; the genus being the first abstraction, or class to Avhich the object is first referred, and the ditferentia being the subordinate classes in the same line of abstraction. Noav, the process by which we discover these successive genera, is strictly one of philosophical induction. As in the phi- losophy of nature in general, we take certain facts as the basis of enquiry,! i and proceed by rejection and exclusion of princiijles iuA'oh'ed in the enquiry, until at last — there appearing no ground for further rejection — Ave conclude' . that Ave are in possession of the true principle of the object examined; so,i in the philosophy of language, we must proceed b}' a like rejection and ex-| elusion of notions implied in the general term Avith which we set out, uutl]| Ave reach the very confines of that notion of it Avith Avhich our enquiry is' concerned. This exclusion is eff"ected in language, by annexing to the gene-; ral term denoting the class to which the object is primarily referred, othei' terms not including under them those other objects or notions to Avhich thf^ general term applies. For thus, AAiiilst each successive term in the definition., in itself, extends to more than the object so defined, — yet all vicAved togethei, do not ; and this their relative bearing on the one point constitutes the beinj! of the things. This i thus illustrated by Ailstotle : — ' If we are enquiring,; he says, ' what magnanimity is, we must consider the instances of certairj magnanimous persons whom aa-c know, what one thing they all have so fai| forth as they are such ; as, if Alcibiades was magnanimous, or Achilles, oj '. Ajax; — AA'hat one thing they all haA'e ; say, impatience wider insult ; foron<' made war, another raged, the other sleAv himself. Again, in the instance;. of others, as of Lysander or Socrates — if here it is , to be unaltered by prospe i rity or adversity ; — taking these two cases, I consider, what this apatJnjii, regard to events, and impatience under insult, have the same in them. If; now, they haA^e nothing the same, there must be two species of magnani! mity.' " (P. 513.) ] Mr Hampden afterwards states, inter alia, that the inductioi| of Aristotle, " having for its object to determine accurately ii' words the notion of the being of things, proceeds, according t" the nature of language, from the general, and ends in the parti > cular ; whereas the investigation of a laAV of nature proceeds froE; the particular, and ends in the general. Dialectical induction ij synthetical, whilst philosophical induction is analytical in thj INDUCTIVE PROCESS. 171 'a result." On this ground, he explains the moaning of the term '^ (i-Kuyayri), and defends the Induction of Aristotle against its dis- paragement by Lord Bacon. We had imagined, that every compend of logic explained tlu' two grand methods of Livestigating the Dejinition; but upon look- ing into the Oxford treatises on this science, we were surprised ti» tind, that this, among other important matters, had in all of them been overlooked. This may, in part, enable us to surmise, Iiow Mr Hampden could have so misconceived so elementary a jtoint, as to have actually reversed the doctrine, not only of Aristotle, but of all other philosophers. A few words will be sutlicient to illustrate the nature of the error. In the thirteenth chapter (Pacian division) of the second book of the Posterior Analytics, Aristotle treats of the manner of hunting out, as he terms it, the essential nature (to t/ kart, quidditas) of a )iL ithing, the enunciation of which nature constitutes its definition. ■'!■ |This may be attempted in two contrary ways. — By the one, we *'■ [may descend from the category, or higher genus of the thing to '. pe defined, dividing and subdividing, through the opposite differ- ,,, ences, till we reach the genus under which it is proximately ,(t icontained ; and this last genus, along Avith the specific difference m jby which the genus is divided, will be the definition required. — ''^' iBy the other, we may ascend from the singulars, contained under tlic thing to be defined, (which is necessarily an universal,) by an xclusion of their differences, until we attain an attribution com- mon to them all, which attribution will supply the definition r^ sought. — The former of these is, after Plato, called by Aristotle, fc ^nd logicians in general, the method of Division; the higher '*' cenus being regarded as the (universal) ivhole, the subaltern '^^^ genera and species as the (subject) parts into which it is dividc •^xs/ffToy), was taken, apart from the qualifications under iwhich that illustrious thinker advanced the proposition, (viz. that )this was only by accident, inasmuch as hearmg is the sense of (sound, and sound contingentl}' the vehicle of thought) ; and was .alleged to prove, what was in fact the very converse of its true import, that the deaf are wholly incapable of intellectual instruc- tion. In like manner, a dogma of the physicians, which remounts we jbelieve to Galen, that dumbness was not, as Aristotle had affirmed, jin general a mere consequent of deafness, but the effect of a com- jmon organic lesion of the lingual and auditory nerves, arising as |they do from a neighbouring origin in the brain, — was generally jidmitted as conclusive against the possibility of a deaf person being [taught to articulate sounds. It was, therefore, with great wonder ^nd doubt, that the first examples of the falsehood of these assumj)- j!:ions were received by the learned. The disabilities which the 'p.oman law, and the older codes of every European jurisprudence, imposed on the deaf and dumb, were all founded in the ftrinciple, I — " Surdus natus, mutusest et jAane indiseiplliiabilis," as the great P'rench jurist, Molinaeus expresses it. Rodolphus Agricola, who died in 1485, is the oldest testimony rre recollect to a capacity in the deaf and dumb of an intelligent 178 - DEAF AND DUMB. education ; and it is remarkable, that there is none older. In tht last chapter of his posthumous work, De hwentione Dialectica, as an illustration of " the immense and almost incredible power of the human miud," he instances " as little less than miraculous, wha he himself had witnessed, — a person deaf from infancy, and consej quently dumb, who had learned to understand writing, and, as i| possessed of speech, Avas able to write down his whole thoughts.'j — Ludovicus Vivos, some fifty years later, in his treatise De Anmw (L, ii. c. De Discendi ratione), after noticing that Aristotle hat' justly styled the ear the organ of instruction, expresses hi " wonder that there should have been a person born deaf an ; dumb who had learned letters : let the belief in this, rest wit Rodolphus Agricola, who has recorded the fact, and affirmed ths' he himself beheld it." The countrymen of the unbelieving Vivt were, however, destined, in the following generation, to be tl^ inventors of the art in question. For — The oldest indication we have, of any systematic attempt i[ educating the deaf, is by Franciscus Vallesius, the celebrate Spanish physician, who, in his Philosophia Sacra, pubhshed : 1590, mentions that " a friend of his, Petrus Pontius, a Benedi tine monk, taught the deaf to speak by no other art than instruc ing them first to write, then pointing out to them the objects si nified by the written characters, and finally guiding them to the motions of the tongue, &c., which correspond to the characters What more is now ac'complished ? Petrus Pontius — who was Spaniard, and not to be confounded with the celebrated Scoti: Joannes Poncius, Minorite, and native of Ireland — did not publi an account of his method. This, however, was done by Jo Paul Bonnet, of Arragon, secretary to the Constable of Casti,, who, in 1620, printed, in Spanish, at Madrid, his Reduction '" Letters, and Art of Instructing the Dumb. That this work i' Bonnet contains only the practice of Pontius, is proved by 1 5 evidence of Perez in the book itself, and by that of Antonius i liis Bibliotheca Hispanica. Of the signal success of the art in M hands of Pontius, (among others on two brothers and a sister f the Constable of Castile,) we have accounts by Antonius, j Morales ; and a very curious one by Sir Kenelm Digby, f what he himself saw in the younger brother of the Constal', when he accompanied Charles L, when Prince of Wales, in s expedition into Spain, and to whom he appeals as a fellow-witr is with himself. DALGARNO. i;,, •'There was a nobleman of groat quality that I knew in Spain, the youngi-r brother of the Constable of Castile, who was taught to heare the sounds uf Ml; jU'orrfs with his eyes (if that expression may be pennitted). This Spanish ,1, Lord was bom deafe, so deafc that if a gun were shot olf close by his eare he could not heare it, and consequently he was dumbe ; for not being able to ■^ 'heare the sound of words, he could never imitate nor understand thorn : The '' lovelinesse of his face, and especially the exceeding life and spu-itfuluesso of slif his eyes, and the comelinesso of bis person, and the whole composure of his fc l. Ibody throughout, were pregnant signes of a well-tempered mind within. And therefore all that knew him lamented much the want of meanes to cul- [tivate it, and to embrue it with the notions, which it seemed to be capable jof, in regard of itself, had it not been crossed by this unhappy accident, which ''' Ito reniedie physicians and chyrurgions had long employed their skill, but all ti linvaine. At the last there was a priest, Avho undertooke the teaching him il jto understand others when they spoke, and to speake himselfe that others T. imight understand him, for which attempt at first he was laughed at, yet after , isome yearcs he was looked upon as if he had wrought a mii-acle. In a word, 'after strange patience, constancie, and paines, he brought the young lord to ispeak as distinctly as axij man Avhatsoever ; and to understand so perfectly K Iwhat others said, that he would not lose a Avord in a Avhole dayes convcrsa- ,|(j jtion. I have often discoiirsed with the priest whilst I Avaited upon the Prince of Wales (noAv our gi'acious SoA^ereign) in Spain, and I doubt not l)Ut his Majesty remembreth all I have said of him, and much more : for his Majesty « |was veiy cm-ious to observe, and enquire into the utmost of it. It is true, BtK lone gi'eat misbecomeinguesse he was apt to fall into, AAiiilst he spoke : which ciii jwas an uncertainty iu the tone of his voyce, for not hearing the soimd he uil made when he spoke, he could not steadily governe the pitch of his voyce, (but it would be sometimes higher, and sometimes loAver, though for the most jpart what he delivered together he ended in the same key as he began it. ''' iBut when he had once suffered the passage of his voyce to close, at the open- fe jng it again, chance, or the measure of his earnestness to speak or reply, A gave him his tone, which be was not capable of moderating by such an arti- fice, as is recorded Caius Gracchus used, when passion iu his orations to the people, drove out his voice with too great a vehemency or shrilnesse. He could discerne in another whether he spoke shrill or Ioav; and he avouUI repeat after any bodie any hard word Avhatsoever, Avhich the Prince tried often, not only in English, but by making some Welchmen that serA'cd his Ilighnesso speak words of theii- language, Avhich he so perfectly ecchocd, that I confusse I wondered more at that than at all the rest, and his master himself Avould acknowledge that the rules of his art reached not to produce that eft'ect Avith "^ any certainty. And, therefore, concluded this in him must spring from other mles he had framed unto himselfe out of his OAvn attentive obsei-vation ; which the advantages Avhich nature had justly given him in the sharpnesse of senses to supply the want of this, endowed him Avith an ability and saga- city to do beyond any other man that had his hearing. He expressed it, safely, in a high measure by his so exact imitation of tlie Welch i)ronuncia- tion; for that tongue (like the HebroAv) emi>loyoth much the guttural letters, [-tf» land the motions of that part Avhich frameth tiiem cannot be seen or judged |by the eye, othenvise than by the effect they may hapjiily make by consent 180 DEAF AND DUMB. iu the other paits of the mouth exposed to view. For the knowledge he had of what they said sprung from his observing the motions they made, so that he could converse cun-ently in the light, though they he talked with whis- pered never so softly. And I have seen him at the distance of a large cham- bers breadth say words after one, that I standing close by the si>eaker could not hear a syllable of. But if he were in the darke, or if one turned his face out of his sight, he was capable of nothing one said." — (Treatise of Bodies. ) The prejudice was now dispelled, that the deaf and dumb were incapable of education ; and during the course of the seyenteenth century, many examples are recorded of their successful instruc- tion without even the aid of a teacher experienced in the art. Though nothing can be clearer than the right of Spain to original invention of this art in all its branches, we, however, firn it claimed, at a much later period, and in the same year, (1670), by Lana, the Itahan Jesuit, in his Prodromo ; and for Dr John WalUs, Professor of Geometry in Oxford, in the Transactions oi' the lioyal Society of London. The precepts of the former art; neither new nor important ; and the latter can only vindicate hi'l originality by an ignorance of what had previously been effected: Wallis appears to have long (that is, before the appearance of Dal garno's work) apphed himself mainly to the comparatively unini' portant point of enabUng the deaf to euunciiite words. Withou imderviiluing the merit of his treatise on the nature and pronuni ciation of letters, in the introduction to his English grammar, o'\ the success of bis principles in enabling the deaf to speak, — allthi' had been previously done by others with equal ability and succes.'; The nature of letters, the organic modifications for the productio; of the various vocal sounds, had been investigated by Fahricius a Aquapendente\n'hi& treatise De Lociitione; and thereafter wit j remarkable accuracy and minuteness by P. 3Iontam(S in h' Account of a New Art called the Art of Speech, pubHshed in Hoi land many years prior to the grammar of Dr Wiillis : — wliile Bo)\ net, in the work already mentioned, had, in the first book, treats j " of the nature of letters and theu- pronunciation among differeij nations," and in the second, "showed how the mute maybe taugi the figure and pronunciation of letters by manual demonstratio and the motion of the mouth and hps." — Wallis's originality Ci' indeed hardly be maintained in relation even to English writers To say nothing of Lord Bacon's recommendation of " t ' motions of the tongue, lips, throat, palate, &c., which go to t! making up of the several letters, as a subject worthy of inquiry John Biihver liad. in tlie year 1648, published his curious tn! DALGARNO. IRl iBf entitled, — " Philocophuft, or the Deafe and Dumbe Man's Hend, exhibiting the philosophical verity of that subtile art, which ay {liable one with an observant eie, to heare what ant/ )nan speak^i If the moving of his lips. Upon the same ground, icith the advan- ce of an historical ejcemplification, apparently proving, that a 5rtn borne deafe and dumbe, may be taught to heare the sounds of i>rcfe with his eie. and thence learn to speak ivith his tongue. By iB. sir named the Chirosopher. London, 1648." iBulwer appears to have been ignorant of Bonnet's book, but 1' records manv remarkable cases, several within his own expe- Knee, of what had been accomplished for the education of the ([af. He. was the first also to«recommend the institution of " an ^ademy of the mute," and to notice the capacity which deaf irsons usually possess of enjoying music through the medium of s teeth — a fact which has latterly been turned to excellent ficount, especially in Germany : and there principally by Father iybertson, a monk of the Scots College of Ratisbon, by whose tjertions a new source of instruction and enjoyment has thus lien opened up to those otherwise insensible to sounds. It is lUarkable that Bulwer, who had previously written a work c " Chirologia, or the Natural Language of the Hand," and \»o had thence even obtained the surname of the Chirosopher, ^Duld have suggested nothing in regard to a method of speaking c| the fingers ; and it is still more singular that his attention was J called to this device, as he himself has mentioned a remark- e case in which it had been actually apphed. " A pregnant Sample," he says, " of the oflicious nature of the touch, in sup- ,. f[nng the defect or temporall incapacity of the other senses, we . hve in one Master Babington, of Burntwood, in the county of , Ijsex, an ingenious gentleman, who, through some sicknesse, looming deaf, doth, notwithstanding, feele words, and, as if he ^ h|l an eye m his finger, sees signes in the darke ; whose wife dis- ;. Cjirseth very perfectly with him by a strange way of arthrologie, , ©alphabet, contrived on the joynts of his fingers, who, taking , hp by the hand in the night, can so discourse with him very ,. eictly ; for he feehng the joynts which she toucheth for letters, , bj them collected into words, very readily conceives what she wuld suggest to him." (P. 106.) ' \\'e pass over Holder's " Elements of Speech. An E.'^say if I firry into the Natural Production of Letters, with an Appendix struct Persons Deaf and Dumb;" and Sibscotes " Deaf and 182 DEAF AND DUMB. Dumb Man's Discotirse," which were puhhshed in the interval between WaUis's practical application of his method and the appearance of Dalgarno's book. Dalgarno, we beheve, may;; claim the merit of having first exhibited, and that in its most per-i| feet form, a finger alphabet. He makes no pretensions, however! to the original conception of such a medium of communication; But the great and distinctive merit of his treatise is not so much: that it improved the mechanism of instruction, as that it correctec', the errors of his predecessors, and pointed out the principles oi -. which the art is founded, and by the observance of Avhich alori' it can be carried to perfection. As we first attempt to fix ani communicate our notions by the arid of speech, it was a naturt: prejudice to believe that sounds were the necessary instrument c thought and its expression. The earlier instructors of the def and dumb were thus led to direct their principal effort to tli teaching their pupils to distinguish the different mechanical mov< ments by which different sounds are produced, and to imitat, these sounds by imitating the organic modification on which the; depend. They did not consider that still there existed no souii for the deaf; that the signs to which they thus attached ide- were only perceptions of sight and feehng ; that these were, « the one hand, minute, ambiguous, fugitive, and, on the oth(| difficult; and that it would be better to associate thought with; system of signs more easy to produce, and less liable to be m.- taken. The honour of first educating the deaf and dumb in t' general principles of grammar, and in primarily associating th thought with written instead of with spoken symbols, is genera claimed for the eighteenth century, France, and the Ahhe J VEpee. All this was, however, fully demonstrated a centu' before in the forgotten treatise of our countryman, as in a gr i measure also practised by Pontius, the original inventor of ';) art, a century before Dalgarno. We are indebted, as we forme '' observed, to Mr Dugald Stewart for rescuing the name of I- garno from the oblivion into which it had fallen; and the follr- ing quotation from that distinguished philosopher affords their t competent illustration of his merits : — " After having thiis paid the tribute of my sincere respect to the euli| ■ enecl and benevolent exertions of a celebrated foreigner (Sicard), I ■!' myself called on to lay hold of the only opportunity that may occur to e of rescuing from oblivion the name of a Scottish writer, Avhose merits 1 '' been strangely overlooked, both by his contemporaries and by his succes; »• The person I allude to is George Dalgarno, who, more than a hundred A i DALGARNO. is.x thirty years ago, was led, by his own sagacity, to adopt, a /^y/o//, tlic same general conclusion concerning the education of the dumb, Dtwliich the expe- rimental discovery, and the happy application, have, in our times, rellected such merited lustre on the name of Sicard. I mentioned Dalgarno formerly, ill a note annexed to the first volume of the ' Philosophij of the Human Alind,' a- the author of a very ingenious tract, entitled ' Ars Sit/nonmi,' from Avliich ^t appears indisputably that he was the precursor of Bishop Wilkins in his (speculations concerning a real character and a philosophical language ; and [it now appears to me equally clear, upon a further acquaintance witli the short fragments which he has left behind him, that, if he did not lead the {way to the attempt made by Dr Wallis to teach the dumb to speak, he had iconceived views with respect to the means of instructing them, far more pro- Sfound and comprehensive than any we meet with in the works of that learned Avriter prior to the date of Dalgarno's publications. On his claims iin these two instances, I forbear to enlarge at present ; but I cannot deny iQiyself the satisfaction of transcribing a few paragraphs in justification of What I have already stated Avith respect to the remarkable coincidence '!ietween some of his theoretical deductions, and the practical results of the Trench Academician. •• ' I conceive there might be successful addresses made to a dumb child, ven in its cradle, when he begins n'su coynoscere matretn, if the mother or lurse had but as nimble a hand, as commonly they have a tongue. For instance, I doubt not but the words hand, foot, dog, cat, hat, &c., written fair, pnd as often presented to the deaf child's eye, pointing from the words to :he things, and vice versa^ as the blind child hears them spoken, would be known and remembered as soon by the one as the other ; and as I think the i'ye to be as docile as the ear, so neither see I any reason but the hand might "■ made as tractable an organ as the tongue, and as soon brought to form, f not fair, at least legible characters, as the tongue to imitate and echo back iirticulate sounds.' ' The difficulties of learning to read on the common plan, pre so gi'eat, that one may justly wonder how young ones come to get over hem. Xow, the deaf child, under his mother's tuition, passes securelj^ by ill these rocks and quicksands. Tlie distinction of letters, their names, heir powers, then- order, the dividing words into syllables, and of them again luikiug words, to which may be added tone and accent — none of these luzzling niceties hinder his progi-ess. It is true, after he has passed the liscipline of the nursery, and comes to learn grammatically, then he must jegin to learn to know letters written, by theii- figures, number, and order.' " The same autlior elsewhere observes, that ' the soul can exert her "iwers by tlie ministry of any of the senses; and therefore, when she is It-prived of her principal secretaries, the eye and ear, then she must be con- ' uted with the service of her lackeys and scullions, the other senses; which SIC no less true and faithful to their mistress than the eye and the ear, but i"t so quick for despatch.' ■' I shall only add one other sentence, from which my readers will be iiabled, M'ithout any comment of mine, to perceive with what sagacity and MLcess this very original thinker had anticipated some of the most refincil xperimcntal conclusions of a more enlightened age. " ' My design is not to give a methodical system of grammatical rules, but 184 DEAF AND DUMB. only siicli general directions, whereby an indnstrious tutor may bring his deaf pupil to the vulgar use and on of a language, that so he may be the more capable of receiving instruction in the lion, from the rules of grammar, when his judgment is ripe for that study ; or, more plainly, I intend to bring the way of teaching a deaf man to read and -m-ite, as near as possible to that of teaching young ones to speak and understand theii- mother-tongue.' " In prosecution of this general idea, he has treated, in one very short chapter, of A Deaf Man's Dictionary, and in another of A Grammar for Deaf Persons, both of them containing (under the disadvantages of a style uncommonly pedantic and quaint) a variety of precious hints, from which, if I do not deceive myself, useful practical lights might be deriVd, not only by such as may undertake the instruction of such pupils, as Mitchell or JNIassieu, but by all who have any concern in the tuition of children during the first stage of their education. " That Dalgamo's suggestions with respect to the education of the dumb, ' were not altogether useless to Dr Wallis, will, I think, be readily admitted by those who take the trouble to compare his letter to JNIr Beverley (pub- ' lished eighteen years afterDalgarno's treatise) with his Tractatus de Loquela, published in 1653. In this letter, some valuable remarks are to be found on the method of leading the dumb to the signification of words ; and yet the j name of Dalgarno is not once mentioned to his con-espondent." i We may add, that Mr Stewart is far more lenient than Dr : Walhs' disingenuity merited. Wallis, in his letter to Mr Bever- ;• ley, has plundered Dalgarno, even to his finger alphabet. It is \ no excuse, though it may in part account for the omission of Dal- garno's name, that Dalgarno, whilst he made little account in, general of the teaching of the deaf and dumb to speak, had, in his chapter on the subject, passed over in total silence the very remarkable exploits in this department of " the learned and my worthy friend Dr Wallis," as he elsewhere styles him. On this subject, indeed, it seems to have been fated, that every writer should either be ignorant of, or should ignore, his predecessors.. Bulwer, Lana, and Wallis, each professed himself original ; Dal- garno entitles his Didascalocophus " the first, (for what the author knows) that had been published on the subject;" and Amman whose Surdus Loquens appeared only in 1692, makes solemn oath " that he had found no vestige of a similar attempt in any pre- vious writer." The length to which these observations have run on the Phi locophus, would preclude our entering on the subject of the othei treatise — the Ars Signorum, were this not otherwise impossible within the limits of the present notice. But indeed the mos general statement of the problem of an universal character, an< of the various attempts made for its solution, could hardly b DALGARNO. 18r. mipriscd within the longest article. At the same time, regard- iir as we do the plan of a philosophical language, as a curious leoretical idea, but one which can never be practically realized, ur interest in the several essays is principally limited to the in- onuity manifested by the authors, and to the minor philosophi- j1 truths incidentally developed in the course of these discus- ions. Of such, the treatise of Dalgarno is not barren ; but that hich principally struck us, is his remarkable anticipation, on jeculative grounds, a priori, of what has been now articulately fFOved, a posteriori, by the Dutch philologers and Ilorne Tookc, ito say nothing of the ancients), — that the parts of speech are all oducible to the noun and verb, or to the noun alone. VI.-IDEALISM. •lit ^ tale"' ! m getap WITH REFERENCE TO THE SCHEME OF ARTHUR COLLIER. (April, 1839.) 1. Metaphysical Tracts hy English Philosophers of the Eighteenth Century. Prepared for the Press by the late Rev. Samuel Parr, D.D. 8vo. London : 1837. 2. Memoirs of the Life and Writings of the Rev. Arthur Collier, M.A., Rector of Langford Magna, in the County of Wilts. From A.D. 1704, to A.D. 1732. With some Account of hk Family. By Robert Benson, M.A. 8vo. London : 1837. We deem it our duty to call attention to these publications : for in themselves they are eminently deserving of the notice of the few who in this country take an interest in those higher spe- culations to which, in other countries, the name of Philosophy is exclusively conceded ; and, at the same time, they have not been ushered into the world with those adventitious recommendations which might secure their intrinsic merit against neglect. The fortune of the first is curious. — It is known to those who have made an active study of philosophy and its history, that there are many philosophical treatises written by English authors, — in whole or in part of great value, but, at the same time, of ex- treme rarity. Of these, the rarest are, in fact, frequently the most original : for precisely in proportion as an author is in ad- vance of his age, is it likely that his works will be neglected ; and the neglect of contemporaries in general consigns a book, — espe- cially a small book, — if not protected by accidental concomitants, at once to the tobacconist or tallow-chandler. This is more particu- larly the case with pamphlets, philosophical, and at the same time polemical. Of these we are acquainted with some, extant jierhaps only in one or two copies, which display a metaphysical ENGLISH INDIFFERENCE TO PIIILOSOIMIY. is? talent unappreciated in a former age, but which would command the admiration of the present. Nay, even of Enghsh philoso- phers of the very highest note, (strange to say !) there are now actually lying unknown to their editors, biographers, and fellow- metaphysicians, published treatises, of the highest interest and : importance ; [as of Cudworth, Berkeley, Collins, &c.] j We have often, therefore, thought that, Averc there w4th us a pubhc disposed to indemnify the cost of such a publication, a col- i lection, partly of treatises, partly of extracts from treatises, by Enghsh metaphysical wu'iters, of rarity and merit, would be one of no inconsiderable importance. In any other country than Britain, such a publication Avould be of no risk or difficulty. Al- most every nation of Europe, except our own, has, in fact, at present similar collections in progress — only incomparably more ambitious. Among others, there are in Germany the Corpus Philosophoriim, by Gfrocrer ; in France, the Bibliotheque P/iilo- ,plnque des Temps Modernes, by Bouillet and Garnier ; and in Italy, the Collezione de' Classici Metafisici, &c. Nay, in this country itself, we have pubhshing societies for every department of forgotten literature — except Philosophy. But in Britain, which does not even possess an annotated edi- tion of Locke, — in England, where the universities teach the little philosophy they still nominally attempt, like the catechism, by rote, what encouragement could such an enterprise obtain ? It did not, therefore, surprise us, wdien we learnt that the pub- lisher of the two works under review, — when he essayed what, in the language of " the trade " is called " to subscribe " The Metaphysical Tracts, found his brother booksellers indisposed to \ enture even on a single copy. — Now, what Avas the work which Mur hterary purveyors thus eschewed as w^ormwood to British taste ? The late Dr Parr, whose erudition was as unexclusivo as pro- found, had, many years previous to his death, formed the plan of reprinting a series of the rarer metaphysical treatises, of J^^nglish authorship, which his remarkable hbrary contained. With this view, he had actually thrown off a small impression of five such tracts, with an abridgement of a sixth ; but as these probably formed only a part of his intended collection, which, at the same time, it is known he meant to have prclaced by an introduction, rontaining, among other matters, an historical disfpiisition on Idealism, with special reference to tlic pliilixophy of CoHier. tln> 188 IDEALISM. publication was from time to time delayed, until its completion was finally frustrated by his death. When his library was subse- quently sold, the impression of the six treatises was purchased by Mr Lumley, a respectable London bookseller ; and by him has recently been published under the title which stands as Number First at the head of this article. The treatises reprinted in tliis collection are the following : — " 1. Clavis Universalis; or a neic Inquiry after Truth: being a demonstra- tion of the non-existence or impossibility of an external icorld. By Arthm- Collier, Rector of Langforcl Magua, near Sanmi. London : 1713. 2. A specimen of True Philosophy ; in a discom'se on Genesis, the first chapter and the first verse. By Arthur Collier, Eector of Langford Magua, near Sarum, Wilts. Not improper to be boirnd up with his Clavis Universalis. Sarum: 1730. 3. (An abridgement, by Dr Parr, of the doctrines maintained by Collier in his) Logology, or Treatise on* the Logos, in seven sermons on John 1. verses 1, 2, 3, 14, together with an Appendix on the same subject. 1732. 4. ConjecturcB qucedam de Sensu^ Motu, et Idearum generatione. (This was first published by David Hartley as an appendix to his Epistolary Disser- tation, De Lithoutriptico a J. Stephens nuper invento (Leyden, 1741, Bath, 1746) ; and contains the principles of that psychological theory which he afterwards so fully developed in his observations on ^lan.) 5. An Inquiry into the Origin of the Human Appetites and Affections., show- ing how each arises from Association, irith an account of the entrance of Moral Evil into the world. To which are added some remarks on the independent scheme which deduces aU obligation on God's part and man's from certain abstract relations, truth, &c. Written for the use of the young gentlemen at the Universities. Lincoln*: 1747. (The author is yet unknown.) 6. Man in quest of himself ; or a defence of the Individuality of the Human Mind., or Self Occasioned by some remarks in the Monthly Review for July 1763, on a note in Search's Freewill. By Cuthbert Comment, Gent. London : 1763. (The autlior of this is Search himself, that is, Mr Abraham Tucker.)" These tracts are undoubtedly well worthy of notice ; but to the first — the Clavis Universalis of CoUier — as by far the most in- teresting and important, we shall at present confine the few obser- vations wliich we can afi'ord space to make.* This treatise is in fact one not a little remarkable in the his- tory of pliilosophy ; for to Collier along with Berkeley is due the honour of having first explicitly maintained a theory of Absolute Idealism ; and the Clavis is the work in which that theory is developed. The fortune of this treatise, especially in its own * {^It never rains but it pours. Collier's Cfar/s was subsequently reprint- ed, in a very handsome form, by a literary association in Edinburgli. Would that the books wanting reimpression, were first dealt with !] i FATE OF THE CLAVIS UNIVERSALIS. 18<) •ountry, has been very different from its deserts. Though the legation of an external workl had been incidentally advanced by Berkeley in liis Principles of Human K)iowledge some three >rears prior to the appearance of the Clavis Universalis, with ,vhich the publication of his Dialogues between Hylas and Philo- \ious was simultancons ; it is certain that Collier was not oidy Ivholly unacquainted with Berkeley's speculations, but had de- ay ed promulgating his opinion till after a ten years' meditation. )Otli philosophers are thus equally original. They are also nearly in a level in scientific talent ; for, comparing the treatise of Jollier with the writings of Berkeley, we find it little inferior in inetaphysical acuteness or force of reasoning, however deficient it nay be in the graces of composition, and the variety of illustra- ion, by which the works of his more accomplished rival are dis- inguished. But how disproportioned to their relative merits has )een the reputation of the two pliilosophers ! AMiile Berkeley's >ecame a name memorable throughout Europe, that of Collier was itterly forgotten : — it appears in no British biography ; and is lot found even on the list of local authors in the elaborate history f the county where he was born, and of the parish where he was lereditary Rector ! Indeed, but for the notice of the Clavis by Or Reid (who appears to have stumbled on it in the College liibrary of Glasgow), it is probable that the name of Collier would lave remained in his own country absolutely unknown — until, lerhaps, our attention might have been called to his remarkable viitings, by the consideration they had by accident obtained from he philosophers of other countries. In England the Clavis Uni- I rsalis was printed, but there it can hardly be said to have been "blished; for it there never attracted the slightest observa- i "n ; and of the copies noAV known to be extant of the original ■'iition, " ?iumerus vix est totklem, quot Theharum portce vel divitis ostia A7//." The public hbraries of Oxford and Cambridge, as ]\Ir Benson 'bserves, do not possp.ss a single copy. There are, howevci', wo in Edinburgh ; and in Glasgow, as we have noticed, there is mother. The only country in which the Clavis can truly be said to have •u hitherto pubhshed is Germany. Ill the sixth supplemental volume of the A<-ta Eruditoriim 190 IDEALISM. (1717) there is a copious and able abstract of its contents. Through this abridgement the speculations of Collier became known — particularly to the German philosophers ; and we re- collect to have seen them quoted, among others, by Wolf and Biljinc/er. In 1756 the work was, however, translated, without retrench- ment, into German, by Professor Esclienhach of Rostock, along il ■ with Berkeley's Dialogues between Hylas and Philonous, These two treatises constitute his " Collection of the most distinguished Writers who deny the reality of their own body and of the whole corporeal world," — treatises which he accompanied with " Coun- ter observations, and an Appendix, in which the existence of mat- ter is demonstrated :" These are of considerable value. [I have spoken of them, in Stcwar.t's Dissertation, Note SS.] Speaking of Colher's treatise, the translator tells us : — " If any book ever cost me trouble to obtain it, the Clavis is that book. Every ex- ertion was fruitless. At length, an esteemed friend, Mr J. Selk.j |i candidate of theology in Dantzic, sent me the work, after I had abandoned all hope of ever being able to procure it The preface is wanting in the copy thus obtained — a proof that ii was rummaged, with difficulty, out of some old book magazine- It has not, therefore, been in my power to present it to the curi: ous reader, but I trust the loss may not be of any great import; ance." — In regard to the preface, Dr Eschenbach is, however mistaken ; the original has none. \ By this translation, which has now itself become rare, the worl' was rendered fully accessible in Germany ; and the philosopher of that country did not fail to accord to its author the honour du to his metaphysical talent and originality. The best comparativj view of the kindred doctrines of Collier and Berkeley is indee' given by Tennemann (xi. 399, sq.) ; whose meritorious Histor i of Philosophy, we may observe, does justice to more than on; English thinker, whose works, and even whose name, are in h i own country as if they had never been ! I Dr Reid's notice of the Clavis attracted the attention of ifcj Dugald Stewart and of Dr Parr to the Avork ; and to the nomin I celebrity which, through them, its author has thus tardily attaiij ed, even in Britain, are we indebted for Mr Benson's interestirj Memoirs of the Life and Writings of Arthur Collier : forming tlj second of the two publications prefixed to this article. What wj COLLIER'S BIOGllArilY. 101 (is inducement and what his means for the execution of tliis task, ie biographer thus informs us. I Arthur ColUer was born in 1C80. He was the son of Arthur |!ollier, Rector of Langford-IMagna, in the neighbourhood of Sahs- ury — a hving, the advowson of which had for about a century pen in possession of the family, and of which his great-grand- jither, grandfather, father, and himself, were successively incum- tents. With his younger brother, AVilliam, who w\as also destined 'V the Church, and who obtained an adjoining bencfico, he re- ived his earlier education in the grammar-school of Salisbury. 1 1697 he was entered of Pembroke College, Oxford ; but in 10 following year, when his brother joined him at the University, u iiey both became members of Balliol. His father having died ' ^ 1697, the family living was held by a substitute until 1704, ; then Ai'thur, having taken priest's orders, was inducted into the y. Lectory, on the presentation of his mother. In 1707 he married i. i niece of Sir Stephen Fox; and died in 1732, leaving his wife, , lith two sons and two daughters, in embarrassed circumstances, lii pf the sons : — Arthur became a civihan of some note at the Com- •L lons ; and Charles rose in the army to the rank of Colonel. Of [o daughters : — Jane was the clever authoress of The Art of In- ., .Moiisly Tormenting ; and Mary obtained some celebrity from }('. b,ving accompanied Fielding, as his wife's friend, in the voyage liich he made in quest of health to Lisbon. Collier's family is w behoved to be extinct. , I Besides the Clavis Universalis (1713), The Specimen of True i: philosophy (1730), and the Logology (1732), Collier was the ithor of two published Sermons on controversial points, which ive not been recovered. Of his manuscript works the remains J, re still considerable, but it is probable that the greater propor- m* [on has perished. Our author w^as hardly less independent in his ;ji ^ligious, than in his philosophical, speculations. In the latter ho las an IdeaUst ; in the former, an Arian (like Clarke,) — an Apol- jt' qarian, — and a High Churchman, on grounds which high church- jien could not understand. Of Collier as a parish priest and a -jl jieologian, Mr Benson supplies us with much interesting informa- jon. But it is only as a metaphysician that we at present consider fm ; and in this respect the Memoirs form a valuable supi)lcmcnt •jjii |> the Clavis. Besides a series of letters in exposition of iiis phi- phical system, they afford us, what is even more important, 192 IDEALISM. an insight into the course of study by which Colher was led U his conclusion. AYith philosophical hterature he does not appeal to have been at all extensively conve'^-- int. His writings betray no intimate acquaintance with the woi k, o? the great thinkers o antiquity ; and the compends of the German Scheiblerus and of thi Scottish Baronius, apparently supplied him with all that he kne\ of the Metaphysic of the Schools. Locke is never once aUude( to. Descartes and Mallebranche, and his neighbour Mr ^Norris were the philosophers whom he seems principally to have studied and their works, taken by themselves, were precisely those bes adapted to conduct an untrammelled mind of originahty and bold uess to the result at which he actually arrived. Without entering on any general consideration of the doctrin of Ideahsm, or attempting a regular analysis of the argument (| ColUer, we hazard a few remarks on that theory, — simply wit; the view of calhng attention to some of the pecuhar merits of oi author. i Mankind in general believe that an external world exists, oiil| because they believe that they immediately know it as exister.l As they believe that they themselves exist because conscious of. self or e(/o ; so they beheve that something different from thei- selves exists, because they beheve that they are also conscious this not-self ov non-ego. In the first place, then, it is self-evident, that the existence ■ the external world cannot be doubted, if we admit that we do, we naturally believe we do, — know it immediately as existent, the fact of the knoivledge be allowed, the fact of the existence ca not be gainsaid. The former involves the latter. But, in the second place, it is hardly less manifest, that if c natural belief in the knowledge of the existence of an exteri. world be disallowed as false, that our natural belief in the em- ence of such a world can no longer be founded on as true. T', marvellous to say, this has been very generally done. For reasons to wliich we cannot at present advert, it has b( almost universally denied by philosophers, that in sensitive p ception we are conscious of any external reality. On the contra tliey have maintained, with singular unanimity, that what we ,' immediately cognitive of in that act, is only an ideal object in ' mind itself. In so far as they agree in holding this opinion, j losophers may be called Idealists in contrast to mankind in gene: > ,1 IDEALISM IN GENERAL. Ipmd a few stray speculators who may be called Realists —Xnfural Realists. In regard to the relation or import of this ideal object, philoso- phers are divided ; and this division constitutes two great and apposing opinions in philosopliy. On the one hand, the majority lave maintained that the ideal object of which the mind is consci- )us, is vicarious or representative of a real object, unknown iin- •diately, or as existing, and known only mediately through this ideal substitute. These philosophers, thus holding the exist- ence of an external world — a world, however, unknown in itself, lind therefore asserted only as an hypothesis, may be appropri- itely styled Cosmothetic Idealists — Hypothetical or Assumptive Bealists. On the other hand, a minority maintain, that the ideal [)bject has no external prototype; and they accordingly deny |he existence of any external world. These may be denominated ho Absolute Idealists. Each of these great genera of Idealists is, however, divided ind subdivided into various subordinate species. The Cosmothetic Idealists fall primarily into two classes, inas- Quch as some view the ideal or representative object to be a ertium quid different from the percipient mind as from the •epresented object ; while others regard it as only a modification •f the mind itself, — as only the percipient act considered as repre- entative of, or relative to, the supposed extei-nal reality. The ormer of these classes is again variously subdivided, according 5 theories may diifer in regard to the nature and origin of the icarious object ; as whether it be material or immaterial, — whe- her it come from without or rise from within, — whether it ema- late from the external reality or from a higher source, — whether t be infused by God or other hyperphysical intelligences, or whe- her it be a representation in the Deity himself,— whether it be Qnate, or whether it be produced by the mind, on occasion of {lie presence of the material object within tlie sphere of sense, kc. &c. 0{ Absolute Idealism only two principal species arc possible; t least, only two have been actually manifested in the history of •liilosophy; — the Theistic and the Egoistic. The former sup- loses that the Deity presents to the mind the appearances which re are determined to mistake for an external world ; the latter upposes that these appearances arc manifested to consciousness. a conformity to certain unknown laws, by the mind itself. The N 194 IDEALISM. Tlieistic Idealism is again subdivided into three ; according as God is supposed to exhibit the phrenomena in question in his own substance, — to infuse into the percipient mind representative entities different from its own modification, — or to determine the ; ego itself to an illusive representation of the non-ego* \ Now it is easily shown, that if the doctrine of Natural Realism be abandoned, — if it be admitted, or proved, that we are deceived ■ in our belief of an immediate knowledge of aught beyond the! mind ; then Absolute Idealism is a conclusion philosophically ; inevitable, the assumption of an external world being now an assumption which no necessity legitimates, and which is therefore j philosophically inadmissible. On the law of parsimony it must; be presumed null. ; It is, however, historically true, that Natural Realism had been long abandoned by philosophers for Cosmothetic Idealism, before the grounds on which this latter doctrine rests were shown to he unsound. These grounds are principally the following : — 1.) — In i\\Q first place, the natural belief in the existence of an: external world w^as allowed to operate even when the natural belief of our immediate knoivledge of such a world was argued to be false. It might be thought that philosophers, when they maintained that one original belief was illusive, would not con, tend that another Avas veracious, — still less that they wouk assume, as true, a belief which existed only as the result of v behef which they assumed to be false. But this they did. Thi; , Cosmothetic Idealists, all deny the validity of our natural belie; ( in our knowledge of the existence of external things; but w^; find the majority of them, at the same time, maintaining that sucli existence must be admitted on the authority of our natural belie' of its reality. And yet, the latter belief exists only in and throug the former ; and if the former bo held false, it is, therefore, C all absurdities the greatest to view the latter as true. Thu| Descartes, after arguing that mankind are universally delude' in their conviction that they have any immediate knowledge ( aught beyond the modifications of their own minds ; again argu( ! that the existence of an external world must be admitted,-; because, if it do not exist, God deceives, in impressing on us ' belief in its reality ; but God is no deceiver ; therefore, &c. Thj * [For a more detailed view of these distinctions, see Dids. on Reid, p 816 — 819 ; Compare also above, pp. 61, sq.'] IDEALISM IN GENERAL. ly;, iL'asoning is cither good for nothing, or good tor more than Dcs- i artos intended. For, on the one hand, if God be no deceiver, \ic did not deceive us in our natural belief that we know some- thing more than the mere modes of self; but then the funda- mental position of the Cartesian philosophy is disproved : and if, on the other hand, this position be admitted, God is thereby Iconfesscd to be a deceiver, who, having deluded us in the belief [on which our belief of an external world is founded, cannot be •consistently supposed not to delude us in this belief itself. Such imelancholy reasoning is, however, from Descartes to Dr Brown, the favourite logic by which the Cosmothctic Idealists in general attempt to resist the conclusion of the Absolute Idealists. But on this ground there is no tenable mediimi between Natural Real- ism and Absolute Idealism. It is curious to notice the different views, which Berkeley and Collier, our two Absolute Idealists, and which Dr Samuel Clarke, the acutest of the Hypothetical Reahsts with whom they both came in contact, took of this principle. Clarke was, apparently, too sagacious a metaphysician not to -' c that the proof of the reality of an external world reposed ■mainly on our natural belief of its reality ; and at the same time |that this natural beUef could not be pleaded in favour of his jliypothesis by the Cosmothctic Idealist. He was himself conscious, [that his philosophy afforded him no arms against the reasoning of [the Absolute Idealist ; whose inference he was, however, inclined neither to admit, nor able to show Avhy it should not. Whiston, in his Memoirs, speaking of Berkeley and his Idealism, says: — • He was pleased to send Dr Clarke and myself, each of us, a jbook. xVfter we had both perused it, I went to Dr Clarke and jdiscoursed with him about it to this effect : — That I, being not la metaphysician, was not able to answer Mr Berkeley's subtile premises, though I did not at all believe his absurd conclusion, I. therefore, desired that he, who was deep in such subtilities, liut did not appear to believe Mr Berkeley's conclusions, would iiiswer him ; u'hich task he declined." Many years after this, as \\ e are told in the Life of Bishop Berkeley, prefixed to his works : — " There was, at Mr Addison's instance, a meeting of Drs Clarke ^ind Berkeley to discuss this speculative point; and great hopes Iwere entertained from the conference. The parties, howevei', ^eparated without being able to come to any agreement. Dr Berkeley declared himself not well satisfied with the conduct of lye IDEALISM. his antagonist on the occasion, who, though he could not ansu't-r. had not candour enough to own himself convinced." Mr Benson affords us a curious anecdote to the same eifect in a letter of Colher to Clarke. From it we learn, — that when Collier originally presented his Clavis to the Doctor, through a friend, on reading the title, Clarke good-humouredly said : — " Poor gentleman ! I pity him. He would be a philosopher, but has chosen a strange task ; for he can neither prove his point himself, nor can the contrary be proved againt him." In regard to the two Idealists themselves, each dealt with this ground of argument in a very diiferent way ; and it must be con- fessed that in this respect Collier is favourably contrasted with ; Berkeley. — Berkeley attempts to enlist the natural belief of man- kind in his favour against the Hypothetical Realism of the phi-j : losophers. It is true, that natural belief is opposed to scien- tiiic opinion. Mankind are not, however, as Berkeley reports, Idealists. In this he even contradicts himself ; for, if they be, in truth, of his opinion, why does he dispute so anxiously, so learn- edly against them ? — Collier, on the contrary, consistently rejects all appeal to the common sense of mankind. The motto of hif; work, from Mallebranche, is the watchword of his philosophy :— i " Vidgi assensus et ajiprohatio circa materiam difficilera, est cer'^ turn arguraentum fcdsitatis istius opinionis cui assentitur." Anti in his answer to the Cartesian argument for the reahty of matter from " that strong and natural inclination which all men have t( believe in an external world ; " he shrewdly remarks on the in consistency of such a reasoning at such hands : — " Strange That a person of Mr Descartes' sagacity should be found in S'l plain and palpable an oversight ; and that the late ingenious M ; Norris should be found treading in the same track, and that to upon a solemn and particular disquisition of this matter. Tha^ whilst, on the one hand, they contend against the common ir, chnation or prejudice of mankind, that the visible world is nc, external, they should yet appeal to this same common inclinatio for the truth or being of an external world, which on their prir ciples must be said to be invisible ; and for which therefore (the must needs have known if they had considered it), there neithc is, nor can be, any kind of inclination." (P. 81.) 2.) — In the second place, it was very generally assumed i antiquity, and during the middle ages, that an external wor was a supposition necessary to render possible the fact of oi IDEALISM, WHY SO LATE? l.»7 --cnsitivc cognition. The philosoplicrs who held, that the iniine- iliate ohject of perception was an emanation from an onter reality, and that the hypothesis of the latter was reqnisitc to account for the phamomenon of the former, — their theory involved the exist- ence of an external world as its condition. Bnt from the moment that the necessity of this condition was abandoned, and this was done by many even of the scholastic philosophers ; — from the imoment that sensible species or the vicarious objects in perccp- jtion were admitted to be derivable from other sources than the jexternal objects themselves, as from God, or from the mind |itself : from that moment we must look for other reasons than the preceding, to account for the remarkable fact, that it was not until after the commencement of the eighteenth century that a [doctrine of Absolute Ideahsm was, wnthout communication, con- itemporaneously promulgated by Berkeley and Collier. 3.) — In explanation of this fact, we must refer to a third -round, which has been wholly overlooked by the historians of .philosophy ; but which it is necessary to take into account, would we explain how so obvious a conclusion as the negation of the existence of an outer world, on tlie negiition of our immediate knowledge of its existence, should not have been drawn by so acute a race of speculators as the philosophers of the middle ages, to say nothing of the great philosophers of a more recent epoch. This ground is : — Tliat the doctrine of Idecdism is incom- \patible with the Catholic doctrine of the Eucharist. It is a very jerroneous statement of Reid, in which, hoAvever, he errs only in icommon with other philosophers, that " during the reign of the {Peripatetic doctrine., ive find no appearance of scejyticism about \t1ie existence of matter." On the contrary, during the dominance of the scholastic philosophy, we find that the possibility of the non-existence of matter was contemplated ; nay, that the reasons in support of this supposition were expounded in all their cogency. We do not, however, find the conclusion founded on these reasons formally professed. And why ? Because this conclusion, though philosophically proved, was theologically disproved ; and such disproof was during the middle ages sufficient to prevent the overt recognition of any speculative docti-ino ; for with all its ingenuity and boldness, philosophy during these ages was con- fessedly in the service of the church,— it was always Philo.t God, in fact, object to the sense the species representing an ex- 'crnal world, that tcorld, in rcali/g, not existing ? To these qucs- ious the answer is, always in the first instance, affirmative. ^Vhy bhen, the possibihty, the probabjlity even, being admitted, was he fact denied Philosophically oi-thodox, it was theologically leretical ; and their principal argument for the rejection is, that ju such hypothesis, the doctrine of a transubstantiated cucha- |:ist becomes untenable. A change is not, — cannot be, — (spiritu- ally) real. Such was the special reason, why many of the acuter School- nen did not follow out their general argument, to the express legation of matter ; and such also was the only reason, to say lOthing of other Cartesians, why MalUbranche deformed the simplicity of his peculiar theory with such an assxniiptive hors foBuvre, as an unknown and otiose universe of matter. It is, ndeed, but justice to that great philosopher to say, — that if the ncumbrance with which, as a Catholic, he was obhged to burden t, be thrown off his theory, that theory becomes one of Absolute Idealism ; and that, in fact, all the principal arguments in sup- JDort of such a scheme are found fully developed in his immortal \lnquiry after Truth. This ]\Iallebranche well knew ; and know- lug it, we can easily understand, how Berkeley's interview with iui ended as it did.* Mallcbranche thus left little for his Protestant successors to do. jThey had only to omit the Catholic excrescence ; the reasons vin- i heating this omission they found collected and marshalled to their ' [I cannot, however, concur in the praise of novolty and invention, which :.i~ always been conceded to the central theoiy of Mallebrauche. His l76-/o?i of all things in the Deity,"" is, as it appears to me, simply a transfer- ; -nee to man in the flesh, to the Viator, of that mode of cognition, maintained by many of the older Catholic divines, in explanation of how the Saints, as iisembodied spirits, can be aware of human invocations, and, in general, of what passes upon earth. '' They perceive,^'' it is said, " all thinys in (iudy So that, in tnuh, the philosophical theoiy of Mallcbranche, is nothing but the extension of a theological h>iwthesis, long common in the schools ; and with scholastic speculations, Mallcbranche was evin intimately acquainted. This hypothesis I had once occasion to express : — " Quidquid, in his tenebris vit ditiou, his scholastic subtlety, with his contempt for scholastic authoy, obtained for him the title of Lux Mundi and Magister Contradictivnum. Jn religious opinions, he was the forerunner of Luther. He is not to be JQ- founded (as has been done) with the famous preacher, Joannes^ vai'ic.ly called Wesalius, de Wessalia, and even Wesselus^ accused by the Dominiins of suspicious iutercom-se with the Jcavs, and, through their influence, unjiUy condemned for heresy in 1479, by the Ai-chbishop of Mentz. RISE OF HUMANE STUDIES IN GERMANY. 207 : j'ehemius, Joscphns Horlenius. (tlic master of Moscllaiuis.) ■■: |udolphus Hcringius, xVlcxandcr i\Ioppcnsis, Tilcmannus MoIUtus. ! |he master of Rivius,) Sec, who, as able schoolmasters, propagated ,10 improvement in education and letters throughout tlic north of ovniany. A similar reform was effected by Co7int Spiegclbcrg in the :- phool of Emmerich. Hegiiis, a man of competent learning, but of unrivalled talents" ; a practical instructor, became rector of the school of Davcnter ; id he can boast of having turned out from his tuition a greater imbcr of more illustrious scholars than any pedagogue of modern nos. Among his pupils were, Desiderius Erasmus, Hermannus iischius, Joannes Ca?sarius, Joannes Murmellius, Joannes Glan- jrpius, Conradus Mutianus, Hermannus Torrentinus, Bartho- ;i maeus Coloniensis, Conradus Goclcnius, the Aedicollii, Joannes -J id Serratius, Jacobus Montanus, Joannes Peringius, Timannus ^ amenerius, Gerardus Lystrius, Matthjeus Frissemius, Ludolphus ,■! eringius, &c. Nor must Ortuinus Gratius be forgotten. ,■; Dringenherg transplanted the discipline of Zwoll to Schlecht- j adt in Alsace; and he eifected for the south of Germany what Ij 's colleagues accomplished for the north. Among his pupils, who ,.. anost rivalled in numbers and celebrity those of Ilegius, were ,,- ^nradus Celtes, Jacobus Wimphelingius, Beatus Ehenanus, f- .)annes Sapidus, Bilibald Pirkheimer, John von Dalberg, Fran- „: 15CUS Stadianus, George Simler, (the master of Melanchthon,) f, ad Henricus Bebelius, (the master of Brassicanus and Ilcinrich- [[ ann.) ^ Liher taught successfully at Kempten and Amsterdam ; and, when ;; ^ivenfrom these cities by the partisans of the ancient barbarism, "^ s finally established himself at Alcmar. The most celebrated of "^ ;3 pupils were Pope Hadrian VI., Nicolaus Clenardus, Alardus l^ I Amsterdam, Cornelius Crocus, and Christophorus Longolius. ,,j The genius of Agricola displayed the rarest union of originality, li < ?gance, and erudition. After extorting the reluctant admiration '^ < the fastidious scholars of Italy, he returned to Germany, where ^ h writings, exhortation, and example, powerfully contributed to '^ ] omote the literary reformation. It was only, however, in the i\ ]:ter years of his sliort life, that he was persuaded by liis friend, It 'in Dalberg, Bishop of Worms, to lecture publicly (though i> (clining the status of Professor) on the Greek and Roman 'Withers; and he delivered, with great a])plause, a few courses, 208 EPISTOLiE OBSCURORUM VIRORUM. alternately at Heidelberg and Worms. Celtes and Buschius wer among his auditors. There is no hyperbole in his epitaph by , great Italian : — " Scilicet hoc imo meruit Germauia, laudis Quicquid habet Latinm, Graecia qiiicquid habet." The first restorers of ancient learning in Germany were thu almost exclusively pupils of a Kempis or of his disciples. Ther was, however, one memorable exception in John Reuchlin (Joai nes Capnio), who was not, as his biographers erroneously asser a scholar of Dringenberg at Schlechtstadt.* Of him we are agai, to speak. We have been thus particular, in order to show that the aw., kened enthusiasm for classical studies did not in Germany origi ate in the Universities; and it was only after a strenuous oppositic from these bodies that ancient hterature at last conquered its r' cognition as an element of academical instruction. At the peri( of which we treat, the prelections and disputations, the cxamin tions and honours, of the different faculties, required only an s, quaintance with the barbarous Latinity of the middle ages. T new philology was thus not only a Jwrs cVceuvre in the academic system, or, as the Lcipsic Masters expressed it, a " fifth wheel the waggon;" it was abominated as a novelty, that threw the si cient learning into discredit, diverted the studious from the Ui versities, emptied the, schools of the Magistri, and the bursas • colleges over which they presided, and rendered contemptible t; once honoured distinction of a degree.f * His coimcxiou with Zwoll and the Brethren of St Jerome may, howc^ , be established through Jolm Wessel, from whom he learned the elementhf Hebrew. t " Attamen intellexi," wi-ites Magister Unkenbnnck to Magistor Grat!., " quod habetis paucos auditores, et est querela vestra, quod Buschius et (;- sarius trahuiit vobis scholares et supposita abiude, cum tameu ipsi uou sc'.t ita expoucre Poetas allegorice, sicut vos, et supcrallegare sacram scriptur i. Credo quod diabolus est in illis Poetis. Ipsi destruunt omnes University;, et audivi ab uno antique Magistro Lipscnsl, qui fuit Magister 36. annov i, et dixit mihi, qiiando ipse fuisset inveuis, tunc ilia Universitas bene st( i- set : quia in viginti milliaribus nullus Poiita fuisset. Et dixit etiara, ci tunc supposita diligenter compleverunt lectiones suas formales et materisp) sen bursales : et fuit magnum scandalum, quod aliquis studens iret in plsti, et non haberet Petrum Hispanuni, aut Parva Logicalia sub bracliio. lisi fuerunt Graramatici, tunc portabant Partes Alexandri, vel Vade Medn. vel Exercitium Puerorura, aut Opus Minus, aut Dicta loan. Sinthen. I OPPOSITION TO IIUMANK STUDIES. 201) In possession of power, it is not to bo supposed that the patrons if scholasticism would tamely allow themselves to be stripped of •eputation and influence ; and it did not require the ridicule with vhich the " Humanists," or " Poets," as they were styled, now issailed them, to exasperate their spirit of persecution. Greek in :)articular, and polite letters in general, were bi-anded as hereti- kl;* and, while the academical youth hailed the tirst lecturers i.n ancient literature in the Universities, as " messengers from lleaven," t the academical veterans persecuted these intruders jcholis advertebant diligenter, et habuerunt in honore Magistros Artium, et uando vidcrnnt imum Magistnnn, tunc fuenuit pcrterriti, quasi viderent ;iium Diaboliun. Et dicit ctiam, quod pro tuuc, (piatcr iu anno proniovL'- antur Bacculaurii, et semper pro una vice sunt sexagiuta aut quinquagiuta. )t illo tempore Universitas ilia fuit multum in floro, et quando unus stetit er aunum cum dimidio, fuit promotns in Bacculaurium, et per tres annos at duos cum dimidio, in Magistrum, Et sic parcntes eorum fiierunt con- ?nti, et libenter cxposuerunt pecunias ; quia videbant, quod filii sui vcne- mt ad bonores. Sed nunc supjiosita volant audire Virgiliuni et Plinium, ; alios uovos autores, et licet audiunt per quinquc annos, tamen non pro- loventm-. Et dixit mihi amplius talis Magister, quod tempore suo fuerunt uo millia studentes in Lyptzick, et Erfordise totidem. Et Vieun;e quatuor lillia, et Coloniai etiam tot, et sic de aliis. Nunc autem in omnibus Uni- rsitatibus non sunt tot supposita, sicut tunc iu ima, aut duabus. Et Rla- -tri Lipsenses nunc valde conqueruntur de paucitate suppositorum, quia oiita; faciuut eis damnum. Et quando parentes mittunt filios suos iu bur- is, et collegia, non volunt ibi manere, sed vadunt ad Poctas, et student quitias. Et dixit mihi, quod ipse Liptzick olim habuit quadraginta domi- llos, et quando ivit in ecclesiam, vel ad forum, vel spaciatum in rubetum, no iverunt post enm. Et fuit tunc magnus excessus, studere in Poetria. t quando unus conlitebatur in confessione, quod occulte audivit Virgilium ) uno Bacculaurio, tunc Sacerdos imponebat ei magnam pcenitentiam, vide- !et, jejunare singulis sextis feriis vel orare quotidie septem Psalmos pani- ntiales. Et juravit mihi in conscientia sua, quod vidit, quod unus magis- indus fuit rejectus, quia unus de examinatoribus semcl in die fcsto vidit sum legere in Tercntio. Utiuam adhuc staret ita in Universitatibus !" ets. '^g^ Zpist. Ol)s. Vir. — Vol. II. ep. 46. See also among others, Vol. II. ep. 58 jtjjj id 63. We quote these epistles by number, though this be mai'ked iu uone 0^ the editions. 5 iiii * " Hajre.ois," says Erasmus, speaking of these worthies, — " h«resis est l)(j(! Uteloqui, hoeresis GraJce scire ; quicquid ipsinon intelligunt, quicquid ipsi (tijs! n faciuut, hasresis est. In unum Capnionem clamatur, quia linguas cal- (gs; •" (Opera III. c. 517. ed. Clerici.) See also Peutinger, in Jipist. ad j.,jj| mchl (sig. A ii.) Hutten, Prarf. Xtminis. jjlii' [t " Onmino fervcbat opus," says Cruciger, " et desercbantur tractatiuues •,b' lioris doctrina; atque futilis, et uitor elegantiaque di.sciplin;e politioris ex- uiljantur. Tunc Lipsiam Ricarriii.s Crocus. Britanmis, qui in (lallia o 210 EPISTOL^ OBSCURORUM VIRORUM. as " preachers of perversion," and " winnowers of tlie devil's chaff," * Conradus CeUes, Hermannus Buschius, and Joannes Rhagius Aesticanipianus, were successively expelled from Leipsic;f other universities emulated the example. The great University of Cologne stood, however, " proudly eminent " in its hostility to the new intelligence ; for improvement was there opposed by the united influence of the Monks and Masters. When Von Lange commenced his reformation of the school of Munster, a vehement auditor fuerat Hieronymi Alexaudri [Aleandri], veuit, anno Chr. MDXV' [MDXIV], professusque doctrinam Gvajcarum litterarum, omnium araorera favoremque statim est maximum consecutus : quod liujus liuguaj non prim- ordia, ut aliqui ante ipsum, sed integram atque plenam scientiam illius; afFerre, et posse banc totam explicare, docereque videretur. Negabat mens! pater, cvedibile nunc esse id, quod ipse tunc cognoverit. Tanquam ccelituil demissmnj Crocum omnes veneratos esse aiebat, uuumquemque se felicemi judicasse, si in familiaritatem ipsius insinuaretur : docenti vero et mercedem.) qua3 postularetur, persolvere ; et quocumque loco temporeque pra3sto esse; recusavisse nemiuem ; si conciibia nocte se conveniri, si quamvis longe extrf ; oppidumjussisset, omnes libenterobsecutifuissent." (Loc. Comm.) (Amonj; the Declamations of Melanclitlion, see Oratio de Initiis, &c. and Oratio dij Vita Trocedorfii ; see also Camerarius, (the pujjil of Croke,) in the Preface; to his Herodotus, and in his Life of Melanchthon.) Dr Croke (afterwardi an agent of Henry VIH. in the affair of the divorce, and Public Orator c' Cambridge) was the first Professor of Greek in Leipsic, and the first authof of a grammar of that language, published in Germany. He founded thai school which, under his successor, Sir Godfrey Hermann, is now the chitj fountain of Hellenic literature in Eiu-ope. His life ought to be written. Si! Alexander Croke, in his late splendid history of the family, has collecte! some circumstances concerning this distinguished scholar ; but a gi'eat de; of interesting information still remains ungathered, among his own and tl : writings of his contemporaries. We could fill a page with mere references! * Buschu\i\\[\m\ Humanitatis, ed. Burckhardi, p. 15. In Leipsic, humai* letters were styled by the theologians, Dcemonum cibus, DcBmonum opsoniw ' Aegyptiae ollae, virulentae Aegyptiorum dapes. (Pauegyricum Lipsiens; Theologi. — Praef. Lipsiae, 1514.) ; t We have before us an oi'ation of Aesticanipianus, delivered in 1511, ti his departure from Leipsic, ait^r \\\q public schools had been closed again! him by the faculty of arts. We extract one passage — " Quem enim po(; arum eloquentium non sunt persecuti patres vestri, et quem vos ludibrio n habuistis, qui ad vos expoliendos, quasi ccelitus sunt demissi? Nam, ut| multis paucos referarn, Couradum Celten pene hostiliter expulistis ; Hernia; num Buschium diu ac midtum vexatum ejecistis ; Joannem quoque Aesticar planum variis machinis oppugnatum, tandem evertitis. Quis tandem Poi arum ad vos vcniet? Nemo, hercle, nemo. luculti ergo jejunique vivef fcedi animis et inglorii, qui, nisi poenitentiam egeritis, damnati omnes imn rieminiy \ M PERSECUTION OF THE HUMANISTS AND OF HEICMIMN. -jn monstrance "vvas transmitted from tlio faculties of Colojjne t<> 10 bishop and chapter of tliat see, reprobating the projected iano;e in the schoolbooks hitherto in use, and remonstrating gainst the introduction of pagan autliors into the course of juvo- ile instruction. Foiled in this attempt, the obscurants of that ?nerable seminary resisted only the more strenuously every ifort at a reform within Cologne itself. They oppressed and i;legated, one after another, Bartholomajus Coloniensis, the two edicolhi (Joannes and Serratius), Joannes IMurmellius, Joannes laBsarius, and Ilermannus Buschius, as dangerous innovators, ;ho corrupted the minds of youth l)y mythological fancies, ,id the study of unchristian authors. Supported, however, V Count Nuenar, dean of the canonical chapter, and the ifluence of his own rank, Buschius, a nobleman by birth, the fjholar of Hegius, and friend and schoolfellow of Erasmus, stood h ground even in Cologne, against the scholastic zealots ; and, tough thrice compelled to abandon the field of contest, he finally acceeded in discomfiting, even in their firmest stronghold, the «emies of hght. Phny and Ovid were read along with Boethius m Sedulius ; the ancient school-books — the Doctrinale of Alex- der, the Disciplina Scholarum, the CafJwlicon^ the Mammo- ictus, (Mammaetractus,) the Gemma Gemmarum, the Laby- thus, the Dormisecure, &c. &c., were at last no longer, even in ^)logne, recognised as of exclusive authority ; and, within a few liars after their disgrace in this fastness of prescriptive barbarism, tpy were exploded from all the schools and universities through- (|t the empire. In this difficult exploit Buschius was aided by ll-asmus, Hutten, Melanchthon, Torrentinus, Bebelius, Simlcr, &c. IThis was, however, but a skirmish, compared with another Midred and simultaneous contest ; and the obstinacy of Buschius, i defence of classical Latinity, only exasperated the theologians CI Cologne to put forth all their strength in opposition to Beuch- 1 , a still more influential champion of illumination, and in sup- j3Ssion of the more obnoxious study of Hebrew. The character of Reuchlin is one of the most remarkable in tit remarkable age; for it exhibits, in the highest perfection, a cnbination of equalities which are in general foimd incompatible. i once a man of the world and of books, he excelled equally in pictice and speculation; was a statesman and a philosoj)hcr, a i(ii jjist and a divine. IS^obles, and princes, and emperors, honoured n with their favour, and employed him in their most difficult 212 EPISTOL.E OBSCURORUM VIRORUM. affairs ; while the learned throughout Europe looked up to him as the " trilingue miraculum," the " phoenix litterarum," the " eruditorum aAfpct." In Italy, native Romans listened with plea- sure to his Latin declamation ; and he compelled the jealous Greeks to acknowledge that " Greece had overflown the Alps." Of his countrymen, he was the first to introduce the study of ancient literature into the German Universities ; the first who opened the gates of the east, unsealed the word of God, and un- veiled the sanctuary of Hehrew wisdom. Agricola was the only German of the fifteenth century who approached him in depth of i classical erudition ; and it was not till after the commencement of the sixteenth, that Erasmus rose to divide with him the admira- ! tion of the learned. As an Oriental scholar, Reuchlin died with- 1 out a rival. Cardinal Fisher, who " almost adored his name," I made a pilgrimage from England, for the sole purpose of visiting ' the object of his worship; and that great divine candidly con-) fesses to Erasmus, that he regarded Reuchlin as " bearing offj from all men the palm of knowledge, especially in what pertained! to the hidden matters of religion and philosophy." At the period of which Ave speak, Reuchlin, withdrawn from academical tuition' to the conduct of political affairs, was not, however, unemployed! in peaceably promoting by his writings the cause of letters;' when suddenly he found himself, in the decline of life, the victinj of a formidable persecution, which threatened ruin to himself, anc) proscription to his favourite pursuits. The alarming progress of the new learning had at last conj vinced the theologians and philosophers of the old leaven, tha' their credit was only to be restored by a desperate and combineij effort, — not against the partisans, but against the leaders of th literary reformation. " The two eyes of Germany " were to b extinguished ; and the theologians of Cologne undertook to dei with Reuchlin, while Erasmus was left to the mercies of thai brethren of Louvain. The assailants pursued their end wit, obstinacy, if not with talent ; that they did not succeed, showej that the spirit of the age had undergone a change, — a chan^; which the persecutions themselves mainly contributed to accon phsh. It was imagined that Hebrew literature, and the influence Reuchlin, could not be more effectually suppressed, than I rendering both the objects of religious suspicion. In this a' tempt, the theologians of Cologne found an appropriate instr! HISTORY OF THE REUCHLINIAN PROCESS. -JIS lent in John Pfeffci-korn, a Jew, who had taken refuge in liristianlty from the punishment which his crimes had merited t the hands of his countrymen.* In the course of the years "03 and 1509, fourf treatises (three in Latin, one in German) rvc published under the name of the new convert ; the scope of hieh was to represent the Jewish rehgion in the most odious j,ht. The next step was to obtain from the Emperor an edict, iminanding that all Hebrew books, with exception of the Bible, lould be searched for, and burned, throughout the empire ; on ic ground, that the Jewish literature was nothing but a collec- )n of libels on the character of Christ and Christianity. The iltivation of Hebrew learning would tlnis be rendered impos- ;jle, or at least discouraged ; and, at the same time, it was pro- ubly expected that the Jews would bribe liberally to evade the • cecution of the decree. Maximilian was, in fact, weak or negli- :iit enough to hsten to the misrepresentation, and even to bestow u Pfefferkorn the powers necessary to carry the speculation into l^'ect ; but some informaUty having been discovered, in the terms th."-^ It was this contest, indeed, which first jirovcd that the uions were awake, and public opinion again the paramount tri- mal. In this tribunal the cause of Ileuchhn was in reality ■cided, and his triumph had been long complete before it was a-mally ratilied by a papal sentence. Ileuchlin's victory, in Liblic opinion, was accomplished by a satire ; of Avhich, the ana- lema on its publication by the holy see, only gave intensity to 16 effect. — But to return. ■ Hoogstraten now cited licuchlin before the court of Inquisition Mentz, (1513.) ReuchHn dechned Hoogstraten as a judge ; ■ was his personal enemy, and not his provincial; and when lesc objections were overruled he appealed to the Pope. This peal, notwithstanding, and in contempt of a sist on the pro- dings by the Elector of Mentz, Hoogstraten and his thcologi- il brethren of Cologne condemned, and publicly burned the litings of Reuchhn, as " offensive, dangerous to religion, and ivouring of heresy ; " and to enhance the infamy, they obtained mm the Sorbonne of Paris, and the Theological Faculties of pntz, Erfarth, and Louvain, an approval of the sentence. Their Kumph was wild and clamorous, but it was brief. On Ileuchlin's jppeal, the Pope had delegated the investigation to the Bishop of * EDgland, for example, sent to the " army of the Reuchlinists," Mure, sher, Lynacre, Grocyn, Colct, Latimer, Tiinstall, and Ammonius of Lucca ; omnes," says Erasmus to Reuclilin, " Grtecc docti prreter Coletuni ; (but ! we know from Erasmus, Colet soon made of that language an assiduous udy.) {Epist. ill. Vir. ad Reuchl. L. II. sig. Ti.) We may notice that lis rare and interesting collection has five letters of Erasnuis, not to be und in any edition of his works. t Jo. Ciesarius {Ep. ad Reucld. Lib. II. sig. X. iii.) and Eobanus Ilessus bid. Z. i.) [See Reuchlin's letter at tiie end of this articli-.] XEpUt. ad Reuchl. Lilt. II. sig. ('. iii. [and in De Wette's LiUlin's Brief e, 196.] 216 EPiSTOL.i: OBSCURORUM VIRORUM. Spires ; and that prelate, Avithout regard to the determinations ot the reverend faculties, decided summarily in favour of Reuchlin, and condemned Hoogstraten in the costs of process, (1514.) Ij was now the Inquisitor's turn to appeal ; [but Reuchhn likewist cited him to Rome.*] The cause was referred by Leo to a bod\ of commissioners in Rome ; and Hoogstraten, amply furnisher with money, proceeded to that capital. The process thus pro tracted, every mean was employed by the Dominicans to secun a victory. In Rome, they assailed the judges with bribes am intimidation. In Germany, they vented their malice, and endea, voured to promote their cause by caricatures and libels, amonj which last the Tocsin (Sturmglock,) ostensibly by Pfefferkori; was conspicuous ; while the pulpits resounded with calumnie; against their victim. , Amid this impotent discharge of squibs, there was launchec' from an unknown hand, a pasquil against the persecutors ( Reuchhn. It fell among them like a bomb, scattering disma* and ruin in its explosion. This tremendous satire was the " Epi' tolce Obscurorum Virorum ad venerahilem virum Magistrw, Ortuinum Gratium." Its purport is as follows : — Before the commencement of his persecution, Reuchhn hs published a volume of letters from his correspondents ; and Reucl' hn's enemy, Ortuinus, is now, in hke manner, supposed to pri' a volume of the epistles addressed to him by friends of his. B whilst the correspondents of Ortuinus were, of course, any tliii; but less distinguished than those of Reuchlin, the former is sui posed to entitle his collection — " Epistolse Obscurorum Virorum .■ Ortuinum," in modest ridicule of the arrogance of the " Epista Illustrium Virorum ad Reuchlinum, virum nostra aetate doctis[ mum.'" ^ The plan of the satire is thus extremely simple:— | make the enemies of Reuchlin and of pohte letters represe; themselves ; and the representation is managed with a truth . nature, only equalled by the absurdity of the postures in whi the actors are exhibited. " Barhare ridcntar harhari" say H ■ ten himself and Erasmus of the Epistles : and never, certain i, * [See the letter of Reuchlin (now priuted for the first time) at the endf the article.] t See E. O. V. Vol. II. Ep. 1. Dr Muench is wrong in supposing tit " EpistolfE Obscurorum Virorum," means " Briefe der Finstcrlinge." '.'^ original title does not sufficiently conceal the satire; the translated opey declares it. CIIARACTEU OF THE SATIRE. 217 fere unconscious barbarism, self-glorious ignoi-anco, intolerant Itupidity, and sanctimonious immorality, so ludicrously delineated ; !iever, certainly, did delineation less betray the artiticc of I'idieule. lie Epistola3 Obscurornm Virorum arc at once the most cruel lul the most natural of satires ; and as such, they were the most tiective. They converted the tragedy of Keuchlin's persecution ito a tarcc ; annihilated in public consideration the enemies of u Litellectual improvement ; determined a radical reform in the terman universities ; and even the associates of Luther, in .utlier's lifetime, acknowledged that no other writing had contri- uted so powerfully to prepare the downfall of the papal domina- >!L* " Veritas non est de i-atione faceti ; " but never was argu- .1 lit more conducive to the interest of truth. ^lorally considered, indeed, this satire is an atrocious libel, .. hich can only be palliated on the plea of retaliation, necessity, Kf ae importance of the end, and the consuetude of the times. Its k ictims are treated like vermin ; hunted without law, and exter- linatcd without mercy. AVhat truth there may be in the wicked ijJi pandal it retails, we are now unable to determine. Critically considered, its representations may, to a mere modern 3ader, appear to sacrifice verisimiHtude to effect. But by those ho can place themselves on a level with the age in which the pistolaj appeared, their ridicule (a few passages excepted) will ot be thought to have overshot its aim. So truly, in fact, did it it the mark, that the objects of the ridicule themselves, with the tception of those who were necessarily in the secret, read the tters as the genuine product of their brethren, and even hailed le publication as highly conducive to the honour of scholasticism ad monkery. In 1516, immediately after the appearance of the first volume, lus writes Sir Thomas More : — " Epistokie Obscurorum Virorum peraB pretium est videre ciuantopere placent omnibus, et doctis jtco, et indoctis serio, qui, dum ridemus, putant rideri styhim 111 JP tri ^: ^ntum, quom illi non defendunt, sed gravitate sententiarum |icunt compensatum, et latere sub rudi vagina pulchen-inmm ladium. Utinam fuisset inditus libello alius titulus! profccto * " Ncscio," says Justus Jonas, " an ullum hujus sncculi scriptum sic ipistico regno nocuerit, sic oniuia papistica ridicula rcddiderit, ut hx Ob- furorum Virorum Epistolje, qu* omnia, minima, maxima, clericorum vitia srterint in risum." — Epist. Anonymi ad f'rdtum. 218 EPISTOL^ OBSCURORUM VIRORUM. m intra centum annos homines studio stupidi non sensissent nasum quanqum rhinocerotico longiorem." {Erasmi Op. iii., p. 1575.) " Pessime consuluit," says Erasmus in 1518, "rebus liumanis,ii qui titulum indidit Obscurorum Virorum : quod ni titulus prodi- disset lusum, et hodie passim legerentur ill^ EpistolaB, tanquam in gratiam Prsedieatorum scriptse. Adest hie Lovanii, Magisterj Noster, pridem Prior apud Bruxellas, qui viginti libellos coemerat,( jn gratificaturus amieis, paulo antequam Bulla ilia prodiret, quaw lJ» effulminat eum libellum. Primum, optabam non editum, veruiffl * ubi fuerat editus, optabam ahum titulum." — And again, in a letter w some ten years thereafter : — " Ubi primum exissent Epistoksi Obscurorum Virorum miro Monachorum applausu exceptae sunti apud Britannos a Franciscanis ac Dominicanis, qui sibi persuade-| bant eas in Reuchlini contumeliam, et Monachorum favorem, serioj proditas ; quumque quidam egregie doctus, sed nasutissimus, fin-i geret se nonnihil offendi stylo, consolati sunt hominem : — ' N(j spectaris,' inquiunt, ' 6 bone, orationis cutem, sed sententiaruir| vim.' Nee hodie deprehendissent, ni quidam, addita epistolal lectorem admonuisset rem non esse seriam." (Erasmus probably refers to the penult letter of the second volume, in whiclj Ortuinus is addressed as " Omnium Barbaroruiyi defensor, quiclal mat more asinino," &c.) " Post, in Brabantia, Prior quidam Do) minicanus et Magister Noster, volens innotescere patribus, coemii acervum eorum libellorum, ut dono mitteret ordinis Proceribusl k nihil dubitans quin in ordinis honorem fuissent scriptae. Quif; h fungus possit esse stupidior ! " {Ibid. pp. 1678, 1110.) " Quis fungus possit esse stupidior ! " — Erasmus would hav wondered less at the stupidity of the sufferers, and more, perhap at the dexterity of the executioner, could he have foreseen, ths one of the most learned scholars of England, and he the mos; learned of her bibliographers, should have actually republishe; these letters as a serious work ; and that one of our wittiest satiii ists should have revieioed that publication, without a suspicion n the lurking Momus. And what is almost equally astonishinji these absurdities have never been remarked. I In 1710, there was printed in London the most elegant editic «% * A re-impression of this edition, and witli tlie name of the same boo seller (Clements), appeared in 1742. We know not on what grounds H(i Ebert (the highest bibliographical authority certainly in Europe), assei that tliis re-impression was, in reality, published in Switzerland. The paf J'^ and print seem decidedly English. J:',;i CHARACTER 01' THE SATIRE. 2,., i.it has yet appeared of the Epistola; Obscurovum Vii-oruin, which e e-n/- ( liis to the learned luorld than the swarms of Goths and Vandals 1 the politic. {! ! !) It is, methinks, wonderful, that fellows could V awake, and utter such incoherent conceptions, and converse ivith (eat gravity like learned men, without the least taste of know- Jlge or good sense. It would have been an endless labour to tve taken any other method of exposing such impertinencies, mn by a j)u^^lic(^tion of their own luorks, where you see their illies, according to the ambition of such virtuosi, in a most correct e^tion." (1 1 1 !) And so forth. — The monks are no marvel after is. These letters have been always, however, a stumbling-block to r British divines, critics, and historians. Knight, in his Life of Erasmus, knows nothing of the Epistolie, d less than nothing of their authors. Jortin has made as, with his talents, he could hardly fail to 1 ike, an amusing farrago out of the life and writings of Eras- 1 13 ; though not even superficially versed in the literary history ,,> I, the sixteenth century. Of the German language he knows ijthing ; knows nothing of the most necessary books. He rarely, i'fact, ventures beyond the text of Erasmus and Lc Clerc, without ~ luibUng. He confesses to having seen only the first of the three j> Uumes of Burckhard's Vita Huttcni; nay that he obtained Burig- ^ i['s Vie d'Erasme, only as he had finished his own. Altogether, I'tin was not in a position to judge aright the character of i-inus; nor is he even on his guard against the selfishness. 220 EPISTOL.E OBSCURORUM VIRORUM. meanness, and timidity of that illustrious genius. Accordingly, all the unworthy falsehoods which Erasmus whispers about his former friend, are unsuspiciously retailed as truths ; for Jortin was una-i ware even of the authors by whom these are exposed, and the re- putation of Hutten vindicated. Of Hutten, indeed, — his charac- ter, genius, writings, and exploits, — he everywhere betrays the profoundest ignorance. Nor has he blundered less in regard tc the Epistolse Obscurorum Virorum, than in regard to their great author. The Jew, Pfetferkorn, he knows only as a writer againsi the Epistolse, and knows not tliat these were written, among others against him. The Epistolae themselves, which he could neveij have perused, but with which especially, as historian of Eras mus, he ought to have been familiar, he describes as " a piece o' harmless Avit." Finally, in utter unacquaintance with the Fasci cuius of Ortuinus, though himself an historian of the Church, am; that remarkable source of ecclesiastical history, republished ii: England by an Anglican divine ; — he conceives it to be only ii collection of " Epistolm Clarorum Virorum," a counterpart am precursor, it would appear, to the Epistolse Obscurorum Virorun published twenty years before, confusing it probably Avith tli " Epistolce Illustrium Virorum ad Reuchlinum" A late accomphshed author {Lord Woodhouselee), asserts, thfi; the Epistolse were written in imitation of Arias Montanus's versio; of the Bible. That learned Spaniard was born some ten yeai subsequent to the supposed parody of his Interprefatio L teralis. The only other notice in English literature of this celebrate satire that occurs to us, is an article on the subject, which a] peared a few years ago in the Retrospective Review. We recoiled it only as a meagre and inaccurate compilation from the mo superficial authorities. No question in the history of letters has been more various! answered than that touching the conception and authorship these celebrated epistles. — Reuchlin and Erasmus alone, hav for themselves, expressly denied the authorship ; which has be« otherwise attributed to an individual — to a, Jew — and to many. An individual. — Jovius, Valerius Andreas, Koch, Opmec Mains, Naude, Gehres, and others, hold Reuchlin himself to ha ' been sole author. Caspar Barthius, J. Thomasius, Tribbechovii IMorhoif, Loescher, Weislinger, and Schurzfleisch, attribute the more or less exclusively to Hutten. Du Pin gives them . OPINIONS TOUCHING THEIR ArTHORSIIlP. 221 ;uchlin or to Hutten. Justus Jonas, Olearius, Kapp and ^^\■l- r, assign them to Crohis. Some, as Sonleutner, have given icm to Eohanus Hessus ; — others to Erasmus ; — and others to ^jiriciits Cordits ; — Goldastus, again, refers them to Brussianus ; -and Gisbert Yoetius to tlie poet-laureate Glarcamis. A FEW. — Gundling views Renehlhi as the exclusive writer of 10 first part, assisted by Erasmus and Hutten in the second. — 1 both volumes, Hutten has been regarded as the principal, 'rotus as the assistant, by the Unschuldige Nachricliten of 716, Vcller, ]\Ieincrs, Panzer, and Lobstein. — But C. G. JMucl- r and Erhard view Crotus as sole author of the first volume, 1(1 Hutten, perhaps others, as his coadjutors in the second. — liffst, as deviser of the whole, and exclusive writer of the first ilume. and, with the aid of Hntten, Crotus, and others, as prin- pal author of the second, has found an advocate in IMohnicke. — inally, by some anonymous writers Hutten and Eobanus have 'cn viewed as joint authors of both volumes. Many. — Hamelmann bestows the joint honour, among others, 1 Count Nuenar, Hutten, Reuchlin, and Biischius ; — to whom oichenberg adds Erasmus, and Coisarius ; — whilst Freitag vides it between Crotus, Hutten, Buschius, Aesticampianus, 'isai'ius, BeuchUn, Pirkheimer, Glandorpius, and Eobanus. — iirckhard originally gave the authorship of the whole to Hutten, '^'enar, BeuchUn, Buschius, and Ca'sarius, with Stromer and 'irkheimer as probable coadjutors ; but after the publication of le " Epistola Anonymi ad Crotum," to Hutten and Crotus, as venters and principal writers of both volumes, assisted by Nue- ii\ Aesticampianus, Buschius, Ccesarius, BeuchUn, Pirkheimer, id possibly Eobanus. — Burigny (with Revius ?) makes Hutten 10 sole or principal author, if not assisted by BeuchUn, Eoba- 's. Buschius, Ccesarius, and Nuenar. — Niceron attributes them Hutten, BeuchUn, Nuenar, Crotus, and others. — ITeumannus id StoU regard Hutten as the chief author, aided by various lends, among whom the former particularises James Fuchs. — > Meiisel, Crotus is supposed to have conceived the plan, and, "Ug with Hutten, to be the principal writer of the first part, 't unaided, however, by Buschius and Aesticampianus; to the imposition of the second, Nuenar, Pirkheimer, Fuchs, and per- ips others, contributed their assistance. — Uuhkopf assumes as itliors, BeuchUn, Hutten, Eohanus, Cordus, Crotus, Buschius, —By Scheibe thev are held to have been Crotus, Hutten. 222 EPISTOL.E OBSCURORUM VIRORUM. Buschius, Nuenar, Pirkheimer, and others. — AVachlcr hold? Crotiis to be the 'writer of the first volume, Hntten and others tc be authors of the second. — Dr Muench, in his matured opi- nion, considers Hutten and Crotus as principals, assisted more oi less by Eohanus. Aesticampianus, Buschius, Ccesarius, Pirkhei- mer. Angst, Franz von Sickingen, and Fuchs. Muench's unex- elusive views have found favour with Majerhoif and Eichstadt.— The former regards Crotus and Angst, exclusively of Hutten, a.'' authors of the first book ; and of the second, Hutten, Buschius\\ Crotus, Pirkheimer, perhaps also Eohanus, Ccesarius, Angstl Fuchs. Aesticampianus, and Sickingen. — The latter ascribes tin authorship of the first book to Crotus, Buschius, and Pirkheimer \ and of the second, along with these., to Hutten, Eohanus, Angst Sickingen, and others. To these he finally adds Melanchthon. i The preceding summary, which affords a far more complet' enumeration than has yet been attempted of the various opinion! on this question, shows how greatly any adequate criticism of th! difi'erent hypotheses would exceed our limits: — if that indeei were worth while ; for the fact of the variation is itself proc* sufficient, that all opinion is as yet baseless conjecture. Our obsei' vations {oi.vrot. ovvirolai) shall only be in supplement to what ' already known. Suffice it to say, that as yet there has bee' adduced no evidence of any weight to establish the co-operatio' of other writers in these letters, besides Ulrich von Hutten an Crotus Rubianus ; and, independent of the general presumptic against an extensive partnership, there is proof sufficient to e:! elude many of the most likely of those to whom the work h; been attributed — in particidar, Reuchlin, Erasmus, and Eobann We propose to show that Hutten, Crotus, and Buschius a' the joint authors ; and this, in regard to the first and last, 1 evidence not hitherto discovered. Crotus. — The share of Crotus is, we conceive, sufficient) established by the anonymous letter addressed to him by ■ friend on his return to the Catholic Church; and this frien there is every reason to believe, was Justus Jonas. Crotus a' Hutten were bosom friends from almost childhood to death ; ar as boys, they had fled together from the Monastery of Ful to the University of Cologne. — The co-operation of Crotus, ■ assume. Hutten. — Doubts have been of late thrown on Hutten' s par cipation, at least in the first volume of tlie Epistolse, founded IIUTTEN, CROTUS, BUSCHIUS THEIR AUTHORS—IIUTTRX. 22S h two letters to Kichard Crokc, discovered and published l)v ( G. Mueller in 1801. More might be added to what Dr luench has acutely alleged in disproof of the inference which iaeller has deduced from these ;* but we shall not pause to show tit Hutten could have been a writer of the volume in question ; T:f shall at once demonstrate that he must. The middle term of our proof is the Tnamphus Capnionis. lis must, therefore, be vindicated to Iluttcn. Mohnicke has, Tth considerable ingenuity, recently attempted to invalidate the gounds on which Iluttcn had been hitherto recognised as the athor of this poem. Added, however, to the former evidence, t,; proof which we shall now adduce appears to us decisive in f^ our of the old opinion. — A letter of Erasmus to Count Nuenar, ilAugust 1517, to say nothing of the twenty-fifth letter of the fipt volume of the Epistola} Obscurorum Virorum, proves that tf' Triumphus Capnionis was ready for publication two years 6jWe. and that at his instance it had been then suppressed. In pnt of fact, it was only printed in 1519. This being under- Bjod, the following coincidence of thought and expression between hiters of Hutten, all written one, two, or three years before the pplication of the Triumphus, and the Triumphus itself, can be riionally explained only on the hypothesis that both were the P|)ductions of the same mind. |[n the Letter to Nuenar, April 1518, speaking of the Domini- cifs, and their persecution of true learning and religion, Hutten 8(s : — " Quodsi me audiat Germania, quanquam inferre Turcis bjlum necesse est hoc tempore, prius tamen huic intestine malo ruedium opponere quam de Asiatica expeditione cogitare ius- 8(jo," ets. ; then immediately folloivs a mention of the famous iijiosture of the Dominicans of Berne, which he calls the " Ber- n^:.$e Scehts." In the Preface of the Triumphus, on the other had, immediately after noticing, in the same words, the " Ber- fUM Scelus," the autlior adds, in reference also to the Domini- CVS and their hostility to polite letters and rational theology, , For example :— Mueller (with Boehmius— indeed, with all others, as to tbjformer,) is wrong in regard to two essential points.— 1°, Croke did not m come to Leipsic in 1515. " Crocus regnat in Acaderaia Lipsiensi, pub- ;li(j docens Gra?cas literas," says Erasmus in a letter to Linaccr, of June l^i. (Op. t. iii. p. 136.)— 2", The first edition of the Erasniian Testament n] ared in March 1516 (Wetstein Proleg.), and the Letter of Erasmus to '• X., relative thereto, is Aug. 1515, not 1516, as alleged by Mucllor. 224 EPISTOL.E OBSCURORUM VIRORUM. " Quippe Turcos nego, aut ardentiori dignos odio, aut major oppugnandos opere," ets. — Again, in the same Letter, Hutten writes : — " In Italia certe nostri me puduit, quoties de Capnioninj afflictione, orto cum Italis sermone, illi percontarentur, tantun] licet in Germania fratribiis ? " In the Preface to the Triumphus; the author says : — " Memini opprobratam nobis in Italia homini (Hogostrati sc.) insolentiam. Tantiim, inquit ahquis, licet i, Germania fratrihus ?'' — x\gain, in the same Letter, Peter Maye and Bartholomew Zehender, are vituperated in conjunction: s also in the Triumphus. — Again, in the Letter it is said : — " Petn , Mayer indoctissimus..,audax tamen." In the Triumphus, th| marginal title is Petrus Mayer indoctissimus," and in the tej, " nemo est ex vulgo indoctior ipso, Audax nemo magis," (v. 824; — Again, in the Letter, it is said of " Bartholomoeus qui Dec. mator," " simile quid scorpionibus habet." In the Triumphil " Bartholomceus Zehender qui et Decimator," as he is styled '; the running title, is thus addressed in the text, (v. 772,) " Mifrj hue te Vipera." — Again, in his Letter to Gerbellius, Augu 1516, Ilutten extols Rcuchlin and Erasmus, " per eos enim ba bara esse desinit hoic natio (Germania sc.) So in the Triumphi. (v. 964,) Germania lauds Reuchlin, per te ne barbara dicar A; rudis effectum est." — Again, in the conclusion of Hutten's lett; to Pirkheimer, (August 1518,) we find " accipe laqueum, hs, baries," and in the j^ddress to the " Theologistas," closing t Triumphus, we have " proinde laqueum sumite" and " obscii*. viris laqueum prsebens;" while in both, this expression follows animated picture of the rapid progress of polite literature. — i like manner, compare what is said in Hutten's Letter to Crol, August 1516, " Sententia non jam de Capnione, sed de nost'> communibus studiis lata," with the text of the Triumphus, (i) long to quote,) of which the marginal summary is, " Capnion cc- munis libertatis assertor," (v. 917.) — Also the same series of crir 3 is imputed to the Predicant Friars, and raked up, in the saJ manner, in Hutten's Intercessio pro Capnione, and in two plas of the Triumphus {v. 305, ets. and v. 400, ets.) — Though Is remarkable, we may likewise adduce the expression, " rumpanf ut ilia,'' applied to the Friars, both in Hutten's Letter to Eil'i- mus, (July 1517,) and Preface to the Nemo, and in the Trii'i- phus, (v. 378.) — The " Jacta est alea,'' in the final address')f the Triumphus, was subsequently Hutten's peculiar motto in is various polemical writings against the court of Rome; as shoijy J>ii ■ PROOF OF THEIR THREE AUTHORS ; HUTTEN. 2-2r, ■ )fore, it had been first adopted by him in liis invectives against Inke Uh'ich of Wirtemberg. — The occurrence also of the unusual '. I vorbial allusion, " herbam porriffem," in Ilutten's Preface to ;o Xcrao, and " herbam sumemiis," in the conclusion of the Tri- nphus, is not without its weight, — It may also be observed, lat the author of the Triumphus and Ilutten agree in always ing the form Capnion and not Capnio, and in the employment . rsque nauseam) of the terms Tlwofof/htae, SophiMae, Curtimni, \c. [Since writing the above, I have met with the very highest stimony to Huttcn's authorship of the Triumphus, by his friend anierarius, in the life of his friend jNIelanchthon. The words are : -" Hkjus (Hutteni sc.) est carmen triumphale victoriae Eeuddini, tm pictura,'' &c. (Sub a. 1514) All doubt becomes, in these :• reumstances, ridiculous ; and I suppress other internal evidence, : ndence which I am able to produce.] ■\ Hutten, thus proved the author of the Triumphus Capnionis, is, t iT a similar comparison of that work with the Epistola> Obscu- «; >rum Virorum, shown to be a writer of the first, no less than E ' the second, volume of these letters. — The Triumphus, be it ■J smembered, was ready for publication before the first volume ;. ' ■ the Epistolae, in the twenty -fifth letter of which it is, indeed, Doken of as already written. Thus, no allusion occurs in the riumphus to the Epistolfe ; but the expression, obscuri viri, in M' peculiar signification of the Epistolae, which is employed at i-t five times in the Triumphus, argues strongly for the com- ,. |un origin of both. The following are, however, far more signal \i |)incidences. — In the Triumphus, (v. 309, ets.) speaking of the •imes of the Dominicans, the marginal title bears " Henricus lip. Sacramento intoxicatus." In the Epistola^, (vol. I., ep. 35,) ;,. )eaking, in like manner, of the crimes of the same order, ;.; [agister Lyra reports that it is written from Rome, that, as a |j; unishment for their falsification of Rcuchlin's Eyeglass, these ^, iars are to be condenmed to wear a pair of white spectacles on leir black cowls, (in allusion to the name of that pampldet, and 1 the titlepage of which a pair of large black spectacles appears,) sicut jam etiam debcnt pati unum scandal um in celebratione mali, propter intoxicationem alicujus Imperatorisy The allu- on to the poisoning of Henry VII. in both, is remarkable ; but le coincidence is carried to its climax, by the employment, in ich, of so singular, and sn unlikely a barbarism, (at least in the p 226 EPISTOL.E OBSCURORUM VIRORUM. Triumplius) as intoxicatus and intoccicatio, — terms unknown even in the iron age of Latinity, — An equally striking conformity is found between a passage in the Triumphus, (v. 269 — 302,) where Huttcn asserts, firstly, the superiority of Reuchlin's theo- logical learning, as contrasted with that of his persecutors, andij secondly, his equal participation with them in the gift of the Holy Spirit, — and a passage in the fifth letter of the first volume of the; Epistolse, in which the same attributes are affirmed of the same persons, in the same relation, and in the same consecution. — Hutten's co-operation in the first volume is thus evinced ; and his co-operation there, to any extent, is proved by estabhshing his co-operation at all. Hutten's participation in the second volume has been less dis- 1 puted than his share in the first. Besides the evidence already stated by others, we may refer to the intended persecution of Jh'asmus for his edition of the New Testament, as stated in tliej letter of Hutten to Pirkheimer, from Bologna, June 1517, and in j the forty-ninth letter of the second volume of the Epistohie. — Also to the " conjuratio " and " conjurati " (a remarkable expression) in favour of Reuchlin against the theologians, in the address ap- pended to the Triumplius, and in the ninth letter of the latter part of the Epistolfe, The parallelisms we have hitherto adduced are sufficiently con- vincing in themselves ; but they are far more conclusive when we consider ; — 1°, how narrow is the sphere within which they are found; and 2", that similar repetitions are frequent in the un- doubted works of Hutten. — As to Wxe former ; the letters of Hut- ten, belonging to the period, and the Triumphus, extend only to a few pages ; and we defy any one to discover an equal number of equally signal coincidences (plagiarism apart) from the works of any two authors, allowing him to compare as many volumes j as, in the present case, we have collated paragraphs. — As to the latter ; nothing but a fear of trespassing on the patience of thei reader prevents us from adducing the most ample evidence of the;| fact. BuscHius. — We now proceed to state the grounds on which we contend that there were three principal, or rather, perhaps, threOi exclusive, authors of the work in question; and that the celebrated Hermann von dem Busclie, or, as he is more famiharly known to scholars, Hermannus Buschiiis, completes, with Hutten and Cro- tus, this memorable triumvirate. I ^'''? PROOF OF THEIR THREE AUTHORS ; liUSCHHS. 227 Ortuinus Gratius, wlio may be allowed to have had a shrewd iioss at his tormentors, not only in his Lamentationes Virorum HK^i'urornm* immediately after the appearance of the Epistola?, lit. what lias not been observed, twenty years thereafter in his \isdcidus Rerum Expetendarum,^ asserts that the Epistola; were 10 work of several authors, and states, even in the former, that ( //• names were hwivn. — Erasmus, who enjoyed the best oppor- inities of information, | and in circumstances under which it was 1 longer a point of delicacy to dissemble his knowledge, asserts lat the authors of the Epistolse were three. " Ecjuidcm non norabam auctores. Nam tres fuisse ferebantur. In neminem rivavi suspicionem." || This testimony is at once the most * P. 116, ed. 16-19. It has been doubted whether Ortuinus be the real thor of the Lamentationes^ and whether that silly rejoinder be the work of Aiiti-Eeuchlinist at all. The affirmative we could fully establish by pas- L. - from the works of Hutten and Erasmus which have been wholly over- ikcd ; — but it is not worth while. t T. I., p. 479, (Brown's edition.) Dr Muench and others conceive, tliat lis work is palpably pseudonymous. He could hardly have read Avhat Cle- i?nt (Bibl. Cur. t. viii. p. 241, ets.) lias said upon this subject ; and in addi- Mi to the observations of that acute bibliographer we may notice, that the -ciculus is not hostile to Catholicism ; its puii^ort is only to maintain that 1- which the Universities in general, and Paris and Cologne in particular, I'l always strenuously contended, — that a Council was paramount to the i'ln', and that a council Avas the only mean, at that juncture, of reconciling 1 ■ dissensions in religion. Ortuinus's zeal in the cause was probably any 1 nir but alhiyed by the papal decision in the case of Reuchlin. N.B. Tlie in;:inal notes in the English edition are, for the greater part, by the pro- tt'iiit editor; an ignorance of this may have occasioned the misapprehen- - n. t lie was the familiar friend of the whole circle of those who either wrote t work, or knew by whom it was Amtten, — of Hutten, Crotus, Buschius, Miliar, Cc-csarius, Pirkheimer, Eobanus, Angst, Stromer, &c. Some of the 1 istolaj were even communicated to him before publication, and tlie design r 1 execution vehemently applauded. He himself expressly acknowledges < ■: attributed to Hutten ; and Justus Jonas, liis friend, asserts that they \ re copied by him, and dispatclied to his con-espondents, committed t memory, and recited in company. Nay, they are said to have cured an iposthume on his face by the laughter tliey excited. He was tlius mani- i^;tly not only able to discover the history of the composition, but strongly •iilerested in the discovery. The selfishness and caution of his own charac- t are slyly hit oflF in the second volume — " Erasmus est homo pro se ; " and \ should be disposed to attribute the clamour of his subsequent disapproba- t u to personal pique, as much, at least, as to virtuous indignation, or even t lidity. Spon//>a adr. axp. Hutteni (Opera, t. x. c. 1610, cd. Clerici.) 228 EPISTOL.li OBSCURORUM VIRORUM. cogent and most articulate that exists ; so strong is it, tlia we at once accept it, OA-en against the presumption that an eifu sion of SO singular a character, of such uniform excellence, an« rising so transcendently above the numerous attempts at imitatior could have emanated only from a single genius. To suppose th co-operation of a plurality of minds, each endowed with the rar' ability necessary for such a work, is in itself improbable, an the improbability rises in a geometrical ratio to the number such minds which the hypothesis assumes. In the present case the weight of special evidence in favour of plurality is sufficient t counterbalance, to a certain extent, the general presumption i favour of unity. But gratuitously to postulate, as has been s frequently done, all and sundry not disinclined to Reuchlin, t have been able to write, and actually to have assisted in writin this masterpiece of wit, is of all absurdities the greatest. Th law of parsimony is overcome by the irrecusable testimony « Ortuinus and Erasmus, so far as to compel us to admit a plurali of authors, and that to the amount of three ; but philosophical pr« sumption, and historical evidence, combine in exploding the suj position of a greater number. Of these three authors, two are already found. — We could provi we think, by exclusion, that no other, besides Buschius, was at a likely to have been the third. But as this negative would 1: tedious, we shall only attempt the positive, by showing that ever circumstance concurs in pointing out that distinguished scholar .' the colleague of Hutten and Crotus. The name of Buschius hf once and again been mentioned, among the other wellwishers < Reuchlin, as a possible author of this satire ; but whilst no ev dence has yet been led, to show that his participation in that wor was probable, grounds have been advanced, and still rema' unanswered, which would prove this participation to have bet impossible. We must therefore refute, as a preliminary, this alleged impo sibility. — "' Hamelmann," says ]\Ieiners, whose authority on th question is deservedly of the highest, "believes that Hermai von dera Busche had a share in the Epistolre Obscurorum Vir rum. This supposition is contradicted by the chronology of the' letters, which were written and printed previously to the retui of Yon dem Busche to Germany." * This objection, of whi( Lebensbeschr . her. Maermei\ II. p. 380. fl \ rilOOF OF THEIR TIIREK AUTHORS; Bl SCHlliS. 2.'(| it. il Mueiich was not aware, is established on llanielinanii's biograpliv an fi jf Buschius ; and, if true, it would be decisive. We can prove, tiowcver, that Buschiiis icas not only in Gei'many, but resident it Cologne for a considerable time previous to the printing of the Irst volume of the Epistolce, and continued to reside there, until ibout the date of the publication of the second* — Buschius was .caching in the university of Cologne, soon after the publication )f the Pr?Dnotamenta of Ortuinus, in 1514, as is proved by the ntcj etter of Magister Hipp, the 17th in the first volume of the Epis- olae. In the 19th letter of the second volume, Magister Schlauralf, t the commencement of his peregrination, leaves Buschius in lostoch, but at its termination finds him teaching in Cologne ; irhile the 4Gth of the same volume speaks of him as then (i. e. 516) a rival of Ortuinus in that school, Glareanus in his Epistle t Mo Rcuchlin, dated from Cologne, January 1514, speaks of Bus- hius as resident in that city. (111. Vir. Ep. ad Reuchl. X iii.) The letter of Buschius himself to Reuchlin, written in October, ,j1 J[ from his own house in Cologne," is checked by the events to [])jj rhich it alludes to the year 1515, (Ibid. Y i.) ; and, finally, we nd him addressing to Erasmus a poetical congratulation on his ntry into that city in 1516, (Erasmi Opera III. c. 198 and c. 578, ed. Clerici.) Buschius could not thus have left Cologne, efore the middle or end of the year 1516, (his absentation at that lj, incture becomes significant ;) and when recalled from England to ologne in 1517, by Count Nuenar, Dean of the Canonical diap- er, that nobleman, with all his influence, was unable to suppoit im against the hostility of the Monks and Magistri Nostri, loogstraten, Ortuinus & Co., to whom, if a know^n or suspected ontributor to the Epistolse, he would now have become more than ver obnoxious. Erasmus found him at Spires in 1518. — So far, lerefore, from being placed beyond the sphere of co-operation uring the concoction of the Epistola), he was /or the whole period t its very centre. But his participation is not simply possible, — it is highly pro- able. In the first place, his talents were not only of the highest order, ad his command over the Latin tongue in all its applications 'liiii! m Meiucrs, it may be observed, makes the aj)i)carance of the first volume f the Epistolae a year too late. Tiiis was in 1515, or, at latest, in the be- ing of 151G; while the serond volunn' was published towards the end of 516, or early in 1517. 230 EPISTOL.E OBSCURORUM \ IRORUM. almost unequalled, but his genius and character in strict analogy with the work in question. The Epistolse Obscurorum Virorum are always bitterly satirical, and never scrupulously decent,* The writings of Buschius, — his CEstrum, his Epistola pro Ileuchlino, his Concio ad Clerum Coloniensem, his Vallum Humanitatis, to say nothing of others, — are just a series of satires, and satires of precisely the same tendency as that pasquil. The Vallum, by which he is now best known to scholars, Erasmus prevailed on him to soften down ; it still remains suificiently caustic. His epigrams show that, in his writings, he did not pique himself on modesty ; while the exhortation of the worthy Abbot Trithemius, " ut ita viveret ne moribus destrueret eruditionem," proves that he was no rigorist in conduct. In the second place, in thus maintaining the cause of Reuchlin he was most effectually maintaining his own. In the third place, Ortuinus Gratius, to whom the EpistolaB Virorum Obscurorum are addressed, is the principal victim of this satire, though not a prominent enemy of Reuchlin, — far less of Hutten and Crotus. But he was the literary opponent, and personal foe of Buschius. Westphalians by birth, Ortuinus and Buschius were countrymen ; they had also been schoolfellows at Daventer, under the celebrated Hegius. But as they were not \ « allies, their early connexion made them only the more bitter ad- ! versarics. Buschius, the champion of scholastic reform, was '• opposed by Ortuinus, with no sincerity of conviction, but all the ! vehemence of personal animosity, in his endeavours to extermi- nate the ancient grammars, which, having for ages perpetuated barbarism in the schools and universities, were now loathed as i philological abominations by the restorers of ancient learning. ' Buschius had thus not only general reasons to contemn Ortuinus, as a renegade from the cause of illumination, but private motives^ to hate him as a hypocritical and malevolent enemy. The attack of Ortuinus is accordingly keenly retorted by Buschius in the; * This excludes Eobauus Hessus, of whom we know from Erasmus, Joachim Camerarius, and Melchior Adamus, (to say nothing of the negative evidence of his oavu writings,) that he was morbidly averse from satire and obscenity. Mucnch, who comprises Eobanus (he has it uniformly Erban):' I in his all-comprehensive hypothesis of authorship, makes him writer of thej tract De Fide Meretrictmi. He was not ; and if he were, the author of that • wretched tAvaddle was certainly no author of the Epistola? Obscurorum Virorum . PROOF OF THEIR THREE AUTHORS ; lU bL'HUIS. -j:!! i-oface to his second edition of Donatiis, as it is also ridiculed in ic 9th and 32d letters of the tirst volume of the Epistolfe Ohscu- orum Viroruni. In the fourth place, the scandal about the family and parentage f Ortuinus, (and lie is the only one of the Obscure Avhose birth ; satirized,) seems to indicate the information of a country- lan ; and with every allowance for exaggeration, still even the •ntradictions of his sacerdotal filiation, which Ortuinus found necessary to publish in his various works subsequent to the ipistola?, preserve always a suspicious silence touching his (Other. In the Jifh place, Buschius was the open and strenuous partisan f Reuchhn, in whose cause he published, along with Nuenar and [utten, a truculent invective against the Apologia of Iloog- ;raten. He is always, indeed, found enumerated among the lost active and prominent of the Reuchlinists. In evidence of lis, we regret that we cannot quote from the EpistolaB illustrium 'irorum ad Keuchlinum, the letters of Nuenar (T iii.), of Glare- Qus (X iii.), and of Eobanus (Y iii.), and from the Epistolas Ibscurorum Virorum, the 59th letter of the second volume ; in all f which, the mention made of Buschius is on various accounts 3markable, In the sixth place, Buschius was also the intimate friend of lotus and Ilutten ; and among the letters to which we last bferred, those of Nuenar and Eobanus significantly notice his b-operation in aid of lleuchlin with these indubitable authors of ic work in question. His attachment to Hutten was so strong, .lat it lost him, in tlie end, the friendship of his schoolfellow trasmus. In the seventh place, Cologne and Leipsic arc the universities tominently held up to ridicule throughout the Epistola3. We ■c why, in the cause of lieuchlin, the Magistri Nostri of Cologne lould be especial objects of attack ; — but why those of Leipsic ? labascunt,) indefessa bella gerant, ut mihi vix concedatur spirare ac i; quando vires resumere. Et tu moleste querei-is, me tuis ad me datis liti/ in hoc tarn laborioso tempore nihil respondisse ! Tristius hand illis monstrum, nee sccvior ulla Pestis. [Virg.] Quotidie calamum agitant meum, et mcnteni, pene defatigato mihi, alio pellunt, ut melioribus Uteris incumbere ucqueam. Tu potes in HeliC'H choreas duccre, Ascrajoque calamo imitari Musarum voluptates. At rii non est integrum inter tot crabrones consusm-rare, aut quippiam, vel seri et rigidius Catone, meditari. Ergo nisi te amem, iuvidebo illi tua; pros.'* ritati, et mei miserebor : quod tu, pi-inceps rei literari* nobilissinius, cai,5 a?mulis ; cura non modo tam illustres generosi animi tui couatus, quo.;' Heroidibus ostentas, verum etiara nomen ipsum tuuni, tants majestatis • i !l 1 I NPUnLISHED LETTER OF REUCIILIN. iculum, atl invidiam multos i:oncitarc debuerat, (ut est nunc hominuni nnii- rum conditio, sonescento miindo). Epbesiis enini Hesseu, idem (luod y^V.)- [atlnis, dicitur, Callimaclio poota Cyrona?o teste ; qui Jovem, non sorte btnm esse Regem Deoruni assorit, sed opcribus niamium, in Ilymno ad Jo- '■m hoc utens carmine : — Ov oi &iuu kaaitva [vulgO, iaa^ux'^ Tu'hoi diaotv, SQ'yu. Ss x^i^au. M Hessena summum rogem designat. [Chald. Ilasin., potens.] Inter im .Ttatis tua; Ciiristianos poetas, ipse Rex es ; qui scribendis vcrsibns, . iidara potentatu et ingenii dominio cminentiore, plus ca^teris metro im- iMs, et syllabas quasqne ad regulam regis. Gratulor itaqne Universitati ■ lifordiaj, quod te tali clarescunt viro. Nee me in odium ejus, quominus . -nil splendore ac laudis amplitndine gaudcam, unquara concitabnnt qui- .111, male de mc homines meriti, tecum habitantes ; qui tametsi Theologian! ptiteutur, tamen in condemnando mea, Dei vocem non suntsequuti, — Adam : ii es f Ipsi autem illi inter pcjores, non dico boni, sed minns mali fuerunt. fianqnam omnes, cum suis coraplicibus, qui non vident trabem in oculo ixpectabunt Dei judicium dicentis : — In quo judicio judicavcrUis^judi- .uini; Nolite condemnare, et non condemnahiminL Certum hoc est : non 1 ntitur Deus. Tu vero, quanquam omnium bellorum exitus incerti -It, tamen de mea causa spem tibi concipe, quod has volucres pi'orsus su- jrabo. Sententiam ditEnitivam cum executione obtinui. Sed adversarii, L •vjtoriam meam putantes revera suam infamiam, omni diligentia invocave- : r>t Francorum Regem. Mlrum, quod non [jam] Persarum summum item . plitificem [atque] alios principes exorcisarunt, ut Sententiam Apostolicam 1 liefactarent. Quapropter ego, licet victor, illos Romam citavi. Ut ab h; exemplo discere potes ! Unde paulisper suspende chelyn, dum coucla- iTtnm fuerit. Interea tamen, si me amas, adapta citharam et Musis mate- r u colliga. — iEque fceliciter vale. ". Stutgardia, vii Kal. Novcmbres, Anno M.o.xiiir. JoAKNEs Reuchlin Phorcen. LL.D. 11 fervente ad Vindictam lambo, non eris solus neque alter." ileuchlin's reference to the language of the Ephesians is explained by the 1 iiiologicon Magnum {sub voce.) -nbanus, in his answer, says, inter alia, that he had shown this letter l< luidry good men in Erfurt, admirers of Reuchlin, and enemies of the hrtile faction, and to some even of the Theological Faculty, (who had con- doned the Eyeglass without interrogating its author.) " Sunt enim et hie qjqne boni et raali ; ipsi autem illi, quos tu, no7i bonos sed inter pejores mm malos, appellas, poenitcre videntur, quod Coloniensibus asinis et cir- iraneis nugigivendis ipsi decepti potius cpiam instructi, suffragium addi- it." l>anus signalises " Ilutten, Buschius, and Crotus,'' as the throi' /irsf of I uinpeters of Reuchlin's victory.] II.-ON THE REVOLUTIONS OF MEDICINE. IN REFERENCE TO CULLEN.* (July, 1832.) 3 I Ati Account of the Life, Lectures, and Writings of Willia''\ Cullen, M.D., Professor of the Practice of Physic in the Un\ versity of Edhiburgh. By John Thomson, M.D,, Professor ! Medicine and General Pathology in the University of Edinburg; Vol. I. 8vo. Edinburgh : 1832. \ f We arc much gratified by the appearance of the present wori Cullen is one of those illustrious minds by whom Scotland, durii the past century, was* raised from comparative insignificance the very highest rank in literature and science. In no depai' ment of intellectual activity has Scotland been more prolific distinguished talent, than in medicine ; and as a medical philos pher the name of Cullen stands, in his native country, pre-eE nent and alone. It would be difiicult indeed to find in any nati an individual Avho displayed a rarer assemblage of the higbj tk qualities of a physician. The characters of his genius were pijj |9 minent, but in just accordance with each other. His eruditi was extensive, yet it never shackled the independent vigour ! his mind ; while, on the other hand, no love of originality maj him overlook or disparage the labours of his predecessors. 1| capacity of speculation was strong, but counterbalanced by 1 equal power of observation ; his imagination, though lively, y\ broken in as a useful auxiliary to a still more energetic reas'' * [This article, placed under the head of Literature^ requii'es some inc gence; I could not give it a class for itself, and it falls at least more nn rally mider this, than under either of the other heads.] II CULLEN. 230 lio circumstances under whicli his mind was cultivated, were -0 conducive to its full and harmonious evolution. His cduca- nn was left sufficiently to himself to determine his fiiculties to a ee and vigorous energy ; sufficiently scholastic to prevent a ic-sitled and exclusive development. It was also favourable to e same result, that from an early period of life, his activity was vided between practice, study, and teaching ; and extended to most every subject of medical science, — all however viewed in Uordination to the great end of professional knowledge, the cure <' disease. CuUen's mind was essentially philosophic. Without neglecting (iservation, in which ho was singularly acute, he devoted him- slf less to experiment than to arrangement and generalization, are not aware, indeed, that ho made the discovery of a single sible ph?enomcnon. Nor do we think less of him that he did k. Individual appearances are of interest only as they rcpre- nt a general law. In physical science the discovery of new pts is open to every blockhead with patience, manual dexterity, axiute senses ; it is less eiiectually promoted by genius than I co-operation, and more frequently the result of accident than design. But what Cullen did, it required individual ability to portunities of improvement which Glasgow supplied, Cullen, ilaDaini'y^ the view of obtaining a professional appointment, went, in his ijiotoalil^Nntieth year, to London. Through the interest of Commissioner Cullen, t«fiPliand, (Will Honeycomb of the Spectator,) probably his kins- rftfe"^' lie was appointed surgeon to a merchant vessel trading to l^,j,i;torji!iih!Spanish settlements in the West Indies, commanded by Cap- CaleDs!^*' Cleland of Auchinlee, a relation of his OAvn. In this voyage ,;; ijlisjAeemained for six months at Port Bello ; thus enjoying an oppor- •0,sjit»iy of studying the effects of a tropical climate on the constitu- racfa 242 ON THE REVOLUTIONS OF MEDICINE. tion, and the endemic character of West Indian diseases. On his return to London, with the view of perfecting his knowledge of drugs, he attended for some time in the shop of Mr Murray, au eminent apothecary in the city. Two years (1732 — 1734) he spent in the family of Captain Cleland, at Auchinlee, in the parish of Shotts, wholly occupied in the study, and occasional practice, oi his profession ; and after a season devoted to the study of genera literature and philosophy, under a dissenting clergyman of Eoth| bury in Northumberland, he completed his public education bv attending for two sessions (1734-5, 1735-6) the medical classe| in the University of Edinburgh. "The foundation," says his biogi'apher, "of a new and extended medic, school had been laid a few years before this time in Edinburgh, by the aj: pointment of Dr Monro to the Chair of Anatomy in the University, and b the judicious arrangements which that excellent anatomist and experience surgeon afterwards made with Drs Rutherford, Sinclaii", Innes and Plumme for the regular and stated delivery of lectures on the different branches * medicine. Previously to this arrangement, almost the only regular lecturj i given upon any subjects connected with medicine in Edinburgh, were thoj J,' which had been delivered in the Hall of the College of Surgeons, the chij « medical school in that city, from the first institution of the College, in tJ ' year 1505, till the transference of the anatomical class into the University ' 1725. 1 "Though scarcely tenj^ears had elapsed from the first establishment o ^ regular school of medicine in the University of Edinburgh when Dr Culli became a student there, the reputation of that school was beginning to j every where acknowledged, and had already attracted to it, not only a grii portion of those who were preparing themselves for the profession of mei cine in the British dominions, but many students from foreign universitie —P. 8. At the age of twenty-six, Cullen commenced practice in ; native town, and with the most flattering success. His dishke,' surgery soon induced him to devolve that department of bnsini upon a partner; and for the last four years of his residence;! Hamilton (having graduated at Glasgow), he practised only 2A physician. Here he married Anna, daughter of the Reveril Mr Johnstone, minister of Kilbarchan ; who brought him a la 19 family, and formed the happiness of his domestic life for forty x years. Here also he became the friend and medical preccpto 'i the late celebrated Dr William Hunter. Hunter had been t ,i- cated for the church ; but an intercourse with Cullen determi <» him to a change of profession. After residing for a time in fai J with his friend, it was agreed that he should go and prosecutes studies in Edinburgh and London, with the intention of ultima y CULLEN'S LIFE AND MEDICAL MERITS. 24:{ ettling at Hamilton as Cullen's partner. This design was not, lowever, realized. Other prospects opened on the yonng anato- list while in London, and Cullcn cordially concurred in an alte- iation of plan, which finally raised his pupil to a professional felebrity, different , pays no regard to the differences of natural disposition and future dcs- tultion, overloads the memory and compromises the development of the hiicr mental and moral capacities, while, more especially, it stunts the cvo- luU of that free and independent activity of thought on which a utility for liflmd a susceptibility for its noblest avocations depend." Ills article Avas attacked in a pamphlet published by Professor Chcvallier 1 liam, in the course of the year ; but his opposition being either mere in or mere mistake, I do not find it necessary to say anything in rejtly. 'I' let, his defence of " The Study of Mathematics as conducive to the dc- vejpment of the Intellectual Powers," may suffice to show how little, even H 25S STUDY OF MATHEMATICS. tion. Whether, and to what extent, the study of mathematic conduces to the development of the higher faculties, is a questio which, though never adequately discussed, has been very conl dently and very variously decided. The stream of opinions, an the general practice of the European schools and universitie allow to that study, at best, only a subordinate utility as a met of liberal education ; — that is, an education in which the individu, is cultivated, not as an instrument towards some ulterior end, b as an end unto himself alone ; in other words, an education, which his absolute perfection as a man, and not merely his relati ; dexterity as a professional man, is the scope immediately in vie But, at the same time, it cannot be denied, that signs of a revel tionary tendency in popular opinion, touching the objects and t end of education, are, in this nation at least, becoming daily mt and more obtrusive; and as the extended study of mathemat; is that mainly proposed, in lieu of the ancient branches of dis- pline which our innovators would retrench, a professed inquiij, like the present, into the influence of this study on the intellect 1 habits, comes invested, independently of its general importan . with a certain local and temporary interest. But the centre from which it proceeds, enhances also the ii - rest of the pubhcation. In opposition to the general opiniorif the learned world, — in opposition to the practice of all other U- versities, past or present, — in opposition even to its oaths i|d statutes, and to the intention of its founders and legislators, ie University of Cambridge stands alone in noiv making mathei- tical science the principal object of the whole liberal educatioit affords ; and mathematical skill the sole condition of the ie tripos of its honours, and the necessary passport to the othei'i- thus restricting to the narrowest proficiency all places of dist.c- tion and emolument in university and college, to which 5?li honours constitute a claim ; — thus also leaving the immense noiO- ■ rity of its alumni without incitement, and the most arduous d important studies void of encouragement and reward. It is t|c, by an able advocate, can be alleged in vindication of their utility iDfli* respect at aU. Certain statements in the criticism have also been controverted by Pi -S* sor Boole in his very able " Mathematical Analysis of Logic," in 184 j I shall consider these in a note. (P. 273.) j On Dr Whewell's rejoinder, see tlio end of the article. j Ono unimportant note appended by the Editor is omitted.] | WORK REVIEWED. or,.) . [ideed, that the effect of this contracted teiulcncy ui" the ijublic hdversitij is, in some degree, tempered by certain favourable acci- fents in the constitution of more tlian one of ita private colleges ; flit with every allowance for petty and precarious counteraction, ind latterly for some very inadequate legislation, the University [' Cambridge, unless it can demonstrate that mathematical study the one best, if not the one exclusive, mean of a general cvolu- on of our faculties, must be held to have established and main- ,ined a scheme of discipline, more partial and inadequate than ly other which the history of education records. That no Cam- ■i(lg:e mathematician has yet been found to essay this demonstra- -0 necessarj for his university, so honourable to his science, . . always appeared to us a virtual admission, that the thesis was jcapable of defence. A treatise, therefore, apparently on the • ry point, and by a distinguished member of the university, ' uld not fail of engaging our attention ; and this, whether it i Toposed to defend the actual practice of the seminary, or to urge -'' \q expediency of a reform. ' From the character of its author, the pamphlet before us hke- -0 comes recommended by no mean claim to consideration. Mr hewell has already, by his writings, approved to the Avorld, not '' «Iy bis extensive acquirements in mathematical and physical • Mcnce, but his talent as a vigorous and independent thinker. To 1- ilnarrower circle, he is know^i as the principal public tutor of the ipal college of his university ; and in this relation, his zeal, knowledge, and ability have concurred in raising him to an t,' viable eminence. Though more pecuharly distinguished by his !: ijblieatious in that department of science so exclusively patron- it i[d by the university, he has yet show^n at once his intelligence [i m. liberahty, by amplifying the former circle of studies pursued ijthe college under his direction; and, in particular, w^e arc in- med, that he has exerted his influence in awakening a new rit for the cultivation of mental philosophy ; in which depart- nt he has already introduced, or is in the course of introducing, i'-'S of more appropriate authors than those previously in use. 1 these circumstances it was with more than usual expectation tat we received Mr Whewell's pamphlet. Its perusal — must wo -. it? — has disappointed us. The confession is unavoidable. ■ the respect which we entertain for the character and talents .'3 author, compels us to be plain rather than pleasant with "rk. As a writer, Mr Whewell has long out-grown tlic need 260 STUDY OF MATHEMATICS. of any critical dandling : the question he agitates is far ton >ci iou> to tolerate the bandying of compliments ; his authority, in oppo- sition to our conviction, is too imposing to allow of quarter to his reasoning ; whilst we are confident, that he is himself too sincere a champion of truth, to accept of any favour but what the inte- rest of truth demands. AYe say, that we are disappointed with the pamphlet, and this on sundry accounts. "We are disappointed, certainly, that its author did not here advocate for the university the liberal views which he had already extended to his college. But taking it for a vindication of mathematical study, as the principal mean in the' cultivation of the reasoning faculty, — supposing also that the rear' soning faculty is that whose cultivation is chiefly to be encourager in the liberal education of a university, — considering it, in a word' from its own point of view alone, we say that we are disappointec with it, as faihng signally in the accomplishment of what it pro poses. In fact, had our opinion not previously been decided oi the question, the perusal of this argument in defence of mathe matical study, as a useful gymnastic of the mind, would have onl; tended to persuade us, that in this relation, it was comparative! useless. Before entering on details, it is proper here, once for all, f premise : — In the first place, that the question docs not regarc' the value of mathematical science, considered in itself, or in i objective residts, but the utility of mathematical study, that ij in its subjective effect, as an exercise of mind ; and in the secom that the expediency is not disputed, of leaving mathematics, as co-ordinate, to find their level among the other branches of ae demical instruction. It is only contended, that they ought n' to be made the principal, far less the exclusive, object of acad mical encouragement. We speak not now of professional, but ; liberal, education ; not of that, which considers the mind as v instrument for the improvement of science, but of this, whi' considers science as an instrument for the improvement of mind Of all our intellectual pursuits, the study of the mathematic sciences is the one, whose utility as an intellectual exercise, wh carried beyond a moderate extent, has been most peremptor:, denied by the greatest number of the most competent judge and the arguments, on wliicli this opinion is estabhshed, ha hitherto been evaded rather than opposed. Some intcllig( mathematicians, indeed, admit all that has been urged agait' I QUESTION STATED— MR WHEWELL S GRUUNl). -jiJl [heir science, as a principal discipline of the mind ; and only con- ond that it ought not to be extruded from all place in a schcnio f liberal education. With these, therefore, we have no contro- crsy. More strenuous advocates of this study, again, maintain, aat mathematics are of primary importance as a logical exercwe if reason ; but unable to controvert the evidence of its con- •acted and partial cultivation of the faculties, they endeavour to indicate the study in general, by attributing its evil influence to )me peculiar modification of the science ; and thus hope to avoid le loss of the whole, by the vicarious sacrifice of a part. But ■re unfortunately they are not at one. Some are willing to irrender the modern analysis as a gymnastic of the mind. They nfess, that its very perfection as an instrument of discovery ifits it for an instrument of mental cultivation, its formula) echanically transporting the student with closed eyes to the inclusion ; whereas the ancient geometrical construction, they ntend, leads him to the end, more circuitously, indeed, but by ~ own exertion, and with a clear consciousness of every step in ■ procedure. Others, on the contrary, disgusted with the idious and complex opei'ations oi [/eometjy, recommend the alfje- iaic process as that most favourable to the powers of generaliza- 1 )n and reasoning ; for, concentrating into the narrowest com- ] ss the greatest complement of meaning, it obviates, they main- tin, all irrelevant distraction, and enables the intellect to operate i? a longer continuance, more energetically, securely, and efi:"ec- tdly. — The arguments in favour of the study, thus neutralize tch other : and the reasoning of those who deny it more than a sbordinate and partial utility, stands not only uncontroverted, U untouched, — not only untouched, but admitted. Mr "Whewell belongs to the class of thorough-going advocates ; I would maintain the paramount importance of mathematical Sidy in general; but willingly allows the worst that has been I ^ed against it to be true of certain opinions and practices, to vich he is opposed. The obnoxious modifications are not, how- e)r, with him coincident either with the geometric, or with the analytic, method ; but though, we think, if fairly developed, his I'uciples would tend to supersede the latter, — as he has applied t ui, they merely affect certain alleged abuses in both depart- lints of the science. We wore disappointed in finding so little said on the general ;i:umcnt; and the special reasoning we must be allowed to dis- 262 STUDY OF MATHEMATICS. regard, as we cannot recognise a suspected substance to be wliol. some food, merely because certain bits of it are admitted to b' deadly poison. But the general argument is not only brief but inconckisivt The usual generalities, the common vague assertions, we have, i praise of mathematics, and of the logical habits, which it is assumeo that they induce ; but Mr Whewell controverts none of the groundr he refers to none of the authorities, which go to prove that the tei dency of a too exclusive study of these sciences is, absolutely, t disqualify the mind for observation and common reasoning. ^| cannot now criticise its details, though to some we shall allude i! the sequel ; but the very conception of the argument is viciou' Mr Whewell contrasts Mathematics and Logic, aod endeavou-' to establish the high and general importance of the former, l| showing their superiority to the latter as a school oi practice reasoning. Now admitting, what we are far indeed from doin that the merits of the two sciences are fully produced and fair weighed against each other, still the comparison itself is invali' Logic, by a famous distinction, is divided : — into Theoretical ■ General Logic {xae^U 'TCQ^ay^ikruv^ docens), in so far as it analyzes ti mere laws of thought ; and into Practical or Special Logic |^ x^viast^ utens), in so far as it applies these laws to a certain mattH» or class of objects. The former is one, and stands in the sail ■ common relation to all the sciences ; the latter is manifold, aj. stands in proximate relation to this or that particular science, w t which it is in fact identified. Now, as all matter is either necessc or contingent (a distinction which may be here roughly assuni to coincide with mathematical and non-mathematical), we h.'l' thus, besides one theoretical or general logic, also tivo practical i' special logics in their highest universality and contrast. i Theoretical LoGicf. \ 1) Practical Logic, 2) Practkial Logic, \ As specially applied to iVcc<'5- As specially applied to Cj- sary Matter = Mathematical tingent 3fatter= Philosophy .'^ reasoning. General reasoning.* j Now, the question which Mr Whewell proposes to handle, ip * [The stxidy of Language, if conducted upon rational principles, is oipi" tlie best exercises of an applied Logic. This study I cannot say that anpf our universities encourage. To master, for example, the Minerva of Sj> tins with its commentators is, I conceive, a far more profitable exercifjO' mind than to conquer the Principia of Newton. — But I anticipate.] | MR WIIE WELL'S GllOlND UNTENAULK. 2C,[i What is the heM imtrnment for educating men to a, full develop- >uiit of the reasoninci faculty'? and his answer to that question is —Mathematics. But tlie reasoning faculty of men, being in all rnncipally/m most altogether, occupied upon contingent matter, i»niprising, \yhat i\Ir Whewell him>;olf calls, — " the most important inployments of the human mind ; " he was bound articulately to .rove, what certainly cannot be presumed, that Mathematics, (the l^ractical Logic of necessary matter,) cultivate the reasoning faculty lor its employmentojj contingent matter, better than Philosophy, &c. -the Practical Logic itself of contingent matter. But this he does ot even attempt. On the contrary, after misstating the custom of i our universities," he actually overlook's the existence of the prac- jical logic of contingent matter altogether ;-^then, assuming ma- Ihematics, the logic of necessary matter, to be the only practical )gic in existence, he lightly concedes to it the victory over theo- etical logic, on the ground, that "reasoning, a jyractical process, lust be taught hy practice better than by precep)t." The primary ondition and the whole difficulty of the problem is thus eluded ; )r it behoved him to have proved, not to have assumed, the para- ox : — That the study of necessary reasoning alone, is a better xercise of the habits of probable reasoning, than the j^i'dctice of robable reasoning itself, and that, also, illustrated by the theory of 'le Imvs of thought and of reasoning in general. We may at once dmit, that theoretical logic realizes its full value only through its iractical applications. But does it therefore follow, — either that useful practice is independent of theory, or that we shall come tsst trained to the hunting-field of probability , hij assiduous loco- motion on the railroad of calcidus and demonstration ? But of pis hereafter. Having laid it down by this very easy process, that " Mathe- latics are a means of forming logical habits better than Logic 'self" Mr Whewell broaches the important question : — "How far the study thus recommended is justly chargeable Avith ceil con- '^[uences?. . . .Does it necessarily make men too little sensible to other than lathematical reasonings ? Does it teach tliem to require a kind of funda- jiental principles and a mode of deduction Avliich arc not in reality attainable i questions of morals or politics, or even of natural philosophy ? If it docs is, it may well unfit men for the most important employments of the human ind, &c. . . . But is this, in fact, usually the case? And if it happen 'metimes, and sometimes only, under what circumstances does it occur? Iiis latter question has, I think, important practical bearings, and I shall y to give some answer to it. • I would reph', then, that [1", | if mathematics be tauglit in such a man- 264 STUDY OF MATHEMATICS. 1 ,11, uer, that its foundations appear to be laid in arbitrary definitions without any con-espondiug act of the mind; — or [2°,] if its first principles be represented as boiTowed from experience, in such a manner that the whole science is em- pirical only ; — or [3°,] if it be held forth as the highest perfection of the science to reduce our knowledge to extremely general propositions and pro- cesses, in which all particular cases are included : — so studied, it may, I con- ceive, unfit the mind for dealing with other kinds of truth." (P. 8.) The development and illustration of these three propositions occupy the remainder of the pamphlet. Now, it will be observed that Mr Whewell does not here or elsewhere, attempt any vindication of mathematics from those charges to which it is thus acknowledged to be obnoxious ; for it ^m is no defence of the study in general, against which alone these accusations have from all ages been advanced, to admit, nay, to exaggerate, the evil tendency of certain petty recent opinions, wholly uncontemplated by the accusers. The principal value of Mr WhewcU's pamphlet hes in the special illustrations of the first and third heads. There the mathemati- if jif cian is within his sphere. On these we should not have been in- disposed to offer some remarks ; but the technical natin'c of the subject could not interest the general reader ; and in the words of Rabbinic apophthegm, — "Dies hrevis, et opus midtuni, et pater- familias urgety The second head, in which Mr Whewell trenches on philosophy, we cannot altogether overlook. He says : — " I wOl not suppose, that any person who has paid any attention to mathe- matics does not see clearly the difi"erence between necessary truths and em- pirical facts ; between the evidence of the properties of a triangle, and that of the general laws of the structure of plants. The peculiar character of mathematical truth is, that it is necessarily and inevitably true ; and one of the most important lessons which we learn from our mathematical studies is j a knowledge that there are such truths, and a familiarity with their form and \ l. character. " This lesson is not only lost, but read backwards, if the student is taught that there is no such difitrence, and that mathematical truths themselves are learnt by experience. I can hardly suppose that any mathematician would hold such an opinion with regard to geometrical truths, although it has been entertained by metaphysicians of no inconsiderable acuteness, as Hume. We might ask such persons how Experience can show, not only that a thing is, but that it rmist be ; by what authority she, the mere recoixler of the actual occiurences of the past, pronounces upon all possible cases, though as yet to be tried hereafter only, or probably never. Or, descending to particidars ; when it is maintained that it is from experience alone that we know that ; I two straight lines cannot enclose space, we ask, who ever made the trial, and how? and we request to be informed in what way he ascertained that the lines with which he made his experiment were accurately straight. The ti M i .MAT111::.M Alius iNUT fHlLUSUFllY. 205 illacj is in this cast-, I coucoivo, too palpable to require to be dwdt upon." -(P. 32.) Now, ill tlic^;v^ place, it is wholly beyond the domain of nui- i hematics to inquire into the origin and nature of their principles. Mathematics, as Plato * observes, and FroclHs,\ arc founded on hypotheses, of which they can render no account ; and for this leason, the former even denies them the denomination of Science. ■ The geometer, qua geometer," says Aristotle, " can attempt no Jisoussion of his principles." J As observed by Seneca : — " The Mathematical is, so to speak, a superlicial science ; it builds on a borrowed site, and the principles, by aid of which it proceeds, are not its own : Philosophy, on the contrary, begs nothing from an- other ; it rears its own editice from its own soil." % These autho- rities represent the harmonious opinion of philosophers and ma- thematicians, in ancient and in modern times. But, in the second place, if a mathematician know so httle of his province, as to make such an inroad into that of the philoso- plicr, we cannot for our life imagine, how a metaphysical Hourish at the head of a mathematical system can affect the treatment nf the science, and through that affect the mind of the student. AVe doubt, indeed, whether one mathematician in a hundred has ever possessed an opinion, far less the right to an opinion, on the matter. In the third place, what are we to think of the assumption, that the study of mathematics is requisite to make us aware of the existence of Necessary Cognitions — Necessary Truths ? That rcrtain notions, that certain judgments, there are, which we are i compelled to recognise as necessary, is a fact that was never un- Iknown to, was never denied by, any rational being. Whether these necessary notions and judgments are truths, has been in- deed doubted by certain philosophers ; but of this doubt matlie- ,matics can afford us no solution, — no proper materials for a solu- Ition. The very propositions on which these sciences build their whole edifice of demonstration, are as well known by the tyro Avhen he opens his Euchd, as by the veteran Euler or Laplace ; nay. they are possessed, even in prior property, by the philosopher, to whom, indeed, the mathematician must look for their vindica- tion and estabhshment. * De Rejmb. LI. vi. vil. t ^« Eudtil. L. i. p. 22. t Post. Anahjt. L. i. c. 12, § 3. Compare Phys. L. i. c. 2, text 8. •| Epist. Ixsxviii. STUDY OF MATHEMATICS. But, in the fourth place, if Mr Whewell " can hardly suppose that any mathematician would hold the opinion that mathe- matical truths are learned from experience," we cannot under- stand why he takes the trouble of writing this treatise against such an opinion, as actually held, and held by a whole " school of mathematics ? " Perhaps, he means by " any mathematician," — any mathematician worthy of the name. But then if thisi " school of mathematics" be so contemptible, why write, and thati^sifi so seriously, against them ? This, we may observe, is not the only contradiction in the pamphlet we have been wholly unablei to reconcile. But, in the ffth place, the contrast of the mathematician and metaphysician is itself an error. — In regard to the ea;culpcftion oj the mathematicians, we need look no farther than to the late Sir John Leslie for its disproof. " Geometry" (says that original thinker, and he surely was a mathematician.) " is thus founded likewise on observation ; but of a kind so familiar and ob^illit vious, that the primary notions which it furnishes might iil« seem intuitive." * — As to the inculpation of the metaphysicians,^ — why was Locke not mentioned in place of Hume ? If Hume did advance such a doctrine, he onl}'^ sceptically took u] what Locke dogmatically laid down. But Locke himself received this opinion from a mathematician ; for this part of his philosophy; he borrows from Gassendi : and, what is curious, he here deserts the schoolman from who'in he may appear to have adopted, as the basis of his philosophy, the twofold origin of knowledge, — Sense and Reflection ; for the unacknowledged master maintains on this, as on many other questions, opinions far more profound than those of his disciple. — But in regard to Hume, Mr Whewell is wholly- wrong. So far is this philosopher from holding " that geometri- cal truths are learnt by experience," that, while rating mathcma-i tical science, as a study, at a very low account, he was all too acute' to countenance so crude an opinion in regard to its foundation: and, in fact, is celebrated for maintaining one precisely the reverse On this point Hume was neither sensualist nor sceptic, but deserted Aenesidemus and Locke to encamp with Descartes and Leibnitz, j J^^ In the sixth place, the quality of necessity is correctly stated b}'! I f Mr AVhewell as the criterion of a pure or a priori knowledge So far, however, from this being a truism always familiar to ma- * Rudiments of Plane Geometry, p. 18 ; and more fully in Elemejits oj Geometry and of fleometrical Analysis, p. 453. I MATHEMATICAL NOT AN IMPROVING STUDY. 207 iheinaticians, it only shows tlmt Mr Whcwcll has himself been lecontly dipping into the Kantian philosophy ; of which he here ad- duces a ftmious principle and one of the most ordinary illustrations. The principle was indeed enounced by Leibnitz, in whom mathe- matics may assert a share; but that philosopher fiiilcd to carry it out to its most important applications. In his philosophy, our conceptions of Space and Time are derived from experience. \\^q e;in trace it also obscurely in Descartes, and several of the older uictaphysicians ; but assuredly it was «of ///»(/ "palpable," notldwj to which the mathematicians can lay claim. On this principle, as iii'st evolved, — at least, first signahsed by Kant, Space and Time arc merely modifications of mind, and mathematics thus only con- \ crsant about necessary thoughts, — thoughts which can even make no pretension to truth and objective reality. Are the foundations of the science thus better laid ? — But to more important matters. It is an ancient and universal observation, that different studies cultivate the mind to a different development ; and as the end of a liberal education is the general and harmonious evolution of its faculties and capacities in their relative subordination, the folly has accordingly been long and generally denounced, which would attempt to accomplish this result, by the partial application of certain partial studies. ■ And not only has the effect of a one-sided disciphno been remarked upon the mind in general, in the dispro- portioned development of one power at the expense of others ; it has been equally observed in the exclusive cultivation of the ^ame power to some special energy, or in relation to some parti- cular class of objects. Of this no one had a clearer perception than Aristotle; and no one has better illustrated the evil effects of such a cultivation of the mind, on all and each of its faculties, flo says : — "The capacity of receiving knowledge is modified by the liabits of the rc- 1 iliient mind. For, as we have been habituated to learn, do we deem that I \ cry thing ought to be taught ; and the same object presented in an unfamiliar manner, strikes us, not only as unlike itself, but, from Avaut of custom, as comparatively strange and unknown. For the accustomed is the better known. How gi-eat, indeed, is the influence of custom, is manifested in the laws ; for here the fabulous aud puerile exert a stronger influence, through habit, than, through knowledge, do the true and the expedient. Some, therefore (who have been overmuch accustomed to mathematical studies), will only listen to one who demonstrates like a mathematician ; others (who ' have exclusively cultivated analogical reasoning), require the employment of t I examples ; while others, again (whose imagination has been exercised at the ' nxpensp of judgincnt), deem it sufiicieut to adduce the testimony of a poet. 263 STUDY OF MATHEMATICS. Some are satisfied only with an exact treatment of every subject ; to others, again, from a trifling disposition, or an impotence of continued thouglit, the exact treatment of any becomes ii-lisome. We ought, therefore, to be edu- cated to the different modes and amonnt of evidence, which the different oh- jects'^of our knowledge admit." * And again : — "It is the part of a well-educated man to require that measure of accuracy in every discussion, which the nature of its object-matter allows ; for it would not be more absurd to tolerate a persuasive mathematician, than to astrict an orator to demonstration. But every one judges competently in the matters with which he is conversant. Of these, therefore, he is a good judge, — of each, he who has been disciplined in each, absolutely, he who has been dis- ciplined in all." t But the difference between different studies, in their contract- ing influence, is great. Some exercise, and consequently develope, perhaps, one faculty on a single pliasis, or to a low degree ; whilst others, from the variety of objects and of relations which they present, calling into strong and unexclusive activity the whole circle of the higher powers, may almost pretend to accomplish alone the work of catholic education. If we consult reason, experience, and the common testimony of ancient and modern times, none of our intellectual studies tend to cultivate a smaller number of the faculties, in a more partial or feeble manner, than mathematics. This is acknowledged by every writer on education of the least pretension to judgment and expe- 1 y rience ; nor is it denied, even by those who are the most decidedly opposed to their total bahishment from the sphere of a liberal in- struction. Germany is the country which has far distanced every other in the theory and practice of education ; and the three fol- lowing testimonies may represent the actual state of opinion in the three kingdoms of the Germanic union which stand thei highest in point of intelligence — Prussia, Bavaria, and Wirtem- berg. The first authority is that of : — Bernhardt, one of the most in- telhgent and experienced authorities on education to be found iu Prussia. H »■ kbt 1] tlti m M J0. * Metaph. 1. ii. ("AA(p« ro 'i'KccTro'j) c. 8, text. 14. t Eth. Nicom. 1. i. c. 3. The text universally received (^"Ex-aaro; le >c^mt' x-aChuc, a. ytumKU x.etl rovruv larlv dyot.Qog K^iTtjg- x.a.ff iKotinov oi^a, 6 TTSTcctliVfii vor (x.TT'hug §s viQl 'TToi.u '^i'7renhvf<,iuo;-)i is at once defective and tautological, j • The cause of the corruption is manifest; the emendation simple and, we , S,^ think, certain. "Exao-roj Is kqIvh xu.'Kug d ytvimmL rovzuv «.( sotIv «y«^oVMl|| >cQtr7ig' Kxff SKXOTOV, 6 K»ff iKoiarov 'TH'TrxtZiVf^ivoif a-TrT^as os, 6 TrtQi Ta^i^Hjjj ■Ti-eTroci^ivfiiuog. fU^ MATHEMATICAL NOT AN IMPROVING STUDY. 2C.9 " It is asked — Do Mathematics atcaken the judgment^ the reasoning fuculti), nd the understanding in general to an all-sided activity f We are cinnpellod answer, — No. For they do this oul}- in rchition to a knowledge of d thus are we to explain why the efficiency of the latter does not stretch widely over our intellectual territory ; why it never developes the mind n so many sides ; and why, also, it never penetrates so profoundly. By lathematics, the powers of thought are less stirred up in their inner essence, ban drilled to outward order and severity ; and, consequently, manifest their ducation more by a certain formal precision, than through their fertility and epth. This truth is even signally confirmed by the experience of our owti istltution. The best of om- former Reed scholars, when brought into colla- with the Latiti scholars could, in general, hardly compete ■nith the most aiddling of these, — not merely in matters of language, but in every thing ?hich demanded a more developed faculty of thought." J * Ansichten, ^c, i. e. Thoughts on the Organization of Learned Schools, by ^. F. Bemhardi, Doctor of Philosophy, Director and Professor of the Fre- lerician Gymnasium, in Berlin, and Member of the Consistorial Council, 818. t Vide Morgenstenii Orat. De Litteris Humaniorihus, p. 11. X From a Dissertation accompanj^ing tlieylHwwaZ Report of the Royal Insti- ute of Studies, in Municli, for the year 1822, by its Director, Cajetan von CVeiller, Privy Counsellor, Perpetual Secretary of the Royal Academy of sciences, &c. This testimony is Avorthy of attention, not merely on account )f the high talent, knowledge, and experience of the witness, but because it lints at the result of a disastrous experiment made by authority of GoveiTi- iiont throughout the schools of an extensive kingdom ; — an experiment of Aliich certain empirics would recommend a repetition amongst ourselves. Cut the experiment, which in schools organized and controlled like those of jBavaria, could be at once arrested when its evil tendency was sufficiently [ipparent, would, in schools circumstanrcd like ours, cud only, either in their 270 STUDY OF MATHEMATICS. The tliird Avituess whom we call, is one, be it remarked, with a stronger bias to realism, in the higher instruction, than is of late, after the experience of the past, easily to be found in Germany. Professor Klumpp observes : — "■ We shall first of all admit, that mathematics only cultivate the mind ou a single phasis. Their object is merely/or,>« and quantity. They thus remain, as it were, only on the surface of things, without reaching theii- essential (qualities, or their internal and far more important relations, — to the feelings, namely, and the wUl, — and consequently without determining the higher facul- ties to activity. So, likewise, on the other hand, the memory and imagination remain in a great measure unemployed ; so that, strictly speaking, the under- standing alone remains to them, and even this is cultivated and pointed only in one special direction. To a many-sided cidture, — to an all-sided harmonious \ excitation and development of the many various powers, they can make no pretension. This, too, is strongly confirmed by experience., inasmuch as many mere mathematicians, however learned and estimable they may be, are still notorious for a certain one-sidedness of mind, and for a want of practical tact. If, therefore, mathematical instruction is to operate beneficially as a mean of mental cultivation, the chasms which it leaves must be filled up by other] objects of study., and that harmonious evolution of the faculties procured, which |^ our learned schools are bound to propose as their uecessaiy end."* i i To the same general fact, we shall add the testimony of one of: the shrewdest of human observers, we mean Goethe, who in a letter to Zelter thus speaks : — j " This also shows me more and more distinctly, what I have long inj secret been aware of, that the cultivation afforded by the Mathematics is, in^ the highest degi'ee, one-side nnd contracted. Nay, Voltaire does not hesitate i somewhere to affirm, ' j'ai toujours remarque que la gcometrie laisse Vesprii ou elk le trouve.'' Franklin., also, has clearly and explicitly enounced his particular aversion for mathematicians ; as he found them, in the intercourse of societj^ insupportable from their trifling and captious spirit." -f Even D'Alembert, the mathematician, and professed encomiast' ruin, or in their conversion from inadequate instruments of a higher culti-; vation to effective engines of a disguised barbarism. We may endeavour' erelong, to prevent the experience of other nations from being altogether un-' profitable to ourselves. '•'•Felix quemf admit aliena pericula cautum.'''' Hi * Die Gelehrten Schiden., Sj-c, i. e. Learned Schools, according to the prin\^i ciples of a gemune humanism, and the demands of the age. By F. W. Klumpp Professor in the Royal Gymnasium of Stuttgart. 1829, vol. ii. p. 41. Ar! J-a interesting account of the seminary established on Klumpp's principles, b] the King of Wirtemberg, at his pleasure palace of Stetten, in 1831, is to Ix found in the Conversations Lexicon fuer neuesten Zeit. i. p. 727. t Briificechsel zicischen Goethe nnd Zcltcr, 1833, i. p. 430. MATHEMATICAL NOT AN IMPROVING STUDY. -271 ^«iiJlI)f the niatlicmatics, cannot deny the charge that they freeze and isofliBpai'ch the mind : but lie endeavours to evade it. Wc shall content ourselves with the remark, that if mathematics (as is isserted with sutticient reason) onh/ make straight the minds which arc without { ftjfls, so they onlif dry up and chill the minds ulreadij prepared for this ope- ation by nature^* Yet what a confession ! The Cambridge cathohcon is thus a ose which never bestows health, but tends ahvays to evolve the eeds of disease. Nay, Descartes, the greatest mathematician of his age, and, a spite of his mathematics, also its greatest philosopher, was con- inced from his own consciousness, that these sciences, however canimtiRjJuable as an instrument of external science, are absolutely per- iicbii ikious as a mean of internal culture. Baillet, his biographer, fbeiffl requently commemorates this ; and first under the year 1623, he 28th of the philosopher, he records of Descartes, that : — " It was now a long time, since he had been convinced of the small tdility f the Mathematics^ especially when studied on their own account, and not pplicd to other things. There was nothing, in truth, which appeared to im more futile than to occupy ourselves with simple numbers and imaginary ij 01 01 gm^es^ as if it were proper to confine om-selves to these trifes (bagatelles) !,wlloi rithout canying our view beyond. There even seemed to him in this some- worse than useless. His maxim was, that such aj)plicatio7i insensibly isaccustorned us to the use of our reason^ and made us run the danger of )sing the path which it traces." {Cartesii Regulae ad Directionem Ingenii, • Th ^' ^^' ^^SS.) — [The Avords themselves of Descartes deserve quotation : — Revera nihil inanius est, quam circa nudos numeros figurasque imagiua- ias ita vcrsari, ut velle videamur in talium nugarum cognitione conquiescerc, tque snpei-ficiarlis istis demonstrationibus, quae casu saepius quam arte iveniimtur, et magis ad oculos et imaginationem pertinent, quam ad intel- ictnm, sic iucubare, ut quodammodo ipsa ratione uti desuescamus ; simulque 1 encOi ihll intricatius, quam tali proband! modo, novas difBcultates confusis nume- is involutas, expedire. Quum vero postea cogitarem, uude ergo fieret, lijgl,(,j t primi dim Philosophiae iuventores, neminem Matheseos imperitum ad jjjjj, tudium sapientiae vellent admittere, [a fable, the oldest recorder of which Gem tbns leiri itiel infill ;,tben ikmoi bveloij osli'csl laissffi keiatcM itogete 1831, i!« oui'ished some sixteen centuries subsequent to Plato,] tanquam haec dis- iplina omnium facillima et maxime uecessaria vidcatur, ad ingeuia capes- endis aliis majoribus scieutiis erudienda et pn\3paranda; plane suspicatus guamdam cos Mathesitn agnovisse, valde diversam a vulgari nostrae rtafis."] — Baillet goes on : — " In a letter to Mcrsenne, written in 1630, M. >escartes recalled to him that he had renounced the study of mathematics fliW ^ fi^finy years ; and that he was anxious not to lose any more of his time in \e barren operations of geometry and arithmetic^ studies ivhich never lead to * Melanges, t. iv. p. 181, od. ITG-I. [Compare also Esprit de VEncycl. II. 349.] 272 STUDY OF MATHEMATICS. any thing important.'" — Finally, speaking of tlie general character of the phi losopher, Baillet adds : — " In regard to the rest of mathematics," (he had jus spoken of astronomy, which Descartes thought, " though he dreamt in it him- self, only a loss of time,'') — "in regard to the rest of mathematics, those whc know the rank which ho held above all mathematicians, ancient and modeni will agree that he was the man in the world best qualified to judge them We have observed that, after having studied these sciences to the bottom he had renounced them as of no use for the conduct of life, and solace of man i kind.'"* j We sliall refer to Descartes again. | How opposite are the habitudes of mind whicli the study of th<: Mathematical and the study of the Philosophical sciences f requir' and cultivate, has attracted the attention of observers from th' most ancient times. The principle of this contrast lies in thei different objects, in their different ends, and in the different mode, (. of considering their objects; — differences in the sciences their selves, which calling forth, in their cultivators, different facultie; or the same faculty in different ways and degrees, determin developments of thought so dissimilar, that in the same ind vidual a capacity for the one class of sciences has, not withoi reason, been considered as detracting from his qualification fc: the other. j As to their objects. — In the first place : — The Mathematic;; sciences are limited to the relations of quantity alone, or, to spea; * La Vie de Descartes,' F. i. pp. Ill, 112, 225. P. ii. p. 481.— [Tlj Regular of Descartes, extracted also in the Port Royal Logic, were publishe; in full, at Amsterdam, in 1701. They are found in the third volume Garnier's edition of the " CEuvres Philosophiques de Descartes," (that is, 1, works to the exclusion of the Mathematical and Physical vrr'it'mgs) ; and we i translated into French by M. Cousin, in his edition of the whole works i the philosopher.] ] t [Reminded by the preceding note, — it may be proper here to remaj upon the vague universality which is given to the tenns philosophy and j9/j losophical ia common English ; an indefiuitude limited specially to tl, country. Mathematics and Physics may here be called philosophical scienc( , whereas, on the Continent, they are excluded from philosophy, philosophl being there applied emphatically to those sciences which are immediately ' mediately mental. Hegel, in one of his works, mentions that in looking o^r what in England are published under the title of " Philosophical Transi- tions," he had been unable to find any philosophy at all. This abusive e h ployment of the words is favoured, I believe, principally at Cambridge ; .* if Mathematics and Physics arc not philosophical, then that university m S confess that it now encourages no philosophy whatever. The history of t i insular peculiarity might easily be traced.] REASONS WHY MATHEMATICAL STUDV UNIMPROVING. 273 more correctly, to the one relation of quantities — equality and inequality; the Philosophical sciences, on the contrary, are astricte J to none of the categories, are coextensive with existence and its modes, and circumscribed only by the capacity of the luunan intellect itself. — In the second place : — IMathcmatics take no account of things, but are conversant solely about certain images ; and their whole science is contained in the separation, conjunction, and comparison of these. Philosophy, on the other hand, is mainly occupied with realities ; it is the science of a real , existence, not merely of an imagined existence. As to their ends, and their procedure to these ends. — Truth or cnowledge is, indeed, the scope of both ; but the kind of know- otlge proposed by the one is very different from that proposed ly the other. — In Mathematics, the whole principles are given ; II Philosophy, the greater number are to be sought out and esta- 'lished. — In Mathematics, the given principles are both material I ad formed, that is, they afford at once the conditions of the con- truction of the science, and of our knowledge of that construction principia essendi et cognoscendi). In Philosophy, the given prln- iplcsare only formal — only the logical conditions of the abstract issibility of knowledge. — In Matliematics, the whole science is irtually contained in its data; it is only the evolution of apoten- lal knowledge into an actual, and its procedure is thus merely __ xplicative. In Philosophy, the science is not contained in data ; ;- :s principles are merely the rules for our conduct in the quest, in 1* jhe proof, in the arrangement of knowledge : it is a transition from * Ibsolute ignorance to science, and its procedure is therefore am- liative. — In Mathematics we always depart from the definition ; 1 Philosophy, ivith the definition we usually end. — Mathematics now nothing of causes ; the research of causes is Philosophy ; the rmer display only the that (to &t/) ; the latter mainly investi- itcs the ivhy (to atori). * — The truth of Mathematics is the har. * [By cause^ &c., with modern philosophers, I mean efficient cause, and lould have stated this articulately, had the possibility of ambiguity ever ■on suggested. When I therefore said that Philosophy and Mathematics ■ distinguished, in that the former is, and the latter is not, a research of >>es, I, of course, meant and mean efficient causes. Avery acute philoso- i'-al mathematician, Professor Boole, in his "Mathematical Aualj'sis of -ic," (pp. 11, sq., 81, sq.) makes me in this contradict Aristotle; and is literally correct in his quotation from the Posterior Analytics, wiiere I'i-^totle does declare, that the geometer investigates the lion. Mr Boole is not, however, recollected, that Aristotle had four causes ; and, as Ma- lematicsare confessedly occupied with the/orma/, the philosopher, not only 274 STUDY OF MATHEMATICS— mony of thought and thought ; the truth of Philosophy is the harmony of thought and existence. — Hence the absurdity of all apphcations of the mathematical method to philosophy. It is, however, proximately in the different modes of considerim/ their objects that Mathematics and Philosophy so differently culti- vate the mind. In the first place : — Without entering on the metaphysical na- ture of Space and Time, as the basis of concrete and discrete quantities, of geometry and arithmetic, it is sufficient to say that Space and Time, as the necessary conditions of thought, are. severally, to us absolutely one ; and each of their modifications, though apprehended as singular in the act of consciousness, is, at the same time, recognised as virtually, and in effect, universal Mathematical science, therefore, whose notions (as number, figure motion) are exclusively modifications of these fundamental forms; separately or in combination, does not estabhsh their universality; on any a posteriori -process of abstraction and generalization ; buj at once contemplates the general in the individual. The universal notions of philosophy, on the contrary, are, vnih a, few great es ceptions, generalizations from experience ; and as the universf constitutes the rule under which the philosopher thinks the ind vidual, philosophy consequently, the reverse of mathematic; views the individncd in the genercd. In the second place : — In Mathematics, quantity, when not d; vorced from form, is itself really presented to the intellect in ! lucid image of phantasy, or in a sensible diagram; and the qua' titles which cannot thus be distinctly construed to imagination ai, sense, are, as only syntheses of unity, repetitions of identity, ad quately, though conventionally, denoted in the vicarious combir- tion of a few simple symbols. Thus both in geometry, by ostensive construction, and in arithmetic and algebra, by a sy ;■ in the place adduced, but in sundry others, therefore states, that the mathen • tician is conversant about the whj. But even Aristotle was fully awa,, that the tenn cause or principle properly and emphatically pertains onlj) the efficient; and accordingly in his Eudemian Ethics, (ii. 6) he states tl', adding, as an example, that u-hat in mathematics are called principles, aro styled, not inproprietij. but only by analogy or resemblance. He indeed cxpre.' y denies to them the efficient., &c. (INIetaph. iii. 2. alibi.) \ IMr Boole, likewise, has not observed, that it is not Abstract, Pure or Tl\- retical Logic which I oppose to INIathematics, but that I oppose to each oifr tivo Concrete, Applied or Practical Logics ; to wit, that of necessary matti = mathematics, and that of contingent matter philosophy and common reaj»- iug. See p. 262.] REASONS WHY MATHExMATICAL STUDY UNniPROVINCi 275 liolical, the intellect is relieved of all eftort in the support and presentation of its objects ; and is therefore left to operate upon these in all the ease and security Avith which it considers the con- i rete realities of nature. Philosophy, on the contrary, is princi- pally occupied with those general notions which are thought by the intellect but are not to bo pictured in the imagination; and yet, though thus destitute of the light and definitude of mathematical i-oprcscntations, philosophy is allowed no adequate language of its own ; and the common language, in its vagueness and insufficiency, does not afford to its unimaginable abstractions that guarantee md support, which, though less wanted, is fully obtained by its lival science, in the absolute equivalence of mathematical thought uul mathematical expression. In the third place : — Mathematics, departing from certain ori- j,inal hypotheses, and these hypotheses exclusively determining •very movement of their procedure, and the images or the vicari- uis symbols about which they are conversant being clear and imple, the deductions of these sciences are apodictic or demon- -trative ; that is, the possibility of the contrary is, at every step, -cen to be excluded in the very comprehension of the terms. On rho other hand, in Philosophy (with the exception of the Theory if Logic), and in our reasonings in general, such demonstrative ertainty is rarely to bo attained ; prohahle certainty, that is, here we are never conscious of the impossibihty of the contrary, - all that can be compassed ; and this also, not being internally \ olvcd from any fundamental data, must be sought for, collected, lid applied from without. From this general contrast it will easily be seen, how an cxces- -ive study of the mathematical sciences not only docs not prepare, lut absolutely incapacitates the mind, for those intellectual ener- gies which philosophy and hfe require. We are thus disqualified or observation, either interned or external, — for abstraction and lenercdization, — and for common reasoning ; nay disposed to the iltornative of blind credulity or of irrational scepticism. That mathematics, in which the objects are purely ideal, in •vliich the principles are given, in which, from these principles, he whole science is independently developed, and in which de- velopment the student is, as Aristotle expresses it, not an actor, 'Ut a mere spectator; — that mathematics can possibly in their rudy educate to any active exercise of the powers of observation, ither as reflected upon ourselves, or as directed on the affairs of 276 STUDY OF MATHEMATICS. life and the phsenomena of nature, will not, we presume, be main- tained. But of this again. That they do not cultivate the power of generalisation is equally apparent. The ostensive figures of Geometry are no abstractions, — but concrete forms of imagination or sense ; and the highest praise, accorded by the most pliilosophical mathematicians, to the symbolical notation of arithmetic and algebra, is, that it has relieved the mind of all intellectual effort, by substituting a sign for a notion, and a mechanical for a mental process. In mathe- matics, genus and species are hardly known. Geometry, indeed, has been justly considered as cultivating rather the lowest degree of the imagination * than any higher power of the understanding. — " The geometer " (says Philoponus or rather Ammonius) " considers the divisible forms in the imagina- tion ; for he uses his imagination as his hoard." f " Those rejoice " (says Albertus Magnus), " in the mathematical sciences ivhose organ of imagination for receivi7ig figures is ternperately dry and warm "I — " Among philosophers," (says Fracastorius, the mathe- matician, the philosopher, the poet,) " some delight to investigate the causes and substances of things, and these are the Philosophers, properly so called. Others again, inquiring into the relations of certain accidents, are chiefly occupied about these, such as num- bers and figures, and, in general, quantities. These latter are principally potent in the faculty of imagination, and in that part of the brain which lies towards its centre ; this, therefore, they have hot, and capacious, and excellently conservative. Hence, they imagine well how things stand in their wholes and in relation to each other. But we have said, that every one finds pleasure in those functions which he is capable of performing well. Where- , fore, tJiese principally delight in that knowledge which is situate * In this country, the term Imagination has latterly been used in a more contracted signification, as expressive of what has been called the creative or productive imagination alone. IMi- Stewart has even bestowed on the re- productive imagination the term Conception; — happily, we do not tliink; as both in grammatical propriety, and by the older and correcter usage of phi- losophers, this term (or rather the product of this operation — Concept) ]& convertible with general notion^ or more correctly notion, simply, and in this sense is admu-ably rendered by the Begriff {y^haX is gi-asped up) of the Ger-' mans. t In Aristot. de Anima, Sign. B. iv. ed. TrincaveUi, 1535.— (Ai-istot. 1. i. text. 16.) So Themistius, frequently. X In Metaph. Aristot. L. 1. tract i. c. 5. So Averroes, fi-equently. MATHEMATICS DO NOT CONDUCE TO GENERALISATION. 277 in the imagination, and they are denominated Mathematicians. " * Though no behevers in Gall, there can, however, we think, be no doubt, that in the same individual there are very different degrees of imagination for different objects ; and of these one of the most remarkable is, the peculiar capacity possessed by certain persons of presenting and retaining quantities and numbers, — the condi- tion of a mathematical genius. — " The study of mathematics " [sajs Descartes, and he frequently repeats the observation,) prin- clpally exercises the imagination in the consideration of figures .,ind motions." f Nay, on this very ground, he explains the inca- jpacity of mathematicians for philosophy, " That part of the mind," says he, in a letter to Father Mersenne, " to wit, the Imagination, which is principally conducive to a skill in mathema- tics, is of greater detriment than service for metaphysical sp>ecula- )ions." I Sir Kenelm Dighy acutely says : — " I may observe, as )ur countryman Roger Bacon did long ago, that those students, who busy themselves much with such notions as reside wholly in ;he Fantasie, do hardly ever become idoneous for abstracted meta- ohysical specidations ; the one having bulkie foundation of matter, ir of the accidents of it, to settle upon (at least with one foot) ; he other[^flying continually, even to a lessening pitch, in the sub- ile air. And, accordingly, it hath been generally noted, that he exactest mathematicians, who converse altogether with lines, igures, and other differences of quantity, have seldom proved 'minent in metaphysics or specidative divinity; nor again, the irofessors of these sciences, in the other arts. Much less can it )Q expected that an excellent physician, whose fancy is always Vaught with the material drugs, that he prescribeth his apothe- ■ary to compound_]^his medicines of, and whose hands are inured the cutting up, and eyes to the inspection, of anatomised bodies, ■hould easily^and with success, flie his thoughts at so towering a lame, as a pure" intellect, a separated and unbodied soid." \\ — The lependence of mathematics on the lower imagination is recognised, n hke manner, in the Kantian philosophy and its modifications. But the study of mathematical demonstration is mainly recom- nendcd as a practice of reasoning in general ; and it is precisely, IS such a practice, that its inutihty is perhaps the greatest. — aeneral reasoning is almost exclusively occupied on contingent * De Intelkctione, L. ii. Opera, f. 148, ed. 3. Vcnet. 1584. t Lettres, p. i. let. xsx. X Epist. p. ii. ep. xxxiii. II Observations on Sir Thos. Brown's Religio Medici, sub initio. 278 STUDY OF MATHEMATICS. matter ; if mathematical demonstration therefore supplies, as is contended, the best exercise of practical logic, it must do this by best enabling us to counteract the besetting tendencies to error, and to overcome the principal obstacles in the way of our probable reasonings. Now, the dangers and difficulties of such reasoning lie wholly, — 1) in its/on?i, — 2) in its vehicle, — 3) in its object-mat- ter. Of these severally. 1.) As to the form: — The study of mathematics educates to no sagacity in detecting and avoiding the fallacies which originate in the thoiight itself of the reasoner. — Demonstration is only demon- stration, if the necessity of the one contrary and the impossibility of the other be, from the nature of the object-matter itself, abso- lutely clear to consciousness at every step of its deduction. Mathe- matical reasoning, therefore, as demonstrative, allows no room for any sophistry of thought ; the necessity of its matter necessi- tates the correctness of its form ; and, consequently, it cannot forewarn and arm the student against this formidable principle of error. Mr Whewell, indeed, says, that — " In Mathematics the student is rendered familiar with the most perfect examples of strict inference ; compelled habitually to fix his attention on those conditions on which the cogency of the demonstration depends ; and in the mistaken and imperfect attempts at demon- stration made by himself or others, he is presented with examples of the most natural fallacies, which he sees exposed and cor- rected." (P. 5.) We must be pardoned for observing that we should have wished the connexion of the first clauses of this sen-, tence and the last, had been instructed by something better thar; an " and;" also that the novel assertions in this last itself hac' been explained and exemplified. Were the truth of our argu-j ment not sufficiently manifest of itself, we might appeal to th(; fact, noticed by Aristotle and confirmed by all subsequent expe , rience, that of the sciences, mathematics alone have continued t(i advance without " shadow of turning," and even (as far as their proper objects are concerned) without dispute. Mathematic have from the first been triumphant over the husk ; Philosophj| is still militant for the kernel. Logic, therefore, as the doctrim of the form of reasoning, so valuable in every other subject, i; practically valueless in mathematics; and, so far from " for mint logical habits better than logic itself," as Mr Whewell intrepidly asserts, mathematics cannot in this relation conduce to " logical habits" at all. The art of reasoning right is assuredly not to h] MATHEMATICS NOT A LOGICAL EXERCISE. 279 taught bj a process in wliicli there is no reasoning wrong. We ilo not learn to swim in water by previous practice in a pool of iiuicksilver. Yet, if mathematics arc to be recommended as coun- teracting our natural tendency to err, why not also propose the mercury as counteracting our natural tendency to sink ? J/i- Coleridge (himself a Cantabrigian) is right, when he says : — " It is I great mistake to suppose geometry any substitute for logic."* Since writing the above, wc have stumbled on the following ,iassage of Du Hamel, not only a distinguished philosopher but I distinguished mathematician : — " I do not liud, that geometers are mighty solicitous whether then- argii- iients be, iu formula, compounded according to logical prescription ; and . L't there are none who demonstrate either more precisely or with greater ouviction. For they usually follow the guidance of nature ; descending •tep by step, from the simpler and more general to the more complex, and lefiniug every term, they leave uu ambiguity in theii- language. Hence t is, t/icit tliey cannot err in the form of their syllogisms; for we seldom deviate rtim logical rules, except when we abuse the ambiguity of words, or attri- lute a ditferent meaning to the middle term, in the major and ui the minor loposition. — It is also the custom of geometers to prefix certain self-evident ixioms or principles, from which all that they are subsequently to demon- •trate flows. — Finally, their conclusions are deduced, either from definitions vhich cannot be called in question, or from those principles and propositions vuown by the light of nature, and styled axioms, or from other already esta- ilished conclusions, which now obtain the cogency of principles. They make Hj troublesome inquiry into the mood or figure of a syllogism, nor lavish itlention on the rules of logic; for such attention, by averting their mind ti-om iiore necessary olijects, would be detrimental rather than advantageous." f [Arnauld has hkewise some observations to the same effect. — lluygens and Leibnitz, indeed, truly observe, that mathematicians an, and sometimes do, err in point of form. But this aberration ■> rare and exceptional ; it requires, indeed, a most ingenious tupidity to go wrong, where it is far more easy to keep right. V mathematical reasoning may certainly transgress in form, and I railway locomotive may go off the rails. But as a railroad con- luctor need not look ahead for ditches and quagmires, so a ma- liematician, in his process, is not compelled to be on guard against lie fallacies which beset the route of the ordinary reasoner.] * Table Talk, i. 16. t {De Mente Humana^ 1. iii. c. 1. Opera^ t. 11. p. 351.) See also, instar iiinium, Fonseca (in Metaph. Arisiot. L. 11. c. 3, q. 4, sect. 3.^ Leibnitz ' 'pera. t. 11. p. 17) commemorates the notable exploit of two zealous, but ick-headed logicians,— Herlinus and Dasypodius by name,— who actually lucod the first six books of Euclid into formal syllogisms. 280 STUDY OF MATHEMATICS. But if the study of mathematics do not, as a logical discipline, warn the reason against the fallacies of thought, does it not, as an invigorating exercise of reason itself, fortify that faculty against their influence ? To this it is equally incompetent. The principles of mathematics are self-evident ; and every transition, every successive step in their evolution, is equally self-evident. But the mere act of intellect, which an intuitive proposition deter- mines, is of all mental energies the easiest, — the nearest, in fact, to a negation of thought altogether. But as every step in mathe- matical demonstration is intuitive, every step in mathematical demonstration calls forth an absolute minimum of thought ; and as a faculty, is always evolved in proportion to its competent . degree of exercise, consequently mathematics, in determining ■ reason to its feeblest energy, determines reasooi to its most limited \ development. '. In the inertion of tliis study, the mind, in fact, seldom rises to ■ the full consciousness of self-activity. We are here passively! moved on, almost as much as we spontaneously move. It has been well expressed : — " Mathematicce munus pistrinarium est ; ad molam enim alligati, verthnur in gyrum aeque atque vertimus." The routine of demonstration, in the gymnastic of mind, may,' indeed, be compared to the routine of the treadmill, in the gym-j nastic of body. Each determines a single power to a low but; continuous action ; all, not disabled in the ordinary functions oi! humanity, are qualified to take a part in either ; but as few with-| out compulsion are found to expatiate on the one, so few withoul; impulsion are found to make a progress in the other. Both ar( conversant about the necessary ; both depart from data ; of botlj j the procedure is by steps ; and in both, the first step being con ceded, the necessity of every other is shown on evidence equally intuitive. The one is ever moving, never advancing ; the othe: ever varying to infinity only the expression of the same identity, Both are abstract occupations ; and both are thought to disqualif; for the world; for though both corrective disciplines, a prejudic prevails towards the one, against the moral habits of its votarief towards the other, against their moral reasoning. Among man; other correspondences, both, in fine, cultivate a single intellectm virtue; for both equally educate to a mechanical continuity (' attention; as in each the scholar is disagreeably thrown out, o the slightest wandering of thought. Nor is the exivemQ facility of mathematics any paradox. " !Ni MATHEMATICS NOT A LOGICAL EXERCISE. 2S1 me, almost," says Cicero, " seems to have intently applied him- elf to this science, who did not attain in it any proliciency he ileased;"* " Mathematics are the study of a shifigish intellect," ays " the Helvetian Plini/ ;" -f and Warbm'toii calls, " the routine >t" demonstration the easiest exercise of reason, where much less -f the vigour than of the attention of mind is required to excel." $ Vmong the Greeks in ancient, as in the school of Pestalozzi, and thers in recent times, mathematics were drawn back to the pri- iiary elements of education. Among a hundred others, Aristotle bserves that not youths only, but mere hoijs easily become aathematicians, while yet incapable of practical or speculative (liilosophy. II And in regard to boys, it is acknowledged by Vieine)/er, one of the highest authorities, in education, of our age, ■ to be a fact notorious in all schools, that the minds which mani- est a partiality for this class of abstract representations, possess he feeblest J udf/iv lit in reference toother matters." % "The lathematical genius" (says the learned Bishop of Avranches, an dmirer of mathematics, and himself no contemptible geometer,) requires much phlegm, moderation, attention, and circumspec- ion. All, therefore, that goes to the formation of those brilliant iiinds, to whom has been conceded by privilege the title of heaux- sprits, I mean copiousness, variety, freedom, reacUness, vivacity, —all tliis is directly opposed to mathematical operations, which re simple, slow, dry, forced, and necessary." ** — [Finally, this •xtrerae facihty of the mathematical processes is not only promptly iJmitted by mathematical authors, but founded on by many of hem as a strong recommendation of the study. Of these we ■!'cd only mention, among many others, Descartes, Wolf, Daries, "lerus, Horrebovius, Weidler, Lichtenberg, &c., &c. ; but to iiese it is unnecessary to give articulate references.] This leads us to observe, that to minds of any talent, mathe- iiatics are only difficult because they are too easy. — Pleasure is he concomitant of the spontaneous and unimpeded energy of a acuity or habit ; and Pain the reflex, either of the compulsion of I power to operation beyond its due limits, whether in continuance * De Oratore, L. i. c. 3. t Zuingerns in Ethic. Nicom. L. vi. c. 9. X Julian, Prcf. M'orks, iv. p. 345. II Etii. Nic. L. vi. c. 8. If Ueber Pestalozzi, 1810, p. 61. See also Klumpp, ut svpra, vol. ii. p. 41. ** Huetiana, ch. 123. 282 STUDY OF MATHEMATICS. or degree, or of the compulsory repression of its spontaneous ten- dency to action. A study, therefore, will be agreeable, in pro- portion as it affords the conditions of an exercise, spontaneous and unimpeded, to a greater number of more energetic faculties ; and irksome, in proportion as it constrains either to a too intense or too protracted activity, or to no activity at all. It is by reason of this principle that mathematics are found more peculiarly intoler- able, by minds endowed with the most varied and vigorous capa- cities ; for such minds are precisely those which the study mulcts of the most numerous and vivid pleasures, and punishes with the largest proportion of intensest pains. It cannot, certainly, be said that the cultivation of these sciences fatigues a single faculty, by- urging it to an activity at any moment too intense ; in fact, theyji are felt as irksome, in a great measure, because they do not allowj even the one power which they partially occupy, its highest healthy exercise. In mathematics we attain our end, — " non vi sed saepe cadendo." But the continued and monotonous attention; they necessitate to a long concatenated deduction, each step ir the lucid series calling forth, on the same eternal relation, and t( the same moderate amount, the same simple exertion of reason — this, added to the inertion to which they condemn all the noble) and more pleasurable energies of thought, is what renders mathe matics, in themselves the easiest of all rational studies, — the mos ; arduous for those very minds to which studies, in themselves mos arduous, are easiest. In mathematics dulness is thus elevated into talent, and talen degraded into incapacity. — " Those," says the Cliian Aristo, " wh- occupy themselves with Mathematics to the neglect of Philosophy are hke the wooers of Penelope, who, unable to attain the mistress* contented themselves with the maids." * — H'qyponicus, a mathej matical genius, and general blockhead, of whom his pupil, the phi) losopher Arcesilaus, used to say, " that his science must hav' flown into his mouth when yawning," f is the representative of numerous class. — " The mathematician is either a beggar, a dunc( or a visionary, or the three in one," was long an adage in the Eurc pean schools. J — " Lourd comme un geometre" || (dull as a mathf * Stobaei Floril.^ Tit. iv. 110. — We accept, biit do not pledge cm-selves 1; defend, the interpretation of the nniversal Gesuer. t Laert. L. iv. seg. 32. % Alstedu Didactica., c. 12 ; and Muelleri ParoemicB AcademiccB^ p. 38. II Encyclopedie^ t. iv. p. 627. Art. Geometre, par D^Alembert, (in Espt &c.) MATHEMATICS NOT A LOGICAL EXERCISE. 2S3 iiatieiaii) has also, by the confession of its objects, obtained a ■roverhial currency in the most mathematical nation of Europe. — " A dull and patient intellect," says Joseph Scaliger, the most earned of men, — " such should be your geometers. A great cuius cannot be a great mathematician " * — " We see," says '\0(jer Bacon, a geometer above his age, " that the very rudest cholars are competent to mathematical learning, although unable attain to any knowledge of the other sciences." f — On the ther hand, to say nothing of less illustrious examples, Bayle, he impersonation of all logical subtilty, is reported by Le Clerc • to have confessed that he could never understand the demon- rration of the first problem of Euchd : :j: and Wolf, " the )hilologer," the mightiest master of the higher criticism, as we re informed by his biographer and son-in-law, " was abso- itely destitute of all mathematical capacity;" nay, "remained rmly convinced" (what, as gymnasiarch and professor, he had the niplest opportunities of verifying,) " that the more capable a mind as for mathematics, the more incapable was it for the other no- lost sciences." || We are far from meaning hereby to disparage the mathematical enius, which invents new methods and formulae, or new and feli- itous applications of the old ; but this we assert, — that the most idinary intellect may, by means of these methods and formulae, nee invented, reproduce and apply, by an eifort nearly mechani- al, all that the original genius discovered. The merit of a mathe- latical invention is, in fact, measured by the amount of thought hich it supersedes. It is the highest compliment to the ingenuity f a Pascal, a Leibnitz, and a Babbage, in their invention of the lithmetical machine, that there would not be recpiired, in those ho use it, more than the dexterity of a turnspit. The algebraic nalysis is not an instrument so perfect ; it still requires a modi- iun of mind to work it. Unlike their divergent studies, the inventive talents of the lathematician and philosopher, in fact, approximate. To meta- liysical intellects, hke those of Descartes and Leibnitz, mathe- latical discovery shows almost as an easy game. Both were liistrious inventors, almost as soon as serious students, of the * Scaligerana Secunda, p. 270, Ed. Des Maizcaux. t Opus Majus, P. iv. c. 3. X Bibl. Clioisie, t. xii. p. 223. II Kortum, Leben Wolfs des Philoloyen. 1833. Vol. i. p. 23. 284 STUDY OF MATHEMATICS. science ; and when the former, at the age of forty-two, pubhshed : the work which, embodying his boyish discoveries, determines the grand sera in the progress of the modern analytic, he had fof seventeen years, as he expressly tells us, completely forgotten even^ the elementary operations of arithmetic. Yet so far was thej: puerile play of the philosopher, in advance of the veteran effort' of the mathematicians, that it is only about four years, sincd Fourier practically demonstrated how a great principle of Des^ cartes, previously unappreciated, affords the best and the mos ' rapid method for the analysis of numerical equations. 2.) In regard to the vehicle : — Mathematical language, precis and adequate, nay, absolutely convertible ivith mathematica thought, can aford us no example of those fallacies ivhich s, easily arise from the ambiguities of ordinary language; its stud' i cannot, therefore, it is evident, supply us with any means of ob viating those illusions from which it is itself exempt. The contras J of mathematics and philosophy, in this respect, is an interestinj object of speculation ; but, as imitation is impossible, one of nj practical result. \ 3.) In respect of the matter : — 3Iathematics afford us no assist ance, either in conquering the difficulties, or in avoiding the dati gers which ive encounter in the great field of probabilities wher&.\ we live and move. \ As to the diffcidties : — Mathematical demonstration is solelj occupied in deducing ' conclusions ; probable reasoning, princ) pally concerned in looking out for premises. — All mathematic' reasoning flows from, and — admitting no tributary streams,- can be traced back to its original source : principle and concl sion are convertible. The most eccentric deduction of the scien i is only the last ring in a long chain of reasoning, which descenc' with adamantine necessity, link by link, in one simple series, fro its original dependence. — In contingent matter, on the contrar' the reasoning is comparatively short; and as the conclusion c; seldom be securely established on a single antecedent, it \ necessary, in order to realize the adequate amount of evidence, , accumulate probabilities by multiplying the media of inferenc and thus to make the same conclusion, as it were, the apex f many convergent arguments. (Compare Aristot. Anal. Pc\ I. 12, § 13.) In general reasoning, therefore, the capaciti mainly requisite, and mainly cultivated, are the prompt acui- ness which discovers what materials are wanted for our pi- MATHEMATICS NOT A LOGICAL EXERCISE. 285 lises, and the activity, knowledge, sagacity, and research able mipetently to supply them. — In demonstration, on the contrary, le one capacity cultivated is that patient habit of suspending all itrusive thought, and of continuing an attention to the unvaried i^olution of that perspicuous evidence which it passively recog- ises, but does not actively discover. Of Observation, Experi- ient, Induction, Analogy, the mathematician knows nothing. /hat Mr Whewell, therefore, alleges in praise of demonstration, -" that the mixture of various (/rounds of convict ion, which is so immon in other men's minds, is rigorously excluded from the athematical student's," is precisely what mainly contributes to ndcr it useless as an exercise of reasoning. In the practical isincss of life the geometer is proverbially but a child : and r the theory of science? — the subtlety of mind, the midti- nnity of matter, lie far beyond calculus and demonstration; athematics are not the net in which Psyche may be caught, nor .e chain by which Proteus can be fettered. As to the dangers : — How important soever may be the study of ?neral logic, in providing us against the fallacies wliich originate »th in i\iQ form and in the vehicle of reasoning, the error of our aiclusions is, in practice, far less frequently occasioned by any CO in our logical inference from premises, than by the sin of a sh assumption of premises materially false. Now if mathema- ?s, as is maintained, do constitute the true logical catharticon, c one practical pi'opcedeutic of all reasoning, it must of course lable us to correct this the most dangerous and prevalent of our idkctual failings. But, among all our rational pursuits, mathe- atics stand distinguished, not merely as affording us no aid wards alleviating the evil, but as actually inflaming the disease. he mathematician, as already noticed, is exclusively engrossed 1th the deduction of inevitable conclusions, from data passively ^ceived ; while the cultivators of the other departments of know- idge, mental and physical, are for the most part, actively occu- '1 in the quest and scrutiny, in the collection and balancing of I (abilities, in order to obtain and purify the facts on which Ir premises are to be established. Their pursuits, accordingly, a the mingled experience of failure and success, have, to them, ivcd a special logic, a practical discipline, — on the one hand, of II and confidence, on the other, of caution and sobriety : his, on It-' contrary, have not only not trained him to that acute scent, that delicate, almost instinctive, tact which, in the twilight of 286 STUDY OF MATHEMATICS. probability, the search and discrimination of its finer facts demand : they have gone to cloud his vision, to indurate his touch, to all but the blazing light and iron chain of demonstration, leavino him, out of the narrow confines of his science, either to a passive credulity in any premises, or to an absolute incredulitij in all. Before, however, proceeding articulately to show how, in diffc rent dispositions, these opposite vices are, both, the natural con^c■ qucnccs of the same common cause, we may first evince that ou doctrine in regard to the general tendency of mathematical studi is the universal opinion of those who, from their knowledge an( their powers of observation, are the best qualified to pronounc. a judgment. "We quote the authorities that chance to linger i) our recollection ; a slight research might multiply them withou end. On such a question, we, of course, prefer the testimony v mathematicians themselves ; they shall constitute our first class- and under this head we include those only who have distinguishej themselves by mathematical publications. Of these, the oldest we shall adduce is that miracle of universi; genius — Pascal : — " There is a gi'eat difference between the spirit of Mathematics* and tl spirit of Observation. ■\ — In tho^ former., the principles are palpable, but r^ mote fi'oni common use ; so that fi'om want of custom it is not easy to tii our head in that direction ; but if it be thus turned ever so little, the princ' pies are seen fully confessed, and it would argue a mind incorrigibly false, \ reason inconsecpiently on principles so obtrusive, that it is hardly possible overlook them — But, in \.\iq field of observation., the principles are in comm use, and before the eyes of all. "We need not to turn our head, to make a effort whatsoever. Nothing is wanted beyond a good sight : but good must be ; for the principles are so minute and numerous, that it is hardly p(; sible but some of them should escape. The omission, however, of a single pri ciple, leads to error ; it is, therefore, requisite to have a sight of the clcare to discern all the principles ; and, then, a con-ect intellect to avoid false n, sonings on known principles. — All mathematicians would, thus, be obsei-vaj i had they a good sight ; for they do not reason falsely on the principles wh 1 * In the original — Vesprit de Geometric. Geometrie., as is usual in Fren , is here employed by Pascal for mathematics in general. t In the original — Vesprit de Finesse. It is impossible to render this qt •- adequately in English. Fin is here used for acute., subtile, observant; fl esprit de finesse is nearly convertible with spirit of acute observation, appM especially to the affairs of the world. But as the expressions observant i\ spirit of observation with us actually imply the adjective, the rejietitior^f which would be awkward, we have accordingly translated the original |' these alone. I i MATHEMATICS NOT A LOGICAL EXERCISE. 287 icy know ; and minds of observation would be mathematical could they turn uir view towards the unfamiliar principles of mathematics. — The cause why vtain observant minds are not mathematical, is, because they are wholly hlo to turn themselves towards the principles of mathematics ; hnt the ■ 'II u-hii there arc mathematicians void of observation^ is, that they do 7tol T what lies before them; and that aecustomed to the clear and palpable prin- fples of mathematics, and only to reason after these principles have been well ■•en a}id handled, they lose themselves in matters of observation, where the prin- 'ples do not allow of being thus treated. These objects are seen with diffl- iilty ; nay, arc felt rather than seen ; and it is with infinite pains that others III be made to feel them, if they have not already felt them without aid. hoy are so delicate and so numerous, that to be felt they require a very fine ml a very clear sense. They can also seldom be demonstrated in succession < is done in mathematics ; for we are not so in possession of their principles, liile the very attempt would, of itself, be endless. The object must be dis- vered at once, by a single glance, and not by course of reasoning,— at least ,1 to a certain point. Thus it is rare, that mathematicians are observant, or I at observant minds are mathematiccd : because mathematicians would treat latters of observation by rule of mathematic ; and make themselves ridicu- n;3 by attempting to commence by definitions and by principles, — a mode f procedure incompatible with this kind of reasoning. It is not, that the liud does not perform the process ; but performs it silently, naturally, and [rtlessly : for its expression surpasses all men, and the consciousness of it jppertains to few. — On the other hand, minds of observation, habituated to pnn their judgment at a single glance, arc so amazed when propositions are |iid before them, whereof they comprehend nothing, and wherein to enter, it ilioves them to pass through definitions and barren principles, Avhich they 10 also unaccustomed thus to consider in detail, — that they are revolted and i-gusted. But false minds, they are never either observant or matheraati- il.— Mathematicians, who are mere mathematicians, have thus their under- [tanding con-ect, provided always that every thing be well explained to them y definition and principle: otherwise they are false a7id insupportable ; for \eii are correct only iipon 7iotorious principles. — And minds of observation, if y observant, are incapable of the patience to descend to the first principles matters speculative and of imagination, of which they have had no expe- ice in the usage of the world." * Ikrhcky is our second mathematician. He asks, and his que- i'S are intended to be answered in the negative : — , '• Whether tedious ccdculations in algebra and fluxions be tJie likeliest method lo improve the mind? And whether men's being accustomed to reason alto- ;ether about mathematical signs and figures, doth not make them at a loss ttow to reason without them? — Whether whatever readiness annlysts acquire ^1 stating a problem, or finding apt expressions for mathematical quantities, I' same doth necessarily infer a proportionable ability in conceiving and ex- ' ^si7ig other matters ? " f * Pense.es, T. Partie, art. 10, sect. 2. t Analyst, Qu. 38, 39. 288 STUDY OF MATHEMATICS. iS" Gravesande, our third mathematical testimony, after praising geometry, as an useful exercise of intelligence, inasmuch as its principles are simple, its conclusions undoubted, and as it ascends from the easiest and simplest to the more difficult and more com- plex; and the method of analysis, as cultivating the invention from the necessity it imposes of discovering the intermediate term; requisite for bringing given extremes into comparison, (this ad vantao-e, be it noticed, cannot be allowed to the mere study of th( method,) proceeds : — " But it is not sufficient to have applied the mind to one science ; the mor widely different among themselves are the ideas whicli the intellect acquires and concerning which it reasons, the more expanded becomes its intelligence In the mathematical sciences, by a well ordered exercise, the above-mentioneij faculties are improved. But there is required, moreover, that these sam; faculties should be exercised upon ideas, now of one kind, now of another and different froin mathematical. Those who are habituated to the considera tion of ideas of a single class, however skilful they may be in the handling c these, reason absurdly upon other matters. A pliant genius ought to be ac quired ; and this is only to be compassed by applying the mind to a pluralil of studies, wholly different from each other. . . ."We Ought to be peculiarly at. tentive to this, — that the mind be inured to abstract consideration. Where idea are to be compared, things are never more clearly illustrated than whenTv, examine these ideas separately from all others. In such an exercise of mini the study of metaphysics is peculiarly useful, provided that all confused idea, be removed, and the others expounded in a natural order." * D'Alemhert is the fourth mathematical authority. ' "It seems as, if great mathematicians ought to be excellent metaphysician, at least upon the objects about which their science proper is conversant nevertheless, tliis is very far from being ahvays the case. The logic of son of them is comprehended in their formulse, and does not extend beyond. Tl j case resembles that of a man who has the sense of sight contrai7,.to that 'i touch, or in whom the latter of these senses is only perfected at the expens' of the foiTner. These bad metaphysicians in a science in which it is so eat not to reason wrong, would infallibly be much worse, as experience prove on matters in which they had not the calculus for a guide." f [Lichtenherg, the celebrated Professor of Mathematics ar Physics in Goettingen, but who was also something better, beir one of the wittiest writers and most philosophical thinkers of h country, is our fifth mathematical authority. After stating thj " Mathematics are not only the most certain of all human science; but also the easiest," he makes the followine- observation : — * Introductio ad Philosophiam, ^-c, § 887, sq. t Elimens de Philosophie, c. 15. MATHEMATICS NOT A LOGICAL EXERCISK. 280 •• Mathematics are a noble science, but as for the mathematicians, they an: t'tvn not u-orth the hangman. It is nearly the same with mathematics as .iili theologj^; for, as those who apply themselves to the latter, especially f they once obtain an oflice, forthwith arrogate to themselves the credit (f teciiliar sanctity and a closer alliance with God, though very many among ihem arc in reality but good-for-nothing subjects ; in like manner, he who is tyletl a mathematician very frequently succeeds in passing for a deep 'pinker, although under that name are included the veriest dunderheads (die jroessten PlunderkoepfeJ in existetice, incapable of any business whatsoever '-hich requires reflection, since this cannot be immediately performed by the 7sy process of connecting symbols, which is more the product of routine lan of thought."*] I To tills Ccatcgory wc may also not improperly refer Dugald Hewart, for though not an author in mathematical science, he fas in early life a distinguished professor of mathematics ; whilst [is philosophical writings prove that, to the last, he had never |holly neglected the professional studies of his youth. In other pspects, it is needless to say that his authority is of the highest. j " How accurate soever the logical process may be, if our fii-st principles f! rashly assumed, or if om- terras be indefinite and ambiguous, there is no ^surdity so great that we may not be brought to adopt it ; and it uufortu- itely happens that, while mathematical studies exercise the faculty of rea- ning or deduction, they give no employment to the other powers of the iderstandiug concerned in the investigation of truth. On the contrarv, ey are apt to produce a facility in the admission of data, and a circurascrip- jm of the field of speculation by partial and arbitrary definitions. . . . j"hen the mathematician reasons upon subjects unconnected with his favour- \ studies, he is apt to assume, too confidently, certain intermediate prin- ^les as the foimdatiou of his arguments. ... I think I have observed peculiar proueuess in mathematicians, on occasions of this sort, to avail ^mselves of principles sanctioned by some imposing 7iames, and to avoid all ^cussion which might lead to an examination of idtimate truths, or irivolve a porous analysis of their ideas^ f 'And much more to the same effect, which we do not quote, as work is, or ought to be, in the hands of every one to whom a •(scussion like the present can be of any interest. '. The other authorities we shall take also in the order of time. [The testimonies of Ludovicus Vives, are valuable alike for the * \}'ermischte Schriften, 11., p. 287, 1st ed. — I had resolved to add no lisv authorities to those which the article originally contained ; both because, ijfact, these were perhaps superabundant, and because there need be no end t additions, if any be allowed. But this and those of Vives had been i ended for the article ; in the haste, however, with which it was prepared, t V were overlooked, until too late for insertion.] ' Klernents of the Philosophy of the Human Mind, iii. jip. 271, 288, 290. T ^ 290 STUDY OF MATHEMATICS. high authority of the Avitness, and for the number of points to which his evidence appHes. He says : — " These arts [the mathematical] as they appertain to use, so if use b( superseded, are elevated to matters ichoUy profitless^ aflfording only a sterile contemplation and inquiry without end, in as much as step determines stej^ to an infinite series : and whilst the rudiments of these disciplines, and i certain legitimate progi'ess in their study, aids, sharpens, and delights th mind ; so their ititense and assiduous exercise constitutes the torture (caroifi cinje) of noble intellects^ — of those born ^or the benefit of^nanhind.''''* " Minds volatile and restless, prone to self-indulgence, and incapable ( the labour of an unremitted attention, are vehemently abhorrent from thes studies. For they tie down the intellect, compel it to do this or that, au' permit it not to wander to any other object. Persons of an oblivious memor. are, likewise, disqualified ; for if the previous steps be forgotten, not a hiu dredth of the others can be retained, — such, in these sciences, is the seri' and continuous concatenation of the proofs. And for this reason, they ve. soon slip from the mind^ unless beaten in by fi-equent exercise. Those ill adaptii for the other and more agreeable, are frequently the subjects peculiarly fittr for these severe and repulsive, studies. But such knowledge, if any one co , tinue to indulge himself therein, is without end ; whilst its sedulous purs, leads axcay from the business oflife^ and even deprives its votaries of comm sense."] f After Sir Kenebn Dighy, already quoted, (p. 277,) and to whc: we here again refer, the next is that of Sorhiere, Historiography Royal of France, who, if not a mathematical author himself, -nj the intimate friend of the most distinguished mathematicians i his age, — as Gassendi (of whose philosophy he was acknowledgl even by Bernier to be the most accomplished disciple), Mersen:', Format, Carcavi, &c. Speaking of Gassendi's disregard of \'i higher geometry and algebra, and his valuing mathematics i general, only as the instrument of more important sciences, e says : — " It is certain that the abstrusest Mathematics do not much conduce^ to y nothing worse of them^ to the acquisition of right reasoning^ and the illustra n of natural phsenomena ; as every one is aware that mathematicians, disi- guished in the higher branches of their science, are sometimes none of W most clear-sighted in matters beyond its province." X (And in another work) : — " It is an observation which all the world .n verify, that there is nothing so deplorable as the conduct of some celebr 'd mathematicians in their men affairs, nor any thing so absurd as their opit «* on the sciences not within their jurisdiction. I have seen of them, those lo ruined themselves in groundless lawsuits ; who dissipated theii- whole m^ * [Z)e Causis corruptarum artium. L. v. c. De Mathematicis.'] t \_De tradeiidis disciplinis. L. iv.] X Vita Gassendi; Praef. Operum Gassendi. I MATHEMATICS NOT A LOGICAL EXERCISE. '291 in quest of the philosopher's stone ; who built extravagantly ; who embarked n undertakings of which every one foresaw the ill success ; who quaked for ^error at the pettiest accident in life ; who formed only chimeras in politics ; , md who had no more of our civilisation than if born among the Hurons or , [:he Iroquois." — (After a curious example.) " Hence, sir, you may form [iome judgment of hoir far aJgthra conduces to common sense, when the ques- ion is not about an affair of figures, and if there be not reason to believe . [h&t its abst)-(ich'ons are themselves ofayioxioits injiiience in the commerce of he world. They are too minute for the ordinary' usage of civil society ; and t is requisite to incorporate them with something less spiritual, in order . hat the thought may not be so piercing, so decisive, and so difficult to con- rol." * Clarendon : — " The Earl of Leicester was a man of great parts, very conversant in •: Kwks, and much addicted to the mathematics ; but though he had been a sol- fi iier, and commanded a regiment in the service of the states of the United ii« ('rovinces, and was employed in several embassies, as in Denmark and r. I'rance, was, in truth, rather a speculative than a practical man, and expected f \ffreater certitude in the consultation of business, than the business of this ;f I'orld is capable of, which temper proved very inconvenient to him through (*■ pe course of his life." f i Le Clerc: — )^ 1 " There is also sometimes to be considered so great a number of Modes ,. pd Relations, and these so minute, that they cannot, without a far greater Y 'Spense of time than we can afford them, be arranged in geometric order. ^ Ijid yet to form a con-ect judgment in regard to these, is a matter of much CB peater importance to us than concerning mathematical problems. Such are jk |ie various affections of the minds of men and of the affairs of life, concern - jfif jig which, the most expert geometers do not Judge better than their neiglibours, 11 '?y-, frequently icorse. It is a question, for instance, whether a certain plan ■ I" undertaking is to have a prosperous result. In that undertaking there '*'■• re a multitude of ideas which cannot be brought to an issue unless in a BiB l-eat variety of ways, which again depend on innumerable circimistances. i%o«e accustomed to mathematical ideas, which are very easily observed, and J mf easily discriminated from each other, when, by the rules of their science jjjj, '^ attempt to judge of the administration of public or private affairs, arrive ; conclusions the most absurd. For they take into account only the abstract . j)ssibilities, omitting in their reasonings certain dispositions of things and ;rsons, which by their multiplicity and minuteness, almost elude the acutcst ^. )8ervation. It also happens, for the most part, that they who Judge cor- cdy in regard to such matters are wholly wrong in regard to mathematical tettions, if, indeed, they do not eschew them as difficult, and alien from eir habits." t Buddeus : — "Such is the nature of the human mind, that, if habituated to certain * Lettres, let. Ixviii. f History, &c. vol. ii., p. 153, Ed. 1704. t Clerici Logica, Pars. iii. c. 3, §§ 13, 14. 292 STUDY OF MATHEMATICS. kinds of tliought, it cannot foithwitli divest itself tliereof, when passing to the consideration of other objects, but conjures up notions concerning tliese, analogous to tliose ah-eady irradicated in it by custom. This is the real cause of errors almost infinite. Thus they, who inconsiderately carry over mathe- matical notions into morals and theology^ seem to themselves to find in these new sciences the same necessary connexion which they discovered in the old.'''' * Barheyrac, speaking of the notes on Grotius De Jure Belli, &c. by Feldenus, professor of mathematics at Helmstadt, of which Sahnasius " had promised mountains and marvels," says : — " Never was there seen aught more wretched ; and we might be surprised that a mathematician could reason so ill., had we not other, and fiir more illus- trious examples, which clearly evince, that the study of the mathematics doe. not always render the mind more correct in relation to subjects beyond the spheii of these scietices." f Warburton : — " It may seem, perhaps, too much a paradox to say, that long habit in thi science {mathematics) incapacitates the mind for i-easoning at large., and esperiall in the search of moral truth. And yet, I believe, nothing is more certaii The object of geometry is demonstration, and its subject admits of it, and i almost the only one that doth. In this science, whatever is not demonstrs tion is nothing, or, at least, below the sublime inquirer's regard. Probab' lity, througli its almost infinite degrees, from simple ignorance up to absolu; certainty, is tlie terra incognita of the geometrician. And yet here it is, th;; the great business of the human mind is carried on, — the search and discoveii of all the important truths which concern us as reasonable creatures. Ai ; here too it is, that all its vigour is exerted ; for to proportion the assent to tl; probability accompanying every varying degi'ee of moral evidence, requu' the most enlarged and sovereign exercise of reason. But the harder the use ' any thing, the more of habit is reqtdred to make us perfect in it. Is it th : likely that the geometer, long confined to the routine of demonstration, t; eisiest exercise of reason, where much less of the vigour than of the atfenti of mind is required to excel, should form a right judgment on subjects whc, truth or falsehood is to be rated by the probabilities of moral evidence?"] Basedow: — j '•'•Mathematics tolerate no reasoning from, analogy. Of the coacervatiODi ( proofs from many probable grounds ; of arguments fi-om the certainty f » adaptation of thought ; of the collison of proofs ; of useful probabilities;/ exceptions fi-om ordinary truths in extraordinary circumstances, — of all th) they take no account. Everything, on the contrary, is determinatelycerti from the commencement ; of exceptions no mathematician ever dreams. M is this character of thought applicable to the other branches of our knowledge'^ 'B moment we attempt to treat logic, morals, theology, medicine, jurisprudei l politics, criticism, or the theory of tlie fine arts in this mathematical method/'e * Isagoge Ilistorico-Tlieologica, I. i., c. 4. t Preface to his Grotius, t. i., p. ix., Ed. 1724. X Julian, Pref. p. xix.. Works, vol. iv., p. 345. MATHEMATICS NOT A LOGICAL EXERCISE. 2l)S jlay tlie part, not of philosophers but of dreamers, and this to the great iletri- uent of human reason and happiness," &c. &c.* Walpole : — *' The profound study of mntlicmatics seems to injure the more general and seful mode of reasoning — that by induction. Mathematical truths being, so I speak, palpable, the moral feelings become less sensitive to impalpable ruths. As Avhen one sense is carried to great perfection, the others are usually ■ss acute, so mathematical reasoning seems, in some degree, to injure the titer modes of ratiocination." ■\ Gibbon : — •• Frotn a blind idea of the usefulness of such abstract science, raj' father had hcu desii-ous, and even pressing, that I should devote some time to the JNIa- heinatics ; nor could I refuse to comply with so reasonable a wish. During wo winters I attended the private lectures of M. de Traytorrens, who ex- 'laiucd the elements of algebra and geometry, as far as the conic sections of ho Marquis de Tliopital, and appeared satisfied with my dUigence and im- lovement. But as my childish propensity for numbers and calculations Avas 'tally extinct, I was content to receive the passive imiH-essions of my pro- cssor's lectures, without any active exercise of my own powers. As soon as I iiiderstood the principles, I relinquished for ever the pm-suit of the mathe- iiatics ; nor can I lament that I desisted before my mind was hardened by the labit of rigid demonstration, so destructive of the finer feelings of moral evidence, .vhich must, however, determine the actions and opinions of our lives." % Kirwan : — •' Some have been led to imagine, — ' that the true way of acquiring a habit ; reasoning closely, and in train, is to exercise ourselves in mathematical de- iMiistrations ; that having got the way of reasoning which that study ueces- ai-ily brings the mind to, they may be able to transfer it to other parts of viiowledge as they shall have occasion.' TJus, hoioever, is an egregious mis- 'hown by mathematicians to fanaticism ; but we shall quote his testimony to the phaenomenon. "It is a certain fact, that, in mathematicians who have conlined their studies to mathematics alone, there has often been observed a proneness to that species of religious enthusiasm in which imagination is the predominant element, and which, like a contagion, is propagated in a crowd. In one of our most celebrated universities, which has long enjoyed the proud distinction of being the principal seat of mathematical learning in this island, I have been assured, that if, at any time, a spirit of fanaticism has infected (as will occa- sionally happen in all numerous societies) a few of the unsounder limbs of !tbat learned body, the contagion has invariably spread much more widely \among the mathematicians than among the men of erudition. Even the strong jhead of Waring, imdoubtedly one of the ablest analysts that England has produced, was not proof against the malady, and he seems at last (as I was told by the late Dr Watson, Bishop of Llandaff ) to have sunk into a deep 'religious melancholy, approacliing to insanity." J On this principle of facile credence, it is to be explained why of juetaphysicians, the most fanciful and most confident spccuIator.s jhave been usually the most mathematical. Pythagoras, Plato, 'Cardan, Descartes, Mallebranche, and Leibnitz, are names not * Grundzuege der allgemeiner Philosophie ; by J. Salat, Ordinary Profes- M.r of Moral Philosophy in the University of Landshut, &c. 1820. t Elements, vol. iii. pp. 271, 280. t Ibid. p. 291. 296 STUDY OF MATHEMATICS. more distinguisLed for their philosophical genius than for their philosophical credulity. Conversant, in their mathematics, only about the relations of ideal objects, and exclusively accustomed > i to the passive recognition of absolute certainty, they seem in their metaphysics almost to have lost the capacity of real observation and of critically appreciating comparative degrees of probability. In their systems, accordingly, hypothesis is seen to take the place of fact ; and reason, from the mistress, is degraded to the hand- maid, of imagination. '• Mathematical science," says the marvellous Prince o/il/iVan- dola, "■ does not bestoiv ivisdom : it was therefore, by the ancients, made the disciphne of boys. On the contrary, though preparing for philosophy, '\i previously sipped in moderation, when raised to an object of exclusive study, it affords the greatest occasions of philosophical error. To this Aristotle bears evidence." * " Descartes," says Voltaire, " was the greatest mathematician of his age ; but mathematics leave the intellect as they find it. i That of Descartes was too prone to invention. He preferred the ; divination to the study of nature. The fii'st of mathematicians , produced nothing almost but romances of philosophy." f A more fehcitous expression had been preoccupied by Father Daniel ; — " The philosophy of Descartes is the romance of nature." But in fact, Descartes himself was author of the mot : — " i\Iy theory of vortices is a philosophical romance." In regard to Leibnitz," even his intelligent and learned friend, the Jirst Queen of Prussia, was not blind to the evil influence of his mathematics on his philosophy. She was wont to say, with an eye to the " Pre-established Harmony" and "Monads," — • " that, of all who meddled with philosophy, the mathematicians! satisfied her the least, more especially when they attempted to explain the origin of things in general, or the nature of the soul in particular ; and that she was surprised, that, notwithstanding' their geometrical exactness, metaphysical notions ivere, for most oj them, lost countries, and exhatistless sources of chimeras. | * Joannes Picus jMiraudiilanixs in Astrologiam, 1. xii. c. 2. He is still more decided in his Condusiones : — " There is nothing more hm-tftil to a' divine than a frequent and assidnoiis exercise in the mathematics of Euclid.", (Ixxxv. 6.) See also his nephew's (John Francis) Examen Vanitatis Doc- trince Gentium^ 1. iii. c. 6. | ^J .t t Le Specie de Louis, xiv. c. 29. | ■ li X Hist. Crit. de la Bepubliqiie des Lettres^ t. xi p. 128. j MATHEMATICS INDUCE CREDULITY. L>- liening presumptioii or incurable arrogance; for, believing themselves in pos- Ission of demonstrative certainty in regard to the objects of their peculiar ience, they persuade tliemselves that, in like manner, they possess a know- dge of many things beyond its sphere. Then, co-ordinating these with the rmer, as if demonstrated by equal evidence, they spurn every objection to ery opinion, Mith the contempt or indignation they Avould feel at an endea- )ur to persuade them that two plus tAvo are not fom*, or that the angles of triangle are not equal to two right angles," &c. f Warhurton : — ' Besides this acquired inability [p. 292], prejudice renders the veteran athematiciau still less capable of judging of moral evidence. He who hath ;en so long accustomed to lay together and compare ideas, and hath reaped ;monstration, the richest fi'uit of speculative truth, for his labour, regards I the lower degrees of evidence as in the train only of his mathematical incipality; and he commonly ranks them in so arbitrary a manner, that e ratio ultima mathematicorum is become almost as great a libel upon jmmon sense as other sovereign decisions. I might appeal for the truth of ■is to those wonderful conclusions which Geometers, when condescending Mrite on history, ethics, or theology, have made of their premises. But (■ thing is notorious ; and it is no secret that the oldest mathematician in ngland is the worst reasoner in ?Y." J i De Stael :— "The study of mathematics, habituating us to certainty, inflames us l^ainst all opinions in contradiction with our own," &c.|| L'Art de Penser, (Cours. t. iii. p. 398, Ed. 1780.) (Euvres Philosophiques, vi, p. 225. Ed. t De Eruditione Solida, &c. Ed. 1692, p. 306. X Julian., Pre/, p. xx. ; Works, iv. p. 346. !i De VAllemagne, i. c. 18. 298 STUDY OF MATHEMATICS. Dugald Stewart : — " The bias now mentioned, is strengthened by another cu-cumstance,— the confidence which the mere mathematician naturally acquires in his powers of reasoning and judgment, — in consequence of which, though he may be prevented in his own pursuits from going far astray, by the absurdi- ties to which his errors lead him, he is seldom apt to be revolted by absurd conclusions in the other sciences. Even in physics., mathematicians have been ltd to acquiesce in conclusions which appear ludicrous to me7i of different habits." * , We must refer to the original for some curious and instructive instances of this, in Euler, Leibnitz, D. Bernoulh, Grandi, La Place, Leshe, Fitcairn, and Cheyne. The opposite bias, — the scepticism of the mathematician, is principally relative to the spiritual or moral world. His studies determine him to this in two ways. — In the first place, h^ abstracting him from the view, and disqualifying him for th(; observation, of the phsenomena of moral Hberty in man ; and ii the second, by habituating him to the exclusive contemplation o the phaenomena of a mechanical necessity in nature. But ai ignorance of the one order, and an extensive and intimate anc constant consideration of the other, are tantamount to a nega tion of the unknown. For on the one hand, as we naturalb; believe to exist that only which we know to exist ; and on tbj other, as all science tends to unity, reason forbidding us t; assume, without necessity, a plurality of causes ; consequent!;; the mathematician, if he think at all, is naturally and rationall ! disposed to hold, as absolutely universal, what is universal rels tively to his own sphere of observation. It is chiefly, if not solely, to explain the one phaenomenon (; morality, of freewill, that we are warranted in assuming a seconi and hyperphysical substance, in an immaterial principle < |^, thought ; for it is only on the supposition of a moral liberty i; man, that we can attempt to vindicate, as truths, a moral orde' and, consequently, a moral governor, in the universe ; and it only on the hypothesis of a soul within us, that we can assert tl reality of a God above us, — " Nullus in microcosmo Spiritu nidhis in macrocosmo Dens." In the hands of the materialist, or physical necessitarian, evei argument for the existence of a deity is either annulled, • * Elements, iii. p. 272. '8 MATHEMATICS INDUCE SCEPTICISM. 209 eversed into a demonstration of atheism. In liis hands, with the iioral worth of man, the inference to a moral ruler of a moral ^^orld is gone. In his hands, the argument from the adaptations If end and mean, OAcry where apparent in existence, to the pri- ■lary causality of intelligence and liberty, if applied, establishes, |i fact, the primary causality of necessity and matter. For as |jis argument is only an extension to the universe of the analogy jbserved in man : if in man, design, — intelligence, be only a phie- 'omenon of matter, only a reflex of organization ; this consecution f first and second in us, extended to the universal order of things, ijyerses the absolute priority of inteUigence to matter, that is, 'ibverts the fundamental condition of a deity. Thus it is, that jiir theology is necessarily founded on our psychology ; that we jiust recognise a God from our own minds, before we can detect I God in the universe of nature. I Now, the mathematical sciences, on the one hand, by leavuig holly unexercised the capacity of philosophical reflection, pre- 3nt the mind from rising to a clear consciousness of those fun- ^mental facts on which its moral freedom is established ; and on tie other, by accustoming it to the exclusive contemplation of the ws of physical necessity, indispose it to tolerate so extraordi- %rj an assumption, so indemonstrable an anomaly, as a moral \'der, an hyperphysical liberty, and an immaterial subject. This tendency of mathematical study has been always suffi- ently notorious. Hence — (to take only the three contemporary thers) — by St Austin mathematics are said " to lead away from od ;" * by St Jerome to be " not sciences of piety ; " * while St mbrose declares, that " to cultivate astronomy and geometry to abandon the cause of salvation, and to follow that of Tor." t I We may here again refer to Sir Kenelm Digby's testimony, I'eviously adduced (p. 277). And Poiret, again, who, though a mystic in religion, was one the profoundest thinkers of his age. I" The mathematical genus is wont, unless guarded against, to imbue the ilinds of its too intemperate votaries with the most pestilent disi)ositions. •r it infects them with fatalism, spiritual insensihilitij, brutalism, disbelief and almost incurable presumption. For when, in tlie handling of their num- rs, figures, and machines, they perceive all things to follow each other, as •were by fate, to the exclusion of liberty ; they hence become so accustomed .* Vide Agiippam, De Van. Scient. C; xl. t Qfficiorum, 1. i. 26. 300 STUDY OF MATHEMATICS. to the cousideratioii of necessary couuectiou alone, that they altogether eliminate freewill from the uatm-e and government of things spuitual, an establish the universal supremacy of a fatal necessity." * So Bayle : — " It cannot be disputed, that it is rare to find much devotion in persons wh have once acquired a taste for the study of the mathematics^ and who have maci in these sciences an extraordinary progress." f 1 So Qundling : — I " He who too zealously devotes himself to the physical and mathematic! sciences, may lightly lapse into an atheist. Hence we find, that all the mo ; ancient philosophers were atheists, and this because too exclusively absorbi, in physical and mathematical contemplations." % \ Berkeley, himself no vulgar mathematician, asks : — , " Whether the corpuscularian, experimental, and mathematical philos! pliy, so much cultivated in the last age, hath not too much engrossed mei attention; some part whereof it might have usefully employed? — Whetl! fi-om this, and other concurring causes, the minds of speculative men ha' not been borne downward, to the debasing and stupifying of the higher fac\ ties? And whether we may not hence account for that prevailing naiToj ness and bigotry among many who pass for men of science, then- incapai) for things morale intellectual, or theological, their proneness to measure \ truths by sense and experience of animal life ? " || | Dr John Gregory, of a family to which mathematical gen;^ seems almost native, and one of the most distinguished found<^ of the Edinburgh School of Medicine, in his " Lectures on le Duties and Qualifications of a Physician," after confessing that ;) distrusted his own judgment in relation to the study of matherl- tics, as afraid of his partiality to a science which he viewed w'l a kind of innate and hereditary attachment, and which had b(a at once the business and the pleasure of his early years, tl|S warns his pupils : — ' " Let me also desire you to guard against its leading you to a disposivn to scepticism and suspense of judgment in subjects that do not admit of ma ?• matical science. " ^ Monhoddo : — " Those who have studied mathematics much, and no other science, fe apt to grow so fond of them, as to believe that there is no certainty in *y other science, nor any other axioms than those of Euclid." ** * De Eruditione Solida, p. 304. Ed. 1692. ! t Diet. Hist, voce Pascal, note G. i % Historic der Gelehrheit, vol. i. Disc. Prelim, p. 8. | II Analyst, Qu. 56, 57. t Works, iii., p. 107. ** Ancient Metaphysics, i., p. 394. ^ ^ ■ MATHEMATICS INDUCE SCEPTICISM. 301 De Stael :— •' The mathematics lead us to lay out of account all that is not proved; « bile the primitive truths, those which sentiment and genius apprehend, are ii.it susceptible of demonstration." * This tendency in their too exclusive cultivcation, to promote a lisbclief in any other than an order of necessity and nature, is common to the j^^tysical and the mathematical sciences ; hence, in [reference to the former, the okl adage — " Tres Medici, duo Athei." !t is, however, when the two stu(Hes are conjoined and carried lilt to the most extensive sphere of application, that this tendency I- more powerfully and conspicuously manifested, — that is, in 'stronomy. In the following sublime passage, Kant, with a different inten- tion indeed, finely illustrates the opposite influences of material ^- land mental studies, and this by the contrast of the two noblest objects of our contemplation : — " Two things there are, which, the oftenei- and the more steadfastly we :niisider, fill the mind with an ever new, an ever rising admiration and g reverence, — t/ie Starry Heaven above^ the Moral Laiv within. Of neither am [ compelled to seek out the existence, as shrouded in obscimty, or only to I surmise the possibility, as beyond the hemisphere of my knowledge. Both 't- |[ contemplate lying clear before me, and connect both immediately with the • fconscionsness of my being. — The one departs fi'om the place I occupy in tlie I i)uter world of sense ; expands, beyond the limits of imagination, tliat con- j[j jiection of my being with worlds rising above worlds, and systems blending .1. pto systems; and protends it also to the illimitable times of their periodic novement — to its commencement and continuance. — The otlier departs ti'om ™' fny invisible self, from my personality ; and represents me in a world, truly lii [ufinite indeed, but whose infinity is to be fatliomed only by the intellect. If,; (ivith which also my connection, unlike the fortuitous relation I stand in to the world of sense, I am compelled to recognise, as necessary and universal. ., ^-In the former, the first view of a countless multitude of worlds annihilates, IS it were, my importance as an animal nature., which, after a brief and incom- •' brehensible endowment with the powers of life, is compelled to refund its pnstituent matter to the planet — itself an atom in the universe— on whicli [t grew. — The aspect of the other, on the contrary, elevates my worth as [is bn intellit/ence, even to infinitude ; and tliis tln-ough my personality, in wliidi ijlji |the moral law reveals a facidty of life independent of my animal nature, nay, |5f the whole material world: — at least, if it be permitted to infer as much -- (rom the regidation of my being, Avhicli a confoiniity wftli tliat law exacts ; jproposing, as it does, my moral worth for the absolute end of my activity, conceding no compromise of its imperative to a necessitation of nature, * De PAllemagiie, i., c. 18. 302 STUDY OF MATHEMATICS. and spurning in its infinity the limits and conditions of my present traus: tory life."* " Spii'at euim majora animus seque altius effert Sideribus, transitque vias et nubila fati, Et momenta premit pedibus quajcunque putantur Figere propositam natali tempore soi-tem." t As a pendant to tliis, we shall adduce another testimony b^ profound philosopher of an opposite school ; by him whom hi countrymen have hailed the Plato of the latter age, — Freder\ Henry Jacohi. " What, in opposition to Fate, constitutes the ruling principle of the un verse into a true God, is termed Providence. Where there is no foreca there is no intelligence, and where intelligence is, there also is there prov deuce. This alone is mind ; and only to what is of miud, respond the fee ings that manifest its existence in ourselves, — Wonder, Veneration, Lov We cau, indeed, pronounce an object to be beautiful or perfect, without previous knowledge that it is the work of foresight or not : but the power I which it was produced, that we cannot admire, if, without thought, aud witl! out a purpose, it operated in obedience to the laws of a mere physical nece sity. Even the glorious majesty of the heavens, the object of a kneelii adoration to an infant world, subdues no more the mind of him who compr hends the one mechanical law by which the planetary systems move, mainta' then- motion, and even originally form themselves. He no longer marvels j the object, infinite as it always is, but at the human intellect alone, which, ii Copernicus, Kepler, Gassendi, Newton, and Laplace, was able to transceij the object, by science to terminate the miracle, to reave the heaven of: divinities, and to disenchant the universe. — But even this, the only admir tion of which our intelligeut faculties are now capable, would vanish, wer(! future Hartley, Darwin, Condillac, or Bonnet, to succeed in displaying to a mechanical system of the human mind, as comprehensive, intelligible, a satisfactory as the Newtonian mechanism of the heavens. Fallen from thii elevation. Art, and Science, and Yii-tue, would no longer be to man the c jects of a genuine and reflective adoration. The works and actions of t heroes of mankind, — the life of a Socrates and Epaminondas, — the science ' a Plato and Leibnitz, — the poetical and plastic representations of a Horn Sophocles, and Phidias, — these might still pleasurably move, might s rouse the mind to an enjoyment rising into transport ; even so as the s< sible aspect of the heavens might still possibly aftect and gratify the d ciple of a Newton or Laplace : but we must no longer ask about the pr ciple of our emotion ; for reflection would infallibly chide our puein infatuation, and dash our enthusiasm by the suggestion — That Wonder is o;^ the daughter of Ignorance.'''' % : _j_ * Cr. d. pr. V. Beschluss. This suggests Prudentius. I t Prudent. Contra Sym. ii. 479. | % [ Werke, ii. p. 54. — The philosophy of the modem Plato is, in this spect, strictly correspondent with the philosophy of the ancient. " The d MATHEMATICS INDUCE SCEPTICISM. :<03 We shall terminate our cloud of witnesses with the testinionv )f a celchrated metaphysician, a distinguished professor also of iiathcmatics and physics in one of the principal universities of ionnany. Fries, in his Lectures on Astronomy thus speaks : — " But it is rejoined, — You explain every thing by your oniuipotcnt '^va- Tjj [ntation ;— what is the origin of that? I answer: — This, too, we know ! ' j'ull well ! The daughter of the old blind Fate, her servants ]\Iagnitude, ? knmber, and Proportion, her inheritance a universe without a God, wliich '* f^qnires noGod When the great astronomer Lalande denied a leity, — could trace in the heavens no God, in the movement of the stars no ijj. linger of God, we are compelled to allow the logical consequence of his rea- fig lioning. That high order and adaptation of end and means is only the pro- jp ;luct of the rigid mechanism of necessary physical laws ; there, above, is |i )nly a blind mindless destiny, the absolute ruler of its universe. But I appeal I L- :o the truth of the saying in St John, — " In the spirit only shall ice worship j,j,j 3W;" and in what only our science is for mind, are its dignity and value to be ^,j 'onnd. He alone can style the order of the universe an adaptation of means jj^ » end, who brings to its observation a belief in the reality of design. But ,|,, ;he true iuteii)retation of the order of design, lies^r 7nore clearly apparent in Ijj^; he mind of man. The infinite spirit does not bail itself under proportion and inmber ! The play with number is an easy play, — its joy only the joy of the • mprisoncd spirit at the clank of its fetters." * ani Are Mathematics then of no value as an instrument of mental liAi culture 1 Nay, do they exercise only to distort the mind ? To "^ ;his we answer : That their study, if pursued in moderation and ,' jfficiently counteracted, may be beneficial in the correction of a IP pertain vice, and in the formation of its corresponding virtue. iiji [Fhe vice is the habit of mental distraction ; the virtue the habit jHti \— m bine," (to this effect speaks the Athenian), " which has propagated impiety itb ^mong men, and occasioned all en-oneous opinions concerning the nature of liii f,he Deity : is that, which reversing the real consecution of existence, affirms iiids |n regard to the generation of the universe, that to be posterior which is, in iHi truth, the cause; and that to be antecedent, which is only the effect. For, ijlii fhongh mind and its operations are anterior to matter and its phajnomena, \\,, ^d though nature and natural production are preceded and determined by tl,) intelligence and design ; some, however, have preposterously sistcd nature ,1;, |i8 the first or generative principle, and regarded mind, as merely the dcriva- jji |yive of coqioreal organism." {De Leyibus, x.) The relative passage of Plato j^j, ^, I see, quoted by the great Cudworth, (in Cambridge, " there were giants jin those days,") in his Immutable Morality (B. iv. ch. 6, § 6. sq.) (In con- -— taection with this matter, I may here notice a monstrous erratum (§ 14) which stands, both in the English edition of that posthumous work, pro- cured by Chandler, Bishop of Durham, and. what is more remarkable, in the jj,lj ^tin vei-sion by the leanied Mosheiin ; contemplation for contcmperation.)'] j^l j * Vorksunyen ueber die Sternktinde, pp. 16, 18, 227. 304 STUDY OF MATHEMATICS. of continuous attention. This is the single benefit, to which tli study of mathematics can justly pretend, in the cultivation of th mind ; and it is almost the one only, or at least the one principa'i accorded to it by the most intelligent philosophers. — Bacon, wb; in his earher writings admitted the utility of mathematics i; sharpening the intellect ; in his maturer works recommended study of the school philosophy, as the best disciphne of subtilit, and discrimination.* — In like manner, the mathematical philosc pher Du Hamel seems to accord no higher mental advantage t; the mathematics ; and at the same time observes, that " the, have this of vice, that for the most part they render us alien awj abJwrrent from the business of life." ■\ — Of mathematical sciem; Wa7^burto7i holds, that besides affording us a knowledge of i; pecuUar method, " all its use, for the purpose in question, (til improvement of the powers of reasoning), seems to be only hab tuating the mind to think long and closely ; and it would be W(: if this advantage made amends for some inconveniences, as insj parable from it."t — This, likewise, is all that is admitted of tl' study by one of the most acute and cautious observers of tJ human mind and its modifications, and whose predilections, if ^: * In the first edition of his Essai/s, published in 1697, Bacon sav " Mathematiks malie men subtill;" but having learned better in the int Perga " Though never abandoning the confines of the universal, Geometi reduces the laws and attributes of magnitude to perfect clearness,— I according to the senses a representation of those lines, surfaces, and solii which it conceives with the utmost completeness and precision ; and th issuing forth from behind the veil of mental invisibility into the visible ai palpable, its doctrines may almost be seen and handled, and yet witho losing aught of their purity and necessity. Thus Geometry, if I may ' express myseF, becomes a thinking with the eye, while Grammar throu the ear holds intercourse with the inner mind. This relation of its laws j determinate figures, this apprehension of the highest and most surprisi doctrines through the visibility of body, is precisely what at once attra^ and animates the young, — what gradually elevates and prepares for hi' abstraction their powers as yet incapable of such an exercise. On t; account all employment of the Algebraic formulcB even for conic sectiol ought to be discarded from the Geometry of the Gymnasium. Essential ;i these are to the Mathematician, in order to rise to the higher regions of ; science, they are profitless and even hurtful in the course of discipline p • paratory to its acquisition, and in the general cultivation of youth, inasm i as they are only the repetition, in another form, of a procedure already fa '• liar. He who five or six times transposes or transforms a given equatiorl) i as in the end to obtain a solution, teaching him, for example, that a pro-j- tile in its flight describes a parabolic curve ; — to be conducted, I say, to Js important result as by an in\'isible constraining force, rapidly and uni- ingly, indeed, — this will content him if an adept in Mathematics; bu o the student it is profitless, inasmuch as the compulsory conclusion only e: - bits to him in a new formula what he already knew by superfluous e>> rience to be true. But something more than this is obtained by him o reaches the same truth by the Geometrical procedure of the ancients ii I which Algebra was unknoAvn, viz. by the constructive method of figures 'd the intuition founded on it. Whilst the Algebraic formulae conduct us bljl- . fold to the conclusion, the constructive method of Ai-chimedes shows ttis the whole machinerj- of the procedure laid open to the light, especially TJiii the omission of the intermediate propositions is supplied by an iutelhV'Qt teacher. Here every step is made with open eyes, with consciousness, id understanding; and, in the example adduced, from the harmonic conne ^m of figures, and from the consequences fully and lucidly evolved out of iir properties, the result is finally obtained of the parabolic flight of projec jJS. The same is the case with every other law, each being displayed to the I'^w of the satisfied and admiring pupil, as a consequence clear and rigo is. Nothing can be better calculated than such a process to awaken theinti'.'ct to the clearest apprehension of the nature and cogency of strict proba"; and thus to place it in possession of itself and its highest fjiculty, — th ^ o' deducing what is sought from what is given, what is invisible from wbj is i oMPARATiVE USE OF GEOMETRIC AND ALGEBRAIC STl'DY. im ■eu, in order, like Archimedes, from a point beyond the earth to move tlie [u'th itself. What therefore is requisite, and even indispensable, is a coni- llete and systematic manual of Geometry on the principles of Euclid, Archi- iiedes, and Apollouius Pergjuus, which, assuming their capital propositions, [id connecting these with others, would afford a comprehensive view of con- [ractive Geometry, in the spirit of antiquity, for the instruction, awakening, lid improvement of youth." * I Nay, the present predominance in Cambridge of the Algc- Iraic Mathematics, (a predominance perhaps partly owing to the [jproach cast by Playfair, some forty years ago, on the ignorance {revalent in Cambridge of the Continental analysis, but which, Assuredly, is no longer applicable, seeing that the second Eng- rsh University, the second Theological Seminary of the Anglican stabhshment, is now a second-rate Ecole Folytechnique,) — lis is lamented, and its effect, as a slaughtering of intellect, jluctantly confessed, by the most intelligent friends of Cam- ridge herself. The two following extracts from the Quarterly \eview may suffice to prove this ; for that journal has always een the champion of the actual system of the English Universi- es, where this could with any justice be defended. — The first is om an able article on Paley ; and it is justly considered as a gn of liis uncommon intellectual vigour, (and this even before ambridge had again turned Anti-Newtonian and Algebraic,) iiat he was senior wrangler, yet his mind not apparently en- •ebled by the exertion. ■• The Cambridge system of study is a forcing system, which applying fjclf almost wholly to one subject, and being adapted to minds of a single jist, frequently debilitates the understandiiig through life, by the effort to pro- 'loe a single fruitage." f What can be confessed, — what can be conceived, worse of a niversity ? The second extract is from an intelligent article on the Life of ishop Watson. " Tlie period at which Watson appeared in the University of Cambridge ay justly be regarded as the Augustan age of that University ; the physics ■ Descartes had just before [Watson entered the University in 1757, that seventy years after the publication of the Principia,] given i)lace to the iblime Geometry of Xewtou; the Metaphysics of human nature, as taught Y Locke, had supplanted Aristotle ; and the old scholastic Theology had Jen superseded in the schools by a set of rising and enlightened divines, ider a learned and candid professor. It was certainly to the advnntrKje of the * Ueber gelehrten Schulen, iv. Abth. p. 374, seq. t Yol. ix. p. 390. 310 STUDY OF MATHEMATICS. academical studies that the hii//ter Algebra was not yet iuvented, [?] and tha the study of philosophy [(. e. physics] in general was not hitherto pushed sd far as either to engi-oss or to exhaust the understanding of the acadeniica youth. A due place was also allowed and required for classical pursuits; while the piu-est writers of antiquity were studied, not so much for the pur^ pose of consummating the knowledge of points and metres, as of acquirin:| the noblest ideas of morals and politics in the clearest and most elegant Ian; guage. Precisely at this period arose a constellation of 3'oung men emiaentl ! qualified, both by the force of then* understandings and the elegance of theij taste, to avail themselves of these advantages ; and the names of Kurd an' Powell, of Balguy and Ogden, are never heard by those who knew them c^ know their books, without the associated ideas of all that is clear in ratid ciuution, profound in research, and beautiful in language. As they disaj! jjcared from the scene, abstract mnthematics began to prevail in the univei sity; the equilibrium of study was destroyed; the liberal and manly systei' of education which had produced so many men of business and of the worLj as well as of science, gradually disapi>eared ; while the rcAvards Avhich becan' necessary as stimuli to the higher acquirements of classical literature, tend* to urge on the pursuits of ditficult and recondite minutiie in criticism, ; inapplicable, in one way, to any practical purpose of life, as the obscuritij of Waring's JMiscellanea Analytica, in another. The effects of this declei^ sion are but too visible at present in a hard, dry, ' exsuccous ' style of wrij ing, which has long since superseded, excepting in one or two solita! instances, the attic graces of the last generation."* j But returning from our digressive contrast of the ostensr and symbolical, of the geometric and algebraic processes, in educational point of view ; and calling to mind, that the form had, exclusively of the- latter, been proposed as a mean conduci to the one sole intellectual virtue of continuous attention: we pD ceed to consider, how far the study of geometry may pretend be tlie appropriate discipline even of this.] But mathematics are not the only study which cultivates tj attention ; neither is the kind and degree of attention which th | tend to induce, the kind and degree of attention which our othi and higher speculations require and exercise. In the study f mathematics we are accustomed, if we may so express ourselvl to a protensive, rather than to either an extensive, a compreh(- sive, or an intensive, application of thought. It does not com] I us to hold up before the mind, and to retain the mind upon.i multitude of different objects; far less does it inure us to a steaf consideration of tiic fugitive and evanescent abstractions and gef,- ralities of the reflective intellect. Mr Kirwan truly observes :j- " As to Mathematics habituating the mind to intense applicatbj, * Vol. xviii. p. 235. i TKUE USE OF MATHEMATICAL STrDV. ;vho '•' disapproved of the study of geometry," (and he says the pame of astronomy,) " when carried the length of its more dif- licult diagrams. For, though himself not inconversant with 'these," (which he had studied under the celebrated geometer, jriieodorus of Cyrene), •' he did not perceive of what utihty ithey could be, calculated as they were to consume the life of a man, and to turn him away from many other and important acquirements." * We must now abruptly terminate. Our Umits arc already greatly exceeded. But we nuist still state, in a few words, what •many sentences would be required to develope. * Lofjick, I., preface, p. 6. t ^« VAllemagne, I., c. 18. X De Mente Humana, 1. i. c. 8. XenophontiR Memorahi/ia, 1. iv. c. 7, §§ 3, .o. 312 STUDY OF MATHEMATICS. In extending so partial an encouragement to mathematical and physical pursuits, thus indirectly discouraging the other branches of liberal education, the University of Cambridge has exactly re- versed every principle of academical policy. — What are the grounds on which one study ought to be fostered or forced, in such a seminary, in preference to others ? The first and principal condition of -academical encouragement is, that the study tends to cidtivate a greater number of the nobler faculties in a higher degree. That the study of mathematics effects any mental development, at best, in a most inadequate and precarious manner, while its too exclusive cultivation tends posi- tively to incapacitate and to deform the mind, — this it has beec^ the scope of the preceding argument to establish. The second condition is, that the protected study comprehendi ivithin its sphere of operation a larger proportion of the academit youth. It can easily be shown that, in this respect, mathematics have less claim to encouragement than any other object of educa^i tion. [They present no allurement for those not constrained to i, degree; they qualify for none of the professions; and Cam bridge stands alone in turning out her clergy, accomplished foi; actuaries or engineers, it may be, but unaccomphshed for divines. : The third is, that it is of greater general utility for the conduc\ of the business, or for the enjoyment of the leisure, of after life'' — In regard to the business : — For men in general, no study i more utterly worthless than that of mathematics. In regard t< the leisure : — For which, as Aristotle properly observes, a hbera education ought equally to provide, this study is of even less im portance than for the business. No academical pursuit has &! few extra-academical votaries. The reasons are manifest. In thj frst place, mathematics, to be spontaneously loved, require a mor ! peculiar constitution of mind and temperament than any othe. intellectual pursuit. In the second, as observed by Plato, no stud;, forced in the school is ever voluntarily cultivated in life ; (jvx Qtxioi^ ovliu ififiius; fcocS/if^cc). In the third, to use the words of St neca : — " Some things, once known, stick fast; others, it is nc; enough to have learnt, our knowledge of them perishing when w, cease to learn. Such are mathematics.'" * — The maxim, " Nu' scholaB sed vitae discendum/' is thus, in every relation, by th^ University of Cambridge, reversed. * De Beneficiis^ 1. iii. c. 5. [See also Vivos, above, p. 290.] CAMBRIDGE SYSTEM ABSURD. 313 The fourth is, that, independently of its oimi importance, it is a passport to other important branches of knowledge. In this .'spect mathematical sciences (pure and applied) stand alone ; to iie other branches of knowledge they conduce, — to none directly, \ad if indirectly to any, the advantage they aiford is small, con- ngent, and dispensable. I The fifth is, that, however important, absolutely and relatively, I is yet of such a nature, that, without an external stimidus, it ml not be so generally and so thorouyhly cidtivated as it deserves. iatheraatics, certainly, from the nature of their study, require ;ich stimulus ; the question is — Do they deserve it ? We cannot conclude, without strongly expressing our sincere inspect for the venerable school of which, in this article, we have iideavoured to expose a modern abuse. \Yith all its defects, |iere is even now, in the spirit of the place, what, were its mighty neans all as well directed as some already are, would raise it in rery faculty, in every department, to the highest rank among le European universities. Some parts of the reform are dif- l:ult, and must be accomplished from without. Others are pmparatively easy, and, it is not too much to hope, may be ,8termined from within. Of these, the first and most manifest jQprovement would be the establishment of three Triposes of co- rdinate and independent honours ; of which one should comprise le different departments of philosophy proper, ancient and mo- i-n, — another the mathematical and physical sciences, — and a urd the multifarious branches of classics, classical philology, his- )ry, &c. We cannot add a word in reference to the expedi- ;icy and details of such a plan ; but, in allusion to a philoso- jbical Tripos, a noble testimony to the influence of metaphysical jad moral studies in the improvement of the mind, rises to our ^collection, which, as peculiarly appropriate to the occasion, we finnot refrain from adducing. It is by one of the acutest of iiinkers, — the elder Scaliger. — " Harum indagatio subtilitatum [tsi non est utilis ad machinas farinarias conficiendas, exuit tamen joimum inscitiae rubigine, acuitque ad alia. Eo denique splen- iore afficit, ut praeluccat sibi ad nanciscendum primi opiticis imilitudincm. Qui ut omnia plene ac perfecte est, at praetor, et [jpra omnia; ita eos qui scientiarum studiosi sunt, sues esse voluit, jsorumque intellectum rerum dominum constituit." * * De Hubtilitate, Exerc. cccvii. 3. [When tliis was quoted, the fuller ex- net above (p. 40) was in abeyance.] NOTE, TOUCHING THE PRECEDING ARTICLE. (April, 1836.) It is contrary to our practice to publish any answers or com plaints, by authors dissatisfied with our criticisms ; but we ar induced to make an exception of Mr Whewell. He complains; that we have not fairly stated the purport of his recent publica tion on the Study of Mathematics. The nature of the charge and the great respectability of the gentleman by whom it i; made, render it impossible for us to be altogether silent ; w(j therefore, reprint his letter, (which has already appeared both i: the Newspapers, and in the second edition of his Pamphlet*, with a few observations under the form of Notes, in vindicatio; of ourselves. ' ■ " To the Editor of the Edinburgh Review. " Cambkidge, Jan. 2oil, 1836. " My Dear Sir, *' 1 was gratified to find that a little pamphlet which I recent published, as " Thoughts on the Study of Mathematics," hi excited so much notice as to give it a place at the head of .' article in the Edinburgh Review ; — and in regard to the mann in which the Reviewer has spoken of me, I have certainly ) reason to be dissatisfied ; nor am I at all disposed to complaj * [This Letter Mr Whewell republished also in the following year at the Ci' of his book " On the Principles of English University Education,"— 1 1 without the notes in reply. — For that book and for the Preface to his JV! chanics, on both of which I shall be obliged to comment, I am indebted tlif politeness of the author.] MR WHE WELL'S LETTER. ai.-, f the way in wliich ho has urged his; own opiuicuis. But I jhink the article is hkely to give rise to a misapprehcnsiun whicli lught to be corrected ; and for that purpose I troubh" you witli ihis letter, I " I wrote my pamphlet in order to enforce certain views especting the conduct of our mathematical examinations at Cam- [ridge. The question on which I threw out a few ' Thoughts ' las, what kind of mathematics is most beneficial as a part of a beral education. Tliat this was the question to which I was try- jig to give some answer I stated in a passage (quoted by the Re- lewer) at page 8 of the pamphlet. The previous seven pages, in /hich among other matter I had said a few words on the ques- ion, whether mathematics in general, or logic is the better mental iscipUne, were obviously only an introduction to the discussion f certain propositions, which, as the Reviewer observes, * occupy lie remainder of the pamphlet.' (1) It was therefore with no slight surprise that I looked at the lagnificent manner in which the Reviewer has spoken of the mall portion of these seven small pages which refers to the more eneral question. He calls it ' a treatise (a Treatise !) apparently n the very point ' (2), (p. 259), ' a vindication of mathematical tudy ' (3), (p. 260) ; and having thus made me work at a task of own devising, he repeatedly expresses great disappointment hat I have executed it so ill ; — that ' so little is said on the gene- |al argument.' I should have thought that this circumstance jiiglit have helped him to perceive that it was not my general |rgunient. " I see nothing but the convenient and blameless practice of I e views in making the title of my book the occasion of publishing iu Essay on a subject only slightly connected with mine ; but it ippears to me that to attempt to gain a victory by representing a fage or two of my ' Thoughts ' as containing all that can be said 'V an able, earnest, official advocate on the otiicr side, is not a 'Msonable treatment of the question. The writer proclaims that ■ means to give ' no quarter to ray reasonings;' but this pro- 'iJing looks rather hke making an unexpected attack on a point 'lien he thinks himself well prepared, on the arbitrary i)retext liat the truce has been broken by the adversary. (4) ■' I should have no disinclination on a convenient occasion, to ' uss the very important and interesting question which is the 316 STUDY OF MATHEMATICS-NOTE. subject of the Review. I cannot, however, look forward with confidence to the prospect of my being able to take it up for a considerable period ; and shall probably leave the Eeviewer in possession of his self-chosen field of battle for several months, it may be years. But if I should return to the subject, I should wish to know, as definitely as is possible, what are the questions at issue between us; (5) and I would therefore beg from the Reviewer information on the following points. " The Works, which form our examples of Mathematical reasoning are well known ; I wish to know also what works ol ' Practical Logic ' on other subjects (p. 263) the Reviewer i- wilhng to propose as rival instruments of education. (6) " I wish to have some distinct account of the nature of tha ' Philosophy ' which is by the Reviewer put in contrast to Matbe^ raatical study (p. 272) ; and if possible to have some work oi,' works pointed out, in which this Philosophy is supposed to b( presented in such a way as to make it fit to be a cardinal poin, of education. " I may remark also, that all the Reviewer's arguments, and- I believe, the judgments of all his ' cloud of witnesses,' ar; founded upon the nature and processes of pure mathematics only i — on a consideration of the study of the mere properties of spaci and number. My suggestion of the means of increasing thi utility of mathematical^ studies was directed mainly to this point — that we should avoid confining ourselves to pure mathematics- — that we should resort to departments in which we have to der with other grounds of necessary truth, as well as the intuitions ( space and time : so far, therefore, the Reviewer and I have common aim, and I notice this with the more pleasure, since ^' have so far a better prospect of understanding each other in an future discussion. (7) " I will not now trespass further on your patience. In ordi, to remind my Cambridge readers of the state of the cj[uestion,! shall probably place before them something to the same effect !{ what I have now written. " Believe me, my dear Sir, " Yours very faithfully, " W. Whew ELL." ' OBSERVATIONS ON MR WHEWF.U/S LETTEH. 317 Notes on the preceding Letter. (1) We of course Avillingly admit whatever J\lr Wliewell says v;is Jiis intention in writing liis pamphlet ; but wc must be allowed o maintain that, as written, our view of its purport (in reconnnen- riation and defence of mathematics in general, as a mean of liberal jducation,) is the view which every reader, looking either at the ritle of the treatise, or at the distribution and conduct of its argu- ■nent, must necessarily adopt. The title is — " Thoughts on the Study of Mathematics, as a part of a Liberal Education." The Damphlet opens with a statement of the two counter opinions in •egard to the study of mathematics, as a mental discipline ; — the me holding it to be highly beneficial, the other, highly detrimental. Mr Wliewell then proceeds : — " Any view of this subject which •Tould show us how far and under what circumstances each of these )pinions is true, would probably help us to see how we must Tgulate our studies so as to make them most beneficial," &c. It is in this belief that the few reflections which follow have M'cn written." The plan of the work being thus laid down, the luthor goes on to accomplish the first part of his undertaking, by ■udcavouring to show, that the former ophdon is absolutely true ; nasmuch as the study of mathematics is conducive, even more lian logic, to the cultivation of the reasoning faculty. Tliis M'ing done, he passes to the second jyart, and endeavours to -liow, that the latter opinion is conditionally true, inasmuch as rrtain modes of teaching the science, to which Mr Whewell is opposed, are given up as worthy of all condemnation. These two iparts are, ex facie libri, co-ordinate ; nay, so far is the first part, iiongh occupying a smaller portion of the pamphlet, from being • obviously only an introduction" to the second, that, whatever Iwere the intentions of the writer, if the two be not allowed to be Ico-ordinatc, the reader must, from the tenor of the writing, hold |the second to be correlative to the first. For it is only on tJie \ground of the first part, — only on the supposition of the general (argument being conclusive, that the second part, or special argu- ment, is allowed by the pamphlet subordinately to emerge. The following are the words of transition from the one head to the other : — " Supposing, then, that we wish to consider mathematics as an element of education, and as a means of forming logical habits better than logic itself, it becomes an important question. 318 STUDY OF MATHEMATICS— NOTE. how far this study, thus recommended, is justly chargeable with evil consequences, such as have been already mentioned." Then follows the rest of the passage (p. 263) referred to by Mr Whewell, and quoted in the Review ; where, however, there is not to be found a single word of a different tendency. (2) We must be allowed to observe, that we did not. That ex- pression was used by us in speaking of the ivhole ivork, and ii speaking of it as yet known, only from the advertisement of it title. What is Mr Whewell's notion of a treatise ? (3) If \\\Q first division of the pamphlet be not a " vindicatioi; of mathematical study as a principal mean in the cultivation o the reasoning faculty" (for that is our full expression), what i, it? We said that it was too short ; and that it took notice o none of the objections to the study in general, as disquahfying tb, mind for observation and common reasoning. We cannot, there' fore, justly be accused of allowing it to be supposed, far less o; holding it out, to be other than what it actually is. How theij can Mr Whewell assert, as he afterwards does, that we " ati tempted to gain a victory by representing a page or two of hi; ' Thoughts' as containing all that can he said by an able, earnes:'\ official advocate .^" But thougli the general argument was, a' wo stated, brief and only confirmatory, were we not warrantee! on that very ground, in supposing that Mr Whewell regarded ! as of itself sufficiently strong, — as of itself decisive ? Because is shown to be illogical, it does not cease to exist. i (4) The expression quoted was, in its connexion, manifestly onl I one of personal -civility to Mr AAliewell. Of all meanings, assi redly the one here put upon it is about the last which it could reii sonably bear. — We were too conscious of the unavoidable haste 'h which the article audits authorities were thrown together, wit j sole reference to Mr Whewell's treatise, to dream of plumir: ourselves on our preparation for attack. On this ground v must even found an excuse for one error at least, incurred in oi: too absolute assertion touching Bacon, in the text [now correcte(! and relative note at p. 304. — As to " truce," — " pretext," — " a' versary," we comprehend nothing. (i>) The one general thesis which we maintained was : — Th; the study of the mathematical sciences is, for reasons assigne, undeserving oi special encouragement, as a mean of mental cuU vation ; and, therefore, that the University of Cambridge, in I I OBSERVATIONS ON ilR WITE WELL'S LETTER. 310 :.r as its system of education bestows not only a special, but a firamount, not to say an exclusive, encouragement on these jtiences, violates every principle of academical policy.* I * [Dr A^licwell ou this says :— " The cliarge, that the University of Cam- lidge bestows not only a special but a paranioimt and exclusive encourage - lent on these (the mathematical) sciences is not only unfounded, but is in- iccusably so, because it is impossible to refiT to any record of the prizes jhich the University bestows, without seeing that there is a much gi-eater jimber offered and given in other subjects than in ^Mathematics." (Me- Unics, fifth edition, Preface, p. viii.) .What I stated (though Dr Whewell is pleased to call it " not only un- unded, but inexcusably so,") is literally correct. But Dr Whewell, in thojimt place, misrepresents my words. I did not \ , " that the University of Cambridge bestows an exclusive encouragement 1 the mathematical sciences ;" and what I did say, " that the University of jambridge bestows not only a special but a paramount, not to say an exclu- .'e, encouragement on these sciences," — this is rigidly true. But in the second place, Dr "Whewell himself asserts what, to use his own jrds, " is not only unfounded, but inexcusably so," inasmuch as he makes the prizes which the University bestows," and their " nujnber" the mea- re of academical encouragement. This is wholly fallacious : and for these isons : — 1", The prizes, afford they what encouragement they ma}-, are not •jinded, cannot be withheld, and therefore are not, in propriety, bestowed, ■ the University, that is by its dominant body, at all. They are the acci- iital bcijuests of indi%-iduals, in favour of certain favourite pursuits, (it may 1 iif certain personal crotchets. 2", Their number is insignificant, and a minority given to, or not without, mathematical eminence. 3°, Their iiiary value is small, and, in this respect, tiie highest are the mathenia- 1 ". The competition is principall}' for those mathematical, as to them the St honour and the surest advantages are attached 5", liut to these inade- :te marks of distinction, which the University really does not bestow, ami r which, be it for good or ill, it is, in fact, not responsible, Dr Whewell iild not only himself limit, but would compel me to limit, the encourage- iit which Cambridge extends to the several branches of education. Mar- l"Us to say ! he ^\ holly overpasses the one encouragement, in comparison liich all others f;ide out of view ; I mean the 'Tripos, that is, as he him- I'fines it, " the list of the names of those to whom the University assigns liiourable distinction after a public trial," and this in the order of merit. jit will not be denied that this is the standard, according to which inCam- higher, (from 1739 to 1824) there was no Tripos list, that is, no public n-nr, except for mat/iemotiral OBSERVATIONS ON MR WHE WELL'S LETTER, ETC. 321 ; (7) Our objections and those of the authorities -which wc Idduced, are directed against [the excessive study of] the niathc- jUien, therefore, the reviewer, in reply, flatly refused ' to perplex the ques- on by a compliance with Mr Whewell's misplaced request,' I certainly con- ilcrod myself as freed from any call to continue the controversy. No llierent of the reviewer could expect me to refute a proposition which the [ithor himself did not venture to enunciate in an intelligible form. And, lierefore, in the present book, I do not at all profess to discuss the question ■ the value of mathematics, and other kinds of philosophy, Avith reference to (■ reviewer's assertion, but simply so far as it is brought before me by the iieral course of my reflections." On this I must be permitted to observe, that Dr Whewell represents me saying what, in fact, is a reversal of my real expression. For I did t ''fatly refuse" to state what I thought were the particular books which philosophy might be most profitably studied, I merely adjourned it its proper season. " This," I said, " may fomi the subject of ulterior dis- >sion." I did not, as Dr Whewell quotes me, " refuse ' to perplex the tesiion,^ " &c., but " to perplex the present question," &c. This is Avhat I [;tually said. ■ In this ]n-oceeding I was fully persuaded of its propriety. The question I Mhich I had engaged was, the utility of mathematical study, in general, in '/ form, in any books, as a liberal exercise of mind; and this question ■lioved to be disposed of, before entering on another, — and another whicli ily emerged, aud that too subordinately, after the primary and principal oblem had been decided. On this problem, I was firmly convinced that r Whewell could allege nothing solid in favour of mathematical study, to e extent in which it is fostered or forced in Cambridge ; for to that extent, knew that nothing solid ever had been, nor I believed ever could be, li^ered in faAour of mathematical study. Was I therefore to descend from impregnable position, where I stood secure, and of which I believed, event has justified the anticipation,) that Dr Whewell was too prudent attempt the assault? — Counter arguments, worthy of consideration, there • none; and as to authorities of any cogency, there is only the autho- y of the University of Cambridge itself. And of what value is that? It not, in fact, the University of Cambridge, in propriety, which can be iliged as such authority ; that is, the University organised by statute. It is dy a private and intrusive interest which has there superseded the pul)lic :minary, and this has calculated for the advantage of its members, and nut r the national good, the education which Cambridge has long been permitted dispense. This private interest is that of the Colleges and of their Tutors ; ' ill Cambridge there has for generations been taught, not what the ends Incation, not what the ends of science, prescribe, but only what and how ' College Tutors are capable of teaching. It would be here out of place 11(1 is indeed done elsewhere) to explain how a more tutorial instruction list be scanty and mechanical, and how the meciianism once made up, mains, and must remain, long after the opinions which it chances to coni- ' liond and teach are elsewhere exploded. Suffice it for an example, that X I 322 STUDY OF MATHEMATICS— NOTE. raatical sciences in general. Mathematics can be applied to objects of experience only in so far as these are mensurable ; that is, in fifty, that sixty years after Newton had published his Principia, the physicallj hypotheses of Descartes were still tiitorially inculcated in Newton's own Uni- versity : in fact, I believe, that the Cambridge Colleges were about the last seminaries throughout Europe in which the Newtonian doctrine superseded the Cartesian ; and this too in opposition to the Professorial authority oi Newton himself, and his successors in the public chair. And why ? Simply because in these colleges instruction was dispensed by tutors, for then- own convenience and advantage ; and these tutors, educated in the older system, were unable or unwilling to re-educate themselves for teachers of the new; This is an example of the value of Colleglal, of Tutorial, authority in Cam-! bridge ; and we may be sure, that whatever are the subjects comprised ii, the tutorial mechanism of the time, will be clamorously asserted by the col] legial interest to be the best possible subjects of academical education ; whiltj all beyond it, all especially that cannot be reduced to a catechetical routine! will be as clamorously decried. Even the noble and invigorating study c' ancient literature may be reduced to a comparatively barren and unimprov. ing exercise of the lower faculties alone. But on this matter I am happ. to agree with Dr AVhewell ; and nothing certainly can be more deserve , than his censure of the Cambridge tutorial methods of classical readiii; and examination. ; But the notion of Dr Whewell, that because the Cambridge text books o-j mathematics are " well known," (though, if I knew, I never once referred tj any,) therefore, that! was bound, and hoc statu^ to specify the book orbooH on philosophy which I would recommend in their room ; — this notion is n(i merely preposterous. For — • 1°. In mathematics thei'e is no difference of opinion about mathematlct truth ; all mathematical books are all true ; and the only difference of betti; and worse, between one mathematical book and another is, that thisprescii the common truths under an easier form than that, exacting, therefore, fro the student a less amount of intellectual effort. The best mathematicj treatise thus constitutes, pro tanto^ in itself, the worst instrument of educi tion. For — \ 2°. The highest end of education is not to dictate truths, but to stimulaj exertion ; since the mind is not invigorated, developed, in a word, educatei by the mere possession of truths, but by the energy determined in then- qu€ and contemplation. But — 3°. This is better done by ani/ work on philosophy which stimulates strong and independent (be it even for the time erroneous) speculation, th by the best work in mathematics which delivers truth but does not exc: thought. Mathematical contrasted with philosophical truths, are, indee, comparatively uninteresting, comparatively worthless; but they are m( certain. I admit, indeed, now, as I have done before : — " Mathemati' from the first, have been triumphant over the husk ; Philosophy is still mi' tant for the kernel." But what is this to the question — Which study b] cultivates the mind ?] j I oiJSERVATIONS ON MR WIIEWELL'S LETTEH, ETC. :V23 far as tlicy come, or arc supposed to come, under the categories extension and number. Applied mathematics are, tlicrelbre, ij[ually limited and equally unimproving as pure. The sciences, (deed, with which mathematics are thus associated, may afford a pre profitable exercise of mind ; but this is only in so far as they pply the matter of observation, and of probable reasoning, and erefore, before this matter is hypothetically subjected to mathc- ■atical demonstration or calculus. Were there in the physical ienccs, as Mr Whewell supposes, other grounds of necessary th than, the intuitions of Space and Time, the demonstrations duced from these would be equally monotonous, equally easy, id equally unimproving, as the mathematical. But, that Mr hewell confounds empirical wuth pure knowledge, is shown by e very example which he adduces at p. 33 of his pamphlet. ic solution of that requires nothing but experience and the ' ical analysis of thought.* rKeferriug to this paragraph, Dr Whewell (Preface to the fifth edition this Mechanics, p. vi.) says : — " Some persons appear to doubt Avhether L^re are, in the physical sciences, other grounds of necessary truth than the [aitions of space and time. We might demand of such persons whetlier properties of the pressures which balance each other on the lever, as red by Aixhimedes, be not necessary truths ? whether our conceptions of ssures, and the properties of pressm-es, are modifications of our concep- LS of space and time ? and if they are not, whether necessary truths cou- i-ning pressures must not have some other ground than the Axioms of L'ometry and Xumber? AVe might ask them whether we do not, in fact, in Irks like this, show that there are such other grounds, by actually enun- (jiting them ? whether the Axiom, that the pressure on the fulcrum is equal nhe sum of the weights, be not telf evident, and therefore necessary? I" If it be said, that the establishment of such propositions as this ' requires jthing but experience and the logical analysis of thought,' we cannot help tolying, that such a remark seems to betray confusion of thought and igno- tice of the subject. For it would appear as if the author denied the cha- tter of necessary truth to such principles because they depend onli/ on (perieuce and analysis; and that if, besides these, they depended upon •ne additional grounds, he woidd allow them to be necessary. Again, it i' liar tliat, in fact, such propositions do not depend at all upon experience ; ■ . as has elsewhere been urged, — ' Who supposes that Archimedes thought issary to verify this result by actual trial? Or if he had done so, by more evident principle could he have tested the equality of the iits?' (Thoughts on the Study of Mathematics, &c. p. 33.) And if liropositions depend upon logical analysis only, how can they be other- tlian necessary? Does the objector hold that truths which resolve -I'lves into logical analysis, are empirical truths? 1 conceive, therefore, that the cultivation of such a subject as this may be 324 STUDY OF MATHEMATICS— NOTE. of great use both to the Students of this University aud to other persons, not only in familiarizing them with the character of necessary truths, and the processes of reasoning by which a system of such truths is built up ; bnti also by shewing that such truths are not confined to the domain of space andj number merely." Here the tables are completely turned. — I had objected to mathematica I study, — that, if too exclusively pursued, it tended to induce a habit of con fused thinking; but " confusion of thought and ignorance of the subject' are here objected to the objector. This stroke is bold, but dangerous. li not successful, it is suicidal; for it challenges i-etort, and should the missilt; from Dr Whewell fall harmless, it may be returned with even fixtal effect. : Dr Whewell, by position, is the first man in the first college, ^as by repiii tation, he is the ablest functionary, of Cambridge. In that mathematica university he stands the foremost mathematician; but there, he likewis rises pre-eminent, out of mathematics, as a philosopher. Cambridge ami mathematics could not, therefore, be more favourably represented. In thes; circumstances, if Dr Whewell, accusing others, be himself, and from th' very terms of his accusation, proved guilty of his own charge ; how virulent' how permanently deleterious, must be the eftect of mathematical study when a naturally vigorous intellect could not resist, when other aud iuvigoralj ing studies could not counteract, the mathematical alacrity to confusion v thought, even during the brief act of preferring that reproach itself, an, with reference likewise to a favourite science? But so it is. For to estahlif the fact, it is unnecessary to look beyond the previous extract ; which, bol, in the gi-ound of charge itself, and in the statements by which that charge j accompanied, supplies abundant evidence of confused aud inadequate thinlj ing. i Dr Whewell here, as in his "Thoughts on the Study of Mathematics repeatedly propounds it, afs " a self-evident, and therefore necessary" prop- sition, — as an " Axiom;" that " the pressure on the fulcrum is equal to t:, sum of the weights." Biit to common sense and unconfused consciousne; this proposition is nothing of the land ; it is not self-evident, it is not necf^ sary, it is not an axiom, for it is not true. The pressure on the fulcrum ; equal to the sum of the weights, phis the weight of the lever; in other wonj it is equal to the weight of the system. Of course, no one knows this beti: than Dr Whewell, but having ideally abstracted from the weight of the lev | he inadvertently advanced, in his popular pamphlet, without warning ; explanation, a statement which, to popular apprehension, is manifestly fal, There are other parts of this extract which I for one do not pretend understand, — without at least supplying what the author has omitted ; 1 let that pass. Having so indistinctly expressed himself, I cannot wonder that ' Whewell has so completely misconceived me ; — supposing, as he does, thr could possibly hold propositions to be empirical, to be not necessary, in ;> far as these are applications of the canons of Logic. What I said, and clea/ i said, was this : — that the proposition in question (waving all inadeqnac}if expression) is no axiom, is no principle, because a derivative judgin(.|) derived too from a double source; 1°, derived from the exercise of ex|- rience ; 2", derived from the laws of thought. This was said, in saying, It OBSKRVATIONS OX MR WHEWELL'S LETTER, ETC". 32:. hcwell's pretended axiom " requires nothing for its solution but expe- and the logical analysis of thought." And that it is derived, and from these two sources, 1 now proceed to establish. It is derived from experience.— Dr Whewell asserts, " that such propo- do not depend at all upon experience." On the contrary, I maintain at all propositions which involve the notion of gravitation, weight, pres- ire, presuppose experience ; for by experience alone do we become aware, liat there is such a quale and quantum in the universe. To think it existent, lere is no necessity of thought; for we can easily in thought conceive the articles of matter, indifferent to each other, nay, endowetl with a mutually 'pulsive, instead of a mutually attractive force. We can even, in thought, ianihilate matter itself. So far the asserted axiom is merely a derived, and iiat too merely an empirical, proposition.— But, moreover, not only are we lependent on experience, for the fact of the existence of gra\'itatiou, &c., we jre also indebted to observation for the further facts of the uniform and con- ^tuous operation of that force , and thus, in a second potence, are all such tropositions dependent upon experience. — In sum : ^^'e cannot think this and lich like propositions, without founding doubly upon experience. — Dr Whew- (1 indeed observes, in addition to what has been extracted : — " If it be [lid, that we cannot possess the ideas of pressure and mechanical action pthout the use of our senses, and that this is experience ; it is sutHcient to jjply, that the same may be said of the ideas of relations in space ; and jiat thus Geometry depends upon experience in this sense, no less than Ifechanics." (lb. p. viii.) — This is, however, only another instance, in him, f the " confusion of thought and ignorance of the subject," which he imputes }) me. " The ideas of relations in space," and " the ideas of pi-essure," &c. iffer obtrusively in this : — that we can in thought easily annul pressure, jll the properties of matter, and even matter itself; but are wholly unable b think away space and its relations. The latter are conditions, the former ire educts, of experience ; and it is this difference of their object-matters rhich constitutes Geometry a pure or a priori, and Mechanics an empirical r a posteriori, science. I I now proceed to the second head of reduction. 2°, It is derived from the logical analysis of thought. — Under this head my ibjection to Dr Whewell's " Axiom " is, that it is merely a predication of a liing of itself, a mistaken commutation of the analytical principle of identity k logic with a synthetical principle of some non-identity in mechanics. This jretended axiom is, in fact, nothing more than the tautological judgment, I that the whole is equal to all its parts ;" the confusion being occasioned lad veiled by different words being employed to denote the same thing. JTiese different words are weight and pressure. But weight and pressure are tJere) only various terms for the same force. What weighs, pro tunto, is lipposed to press ; Avhat presses, jjro tanto, is supposed to Aveigh. Tlwpres- ire on the fulcrum — is thus only another phrase for — the iceight on the ful- :am ; and to say, with Dr Whewell, that " the pressure on the fulcrum is inal to the sum of the weights," this (waving always the inaccuracy) is only ' unount to saying, — either, that the pressure on the fulcrum is equal to lira of the pressures on the lever, — or, that the Aveight on the fulcrum is 1" il to the sum of the weights on the lever. It ronspfiuently requires, as I gtheua sneh^il 326 STUDY OF MATHEMATICS— NOTE. said, only a logical analysis of the enouncement that " the whole is equal to all its parts, therefore, to its two halves," &c., to obtain the idle proposition which Dr Whewcll has dignified by the name of — Axiom in Mechanics. Dr Whewell's error from " confusion of thought," in this instance, is akin^ to a mistake which I have elsewhere found it necessary to expound, (Disser- • tations on Reid, p. 853) ; — I mean his attempted " Demonstration," (from a • supposed law of thought,) " that all matter is heavy." But, — I had almost forgotten, — what shall we say of Archimedes ? " The Axiom " is apparently fathered upon him ; he was a gi-eat mathematical , inventor ; and it is maintained above (p. 283, sq.) that mathematical inven- tion and philosophical genius (in which are necessarily comprehended distinct and perspicuous thinking) coincide. I was certain, before re-examining theu treatise on ^Equiponderants by Archimedes, that it could contain no principle, no such truism ; nor does it. The reader is now in a condition to decide : — Whether the charge olj " confusion of thought and ignorance of the subject'''' weigh on the accuser oi' on the accused ; and, in general. Whether " Mathematics be a means offormA ing logical habits better than Logic itself.'''' , But before concluding, I am tempted to give one other specimen of " th( confusion of thought" in Dr Whewell's reasoning, and of the manner ii| which (telumque imbelle sine ictu,) his " Mathematical Logic" is brough' to bear against my argmnents. — " I shall not piu-sue," says he, " the consi' deration of the beneficial intellectual influence of Mathematical studies. I would be easy to point out circumstances, which show that this influencv has really operated ; — for instance, the extraordinary number of persons who, after giving more than common attention to mathematical studies a the University, have afterwards become eminent as English laicyers.''' (Eng lish University Education, p. 14.) — The fact of the consecution I do m, doubt. But if Dr WheweU had studied logic, as he has studied mathema tics, he would not have confounded an antecedent with a cause, a consequeu. with an effect. There is a sophism against which logic, the discipline (j unconfused thinking, puts us on our guard, and which is technically calle' the " Post hoc, ergo propter hoc.'''' Of this fallacy Dr Whewell is, in this li ■ one selected instance, guilty. And how? English law has less of principli; and more of detail, than any other national jurisprudence. Its theory ca^ be conquered, not by force of intellect alone; and success in its practi(; reqim-es, with a strong memory, a capacity of the most continuous, of tl; most irksome application. Now mathematical study requires this lik(' wise; it therefore tests, no doubt, to this extent, " the bottom" of tl' student. But because a great English Lawyer has been a CambmV wrangler, it is a curious logic to maintain, that mathematical study conduc to legal proficiency. The Cambridge honour only shows, that a mau has ! him, by nature, one condition of a good English lawyer. And we might . well allege, in trying the blood of a terrier puppy, by holding him up fro' ear or paw, that the suspension itself was the cause of his proving " of tl' right sort ; " as that mathematical study bestowed his power of dogg'i application, far less his power of legal logic, on the future counsellor. Fj .' one man of genuine talent and accomplishment, who has sacrificed to t ; i iNIolech of Cambridge idolatry, how many illiterate incapables do the lists: OBSERVATIONS ON MR WIIEWELL'S LETTER, ETC. :vi: atbematical Wranglers exhibit ? How many noble minds has a Ibroccl bpllcation to mathematical study reduced to idiocy or madness? How any generous victims (they " died and made no sign,"^ have perished, and .11 forgotten, in or after the pursuit of a mathematical Honour? This < hmcholy observation is familiarly made in Cambridge itself.* Again, do ^Mathematics form logical habits better than Logic itself?" As the elc- int Lagomarsini (" vir melioris Latinitatis i)eritissimus," to use the words |"Ruhnkenius), in his oration on the Grammar Schools of Italy, said in fereuce to an English criticism : — " Hoc tantum dicam ; tunc me asquo limo de re latina pi'a^cipientes, Italorumque in ea tractanda rationem repre- nuleutes, Britanuos homines auditurum, quum aliquid vere latinum (quod mdiu desideramns) ab se elaboratum ad nos ex illo Oceano suo miserint :" ■ for us, it will be time enough to listen to any Cambridge disparagement non-mathematical logic, when a bit of reasoning has issued from that Diversity, in praise of mathematical logic, not itself in violation of all gical law, — for such, as yet, certainly, has not been vouchsafed. In fact e need look no farther than the Cambridge panegyrics themselves of mathe- atical study, to see how illogical are the habits Avhich a too exclusive pur- it of that study fosters. — But in conclusion, Dr Whewell also says : — " I ive already noticed hoAv well the training of the college appears to prepare en to become good lawyers. I \^■ill add, that I conceive our physicians to ! the first in the world," &c. (lb. p. 51,) In so far as Cambridge is con- med, I should be glad if Dr Whewell had specified these paragons, Avho ith merit so transcendent, hide their talent under a bushel ; for of their limes, discoveries and reputations, I profess myself wholly ignorant, and :..o-Koyiiu kxI avjivfiovaix^siv. The cxtonsive diffusion of learnin<; in a nation is even a requisite of its intensive cultivation. Num bers are the condition of an active emulation ; for without a rivalrv of many vigorous competitors there is little honour in the contesi and the standard of excellence will be ever low. For a few hold ers of the plough there are many prickers of the oxen ; and score of Barneses are required as the possibility of a single Bentle} In accounting, therefore, for the low state of classical eruditio in Scotland, we shall, in the /rsf place, indicate the causes why i this country an inferior amount of ancient learning has been Ion ' found sufficient for its Law, Medicine, and Divinity ; and, in th' second, explain how our Scottish Schools and Universities are s ill adapted for the promotion of tliat learning. J, AW, HOW CONDUCIVf: TO CLASSICAL STUDY. 331 [. The Profeif milology and criticism ; of which the basis is a profound know- 1 Mge of the languages and history of the ancient world. To be competent divine is, in fact, to be a scholar. Christianity is founded upon Miracles ; but these mii-acles are pit, ' jot continued, and the proof of their original occurrence is con- -Tjuently left to human learning as a matter of historical evidence. Again, Revelation, under either dispensation, was made through >ters divinely autJiorized and insjnred. But in some cases it loubted, whether certain of these writers have been actually [lired; and in others, whether the works purporting to have ' ''n written by them are actually theirs. This necessitates pro- jj,; ,jund researches in regard to the authors of the several writings, jijii [-to the time when, — to the circumstances under which, — to the 'lace where, — and to the persons for whom, thoy wore first writ- 334 ON THE CONDITIONS OF CLASSICAL LEARNING. ten. It behoves, to discover all that is known or not known touching the first publication of these writings, — what is histori- cally certain or probable as to their original recognition, and annexation to the general collection of inspired writings, — and, ir fine, all that is known of the fate, of the contradiction it encouni tered, and of the changes which this collection or Canon maj have undergone. The vehicle of revelation is Writing; and no miracle wa vouchsafed to preserve the sacred documents from the fate o other ancient manuscripts, or to prevent the omissions, changes and interpolations of careless or perfidious transcribers, througl the period of fourteen centuries. This was left to the resource, of human Criticism ; and the task requires for its accomplishmen the profoundest scholarship. The collation of the most ancienj manuscripts, the discrimination of their families, and a compariso! of the oldest versions may afford certain valuable criteria; bi the one paramount and indispensable condition for the determine tion of the genuine reading, is a familiar acquaintance with tl spirit of the languages in which the sacred volume is written. Interpretation, therefore, is not only the most extensive ar arduous, but the most important function of the theologian ; — tli; is, an inquiry into the sense of the inspired waitings, and r exposition of the truths which they contain. — To speak only the New Testament. God did not select for his apostles the el quent and the learned. It is, therefore, necessary to evolve tl sense from the phraseology of unlearned men, writing also in language not then' own. At the same time, the circumstanc which determined the associations and course of thought, ai consequently explain the meaning of the authors, are to be d covered only through a knowledge of the Uterature to which t writings belong, — of the age in which they appeared, — of t^ particular public whom they addressed, — and of the cii'cumstancj under which they were produced. Add to this, that the origii[ language, though Hellenistic Greek, is yet in a great part inm> diately, and in a still gretiter, mediately, translated from t' Aramaic or Syro-Chaldaean ; and it is universally admitted the learned, that without a knowledge of the various Semi; dialects, it is impossible to enter thoroughly into that pecul'* chai'acter of thought and expression, which is necessary to / understood, to understand the real import of the vehicle in wha revelation is conveyed. The interpretation of the sacred bo( ^ I THEOLOGY, HOW CONDUCIVE TO CLASSICAL STIDV. 335 US supposes a profound and extensive knoivledge of the lan- \iages of antiquity, not merely in their words, but in their spirit ; .i kd an intimate familiarity ivith the historical circumstances of I \e period, which can only be acquired through a coniprchcjisivc 1 iidy of the contemporary authors. i; It is thus evident, on the one hand, that no country can possess itheojogy without also possessing a pliilological erudition; and l( I the other, that if it possess a philological erudition, it possesses k {q one necessary condition of a theology. Now, for nearly two ijr kiixmes, Scotland, compared with other countries, may be broadly k {id to have been without a theology ; but as no other country has s ien more strongly actuated by religious interests, it cannot be k Apposed that its clergy held in their hands the condition of a (cology which (overlooking two qualified exceptions) has been ! \ or realised by any. What then are the peculiar circumstances MH'h caused, or which allowed, the Scottish Church to remain so t- behind all other national establishments in theological, and, [,i i|Usequently, in classical erudition ? Id ! In the first place, the Reformation in Scotland, and the consti- :p( ttion of the Scottish Church were not indigenous, — were not the i.. (JDclusions of a native theology. In Scotland the new opinions ^TC a communication from abroad. The polity and principles the Scottish Church were borrowed, — borrowed from Calvin 1 Geneva; and it was only one, and one of the least prominent, the many Calvinist and Presbyterian Churches throughout iiropc. At the same time, it was neither the creature nor the t> (lurite of the Prince. The defence of that moditication of Chris- Miity established in Scotland Avas thus no peculiar, no principal J jiut of honour with the nation or the state; and the Scottish (liiii V^'Sy' geographically remote from the great centre of P^uropean J flemic, were able, without manifest discredit, to devolve upon ' ■ kindred communions the vindication of their common polity ■1 doctrine. — In this respect the English Church exhibits a - iking contrast to the Scotch. The former stood alone among ; 1 1' Protestant communions. It was at once opposed to these and 1| the Church of Home. It was the establishment of a great and "-, Joininent nation ; and the personal and political honour of the ionarch — the dispenser of its high distinctions and emoluments — is long deeply interested in its credit and support. The Church I'":, ([England was thus, from its origin, in a relation of hostility to •lory other. Polemical it must be ; and in the general warfare 336 ON THE CONDITIONS OF CLASSICAL LEARNING. which it waged, as it possessed the means, so it had every motiv' to reward, in its champions, the higher quahties of theologica prowess. If the Church of England could dispense with learned clergy, it could not dispense with a complement <:■ learned divines. In the second place, the determination given to the Church c Scotland by those through whom it was estabhshed was not on of erudition. In Germany the Reformation proceeded from, and was princ pally carried through by, the academical divines ; the prince; the cities, and the people only obeyed the impulsion first give and subsequently continued from the universities. In its origi the religious revolution was, in the empire, a learned revolutior and every permanent modification, every important movement ij- its progress had some learned theologian for its author. FroiJH this character of the Reformation in Germany, the determinatic'^ of rehgious dogmas was there naturally viewed as a privilege ■ erudition, — as more the function of the universities than of tl; church, the people, or the state. Religion consequently remainc in the German schools a matter peculiarly proposed for learnt, investigation ; the authority of confessions was not long allow( to suspend the Protestant right of inquiry ; and the alarmir freedom with which this right has been latterly exercised by tl; Lutheran divines, maj^ be traced back to the license and examj: of Luther himself. In Germany, indeed, theology necessari shared the fate of classical learning. The causes which, from t conclusion of the sixteenth century, depressed the latter, reduc the former to a shallow and barbarous polemic; and the reviv of the study of antiquity, from the middle of the eighteenth, w principally the condition, and partly the consequence, of a revi". of theological learning. : In England the peculiar form under which the Reformat; i was established was principally determined by the royal w. But the very fact that the Church of England was neither in i origin the free creation of a learned theology, nor the sponta - ous choice of a persuaded people, only enhanced the necessity f a higher erudition to illustrate and to defend it when establish . Besides standing, in Europe, opposed to every other establi'- ment and communion, it was, in its own country, surrounded b^^ ii more powerful host of sectaries than any other national church - It who, originally hostile to its polity and privileges, became, on s l| THEOLOGY, HOW CONDUCIVE TO CLASSICAL STUDY. 337 'onversion from Calvinism, by Laud, the more deadly cneinios tf its doctrine. The difficulty and increasing danger of this josition kept up an unceasing necessity for able and erudite jefenders ; and as honours and riches were not stinted as the Irice, the supply of the commodity was hardly inferior to the [emand. The Church of Scotland, on the contrary, was neither the ofl- ring of learning nor of power ; it was the choice of an unlearn- ,1 people, and after being long upheld by the nation in defiance t" every effort of the government, it was finally estabhshed by a volution. As the Scottish Reformation did not originate in native learn- g, so it did not even come recommended to the Scottish people, the learned authority of its propagators. In relation to other lational Reformers, the Reformer of Scotland was an unlettered lian. " Compared with Knox," says a great German historian, Luther was but a timorous boy ; " — but if Ivnox surpassed Luther imself in intrepidity, even Luther was a learned theologian by pe side of Knox. With the exception of Melville, who obtained hat erudition he possessed abroad, the rehgion of the people of |cotland could boast of no theologian worthy of the name. Some ■^markable divines indeed Scotland has possessed ; but these were 1 adherents of that church, which for a season was established by pe will of the monarch in opposition to the wishes of the nation. I'he two Forbeses, to say nothing of Leighton, Burnet, and Sage, Vre EpiscopaUans. In fact the want of popular support made it ' cssary for the divines of that estabhshment to compensate by 18 strength of their theological learning for the weakness of their olitical position. The struggle which ensued between the Epis- )pal and Presbyterian parties was, from first to last, more a opular than a scientific, — more a civil than a theological contest ; id the Covenanters, whose zeal and fortitude finally wrought it the establishment of the religion and liberty of the nation, '■re unlearned as they were enthusiastic. With the triumph of H." Presbyterian polity and doctrines, the controversy between 1'.' rival persuasions ceased. The Scottish EpiscopaUans were w in numbers, and long politically repressed ; and the other ■paratists from the establishment, so far from being, as in Eng- iiid, the enemies of the dominant church, were in reality its use- il friends. They pitched in general somewhat higher the prin- I'les which they held in common with the establishment ; and \ 338 ON THE CONDITIONS OF CLASSICAL LEARNING, whereas in England the Dissenters would have radically destroyed what they condemned as vicious, in Scotland they wished only,! as they in fact contributed, to brace what they viewed as relaxed. Thus, in Scotland, if sectarian controversy did not wholly cease,; theological erudition was not required for its prosecution. Thtl learning of the Dissenters did not put to shame the ignorance o:; the Estabhsliment ; and the people were so well satisfied with their own triumph, and their adopted church, that its clergy had m' call on them for erudition to illustrate what was already respected! or to vindicate what was not assailed.* Even the attacks on Chris, tianity which were subsequently made in Scotland, and whiclj it was therefore more immediately incumbent on the Scottis]; clergy to repel, were not such as it required any theological eriii dition to meet ; while, from the rehgious dispositions of the pul lie, these attacks remained always rather a scandal than a dangei At the same time, in no other country was there so little verg( far less encouragement, allowed to theological speculation. Tb; standards of Scottish orthodoxy were more articulate and unan biguous than those of any other church ; and to its members tl: permissible result of all inquiry was in proportion rigorously pr< determined. Though often ignorantly mistaken, often intei tionally misunderstood, the national creed could not, as in othc; countries, by any section of the established clergy, be either pr; fessedly abandoned or openly attacked. In religious controvers popular opinion remained always the supreme tribunal ; and a cl! mour, when this could be excited, was at once decisive of victor: At the same time the highest aim of clerical accomplishment w to preach a popular discourse. Under the former system of chur ; patronage, this was always a principal condition of success ; und * [Wheu yet comparatively learned, — before its secure establishment, a the consequent slumber into Avhich it was allowed to sink, the Presbyteri Church of Scotland, sensible of its deficiencies, sought, more especially fr Holland, for theologians and scholars who might raise the fallen and fallij; standard of its aspirants to the ministry. This consciousness of self-dii- ciency is an honourable testimony to the older Church. Of these movemeii, I am aware of two, and of these I write merely from recollection. The ampering of the few, — its beggarly starvation of the many. The irrosser the ignorance which it tolerated, the more distinguished JQUst be the erudition which it encouraged ; and in the distribu- ion of its higher honours, the promotion of merit, in some cases, jras even necessary to redeem the privilege of neglecting it in j:eneral. Thus the different circumstances of the two churches jendered the clergy of the one, neither ignorant nor learned ; of e other, ignorant and learned at once. i j The circumstance, however, of most decisive influence on the • [This was written soou after the passing of what is called the Veto Act the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland, which declared, as dent and indefeasible, the right of the people to refuse, without reasons, y pastor presented to them ; and before this Act had been pronounced, by e competent tribunals, illegal. Had the measure gone to compel an ade- iuate education and trial of the clergy, — had it provided that none should [-1 issome the character of pastor who was not fully competent to pastoral I mties,— and that each parish should obtain, among qualified candidates, the J jiinisterbest suited to its reasonable wants ; — had it, in fact, abolished pri- j; late patronage, — and declared as imperative, all that the national Churcli, j I this, or any other Protestant state, had ever even sought to confer upon ,]f pe people: in that case I, for one, should have wished it all success. But 3-40 ON THE CONDITIONS OF CLASSICAL LEARNING. erudition of a clergy is the quality and amount of the prepara- tory and professional education they receive. As almost exclu- sively bred in the common schools and universities of a country, and their necessary course of education being in general con- siderably longer than that of the other learned professions, the clergy consequently express more fully and fairly than any other class the excellences and defects of the native seminaries. On the other hand, the quality and amount of their learning princi- pally determine for good or evil the character of the whole edu- cation, public and private, of a country ; for the clergy, or those trained for the church, constitute not only the most numerous body of literary men, but the class from which tutors, schoolmas- ters, and even professors, are principally taken. Their ignorance or erudition thus reacts most powerfully and extensively, either to raise and keep up learning, or to prevent its rising among al' orders and professions. The standard of learning in a nationa< clergy is, in fact, the standard of learning in a nation. This leads us to the second general condition of classical eru^ dition. II. The system of Schools and Universities. — And in Scotlami our higher and lower seminaries are, perhaps, worse calculatei; for the promotion of ancient learning than those of any othej European country. i No other country i^ so defective in the very foundation of i classical instruction, — the number and quality of Grammar School ■ England has its five hundred of these, publicly endowed: ho many has Scotland ! The attempt to supply this want b making the parochial schoolmaster teach the elements of Lati:; — Greek is out of the question, — proclaims but does not remed; the deficiency. If sometimes hardly competent to the work : primary education, this functionary is rarely qualified for , classical instructor. Yet to his incompetency has, in generij been abandoned the preparation of the future clergy and schdi masters of the nation. It is, indeed, only of late years that; few grammar schools have ventured upon Greek ; the alphal;. of which is, by country students at least, still usually acquired * the university. The universities were, indeed, obliged, changi; their proper character, to stoop, in order to supply the abser'5 or the incompetency of the inferior seminaries. To do this a<'- quately was, in the circumstances, impossible. Professorial p: I SCOTTISH SEMINARIES, CLASSICALLY INCOMPETENT. 341 lections are no substitute for scholastic discipline.* Prematurely 1 matriculated, the student often completed his academical course 1 of philology, before boys in other countries had finished school ; I and, in his progress through the superior classes, he soon forgot ! the scantling of the languages which he had now no longer any ; occasion to employ. Even in the long course of academical I instruction, to which the future churchman was astricted, a few : trifling exercises of form arc all, we believe, that render some I knowledge of Latin a convenient accomplishment. — What, in fine, i is the character of his professional examination ? It is peculiar to Scotland, that the candidate for holy orders is tried, not by one or a few responsible individuals, specially nominated for that [purpose from superior erudition and ability ; but left to the low [standard and fortuitous examination of all or any members of the iPresbytery (clergy of a district) to wliich he may apply. This Iperhaps is worse even than the examination by a Bishop's Chap- lain ; but the Enghsh and Scottish Churches have, between them, jthe worst tests of clerical competency in Christendom. Nor even indirectly was there encouragement of any kind pre- sented by the universities for proficiency in classical attainments. iThe Degree in Arts, as it conferred no honour, was no object of [ambition ; and when not an empty compliment, a minimum of the ilearned languages sufiiced for the examination.f * [It is part and parcel of its general defect in scholarship, that the want |of grammar or classical schools throughout the country has never, for some ttwo centuries, been felt by our Church. A tythe of the agitation fruitlessly expended on some mistaken object, would have succeeded in forcing the state to remedy this opprobrium, which has so long and so heavily weighed [on the clergy and people of Scotland.] t [In Edinbm-gh, a gi-eatcr amount of knowledge is ostensibly rcquii-ed for tthis degree than in any other University ; but no other University can accept [lesa, no other, I believe, accepts so little. The fundamental principle of [academical gi-aduation, not to ask more than must be given, is here, not only violated, but reversed. Had there been any prospect of a reform from witli- but, I should long ago have proclaimed tbe evils to be amended ; and having WO hope of a reform from witluu, it is now (I deem it proper publicly to state) jmany years since I overtly withdrew from every responsibility in the dis- charge of this, as of all other trusts, reposed in tiie Senatus Academicus. — k)ne very simple remedy for, at least, the most disgraceful part of the Hegrees in Medicine and in Ai-ts, would be to make it necessary for the cau- Ididate to pass, for a preliminary minimum, an examination by some extra |academical and disinterested board, taken, say, from the Masters of the High School or Edinburgh Academy, either or both.] 342 ON THE CONDITIONS OF CLASSICAL LEARNING. Of old, the Scottish educational system was a more effectual mean of classical instruction than it proves at present ; but that it was never adequate to this end is proved by two facts, to which, on a former occasion, [Ed. No. iii.] we have alluded. — The first : — that although a trifling proportion of the educated ranks could have received their instruction and literary impulses abroad ; yet of Scottish scholars, all of the highest celebrity, and far more than nine-tenths of those, worthy of the name at all, have been either educated in foreign seminaries, or their tastes and studies deter- mined in the society of foreign learned men. — The second : — that although in other countries the clergy take, as a class, the highest place in the higher regions of erudition ; yet in Scotland, froiD; their dependence on the native seminaries for education, theyi have remained comparatively inferior in classical learning ; almosii every scholar of distinguished note having, for nearly two cen- turies, been found among the laity. For those able to supply their development, the preceding' hints may suffice, to exj)lain the causes of the low state of classical learning in Scotland. In fact, were it not for the neighbourhooi^ and ascendency of England, and that a considerable proportion c those who give a bias to public opinion receive their education an literary convictions out of Scotland, we are almost disposed t believe that in this country, Greek and Latin would long ere no have been studied, as. we study Hebrew or Sanscrit. As it i these influences are only decisive in the capital ; and even hei the opinion of the more intelligent in favour of the primary in portance of classical education is encountered by a numeroi opposition. It is, indeed, fortunate for Edinburgh, that its clasj cal institutions have been powerfully upheld by the reputation ai' talents of their teachers ; but all that individual men, — all th individual seminaries, — all that partial and precarious influenC; can effect, are insufficient to turn back that tide of circumstancs which threatens, unless some public effort may arrest it, to whe j- in one flood of barbarism, all that is most conducive to our inti- lectual and moral well-being, — all that is not subsidiary to vulgf interests, and to the comforts of an animal existence. I The public is now awakening to the necessity of a better e(- cation for the peoj)le ; our self-satisfied contentment with i3 sufficiency of our parish schools, is already dissipated even> Scotland ; and the state cannot long withhold from the Brit a nation what is already enjoyed by the other countries of Eurc- SCOTTISH SEMINARIES, CLASSICALLY INCOMPETKNT. 3-ir> But it is the duty of a government, not only to provide for tlio oecessary instruction of the people, but also to promote the liberal education of the higher orders ; and in particular, to secure a competent erudition in the church, and the other privileged pro- fessions. In Scotland, how defective soever be the system of popular schools, this may be viewed as complete and perfect, com- [lared with the system of grammar schools. Until a sufficient number of these be estabhshed over Scotland, and brought within ho reach of those destined for an academical career, it is impos- - -ible that the universities can perform their proper function in the iiltivation of learning ; or that the professions, and the clergy in 'articular, should be insured in that amount and quality of clas- ical knowledge which is requisite to place them on a level with heir brethren in other countries. Nor until the patronage and ogulation of our universities be deposited in more enhghtencd aid disinterested hands, can we hope that solid learning will receive the preference and encouragement which a university ifc .should afford ; if academical, if liberal study is to be something ± [higher than a mere popular cultivation of the amusing, of the pal- )rti(! jpable, of the vulgarly useful. Amid all the corruptions of Oxford, tiiF [fchafr university has maintained (from accidental circumstances, )0jj,; indeed,) this fundamental principle ; and it is the maintenance of ff(f Ihis principle, however imperfectly applied, that was mainly the \ji ground of our conviction, that if the legislature do its duty, fpjt Oxford is the university susceptible of the easiest and most effec- ual regeneration.* [Ed. No. iv.] iiitt I These observations have detained us too long from our author ; |. and the length to which they have extended precludes us from [ * We have said nothing of the effect of endowments specially destined for 1"''* the encouragement of learning, by enabling the beneficiary to devote himself, ton! without distraction, to the pursnits of erudition. There can be no doubt 0i that such a mean, if properly applied, might be of important service. But 1 ^^ where they do actually exist, — as in England, — these endowments have sel- dom been found wisely atlministered, and their effect, upon the whole, has peen mjiu-ious rather than beneficial. In point of fact, the countries of leW teurope where learning in general, and classical learning in jjarticular, has fflli jbeen most successfully cidtivated, as Holland and Protestant Germany, pos- ,j(5j Iscss no advantages of the kind ; and are only superior to Scotland in a com- , & jplcter organisation of schools, and a tolerable system of university patronage. „ — [See the next following article.] 344 ON THE CONDITIONS OF CLASSICAL LEARNING. offering, as we meant, some contributions of our own in connection with the argument which he so ably and conclusively maintains. Professor Pillans opens the first Lecture with a rapid survey of national education in ancient and in modern times ; and he justly attributes to the states of the Germanic Union the glory of having first practically reahzed it as a great principle of political mora- lity, — that every government is bound to provide and to ensure the moral training and intellectual instruction of the whole body of its subjects. He shoAvs the humihating contrast in which Bri- tain stands in this respect to the states of Germany ; vindicates their enforcement of education by law ; and accords a well-merited encomium to the enlightened magnanimity of France in profiting by the experience, and in adopting the institutions of Prussia., After some valuable observations on the methods and principles of popular instruction, he signalizes the difference, in end and means,, between the education of the lower and the education of the higher classes of society. ... In the second Lecture, after exposing that most contemptible, of all delusions, that the mere possession of facts, — the simple swallowing of truths, — is the end proposed by education, and, showing that it is not by the amount of hioivledge communicated, but by the amount of thought which such knowledge calls intc; activity, that the mind is exercised and developed, our authoi, proceeds to contrast the advantages in this respect of mathematica , and classical instruction. We are gratified to find that our owi' conclusions in regard to the minor value of mathematical study ai' a mean of mental cultivation are not opposed to those of so higl an authority in practical education ; and that our convictions both of the paramount utility, in this relation, of classical study and of the errors by which, in practice, this utility is too ofte; compromised, are in all respects the same with those of so pbilo sophical a scholar. "We must pass over his strictures on the grea schools of England, in order to quote his unfavourable opinion c the organization of our Edinburgh classical schools ; — an organ zation now peculiar, we believe, to Scotland, and which we hav long been convinced is almost the only impediment that prevem the distinguished zeal and ability of their teachers from carryin these seminaries to their attainable perfection. On the preser plan, a new class commences every year under a separate mastei; and the boys, however numerous, and however different in cap city, remain during four years — i. e. — until they enter under tl AUTHOR'S LECTURES. 345 ector — the exclusive pupils of the same classical instructor, hose emoluments are in proportion to the number of his peculiar holars On the manifold disadvantages of this arrangement much might ^ said ; — and wo could quote a host of authorities in favour of e scheme of promotion and retardation, as determined by solemn iminal examinations ; — a scheme for centuries established in (illand, Germany, and other continental countries. IJuchanan, his plan of a classical school, in his " Opinion anent the Beforma- ->n of the Universitie of St Androis," orders " that the classes *all be visit every quarter of a year, and promovit aftir thei* erits." * In most countries this act takes place at half-yearly tervals. In his third and last Lecture our author is occupied with his ■incipal subject, the vindication of classical studies from the I arge of inutility, — an easy matter ; and the far more difficult sk of illustrating the various and peculiar modes in which these i idles exercise and improve the mind. We regret that we are 1 table to afford our readers more than a sample of his admirable ( iservations. After a copious enumeration of the general advan- 1 ges to be reaped from the study of the ancient authors, he pro- .■ds:_ But, again, it may be argued, Why might not all this be done, and i.ne more compeniliously and expeditiously, by taking the works of our (ra English authors for the substratum of this intellectual and moral train- ' : ? My answer is, that, with such means, it could not, I think, be done :ll." It is, indeed, a gi-eat and just boast of these languages (which have been ' led, from the circumstance, transpositive), that this liberty of an-angement ' ibles the speaker or writer to dispose his thoughts to the best advantage. * Professor Pillans will be also pleased to find, from the same Opinion, ich is, we believe, very little known, that his favourite " Monitorial Sys- I ■' was can-ied into effect by Buchanan. It has not been noticed that in ' ~ plan of studies Buchanan was greatly indebted to his friend Sturmius ; il that great paidagogue is also a high authority in favour of the plan of miction of the younger by older pupils. It had also previously been iced to practice by Trotzendorf. For centuries, it has been prudently lifd in Schulpforte, the prime classical school of Europe. The compul- ' lecturing, — the necessary regenaj, — of graduates or iticeptors in the iint universities mainly proceeded on the profound principle, Doce ut "IS. As the scholastic brocard runs : — " Disccre si queer is^ doceas^ sic ipse doceris ; Nam studio tali tibi projicis alquc sodali." 346 ON THE CONDITIONS OF CLASSICAL LEARNING. and to place in most prominent relief tliose which he wishes to be peculiar impressive ; and that thns they are pre-eminently fitted for the pui-poses > eloquence and poetry. It is owing to the same peculiarities in the structu' of the ancient languages, that the writers in them were enabled to construj those long and curiously involved sentences, which any attempt to translaj literally serves only to perplex and obscure; but which presented to ti ancient reader, as they do to the modern imbued with his taste and perce tions, a beautiful, and, in spite of its complexity, a sweetly harmonizi system of thoughts. I have already alluded to the exertion of mind requii ! to perceive all the bearings of such a sentence, as to an exercise well fitt for sharpening the faculties ; and this view of the ancient tongues — consid' ed as instruments of thought Avidely differing fi-om, and in most respei superior to, om- own — is one which recommends them to be used also instruments of education. " Again, our mother tongue is so entwined and identified with our early i\ ordinary habits of thinking and speaking, it forms so much a part of oui'sel ; from the nursery upwards, that it is extremely difficult to place it, so to spe, at a sufiicieut distance from the mind's eye to discern its nature, or to judg f its proportions. It is, besides, so uucompouuded in its structm-e, — so pati- work-like in its composition, so broken down into particles, so scanty ink inflections, and so simple in its fundamental rules of construction, that :s next to impossible to have a true gi-ammatical notion of it, or to form ind:d any correct ideas of grammar and philology at all, without being able to C' - pare and contrast it with another language, and that other of acharaT essentially different." Nothing has more contributed in this country to disparage }e cause of classical education than the rendering it the educatioipf all. That to many*this education can be of httle or no ad^li- tage, is a truth too manifest to be denied ; and on this admis'^n the sophism is natural, to convert " useless to many " into '•' us til to none." With us, the learned languages are at once taught )o extensively, and not intensively enough ; an absurdity in w!;;h we are now left almost alone in Europe. We may notice thatie distinction of schools, to which, in the following passage, |Ir Pillans alludes, is not peculiar to Prussia, but has been long iii- vcrsal in the German and Scandinavian states: even Eussia'as adopted it. " The strongest case against the advocates for classical education, i lie practice that has hitherto prevailed of making it so general as to inide boys of whom it is knowni beforehand that they are to engage hi the ord jiiy pursuits of trade and commerce ; who are not intended to prosecute ,w education farther than school, and are not therefore likely to follow oi the subject of their previous studies much, or at all, beyond the period of eir attendance there. " I wUliugly allow, and have already admitted, that a youth who ^ks forward fi-om the very outset to the practice of some mechanical or "e" AUTHOR'S LECTURES. 347 p:^l7 scientific art, may employ liis time better, in acquiring manual dex- tlity and mathematical knowledge, than in making himself imperfectly ajnainted with a dead language. There must be in all very large and poulous towns, a class of persons in tolerably easy circumstances, and i30se daily business affords them considerable leisure, but wJio contemplate f( their children nothing beyond such acquirements as shall enable thorn to fiow out the gainful occupation, and move in the narrow circle, in Avhich t|iy themselves, and theii- fathers before them, have spent a quiet and ijffensive life. It was for youth of this sort that the Prussian government, \ li a sagacity and foresight characteristic of all its educational proceedings, I \ ided what are called bttenjer and mittel-schulcn^ — intermediate steps be- li-eu the volks-schukn, and primary schools, and the Gymnasia, or gckhrte- mien; and the French have wisely followed the example of Prussia, by aining the establishment of ecoles moycnncs, called also ecoles primaires - licures, in all to^iis above a certain population." rrom the specimens now adduced, the reader is enabled to l.ni certainly a high, but by no means an adequate estimate of t 'se lectures. To be properly appreciated, the whole reasoning II st be studied in connection — which, we are confident, few, sin- ccly interested in the subject, will fail to do. III.-ON THE PATRONAGE AND SUPERINTEl DENCE OF UNIVERSITIES.* (April, 1834.) Report made to His Majesty, by a Royal Commission of lnqui\ into the State of the Universities of Scotland. (Ordered by t' House of Commons to be printed, 7th October, 1831.) ■ We have long had it in view to consider this Report, both wi respect to what it contains, and to what it omits. At present | must Hmit ourselves to the latter head ; and in particular sbl endeavour to make up for its remarkable silence as to the syste'j of Academical Patronage in this country, their palpable defei', and the means of improvement. This, and the revision and f'- mation of constitutions, were the only objects upon which Is framers could have employed themselves beneficially ; for it is f far more importance to secure good Teachers, than to make ri'S about Teaching; and it shall be our present endeavour to sly in what way this primary, end must be attained in principle, IV it has been attained in other countries, and might be rended attainable in our own. On a future occasion, we may perhs make some observations on the more censurable parts of e Report with respect to Teaching and Academical Pohcy ; mci- Avhile, we shall touch principally on the one capital omission jff commemorated. ■ This omission, however singular it may appear, is not wit! it excuse. During the ascendency of those principles of govfi- ment under which the Commission was constituted, to 1/e deprived public trustees of their office only for incompet'joe and self-seeking, would have been felt a far-reaching and a 'p ___!- * [Omitted, some interpolations of little moment.] t PATRONAGE— ITS CONDITIONS. 349 daf^erous precedent ; and so long as Tlio Great Corporation re ained the pattern and the patron of corrnption, to have at- te pted a reform of minor corporations wonld have been at once prtosterous and unavaihng. At the same time, the theory of ed:atioual cstabhshments is so Httle understood in this country, an so total an ignorance prevails in regard to what has been pr?ticallT accomplished in foreign Universities, past and present, th the Commissioners are hardly to be blamed for any limited an erroneous views of the imperfections of our academical sys- te . or of the measures to be adopted for its improvement. To th same cause is it to be attributed, that while all admit, in pro- pc:ion to their intelligence, the defective patronage of our Uni- veaties, there are few who do not resign themselves to a comfort- les despair of the possibility of any important melioration. Yet, th despair is itself the principal, — indeed, the only obstacle to sui a result. And to show that it is totally unfounded, that, in th)ry, the principles which regulate the right organization of aclemical patronage are few, simple, and self-evident, and that in practice, these have aliuays proved successful, even when very ruely applied, is the purpose of the following observations. They piiend only to attract public attention to the subject ; and fully covinced of the truth and expediency of our views, we regret that th exposition we can now afford them, is so inadequate to their pdamount importance. \Jniversities are establishments founded and privileged by the Site for public purposes : they accomplish these purposes through thr Professors ; * and the right of choosing professors is a public 7\'.ist confided to an individual or body of men, solely to the end, th* the persons best qualified for its duties, may be most certainly picuredfor the vacant chair. — Let us explicate this definition of acjdemical patronage in detail. In the first place, in regard to the nature of academical onage : | — That it is a trust conferred by, and to be adminis- pspi 1( Oxford and Cambridge are no exceptions. Inasmuch as thej now ac- complish nothing through their professors, they are no longer Universities ; arjthis even by their own statutes. The term Patron, as applied to those to whom the election of public func- ticaries is confided, is not unobjectionable ; inasmuch as it comjjrehends bu those who have at least a qualified right of property in the situations to w :h they nominate, and those who are pureh/ trustees for the community. Icjihe poverty of language, precision must, however, often bend to cou- v(;;ence. 350 ACADEMICAL PATRONAGE AND SUPERINTENDENCE. tered solely for, the benefit of the pubhe, no one, we are confi- dent, will be intrepid enough to deny. On the part of a Uni- versity patron, such denial would be virtually an act of officia suicide. Assuming, therefore, this as incontrovertible, it neces sarily follows : — j 1°, That the reason of lodging this patronage in certain hands was the behef held at the time by the public or its administra tors, that these were, under circumstances, the best qualified t< work out the intention of the trust ; consequently, if this belie be subsequently found erroneous, or, if circumstances change, sn as to render either these hands less competent to discharge th duty, or others more ; then is the only reason gone for thi longer continuance of the patronage in the original trustees, an'i it forthwith becomes the duty of the State to consign it anew ti worthier depositaries. t 2", That the patronage is wisely deposited in proportion as th; depositary is so circumstanced as to be kept ever conscious (! his character of trustee, and made to appreciate highly the m portance of his trust. Consequently, that organization is radicall' vicious, which conjoins in the same person, the trustee and tl beneficiary ; in other words, where the academical patron an professor are identical. 3°, That the patron has no claim to a continuance of his offic ' from the moment that, the interest of the public demands its r sumption, and transference to better hands. II. In the second place, in regard to the end which academic patronage proposes, — the surest appointment of the highest qu lifications, — it is evident that this implies two conditions in tl patron : — 1°, The capacity of discovering such qualifications; anl 2", The inclination to render such discovery eftectual. , In regard to the former : — The capacity of discovering t| highest qualifications is manifestly in proportion to the higher i, telligence of the patron, and to the wider comprehension of ] sphere of choice, — The intelligence of the patron requires no coi ment. As to his sphere of choice, this may either be hmited circumstances over which he has no control, or it may be com ed, without external necessity, by his own incapacity or wantiiv i^ will. Religion, country, language, &c., may, on the one hai by law, exclude from his consideration the worthiest objects preference ; and on the other, the advantages attached to t ofiice in his gift, may not afford an adequate inducement to th< ;ed m ts itraK ^i PATRONAGE— ITS CONDITIONS. 351 w )m he finds most deserving of his choice. For these a patron hf not to answer. But if he allow himself to be restricted in his oi-ook by sectarian and party prejudices, — above all, if he con- tii his choice to those only Avho will condescend to sue him as ca hdatcs for the office ; he certainly excludes from his considera- tic the greater proportion of those best qualified for the appoint- inat, possibly even the whole ; and the end of the trust confided to im reraidns most imperfectly accomplished. a regard to the latter condition, — the disposition in the patron toiender the discovery of the best qualified persons available : — Its evident that his power to do this must depend on the teiptation which he can hold out to their ambition. — A system of atronage is therefore good or bad, in proportion as it tends tolevate or to degrade the value of its appointments; that is, ast tends to render them objects of competition or contempt. T\ value of an academical office, estimated by the inducements wlch it holds out to men of eminence, is a sum formed by an ad tiou of sundry items. There are, — 1°, The greater emolu- mtt attached to it ; 2°, The less irksome and more intellectual ch 'acter of its duty ; 3°, The amenity of situation, the agreeable so(.>ty, and other advantages of the town and country in which thtUniversity is situated. These are more or less beyond the poler of the patron. But, in another way, it is in the power of paions, and of patrons only, greatly to raise or sink the value of cademical appointments. As the patronage is administered, thcprofessorial body is illustrious or obscure, and the place of cokigue either an honour or a discredit. In one University, an ap;)intment is offered by a spontaneous call, and prized as a cri- tei!)n of celebrity. In another, even the chance of success must be purchased by humihation; success is but the triumph of faNjur, and an appointment the badge of servility and intrigue. Tli|s, under one set of patrons, a professorship will be accepted as j distinction by the person who would scorn to solicit, or even accpt, a chair of thrice its emolument, under another. In one coiitry the professorial status is high, and the academy robs the prtbssions of the best abilities; in another, it is low, and the prc'ssions leave the academy, however amply endowed, only thcr refuse. Of this, the comparative history of the P^uropean Urrersities, and our own in particular, affords numerous and strung proofs. 1. In tlie third place, such being the nature, and such the 352 ACADEMICAL PATRONAGE AND SUPERINTENDENCE. end, of academical patronage, we must finally consider what i the proper organization of its histruments ; in other words, wha person or persons are most likely to feel intensely the obligation of the trust, and to be able to realize completely its intention. I is evident that the problem here, is, simply, how to find a patror or how to constitute a board of patrons, that shall most certainh and in the highest degree, possess these two quahties — Good-^Wi and Capacity. In regard to good will, — a patron will be well disposed pn cisely in proportion as he has motives more and stronger to fulti fewer and weaker to violate, his duty. The aim, therefore, of a enlightened scheme of patronage, is, in the first place, to supp); him with as many as possible of the one class, and in the seconii to remove from him as many as possible of the other. ' As to the supply of direct motives : — Independently of tl' general interest which academic patrons, in common with {; intelligent and patriotic citizens must feel in the welfare of the! Universities, it is evident, that motives peculiai^y determinii' them to a zealous discharge of their trust, will be given by co^ necting their personal honour and dishonour with the appoii ment of worthy and unworthy professors ; and that this moti' will be strong or weak, in proportion as, on the one hand, t' honour or dishonour is more or less intense and enduring in ' application, and on the other, as the patrons are persons of a el- racter more or less alive to the public opinion of their condu. These conditions determine the following principles, as regulati; the organization of a board of academical patronage, 1°, The patrons must be few: to the end that their responsi- lity may be concentrated ; in other words, that the praise or bla'j attributed to their acts may not be weakened by disseminat \ among numbers. : 2", The board of patrons must be specially constituted ad h\; at least, if it discharges any other function, that should be of a analogous and subordinate nature. Nothing tends more direi Studio di Padova,) intrusted to the six senators of the venerable li College of Seniors, by whose wisdom the most important affairs of \ the Eepublic were administered. To this small and select body ' of Moderators, the Senate delegated the general care of the Uni- versity ; and, in particular, that of looking around through Europe \ for the individuals best qualified to supply the wants of the Uni- versity. Nor were they easily satisfied. The plurality of con- i current chairs (which long continued) superseded the necessity of j hasty nominations ; and it not unfrequently happened that a prin- cipal Ordinary ivas vacant for years, before the Triumvirs found • an individual sufliciently worthy of the situation. On the other hand, where the highest celebrity was possibly to be obtained, | nothing could exceed the liberality of the Senate, or the zeal of' the Moderators ; and Padua Avas thus long eminently fortunate, in • her competition for illustrious teachers with the most favoured! Universities of Europe. { In Pisa, the students do not appear to have ever exercised so! preponderant an influence in the election of their teachers as in i Padua, or even Bologna. From the period of the restoration of! the University by Lorenzo de' Medici, the academical patronage j of the state was virtually exercised by a small, intelligent andj responsible body. In 1472, the Senate of Florence decreed thatj five Prefects should be chosen out of the citizens, qualified for thcj magistracy, to whom should be confided the superintendence botl '• of the Florentine and Pisan Universities. These were annuall}; elected ; but as re-election was competent, the body was in realit)' permanent. Lorenzo appears among the first. In 1543, CosnK' de' Medici gave new statutes to the University of Pisa, with whicli that of Florence had been united. By these, beside the Prefects; who were not resident in Pisa, a Curator or Provisor was esta! blished on the spot. This ofifice was for life ; nor merely honor; ary, for attached to it was the Priorship of the Knights of Si Stephen. The Curator was charged with the general superinteDj dence of student and professor ; and whatever directly or indij rectly concerned the well-being of the University, was within hiij sphere. In the appointment of professors, he exercised a greaj and salutary influence. The Prefects were the definitive electors, it was, however, the proximate duty of the Curator to look arouni for the individuals suited to the wants of the University, and t' bring their merits under the judgment of the Prefects. How b«: ITALIAN UNIVERSITIKS— PISA ; DUTCH— LEYDKN. .inO leficially the Curator and Prefects acted as mutual stimuli and iiiecks, requires no comment. j By this excellent organisation of the bodies to whom their cademical patronage was confided, Padua and Pisa, in spite of lany unfavourable circumstances, long maintained a distinguished ..'putation ; nor was it until the system which had determined iieir celebrity was adopted and refined in other seminaries, that ley lost the decided pre-eminence among the Universities of urope. From the integrity of their patrons, and the lofty ;andard by which they judged, the call to a Paduan or Pisan iiair was deemed the highest of all literary honours. The status ■ Professor was in Italy elevated to a dignity, which in other )untries it has never reached ; and not a few of the most illus- ious teachers in the Italian seminaries, were of the proudest :»bihty of the land. While the Universities of other countries \d fallen from Christian and cosmopolite, to sectarian and local liools, it is the pecuhar glory of the Italian, that under the ,dightened hberality of their patrons, they still continued to jisert their European universality. Creed and country were in nam no bar ; the latter not even a reason of preference. Foreign - j's of every nation are to be found among their professors ; and le most learned man of Scotland (Dempster) sought in a Pisan iiair, that theatre for his abilities which he could not find at )me. When Calvinist Leyden was expatriating her second oerhaave, the Catholic Van Swieten ; Catholic Pisa had drawn cm Leyden the Calvinist foreigner Gronovius. In Schismatic ngland, a single sect excludes all others from the privileges of niversity instruction ; in Catholic Italy, even the academic lairs have not been closed against the heretic. The system was, however, carried to a higher perfection in le Dutch Universities ; and notwithstanding some impediments 'ising from religious restrictions, (subsequent to the Synod of ordt,) its efficiency was in them still more conspicuously dis- ayed. ' It was first reahsed in Leyden, the oldest of these seminaries ; id from the greater means and more extensive privileges of that j niversity, whose degrees were favoured throughout France, its Deration was there more decisive. In reward of the heroic defence made by the citizens in the inorable siege of Leyden, they received from the States their K^'icc of an immunity from taxation, or of a University. Tliov 3(30 ACADEMICAL PATRONAGE AND SUPERINTENDENCE. chose the latter. But though a recompense to the city, and though the civic aristocracy was in no other country so preponderant as in Holland, the patronage of the new estabhshment was not asked by, nor conceded to, the municipality. Independently of reason, experience had shown the evil effects of such a constitution in the^ neighbouring University of Louvain, where the magistrates and the professors rivalled each other in their character of patrons, to prove, by a memorable example, how the wealthiest endowments, and the most extensive privileges, only co-operate with a vicious system of patronage in sinking a venerable school into contempt. The appointment of professors, and the general superintendence of the new University, were confided to a body of three Curators' with whom was associated the Mayor of Leyden for the timt. being. One of these Curators was taken from the body of nobles' and chosen by them ; the two others, drawn from the cities o Holland, or from the courts of justice, were elected by the State, of the province. The duration of the office was originally fo:' nine years, but custom soon prolonged it for life. The Curator were recompensed by the high distinction of their office, but war allowed a learned Secretary, with a salary proportioned to hi trouble. The system thus established continues, to the present hour, ii principle the same ; but the changes in the political circumstance! of the country have necessarily occasioned changes in the const! tution of the body, — whether for the interest of the University i still a doubtful problem. Until the revolutionary epoch, no alte; ation was attempted in the college of Curators ; and its perm; nence, amid the ruin of almost every ancient institution, prove independently of other evidence, that all parties were at one .. regard to its virtue and efficiency. In 1795, the four Curate j were increased to five, and all made permanent. Of these, thr*; were elected by the national delegates, two by the muuicipaUty ( Leyden ; and the spirit in which they were chosen, even durii^ the frenzy of the period, is shown in the appointments of Sant nius and De Bosch, — the most illustrious scholars in the curatoi since the age of Douza. On the restoration of the House Orange, and establishment of the Kingdom of the Netherlands,- uniform constitution was given to the Batavian and Belgian Uj, versities. By the statutes promulgated in 1815 for the iovvM- and in 181C for the latter, it is provided that " in each Univ( sity" (these were now Leyden, Utrecht, and Groningen, Louva DUTCH UNIVERSITIES- LEYDEN. 301 id, and Liege,) " there shall be a board of Curators, eonsist- _^ L>t" five persons, distinguished both by their love of literature ad the sciences, and by their rank in society." " The Curators lall take precedence according to the date of their appoint- ent ;" but in the statutes of the Belgian Universities, it is stated, j the President shall be named by the King, and must be resident i the town where the University is established." " These cura- Irs shall be nominated immediately by the King, and chosen, — least three-tifths of them, — in the province where the Univer- ;y is estabhshed ; the two others may be chosen from the adja- iit provinces." " The chief magistrate of the town in which the uiversity is situated, is, in virtue, but only during the continu- iice, of liis office, a member of the college of Curators." Beside 'e duties touching the superintendence and administration of the uiversity, " when a chair falls vacant, the curators shall propose the Department of Instruction in the Arts and Sciences" (in ■ Batavian statutes, '* to the ministry of the Home Depart- ;unt,") " two candidates for the situation, and they shall subjoin their proposal the reasons which have determined their choice, 'be definitive nomination shall be made by the King." To hold, anually, two ordinary and as many occasional meetings as cir- < instances may recpiire. " The curators shall, on their appoint- ent, make, before the King, the following oath : I swear (I pro- ise) fidelity to the country and to the King. I swear to observe regidations and enactments concerning academical establish- in so far as they concern my function of Curator of the liversity of , and to co-operate, in so far as in me lies, to tvelfare and celebrity." Office of curator gratuitous ; certain velhng expenses allowed. " To every college of Curators a '•rotary is attached, bearing the title of Secretary-inspector, • il having a deliberative voice in their meetings. He shall be Ijiund to residence in the town where the University is esta- Mshed, and, when the college of Curators is not asseml)Ied, shall Utch that the measures touching the high instruction and the ijgulations of the University are observed, &c." This Secretary ts salaried. We have spoken specially oi Leyden, but all the schools of IIol- id owed their celebrity to the same constitution ; and the emula- '^n of these different boards contributed greatly to their prosperity. 10 University of Franeker, founded in 1585, had three Curators I'l a Secretary. That of Groningen. founded in 1G15, was 332 ACADEMICAL PATRONAGE AND SUPERINTENDENCE. governed by a college of six Curators, appointed by the States o the province. Utrecht, raised from a Schola Illustris to a Univer sity in 1636, and in endowments second only to Leyden, had/r Curators and a Secretary. For Harderivick (we believe) there wa a board oifive Curators and a President. The Atheiiceum of Amstei dam, which emulated the Universities of Leyden and Utrecht, wa governed by tivo Curators ; and the other Scholse lUustres wer under a similar constitution. On the curatorial system likewis was estabhshed the excellence of the classical schools of Holland and these, as recently admitted by the most competent authorit in Germany, (Thiersch,) have been long, with a few individu; exceptions in Germany, the best throughout Europe. But let us consider how the system wi'ought. We shall spea only of Leyden. i It is mainly to John Van der Does, Lord of Noortwyk, a di' tinguished soldier and statesman, but still more celebrated as . universal scholar, under the learned appellative of Janus Douz that the school of Leyden owes its existence and reputation, i governor of that city, he had baffled the leaguer of Kequesen and his ascendency, which moved the citizens to endure t horrors of the blockade, subsequently iuflaenced them to preft to a remission of imposts, the boon of a University. In the cc stitution of the new seminary it was he who was principally cc suited ; and his comprehensive erudition, which earned for li the titles of the " Batavian Varro," and " Common Oracle of t LTniversity," but still more his lofty views and unexclusi liberality, enabled him to discharge, for above thirty years, t function of first curator with unbounded influence and unparalle' success. Gerard Van Hoogeveen, and Cornelius de Coning, wi his meritorious colleagues. Douza's principles were those which ought to regulate t;) practice of all academical patrons ; and they were those of i successors. He knew, that at the rate learning was seen pri:i by the state in the academy, would it be valued by the nation t large. In his eyes, a University was not merely a mouthpi i of necessary instruction, but at once a pattern of lofty eruditi . and a stimulus to its attainment. He knew that professors wrou|.t more even by example and influence than by teaching; thaft was theirs to pitch high or low the standard of learning ii^ country ; and that as it proved arduous or easy to come up ? them, thcv awoke either a restless endeavour after an over lofH' DUTCH UNIVERSITIES— LEYDEN. S(!3 ftainment, or lulled into a self-satisfied conceit. And this rela- ijtn between the professorial body and the nation, held also litween the professors themselves. Imperative on all, it ^vas pre particularly incumbent on the first curators of a University, t strain after the very highest qualifications; for it was theirs to ctermine the character which the school should afterwards main- tin ; and theirs to give a higher tone to the policy of their suc- (^sors. With these views, Douza proposed to concentrate in iyden a complement of professors all illustrious for their Icarn- ig; and if the most transcendent erudition could not bo procured fr the University, with the obligation of teaching, that it should ^11 be secured to it without. For example. Lipsius, " the Prince cLatin literature," had retired. Who was to replace him? Joseph laliger, the most learned man whom the world has ever seen, V5 then living a dependent in the family of llochepozay. He, ( all men, was if possible to be obtained. The celebrated Bau- tis, and Tuningius, professor of civil law, were commissioned t proceed as envoys to France, with authority to tender the ajpointment, and to acquiesce in any terms that the illustrious siolar might propose. Nor was this enough. Not only did the (irators of the University and the Municipality of Ley den write ithe most flattering strain to the " Prince of the literarj' Senate," i»ing his acquiescence, but also the States of Holland, and liurice of Orange. Nay, the States and Stadtholder preferred 1 ewise strong solicitations to the King of France to employ his i luence on their behalf with the " Phoenix of Europe ;" whicli the seat Henry cordially did. The negotiation succeeded. Lcydcn illustrated ; the general standard of learned acquirement in -uuntry, and the criterion of professorial competency, were Cjjvated to a lofty pitch ; erudition was honoured above riches aid power, in the person of her favourite son ; nor had the fallen I spot of Verona to regret his ancestral dignity, whilst re])ublics, id princes, and kings, were suitors to the " Dictator of the Com- Dnwealth of Letters." — After the death of Scaliger, who never tught, the curators, with a liberality in which they were soon aer checked, tried to induce Julius Pacius (for whom the Uni- ^rsities of Germany, of France, and, though a heretic, of his rtive Italy, hkewise contended,) to accept a large salary, on con- < ion only of residence in Ley den. But the place of ScaUgcr to be filled by the only man who may contest with him the , ' mafy of l(\arning ; and Salmosim, who, though a Pcntiw. 364 ACADEMICAL PATRONAGE AND SUPERINTENDENCE. tant, had been invited to Padua, but under the obhgation of le' turing, preferred the literary leisure of Leyden, with the emoli ments and honours which its curators and magistracy lavished di him: — simply, that, as his call declares, "he might improve l! conversation, and stimulate by example, the learned of the place i or, in the words of his funeral orator, " ut nominis sui honorej Academise huic impertiret, scriptis eandem illustraret, prsesentj condecoraret." And yet the working professors of Leyden, I that time, formed a constellation of great men which no othi University could exhibit.* , Such is a sample of the extraordinary efforts (for such sinecun were out of rule) of the first curators of Leyden, to raise th(, school to undisputed pre-eminence, and their country to the mc learned in Europe. In this attempt they were worthily second i by their successors, and favoured by the rivalry of the patrons ;' the other Universities and Scholse lUustres of the United Pi vinces. And what was their success? In the Batavian Neth(i lands, when Leyden was founded, erudition was at a lower e.' than in most other countries ; and a generation had hare passed away when the Dutch scholars, of every profession, w(;i the most numerous and learned in the world. And this not fnji artificial encouragement and support, in superfluous foundatioi, affording at once the premium of erudition, and the leisure ,;• its undisturbed pursuit, for of these the Provinces had noij; not from the high endowments of academic chairs, for the mop rate salaries of the professors were returned (it was calculat|) more than twelve times to the community by the resort Jf foreign students alone ; but simply through the admirable orgaj- zation of all literary patronage, by which merit, and merit aloj, was always sure of honour, and of an honoured, if not a lucralje appointment; — a condition without which Colleges are nuisan now, for a considerable period, been turned very generally linst them. The rise of the German Universities, in fact, ossarily determined a dechne in the external prosperity of Dutch. riie Universities of the Empire, indeed, exhibit perhaps the st striking illustration of the exclusive efficacy of our prin- Ic. For centuries, these institutions had languished in an -curity which showed the darker by contrast to the neigh- iring splendour of the Batavian schools : when, by the simple j'lication of the same curatorial patronage, with some advan- _e3, and reheved from the religious restrictions which clogged exercise in Holltind, the Protestant Universities of Germany ne out at once with a lustre that threw almost into the ide the seminaries by which they had themselves been previ- >ly eclipsed. The older German Universities, like those of France, the tlierlands, England, and Scotland, were constituted on the ' lisian model ; consequently, all graduates became, in virtue of •ir degree, ordinary members of the several faculties, with |ual rights in the government of the corporation, and equal •ivileges and obligations as academical teachers. But though ic privilege of lecturing in the University was preserved to the raduates at large, a general dispensation of its compulsory vorcise was in Germany, as in other countries, soon rendered issible by the endowment which took place of a certain number 366 ACADEMICAL PATRONAGE AND SUPERINTENDENCE. of lectureships on the most important subjects, with salaries arising from ecclesiastical benefices, or other permanent funds, Of these, which were usually twelve, at most twenty, in all, the holders were, of course, bound to gratuitous instruction ; for throughout the European Universities the salary of an academi- cal teacher was always given (as a boon to the public, and mor( especially to the poor) in lieu of his exigible j^astus. The device! by Avhich this obligation has been, in various countries, variously (per fas, per nefas) eluded, would form a curious history. From towards the middle of the sixteenth century, no Germai. University was founded without a complement of such salarieci ! teachers, or, — as they began from the commencement of tha! century, distinctively to be denominated, — Professors; and froD: this period, these appointments were also generally for life. Thesi; professors thus came to constitute the ordinary and permanen! members of the faculties to which they belonged ; the other gra duates soon lost, at least on equal terms, the privilege of academii cal teaching, and were wholly excluded from the everyday admi,' nistration of the University and its Faculties. i To the salaried teachers thus established in the Universities,-; to them collectively, in colleges, or in faculties, the privilege wat generally conceded of choosing their own colleagues ; and this ij the fond persuasion, as the deed of concession usually bore, thr; the election would be^ thus always determined with knowledgi; and by the superior merit of the candidate. The princes an' free cities, who, in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, founde Universities and endowed Professorships, abandoned to the salarie teachers this right either entirely or in part, Leipsic an I Tuebingen are examples of the one, Ingoldstadt of the other. 1| the sixteenth and following centuries, on the contrary, when tlj custom of endowing every public chair with a salary, and that ft; life, became more and more universal, no German University w.'| erected in which an unfettered right of election was granted ', the professors ; and as experience had now proved the pernicioi pohcy of such a concession to the older Universities, it was aL from them generally withdrawn. The Senate or the Faculti obtained at most the privilege of presenting candidates for a' pointment. Of this Koenigsberg is an instance. But until tl* foundation of the University of Halle, in 1694, by the statutes i which, the chairs in the juridical and medical faculties we! declared absolutely in the appointment of the Pi'inco, (thonj GERMAN UNIVERSITIES— GOETTINGEN. 3r,7 kese bodies still ventured to interpose their advice ;) the selection 4d ordinary appointment of professors, under the various forms c presentation, commendation, proposal, or desiynation, was vir- tally exercised by the professorial bodies. There was, in fact, il the state, no other authority on whom this function peculiarly (J responsibly devolved. It was the establishment of the Univer- ^ of Goettingcn, exactly a century ago, which necessitated a tial and most salutary change of system. " The great Muench- llusen," says an illustrious professor of that seminary, " allowed ck« University the right of Presentation, of Designation, or of ^commendation, as little as the right of free Election ; for he y^ taught by experience, that although the faculties of Univei'- BJics may know the individuals best qualified to suj)ply their vjjant chairs, that they are seldom or never disposed to propose f(j appointment the worthiest within tlreir knowledge." ilhe length to which this article has already run, warns us not tjattempt a contrast of the past and present state of the German lliversities. On this interesting subject, " satius est silerc quam pi'um dicere." By Germans themselves, they are admitted to hre been incomparably inferior to the Dutch and Italian Uni- T sities, until the foundation of the University of Goettingcn. Alenchhausen was for Goettingcn and the German Universities, fixi Douza was for Ley den and the Dutch. But with this dif- fejnce: — Ley den was the model on which the younger Univer- sies of the Republic were constructed ; Goettingcn the model on wich the older Universities of the Empire were reformed. Both yra statesmen and scholars. Both proposed a high ideal for -thools founded under their auspices ; and both, as first cura- laboured with paramount influence in realising this ideal for ame long period of thirty -two years. Under their patronage, lien and Goettingcn took the highest place among the Uni- vi>ities of Europe ; and both have only lost their relative supre- 1 y, by the application in other seminaries of the same measures U had at first determined their superiority. 1 cm the mutual relations of the seminaries, states, and people "ilie Empire, the resort to a German University has in general ■ M always mainly dependent on its comparative excellence ; and '-' interest of the several states was involved in the prosperity lieir several Universities, the improvement of one of these "Is necessarily occasioned the improvement of the others, ^ -ooner, therefore, had Goettingcn risen to a decided superio- 3G8 ACADEMICAL PATRONAGE AND SUPERINTENDENCE. rity through her system of curatorial patronage, and other subor- dinate improvements, than the different governments found it necessary to place their seminaries, as far as possible, on an equal footing. The nuisance of professorial recommendation, under which the Universities had so long pined, was generally abated;! and the few schools in which it has been tolerated, subsist only^ through their endowments, and stand as warning monuments ol! ;i its effect. Compare wealthy Greifswalde with poor Halle. The vir-' tual patronage was in general found best confided to a small bodi: of curators; though the peculiar circumstances of the country, and the peculiar organization of its machinery of government! have recently enabled at least one of the German states to con centrate, without a violation of our principles, its academica patronage in a ministry of public instruction. This, however, w, cannot now explain. It is universally admitted, that since thei! rise through the new system of patronage, the Universities cj Germany have drawn into their sphere the highest talent of thj nation; that the new era in its intellectual life has been whoU; determined by them ; as from them have emanated almost all tb! ^ most remarkable products of German genius, in literature, erudj tion, philosophy, and science. j The matter of academical patronage has of course been di; cussed in Germany, where education in general has engrossd greater attention thai^ throughout the world beside ; and wher in particular, the merits of every feasible mode of choosing pr fessors have been tried by a vai'ied experience. But in thj country the question has been hardly ever mooted. All are ' one. Every authority supports the policy of concentrating t academical patronage in an extra- academical body, smcdl, intei\ . gent, and responsible; and we defy the allegation of a sinji|j modern opinion in favour of distributing that patronage amonji" numerous body of electors, — far less of leaving it, in any circus stances, modification, or degree, under the influence of the p • fessorial college. The same unanimity has also, we have noticp always prevailed in Holland, As a specimen of the state jf opinion in Germany on this decided point, we shall cite o.f three witnesses, all professors, all illustrious authors, and alli the very highest authority, in a question of learned educatioc'r of academical usage. These are Michaelis, Meiners, and Schle macher. Michaelis. — " It is inexpedient to allow the choice of academical teaci'S . TESTIMONIES OF MICHAELIS AND OF MEINERS. 369 1 the professors themselves, be it either to the n-liole concilium or to tlie iveral faculties : and tliose Universities which exercise this ri;,Mit, pay llio [ualty of the privilege. A choice of this description is always ill made by numerous body, and a single intelligent judge is better than a multitude of (Ctors. - - - - In an election by professors, it is also to be feared tilt partiality, nepotissTn, complaisance to a colleague in expectation of a re- tju, would be all-powerful ; and were it only a patriotic preference of ti.ives to strangers, still would the election be perverted. There is, more- QiT, a painful circumstance on which I am loath to touch. It is not im- psible that the most intelligent judge among the professors, one in the en- jtment of distinguished influence and reputation, may, in tiie appointment oa colleague, look that this reputation and influence be not eclipsed, and cisequently, to the exclusion of all higher talent, confine his choice to such i».>rlor qualifications as he can regard without dread of rivalry. Professors iry, it is true, be profitably consulted ; but no reliance should be placed on tl advice of those who have any counter interest to the new professor. - - - - The direst evil in the choice of professors, and the certain prelude to tl' utter degi-adation of a University, is nepotism ; that is, if professors, wf?ther directly through election, or indirectly through recommendation ai advice, should succeed in obtaining academical appointments for sons, 6(5-in-law, &c., of inferior learning. The man who in this manner becomes e^raordinary professor will, without merit, rise also to the higher office ; and tl job which is tolerated on one occasion, must, from collegial friendship aii even equitable reciprocity, be practised on others." {Raisonnement ueber diprotestantisc/ien Universitaeten in Deutsc/iland, (1770) ii. p. 412.) Iei.neks. — " It should be no matter of regret that faculties have now lost tliprivilege of electing their members, or of recommending them for ap- pcitment. Certain as it is, that each faculty is best competent to deter- mie what qualifications are most wanted for its vacant chairs, and who are thjpersons possessing these qualifications in the highest eminence ; certain ali is it, that in very many cases the faculties would neither elect nor re- cojmend the individual deserving of preference ; — that is, in all cases where th'- might apprehend that the worthiest would prejudice the interests, or th;w into the shade the reputation, of themselves or friends. - - - Let ac'lemical patrons be cautious as possible, and let them consult whom they ni.f in the choice of public teachers, it cannot but happen that they should coonit occasional mistakes. And when such occur, then is it that we are suj to hear — ' This could not have happened, had the University or F.'i.alty been consulted.' Yet far worse and far more frequent en-ors wold occur, did the faculties possess the right of free election, or did th higher authorities only choose out of a list presented by the pro- fe.':)rs. - . - . jThe actual choice and confirmation of public teachers is now, in most UJFersities, in the hands of the Prince, and of the Curators appointed by Wi; in very few is it exercised by the Universities themselves, or by their sejral faculties and functionaries. The Universities in which teachers are ch'en and confirmed by the Prince, or by the curators nominated by him, ar-listmguished among themselves by this difference ;— that in some, the ^'He professorial body, or the several faculties, have either the right or tlif> 9 A 370 ACADEMICAL PATRONAGE AND SUPERINTENDENCE. permission to propose, or at least recommend, candidates for the vacaii places ; and that, in others, they have not. The questions thus arise :— 1 it better that the Universities themselves, or those in authority over then should elect the professors ? Is it better that the University or academic; bodies should or should not have the right or permission to propose or n commend for appointment ? " It does not admit of doubt, that the choice of professors by extra-acad mical governors, is preferable to their election by the senatus or facultie Cm-ators, however leanied they may be, still cannot be so familiar wi every department of erudition, as to be able, on every vacancy, to determin from their own knowledge, what individuals ought to be taken intoconside ation, and who of these is best deserving of preference. To this the in(( learned professor Avould be equally incompetent as the academical ciu-atO' It is not, however, difficult for well-disposed and enlightened curators to c tain the information which they themselves cannot possibly possess. Th reside, in general, either in great cities, or, at least, in towns inhabited men of learning, intimately acquainted with every branch of literatu They likewise in general personally know, in the Universities over wh they preside, individuals of approved erudition, who can either afford adv themselves, or obtain it from others with whom they are acquainted, either way, it is easy to ascertain both the number and the relative qua) cations of those who would accept the office. This must be admitted; ■ can it be denied, that curators will in almost every instance elect those ■ commended to them as the worthiest, by the best informed and most imp- tial advisers. Curators have no other, at least no stronger interest, than 'J maintenance and increase of the prosperity of the University intruste(:) their care. This interest induces them, in the academical appointme;, rigidly to scrutinize the qualifications of candidates, and to accord the in- ference only to the moSt deserving. The individuals out of whom fly choose are not of their connexions, and seldom even their personal acqua^- ances. There is thus i-arely any ground of partiality or disfavour. If Ci.- toi's elect according to merit, they enjoy, beside the inestimable approban of a good conscience, the exclusive honour of their choice. Do they a ,ff themselves to be influenced by unsifted recommendations, to choose anoir than the worthiest,— they expose themselves, by their neglect of duty, toi> lie and private reprobation. i " Academical senates and faculties possessing the privilege of :f- election, have at least this advantage over curators of Universities, ,at they are able, from their own knowledge, to appreciate the mer of candidates. But, on the other hand, they in this are inferior to cura's, that we can rarely allow them credit for the will to elect him whom ey are themselves conscious is best entitled to the place. The wort?st are either opponents or rivals of the electors themselves, or of ?^ friends. The electors, or their friends, have relations or favourite for whom they are desirous to provide. In most cases, likewise, the very tfi- rest of the electors excludes the most deserving, and prescribes the cice of an inferior candidate. Impartial elections can only take place in;a- demical senates and faculties, when a chair is to be filled for which ere is no competition, and the prosperity of which is for the direct and i^i^' i I TESTIMONIES OF MEINERS AND OF SCIILEIERMACFIK R. :{71 iiite advautage of the electors at large. It will be granti-d that tlie case icnrs but seldom. As long, therefore, as we must admit that academical iiates and fticulties are more frequentl)' partial than curators of Universi- rs are ill-informed, so long must we maintain, that professors should bo ected by a superior authority, and not by the University itself. This, story and experience have already for centuries determined. " Proposals and recommendations of candidates by senates and faculties, ^ a minor evil to actual election ; but still an evil which should be lolished or avoided. The same causes which determine the election of infe- *r merit, must ojierate against the proposal and recommendation of supe- ifr. "Where it is the custom that the senate or faculty proptjses a certain ijmber of candidates, out of which the higher authorities make choice, there ^ses, if not an open nepotism, at least a provincial spirit of preference, and ^.ecrct conspiracy against foreigners, pernicious to a University. If the ijjher authorities, therefore, confine their choice to those thus recommended, tty will always find that the vacant chairs are not provided with the most tiinent professors. On the other hand, if they disregard their recommenda- tln, they atford the academical bodies cause of umbrage, and render them tj! sworn enemies of the professor actually appointed ; comi)laints are raised broken privileges ; and he Avho is forced on them through such a breach, :omes the object of odium or persecution. It is, therefore, highly advis- e, that the founder, and those in authority over Universities, should ain unfettered in the choice of professoi-s ; and that in the exercise of t^ function, they should obtain the advice of those, within and without tiir Universities, who will afford them the most impartial and enlightened - cinsel." {VenvaUung deutscher Universitoeten, (1801), i. p. 124, ii. p. 35.) - ^CHLEiERMACHER. — " The University itself must certainly best know its I vbt, when a vacancy occurs, or the opportunity oft'ers of extending the ■t 8 lere of its instruction ; and as we are bound to presume in its members a 1 kjjwledge of all that appears of any scientific importance in the country, t y must likewise know from whence to obtain wherewithal to supply this vnt. But, alas ! no one w^ould on that account be inclined to accord to a Ijiversity the choice of its teachers. Universities are, one and all, so infa- ^; njus for a spirit of petty intrigue, that were this privilege once conceded, vtat rational being is there who, from their devotion to party, from the pas- - 1- excited in their literary feuds, and from their personal connexions, ' 111 not anticipate the pernicious consequences? " {Gedanhen tieher Uni- ' ^itneten in deutschem Sitm, flSOS), p. 97.) Having thus generalized the principles which govern a well- !' otanized system of academic patronage, and historically shown '• tilt these principles have been actually applied in all the most " djtinguished Univei'sities, we shall now conclude our discussion |, U considering the modes of appointing professors in use in Scot- To say nothing of the special patronage of a few individual iirs, the merits of which we cannot at present pause to con- •r, the general systems of academical pati'onage here preva- 372 ACADEMICAL PATRONAGE AND SUPERINTENDENCE. lent, are three ; the trust being deposited in the hands either a Municipal Magistracy, — of the Professorial body itself, — or ' the Crown. The first of these systems, though not unknown in one of t other Universities, is preponderant only in that of Edinbur^i where the far greater number of professors are elected imn- diately by the suffrages of the thirty -three members of the To i Council. This system is generally and justly admitted to be grea^ preferable to the other two. An admission, however, of the ki:., proves aught rather than the absolute excellence of the meth'. It is melancholy indeed that such a system should be toleratedii our country ; still more melancholy that it must be lauded as ie best we have. The utmost that can be said in its favour is, t',t compared with the other tAvo, it is of itself less disposed to el, and more capable of being inclined to good. ; A body like the Edinburgh Town Council, as it ivas, fu|s none of the conditions of a well-organized board of academJ patrons. From their education and rank in society, they we, on the average, wholly destitute of that information and int'i- gence which such patrons ought to possess ; they were a co Jc- tion of individuals, — numerous, — transitory, — obscure ; and (le function itself was an appendage wholly accidental to their off!!. Such a body of* patrons was wholly incapable of an acjye exercise of their trust. Their unintelhgence, numbers, and ic- tuating association, prevented them from anticipating and folloog out any uniform and systematic measures. No general prin )le determined among them a unity of will. They could not att( pt an extensive survey for a discovery of the highest quahficatiis; nor make a tender of the appointment to those who might a(!pt what they would not solicit. Their sphere of choice was ;ius limited to actual candidates ; and the probabilities of success fiiin always limited candidates to those Avhose merits were suppi;ed or supphed by local and adventitious circumstances. Even r;he narrow circle of candidates, the choice of the civic patrons ras always passive; and its character for good or ill, wholly d< en- dent on the nature of some external determination. The judgent of a proper body of patrons should be higher than that oth^ community at large ; it should guide, not merely follow, \?"^ opinion. This, however, was not to be expected from a bo' of burgesses ; in fact, it has been the only merit of the Town intelligent and patriotic to attempt the exercise of such a 1 lotion. The nomination of professors, though formally ratified 1 the senate, was virtually made by a board of four curators; ; il what is worthy of remark, so long as curatorial patronage I Hs a singularity in Germany, Altdorf maintained its relative pre- iii; tiinence, — losing it only when a similar mean was adopted in the ti; i)re favoured Universities of the Empire. i: These observations arc, in their whole extent, applicable only |5, tthe old Town Council; but it is manifest that all the principal t; (cumstances which incapacitated that body, under its former i: (flstitution, for a competent exercise of academic patronage, con- *: t ue still to operate under its present ; and if some minor objec- il tns are removed, others, perhaps of even greater moment, have [!, « sen. On these, however, we cannot at present touch. Indeed, in iis only in a country far behind in all that regards the theory k: ad practice of education, that the notion of intrusting a body like anunicipal magistracy with such a trust, would not be treated )|, vth derision ; and we have so high an opinion of the intelligence 1(1 ad good intentions of the present Town Council, that we even r cifidently expect them to take the lead in depositing in proper ,j lads that important part of their public trust, which they are y iJ able adequately to discharge themselves. [But alas !] jr Their continuance as patrons would, in fact, seal the downfall ,j, the University of Edinburgh; unless, what is now impossible, I,; 8 stems of patronage still more vicious should continue to keep J,- d«rn the other Universities of Scotland to tlieir former level. ^ 1\ of these are superior to Edinburgh in endowments; and if the ll,j 03 decisive superiority which Pklinburgh has hitherto enjoyed , o|3r them, in the comparative excellence of her patronage, be !■ orsed in their favour, the i-esult is manifest. 1 rom the best of our Scottish systems of academical patronage, ^' now pass to the worst ; and public opinion is, even in this ' lutry, too unanimous in condemnation, to make it necessary to I . djell upon its vices. AVe mean that of self-patronage. *In the unqualiiied form in which it has so long prevailed in • !and, it was tried, in the darkness of the middle ages, in a very ' >f the continental Universities ; and in these the experiment , v|s brief. In an extremely modified shape, and under circum- ■ sinces which greatly counteracted its evils, it was tolerated for 376 ACADEMICAL PATRONAGE AND SUPERINTENDENCE. a considerable period in the German Universities ; experience however, proved its inexpediency under every mitigation, and i' has been long in tliat country, as we have shown, absolutely ant universally condemned. [See the authorities above, p. 368 — 371. . As established in Scotland, this system violates, or rathe reverses, almost every condition by which the constitution of board of patrons ought to be regulated. — In the first place, b conjoining in the same persons the right of appointment and th right of possession, it tends to confound patronage with propert} and thus to deaden in the trustee the consciousness of his chara( ter ; in fact, to foster in him the feeling, that, in the exercise ( his function, he is not discharging an imperative duty, but doin arbitrarily what he chooses " with his own." — In the seco?id plac! as it disposes the patron to forget that he is a trustee, so it aL primes liim with every incentive to act as a propinetor. Natur affection to children and kindred; * personal friendship and enmit; party, (and was there ever a University without this curse ?) ; je lousy of superior intelligence and learning, operating the strong ■. the lower the University is degraded ; the fear of an unaccomni' dating integrity ; and finally, the acquiescence even of opposi parties in a job, with the view of a reciprocity ; — these and otb: motives effectually co-operate to make the professorial patrl abuse his public duty to the furtherance of his private ends. Ti single motive for bestowing on professors the power of nominati^ their colleagues, was the silly persuasion that they were the pt; sons at once best able to appreciate ability, and the most interest in obtaining it. If this were true, — if it were not the reverse ' truth, we should surely find our professorial patrons in Scotlai, like the curators of foreign universities, looking anxiously arouj;, on every vacancy, for the individual of highest eminence, a I making every exertion to induce his acceptance of the chair. li has it been heard that this primary act of a patron's duty ^,i ever yet performed by a college of professorial patrons ? In J nature of things it could hardly be. For why ? This would be i * " Hence the hereditary successions in colleges which are thus patronL , — the firm and iufi-angible compacts, which sometimes last for generatiH) cemented as they are by the affinities of blood and relationship, — the dcc- ing lustre of chairs once occupied by men of highest celebrity and talent, ;t the very ascendancy of whose influence when living, or of whose names s J they were dead, effected the transmission of their offices to a list of des( ■ dants." — Dr Chalmers. ACADEMICAL SELF-PATRONAGE. 377 . ert admission, that they were mere trustees performing a duty, ;)t proprietors conferring a favour. Were the highest quahlieu- nns once recognised as the sole rule ; why not make its apphca- im universal ? But then, the standard of professorial competent'e ■buld be inconveniently raised ; the public would expect that the jputation of the University should not be allowed to fall ; and the (jairs could therefore no longer be dealt about as suited the pri- ite interest of the patrons. The private interest of the patrons, ^erefore, determined an opposite policy. The standard of pro- ijsSGrial competence must be kept down — it seldom needed to be kvered — to the average level of their relatives and partisans. K^ot (fly must no invitation be given to men of reputation, they must \ disgusted from appearing as candidates. The value of the chairs, i| places of honour, must be reduced ; that, as places of emolu- ijint, they might not, and that in an unlearned country, be beyond tie reach of ordinary men. Instead of receiving an unsolicited ell to take his seat among the members of an illustrious body, the mn of highest reputation, to obtain the chance even of a cliair, ijjst condescend to beg the lowered office as a favour, from a ibwd of undistinguished individuals, to obtain whose voices was i| credit, and not to obtain them would still be felt as a disgrace ; fjd submit to the humiliation of being fellow-candidate of all and sndry, whom the humble vanity of standing for a chair, or per- fjnal and party interest with the electors, called — and with pro- I:ble success — into the field. To be left to divide the cake in the fciade, has been the aim of all professorial patronage. We do not fjsert, that under this system no men of distinguished merit have iistrated our Universities; — far from it; but we assert that of i others it tends to make celebrity the exception, obscurity the ^le. And of the small number of great names to which the ijofessorial patronage can lay claim, some conquered their aj)- pintments by other reasons than their merits, and more took tieir patrons and the world by surprise in their subsequent repu- tLion. We know something of the history of foreign Universities, id something, at least by negation, of the history of our own. J id this we affirm, that if a premium were given to the Univcr- |y which could exhibit among its professors the largest propor- n of least distinguished names, the Scottish Universities, where f-election is prevalent, would have it only to contend for among mselves. We may here anticipate an objection wo have often hoard, that. 378 ACADEMICAL PATRONAGE AND SUPERINTENDENCE. however bad in theory, the patronage of the Scottish Universitiei is found, in practice, to work well ; these seminaries fully accoir plishing their end, as shown by the flourishing state of learnin in the country. ; Assuming, with the objector, the effect produced, as a test v. the instrument producing,* this patronage must on the contrari be granted to have wrought almost worse in practice, than reij soning could have led us to anticipate ; erudition, in every higJu\ acceptation, being in Scotland at a lower pass than in any oih<, country almost of Europe. — Without, we think, any overweenir, patriotism, we may assert, that no people in modern times li. evinced more natural ability than our own ; and in all the depai, ments of knowledge where intellectual vigour, rather than extej sive erudition, may command success, the Scotch are at least nj inferior to any other nation in the world. " Animi illis," sa' Barclay, " in qusecunque studia inclinant, mirifico successu inclyl: ut nullis major patientia castrorum, vel audacia pugnsB, et Mu;i nunquam delicatius habeant, quam cum inciderunt in Scotoi; Nor, assuredly, have they shown an incapacity for the highc scholarship, when placed in circumstances disposing them to cultivation. On the contrary, no other people have achieved i much in this department in proportion to their means. From t; petty portion of her scanty population, whose education was i^ stunted in her native seminaries, Scotland can show at least so]j! three or four more consummate masters of a J^atin style, andtli both in prose and verse, than all the other nations of the Brit i Empire can exhibit, with ten times her population, and so ma; boasted schools. Nature gives ability, education gives learniri; and that a people of such peculiar aptitude for every study, shoijl remain behind all others in those departments and degrees if erudition, for the special cultivation of which Universities w? : estabhshed, proves, by the most appropriate of evidence, tjt those of Scotland are, in their present state, utterly unqualilji for the higher purposes of their existence. Of these correlatjs facts, we shall supply tivo only, but these, significant illustratiC|i. [On these compare also Ed. No. ii.] ' The first. It will be admitted, that a very trifling fraction ff * Though the principal, we do not, of course, hold that a good acadeiBjJ patronage is the oiili/ condition of high learning in a country. An exposi :» of all the concurrent causes of this result would form the subject ol'n important discussion. SCOTLAND LOW IN LEARNINtJ. 37.) t ) cultivated population of any country can receive its education al literary impulsion in foreign lands ; consc(|uently, if the semi- nt'ies of Scotland were not incomparably inferior, as instruments oeruditiou, that the innnense majority of Scottish scholars must hve owed their education exclusively to Scottish schools. Now, on this standard, what is the case ? Of Scottish scholars, ai of the highest eminence, and far more than nine-tenths of those ^vTthy of the name of scholar at all, have been either educated iitforeign seminaries, or their tastes, and the direction of their sKlies, determined in the society of foreign learned men. Nor is the second illustration less remarkable. It will be admit- ■ t4, that the erudition of a national (we do not mean merely esta- Vshed) church, affords not only a fair, but the most favourable • c|terion of the erudition of a nation. For, in the first place ; Tleology, comprehending (or rather being itself contained in) a - v^er sphere of scholarship than any other learned profession, ; al its successful cultivation necessarily proportioned to the ' d;ree in which that scholarship is applied ; it follows, that the . leology of a country can never transcend, and will rarely fall IS bieath, the level of its erudition. In the second; the clergy * f(|m every where the most numerous body of literary men ; con- ;: s^uently, more than any other, express the general diffusion of ' lij^rary accomplishment throughout a people. In the third; the 1 cjrgy or those educated for the church, constitute the class from t wjich tutors, schoolmasters, and professors, are principally taken. ii j[|eir proficiency and example thus react most powerfully and s elensively, either to raise and keep up learning, or to prevent its 1« ring among all orders and professions. In \\\c fourth ; as almost It,; efclusively bred in the schools and Universities of their country, (ifl tiy reflect more fairly than the rest of the educated ranks, the B e lellences and defects of the native seminaries. And in the fifth ; B a their course of academical study is considerably longer than If. tl .t of the other learned professions, they must be viewed as even trr aiighly favourable specimen of what their native seminaries can p aomplish. Now, in Scotland, on this criterion, what is the result 'i Simply rji is: Though perhaps the country in Europe where religious ^ iierests have always maintained the strongest hold, Scotland, in '* t history of European Theolofjy, has, for nearly two centuries, '^ r\ name, no place. For nearly two centuries, the home-bred ; crgy of Scotland, established and dissenting, among their count- 380 ACADEMICAL PATRONAGE AND SUPERINTENDENCE. less publications of a religious character, some displaying great and various talent, have, with two [one], not illustrious exceptions, contributed not a single work to the European stock of theologica] erudition ; and for an equal period, they have not produced a single scholar on a level with a fifth-rate philologer of most othei countries. In these respects, many a dorf in Germany or Hollanc has achieved far more than the broad realm of Scotland. A com parison of the Scotch and Enghsh Churches affords a curiou illustration in point. In the latter, the clergy have a tolerabL classical training, but for ages have enjoyed, we may say, n( theological education at all. In the former, the clergy mus accomplish the longest course of theological study prescribed i any country, but with the worst and shortest classical preparatioi Yet in theological erudition, what a contrast do the two Churche, exhibit ! And this, simply because a learned scholar can easil , slide into a learned divine, without a special theological educf; tion ; whereas no theological education can make a man a competerj divine, who is not a learned scholar ; — theology being, in a huma sense, only a philology and history, applied by philosophy. — Bi again. In other countries, the clergy, or those educated for tl church, as a class, take the highest place in the higher depar ments of learning. Scotland, on the contrary, is singular in thi that all her scholars of any eminence, have, for almost two ce turies, been found exclusively among the laity, and these, as t have noticed, rarely educated in her native institutions. The third and last mode of appointing to academical offices Scotland, is nomination by the Crown. — There being no spec: department, in our Government, for public instruction, this patro age has fallen to the Secretary of State for the Home Departmei' The defects of this mode of appointment are sufficiently obvioi Here a great deal certainly depends on the intelUgence and lil rahty of the individual Minister, to counteract the natural defe^ of the system. But, even under the best and most impart Minister, it can accomplish its end only in a very precarious a unsatisfactory manner. The Minister is transitory ; the choice" professors is a function wholly different in kind from the ordin? duties of his department ; is not of very frequent recurrence; e- concerns a distant quarter of the empire, where the Universil' are situated, and the candidates generally found. The Minis ' cannot, therefore, be presumed to think of specially qualify ,' himself for this contingent fraction of his duty. He must relyi ACADEMICAL PATRONAGE BY THE CROWN. -m te information of others. But can lie obtain impartial infornia- 111. or be expected to take the trouble necessary in seeking it'.'' (1 the other hand, he will be besieged by the solicitations of (.iididates and their supporters. Testimonials, collected by the ; plicant himself among his friends, and strong in proportion to I ' partialities of the testifier, and the lowncss of the criterion by \iich he judges, will be showered in, and backed by political and I rsonal recommendations. If he trust to such information, he 1 lits his patronage to those who apply for the appointment ; and ; all certificates of competence are in general equally transcendent, 1 will naturally allow inferior considerations to incline his pre- f'cnce among candidates all ostensibly the very best. To lift this patronage out of the sphere of political partiality, ; d to secure precise and accurate information from an unbiassed, i clligent, and responsible authority, is what every patriotic ' iiistcr of the Crown would be desirous to effect. But this can 1 best accomplished by organizing a board of Curators (the name ! nothing) for each University, on the principles of patronage we 1 \ e explained ; whose province would be to discover, to compare, t choose, to recommend, and to specify the grounds of their pre- tence, to the Minister, with whom the definitive nomination "' Viuld remain, — a nomination, however, which could be only formal, '*"' i the curators conscientiously fulfilled the duties of their trust. te ])w beneficially these authorities would reciprocally act as checks s. ad counter checks, stimuli and counter-stimuli, is apparent. By t ■< arrangement, the Crown would exchange an absolute for a 1 idified patronage in those chairs now in its presentation ; but liusi tjs modified patronage would be extended over all others. The )f cfinitive nomination would certainly be no longer of value as a tljf Jtty mean of ministerial influence ; but the dignity of the Crown icest "viuld thus be far better consulted in making it the supreme and fii ^neral guardian of the good of all the Universities. Nor would it it tj system of curatorial boards be superseded, were a separate 0i cpartment of public instruction to be established in the admini- hft 8'ation of the State. On the contrary, in most countries where ilies ts organization of government prevails, the University curators riei« f 'm one of the most useful parts of its machinery ; and nothing [0. citributes more to perfect the curatorial system itself, than the [le! cisciousness of the curator that his recommendation is always v(ji» sictly scrutinized by an intelligent and well-informed Ministry, Ifore beintr carried into effect. 382 ACADEMICAL PATRONAGE AND SUPERINTENDENCE. In the present article, we have limited our discussion to th general conditions of a good system of academic patronage. W do not, therefore, now touch on the difficult and important que? tion — How is a board of academic patrons and governors to he be^ constituted nnder the particular circumstances of this country? * * [As in part supplying an aus\\'er to this important question, it ma not be improper here to extract that portion of the Evidence given by me i the course of the same year, when examined by " The Commissioners aj pointed to inquire into the state of Municipal Corporations in Scotland." ] Appendix III. will be found likewise a relative extract from the Gener Report of these Commissioners, presented to both Houses of Parliament. " The best mode of organizing a board of Curatorial Patrons for the Ud versify of Edinburgh, appears to me the only point of any considerable difl^ culty ; and this because we have here not to deal merely Avith principles the abstract, but to determine what, under the special circumstances of t! case, is the highest point of perfection which we can practically realize. " But before stating what appears to me the most expedient plan of const, tuting such a board, I would premise that a board of curators, almost aij how elected, and of only ordinary intelligence and probity, would, if sma, and not of a transitory continuance in office, be always greatly preferable : academical governors and patrons to the passing mob of civic councilloi either under the past or present constitution of the city ; because such a bO'' could hardly fail of being more competent to their office, from great; average understanding, from their not being disabled for active and harm! nious measures towards obtaining University teachers of the very highii qualifications, and from their standing prominently forward to public vie and consequently acting 'under a powerful feeling of responsibility in (> exercise of their trust. But merely to improve on so vicious a system patronage as the present would be doing very little ; and, though a sm board of curators could not but be preferable to the town-council, still l aU-important qixestion remains, — Hoiv is such a board, of the highest possi. excellence, to be most securely obtained ? > " In attempting a feasible solution of this problem, we must accommod ' our plan to existing circumstances, and construct our buUdiug with materials that lie around us. These are certainly not the best possible; ':■ they seem to me not inadequate to the end in view; and the difficulty,; obtaining better, if such could actually be obtained, would probably far m .! than overbalance the superior advantages they might otherwise prom . Taking, therefore, the public bodies, such as we tind them in this city, ; I employing the principal of these as the means of organizing a boai'd of aca - mical Curators, the following appears to me the plan which would proba-' accomplish, to the highest practical perfection, the end in vieAv, i.e. the e - tion of Curators competent to their duty, and actuated by the strongest ) • tives to its fulfilment. " Let the Curators be elected for a fixed term of years, say seven ; and tl je may either be a general septennial election, or each Curator may continiin now ACADEMICAL CURATORS TO BE HERE APPOINTED? :m Vo the full torin, from the actual date of his appointment. Curators to bo li;iible; it being also understood that they oinj/it to be re-elected, if their hict merit approbation. ^\'llen a vacancy occurs, a writ to be issued from , requiring each of tin- \ following bodies to elect, and their president to return to , as elected by majority of at least tAvo-thirds, a De/eec/f/^ purposes, but even to the personal advantage of aomplement of the trustees : — the small majority refusing a preliminary iiniry, and not listening to the information oflfered, in regard to the general •Wats of the University ; overlooking all disapproval by the highest authori- t: 1 of the moral character of the proceedings ; nay, resiling from then- own pviously professed intention of interrogating a Court of Law in regard to tl bare legality of any contested measures. In fact, they are now content to sijif so allowed, even under the judicial stigma incidentally called forth on tl way in which the trust has been administered. (Compromise, conces- — any thing for non-discussion may be expected forthwith.) Now, had been a respected board of Curators over the University, these proceed- I - would never even have been attempted ; nor would a protesting minority II '^ be compelled to share in the opprobrium of the very acts which they so '^.illy reprobated and so openly disavowed.] IV.-ON THE STATE OF THE ENGLISH UNIVERSITIES, WITH MORE ESPECIAL REFERENCE TO OXFORD.* (June, 1831.) f I I I 1, — Addenda ad Corpus Statutorum Universitatis Oxoniensi] 9 4to. Oxonii: 1825. 2. — The Oxford University Calendar, for 1829. 8vo. Oxford 1 1829. This is the age of reform. — Next in importance to our religio and political establishments, are the foundations for public educ tion; and having noW seriously engaged in a reform of " t constitution, the envy of surrounding nations," the time cane * [In Cross's Selections ; translated into German ; and abridged by Peisse, &c. Wlien this article was written, the history of our oldest universit' (Oxford and Cambridge) had fallen into obli\T[on ; their parts and princip were not understood, even by themselves ; nay, opinions asserted and u versally accepted touching the most essential points of their constituti; not only en-oueous, but precisely the converse of truth. The more obvi;' sources of information did not remedy, when they did not countenance, the n j- . apprehensions. Criticism, not compilation, was therefore requisite ; andacpi rectiou of the more important errors, avoiding as much as possible all secor-- hand authorities, — this a collection of original documents, to say notb',' of the more authentic histories of universities and academical antiquit., which I had succeeded in forming, has enabled me (I hope unostentatious ) to accomplish. The views in this and the subsequent articles, have b 1 followed, (often silently,) without controversy, and almost without has - tion, both in this country and abroad; while even the trifling inaccm^ac), into which I had inadvertently fallen, ai-e faithfully copied by those 10 would be supposed to look and speak for themselves.] PLAN OF DISCUSSION. 387 > distant for a reform in the schools and universities whicli ive hardly avoided their contempt. Pubhc intelligence is not, . hitherto, tolerant of prescriptive abuses, and the country now mands — that endowments for the common weal should no longer ' administered for private advantage. At this auspicious crisis, id under a ministry, no longer warring against general opinion, .^ should be sorry not to contribute our endeavour to attract tention to the defects which more or less pervade all our itional seminaries of education, and to the means best calculated r their removal. We propose, therefore, from time to time, to iitinuo to review the state of these establishments, considered ith absolutely in themselves, and in relation to the other cir- mstances which have contributed to modify the intellectual I ndition of the different divisions of the empire. In proceeding to the Universities, we commence with Oxford. lis University is entitled to precedence, from its venerable anti- ity, its ancient fame, the Avealth of its endowments, and the ; 'ortance of its privileges : but there is another reason for our ■fcrence. Without attempting any idle and invidious comparison, — with- < t asserting the superior or inferior excellence of Oxford in con- 1 ist with any other British University, we have no hesitation I affirming, that comparing what it actually is with what it pos- i]y could be, Oxford is, of all academical institutions, at once ' ■ most imperfect and the most perfectible. Properly directed, they might be, the means which it possesses would render ihe most efficient University in existence ; improperly directed, ; they are, each part of the apparatus only counteracts another ; ; il there is not a similar institution which, in proportion to what i ought to accomplish, accomphshes so little. But it is not in < inonstrating the imperfection of the present system, that we lincipally ground a hope of its improvement; it is in demon- ting its illegality. In the reform of an ancient establishment :e Oxford, the great difficulty is to initiate a movement. In paring Oxford as it is, with an ideal standard, there may be ferences of opinion in regard to the kind of change expedient, not in regard to the expediency of a change at all ; but, in paring it with the standard of its own code of statutes, there be none. It will not surely be contended that matters should tinue as they are, if it can be shown that, as now administered. I University pretends only to accomplish a potty fraction of 388 ENGLISH UxMVERSITIES— OXFORD. the ends proposed to it by law, and attempts even this only byl illegal means. But a progress being determined towards a state of right, it is easy to accelerate the momentum towards a state ot excellence : — «?;«»? '/j/nKrv -TrauTog. Did the limits of a single paper allow us to exhaust the sub- ject, we should, in the first place, consider the state of the Um-g versity, both as established in law, but non-existent in fact, audi as established in fact, but non-existent in law ; in the second, thf causes which determined the transition from the statutory to th( illegal constitution; in the third, the advantages and disadvan; tages of the tvro systems ; and, in the fourth, the means by whicl the University may be best restored to its efficiency. In the pre. sent article, we can, however, only compass, — and that inade. quately, — the first and second heads. The third and fourth Wt must reserve for a separate discussion, in which we shall endea vour to demonstrate, that the intrusive system, compared wit. the legitimate, is as absurd as it is unauthorized, — that the prel, minary step in a reform must be a return to the Statutory Cor stitution, — and that this constitution, though far from faultles; may, by a few natural and easy changes, be improved into a. instrument of academical education, the most perfect perhaps i the world. The subject of our consideration at present requin a fuller exposition, not only from its intrinsic importance, bi because, strange as it may appear, the origin, and consequent! the cure, of the corruption of the English Universities, is total misunderstood. The vices of the present system have observed, and frequently discussed ; but as it has never shown in what manner these vices were generated, so it has been perceived how easily their removal might be enforced, generally believed that, however imperfect in itself, the mechanism of education organized in these seminaries, is a tini) honoured and essential part of their being, established upon slj tute, endowed by the national legislature with exclusive prij leges, and inviolable as a vested right. We shall prove, on ti contrary, that it is new as it is inexpedient, — not only acciden to the University, but radically subversive of its constitution,, witliout legal sanction, nay, in violation of positive law, — an^-Jf^ gating the privileges exclusively conceded to another systej which it has superseded, — and so far from being defensible those it profits, as a right, that it is a flagrant usurpation, obtairi through perjury, and only tolerated from neglect. UNIVERSITY AND COLLEGES— PRESENT ILLE(;aLITV. .SSil I. Oxford and Cambridge, as establishments for education, . iisist of two parts, — of the University jyroper, and of the Coi- ns. The former, original and essential, is founded, controlled, .1 privileged by public authority, for the advantage of the I tion. The latter, accessory and contingent, are created, regu- 1 od, and endowed by private munificence, for the interest of cer- im favoured individuals. Time was, when the Colleges did not » ist, and the University was there ; and were the Colleges again ; olished, the University would remain entire. The former, t-mded solely for education, exists only as it accomplishes the ! ^ of its institution ; the latter, founded principally for aliment '• sjd habitation, w^ould still exist, were all education abandoned ■ uhin their walls. The University, as a national establishment, '^ ilnecessarily open to the lieges in general ; the Colleges, as pri- ' vte institutions, might universally do, as some have actually " cne, — close their gates upon all, except their foundation mem- *' I PS. "I The University and Colleges are thus neither identical, nor ''- various of each other. If the University ceases to perform its '^ fuctions, it ceases to exist ; and the privileges accorded by the •' liion to the system of public education legally organized in the ^ diversity, cannot, without the consent of the nation, — far less 11 ^.hout the consent of the academical legislature, — be lawfully *• tmsferred to the system of private education precariously organ- ic iidin the Colleges, and over which neither the State nor the w I iversity have any control. They have, however, been unlaw- ^! f\ly usurped. Chrough the suspension of the University, and the usurpation ts functions and privileges by the Collegial bodies, there has a sen the second of two systems, diametrically opposite to each er. — The one, in which the University w^as paramount, is aiient and statutory ; the other, in which the Colleges have the iidant, is recent and illegal. — In the former, all was subser- • to public utility, and the interests of science ; in the latter, IS sacrificed to private monopoly, and to the convenience of '1 teacher. — The former amplified the means of education in aijommodation to the mighty end which a University proposes; til latter limits the end which the University attempts to the "ity of the petty instruments which the intrusive system '"VS. — The one afforded education in all the Faculties: the i 3U0 ENGLISH UNIVERSITIES— OXFORD. other professes to furnish only elementary tuition in the lowes — In the authorized system, the cycle of instruction was distr buted among a body of teachers, all professedly chosen from meri ; and each concentrating his ability on a single object ; in th unauthorised, every branch, necessary to be learned, is monopti lized by an individual, privileged to teach all, though probably i qualified to teach any. — The old system daily collected into lar^ classes, under the same professor, the whole youth of the Unive sity of equal standing, and thus rendered possible a keen and co stant and unremitted competition ; the new, which elevates tl colleges and halls into so many little universities, and in the houses distributes the students, without regard to ability or stani ing, among some fifty tutors, frustrates all emulation among t ; members of its small and ill-assorted classes. — In the supersedl system, the Degrees in all the Faculties were solemn testimonii' that the graduate had accomphshed a regular course of study • the public schools of the University, and approved his competer; by exercise and examination ; and on these degrees, only as sii testimonials, and solely for the public good, were there besto^r . by the civil legislature, great and exclusive privileges in 1; church, in the courts of law, and in the practice of medicine, i the superseding system. Degrees in all the Faculties, except 4 lowest department of the lowest, certify neither a course f academical study, nor any ascertained proficiency in the gradua.; and these now nominal distinctions retain their privileges to ? public detriment, and for the benefit only of those by whom tl . have been deprived of their significance. — Such is the gem 1 contrast of the two systems, which we must now exhibits detail. ; System de jure. — The Corjms Statutorum by wliich the li- versity of Oxford is — we should say, ought to be — governed, is digested by a committee appointed for that purpose, through le influence of Laud, and solemnly ratified by King, Chancellor, d Convocation, in the year 1636. The far greater number of tl 5e statutes had been previously in force ; and, except in cerin articles subsequently added, modified, or restricted, (containe|m the Appendix and Addenda,) they exclusively determine the >w and constitution of the University to the present hour. E"y member is bound by oath and subscription to their faithful 01'^' vance. — In explanation of the statutory system of instructic » LEGAL SYSTEM— HISTORY OF. 8)H lay be proper to say a few words in regard to the history <>l" ademical teaching, previous to the ]>ubHcation of the Laudian ndc. [u the original constitution of Oxford, as in that of all the older iiiversities of the Parisian model, the business of instruction was ot confided to a special body of privileged professors. The Uni- [ersity was governed, the University was taught, by the graduates t large. Professor, Master, Doctor, were originally synonymous. very graduate had an equal right of teaching publicly in the iiiversity the subjects competent to his faculty, and to the rank f his degree ; nay, every graduate incurred the obhgation of ^aching publicly, for a certain period, the subjects of his faculty, >r such was the condition involved in the grant of the degree self. The Bachelor, or imperfect graduate, partly as an exercise )wards the higher honour, and useful to himself, partly as a pcr- rmance due for the degree obtained, and of advantage to others, as bound to read under a master or doctor in his faculty, a course i" lectures ; and the Master, Doctor, or perfect graduate, was, in ke manner, after his promotion, obliged immediately to com- lence, {incipere,) and to continue for a certain period publicly to 'ach, (regere,) some at least of the subjects appertaining to his I ulty. As, however, it was only necessary for the University ' enforce this obligation of pubhc teaching, compulsory on all jraduates during the term of their necessary regency, if there did ot come forward a competent number of voluntary regents to L'utc this function ; and as the schools belonging to the several iculties, and in which alone all public or ordinary instruction |)uld be delivered, were frequently inadequate to accommodate "^ multitude of the inccptors ; it came to pass, that in these Uni- -ities the original period of necessary regency was once and ^^ain abbreviated, and even a dispensation from actual teaching luring its continuance, commonly allowed.* At the same time, as In Oxford, where the public schools of the Faculty of Arts, in School it(U, were proportionally more numerous (there are kno-wn by name above l»rty sets of schools anciently open in that street, i. e. lniil(lin;,'s, finitaiiiiii^j om four to sixteen class-rooms) than those in i'aris belon{,Mn;,' to tiie dif- iviit nations of that faculty, in the Rue dc la Fouarre ( Vicus Stramineus), ill Oxford this dispensation was more tardily allowed. In Paris, the Mas- 1 who was desirous of exercising this privilege of his dcgi-ee, petitioned hi.** ulty pro regentia et scholis ; and schools, as they fell vacant, were gi-antod ■ him by his nation, according to his seniority. 392 ENGLISH UNIVERSITIES— OXFORD. tlie University only accomplished the end of its existence through its regents, they alone were allowed to enjoy full privileges in itt legislation and government ; they alone partook of its beneficij and sportulse. In Paris, the non-regent graduates were onlj; assembled on rare and extraordinary occasions ; in Oxford, th(i regents constituted the House of Congregation, Avhich, amon[; other exclusive prerogatives, was anciently the initiatory assembly! through which it behoved that every measure should pass, befori it could be submitted to the House of Convocation, compose( indifferently of all regents and non-regents resident in the Uni: versity.* This distinction of regent and non-regent continued most rigidl;' marked in the Faculty of Arts, — the faculty on which the olde universities were originally founded, and which Avas always greatl;i the most numerous. In the other faculties, both in Paris an^ Oxford, all doctors succeeded in usurping the style and privilege; of 7'egent, though not actually engaged in teaching ; and in Oi. ford, the same was allowed to masters of the Faculty of Art' during the statutory period of their necessary regency, eve; when availing themselves of a dispensation from the performancj of its duties ; and extended to the Heads of Houses, (who wei; also in Paris Regens d'honneur,) and to College Deans. Th; explains the constitution of the Oxford House of Congregation n the present day. ' i The ancient system of academical instruction by the gradjiatt; at large, was, however, still more essentially modified by anothr innovation. The regents were entitled to exact from their aud tors a certain regulated fee {pastus, collecta.) To relieve tl; scholars of this burden, and to secure the services of able teacher: salaries were sometimes given to certain graduates, on consider! tion of their delivery of ordinary lectures without collect. ]' many universities, attendance on these courses was specially reqij red of those proceeding to a degree; and it was to the salari* graduates that the title of Professors, in academical languag was at last peculiar 1}^ attributed. By this institution of salaric; lecturers, dispensation could be universally accorded to the othj graduates. The unsalaried regents found, in general, their schoci . . — . — — i * It was only by an abusive fiction that those Avei*e subsequently held 1 be Convictores, or actual residents in the University, who retained thj names on the books of a Hall, or College. See Corpus Statutorum, tit. x. §' LEGAL SYSTEM— HISTORY OF. 39;^ jrted for the gratuitous instruction of the privileged lecturers ; though the right of public teaching competent to every gra- still remained entire, its exercise was, in a great measure, jldoned to the body of professors organized more or less com- ly in the several faculties throughout the universities of To speak only of Oxford, and in Oxford only of the Ity of Arts : ten salaried Readers or Professors of the seven and the three philosophies* had been nominated by the of Congregation, and attendance on their lectures enforced itute, long prior to the epoch of the Laudian digest. At the ute of that code, the greater number of these chairs had obtain- ! permanent endowments ; and four only depended for a fluctua- ig stipend on certain fines and taxes levied on the graduates ey relieved from teaching, and on the under-graduates they jre appointed to teach. At that period it was, however, still ual for simple graduates to exercise their right of lecturing in r public schools. While this continued, ability possessed an yportunity of honourable manifestation ; a nursery of experienced lichers was afforded ; the salaried readers were not allowed to aiinber in the quiescence of an uninfringible monopoly ; their ^tion could less easily degenerate into a matter of interest and ivour ; while the student, presented with a more extensive sphere absurd. It was standing which .■should have boen shf)rteno(l. 396 ENGLISH UNIVERSITIES-OXFORD. years of his academical life, to the subsidiary and private disc; phne of a Tutor in the Hall or College to which he belongec This regulation was rendered peculiarly expedient by circunr stances which no longer exist. Prior to the period of the Laudia' digest, it was customary to enter the University at a very earl ' age ; and the student of those times, when he obtained the ran of Master, was frequently not older than the student of the pn sent when he matriculates. It was of course found useful to plac these academical boys under the special guardianship of a tutc during the earlier years of their residence in the University; ; it was also expedient to counteract the influence of Popish tutor With this, however, as a merely private concern, the Universit' did not interfere ; and we doubt, whether before the chancello ship of the puritanical Leicester, any attempt was made to reg ! late, by academical authority, the character of those who migl officiate in this capacity, or before the chancellorship of Lau; to render imperative the entering under a tutor at all, and tutor resident in the same house with the pupil. (Compa Wood's Annals, a. 1581, and Corp. Stat. T. iii. § 2.) Be tli however, as it may, the tutorial office was viewed as one of ve: subordinate importance in the statutory system. To commen tutor, it was only necessary for a student to have the low( degree in arts, and that his learning, his moral and religious ch racter, should be approved of by the head of the house in which . resided, or, in the event of controversy on this point, by the vi( chancellor. All that was expected of him was, " to imbue 1 pupils with good principles, and institute them in approv authors; but above all, in the rudiments of religion, and the d<, trine of the Thirty-nine Articles ; and that he should do all tl ■ in him lay to render them conformable to the Church of Englanc " It is also his duty to contain his pupils witliin statutory regU' tions in matters of external appearance, such as their cloth', boots, and hair ; wliich, if the pupils are found to transgress, 1) tutor for the first, second, and third offence, shall forfeit six a t eightpence, and for the fourth, shall be interdicted from his tu • rial function by the vice-chancellor." (T. iii. § 2.) — Who coil have anticipated from this statute what the tutor was ultimat/ to become ? i The preceding outline is sufficient to show that by statute 3 University of Oxford proposes an end not less comprehens? than other universities, and attempts to accomplish that end SYSTEM DE JURE— SYSTEM DE FACTO. 397 ■ same machinery which they employ. It proposes as its ade- , ite end, the education of youth in the four faculties of arts, oology, law, and medicine ; and for accomplishment of this, a •ily of public lecturers constitute the instrument which it prin- [ially, if not exclusively, employs. But as the University of \ford only executes its purpose, and therefore only realises its jstence, through the agency of its professorial system ; consc- lontly, whatever limits, weakens, or destroys the efficiency of at system, limits, weakens, and destroys the university itself. ith the quahties of this system, as organised in Oxford, we have . present no concern. We may, however, observe, that if not rfcct, it was perfectible ; and at the date of its establishment, re were few universities in Europe which could boast of an anization of its public instructors more complete, and none haps in which that organization was so easily susceptible of so Ai an improvement. In the system de facto all is changed. The University is in ■vance; — " Stat magni nominis xnnhra." In none of the facul- - is it supposed that the professors any longer furnish the i-truction necessary for a degree. Some chairs are even nomi- ! Ily extinct where an endowment has not perpetuated the sinc- a-e; and the others betray, in general, their existence only 1 rough the Calendar. If the silence of "the schools" be occasionally I'iken by a formal lecture, or if on some popular subjects (fees ling now permitted) a short course be usually delivered; atten- ' nee on these is not more required or expected, than attendance ' the music-room. For every degree in every faculty above liclor of Arts, standing on the College books, is allowed to nut for residence in the university, and attendance on the iblic courses ; and though, under these circumstances, exami- itions be more imperatively necessary, an examination only ts for the elementary degree, of wliich residence is also a lition. 1 1 is thus not even pretended that Oxford now supplies more Uu the preliminary of an academical education. Even this is lit afforded by the University, but abandoned to the Colleges ad Halls ; and the Academy of Oxford is therefore not one puh- ^ University, but merely a collection of iwivate schools. The ' iivcrsity, in fact, exists only in semblance, for the behoof of the uthorized seminaries by which it has been replaced, and whicli 398 ENGLISH UNIVERSITIES— OXFORD. have contrived, under covert of its name, to slip into possession of its public privileges.* But as academical education was usurped by the Tutors fromj the Professors, — so all tutorial education was usurped by the^e^ lows from the other graduates. The fellows exclusively teach all that Oxford now deems necessary to be taught; and as every tutor is singly vicarious of the whole ancient body of professors — oivTi^ ■TroT.-huu tx,urix,^ioi oiXKuv, — the present capacity of the Univer- sity to effect the purposes of its establishment must, consequentlv be determined by the capacity of each fellow-tutor to compass tht cydopcedia of academical instruction. If Oxford accomphshes th( ends of a University even in its lowest faculty, every fellow-tutoi must be a second " Doctor Universalis," " Qui tria, qui septem, qui totum scibile scivit." But while thus resting her success on the most extraordinary ability of her teachers, we shall see that she makes no provisio; even for their most ordinary competence. * How completely the University is annihilated, — how completely even a memory of its history^ all knoicledge of its constitution, have perished in Oxfon is significantly shown in the following passage, wi'itten not many years agi by a very able defender of things as they now are in that seminary. " Thei are, moreover," says Bishop Copplestone, " some points in the constitutic of this place, which are carefully kept out of sight by our revilers, but whic ought to be known and well considered, before any comparison is mat between what we are, and what we ought to be. The Univeksitt c Oxford is not a Xatioxal ForxDAxiox. It is a congeries of foundation originating some in royal munificence, but more in private piety and bount They are moulded indeed into one corporation ; but each one of our twen Colleges is a coi-poration by itself, and has its ovra. peculiar statutes, n only regulating its internal aifairs, but confining its benefits by a gi'e variety of limitations." {Reply to the Calumnies of the Edinburgh Revie p. 183.) In refutation of this uncontradicted assertion, which is not simp: wrong, but diametrically opposed to the truth, we shall content oiu-selvi with merely quoting a sentence fi-om the " Abstract of divers Privileges a . Rights of the University of Oxford,''' by the celebrated Dr WaUis, the least whose merits was an intimate acquaintance with the history and constituti of the establishment of which he was Registrar. " The rights or privilef (Avhatever they be) [are] not gi-anted or belonging to Scholars as living ■ Colleges, cVc but to Colleges, &c., as houses inhabited by Scholars, the C'^ leges which we now have being accidental to the corporation of the Universi and the confining of Scholars now to a certain number of Colleges and Ha' being extrinsical to the University, and by a law of their oivn making, ea College (but not the Halls) being a distinct corporation from that of the U;' versity." H SYSTEM DE FACTO— FELLOW-TUTORS. .199 M As the fellowships were not tbuiuled tor the purposes of teach- ^r, so the qualitications that constitute a fellow are not those that cistitutc an instructor. The Colleges owe their establishment ttthe capricious bounty of individuals; and the fellow rarely ojcs his eligibility to merit alone, but in the immense majority of C|ies to fortuitous circumstances.* The fellowships in Oxford ■ ajj, with few exceptions, limited to founder's kin, — to founder's : ^^ born in particular counties, or educated at particular schools, tIo the scholars of certain schools, without restriction, or nar- ■ rked by some additional circumstance of age or locality of birth, : Ao the natives of certain dioceses, archdeaconries, islands, coun- :. tB, towns, parishes or manors, under every variety of arbitrary cjidition. In some cases, the candidate must be a graduate of a c^tain standing, in others he must not ; in some he must be in oiers, perhaps priest's, in others he is only bound to enter the cwrch within a definite time. In some cases the fellow may fr3ly choose his profession ; in general he is limited to theology, ail in a few instances must proceed in law or medicine. The n-mnation is sometimes committed to an individual, sometimes to ajody of men, and these either within or without the College ail University ; but in general it belongs to the fellows. The efctive power is rarely, however, deposited in worthy hands ; ' ail even when circumstances permit any liberty of choice, desert hJ too seldom a chance in competition with favour. With one important exception, the fellowships are perpetual ; but they This is candidly acknowledged by the intelligent apologist just quoted. ,.. " |i most Colleges the fellowships are appropriated to certain schools, dio- ' ces, counties, and in some cases even to parishes, with a preference given " tope founder's kindred for ever. Many qualifications, quite foreign to in|lectual talents and learning, are thus enjoined by the founders; and in I' fe7v instances is a free choice of candidates allowed to the fellows of a - ■, upon any vacancy in their number. Merit therefore has not such ■"« made as the extent of tlie endowments might seem to promise. it is certain that each of tliese various institutions is not the best. The r them perhaps are those [in only two Colleges] where an unrestrained f lice is left among all candidates who have taken one degree. The worst arjthose which are appropriated to schools, from which boys of sixteen or ^" 'iteen are forwarded to a fixed station and emolument, which nothing ifeit but fkigrant misconduct, and which no exertion can render more li'le." (lUp/i/ to the Calumnies, &c. p. 183.) We may add, that even u IV " a free choice of candidates is allowed," the electors are not always " i^ted by the spirit which has latterly prevailed in the Colleges,— of Balliol ' »nel, Oxford, of Trinity, Cambridge. 400 ENGLISH UNIVERSITIES— OXFORD. are vacated by marriage, and by acceptance of a living in th( Church above a limited amount. They vary greatly in emolu ment in different Colleges ; and in the same Colleges the differ ence is often considerable between those on different foundations and on the same foundations between the senior and the junio fellowships. Some do not even afford the necessaries of life others are more than competent to its superfluities. Residence i now universally dispensed with; though in some cases certai advantages are only to be enjoyed on the spot. In the Church the Colleges possess consideriible patronage ; the livings as the;, fall vacant are at the option of the fellows in the order of seniority and the advantage of a fellowship depends often less on thj amount of salary which it immediately affords, than on the valu. of the preferment to which it may ultimately lead. i But while, as a body, the fellows can thus hardly be sufi posed to rise above the vulgar average of intelligence aOj acquirement : so, of the fellows, it is not those best competent \\ its discharge who are generally found engaged in the business u tuition. In the first place, there is no power of adequate selectio), were there even sufficient materials from which to choose. Tl head, himself, of the same leaven with the fellows, cannot \ presumed greatly to transcend their level ; and he is peculiar!' exposed to the influeuce of that party spirit by which collegi; bodies are so frequently distracted. Were his approbation ; tutors, therefore, free, we could have no security for the wisdo: and impartiality of his choice. But in point of fact he a only legally refuse his sanction on the odious grounds of ignc ance, vice, or irrehgion. The tutors are thus virtually se,' appointed. But in the second place, a fellow constitutes himself a tut(; not because he suits the office, but because the office is conv nient to him. The standard of tutorial capacity and of tutor performance is in Oxford too low to frighten even the diffide. or lazy. The advantages of the situation in point either profit or reputation, are not sufficient to tempt ambitious talei, and distinguished ability is sure soon to be withdrawn from t vocation, — if marriage does not precipitate a retreat.* T^ * " So far from a College being a draiu upon the world, the world dra* Colleges of their 7nost efficient members ; and although the University (> I SYSTEM DE FACTO— FELLOW-TUTORS. 401 jllow who in general imdortokes tlie office, and continues the lagcst to discharge it, is a clerical expectant whose liopes are hinded by a College living ; and who, until the wheel of pro- wtion has moved round, is content to relieve the tedium of a Tsure life by the interest of an occupation, and to improve his ii?ome by its emoluments. Thus it is that tuition is not solemnly egaged in as an important, arduous, responsible, and perma- mt occupation ; but hghtly viewed and undertaken as a matter c| convenience, a business by the by, a state of transition, a s'pping-stone to something else; — in a word, as a jyass-time. But in the tJm-d place, were the tutors not the creatures of a'ident, did merit exclusively determine their appointment, ali did the situation tempt the services of the highest talent, S'l it would be impossible to find a complement of able men eiial in number to the cloud of tutors whom Oxford actually employs. This general demonstration of what the fellow-tutors of Oxford 7r\st be, is more than confirmed by a view of what they actually oi. — It is not contended that the system excludes men of merit, b'. that merit is in general the accident, not the principle, of tlir appointment. We might, therefore, always expect, on the cnmon doctrine of probabilities, that among the multitude of coege tutors, there should be a few known to the world for al.ity and erudition. But we assert, without fear of contradic- tii, that, on the average, there is to be found among those to u/i^n Oxford confides the business of education, an infinitely sMler proportion of men of literary reputation, than among the cUaal instructors of any other University in tJie world. For e>!mple : the second work at the head of this article exhibits the nr les of above forty fellow-tutors ; yet among these we have nf| encountered a single individual of whose literary existence thlpubhc is aware. This may be an unfavourable accident ; but wire is the University, out of Britain, of which so little could at an time be said of its instructors t ire at present consider the system de facto in itself, and with- ouireference to its effects ; and say nothing of its qualities, except helines a more effectual engine of education [!how?] it loses much of that chiacteristic feature it once had, as a residence of learned leisure, and an eiH)rium of literature." — Reply to the Calumnies^ &j-c. p. 185. — [Adam Smith, wli was himself of Oxford, has some good observations upon this rapid dr^age and its effect in sinking the University.] 2 c 402 ENGLISH UNIVERSITIES— OXFORD. zation. So much, however, is notorious ; either the great Uuiver-( sitj of Oxford does not now attempt to accomplish what it wa^ established to effect, and what every, even the meanest, University proposes; or it attempts this by means inversely propoy^tioned to the end, and thus ludicrously fails in the endeavour. That there is much of good, much worthy of imitation by other Universi- ties, in the present spirit and present economy of Oxford, we art) happy to acknowledge, and may at another time endeavour k\ demonstrate. But this good is occasioned, not effected ; it exists f not in consequence of any excellence in the instructors, — and V only favoured in so far as it is compatible Avith the interest o! those private corporations, who administer the University excluj sively for their own benefit. As at present organized, it is ;| doubtful problem whether the tutorial system ought not to bl ^ abated as a nuisance. For if some tutors may afford assistance ti some pupils, to other pupils other tutors prove equally an imped; j ment. We are no enemies of collegial residence, no enemies of ' tutorial disciphne, even now when its former necessity has in ! great measure been superseded. To vindicate its utihty undc^ present circumstances, it must, however, be raised not merely froi{ its actual corruption, but even to a higher excellence than it pp|^ sessed by its original constitution. A tutorial system in suba dination to a professorial (which Oxford form.erly enjoyed) y regard as affording the condition of a,n absolutely perfect Ufi versity. But the tutorial system as now dominant in Oxfor is vicious : 1°, in its apj^lication, — as usurping the place of tlj professorial, whose function, under any circumstances, it is inadj quate to discharge ; 2°, in its constitution, — the tutors as n(' fortuitously appointed, being, as a body, incompetent even to ti duties of subsidiary instruction. } II. We come now to our second subject of consideration : — 'J inquire by what causes and for what ends this revolution v| accomphshed; how the English Universities, and in particu! Oxford, passed from a legal to an illegal state, and from pul\ Universities were degraded mio private schools? — The answer,' precise : This luas effected solely by the influence, and exclusiv; for the advantage, of the Colleges. But it requires some illustj- tion to understand, how the interest of these private corporatip was opposed to that of tlie public institution, of which they wp the accidents : and how their domestic tuition was able graduf'f ■I HISTORY OF THE CORRUPTION-^ COLLEGES, ETC. Aon ttuiidermiae, and ultimately to supersede, the system of acado- n^al lectures in aid of which it was established. riiough Colleges be unessential accessories to a University, y common circumstances occasioned, throughout all the older livcrsities, the foundation of conventual establishments for the haitation, support, and subsicUary discipline of the student ; and ^ date of the earliest Colleges is not long posterior to the date the most ancient Universities. Establishments of this nature .[ tlms not pecuhar to England ; and Ukc the greater number of h; institutions, they were borrowed by Oxford from the mother Ijfiversity of Paris — but with peculiar and important modifica- tiis. A sketch of the Collegial system as variously organized, ai as variously affecting the academical constitution in foreign [' versities, will afford a clearer conception of the distinctive ■ Iracter of that system in those of England, and of the para- mant and unexampled influence it has exerted in determining thir corruption. 'he causes which originally promoted the establishment of C leges, were very different from those which subsequently occa- si'icd their increase, and are to be found in tlie circumstances 111 or which the earliest Universities sprang up. The great con- -e of the studious, counted by tens of thousands, and from y country of Europe, to the illustrious teachers of liaw, Mdicine, and Philosophy, who in the twelfth and thirteenth cen- tuies delivered their prelections in Bologna, Salerno, and Paris, nejssarily occasioned, in these cities, a scarcity of lodgings, and ai jxorbitant demand for rent. Various means were adopted to ■Iviate this inconvenience, but with inadequate effect; and the hsdships to which the poorer students were frequently exposed, m-ed compassionate individuals to provide houses, in which a ceain number of indigent scholars might be accommodated with is\ lodging during tlie progress of their studies. The manners, "' . of the cities in which the early Universities arose, were, for ' lus reasons, more than usually corrupt ; and even attendance 'lo pubhc teachers forced the student into dangerous and uhng associations.* Piety thus concurred with benevolence, Tunc autem," says the Cardinal dc Vitiy, who wrote in the first half ■ thirteenth century, in speaking of the state of Paris, — " tunc auteni ius in Clero quam in alio populo dissoluta (Lutetia sc), taniquara capra sa et ovis morbida, peniicioso exemplo multos hospitos sues undique ad ;iffluentes coiTumpebat, habitatores suos devorans et in profimdum 404 ENGLISH UNIVERSITIES— OXFORD. in supplying houses in which poor scholars might be harboure without cost, and youth, removed from perilous temptation,! placed under the control of an overseer ; and an example w afforded for imitation in the Hospitia which the rehgious orde^ estabhshed in the University towns for those of their membe' who were now attracted, as teachers and learners, to these plac of literary resort.* Free board was soon added to free lodginj' and a small bursary or stipend generally completed the endo i it, ment. With moral superintendence was conjoined literary d J ciphne, but still in subservience to the public exercises and 1(' tures : opportunity was thus obtained of constant disputation, which the greatest importance ivas wisely attributed, through all n scholastic ages ; while books, which only affluent individuals coi. then afford to purchase, were supplied for the general use of t? indigent community. ; But as Paris was the University in which collegial estabh.- ments were first founded, so Paris was the University in whi they soonest obtained the last and most important extensi of their purposes. Kegents were occasionally taken from 3 public schools, and placed as regular lecturers within the (.- leges. Sometimes nominated, always controlled, and o\ degraded by their Faculty, these lecturers were recognised s among its regular teachers ; and the same privileges accorijl to the attendance on. their College courses, as to those delived by other graduates in the common schools of the Universr. Different Colleges thus afforded the means of academical edi i- tion in certain departments of a faculty, — in a whole faculty - or in several faculties ; and so far they constituted partici,r demergens, simplicem fornicationem nullum peccatum reputabat. Mer i- ces publicse, ubique per vicos et plateas civitatis, passim ad lupauaria la clericos transeuntes quasi per violeutiam pertraliebant. Quod si te ingredi recusareut, confestim eos ' Sodoniitas,' Tpost ipsos conclamentes, I'e- baut. In una autem et eadem domo^ scholce erant superius, prostibula inft is. In parte svperiori mar/istri legebayit, in inferiori meretrices officia turpitu i« exercebant. Ex una parte, meretrices inter se et ami Cenonibns [tenon s] litigabant; ex alia parte, disputantes et content iose agentes clerici prod a- bant." — (Jacobi de Vitnaco Hist. Occident, cap. vii.) — It thus apffs. that the Schools of the Faculty of Arts were not as yet established i 'li* Rue de la Fouarre. At this date in Paris, as originally also in Os-d, the lectures aud disputations were conducted by the masters in their pi habitations. * [In Italy the Colleges seem never to have gone beyond this. See w ciolati Syntagma x.] J : lie HISTORY OF THE CORRUPTION-COLLEGES, ETC. i3orporations of teachers and learners, apart from, and, in ^me degree, independent of, the general body of the University. 'Iiey formed, in fact, so many petty Universities, or so many figments of a University. Into the Colleges, thus furnished \ih professors, there were soon admitted to board and educa- in pensioners, or scholars, not on the foundation ; and nothino- me was wanting to supersede the lecturer in the public schools, tui to throw open those domestic classes to the members of tiie ciier Colleges, and to the martinets or scholars of the University nt belonging to Colleges at all. In the course of the fifteenth c'ltury this was done ; and the University and Colleges were tlis intimately united. The College Regents, selected for talent, ai recommended to favour by their nomination, soon diverted students from the unguaranteed courses of the lecturers in University schools. The prime faculties of Theology and Arts ame at last exclusively collegial. With the exception of two irses in the great College of Navarre, the lectures, disputations, i acts of the Theological Faculty were confined to the college ojthe Sorhonne ; and the Sorbonne thus became convertible with tl; Theological Faculty of Paris. During the latter half of the fi|eenth century, the ''famous Colleges," or those " of complete €\rcise," (cc. magna, celebria, famosa, famata, do plein exercise,) ii|the Faculty of Arts, amounted to eighteen, — a number which, bore the middle of the seventeenth, had been reduced to ten. Aout eighty others, (cc. parva, non celebria,) of which above aialf still subsisted in the eighteenth century, taught either only tl subordinate branches of the faculty, (grammar and rhetoric,) a[l this only to those on the foundation, or merely afforded habi- tjjion and stipend to their bursars, now admitted to education in ajthe larger colleges, with the illustrious exception of Navarre. l(e Rue de la Fouarre, {yicus stramineus,) which contained the 6<^ols belonging to the different Nations of the Faculty, and to Wich the lectures in philosophy had been once exclusively con- find, became less and less frerpiented ; until at last the public c».ir of Ethics, long perpetuated by an endowment, alone remained ; a^l " The Street'' would have been wholly abandoned by the uilversity, had not the acts of Determination, the forms of Incep- tcihip, and tlie Examinations of some of the Nations, still con- n»ted the Faculty of Arts with this venerable site. The colleges "tuU exercise in this faculty, continued to combine the objects of I i>>ical school and university : for, besides the art of grammar 406 ENGLISH UNIVERSITIES— OXFORD. taught in six or seven consecutive classes of humanity or ancie hteraturc, they supphed courses of rhetoric, logic, metajyhysin physics, mathematics, and morals ; the several subjects, taught ]' different professors. A free competition was thus maintain! between the Colleges ; the principals had every inducement i appoint only the most able teachers; and the emoluments of t rival professors (who Avere not astricted to celibacy) depend! mainly on their fees. A blind munificence quenched this usei. emulation. In the year 1719, fixed salaries and retiring pcnsici were assigned by the crown to the College Regents; the liej'; at large now obtained the gratuitous instruction which the p( • had always enjoyed, but the University gradually declined. : After Paris, no continental University was more affected in j fundamental faculty by the collegial system than Louvain. Q- ginally, as in Paris, and the other Universities of the Paris i model, the lectures in the Faculty of Arts were exclusively dj- vered by the regents in vico, or in the general schools, to eacbf whom a certain subject of philosophy, and a certain hour of tea - ing, was assigned. Colleges were founded ; and in some of th(;i, during the fifteenth century, particular schools were establisljl. The regents in these colleges were not disowned by the facuj', to whose control they were subjected. Here, as in Paris, je lectures by the regents in vico gradually declined, till at last |e three public professorships of Ethics, Rhetoric, and 3Iathemai% perpetuated by endowment, were in the seventeenth century le only classes that remained open in the halls of the Facultj}f Arts, in which, besides other exercises, the Quodlibetic Disp'if- tions were still annually performed. The general tuition of W faculty was conducted m four rival colleges of full exercise've Pcedagogia, as they were denominated, in contradistinction tojie other colleges, which were intended less for the education, I'm for the habitation and aliment of youth, during their stu<:!S. These last, which amounted to above thirty, sent their bursar; or education to the four privileged Colleges of the Faculty ; to jae or other of which these minor establishments were in gei-al astricted. In the Pa3dagogia, (with the single exception of|tie Collegium Porci,) Philosophy alone was taught, and this u|er the fourfold division of Logic, Physics, Metaphysics, and Mo\% by four ordinary professors and a principal. Instruction inihe LittercB Humaniores, was, in the seventeenth century, disc|ti- niied in the other three, {cc. Castri, Lilii, Falconis) ; —the eajiei' HISTORY OF THE CORRUPTION— COLLEGES, ETC. 407 -titution in this department being afforded by the oppidan liools then everywhere estabhshed ; the higher by the Colle(jiutn 'tndense; and the highest by the three professors of Latin, leek, and Hebrew Uterature, in the Collegium 7Vilingue, founded 1 1517, by Ilieronymus BusUdius — a memorable institution, Uated by Francis I. in Paris, by Fox and Wolsey in Oxford, I by Ximenes in AlcaUi de Henares. In the Pfedagogia the iphne was rigorous; the dihgence of the teachers admirably rained by the rivalry of the different Houses; and the eraula- II of the students, roused by daily competition in their several asses and colleges, was powerfully directed towards the great ineral contest, in which all the candidates for a degree in arts (im the different Pasdagogia were brought into concourse, — pub- ly and minutely tried by sworn examinators, — and finally •ranged with rigorous impartiahty in the strict order of merit. 'liis competition for academical honours, long the peculiar glory ' Louvain, is only to be paralleled by the present examinations 1 the English Universities;* we may explain ihe former when I' come to speak of the latter. — [See lleid's Works, p. 721 sq.] In Germany coUegial establishments did not obtain the same ii'ponderance as in the jS^etherlands and France. In the older piversities of the empire, the academical system was not essen- ally modified by these institutions : and in the universities >anded after the commencement of the sixteenth century, ley were rarely called into existence. In Prague, Vienna, [eidelberg, Cologne, Erfurth, Leipsic, liostoch, Ingolstadt, ubingen, &c„ we find conventual estabhshments for the habita- on, aUment, and superintendence of youth ; but these, always '''^idiary to the public system, were rarely able, after the revival Iters, to maintain their importance even in this subordinate .ipacity. I In Germany, the name of College was usually applied to founda- is destined principally for the residence and support of the li'mical teachers; the name of Bursa was given to houses iiiabited by students, under the superintendence of a graduate in m. In the colleges, which were comparatively rare, if scholars e admitted at all, they received free lodging or free board, Wc suspect that the present Cambridge scheme of examination aud urs was a direct imitation of tliat (.f Louvain. The similarity in certain ;> Stems toj precise to be accidental. The deplorable limitation of the •, is of bourse quite original.— [See Appendix iii.] 408 ENGLISH UNIVERSITIES— OXFORD. but not free domestic tuition ; they were bound to be diligent ii attendance on the lectures of the pubhc readers in the University and the governors of the house were enjoined to see that thi; obligation was faithfully performed. The Bursse, which corre; sponded to the ancient Halls of Oxford and Cambridge, prevailec in all the older Universities of Germany, They were eithe: benevolent foundations for the reception of a certain class o favoured students, who had sometimes also a small exhibition fo their support (66. privatce) : or houses licensed by the Faculty o Arts, to whom they exclusively belonged, in which the student admitted were bound to a certain stated contribution (positio) to . common exchequer {bursa — hence the name), and to obedience t the laws by which the discipline of the establishment was regu lated, (66. communes.) Of these varieties, the second was i general engrafted on the first. Every bursa was governed by graduate {rector, conventor ;) and in the larger institutions, unde; him, by his delegate {conrector) or assistants {mcigistri conven' tores.) In most Universities it was enjoined that every regula.' student in the Faculty of Arts should enrol himself of a burse but the burse was also frequently inhabited by masters engage; in public lecturing in their own, or in following the courses of i higher faculty. To the duty of Rector belonged a geneni superintendence of the diligence and moral conduct of the inferici members, and (in the Itirger bursse, with the aid of sl procurata or a'conomus) the management of the funds destined for the mail tenance of the house. As in the colleges of France and Englan( he could enforce discipline by the infliction of corporeal punisl raent. Domestic instruction was generally introduced into the.'^ establishments, but, as we said, only in subservience to the publi' The rector, either by himself or deputies, repeated with his bu ; sars their public lessons, resolved difiiculties they might propos! supplied deficiencies in their knowledge, and moderated at tl' performance of their private disputations. The philosophical controversies which, during the Middle Age divided the universities of Europe into hostile parties, were wag( with peculiar activity among a people, hke the Germans, actuate • more than any other, by speculative opinion, and the spirit of seci The famous question touching the nature of Universals, whi(| created a schism in the University of Prague, and thus found(' the University of Leipsic; which formally separated into two, tl faculty of arts (called severally the via antiqua or realist, and tl I HISTORY OF THE CORRUPTION-COLLEGES, ETC. -109 ti moderna or nominalist,) in Ingolstaclt, Tubingen, Heidelberg, t.. ; and occasioned a ceaseless warfare in the other schools of pilosophy throughout the empire : — this question moditied the (lirman burs^e in a far more decisive manner than it affected the cileges in the other countries of Europe. The Nominalists and Balists withdrew themselves into different bursae ; whence, as fim opposite castles, they daily descended to renew their clamor- 65, and not always bloodless contests, in the arena of the public sliools. In this manner the bursa) of Ingolstadt, Tubingen, liidelberg, Erfurth, and other universities, were divided between t]; partisans of the Via Antiquorum, and the partisans of the \a Modernorum ; and in some of the greater schools the several s^ts of Reahsm — as the Albertists, Thomists, Scotists, — had bur- si of their " peculiar process." — [Thus in Cologne.] The effect of this was to place these institutions more absolutely ier that scholastic influence which swayed the faculties of arts ai theology ; and however adverse were the different sects, in a common enemy was at a distance, no sooner was the n of scholasticism threatened by the revival of polite letters, I their particular dissensions were merged in a general \T. BJicretism to resist the novelty equally obnoxious to all, — a . Instance which, if it did not succeed in obtaining the absolute :: piscription of humane literature in the Universities, succeeded, ff ateast, in excluding it from the course prescribed for the degree t irprts, and from the studies authorised in the bursse, of which t. tljt faculty had universally the control.* In their relations to !;. tlj revival of ancient learning, the bursre of Germany, and the i: cdeges of France and England, were directly opposed ; and to 11 . contrast is, in part, to be attributed the difference of their t r. The colleges, indeed, mainly owed their stability, — in J^^iand to their wealth, — in France to their coalition with the I versity. But in harbouring the rising hterature, and render- in themselves instrumental to its progress, the colleges seemed ;n\v to vindicate their utility, and remained, during the revolu- ti' ary crisis at least, in unison with the spirit of the age. The ' ' -"', on the contrary, fell at once into contempt Avith the anti- ' d learning which they so fondly defended; and before they disposed to transfer their allegiance to the dominant litera- '" . other instruments had been organized, and cu-cumstances * [See the article on the Epistolce Obscurorton Virortmi.'] 410 ENGLISH UNIVERSITIES— OXFORD. had superseded their necessity. The philosophical faculty t which they belonged, had lost, by its opposition to the admissio of humane letters into its course, the consideration it formerl obtained ; and in the Protestant Universities of the Empire j ■■ degree in Arts was no longer required as a necessary passport li the other faculties. The Gymnasia, established or multiplied c the Reformation throughout Protestant Germany, sent the youli to the universities with sounder studies, and at a maturer agd and the public prelections, no longer intrusted to the fortuitoi competence of the graduates, were discharged, in chief, by Profe' sors carefully selected for their merit, — rewarded in exact propo tion to their individual value in the literary market, — and stim' lated to exertion by a competition unexampled in the academic arrangements of any other country. The discipline of the bursjil was now found less useful in aid of the University ; and t'i n student less disposed to submit to their restraint. No wealtl; foundations perpetuated their existence independently of us; and their services being found too small to warrant their mai. tenance by compulsory regulations, they were soon genera'; abandoned. — [The name Bursch (student) alone survives.] • In the English Universities, the history of the collegial elenK;, has been very different. Nowhere did it deserve to exerciser small an influence ; nowhere has it exercised so great. The cj- , leges of the continenfal Univei-sities were no hospitals for droniiTj their foundations were exclusively in favour of teachers and Ua '.■ ers ; the former, whose number was determined by their necessi, enjoyed their stipend under the condition of instruction; and 3 latter, only during tho period of their academical studies. In ? English colleges, on the contrary, the fellowships, with hardly ;i exception, are perpetual, not burdened with tuition, and indefije in number. In the foreign colleges, the instructors were choii from competence. In those of England, but especially in Oxid, the fellows in general owe their election to chance. Abroad 5 the colleges were visited, superintended, regulated, and reforid by their faculty, their lectures were acknowledged by the Uni '- sity as public courses, and the lecturers themselves at last rci,'- nised as its privileged professors. In England, as the Univer^y did not exercise the right of visitation over the colleges, tjir discipline was viewed as private and subsidiary ; while the fejw was never recognised as a public character at all, far less .' a- privileged instructor. In Paris and Louvain, the college discij le i\ HISTORY OF THE CORRUPTION— COLLEGES, ETC. 411 : piTseded only the precarious lectures of the graduates at large.* .1 Oxford and Cambridge, it was an improved and improvable ifstem of professorial education that the tutorial extinguished. \ the foreign Universities, the right of acadcmial instruction was i'puted to a limited number of " famous colleges," and in these ily to a full body of co-operative teachers. In Oxford, all aca- imical education is usurped, not only by every house, but by lery fellow-tutor it contains. The alliance between the Colleges id University in Paris and Louvain was, in the circumstances, jrhaps a rational improvement ; the dethronement of the Uni- 'rsity by the Colleges in Oxford and Cambridge, without doubt, ^preposterous, as an illegal, revolution. \ It was the very peculiarity in the constitution of the English dleges which disqualified them, above all similar incorporations, len for the loiuer offices of academical instruction, that enabled tern in the end to engross the very highest ; and it only requires i!. acquaintance with the history of the two Universities, to «iplain how a revolution so improbable in itself, and so disastrous Iits effects, Avas by the accident of circumstances, and the influ- ce of private interest, accomplished. " Reduce," says Bacon, things to their first institution, and observe how they have generated." This explanation, limited to Oxford, will be given ir showing : — 1", How the students, once distributed in numerous giall societies through the halls, were at length collected into a vv large communities within the colleges ; 2°, How in the colleges, his the peufolds of the academical flock, the fellows frustrated ad hitherto occasioned this diminution in i} number of scholars, and in the number of the houses destined • their accommodation, were, among others, the plagues, by wh i Oxford was so frequently desolated, and the members of the U - versity dispersed, — the civil wars of York and Lancaster, — p rise of other rival Universities in Great Britain and on the Coi- tinent, — and, finally, the sinking consideration of the scholaic philosophy.* The character which the Reformation assumed n England, co-operated, however, still more powerfully to the saje result. Of itself, the schism in religion must necessarily h!e diminished the resort of students to the University, by banish g those who did not acquiesce in the new opinions there inculcad by law ; while among the reformed themselves, there arose jn influential party, who viewed the academical exercises as soph;,i- * The same decline was, at this period, experienced in the contineal Universities. See the article on the Epist. Obs. Vir. pp. 208, 209 of |i8 volume, Note f. i I HISTORY OF THE CORRUPTION -COLLEGES, ETC ; qi, and many who even regarded degrees as Antichristian. IJut . ii England the Eeformation incidentally operated in a more pecu- Ir manner. Unlike its fate in other countries, this religious nulntion was absolutely governed by the fancies of the royal .-pot for the time; and so uncertain was the caprice of Henry, ~ . untradictory the policy of his throe immediate successors, tjit for a long time it was difficult to know what was the religion I I- law established for the current year, far less possible to cal- date, with assurance, on w^hat would be the statutoi-y orthodoxy I, i' the ensuing. At the same time, the dissolution of the monastic ; (jders dried up one great source of academical prosperity ; while t3 confiscation of monastic property, which was generally i.arded as only a foretaste of wdiat awaited the endowments of ; rniversitics, and the superfluous revenues of the clergy, ren- 1 10(1 literature and the church, during this crisis, uninvitino- j,ufossious, either for an ambitious, or (if disinclined to martyr- , (jm) for a conscientious man. The effect was but too apparent ; '• many years the Universities were almost literally deserted.* In the year 1539, the House of Convocation complains, In a letter ijJressed to Secretary Cromwell, that " the University, within the last five : mrs, is gi'eatly impaired, and the number of students diminished by one ,. Rlf." — ^In a memorable epistle, some ten years previous, to Sir Thomas More, tp same complaint had been still more strenuously urged : — " Pauperes dim sumus. Olim siuguli nostrum annuum stipendium habuimus, aliqui a • ibilibus, nonnulli ab his qui Monasteriis prtcsunt, pliirimi a Presbyteris :: (^bas ruri sunt sacerdotia. Nunc vero tautum abest ut in hoc perstcmus, ilU quibns debeant solitum stipendium dare recusant. Abbates enim suus nachos domum accersunt, Mobiles suos liberos, Presbyteri suos consan- ineos : sic minuitur scholasticorum numcrus, sic ruunt Aulce nostra^ sic fri- cnnt omnes liberales disciplinas. Collegia solum perseverant ; quje si quid vere cogantur, cum solum habeant quantum sufBcit in victum suo scholas- ^orum numcro, nccesse erit, aut ipsa una labi, ant socios aliquot ejici. "jdes jam, More, quod nobis omnibus imminoat periculum. Vidcs ex |ademia futuram non Academiam, nisi tu cautius nostram causani egeris." wood, a. 1539, 1540.) — In 1546, in which year the number of graduations Id fallen so low as thirteen, the inhabited halls amounted only to eitjht, and fen of these several were nearly empty. (Wood, a. 1540.) — About the ^e time, the celebrated "Walter Iladdon laments, that in Cambridge " the iiools were never more solitary than at present ; so notaijly few indeed are 1|2 students, that for every master that reads in them there is liardly left an iditor to listen." (Lucubratiories, p. 12, edit. 15G7.)— " In 1551," says the iford Antiquary, " the colleges, and especially the ancient halls, lay either »ste, or were become the receptacles of poor religious people turned out of eir cloisters. The present halls, especially St Edmund's and New Inn, were id of students." (a. 1551.)— And again : •' The truth is, though the M'holc 416 ENGLISH UNIVERSITIES— OXFORD. The Halls, whose existence solely depended on the coufluen of students, thus fell ; and none, it is probable, would have su vived the crisis, had not several chanced to be the property certain colleges, which had thus an interest in their support. Tl Halls of St Alban, St Edmund, St Mary, New Inn, Magdak severally belonged to Merton, Queen's, Oriel, Nesv, and Magdal Colleges ; and Broadgates Hall, now Pembroke College, Gloucest Hall, now Worcester College, and Hert Hall, subsequently Hei ford College, owed their salvation to their dependence on the fou dations of Christ Church, St John's, and Exeter. — [In Cambrid the Hostles ended in 1540 (Fuller.) Halls are there Colleges. The circumstances which occasioned the ruin of the haJ: and the dissolution of the cloisters and colleges of the monasii orders in Oxford, not only gave to the secular colleges, which i remained, a preponderant weight in the University for the ju - ture ; but allowed them so to extend their circuit and to lucre; j their numbers, that they were subsequently enabled to comp'- hend within their walls nearly the whole of the academical po >■ lation, though, previously to the sixteenth century, they appr to have rarely, if ever, admitted independent members at a;* As the students fell off, the rents of the halls were taxed a 4 lower rate ; and they became, at last, of so insignificant a vas to the landlords, who could not apply it to other than academil purposes, that they were always willing to dispose of this falii and falling property for the most trifling consideration, p Oxford, land and houses became a drug. The old colleges tts extended their limits, by easy purchase, from the impoverisd burghers ; and the new colleges, of which there were four e i- blished within half a century subsequent to the Reformation, d altogether six during the sixteenth century, were built on f's number of students were now a thousand and fifteen, that had names ir:ie buttery books of each house of learning, yet the greater part were ab;it, and had taken then- hist farewell." (a. 1552.) — " The two wells of leami ;," says Dr Bernard Gilpiu in 1552, — " the two wells of learning, Oxford id Cambridge, are dried up, students decayed, of which scarce an hundi-edire left of a thousand ; and if in seven years more they should decay so 3t| there would be almost none at all ; so that the devil would make a triu:>h, whilst there were none learned to whom to commit the flock." {Ser'v their celebrity from other schools and countries, were profes- dly chosen exclusively from merit ; and their position enabled lem to establish, by ability and zeal, a paramount ascendency rer the whole academical youth. As men, in general, of merely ordinary acquirements, — holding their collegia! capacity only an accidental character in the niversity, — and elevated, simply in quality of that character, by I act of arbitrary power to an unconstitutional pre-eminence ; e Heads were, not unnaturally, jealous of the contrast exhibited themselves by a body like the Professors, who, as the principal gans, deserved to constitute in Oxford, what in other Universi- ■;s they actually did, its representatives and governors. Their I ly hope was in the weakness of their rivals. It was easily pcr- • ived, that in proportion as the professorial system of instruction improved, the influence of the professorial body would bo : creased; and the Heads were conscious, that if that system 3re ever organized as it ought to be, it would no longer be pos- i)Ie for them to maintain their own factitious and absurd omni- ]itence in the academical polity. Another consideration also co-operated. A temporary decline the University had occasioned the desertion of the Halls ; a If^ houses had succeeded in collecting within their walls the ^ lole academical population ; and the heads of these few houses \A now obtained a preponderant influence in the University, 'wer is sweet ; and its depositaries were naturally averse from y measure which threatened to diminish their consequence, by ultiplying their numbers. The existing Colleges and Halls a the contrary, by conficHng this duty to that interest, it was in ict decreed, that the professorial system should, by its appointed iiardians, be discouraged, — corrupted, — depressed, — and, if not ttorly extinguished, reduced to such a state of inefficiency and nitempt, as would leave it only useful as a foil to relieve the II perfections of the tutorial. And so it happened. The profes- a-ial system, though still imperfect, could without difficulty have 'on carried to unlimited perfection ; but the Heads, tar from msenting to its melioration, fostered its defects in order to prc- pitate its fall. In Oxford, as originally in all other Universities, salaried teach- is or Professors were bound to deliver their prelections gratis. • at it was always found that, under this arrangement, the pro- ->or did as little as possible, and the student undervalued what '-t him nothing. " Gratis etfnistra." Universities in general, nrefore, corrected this defect. The interest of the Professor as made subservient to his dihgence, by sanctioning, or winking his acceptance of voluntary gifts or honoraria from his audi- - ; which, in most Universities, were at length converted into xigible fees. In Oxford, this simple expedient was not of course ' rmitted by the Heads: and Avhat were the consequences? The lebdomadal Meeting had the charge of watching over the due bservance of the statutes. By statute and under penalty, the Vofessors were bound to a regular delivery of their courses ; by tatute and under penalty, the Students were bound to a regular ttendance in the public classes ; and by statute, by oath, but not nder penalty, the Heads w^ere bound to see that both parties uly performed their several obligations. It is evident, that the leads were here the keystone of the arch. If they relaxed in beir censorship, the Professors, finding it no longer necessary to }cture regularly, and no longer certain of a regular audience, rould, erelong, desist from lecturing at all ; * while the Students, ♦ How well disposed the salaried readers always were to convert their hairs into sinecures, may be seen in Wood, aa. 1581, 1582, 1584, 1589, ■^W, 1.594, 1506, 1608, &c. 424 ENGLISH UNIVERSITIES— OXFORD. finding attendance in their classes no longer compulsory, and nc longer sure of a lecture when they did attend, would soon ceast to frequent the schools altogether. The Heads had only to vio late their duties, hy neglecting the charge especially intrusted t( them, and the downfall of the obnoxious system was inevitable And this they did. At the same time, other accidental defects in the professoria' system, as constituted in Oxford, — the continuance of which wa guaranteed by the body sworn " to the scholastic improvemen of the University," — co-operated also to the same result. Fees not permitted, the salaries which made up the whole emc luments attached to the different chairs were commonly too sma: to afford an independent, far less an honourable livelihood. Thei could therefore only be objects of ambition, as honorary appoinii ments, or supplemental aids. This limited the candidates to thos! who had otherwise a competent income ; and consequently thre : them, in general, into the hands of the members of the coUegi;! foundations, i. e. of a class of men on whose capacity or gov intention to render the professorships efficient, there could be i rational dependence. Some, also, of the public lectureships Avere temporary ; the;' were certain to be negligently filled, and negligently taught. \ Another circumstance likewise concurred in reducing the sta| dard of professorial competence. The power of election, nev; perhaps intrusted to the safest hands, was in general even co; fided to those interested in frustrating its end. The appointme was often directly, and almost always indirectly, determined 1 college influence. In exclusive possession of the tutorial offi'ofessors to I ilect their statutory duty, and empty standing to be taken l<:ked upon the stars soberly in his life, professor of astronomy : we have 1'' li^ history professors, who never read any thing to qualify them for it, ' 1 ' Tom Thumb, Jack the Giant-killer, Don Bellianis of Greece, and such ii'cords : we have had likewise numberless professors of Greek, Hebrew, 1 Arabic, who scarce understood their mother tongue ; and not long ago, .'.imous gamester and stock-jobber was elected Margaret Professor of I'iuity; so gi-eat, it seems, is the analogy between dusting cusliions and i iiig of elbows, or between squandering away of estates and saving of ."' And in a letter, from an under-gi-aduate of Wadham : — "Now, it '"ustrous, that notwithstanding these public lectures are so much neglected, > are all of us, when we take our degrees, charged witli and punislied for I appearance at the reading of many of them ; a formal dispensation is i I'y our respective deans, at the time our gi-ace is proposed, for our non- arance at these lectm-es, {N. B.] and it is with difficulty that some grave • - of the congregation are induced to grant it. Strange order ! that each 1 turer should have his fifty, his hundred, or two hundred i)Ounds a-ycar for ' iig nothing ; and that we (the young fry) should be obliged to pay money ' not hearing such lectures as were never read, nor over composed." . 0. X.) 426 ENGLISH UNIVERSITIES— OXFORD. in lieu of the course of academical study, ivhicJi it legally implied. The Professorial system was thus from the principal and neces- sary, degraded into the subordinate and superfluous ; the tutorial elevated, Avith all its adcUtional imperfections, from the subsidiary, into the one exclusive instrument of education. In establishing the ascendency of the collegial bodies, it mattered not that tbi extensive cycle of academical instruction was contracted to tlni narrow capacity of a fellow-tutor ; — that the University was annii hilated, or reduced to half a faculty, — of one teachership, — ^whiclt every " graduated dunce " might confidently undertake. Th great interests of the nation, the church, and the professions, weri sacrificed to the paltry ends of a few contemptible corporations! and the privileges by law accorded to the public University ci Oxford, as the authorised organ of national education, were by it perfidious governors furtively transferred to the unauthorise, absurdities of their private — of their college, discipline. | That the representatives of the collegial bodies, as constitutinj the Hebdomadal Meeting, were the authors of this I'adical subvei sion of the establishment of which they were the protectors,-; that the greatest importance was attached by them to its accor: plishment, — and, at the same time, that they were fully conscio'. of sacrificing the interests of the University and public to a priva' job ; — all this is manifested by the fact, that the Heads of Houst rather than expose the college usurpations to a discussion by t: academical and civil legislatures, not only submitted to the d grace of leaving their smuggled system of education without, legal sanction, but actually tolerated the reproach of thus cc verting the great seminary of the English Church into a scJwol j perjury, without, as far as we know, an effort either at \andicatii or amendment. This grievous charge, though frequently ad vane : both by the friends and enemies of the establishment, we menti, with regret ; we do not see how it can be rebutted, but shall ; truly gratified if it can. Let us inquire. i At matriculation, every member of the University of Oxfd solemnly swears to an observance of the academical statutes! which he receives a copy of the Excerpta, that he may be una J to urge the plea of ignorance for their violation ; and at ev" ^ successive step of graduation, the candidate not only repf> this comprehensive oath, but after hearing read, by the serr Proctor, a statutory recapitulation of the statutes which \ - HISTORY OF THE CORRUPTION— COLLEGIAL INTEREST. 427 sobe the various public courses to be attended, and the various pulic exercises to be performed, as the conditions necessary for tb degree, specially makes oath, " tliat having heard what was th< read, and having, within three days, diligently read or d read, [the other statutes having reference to the degree ^ about to take,] moreover the seventh section of the sixth . that he has ^yerformed all that they require, those particulars ted for which he has received a dispensation." (Stat, T. ii. T. ix. S. vi. § 1 — 3.) The words in brackets arc omitted in ro-enactmcnt of 1808. (Add. T. ix. § 3.) lOW, in these circumstances, does it not follow that every iiMiber of the University committs perjury, who either does not ol -rve the statutory enactments, or does not receive a dispensa- rii for their non-observance? 'nder the former alternative, false swearing is manifestly ine- vi.ble. Of the University laws, it is much easier to enumerate tb|5e which are not violated than those which are ; and the " Ex- I ee^ta Statutorum," which the intrant receives at matriculation, ii fajfrom enabling him to prove faithful to his oath, serves only to i' shjsv him the extent of the perjury, which, if he does not fly the ii U varsity, lie must unavoidably incur. Suffice it to say, that <:■ al ost the only statutes now observed, are those which regulate II miters wholly accidental to the essential ends of the institution, - the civil polity of the corporation, or circumstances of mere . and ceremonial. The whole statutes, on the contrary, that i coptitute the being and the well-being of the University, as an r es.blishmcnt of education in general, and in particular, of educa- [ ti( in the tliree learned professions, — these fundamental statutes ! ! ai one and all, absolutely reduced to a dead letter. And why ? i Bjause they establish the University on the system ofprofessorial mnidion. The fact is too notorious to be contrachcted, that ^v 1st every statute which comports with the private interest of tli, college corporations is religiously enforced, every statute injinded to insure the public utility of the University, but incom- pable with their monopoly, is unscrupulously violated. he latter alternative remains ; but does dispensation aiFord a |"t^ allowed to qualify, on equitable grounds, the rigour of the 1;,. It will not be contended, that a power of dispensation allowed ir the not altogether diligent attendance on the pubhc readers, ';S meant by the legislature to concede a power of dispensing vji all attendance on the professorial courses ; nay, of absolutely d heretofore wrought grievous detriment to the University," (C p. St. T. X. S. ii. § 5.) Accordingly, nnder the head oi Dispensk Matter, there is to be found nothing to warrant the supposiln, that power is left with Convocation of dispensing with the reg:ir lectures of all or any of its professors, or with attendancf Jn these lectures by all or any of its scholars. On the contrar it is only permitted, at the utmost, to give dispensation t(in ordinary (or public) reader, who had been forced by necessitto deliver his lecture, through a substitute, without the reg'ar authorization. (T. x. S. ii. § 4.) — Again, under the heaiiof Indispensable Matter, those cases are enumerated in whichihe indulgence had formerly been abused. All defect of standg, HISTORY OF THE CORRUPTION— COLLEGIAL INTEREST. 429 (snding at that time meant length of attendance on the pvofes- so-al lectiires,) all non-performance of exercise, either before or af r graduation, are declared henceforward indispensable. But if iie less important requisites for a degree, and in which a relax- »tn had previously been sometimes tolerated, arc now rendered inferative ; midto 7najus, must the conditions of paramount im- ;' ptJtance, such as delivery of, and attendance on, the public ' corses, be held as such, — conditions, a dispensation for which ' h^ing never heretofore been asked, or granted, or conceived " pcjsible, a prospective prohibition of such abuse could never, by ■ ttj legislature, be imagined necessary. At the same time, it is ' ddared, that hereafter no alteration is to be attempted of the "- ftts, by which founders, with consent of the University, had "■ dermined the duties of the chairs by them endowed ; and these ^ nJ;s, as thus modified and confirmed, constitute a great propor- ^' tii of the statutes by which the system of public lectures is reulated. (T. x. S. ii. § 5.) — Under both heads, a general power ' isjindeed, left to the Chancellor, of allowing the Hebdomadal ''1^ Misting to propose a dispensation ; but this only "from some * n^ssary and very urgent cause,'" and " in cases which are not " r^ignant to academical discipline." We do not happen to know, 'i ai cannot at the moment obtain the information, whether there nc is, or is not, a form of dispensation passed in convocation for fc tb non-delivery of their lectures by the public readers, and for * tl non-attendance on these lectures by the students. Nor is the « fai of the smallest consequence to the question. For either the fi st utes are violated without a dispensation, or a dispensation i: is)btained in violation of the statutes. [See next following » aide.] } Nt as there is nothing in the terms of these statutes, however ?• cfiiiistically interpreted, to aiford a colour for the monstrous "sition, that it was the intention of the legislature to leave iher house the power of arbitrarily suspending the whole iiilianism of education estabhshed by law, that is, of dispensing w 1 the University itself, whereas their whole tenor is only sig- lii nij:ant as proving the reverse ; let us now look at the " Epi- ij! nkis, or explanation of the oath taken by all, to observe the sta- !(■ tv^s of the University, as to what extent it is to be held binding," li ini^hich the intention of the legislature, in relation to the matter u atjissue, is unequivocally declai'ed. This important article, ' in>nded to guard against all sophistical misconstruction of the 430 ENGLISH UNIVERSITIES— OXFORD. nature and extent of the obligation incurred by this oath, thoinii it has completely failed in preventing its violation, renders, it least, all palliation impossible. It is here declared, that all are forsworn who wrest the terj of the statutes to a sense different from that intended by % legislature, or take the oath under any mental reservation. C- sequently, those are perjured : 1°, who aver they have perfornX, or do believe, what they have not performed, or do not belie j; 2°, they who, violating a statute, do not submit to the pemly attached to that violation; 3°, they who proceed in their degi'S without a dispensation for the non-performance of dispensre conditions, hut much more they who thus proceed without actuiiy performing those prereqiiisites which are indispensable. AjIo other delicts," (we translate hterally,) " if there be no conierlt, no gross and obstinate neghgence of the statutes and their pe ci- ties ; and if the delinquents have submitted to the penalties sec- tioned by the statutes, they are not to be held guilty of viola !ig the religious obhgation of their oath. Finally, as the rever body of men would, without inducement, sit down under the bral of " violated faith and perjury." Now this inducement in|t have been either a. public, or a. private advantage. Public it co|l not have been. There is no imaginable reason, if the professoi,! system were found absolutely or comparatively useless, why s abolition or degradation should not have been openly moved i Convocation ; and why, if the tutorial system were calculateco accomplish all the ends of academical instruction, it should eitr at first have crept to its ascendency through perjury and treaii, or, after approving its sufficiency, have still only enjoyed s monopoly by precarious toleration, and never demanded its raji- cation on the ground of public utility. If the new system -p/e superior to the old, why hesitate to proclaim that the academal instruments were cl].anged ? If Oxford were now singular in ir- fection, wliy delusively pretend that her methods were still tlse of universities in general ? It was only necessary that the h( is either brought themselves, or allowed to be brought by other a measure into Convocation to repeal the obsolete and rude, an to legitimate the actual and improved. ' But as the heads never consented that this anomalous stat |of gratuitous perjury and idle imposition should cease, we are drk to the other alternative of supposing, that in the transition )r& the statutory to the illegal, the change was originally determilsd, and subsequently maintained, not because the surreptitious s,y ;!m was conducive to the public ends of the University, but becai. it was expedient for the interest of those private corporation! by whom this venerable establishment has been so long latterly aW- nistered. The collegial bodies and their heads were not igmtot of its imperfections, and too prudent to hazard their discu^bn. They were not to be informed that their policy was to enjoy pat HISTORY OF THE CORRUPTION— COLLEOIAT, INTEREST. 433 V had obtained, in thankfulness and silence; not to risk tlio - of the possession by an attempt to found it upon right. Thev aid not but be conscious, that should they even succeed in I laining — what was hardly to be expected — a ratification of nir usurpations from an academical legislature, educated under •,ir auspices, and strongly biassed by their influence, they need ..r expect that the State would tolerate, tliat those exclusive pri- ces conceded to her graduates, when Oxford ivas a university which all the faculties ivere fulli/ and competently taught, 'lid he continued to her graduates, tvhen Oxford no longer rded the public instruction necessary for a degree in any I'.lty at all. The very agitation of the subject would have >n a signal for the horrors of a Visitation. The strictures, which a conviction of their truth, and our interest the honour and ntility of this venerable school, have constrained 1 to make on the conduct of the Hebdomadal Meeting, we mainly ; ply to the heads of houses of a former generation, and even to lem solely in their corporate capacity. Of the late and present umbers of this body, we are happy to acknowledge, that, during ie last twenty-five years, so great an improvement has been ('ected through their influence, that in some essential points ' tford may, not unworthily, be proposed as a pattern to most ( ber universities. But this improvement, though important, is Ttial, and can only receive its adetpiate development by a return 1 the statutory combination of the professorial and tutorial sys- ins. That this combination is implied in the constitution of a l^rfect university, is even acknowledged by the most intelligent ilividuals of the collegial interest, — by the ablest champions of ie tutorial discipline:* such an opinion cannot, however, be ( pected to induce a majority of the collegial bodies voluntarily 1 surrender the monopoly they have so long enjoyed, and to (scend to a subordinate situation, after having occupied a incipal. All experience proves, that universities, like other irporations, can only be reformed from without. " Voila," says •evier, speaking of the last attempt at a reform of the Univer- ily of Paris by itself — " voila a quoi aboutirent taut de projets. 1 nt dc deliberations : et cette nouvelle tentative, aussi infruc- 1 euse que les precedentcs, rend de plus en plus visible la ma.xime * Copplestone's Rephj to the Calumnies, &c. p. 1 Ifi. 2 E 434 ENGLISH UNIVERSITIES— OXFORD. claire en soi, que Us campagnies ne se reforment point elks-! memes, et qiCune entreprise de refoinne oii n'intervient point une aiitorite superieure, est une entreprise manq2iee." * A Committee of Visitation has lately terminated its labours on the Scottish Universities : we should anticipate a more important result fron- a similar, and far more necessary, inquiry into the corruptions o: those of England. * ^ t Histoire de V Universite de Paris, t. vi. p. 370. V.-ON THE STATE OF THE ENGLISH UNIVERSITIES, WITH J^IORE ESPECLiL REFERENCE TO OXFORD. (SUPPLEMENTAL.) (December, 1831.) he Legality of the present Acadeiaical System of the University of Oxford, asserted against the new Calumnies of the Edin- burgh Review. By a Member of Convocation. 8vo. Oxford : 1831. In a recent Number we took occasion to signalize one of the est remarkable abuses upon record. We allude to our article 1 the English Universities. Even in this country, liitherto the iradise of jobs, the lawless usurpation of which these venerable tabhshments have been the victims, from the magnitude of the il, and the whole character of the circumstances under which it IS consummated, stands pre-eminent and alone. With more amediate reference to Oxford, (though Cambridge is not behind md in the delict,) it is distinguished, at once, for the extent to hich the most important interests of the pubhc have been sacri- ced to private advantage, — for the unhallowed disregard, shewn I its accomphshment, of every moral and religious bond, — for le sacred character of the agents through whom the unholy •eason was perpetrated, — for the systematic |)erjui-y which it ^ naturahzed in tiiis great seminary of religious education, — n the apathy, wherewith the injustice has been tolerated by the 'tate, the impiety by the Church,* — nay, even for the unac- * The Archbishop of Canterbury possesses, jure metropoh'tico, to 8ay ■thing fif tlu' inferior diocesan?, the rijrht of ordinary visitation of the two 43fi ENGLISH UNIVERSITIES— OXFORD.- (SUPPLEMENTAL.) quaintance, so universally manifested, with so flagrant a corrup: tion. The history of the University of Oxford demonstrates b i a memorable example : — That bodies of men will unscrupiilousl j carry through, what individuals would blush even to attemptj and that the clerical profession, the obligation of a trust, tlr sanctity of oaths, afford no security for the integrity of functior aries, able with impunity to violate their public duty, and with ] private interest in its violation, i In being the first to denounce the illegality of the state of thi great national school, and, in particular, to expose the heads •' the Collegial interest as those by whom, and for whose ends, th calamitous revolution was effected, we were profoundly conscior of the gravity of the charge, and of the responsibihty which \' incurred in making it. Nothing, indeed, could have engaged I in the cause, but the firmest conviction of the punctual accural of our statement, — and the strong, but disinterested, wish ; co-operate in restoring this noble University to its natural pr eminence, by relieving it from the vampire oppression, und' which it has pined so long in almost lifeless exhaustion. But though without anxiety about attack, we should certair! have been surprised had there been no attempt at refutatic,. It is the remark of Hobbes : — " If this proposition — the thit angles of a triangle are equal to two right angles — had be'i opposed to the advantage of those in authority, it would long a!) have been denounced as heresy or high treason." The opini(!i of men in general are only the lackeys of their interest; and wli so many so deeply interested in its support, the present profita|3 system of corruption could not, in Oxford, find any scarcity]', at least, willing champions. At the same time it is always betlj', in speaking to the many, to say something, should it sigrjf nothing, than to be found to say nothing at all. Add to t"'-, that the partisans of the actual system had of late years shc'n themselves so prompt in repelling the most trivial objurgatic:^, that silence, when the authors of that system were accused of 'e weightiest offences, and the system itself articulately displayeijis _ . . _j Universities, in all matters of heresy, schism, and, in general, of religjis concernment. English Bishops have been always anti-reformers ; and inW present instance they may have closed their eyes on its perjury, by fin 'ig that the illegal system, in bestowing on the College Fellows the raonoJiy of education, bestowed it exclusively on the Church. Before this usurp;; pn the clergy only had their share of the University. OCCASION OF WRITING- STATE OF THE QUESTION. 4:17 ne glaring scheme of usurpation and absurdity, would have been jintamount to an overt confession of the allegation itself. If our jicidental repetition of the old bye-word of " Od'oiiian Latin," *^ -ouglit down on us more than one indignant refutation of tlu- calumny;" our formal charge oi Illegality, Treawn, Perjury, id Corruption could not remain unanswered, unless those who [jsterday were so sensitive to the literary glory of Oxford, were -day wholly careless not only of that, but even of its moral id religious respcctabiUty ; — " Diligeutius studcntes lo(pii quam ivere." But how was an answer to be made? This was either easy • impossible. If our statements were false, they could be at ice triumphantly refuted, by contrasting them with a few short itracts from the Statutes ; and the favourable opinion of a ^spectable Lawyer would have carried as general a persuasion ' the legahty of the actual system, as the want of it is sure to ,rry of its illegality. In these circumstances, satisfied that no wyer could be found to pledge his reputation in support of the gality of so unambiguous a violation of every statute, and that, ithout such a professional opinion, every attempt, even at a ausible reply, Avould be necessarily futile ; we hardly hoped J at the advocates of the present order of things would be so ill- vised as to attempt a defence, which could only terminate in rroborating the charge. We attributed to them a more wily otic. The sequel of our discussion, (in which we proposed to nsider in detail the comparative merits of the statutory and egal systems, and to suggest some means of again elevating the niversity to what it ought to be,) might be expected to afford wider field for controversy ; and we anticipated, that the objec- )n of illegality, now allowed to pass, would be ultimately slurred • Julius Cj:sar Scai.iger De Subtilitate, lixorc. xvi. 2 — " Loquar ergo 50 more, barbare et ab Oxonto ;''' and honest Antliony admits that " Oxo- 8 loquendi mos'' was thus proverbially used. — Speaking of Scaliger and sford, we may notice that, from a passage in the same work, (Kxorc. :ix.) it clearly appears that this transcendent genius may be claimed by Jtford, as among her sons. " Lutctiic aut Oxonll, mudica inihiti togulii, 'ernes non solum feire, sed etiam frangere dlilirituus.'''' '\'\w im))ortance of is carious discovery, unsuspected by Scioppius, and contradictory of what «eph Scaliger and all others have asserted and believed of the early life hi.s father, will be appreciated by those interested in the mysterious bio- aphy of this (prince or impostor) illustrious philosopher and critic. 43S ENGLISH UNIVERSITIES-OXFORD— (SUPPLEMENTAL.) over, a reply to our whole argument being pretended under covert- of answering a part. We were agreeably mistaken. The bulky pamphlet at thelj head of this article has recently appeared ; and we have to ten-ii der our best acknowledgments to its author, for the aid he has sci effectually afforded against the cause he intentionally supports. This " Assertion (the word is happily appropriate!) of the Lega- lity of the present academical system of Oxford" manifests twc things : — How unanswerable are our statements, when the oppo' nent, who comes forward professing to refute the " new ancj unheard-of calumny," never once ventures to look them in th(' face ; and. How intensely felt by the Collegial interest must b(i the necessity of a reply, — a reply at all hazards, — when a Mem; ber of the Venerable House of Convocation could stoop to sucl' an attempt at delusion, as the present semblance of an answe' exhibits. It may sound like paradox to say, that this pamphlet is n answer to our paper, and yet, that we are bound to accord it reply. But so it is. Considered merely in reference to th points maintained by us, we have no interest in disproving it' statements : for it is, in truth, no more a rejoinder to our reasor' ing, than to the Principia of Newton. Nay less. For, in faci our whole proof of the illegality of the present order of things i' Oxford, and of the treachery of the College Heads, would b; invalidated, were the single proposition, which our pretended antagonist so ostentatiously vindicates against us, not accurate] true. We admit, that if we held what he refutes as ours, oi positions would be not only false, but foolish ; nay, that if we ha not established the very converse, as the beginning, middle, ar end of our whole argument, this argument would not only 1 unworthy of an elaborate answer, but of any serious considerati( ; at all. It is a vulgar artifice to misrepresent an adversary, > gain the appearance of refuting him ; but never was this contcm tible manoeuvre so impudently and systematically practised, so far as it has any reference to our reasoning, the whole pamphl, is, from first to last, just a deliberate reversal of all our statemen'j Its sophistry (the word is too respectable) is not an ignoratio, b' a mutatio, elenchi ; of which the lofty aim is to impose on t simplicity of those readers who may rely on the veracity of "! Member of Convocation," and are unacquainted with the pap<: OCCASION OF WRITING— STATE OF THE QUESTION. 43ty at all, receives only the same minimum of Theological tuition .0 neinbcre. If an academical logi>latiire abolisli academical education, and ,jl^ icademical trials of proficiency in tlic ditlVreiit faculties, it conunitM suicide, siifti '"^ ^ *"^''' t''emincnce. By the former, in spite of every legitimate oppo- MDU, these creatures of accident and private lavour were raised trthe rank of a public academical body ; and, along with the yw of the three higher faculties, and the two Proctors, con- . il into an assembly, to which the prior discussion was con- cicd of all measures to be proposed in Convocation. By the la'or, an absolute initiative, with other important powers, was, by tl exclusion of the Doctors, given and limited to the Heads and /'•'■toj-s, a body which, from its weekly diets, has obtained the II, le of the Hebdomadal Meeting; and to obviate resistance to [li arbitrary subjection of the university to this upstart and I! nuilous authority, the measure was virtually forced upon the 11 i the books amount to 5258. Deducting the former from the latter, tie remain of members not astricted to residence, 3710. Averaging the Bf 'I dues paid by each at thirty shillings, tliere results an annual income f» ' I AMPLIFIED RECAPITULATION— COLLEGES. 44:. hrhrougb the agency of its Heads, tlic collegia! interest accoju- pshed its usurpation. Public education in the Four Faculties ids reduced to private instruction in the lower department of the U'est; and this, again, brought doivn to the individual incapacity ojn'ei'y Fellow-Tutor. — The following wc state in supplement of 0^ more general exposition. 'n the first place, this was effected by converting the professo- rs system of instruction, through which, as its necessary mean, til University legally accomplishes the ends prescribed to it by lai, into an unimportant accident in the academical constitution. ^0 this end, the professorial system was mutilated. — Public inlruction was more particularly obnoxious to the collegia! inte- re! in the Faculty of Arts ; and four chairs, established by the uifersity in that Faculty, were, witliout the consent of tlie unersity aslced or obtained, abolished by tlie Hebdomadal Meet- ing The salaries of tlie Professorships of Grammar, Rhetoric, Lac, and Aletaphysic, thus illegally suppressed, were paid by thA^roctors out of certain statutory exactions ; and we shall state ou1 reasons for suspecting tliat tlieir acquiescence in tliis and otlti- similar acts, was purchased by their colleagues, the Heads of jouses, allowing these functionaries to appropriate the salaries to liemselves. The Proctors hung more loosely on the collegia! int[cst tlian the other members of the Hebdomadal Meeting ; * an(|as their advantage was less immediately involved in tlie sup- prciiion of the professorial system, it required, we may suppose, soiV positive inducement to secure their thorough-going subser- livi ice alone of L.5565, (and it is much more,) to be distributed among uaes, for the improvement of headships, fellowsliips, the purcliase of ijs, &c. • ifure the Caroline statute of 1G28, the Proctors were elected by, ami he whole body of full graduates in all the faculties of the university. ' •■ was an object of the highest ambition; men only of some mark 1 .!■ lit had any chance of obtaining it ; and it.s duties were paid, not by •I'll . liut distinction. By this statute all was changed ; and another moan ;i])li. long ago as the commencement of the hist century, Serjeant Miller, iiic ntagonist of Bcntley, and who is praised by Dr Monli for his profonnd knj'ledgc of academical affairs, ouce and again, in his Account of the Uni- ver\i/ of Cambridge, (pp. 21, 80,) assures us, that the terms "Regent" and " ^n-Rcgent" urre then not understood; and the same ignorance at the prejnt day is admitted by the recent historian of that University, Mr Dyer. (Pi-ileges, &c. ii. p. cxxiii.) Before our late article appeared, we do not belj^c there was a member of either English University who could have exfjiincd the principle of this distinction, on which, however, tiie consti- tutji of these academical corporations fundamentally rests ; or who was '" ■ that every full graduate possesses, in vu-tue of his degree, the right of !L' on any subject of his faculty in the public schools of the Univcr- < )n this right, it may be proper to add a few words in addition to what nicrly stated. It is certain, that, before the Laudian Conni.s, gradua- tli confen-ed the right, and imposed the obligation, of pulilic teaching; for ever, the other during a certain time. — In regard to the fonner, - was altered by this code. The form of a Bachelor's degree is, in ■i»^' to this moment, that of a license to lecture on certain books within hifijiculty; and that of a Master's and Doctor's, a license to commence 448 ENGLISH UNIVERSITIES-OXFORD.— (SUPPLEMENTAL.) This grand object of their pohcy, the Hebdomadal Meetiii was constrained to carry through, without even the pretext . law. There is neither statute nor dispensation to allege for tl conduct of the Heads, or the conduct of the Professors. In the second place, the obligation of attendance on the publ lectures was no longer enforced. This violation of the statut( was correlative of the last ; but in the present instance, it wou' appear, that the illegality has been committed under the sec blance of a legal act. In our former article, as then uncertain touching the point actual practice, we could only in general demonstrate, that i universal dispensation of attendance on the public lectures is co: ceded by statute, and that none such, therefore, could legally 1^ passed either by Congregation or Convocation. We have sin ascertained, that a dispensation is pretended for this non-obse vance as obtained from Congregation, under the dispensing powj conceded to that house, " Pro minus diligenti jniblicorum Lect^ rum auditione;" at least, such a dispensation is passed for ; candidates, while no other relative to the observance in questi is conceded. It will here be proper to prove more particular)' that the dispensation, in the present instance, actually accordt and the dispensation necessarily required, have no mutual prop( tion. The dispensation required, in order to cover the violati( is one : — 1°, for an absolute non-attendance ; 2°, without t excuse of an unavoidable impediment ; and, -S", to all candidal indifferently. The dispensation which Congregation can concede the dispensation therefore actually conceded, is, 1°, not grant for non-attendance absolutely, but only for the negation of I highest quahty — a not altogether diligent attendance ; 2°, i' granted without just reason shown ; and, 3°, consequently i- granted to all, but only to certain individuals. It must bo reme' bered, that every candidate for graduation is unconditiona (incipere — hence Occam's title of Venerabilis Inceptor,) all those solemn i\ of teaching, disputation, &c., which belong to, and are required of, a peri' graduate, (T. ix.) — In regard to the latter, the obligation of public teach: is declared not repealed, (T. iv. § 1 ;) and if the obligation could stii'; enforced, a majore, the right could still be exercised. It is only permit J to Congregation to dispense with the " iiecessary regency" if they, on ,! one hand, _/br a reasonable cause^ think Jit, and if the inceptor, on the ot:! choose to pay for this indulgence. (T. ix. S. iv. § 2. 21.) In point of f,i this right of lecturing continued to be exercised by the graduates for a ( ■ siderable time after the ratification of the Corpus Statutorum. AMPLIFIED RECAPITULATION-COLLEGES. 440 Ijund by statute to have '' diligenthj heard (dlligcnter auJivisse) iz public lectures " relative to his degree : whilst the fulfilment c this condition, hi the same terms, is sworn to in the oath ho ijikes to the senior Proctor ; and forms part of his supplication fi" a grace to the House of Congregation. But as no one could jiictly aver that he had " diligently heard " these lectures who \ > absent from their dehvery, however seldom, (and the framers u the statutes were as rigid in their notions of perjury as the alaainistrators have subsequently been lax,) while at the same tjie it would have been unjust to deprive a candidate of his d^ee for every slight and unavoidable non-performance of this cjidition ; it was therefore thought equitable and expedient to ^ilify the oath to the extent of allowing, " occasionally," to 'yrtain persons," for the reason of a "just hinderance," a dis- pjisation " for the non-fulfilment of every particular, in the mode aAform required by statute," and in special " for the not com- ptely regular (minus diligenti) attendance on the public readers." He words are : — " Cum justa quandoque impedimenta interveni- a: , quo minus ea omnia, qua ad Gradus et alia exercitia Univer- siitis requiruntur, modo et forma per Statuta requisitis, rite performance of the one para- mknt condition of their degree, no honest man in his senses will ve'.ure to maintain. The supposition involves every imaginable abirdity. It is contrary to the plain meaning of the clause, CO iidered either in itself or in reference to the obligation which it odifies ; and contrary to its meaning, as shown by the prac- tic of the University, at the period of its ratification, and long iu'iequent. It would stultify the whole purport of the academi- 2f 450 ENGLISH UNIVERSITIES— OXFORD.— (SUPPLEMENTAL.) cal laws, — make the University commit suicide, (for the University exists only through its pubhc education,)— and suicide without f motive. It would suppose a statute ratified only to be repealed and a dispensation intended to be co-extensive with a law. Ii, would make the legislative House of Convocation to concede t(' the inferior House of Congregation, a power of dispensing with i performance infinitely more important than the most important o those in which it expressly prohibits this indulgence to itself; am, all this, too, by a clause of six words, shuftled in among a score o ! other dispensations too insignificant for mention. The non-attendance of candidates on the public courses, as per' mitted by the Heads, is thus illegal; and perjury is the price tha: must be paid by all for a degree. j In the third place, the residence in the University required by sta tute to qualify for all degrees above Bachelor of Arts was not enforced This violation is also a corollary of the two former ; and here like, wise, but without success, it is attempted to evade the illegality. | The House of Convocation, i. e., the graduates, regent and non' regent, of the University, though fully possessing the powers O; legislation, found it necessary to limit their own capacity of m pending, in particular cases, the ordinary application of thei; statutes. If such a dispensing power were not strictly limitecj the consequences are manifest. The project of an academicc^ law, as a matter of gcjieral interest, solemnly announced, obtaic a grave deliberation, with a full attendance both of the advocate and opponents of the measure ; and it is passed under the cor sciousness that it goes forth to the world to be canvassed at th bar of public opinion, if not to be reviewed by a higher posith tribunal. The risk, therefore, is comparatively small, that . statute will be ratified, glaringly contrary either to the aggregal interests of those who constitute the University, or to the publ; ends which the University, as an instrument privileged for th sake of the community, necessarily proposes to accomplish. A- is different with a dispensation. Here the matter, as private aiii particular, and without any previous announcement, attracts, in a ! Hkelihood, only those in favour of its concession ; is treated lightl as exciting no attention ; or passed, as never to be known, or, ^ known, only to be forgot. The experience also of past abuse, had taught the academical legislators to limit strictly the liceni! of dispensation permitted to themselves : — " Quia ex nimia dt pensandi Ucentia grave incommodum Univ&rsitati antehac oho AMPLIFIED RECAPITULATION-COLLEGES. 451 /// I'^t (nec aliter fieri potuit ;) statuit et decrcvit Univcrsitas, n in posterum, dhpeiisationes ullatenus proponantur in casibus stuentibus." (Corp. Stat. T. x. S. 2, § 5.) A list of matters is tin given (described in our last paper, p. 428 sq.) with which Con- ycation cannot dispense ; the most important of which are, how- Q\Y, in actual practice violated without a dispensation. It is suf- fient here to notice, that the matters declared indispensable, (f)se particulars, namely, in which this indulgence had formerly bm abused.) to say nothing of the others declared dispensable, ai the merest trifles compared luith that under discussion. Un- d( the heads, both of Dispensable and of IncUspcnsable Matter, a eneral power is indeed cautiously left to the Chancellor, of alwing the Hebdomadal ^Meeting to propose a dispensation; but th! only '"' from some necessary and venj urgent cause (ex ncces- saja et perurgcnte aliqua causa), and moreover under the former hei, only " in cases which are not repugnant to academical dis- cijine, (qui disciplinse Academical non repugnant)." The legisla- tttj did not foresee that the very precautions thus anxiously adbted, to prevent the abuse of dispensation in time to come, wijtout altogether surrendering its conveniencies, were soon to be eniloyed as the especial means of carrying this abuse to an ex\it, compared with which all former abuses were as nothing. Tl J did not foresee that the Chancellor was soon to become a pa'ive instrument in the hands of the nebdomadal Meeting ; that th<,e appointed guardians of the law were soon themselves to beime its betrayers ; that the Collegia! bodies were soon to chlish interests at variance with those of the University ; that neily the whole resident graduates were soon to be exclusively lat interest, and soon, therefore, to constitute, almost alone, rdinary meetings of the two Houses ; and that in these ordi- meetings, under the illegal covert of Dispensations, were all 'nndamental Statutes of the Uniuersity to be soon absolutely "II 'lied, in pursuance of tlie private policy of the Colleges. iider the extraordinary dispensing power thus cautiously left '■ Chancellor, Heads, and Convocation, a legal remission of isidcnce required by statute is now attempted ; but in vain, "m his situation, the Chancellor is only the organ of the ■gial Heads. His acts are therefore to be considered as til' s. Chancellor's Letters are applied for and furnished, ready ' ■ ' ■, by the University Registrar, to all proceeding to degrees '' Bachelor of Arts, permitting the Hebdomadal Meeting to 452 ENGLISH UISIVERSITIES— OXFORD.— (SUPPLEMENTAL.) propose in Convocation a dispensation in their favour for the re . dence required by statute. The dispensation is proposed, and, ; a matter of routine, conceded by the members of the colleg} interest met in an ordinary Convocation. — But is this legal ? j) this what was intended by the legislature ? Manifestly not. J) contingency in the eye of law, for which it permits a dispensatiil. and the case for which, under this permission, a dispensatJi is actually obtained, are not only different, but contrary. V, shall not stop to argue that the dispensation obtained is illeg, because " repugnant to academical discipline ;" for it is manifestj, as far as it goes, the very negation of academical discipline all- gether. We shall take it upon the lowest ground. — A dispensat ''\ of its very nature is relative to particular cases ; and in allowi'; it to Convocation, the law contemplated a particular emerger!' arising from " some necessary and very urgent cause,"' not to 3 anticipated by statute, and for which, therefore, it provides a sudci and extraordinary remedy. But who will pretend that a perpetl remission of attendance to all could be comprehended under U category ? Such a dispensation is universal, and therefore tw- mount to a negation of the law. It thus violates the very notji of a dispensation. — Then, it does not come under the conditi-s by which all dispensations, thus competent to Convocation, ,3 governed. It is neither '*' necessary" nor " very urgent." I* , certainly, at the commencement of the practice ; for how, on i'l day, week, month, or year, could there have arisen a necessity}} urgency, for abohshing the term of residence quietly tolerali during five centuries, so imperative and sudden, that the malir could not be delayed (if a short delay were unavoidable) u}l brought into Convocation, and approved or rejected as a geii(j.l measure? But if the " cause" of dispensation were, in this Ci';, so " necessary " and so " very urgent," at first, that it could ft brook the delay even of a week or month, how has this necesiy and urgency been protracted for above a century ? The pres't is not one of those particular and unimportant cases, with wh i, it might be said, that the statutes should not be incumbered, jd which are therefore left to be quietly dealt with by dispensatji. The case in question is of universal application, and of paramdit importance ; one, of all others, which it was the appointed djy of the Heads to have submitted without delay to the academjil legislature, as the project of a law to be by Convocation reje(|d or approved. (Tit. xiii.) AMPLIFIED RECAPITULATION— PRESENT ILLEGALITY. 453 k \The dispensation of residence is thus palpabh/ illegal. ■: jlll. In evidence of the third proposition, wo showed, as already (^ jbved, — that the present academical system is illegal, being one r inversal violation of another system, exclusively established by I ■ statutes of the University ; — that this illegal system is for t; private behoof of the Colleges ; — that this system, profitable ;f, Uthe Colleges, was intruded into the University by their Heads, n ^0 for this end violated, or permitted to be violated, the whole ;; fli(jati(»i of Oaths.) I He qui honiinem provocat ad juratioiiem, ct scit eum falsum juratu- -e, vicit homicidam : quia homicida corpus occisurus est, ille animam, ■ 'bias animas; et ejus animam quern jurare provocavit, ct suara." — \ .' sTixus iu Decollat. S. Joannis Baptistae et hub. 22. quacst. 5. Il/e al 454 ENGLISH UNIVERSITIES— OXFORD.- (SUPPLEMENTAL.) , of the Heads, in so long exclusively maintaining their intruve system, and never asking for it a legal sanction; except t?ir consciousness, that it was too bad to hope for the solemn appri\cd of a House of Convocation, albeit composed of members ojhe collegial interest, and too profitable not to be continued at e 'ry sacrifice. Kather indeed, we may now add, than hazard the continuJ.ce of this profitable system, by allowing its merits to be canvajed even by a body interested in its support, the Heads have Ec- lated not only their moral and religious obligations to the |ni- versity and country, but, in a particular manner, their ity to the Church of England. By law, Oxford is not merelian estabhshment for the benefit of the English nation; it ijan establishment for the benefit of those only in community !ith the English Church. But the Heads well knew that the ian will subscribe thirty-nine articles which he cannot beheve, fho swears to do and to have done a hundred articles which he&n- not, or does not, perform?* In this respect, private usurp 'ion was for once more (perversely) liberal than public law. Ider the illegal system, Oxford has ceased to be the seminary f a particular sect; its governors impartially excluding all rel\on- ists or none. Nor is this all. The natural tendency o|the academical ordeal was to sear the conscience of the patiel to every pious scruple ;f and the example of " the accursed tljig" thus committed and enforced by " the Priests in the high pl;3s," extended its pernicious influence, from the Universities, tbr gh- out the land. England became the country in Europe prov |bial for a disregard of oaths ; | and the English Church, in parti jlar, * Nay, the oath for observance of the Statutes is, by the academica i^- lature, held a matter of far more serious obligation than the subscript of the Thirty-nme Articles. For by Statute (T. II. § 3,) the intrant i not allowed to take the oath until he reach the age of sixteen; whereas thswi- scription is lightly requii-ed even of boys matriculating at the tender je o( tioelve. [Of this more again.] : t " Dico vobis non jurare omnino ; ne scilicet jurando ad faciitem jurandi veniatur, de facilitate ad consuetudinem, de consuetudme adjeiju- rium decidatm-." — (Augustinus De Alendado.) " In Novo Testfento dictum est, Ne omnino juremus : quod mihi quidem propterca dictii:esse videtur, non quia jurare peccatum est, sed quia pejerare immane peatuni est, a quo longe nos esse voluit, qui omnino ne juremus commovit."- p^^ in Epist. ad Publicolam, et Imb. 22. gu. 1. in novo.) i X [See the reflections of Bishops Sanderson and Berkeley on this i jionw opprobium quoted in the seventh article of this series.] 1 AJirLlFlEI) RECAPITlfLATION— PRESENT ILLEGALITY. -i:,:. '^ |as abandoned, as a peculiar prey, to the cupidity of men allured 'I" y its endowments, and educated to a contempt of all religious "! fats.* As Butler has it : — " They swore so many lies before, Tliat now, without remorse, They take all oaths that can be made, As only things of course." f ui I Xo one will doubt the profound anxiety of the Heads to avert ikt ^ese lamentable consequences, and to withdraw themselves from lo4 jresponsibiUty so appalling. We may therefore estimate at once tlj le intensity of their attachment to the illegal system, as a pri- Ibb Lie source of emolument and power, and the strength of their ib;i Inviction of its utter worthlessness, as a public instrument for m icomplishing the purposes of an University. Not only will the uts jstcm, when examined, be found absurd ; it is already admitted y,; i be so : and all attempt at an apology by any individual, by any lili 1 bordinate, member of the collegial interest, would be necessarily CH in, while we can oppose to it •' the deep damnation " reluctantly \ii onounced on their own act and deed by so many generations of ijiju e College Heads themselves. all It thus appears, that the downfall of the University has been lfi, le result, and the necessary result, of subjecting it to an influence |,Mi jdous of its utility, and, though incompetent to its functions, .^ i ibitious to usurp its place. The College Heads have been, and g, 11 always be, the bane of the University, so long as they are ijg. iffered to retain the power of paralysing its efficiency : at least, ,„,, i a radical reconstruction of the whole collegial system do not jjjj fentify the interests of the public and of the private corporations, — id infuse into the common governors of both a higher spirit and wiiore general intelligence. We regret that our charges against , nj \^ Heads have been so heavy ; and would repeat, that our stric- •es have been applied to them not as individuals, but exclusively their corporate capacity. We are even disposed altogether to iempt the recent inembers of tliis body from a reproach more era* • [This melancholy conscriuence came out more obtrusively, after the obscr- li ^tion in the text was written. See the same article.] !• Another annoying consequence of the illegal state of the English Uni- jiuis! ipsities may be mentioned. The Heads either durst not, under present 0i- (cnmstances, attcmjjt, or would be inevitably baffled in attcmitting, to resist t! communication to other seminaries of tho.se at adcmiia! privileges which t!y thcm.selves have so disgracefully abused. Tiie truth uf this observation Ml probably soon be manifested by the event. [And has been.] 456 ENGLISH UNIVERSITIES— OXFORD. -(SUPPLEMENTAL.) serious than that of ignorance as to the nature and extent of the duty to the University ;* while we freely acknowledge that tht= have inadequately felt the want, and partially commenced t]\ work, of reformation, which we trust they may long hve to sj completed. We should be sorry indeed not to believe, that, amoi; the present heads, there are individuals fully aware that Oxfo is not what it ought to be, and prepared cordially to co-operai in restoring the University to its utility and rights. But it is di in the power of individuals to persuade a body of men in oppoi tion to their interests : and even if the whole actual members j the Hebdomadal Meeting Avere satisfied of the dishonest characti of the policy hitherto pursued, and personally anxious to revei it ; we can easily conceive that they might find it invidious to ta upon themselves to condemn so deeply so many generations their predecessors, and a matter of delicacy to surrender, behalf of the collegial interest, but in opposition to its wishes, t valuable monopoly it has so long been permitted without moles tion to enjoy. In this conflict of dehcacy, interest, and duty, t. Heads themselves ought to desire, — ought to invoke, the inter] sition of a higher authority. A Royal or Parliamentary Visi tion is the easy and appropriate mode of solving the difliculty;; a difficulty which, in fact, only arose from the intermission, ;| above the last century and a half, of that corrective, which, siii the subjection of the University to the Colleges, remained theoi[ remedy for abuses, and abuses determined by that subjection its', Previous to that event, though the Crown occasionally interpof I to the same salutary end, still the University possessed wit'i itself the ordinary means of reform ; Convocation frequenf appointing delegates to inquire into abuses, and to take couri for the welfare and melioration of the establishment. But ' bestowing on a private body, like the Heads, the exclusive gu- dianship of the statutes, and the initiative of every legal mcasi', Convocation was deprived of the power of active interference, i \ condemned to be the passive spectator of all that the want of ^ - dom, all that the self-seeking of the academical executive miJt do, or leave undone. i * Any degree of such ignorance in the present Heads we can imagine ] - sible, after that recently shown by the most intelligent individuals in Oxf !, of the relation subsisting between the public and the private corporati '<■ As we noticed in our last paper, the parasitic Fungus is there mistakerir the Oak ; the Colleges are viewed as constituting the University. WHENCE A REFORMATION ? "' [Through the influence, and for the personal aggrandisement of ^ a' ambitious statesman, the Crown delivered over the reluctant ( liversity, bound hand and foot, into the custody of a private and i I sponsible body, actuated by peculiar and counter interests ; a 1. to consummate the absurdity, it never afterwards interfered, ai heretofore, to alleviate the disastrous consequences of this ''■ it own imprudent act. And had the Heads met, had they I'' oected to meet, the occasional check of a disinterested and '° Tjer body, they would probably never have even thought of '^^ ai^mpting the collegial monopoly of education which they have f^ siceeded in establishing on the ruin of all the foculties of the Tiversity. This neglect was unfair, even to the Heads thcm- -( es, who were thus exposed to a temptation, which, as a body, * itiras not in their nature to resist. " Ovem lupo commisisti." * Bt it is not the wolf, who acts only after kind, it is they who K C()fide the flock to his charge, who are bound to answer for the It- sljep. To the administrators of the State, rather than to the 'i acjainistrators of the University, are thus primarily to be attri- le^ bied the corruptions of Oxford. To them, hkewise, must we ifj 1(^ for their removal. The Crown is, in fact, bound, in justice k tojhe nation, to restore the University against the consequences lib. of ts own imprudence and neglect. And as it ought, so it is lib alie able. To expect, in opposition to all principle and all expe- it ri ice, that a body, like the Heads, — that a body even like the if; pi sent House of Convocation, — either could conceive the plan of isj ar idequate improvement, or would will its execution, is the very '»] cliiax of folly. It is from the State only, and the Crown in par- fe ti( lar, that we can reasonably hope for an academical reformation !; ^Hhj of the name. " Et spes et ratio studioriun in Cajsarc taiitum." iyi lut with a patriot King, a reforming Ministry, and a reformed lit Pdiament, we are confident that our expectations will not bo $:Vai. A general scholastic reform will be, in fact, one of the i; gr itest blessings of the poHtical renovation, and, perhaps, the iiii eu!st test of its value. Jid on this great subject, could we presume pei\sonally to -adress his Majesty, as supi*eme Visitor of the Universities, we *'Bhild humbly repeat to William the Fourth, in the present, the 'C0;isel which Locke, in the last groat crisis of the constitution, "^ 80 mnly tendered to William the Third : — " Sire, you have made o lost glorious and happy Revolution; but the good effects of 458 ENGLISH UNIVERSITIES— OXFORD.— (SUPPLEMENTAL.) it will soon be lost, if no care is taken to regulate the Ui versities." * On the other hand, were we to address the Senators of Er!i land, as the reformers of all abuses both in church and stat' though it needs, certainly, no wizard to expose the folly of wa ing for our reformation of the English Universities from the ve parties interested in their corruption ; it would be impossible do so in weightier or more appropriate words, than those in whi Agrippa — " the wise Cornelius" — exhorts the Senators of Cologi to take the work of reforming the venerable University of tl , city exclusively into their own hands : — " Dicetis forte, quis n trum ista faciei, si ipsi scholarum Rectores et Prcesides id %'', faciunt ? — Certe si illis permittitis reformationis hujus negotiui, in eodem semper luto haerebitis ; cum unusquisque illorum tal> gestiat formare Academiam, in qua ipse maxime in pretio ', futurus, ut hactenus asinus inter asinos, porcus inter pore. Vestra est Universitas ; vestri in ilia praecipue erudiuntur fi ; vestrum negotium agitur. Vestrum ergo est omnia recte ordina , prudenter statuere, sapienter disponere, sancte reformare, t vestrse civitatis honor et utilitas suadent ; nisi forte vultis fils vestris ignavos, potius, quam erudites, pra)esse Magistros, at(j3 in civitatem vestram competat, quod olim in Ephesios ; — ' Na apud nos fit frugi; si quis extiterit, in alio loco et apud alios t ille.' Quod si filios-vestros, quos Reipublicae vestrsB profutus genuistis, bonarum literarum gratia ad externas urbes et UniA - sitates peregre mittitis erudiendos, cur in vestra m-be illos s studiis fraudatis? Cur artes et literas non recipitis peregrin, qui fihos vestros illarum gratia emittitis ad peregrines ? - -;- Quod si nunc prisci illi urbis vestrsB Senatores sepulchris :^ exirent, quid putatis illos dicturos, quod tatn celeh'em olim L versitatcm. vesiram, magnis sumj)tibus, laboribus et precibus o ipsis hide urhi comparatam, vos ialiter cum obtenehrari patimK turn funditus extingui sustineatis ? Nemo certe negare pott, * This anecdote is told by Seijeaut Miller, in his Account of the Univety of Cambridge, published in 1717, (p. 188.) It is unknown, so far as '6 recollect, to all the biographers of Locke. But William probably thoDJt, like Dr Parr, " that the English Universities stood in need of a thonjh reformation ; only, as seminaries of the church, it was [selfishly] the w st thing for [King and] Parliament to let them alone, and not raise a ne|of hornets about their ears." — [The Universities are not, however, nov^o strong; public opinion is not now so weak; whilst the nation at \c'^ seems roused from its apathy, urgent and earnest for a reform.] WHENCE A REFORMATION ?-ASSERTOR'S PAMPHLET. 4oU I'bem vestram civcsquc vestros omnibus Germaniaj civitatibus Tum atque moruin inagiiiticcntia antcponcndam, si unus ille Itnarum literanim splendor vobis non deesset. Pollctis cniiii JDnibus fortuna3 bonis ct divitiis, nullius, ad vita3 et magnificentia) >um cgetis ; sed hajc omnia apud vos mortua sunt, ct velut in jtriete picta ; quoniam quibus ha^c vivificari ct animari dcbcant, ^ima carctis, hoc est, bonis Uteris non polletis, in quibus sobs i)nor, dignitas, ct immortalis in Ionga3vam postoritatcm gloria uitinetur.'' * [The preceding statement will enable us to make brief work ith the Assertor. — His whole argument turns on two cardinal jopositions : the one of which, as maintained by us, he refutes ; ^c other, as admitted by us, he assumes. Unfortunately, how- fr, we maintain, as the very foundation of our case, the con- se of the proposition he refutes as ours ; and our case itself ii the formal refutation of the very proposition he assumes as (jnceded. The proposition professedly refuted is, — That the legitimate oistitiition of the University of Oxford ivas finally and exclusively itermined by the Laiidian Code, and that all change in that con- itiition, by subsequent statute, is illegal. The proposition assumed is, — That the present academical Mem, though different from that established by the Laudian yde, is, however, ratified by subsequent statute. j(This refutation and assumption, taken together, imply the oiclusion, — That the present system is legal.) \The former proposition, as we said, is not ours ; we not only I ver conceiving that so extravagant an absurdity could be main- tjned, but expressly stating or notoriously assuming the reverse ij almost every page, nay estabhshing it even as the principal Ipis of our argument. If this proposition were true, our whole cjpionstration of the interested policy of the Heads would have ben impossible. How could wo have shown, that the changes ipoduced by them were only for the advantage of themselves ;'d of the collegial interest in general, unless we had been able 1 >liow, that there existed in the University, a cajxtcity of legal ' luge, and that the preference of illegal change by the Heads, - nod that their novelties were such as, they themselves were ^ istied, did not deserve the countenance of Convocation, that ia, • Epistohirum L. vii. (?p. 2G. Opera, II. p. lo4i 460 ENGLISH UNIVERSITIES— OXFORD.- (SUPPLEMENTAL.) of the body legislating for the utihty and honour of the Univt sity? If all change had been illegal, and, at the same tin change (as must be granted) unavoidable and expedient ; the cc duct of the Heads would have found an ample cloak in the folly, in the impossibility of the law. — Yet the Venerable and Vera ous Member coolly " asserts," that this, as the position which - maintain, is the position which he writes his pamphlet to refu, With an effrontery, indeed, ludicrous from its extravagance, even exults over our " luckless admission," — " that Convocati possesses the right of rescinding old, and of ratifying new, law^! (p. 25) ; and (on the hypothesis, always, that we, like himsfi had an intention of deceiving), actually charges it as " one of o greatest blunders" — a blunder betraying a total want of " comm sense" — " to have referred to the Appendix and Addenda to t Statute-book," (p. 86,) i.e. to the work we reviewed, to the do( raents on which our argument was immediately and jji^incipa' founded ! * In regard to the latter proposition, it is quite true that if t; former academical system had been repealed, and the preso. ratified by Convocation, the actual order of things in Oxford! legal, and the Heads stand guiltless in the sight of God a man. But, as this is just the matter in question, and as inste * It may amuse our readers to hear how our ingenuous disputant lays his pamphlet, alias, his refutation of " the Medish immutability of the L dian digest." This immutability he refutes by arguing : — " From the general principles of jurisprudence, as they relate to the mn[ bility of human laws. (Sect. II.)— From the particular principles of mui- cipal incorporation, as they relate to the making of by-laws. (Sect. III. j- From the express Avords of the Corpus Statutorum. (Sect. IV.) — From ii memorial usage, that is, the constant practice of the University from 123f» 1831. (Sect. V.) — From the principle of adaptation upon which the stati ii of 1636 were compiled and digested. (Sect. Yl.) — From Archbishop Lai^s own declarations in respect of those statutes. (Sect. VII.)— From ii instructions to Dr Frewin, in 1638, to submit to Convocation some ame i- ments of the statute-book, after it had been finally ratified and confirm ]■ (Sect. VIII.) — From the alterations made in the statute-book after the de;i of the Archbishop, but during the lives of those who were his confiden ;l friends, and had been his coadjutors in the work of reforming it. (Sect. Ij) — From the alterations made in the statute-book from time to time, si|! the death of the Archbishop's coadjutors to the present day. (Sect. X)- Frora the opinion of counsel upon tlie legality of making and altering i'- tutes, as delivered to the Vice-Chaucellor, June 2, 1759. (Sect. XI.)-i 16. — This elaborate parade of argument (the pamphlet extends to a hundjl and fifty mortal pages) is literally answered in two words— Qm^'s dubitavtt' ASSERTORS PAMPHLET. 4G1 (| the affirmative being granted by us, the wliole nisus of our ifisoning was to demonstrate the negative ; we must hold, that sice the Assertor has adduced nothing to invalidate our state- r[!nts on this point, he has left the controversy exactly as he found il To take a single instance : — Has he shown, or attempted to Bbw, that by any subsequent act of Convocation those fundamen- tj statutes which constitute and regulate the Professorial system, a the one essential organ of all academical education, have been r')ealed? — nay, that the statutes of the present century do not 0^ this point recognise and enforce those of those preceding? — (Jid. p. 129—133, pp. 187, 188, et passim.) If not, how on lij own doctrine of the academic oath, {in tvhich we fully coin- cie,) does he exempt the guardians of its statutes, to say nothing oithe other members of the University, from perjury ? — (Major.) "|t" (the academic oath) " is, and will always be, taken and kept wh a safe conscience, as long as the taker sliall faithfully observe tl academic code, in all its fundamental ordinances, and accord- ir! to their true meaning and intent. And with respect to other ; nitters, it is safely taken, if taken according to the will of those '<■ up made the law, and who have the power to make or unmake, tcjiispense with or repeal, any, or any parts of any, laws edu- Cfj.onal of the University, and to sanction the administration of tli oath with larger or more limited relations [i. e. ?] according to^vhat Convocation mag deem best and fittest for the ends it has tmccomplish." — (P. 132.) — (Minor.) In the case adduced, the uiibserved professorial system is a " fundamental orchnance," is|xclusively " according to the will of those who made, make, aij unmake the law," exclusively " according to what Convo- cajon deems the best and fittest."* — (Conclusion.) Consequently, &i confuting the propositions we have now considered, the See Sanderson De Juramenti Oblif/atione, Prael. III. § 18. — too long to exjact. — ^The Assertor avers, but without quoting any authority, tliat San- debu wrote tlie Epinomis of the Coi7)us Statutoiuni. If true, which we do nojbelieve, the fact would be curious. It is unnoticed by AVood, in his Hhrk, Annak, or At/ience, — is unkno^vn to Walton, or to a/ii/ indeed of r-^on's biographers. It is also otherwise improbable. Sanderson left livcrsity in 1G19, when he surrendered his fellowship, and only returned 111 ,42, when made Regius Professor of Divinity. The Statutes were com- pili in the intei-val ; and why should the Epinomis be written by any other thijthe delegates ? We see the motive for the fiction ;— it is too silly to be wc«h mentioning. 462 ENGLISH UNIVERSITIES— OXFORD._(SUPPLEMENTAL ) Assertor's whole pamphlet is confuted. — We shall however noti (what we cannot condescend to disprove) a few of the suhaltel! statements which, with equal audacity, he holds out as maintain! by us, and some of which he even goes so far as to support Ij fabricated quotations. — Of these, one class contains assertioi; not simply false, but precisely the reverse of the statements rea> made by us. Such, for instance : — That we extolled the acaden system of the Laudian code as perfect, (pp. 95, 96, 144, &o.); That wo admitted the actual system to be not inexpedient insufficient, (p. 95) ; and, That this system was introduced useful accommodation to the changing circumstances of the a|' (p. 95.) — Another class includes those assertions that are simj^ false. For example: — That we expressed a general approbatii of the methods of the ancient University, and of the scholasi exercises and studies, beyond an incidental recognition of the i ■ lity of Disputation, and that too, [though far from undervalui;; its advantages even now,] in the circumstances of the midi ages ; and we may state, that the quotation repeatedly alleged i support of this assertion is a coinage of his own, (pp. 6, 11, !;, 06, 97, 138, 139) ;— That we reviled Oxford for merely devj- ting from her ancient institutions, (pp. 5, 11, 12, 95, &c.):r That we said a single word in delineation of the Chamberdeck'i at all, far less (what is pronounced " one of the cleverest sleig j of hand ever practised in the whole history of hterary legeri- main") " transformed him into an amiable and interesting yoi^ gentleman, poor indeed in pocket, but abundantly rich in in - lectual energies, and in every principle that adorns and digni 3 human nature!" (p. 113.)— Regarding as wc do the Asser; only as a curious psychological monstrosity, we do not affect) feel towards him the indignation, with which, coming from iv other quarter, we should repel the false and unsupported chars of " depraving, corrupting, and mutilating our cited passag( ' (p. 24); — of " making fraudulent use of the names and autb - ties of Dr Newton and Dr Wallis, of Lipsius, Crevier, and i Boullay," (p. 142) ; and to obtain the weight of his authority f fathering on Lord Bacon an apophtliegm of our own, though o f alleo-ino-. without reference, one of the most familiar sentence:,'! his most popular work. (p. 7.) — To complete our cursory dis •- tion of this moral Lusus Naturse, we shall only add that he qn*^ us just thirteen times; that of these quotations one is authen ; ■nx are more or less altered : one is garbled, half a sente e ASSERTOR'S PAMPHLET. 403 bing adduced to support what the whole would have overtlirown, ([20); and Jiue arc fabrications to countenance opinions which tlr labricator finds it convenient to impute to us, (pp. 9, 10, 11, ij), 141.) \Ye might add mucli more, but enough has now been said. — \^ have proved that our positions stand unconfuted, — uncon- tnerted, — untouched ; * that to seem even to answer, our oppo- mt has been constrained to reverse the very argument he ateked ; and that the perfidious spirit in which he has conducted th controversy, significantly manifests his own consciousness of tb hopeless futility of his cause. Ami what was true twenty years ago, is, in every respect, true now.] VI.-ON THE RIGHT OF DISSENTERS TO ADMISSK INTO THE ENGLISH UNIVERSITIES. (October, 1834.) A Bill to remove certain Disabilities which prevent some of his Majesty's Subjects from resorting to the Universitiei'^ England, and proceeding to Degrees therein. 21 April ;i83;J imissi f i The whole difficulty of the question, in regard to the admiss of Dissenters into the English Universities, lies in the prest anomalous state — we do not say constitution — of these establi- ments. In them the University, properly so called, ^. e. the nei!- sary national establishment for general education, is at pres t illegally suspended, "and its function usurped, but not perforn , by a number of private institutions which have sprung up ina- dental connexion with it, named Colleges. Now, the Claim of the Dissenters to admission into the pu c university cdixmoi justly be refused; nor, were the universit},i fact, what it ought legally to be, would the shghtest difficultyr inconvenience be experienced in rendering that right availa ■■ But the university has been allowed to disappear, — the colks have been allowed to occupy its place : and, while the actual, it is the present, right of the colleges, as private estabhshments o close their gates on all but members of their own foundati s, cannot be denied ; independently of this right, the expedienc s worse than doubtful, either, on the one hand, of forcing a col. e to receive inmates, not bound to accommodate themselves tc^ religious observances, or, on the other, of exacting from tl;e entitled to admission, conformity to rehgious observances, in o]> sition to their faith. Now, neither in the bill itself, nor in an >» tlie pamphlets and speeches in favour of the Dissenters, or ag) ii REAL QUESTION AT ISSUE. 465 t'|Jin, is there any attempt made to grapple with the real difficul- tk of the question ; and the opponents of the measure are thus 1«: to triumph on untenable ground, in objections which might l)e r*orted with tenfold effect upon themselves. The sum of all the arguments for exclusion amounts to this : — Te admission of the Dissenters is inexpedient, as inconsistent wih the present state of education in the universities, which is a«med to be all that it ought to be ; and nvjiist, as tending to derive those of their influence, who are assumed to have most w -thily discharged their trust. — In reply, it has been only feebly at-rapted, admitting the assumptions, to evade the right, and to priate the inconveniences. Instead of this, it ought to have been belly contended : — in the first place, that the actual state of edu- cajon in these schools is entitled to no respect, as contrary at 0D,3 to law and to reason ; and that all inconveniences disappear th'moment that the universities are in the state to which law and re^on demand that they be restored ; in the second, that so far frdi unjustly degrading upright and able trustees, these trustees hap, for their proper interest, violated their public duty ; and, foi|:he petty ends of their own private institutions, abolished the gFj.t national establishment, of whose progressive improvement th*' had solemnly vowed to be the faithful guardians. 11 attempting any reform of an ancient institution like the Erilish Universities, it should be laid down as a fundamental prjciple, that the changes introduced be, as far as possible, in coiprmity with the spirit and even the mechanism of these insti- tut|ns themselves. The English Universities, as spontaneously de^Ioped and as legally established, consist of two elements ; and thc^eparate perfection, and mutual co-operation and counterpoise of tiese elements, determine the perfection of the constituted wh e. The one of these, principal and necessary, is the public insiuction and examination in the several faculties afforded by "tiiversity Proper ; the other, subordinate and accidental, is rivate superintendence exercised in the Licensed House, the under-graduate must inhabit, and the private tuition I'd by the Licensed Tutor, under whose guidance he must pldij himself. We are no enemies to this constitution. On the coniary, we hold that it affords the condition of an absolutely perjct university. The Enghsh universities, however, afford a mehcholy illustration of the axiom, " Corruptio optimi pessima." 2g 466 ENGLISH UNIVERSITIES-ADMISSION OF DISSENTERS. In, them the principles of health are converted into the causes o disease. In two preceding articles, [the two last,] we have shown, (espe cially in regard to Oxford, but in all essential circumstances ou: statements apply equally to Cambridge,) that in the English Uni versities there is organized, hy Statute, an extensive system o Public instruction, through a competent body of Professors con stantly Lecturing in all the Faculties; but that, de facto, thij statutory system has now no practical existence. We havj shown that, besides this original and principal system, — througli which, in fact, alone other universities accomplish their end, — Hal English universities came subsequently to employ two other sub ordinate means, — means intended more to ensure order than i\ bestow instruction. In the first place, they required, from j remote period, that every member of the university should belon; to some house governed by a graduate, licensed by the academi«, authorities, and responsible to them for the conduct of the otlif, members of the establishment ; and in the second, they have, fc; above two centuries, enjoined that all under-graduates, who weij then generally four years younger than at present, should be libj wise under the special discipline of a tutor, whose principal offi(i it was, privately to do what the University could not constitutioij ally, in its lay Faculty of Arts,* publicly attempt, — " institui his pupil in the rudiments of religion and the doctrine of tlj Thirty-nine Articles ; " but so little was expected from this su j sidiary instructor, that by statute any one is competent to tli office who has proceeded to his Bachelors' degree in Arts, . degree formerly taken by the age at which the University is ncj entered,) and whose moral and religious character is approved 1; the head of the house to which he belongs,f or in the event of j dispute on this point, by the Vice- Chancellor. We also show; how all these parts of the public academical constitution had be . illegally annihilated, or perverted by the influence and for tj * [It has been ignorantly contended against this, that the Faculty of A! in the older Universities was not lay but clerical; and this on the gi-oundtl! the learners and teachers of that faculty are frequently called ckrici. Ij those who know anything of niediteval language are aware, that cleri quent and decisive measures taken in Oxford against the Ch i- HISTORY OF DOMESTIC SUPERINTENDENCE 471 trdekyiis, or scholars haunting the public lectures, but uf no {|thorized house, than in Paris were ever employed against the jUirtinets. And Avliile in the foreign universities none but stu- dnts of the faculty of arts were subjected to collegial or bursal sberintendence ; in the English universities, the graduates and i^er-graduates of every faculty were equally required to be E|;mbers of a privileged house. 'By this regulation, the students were compelled to collect t);mselves into houses of community, variously denominated liills, Hostels, Inns, Entries, Chambers, {Aulae, Hosjntia, Introi- t^, Camerae.) These halls were governed by peculiar statutes, ejabUshed by the University, by whom they vrere also visited ail reformed; and they were administered by a principal, eped by the scholars themselves, but admitted to his office by M chancellor or his deputy, on finding caution for payment of ti rent. The halls were in general held only on lease ; but by aprivilege common to most Universities, houses once occupied clerks or students could not again be taken from the gown, iithe rent were punctually discharged; the rate of which was nqucnnially fixed by the academical taxators. The great jority of the scholars who inhabited these halls lived at their 11 expense ; but the benevolent motives which, in other coun- ti;s, determined the estabhshment of colleges and private hursce, nvhere operated more powerfully than in England, In a few hises, foundations were made for the support of a certain num- b' of indigent scholars, who were incorporated as fellows, (or jot participators in the endowment,) under the government of a ead. But with an unenlightened liberality, these benefactions '■ not, as elsewhere, exclusively limited to learners, during their li'raical studies, and to instructors; and whilst merit was not II the condition on which their members were elected, the sub- •»n of the colleges to private statutes, with their emancipation II 11 the control of the academical authorities, gave them interests ■I] rt from those of the pubhc, and not only disqualified them from ctbperating towards the general ends of the university, but ren- d(icd them, instead of powerful aids, the worst impediments to it utility. "lie Colleges, into which commoners, or members not on the l"'idation, were, until a comparatively modern date, rarely ;i' litted, remained also for many centuries few in comparison 472 ENGLISH UNIVERSITIES— ADMISSION OF DISSENTERS. with the Halls. The latter were counted by hundreds ; the fo nier, even at the present day, extend only to nineteen. In Oxford, at the commencement of the fourteenth centurij the number of the halls was about three hundred, — the numbj of the secular colleges at the highest, only three. At the cor mencement of the fifteenth century, when the colleges had ris( to seven, it appears, that the students had diminished as tl, foundations had increased. At the commencement of the sii teenth century, the number of halls had fallen to fifty-jvi\ while the secular colleges had, before 1516, been multiplied i twelve. From causes, which in our former article we fully stated, t^ universities during the period of the Reformation were alm(i literally deserted. The halls, whoso existence solely dependl on the confluence of students, thus fell ; and none, it is probab I would have survived the crisis, had not several chanced to be t; property of certain colleges, which had thus an interest in th( support. The circumstances which occasioned the ruin of the halls, a, the dissolution of the cloisters and colleges of the monastic ordc in Oxford, not only gave to the secular colleges, which I remained, a preponderant weight in the university for the jui; ture, but allowed them so to extend their circuit and to incret. their numbers, that they were subsequently enabled to compii hend within their walls nearly the whole of the academical pop lation ; though, previously to the sixteenth century, they appc to have rarely, if ever, admitted independent members at all. the students fell off, the rents of the halls, which could not ; alienated from academical purposes, were taxed always at a lo^v rate ; and they became, at last, of so insignificant a value to < landlords, that they were always willing to dispose of this fal and falling property for a trifling consideration. In Oxford, In. and houses became a drug. The old colleges thus extended th ■ limits, by easy purchase, from the impoverished burghers ; a • the new colleges, of which there were four established witl^ half a century subsequent to the Reformation, and altogether f' during the sixteenth century, Avere built on sites either obtairl gratuitously or for an insignificant price. After tliis period oi o)ie college was founded — in 1610 ; and three of the eight li; • transmuted into colleges, in 1610, 1702, and 1740; but of tli ■ one is now extinct. ' ■ HISTORY OF DOMESTIC SUPERINTENDENCE. 473 These circumstances explain in wliat manner the halls declined ; i lomains to tell, why, in the most crowded state of the univer- ~ ^ . not one has been subsequently restored. — Before the era of r downfall, the establishment of a hall was easy. It required that a few scholars should hire a house, find caution for a vir's rent, and choose for principal a graduate of respectable ™- ckracter. The chancellor, or his deputy, could not refuse to '•' sktion the establishment. An act of usurpation abolished this f fffllity. The general right of nomination to the principality, and "'i c^sequently to the institution of halls, was, " through the abso- h'? potency he had, procured by the Earl of Leicester," chan- cior of the university, about 1570 ; and it is now, by statute, vted in his successors. In surrendering this privilege to the k clncellor, the colleges were not blind to their peculiar interest. sfi F»m his situation, that magistrate was sure to be guided by their ImIs : no hall has since arisen to interfere with their monopoly ; ai the collegia! interest, thus left without a counterpoise, and (I ccntrated in a few hands, was soon able to establish an abso- ir supremacy in the university. i iving thus, in obedience to Bacon's precept, " reduced things Ac'w tirst institution, and observed how they had degenerated :" v are in a condition " to take counsel of both times, — of the ■ rnter time what is best, and of the later time what is fittest ; form without bravery or scandal of former ages ; but yet, to :r down to ourselves as well to create good precedents as to w them." * ere the system of public education in the English Universi- ti< recalled into being, raised to the perfection Avhich it ought to in, and access to its benefits again opened to all ; — a greatly used resort to Oxford and Cambridge would be the inevitable t. The colleges and halls hardly suffice at present ; — how- can additional numbers, without detriment, if not with advan- . to tlie established discipline, be accommodated ? — Now, in • ring this question, we may do so cither generally, — or in il reference to the Dissenters. But it is evident, that an lient mode of solving the problem, is, if possible, to be devised, 'Ut taking religious diftercnces into account. I • only plan that has been proposed to obviate the difficulties "iili the actual, though illegal, merging of the Public University "I 10 private colleges presents to the admission of dissenters, is "' How them to found a college or colleffes for themselves. — Wo 474 ENGLISH UNIVERSITIES— ADMISSION OF DISSENTERS. strongly deprecate this plan. We do not, of course, question t right of the Dissenters, if admitted to the university, of foundii and endowing colleges, nay of imposing what religious conditio | they may choose, either on a participation in the endowments or { admission within the walls. But we regard the exercise of C right as inexpedient, — even as detrimental, in the highest degr To say nothing of its expense, and supposing always that sue),, measure might be carried into effect with far better means off! thering the ends of education than the old foundations, throui their fellows, generally supply ; still it would accomplish nothi'; which may not be effected by much easier methods; whilst i; would contribute to entail a continuance of that sectarian bigoii' and intolerance which, in this country, at present, equally (I graces the established and dissenting divisions of our comnii faith. By this proceeding, the exclusive spirit of the presit colleges would be imitated, justified, exacerbated, and fj. petuated ; and in the old colleges and the new together, e universities would become the nurseries and camps and bai3 fields of a ferocious and contemptible polemic : whereas, left!) themselves, and to the influence of a more enlightened sp!;, there is no doubt, but the ancient foundations will be graduiiy won over by the liberality of the age, and the charities cia common Christianity. We are confident, their disabilities bdg removed, and the mSans offered to the dissenters of a univer iy education, without any forced religious compliances, that ty would never think of establishing for themselves collegiate Ni- dations of a sectarian character ; and we are equally confid t, that if this were not attempted by them, and did the accommilir tion in the authorized houses of the university once exceed : a degree the demand for admission, that the colleges would le equally patent to such dissenters as were not averse from t ir observances, as to members of the Established Church. And it such means may be easily afforded, without violating the co i- tutional discipline of the universities, is manifest from the his y we have previously given of the system of their domestic su^r- intendence. Without, therefore, proposing to dispense with domestic su r- intendence altogether, as was originally the case in Oxford w Cambridge, and as has been always generally practised in ojer universities; and without supposing the necessity of any exln- sive foundations, or even of establishments that will not e.ly I OBJECTION FROM RELIGIOUS DISCIPLINE. 47:, sjpport themselves ; we think the difficulty may be overcome, by . soply returning to the ancient practice of the English universi- 1 its, in regard to the easy establishment of Halls or Hostels ; lider any new restrictions, however, that may be found proper 1 tl enhance their character and utility. — These halls may be , ejablished under a double form. Either the hall shall consist 1; o|y of a single house, in which its head or principal (necessarily aigraduate) resides ; or of a number of separate houses, each ulJer the care of an inferior officer, bound to report to the prin- : cial all violations of rule. The advantage of the latter form ! \in\d be its more moderate expense. The great benefits which 1 tk return to the natural system of the university Avould afford, L ir) breaking the detestable monopoly of the fellow-tutors, — in ptsenting to merit a free and honourable field of competition, — ( in^etaining in the universities men of distinguished learning and I ajhty, — in determining an improvement both of the public and ti: pjvate education, — and in raising to a high pitch tlie standard of I acideraic accomplishment ; these, and other advantages, Ave may j, pibably take a more fitting opportunity of discussing. In refer- j, eie to our present question, this restoration of the halls would, f .wjthink, obviate all difficulties in regard to the dissenters, Avere I,;, ,th routine of morning and evening prayers, in conformity to the |. Lpgy, simply not rendered imperative in the new establish- |,- iBits; of which, indeed, for the sake of religion itself, the old , oirht, perhaps, to be relieved. — But on details Ave cannot now „ erjr ; and hasten to consider the other objections by Avhich the ■ misure for the admission of dissenters has been principally j oiosed. '", It is objected, that Universities in general, and the English iii.crsities in particular, are not more places of literary and itific instruction than places of religious education; that reli- ran be only tauglit on the doctrine of a single sect ; that ill ilominant sect in the state must remain the dominant sect 111 lie university; consequently, universities, and especially the , Ei;lish universities, are not places into Avhich dissenters from thl established faith ought either to wish, or should be allowed, 'iter. Ills objection is of any cogency only from the miserable con- l'U|>n in which it is involved. We must make two distinctions : — * dijinguish, firstly, the religious education given in the Public ' vcrsity from the religious education afforded in the I'l-ivatc 476 ENGLISH UNIVERSITIES— ADMISSION OF DISSENTERS. Colleges; and, secondly, in the former, the prqfessional'instr , tion in religion given to the future divine in the faculty of Thl- logy, from the liberal instruction in religion which may be gi;a to all in the preliminary or general faculty of Arts. In so far as regards the University Proper, there is no d - culty whatever. We shall suppose this restored to life, — to bes it has been, and ought to be. It will not be contended tic, either in the English universities, or in any university whate^*, it was ever required or expected, if indeed allowed, that perss admitted for general education in arts, or for professional edi> tion in law or medicine, should attend the professional lecti s delivered in the theological faculty. The theological faculty il always teach the doctrine of the establishment; but none n'd attend its instructions beside those destined for the church : — r^, to the ineffable disgrace of the establishment and universities.'o far are Oxford and Cambridge from being pre-eminently ii- gious schools, that the Anglican is the one example in Chrisi- dom of a church, ivhose members are not prepared for their /f calling, by an academical course of education in the diffe.^ branches of theology; and the .English are the only Universitie'ii tlie world, in which such a course cannot actually be obtavji. The English clergjTuan is perhaps destitute of academical edij- tion altogether; but if he enjoys this advantage, " one ft- night," (to use the *words of Professor Pusey,) " comprises .e beginning and end of all the public instruction which any 'i- didate for holy orders is required to attend, previously to cur- ing upon his profession." Yet, though the London Univeriy only omits, what the Church of England does not think it ne^ sary to require of its ministers, — a course of professional ed '> tion in divinity, — and though the London University actult/ teaches what Oxford and Cambridge teach only in statute ; st the members of that church and of these universities clan'ir against the incorporation of the London University, because, i'- sooth, it does not fulfil the conditions which its name implies! "We may take this opportunity, by way of parenthesis, of ^^ ing a few words in exposition of the very general mistaken regard to the name and nature of a University ; — a mis xe which threatens to become of serious practical importance, i|ffl the consequences that are now in the course of being ded 30 from it. University, in its academical application, is suppose to yi MUST A UNIVERSITY COMPRISE THEOLOGY ? 477 an a university of sciences ov faculties, {scientiarunt,facultatutn tfiversitas.) [pleased as we are with the candour of Mr Scwcll's confessions, -|" that the University of Oxford is not an enhghtencd body," -|" that we (its members) have httle hberahty in rehgion," — ad "study logic in a very humble way;" we should hardly Sve been moved to a refutation of his opinion, (founded on this erpretation of the word,) that the " University of London," ai excluding theology from its course of studies, is unentitled tithe name it has usurped. But when it has been seriously arued before the Privy Council by Sir Charles Wetherell, on bialf of the English Universities, as a ground for denying a cjirter to this institution, that the simple fact of the Crown incor- pj-ating an academy under the name of university, necessarily, . ail in spite of reservations, concedes to that academy the right i oWanting all possible degrees; nay, when (as we are informed) tl case itself has actually occurred, — the Durham University, ; indvertently, it seems, incorporated under that title, being in til course of claiming the exercise of this very privilege as a rilit, necessarily involved in the public recognition of the name : n these circumstances, we shall be pardoned a short excursus, )rder to expose the futility of the basis on which this mighty once is erected. Charles Wetherell, after quoting the argument of Mr Attor- •Jeneral Yorke, in the case of Dr Bcntley — (" The power of ginting degrees flows from the Crown. If the Crown erects a uwersity, the power of conferring degrees is incident to the gwit. Some old degrees the universities have abrogated, some m they have erected," &c.) inter alia, contends : — " The second pdit stated in Mr Yorke's argument is equally material to be kflt in view; namely, that the power of conferring degrees is in|.lent to a university, and some particular remarks must be ived from it. Allusion was made the other day by Dr Mgton to a passage stated in the Oxford petition, importing ilicy had been advised that it was matter of great doubt, 'nT a proviso in the charter, restricting this institution conferring degrees in divinity, Avould be binding and effec- ind some surprise was expressed at it. That advice I and I considered Mr Attorney-General Yorke as my iitor in giving it, for it is founded upon his opinion. [ vstand that a charter is now asked for, to make a univcr- 478 ENGLISH UNIVERSITIES— ADMISSION OF DISSENTERS. i sity, who are not to gi^ant theological degrees. There is son|. thing very whimsical in this : for theological learning is, beyol all doubt, one of the main purposes and characteristics ofi university. But, say these gentlemen, (and their friends al advocates, at the Common-Council at Guildhall, said the sai thing,) to be sure it will be too bad to have a university p. tending to give degrees in theology, for we have neither 0soj i the place, nor Aoyo;. The Deity and Revelation we intend j; ourselves to recognise, — we shall ask only for degrees in ai, law, surgery, and medicine. But even the surgical or medicil degree is likely to be amputated ; at j)resent, at least, they hj.! no means to confer it. In this state of things, (independentlyif the general legal argument with which 1 have troubled yd* Lordships, to show that theology, according to the doctrines (f the Church of England, must form a part of the instruction gi^'i in an institution which is to be established as a university,) ij question of law arises : — How can this anomalous and strai ; body be constituted in the manner professed? It is to be a ' t- versity,'' but degrees in theology it is not to give. But Mr Att- ney-General Yorke tells us, that the power of giving degree: 5 incidental to the grant. If this be law, is not the power of c- ferring theological degrees equally incident to the grant, as oti" degrees ; and if this be so, how can you constitute a univerf^ without the power of giving ' all' degrees? The general lie of law undoubtedly is, that where a subject-matter is grani which has legal incidents belonging to it, the incidents must - low the subject granted; and this is the general rule as to t- porations ; and it has been decided upon that principle, tha1;a a corporation, as an incident to its corporate character, ha a right to dispose of its property, a proviso against alienatio > void."* We entertain great respect for the professional authority of j.r Yorke and of Sir Charles Wetherell ; and should not certa y have ventured to controvert that authority on any questioi)f English law. But this is no such question. Here the card J point is the meaning of the word universitas, in its acadenil signification. But as the word was originally not of Enghsh bi 3i European consuetude ; and as it will not be pretended that oiW * " Substance of the speech of Sir Charles Wetherell before the Lon of the Privy Council, on the subject of incorporating the London Univers;- London: 1834, pp. 79-81. UNIVERSITY—MEANING OF THE TER.AI. 47!t it»ad a different meaning as applied to Oxford and Carabridgo, (i which sense, tlie Crown in this country must be supposed in ar new erection to employ the word,) from what it expressed as ajlied to Paris or Bologna : consequently, the whole question rtj)lves itself into one, to be determined, not by English law, (for th'C can be neither rule nor recent precedent in the case,) but byhe analogies to be drawn from the history and charters of the arent European universities. And without research, dipping oq- into the academical documents nearest at hand, we shall find nolifficulty in proving that University, in its proper and original Diujing, denotes simply the wliole members of a body (generally, intrporated body,) ofpersois teaching and Icarniiu/ one or more de/rtmc7its of knoioledye ; and not an institution privileged to te*",!! a determinate circle of sciences, and to grant certificates of pr«ciency (degrees) in any fixed and certain departments of that cirte (faculties). (lie oldest word for an unexclusive institution of higher educa- tio! was Studium, and Stiidium generale, — terms employed in thdwelfth and thirteenth centuries, and retained in those which foliwed. — The word univcrsitas, in the common language of Rome, is dually apphcable to persons and to things. In the technical lan- gu^-e of the civil law, it was, in like manner, applied to both. In thci'ormer signification, (convertible with collegium,) it denoted a pluidity of persons associated for a continued purpose, and may be [.adequately rendered by society, comjiany, corporation ; in the latir, it denoted a certain totality of individual things, constituted iMi).. by their mutual relation to a certain common end, {univer- "-ti,) or by a mere legal fiction, {iiniversitas juris). — In the xe of the middle ages, it was applied either loosely to any -rood class of persons ; * or strictly (in the acceptation of ii>- itjman law) to a public incorporation, more especially (as -9qu[alent with communitas) to the members of a municipality ,f ' tlie members of " a general study." In this last appUcation ■r instance, in 1212, universitas vestra, applied by municipality of ' ' 1 to " omnibus Christi fidelibus ;" and four years after, by the Papal I , to "omnibus Magistris et Scholaribus Oxonii commorantibus." In iiiversitas vestra, applied, in same deed, by Bishop of Ely, to " uni- ' liristi fidelibus," and universitas, used as convertible with " univcrsi- - ntinm et Scholarium studentium Cantabrigiae." I)u Cangc and Carpentier in voce ; add Bulaeus, iv., p. 27. Fatto- ■ p. 67-58. It was frequently applied to the college of Canons in a Mlhilral. 480 ENGLISH UNIVERSITIES-ADMISSION OF DISSENTERS. it was, however, not uniformly of the same amount ; and meaning was, for a considerable period, determined by the woi; with which it was connected. Thus, it was used to denote eitl- (and this was its more usual meaning) the whole body of teach'; and learners,* or the whole body of learners,! or the whole bo^ of teachers and learners, divided either by faculty $ or by countr I or by both together. IF But no one instance can, we are confident, i adduced, inAvhich(we mean until its original and proper significat i had been forgotten**) it is employed for a school teaching, or pri- leged to teach, and grant degrees, in all the faculties. As " cc ■ munitas," which originally was employed only Avith the addition; " incolarura civitatis," or the like, came latterly, absolutely and . itself, to denote the whole members of a civic incorporation ;- \ universitas, at first currently employed as a convertible express i for " communitas," and in its academic application, always joiil with " magistrorum et scholarium," or some such complements; term, came, during the fourteenth century, to be less frequen'' employed in the former signification ; and in the latter meani', to be used either simply by itself, or, for a time, frequentlji i * Paris. Bull, in 1209, Doctorum et Scholarium Universitas ; Bull, li, Doctorum et discipulorum U. ; University itself, 1221, U. MagistrorurM Scholarium ; Henry III. of England, U. Scholarium ; a history, 1225, f. Scholarium. — So Thoulouse in 1233 ; Montpellier, 1289 ; Lisbon, 12'; Bologna, 1235. — Oxford. Matthew Paris, c. 1250, U. Scholarium, and )!• sim; Royal Charter, 1255, U. Scholarium; Royal Letter, 1255, same; Kd letters, 1286, same; Bull, 1300, U. Magistrorum, Doctorum et Sckolaril; University itself, 1312, U. Magistrorum et Scholarium. — Cambridge. Ki 1 letter, 1268, U. Scholarium ; Decree, 1276, U. Regentium et Scholar. ■ Universitas Studentium, occurs in Ross, c. 1486. t In Bologna and Padua, the whole body of students were styled'. Scholarium, (though at an ancient date, the term scholaris includes I'll teacher and learner). ; % In Bologna and Padua the students, according to foculty, were div,d into the U. Juristarum, and U. Artistarum. We have before us the Sic a Almae Universitatis Juristarum Patavinorum. 4, 1550. ; II In Bologna and Padua, the students, according to nations, were divi^ into U. Ultramontanorum, and U. Cismontanorum. ' 1" In Padua, we have U. Juristarum Ultramontanorum, and U. Juristc* Cismontanorum; the U. Artistarinn Ultramontanorum, and U. Artiste* Cismontanorum. ** Thus Halle, (founded 1691,) was styled Studiorum Universitas, a pi '^ equally erroneous as that applied to the new university of Frankfort— 1 '• lica Universitas. UNIVERSITY— MEANING OF THE TERM. 4Sl C(jibination with " studium," or " stadium generale ;" * the o^or, and more ancient denomination, — as, nnirersitas stvdii Oloniensis, Tarisiensis, &c.f — The oldest universities arose spon- tacously during- the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. The ii]|;hty crowds drawn from every country of Europe by an Ii^.^rius to Bologna, or by an Abelard or a Lombardus to Paris, i\ ived at first local immunities, in order to fix the teachers and st'lents in the towns, which well appreciated the advantages of th( great resort ; and the papal and royal privileges subsequently - 'cled, did not create the focultics which they then pubHcly ited. But by this public protection, the universities became that moment integral parts of the Church and State ; and, rjuently could not, of their own authority, organize new .!os4 ^ot ^^ existence at the date of their privileges. ■ Vir example: — Paris. Biill, 1358; the University itself, iu a letter, -Vienna. Charter, 1366; Ball, 1384.— Pragnc. Bull, 1347, and —Oxford. Bull, 1300.— Louvaiu. Bull, 14-25.— Aberdeen. Bull, 1526, '//( rsitas stiidii generalis. rhe term studium genkrale, in like manner, did not mean originally, Uisiall was taught, but that what was taught, was taught to all. Oxford sjiCambridge will thus only, by the abolition of the test, be restored to the ■ if universities. " Studia generalia," (says a great jurist of the six- century, the dean of the juridical faculties in three universities,) — .-alia generalia, hodie, sen publica dicuntur, scholae, in quibus publice ex pri|legio puntiticis summi vel principis, vel antiqua consuetudine, cujus initii iiui 'xtat memoria, studium est privilegiatum, et pcrmissa societas et con- - scholasticorum et docentium ; continens pro contcnto. Potest dici '/( generale et univeraitas ratione eadera, quod studia qua? ibi tractautur propositn sint et sint publica, et gi-atis, volentibus discere, propo- ab institutis preceptoribus, sintque privilegia uuiversis studentibus -sa. Neque ideo minus studia generalia dicentur aut universitates, quod lines scientiae ibi, sed certae tantum tractentur et doceantur. Nam gene- - ad universitatem non jjertinet scicniiarum, sed ad publicam causam '11: prout enim placnit lis qui instituerunt et erexerunt et privilegiarunt ■ I. scientiae et artes ibidem logi publico tantum debent, et si aliae l^giitur, non utuntur privilegiis quibus praescriptae docendae, et earura dodires et auditores utuntur et potiuntur. Non enim actus ageritium iitur ultra illorum intentionem. (L. non omnis numcratio, de reb. /*.)" Petrus Gregorlus Tholosanus De Bepublica, Lib. xviii. c. 1, uiti^rsi a&iar trie IFo understand the meaning of the word Faculty, it must be remembered aloriginally, in all the older Universities, a Degree conferred the right, imposed the obligation, of teaching ; and a faculty was, after universi- td become public, the body of teachers or graduates, who not only had ri\ ilege of lecturing on a certain department of knowledge, of examining 2 H 482 ENGLISH UNIVERSITIES— ADMISSION OF DISSENTERS. The University of Paris, like tliose of Oxford and Cambridj, at first existed only in the lay Faculty of Arts, On this facul , these great universities are founded, as in it alone they oi existed ; and in the two latter, the higher faculties never, in fa, were separated, as in the continental schools, into independtj; corporations. In Paris, the faculties of Divinity, Canon Law, s\ Medicine subsequently arose ; but there was no faculty of C jl Law when Paris received its privileges ; and it cousequenf neither could of itself create that faculty, nor, for certain reaso^ was it able to obtain papal authorization so to do. But Pa . though thus without a principal faculty, was acknowledged o ■ Europe, not only as a university, or general study, but the scbl above all others entitled to the name. Its title was, " the Ft School of the Church;" and so httle did the term universr^a imply an academical encyclopaedia, and a full complement of fa(r ties, that several of the most venerable universities possess;, while in the zenith of their Eluropean fame, only a single faculty i- as Salerno, the single faculty of medicine. ; Mr Yoj'ke is mistaken when he says, — " Some old degrees e Universities (of Oxford and Cambridge) have abrogated, Sii new they have erected." The former clause of the sentences true, in so far as these seminaries have allowed some {e. g., ie minor degrees in grammar and logic) to fall into desuetude ; Id the degrees in canon law, by command of the Crown, were j- continued at the Eeformation ; but no new degree have ty introduced, or attempted to introduce. The precedent tis alleged, in confirmation of his principle, in fact disproves it. In like manner, in all the Universities throughout Eun?, which were not merely privileged, but created by bull and c! •- ter, every liberty conferred was conferred not as an inciut, through implication, but by express concession. And this in jO ways : — For a university was empowered, either by an expit: grant of certain enumerated rights, or by bestowing on it in i- citly the known privileges enjoyed by certain other pattern 1 i- versities. These modes were frequently conjoined ; but we n e bold to say, that there is not to be found, throughout Eur-. and admitting candidates for degrees into their body, but also the rig of making statutes, choosing officers, employing a seal, and of doing all «' pertains to a privileged coiiwration. — In the Italian universities, the fa'T was composed of the teachers and students together. There, indeed le studeuts were origiuallv all in all. UNIVERSITY— MEANING OE THE TERM. oil example of a iiiate privileges,- University erected without the grant of dotor- — far less of a University, thus erected, enjoy- through this omission, privileges of any, far less of every otl:!!'. — In particular, the right of granting degrees, and that in M many fiicultics, must (in either way) he expressly conferred. T\ number of the faculties themselves is extremely indetormi- njij; ; and, to many universities and faculties, the right of confer- riil; certain special degrees has been allowed, the possessors of wl^h did not constitute a faculty at all. For example, the del'ces in Graumiar, Logic, Poetry, Music, &c. It was the coni- mc custom to erect a university in only certain faculties ; and nojunfrequently a concession of the others was subsequently a(l"d. Thus— juring the thirteenth century, Innocent IV. founded in, and mij-atory with, the court of Rome, a university of only two fac|tics, — Theology, and the Laws, in one faculty, — but with all thcii)rivileges of a " Studium Generale." This was amplified duijig the fourteenth century, with professorships of Hebrew, Ch|dec, and Arabic ; and, finally, Eugenius IV. bestowed on it a (Implement of all the faculties. For this case we rely on Th^sanus. \\]>e Martin V. erected, in 1425, the great university of 'in, as a " Stadium Generale," or " Universitas Studii," in the -> of xVrts, the Canon and Civil Laws, (forming two facul- id Medicine ; nor was it until some years thereafter (1431) iL^enius IV. conceded to it the privilege of a fifth or Theo- - : faculty and promotions. This case we take from the '' ' y ■^itata themselves. . iVdorf was, in 1578, erected by the Emperor, in favour of the Veejity of Nuremberg, into an academy of one faculty, that of \Tthr Philosophy, with the right to that faculty of conferring t* nlinary degrees of Bachelor and Master, but Avithout the 1 rights and privileges of a University. In 1G22, the I'S of Law and Medicine were conceded, with all privileges; fiudilie faculty of Arts also received the right almost peculiar o tfe University of Vienna, of creating Poets Laureate. (The 'igh of laureation conceded to the University of Vienna by tlaxhilian I. in fact constituted what may he held a distinct '^uk— a Collegium Poeticum.) , Atlorf was now a privileged university, (Academia Universa- ts, Sudium Universale,) and her graduates endoworl witb all the 484 ENGLISH UNIVERSITIES— ADMISSION OF DISSENTERS. rights enjoyed by those of other universities ; Cologne, Viennj Tubingen, Freiburg, Ingoldstadt, and Strasburg, are speciall referred to. Her new diploma spoke only of promotions in tli Medical and Juridical faculties ; but it did not prohibit them i Divinity. The notion, hovrever, that the Senate of Nurember could, on such a charter, authorize a theological faculty i their University, was found " wholly groundless ; as no sta' of the empire" (we quote the historian of the school) " w; entitled to stretch the imperial privileges beyond the clear lett( of the deed of incorporation, and its immediate and necessai consequences." — Accordingly, it was not until 1697, that tl Senate succeeded in obtaining from the Emperor a conf\rmati( of the privileges previously conceded, and their extension to Theological faculty. AVithout entering on details, we may also add, that Rosto( was founded only in three faculties, the Juridical, Medical, ai Philosophical ; whilst Heidelberg, Prague, and, in general, t older Universities of Germany, had, like Paris and Alcala, faculty of Civil Law, a faculty which was afterwards granted the competent authority. In like manner, Bamberg and G had only two faculties, the Philosophical and Theological, ui 1739 and 1788, respectively ; when the Medical and Juridi were conceded ; and Duisburg has never, we believe, possessl more than the two former. A slight research would accumul;; many additional examples, [were it requisite, to refute an opinii which is disproved by the history of almost every University |i Europe. It would, in fact, be idle to contend in this country, al at the present time, what seminary has or has not the privike of gTanting degrees; when degrees, as granted by most of (3 privileged seminaries themselves, are now so justly the objects f a rational contempt.] But to return from our digression : — The religion taught in 3 Professional Faculty cannot thus interfere with the dissente ; but in the faculty of Arts or of Philosophy, — in that fundamer 1 faculty in which the individual, as an end unto himself, is libera r' educated to the general development of his various capacities, s man and gentleman, and not as in the others, viewed as a me-, merely towards an end, ulterior to himself, and trained to certi^ special dexterities as a professional man; — in this fundameil faculty is there no religion taught ? — We are far from holdi -j that if this were possible, it ought not to be accompHshed ; birt Oil T I Tilt: FACULTY OF AllTS DOES NOT TExVCH TllFOLOCJY. 4So ,i>soi't, and fear uo contradiction, that by no nnivcrsity lias it ever ih:t been attempted. After all the bigoted or hypocritical raihng auainst the London University, for omitting religion in its conrse of general education ; in point of fact, that school omits only from necessity, what all universities had previously omitted with- lijit. Let those who stand astounded at this assertion, adduce a -ingle instance of any university, in which religious information •onstituted, or constitutes, an essential element of its course of iirticlcs; and we believe that in Cambridge a certain acquaint- lice is required with Paley's Evidences and Butler's Analogy. 'hough contrary to all academical precedent, we have certainly 1 objection to the innovation. And wdien dissenters are admit- •d, the only change required will be, not to make the Thirty- iuc Articles a necessary subject of examination in Oxford. In so far, therefore, as the University Proper and its public i-y the most pious and orthodox divines, must by its very nature be involved in every Protestant obhgation to rehgious confor- mity. We need only mention two, — Spener the Pietist, and ; Reinhard, the most powerful champion of Supcrnaturalism. fi- Melanchthon, himself the author of the two principal Symbolical Books, professes, as he practised, that " articles of faith should be frequently changed, in conformity to times and circumstances." ii (The German doctrine of Protestant subscription is not less appli- ! cdble to the Thirty-nine Articles than to the Symbolical Books; and what is universal in the one country, may soon become no less ]M'cvalent in the other. This of itself is a powerful argument for the abolition of so frail a barrier, — were that barrier in itself cxpe- licnt. — Nay, in point of fact, this theory of subscription is the one Irtually maintained hy the most distinguished divines of the Eng- i^h Church and Universities. We shall quote only one Anglican mthority, but that one, on the question, worth a host of others. —Bishop Marsh, the learned Margaret Professor of Divinity in he University of Cambridge, and whom no one assuredly will aspect of aught but ultra reverence to the Church of England md her Articles, thus expounds the obligation of those who have lilt only subscribed these articles, but devoted themselves to iiinister at the altar : — " As our Liturgy and Articles are avow- ■dly founded on the Bible, it is the special duty of those, who ire set apart for the ministry, to compare them with the Bible, lid see that their pretensions are well founded. But then oui- iiterpretation of the Bible must be conducted independently of hat, of which the truth is to be ascertained by it. Our interpre- .ition of the Bible, therefore, must not be determined by religiotis ustem : and we must follow the example of our reformers, who iipplicd the place of Tradition by Reason and Learning." The alics are not ours. But to return to Mr Pearson : — " For instance," says he, Roscnmiiller in the first edition of his ' Commentary on the »ld Testament,' the most valuable in existence, perhaps, consi- rcd as a critical and philological commentary on the Hebrew xt, speaks of the Creation, the Fall, and the Deluge, as Fables." Fable is a most unfair or a most ignorant conversion of Mythus. 488 ENGLISH UNIVERSITIES— ADMISSION OF DISSENTERS. ail; Mr P. goes on :) — " He (Rosenmiiller) describes the history c Jonah to be a mere repetition of the Mythus of Hercules, swa lowed by a sea-serpent ; and he says that it was not written b Jonah, but by some one contemporary with Jeremiah ; and h considers the prophecy of Isaiah as made up by one writer out ( the minor works of several others. Gesenius, the Professor < Theology at Halle, maintains after Paulus, Professor at Wurt: burg, that the Pentateuch was composed after the time of Sol mon, out of different fragments which were collected together. {JVot Paulus, but Vater and De Wette, were, among the moder German critics, the first and contemporaneous promulgators of tl theory in regard to the compilation of the Pentateuch subsequentlj to the kings of Israel ; and Eichhorn, after Astruc, was the firi to maintain (what even Catholic divines, e. g. Jahn, admit that \ has made out,) the fragmentary composition of Genesis, &c. IV P. goes on :) — " Bauer, in his introduction to the Old Testamer; has a chapter on what he calls the Mythi or fables [fables agaii; of the Old Testament." (Bauer has not only a Chapter, butj famous Book in two volumes, now more than thirty years entitled, " Hebrew Mythology of the Old and New Testaments: &c. Mr P. proceeds :) — " Bretschneider rejects the Gospel ! St John, as the work of a Gentile Christian of the second ce tury." (Bretschneider did not reject, but only proposed fi discussion, Probabilia' against it; and he has since candid; admitted his tentative to have been satisfactorily refuted. A P. concludes :) — " Eichhorn pronounces the Revelations to be : drama representing the fall of Judaism and Paganism ; whi Semler condemned it entirely as the work of a fanatic." j Our present argument does not require us to enter on i: merits or demerits of the German Theology ; on his knowled; of which we, certainly, cannot compliment the Christian Ad\' cate of Cambridge. But we have no objection whatever th' he should make his bugbear look as black and grisly as he ca: we shall even hold it to be a veritable Goblin. Still, admittii his premises, we shall show that there is no consequence in 1| conclusion. j In the first place, Mr Pearson assumes the whole matter j dispute, and that not only without, but against experience.j- Admitting all that he asserts in regard to the character of GlH the eternal and invariable will of God, who [wliicli] blasts and «i^ shatters in pieces the freedom of the will." [F. 165] — " God may will ; if mounted by Satan, it wills and wends whithersoever Satan may will : neither hath it any liberty of choice to which of the two riders it shall run, which it shall affect ; but the riders themselves contend for its acquisi- tion and possession." (Jena Latin, iii. f. 171.) In this note, I have spoken of Bossuet, signifying my reliance on the accu- racy of his qui'tations; and I am as fully convinced of his learning as a J ilieologian, as of the greatness of his genius. Archdeacon Hare, (who has done me the honour to devote seventy-five ample pages of an excursus / \ appended to his Mission of the Comforter, in refutation of my statements touching Luther, a refutation which, as far as necessary, I shall consider in the sequel,)— INIr Hare never loses an opportunity of attacking, after his j fashion, " the eagle of Meaux ; " — " impar congressus Achilli." Indeed, to (J [speak more accurately, our assailant usually combats only a phantom of his own ; the Archdeacon rarely understands the Bishop. An excellent example of this is exhibited, when Mr Hare makes his first and principal attack on Bos- Miet, (p. 664, sq.) ; and here, in place of the triumph which he so loudly -oimds, fi'om a total unacquaintance with Luther's great doctrine of Assur- nice, Air Hare only shows how utterly he misconceives the import of Bos- I't's criticism of the Reformer. As this is an important, and, at the same ;u\ an ill understood matter, I may be allowed a few words in explanation. Asxiirauce^ personal assurance, (the feeling of certainty that God is propi- tious to mi", — that my sins are forgiven, Fiducia^ PleropJioria fidei^) was long imiversally held in the Protestant communities to be the criterion and con- iion of a true or saving Faith. Luther declares, that he who hath not -urance spews faith out ; and Melanchthon makes assurance the discrimi- nating line of Christianity from heathenism. It was maintained by Calvin, nay even by Arminius ; and is part and parcel of all the Confessions of all the Churches of the Reformation down to the Westminster Assembly. In that Synod Assurance was, in Protestantism, for the^/"s^ time declared, not '■> he of the essence of Faith ; and accordingly, the Scottish General Assembly 1-. subsequently, once and again, condemned and deposed the holders of this, I ■ doctrine of Luther, of Calvin, and of the older Scottish Church itself. In ilie English, and, more articulately, in the Irish, Establishment, it still -lands a necessary tenet of belief. Assurance is now, however, disavowed, ^vlien apprehended, by Churchmen high and low ; but of these many, like Mr Hare, are blessfully incognisant of the opinion, its import, its history, and ■von its name. This d(»gnia, with its fortune, past and present, affords indeed a series of he most curious contrasts. It is curious, that this cardinal point of Lnther's h'ctrine should, without exception, have been constituted into the funda- iiental ]mncii)le of all the Churches of the Reformation, and as their com- iion and uncatholic doctrine, have been explicitly condemned at Trent. It - furious, that this common doctrine of the Churches of the Reformation, lioiild now Ije aljandoned virtually in, or furnially by, all these Cliurchi's (hem- 494 ENGLISH UNIVERSITIES— ADMISSION OF DISSENTERS. creates in us the evil, in like manner as the good." [F. 170 f. 216.] — " The high perfection of faith, is to beheve that God ii just, notwithstanding that, by his will he renders us necessarily damnable, and seemeth to find pleasure in the torments of t] miserable." [F. 171.) — All from the treatise De Servo Arhl^. trio.~\ * ifM i selves. It is curious, that Protestants should now generally profess the counter doctrine, asserted at Trent in the condemnation of their own pria ciple. It is curious, that this the most important variation in the faith o Protestants, as, in fact, a gravitation of Protestantism back towards CathO' licity, should have been overlooked, as indeed in his days undeveloped, bj the keen-eyed author of " The history of the Variations of the Protestaa' Churches." Finally, it is curious, that, though now fully developed, thii central approximation of Protestantism to Catholicity should not, as far a I know", have been signalised by any theologian, Protestant or Catholic whilst the Protestant symbol, {Fides sola justificaty Faith alone jiistifiesy though now eviscerated of its real impoit, and now only manifesting a dif ference of expression, is still supposed to discriminate the two religious deno minations. For both agree, that the three heavenly virtues must all concul to salvation ; and they only differ, whether Faith, as a word^ does or doe; not involve Hope and Charity. This misprision would have been avoidei had Luther and Calvin only said — Fidiicia sola justificat. Assurance alone jus tifies ; for on their doctrine. Assurance was convertible with true Faith, au(' true Faith implied the other Christian graces. But this primary and pecu ' liar doctrine of the Reformation is now harmoniously condemned by Catholic; and Protestants togetlier. As to the Archdeacon, he only adds to this curious series. For it i curious, that Mr Hare should reprehend Bossuet for " grossly misrepresent ing" Luther, while Mr Hare, misunderstanding, only " grossly misrepre sents" Bossuet. And it is curious, that Mr Hare should reproach Bossuet for attributing to Luther what is, in fact, the very cardinal point of Luther' ! doctrine. — Such is the first of the Archdeacon's polemical exploits, and tli sequel of his warfare is not out of keeping with the commencement. * ]\Ir Hare's observations under this head of Speculative Theology, (p. 807- 812,) exhibit curious specimens of inconsistency, bad faith, and exquisit error. I shall adduce instances of each. Inconsisteney. — There are several others, but to take only a single example JNIi- Hare, on the one hand, thus concludes his observations upon this head :- " What a testimony is it to the soundness of Luther's doctrines, that tbi knot of garbled sentences, thus twisted and strained from then* meaning, ar all that so unscrupulous an enemy (!) has been able to scrape together agains, him, under the head of Speculative Theology ! " On the other hand, in th page immediately preceding, Mr Hare asserts, that this " so unscrupulou enemy" had " never set eyes on the original Latin of any one of these fou sentences," — all that he had " been able to scrape together" being copip' DO RELIGIOUS TESTS ENSURE RELIGIOUS TEACHERS? 4