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 Theories of knowledge historically consi 
 
 3 1924 031 223 435 
 olin.anx 
 
THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE 
 
 HISTORICALLY CONSIDERED 
 
 WITH SPECIAL REFERENCE TO SCEPTICISM 
 AND BELIEF 
 
 BY 
 
 Rev. W. D. Wilson, D.D., LL.D., L.H.D. 
 
 Professor Emeritus in Cornell University, 
 
 Author of Psychology— Comparative 
 
 AND Human, Text-Book of Logic, 
 
 Introduction to the Study 
 
 OF Metaphysics, Etc., 
 
 Etc., Etc., Etc. 
 
 SYRACUSE AND AUBURN N. Y. 
 
 WOLCOTT & WEST 
 18S9 
 
Copyright, 1889, 
 By W. D. Wilson. 
 
TO 
 
 MY FeRMER PaPILS 
 IN HOBART COLLEGE FROM 1850 to 1868 
 
 AND 
 
 IN CORNELL UNIVERSITY FROM 1868 to 1886 
 
 These i2EeraRES, 
 
 the result of much study and thought 
 
 for their bakes 
 
 Are Affectionately Dedicated 
 
 BY 
 
 THE AUTHOR. 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 I have felt for some time that there ought to be 
 some plainer statement with more familiar illus- 
 trations of the various theories of knowledge that 
 have been proposed than has yet been offered to the 
 public. I have felt, too, as though I had some 
 special opportunities for preparing such a work, 
 having been engaged in a "course of instruction for 
 nearly forty years which required me to go over the 
 subject once at least each year. 
 
 My belief is, that there is no one of these theories 
 that cannot be stated in the common language of 
 mankind and illustrated by examples so familiar as 
 to bring it within the comprehension of all ordinary 
 minds. But whether I have had too much conceit 
 in my own ability in this direction, or whether I 
 have not fully comprehended the systems them- 
 selves, are points on which the reader will judge for 
 himself. 
 
viii. PREFACE. 
 
 When Agassiz came to this country and began to 
 teach Natural History at Harvard, he is said to have 
 made the remark that when the students of Nature 
 go out from their books and their libraries to study 
 nature itself, they never find it. His complaint was, 
 that the students had been studying books, and 
 could repeat all that had been said about things, and 
 discuss very learnedly all the different views of the 
 various authors that had written on the subjects, 
 but when they came face to face with the facts and 
 objects themselves, they knew but very little about 
 them, and in many cases they could not even recog- 
 nize them when they had found them. His view 
 commends itself to all men in our day. 
 
 These men had studied books and words, rather 
 than things. And it has often appeared to me that 
 many of our students, and teachers, too, of meta- 
 physics have made the same niistake. 
 
 Words are but arbitrary signs of the things which 
 we propose to signify by them. And it is quite 
 true that in metaphysics we cannot turn from the 
 words of the author to any external facts, objects or 
 processes, which they may be supposed to represent 
 or describe. But if they are true at all they must rep- 
 resent and describe some facts or processes of an in- 
 ternal character that occur in the minds of men. 
 
PREFACE. ix. 
 
 And if they have occurred in the mind of any one 
 man and are of a general character, so as to consti- 
 tute the proper basis or material for a philosophy, 
 they must have occurred in the minds of most men, 
 and presumably, therefore, in the mind of any stu- 
 dent or reader of metaphysics. Hence, he has 
 but to look within himself to the facts of his own 
 consciousness and experience for his illustrations. 
 
 But in all cases words must be interpreted by 
 facts, if we are to have any scientific knowledge of 
 anything. 
 
 The difference I have in mind admits of an easy 
 and familiar illustration. Suppose we ask the same 
 question to a class of students. Let it be, "how is 
 the State of Tennessee bounded ?" One student 
 will recall and repeat the words which he has learned 
 from some text book ; the answer, we will suppose, 
 is perfectly correct. The other student immediately 
 recalls in imagination a map and sees the States that 
 are around Tennessee, and gives their narnes. And 
 he, too, is perfectly correct. But he describes the 
 thing and uses his own words for that purpose, 
 while the former student repeats the words he has 
 learned, and this, as we often see, may be done with- 
 out the slightest idea of their meaning. 
 
 Most of the theories of knowledge that have been 
 
X. PREFACE. 
 
 given to the world have been written in languages 
 that are foreign to us and some of them in ages that 
 have long since gone by. Hence the words which 
 these authors used are often such as admit of no full 
 and adequate translation by words that are familar 
 in our language. Nor can they be paraphrased 
 so as to make their meaning obvious to the inex- 
 perienced reader. What we want.is not "the very 
 words " of the author, but some explanation of what 
 he meant by the words he used. 
 
 Of course, a knowledge of the words, as given in 
 this Grammar, and the meaning of their terms, as 
 given in the Dictionaries of these languages, is indis- 
 pensable. But, more than that, and more, too, than 
 a knowledge of the facts of which the author is 
 speaking, is necessary to a right apprehension of 
 what he really meant to say. There must be some 
 familiarity with the habits of thought and the modes 
 of expressing them that' were in current use at the 
 time when the author wrote. 
 
 I write chiefly for those who read only the English 
 language and that, too, the English that is in com- 
 mon use in denoting common things, and in express- 
 ing the thoughts that are common to most men of 
 intelligence. Hence, it has been my constant care 
 and aim, while giving the technical terms that are 
 
PREFACE. xi. 
 
 used for the sake of scholars, to give also a common 
 sense statement of the doctrine that is conveyed or 
 rather, perhaps, often concealed by them, with free 
 and very familiar illustrations for the use of those 
 who have no taste for those things. 
 
 But, after all, I fear, it must be confessed that 
 there are certain minds to which many of the truths 
 of metaphysics cannot be made so plain as to come 
 within a range of their entire comprehension. 
 
 Recent discoveries and discussions have made us 
 familiar with the phenomena of color-blindness. 
 Many persons who are not at all deficient in the 
 sense of hearing are what we may, perhaps, call 
 music-deaf. Most animals hear the words we speak 
 as well as we can, and yet they are sense-blind. That 
 is, they can attach to most of the words they hear 
 none of that sense which makes them so influential 
 with us. 
 
 One of the best mathematicians I ever knew could 
 not learn any foreign language ; and one of the best 
 linguists I have ever seen could not understand any- 
 thing of mathematics beyond its very first principles. 
 He could repeat wordf or word the demonstrations 
 in his Geometry and even, to some extent, in the 
 higher mathematics, but he could neither understand 
 them nor see their force as proof of the proposition 
 they were intended to demonstrate. 
 
xii. PREFACE. 
 
 In view of these facts, we ought not to be sur- 
 prised if there are some minds which are very highly 
 gifted for other departments of knowledge, that have 
 no taste for metaphysics and find it difficult, if not 
 quite impossible, to understand their more abstruse 
 principles. 
 
 And these considerations must be accepted as my 
 reason (and apology, if apology be deemed necessary) 
 for the frequent recurrence and repetition of some 
 of the more fundamental facts and doctrines, in 
 different relations, and with a greater variety of illus- 
 trations than I should otherwise have thought desir- 
 able. 
 
 With these remarks I commend the book to the 
 consideration of the reader, trusting that when he 
 shall have carefully considered its contents he will 
 have a clearer and better idea of the scope and ex- 
 tent of what may be regarded as knowledge, whether 
 attained or attainable, as well as a more adequate 
 idea of what we may properly believe and reasonably 
 hope for, whether as a matter of science and knowl- 
 edge in this world, or of faith and hope in the world 
 
 to come. 
 
 W. D. WILSON. 
 Syracuse, Feb., 1889. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 LECTURE I. 
 
 PLATO AND THE THEORY OF IDEAS. 
 
 § I. Introduction, p. i. § 2. Philosophy in Greece before Plato, p. 
 3. § 3. Necessity for Ideas, p. 4. J 4. The Nature of Ideas, 
 p. 4. § 5. Their Supernatural Origin, p. g. $ 6, Inferences 
 from this Theory, p. 12. § 7. Discernible by Insight, p. 13. 
 § 8. Two Kinds of Knowledge, p. 17. § 9. Ideas in Rela- 
 tion to the Properties of Objects, p. 21. $ 10. Plato's Theism, 
 p. 32. § II. Idealistic Tendencies, p. 36. § 12. His Theory 
 of Creation, p. 40. 
 
 LECTURE IL 
 
 ARTISTOTLE AND HIS THEORY OF COGNITION. 
 
 ^ I. Aristotle's Relation to Plato, p. 51. § 2. The Nature of Lan- 
 guage, p. 52. § 3. Some Peculiarities of the Greek, p. 56. 
 § 4. Aristotle rejects Plato's Theory of Ideas, p. 60. § 5. 
 Observation the Starting Point, p. 63. § 6. The Formation 
 of Ideas, p. 66. § 7. Essential of Properties, p. 70. § 8. 
 The Means and Way of Discriminating them, p. 77. § g. 
 The Processes of Reasoning, p. 82. 5 10. Different Kinds 
 and Degrees of Certainty, p. 86. $ 11. Aristotle's Ten Cate- 
 gories, p. gi. 5 12. The Four Categories of Science, p. 94. 
 § 13. First and Final Causes. 
 
xiv. CONTENTS. 
 
 LECTURE. III. 
 
 THE MIDDLE AGES ; DESCARTES AND LOCKE. 
 
 % I. Philosophy in the Middle Ages, p. gg. % 2. Realism and Nom- 
 inalism, p. ICO. % 3. The Scholastic Method, p. 107. § 4. 
 Descartes' Classification of Ideas, p. iii. § 5. His Theory 
 of Knowledge, p. 114. % 6. Difficulties of his Theory of 
 Perception, p. ilg. § 7. Locke's Predecessors, Bacon and 
 Hobbes, p. 121. $ 8. Locke's View of the Nature of Ideas, 
 p. I2g. } 9. His Theory of their Origin, p. 132. § 10. 
 Means of Testing his Theory, p. 134. § 11. Necessary Ax- 
 ioms, p. I3g. § 12. Relations of Ideas to Things, p. 141. 
 
 LECTURE IV. 
 
 CRITICS AND DISCIPLES OF LOCKE. 
 
 § I. Locke's system not well understood, p. 147. § 2. Reid's efforts 
 to counteract its bad influences, p. 148. § 3. Cousin's miscon- 
 ception of Locke, p. 151. J 4. His examination of Locke's 
 tests, p. 55. § 15. The Idea of the Infinite, p. 161. § 6. 
 Results of Cousin's Criticisms, p. 167. § 7. The Principle of 
 causation, p. 170. § 8. Comte's Positivism, p. 176. § 9. Mind 
 not an Abstraction, p. 178. § 10. Sir William Hamilton's 
 Theory of Perception, p. 182. § 11. Anglican Agnosticism, 
 p. 168. § 12. The Relativity of Knowledge. 
 
 LECTURE V. 
 
 KANT AND HEGEL. 
 
 § I. Some Peculiarities of the German Language, p. 203. § 2. 
 Kant's Relation to Locke and Raid, p. 206. § 3. Kant's 
 "Schemata," -g. 2og. §4. His Theory of Time and Space, 
 p. 2g2. § 5. His Categories, p. 213. § 6. His Classification 
 of Propositions with reference to Certainty, p. 215. § 7. His 
 Antinomies, p. 222. § 8. Extent of his Agnosticism, p. 225 
 § g. Hegel's relation to Kant, p. 227. § 10. Absolute Being. 
 p.228. § II. This View compared with Aristotle's, p. 231. §12. 
 Hegel's Law of Co-ordination, p. 232. § 13. Application to 
 Ontology, p. 235. § 14. Hegel's Idealism, 242. 
 
CONTENTS XV. 
 
 LECTURE VI. 
 THE EXTENT OF REALITY. — {The Use of Fiction) 
 
 § I. Summary Review, p. 253. § 2. Points gained, p 254. § 3. 
 Touch and Sight, p. 256. § 4. The Law of Co-ordination, p. 
 258. § 5. Axioms first in the Logical Order, p. 262. § 6. 
 Inertia and Spontaneity, p. 266. § 7. The Law of Causation, 
 p. 274. § 8. Illustrations from Science, p. 277. § 9. Illus- 
 trations from History, p. 281. § 10. Three Departments of 
 Knowledge, p. 286. §11. Rules for Testing Reality, p. 291. 
 § 12. Examples of the Use of Fictions, p. 294. § 13. 
 Rules for Testing Them, p. 297. § 14. Necessity for their 
 Use, p. 298. § 15. Examples in constant use, p. 303. 
 
THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 LECTURE I. 
 PLATO AND THE THEORY OF IDEAS. 
 
 § I. Theories of knowledge lie at the foundation 
 of all other theories. No theory can be formed, and 
 scarcely a statement can be made, on any subject of 
 human thought, that does not imply and presuppose 
 some theory of knowledge — a theory of its origin, 
 our means of knowing, and both the foundations and 
 the extent of that which we can claim to know. 
 
 In the ages past several theories have been pro- 
 posed, and gained a more or less wide reception 
 among mankind. And each one of them, during the 
 period of its prevalence, and throughout the extent 
 to which it prevailed, exerted a very marked and 
 powerful influence on many of the practical opinions 
 of the age — both theological and moral — which were 
 of the greatest importance to mankind. 
 
 It has been said by as good an authority as Sir 
 William Hamilton, " that no theological dogma has 
 
2 - THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 ever been set forth by the Church or by any branch 
 of it, whose phraseology had not been derived from 
 some one or another of the systems of philosophy 
 that have prevailed, to such an extent that it means 
 one thing or another, according as its terms are inter- 
 preted by one or another of these systems ; and that 
 the various meanings thus given, or rather attached 
 to, it are often quite the reverse and contradictory of 
 each other." 
 
 For this reason, if for no other, it would seem that 
 some knowledge of metaphysics, or theories of knowl- 
 edge, is indispensable to all educated men. There 
 are, in fact, practical principles of great importance, 
 which they can understand and apply in all the ordi- 
 nary affairs of life, without much comprehension of 
 the more abstruse points that occupy so large a space 
 in any of our professed treatises on the subject. Met- 
 aphysics is, in this respect, like most other sciences ; 
 men often apply their principles without knowing the 
 reasons for them. 
 
 It is my purpose in these Lectures to give a plain, 
 common sense statement of these theories, with fa- 
 miliar illustrations ; and to point out the influences 
 which they have exerted, and some, at least, of the 
 diversities in the religious belief and moral practices 
 of mankind, to which the different theories of knowl- 
 edge have led. 
 
 It is a very common impression that there is no 
 philosophy that explains the facts and phenomena of 
 human nature and human belief ; but only this man's 
 opinion and that man's system — no science or phi- 
 
PLATO AND THE THEORY OF IDEAS. 3 
 
 losophy in the case in fact, which rests upon undis- 
 puted facts, and is built up by the methods that give 
 intelHgibility and certainty to the results that are at- 
 tained, or attainable, in other departments of thought 
 and inquiry. 
 
 I fear that this is true to a very large extent; 
 much ■ farther than it ought to be. What we call 
 metaphysics is unintelligible to most persons. And 
 scarcely can we cite an opinion that is not disputed 
 and controverted ; so that the number of doctrines or 
 principles in which all are agreed is exceedingly 
 small. I can hardly recall one. 
 
 § 2. Philosophy began in Greece with Thales, born 
 about 640 B. c, and Pythagoras about 580 B. c. — 
 and in part at least — as a protest and reaction against 
 the prevailing polytheism and mythology. These 
 earlier philosophers, however, were neither material- 
 ists nor atheists. The contemplation of nature and 
 of the human mind, and the direct study of their 
 phenomena, led them to a belief in one Supreme 
 Mind. But among the philosophers, diversity of 
 views and different systems arose, until the necessity 
 for some criterion — %ovsxt. theory oi knowledge — its 
 foundation and limits, and our means of acquiring it, 
 became not only a manifest, but a controlling neces- 
 sity. 
 
 Plato stands first in the order of time, in furnishing 
 a theory of knowledge, and is certainly equal to any 
 of them in the grandeur of his genius, the beauty of 
 his diction, and the poetry of his illustrations. Soc- 
 rates had preceded him. But Socrates left nothing 
 
4 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 in writing behind him. He was a man of most mar- 
 velous insight. But so far as our subject is concerned, 
 he seems to have contented himself with assuming 
 and asserting the fact that, some how or other, man 
 has such an insight into the nature of things, and es- 
 pecially of human actions, that he does know, or can 
 discern, the difference between right and wrong, if he 
 will only take the pains to look into such matters. 
 
 § 3. But Plato saw the necessity of looking — if not 
 deeper (and that is hardly possible) — yet more com- 
 prehensively into the subject. In his view popular 
 opinion, hol^a, the mere sense-impressions and opin- 
 ions, such as prevails among the unreflecting masses 
 — and all mere masses of men are unreflecting — is 
 often faulty and wrong, and is never scientific knowl- 
 edge; whereas scientific knowledge — the rational 
 comprehension of things, eTrto-Tjj/^i/, which is the at- 
 tainment of the few, is of inestimable value. But 
 how do they get it ? That is the great question. 
 
 Of course Plato saw, as we now know, that we can 
 understand, or comprehend, any fact or object only 
 as we see it as one in a class or genus, and in the light 
 of a general law or principle. When, for example, 
 we call an object a plant or an animal, we afifirm a 
 great deal concerning it, and imply a general idea of 
 both plants and animals. When we say of this heav- 
 enly body, it is a planet, or it is a fixed star, we have 
 indicated concerning it vastly more than the mere 
 fact that it is one of the shining bodies that we see 
 nightly over our heads, or in what we call the sky, or 
 than the wholly uneducated man knows concerning it. 
 
PLATO AND THE THEORY OF IDJ^AS. 5 
 
 What Plato was thus inquiring for have, since his 
 time, been called ideas. And knowledge is consid- 
 ered or made up of ideas ; just as the material world 
 is made up of the innumerable and endlessly varied 
 objects that we see and handle around us. 
 
 These ideas are considered to be of two classes or 
 kinds : the one class are idea-images that exactly rep- 
 resent the individual objects that we see and handle ; 
 and the other class consists of those general ideas 
 that represent classes or objects, but no one of them 
 in particular, or exactly as it appears. 
 
 Now these principles or general ideas, if they do 
 not make, are yet essential to, what Plato called sci- 
 ence or scientific knowledge {einffTrinri). 
 
 § 4. But how do we come by these principles ? 
 How do we gain true knowledge? and of what does 
 it consist when contrasted with first impressions — 
 mere ho^a, or popular opinion ? 
 
 Plato saw that every individual thing that we see 
 or can see is changeable. Not only may what is hot 
 now be cold to-morrow, but the same substance may 
 be solid, as ice or snow to-day — fluid, as water to- 
 morrow — evanescent as steam, or invisible moisture 
 or gas the next day. Nay, whatever is seen and ob- 
 served to exist is, and must be, seen in some particu- 
 lar place. And the act of seeing it is one that occurs 
 at some point of what we call time. And yet place 
 and time are constantly changing for all things. 
 Hence his starting-point : " There is no science of the 
 variable." But what is the '' variable " ? Every ob- 
 ject that we see is "variable," We can neither see 
 
6 'THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 nor touch with the hands anything that is not varia- 
 ble. 
 
 In the Theatetus this point is argued at great 
 length. "Theatetus," in answer to Socrates' ques-' 
 tion, says that all knowledge rests on sense-percep- 
 tion. " He that knows anything appears to perceive 
 what he knows, and, as it now seems, science is noth- 
 ing but perception " (ato-^jjaw). But after a long ar- 
 gumentation he is brought to confess that perception 
 and science can never be the same ; and that in order 
 to have any science, or any true comprehension of 
 things, there must be something besides mere sense- 
 perception — something more than we can get by the 
 mere observation of objects. 
 
 His argument is based upon the acknowledged va- 
 riability and changefulness of all visible things. He 
 takes a wide range for examples and illustrations, and 
 finally reaches the conclusion, which he announces 
 by saying : " Sight and hearing convey no truth to 
 men." " But this, as it seems to me, is the result," 
 he continues, "if all things are in motion, or a state 
 of change, every answer, on whatever subject it may 
 be given, will be equally correct, whether we say that 
 a thing is so or not so, or, if you will, becomes so, 
 we may not fix them by any definite assertion." 
 
 The remark that immediately follows is not in the 
 language of any of our modern systems ; but seems 
 to me to be merely the assertion, that if we have no 
 means of knowledge but sense-perception, we cannot 
 only not have any general ideas or truths as the basis 
 of our knowledge, but we could not have even so 
 
PLATO AND THE THEORY OF IDEAS. 7 
 
 much as any general terms, or common nouns in our 
 languages; we could not even say that "this is a 
 man," "that is a horse," "that is a plant or an ani- 
 mal ;" for man, horse, plant and animal are general 
 terms. Or, as he says, we cannot even say of any- 
 thing, " it is so, or it is not so." 
 
 Hence his first inferences ; we gain and can gain 
 no knowledge — that is, not science — by observation ; 
 we must have some other source and means of knowl- 
 edge ; for knowledge we have, that Socrates demon- 
 strated beyond further question, so far at least as 
 moral truths and relations are concerned. We may 
 get in. this way idea-images of individual things, but 
 as Plato thought, not those general ideas, without 
 which there is no science or scientific comprehen- 
 sion of anything. 
 
 Let us not, however, by our hasty generalizations, 
 overlook a very important point. Sense-perception 
 — or perception — never comes alone ; there is always 
 one more intellectual act that accompanies it — almost 
 if not always two ; the one, that almost always ac- 
 companies it, is an act of imagination by which we 
 form an idea-image of the object we perceive ; 'the 
 other act which, in man, always accompanies percep- 
 tion, is insight — a seeing into the nature of the ob- 
 ject. Plato fully recognizes this distinction, though 
 he does not seem to have seen the fact, or at least 
 to have done full justice to it, that the latter — insight 
 — always accompanies sense-perception. Perception 
 he calls aia-6r]a-i^, whereas insight is indicated in his 
 phraseology by its more appropriate term voT/o-t?. 
 By this latter process we discriminate, in the very act 
 
8 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 of sense-perception, between the essential properties 
 of the object we see, and the mere changeable, if not 
 changing, accidents which make up what he calls 
 motion, /ctvjjo-t?, so that when we see an object we 
 see also its essential nature, and we can say not 
 only that it is, but also what it is, as a man, a horse, 
 etc. 
 
 We must always remember that the words «So? 
 and /iSed, which are translated " idea," and which are 
 in fact two Greek forms of one word, are derived 
 from the verb e'tSw, which means to see. Hence the 
 noun eiSo? means the thing that is seen, as its first 
 significance, and the word Ihia means the form or 
 outward appearance of the thing. And both words 
 are used very constantly to denote the form or ap- 
 pearance of the thing that is seen. Hence to the 
 mind of a Greek, and to one in these times who is 
 familiar with the Greek, they have a force that is not 
 likely to be felt by other persons. 
 
 It may be well, however, to state explicitly that in 
 our modern usage the word idea is used in at least 
 four different senses, (i) In the first place it is used 
 to d'enote an image — idea-image — in the mind that is 
 just like the object we see. (2) The word is used to 
 denote what is called an ideal, something that serves 
 as a pattern by which we are to be guided in our ef- 
 forts to produce something, or as a standard to which 
 we compare objects, and which is considered to be 
 more perfect than any reality we can have before us ; 
 more perfect, therefore, than any idea-image we can 
 possibly have. 
 
PLATO AND THE THEORY OF IDEAS. g 
 
 Then (3) we have what we call general ideas, which 
 represent to the mind no one object, possible or real, 
 but rather a class of objects — as man, horse, etc., by 
 the properties that are common to them all. We 
 sometimes (4) also speak of a collective idea, or one 
 that denotes a group of objects, as a congress, a 
 church, a forest, a landscape, etc. 
 
 Nor is this all. In our modern use of language the 
 word " idea" is used to denote any thought, however 
 complex. Knowledge is, in fact, considered as made 
 up of ideas — ideas of things, ideas of classes, ideas of 
 groups or collective wholes, as well as ideas of theo- 
 ries and systems. We often speak of a thing as an 
 idea, when, perhaps, it would be better to say an 
 opinion ; except that the word opinion implies some- 
 thing of assent or belief, whereas the word idea does 
 not. 
 
 We must remember that Plato no where gives a 
 systematic statement of his theory of the nature of 
 ideas, nor does he seem to have deliberately consid- 
 ered all the various meanings of the word which we, 
 in modern times, have given to it. In fact it was 
 scarcely used for this purpose before the time of 
 Plato. It often meant the kind or form of a thing, 
 as " the appearance of death," "the kind or type of a 
 disease." It was scarcely used to denote a thought 
 or state of the mind until it was so used by Plato. 
 
 I will therefore make a selection of passages from 
 Plato, for the purpose of exhibiting his use of the 
 word. 
 
 § 5. And I begin with the one found in the Repub- 
 
lO THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 lie (B. X, c. i). He is there evidently explaining the 
 nature of ideas to those who do not understand what 
 he meant by the word. 
 
 Plato cites the case of a cabinet-maker, and as ex- 
 amples, bedsteads and tables. He says that for these 
 two classes of objects, bedsteads and -tables, there 
 must be two ideas, one for all the bedsteads and an- 
 other for all the tables. And the workman, " look- 
 ing to the idea which is in his own mind," makes the 
 lumber in the one case into a bedstead. But if he 
 looks at the other idea, the idea of tables, and is 
 guided by it, he makes a table. The artificer makes 
 the table or the bed, indeed ; but he does not make 
 the idea. Not at all. " So," as he argues, " the Art- 
 ificer who made all things must have had the ideas of 
 them in His mind before He made them." "Not, 
 only all sorts of utensils, but everything also which 
 springs from the earth. He makes all sorts of ani- 
 mals, and besides these things He makes the earth, 
 the heavens and all things in Heaven and Hades, 
 under the earth, as well." "You are speaking," said 
 the hearers, " of a wonderful sophist " [wiseman]. 
 " But tell me, do you not believe there is such an 
 Artificer?" Then a question is raised about the cre- 
 ation of all things. 
 
 Plato illustrates his view by supposing that we 
 take a mirror and carry it around everywhere. It 
 makes images of all things, and these images of things 
 are, in Plato's theory, to the things themselves as the 
 objects we see and handle in the world of time and 
 space are to the ideas of them which are in the I)i- 
 vine Mind. 
 
PLATO AND THE THEORY OF IDEAS. 1 1 
 
 In the case before us, however, Plato seems to 
 confound, or rather not to discriminate between, 
 what we, in the more exact phraseology of our day, 
 distinguish by the two nouns, general ideas and 
 ideals. A general idea, as I have said, a^^notes — or, 
 as some persons prefer to say, connotes — many indi- 
 viduals in a class, without indicating or describing 
 any one of them. Whereas an ideal is the idea of 
 some one thing — a pattern, in fact, in the mind, like 
 which we try to make and fashion something, some 
 work of art. 
 
 In another place Plato compares the objects that 
 we see to the shadows that we might see in a cave, if 
 we were standing at its mouth looking into it, with 
 the light behind us, and the ideas floating in the light 
 behind and casting their shadows by us on to the 
 wall of the cave, which is opposite to the light {Rep., 
 B. VII, c. i). 
 
 But I think that with the aid of modern science 
 we can give a better illustration of his thought on 
 this point than Plato has done. Take the case of a 
 lamp before a concave polyhedral reflector. Each 
 one of the little facets gives forth an image, no two 
 of which are in the same plane or exactly alike. The 
 lamp is one and the same for them all. So in Plato's 
 theory, there is in the Divine Mind one idea for all 
 the objects in any one species — the idea is general 
 and one, however many and numerous the objects in 
 that class may be — that is, the idea represents the 
 objects by all the properties that are common to 
 them all, but does not represent any one of them in 
 particular. 
 
12 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 But as patterns or paradigms, they may be either 
 what are called ideals or general ideas, though the 
 language Plato uses would seem to imply the latter. 
 
 § 6. What then was Plato's theory of the origin we 
 have of our real knowledge ? We must keep in mind 
 his doctrine that we can get no knowledge — that is, 
 no scientific comprehension of things, by observation 
 of the things themselves — that is, by what we in 
 modern times call a posteriori method. 
 
 I begin with a passage in that beautiful little dia- 
 logue, the Meno. It will be remembered that Plato 
 no where gives a systematic statement of his views 
 on this subject. His theory is to be deduced — de- 
 duced, I say, for he no where elaborately states it — 
 from scattered passages that are to be found through- 
 out his works. And it must be remembered, too, 
 that he says nothing in his own name. He puts all 
 of his thoughts into the mouth of Socrates, as chief 
 interlocutor in his dialogues. 
 
 In the dialogue now under consideration Plato is 
 trying to show the nature of virtue. But to under- 
 stand the nature of virtue we must fall back on a 
 general principle, or idea. And here, as everywhere, 
 we can understand any particular thing, as he thinks, 
 only as we "see it in the light of its principle." 
 What is virtue.? and how are we to distinguish it 
 from something that is of a very different character? 
 Or, in other words, what is the origin and value, or 
 validity of our idea of virtue? The case is the more 
 important and in.structive becau.se it was. invented 
 and given for the purpose of illustrating this, very 
 point. 
 
PLATO AND THE THEORY OF IDEAS. 
 
 13 
 
 The example is as follows : Socrates calls a boy 
 before them and making a rectangular figure on the 
 ground, asks the boy what he calls it ? He then says : 
 Suppose the sides are equal and each side is two feet 
 long, how many feet in the surface ? The boy an- 
 swers, after a moment's reflection, four. Then Soc- 
 rates says, suppose each side were just twice as long 
 as at present, that is, four feet, what would be the 
 area? The boy answers at first that it would be just 
 twice as much, or eight feet. Socrates continues to 
 ask the boy questions, one after the other, until he 
 sees that his first answer was wrong, and that the 
 space with twice the length of the sides would be, 
 in fact, four times as great, or sixteen feet. 
 
 During all this time Socrates keeps calling atten- 
 tion to the fact that he is not teaching or telling the 
 boy anything ; he is only asking him questions. And 
 by this means the boy is led to a truth or an idea 
 that he had not in his mind, or rather could not give 
 expression to, at the beginning of the questioning. 
 
 § 7. From this Socrates, or rather Plato, makes 
 several inferences. The first, in order, is that the 
 mind or soul is something entirely distinct from the 
 body : the next is that the mind or soul had in it, 
 before these questions were put to him, the truth, 
 knowledge or idea, which the questioning merely 
 called into his consciousness, so that he knew and 
 was conscious of knowing it. And finally in this 
 way and in this connection he infers not only the 
 immortality of the soul, but also its pre-existence. 
 " If, then, the truth of things," that is, their ideas, 
 
H 
 
 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 " always exist in the soul, the soul itself must be 
 immortal." And again, " if he always possessed the 
 truth or the ideas, he must have been always in be- 
 ing, as a person." But even if he had acquired these 
 ideas at any previous time, it could not have been 
 in this life; it must' therefore have been in a previ- 
 ous state of existence. Hence on this theory they 
 are called innate ideas. 
 
 From this fact, or part of this theory, Plato infers 
 that what we call education should be conducted 
 chiefly by questioning. It is not the imparting or 
 conveying of ideas to the mind of another, but it is 
 reminiscence, memory, or the recalling of ideas, that 
 we had in a previous state of existence and have for- 
 gotten since we left it to enter into the bodies we 
 now possess. "For," says he, " all objects in nat- 
 ure making one whole being of one kind," or, as we 
 would say, making one summum genus, and the soul 
 having heretofore, "in its previous state of exist- 
 ence," known all things, "there is nothing to pre- 
 vent a man who remembers at all — what we call 
 learning any one thing — from receiving again all the 
 rest," if he has but the courage and perseverance to 
 do so. 
 
 It is manifest from this that Plato regarded 
 .knowledge, or true science, as made up of general 
 ideas, and as but the collective whole or sum of 
 ideas. And these ideas were not mere thoughts — 
 mere states of the mind ; they were something in the 
 mind, something that could be in the mind before 
 we were born, and in the mind even when the mind 
 was not thinking at all. 
 
PLATO AND THE THEORY OF IDEAS. 
 
 15 
 
 I think it worth the while to pause here for a mo- 
 ment to make a remark that seems to me to be ob- 
 viously suggested by this example. It will help to 
 illustrate and make intelligible a good deal of what 
 we shall encounter at a later stage of our discus- 
 sions. 
 
 When Socrates asked the boy the question, how 
 many square feet are there in a square whose sides 
 are each of them two feet, he excited the boy's im- 
 agination. He could easily picture before his mind, 
 by what we call an act of intuition, just such a 
 square, and see by intuition of the picture thus cre- 
 ated precisely how many feet there were. It was 
 intuition, the looking upon the object or its picture 
 by imagination and not insight, the looking into the 
 nature of the object. And he answered at once and 
 correctly. But when Socrates asked him how many 
 feet in a square with twice the length of the sides, 
 he had proposed a question that went beyond the 
 ready exercise of imagination and mere intuition; 
 the boy could not see at a mere glance of intuition 
 any more than with a mere glance of the eye, if 
 such an object had been before him, how many 
 square feet there were in the figure ; he must at 
 least take time to count. But instead of that he 
 made a mere verbal inference : If the side is "twice' 
 as long, the area will be " twice " as great. There 
 has been an immense amount of what is called phi- 
 losophy, which has been the result of just this kind 
 of mental exercise. It is a mere verbal inference or 
 construction, with no intuition, much less has in- 
 
1 6 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 sight into the nature of the things that are spoken of. 
 
 But in the case of the boy, the answer, as we have 
 seen, was wrong. And it is equally true that Soc- 
 rates did not tell him anything — that is, " convey 
 any idea into his mind." What then did he do? 
 He began by asking questions that excited and 
 called into exercise his insight into the nature of the 
 case, and thus he led the boy on, step by step, to 
 see not only that he was wrong, but also what was 
 the truth in regard to the matter. 
 
 We have then sight, by which we see things when 
 they are before us ; intuition, by which we look 
 upon them and imagine them as if they were before 
 us when they are not ; and insight, by which we 
 look into them, even into the very nature of things 
 and in some cases even into the nature of things 
 that are not visible to the eye or subject to imagin- 
 ation at all in any proper sense of the word. 
 
 This reference to memory or reminiscence, as the 
 origin of our ideas, is not a mere casual remark, an 
 obiter dictum, but it is asserted emphatically and 
 with reiteration. " Meno," in the dialogue already 
 quoted, had asked Socrates, " But how say you this, 
 namely, that we do not learn, but that what we call 
 learning is only recollection ? Can you teach me 
 that this is so ? " Socrates replies : " You are very 
 crafty, Meno. You ask me to teach you something 
 when I have just told you that there is no such 
 thing as teaching, but only reminiscence." And so, 
 repeatedly, he calls attention to the fact that he had 
 told or taught the boy nothing, but only quickened 
 his memory by the questions he had put to him. 
 
PLATO AND THE THEORY OF IDEAS. 
 
 17 
 
 And so, likewise, the inferences he draws from the 
 case imply that the act is one of memory or remem- 
 bering alone, and that the ideas are substantial real- 
 ities in the mind, and not mere thoughts or states of 
 the mind. From this case, as I have already said, 
 Plato infers, not only the pre-existence of the soul in 
 a different state before our birth, but also its immor- 
 tality in some future state. 
 
 § 8. But in another connection Plato speaks in 
 different terms of this process. In the Republic 
 (B VII, c. 10) he speaks of these ideas, which he has 
 come to regard and to affirm to be the only real 
 things in the universe — all else being but mere shad- 
 ows of the ideas — he affirms, I say, that they are 
 seen by " the reason and not by the eyes," {vo'qtreiv, 
 oW ovK ofifiaaiv), and he says (c 1 1), " which things 
 can indeed be seen by reason," or, as we had bet- 
 ter, perhaps, translate the word (w^o-t?) insight. He 
 also uses the word \o'709 and Sidvoia, to indicate the 
 kind of mental action. In(B. VII, c. 3 and 4) Plato 
 speaks of the dullness of our intellect, comparing it 
 to our experience in regard to vision. When we are 
 passing, as he says, either from great light into par- 
 tial darkness, or the reverse, from darkness into a 
 very strong light, the eyes • are blurred, so that 
 we cannot see distinctly. And when we consider 
 that the same thing takes place in reference to the 
 soul and its ideas, when it enters the body, we shall 
 not be surprised at the defect in the intelligence or 
 insight of most men. But we should rather consider 
 that the soul, " in coming into this world and enter- 
 2 
 
1 8 THEORIES OF KNO WLEDGE. 
 
 ing into the body, has come out of a more brilliant 
 existence and is now partly blinded by change of 
 condition ; or else that it is emerging out of gross 
 darkness into a more luminous state of being, and 
 thus one will congratulate it on the former life 
 while he pities the present." 
 
 The two theories are thus distinctly set forth : 
 that of innate ideas- which were in the mind before 
 birth in such a way that our acquisition of knowl- 
 edge now, and in this state of being, is but properly 
 a form of reminiscence or recollection, and the other, 
 that these ideas are a matter of insight, to be ob- 
 tained, not by observation of external things, but 
 by intuition or introspection. In either case they 
 are supposed to be realities within us ; in the one 
 case they are called up by recollection, so as to form 
 a part of our real knowledge, and in the other they 
 are discerned in us by an act of intuition or intro- 
 spection. 
 
 And yet if we look a little deeper or sharper into 
 the subject I think that we shall see that the two 
 theories thus suggested are not at all inconsistent 
 with each other ; and that we may be doing Plato 
 an injustice to so speak of them. If the ideas were 
 in the mind, but forgotten, we might easily speak 
 of the act of recalling them as one of insight, dis- 
 crimination, and possibly reasoning ; the voluntary 
 effort which we are conscious of making to recall 
 them might easily be regarded and spoken of as 
 looking for or into them. 
 
 In the example I have cited, Plato might be re- 
 
PLATO AND THE THEORY OF IDEAS. 
 
 19 
 
 garded as having in view only those ideas that make 
 up what we call intuitive or a priori knowledge — 
 that is, such knowledge as we gain by mere insight 
 and without any actual cognition of any object. Of 
 this kind are all the self-evident axioms that lie at 
 the foundation of mathematics, and indeed of all 
 other sciences. I know, for example, that this ob- 
 ject is an apple, that is, it belongs to the class ap- 
 ples, by seeing it, handling it and tasting it. I 
 know, also, as soon as 1 see that it is an apple, that 
 it grew on a tree, is good for food, contains within 
 it seeds that will germinate, grow and produce other 
 apples. I know, too, in that case, that the seeds are 
 not likely to produce fruit of precisely the same kind, 
 size, color, flavor, etc., as the apple from which they 
 were taken. But all this is a posteriori — that is, I 
 know it after having seen the apple, seen other ap- 
 ples, formed a general idea of apples and known 
 something of their growth and the laws of their re- 
 production. 
 
 But if we refer again to Plato's example, we find 
 truths or ideas of a different order. We know that 
 two and two are four, not from observation, but 
 from the nature of the case and insight into the nat- 
 ure of number. I know that this object is a man, 
 and that object is an apple, because I have seen men 
 and apples. But it is no matter what they are, 
 whether men, apples or peanuts, two and two of 
 of them must and will be four. A square, no mat- 
 ter of what, paper, cloth or land, or water surface, 
 two feet on each side, will contain four square feet ; 
 
20 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 and if it is four feet on the side it will contain six- 
 teen square feet. 
 
 And so of all the truths of pure mathematics ; and 
 the axioms of the physical sciences as well. What- 
 ever is extended is divisible. No mere process of 
 analysis or synthesis, such as we can perform in our 
 chemistry, can either create or annihilate a particle 
 of matter. Hence the sum of the parts must be 
 equal to the whole, and the whole must weigh as 
 much as, and can weigh no more than, the parts 
 that went into its composition. 
 
 But we explain the origin of this knowledge — this 
 part of our knowledge — by reference to intuition or 
 insight. Does the act disclose or discover eternal 
 ideas that were always in our minds ? Does it 
 awaken memory and recall ideas that we once had 
 in a previous state of being, but have now forgotten ? 
 This was Plato's theory, and it matters not so far as 
 that is concerned whether we get them by recollec- 
 tion or by insight. 
 
 We can understand the process and the facts in 
 the case just as well, however, without supposing 
 that there are any ideas in the mind, but only a 
 change in the state and condition of the mind. And 
 I think that this latter view is the one towards 
 which philosophy is tending, even if it has not 
 reached it already. 
 
 We will suppose, for the sake of illustration, that 
 I have never seen an alligator, never, in fact, have 
 heard or seen the word before. But now I have one 
 before me. I see it and know what it is. Had I an 
 
PLATO AND THE THEORY OF IDEAS. 2 1 
 
 idea of it— or rather of the species — in my mind be- 
 fore, though lying latent and (perhaps) dormant 
 there ? That would be in accordance with Plato's 
 theory. Did I form an idea of it while looking at 
 it ? That would be in accordance with a more re- 
 cent theory of knowledge. Or, on the contrary, is 
 there no idea, or idea-image of the case, but only a 
 change in myself? I have just eaten my dinner, 
 but in a few hours I shall be hungry. Is the hunger 
 a thing that comes and goes ? or is it a state of the 
 system ? Is it a thing that is " formed " within me ? 
 Or is it only a state of myself that I denote by that 
 name ? Before I saw the alligator I was ignorant. 
 After I had seen him I am knowing what he is, both 
 the thing and the meaning of the word. Is there 
 anything in all this, more, or other, than a change in 
 myself, the state or condition of my mind ? As I 
 have said, I think that such is the theory of knowl- 
 edge to which we are tending. 
 
 We have then before us two of the passages in 
 which Plato makes, as it seems to me, the most dis- 
 tinct and lucid statements of his theory of the nat- 
 ure and origin of our ideas. But he no where gives 
 us a systematic or connected statement of his theo- 
 ry. We are left, therefore, to do the best we can 
 by making our own selections and grouping of what 
 seems best for our purpose. 
 
 § 9. If now we consider the two examples we 
 have cited, we shall find that Plato has been consid- 
 ering each of the two parts into which all science or 
 scientific knowledge is divided, or rather the two 
 
22 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 parts of which it is composed. The one part I have 
 already designated as a priori. It is sometimes also 
 called absolute, because its truths are universal and 
 admit of no exceptions. It is totally independent 
 of experience and observation, and would have been 
 just*as true as it now is, if no one thing had ever 
 existed in heaven or on earth. We get it not from 
 looking at things themselves and studying them by 
 means of our organs of sense, but by looking into 
 their very nature by an act of insight, as we now 
 call it, which is the vo^crt? of Plato, and so often 
 occurs in his writings as contrasted with sensation 
 and sense-perception, aia6r]t7i<i. 
 
 Take as an illustration the truths of geometry. 
 And, to be more specific, take what we know of the 
 triangle, as the length of any two of its sides when 
 taken as a continuous straight line, is always greater 
 than the length of the other line or side ; the sum 
 of its three angles is always the same as that of two 
 right angles ; the area is always one half that of a 
 rectangle of the same base and height ; and so of all 
 the other propositions we affirm of triangles, wheth- 
 er in our geometry or trigonometry. 
 
 Now, we do not have these truths by actual ob- 
 servation and measurement. We reason from the 
 nature of lines and angles, and from that of the tri- 
 angle in particular. In fact the triangle itself is a 
 fiction ; there is no such thing in nature ; triangular 
 things there may be, and are, in abundance, as a tri- 
 angular piece of paper, of cloth, or of land. 
 
 Nor, in this reasoning, do we assert, assume, or 
 
PLATO AND THE THEORY OF IDEAS. 23 
 
 prove the existence of anything. There need be, for 
 the purposes of our knowledge or our demonstration, 
 no one thing that is triangular in shape in heaven or 
 on earth. What we are proving is merely the con- 
 ditions and possibilities of existence, so that if any- 
 thing, no matter what, or wnere, or when, does ex- 
 ist, has existed, or shall ever exist, that is triangular 
 in form, these and all the other propositions we can 
 demonstrate concerning triangles in our geometry 
 and trigonometry are and must be true of the one 
 that thus exists, and of all that do or can exist. 
 
 In Plato's theory all these ideas of triangles, cir- 
 cles, as well as all general ideas of existing things, 
 and all ideas of the things that can be made to ex- 
 ist, are innate. They are in the soul, and were put 
 there by the Divine Mind before the soul was unit- 
 ed with the body, or we were born into this world. 
 But on another theory they are formed in the 
 mind, and on another theory still, they are only 
 states of the mind itself, as we shall see more fully 
 in the following Lectures in this course. 
 
 Now, all pure mathematics is of this kind. So, 
 too, are the fundamental principles of logic, as we 
 shall see in the next Lecture. So, also, are the first 
 axioms of all the sciences. They begin by assuming 
 certain truths or laws that are so obvious that they 
 need no explanation or demonstration, or other at- 
 tempt at proof. In all the Natural Sciences it is 
 assumed that whatever is extended can be measured, 
 and is, in theory, divisible ; that whatever is com- 
 pounded is made of parts that can be separated ; 
 
24 
 
 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 whatever is inert, not living, can move only as it is 
 acted upon by forces outside of itself ; and such 
 like. And without these axioms, as they are called, 
 no one principle, fact, or law of any one of the Nat- 
 ural Sciences could be asserted as a matter of hu- 
 man knowledge. 
 
 The second example cited, that of the boy and 
 the rectangle, will be seen at once to belong to this 
 class. And the truth — we should hardly call it the 
 idea — is represented by Plato to have been innate 
 — that is, in his mind, before he was born into this 
 world, and his ignorance, when the question was 
 first proposed to him, was regarded as a mere mat- 
 ter of forgetfulness, so that all that was needed was 
 an act of recollection — an exercise of memory — 
 which in this case was stimulated by the questions 
 which are represented to have been put to him by 
 Socrates. 
 
 For these reasons this part of our knowledge is 
 called, as I have already said, sometimes a priori, 
 sometimes absolute, and sometimes also it is called 
 abstract knowledge, because it is true abstractly and 
 independently of any facts or events that have been 
 or could have been observed. 
 
 This part of our knowledge, although the last to 
 come to distinct consciousness and formal statement 
 in the order of time, is the first in the logical order ; 
 that is, it is presupposed and acted upon, before it 
 is consciously seen and put into express form. And 
 his fact is doubtless one of the reasons which led 
 Plato, as it has led philosophers in modern times, to 
 
PLATO AND THE THEORY OF IDEAS. 25 
 
 regard it as in some sense innate, that is, either as 
 in the mind at and before birth, as with Plato, or as 
 born in the mind, whenever any thing, object or 
 event, occurs to call for it, as held in later times. 
 The other part of our knowledge is regarded as 
 resting on observation, and is, as I have already said, 
 sometimes called a posteriori for that reason. 
 
 As a matter of fact all knowledge does begin with 
 some act of observation. In this all philosophers 
 and all theories of knowledge are agreed. Even 
 Plato would admit this. The external objects exist 
 and excite, through our sense-organs, our minds to 
 acts of perception and the contemplation of objects. 
 In these later times we call the result of the first 
 stages of this mental activity, an idea of the object 
 ' — though I do not now recall any instance in which 
 Plato has used the word in precisely this sense — I 
 think he has never so used it — and to discriminate 
 them from other kinds of ideas we usually designate 
 them as idea-images. 
 
 But in order to see or discriminate any one object, 
 there must be, as we now know, at least two, which, 
 therefore, must be each of them finite — the one lim- 
 iting the other in the domain of real things, and also 
 different from it in some one or more of its proper- 
 ties. Thus, if we see an object that is white, there 
 must be another object in the field of visipn that is 
 not white, which, therefore, limits the one I see and 
 is outside of it, and must also be of a different color, 
 or shade of the same color ; else I could not see it 
 at all, 
 
26 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 Hence there must always be two objects at least, 
 in order that either one of them may be seen. But 
 not only sp, they must be different in one respect at 
 least, as in the case of color, and they may be differ- 
 ent in other respects, as form, hardness, temperature, 
 etc. But they must also be alike in some respects, 
 as in the case before us, in having color, or in being 
 luminous in the light, so thatthey can be seen. 
 
 Thus every object in existence must be one in the 
 collective whole, which we call the universe, or as 
 Plato called it, o K6a-fio<; — that is, an orderly, arranged 
 whole, made up, indeed, of innumerable parts. 
 
 But this is not all. Each object that is seen must 
 be one — an individual object, individual and indivisi- 
 ble logically — in some class or genus. But how do 
 we come by the idea of the class or genus ? The ob- 
 jects we see at all we see one by one and individual- 
 ly ; but aU of them, that make up the genus, kind, 
 or class, we never see at once. Nay, more, we never 
 can see them ; for many of them, perhaps millions of 
 them, are gone irrevocably in the past, and millions, 
 untold millions more of the same kind or species, 
 may come into existence in the future. How, then, 
 do we come by the idea of the class or genus ? since 
 our idea of the class can contain only those proper- 
 ties that are common to all the individuals in the 
 class. 
 
 Now this is the question that Plato had before him 
 in the first example, which I have already cited. Sup- 
 pose the artisan had in his mind a definite idea, an 
 idea-image, or, as we sometiines call it, an ideal, pf 
 
PLATO AND THE THEORY OF IDEAS. 
 
 2; 
 
 what he was intending to make. How did he know 
 that it was a table or a bedstead ? Plato's argument, 
 or rather his assumption, is that the idea, must have 
 been in his mind before he could have known or 
 thought what it was, or would be, when it was made ; 
 that is, the general idea of tables, and not only the 
 idea-image or ideal of the particular piece of furni- 
 ture he was going to make, must have been in his 
 mind. 
 
 I think that in modern times we have corrected 
 Plato's assumption in this respect, and shown that 
 the actual process is quite different from what he 
 supposed, and therefore presents a very different 
 problem and not at all the problem he undertook to 
 solve. As we explain the phenomenon, the child 
 first sees an object, a table ; he hears it called a table, 
 and thus gets the name and remembers it. He then 
 sees another object that is called by the same name, 
 and compares the two, one with the other. He sees 
 still other objects that are called tables, and his idea 
 is enlarged, and sooner or later he comes to consider 
 what are the properties that are common to all tables, 
 make up what we call the essentia of tables ; or the 
 differentia that distinguish tables and other articles 
 in the genus or class furniture, from one another. 
 But certainly Plato was right in holding that we 
 must always have this idea in the mind before we 
 can say of any particular article : " it is a table," or 
 " it is not a table," if that is the case. 
 
 Now, although Plato does not speak of reminis- 
 cence in this case, yet his whole theory implies that 
 
28 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 the idea of tables, of bedsteads, and whatever else 
 one would make, or even recognize and name, must 
 have been in the mind before any act of making or 
 of recognition could have taken place. 
 
 I have said that I do not remember that Plato ever 
 expressly gives the name idea, or uses it in reference 
 to the thought of an individual object, whether an 
 ideal or an idea-image ; the two are not quite the 
 same in the more exact use of terms. The idea-im- 
 age is formed by an actual inspection of the object 
 and exactly represents it as it is, or rather as it ap- 
 pears to us at the time ; while an ideal is what we 
 form beforehand, and serves as a model or pattern 
 after which we work and by which we are guided in 
 the making of our object, whether it be a utensil of 
 common use or a work of art. 
 
 In the case cited by Plato as an example, this idea- 
 image, or rather ideal, is quite as necessarily implied 
 and proved to have existed in the mind of the arti- 
 san, as the general idea by which he knew his works 
 to be, one of them a table and the other a bedstead. 
 
 And so, too, in the application of the principle of 
 the argument to the great Artificer of the Universe, 
 the work of creation. Plato saw, and no man has 
 ever more clearly seen, or more keenly appreciated 
 the fact, that all things in the universe are in har- 
 mony, harmoniously and beautifully arranged, and 
 for "the greatest good of the greatest number." 
 And hence he is constantly insisting upon the proof 
 thus furnished of the existence of a One Mind, or In- 
 telligent Being, who is the Cause and Creator of all 
 
PLATO AND THE THEORY OF IDEAS. 29 
 
 things. This point, as you will remember, he insists 
 upon in immediate connection with the illustration 
 first cited. This Artificer, he insists, must have had 
 all these ideas of all things in His mind before crea- 
 tion, as truly and as necessarily as the artisan had the 
 ideal of a table in his mind ; so that instead of mere 
 hewing and hacking the lumber to no purpose, his 
 labors — the motions of his hands and the efforts of 
 his will — resulted in producing the useful article 
 which we and all men agree in calling a table. 
 
 But as the artisan makes tables individually and 
 one by one, so the Artificer of the Universe must 
 have created the objects that make up its whole, itg 
 Kosmos, one by one, though not necessarily as the 
 cabinet-maker did, one at a time and |n succession, 
 one after another. Creation is an individual affair. 
 It can act only on individuals. There is no possi- 
 bility of the creation of a species except as we create 
 the individuals one by one that make up the species. 
 This is one of those fundamental a priori axioms, 
 or intuitive judgments, which, as I have just said, 
 must underlie and be presupposed in all knowledge, 
 or scientific assertion, about anything whatever. 
 
 Plato's theory, therefore, necessarily implies the 
 existence of ideals of possible things, if not exact 
 idea-images of real things, in the mind both of man, 
 the artisan, as well as the artist, and also in the jnind 
 of the Creator or Artificer of the Universe. And 
 he argues, in regard to the artisan, that although he 
 makes the tables and bedsteads, he does not and 
 cannot make the ideas of them. And his argument 
 
30 
 
 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 is equally as applicable to the general idea, by which 
 he knows that what he makes is a table and not 
 something else, as to the ideal, by which he is 
 guided in his work, so that what he makes will be a 
 table or a bedstead, or whatever else he undertakes 
 to make. 
 
 In fact, the one great object of Plato's teaching, 
 so far as our present subject is concerned, was to 
 show that all our general ideas must be innate in his 
 sense of the word, that is, in the mind when we 
 were born, and not, as in the later sense, born in the 
 mind. He starts, as we have seen, with what he 
 regards as the demonstration that general ideas 
 which make up the substance and material of sci- 
 ence, cannot be obtained by immediate sense-per- 
 ception or observation of things themselves. And, 
 as we have seen also, he does not discriminate 
 between what we call ideals and general ideas, nor, 
 in fact, does he appear to have ever carefully con- 
 sidered the difference. 
 
 Hence, thus far we have to consider only the two 
 kinds of ideas: idea-images of individual objects, 
 and general ideas of classes, species or genera. As 
 we proceed, however, we shall soon find occasion to 
 consider another class of ideas, namely, what we 
 may call abstract ideas, that is, ideas of single prop- 
 erties or qualities of things, as whiteness, hardness, 
 and such like. 
 
 But the question arises which reaches farther into 
 the subject than Plato seems to have gone, namely, 
 how are we to discriminate between ideas that are 
 
PLA TO AND THE THEORY OF IDEAS. 31 
 
 true and ideas that are false ? Are not all innate 
 ideas — that is, innate in his sense — true ? Can we 
 suppose that God would put into our minds an idea 
 that is not true and does not truly represent its ob- 
 ject as far as it goes? If so, how come we to have 
 false ideas, erroneous ideas and erroneous opinions 
 at all ? In the case cited in the Meno, how came the 
 boy to say eight instead of sixteen? Surely the 
 word he used expressed the idea that was in his 
 mind at the time, and it was wrong. 
 
 Are then all general ideas innate ? Are innate 
 ideas always true ? In either case how are we to dis- 
 criminate either the ideas that are innate from those 
 that are not, and so are fictitious and false? Or if 
 the discrimination must be made between the two- 
 classes of ideas that are really and alike innate, how 
 and by what test shall we be guided in our dis- 
 crimination ? This a question that Plato does not 
 attempt to answer. 
 
 We have then clearly before us Plato's theory of 
 the origin of each of the two parts of human knowl- 
 edge, whether we accept the one or the other of the 
 two expositions — reminiscence or insight, and it 
 does not appear that he discriminates so clearly be- 
 tween the two as modern philosophers have done. 
 
 But in both cases, and alike, he held to and taught 
 the doctrine of ideas as realities in the mind, and not 
 merely thoughts or states of the mind, and that in 
 acquiring knowledge we get something into the mind 
 whether by recollection or insight, and not merely 
 undergo a change in the state and condition of our 
 
32 
 
 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 minds. He held that in the strictest sense of the 
 words we " acquire ideas " rather than merely " pass 
 from a state of ignorance to that of knowledge," just 
 as the body may be said to pass from a state of rest 
 to one of fatigue, and from a state of fullness to one 
 of hunger. And Plato's theory has given the forms 
 of expression and the phraseology that are in use and 
 have been in use, among all European nations from 
 his day to our own ; just as we continue to speak of 
 the sun, moon and stars as rising and setting, etc., 
 according to the old Ptolemaic system, although no 
 well-informed man now believes that theory. 
 
 We have seen that in Plato's theory, knowledge or 
 true science, iirnTTijfn], as opposed to mere first im- 
 pressions and popular belief, So^a, consists of the two 
 elements, intuitive axioms, or self-evident truths, as 
 we call them, and general ideas ; both of which he 
 considered and called ideas.. But in niodern times 
 we speak of idea-images as well as general ideas, 
 which we consider as parts of knowledge. 
 
 § lo. But there is another element still, which 
 Plato often speaks of and calls ideas, and that is, 
 ideas of the separate properties of things. Idea- 
 images represent individual objects ; general ideas 
 represent species or classes of objects, but no one in 
 particular or specially ; while the ideas we are now 
 speaking of, represent only single properties of ob- 
 jects, and are sometimes called abstract ideas, and 
 are always expressed by what we call abstract terms, 
 as whiteness, courage, justice, etc. 
 
 In the Parmenides Plato discusses this class of 
 
PLATO AND THE THEORY OF IDEAS. 33 
 
 ideas. He instances such properties as "humanity," 
 the characteristic of man ; "heat," the characteristic 
 of fire; "beauty," "justice," "greatness" (physical, 
 as any great or large object), and such like. And 
 the argument he uses impHes the same doctrine with 
 regard to all othier qualities, properties or modes, 
 which we can represent by adject,vyes, and predicate 
 of any noun : as when we say " snow is white" " iron 
 is hard" "the rainbow is beautiful" etc. From 
 these adjectives as well as from certain verbs, we de- 
 rive abstract nouns, as whiteness, hardness, beauty, 
 justice, life, humanity, similitude, etc. Arid Plato 
 regards each one of these terms as expressing an idea 
 which is in his mind. Consequently, each of these 
 words denotes a reality, which, when considered as 
 in the mind, whether in the mind of man or the mind 
 of God, is called an idea ; but which, when consid- 
 ered as belonging to something out of the mind, as a 
 substantial object in space, is a property of that ob- 
 ject. This leads to the notion of a substance with- 
 out properties, mere being, to ov, the vKt) atrotm of 
 the Stoics, to which God is conscious of transferring 
 or imparting the ideas of His own mind ; which ideas 
 thereby become the properties of this and that piece 
 of matter, making one to be water, another earth, 
 and another some particular kind of matter, as irort, 
 sulphur, carbon, or whatever else one may choose to 
 name. Considered as in the mind, I say they are 
 called ideas, but considered as out of the mind they 
 are properties of things external. 
 
 This part of Plato's theory is the most difficult of 
 
 3 
 
34 
 
 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 all to understand if we attempt to look beyond the 
 words he uses to the things themselves, And to rieal- 
 ize the process which the words he uses really im- 
 plies. We cannot imagine — I say imagine, for we 
 can suppose almost anything — ideas passing out of 
 the mind and being put upon or into matter. And 
 yet this is what he affirms and what his theory im- 
 plies. ." ■•' 
 
 These ideas, too, although originally in the Divine 
 Mind only, are innate in our minds. We have them, 
 and brute beasts have them not ; therefore we are 
 rational and intelligent, while they are not. They 
 have all the senses and sense-perception as complete 
 as we do. But they have no ideas, are not rational. 
 They perceiye, but do not understand ; have instinct, 
 but no wisdom or science. .. ■ •' 
 
 And these ideas, like all the others, are eternal ; 
 they were not only in our mimls before dur birth, 
 but they are in the mind of God ; they ire; in fact. 
 His essence — not His substance, but His e^sence^^^ 
 that is, they are essential to Him, and He would. not 
 be God without them. And as St. John could say, 
 " God is love," so Plato could say, " God is wisdom," 
 " God is reason," " God is intelligence," and all ex- 
 ternal things are real only as they " partake " of these 
 ideas, and they " partake of " or " participate in " 
 them only because God has conferred upon or im- 
 parted them to these objects. We are intelligent 
 because they are in us as ideas ; and; these objects 
 are intelligible because they are in or on those objects 
 as their properties. 
 
PLATO AND THE THEORY OF IDEAS. 
 
 35 
 
 This theory of ideas lay at the foundation of the 
 ReaUsm of the Middle Ages, as we shall see hereafter, 
 and gave rise to the much-discussed question, wheth- 
 er universals existed before particulars. Of course 
 the ideas of things, in Plato's sense, must have ex- 
 isted in the Divine Mind before any act of creation 
 could have been performed. Not only the general 
 ideas of the classes of things He would make, but 
 also the abstract ideas of each of the properties they 
 should have, or He should " impart " to them, must 
 have been in His mind. 
 
 Hence Plato's theory of knowledge is intense- 
 ly theistic. But I do not think that Plato was a 
 pantheist. It is true that he made ideas the essence 
 of God, ovaia, but this doctrine is more adequately 
 expressed to modern minds, as I think, by saying 
 that God is essentially intelligent, essentially a think- 
 ing Being, as contrasted with the unthinking objects 
 of the material world. 
 
 It is also true that Plato regards and calls these 
 ideas the eternal realities of the universe, and he 
 speaks, more than once, of things seen and tangible, 
 as having no real existence, as non-existing. But I 
 Jchitik that what he meant, and all he meant, was not 
 &nly that they are constantly changing, always in a 
 state of change {travra pei), but also that they are of 
 no great account anyhow. 
 
 Plato, however, was not alone in his^ view of the 
 Uncertainty and unreality of all visible things. Gor- 
 gias, a contemporary and friend, after whom Plato 
 has named one of his most interesting and instructive 
 
36 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 dialogues, wrote a treatise fully in the spirit of Pla- 
 to's teachings, on the things of nature, which he 
 called " the things that are not or do not exist " (Trepi 
 TOW /i^ ovTO?, 7) irepl ^va-ew}) ; there was, however, a 
 difference in the Greek between . «/*t, to be, and 
 vtrap'xto, to begin to be, so that , while the latt^, verb 
 could be applied to whatever was transient in.:Jts nat- 
 ure, as all visible material things are, the fornaer verb 
 meant primarily to be, only ; and so, by natural con- 
 sequence, whatever is is eternal and always the same. 
 
 This difference between the two words, which were 
 in constant use, prepared the minds of those who 
 were familiar with them for a distinction between the 
 two classes of things and for the use of expressions 
 concerning them which we can hardly understand, 
 and which seems to u^ to be contrary to the most 
 obvious principles of common sense, if not to involve 
 an absurdity-^a manifest contradiction in terms. 
 
 § 1 1. And not only was Plato not. a pantheist : he 
 held very: strongly to all that constitutes the person- 
 ality of God. Besides what we have already seen of 
 his view of the personality of God in the acts of cre- 
 ation, he uses strong language also in regard to His 
 providential care of his works, j In the Xth Book of 
 " The Laws," after a long argument to prove from 
 the phenomena of nature and of observed things in 
 general, that mind, from its very nature, must be self- 
 active, and not inert, as all merely material things 
 are, and that from a like mode and kind of reasoning 
 there must be a One Mind, or God, over all things 
 and in all things, he proceeds : " Since then ye see 
 
PLATO AND THE THEORY OF IDEAS. 
 
 3; 
 
 arid admit that God sees all things, and hears all 
 things, and knows all things, it follows that nothing 
 that can be matter or subject of perception or knowl- 
 edge can be hid from- Him. And since we have 
 agreed that God is good and the best of all beings, 
 can we suppose that ^ He is indifferent or inactive in 
 regard to human affairs ? ■ With us inactivity is the 
 result of indifference, cowardice or indolence." From 
 this he proceeds to infer that God, being omnipo- 
 tent, omniscient, and good, even the best of all be- 
 ings, " must care for all things ; either this, or that 
 He sees and knows that they need no taking care 
 of." "Let us then," he proceeds, "persuade the 
 many men, by our reasonings,- that by Him who 
 takes care of the universe, with a view to the safety 
 of the whole, everything 'has been arranged so that 
 as far as possible each part of it suffers and acts 
 what is best suited to it." 
 
 It may be well to turn aside for a moment to men- 
 tion what seems" to me to have been a curious disre- 
 gard of the obvious meaning' in the translation of a 
 passage ascribed to Xenophanes, who lived about 
 500 B. c, or some fifty or sixty years before Plato. 
 In the words ascribed to him by Diogenes Laertius 
 (Bk. IX, c. ii, §'iii), he is- represented in the transla- 
 tion as saying that God is " spherical in form, in no 
 respect resembling man ; that all things can see and 
 hear, but do not breathe." But it was customary ■ 
 for the Greek' philosophers, especially those of the 
 Italian school, to speak of the sphere as the most 
 perfect figure, and hence of anything that they re- - 
 
38 
 
 THEORIES OF. KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 garded as perfect as a sphere, or spherical in form. 
 Xenophanes, however, does not say " spherical in 
 form" as translated, but only spherical in " nature," 
 hvaia. Hence what he says of God is, that He is 
 perfect in His nature, and not at all like men, who 
 are imperfect in most if not in all respects. Then 
 follows what I have given in the commonly received 
 translation. But if we take rd irdvra, though in the 
 accusative before the infinitive, as really the subject 
 of the verb, we may translate the whole senteace as 
 follows : "God is perfect in His nature, and not like 
 men ; He sees all things, hears all things, but does 
 not breathe ;" that is, has no body — for bodies only 
 breathe — and no animal life. And then follow im- 
 mediately the words : " He is wholly intellect, vow-r- 
 wise and eternal. Whatever is produced is perisha- 
 ble, but there is both soul, yjrvxi), and spirit, irvevfia, 
 and everything else is inferior to mind, vow." 
 
 There can be no doubt whatever about the trans- 
 lation of the passage in Plato ; and the words are too 
 nearly the same to allow of a doubt that he had in 
 mind the saying which was ascribed to the older- 
 philosopher. Plato says, " Ye both of you agree that 
 the gods [God] knows and sees and hears all things." 
 The difference is that Plato uses the word ndvra for 
 "all," and the word as given by Diogenes is oXov in 
 the Greek, either of which may be translated "all"- 
 or " the universe." But this assuredly can make no 
 difference with the question now before us, namely, ' 
 whether it is " God that sees and knows all things," 
 or " all things see and know." It seems to me there 
 
PLATO AffD THE THEORY OF IDEAS. ^g 
 
 £an be no doubt, and that it is but fair to give the 
 ..old philosopher the credit of having said what is at 
 least good sense. 
 
 . Eloubtless. Plato eomes far short of the Christian 
 view of Providence and the Moral Government of 
 God over all His works. But he was exceedingly 
 wise for- a heathen, and Xenophon has given us in 
 \^% Memorabilia of Socrates, Plato's master and 
 teacher, a fine illastration of the argument for the 
 goodrvess and jDrovidence of God, by referring to the 
 humanirame,ramong other things ; as the eye-lashes 
 tokeepidirt outof the eyes, the eyebrows and cheek 
 bpnes to protect the eye from injury by blows and 
 such-like^ This line of argumentation is like that 
 which is used in modern times by Christians, with 
 great force, as in the works of Paley, Lord Brougham, 
 and the Bridgewater Treatises. 
 
 But it- has naturally grown outof Plato's theory 
 that we use abstract nouns denoting but one proper- 
 ty, to a large extent, as if they were concrete. We 
 say " humanity," when in fact we mean " human be- 
 ings," the class as a whole, and " personality," when 
 in iact we mean a "person." In this way we make 
 the mere fictions of the abstractions real things and 
 even eflficjent causes, and prepare the way — and the 
 mind, too^-for all forms of pantheism, polytheism. 
 And even in all forms of atheism it becomes necessary 
 to make this use of abstractions. 
 
 I, shall have occasion to consider this point more 
 fully hereafter. But I take the occasion in passing 
 to say. that: this doctrine of Plato's with regard to the 
 
40 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 reality of ideas, and the unreality, the unsubstantial 
 nature and constant changeableness of all visible 
 things, has led from the very first to fixing attention 
 on mere properties. And modes, and speaking of them 
 as the real things in knowledge has led to their object- 
 ification, and in many cases to their personification, 
 so that the mere properties and modes of things have 
 been regarded not only as " real causes " in nature, 
 but as objects of worship, and adoration as well. 
 
 § 12. It is manifest that Plato's theory of knowledge 
 could give no impulse or encouragement to the pros- 
 ecution of the Natural Sciences, which begin with 
 observation and are prosecuted by induction. On 
 the contrary, its influence was in the other direction 
 — to that introspection that finds " ideas " and 
 " knowledge " within, and also leads to that exercise 
 of imagination or fancy which creates a world. of 
 " realities " of its own — such as they are— and thus 
 leads to that mysticism which has formed a very im- 
 portant and conspicuous part of philosophy from his 
 time to the present day. 
 
 There are, and always have been, in the world two 
 classes of minds among those that are given to 
 intellectual pursuits : the one class are practical men, 
 who look at things as they are, and are disposed to 
 begin their philosophy with the recognition and ob- 
 servation of facts. They are inclined to limit the 
 word " knowledge " to what is thus gained, as is the 
 case with our modern agnostics. The other class are, 
 like Plato, of an introspective turn ; and they would 
 limit the word " knpwledige " to ideas, whether innate, 
 
PLATO AND THE THEORY OF IDEAS. ^j 
 
 as with Plato, or created by the mind, as with our 
 modern idealists, Kant and Hegel. 
 
 Aside from the inference from the nature of ideas, 
 Plato has two lines of argument to prove the exist- 
 ence of God. One is, that which we use in modern 
 times, from the order and regularity of nature and 
 the appearance of design and thought in the objects 
 of the world around us. He argued as the great 
 Agassiz has done in our own day, that " intelligibil- 
 ity in the things around us proves for them an intel- 
 ligent Author and Creator." 
 
 In the other line of argument, he reasons'from the 
 nature of motion, as in fact Prof. Pierce has done in 
 his great work on Analytic Mechanics. Motion is 
 of two kinds, he argues ; the one kind is such as we 
 see in the inanimate objects around us, produced in 
 them by something outside of and external to them. 
 Each act had its origin in time and is finite. But 
 we see another kind of motion in ourselves that 
 originates in us; we move ourselves. And yet we 
 were not always in motion. There was a time when 
 we began to move, and when there was no motion 
 in us. But there must have been One Self-moving 
 Being before all or any other motion began, the 
 Mover of all things, and He not only must be self- 
 moved, but He must also be eternal and omnipotent 
 in His power to move and change things according 
 to His own will, or rather according to the ideas that 
 are in Him. 
 
 But I do not think that Plato meant to teach that 
 exlSertial things, the objects and affairs of our daily 
 
42 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 lives, were unreal or non-existent in our modern 
 sense of the words. But he did mean to teach that 
 they are comparatively unimportant. He was born 
 of wealthy, aristocratic parents, and therefore never 
 had occasion to know the struggle for existence that 
 comes of poverty ; and he taught also that no real 
 knowledge — none that is worth having — could be 
 gained by studying the mere facts, and phenomena of 
 nature, by the inductive method, but rather that all 
 wisdom and knowledge — all true . science— coiiies 
 from insight, intuition, introspection,T^looking into 
 and developing truth and from one's own " interior 
 consciousness." 
 
 Nor again do I think that Plato ever indulged in 
 that objectification and mere personification of ab- 
 stractions which form so conspicuous a feature of 
 hisfollowers, the Neo-Platonistsofthe several grades 
 in old times, or the philosophers of our modern"' 
 times who are the most pronounced in claiming to 
 belong to his school, or rather as not belonging to 
 the school of sensationalists, materialists, and agnos- 
 tics, who would limit all knowledge to what we gain 
 by sense-perception alone. Here, as elsewhere, a 
 man who is great enough to have disciples at all, is 
 pretty sure to have many who do not an,d cannot, 
 and perhaps none who do fully appreciate him, and 
 who out-Herod Herod, by carrying some one or 
 another of his principles to an impracticable, if not to 
 a ridiculous and harmful extreme. 
 
 Thus the Neo-Platonists of Alexandria made a 
 pantheism out of Plato's ideas, And in more recent 
 
PLATO AND THE THEORY OF IDEAS. 43 
 
 times we hai^e the abstractions that constitute but 
 one of Plato's elements of knowledge, elevated and 
 apotheosized into real causes, efficient agents, and 
 made to do service as explaining all things whether 
 in the material world or in the immaterial in nature, 
 or in what is supernatural. But when we begin to 
 use words in this way, we become unintelligible and 
 never say what we really mean and are always saying 
 something that we really do not intend to say. Of 
 this we. shall see abundant examples before we get 
 through these Lectures. 
 
 It may be well to get a taste for this style of writ- 
 ing before we go any further. I quote from a work 
 by a disciple of Cousin, translated by the late Dr. C. S. 
 Henry. It is in what he calls an " Exposition " — 
 the reader will remember that the word " exposition" 
 is used in two quite different senses — of the " Alex- 
 andrian Philosophy." " In the Primary Unity pure 
 
 and absolute, there exists no distinction 
 
 From this unity emanates the intelligence which is 
 its reflection This emanation produces an- 
 other emanation, . . . which is the soul, a motive 
 force, the principle of motion. . . . When the uni- 
 ty had produced intelligence, . . . there also com- 
 menced duality, ... unity became multiple. . . . 
 The intelligence contains all the ideas of possible 
 things. . . . Ideas being at once intelligence and 
 the objects of intelligence, there is an absolute iden- 
 tity between ideas and realities ; that which knows 
 and that which is known, are one and the same thing. 
 . . . The soul . . . tends necessarily to produce 
 
44 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 ideas outwardly, and the ideas produced afe the dif- 
 ferent souls. . . . Matter is the habitation, the tem- 
 ple, which the soul itself constructs in order to dis- 
 pose in it its forms. . . . From all this it follows 
 that the world is only a great soul, informing, giving 
 form to matter by the ideas of the souls which it 
 produces. . . . True science is acquired by means 
 of illumination. It is less a science than an intimate 
 presence of God in the soul." {History of Philoso- 
 phy, Vol. I, pp. 212 and 219.) 
 
 This is but a specimen, and it would not be diffi-i 
 Cult to match it by quotations from modern authors. 
 In fact Sterling, in his Secret of Hegel, has claimed 
 quite an identity between hirh and those Neo-Platon- 
 ists of Alexandria. 
 
 However Plato laid the foundation for all the 
 philosophy which regards ideas as more real and 
 more " substantial " than the visible and tangible 
 things of this world, and for that use of language 
 which grew out of such a view of things. There is 
 a passage in Plato that I will quote in reference to 
 this point. It occurs in the Theatetus, § 33. After 
 discussing the uncertainty of all ideas derived from 
 the observation and study of external objects by the 
 senses, he asks, " Will you not then feel obliged to 
 me if I assist you in finding the true opinion?" 
 "How should I not," says " Theatetus," " be exceed- ' 
 ingly obHged to you?" Socrates answers, "Look 
 around then, and see that no profane (a/tiwro?) 
 uninitiated persons hear us, for there are such who 
 think that nothing else exists except what they can 
 
PLATO AN~D THE THEORY OF IDEAS. 
 
 45 
 
 grasp with their hands, and who do not admit that 
 the actions and the creations of our minds or any- 
 thing that cannot be seen by the eyes, is to be reckoned 
 among the things that have or partake of essential 
 being" (oJ? h> dvaiai fiepee). 
 
 § 13. Naturally enough, therefore, it would follow 
 from Plato's theory, that material things — though 
 existing around us — are mere accidents of no great 
 or essential importance, anyway ; and that the only 
 things that are of real importance and of permanent 
 and substantial value, are the ideas that are within 
 our own minds. And his Timaeus, which is his ac- 
 count of the orgiri and development or evolution 
 of the universe, is based on this view, and is in the 
 line of its development. He postulates three dis- 
 tinct things that existed before the formation of the 
 universe, being, ovaLa ; place, toVo? ; and generation, 
 
 ! But these are all abstract terms. By hvaia, Plato 
 seldom (so far as I can remember never) means 
 matter or any substantial thing; it is rather the 
 nature of the things. In another form, and one 
 which is more intelligible to us, it would be " the 
 essential properties of things." And thus we should 
 have as the theorem, the properties of things, space 
 or a place for them to exist in, and generation, pro- 
 duction or creation, or the process by which these 
 properties could be conferred on the to ov, or sub- 
 stantial matter to make of it the varied things we 
 see about us. 
 
 Hence the three here postulated are (i) the pro- 
 
46. THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 perties or natures of the different things that exist 
 in the universe; (2) a place for each one, and (3) a 
 a time at which it was brought into existence. 
 
 But besides these three, the whole course of Plato's 
 philosophy implies that there was (i) matter to work 
 upon (for he apparently had no idea of the creation 
 of matter out of nothing), and (2) God or Mind it- 
 self, in which or whom were the ideas that make up 
 the nature of the things and by whom they were 
 imparted to the matter. 
 
 And although he believed in substantial matter, 
 and in God as the Creator or Artificer of all things 
 in the universe, he recognized' also the fact that 
 there is an element of necessity, or certain necessary 
 laws and conditions, that must be observed. Thus 
 in the Timaeus, " We ought also to speak of things 
 that come of necessity,, for the production of this 
 world results wholly from the co-operation of in- 
 tellect and necessity, intellect indeed ruling over 
 necessity." And this "necessity" he finds in the 
 nature of matter, in its four forms — fire and water, 
 earth and air. 
 
 These ideas that make the nature of the things or 
 the patterns of all things that exist, Plato regarded 
 as the substantial realities of the universe ; they are 
 eternal and always the same, ( Timaeus xxvi), the 
 are the very essence of the Divine Mind. 
 
 But these invisible things that constitute, in 
 Plato's theory, the only realities, are for the most 
 part denoted by abstract terms; they are in fact 
 only the properties and modes of things considered 
 as things themselves. 
 
PLATO AND THE THEORY OF IDEAS. ,47 
 
 And here it may be well to pause and say a word 
 as to what we mean by abstract terms, as the word is 
 used in several different senses and connotations. 
 
 In its strictest sense, an abtsract term is a noun 
 which, in regard to its etymology, is derived from an 
 adjective or a verb, as from white, whiteness ; hum- 
 ble, humility, or from the verb to live, life ; and 
 from to move, motion ; and denotes only a property 
 of things or modes in which they exist. 
 
 But in the second place it is very common to 
 speak of general terms, as man, horse, table, chairs, 
 etc., as abstract terms, and thus include the two 
 abstract and general terms in the same category and 
 ignore the very important difference between them 
 the one, as just "said, denotes only the property or 
 mode of things^ and the other denotes the things 
 themselves by those properties that are common to 
 all that are included in the class. 
 
 Then again, in the third place, some men — our 
 modern agnostics for example — call all the names 
 that denote invisible things, abstract, as the mind 
 of man, and evten the Supreme Being, God Him- 
 self. 
 
 But manifestly nothing could be more fatal to 
 clearness of conception and soundness of reasoning, 
 than the use of one and the same word to denote 
 these entirely different classes of objects: (i) mere 
 properties of things ; (2) material or tangible things 
 themselves considered in their essential properties, 
 and without regard to their varying, and variable ac- 
 cidents; (3) God Himself, the most real and sub- 
 
48 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 stantial of all things, who is both a substatltial 
 Reality and a Personal Being, the One Person. 
 Therefore, His name, like the name of all individual 
 objects, is neither abstract nor general, but indi- 
 vidual — or, as we usually call it, a proper name. 
 
 I call attention to this vanned use of the term " ab- 
 stract " at this early period, not only on account of 
 its importance, but also because I shall have occasion 
 thus to use it in these Lectures, and the knowledge 
 of this fact, and the constant mindfulness and appre- 
 ciation of thq fact will be indispensable to the right 
 understanding of what I have to say. 
 
 In one important sense, general terms stand mid- 
 way between the concrete terms that denote individ- 
 ual things, and the abstract terms which denote only 
 single properties or modes. They constitute a class 
 by themselves, and are as unlike abstract terms as they 
 are unlike concrete terms, in their more modern sense. 
 But at any rate they do not objectify mere proper- 
 ties. 
 
 Plato, however, in his theory of knowledge, laid 
 the foundation for that use of abstract terms which 
 has formed a very conspicuous and significant feat- 
 ure of most of the metaphysics that have prevailed 
 since his time, and has, to a large extent, influenced 
 the theological dogmas that have been approved in 
 the Christian Church, and forms the basis of, or at 
 least is necessary to every form of polytheism, athe- 
 ism and agnosticism that has yet been proposed in 
 the world — a conclusion which I hope to make 
 abundantly obvious before I reach the close of these 
 Lectures. 
 
PLATO AND THE THEORY OF IDEAS. 45 
 
 But Plato himself was not a materialist. He was 
 no pantheist, nor yet a polytheist, and, least of all, 
 an agnostic. To him God was one, the Mind or 
 NoO? of the Universe ; eternal, uncreated, and the 
 Creator of all things ; so that in Him, in the most 
 important sense, all things that are, or exist at all, 
 may be said to " live and move and have their be- 
 ing." 
 
 Doubtless we can see that his theory of ideas im- 
 plied, or contained among its elements, errors, and 
 perhaps we may say, absurdities and contradictions. 
 These absurdities, however, become more apparent 
 in the writings of his followers than they are in his 
 own, and in the Neo-Platonists of Alexandria they 
 bloom out in the most unintelligible paradoxes. They 
 are, however, scarcely apparent in his own writings, 
 and he remains to this day, with the great majority 
 of speculators, the Prince of Philosophers, the ex- 
 pounder and source of the most precious truths. 
 
 But great as Plato may have been, we can hardly 
 doubt that there have been other men that were as 
 great as he was, since his time. But even if not, 
 then, according to the saying, " a dwarf standing on 
 a giant's shoulders can see farther than the giant," 
 there may have been men since his time, who, though 
 dwarfs comparatively, standing on his shoulders, 
 could see farther than he saw. 
 
 And we have a series of great men since him, who 
 
 have devoted their time and talents to the solution 
 
 of the problems which so intensely interested him. 
 
 We may name five at least of them, whom we must 
 
 4 
 
50 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 regard as original thinkers in this line of investiga- 
 tion, or who, at all events, have made their mark and 
 have left and will leave their impress as deeply stamped 
 on the course of thought and the progress of philos- 
 ophy as Plato himself. The five I have in mind, 
 making with Plato six in all, are Aristotle, Descartes, 
 Locke, Kant and Hegel ; each of whom may be re- 
 garded as standing on the heads, one above another, 
 of those that preceded him. And of each of these 
 men I shall have something to say as we progress 
 with our subject. 
 
LECTURE II. 
 
 ARISTOTLE AND THE THEORY OF COGNITION. 
 
 § I. Aristotle was born b. c. 384, and Socrates 
 died B. C. 399. Consequently, Aristotle [never saw 
 Socrates. But he became a pupil of Plato 367. He 
 was highly appreciated by his master, who is said to 
 have called him the mind or brain of his school. 
 And it is related that when Plato delivered that most 
 obscure of all his dialogues, the Timaeus, the other 
 pupils, losing their interest, went out one by one, so 
 that at the close of the discourse only one remained 
 as a listener, and that one was Aristotle. 
 
 Plato and Aristotle were of quite different mental 
 constitutions. Plato was essentially poetic and aes- 
 thetic ; whereas Aristotle was essentially scientific 
 and practical. In attempting to set forth Aristotle's 
 theory of knowledge, we encounter great difficulties. 
 His language is very peculiar and obscure. He sel- 
 dom wrote out anything elaborately, and it is the 
 opinion of many of the best scholars, that part, at 
 least, of what is now ascribed to him consists of notes 
 which may have been used by him in delivering his 
 
52 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 lectures, and possibly of notes that were taken and 
 elaborated by his pupils, and possibly by disciples 
 who supposed they were writing what he would have 
 said, if he had spoken on the subject at all, though 
 he had never done so. 
 
 § 2. But as all knowledge must be expressed in 
 words, and in some 'form of language, we will first 
 consider for a few inoments something of the nature 
 of language in general. 
 
 Language consists of words, which are in them- 
 selves only arbitrary signs of the things we think and 
 speak about. And we understand the words only 
 by reference to the things and events which they are 
 used to denote. The nouns denote things. And as 
 we perceive objects individually and one by one, we 
 should have only individual and proper names, if we 
 had nothing but sense-perception. In that case each 
 noun would denote some one individual object, just 
 as the names of the persons around us, and of the 
 rivers and mountains on the surface of the globe, 
 now in common use, denote each one of them, its 
 own individual object and no other. 
 
 But if all the names in a language were of that 
 kind, there would be no science, and what we should 
 have could hardly be called knowledge, and we 
 should see objects before us and around us as we do 
 now, and might make a sound, a noise, which would 
 be in a sense the name of the thing. But we could 
 say nothing more about it ; we should have in fact 
 no " knowledge " in regard to it, and could of course 
 convey or communicate none to others. We could 
 
ARISTOTLE AND THE THEORY OF COGNITION. 
 
 S3 
 
 not call the object a man, a horse, or a dog, for we 
 should have no such words, and could not know what 
 they mean if we had, for to know what they are, or 
 the words mean, is to have in the mind the ideas 
 which the words express. 
 
 This, as we have seen in our last Lecture, was the 
 starting-point with Plato. We see objects individu- 
 ally and one by one. But as we can have no knowl- 
 edge without general ideas, and as these objects are 
 constantly changing, never continue long the same, 
 or in the same place ; and we could say of this object 
 indeed it is James or John, but we could not say he 
 is a man, and both of them are men, or belong to the 
 class " man." We have seen too what was Plato's 
 theory or account of the nature and origin of these 
 general ideas, or the ideas that we express by com- 
 mon nouns or general terms. Plato, as we will re- 
 member, thought these ideas were in the mind natu- 
 rally, at birth, in fact, and put there by the Creator 
 of all things before we were born. This, as I have 
 said, was the first theory that was proposed on the 
 subject as a solution of the problem. And it has 
 been, with some modifications, the favorite theory 
 with philosophers of a certain school, until the pres- 
 ent time. 
 
 But somehow or other, we came to have common 
 nouns or general terms, that denote objects by classes 
 (or rathpr classes of objects), and do not at all dis- 
 criminate or point out any one of the objects in the 
 class in particular. With most or all the human be- 
 ings around us we have special relations and duties. 
 
54 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 Hence we need names that designate them, individ- 
 ual or personal names — " proper names," as the 
 grammarians call them. But besides these few cases, 
 persons, cities, towns, nations, rivers, mountains, etc., 
 we deal with the objects and speak of them only in 
 general, and have for them only the general names 
 that denote class. Thus, in Natural History we deal 
 only with species and genera, or at most with varie- 
 ties, and sports or monsters. We speak of foxes and 
 wolves, and very seldom have occasion to refer to 
 any one in particular. For most purposes, animals 
 and plants which are. of the same class are all the 
 same to us. 
 
 These common nouns, however, denote the objects 
 by those properties only which are common to the 
 class, and are therefore essential to it. And these 
 properties will be essentia, in the technical sense of 
 the word, if we regard them as showing the compre- 
 hensiveness of the class, how far it extends in the in- 
 clusion of individuals; but differentia, if we regard 
 them as constituting the distinction or difference 
 between that class and some other class. 
 
 But in any view these properties are essential to 
 the class, and to every individual in the class — ex- 
 cept, perhaps, acknowledged monstrosities, which 
 are considered as belonging to the class, though ex- 
 ceptions in some respects to the general rule. Thus, 
 though the possession of reason, and the ordinary 
 mental faculties are regarded as one of the essential 
 characteristics of human beings yet I suppose that 
 an idiot, or monster of any other kind, would be re- 
 
ARISTOTLE AND THE THEORY OF COGNITJON. 
 
 55 
 
 garded as a human being, if he had been born of 
 human parents, notwithstanding his exceptional pe- 
 culiarity. 
 
 But the controlling fact is that the great mass of 
 the objects around us — the untold millions of objects 
 that are objects of thought and included in science, 
 each and any one of which may be, if it has not al- 
 ready been, an object of observation and study to 
 some human observer, is denoted by general terms 
 alone. 
 
 These terms imply, and are based upon a classifi- 
 cation, made by our ancestors long ago, in the ge- 
 nealogy of thought and science. And they were 
 based, when they were made, upon what were then re- 
 garded as essential properties, and if essential, then 
 unchanging, so that before the first individuals of 
 that class came into existence, there was no such 
 group of properties as a group anywhere, and when 
 the group of properties ceases as a group, the species 
 or class will be regarded as having become extinct. 
 
 Geology is full of illustrations of this point. Ge- 
 ologists tell us of races of animals that first made 
 their appearance in such or such an age, and became 
 extinct in such another age ; the trilobites, for ex- 
 ample. But why say that they first appeared in 
 the Silurian, if that be the case, and became ex- 
 tinct in the Carboniferous? There were animals 
 before, and there have been almost innumerable 
 classes of animals since. But there were, even be- 
 fore that period, as there have been since, no ani- 
 mals that had that group, congeries, or combina- 
 
56 THEORIES OP ]^NQWLED€E. ■ " 
 
 tion of properties, which at the same time, though 
 in different relations, make up the essentia and the 
 differentia of the trilobites. Hence we say that 
 whatever else they may have been before that peri- 
 od, there were no trilobites; and there have been 
 none since. No science of evolution has overcome, 
 or can overcome, this fundamental fact nor seek to 
 do so, in the use of language, and whatever may be 
 true of " the origin of species " as a matter of Natu- 
 ral History — this is the law, and the fact as well, in 
 regard to those natural classifications, which we 
 make in the acquisition of knowledge, and indicate 
 by common nouns as we pass from the ignorance of 
 childhood to the scientific attainments of the most 
 mature wisdom. 
 
 As we have seen in the previous Lecture, Plato 
 thought that these general ideas were in the mind 
 at birth, put there before we came into this world, 
 and constituted the substance of the knowledge of 
 things which we had then, and which we lost only 
 by forgetting it when we came into this world, and 
 during our infancy — the period of our mere animal 
 existence. Aristotle, as we shall see, dissented from 
 this view of the orgin of general ideas. 
 
 § 3. Now one of the peculiarities in the use of 
 terms that occurs so often in Aristotle's Meta- 
 physics, and renders it so very difificult to under- 
 stand him, is one that is very common in many 
 modern writers of a certain school, — namely, that 
 instead of using those common nouns which denote 
 things by their essentia and differentia (§ 2), they are 
 
ARISTOTLE A^ND THE THEORY- OF COGNITION. 5^ 
 
 constantly using an adjective. with an article before 
 it as the subject of their propositions. But an ad- 
 jective denotes but one property of an object, and 
 whether simple or complex, it is for all occasions 
 but one, as white or black, human or divine, finite 
 or infinite. 
 
 But in every idea of things, or of a class of 
 things, there must be indicated by its very name 
 more than one property, in order that we can under- 
 stand it, reason about it, or even talk about it, any 
 further than to inquire what it is and to ask about 
 it, so as to know what is really the subject under 
 consideration. 
 
 Thus to take an example from a modern writer, 
 Cousin cites " the infinite " as one of the terms ex- 
 pressing an idea that cannot have come from mere 
 sensation. But we naturally ask, "the infinite 
 what ? " The adjective, even if it were a positive 
 term, instead of being negative, as it is in this case, 
 could give us only the one property, and not at all 
 the essentia 2svA the differentia of any class. It, in 
 fact, makes a class for the occasion. But what can 
 a class include? Only these things, of course, of 
 which we may predicate this adjective — infinite. 
 Thus if I say " the white," I include in the class all 
 things that may be said to be white, and the objects 
 thus indicated' may have no other property common 
 to them all. So in regard to the word infinite. We 
 say of time, " it is infinite " (or at least Cousin does), 
 and so of space, "it is infinite," and of number 
 (sometimes), " it is infinite," and of God, " He is in- 
 
58 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 finite." But manifestly these four — time, space, 
 number and God, — even if there are no more, do 
 not make a class of which any one thing can be pred- 
 icated or said except that they are infinite. 
 
 It is indeed quite true that we do sometimes use 
 the adjective in this way without any violation of 
 the laws and conditions of intelligibility. As for 
 example, in the parable of the great draught of 
 fishes. We read that it contained good and bad, 
 and that the fishermen divided them into two 
 classes, gathering the good into their vessels, and 
 throwing the bad away. We have no difficulty here, 
 because the context clearly shows what was the 
 genus of the objects, so to speak, that was in the 
 mind, and that goodness, and its opposite, badness, 
 was made for the occasion the differentia of the two 
 species into which the genus was divided. 
 
 But when adjectives are used in this way and no 
 proximate genus is either given or clearly indicated, 
 it is difificult, and sometimes quite impossible, to tell 
 what is meant and to know whether to assent to or 
 dissent from what is said. 
 
 A writer whose work on Aristotle I have in my 
 hand, Wallace, says, in speaking of Plato's philoso- 
 phy : " The end, therefore, of philosophical study is 
 to see the one in the many, and the many in the 
 one." But we naturally ask, the one what ? and the 
 many what ? Without wasting words, or taking un- 
 necessary time, I will say that what he really means 
 is that we must see each object (" the one "), as an 
 object in the class, (" the many "), and we can see the 
 
ARISTOTLE AND THE THEORY OF' COGNITION, eg 
 
 class, "the many," only as it appears in "the one "- 
 — that is, the properties that are common to the 
 class, are to be seen as present among the properties 
 of each of the individuals in the class. 
 
 Now Aristotle is constantly offending in this way. 
 It is indeed true that the Greek language afforded 
 some peculiar facilities and inducements for doing so. 
 The Greeks, as is well known, varied their adjectives 
 so as to agree with their nouns in gender and num- 
 ber as well as in case. Thus they could say ra direipa, 
 the infinite, or ro aireipov, which we usually translate 
 by the same words, "the infinite." But the former 
 form of expression suggests to the one who is famil- 
 iar with the Greek idiom, the genus or class of ob- 
 jects of which the only property common to all the 
 individuals in the class, is this infinity ; while the lat- 
 ter form would suggest rather the property of infin- 
 ity or the subject of the remark that was made. In 
 our language, in order to distinguish the two things, 
 we should translate one phrase "infinite things," and 
 the other " infinity." 
 
 Again, Aristotle is constantly using abstract terms 
 as if they were concrete, or at least he so uses them 
 where we expect to find concrete terms, and must 
 replace abstract terms by those that are concrete, if 
 we would find any meaning in his words. For ex- 
 ample, he discusses the question with regard to 
 " generation " and " motion." Is generation eternal 
 — has it always existed ? So with motion, is it eter- 
 nal ? And in these discussions he apparently never 
 raised the question with regard to the substantial re- 
 
6o • THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 ality of these processes, or mere modes, any more 
 than he did when he was discussing the question with 
 regard to matter, and even God Himself. It is true 
 that he arrives at the conclusion that motion from 
 its very nature cannot be eternal, by a line of argu- 
 ment which, stated in terms that are intelligible to 
 us, is equivalent to the demonstration that matter 
 cannot have always been in motion, for if so it must 
 be able to move itself. So with regard to genera^ 
 tion. It is a process, and as such there must have 
 been a first act or cause, as well as an Infinite or 
 Eternal Being that produced it, as well as " matter " 
 on which He acted. 
 
 And in fact Aristotle, though expressly repudiat- 
 ing Plato's theory of ideas, accepted it nevertheless, 
 or its consequences, so far at least as to use the ab- 
 stract terms which denote only properties and 
 modes, as if the properties and modes were as sub- 
 stantial as the concrete things themselves. And 
 thus, while rejecting one of the elements of Plato's 
 theory of ideas, and giving an entirely different view 
 of their origin, he accepts the other most conspicu- 
 ous one, namely, he regards them as the proper ob- 
 jects of discussion and speculation, and as making 
 up our knowledge, when inquiring into the " nature 
 of things," so called. 
 
 § 4. But to pass to the more immediate subject of 
 our Lecture — Aristotle's theory of knowledge. 
 
 Having been a pupil of a master so great and so 
 much admired as Plato, that master's theory of ideas 
 as the characteristic features of his theory of knowl- 
 
ARISTOTLE AND'THE THEORY OF COGNITION: gj. 
 
 edge could not fail to be much in his thoughts and 
 occupy a conspicuous place in his discussions. But 
 Aristotle was of an entirely different turn of mind 
 from Plato. He could not fully accept his master's 
 theory of ideas. To his mind they were as elements 
 or means of knowledge, no explanations of the things 
 and phenomena we see around us. Suppose, for ex- 
 ample, I have, as Plato supposes, the idea of man in 
 my mind, and there is an object before me ; how do 
 I know, by means of that idea, that it is a man rath- 
 er than something else ? Do you say, by resem- 
 blance ? Butrfhow can a material thing that is exter- 
 nal to the mind — is solid — extended, so as to be more 
 or less large, colored, and having a definite and visi- 
 ble form, be like any idea that is in the mind, and 
 can therefore have none of these material or phys- 
 ical properties ? The idea cannot be large, of this or 
 that form and color. How then can it represent an 
 object whose characteristics so far as recognition is 
 concerned are these very properties? The ideas, 
 therefore, cannot be patterns, ideals, or paradigms of 
 things, as Plato liked to call them. We may have 
 models of things, such as we have all seen, which, 
 though smaller than the objects themselves, as in the 
 case of the model of the steam-engine, for example ; 
 it is a very exact representation of the steam-engine, 
 and gives a very correct idea of it in all respects ex- 
 cept its size. But the model has form and color 
 and size, as well as the engine itself. But the ideas 
 in the mind, if there are any in the mind, can have 
 no such properties, and therefore can be no such rep- 
 
62 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 resentatives, models or paradigms of things that are 
 around us in the material world. 
 
 Plato, as we have seen, would explain this act of 
 cognition by what he calls the " participation " of the 
 object in the idea, making, in fact, the idea and the 
 property to be one and the same. But we cannot 
 imagine the transference of the property, as white- 
 ness or triangularity for example, like paint from a 
 jar to some object so as to make it white. So if there 
 is the idea of the property in my mind, it is not the 
 same as an element of knowledge to my thoughts as 
 the property of objects which I call by the same 
 name. The hardness of an object cannot be con- 
 ceived to be the same as the hardness in the mind. 
 If, therefore, we could understand how the idea 
 could be carried out of the mind and put upon the 
 material substance, that would not help us to form 
 any ideas of the object to which it had been trans- 
 ferred. I do not know that an object is white or 
 black, solid or fluid, merely by having these ideas of 
 blackness, solidity, etc., in my mind. Suppose I 
 take something into my hands in the dark ; I do not 
 know by the mere contact of my hands what is its 
 color, whether it be white or black. The idea being 
 in my mind is no help to me, even if it is there as a 
 means of knowledge of the object, without actual 
 cognition of the object itself; just as we have seen, 
 it is no help to the actual cognition. 
 
 For these and other like reasons Aristotle con- 
 cludes that Plato's theory of ideas is unsatisfactory 
 and, perhaps purely fictitious. Thus he says {Met., 
 
ARISTOTLE AND THE THEORY OF COGNITION. 
 
 6S 
 
 B. I, e. g., § I,) " the assertion that these forms [ideas] 
 are examples or paradigms, and that all other objects 
 partake of them, is to speak vain [empty, unmeaning] 
 words and to utter mere poetic metaphors." And 
 again (B. XI, v), " the assertion that ideas are models 
 or examples and that other things partake of them, is 
 to speak quite at random and to assert what is 
 equivalent to mere poetic metaphors." 
 
 And he makes, in immediate connection with this 
 last quotation, another important criticism. If the 
 idea is the only reality, as Plato had constantly as- 
 serted, there could be no possibility of denying the 
 reality of anything of which we have any idea, for in 
 order even to deny its reality, the idea of it must be 
 in the mind, and thus the reality is there. " Even 
 though," he says, " we should deny that Socrates does 
 exist, yet the very act would generate Socrates." 
 And in like manner this would make Socrates exist 
 and be eternal, though . we were affirming that he 
 never existed. 
 
 § 5. The starting point of Aristotle's theory 
 of knowledge is in fact the same as that of all 
 the theories that have been proposed — the per- 
 ception of external objects. But he distinctly 
 recognizes the fact that in sense-perception, external 
 objects act on the mind through the organs of sense. 
 These objects, therefore, in his theory, are real and 
 must be recognized as real causes. They cause the 
 sensations in us, they are the starting point of 
 knowledge and true science. 
 
 Then he says, "the mind, when it perceives and 
 
64 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 thinks of that which comes within the mind as the 
 sensations that are produced there by external 
 objects, is cognisant of itself, for it becomes an 
 object of perception (to itself) by contact (with those 
 objects) and by the act of intellectual apprehension 
 that which is receptive of impression from what is 
 an object of perception, and is a substance, is mind, 
 and when, it is in possession of these impressions (or 
 sensations) it energizes or exists in a state of 
 activity " {Metaph., B. XI, c. vii.) 
 
 Now here is what Locke taught nearly two thou- 
 sand years later as the foundation and corner-stone 
 of his theory of knowledge. Locke denied all innate 
 idea^, such as Plato and the Realists had insisted 
 upon. But he held that our ideas of things are 
 complex — made up of elements — and one part of 
 these elements is derived from the external objects 
 acting upon our minds, in sense-perception, thus giv- 
 ing us the ideas of all the sensible or physical prop- 
 erties of bodies, and then by setting our minds to 
 work we get by reflection or consciousness of their 
 states the other class of elements of ideas — the 
 sum of which makes up our knowledge. 
 
 In the theory of Aristotle, therefore, knowledge 
 begins with an act of cognition or sense-perception. 
 In this act there is, and of necessity there must be, 
 something before the mind and acting on the or- 
 gans of sense, the eye, the hand, etc. In this very 
 act we perceive something which he calls tL, and by 
 dwelling upon it we perceive what is, the oVt. And 
 this is true, alike in regard to the SJ^a, or common 
 
ARISTOTLE AND THE THEORY OF COGNITION. 
 
 65 
 
 impressions of the unreflecting mass of mankind, 
 and the e-m,crTrinr}, the scientfic knowledge of the 
 more reflecting, the philospher, the men of science. 
 And with this in his theory, knowledge begins. 
 
 In modern use of language we would say that in 
 this act we get an idea — or an idea-image of the ob- 
 ject, which Aristotle calls rt, and which is more or 
 less adequate, and correctly represents the object. 
 But we also see, soon if not at first, what the object 
 realy is, the otl, as a table or a chair, a man or a 
 horse, etc. 
 
 But how do we know this? The idea of table, 
 chair, horse, man, etc., must have been in the mind, 
 so to speak of it, before I could say that this object 
 is a horse, a man, etc., and even before I could think 
 of it or know it to be such. 
 
 Now here is just the point at which Aristotle and 
 Plato separate in their theories of knowledge. Plato 
 held, as we have seen in our last Lecture, that on 
 the occasion of the mind being excited into a state 
 of activity by the action of an external object on 
 the sense organs, the idea of the thing was called 
 out of memory into consciousness, by an act of 
 recollection or remembrance, or possibly intution. 
 The idea had been put into the mind by God Him- 
 self before we were born into this world. Thus the 
 mind furnishes, from its own resources, the idea of 
 horse, man, table, as the case may be, and then we 
 know and can say that the object is a horse, or a 
 table, etc. 
 
 : But in Aristotle's theory, we discriminate at opce, 
 5 
 
66 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 and in the act of perception, between the properties 
 of the object we see. We see that some are ac- 
 cidental, and others arfe essential. The table, for 
 example, might be of a different color or form, or be 
 standing somewhere else, and yet be a table, and the 
 same table that it is now ; these accidental proper- 
 ties constitute the <rw/i/8e/8i;«;o'Ta. We discriminate 
 these properties from those that are essential, and 
 that make the object to be a table rather than some- 
 thing else. These essential properties make up the 
 ovaia, the essence of the object, as Aristotle calls it, 
 and we group them into an idea, or, as Aristotle 
 would call it, a vorjfMi, or notion, of the thing, which is 
 equally an idea or notion of all the things of that 
 class, that is, of all tables, so that when we see an 
 object having the same ouo-ta, or essential properties, 
 we know it to be a table. 
 
 § 6. Here then we reach the central fact, the start- 
 ing-point, from which the two theories, that of 
 Plato and that of Aristotle, diverge. Plato held 
 and taught, as we have seen and so often said, 
 that the general ideas of horse, man, etc., were innate 
 in the mind, and that the act of perception only 
 called them into consciousness. But in Aristotle's 
 view, the mind makes the idea out of the elements 
 of ideas which are thus furnished, and which the 
 mind sees to be, or at least determines at that time 
 to regard, as essential or as making up the ovala or 
 on, the what it is of the object. 
 
 The word ovaCa has a close relation to the verb 
 huC, to be, though it is not, as is sometimes said. 
 
ARISTOTLE AND THE THEORY OF COGNITION. Sj 
 
 the participle. Its first use in the Greek was to 
 denote one's property or possessions, what he 
 had, what belonged to him." In the time of Plato it 
 had begun to be used in the philosophical sense. 
 But in the works of Aristotle it passed fully into 
 its technical sense, denoting the essential properties 
 of the thing. 
 
 In Aristotle's view, then, we see by what he 
 calls aurOffK, that there is something, the rt, the that 
 it is, and then by insight or votjo-k, we discriminate 
 between the mere accidents and what we regard as 
 essential to it, and these we form into what he calls 
 avoT/To'v of the object, and then we extend the idea 
 and the use of the word to the class which includes 
 all the objects that have the same properties, how- 
 ever much they may differ in what we regard as their 
 accidenal properties, such as distinguish the objects 
 in the same class, and even one state of an object 
 from another state of the same object. 
 
 Thus while the notions, i/o^/tara, were formed in 
 the mind out of the material acquired by sense-per- 
 ception and insight, there was an ovaia or notion of 
 the thing itself, which was, like the ideas of Plato, 
 quite independent of our sense-perception and in- 
 sight, lying beyond it as it were, ready to be seen and 
 studied into. Aristotle defines it in various ways. 
 He sometimes indeed uses eiSo<s, one of Plato's nouns 
 for ideas. He also calls it to ti can — or to ri rjv 
 hvai " that which a thing really is,' ' or ought to be 
 —its ideal, the thing in its perfection. 
 
 This theory of Aristotle lays the foundation for 
 
68 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 his ontology. The external objects must be real 
 and substantial, or they could not produce the 
 sensations in us by which we perceive them. And 
 the mind must be real, or it could not act either 
 in perceiving the objects or in perceiving itself, 
 in the act of perceiving them. 
 
 Hence while with Plato the innate ideas were the 
 only substantial realities in the universe, even in fact 
 "the matter" of which the universe is made up, 
 Aristotle regards the objects we observe, the mate- 
 rial things arounti us, as the real objects, and the sub- 
 ject matter of science. 
 
 And in like manner the mind within us must be a 
 substantial reality, else it could not perceive the ob- 
 jects, and, therefore, no act of perception could take 
 place. We have then mind and matter, or material 
 things, as subjects of knowledge. 
 
 And thus Aristotle argues, as Plato had done, 
 from the nature of motion in the things we .see, 
 that there must be One Self-moving Being, — "a 
 Motion that moves Itself," who must also be intelli- 
 gent, like our own minds, and from the nature of the 
 case He must be omniscient, omnipotent, omnipres- 
 ent, since all the power that is manifest in the mo- 
 tion of the things we see, must have been derived 
 from Him. 
 
 It is easy now to see how Aristotle would have 
 explained the formation of idea-images, if he had 
 thought it worth while to explain their origin any 
 futher than I have already indicated. I do not, 
 however, now remember any pasage in his works in 
 
ARISTOTLE AND THE THEORY OF COGNITION. 
 
 69 
 
 which he has done so. But from his theory, the 
 formation must have been regarded as purely a work 
 of imagination. The elements of the ideas come in- 
 to the mind through the senses as sense-perception. 
 The mind combines them into a complex idea or 
 idea-image of the object. Thus I have an idea of an 
 orange, but some of the elements of that idea, as 
 color and form, come through the eye, others come 
 by touch, and both taste and smell have each contrib- 
 uted its share. But the mind combined them into 
 an idea of that one particular orange I saw and han- 
 dled. 
 
 I speak of this as the most natural and rational ex- 
 planation. But it assumes that the idea-image is a 
 real thing in the mind, rather than a mere state or 
 mode of the mind itself, which we shall see rea- 
 son by-and-by to doubt. 
 
 But there is another theory, which regards the idea- 
 image as a reality in the mind also, and which seems 
 to have been entertained, namely, that the idea of 
 the thing seen, the idea-image, is rather like the im- 
 age formed in or on a mirror which receives the rays 
 directly from the object and reflects its image to 
 our eyes. 
 
 Thus with the idea-image, or several of them, we 
 separate by abstraction, compare and contrast the 
 objects, and out of the properties we thus find to be 
 common to all objects, we form our general idea, or 
 notion of the class. And the progress in correcting 
 the hasty notion thus formed, constitutes a large 
 share in the progress of Science, 
 
70 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 I think we have now seen pretty clearly how, in 
 Aristotle's theory, we get our knowledge of individ- 
 ual objects and how we form our general ideas. 
 
 § 7. But the question is not merely how do we 
 come to have general ideas and to make general or 
 universal assertions; but what is the ground on 
 which they rest? With Plato the two questions 
 were included in the one that he had before his mind. 
 We make the assertion, "this is a man," because 
 we have the general idea of man in our minds and 
 we believe it, because we have the idea and make 
 the assertion. But have we no false or inadequate 
 ideas? To Aristotle this became a grave question, 
 and all the more important and prominent in his 
 mind because he felt himself obliged in two very im- 
 portant and prominent respects to disagree with 
 Plato. 
 
 And this our philosopher accomplishes by the use 
 of what has been since regarded as an axiom, and 
 which he asserts to be "the first principle of all 
 axioms." He states it in these words : " It is impos- 
 sible for the same thing to be and not to be at the 
 same time in the same subject and in reference to 
 the same object " {Met., B. Ill, c. iii). 
 
 If now after the verb to be we put an adjective, we 
 shall make his statement more clear. Thus it is im- 
 possible for this piece of paper to be white and not 
 to be white at the same time, in the same sense of the 
 word white, and in reference to the same standard of 
 color or comparison. And in chapter vi, Aristotle 
 gives us a further illustration and application of this 
 
ARISTOTLE AND THE THEORY OP COGNITION. 71 
 
 rule. Some of the properties of objects he says exist 
 by nature and essentially in the substance, and others 
 are capable of separation from it, such as in the case 
 of man, walking, sitting, being in good health, and 
 these properties, which cannot be separated from the 
 substance, he calls the essential properties and con- 
 stitute what he calls the essence, ovaCa. All 
 other properties are accidental and constitute ra 
 (TVfi^e^TjKora, or the mere " accidents " of its ex- 
 istence, as sitting or walking, sleeping or waking in a 
 man. But under these properties — whether essential 
 or accidental, there is in his estimation a substance 
 vXri, an underlying substance vXrj inroKeifjLrjvrj. 
 
 Hence in Aristotle's theory every individual object 
 consists of two elements: (i) the underlying sub- 
 stance, vXr), and (2) the overlying properties. And 
 these properties are of two classes : (i) essential, ovaia, 
 and (2) accidents, avfi^e^rjicoTa. 
 
 In the most general view, the underlying substance 
 had no properties or character at all. It was invisible, 
 without character, afiop^ov, and aopurrov, or as it was 
 called at a later day, aTroio? ; the essence consisted of 
 the properties that gave it its specific character, and 
 without which it could not exist in that character — 
 as iron, wood, stone, water, air, etc., while the ac- 
 cidents were, in this view, the form, temperature, 
 size, place of existence, etc., of this particular or in- 
 dividual object. 
 
 Or to take a specific case, this table, for example. 
 The matter, v\rf, is, we will say, wood, the essentia, 
 or ovaia, all those properties which give it its specific 
 
72 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 character and makes it a table, instead of being a 
 c-hair or other object that may be made of wood. 
 Its accidents are those of size, special, form, present 
 condition, place of standing, etc. 
 
 At a later stage in the progress of science it was 
 found necessary to divide the ovaia into essentia and 
 differentia, and the accidents into separable and in- 
 separable. The latter distinguishes one object from 
 another. The form, the separable accidents distin- 
 guish one state of the same object from another state 
 of the same object. 
 
 But this underlying matter, the vXt], has a nature 
 of its own. And though spoken of as without prop- 
 erties, we must, I think, understand the remark as 
 applying to the visible or cognizable properties, such 
 as make up the "essence" and the " accidents." But 
 in as much as it has a nature of its own, so that there 
 are certain necessary laws which even the Divine Mind 
 cannot overcome. 
 
 In one or two places Aristotle seems to consider 
 the primitive matter as but merely condensed space, or 
 place rather, to'tto?. This, however, is probably but 
 a figurative expression. But even so, he must have 
 regarded it as having extension, and if so, divisibility. 
 
 In fact there are always in every primary form of . 
 substance certain metaphysical properties, so to call 
 them, that are not obvious to either sight or insight, 
 or mere inspection. We reach them only by reason- 
 ing. Of this kind is the inertia of all merely material 
 objects. 
 
 Hence. the method is obvious. All the properties 
 
ARISTOTLE AND THE THEORY OF COGNITION. 73 
 
 of an object that can be at one time affirmed of it, 
 and at others denied of it, are only accidents, 
 (rufiPefirfKOTa, and all others are essential and make 
 up its essential or permanent being, and this class 
 we divide into the essentia of the genus, and the 
 differentia of its species, as a species cat or dog, in 
 the genus animal. 
 
 We have then two classes of cases. Take first the 
 case of an individual object, and let it be a man, 
 John Adams, if you please to call him by that name. 
 I see him, for example, now moving about the room, 
 anon, sitting down or standing still. I know that it 
 is the same man all the while, for I see him as he 
 passes from one of these states to the other. Hence 
 these are mere accidents or accidental properties and 
 modes of the man. 
 
 So with sickness and health, fatigue and rest, full- 
 ness and hunger. Nay, so it is with his age as he 
 passes from infancy to old age and death or the end 
 of his life. These then are accidents. And more 
 than that, they are separable accidents as well, 
 and do not necessarily enter into my notion of this 
 particular' man, John Adams. 
 
 But again he is now sitting in the chair yonder, 
 and no other person or thing is sitting in that chair 
 now. Hence this fact or mode distinguishes him 
 from all other objects ; nay, it is inseparable from 
 him. If we take into account the two elements of 
 time and place, no one else and nothing else can be 
 sitting there in that precise place and at this instant 
 passing moment. Hence this is an inseparable ac- • 
 
74, THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 cident with regard to him. But as any given posture 
 ma^ be denied of him with reference to any other 
 moment, as well as afifirmed in reference to another, 
 the posture is an accident not essential to the man ; 
 but with the elements of time and place added, it 
 comes to be a part of his history, a property that 
 must be affirmed and cannot be denied of the same 
 individual, and therefore ' it is an inseparable acci- 
 dent ; and thus it individualizes him and distin- 
 guishes him from all other individual men and all 
 other objects, man or brute, or a mere lump of inani- 
 mate matter. 
 
 And so of other properties or modes of being that 
 can be affirmed of any one object and not of another, 
 as in regard to a man, for example — the time and 
 place of his birth, his parentage, and all the peculiar 
 events of his life. 
 
 The formation of our ideas is not, however, always 
 limited to the two processes of comparison and con- 
 trast, as between the objects we have really seen. 
 There is an insight that goes farther than such mere 
 comparison. We often think of a property which, 
 so far as we have seen, has been an invariable, accom- 
 paniment of all the objects in that class, which, how- 
 ever, we come to think to be necessary, and we re- 
 gard its absence or abstraction as possibly something 
 that would be an improvement to all the objects of . 
 that class. And so too in the direction of improve- , 
 ment. It is in fact regarded as a characteristic of 
 what we call ideals, that they are better than any- 
 thing that we have seen or can produce, are something 
 
ARISTOTLE AND THE THEORY OF COGNITION. 75 
 
 in fact that is always before us, floating, perhaps, and 
 receding as we approach them, so that we can never 
 expect to reach them, never look forward to a time 
 when there is not something to aim and strive for, 
 something in the way of faith and hope to stimulate 
 our aspirations and efforts. 
 
 Hence then we have two classes, or sub-classes 
 rather, of the properties of objects, the one called 
 separable accidents, which make up the transient 
 modes in which any object may exist, and in some 
 one of which it must exist ; and the other, those 
 properties which belong to that individual exclusive- 
 ly and are inseparable from him, so that they do not 
 belong to and cannot be affirmed of any other object 
 of thought or knowledge, and therefore distinguish 
 that individual from all others ; and they are called 
 inseparable accidents. 
 
 But after all these accidents do not constitute the 
 " ideas " of Plato or the " notions " of Aristotle. 
 They do not form a part of what either of them 
 would consider science or true knowledge. And it 
 is for this reason that they are called accidents or 
 accidental properties. In the science of zoology, for 
 example, the professor has no occasion to tell, in 
 treating of foxes, the history of the peculiarities of 
 any one particular fox. And if he speaks of them at 
 all, it is a mere amusing anecdote, or an illustration ; 
 it is no part of the science of foxes, or of Natural 
 History. But he should tell us what is common to 1 
 all foxes, the anatomy of their bodies, the structure 
 of their organs, the size and convolutions of their 
 
yS THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 brain, their instincts and habits of life, and whatever 
 else there may be that is common to and character- 
 istic of the class of objects (animals) which we call 
 foxes. 
 
 These general ideas, that is, ideas of objects or 
 classes, which denote the class and not at all any 
 one individual, are not only necessary to science and 
 a scientific comprehension of all subjects, but science 
 in the proper sense of the term, does not deal with 
 the individual objects that make up the species or 
 their accidents ; it deals only with the essential prop- 
 erties of objects that make these classes, species or 
 genera. When we speak of individuals it becomes 
 biography, or amusing anecdote, and then we talk of 
 persons, tell who they were, when they lived, what 
 they said, and what they did. But we do not regard 
 it as science. 
 
 We have thus far considered Aristotle's theory of 
 the first steps or stages towards knowledge. We 
 have seen his theory of notions as contrasted with 
 Plato's theory of ideas. 
 
 We now proceed to the second great part of his 
 theory of knowledge. 
 
 It is a starting-point in Aristotle's theory of knowl- 
 edge, that we can ailfirm of objects nothing but what 
 we have seen in them, or in other words, we can 
 predicate of them no property, whether as accident 
 or essentia or differentia, which has not been given 
 us — furnished to the mind by the senses. Hence in 
 his theory, cognition of objects is the basis and ori- 
 gin and source of all our knowledge of. things. This 
 
ARISTOTLE AND THE THEORY OF COGNITION, -j-j 
 
 for external objects. And then for the mind itself, we 
 have consciousness, avveiSrja-K, by which the niind 
 perceives its own acts and states, as said above. 
 Thus we have sense-perception, dia-drjtnv, for exter- 
 nal objects, and trvveiSria-K, or consciousness, for the 
 mind or self. And as we see the objects by their 
 properties, as color, form, etc., so we see the mind 
 by its acts and states, and thus get our ideas of per- 
 ception, memory, reason, imagination, volition, etc., 
 and thus come to have, or may come to have, as 
 good a knowledge of the mind as we have or can 
 have of any external object or material thing what- 
 ever. 
 
 § 8. Now the rule of Aristotle comes to our aid. 
 Whatever we can affirm at one time or in one rela- 
 tion of an object, and deny at another time or in an^ 
 other relation of the same object, is a separable acci- 
 dent with regard to that object. And then one 
 step farther. Whatever of these properties or modes 
 or acts we can affirm of any one object and never de- 
 ny of that object or individual, and can affirm of no 
 other individual or object, is an inseparable accident 
 of that object. But they are, as Aristotle and Plato 
 would both of them hold, no part of " science " ; they 
 enter into biography, but they constitute no part of 
 what is called science. 
 
 But whatever may be affirmed constantly and al- 
 ways of two or more individual objects, may be made 
 a differentia or an essentia of the two or more as a 
 class of objects. And it and all the other properties 
 that may be thus affirmed of all the objects in th^ 
 class are its essence, or ovala, of the class. 
 
78 
 
 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 There is, however, no one property that can al- 
 ways and in all relations* be called by either one of 
 these technical terms, differentia or essentia. We 
 first, see objects one by one. And the moment we 
 see two that are alike in any respect, and notice the 
 resemblance, we make that likeness B.n essentia, and 
 the two constitute what is called a genus. And of 
 course the genus includes all objects that have that 
 property, and is therefore like the ones we have seen, 
 in that respect. But when the individuals which we 
 have seen in that class, that is, having this property, 
 become numerous, we see that a part of them have 
 some property or characteristic common to them, 
 which, however, is not found in the rest, and we di- 
 vide the class accordingly. Thus some men are hon- 
 est, and some are not so. Here man is the genus, 
 and we make for the occasion this property, honesty, 
 what is technically called a differentia. But suppose 
 again we find the objects in this species require to be 
 divided on account of some difference among them 
 into two or more classes ; then what was the differ- 
 entia becomes an essentia now, and we make this 
 newly-discovered property a differentia for the occa- 
 sion. Thus, if we find among honest men that some 
 are black and others are white, we make honesty the 
 essentia of our genus, and color black or white, the 
 differentia, or rather the two differentias — the one 
 for one species or class, the white honest men, and 
 the other for the black honest men. 
 
 Thus any property, whether included by Aristotle 
 in his " essence " or among his " accidents " (ovaria or 
 
ARISTOTLE AND THE THEORY OF COGNITION. 7^ 
 
 . ffw/A^e^ij/eoVo), may be made an essentia or a differ- 
 entia for the occasion. 
 
 But in Aristotle's classification we have as essen- 
 tial properties of things such as cannot be separated 
 from them. For a class these properties can be only 
 those that are common to all the objects in the class. 
 But for any individual object they include the insep- 
 arable accidents as well. 
 
 While, therefore, his accident coincides with what 
 we thus call by that name, his essence does not 
 coincide with what we call the essentia, and scarcely 
 bears any constant relation to it. 
 
 In the first place, it may mean all the properties 
 that belong of necessity to the class, as in mathemat- 
 ics, all the properties of triangles that we can prove 
 to be properties of them are essential. But in the 
 second place, in all existing objects, all the objects 
 that we see, there are certain properties that are com- 
 mon to each of the objects in the group or class, and 
 never absent except in cases of acknowledged mon- 
 strosities, which we call in Aristotle's use of terms 
 the essential properties of the class, and which we 
 denote by the name we give the class. Then in the 
 third place, Aristotle regards, as we have said, the in- 
 separable accidents of any individual person or object 
 as of the essence of that individual, its ovaCa. 
 
 It is often a little difificult at first, and for one that 
 is not accustomed to such things, to fix clearly and 
 distinctly in his mind the exact meaning of each of 
 these technical terms. But they are a part of science 
 and cannot be altogether avoided. Hence, whenever 
 
8o THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 there is one of these three parts or elements of any 
 existing thing, there must be the other two. There 
 can be no substance without essence and accidents, 
 and no essence, ova-ia, without both an underlying 
 substance and a surrounding of accidents. And in 
 hke manner any accidental, property implies both a 
 substance and a group of essential properties, which 
 malce the object to be in one or another of the spe- 
 cies of the objects to which we give a general name. 
 
 But the accidents never enter into science and 
 make no part of our scientific knowledge, however 
 essential in a practical point of view. , 
 
 And as we never perceive the underlying matter, 
 and as the matter must have its essence, it is not 
 strange that the word ovaLa came to be used. to de- 
 note the substantial thing itself — nay, in many -cases 
 it came to denote even the substance of the thing. 
 Of course whenever any essence is present some sub- 
 stance must be there also. Hence in Latin the word 
 ovaia, or essence, came to be translated by substantia, 
 and the two in the, common speech of mankind were 
 confounded with one another, and the terms them- 
 selves were often used iiidiscriminately. 
 
 It is not altogether easy to understand and realize 
 what Aristotle meant by soul, ■f-vy(rj. In his work 
 on the soul, wepl .t?;? yjrv^i^i!, he regards everything that 
 lives, even plants and the lowest animals, as having 
 soul. In his view soul is but an abstract term, and 
 denotes the phenomena of life, growth, reproduction, 
 decay, etc., as well as digestion and such like; very 
 much as gravity is to the falling.bodies, or electricity 
 
ARISTOTLE AND THE THEORY OF COGNITION, gi 
 
 to the flash and roar of thunder, or the clicking of 
 the telegraph register. It is the unseen force that 
 becomes manifest in these phenomena, and is more 
 nearly like the so-called " principle of life " than any- 
 thing else that we have a name for in our language. 
 
 Aristotle made a distinction between two or per- 
 haps three modes or states of existence, or being, 
 which, although not very directly in the line of my 
 object in these Lectures, is, nevertheless, of sufificient 
 importance, in my estimation, to justify me in step- 
 ping aside for a moment to mention it. The words 
 used by him to express his view of the three stages 
 in the existence of anything are, Svva/jiK, ivepjeia and 
 eineXexta, the first denoting " in power " or " possi- 
 bility," the next " in fact " and the last in its perfect- 
 ed state. 
 
 In this view everything must be considered as 
 having existed in power, potency or possibility, be- 
 fore it existed in fact and reality. And most things 
 may and ought to be considered in reference to this 
 potency, or in plain English, what it is possible for 
 them to be or become, as well as in reference to 
 what they are, if we would have a full and complete 
 scientific knowledge of them. 
 
 Hence the words " potential " and " potency " 
 have come to have a use in our modern discussions 
 of science that are somewhat technical, and grew 
 out of this part of Aristotle's theory of knowledge. 
 Thus Tyndall says, in speaking of primeval matter : 
 " I cross the boundary of experimental wisdom and 
 discern in matter .... the promise znd potency 
 6 
 
82 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 of all terrestial life {Fragments, p. 534). In plain 
 English, and without any metaphysics, this means 
 that he saw (in imagination ? or insight ?) from a 
 consideration of the nature of matter, even in that 
 state, that it was possible for all living things that 
 now exist or are hereafter to come into existence, to 
 be formed of that matter ; or better still, it was pos- 
 sible for that matter to pass (to be formed ?) into the 
 forms of animal life, such as we now have " in fact " 
 — kv evreke'x^ia, as Aristotle would call it. 
 
 Of course this may have been a matter of imagi- 
 nation and thus have no scientific value, or a matter 
 of insight ; and if so then he should have told us 
 how this inorganic matter could take on the form of 
 organized life and become living plants and animals 
 of itself and without an act of the Creator. 
 
 But it is time to pass now from this one great 
 branch of Aristotle's theory of knowledge to the 
 other and second great department of it. The first 
 part consists, as we have seen, of observation, or 
 sense-perception, insight and classification. 
 
 § 9. But observation and induction, leading to and 
 implying generalization, are not the only means of 
 knowledge that are recognized and described by Aris- 
 totle. These are Deduction and Demonstration, or 
 a7ro7<»7i7, and airoSei^K as well. The former means 
 literally the taking of one fact or truth from another, 
 and the latter means the showing of one truth by 
 means of another ; the former is what Aristotle calls 
 Deduction, and the latter is what he calls Demonstra- 
 tion. 
 
ARISTOTLE AND THE THEORY OF COGNITION. §- 
 
 There is a disposition in these modern days to lim- 
 it demonstration to that form of a priori reasoning, 
 to which we confine ourselves in the pure Aiathemat- 
 ics, although the word is constantly used in a differ- 
 ent sense in scientific discussions. We speak of dem- 
 onstrating a doctrine by a fact or an experiment. 
 And in the study of anatomy the word demonstra- 
 tion has still a more limited signification. 
 
 But deduction is general, and even the cases of 
 demonstration may always be stated in the form of 
 deduction. By deduction we arrive at the knowledge 
 of much of the detail of all sciences, and at all the 
 applications of these principles of any science to the 
 practical purposes of life. Thus I have a piece of 
 iron before me. Will this piece melt and become 
 fluid ? Will it unite with oxygen or carbon ? I do 
 not know from observation, for I have never seen the 
 thing tried on this particular piece of that metal. 
 
 But I have learned by induction and generalization, 
 based on, and proceeding from, observation and in- 
 sight, that iron will melt at a white heat. I have not 
 only seen that it will do so in all the cases that I 
 have tried, but I have come somehow or other to the 
 conclusion that this property of melting at that tem- 
 perature is essential to iron, and is to some extent 
 characteristic of it, so that if this object I have before 
 me be a piece of iron, and will not melt at that tem- 
 perature, one of two things is certain — either it is not 
 iron at all, or it is an abnormal and exceptional case. 
 ■ Hence Aristotle's fundamental axiom, known as 
 his dicttim de omni et nulla, " Whatever may be af- 
 
84 
 
 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 firmed of a class of objects is essential to the class, 
 and may be afifirmed accordingly of any and every 
 individual in that class " (Categories, iii). 
 
 Aristotle's statement is not quite so clear as the 
 above ; but it is the same in import ; " Whatever is 
 predicated of another as a subject, then whatever 
 things may be said of that predicate may be said of 
 the subject also ;" or, to put it in the form of a syllo- 
 gism: 
 
 All pieces of iron melt at a white heat ; 
 
 This is a piece of iron ; 
 
 Therefore it will melt at white heat. 
 
 It will be seen from this example that much of our 
 knowledge of detail as well as all precepts for the 
 practical application of our knowledge, must be at- 
 tained in this way, that is, by inference from general 
 principles. In short, deduction is as essential to 
 knowledge of detail and the completion of science as 
 induction itself. 
 
 As is well known, Aristotle wrote a treatise on 
 Logic, or rather several treatises, which, taken to- 
 gether, make up what is called his Logic. With him, 
 as he treats the subject, it is both a science and an 
 art. He treats the general and fundamental princi- 
 ples, and discusses also the nature and use of the 
 terms or words and phrases by which our meaning 
 may be expressed. 
 
 The principle — the dictum de omni et nulla just 
 stated — really affirms only the principle of what is 
 called the First Figure. But Aristotle knew of two 
 others, and described them. The Second is, as re- 
 
ARISTOTLE AND THE THEORY OF COGNITION. 85 
 
 suiting from the nature of classification, that when 
 any property may be affirmed of any object and de- 
 nied of another, they are not the same object under 
 different names, nor yet do they belong to the same 
 class ; thus making the predicate that is affirmed of 
 one and denied of the other, as a differentia, so that 
 they do not belong to the same species. Thus, 
 
 John Adams was an American ; 
 
 Napoleon Bonaparte was not an American ; 
 
 Therefore John Adams could not have been Napo- 
 leon Bonaparte under another name. 
 
 Scientific men use this form freely and frequently. 
 When, for example, a new species of animal is found, 
 or the fossil remains of any extinct animal, quite as 
 much is inferred negatively from what is actually 
 seen, as to what it was not, as can be affirmed, as a 
 matter of positive science or knowledge of what it 
 really was. What is seen may indicate that it did not 
 live in the water ; and thus we have the whole group 
 of properties that may be derived from this one ; as 
 that it had not the second stomach of the ruminants. 
 And the absence of any one or all of its peculiarities 
 of constitution throws light in one direction or the 
 other upon the animal whose frame we have before us. 
 But there is still a third principle of deduction which 
 depends upon another law of the correlation of species 
 and leads to the other class of useful inference. It is 
 this. Whenever any property may be affimed of two 
 different classes, that property cannot be a differentia 
 of either class, but must be common to some at least 
 of the individuals in the two classes named, thus : 
 
 All remedies are useful in their place ; 
 
86 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 But some remedies cause pain in their application ; 
 
 Therefore some things that are useful cause pain 
 in their application, and conversely, some things that 
 cause pain are useful in the end. 
 
 There is indeed a fourth mood. But Aristotle 
 either knew not of it, or if he did, he did not consider 
 it worth discussing in his treatises. And in fact it 
 rests on the dictum de omni et nullo, and is but the 
 same rule taken backwards, so to call it. 
 
 And since the time of Aristotle there has been recog- 
 nized a form of syllogism that does not in fact come 
 under his dictum at all. It is called the comparative 
 syllogism, and has necessarily four terms, while his 
 can have only three, thus : 
 
 A: B :C: D; 
 
 A is one-half of B ; 
 
 Therefore C is one-half of D. 
 
 This form of reasoning is used largely in mathe- 
 matics. But it is extensively used elsewhere. In 
 fact its major premise is the basis of all metaphors, 
 thus: 
 
 Washington is to his country as a father to his 
 family ; 
 
 Washington the father of his country, or simply, 
 " the father of his country." 
 
 § lo. It is manifest from this review that we have 
 within the domain of knowledge three kinds or de- 
 grees of certainty. 
 
 The first and highest is obtained by demonstration 
 in the narrower and more restricted sense of the 
 word. It begins with self-evident axioms, and pro- 
 
ARISTOTLE AND THE THEORY OF COGNITION. 87 
 
 ceeds with definitions only, and by means of steps, 
 any one of which is either a self-evident axiom or the 
 result of a demonstration in this narrower sense of 
 the word. Aristotle everywhere assumes the exist- 
 ence and character of this method. But he no where, 
 so far as I now remember, professedly or directly de- 
 scribes it. We have the best illustrations of this 
 method in the pure mathematics. There we begin 
 with the announcement of a few axioms. We then 
 define the point, the line, the triangle, the rectangle, 
 the circle, etc., and then proceed to develop the nec- 
 essary truths that are imphed in each of these figures, 
 or definitions rather. But in the whole process we 
 assume nothing that depends upon observation, noth- 
 ing but what is implied in the nature of things, so 
 that there can be no error, no exception, and no gen- 
 eralization that is too broad for the premises. 
 
 In this case we deal with only what Aristotle calls 
 the essence of things in the strictest sense (see above). 
 The definition of the terms gives part of the essence, 
 that is obvious to all. The axioms state only what is 
 essential — obviously so to the subject of the axioms. 
 And the demonstration can neither add nor detract 
 anything ; it only develops, and can do nothing more 
 nor less, other properties that are of the essence of the 
 figure or number we are dealing with. It can bring 
 out to view all the hidden essence of the subject that 
 we are reasoning about. 
 
 The next kind or degree of certainty — and in fact it 
 is very different both kind and in degree — is that 
 which is based on observation, generalization and de- 
 
88 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 duction from more general truths. The sources of 
 nncertainty here is the possibility of false perception 
 and the still greater possibility of seeing things 
 through false and distorting mediums, and hasty gen- 
 eralization. 
 
 There have been along in the history of philosophy 
 several evolutions of a form of idealism which denied 
 the reality of external objects, and thus aimed to 
 throw distrust on observation altogether. But the 
 recognized and undeniable distinction between true 
 and false perception, makes the objects of true percep- 
 tion an undeniable reality, and the reality or act of 
 perceiving implies the reality of the thing perceived 
 — to perceive nothing is not to perceive at all. Hence 
 in all acts of true perception, the reality of the object 
 perceived is implied and proved by the most rigorous 
 demonstration. This is the reason for making this, 
 which most persons regard as the source of the most 
 absolute certainty, the second grade and inferior to 
 the kind of demonstration I have indicated. Cases 
 of false perception do undoubtedly occur, in which 
 we have nothing but a demonstration of the impossi- 
 bility of what we thought we saw to convince us of 
 its unreality. Often indeed there is a doubt in the 
 mind of the observer himself, whether his faculties 
 are in this unreal condition and may be. trusted. But 
 this is not always the case. 
 
 But the world is full of hasty generalizations. And 
 one of the most important as well as one of the most 
 difficult things in the progress of science, has been 
 the correction of these hasty generalizations that men 
 
ARISTOTLE AND THE THEORY OF COGNITION, gg 
 
 have made in the ages that aire past. The time was 
 not long ago when all animals that lived wholly in 
 the waters were called fish ; all that fly were birds. 
 But we have whole groups or classes of shell-fish that 
 are not fish at all, and besides bats that fly in the air 
 we have flying squirrels, and I believe also flying fish 
 in some countries. 
 
 The other kind or degree of certainty is that which 
 attends deduction in the ordinary sense of the word. 
 And yet the fault or danger does not depend on the 
 process, or rather the principles of the process. 
 These are as certain as the axioms of mathematics. 
 And in fact, as logic is ordinarily taught, there is but 
 the one principle or axiom already stated : the dictum 
 de omni et nulla, that is, the principle of subordina- 
 tion and comprehension. For all the recognized syl- 
 logisms can be reduced to the First Figure and thus 
 placed obviously under this dictum. And all the oth- 
 er recognized forms, as conditional, hypothetical, dis- 
 junctive, are but various ways of stating the argu- 
 ment. 
 
 In mere deduction, however, there is, as I have 
 said, the possibility of error, arising from the possi- 
 bility of what are called exceptions. In tl^e strictest 
 sense of the word, the essence of a thing consists of 
 those properties of objects without which they could 
 not exist, or be in the class to which they are referred. 
 But besides these properties, all or nearly all the ob- 
 jects in any class have other properties, which are 
 common but not essential. Thus, most men speak, 
 but we do not hesitate to call one who cannot speak 
 
 7 
 
go THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 a man, or one of the human species, though he were 
 dumb and incapable of speech. But if there were or 
 could be an animal in the form of a dog for example, 
 that could speak and use language as men now do, 
 we should not call him a man on that account, but 
 rather a speaking dog, and a speechful dog. Hence 
 speech, though a property common to man, is not in 
 the strictest sense of the word the hvaia or essence 
 of man. 
 
 All real objects, that is, all objects that naturally 
 exist, have such properties. And hence the uncer- 
 tainty of mere deduction as contrasted with demon- 
 stration, which is based upon the essential properties 
 of things, and upon them only. 
 
 But the sources and danger of error of this kind 
 are twofold. First ; as all reasoning must be stated 
 in language, there is always the possibility and the 
 danger of some fallacy in diction. Aristotle saw this 
 and devoted a large space of his logical treatises to 
 its consideration. Thus, in the well-known illustra- 
 tion: 
 
 Light comes from the sun ; 
 
 Feathers are light ; 
 
 Therefore feathers come from the sun, 
 We have a clear case of ambiguity in the use of the 
 word light. 
 
 But in the second place we reason for the most 
 part from general principles, which we call major 
 premises, that have been obtained by induction from 
 observed facts. Hence, aside from all the liabilities 
 to err in the process of observation and generalization. 
 
ARISTOTLE AND THE THEORY OF COGNITION, gi 
 
 which make up the induction, or, to speak more ac- 
 curately, the observation and the induction that make 
 up the generaUzation, there is always the possibility 
 of exceptions, monstrosities and sports, which render 
 it possible that in every particular case our inference 
 may not prove true on actual observation and expe- 
 rience of it. This source of liability of error, how- 
 ever, does not depend on the nature of the process 
 of deduction, but rather on the matter to which it 
 applies. It is not found in mathematics at all, for 
 although all the reasoning in any mathematical dem- 
 onstration can be reduced to one or the other of the 
 two forms of syllogism I have named, the categorical 
 and the comparative, yet in mathematics we reason 
 from definitions that give us only the nature of the 
 things — the most obvious differentia — instead of 
 mere generalized ideas that have been obtained from 
 observation and of particular examples. 
 
 § II. But we must in conclusion notice Aristotle's 
 two famous groups of categories, or rather his classi- 
 fications and indications of the extent and scope of 
 human knowledge. 
 
 The first of these lists that I shall notice is the 
 most comprehensive, and includes all that can be 
 called knowledge, or all that one can be said to know, 
 or even wish to know, in the most comprehensive 
 use of the term. It consists of ten categories or 
 classes of predicates that can possibly be affirmed of 
 anything, including — as science in the stricter sense 
 does not — the modes that are made by the most va- 
 riable of the separable accidents. 
 
Q2 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 The first named category is the ovala or essence of 
 the thing we indicate by its name. Then follows, 
 secondly, the quantity, as how many, or how much. 
 The quality, or any of the adjective predicates that 
 may be affirmed of it besides those embraced in 
 the first category, or its nature as indicated by its 
 name. Fourthly, its relation to other things, as a 
 father to a son, cause and effect, etc. Fifthly, the 
 place where it is, or has occurred ; and, sixthly, the 
 time when it was, or was in the condition which we 
 have in mind. Seventhly, its position, as standing, 
 or walking ; and, eighthly, what it has, holds or pos- 
 sesses. Then, ninthly, its state of action, what it is 
 doing, or whether it is doing nothing ; and so at last 
 and finally, tenthly, its passion, or what if anything 
 it is suffering or is being done to it. 
 
 There has been much discussion and much differ- 
 ence of opinion as to what Aristotle meant precisely 
 by his first-named category, ovaia. But it seems to 
 me that after the two thousand years that have 
 elapsed since he lived, one need have no difficulty in 
 stating clearly what perhaps he did not see quite 
 clearly. He, however, recognizes the fact that he 
 uses the word in two senses {Cat., c. iii). In one 
 sense it denotes the individual, including the insepa- 
 rable accidents, and in the other it denotes only the 
 class by the properties that are common to all the 
 objects in the class. In the first sense, as Aristotle" 
 takes pains to say, it is never a predicate in the prop- 
 er sense of the word, while in the second sense, it is 
 one of the most commonly used of all predicates. 
 
ARISTOTLE AND THE THEORY OF COGNITION. 
 
 93 
 
 I have said that Aristotle regards Plato's doctrine of 
 eternal ideas in the mind, and substitutes in a meas- 
 ure what we translate notions, vo^/iara, as formed 
 by the mind itself. But his ovtrta, or nature of things, 
 comes to be nearly the same, and for every purpose 
 just the same, as the ideas of Plato, as we shall see 
 more fully in the next Lecture. 
 
 They include all the possible predicates, and, as 
 Aristotle says, no one of them considered by itself 
 either afifirms or denies anything of any subject. 
 But when connected by the copula " is " or " are," 
 and so formed into a preposition, as " paper is white," 
 we have an affirmation, and the first step after simple 
 cognition or apprehension of objects towards knowl- 
 edge or science, which is but systematized knowledge. 
 And moreover these propositions must be formed be- 
 fore we can have any process of deduction or dem- 
 onstration. They must be formed in fact before we 
 can say anything, or rather they are necessarily 
 formed in the act of saying anything of any subject 
 whatever {Cat., c. iv). 
 
 Then, as true predicates, all these elements are of 
 three kinds, so that in a simple sentence a predicate 
 may be (i) a common name denoting the genus, yeuo^, 
 as John is a man ; and (2) some differential property 
 which makes the class, aS John is human, that is, a 
 human being — a man ; or lastly, some accidental 
 property, avfi^efiriKov, as John is sick. 
 
 Aristotle does not in this place recognize or speak 
 of the identical propositions such as have as subject 
 and predicate, two nouns which are only names for 
 
54 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 the same thing, as " common salt is the chloride of 
 sodium." And his distinction between his second 
 and third forms it seems to be hardly worth the while 
 to retain. 
 
 So then we have but three kinds of afifirmative cat- 
 egorical propositions ; those (i) in which the predi- 
 cate is but the synonym of the subject ; (2) those in 
 which the predicate is a common name, denoting the 
 genus or kind of the subject ; and (3) an adjective 
 denoting a property which is ascribed to the subject, 
 and this whether essential or accidental. 
 
 § 12. But it is time to pass to the other subdivis- 
 ion of knowledge which has reference chiefly to sci- 
 entific comprehension of things, which is systemat- 
 ized knowledge. In this classification all knowledge 
 is referred to four heads or first principles, which he 
 calls both aniai, causes, and apy^di, or first princi- 
 ples. He repeats this classification and enumeration 
 several times, as in MeL, III, B. IV, c. ii ; B. XI, c. 
 iv; and Phys., II, 3d, 194 and 23. They are some- 
 times spoken of as the (i) efficient cause, (2) the ma- 
 terial cause, (3) the formal cause, and (4) the final 
 cause. 
 
 Although the above is the order in which Aristotle 
 usually mentions them, and the order also in which 
 they occur both in time and in logical sequence, it is 
 better, as I think, for our present purpose, to take 
 them up in an order that is somewhat different from 
 that given by Aristotle. 
 
 The material cause is that of which anything is 
 made, as wood or stone, and the particular kinds of 
 
ARISTOTLE AND THE THEORY OF COGNITION, qj 
 
 material, as oak, marble, granite, etc. This is a part 
 of our knowledge of any object, and it gives knowl- 
 edge also within certain limits of the things we 
 are talking about. Of anything that is made of oak, 
 many things may be said that could not be said of 
 a thing although in other respects the same, but yet 
 is made of iron or marble. It thus includes things 
 that are inherent in and inseparable from the nature 
 of the material itself. 
 
 The formal cause is the specific character, the 
 QvaU of Aristotle's phraseology and the " idea " of 
 Plato's. And Aristotle borrows, or rather follows, 
 the doctrine of his master far enough to regard and 
 speak of these ideas as causes. It is the idea of 
 table put upon the substance wood that makes the 
 wood to be a table rather than something else. It 
 means thus in our language the specific character, 
 what kind of a thing it is ; to what species does it 
 belong, as, if made of wood (material cause), is it ta- 
 ble, chair, or what. And if we will consider the 
 matter as descending to individuals, it includes all of 
 its inseparable accidents, which are a part of the es- 
 sence of the individual. All those properties and 
 modes in fact that make him to be what he is as dis- 
 tinct from all other men and other objects of thought. 
 But it can hardly be said to descend so as to include 
 the separable accidents. 
 
 We come now to speak of efificient causes. Aris- 
 totle regarded everything in the universe but One as 
 an effect produced in time, and so far at least as its 
 present form is concerned, dependent in its exist- 
 
^6 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 ence. He speaks of essence without substance as 
 that which makes things to be what they are. But 
 of substance he recognizes three kinds : (i) that 
 which is visible to the eyes ; (2) that which is invisi- 
 ble to the eyes, but is seen by the reason or insight ; 
 and (3) that which exists in no cognizable form as 
 yet, but only in potentiality, and may be brought 
 into existence, as well as into all the changes in its 
 form and mode of existence, imply an efificient 
 cause. Of these, there is but One First Cause. 
 There are many human causes, as every human be- 
 ing is a cause also in this sense. 
 
 And then each substantial thing is a real cause, 
 though a cause in a secondary sense, as acting upon 
 other things and producing effects in them only as 
 it is acted upon and actuated by some thing or per- 
 son also, who is a cause in the first or primary 
 sense. 
 
 § 13. With Plato, as we have seen, the starting- 
 point of his theology was the thought of God as the 
 Mind, the source and repository of ideas, and then 
 of ideas themselves as guiding intelligence in its ac- 
 tivity by love and a desire for the good and the hap- 
 piness of all things. But Aristotle, starting as he 
 did, with the objects and phenomena of the material 
 Universe around us, was led to think of law and mo- 
 tion, and to consider God as the First Cause of motion 
 and of all the changing phenomena of nature. Thus 
 motion was with him the central thought, the start- 
 ing point, as mind had been with Plato. 
 
 Aristotle, as we have seen {Met., B. XI, c. vii), de- 
 
ARISTOTLE AND THE THEORY OF COGNITION. 
 
 97 
 
 fines mind to be that within us which as substance 
 receives impressions from things around us, such as 
 are capable of being perceived, and then when it has 
 received these impressions (sensations) it subsists in 
 a state of activity (active thought). He then passes 
 from this definition to the idea of God, " Wherefore 
 this [state and kind of activity] seems to belong to 
 and characterize the First Mover more conspicuously 
 than the mind of man, so that in man it seems to be 
 rather a divine prerogative which man possesses." 
 " The principle of life is surely inherent in God. For 
 the reality of active exertion constitutes life, and 
 eternal life constitutes the essence of God." 
 
 In this classification he thinks that there are four 
 substances : Fire, which is essentially active but not 
 always or incessantly so ; and the other three, air, 
 fire and water are often at rest. But of course, as he 
 argues, there must be something that is spontaneously, 
 that is necessarily active, and thus he argues must 
 necessarily be eternal, indestructible, incapable of 
 passion, or being moved or acted upon by others, 
 and not only always active but the cause of all action, 
 motion or change in the others. It (He) is not only 
 potential energy, that is capable of acting, but is 
 actual energy, or energy in action. 
 
 Thus while Plato, from his method and starting- 
 point, reaches something like the universal intelligence 
 or reason of our modern idealists, Aristotle, with his 
 starting-point and method, reaches something like the 
 force, which is the ultimate fact with our agnostics. 
 
 8 
 
98 
 
 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 But both these two grand old philosophers hold to 
 the personality and moral attributes of God. 
 
 Then finally there is a final cause for everything 
 that exists except the One, that is, a reason why it 
 exists, and a purpose or design in its existence. 
 This results from Aristotle's view of the First 
 Cause, as an intelligent Being, acting spontaneously 
 and from purpose or design ; Plato had argued the 
 same view in his later work, the Laws (B. X, c. ii). 
 
 In his view of a final cause we never understand 
 anything fully until we know what it was created (if 
 created by God) or produced (if by man) for ; that 
 is, what was the design or aim in producing it. But 
 in modern times men of a sceptical turn of mind 
 have come to doubt or be cautious about what are 
 called final causes in the domain of nature, and Aris- 
 totle's fourth class comes to be the effects or conse- 
 quences which anything in existence may produce. 
 
 Thus I think we shall see that Aristotle's enumer- 
 ation of the categories, or his classification of knowl- 
 edge, is very complete and that he had a wide and 
 comprehensive grasp of the whole subject, and did 
 much for the world of thoughtful men, which the 
 world has had no occasion to do again. He stands 
 out as one of the greatest lights, and perhaps the 
 greatest light, on the whole, of all antiquity — a phil- 
 osopher who was so far before his age that the more 
 we study his Works in these modern times, the more 
 do we find in him, and the more do we become aware 
 that he had anticipated to a large extent our wisest 
 and best thoughts. 
 
LECTURE III. 
 
 DESCARTES AND LOCKE. 
 
 § I. Plato made such an impression that his views 
 were always prominent in the minds of men who re- 
 garded themselves as students of philosophy. In 
 this line we have several stages of evolution until we 
 come to the so-called Neo-Platonists of Alexandria. 
 And in fact the principles of his philosophy had made 
 such an impression on the minds of many of the 
 early converts to Christianity, that it enters some- 
 what largely into the theological speculations and 
 the accepted teachings of the early theologians, if 
 not those of the Church itself. 
 
 But in the case of Aristotle it was quite otherwise. 
 He can scarcely be said to have formed any school, 
 or to have had disciples at all. It was not until some 
 two hundred and fifty years after his death that the 
 first complete collection of his works was made. 
 Nor did they receive much attention for a long time 
 after that date. In fact Plato's theory of ideas was, 
 strange as it may now seem, easily understood after 
 a fashion, and accepted by a large class of men of 
 certain mental characteristics. And it was thought 
 to be particularly favorable to the reception and the 
 
lOO THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 right interpretation of Christianity. But Aristotle's 
 philosophy was far more difficult of comprehension 
 and appreciation. Plato's theory gave an impulse 
 and play to imagination and the unlimited exercise 
 of fancy. Aristotle's theory called for careful and 
 accurate thought, nice discrimination and patient in- 
 vestigation. In fact it laid the foundation and 
 actually called for the system which we often regard 
 as not only of late discovery, but as the peculiarity 
 of modern times — the method of induction and the 
 patient investigation of facts. 
 
 Another influence deserves a passing mention. 
 The philosophy of Plato was far more congenial to 
 certain forms of Oriental speculation, which were at 
 that time making their way westward. Philo, the 
 Jew, applied it to the interpretation of the Old Tes- 
 tament teachings. And at a later date it gave rise 
 and form to what was called Gnosticism. 
 
 Aristotle's logic was revived, however, after a 
 while. Porphyry wrote an introduction to it (about 
 275 A. D.) and explained it in order to bring its 
 methods into general use. It was also adopted by 
 Mahometans in their schools. But the application 
 of one part of Aristotle's logic — his method of deduc- 
 tion, omitting wholly the part of observation and in- 
 duction as a means of reaching general maxims or 
 first principles — to the first principles or innate 
 " ideas " of Plato and the " essences " of Aristotle, 
 gave rise to what is known as the scholastic system 
 of the Middle Ages. 
 
 § 2. The great controversy of the Middle Ages, so 
 
DESCARTES AND LOCKE. jqi 
 
 far as our subject is concerned, is known as the con- 
 troversy between the Realists and the Nominal- 
 ists — the ReaHsts affirming Plato's theory of ideas 
 or Aristotle's doctrine of " essences," and those who 
 are commonly called Nominalists dissenting from it. 
 
 We know but little of the Nominalists except 
 through the representations — or possibly we should 
 say the misrepresentations- — of their adversaries, the 
 Realists. With the Realists all knowledge consisted 
 in or was derived from the innate ideas or essences, 
 although now, under the influence of Christianity, 
 the doctrine of a pre-existence of the soul and the 
 acquisition of its ideas in this earlier stage of its 
 existence, was no longer held. But the philosophers 
 of the age seemed to think that there was and could 
 be only the two sources of ideas — in view of .one of 
 which they were called innate, and the other, which 
 was held by the Nominalists, was supposed to derive 
 them all from sensation. It was held, therefore, that 
 unless we have innate ideas, that is, ideas that are 
 not obtained by sensation, we can have no ideas of 
 anything but material objects ; and all other words 
 than those used to denote some material thing — 
 something that we can see and handle — must be 
 mere r\3imes, flatus vocis — vox proeterea nihil, and the 
 advocates of that theory of knowledge could be only 
 atheists and materialists. 
 
 All objects that could be thus seen and cognized 
 were considered as denoted by concrete terms. But 
 all invisible objects were denoted by terms, which, 
 in the philosophy of that day, were regarded as 
 
I02 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 abstract. Thus the mind or soul of man, as well as 
 truth and justice, virtue, and primarily all general 
 ideas, nay, even God Himself was denoted by what 
 were regarded as abstract .terms. 
 
 In modern times, however, as I shall have occasion 
 to show hereafter, we find it necessary to make a 
 very different classification of our terms. 
 
 The controversy turned on what were called gen- 
 eralia or universalia, or as we call them, general 
 terms. It was held by the Realists that there must 
 be general ideas before we could perceive any in- 
 dividual object, or give it a name, or know what it 
 really is. 
 
 There is an object before my eyes. What is it ? 
 I see it, its outline, its form, color, etc. ; but what is 
 it ? I say, "It is a man." "Ah, yes," say the Real- 
 ists, "how could you call it a man if the idea, the 
 general idea, of man were not already in your 
 mind ?" Well, I suppose I could not. But then 
 the inquiry arises, how came that general idea in 
 my mind ? You never saw man. You have seen 
 men individually, one at a time, and one by one. 
 But all these are concrete objects. The word man, 
 on the other hand, is general, and as such cannot 
 denote any object that can anywhere be seen ; that 
 is, we can see no one anywhere that has not the 
 accidental properties that make him to be some one 
 individual man, no where one with merely the essen- 
 tial properties that make up our ideas of man in 
 general. 
 
 How then do I call the object that is before me a 
 
DESCARTES AND LOCKE. jq, 
 
 man ? If you ask for the word man, I answer, I 
 learned that from my ancestors, who speak English. 
 But do you inquire for the idea ? I answer substan- 
 tially, as Aristotle had done, and as all modern phi- 
 losophy requires us to do (Lecture II). 
 
 In the first place, 1 got all of my first ideas of 
 this kind — that is, general ideas — by analysis, in- 
 sight and generalization. I saw at first one or more 
 objects that people called men. I saw that in 
 some respects they were all alike, and in some re- 
 spects no two of them were exactly alike. Out of 
 these points of resemblance or similarity I formed 
 my idea of man in general. And thus with both 
 the word and the idea, I can and do call all objects 
 of sight, or of thought, even, that possess those 
 properties that are common to them all, men, and 
 constitute my general idea of man. 
 
 And thus it is with all the general names that I 
 learned from my ancestors and teachers, and also 
 with all the general ideas that I have formed of 
 objects that I have really seen. But then, in the 
 second place, I have general ideas of things that I 
 have not seen. These I get from dictionaries and 
 such other means as describe for me objects that I 
 have not seen, some of which perhaps I never can 
 see. 
 
 But these ideas, that is, ideas of this class, are 
 only general ideas. Besides the ideas which in this 
 philosophy were considered concrete ideas, that is, 
 ideas of visible and tangible individual objects, 
 there were two other classes that were not account- 
 ed for in this way. 
 
I04 
 
 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 The one class are what we now call abstract ideas 
 in the narrower and more strict sense of the term. 
 These are formed, as we hold in modern times, by 
 what we call the process of abstraction. In this 
 process we are supposed to withdraw the mind from 
 thinking of the thing itself, and fix our thought on 
 some one of its modes or properties, and then by 
 an act of fancy or imagination, we erect it into a 
 reality that can be thought of and spoken of by 
 itself. As, for example, I see this paper ; but I with- 
 draw my thoughts from the paper and think of its 
 color, its form, etc., and speak of its whiteness, its 
 rectangularity, its flexibility, etc, as though they 
 were as real and as substantial, too, as the paper 
 itself. 
 
 This act of the mind has played an important part 
 in the past, and has really created a world of fictions 
 that philosophers have supposed they must recognize 
 and account for as part of the facts of nature — the 
 universe of realities. 
 
 The other class are really concrete terms, though 
 denoting objects that are not visible to the eyes, as 
 the soul of man, and the Being, God himself. But 
 of these ideas more will be said by-and-by. 
 
 The Realists insisted, as in favor of their view, 
 that " the universal " must exist, or have existed, 
 before " the particular " or the individual. Even on 
 the explanation which we have given, this claim of 
 theirs would seem to be implied. And in view of 
 this tact we have three theories characterized as (i) 
 universalia or generalia ante rem, which was the truly 
 
DESCAXTES AND LOCKE. 
 
 105 
 
 Platonic theory ; and (2) universalia post rem, which 
 is virtually the one I have just given in explanation 
 of the fact of our calling an object by its general 
 name ; and (3) universalia in re, which coincides 
 with the second, and in fact the second and third are 
 parts of our theory. We see objects, the essential 
 properties of which constitute the general ideas, and 
 these properties are in them " in re" and we form 
 the idea after seeing them, and thus the ideas are 
 post rem. 
 
 This view excludes, of course, Plato's theory of 
 ideas in the mind before birth. But it leaves the 
 question of innate ideas in the more modern sense, 
 that is, ideas in the mind arising into consciousness 
 on the perception of any object. 
 
 It provided for Aristotle's " notions " as formed 
 by the mind, but it hardly accounts for his " essence " 
 which seems to have been virtually what Plato's 
 ideas were, something which, if not in the human 
 mind, were yet in the Divine Mind and to be ap- 
 proached and approximated to by the human mind. 
 
 But to return for a moment to the point that the 
 universal must have existed before the individual or 
 the particular. 
 
 We ask, in reference to whom must this have been 
 the case ? And in what sense did they exist ? The 
 question is important. If we refer to the Creator, 
 then in accordance with Plato's argument, spoken of 
 in our first Lecture, the idea must have been in His 
 mind before any act of creation could have taken 
 place ; that is. He must have had an idea of what He 
 
Io6 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 was going to create. And in the case of man, as in 
 Plato's example, the idea of a bed, a table, must have 
 been in his mind also. 
 
 Hence in regard to the mode, way or place of 
 existence, the ideas exist, if in fact they are things 
 at all, in the mind and only in the mind. But the 
 things exist out of the mind and in nature. Hence 
 the word existence means very differently when used 
 in one case from what it does when used in the other. 
 Even in regard to God and creation, the ideas of 
 things existed in His mind, while the objects exist 
 out of the mind, individually and one by one in 
 nature, and constitute the universe of things, in 
 heaven and on earth — the material things that are 
 visible in the world, and the souls of men and angels 
 which are invisible. 
 
 But if the question be in relation to man, we have 
 a somewhat different answer to give. 
 
 Man begins to get his ideas after the creation of 
 the objects, and when they are before him and sub- 
 ject to his observation. And with each act of ob- 
 servation he gets or forms an idea-image of the object 
 he sees, and then by processes already explained, he 
 forms (i) his general ideas of classes of objects, and 
 (2) his abstract ideas of the mere properties, modes 
 and forms of existence, which cannot be seen by 
 themselves. But as I have already said, we objectify 
 these mere abstractions — modes and properties of 
 things — and speak of them to a large extent as if they 
 were things themselves, denoted in fact by concrete 
 terms. 
 
DESCARTES AND LOCKE. 107 
 
 This delusion — for I can consider it as nothing 
 else, unless one prefers to call it an illusion — began 
 to prevail at a very early stage in the Aryan mind ; 
 and it clings to it with a very remarkable tenacity. 
 In fact but few persons, and nobody, perhaps, ever 
 had the thought occur to them until recently. And 
 even now it is not uncommon to hear one argue that 
 the properties must have existed before the things, 
 as whiteness before anything that is white. But 
 whiteness is not a substance like a coat of paint, that 
 can be put on or kept off of its object. 
 
 I have spoken of the fact (Lecture I) that both 
 Plato's theory of ideas and his use of language led 
 very naturally to the speaking of properties as things 
 themselves. 
 
 § 3. What is known as the Scholastic Philosophy 
 arose from the application of Aristotle's logic to 
 Plato's theory of ideas, and his own theory of 
 essences as " first principles," which came to be recog- 
 nized as the phhilosopia prima, or set of first princi 
 pies which were regarded as prerequisite to all other 
 mental operations. Then Aristotle's logic, as devel- 
 oped and explained by Porphyry and a few others, 
 when applied to those principles gave us, or was sup- 
 posed to give us, all we could know of Natural 
 Science ; and when applied to texts of Scripture and 
 the accepted dogmas of the Fathers, it gave us, or 
 would give us, all that we have or can have of Theology. 
 
 The method thus pursued was called demonstra- 
 tion. But, as I have said in the last Lecture, demon- 
 stration as a method is of two kinds, or rather is 
 
I08 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 applicable to entirely different classes of subjects. 
 The one is such as we have in mathematics, in which 
 we demonstrate from the nature of a thing, as a tri- 
 angle, a circle, truths concerning it. The other kind 
 is that in which we demonstrate, not from the nature 
 of the thing, but from some accidental property of a 
 thing, as its color, its weight, etc., denoted by an 
 abstract term, a truth or law concerning the thing 
 itself and all things belonging to the class. 
 
 In regard to the theology of the Middle Ages as 
 developed by this method, I shall say nothing in this 
 place. But the application of this method to the 
 Natural Sciences calls for a few words of explanation 
 and illustration. Following Plato's doctrine of ideas, 
 or, if you choose, Aristotle's doctrine of essences, it 
 neglected and discredited Aristotle's doctrine of 
 appeal to facts, and the study of the facts of nature. I 
 give the following example which I find in Herschel's 
 Discourse on a Study of Philosophy, and ascribed to 
 Galileo, though I have not been able to find it in any 
 of his published works to which I have had access, 
 and I can hardly believe that it originated with him, 
 or can have been given by him in earnest and as ex- 
 hibiting the method of reasoning and testing the 
 truths of science which he encouraged or approved. 
 
 The object is to prove the "immortality and in- 
 corruptibility of the material heavens," and it runs 
 thus in substance : " Change is either generation or 
 corruption. But generation and corruption can 
 occur only between contraries. The motions of con- 
 traries are contrary. The celestial motions are cir- 
 
DESCARTES AND LOCKE. 
 
 109 
 
 cular. Circular motions have no contraries, for (i) 
 there can be but three simple motions : [a) to the 
 centre, (l>) around the centre, (c) from the centre ; 
 (2) of any three things only one can be contrary to 
 another one of the two (that is, not to the two to- 
 gether) ; (3) but a motion to a centre is manifestly 
 contrary to a motion from a centre. Therefore, a 
 motion around a centre remains without a contrary. 
 Hence the motions of the heavenly bodies being 
 circular, can have no contraries, and hence these 
 heavenly bodies cannot go to corruption and must 
 be immortal and incorruptible." 
 
 Again, when Galileo found the doctrine with re- 
 gard to the velocity of falling bodies inconsistent 
 with the Copernican theory of the solar system, 
 which he was inclined to adopt, he proposed to ap- 
 peal from the deductions of the Scholastic Philoso- 
 phy to facts and experiments. So he went to the 
 top of the leaning tower of Pisa, and dropped two 
 pieces of metal of different sizes and weight, though 
 of course of the same specific gravity, and found 
 that they came down together, the one of them, 
 though it was the smaller and the lighter of the two, 
 just as fast as the other, the larger and heavier. 
 The Scholastics, however, had reasoned from the 
 nature of weight that the greater one, on account of 
 its greater weight would — and would because it 
 must — fall the faster by just so much as it was the 
 heavier of the two. 
 
 I give but one more example. When Torricelli 
 invented the barometer, he found that a vacuum 
 
I lo THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 could be produced in the upper end of the tube at 
 some twenty-nine or thirty inches from the bulb. 
 The Scholastics, who seem to have been able to ac- 
 count for anything and were always ready with an 
 answer to every question that was proposed or could 
 occur to them, suggested that the rising of the mer- 
 cury in the column was not due, as the scientific 
 mind of the discoverer had suggested, to the pressure 
 of the atmosphere on the mercury in the cup below, 
 but to the fact that " nature abhorred a vacuum." 
 Pascal proposed to try this theory by an appeal to 
 facts, assuming that Nature's abhorrence of a 
 vacuum would be as great on the top of a mountain 
 as it was in the valley beneath, while the pressure 
 which results from the weight of the air would be 
 less by just the amount of the height of the mount- 
 ain. This led to the experiment and verified the 
 view that had been taken by the scientific men of 
 that age, and as we now have it taught in our books 
 of science, and developed into the doctrine of grav- 
 ity and the law of universal gravitation. 
 
 These are but few of the examples that might be 
 cited to illustrate the difference between the old 
 scholastic method, and the new or inductive method 
 and study of the Natural Science. 
 
 This process, as I have said, grew out of Plato's 
 theory of ideas, and Aristotle's doctrine of essences, 
 which was accepted, to the rejection of his views of 
 cognition and generalization, which he so emphat- 
 ically enunciated. And yet nearly all the attempts 
 of proof that he makes are not of the nature of appeal 
 
DESCARTES AND LOCKE. j j i 
 
 to fact, but rather of demonstration. Aristotle is 
 constantly reasoning in this way. For example, he 
 explains the reason why a small object on the long 
 end of a lever will balance a larger one on the other 
 end, by referring to the nature of the curved line. 
 " The ends of the lever move in curves," he says, 
 and as the long end moves the furthest, there is 
 more of a curve, and consequently a small weight 
 on that end has an advantage over any weight that 
 might be at the other end of the lever. 
 
 Much of the speculative theology of the schools 
 during the Middle Ages was of this kind, and, in my 
 estimation, it was about as senseless. 
 
 I have dwelt so long upon this subject because of 
 its great importance to the history of philosophy 
 and the theories of knowledge. 
 
 § 4. The next great writer and thinker whose 
 theory I shall consider was Descartes. I say the 
 next great thinker, next after Plato and Aristotle, 
 for there was but little in all the centuries between 
 Aristotle B. c. 394, and Descartes, born A. D. 1596, 
 except mere reiteration of some one or another of 
 the doctrines of one or another of these two great 
 and original thinkers, and efforts at combinations 
 and compromises. It was as if one were trying to 
 build a stone house out of the brick that had been 
 obtained by tearing down an old edifice, under the 
 impression that if we could only put the brick to- 
 gether in the right way, the house would be all right 
 — of stone, of the most approved style, and rest on 
 an immovable foundation of solid rock, rather than 
 the unstable foundations of mere sand and stubble. 
 
112 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 Descartes lived after the hundreds of years of 
 controversy that had followed the age of Plato and 
 Aristotle. He had seen and heard all that had been 
 said, and knew all that could be said, on the two 
 sides of the controversy between the Realists and 
 the Nominalists. The theory of Conceptualism, 
 proposed by Abelard, did not seem to solve the 
 problem or clear up the difficulty that was involved. 
 He, therefore, proposed the method of "interior ob- 
 servation," called in these latter days, "conscious- 
 ness" and "reflection," upon the acts and states of 
 the mind, which we can thus subject to immediate 
 observation, as the only true and proper method. 
 We may err, he assumed, in our analysis and inter- 
 pretation of the facts of consciousness, as we may 
 err, and often do err, indeed, in our understanding 
 and interpretation of the facts and phenomena of 
 nature that are seen in the outer world. But the 
 reality of the facts we cannot deny ; and with them 
 we must begin our science of metaphysics, and our 
 theories of knowledge. Calling, as it was common 
 to do, our thoughts ideas, he clearly saw, as he 
 thought, that there are three classes of ideas. The 
 first class represents objects, which, though we 
 must regard them as real, are not visible to the eye 
 nor in any way cognizable by the senses. These 
 ideas he thought must be innate, not perhaps exactly 
 in the Platonic sense of having been in our minds 
 when and before we were born, but rather in the 
 more modern sense of having been born in the mind 
 itself, nees avec moi, without any act of direct and 
 
DESCARTES AND LOCKE. 1 1 3 
 
 immediate cognition of the objects the ideas repre- 
 sent. The other or next class he called adventitious, 
 etrangers et venir de dehors, for he says : "If I hear a 
 noise, or see the sun, or feel the heat, I cannot but 
 judge that these sensations proceed from something 
 out of myself. These ideas represent external or 
 material objects." Then we have a third class, 
 faites et inventees par mot meme, which he calls facti- 
 tious. Such are the ideas of what never existed, as 
 "sirens," "hippographs," and such like things, (Med., 
 III). 
 
 In analyzing the classes of ideas, however, he 
 comes to the conclusion that the one universal and 
 absolutely necessary element in those that he calls 
 "adventitious," is extension, implying more or less 
 of solidity ; and the one indispensable and always 
 present element in those that come from the mind 
 by consciousness, is thought. Hence he makes ex- 
 tension to be the essence, or differentia rather, of 
 matter and material things, and thought to be the 
 essence, or differentia, of mind. 
 
 The "factitious" ideas, those made by the mind, 
 may be of two kinds. In the one case they are 
 mere fictions and represent objects that never exist- 
 ed and such as perhaps can never exist. 
 
 But in the other case all the ideas that we have of 
 objects that we have never seen, but have only read 
 of, or had described to us, are factitious in this sense 
 — they are made in the mind,/«r nioi meme, and 
 are made and intended to represent real things. 
 
 Descartes was brought up and educated in the 
 
1 14 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 philosophy of which I have been trying to give 
 some idea — Realism — or at least Realism as modi- 
 fied by some concessions made by Abelard and 
 THomas Aquinas, and generally acquiesced in. But 
 he says of its character and value that it "gives one 
 the means of talking plausibly about all things, and 
 of exciting the admiration of those who are less 
 learned than one's self." But he regarded nearly all 
 its positive teachings as doubtful, and its influence 
 on the mind and mental habits as bad. He said 
 that when he came to think for himself he found 
 that he had "opinions" on almost all subjects, but 
 that many of them were at least very doubtful, and 
 none of them his own in any sense, except that he 
 had adopted them and professed them out of defer- 
 ence to the authority of his teachers, and perhaps 
 in some cases from mere self-conceit. 
 
 § 5. Descartes accepted for the practical purposes 
 of life the commonly received principles of morality 
 and religion, common deportment and social deco- 
 rum. But in regard to all else, all that could be 
 called knowledge or philosophy, he became, for the 
 purpose, a critic and a complete sceptic, or agnostic, 
 or know-nothing, if we prefer that term ; and re- 
 solved to go back or down until he should find some 
 one truth or assertion that he could not doubt or 
 deny. This he found in his famous assertion or en- 
 thymeme, eogito ergo sum, "I think, therefore I am." 
 "But," said he, "if one doubts, or even denies, he 
 cannot doubt that he doubts or deny that he denies. 
 And in either case, and alike, he must be — in order 
 
DESCARTES AND LOCKE. 
 
 115 
 
 that he may doubt or deny, or there can be no 
 doubt or denial at all." St. Augustine had found 
 his way to the same principle and gave the same 
 illustration of it about one thousand years before. 
 This axiom, however, implied a difference between 
 subject and predicate, substance and mode ; that is, 
 between the substantial / and its modes of existence, 
 which it did not assert, and which formed no 
 part of the philosophy of his day. It assumes that 
 the I, or substance, could not exist except in some 
 mode, and that the mode implies the reality of the 
 substance. It is assumed that no mode could exist 
 as a substance, or without a substance, in which, as 
 the Realists would say, it inheres ; or, as we would 
 say, a substance of which it is a mode or property, 
 and of which it may be predicated. 
 
 Descartes was in more respects than one the 
 founder of Modern Philosophy and Methods of 
 Knowledge. He divided all knowledge into three 
 parts, (i; Philosophy, (2) Mathematics, and (3) Phys- 
 ical or Natural Science, and in each one of them he 
 did good service. 
 
 But our concern with him at present is chiefly as 
 the exponent of the theory of knowledge. 
 
 As I have said, with him all knowledge is included 
 in the three departments, Philosophy, Mathematics, 
 and Natural Science. 
 
 In Philosophy, according to Descartes, we begin 
 with facts of consciousness that, I think, is to me a 
 matter of immediate consciousness, and therefore I 
 cannot doubt or disprove it. But the assertion, "I 
 
Il6 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 think," implies that 1 am conscious of thinking, and 
 thus by inevitable necessity that the I that thinks is 
 a substantial reality. 
 
 Hence as a general principle the facts of conscious- 
 ness, those of which we are immediately conscious, 
 are elements of knowledge ; they are starting-points ; 
 we cannot deny them, we may err in interpreting 
 them, mistake their character, and draw wrong in- 
 ferences from them. But they are ultimate facts, 
 the best known of all facts, and facts that cannot be 
 denied. And we build up our philosophy or meta- 
 physics on these facts, and by reasoning from them. 
 
 The acts of the mind are a manifestation of the 
 mind, its nature and modes, just as the sensations 
 in us are produced by, and are thus the manifesta- 
 tions of the external objects that we perceive around 
 us. 
 
 It may be well to recall to mind what Aristotle 
 had said on this subject as quoted in the last Lecture. 
 And thus, in the view of both Aristotle and Descartes, 
 we have in these observed facts of the mental states 
 and acts of the mind, material and means for knowl- 
 edge of mind, as we have by perception for a knowl- 
 edge of nature. 
 
 We believe in the reality of external things only 
 on account of the sensations they produce in us. 
 We know them only by those sensations, and we 
 call their properties by names which are indicated 
 by these sensations, as hot or cold, and the like. 
 These sensations correspond to the properties of 
 objects. But there is an underlying substance which 
 
DESCARTES AND LOCKE. 
 
 117 
 
 we cannot see. It is, to use his figure, like the bodies 
 of men and women passing on the walk under my 
 window, which, however, we can never see on account 
 of the clothes, hats and caps, the coats and cloaks 
 that are on their bodies and cover them from our 
 sight. 
 
 In the case of the mathematics we begin, not with 
 observed facts at all, but with definitions setting 
 forth the essence or the essential nature of that 
 about which we are to reason, and then proceed by 
 the use of certain self-evident axioms to the desired 
 conclusions. 
 
 But in the Natural Sciences we begin with ob- 
 served facts in the outward world and proceed by 
 induction and deduction, as Aristotle had taught. 
 
 In regard to the origin of knowledge, he held, as 
 we have seen, that one class of our ideas is derived 
 by consciousness or reflection upon our own mental 
 states or acts. But of the self or mind, as he says, 
 {Med., VI), " In truth when I consider the mind, 
 that is, when I consider myself in so far as I am only 
 a thinking thing-, I can distinguish in myself no parts, 
 but I may clearly discern that I am somewhat, that 
 is, absolutely one and entire. Yet, although the 
 whole mind seems to be united to the whole body, 
 when a foot or an arm is cut off, I am conscious that 
 nothing has been taken from my mind." 
 
 Another class he regarded as derived from the 
 objects we see, by means of the sensations they pro- 
 duce in us. He says {Med., VI), " Out of myself, 
 besides extension and figure, and the motion of 
 
1 1 g THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 bodies, I perceive likewise their hardness, their heat 
 and the other tactile qualities, and in addition, light, 
 color, and odors, tastes and sounds. And consider- 
 ing the ideas of all these qualities which are pre- 
 sent to my mind and which alone [the qualities] 
 I properly and immediately perceive, it was im- 
 possible for me not to think that I perceived certain 
 objects wholly different from my own thoughts, 
 which are bodies or material things from which those 
 ideas proceeded." 
 
 The class of ideas which represent things that 
 are invisible he is inclined to regard as innate. And 
 among them most especially the idea of God. But 
 at any rate he represents or reckons those ideas that 
 represent substances as something more and entirely 
 different from those that represent only modes or 
 accidents. " And again," he says, " the idea by 
 which I think of God as eternal, infinite, omniscient, 
 omnipotent and the Creator of all things that are 
 beside Himself, this I say has certainly in it more 
 objective reality than the ideas that are represented 
 by finite substances." 
 
 Descartes' theory of knowledge, and of the nature 
 and origin of ideas which make up knowledge, was 
 such as to make the idea of God and His existence 
 of logical necessity. He developed and illustrated 
 this doctrine in various ways which I have not now 
 time to consider and set forth. 
 
 Descartes made the essentia of substance, the one 
 only property common to all substances in opposi- 
 tion to non-living or unreality, to be simply being. 
 
DESCARTES AND LOCKE. j jq 
 
 Liebnitz, after him, added causality, so that in his 
 view a substance is that which not only is, but acts 
 as cause. 
 
 This doctrine of Liebnitz is an important addition 
 to the idea or definition of substance. To act, it 
 must be, and not only be, but be something specific, 
 if not personal. In fact the verb to be, in any and 
 all its forms, requires a predicate after it, as the words 
 do not completely express any idea. We cannot 
 even talk intelligibly about that of which we can say 
 only that it is. 
 
 And we know things only as they act in us or upon 
 us as causes. The mind acts as cause when it thinks 
 — external objects act as causes whenever they pro- 
 duce the sensations we perceive them by. 
 
 We have then matter and spirit. The differentia 
 of the first or matter was in his, Descartes', estima- 
 tion extension, and that of the latter — spirit^was 
 thought ; so that whatever is extended is material 
 substance and whatever thinks is spiritual substance. 
 And both are causes. But one class of properties 
 exists only as modes of matter and the other only 
 as states and acts of mind. And in both cases we 
 know them only as they act as causes in us or upon 
 us. 
 
 § 6. The importance which Descartes attached 
 to sense-perception as furnishing one class of our 
 elementary ideas, the matter and substance, so to 
 call it, of our ideas of things or idea-images, caused 
 a great deal of attention to be given to sense-per- 
 ception in regard to its methods and possibility. 
 
I20 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 Two principles as axioms of the scholastic philos- 
 ophy which had prevailed now for several centuries, 
 and had been growing all the while, presented seri- 
 rious difficulties. The one was that "nothing can 
 act but where it is." Does, then, the mind go out 
 of the body to act on the object which we think we 
 perceive? This will hardly be maintained. Does, 
 then, the object come into the mind ? This is less 
 likely. Hence the difficulty seemed to be insuper- 
 able. 
 
 The other principle was, that nothing can act upon 
 another thing without some likeness, or some one 
 property at least, that is common to both." Thus, 
 in the case of the resistance of bodies, they are both 
 hard, or they could not act on each other in the way 
 of causes producing the phenomena of resistance, 
 or the motion of the one by the impinging of the 
 other upon it. But in Descartes' theory there was 
 no one property common to both mind and matter. 
 How, then, could either material objects produce 
 sensations in us, orthe mind perceive the objects ? 
 
 Malebranche (b. 1638), in view of these axioms 
 and the difficujties that grew out of them, denied 
 the reality of external objects and proposed the 
 theory of knowledge which has been called, "Seeing 
 all things in God :" that is, we do not see the ob- 
 jects themselves, for they have no objective exist- 
 ence, but only their ideas which are in God, and 
 which He produces or creates in our minds when we 
 think we see the things. 
 
 Liebnitz, in view of this difficulty, proposed what 
 
DESCARTES AND LOCtCE. X2X 
 
 has been called the theory of " pre-established har- 
 mony." He supposed the universe made up of 
 atoms, monads, that so act in harmony, that without 
 acting on each other, they concur in their actions, 
 like the hands of a watch, which, although they do 
 not act directly on each other, yet concur in their 
 motions, so as to come around together at stated 
 times, and thus really indicate the hour of the day. 
 
 But neither of these axioms presents much dififi- 
 culty at the present day. We have discovered 
 gravity and believe that the sun and moon and earth 
 do act on each other, though far off and apart from 
 each other, notwithstanding this medieval axiom. 
 And we do believe and know that material objects 
 do somehow act on the mind and produce sensations 
 and excite the acts of perception and volition, though 
 we cannot explain their mode of operation. 
 
 § 7. We come now to the next great name, that 
 of John Locke. He was born in 1632, and lived 
 thirty-six years after Descartes, until 1704. And 
 since his time few if any names have been more con- 
 spicuous than his in the discussions of philosophy 
 and of the theories of knowledge — its origin, nature 
 and extent. But before we can go on with our dis- 
 cussions of Locke's theory, we must pause a moment 
 to consider one or two of the names that come before 
 his in the chronological order of the discussion. 
 
 Francis Bacon was born in England in 1561, sev- 
 enty-one years before Locke and thirty-five years 
 before Descartes was born in France. He was edu- 
 cated at Cambridge, and early came to have a great 
 
122 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 dislike for the prevailing philosophy that was taught 
 there. As we have seen in the case of Descartes, 
 that he thought but little of the philosophy that 
 prevailed, the scholastic, so Bacon says of what he 
 was being taught at Cambridge : " They learn 
 nothing at the university but to believe ; they are 
 like a becalmed ship : they never move but by the 
 wind of another man's breath, and have no oars of 
 their own to steer withal." Again in the Nov. Or- 
 ganon Axiom, XC, he says : " They were chained 
 down to the writings of particular authors ; " every- 
 thing " was opposed to the progress of the sciences." 
 
 It does not appear that Bacon knew much of the 
 real Aristotle. What he knew and disliked was the 
 prevailing philosophy, the scholastic, which he called 
 "Aristotlean," but which, as we have seen, was a com- 
 pound made up of the ideas of Plato for its sub- 
 stance, and the deduction from them by what was 
 regarded as the method of Aristotle. 
 
 But I know of scarcely any two minds, who are 
 among the greatest that the world has seen, that are 
 more alike, as I regard them, than Bacon and Aris- 
 totle. It is true that Aristotle gave far more atten- 
 tion to the metaphysical part of knowledge than 
 Bacon, and less to the methods of science. But 
 Aristotle agreed with Bacon in his views and theories 
 on this part of the subject, and he did, by way of 
 observation, the getting, analyzing and classifying of 
 facts, far more than Bacon. But what Aristotle did 
 in his line was not appreciated in his age. He was 
 much too far in advance of his age for that ; and 
 
DESCARTES AND LOCKE. . 135 
 
 consequently his works fell into neglect and forget- 
 fulness. But as a result of a somewhat careful and 
 prolonged study of both authors, I am inclined to 
 think that Aristotle understood the philosophy of 
 induction at least quite as well, if not better, than 
 Bacon did. 
 
 Like Aristotle, Bacon aimed at taking a complete 
 survey of the whole field of human knowledge and 
 mapping it out into its various departments. Aris- 
 totle, in fact, as I have already said, went over the 
 whole ground, as did both Bacon and Descartes, but 
 each of these two confined himself to, or at least 
 specially elaborated, one only of the two great de- 
 partments. Physics and Metaphysics, while Aristotle, 
 as it seems to me, went fully as deep into each of 
 them as either of these modern philosophers did 
 into the one department which he had chosen to 
 make his specialty. 
 
 Bacon seems to have accepted, or rather never to 
 have thrown off, the Platonic element of scholasti- 
 cism, ideas. He says indeed but little on that point. 
 And if at any time any expression has escaped him 
 that implies a different view, it is merely an instance 
 in which his strong common sense and sturdy En- 
 glish practical view of things outcropped and, for 
 the moment, at least, triumphed over the doctrine 
 of the philosophy which he had been taught at Cam- 
 bridge in his undergraduate course. As to "the phi- 
 losophy which we have received principally from the 
 Greeks," he says, "in regard to its usefulness it would 
 be acknowledged to be puerile, or rather talkative 
 
t24 
 
 THEORIES OP KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 than generative, being chiefly fruitful only in contro- 
 versies, but barren of effects. {Preface). But we 
 must remember that he had in mind the scholastic 
 philosophy of his age, rather than the Greek philos- 
 ophy as taught by Plato and Aristotle. 
 
 Bacon seems to have acted on his own principle, 
 "It is better to set up one large light in a noble room, 
 than to go about with a small candle and try to 
 illuminate every corner thereof" (B. I). So he took 
 "the noble room" of the Natural Sciences as the 
 chief field of his labors. 
 
 In Bacon's view, "the justest division of human 
 learning is that which is derived from the three fac- 
 ulties of the soul [and the scholastic philosophy 
 reckoned but the three — reason, imagination and 
 memory] — (i) History, relative to the memory, (2) 
 Poetry, to the imagination, (3) Philosophy, to the 
 reason." "By poetry we understand feigned history 
 or fable. History is properly concerned about indi- 
 viduals circumscribed by time and space. But phi- 
 losophy, foreaking individuals, fixes on notions [that 
 is, the essentia and not the "accidents"], and is em- 
 ployed in compounding and separating these no- 
 tions according to the laws of nature and the evi- 
 dence of things themselves." 
 
 Bacon then refers to "the origin of our ideas" and 
 says, "Individual objects first strike the sense, which 
 is, as it were, the port or entrance to the understand- 
 ing. Then the understanding ruminates upon these 
 images or impressions, . . . forming them into 
 
DESCATRES AND LOCKE. 125 
 
 certain classes by composition or separation." In 
 this Bacon entirely coincides with Aristotle and dis- 
 sents from Plato's view of the origin of general ideas. 
 "As history and experience are one and the same 
 thing, so also are philosophy and the sciences." And 
 he adds that even "divine learning does not call for 
 any other division." And he makes, and always 
 keeps in view, the important distinction between 
 discovery on the one hand and revelation on the 
 other. Revelation is what God makes known to us 
 by inspiration, and discovery is what we gain of 
 truth by the legitimate use of our natural powers. 
 "Knowledge," he says, "is like waters ; some descend 
 from the heavens, and some spring from the earth," 
 " for all knowledge springs from a two-fold source — 
 either from divine inspiration or from external sense." 
 "We therefore divide science into theology and phi- 
 losophy. In the former we do not include natural 
 theology, but restrict ourselves to inspired divinity." 
 "Philosophy has three objects, God, nature, and man. 
 . . . Whence it is proper to divide philosophy 
 into the doctrines concerning Deity, the doctrine of 
 nature, and the doctrine of man." 
 
 But he holds that there must be universal sci- 
 ence that is common to all three of the branches 
 named — a sort of a philosophia prima, some general 
 science consisting of "axioms, that are common to 
 all three of the great branches" just named. 
 
 " Axioms of this kind," he says, " are numerous," 
 and he gives examples. " If equals be added to 
 equals, the wholes will be equal," and then he pro- 
 
126 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 ceeds to say that this holds in justice or law as 
 well as in mathematics. As another example he 
 gives, " things agreeing to the same third thing agree 
 with each other." And it is suggestive of the state 
 of what was regarded as " logic " in his day, that this 
 axiom, rather than the dictum of Aristotle, de omni 
 et nulla, was regarded as the fundamental axiom on 
 which all syllogisms rest. As another example Bacon 
 gives, " Nature shows herself best in her smallest 
 works." As still another, " All things change, but 
 nothing is lost." " This is an axiom," he says, " in 
 physics, but it holds in natural theology." And to 
 give one more example, " Things are preserved by 
 bringing them back to their principles." This, though 
 an axiom in physics, is good, he says, in politics as 
 well, " for the preservation of states depends upon 
 little more than reforming and bringing them back 
 to their ancient custom^." 
 
 The collection of these axioms, or the formation 
 of a " primal philosophy," Bacon regards as the first 
 step in the advancement of learning. And he seems 
 to think that this will be done best by consulting 
 the past, the books that have already been written, 
 very much like the Books of Sentences, which were 
 so much in use in the Middle Ages. These he would 
 make the a priori principles of all knowledge. 
 
 A slight examination of these axioms, however, 
 shows that they are made up of three entirely differ- 
 ent classes : (i) axioms or self-evident truths, such 
 as the first and second just cited ; and (2) maxims 
 which are mere general notions with possible excep- 
 
DMSCAHTES AND LOCKE. 137 
 
 tions ; and (3) mere dicta of men acknowledged to 
 be authority. 
 
 Now, while the axioms of the first class are infal- 
 libly true, absolute and universal, the dicta have 
 been a source of error and one great obstruction to 
 science in all ages. I have given one or two ex- 
 amples in the last Lecture, as standing in the way 
 of the two doctrines with regard to the velocity of 
 falling bodies, and the weight of the atmospheric 
 pressure as accounting for the vacuum in the top of 
 the barometric tube. And in fact these dicta con- 
 stitute the assumed principles of that conservatism, 
 which, while it is of inestimable value as " holding 
 fast that which is good," it is also an obstacle to 
 progress in correcting the errors that have been held 
 as truths in the times that are past. 
 
 Bacon saw clearly that the first tendency of his 
 method was to scepticism, and even to atheism. But 
 this is not the final or ultimate tendency. It is only 
 a superficial view. " Undoubtedly," he says, " a 
 superficial tincture of philosophy may incline the 
 mind to atheism. Yet a further knowledge brings 
 it back to religion, for on the threshold of philoso- 
 phy, when second causes appear to absorb the atten- 
 tion, some oblivion of the highest cause may ensue ; 
 but when the mind goes deeper, and sees the depend- 
 ence of causes and the works of Providence, it will 
 easily perceive that the upper link of Nature's chain 
 is fastened to 'the throne of God.'" (B. I., p. 31.) 
 
 It would lead us too far from our purpose to dis- 
 cuss the principles of Bacon at length, but they do 
 
128 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 not differ in their general character from those that 
 were laid down by Aristotle, though much more full 
 in their detail of precepts and rich in their illustra- 
 tion by examples. Nor do they differ from the 
 method that had been recommended and in use more 
 or less by all the students and advocates of natural 
 science from Alfred the Great in the thirteenth cen- 
 tury, including Copernicus, Kepler, Galileo, Tycho 
 Brache, Paracelsus, Agricola, Libavius and Von Hel- 
 mont, who was his contemporary and who began the 
 new analysis leading to the doctrine of the chemical 
 elements which Bacon called a " fiction." 
 
 Yet Bacon was a great man nevertheless — one of 
 the greatest the world has ever seen — and gave a 
 great impulse to the progress of knowledge, though 
 by no means one of the most important so far as 
 original theories of knowledge are concerned. And 
 in fact in this respect, if it were all, he would hardly 
 deserve mention in this connection. 
 
 But it is quite time that we pass on to the brief 
 notice of one name more that must be mentioned 
 before we come to John Locke, and this is Thomas 
 Hobbes, who was born in England, A. D. 1588, forty- 
 four years before Locke, twenty-seven years after 
 Bacon, and eight years before Descartes in France. 
 
 Hobbes, apparently without a very careful con- 
 sideration and rather as a matter of reaction from 
 the idealism and mysticism that were resulting from 
 the doctrines of the Realists than anything else, 
 adopted the dogma, as a fundamental point, that all 
 ideas are derived by sensation, and of course, there- 
 
DESCARTES AND LOCKE. ijq 
 
 fore, from external and material objects. And he 
 carried this view logically to its legitimate extremes. 
 He became a Materialist — denied the reality of a 
 soul or mind in man, the existence of God and a 
 future world for man. Consequently he held that 
 natural philosphy is the only science, and all the 
 knowledge that we can have. He denied human 
 freedom or the power of choice in man, and held to 
 the doctrine that in the state " might makes right," 
 and the only proper motive for man to act upon is 
 self-interest, if not selfishness, and the only enjoy- 
 ment and happiness that is worth pursuing is the 
 mere personal pleasure that results from self-indulg- 
 ence, and the pursuit of selfish ends. 
 
 But a doctrine so repugnant to the best instincts 
 of mankind could not gain general acceptance, nor, 
 as it would seem, long hold its sway over the minds 
 of men. And yet it is in accordance with some of 
 the lower instincts, and many of the pursuits of 
 mankind. 
 
 § 8. John Locke, born in 1632; was educated at 
 Oxford, where he graduated in 1655 ; but he re- 
 mained there as a student for some years afterward, 
 until 1664. He studied medicine, though he does 
 not appear to have practiced that profession. But, 
 like Descartes and Bacon, he formed a great dislike 
 for the prevailing philosophy which was taught then 
 in the university, and he set himself to revise the 
 very foundation on which it rested, the doctrine 
 with regard to the origin and nature of our ideas. 
 
 Before going further with our discussion it will be 
 
 9 
 
I30 
 
 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 well, I think, to consider a little more distinctly what 
 is meant by the word idea. Locke says that he has 
 " used the word to express whatever is meant by 
 phantasm, notion, species or whatever it is which the 
 mind can be employed about in thinking." " I think 
 it [the word idea] serves best to stand for whatsoever 
 is the object of the understanding when a man 
 thinks." " I presume,' he adds, " it will be easily 
 granted me that there are such ideas in men's minds. 
 Every one is conscious of them in himself, and men's 
 words and actions will satisfy him that they are in 
 others" (Int. Sec, 8). 
 
 The progress of science since the days of Bacon 
 and Locke has furnished us with an illustration of 
 the theory which is thus assumed by Locke, that 
 makes it necessary for us to consider the theory it- 
 self, as a means of understanding and appreciating 
 his discussion of the subject, before we go any further 
 with our effort to understand his theory of knowl- 
 edge. 
 
 It is true that he says at a later stage of the dis- 
 cussion, and as his theory implies, that what we are 
 really conscious of is the acts and states of our own 
 minds. Are ideas then only states and acts of the 
 mind? He does not mention this in the definition 
 which we have just quoted. But we shall have occa- 
 sion to consider this subject further on in our Lec- 
 tures. 
 
 But the illustration of this theory which I wish to 
 give, and to which I wish to call special attention, is 
 derived from the science of chemistry. Knowledge 
 
DESCA R TES AND LOCKE. 1 3 1 
 
 in this theory and as it has been regarded since the 
 time of Plato, is considered as made up of ideas, 
 just as the material world is made up of objects, 
 endless in number and form, but whatever the form 
 or color or general appearance of any object may be, 
 it is composed of what are called " elements" in 
 their various combinations. In chemistry these ele- 
 ments are, as at present recognized, only about sixty- 
 four or five. 
 
 In order to understand Locke's theory, we must 
 consider ideas of things, if we are to regard them as 
 things in the mind, as complex objects, made up of 
 certain elements, just as most of the objects around 
 us are made up of two or more of the chemical ele- 
 ments. These elements make what Locke calls the 
 "matter" of the ideas. In Kant's phraseology, 
 which has" come into somewhat general use since his 
 day, they are " the content " of the ideas ; that is, they . 
 are the elements, matter, or what is contained in the 
 ideas, just as oxygen and hydrogen, for example, 
 are the elements of water. 
 
 These materials, the " matter " of our ideas, are 
 but the properties and modes of the objects, which 
 in Locke's theory the ideas themselves represent in 
 our consciousness, or rather the ideas are made up 
 of the ideas of those properties which, therefore, we 
 will call, for convenience sake, elementary ideas. 
 
 Thus my idea of an orange, for example, is a com- 
 plex idea, made up of the elementary ideas of color, 
 size, form, taste, odor, etc., which are simple or ele- 
 mentary ideas. 
 
1,2 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 % 9. Now the fundamental characteristic of Locke's 
 system was his denial of the reality of any innate 
 ideas, whether we regard them as simple and element- 
 ary ideas of the properties of things, or the complex 
 ideas of the things themselves, or the general ideas 
 of classes. 
 
 He begins by considering the mind as a piece of 
 white paper, " tabula rasa" ^o\6. of all characters ; 
 that is, without any ideas. " How comes it to be 
 furnished ? " " To this I answer in one word — from 
 experience, in that all our knowledge is founded, 
 and from that it ultimately derives itself. Our ob- 
 servation is employed either about external sensible 
 objects or about the internal operations of our 
 minds." 
 
 "First, our senses conversant about particular 
 sensible objects do convey into the mind several dis- 
 tinct perceptions of things according to those vari- 
 ous ways wherein those objects do affect them ; and 
 thus we come by those ideas we have of yellow, 
 white, heat, cold, hard, bitter, sweet, and all those 
 which are called sensible qualities. This great source 
 of most of the ideas we have depending wholly upon 
 our senses, and derived by them to the understand- 
 ing, I call Sensation. 
 
 "Secondly, the other fountain from experience 
 which furnisheth the understanding with ideas is the 
 perception of the operation of our own minds with- 
 in us . . . which operation, when the soul comes 
 to reflect on and consider, do furnish the understand- 
 ing with another set of ideas which could not be-had 
 
DESCARTES AND LOCKE. 1 22 
 
 from things without ; and such are perception, think- 
 ing, doubting, beheving, reasoning, knowing, wilHng, 
 and all the different actings of our own minds which 
 we, being conscious of, and observing in ourselves, 
 do from these receive into our understandings, as 
 distinct ideas as we do from the bodies affecting our 
 senses." "This source of ideas," he adds, "every 
 man has wholly in himself." "But as I call the other 
 sensations, so I call this REFLECTION." 
 
 "These two, I say," he continues, "viz. (i), exter- 
 nal material things or the objects of sensation, and 
 (2) the operations of our own minds within, as the 
 objects of reflection, are to me the only originals 
 from whence all our ideas take their beginning." 
 And he adds by way of emphasis, "The understand- 
 ing seems to me not to have the least glimmering of 
 any ideas which it doth not receive from one of these 
 two." "Thus, when we have taken a full survey of 
 them and their several modes, combinations and re- 
 lations, we shall find to contain all our whole stock 
 of ideas" {Ess., B. II, §§ 2-6). 
 
 I have thus quoted Locke's words at such great 
 length, not only on account of the great importance 
 of the subject, but also because one part of it has 
 been almost, if not quite and entirely neglected, not- 
 withstanding the emphasis with which he utters it, as 
 we shall see as we proceed. 
 
 Locke, however, was not the first to propose this 
 source of ideas. As we have seen in our second 
 Lecture, Aristotle distinctly recognizes it as the 
 source of our ideas or knowledge of self. So, too. 
 
134 
 
 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 in this Lecture Descartes recognizes it. Both he and 
 Aristotle not only speak of our being conscious of 
 our sensations, acts of perceiving, etc., but they dis- 
 tinctly speak of it as the means by which we get 
 our ideas or knowledge of our own minds. And yet 
 nobody had followed it out. Even Locke does not 
 follow it out very thoroughly. 
 
 Now on this theory no ideas are innate in the 
 ordinary sense of the words. The " matter " of them 
 all comes into the understanding from either the 
 objects in the external world through sense-percep- 
 tion, or from the mind itself by consciousness, that 
 is, by the avenue of sense-perception for the one 
 class and by that of consciousness for the other. 
 And the mind itself, by its own action in its " several 
 modes " of combinations, makes up for itself the 
 ideas we have of things, which constitute the sum 
 of all our knowledge. 
 
 § lo. I have referred to chemistry for an illustra- 
 tion of our subject, and it is useful in many ways. 
 All the objects around us, however innumerable and 
 unlike, are compounded of the sixty-four or five 
 recognized elements. So our ideas of things are 
 made up of the comparatively few elements that the 
 mind gets from the cognition of objects, material 
 objects, by sense perception, and the mind itself by 
 consciousness. And the objects make up a universe, 
 only as they are in relations to one another, making 
 logical wholes as species and genera, and collective 
 wholes as groups, and are expressed in sentences 
 according to the nature and laws of language. 
 
DESCAXTES AND LOCKE. 
 
 135 
 
 Locke devotes the first of his Essay to the proof 
 that there are no innate axioms or principles, whether 
 speculative or practical, in the mind. Children have 
 them not, uneducated savages have them not, and 
 even the ignorant and thoughtless in civilized 
 countries do not have them in their minds, as matter 
 of conscious knowledge. At a later stage in his 
 work, Locke recognizes such axioms or first princi- 
 ples as matters of intuitive judgment, but yet in that 
 view they are ideas, if indeed they can be called 
 ideas at all, which are formed in the mind and by 
 the mind itself ; and out of the matter which had 
 been introduced from one or the other of the two 
 sources named — (i) the material 'objects around us, 
 and (2) the minds within us, and by one or the other 
 of the two means or avenues already mentioned, 
 sense^perception and consciousness. 
 
 In Chapter IV Locke proceeds to consider ideas 
 of things as being more elementary than such axioms 
 as he had been considering in the two preceding 
 chapters. He holds that no principles can be innate, 
 in the proper sense of the word, unless the ideas 
 represented by their two terms are innate, that is, 
 principles or axioms are propositions asserting a 
 relation between objects, or their ideas rather, in 
 Locke's theory, and hence unless the ideas themselves 
 are innate, the propositions asserting the relation 
 cannot be innate. They may be indeed intuitive, so 
 that we afifirm the relation just so soon as we have 
 the ideas distinctly before the mind. But they cannot 
 be regarded as innate in any proper sense of the word. 
 
136 
 
 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 Locke then proceeds to consider what he regards, 
 and thinks others will accept, as test words, such as 
 identity, God, substance, time, space, infinity, etc. 
 But as I shall have occasion to speak of these test 
 examples soon in another connection, I will pass 
 them with this mere enumeration of them at the 
 present. (See next Lecture, Sec. 4.) 
 
 The difificulty of understanding and accounting for 
 sense-perception, that so embarrassed Malebranche, 
 Liebnitz, and other disciples of Descartes, did not 
 escape Locke. His theory was that " certain singu- 
 larly imperceptible bodies " come off from the proper 
 ties of the bodies we see, and entering the " sensorium 
 through the organs of sense, excite there the motions 
 by which our minds form the ideas we have of them." 
 
 Now the first principle, the foundation and corner- 
 stone of Locke's theory of knowledge, is that all the 
 elements of our knowledge come from or by observa- 
 tion of real objects. 
 
 To recur to our chemical illustration ; the chemist 
 with his sixty-four or five elements can go into his 
 laboratory and make, we will suppose, by compound- 
 ing them, any or all the compound substances that 
 are known in nature. And he may in fact make 
 some that are not found in the present state of the 
 material universe. But he cannot make or originate 
 a single element besides those he now has, nor can 
 he get even these elements in any other way than by 
 analysis from some existing compound in which they 
 are already contained. To get them or any new one 
 in any other way, would be an act of creation, fpr 
 
DBSCAkTES AND LOCKE. 
 
 137 
 
 which man, in the present state of his existence and 
 powers, is not competent. 
 
 So with ideas according to Locke's theory. With 
 the few elementary ideas derived from these two 
 sources, the one or the other of them separately or 
 both combined, we may compound them into com- 
 plex ideas of things that we have seen, the adventi- 
 tious ideas of Descartes, or into ideas of things that 
 we have never seen, and which never did or can exist, 
 the monstrosities of popular superstition and of fable, 
 " the fictitious ideas of Descartes." But there our 
 power ends. We have no elements that are innate, 
 and we cannot originate any of ourselves, or get them 
 at all, except as we get them by sense-perception or 
 consciousness. 
 
 Hence our ideas in the mind imply either a reality 
 out of the mind, or the mind itself, which was the 
 observed object from which the idea was obtained. 
 Thus, if one has the idea of a white lion, it does not 
 necessarily imply that he has seen a white lion, or 
 that there ever has been one. But it does imply 
 that there is something external to his own mind 
 which is white, and that he has seen such an object, 
 though the idea of a lion may be purely " factitious." 
 The idea of whiteness, therefore, implies both the 
 reality of an object that is white, and the reality of 
 the act of perception. And the act of perception 
 implies the reality of the mind that perceives. No 
 act of perception could take place without the two 
 objects in mutual relations to — shall we say recipro- 
 cal action upon — each other 1 
 
138 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 And this view is confirmed by all experience. 
 The blind, as we all know, have no ideas of the 
 colors of objects, and the deaf have no ideas of their 
 sounds. And so on throughout the list of the special 
 senses. Not even in the vagaries of dreams or the 
 wildness of delirium do these elements or ideas come 
 into the mind except in the way described. 
 
 It will be carefully noted that Locke recognizes 
 two entirely distinct and different classes of element- 
 ary ideas, one, of the properties of material objects 
 called sensible properties, and the other, ideas of the 
 acts and states of the mind. And in a subsequent 
 section he recognizes the feelings of pleasure and 
 pain, as furnishing elements of ideas of the soul, as 
 well as the active states of perceiving, reasoning, 
 willing, etc. 
 
 I call attention to this fact because, strangely 
 enough, -the ideas of the second class have been 
 almost if not entirely overlooked or ignored by both 
 disciples who professed to receive his system and 
 carry it out to its legitimate results ; and by the 
 critics who have attempted to criticise and refute it. 
 
 Locke's system, in its accuracy and completeness, 
 was in fact in advance of his time, as thoroughly so 
 as was Copernicus's theory of the solar system, and 
 it is, as I believe, as completely destined to be re- 
 vived and universally received by intelligent people 
 as Copernicus's system has been already. 
 
 I think that Locke has stated the facts correctly, 
 and that the world is coming to see and to acknowl- 
 edge that he has done so. 
 
DESCARTES AND LOCKE. jjg 
 
 If, then, Locke is right, we have immediate knowl- 
 edge of the facts of consciousness only, that is of the 
 acts, states and feelings of our own minds. One 
 class of these acts, or states rather — sensations — we 
 refer to some external object. We know that we 
 do not and cannot produce them ourselves, volun- 
 tarily or by mere effort of will. They are not the 
 effects of the action of, our own minds, we cannot 
 control them. Hence we refer them to external 
 objects, and thus speak of perceiving the objects. 
 
 And for the. most part we speak of that kind of 
 knowledge as immediate. But iti the stricter sense, 
 it is not immediate, for it is always obtained by 
 means of our sense-organs. And any change in these 
 organs may occasion an entirely different impression 
 concerning any object that we perceive by them. 
 
 § II. Any account of Locke's system or theory of 
 knowledge, however, would be quite inadequate if 
 we were to omit all reference to his B. IV, ch. vii, 
 in which he discussses the fundamental axioms of 
 all Iknowledge, " intuitive judgments," as he calls 
 them. These judgments contain no new elements 
 of ideas, they are merely the affirmation of relations 
 between objects, or rather, as Locke would say, 
 between ideas that represent objects, whether simple 
 or complex. He holds that there are certain ideas, 
 the relation between which is seen by immediate in- 
 sight, or intuition, as it is sometimes called. Nobody 
 denies them, or can deny or doubt them when he once 
 understands the terms or words in which they are 
 expressed. Such axioms are : "Nothing can be x 
 
140 THEORIES OP KNOWLEDGE. . 
 
 and not be x at the same time and in the same rela- 
 tion." " The whole is equal to the sum — or is the 
 sum — of the parts." 
 
 These axioms or intuitive judgments lie at the 
 foundation of all knowledge, or if not at the founda- 
 tion of knowledge, at the foundation of all reasoning, 
 and are implied along with the ideas in any afifirma- 
 tion we make, whether in regard to things material 
 and visible, or immaterial and'invisible. 
 
 These axioms are, as we have seen, of two kinds : 
 the one class states a relation between the properties, 
 or elements of ideas, which are or may be supposed 
 — I say supposed, not conceived — to be combined in 
 any one object. In regard to such properties, we 
 often see at once, that they (i) can be combined, (2) 
 that they must be combined, so that where the one is 
 the other must be also, and (3) that they cannot be 
 combined. 
 
 Thus whatever is hard may be white. But as an 
 example of the third, whatever is extended cannot 
 be impalpable, so as not to be either felt by the 
 touch of the hand, or resist pressure. Or in other 
 words, all matter is impenetrable, so that no two 
 atoms can occupy the same point in space. 
 
 But a proposition must have two terms, a subject 
 and a predicate, and thus it imples two ideas in 
 Locke's sense of the word idea, though we often 
 speak of a proposition as containing or affirming and 
 asserting an idea, as if there were only one idea in- 
 volved or implied. And in fact this is in accordance 
 with Plato's use of the word. In his use, and in the 
 
DESCARTES AND LOCKE. 141 
 
 popular use, the statement, "A rectangle whose sides 
 are each four feet contains sixteen square feet," is 
 but the expression of one idea, though we may have 
 the two terms connected by the term contains — is 
 equivalent to or " is containing." 
 
 But in Locke's sense and in the sense to which we 
 must conhne ourselves for an intelligent discussion 
 of our subject, each proposition must have two ideas, 
 but the two terms may be in one case, only different 
 names for one and the same thing, and thus we have 
 in fact but one idea with two terms or words to ex- 
 press it. But in all other cases there must be two 
 ideas, one expressed by the subject, and the other 
 by the predicate of the proposition. 
 
 There are but three forms of simple propositions, 
 (1) those just referred to in which subject and predi- 
 cate are only two names for the same things, (2) those 
 in which the predicate is an adjective, as "snow is 
 white," and (3) those in which the predicate is a 
 common noun, as "horses are animals." 
 
 Hence as propositions are made up of terms ex- 
 pressing ideas, there can be no element oi an idea, or 
 elementary idea in the proposition that is not to be 
 found in one or the other of the ideas which are ex- 
 pressed by the terms. 
 
 § 12. The idea of a thing must always be a com- 
 plex idea, that is, it must be made up of several ele- 
 ments. It is probable that we get these elements 
 separately, as we certainly do get them for the most 
 part by different avenues, as the eye, the ear, etc. 
 Consequently, as the mind compounds them in the 
 
142 
 
 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 process of forming the idea, it can analyze or sep- 
 arate them so as to think of each one of them sep- 
 arately, and thus form what we call abstract ideas, 
 or rather ideas that we express by abstract terms, 
 as roundness, hardness, i tc. 
 
 And each and, every one of the properties which we 
 have thus combined into the complex idea, or can 
 obtain from it by analyzing it, may be predicated of 
 it as an adjective in the second form of propositions 
 as given above. 
 
 Here then is one test of the correctness, the ac- 
 curacy and the completeness of Locke's theory of 
 the origin of our ideas. 
 
 Take the case already cited, an orange. We say 
 it is round, hard, etc. These elements we get at first 
 by sight, as it were, at first sight. But on further 
 inquiry we find that it grew on a tree, and the tree 
 grew from a seed, etc. We have also its chemical, 
 medicinal and nutritious qualities. And all these 
 we can predicate of the orange. But there is none 
 of them that did not come into the mind through 
 some one of the senses, as exercised by some human 
 being like ourselves. 
 
 Or, again, take the mind. What do we or what 
 can we say of it ? Sometimes people say that we 
 know nothing of its substance. But then it is most 
 likely it has no " substance " in this sense of the 
 word. We know what it does — it perceives, remem- 
 bers, reasons, chooses, feels pleasure or pain, hates 
 or Joves, as the case may be. And we can thus pred- 
 icate or afifirm of it what we have been conscious of, 
 
DESCARTES AND LOCKE. j., 
 
 terms expressing ideas that denote properties or 
 states of mind that have actually occurred within us, 
 these only. 
 
 Or again, take a third case. There is an object 
 before me ; suppose it is a dog. I get my ideas, all 
 that I affirm of his size, color, form, etc., by sense- 
 perception. But I see that he moves about as a 
 chair or table cannot. And not only so, but more 
 than this, he seems to know me, shows signs of affec- 
 tion, and in some cases signs of reasoning and vol- 
 untary actions. But all these ideas which I may 
 ascribe to him, affection, reason, volition, etc., as 
 accounting for his acts. I have gotten from my con- 
 sciousness of what occurs in my own experience. 
 Whether he actually possesses them or not, is quite 
 another matter. My ascription of them to him is 
 my theory of the nature of his actions. But what 
 I want now to have considered, is the fact that I 
 ascribe to him, bodily, nothing but ideas that have 
 been obtained by sense-perception, and mentally, 
 nothing but what I have been conscious of in my 
 own experience, no idea nor element of an idea ex- 
 cept such as have been obtained in one or the other 
 of the two ways described by Locke. 
 
 A case of a different kind may be given. When 
 Newton first announced his theory of gravitation he 
 recognized the fact that his doctrine of masses so 
 far apart as the sun and moon and the earth acting 
 on each other by way of attraction, was something 
 of which we can have no conception. I can push 
 whatever I can reach, and so, too, I can pull it to me. 
 
144 
 
 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 I can get hold of it. But how to push or pull that 
 which is out of my reach is a matter of which we 
 have no experience and therefore no idea. And 
 within the last year or two Huxley has renewed this 
 consideration and suggested it as a reason for doubt- 
 ing, even at this late day, the theory of gravitation. 
 
 I have already referred to the negative evidence 
 of the correctness of Locke's theory, namely, that 
 the blind have no ideas of color, the deaf no ideas 
 of sound, and so on. It has been claimed that we 
 have ideas that cannot have come by either of these 
 channels named by Locke. I shall consider them in 
 the next Lecture. But before I leave this part of 
 my subject, I want to call attention to one more 
 point. 
 
 Locke's theory must be understood as referring 
 only to the elements of ideas which he called "mat- 
 ter" in the strictest sense of the word. And here 
 we may encounter some difficulty, both in testing it 
 and in discussing the objections that have been 
 offered to it. What is an element of an idea ? The 
 chemist will tell you that he has no test for an element 
 in his science except the fact that it has not been 
 resolved by analysis into simpler elements or com- 
 ponent parts. So with us, that which has not been 
 resolved and thus far resists all efforts to resolve it, 
 must be regarded as elementary. Thus I regard 
 white, red, yellow, and blue as elementary colors, so 
 that one who never had seen anything that is white, 
 or red, or blue, even though he were not blind, could 
 have no idea of those colors, or understand what the 
 words we use to denote them mean. 
 
DESCARTES AND LOCKE. 
 
 145 
 
 But I think the case is different with gray, orange, 
 purple, etc. I think that one who had seen two ob- 
 jects, one of them white and the other black, could 
 imagine one that is gray and be made to understand 
 the meaning of the word, though he had never seen 
 an article that is of a gray color. 
 
 And, finally, I think there is one more test. No 
 absolutely elementary idea can be defined. We can- 
 not define whiteness so that a blind man will know 
 what it is, or what the term means. Nor, if I am 
 right, could we explain it, the idea, the term or the 
 color, to any one who, however good his eyesight 
 may be, had never seen any object that we and he 
 and the world are agreed in calling white. 
 
 And for this reason I think that even if there were 
 any element of knowledge, that is, any elementary 
 idea, that had not been obtained in one or the other 
 of the two ways described by Locke, we could have 
 no term or word to express it. We should be in re- 
 lation to it like the blind in relation to color, or the 
 deaf man in relation to sounds. We could define 
 and describe, as I think, something that is gray, or 
 orange, or purple, if one had seen objects that are 
 white and black, red and yellow, red and blue, but 
 not at all one of the elementary colors. 
 
 What I have thus described as possible is in fact 
 constantly occurring. Every few days our manufac- 
 turers of fancy goods are treating us with something 
 that is of a new color, and called by a new name. 
 We that have seen it, describe it to others who have 
 not, by comparing it with things that we and they 
 10 
 
146 
 
 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 Rave seen. It is red with just a shade of blue, or 
 by some such comparison. But if it were of an ele- 
 mentary color that the person we were talking to 
 had never seen, we should have no such resource. 
 There would be no resource but by a sight of the 
 object itself. 
 
 In fact, as Locke says, and it results from his 
 theory, man's ideas, and so his knowledge of 
 things, is limited by his experience. In the earliest 
 stages of his life, that experience is limited pretty 
 closely to the things he has seen. But as he grows 
 up he begins to imagine things that he never saw, 
 and knows much of which he has never had personal 
 observation or experience. But in all this he is lim- 
 ited in the formation of his ideas, whether "adventi- 
 tious" ideas of things that exist and may be seen, or 
 "factitious" ideas of what no one has seen, and pos- 
 sibly has never existed or can exist, limited to those 
 elements of ideas which have been gained by sense- 
 perception of things around us or consciousness of 
 the mind within man himself. 
 
LECTURE III. 
 
 THE CRITICS AND DISCIPLES OF LOCKE. 
 
 § I. Locke's philosophy has had rather a strange 
 development, or series of developments, both in 
 England and on the continent of Europe. Li fact 
 it has been the starting point for all systems and 
 speculations since his time. But no one of his "dis- 
 ciples" or his "critics" seems to have taken the whole 
 theory, in both of its parts, into their minds, or to 
 have appreciated his system. 
 
 I propose in this and the next Lecture to follow 
 out some of these developments, and I begin with 
 that of Reid, the Scotchman, and that of the French- 
 man, Cousin. 
 
 There were really three distinct movements in 
 philosophy that took their inception and starting- 
 point from Locke's essay : (i) That of Hume and 
 the skeptics and the agnostics of the present day ; 
 (2) that begun by Reid in Scotland and continued by 
 Royer Collard and Cousin, in France ; (3) that begun 
 by Kant and continued by Hegel in Germany. 
 
 The first of these, as already intimated, was in the 
 
148 
 
 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 direction of atheism, or agnosticism. The move- 
 ment commenced in each of the other cases was in 
 the direction of faith and belief, though with very 
 different results, as we shall see. 
 
 Those who were so disposed had neglected the 
 fundamental principle of Locke's system, namely, 
 that all ideas imply the reality of the observed object 
 from which, by the act of observation, they are ob- 
 tained. And then in England his professed disciples 
 neglected the second class of elementary ideas as 
 described by him, namely, those which represent our 
 own minds, or rather their acts and states, and thus 
 they deduced from what was accepted and called his 
 system, conclusions of a nature alike fatal to earnest- 
 ness in religion and sound principles in morality. 
 
 § 2. Dr. Thomas Reid (b. 1710J undertook to 
 counteract the bad influence which, in this defective 
 form, had been derived from it by Hume and others, 
 and represented as its legitimate fruits. 
 
 In the first place, Reid denies Locke's doctrine 
 that in thinking of external objects, the object with 
 which the mind is immediately occupied is not the 
 object itself, but its idea, or image; in the mind. He 
 maintained that we perceive the object immediately 
 and that the mind in thinking of it is occupied with 
 the object itself immediately, that is, without the 
 intervention of any idea of it. Reid's appeal was to 
 " the common sense of mankind." 
 
 He says, "the vulgar, that is, common people, 
 allow or believe that the expression ' having an idea 
 of a thing,' implies a mind that thinks, an act of that 
 
THE CRITICS AND DISCIPLES OF LOCKE, j^q 
 
 mind which we call thinking and an object about 
 which we think. But besides these three the phi- 
 losopher conceives that there is a fourth, to wit, 
 " the idea which is the immediate object of mental 
 activity when we are thinking." He then adds : "I 
 believe ideas in this sense are mere fictions of the 
 philosophers." 
 
 And I think that Reid was right in both these 
 points, namely, that which we perceive is the object 
 itself, and the object is also what we think about, or 
 that "with which the mind is occupied in thinking," 
 and that the ideas considered as realities in the mind, 
 whether they can or cannot exist out of the mind, 
 are mere fictions ; and that what we really mean by 
 saying that we have an idea of a thing, is, so far as 
 facts and truth are concerned, only the same as saying 
 that we are thinking of the thing. And this is Reid's 
 view. 
 
 In the next place Reid did not fully appreciate 
 Locke's theory and was not quite satisfied with the 
 doctrine that all the elements of our ideas or 
 knowledge come from experience, or are at least 
 acquired by sense-perception and consciousness. 
 
 In fact the analysis which I have given, and taken 
 so much pains to illustrate, does not seem ever to 
 have occurred to Reid. And, as we shall soon see. 
 Cousin, the French philosopher, overlooked it alto- 
 gether. And in fact Locke himself is somewhat at 
 fault in this matter. He did not bring out this point 
 of his theory, as we now see to be necessary, and 
 show that what we get by the primary acts is not 
 
igo 
 
 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 the ideas of things, but only their elements, though 
 in speaking of them Locke makes mention of the 
 elements only as color, hardness, perception, memory, 
 volition. 
 
 So thus Reid says (Ess. II, chap. 6, p. 2), "the 
 child sees the jack and every part of it as well as 
 the man. The child, therefore, has all the notion 
 of it which sight gives ; whatever there is more in 
 the notion which the man forms of it, must be de- 
 rived from other powers of the mind." But Reid 
 does not tell us what those "powers" are. And there 
 is nothing in the fact stated that is contrary to, or 
 tends to confute, Locke's theory when rightly under- 
 stood. For, on that theory, or at least in accord- 
 ance with it, the elements of ideas that enter into our 
 idea or notion of a thing are not all of them acquired 
 at once and at first sight. On the contrary they are 
 acquired gradually, and one after another, as we see 
 and experience more and more of the object itself. 
 
 Take, as an illustration, the idea we have of a man. 
 It is at first merely an idea of his form, size, color, 
 etc. After a while we learn by observation and ex- 
 perience that he has within his exterior contour a 
 framework of bones, a system of vital organs, and 
 has also a thinking mind which is at least something 
 like our own. And then our idea becomes more 
 definite and individualized as we learn of his past 
 history, present opinions, purposes and relations in 
 life. But in all this we get no ntvf elements of ideas, 
 or none at least that are not derived, as Locke main- 
 tains, by one or the other of the two sources speci- 
 
THE CRITICS AND DISCIPLES OF LOCKE. j e i 
 
 fied by Locke — sense-perception and consciousness. 
 And Reid, so far as I can now recollect, does not 
 make any direct effort to show to the contrary. 
 
 Reid's system, however, has not proved satisfac- 
 tory to either : (i) those who, on the one hand, claim 
 to be more profoundly metaphysical or philosophical, 
 or (2) to those who, on the other, profess to have a 
 disregard, if not a contempt, for all metaphysics — ^ 
 for all and everything but "facts" and the natural 
 sciences. 
 
 Reid's work is commendable for its sterling com- 
 mon sense. As I have just stated, he rejects the 
 philosophers' notions of ideas, calling them mere 
 fictions, as Aristotle had done, and he insists, in 
 accordance with the common sense of unsophisticated 
 men, that what we see and think about are the real 
 objects themselves. 
 
 But Reid seems to have had no appreciation of 
 Locke's second class of elementary ideas — those 
 derived from consciousness — and their proof of the 
 reality of a soul in man. He rests his belief in this 
 respect in the existence of God and morality, upon 
 the common sense of mankind. 
 
 But as it is the system which is most in accord 
 with the common sense of mankind, it is also the 
 one taught in some of its forms, so far as its essential 
 characteristics arc concerned, in most of our schools 
 and colleges. It stands between the two extremes — 
 that of agnosticism on the one hand and that of 
 idealism on the other. 
 
 § 3. The other name that remains to be consid- 
 
152 
 
 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 ered in this line in this Lecture is that of Victor 
 Cousin. He was born in France in 1792. He re- 
 turned from Germany in 1826, where he had studied 
 the philosophy of Kant and had heard the lectures 
 of Hegel. He began his course of lectures by a re- 
 view of the "History of Philosophy" in the Sarbonne. 
 Perhaps no course of lectures on a subject which is 
 so abstruse and generally uninteresting, not to say 
 repellent, was ever attended by such a large con- 
 course of hearers. There are said to have been some- 
 times from three to four thousand in attendance. 
 
 "Locke's Philosophy," as it was called, omitting 
 the two elements named above, namely, the reality 
 of all objects cognized and the second class of the 
 elements of " the matter" of ideas, derived from 
 consciousness, had been introduced into France by 
 Condillac, 1766, and developed into the atheism and 
 infidelity of the French Revolution. But in 181 1 
 Rozer Collard introduced what was called the Scotch 
 Philosophy and it was continued by other less known 
 names until 1 826, when, as I have said, Cousin, having 
 returned from his banishment to Germany on 
 account of political difficulties, began his lectures. 
 
 With Cousin there is no fundamental principle 
 or fact as a starting-point. His method is one of 
 eclecticism. It consists in reviewing all systems, 
 adopting no one system as a whole, but rather select- 
 ing and accepting whatever one may find to his liking 
 or "that is true," as he thinks. And the only ulti- 
 mate test is intuition, or rather insight, which, how- 
 ever, Cousin calls reason, or rather "the reason.' 
 
THE CRITICS AND DISCIPLES OF LOCKE. 
 
 153 
 
 This he says, "though it is in us, is not ours nor our- 
 selves, nor under our control — it is God within 
 us." (See below.) He regards it as infallible. 
 Error comes only from reason?«!^, and not from rea- 
 son or mere immediate intuition or insight. 
 
 Cousin claims to be, to a large extent, a disciple 
 of Reid. He denies very emphatically that there 
 are any ideas in the mind as a means or a part of 
 knowledge. Thus (Lect. XXII) he says, " If by 
 ideas be understood something real, that exists in- 
 dependently of words, I say then there are absolutely 
 no ideas. There is nothing real except things and 
 the mind with its operations." Again, " now we re- 
 ject the doctrine of innate * * * * ideas; and for 
 this very simple reason, that there are, in nature, 
 neither propositions nor ideas. What is there in 
 nature? Besides bodies there is nothing except 
 minds, and among these, that which we are, which 
 conceives and knows directly things, minds and 
 bodies. And in the order of mind what is there 
 innate ? Nothing but the mind itself, the understand- 
 ing, the faculty of knowing." Once more, "there are 
 then, indeed, no innate ideas really existing." 
 
 These statements all occur in the same Lecture 
 (Lect. XXII, 2d series. Chap, vii, in Henry's Psy- 
 chology of Cousin). But the thought occurs else- 
 where. Thus in Lect. V, 2d series, he says : " if we 
 reject Nominalism must we admit that ideas are 
 things that exist like all else? Not at all. Ideas are 
 not things — are not beings. Who has seen ideas ? 
 Who has touched them ? If, as I very much doubt, 
 
1 54 
 
 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 Realists have intended to speak of the external 
 existence of ideas, they have fallen into the most 
 evident absurdity. I am ready to admit that ideas 
 are only conceptions of reasons." 
 
 This would seem to be sufficiently explicit and 
 emphatic. In this Cousin agrees with Aristotle and 
 Reid. But it leads to a " realism" quite the reverse 
 of that of the philosophers of the Middle Ages. 
 They held that ideas, which Aristotle and Rei"d thus 
 concur in calling mere " fictions " and which Cousin 
 says have "no existence in the domain of reality and 
 among the substantial things of the universe in 
 which we have our being, are real, if not, indeed, the 
 only real things in the universe, as some of the early 
 followers of Plato held, and, indeed, many modern 
 followers of Hegel profess to hold. But our Realism 
 is the reality of things that exist. 
 
 But Cousin neglects and wholly fails to appreciate 
 the second great class of the elements of ideas recog- 
 nized and described by Locke, those derived from 
 "reflection" or consciousness, and proceeds to criti- 
 cise and treat this system as if he had held and 
 taught that «//the elements of our ideas — our knowl- 
 edge — come into the mind by sense-perception alone. 
 Thus (Lect. XVII) he says, "the first faculty of the 
 mind, then, Refiectian or Consciousness [Locke had 
 at first called it Reflection], adds nothing to what is 
 given by sensation ; it merely takes knowledge of it. 
 In retention, contemplation only continues the per- 
 ception, when faded, the memory recalls it. Discern- 
 ment separates, composition reunites, these percep. 
 
THE CRITICS AND DISCIPLES OF LOCKE. 
 
 I5S 
 
 tions ; abstraction seizes their most general character. 
 But still the materials are always, in the last analysis, 
 ideas of sensation due to perception. Our faculties 
 add nothing to the knowledge which they draw from 
 them, but that of their own existence and of their 
 actions." 
 
 This might seem like a recognition of Locke's sec- 
 ond class ; but if it be so it is wholly inadequate. 
 Cousin makes no further use of it, and shows, as I 
 think most conclusively, that he did not fully 
 understand it or at all appreciate its importance. 
 He proceeds, in fact, as if it had never been men- 
 tioned by Locke. 
 
 Cousin's main object in these lectures is to show 
 that Locke's "system " is faulty in that it does not 
 recognize any innate, or rather a priori, ideas, as he 
 prefers to call them. He seems to recognize the 
 inference that had been drawn from that system as 
 it was understood by the sceptics and rationalists in 
 England and Scotland, as well as the " infidels " in 
 France, as logically inevitable from that system, 
 and if logically inevitable then by necessary inference 
 they had rightly understood and interpreted that 
 system. 
 
 § 4. Cousin professes to accept Locke's challenge 
 to appeal to facts, and takes the seven words that 
 Locke himself had chosen (see last Lecture), time 
 and space, substance and identity, cause, God, and 
 good and evil. 
 
 Before we proceed to examine Cousin's remarks on 
 these tests let us make sure of our ground and see. 
 
156 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 carefully what we are about. And I think it will be 
 found that, as Locke had neglected to unfold and 
 develope his theory aS fully as the case required, and 
 more especially with regard to the second class, so 
 Cousin has failed to see and appreciate one of the 
 fundamental points — which is perhaps rather as- 
 sumed than explicitly stated and fully elaborated 
 by Locke. 
 
 Every concrete idea — that is, every' idea of a thing 
 which has or can have a name, a name denoting it 
 must be, in the sense we have used the word, a 
 complex idea made up of several elements. If now 
 we analyze that idea we get the" elements which can 
 always be used as adjectives when we are speaking 
 of the object, and we may get in this way, too — that 
 is by analysis — all that we can say or ai^rm of any 
 object whatever. This paper is " white," " hard," 
 " flexible," "made of linen," "made at the mills in 
 Lancaster," and so on. These are the "elements" of 
 my idea of this piece of paper, and constitute what 
 I know of it. And they, when fully enumerated, 
 constitute all that I know of it, all that I can say 
 about it, even by way of fancy or of conjecture. 
 
 Now it must be carefully noted that of these seven 
 words, proposed by Locke and accepted by Cousin, 
 every one of them, except perhaps one-^ca.use — stands 
 for a complex idea, an idea of a thing, and not for a 
 simple or elementary idea of a property or mode, so 
 that, if with that exception he should succeed in 
 showing that we have the ideas of the things which 
 are denoted by them a priori, that is before any 
 
THE CRITICS AND DISCIPLES OF LOCKE. 157 
 
 actual cognition of the things themselves, it would 
 be no refutation of Locke's theory. 
 
 In a most important sense all ideas of things which 
 we have not actually seen and observed for ourselves 
 and personally are a priori. But then such ideas do 
 not necessarily, nor do they at all,infact, contain any 
 element or elementary ideas that were not in the 
 mind before, and which had not been derived, as 
 Locke has maintained, by observation in one or the 
 other of its twofold forms — sense-perception and 
 consciousness. 
 
 For example, I have never been in Egypt, or seen 
 the Nile and the Pyramids. But I have pretty defi- 
 nite ideas of them, and these ideas are all a priori 
 to me in a most important sense. I have them 
 before seeing the objects ; they are in one sense, there- 
 fore, factitious, in Descartes' classificatio/i. ' But they 
 are all complex ideas and made up of elements of 
 ideas that I have gained in acts of actual observation 
 of things that I have seen. No one of the elements 
 is a priori or gained otherwise than by actual obser- 
 vation, of real objects to and by the senses, as main- 
 tained by Locke in his Essay. 
 
 We will take, together, first the two of Cousin's ex- 
 amples, time and space, for he treats them very much 
 alike. 
 
 It is a pertinent question at the outset whether 
 they are realities in nature or only fictions. This is 
 a grave question. Doubtless we have never cognized 
 them, and if the decision be that they are mere fic- 
 tions, like Cousin's hippogriffs, the case would seem 
 to be settled. 
 
158 
 
 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 But suppose they are realities, as Cousin assumes, 
 ttie question is what do we predicate of them? Of 
 what elementary ideas are our ideas of them com- 
 posed ? Is space " extended ?" So is this proper 
 which I can see. Does time "endure ?" So do the 
 hills and mountains around one, as well as the pain 
 I feel, or the love I have to my fellow men. And 
 these elements of the two ideas, that of space and 
 that of time, are derived, the one from sight or feel- 
 ing or both, and the other from any consciousness of 
 the state and feeling of my own mind. 
 
 Cousin ascribes to them the three properties. 
 They are "infinite," "without form," and "of neces- 
 sary existence." The first are obvious, but they are 
 negative terms, they do not ascribe to, but they 
 rather ablate from their objects, any property what- 
 ever. 
 
 But as to necessary existence. Cousin says, "I can 
 suppose or imagine this book or any other object 
 annihilated, sb as not to be in existence at all. But 
 I cannot imagine or suppose space to be annihilated 
 or non-existent." 
 
 But suppose space is not anything, is nothing. In 
 that case we cannot imagine or even suppose it to be 
 annihilated, for to annihilate nothing is not to 
 annihilate at all. 
 
 Let us suppose then that this book and all other 
 things are annihilated ; what would be left ? Simply 
 space— blank, empty space. Space then is not a 
 thing, for by the very supposition all things have 
 been annihilated and yet space is left. 
 
THE CRITICS AND DISCIPLES OF LOCKE, i jg 
 
 But do we say space surrounds all things ? So 
 does the air surround all things that are in it. The 
 idea of surrounding, therefore, comes from observa- 
 tion. Do we say that time outlasts all things ? So 
 does the day "outlast" the passing hours. 
 
 Let us now pass to the next two of Cousin's ex- 
 amples, substance and identity. 
 
 The word substance is used in several different 
 senses. But then it means a something that has of 
 itself no properties, while it underlies all of the 
 properties that we ascribe to an object. But the 
 theory is a survival of the Realism which Cousin 
 professes to have repudiated. Thus, if we take 
 Descartes' illustration, it assumes that the properties 
 are, to the underlying substance, very much as a 
 man's hat and coat are to his body, which is covered 
 out of sight by them. But this makes the properties 
 to be as really substantial as the substance itself — 
 the hat and coat as substantial as the head and 
 shoulders which they cover. 
 
 Cousin also assumes, with most all others, as an 
 heirloom of Realism, that what we see, the immediate 
 object of sight, is not the thing itself, but the prop- 
 erties of the object, its color, form, etc., and not the 
 object itself. And he is very emphatic, as usual, in 
 saying that which the senses give you are solidity, 
 color, form, etc. Do men believe that these qual- 
 ities are merely in the air? Or do not men believe 
 that they are qualities of something really existing 
 and which, because it really exists, is solid, etc." 
 Precisely, but do you perceive the solidity or the 
 
l6o THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 solid substance ? To assume that we perceive the 
 solidity is to make of the solidity a quality. or prop- 
 erty, a substance for the occasion at least. This 
 fallacy underlies his whole argument. 
 
 "Identity," I apprehend, is not an elementary idea 
 at all, though denoted by an abstract term. It 
 implies that what appears at first to be two objects, 
 observed at different times or places, are one and the 
 same. I think the word expresses a judgment that 
 is reached by seeing some one object as- it passes 
 through the various changes or conditions. 
 
 Cousin applies it chiefly to the person, the sub- 
 stantial mind or soul that endures, or continues the 
 same during several successive states or stages of 
 thought and feeling. But the idea of the soul is, 
 according to Locke, and Cousin does not differ from 
 him in this respect, obtained by consciousness of 
 our own mental states and acts. And the identity 
 may be the result of continued consciousness during 
 the coming and going of thoughts and feelings. Thus 
 we should get the idea of identity from natural ob- 
 servation of the soul itself, as it passes through its 
 various states. But in other cases we afifirm it as 
 an act of judgment. 
 
 In regard to cause, Locke says expressly that we 
 get the clearest idea of it, or of active power, from 
 the mind itself, by our consciousness of volition and 
 effort. We need not, therefore, pursue our remarks 
 on this point any farther, and inquire whether by in- 
 sight we could get the idea of cause as something 
 different from and more than mere antecedence, 
 
THE CRITICS AND DISCIPLES, OF LOCKE. i6i 
 
 from the phenomena of external nature. We may 
 leave this as a question that need not be discussed 
 in this place. 
 
 I pass then to the idea of "good and evil." Cousin 
 maintains that good is something more and higher 
 than mere pleasure, and I certainly shall not dissent 
 from his view in this respect. Pleasure is a matter 
 of consciousness, but it is not so with "goodness." 
 Goodness, however, is a property which we ascribe 
 to that which gives us pleasure. That which is good 
 is, as Socrates said, good for something and in refer- 
 ence to an end, or else it is good for nothing. And 
 whatever we call good at all we call good as a means 
 to an end, though perhaps we may overlook the end 
 for the moment and call it absolutely good, that is, 
 good always in the result, and good in this respect 
 without comparison or reference to anything else. 
 
 But even so the idea, the elementary idea, was 
 obtained by comparison and reference to an end. 
 Pleasure has reference to self, or to a person. G-ood 
 has reference to something higher, so that which is 
 good need not be pleasant for the present at least, 
 and that which is pleasant now is not always good 
 in the end. The difference results from the differ- 
 ence in the object with which the comparison is made, 
 or to the end that is had in view. 
 
 § 5, I come now to the last of the seven words, 
 or ideas, "the infinite." But adhering to our method 
 and our principles we actually ask "the infinite" what ? 
 Cousin certainly speaks of four objects at least, of 
 which he would predicate the term "infinite ;" they 
 are "time," "space," God and "number." 11 
 
l62 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 But the word itself is negative in form, and 
 neither denotes nor implies any property by which 
 an object, whether mind or matter, can be cognized. 
 To say that a thing is infinite is merely to express a 
 judgment concerning it, and to say that it is without 
 bounds or limits. The word ascribes to and predi- 
 cates of the object nothing whatever. 
 
 Dropping all the other terms, however, and re- 
 stricting our remarks to the One Infinite Being, the 
 question arises how do we come to think at all of 
 Him, and what attributes do we ascribe to Him? 
 And the latter of the two questions is the only one 
 that need concern us now. 
 
 The word denotes at all events a complex idea, 
 the idea of a Being with various attributes. But 
 what are these attributes? Confessedly not any one 
 of the sensible properties of matter. As the old 
 Greek philosopher said, "God sees all things and 
 knows all thmgs, but He does not breathe." He is 
 all mind. 
 
 Now I do not know, and Cousin has not attempted 
 to show, that we ascribe to Him anything that we 
 are not conscious of in ourselves, — sin and infirmity, 
 weakness and wickedness, alone excepted. He is as 
 we say omnhcA^nt, we know some things. He is 
 o»2»«potent, we can do some things. He is omni- 
 present, we are present here and now, under the 
 limitations of time and space and so on. We judge 
 of Him and what He is by what we see of the works 
 in nature, and in revelation which we ascribe to Him ; 
 just as we do of our fellow men by the acts they per- 
 
THE CRITICS AND DISCIPLES OF LOCKE. 
 
 163 
 
 form and the words which they speak. And we 
 ascribe to Him as attributes whatever of thought, 
 feeling and purpose they seem to indicate. 
 
 But with regard to number the case is sqmewhat 
 different, as Cousin points out. Infinity in number 
 is only a convenient fiction. There is no number that 
 is actually infinite, it is only indefinite, so that to any 
 number that exists something may be added as well 
 as subtracted from it. 
 
 But infinity as we ascribe it to the attributes of 
 God, is not, as Cousin well and pointedly says, of this 
 kind. It cannot be reached by addition or multipli- 
 cation. But how then ? Cousin does not attempt to 
 tell us. His a priori idea, if he has one, cannot be 
 expressed in words, or at least he gives no word for 
 it. (See last Lecture.) 
 
 The two words, as J. S. Mill has remarked, are 
 different, and the difference is important. Both are 
 applied in the common use of language to God. But 
 we say, for example, of water that it is perfectly pure, 
 or it's purity is perfect. So too we say of space that 
 it is infinite. But we do not interchange these 
 adjectives and call the purity of water, for example, 
 infinite. 
 
 In speaking of the attributes of God, however, we 
 often use both adjectives. His love, for example, we 
 say is perfect, to indicate that it is unmixed with any 
 other attribute in such a way as to render it less 
 effective. And yet we say that it is infinite, to indi- 
 cate that it extends to all things and all particulars. 
 To say thus of God, that his attributes of love and 
 
164 
 
 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 goodness are perfect, is to ascribe to them no prop- 
 erty but such as we have got or can get an idea of 
 from many other things. And as to the word 
 "infinite" it is, as I have said, only an etymological 
 compound. In and of itself it denotes no reality nor 
 the property of any, that we have ever seen, whether 
 by sense-perception, consciousness, or otherwise. 
 Finiteness we know. But infinity we do not know, 
 nor immediately anything that is infinite. 
 
 Our minds are finite. I know a few things and 
 can think of but one or two things at a time. I can 
 do something, but very Httle. Other minds resist 
 me, natural objects resist me. I cannot sink into the 
 ground, as I sometimes wish I might do. I cannot 
 fly in the air as the birds do. But God, the Infinite 
 Mind, is infinite in power and perfect in his attributes. 
 If so, all thoughts must be present to His conscious- 
 ness at one and the same time ; that is. He is omnis- 
 cient. He must be present in all places, without 
 extending from one place to another as material 
 objects do. Finite minds and finite things can have 
 no power as against Him. Even in mathematics we 
 can do nothing with the sign of infinity. When we 
 come to that sign we are at the end of all possible 
 operations. We can no longer either add or subtract, 
 multiply or divide. 
 
 It has sometimes been proposed as a problem, "if 
 an irresistible force encounters an immovable body 
 what will be the result ?" This may do for a witticism 
 or a puzzle.* But if there be an irresistible, that is 
 an infinite, force there can be no immovable body, 
 
THE CRITICS AND DISCIPLES OF LOCKE. 165 
 
 or if there is an immovable body there can be no 
 irresistible, or infinite, force. 
 
 Doubtless the view of the Divine Being that is 
 thus presented is somewhat anthropomorphitic. But 
 I know of no idea or conception of Him that is not 
 so. From the lowest idea that is entertained by the 
 most degraded or most uneducated, up to the highest 
 and most spiritual, something of this character 
 always accompanies and modifies our idea of the 
 Supreme Being. 
 
 One of the questions of our day with philosophers 
 is with regard to "the personality of God." We 
 begin with the idea of personality as derived from 
 observation of our fellow men. As persons they are 
 visible in bodily form as well as imperfect and de- 
 fective in many respects. And when these philoso- 
 phers deny the personality of God, what they mean 
 to deny, and all they mean to deny, is for the most 
 part only these peculiarities of men, visibility of 
 form and imperfections of character. Of course in 
 the last stage this denial of the personality of God 
 denies His substantial existence as well — His posses- 
 sion and exercise of will power and purpose, as well 
 as His agency or activity or cause. 
 
 But in all our affirmations concerning God there 
 is no element of the idea, element of character, or 
 attribute, which is not formed and furnished to us in 
 its elementary form by the consciousness of our own 
 mental acts or states. We are made in His image, 
 and are "partakers of His nature," that is, His attri- 
 butes. 
 
1 66 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 I find, therefore, in Cousin's criticism nothing to 
 raise or justify a doubt as to the correctness of 
 Locke's theory, when taken in its full comprehension 
 and fairly and fully understood. Cousin's great mis- 
 take, one of them, was the factthat he did not recog- 
 nize the difference between the complex ideas of 
 things and the elements out of which they are made. 
 
 There are two considerations, besides those already 
 expressly stated, that seem to make Cousin's position 
 untenable and Locke's impregnable. 
 
 The first is that if there were any «/wr2 elements 
 of ideas, any elements that had not been obtained 
 by experience as Locke has defined it, we should and 
 could have no words to express them. 
 
 Let us suppose, for example, a man is perfectly 
 blind and has always been so. No effort we can 
 make, no words or illustrations we can use can en- 
 able him to understand what the word "white" means 
 or when to use it as a predicate to any noun, the 
 name of anything whatever. He can come to under- 
 stand the word, "get the idea of it," if we prefer 
 that expression, only by seeing something that is 
 white, and so of all the truly elementary ideas. 
 
 The second point is that if we had such ideas and 
 could use the words that express them, they would 
 be no proof of knowledge. 
 
 Suppose, for example, that one has the idea of 
 whiteness, or any other color, and takes into his 
 hands, in the dark where he cannot see it, any object, 
 he, with all the ideas in his head could not tell what 
 is the color of the object, if limited, as in that case 
 
THE CRITICS AND DISCIPLES OF LOCKE. 
 
 167 
 
 he would be, to the mere sense of feeling. And so 
 of all other elementary ideas. 
 
 Again, it is a serious fault with Cousin, as it was 
 with Plato (Lect. IV), that he has given us no ulti- 
 mate test of truth that is of any practical value. 
 He refers to "the Reason which he insists and re- 
 peats (Lects. VI, VII, VIII, 1st series; Lects. Vand 
 VI, 2d series) is impersonal, in us, but not ours, of 
 us, or in any way under our control." But he gives 
 us no means and prescribes for us no way by which 
 we can discriminate these dicta of "the Reason" from 
 the mere creations of our own fancy. If a man only 
 feels perfectly sure that anything is right, it is so — 
 for him at least. 
 
 § 6. But Cousin concurs in his general results with 
 Reid. (Lect. XXII, Chap. VII, Henry.) He gives 
 as the results of his methods : 
 
 (i) We know matter and mind, the world, the soul 
 and God, otherwise than by ideas (in Locke's sense). 
 (2) We know things directly, and without the means 
 or medium of ideas, the mind is subject to certain 
 conditions and limitation. But when these conditions 
 are supplied or fulfilled, it enters into exercise and 
 knows, for the sole reason that it is endowed with 
 the faculty of knowing," or in short it knows because 
 it can know and that is its nature. 
 
 I think, therefore, that Locke has "touched the 
 bottom" of this question and given a solution that 
 must remain among the posterities. Like Coper- 
 nicus' theory of the motions of the heavenly bodies, 
 Newton's law of gravitation, Dalton's doctrine with 
 
1 68 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 regard to the laws of chemical combination, Aris- 
 totle's dictum de omni et nulla, or Hegel's law of 
 co-ordination and comprehension in a higher genus, 
 or Leibnitz's and Cousin's law of causation as the 
 foundation of all positive knowledge of any thing, 
 or of all things that we know or can know anything 
 about whatever. 
 
 1 have insisted in this discussion that our inquiry 
 must be limited to the elements of ideas. And I 
 have given several reasons why there can be none 
 that are either innate in Plato's sense, or in the sen«e 
 of the Medieval Christian Realists, or a priori in 
 Cousin's sense. 
 
 I give, in conclusion, once more, the elements of 
 ideas cannot be defined. No one can tell what 
 "whiteness" is. If you ask me what whiteness or 
 any other strictly elementary part of a complex idea 
 is, I cannot tell. I can only say that you must see 
 something that is white and then you will know 
 what the words mean. I can possibly tell you where 
 or when you can see something that is of that color. 
 
 We can define and explain only the words that 
 express complex ideas and denote things that may be 
 known without being seen, and then only as they 
 contain no elements of ideas that we have not 
 already acquired. 
 
 It is in this way that we define the triangle, the 
 circle and other mathematical figures, and reason 
 frdm these definitions to all that we know of mathe- 
 matics. We reason in this way also, only to a much 
 more limited extent, from the nature of things in the 
 natural science and metaphysics. 
 
THE CRITICS AND DISCIPLES OF LOCKE. 
 
 169 
 
 So, too, in this way we get very clear and distinct 
 ideas of things we have never seen — mountains and 
 rivers, cities and continents. Persons who have seen 
 them describe them to us, and we construct the 
 elements thus indicated into complex ideas of the 
 objects, but only in case we have the elements of the 
 ideas already in mind. But if we are called upon for 
 any element of an idea that we have not got by 
 actual observation, the case is hopeless. No innate 
 or a priori process will be of any avail to us. 
 
 But does any one ask : Why not accept the doc- 
 trine of some innate or a priori ideas? 
 
 First of all, because there is no proof of any. It 
 would, therefore, be to recognize an element of 
 uncertainty, that is, facts of the existence of which 
 we have no knowledge or proof as among the facts 
 of nature that, we have to account for and explain, 
 and take into the "material" of our philosophy. 
 
 But in the next place it would be opening a bound- 
 less field for the play of fancy in all our speculations 
 and allow a man to invent "facts" at will and to 
 affirm and believe whatever he might take a fancy 
 to afifirm. If a man may invent his facts he can 
 prove anything and can never be refuted or confuted 
 in anything he may choose or profess to hold. We 
 should, in fact, be opening the field and preparing 
 the way for any quantity of the dicta of the philoso- 
 phers like those of the Middle Ages, which we have 
 seen to be so effective in their influence against 
 nearly every step in the modern progress of science 
 and discovery ; it would, in fact, totally obliterate 
 
I70 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 the distinction between fancy and reason for all the 
 practical purposes, whether of life or of philosophy. 
 
 § 7. But although we reject Cousin's theory of 
 innate a priori elements of knowledge we must give 
 him the credit of having distinctly enunciated the fact 
 or principle that lies at the very foundation of all 
 knowledge ; it is that all cognition and all knowledge 
 rests ultimately on the principle of causation. 
 
 Although Locke had made the remark in passing 
 that we get our best idea of force Or cause from the 
 consciousness of our own mental act in choosing, he 
 yet attempts to account for our idea of cause by 
 reference to the observed antecedence of events, 
 facts and phenomena in the material world. This 
 was accepted by Hume and the others, who were of 
 an atheistic turn of mind, as final ; and thus they 
 denied any difference between the two — antecedence 
 and causation. But Cousin not only shows that 
 there is a difference — sometimes the cart before the 
 horse, the wheelbarrow before the Irishman — and at 
 any rate the iileas of the two are different, so that 
 we may often predicate one when we must deny 
 the other. 
 
 Nor is this all. He made this principle, that every 
 effect must have or have had a cause, fundamental, 
 or, rather, he recognized the fact that it is fundamental 
 to all knowledge. We know external objects only 
 as they act as causes in producing sensations in us. 
 And the cause must always be adequate. If the 
 sensation be of one kind, we call the object white, if 
 of another, red, if of another, hard, etc., etc. 
 
THE CRITICS AND DISCIPLES OF LOCKE. 171 
 
 And SO internally, though Cousin does not seem 
 to haVe appreciated this application of his own 
 principle. I am conscious of perceiving, remember- 
 ing, reasoning, willing, choosing and putting forth 
 effort and therefore the I, or ego, must be active as 
 a cause, and if a cause, then, as Leibnitz has shown, 
 a substance and not a mere property or mode. And 
 if a substance and cause it must be adequate to the 
 observed effects, it must be intelligent, capable of 
 insight an-d spontaneity of action, or, as we say, 
 free will, for in choice there is of necessity spontaneity 
 as opposed to inertia. 
 
 Or to state this doctrine in another form, "We 
 know things only by what they do" (i) to us or (2) 
 to one another. Thus, take any material object, I 
 know it, in the first place, by what it does to my 
 organs of sense-perception. It does something to 
 the cells that constitutes the retina of my eye, and 
 I call it white, or if it does something different, I 
 call it, perhaps, red or yellow. So of all the other 
 organs of sense. 
 
 Then, in the next place, I know of it chemically, 
 mechanically and even medicinally, by what it does 
 to other beings and things — the way it acts on them, 
 and I give it names for its properties in this relation 
 as affinity, attraction, repulsion, etc. 
 
 So of the mind, I know it by what it does within 
 me. Perhaps it is true that I know nothing of it, 
 what it is and how it appears when it is not in action. 
 But I know it by what it does and of it whatever it 
 does. It perceives, imagines, remembers, reasons, 
 
172 
 
 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 and wills and I know it as doing these things just as 
 I know the objects around me by what they do in 
 acting on my sense-organs or on one another in the 
 varied forms of the natural phenomena. 
 
 And, in the same way, applying this principle to 
 the facts and phenomena of nature, we arrive at the 
 idea and certainty of a First Cause, omnipotent, 
 omniscient and omnipresent. And this He must be 
 in order to be adequate to the production of the 
 phenomena we ascribe to Him. This paper must 
 be hard or I could not feel it ; it must be of 
 some color or I could riot see it. That is, it must 
 be as a cause adequate to the sensations by which I 
 feel it to be hard or see it to be white, etc. 
 
 So with the First Cause. He must be omniscient, 
 omnipotent and omnipresent to produce those phe- 
 nomena in the material world in its present and past 
 history, which we see and which we cannot ascribe 
 to either man, animal or mere inert matter as their 
 adequate cause. 
 
 Here then is our starting point. And we shall 
 proceed, in what remains of this course of Lectures, 
 to consider some of the efforts that have been made 
 to build on this foundation, or rather on one and 
 another of its parts taken as a whole. And I think 
 we shall see that no one of them has succeeded in 
 accepting the foundation as a whole, and that as a 
 consequence they have arrived at very unsatisfactory 
 results as the final outcome of their labors. 
 
 We must remember that Locke's starting point 
 was that all the elements of our knowledge are de- 
 
THE CRITICS AND DISCIPLES OF LOCKE. i^^ 
 
 rived from actual observation of real objects, and 
 were of two kinds, the one obtained from the mate- 
 rial world by sense-perception and the other obtained 
 from the mind itself by consciousness. 
 
 The two movements last considered, those of 
 Reid and Cousin, were both of them made in the 
 interest of Christianity and Christian belief. Reid, 
 as I have said, based his philosophy on the innate 
 common sense of mankind. Cousin thought to base 
 his efforts on the a priori ideas (he avoids the term 
 innate) which, as he thought, enter into the knowl- 
 edge and belief of all men, and thus furnish a foun- 
 dation for religion and morality. 
 
 I now proceed to consider the developments from 
 Locke's theory, or rather their misapprehension of it, 
 in the other direction, in the interests of unbelief 
 and agnosticism. 
 
 These philosophers, neglecting the doctrine that 
 every act of cognition implies the reality of the thing 
 cognized as indispensable to the act, and neglecting, 
 also, or intentionally ignoring, as Comte and others 
 have done, his second class of the elements of ideas, 
 those derived from consciousness, we have a develop- 
 ment of scepticism and uncertainty in regard to the 
 objects of cognition by the senses, and of agnosti- 
 cism in regard to all others. 
 
 August Comte, born in 1798, is known as the 
 author of what is called Positiveism. He thought 
 that there had been three distinct ages in the prog- 
 ress of human thought : First, the theistic, in which 
 men ascribed all phenomena to God or to "gods 
 
174 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 many" with a mythology to explain all things. Sec- 
 ond, a metaphysical age, in which men referred phe- 
 nomena to laws and invisible "causes," denoted, for 
 the most part, by abstract terms (which we may add 
 is an outcome of Plato's theory of ideas and the 
 Realism of the Middle Ages). The third age he 
 claimed to have been inaugurated by himself. He 
 accepted Locke's first principle, that all our elements 
 of ideas are obtained by cognition of external things, 
 expressly and professedly rejecting the elements of 
 ideas that we get of the mind and by consciousness. 
 
 As a necessary consequence of this basis, he lim- 
 ited the word "knowledge" to what we get by Sense- 
 perception and which, therefore, pertains only to 
 material things ; all else being relegated to the 
 realm of the "unknowable." By this means, agnos- 
 ticism was not only justified, but it was made an in- 
 evitable necessity. This was Comte's third stage 
 and, in his view, the last and the perfect stage. 
 
 But if we accept, with him, Locke's fundamental 
 principle that all the elements of ideas are derived 
 to the mind by actual cognition, and take into 
 account the neglected half of the other principle, 
 the ideas derived from consciousness, we enlarge the 
 sphere of knowledge, in the strictest sense of the 
 word, and we have what we know of mind as well 
 as of matter, included in the word knowledge. And 
 we have, as elements of our idea or knowledge of 
 mind, such ideas as perception, consciousness, mem- 
 ory, insight, love and hate, will and effort, which 
 make up the complex idea of mind and personality. 
 
THE CRITICS AND DISCIPLES OF LOCKE, jye 
 
 But even "knowledge" will not stop here. We 
 have from things seen, knowledge of things unseen ; 
 and that, too, both in the material and in the spirit- 
 ual world. 
 
 The planet Neptune, as is well known, was proved 
 and known to exist before it had been seen by 
 human eye. No one has ever seen an ultimate atom 
 of matter ; yet that atoms smaller than have ever 
 been seen or can be seen, exist as certainly as mat- 
 ter itself, or any one of the things we see around us, 
 cannot be denied. 
 
 Malebranche, as we have seen, being unable to 
 understand how we perceive things that are in the 
 material world, invented his theory of "seeing all 
 things in God." 
 
 Liebnitz had invented the theory of monads and 
 pre-established harmony, by which he thought to 
 avoid the difficulty that arises from ^our being 
 unable to understand how mind can act on matter 
 or matter on mind. There was on his theory no 
 interaction, or action and reaction, in the case ; it 
 was only an instance of two substances, or monads, 
 acting in harmony and, at the same time, pre-estab- 
 lished harmony, but not on each other. 
 
 Berkley experienced the same difficulty as Male- 
 branche had done. He assumed or implied the 
 reality of a human mind in man and a God in the 
 universe Who is a Creator of all things. And he 
 made a new suggestion as to the mode and nature 
 of creation. But he denied the substantial exist- 
 ence of matter and of material things. Hence the 
 witty saying of some wag, perhaps Butler: 
 
1 76 THEORIES OF KNO WLEDGE. 
 
 '•If Berkeley says there is no matter, 
 'Tis no matter what Berkeley says.'' 
 
 But Hume (b. 171 1) thought that the assumption 
 of even a nlind in man was unwarranted, and 
 especially did he maintain that we have no right, on 
 any grounds of philosophy, to afifirm or assume the 
 existence of God. What we know and all we know, 
 he held, immediately, is our sensations or perceptions. 
 The belief in anything else is mere assumption, and 
 entirely unphilosophical. It is reported of him that 
 having been asked by some one if he did not really 
 believe that the objects around him on the table and 
 the chairs really existed, he replied : "This is not a 
 fair question ; what I may believe as a man is one 
 thing, and what I have a right to believe as a phi- 
 losopher is quite another and a very different thing." 
 
 § 8. But Comte is the founder of what is called 
 "the Positive Philosophy" and, to some extent, what 
 is better known in our day as Agnosticism. 
 
 In his view all things are in one of two states, one 
 is a quiescent condition or mode and the other is an 
 active state. "All considerations range themselves 
 under the one or the other of these heads." If we 
 regard them as mere inactive modes, we must, so 
 far as mind and thought are concerned, determine 
 the organic circumstances of the case, which makes 
 it a question of mere "anatomy and physiology." 
 If we regard them as active states, which he calls the 
 "dynamic aspect," we have to study only "the exer- 
 cise and results of the intellectual powers. " "In short, 
 looking at all scientific theories as so many great 
 
THE CRITICS AND DISCIPLES OF LOCKE. 177 
 
 logical facts, it is only by the thorough observation 
 of .these facts that we can arrive at the knowledge cff 
 logical laws. These being the only means of knowledge 
 or intellectual phenomena, the illusory psychology, 
 which is the last phase of theology, is excluded. It 
 pretends to discover the laws of the human mind by 
 contemplating it in itself, that is, by separating it 
 from causes and effects. Such an attempt, made in 
 defiance of the physiological study of our intellectual 
 organs and of the observation of rational methods of 
 procedure, cannot succeed at this time or day. (Vol. 
 I, p. II, Martineau's Ed.) Again (p. 461) he says, 
 "as far as this fundamental principle of interior obser- 
 vation is concerned it would certainly be superfluous 
 to add anything to what I have already said about 
 the absurdity of the supposition of a man seeing him- 
 self think." 
 
 Herbert Spencer follows Comte far enough in this 
 respect to say that "a cognition of self, properly so 
 called, is absolutely negatived by the laws of 
 thought." If the object perceived is self, what is 
 the subject that perceives ? Or if it is the true self 
 that thinks, what other self can it be that is thought 
 of? Clearly, true cognition of self implies a state in 
 which the knowing and the known are one. Subject 
 and object are identified, which Mr. Mansel rightly 
 holds to be the annihilation of both. (First Princi- 
 ples, p. 64.) 
 
 But somehow or other we do manage to "see our- 
 selves think." This is another instance, even in our 
 day, of the application of that philosophy, or method 
 
 12 
 
178 
 
 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 of argument, by which the "philosophers" of the day- 
 resisted or denied the law of the velocity of falling 
 bodies, the" pressure of the atmosphere and such 
 like truths. But somehow we do see ourselves think. 
 I see this table in the ordinary way, but I look into 
 the mirror and I see myself ; subject and object are 
 here one and the same. Do men say it is by the 
 reflection of the mirror ? So it is in acts of mental 
 reflection that we are able to see ourselves think. 
 
 But there need be no dispute or uncertainty about 
 the matter. No one doubts or disputes the fact that 
 we are conscious of our mental acts and states, per- 
 ceiving, remembering, willing, etc. The only point 
 is whether there is an ego, or self, a mind that thinks, 
 a mind that performs mental acts, or "mentalizes," 
 as it has been called. The question reduces itself, 
 then, mainly to a question of words and names. 
 
 Or, perhaps, not quite that. Men of this school 
 of philosophy very generally i-egard the word mind 
 as an abstract term. They admit that we are con- 
 scious of or cognize thought and feeling, but do not 
 immediately or directly see the mind that thinks. 
 
 But in sense-perception we have the same prob- 
 lem. On this theory what we see is the whiteness, 
 etc., but not at all, or by any means, the substance 
 that is white. We feel hardness, but not the sub- 
 stance that is hard, etc. ' 
 
 § 9. This old delusion clings, with a wonderful 
 tenacity, to the minds of our philosophers. In fact, 
 there is no "substance" in the sense these men imply. 
 That is, there is nothing that is of itself without 
 
THE CRITICS AND DISCIPLES OF LOCKE, j^q 
 
 properties underlying the properties we see. The 
 supposition of the reality of such a substance makes 
 the properties themselves to be substantial, the 
 colors of an object, for example, as substantial as the 
 paint we put on them. 
 
 Even so good a thinker as John Stuart Mill defines 
 matter as only "the present possibility of sensation." 
 (Ex. of Hamilton, Vol. I, p. 243.) And of mind he 
 gives no better account than that "it is nothing but 
 the series of our (?) sensations (p. 253). A series of 
 feeling which is aware of itself as past and future" 
 (p. 261). 
 
 But there can be no thought of properties or modes 
 without thought of substance, nor of substance with- 
 out properties or mode. We use the terms as we 
 often do what we call "imaginaries" in mathematics 
 as the square root of a minus quantity. We cannot 
 get along with our discussions without using them. 
 But everybody knows that there are and can be no 
 such things in rerum naturd. All men see and 
 admit it, too, unless like Hume they feel justified, 
 or at least required, to affirm and maintain, as philos- 
 ophers, what, as men, they know to be untrue in fact 
 and are constantly obliged to act upon. 
 
 No. Where there are properties there is substance, 
 and where there are actions, whether material or 
 mental, there is an active agent or cause. Of this 
 all men are satisfied, as men, and act accordingly. 
 
 But, as philosophers, the doctrine must be seen to 
 be undeniable the moment our thoughts have been 
 concentrated upon it. 
 
I go THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 An act of consciousness implies a conscious mind, 
 and thus the elements of our knowledge of mind or 
 self, lie at the foundation of all knowledge, at the 
 basis of every assertion or affirmation we can make. 
 
 I say, for example, this paper is white. But how 
 do I know that it is white, or that I see it at all? It 
 is only because I know, that is, am conscious, that I 
 see it. There could be no knowledge of the object 
 without knowledge of the act of perceiving it. We 
 cannot go back of that fact, or deeper into the. sub- 
 ject. Hence, without consciousness of the mental 
 act of perceiving it, we could not make any affirma- 
 tion with regard to, or have any knowledge of, the 
 object perceived. 
 
 Is is quite possible that these philosophers, under 
 the pressure of this argument, might say that we are, 
 indeed, conscious of the acts of perceiving, etc., but 
 not of the mind itself, and have no cognition of 
 knowledge of it. 
 
 But here is the old fallacy, a survival of the scho- 
 lastic philosophy, which is, perhaps, an outgrowth 
 of Plato's theoiy of ideas. The fact is we do not 
 perceive properties or modes at all, but subtances, in 
 this, that or some other mode. We do not see 
 the whiteness of the paper, but the paper white. In 
 the common use of words vve say, indeed, that we 
 are conscious of thinking, feeling, etc. But there 
 must be something, an underlying substance, that 
 thinks and feels. 
 
 Perhaps, I ought to say a little more definitely 
 what we mean by the word substance in this connec- 
 
THE CRITICS AND DISCIPLES OF LOCKE, igi 
 
 tion. We may say that we call that a substance 
 which we can Imagine or conceive to exist by itself, 
 and even to exist if there were no other thing in 
 existence. Thus, I can imagine, or suppose, this 
 table to exist and to continue to exist if all other 
 things were annihilated so that there would be 
 nothing else in existence. But I cannot imagine, or 
 even suppose, its whiteness, or solidity, to exist 
 except as there is something substantial that is white 
 or solid. 
 
 It is easy to see what is the real diffculty with 
 these men. They are expecting what is impossible, 
 namely, that they shall be able to see the mind, that 
 is, see it literally, as they do external objects, in 
 these acts of perception, reasoning, willing, etc., just 
 as we see the lamp when it gives light or the paper 
 when it receives the ink I am putting upon it. What 
 they want and expect is, as Tyndall expressed it, to 
 ^'visualize" the mind in order to cognize it in these 
 acts and states. But the mind is not visible nor can 
 it be "visualized." 
 
 But most assuredly we are not justified in denying 
 its reality on that account. Look upon the trees in 
 yonder grove ; you see that the wind blows upon 
 them ; but the wind itself you cannot see, you can- 
 not '■'visualize" it. But it is there and it "bloweth 
 where it listeth," nevertheless. 
 
 I often think of the invisible things, that is, im- 
 material things, as being in relation to us much as all 
 the objects around us would be to a man who is per- 
 fectly blind and who, moreover, has no tactile sense 
 
Ig2 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 by which he can feel things that he cannot see with 
 his eyes or touch with his hands or other parts of his 
 body. He could hear the sounds they make and 
 smell the odors they emit and float on the air. But 
 he could neither see nor feel them ; he could not 
 "visualize" them at all. Nor in the ordinary sense 
 of the words, could he form any idea of them what- 
 ever. But he would know that they are real and are 
 around him. He would know them by what they 
 do to him, the sensations they produce in him, and 
 the thoughts he has about them in consequence of 
 these actions on such organs of sense as he happens 
 to possess. And they would be none the less real 
 to him because he could not see or "visualize" them. 
 
 § 10. Sir William Hamilton must be included 
 among those that have followed in the wake of these 
 misapprehendens of Locke, as must also the two 
 Mills, father and son, James and John Stuart. 
 
 The name of Hamilton furnishes one of those 
 cases in which a man dashes into the atmosphere of 
 philosophy like a meteor, but shines after a while 
 with a decreasing light. I think that while every- 
 body has the very highest respect for the character 
 and motives of Sir William Hamilton, the estimate 
 of his work in philosophy is on the decline. Born 
 two years before the great Frenchman, Comte(i788), 
 he cannot be supposed to have known much, if any- 
 thing of his position, or the character of the "Posi- 
 tive Philosophy," or to have been influenced by it 
 any further than it was already "in the air," so to 
 speak, that is, was current in an unrecognized form 
 and influence in the thoughts of the age. 
 
THE CRITICS AND DISCIPLES OF LOCKE. 183 
 
 Sir William Hamilton must be reckoned among 
 those very learned men who have read everything 
 and knows all that can be obtained from books, or 
 that books can teach them. But he seems to have 
 seldom, if ever, looked beyond mere words to things. 
 And consequently he has been most severely cen- 
 sured for misapprehending his authorities, and either 
 making them utter what is pure nonsense or ascrib- 
 ing to them opinions that are as far remote as possi- 
 ble from what they really intended to say. (See 
 Sterling's "Secret of Hegel."') 
 
 How to hold to a belief in the reality of external 
 things, consistently with any sound principles of 
 philosophy that should furnish the ground and first 
 principles of all knowledge, was the great question. 
 Comte, as we have seen, would not admit it to be — 
 probably from the peculiar constitution of his mind 
 did not see or feel that it was — any question at all. 
 He assumed it as a first principle and not only vir- 
 tually, but professedly, rePected all principles of met- 
 aphysics and metaphysics itself as groundless and 
 absurd. 
 
 But Hamilton took a different course. He en- 
 larged the idea of consciousness, and made it to be 
 a "special faculty" whose function it is to cognize 
 the states and acts of the mind and the mind itself, 
 as it is the function of the eye in these states and 
 acts to cognize the colors and forms of objects, or of 
 the ear to cognize their sounds. But it was, rather, 
 in his estimation, a genus including, in fact, all the 
 forms and classes of mental activity. 
 
1 84 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 Thus, in accordance with his view, we should not 
 say that consciousness is the faculty of knowing the 
 acts or states of our minds, just as perception is the 
 faculty or process of knowing or perceiving actual 
 objects around us, and memory is the faculty of 
 knowing or recalling past facts and states of our 
 minds ; but consciousness, in his view, is "the sum 
 total of our mental states and acts" of the mind, and 
 is, in fact, "the genus of which acts of perception, 
 memory, imagination, reasoning, etc., are but the 
 co-ordinate species." 
 
 It is undoubtedly true that we do sometimes use 
 the word in that sense. But it is not the usual 
 meaning or scope of the word, nor has his suggestion 
 been generally received. In fact it was seen, almost 
 at once, that it would not remove the difficulty alto- 
 gether and could at most only change its place and 
 form in the position it should occupy in our dis- 
 cussion. 
 
 But Sir William thought otherwise and announced 
 the result of his new method very emphatically. 
 Thus, in his article on "the Philosophy of Common 
 Sense" he says, "in the act of sensible perception I 
 am conscious of two things, of myself 2& \h^ perceiv- 
 ing subject and of an external reality in relation with 
 myseli as the od/ect perceived." And again, in "the 
 Philosophy of Perception" he says, "the assertion that 
 we can be conscious of an act of knowledge without 
 being conscious of its object, is virtually suicidal. . . 
 If a relation connot be comprehended in one of its 
 terms, we cannot be conscious of the operation with- 
 
THE CRITICS AND DtSCIPLES OF LOCKE. 
 
 185 
 
 out being conscious of the object to which it exists 
 only as correlative." 
 
 Here it is to be noted that Sir William uses the 
 word "conscious" in its ordinary sense and not in 
 the one to which he has proposed to limit it. 
 
 In the next place he has clearly mistaken what is 
 actually contained in the act of perception, so to 
 speak of it, and a condition external to the act it- 
 self, without which it could not occur. For example, 
 I could not write these Lectures without something 
 to write them on. But yet nobody supposes, or is 
 in danger of mistaking, the paper for a part of the 
 act itself. 
 
 But Hamilton's suggestion is faulty in another 
 way. It would confound acts of consciousness that 
 are indisputable, with those that are not so. I can- 
 not doubt that I perceive, for example, but there are 
 cases of false perception in which, so far as mere 
 consciousness is concerned, the act is complete and 
 undistinguishable from other acts of perception, 
 when in fact there is no real object perceived. 
 
 This is not the place to show that there must be 
 acts of true perception in which the object is there 
 and really perceived, and that they are not all like the 
 fancied perceptions in a dream. But that point we 
 shall reach by-and-by, at a further state of progress 
 in our Lectures and under another head. 
 
 Hamilton has chiefly in mind, undoubtedly, the 
 scepticism of Malebranche and Berkley and Hume 
 with regard to the substantial reality, if not to the 
 very existence, of external things. He saw no other 
 
1 86 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 way to meet it or to obviate their difficulties. We 
 shall see in our next Lecture how Fichte, following, 
 in one sense at least, Kant, encountered the same 
 difficulty and ran into substantially the same form of 
 scepticism with regard to external things. In this 
 view they are like the images in our dreams or the 
 objects we think we see in cases of false perceptions 
 or hallucination. 
 
 We have thus the act of perception as a matter of 
 consciousness, which no one ever does or can deny ; 
 then, we have the fact or law that no such act of 
 true perception can occur without the reality of the 
 perceived object. 
 
 Hamilton agreed with the current of speculation 
 that was'setting in in that direction, and ignored or, 
 as in his case, expressly rejected, the second class of 
 elementary ideas as indicated by Locke — those de- 
 rived from consciousness. 
 
 After reciting at some length, as was his custom in 
 most cases, the doctrines and opinions that had been 
 held on that subject, as he understood them, beginning 
 with Plato, he referred especially to the form of 
 statement in which Locke's system had been intro- 
 duced into France by Condillac and expounded by 
 Diderot and Condorcet, namely, that Locke had 
 stated and proved that all our ideas are compounded 
 of sensations, and in regard to the exceptions to this 
 view of Locke's system that had been tqken, espe- 
 cially by Reid and Stewart, he says : "On these 
 observations [of Reid and Stewart] I must remark 
 that they do not at all satisfy me ; and I cannot but 
 
THE CRITICS AND DISCIPLES OF LOCKE. 
 
 1 87 
 
 regard Locke and Gassendi as actually on a par, and 
 both as deriving all our knowledge from experience." 
 By which he meant the experience of the senses, or 
 sensation, for he adds : "In the first place, I cannot 
 concur with Mr. Stewart in allowing any weight to 
 Locke's distinction of Reflection or self-conscious- 
 ness as a second source of knowledge" . . "'And 
 if this be the case, it follows that the formal reduc- 
 tion by Condillac of Reflection to Sensation, is only 
 a consequent following out of the principles of the 
 doctrine itself" (p. 406). 
 
 But it is time to pause and consider what these 
 philosophers of the French school, and Hamilton 
 who agrees with them in -this, intended to do with 
 Locke's second source of ideas. Did they mean to 
 deny that we are conscious of perception, memory, 
 etc. ? Not at all. But their mistake, or, rather, the 
 conclusion at which they arrived, resulted from two 
 errors or faults. 
 
 In the first place, they did not take and use the 
 word idea in so comprehensive a sense as Locke had 
 done. He defined it to be that with which the mind 
 is occupied when it thinks. Consequently it might 
 be the mind itself, or any mere property, or object, 
 or state, or act of the mind itself. 
 
 In the next place they failed to see and appreciate 
 what Locke means by his ideas of the second class. 
 And for this Locke, it must be admitted, is partly 
 to blame himself. His mind was so entirely fixed 
 upon the other direction in which the discussion 
 should be pursued that he did not give to this part 
 
1 88 THEORIES OF KNO WLEDGE. 
 
 of his subject so much of an exposition, development 
 and illustration, as he did the other, and as, we may 
 add, the importance of the subject demanded of him. 
 
 I think it must be manifest from this review that 
 Hamilton's system is about as atheistic or agnostic 
 as that of either Hume or Comte. I say his system, 
 because he professed to provide against the scepti- 
 cism in regard to material things, as agaiiist Male- 
 branche, Berkeley and Fichte, by making the object 
 perceived a matter of consciousness. And in regard 
 to the existence and attributes of God, he and his 
 followers excluded all ideas of Him from the sphere 
 of knowledge and left them to depend upon and be 
 derived from Revelation. (Mansel's Limits of Re- 
 ligious Thought, Lect. II.) 
 
 I will close this Lecture with a consideration of two 
 great phases of the theories of knowledge which the 
 discussions and developments from this misappre- 
 hension and misuse of Locke's system have made 
 quite prominent in this age. The one is called 
 '^Agnosticism" and the other "the Relativity of 
 Knowledge r 
 
 § II. Agnosticism, as we have seen, comes from 
 (i) neglecting the second class of the elements of 
 ideas as Locke described them and (2) from limiting 
 the use of the word "knowledge" to what we know 
 by sense-perception alone. 
 
 I do not propose to discuss the views of these 
 philosophers in detail. Most of their opinions may 
 be true, as I suppose to be the case with all other 
 systems of philosophy ; they are not all and altogether 
 
THE CRITICS AND DISCIPLES OF LOCKE. 
 
 189 
 
 wrong. In fact, most of their statements are true. 
 The great evil consists in the fact that they have in 
 them some one seminal or germinal principle, that 
 brings forth evil fruit ; in other words, some one 
 principle from which logic will make deductions, and 
 history will develop results that are wrong, injurious, 
 and even apparently absurd. Common sense, how- 
 ever, imposes its restraints and compels men to 
 believe and speak of a mind in man as though they 
 believed it. 
 
 Thus Herbert Spencer says, speaking of the phe- 
 nomena of mental action, "Whence may be drawn 
 the inference that it is held" (the existence of mind 
 in man) "by thinkers, as well as by the vulgar, to be 
 beyond all facts unquestionable." . . . "Shall 
 we say that they" (these phenomena) "are the affec- 
 tions of something called mind, which, as being the 
 subject of them, is the real ego ? If we say this we 
 manifestly imply that the ego is an entity." And 
 then, after examining the suggestions and theories 
 for denying the existence of a mind in each one of 
 the human beings that make up our race, he pro- 
 poses several inquiries and then adds, "Unless he 
 can give a satisfactory answer to these queries, which 
 he cannot, he must abandon his conclusions, and 
 must admit the reality of the individual mind. {First 
 Principles, § 20,) 
 
 And Huxley has said, "we know more of mind than 
 we do of body, the immaterial world is a firmer 
 reality than the material." {Sensation and Sensifer- 
 ous Organs.) Huxley, however, believes in what he 
 calls "the relativity" of knowledge. 
 
igo THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 But, if Locke's theory be true, we have a knowl- 
 edge of mind as well founded and as certain in its 
 teachings as the knowledge of the material world is 
 or can be.. Nay, and for the reason that both Spen- 
 cer and Huxley give, more certain than our knowl- 
 edge of material things. 
 
 It may be, and I am inclined to think that it is so, 
 that the recently discovered and not yet fully ap- 
 preciated phenomena of what is called "reflex 
 action" will call for quite an extensive reconstruc- 
 tion of our "Mental Philosophy." But so did the 
 suggestion of Copernicus, and the discovery of New- 
 ton, call for an entire reconstruction of astronomy. 
 The old theories of Phlogiston and latent heat have 
 passed away. Dalton's law is accepted and chem- 
 istry has become quite a different thing from what 
 it was before the days of Tachenius and Boyle. 
 
 And so the more recent discoveries in what used 
 to be regarded as Psychology may entirely revolu- 
 tionize the science. But it is a science, nevertheless, 
 and based on observed facts no less than Chemistry 
 and Astronomy. 
 
 It is quite possible that Comte had something of 
 this kind in view when he made the sweeping asser- 
 tions already quoted above. It is quite certain 
 that Spencer has had the phenomena of reflex action 
 in view when he made his assertion. And Huxley 
 has written an essay to prove that all of what we 
 have hitherto regarded as mental ^cWovi is only reflex 
 action of the nerve centers. 
 
 But even reflex action, as seei;i in man at least, 
 
THE CRITICS AND DISCIPLES OF LOCKE, jgi 
 
 cannot be all of it interpreted, except by the con- 
 sciousness of what takes place in the mind itself. 
 
 Nor do these agnostics deny the existence of God ; 
 they simply ignore Him and relegate all thoughts of 
 him to the domain of "the unknowable." And 
 let us be sure to keep this fact always in mind. What 
 they hold and all that their theory of knowledge re- 
 quires them to hold, is that God and the mind of 
 man are not visible and tangible, like the objects of 
 the natural sciences. John Stuart Mill holds and 
 teaches in his posthumous works, that the existence 
 of God, though not an absolute certainty, like the 
 truths of mathematics, is, nevertheless, as certain, if 
 not more so, than any one of the truths obtained in 
 the Natural Sciences by the means of induction. 
 And Herbert Spencer, by the application of Hegel's 
 law of co-ordination, though he probably did not 
 know it was Hegel's, to Mansel's reasoning, has 
 proved by the most rigorous demonstration, that 
 there must be in the universe a Being who is infinite 
 and absolute so far as being dependent upon any 
 other being or anything else for His existence is 
 concerned (p. 88). Spencer also shows (p. 99) that 
 this power is omnipresent. In p. 280 he claims to 
 show that He is the only Force in the universe, so 
 that heat, light, chemical affinity, etc., are but modes 
 of His action in nature ; and, finally, Spencer 
 speaks of Him as producing in us certain beliefs and 
 opinions which it is our highest wisdom and duty to 
 accept as from Him and act upon them accordingly 
 (p. 123, § 34.) 
 
ig2 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 Tyndall says (Frag. p. 355), "the world will have 
 a religion of some kind. We cannot read history 
 with open eyes, or study human nature to its depths, 
 and fail to discover such a requirement. Man never 
 has been and never will be satisfied with the operations 
 and products of understanding alone (knowledge, 
 as these men call it), hence, physical science cannot 
 answer all the demands of his nature." And in an- 
 other place (p. 366) he says, "When I attempt to give 
 to the Power which I see manifested in the universe, 
 an objective form (to "visualize" it), personal or other- 
 wise, it slips away from me, declining all intellectual 
 manipulation. I dare not, save practically, use the 
 pronoun "He" regarding it; I dare not call it Mind ; 
 I refuse to call it even Cause." That is, we cannot 
 imagine it as a visible object, personal or otherwise, 
 handle (manipulate it is his expression), nor visual- 
 ize it. It escapes all such efforts and "remains a 
 mystery still and overshadows" him. But yet the 
 theory that He controls events and may even change 
 phenomena in -answer to the prayers of men, is in 
 his opinion a "perfectly legitimate one" for men to 
 hold and act upon (p. 468). 
 
 Now all this, the Agnostics hold, is not knowl- 
 edge. And if not, is it the something that is higher 
 and better — above all knowledge ? Will he have us 
 call it faith ? Even so, on his own theory, it is not 
 only higher and more elevating than what he calls 
 knowledge, but more absolutely certain as well. 
 
 § 12. Our remaining topic is "relativity of knowl- 
 edge," as already intimated. I think that Sir Will- 
 
THE CRITICS AND DISCIPLES OF LOCKE, jqj 
 
 iam Hamilton first introduced this expression and 
 gave full exposition and sway to the doctrine. 
 But Herbert Spencer accepts it, and its considera- 
 tion occupies the fourth chapter of the first part of 
 his "First Principles of Knowledge." 
 
 This doctrine, taken in its fullest extent, would 
 take from all knowledge the elements of certainty. 
 Even self-evident axioms would not remain and 
 serve as a basis to stand upon. Not even the axiom 
 "I think, therefore, I am," would remain to us. 
 
 Knowledge consists, not only of ideas of things, 
 but also of the relations that exist between the 
 things, that is, the objects represented by the ideas. 
 
 The properties of objects considered as elements 
 of knowledge may be referred to four classes: (i) 
 The objective properties, such as color, form, etc ; 
 (2) the subjective properties, which are indicated by 
 such terms as beautiful, horrible, frightful, etc.; (3) 
 the relative properties, which indicate the relations 
 of objects one to another, as affinity, cohesion, grav- 
 ity, etc., and (4) what we may call the metaphysical 
 properties, that are seen to exist only as a result 
 of insight or reasoning, as inertia, infinite diversibil- 
 ity, etc. 
 
 But the relations of objects that make up our 
 knowledge may be referred to three classes : (i) 
 relations of the substance to its properties and modes, 
 as when we say the paper is white, or hard, or 
 smooth, or flexible ; (2) the relation of the perceived 
 object to the perceiving subject, as when I say this 
 is beautiful (to me) or this is white (as it appears to 
 
 13 
 
IQ4 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 me), and (3) the relations of objects to one another, 
 as when we say, "all objects attract all others in pro- 
 portion to their quantity of matter, and inversely as 
 the square of their distance. 
 
 In this view all knowledge is, in a sense, relative ; 
 that is, it is a knowledge of the relations of things 
 one to another and of the objects substantially con- 
 sidered in relation to their properties, modes and 
 states. If this is what is meant by the Relativity of 
 Knowledge, then all knowledge is relative, or rela- 
 tiyity is an attribute or characteristic that atten<is 
 every assertion we can make. But in this case rela- 
 tivity implies no degree or kind of uncertainty. 
 
 There is, however, another kind of "relativity" 
 which affects a certain .part of our knowledge, and 
 this kind of relativity does give to that part a 
 degree or kind of uncertainty which no means at 
 our command will entirely obviate. And it seems 
 to me not unlikely that our philosophers, having 
 fixed their attention on this part of our knowledge, 
 have, by a too hasty generalization, affirmed it as a 
 characteristic of the whole. Or it is possible that 
 they, having eliminated by their theory of the origin 
 of our ideas, the nature of what have been regarded 
 as axioms of absolute truth, ha\^e left nothing which, 
 in their estimation, ought to be called knowledge 
 to which this characteristic of relativity, with its in- 
 separable accompaniment of uncertainty, does not 
 pertain. 
 
 But even then I think I shall be able to show that 
 there is, in fact, one class of our ideas, a subdivision 
 
THE CRITICS AND DISCIPLES OF LOCKE. 
 
 195 
 
 of even those ideas which they recognize as making 
 up our knowledge, which is. exempt from the fault of 
 uncertainty which they predicate of all. It is a part 
 of the first class of properties just named. 
 
 Sensations, as we know, are states of body or of 
 mind (and it makes no difference which, now), pro- 
 duced within us by external objects through our 
 organs of sense as means. Now it is known to 
 everybody that a change in the object will produce a 
 change in the sensation which it produces and so in 
 the appearance of the object itself, and thus in .our 
 idea of it. This piece of paper might, though re- 
 maining the same piece of paper, be changed in color 
 so as to be red or black, instead of white, and the 
 sensation produced and the idea of it in my mind 
 would be changed accordingly. 
 
 But it is not so generally known and considered 
 that a change in the organ of vision, that is, the eye, 
 might produce the same effect in our minds, or upon 
 the idea of the object that is supposed to be in the 
 mind. 
 
 We have a good illustration of this fact in the case 
 of our sensations of temperature. Let two persons 
 come into the same room, the one shaking with a 
 chill and the other burning with a fever, and the air 
 of the room will feel cold to the one, while it will 
 seem to be altogether too warm to the other. 
 
 What, then, is temperature ? It is only a relation 
 between us and things around us. What is cold to 
 one person and under one set of circumstances, is 
 hot or, at least, too warm to another or to the same 
 person under different circumstances. 
 
196 
 
 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 Now it has been assumed and asserted that this 
 element of "relativity" pertains to all our knowledge. 
 But I think I can show that even within the do- 
 main of the knowledge acquired by sense-perception, 
 there are exceptions to this general rule, and very 
 important exceptions. 
 
 Take, first, the individuality of objects. There 
 are two pieces of paper on the table before me. 
 They are absolutely two and not one, and no change 
 in my organs of vision can make them either to be 
 or to seem to be only one and the same object, ex- 
 cept by a case of actual false perception. 
 
 Or, again, this paper is rectangular; this form is 
 absolute, the same to all persons who can see it with 
 their eyes or feel it with their hands. And here, too, 
 no change in the condition of the organs by which 
 we perceive it can make it seem of another shape, 
 as round, oval, or triangular. Its form is absolute. 
 
 Hence, the reality of all objects that we see in 
 true perception, as opposed to false perception, is a 
 necessary truth. Their individuality, their form, and 
 their number are not relative. 
 
 We may see the difference between the perceptions 
 of form and of color and most of the other proper- 
 ties of objects in another way and by a different 
 statement of the facts in the case. The color of an 
 object depends on the quality of the nerve cells in 
 the tissue of the organ of sight which we call the 
 retina of the eye, and any change of their quality 
 would effect a change in the sensation which is pro- 
 duced by the object, so that it would appear to be of 
 a different color. 
 
THE CRITICS AND DISCIPLES OF LOCKE. 
 
 197 
 
 But in the case of the form of objects, that does 
 not depend upon this quality at' all, but upon their 
 position in relation to one another and, of course, no 
 change can be effected in that without destruction of 
 the tissue and sight altogether. If the position of 
 the cells is such that the object appears round or 
 square, that is, forms a round or square image on the 
 retina of the eye, the appearance of the object will 
 be in accordance, whatever may be its color and not- 
 withstanding any change in its color. 
 
 I think we have a good illustration of this fact in 
 what is now pretty well known as color blindness. 
 It is doubtless a result of some fault in the nerve 
 tissues ; but in these cases there is no fault or defect 
 in the matter of the perception of form ; the forms 
 of the objects we perceive. These color-blind peo- 
 ple see things distinctly, as distinctly as we do, and 
 they have no uncertainty and indistinctness in regard 
 to the forms of objects. And this holds true of all 
 the grades and degrees of color-blindness. 
 
 Form is, undoubtedly, in most respects an ele- 
 mentary idea. But in one respect, at least, it differs 
 from all of the other elements of our ideas : it is, or 
 can be, derived from either of two or more of the 
 organs of sense ; color, for example, by the eye, 
 sound by the ear, odor by the nose ; but the idea of 
 form is obtained by both the eye and the hand, 
 or the organ of touch. Hence there is nobody who 
 has it not by one or the other of these means, and 
 it is, in fact, the same to both of these organs and the 
 same also to all persons, with no element of relativ- 
 ity in the case. 
 
1 98 
 
 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 But the knowledge we get of objects is not all 
 derived from, or dependent upon, the way they act 
 on us. It depends, to a large extent, on the way 
 they act on one another. That branch of our 
 knowledge which we call Chemistry is derived from 
 our observation of the way in which the objects in 
 nature act on one another. So in Physics and 
 Astronomy. It is not merely the primary ideas that 
 we get from seeing them and their action on sense- 
 organs, but, rather, their actions on one another, that 
 make up our knowledge of them. And these, 
 though indicating their relations to one another, are 
 not relative to us. 
 
 And it is worthy of special note that nearly all, 
 perhaps all, of the classifications on which our Nat- 
 ural Sciences depend, while they imply the individu- 
 ality of their objects, are actually based on the form 
 of the objects as wholes, or of their parts and or- 
 gans considered as parts of them as wholes, or the 
 relative properties just referred to. In Chemistry 
 and Botany I believe that the men of science do 
 rely somewhat on color and odor. The Chemist 
 recognizes ammonia, sulphur, bromine, and some 
 other elements by their odor. But after all, the 
 forms and the modes of their action one on another 
 are the main basis of the classifications that are 
 generally made and accepted and on which the Sci- 
 ences are founded. And these are not relative ; they 
 are the same for all persons, at all times and under 
 all conditions, so long as the things themselves last 
 and are in the same relations to one another. 
 
THE CRITICS AND DISCIPLES OF LOCKE, iqq 
 
 But we can try another test. Nobody can tell 
 what whiteness, for example, is ; there can be no 
 definition of it that will give its exact differentia. 
 It is a color, and that is its genus, or essentia ; but 
 its differentia, as among its observed properties, no 
 one can give. He that has seen it, or rather some- 
 thing that is white, knows what the word means, but 
 what the thing is, no one can tell ; it is purely and 
 wholly relative. 
 
 But with regard to form it is quite otherwise. 
 We know and can tell what roundness and square- 
 ness are. We can define the geometrical figures 
 precisely, with both essentia and differentia. And 
 we can so define and explain them that any one who 
 has never seen a round or square object, if, indeed, 
 there is or could be such a person, will know exactly 
 what they are, or, rather, what their form is, if only 
 he has the senses of sight and feeling, or either one 
 of them. There is no relativity about the form of 
 objects. 
 
 We have, then, the axioms, or self-evident truths, 
 the first principles of all knowledge, that are abso- 
 lutely true. There is no relativity about them, in 
 the sense of the word we are now considering. The 
 ovL&ness, the \yioness of objects and all the laws of 
 number ; the straightness of the line, the roundness 
 of the object, or the squareness of the figure, and 
 all the truths of Geometry and Arithmetic, are ab- 
 solute ; they are the same for all persons and all 
 places, now and here, heretofore and hereafter ; as 
 true in heaven and for all time, as they are now and 
 
200 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 for us inhabitants of this transient and changeable 
 earth. 
 
 And these axioms enter into and underlie all 
 branches and departments of knowledge. What we 
 see is seen, and to be seen it must be substantial, or 
 a real object and not a mere mode of an object, al- 
 though we cannot see it except as it is in one or 
 another of its possible modes. What is inert can- 
 not move, except as it is acted upon and moved by 
 something else. Mere analysis cannot destroy an 
 element, nor can mere synthesis create one. Every 
 effect must have had an adequate cause. 
 
 These axioms and such like axioms, as well as the 
 principles of number and form. Arithmetic and Ge- 
 ometry, underlie and enter into the composition of 
 that knowledge which makes up all that we call the 
 Sciences, whether we take the word in its broader or 
 in its narrower and most restricted sense. 
 
 While, then, we must admit that there is an ele- 
 ment of relativity, and so of uncertainty, running 
 through all sciences that are based on sense-percep- 
 tion, we must not overlook or forget the fact that 
 there is also an element of absolute truth that runs 
 through them and is mixed up with the uncertain or 
 relative part of them. 
 
 Nor must we forget that there is a whole field of 
 knowledge — the mathematics, at least — in which 
 there is no uncertainty, no relativity whatever. 
 
 Of course I am saying nothing of the uncertainty 
 that attends the results and deductions of our rea- 
 soning, the fallacies in form and in diction to which 
 
THE CRITICS AND DISCIPLES OF LOCKE. 20 1 
 
 we are all liable. But I am concerned only with the 
 uncertainty, "the relativity," that arises from its 
 two sources, the cases of false perception, and the 
 fact that many of what we call the sensible proper- 
 ties of objects may appear different to different 
 persons. And I think I have shown that there is a 
 satisfactory basis for what may be called knowledge 
 in the various departments of Science, and that 
 whatever of relativity there may be in this depart- 
 ment, it does not extend to mathematics, or to the 
 great mass of moral and religious truths. 
 
 And so with the other great branch or department 
 of knowledge beginning with Psychology. We may 
 mistake the facts of consciousness one for another, 
 may misunderstand them, misinterpret them, and 
 misapply them. But they are real none the less on 
 that account. There is no "relativity" about the 
 fact of their existence. And there may be and is as 
 much certainty in any of our conclusions from them, 
 or theories concerning them, as there is in any of 
 our theories or explanations of the facts and phe- 
 nomena of nature. 
 
LECTURE V. 
 
 KANT AND HEGEL. 
 
 The movement inaugurated by Locke took quite 
 a different form in Germany from that which it took 
 in France and England. 
 
 Kant, though of Scotch descent, was born in 
 Germany, 1794, about fourteen years after Raid was 
 born in Scotland and ninety-two years after Locke 
 in England. They, both of them, entered the field 
 of metaphysics for very much the same purpose, 
 namely, to counteract the tendencies of what had 
 been regarded as "Locke's system" to materialism, 
 atheism, scepticism, and general unbelief. 
 
 But before I proceed to discuss this evolution of 
 philosophy, I think it will be well to turn aside and 
 consider one or two points in the philosophy or 
 logic of language, which seem to have had a pretty 
 direct bearing on this subject. 
 
 § I. All languages, I believe, that have a definite 
 article at all, except the English, use this article 
 before abstract and concrete nouns alike and with no 
 difference in this respect. But in the English the 
 
KANT AND HEGEL. 203 
 
 article is not used before abstract nouns, except 
 when they are followed by the preposition "of," or 
 some clause which is equivalent to it, in the matter 
 of limiting their meaning. Thus, when we say, "the 
 whiteness," we expect something else to follow, as 
 "the whiteness 0/ snow," "the whiteness ^/the rose," 
 or, "the whiteness which the tissues exhibit," etc. 
 
 But the French and German languages make no 
 difference in this respect in their use of the article, 
 and thus they would say, ^^the physiology is the sci- 
 ence of," etc., whereas we should say, "physiology" 
 [without using the article] "is the science." In fact, 
 the French requires the article before all nouns, 
 while the German is not quite so rigorous in this 
 matter and allows more latitude of use. 
 
 Now, this use of the article, doubtless, originated 
 when the difference between abstract terms, which 
 we now recognise and see to be of vast importance, 
 was not seen or appreciated, and the continued use 
 of the article in this way tends to perpetuate the 
 error of confounding the two classes of "realities," 
 just as the continued use of language in speaking of 
 heat and light perpetuates the belief that they are 
 real entities, which may be sent, reflected, refracted, 
 radiated, converted, and even changed, the one into 
 the other. 
 
 We have a good illustration of the effect of this 
 misuse of terms, as we must call it, in a matter that 
 is intimately connected with our general subject. 
 We are in the constant habit of speaking of ^Hhe 
 imagination," "the reason," "the memory," "the 
 
204 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 will," etc., as though they were concrete things, the 
 organs, faculties of the mind, as we call them. This 
 use of abstract terms, with or without the article, is 
 constantly obscuring the actual distinction there is 
 between things which are substantial realities and 
 real' causes, and mere fictions which have no sub- 
 stantial reality, or real efficiency, or causation any- 
 where. 
 
 There is one other form of expression which, al- 
 though it seems to be congenial to the French and 
 German languages, is foreign to the genius of our 
 own. It consists in the reflex form of the verb, in- 
 stead of the passive. Thus, a writer on Chemistry 
 says, "carbonic acid forms itself in the lungs," by 
 the union of carbon and oxygen there. But this is 
 not quite so bad as the German's account of the 
 cause of his neighbor's death : "He bit himself mil 
 a rattlesnake." 
 
 I have in mind one or two other examples. When 
 Cousin was in Germany and had been listening to 
 some German metaphysics that was too obscure for 
 him, with true French politeness he expressed his 
 difficulty by saying, "this does not express itself 
 with sufficient clearness for my apprehension." The 
 thought was not in the Professor, not at all ; only 
 the thought did not express itself as it ought to 
 have done. Even the matter-of-fact Montesquieu, 
 in speaking of some, social conditions and their in- 
 fluence on human society and life, says that under 
 these circumstances, "a marriage will make itself," 
 {il se fait une marriage). With us, marriages may 
 
KANT AND HEGEL. 205 
 
 sometimes be made unadvisedly and with most un- 
 fortunate results, but they are never considered as 
 "making themselves." We do not hope or claim to 
 get rid of the responsibility for them so easily or in 
 that way. 
 
 Now, when such uses of language prevail, fhere 
 will be a difficulty in understanding, merely from the 
 words he uses, what the author really intends to say 
 — a difficulty, at least, for us who are accustomed to 
 our English usage in such cases. 
 
 And I think that this use of language has exerted 
 its appropriate influence on the minds of the Ger- 
 man Philosphers themselves and German thought in 
 general. It has often led, as I think, to protracted 
 and obscure discussions — very profound, as many 
 persons think them — when, to our English mind and 
 expressed in terms we are accustomed to in the 
 matter-of-fact English language, there is really no 
 question at all ; or only a matter of fact which is 
 obvious at sight, or on the merest statement of the 
 question. 
 
 But in stating the views of such writers as Kant 
 and Hegel there arises a peculiar difficulty. Not 
 only has the German language difficulties peculiarly 
 its own, but these authors appear to have had less 
 regard to the common thought and the common dic- 
 tion of mankind than most others. Besides reading 
 them in the original, I have read at least three or 
 four professed translations and at least thrice as 
 many critics and expositions, no two of whom fully 
 agree as to what is their real meaning, and no one of 
 them that does not find fault with the rest. 
 
2o6 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE, 
 
 Dr. Sterling, of Edinburg, has written two good- 
 sized volumes on "the Secret of Hegel ;" but he 
 does not profess to see clearly what that "secret" 
 really was, or if he did I fear that few of those who 
 have read his volumes from end to end, as I have 
 done, will feel very sure that they understand even 
 what Dr. Sterling understood to be the real mean- 
 ing of his author. 
 
 In view of this state of things I may be excused 
 if I feel some distrust in regard to the interpretation 
 which I have put upon their statements. But in all 
 cases I have endeavored to look at the facts which 
 these authors have had in mind, as the best means 
 — after, of course, a fair knowledge of the language 
 they used — of interpreting what they have said. 
 Thus, I have always given what, in my opinion, they 
 ought to have said, in view of these facts, whether it 
 was their true meaning or not. 
 
 § 2. But it is time to hasten on with our more im- 
 mediate subject, German Metaphysics, and especially 
 as taught by Kant and Hegel. 
 
 Kant, as I have already said, was born in Germany 
 fourteen years after Reid was born in Scotland. He 
 sympathized with Reid in his alarm at the material- 
 istic and atheistic inferences that were constantly 
 being drawn from what was called and generally re- 
 garded as "Locke's system," both in France and in 
 the island of Great Britain, including both Scotland 
 and England. The Irish do not appear to have made 
 much progress in that direetion. But the German 
 mind was too profoundly religious and idealistic to 
 
KANT AND HEGEL. 207 
 
 be carried far in that direction. And Kant was not 
 satisfied with Reid's way of treating the subject. 
 Reid scarcely attempted to give a philosophical 
 account of the basis of our knowledge, or even of 
 his own theory of it. He rejected, as we have seen, 
 the doctrine of ideas as things in the mind, and he 
 held that in perception we see the object, and that in 
 "reflection," or thinking upon it, the mind is occu- 
 pied with the object itself and not with a mere idea- 
 image of it, as Locke had taught. But he insisted 
 on certain fundamental principles of "common sense" 
 as furnishing a basis for our knowledge. Of this kind 
 are, "what we think we see, we believe to exist as a 
 substantial reality out of our minds." "What we re- 
 member, we believe to have truly occurred and as we 
 remember it," and such like. But he did not at- 
 tempt to give any account of these principles any 
 further than to recognize and specify some of them 
 as examples for our acceptance. He regarded them as 
 fundamental, but he did not even attempt to gather 
 them all and enumerate or group them into a system. 
 When Locke's system first came to the knowledge 
 of Leibnitz (from 1646, four years after Locke) under 
 the form that had been adopted by the French, 
 namely, that he derived all ideas from sensation 
 alone, it was stated in the form, "there is nothing in 
 the mind that had not been previously in the senses 
 — nihil in intellectu quod non prius in sensu, and he 
 replied, "yes, prceter intellectum ipsum" — nothing 
 but the mind itself. And it is understood that he 
 meant to imply by this, that the mind itself has a 
 
2o8 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 nature of its own and laws of action which must be 
 taken into account in forming any satisfactory theory 
 of knowledge. 
 
 This fact Kant fully recognized and appreciated, 
 and what he really undertook to do was to work out 
 what Liebnitz had indicated by his remark that the 
 mind must be a something, have a nature and modes 
 of operation of its own, a due consideration of which 
 is essential to any true theory of knowledge. 
 
 Kant remarked, that as in Astronomy all systems 
 had failed until Copernicus suggested that we start 
 with the idea that the sun stands still and the earth 
 moves, so as all efforts at a psychology which started 
 with the assumption that things exist, had failed, in 
 his estimation, it is time now to begin with the mind 
 itself. 
 
 With this view he neglected Locke's doctrine of 
 the origin and source of the elements of our ideas. 
 And yet he virtually accepted the first class of these 
 elements, those derived from sensation. Locke had 
 spoken of these elements as the "matter" of our 
 ideas ; Kant calls them Imhalt, "content," as indi- 
 cating what is contained in them, or that of which 
 they are made up. But he omitted all except those 
 derived from sensation. 
 
 If I were to borrow an illustration from the Physi- 
 cal Sciences I should refer to a different class of phe- 
 nomena. Men have always known that there were 
 clouds in the sky, and that the water we have comes 
 in the form of rain from the clouds. But there were 
 long and varied speculations about the clouds and 
 
KANT AND HEGEL. 209 
 
 the source from which they got their supply of water 
 to make the rain. But now, at last, we have come 
 to know that it all arises from the earth in the form, 
 for the most part, of invisible vapor. There is 
 nothing supernatural or mysterious about it. 
 
 § 3. The first form of activity ascribed to the mind 
 by Kant was that of furnishing the "form, or schema 
 of the idea." Locke had indeed spoken of the mind 
 as forming the ideas; this we can understand. But 
 was it the same as "furnishing the form, or schema"^'' 
 To form the matter or materials, or to make them 
 into an idea, is a form of expression that we can 
 understand, though in doing so we must fancy the 
 idea to be something in the mind. But how the 
 mind ca.n furnish "the form" to anything, it is not 
 so easy to understand or even to imagine or fancy. 
 And yet Kant speaks of the "form" or "schema" as 
 if it were a thing separate, or at least separable, in 
 thought from the matter of the idea and as real and 
 substantial even as the matter itself. 
 
 In Locke's theory the ideas thus formed in the 
 mind are much Hke the images formed in the mirror, 
 and thus resemble the objects themselves, though, 
 perhaps, infinitely smaller, or, perhaps, like the 
 "models" of objects which we may find in a museum, 
 or in the patent office at Washington. 
 
 One of Kant's disciples has said that this operation 
 of the mind in forming its ideas of things is like that 
 of a kaleidoscope. We put into it certain pieces of 
 colored glass, but the picture depends upon the 
 arrangement of the pieces, and that depends upon 
 
 14 
 
2IO THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 the kaleidoscope itself. I take it up and have one 
 combination of the elements and a picture accord- 
 ingly. I lay it down and take it up again, it has 
 been moved about and the picture, though having 
 the same elements or pieces of glass as before, the 
 same matter, is very different in form, or schema, as 
 Kant calls it. 
 
 Now, suppose that instead of taking up the instru- 
 ment the second time myself, some other person had 
 taken it up ; the picture he sees is likely to differ as 
 much from mine as the second picture I saw did 
 from the first. The difference between the two pic- 
 tures that I saw results, indeed, from the different 
 positions and relations of the glass. But in the case 
 of two or more different persons, it may be the 
 result of the difference in their mental constitutions. 
 
 You will rfecall what I said in the last Lecture 
 about the "relativity of knowledge." If we look at 
 the image that is formed on the retina of the eyes of 
 different persons, we see that they are alike in all 
 persons, both in regard to color and to the form of 
 the image. But this gives us no assurance that the 
 state of the nerve cells in the interior organs, or the 
 sensation itself, is the same in different persons. 
 What one calls white may, for aught we know, be 
 the same in these respects as what another calls blue. 
 But we have no means of comparing them that 
 I know of. And in so far Kant's doctrine is, doubt- 
 less, correct. 
 
 But no such uncertainty, or "relativity," extends 
 to the facts (i) that the objects — "the things them- 
 
KANT AND HEGEL. 3 1 1 
 
 selves" — exist, (2) their separate individuality, (3) 
 their form, and (4) their other properties (their rela- 
 tions to actions and reactions upon one another"). 
 These elements of knowledge of things, therefore, 
 are not affected by the element of uncertainty, or 
 "relativity," which Hamilton pointed out. And it 
 is not at all unlikely that Hamilton derived this 
 doctrine of his from Kant. If so, it is not the only 
 one in which he has taken points from Kant, perhaps 
 unconsciously, but certainly without credit. . 
 
 But do different minds form their ideas differently ? 
 If so, why ? What, in fact, are the laws of mind 
 or intelligence under which the mind forms its ideas ? 
 This is the question Kant undertook to answer. It 
 resulted from Locke's theory that ideas are, as the 
 word, taking its Greek origin into account, implies, 
 resemblances, or likeness of things. But in Kant's 
 theory they are not so, or, at least, we have no means 
 of knowing that they are so, or even so much as 
 feeling that they are so. Hence, he preferred to call 
 them anschaiiungen, the "phenomena," that is, the 
 appearances which things assume in our mind or 
 rather which our mind gives them. Hence, his favor- 
 ite and somewhat famous assertion, that we know 
 nothing of "things themselves," ding an sick, but 
 only their "phenomena," or in other words, the ap- 
 pearance or ideas of them which our own minds have 
 made for our use. 
 
 I shall, however, continue to use the word "idea" 
 instead of "phenomena," and we must remember 
 that the only difference between ideas, as held by 
 
212 
 
 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 Locke and the ideas, or phenomena, as the word is 
 used, by Kant, is that in Kant's use they did not, 
 necessarily, while in Locke's they did, represent 
 things by being like them in appearance. 
 
 § 4. The first of these laws and conditions, as Kant 
 discusses them, is that of time and space. 
 
 For all finite minds the act of cognition, and the 
 act of forming the idea as well, must take place at 
 some particular moment [of time] and the object 
 must be, or, at least, it must be thought of as 
 existing, in some particular place. 
 
 But what are time and space? Are they external 
 realities, as Locke has assumed, and as even Cousin, 
 after both Locke and Kant, had assumed them to be ? 
 If we see a thing at all, as finite beings, we see it now 
 and it is here ; or if the act does not take place now, 
 and the thing is not here, the act took place at 
 some time in the past and the thing was somewhere 
 [in space] at the time. Hence space and time are 
 conditions under which both, and alike, the acts of 
 cognition must take place and the idea of the object 
 must be formed in the mind. In this view the expres- 
 sions "in time" and "in space" are not to be consid- 
 ered logically as nouns with a preposition before 
 them, although they are so, but rather they are 
 adverbs, denoting and expressing only modes or con- 
 ditions of the act which we are speaking of, whether 
 cognition or ideation. And it is convenient to form 
 two fictions, one of a something extending through 
 and surrounding all things, infinite in extension, and 
 the other, beginning with the first event in the course 
 
KANT AND HEGEL. 2 1 3 
 
 of the world's events and extending, or, rather, en- 
 during throughout the whole series so as to include 
 all events, the one after the other, to the very last in 
 the series, and call this time. 
 
 I will take occasion to say that I think that this is 
 the best solution that has been yet offered of this 
 problem, and I think that Kant will hereafter be 
 acknowledged to have done the world a great service 
 by suggesting it. 
 
 § 5. Kant thinks that cognition, or conception, 
 whichever it may be (and by cognition I mean the 
 act by which we perceive the object or thing itself, if 
 that ever takes place, and by conception I mean the 
 act by which we form the idea of it, whether an act 
 of cognition has taken place or not) — Kant, I say, 
 holds and teaches that cognition or conception can 
 take place only under four laws of mental action 
 which he calls "' categories y Whatever we see or think 
 of must be seen or thought of as (i) («) an individ- 
 ual object, (b) several, making a part of a class, and 
 (<r) several, making a whole class or genus. (2) As 
 (a) being real, {p) being unreal, or (c) partly real and 
 partly fictitious or fancied. (3) («) As either sub- 
 stance, {b) as cause or effect, (c) as a reciprocity, that 
 is, action and reaction between two objects, as grav- 
 ity between the sun and the earth, etc., or (4) what- 
 ever is thought of must be thought of as (a) existing 
 in fact, (^) possible or impossible, (c) as existing by 
 necessity. 
 
 Now, whatever we may think of the practical value 
 of these Categories, I think that no one will doubt 
 
214 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 their accuracy and completeness. They are, indeed, 
 very different from Aristotle's Categories, whether 
 we regard his four causes for scientific purposes as 
 (i) efficient, (2) material, (3) formal and (4) final, or 
 the ten which he specified in his Logic for rhetorical 
 purposes. But I think we shall see that, as giving a 
 complete list of all the possible categories or laws 
 under which we form our conceptions, they are of 
 great value and give a comprehensive view and are 
 of use for a purpose quite unlike that of either of 
 those given by Aristotle. In fact, they are not so 
 much categories of knowledge, designed to show its 
 nature, limits, and its comprehensiveness, as laws and 
 conditions under which knowledge can he. obtained, 
 or the mind can form its conceptions, idea-images — 
 erscheinungen, vorstellungen, or begriffe, as the case 
 may be, or as one may choose to call them. 
 
 In view of what he has thus done, I think that the 
 name of Kant will ever be regarded as that of one of 
 the greatest names in the progress of knowledge, or, 
 rather, in the progress of our knowledge or concep- 
 tion of what knowledge is, and the ways in which it 
 can be acquired. 
 
 But we must remember that his Categories are but 
 an attempt to set forth what Liebnitz called for — a 
 knowledge of the laws of nature and the mind in its 
 actions. 
 
 Thus far I have spoken chiefly of Kant's theory of 
 the origin and formation of our ideas or conceptions 
 — begriffe, as he preferred to call them in this rela- 
 tion. 
 
KANT AND HEGEL. 2 1 5 
 
 § 6. But in reference to the proof or certainty of 
 propositions, he divides them into three classes: (i) 
 analytic a priori, which assert of the subject only 
 what we know of it by knowing its name and the 
 definition of the word, as, "a triangle has three sides ;" 
 (2) synthetic a priori, including in that class all the 
 propositions which add to our knowledge of an object 
 anything more than was contained in the mere defi- 
 nition of the object that can be proved to be true 
 by reasoning from its nature and without any observ- 
 ation, experience, or measurement, as, "the sum of 
 the angles of a triangle is equal totwo right angles," 
 and (3) synthetic a posteriori, including all those prop- 
 ositions with regard to things and classes of things 
 ,that can be proved only by observation, and as a 
 result of personal observation or testimony, and 
 reasoning by induction or deduction from facts that 
 have been thus obtained. 
 
 The first of these classes, the analytic a priori, he 
 regards as asserting truths that are absolutely cer- 
 tain. The second, the synthetic apriori, though in 
 his estimation highly probable, czxws.o'i be tested by 
 the only infallible means, namely the principle of 
 identity and contradiction. The first class rests on 
 immediate insight, the second one on demonstration 
 from the nature of the things in the strictest sense of 
 the word, as in mathematics. But the third class, 
 the synthetic a posteriori, relate to facts and objects 
 in nature, or what we regard as such, and of which in 
 themselves we have no knowledge. 
 
 Kant, in his "Prolegomena" or introduction, "to 
 
2i6 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 any future system of Metaphysics" (§1, 2, a, b, and c), 
 lays it down as a fundamental fact that the principle 
 of identity and contradiction which Aristotle had 
 laid down as fundamental (Lect. II,) can be ap- 
 plied only to the first of the three classes of prop- 
 ositions named above, the analytic a priori. 
 
 But in fact it is as applicable to the second class, 
 the synthetic a priori, though the application is not 
 so easily made. The application may require, as 
 doubtless it does, some ingenuity and skill in the 
 transformation of sentences. What is to be done 
 with the words of a sentence is very much the same 
 as the transpositions and transformations of the terms 
 used in Algebraic equations. By this means we can 
 get any one of the terms of an equation into one 
 member and on one side of the sign of equation, 
 so that we can see its value in the other terms. 
 Now just this thing can be done with the words in 
 any sentence. Kant probably had never seen or 
 thought of this fact. 
 
 What Kant regards as Logic is rather an account 
 of the formation of our ideas or conceptions, the laws 
 and conditions under which that formation takes 
 place, rather than the process of reasoning, including 
 both induction and deduction, which Aristotle in- 
 cluded under that name and gave to the world as 
 properly to be called by the title. Logic. 
 
 But Kant's great fault and his first mistake was in 
 overlooking two of Locke's fundamental principles ; 
 (i) that the mere act of cognition by sense-percep- 
 tion, or in any other way, necessarily implies the 
 
KANT AND HEGEL. 2 1 7 
 
 reality of the object perceived, and (2) omitting the 
 second great class of the elements of our ideas, 
 namely, those that are derived by consciousness and 
 reflection, the ideas of the acts and states of the mind. 
 
 But we may pause a moment to consider what is 
 the real force and value of his distinction between 
 knowledge or cognition of the "thing itself," and 
 merely a conception of it formed by the mind in the 
 way already described, when we spoke of the mind 
 as furnishing the schema, a form of the idea. 
 
 And in a certain very important sense our ideas of 
 things are all that we know of them. The ideas 
 that we have of things are what we are guided by in 
 all our actions and estimates of things. If my idea 
 of the sun and moon is, that they are but small 
 bodies revolving around the earth, I so speak of 
 them and so act in regard to them. The articles I 
 buy for food or clothing depend upon my ideas of 
 them, or, rather, the act of buying or neglectipg 
 them does. My taking of a drug depends upon my 
 ideas of its nature and effect on my system. My 
 rejection or adoption of Christianity depends on the 
 idea I have of it. 
 
 But if we accept Locke's first principle, as stated 
 above, and I think the time has gone by when it will 
 be or can be seriously questioned, the act of cogni- 
 tion implies the reality of the thing itself. In fact, 
 Kant himself admits it and accepts it far enough for 
 our present purpose. It may be no matter whether 
 we know what whiteness, for example, is, "in itself." 
 But we do know that objects are white, some of 
 them at least, while others are of a different color. 
 
2i8 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 The fault that underlies and falsifies Kant's dis- 
 cussion of this whole subject from beginning to end, 
 is the fact that he makes no distinction, recognizes 
 no difference and apparently never so much as 
 thought that there is any difference between sub- 
 stances and attributes, or thought of attributes as 
 less substantial than the things themselves. We see 
 things, doubtless ; the common language of all men 
 implies this. But then, on Kant's theory, or on 
 Locke's, what we get on seeing them is their prop- 
 erties; these properties become the matter of our 
 ideas ; we work it up into them. But in doing so we 
 make them substances and treat them as such. 
 
 Now, it is manifest that in the very act of cogni- 
 tion we not only see that something is, but also 
 something of what it is. Thus, I cannot see this paper 
 without, or unless, it is here to be perceived. If I per- 
 ceive it by the eye, it must be white or of some other 
 color, and that so far as it goes is knowledge of 
 the thing itself — the paper. If I perceive it by the 
 hand, it must be hard so as to resist pressure, of some 
 temperature colder or warmer than my hand, of pre- 
 cisely the same temperature. But even then I should 
 perceive it by reason of the difference in what is 
 called the specific temperature and the readiness, or 
 the contrary, with which it imparts its heat to other 
 objects. But all of them, hardness, temperature, 
 etc., are the properties of the object. They go to form 
 not only my idea of the object, its appearance 
 {erscheinung) within me, but it is a part of my knowl- 
 edge of the object, "the thing itself ;" that is, I know 
 
KANT AND HEGEL., 319 
 
 by these means that it is white ; and what is white- 
 ness, hardness, etc.? In fact we know nothing of the 
 property except as we know the thing itself, and we 
 know as much of the thing as we know of its 
 properties. 
 
 There is no question and no question can be 
 raised or discussed, or so much as thought of, that 
 does not begin by objectifying the abstractions and 
 making the properties substances for the occasion. 
 It is, in fact, Descartes' old mistake. "I cannot," he 
 says, "see the men and women that are passing 
 under my window, on account of the coats and hats 
 that cover them." Just so, in his estimation, the 
 properties of objects cover the objects themselves — 
 their substance — from our sight. But this makes 
 the properties as substantial as what he calls the sub- 
 stance itself. 
 
 This doctrine of Kant is sometimes taken and dis- 
 cussed as though what he meant was, that we do 
 not know anything of these objects as they would 
 be if they existed each one of them alone and by 
 itself and not in relation to anything else. Perhaps 
 some such thought was in his mind at times, at least. 
 But such a knowledge, if it were possible, could be 
 of no value, for the objects are in relation to us and 
 to one another, and can never be otherwise. If that 
 be taken as Kant's meaning, it is true enough, per- 
 . haps, but it is of no importance. I do not know of 
 anybody that would care to deny it ; there would be 
 either nothing to be known or nobody. to know it. 
 But even so, truths that are a priori in Kant's sense. 
 
220 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 whether analytic or synthetic, must be substantially 
 true, whether there is anybody to know them or not. 
 
 And yet, what we have by observation is knowl- 
 edge, if there is anything that can be called by that 
 name ; and if it is knowledge at all, it must be knowl- 
 edge of "the things themselves," as far as it goes. 
 It cannot be of mere fictions, arbitrary creations of 
 the mind, nor yet of mere subjective states of the 
 mind, its mere thoughts and feelings. As knowl- 
 edge it may be very inadequate ; perfectly adequate 
 knowledge would be omniscience. And it may be 
 very incorrect, for a large part of our experience 
 consists in correcting the errors we have fallen into. 
 But it is knowledge nevertheless, what there is of it. 
 
 We must remember that Locke's account of ideas 
 considered all ideas of things as complex, made up 
 of elements of the two classes which I have often 
 named and referred to. When Kant, therefore, in- 
 sists that we know "not things themselves," or "in 
 themselves," as it is common to write it in English, 
 I doubt if he referred to these elements, as white- 
 ness, hardness, etc., at all. He seems, rather, to 
 have had in mind the complex ideas of the things, 
 just as Cousin did at a later date. 
 
 These elements of ideas the mind of each one of 
 us combines for itself and each in its own way. And 
 this it does, in Locke s view, so as to make of them 
 resemblances of the objects ; while, in Kant's view, 
 the mind acts under laws, or Categories, indeed, but 
 these laws, or Categories, are such that they do not 
 make the ideas, "phenomena," or appearances of the 
 
JCANT AND HEGEL. 221 
 
 things, so far as we know or can know, in any sense 
 or to any extent, like the objects themselves. 
 
 But Kant, like Reid, was not inclined to leave 
 matters here. He fell back, as Ried had done, on 
 the natural instincts and common sense of mankind. 
 As a philosopher, like Hume, he could fimi no 
 ground for believing anything ; but as a man he, like 
 Hume, did believe in what he could see. And, like 
 Reid, he did believe in God and immortality, in duty 
 and in religion. He wrote a treatise on what he 
 called "the Practical Reason," for the purpose of 
 setting forth these facts and doctrines. In these 
 writings he recognized the fact of the feeling of ob- 
 ligation, that gives rise to what has been called his 
 "categorical imperative" — the feeling of absolute 
 obligation to do certain things whenever the idea of 
 them rises distinctly before the mind. 
 
 Kant's doctrine that we know nothing of things 
 themselves, was not his only contribution to the ag- 
 nosticism of our age. He held or, rather, expressly 
 declared, as I have just said, that the principle of 
 identity and contradiction applies only to defini- 
 tions, or, as he called them, analytic propositions a 
 priori. And yet all the reasoning in his whole work 
 — "the Kritik of Pure Reason" — depends on that 
 principle and is an exhibition of its influence and 
 applications to whatever can be asserted as absolute 
 truth. This is one of the two greatest surprises I 
 have ever met with in my reading in metaphysics. 
 The other 'of the two was that in which Aristotle 
 perseveres through several chapters in an effort to 
 
222 THE 0R7ES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 show how and under what circumstances we may 
 have conclusions that are true, from premises that are 
 confessedly false ! 
 
 The importance of this position of Kant's is seen 
 if we call to mind the fact that he regarded all the 
 truths of mathematics beyond the mere first axioms 
 and definitions a^s a priori ; although synthetic, as he 
 called them. They are synthetic, that is, they add to 
 our knowledge of a thing something more than is 
 contained in, or expressed by, its mere mame or defi- 
 nition. Thus, that a triangle has three sides is 
 analytic, but that its three angles are equal, to two 
 right angles is synthetic, and yet it is a priori and as 
 truly tested' by, and dependent upon, the principle 
 of identity and contradiction, though perhaps not 
 easily applied,' as'the>definition itself. . ■ ^ , 
 
 § 7. Another contribution to Agnosticisn) was his 
 assertion that all our knowledge, all we know or can 
 hope -or profess to know, rests on one or more of 
 four pairs of "Antinomies." These pairs are made 
 up of two apparently contradictory propositions each, 
 and the one and the other of each pair may be proved 
 as well as the other. And the proof, as he gives it, 
 and in fact that which he everywhere gives, is, will it 
 be believed? — based on the very principle he repu- 
 diates, the principle of identity and contradiction? 
 The reasoning is good and irrefutable in form. But 
 in each of the four cases-it rests on what is a mani- 
 fest "ambiguous middle." - ■■ 
 
 It seems to me worth while to- state these Anto- 
 monies in form* They are four in. number. . 
 
KANT AND HEGEL. 
 
 223 
 
 1. Thesis. The world had a beginning in time and 
 is limited in space. Antithesis. The world has, in 
 respect to time and space, neither beginning, nor 
 limits. 
 
 2. Thesis. Everything in the world is simple. 
 Antithesis. Nothing in the world is simple, but all 
 things are made up of parts. 
 
 3. Thesis. In the world there are free and sponta- 
 neously acting causes. Antithesis. In the world 
 there is no free agency, but all is bound by the laws 
 of nature. 
 
 4. Thesis. In the series of the world's causes there 
 is somewhere a Being whose existence is of necessity. 
 Antithesis. There is nothing in the world whose 
 existence is necessary, but all is contingent or acci- 
 dental. {Zufollig) 
 
 Kant follows each of these pairs of "contradic- 
 tions" (as he calls them and as they are in form) with a 
 series of "remarks" and also of what he calls "proof." 
 
 From these "remarks" and "proofs" it is evident 
 that in each case there is an ambiguity, what is called 
 an "ambiguous middle." 
 
 In the first pair, in the thesis, 'the world" means, 
 as he says, weltreiche, the course of worldly events 
 and the series of worldly objects. But in the Anti- 
 thesis it means, as he also says, the weltinbegriff, or 
 the conception or idea of the world. Thus, while of 
 the objects in the world there is no one that is infi- 
 nite, and among its events there is no one that is eter- 
 nal in duration, yet the very idea of the world, not 
 the world itself, implies something, as he argues, 
 that is infinite and eternal. 
 
224 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 In the second pair he means by "simple," incapa- 
 ble of division, and he instances the mind and space. 
 But when saying that all objects in the world are 
 made of parts, and so are not simple, he is referring 
 to material objects and the doctrine that they are 
 made up of atoms and are infinitely divisible as all 
 modern science teaches. 
 
 In the third pair, when he denies free agency and 
 spontaneous activity in "the world," he expressly 
 limits his statements to the world, as made up of 
 material objects, and then afifirms that this kind of. 
 action in the mind of man — he is conscious of it in 
 himself — which is also in a sense in the world. 
 
 In the fourth pair, taking the Thesis z.-aA Antithesis 
 together, he proves that while all other objects and 
 events which make up "the world" are not one of 
 them necessary, so that their existence may not be 
 denied, and the world would have been pretty much 
 the same if they had never existed or occurred and 
 no one that is not dependent on some cause or condi- 
 tion, yet there is one Being whose existence is abso- 
 lute and cannot be denied. 
 
 Hence, we have as the elements of Kant's Agnos- 
 ticism : (i) the denial that we know "things them- 
 selves" or anything else but our ideas of them, which 
 he calls their phenomena ; (2) his denial of the appli- 
 cation of the principles of identity and contradiction 
 to anything beyond what he calls propositions, which 
 are analytic a priori, that is, mere definitions, and 
 (3) his doctrine that all that we can call knowledge 
 rests in the last analysis, on one or another or sev- 
 
KANT AND HEGEL. 
 
 225 
 
 eral of these apparent contradictions which he calls 
 Antinomies. 
 
 Kant saw, fully and clearly, the extent of the un- 
 certainty and agnosticism to which his principles 
 would give rise. Thus he says, "we can neither en- 
 dure the thought nor yet protect ourselves against 
 it, that a Being whom we represent to ourselves as 
 the highest among all possible things should say to 
 Himself, 'I am from eternity to eternity, besides Me 
 there is nothing except what exists and is something 
 through My will. But where then am I ? Here 
 everything sinks under us and the greatest and most 
 perfect Thing, as well as the smallest, floats before 
 the speculative reason without support to which it 
 costs (the reason) nothing to allow them, the one, as 
 well as the other, that is, the highest and most per- 
 fect, as well as the smallest, to disappear in nothing- 
 ness without the least effort to prevent it.' " (Kritik, 
 works. Vol. II, p. 477.) 
 
 We have seen that he proposed to base our belief in 
 God (it was not "knowledge" in his sense of the 
 word), and in the principles of morality on our in- 
 stincts and natural tendencies to believe and act as 
 though things were true and real, though, as it thus 
 appears, he could see no way to preserve them, to be 
 true. 
 
 Kant's theory of knowledge thus did not imply 
 the existence of any one substantial thing, neither 
 material objects in the outward world, nor even the 
 mind within, as Locke's had done. It was so formed 
 as to be true if there were nothing in existence but 
 our ideas, as well as if there were. 15 
 
226 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 What then, we may ask, is the necessity for the 
 existence of realities on the theory of Kant? That 
 theory neither implies their existence nor furnishes 
 any means of proving it. 
 
 So Fichte thought, and we have, after Descartes, 
 Malebranche, and after Locke, Berkeley, so after 
 Kant, Fichte, trying to form a theory of knowledge 
 and of ontology as well, which is purely ideal, and 
 does not imply or assume the existence of any sub- 
 stantial thing, whatever, not even the mind of him 
 that thinks. This it will be observed is carrying 
 the process of ignoring or denying the difference 
 between substances and properties to the extreme, 
 and leaving no ground for the difference in the use 
 of abstract and of concrete terms. It implies percep- 
 tion without anything perceived, observation with- 
 out anything that is observed, reflection without 
 either any mind that reflects or any object that is 
 reflected upon. 
 
 Doubtless these men used language that implies 
 the doctrine which they professed to deny, or rather 
 to ignore. Nay, in some cases they made positive 
 declarations that implied the truth of what they deny 
 or say cannot be known. They were men and their 
 natural instincts would sometimes triumph over their 
 philosophy, so that, after the example of Hume, they 
 would believe and act upon, as men, what, as philos- 
 ophers," they could see no good reason for affirming 
 or professing to believe. 
 
 In the philosophy of these men there is nothing 
 substantial, at least, nothing that is not of the mind. 
 
KANT AND HEGEL. 
 
 227 
 
 The objects that we see, or think we see, are only 
 states of our own minds projected, by a sort of magic- 
 lantern process, into what we call space, just like the 
 "shadows" which Plato supposed his men to be see- 
 ing in the cavern before them, which were, in his 
 opinion, but "the shadows of ideas." Or, to use one 
 other illustration, what we think we see is like the 
 images of our dreams, or the hallucinations of false 
 perception. 
 
 Even God, in 'this philosophy, is no substantial 
 Reality, no personal Being, but, rather, as one writer 
 has it, "not an individual Being, but merely a mani- 
 festation of Supreme laws, the logical order of events, 
 the ordo ordinans of the universe." Hence, in his 
 view, the question whether a philosophical system is 
 atheistic or agnostic, is of no account, or rather it is 
 preposterous ; for there is no atheism, all is theism, all 
 is God, there is no agnosticism, for all is knowledge ; 
 knowledge is but thought and thought is knowl- 
 edge, so that what a man thinks, that he knows. 
 
 § 6. Now that which Kant had shown to be neces- 
 sary and conditional to our ideas and conception of 
 things, Hegel undertook to show to be the essen- 
 tial conditions of the existence of the things them, 
 selves. 
 
 The laws which he developed are, in relation to the 
 ontology of things, very much the same as the laws 
 which are developed in arithmetic and geometry — 
 including, of course, the higher branches of mathe- 
 matics. Analytics and the Calculus, are to their rela- 
 tions to number and form. If things will exist, then 
 
228 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 two and two of them must make four of them, and 
 so on, of all the relations of number, whatever they 
 may be and wherever and whenever they may exist. 
 So, too, if they will exist as extended objects, any 
 straight line in them must be the shortest between 
 two points, any triangular surface must be just half 
 that of a rectangle of the same base and height. 
 
 So in ontology, there are certain inevitable laws 
 which may be developed_« /r2or« , and rest ultimately 
 on the principle of identity and contradiction, and 
 may be reduced to a form of statement in which the 
 applicability of that law is manifest on inspection. 
 It is here, as in Algebra, chiefly a matter of dexterity 
 and skill in manipulating the formulae. But the 
 process has definite rules, rules as definite as those 
 for the transposition of terms from one member of 
 an equation to the other, or of the substitution of 
 one form of a term for another which is its equiva- 
 lent. 
 
 Hegel's language is very peculiar. It is extremely 
 difficult and obscure, paradoxical and apparently 
 self-contradicting in the extreme. But I venture to 
 give the following as the substance of his theory : 
 
 § 10. I think we shall get at our starting-point 
 best by supposing the things around existing as they 
 now appear to do, each one in a different place or 
 point of space, and also with a difference in some of 
 its properties or modes from any and every other 
 thing. Now, suppose each of these objects to lose 
 all of its properties and sink at once into an undis- 
 tinguishable mass without any properties whatever. 
 
KANT AND HEGEL. 
 
 229 
 
 This would be Hegel's absolute Being, Seyn. It is 
 also his "nothing," das Nichts ; for, as it would have 
 no properties and could not even be in any place, 
 nothing could be said of it, for it has no properties 
 and is nowhere. We could not even say, "it is here," 
 or, "it exists now." We could not even say that it 
 f;jrists. It merely is — "absolute quality/^JJ being." 
 
 This absolute being cannot be said to ^;irist — 
 daseyn ; for existence implies being Jo/«^where and 
 out of {ex) something which, therefore, implies the 
 reality of that out of which {ex) it exists, and which, 
 therefore, is some other thing; 
 
 This Being — absolute Being — is eternal, for to be 
 at any particular time, now, past, or hereafter, would 
 be to exist and then it must be somewhere and have 
 properties, or be something. 
 
 It is infinite, for, having no properties, it can have 
 no limits, for limits imply extension in space, and so 
 difference from other objects. 
 
 It is absolute, for to be in relations to any other 
 thing, whether of dependence, contrariety, or any 
 other, that other thing must exist, be somewhere 
 and something also. 
 
 And, moreover, in as much as, according to the 
 hypothesis, it has no properties, nothing can be said 
 of it, for in saying anything of it we should predi- 
 cate some property of it. It is, therefore, virtually 
 and in a most important sense, nothing as well as 
 absolute being. And Hegel's fundamental paradox 
 and apparent contradiction is, "Being and non-Being 
 are the same thing." This, he calls, therefore, not 
 
230 
 
 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 only absolute being or being, absolutely, but also 
 "the absolute non-being," ox das Nichts, "the nothing," 
 literally, which is eternal, infinite and absolute. 
 
 But now suppose some part of this absolute being 
 emerges from the property /?jj mass. It must emerge 
 some where and at some time and must, moreover, take 
 to itself some property. This constitutes its exist- 
 ence and makes it to be some one thing. But the 
 remainder of the absolute being is no longer absolute, 
 it is related to what has thus sprung into existence 
 and must exist also somewhere and with some prop- 
 erty that is unlike that which had already sprung 
 into existence. Here, then, are two some things, un- 
 like in their properties {differentia), and co-ordinated 
 in their existence. If one is inert and senseless 
 matter the other must be intelligent and spontane- 
 ously active. 
 
 This process once begun may be conceived as 
 going on forever. The matter may be divided into 
 fluid and solid ; it may be divided, also, into the 
 chemical elements, each one with a differentia of its 
 own. It may be divided so that a part of it becomes 
 living tissues, and these living beings may be divided 
 and subdivided until we have all the species of plants 
 and animals that now exist or may exist hereafter. 
 And even the species are divided into individuals, 
 which, being no longer logically divisible, is the end 
 in that direction. 
 
 This, however, is not the only line of sub-division. 
 We may divide objects in reference to their acci- 
 dental properties, making a mere transient classifica- 
 
KANT AND HEGEL. 23 1 
 
 tion, as when we speak of the good and the bad, of 
 things useful or useless, of men who are soldiers or 
 farmers, or merchants, or mechanics, or of the sick, as 
 a class who are distinct from the well ones, and so 
 on. 
 
 § 1 1. We are now in a position to contrast the two 
 great world-schema, that of Aristotle with its oppo- 
 site, that of Hegel. The one begins where the 
 other ends. And they go in opposite directions. 
 
 Aristotle begins with individual objects. Each 
 one belongs to a class, this is a table, that is a chair, 
 etc. Tables and chairs, then, are species ; but they, 
 as species, imply and belong to a class above them 
 which we call a proximate genus, ^s, furniture. But 
 articles of furniture are but a class, and articles of 
 clothing are another ; these two, as well as a good 
 many others, belong to some corresponding class or 
 genus, as material things. But there are z/wmaterial 
 things, as the minds of men, which, together with 
 material things, make up a still higher and more 
 comprehending class, as, for example, "things,'" the 
 highest and most comprehensive class we call, the 
 summum genus. 
 
 And this view of the universe of things gives rise 
 to the dictum so often quoted, "whatever may be 
 afifirmed or denied of a class, may be affirmed or 
 denied accordingly of any individual in that clais," 
 
 This is the question of subordination and compre- 
 hension and includes all things that we think of or 
 suppose to exist in our summum genus or all-com- 
 prehending class. 
 
232 
 
 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 The conception, or idea, of. any individual object 
 has for its comprehension, as we call it, only one 
 object, but all of the three classes of properties, 
 essentia, differentia, and inseparable accidents, as 
 making up the matter, or as we sometimes call it, the 
 intention of the conception of the individual. 
 
 The summum genus, on the other hand, and at 
 the other extreme, includes for its comprehension all 
 objects in the universe, while it has for its intention 
 or matter only one property which is common to 
 them all. 
 
 Hegel, on the other hand, as we have seen, begins 
 at the other extreme, at "absolute being," which, 
 in his schema, has no properties and is the same 
 as nothing, or the all, and proceeds .by division and 
 sub-division, until he reaches individual objects with 
 which Aristotle begins. 
 
 But a consideration of Hegel's view gives rise to 
 another profound principle of reasoning and means 
 of knowledge, which is, in fact, the compeer of 
 Aristotle's, and may be called the law of exclusion 
 and co-ordination, as we call Aristotle's the law of 
 subordination and comprehension. 
 
 § 12. This law may be considered from either of 
 two points of view. Thus, if we start from Aristo- 
 tle's point of view, we see that co-ordination is essen- 
 tial to cognition. The bhnd have no idea of light or 
 of color. But they have no idea of darkness either. 
 The deaf have no idea of silence. Enable the blind 
 to see and they will know or see what darkness is as 
 well as that of light. So with the deaf ; enable them 
 
KANT AND HEGEL. 233 
 
 to hear and with their idea of sound they get that of 
 silence as well. 
 
 Now, this law is universal. We get, and can get, 
 no idea or thought of anything whatever, except as 
 we get it by co-ordination with its opposite. 
 
 But Hegel takes the other starting-point and 
 shows that it is a law of being and the coming into 
 existence, as well as one of cognition, from which it 
 results that no one thing can exist without its co- 
 ordinate or opposite. No part of the absolute being 
 can take the property of whiteness, without leaving 
 the rest, or some part of it that exists but is (nega- 
 tively) not white. And if it is at all and is not 
 white, it must be (affirmatively) of some other color, 
 for color only is co-ordinate to color ; that is, one 
 color and that alone, is co-ordinate to another color. 
 
 Thus, if a part of the non-being, or absolute, be- 
 comes inert, we call it matter. But the other part, 
 or another part, must be spontaneous in its activity, 
 and we call it mind. Hence, everthing that ^;irists 
 is co-ordinated by something else which also exists 
 and forms either another species or another indi- 
 vidual. 
 
 This is, in reality, the ultimate fact or reality on 
 which what are called Disjunctive Syllogisms are 
 based. Every individual object is the co-ordinate of 
 some other. The same is true of every species and 
 proximate genus, until we reach the two which 
 together make up the summum genus, whatever that 
 may be. Thus, in the case of numbers, there are 
 but two kinds or species, odd and even. Hence, we 
 
234 
 
 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 say of any number, as x, "x is either odd or even." 
 Now, we may have the means of knowing or prov- 
 ing that a number is not even, without knowing how 
 much it is. Hence, we may say, "as it is not even, 
 therefore it must be odd." 
 
 In this case we have but two co-ordinate species 
 and, therefore, we need to mention only two. But 
 there may be three or, in fact, any number of co-or- 
 dinate species in a genus. This is the case in regard 
 to the states of' matter. It may be either solid, 
 fluid or gaseous. If, then, by way of conclusion, we 
 show or ascertain that a piece of matter is not in 
 either one of the two, the inference that it is in the 
 other is inevitable. 
 
 This, so far as reasoning is concerned. But Hegel 
 insists and, as I think, proves that it must be so in 
 regard to reality and existence as well. We must be 
 sure that they are co-ordinates. 
 
 § 12. And this raises a question that Hegel has 
 not considered, nor has it received from any one, so 
 far as I know, the attention which its importance 
 deserves. 
 
 In the course of these Lectures I have had occa- 
 sion several times to refer to the elements of ideas, 
 or the elementary ideas. They are such as no one 
 can get, except by actual cognition of some object. 
 Such, as I think, are the ideas of white, yellow, red, 
 blue, and black, among the colors of objects. But I 
 think, as I have said, that a person who had seen 
 objects that are the one black and the other white, 
 could imagine one that is gray. So with yellow and 
 
KANT AND HEGEL. 235 
 
 red in relation to orange-colored objects, blue and 
 red with regard to those that are purple. 
 
 § 13. I will suggest here three limitations or cau- 
 tions that must be observed in the application of 
 this law — Hegel's law of co-ordination and exclu- 
 sion, or exclusion and co-ordination, whichever we 
 may choose to call it : 
 
 (i) The first is, that we must not accept a word 
 which is a mere etymological compound, as necessa- 
 rily implying the reality of anything. 
 
 For example, this paper is finite, this table is finite, 
 and so are all the objects I can see ; they are limited 
 and finite in the extent of their being, in their real- 
 ity. But I can very easily put the negative, "in," 
 before the adjective, "finite," and say of anything, 
 it is infinite. This would furnish no proof that I 
 had seen anything that is infinite, nor would it of it- 
 self be proof that there is anything of which this 
 adjective can be predicated. The only proof, if, 
 indeed, there can be any such thing as proving a 
 negative, is by the process of demonstration. 
 
 The word, "substance," furnishes another good 
 illustration of this point. We see objects before us ; 
 they are substantial. But what do we mean by the 
 word, "substance ?" We begin to think of an object, 
 how it looks, contrast and compare it with others. 
 We thus find ourselves thinking of what we call its 
 properties. But then, we also think of something 
 behind or under these properties. We call it the 
 substance. But the word is purely an etymological 
 compound. It denotes the object by no objective 
 
236 
 
 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 property, but only by what it does ; it stands, or is 
 supposed to do so, under the properties, for that is the 
 etymology of the word. 
 
 (2) The second caution that I would give arises 
 out of the fact first stated, namely, that we can often 
 imagine objects that are characterized by what I 
 have thus indicated as compound properties. Thus 
 if we can think of an object as white, there must 
 have been, and have been seen by us, an object of 
 that color. But suppose we call it gray. I do not' 
 think that the mere use of the term would prove 
 that any object of that color had been seen, or had 
 ever existed, but only imagined. 
 
 (3) The third caution that I would suggest is that 
 any adjective which denotes only the absence of 
 certain properties that distinguish and co-ordinate 
 two or more objects, or species, does not necessarily 
 prove the existence of either an object or a class of 
 objects differentiated by that term. Thus we speak 
 of animals as male and female. But there is another 
 class of objects, inanimate objects, that have not the 
 characteristics of either of these two, and we call them 
 neuter, and the words that denote them we regard 
 as of the neuter gender. But this would not of it- 
 self prove that there were such objects. 
 
 Or, to take the case already alluded to. We know 
 that matter exists in the three forms, fluid, gaseous 
 and solid. We suppose a form called ether, that is, 
 neither the one nor the other of the three, but is 
 without gravity, without impenetrability and yet 
 with most intense elasticity. We call this supposed 
 
KANT AND HEGEL. 237 
 
 substance aether, the Greek word, which meant in that 
 language the air, and more especially the upper air, 
 as being the purest and the lightest. But the exist- 
 ence of ether is doubted by scientific men. That, 
 however, is a question we need not now consider. 
 My point is that the mere word does not prove 
 the existence of the thing, because we ascribe to it 
 no element of an idea that we may not have obtained 
 by the cognition of something else. 
 
 Now this law is an ontological law of existence 
 which Hegel was the first to develop and state, 
 I cannot say, explain, or state clearly ; for his state- 
 ments are far from clear to most readers, and may be 
 called, as I have said, the law of co-ordination and 
 exclusion. And I regard it as the peer of Aristotle's 
 famous dictum, de omni et nulla, which we have 
 called the law of subordination and comprehension. 
 
 It is a matter of fact that whatever we cognize, we 
 cognize as an individual object, as Aristotle supposed. 
 It may be mechanically or numerically divisible, but 
 logically it is indivisible, that is, it is an individual. 
 This pen, for example, may be divided into any num- 
 ber of parts mechanically, but it cannot be divided 
 logically so as to be two or more pens. So witft any 
 object we perceive or observe. 
 
 This is, in fact, the fundamental law or fact which 
 Kant has stated in the illustrations and proofs of his 
 second pair of Antitheses. Mechanically and numer- 
 ically all objects are considered as "complex," made 
 up of atoms, and, therefore, divisible, potentially, to 
 infinity. But then, every object is considered as one. 
 
238 
 
 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 an individual in a class, is indivisible in this respect 
 and not made up of other individuals. We cannot 
 divide the individual without destroying the individ- 
 uality. We may, by division, make it into parts and 
 into parts only, there can be no logical division. 
 
 But we can never observe one object unless there 
 are two that are co-ordinated. If we see an object 
 that is white it is because there is some, other object 
 in the field of vision and is seen at the same time 
 and in the same act of vision that is not white, and 
 so is of some other color. If there were but one 
 object in the field of vision, and that object were of 
 one color and the same shade of the color, so that 
 we could see no difference in color or shade, we could 
 not see it at all, any more than we can see in the 
 dark. And so of all the sensible properties of objects. 
 
 And this law holds with regard to conception as 
 well as to the perception or cognition of objects. 
 We see this in the case of the blind and the deaf, 
 as already said. The blind have no idea of color, 
 as all know. But they have no idea of darkness 
 either. So the dumb not only have no idea of sound, 
 they have no idea of silence either ; although 
 they ftre immersed in it all the while. In a sense 
 they have experience of it but in another sense they 
 have not. They have no idea of it. 
 
 Not, so far as we know, from any experience and 
 observation of facts of all the classes of sensations 
 that we get by them, the absence or inactivity of the 
 organ precludes the possibility of that subdivision 
 of the class of elementary ideas, which, according to 
 Locke's theory, we get by that organ. 
 
KANT AND HEGEL. 239 
 
 I think, therefore, that this fact, and the class of 
 facts of which it is an example, proves 
 
 (i) Locke's theory that all of our elements of 
 ideas, so far as sensible objects are concerned, are 
 derived by sensations produced in us by the objects 
 themselves. 
 
 (2) I think that they prove Kant's doctrine, that 
 we cannot imagine, conceive, or think of objects, 
 except as existing in time and space, and as being 
 in one or the other of his specified categories. Nor 
 can we think of anything, substance, property or fic- 
 tion, except as we think of it as in one of the two 
 categories ; (i) substance, or (2) property. And if 
 as substance, then as cause, and if as property, then 
 as inhering in and belonging to some substantial 
 object. 
 
 (3) And I think that they prove Hegel's doctrine 
 that things exist and can exist only in pairs, at least, 
 and in co-ordination to each other, as well as in sub- 
 ordination to a higher class, speci< s, genus, or some 
 proximate genus, which is according to Aristotle's 
 view. 
 
 If, now, we turn our attention to Lock's second 
 class, the elements of ideas which we get from con- 
 sciousness and reflection, I think we shall find a con- 
 firmation of these views which is quite as satisfac- 
 tory, though not so obvious and easily understood 
 at first thought. 
 
 We can readily see and understand that one who 
 had not perceived anything could no more under- 
 stand what the act of perception is, or what we 
 
240 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE; 
 
 mean by the word perception, than a blind man can 
 understand what color is, never having perceived 
 anything that is of any color. In the same way one 
 who had never felt any pain, or seen and admired 
 anything that we call beautiful, could not under- 
 stand what the words pain, admiration, and beauty 
 mean ; he would have no idea of the acts and states 
 of the mind which they are used to denote. 
 
 We may get a good illustration of this point from 
 a subject that has greatly occupied the thoughts and 
 discussions of men for many centuries — I mean the 
 freedom of volition. 
 
 We embarrass the subject by speaking of "the 
 will" and then discussing the subject as if "the will" 
 were a substantial reality that God has made, instead 
 of being only a fiction of our own creation. The 
 only reality in the case is "the mind,"or if we choose 
 to so regard it, "the will" or an "alternate concep- 
 tion" of the mind, which is the same as the mind 
 willing, or acting as will. 
 
 The question then is, is the mind free in its 
 action ? Is it, in other words, spontaneous rather 
 than inert like the objects of inanimate matter 
 around us ? 
 
 I think that spontaneity is simple and elementary 
 in its nature. It clearly does not occur in inanimate 
 matter. Does it occur in our own minds ? If not, 
 whence the idea? Whence the question.? Whence 
 the name ? Without experience of it we could no 
 more have the word or the idea, than the blind could 
 have the idea of color, or the deaf the idea of sound. 
 
KANT AND HEGEL. 24I 
 
 Now, make this general, and suppose one to have 
 none of the mental acts or states denoted by the 
 words, perception, reasoning, memory, etc. ; he would 
 have no consciousness, in the sense of the term in 
 which it has been used. And, perhaps, we had bet- 
 ter avail ourselves of the distinction that is insisted 
 upon by Kant and call it, in this respect, conscious- 
 ness. In this case we have complete idiocy. 
 
 But what makes the idiocy? It is the very 
 absence of these forms of mental activity, so that 
 they cannot be seen or perceived in the conscious- 
 ness, and cannot be seen or observed in this case, 
 simply on account of the mere fact that they are 
 not there to be seen or observed. Now, here, as in 
 sense-perception, the result is the same in each of 
 the two cases, namely, (i) where there is reality to be 
 seen, and (2) no faculty, organ, means, or instru- 
 ment with which to perceive it. In both cases and 
 alike there is no elementary idea. 
 
 If, now, we adopt Locke's doctrine with regard to 
 the elements of our ideas in the mind, this law of 
 co-ordination comes to be of fundamental impor- 
 tance in regard to our ontology and knowledge of 
 things. For it follows 
 
 (i) That there can be no element of an idea, 
 whether of matter or of mind, without some object 
 that has been actually cognized which has the prop- 
 erty or mode denoted by the word that expresses 
 that idea and, therefore, of course, the object, whether 
 matter or mind, must be a substantial reality. 
 
 (2) There can be no word in any language denot- 
 
 16 
 
242 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 ing an object, or any quality or mode of an object, 
 without its opposite or co-ordinate, which also implies 
 a reality that has been cognized, as silence and sound, 
 light and darkness, etc. Or, to take concrete terms, 
 we have mind and matter, God and the world (of 
 material things). 
 
 If, however, Locke's theory be not the correct one 
 and if the mind can originate, not idea-images of 
 things, but the very elements of our ideas, then 
 there is and can be no certainty of anything unless 
 it be, by possibility, the certainty of our own exist- 
 ence, cogito ergo sum. And I think this certainty 
 implies the substantial existence of the ego, the 
 mind> not as Hume and J. S. Mill hold, a mere bun- 
 dle or conglomeration of sensations. 
 
 But if this theory be true, each of the objects 
 around us which we truly perceive, must be as real 
 as ourselves ; light must be as real, and real in the 
 same sense, as darkness ; mind as real as matter, and 
 God as real as the material universe. 
 
 We have, then, the three points just demonstrated, 
 I think, so far as observed facts can ever be said to 
 demonstrate any general truth, namely, (i) that all 
 the elements of ideas are derived from observation, 
 (2) the very thought of objects implies thought of 
 them in some particular place or form, and (3) their 
 very existence implies in each case the reality of 
 something else. 
 
 § 14. But a due consideration of Hegel's theory 
 of knowledge leads us one step farther, though im- 
 plying in the most peremptory manner the existence 
 
KANT AND HEGEL. 243 
 
 and reality of external things. He has been thought 
 to teach a philosophy that does not inculcate as a 
 positive doctrine their substantial existence. He 
 does, indeed, say that ''the concept" der begriff, not 
 only contains all things but is, in fact, all things. I 
 think, however, that what Hegel really means is, that 
 this universal conception comprehends all that we 
 know or even think of, only in a logical way. It is 
 virtually, as it seems to me, only the sumntum genus 
 of the scholastics. 
 
 But then, undoubtedly, Hegel was too much of a 
 German to see and appreciate any difference between 
 an abstraction and a reality ; too much of a German 
 to have a doubt that ideas, notions, or concepts are 
 realities in tlie mind ; as real in the mind as the table, 
 chairs, and other articles of furniture, are in the room 
 around us. 
 
 And, doubtless, too, he appreciated Kant's point, 
 which for all practical purposes was well taken, that 
 what we have to do with in our logic and reasoning 
 about things, as well as in the practical use we make 
 of them, is not so much the things themselves as they 
 are in reality and in nature, as our ideas of the things, 
 the appearance which they have to our mental fac- 
 ulties. In fact we are guided by our ideas of things 
 rather than by the things themselves. And in con- 
 sequence he has been regarded as denying, or rather 
 ignoring, the existence and reality of external things, 
 and even the existence of a Personal God. 
 
 This has led, as I think, to a misconception of his 
 real work and his great merit as a philosopher. It 
 
244 
 
 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 has led also to a misappreciation of his system, as I 
 cannot but regard it, in the neglect of facts and the 
 inductive methods of investigation, both in history 
 and in the natural sciences. 
 
 In fact Hegel's philosophy, that is, what he taught 
 and is regarded as his philosophy, has had the usual 
 fate of all great founders of systems and original 
 thinkers, they seldom have disciples who fully appre- 
 ciate them and take their system as a whole. We 
 have seen how Plato's disciples developed Neo-Pla- 
 tonic pantheism, how Aristotle's disciples developed 
 scholasticism, how Locke's disciples, or those that 
 claimed to be such, developed atheism, or at least 
 agnosticism, from what they understand to be his 
 system. 
 
 So with Hegel, most of those who are known as 
 Hegelians, and who claim to be his disciples, over- 
 look that part of his system which leads to a very 
 positive ontology, demonstrating the difference be- 
 tween substance and properties ; demonstrating, also, 
 the existence of material objects out of the mind as 
 well as the mind itself and its thoughts ; and the ex- 
 istence of a Personal God, as truly and as certainly 
 as that of any other one object that we can cognize 
 or speak of. They start from his use of abstract 
 terms and from his declaration that "the concept," 
 der Begriff, is, or as we should rather say, includes all 
 things, and proceed to develop a form of idealism 
 which is unintelligible as Neo-Platonism, and which 
 is sometimes confounded with pantheism, but which 
 reduces all things to mere thought and, for each man, 
 his own thought. 
 
KANT AND HEGEL. 345 
 
 The following propositions are not only expressly 
 stated but they are as clearly deducible from such a 
 conception of his system as the atheism of Hume 
 and as the agnosticism of Spencer is from Locke's 
 system. 
 
 (i) Thought does not necessarily imply a thinking 
 mind, if, indeed, there is any difference between mind 
 and thought ; and thought and the things thought of 
 are not one and the same. The perceiving mind and 
 the things perceived are substantially one and the 
 same. 
 
 (2) We cannot properly say that God exercises 
 any moral government over the world, or punishes 
 men for sin. All there is in the case is the fact that 
 men's thoughts punish them for wrong doing when- 
 ever they are conscious of having done anything that 
 is wrong. 
 
 (3) We cannot affirm that there is any personal 
 immortality for man, that is, any continuance of the 
 personal living being after the death of the body. 
 All we can say of any man is what we say of Plato, 
 "he lives in his philosophy, or of Howard, "he lives 
 in his works," or of Washington, "he lives in the 
 Republic he founded." 
 
 (4) Governments have no legitimate authority to 
 declare certain acts to be crimes and to punish those 
 that commit them for so doing. The case presented 
 was this : "Suppose a man met you on the sidewalk, 
 knocks you down and takes your purse from your 
 pocket, what right have you, or has the State, to 
 punish him for this larceny from the person, more 
 
246 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 or other than he would have to bring you into court 
 and punish you for refusing to give him your purse 
 in case he had merely asked you for it and you had 
 refused to give it to him ? " And the answer was 
 "none whatever," no right but only the power to do 
 so. 
 
 Now the great fundamental fault of this form of 
 IdeaHsm, is the overlooking and the neglecting the 
 difference between things and their modes or prop- 
 erties, that is, between concrete and abstract terms 
 in regard to the use we may make of them. By 
 Hegel's law, there can be no reality, that is, no 
 real substance or thing, without properties, and no 
 property without a substance. But the one cannot 
 be the other. Substance cannot be property; if it is, 
 it. is not substance. And so, if a property is sub- 
 stance it is not property. This paper is white, but 
 it is not white^^j.?. A man is wise, but he is not 
 wisdom ; nor is wisdom a man. A man is a person, 
 but he is not a personah'tj, nor is a personality a 
 man, or anything else but a property or character of 
 a person. 
 
 The moment we look through the words to the 
 things which they denote, we see this truth, and see, 
 moreover, its absolute truth and necessity as a fund- 
 amental law of thought, and of cognition, and a 
 fundamental law of reality and existence as well. 
 
 We cannot think of a substance without some 
 congeries of properties, nor of a property without 
 some substance 0/ which it is the property. This 
 paper is white. I can think of it as of some other 
 
KANT AND HEGEL. 247 
 
 color, or, possibly, as of no other color at all, that is, 
 as invisible, like the air we breathe. But I cannot 
 think of it without extension and form, nor can I 
 think of whiteness as existing without a substance, 
 that is, without something that is white. 
 
 Cousin puts this point with his usual clearness and 
 force. "Touch gives you the idea of resistance, of 
 solidity. The other senses give you the ideas of 
 other qualities. But what !• Is there nothing but 
 these qualities ? While the sense gives you (the ideas 
 of solidity) color, figures, softness, hardness, etc., do 
 you not believe that they are the qualities of some- 
 thing really existing and which, because it really 
 exists, is solid, hard, soft, of a certain color, figure, etc.? 
 You would not have had the idea of this something 
 if the senses had not first given you the idea of these 
 qualities.. But you cannot suppose that they exist 
 in empty space. You cannot have the idea of these 
 qualities without the idea of this something existent. 
 This is the universal belief, which implies the distinc- 
 tion and the difference between the qualities and the 
 subject of these qualities, between properties and 
 substance." (Henry's Ed., p. 163.) 
 
 But this is just what the professed disciples of 
 Hegel have done ; they overlook the difference, or, 
 rather, they deny that there is any, and make the 
 ideas of things, or, rather, the properties of things, 
 to be the real things themselves. And this is Hegel's 
 idealism, and all through his works, as well as those 
 of his disciples, whether professed or unconscious, 
 we have a neglect of facts and the constant use of 
 
248 
 
 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 abstract terms where concrete terms are demanded 
 by the logic of language and are indispensable to 
 the understanding of what is said. 
 
 But it is easier to use abstract than concrete terms 
 and, in the estimation of some persons, it is more 
 philosophical. Concrete terms denote facts. But it 
 is easier to neglect facts and deal with fictions; for 
 the fictions are the creations of our own mind, and 
 we can make of them and do with them what we 
 will, and if nobody understands, it may result in our 
 being credited with a depth or profundity which no 
 common minds can understand, or, at least, common 
 minds which have been trained in the English use 
 of language and in the common-sense views of 
 English-speaking people cannot understand. 
 
 As a specimen of his clearness I cite the follow- 
 ing from what is regarded and declared by Sir Wil- 
 liam Hamilton even, to be a very "liicid" and "per- 
 spicacious" exposition of Hegel's philosophy (I cite 
 from Chalebayus' Historic Summary) : "Each Ego 
 attains for itself as an individual ;" this "the mag- 
 netism of its fiction, and self-subsistence, and that, 
 indeed, from other Egoes, and acknowledges the lat- 
 ter in turn to be its equalsj or to be the counterpart 
 or equivalent of self. This, then, is the universal 
 self -consciousness, the positive knowledge of one's 
 self in some other self ; each of these selfs being a 
 free individuality having absolute self-subsistence. 
 All are consequently in and for themselves free in 
 regard to action and self-consciousness: We have, 
 in short, an atomistic plurality of Egoes, but all 
 
KANT AND HEGEL. 
 
 Ug 
 
 being alike and not qualitatively distinct in their 
 natures from each other. It follows that they will 
 now feel themselves to be an universal spiritual sub- 
 stance. With this sphere of consciousness is attained 
 the consciousness of the Absolute, or the reason, and 
 the reason is the above-mentioned substance or sub- 
 stratum of all subj-ects, the rational process of 
 thought, which is itself the substance, i. e. the sub- 
 ject which contemplates and determines itself and is 
 the truth of all knowledge in which being and think- 
 ing are no longer apart from each other : for being 
 is no longer an object for the thinking process," 
 but the thinking process is itself the object of the 
 thinking process and, on that account, is called being. 
 We thus arrive at the Aristotelian voya-K rfjcr vor]ae(o<; 
 the self-thinking principle of thought, or the self- 
 knowing truth, Absolute idealism, which in itself, is 
 Absolute Realism." -I have given the italics as in 
 the outline. 
 
 If, now, one wishes to know what I think this 
 means, I can tell him in very few words : "We get 
 our knowledge of ourselves as free agents, by com- 
 parison and contrast with other things. But by this 
 process we get our general ideas of human nature 
 also, and by ideaUzing, leaving out (though Hegel 
 does not say so) sins and imperfections we get our 
 idea of the Divine Character and attributes, as well 
 a Being who is both Real and Ideal. 
 
 But if Hegel's fundamental doctrine of co-ordina- 
 tion is correct, there can be no substance without 
 properties, and the reverse, no properties without a 
 
250 
 
 THEORIES OF KNOWLEGDE. 
 
 substance ; no matter or material object without 
 mind, and no finite thing, whether matter or mind, 
 without an Infinite something Who is not mere 
 thought, or the thinking process, but a Person and 
 adequate to all that mere inert matter or animals 
 cannot produce, as well as to purpose and final 
 cause in the Universe which man cannot be regard- 
 ed as having produced. 
 
 It is but fair to say, however, that while princi- 
 ples laid down and established, as I think, beyond 
 question or refutation, lead to these results, most of 
 Hegel's own writings, and especially his Logic and 
 his Philosophy of History, have been in the other 
 direction, the direction of idealism and the princi- 
 ples stated a few pages back. Like Locke, his fol- 
 lowers followed, for the most part, only one line of 
 the developments for which he laid the foundation, 
 and that was the worst line. 
 
 And thus extremes meet. The Agnostics, while 
 admitting that there is a mind in man and that there 
 must be a God in the Universe, relegate both of 
 these realities to the realms of the "Unknowable" 
 and declare that "the knowledge within our reach is 
 the only knowledge that can be of service to us." 
 (Herbert Spencer's First Principles, § 25.) They 
 deny the Personality of God, the reality of miracles 
 and, of course, therefore, the possibility of Revela- 
 tion, or of any Religion that can be a means of sal- 
 vation or a matter of personal obligation. All is 
 matter and material objects that we can see and 
 handle and that, so far as we are concerned, must 
 perish with the using. 
 
KANT AND HEGEL. 35 I 
 
 Spencer did, indeed, postulate "matter" as one of 
 the requisitions to his solution of the Universe, and 
 most of the later Agnostics ask for both matter and 
 force. But the Hegelians ask for nothing but 
 thought, "the conception," and I quote in conclu- 
 sion, with an apology for its blasphemous character, 
 the following from Dr. Sterling (the Secret of He- 
 gel), as the outcome of Hegel's theory of knowledge, 
 when applied to Religion : "Before Christ, God was 
 (supposed to be) external to man, and worship or 
 obedience to him consisted in external ceremonies. 
 But since Christ, God is inward to man. He is our 
 conscience. We no longer ask the will of God from 
 external oracles, from external signs, but from our 
 own selves in the place of God. We are to ourselves 
 God. God and man are identified. In this way 
 then, too, as in every way, Christ is the Mediator, 
 the Redeemer, the Saviour." - 
 
 And that is all. Scripture is of no authority. 
 Miracles, in the proper sense of the word, never oc- 
 curred. The Resurrection is but a myth, and facts, 
 air the facts, of history, are to be disposed of accord 
 ing to a preconceived theory of what they ought to 
 have been ; they must have occurred in history 
 as indicated by the laws of thought. History is but 
 a development of thought — the thought that is de- 
 veloped in our own minds. 
 
LECTURE VI. 
 
 REALITIES AND FICTIONS. 
 
 § I. In this, the concluding Lecture of the series, 
 I propose to restate, in a summary way, some of the 
 leading and most important points which seem to 
 me to have been gained, with special reference to 
 what must be regarded, as I think, as the present 
 state of our theories of knowledge and of the ex- 
 tent and comprehension of what really comes within 
 its limits. 
 
 We have seen that Aristotle distinctly recognizes 
 ( see Lecture II ) the two sources of the ele- 
 mentary ideas and the activity of the mind in forming 
 these elements into ideas, or notions, as he preferred 
 to call them, of various kinds and grades of compre- 
 hensiveness. But he specially elaborated the doc- 
 trines and formularies of the processes of reasoning, 
 and was known to posterity for many centuries 
 chiefly, if not only, as the founder of scholasticism, 
 "the knowledge" that prevailed in the Middle Ages. 
 
 Locke, also, as we have seen, distinctly recognized 
 the two sources and very emphatically declared them 
 
REALITIES AND FICTIONS. 
 
 253 
 
 to be the only sources of the elements of our ideas. 
 But he devoted by far the most of his attention and 
 the largest part of his work to the formation and 
 development of the ideas of the first named class, 
 those derived from sense-perception ; and he has 
 been regarded as the founder of modern materialism 
 and agnosticism. 
 
 Hegel taught the principles that lay the founda- 
 tion for a most irrefutable ontology, with its three 
 co-ordinate objects, or classes of objects — matter, 
 mind, and God. And yet he gave himself chiefly to 
 a development of his theory of concepts, or ideas, 
 and is regarded as the father and founder of modern 
 idealism. The one system of this expounder denies 
 or, at least, ignores, the existence of God and a 
 spiritual world ; the other denies or ignores the 
 reality of any material world, and makes even spirit- 
 ual things, God and the mind of man, to be only 
 ideas — each one's own thought is all that there is for 
 himself. 
 
 These, as I have said, are the two extremes of 
 modern times. But there is a middle school founded 
 by Reid and based chiefly on what he calls "the 
 common sense" of mankind, which is, in fact, in one 
 form or another, the system that is most extensively 
 taught in our schools and colleges. Its most con- 
 spicuous advocates in our country are, perhaps, the 
 two ex-presidents of two of our great colleges, Pres- 
 ident Porter, of Yale, and President McCosh, of 
 Princeton. But for many reasons, already stated, 
 this philosophy is not altogether satisfactory. 
 
254 
 
 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 Not satisfactory, chiefly as I think, and, perhaps 
 only, in the account it gives of the foundation on 
 which its doctrines rest. If, however, Locke's sys- 
 tem, as I understand it and am trying to set it forth 
 in these Lectures, be correct and accepted it will not 
 differ materially in the practical precepts which it 
 teaches from those that are taught by the disciples 
 of the Reid and Cousin school. But it will rather 
 place them, it seems to me, on an immovable and 
 perfectly satisfactory foundation. 
 
 There are two methods that may be pursued in 
 discussions of this kind. We may start out with 
 certain principles in religion and morals in our minds, 
 which our philosophy ought to teach, and reason back 
 to first principles, which, if adopted, will give solidity 
 and foundation to those principles. The other is to 
 start from facts or assumed facts, as first principles, 
 and reason from them to conclusions. The fault of 
 what I have called the Scotch school seems to have 
 been their pursuit of the former method. And hence, 
 its unsatisfactoriness to philosophers who prefer the 
 other method. 
 
 § 2. I think it settled, also, beyond further con- 
 troversy or doubt that while there are no a priori ele- 
 ments of ideas or knowledge, there are a priori 
 or 'm.\.\x\'i\\i& judgments or axioms, affirming relations 
 between these ideas, which are not only assumed by 
 all persons who think and make assertions at all, but 
 which are also readily assented to by all persons as 
 soon as the meaning of the terms in which they are 
 expressed separately, and one by one, is fully under- 
 
RE A LI TIES A ND FIC TIONS. 355 
 
 stood. Many men, like Plato, Aristotle and Locke, 
 have expressly asserted and maintained this doctrine. 
 But all men assume it and act upon it, not only as 
 men, but as philosophers as well. Nay, even the most 
 simple and elementary principles of their teachings 
 are based on these axioms, as well as the more remote 
 and abstruse deductions. These axioms form a part 
 of our knowledge, which is absolute, and the axioms 
 are seen, by their very nature, as soon as their mean- 
 ing is fully understood, to admit of no exceptions 
 here or elsewhere, now or at any time hereafter. 
 
 Our knowledge of things begins in the order of 
 time with sense-perception. For it is doubtful if 
 there is, or can be, for us finite beings, any conscious- 
 ness without, or, rather, until after, there has been 
 some sense-perception of an external object. 
 
 I think that Hegel's doctrine of co-ordination goes 
 so far as this. In all sense-perception, there must be 
 the two — the co-ordination of the perceiving self, 
 the ego, the I, and the perceived object, the not-me, 
 or non-ego — the subject on the one hand and the 
 object on the other. 
 
 But with the cognition of the one, the object, there 
 comes the consciousness of the subject. And after 
 this relation has been once recognized, it is not 
 always or necessarily the case that we think of the 
 two at the same time, or not of either. For the 
 most part we perceive objects, with the eye, for ex- 
 ample, with no thought of the eye, no consciousness 
 of the sensations produced by the external object, 
 and no consciousness, in fact, of the act of the mind 
 
256 
 
 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 in perceiving the object. Our thoughts, all of them, 
 at least of which we have any recollection afterwards, 
 are occupied in thinking of the object we saw. 
 
 And so it is in the other direction also with the 
 observation of self, its acts and conditions by con- 
 sciousness. When a sensation is painful we are con- 
 scious of the pain, think of it at the time and remem- 
 ber it afterward. So, too, if an act of perception, 
 imagination, insight or memory is performed only 
 with more or less of difficulty, so as to cost some- 
 thing of an effort, we are conscious of it at the time, 
 far enough at least to remember it as an event in our 
 personal experience after it has passed. But for the 
 most part there is no consciousness of self in these 
 acts and states of the mind at the time they occur, 
 although there are abundant reasons from physiology 
 and psychology for asserting that they did certainly 
 take place, with all that their occurrence necessarily 
 implies. 
 
 § 3. In the acquisition of the elements of our 
 ideas of natural things there are two of our sense- 
 organs that are occupied with the process of percep- 
 tion in which our cognition of external things de- 
 pends, that not only take the lead, but are, in fact, 
 the foundation of all others, namely, sight and touch. 
 
 In this connection I take no notice of the most 
 important difference that is known to exist between 
 touch or the tactile sense in its more limited form or 
 sense, and the general sensibility to pain, pleasure, 
 etc., which exists in all the subcutaneous tissues, and 
 especially the muscles. This is sometimes called the 
 
REALITIES AND FICTIONS. 257 
 
 muscular sense. Thus, I judge of the weight of a 
 body that is resting on my hand, by its mere press- 
 ure, or its resistance to my effort to lift it ; its hard- 
 ness by its resistance to pressure, and not by the 
 mere sense of touch alone. 
 
 But we are never led to affirm the existence of 
 anything external to ourselves by either of the 
 senses, except sight, and touch taken in this broader 
 sense. 
 
 If we hear a sound, we believe indeed that there is 
 some sonorous body within hearing distance. But 
 we never feel satisfied with the mere sound until we 
 have found something that we can either see or feel, 
 that has produced it. 
 
 So with an odor ; we never doubt that there is 
 something that emits it, and we often know by the 
 peculiar character of the odor, what it is that has 
 sent it out on the air we breathe. But we never 
 rest content or cease our inquiries, when we care to 
 pursue them, until we iind something that we can 
 see, or handle, or feel its pressure when we can get 
 it into a condition to compress it, or at least to press 
 upon it. This is especially the case with the gases, 
 which are, for the most part, invisible to our eyes. 
 
 And I doubt if we should ever cognize or think of 
 objects as external to ourselves, by sight alone, if we 
 had not first cognized them by touch or the resist- 
 ance which they offer to our efforts to compress 
 them or remove them from the position they occupy. 
 The experience of the cases, now several in number, 
 in which persons who had been totally blind up to a 
 
 17 
 
258 THEORIES OF KNO WLEGDE. 
 
 certain period of their lives, say twelve or fourteen 
 years, at least, and have been able by some surgical 
 operation to see, both suggests and confirms 
 this view. At first they had no idea that the 
 things they saw with their eyes were realities exter- 
 nal to themselves. As was said in regard to one of 
 them, "he actually thought that everything he saw 
 was in his eyes." 
 
 It is certainly worthy of special notice, in this 
 connection, that these are the two senses, sight and 
 touch, which, while giving us the objective proper- 
 ties of color and temperature, do also give us the 
 properties of form and individuality, which are by 
 no means relative. 
 
 § 4. Hegel's doctrine of co-ordination helps us in 
 a question that has often occurred to us — the reality 
 of true perception. If there is true perception, it is 
 admitted that there must be a real object that is per- 
 ceived. And if we generalize this doctrine we have 
 indisputable evidence, or certainty, of whatever is or 
 has been really perceived by either sight or touch. 
 And this will include all the objects in the material 
 universe, all objects that are treated of by the nat- 
 ural sciences and of which we afifirm, or have any 
 reason to afifirm, their existence as material objects ; 
 or nearly so, as we shall see by-and-by. 
 
 But is there any true perception ? Is it not all 
 like the images of our dreams and hallucinations, 
 and like the false perceptions which we confessedly 
 have in our waking hours ? How shall we deter- 
 mine the question ? Everybody, that is, everybody 
 
REALITIES AND FICTIONS. 359 
 
 but a few philosophers, believes that there are true 
 perceptions as well as false, and everybody, philoso- 
 phers and all, believe that, in order to any true per- 
 ception, there must be the reality of the object per- 
 ceived. In fact, this is the differentia of true percep- 
 tion, namely, that the object is real, and present, 
 and actually producing the sensations by which we 
 perceive it. Whereas, in false perception there is no 
 true object and the sensations are produced by some 
 abnormal activity of the nerves or nerve-centers. 
 
 This point has been pressed with great and even 
 irresistible force against the more modern philoso- 
 phers who profess to be, or are unconsciously, of the 
 Hegelian School of Idealists. The only difference 
 there is between true and false perception, the test 
 of the reality of the true, is the fact that in the one 
 case there is and in the other there is not a real ob- 
 ject that is perceived. Are there, then, the two 
 classes of cases ? It is like color and darkness to 
 the blind, silence and sound to the deaf. If there 
 were not both, we should have no idea of and no 
 name for either. 
 
 Now Hegel's law comes to our aid. The two are 
 co-ordinates ; false perception and true perception. 
 And they are a pair, as well. Like odd and even in 
 numbers, there can be no third kind, so that if a 
 number is not the one it must be the other. If, 
 now, we take Kant's law, we can have no thought 
 even of the one without the thought of the other. 
 But if we take Hegel's law, or, rather, his view of 
 this one, and the same law as Kant has stated it, it 
 
26o THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 carries us one step farther and enables us to say that 
 there cannot be the one without the other. 
 
 So with true perception and false. If there were 
 not both, we should have and could have no name 
 for either and no idea of either of the two kinds of 
 mental acts and no question about them. 
 
 But, as we have seen, if there be true perception, 
 then, whenever it occurs, there is a real substantial 
 material thing that is perceived as the object of that 
 perception. 
 
 And the knowledge we get of it by that mental 
 act and all the mental acts that are true perceptions, 
 is not only real knowledge, but it is, so far as it goes, 
 knowledge of the thing itself — ding an sich. 
 
 But then, the opposite views, the view of Kant 
 and of his followers, both in Germany and 
 in this country, opens an immense field for 
 fancy. And with all due respect to the names of 
 many very earnest men who must be included in 
 this class, I am inclined to think that this feature 
 of that theory is its chief attraction for them. We 
 have seen how, in the days of the most eminent 
 Greek philosophers, the theory of Plato, which was 
 largely a fancy and called fancy into conspicuous 
 exercise, caught the minds of men and prevailed 
 until we have the vagaries and incomprehensi- 
 ble systems of Neo-Platonism, while the more sober 
 views of Aristotle scarcely secured a disciple, and were 
 entirely overlooked and forgotten, until the sad ex- 
 perience of the Dark Ages and the absurdities of 
 Scholasticism compelled men to fall back upon that 
 
RMALifiES And PicfioML 
 
 20 r 
 
 very method of observation and the study of facts 
 which has resulted in the marvelous attainments of 
 modern science. This latter method is the slower 
 and more tedious, but it is the sure one in the end. 
 It is, in fact, the only sure method, and all men who 
 are genuine lovers of truth must come to it sooner 
 or later. 
 
 This law, as Hegel states it, is, as I think, but 
 another form of the law of Excluded Middle as given 
 by Liebnitz and recognized by the Scholastic Philos- 
 ophy. Take the case above cited, odd and even in 
 relation to numbers. There is no other sort, as a 
 "middle" sort or species, in which a number may be 
 found so as to be neither odd nor even. Hence, by 
 Excluded Middle, as they call it, if a number is 
 known or ascertained by direct observation, or any 
 other means, not to be even, we need go no further 
 with our investigations and experiments, or seek any 
 direct positive proofs. We know by this law that it 
 is odd. 
 
 Or, take another illustration. "All men are hon- 
 est." "No men are honest." Here is not Excluded 
 Middle, for there may be a middle proposition — 
 "some men are honest" — while both .of the two uni- 
 versal propositions are false, taken as they stand, 
 that is, as universals. But if we have the two 
 propositions, "All men are honest," and "some men 
 are not honest," it is manifest, at sight, that they 
 cannot both of them be either true or false. Hence, 
 from the known truth of one, we can infer the falsity 
 of the other. And, vice versa, from the ascertained 
 
262 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 falsity of the one we can infer, without further in- 
 vestigation or effort at proof, the truth of the other. 
 What is known in mathematics as the indirect method 
 of proof, is based on this principle of Excluded 
 Middle. 
 
 I do not, however, intend by this to detract in the 
 slightest degree from the merits of Hegel for dis- 
 covering and setting forth this law. 
 
 § 5. I have spoken of -the elements of our ideas 
 as obtained first in the order of time, by sense-per- 
 ception, and afterwards by consciousness. But there 
 are certain intuitive axioms which occur to our 
 thoughts as soon as reflection begins, which, as Cou- 
 sin has shown, Art. first in the order of logic. That 
 is, they are presupposed in order, not to the mere 
 act of sense-perception, but to the insight we may 
 have and affirm of the objects themselves. 
 
 Of course we are all familiar with some of these 
 axioms of a more general character, which are as- 
 sumed and underlie, even if they are not always 
 announced, all the sciences as they are formally 
 taught. We usually have them announced in our 
 works on Geometry and Algebra, and less frequently, 
 though it sometimes occurs, in our Physics and 
 Chemistry. These judgments are never, of course, 
 elementary ideas, or the mere elements of ideas, not 
 ideas at all, as Cousin maintains. They are affirma- 
 tions of relations of things or the ideas of things. 
 
 I need not take time here to discuss the origin of 
 these judgments. As Cousin has forcibly said, they 
 are not innate, that is, they are not in the mind be- 
 
REALITIES AND FICTIONS. 
 
 263 
 
 fore any act of observation ; for there are no innate 
 judgments. Judgments, in fact, are not things in 
 the mind. The word denotes primarily an act of 
 the mind and thus, it is used to denote the result of 
 the act, as though the act created something that 
 remains. The mind evidently affirms these judg- 
 ments by its own insight into the nature of things 
 as soon, for the most part, as any act of perception 
 occurs, requiring them as ameans of saying anything 
 in regard to the object. They are thus and to this 
 extent a priori. They are not like the judgments, 
 "This paper is white," "This iron is solid :" for these 
 last affirmations, or judgments, are based on the per- 
 ception of the object and the concomitance of the 
 subject and the predicate in the very act of cogniz- 
 ing the object itself. 
 
 These axioms, however, underlie all knowledge, 
 all affirmation with regard to things. That is, all 
 affirmations in which the subject is a concrete term, 
 whether individual, general, or collective. 
 
 We have, then, three distinct sources of knowl- 
 edge : (i) Self-evident axioms and reasoning from 
 them, by means, not of facts or existing objects, but 
 of definitions giving the nature of the things by 
 their most obvious essentia or differentia. These 
 axioms, as I have said, underlie, and are implied in, 
 all the assertions and propositions we can make in 
 any department of science or of knowledge. They 
 and the reasoning from them, by means of defini- 
 tions, constitute the whole of the pure mathematics 
 as well as formal logic ; that is, all there is or can be 
 of logic without the consideration of language. 
 
264 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 In the second place we have observation, or expe- 
 rience, and this is divided at the outset into the two 
 parts indicated by Locke, (i) the one, sense-percep- 
 tion, giving us the elements of our knowledge of the 
 material objects and facts that make up the material 
 world, and (2) the other, consciousness and reflec- 
 tion, giving us the elements of our knowledge of 
 mind and so of human nature, whatever we can 
 know of human character, history, and whatever 
 relates to the actions, opinions, hopes, and fears of 
 men. It enters largely, also, into our Natural His- 
 tory as explaining or ennablirig us to understand the 
 instincts and actions of animals. 
 
 And, in the third place, we have reasoning. And 
 in view of what has been said, I think we may name 
 four fundamental principles on which the reasoning 
 is based : (i) From cause to effect, but more fre- 
 quently the reverse, from effect to an adequate 
 cause, dependent on the principles of causation. (2) 
 Aristotle's dictum growing out of the relation of 
 subordination and comprehension. (3) Hegel's law 
 of co-ordination and exclusion ; and (4) the law of 
 comparison and by means of comparative syllogisms 
 of which I have given a brief account in the second 
 Lecture. 
 
 But it has been suggested that mind and matter- 
 may be, after all, only one and the same substance 
 under different forms. It is said that the difference 
 in the properties, which we learn in these two ways, 
 does not necessarily prove that there are two sub- 
 stances that are entirely different ; but rather, two 
 
REALITIES AND FICTIONS. 265 
 
 different states of one and the same substance. As 
 an illustration and proof it is said that, as a matter of 
 fact, we get entirely different qualities of the objects 
 before us by the different senses, sight and touch, 
 for example. By the one we get colors, as black 
 and white, red and gray, etc. By the other, hard- 
 ness and softness ; temperature, as warm or cold, 
 and moisture, as wet or dry. May not mind and 
 matter, then, be but one substance under different 
 forms of existence and activity ? Descartes thought 
 that extension was the essentia or differentia of mat- 
 ter, while thought, in his view, sustains the same 
 relation to mind. But may not an extended object 
 be a thinking substance as well ? And may not the 
 mind be extended, though invisible, diffused through- 
 out the body, like air through the room, or ether 
 throughout space ? Can it be shown that extension 
 and thought are incompatible ? May not mere mat- 
 ter think, and may not mind be extended and dif- 
 fused so as to occupy and fill all the cells of the 
 brain and all the pores and fibres of the body ? 
 
 I do not know that we can answer these questions 
 either in the affirmative or in the negative. We 
 have seen that water may exist in the two forms, 
 visible and tangible in the one, and neither visible 
 nor tangible in the other. When it rises from the 
 lake we cannot see it. But it often comes into the 
 form of a cloud or fog, and then we can see it with 
 our eyes and feel it with our hands. May it not be 
 so with the one substance, so that what we call mind 
 and what we call matter may be, after all, but one and 
 
266 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 the same substance under two forms of existence 
 and cognized in two different ways ? The question, 
 I say, has often been asked and the idea has been a 
 favorite one with a certain school of philosophy and 
 with minds of a certain constitution, from the earli- 
 est days of human speculation until now. But if it 
 be so, it is not known as a fact, nor do I feel sure 
 that it can ever be known for a certainty. 
 
 § 6. We have seen that what Descartes proposed 
 as differentia — "extension" and "thought" — are 
 not co-ordinates and mutually inconsistent or incom- 
 patible, so as to constitute an Excluded Middle. But 
 more recent times have led to another ground of 
 fundamental distinction between the two. Matter 
 is held to be inert, and mind to be spontaneous in 
 its activity. 
 
 By inertia in this connection we do not mean 
 absolute rest or inactivity, for recent investigations 
 and speculations in physical science would seem to 
 show that, whatever may have been the case at some 
 former period with regard to "absolute rest or equi- 
 librium," as Herbert Spencer calls it, there is now 
 no particle or atom of matter which is absolutely at 
 rest or inactive. Every particle is supposed to be 
 active in the way of gravity, or attraction of dis- 
 tant masses. Most or all of them are also active in 
 the way of chemical action. Even the atoms of 
 oxygen and hydrogen that make up a molecule of 
 water are still active in the way of affinity which 
 prevents those, atoms from separating into their 
 formative gases again. 
 
REALITIES AND FICTIONS. 
 
 267 
 
 But what we mean is (i) that ?/any particle, mass 
 or molecule is now at rest or not in action, it cannot of 
 itself start into a state of motion (mechanically) or 
 into a state of action (chemically) without the influ- 
 ence and agency of something else acting upon it. 
 And (2) if any particle or piece of matter is now in 
 a state of motion or activity, it cannot, of itself, 
 change the rate of its motion or the intensity of its 
 action, without some action or change in something 
 else, so as to act upon it, or allow other causes to 
 act which are now kept from acting by some other 
 cause than this particle or piece of matter itself. 
 And this is held to be the law and condition of all 
 mere inorganic matter. And all science is based on 
 the idea of inertia in this sense, as an inseparable 
 character — the very differentia of matter. 
 
 I say this is the foundation of every statement we 
 can make in the department of the physical sciences : 
 the laws of motion in Physics and Astronomy, the 
 laws of analysis and synthesis in Chemistry assume 
 it. If atoms and molecules could skip about at will, 
 as the frisky child does, we could prescribe no law 
 to its motions. If in Chemistry the atoms of the el- 
 ements could unite and disunite as thoughtlessly 
 and as capriciously as our children and youth do in 
 forming their friendsh ps and antipathies, we could 
 have no science or knowledge of Chemistry. 
 
 On the other hand, mind is supposed to be spon- 
 taneous, which is the direct opposite and contradic- 
 tory of inert in this respect. So far as the testi- 
 mony of consciousness goes, we do sometimes start 
 
268 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 from a state of inactivity and rest, and we do begin 
 to act voluntarily, of our own selves, that is, sponta- 
 neously. And not only so, we can accelerate or re- 
 tard our movements at will. 
 
 We have a direct consciousness of this spontaneity 
 of action in ourselves. Everybody thus knows — 
 as well as anybody can tell him — what it is. Every 
 body believes in it and acts accordingly, whatever 
 may be his metaphysical questions about it, whatever 
 he as a philosopher may have professed to believe. 
 
 Moreover, I think Hegel's law is applicable and 
 prevails here. Spontaneity and inertia in the sense 
 we use the terms are co-ordinates, and a pair as well ; 
 so that what is not inert is spontaneous in its activ- 
 ity, and conversely, whatever is spontaneous, is not 
 and cannot be inert. The one is virtually, though 
 not verbally, the negative of the other ; consequently 
 by that law there must be two corresponding re- 
 alities, or classes of realities, the one inert and the 
 other spontaneously active. And by Locke's doc- 
 trine with regard to the origin of elementary ideas, 
 examples of one at least of each of these classes of 
 objects must have been immediately cognized by us. 
 
 Doubtless the contrast or difference does not be- 
 come a matter of thought and question, or avowed 
 belief, until after there has been a good deal of re- 
 flection on the subject ; that is, we do not exactly 
 see what it is, until after much philosophizing about 
 it. But the merest child knows that there is a dif- 
 ference. He can get up and rim across the room. 
 This he knows. But he knows a^so that his toys 
 
REALITIES AND FWTIONS. 
 
 269 
 
 cannot do so— that they will stay where he leaves 
 them, and as he leaves them, unless somebody takes 
 them away or moves them out of the position in 
 which he left them. 
 
 I believe that the doctrine of the inertia of all 
 mere matter was not distinctly conceived and started 
 until the time of Newton and Leibnitz, when the 
 physical sciences were being established on their 
 proper foundation. Unless, then, there had been the 
 two, spontaneity and inertia, and something that is 
 inert as well as something that is spontaneous in its 
 activity, which is what we mean by freedom of will, 
 and if examples of both kinds had not been actually 
 and immediately cognized, there could have been no 
 idea of either, the one or the other — inertia or spon- 
 taneity — and no name for the one or the other, any 
 more than there would have been thought of or 
 names for light and darkness, silence and sound, if 
 all the world had been blind or deaf. 
 
 But we have another proof. In the efforts which 
 have been made to discover the rate at which the 
 nerve currents pass to and from the brain, a proof of 
 this point has been quite unexpectedly reached, that 
 is of a different kind, and will, to my mind, be of a 
 much more satisfactory character. The one we have 
 given may be regarded as metaphysical ; the one I 
 am about to give is physical. 
 
 Suppose, for example, we take the well-known case 
 of the electric spark. If one fakes the wire in his 
 hand and the electricity is set in motion, the current 
 passes up the arm to the gray matter of the spinal 
 
270 
 
 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 cord ; there it is transformed in character by that 
 gray matter and returned down to the muscles of 
 his arm at the rate of about ninety feet per second. 
 But if in order to get a longer circuit we touch a 
 man's toe and tell him to make a sign with his finger 
 as soon as he feels it, the current must now, follow- 
 ing the course of the nerves, pass up the whole 
 length of the body to the anterior lobe of the brain, 
 and then down again so as to go out at the hand 
 and to the end of the finger that is to give the sig- 
 nal. But there is no complete circuit in the case, as 
 there was in the case of the electric shock to the 
 hand. It is like a telegraph line ; if it goes across 
 the continent from New York to California, say for 
 example, and there winds around an insulator and 
 comes back, we can send a message to California 
 which will come back to us at once, with just and 
 only the time needed to go across the continent 
 twice. But if there is no insulator, then the message 
 must be received there by an operator, taken off and 
 re-written. This will of course take time. And not 
 only so, but the operator can take his own time, or 
 even delay and neglect or refuse to send it at all. 
 
 Now, just so with the nerve current in the 
 case we are considering ; there is no circuit between 
 the foot and the hand ; and the message has to be taken 
 off, as we say, and repeated ; that is, the subject of 
 the experiment feels the touch of his foot, is con- 
 scious of the sensation, and must exert an act of 
 'volition before the finger will move to give the ap- 
 pointed sign. And this takes time. And not only 
 
REALITIES AND FICTIONS. 27 1 
 
 SO ; but " the operator," whose seat is, in this case, 
 in the brain, can take his own time, vary it at his 
 will, or even neglect to raise his finger and give the 
 sign at all. 
 
 But this is not according to the law of inertia. 
 In that case not only are action and reaction equal, 
 but they follow upon each other instantaneously. 
 There is and can be no delay. When the shock is 
 given, as in the case just supposed, the jerking of 
 the hand comes at once, and involuntarily so far as 
 we are concerned We cannot take our own time, 
 consult our own convenience in the case, or neglect 
 to jerk the hand altogether. 
 
 Here, then, we have a most manifest and indispu- 
 table proof of the difference between spontaneity and 
 inertia, and also of the fact that there is something 
 in the brain and acting there, that is spontaneous or 
 acts under the law of spontaneity, which is directly 
 the reverse of that law of inertia which we see ob- 
 served everywhere in inorganic matter. 
 
 Nor does the brain itself obey in its reflex action 
 a law different from that which we see obtains every- 
 where else in mere matter. In the case of its own 
 reflex actions, it obeys the same law as the spinal 
 cord, for instance. Thus, the involuntary laughter, 
 the outcry of grief or weeping which comes at the 
 sight of, or on hearing the announcement of, some- 
 thing witty, ludicrous, or sad and distressing, are, 
 for the most part, involuntary and come without the 
 delay that we can impose upon whatever we do vol- 
 untarily, and in regard to which we can take our 
 own time or omit it altogether. 
 
272 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 Now, call this which acts in the brain and upon 
 the brain, mind, or what you will, it is undeniably 
 manifest that it is something that is both substan- 
 tially and essentially different from the brain itself, 
 in the present state of existence and order of 
 things, and we call it mind. 
 
 We have, then, the two, mind and matter, essen- 
 tially different, the one acting under the law of 
 spontaneity, and the other acting always and every- 
 where, so far as we know it or know of\t, under the 
 co-ordinate law of inertia. And of the objects in 
 the one domain, we cognize and have whatever we 
 know or can know of their primary or objective 
 properties, by the sense-organs and acts of sense- 
 perception, and of the other we obtain all the ele- 
 ments of our knowledge by consciousness and reflec- 
 tion upon the acts and states of our own minds. 
 
 We come back again, therefore, to our second 
 point, namely, observation in its two-fold aspects, 
 sense-perception and consciousness. By the one 
 we get our material for the Natural and Physical 
 Sciences, and by the other we get our material for 
 the Mental or Psychological Sciences, and by the 
 two, the Mixed Sciences, as history and such other 
 sciences as relate to man and animals considered as 
 sensitive, if not rational beings, and our Natural 
 Theology also. 
 
 But from one or the other of these two sources — 
 sense-perception and consciousness — come all the 
 elements of our ideas of things ; and the ideas of 
 things themselves the mind maJtes out of these 
 
REALITIES AND FICTIONS. 
 
 273 
 
 ideas, (i) out of those that come from sense-percep- 
 tion, all our ideas pf purely material and inanimate 
 objects ; (2) from those that come by conscious- 
 ness, all our ideas of mind and purely spiritual 
 beings, and (3) by a combination of elements derived 
 from both of these sources, our ideas of animals to 
 which we ascribe some degree or kind of intelli- 
 gence. 
 
 Our ideas of things — to whichsoever of the three 
 classes just indicated they may happen to belong — 
 are complex. Hence, we can always analyze them 
 and define the thing which they represent — de- 
 fine it, I say, by giving its essence, or nature, as well 
 as describe it by telling where it is, where or how it 
 occurs and what are its relations. But our simple 
 ideas, that is, the elements of ideas, we cannot de- 
 fine ; we can only tell Where they are to be found, 
 when they occur, and where we may get them by ac- 
 tual observation and cognition (if we have the organs 
 and means of cognizing it) of some object to which 
 it belongs as a property. We cannot define white- 
 ness, but we can tell any one where and when he can 
 see something that is white. We cannot define the 
 act of perception, but we can tell any intelligent 
 human being where, when and how it may occur, 
 and thus put him into the way to get, an idea of the 
 act, if he has it not already, or does not happen to 
 know what we mean by the word. 
 
 And there is a very important inference from this 
 fact that is specially pertinent to the matter we have 
 in hand. 
 18 
 
2;4 
 
 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 As we can analyze our idea of any object and 
 thus define the object, so we can deny the reality of 
 that object. But, as we cannot originate any one of 
 the elements of our ideas and can get them only in 
 the act of cognition of some object of which it is a 
 property or mode, so we cannot deny the reality of 
 the object of which it is the property or mode. 
 
 Thus, as we cannot define whiteness, so we cannot 
 deny that there is something that is white. As we 
 cannot define the act of perception, so we cannot 
 deny that there is something — call it mind, or what 
 you will — something that perceives. So, too, as we 
 cannot define the simple act of volition or choice, 
 we cannot, even if we would, deny that there is 
 something that chooses. And as perception and 
 choice are not (supposed to be) acts of mere matter, 
 we ascribe them to something that has none of the 
 properties of matter and call it mind, or soul. 
 
 § 7. Then, in the third place, we have the great 
 department of reasoning from observed facts consid- 
 ered as effects to objects, that are beyond the reach 
 of our cognition, which are their causes. 
 
 Leibnitz had insisted that whatever is conceived 
 of as a substance, must also be considered as a cause. 
 But it was Cousin, so far as I know or remember, 
 that in modern times first made the doctrine that we 
 know all things as causes and as causes only, and all 
 our knowledge of things, including direct observa- 
 tion, depends on the law of causation, or the relation 
 of cause and effect. 
 
 We can see the truth of this doctrine in the case 
 
REALITIES AND FICTIONS. 275 
 
 of immediate observation of the two kinds, sense- 
 perception and consciousness, by a moment's reflec- 
 tion and analysis. We can perceive external things 
 only as they act as causes in producing within us 
 those sensations by which we perceive them. 
 
 In sensation, it will be remembered, we are passive, 
 while in perception the mind is active. And as ex- 
 ternal objects act upon the sense-organs, producing 
 sensations, we perceive the objects. It is true that, 
 although the act is involuntary, that is, we can 
 neither produce it without the object thus acting 
 upon us, nor prevent the act of perception when the 
 object thus acts, it is still a mental act. And I be- 
 lieve it is the only one, except consciousness, that is 
 thus wholly involuntary and beyond the control of 
 the will. We can direct the imagination, the rea- 
 son, the memory, and the will, each and every one 
 of them to a large extent. But the act of percep- 
 tion is beyond our control, whenever any external 
 object acts upon our sense-organs in the normal and 
 appointed way. 
 
 So, too, in consciousness. We are conscious 
 whenever the mind acts, but it must act as cause or 
 agent in producing those states of activity which 
 Locke more especially noticed as "its actings," per- 
 ception, thinking, reasoning, remembering, doubting, 
 willing, etc. And in the passive states, as feelings 
 of praise, admiration, etc., the causality may, per- 
 haps, be divided between the two, the external ob- 
 ject that caused the feelings, and the mind itself in so 
 directing our thoughts that by imagination or rec- 
 
276 
 
 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 ollection we reproduce the feelings we once had. 
 But at any rate we cognize the mind only as it is 
 active and acts as cause in producing those states or 
 changes in its states which we call perceiving, re- 
 membering, reasoning, willing, etc., by which we 
 know it to be mind within us. 
 
 But this is only the first step. The second step is 
 that of reasoning from the observed facts to facts 
 and objects that do not fall under our own immedi- 
 ate observation. 
 
 And here a very important distinction must be 
 made and carefully noted. Causation may produce 
 (i) either a new thing, or (2) only a change in the 
 condition and mode of existence of things that are 
 already in existence and were so before the act of 
 causation took place. In the foi-mer case we have 
 an act of creation, which neither man nor the 
 objects in nature are supposed to be able to perform. 
 God only, as Creator, is capable of producing some- 
 thing that is new, or doing anything more than 
 changing the mode of existence in the things He has 
 to work upon. This distinction is important. And 
 thus we have in nature and in human activity only 
 the production of changes in the form of the mate- 
 rials that either we or it have to act upon. 
 
 Whenever we see anything, by direct observa- 
 tion of either of the two kinds so often named, and 
 see by observation, insight, or otherwise, that it has 
 not always existed as it is, although it may have ex- 
 isted in some other form or mode, we know it, or 
 rather its present state, to be an effect which must 
 have had an adequate cause. 
 
REALITIES AND FICTIONS. 
 
 277 
 
 § 8. Few people are probably aware how much 
 of what we think we know has actually been ob- 
 tained in this way and on this principle of causation 
 rather than by direct observation. Doubtless it de- 
 pended on observation at first, but then it was the 
 observation of other persons than ourselves. 
 
 I have shown in a former Lecture (II) how we de- 
 rive a large share of the details of all the sciences 
 as well as the practical precepts by which we apply 
 what we know by deduction from general principles. 
 But what I am speaking of now is reasons from cause 
 to effect and the reverse from effect to cause. 
 
 When I look at the furniture of this room, for ex- 
 ample, I know that there is not an article of it that 
 has always existed where it is and as it now is. And 
 I do not believe that God Himself was the creator 
 of any one of the articles as it now exists. But they 
 all show intelligence and purpose in their immediate 
 causes, that is, the men who made them — I say men, 
 for if their present condition and shape show intelli- 
 gence and design, efficient and final cause as well as 
 material^and formal cause — then of course they must 
 had some human being as their cause. For one 
 class of these articles I refer to a cabinet-maker, for 
 others to the workers in iron and other metals ; and 
 for the carpets and drapery, I refer to the weaver. 
 And then back of these there must have been lum- 
 bermen, miners, machinists and farmers, each of 
 them with his measure of physical strength and ac- 
 quired skill, in order to be not only causes, but 
 causes adequate to the production of what I thus 
 see around me in my room. 
 
278 
 
 THEORIES OF KNOWLEGDE. 
 
 If, however, I want to trace any particular object 
 to its individual cause, the man who made it, I must 
 in most cases go beyond the proper range of science 
 and resort to its history and avail myself of the tes- 
 timony of others. But in some cases the work will 
 bear such marks of its author that there can be no 
 mistake. Thus it is claimed in regard to works of 
 art, paintings, sculptures, architectural structures, mu- 
 sic, poems, etc., that their authorship can be dis- 
 cerned and clearly demonstrated by marks and char- 
 acteristics that are inseparable from the works them- 
 selves, at least in the case of the greatest geniuses 
 that have blessed mankind with the production of 
 their minds. 
 
 In Science also we are dependent on this method 
 and this principle. Take the case of Geology alone 
 — ^the Geologist can examine the earth as it now is. 
 But he finds evidences of changes everywhere, that 
 go back beyond the possibility of human testimony 
 and human observation. He infers an accumula- 
 tion of ice and an ice age, of whose reality he has 
 no more doubt than he has of the existence of the 
 Andes now, or of the earthquakes of Calabria or of 
 Lisbon, or even of that of Charleston in 1886. And 
 he goes back to that period also and finds evidence 
 of periods of greater heat than we have now in high 
 latitudes, of a greater amount of carbonic acid in 
 the air than is consistent with the forms of animal 
 and vegetable life that exist now around us. And 
 far back in time beyond this he^^^finds, as he thinks, 
 evidences of a very high temperature of the earth 
 
REALITIES AND FICTIONS. 370 
 
 and, most likely, a state of gaseous diffusion, where 
 none of the chemical compounds that make up the 
 materials, vegetable or mineral, that now constitute 
 our surroundings, were thus united. 
 
 And this raises the question of an Adequate 
 Cause. Had the atoms of matter at that time and 
 when they were in that condition, the properties 
 which they are now supposed to have ? Were they 
 at rest-^— the absolute rest of inactivity ? If so, who 
 or what set them in motion ? What started them 
 out of their state of '^rest" and set them in motion 
 towards the centres, or perhaps towards several cen 
 tres, in the way which we now call gravitation ? 
 And what or who gave them their powers of chem- 
 ical affinity and combination, so that by their mu- 
 tual actions upon one another they might become 
 luminous with light and heat, or electric and mag- 
 netic with forces for which we have, perhaps, no 
 name ? Who or what started them from a state of 
 rest and inactivity, into motion and chemical com- 
 binations ? 
 
 Or were these atoms only in a state of equilibrium ? 
 If so, it must have been very "stable," for science 
 knows of no time or period back of that when, even 
 if they were in existence, they could have been in any 
 other condition. And if they were not in existence. 
 Who created them ? Or if they were. Who inter- 
 fered to disturb that equilibrium and set them in 
 motion, thus beginning the evolution ? 
 
 In either case an Adequate Cause is proved to 
 have existed and been active in the work. Philosophy 
 
28o THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 not only thus brings It or Him into existence^ but 
 into the range or domain of knowledge as well, on the 
 principle which is thus seen to be fundamental to, 
 nay, the very foundation of all our knowledge. 
 
 And in either case, whether in the state of abso- 
 lute rest or in that of a most stable equilibrium, the 
 cause that could have started it into motion could 
 not have been inert, and consequently not matter as 
 we now know it, If the atoms were then Created, 
 who created them? Who was their creator? If 
 they were at rest, who gave them the properties they 
 now have, or set them in niotion, so that acting as 
 causes on our sense organs, we can perceive them ; 
 and acting on each other, they form the mineral and 
 vegetable compounds, or the rock and mountain 
 masses and even the planets and stellar orbs that 
 seem to fill the space around us? 
 
 Or, finally, if they were in a state of equilibrium, 
 who interposed and brought them into such a state 
 of proximity that the action and motion that make 
 up what we now call the "forces" of nature, light, 
 heat, electricity, gravity and such like, could show 
 themselves to be true kinetic forces, and not the 
 mere latent fictions which our imaginations some- 
 times create to cheat our understandings, and call 
 latent forces ? 
 
 I say this Cause, on any one of these three possi- 
 ble hypotheses, must have been a spontaneous Per- 
 son. It could not have been mere inert matter, for 
 inertia was the one great thing to be overcome, the 
 one great obstacle to the bringing of an evolu- 
 
REALITIES AND FICTIONS. 28 1 
 
 tion, or a system of evolutions, in the Universe. 
 This Cause may have been "extended" in accord- 
 ance with Descartes' differentia of matter, extended 
 and diffused, so as to. be omnipresent by extension 
 and diffusion throughout all space, rather than by 
 that divine method incomprehensible to us. But He 
 could not have been inert as all matter now is, for 
 then there could have been no creation and no be- 
 ginning to evolution. He must have been free and 
 spontaneous in the nature of His activity and so 
 spiritual in His nature and a Person. 
 
 It is sometimes said, as if to obviate the force of 
 this argument, that we cannot stop here ; reason and 
 philosophy as much demand a cause for this so-called 
 First Cause as for any other. 
 
 But this is to mistake the whole grourid of the ar- 
 gument — the very first and fundamental principle on 
 which it rests. The quest after a cause arises only 
 as, and when, we have seen an object to be an effect. 
 In the case of the First Cause that is found by this 
 process, there is no such indication or proof — noth- 
 ing to lead us to seek for Him any cause. And 
 hence we call Him the First Cause — the Uncaused 
 Cause of all things. 
 
 § 9. Let us now take a case from human history. 
 The surface of the earth bears almost everywhere 
 marks and traces of a population earlier than that 
 which now inhabits the place where these remains 
 are found. And in some cases these remains indi- 
 cate a succession of races, one following another in 
 the same habitation. But how do we know that 
 
282 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 they are the works of human hands and human art ? 
 It is clearly by regarding them as effects that must 
 have had a sfifiucient and adequate cause ; a people 
 sufficient in point of numbers for the work, and 
 adequate in point of skill, their knowledge of the 
 arts and sciences, to have produced such works. 
 And we judge that there must have been two or 
 more successive races, if that were the fact in the 
 case, by such differences in their works as to imply 
 two different races as causes that would be adequate 
 by their difference to the kind of works so unlike 
 as those we find and attribute to them. 
 
 And in this way some of the most interesting and 
 important knowledge we have, or are likely to get, 
 of the early history of mankind, has been obtained. 
 And we may add that the indications of the early 
 history and condition of mankind, which have been 
 obtained in this way, have gone far to change some 
 of the theories which men had been inclined to hold 
 in regard to it. We find evidence of an intelligence 
 and a purity of morals and arrangements of do- 
 mestic life quite unlike what has been sometimes 
 assumed to have been man's primitive condition and 
 which, it was asserted, we find most fully illustrated 
 in the lives and conditions of the lowest savages of 
 our time. But we find, on the contrary, that the 
 savages must have changed in the course of the ages 
 about as much, if, indeed, not quite as much, in the 
 way of degeneracy and degradation, as the more 
 highly civilized and refined have advanced from that 
 primitive condition. It seems that they were more 
 
REALITIES AND FICTIONS. 
 
 283 
 
 like innocent, inexperienced children, than like either 
 the savages we find in the most degraded of condi- 
 tions, or the most highly civilized and refined popu- 
 lation of our most advanced nations. 
 
 I need not refer to, and I have not time to con- 
 sider, the disclosures in Egypt and Babylonia which 
 have recently thrown so much light on the earlier 
 stages of man's history. 
 
 Or take another instance. We have a religion 
 called Christianity. It is a part of the world's his- 
 tory; as much so and as conspicuous, in fact, as the 
 coal fields of Pennsylvania, or the Rock of Gibral- 
 tar. But what was its origin, its Adequate Cause ? 
 I take up a Book, the Book, or Bible. It claims to 
 give an account of its origin and, after admitting all 
 that the most adverse criticism has shown or claimed 
 to show to its disparagement, I find that it accounts 
 for the origin and force of this religion by referring 
 to the life and teachings, nay more, to the crucifixion, 
 resurrection from the dead, and ascent into Heaven, 
 of its Founder. The cause thus assigned is suffi- 
 cient. But is there any other that has been, or can 
 be, assigned that can be regarded as at all adequate 
 to such unprecedented results in the world's his- 
 tory ? 
 
 But back of this there is an older Religion and 
 there are books in the Bible that claim to give an 
 account of its origin. Did Moses live ? Did he 
 write the Pentateuch ? Did he work miracles ? 
 Was he inspired ? Make all the allowances which a 
 fair criticism can demand of us, and the question 
 
284 TMEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 still arises — not now with regard to the miracles he 
 is alleged to have performed, nor yet as to the truth 
 of the doctrines he taught, or even the excellence of 
 the laws and institutions which he put in force 
 among the Hebrew people, but the question now is 
 with regard to his knowledge of "the beginning" of 
 things in this mundane sphere. Was he, simply as 
 a man of learning and genius and without inspira- 
 tion, adequate to such a result ? 
 
 I take the facts in regard to this event as ascer- 
 tained by the investigations and discoveries of mod- 
 ern science ; and I accept them as undoubtedly 
 true. I see that Moses, as the author of the book 
 of Genesis, does not use the same phraseology as 
 our modern scientists, and he could not have done 
 so. The terms and phrases we now use were not in 
 existence at that time, and ho language then used 
 by man could have furnished them. But, taking the 
 idioms of that early Hebrew and our own modern 
 dialects into account, and making due allowance for 
 them, I find a wonderful agreement. Nay, I think 
 there is about as much agreement, both in fact and 
 in language, as there would be to-day between two 
 statements made by the same man, the one for scien- 
 tific men and for scientific purposes or to a class of 
 students, and the other to a popular audience of 
 uneducated people, and for the religious purpose of 
 asserting the unity of God, the fact of the creation 
 of the world by Him, and that, too, not by one 
 instantaneous _/?«^, but as men do things, in a meas- 
 ure, in order, and with a succession of stages in its 
 progress. 
 
REALITIES AND FICTIONS. 
 
 285 
 
 Now, the question is, how did Moses get this 
 knowledge, these ideas, of the processes of creation, 
 or evolution, if we choose to call the process by 
 that name ? If I turn to the "cosmologies," as they 
 are called, of those times, I find them in many re- 
 spects unlike the Mosaic account, and totally inade- 
 quate as a resource from which he could have drawn 
 the statements he made. We know those early ac- 
 counts of the origin of the world pretty well. The 
 old Accadian, the Shemitic Assyrian, as well as the 
 Egyptian beliefs and teachings on this subject, are 
 pretty well known. And it is manifest that it would 
 have taken more genius than any one man ever pos- 
 sessed, to deduce the elements of this account from 
 what is contained in any or all of them, and to have 
 put those facts into the order and simplicity of 
 statement he has given us. Of course there is no 
 pretence that Moses, merely as a man of science, 
 could have discovered them, and, in that early age, 
 so far anticipated what all the world have regarded 
 as newly-discovered facts and truths, as to have 
 written this account as a matter of scientific infor- 
 mation. Moses, therefore, as a man, whether as a 
 poet under the inspiration of genius, or as a scien- 
 tist with pickaxe and alembic, could not have written 
 that account. Nor could anybody else have done 
 so without supernatural aid in that early age. Mere 
 man was not then an adequate cause of what un- 
 questionably occurred. No man without the inspi- 
 ration, guidance and aid of some higher Being, 
 could have written that account of what occurred 
 
286 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 millions of years, most probably, before any Human 
 being could have been there to see and act as an 
 observer and report what he saw, for our information. 
 The conclusion seems to me inevitable. And the 
 inspiration, the supernatural inspiration, of the early 
 chapters of the Book of Genesis seems to me about 
 certain and as well proved, and that, too, on the 
 same principles of observation and reasoning, as the 
 certainty we have of an ice age that gouged out our 
 valleys, or a carboniferous period, in which grew the 
 material of our coal fields. The origin and exist- 
 ence of the one is as certain as the other. And I 
 think that the Book of Genesis furnishes as much 
 proof of the inspiration of the author, as the ice 
 age does of a cold such as we are not accustomed to 
 see in our day, or as the coal beds do of a heat and 
 an amount of carbonic acid in the air which would 
 render lives like ours impossible. 
 
 § 9. We have, then, three departments or classes 
 of objects within the range of our knowledge : (i) 
 matter, or, rather, the objects in the material world ; 
 
 (2) mind, the minds of others with whom we may be 
 acquainted, or of .whom we may acquire knowledge ; 
 
 (3) the One of Whom we know by the principle of 
 causation, or the One First Cause of all things, and 
 Who, to be adequate to the effects He has produced, 
 must be an intelligent. Personal Agent, acting 
 according to the distinguishing characteristics of 
 personality — spontaneity and thought, with motive 
 and for a purpose — yet freely and from His own 
 motives and choice. 
 
REALITIES AND FICTIONS. 
 
 287 
 
 Under the second head I include, for the present, 
 only human beings, and not animals ; for, in the 
 present state of our knowledge, it is doubtful wheth- 
 er there is in them anything more than mere reflex 
 action which, if not of a purely physical or mechan- 
 ical nature, is at least of a physiological nature and 
 does not imply mind ; or, if they have minds we 
 shall put them into a middle group, and apply to 
 them the ideas of intelligence and feeling of which 
 we get the elements from a consciousness of what 
 we experience in ourselves. 
 
 Nor do I include in this enumeration any unseen 
 spiritual beings besides the One, whether angels or 
 demons ; for, as a matter of scientific knowledge, I 
 think we have no such manifestation of their exist- 
 ence, whatever we may believe or affirm concerning 
 them, on other grounds. 
 
 Now, note the fact that any name we may give to 
 any one object in either of these three groups or de- 
 partments will be a proper name, and, therefore, of 
 necessity a concrete term. Or if we speak of more 
 than one as a class, or species, or genus, or variety, 
 the word we use will be a common noun, or a gen- 
 eral term, in the logical designation of terms. 
 
 I have had occasion several times to speak of the 
 logical quality of terms, and it may be well to say a 
 few words more now in the conclusion of our sub- 
 ject. 
 
 In the early discussions, all_ names were regarded 
 as either (i) concrete, (2) general, or (3) negative. 
 In this classification no names were regarded as 
 
288 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 concrete that did not denote a single individual ob- 
 ject which was visible and manifest to the senses. 
 It might be either a proper noun, or a common 
 noun with some such qualification as "this," "that," 
 or such like. Negative terms were considered to 
 be indicated by their form, as infinite, 2<«believing, 
 etc. And general terms were thought to include all 
 invisible things. 
 
 But in the progress of discussion we have found 
 it necessary to make of the second class, two classes 
 and distinguish between general terms in their proper 
 sense, as if^-noting, or, as is sometimes said, con-not- 
 ing, many individuals, making up a class without 
 making any distinction between them and abstract 
 terms which denote only some property or mode of 
 objects, and can scarcely be said to conn2Xit or imply 
 anything. 
 
 So, too, we distinguish between negative terms 
 and privative. Negative terms denote nothing. 
 They simply deny, or imply the absence of the prop- 
 erty denoted by the adjective in its positive form. 
 But privative terms denote a species or class of ob- 
 jects by the absence of some property which they 
 would have in their normal condition, as blindness, 
 or the blind, etc. 
 
 Hence, in one very important classification, words 
 in regard to their logical quality are either (i) posi- 
 tive, (2) negative, or (3) privative. 
 
 But in another and perhaps still more important 
 classification, all terms, or, rather, all positive terms 
 are either (i) concrete, or (2) abstract. And in this 
 
REALITIES AND FICTIONS. 
 
 289 
 
 classification we must include amfong the concrete 
 terms not only individual and general, but collective 
 terms as well, such as church, nation, congress, 
 legislature, etc. 
 
 These three, then — matter, mind, and God — are 
 within the reach and domain of knowledge, and each 
 one of them is as certainly known to be a reality as 
 the other. The certainty of the existence of each 
 is, as I think, absolute. We may know more of the 
 objects in the one class, than in either of the other 
 two ; but the certainty of their existence is as great 
 and as absolute in the one case as in the others. 
 
 But in the order of fact and in the varied experi- 
 ence of men, most people know more of the material 
 world and its objects than they do of their minds ; 
 and more of each and both of these objects than 
 they do of God. And men of different mental con- 
 stitutions will differ in this respect. There are men, 
 practical men, of the class of Aristotle and Bacon, 
 who know a good deal more of the material things 
 around them, than of either their own souls, or of 
 God, their Creator and final Judge. In fact, their 
 knowledge, what they have, is so exclusively of these 
 things that they can see and handle, that they think 
 they have no knowledge of anything else, and would 
 limit the word, knowledge, to such subjects ; all else 
 seems unreal and delusory. Others there are who 
 seem to be so occupied with their own minds, their 
 thoughts and feelings, that they scarcely seem to 
 know anything else, and mind, or, rather, thought 
 and ideas, seem to them to be the only reality. Of 
 19 • 
 
290 
 
 THEORIES OF KNOWLEGDE. 
 
 this kind are Plato and our modern Idealists. And 
 there are a few mystics who devote themselves, body 
 and soul, so much to thoughts of God and acts of 
 devotion, that for them He "is all," as well as "in 
 all." They feel more sure of His existence and pres- 
 ence than of the existence of anything else — even 
 their own souls or bodies. 
 
 Men begin to get their knowledge of material 
 things as soon as they open their eyes on the things 
 around them. And, naturally enough, it seems in 
 the first stages of their existence to be the most 
 certain of all, if not the only thing that is certain. 
 Their knowledge of themselves, their minds, they 
 begin to get only at a later stage, and much of it is 
 learned from books on Mental Science. But their 
 knowledge of God is, for the most part, communi- 
 cated to them by their teachers and pastors, and par- 
 takes, therefore, necessarily and to a large extent of 
 the doctrines of Revelation and the dogmas of the 
 church to which they happen to belong. 
 
 But the three are realities — the outward world, 
 the inward mind, and the ever-existing God. And 
 of each there is a proper and appropriate branch of 
 Knowledge. Physical Science for the one, Mental 
 Philosophy for another, and Natural Theology for 
 the One, Who is over all and before all — God, 
 blessed forever. 
 
 And these three indicate the limit of knowledge* 
 or science, properly so-called, that is obtainable by 
 natural means., If there be other objects or beings 
 — objects or beings not included in one or the other 
 
REALITIES AND FICTIONS. 
 
 291 
 
 of these three categories or classes — they must be 
 objects of revelation, and what we know of them, 
 even the fact of their existence, must have been re- 
 vealed to us from some Being Who has means of 
 knowledge that have not been vouchsafed to us. In 
 this category are, of course, angels, demons, and the 
 arch-demon himself. Their existence is and must 
 be with us during this life a matter of faith ; it can- 
 not be a matter of knowledge. 
 
 § 1 1. But besides this world of reality — the objects 
 that God has made — we have a world of fictions 
 of our own make. 
 
 In order to be better able to discriminate facts 
 from mere fictions it will be well to give another 
 class or series of tests founded upon and derived 
 from the logic of language. 
 
 In Grammar we have the Rules of Syntax by which 
 we are taught how to combine words so that they 
 may make that collective whole which we call a 
 sentence. 
 
 But, besides this, there are certain rules of the 
 Logic of Language which let us a little more deeply 
 into the thought of the author or, at least, indicate 
 to us some things that lie beneath the thought that 
 is expressed by the sentence, that the mere Rules of 
 Syntax do not disclose. 
 
 Language is, in more respects than one, like music. 
 I suppose that there is no sound of the human voice 
 that may not be regarded and made a note in, music 
 and put into such relations to other sounds that there 
 will not be both melody and harmony. 
 
2Q2 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 But however this may be in regard to music it is 
 certainly the case in regard to language. There is no 
 sound that may not be made a noun, the name of 
 something real or imagined, that may be made the 
 subject of conversation. 
 
 And so, too, if frhe words are put together in con- 
 
 , formity to certain rules of Grammar, making what we 
 
 call orthography, there is no one word or sound that 
 
 may not be so combined with others as to make a 
 
 sentence. 
 
 Now, in music there is, properly speaking, no 
 thought expressed. It arises from emotion or feeling 
 and excites emotions or feelings of various kinds, ac- 
 cording as it belongs to one or another of the well- 
 known classes, as dancing, martial music, devotional, 
 patriotic, etc. And it will, too, suggest, or, rather 
 awaken thought in us, the hearers, each according to its 
 kind, although it is quite likely that they are not at 
 all the thoughts that were in the mind of the com- 
 poser of the music, or are now in the minds of those 
 who perform it for our hearing. 
 
 And words that are arranged according to the 
 laws of Grammar may do precisely the same thing ; 
 they may be so selected and arranged as to produce 
 in the hearer or the reader precisely the thoughts 
 that were in the mind of the speaker or the com- 
 poser. But then, they may be so selected and 
 arranged as to fulfill every requirement of Grammar 
 and Rhetoric, too, and accomplish only what the 
 notes of music accomplish for the hearer. They set 
 us to thinking, doubtless ; but then, the thoughts 
 
REALITIES AND FICTIONS. 
 
 293 
 
 they excite in us are our own, the creations of our 
 own fancy, and by no means a reproduction of the 
 thoughts of him who composed the sentence — if he 
 had any. 
 
 The fundamental facts are, (i) that narnes of what- 
 ever class, indicate the things that we are speaking 
 about, and (2) all the other words are used merely 
 to indicate the relations that exist, or that we afifirm 
 to exist, between the objects denoted by the names. 
 "This paper lies on the table." "Birds y?y in the air 
 with the use of their wings," etc. 
 
 The second law is, that in order that a sentence 
 may be intelligible, the other words must indicate 
 a relation between the things that are spoken of, 
 which we have seen existing between them or can 
 suppose to exist. 
 
 Of these laws I will specify four, as all that we 
 need to consider for our present purpose : 
 
 (i) If the verb is simply "is" or "are," the predi- 
 cate must be either (i) a synonym of the subject, (2) 
 an adjective denoting some property of it, or (3) a 
 common noun denoting some class in which the sub- 
 ject is included. 
 
 (2) If the verb be active, anything, in fact, but the 
 verb, to be, the nominative must be a concrete term, 
 since it denotes (a) a substance that is in the mode 
 indicated, as, John sleeps, or is sleeping ; or (p) a 
 cause that performs the act, as, John runs, Peter 
 strikes, Birds fly. 
 
 (3) When the verb is transitive, the noun follow- 
 ing it must be a concrete term to denote a substance 
 
2Q4 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 acted upon, as, John makes a table, etc. The only 
 recognized exception to this rule is the case of what 
 is called "cognate accusatives," in which the noun is 
 cognate to the verb itself, as, to fight a battle, to 
 win a race, etc, 
 
 (4) In all cases of nouns that are connected by 
 copulative conjunctions the nouns must be of the 
 same logical quality, that is, if one of them is concrete, 
 all must be so, and if one of them is abstract the 
 other must be so. 
 
 Language, in conformity with these rules, is most 
 strictly literal; all else needs some transformation 
 before we can eliminate the fictions from the facts. 
 
 The only departure from these rules that we need 
 now to consider arises from the use of abstract terms 
 denoting mere properties and modes of things, in- 
 stead of concrete terms that denote things themselves 
 — by their properties. These departures constitute 
 what is called by the writers on rhetoric, metonomy 
 or metaphor. 
 
 § 12. We see a conspicuous illustration of this 
 last rule in the statement : " Water is composed of 
 oxygen, hydrogen and fluidity." It is composed of 
 oxygen and hydrogen and it is fluid ; but fluidity is 
 not an element in the same sense as the oxygen and 
 hydrogen are. 
 
 Plato's postulate in his Timceus offends against 
 this rule, "matter," generation," and " place." Gen- 
 eration is a process — with Plato the process of pass- 
 ing into specific forms, and this must be in some 
 place. 
 
REALITIES AND FICTIONS. 
 
 29s 
 
 In the same way Herbert Spencer's postulate (First 
 Principles, c. v.) offends against this law. He asks 
 for the five, Matter, Motion, Force, Time, and Space. 
 But motion is abstract. Matter in motion moves 
 with force and is, in a sense, force, and if it moves it 
 must move somewhere, in space, and at some mo- 
 ment in time. Hence the only real things that he pos- 
 tulates is matter in motion, or moving matter. 
 
 Hence the more recent speculators in this depart- 
 ment usually postulate two primordial elements. 
 Matter and Force. And in this connection " force" 
 must be something that is of an immaterial nature, 
 or, in other words, is not matter. But if it is not 
 matter and is a reality, a real cause or agent, it must 
 be spirit, as we know only the two forms of sub- 
 stantial existence or causal agents.' What >ve call 
 gravity, heat, light, electricity, etc., are now recog- 
 nized as no substances or real causes, but only as 
 "modes of motion." 
 
 We can always eliminate the fiction and find the 
 fact by the application of the following rule : 
 
 (i) Put the noun into its adjective form and then 
 place after it any name which the nature of the case 
 supposes, or will allow ; and if the meaning of the 
 sentence remains the same as before, the noun is con- 
 crete ; otherwise it is abstract. 
 
 We will take two cases for illustration. We say, 
 for example, " heat comes from the sun," " heated or 
 hot things come from the sun." Clearly, this is not 
 what we intend to say. Then we have, " heated- 
 ness " or "hot " is a mode produced by, indeed, as we 
 know, but not a thing, that comes from the sun. 
 
,296 
 
 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 Again, we say, "the mind thinks." Make the 
 changes, "the mental substance thinks." This is 
 just what was meant by the proposition in its other 
 form and was, in fact, the better form of the two. 
 
 As an illustration of this method in violation of 
 the fourth rule we may take the following : 
 An author, whose work I have before me, says, "that 
 in the, earliest geological times we must recognize 
 three forces or agents as especially at work and act- 
 ive — ^water, heat and pressure." Now, "water" is a 
 concrete term. For heat we may say, heated ob- 
 jects around and acting upon the changing mass ; 
 for "pressure," we have "heavily pressing masses" 
 resting upon, etc. But this statement of our author 
 is undoubtedly a condensed and forcible way of 
 stating the fact or condition of things at that early 
 time. 
 
 But there are cases in which the rule eliminates 
 the fiction indeed, but it leaves the sentence without 
 meaning ; wherefore we apply another rule. 
 
 (2) Suppose the abridged form to be not a meton- 
 omy, butjTather, a metaphor, which is, therefore, an 
 abridged comparison. As, for example, "Washing- 
 ton is to his country as a father to his family ;" 
 whence we speak of Washington as "the father of 
 his country. 
 
 Take, for illustration, "Sound travels at the rate 
 of 1 1 12 feet per second." But sound does not 
 travel; it has no feet. Neither does it "swim," or 
 fly ; it has neither fins nor wings. Shall we say, 
 then, "sonorous," or "sounding" bodies move at the 
 
REALITIES AND FICTIONS. 297 
 
 rate of 11 12 feet per second? Everybody sees that 
 that is not what we intend to say. But what we do 
 intend to say is, that it is the same in the observed 
 effect as if there were such a thing as sound, and it 
 moved by traveling, or some other way, at the rate 
 specified. But what is sound ? Perhaps we do not 
 know. What is flight ? What is heat ? What is 
 whiteness ? Perhaps we do not know. But we speak 
 of them as objects, or as active causes, when we 
 wish to speak of certain observed effects, the cause 
 of which we do not yet exactly know. Nor -do we 
 fully understand their mode of operation, if, indeed, 
 they are real causes and have any modes of opera- 
 tion at all. 
 
 § 13. The use of abstract terms, then, in ways and 
 places where the above four rules, or either of them, 
 requires concrete terms, in order to the perfect intel- 
 igibility of the causes, falls under one or the other 
 of two classes of cases. 
 
 (i) In the first case the abstract term is oftpn used 
 for a general term. As when we say, "humanity repu- 
 diates such a sentiment." Here, clearly, we want to 
 say, all men, and because they are men, and on 
 account of this very humanity, repudiate, etc. The 
 expression is not' only rhetorically good, but it is 
 excellent, graceful and emphatic. 
 
 But take another case. " History teaches," etc. 
 Here it is doubtful what is meant. Do we mean to 
 say that "historians," the writers of history, teach 
 so and so ? Or do we make a fiction, a sort of god- 
 dess, like those of ancient mythologies of the Aryan 
 
298 
 
 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 nations, who in her capacity of teacher tells so and 
 so ? This is a question that must be determined by 
 the context alone. 
 
 (2) But it leads to the second class of cases, those, 
 in fact, in which we clearly create a fiction. We 
 do this by objectifying some property. We say, 
 " heat expands all bodies." It is true that heated 
 things; or things wheri they are hot, expand, etc. 
 But that is not quite what we mean. Long before 
 the true nature of heat was known — even if it is 
 now known to be nothing more than a " mode of 
 motion " — the active mind of man had objectified it 
 into a fiction and supposed it to be, or, at least, 
 spoke of it as, a substantial reality — a thing that 
 could come and go — be radiated, conducted — act as 
 a cause, expand all bodies arid evaporate most of 
 them, at least, into vapor or invisible gas. 
 
 This process has, in fact, created most of the divin- 
 ities of the ancient mythologies. But we are chiefly 
 concerned with the fictions used in science. 
 
 These fictions may be of two kinds ; the one made 
 either to amuse or to deceive and mislead mankind 
 and the other as a mere convenience for expressing 
 or aiding towards expressing so much of a completed 
 bought or knowledge of a subject as we already 
 have in our mind. With the last class only shall we 
 have a few words in conclusion. 
 
 § 14. The full knowledge, the fully adequate con- 
 ception of any object or event, implies what Aristotle 
 grouped into his quaternoin of causes — efficient, 
 material, formal, and final, or, excepting final causes, 
 
REALITIES AND PTCTtONS. jQO 
 
 we have the other three. These may be stated more 
 m conformity with modern -modes of expression by 
 saying that it includes a knowledge of (i) the thing 
 itself ; (2) its cause ; (3) the law of its occurrence, 
 (4) its consequences. 
 
 The first of these elements that we know, in the 
 order of time, is the one I have stated as first, the 
 thing itself. The knowledge we have of this is 
 pretty nearly what Aristotle, and Bacon after him, 
 included in the second and third of their categories, 
 the matter it is made of and its specific character, or 
 the species it belongs to. The law, or the law of 
 its occurrence, we get only by knowing something, 
 at least, of the efficient cause, or cause, as we usually 
 designate it, the nature and character of that cause, 
 so as to know how it acts, and the reason why, or 
 the motive, if it be a moral agent. 
 
 Consequently we often know a fact by observation 
 before we have any idea of either its cause or its law. 
 And we want to express that fact. But it often 
 happens that we have no words to express the fact 
 alone, and nothing more. When we say " the sun 
 rises," we express the fact and indicate also a cause 
 or the theory of the fact. If we say, " I hear a 
 sound," I am really making sound something that may 
 not only be, but be heard. And our real meaning is, 
 that it is as if sound were something that is made 
 by the bell (if it be a bell that I have heard and am 
 speaking of) that passes through the air and en- 
 ters my ear. 
 
 But in this case I have made a fiction of sound. I 
 
,300 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 have objectified an abstraction, arid made use of it 
 as a fiction, by the help of .which I am enabled to go 
 farther towards a full and adequate expression of 
 what I actually know on the subject, than I could 
 otherwise have done in the then state of my knowl- 
 edge. 
 
 The history of language is instructive on this point. 
 The first form of verbs that was indicated by a 
 special termination, or pronunciation, as different 
 fom the active voice, was what was called the middle 
 voice. The active voice denoted action ; the mid- 
 dle denoted action returning upon the agent, as "I 
 strike myself." But in both cases alike, a noun which 
 was used as nominative to the verb denoted the 
 agent or cause of the action. 
 
 In the very earliest stages, we may believe that 
 the events that men had occasion to speak of were 
 such that they saw both the act and the agent, or 
 the agent in the act of perforiping it. But soon 
 they began to philosophize and speculate. And 
 then they became fully aware that there were a good 
 many events that they saw, the causes of which they 
 did not know, or in regard to which, at least, they 
 were in doubt. Hence the necessity for a passive 
 form of a verb, in which the act could be affirmed 
 without any assertion, or even so much as an impli- 
 cation concerning the cause or agent, as " I am 
 struck." 
 
 This was one way of relieving men of the diffi- 
 culty. But another was, the invention of fictions to 
 act as causes and "to receive the blows." This 
 
REALITIES AND FICTIONS. ,qj 
 
 method has led to many very serious consequences. 
 It has really filled the thoughts of men with unreal 
 objects, which often call for more effort to explain 
 and account for, than the real objects that we know 
 of themselves. How much time and thought and 
 how many words have been wasted on the discussion 
 of the nature of light, and theories, of heat, be- 
 ginning with Stahl's "phlogiston," including Black's 
 "latent heat" and Tyndall's "mode of motion," in 
 the department of Physical Science. 
 
 It is now considered "as the scientific idea" to use 
 Tyndall's expression, that the atoms and molecules 
 of matter act on each other, so that what we call the 
 forces of nature, as heat, light, electricity, magnet- 
 ism, gravity, and such like, are but fictions — conven- 
 ient fictions — invented and used as a means of 
 expressing — expressing, I say, and not explaining — 
 the phenomena observed in the case. It is as 
 though there were a reality which we call heat, that 
 comes from the sun, is radiated into space, warms all 
 things it falls upon, etc., etc. 
 
 The first use of any noun could hardly have been 
 otherwise than as a proper name for an individual 
 thing. But the observance of resemblances would 
 very soon lead to the application of that noun to 
 other similar objects and then it would become a 
 common noun denoting the class ; and the classifica- 
 tion which led to that use of the word, could not 
 have been based on anything but some property 
 that was essential to the object. 
 
 But, as it must have been observed, the quality of 
 
302 
 
 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 the causation of objects, so to call it, often depends 
 upon qualities, properties, or conditions that are but 
 accidental to the object that acts as cause. Thus, 
 we can see objects, that is, they act on the eye as 
 causes of our sensations, only on condition that they 
 are luminous. We can feel them only on condition 
 that they are hard. And, as hot, they affect the 
 objects around them in one way, while as cold they 
 produce very different effects. 
 
 If, now, we turn to "the psychological sciences, we 
 find that the same process has been going on ; and 
 not only so, it has furnished a large share of the 
 phraseology that is now in common use. 
 
 Take the words " idea," " conception," notion,"' 
 " concept," and such like, and I think we should 
 now have no difficulty in seeing, as Reid and Cousin 
 said of them, that they are but fictions. " Thefe is 
 nothing real," says Cousin, " but bodies and minds, 
 with theirthoughts and modes." " Ideas," " notions," 
 etc., are but fictions used to denote thoughts and we 
 could not, very well, discuss the questions that arise 
 in our mental philosophy, nay, we could not make 
 the statements that ordinary consideration calls for 
 without using these fictions. 
 
 [Will the reader just cast his eye over this last 
 sentence I have written and see how many fictions 
 I have used ? The words " thoughts," " questions," 
 " mental philosdpy," " conversation," are, I think, of 
 this kind.] 
 
 The next class of fictions that occurs in this de- 
 partment of science are the terms used to denote the 
 
REALITIES AND FICTIONS. ^03 
 
 so-called mental faculties. We speak of " the mem- 
 ory," " the imagination," " the will," etc., as we do 
 of the organs of the body, the heart, the lungs, and 
 such like. But everybody knows that such they are 
 not. The words are mere objectifications of abstrac- 
 tions — acts of reasoning, willing, etc. And, although 
 their use in this form, with the article before them, 
 suggests an error in regard to their nature, we could 
 not get along very well in our intellectual philosophy 
 without this use of them. 
 
 Now, besides the two classes of fictions named, 
 " the forces " of nature and the " faculties " of the 
 mind, the necessities of language led men to elevate 
 their accidental properties and conditions into fic- 
 tions, such as I have been describing ; and heat, light, 
 etc., in the department of the physical sciences and 
 imagination, reason, memory, etc., among the mental 
 sciences, are among the results. 
 
 § 15. But beyond this there seems to be really no 
 limit to the invention and use of fictions in this way. 
 In some cases, indeed, we use the abstract term to 
 denote the genus. Thus, we often say, "humanity," 
 as I have already said, when we mean all mankind, 
 the whole human race. And so, many persons say 
 — for the sake of elegance, I suppose — "personality," 
 when what they mean is, "person." But beyond 
 this we are constantly creating and using fictions of 
 another kind, or, rather, of the same kind in a dif- 
 ferent form. Thus, we say, "science has shown us," 
 etc., "history teaches us," "speculation has led," "in- 
 duction," or "demonstration, has proved," etc., etc. 
 
204 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 That is, in accordance with a rule already laid down, 
 the effect which we have noticed and wish to in- 
 dicate is the same as if these fictions, science, history, 
 etc., etc., were realities and act as causes, and so act- 
 ing have produced the effects which are thus ascribed 
 to them. 
 
 So, too, with the word, " law." We find it con- 
 venient often to speak of law, not merely as a rule 
 or mode of action, but as an agent or power that can 
 make things act in this or that way. In such cases 
 we make law a fiction, as seen on the instant we fix 
 our thoughts on the subject. Thus, an eminent 
 Scotch Professor, in a work now before me, says : 
 " Give .the laws of God free play. They work out 
 this conclusion for themselves ; and when they work 
 it out, the effect will be permanent." 
 
 And, I suppose, we are all familiar with that oft 
 quoted passage of Hooker : " Of law there can 
 be no less acknowledged, than that her seat is 
 the bosom of God, her voice the harmony of the 
 world ; all things in heaven and earth do her homage, 
 the very least as feeling her care, and the greatest 
 as not exempt from her power; both angels and 
 men and creatures of what condition soever, 
 though cast in a different sort and manner, yet all, 
 with uniform consent, addressing her as the mother 
 of their peace and joy." 
 
 If we pass over to the Mental Sciences, the two 
 great fictions are ideas and mental faculties. 
 
 I think it will be conceded now — or if not conceded 
 now, it will be universally acknowledged very soon 
 
REALITIES AND FICTIONS. 
 
 305 
 
 — that ideas in the sense of something in the mind 
 so as to be spoken of as entities, objects of transitive 
 verbs and subjects of active verbs, are nothing but 
 convenient fictions. It is in most all respects as if 
 God had actually put their resemblance of things 
 into our mind before birth or soon after, according to 
 the doctrine of Plato and the Mediaeval Realists ; or 
 as if the mind had made them according to its own 
 laws and of " matter" sent in through the senses or 
 obtained from the mind itself in consciousness and 
 reflection, according to Locke, or formed them out 
 of nothing and a priori, according to Cousin and 
 his school, when, in fact, they are but fictions and 
 there is nothing to be accounted for in this way — 
 nothing whose origin need occupy a moment's at- 
 tentions, for they had no origin, and have no exist- 
 anywhere. 
 
 So, too, it was very natural as soon as men began 
 to study psychology in the inductive way of observ- 
 ation, analysis, and generalization, that they should 
 think of it and speak of the mind as made up of 
 faculties, just as the body is made up of organs, 
 heart and lungs, liver and stomach. Besides this, it 
 was necessary to speak of the acts of the mind in 
 groups and classes, as perception, memory, imagina- 
 tion, etc. These became, therefore, most conven- 
 ient fictions — almost, if not quite, indispensable to 
 the discussion of facts and questions of mental 
 philosophy. 
 
 But we must distinctly notice the fact that they 
 are fictions, both "faculties" and "ideas," that the 
 
3o6 THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 mind acts as one uncompounded whole, now in this 
 way and now in that way ; and that what we actu- 
 ally do when we "acquire ideas," as we express it, is 
 to become knowing, or wise ; the change is in our- 
 selves, the mode of our existing and acting, as it is 
 with the body when we are sick and get well, or are 
 hungry and fahiished, and are satisfied by eating the 
 necessary food. Doubtless the food is a reality and 
 we undergo the change by eating it and taking it 
 into our bodies. But so are the objects around us 
 and the mind within us ; and we get knowledge, 
 become knowing, or wise, by beholding them, think- 
 ing about them, and reflecting upon them. 
 
 I have already intimated that the polytheism and 
 mythology of the Aryan people at least originated 
 in just this way — the objectification of some ob- 
 served, but not fully understood, phenomenon and 
 quite as much for scientific as for religious purposes. 
 Just as that has passed away in the progress of scien- 
 tific discovery, so, as we progress in the discovery of 
 the real causes and their laws or modes o-f action, so 
 these fictions will be eliminated from our Science, 
 and either relegated to the domain of acknowledged 
 fiction, or retained as mere convenient, though well- 
 understood, modes of expressing facts. 
 
 But the world of reality, wlien our thoughts are 
 cleared from all fictions, will be found to contain, so 
 far as men, knowledge and philosophy are concerned 
 or can carry us, only the material objects that our 
 eyes can see or our hands can handle, and the mifids 
 or souls that we are conscious of within us and that 
 
REALITIES AND FICTIONS. 
 
 307 
 
 we can take note of in our fellow creatures by our 
 conversation with them in the acts that they perform 
 for our observance ; and the God, who is One over 
 all, the Creator of all things and the Being on whom 
 all things depend for their continuance in being, the 
 God whom we do, or should, worship and obey, and 
 who is our best Friend here, and our Final Judge 
 and Reward hereafter. 
 
.x^"- 
 
 ^^1 
 
 l«i._