Consequently, the attribute of infinity is not predicable either of 'diminution without limit,' 'augmentation without limit,' or 'endless approximation to a fixed limit,' for these mathematical processes continue only as we continue them, consist of steps successively accomplished, and are limited by the very fact of this serial incompletion.
"We can not forbear pointing out an important application of these results to the Critical Philosophy. Kant bases each of his famous four antinomies on the demand of pure reason for unconditioned totality in a regressive series of conditions. This, he says, must be realized either in an absolute first of the series, conditioning all the other members, but itself unconditioned, or else in the absolute infinity of the series without a first; but reason is utterly unable, on account of mutual contradiction, to decide in which of the two alternatives the unconditioned is found. By the principles we have laid down, however, the problem is solved. The absolute infinity of a series is a contradictionin adjecto. As every number, although immeasurably and inconceivably great, is impossible unlessunityis given as its basis, so every series, being itself a number, is impossible unless afirst termis given as a commencement. Through a first term alone is the unconditioned possible; that is, if it does not exist in a first term, it can not exist at all; of the two alternatives, therefore, one altogether disappears, and reason is freed from the dilemma of a compulsory yet impossible decision. Even if it should be allowed that the series has no first term, but has originatedab œterno, it must always at each instant have alast term; the series, as a whole, can not be infinite, and hence can not, as Kant claims it can, realize in its wholeness unconditioned totality. Since countless terms forever remain unreached, the series is forever limited by them. Kant himself admits that itcan never be completed, and is only potentially infinite; actually, therefore, by his own admission, it is finite. But a last term implies a first, as absolutely as one end of a string implies the other; the only possibility of an unconditioned lies in Kant's first alternative, and if, as he maintainsReason must demand it, she can not hesitate in her decisions. Thatnumber is a limitationis no new truth, and that every series involves number is self-evident; and it is surprising that so radical a criticism on Kant's system should never have suggested itself to his opponents. Even the so-calledmomentsof time can not be regarded as constituting a real series, for a series can not be real except through its divisibility into members whereas time is indivisible, and its partition into moments is a conventional fiction. Exterior limitability and interior divisibility result equally from the possibility of discontinuity. Exterior illimitability and interior indivisibility are simple phases of the same attribute ofnecessary continuitycontemplated under different aspects. From this principle flows another upon which it is impossible to lay too much stress, namely;illimitability and indivisibility, infinity and unity, reciprocally necessitate each other. Hence the Quantitative Infinites must be also Units, and the division of space and time, implying absolute contradiction, is not even cogitable as an hypothesis.220
"The wordinfinite, therefore, in mathematical usage, as applied toprocessand toquantity, has a two-fold signification. An infinite process is one which we can continueas long as we please, but which exists solely in our continuance of it.221An infinite quantity is one which exceeds our powers of mensuration or of conception, but which, nevertheless, has bounds and limits in itself.222Hence the possibility of relation among infinite quantities, and of different orders of infinities. If the wordsinfinite, infinity, infinitesimal, should be banished from mathematical treatises and replaced by the wordsindefinite, indefinity,andindefinitesimal, mathematics would suffer no loss, while, by removing a perpetual source of confusion, metaphysics would get great gain."
Footnote 220:(return)By the application of these principles the writer in the "North American Review" completely dissolves the antinomies by which Hamilton seeks to sustain his "Philosophy of the Conditioned." See "North American Review," 1864, pp. 432-437.
Footnote 221:(return)De Morgan, "Diff. and Integ. Calc." p. 9.
Footnote 222:(return)Id., ib., p. 25.
The above must be regarded as a complete refutation of theposition taken byHume, to wit, that the idea of nature eternally existing in a state of order, without a cause other than the eternally inherent laws of nature, is no more self-contradictory than the idea of an eternally-existing and infinite mind, who originated this order--a God existing without a cause. The eternal and infinite Mind is indivisible and illimitable; nature, in its totality, as well as in its individual parts, has interior divisibility, and exterior limitability. The infinity of God is not aquantitative, but aqualitativeinfinity. The miscalled eternity and infinity of nature is anindefiniteextension and protension in time and space, and, asquantitative, must necessarily be limited and measurable, thereforefinite.
The universe of sense-perception and sensuous imagination is a phenomenal universe, a genesis, a perpetual becoming, an entrance into existence, and an exit thence; the Theist is, therefore, perfectly justified in regarding it as disqualified forself-existence, and in passing behind it for the Supreme Entity that needs no cause. Phenomena demand causation, entities dispense with it. No one asks for a cause of thespacewhich contains the universe, or of the Eternity on the bosom of which it floats. Everywhere the line is necessarily drawn upon the same principle; that entitiesmayhave self-existence, phenomenamusthave a cause.223
Footnote 223:(return)"Science, Nescience, and Faith," in Martineau's "Essays," p. 206.
IV.Psychological analysis clearly attests that in the phenomena of consciousness there are found elements or principles which, in their regular and normal development, transcend the limits of consciousness, and attain to the knowledge of Absolute Being, Absolute Reason, Absolute Good, i.e., GOD.
The analysis of thought clearly reveals that the mind of man is in possession of ideas, notions, beliefs, principles (ase.g., the idea of space, duration, cause, substance, unity, infinity), which are not derived from sensation and experience, and which can not be drawn out of sensation and experience by any process of generalization. These ideas have this incontestable peculiarity,as distinguished from all the phenomena of sensation, that, whilst the latter are particular, contingent, and relative, the former areuniversal,necessary, andabsolute. As an example, and a proof of the reality and validity of this distinction, take the ideas ofbodyand ofspace, the former unquestionably derived from experience, the latter supplied by reason alone. "I ask you, can not you conceive this book to be destroyed? Without doubt you can. And can not you conceive the whole world to be destroyed, and no matter whatever in existence? You can. For you, constituted as you are, the supposition of the non-existence of bodies implies no contradiction. And what do we call the idea of a thing which we can conceive of as non-existing? We call it acontingentandrelativeidea. But if you can conceive this book to be destroyed, all bodies destroyed, can you suppose space to be destroyed? You can not. It is in the power of man's thought to conceive the non-existence of bodies; it is not in the power of man's thought to conceive the non-existence of space. The idea of space is thus anecessaryandabsoluteidea."224
Footnote 224:(return)Cousin's "Hist. of Philos.," vol. ii. p. 214.
Take, again, the ideas ofeventandcause. The idea of an event is acontingentidea; it is the idea of something which might or might not have happened. There is no impossibility or contradiction in either supposition. The idea of cause is anecessaryidea. An event being given, the idea of cause is necessarily implied. An uncaused event is an impossible conception. The idea of cause is also auniversalidea extending to all events, actual or conceivable, and affirmed by all minds. It is a rational fact, attested by universal consciousness, that we can not think of an event transpiring without a cause; of a thing being the author of its own existence; of something generated by and out of nothing.Ex nihilo nihilis a universal law of thought and of things. This universal "law of causality" is clearly distinguishable from ageneraltruth reached by induction. For example, it is a very general truth that, during twenty-four hours, day is succeeded by night. But this is nota necessary truth, neither is it a universal truth. It does not extend to all known lands, as, for example, to Nova Zembla. It does not hold true of the other planets. Nor does it extend to all possible lands. We can easily conceive of lands plunged in eternal night, or rolling in eternal day. With another system of worlds, one can conceive other physics, but one can not conceive other metaphysics. It is impossible to imagine a world in which the law of causality does not reign. Here, then, we have one absolute principle (among others which may be enumerated), the existence and reality of which is revealed, not by sensation, but by reason--a principle which transcends the limits of experience, and which, in its regular and logical development, attains the knowledge of the Absolute Cause--the First Cause of all causes--God.
Thus it is evident that the human mind is in possession of two distinct orders of primitive cognitions,--one, contingent, relative, and phenomenal; the other universal, necessary, and absolute. These two distinct orders of cognition presuppose the existence in man of two distinct faculties or organs of knowledge--sensation, external and internal, which perceives the contingent, relative, and phenomenal, andreason, which apprehends the universal, necessary, and absolute. The knowledge which is derived from sensation and experience is calledempiricalknowledge, or knowledgeà posteriori, because subsequent to, and consequent upon, the exercise of the faculties of observation. The knowledge derived from reason is calledtranscendentalknowledge, or knowledgeà priori, because it furnishes laws to, and governs the exercise of the faculties of observation and thought, and is not the result of their exercise. The sensibility brings the mind into relation with thephysicalworld, the reason puts mind in communication with theintelligibleworld--the sphere ofà prioriprinciples, of necessary and absolute truths, which depend upon neither the world nor the conscious self, and which reveal to man the existence of the soul, nature, and God. Every distinct fact of consciousness is thus at oncepsychologicalandontological, and contains thesethree fundamental ideas, which we can not go beyond, or cancel by any possible analysis--thesoul, with its faculties;matter, with its qualities;God, with his perfections.
We do not profess to be able to give a clear explication and complete enumeration of all the ideas of reason, and of the necessary and universal principles or axioms which are grounded on these ideas. This is still the grand desideratum of metaphysical science. Its achievement will give us a primordial logic, which shall be as exact in its procedure and as certain in its conclusions as the mathematical sciences. Meantime, it may be affirmed that philosophic analysis, in the person of Plato, Aristotle, Kant, and Cousin, has succeeded in disengaging suchà prioriideas, and formulating such principles and laws of thought, as lead infallibly to the cognition of theAbsolute Being, theAbsolute Reason, theAbsolute Good, that is, GOD.
It would carry us too far beyond our present design were we to exhibit, in each instance, the process ofimmediate abstractionby which the contingent and relative element of knowledge is eliminated, and the necessary and absolute principle is disengaged. We shall simply state the method, and show its application by a single illustration.
There are unquestionablytwosorts of abstraction: 1. "Comparativeabstraction, operating upon several real objects, and seizing their resemblances in order to form an abstract idea, which is collective and mediate; collective, because different individuals concur in its formation; mediate, because it requires several intermediate operations." This is the method of the physical sciences, which comprises comparison, abstraction, and generalization. The result in this process is the attainment of ageneraltruth. 2. "Immediateabstraction, not comparative; operating not upon several concretes, but upon a single one, eliminating and neglecting its individual and variable part, and disengaging the absolute part, which it raises at once to its pure form." The parts to be eliminated in a concrete cognition are, first, the quality of the object, and the circumstancesunder which the absolute unfolds itself; and secondly, the quality of the subject, which perceives but does not constitute it. The phenomena of the me and the not-me being eliminated, the absolute remains. This is the process of rational psychology, and the result obtained is auniversalandnecessarytruth.
"Let us take, as an example, the principle of cause. To be able to say that the event I see must have a cause, it is not indispensable to have seen several events succeed each other. The principle which compels me to pronounce this judgment is already complete in the first as in the last event; it can not change in respect to its object, it can not change in itself; it neither increases nor decreases with the greater or less number of applications. The only difference that it is subject to in regard to us is that we apply it, whether we remark it or not, whether we disengage it or not from its particular application. The question is not to eliminate the particularity of the phenomenon wherein it appears to us, whether it be the fall of a leaf or the murder of a man, in order immediately to conceive, in a general and abstract manner, the necessity of a cause for every event that begins to exist. Here it is not because I am the same, or have been affected in the same manner in several different cases, that I have come to this general and abstract conception. A leaf falls; at the same moment I think, I believe, I declare that this falling of the leaf must have a cause. A man has been killed; at the same instant I believe, I proclaim that this death must have a cause. Each one of these facts contains particular and variable circumstances, and something universal and necessary, to wit, both of them can not but have a cause. Now I am perfectly able to disengage the universal from the particular in regard to the first fact as well as in regard to the second fact, for the universal is in the first quite as well as in the second. In fact, if the principle of causality is not universal in the first fact, neither will it be in the second, nor in the third, nor in the thousandth; for a thousandthis not nearer than the first to the infinite--to absolute universality. It is the same, and still more evidently, withnecessity. Pay particular attention to this point; if necessity is not in the first fact, it can not be in any; for necessity can not be formed little by little, and by successive increments. If, on the first murder I see, I do not exclaim that this murder had necessarily a cause, at the thousandth murder, although it shall be proved that all the others had causes, I shall have the right to think that this murder has, very probably, also a cause, but I shall never have the right to say that itnecessarilyhad a cause. But when universality and necessity are already in a single case, that case is sufficient to entitle me to deduce them from it,"225and we may add, also, to affirm them of every other event that may transpire.
Footnote 225:(return)Cousin, "True, Beautiful, and Good," pp. 57, 58.
The followingschemawill exhibit the generally accepted results of this method of analysis applied to the phenomena of thought:
(i.)Universal and necessary principles, or primitive judgments from whence is derived the cognition of Absolute Being.
1.The principle of Substance; thus enounced--"every quality supposes asubjector real being."
2.The principle of Causality; "every thing that begins to be supposes apoweradequate to its production,i.e., an efficient cause."
3.The principle of Unity; "all differentiation and plurality supposes an incomposite unity; all diversity, an ultimate and indivisible identity."
4.The principle of the Unconditioned; "the finite supposes the infinite, the dependent supposes the self-existent, the temporal supposes the eternal."
(ii.)Universal and necessary principles, or primitive judgments, from which is derived the cognition of the Absolute Reason.
1.The principle of Ideality; thus enounced, "facts of order--definite proportion, symmetrical arrangement, numericalrelation, geometrical form--having a commencement in time, present themselves to us as the expression ofIdeas, and refer us toMindas their analogon, and exponent, and source."
2.The principle of Consecution; "the uniform succession and progressive evolution of new existences, according to fixed definite archetypes, suppose a unity ofthought--a comprehensiveplanembracing all existence."
3.The principle of Intentionality or Final Cause; "every means supposes anendcontemplated, and a choice and adaptation of means to secure theend."
4.The principle of Personality; "intelligent purpose and voluntary choice imply a personal agent."
(iii.)Universal and necessary principles, or primitive judgments, from whence is derived the cognition of the Absolute Good.
1.The principle of Moral Law; thus enounced, "the action of a voluntary agent necessarily characterized asrightorwrong, supposes an immutable and universal standard of right--an absolute moral Law."
2.The principle of Moral Obligation; "the feeling of obligation to obey a law of duty supposes aLawgiverby whose authority we are obliged."
3.The principle of Moral Desert; "the feeling of personal accountability and of moral desert supposes ajudgeto whom we must give account, and who shall determine our award."
4.The pnnciple of Retribution; "retributive issues in this life, and the existence in all minds of an impersonal justice which demands that, in the final issue, every being shall receive his just deserts, suppose a being ofabsolute justicewho shall render to every man according to his works."
A more profound and exhaustive analysis may perhaps resolve all these primitive judgments into one universal principle or law, which Leibnitz has designated "The principle or law of sufficient reason," and which is thus enounced--there must be an ultimate and sufficient reason why any thing exists, andwhy it is, rather than otherwise; that is, if any thing begins to be, something else must be supposed as the adequate ground, and reason, and cause of its existence; or again, to state the law in view of our present discussion, "if the finite universe, with its existing order and arrangement, had a beginning, there must be an ultimate and sufficient reason why it exists, and why it is as it is, rather than otherwise." In view of one particular class of phenomena, or special order of facts, this "principle of sufficient reason" may be varied in the form of its statement, and denominated "the principle of substance," "the principle of causality," "the principle of intentionality," etc.; and, it may be, these are but specific judgments under the one fundamental and generic law of thought which constitutes themajorpremise of every Theistic syllogism.
These fundamental principles, primitive judgments, axioms, or necessary and determinate forms of thought, exist potentially or germinally in all human minds; they are spontaneously developed in presence of the phenomena of the universe, material and mental; they govern the original movement of the mind, even when not appearing in consciousness in their pure and abstract form; and they compel us to affirma permanent beingorrealitybehind all phenomena--apoweradequate to the production of change, back of all events; apersonal Mind, as the explanation of all the facts of order, and uniform succession, and regular evolution; and apersonal LawgiverandRighteous Judgeas the ultimate ground and reason of all the phenomena of the moral world; in short, to affirman Unconditioned Cause of all finite and secondary causes; a First Principle of all principles; an Ultimate Reason of all reasons; an immutable Uncreated Justice, the living light of conscience; a King immortal, eternal, invisible, the only wise God, the ruler of the world and man.
Our position, then, is, that the idea of God is revealed to man in the natural and spontaneous development of his intelligence, and that the existence of a Supreme Reality corresponding to, and represented by this idea, is rationally and logicallydemonstrable, and therefore justly entitled to take rank as part of our legitimate, valid, and positiveknowledge.
And now from this position, which we regard as impregnable, we shall be prepared more deliberately and intelligibly to contemplate the various assaults which are openly or covertly made upon the doctrine thatGod is cognizable by human reason.
"The abnegation of reason is not the evidence of faith, but the confession of despair."--LIGHTFOOT.
At the outset of this inquiry we attempted a hasty grouping of the various parties and schools which are arrayed against the doctrine that God is cognizable by human reason, and in general terms we sought to indicate the ground they occupy.
Viewed from a philosophical stand-point, we found one party marshalled under the standard of Idealism; another of Materialism and, again, another of Natural Realism. Regarded in their theological aspects, some are positive Atheists; others, strange to say, are earnest Theists; whilst others occupy a position of mere Indifferentism. Yet, notwithstanding the remarkable diversity, and even antagonism of their philosophical and theological opinions, they are all agreed in denying to reason any valid cognition of God.
The survey of Natural Theism we have completed in the previous chapter will enable us still further to indicate the exact points against which their attacks are directed, and also to estimate the character and force of the weapons employed. With or without design, they are, each in their way, assailing one or other of the principles upon which we rest our demonstration of the being of God. As we proceed, we shall find that Mill and the Constructive Idealists are really engaged in undermining "theprinciple of substance;" their doctrine is a virtual denial of all objective realities answering to our subjective ideas of matter, mind, and God. The assaults of Comteand the Materialists of his school are mainly directed against "the principle of causality" and "the principle of intentionality;" they would deny to man all knowledge of causes, efficient and final. The attacks of Hamilton and his school are directed against "theprinciple of the unconditioned," his philosophy of the conditioned is a plausible attempt to deprive man of all power to think the Infinite and Perfect, to conceive the Unconditioned and Ultimate Cause; whilst the Dogmatic Theologians are borrowing, and recklessly brandishing, the weapons of all these antagonists, and, in addition to all this, are endeavoring to show the insufficiency of "the principle of unity" and the weakness and invalidity of "themoral principles," which are regarded by us as relating man to a Moral Personality, and as indicating to him the existence of a righteous God, the ruler of the world. It is necessary, therefore, that we should concentrate our attention yet more specifically on these separate lines of attack, and attempt a minuter examination of the positions assumed by each, and of the arguments by which they are seeking, directly or indirectly, to invalidate the fundamental principles of Natural Theism.
(i.)We commence with the Idealistic School, of which John Stuart Mill must be regarded as the ablest living representative.
The doctrine of this school is that all our knowledge is necessarily confined tomentalphenomena; that is, "tofeelingsor states of consciousness," and "the succession and co-existence, the likeness and unlikeness between these feelings or states of consciousness."226All our general notions, all our abstract ideas, are generated out of these feelings227by "inseparable association," which registers their inter-relations of recurrence, co-existence, and resemblance. The results of this inseparable association constitute at once the sum total and the absolute limit of all possible cognition.
Footnote 226:(return)J. S. Mill, "Logic," vol. i. p. 83 (English edition).
Footnote 227:(return)In the language of Mill, every thing of which we are conscious is called "feeling." "Feeling, in the proper sense of the term, is a genus of which Sensation, Emotion, and Thought are the subordinate species."--"Logic," bk. i. ch. iii. § 3.
It is admitted by Mill that oneapparentelement in this total result is the general conviction that our own existence is really distinct from the external world, and that the personalegohas an essential identity distinct from the fleeting phenomena of sensation. But this persuasion is treated by him as a mere illusion--a leap beyond the original datum for which we have no authority. Of a real substance or substratum called Mind, of a real substance or substratum called Matter, underlying the series of feelings--"the thread of consciousness"--we do know and can know nothing; and in affirming the existence of such substrata we are making a supposition we can not possibly verify. The ultimate datum of speculative philosophy is not "I think," but simply "Thoughts or feelings are." The belief in a permanent subject or substance, called matter, as the ground and plexus of physical phenomena, and of a permanent subject or substance, called mind, as the ground and plexus of mental phenomena, is not a primitive and original intuition οf reason. It is simply through the action of the principle of association among the ultimate phenomena, called feelings, that this (erroneous) separation of the phenomena into two orders or aggregates--one called mind or self; the other matter, or not self--takes place; and without this curdling or associating process no such notion or belief could have been generated. "The principle of substance," as an ultimate law of thought, is, therefore, to be regarded as a transcendental dream.
But now that the notion ofmindorself, and ofmatteror notself, do exist as common convictions of our race, what is philosophy to make of them? After a great many qualifications and explanations, Mr. Mill has, in his "Logic," summed up his doctrine of Constructive Idealism in the following words: "As body is the mysterioussomethingwhich excites the mind to feel, so mind is the mysterioussomethingwhich feels and thinks."228But what is this "mysterious something?" Is it a reality, an entity, a subject; or is it a shadow, an illusion, a dream? In his "Examination of Sir Wm. Hamilton's Philosophy," whereit may be presumed, we have his maturest opinions, Mr. Mill, in still more abstract and idealistic phraseology, attempts an answer. Here he defines matter as "a permanent possibility of sensation,"229and mind as "a permanent possibility of feeling."230And "the belief in these permanent possibilities," he assures us, "includes all that is essential or characteristic in the belief in substance."231"If I am asked," says he, "whether I believe in matter, I ask whether the questioner accepts this definition of it. If he does, I believe in matter: and so do all Berkeleians. In any other sense than this, I do not. But I affirm with confidence that this conception of matter includes the whole meaning attached to it by the common world, apart from philosophical, and sometimes from theological theories. The reliance of mankind on the real existence of visible and tangible objects, means reliance on the reality and permanence of possibilities of visual and tactual sensations, when no sensations are actually experienced."232"Sensations," however, let it be borne in mind, are but a subordinate species of the genus feeling.233They are "states of consciousness"--phenomena of mind, not of matter; and we are still within the impassable boundary of ideal phenomena; we have yet no cognition of an external world. The sole cosmical conception, for us, is still a succession of sensations, or states of consciousness. This is the one phenomenon which we can not transcend in knowledge, do what we will; all else is hypothesis and illusion. Thenon-ego, after all, then, may be but a mode in which the mind represents to itself the possible modifications of theego.
Footnote 228:(return)"Logic," bk. i, ch. iii. § 8.
Footnote 229:(return)"Examination of Sir Wm. Hamilton's Philosophy," vol. i. p. 243.
Footnote 230:(return)Ibid., vol. i. p. 253.
Footnote 231:(return)Ibid., vol. i. p. 246.
Footnote 232:(return)Ibid., vol. i. pp. 243, 244.
Footnote 233:(return)"Logic," bk. i. ch. iii. § 3.
And now that matter, as a real existence, has disappeared under Mr. Mill's analysis, what shall be said of mind or self? Is there any permanent subject or real entity underlying the phenomena of feeling? In feeling, is there a personal self that feels, thinks, and wills? It would seem not. Mind, as well as matter, resolves itself into a "series of feelings," varying and fugitive from moment to moment, in a sea of possibilities offeeling. "My mind," says Mill, "is but a series of feelings, or, as it has been called, a thread of consciousness, however supplemented by believed possibilities of consciousness, which are not, though they might be, realized."234
Footnote 234:(return)"Examination of Sir Wm. Hamilton's Philosophy," vol. i. p. 254.
The ultimate fact of the phenomenal world, then, in the philosophy of Mill, is neither matter nor mind, but feelings or states of consciousness associated together by the relations, amongst themselves, of recurrence, co-existence, and resemblance. The existence of self, except as "a series of feelings;" the existence of any thing other than self, except as a feigned unknown cause of sensation, is rigorously denied. Mr. Mill does not content himself with saying that we are ignorant of thenatureof matter and mind, but he asserts we are ignorant of theexistenceof matter and mind as real entities.
The bearing of this doctrine of Idealism upon Theism and Theology will be instantly apparent to the reader. If I am necessarily ignorant of the existence of the external world, and of the personalego, or real self, I must be equally ignorant of the existence of God. If one is a mere supposition, an illusion, so the other must be. Mr. Mill, however, is one of those courteous and affable writers who are always conscious, as it were, of the presence of their readers, and extremely careful not to shock their feelings or prejudices; besides, he has too much conscious self-respect to avow himself an atheist. As a speculative philosopher, he would rather regard Theism and Theology as "open questions," and he satisfies himself with saying, if you believe in the existence of God, or in Christianity, I do not interfere with you. "As a theory," he tells us that his doctrine leaves the evidence of the existence of God exactly as it was before. Supposing me to believe that the Divine mind is simply the series of the Divine thoughts and feelings prolonged through eternity, that would be, at any rate, believing God's existence to beas real as my own235. And as for evidence, the argument of Paley's 'Natural Theology,' or, for that matter, of his 'Evidences of Christianity,' would stand exactly as it does.
The design argument is drawn from the analogies of human experience. From the relation which human works bear to human thoughts and feelings, it infers a corresponding relation between works more or less similar, but superhuman, and superhuman thoughts and feelings.Ifit prove these, nobody but a metaphysician needs care whether or not it proves a mysterioussubstratumfor them.236The argument from design, it seems to us, however, would have no validity if there be no external world offering marks of design. If the external world is only a mode of feeling, a series of mental states, then our notion of the Divine Existence may be only "an association of feelings"--a mode of Self. And if we have no positive knowledge of a real self as existing, and God's existence is no more "real than our own," then the Divine existence stands on a very dubious and uncertain foundation. It can have no very secure hold upon the human mind, and certainly has no claim to be regarded as a fundamental and necessary belief. That it has a very precarious hold upon the mind of Mr. Mill, is evident from the following passage in his article on "Later Speculations of A. Comte."237"We venture to think that a religion may exist without a belief in a God, and that a religion without a God may be, even to Christians, an instructive and profitable object of contemplation."
And now let us close Mr. Mill's book, and, introverting our mental gaze, interrogateconsciousness, the verdict of which, even Mr. Mill assures us, is admitted on all hands to be a decision without appeal.238
Footnote 235:(return)"Examination of Sir Wm. Hamilton's Philosophy," vol. i. p. 254.
Footnote 236:(return)"Examination of Sir Wm. Hamilton's Philosophy," vol. i. p. 259.
Footnote 237:(return)Westminster Review, July, 1835 (American edition), p. 3.
Footnote 238:(return)"Examination of Sir Wm. Hamilton's Philosophy," vol. i. p. 161.
1. We have an ineradicable, and, as it would seem, an intuitive faith in the real existence of an external world distinct from our sensations, and also of a personal self, which we call "I," "myself," as distinct from "my sensations," and "my feelings." We find, also, that this is confessedly the common belief of mankind. There have been a few philosophers whohave affected to treat this belief as a "mere prejudice," an "illusion;" but they have never been able, practically, so to regard and treat it. Their language, just as plainly as the language of the common people, betrays their instinctive faith in an outer world, and proves their utter inability to emancipate themselves from this "prejudice," if such it may please them to call it. In view of this acknowledged fact, we ask--Does the term "permanent possibility of sensations" exhaust all that is contained in this conception of an external world? This evening Irememberthat at noonday I beheld the sun, and experienced a sensation of warmth whilst exposing myself to his rays; and Iexpectthat to-morrow, under the same conditions, I shall experience the same sensations. I nowrememberthat last evening I extinguished my light and attempted to leave my study, but, coming in contact with the closed door, experienced a sense of resistance to my muscular effort, by a solid and extended body exterior to myself; and Iexpectthat this evening, under the same circumstances, I shall experience the same sensations. Now, does a belief in "a permanent possibility of sensations" explain all these experiences? does it account for that immediate knowledge of anexternalobject which I had on looking at the sun, or that presentative knowledge ofresistanceandextension, and of an extended, resistingsubstance, I had when in contact with the door of my study? Mr. Mill very confidently affirms that this belief includes all; and this phrase expresses all the meaning attached to extended "matter" and resisting "substance" by the common world.239We as confidently affirm that it does no such thing; and as "the common world" must be supposed to understand the language of consciousness as well as the philosopher, we are perfectly willing to leave the decision of that question to the common consciousness of our race. If all men do not believe in a permanentreality--a substance which is external to themselves, a substance which offers resistance to their muscular effort, and which produces in them the sensations of solidity, extension,resistance, etc.--they believe nothing and know nothing at all about the matter.
Footnote 239:(return)"Examination of Sir Wm. Hamilton's Philosophy," vol. i. p. 243.
Still less does the phrase "a permanent possibility of feelings"exhaust all our conception of a personal self. Recurring to the experiences of yesterday, Irememberthe feelings I experienced on beholding the sun, and also on pressing against the closed door, and I confidentlyexpectthe recurrence, under the same circumstances, of the same feelings. Does the belief in "a permanent possibility of feelings" explain the act of memory by which I recall the past event, and the act of prevision by which I anticipate the recurrence of the like experience in the future? Who or what is the "I" that remembers and the "I" that anticipates? The "ego," the personal mind, is, according to Mill, a mere "series of feelings," or, more correctly, a flash of "presentfeelings" on "a background of possibilities of present feelings."240If, then, there be no permanent substance or reality which is the subject of the present feeling, which receives and retains the impress of the past feeling, and which anticipates the recurrence of like feelings in the future, how can thepastbe recalled, how distinguished from the present? and how, without a knowledge of the past as distinguished from the present, can thefuturebe forecast? Mr. Mill feels the pressure of this difficulty, and frankly acknowledges it. He admits that, on the hypothesis that mind is simply "a series of feelings," the phenomena of memory and expectation are "inexplicable" and "incomprehensible."241He is, therefore, under the necessity of completing his definition of mind by adding that it is a series of feelings which "is aware of itself as a series;" and, still further, of supplementing this definition by the conjecture that "something which has ceased to exist, or is not yet in existence, can still, in a manner, be present."242Now he who can understand how a series of feelings can flow on in time, and from moment to moment drop out of the present into non-existence, and yet bepresentandconscious of itself as a series, may beaccorded the honor of understanding Mr. Mill's definition of mind or self, and may be permitted to rank himself as a distinguished disciple of the Idealist school; for ourselves, we acknowledge we are destitute of the capacity to do the one, and of all ambition to be the other. And he who can conceive how thepastfeeling of yesterday and thepossiblefeeling of to-morrow can be in any mannerpresentto-day; or, in other words, how any thing which has ceased to exist, or which never had an existence, cannowexist, may be permitted to believe that a thing can be and not be at the same moment, that a part is greater than the whole, and that two and two make five; but we are not ashamed to confess our inability to believe a contradiction. To our understanding, "possibilities of feeling" are not actualities. They may or may not be realized, and until realized in consciousness, they have no real being. If there be no other background of mental phenomena save mere "possibilities of feeling," then present feelings are the only existences, the only reality, and a loss of immediate consciousness, as in narcosis and coma, is the loss of all personality, all self-hood, and of all real being.
Footnote 240:(return)"Exam. of Hamilton," vol. i. p. 260.
Footnote 241:(return)Ibid, p. 262.
Footnote 242:(return)Ibid.
2. What, then, is the verdict of consciousness as to the existence of a permanent substance, an abiding existence which is the subject of all the varying phenomena? Of what are we really conscious when we say "I think," "I feel," "I will?" Are we simply conscious of thought, feeling, and volition, or of a self, a person, which thinks, feels, and wills? The man who honestly and unreservedly accepts the testimony of consciousness in all its integrity must answer at once,we have an immediate consciousness, not merely of the phenomena of mind, but of a personal self as passively or actively related to the phenomena. We are conscious not merely of the act of volition, but of a self, a power, producing the volition. We are conscious not merely of feeling, but of a being who is the subject of the feeling. We are conscious not simply of thought, but of a real entity that thinks. "It is clearly a flat contradiction to maintain that I am not immediately conscious of myself, but only of my sensationsor volitions. Who, then, is thatIthat is conscious, and how can I be conscious of such states asmine?"243
Footnote 243:(return)Mansel, "Prolegomena Logica," p. 122, and note E, p. 281.
The testimony of consciousness, then, is indubitable that we have a direct, immediate cognition ofself--I know myself as a distinctly existing being. This permanent self, to which I refer the earlier and later stages of consciousness, the past as well as the present feeling, and which I know abides the same under all phenomenal changes, constitutes my personal identity. It is this abiding self which unites the past and the present, and, from the present stretches onward to the future. We know self immediately, as existing, as in active operation, and as having permanence--or, in other words, as a "substance." This one immediately presented substance, myself, may be regarded as furnishing a positive basis for that other notion of substance, which is representatively thought, as the subject of all sensible qualities.
3. We may now inquire what is the testimony of consciousness as to the existence of the extra-mental world? Are we conscious of perceiving external objects immediately and in themselves, or only mediately through some vicarious image or representative idea to which we fictitiously ascribe an objective reality?
The answer of common sense is that we are immediately conscious, in perception, of anegoand anon-egoknown together, and known in contrast to each other; we are conscious of a perceiving subject, and of an external reality, as the object perceived.244To state this doctrine of natural realism still more explicitly we add, that we are conscious of the immediate perception of certain essential attributes of matter objectively existing. Of these primary qualities, which are immediately perceived as real and objectively existing, we mentionextensionin space andresistanceto muscular effort, with which is indissolubly associated the idea ofexternality. It is true that extension and resistance are only qualities, but it is equally true that theyare qualities of something, and of something which is external to ourselves. Let any one attempt to conceive of extension without something which is extended, or of resistance apart from something which offers resistance, and he will be convinced that we can never know qualities without knowing substance, just as we can not know substance without knowing qualities. This, indeed, is admitted by Mr. Mill.245And if this be admitted, it must certainly be absurd to speak of substance as something "unknown." Substance is known just as much as quality is known, no less and no more.
Footnote 244:(return)Hamilton, "Lectures," vol. 1. p. 288.
Footnote 245:(return)"Logic," bk. i. ch. iii. § 6.
We remark, in conclusion, that if the testimony of consciousness is not accepted in all its integrity, we are necessarily involved in the Nihilism of Hume and Fichte; the phenomena of mind and matter are, on analysis, resolved into an absolute nothingness--"a play of phantasms in a void."246
(ii.) We turn, secondly, to theMaterialistic Schoolas represented by Aug. Comte.
The doctrine of this school is that all knowledge is limited tomaterialphenomena--that is, to appearancesperceptible to sense. We do not know the essence of any object, nor the real mode of procedure of any event, but simply its relations to other events, as similar or dissimilar, co-existent or successive. These relations are constant; under the same conditions, they are always the same. The constant resemblances which link phenomena together, and the constant sequences which unite them, as antecedent and consequent, are termedlaws. The laws of phenomena are all we know respecting them. Their essential nature and their ultimate causes,efficientorfinal, are unknown and inscrutable to us.247
Footnote 246:(return)Masson, "Recent British Philos.," p. 62.
Footnote 247:(return)See art. "Positive Philos. of A. Comte,"Westminster Review, April, 1865, p. 162, Am. ed.
It is not our intention to review the system of philosophy propounded by Aug. Comte; we are now chiefly concerned with his denial of all causation.