_Outline of European Philosophy in the Seventeenth Century,
and the early part of the Eighteenth._
HAVING in the second volume of this work referred to the state of
philosophy in relation to the Reformation, and the influence of that
revolution in stimulating inquiry, an outline of the philosophic
thought of Europe in the seventeenth century and the early part of
the eighteenth will be an appropriate introduction to the subsequent
history of Scottish philosophy. This will enable us to estimate the
position and the claims of Scottish philosophy. Although the stream
of European thought seems to run in several channels, these meet and
influence each other at many points, and thus it is impossible to
attain a just appreciation of the philosophy of one school or nation,
without some general knowledge of the preceding and contemporaneous
schools. So far as we know, there is nothing in the universe completely
isolated, as all systems of philosophy are more or less related to
each other, an entirely original idea is a rare phenomenon. But the
field thus opened is exceedingly wide, and cannot be covered within
the limits at my disposal. Therefore, it is to be distinctly understood
that the aim of this outline is only to indicate the historical
antecedents of the philosophy which subsequently arose in Scotland,――a
matter of such interest and importance as to justify the attempt to
elucidate its historic significance and relation to preceding systems
of thought.
After the series of struggles which issued in the Reformation, the
human mind continued to strive after independence and freedom for
more than a century. Most of the philosophers of the sixteenth century
were scholars and men of research, rather than unfettered thinkers,
and exerted themselves in collecting old manuscripts, translating,
annotating, and lecturing on the writings of Aristotle and Plato,
while some of them manifested a tendency to theosophy, and others
to materialism and scepticism. The veneration for the opinions of
antiquity and the shackles of authority were not easily broken, and
many curious moves were made ere reason and common-sense attained sway.
At length men began to enter more and more on independent investigation
of nature and mind, and the problem of moral freedom.
When undeterred by fear, interest, or authority, the human mind is
the most powerful and wonderful agent in the universe. This was anew
exemplified in the rapid development of mathematical science, and the
adoption of more accurate methods of investigation in the seventeenth
century, and ever since the progress of discovery and of invention have
been continuous. It is my task to indicate briefly some of the intense
wrestlings of those strong and exalted minds who have contributed
to weaken the power of traditional authority, to brave the force of
ignorance, of biting scorn, and of death itself.
Giordano Bruno was one of the boldest thinkers in the sixteenth century.
Born at Nola――in the province of Naples――in 1548, he entered the Order
of the Dominicans, but relinquished it when he found his convictions
in conflict with the doctrines of the Church. From that time onward
he lived a wandering life, sometimes sojourning in France, in England,
in Germany, and sometimes in other countries. But having returned to
Venice, he fell into the hands of the Inquisition in 1592, and after
suffering a long imprisonment in Rome, was tried for heresy, condemned,
and burned in 1600.
He was a voluminous author, and wrote both in Italian and in Latin, but
several of his treatises and tracts have been lost. He was gifted with
a lively, warm, and exuberant imagination, which often impelled him to
express his views in a poetical form, and thus sometimes he embodied
his thoughts in a haze of clouds; at other times, however, he delivered
his opinions with remarkable force and clearness. The elements of
sympathy were excessively strong in him, and entered into his modes of
thought and coloured all his philosophic efforts.
Bruno boldly essayed the reconstruction of the universe on the
principle of the unity and universality of substance. In astronomy
he embraced the Copernican view, and expounded it. According to him,
the universe is infinite in time and in space, the solar system being
merely one of innumerable worlds, of which God is the original and
immanent cause. The attributes of God are power, wisdom, and love. The
stars are not moved by a prime mover, but by the souls inherent in them.
He rejected the idea of a dualism of matter and form, and identified
the form or moving cause with the end and matter of all organic things;
thus matter contains in herself the forms of all things, and brings
them forth from her own bosom as the travailing mother expels her
offspring. The elements of all that exists are the monads, which are
a kind of points, not entirely unextended but spherical, and at once
material and psychical. The soul is a monad, and it is never wholly
without a body. God is the monad of monads, and He is the least, as all
things are external to Him, and the greatest, because all things are
in Him. God caused the worlds to spring out of Himself, not by an act
of mere will, but by an inner necessity, moving freely and without any
compulsion. The worlds being nature realised, and God nature working,
thus God is present in all things. Each of the worlds is perfect in its
kind, and there is no positive evil. All individual objects and living
organisms are subject to change, but the universe remains in its entire
perfection always like itself.
Bruno’s philosophy is full of the unity of being, which is the
principle and end of all philosophy. God is the infinite All, the
One, the prime and universal substance, of Himself, excluding all
delimitation, and is not to be sought beyond the universe and the
infinity of things. “Why think of any twofold substance, one corporal
and another spiritual, when in sum these have but one essence and one
root, for corporal substance, which manifests to us that which it
involves, must be held a thing divine, parent of natural things; and
if you think aright, you will find a divine essence in all things.” Yet
he occasionally speaks of the supernatural. “The highest contemplation
which transcends nature is impossible and null to him who is without
belief, for we attain to this by supernatural, not by natural light;
and such light they have not who hold all things to be corporal, and
who do not seek Deity beyond the infinite world and the infinity of
things, but within this and these.”¹
¹ The works in which Bruno chiefly developed his system were
written in Italian, and of these the most important is
the “Della Causa, Principio et Uno,” 1584, and in the
same year appeared his “De l’Infinito Universo e Mondi.” A
complete list of his writings is given in the second volume
of Ueberweg’s _History of Philosophy_ (page 469). In the
present century the extant writings of Bruno have been
carefully studied and ably expounded by several eminent
writers and historians of philosophy.
It is obvious that Bruno’s philosophy is a form of pantheism, one of
the most fascinating systems of thought ever propounded. The system
originates from the difficulty of conceiving the action of the mind
or thought except when conjoined with a body――an insuperable and
far-reaching difficulty, because there is no direct evidence anywhere
of a mind operating without the conjunction of an organism. Hence
the strong temptation to identify God and the universe in one idea or
principle: that is, the universe is God, and God is the universe. This
is a proposition which imparts no light, but it is, nevertheless, the
fundamental idea of the system which figures the external substance
of the universe as God, from which step by step all things have issued.
Thus the prime idea of pantheism is a constant quantity or unity,
although the developments of the system in the hands of different
thinkers has assumed varied modifications in detail.
Bruno’s views have influenced the subsequent developments of several
once famous philosophies. The noted Spinoza was indebted to him for
several of his ideas, but the fundamental idea of pantheism is much
older than the times of either of the two philosophers, as it stretches
back to an early period in the evolution of human thought. Through
Spinoza’s system German speculation has been largely influenced,
and even some recent Scottish speculations bear distinct traces of a
similar descent.
In France, during the latter part of the sixteenth century, the
Jesuits were the most active instructors and disseminators of doctrine.
Their schools were planted in all the chief towns of the nations. They
encouraged the study of classical literature, and prepared the best
text-books and lexicons. But they were a conservative and obstructive
body, and wielded much influence over the intellect of the French. At
the same time a form of ancient scepticism was revived in France by
Montaigne. “In fact, Montaigne represents, if he did not inaugurate,
the school of French satirists, who, standing between, as it were,
Calvin and Rabelais, avoided both the coarseness and abandon of
the latter, and the ascetic sternness and awkward pleasantries of
the former.”¹ His sceptical views were more or less directed to the
doctrines of Christianity, but from whatever motive or reason, he
generally concluded with a recognition of the necessity of a revelation,
and thus avoided a conflict with theology. In their ultimate result
his reflections pointed to such conclusions as――whether we are not a
rather presumptuous class of beings in fancying that we have any higher
faculties than those which are bestowed on other animals; whether the
pursuit of truth may not be a pleasant amusement, rather than one that
promises any result; whether religious forms may not be serviceable
to the business of life, and therefore to be defended; whether they do
not become mischievous when they lead to conflicts and to persecutions;
whether a full recognition of our folly, ignorance, and uncertainty,
might not save us from the dogmatism which produces such things? A
similar strain of thought was indulged in by Charron and other French
writers.²
¹ Van Laun’s _History of French Literature_, Volume II., pages
299‒300.
² Montaigne’s _Essays_. He states himself that Buchanan was
one of his preceptors; and some traces of this Scotsman’s
opinions may be found in the easy and self-satisfied
Frenchman’s writings.
Another Frenchman, Gassendi, undertook the defence of Epicureanism,
showing that it contained the best doctrine of physics, and also
attempting to combine it with Christian theology. In physics, he
embraced the theory of atomism; but he saw its weak side, namely,
the difficulty of explaining the derivation of sensation out of atoms
and space. He discussed this problem at great length, but admitted
that there was something left unexplained. He was a voluminous writer.
Gassendi has been claimed by the historians of materialism as the chief
reviver of systematic materialism in modern times. “We lay especial
stress upon this, that Gassendi drew again into the light, adapted to
the circumstances of the time, the fullest of the materialistic systems
of antiquity, that of Epikuros.” Again, in reference to his historical
qualifications, “Gassendi, whose thorough philological and historical
training equipped him with a knowledge of all the systems of antiquity,
embraced with a sure glance exactly what was best suited to modern
times, and to the empirical tendency of his age. Atomism, by his means
drawn again from antiquity, attained a lasting importance, however
much it was gradually modified as it passed through the hands of
later inquirers.” Once more, “Gassendi is, of all the most prominent
representatives of materialism, the only one gifted with a historic
sense, and that he has in an eminent degree. Even in his ‘Syntagma
Philosophicum,’ he treats every subject at first historically, from
all possible points of view.”¹
¹ Lange’s _History of Materialism_, Volume I., pages 253‒269.
“The evolution and dissolution of things is nothing but the
union and separation of atoms. When a piece of wood is burned,
the flame, smell, and ashes, and so on, have already existed
in their atoms, only in other conditions. All change is only
movement in the constituents of a thing, and hence the simple
substance cannot change, but only continues its movements in
space.”――_Ibid._, page 267.
Descartes was born in 1596 at La Haye, in the province of Touraine.
At the age of eight he was sent to the Jesuit College of La Flèche,
and placed under the instruction of the Jesuits, where he remained for
eight years, and received his general education. He was a contemporary
of Gassendi, and a more famous philosopher; each represented opposite
systems and assailed one another, but neither of them influenced the
other in his views. The two were contrasted in every way. Descartes
always aimed at being original, and often was so, while Gassendi was
more historical and dependent, and more learned, but he lacked the
genius of his contemporary; both, however, were the fathers of great
modern schools of thought. In philosophy and in scientific method, the
real turning-point came in the early part of the seventeenth century,
and in the great movement Descartes holds a foremost place, entitling
him to some account, however brief, in this exposition.
Descartes was eminent both as a philosopher and as a mathematician;
in the latter department of science he takes a position among the
great mathematicians of the seventeenth century. In algebra he was
the first to place the doctrine of powers on a clear basis, freeing it
from its dependence on geometry, which prevented its proper expansion;
while, by introducing the index notation, he gave the science a new and
potent means of expression. He also advanced the treatment of negative
quantities, and first brought into prominence the equal significance of
the negative roots, and for determining a limit to their number, gave
the rule which still bears his name. But his fame as a mathematician
rests chiefly on his application of algebra for “the expression of
continuously varying quantity.” By this invention he may be considered
as the founder of analytic geometry, or the algebraic treatment of
curves, and he is well entitled to a place in the history of the
mathematical achievements which ultimately led to the discovery of
the Differential Calculus.¹
¹ _Descartes_, by J. P. Mahaffy, pages 207‒209, 1880. It was
a curious feature in the character of Descartes that he
designedly so composed his Essay on Geometry as to be very
difficult, “and only understood by mathematicians of a high
order. He omitted what was obvious, and in the solving of
problems only gave the means of solution, and not each step
in the demonstrations. He even chuckles in his letters at the
number of professed mathematicians who were unable to follow
his arguments, and tells us that not a single professor in
the new universities of Holland was able to open his mouth
upon the subject.”
In physics, his achievements were mainly in the science of optics.
He at least contributed to the discovery and statement of the law
of refraction, though his independent discovery of this law has been
keenly disputed. He explained the colours of the rainbow, and it
appears that he originated the undulatory theory of light. But his
positive contributions to science were not the most important elements
of his philosophy, as its influence sprang more from its spirit and
method, which were the expression of his own acute and determined mind.
Descartes’ philosophy is fundamentally a deductive system, based
on mathematical principles, but in its development it assumed the
form of a methodical and rather dogmatic rationalism. Although the
initial steps of his method are founded in doubt, this is not the most
distinctive feature of his philosophy. His doubt, at the threshold,
merely gave him the data of his own thought and existence, and enabled
him to assert a right to discard authority, and to erect a standard
independent of all former times and thinkers. In the development of
his system he attempted to find the ultimate principle in the order
of synthesis, which would afford the conditions of philosophy and of
science, or that something which is the highest of all. This principle
must be self-evident, and Descartes found it in his famous “cogito
ergo sum;” then he struggled hard and determinedly to connect this with
the idea of God, and thus associating the criterion of truth with the
perception of Deity, makes the one in a sense dependent on the other.
In his first published work, which appeared in 1637, and marks an epoch
in the history of human thought, he enunciated four rules of method in
the following order:――“1. Never to accept anything as true which was
not clearly known to be such; that is, carefully to avoid precipitancy
and prejudice, and to include nothing more in my judgment than what
was presented to my mind so clearly and distinctly as to exclude all
ground of doubt. 2. To divide each of the difficulties into as many
parts as possible, and as might be necessary for its adequate solution.
3. To conduct my thoughts in order, by commencing with objects, the
simplest and easiest kind to know, that I might ascend by degrees, as
it were, step by step, to the knowledge of the more complex; assigning
in thought a definite order even to objects which in their own nature
do not stand in a relation of antecedence and sequence. 4. In every
case to make enumerations so complete, and reviews so general, that I
might be assured that nothing was omitted.”¹ This work was entitled,
“Discourse on the Method of Rightly Conducting the Reason and Seeking
Truth in the Sciences; also the Dioptrics, the Meteors, and the
Geometry, which are Essays in this Method.” Thus Descartes introduced
his Method to the world with the recommendation of his own discoveries
in mathematics, and with the solution of problems which were then
beyond the reach of ordinary minds, as was indicated in the last note.
The three essays presented as applications of his Method have long
been superseded or absorbed in later works, but the discourse on Method
will always be valuable. The volume containing the whole was written in
French, which in that day was itself a bold innovation.
¹ _Discourse on Method_, Part II.
The Discourse on Method though only a short treatise, which might be
read at a single sitting, nevertheless was a memorable proclamation
against the ages of inert formalism, and the thraldom of the human mind.
It contains details relating to the formation of his opinions, and the
beginning of the development of his system. It is a book of absorbing
interest, and should be carefully read by every student of philosophy.
It is divided into six parts, which treat of the following topics:
――1. Various considerations touching the Sciences. 2. The principal
rules of the author’s method, the heads of which I have stated above.
3. Some rules of morals deduced from this method. 4. His reasonings
establishing the existence of God and of the human soul. 5. The order
of the questions in physics, the explanation of the motion of the heart
and of some other difficulties, as also the difference between the soul
of man and that of the brutes. 6. What he believes to be requisite in
order to greater advancement in the investigation of nature than has
yet been made, with the reasons that have induced him to write. I had
transcribed several passages for quotation, but space forbids their
insertion; and as the work is now easily accessible to English readers,
long quotations are unnecessary. But to lighten the exposition, I may
briefly dispose of some of his peculiar views touching the organisation
of man and the lower animals.
He adopted a mechanical theory of the universe, attributing to
matter only pressure and impulsion, by which to explain all material
phenomena. Then developing his theory in accounting for life, plants,
and animals, he ultimately arrived at the conclusion that the functions
and actions of animals and living organisms are purely the result of
heat and motion, as mechanically as the going of a clock is the result
of cog-wheels and pulleys. Thus man so far as his body is concerned, is
merely an automaton, while all the lower animals are automatons, mere
machines, constructed by the Deity according to the general laws which
He has impressed upon matter: they have no rational soul, as they use
no language, or perform any actions which cannot be proved to be the
direct result of their internal organism.
Touching the origin of the human soul, he followed the very old notion
of supposing that God infused a soul into every human being at the
first moment of its existence, and thus the soul was radically distinct
from the body, though closely united with it. As an unextended entity,
however, the soul can be in contact with the body only at one point,
which is the brain, or more precisely, in the single centre of the mass,
the conarium, or pineal gland. He says, “Although the human soul is
united to the whole body, it has, nevertheless, its principal seat in
the brain, where alone it not only understands and imagines, but also
perceives, and this by the medium of the nerves, which are extended
like threads from the brain to all the other members, with which they
are so connected that we can hardly touch any one of them without
moving the extremities of those nerves which are collected in the brain
round the seat of the soul.” Again, “It is clearly established, however,
that the soul does not perceive in so far as it is in each member of
the body, but only so far as it is in the brain, when the nerves by
their movements convey to it the diverse actions of external objects
that touch the parts of the body in which they are inserted.”¹
¹ _Principles of Philosophy_, IV., 189, 196.
The Discourse on Method contained in a condensed form the principles
and chief characteristics of Descartes’ system, and it was followed
by his “Meditations,” which were published in 1641. As the subject was
so full of difficulties, and thus liable to much misunderstanding and
misconception, he had manuscript copies of his “Meditations,” submitted
for criticism to some of the most learned men and philosophers of the
time, among whom were Gassendi, Arnauld, Hobbes, and others. A summary
of their objections, with his replies, was published, and many of their
criticisms were able and just. But Descartes so firmly believed in
his own system, and was so convinced that he saw it all clearly and
distinctly, that he could hardly be moved to change any of his settled
ideas. He simply wanted these learned men’s objections, that he might
refute them, and thus more effectually establish the certainty of his
own system in other minds. To the Catholic theologians only, for the
sake of their patronage and peace, he conceded some trifling points.
The Meditations are an expansion of the metaphysics of his Discourse
on Method, and the work embraced six meditations, which treat on the
following subjects: “Of the Things of which we may Doubt; of the Nature
of the Human Mind, and that it is more easily known than the body; of
God, that He Exists; of Truth and Error; of the Essence of Material
Things, and of God; of the Existence of Material Things, and of the
real distinction between the mind and body of man.” In his preface to
these Meditations he says: “Now that I have once, in some measure, made
proof of the opinions of men regarding my work, I again undertake to
treat of God and the human soul, and at the same time to discuss the
principles of the entire First Philosophy, without, however, expecting
any commendation from the crowd for my endeavours, or a wide circle of
readers. On the contrary, I would advise none to read this work unless
such as are able and willing to meditate with me in earnest, to detach
their minds from commerce with the senses, and likewise to deliver
themselves from prejudice; and individuals of this character are, as
I well know, remarkably rare. But with regard to those who, without
caring to comprehend the order and connection of the reasonings,
shall study only detached clauses for the purpose of small but noisy
criticism, as is the custom with many, I may say that such persons
will not profit greatly by the reading of this treatise; and although,
perhaps, they may find opportunity for cavilling in several places,
they will yet hardly start any pressing objections, or such as shall
be deserving of reply.”
Thus the Meditations were intended to be a discussion on the first
or fundamental principles of philosophy, but their main drift is to
prove that the knowledge of God and of the mind is the most certain
of all things. This was attempted in two ways: first, by showing the
uncertainty of all our knowledge of bodies, and then by presenting
demonstrations of our own existence as thinking beings, and of the
existence of the Deity. The first Meditation expounded the grounds
on which we may doubt of all things, and especially of all material
objects. After showing the uncertainty of all things, save some points
in arithmetic and geometry, he affirmed his own strong belief in the
existence of an all-powerful God, who created him such as he was, and
then says: “If, however, it were repugnant to the goodness of God to
have created me subject to constant deception, it would seem likewise
to be contrary to his goodness to allow me to be occasionally deceived,
and yet it is clear that this is permitted. Some, indeed, might perhaps
be found who would be disposed rather to deny the existence of a Being
so powerful than to believe that there is nothing certain. But let us
for the present refrain from opposing this opinion, and grant that all
which is here said of God is fabulous, nevertheless, in whatever way it
may be supposed that I reached the state in which I exist, whether by
fate, or chance, or by an endless series of antecedents and consequents,
or by any other means, it is clear (since to be deceived and to err
is a certain defect) that the probability of my being so imperfect as
to be the constant victim of deception, will be increased exactly in
proportion as the power possessed by the cause, to which they assign
my origin, is lessened. To these reasonings I have assuredly nothing
to reply, but am constrained at last to avow that there is nothing
of all that I formerly believed to be true of which it is impossible
to doubt.” Having now disposed so far of all material objects, in the
second, he repeats his argument affirming from the fact of doubt, our
own existence as doubting beings. “But what, then, am I? A thinking
thing, it has been said. But what is a thinking thing? It is a thing
that doubts, understands, affirms, denies, wills, refuses, that
imagines also, and perceives. Assuredly it is not little, if all these
properties belong to my nature. But why should they not belong to it?
Am I not that very being who now doubts of almost everything, who,
for all that, understands and conceives certain things, who affirms
one alone as true, and denies the others, who desires to know more of
them, and does not wish to be deceived”; and so on in the same line
of argument. He next showed that external objects can only be known
when they become or are made the objects of thought, and then makes
a vigorous effort showing that mind itself is more clearly known than
any or all the objects of the external world. “But, finally, what
shall I say of the mind itself, that is, of myself? for as yet I do not
admit that I am anything but mind. What, then? I who seem to possess
so distinct an apprehension of the piece of wax,――do I not know myself,
both with greater truth and certitude, and also much more distinctly
and clearly? For if I judge that the wax exists because I see it, it
assuredly follows, much more evidently, that I myself am or exist, for
the same reason, it is possible that what I see may not in truth be wax,
and that I do not even possess eyes with which to see anything; but it
cannot be that when I see, or, which comes to the same thing, when I
think I see, I myself who think am nothing. So, likewise, if I judge
that the wax exists because I touch it, it will still also follow
that I am, and if I determine that my imagination, or any other cause,
whatever it be, persuades me of the existence of the wax, I will still
draw the same conclusion. And what is here remarked of the piece of wax
is applicable to all the other things that are external to me.”
In the third Meditation he unfolded his chief argument for the
existence of God. He insisted that as the idea of God in the human mind
is innate, God himself is its cause. And he described God thus:――“By
the name of God, I understand a substance infinite, eternal, immutable,
independent, all-knowing, all-powerful, and by which I myself, and
every other thing that exists, if any such there be, were created.”
Here he associates God, or the idea of God, with his own criterion of
truth. In the fourth, he proceeded to show that all which we clearly
and distinctly perceive must be true, and then explained the nature
of intellectual error. Referring to the will as the cause of error,
he says: “I have no reason to complain because God has given me a will
more ample than my understanding, since, as the will consists only
of a single element, and that indivisible, it would appear that this
faculty is of such a nature that nothing could be taken from it without
destroying it; and certainly, the more extensive it is, the more cause
I have to thank the goodness of Him who bestowed it upon me.... For
as often as I so restrain my will within the limits of my knowledge,
that it forms no judgment except regarding objects which are clearly
and distinctly represented to it by the understanding, I can never
be deceived, because every clear and distinct conception is doubtless
something, and as such cannot owe its origin to nothing, but must
of necessity have God for its author――God, I say, who, as supremely
perfect, cannot, without a contradiction, be the cause of any error,
and consequently it is necessary to conclude that every such conception
or judgment is true.”
He began the fifth Meditation by expounding the essence of material
things, giving some examples from quantity and form. And he asserted
that the figure of a triangle ♦and other mathematical figures possess
a certain determinate form, or essence, which is immutable and eternal;
and again repeated that whatever is clearly and distinctly perceived
is true, truth being identical with existence. He then proceeded
to demonstrate in a somewhat new form his arguments for proving the
existence of God, and making all knowledge dependent upon this. “But I
remark further that the certainty of all other truths is so absolutely
dependent on it, that without this knowledge it is impossible ever
to know anything perfectly.... And thus I very clearly see that the
certainty and truth of all science depends on the knowledge alone of
the true God, inasmuch that, before I knew him, I could have no perfect
knowledge of any other thing. And now that I know him, I possess the
means of acquiring a perfect knowledge regarding innumerable matters,
as well relating to God himself and other intellectual objects as to
corporeal nature.” In the sixth he explained the difference between
imagination and pure intellection; reviewed the errors of the senses,
pointing out the means of avoiding them, the distinct difference of
the mind and the body, and their relation to each other, and then
adduces the evidence from which the existence of the external world
may be inferred, and all with the aim of showing that our knowledge of
external objects is not so clear and distinct as the knowledge which we
have of our own minds and of God. Thus far I have attempted to explain
Descartes’ own efforts to develop his philosophy.
♦ “aud” replaced with “and”
But it is in his work entitled _The Principles of Philosophy_, written
in Latin, and published in 1644, that he developed his theories
and ideas systematically, and gave the most complete exposition and
representation of his system.¹ In this work he expounded his philosophy
synthetically. It is divided into four parts, which treat consecutively
of the principles of human knowledge, of the principles of material
things, of the visible world, and of the earth. The first part contains
an orderly summary of his metaphysical views, repeating what had
been stated in the Discourse and the Meditations, and adding some
new elucidations. And it is chiefly to this part that I must direct
attention, as being most consonant to the aim of this chapter.
¹ In a long preface to the French translation of his
_Principles of Philosophy_, which appeared in 1647, Descartes
enters at some length on several topics of an interesting
character, which are still well worth reading.
But not to leave his physics altogether unnoticed, the following
is a brief indication of his physical theory. Basing his ideas on
mathematics, he boldly asserted that extension is an eternal attribute
of matter, and that to us it is the very essence of matter. “Give
me extension and motion,” he exclaims, “and I will construct the
universe.” Matter is infinite or unlimited in space or time, and it is
everywhere identical with extension, all differences of quality being
simply produced by a different mechanical composition, and a difference
of motion in its parts.
In the second part of his Principles, he reduces all the phenomena
of nature to variations of size, figure, and motion, in the minute
particles of a homogeneous matter, there being but one kind of matter
in the whole universe. He gave special laws of motion, which are now
superseded. In the third part he treated on the theory of the solar
system, and on the nature and origin of the fixed stars, and assuming
three elements of various density in degree, explained the whole
universe by the theory of vortices or of circular motion. In the fourth
part he treated of the earth and its formation, of water, fire, and
other matters.
“When he gives _a priori_ explanations of all manner of phenomena in
heaven and in earth, deduced from the motion of diverse particles,
he confesses that the plurality of causes which may produce the same
effect is his great difficulty. He feels that endless time and outlay
is required to verify his theories by crucial experiments, and till
that has been done, he can offer nothing but the satisfactoriness
and simplicity of the explanation as a guarantee of its truth. Once,
indeed, he advances the statement that the veracity of the Deity would
come into question if he permitted us to be deceived in following such
strict and sober demonstrations. But in general the distinction of
purely mathematical and physical proof is acknowledged by Descartes,
and he confesses the possibility, though he never admits the fact, that
he might be mistaken.”¹
¹ _Descartes_, by J. W. Mahaffy, page 163.
The most notable peculiarities of Descartes’ metaphysics are his
conception of God and his definition of Substance. He says that in the
concept of God is comprised absolutely necessary and external existence,
while our concept of other things merely includes contingent existence.
God is also omniscient, all-powerful, absolutely perfect, absolutely
veracious, and the source of all light, “so that it is plainly
repugnant for him to deceive us.”¹ He exerted his great powers to make
this clear, and if his premisses were true, the conclusions of course
would follow, but his assumption of an innate idea of God in the human
mind of such a character as he assigned to it, is nowhere to be found
save among a small section of the most cultivated of the race. Besides
it is very questionable if this idea of God be obtained at all in the
way which he maintained. Then he defined substance thus: “By substance
we can conceive nothing else than a thing which exists in such a way
as to stand in need of nothing beyond itself in order to its existence.
And, in truth, there can be conceived but one substance which is
absolutely independent, and that is God.” We perceive that all other
things can exist only by the concourse of God; and, accordingly, the
term substance does not apply to God and the creatures in the same
sense, and no meaning of this word can be distinctly understood which
is common to God and them. Created substances, however, of all kinds
may be conceived as things existing by the concourse of God, but
existence by itself is not observed by us. Every substance has one
principal attribute, as thinking of the mind, extension of the body.
Thus extension in length, breadth, and depth constitutes the nature of
corporeal substance, and thought the nature of thinking substance. For
everything else that can be attributed to body presupposes extension,
and is only some mode of an extended thing, just as all the properties
which we discover in the mind are only different modes of thinking.²
¹ _Principles of Philosophy_, I. 22, 23, 29.
² _Principles of Philosophy_, I., 51, 52, 53.
His doctrine of the concourse of God is thus explained: “Because I was
in existence a short time ago, it does not follow that I must now exist,
unless in this moment some cause create me anew as it were, that is,
conserve me. In truth, it is perfectly clear and evident to all who
attentively consider the nature of duration, that the conservation of
a substance, in each moment of its duration, requires the same power
and act that would be necessary to create it, supposing it were not yet
in existence; so that it is manifestly a dictate of the natural light
that conservation and creation differ merely in respect of our mode of
thinking and not in reality.” Again, “From the fact that we now are,
it does not necessarily follow that we shall be a moment afterwards,
unless some cause, namely, that which first created us, shall, as it
were, continually recreate us, that is, conserve us. For we easily
understand that there is no power in us by which we can conserve
ourselves, and that the being who has so much power as to conserve
us out of himself, must also by so much the greater reason conserve
himself, or rather stand in need of being conserved by no one whatever,
and, in fine, be God.”¹
¹ _Meditation_, III.; _Principles of Philosophy_, I., 21.
It is pretty evident that the above view of substance contained an
element of pantheism. Since that substance which exists entirely in
itself and absolutely independent of aught beyond itself, is declared
to be God; and since there is only one kind of matter in the universe,
the sum and essence of substance being included in extension, what is
God but the universe. Hence Spinoza adopted this Cartesian conception,
and placed it at the summit of his pantheistic system of the universe;
while Descartes’ doctrine of conservation or continuous creation seems
to have suggested to his distinguished follower Geulinx the doctrine
of Occasional Causes; and Malebranche also made a modification on the
former doctrine in his own theory of seeing all things in God, who
is the place of spirits.¹ In truth, Descartes’ theory of the relation
of body and mind, even when supported by divine conservation, was
unsatisfactory and scarcely conceivable.
¹ Geulinx’s _Commentaries on Descartes’ Principles of
Philosophy_; Malebranche’s _De la Recherche_, etc.
Touching his first principle, and the criterion of truth, which are
involved in each other, he said:――“I think, therefore, I am, and this
proposition is of all others the first and most certain which occurs to
one philosophising orderly.” Thus knowledge must begin with a definite
act of a conscious being, self-revealed in the conscious act. He
did not, indeed, analyse the conditions of the object of which the
self-conscious being takes notice, or trace how the conscious act has
originated. Nevertheless, it was an important step towards placing
investigation on the true basis of conscious experience; though, of
course, on the subjective and notional side, it has often been carried
to extremes, and was so in the end by Descartes himself. He endeavoured
to deduce a criterion of truth from his first certain proposition,
and this he founded on clearness and distinctness of knowledge. This
test he defined in these words:――“I call that clear which is present
and manifest to the mind giving attention to it, just as we are said
clearly to see objects when, being present to the eye looking on,
they stimulate it with sufficient force, and it is disposed to regard
them; but the distinct is that which is so precise and different from
all other objects as to comprehend in itself only what is clear.”
As already stated, he called in the veracity of God to support this
criterion of truth.¹ But it is vague and comparatively useless in
its application, since it must be admitted that the clearness and
distinctness of an idea, a conviction, or an opinion, in the mind of
the person holding them, is not always a guarantee of their truth;
although it is a very good reason for such opinions and ideas being
strongly asserted and firmly maintained.
¹ _Principles of Philosophy_, I., 45, IV., 206; _Meditations_,
IV.
Descartes’ metaphysics does not reach the external world by a distinct
perception, but by an indirect or mediate inference. First, he resolved
to prove his own existence as a thinking being, and then deduced the
existence of God from the fact that thinking beings exist who possess
the idea of him, before the external world came into view at all.
He presented his demonstration of God’s existence under three forms,
which, however, are all essentially founded on the idea that he himself
had of God; and they are neither wholly new nor at all satisfactory,
and raised a storm of controversy which raged long and widely.
Turning to Descartes’ psychology, which is not separately or
exhaustively treated in his writings, and on some points there is
a little difficulty in ascertaining his views. He called the mind
a thinking substance or thinking thing; the word thought meant all
that we are immediately conscious of; and, accordingly, not only to
understand, to will, to imagine, but even to perceive, have here the
same meaning as thinking. There are only two modes of thinking of
which we are conscious, namely, the perception or operation of the
understanding, and volition or the operation of the will; thus to
perceive through the senses, to imagine, and to conceive purely mental
objects, are only different modes of perceiving; but to desire, to
be averse from, to affirm, to deny, to doubt, are different modes of
willing.¹
¹ _Principles of Philosophy_, I., 9, 32. He says that the
simplest self-evident notions are only obscured by logical
definitions, as these are not to be reckoned among the
cognitions acquired by study, but as born with us. _Ibid._,
10.
The word perception has a wider meaning in the writings of Descartes
and his followers than in the philosophic literature of the present
time. With them perception was generally employed to indicate an act of
mind by which we apprehended any mental object, as distinguished from
an affirmation or judgment concerning it; and thus in their writings
perception is nearly equivalent to cognition. All acts of memory,
of imagination, of sense, and of pure intellect, are merely modes of
perceiving, as in each we only know as being conscious of the object
of the act.
But here we come face to face with the relation of the mind to the
objects of its knowledge, which is the crucial problem in philosophy
and in psychology. As already implicitly stated above, according to
Descartes, the mind has no immediate perception of external objects or
of the material world. On the principles of his theory, the mind can
have no immediate knowledge of anything beyond its own modifications.
Although the mind is only conscious of its own modifications or
ideas, still it is not solely modified by its own energy, and in many
instances it is affected by the antecedent affections of the body,
owing to its junction therewith. Thus some of the modifications of the
mind are affections originating from the body, and mainly relative to
it; others, though not quite independent of corporeal contact, must
be more especially considered as affections of the mind; while others
are in themselves purely or absolutely intellectual energies in their
origin and in their continuance. The point of alliance of the mind with
the body is the brain, at this point all organic changes from external
causes terminate, and through these the mind is, owing to the nature
of its junction, hyperphysically determined to a relative modification.
There also all corporeal movements, at the call of the will, commence,
and thus produce the bodily movement answering to the volition of the
mind. The mind only perceives objects as its seat in the brain, and not
at the point of affection in the organs.¹
¹ _Principles of Philosophy_, I., 48, 53; III., 2, 3; IV., 189,
196‒198. Hamilton’s _Reid_, note N.
Thus we have only a mediate perception of an external object: a
representation of the object is all that is known to us, as it is that
only which comes within the seat of the conscious mind. This mental
representation of the external object is called an idea.¹ The organic
movement at the point of junction in the brain may also metaphorically
be called an impression, as it is the result of an external impulse,
though at the same time it has no natural resemblance to the external
object; it may be termed an image, as in some way suggesting the
representation to the mind; or it may be named a corporeal species,
though nothing similar to itself is transmitted from the object;
or it may be styled an idea, though it is not the immediate object
of the mind. If any one say that this theory of mediate perception
retains no evidence of the reality of an external world consistent
with the representations of our own minds, Descartes replies, that
in consequence of our early and deep-rooted prejudices we are led to
attribute to the immediate objects of our perceptions an external and
chief, instead of internal and vicarious, existence. “Hence arose the
belief that there was more substance or body in rocks and metals than
in water or air, because the mind perceived in them more hardness and
weight. Moreover, the air was thought to be merely nothing so long as
we experienced no agitation of it by the wind, or did not feel it hot
or cold. And because the stars gave hardly more light than the slender
flames of candles, we supposed that each star was but of this size.
Again, since the mind did not perceive that the earth moved on its axis,
or that its superficies was curved like that of a globe, it was on that
account more ready to judge the earth immovable and its surface flat.”
Of course, he also appeals to the veracity of the ♦Deity.²
¹ But whether his idea is to be considered as having an
existence independent of the mind or not, was a disputed
point among Descartes’ followers.
♦ “Diety” replaced with “Deity”
² _Principles of Philosophy_, I., 66‒72.
Descartes used the term idea to denote both mental objects and mental
acts, applying it indifferently to a material or a mental modification,
in relation to sense and imagination. Hence throughout his writings
this term appears under many relations and many different meanings. It
is often employed as an object of consciousness, as a representative
thought; while sometimes an objective and sometimes a subjective
meaning is attached to it, and this in all degrees and relations of
mind itself and its objects.
Touching his doctrine of innate ideas, which is a necessary part of
his theory of body and mind, the hyperphysical element of his system,
which he seems to have deemed requisite to cover and assist the purely
mathematical and mechanical principles upon which his philosophy is
essentially founded. By innate ideas he meant mental modifications
existing in the mind prior to all experience, and that they come into
consciousness whenever the mind begins to think and reflect. To the
class of innate modifications belong the ideas of God, of substance, of
unity, and others. These ideas might remain long inactive in the mind,
but they always exist in it potentially. And it is in relation to these
ideas that the veracity of the Deity is all-important, because a malign
Creator could have made us believe innate falsehoods.¹
¹ “With respect to ideas, some of them appear to me to be
innate.” _Meditations_ III. “The mind first of all discovers
within itself the ideas of many things ... the mind also
discovers certain common notions out of which it frames
various demonstrations that carry conviction to such a degree
as to render doubt of their truth impossible, so long as
we give attention to them. For example, the mind has within
itself ideas of numbers and figures; and it has also among
its common notions the principle that if equals be added to
equals the whole will be equal, and the like.”――_Principles
of Philosophy_, I., 13.
“In the first place, I discover that it is impossible for
God ever to deceive me, for in all fraud and deceit there is
some imperfection: and although it may seem that the ability
to deceive is a mark of subtlety or power, yet the will
testifies without doubt of malice and weakness; and such,
accordingly, cannot be found in God. In the next place, I
am conscious that I possess a certain faculty of judging
or discerning truth from error, which I doubtless received
from God, along with whatever else is mine; and since it is
impossible that he should will to deceive me, it is likewise
certain that he has not given me a faculty that will ever
lead me into error, provided I use it aright.”――_Meditations_
IV.
His exposition of the senses, or sensation, is comparatively brief, but
interesting and important.
In his treatise on the passions, he admitted six primitive passions
or emotions, namely, admiration, love, hate, desire, joy, and sadness.
From these he sought to deduce all the other passions and emotions, but
his exposition is mainly an echo of the views of Aristotle. He, however,
stated that the most perfect of all emotions is intellectual love to
God.
Touching ethics, Descartes expressly declined to produce a formal work,
on the ground that it would be liable to violent and unfair criticism
from his opponents; for a similar reason he refrained entirely from
treating of religion or of faith, preferring, as he says, to adhere
to the faith, and to submit to the authority of the Roman Catholic
Church, in which he had been educated from childhood. Yet occasionally
in his writings he touches on moral subjects, and in his letters on
the sovereign good, in his criticism of Seneca, and in his treatise on
the passions, he has indicated his ethical views. But he contributed
nothing specially original in this department, as he approached the
subject from the ancient standpoint, not from the modern, and he does
not treat the question of the moral faculty, or moral obligation. Still
his views, so far as they go, are generally wise and just.
But, as already indicated, the influence of Descartes did not quite
depend on the positive results of his philosophy. The emphatic doubt
at the threshold of his system was, in my opinion, the most influential
element in his philosophy. He had many disciples and many opponents,
while theologians generally were his bitterest enemies. Nevertheless,
Cartesianism spread in France and held its ground till about the middle
of the eighteenth century; while the influence of his system was felt
in other countries of Europe, especially in Holland. As for the general
tendency of his system in subsequent speculation and in literature,
it appeared in idealism, rationalism, and especially in scepticism and
nihilism.
The philosopher whose thought I have now to explain, Benedict Spinoza,
is an interesting character, sprung from a remarkable race. He
was born at Amsterdam, in November, 1632, a Jew by birth, and was
carefully educated in the Jewish religion and in the Hebrew language
and literature. But his energy of mind soon made him an object of
suspicion amongst his brethren, and in his twenty-fourth year he was
excommunicated, according to the Jewish ritual, from the Synagogue,
and from all intercourse with any of the tribes of Israel.¹ He earned
his livelihood by the art of grinding and polishing lenses for optical
instruments, a kind of work at which he became very skilful. He was
thus able to support himself in comparative ease and independence, as
his wants were few, and his mode of life extremely simple.
¹ _Spinoza, His Life and Philosophy_, by F. Pollock, 1880.
The chief authority for the life of Spinoza is John Colerus,
a minister of the Lutheran Church, at the Hague, who first
published his account of Spinoza in the Dutch language, in
1705, and it appeared in French in 1706 and 1733.
As he adopted a mathematical method, his system is deductive, and
the chief characteristics of his philosophy may be stated briefly as
follows. His fundamental conception is the unity of substance, and by
this he meant that which is in itself and is conceived by itself. There
is but one substance in the universe with infinite attributes, and that
is God. Two only of the attributes of this substance are cognisable
by man, namely, thought and extension: there is no extended substance
really distinct from thinking substance. All individual existence
is included among the changing modes of these attributes, but such
existence does not belong to God, else he would be finite, and not
absolute, since all determination is negation. God is the immanent
cause of all things, and operates according to the inner necessity
of his nature, and in this consists his freedom. But he produces all
finite effects only indirectly by finite causes, and nowhere proceeds
with a view to ends, and there is no such thing as human freedom apart
from causality. All that can be said is, that one mode of extension
merely acts upon another mode of extension, and one mode of thought
upon another mode of thought, and so on continually throughout the
universe. Between thought and extension, on the other hand, there
is a complete agreement, as the order of thought is identical with
the order and connection of things, each thought in every case being
merely the idea of the corresponding mode of extension. Our ideas vary
in clearness and in value from the confused representations of the
imagination to the adequate knowledge of the intellect, which conceives
all particulars from the standpoint of the whole which contains them,
and comprehends all things under the form of eternity, and as necessary.
From those confused mental representations which cannot rise above the
finite, spring passions and the bondage of the will, while intellectual
knowledge may assume the form of pure love to God, in which our
happiness and freedom consist.¹
¹ Compare Ueberweg’s _History of Philosophy_, Volume II., page
55, 1874.
Spinoza’s first published work was an exposition of the principles
of Descartes’ philosophy, which appeared in 1663. It contained the
exposition of two parts of Descartes’ Principles, and a fragment of a
third part, with an appendix of “Metaphysical Reflections.” He adopted
the geometric method of statement and argument, and so far as he went,
gave a pretty fair account of Descartes’ system. His next work was
entitled “Tractatus Theologico-politicus,” 1670. It is an elaborate and
able defence of freedom of thought and speech in matters of religion.
His final contention was, that “in a free state it should be lawful
for every man to think what he will and to speak what he thinks.”
In the development of his own thoughts, Spinoza seems to have been
much influenced by his study of Maimonides, yet the two philosophers
held different views touching the Jewish Scriptures; Spinoza adopting
a theory which permitted him to treat the Bible historically and
critically, while the earlier philosopher maintained that the Law was
given to the Jews as a revelation of the highest truths. He was the
author of several other treatises, but his chief work is his _Ethics_.
Spinoza’s _Ethics_ was not published till after his death, but it was
written several years before; and he seems to have gradually elaborated
it with much care. This work contains the fullest exposition of his
system, and is divided into five parts, which treat respectively of
God, of the nature and principle of the mind, of the source and nature
of the affections, of human slavery or the power of the passions, and
of human freedom or the power of the intellect. It is in this treatise
that he developed his leading idea of substance and other subjects.
But it is not at all an attractive work. The method of demonstration by
definitions, axioms, propositions, postulates, corollaries, and scholia,
is tedious and difficult to follow to the last degree. However, it is
requisite to give some specimens of his method and form of thought.
In the first part of the _Ethics_, touching God, the following
definitions are stated at the beginning:――“1. By self-caused I
understand that whose essence involves existence, or that which cannot
be conceived as non-existing. 2. A thing is called finite in its kind
which can be limited by another of the same nature. 3. By substance I
understand that which is self-contained and is conceived by itself. 4.
By attribute I understand that which the mind perceives in substance
as constituting its essence. 5. By mode I understand the affections
of substance, or that which is in something else, through which it
is apprehended. 6. By God I understand a Being absolutely infinite, a
substance consisting of infinite attributes, each expressing an eternal
and infinite essence. 7. A thing is called free which by the sole
necessity of its own nature is determined to action by itself alone,
but constrained, if it is determined by something else, to exist and to
act in a fixed manner. 8. By eternity I understand existence itself, so
far as it is conceived to follow necessarily from the definition of an
eternal thing.” The first definition is vague, for strictly speaking,
the term self-caused is an irrational conception; because if anything
is said to cause itself, it is assumed that it exists before itself, in
order that it may cause itself. But Spinoza intended the definition to
express the dependence of existence on essence; still the latter cannot
cause the former, unless it already exists itself, thus what was to be
caused already existed before being caused. The definition might have
been put in this form: the first cause in the universe is self-existent
and eternal and immutable in its essence. Others of his definitions
involve inconsistencies, but it is unnecessary to go over them.
The axioms are next stated thus:――“1. All that is, is either in itself,
or in some other than itself. 2. That which cannot be conceived by
another thing, must be conceived by itself. 3. From a determinate
cause an effect must follow; without such a cause no effect can follow.
4. Knowledge of an effect depends on the knowledge of the cause and
involves the same. 5. Things that have nothing in common cannot explain
each other. 6. A true idea must agree with its object. 7. Everything
that can be conceived as not existing, its essence does not involve
existence.”
From these definitions and axioms, he proceeded in a series of
propositions to develop his ideas of God and the universe. These
propositions extend to thirty-six, and he attempted throughout to give
them the form and the reality of demonstrations.
His main conclusions in this part of the Ethics are these:――“Besides
God, no substance can exist or be conceived to exist. Whatever is,
is in God, and nothing can be, nor can anything be conceived to be,
without God.” He demonstrated this at some length, using geometrical
illustrations, and then enunciated that “God acts by the sole laws
of his own nature, and by constraint of nothing. God is the immanent
indwelling, not the outside, cause of all things. God and all his
attributes are eternal. The existence and the essence of God are one
and the same thing. All that follows from the absolute nature of any
attribute of God must have existed from eternity. God is not only the
efficient cause of the existence of things, but also their essence.
The thing that is determined to effect anything is necessarily so
determined by God, and that which is not determined by God cannot
determine itself to act, and therefore ♦the thing that is determined
by God to do anything cannot render itself undetermined. The individual
finite thing that has determinate existence cannot be determined to
exist and act, unless it be itself determined to exist and act by
another cause, which is also finite and possessed of determinate
existence, and this cause again can neither exist nor be determined to
act save by another cause, which is also finite and has a determinate
existence, and this yet again by another, and so on to infinity. In the
nature of things there is no contingency; as all things are determined
by the necessity of the Divine nature to exist and to act in a definite
manner.”
♦ duplicate word “the” removed
“Understanding, whether as finite or infinite, must comprehend the
attributes and the affections of God, and nothing else. Will cannot
be called a free cause, but a necessary cause only. Things could have
been produced by God in no other order than as they have been produced.
Nothing exists from the nature of which some effect does not follow.”
These are some of the principal ideas which Spinoza essayed to
demonstrate; but at the end of this part of his work, he was aware that
many prejudices existed among mankind, which would prevent them from
adopting his views; and therefore he deemed it worth his trouble to
examine such prejudices more fully in an appendix, in which he assailed
the doctrine of final causes, and exerted his power of sarcasm to
extinguish it.
He began the second part of his Ethics, on the nature and origin of
the mind, as before, with definitions and axioms; and then proceeded
to demonstrate his views in a series of propositions. The first
four propositions are couched in the following terms:――“Thought is
an attribute of God, or God is a thinking entity. Extension is an
attribute of God, or God is an extended being. The idea of his own
essence, as all things that necessarily follow from it, necessarily
exist in God. The idea of God whence infinities follow in infinite
modes can only be single.” The idea of an individual thing existing in
act is considered as effected by another idea of an individual thing
existing in act, of which God is also the cause, in so far as he is
effected by a third idea existing in act, and so on to infinity; the
order and chain of ideas and causes being the same throughout the
universe.
“The human mind does not know the human body in itself, nor does it
know that the body exists except through the ideas of the affections by
which the body is influenced. There is also present in God an idea or
consciousness of the human mind, and this follows in the same way, and
is referred to God in the same manner, as the idea of consciousness of
the human body. This idea of the mind is united with the mind in the
same way as the mind itself is united with the body. The mind not only
perceives the affections of the body, but the ideas of these affections
also. The mind has no consciousness of itself, save in so far as it
perceives ideas of the affections of the body. The human mind involves
no adequate knowledge of the parts composing the human body. The idea
of each affection of the human body does not involve knowledge of an
external body. The human mind perceives no external body as existing
in fact, save through ideas of affections of the body. The idea of
any state or affection of the human body does not involve the adequate
cognition of the human body itself. Ideas of the affections of the
human body, in so far as they are referred to the mind only, are not
clear and distinct, but confused. The idea of each of the affections
of the human body does not involve the adequate cognition of the
human mind. All ideas in so far as they are referred to God, are true.
Falsehood consists in the absence of the cognition which inadequate
and confused ideas involve. Inadequate and confused ideas follow by
the same necessity as clear and distinct ones.”
All these statements are elaborated at length. Then he distinguished
three degrees of cognition. First, opinion, which is the development
of perceptions and general notions from the impression of the senses,
represented to the understanding confusedly, or through certain words
retained in the memory, which may represent imperfect ideas of things.
The second kind of cognition he called reason, which consists of common
notions and adequate ideas of the properties of things. The third
and highest kind of cognition is intuition, which proceeds from the
adequate idea of the real essence of some of the attributes of God,
to the requisite cognition of the essence of things. Cognitions of the
first kind may be uncertain or untrue; those of the second and third
kind are necessarily true, and teach us to distinguish the true from
the false. He who has a true idea, is at the same time certain of its
truth. The human mind in so far as it has true ideas, is a part of
the infinite intellect of God; and so its clear and distinct ideas
are as necessarily true as are the ideas of God.¹ As reason considers
things as they really are in themselves, it concludes that they are
not contingent but necessary. This necessity of things is the very
necessity of the eternal nature of God; therefore, reason apprehends
things under a certain form of eternity. Every idea of an actual
concrete object necessarily involves the eternal and infinite essence
of God, which pervades all alike, and is therefore adequately cognised
by the human mind.
¹ The very core of Cartesianism.
But there is no such thing in the mind as free-will, since it is a
certain and determined mode of thought. “It is determined to will
this or that by a cause which is determined by another cause, this by
another, and so on to infinity.” The will to affirm or deny ideas is
not a mere causeless act, it is the necessary consequence of the ideas;
as distinct volitions and ideas are identical, so also are will and
understanding one and the same.
The third part of the Ethics, treating on the affections and the
emotions, as usual opened with definitions. By affections and emotions,
he meant states of the body, whereby its power to act is increased
or diminished, aided or controlled, together with the mental ideas
of these affections. Opposing natures which would destroy each other
cannot exist in the same individual; and each individual thing as far
as it can strives to conserve its life. The idea of anything which
increases or diminishes the power of the body to act, in an equal
degree increases or diminishes the thinking power of the mind; hence
the mind strives to imagine such things as increase the power of the
body to act. Desire is conscious appetite, and appetite is the very
essence of man, in so far as he is determined to those actions that
subserve his own preservation.
Spinoza gave a wide meaning to the word desire, including under it
efforts, impulses, appetites, and volitions of every kind. Still this
part of his work is the most valuable portion of his philosophy.
He recognised only three primary affections, namely, joy, sorrow, and
desire. Joy is explained as the transition from a less to a higher
state of perfection, while a change in the opposite sense causes sorrow.
Love is joy associated with the idea of an external object. Hate is
sorrow accompanied by the idea of an external cause. Liking is joy
accompanied by the idea of an object which is accidentally the cause of
joy. Devotion is love of that which we admire. Scorn is pleasure sprung
from this――that something we despise is imagined in the thing we hate.
Hope is wavering joy sprung from an idea of something past or to come,
of the issue of which we are more or less in doubt. Fear is unstable
sorrow arising from the idea of something past or future, of the issue
of which we are in some degree doubtful. Security is joy derived from
the idea of something past or future in connection with which all cause
of doubt is removed. Despair is sorrow sprung from the idea of a future
or past thing combined with no cause of doubt. Thus it appears, that
security may be associated with hope, and despair with fear. Sympathy
is love so affecting man that he rejoices in another’s weal, and on the
other side, grieves over another’s woe.
Thus his descriptions of the affections are generally brief, but
careful and well stated. His general description of the affections is
to this effect: “The affection which is characterised as a passion of
the mind is a confused idea, whereby the mind affirms a stronger or
weaker power of existing than was before experienced in its body, or
some parts of its body, and which being affirmed, the mind itself is
determined to think of this thing rather than of that.” He also stated
that all our ideas of bodies rather proclaim the actual constitution
of our own body than the nature of any external body, and that those
ideas which constitute emotional forms must indicate or express
the constitution of the body, or some of its parts, increasing or
diminishing its power of acting.
The fourth part of the Ethics treated on the strength of the affections,
or human slavery, by which he meant that man is impotent in the
direction and the restraint of his own passions. In his introduction to
this part, he says: “I call man’s inability to moderate and to control
the affective and emotional element in his nature, Slavery. For man
under the dominion of his affections is not master of himself, but is
controlled by fate, as it were, so that in seeing and even in approving
of the better course, he, nevertheless, feels himself constrained to
follow the worse.” He repeats his view that there is no final causes
or free-will, and then states: “We have shown that nature does not act
with a purpose, for the eternal and infinite Being whom we call God,
or Nature, as he exists of necessity, so does he act of necessity; and
we have shown that by the same necessity that God exists, by the same
necessity does he act. The reason, therefore, why God exists and why
he acts, is one and the same, and as he does not exist for any end
or purpose, so he does not act for any end or purpose; for as he is
without beginning or end, as regards his existence, so is he infinite
and eternal as regards his acts. Now a final cause, as it is called,
is nothing but a human appetite or desire, considered as the cause of
anything.”
In this part, his moral views are mainly founded on the following
definitions of good and evil:――“By good I understand that which we know
to be useful to us. By evil I understand that which we know prevents
us from enjoying something good.” The knowledge of good and evil is
nothing more than an emotion of joy or of sorrow, so far as we are
conscious of this; hence we call that good or evil which favours or
opposes the continuance of our life, or anything which assists or
hinders our powers of action. To act virtuously is merely to act for
our own life, and to preserve ourselves by the dictates of reason.
Man always seeks to preserve his life for the sake of nothing but
that which he thinks useful to him. The mind in so far as it reasons,
desires nothing but to understand; nor does it judge anything to be
useful to it save that which leads to understanding――and therefore
we know nothing certainly as good save that which leads truly to
understanding; and on the other hand, nothing is evil save that which
prevents us from understanding. “The supreme good of the mind is the
knowledge of God, and the highest virtue is to know God.” This is the
highest knowledge that the human mind can attain. “Therefore that which
is supremely useful or good to the mind is the knowledge of God ...
the absolute virtue or power of the mind is, therefore, to understand.
But the height of the mind’s understanding is God; consequently, the
supreme power of the mind is to know God.”
We call that evil which is the cause of grief or pain to us. In so far
as anything agrees with our nature, so far it is good; hence the more
that anything accords with our nature, the more useful it is to us,
and the more it is good; and so the more useful anything is to us, the
more does it agree with our nature. “Nothing, therefore, save in so far
as it accords with our nature, can be good; even as the more a thing
accords with our nature, the more useful it is.”
The good that the virtuous man desires for himself he also desires for
his fellow-men, and this the more ardently as he has a high cognition
of God. “Therefore does the votary of virtue desire for all men the
good he desires for himself.... Thus, therefore, the greater the
conception of God involved in the essence of the mind, the greater will
be the desire of the disciple of virtue that any good he enjoys himself
should also be enjoyed by others.” Moreover, “the good which a man
desires, he will love and desire more constantly if he see that others
love and desire it also; and so he will strive to make others love it;
and because this good is common to all, and all may equally share it,
he will further strive that all should enjoy it, and this so much the
more as he himself enjoys it the more.”
All that conduces to the order of society, and tends to make men live
in amity, is good; while whatever brings disorder into the state is
evil, as everything that causes men to live amicably together, at
the same time causes them to live in conformity with reason, and is
therefore good. “The man led by reason is freer when he lives as a
member of a community under compact and bond of law, than when he lives
in solitude and obeys himself alone.... The man, therefore, who is
led by reason and desire to live in freedom is careful to observe the
common laws of his country.”
To make this part of his work more clear and compact, he gave in an
appendix an excellent summary of the whole, and concluded with the
following:――
“Man’s power is very limited, and is infinitely surpassed by the
power of external causes; and, therefore, we have no absolute power of
adapting to our own use things external to ourselves. Still, we should
bear with an even mind that which befalls us against the conditions of
our advantage, if we are aware that we have fairly done our duty, and
that the power we possess could not have gone so far as to avoid those
evils, and that we are a part of the whole order of nature, and bound
thereby. And understanding this much clearly and distinctly that the
part of us which is called intellect, our better part, will therein be
contented, and will seek to persist in that content. For, so far as we
understand, we consider only that which is necessary, and can rest in
nothing but the truth, and, therefore, so far as we rightly understand
these things, the endeavour of our better part accords with the
universal order of nature.”
The fifth and last part of the Ethics treats on the power of the
understanding or human freedom. He repeated his doctrine that the order
and connection of ideas is the same as the order of things.¹ Spinoza’s
aim in this part is mainly to expound the relation between emotion
and reason, the power of the latter over the energy of the former. A
passion itself is a confused idea, but whenever we are able to form
a clear and distinct idea of it, it ceases to be a passion; hence it
follows that to know the passions is the best way to restrain them;
understand the passions that you may be master of them. The more that
the mind recognises all things as necessary, the less does it suffer
from the passions. He who clearly and distinctly knows himself and
his passions, rejoices, because such knowledge is accompanied with the
idea of God. The love of God ought chiefly to fill the mind, as it is
associated with all the higher emotions. “God is without passions or
any emotion of joy or sorrow, because all ideas so far as they are
referred to God are true; again, God cannot pass from a greater to
a less, or from a less to a greater state of perfection. Therefore,
as God is not affected by joy nor sorrow, he can neither love or hate
anyone. No one can hate God, because the idea of God within us is
adequate and perfect; and so far as we contemplate him, to that extent
do we act, and consequently, there can be no pain associated with the
idea of God. He that loves God cannot seek that God should love him
in return; because if man looked for this, he would thereby desire
that God should not be God. This love towards God is the highest good
which man under the dictates of reason can desire; it is common to all
mankind, and we can wish that all should enjoy it as much as ourselves;
thus the love of God is not liable to be narrowed by envy or jealousy,
on the contrary, it must be cherished the more, the greater the number
of our fellow-men we imagine to enjoy it.”
¹ This identity of thought with the order of development in
things was adopted by Hegel.
Touching the duration of the human mind, though it cannot remember
anything that is past, save during the continuance of the body, yet,
as God is the cause of its existence, and also of its essence, there
is an idea in God which expresses the essence of this or that human
body under the form of eternity. Thus the human mind cannot be wholly
destroyed with the body, something of it survives which is eternal.
This idea which expresses the essence of body under the form of
eternity is a certain mode of thought belonging to the essence of the
mind, and necessarily eternal. This, however, cannot be determined by
a reference to duration in time, as we cannot remember to have existed
before our bodies; nevertheless we feel and are persuaded that we
are eternal, as the ground of this feeling and conception is logical
demonstration. Our mind can only be said to endure, and its existence
to be limited to a certain time, in so far as the existence of the body
is involved, and thus far only has the mind the power of apprehending
things under the form of time.
The highest effort of the mind and the highest virtue is to understand
things through the most perfect kind of cognition; and this is the
cognition proceeding from an adequate idea of certain attributes of
God to an adequate conception of the essence of things, and the more
we comprehend things in this way, the more we know of God. The more apt
the mind is to know things in this way the greater its desire for such
knowledge, and from this springs the highest satisfaction of the mind.
“Our mind in so far as it knows itself and the body under the form
of eternity, thus far has it a requisite knowledge of God, and knows
that it is in God and is conceived through God. This kind of intuitive
cognition depends on the mind itself as its formal cause, in so far
as the mind itself is eternal. The farther we advance in this kind of
knowledge, the more conscious are we of ourselves and of God, we take
delight in it, and our joy is associated with the idea of God as its
cause. From this intuitive cognition arises the intellectual love of
God, which is eternal. God loves himself with an infinite intellectual
love. The intellectual love of the mind for God is the very love of
God――the love wherewith God loves himself, not as He is infinite, but
as He can be interpreted by the essence of the human mind considered
under the form of eternity; that is, the intellectual love of the mind
towards God is part of the infinite love wherewith God loves Himself.
Hence it follows, that in so far as God loves Himself, He loves mankind,
and that the love of God for man, and the intellectual love of the mind
of man for God, are one and the same. From this we clearly understand
wherein consists our salvation, our happiness, and our liberty. It is
this eternal love of God, which in sacred scripture is spoken of as
glory, and with truth, for whether it be referred to the mind of man
or of God, it is rightly designated peace of mind, which, in fact, is
not to be distinguished from the glory of scripture. There is nothing
in nature opposed to this intellectual love, or to abrogate it, and
the greater the number of things that the mind knows, according to the
second and the third kinds of cognition, the less does it suffer from
evil passions, and the less does it fear death.”
He touched on other points of interest to this effect. Inasmuch as the
most perfect peace of mind arises from intuitive cognition, it follows
that the human mind may be of such a nature that what we have shown to
be liable to pass away and perish with the body, when contrasted with
what remains, may be of no significance. He who has a mind capable of
many things, has a mind the greatest part of which is eternal. Inasmuch
as human bodies are capable of a great variety of actions, it is not
doubtful that their nature may be such as to be referable to minds
which have extensive knowledge of God and of themselves, and of which
the principal part is eternal, so that they have scarcely any fear of
death. The more perfect anything is it is the more real, and the more
active it is the less it suffers; hence the more perfect a thing is
the more active it is. From this it is assumed to follow that the part
of the mind which remains after the death of the body, whatever be its
quantity, is more perfect than the rest. Now, the eternal part of the
mind is the understanding, by which we say that we act, but the part
that perishes we have shown to be that wherewith the imagination is
connected.
From what is stated above, and in other parts of his works, it appears
that the human mind, in so far as it is possessed of understanding,
is an eternal mode of thought, which is determined by another eternal
mode of thought, this by another, and so on to infinity――so that all
together constitute the eternal and infinite intelligence of God. Thus,
whatever portion of the mind of man may survive the body, is merged in
the divine mind. It has no conscious or distinct existence of its own.
It is merely a mode of thought controlled by another and another mode
of thought till united and centred in the one eternal essence of the
universe.
Spinoza then made some remarks on what he had stated on morality in
other parts of the work, and concluded with these words: “Herewith
I have finished all that I proposed to say touching the power of
the mind over the emotions and her freedom. Whence it is evident how
great is the wise man’s power and his advantage over the ignorant
man who is driven by blind desire. For as such a man is distracted by
external influences, and in many ways besides, and never attains true
contentment in his soul; he lives, as it were, without sense of himself
and God and the nature of things, and no sooner ceases to suffer than
he ceases to be. Whereas the wise man, if we take him as such, is of
a constant mind, and being aware of himself and of God and the nature
of things in a way of eternal necessity, does never cease to be, but
is ever in possession of true contentment. And if the way I have shown
to lead hither seems exceedingly hard, yet it may be discovered. That
truly must be hard which is seldom found. For if salvation were so easy
and could be found with little trouble, how should it come to pass that
nearly all mankind neglect it? But every excellent work is as difficult
as it is rare.” Thus, in the final result, Spinoza came near to the
Stoics’ position: which is, that the way is open to everyone alike, but
as things stand, the mass of mankind are ruled by the coarser motives,
which alone they appreciate. He does not seem to have believed in
any great improvement of the body of mankind; and considering the
state of Europe in his day, and all the circumstances around him, who
could blame him? Even now and here, it must be confessed that the most
sanguine thinker, and the most hopeful reformer, frequently meet with
many things which might shake the confidence of the firmest mind and
the warmest heart.
Viewing Spinoza’s work as a system of the universe, or as a philosophy
of existence, it falls far short of its end. Both in its principles and
in its details it is defective, and it contains many inconsistencies
which have often been pointed out.
But it is chiefly as a moral system that it is interesting to us.
Though he treated many moral points ably and fairly, and freely
admitted and even insisted on the value of the principle of utility,
yet the defects of his system, considered as a moral philosophy,
are obvious. If morality and religion are related subjects, which in
various ways strengthen each other, then little can be made of his
system――since a God of infinite and eternal existence, of infinite
intelligence and perfection, but without will or purpose, or moral
attributes of any kind, could hardly be an object of worship to
ordinary men. But apart from this, and taking morality in the narrowest
sense, his ethical system is defective in many points, which it is
needless to particularise.
Spinoza in several parts of his writings greatly underrated the
complexity of the problems of ethical and political science. He nowhere
signalised the distinction between positive morality and positive
law. He was often astonishingly wrong in believing that he had found
a short road to certain and perfect knowledge, and this is especially
noticeable in his treatment of politics. He thought that no important
experiment in politics remained to be tried that had not been already
discovered and attempted. He manifested no grasp of the method of
the gradual development of society and political institutions; such
shortcomings, however, were common to the philosophers of the period.
But finally, as a philosopher, and as a man, Spinoza manifested great
moral energy and force of character. He was gifted with an intellect
of a keen and original cast, though not of the most comprehensive and
highest order. His doctrine of the eternity of the human mind is one
of the boldest efforts of speculative thought on record, and exhibited
a grasp of mind rarely attained, while it has produced memorable
results. His identification of the human mind with God seems to have
suggested the speculations of Fichte, Schelling, and Hegel touching
the comprehension of the Absolute or God, which raised such a stir in
Germany and in France in the first half of the present century; and,
indeed, historically, Spinoza’s writings have had much influence in
various directions.
An account of Spinoza’s philosophy is given in the chief histories of
philosophy, and there are several works which specially treat on his
system, among which may be mentioned, Pollock’s _Life and Philosophy of
Spinoza_, 1880; Willis’s _Life, Correspondence, and Ethics of Spinoza_,
1870; and others in French and German. Soon after the publication of
Spinoza’s system, a considerable number of works appeared in which his
views were combated. Though not at all a believer in the philosophy of
Spinoza myself, nevertheless, I can honestly join with Schleiermacher,
who said:――“Offer reverentially with me a lock to the manes of the
holy, rejected Spinoza! He was filled with the lofty world-spirit;
the infinite was his beginning and his end; the universe his only and
eternal love. In holy innocence and deep humility he saw himself in
the mirror of the eternal world, and saw how he too was its most lovely
mirror; full of religion was he, and full of holy spirit, and hence he
stands there alone and unrivalled, master in his art, but exalted above
the profane guild, without disciples and without civil right.”
Leibnitz, a contemporary of Spinoza, is usually regarded as the founder
of the German philosophy of the eighteenth century.¹ He attained to
eminence both in philosophy and in mathematics, and wrote on many
subjects. But he nowhere developed his philosophical views in a
systematic and complete form; a mere summary of his doctrines was
presented in his exposition of the monadology.
¹ Born 1646, and died 1716. A list of the books which specially
treat on the life, the writings, and the philosophy of
Leibnitz, is given in the second volume, Ueberweg’s _History
of Philosophy_, pages 94‒96.
He adopted the dogmatic form of philosophising, that is, he believed
that the power of human thought, when aided by clear and distinct ideas,
could transcend the limits of experience, and attain to perfect truth.
But he overstepped both the dualism of Descartes and the monism of
Spinoza, by the recognition of a graduated scale of beings. Eternal
truths are in the divine understanding, distinct from the divine will;
the divine mind being the source of the possibility of things, while
the divine will is the cause of their reality; and hence all truth
must by its nature be rational. In psychology he adopted a form
of the doctrine of innate ideas, associated with the principles of
identity and contradiction. Error arises from a want of clearness
and distinctness; while dark and confused knowledge may be raised by
demonstration to clearness and distinctness.
The aim of his theory of monads¹ is to ascertain the existence and to
determine the nature of the simplest elements of substance, into which
all other things and beings might be resolved. The primary monads seem
to be something like atoms, or units of matter and of mind, endowed
with life and ideas. All the monads have ideas, but of different
degrees of clearness. God is the first monad, the primitive substance,
and all His ideas are perfect. The souls of animals have sensation
and memory. Every soul is a monad, as its power of acting proves its
substantiality, and all substances are monads. Inorganic nature is
merely an aggregate of undeveloped monads, while plants and minerals
are a kind of sleeping monads with unconscious ideas; but in plants
these ideas are formative forces. Man is a monad that has been waked
up. The monads are not distinguishable in kind, but only in degree; the
difference between them consists in the separate stages of development
which each has attained. Every conscious monad has the clearest
perception of those parts of the universe to which it is most nearly
related; and thus from its own standpoint it is a mirror of the
universe.
¹ Leibnitz seems to have borrowed the term monads from Bruno;
see page 400.
His theory of “pre-established harmony” is thus expressed by himself:
――“Every body acts as if there were no soul, and every soul acts as if
there were no body; and yet both act as if each was influenced by the
other.” So between the succession of the ideas, and the motions of the
monad, there is a harmony pre-established by God. The soul and body
of man agree, as it were, like the two clocks originally set together,
and exactly moving at the same rate. In the same way each part of the
universe harmonises with every other part. Creation simply consisted in
first establishing, once for all, the laws of this unity and harmony;
everything being arranged, the parts assigned to their places, every
thought and every motion having been foreseen and provided for, when
the universe was first called into existence. The existing world,
therefore, is the best of all possible worlds, whether our limited
minds can understand it in this light or not. The continuity of
physical law is never broken, and yet the moral world is in harmony
with the physical world, as the course of nature in all cases must be
in accord with the highest interest of the soul.¹
¹ Compare Stewart’s _Dissertion_, pages 254‒257, 560‒561,
edition, 1854; and Ueberweg’s _History of Philosophy_, Volume
II., pages 106‒113.
Though Leibnitz endeavoured to unite the cosmological and the
theological ideas, the origin of the world from God, and its
explanation by physical laws, yet he completely failed to establish
a real harmony of the two conceptions; as everyone before and after
him has failed in their attempts to unite opposite elements in one
conception. The inconsistencies of his philosophy have often been
exposed; nevertheless, it is only justice to state that his writings
contained many valuable suggestions, which subsequently proved to be
true.¹
¹ For instance, his view of the unconscious modifications of
the mind, or latent mental modifications.
Bayle, the author of the Historical and Critical Dictionary, exercised
a pretty wide influence on philosophical opinions.¹ He had a sceptical
cast of mind, and directed his shafts against all forms of dogmatism,
often indulging in sallies of ironical humour. He was a man of
considerable erudition, an acute critic, and endowed with much logical
tact and metaphysical subtlety. There are other philosophers whose
works I should have deemed it necessary to notice, if I had been
writing a complete history of philosophy, such as Malebranche, De la
Forge, Sylvain Regis, Arnauld, P. Nicole, Pascal, Du Hamel, Wolff, and
others.
¹ Born 1647, died 1706.
Turning to English philosophy, it may be noted that at the present time
many in England are conversant with the philosophy of Germany and of
France; and the influence of the speculations of both these nations on
the English thought of the nineteenth century is probably much greater
than is commonly believed. While in the seventeenth and eighteenth
centuries, especially in the latter, English philosophy greatly
influenced the philosophy of France, and in a less degree that of
Germany, and in the present century all sides have influenced each
other; although it appears that German speculation has recently been
in the ascendant in some quarters of England, and even in Scotland.
The place of Lord Bacon in the history of philosophy has often been
very differently estimated, according to the standpoint of those
who have essayed to discuss the subject.¹ Bacon’s avowed aim was to
increase the power of man by enlarging the range of his knowledge. But
to affect this, the mind must be freed from prejudice and superstition
of every sort, so that it may be enabled to apprehend things in their
real relations. Knowledge must begin with experience, starting from
observation and experiment, whence by induction it should proceed
methodically, first to the simpler propositions, and then to others of
higher generality, rising gradually step by step to higher universality;
and then finally, from these to descend to the particular, and thus to
arrive at discoveries which should extend the power of man over nature.
To attain such results he insisted strongly on the value and the
necessity of a patient collection and accurate comparison of facts.
¹ Born 1561, died 1625.
Bacon’s plan for the reorganisation of the sciences embraced a
general review of the whole intellectual field. This was followed
by his doctrine of method, and then by an exposition of the sciences
themselves, with their application to new discoveries. His conception
was grand, and his end highly laudable; but the development of the
principles of his method is far from complete. His own attempts at
original investigation in applying his method is often crude, and fall
much below some of the efforts of his own contemporaries. Still, he
succeeded in indicating several of the fundamental points of induction;
and thus he became the founder of the empirical school of modern
philosophers, though he himself was greater as a critic than as a
philosopher. His greatest merit was that he emphatically insisted on
the importance of the collection, arrangement, and comparison of facts.
On the other hand, he undervalued the method of deduction, and the
value of the syllogism for deductive and mediate knowledge.
His writings have had much influence in Britain, and in other countries
of Europe, especially in France; and thus his method of induction has
contributed at home and abroad to the progress of physical science.¹
¹ An excellent account of Bacon and his philosophy is given by
Kuno Fischer in a work entitled, “Franz Baco von Verulam, die
Real-philosophie und ihr Zeitalter,” 1856.
The eccentric Lord Herbert of Cherbury was a writer of some note.¹ In
his remarkable work, “De Veritate,” he treated on various points of
mental philosophy. He distinguished the faculties of the mind into four,
namely, natural instinct, the inner sense, the external sense, and the
discursive faculty. Each of these powers affords a certain class of
truths, and all truth must become known to us through one or other
of these faculties. But the truths of natural instinct are relatively
higher and more certain than any other. By this faculty (which might
have been called intellectual instinct) we apprehend the common notions
touching the relations of things, and especially those which tend
to our own preservation. They are implanted in us by nature, and
represent something of the divine image and wisdom. They are primary
notions, since they are necessary, independent, universal, certain,
and instantaneous in their manifestation.
¹ Born 1581, died 1648.
The inner sense under the direction of natural instinct, or the
common notions, embraces all the powers which are associated with the
particular forms of the agreeable and the disagreeable, of good and
evil, whether these are dependent on the body or on the mind. The chief
internal sense is conscience, which judges what is good and evil in
their various relations, and thus determines what ought to be done.
The external senses depend on the special effects of external objects
upon our external organs, jointly with the corresponding internal
senses and the natural instincts. The discursive faculty gives that
knowledge of objects presented by the internal and external senses,
which depends on special capacities for investigation, and on
the common notions; and it has reference to existence, qualities,
quantities, relations, and especially to their causes.
He was also the author of several religious treatises and historical
works. He distinguished man from animals, not merely by the gift of
reason, but specially by the capacity of religion, which is peculiar
to the former. He held that all men had the five following notions of
religion:――That there is a God; that He ought to be worshipped; that
virtue and piety are the chief elements of worship; that repentance is
a duty; and that there is a future life, with rewards and punishments.
He maintained that a revelation is possible to individuals, and
affirmed that a special revelation was made to himself; but, since
nothing can be admitted as revealed which contradicts the five common
notions, and anything beyond these can be of no importance to the human
race, therefore, no such revelation should be made public. His views
had some influence on the subsequent lines of English thought, and he
has sometimes been signalised as the earliest of that class of writers
called the English Deists.
But the most famous English philosopher of the Rebellion period was
Thomas Hobbes of Malmesbury. Born in 1588, he was in the prime of
life when the struggle between the parliament and Charles I. began
in earnest. Hobbes firmly maintained the view that the King had an
unquestionable right to absolute and supreme power in the State; and it
is palpably evident that his philosophy, and especially his political
and religious speculations, were much influenced by the struggles
of his own day in England. He was deeply touched by the sight which
the Civil War presented, and the imprisonment and execution of the
King, the religious rancour and the hypocrisy which were mingled in
the conflict, and the consequent suffering of the nation. In such
circumstances, with his prepossessions, it would be unreasonable
to expect from him sound opinions and conclusions on politics;
nevertheless, he was an original thinker of great power, and a man of
varied accomplishments. None of his philosophical or political works
were published till he was past fifty years of age, so they were not
the crude performances of youth, but the deliberate outcome of his
matured thought. In his different treatises and works, however, he
again and again repeated his chief psychological views and political
doctrines, in slightly varied language, but identically the same in
ideas and thought.
In his “Elements of Philosophy,” published in 1655, and divided into
four parts, which treated of logic, of the first grounds of philosophy,
of the proportions of motions and magnitudes, and of physics, he
defines philosophy as the knowledge of effects by their causes, and
of causes from their observed effects, by means of true inferences.
The end of philosophy is the application of our knowledge of effects
to the utmost of our strength, for the benefit of human life, as the
end of knowledge is power, which should result in action. The utility
of philosophy is especially seen in physical science, in geometry,
in astronomy, and in navigation. From his conception of philosophy,
he excluded the doctrine of God, because He is “eternal, ingenerable,
incomprehensible, and in Whom there is nothing either to divide or
compound, or any generation to be conceived”;¹ and also knowledge
acquired by divine inspiration, and all false doctrines, such as
astrology and divinations: for all that which we know by legitimate
deduction can neither be false nor doubtful. I may state that Hobbes’s
idea of God was entirely negative. In his “Leviathan,” after running
over a number of terms and expressions which should not be applied
to God, he says:――“He that will attribute to God nothing but what is
warranted by natural reason, must either use such negative attributes
as infinite, eternal, incomprehensible; or most high, most great;
or indefinite, as good, just, holy; and in such sense as if he meant
not to declare what he is.... There is but one name to signify our
conception of his nature, and that is, I AM; and but one name of his
relation to us, and that is God.” He distinguished philosophy into
natural and civil. But in order to understand the properties of a
commonwealth, it is necessary first to know the dispositions and
manners of men; and so civil philosophy is divided into two parts, the
one treating of men’s dispositions and manners, called ethics, and the
other treating of their civil duties, called political philosophy.² In
the _Leviathan_, published in 1651, he gives a kind of classification
of the sciences, a pretty complete formulation of the knowledge
and science of the time. He reduced everything to consequences.
Matter or bodies being assumed, motion and quantity are placed at
the top of the scale; while consequences from quantity, and motion
indeterminate, which being the principles or first foundation of
philosophy, “philosophia prima,” forms the basis of the whole. Then
follow consequences from quantity, and motion determined――Mathematics,
Geometry; consequences from motion and quantity determined――Cosmography,
Astronomy, Geography, and so on, politics being classed with physics as
a part of natural philosophy.³
¹ Part I., Chapter I., Section 2, _et seq._ All my references
are to the collective ♦edition of Hobbes’s English works, by
Sir William Molesworth.
♦ “dition” replaced with “edition”
² _Leviathan_, Part II., Chapter XXXI.
³ Part I., Chapter IX.
Thinking or reasoning is merely a process of computation, of addition
and subtraction. He says, “to compute is either to collect the sum of
many things that are added together, or to know what remains when one
thing is taken out of another. Ratiocination, therefore, is the same
with addition and subtraction; and if any man add multiplication and
division, I will not be against it, seeing multiplication is nothing
but addition of equals one to another, and division nothing but a
subtraction of equals one from another, as often as possible. So
that all ratiocination is comprehended in these two operations of the
mind, addition and subtraction.” The same doctrine is stated in his
“Leviathan,” and illustrated as applicable to all things that can be
added together, or taken one out of another. Thus, “writers of politics
add together pactions to find men’s duties; and lawyers, laws and facts,
to find what is right and wrong in the actions of private men. In sum,
in whatever matter there is place for addition and subtraction, there
also is place for reason; and where these have no place, there reason
has nothing at all to do.” Finally, reason considered as a faculty of
the mind, is nothing but reckoning, “that is, adding and subtracting
of the consequences of general names agreed upon for marking and
signifying of our thoughts: I say, marking them, when we reckon by
ourselves, and signifying, when we demonstrate our reckonings to other
men.”¹
¹ _Elements of Philosophy_, Part I., Chapter I., Section 2.
_Leviathan_, Chapter V., page 30.
This was Hobbes’s form of nominalistic doctrine, and he has some good
remarks on names, the use of words, and the use and abuse of speech. He
explained this branch of knowledge both in the “Elements of Philosophy”
and in the “Leviathan” in the former at length, and in the latter
briefly. “The general use of speech is to transfer our mental discourse
into verbal, or the train of our thoughts into a train of words;
and that for two purposes, whereof one is the registering of the
consequences of our thoughts; which being apt to slip out of our memory,
and put us to a new labour, may again be recalled, by such words as
they were marked by. So that the first use of names is to serve for
marks or notes of remembrance. Another is, when many use the same words,
to signify, by their connection and order, one to another, what they
conceive, or think of each matter; and also what they desire, fear,
or have any other passion for. And for this use they are called signs.
Special uses of speech are these: first to register what by cogitation
we find to be the cause of anything, present or past, and what we
find things present or past may produce or effect; which in sum, is
acquiring of art. Secondly, to show to others that knowledge which we
have attained, which is, to counsel and teach one another. Thirdly,
to make known to others our wills and purposes, that we may have the
mutual help of one another. Fourthly, to please and delight ourselves
and others, by playing with our words, for pleasure or ornament,
innocently.” To these uses of speech there are four corresponding
abuses. When we register our thoughts wrong, by using improper words,
and stating as our conception that which we never conceived, and thus
deceive ourselves; when we use words in an unusual sense, and thereby
deceive others; when we declare by words that to be true which we know
to be false; when people use words to grieve one another: “for seeing
nature has armed living creatures, some with teeth, some with horns,
and some with hands, to grieve an enemy, it is but an abuse of speech
to grieve him with the tongue, unless it be one whom we are obliged to
govern; and then it is not to grieve, but to correct and to amend.”
He explained the use of different kinds of names, the necessity of
definitions, and stated that everything which can enter into an account
may be considered a subject for names. He gave four forms or scales of
predicaments under the heads of body, quantity, quality, and relation,
which are formed with great care. And further, he explained negative
words, and then added: “All other names are but insignificant sounds,
and those of two sorts; one when they are new, and yet their meaning
not explained by definition, whereof there have been abundance coined
by schoolmen and puzzled philosophers.”¹
¹ _Elements of Philosophy_, Part I., Chapter II.; _Leviathan_,
Part I., Chapter IV.; also his treatise _Human Nature_,
Chapter V.
Motion is the prime and fundamental idea in Hobbes’s philosophy. It
runs through all his writings, and enters into almost every explanation
which he has given of anything. He treated sense and sensation at
length as a part of physics in his “Elements of Philosophy,” and in
almost all his different works he touches more or less on this subject.
His psychology has the merit of being pretty distinct; as sensation and
thought both proceed from motion, their explanation is not a difficult
matter. Concerning sense, he says: “I have shown that no motion is
generated but by a body contagious and moved: whence it is manifest
that the immediate cause of sense or perception consists in this, that
the first organ of sense is touched or pressed. For when the uttermost
part of the organ is pressed, it no sooner yields but the part next
within it is pressed also; and, in this manner, the pressure or motion
is propagated through all the parts of the organ to the innermost.
And thus, also, the pressure of the uttermost part proceeds from
the pressure of some remote body, and so continually till we come to
that from which, as from its fountain, we derive the phantasm or idea
that is made in us by our sense. And this, whatever it be, is what we
commonly call the object. Sense, therefore, is some internal motion
in the sentient, generated by some internal motion of the parts of the
object, and propagated through all the media to the innermost part of
the organ.... Moreover, I have shown that all resistance is endeavour
opposite to another endeavour, that is to say, reaction...; so that
when that endeavour inwards is the last action in the act of sense,
then from the reaction, however little the duration of it be, a
phantasm or idea has its being; which, by reason that the endeavour
is now outwards, does always appear as something placed without the
organ.” ... Then we get this definition: “Sense is a phantasm made by
the reaction and endeavour outwards in the organ of sense, caused by
an endeavour inwards from the object, remaining for some time more or
less.” How much importance he attached to motion in the derivation of
sensation, ideas, and thought is indicated in the following passages:
“Now [that] all mutation or alteration is motion or endeavour (and
endeavour also is motion), in the internal parts of the thing that
is altered, as has been proved.... Sense, therefore, in the sentient,
can be nothing else but motion in some of the internal parts of the
sentient, and the parts so moved are parts of the organs of sense.”
Again, “the original of life being in the heart, that motion in the
sentient, which is propagated to the heart, must necessarily make
some alteration or diversion of vital motion, namely, by quickening or
slackening, helping or hindering the same. Now, when it helps, it is
pleasure; when it hinders, it is pain, trouble, grief, and so on....
Now vital motion is the motion of the blood, perpetually circulating
(as has been shown from many infallible signs and marks by Dr. Harvey,
the first observer of it) in the veins and arteries. Which motion, when
it is hindered by some other motion, made by the action of sensible
objects, may be restored again, either by bending or setting straight
the parts of the body; which is done when the spirits are carried
now into these, now into other nerves, till the pain, as far as is
possible, be quite taken away. But if vital motion be helped by motion
made by sense, then the parts of the organ will be disposed to guide
the spirits in such manner as conduces most to the preservation and
augmentation of that motion, by the help of the nerves. And in animal
motion this is the very first endeavour, and found even in the embryo;
which while it is in the womb, moves its limbs with voluntary motion,
for the avoiding of what troubles it, or for the pursuing of what
pleases it. And this first endeavour, when it tends towards such things
as are known by experience to be pleasant, is called appetite, that
is, an approaching; and when it shuns what is troublesome, aversion, or
flying from it.”¹ He goes on to associate appetite and will, and shows
that the same thing is called both will and appetite. More briefly,
he says that all ideas and thought originate from sensation, thus:
“The original of them all is that which we call sense, for there is no
conception in a man’s mind which has not at first, totally, or by parts,
been begotten upon the organs of sense. The rest are derived from that
original.” Again, originally, all conceptions proceed from the action
of the thing itself, whereof it is the conception: now when the action
is present, the conception it produces is also called sense; and the
thing by whose action the same is produced, is called the object of the
sense.² Hobbes stated the conditions of sensation and perception very
well. In order to make them clear, he distinguished the subject and
object of sense, the former being the perceiving person, and the latter
the thing perceived; and it is more correct to say that we see the sun
than that we see the light; because light and colour, heat, sound, and
other qualities, are not properly objects, but ideas in the mind. He
further stated that there must always be a variety and difference among
the objects of perception, and discriminated other points.
¹ _Elements of Philosophy_, Past IV., Chapter XXV., Section 2;
Sections 2, 12, 13.
² _Leviathan_, Part I., Chapter I.; _Human Nature_, Chapter
II., Section 2.
In further explaining his views of mind, he calls imagination “a
decaying sense,” by which he means the impressions, images, or ideas
of external objects remaining in the mind after the sensations which
caused them were past. His exposition of the subject is this:――“That
when a thing lies still, unless somewhat else stir it, it will lie
still for ever, is a truth that no man doubts of. But that when a thing
is in motion, it will eternally be in motion, unless somewhat else
stay it, though the reason be the same, namely, that nothing can change
itself, is not so easily assented to.” ... Therefore, “when a body is
once in motion, it moves, unless something else hinder it, eternally;
and whatever hinders it, cannot in an instant, but in time, and by
degrees; and as we see in the water, though the wind cease, the waves
give not over rolling for a long time after; so also it happens in that
motion which is made in the internal parts of a man, then, when he sees,
dreams, and so on. For after the object is removed, or the eye shut, we
still retain an image of the thing seen, though more obscure than when
we see it. And this is it the Latins call imagination, from the image
made in seeing.... But the Greeks call it a fancy, which signifies
appearance, and is as proper to one sense as to another. Imagination,
therefore, is nothing but decaying sense; and is found in men, and in
many other living creatures, as well sleeping as waking.
“The decay of sense in men waking is not the decay of the motion made
in sense but an obscuring of it, in such manner as the light of the
sun obscures the light of the stars.... For as at a great distance of
place, that which we look at appears dim and without distinction of the
smaller parts, so also, after great distance of time, our imagination
of the past is weak, and we lose, for example, of cities we have seen,
many particular streets, and of actions, many particular circumstances.
This decaying sense, when we would express the thing itself, I mean
fancy itself, we call imagination; but when we would express the
decay, and signify that the sense is fading, old, and past, it is
called memory.” So that imagination and memory are but one thing with
different names.¹
¹ _Leviathan_, Part I., Chapter II.; see also _Human Nature_,
Chapter III., Sections 1, 7.
Hobbes manifested a fair knowledge of the operation of those principles
which subsequent psychologists have termed the laws of association and
mental modifications and ideas. He points out and distinguishes various
ways in which ideas and thoughts are associated, though he does not
use the term association of ideas, but uses the expressions, trains of
imaginations, and trains of thoughts. But I can only afford space for
a few of his illustrations:――
“When a man thinks on anything, his next thought after is not
altogether so casual as it seems to be. Not every thought to every
thought succeeds indifferently.... All fancies are motions within us,
relics of those made in the sense: and those motions that immediately
succeed one another in the sense, continue also together after sense;
inasmuch as the former coming again to take place and be predominant,
the latter follows, by coherence of the matter moved, in such manner
as water upon a plain table is drawn which way any one part of
it is guided by the finger.” Again, “The cause of the coherence or
consequence of one conception to another, is their first coherence
at that time when they are produced by sense; as, for example, from
St. Andrew the mind runs to St. Peter, because their names are read
together; from St. Peter to a stone, for the same cause; from stone
to foundation, because we see them together; and for the same cause,
from foundation to church, and from church to people, and from people
to tumult: and according to this example, the mind may run almost
from anything to anything. But as in the sense the conception of
cause and effect may succeed one another, so may they after sense
in the imagination: and for the most part they do so.” He stated and
illustrated other ways in which the train of thoughts is regulated.
Of reminiscence he says: “Beginning with the appetite to recover
something lost, proceeding from the present backwards, from thought
of the place where we miss it, to the thought of the place whence we
came last; and from the thought of that to the thought of a place
before, till we have in our mind some place wherein we had the thing
we miss: and this is called reminiscence.” Further, “The remembrance
of succession of one thing to another, that is, of what was antecedent,
and what consequent, and what concomitant, is called an experiment,
whether the same be made by us voluntarily, as when a man puts anything
into the fire, to see what effect the fire will produce upon it, or
not made by us, as when we remember a fair morning after a red evening.
To have had many experiments is what we call experience, which is
nothing but remembrance of what antecedents have been followed by what
consequents.”¹
¹ _Leviathan_, Part I., Chapter III.; _Human Nature_, Chapter
IV., Sections 2, 5, 6.
On the side of feeling, emotion, and will, Hobbes’s psychology is of
less value. His description of the passions, feelings, and emotions,
though on some points clear and accurate, is, as a whole, imperfect
and lacking in consistency. His theory of the will was this: “In
deliberation, the last appetite, as also the last fear, is called will,
namely, the last appetite, will to do, or will to omit. It is all one,
therefore, to say will and last will. Will, therefore, is the last
appetite in deliberating.... Appetite, fear, hope, and the rest of the
passions, are not called voluntary, for they proceed not from, but are
the will; and the will is not voluntary, for a man can no more say he
will will, than he will will will, and so make an infinite repetition
of the word will, which is absurd and insignificant. Forasmuch as will
to do is appetite, and will to omit fear, the cause of appetite and
fear is the cause also of our will.” With Hobbes, will and appetite are
the same thing, till deliberation is brought into operation; so that
the action of appetite is necessitated, “and, therefore, such a liberty
as is free from necessity is not to be found either in the will of men
or beasts.” But he admits the relation of will and belief.¹
¹ _Human Nature_, Chapter XII., Sections 2, 5, 6; _Leviathan_,
Part I., Chapter VI. _Elements of Philosophy_, Part IV.,
Chapter XXV., Section 13.
Hobbes’s politics need not detain us long, as his political theory is
simple and distinct. He maintained that by nature all men were nearly
equal: that all society and government originated, not in social
feelings, or any elements of sympathy for each other, but in their
mutual fear of one another; and that by nature every man was his own
judge, and had a right to all things, but which in effect was no right
at all; because in the state of nature mankind were continually at war
and killing one another: then every man was an enemy to every other man,
each depending on his own strength; and as there was no security, but
everything uncertain, so there was no place for industry, no culture
of the earth, no navigation or means of communication, no knowledge
of the face of the earth, no account of time, no arts, no letters,
and no society; and what was worst of all, continual fear and danger
of violent death prevailed; and the life of man was solitary and poor,
brutish and short.¹
¹ _De Corpore Politico_, Part I., Chapter I., Sections 1, 3,
4, 5, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12; _Leviathan_, Part I., Chapter
XIII.; also his treatise, _Elements of Philosophy, or a True
Citizen_, Chapter I., Sections 2, 3, 10, 11, 12. He indeed
says, “It may perhaps be thought there never was such a
time, or condition of war as this; and I believe it was never
generally so over all the world: but there are many places
where they live so now in that brutish manner which I have
described.”――_Leviathan._
Such being the state of mankind originally, how to get out of it was
the great problem. It seems reason at last dictated to every man that
it was for his own good to seek after peace, as far as there was any
hope of attaining it,¹ then to strengthen himself as much as he can for
his own defence against those who would not come to terms of peace. And
it follows from this law of reason or nature, that every man by common
consent should divest himself of the right to all things which he has
by nature, and to be content with a limited liberty.² Hobbes proceeded
to describe the circumstances and the proceedings relating to that once
famous “Contract Theory of Society,” when at some far-off and unknown
period in the history of the race, a multitude of men assembled with
the intention of uniting themselves, and thus established peace and
regular government.³ When men met to form regular governments for the
first time, then as to what they sanctioned, “it is to be understood
that each man has consented to it, and not the majority only. Secondly,
though thus assembled with intention to unite themselves, they are
yet in that estate in which every man has right to everything, and
consequently, as has been said, Chapter I., Section 10, in an estate
of enjoying nothing. And, therefore, meum and tuum has no place amongst
them. The first thing, therefore, they are to do, is expressly every
man to consent to something, by which they may come near to their
ends, which can be nothing else imaginable but this, that they allow
the wills of the majority of their whole number, or the wills of the
majority of some certain number of men by them determined and named; or
lastly, the will of some one man, to involve and be taken for the wills
of every man. And this done, they are united, and a body politic. And
if the majority of their whole number be supposed to involve the wills
of all the particulars, then they are said to be a democracy, that is,
a government in which the whole number, or so many of them as please,
being assembled together, are the sovereign, and every particular
man a subject. If the majority of a certain number of men, named
or distinguished from the rest, be supposed to involve the wills of
every one of the particulars, then are they said to be an oligarchy or
aristocracy, which two words signify the same thing, together with the
diverse passions of those that use them.... Lastly, if their consent
be such, that the will of one man, whom they name, shall stand for the
wills of them all, then is their government or union called a monarchy,
and that one man a sovereign, and all the rest subjects.
¹ “As long as this natural right of every man to everything
endures, there can be no security to any man, however strong
or wise he may be, of living out the time which nature
commonly allows men to live. And consequently, it is a
general rule of reason that every man ought to endeavour
peace, as far as he has hope of obtaining it; and when he
cannot obtain it, that he may seek and use all means to
defend himself.”――_Leviathan_, Part I., Chapter XIV.
² “From this fundamental law of nature, by which men are
commanded to endeavour peace, is derived this second law:
that a man be willing, when others are so, as far forth, as
for peace and defence of himself he shall think it necessary,
to lay down this right to all things, and be content with so
much liberty against other men as he would allow other men
against himself.”――_Ibid._, also _De Corpore Politico_, Part
I., Chapter II., Sections 1, 2, 3.
³ _Leviathan_, Part I., Chapter XIV.
“And these several unions, governments, and subjection of man’s will,
may be understood to be made absolutely for all future time, or for a
limited time only. But as we speak here of a body politic, instituted
for the perpetual benefit and defence of them that make it, which,
therefore, men desire should last for ever, I will only treat of this
class.”¹
¹ _De Corpore Politico_, Part II., Chapter I., Sections 2, 3, 4.
Thus having found the state, he proceeded to develop his political
philosophy. As a matter of logical sequence it fell to the state to
determine the distinctions of right and wrong, of virtue and vice, of
good and bad; and therefore, whatever the supreme power of the state
sanctioned and commanded was good, and the opposite bad. Religion
and superstition are both the same, in so far as they embody the
fear of invisible powers, whether imaginary or believed on tradition;
and whichever of these the state recognised, is religion, the others
superstition. Anyone who places his private religious convictions in
opposition to the faith sanctioned by the state, thereby commits a
revolutionary act which tended to dissolve society; and, therefore, no
man has any just pretence for making religion a cause of disobedience
to the laws of the commonwealth. For God speaks through the supreme
powers on earth, “by sovereign kings, or such as have sovereign
authority as well as they.” But, though the rights of sovereignty
should be as absolute as it is possible to make them, yet the sovereign
has duties, namely, to procure the safety of the people, to which he is
obliged by the law of nature, and to render an account of this to God,
the author of that law, and to none but him. And for the same reason
the sovereign authority is bound to establish that religion which in
their conscience they believe to be best, inasmuch as eternal good is
better than temporal; and unless they do this, it cannot really be said
that they have done their utmost for their people.¹
¹ _De Corpore Politico_, Part II., Chapters VI., VII., IX.;
_Leviathan_, Part II., Chapters XVIII., XIX., XX., XXX.
This was the current view of the king’s power, which we find
so emphatically stated and reiterated in the Scots Acts of
Parliament from the Restoration to the Revolution.
But he is specially emphatic in placing the civil power above the
ecclesiastical. He quoted an enormous quantity of Scripture, and
treated at great length on its meaning and interpretation; and
maintained throughout that the king himself was the supreme pastor of
his people, and therefore he had a right to appoint all other pastors
within his kingdom. The King also in virtue of his office, might preach
and baptise if he pleased, and read lectures on science too, in any
university within his kingdom. In short, Christian sovereigns have all
manner of power over their subjects which can be given to man for the
regulation of men’s external actions, both in policy and religion; and
may make whatever laws they should think fittest for the government of
their own subjects, as they are the commonwealth and the church, and
both state and church being the same men.¹
¹ _Leviathan_, Part IV., Chapter XLII.
Hobbes has some good remarks on law, and on moral philosophy too, and
clearly distinguished moral law and positive law. But owing to the
conception and the necessities of his political views and opinions,
he took a short cut, and made the positive or civil law the standard
and measure of right and wrong: and consequently, whatever the supreme
sovereign forbade was wrong, and whatever it commanded was right.¹ This
feature of his ethical theory, as well as the heterodoxy of many of his
religious and theological opinions, called forth a host of opponents.
¹ _De Corpore Politico_, Part II., Chapter X.
There is no evidence in Hobbes’s writings that he had any conception
of the historical growth of society, or the gradual development
of a nation. The complex organisation of human society can only be
understood by a careful examination and study of the long processes
of development. Man as we now find him is the product of many forces,
which have operated for a long series of ages, and gradually modified
his character. But Hobbes failed to grasp or even to recognise this,
and hence we have his imaginary state of nature――continual war, and the
equally imaginary social contract theory.
Some of Milton’s prose writings touched on political principles, and
also on some important moral points, as in his treatise on divorce.
Although he is not usually regarded as a philosopher, nevertheless
he was a thinker of exceptional power, a masterly writer, vehement
and impassioned, often abusive, and not always fair to his opponents.
His pamphlets and controversial writings during the period of the
great Rebellion and the Commonwealth form a study of themselves; and
altogether he was one of the great men of the Commonwealth.
Milton threw the whole force of his mind into the anti-episcopal
pamphlets, and they are extremely vehement and bold. He entered deeply
and warmly into the Church questions which were then so fiercely
contested; and in some of his pamphlets he wrote decidedly in favour
of the democratic and presbyterian form of polity. In his pamphlet
entitled, “Of Reformation touching Church Discipline in England, and
the causes that hitherto have hindered it,” he discussed both the
question of fact and of reason involved in the subject, as why the
English Church had not been thoroughly reformed. He made some scathing
charges against the bishops, and concludes his work with a prayer,
which for fire and force is unmatched in English literature.