In reply to the query of "B.G." (p. 107. of your 7th No.), I beg to say
that Bishop Berkeley's _Theory of Vision Vindicated_ does not occur
either in the 4to. or 8vo. editions of his collected works; but there is
a copy of it in the library of Trinity College, Dublin, from which I
transcribe the full title as follows:--
"The Theory of Vision, or Visual Language, shewing the immediate
Presence and Providence of a Deity, vindicated and explained. By
the author of Alciphron, or The Minute Philosopher.
"Acts, xvii. 28.
"_In Him we live, and move, and have our being_.
"Lond. Printed for J. Tonson in the Strand.
"MDCCXXXIII."
Some other of the author's tracts have also been omitted in his
collected works; but, as I am now answering "a _Query_," and not making
"a _Note_," I shall reserve what I might say of them for another
opportunity. The memory of Berkeley is dear to every member of this
University; and therefore I hope you will permit me to say one word, in
defence of his character, against Dugald Stewart's charge of having been
"provoked," by Lord Shaftesbury's _Characteristics_, "to a harshness
equally unwonted and unwarranted."
Mr. Stewart can scarcely suppose to have seen the book upon which he
pronounces this most "unwarranted" criticism. The tract was not written
in reply to the _Characteristics_, but was an answer to an anonymous
letter published in the _Daily Post-Boy_ of September 9th, 1732, which
letter Berkeley has reprinted at the end of his pamphlet. The only
allusion to the writer of this letter which bears the slightest tinge of
severity occurs at the commencement of the tract. Those who will take
the trouble of perusing the anonymous letter, will see that it was
richly deserved; and I think it can scarcely, with any justice, be
censured as unbecomingly harsh, or in any degree unwarranted. The
passage is as follows:--
[After mentioning that an ill state of health had prevented his
noticing this letter sooner, the author adds,] "This would have
altogether excused me from a controversy upon points either
personal or purely speculative, or from entering the lists of
the declaimers, whom I leave to the triumph of their own
passions. And indeed, to one of this character, who contradicts
himself and misrepresents me, what answer can be made more than
to desire his readers not to take his word for what I say, but
to use their own eyes, read, examine, and judge for themselves?
And to their common sense I appeal."
The remainder of the tract is occupied with a philosophical discussion
of the subject of debate, in a style as cool and as free from harshness
as Dugald Stewart could desire, and containing, as far as I can see,
nothing inconsistent with the character of him, who was described by his
contemporaries as the possessor of "every virtue under heaven."