The reader of Plato's _Republic_ will readily recall to mind that
wonderful passage at the end of the sixth book, in which the philosopher,
under the image of geometrical lines, exhibits the various relations of
the intelligible to the sensible world; especially his lofty aspirations
with regard to "that second segment of the intelligible world, which
reason of itself grasps by the power of dialectic, employing hypotheses,
not as principles, but as veritable hypotheses, that is to say, as steps
and starting-points, in order that it may ascend _as far as the
unconditioned_ ([Greek: mechri tou anypothetou]), to the first principle
of the universe, and having grasped this, may then lay hold of the
principles next adjacent to it, and so go down to the end, using no
sensible aids whatever, but employing abstract forms throughout, and
terminating in forms."
This quotation is important for our present purpose in two ways. In the
first place, it may serve, at the outset of our remarks, to propitiate
those plain-spoken English critics who look upon new terms in philosophy
with the same suspicion with which Jack Cade regarded "a noun and a verb,
and such abominable words as no Christian ear can endure to hear," by
showing that the head and front of our offending, "the Unconditioned," is
no modern invention of Teutonic barbarism, but sanctioned even by the
Attic elegance of a Plato. And in the second place, it contains almost a
history in miniature of the highest speculations of philosophy, both in
earlier and in later times, and points out, with a clearness and
precision the more valuable because uninfluenced by recent controversies,
the exact field on which the philosophies of the Conditioned and the
Unconditioned come into collision, and the nature of the problem which
they both approach from opposite sides.
What is the meaning of this problem, the solution of which Plato proposes
as the highest aim of philosophy--"to ascend to the unconditioned, and
thence to deduce the universe of conditioned existence?" The problem has
assumed different forms at different times: at present we must content
ourselves with stating it in that in which it will most naturally suggest
itself to a student of modern philosophy, and in which it has the most
direct bearing on the subject of the present article.
All consciousness must in the first instance present itself as a relation
between two constituent parts, the person who is conscious, and the
thing, whatever it may be, of which he is conscious. This contrast has
been indicated, directly or indirectly, by various names--mind and
matter; person and thing; subject and object; or, lastly, in the
distinction, most convenient for philosophy, however uncouth in sound,
between self and not self--the _ego_ and the _non-ego_. In order to be
conscious at all, I must be conscious of something: consciousness thus
presents itself as the product of two factors, _I_ and _something_. The
problem of the unconditioned is, briefly stated, to reduce these two
factors to one.
For it is manifest that, so long as they remain two, we have no
unconditioned, but a pair of conditioned existences. If the _something_
of which I am conscious is a separate reality, having qualities and modes
of action of its own, and thereby determining, or contributing to
determine, the form which my consciousness of it shall take, my
consciousness is thereby conditioned, or partly dependent on something
beyond itself. It is no matter, in this respect, whether the influence is
direct or indirect--whether, for instance, I see a material tree, or only
the mental image of a tree. If the nature of the thing in any degree
determines the character of the image--if the visible form of a tree is
different from that of a house because the tree itself is different from
the house, my consciousness is, however remotely, influenced by something
different from itself, the _ego_ by the _non-ego_. And on the other hand,
if I, who am conscious, am a real being, distinct from the things of
which I am conscious--if the conscious mind has a constitution and laws
of its own by which it acts, and if the mode of its consciousness is in
any degree determined by those laws, the _non-ego_ is so far conditioned
by the _ego_; the thing which I see is not seen absolutely and _per se_,
but in a form partly dependent upon the laws of my vision.
The first step towards the reduction of these two factors to one may
obviously be made in three different ways. Either the _ego_ may be
represented as a mode of the _non-ego_, or the _non-ego_ of the _ego_, or
both of a _tertium quid_, distinct from either. In other words: it may be
maintained, _first_, that matter is the only real existence; mind and all
the phenomena of consciousness being really the result solely of material
laws; the brain, for example, secreting thought as the liver secretes
bile; and the distinct personal existence of which I am apparently
conscious being only the result of some such secretion. This is
_Materialism_, which has then to address itself to the further problem,
to reduce the various phenomena of matter to some one absolutely first
principle on which everything else depends. Or it may be maintained,
_secondly_, that mind is the only real existence; the intercourse which
we apparently have with a material world being really the result solely
of the laws of our mental constitution. This is _Idealism_, which again
has next to attempt to reduce the various phenomena to some one
immaterial principle. Or it may be maintained, _thirdly_, that real
existence is to be sought neither in mind as mind nor in matter as
matter; that both classes of phenomena are but qualities or modes of
operation of something distinct from both, and on which both alike are
dependent. Hence arises a third form of philosophy, which, for want of a
better name, we will call _Indifferentism_, as being a system in which
the characteristic differences of mind and matter are supposed to
disappear, being merged in something higher than both.
In using the two former of these terms, we are not speaking of
Materialism and Idealism as they have always actually manifested
themselves, but only of the distinguishing principle of these systems
when pushed to its extreme result. It is quite possible to be a
materialist or an idealist with respect to the immediate phenomena of
consciousness, without attempting a philosophy of the Unconditioned at
all. But it is also possible, and in itself natural, when such a
philosophy is attempted, to attempt it by means of the same method which
has approved itself in relation to subordinate inquiries; to make the
relation between the human mind and its objects the type and image of
that between the universe and its first principle. And such attempts have
actually been made, both on the side of Materialism and on that of
Idealism; and probably would be made oftener, did not counteracting
causes frequently hinder the logical development of speculative
principles.
In modern times, and under Christian influences, these several systems
are almost necessarily identified with inquiries concerning the existence
and nature of God. The influence of Christianity has been indirectly
felt, even in speculations prosecuted in apparent independence of it; and
the admission of an absolute first principle of all things distinct from
God, or the acknowledgment of a God separate from or derived from the
first principle of all things, is an absurdity which, since the
prevalence of Christianity, has become almost impossible, even to
antichristian systems of thought. In earlier times, indeed, this union of
philosophy with theology was by no means so imperative. A philosophy like
that of Greece, which inherited its speculations from a poetical
theogony, would see no difficulty in attributing to the god or gods of
its religious belief a secondary and derived existence, dependent on some
higher and more original principle, and in separating that principle
itself from all immediate connection with religion. It was possible to
assume, with the Ionian, a material substance, or, with the Eleatic, an
indifferent abstraction, as the first principle of things, without
holding that principle to be God, or, as the only alternative, denying
the existence of a God; and thus, as Aristotle[A] has observed,
theologians endeavoured to evade the consequences of their abstract
principles, by attributing to the chief good a later and derived
existence, as the poets supposed the supreme God to be of younger birth
than night and chaos and sea and sky. But to a Christian philosophy, or
to a philosophy in any way influenced by Christianity, this method of
evasion is no longer possible. If all conditioned existence is dependent
on some one first and unconditioned principle, either that principle must
be identified with God, or our philosophical speculations must fall into
open and avowed atheism.
[A] _Metaph._, xiv. 4.
But at this point the philosophical inquiry comes in contact with another
line of thought, suggested by a different class of the facts of
consciousness. As a religious and moral being, man is conscious of a
relation of a personal character, distinct from any suggested by the
phenomena of the material world,--a relation to a supreme Personal Being,
the object of his religious worship, and the source and judge of his
moral obligations and conduct. To adopt the name of God in an abstract
speculation merely as a conventional denomination for the highest link in
the chain of thought, and to believe in Him for the practical purposes of
worship and obedience, are two very different things; and for the latter,
though not for the former, the conception of God as a Person is
indispensable. Were man a being of pure intellect, the problem of the
Unconditioned would be divested of its chief difficulty; but he is also a
being of religious and moral faculties, and these also have a claim to be
satisfied by any valid solution of the problem. Hence the question
assumes another and a more complex form. How is the one absolute
existence, to which philosophy aspires, to be identified with the
personal God demanded by our religious feelings?
Shall we boldly assume that the problem is already solved, and that the
personal God is the very Unconditioned of which we were in search? This
is to beg the question, not to answer it. Our conception of a personal
being, derived as it is from the immediate consciousness of our own
personality, seems, on examination, to involve conditions incompatible
with the desired assumption. Personal agency, similar to our own, seems
to point to something very different from an absolutely first link in a
chain of phenomena. Our actions, if not determined, are at least
influenced by motives; and the motive is a prior link in the chain, and a
condition of the action. Our actions, moreover, take place in time; and
time, as we conceive it, cannot be regarded as an absolute blank, but as
a condition in which phenomena take place as past, present, and future.
Every act taking place in time implies something antecedent to itself;
and this something, be it what it may, hinders us from regarding the
subsequent act as absolute and unconditioned. Nay, even time itself,
apart from the phenomena which it implies, has the same character. If an
act cannot take place except in time, time is the condition of its taking
place. To conceive the unconditioned, as the first link in a chain of
conditioned consequences, it seems necessary that we should conceive
something out of time, yet followed by time; standing at the beginning of
all duration and succession, having no antecedent, but followed by a
series of consequents.
Philosophical theologians have been conscious of this difficulty, almost
from the earliest date at which philosophy and Christian theology came in
contact with each other. From a number of testimonies of similar import,
we select one or two of the most striking. Of the Divine Nature, Gregory
Nyssen says: "It is neither in place nor in time, but before these and
above these in an unspeakable manner, contemplated itself by itself,
through faith alone; neither measured by ages, nor moving along with
times."[B] "In the changes of things," says Augustine, "you will find a
past and a future; in God you will find a present where past and future
cannot be."[C] "Eternity," says Aquinas, "has no succession, but exists
all together."[D] Among divines of the Church of England, we quote two
names only, but those of the highest:--"The duration of eternity," says
Bishop Pearson, "is completely indivisible and all at once; so that it is
ever present, and excludes the other differences of time, past and
future."[E] And Barrow enumerates among natural modes of being and
operation far above our reach, "God's eternity without succession,"
coupling it with "His prescience without necessitation of events."[F]
But it is needless to multiply authorities for a doctrine so familiar to
every student of theology.
[B] _C. Eunom._, i., p. 98, Ed. Gretser.
[C] _In Joann. Evang._, tract. xxxvii. 10.
[D] _Summa_, pars. i., qu. x., art. 1.
[E] _Minor Theol. Works_, vol. i., p. 105.
[F] Sermon on the Unsearchableness of God's Judgments.
Thus, then, our two lines of thought have led us to conclusions which, at
first sight, appear to be contradictory of each other. To be conceived as
unconditioned, God must be conceived as exempt from action in time: to be
conceived as a person, if His personality resembles ours, He must be
conceived as acting in time. Can these two conclusions be reconciled with
each other; and if not, which of them is to be abandoned? The true answer
to this question is, we believe, to be found in a distinction which some
recent critics regard with very little favour,--the distinction between
Reason and Faith; between the power of _conceiving_ and that of
_believing_. We cannot, in our present state of knowledge, reconcile
these two conclusions; yet we are not required to abandon either. We
cannot conceive the manner in which the unconditioned and the personal
are united in the Divine Nature; yet we may believe that, in some manner
unknown to us, they are so united. To conceive the union of two
attributes in one object of thought, I must be able to conceive them as
united in some particular manner: when this cannot be done, I may
nevertheless believe _that_ the union is possible, though I am unable to
conceive _how_ it is possible. The problem is thus represented as one of
those Divine mysteries, the character of which is clearly and well
described in the language of Leibnitz:--"Il en est de même des autres
mystères, où les esprits modérés trouveront toujours une explication
suffisante pour croire, et jamais autant qu'il en faut pour comprendre.
Il nous suffit d'un certain _ce que c'est_ ([Greek: ti esti]) mais le
_comment_ ([Greek: pôs]) nous passe, et ne nous est point
nécessaire."[G]
[G] _Théodicée, Discours de la Conformité de la Foi avec
la Raison, § 56._ Leibnitz, it will be observed, uses
the expression _pour comprendre_, for which, in the
preceding remarks, we have substituted _to conceive_.
The change has been made intentionally, on account of an
ambiguity in the former word. Sometimes it is used, as
Leibnitz here uses it, to denote an apprehension of the
manner in which certain attributes can coexist in an
object. But sometimes (to say nothing of other senses)
it is used to signify a complete knowledge of an object
in all its properties and their consequences, such as it
may be questioned whether we have of any object
whatever. This ambiguity, which has been the source of
much confusion and much captious criticism, is well
pointed out by Norris in his _Reason and Faith_ (written
in reply to Toland), p. 118, Ed. 1697: "When we say that
_above reason_ is when we do not comprehend or perceive
the truth of a thing, this must not be meant of not
comprehending the truth in its whole latitude and
extent, so that as many truths should be said to be
above reason as we cannot thus thoroughly comprehend and
pursue throughout all their consequences and relations
to other truths (for then almost everything would be
above reason), but only of not comprehending the union
or connection of those immediate ideas of which the
proposition supposed to be above reason consists."
_Comprehension_, as thus explained, answers exactly to
the ordinary logical use of the term _conception_, to
denote the combination of two or more attributes in an
unity of representation. In the same sense, M. Peisse,
in the preface to his translation of Hamilton's
_Fragments_, p. 98, says,--"Comprendre, c'est voir un
terme en rapport avec un autre; c'est voir comme un ce
qui est donné comme multiple." This is exactly the
sense in which Hamilton himself uses the word
_conception_. (See _Reid's Works_, p. 377.)
But this distinction involves a further consequence. If the mysteries of
the Divine Nature are not apprehended by reason as existing in a
particular manner (in which case they would be mysteries no longer), but
are accepted by faith as existing in some manner unknown to us, it
follows that we do not know God as He is in His absolute nature, but only
as He is imperfectly represented by those qualities in His creatures
which are analogous to, but not identical with, His own. If, for example,
we had a knowledge of the Divine Personality as it is in itself, we
should know it as existing in a certain manner compatible with
unconditioned action; and this knowledge of the manner would at once
transform our conviction from an act of faith to a conception of reason.
If, on the other hand, the only personality of which we have a positive
knowledge is our own, and if our own personality can only be conceived as
conditioned in time, it follows that the Divine Personality, in so far as
it is exempt from conditions, does not resemble the only personality
which we directly know, and is not adequately represented by it. This
necessitates a confession, which, like the distinction which gives rise
to it, has been vehemently condemned by modern critics, but which has
been concurred in with singular unanimity by earlier divines of various
ages and countries,--the confession that the knowledge which man in this
life can have of God is not a knowledge of the Divine Nature as it is in
itself, but only of that nature as imperfectly represented through
analogous qualities in the creature. Were it not that this doctrine has
been frequently denounced of late as an heretical novelty, we should
hardly have thought it necessary to cite authorities in proof of its
antiquity and catholicity. As it is, we will venture to produce a few
only out of many, selecting not always the most important, but those
which can be best exhibited _verbatim_ in a short extract.
CHRYSOSTOM.--_De Incompr. Dei Natura_, Hom. i. 3: "_That_ God is
everywhere, I know; and _that_ He is wholly everywhere, I know; but
the _how_, I know not: _that_ He is without beginning, ungenerated
and eternal, I know; but the _how_, I know not."
BASIL.--Ep. ccxxxiv.: "That God is, I know; but what is His essence
I hold to be above reason. How then am I saved? By faith; and faith
is competent to know that God is, not what He is."
GREGORY NAZIANZEN.--Orat. xxxiv.: "A theologian among the Greeks
[Plato] has said in his philosophy, that to conceive God is
difficult, to express Him is impossible. ... But I say that it is
impossible to express Him, and more impossible to conceive Him."
[Compare Patrick, _Works_, vol. iii., p. 39.]
CYRIL OF JERUSALEM.--Catech. vi. 2: "We declare not what God is,
but candidly confess that we know not accurately concerning Him.
For in those things which concern God, it is great knowledge to
confess our ignorance."
AUGUSTINE.--Enarr. in Psalm, lxxxv. 8: "God is ineffable; we more
easily say what He is not than what He is." Serm, cccxli.: "I call
God just, because in human words I find nothing better; for He is
beyond justice.... What then is worthily said of God? Some one,
perhaps, may reply and say, _that He is just._ But another, with
better understanding, may say that even this word is surpassed by
His excellence, and that even this is said of Him unworthily,
though it be said fittingly according to human capacity."
CYRIL OF ALEXANDRIA.--_In Joann. Evang_., 1. ii., c. 5: "For those
things which are spoken concerning it [the Divine Nature] are not
spoken as they are in very truth, but as the tongue of man can
interpret, and as man can hear; for he who sees in an enigma also
speaks in an enigma."
DAMASCENUS.--_De Fide Orthod_., i. 4: "That God is, is manifest;
but what He is in His essence and nature is utterly
incomprehensible and unknown."
AQUINAS.--_Summa_, pars. i., qu. xiii., art. 1: "We cannot so name
God that the name which denotes Him shall express the Divine
Essence as it is, in the same way as the name _man_ expresses in
its signification the essence of man as it is." _Ibid._, art. 5:
"When the name _wise_ is said of a man, it in a manner describes
and comprehends the thing signified: not so, however, when it is
said of God; but it leaves the thing signified as uncomprehended
and exceeding the signification of the name. Whence it is evident
that this name _wise_ is not said in the same manner of God and of
man. The same is the case with other names; whence no name can be
predicated univocally of God and of creatures; yet they are not
predicated merely equivocally.... We must say, then, that such
names are said of God and of creatures according to analogy, that
is, proportion."
HOOKER.--_Ecc. Pol._, I., ii. 2.--"Dangerous it were for the feeble
brain of man to wade far into the doings of the Most High; whom
although to know be life, and joy to make mention of His name, yet
our soundest knowledge is to know that we know Him not as indeed He
is, neither can know Him."
USHER.--_Body of Divinity_, p. 45, Ed. 1645: "Neither is it [the
wisdom of God] communicated to any creature, neither can be; for it
is unconceivable, as the very essence of God Himself is
unconceivable, and unspeakable as it is."
LEIGHTON.--Theol. Lect. XXI., _Works_, vol. iv., p. 327, Ed. 1830:
"Though in the schools they distinguish the Divine attributes or
excellences, and that by no means improperly, into communicable and
incommunicable; yet we ought so to guard this distinction, as
always to remember that those which are called communicable, when
applied to God, are not only to be understood in a manner
incommunicable and quite peculiar to Himself, but also, that in Him
they are in reality infinitely different [in the original, _aliud
omnino_, _immensum aliud_] from those virtues, or rather, in a
matter where the disparity of the subjects is so very great, those
shadows of virtues that go under the same name, either in men or
angels."
PEARSON.--_Minor Theol. Works_, vol. i., p. 13: "God in Himself is
an absolute being, without any relation to creatures, for He was
from eternity without any creature, and could, had He willed, be to
eternity without creature. But God cannot naturally be known by us
otherwise than by relation to creatures, as, for example, under the
aspect of dominion, or of cause, or in some other relation."[H]
BEVERIDGE.--_On the Thirty-nine Articles_, p. 16, Ed. 1846: "But
seeing the properties of God do not so much denote what God is, as
what we apprehend Him to be in Himself; when the properties of God
are predicated one of another, one thing in God is not predicated
of another, but our apprehensions of the same thing are predicated
one of another."
LESLIE.--_Method with the Deists_, p. 63, Ed. 1745: "What we call
_faculties_ in the soul, we call _Persons_ in the Godhead; because
there are personal actions attributed to each of them.... And we
have no other word whereby to express it; we speak it after the
manner of men; nor could we understand if we heard any of those
unspeakable words which express the Divine Nature in its proper
essence; therefore we must make allowances, and great ones, when we
apply words of our nature to the Infinite and Eternal Being."
_Ibid._, p. 64: "By the word _Person_, when applied to God (for
want of a proper word whereby to express it), we must mean
something infinitely different from personality among men."
[H] Bishop Pearson's language is yet more explicit in
another passage of the same work, which we give in the
original Latin:--"Non dantur pro hoc statu nomina quæ
Deum significant quidditative. Patet; quia nomina sunt
conceptuum. Non autem dantur in hoc statu conceptus
quidditativi de Deo."--(P. 136.)
The system of theology represented by these extracts may, as we think, be
fairly summed up as follows: We believe that God in His own nature is
absolute and unconditioned; but we can only positively conceive Him by
means of relations and conditions suggested by created things. We believe
that His own nature is simple and uniform, admitting of no distinction
between various attributes, nor between any attribute and its subject;
but we can conceive Him only by means of various attributes, distinct
from the subject and from each other.[I] We believe that in verum, aut
bonum esse, aut omnino ipsum esse. His own nature He is exempt from all
relations of time; but we can conceive Him only by means of ideas and
terms which imply temporal relations, a past, a present, and a
future.[J] Our thought, then, must not be taken as the measure and
limit of our belief: we think by means of relations and conditions
derived from created things; we believe in an Absolute Being, in whose
nature these conditions and relations, in some manner unknown to us,
disappear in a simple and indivisible unity.
[I] This will be found most distinctly stated in the context
of the extract from Beveridge, and in the citations from
St. Augustine given in his notes; to which may be added
the following from _De Trinitate_, vi. 7:--"Deus vero
multipliciter quidem dicitur magnus, bonus, sapiens,
beatus, verus, et quidquid aliud non indigne dici
videtur; sed eadem magnitudo ejus est quæ sapientia,
non enim mole magnus est, sed virtute; et eadem bonitas
quæ sapientia et magnitudo, et eadem veritas quæ illa
omnia: et non est ibi aliud beatum esse et aliud magnum,
aut sapientem, aut verum, aut bonum esse, aut omnino
ipsum esse."
[J] Compare the remarkable words of Bishop Beveridge,
_l.c._, "And therefore, though I cannot apprehend His
mercy to Abel in the beginning of the world, and His
mercy to me now, but as two distinct expressions of His
mercy, yet as they are in God, they are but one and the
same act,--as they are in God, I say, who is not
measured by time, as our apprehensions of Him are, but
is Himself eternity; a centre without a circumference,
eternity without time."
The most important feature of this philosophical theology, and the one
which exhibits most clearly the practical difference between reason and
faith, is that, in dealing with theoretical difficulties, it does not
appeal to our knowledge, but to our ignorance: it does not profess to
offer a definite solution; it only tells us that we might find one if we
knew all. It does not profess, for example, to solve the apparent
contradiction between God's foreknowledge and man's free will; it does
not say, "This is the way in which God foreknows, and in this way His
foreknowledge is reconcileable with human freedom;" it only says, "The
contradiction is apparent, but need not be real. Freedom is incompatible
with God's foreknowledge, only on the supposition that God's
foreknowledge is like man's: if we knew exactly how the one differs from
the other, we might be able to see that what is incompatible with the one
is not so with the other. We cannot solve the difficulty, but we can
believe that there is a solution."
It is this open acknowledgment of our ignorance of the highest things
which makes this system of philosophy distasteful to many minds: it is
the absence of any similar acknowledgment which forms the attraction and
the seductiveness of Pantheism in one way, and of Positivism in another.
The pantheist is not troubled with the difficulty of reconciling the
philosophy of the absolute with belief in a personal God; for belief in a
personal God is no part of his creed. Like the Christian, he may profess
to acknowledge a first principle, one, and simple, and indivisible, and
unconditioned; but he has no need to give to this principle the name of
God, or to invest it with such attributes as are necessary to satisfy
man's religious wants. His God (so far as he acknowledges one at all) is
not the first principle and cause of all things, but the aggregate of the
whole--an universal substance underlying the world of phenomena, or an
universal process, carried on in and by the changes of things. Hence, as
Aristotle said of the Eleatics, that, by asserting all things to be one,
they annihilated causation, which is the production of one thing from
another, so it may be said of the various schools of Pantheism, that, by
maintaining all things to be God, they evade rather than solve the great
problem of philosophy, that of the relation between God and His
creatures. The positivist, on the other hand, escapes the difficulty by
an opposite course. He declines all inquiry into reality and causation,
and maintains that the only office of philosophy is to observe and
register the invariable relations of succession and similitude in
phenomena. He does not necessarily deny the existence of God; but his
personal belief, be it what it may, is a matter of utter indifference to
his system. Religion and philosophy may perhaps go on side by side; but
their provinces are wholly distinct, and therefore there is no need to
attempt a reconciliation between them. God, as a first cause, lives like
an Epicurean deity in undisturbed ease, apart from the world of
phenomena, of which alone philosophy can take cognisance: philosophy, as
the science of phenomena, contents itself with observing the actual state
of things, without troubling itself to inquire how that state of things
came into existence. Hence, neither Pantheism nor Positivism is troubled
to explain the relation of the One to the Many; for the former
acknowledges only the One, and the latter acknowledges only the Many.
It is between these two systems, both seductive from their apparent
simplicity, and both simple only by mutilation, that the Philosophy of
the Conditioned, of which Sir William Hamilton is the representative,
endeavours to steer a middle course, at the risk of sharing the fate of
most mediators in a quarrel,--being repudiated and denounced by both
combatants, because it declares them to be both in the wrong. Against
Pantheism, which is the natural development of the principle of
Indifferentism, it enters a solemn protest, by asserting that the
Absolute must be accepted in philosophy, not as a problem to be solved by
reason, but as a reality to be believed in, though above reason; and that
the pseudo-absolute, which Pantheism professes to exhibit in a positive
conception, is shown, by the very fact of its being so conceived, not to
be the true Absolute. Against Positivism, which is virtually Materialism,
it protests no less strongly, maintaining that the philosophy which
professes to explain the whole of nature by the aid of material laws
alone, proceeds upon an assumption which does not merely dispense with
God as a scientific hypothesis, but logically involves consequences which
lead to a denial of His very existence. Between both extremes, it holds
an intermediate position, neither aspiring, with Pantheism, to solve the
problems of the Absolute, nor neglecting them, with Positivism, as
altogether remote from the field of philosophical inquiry; but
maintaining that such problems must necessarily arise, and must
necessarily be taken into account in every adequate survey of human
nature and human thought, and that philosophy, if it cannot solve them,
is bound to show why they are insoluble.
Let us hear Hamilton's own words in relation to both the systems which he
opposes. Against Pantheism, and the Philosophy of the Unconditioned in
general, he says:--
"The Conditioned is the mean between two extremes,--two
inconditionates, exclusive of each other, _neither of which can be
conceived as possible_,[K] but of which, on the principles of
contradiction and excluded middle, _one must be admitted as
necessary_. On this opinion, therefore, our faculties are shown to
be weak, but not deceitful. The mind is not represented as
conceiving two propositions, subversive of each other, as equally
possible; but only as unable to understand as possible either of
the two extremes; one of which, however, on the ground of their
mutual repugnance, it is compelled to recognise as true. We are
thus taught the salutary lesson, that the capacity of thought is
not to be constituted into the measure of existence; and are warned
from recognising the domain of our knowledge as necessarily
co-extensive with the horizon of our faith. And by a wonderful
revelation, we are thus, in the very consciousness of our inability
to conceive aught above the relative and finite, inspired with a
belief in the existence of something unconditioned beyond the
sphere of all comprehensible reality."--_Discussions_, p. 15.
[K] It must be remembered that, to conceive a thing as
possible, we must conceive the manner in which it is
possible, but that we may believe in the fact without
being able to conceive the manner. Had Hamilton
distinctly expressed this, he might have avoided some
very groundless criticisms, with which he has been
assailed for maintaining a distinction between the
provinces of conception and belief.
Against Materialism, and virtually against Positivism in general, he
says:--
"If in man, intelligence be a free power,--in so far as its liberty
extends, intelligence must be independent of necessity and matter;
and a power independent of matter necessarily implies the existence
of an immaterial subject--that is, a spirit. If, then, the original
independence of intelligence on matter in the human
constitution--in other words, if the spirituality of mind in man be
supposed a datum of observation, in this datum is also given both
the condition and the proof of a God. For we have only to infer,
what analogy entitles us to do, that intelligence holds the same
relative supremacy in the universe which it holds in us, and the
first positive condition of a Deity is established, in the
establishment of the absolute priority of a free creative
intelligence. On the other hand, let us suppose the result of our
study of man to be, that intelligence is only a product of matter,
only a reflex of organization, such a doctrine would not only not
afford no basis on which to rest any argument for a God, but, on
the contrary, would positively warrant the atheist in denying His
existence. For if, as the materialist maintains, the only
intelligence of which we have any experience be a consequent of
matter,--on this hypothesis, he not only cannot assume this order
to be reversed in the relations of an intelligence beyond his
observation, but, if he argue logically, he must positively
conclude that, as in man, so in the universe, the phenomena of
intelligence or design are only in their last analysis the products
of a brute necessity. Psychological Materialism, if carried out
fully and fairly to its conclusions, thus inevitably results in
theological Atheism; as it has been well expressed by Dr. Henry
More, _Nullus in microcosmo spiritus, nullus in macrocosmo Deus_. I
do not, of course, mean to assert that all materialists deny or
actually disbelieve a God. For, in very many cases, this would be
at once an unmerited compliment to their reasoning, and an
unmerited reproach to their faith."--_Lectures_, vol. i, p.
31.[L]
[L] This part of Hamilton's teaching is altogether
repudiated by a recent writer, who, strangely enough,
professes to be his disciple, while rejecting all that
is really characteristic of his philosophy. Mr. Herbert
Spencer, in his work on _First Principles_, endeavours
to press Sir W. Hamilton into the service of Pantheism
and Positivism together, by adopting the negative
portion only of his philosophy--in which, in common with
many other writers, he declares the absolute to be
inconceivable by the mere intellect,--and rejecting the
positive portions, in which he most emphatically
maintains that the belief in a personal God is
imperatively demanded by the facts of our moral and
emotional consciousness. Mr. Spencer regards religion as
nothing more than a consciousness of natural facts as
being in their ultimate genesis unaccountable--a theory
which is simply a combination of the positivist
doctrine, that we know only the relations of phenomena,
with the pantheist assumption of the name of God to
denote the substance or power which lies beyond
phenomena. No theory can be more opposed to the
philosophy of the conditioned than this. Sir W.
Hamilton's fundamental principle is, that consciousness
must be accepted entire, and that the moral and
religious feelings, which are the primary source of our
belief in a personal God, are in no way invalidated by
the merely negative inferences which have deluded men
into the assumption of an impersonal absolute; the
latter not being legitimate deductions from
consciousness rightly interpreted. Mr. Spencer, on the
other hand, takes these negative inferences as the only
basis of religion, and abandons Hamilton's great
principle of the distinction between knowledge and
belief, by quietly dropping out of his system the facts
of consciousness which make such a distinction
necessary. His whole system is, in fact, a pertinent
illustration of Hamilton's remark, that "the phenomena
of matter" [and of mind, he might add, treated by
materialistic methods], "taken by themselves (you will
observe the qualification, taken by themselves), so far
from warranting any inference to the existence of a God,
would, on the contrary, ground even an argument to his
negation." Mr. Spencer, like Mr. Mill, denies the
freedom of the will; and this, according to Hamilton,
leads by logical consequence to Atheism.
In the few places in which Hamilton speaks directly as a theologian, his
language is in agreement with the general voice of Catholic theology down
to the end of the seventeenth century, some specimens of which have been
given on a previous page. Thus he says (_Discussions_, p. 15): "True,
therefore, are the declarations of a pious philosophy,--'A God understood
would be no God at all;' 'To think that God is, as we can think Him to
be, is blasphemy.' The Divinity, in a certain sense, is revealed; in a
certain sense is concealed: He is at once known and unknown. But the last
and highest consecration of all true religion must be an altar [Greek:
Agnôstô Theô]--'_To the unknown and unknowable God._'" A little later
(p. 20) he says: "We should not recoil to the opposite extreme; and
though man be not identical with the Deity, still is he 'created in the
image of God.' It is, indeed, only through an analogy of the human with
the Divine nature, that we are percipient and recipient of Divinity." In
the first of these passages we have an echo of the language of Basil, the
two Cyrils, and John Damascene, and of our own Hooker and Usher; while in
the second we find the counter truth, intimated by Augustine and other
Fathers,[M] and clearly stated by Aquinas, and which in the last
century was elaborately expounded in the _Divine Analogy_ of Bishop
Browne,--namely, that though we know not God in His own nature, yet are
we not wholly ignorant of Him, but may attain to an imperfect knowledge
of Him through the analogy between human things and Divine.
[M] As _e.g._, by Tertullian (_Adv. Marc._, l. ii., c. 16):
"Et hæc ergo imago censenda est Dei in homine, quod
eosdem motos et sensus habeat humanus animus quos et
Deus, licet non tales quales Deus: pro substantia enim,
et status eorum et exitus distant." And by Gregory
Nazianzen, Orat. xxxvii.: "[Greek: Ônomasamen gar hôs
hêmin ephikton ek tôn hêmeterôn ta tou Theou]" And
by Hilary, _De Trin._, i. 19: "Comparatio enim
terrenorum ad Deum nulla est; sed infirmitas nostræ
intelligentiæ cogit species quasdam ex inferioribus,
tanquam superiorum indices quærere; ut rerum
familiarium consuetudine admovente, ex sensus nostri
conscientia ad insoliti sensus opinionem educeremur."
As regards theological results, therefore, there is nothing novel or
peculiar in Hamilton's teaching; nor was he one who would have regarded
novelty in theology as a recommendation. The peculiarity of his system,
by which his reputation as a philosopher must ultimately stand or fall,
is the manner in which he endeavoured to connect these theological
conclusions with psychological principles; and thus to vindicate on
philosophical grounds the position which Catholic divines had been
compelled to take in the interests of dogmatic truth. That the absolute
nature of God, as a supertemporal and yet personal Being, must be
believed in as a fact, though inaccessible to reason as regards the
manner of its possibility, is a position admitted, almost without
exception, by divines who acknowledge the mystery of a personal
Absolute--still more by those who acknowledge the yet deeper mystery of a
Trinity in Unity. "We believe and know," says Bishop Sanderson of the
mysteries of the Christian faith, "and that with fulness of assurance,
that all these things are so as they are revealed in the Holy Scriptures,
because the mouth of God, who is Truth itself, and cannot lie, hath
spoken them; and our own reason upon this ground teacheth us to submit
ourselves and it to _the obedience of faith_, for the [Greek: to hoti],
that so it is. But then, for the [Greek: to pôs], Nicodemus his
question, _How can these things be?_ it is no more possible for our weak
understandings to comprehend that, than it is for the eyes of bats or
owls to look steadfastly upon the body of the sun, when he shineth forth
in his greatest strength."[N] This distinction Hamilton endeavoured to
extend from the domain of Christian theology to that of philosophical
speculation in general; to show that the unconditioned, as it is
suggested in philosophy, no less than as it connects itself with revealed
religion, is an object of belief, not of positive conception; and,
consequently, that men cannot escape from mystery by rejecting
revelation. "Above all," he says, "I am confirmed in my belief by the
harmony between the doctrines of this philosophy, and those of revealed
truth.... For this philosophy is professedly a scientific demonstration
of the impossibility of that 'wisdom in high matters' which the Apostle
prohibits us even to attempt; and it proposes, from the limitation of the
human powers, from our impotence to comprehend what, however, we must
admit, to show articulately why the 'secret things of God,' cannot but be
to man 'past finding out.'"[O] Faith in the inconceivable must thus
become the ultimate refuge, even of the pantheist and the atheist, no
less than of the Christian; the difference being, that while the last
takes his stand on a faith which is in agreement alike with the authority
of Scripture and the needs of human nature, the two former are driven to
one which is equally opposed to both, as well as to the pretensions of
their own philosophy.
[N] _Works_, vol. i., p, 233.
[O] _Discussions_, p. 625.
Deny the Trinity; deny the Personality of God: there yet remains that
which no man can deny as the law of his own consciousness--_Time_.
Conditioned existence is existence in time: to attain to a philosophy of
the unconditioned, we must rise to the conception of existence out of
time. The attempt may be made in two ways, and in two only. Either we
may endeavour to conceive an absolutely first moment of time, beyond
which is an existence having no duration and no succession; or we may
endeavour to conceive time as an unlimited duration, containing an
infinite series of successive antecedents and consequents, each
conditioned in itself, but forming altogether an unconditioned whole. In
other words, we may endeavour, with the Eleatics, to conceive pure
existence apart and distinct from all phenomenal change; or we may
endeavour, with Heraclitus, to conceive the universe as a system of
incessant changes, immutable only in the law of its own mutability; for
these two systems may be regarded as the type of all subsequent
attempts. Both, however, alike aim at an object which is beyond positive
conception, and which can be accepted only as something to be believed in
spite of its inconceivability. To conceive an existence beyond the first
moment of time, and to connect that existence as cause with the
subsequent temporal succession of effects, we must conceive time itself
as non-existent and then commencing to exist. But when we make the
effort to conceive time as non-existent, we find it impossible to do
so. Time, as the universal condition of human consciousness, clings round
the very conception which strives to destroy it, clings round the
language in which we speak of an existence _before_ time. Nor are we more
successful when we attempt to conceive an infinite regress of time, and an
infinite series of dependent existences in time. To say nothing of the
direct contradiction involved in the notion of an unconditioned
_whole_,--a something completed,--composed of infinite parts--of parts
never completed,--even if we abandon the Whole, and with it the
Unconditioned, and attempt merely to conceive an infinite succession
of conditioned existences--conditioned, absurdly enough, by nothing
beyond themselves,--we find, that in order to do so, we must add moment to
moment for ever--a process which would require an eternity for its
accomplishment.[P] Moreover, the chain of dependent existences in this
infinite succession is not, like a mathematical series, composed of
abstract and homogeneous units; it is made up of divers phenomena, of a
regressive line of causes, each distinct from the other. Wherever,
therefore, I stop in my addition, I do not positively conceive the terms
which lie beyond. I apprehend them only as a series of unknown
_somethings_, of which I may believe _that_ they are, but am unable to
say _what_ they are.
[P] See _Discussions_, p. 29. Of course by this is not meant
that no duration can be conceived except in a duration
equally long--that a thousand years, _e.g._, can only be
conceived in a thousand years. A thousand years may be
conceived as one unit: infinity cannot; for an unit is
something complete, and therefore limited. What is meant
is, that any period of time, however long, is conceived
as capable of further increase, and therefore as not
infinite. An infinite duration can have no time before
or after it; and thus cannot resemble any portion of
finite time, however great. When we dream of conceiving
an infinite regress of time, says Sir W. Hamilton, "we
only deceive ourselves by substituting the _indefinite_
for the infinite, than which no two notions can be more
opposed." This caution has not been attended to by some
later critics. Thus, Dr. Whewell (_Philosophy of
Discovery_, p. 324) says: "The definition of an infinite
number is not that it contains all possible unities; but
this--that the progress of numeration, being begun
according to a certain law, goes on without limit." This
is precisely Descartes' definition, not of the
_infinite_, but of the _indefinite_. _Principia_, i. 26:
"Nos autem illa omnia, in quibus sub aliqua
consideratione nullum finem poterimus invenire, non
quidem affirmabimus esse infinita, sed ut indefinita
spectabimus." An indefinite time is that which is
capable of perpetual addition: an infinite time is one
so great as to admit of no addition. Surely "no two
notions can be more opposed."
The cardinal point, then, of Sir W. Hamilton's philosophy, expressly
announced as such by himself, is the absolute necessity, under any system
of philosophy whatever, of acknowledging the existence of a sphere of
belief beyond the limits of the sphere of thought. "The main scope of my
speculation,"[Q] he says, "is to show articulately that we _must
believe_, as actual, much that we are unable (positively) _to conceive_
as even possible." It is, of course, beyond the range of such a
speculation, by itself, to enter on an examination of the positive
evidences in support of one form of belief rather than another. So far as
it aims only at exhibiting an universal law of the human mind, it is of
course compatible with all special forms of belief which do not
contradict that law; and none, whatever their pretensions, can really
contradict it. Hence the service which such a philosophy can render to
the Christian religion must necessarily, from the nature of the case, be
of an indirect and negative character. It prepares the way for a fair
examination of the proper evidences of Christianity, by showing that
there is no ground for any _à priori_ prejudice against revelation, as
appealing, for the acceptance of its highest truths, to faith rather than
to reason; for that this appeal is common to all religions and to all
philosophies, and cannot therefore be urged against one more than
another. So far as certain difficulties are inherent in the constitution
of the human mind itself, they must necessarily occupy the same position
with respect to all religions alike. To exhibit the nature of these
difficulties is a service to true religion; but it is the service of the
pioneer, not of the builder; it does not prove the religion to be true;
it only clears the ground for the production of the special evidences.
[Q] Letter to Mr. Calderwood. See _Lectures_, vol. ii, p.
534.
Where those evidences are to be found, Sir W. Hamilton has not failed to
tell us. If mere intellectual speculations on the nature and origin of
the material universe form a common ground in which the theist, the
pantheist, and even the atheist, may alike expatiate, the moral and
religious feelings of man--those facts of consciousness which have their
direct source in the sense of personality and free will--plead with
overwhelming evidence in behalf of a personal God, and of man's relation
to Him, as a person to a person. We have seen, in a previous quotation,
Hamilton's emphatic declaration that "psychological materialism, if
carried out fully and fairly to its conclusions, inevitably results in
theological atheism." In the same spirit he tells us that "it is only as
man is a free intelligence, a moral power, that he is created after the
image of God;"[R] that "with the proof of the moral nature of man,
stands or falls the proof of the existence of a Deity;" that "the
possibility of morality depends on the possibility of liberty;" that "if
man be not a free agent, he is not the author of his actions, and has
therefore no responsibility, no moral personality at all;"[S] and,
finally, "that he who disbelieves the moral agency of man, must, in
consistency with that opinion, disbelieve Christianity."[T] We have
thus, in the positive and negative sides of this philosophy, both a
reasonable ground of belief and a warning against presumption. By our
immediate consciousness of a moral and personal nature, we are led to the
belief in a moral and personal God: by our ignorance of the
unconditioned, we are led to the further belief, that behind that moral
and personal manifestation of God there lies concealed a mystery--the
mystery of the Absolute and the Infinite; that our intellectual and moral
qualities, though indicating the nearest approach to the Divine
Perfections which we are capable of conceiving, yet indicate them as
analogous, not as identical; that we may naturally expect to find points
where this analogy will fail us, where the function of the Infinite Moral
Governor will be distinct from that of the finite moral servant; and
where, consequently, we shall be liable to error in judging by human
rules of the ways of God, whether manifested in nature or in revelation.
Such is the true lesson to be learnt from a philosophy which tells us of
a God who is "in a certain sense revealed, in a certain sense
concealed--at once known and unknown."
[R] _Lectures_, vol. i., p. 30.
[S] _Lectures_, vol. i, p. 33.
[T] _Ibid._, p. 42.
It is not surprising that this philosophy, when compared with that of a
critic like Mr. Mill, should stand out in clear and sharp antagonism. Mr.
Mill is one of the most distinguished representatives of that school of
Materialism which Sir W. Hamilton denounces as virtual Atheism. We do not
mean that he consciously adopts the grosser tenets of the materialists.
We are not aware that he has ever positively denied the existence of a
soul distinct from the body, or maintained that the brain secretes
thought as the liver secretes bile. But he is the advocate of a
philosophical method which makes the belief in the existence of an
immaterial principle superfluous and incongruous; he not only
acknowledges no such distinction between the phenomena of mind and those
of matter as to require the hypothesis of a free intelligence to account
for it; he not only regards the ascertained laws of coexistence and
succession in material phenomena as the type and rule according to which
all phenomena whatever--those of internal consciousness no less than of
external observation--are to be tested; but he even expressly denies the
existence of that free will which Sir W. Hamilton regards as the
indispensable condition of all morality and all religion.[U] Thus,
instead of recognising in the facts of intelligence "an order of
existence diametrically in contrast to that displayed to us in the facts
of the material universe,"[V] he regards both classes of facts as of
the same kind, and explicable by the same laws; he abolishes the primary
contrast of consciousness between the _ego_ and the _non-ego_--the person
and the thing; he reduces man to a thing, instead of a person,--to one
among the many phenomena of the universe, determined by the same laws of
invariable antecedence and consequence, included under the same formulæ
of empirical generalization. He thus makes man the slave, and not the
master of nature; passively carried along in the current of successive
phenomena; unable, by any act of free will, to arrest a single wave in
its course, or to divert it from its ordained direction.
[U] That this is the real battle-ground between the two
philosophers is virtually admitted by Mr. Mill himself
at the end of his criticism. He says:--"The whole
philosophy of Sir W. Hamilton seems to have had its
character determined by the requirements of the doctrine
of Free-will; and to that doctrine he clung, because he
had persuaded himself that it afforded the only premises
from which human reason could deduce the doctrines of
natural religion. I believe that in this persuasion he
was thoroughly his own dupe, and that his speculations
have weakened the philosophical foundation of religion
fully as much as they have confirmed it."--P. 549. Mr.
Mill's whole philosophy, on the other hand, is
determined by the requirements of the doctrine of
Necessity; and to that doctrine he intrepidly adheres,
in utter defiance of consciousness, and sometimes of his
own consistency. Which of the two philosophers is really
"his own dupe," Mr. Mill in believing that morality and
religion can exist without free will--that a necessary
agent can be responsible for his acts--or Sir W.
Hamilton in maintaining the contrary, is a question
which the former has by no means satisfactorily settled
in his own favour.
[V] Hamilton, _Lectures_, vol. i, p. 29.
This diametrical antagonism between the two philosophers is not limited
to their first principles, but extends, as might naturally be expected,
to every subordinate science of which the immediate object is mental, and
not material. Logic, instead of being, as Sir W. Hamilton regards it, an
_à priori_ science of the necessary laws of thought, is with Mr. Mill a
science of observation, investigating those operations of the
understanding which are subservient to the estimation of evidence.[W]
The axioms of Mathematics, which the former philosopher regards, with
Kant, as necessary thoughts, based on the _à priori_ intuitions of space
and time, the latter[X] declares to be "experimental truths;
generalizations from observation." Psychology, which with Hamilton is
especially the philosophy of man as a free and personal agent, is with
Mill the science of "the uniformities of succession; the laws, whether
ultimate or derivative, according to which one mental state succeeds
another."[Y] And finally, in the place of Ethics, as the science of the
_à priori_ laws of man's moral obligations, we are presented, in Mr.
Mill's system, with Ethology, the "science which determines the kind of
character produced, in conformity to the general laws of mind, by any set
of circumstances, physical and moral."[Z]
[W] Mill's _Logic_. Introduction, § 7.
[X] _Ibid._, book ii. 5, § 4.
[Y] Mill's _Logic_, book vi. 4, § 3.
[Z] _Ibid._, book vi. 5, § 4.
The contrast between the two philosophers being thus thoroughgoing, it
was natural to expect beforehand that an _Examination of Sir William
Hamilton's Philosophy_, by Mr. Mill, would contain a sharp and vigorous
assault on the principal doctrines of that philosophy. And this
expectation has been amply fulfilled. But there was also reason to
expect, from the ability and critical power displayed in Mr. Mill's
previous writings, that his assault, whether successful or not in
overthrowing his enemy, would at least be guided by a clear knowledge of
that enemy's position and purposes; that his dissent would be accompanied
by an intelligent apprehension, and an accurate statement, of the
doctrines dissented from. In this expectation, we regret to say, we have
been disappointed. Not only is Mr. Mill's attack on Hamilton's
philosophy, with the exception of some minor details, unsuccessful; but
we are compelled to add, that with regard to the three fundamental
doctrines of that philosophy--the Relativity of Knowledge, the
Incognisability of the Absolute and Infinite, and the distinction between
Reason and Faith--Mr. Mill has, throughout his criticism, altogether
missed the meaning of the theories he is attempting to assail.
This is a serious charge to bring against a writer of such eminence as
Mr. Mill, and one which should not be advanced without ample proof.
First, then, of the Relativity of Knowledge.
The assertion that all our knowledge is relative,--in other words, that
we know things only under such conditions as the laws of our cognitive
faculties impose upon us,--is a statement which looks at first sight like
a truism, but which really contains an answer to a very important
question,--Have we reason to believe that the laws of our cognitive
faculties impose any conditions at all?--that the mind in any way reacts
on the objects affecting it, so as to produce a result different from
that which would be produced were it merely a passive recipient? "The
mind of man," says Bacon, "is far from the nature of a clear and equal
glass, wherein the beams of things shall reflect according to their true
incidence; nay, it is rather like an enchanted glass, full of
superstition and imposture, if it be not delivered and reduced." Can what
Bacon says of the fallacies of the mind be also said of its proper
cognitions? Does the mind, by its own action, in any way distort the
appearance of the things presented to it; and if so, how far does the
distortion extend, and in what manner is it to be rectified? To trace the
course of this inquiry, from the day when Plato compared the objects
perceived by the senses to the shadows thrown by fire on the wall of a
cave, to the day when Kant declared that we know only phenomena, not
things in themselves, would be to write the history of philosophy. We can
only at present call attention to one movement in that history, which,
was, in effect, a revolution in philosophy. The older philosophers in
general distinguished between the senses and the intellect, regarding the
former as deceptive and concerned with phenomena alone, the latter as
trustworthy and conversant with the realities of things. Hence arose the
distinction between the sensible and the intelligible world--between
things as perceived by sense and things as apprehended by
intellect--between Phenomenology and Ontology. Kant rejected this
distinction, holding that the intellect, as well as the sense, imposes
its own forms on the things presented to it, and is therefore cognisant
only of phenomena, not of things in themselves. The logical result of
this position would be the abolition of ontology as a science of things
in themselves, and, _à fortiori_, of that highest branch of ontology
which aims at a knowledge of the Absolute[AA] [Greek: kat' exochên],
of the unconditioned first principle of all things. If the mind, in every
act of thought, imposes its own forms on its objects, to think is to
condition, and the unconditioned is the unthinkable. Such was the logical
result of Kant's principles, but not the actual result. For Kant, by
distinguishing between the Understanding and the Reason, and giving to
the latter an indirect yet positive cognition of the Unconditioned as a
regulative principle of thought, prepared the way for the systems of
Schelling and Hegel, in which this indirect cognition is converted into a
direct one, by investing the reason, thus distinguished as the special
faculty of the unconditioned, with a power of intuition emancipated from
the conditions of space and time, and even of subject and object, or a
power of thought emancipated from the laws of identity and
contradiction.
[AA] The term _absolute_, in the sense of _free from
relation_, may be used in two applications;--1st, To
denote the nature of a thing as it is in itself, as
distinguished from its appearance to us. Here it is used
only in a subordinate sense, as meaning out of relation
to human knowledge. 2ndly, To denote the nature of a
thing as independent of all other things, as having no
relation to any other thing as the condition of its
existence. Here it is used in its highest sense, as
meaning out of relation to anything else.
The theory of Hamilton is a modification of that of Kant, intended to
obviate these consequences, and to relieve the Kantian doctrine itself
from the inconsistency which gave rise to them. So long as the reason is
regarded as a separate faculty from the understanding, and things in
themselves as ideas of the reason, so long the apparent contradictions,
which encumber the attempt to conceive the unconditioned, must be
regarded as inherent in the constitution of the reason itself, and as the
result of its legitimate exercise on its proper objects. This sceptical
conclusion Hamilton endeavoured to avoid by rejecting the distinction
between the understanding and the reason as separate faculties, regarding
the one as the legitimate and positive, the other as the illegitimate and
negative, exercise of one and the same faculty. He thus announces, in
opposition to Kant, the fundamental doctrine of the Conditioned, as "the
distinction between intelligence _within_ its legitimate sphere of
operation, impeccable, and intelligence _beyond_ that sphere, affording
(by abuse) the occasions of error."[AB] Hamilton, like Kant, maintained
that all our cognitions are compounded of two elements, one contributed
by the object known, and the other by the mind knowing. But the very
conception of a relation implies the existence of things to be related;
and the knowledge of an object, as in relation to our mind, necessarily
implies its existence out of that relation. But as so existing, it is
unknown: we believe _that_ it is; we know not _what_ it is. How far it
resembles, or how far it does not resemble, the object apprehended by us,
we cannot say, for we have no means of comparing the two together.
[AB] _Discussions_, p. 633.
Instead; therefore, of saying with Kant, that reason is subject to an
inevitable delusion, by which, it mistakes the regulative principles of
its own thoughts for the representations of real things, Hamilton would
say that the reason, while compelled to believe in the existence of these
real things, is not legitimately entitled to make any positive
representation of them as of such or such a nature; and that the
contradictions into which it falls when attempting to do so are due to an
illegitimate attempt to transcend the proper boundaries of positive
thought.
This theory does not, in itself, contain any statement of the mode in
which we perceive the material world, whether directly by presentation,
or indirectly by representative images; and perhaps it might, without any
great violence, be adapted to more than one of the current hypotheses on
this point. But that to which it most easily adjusts itself is that
maintained by Hamilton himself under the name of _Natural Realism_. To
speak of perception as a _relation_ between mind and matter, naturally
implies the presence of both correlatives; though each may be modified by
its contact with the other. The acid may act on the alkali, and the
alkali on the acid, in forming the neutral salt; but each of the
ingredients is as truly present as the other, though each enters into the
compound in a modified form. And this is equally the case in perception,
even if we suppose various media to intervene between the ultimate object
and the perceiving mind,--such, _e.g._, as the rays of light and the
sensitive organism in vision,--so long as these media are material, like
the ultimate object itself. Whether the object, properly so called, in
vision, be the rays of light in contact with the organ, or the body
emitting or reflecting those rays, is indifferent to the present
question, so long as a material object of some kind or other is supposed
to be perceived, and not merely an inmaterial representation of such an
object. To speak of our perceptions as mere modifications of mind
produced by an unknown cause, would be like maintaining that the acid is
modified by the influence of the alkali without entering into combination
with it. Such a view might perhaps be tolerated, in connection with the
theory of relativity, by an indulgent interpretation of language, but it
is certainly not that which the language of the theory most naturally
suggests.
All this Mr. Mill entirely misapprehends. He quotes a passage from
Hamilton's Lectures, in which the above theory of Relativity is clearly
stated as the mean between the extremes of Idealism and Materialism, and
then proceeds to comment as follows:--
"The proposition, that our cognitions of objects are only in part
dependent on the objects themselves, and in part on elements
superadded by our organs or our minds, is not identical, nor _prima
facie_ absurd. It cannot, however, warrant the assertion that all
our knowledge, but only that the part so added, is relative. If our
author had gone as far as Kant, and had said that all which
constitutes knowledge is put in by the mind itself, he would have
really held, in one of its forms, the doctrine of the relativity of
our knowledge. But what he does say, far from implying that the
whole of our knowledge is relative, distinctly imports that all of
it which, is real and authentic is the reverse. If any part of what
we fancy that we perceive in the objects themselves, originates in
the perceiving organs or in the cognising mind, thus much is purely
relative; but since, by supposition, it does not all so originate,
the part that does not is as much absolute as if it were not liable
to be mixed up with, these delusive subjective impressions."--(P.
30.)
Mr. Mill, therefore, supposes that _wholly relative_ must mean _wholly
mental_; in other words, that to say that a thing is wholly due to a
relation between mind and matter is equivalent to saying that it is
wholly due to mind alone. On the contrary, we maintain that Sir W.
Hamilton's language is far more accurate than Mr. Mill's, and that the
above theory can with perfect correctness be described as one of _total
relativity_; and this from two points of view. First, as opposed to the
theory of partial relativity generally held by the pre-Kantian
philosophers, according to which our sensitive cognitions are relative,
our intellectual ones absolute. Secondly, as asserting that the object of
perception, though composed of elements partly material, partly mental,
yet exhibits both alike in a form modified by their relation to each
other. The composition is not a mere mechanical juxtaposition, in which
each part, though acting on the other, retains its own characteristics
unchanged. It may be rather likened to a chemical fusion, in which both
elements are present, but each of them is affected by the composition.
The material part, therefore, is not "as much absolute as if it were not
liable to be mixed up with subjective impressions."