View of Bacon's Philosophy.

nomers, who must all grant, that the appearances of motion will be precisely the same whether the earth moves round the sun like the other planets, or whether the sun with his attendant planets moves round the earth; and that the demonstration of the first opinion is had from a fact totally unconnected with all the deflections or even with their causes: for it may be asserted, that Dr Bradley's discovery of the aberration of the fixed stars, in consequence of the progressive motion of light, was the first thing which put the Copernican system beyond question; and even this is still capable of being explained in another way. The Author of Nature seems to delight in variety; and there cannot be named a single purpose on which the most inconceivable fertility in resource is not observed. It is the most delightful occupation of the curious mind and the sensible heart to contemplate the various contrivances of nature in accomplishing similar ends.

As a principle therefore on which to found any maxim of philosophical procedure, this is not only injudicious, because imprudent and apt to mislead, but as false, and almost sure to mislead. In conformity to this observation, it must be added, that nothing has done so much harm in philosophy as the introduction of hypotheses.

Authors have commonly been satisfied with very slight resemblances, and readers are easily misled by the appearances of reasoning which these resemblances have countenanced. The ancients, and above all Aristotle, were much given to this mode of explanation, and have filled philosophy with absurdities. The slightest resemblances were with them sufficient foundations of theories. It has been by very slow degrees that men have learned caution in this respect; and we are sorry to say that we are not yet cured of the disease of hypothetical systematizing, and to see attempts made by ingenious men to bring the frivolous theories of antiquity again into credit. Nay, modern philosophers even of the greatest name are by no means exempted from the reproach of hypothetical theories. Their writings abound in ethers, nervous fluids, animal spirits, vortices, vibrations, and other invisible agents. We may affirm that all these attempts may be shown to be either unintelligible, fruitless, or false. Either the hypothesis has been such that no consequence can be distinctly drawn from it, on account of its obscurity and total want of resemblance to anything we know; or the just and legitimate consequences of the hypothesis are inconsistent with the phenomenon (N). This is remarkably the case in the hypotheses which have been introduced for the explanation of the mechanical phenomena of the universe. These can be examined by accurate science, and the consequences compared without any mistake; and nothing else but a perfect agreement should induce us even to listen to any hypothesis whatever.

It may here be asked, Whether, in the case of the most perfect agreement, after the most extensive comparison, the hypothesis should be admitted? We believe that this must be left to the feelings of the mind. When the belief is irresistible, we can reason no more. But as there is no impossibility of as perfect an agreement with some other hypothesis, it is evident that it does not convey an irrefragable title to our hypothesis. It is said, that such an agreement authorizes the reception of the hypothetical theory in the same manner as we must admit that to be the true cipher of a letter which will make perfect sense of it. But this is not true: in deciphering a letter we know the sounds which must be represented by the characters, and that they are really the constituents of speech: but in hypothetical explanations the first principle is not known to exist; nay, it is possible to make two cyphers, each of which shall give a meaning to the letter. Instances of this are to be seen in treatises on the art of deciphering; and there has been lately discovered a national character (the ogam discovered in Ireland) which has this property.

We conclude our criticism on hypothetical explanations with this observation, that it is impossible that they can give any addition of knowledge. In every hypothesis we thrust in an intermediate event between the phenomenon and some general law; and this event is not seen, but supposed. Therefore, according to the true maxims of philosophical investigation, we give no explanation; for we are not by this means enabled to assign the general law in which this particular phenomenon is included: nay, the hypothesis makes no addition to our list of general laws; for our hypotheses must be selected, in order to tally with all the phenomena. The hypothesis therefore is understood only by and in the phenomena; and it must not be made more general than the phenomena themselves. The hypothesis gives no generalization of facts. Its very application is founded on a great coincidence of facts; and the hypothetical fact is thrust in between two which we really observe to be united by nature. The applicability therefore of the hypothesis

(N) It has often been matter of amusement to us to examine the hypothetical theories of ingenious men, and to observe the power of nature even when we are transgressing her commands, Naturam expellat furca, tamen usque revertitur. The hypothesis of an ingenious man is framed in perfect conformity to nature's dictates; for you will find that the hypothetical cause is touched and retouched, like the first fitting of a picture, till it is made to resemble the phenomena, and the cause is still inferred, nay explained, in spite of all his ingenuity, from the phenomenon; and then, instead of desiring the spectators to pay him his due praise, by saying that the picture is like the man, he insists that they shall say, what gives him no credit, that the man is like the picture. But alas! this seldom the case: The picture is generally an anamorphosis, unlike any thing extant in nature, and having parts totally incongruous. We have seen such pictures, where a wood is standing on the sea, and an eye is on the end of an elephant's trunk; and yet when this was viewed through a proper glass, the wood became an eyebrow to the eye, and the proboscis was a very pretty ringlet of hair. We beg indulgence for this piece of levity, because it is a most apposite illustration of a hypothetical theory. The resemblance between the principle and phenomenon is true only in detached unconnected scraps, and the principle itself is an incongruous patchwork. But by a perversion of the rules of logic, all these inconsistencies are put out of view, and the explanation is something like the phenomenon. View of Bacon's Philosophy.

Hypothesis is not more extensive than the similarity of facts which we observe, and the hypothetical law is not more general than the observed law. Let us then throw away entirely the hypothetical law, and infer the observed one in our list of general laws: it will be in different language from the hypothetical law, but it will express the same facts in nature.

It is in experimental philosophy alone that hypotheses can have any just claim to admission; and here they are not admitted as explanations, but as conjectures serving to direct our line of experiments.

Effects only appear; and by their appearance, and the previous information of experience, causes are immediately ascertained by the perfect familiarity of the whole train of events to other trains formerly observed: Or they are suggested by more imperfect resemblances of the phenomena; and these suggestions are made with stronger or fainter evidence, according as the resemblance is more or less perfect. These suggestions do not amount to a confidential inference, and only raise a conjecture. Wishing to verify or overturn this conjecture, we have recourse to experiment; and we put the subject under consideration in such a situation, that we can say what will be the effect of the conjectural cause if real. If this tallies with the appearance, our conjecture has more probability of truth, and we vary the situation, which will produce a new set of effects of the conjectured cause, and so on. It is evident that the probability of our conjecture will increase with the increase of the conformity of the legitimate effects of the supposed cause with the phenomena, and that it will be entirely destroyed by one disagreement. In this way conjectures have their great use, and are the ordinary means by which experimental philosophy is improved. But conjectural systems are worse than nonsense, filling the mind with false notions of nature, and generally leading us into a course of improper conduct when they become principles of action. This is acknowledged even by the abettors of hypothetical systems themselves, when employed in overturning those of their predecessors, and establishing their own: witness the successive maintainers of the many hypothetical systems in medicine, which have had their short-lived course within these two last centuries.

Let every person therefore who calls himself a philosopher resolutely determine to reject all temptations to this kind of system-making, and let him never consider any composition of this kind as anything better than the amusement of an idle hour.

After these observations, it cannot require much difficulty to mark the mode of procedure which will infuse progress in all philosophical investigations.

The sphere of our intuitive knowledge is very limited; and we must be indebted for the greatest part of our intellectual attainments to our rational powers, and it must be deductive. In the spontaneous phenomena of nature, whether of mind or body, it seldom happens that the energy of that natural power, which is the principle of explanation, is so immediately connected with the phenomenon that we see the connection at once. Its exertions are frequently concealed, and in all cases modified, by the joint exertions of other natural powers: the particular exertion of each must be considered apart, and their mutual connection traced out. It is only in this way that we can discover the perhaps long train of intermediate operations, and also see in what manner and degree the real principle of explanation concurs in the often-felt processes of nature.

In all such cases it is evident that our investigation (and investigation it most strictly is) must proceed by steps, conducted by the sure hand of logical method. To take an instance from the material world, let us listen to Galileo while he is teaching his friends the cause of the rise of water in a pump. He says that it is owing to the pressure of the air. This is his principle; and he announces it in all its extent. All matter, says he, is heavy, and in particular air is heavy. He then points out the connection of this general principle with the phenomenon. Air being heavy, it must be supported; it must lie and press on what supports it; it must press on the surface AB of the water in the cistern surrounding the pipe CD of the pump; and also on the water C within this pipe. He then takes notice of another general principle which exerts its subordinate influence in this process. Water is a fluid; a fluid is a body whose parts yield to the smallest impression; and, by yielding, are easily moved among themselves; and no little parcel of the fluid can remain at rest unless it be equally pressed in every direction, but will recede from that side where it sustains the greatest pressure. In consequence of this fluidity, known to be a property of water, if any part of it is pressed, the pressure is propagated through the whole; and if not resisted on every side, the water will move to that side where the propagated pressure is not resisted. All these subordinate or collateral propositions are supposed to be previously demonstrated or allowed. Water therefore must yield to the pressure of the air unless pressed by it on every side, and must move to that side where it is not withheld by some opposite pressure. He then proceeds to show, from the structure of the pump, that there is no opposing pressure on the water in the inside of the pump. "For (says he) suppose the piston thrust down till it touches the surface of the water in the pipe; suppose the piston now drawn up by a power sufficient to lift it, and all the air incumbent on it; and suppose it drawn up a foot or a fathom—there remains nothing now (says he) that I know of, to press on the surface of the water. In short (says he), gentlemen, it appears to me, that the water in the pump is in the same situation that it would be in were there no air at all, but water poured into the cistern to a height AF: such, that the column of water FABG presses on the surface AB as much as the air does. Now in this case we know that the water at C is pressed upwards." View of wards with a force equal to the weight of a column of Bacon's water, having the section of the pipe for its base and Philofophy GH for its height. The water below C therefore will be pressed up into the pipe CD, and will rise to G, so that it is on a level with the external water FG; that is, it will rise to H. This is a necessary consequence of the weight and pressure of the incumbent column FABG, and the fluidity of the water in the cistern. Consequences perfectly similar must necessarily follow from the weight and pressure of the air; and therefore on drawing up the piston from the surface C of the water, with which it was in contact, the water must follow it till it attain that height which will make its own weight a balance for the pressure of the circumambient air. Accordingly, gentlemen, the Italian plumbers inform me, that a pump will not raise water quite fifty palms; and from their information I conclude, that a pillar of water fifty palms high is somewhat heavier than a pillar of air of the same base, and reaching to the top of the atmosphere."

Thus is the phenomenon explained. The rise of the water in the pump is shown to be a particular case of the general fact in hydrostatics, that fluids in communicating vessels will stand at heights which are inversely as their densities, or that columns of equal weights are in equilibrium.

This way of proceeding is called arguing *a priori*, the synthetic method. It is founded on just principles; and the great progress which we have made in the mathematical sciences by this mode of reasoning shows to what length it may be carried with irresistible evidence. It has long been considered as the only inlet to true knowledge; and nothing was allowed to be known with certainty which could not be demonstrated in this way to be true. Accordingly logic, or the art of reasoning, which was also called the art of discovering truth, was nothing but a set of rules for successfully conducting this mode of argument.

Under the direction of this infallible guide, it is not surely unreasonable to expect that philosophy has made sure progress towards perfection; and as we know that the brightest geniuses of Athens and of Rome were for ages solely occupied in philosophical researches in every path of human knowledge, it is equally reasonable to suppose that the progress has not only been sure but great. We have seen that the explanation of an appearance in nature is nothing but the arrangement of it into that general clas in which it is comprehended. The clas has its distinguishing mark, which, when it is found in the phenomenon under consideration, fixes it in its clas, there to remain for ever an addition to our stock of knowledge. Nothing can be lost any other way but by forgetting it; and the doctrines of philosophers must be liable like the laws of nature.

We have seen, however, that the very reverse of all this is the case; that philosophy has but very lately emerged from worse than total darkness and ignorance; that what passed under the name of philosophy was nothing but systems of errors (if systems they could be called), which were termed doctrines, delivered with the most imposing apparatus of logical demonstration, but belied in almost every instance by experience, and affording us no assistance in the application of the powers of nature to the purposes of life. Nor will this excite much wonder in the mind of the enlightened reader of the present day, who reflects on the use that in this dialectic process was made of the categories, and the method in which those categories were formed. From first principles so vague in themselves, and so gratuitously assumed, ingenious men might deduce many different conclusions all equally erroneous: and that this was actually done, no surer evidence can be given, than that hardly a lifetime elapsed in which the whole system of doctrines which had captivated the minds of the most penetrating, have been oftener than once exploded and overturned by another system, which flourished for a while, and then was uprooted by a third which shared the same fate. Here was an infallible proof of their error, for instability is incompatible with truth.

It is allowed by all that this has been the case in those branches of study at least which contemplate the philosophical relations of the material world, in astronomy, in mechanical philosophy, in chemistry, in physiology, in medicine, in agriculture. It is also acknowledged, that in the course of less than two centuries back we have acquired much knowledge on these very subjects, call it philosophy, or by what name you will, so much more conformable to the natural course of things, that the deductions made from it by the same rules of the synthetic method are more conformable to fact, and therefore better fitted to direct our conduct and improve our powers. It is also certain that these bodies of doctrine which go by the name of philosophical systems, have much more stability than in ancient times; and though sometimes in part superseded, are seldom or never wholly exploded.

This cannot perhaps be affirmed with equal confidence with respect to these speculations which have our intellect or propensities for their object: and we have not perhaps attained such a representation of human nature as will bear comparison with the original; nor will the legitimate deductions from such doctrines be of much more service to us for directing our conduct than those of ancient times: and while we observe this difference between these two general classes of speculations, we may remark, that it is conjoined with a difference in the manner of conducting the study. We have proceeded in the old Aristotelian method when investigating the nature of mind; but we see the material philosophers running about, passing much of their time away from books in the shop of the artizan, or in the open fields engaged in observation, labouring with their hands, and busy with experiments. But the speculative on the intellect and the active powers of the human soul seems unwilling to be indebted to anything but his own ingenuity, and his labours are confined to the closet. In the first clas, we have met with something like success, and we have improved many arts; in the other, it is to be feared that we are not much wiser, or better, or happier, for all our philosophic attainments.

Here, therefore, must surely have been some great, some fatal mistake. There has indeed been a material defect in our mode of procedure, in the employment of this method of reasoning as an inlet to truth. The fact is, that philosophers have totally mistaken the road of discovery, and have pretended to set out in their investigation from the very point where this journey should have terminated.

The Aristotelian logic, the syllogistic art, that art so much boasted of as the only inlet to true knowledge,

The only means of discovery, is in direct opposition to the ordinary procedure of nature, by which we every day, and in every action of our lives, acquire knowledge and discover truth. It is not the art of discovering truth, it is the art of communicating knowledge, and of detecting error: it is nothing more than the application of this maxim, 'whatever is true of a whole class of objects, is true of each individual of that class.'

This is not a just account of the art of discovering truth, nor is it a complete account of the art of reasoning. Reasoning is the producing belief; and whatever mode of argumentation invariably and irrefutably produces belief, is reasoning. The ancient logic supposes that all the first principles are already known, and that nothing is wanted but the application of them to particular facts. But were this true, the application of them, as we have already observed, can hardly be called a discovery; but it is not true; and the fact is, that the first principles are generally the chief objects of our research, and that they have come into view only now and then as it were by accident, and never by the labour of the logician. He indeed can tell us whether we have been mistaken; for if our general principle be true, it must influence every particular case. If, therefore, it be false in any one of these, it is not a true principle. And it is here that we discover the source of that fluctuation which is so much complained of in philosophy. The authors of systems give a set of consecutive propositions logically deduced from a first principle, which has been hitherto adopted, and has no foundation in nature. This does not hinder the amusement of framing a system from it, nor this system from pleasing by its symmetry; and it takes a run: but when some officious follower thinks of making some use of it, which requires the comparison with experience and observation, they are found totally unlike, and the whole fabric must be abandoned as unfounded: and thus the successful systems were continually pushing out their predecessors, and presently met with the same treatment.

How was this to be remedied? The ratiocination was seldom egregiously wrong; the illogical art had ere now attained a degree of perfection which left little room for improvement, and was so familiarly understood by the philosophical practitioners, that they seldom committed any great blunders. Must we examine the first principles? This was a task quite new in science; and there were hardly any rules in the received systems of logic to direct us to the successful performance of it. Aristotle, the sagacious inventor of those rules, had not totally omitted it; but in the fervour of philosophic speculation he had made little use of them. His fertile genius never was at a loss for first principles, which answered the purpose of verbal disquisition without much risk of being belied on account of its dissimilitude to nature; for there was frequently no prototype with which his systematic doctrine could be compared. His enthusiastic followers found abundant amusement in following his example; and philosophy, no longer in the hands of men acquainted with the world, conversant in the great book of nature, was now confined almost entirely to recluse monks, equally ignorant of men and of things. But curiosity was awakened, and the men of genius were fretted as well as disgusted with the disquisitions of the schools, which one moment raised expectations by the symmetry of composition, and the next moment blasted them by their inconsistency with experience.

They saw that the best way was to begin de novo, to throw away the first principles altogether, without exception or examination, and endeavour to find out new ones, which should stand the test of logic; that is, should in every case be agreeable to fact.

Philosophers began to reflect, that under the untutored tuition of kind nature we have acquired much useful knowledge. It is therefore highly probable, that her method is the most proper for acquiring knowledge, by nature, and that by imitating her manner we shall have the like success. We are too apt to slight the occupations of children, whom we may observe continually busy turning everything over and over, putting them into every situation, and at every distance. We excuse it, saying, that it is an innocent amusement; but we should pay with an ingenious philosopher (Dr Reid), that they are most seriously and rationally employed: they are acquiring the habits of observation; and by merely indulging an undetermined curiosity, they are making themselves acquainted with surrounding objects: they are struck by similitudes, and amused with mere classification. If some new effect occurs from any of their little plays, they are eager to repeat it. When a child has for the first time tumbled a spoon from the table, and is pleased with its jingling noise on the floor, if another lie within its reach, it is sure to share the same fate. If the child be indulged in this diversion, it will repeat it with greediness that deserves our attention. The very first eager repetition shows a confidence in the constancy of natural operations, which we can hardly ascribe wholly to experience; and its keenness to repeat the experiment, shows the interest which it takes in the exercise of this most useful propensity. It is beginning the study of nature; and its occupation is the same with that of a Newton computing the motions of the moon by his sublime theory, and comparing his calculus with observation. The child and the philosopher are equally employed in the contemplation of a similarity of event, and are anxious that this similarity shall return. The child, it is true, thinks not of this abstract object of contemplation, but throws down the spoon again to have the pleasure of hearing it jingle. The philosopher suspects that the conjunction of events is the consequence of a general law of nature, and tries an experiment where this conjunction recurs. The child is happy, and eager to enjoy a pleasure which to us appears highly frivolous; but it has the same foundation with the pleasure of the philosopher, who rejoices in the success of his experiment: and the fact, formerly a trifle to both, now acquires importance. Both go on repeating the experiment, till the fact ceases to be a novelty to either: the child is satisfied, and the philosopher has now established a new law of nature.

Such (says this amiable philosopher) is the education of kind nature, who from the beginning to the end of our lives makes the play of her scholars their most instructive lessons, and has implanted in our mind the curiosity and the inductive propensity by which we are enabled and disposed to learn them. The exercise of this inductive principle, by which nature prompts us to infer general laws from the observation of particular facts, gives us a species of logic new in the schools, but old as human nature. It is certainly a method of discovery; for by these means general principles, formerly unknown, have come into view.

It is a just and rational logic; for it is founded on, and indeed is only the habitual application of, this maxim, "That whatever is true with respect to every individual of a class of events, is true of the whole class." This is just the inverse of the maxim on which the Aristotelian logic wholly proceeds, and is of equal authority in the court of reason. Indeed the expression of the general law is only the abbreviated expression of every particular instance.

This new logic, therefore, or the logic of induction, must not be considered as subordinate to the old, or founded on it. See Logic, Part III. chap. 5. In fact, the use and legitimacy of the Aristotelian logic is founded on the inductive,

All animals are mortal; All men are animals; therefore All men are mortal.

This is no argument to any person who chooses to deny the mortality of man; even although he acknowledges his animal nature, he will deny the major proposition.

It is beside our purpose to show, how a point so general, so congenial to man, and so familiar, remained so long unnoticed, although the disquisition is curious and satisfactory. It was not till within these two centuries that the increasing demand for practical knowledge, particularly in the arts, made inquisitive men see how useless and insufficient was the learning of the schools in any road of investigation which was connected with life and business; and observe, that society had received useful information chiefly from persons actually engaged in the arts which the speculators were endeavouring to illustrate; and that this knowledge consisted chiefly of experiments and observations, the only contributions which their authors could make to science.

The Novum Organum of Bacon, which points out the true method of forming a body of real and useful knowledge, namely, the study of nature in the way of description, observation, and experiment, is undoubtedly the noblest present that science ever received. It may be considered as the grammar of nature's language, and is a counter-part to the logic of Aristotle; not exploring it, but making it effectual.

As the logic of Aristotle had its rules, so has the Baconian or inductive; and this work, the Novum Organum Scientiarum, contains them all. The chief rule, and indeed the rule from which all the rest are but derivations, is, that "the induction of particulars must be carried as far as the general affirmation which is deduced from them." If this be not attended to, the mind of man, which from his earliest years shows great eagerness in searching for first principles, will frequently ascribe to the operation of a general principle events which are merely accidental. Hence the popular belief in omens, palmistry, and all kinds of fortune-telling.

This rule must evidently give a new turn to the whole track of philosophical investigation. In order to discover first principles, we must make extensive and accurate observations, so as to have copious inductions of facts, that we may not be deceived as to the extent of the principle inferred from them. We must extend our acquaintance with the phenomena, paying a minute attention to what is going on all around us; and we must study nature, not shut up in our closet drawing the picture from our own fancy, but in the world, copying our lines from her own features.

To delineate human nature, we must see how men act. To give the philosophy of the material world, we must notice its phenomena.

This method of studying nature has been prosecuted during these two last centuries with great eagerness and success. Philosophers have been busy in making accurate observations of facts, and copious collections of them. Men of genius have discovered points of resemblance, from which they have been able to infer many general powers both of mind and body; and resemblances among these have suggested powers still more general.

By these efforts investigation became familiar; philosophers studied the rules of the art, and became more expert; hypotheses were banished, and nothing was admitted as a principle which was not inferred from the most copious induction. Conclusions from such principles became every day more conformable to experience. Mistakes sometimes happened; but recourse being had to more accurate observation or more copious induction, the mistakes were corrected. In the present study of nature, our steps are more slow, and hesitating and painful; our conclusions are more limited and modest, but our discoveries are more certain and progressive, and the results are more applicable to the purposes of life. This pre-eminence of modern philosophy over the ancient is seen in every path of inquiry. It was first remarkable in the study of the material world; and there it still continues to be most conspicuous. But it is no less to be seen in the later performances of philosophers in metaphysics, pneumatology, and ethics, where the mode of investigation by analysis and experiment has been greatly adopted; and we may add, that it is this juster view of the employment which has restored philosophers to the world, to society. They are no longer to be found only in the academies of the sophists and the cloisters of a convent, but in the discharge of public and private duty. A philosophic genius is a genius for observation as well as reflection, and he says, Homo sum, humani a me nihil alienum puto.

After saying so much on the nature of the employment and the mode of procedure, it requires no deep the philosophical penetration to perceive the value of the philosophical character. If there is a propensity in the human mind which distinguishes us from the inferior orders of sentient beings, without the least circumstance of interference, a propensity which alone may be taken for the characteristic of the species, and of which no trace is to be found in any other, it is disinterested intellectual curiosity, a love of discovery for its own sake, independent of all its advantages.

We think highly (and with great justice do we think so) of our rational powers; but we may carry this too far, as we do every ground of self-estimation. To every man who enjoys the cheering thought of living under the care of a wise Creator, this boasted prerogative will be viewed with more modesty and diffidence; and He has given us evident marks of the rank in which He esteems the rational powers of man. In no case that is of essential importance, of indispensable necessity, not on ly... ly to our wellbeing but to our very existence, has He left man to the care of his reason alone; for in the first instance, He has given us reason.

To guide the helm, while passion blows the gale.

God has not trusted either the preservation of the individual or the continuance of the race to man's notions of the importance of the task, but has committed them to the sure guards of hunger and of sexual desire. In like manner, He has not left the improvement of his noblest work, the intellectual powers of the soul of man, to his own notions how important it is to his comfort that he be thoroughly acquainted with the objects around him. No: He has committed this also to the sure hand of curiosity: and He has made this so strong in a few superior souls, whom He has appointed to give light and knowledge to the whole species, as to attract them from all other pursuits, and to engage them in intellectual research with an ardour which no attainment can ever quench, but, on the contrary, inflames it the more by every draught of knowledge.

But what need words

To paint its power? For this the daring youth Breaks from his weeping mother's folding arms In foreign climes to rove. The penive sage, Headless of sleep, or midnight's hurtful vapour Hangs o'er the flicker taper.—Hence the scorn Of all familiar prospects, though beheld With transport once. Hence the attentive gaze Of young astonishment.

Such is the bounteous providence of Heaven, In every breast implanting the desire Of objects new and strange, to urge us on With unremitting labour to attain The sacred stores that wait the rip'ning soul In Truth's exhaustless bosom. Aikenfide.

But human life is not a situation of continual necessity; this would ill suit the plans of its beneficent Author: and it is from induction of phenomena totally opposite to this, and from such induction alone, that we have ever thought of a wise Creator. His wisdom appears only in His beneficence. Human life is a scene filled with enjoyment; and the soul of man is stored with propensities and powers which have pleasure, in direct terms, for their object. Another striking distinction of our nature is a continual disposition to refinement, of which few traces are to be found in the actions of other animals. There is hardly a gift of nature so grateful in itself as to please the freakish mind of man till he has moulded it to his fancy. Not contented with food, with raiment, and with shelter, he must have nice cookery, ornamental dress, and elegant houses. He hunts when he is not hungry, and he refines sexual appetite into a most elegant passion. In like manner he has improved this anxious desire of the knowledge of the objects around him, so as to derive from them the means of subsistence and comfort, into the most elegant and pleasing of all gratifications, the accumulation of intellectual knowledge, independent of all consideration of its advantages. And as every man has a title to the enjoyment of such pleasures as he can attain without injuring his neighbour; so it is allowable to such as have got the means of intellectual improvement, without relinquishing the indispensible social duties, to push this advantage as far as it will go: and, in all ages and countries, it has been considered as forming the greatest distinction between men of easy fortune and the poor, who must earn their subsistence by the sweat of their brow. The plebeian must learn to work, the gentleman must learn to think; and nothing can be a surer mark of a groveling soul than for a man of fortune to have an uncultivated mind.

Let us then cherish to the utmost this distinguishing ought to propensity of the human soul: but let us do even this like philosophers. Let us cultivate it as it is: as the it is subser- handmaid to the arts and duties of life; as the guide vient to the something yet more excellent. A character is not to be estimated from what the person knows, but from what he can perform. The accumulation of intellectual knowledge is too apt to create an inordinate appetite for it: and the man habituated to speculation is, like the miser, too apt to place that pleasure in the mere possession, which he ought to look for only or chiefly in the judicious use of his favourite object. Like the miser, too, his habits of hoarding up generally unfit him for the very enjoyment which at setting out he proposed to himself. Seldom do we find the man, who has devoted his life to scientific pursuits for their own sake, possessed of that superiority of mind which the active employ to good purpose in times of perplexity; and much seldomer do we find him possessed of that promptitude of apprehension, and that decision of purpose, which are necessary for passing through the difficult scenes of human life.

But we may use the good things of this life without abusing them; and by moderation here, as in all other pursuits, derive those solid advantages which philosophy is able to bestow. And these advantages are great. To enumerate and describe them would be to write a great volume. We may just take notice of one, which is an obvious consequence of that strict and simple view which we have given of the subject; and this is a modest opinion of our attainments. Appearances are all limits of that we know; causes are for ever hid from our view; our knowledge the powers of our nature do not lead us so far. Let us therefore, without hesitation, relinquish all pursuits which have such things as ultimate principles for objects of examination. Let us attend to the subordinations of things which it is our great business to explore. Among these there is such a subordination as that of means to ends, and of instruments to an operation. All will acknowledge the absurdity of the project of viewing light with a microscope. It is equally absurd for us to examine the nature of knowledge, of truth, of infinite wisdom, by our intellectual powers. We have a wide field of accessible knowledge in the works of God; and one of the greatest advantages, and of the most sublime pleasures, which we can derive from the contemplation, is the view which a judicious philosophical research will most infallibly give us of a world, not consisting of a number of detached objects, connected only by the fleeting tie of coexistence, but an universe, a system of beings, all connected together by causation, with innumerable degrees of subordination and subversion, and all cooperating in the production of one great and glorious purpose. The heart which has but a spark of sensibility must be warmed by such a prospect, must be pleased to find itself an important part of this stupendous machine; and cannot but adore the incomprehensible Ar- View of Bacon's Philosophy.

Philosophical disquisition gives just notions of God and that wonderful concatenation and adjustment of every thing both material and intellectual, as the most striking instance of incomprehensible wisdom; which, by means so few and so simple, can produce effects which by their grandeur dazzle our imagination, and by their multiplicity elude all possibility of enumeration. Of all the obstacles which the weakness, the folly, or the sinful vanity of men, has thrown in the way of the theologian, there is none so fatal, so hostile to all his endeavours, as a cold and comfortless system of materialism, which the reasoning pride of man first engendered, which made a figure among a few speculators in the last century, but was soon forgotten by the philosophers really busy with the observation of nature and of nature's God. It has of late reared up its head, being now cherished by all who wish to get rid of the flings of remorse, as the only opinion compatible with the view of peace of the licentious and the sensual; for we may say Bacon to them as Henry IV. said to the prince of Wales, "Thy will was father, Harry, to that thought." In vain will the divine attempt to lay this devil with the metaphysical exorcisms of the schools; it is philosophy alone that can detect the cheat. Philosophy singles out the characteristic phenomena which distinguish every substance; and philosophy never will hesitate in saying that there is a set of phenomena which characterize mind and another which characterize body, and that these are toto caelo different. Continually appealing to fact, to the phenomena, for our knowledge of every cause, we shall have no difficulty in deciding that thought, memory, volition, joy, hope, are not compatible attributes with bulk, weight, elasticity, fluidity. Tuta sub axeide Pallas; philosophy will maintain the dignity of human nature, will detect the sophisms of the materialists, confute their arguments; and she alone will restore to the countenance of nature that ineffable beauty, of which those would deprive her, who would take away the supreme Mind which shines from within, and gives life and expression to every feature.