prevents us from adverting to sundry other opinions of our author, which we conceive to be equally unfounded. -For example, (to say nothing of his proof of the impersonality of intelligence, because, forsooth, truth is not subject to our will), what can be conceived more self-contradictory than his theory of moral liberty? Divorcing liberty from intelligence, but connecting it with personality, he defines it to be a cause which is determined to act by its proper energy alone. But (to say nothing of remoter difficulties) how liberty can be conceived, supposing always a plurality of modes of activity, without a knowledge of that plurality;-how a faculty can resolve to act by preference in a particular manner, and not determine itself by final causes;-how intelligence can influence a blind power without operating as an efficient cause;—or how, in fine, morality can be founded on a liberty which, at best, only escapes necessity by taking refuge with chance:-these are problems which M. Cousin, in none of his works, has stated, and which we are confident he is unable to solve.

After the tenor of our previous observations, it is needless to say that we regard M. Cousin's attempt to establish a general peace among philosophers, by the promulgation of his Eclectic theory, as a failure. But though no converts to his Unconditioned, and viewing with regret what we must regard as the misapplication of his distinguished talents, we cannot disown a strong feeling of interest and admiration for those qualities, even in their excess, which have betrayed him, with so many other aspiring philosophers, into a pursuit which could only end in disappointment;-we mean his love of truth, and his reliance on the powers of man. Not to despair of philosophy is "a last infirmity of noble minds." The stronger the intellect, the stronger the confidence in its force; the more ardent the appetite for knowledge, the less are we prepared to canvass the uncertainty of the fruition. "The wish is parent to the thought." Loath to admit that our science is at best the reflection of a reality we cannot know, we strive to penetrate to existence in itself; and what we have laboured intensely to attain, we at last fondly believe we have accomplished. But, like Ixion, we embrace a cloud for a divinity. Conscious only of, -conscious only in and through, limitation, we think to comprehcnd the infinite; and dream even of establishing the science--the nescience of man, on an identity with the omniscience of God. It is this powerful tendency of the most vigorous minds to transcend the

phoe of sar faculties, which makes a "learned ignorance" the most difful acquiretaent, perhaps, indeed, the consummation, of Intrag words of a forgotten, but acute philosopher:Mear, ima i taimu pars sapientia est,quædam æquo animo

tix I. for testimonies in regard to the limitation of our

II-PHILOSOPHY OF PERCEPTION. *

(OCTOBER, 1830.)

Euvres Complètes de THOMAS REID, chef de l'école Ecossaise. Publiées par M. TH. JOUFFROY, avec des Fragments de M. ROYER-COLLARD, et une Introduction de l'Editeur-Tomes II. -VI. 8vo. Paris, 1828-9, (not completed.)

sons.

WE rejoice in the appearance of this work,-and for two reaWe hail it as another sign of the convalescence of philosophy, in a great and influential nation; and prize it as a seasonable testimony by intelligent foreigners, to the merits of a philosopher, whose reputation is, for the moment, under an eclipse at home.

Apart from the practical corruption, of which (in the emphatic language of Fichte) "the dirt-philosophy" may have been the cause, we regard the doctrine of mind, long dominant in France, as more pernicious, through the stagnation of thought which it occasioned, than for the speculative errors which it set afloat. The salutary fermentation, which the scepticism of Hume determined in Scotland and in Germany, did not extend to that country; and the dogmatist there slumbered on, unsuspicious of his principles, nay even resigned to conclusions, which would make philosophy to man, the solution of the terrific oracle to Edipus:

"Mayst thou ne'er learn the truth of what thou art!”

Since the metaphysic of Locke," says M. Cousin, “crossed the channel, on the light and brilliant wings of Voltaire's imagina

[In French by M. Peisse; in Italian by S. Lo Gatto; in Cross's Selections. Some deletions, found necessary in consequence of the unexpected length to which the Article extended, (especially from the second paragraph on this page, to "contributed," near the bottom of p. 41), have been restored. One note has been omitted, which Mr Napier had appended; not that I would proclaim a dissent from its statements, but simply because it is not mine. I have added little or nothing to this criticism beyond references to my Dissertations supplementary of Reid, when the points under discussion are there more fully or more accurately treated.]

}

Co, Sensualista has reigred in France, without contradiction, adwith an auth aity of which there is no parallel in the whole of plosophy. It is a fact, marvellons but incontestable, theho te tie of Condillae, there has not appeared among us philosophical work, at variance with his doctrine, which has Sondast in press on the public mind. Condillac tom-roigned, place; and his domination, prolonged even to our coly, urogh changes of every kind, pursued its tranquil ily above the reach of danger. Discussion had said, I had only to develope the words of their master: plome. seva ed accomplished.”—--(Journal des Savans, 1819.) No world such a result have been desirable, had the one exbeen true, as it was false,-innocent, as it was corThe accomplishment of philosophy imply a cessation is on .- -it de result of speculation be a paralysis of itself; antion of knowledge is the condition of intellectual

I

Et has profoundly defined man, "the hunter of th, for in this chase, as in others, the pursuit is all in all, Store gomar 'vely nothing. Did the Almighty," says Less, tabling in his right hand Truth, and in his left Search Toth, legn to picïor me the one, I might prefer;—in all but without hesitation, I should request-Search after only as we energise; pleasure is the reflex of

energy is the mean by which our faculties

I a higher energy the end which their developIn action thus contained the existence, happi

*s, cry Bovement, an.,erfection of our being; and knowledge s, as it may afford a stimulus to the exercise of our 1 the cood.ion of their more complete activity. Specuut' is, t. refore, subordinate to speculation itself; and its astly measured by the quantity of energy which it 65-10mediately in it decovery,mediately through its Life to Endymion was not preferable to death; Treba pre tice, a waking error is better than a sleeping truth. Nerer in point of fact, is there found any proportion between pos via of trutts, and the development of the mind in which nry we do osted. Every learner in science, is now familiar tore truther Aristotle or Plato ever dreamt of knowing; Vienpared with the Stagirite or the Athenian, how few, among van fera of modern seionco, rank higher than intellectual barhawa! Andert (nece and modern Europe prove, indeed, that the march of in Leet" is no inseparal le concomitant of the

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march of science";-that the cultivation of the individual is not to be rashly confounded with the progress of the species.

But if the possession of theoretical facts be not convertible with mental improvement; and if the former be important only as subservient to the latter: it follows, that the comparative utility of a study is not to be principally estimated by the complement of truths which it may communicate; but by the degree in which it determines our higher capacities to action. But though this be the standard by which the different methods, the different branches, and the different masters, of philosophy, ought to be principally, (and it is the only criterion by which they can all be satisfactorily) tried; it is nevertheless a standard, by which, neither methods, nor sciences, nor philosophers, have ever yet been even inadequately appreciated. The critical history of philosophy, in this spirit, has still to be written; and when written, how opposite will be the rank, which, on the higher and more certain standard, it will frequently adjudge,-to the various branches of knowledge, and the various modes of their cultivation,-to different ages, and countries, and individuals, from that which has been hitherto partially awarded, on the vacillating authority of the lower!

On this ground (which we have not been able fully to state. far less adequately to illustrate,) we rest the pre-eminent utility of metaphysical speculations. That they comprehend all the sublimest objects of our theoretical and moral interest;-that every (natural) conclusion concerning God, the soul, the present worth, and the future destiny of man, is exclusively metaphyscal, will be at once admitted. But we do not found the importance, on the paramount dignity, of the pursuit. It is as the best gymnastic of the mind, as a mean, principally, and almost exclusively conducive to the highest education of our noblest powers, that we would vindicate to these speculations the necessity, which has too frequently been denied them. By no other intellectual application (and least of all by physical pursuits) is the soul thus reflected on itself, and its faculties concentered in such independent, vigorous, unwonted and continued energy;--by none. therefore, are its best capacities so variously and intensely evolved. "Where there is most life, there is the victory."

Let it not be believed, that the mighty minds who have cultivated these studies, have toiled in vain. If they have not always realised truth, they have always determined exertion; and in the congenial eloquence of the elder Scaliger:-" Eæ subtilitates, quanquam sint animis otiosis otiosæ atque inutiles; vegetis tamen