NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.

Note (A.) page 51.

THAT there are many words used in philosophic discourse, which do not admit of logical definition, is abundantly manifest. This is the case with all those words that signify things uncompounded, and consequently unsusceptible of analysis ;—a proposition, one should think, almost self-evident; and yet it is surprising, how very generally it has been overlooked by philosophers.

That Aristotle himself, with all his acuteness, was not aware of it, appears sufficiently from the attempts he has made to define various words denoting some of the simplest and most elementary objects of human thought. Of this, remarkable instances occur in his definitions of time and of motion; definitions which were long the wonder and admiration of the learned; but which are now remembered only, from their singular obscurity and absurdity. It is owing to a want of attention to this circumstance, that metaphysicians have so often puzzled themselves about the import of terms, employed familiarly without the slightest danger of mistake by the most illiterate ;-imagining, that what they could not define must involve some peculiar mystery; when, in fact, the difficulty of the definition arose entirely from the perfect simplicity of the thing to be defined. "Quid sit Tempus," said St. Augustine," si nemo quærat a me, scio; si quis interroget, nescio."

According to Dr. Reid, Descartes and Locke are the earliest writers by whom this fundamental principle in logic was stated; but the remark is by no means correct. I do not know if Mr. Locke himself has expressed it more clearly than our celebrated Scottish lawyer Lord Stair, in a work published several years before the Essay on Human Understanding; and it is worthy of observation, that, so far from ascribing the merit of it to Descartes, he censures that philosopher, in common with Aristotle, for a want of due attention to it.

"Necesse est quosdam terminos esse adeo claros, ut clarioribus elucidari nequeant, alioquin, infinitus esset progressus in terminorum explicatione, adeo ut nulla possit esse clara cognitio, nec ullus certo scire possit alterius conceptus."

"Tales termini sunt Cogitatio, Motus, quibus non dantur clariores conceptus aut termini, et brevi apparebit, quam inutiliter Aristoteles et Cartesius conati sunt definire Motum."

Physiologia Nova Experimentalis, &c. (p. 9.) Authore D. de Stair, Carolo II. Britanniarum Regi a Consiliis Juris et Statûs. Ludg. Batav. 1686.—See also p. 79 of the same book.

Locke's Essay (as appears from the dedication) was first printed in 1689. Lord Stair's work must have been published a considerable time before. The Latin translation of it (which is the only edition of the book I have seen) is dated 1686; and bears, on the title page, that the original had appeared before. Nuper Latinitate donata.

According to a learned and ingenious writer, Aristotle himself" had taught, before Mr. Locke, that what the latter calls simple ideas could not be defined.”—(Translation of Aristotle's Ethics and Politics, by Dr. Gillies, Vol. I. p. 138, 2d edit.) The passages, however, to which he has referred, seem to me much less decisive evidence in support of this assertion, than Aristotle's own definitions are against it. Nor can I bring myself to alter this opinion, even by Dr. Gillies's attempt to elucidate the celebrated definition of Motion.

Note (B.) page 65.

It may be of use to some of my readers, before proceeding to the third chapter, to read with attention, the following extracts from Dr. Reid.

"The word idea occurs so frequently in modern philosophical writings upon the mind, and is so ambiguous in its meaning, that it is necessary to make some observa

tions upon it. There are chiefly two meanings of this word in modern authors, a popular and a philosophical.

"First, In popular language, idea signifies the same thing as conception, apprehension, notion. To have an idea of any thing, is to conceive it. To have a distinct idea is to conceive it distinctly. To have no idea of it, is not to conceive it at all. "When the word is taken in this popular sense, no man can possibly doubt, whether he has ideas. For he that doubts must think, and to think is to have ideas.

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Secondly, According to the philosophical meaning of the word idea, it does not signify that act of the mind which we call thought or conception, but some object of thought. Ideas, according to Mr. Locke, (whose frequent use of this word has probably been the occasion of its being adopted into common language) are nothing but the immediate objects of the mind in thinking.' But of those objects of thought called ideas, different sects of philosophers have given a very different account.

"Mr. Locke, who uses the word idea so very frequently, tells us, that he means the same thing by it, as is commonly meant by species or phantasm. Gassendi, from whom Locke borrowed more than from any other author, says the same. The words species and phantasm, are terms of art in the Peripatetic system, and the meaning of them is to be learned from it.

"Modern Philosophers, as well as the Peripatetics of old, have conceived, that external objects cannot be the immediate objects of our thought; that there must be some image of them in the mind itself, in which, as in a mirror, they are seen. And the name idea, in the philosophical sense of it, is given to those internal and immediate objects of our thoughts. The external thing is the remote or mediate object; but the idea or image of that object in the mind, is the immediate object, without which we could have no perception, no remembrance, no conception of the mediate object.

"When, therefore, in common language, we speak of having an idea of any thing, we mean no more by that expression, but thinking of it. The vulgar allow, that this expression implies a mind that thinks; and an act of that mind which we call thinking. But besides these, the philosopher conceives the existence of an idea which is the immediate object of thought. The idea is in the mind itself, and can have no existence but in a mind that thinks; but the remote or mediate object may be something external, as the sun or moon; it may be something past or future; it may be something which never existed. This is the philosophical meaning of the word idea; and we may observe, that this meaning of that word is built upon a philosophical opinion: For if philosophers had not believed that there are such immediate objects of all our thoughts in the mind, they would never have used the word idea to express them. "I shall only add on this article, that although I may have occasion to use the word idea in this philosophical sense, in explaining the opinions of others, I shall have no occasion to use it in expressing my own, because I believe ideas, taken in this sense, to be a mere fiction of philosophers. And, in the popular meaning of the word, there is the less occasion to use it because the English words thought, notion, apprehension, answer the purposes as well as the Greek word idea; with this advantage, that they are less ambiguous."-(Essays on the Intellectual Powers, p. 22. et seq.)

After this long quotation from Dr. Reid, it is proper to mention, what has induced me to make an occasional use, in these Essays, of a word which he has taken so much pains to discard from the language of philosophy.

My reason is shortly this, that finding, after all he has written on the subject, the word idea still maintains, and is likely long to maintain its ground, it seemed to me a more practicable attempt to limit and define its meaning, than to banish it altogether. For this purpose, I generally couple it with some synonymous word, such as thought or notion, so as to exclude completely all the theoretical doctrines usually implied in it; and I cannot help flattering myself with the hope, that in this way, I may be able to contribute something towards the gradual extirpation of the prejudices, to which, in its philosophical acceptation, it has hitherto given so powerful a support.

It may gratify the curiosity of some of my readers, to be able to compare the language of Descartes concerning ideas, with that of Mr. Locke. According to the first of these writers, " an idea is the thing thought upon, as far as it is objectively in the understanding." Idea est ipsa res cogitata, quatenus est objectivè in intellectu. By way of comment upon this, he tells us afterwards, in reply to a difficulty started by one of his correspondents;-" ubi advertendum, me loqui de ideâ quæ nunquam est extra intellectum, et ratione cujus esse objectivè non aliud significat, quàm esse in intellectu eo modo quo objecta in illo esse solent."-(Responsio ad Primas Objectiones in Meditationes Cartesii.)

I may not have a better opportunity of observing afterwards, that Descartes rejected entirely that part of the Peripatetic system which accounts for perception by species or ideas proceeding from external things, and transmitted to the mind through the channel of the senses. His arguments against that hypothesis were so clear and conclusive, that Gravesande, in a small treatise published in 1737, speaks of it as unworthy of refutation: "Explosam dudum, de speciebus à rebus procedentibus, et menti impressis, sententiam explicare et refellere, inutile credimus.”*—(Introductio ad Philosophiam, p. 98.)

While Descartes, however, dissented on this point, from the schoolmen, he maintained in common with them, that what we immediately perceive is not the external object, but an idea or image of it in our mind.

Among our later writers, I do not recollect any who have entered into so elaborate an explanation of the nature of ideas, considered as the objects of thought, as the ingenious author of a work entitled, the Light of Nature Pursued. The following passage, which he gives as the substance of his own creed on this point, is, I suspect, a tolerably faithful exposition of prejudices which still remain in most minds; and which are insensibly imbibed in early life, from the hypothetical phraseology bequeathed to us by the schoolmen.

"Idea is the same as image, and the term imagination implies a receptacle of images: but image being appropriated, by common use, to visible objects, could not well be extended to other things without confusion; wherefore learned men have imported the Greek word idea, signifying image or appearance, to which, being their own peculiar property, they might affix as large a signification as they pleased. For the image of a sound, or of goodness, would have offended our delicacy, but the idea of either goes down glibly: therefore idea is the same with respect to things in general, as image with respect to objects of vision.

"In order to render the notion of ideas clearer, let us begin with images. When a peacock spreads his tail in our sight, we have a full view of the creature with all his gaudy plumage before us; the bird remains at some distance, but the light reflected from him paints an image upon our eyes, and the optic nerves transmit it to the sensory. This image, when arrived at the ends of the nerves, becomes an idea, and gives us our discernment of the animal; and after the bird is gone out of view, we can recall the idea of him to perform the same office as before, though in a duller and fainter manner. So, when the nightingale warbles, the sound reaches our ears, and, passing through the auditory nerves, exhibits an idea, affecting us with the discernment of her music and after she has given over singing, the same idea may recur to our remembrance, or be raised again by us at pleasure. In like manner, our other senses convey ideas of their respective kinds, which recur again to our view long after the objects, first exciting them, have been removed.

"These ideas having entered the mind, intermingle, unite, separate, throw themselves into various combinations and postures, and thereby generate new ideas of reflection, strictly so called, such as those of comparing, dividing, distinguishing, of abstraction, relation, with many others: all which remain with us as stock for our further use on future occasions."

-"What those substances are whereof our ideas are the modifications, whether parts of the mind as the members are of our body, or contained in it like wafers in a box, or enveloped by it like fish in water; whether of a spiritual, corporeal, or middle nature between both, I need not now ascertain. All I mean at present to lay down is this: That, in every exercise of the understanding, that which discerns is numerically and substantially distinct from that which is discerned; and that an act of the understanding is not so much our own proper act, as the act of something else operating upon us."-Vol. I. p. 15, et seq. (edit. of 1768.)

On these and some other points touched upon in these Essays, I am sorry that I have the misfortune to differ from an author, for whose talents, learning, and taste, I entertain a high respect. I have purposely avoided any reference to his book through the whole of this volume, as his reasonings did not appear to myself to invalidate the conclusions which I was chiefly anxious to establish. See Academical Questions by the Right Honourable Sir William Drummond (London, 1805): particularly Chapter X., which contains his defence of the Ideal Theory. It is directed

*Mr. Hume afterwards relapsed into the old scholastic language on this subject: "The slightest philosophy teaches us, that nothing can ever be present to the mind but an image or perception; and that the senses are only the inlets through which these are received, without being ever able to produce any immediate intercourse between the mind and the object.”—Essays.

How this language is to be reconciled with the philosophy which teaches, that ideas or images can have no existence but in a mind, Mr. Hume has not attempted to explain.

chiefly against some arguments and expressions of Dr. Reid; and must be acknowledged, even by those who dissent the most widely from its doctrines, to be written with equal ability and candor.

Note (C.) page 73.

"Those things which are inferior and secondary, are by no means the principles or causes of the more excellent; and, though we admit the common interpretations, and allow sense to be a principle of science, we must, however, call it a principle, not as if it was the efficient cause but as it rouses our soul to the recollection of general ideas. According to the same way of thinking, is it said in the Timæus, that through the sight and hearing we acquire to ourselves philosophy, because we pass from objects of sense to Reminiscence or Recollection."" For, in as much as the soul, by containing the principles of all beings, is a sort of omniform representation or exemplar: when it is roused by objects of sense, it recollects those principles, which it contains within, and brings them forth.”

The foregoing passages (which I give in the version of Mr. Harris) are taken from a manuscript commentary of the Platonic Olympiodorus upon the Phædo of Plato. See Harris's Works, Vol. I. p. 426.

The following lines are from Boëthius, who, after having enumerated many acts of the Mind or Intellect, wholly distinct from Sensation, and independent of it, thus

concludes:

To these quotations I shall only add a short extract from Dr. Price.

"Acording to Cudworth, abstract ideas are implied in the cognoscitive power of the mind; which contains in itself virtually (as the future plant or tree is contained in the seed) general notions or exemplars of all things, which are exerted by it, or unfold and discover themselves as occasions invite, and proper circumstances occur. This no doubt, many will very freely condemn, as whimsical and extravagant. I have, I own, a different opinion of it; but yet I should not care to be obliged to defend it."-Price's Review, &c. (London 1769) p. 39.

Note (D.) page 80.

The word sentiment, agreeably to the use made of it by our best English writers, expresses, in my opinion, very happily, those complex determinations of the mind, which result from the cooperation of our rational powers and of our moral feelings. We do not speak of a man's sentiments concerning a mechanical contrivance, or a physical hypothesis, or concerning any speculative question whatever, by which the feelings are not liable to be roused, or the heart affected.

This account of the meaning of the word sentiment corresponds, I think, exactly with the use made of it by Mr. Smith, in the title of his Theory. It agrees also nearly with the following explanation of its import, in Campbell's Philosophy of Rhetoric: "What is addressed solely to the moral powers of the mind, is not so properly denominated the pathetic, as the sentimental. The term, I own, is rather modern, but is nevertheless convenient, as it fills a vacant room, and does not, like most of our new-fangled words, justle out older and worthier occupants, to the no small detriment of the language. It occupies, so to speak, the middle place between the pathetic and that which is addressed to the imagination, and partakes of both, adding to the warmth of the former, the grace and attractions of the latter."

Would not Campbell have stated this philological fact still more accurately, if he had substituted the word understanding instead of imagination, in the last sentence?-making such alterations on the subsequent clause, as this change would have rendered necessary. In proposing the following, I wish only to convey my idea more clearly:-" and partakes of both, adding to the interest of the former, the sober and deliberate conviction of the latter."

Dr. Beattie has said, "that the true and the old English sense of the word sentiment is a formed opinion, notion, or principle;" and he is certainly supported in this remark, by the explanation of that word in Johnson's Dictionary. It is remarkable however, that the very first authority quoted by Johnson is strongly in favor of what I have stated concerning the shade of difference between the words sentiment and opinion. "The consideration of the reason, why they are annexed to so many other ideas, serving to give us due sentiments of the wisdom and goodness of the sovereign Disposer of all things, may not be unsuitable to the main end of these inquiries."-(Locke.)

One thing at least must be granted, that if this term be considered as exactly synonymous with opinion or principle, it is altogether superfluous in our language; whereas, in the restricted sense in which I am inclined to employ it, it forms a real and most convenient accession to our philosophical vocabulary.

If these remarks be just, Dr. Reid has made use of the word somewhat improperly (at least according to present usage,) when he speaks in his Essays on the Intellectual Powers, of the sentiments of Mr. Locke concerning perception; and of the sentiments of Arnauld, of Berkeley, and of Hume, concerning ideas. He seems, himself, to have been sensible of this; for in his Essays on the Active Powers, published three years after the former, he observes, that "sentiment was wont to signify opinion or judginent of any kind; but of late, is appropriated to signify an opinion or judgment, that strikes, and produces some agreeable or uneasy emotion." (P. 479. 4to edit.)

Mr. Hume, on the other hand, sometimes employs (after the example of the French metaphysicians) sentiment as synonymous with feeling; an use of the word quite unprecedented in our tongue.

In ascertaining the propriety of our vernacular expressions, it is a rule with me, never to appeal from the practice of our own standard authors to etymological considerations, or to the use which is made, in other languages, either ancient or modern, of the corresponding derivatives from the same root. In the present instance, accordingly, I pay no regard to the definitions given of the word sentiment, in French dictionaries; although I readily acknowledge, that it was from that country we originally borrowed it: And I am much fortified in my doubts with respect to the competency of foreign tribunals to decide any such questions, by the variety of senses attached to this very word, in the different languages of modern Europe. On this point I willingly borrow a few remarks from a very ingenious and judicious

critic.

"Le mot sentiment, dérivé du primitif Latin sentire, a passé dans les langues modernes, mais avec des nuances d'acception particulières à chacune d'elles. En Italien, sentimento exprime deux idées différentes; 1. l'opinion qu'on a sur un objet, ou sur une question; 2. la faculté de sentir. En Anglois, sentiment n'a que le premier de ces deux sens. En Espagnol, sentimiento signifie souffrance, acception que le mot primitif a quelquefois en Latin.

"En François, sentiment a les deux acceptions de l'Italien, mais avec cette différence, que dans la dernière il a beaucoup d'extension. Non seulement il désigne généralement en François toutes les affections de l'âme, mais il exprime plus particulièrement la passion de l'amour. En voici un example; son SENTIMENT est si profond que rien au monde ne peut la distraire des objets qui servent à le nourrir. Si l'on traduit cette phrase dans toute autre langue, en conservant le mot sentiment, on fera un Gallicisme. On en fera également un, en employant ce mot dans la traduction des phrases suivantes: c'est un homme á SENTIMENT; voilà du SENTIMENT; il y a du SENTIMENT dans cette pièce; il est tout âme, tout SENTIMENT -parce qu'il y est pris dans une acception vague, pour tout ce qui tient à la faculté de sentir. Aussi STERNE en a-t-il fait un en donnant à son voyage le titre de sentimental; mot que les François n'ont pas manqué de réclamer, et de faire passer dans leur langue, parce qu'il est parfaitement analogue à l'acception qu'ils ont donnée au mot sentiment.”—(Dissertation sur les Gallicismes, par M. Suard.)

It does not appear to me that Sterne can be justly charged with a Gallicism, in the title which he has given to his book; the adjective sentimental, although little used before his time, being strictly conformable in its meaning to the true English import of the substantive on which it is formed. On the contrary, I think, that in adopting the adjective sentimental, as well as the phrase homme à sentiment, the French have imitated the English idiom. In applying, indeed, the word sentiment to the

* Essay on Truth, Part ii. c. i. sect. I