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dogmatical assertion that these contraries might be reconciled. How this was to have happened he has no where, so far as we know, been condescending enough to inform us. Let us attend for one moment to this matter. If all things are pre-established in perfect harmony by God, then one of two things must follow: Either there is no evil, physical or moral, existing in the universe; or, if there is, God is the author of that evil, which he has pre-established by unchangeable, perhaps eternal, laws. Leibnitz certainly did hold, however, that the permission "of moral evil does not detract from the goodness of God;" but, as we have just observed, we have nothing but his authority for the truth of this allegation, more worthy of a quibbling "metaphysical theologian," than of a great philosopher searching after truth. What, we would ask, is the difference, as far as the present question is concerned, between permitting evil, which you have the power to prevent, and being the author of that evil? A man, for example, stands by unconcernedly, and beholds his fellow-creature robbed and murdered, when he could have effectually interposed, and, by this act, saved at once his property and his life. Would not such an act of permission, whatever the philosophers and theologians may say respecting it, subject the person implicated to be tried as an accessary before the fact, by the laws of every civilized country on earth? Again, the Head of a family suffers, permits, or winks at, the most immoral and irreligious conduct in his offspring, or retainers, who are under his control, and can only effect the gratification of their vicious propensities by his connivance. Perhaps human laws would not reach such a miscreant, yet who doubts that the permission, on his part, implies a high degree, not only of responsibility, but of guilt. Would we look for a Lucretia in a bagnio, or a Cato among the pickpockets of St Giles's? Can evil ever emanate in any shape, or under any disguise, from the source of goodness? And, on the principles of Leibnitz, "Is there evil in the city and the Lord hath not done it?" He is, therefore, between the horns of a dilemma. If he admits the ex

istence of evil, physical and moral, it follows from the hypothesis of Preestablished Harmony, that God is the Author of Evil: If he deny the existence of Evil altogether, he is no longer to be reasoned with, such a denial implying at once a disbelief of the senses and of the understanding. In the last case, which, for the sake of illustration, we have supposed, who can for a moment doubt that the Head of a family, who winks at the vices, or, perchance, the crimes, of those over whom he possesses control and effective influence, is to be viewed as the Origo malorum, the Fons criminum? This being indubitable, let us enquire farther, How is the case altered, with regard to the person we have supposed, by telling us that some of those sinners whom he fostered into the full maturity of crime, by his wicked sufferance, will, peradventure, be afterwards sorry for their crimes, when they see a halter foredoomed for them in this world, and anticipate hell and damnation in the next? In other words, Would the contingent and precarious repentance of a Magdalen be any justification of him who had originally betrayed the innocence of the penitent? Certainly not. The partizans of Optimism and Fatalism (for they are virtually the same thing) may answer these questions, or contemn them, as their humour or caprice may prompt them. For our own parts, we hate to be misled and cajoled by mere words. The Leibnitzian gravely tells us, that man is accountable for all his actions, and that guilt is imputable to him for his crimes; and yet, in the very same breath, he adds, for our comfort, that, in his harmonious world, God has pre-established that he shall be criminal, or, at least, that he is virtuous or vicious according, not to his own free volitions, but to the pre-establishment of his maker. He also says, that, upon his principles, God is good though he permits evil; and yet, when the same principle is applied to a human be ing, he acknowledges the justice of the law that awards him punishment. Such are the aberrations and inconsistencies of the human mind when it attempts to descend into the unexplored, and probably fathomless, depths of those awful mysteries,

which they only who try to be "wise above what is written" make the subject of serious and deliberate enquiry. Before quitting the subject of Leibnitz's metaphysical speculations, we must direct the attention of the reader to some Logical Principles evolved by him in the course of propounding his Theory of Pre-established Harmony and of Optimism, and which, as Mr Stewart has correctly remarked, still maintain "an extensive influence over the reasonings of the learned on questions seemingly the most remote from all metaphysical conclusions." These are the Principle of the Sufficient Reason, and the Law of Continuity. On each of these heads we shall hazard a few words: And,

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1. With regard to the Principle of the Sufficient Reason, agreeing, as we do most cordially, with Mr Stewart as to the paradoxical and even dan gerous conclusions which Leibnitz has (we think erroneously) drawn from the application of this Logical Rule, we are, at the same time, by no means prepared to concede to him, that the Principle, under certain limitations, may not be applied to our reasonings with irresistible force and conviction, and may not be rendered a powerful engine in the elaboration of truth. Whatever exists proceeds from a cause, and that cause is determined to the production of a particular effect. Now uniformity implies design, or pre-appointment, for which there must, in the instance of Perfect Intelligence, be always a sufficient reason. For what happens without a sufficient reason is the production of absolute chance, not of Intelligence. Every thing in the universe has its existence determined in one particular way, rather than another; as, for example, gravity is attached as a quality of matter causing bodies to descend in the line of a radius of the terrestrial spheroid ;-and to suppose or assume, that there exists No Sufficient Reason for that particular determination, is to suppose or assume a contradiction; for the fact, that all things exist after one form peculiar to themselves, implies a sufficient reason for that fact, and to deny afterwards the existence of that reason is at once to affirm and deny the same thing. All forms

of existence are conceivable, and the choice of one form, in preference to an infinitude of others, implies will and design: and no being can will or design without a reason or motive. We think this principle most strikingly applicable to Physics; and indeed Leibnitz has furnished us with a very pertinent illustration. "Archimedes, in his book De Equilibrio, was obliged to take for granted, that if there be a balance, in which every thing is alike on both sides, and if equal weights are hung on the two ends of the balance, the whole will be at rest. It is because no reason can be given why one side should weigh down rather than the other. Now, (he adds,) by this single principle of the Sufficient Reason, may be demonstrated the being of a God, and all the other parts of Metaphysics or Natural Theology; even, in some measure those physical truths that are independent upon Mathematics, such as THE DYNAMICAL PRINCIPLES, or THE PRINCIPLES OF FORCES."

2. But if we dissent from the acute observations of Mr Stewart respecting the principle of the Sufficient Reason, much more widely do we recede from what he says on the Law of Continuity, according to which "all changes are produced by insensible gradations, so as to render it impossible for a body to have its state changed from motion to rest, or from rest to motion, without passing through all the intermediate states of velocity:"-in other words, "natura non operatur per saltum." The metaphysical argument employed by the followers of Leibnitz, and indeed frequently hinted at by himself, in proof of the Law of Continuity, has always appeared to us perfectly unanswerable, notwithstanding the dissent of our author; and is this: "If a body at rest begins, per saltum, to move, with any finite velocity, then this body must be, at the same indivisible instant, in two different states, that of rest and of motion, which is impossible *." It is perfectly true, as

"Si toto tempore (says Boscovich) ante contactum subsequentis corporis superficies antecedens habuit 12 gradus velocitatis, et sequenti 9, saltu facto momentaneo ipso initio contactus; in ipso mo

Mr Stewart has stated, that "some finite portion of time enters, as an essential element, into our conception" of a body as either in a state of motion or rest: for whoever thought of denying that a body cannot be either in motion or rest, except in time? What the Leibnitzians maintain is, that it cannot be in both states at once, (or " at the same indivisible instant,") and that time must elapse as it passes from the one state to the other. Mr Stewart plays on the word indivisible, which is here applied merely because language does not supply one more logical or precise: and yet he tells us, that an indivisible instant may form a limit between a state of rest and a state of motion." We hold that it must, or in other words, that a body cannot pass per saltum from the one to the other. But suppose," says Mr S. "one half of this page to be painted white and the other black, it might, I apprehend, be said, with the most rigorous propriety, that the transition from the one colour to the other was made per saltum." Here the reader will be pleased to observe, that the boundary between the two colours is a mathematical line, a mere conception, or abstract idea, whereas we are talking of a physical fact subjected to the cognisance of the senses; and there fore the analogy is not in point. But, assuming, for the sake of argument, that it is perfectly so, "the transition, says our author, from the one colour to the other may, with the most rigorous propriety, be said to be made per saltum;" that is, when we translate this into equivalent terms, it is possible to be on both sides of the mathematical line, (which constitutes the boundary between "the one colour and the other")" at the same indivisible instant of time !"-which is impossible. We will not enter farther into this subject at present, but we cannot, at the same time, avoid noticing, that the discovery of the Polypus furnishes a striking exemplification of the Law of Continui ty in the natural world; that the same law appears to regulate the very

mento ea tempora dirimente debuissent habere et 12 et 9 simul, quod est absurdum. Duas enim simul habere corpus non polest." (Theoria Phil. Nat.)

perceptions of our senses, as the numberless infinitismal particles sent off from bodies do not, each of them, excite a separate sensation, but continuously the sensation of smell: and that we are by no means so sceptical as our author with regard to that continuity of opinion and improvement, so beautifully illustrated by Helvetius, and which forms the groundwork of all predictions of the future improvement, and, to use a favourite phrase of Dr Thomas Brown's, of the "splendid destiny" of our race.

Having said so much on this and other topics, we can now do little more than present our readers with a rapid enumeration of the successive subjects which pass in review under the comprehensive eye of this able and eloquent chronicler of human improvement; conjoining this with an apology for having detained them so long with matters which can only interest the speculative metaphysician, or, at best, that scanty class of persons who reap a noble and independent pleasure in attending to any investigation which calls on them to think, by furnishing them with aliment for their own cogitations.

To the metaphysical speculations of Newton and Clarke, our author next proceeds to direct the attention of his readers, and on this part of his subject he enters con amore. Newton has left little behind him to entitle him to be rated as a metaphysician: but in that little, consisting of some accidental notices in the Scholia annexed to the Principia; and in the queries subjoined to his book on Optics, there are scattered hints which establish a connection between his opinions and those of his illustrious friend and contemporary. The following extract, containing the germ of Clarke's celebrated argument, a priori, for the existence of God, will illustrate what we have just stated:-"Eternus est et infinitus, omnipotens et omnisciens; id est, durat ab æterno in æternum, et adest ab infinito in infinitum. Non est æternitas et infinitas, sed æternus et infinitus; non est duratio et spatium, sed durat et adest. Durat semper et adest ubique, et existendo semper et ubique, durationem et spatium constituit." "The chief glory of Clarke, as a metaphysical author, says Mr S.,

is due to the boldness and ability with which he placed himself in the breach against the Necessitarians and Fatalists of his times." Without entering into this point, we coincide in opinion with our author, that the correspondence between Clarke and Leibnitz is the most instructive and interesting on record; which, it is to be regretted, the death of Leibnitz, in 1716, prevented from being continued. Some curious notices of Clarke's early turn and bias towards metaphysics are also interspersed with the account of his contributions to the science of mind; notices which would seem to give some countenance to the sarcastic phrase of Voltaire, that he was a mere reasoning machine (moulin à raisonnement). Here follows a very interesting digression, full of novel matter, regarding Spinoza (“an Amsterdam Jew of Portuguese extraction") and Spinozim. The author has chiefly been indebted to Bayle for his materials, but he has favoured us with much information, and a few biographical notices entirely new to the mere English reader. Mr Stewart has examined the atheistical tenets of Spinozim with his usual discrimination and ability. We would recommend this part of the Dissertation to the particular attention of our readers. From this digression our author returns, and favours us with a somewhat lengthened account of a book entitled "A Philosophical Inquiry concerning Human Liberty," by Anthony Collins, a man of real ability, and celebrated as the antagonist of

The following reflection of Voltaire on the writings of Spinoza, we would recommend to the attentive consideration of those who are constantly calling out about the danger of speculations which are either unintelligible in themselves, or which (and that comes ultimately to the same thing) nobody reads:-"Vous êtes très confus Baruc Spinoza, mais êtes vous aussi dangereux qu'on le dit? Je soutiens que non, et ma raison c'est que vous êtes très confus, que vous avez ecrit en mauvais Latin, et qu'il n'y a pas dix personnes en l'Europe qui vous lisent d'un bout l'autre. Quel est l'auteur dangereux? C'est celui qui est lu par les Oisifs de la Cour, et par les Dames." (Quest. sur Encyclop. Art. Dieu.)

Clarke. His book is deservedly remarkable, as being the ground-work of Edwards' Treatise on the Freedom of the Will, in which the American Philosopher has done little more than methodise the arguments furnished by the fertile and original mind of Collins. The "Philosophical Inquiry" brought Collins in contact with Clarke, with whom "the liberty of the will, or moral agency of man (says his friend Bishop Hoadly) was a darling point." Bonnet also falls to be mentioned as the contemporary of Collins; a man equally pious, equally learned, but by no means so ingenious and inventive as Collins.

Our author next proceeds to give some account of the Prince of Sceptical Critics, Bayle, of Fontenelle, and of Addison, as well as of the Metaphysical Works of Berkeley. A number of curious particulars are collected respecting Bayle, but we are not aware that any of them are very new. Leibnitz said of him, with infinite felicity and truth," Ubi bene, nemo melius." It is creditable alike to our author's taste and judgment, that he vindicates the Metaphysical acumen of Addison, to whom his contemporaries were, in this respect at least, unjust. His Essays on the Pleasures of Imagination, a subject quite untouched at the time when he wrote, and his Hints on Wit, Humour, and the Causes of Laughter, if they do not entitle him to the very highest rank as a profound thinker, must be allowed to place him very near it, and to indicate a precision accuracy, and originality, together with a fine taste, and an elegance and purity of diction, which have never probably, since his time, been combined in the same degree in any other writer. "He had the merit," says Mr S. "of starting these as problems for the consideration of philosophers; nor would it be easy to name among his successors a single writer who has made so important a step towards their solution as the original proposer." Fontenelle is chiefly famous for his Eloges Museo contingens cuncta lepore," which every where present

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very pleasing pictures of genius and learning in the scenes of domestic life." In spite of the flood of light which the discoveries of

Newton threw on the subject of Metaphysicians of a late date." This physics, he continued a determined is apparently one of the most labourCartesian to the last. Mr Stewart has ed parts of the present Essay, and entered more fully into the metaphy- we regret we cannot present our readsical writings of Berkeley than is per- ers with even an outline of its varihaps necessary, considering how much ous and interesting contents. The he had already written (in his Philo- philosophy of Condillac, or, to speak sophical Essays and Philosophy of more precisely, Condillac's exposithe Human Mind) on that subject. tion of the philosophy of Locke, In this Dissertation the reader will is flimsy, superficial, and piquant, meet with many very ingenious ob- and was dextrously calculated for servations on the "New Theory of a people among whom, says Madame Vision;" a book which forms a re- de Stael," nobody reads a book markable era in the history of the except to talk of it." From this progress of Metaphysical inquiry. censure, however, must be exempted all that he has written on the subject of language. He deserves infinite credit, indeed, for the ingenuity and force with which he has established, beyond controversy, the important truth, that we think only through the medium of words. This is a most valuable and original discovery, and gives particular value to those etymological analyses and decompositions of words, as a method of tracing the processes of the mind in the formation and arrangements of its thoughts and ideas, which have been lately pursued, with so much learning and ingenuity, in the Eala IIgavrë, and other works, and to which, from some cause we cannot comprehend, Mr S. cherishes so strong an aversion. Had Condillac done nothing more, he would have been entitled to the lasting gratitude of all those who make the human mind a particular study, Our author has assigned more consequence to the snatchy opinions of Helvetius, than his book "of shreds and patches" entitles him to. It is, however, a fair index of the state of opinions in Paris at the time when it was composed, or rather pieced together, the author having merely set down in his book the opinions sported (if we may say so) in the circle in which he moved, as faithfully as the sayings and eccentricities of Dr Samuel Johnson were recorded and chronicled by the inimitable James Boswell. The correspondence of Grimm, from the talents of the writer, is deserving of more consideration than the wishy-washy thing De l'Esprit: it also throws much light on the state of literary society in the French Capital during a most interesting period, and superadds, to the proofs already known, the testi

Mr S. devotes a section to the "Hartleian School," which we shall very hastily dismiss. Dr Law, bishop of Carlisle, (father of the late Lord Ellenborough), and translator of Archbishop King's book on the Origin of Evil, appended to his translation a Dissertation on the Fundamental Principle of Virtue, by the Rev. Mr Gay, which last appears to have suggested to Hartley the possibility of accounting for all our intellectual pleasures and pains" on the single principle of association of ideas. Much about the same time, Charles Bonnet of Geneva published some similar speculations. Both seemed to have viewed the mind and body, as placed at the opposite ends of a fiddle-string, moistened by some sort of fluid which they called " subtile and elastic æther," by which the connection and mutual understanding and co-operation of mind and body are maintained and carried on. Hence, both of these writers talk of vibrations (ébranlemens), and Hartley has added the diminutive, vibratiuncles. What is there in Hartley's theory beyond physiological nonsense, and a very unwarrantable innovation in propriety of speech? In proof of the former, we need only mention that he imagines the thinking principle to be nothing else than some vibrations in the medullary; and, with regard to the latter, he first calls all "our intellectual pleasures and pains" ideas, and then he gravely adds, that the mental phenomena are all subjected to one law, namely, Association of Ideas. These physiological theories are really unworthy of serious exa

mination.

The title of our author's next section is "Condillac, and the French

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