Imágenes de páginas
PDF
EPUB

numerically different from itself. An immediate cognition, inasmuch as the thing known is itself presented to observation, may be called a presentative; and inasmuch as the thing presented, is, as it were, viewed by the mind face to face, may be called an intuitive, cognition. A mediate cognition, inasmuch as the thing known is held up or mirrored to the mind in a vicarious representation, may be called a representative cognition. (Reid's Works, p. 805.) To be known immediately, an object must be known in itself. (Disc. p. 50.) Mind and Matter are both equally known to us as existent and in themselves. (Disc. p. 52.) Knowledge of mind and matter equally immediate. (Disc.p.54.) Consciousness declares our knowledge of material qualities to be intuitive-this the natural conviction of mankind. (Disc. p. 55.) Knowledge and existence are then only convertible when the reality is known in itself; for then only can we say, that it is known because it exists, and exists since it is known. And this constitutes an immediate, presentative, or intuitive cognition, rigorously so called. (Disc. p. 58.) The external reality itself constitutes the immediate and only object of perception. The very things which we perceive by our senses do really exist. (Disc. p. 59.) The object known convertible with the reality existing. (Disc. p. 93-4.) Immediate knowledge of external objects. . . if we hold the doctrine of immediate perception, the necessity of not limiting consciousness to our subjective states. (Meta. i. 229.) Consciousness, a knowledge of the object of perception, meaning by that object the unknown reality itself. (Meta. i. 231.) The material reality is the object immediately known in perception. (Meta. i. 279.) Those things we immediately perceive are the real things. (Meta. i. 289.) In perception we immediately know the external reality in its own qualities, as existing... knowledge and existence convertible . . . the reality is known in itself [bis] ... the external reality itself constitutes the immediate and only object of perception. . . . Intuitive or immediate knowledge is that in which there is only one object, and in which that object is known in itself or as existing. In an immediate

--

[ocr errors]

lies in the general object of that movement's originator. Reid, namely, sought to replace the Mediate and Representative Perception of the Ideal System' -a perception that asserts itself to perceive, not things without, but ideas within-by the Immediate and Presentative Perception of Common Sense, which believes itself to perceive, on the contrary, not ideas within, but things without. And, if this was the object of Reid, it was equally the object—with but few exceptions (Brown, for example) — of his followers, and, among these, of Hamilton in especial. Hence it was that he (Hamilton)—on the authority of 'consciousness' and with appeal to 'common sense'-opposed to the theory of 'representationism,' or 'cosmothetic idealism,' his own creed of presentationism,' or ‘natural realism,' ' natural dualism.' This, indeed, is the information of the very first step in Hamilton -information so impossible to mistake, that it is not easy to describe the shock with which we experience the contradiction of the second. It is with this contradiction, then, that we shall open the present discussion.

[ocr errors]

1. Hamilton both Presentationist and Phenomenalist.

We quote at once as follows:

I hold that Perception is an Immediate or Presentative, not a Mediate or Representative, cognition. (Reid's Works, p. 883.) Perception is the faculty presentative or intuitive of the phenomena of the Non-Ego or Matter. (Reid's Works, p. 809.) In Perception, mind is immediately cognisant of matter. (Reid's Works, p. 755.) A thing is known immediately or proximately, when we cognise it in itself; mediately or remotely, when we cognise it in or through something

numerically different from itself. An immediate cognition, inasmuch as the thing known is itself presented to observation, may be called a presentative; and inasmuch as the thing presented, is, as it were, viewed by the mind face to face, may be called an intuitive, cognition. A mediate cognition, inasmuch as the thing known is held up or mirrored to the mind in a vicarious representation, may be called a representative cognition. (Reid's Works, p.805.) To be known immediately, an object must be known in itself. (Disc. p. 50.) Mind and Matter are both equally known to us as existent and in themselves. (Disc. p. 52.) Knowledge of mind and matter equally immediate. (Disc.p.54.) Consciousness declares our knowledge of material qualities to be intuitive-this the natural conviction of mankind. (Disc. p. 55.) Knowledge and existence are then only convertible when the reality is known in itself; for then only can we say, that it is known because it exists, and exists since it is known. And this constitutes an immediate, presentative, or intuitive cognition, rigorously so called. (Disc. p. 58.) The external reality itself constitutes the immediate and only object of perception. The very things which we perceive by our senses do really exist. (Disc. p. 59.) The object known convertible with the reality existing. (Disc. p. 93-4.) Immediate knowledge of external objects ... if we hold the doctrine of immediate perception, the necessity of not limiting consciousness to our subjective states. (Meta. i. 229.) Consciousness, a knowledge of the object of perception, meaning by that object the unknown reality itself. (Meta. i. 231.) The material reality is the object immediately known in perception. (Meta. i. 279.) Those things we immediately perceive are the real things. (Meta. i. 289.) In perception we immediately know the external reality in its own qualities, as existing... knowledge and existence convertible . . . the reality is known in itself [bis] ... the external reality itself constitutes the immediate and only object of perception. . . . Intuitive or immediate knowledge is that in which there is only one object, and in which that object is known in itself or as existing. In an immediate

...

cognition, the object in consciousness and the object in existence are the same; the esse intentionale or representativum coincides with the esse entitativum, the two objects both in representative knowledge. (Meta. ii. 80, 81, 82, 87, 88, 69.) The Hypothetical Realist [otherwise called also the Representationist' or the 'Cosmothetic Idealist'] contends that he is wholly ignorant of things in themselves, and that these are known to him, only through a vicarious phenomenon, of which he is conscious in perception;

6

'Rerumque ignarus, imagine gaudet.' (Disc. p. 57.)

*

The last of these extracts adds the light of the antithesis to that of the thesis so abundantly present in the rest; and only two points, perhaps, give a moment's pause. Firstly, the quotation from page 755 of Reid's Works asserts an immediate cognition of matter, while that from page 809 substitutes for matter the phenomena of the same; and in this way the two contradictories of noumenal and phenomenal knowledge would seem to be identified. Secondly, the quotation, Meta. i. 231, talks of the object of cognition as the unknown reality itself, and thus, so far as the words go, seems on the part of a presentationist-to whom, necessarily, the reality itself is not unknown-a contradiction in terms. Neither difficulty, however, is of any moment as it stands. The term phenomena is used, not always as in relation to cognition, and so, therefore, as opposed to noumena, but frequently also just as event in general; while the phrase the unknown reality itself is too plainly a mere allusion to a common parlance of the opposite school, to cause a moment's hesitation. These extracts, then,

* In the above, the italics are Hamilton's own.

will, without difficulty, be received as definitively demonstrative of that appeal to consciousness and common sense,—of that presentationism, realism, dualism, —of that acceptance of the position of Reid generally, -which we have already attributed to Hamilton. Two opinions on the matter, indeed, cannot well be conceived possible: this is Hamilton's overt and publicly known position. Nevertheless, we have now to see, as already hinted, that if, in the extracts above, Hamilton has asserted presentationism and appealed to common sense, he has, in these others below, asserted phenomenalism and appealed to the philosophers,— and this, too, as it would seem, with equal conviction, equal decision:

Whatever we know is not known as it is, but only as it seems to us to be. (Meta. i. 146.) Mind and matter exist to us only in their qualities: and these qualities exist to us only as they are known by us, i. e. as phenomena. (Disc. p. 61.) The universe and its contents,-these are known to us, not as they exist, but as our mind is capable of knowing them. (Meta. i. 61.) Existence is not cognisable absolutely and in itself, but only in special modes; because these modes can be known only if they stand in a certain relation to our faculties; and because the modes, thus relative to our faculties, are presented to, and known by, the mind only under modifications determined by these faculties themselves. (Meta. i. 148.) Although, therefore, existence be only revealed to us in phenomena, and though we can, therefore, have only a relative knowledge either of mind or of matter; still by inference and analogy we may legitimately attempt to rise above the mere appearances which experience and observation afford. (Meta. i. 125.) [At page 143 of this volume, he avails himself, in his own support, of the same passages from the Micromégas of Voltaire

« AnteriorContinuar »