may err also in the remainder of the sum, be it or be it only ? And, in such a case, may we not say, then, with Hamilton himself and the saying is an argument to which he wholly trusts himself— 'if consciousness be confessed to yield a lying evidence in one particular, it cannot be adduced as a credible witness at all,-falsus in uno, falsus in omnibus?'

may

It be said that these analyses are only supposititious, only illustrative. We willingly grant the former epithet we hardly see the pertinence of the latter. Illustrative! Well, it is illustrative of what we shall have perpetually before us throughout the whole of the present inquest-Hamiltonian contradiction, Hamiltonian futility;—this within, while without, guns, drums, trumpets, gesticulation, and assertion proclaim the advance of an athlete that is to throw a Kant, that is to fling a Hegel. But, grant it to be only an illustration, this illustration, referring to an alleged analysis, must constitute, surely, with the analysis, a legitimate object of discussion. Or if the analysis, indeed, is naught, why the illustration?—or why any talk of it at all?

But let us tear ourselves away from these endless subordinate contradictions, and consider, at last, the question before which we, in effect, stand:-Why has Hamilton, at the same time that he holds all our knowledge to be phenomenal only, unequivocally asserted presentationism as well? This question may be put more fully thus:-What were the reasons which, though unexpressed, were so present to

Hamilton's mind that he perceived no contradiction in, and was never led to offer any apology for, the opposed assertions, now that things in themselves were incomprehensible, incognisable, unknown, zero, and now that they were immediately, intuitively, and face to face, known? Or at shortest:-Why did Hamilton, without sense of contradiction, as it seems, assert at once knowledge and ignorance-of things in themselves?

Now, as already intimated, the answer here is to be found in our last two extracts but one, and we may state it to run (as if Hamilton spoke) thus:-I do perceive the non-ego, and therefore I am a presentationist; but I only perceive it phenomenally, and therefore I am a phenomenalist. Further, first, I know that I do perceive the non-ego, both by the testimony of consciousness and the analysis of philosophy; and, second, I know myself to perceive only phenomenally, Because,' as I say elsewhere, '1°, Existence is not cognisable absolutely and in itself, but only in special modes; 2°, Because these modes can be known only if they stand in a certain relation to our faculties; and, 3o, 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.)

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To take the last point in this answer first, or the modality, relativity, and modifiedness of existence as known-this Hamilton merely asserts. He assumes it to be a fact, an ultimate fact, which, to be admitted, needs only to be understood. He condescends to no rationale: he never dreams of dispute. Relation, mode,

and modification are to him simply self-evident; and he never suspects, in their regard, even the possibility of doubt. This, then, so far, is very loose: it is but a loose appeal to the consciousness of the reader, or an appeal still looser to some presupposed philosophy. Assertion, then, being certainly always equal to assertion, there is the same right to another to assert the substantial, irrelative, and unmodified cognition of existence that there is to Hamilton to assert the contrary. Such assertion of a substantial, irrelative, and unmodified cognition is not far to seek, indeed-if we but return to Hamilton's own first series!

As for the testimony of consciousness and the analysis of philosophy, they occur to be considered at full elsewhere; and are here, so far, conceded. That is, we accept the contradiction they offer, and only consider it as offered and in itself.

There remains before us now, then, but the single difficulty: How can we possibly understand with Hamilton phenomenal and presentative perception to be one and the same? for, as we know, presentationism is noumenalism. Noumenally to perceive is to perceive a thing in itself, and as it is; phenomenally to perceive is to perceive, on the contrary, a thing as it is in another, and as it seems. These are Hamilton's own definitions of presentationism and representationism. The one, then, is identical with noumenalism and the other with phenomenalism. Of this we are not allowed to doubt; or doubt itself were at once quashed by an instant's reference to Kant. The contradiction of the two, then, which to Hamilton are one, is sheer.

One might be apt to suspect weakness on the part of Hamilton here what we might call, perhaps, the weakness of both sides. One might be apt to picture Hamilton, that is, loudly and ostentatiously to take up his position with the 'vulgar;' but, after a while, wistful and penitent, softly to quit his place, quietly to slip over the way, and insinuatingly to whisper the 'philosophers:' I am a phenomenalist all the same! In all probability, however, the facts of the case are differently situated.

That Hamilton was not without satisfaction in his double position we doubt not at all; for, as we have seen, his inadvertence in its regard had no reference whatever to the fact of this duplicity. Of that fact, rather, he must be held to have possessed a clear and complete consciousness. No; any inadvertence of Hamilton here concerned, probably, only the burthen of the fact -only the contradiction which the peculiar duplicity involved. This we cannot attribute to design-this we must attribute to oversight. And, surely, it is much more natural to believe in the accident of a mistake than in the possibility of Hamilton—with his eyes open-asserting himself to perceive a phenomenon that was also a noumenon. Noumenalism (the 'vulgar') with a rider of phenomenalism (the 'philosophers'),this, indeed, were a device too weak to be imputed to such an intellect. Presentationism, on such an assumption as this, were, to a consciousness fully awake, no longer presentationism at all, nor representationism any longer representationism. Should the external reality be conceived, indeed, to be pre

sented but in a phenomenon, then it were not presented, it were represented. But of this more fully again.

Mistake or no mistake, however, Hamilton's answer is really what the penultimate period above implies: to him the external reality is presented in a phenomeHowever phenomenally wrapt up, the non-ego is actually presented to the ego. Presentation of a phenomenon is Hamilton's conviction: what dominates him is, that the non-ego is actually there.

non.

But is, then, the representationist, even in this respect, and in his answer generally-so very different? To Kant, for example,—in whom representationism certainly culminated—not only was the non-ego present, but the element of a non-ego was absolutely indispensable.*

For proof here, we point, firstly, to the Kritik of Judgment and that harmony of faculties which gives rise to the cognition and emotion of Beauty; and, secondly, to the Kritik of Pure Reason where the element of a non-ego is held to declare itself on occasion of every sensational state whatever.

Kant certainly holds that, though the fact of beauty indicate an adaptation of outer to inner, or of non-ego to ego, and though the fact of sensation indicate the actuality of this outer, of this non-ego, what we know is still really our own state. The non-ego is indispensable antecedent and necessary stimulus or exciting cause, but then it is not this antecedent, this

* I hold the second edition of the Kritik of Pure Reason to supersede the first.