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when he proceeded, instead, to open inquiry into these beliefs-then, in an instant, the vulgar had fled, and there was only philosophy again-philosophy at all its old cobwebs-cheerful, hopeful, busy as ever.

With Hamilton, too, we can bring the matter to the same short issue. When perception, namely, withdrew from the world without, and transported itself to the nerves within, common sense refused to follow, and Hamilton found himself cut off from it by a chasm as wide and deep as that that, to Reid, separated the 'philosophers' from the 'vulgar.'

But we are not confined to what is indirect here. Hamilton, the very loudest for the sufficiency of common sense, is equally the loudest for its insufficiency also. He says (Reid's Works, p. 752):

In this country in particular, some of those who opposed it [common sense] to the sceptical conclusions of Hume, did not sufficiently counteract the notion which the name might naturally suggest; they did not emphatically proclaim that it was no appeal to the undeveloped beliefs of the unreflective many; and they did not inculcate that it presupposed a critical analysis of these beliefs by the philosophers themselves.

He goes on, indeed, to assert that their language sometimes warranted an opposite conclusion; and he names Beattie, Oswald, and even Reid, as examples.

Now, this is surely very simple, but, at the same time, very equivocal, procedure. Reid says that common sense and philosophy are directly opposed; and he would destroy the latter under the feet of the former. I quite agree with him, says Hamilton; I

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cry common sense too, but I practise philosophy all the same. That is, I take the name common senseit is a good name; then 'I counteract the notion which it might naturally suggest;' after that, 'I emphatically proclaim that it is no appeal to the undeveloped beliefs of the unreflective many;' next, 'I inculcate that it presupposes a critical analysis of these beliefs by the philosophers themselves;' lastly, 'I, as a "philosopher," still with the name and all the advantages of the position claimed, set on my "critical analysis," and tell my findings.' There are other inferences here; but we, for our parts, ask only, In what respect this position differs from that of 'the ideal system,' from that of Descartes, Malebranche, Locke, Berkeley, and Hume,' to combat and confute which were the reason and the necessity of any resort to common sense at all?

In Hamilton's hands, in fact, common sense shows no difference whatever from philosophy, and the conclusion of the whole matter just is, that we are all to reason to the best of our ability, reason itself being sure to pull us up when wrong. Reason, in fact, has no standard but reason; and, with whatever disinclination, no one can refuse to keep his seat, so long as it is reason that drives. The sentence from Hamilton, in truth, is nothing else than the restoration to the judge reason of the chair into which the drudge common sense had been for an instant thrust. Nevertheless, this is a deliberate act of Hamilton, and he will be found (Reid's Works, p. 816) expressly dividing common sense into a 'philosophical form,'

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and a 'vulgar form'-quite unaware, apparently, that, thereby, he has taken the standard on himself, or that he has transferred that standard to philosophy, or that he has vitiated and undermined the standard, or that he has demonstrated it to be a standard incompetent to him.

But the term, common sense, is as yet quite general, and the position abstract; what are the particular principles by which Hamilton would introduce into the latter a concrete filling? These principles-at least, to take the profession of Hamilton—are understood in a word when we describe them as what are known to philosophy as our stock of primary truths. True, it is very difficult to make out what these truths are, if we trust to Hamilton; but not the less does he make words enough about them. The characteristic signs by which he would have us recognise them, he tells us, for instance, may (Reid's Works, p. 754) 'be reduced to four;-1°, their Incomprehensibility-2°, their Simplicity-3°, their Necessity and absolute Universality-4°, their comparative Evidence and Certainty.' Now, suppose we draw attention here to sign the third first. Well, these two terms, necessary and universal, have, by Kant, been included together in the single word apodictic (written by purists apodeictic); and they concern one of the most important and fertile distinctions in later philosophy.

Hume busied himself much with what has proved, not only the fundamen of German philosophy, but the angle of all philosophy else, probably for some time to come-the distinction, namely, between mat

ters of fact, and relations of ideas. The former are, one and all of them, whatever we have experiencedwhatever we know by experience: and experience, as medium of knowledge, is sense, principally external, but also, as understood by Locke and Kant, internal. The sun shines, stones fall, fire burns, wood floats, &c. &c. &c.; and the truth of all such propositions, or the fact they name, is only known by trial, and trial is but another word for experience. We have actually experienced the event, and—to signalise the shade between the two words-we can, at any time, try it. Of all such propositions, it is seen that they are true; but it is not seen that they are necessarily, or must be, true. That is, no reason is seen why they are true; and, consequently, what is the same thing, their contrary implies no contradiction, and is equally possible. The contraries, for example, the sun does not shine, stones do not fall, fire does not burn, wood does not float, &c. &c. &c., we know by experience, by trial, to be untrue; but they are not contradictions to thought, they are not impossible, they are still conceivable (as really, perhaps, some woods do not burn); and they depend wholly and solely on the state of the case, which is, once for all, found to be so and so and not otherwise. Now truths of this nature—the former class, the matters of fact-are named by Hume (with reference to their validity, or peculiar evidence) contingent, and by Kant (with reference to their source experience, to the after the fact that is in them) à pos

teriori.

The latter class, again, the relations of ideas, are

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widely different; and, in the words of Hume, consist of every affirmation which is either intuitively or demonstratively certain.' Indeed, seeing that whatever is demonstratively certain rests at last on what is intuitively certain, we may withdraw the former as superfluous, and define relations of ideas to be, all affirmations that are intuitively certain. Of this class all the axioms and propositions of mathematics are examples. The whole is greater than its part, for instance: for the proof of this, we do not refer to experience, to trial; we do not say that it just is so, that this is just the fact; we know that it, not only is so, but necessarily is so; we know the reason why it is so; and we know that its contrary (the whole is not greater than its part) implies a contradiction, and is by necessity impossible. This class, then, with reference to their validity are named necessary and universal, or apodictic, truths, and (by Kant), with reference to their independence of sense—of any trial or experience of sense-as source (the before the fact, or the independence of the fact), à priori truths.

There is good reason for believing, we may remark, that Hume, in using the word intuitive, attached to it that evidence, vision, insight-that actual perception and looking-at-which Kant always had before him in the German word for intuition—Anschauung. Indeed, it is pretty certain that their common predecessor, Locke, entertained the same view. Many a one,' he says (Book iv. c. vii. s. 10), 'knows that one and two are equal to three, without having heard or thought on that or any other axiom by which it might be