CHAPTER III.

ON LAW, AS RELATED TO THOUGHT AND OTHER OBJECTS.

THE following passage from Archbishop Whately's Logic may serve as an appropriate introduction to this part of our subject. "What may be

called a mathematical impossibility, is that which involves an absurdity and self-contradiction; e. g. that two straight lines should inclose a space, is not only impossible but inconceivable, as it would be at variance with the definition of a straight line. And it should be observed, that inability to accomplish any thing which is, in this sense, impossible, implies no limitation of power, and is compatible, even with omnipotence, in the fullest sense of the word. If it be proposed, e. g. to construct a triangle having one of its sides equal to the other two, or to find two numbers having the same ratio to each other as the side of a square and its diameter, it is not from a defect of power that we are precluded from solving such a problem as these; since in fact the problem is in itself unmeaning and absurd: it is, in reality, nothing, that is required to be done"."

a

Whately's Logic, p. 353. (Sixth Edition.)

Substantially, perhaps, this is not far from the truth. But it may be stated in a more satisfactory form, by divesting it of a hypothesis, which, even if true, (and this we have no means of ascertaining,) may for the present purpose be dispensed with ".

When any thing is said to be inconceivable, it is thereby acknowledged that the human mind is not altogether unrestricted in its operations. It is bounded, not only as regards the sphere of objects of which it is permitted to take cognisance, but also as regards the manner in which it is capable of thinking about objects within that sphere. In other words, there are laws under which the mind is compelled to think, and which it cannot transgress, otherwise than negatively, by ceasing to think at all.

The existence, then, of laws of thought, is a fact of which our every-day consciousness assures us. Necessity, of whatsoever kind, implies a necessary agent, that is, an agent acting under a law. If, then, any question can be proposed to the mind of man, which he feels himself compelled to decide in one way only, that compulsion is at once an

b

In venturing to criticise this note, one of the most valuable portions of the Archbishop's work, I beg to state, that it is to the wording only of the first part that my remarks are intended to apply. With the just and philosophical distinction laid down in the same place between the three senses of the word impossibility, I have only to express full concurrence.

evidence of the existence of laws which as a thinker he is compelled to obey.

And this admission is all that is required for the solution of such difficulties as that suggested above. If our whole thinking is subject to certain laws, it follows that we cannot think of any object, not even of Omnipotence itself, except as those laws compel us. The limitation does not lie in the object of which we think, but in the thinking subject. "Whatsoever we imagine," says Hobbes, "is finite. Therefore there is no idea or conception of any thing we call infinite. No man can have in his mind an image of infinite magnitude; nor conceive infinite swiftness, infinite time, or infinite force, or infinite power. When we say any thing is infinite, we signify only, that we are not able to conceive the ends and bounds of the things named; having no conception of the thing, but of our own inability"."

It may be, indeed, that the conditions of possible thought correspond to conditions of possible being, that what is to us inconceivable is in itself non

Leviathan, i. 3. (p. 17. ed. Molesworth.) This opinion of Hobbes has been severely censured by Cudworth, Intellectual System, B. I. ch. v. sect. 1. who however mistakes the meaning of the assertion, both in what it expresses and in what it implies. The error of Cudworth in this respect has been corrected by his learned translator Mosheim, who, though no friend to Hobbes's views in general, admits that in this particular his doctrine is not liable to the objections urged against it. See Harrison's edition of Cudworth, vol. ii. p. 522.

existent d. But of this, from the nature of the case, it is impossible to have any evidence. If man as a thinker is subject to necessary laws, he cannot examine the absolute validity of the laws themselves, except by assuming the whole question at issue. For such examination must itself be conducted in subordination to the same conditions. Whatever weakness, therefore, there may be in the object of criticism, the same must necessarily affect the critical process itself.

We may indeed believe, and ought to believe, that the powers which our Creator has bestowed upon us are not given as the instruments of deception. We may believe, and ought to believe, that, intellectually no less than morally, the present life is a state of discipline and preparation for another; and that the portion of knowledge which our limited faculties are permitted to attain to here may indeed, in the eyes of a higher Intelligence, be but partial truth, but cannot be absolute falsehood. But in believing thus, we desert the evidence of Reason to rest on that of Faith, and of the principles on which Reason itself depends it is obviously impossible to have any other guarantee.

In itself, distinguished from, as an object of thought. As the latter, it is of course impossible. The distinction between things per se, and things as objects of thought, will be familiar to every reader of Kant: it is, in fact, the cardinal point of the whole Critical Philosophy.

G

But such a faith, however well founded, has but a regulative and practical, not a speculative application. It bids us rest content within the limits which have been assigned to us: it cannot enable us to overleap them, or to exalt to a more absolute character the conclusions obtained by finite thinkers concerning finite objects of thought. For the same condition which disqualifies us from criticising the laws of thought must also deprive us of the power of ascertaining how much of the results of those laws is true in itself, and how much is relative and dependent upon the particular bodily or mental constitution of man during the present life. To determine this question, it would be necessary to examine the same conclusions with a new set of faculties and under new conditions of thought, so as to separate what is merely relative to the existing state of human

e When Kant (Kritik der r. V. p. 49.) declares that the objects of our intuition are not in themselves as they appear to us, he falls into the opposite extreme to that which he is combating: the Critic becomes a Dogmatist in negation. To warrant this conclusion, we must previously have compared things as they are with things as they seem; a comparison which is, ex hypothesi, impossible. We can only say, that we have no means of determining whether they agree or not. And, in the absence of proof on either side, the presumption is in favour of what is at least subjectively true. The onus probandi lies with the assailant, not with the defender, of our faculties. Cf. Royer-Collard, Jouffroy's Reid, vol. iv. p. 412.

See Reid, Intell. Powers, Essay vi. ch. 5. (p. 447. ed. Hamilton.)