further to undermine the argument from our moral nature. This process has actually taken place in Germany, and we have no desire to see it repeated among metaphysical youths in this country. It is on this account, mainly, that we have been so anxious to point out the gross defects in the account given by Hamilton of our necessary convictions. The question is started at the close of our survey, are we to have for ever nothing but a succession of schools in mental science, Hutcheson superseded by Reid, and Reid by Brown, and Brown by Hamilton, and Hamilton superseded, as the author of it would wish, by a new and Ideal school, and in this view is Hamilton to be as much disparaged in the next age as Brown is in this? We reply that Reid and Stewart are not superseded, that they stand as high as they ever did that Brown so far as he has really added to psychology is not superseded, and that Hamilton, inasmuch as he has given us admirable summaries of philosophic systems, and masterly classifications of mental phenomena, will go down through ages, with the brightest names in philosophy. All that is solid and permanent in mental science has been reached, in fact, by observation and induction. We must here, however, draw a distinction which has often been lost sight of. When we say that observation is needful in order to construct metaphysical science, we do not mean to say that there are no principles in the mind except these derived from observation and experience. Observation shows that there are principles in the mind, native and necessary, and regulating experience. But these principles acting in the mind as regulative principles are not before the consciousness as principles; all that is before the consciousness are the individual acts and exercises. The law of Causation is not written on the surface of the mind to be discovered by consciousness any more than the law of gravitation is written on the sky to be read by the senses. All that is before the senses, in the latter case, is an individual fact, say an apple falling to the ground, and the law is to be discovered by a process of generalization; and all that is before consciousness, in the former, is a particular mental conviction-the principle of which can be detected only by classification. And so it may be quite true that there are à priori principles in the mind, and yet a process of careful à posteriori induction may be absolutely requisite in order to discover their nature and their rule, and to entitle us to employ them in philosophic speculation. In regard to systems which are not built upon inductive psychological proof they are to us all alike; they differ only in respect of the peculiar intellectual character and tendencies of those who have constructed them. The man of genius, like Schelling, Evils Arising from Transcendental Speculation. 433 will form a theory, distinguished for its ingenuity or beauty; the man of vigorous intellect, like Hegel, will erect what looks like a very coherent fabric; but until they can be shown to be founded on the inherent principles of the mind by a rigid induction, we wrap ourselves up in doubt, and refuse to give our consent.1 And we cleave to this principle because of its wisdom, knowing all the while that there are fervent youths (abetted by conceited older men) who, as believing that the next turn in the high à priori road which they are pursuing, is to open on the ocean of absolute truth, will feel as if it were turning them back, when the long looked for object were about to burst gloriously on their view. Nor are we to be seduced into an admiration of these imposing systems, by the plea often urged in their behalf, that they furnish a gymnasium for the exercise of the intellect. We acknowledge that one of the very highest advantages of study of every description is to be found in the vigour imparted to the mind which pursues it. But, whatever may have been the state of things in the days of the schoolmen, it is not necessary now to resort to fruitless à priori speculation, in order to find an arena in which to exercise the intellect. Nay, we are convinced that when the research conducts to no solid results, it will weary the mind without strengthening it; the effort will be like that of one who beateth the air; and activity will always be followed by exhaustion, by dissatisfaction, and an unwillingness to make further exertion. Labour it is true, is its own reward; but if there be no other reward there will be the want of the proper incentive, the vigour imparted is only one of the incidental effects which follow when labour is undertaken in the hope of 1 Professor Ferrier has endeavoured to introduce into this country an ideal system, which may attain the same notoriety as those of Schelling and Hegel in Germany, but in this he will fail. For, in addition to British good sense, he has the transparency of his own style against him. No man can confute Hegel, for no man is sure that he understands him, and to any professed refutation it will always be competent to reply that he has been misunderstood. But Ferrier's style is as clear as it is often fascinating, and the error is very visible. We may remark, however, that onlookers will often be tempted to think that Ferrier is in the right, if he be met by mere logical distinctions. A few stones from a sling will be felt to be far more annoying to this most dexterous of small swordsmen, than a more formidable weapon. He has given us a pretended demonstration without axioms or definitions. He is no sceptic, and has propositions which he assumes. On what ground we ask him? When he specifies the ground, we show on the same ground, that when we look on a stone, we know the stone to be an object separate from, and independent of the object. He says (Scot. Phil. pp. 19, 20), that "no man in his senses would require a proof that it (that is real existence) is." We are glad of this appeal to man's "senses", but we insist that these same "senses" tell us that the stone has an existence independent of the contemplative mind. This cannot be disproved by any pretended demonstration, for the principles assumed in such cannot be more certain than the truth which they would set aside. reaching substantial fruits. Nor is it to be forgotten that these speculations though fruitless of good are not fruitless of evil. In the struggles thus engendered, there are other powers of the mind tried as well as the understanding; there are often sad agonizings of the feelings, of the faith, and indeed, of the whole soul, which feels as if the foundation on which it previously stood had been removed and none other supplied, and as if it had in consequence to sink for ever-or as if it were doomed to move for ever onward without reaching a termination, while all retreat has been cut off behind. In these wrestlings, we fear that many wounds are inflicted, which rankle for long, and often terminate in something worse than the dissolution of the bodily organism, for they end in the loss of faith and of peace, in cases in which they do not issue in immorality, or in scepticism and profanity. These exercises we suspect resemble not so much those of the gymnasium, as those of the ancient gladiatorial shows, in which no doubt there were many brilliant feats performed, but in which also, members were mutilated, and the heart's blood of many a brave man shed. We fear that in not a few cases generous and courageous youth have entered the lists to lose in the contest, all creed, all religious-and in some cases all moral principle, and with these all peace and all stability. Slavery and the Slave States. 435 ART. V.-1. Letters from the Slave States. By JAMES 1857. By WILLIAM CHAMBERS. 1857. Two nations, in the present era of the world's history, are exercising almost a paramount influence on the world's progressBritain and the United States of America. They bear the relationship of sire to son. The one in the full prime of life pursues his habitual avocation, exhibiting no symptoms of decay,the other, having attained to manhood and achieved independence, strides onward in a separate but not altogether dissimilar career. They acknowledge their kindred by terming themselves Anglo-Saxons-a name unknown to the official catalogue of political designations, but one which expresses, in a higher sense than mere political classification, a community of origin, and not the less a community of end, aim, purpose, and destination. Of all races, this Anglo-Saxon race is the most ceaselessly active, the most daring in design, the most indomitable in execution. It is girding the world with its power, from two ends, and carrying into new regions the fruits and labours of civilization more than any, or all other races combined. Geographical considerations have assigned to Britain one course, and to America another course, but the end in view is substantially the same. America, with the same intention as Britain-" to subdue the earth and make it yield its increase"-has obviously a different career from that of Britain, a different destiny over which a different genius presides. Britain departs from a centre, works from a centre, colonizes from a centre, and governs from a centre. Her political action is outward, not less than inward. Her two islands, Britain and Ireland, are all that she has to boast of in the shape of a main land fit to rear a nation. The rest of her home territories are small islands-little dots that stand like children round the father and mother of the family. Seen from the moon by some lunar Herschel or Lord Rosse, Britain would appear to occupy but a small space. The map of the world reveals her territorial insignificance. We see two little spots huddled up into a corner, awkwardly shot off to a side, as it were, yet facing the great sea, on the very verge and lip of the great waste of waters, with nothing outside of them to protect them; not like Greece, or Italy, or Egypt, in a Mediterranean bounded by a surrounding shore to be coasted by timid mariners, but on the very edge and verge of the great ocean, looking out westward to the expanse. If she launch at all, she must launch with the fearless heart that is ready to brave old ocean-to take him with his gigantic western waves-to face his winds and hurricanes his summer heats of the dead still tropics-his winter blasts his fairy icebergs-his fogs like palpable darkness-his hail blasts and his snow. Britain has done so. From her island home she has sailed east and west, north and south. She has gone outwardly and planted empires. The States themselves, now her compeer, were an offshoot from her island territory. Her destiny is to plant out nations, and the spirit of colonization is the genius that presides over her career. She plants out Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and the Cape. Ceylon and the Mauritius she occupies for trade. India she covers with a net-work of law framed and woven in her AngloSaxon loom. She clutches China, and begins at least to break up the celestial solecism. She lays hold of Borneo, and straightway piratical prahus are seen wrecked and stranded on the shore, or blown to fragments in the air. She raises an impregnable fortress at the entrance of the Mediterranean, and another in its centre, as security to her sea-borne trade. She does the same in embryo at the entrance to the Red Sea. Westward from Newfoundland she traverses a continent, and there, in the Pacific, Vancouver's Island-which may one day become the new Great Britain of new Anglo-Saxon enterprise, destined to carry civilization to the innumerable islands of the great seabears the Union Jack for its island banner, and acknowledges the sovereignty of the British crown. At Singapore she has provisionally made herself mistress of the straits of Malacca, and thousands of miles away on the other hand at the Falkland Islands, near to the Land of Fire, the British mariner may hear the voice of praise issuing in the Anglo-Saxon tongue. In addition to this, she has representatives at every court, and consuls at every sea-port. Her cruisers bear her flag on every navigable sea. Europeans, Asiatics, Africans, Americans, and Australians are found wearing her uniform, eating her bread, bearing her arms, and contributing to extend her dominion. All this may be construed into ambition. We shall not stay to argue that point, but content ourselves with believing that, one service which Britain renders to the world would go far to justify the introduction of her policeman's baton among the tribes of the earth who otherwise would be a prey to lawless force. Britain keeps the police of the ocean. Without the British flag and the British cannon, piracy would make navigation too dangerous to be pursued as an art of peace, and that fact is occasionally overlooked when foreigners charge Britain with ambition. Perhaps, also, there is a deeper and a better truth than the im |