On the Philosophy of Discovery, Chapters Historical and Critical

The actual and the ideal, the external and the internal elements of knowledge, were called by the Germans the objective and the subjective elements respectively. The forms of knowledge and especially space and time, were pronounced by Kant to be essentially subjective; and this view of the nature of knowledge, more fully unfolded and extended to all knowledge, became the subjective ideality of Fichte. But the subjective and the objective are, as we have said, in their ultimate and supreme form, one; and hence we are told of the subjective-objective, a phrase which has also been employed by Mr. Coleridge. Fichte had spoken of the subjective element as the Me, (das Ich); and of the objective element as the Not-me, (das Nicht-Ich); and has deduced the Not-me from the Me. Schelling, on the contrary, laboured with great subtlety to deduce the Me from the Absolute which includes both. And this Absolute, or Subjective-objective, is spoken of by Schelling as unfolding itself into endless other antitheses. It was held that from the assumption of such a principle might be deduced and explained the oppositions which, in the contemplation of nature, present themselves at every step, as leading points of general philosophy:—for example, the opposition of matter as passive and active, as dead and organized, as unconscious or conscious; the opposition of individual and species, of will and moral rule. And this antithetical development was carried further by Hegel, who taught that the Absolute Idea developes itself so as to assume qualities, limitations, and seeming oppositions, and then completes the cycle of its development by returning into unity.

12. That there is, in the history of Science, much which easily lends itself to such a formula, the views which I have endeavoured to expound, show and exemplify in detail. But yet the attempts to carry this view into detail by conjecture—by a sort of divination—with little or no attention to the historical progress and actual condition of knowledge, (and such are those which have been made by the philosophers whom I have mentioned,) have led to arbitrary and baseless views of almost every branch of knowledge. Such oppositions and differences as are found to exist in nature, are assumed as the representatives of the elements of necessary antitheses, in a manner in which scientific truth and inductive reasoning are altogether slighted. Thus, this peculiar and necessary antithetical character is assumed to be displayed in attraction and repulsion, in centripetal and centrifugal forces, in a supposed positive and negative electricity, in a supposed positive and negative magnetism; in still more doubtful positive and negative elements of light and heat; in the different elements of the atmosphere, which are, quite groundlessly, assumed to have a peculiar antithetical character: in animal and vegetable life: in the two sexes; in gravity and light. These and many others, are given by Schelling, as instances of the radical opposition of forces and elements which necessarily pervades all nature. I conceive that the heterogeneous and erroneous principles involved in these views of the material world show us how unsafe and misleading is the philosophical assumption on which they rest. And the Triads of Hegel, consisting of Thesis, Antithesis, and Union, are still more at variance with all sound science. Thus we are told that matter and motion are determined as inertia, impulsion, fall; that Absolute Mechanics determines itself as centripetal force, centrifugal force, universal gravitation. Light, it is taught, is a secondary determination of matter. Light is the most intimate element of nature, and might be called the Me of nature: it is limited by what we may call negative light, which is darkness.

13. In these rash and blind attempts to construct physical science à priori, we may see how imperfect the Hegelian doctrines are as a complete philosophy. In the views of moral and political subjects the results of such a scheme are naturally less obviously absurd, and may often be for a moment striking and attractive, as is usually the case with attempts to reduce history to a formula. Thus we are told that the State appears under the following determinations:—first as one, substantial, self-included: next, varied, individual, active, disengaging itself from the substantial and motionless unity: next, as two principles, altogether distinct, and placed front to front in a marked and active opposition: then, arising out of the ruins of the preceding, the idea appears afresh, one, identical, harmonious. And the East, Greece, Rome, Germany, are declared to be the historical forms of these successive determinations. Whatever amount of real historical colour there may be for this representation, it will hardly, I think, be accepted as evidence of a profound political philosophy; but on such parts of the subject I shall not here dwell.

14. I may observe that in the series of philosophical systems now described, the two elements of the Fundamental Antithesis are alternately dwelt upon in an exaggerated degree, and then confounded. The Sensational School could see in human knowledge nothing but facts: Kant and Fichte fixed their attention almost entirely upon ideas: Schelling and Hegel assume the identity of the two, (a point we never can reach,) as the origin of their philosophy. The external world in Locke's school was all in all. In the speculations of Kant this external world became a dim and unknown region. Things were acknowledged to be something in themselves, but what, the philosopher could not tell. Besides the phænomenon which we see, Kant acknowledged a noumenon which we think of; but this assumption, for such it is, exercises no influence upon his philosophy.

15. We may for the sake of illustration imagine to ourselves each system of philosophy as a Drama in which Things are the Dramatis Personæ and the Idea which governs the system is the Plot of the drama. In Kant's Drama, Things in themselves are merely a kind of 'Mute Personages,' κωφὰ πρόσωπα, which stand on the stage to be pointed at and talked about, but which do not tell us anything, or enter into the action of the piece. Fichte carries this further, and if we go on with the same illustration, we may say that he makes the whole drama into a kind of Monologue; in which the author tells the story, and merely names the persons who appear. If we would still carry on the image, we may say that Schelling, going upon the principle that the whole of the drama is merely a progress to the Denouement, which denouement contains the result of all the preceding scenes and events, starts with the last scene of the piece; and bringing all the characters on the stage in their final attitudes, would elicit the story from this. While the true mode of proceeding is, to follow the drama Scene by Scene, learning as much as we can of the Action and the Characters, but knowing that we shall not be allowed to see the Denouement, and that to do so is probably not the lot of our species on earth. So far as any philosopher has thus followed the historical progress of the grand spectacle offered to the eyes of speculative man, in which the Phenomena of Nature are the Scenes, and the Theory of them the Plot, he has taken the course by which knowledge really has made its advances. But those who have partially done this, have often, like Hegel, assumed that they had divined the whole course and end of the story, and have thus criticised the scenes and the characters in a spirit quite at variance with that by which any real insight into the import of the representation can be obtained.

If it be asked which position we can assign, in this dramatic illustration, to those who hold that all our knowledge is derived from facts only, and who reject the supposition of ideas; we may say that they look on with a belief that the drama has no plot, and that these scenes are improvised without connexion or purpose.

16. I will only offer one more illustration of the relative position of these successive philosophies. Kant compares the change which he introduced into philosophy to the change which Copernicus introduced into astronomical theory. When Copernicus found that nothing could be made of the phenomena of the heavens so long as everything was made to turn round the spectator, he tried whether the matter might not be better explained if he made the spectator turn, and left the stars at rest. So Kant conceives that our experience is regulated by our own faculties, as the phenomena of the heavens are regulated by our own motions. But accepting and carrying out this illustration, we may say that Kant, in explaining the phenomena of the heavens by means of the motions of the earth, has almost forgotten that the planets have their own proper motions, and has given us a system which hardly explains anything besides broadest appearances, such as the annual and daily motions of the sun; and that Fichte appears as if he wished to deduce all the motions of the planets, as well as of the sun, from the conditions of the spectator;—while Schelling goes to the origin of the system, like Descartes, and is not content to show how the bodies move, without also proving that from some assumed original condition, all the movements and relations of the system must necessarily be what they are. It may be that a theory which explains how the planets, with their orbits and accompaniments, have come into being, may offer itself to bold speculators, like those who have framed and produced the nebular hypothesis. But I need not remind my readers either how precarious such a hypothesis is; or, that if it be capable of being considered probable, its proofs must gradually dawn upon us, step by step, age after age: and that a system of doctrine which assumes such a scheme as a certain and fundamental truth, and deduces the whole of astronomy from it, must needs be arbitrary, and liable to the gravest error at every step. Such a precarious and premature philosophy, at best, is that of Schelling and Hegel; especially as applied to those sciences in which, by the past progress of all sure knowledge, we are taught what the real cause and progress of knowledge is: while at the same time we may allow that all these forms of philosophy, since they do recognize the condition and motion of the spectator, as a necessary element in the explanation of the phenomena, are a large advance upon the Ptolemaic scheme—the view of those who appeal to phenomena alone as the source of our knowledge, and say that the sun, the moon, and the planets move as we see them move, and that all further theory is imaginary and fantastical.

CHAPTER XXV.

The Fundamental Antithesis as it exists in the Moral World

1. WE HAVE hitherto spoken of the Fundamental Antithesis as the ground of our speculations concerning the material world, at least mainly. We have indeed been led by the physical sciences, and especially by Biology, to the borders of Psychology. We have had to consider not only the mechanical effects of muscular contraction, but the sensations which the nerves receive and convey:—the way in which sensations become perceptions; the way in which perceptions determine actions. In this manner we have been led to the subject of volition or will297, and this brings us to a new field of speculation, the moral nature of man; and this moral nature is a matter not only of speculative but of practical interest. On this subject I shall make only a few brief remarks.

2. Even in the most purely speculative view, the moral aspect of man's nature differs from the aspect of the material universe, in this respect, that in the moral world, external events are governed in some measure by the human will. When we speculate concerning the laws of material nature, we suppose that the phenomena of nature follow a course and order which we may perhaps, in some measure, discover and understand, but which we cannot change or control. But when we consider man as an agent, we suppose him able to determine some at least of the events of the external world; and thus, able to determine the actions of other men, and to lay down laws for them. He cannot alter the properties of fire and metals, stones and fluids, air and light; but he can use fire and steel so as to compel other men's actions; stone-walls and ocean-shores so as to control other men's motions; gold and gems so as to have a hold on other men's desires; articulate sounds and intelligible symbols so as to direct other men's thoughts and move their will. There is an external world of Facts; and in this, the Facts are such as he makes them by his Acts.

3. But besides this, there is also, standing over against this external world of Facts, an internal world of Ideas. The Moral Acts without are the results of Moral Ideas within. Men have an Idea of Justice, for instance, according to which they are led to external acts, as to use force, to make a promise, to perform a contract, as individuals; or to make war and peace, to enact laws and to execute them, as a nation.

4. Some such internal moral Idea necessarily exists, along with all properly human actions. Man feels not only pain and anger, but indignation and the sentiment of wrong, which feelings imply a moral idea of right and wrong. Again, what he thinks of as wrong, he tries to prevent; what he deems right, he attempts to realize. The Idea gives a character to the Act; the Act embodies the Idea. In the moral world as in the natural world, the Antithesis is universal and inseparable. It is an Antithesis of inseparable elements. In human action, there is ever involved the Idea of what is right, and the external Act in which this idea is in some measure embodied.

5. But the moral Ideas, such as that of Justice, of Rightness, and the like, are always embodied incompletely in the world of external action. Although men's actions are to a great extent governed by the Ideas of Justice, Rightness and the like; (for it must be recollected that we include in their actions, laws, and the enforcement of laws;) yet there is a large portion of human actions which is not governed by such ideas: (actions which result from mere desire, and violations of law). There is a perpetual Antithesis of Ideas and Facts, which is the fundamental basis of moral as of natural philosophy. In the former as in the latter subject, besides what is ideal, there is an Actual which the ideal does not include. This Actual is the region in which the results of mere desire, of caprice, of apparent accident, are found. It is the region of history, as opposed to justice; it is the region of what is, as distinct from what ought to be.

6. Now what I especially wish here to remark, is this;—that the progress of man as a moral being consists in a constant extension of the Idea into the region of Facts. This progress consists in making human actions conform more and more to the moral Ideas of Justice, Rightness, and the like; including in human actions, as we have said, Laws, the enforcement of Laws, and other collective acts of bodies of men. The History of Man as Man consists in this extension of moral Ideas into the region of Facts. It is not that the actual history of what men do has always consisted in such an extension of moral Ideas; for there has ever been, in the actual doings of men, a large portion of facts which had no moral character; acts of desire, deeds of violence, transgressions of acknowledged law, and the like. But such events are not a part of the genuine progress of humanity. They do not belong to the history of man as man, but to the history of man as brute. On the other hand, there are events which belong to the history of man as man, events which belong to the genuine progress of humanity; such as the establishment of just laws; their enforcement; their improvement by introducing into them a fuller measure of moral Ideas. By such means there is a constant progress of man as a moral being. By this realization of moral Ideas there is a constant progress of Humanity.

7. I have made this reflection, because it appears to me to bring into view an analogy between the Progress of Science and the Progress of Man, or of Humanity, in the sense in which I have used the term. In both these lines of Progress, Facts are more and more identified with Ideas. In both, there is a fundamental Antithesis of Ideas and Facts, and progress consists in a constant advance of the point which separates the two elements of this Antithesis. In both, Facts are constantly won over to the domain of Ideas. But still, there is a difference in the two cases; for in the one case the Facts are beyond our control. We cannot make them other than they are; and all that we can do, if we can do that, is to shape our Ideas so that they shall coincide with the Facts, and still have the manifest connexion which belongs to them as Ideas. In the other case, the Facts are, to a certain extent, in our power. They are what we make them, for they are what we do. In this case, the Facts ought to come towards the Ideas, rather than the Ideas towards the Facts. As we called the former process the Idealization of Facts, we may call this the Realization of Ideas; and the analogy which I have here wished to bring into view may be expressed by saying, that the Progress of Physical Science consists in a constant successive Idealization of Physical Facts; and the Progress of man's Moral Being is a constant successive Realization of Moral Ideas.

8. Thus the necessary co-existence of an objective and a subjective element belongs not only to human knowledge, as was before explained, but also to human action. The objective and the subjective element are inseparable in this case as in the other. We have always the Fact of Positive Law, along with the Idea of Absolute Justice; the Facts of Gain or Loss, along with the Idea of Rights. The Idea of Justice is inseparable from historical facts, for justice gives to each his own, and history determines what that is. We cannot even conceive justice without society, or society without law, and thus in the moral and in the natural world the fundamental antithesis is inseparable, even in thought. The two elements must always subsist; for however far the moral ideas be realized in the world, there will always remain much in the world which is not conformable to moral ideas, even if it were only through its necessary dependence on an unmoral and immoral past. As in the physical world so in the moral, however much the ideal sphere expands, it is surrounded by a region which is not conformable to the idea, although in one case the expansion takes place by educing ideas out of facts, in the other, by producing facts from ideas.

I shall hereafter venture to pursue further this train of speculation, but at present I shall make some remarks on writers who may be regarded as the successors amongst ourselves of these German schools of Philosophy.

CHAPTER XXVI.

Of the "Philosophy of the Infinite."

In the last Chapter but one I stated that Schelling propounded a Philosophy of the Absolute, the Absolute being the original basis of truth in which the two opposite elements, Ideas and Facts, are identified, and that Hegel also founded his philosophy on the Identity of these two elements. These German philosophies appear to me, as I have ventured to intimate, of small or no value in their bearing on the history of actual science. I have in the history of the sciences noted instances in which these writers seem to me to misconceive altogether the nature and meaning of the facts of scientific history; as where298 Schelling condemns Newton's Opticks as a fabric of fallacies: and where299 Hegel says that the glory due to Kepler has been unjustly transferred to Newton. As it appears to me important that English philosophers should form a just estimate of Hegel's capacity of judging and pronouncing on this subject, I will print in the Appendix a special discussion of what he has said respecting Newton's discovery of the law of gravitation.

Recently attempts have been made to explain to English readers these systems of German philosophy, and in these attempts there are some points which may deserve our notice as to their bearing on the philosophy of science. I find some difficulty in discussing these attempts, for they deal much with phrases which appear to me to offer no grasp to man's power of reason. What, for instance, is the Absolute, which occupies a prominent place in these expositions? It is, as I have stated, in Schelling, the central basis of truth in which things and thoughts are united and identified. To attempt to reason about such an "Absolute" appears to me to be an entire misapprehension of the power of reason. Again; one of the most eminent of the expositors has spoken of each system of this kind as a Philosophy of the Unconditioned300. But what, we must ask, is the Unconditioned? That which is subject to no conditions, is subject to no conditions which distinguish it from any thing else, and so, cannot be a matter of thought. But again; this Absolute or Unconditioned is (if I rightly understand) said to be described also by various other names; unity, identity, substance, absolute cause, the infinite, pure thought, &c. As each of these terms expresses some condition on which the name fixes our thoughts, I cannot understand why they should any of them be called the Unconditioned; and as they express very different thoughts, I cannot understand why they should be called by the same name. From speculations starting from such a point, I can expect nothing but confusion and perplexity; nor can I find that anything else has come of them. They appear to me more barren, and more certain to be barren, of any results which have any place in our real knowledge, than the most barren speculations of the schoolmen of the middle ages: which indeed they much resemble in all their features—their acuteness, their learning, their ambitious aim, and their actual failure.

2. But leaving the Absolute and the Unconditioned, as notions which cannot be dealt with by our reason without being something entirely different from their definitions, we may turn for a moment to another notion which is combined with them by the expositors of whom I speak, and which has some bearing upon our positive science, because it enters into the reasonings of mathematics: I mean the notion of Infinite. Some of those who hold that we can know nothing concerning the Absolute and the Unconditioned, (which they pretend to prove, though concerning such words I do not conceive that anything can be true or false,) hold also that the Infinite is in the same condition;—that we can know nothing concerning what is Infinite;—therefore, I presume, nothing concerning infinite space, infinite time, infinite number, or infinite degrees.

To disprove this doctrine, it might be sufficient to point out that there is a vast mass of mathematical science which includes the notion of infinites, and leads to a great body of propositions concerning Infinites. The whole of the infinitesimal calculus depends upon conceiving finite magnitudes divided into an infinite number of parts: these parts are infinitely small, and of these parts there are other infinitesimal parts infinitely smaller still, and so on, as far as we please to go. And even those methods which shun the term infinite, as Newton's method of Ultimate Ratios, the method of Indivisibles, and the method of Exhaustions of the ancient geometers, do really involve the notion of infinite; for they imply a process continued without limit.

3. But perhaps it will be more useful to point out the fallacies of the pretended proofs that we can know nothing concerning Infinity and infinite things.

The argument offered is, that of infinity we have no notion but the negation of a limit, and that from this negative notion no positive result can be deduced.

But to this I reply: It is not at all true that our notion of what is infinite is merely that it is that which has no limit. We must ask further that what? that space? that time? that number?—And if that space, that what kind of space? That line? that surface? that solid space?—And if that line, that line bounded at one end, or not? If that surface, that surface bounded on one, or on two, or on three sides? or on none? However any of these questions are answered, we may still have an infinite space. Till they are answered, we can assert nothing about the space; not because we can assert nothing about infinites; but because we are not told what kind of infinite we are talking of.