UEGEL S SCHEME OF KNOWLEDGE. 129 



true essence of man ; second, that thought is the essence of 

 the world ; and that, therefore, there is nothing but thought ; 

 his classification, beginning with the science of pure thought, 

 may be acceptable. But otherwise, it is an obvious objec 

 tion to his arrangement, that thought implies things thought 

 of that there can be no logical forms without the substance 

 of experience that the science of ideas and the science oi 

 things must have a simultaneous origin. Hegel, however, 

 anticipates this objection, and, in his obstinate idealism, re 

 plies, that the contrary is true ; that all contained in the 

 forms, to become something, requires to be thought : and 

 that logical forms are the foundations of all things. 



It is not surprising that, starting from such premises, and 

 reasoning after this fashion, Hegel finds his way to strange 

 conclusions. Out of space and time he proceeds to build up 

 motion, matter, repulsion, attraction, weight, and inertia. 

 He then goes on to logically evolve the solar system. In 

 doing this he Avidely diverges from the Newtonian theory ; 

 reaches by syllogism the conviction that the planets are the 

 most perfect celestial bodies ; and, not being able to bring 

 the stars within his theory, says that they are mere formal 

 existences and not living matter, and that as compared with 

 the solar system they are as little admirable as a cutaneous 

 eruption or a swarm of flies.* 



Results so outrageous might be left as self-disproved, 

 were it not that speculators of this class are not alarmed by 

 any amount of incongruity with established beliefs. The 

 only efficient mode of treating systems like this of Hegel, is 

 to show that they are self-destructive that by their first 

 steps they ignore that authority on which all their subse 

 quent steps depend. If Hegel professes, as he manifestly 

 does, to develop his scheme by reasoning if he presents 



* It is somewhat curious that the author of &quot; The Plurality of Worlds,&quot; 

 with quite other aims, should have persuaded himself into similar conclu 

 sioiU3. 



