8 MEMOIR OP ARISTOTLE. 



gular, that the Stagirite did precisely what he is 

 olamed by Lord Bacon, Hobbes, Malebranche, and 

 other French philosophers, for not doing. The au- 

 thor of the Leviathan frequently combats, under the 

 name of the Peripatetic philosophy, abstract essences, 

 substantial forms, and innumerable other doctrines, 

 metaphysical as well as moral and political, with 

 nearly the same arguments by which Aristotle, their 

 supposed author, had long before victoriously re- 

 futed them. The evil of confounding the simpli- 

 city of this philosophy with Platonism, was igno- 

 rantly perpetuated from age to age, through a suc- 

 cession of critics and commentators, not excepting 

 the latest of them all, Mr Harris and Lord Mon- 

 boddo, who perpetually ascribe to Aristotle the doc- 

 trine of general ideas, which he repeatedly and for- 

 mally denied. His logic was misrepresented by 

 Locke and Lord Kames ; and even Dr Reid speaks 

 of him harshly, as having purposely obscured his 

 analytical rules by unmeaning illustrations. But 

 wherever his principles and tenets have been studied 

 with a competent degree of honesty and informa- 

 tion, they have never failed to produce a conviction 

 of their soundness and perspicuity; and, at the same 

 time, an admiration for the wonderful discoveries 

 and attainments in a man deemed the wisest of an- 

 tiquity, and to whom, even in modern times, it will 

 be easier to name many superiors in particular 

 branches of knowledge, than to find any one rival in 

 universal science. 



