THE ARBITER OF ETHICS 235 



zation of, and much contempt for, experimental knowl- 

 edge. He assumed certain abstract definitions as uni- 

 versal postulates and from them derived all his con- 

 clusions by pure ratiocination without any regard as 

 to whether these conclusions conformed to objective 

 facts. A brief glance at some of the definitions and 

 deductions, which may be found in his Leviathan, will 

 show that he was advancing a purely metaphysical sys- 

 tem of thought. Thus, every part of the universe is 

 body. Bodies comprise those things which are formed 

 by nature and commonly called bodies and those formed 

 by the human will which we call societies; this latter 

 idea still lingers in the phrase, the body politic. Mo- 

 tion is the cause of all things, even of the human pas- 

 sions, etc. The small beginnings of motion within the 

 body of man before they appear in walking, speaking, 

 striking, and other visible actions, are commonly called 

 endeavor. Endeavor, when it is toward some thing 

 which causes it, is called appetite, or desire. He dis- 

 tinguishes in the following and entirely arbitrary 

 fashion between the sensations. Heat is motion re- 

 sulting from the light endeavor; hearing is generated 

 by the motion of the medium, but not in the same man- 

 ner as seeing. Sight is an endeavor from pressure 

 produced by the luminous body on the retina of the eye, 

 and by the pressure on that part it will be propagated 

 to the heart, the innermost organ of sight and of all 

 the senses; and from the reaction of the heart, in which 



