DEDUCTIVE PHILOSOPHY 



Patrizi, Campanella and others, all violently oppos- 

 ing the Aristotelian Philosophy. But they destroyed 

 their influence by trying to substitute the theories of 

 Parmenides, (504 B. c.) of Plato, or ideas of their own, 

 equally unreal and false. To Cartesian ism is mainly 

 due the rejection of authority in scientific investi- 

 gation the downfall of the Aristotelian Philosophy, 

 and the insistance on doubt and distrust of all tradi- 

 tion or accepted belief, axioms, or dogmatic teaching 

 in philosophy and science, until satisfactory proof be 

 given to the mind of their existence and truth. 



The Deductive Philosophy had for its principle 

 the belief that the human mind was capable, by 

 reflecting upon its own thoughts, of recognizing cer- 

 tain axioms or incontrovertible truths which it was 

 believed necessarily existed, and which, being in 

 the mind, were therefore in nature. From these 

 a-priori cognitions, such as the scholastic doctrine of 

 the Universals, Descartes' " Cogito ergo sum," or 

 Spinoza's idea of substance, there could logically 

 be deduced conclusions that it was difficult to refute. 

 Indeed, it would be impossible consistently to refute 

 them were it not that from the same premises con- 

 clusions equally logical, but diametrically the opposite, 

 might be reached by varying the point or line of 

 departure. The mind, thus occupied by its own 

 thoughts only, could not increase its sum of knowl- 

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