132 DISSERTATION SECOND. [pabth. 



are founded, invention can hardly be kept in the right 

 course. The German philosopher was not furnished with 

 them in the same degree as the English, and hence his 

 great talents have run very frequently to waste. 



It may be doubted also, whether Leibnitz's great me- 

 taphysical acuteness did not sometimes mislead him in the 

 study of nature, by inclining him to those reasonings 

 which proceed, or affect to proceed, continually from the 

 cause to the effect. The attributes of the Deity were 

 the axioms of his philosophy ; and he did not reflect that 

 this foundation, excellent in itself, lies much too deep for 

 a structure that is to be raised by so feeble an architect 

 as man ; or, that an argument, which sets out with the 

 most profound respect to the Supreme Being, usually ter- 

 minates in the most unwarrantable presumption. His rea- 

 sonings from first causes are always ingenious ; but nothing 

 can prevent the substitution of such causes for those that 

 are physical and efficient, from being one of the worst and 

 most fatal errors in philosophy. 



As an interpreter of nature, therefore, Leibnitz stands 

 in no comparison with Newton. His general views in 

 physics were vague and unsatisfactory ; he had no great 

 value for inductive reasoning; it was not the way of ar- 

 riving at truth which he was accustomed to take ; and 

 hence, to the greatest physical discovery of that age, and 

 that which was established by the most ample induction, 

 the existence of gravity as a fact in which all bodies 

 agree, he was always incredulous, because no proof of it, 

 a priori, could be given. 



As to who benefited human knowledge the most, no 

 question, therefore, can arise ; and if genius is to be weigh- 

 ed in this balance, it is evident which scale must prepon- 

 derate. Except in the pure mathematics, Leibnitz, with 

 all his talents, made no material or permanent addition 



