448 Additional Notes. 



a third would account for every intellectual exercise, by ascrib- 

 ing them to vibrations of a stronger or weaker kind. Though 

 some of these writers approach much nearer to the true doc- 

 trine of mind than others, they are all erroneous; and many 

 of their mistakes arise from aiming at a simplicity of which 

 the subject does not admit. The works of the Author of 

 Nature can be contemplated by us only in detail: and the pro- 

 cess of generalization, though always pleasing to human prid°, 

 and sometimes, in a degree, just and useful; yet, when car- 

 ried beyond a certain length, is, doubtless, calculated to de- 

 ceive the inquirer, and to countenance the most mischievous 

 errors. 



Dr. Re id was enabled to present the improved views of 

 the science of mind, which his works contain, by pursuing a 

 method of inquiry which he first applied to this subject. The 

 inductive plan of investigation, recommended by Bacon, had 

 been long before applied to the physical sciences ; and a few 

 writers, from the beginning till the middle of the eighteenth 

 century, had suggested the propriety of attempting to explore, 

 on similar principles, the phenomena of the intellectual world. 

 But Dr. Re id is asserted to have been the first person " who 

 conceived justly and clearly the analogy between these two 

 different branches of human knowledge; defining with pre- 

 cision the distinct provinces of Observation and of Reflection, 

 in furnishing the data of all our reasonings concerning Mat- 

 ter and Mind; and demonstrating the necessity of a careful 

 separation between the phenomena which they respectively 

 exhibit, while we adhere to the same mode of philosophizing 

 in investigating the laws of each." — Stewart's Life of 

 Reid, p. 48. 



Dr. Reid's Use of the Phrase Common Sense, p. 12. 



" One of the first writers who introduced the phrase Com- 

 mon Sense into the technical or appropriate language of Lo- 

 gic, was Father Buffier, in a book, entitled, Traite des 

 Premieres Verites. It has since been adopted by several au- 

 thors of note in Great-Britain, particularly by Dr. Reid, Dr. 

 Oswald, and Dr. Beattie; by all of whom, however, I 

 am afraid, it must be confessed, it has been employed without 

 a due attention to precision. The last of these writers uses 

 it to denote that power by which the mind perceives the truth 

 of any intuitive proposition, whether* it be an axiom of ab- 



