Additional Notes. 449 



stract science, 01 a statement of some fact resting on the im- 

 mediate information of consciousness, of perception, or of me- 

 mory ; or one of those fundamental laws of belief which are im- 

 plied in the application of our faculties to the ordinary business 

 of life. The same extensive use of the word may, I believe, be 

 found in the other authors just mentioned. But no authority 

 can justify such a laxity in the employment of language in phi- 

 losophical discussions: for if mathematical axioms be (as they 

 manifestly and indisputably are) a class of propositions essen- 

 tially distinct from the other kinds of intuitive truths now de- 

 scribed, why refer them all indiscriminately to the same prin- 

 ciple in our constitution? If this phrase, therefore, be at ail 

 retained, precision requires that it should he employed in a 

 more limited acceptation; and accordingly, in the works un- 

 der our consideration, it is appropriated most frequently^ 

 though by no means uniformly, to that class of intuitive 

 truths which I have already called fundamental laws of be- 

 lief. When thus restricted, it conveys a notion unambiguous 

 at least, and definite; and, consequently, the question about 

 its propriety and impropriety turns entirely on the coincidence 

 of this definition with the meaning of the word as employed 

 in ordinary discourse." 



" I have said that the question about the propriety of the 

 phrase Common Sense, as employed by philosophers, must 

 be decided by an appeal to general practice: for although it 

 he allowable, and even necessary, for a philosopher to limit 

 the acceptation of words which are employed vaguely in com- 

 mon discourse, it is always dangerous to give to a word a 

 scientific meaning essentially different from that in which it is 

 usually understood. It has, at least, the effect 'of misleading 

 those who clo not enter deeply into the subject; and of giving 

 a paradoxical appearance to doctrines which, if expressed in 

 more unexceptionable terms, would be readily admitted." 



" It appears to me that this has actually happened in the pre- 

 sent instance. The phrase Common Sense, as it is generally 

 understood, is nearly synonymous with Mother-wit ; denot- 

 ing that degree of sagacity (depending partly on original ca- 

 pacity, and partly on personal experience and observation) 

 which qualifies an individual for those simple and essential 

 occupations which all men are called oji to exercise habitually 

 by their common nature. In this acceptation it is opposed to 

 those mental acquirements which are derived from a regular 

 education, and from the study of books; and refers not to 

 the speculative convictions of the understanding, but to than 



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