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action. The toleration and scepticism of the first 

 renascence had causes no deeper than a general 

 enlargement of experience and thought. 



To appreciate the influence, covert or overt, of 

 scepticism in the Middle Ages we must clear the 

 meaning of the word. Under the yoke of tribal 

 custom scepticism can hardly arise, there is no 

 place for the half-hearted, as all men feel alike 

 so all think alike : scepticism arises when beliefs 

 are put into formal propositions. Then, as experi- 

 ence and comparison enlarge, we detect scepticism 

 in three forms or degrees : namely, doubt of a par- 

 ticular creed ; doubt of all unverified propositions ; 

 and doubt of the validity of reason itself, whether in 

 respect of the supernatural only or of all argument. 

 It is remarkable that this last, the most devastating 

 of the forms of scepticism, has come from the ranks 

 of the faithful (Pascal, Hamilton, Mansel), who in 

 resentment of the attacks of reason have turned 

 blindly to rend reason herself. No civil society 

 has been without scepticism ; even in ages of most 

 prevalent faith some current of doubt has flowed 

 under the surface. In the Ionian philosophy the 

 place of scepticism was only restricted in so far as 

 many aspects of the subject-matter were not before 



