Hartley. Dr Byrom, 
648 
the inventor of a oR sevens wri- 
ting, was much-respected by him for and accu- 
eo nati dguient in philology Mr Hooke, the Roman 
historian and disciple of the Newtonian chronology, 
was amongst his literary intimates. The celebrated 
poet Pope was likewise admired by him as a man of 
genius, and a true poet ; yet he regarded the celebrat- 
ed Essay on Man as tending to insinuate, that the di- 
vine revelation of the Christian religion was superflu- 
ous, in a case where human philosophy was adequate. 
He suspected the secret influence of Lord Bolingbroke, 
as guiding the poetical pen of his unsuspecting friend, to 
deck out in borrowed plumes the plagiarisms of modern 
ethics from Christian doctrines. From his earliest youth 
he was devoted to the sciences, particularly to logic 
and mathematics, which last he studied under the ce« 
lebrated Professor Saunderson. He published, 1. 4 
View of the present Evidence for and against Stevens's 
‘Medicines as a solvent for the Stone, London 1739, 204 
es 8vo, dedicated to the President and Fellows of 
the Royal College, London. His own case is the 123d 
in the book ; yet he is said, after all, to have died of 
the stone, after having taken above two hundred pounds 
weight of sop and it must be acknowledged, though 
with regret, that that celebrated medicine has no power 
of dissolving stones in the kidneys or bladder. - 2. Dr 
Hartley is said to have written in defence of inocula~ 
tion against Dr~ Warren of St Edmund’s Bury; and 
some letters of his are to be met with in the Phil. Trans. 
3. But his most celebrated work is entitled, Odserva- 
tions on Man, his Frame, his Duty, and his Expecta- 
lions, in two parts; part the first, containing observa- 
tions on the frame of the human body and mind, and 
on their mutual connections and influences ; part the 
second, containing observations on the duty and ex- 
tions of mankind ; London, 1749. The author 
gives the following account of the origin and progress 
of the work, “ About eighteen years ago, I was in- 
formed that the Rev. Mr Gay, then living, asserted the 
possibility of deducing all our intellectual pleasures and 
pains from association. This put me upon considering 
the power of association. Mr Gay published his senti- 
ments on this matter, about the same time, in a disser- 
tation on the fundamental Principle of Virtue, prefixed 
to Mr Archdeacon Law’s translation of ‘Archbishop 
King’s Origin of Evil. From inquiring into the power 
of association, I was led to examine both its conse- 
quences, in respect of morality and religion, and its 
physical cause. By degrees, many disquisitions foreign 
to the doctrine of association, er at least not immedi- 
ately connected with it, intermixed themselves. I have 
here put together all my separate papers on these sub- 
jects, digesting them in such order as they seemed na-~ 
turally to suggest, and adding such things as were ne- 
cessary to make the whole appear more complete and 
systematical.” The author, aware that he had thus laid 
himself open to the charge of having first adopted a 
theory, and afterwards accommodated his observations 
in subserviency to it, adds, that “he did not first form 
a system, and then suit the facts to it ; but was carried 
on by a train of thoughts from one thing to another, 
frequently without any express design, or even any pre- 
vious suspicion of the consequences that might arise ; 
and that this was most remarkably the case in respect 
of the doctrine of Necessity; for I was not at all aware, 
that it followed from that of association, for several years 
after I had begun my inquiries; nor did I admit it at 
last without the greatest reluctance.” 
In regard to the doctrine of necessity, justice to the: 
HARTLEY. 
author requires that his note of ion should be 
here given, viz. ‘‘ that he no where denies practical free« 
will, or that voluntary power over our affections and 
actions, by which we deliberate, suspend, and choose, 
and which makes an essential part of our ideas of virtue 
and vice, reward and punishment.” To the doctrine of 
associations he has added vibrations, and endeavoured 
to establish a connection between these, and to shew 
the general use of these in explaining the nature of sen- 
sations. In the introductory remarks to the second 
part of the’ work, “ On the Duty and Expectations of 
Man,” he says, that * the contemplation of our frame 
and constitution appe: to him, to have a peculiar 
tendency to lessen the difficulties attending natural and 
revealed religion, and to improve their evidences, as 
well as to concur with them in their determination of 
man’s duty and expectations ; with which view he drew 
up the foregoing observations on the frame and con- 
nexion of the body and mind: And in prosecution of 
the same design, he goes on in this part, from this 
foundation, and upon the other phenomena of nature, 
to deduce the truths of natural religion; laying down 
all these as a new foundation whereon to build evi- 
dences for revealed religion, to inquire into the rule of 
life resulting from the frame of our natures, the dic« 
tates of natural religion, and the precepts of Scripture. 
And, lastly, To inquire into the genuine doctrines of 
natural and revealed religion, thus illustrated, con- 
cerning the expectations of mankind here and here- 
after. 
The intentions of the author seett to have been up- 
right and pious, and considerable ingenuity, as well as 
acquaintance with the human frame, are displayed 
throughout the work. Yet few, it is believed, Wil be 
found to assert that his system throws any light on the 
mysterious union of matter and mind, or that his re- 
duction of all the operations of the human mind to as« 
sociation of ideas, has tended in any de, to simplify 
the subject. “ The philosophy of mind (observes 
fessor Stewart) has its alchemists ; men, whose studies 
are directed to the pursuit of one single principle; mto 
which the whole science may be resolved; and they 
flatter themselves with the hope of discovering the’ 
grand secret by which the pure gold of truth may be 
produced at pleasure? Of such metaphysical alche- 
mists, Hartley is clearly entitled to the first place. But 
all the generalizations of his system are yerbal only, 
and it succeeds in bringing all our mental operations 
under the head of associations, only by using the termr 
in such an unprecedented latitude, as to make it com 
prehend all sorts of mental operations, and every kind 
of connection of ideas. Every thing, according to 
Hartley, of which we are conscious, excepting only 
our sensations, may be called ideas; and every kind of 
relation between them he terms an association, so that 
the connexion betwixt twice two and four, is merely 
an association of ideas, and that all mathematical rela- 
tions are of the same denomination. This, it is evi« 
dent, is not a discovery in philosophy, but an innova- 
tion in language.” ( Philosoph. Essays.) tis said that 
he did not expect that his work would meet with any 
general or immediate reception in the philosophical 
world, or even that it would be much read or under- 
stood ; but that at some distant period it would be-« 
come the adopted system of future philosophers. There 
seems no probability of this expectation being realized. 
The prevailing systems of Reid, Stewart, &c. the in- 
ductive philosophy of mind, seems to bid much fairer for 
general adoption, Although. Hartley cannot be recom- 
