METAPHYSICS. 



87 



MMaphr- For some account of the leading principles of Locke's 

 * tyctem, and some strictures upon them, see the article 

 Looic. At present, we mean merely to advert to the 

 revolution which his opinions have produced in the 

 philosophy of the human mind ; and to the very sin- 

 gular and opposite conclusion* to which they have been 

 made subservient. For, on the one hand, they gave 

 rue to the system of Berkeley, Hume, and other ideal- 

 ist* , who deny the separate existence of matter, and 

 bold, that what we call by that name is only a modifi- 

 cation of thought ; whilst, on the other hand, they have 

 given birth, particularly on the Continent, to the mate- 

 rial system of Diderot and others, who maintain that 

 mind is only a more refined specie* of material sub- 

 stance. 



Qpfoiili It m*y appear strange that such opposite conclu- 



asarta lisas aion* should arise out of the same system ; but it must 

 ******* apnsiar stranger Kill, that they are both legitimately 

 " . deduced from it. That U to say, that Locke, by not 

 inttt'tt. ufficienlly guarding some of his principle*, has afford- 

 ed room for their being applied or perverted in both 

 these way*. He himself never intended to teach any 

 such doctrine* a* those which succeeding phikwopher* 

 and sceptics hare deduced from hi* opinion*. 



Mt t phy- 

 sic*. 



The most celebrated of these *y*tem* is that of Berke- 

 ley ; and we have no hesitation in saying, that it is the 

 most difficult to refute by reasoning. It not only de- 

 nies the existence of the material world, hut affirms that 

 the existence of matter b impossible. Talking of the 

 quilities of matter, Locke had said, that " the ideas of 

 primary qtnlitin of bodie* are resemblances of them, 

 -:r patterns do really exist in the bod tea them- 

 elves ; t.'.t the idea* produced in us by theae aweaW 

 fry qualtiifi have no resemblance of them *t all. There 

 i* nothing like our idea* existing in the bodie* tbero- 

 rlvea. They are in hndie* we denominate from them 

 only power to produce thoee sensation* in us ; and 

 what is sweet, blue, or warm in iVa. i* but the certain 

 bulk, figure, aad motion of the insensible parti in the 

 bodie* themselves which we call so." 



On theae data Berkeley build* hi* system. " They 

 who inert," says be, " that figure, motion, and the mt 

 of the primary or original qualities, do exit without 

 the mind in unthinking *ubetaar, do at the -amr time 



' 



sounds, heat, cold, and tuch 

 qualities do not ; which, they trll in, 

 'existing in the mind alone, that depend 

 on, and are occasioned by the different size, texture, 

 and motion of the minute particle* of matter. This 

 they take for sin undoubted truth, which they can de- 

 monstrate ttrjonA all exception. Now, if it be certain 

 that those one >et are inseparably united with 



the other aemible qualities and not even in thought 

 capable of being abstracted from them, it plainly fol- 

 lows that they rtist only in the mind. Hut I desire 

 any one to reflect, aad try whether he can, by any ab- 

 st rartion of thought, conceive the extension and motion 

 of j b dy without all other sensible qualities. For my 

 *>wn part, I see evidently trut it i not in my power to 

 frame an idea of a body extended and moved, but I must 

 o it some colour, or other sensible quality, 

 which is *ekn<>w)edged t r in the mm 



short, extension, figure, and motion, a!trrtcrl 

 all qualities), are inconceivable. Where, therefore, the 

 other senstlile qualities are. there mn-t be these also, to 



ic mind, and no where else." 



Bel ore we advert to the w.,y in which these aririi- 

 hve been answered, we may take notice of the 

 which are suppoied to flow from them. 



These are thought to amount to nothing leas than the 

 unhinging of all belief, and the introduction of uni- 

 versal scepticism. Nothing certainly could be farther '"V" 

 from the intention of the amiable and ingenious author. 

 For, in the preface to hi* Dialogues, he says, " If the 

 principles which I here endeavour to propagate are ad- 

 mitted for true, the consequences I think that evidently 

 flow from them are, that atheism and scepticism will 

 be utterly destroyed; many intricate points made plain ; 

 great difficulties solved ; (peculation referred to prac- 

 tice; and men reduced from paradoxes to common 

 sense." 



In fact, nothing was ever so completely misunder- 

 stood and misrepresented as the system of Berkeley, 

 and that too by men of some name in philosophy. 

 Berkeley anticipated these conclusions, and, in our opi. 

 nion, gives a most triumphant refutation of them. To 

 do him full justice, we use his own words : " I am of a 

 vulgar cast," says he, " simple enough to believe my 

 aenses, and leave things as I find them. It is my opi- 

 nion, that the real things are those very things I see, 

 and feel, and perceive by my senses. That a thing 

 should really be perceived by my senses, and at the 

 me time not really exist, U to me a plaiu contradic- 

 tion. When I deny sensible things an existence out 

 of the mind, I do not mean my mind in particular, but 

 all mind*. Now it is plain they have an existence ex- 

 terior to my mind, since 1 find them, by experience, to 

 he independent of it. There is, therefore, some other 

 mind wherein they exist during the intervals between 

 the time* of my perceiving them, as likewise they did 

 before my birth, and would do after my annihilation. 

 And as the same i* true with regard to all other finite 

 created spiriu, it nrcsaaarily follows that there is an 

 omnipotent eternal mind, which knows and compre- 

 hends all things, and exhibits them to our view in Midi 

 a manner, ana according to such rule* as he himself 

 hath ordained, and are by us termed the laws of na- 

 ture." 



No man who know* any thing of philosophy can 

 doubt that all this i perfectly possible, and, if receiv- 

 ed in the way in which Ilerkely has explained it, could 

 have no unfavourable influence on the conduct, the 

 happiness, and the hope* of men ; and we may affirm, 

 without hesitation, that it is grossly misrepreiented, 

 and indred totally misunderstood by Beattie, when he Berkeley ' 

 ays, " It i* subversive of man's mo<t important inter- 7teoi of- 

 ests, a* a moral, intelligent, and percipient being ; and '*" J"**?*' 

 not only so, but alao, if it were universally and scri- 

 ously adopted, the duwolution of society, and the de- 

 struction of mankind, would necessarily rriMie within 

 the compaa* of a month." So thought not Plato, who 

 conceived it possible that life might be a continued 

 sleep, and all our thought* and sensations only dream*. 

 Beattie seems to have confounded the principles of Ber- 

 keley with those of I'yrrho, who also denied the exist- 

 ence of the material world, in the ino-t unqualified 

 enae ; so that his friends, a* it is reported, were obliged 

 to arcomjwny him wherever he went, that he might 

 not be run ovi r by carriages, or fall down precipices. 



We eve: think that Mr. Stewart, the most candid of 

 all philosopher*, has scarcely given a fair view of Ber- 

 keley'* system, when comparing it witli that of the Ve- 

 danti school among the Hindoos. " The difficulties," 

 ay* Sir Wi'luin Jones, " attending the vulgar notion 

 of material luboUnces, induced many of the wisest 

 among the ancienU, and M.me of the mot enlightened 

 among; the moderns, as well a* the Him 'on philosophers, 

 to believe that the whole-creation was rather an energy 



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