A WEEKLY illustrated; JOURNAL OF SCIENCE 



" To the solid groiina 

 Of Nature trusts the mind w/iic/i builds for aye." — Wordsworth 



THURSDAY, MAY 7, 1874 



LEIVES 'S " PROBLEMS OF LIFE AND MIND " 

 Problems of Life and Mind. By George Henry Lewes. 



First Series : The Foundation of a Creed. Vol. I. 



(Trubner & Co.) 

 T N this volume Mr. Lewes speaks in an attractive, if 

 rather conversational way, on a great many philo- 

 sophical and psychological topics ; but the most striking 

 feature of the book is the many announcements of dis- 

 coveries and original views to be proved and elaborated 

 in future volumes. And the author's opinion that the 

 work is of " somewhat ambitious pretensions " is, we 

 think, likely to be shared by his readers. 



We are promised a Psychology, but introductory there- 

 to Mr. Lewes has produced two volumes (the second is 

 now under final revision), in which he aspires to lay the 

 Foundation of a Creed. " The great desire of this age is 

 for a doctrine which may serve to condense our know- 

 ledge, guide our I'esearches, and shape our lives, so that 

 Conduct may really be the consequence of Belief." Per- 

 haps there is a general, certainly not a universal, longing 

 for something of this kind. The first question is, what is 

 to be the fate of this hunger of the soul ? Is this longing 

 doomed to perish for want of an object ? or is it destined 

 to be satisfied ? If so, how ? Religion, thinks Mr. Lewes, 

 is not to die, but to be transformed. 



According to Mr. Lewes this new Religion, " Instead of 

 proclaiming the nothingness of this life, the worthlessness 

 of human love, and the imbecility of the human mind, 

 will proclaim the supreme importance of this life, the 

 supreme value of human love, and the grandeur of the 

 human intellect." The first half of this fine sentence is 

 entirely negative ; it tells us that the new creed will not 

 seek to suppress or degrade human nature, after the man- 

 ner imputed to some of the old religions. This is well, 

 and, as it seems to us, sufficient for all that Mr. Lewes, 

 so far as we can make out, has in view. 



Before this new doctrine, which is to reconcile the 

 claims of Religion and Science, can be established, it is 

 Vol. -x.— No. 236 



necessary as a preliminary to transform Metaphysics. 

 Accordingly Mr. Lewes has applied himself to this task. 

 Defining Metaphysics as the " Science of the most general 

 conceptions," to be pursued solely by the method of 

 Science, he discards " all inquiries whatever which trans- 

 cend the ascertained or ascertainable data of experience." 

 As a name for the province which he thus excludes from 

 metaphysics, he suggests the word melcmpirics ; and as 

 melempirical has much to recommend it, besides its being 

 the exact correlative of empirical, it will, we hope, es- 

 tablish itself as a useful addition to the language of philo- 

 sophy. Mr. Lewes anticipates very large results from sys- 

 tematically keeping in view as a principle of research the 

 necessity of clearly and completely eliminating from the 

 statement of each problem all metempirical elements. 

 In the light of this method all mystery, it seems, will vanish 

 from the universe, as the shadows of the morning fly before 

 the rising sun : — "When rationally stated there is no greater 

 mystery in the existence of an external world, or the rela- 

 tions between object and subject, than the relation between 

 activity and waste in the tissues." For, though as Mr. 

 Lewes observes, " it may seem a very bold thing to say," 

 yet he believes and hopes to show that " we not only 

 know that an external Not-self exists, — know it with the 

 same assurance that we know an internal Self to exist, 

 but we also know the manner in which the two are com- 

 bined in Feeling and Thought." Mr. Lewes will certainly 

 have philosophised to some purpose if he put us in 

 possession of a principle of research that will enable us 

 so completely to transcend what at present appears to be 

 the highest reach of our powers. One condition of under- 

 standing the manner of a combination has hitherto been 

 a knowledge of the elements in separation. If we know 

 how oxygen and hydrogen combine to form water, it is 

 because we know these gases otherwise than combined in 

 water. But of the Self and Not-self we know nothing, and 

 can never know anything save as feeling and thought. 

 In the author's own words, "all that we can know of the 

 external is what we have felt or might feel." Nor do we 

 see at this moment that this criticism would lose its point 

 even were we to accept Mr. Lewes's peculiar doctrine of 



