214 SIR WILLIAM Hamilton's philosophy. 



know by the senses, but only of a material substance, which these 

 things represent, th'ough, in itself, it can never be known by the 

 senses or by any other means. These things, however, which we 

 know by the senses, but which merely represent to us real existence, 

 were, as we have already seen, called ideas in the ph losophy preva- 

 lent at Berkeley's time ; yet, in spite of this unfortunate fact, it is 

 not difficult to arrive at the conclusion that, regarding the reality of 

 his opposition to the theory of representative perception, there is not 

 a shadow of the doubt from which Sir William Hamilton acknow- 

 ledges himself unable to clear the language of Reid. ** These ideas, 

 as you call them," his language repeatedly and explicitly insists, 

 ** these things which we see and touch, you may call them by what- 

 ever name you please, are not mere images ; they are not the mere 

 show of a world, but the real material world itself, and the only ma- 

 terial world that really exists : for that unknown, and unknowable, 

 and unthinkable world, of which you say the world Vve know is out a 

 phantasm — it is that world which is a phantasm ; the result of your 

 own fantastic speculations, with which you puzzle yourselves and 

 your followers." Berkeley, therefore, does not seek to explain the 

 material world, 'which we know, by supposing the existence of an- 

 other world, about which we know and can know nothing. 



3. "What, then, is the explanation which Berkeley gives of the 

 existence which we attribute to material things? According to him, 

 since a thing exists for us only inasmuch as we know it, its very exis- 

 tence, so far ■ as we are concerned, consists in our knowledge of it. 

 The existence of anything independent on me must, therefore, he 

 concludes, be merely the fact that it is known by some other mind ; 

 and, consequently, the material universe, as it does not depend for ita 

 existence on human, finite minds, must be known by an Universal and 

 Everlasting Mind. 



Berkeley brings us, naturally, to the speculations of the Scottish 

 school, not merely because it was necessary to go back upon him ta 

 find the originating influence of these speculations, but also because 

 we must go to Scotland to follow the history of the Berkeleyan philo- 

 sophy. It is fortunate that Dugald Stewart has preserved to us, on 

 the authority of his teacher. Professor Stevenson, the most valuable 

 evidence we possess of the extent to which the doctrines of Berkeley 

 were studied, and studied sympathisingly, among his younger contem- 

 poraries in Scotland. The evidence, to which I refer, is the fact, that 

 a number of young men in Edinburgh had formed a club for the pur- 



