SIR WILLIAM Hamilton's philosophy. 73 



ingly denominated primary all hinge upon these conditions. It is 

 therefore of the utmost importance to discriminate precisely and con- 

 stantly all questions in reference to our consciousness of the nonego in 

 general from those concerning the special group of nonegos distinguished 

 by the attribute of extension. 



As we have found, in the most celebrated criticism of Hamilton, the 

 absence of any discrimination between these two classes of questions, 

 it will not surprise us to come upon the same confusion in his own 

 writings. This want of precision could be adequately illustrated only 

 by an extensive examination of his works ; but one or two passages 

 expose with special clearness the inexact use which he makes of the 

 terms ego and nonego with their equivalents. " It may appear," 

 says he, for example, in Note D* appended to Eeid's Works, 

 " not a paradox merely, but a contradiction, to say, that the organism 

 is, at once, within and without the mind ; is, at once, subjective and 

 objective; is, at once. Ego and Nonego. But so it is ; and so we must 

 admit it to be, unless, on the one hand, as Materialists, we identify 

 mind with matter, or, on the other, as Idealists, we identify matter with 

 mind. The organism, as animated, as sentient, is necessarily ours ; its 

 affections are only felt as affections of the indivisible Ego. In this 

 respect, and to this extent, our organs are not external to ourselves." * 

 In order to avoid the conclusion, that this quotation contains ''not a 

 paradox merely, but a contradiction," it is evidently necessary to under- 

 stand by Ego something more than is expressed by the first personal 

 pronoun, — to understand not me simply, but everything else that may 

 be viewed as having a certain relation to me. More pertinent to the 

 subject in hand is Sir W. Hamilton's constant identification of the non- 

 ego with matter. " When I concentrate my attention in the simplest 



* Reid's Works, p. 886, note *. Compare p. 858, note*. It is curious to come 

 upon the same observation in Locke's Essay ■ " Self is that conscious thinking 

 tiling, whatever substance made up of (whether spiritual or material, simple or 

 compounded, it matters not), which is sensible, or conscious of pleasure or pain, 

 capable of happiness or misery, and so is concerned for itself, as far as that con- 

 sciousness extends. Thus every one finds, that whilst comprehended under that 

 consciousness, the little finger is as much a part of himself as what is most so. 

 Upon separation of this little finger, should this consciousness go along with the 

 little finger and leave the rest of the body, it is evident the little finger would be 

 the person, the same person ; and self then would have nothing to do with the 

 rest of the body" (Book II., chap. 27, i 17). 

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