REVIEWS — RATIONAL PHILOSOPHY IN HISTORY, ETC. 355 



ing universe different in kind from our practical faith in its reality 

 as finite." The explanatory foot-note is added : " I do not now 

 discuss the origin of the former belief, or its relation to mental 

 association — one of the minor problems of a past day." Here may 

 we be allowed to ask whether Mr. Praser means to intimate that. the 

 origin of the two beliefs referred to is not the same ? "We should 

 almost fancy that he does, from his specifying " the former belief" 

 in so marked a way. Let our readers observe what the beliefs are. 

 The one is our belief in the coherence of the universe ; the other, 

 our belief in the reality of the universe as finite : not, however, our 

 belief in the reality of the phenomena of matter immediately appre- 

 hended in an act of external perception, but (as the context shows) 

 our belief in the reality of material phenomena lying beyond the 

 range of consciousness. Now we hold it to be altogether incontro- 

 vertible that the origin of these two beliefs is the same. Yet Mr. 

 Praser seems to deny this. We should have liked if he had told us 

 what he thinks the origin of our belief in the coherence of the uni- 

 verse to be ; and, in connection with this, what validity he ascribes 

 to it. We have no hesitation in saying that we do not regard it as 

 a primitive belief, or as possessed of any such absolute validity as 

 (for instance) the causal belief. In itself, the question of the origin 

 of our belief in the coherence of the universe may indeed be, as Mr. 

 Eraser says, a minor question ; it is hardly so, however, if we con- 

 sider the indication which an erroneous solution of it would afford, of 

 radical imperfection in the general philosophical views of any one by 

 whom such a solution was adopted. 



The doctrine that real existence is ultimately infinite, is manifestly 

 irreconcileable with the vulgar notion, that body is made up of con- 

 tinuously extended material particles, or ultimate molecules, of finite 

 size. We were anxious to learn exactly what Mr. Eraser's opinion is 

 respecting the extension of body, but have been disappointed to find 

 him extremely reserved on this interesting point. Does he believe 

 that body is extended at all 1 He appears to say so, though never 

 very explicitly. The most distinct statement on the subject which 

 his treatise contains, as far as we have noticed, is this : "If it be the 

 common feeling of the human mind, in its healthy condition, that an 

 external and extended, and not merely the internal or self-conscious 

 world, is actually present to consciousness in external perception, may 

 that common feeling be arbitrarily set aside as irrational ? If so, all 

 our common feelings may be worn away by speculative reasoning." 

 This is hardly enough to satisfy our curiosity. On the one hand, if 



