216 Transactions. — Miscellaneous. 



faced unity — would appear to comply with all the exigencies of the case." 

 Such thinkers are not seeking to bridge over a supposed chasm between 

 miud and matter, but are denying that there exists any gulf to be crossed. 

 To those, on the other hand, who hold that the antithesis between miud 

 and matter is indestructible, every attempt to identify the spheres of 

 Subject and Object, the External and Internal worlds, must needs appear 

 a futile undertaking. In the view of Duahstic Philosophy, the two spheres 

 are separate as regards, alike, the essential nature of their contents, and 

 the organs and modes of observation whereby they become known to us. 

 Our knowledge of mind is derived from self-consciousness ; our knowledge 

 of matter from perceptive observation of the external world. Whilst the 

 phenomena of matter are referred by us to Time and Space, mental pheno- 

 mena are referred to Time alone ; nor can the attempt be made to attribute 

 extension to any purely mental experience without violating the conditions 

 of thought, and lapsing into nonsense. Finally, whilst Miud appears 

 essentiaUy active, and mental expei'ience is the source of our ideas of 

 cause and force, the conception of Matter, of necessity, includes the notion 

 of inertia. 



The Monistic theorists of the present day affect, and no doubt desire, 

 to take a firm and indifferent position on the fulcrum of the balance ; but 

 they fail — so at least it seems to their critics — to secure a truly central 

 stand-point, and thus come sliding gently down the beam into the scale of 

 Matter. Berkeley, who is followed by Mr. Frankland through the earlier 

 portion of his paper, whilst he denied to us any knowledge of the external 

 world of matter, affirmed (as a fact known to us more surely and intimately 

 than any other) the existence of Mind. Hume went beyond Berkeley, 

 denying to human knowledge the existence of both entities. He is to be 

 considered as the immediate progenitor of the modern Phenomenal School. 

 The modern Monist may seem to follow Berkeley for a time, but it is soon 

 evident that minds trained in the school of physical research cannot endure 

 a lengthened sojourn in the thin region of Idealism. It may have seemed 

 that they were on the point of merging Matter in Mind. But, habit and 

 training are strong with them. Theh- pretension to apply to mental pheno- 

 mena the methods of analysis and computation which have served them in 

 the field of Matter, makes it evident that their speculation has resulted — 

 according to theu* own apprehension of its consequences — not in the 

 resolution of Matter into Mind, but in the merging of Mind in Matter. 



That this is really Mr. Frankland's position seems apparent from his 

 very choice of a name for his doctrine. It would be difficult to find a term 

 more thoroughly materialistic in its associations and suggestions than this 

 of " Muid- Stuff." If there could be any doubt about the writer's real 



