ON HUMAN UNDERSTANDING. 



383 



1 ' ■- ' 



LECTURE III. ' 



ON HUMAN UNDERSTANDING. 



Having taken a brief survey of the essence and duration of the soul« 

 tnind, or intelhgent principle, as far as we have been able to collect any 

 information upon this abstruse subject, from reason, tradition, and revela- 

 tion, let us now proceed, with equal modesty and caution, to an examina- 

 tion into its faculties, and the mode by which they develope themselves and 

 acquire knowledge. 



All our knowledge,'' observes Lord Bacon, " is derived from expe* 

 rience." It is a remark peculiarly characteristic of that comprehensive 

 judgment with which this great philosopher at all times contemplated the 

 field of nature, and which has been assumed as the common basis of every 

 system that has since been fabricated upon the subject. Whence," in- 

 quires Mr. Locke, " comes the mind by that vast store which the busy and 

 boundless fancy of man has painted on it with an almost endless variety ? 

 Whence has it air the materials of reason and knowledge? I answer, in 

 a word, from experience. In this all our knowledge is founded, from this 

 the whole emanates and issues." M. Degerando, and, in short, all the 

 French philosophers of the present day, in adoptmg Locke's system, have 

 necessarily adopted this important maxim as the groundwork of their rea- 

 soning ; and though, as a general principle, it has been lately called in 

 question by a few of the ablest advocates for what they have ventured to 

 denominate the Theory of Common Sense, and especially by Professor 

 Stewart,* as I may perhaps find it necessary to notice more particularly 

 hereafter, it is sufficient for the present to observe that the shrewd and 

 learned projector of this theory, Dr. Reid, admits it in its utmost latitude : 

 " Wise men," says he, " now agree or ought to agree in this, that there is 

 hut one way to the knoidedge of nature's works, the way of observation 

 and experiment. By our constitution we have a strong propensity to trace 

 particular facts and observations to general rules, and to apply such gene- 

 ral rwles to account for other effects, or to difect us in the production of 

 them. This procedure of the understanding is familiar to every human 

 creature in the common aflfairs of life, and, it is the only one by which 

 any real discovery in philosophy can be made."! 



Now, the only mode by which we can obtain experience is by the use 

 and exercise of the senses, which have been given to us for this purpose, 

 and which, to speak figuratively, may be regarded as the fingers of the 

 mind in feeling its way forward, and opening the shutters to the admission of 

 that pure and invigorating light, which in consequence breaks in upon it. 



It must be obvious, however, to every one who has attended to the ope- 

 rations of his senses, that there never is, nor can be, any direct communi- 

 cation between the mind and the external objects the mi id perceives, which 

 are usually, indeed, at some distance from the sense taat gives notice of 

 them. Thus, in looking at a tree, it is the eye alone that really beholds the 

 tree, while the mind only receives a notice of its presence, by some means 

 or other, from the visual organ. So in touching this table, it is my hand 

 alone that comes in contact with it, and communicates to my mind s> 



* Philos. Essays, yol. i. p. 122. 



t Inquiry into the Human Mind, p. 2. 



