ON ANCIENT AND MODERN SKEPTICS. 



413 



lience I myself of to-day am no more the I myself of yesterday or to= 

 morrow, than I am Nebuchadnezzar or Cleopatra. 



Now all this nonsense in Bishop Berkeley, even had His Lordship gone 

 so far, which, however, he did not do, we could laugh at ; for his mind 

 was of too excellent a cast to mean mischief. But it is impossible to 

 make the same allowance to Mr. Hume, since the doctrines he attempts 

 to build upon this nonsense effectually prevent us from doing so. 



If the mind of every man become every moment a different being, all 

 punishment for crime must be absurd ; for you can never hit the culprit, 

 who is every moment slipping through your fingers, and may as well hang 

 the sheriff as the thief. No philosopher, it seems, can even dream of be- 

 lieving in an external world, and yet (putting by the trash of innate ideas) 

 what other arguments have we, continues the same school, if school it 

 may be called, for the existence and attributes of a Supreme Being. You 

 may talk of power, but it is a word without a meaning : we can form no 

 idea of power, nor of any being endued with any power, much less of a 

 being endued with infinite power. And we can never have reason to be- 

 lieve that any object or quality of an object exists of which we cannot 

 form an idea. It is, indeed, unreasonable to believe God to be infinitely 

 wise and good while there is any evil or disorder in the universe ; nor 

 have we any sound reason to believe that the world, whatever it may be, 

 proceeds from him, or from any cause whatever. We can never fairly 

 denominate any thing a cause till we have repeatedly seen it produce like 

 effects ; but the universe is an effect quite singular and unparalleled ; and 

 hence it is impossible for us to know any thing of its cause ; it is impos- 

 sible for us to know that there is any universe whatever ; any creature or 

 any Creator ; or any thing in existence but impressions and ideas.* 



It is not my intention to enter into these arguments, nor is it necessary. 

 For though there had been ten times more force or more folly in them 

 than there is, we have already traced the Babel-building to its foundation, 

 and know that it rests upon emptiness. 



Scotland has the disgrace of having given birth to this hydra of ab- 

 surdity and mahgnity : she has also the honour of having produced the 

 Hercules by whom it has been strangled. She has, indeed, amply atoned : 

 for she has produced a Hercules in almost every one of her universities. 

 True to the high charge reposed in them, the public guardians of her 

 morals have started forth from Edinburgh, Glasgow, and Aberdeen, 

 armed in celestial panoply, and equally masters of their weapons. Nei- 

 ther argument nor raillery have been spared on the occasion ; and instead 

 of invidiously inquiring whether Reid, Beattie, or Stewart be chiefly enti- 



* Mr. Hume seems to have been only a speculative advocate of his own doctrines : the 

 Bishop of Cioyne, like the Greek skeptics to whom we have formerly adverted, were real 

 believers. And it is not a little singular that the fundamental atheism on which the d.^ctrines 

 of Boodhism are founded, as professed throughout the Burman empire, has given rise, even 

 in the present day, to a sect of philosophical skeptics of the very same kind ; of which Mr. 

 Judson, the intelligent American missionary, to whom I have already alluded, (Ser. III. 

 Lect. III.) gives us, in his Journal, the following notable example : *' May 20, 1821. Encoun- 

 tered another new character, one Moung Long, from the neighbourhood of Shway-doung, a 

 disciple of the great Tong-dwan teacher, the acknowledged head of all the semi-atheists in 

 the country. Like the rest of the sect, Moung Long is, in reality, a complete skeptic, 

 scarcely believing his own existence. They say he is always quarreiling- with his wii'e on 

 some metaphysical point. For instance, if she says, "The rice is ready," he will reply, 

 **Rice ! What is rice ? U it matter or spirit ? Is it an idea; or is it non-entity ?" Perhaps 

 she will say, It is matter !" and he will replj', " VVell, wife, and what is matter ? Are you 

 sure there is any such thing in existence, or are you merely subject to a delusion of the 

 senses Account of the American Baptist Mission to the Burman Empire, &c. by A. H. 

 Judson, p. 304, 8yo. Lond. 1823, 



