407 
just that which excludes “ spontaneity,” “ choice,” or “will,” 
and makes good the doctrine of Dr. Tyndall, against which 
the Duke of Argyll argues on page 7, and in favour of which 
he writes on pp. 334-5 of the Reign of Law. 
I feel that I ought to apologize for criticising thus far a 
work which has received so much praise from the Times news- 
paper downwards, and which the President of the Royal 
Astronomical Association called a “ delightful book.” But 
while I can say most truly that I have myself felt great delight 
in reading it over, and can most heartily enter into and go 
along with much that it contains, I have always thought that 
its weakest chapter was that on the “Reign of Law in the 
Realm of Mind,” and that its weakness consists in its being 
neither consistent with itself, nor with the rest of the book 
which contains it. 
THE NATURE OF VIRTUE. 
The active and moral powers of man, or the springs and 
guides of action, have their correlative virtue. What is this ? 
The various answers to this question, which have been 
given in ancient and modern times, have been classified 
according as the different authors have placed the foundation 
of virtue in the nature of things or in the nature of man. My 
subject, namely, “Ethical Philosophy and its relations to 
Science and Revelation ,” naturally directs to the New Testa- 
ment, from which Mr. John Stuart Mill has said, “it has 
never been possible to extract a body of ethical doctrine.”* 
If by a “body of ethical doctrine,” is meant, in this quota- 
tion, a body of rules , I should agree wfith its author, for it is 
not the business even of the philosopher to lay down rules, 
ethical philosophy being a science of facts, and not a body of 
rules. But if it is meant that the New Testament does not 
contain the principles of a pure philosophy, then I would join 
issue with Mr. Mill and challenge him to prove his position. 
The Founder of Christianity sought to stir up morality by 
an appeal to the springs of moral action; love for mankind- 
(«7 a7rii=<f)i\av0p(i)Tria=humanitas) being the foundation of 
virtue which He laid down ; not love for beings in general, as 
Jonathan Edwards absurdly put it, but love for the race , love 
for mau os man. He worked not upon the heads, but upon 
the hearts of men. Other teachers may have proposed a body 
# On Liberty , people’s ed., ch. ii. 
