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philosophy has not been so much neglected there as the older Oxonians 
present might think. One great reason why a proper system has not been 
adopted in teaching it is that we have no logic. There is no such thing in 
existence now in England as a real logic. We have no real science of logic, 
and the systems of Sanderson and writers of that kind are looked at with 
contempt or serve as pegs to hang criticisms upon. I know I learnt logic by 
committing to memory a compendium, and I was told by my tutor that the 
book was wrong on every point, and we took it part by part. (Laughter.) 
Now I put it to any sensible gentleman or lady present, whether the proper 
way to learn a science is to give a man a compendium that is quite wrong, 
and then to teach him where it is bad. The main reason, therefore, why I 
think morality has not been accurately and properly studied is the want of 
a true logic — there is a certain haziness that must first be got rid of. If 
Mr. Row would elaborate a system for us I have no doubt it would be 
followed. The reason why the coping-stone has not been placed on our 
system of ethical philosophy — that coping-stone which would be placed by 
introducing into morality and adding to it that which we learn from reve- 
lation — the reason why that has not been done is to be found in our 
unhappy theological disputes. There can be no doubt that when Plato 
was talking about the just man, and said “he will be even cut into 
splinters,” he was feeling about in the dark for some one about to come ; and 
the same may be said of Aristotle’s (nrovdaXog , the good man, and <ppofuvo £ , 
the prudent man. It has been owing to our unhappy theological differences 
that we have been prevented from finishing ethics by a proper system of 
Christian morality, based on the teaching of the One truly Just and 
Good Man. I do not think Mr. English in this paper has clearly pointed 
out the relations of ethical philosophy to science and revelation. He 
has not shown how ethical philosophy is connected w r ith revelation : he 
merely says there ought to be such a connection ; and he has not shown its 
relation to science, because he has not gone on the principle of that saying 
of Leibnitz, who, to the sentence “ nihil in intellectu quocl non prius fuerit 
in sensu added the remark “ nisi ipse intelledus ” (laughter), thus destroy- 
ing all the point that appeared to be in the dictum. Now Mr. English 
should have done something of the same kind in regard to the relation 
between ethical philosophy and science. He should have pointed out how 
ethical philosophy is a contradiction to positivism, because it shows that 
there must be a philosophy which of itself cannot be positive, but always 
touches on higher truths, which positivism does not approach. 
Rev. W. Mitchell. — I feel that this is a subject which is very much 
beyond me, but I must say a word as an excuse for my own university. 
Ethics at one time were very widely studied in the University of Cambridge. 
I remember after taking my Bachelor’s degree, I had the good fortune to 
attend ProfessorWhewell’s lectures on Casuistry, which were nothing more than 
giving the students a resume of the history of ethical philosophy, commencing 
with the ancients and coming down to the moderns. But when he came 
down to modern times, so great was the number of books and so great the 
