238 JOURNAL OF THE PLYMOUTH INSTITUTION. 
constitution of the universe; in other words, to create universal 
science. 
That this product of Greek Thought has been perverted to uses and 
ends it could never properly subserve, and that, as a consequence, the 
material progress of society suffered injury, this, I think, must be 
admitted. Yet, surely, because men are foolish enough to misapply 
an instrument, this is no valid argument against the advantages to 
be derived from an application of it to objects suitable to its nature. 
Moreover, it by no means follows that the intense and, as some 
would say, the absurd devotion to metaphysics by means of the 
Aristotelian Logic, during the Middle Ages, was in every respect a 
loss to our modern civilization. We all know what a wonderful 
means of mental discipline the thorough study of the science of 
Formal Logic is to those who have the heart to work hard in master- 
ing its principles and details; and, if there be any truth in the 
modern doctrine of the transmission of mental powers and qualities, 
I imagine that, could we but trace the processes through which our 
modern intellect has attained to its strength and precision, it would 
be found to have inherited not a little of its power and love of 
exactitude from the men whose mental life was governed for 
centuries by the severities of Aristotle’s Formal Logic. The laborious 
Father of Logic claimed no perfection. He, with modesty, regarded 
himself as a helper of his fellow-men in their endeavours to reduce 
all things to scientific form.* 
There is, however, another aspect of the activity of the Greek 
mind which throws some light on our relation to it. We owe to it 
the opening up of the great problems which ever since have engaged 
the earnest thought of all great intellects. A German author has 
very aptly styled the founders of Greek philosophy ‘“ Path-finders.” 
I believe it to be true of our own personal experience that, during 
the first seven years of our life, we acquire more fundamental en- 
during knowledge than during the whole remainder of our existence 
on earth. The objective world of multiform fact and subjective 
reality of the main data given in consciousness, embracing, as these 
do, the subject-matter of all future combination and reflection, are 
the acquisition of early childhood. Never again does the mind 
grasp such stupendous facts, or acquire knowledge of so vast a 
variety of things. Classify the objects of sense it may, and rise 
* “ De Sophis. Elenchis,’ xxxiv. Tavrys 5¢ ris mpayuardias . . .. dvdev 
TavrTenos UmnpXe. K. T. Xr, 
