shall of necessity come into frequent collision with the doctrines of preceding philosophers. This I shall neither sedulously avoid nor yet purposely seek, except as it may contribute to the elucidation of the subject; and I do not mention it as requiring apology, although some of them are writers of deservedly high reputation, for whom I entertain unfeigned respect.

In an age of remarkable progress, in which various systems of false thought and piles of hypothetical facts have crumbled into dust before the steady march of sober science, it would, doubtless, appear somewhat out of scason and even ludicrous to apologise for the effects of inethodical and careful inquiry on received doctrines and established reputations, be those doctrines and their authors what and who they may.

In respect to the latter, it is a consideration worth weighing by such minds as are more tenacious of personal reputations than anxious for truth, that the manifestation of ability is not to be measured by the permanence of its results, and remains as a fact, conferring perennial renown after the doctrine which called it forth has been stripped of its errors, or wholly superseded.

But, on the subject of my present attempt, a direct scrutiny of facts, independent of preceding opinions, combined with a free and unreserved discussion of such opinions, is, perhaps, more needed than on any other; for it is remarkable

that, although each one has in his own breast all the materials of psychology, yet is he peculiarly prone to take his views regarding it from his predecessors, as if in former times they were nearer to it than we are at the actual moment; as if they possessed some great advantage in studying it over ourselves. Hence he is too apt to look at it from the point of view which has become traditional, instead of taking a survey of it from his own station, and trusting his own eyes.

But it is plain, on reflection, that all the mental operations and affections which constitute the matter of the science are experienced by all of us now as fully as they ever were by any human beings that ever existed. Former ages, whether remote or recent, enjoyed, to say the least, no superiority over the present in point of nearness to the subject, or in any other imaginable way; nor is there the shadow of a reason that we should take implicitly their account of a matter which is perfectly and perpetually open to our own scrutiny, any more than that we should content ourselves with relying on their knowledge of the elementary composition of bodies and on their science of the stars. In each case alike, the field for observation is spread out to us as it was to them, without the necessity of trying to look at it exclusively from their point of view, or with their antiquated microscopic or telescopic instruments; nor is this freedom of examination, as I have already hinted,

and as Pascal long ago remarked, at all incompatible with the truest respect for the abilities and acquirements of the really eminent amongst our predecessors.

Having thus indicated the position which the following speculations design to take, I shall defer the commencement of the subject to another letter.

LETTER II.

METHODS OF INVESTIGATING AND SPEAKING OF THE FACTS OF CONSCIOUSNESS.

It seems singular to me that there should ever have been any doubt as to the mode of studying the subject before us.

The proper method of investigating the facts of consciousness can surely be no other than that which is pursued in physical inquiry. Phenomena are to be observed, discriminated, and classified, and general laws to be inferred from them.

What we have to consider in this department of knowledge, are the mental states and operations of the human being, the causes which produce them, the manner in which they accompany or succeed each other, and the resemblances and differences which we discern amongst them. There is here as plain a field for inquiry as that which is presented to us by the world without; there is an equal call in both cases for rigorous method, for keeping to facts, for discarding mere gratuitous assumptions, and for the scrupulous restriction of every word to one precise and uniform sense; while in dealing with states and events of con

sciousness, there is, perhaps, a greater demand for nice and subtile discrimination than in treating material phenomena.

In entering upon the ground before us, it is especially needful to note, and I would emphatically press it on your attention, that it is the human being-the man-who perceives and remembers and thinks and feels and reasons and wills, not something distinct or apart from him; and these are the simplest phrases we can employ to designate the acts or events in question.

We speak, indeed, of his mind perceiving and thinking and feeling, which is a ready and even natural mode of describing his states of consciousness or mental movements in contradistinction to those motions and affections of his physical frame which are to be learned from external observation; but in using such phraseology we gain nothing but convenience, and we should be especially careful not to allow it to lead us to any inferences which cannot be deduced equally well from considering and speaking of the human being himself as in action, or as the subject affected. You will find the utility of attending to the caution here given, in some long disputed and perplexing questions.

Adopting this method for the sake of convenience, and with the precaution indicated, we may speak of the states or acts of the human being when he perceives, remembers, imagines and reasons, as operations of the mind under the names.