ed sense in which he used Association in his writings; comprehending, under that term, all the various connections or affinities among our ideas, natural as well as casual; and even going so far as to anticipate Hartley's conclusions, by representing "the principle of union and cohesion among our "simple ideas as a kind of attraction, of as univer"sal application in the Mental world as in the Na"tural."* As it is now, however, too late to remonstrate against this unfortunate innovation, all that remains for us is to limit the meaning of Association, where there is any danger of ambiguity, by two such qualifying adjectives as I have already mentioned. I have, accordingly, in these Essays, employed the word in the same general acceptation with Mr Hume, as it seems to me to be that which is most agreeable to present use, and consequently the most likely to present itself to the generality of my readers; guarding them, at the same time, as far as possible, against confounding the two very different classes of connections, to which he applies indiscriminately this common title. As for the latitude of Hartley's phraseology, it is altogether incompatible with precise notions of our intellectual operations, or with anything approaching to logical reasoning concerning the Human Mind;-two circumstances which have probably contributed not a little to the popularity of his book, among a very numerous class of inquirers. For my own part, notwithstanding the ridicule to

* Treatise of Human Nature, Vol. I. p. 30.

my

which I may expose myself, by the timidity of researches, it shall ever be my study and my pride to follow the footsteps of those faithful interpreters of nature, who, disclaiming all pretensions to conjectural sagacity, aspire to nothing higher than to rise slowly from particular facts to general laws. I trust, therefore, that while, in this respect, I propose to myself the example of the Newtonian School, I shall be pardoned for discovering some solicitude, on the other hand, to separate the Philosophy of the Human Mind from those frivolous branches of scholastic learning with which it is. commonly classed in the public opinion. With this view, I have elsewhere endeavoured to explain, as clearly as I could, what I conceive to, be its proper object and province; but some additional illustrations, of a historical nature, may perhaps contribute to place my argument in a stronger light than it is possible to do by any abstract reasoning.

IV. It is a circumstance not a little remarkable, that the Philosophy of the Mind, although in later times considered as a subject of purely metaphysical research, was classed among the branches of physical science, in the ancient enumeration of the objects of human knowledge. To this identification of two sciences, so extremely dissimilar in the subjects of which they treat, insurmountable objections might easily be stated; but that the arrangement implies in its authors, the justest views of the logical rules applicable in common to both, appears from this obvious consideration, that, in the study of Mind, as well as in that of Matter, the only progress we are

able to make, is by an accurate examination of particular phenomena, and a cautious reference of these to the general laws or rules under which they are...~ comprehended. Accordingly, some modern writers, of the first eminence, have given their decided sanction to this old and almost forgotten classification, in preference to that which has obtained universally in modern Europe.

"The ancient Greek philosophy," says Mr Smith, "was divided into three great branches; Physics, or Natural Philosophy; Ethics, or Mo"ral Philosophy; and Logic."-" This general di"vision," he adds, "seems perfectly agreeable to "the nature of things." Mr Smith afterwards observes," that as the human mind, in whatever its "essence may be supposed to consist, is a part of the great system of the universe, and a part, too, productive of the most important effects, whatever “was taught in the ancient schools of Greece, concerning its nature, made a part of the system of Physics." *

66

Mr Locke, too, in the concluding chapter of his Essay, proposes, as what seemed to him the most general, as well as natural division of the objects of our understanding, an arrangement coinciding exactly with that of the ancients, as explained by Mr Smith in the foregoing passage. To the first branch of science he gives the name of Quoi; to the second, that of Πρακτική; to the third, that of Σημειωτική ; or Λογική ; adding, with respect to the word Φυσική,

* Wealth of Nations, Vol. III. pp. 163, 166, 9th edit.

(or Natural Philosophy), that he employs it to comprehend, not merely the knowledge of Matter and Body, but also of Spirits; the end of this branch being bare speculative truth, and consequently every subject belonging to it, which affords a field of speculative study to the human faculties.

To these authorities may be added that of Dr Campbell, who, after remarking, that "experience "is the principal organ of truth in all the branches "of physiology," intimates, "that he employs this "term to comprehend not merely natural history,

astronomy, geography, mechanics, optics, hydro"statics, meteorology, medicine, chemistry, but also "natural theology and psychology, which," he observes, "have been, in his opinion, most unnatural

ly disjoined from physiology by philosophers."— "Spirit," he adds, "which here comprises only the "Supreme Being and the human Soul, is surely as ❝ much included under the notion of natural object as body is; and is knowable to the philosopher purely in the same way, by observation and expe"rience." *

*Philosophy of Rhetoric, Vol. I. p. 143 (1st edit.)—It were to be wished that Locke and Campbell, in the passages quoted above, had made use of the word mind instead of spirit, which seems to imply a hypothesis concerning the nature or essence of the sentient or thinking principle, altogether unconnected with our conclusions concerning its phenomena and their general laws. For the same reason, I am disposed to object to the words Pneumatology and Psychology; the former of which was introduced by the schoolmen; and the latter, which appears to me equally exceptionable, has been sanctioned by the authority of

In what manner the Philosophy of the Human Mind came to be considered as a branch of metaphysics, and to be classed with the frivolous sciences which are commonly included under the same name, is well known to all who are conversant with literary history. It may be proper, however, to mention here, for the information of some of my readers, that the word Metaphysics is of no older date than the publication of Aristotle's works by Andronicus of Rhodes, one of the learned men into whose hands the manuscripts of that philosopher fell, after they were brought by Sylla from Athens to Rome. To fourteen books in these manuscripts, which had no distinguishing title, Andronicus is said to have prefixed the words, Τα μετα τὰ τα Quaina, either to denote the place which they occupied in Aristotle's own arrangement (immediately after the physics), or to point out that which it appeared to the Editor they ought to hold in the order of study.

;

Notwithstanding the miscellaneous nature of these books, the Peripatetics seem to have considered them as all belonging to one science; the great object of which they conceived to be, first, to treat of those attributes which are common to Matter and to Mind secondly, of things separate from Matter; particularly of GOD, and of the subordinate Minds which they supposed to carry on the physical changes exhibited in the universe. A notion of Metaphysics nearly the same was adopted by the Peripatetics of

some late writers of considerable note; in particular, of Dr. Campbell, and of Dr Beattie.