into the deep sea, and found that mind was a figment also. If the substratum' in which material phenomena are supposed to inhere could be denied, because not founded on experience, so, for the same reason, the substratum (mind) which supports the 'impressions' might be denied. Substance is an aggregate of impressions and ideas. Belief is nothing but a strong and lively idea derived from a present impression related to it. Nothing is a subject of belief, that is not at the moment vividly impressed, and everything that chances to be so impressed is worthy of acceptance.

Hume, then, concluding from admitted premises, logically reduced philosophy to the singular dilemma of either refuting the sceptical arguments or of declaring itself to be vain and baseless. He tried the strength of human reason, and exposed its feebleness:

The observation of human blindness and weakness is the result of all philosophy, and meets us at every turn, in spite of our endeavors to elude or avoid it.'

Do not essay the incomprehensible. You know all that directly concerns you, with a certainty sufficient for all your wants; but if you push your speculations farther, and attempt to fathom the mysteries of being, you end in that soundless and shoreless gulf which yawns as the terminal road of all consistent metaphysics,Scepticism, belief in nothing, doubt in all. With how wise a sadness does Plato say of such ambitions: 'In these things, we must reach one of two results: either learn and discover how the fact really stands; or else, should this be impossible, at least take up with the best and most incontrovertible belief respecting it; and then, borne upon this as in a skiff, venture the voyage of life, unless we can find a securer and less hazardous passage on the firm support of some Divine Word.'

What, it may still be asked, was Hume's real belief? He explicitly declares that we do believe, and cannot help believing, though in the last analysis we can give no reason for our belief:

'The sceptic still continues to reason and believe, even though he asserts that he cannot defend his reason by reason.'

But what points of support had this traveller with his fatal unrest? Did he carry his theoretical scepticism into his inner life? It must be confessed that while seeking an answer to this question, we have more than once been reminded of the famous

no unimportant feature of his history; but unhappily, in the present instance, little or no light can be shed upon the question. He frequently discusses the passion of love, divides it into its elements as systematically as if he were subjecting it to a chemical analysis; lays down rules regarding it as if it were a system of logic: but the mood of mind in which passions are analyzed is not that in which they are strongly felt. We suspect that, while he had a superficial admiration of women in general, he had not the depth of emotional power to be profoundly influenced by any in particular; and the suspicion is strengthened by his own declaration on hearing of the infatuation of a nobleman, whose eyes, withdrawn from severe study, had opened in a fatal moment upon the charms of a merchant's daughter of sixteen:

They say many small fevers prevent a great one. Heaven be praised that I have always liked the persons and company of the fair sex for by that means I hope to escape such ridiculous passions."

Gayety of temper, which is usually accompanied with frivolous qualities of mind, was in him coupled with extensive learning, profound thought, severe application, and a general earnestness of spirit. In his last illness, a spectator of the past, facing the infinite Silence, he communed with himself:

'I am, or rather was, . . . a man of mild disposition, of command of temper, of an open, social, and cheerful humor, capable of attachment, but little susceptible of enmity, and of great moderation in all my passions. Even my love of literary fame, my ruling passion, never soured my temper, notwithstanding my frequent disappointments. My company was not unacceptable to the young and careless, as well as to the studious and literary; and as I took a particular pleasure in the company of modest women, I had no reason to be displeased with the reception I met with from them. In a word, though most men, anywise eminent, have found reason to complain of Calumny, I never was touched, or even attacked, by her baleful tooth; and though I wantonly exposed myself to the rage of both civil and religious factions, they seemed to be disarmed in my behalf of their wonted fury.'

Rank. An accomplished reasoner, an original, profound, and fearless thinker, more remarkable for depth than for erudition. As a philosopher, the greatest in the school of materialism; as a historian, the first to treat the sequence of historical events in a philosophical manner; as a man, one of the leaders of the race.

Locke had shown that all knowledge is the product of experi ence. Berkeley, admitting the truth of the statement, had shown that since we can know nothing but our own ideas, matter, as unknown and unknowable, must be pronounced a figment. Hume, taking up the line where Berkeley had cast it, flung it once more

necessity, has determined us to judge as well as to breathe and feel; nor can we any more forbear viewing certain objects in a stronger and fuller light upon account of their customary connection with a present impression, than we can hinder ourselves from thinking as long as we are awake, or seeing the surrounding bodies when we turn our eyes towards them in broad sunshine. Whoever has taken the pains to refute the cavils of this total skepticism, has really disputed without an antagonist, and endeavored by arguments to establish a faculty which Nature has antecedently implanted in the mind and rendered unavoidable. But as experience will sufficiently convince any one that, although he finds no error in my arguments, yet he still continues to believe and think and reason as usual, he may safely conclude that his reasoning and belief is some sensation or peculiar manner of conception, which 'tis impossible for mere ideas and reflections to destroy.'

Was he an Atheist? Is there a God? Is there, behind the veil, some power analogous to human intelligence?—

Though the stupidity of men, barbarous and uninstructed, be so great that they may not see a Sovereign Author in the more obvious works of nature to which they are familiarized; yet it scarcely seems possible that any one of good understanding should reject that idea when once it is suggested to him. A purpose, an intimation, a design, is evident in everything, and when our comprehension is so far enlarged as to contemplate the first rise of this visible system, we must adopt with the strongest conviction the idea of some intelligent cause or author.'

Yes, we must believe, though our belief cannot be imprisoned in formulæ or condensed into demonstrations. At the end of all discussions we come to the inscrutable:

The whole is a riddle, an enigma, an inexplicable mystery. Doubt, uncertainty, suspense of judgment, appear the only result of our most accurate scrutiny concerning this subject.'

We must have a standard of achievement, too; one great object to be kept forever in view. Domitian may chase flies, Rufus may hunt wild beasts, Alexander may conquer kingdoms, but the student is inspired by another ideal, not a dream of conquest nor the palling pleasures of sense, but a reality of character; stoical, severe, reaching above the storm-line into the heaven of calm dominion:

In vain do you seek repose from beds of roses. In vain do you hope for enjoyment from the most delicious wines and fruits. Your indolence itself becomes a fatigue. Your pleasure itself creates disgust. The mind, unexercised, finds every delight insipid and loathsome; and ere yet the body, full of noxious humours, feels the torment of its multiplied diseases, your nobler part is sensible of the invading poison, and seeks in vain to relieve its anxiety by new pleasures, which still augment the fatal malady. As much as the wildest savage is inferior to the polished citizen, who, under the protection of laws, enjoys every convenience which industry has invented; so much is this citizen himself inferior to the man of virtue and the true philosopher, who governs his appetites, subordinates his passions, and has learned from reason to set a just value on every pursuit and enjoyment.'

One capital defect narrowed Hume's field of vision,-a cold, unimaginative temperament. It appears in his sentiments; in

the mechanism of his language, polished as marble, cold as marble, too; in Philosophy, where he works with human nature. as an anatomist, who feels that his minute examinations might be injured by any burst of feeling or eloquence; in History, where, naturally opposed to turbulence and enthusiasm, he as naturally leans toward despotism, intolerant of liberty among actors, though he wished it to be fearless and unrestrained among thinkers. No hatred of oppression burns in his pages, no yearning love of man glows there, no stirring sympathy with the restless human soul, no just appreciation of the religious instinct in directing the course of public events. A second defect was his disregard of facts, a negligence which proceeded not from an indifference to truth, for he was an ardent lover of it, nor from a 'constitutional indolence,' which is the usual account, but from his devotion to ideas.

Influence. He was a nettle, and aroused thinkers to unwonted activity.

In Philosophy, before submitting to be gored by either horn of the dilemma to which Hume had reduced it, men looked about to see if there were any possible avenue of escape. The result was the birth of two great schools of thought, the Common Sense, and the Transcendental: the first an appeal, for guidance, to the consciousness of mankind; the second, an attempt to ascertain whether we have any ideas independent of experience, ideas which may be called universal, necessary, and certain.

In Theology, he produced expansion. The foundations of Christianity were deepened and broadened. Its spirit became more liberal and enlightened.

In Ethics, he was the first to give to the utilities the aspect of a theoretical system which to-day is so extensively applied to the successful guidance of daily life, though it discovers not the farreaching light of eternity.

In Political Economy, he was the first to declare the principles of Free Trade. He told-what the politicians of his time despised, but what those of our time are teaching '— that all commodities are bought by labor, that the question for international legislation was one, not of rivalry, but of coöperation.

1 Mr. Hume is, beyond all doubt, the author of the modern doctrines which now rule the world of science.-Lord Brougham.

necessity, has determined us to judge as well as to breathe and feel; nor can we any more forbear viewing certain objects in a stronger and fuller light upon account of their customary connection with a present impression, than we can hinder ourselves from thinking as long as we are awake, or seeing the surrounding bodies when we turn our eyes towards them in broad sunshine. Whoever has taken the pains to refute the cavils of this total skepticism, has really disputed without an antagonist, and endeavored by arguments to establish a faculty which Nature has antecedently implanted in the mind and rendered unavoidable. But as experience will sufficiently convince any one that, although he finds no error in my arguments, yet he still continues to believe and think and reason as usual, he may safely conclude that his reasoning and belief is some sensation or peculiar manner of conception, which 'tis impossible for mere ideas and reflections to destroy.'

Was he an Atheist? Is there a God? Is there, behind the veil, some power analogous to human intelligence?—

Though the stupidity of men, barbarous and uninstructed, be so great that they may not see a Sovereign Author in the more obvious works of nature to which they are familiarized; yet it scarcely seems possible that any one of good understanding should reject that idea when once it is suggested to him. A purpose, an intimation, a design, is evident in everything, and when our comprehension is so far enlarged as to contemplate the first rise of this visible system, we must adopt with the strongest conviction the idea of some intelligent cause or author.'

Yes, we must believe, though our belief cannot be imprisoned in formulæ or condensed into demonstrations. At the end of all discussions we come to the inscrutable:

• The whole is a riddle, an enigma, an inexplicable mystery. Doubt, uncertainty, suspense of judgment, appear the only result of our most accurate scrutiny concerning this subject.'

We must have a standard of achievement, too; one great object to be kept forever in view. Domitian may chase flies, Rufus may hunt wild beasts, Alexander may conquer kingdoms, but the student is inspired by another ideal, not a dream of conquest nor the palling pleasures of sense, but a reality of character; stoical, severe, reaching above the storm-line into the heaven of calm dominion:

In vain do you seek repose from beds of roses. In vain do you hope for enjoyment from the most delicious wines and fruits. Your indolence itself becomes a fatigue. Your pleasure itself creates disgust. The mind, unexercised, finds every delight insipid and loathsome; and ere yet the body, full of noxious humours, feels the torment of its multiplied diseases, your nobler part is sensible of the invading poison, and seeks in vain to relieve its anxiety by new pleasures, which still augment the fatal malady.' 'As much as the wildest savage is inferior to the polished citizen, who, under the protection of laws, enjoys every convenience which industry has invented; so much is this citizen himself inferior to the man of virtue and the true philosopher, who governs his appetites, subordinates his passions, and has learned from reason to set a just value on every pursuit and enjoyment.'

One capital defect narrowed Hume's field of vision,—a cold, unimaginative temperament. It appears in his sentiments; in