It was during the early period of Hutcheson's career, that Scotland gave birth to two minds of a very different order indeed, but both destined to acquire a European reputation, and to exert a very considerable influence upon their age. David Hume was born in the year 1711, and although he is by no means to be classed either with the Scotch or English school of philosophy, yet we just mention his name, in passing, as belonging to this period, inasmuch as the succeeding progress of speculative philosophy in Scotland, as well as in some other countries, was in no small degree owing to his writings.

Leaving, then, with this bare reference, the further consideration of Hume's sceptical principles to the next chapter, we proceed to mention the other author above referred to-I mean Adam Smith, the father of political science, who was born at Kirkcaldy, A.D. 1725. The reputation of this celebrated author rests chiefly upon his "Enquiry into the Wealth of Nations," (a department of science with which we have at present nothing to

ship of Archbishop King (the author of the work on the "Origin of Evil;") and probably decided his future course. In 1828 he pub

lished a second Treatise on the "Nature and Conduct of the Passions," which was followed by his being chosen Prof. of Moral Phil. in Glasgow. His "Synopsis Metaphysicæ," and "Philosophiæ Moralis Institutio," were written as text-books for the class. His most complete and elaborate work, entitled "System of Moral Philosophy," appeared after his death. The views which are therein propounded on the nature of virtue, &c., follow closely those of Shaftesbury. An interesting biography of the author is appended, by Dr Leechman.

do;) his name, however, has found a lasting place amongst pure philosophical writers from his wellknown " Theory of Moral Sentiments."1 Smith may be regarded as the first great investigator of Man's sympathetic affections; for although it is probable, that he hardly found a single mind ready to coincide in his view of the moral sentiments as arising from this source, yet it is pretty certain, that there never was an intelligent reader who arose from the perusal of his work without admiring the beauty of the analysis, and being enlightened by many side-views it affords us of the complicated working of the human feelings. It is true we should not attribute to Smith the merit of taking any decisive step in speculative philosophy, or of aiding, by any direct results, its further development; but by the brightness of his genius, the elegance of his mind, and the charm of his style, he gave a very decided spur to the pursuit of philosophy generally, and filled a place in the metaphysical history of his country, which must ever be taken into consideration, if we would estimate the whole progress of that history aright.2

1 The student who may not wish to follow the development of this celebrated theory through an 8vo volume, is referred to Brown's Lectures on the Philosophy of the Mind, where in lectures 80 and 81 he will find an elegant and lucid statement of the whole subject:

2 The whole works of Adam Smith were published at London in 1812, in five vols. 8vo. The first contains his "Theory of Moral Sentiments." The next three vols. contain the "Wealth of Nations ;" and the last comprehends his miscellaneous Essays, with an account of his life and writings by Dugald Stewart.

But the coryphæus of the rising school of Scotch metaphysics was Dr Reid, who was born at Strachan, April 26th, 1710. The philosophy of Reid is too well known in this country to need here any lengthy analysis, and we shall therefore only devote a very few pages, in order to explain the spirit in which it commenced, the principle on which it proceeded, and the results to which we may fairly admit that it has conducted. Notwithstanding all that Dr Brown has attempted to prove to the contrary,' it must be allowed that the state of mental philosophy on the subject of perception up to the time of Reid, was, to say the least, extremely indefinite and confused. That Descartes rejected the ideal system, as propounded by Aristotle, and held by the scholastics, there can be no doubt; but it is equally clear that he did not admit the possibility of our comprehending anything respecting material objects and their qualities, excepting so far as our perceptions, in some sense or other, represent those qualities. That Locke held the same opinion, we have already proved, since indeed the very foundation principle of his philosophy is, that all things about which the understanding is conversant are

2

1 Lectures 25 and 26.

2 The doctrine of occasional causes is not opposed, as some assert, (Pros. Rev. No. viii.), to the theory of representationalism. Descartes held both; he held that divine power was employed in giving us representations of primary qualities. What else can be the meaning of his doctrine, that whatever we find in our ideas, must be in the external things? See on this point Reid's Essays. Essay II. chap. 4. Also Sir W. Hamilton's Dissertation to Reid's works, p. 832.

ideas, and that these ideas are the subjective representatives of objective realities. The use which Berkeley made of this doctrine, it is well known, was to shake our faith in the existence of the material world; and Hume, carrying his scepticism one step further, employed the very same principle to undermine the whole solid fabric of human belief, as will be shown more at large hereafter.

Reid, in his early life, had been a complete believer in this representative theory, and had leaned strongly to Berkeleianism, as the natural result; but when Mr Hume's "Treatise on Human Nature" came forth to the world, and he saw the consequences to which the whole theory must ultimately tend, he began to inquire within himself whether that theory were really a true one. This inquiry, according to his own account, he carried on perpetually for above forty years, and never could gain any affirmative evidence on the question, except the mere dictum of philosophers.'

The great aim of Reid's philosophy, then, was to investigate the true theory of perception; to controvert the representationalist hypothesis, as held in one sense or another by almost all preceding philosophers; and to stay the progress which scepticism, aided by this hypothesis, was so rapidly making. The course which he follows in order to accomplish this purpose is, first of all to prove that there is no possibility of our tracing the

Stewart's account of the Life and Writings of Reid.

real process of sensation and perception in the human mind at all; that the ideal system of Aristotle is, accordingly, an hypothesis totally unfounded; and that the modification of it which we find in the philosophy of Descartes, Locke, and others, is equally void of proof. That there exists, on the one hand, the mind-the subject which perceives-we are perfectly conscious; and that there exists, on the other hand, the object-the thing which is perceived-we know by a similar testimony; but that there exists any intermediate link or representation by which the two communicate, we have no evidence, either from the testimony of consciousness, or from any other kind of demonstration. In place, therefore, of attempting to account for the mutual influence of mind and matter upon one another, he points us to certain intuitive and original principles of belief, which it is impossible to doubt without incurring the charge of absurdity. When, for example, we see a house or a tree, we not only have the simple apprehension of a phenomenon by virtue of the sensation produced, but we are led, by the very nature of the mind, to form certain judgments respecting it, such as-that an object really exists, that it has a certain form, and is of a given magnitude, &c., judgments which are necessarily implied in, and united to the sensation itself, and which, according to our constitution, we cannot possibly reject. These original and irresistible judgments, he maintains, are a part of the natural furniture of the under