Philosophical Works of the Late James Frederick Ferrier

Volume 1: Institutes of Metaphysic

INSTITUTES OF METAPHYSIC

THE

THEORY OF KNOWING AND BEING

BY

J. F. FERRIER, A.B., OXON.

PROFESSOR OP MORAL PHILOSOPHY AND POLITICAL ECONOMY, ST ANDREWS

THIRD EDITION

WILLIAM BLACKWOOD AND SONS EDINBURGH AND LONDON MDCCCLXXV

CONTENTS.

Introduction

INSTITUTES OF METAPHYSIC.

INTRODUCTION.

§ 1. Throughout the following work the word "Philosophy," when used by itself, is to be taken as synonymous with speculative science, or "metaphysics," as they are usually termed. What philosophy or metaphysic is, will unfold itself, it is to be hoped, in the sequel. At the outset it is merely necessary to state that, as employed in these pages, the term does not include either natural philosophy or mathematical science, but excludes them expressly from its signification.

§ 2. A system of philosophy is bound by two main requisitions,—it ought to be true, and it ought to be reasoned. If a system of philosophy is not true it will scarcely be convincing; and if it is not reasoned, a man will be as little satisfied with it as a hungry person would be by having his meat served up to him raw. Truth is the ultimate end of philosophy: hence a system of philosophy ought to be true. The formation of reason (as affected by the discharge of its proper function, which is the ascertainment and concatenation of necessary principles and conclusions) is the proximate end of philosophy; hence a system of philosophy ought to be reasoned. Philosophy, therefore, in its ideal perfection, is a body of reasoned truth.

§ 3. Of these obligations the latter is the more it is more proper that philosophy should be reasoned, than that it should be true; because, while truth may perhaps be unattainable by man, to reason is certainly his province, and within his power. In a case where two objects have to be overtaken, it is more incumbent on us to secure the one to which our faculties are certainly competent, than the other, to which they are perhaps inadequate. Besides, no end can be so important for man as the cultivation of his own reason.

§ 4. This consideration determines the value of a system of philosophy. A system is of the highest value only when it embraces both of these requisitions—that is, when it is both true and reasoned. But a system which is reasoned without being true, is always of higher value than a system which is true without being reasoned.

§ 5. The latter kind of system is of no value; because philosophy is "the attainment of truth by the way of reason." That is its definition. A system, therefore, which reaches the truth, but not by the way of reason, is not philosophy at all; it has no scientific worth. No man can be called upon to take truth upon trust at the hands of his brother man. But truth not reasoned is truth proposed upon trust. The best that could be said of such a system would be, that it was better than one which was neither true nor reasoned.

§ 6. Again,—an unreasoned philosophy, even though true, carries no guarantee of its truth. It may be true, but it cannot be certain; because all certainty depends on rigorous evidence—on strict demonstrative proof. Therefore no certainty can attach to the conclusions of an unreasoned philosophy.

§ 7. Further,—the truths of science, in so far as science is a means of intellectual culture, are of no importance in themselves, or considered apart from each other. It is only the study and apprehension of their vital and organic connection which is valuable in an educational point of view. But an unreasoned body of philosophy, however true and formal it may be, has no living and essential interdependency of parts on parts; and is, therefore, useless as a discipline of the mind, and valueless for purposes of tuition.

§ 8. On the other hand, a system which is reasoned, but not true, has always some value. It creates reason by exercising it. It is employing the proper means to reach truth, although it may fail to reach it. Even though its parts may not be true, yet if each of them be a step leading to the final catastrophe—a link in an unbroken chain on which the ultimate disclosure hinges—and if each of the parts be introduced merely because it is such a step or Link,—in that case it is conceived that the system is not without its use, as affording an invigorating employment to the reasoning powers, and that general satisfaction to the mind which the successful extrication of a plot, whether in science or in romance, never fails to communicate.

§ 9. Such a system, although it falls short of the definition of philosophy just given, comes nearer to it than the other; because to reach truth, but not by the way of reason, is to violate the definition in its very essence; whereas to miss truth, but by the way of reason, is to comply with the fundamental circumstance which it prescribes. If there are other ways of reaching truth than the road of reason, a system which enters on any of these other paths, whatever else it may be, is not a system of philosophy in the proper sense of the word.

§ 10. But, as has been said, a system of philosophy ought to be both true in all its positions, and also thoroughly reasoned out in a series of strict demonstrations, which, while each is complete and impregnable in itself, shall present, in their combination, only one large demonstration from the beginning to the end of the work. This, indeed, is the only kind of system to which much value can be assigned, or from which any large intellectual profit can be expected. Philosophical books may be read; philosophical lectures may be listened to; but nothing except a strictly-reasoned system can be either taught or learned.

§ 11. Without offering any opinion as to how far the systems of philosophers may be true, we may affirm with certainty of the whole of them, that they are not reasoned—meaning by "reasoned," an unbroken chain of clear demonstration carried through from their first word to their last. To whatever extent preceding inquirers may have fulfilled one of the requirements of philosophy, they have neglected the more essential and obligatory of the two. And the consequence makes itself heard in a murmur, over the whole world, of deep dissatisfaction, to which the words of the following para may give a faithful, though perhaps feeble, expression.

§ 12. It is a matter of general complaint that, although we have plenty of disputations and dissertations on philosophy, we have no philosophy itself. This is perfectly true. People write about it, and about it; but no one has grasped with an unflinching hand the very thing itself. The whole philosophical literature of the world is more like an unwieldy commentary on some text which has perished, or rather has never existed, than like what a philosophy itself should be. Our philosophical treatises are no more philosophy than Eustathius is Homer, or than Malone is Shakespeare. They are mere partial and desultory annotations on some text, on which, unfortunately, no man can lay his hands, because it nowhere exists. Hence the embroilment of speculation; hence the dissatisfaction, even the despair, of every inquiring mind which turns its attention to metaphysics. There is not now in existence even the shadow of a tribunal to which any point in litigation can be referred. There is not now in existence a single book which lays down with precision and impartiality the Institutes of all metaphysical opinion, and shows the seeds of all speculative controversies. Hence philosophy is not only a war, but it is a war in which none of the combatants understands the grounds either of his own opinion or of that of his adversary; or sees the roots of the side of the question which he is either attacking or defending. The springs by which these disputatious puppets are worked, lie deep out of their own sight. Every doctrine which is either embraced or rejected, is embraced or rejected blindly, and without any insight into its merits; and every blow which is struck, whether for truth or error, is struck ignorantly, and at hap-hazard.

§ 13. This description is no exaggeration; it falls short of the truth. It will readily be believed, not perhaps by philosophers themselves, but by all who, without being philosophers, have endeavoured to obtain some acquaintance with the views of those coy custodiers of the truth. But the fact being certain that the condition of philosophy is such as has been described, or worse, the question is, first, How is this state of matters to be accounted for? and, secondly, How is it to be remedied?

§ 14. First, It is to be accounted for generally by that neglect of the chief requisition of philosophy which has been already pointed out—by the circum , namely, that philosophy is not reasoned. What is meant by "reasoned" can scarcely be well explained except by the thing itself being done. The body of this work, therefore, is referred to for a practical and detailed exemplification of the term. Any general observations would probably teach the reader nothing but what he already knows, and would only retard, without enlightening his progress. Strict reasoning, like everything else, is best explained, not by being explained, but by being done. The unsatisfactory state, then, of philosophy is to be accounted for generally by the circumstance that philosophy is not reasoned.

§ 15. So long as philosophy is not strictly reasoned out from the very beginning, no cessation of controversy can be expected; and not only can no armistice be expected—nothing but misunderstandings can prevail. All the captains are sailing on different tacks, under different orders, and under different winds; and each is railing at the others, because they will not keep the same course with himself. More than that,—there is not a single controversy in philosophy in which the antagonists are playing at the same game. The one man is playing at chess, his adversary is playing against him at billiards; and whenever a victory is achieved, or a defeat sustained, it is always such a victory as a billiard-player might be supposed to gain over a chess , or such a defeat as a billiard-player might be supposed to sustain at the hands of a chess-player. These incongruous contests are entirely attributable to the circumstance that philosophy has not been reasoned out from the bottom, and that the disputants have no common question before them on which they have joined issue.

§ 16. As time has advanced, it has constantly sped worse with philosophy, instead of speeding better. This could not be otherwise: to carry forward a pure science, the first principles of which are not thoroughly ascertained, and to carry it forward by other means than that of strict demonstration, is only to add layer after layer to the winding-clothes which already cover up the truth; it is only to add another coating to the infinite litterings of the Augean stable, whose pavement no son of Adam can get down to. Every question in philosophy is the mask of another question; and all these masking and masked questions require to be removed and laid aside, until the ultimate but truly first question has been reached. Then, but not till then, is it possible to decipher and resolve the outside mask, and all those below it, which come before us in the first instance. Instead, however, of removing these successive masks, each succeeding inquirer undertakes to unriddle the outermost one off-hand; and the consequence is, that, so far from resolving it, he puts over it a new coating of paint, and thus leaves the original masks covered over with an additional stratum of concealing visors, by which the first difficulty of attaining to the truth is very considerably augmented. So that now no question comes before the world which does not present many disguises, both natural and artificial, worn one above another; and these false-faces are continually increasing. Does matter exist or not? People actually think that that is, or ever was, a question in philosophy. It is only the outer-case masking a multiplicity of masks, which would all require to be removed before even a glimpse of the true question can be obtained. Another phantom is a mask, or rather a whole toy-shop of masks, which philosophers have been pleased to call the "Absolute;" but what they exactly mean by this name—what it is that is under these trappings,—neither those who run down the incognito, nor those who speak it fair, have ever condescended to inform us. Indeed, it may be affirmed with certainty that no man, for at least two thousand years, has seen the true flesh-and-blood countenance of a single philosophical problem.

§ 17. But how is that to be accounted for? It is to be accounted for by the circumstance, that men have supposed that in philosophy they could advance by going forwards; whereas the truth is, that they can advance only by going, in a manner, backwards. We have tried to get to the end, without having first got to the beginning. Philosophers aimed at the solution of problems, before they had got in hand the elements of their solution. The true state of the case is this: The world of speculation, like the physical globe, is rounded to a sphere, but a sphere of more gigantic compass and more difficult circumnavigation than any which the whole natural universe can show. The primitive articles of all thought, the seminal principles of all reason, the necessary constituents of all knowledge, the keys of all truth, lie, at first, buried under our very feet; but, as yet, we are not privileged to find them. We must first circumnavigate the globe; the whole world of speculation must be traversed by our weary feet. Hence every step forward carries us only farther and farther from the mark. Ere long the elements of truth—all that we are indistinctly looking for—lie in the far-distant rear, while we vainly think that we behold them glimmering on the horizon in our front. We have left them behind us, though we know it not—like decaying camp-fires, like deserted household gods. We still keep moving onwards in a direction which is, at once, wrong and right—wrong, because every step leads us farther and farther from the truth; right, because it is our doom. Every new halt increases our confusion, our consternation, and our dismay. Our hearts may sink within us when we cross the line on the shoreless sea of speculation. At the antipodes the clouds of doubt may settle dark upon our path, and the tempests of despair may cause our fortitude to quail; but, vestigia nulla restrorsum, there is no drawing back for us now. We are embarked on an irrevocable mission; let us press forward then—let us carry through. The intellectual, like the physical world, is a round; and at the moment when the wanderer imagines himself farthest from the house of Humanity, he will find himself at home. He has revolved to the spot of his nativity. He is again surrounded by the old familiar things. But familiarity has been converted into insight; the toils of speculation have made him strong; and the results of speculation have made him wise. He is now privileged to dig up the keys of truth, and to see, and to show to others, the very seeds of reason. He now beholds the great universe of God in the light of a second illumination, which is far purer and far less troubled than the first. Philosophy and common sense are reconciled.

§ 18. The unreasoned and generally unsatisfactory state of philosophy is to be explained by the circumstance, that no inquirer has ever yet got to the beginning; and this, again, is to be accounted for by a fact for which no man is answerable, but which is inherent in the very constitution of things—the circumstance, namely, that things which are first in the order of nature are last in the order of knowledge. This consideration, while it frees all human beings from any degree of blame, serves to explain why the rudiments of philosophy should still be to seek, and why speculation should have exhibited so many elaborate, although unreasoned and ungrounded, productions, while its very alphabet was in arrear. This view may be the better of some illustration.

§ 19. First principles of every kind have their influence, and indeed operate largely and powerfully, long before they come to the surface of human thought and are articulately expounded. This is more particularly exemplified in the case of language. The principles of grammar lie at the root of all languages, and preside over their formation. But these principles do their work in the dark. No man's intellect traces their secret operation, while the language is being moulded by their control. Yet the mind of every man, who uses the language with propriety and effect, is imbued with these principles, although he has no knowledge of their existence. Their practice and their influence are felt long before their presence and their existence are perceived. The operative agencies of language are hidden; its growth is imperceptible.

" Crescit occulto, velut arbor, ævo."

Like a tree, unobserved through the solitudes of a thousand years, up grows the mighty stem, and the mighty branches of a magnificent speech. No man saw the seed planted—no eye noticed the infant sprouts—no mortal hand watered the nursling of the grove—no register was kept of the gradual widening of its girth, or of the growing circumference of its shade—till, the deciduous dialects of surrounding barbarians dying out, the unexpected bole stands forth in all its magnitude, carrying aloft in its foliage the poetry, the history, and the philosophy of a heroic people, and dropping for ever over the whole civilized world the fruits of Grecian literature and art.

§ 20. It is always very late in the day before the seminal principles of speech are detected and explained. Indeed, the language which owed to them both birth and growth may have ceased to be a living tongue before these, the regulating elements of its formation, come to light, and are embodied in written grammars. That most elementary species of instruction which we familiarly term the A, B, C, had no express or articulate existence in the minds, or on the lips, of men, until thousands of years after the invention and employment of language; yet these, the vital constituents of all speech, were there from the beginning.

§ 21. Logic is another instance. Men reasoned, generation after generation, long before they knew a single dialectical rule, or had any notion of the construction of the syllogism. The principles of logic were operative in every ratiocination, yet the reasoner was incognisant of their influence until Aristotle anatomised the process, and gave out the law of thought in its more obvious and ordinary workings. Whether Aristotle's rudiments of logic have not an antecedent rudiments—which time may yet bring to light—is a somewhat unsettled problem in speculation.

§ 22. The same analogy may be observed, to a large extent, in the formation of our civil laws. The laws which hold society together, operate with the force of instincts, and after the manner of vague traditions, long before they are digested into written tables. The written code does not create the law; it merely gives a distinct promulgation, and a higher degree of authority, to certain floating principles which had operated on people's practice antecedently. Laws, in short, exist, and bind society, long before they exist as established, or even as known laws. They have an occult and implied influence, before they obtain a manifest and systematic form. They come early in the order of nature, but late in the order of knowledge; early in the order of action, but late in the order of thinking; early in the order of practice, but late in the order of theory.

§ 23. So in regard to philosophy. Its principles, like all other principles—like the elements of every science and of every art—though first in the order of nature, are last in the order of intelligence; only there is this difference between philosophy and all other creations, that its principles, being the earliest birth of time, are therefore among the very last that shall be completely extricated from the masses in which they lie imbedded. They force man's general powers forward into the light; for themselves, they shrink back, and keep aloof from observation. The invariable rule seems to be, that what is earliest in the progress of existence is latest in the progress of discovery—a consideration which might lead us to suppose that all science can advance only by going, in a manner, backwards, or rather by coming round; that the infinite future can alone comprehend or interpret the secrets of the infinite past; and that the apotheosis and final triumph of human reason will be, when, after having traversed the whole cycle of thought, she returns—enriched only with a deeper insight and a clearer consciousness—to be merged in the glorious innocence of her primitive and inspired incunabula.

§ 24. These considerations may serve to explain, to some extent at least, how it happens that the venerable science of metaphysics should, even thus late in the day, be without any articulate exposition of its most elementary principles. The very circumstance that these principles are elementary, both necessitates and explains the lateness of their appearance. But although no such institutional work exists, we are not to suppose that these principles have been powerless, inert, or non-existent; on the contrary, they have been living seeds which have germinated in luxuriant produce in the minds of all great thinkers, from Pythagoras downwards. But it is certain that these elements, though never dormant, have worked for the most part in secresy and in silence. They nestle away out of sight with wonderful pertinacity; hence nobody knows what they are, and nobody can be told what they are, except by their being shown to him, not in a book about philosophy, but in a reasoned work which is itself philosophy. All preliminary explanations of philosophy and its principles must be more or less insufficient. Farther on, however, in this introduction, the more important initial points of philosophy shall be discussed and adjusted. Meanwhile it may be said, in a very few words, that by the principles, the elements, the rudiments of our science, are meant in particular, its one and sole starting-point, its end or object, its business in this world, what it has to do, why it has to do it, and how it does it. These matters, though early in the order of nature, have been late in the order of science. They are the preliminary steps of metaphysic, yet the world has been very slow in finding them out. They are the antediluvian germs, the pre-formations of philosophy, yet they have never been distinctly brought to light. There cannot be a doubt that the mind of Plato was imbued with a profound sense of the object or business of speculative science, that he had a dim intuition of the necessary principles of all reason, and of all existence. But these objects wavered before his view; they refused to form themselves into shape. They rather overshadowed him from behind, with the awe of a brooding and mysterious presence, than rose up in front of him, like a beautiful countenance, whose lineaments were decipherable and clear.

§ 25. Hence philosophy is nowhere a body of intellectual light, a scheme of demonstrated truth, from the beginning to the end. It could not be such, unless philosophy had possessed a distinct perception of what she had to do, and a steady comprehension of the means of doing it. But philosophy could not possess this insight so long as she lived passive and unconscious under the presidency of her own principles, instead of getting the upper hand of them, and thus obtaining an intelligent survey of their whole scope and operation. It was not enough that the elementary truths, the instigating motives of speculative inquiry, should have secretly influenced the formation of philosophy. It was necessary that the secret influence of these truths and motives should be no longer secret but manifest, before philosophy could go forth fully instructed in the causes of her own being—fully cognisant of the purpose for which she had come into the world, and completely armed with the weapons of universal intellectual conquest. But this consummation was not possible, until a comparatively late period in the career of speculation; for that which is first in time is last in science. Hence philosophy has continued to be a body of opinions not reasoned out from the beginning—of opinions which, even when they seem most obvious and most true, are not entitled to the name of intelligible; because, in strict science, nothing, properly speaking, is intelligible unless it is supported by rigorous demonstration, or is a necessary intuition of reason.

§ 26. It is further to be observed, in explanation of the deficiencies of philosophy, as shown in its unreasoned character, that from an early period there has been a powerful tendency at work, counteracting the proper efforts of speculative thought. This tendency displays itself in the determination, strongly manifested in certain quarters of late years, but certainly far from being triumphant, to limit the strictly necessary truths of reason to the smallest possible amount—to confine them to the pure mathematics, if not to explode them even here. This is an interesting question; but, like all others, it can be effectually settled, not by general observations, but only by the production of the subjects in dispute—that is, the necessary truths themselves. These will appear in their proper places. Meanwhile all enlarged argument in their defence, and all detailed explanation of their character, must be avoided, as our purpose at present merely is, to point out the retarding causes of speculation, of which the discountenance thrown on the necessary truths of reason has been undoubtedly one, and one of the most influential.

§ 27. A few observations, however, may here be offered, in elucidation of what is meant by necessary truth. A necessary truth or law of reason is a truth or law the opposite of which is inconceivable, contradictory, nonsensical, impossible; more shortly, it is a truth, in the fixing of which nature had only one alternative, be it positive or negative. Nature might have fixed that the sun should go round the earth, instead of the earth round the sun; at least we see nothing in that supposition which is contradictory and absurd. Either alternative was equally possible. But nature could not have fixed that two straight lines should, in any circumstances, enclose a space; for this involves a contradiction.

§ 28. The logical "law of identity or contradiction," as it is called, is the general expression and criterion of all necessary truth. This law may be best exhibited by carrying it a point higher than is usually done. The law is, that a thing must be what it is. A is A. Suppose that the denier of all necessary truth, and consequently of this proposition, were to say—"No; a thing need not be what it is;" the rejoinder is—" Then your proposition, that a thing need not be what it is, need not be what it is. It may be a statement to directly the opposite effect. Which of the statements, then, is it? Is it a proposition which affirms that a thing need not be what it is, or a proposition declaratory of the very contrary?" "It is a proposition to the former effect," says he. "But how can I know that? If a thing need not be what it is, why need your proposition (which, of course, is something) be what it is? Why may it not be a declaration that a thing is and must be what it is? Give me some guarantee that it is not the latter proposition, or I cannot possibly take it up. I cannot know what it means, for it may have two meanings." The man is speechless. He cannot give me any guarantee. He must take for granted that his proposition, when he proposes it, is and must be what it is. This is all we want. The law of contradiction thus vindicates itself. It cannot be denied without being assented to, for the person who denies it must assume that he is denying it; in other words, he must assume that he is saying what he is saying, and he must admit that the contrary supposition—to wit, that he is saying what he is not saying—involves a contradiction. Thus the law is established. It proves the existence of, at any rate, one necessary truth or law of reason; and if there can be one, why can there not be many? Indeed, the law of contradiction is not so much one special necessary truth, as the generalisation or general form, and exponent of all ideas (and their name is legion) whose opposites involve a mental contradiction. The reader need scarcely be informed that the law of contradiction has no worth or merit of its own. Looked at in itself, it is trivial beyond triviality. It is merely convenient, as an abbreviated expression for the criterion of all necessary truth, the test being—do their opposites involve a mental contradiction?—are their opposites at variance with the law which declares that A is A? If they are—if they are equivalent to a denial that a thing is what it is—then the truths in question are necessary; if they do not involve this contradiction, the truths in question are contingent.

§ 29. A short but important observation may here be made, that ready acceptance, instantaneous acquiescence, is not the criterion of necessary truth, although it is very generally regarded as such. Our whole natural thinking, as shall be distinctly proved in the body of this work, consists of a series of judgments, each of which involves a mental contradiction,—in other words, controverts a necessary truth or law of reason. But certainly it is not to be expected either that these judgments should be seen to present contradictions the moment they are uttered, or that the ideas of reason by which they are supplanted should be instantaneously acquiesced in as necessary. All important necessary truths require a much longer time, and a much more sedulous contemplation, to obtain the assent of human intelligence than do the contingent ones.