word to which I allude is that very tremendous one of Metaphysics; which, in a lecture on Moral Philosophy, seems likely to produce as much alarm as the cry of fire in a crowded play-house, when Belvidera is left to weep by herself, and every one saves himself in the best manner he can. I must beg my audience, however, to sit quiet, till they hear what can be said in defence of Metaphysics, and in the mean time to make use of the language which the manager would probably adopt on such an occasion,—I can assure ladies and gentlemen, there is not the smallest degree of danger.

The term Metaphysics has no sort of relation to its meaning; and various attempts have been made to substitute a more appropriate word in its place, hitherto without success. Psychology, and Pneumatology, are both candidate expressions for filling this vacancy in our language; but though no objections can be stated to either, they have neither of them fairly got into circulation (even among the few who, by cultivating this science, have acquired a right to adjust the language in which it is taught); but by whatever name the science of the human mind is signified, it has precisely the same foundation in reality that any science conversant with the properties of matter can have. The existence of mind is as much a matter of fact as the existence of matter: it is as true that men remember, as that oxygen united to carbon makes carbonic acid. I am as sure that anger, and affection, are principles of the human mind, as I am, that grubs make cockchafers; or of any of those great truths which botanists teach of lettuces and cauliflowers. The same patient observation, and the same caution in inferring, are as necessary for the establishment of truth in this science as in any other: rash hypothesis misleads as much, modest diligence repays as well. Whatever has been done for this philosophy has been done by the inductive method only; and to that alone, it must look for all the improvement

of which it is capable. So that those who would cast a ridicule upon Metaphysics, or the intellectual part of Moral Philosophy, as if it were vague and indefinite in its object, must either contend that we have no faculties at all, and that no general facts are to be observed concerning them, or they must allow to this science an equal precision with that which any other can claim.

A great deal of unpopularity has been incurred by this science from the extravagances or absurdities of those who have been engaged in it. When the mass of mankind hear that all thought is explained by vibrations and vibratiuncles of the brain,- that there is no such thing as a material world, that what mankind consider as their arms, and legs, are not arms and legs, but ideas accompanied with the notion of outness,—that we have not only no bodies, but no minds;-that we are nothing, in short, but currents of reflection and sensation; all this, I admit, is well calculated to approximate, in the public mind, the ideas of lunacy and intellectual philosophy. But if it be fair to argue against a science, from the bad method in which it is prosecuted, such a mode of reasoning ought to have influenced mankind centuries ago to have abandoned all the branches of physics, as utterly hopeless. I have surely an equal right to rake up the mouldy errors of all the other sciences; to reproach astronomy with its vortices, chemistry with its philosopher's stone,history with its fables, law with its cruelty, and ignorance; and if I were to open this battery against medicine, I do not know where I should stop. Zinzis Khan, when he was most crimsoned with blood, never slaughtered the human race as they have been slaughtered by rash and erroneous theories of medicine.

If there be a real foundation for this science, if observation can do any thing, and has not done all, there is room for hope, and reason for exertion. The extravagances by which it has been disgraced, ought to warn

us of the difficulty, without leading us to despair. To say there is no path, because we have often got into the wrong path, puts an end to all other knowledge as well as to this.

The truth is, it fares worse with this science than with many others, because its errors and extravagances are comprehended by so many. If you tell a man that the ground on which he stamps is not ground, but an idea, he naturally enough thinks you mad. If the same person were told that the planets were rolled about in whirlpools, or that the moon, as Descartes thought, was once a sun,—such a person, who would laugh at the former, might hear these latter opinions advanced, without being struck with their absurdity. Every man is not necessarily an astronomer, but every man has some acquaintance with the operations of his own mind; and you cannot deviate grossly from the truth on these subjects, without incurring his ridicule, and reprehension. This perhaps is one cause why errors of this nature have been somewhat unduly magnified.

Scepticism, which is commonly laid to the charge of this philosophy, may, in the first place, be fairly said to have done its worst. Bishop Berkeley destroyed this world in one volume octavo; and nothing remained after his time, but mind; which experienced a similar fate from the hand of Mr. Hume in 1737;-so that, with all the tendency to destroy, there remains nothing left for destruction: but I would fain ask if there be any one human being, from the days of Protagoras the Abderite to this present hour, who was ever for a single instant a convert to these subtle and ingenious follies? Is there any one out of Bedlam who doubts of the existence of matter? who doubts of his own personal identity? or of his consciousness? or of the general credibility of memory? Men talk on such subjects from ostentation, or because such wire-drawn speculations are an agree able exercise to them; but they are perpetually recalled

by the necessary business and the inevitable feelings of life to sound and sober opinions on these subjects. Errors, to be dangerous, must have a great deal of truth mingled with them; it is only from this alliance that they can ever obtain an extensive circulation: from pure extravagance, and genuine, unmingled falsehood, the world never has, and never can sustain any mischief. It is not in our power to believe all that we please; our belief is modified and restrained by the nature of our faculties, and by the constitution of the objects by which we are surrounded. We may believe any thing for a moment, but we shall soon be lashed out of our impertinence, by hard and stubborn realities. A great philosopher may sit in his study, and deny the existence of matter; but if he goes to take a walk in the streets he must take care to leave his theory behind him. Pyrrho said there was no such thing as pain; and he saw no proof that there were such things as carts, and wagons; and he refused to get out of their way: but Pyrrho had, fortunately for him, three or four stout slaves, who followed their master, without following his doctrine; and whenever they saw one of these ideal machines approaching, took him up by the arms and legs, and, without attempting to controvert his arguments, put him down in a place of safety. If you will build an error upon some foundation of truth, you may effect your object; you may divert a little rivulet from the great stream of nature, and train it cautiously, and obliquely, away; but if you place yourself in the very depth of her almighty channel, and combat with her eternal streams, you will be swept off without ruffling the smoothness, or impeding the vigour, of her course.

With respect to scepticism on subjects of natural and revealed religion, I can really see no connection between such species of doubts, and an investigation into the structure of the human mind. Thus much is true, that out of a certain number of men who exercise their

understanding vigorously, and the same number who do not exercise it at all, we shall have many more dissentients to any thing established by evidence, among the first class, than the second. Among a hundred ploughmen, we should not find one sceptic; among the same number of men of very cultivated faculties, we should probably find some who entertained captious and frivolous doubts against religion; but then there is no more probability that this science should produce such men, than any other science which compels us to a rigorous exercise of all the powers of the mind: the objection seems to be against exercising the faculties altogether, not against exercising them in this particular manner; but surely it is a sad way to cure the excesses of the human mind, by benumbing it; and a very narrow view of the resources of art, to suppose there is no other remedy for the irregular action of any part, than by its destruction. I might do here what I have done before in speaking of the extravagance of some reasoners upon these subjects,-institute a parallel between the tendency to religious scepticism, produced by this science, and many others; a much wiser and better man than I, however, shall do it for me. In speaking of the decline of materialism, Mr. Dugald Stewart says: "There has certainly been, since the "time of Descartes, a continual, and, on the whole, a very remarkable approach to the inductive plan of 'studying human nature. We may trace this in the writings even of those who profess to consider thought "merely as an agitation of the brain. In the writings "of Helvetius and of Hume, both of whom, although they may occasionally have expressed themselves in an unguarded manner concerning the nature of mind, "have, in their most useful and practical disquisitions, "been prevented, by their own good sense, from

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*Life of Reid, p. 81. 1802.