diffidence and modesty in all my decisions. I shall propose the arguments on both sides, beginning with those that induced me to deny the strict and proper identity and simplicity of a self or thinking being.

When we talk of self for substance, we must have an idea annexed to these terms, otherwise they are altogether unintelligible. Every idea is derived from preceding impressions; and we have no impression of self or substance, as something simple and individual. We have, therefore, no idea of them in that sense.

Whatever is distinct, is distinguishable; and whatever is distinguishable is separable by the thought or imagination. All perceptions are distinct. They are, therefore, distinguishable and separable, and may be conceived as separately existent, and may exist separately, without any contradiction or absurdity.

When I view this table and that chimney, nothing is present to me but particular perceptions, which are of a like nature with all the other perceptions. This is the doctrine of philosophers. But this table, which is present to me, and that chimney, may and do exist separately. This is the doctrine of the vulgar, and implies no contradiction. There is no contradiction, therefore, in extending the same doctrine to all the perceptions.

In general the following reasoning seems satisfactory. All ideas are borrow'd from preceding perceptions. Our ideas of objects, therefore, are deriv'd from that source. Consequently no proposition can be intelligible or consistent with regard to objects, which is not so with regard to perceptions. But 'tis intelligible and consistent to say, that objects exist distinct and independent, without any common simple substance or subject of inhesion. This proposition, therefore, can never be absurd with regard to perceptions.

When I turn my reflection on myself, I never can perceive this self without some one or more perceptions; nor can I ever perceive any thing but the perceptions. 'Tis the composition of these, therefore, which forms the self.

We can conceive a thinking being to have either many or few perceptions. Suppose the mind to be reduc'd even below the life of an oyster. Suppose it to have only one perception, as of thirst or hunger. Consider it in that situation. Do you conceive any thing but merely that perception? Have you any notion of self or substance? If not, the addition of other perceptions can never give you that notion.

The annihilation, which some people suppose to follow upon death,

and which entirely destroys this self, is nothing but an extinction of all particular perceptions; love and hatred, pain and pleasure, thought and sensation. These therefore must be the same with self; since the one cannot survive the other.

Is self the same with substance? If it be, how can that question have place, concerning the subsistence of self, under a change of substance? If they be distinct, what is the difference betwixt them? For my part, I have a notion of neither, when conceiv'd distinct from particular perceptions.

Philosophers begin to be reconciled to the principle, that we have no idea of external substance, distinct from the ideas of particular qualities. This must pave the way for a like principle with regard to the mind, that we have no notion of it, distinct from the particular perceptions.

So far I seem to be attended with sufficient evidence. But having thus loosen'd all our particular perceptions, when I proceed to explain the principle of connexion, which binds them together, and makes us attribute to them a real simplicity and identity; I am sensible, that my account is very defective, and that nothing but the seeming evidence of the precedent reasonings cou'd have induc'd me to receive it. If perceptions are distinct existences, they form a whole only by being connected together. But no connexions among distinct existences are ever discoverable by human understanding. We only feel a connexion or determination of the thought, to pass from one object to another. It follows, therefore, that the thought alone finds personal identity. When reflecting on the train of past perceptions that compose a mind the ideas of them are felt to be connected together, and naturally introduce each other. However extraordinary this conclusion may seem, it need not surprize us. Most philosophers seem inclin'd to think, that personal identity arises from consciousness; and consciousness is nothing but a reflected thought or perception. The present philosophy, therefore, has so far a promising aspect. But all my hopes vanish, when I come to explain the principles, that unite our successive perceptions in our thought or consciousness. I cannot discover any theory, which gives me satisfaction on this head.

In short there are two principles, which I cannot render consistent; nor is it in my power to renounce either of them, viz. that all our distinct perceptions are distinct existences, and that the mind never perceives any real connexion among distinct existences. Did our perceptions either inhere in something simple and individual, or did the mind

perceive some real connexion among them, there wou'd be no difficulty in the case. For my part, I must plead the privilege of a sceptic, and confess that this difficulty is too hard for my understanding. I pretend not, however, to pronounce it absolutely insuperable. Others, perhaps, or myself, upon more mature reflections, may discover some hypothesis, that will reconcile those contradictions.

KANT

IMMANUEL KANT was born at Koenigsberg, Prussia, April 22, 1724. His father was of Scottish descent. From 1740 to 1746 Kant studied theology, and for the next nine years made his living as a tutor. In 1755 he returned to the university at Koenigsberg, and after receiving his doctor's degree, acted as a privat docent until 1770, when he was appointed Prof. of Logic and Metaphysics. He never married, although of a social disposition, and never left his native city, unless in a brief walk into the country. He died February 12, 1804.

In 1754 he noted the slight retardation of the earth's motion on account of the tides. In the next year he suggested a nebular hypothesis of the origin of the universe, thus really antedating Laplace. His most important work is, however, the Critique of Pure Reason, published in 1781. The Critique of Practical Reason followed in 1788 and the Critique of Judgment in 1790. The three form the starting point of our philosophy to-day.

Kant saw that on the one hand the continental philosophy had developed into dogmatic speculation, and that on the other English philosophy, starting from Locke's assumption that all knowledge comes from experience, that is, from sensation and subsequent reflection, had developed into a scepticism that denied the possibility of anything more than probable knowledge. Kant set himself to re-examine that basis of knowledge and the elements of the mind. He wanted to account for the possibility of mathematics and natural science, and to discover whether metaphysics is possible at all. His solution of the problem is briefly this: The matter of knowledge comes from experience, the form is furnished by the active mind itself. Space, time, and the various relations,

such as substance and accident or cause and effect, are forms given to our knowledge by the mind. They must apply to anything we can experience, but we cannot know whether they apply to things in themselves. Mathematics is possible because we analyze space and time, which are mental; physics is possible because all experience must be subject to cause and effect, the quantitative relations, and the like, all of which are laws of the understanding. Reason's laws hold good for all experience but they cannot be applied to things we cannot experience. Things in themselves we do not know; we cannot indubitably demonstrate the existence or nature of God or the angels. Though all experience rests on the unifying activity of the self or apperception, yet the soul is outside of experience and these laws do not apply to it. Hence the soul, and God, and things in their higher reality are left free and unconfined by human law.

Kant died in 1804, but his thought is still the most important factor in philosophy. Most of the steps taken since have had to be retraced, and any future philosophy will be indebted to his analysis of the elements of knowledge. This is no place to attempt a criticism of his system, but we will take the liberty to suggest a few points for thought. If cause and effect together with space, time, etc., is merely a mental form, not to be applied at all outside of experience, has Kant the right to presuppose things in themselves at all as a cause of our sensations, seeing that we cannot directly experience them, but can argue their existence only thro' the idea of cause and effect? If not, he would be forced into idealism. On the other hand, the reasons are growing stronger for supposing that there is a close correspondence, or rather concomitant variation, between our perceptions and nature. The more science discovers, the less room there is left for freedom from the laws of experience in so-called physical nature. As philosophy must account for the possibility of science, and hence may use its results as data, we may ask whether on the principle of evolution any race would have survived whose fundamental mental life, upon which it had to act in regard to its environment, was entirely at variance with reality? Would not the law of the survival of the fittest eventually make such fundamental conceptions of the race as time and space an index of reality? To sum up our question on this point, isn't it possible for the various relations to be mental and at the same time closely represent reality? But further discussion and the philosophy since Kant's time must be reserved for another volume.

THE PROLEGOMENA

These Prolegomena are for the use, not of pupils, but of mature teachers, and are intended to serve even the latter, not in arranging their exposition of an existing science, but in discovering the science itself.

There are learned men, to whom the history of philosophy (both ancient and modern) is philosophy itself; for such the present Prolegomena are not written. They must wait till those who endeavour to draw from the fountain of reason itself have made out their case; it will then be the historian's turn to inform the world of what has been done. Moreover, nothing can be said, which in their opinion has not been said already, and indeed this may be applied as an infallible prediction to all futurity; for as the human reason has for many centuries pursued with ardour infinitely various (2) objects in various ways, it is hardly to be expected that we should not be able to match every new thing with some old thing not unlike it.

My object is to persuade all who think Metaphysic worth studying that it is absolutely necessary to adjourn for the present this (historical) labour, to consider all that has been done as undone, and to start first of all with the question, 'Whether such a thing as metaphysic be at all possible?'

If it be a science, how comes it that it cannot, like other sciences, obtain for itself an universal and permanent recognition? If not, how is it ever making constant pretensions, under this supposition, and keeping the human mind in suspense with hopes that never fade, and yet are never fulfilled? Whether then, as a result, we demonstrate our knowledge or our ignorance, we must come once for all to a definite conclusion about the nature of this pretended science, which cannot possibly remain on its present footing. It seems almost ridiculous, while every other science is continually advancing, that in this, which would be very Wisdom, at whose oracle all men inquire, we should perpetually revolve round the same point, without gaining a single step. And so its followers having melted away, we do not find men who feel able to shine in other sciences venturing their reputation here, where everybody, however ignorant in other matters, pretends to deliver a final verdict, as in this domain (3) there is as yet no certain weight and measure to distinguish sound knowledge from shallow talk.