THE

BIBLIOTHECA SACRA.

ARTICLE I.

MODERN THOUGHT.

BY REV. RANSOM BETHUNE WELCH, D.D., LL.D., PROFESSOR IN UNION COLLEGE, SCHENECTADY, N.Y.

In the strife of theories, both science and faith should be saved from confusion. Carefully, at least, if not repeatedly, should we take our bearings, that we may the better detect the drift of modern thought, and distinguish the course of false thinking from that of the true.

At the outset, it is obvious to remark, but it is important to remember, that thought has its laws as fixed as those of material nature-perhaps comprehending the laws of nature and confirming the laws of faith.

The primary law of thought is the recognition of existence; the existence of the thinker, and then of the act of thinking as involving content. This is illustrated by the proposition cogito, expressing the simplest judgment. Whatever may be thought of Descartes' familiar enthymeme, cogito ergo sum, to which we do not refer, the proposition cogito (I think), illustrates this primary law which thought implicitly follows in the simplest judgment, I am thinking. In the simplest and earliest thought, then, there is by inevitable law the consciousness of existence and action-of the thinker thinking. But more than this, there cannot be thought without content, and the primary law involves this, that in every VOL. XXXIII. No. 129. —JANUARY, 1876. 1

thought there shall be the thinker, the thinking, and the theme; the agent and the content, the subject and the object, to both of which the thinking relates. This primary law is so comprehensive that if the mere phenomenon seem to furnish the content, the law is not satisfied. It claims more than this, viz. some substance underlying the phenomenon, as well as some person originating the act of thinking. So scrupulous is this fundamental law of thought, in each direction. requiring reality, implying that there cannot be an appearing or manifesting without some thing which furnishes the appearance or manifestation. Even Herbert Spencer admits, asserts, this to the confusion of Comte and Mill and Lewes and all mere phenomenalists. There must be a seeing self or mind as well as an object seen. For example, a sensation or impression cannot be, unless there be something to produce the sensation or impression; and more, something to cognize the impression or sensation. Without a mind to receive, there could be no appearing in the universe, no manifestation. So that at the outset, we find a certain modern system, in both directions violating this primary law, and therefore doomed to self-renunciation or to self-destruction.

Let valiant knight-errants of science who would fiercely slay theologians and metaphysicians, on the right hand and on the left, sheathe their swords. Their own safety and the higher interest of science will be promoted by peace rather than by Quixotic warfare. Mr. Spencer's advice to scientists is timely and significant: "He who contemplates the universe from the scientific point of view, must learn to see ... that religion must be treated, as a subject of science, with no more prejudice than any other reality."1

Even Mr. Mill admits that "there are laws of thought and of feeling which rest on experimental evidence which are a clue to the interpretation of ourselves and others. Such laws, so far forth, make psychology a positive science, as certain as chemistry." According to the involuntary confession of

1 First Principles, p. 21.

2 See his Inaugural Address at the University of St. Andrew.

the "straitest of the sect" of inductionists, then, we shall, as we advance, meet with other laws of thought.

Knowledge begins in consciousness. Without consciousness knowledge were impossible. Whether or not suggested by Socrates, at least since the time of Descartes this principle has been admitted. In regard to knowledge, then, the subjective factor is primary and chief, and is to be studied first and chiefly, if we would ascertain what can be known and how it can be known. What then is the scope of our knowledge? Evidently, the scope of our consciousness. Whatever may be presented to consciousness may become matter of knowledge.

We have already seen that the primary law of thought is that there must be both content of thought, and agentsomething which thinks and something about which it thinks. Now what and whence and how is the content furnished? Whether these essential questions can be answered a priori we do not stop to inquire. We, at least, will make the approach to the answer a posteriori, and by the process of observation, which the most fastidious Comtean must approve, detect the law which regulates thinking in relation both to the agent and to the content.

Starting with simple apprehension, we pass, by a process of the judgment, from premise to premise, and thus to conclusion. This, which is completed reasoning, may be in the line of analysis or synthesis, from the general to the particular, or from the particular to the general, and so be legitimate reasoning, either deductive or inductive. These laws developed into a science constitute logic. To ascertain these logical laws, and properly to apply them, is the appropriate work of thinkers in any and in every age. To invent a new, another logic, and call it a science, is quite incompetent for any thought in any age. The simple apprehension of termsthe first elements of knowledge-belongs to the mind alone; but it is dependent upon the presentation. The senses are to do at least a part of this important service; and the apprehension, without which the presentation can be of no avail,

the mental apprehension, must be intuitive. The senses, in this presentation, must be supervised by some higher faculty which must evermore verify for the sense, so as to correct for the mind the faulty presentation of a sense, and confirm the true—as in the opposite cases of healthy condition and of nervous derangement, or when the medium for the action of sense is at fault, as in beholding a distant star whose light has been millions of years coming through space, coming to report to us the position of the star in the heavens, not its present position, but the position it held ten thousand centuries ago.

Sense is not only unable to verify for itself, its report may be actually false; e.g. sight reports as the present place of Sirius that which it occupied five millions (?) of years ago, and from which place during this immense period it has been steadily hastening away. Ratiocination, having from the higher laws of astronomy deduced the distance, orbit, and motion of this planet, and the velocity of light, corrects and adjusts the report of sense and tells us the real position which the planet now occupies. Our eyes hail the morning and report the sunrise. But eight minutes have actually elapsed since the sun rose above our horizon; and, again, ratiocination must correct and adjust the report of sense and verify for the mind the knowledge thus imperfectly presented. Sense says the sun rises, the sun sets, daily performing its revolution round the earth. But this report of sense must be corrected by some higher mental faculty before it is accepted by precise science and properly announced as the diurnal revolution of the earth upon its axis. The sailing ship is not where the sense reports it, nor is the floating cloud, nor the flying bird. Our friend receding or advancing is not where we see him, nor is our foe. The lightning flash deceives the eye; the thunder's roar deceives the ear. Did the soldier or the sailor trust to sight or sound, disaster would prevail on land and sea; defeat would take the place of victory.

Instead, then, of sense being competent to verify to the mind all our knowledge, it cannot always verify even for

itself. Its very reports cannot be relied upon. In the instances just cited - and these are but samples of unnumbered instances we must needs call in our reasoning faculty, the understanding, to rectify and adjust and verify for sense. Reason supervises both, and as between the two decides that the conclusion attested by the higher faculty is to be accepted as valid. And, whatever the pretension of some "advanced thinker" or scientific coterie, the world confirms the decision as rational. And now if this be clear and trustworthy, that while sense (sight, hearing, etc.) reports mere phenomena, mere qualities and attributes, but not any subject to which the attributes belong, not any substance in which qualities inhere, nor any cause which produces the phenomena, the reasoning faculty - the understanding - has the competency and the right to supply this deficiency to correct again and adjust this report of sense, and affirm to the mind with an authority which gives higher knowledge than mere sense can give-knowledge of attributes and subject, of qualities and substance, effect and cause; i.e. that thinking is done by a thinker; that extension belongs to a body; that effect is related to its cause. Here, again, reason supervises the work of both, and as between the two decides that the conclusion attested by the higher faculty is to be accepted as valid. And, whatever the pretension of some "advanced thinker" or scientific coterie, the world confirms the decision as rational.

While, then, we admit and affirm what every experiential or sense-philosopher will assert, that the senses present to the mind elements of knowledge; we deny what some of these philosophers assert, that the senses alone can give, and can verify our knowledge.

In tracing the laws of thought we are now prepared to take another step forward.

The reasoning faculty, the understanding, may also present to the mind elements of knowledge deduced from observation and experience. For example, by the argument from progressive approach, the law of motion, or the law of attraction,