ECLECTICISM OF COUSIN.

System stated.

From the chair of philosophy in Paris, Cousin has pronounced Eclecticism as constituting the distinguishing characteristic, the perfection of the philosophic movement of the nineteenth century. Before admitting this enunciation as true, it becomes us to inquire diligently into the meaning of such an imposing term. The attentive reader of the works of this great philosopher will not be at a loss to determine the meaning which he attaches to the term, nor the doctrine represented by it. This philosopher professes to have obtained a point of observation, from which he has brought all previous systems of philosophy into complete harmony with each other. All possible questions in philosophy have been solved in these different systems. Each system has moved in the direction of some one great question, and has attained its object in the solution of that question. It now remains to take from all these systems the principle on which each rests, and which each has developed, and resolve the whole into one harmonious unity. The following passages will show that I have not misconceived nor misstated the principles of this philosopher:

"You may perceive the tendency of my discourse. After the subjective idealism of the school of Kant, and the empiricism and sensualism of that of Locke, have been developed, and their last possible results exhausted, no new combination is, in my opinion, possible; but the union of these two systems, by centering them both in a vast and powerful eclecticism." Again: "Our philosophy, gentlemen, is not a melancholy and fanatical philosophy, which, being prepossessed with a few exclusive ideas, undertakes to reform all others on the same model; it is a philosophy essentially optimistical, whose only end is to comprehend all, and which therefore accepts and reconciles all. It seeks to obtain power only by extension; its unity consists only in the harmony of all contrarieties."

Remarks upon this System.

For myself, I would say, that I wholly dissent from the system of Eclecticism as above announced. I do it for the following reasons:

1. It is, as a system, totally unlike the procedure of the Intelligence in reference to every other science. No science whatever that has stood the test of time has been evolved in conformity to this principle. What if some astronomer, for example, should arise, and profess to have found some point of observation from which he could show that all the systems of astronomy were essentially correct, and should proclaim, that the true system is found in all, as the general in the particular, and should be so evolved as to include all other systems? He might say, in the language of this great philosopher, "Our astronomy, gentlemen, is not a melancholy and fanatical astronomy, which, being prepossessed with a few exclusive ideas, undertakes to reform all others upon the same model; it is as an astronomy essentially optimistical, whose only end is to comprehend all, and which, therefore, accepts and reconciles all. It seeks to obtain power only by extension; its unity consists only in the harmony of all contrarieties." All this is well said, and looks well on paper. But who would expect to find, in a system constructed in conformity to such an hypothesis, the true "Mécanique Céleste?" In every other science, each school has found its point of observation, from which it has attempted a solution of the great questions pertaining to that particular science, and which it was its object to solve. One school has succeeded another, till some one has evolved a system which has stood the test of time. So, I venture to predict, it will be in respect to the Philosophy of Mind. If the true system has not yet been developed, the time is coming when it will be. And that philosopher will have the happiness of attaining this great end, who shall find, not some point of observation from which he can reconcile all the jarring antagonistic systems which have claimed the credence of man, but some great central position, in the depths of our inner being, from which he can solve the diversified questions of philosophy pertaining to the facts of universal Consciousness.

2. The assumption on which Eclecticism, as above defined, rests, is totally false in point of fact: the position that the essential element in each system is true. Take, as an illustration, the system of Pantheism. Now that system is either totally right or wholly wrong. It either correctly explains every fact pertaining to the universe, or it totally falsifies every fact professedly explained by it. It either rightly explains, or totally misrepresents all things. Further, if this

system is right, every other system is totally wrong, and misrepresents everything which it professedly explains. There is no blending of this system with any other which does not assert its fundamental principle; and then it is not another, but one and the same system.

The same holds true of the systems of Hegel, Kant, and Locke. Either thought is the only reality, and then Hegel is totally right, and all other systems wholly false, or thought is not the only reality, and then in nothing is Hegel right. This system either correctly explains or totally misrepresents every fact in the universe.

Either ideas of Reason are valid for things in themselves, and then Kant is wholly wrong, or they are not thus valid, and Kant is wholly right. His fundamental principle either rightly explains or totally misrepresents every idea of Reason. There is no position midway between these ex

tremes.

Either all ideas do come from experience, and then Locke is wholly right and all systems denying this are so far wholly wrong, or all ideas do not come from experience, and then Locke is wholly wrong. It does not help the matter to say, that some ideas come from experience, and therefore Locke is partly right. Locke and all the world knew, long before his celebrated Essay was thought of, that some ideas came from experience. It was only as an universal proposition that Locke affirmed his position. If that proposition is not strictly universal, Locke is wholly wrong, and so he himself regarded the subject.

Nor, in my judgment, was it becoming in a great philosopher to attempt to show, as Cousin has done, in conformity to the spirit of Eclecticism, that the great principle of Locke's philosophy is right, by attributing to him a principle that he never held, or conceived of; to wit, that ideas of experience are the chronological antecedents of all other ideas. The individual who has ever read Cousin's Psychology, translated by Prof. Henry, a work presenting one of the finest specimens of philosophic reasoning to be met with in any language, will recollect the frequency with which the remark is made in that work, that there is an important sense in which the propositions of Locke, that all ideas come from experience, is true. Locke's whole system rests upon this one proposition. Cousin, after proving the proposition false, must show that after all it is true, or the fundamental

position of his own Eclecticism would fail entirely. How does he accomplish his object? By the affirmation that there is a sense in which the proposition, that all ideas are derived from experience, is true; that is, such ideas are the chronological antecedents of all other ideas. But this, I repeat, is a sense in which Locke never presented the proposition under consideration, and never thought of doing it. Did it become a great philosopher to attempt to save his own hypothesis, by attributing to another a principle which all the world know he never held, or, at least, never avowed?

In the remarks made above, I would by no means be understood as advancing the sentiment, that if Pantheism or any other system is wrong, that therefore nothing which the abettors of such systems may say is true. Nothing is farther from my intention than this. This whole Treatise presents proof sufficient of the fact, that no such thing is intended. What I do mean is this, That whatever truths exist in connection with false systems, and many such often are therein found, exist in them not in consequence of the systems, but in spite of them, and are totally misrepresented by them. The true Eclecticism, as I understand it, is this, To search for truth in connection with every system, without assuming beforehand, that it does or does not exist there. "Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." This is an Eclecticism, which is infinitely preferable to that which "consists only in the harmony of all contrarieties."

3. In his position as an Eclectic, Cousin has fallen into the very error which he has charged upon Locke, as so greatly vitiating his method as a philosopher. The error is this:

Beginning with an hypothesis, before carefully analyzing and classifying the facts of Psychology as the basis of an hypothesis. Locke, as Cousin has shown, by assuming at the outset a particular hypothesis respecting the origin of Ideas, was led to misrepresent (an error perfectly natural under the circumstances) the most important facts of human Consciousness. So Cousin, by assuming, that the fundamental elements of all systems are right, must, to be consistent, be a sensualist with Locke, a spiritualist with Fichte, a pantheist with Schelling, and a nihilist with Hegel. These considerations are abundantly sufficient to show the claims of Eclecticism to the regard of philosophers.

COMMON SENSE.

There are few words in more common use than the above. Common Sense is everywhere appealed to as a standard and test of truth and error. Yet it would be somewhat difficult, without the most careful reflection, to define correctly the words under consideration. Dr. Reid regards Common Sense as a distinct faculty of the mind. Philosophers generally have rejected this assumption. This they have done, however, without themselves attempting to tell us what this something is, the reality of which they all acknowledge. My object will be, to state distinctly the real meaning of the words under consideration.

Common Sense defined.

Every one is aware, that, in the presence of certain facts, the universal Intelligence invariably makes particular affirmations. With such affirmations, numberless assumptions, together with their consequents, may be mingled. Hence, in reference to almost all subjects of thought, diversity of opinion appears. Yet, in the midst of all this diversity, there are judgments common to all minds who have apprehended the same facts.

The

Now these affirmations, common to all minds in the presence of the same facts, affirmations in their concrete and particular form, is what is meant by the words Common Sense. words designate the real affirmations of the universal Intelligence, in view of given facts, as distinguished from assumptions, and the logical consequents of the same, pertaining to the same facts. Common Sense, then, is not, as Dr. Reid supposes, a special faculty of the Intelligence. It designates, I repeat, the real affirmations of the general Intelligence, in distinction from assumptions and their logical consequents.

Common Sense a Standard of Truth.

Common Sense, then, may be properly appealed to, as a decisive standard of truth. Its responses must be true, else the universal Intelligence is a lie. No conclusions in philosophy and religion, no results of processes of investigation. and reasoning which are in contradiction to its decisions, will stand the test of time. I will here confess, that the principle under consideration has been a leading idea which has