clusions towards which he was advancing.

Mr. Hume, more acute, and far more daring, immediately perceived, that if right and wrong are made known to us by sense, they stand in exactly the same relation to us as taste, colours, and other sensible qualities, of which it is difficult to affirm, as of truth and error, that they are fixed and immutable, but which seem to depend much upon the organs of the sentient being, and to be, really and essentially, such as they are perceived to be. True to this distinction, we find him continually representing morality as the object, not of reason but of taste; and the inference is, that it shifts with the shifting fashions and opinions of men, being one thing at Athens, another at Rome, and a third in London*.

It is highly gratifying to see so distinguished writer as Mr. Stewart engaged on the side of virtue, and employing his learning and sagacity to sap a system of licentious sentiment miscalling itself morals. Yet we do not think that his just criticism, upon that part of Locke's opinions which Mr. Hume adopted, was necessary for the discussion of the moral (or rather, immoral) theory above mentioned. Right and wrong are evidently terms of reference, and have respect to some rule previously established. What that rule should be, is of no

See the dialogue in the second, volume of Mr. Hume's Essays, which immediately precedes the history of natural religion. See also Essays, vol. i, note [F.]; and vol. ii. Appendix, concerning Moral Sentiment,

importance to the present argument; for surely it is abundantly plain, that so momentous a concern as the discovery of the true principles which are to govern the whole system of our lives, ought not to be abandoned to mere feeling; that it is, at the least, our duty to be secure, that the impulses of sentiment, (supposing all that can be urged in favour of a moral sense to be true,) are guaranteed, ratified, and established by the deliberate conclusions of the understanding; that reason is the highest principle of our nature, and ought to decide upon our highest interests.

After Locke comes Berkeley; a man equally eminent for his genius and his benevolence; a zealous defender of the Christian truth, and, at one period of his life, a sort of missionary for its propagation. The leading feature of his philosophy is pretty generally known, and has excited a great deal of ridicule among those who do not understand it, and a great deal of surprise among those who do. When Berkeley told men that there is no external world, they stared, and thought him mad, When he assured them, that "if his principles were once admitted, atheism and scepticism would be utterly destroyed; many intricate points made plain; great

* Berkeley, during many years of his life, laboured zealously to effect the establishment of a college at Bermuda, for the purpose of converting the American Indians, which he proposed to superintend personally; and he went there himself for the purpose of forwarding the scheme: but it failed ultimately, through the inactivity of others.

difficulties solved; speculation referred to practice; and men reduced from paradoxes to common sense;" they only stared the more, and thought him still more mad. But when they had heard him explain the meaning of his propositions, and state the reasonings on which they were built; though they might still continue to stare and to reject his reasoning, all who comprehended him agreed that there were, at least, no symptoms of derangement. The truth is, Berkeley's train of reasoning is so ingenious, and his eloquence so fascinating, and the arguments which he presses in support of his opinions so plausible, that it is difficult, for a moment, not to be subdued. Dr. Reid, his great antagonist, acknowledges that he, at one time, had embraced the whole of his theory. And Mr. Stewart, a no less zealous nor less powerful opponent, says, (if we mistake not,) in another work, that a man can hardly be a philosopher who has not, at some period of his life, doubted of the existence of matter.

Mr. Stewart begins his essay on the Idealism of Berkeley, with declaring that it is not his intention to enter at all into the argument with respect to the truth of this theory.

To this resolution he has not very scrupulously adhered. The essay before us contains some very acute and original observations, which the author thinks nearly, or quite, conclusive against the Bishop's opinion. We have not room to enter into a

Preface to the Dialogues between Hylas and Phylonous.

formal analysis of these objections, and shall content ourselves with expressing, as concisely and fairly as we can, the substance of Berkeley's theory, and of what has been said in reply to it.

The argument against the existence of material things may be thus stated. The whole world around us is composed of visible and tangible ob jects; that is, of things perceived by the mind through the medium of the senses; that is, of mental perceptions. Is there any thing more than this? If there be, let us know it. What is it like? If like these perceptions, it must be a perception also; for what can resemble an impression on a sentient being, but some other impression on a sentient being? If it is like none of our perceptions, then it is plain we have not the slightest acquaintance with it. No man was ever able to give any other account of the material world, than that above given. It is then composed entirely of mental perceptions: and if the mind were destroyed, must not its perceptions perish with it? The experimental test to which the Berkeleians refer is dreaming; when the mind (they say) perceives objects exactly similar to those which it perceives when awake, though nobody ever thought of ascribing to the former an independent existence.

The reply to this theory is as follows. What we know of the external world, is undoubtedly known through the medium of the senses; but it is not true

*Tastes, sounds, and odours, are so manifestly impressions on the mind, that they are not worth noticing.

that nothing can be known to us by the senses except our sensations: for the fact is, and the concur rent feelings of all men agree respecting it, that by some law of our nature unknown to us, the impressions made upon the senses are accompanied with an instinctive knowledge of external things, and an indestructible belief of their existence independently of us. The experimental test to which Dr. Reid and Mr. Stewart principally refer, is the idea we have of space; which involves (they say) an irresistible conviction, not only that its existence is external, but that it is everlasting and necessary; so that, though there is no absurdity in supposing all material bodies to be destroyed by the power of the Creator, the annihilation of space is inconceivable.

Such are the respective theories of Bishop Berkeley and Dr. Reid.

It is proper, however, to add, that neither the speculations of Berkeley nor of Reid ought to be regarded as affecting the certainty of our knowledge. Our ideas are exactly the same, our senses and fa

The following passage is extracted from the works of D'Alembert; it is translated by Mr. Stewart. "The truth is,

that as no relation whatever can be discovered between a sensation in the mind and the object by which it is occasioned, or at least to which we refer it, it does not appear possible to trace, by dint of reasoning, any practicable passage from the one to the other. Nothing but a species of instinct, more sure in its operation than reason itself, could so forcibly transport us across the gulph by which mind seems to be separated from the material world."