V.

THE PHILOSOPHY OF HUMAN NATURE.

The Nature of Man as Spiritual, Immortal, and Responsible, will be the most frequent topic of this department: though sometimes we shall introduce MISCELLANEOUS Subjects.

THE NATURE OF THE SOUL.

"How do you know that you have a soul? Because I find something within me that can think and know, can wish and desire, can rejoice and be sorry, which my body cannot do."-Watts.

LET a man leave his home and travel through England, visit every distinguished place of resort, examine the varied natural curiosities and wonders that our island contains; let him go into our factories and witness the processes by which the productions of our great towns are brought to their perfection; let him pursue his journey to the Continent, and travel through its most famed parts, gaze upon its most admired scenes and objects, and examine all that is most worthy of attention; let him go from land to land, and see what is peculiar to every clime; and it will be granted that, if he was endowed with ordinary intellectual capacity, and has reflected well upon the scenes, objects, and events which have come under his notice, he must have acquired a very large fund of curious and useful knowledge. He has climed mountains, crossed rivers and valleys, descended into mines, explored caverns; he has examined trees, plants, herbs, in endless variety; he has observed the forms and habits of numerous classes of animals; he has heard, read, and observed much respecting arts, science, commerce, politics, philosophy, literature, and religion; and he brings home the fruit of his lengthened and laborious researches. Let fancy picture this man in the midst of a social party. In answer to varied inquiries, prompted by curiosity, learning, or travel, he relates some particulars of his journey, describes the beauties of nature, delineates the respective charms of different countries, speaks of the inhabitants, their customs, their employments, their characters. He keeps his audience listening with delight until the demands of nature and domestic arrangement require him to desist. He has told a very small part of his tale. The treasures of his knowledge yet unexhibited are vast. They are at hand to illustrate every ordinary topic, to entertain society at any hour, and to supply useful hints in many departments of taste, science, industrial art, business, and commerce. Now a question arises, of lively interest, and involving, in its remoter inferences, conclusions of

immense practical worth, viz:-what is the storehouse in which this learning and knowledge are treasured? Where are these materials deposited? The prompt and complete answer is, IN THE MIND-THE SOUL. But the question has turned our thoughts inward, upon our own spiritual nature, and aroused within us a train of deep and serious interrogation.

The cane which this traveller took with him, though it passed through every country, visited every town, and was present whenever he stood to gaze on the beauties and wonders of nature, has learned nothing of the countries through which it passed, nor of the scenes amidst which it stood. The faithful dog, that never for a day left his master throughout this long tour, though his eyes were open to every sight and his ears were saluted by every sound which conveyed knowledge to his master, retains no recollection of these things-is not a whit more pleasant as a companion than he would have been had he all the time been chained to his kennel-is no better able to administer to his own comfort, nor to afford assistance to others. Whence arises the difference? The man possesses a rational soul, of which the cane and the dog are destitute.

What then is the mind or soul? Wherein does it differ from other things with which we are acquainted? and what are its most important qualities or attributes? The mind is that within us which understands, remembers, reasons, judges, hopes, wishes, grieves, rejoices, &c. By these qualities it is known; and when they are all enumerated, the mind itself is properly described. Our knowledge of it cannot go beyond its states of feeling and modes of acting. Of what that thing is formed which thinks and knows, hopes and fears, we cannot tell, any more than we can say of what a grain of sand, or a small particle of rock, is made. Its essence, therefore, we cannot explain, nor do we attempt to define.

But because we cannot tell what the mind is made of,-cannot speak of its dimensions, form, colour,-cannot assign to it some sensible appearances, Bor compare it with some sensible and known object, it is imagined that, therefore, we know less of it than we do of the body, and of material substances in general. Some people very firmly believe that we know more of the stones we tread on, and of the clothes we wear, than we do of the souls that live within us. But let us inquire how far this opinion is correct. We take up a pebble and examine it. It strikes cold to the hand. It is hard and smooth to the touch. It is heavy, somewhat round, and of a certain colour. It can be broken, and ground into fine dust. We become acquainted with these properties of the stone through the medium of the hand and of the eye. But have we learned what that is in the pebble which gives it hardness, form, colour, &c.? These properties, we are prone to think, must be supported by something and in some way. The roundness does not make the coldness, nor the hardness give the colour. All we know of the stone is, that it has certain properties or qualities. The essence, that which holds and exhibits these qualities, we know nothing of. Just so it is with our knowledge of the soul. We know that it has thought, reason, memory, desire, hope, fear, joy, sorrow, &c. But that which supports these qualities, in which they reside, in other words the essence of mind, we neither understand nor attempt to explain. There is nothing singular, however, in our ignorance on this point; for we are left in precisely the same predicament in respect to the A 2

VOL. II.

pebble and all material substances. That which supports form in the one, and that which supports thought in the other, are both alike unknown to us.*

But does this partial ignorance render the knowledge we have altogether uncertain and useless? By no means. We have no more knowledge than this of any thing whatever. We know that there is life in the members and organs of our bodies. Can we explain its nature? tell what is its essence? We cannot. We only know its properties. One of these is movement in all the parts where it exists; another is secretion in those parts, which creates the demand for nourishment; another is assimilation, by which impaired strength is renewed. Sensibility is a fourth property of animal life. But when we have enumerated all the properties that can be observed in the "living creature," we have said all that is known of life, and, probably, all that ever will be known of that mysterious principle. Shall we then say, that, because we know not what it is which gives sensibility, movement, &c., to the various parts of the body, we have no proper knowledge of life, no certain proof of its exist ence, nothing enabling us to reason and act concerning it? Shall the physician, because his knowledge is confined to the properties of life, and his understanding is incapable of comprehending its essence, cease to attend his patients and abandon all hope of establishing their health? This would be nothing short of insanity. Well then, we know quite as much of mind as we do of life. We know that that within us, to which we give the name of mind or soul, can remember, reason, hope, &c. When we speak of the soul, therefore, we are not discoursing about a phantom, a mere idea; we speak of a thing as certainly known to us as life is known, whose existence is capable of being demonstrated quite as conclusively as is the existence of the sun, the earth, or any one of the objects which we see or feel. We are speaking of "something within us that can think and know, wish and desire, rejoice and be sorry." We do not attempt to dive into mysteries unfathomable. We rest satisfied with knowing the attributes or qualities of mind, and maintain, that having stated them cor

"There is no difference of opinion among our best philosophers on this point. "The essence, both of body and of mind,' says Dr. Reid, is unknown to us. We know certain properties of the first, and certain operations of the last, and by those only we can define or describe them.' 'If I am asked,' adds Mr. Stewart, 'what I mean by matter? I can only explain myself by saying, it is that which is extended, figured, coloured, &c., &c.; i. e., I can define it in no other way than by enumerating its sensible qualities. It is not matter, or body, which I perceive by my senses; but only extension, figure, colour, and certain other qualities, which the constitution of my nature leads me to refer to something which is extended, figured, and coloured. The case is precisely similar with respect to mind. We are not immediately conscious of its existence, but we are conscious of sensation, thought, and volition; operations which imply the existence of something which feels, thinks, and wills.' 'In this respect," states Dr. Brown, 'the philosophy of matter and of mind completely agree that in both equally our knowledge is confined to the phenomena which they exhibit.'-'What matter is independent of our perception we know not.' 'If our knowledge of matter be relative only, our knowledge of mind must be equally so. We know it only as susceptible of feelings that have already existed, &c.' That we know nothing more of the mind,' says the Rev. Mr. Welsh, 'than that, from the time of our birth till the present moment, it has existed in certain states of thought and feeling, is a position so very obvious, that I zan scarcely conceive it to be disputed.""-Dr. Payne's Elements of Mental and Moral Science. Pages 13, 14.

rectly, we have gone as far towards explaining the nature of the soul as the anatomist and the physiologist proceed in explaining the nature of the body, or the philosopher in explaining the nature of those substances which surround us.

Having thus defined the limits of our inquiry, we next remark, that the soul is totally different from matter. Whether, if we fully understood the essence of all things, we should discover that matter and mind have some ultimate principles in common, may be allowed to remain an open question. Both, undoubtedly, are creatures, and both are dependent on the will of God. But to say this, does not determine whether any of their ultimate, constituent, and essential principles are substantially the same, or very much alike: and, as we profess not to be inquiring after the essence of mind, which, to say the feast, is beyond the present reach of our abilities,—we shall pass on to notice the difference observable be tween the properties of mind and those of matter. And here, so far as our positive evidence will carry us, we are led to the conclusion that they are totally dissimilar.

Matter is divisible. It can be separated into indefinitely small particles. We have no positive proof that mind can be divided. True, we have no direct proof that it cannot. But as it is on all hands admitted to be impossible to prove a negative, the absence of proof and probability on the positive side, must be allowed to have weight on the side of the negative. The divisibility of matter is proved by experiment, is testified by history, is witnessed by daily observation; but we have no experiment, no fact, leading at all to the conclusion that mind can be separated into parts. Consciousness testifies that the mind is one, an individual, an absolute unity. It does not think and feel by distinct faculties or parts. The internal being that reasons, is identically and wholly the same as that which grieves. We cannot conceive of the mind as though one part acted while another was quiet, without doing violence to consciousness and memory. "What no man ever doubted, or found it possible to doubt, he could never be created to doubt. Those convictions which are immediate, unicersal, and irresistible, our minds must have been intended to obey."+ The indivisibility of our minds is a conviction of this order. It is an intuitive belief which all subsequent reflection and arrangement confirm. Matter is inherently inert, mind is inherently active. Philosophers are agreed that matter, of itself, cannot give motion to any of its parts,cannot resist nor alter the motion which is given to it. On the other

"It is by no means always the case that we have the power of understanding the whole of whatever we are required, by good evidence, to believe. The contrary most often happens; that is to say, a certain fact is fully established, and yet nothing more is known than the general fact, or than its external significance. Those hidden powers that are developed in the movements and changes of the material world, such as gravitation, chemical and magnetic attraction, electricity, vegetable and animal life, and so forth, demand assent, while nothing concerning them can be understood, beyond the external facts which make themselves known to the senses. Nothing, then, can be more absurd, or unphilosophical, than the determination expressed by some persons that they will believe nothing which they do not understand. To carry such a purpose into effect on all subjects, would be to reduce a man to universal ignorance and idiotcy."-Taylor's Elements of Thought. pp. 51.

Dr. Hamilton's Nuga Literarea. p. 437.

hand, we have continual proof within us that mind is spontaneously active. It seems never to be at rest. When it has done thinking of one thing, it instantly turns to another; when the body is at rest the mind is still busy, in dreams, revisiting the scenes of the past, or employing the imagination and judgment on something new. Thought is quick even as the lightning and passes from one subject to another with amazing rapidity, finding time and space no barrier to its movements. In the face of a child, often, oh, how often! does the sun of pleasure burst through the shower of grief. Mental activity is regulated and controlled by the thinking principle itself. Often, indeed, its thoughts and feelings are awakened by objects of sense; but it can retire from the external world into its own secret chamber, and there devise plans, and determine its future conduct by considerations drawn from its own stores of memory, and contemplated singly, consecutively, and profoundly, at the pleasure and dictum of its own will.

Matter has no feeling, no enjoyment, no pain; whereas mind seems to be the constant subject of one or other of these attributes. The experiments of some physiologists, in cutting asunder the nerves of certain parts of the living body, prove, that when a part of an animal is disconnected, by nervous influence, from the sensorium, and consequently from the mind, the feeling of that part is destroyed. Feeling, then, in the living body, depends upon the sound and healthy condition of the nerves; and the nerves are but the instruments through which the mind feels. In their own nature they are incapable of feeling, otherwise the mere division of their parts would not destroy the attribute. If, then, matter which is organized and animated has not the attribute of feeling, much less can it be supposed, that the inorganic mass possesses it: and if matter be destitute of what we commonly understand by feeling, much less is it capable of those varied emotions which we classify as pleasures and pains.

Matter also is incapable of thought; whereas this appears to be the continual operation of mind. Its thoughts traverse the wide world, ascend to the starry heavens, yea, up to the throne of God. They hold converse with death, judgment, eternity, heaven, and hell. Matter gives no evidence, and awakens no probability that it is capable of consciousness, sensation, or perception. And this universal absence of proof to the contrary must be held as conclusive, that the properties of mind are totally different from the qualities of matter. Indeed, we are speaking of the known, observable, and demonstrated, qualities of matter and mind; and all that is required perfectly to establish their entire dissimilarity is to point out a few vulgar prejudices, and to guard against the fallacy which lurks in figurative terms, as when we speak of a great mind, a capacious soul, a hard or a cold heart, &c.

It may, however, be suggested, that mind is the result of material organization, in fact, the peculiar function of one of the bodily organs, the brain. But this is a mere suggestion, utterly destitute of evidence. If it means anything it means, that the office of the brain is to think, just as the office of the stomach is to digest food. And if it has any force in argument, it must lead also to the conclusion, that animal life is not a principle distinct from animal organization. For if life is something separable from a certain modification of matter, and superadded to it, and