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be able to apply to them a common name. This we cannot do until we have reduced them to a genus; and the formation of a genus implies the power (or process rather) of abstraction. Consequently, we should be unable, without such power, to number.-How great, then, is the practical importance of that intellectual process by which general abstractions are formed!-Without the ability to number, we should be at a loss in all investigations where this ability is required; without the power to classify, all our speculations must be limited to particulars, and we should be capable of no general reasoning.

◊ 146. Of general abstract truths or principles.

There are not only general abstract ideas, but abstract truths or principles also of a general nature, which are deserving of some attention, especially in a practical point of view. Although enough has already been said to show the importance of abstraction, it may yet be desirable to have a more full view of its applications.

The process in forming general truths or principles of an abstract nature seems to be this. We must begin undoubtedly with the examination and study of particulars; with individual objects and characters, and with insulated events. We subsequently confirm the truth of whatever has been ascertained in such inquiry by an observation of other like objects and events. We proceed from one individual to another till no doubt remains. Having in this way arrived at some general fact or principle, we thenceforward throw aside the consideration of the particular objects on which it is founded, and make it alone, exclusively and abstractly, the subject of our mental contemplations. We repeat this process again and again, till the mind, instead of being wholly taken up with a multitude of particulars, is stored with truths of a general kind. These truths it subsequently combines in trains of reasoning, compares together, and deduces from them others of still wider application.

§ 147. Of the speculations of philosophers and others.

What has been said leads us to observe, that there is a characteristical difference between the speculations of

men of philosophic minds and those of the common mass of people which is worthy of some notice. The difference between the two is not so much, that philosophers are accustomed to carry on processes of reasoning to a greater extent, as this, that they are more in the habit of employing general abstract ideas and general terms, and that, consequently, the conclusions which they form are more comprehensive. Nor are their general reasonings, although the conclusions at which they arrive seem in their particular applications to indicate wonderful fertility of invention, so difficult in the performance as is apt to be supposed. They have so often and so long looked at general ideas and general propositions; have been so accustomed, as one may say, to contemplate the general nature of things, divested of all superfluous and all specific circumstances, that they have formed a habit; and the operation is performed without difficulty. It requires in such persons no greater intellectual effort than would be necessary in skilfully managing the details of ordinary

business.

The speculations of the great bulk of mankind differ from those of philosophers in being, both in the subjects of them and in their results, particular. They discover an inability to enlarge their view to universal propositions, which embrace a great number of individuals. They may possess the power of mere argument, of comparing propositions together which concern particulars, and deducing inferences from them to a great degree; but when they attempt to contemplate general propositions, their minds are perplexed, and the conclusions which are drawn from them appear abscure, however clearly the previous process of reasoning may have been expressed.

◊ 148. Of different opinions formerly prevailing.

The subject of general abstract ideas, of which we have given a summary view, excited very considerable interest during the Scholastic ages; and different opinions have prevailed concerning them, not only at that period, but more or less down to the present time. It is perhaps not necessary in most cases and for most persons VOL. I.-R

to plunge deeply into the history of philosophical opinions. A knowledge of the truth, when it is once found, is in general of far greater consequence than an acquaintance with the prolonged and conflicting discussions which led to it. The diputes, however, on the topic of general abstractions so widely prevailed, and excited so much interest and effort, that it seems to be necessary to give a short sketch of them.

In this discussion there have been three parties, viz., the Realists, the Nominalists, and the Conceptualists.

149. Of the opinions of the Realists.

Those who go under this name held that general abstract ideas have a real and permanent existence independently of the mind. Of a man, of a rose, of a circle, and of every species of things, they maintained that there is one original form or archetype, which existed from eternity, before any individuals of the species were created. Its residence they seem to have assigned somewhere in the Eternal Mind itself, with this restriction, that its own existence is otherwise independent, and that it has its appropriate being, nature, and efficiency. Inherently endued with life and activity, it seeks to reveal itself in the visible and tangible figures of creation. Accordingly, this original model or archetype becomes the pattern, according to which the individuals of all species are in the most important respects fashioned. The archetype, which is understood to embrace only the outlines or generic features of things, becomes an object of perception to the human intellect, whenever, by due abstraction, we discern it to be one and the same in all the individuals of the species.

Such was the doctrine of the Realists, which, in its most essential respects, was very widely received from the time of Plato and Aristotle down to the commencement of the 12th century. But since that period, excepting a few ineffectual attempts which have been made from time to time to revive it, it has fallen into as general disrepute, on the ground of its being too hypothetical, and not sufficiently sustained by facts.

150. Of the opinions of the Nominalists.

About the commencement of the 12th century, Roscelinus, the instructer of Abelard, whose name occupies so conspicuous a place in the history of Scholastic learning, proposed a new hypothesis. He maintained not only that there are no original forms or archetypes, such as had been asserted to exist by the Realists, but that there are no universal abstract ideas of any kind. On the contrary, it seems to have been his opinion, as well as the sentiment of those who have subsequently approved of this doctrine, that nothing can be called general or universal but names, and that even to them universality can be ascribed only virtually, and not in the strict and literal sense of the term.-That is, the names are in the first instance given to individuals, but when any individuals are specified, the nature of the mind is such, that we naturally and immediately think of other individuals of the same kind. So that the names are in fact particular, although owing to the operation of the principle of association, the practical effect is the same as if it were otherwise, and hence the epithets "general" and "universal" are applied to them. This opinion in respect to general ideas and names, or some doctrine essentially of this description, has found many advocates from the days of Roscelinus and Abelard to those of Berkeley and Hume.

§ 151. Of the opinions of the Conceptualists.

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Those who hold to the actual existence of general abstract ideas, which are not permanent archetypes independent of the mind, but only states of the mind, have generally been called Conceptualists. We have already given what we suppose to be the true mental process the formation of such ideas. Whether we can have such ideas is best decided by each one's personal experience; and when the examination of his internal experience is conducted with care, it can hardly be doubted in what way such a question will be generally answered.

As far as the Realists are concerned, the mere statement of their doctrine is sufficient at the present day to ensure its immediate rejection. The question lies then between the Nominalists and those who have commonly

been called Conceptualists; and if there be insuperable objections to the doctrine of the former, that of the latter enhances its claims on our adoption.-Some of the objections to the sentiment of Roscelinus and those who have thought with him are forcibly summed up in the following passage from Brown's Philosophy of the Mind. (Lect. xlvi., xlvii.)

"Of that rigid Nominalism, which involves truly no mixture of Conceptualism, or of the belief of those feelings of relation for which I have contended, but denies altogether the existence of that peculiar class of feelings or states of mind which have been denominated general notions or general ideas, asserting the existence only of individual objects perceived, and of general terms that comprehend these, without any peculiar mental state denoted by the general term, distinct from those separate sensations or perceptions which the particular objects comprehended under the term might individually excite, it seems to me that the very statement of the opinion itself is almost a sufficient confutation, since the very invention of the general term, and the extension of it to certain objects only, not to all objects, implies some reason for this limitation, some feeling of general agreement of the objects included in the class, to distinguish them from the objects not included in it, which is itself that very general notion professedly denied.* As long as some general notion of circumstances of resemblance is admitted, I see very clearly how a general term may be

* It is proper to remark, in introducing this passage from Dr. Brown, that this acute writer is to be considered as expressing himself too strongly when he asserts, as he does near the close of it, that the feeling of resemblance is all that the general name truly designates. Possibly he meant to convey by this assertion nothing more than this, that the feeling of resemblance is the prominent and distinguishing circumstance in the notions expressed by general names, since in another passage he speaks of general terms being "invented to express all that multitude of objects which agree in exciting one common feeling of relation, the relation of a certain similarity." If that were not his intention, then we are to consider his views as correct only so far as they go. The feeling of resemblance is a prominent circumstance; but there is something more than this. Whenever we form a complex notion, which is both general and abstract, we combine the feeling of resemblance, the existence of which Dr. Brown has so clearly demonstrated, with the notion of those properties which are found to be possessed in common.

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