And now let us sum up the Kantian argument-limiting ourselves to the case of Space. Kant tells us that Space is the form of all external intuition; which is not true. He tells us that the consciousness of Space continues when the consciousness of all things contained in it is suppressed; which is also not true. From these alleged facts he infers that Space is an à priori form of intuition. I say infers, because this conclusion is not presented in necessary union with the premises, in the same way that the consciousness of duality is necessarily presented along with the consciousness of inequality; but it is a conclusion voluntarily drawn for the purpose of explaining the alleged facts. And then that we may accept this conclusion, which is not necessarily presented along with these alleged facts which are not true, we are obliged to affirm several propositions which cannot be rendered into thought. When Space is itself contemplated, we have to conceive it as at once the form of intuition and the matter of intuition; which is impossible. We have to unite that which we are conscious of as Space with that which we are conscious of as the ego, and contemplate the one as a property of the other; which is impossible. We have at the same time to disunite that which we are conscious of as Space, from that which we are conscious of as the non-ego, and contemplate the one as separate from the other; which is also impossible. Further, this hypothesis that Space is "nothing else" than a form of intuition belonging wholly to the ego, commits us to one of the two alternatives, that the non-ego is formless or that its form produces absolutely no effect upon the ego; both of which alternatives involve us in impossibilities of thought. And all these impossibilities of thought, offered to us along with a supposed necessary inference from supposed facts, we are to accept that we may escape a difficulty of interpretation assumed to be insurmountable, but which is readily surmounted!

§ 400. One other example of metaphysical reasoning may be fitly added—an example lineally descending from the last. It will show us how that rejection of the direct testimony of consciousness which Kantism involves, leads to contradiction when joined with that acceptance of the direct testimony of consciousness implied by "Natural Realism."

Sir William Hamilton, who, from some passages in his writings (see, for instance, p. 882 of the Dissertations), might be supposed to hold that Space is both a law of thought and a law of things; but who proves himself to be a disciple of Kant by saying "It is one merit of the philosophy of the conditioned, that it proves Space to be by a law of thought, and not by a law of things;" has been led by his Kantism into a suicidal argument. In his trenchant criticism on Dr. Brown, he brings into strong relief the inconsistency of that writer by putting side by side two positions respectively received and repudiated by him. The passage, which will be found at page 90 of the Dissertations, is as follows:

"I cannot but believe that material things exist :-I cannot but believe that the material reality is the object immediately known in perception. The former of these beliefs, explicitly argues Dr. Brown, in defending his system against the sceptic, because irresistible, is true. The latter of these beliefs, implicitly argues Dr. Brown, in establishing his system itself, though irresistible, is false."

Now when Sir William Hamilton asserts that Space is only a law of thought, and not a law of things," he falls into an inconsistency of the same kind as that which he here exposes. To show this it needs but to make a small addition to the foregoing passage, and to change the names, thus:

I cannot but believe that material things exist:-I cannot but believe that the material reality is the object immediately known in perception :-I cannot but believe that the space in which material realities are perceived is objectively real.

The two former of these beliefs, explicitly argues Sir William Hamilton, in defending his system against the sceptic, because irresistible, are true. The latter of these beliefs, implicitly argues Sir William Hamilton, in establishing his system itself, though irresistible, is false.

We are not now concerned with the tenability of Dr. Brown's position, or with the tenability of Sir W. Hamilton's criticism. We have to note only that if Sir W. Hamilton's argument is conclusive against Dr. Brown, a parallel argument is conclusive against himself; and that either the criterion he erects is no criterion, or that his belief respecting the subjectivity of Space is disproved by his criterion.

§ 401. Such, then, are metaphysical reasonings; not selected from the works of one writer or one school, but from the works of a series of writers of different schools -Berkeley, Hume, Kant, Hamilton. While disagreeing in other respects, these writers agree in the professed rejection of some or many of the fundamental dicta of consciousness. The passages quoted and criticized have been typical passages directly referring to these fundamental dicta; and the reasonings have been reasonings considered sufficient to disprove them. Have they the requisite cogency? So far from having it, they are full of defects which would invalidate quite ordinary inferences.

In one case we find that what is to be denied in the conclusion is tacitly affirmed in the premises. Now transcendent mental capacity is made the basis for proof of mental incapacity; and disproof of our consciousness of a thing is made to proceed upon our consciousness of another thing which the same argument disproves. To escape from a difficulty of thought, half-a-dozen impossibilities of thought are offered by way of refuge. And once more, the test of true cognitions, which is alleged to be final, is, without any assigned reason, assumed to be worthless in respect of particular cognitions.

CHAPTER V.

NEGATIVE JUSTIFICATION OF REALISM.

§ 402. The foregoing three chapters contain a general survey of the metaphysical position. We have seen that metaphysicians proceed on a tacit assumption which they make no attempt to justify; and which cannot possibly be justified. We have seen that the words they use, one and all, turn traitors; and along with every proposition they are set to express, persist in expressing some fatal counter-proposition. We have also seen that the reasonings framed out of these propositions cannot be coerced into establishing that which they are intended to establish; but have to take for their fulcrum that which is to be dis-established, and are powerless when that fulcrum is removed.

For ordinary purposes such an examination, leading to such results, might be held sufficient. Here, however, it is not intended as more than an introduction. It foreshadows the analytical argument on which we are now to enter, and still more vaguely the synthetical argument that is to supplement it—the one a negative justification of Realism, and the other a positive justification of Realism.

By a negative justification of Realism, I mean a proof that Realism rests on evidence having a greater validity than the evidence on which any counter-hypothesis rests. By such proof the realistic belief is negatively justified; inasmuch as no belief having a better justification exists. Before proceeding to an ultimate analysis, we will advance the examination a stage by making a proximate analysis.

CHAPTER VI.

THE ARGUMENT FROM PRIORITY.

§ 403. Twice in the course of this work (§§ 204 and 332, note) I have named, as illustrating in a remarkable way the effect of habit, the power acquired by microscopists of so moving objects under a microscope as to neutralize the apparent inversions of their motions. This adjustment, which is such that, to move the object to the right the fingers must be moved to the left, and to move it up they must be moved down, is, affer long practice, made automatically, and comes to seem quite natural-so natural that when, for certain purposes, there is used an "erecting glass," which brings the visible motions into their ordinary relations with the tactual motions, these relations seem to be unnatural; and the microscopist is as much perplexed by this normal connexion of impressions as he originally was by the abnormal one.

Habit, thus shown to produce so striking a result in the sphere of simple external perception, is capable of producing a no less striking resuit in the sphere of that complex internal perception which we call reasoning. Here, too, by frequently presenting sequences of thought under an inverted relation, there is gradually superinduced the belief that this is their direct relation. From persistently contemplating them in a certain hypothetical order, exactly opposite to their real order, the hypothetical order eventually comes to appear as the real order and the real order as the hypothetical.