attempted to supplant the shallow materialism and growing infidelity of his age, and to induce his countrymen to take a deeper insight into the constitution of the human mind, and its close connexion with the Divine.

(C.) THIRD PERIOD ORIGINATING WITH KANT AND

CONDILLAC.

The writings of Kant and Condillac formed a new era in the progress both of sensationalism and of idealism. As their respective systems became propagated, the minor efforts of the philosophical spirit--its sceptical as well as its mystical tendencies - gradually disappeared. The former expired under the gigantic power of the one, the latter was dissipated by the clear and lucid analysis of the other. France and Germany now seemed to be equally divided between the material school of Paris, and the idealistic school of Königsberg, and in our present sketch we have to pause for a time silent spectators of this conflict, until we see scepticism and mysticism again appearing between the combatants, anew to chastise their too great temerity, and anew to send them back to a closer examination of the fundamental principles, upon which they were respectively building. Accordingly, ere the century comes to a close, we see the indications of a new system, both of sceptical and mystical philosophy emanating from the Kantian metaphysics; the former brought forward by

Schulz, the latter by Jacobi. As both of these writers, however, though belonging actually to the eighteenth century, yet pertain, as far as their influence goes, more closely to the nineteenth, we shall hereafter take them up as an introduction to the sceptical and mystical philosophy of Germany during the present age. We now come back to our own country.

SECTION II.-Scepticism and Mysticism in England, from the Time of Bacon to the Commencement of the Nineteenth Century.

A struggle, similar to that which we have described between the Cartesians and Gassendists in France, was carried on at the very same period in England between the disciples and the opponents of Hobbism. The idealistic tendency, however, was far less extravagant in our own country than it became on the Continent, in the hands of Malebranche and Spinoza; and the scepticism which arose from its paradoxes was proportionably of a less sweeping character. The author, who in England most perfectly expressed the sceptical tendency of this age, was Joseph Glanville, courtpreacher to King Charles the Second, whose work, entitled " Scepsis Scientifica, or Confessed Ignorance the Way to Science, in an Essay of the Vanity of dogmatizing and confident Opinion," was intended rather to controvert the pretensions

of the Aristotelian and the Cartesian philosophy, than to involve the whole circumference of human knowledge in darkness and uncertainty.

The most remarkable portions of this work are the observations it contains upon causation, in which he very clearly gives the germ of the theory, which was afterwards more fully developed by Hume. Causes, he argues, are the alphabet of science, without which it is impossible for us to understand any part of nature aright. But causes lie altogether beyond the reach of experience, which reveals to us nothing but phenomena; and, consequently, as experience is the only true source of human knowledge, it follows that the knowledge which men have pretended to reach of scientific and abstract truth, cannot be anything better than hypothesis. This reasoning, though not very profound, is yet remarkable as a display of the systematic scepticism, which was then at work within a narrow circle, and as being a kind of preparation for the deeper and more comprehensive views, which were soon after propounded by the Scottish sceptical philosopher who succeeded him.

Mysticism, on the other hand, was favoured at this time with a far greater share of attention, and was supported by far greater learning, than were the feeble efforts of incipient scepticism. The way to this was, perhaps, already paved by the efforts of Robert Fludd (born 1574, died 1637) to revive the fanatical doctrines of Paracelsus; but the more

direct cause is to be found in the fact that many lofty minds, disgusted with Hobbism on the one hand, and unsatisfied with Cartesianism on the other, took refuge in the sublime philosophy of Plato, and devoted themselves with severe and ardent study to the elucidation of his writings. Cudworth, whom we have already classed amongst those who manifested a tendency to idealism, was one of these Platonic philosophers, and not unfrequently mingled up with his more strictly rationalistic views, notions which bear upon their features somewhat of a mystical character. But in Henry More, his friend and companion (born 1614, died 1687), we see exemplified the whole process both of scepticism and mysticism through which the human mind is often led, after being compelled to distrust the conclusions of the current philosophy.

More was educated, according to the custom of the age, in the scholastic doctrines; but, being driven from these by the refutation they had received in the writings of Lord Bacon and his successors, he became a most zealous Cartesian, and even corresponded with Descartes himself on some questions relating to his philosophy. Finding, however, no certainty from these principles, and seeing, with great penetration, the paradoxes among which he would be involved in carrying them out to their just inferences, he plunged so deeply into scepticism, that he at length began even to doubt the proof of his own individuality. Not

yet, however, was the yearning after truth altogether repressed by the spirit of unbelief; for we find him soon after buried in the deep mines of Platonism, and hear him after a while declaring, according to the Platonic doctrine, that true and perfect knowledge, which alone renders us happy, can only be found in that mental purity and spiritual enlightenment, by which we are elevated to a union with the Divine mind itself.

More was deeply impressed with the belief, that the revelation which God had originally made to the Hebrew nation had been communicated through the Pythagorean books to Plato; and not only this, but that the Cabbalistic philosophy as well, contained a system of truth couched under its metaphors and symbols, which was likewise to be traced to the same Divine origin. On this ground he sought to prove, that there is a unity of spirit pervading these various writings, and that the whole sum of true philosophy had its germ in the illumination which man originally received from the supernatural communication made to him by God. The love which More manifested to the most ethereal portions of Platonism, his warm defence of the Cabbala, his peculiar theological tenets, beside many of his poems, all clearly indicated his decided leaning to mysticism. These collateral views, however, might have been passed by almost unnoticed, or regarded simply as the poetic excursions of a lofty soul towards the elevated