Chapter I (1)

STATEMENT OF THE RESOURCES FOR INVESTIGATING HISTORY, AND PROOFS OF
THE REGULARITY OF HUMAN ACTIONS. THESE ACTIONS ARE GOVERNED BY
MENTAL AND PHYSICAL LAWS: THEREFORE BOTH SETS OF LAWS MUST BE
STUDIED, AND THERE CAN BE NO HISTORY WITHOUT THE NATURAL SCIENCES.

Of all the great branches of human knowledge, history is that upon which most has been written, and which has always been most popular. And it seems to be the general opinion that the success of historians has, on the whole, been equal to their industry; and that if on this subject much has been studied, much also is understood.

This confidence in the value of history is very widely diffused, as we see in the extent to which it is read, and in the share it occupies in all plans of education. Nor can it be denied that, in a certain point of view, such confidence is perfectly justifiable. It cannot be denied that materials have been collected which, when looked at in the aggregate, have a rich and imposing appearance. The political and military annals of all the great countries in Europe, and of most of those out of Europe, have been carefully compiled, put together in a convenient form, and the evidence on which they rest has been tolerably well sifted. Great attention has been paid to the history of legislation, also to that of religion: while considerable, though inferior, labour has been employed in tracing the progress of science, of literature, of the fine arts, of useful inventions, and, latterly, of the manners and comforts of the people. In order to increase our knowledge of the past, antiquities of every kind have been examined; the sites of ancient cities have been laid bare, coins dug up and deciphered, inscriptions copied, alphabets restored, hieroglyphics interpreted, and, in some instances, long-forgotten languages reconstructed and re-arranged. Several of the laws which regulate the changes of human speech have been discovered, and, in the hands of philologists, have been made to elucidate even the most obscure periods in the early migration of nations. Political economy has been raised to a science, and by it much light has been thrown on the causes of that unequal distribution of wealth which is the most fertile source of social disturbance. Statistics have been so sedulously cultivated, that we have the most extensive information, not only respecting the material interests of men, but also respecting their moral peculiarities; such as, the amount of different crimes, the proportion they bear to each other, and the influence exercised over them by age, sex, education, and the like. With this great movement physical geography has kept pace: the phenomena of climate have been registered, mountains measured, rivers surveyed and tracked to their source, natural productions of all kinds carefully studied, and their hidden properties unfolded: while every food which sustains life has been chemically analysed, its constituents numbered and weighed, and the nature of the connexion between them and the human frame has, in many cases, been satisfactorily ascertained. At the same time, and that nothing should be left undone which might enlarge our knowledge of the events by which man is affected, there have been instituted circumstantial researches in many other departments; so that in regard to the most civilized people, we are now acquainted with the rate of their mortality, of their marriages, the proportion of their births, the character of their employments, and the fluctuations both in their wages and in the prices of the commodities necessary to their existence. These and similar facts have been collected, methodized, and are ripe for use. Such results, which form, as it were, the anatomy of a nation, are remarkable for their minuteness; and to them there have been joined other results less minute, but more extensive. Not only have the actions and characteristics of the great nations been recorded, but a prodigious number of different tribes in all the parts of the known world have been visited and described by travellers, thus enabling us to compare the condition of mankind in every stage of civilization, and under every variety of circumstance. When we moreover add, that this curiosity respecting our fellow-creatures is apparently insatiable; that it is constantly increasing; that the means of gratifying it are also increasing, and that most of the observations which have been made are still preserved;--when we put all these things together, we may form a faint idea of the immense value of that vast body of facts which we now possess, and by the aid of which the progress of mankind is to be investigated.

But if, on the other hand, we are to describe the use that has been made of these materials, we must draw a very different picture. The unfortunate peculiarity of the history of man is, that although its separate parts have been examined with considerable ability, hardly any one has attempted to combine them into a whole, and ascertain the way in which they are connected with each other. In all the other great fields of inquiry, the necessity of generalization is universally admitted, and noble efforts are being made to rise from particular facts in order to discover the laws by which those facts are governed. So far, however, is this from being the usual course of historians, that among them a strange idea prevails, that their business is merely to relate events, which they may occasionally enliven by such moral and political reflections as seem likely to be useful. According to this scheme, any author who from indolence of thought, or from natural incapacity, is unfit to deal with the highest branches of knowledge, has only to pass some years in reading a certain number of books, and then he is qualified to be an historian; he is able to write the history of a great people, and his work becomes an authority on the subject which it professes to treat.

The establishment of this narrow standard has led to results very prejudicial to the progress of our knowledge. Owing to it, historians, taken as a body, have never recognized the necessity of such a wide and preliminary study as would enable them to grasp their subject in the whole of its natural relations. Hence the singular spectacle of one historian being ignorant of political economy; another knowing nothing of law; another nothing of ecclesiastical affairs and changes of opinion; another neglecting the philosophy of statistics, and another physical science: although these topics are the most essential of all, inasmuch as they comprise the principal circumstances by which the temper and character of mankind have been affected, and in which they are displayed. These important pursuits being, however, cultivated, some by one man, and some by another, have been isolated rather than united: the aid which might be derived from analogy and from mutual illustration has been lost; and no disposition has been shown to concentrate them upon history, of which they are, properly speaking, the necessary components.

Since the early part of the eighteenth century, a few great thinkers have indeed arisen, who have deplored the backwardness of history, and have done everything in their power to remedy it. But these instances have been extremely rare: so rare, that in the whole literature of Europe there are not more than three or four really original works which contain a systematic attempt to investigate the history of man according to those exhaustive methods which in other branches of knowledge have proved successful, and by which alone empirical observations can be raised to scientific truths.

Among historians in general, we find, after the sixteenth century, and especially during the last hundred years, several indications of an increasing comprehensiveness of view, and of a willingness to incorporate into their works subjects which they would formerly have excluded. By this means their assemblage of topics has become more diversified, and the mere collection and relative position of parallel facts has occasionally suggested generalizations no traces of which can be found in the earlier literature of Europe. This has been a great gain, in so far as it has familiarized historians with a wider range of thought, and encouraged those habits of speculation, which, though liable to abuse, are the essential condition of all real knowledge, because without them no science can be constructed.

But, notwithstanding that the prospects of historical literature are certainly more cheering now than in any former age, it must be allowed that, with extremely few exceptions, they are only prospects, and that as yet scarcely anything has been done towards discovering the principles which govern the character and destiny of nations. What has been actually effected I shall endeavour to estimate in another part of this introduction: at present it is enough to say, that for all the higher purposes of human thought history is still miserably deficient, and presents that confused and anarchical appearance natural to a subject of which the laws are unknown, and even the foundation unsettled.[1]

[1] A living writer, who has done more than any other to raise the
standard of history, contemptuously notices 'l'incohérente
compilation de faits déjà improprement qualifiée _d'histoire_.'
_Comte_, _Philosophie Positive_, vol. v. p. 18. There is much in
the method and in the conclusions of this great work with which I
cannot agree; but it would be unjust to deny its extraordinary
merits.

Our acquaintance with history being so imperfect, while our materials are so numerous, it seems desirable that something should be done on a scale far larger than has hitherto been attempted, and that a strenuous effort should be made to bring up this great department of inquiry to a level with other departments, in order that we may maintain the balance and harmony of our knowledge. It is in this spirit that the present work has been conceived. To make the execution of it fully equal to the conception is impossible: still I hope to accomplish for the history of man something equivalent, or at all events analogous, to what has been effected by other inquirers for the different branches of natural science. In regard to nature, events apparently the most irregular and capricious have been explained, and have been shown to be in accordance with certain fixed and universal laws. This has been done because men of ability, and, above all, men of patient, untiring thought, have studied natural events with the view of discovering their regularity: and if human events were subjected to a similar treatment, we have every right to expect similar results. For it is clear that they who affirm that the facts of history are incapable of being generalized, take for granted the very question at issue. Indeed they do more than this. They not only assume what they cannot prove, but they assume what in the present state of knowledge is highly improbable. Whoever is at all acquainted with what has been done during the last two centuries, must be aware that every generation demonstrates some events to be regular and predictable, which the preceding generation had declared to be irregular and unpredictable: so that the marked tendency of advancing civilization is to strengthen our belief in the universality of order, of method, and of law. This being the case, it follows that if any facts, or class of facts, have not yet been reduced to order, we, so far from pronouncing them to be irreducible, should rather be guided by our experience of the past, and should admit the probability that what we now call inexplicable will at some future time be explained. This expectation of discovering regularity in the midst of confusion is so familiar to scientific men, that among the most eminent of them it becomes an article of faith: and if the same expectation is not generally found among historians, it must be ascribed partly to their being of inferior ability to the investigators of nature, and partly to the greater complexity of those social phenomena with which their studies are concerned.

Both these causes have retarded the creation of the science of history. The most celebrated historians are manifestly inferior to the most successful cultivators of physical science: no one having devoted himself to history who in point of intellect is at all to be compared with Kepler, Newton, or many others that might be named.[2] And as to the greater complexity of the phenomena, the philosophic historian is opposed by difficulties far more formidable than is the student of nature; since, while on the one hand, his observations are more liable to those causes of error which arise from prejudice and passion, he, on the other hand, is unable to employ the great physical resource of experiment, by which we can often simplify even the most intricate problems in the external world.

[2] I speak merely of those who have made history their main pursuit.
Bacon wrote on it, but only as a subordinate object; and it
evidently cost him nothing like the thought which he devoted to
other subjects.

It is not, therefore, surprising that the study of the movements of Man should be still in its infancy, as compared with the advanced state of the study of the movements of Nature. Indeed the difference between the progress of the two pursuits is so great, that while in physics the regularity of events, and the power of predicting them, are often taken for granted even in cases still unproved, a similar regularity is in history not only not taken for granted, but is actually denied. Hence it is that whoever wishes to raise history to a level with other branches of knowledge, is met by a preliminary obstacle; since he is told that in the affairs of men there is something mysterious and providential, which makes them impervious to our investigations, and which will always hide from us their future course. To this it might be sufficient to reply, that such an assertion is gratuitous; that it is by its nature incapable of proof; and that it is moreover opposed by the notorious fact that everywhere else increasing knowledge is accompanied by an increasing confidence in the uniformity with which, under the same circumstances, the same events must succeed each other. It will, however, be more satisfactory to probe the difficulty deeper, and inquire at once into the foundation of the common opinion that history must always remain in its present empirical state, and can never be raised to the rank of a science. We shall thus be led to one vast question, which indeed lies at the root of the whole subject, and is simply this: Are the actions of men, and therefore of societies, governed by fixed laws, or are they the result either of chance or of supernatural interference? The discussion of these alternatives will suggest some speculations of considerable interest.

For, in reference to this matter, there are two doctrines, which appear to represent different stages of civilization. According to the first doctrine, every event is single and isolated, and is merely considered as the result of a blind chance. This opinion, which is most natural to a perfectly ignorant people, would soon be weakened by that extension of experience which supplies a knowledge of those uniformities of succession and of co-existence that nature constantly presents. If, for example, wandering tribes, without the least tincture of civilization, lived entirely by hunting and fishing, they might well suppose that the appearance of their necessary food was the result of some accident which admitted of no explanation. The irregularity of the supply, and the apparent caprice with which it was sometimes abundant and sometimes scanty, would prevent them from suspecting anything like method in the arrangements of nature; nor could their minds even conceive the existence of those general principles which govern the order of events, and by a knowledge of which we are often able to predict their future course. But when such tribes advance into the agricultural state, they, for the first time, use a food of which not only the appearance, but the very existence, seems to be the result of their own act. What they sow, that likewise do they reap. The provision necessary for their wants is brought more immediately under their own control, and is more palpably the consequence of their own labour. They perceive a distinct plan, and a regular uniformity of sequence, in the relation which the seed they put into the ground bears to the corn when arrived at maturity. They are now able to look to the future, not indeed with certainty, but with a confidence infinitely greater than they could have felt in their former and more precarious pursuits.[3] Hence there arises a dim idea of the stability of events; and for the first time there begins to dawn upon the mind a faint conception of what at a later period are called the Laws of Nature. Every step in the great progress will make their view of this more clear. As their observations accumulate, and as their experience extends over a wider surface, they meet with uniformities that they had never suspected to exist, and the discovery of which weakens that doctrine of chance with which they had originally set out. Yet a little further, and a taste for abstract reasoning springs up; and then some among them generalize the observations that have been made, and despising the old popular opinion, believe that every event is linked to its antecedent by an inevitable connexion, that such antecedent is connected with a preceding fact; and that thus the whole world forms a necessary chain, in which indeed each man may play his part, but can by no means determine what that part shall be.

[3] Some of the moral consequences of thus diminishing the
precariousness of food are noticed by M. Charles Comte in his
_Traité de Législation_, vol. ii. pp. 273-275. Compare _Mill's
History of India_, vol. i. pp. 180-181. But both these able writers
have omitted to observe that the change facilitates a perception of
the regularity of phenomena.

Thus it is that, in the ordinary march of society, an increasing perception of the regularity of nature destroys the doctrine of Chance, and replaces it by that of Necessary Connexion. And it is, I think, highly probable that out of these two doctrines of Chance and Necessity there have respectively arisen the subsequent dogmas of Free Will and Predestination. Nor is it difficult to understand the manner in which, in a more advanced state of society, this metamorphosis would occur. In every country, as soon as the accumulation of wealth has reached a certain point, the produce of each man's labour becomes more than sufficient for his own support: it is therefore no longer necessary that all should work; and there is formed a separate class, the members of which pass their lives for the most part in the pursuit of pleasure; a very few, however, in the acquisition and diffusion of knowledge. Among these last there are always found some who, neglecting external events, turn their attention to the study of their own minds;[4] and such men, when possessed of great abilities, become the founders of new philosophies and new religions, which often exercise immense influence over the people who receive them. But the authors of these systems are themselves affected by the character of the age in which they live. It is impossible for any man to escape the pressure of surrounding opinions; and what is called a new philosophy or a new religion is generally not so much a creation of fresh ideas, but rather a new direction given to ideas already current among contemporary thinkers.[5] Thus, in the case now before us, the doctrine of Chance in the external world corresponds to that of Free Will in the internal: while the other doctrine of Necessary Connexion is equally analogous to that of Predestination; the only difference being that the first is a development by the metaphysician, the second by the theologian. In the first instance, the metaphysician setting out with the doctrine of Chance, carries into the study of the mind this arbitrary and irresponsible principle, which in its new field becomes Free Will; an expression by which all difficulties seem to be removed, since perfect freedom, itself the cause of all actions, is caused by none, but, like the doctrine of Chance, is an ultimate fact admitting of no further explanation.[6] In the second instance, the theologian taking up the doctrine of Necessary Connexion recasts it into a religious shape; and his mind being already full of conceptions of order and of uniformity, he naturally ascribes such undeviating regularity to the prescience of Supreme Power; and thus to the magnificent notion of One God there is added the dogma that by Him all things have from the beginning been absolutely pre-determined and preordained.

[4] On the relation between this and the previous creation of wealth,
see _Tennemann_, _Geschichte der Philosophie_, vol. i. p. 30; 'Ein
gewisser Grad von Cultur und Wohlstand ist eine nothwendige äussere
Bedingung der Entwickelung des philosophischen Geistes. So lange
der Mensch noch mit den Mitteln seiner Existenz und der Befriedigung
seiner thierischen Bedürfnisse beschäftiget ist, so lange gehet die
Entwickelung und Bildung seiner Geisteskräfte nur langsam von
statten, und er nähert sich nur Schritt vor Schritt einer freiern
Vernunftthätigkeit.' ... 'Daher finden wir, dass man nur in denen
Nationen anfing zu philosophiren, welche sich zu einer
beträchtlichen Stufe des Wohlstandes und der Cultur emporgehoben
hatten.' Hence, as I shall endeavour to prove in the next chapter,
the immense importance of the physical phenomena which precede and
often control the metaphysical. In the history of the Greek mind we
can distinctly trace the passage from physical to metaphysical
inquiries. See _Grote's History of Greece_, vol. iv. p. 519, edit.
1847. That the atomic doctrine, in its relation to chance, was a
natural precursor of Platonism, is remarked in _Broussais_, _Examen
des Doctrines Médicales_, vol. i. pp. 53, 54, an able though
one-sided work. Compare, respecting the Chance of the atomists,
_Ritter's History of Ancient Philosophy_, vol. i. p. 553; an
hypothesis, as Ritter says, 'destructive of all inner energy;'
consequently antagonistic to the psychological hypothesis which
subsequently sprang up and conquered it. That physical researches
came first, is moreover attested by Diogenes Laertius: [Greek: Merê
de philosophias tria, physikon, êthikon, dialektikon; physikon men,
to peri kosmou, kai tôn en autô; êthikon de, to peri biou kai tôn
pros hêmas; dialektikon de, to amphoterôn tous logous presbeuon;
kai mechri men' Archelaou to physikon eidos ên apo de Sôkratous,
hôs proeirêtai, to êthikon; apo de Zênônos tou 'Eleatou, to
dialektikon.] _De Vitis Philosophorum Pro[oe]m._ segm. 18, vol. i.
p. 12: compare lib. ii. segm. 16, vol. i. p. 89.

[5] Beausobre has some good remarks on this in his learned work
_Histoire Critique de Manichée_, vol. i. p. 179, where he says that
the great religious heresies have been founded on previous
philosophies. Certainly no one acquainted with the history of
opinions will admit the sweeping assertion of M. Stahl that 'la
philosophie d'un peuple a sa racine dans sa théologie.' _Klimrath_,
_Travaux_, vol. ii. p. 454, Paris, 1843.

[6] 'Also ist ein Wille, dem die blose gesetzgebende Form der Maxime
allein zum Gesetze dienen kann, ein freier Wille.' _Kritik der
praktischen Vernunft_ in _Kant's Werke_, vol. iv. p. 128. 'Hat
selber für sich eigentlich keinen Bestimmungsgrund.' _Metaphysik
der Sitten_ in _Werke_, vol. v. p. 12. 'Die unbedingte Causalität
der Ursache.' _Kritik der reinen Vernunft_ in _Werke_, vol. ii.
p. 339. See also _Prolegomena zu jeder künftigen Metaphysik_ in
vol. iii. p. 268.

These opposite doctrines of free will and predestination[7] do, no doubt, supply a safe and simple solution of the obscurities of our being; and as they are easily understood, they are so suited to the average capacity of the human mind, that even at the present day an immense majority of men are divided between them; and they have not only corrupted the sources of our knowledge, but have given rise to religious sects, whose mutual animosities have disturbed society, and too often embittered the relations of private life. Among the more advanced European thinkers there is, however, a growing opinion that both doctrines are wrong or, at all events, that we have no sufficient evidence of their truth. And as this is a matter of great moment, it is important, before we proceed further, to clear up as much of it as the difficulties inherent in these subjects will enable us to do.

[7] That these doctrines, when treated according to the ordinary
methods of reasoning, not only oppose but exclude each other, would
be universally admitted if it were not for a desire generally felt
to save certain parts of each: it being thought dangerous to give
up free will on account of weakening moral responsibility, and
equally dangerous to give up predestination on account of impugning
the power of God. Various attempts have therefore been made to
reconcile liberty with necessity, and make the freedom of man
harmonize with the foreknowledge of the Deity. Compare on this
point a remarkable letter from Locke to Molyneux (_Locke's Works_,
vol. viii. p. 305), with the argument in one of Bentley's Sermons
(_Monk's Life of Bentley_, vol. ii. pp. 7, 8); also _Ritter's Hist.
of Ancient Philosophy_, vol. iv. pp. 143, 144; _Tennemann_, _Gesch.
der Philosophie_, vol. iv. pp. 301-304; _Copleston's Inquiry into
the Doctrines of Necessity and Predestination_, pp. 6, 7, 46, 69,
70, 85, 92, 108, 136; _Mosheim's Ecclesiastical Hist._, vol. i.
p. 207, vol. ii. p. 96; _Neander's Hist. of the Church_, vol. iv.
pp. 294, 389-391; _Bishop of Lincoln on Tertullian_, 1845, p. 323;
_Hodgson on Buddhism_, in _Transac. of Asiatic Society_, vol. ii.
p. 232.

Whatever doubts may be thrown on the account which I have given of the probable origin of the ideas of free will and predestination, there can, at all events, be no dispute as to the foundation on which those ideas are now actually based. The theory of predestination is founded on a theological hypothesis; that of free will on a metaphysical hypothesis. The advocates of the first proceed on a supposition for which, to say the least of it, they have as yet brought forward no good evidence. They require us to believe that the Author of Creation, whose beneficence they at the same time willingly allow, has, notwithstanding His supreme goodness, made an arbitrary distinction between the elect and the non-elect; that He has from all eternity doomed to perdition millions of creatures yet unborn, and whom His act alone can call into existence: and that He has done this, not in virtue of any principle of justice, but by a mere stretch of despotic power.[8] This doctrine owes its authority among Protestants to the dark though powerful mind of Calvin; but in the early Church it was first systematically methodized by Augustin, who appears to have borrowed it from the Manicheans.[9] At all events, and putting aside its incompatibility with other notions which are supposed to be fundamental,[10] it must, in a scientific investigation, be regarded as a barren hypothesis, because, being beyond the province of our knowledge, we have no means of ascertaining either its truth or its falsehood.

[8] Even Ambrose, who never went so far as Augustin, states this
principle in its repulsive nakedness: 'Deus quos dignat vocat, quos
vult religiosos facit.' _Neander_, vol. iv. p. 287. Calvin declares
'that God, in predestinating from all eternity one part of mankind
to everlasting happiness, and another to endless misery, was led to
make this distinction by no other motive than His own good pleasure
and free will.' _Mosheim's Eccles. Hist._, vol. ii. p. 103, see also
p. 100; and _Carwithen's Hist. of the Church of England_, vol. i.
p. 552.

[9] On the Manichæan origin of Augustin's opinions, compare _Potter_,
_Esprit de l'Eglise_, vol. ii. p. 171, Paris, 1821; _Tomline's
Refutation of Calvinism_, 1817, pp. 571-576; _Southey's Book of the
Church_, 1824, vol. i. pp. 301, 302; _Matter_, _Hist. du
Gnosticisme_, 1828, vol. i. p. 325. However, Beausobre (_Histoire
de Manichée_, vol. ii. pp. 33-40) seems to have proved a difference
between the election of Augustin and that of Basilides.

[10] On the absurdity of 'an omnipotent arbitrary Deity,' and on the
incongruity of such a combination with [Greek: physei kalon kai
dikaion], see _Cudworth's Intellect. Syst._, vol. i. pp. 45, 419,
vol. iii. p. 241, vol. iv. p. 160. See also _Theodicee_ in _Kant's
Werke_, vol. vi. pp. 141, 142, and _Metaphysik der Sitten_ in vol.
v. p. 332, upon 'den göttlichen Zweck in Ansehung des menschlichen
Geschlechts.'

The other doctrine, which has long been celebrated under the name of Free Will, is connected with Arminianism; but it in reality rests on the metaphysical dogma of the supremacy of human consciousness. Every man, it is alleged, feels and knows that he is a free agent: nor can any subtleties of argument do away with our consciousness of possessing a free will.[11] Now the existence of this supreme jurisdiction, which is thus to set at defiance all the ordinary methods of reasoning, involves two assumptions: of which the first, though possibly true, has never been proved; and the other is unquestionably false. These assumptions are, that there is an independent faculty called consciousness, and that the dictates of that faculty are infallible. But, in the first place, it is by no means certain that consciousness is a faculty; and some of the ablest thinkers have been of opinion that it is merely a state or condition of the mind.[12] Should this turn out to be the case, the argument falls to the ground; since, even if we admit that all the faculties of the mind, when completely exercised, are equally accurate, no one will make the same claim for every condition into which the mind itself may be casually thrown. However, waiving this objection, we may, in the second place, reply, that even if consciousness is a faculty, we have the testimony of all history to prove its extreme fallibility.[13] All the great stages through which, in the progress of civilization, the human race has successively passed, have been characterized by certain mental peculiarities or convictions, which have left their impress upon the religion, the philosophy, and the morals of the age. Each of these convictions has been to one period a matter of faith, to another a matter for derision;[14] and each of them has, in its own epoch, been as intimately bound up with the minds of men, and become as much a part of their consciousness, as is that opinion which we now term freedom of the will. Yet it is impossible that all these products of consciousness can be true, because many of them contradict each other. Unless, therefore, in different ages there are different standards of truth, it is clear that the testimony of a man's consciousness is no proof of an opinion being true; for if it were so, then two propositions diametrically opposed to each other might both be equally accurate. Besides this, another view may be drawn from the common operations of ordinary life. Are we not in certain circumstances conscious of the existence of spectres and phantoms; and yet is it not generally admitted that such beings have no existence at all? Should it be attempted to refute this argument by saying that such consciousness is apparent and not real, then I ask, What is it that judges between the consciousness which is genuine and that which is spurious?[15] If this boasted faculty deceives us in some things, what security have we that it will not deceive us in others? If there is no security, the faculty is not trustworthy. If there is a security, then, whatever it may be, its existence shows the necessity for some authority to which consciousness is subordinate, and thus does away with that doctrine of the supremacy of consciousness, on which the advocates of free will are compelled to construct the whole of their theory. Indeed, the uncertainty as to the existence of consciousness as an independent faculty, and the manner in which that faculty, if it exists, has contradicted its own suggestions, are two of the many reasons which have long since convinced me that metaphysics will never be raised to a science by the ordinary method of observing individual minds; but that its study can only be successfully prosecuted by the deductive application of laws which must be discovered historically, that is to say, which must be evolved by an examination of the whole of those vast phenomena which the long course of human affairs presents to our view.

[11] Johnson said to Boswell, 'Sir, we _know_ our will is free, and
there's an end on't.' _Boswell's Life of Johnson_, edit. Croker,
1848, p. 203. 'La question: Sommes-nous libres? me paraît
au-dessous de la discussion. Elle est résolue par le témoignage de
la conscience attestant que dans certains cas nous pourrions faire
le contraire de ce que nous faisons.' _Cousin_, _Hist. de la
Philosophie_, I. Série, vol. i. pp. 190, 191. 'Die Freiheit des
Menschen, als moralischen Wesens, gründet sich auf das sittliche
Bewusstseyn.' _Tennemann_, _Gesch. der Philosophie_, vol. v.
p. 161. That this is the only ground for believing in the freedom
of the will is so evident, that we need not notice the mystical
proof of Philo (_Ritter's Ancient Philosophy_, vol. iv. p. 447);
nor the physical one of the Basilidian monads (_Beausobre_, _Hist.
de Manichée_, vol. ii. p. 23); still less the argument of
Bardesanes, who thought to demonstrate freedom by the variety of
human customs! _Matter_, _Hist. du Gnosticisme_, vol. i. p. 323,
which should be compared with _Burdach's Physiologie comme Science
d'Observation_, vol. v. p. 50, Paris, 1839.

[12] Mr. James Mill (_Analysis of the Mind_, vol. i. pp. 171, 172) says
that consciousness and belief are the same, and that great error
has arisen from calling 'consciousness a feeling distinct from all
other feelings.' According to Locke (_Essay concerning Human
Understanding_, book ii. chap. i., Works, vol. i. p. 89),
'consciousness is the perception of what passes in a man's own
mind.' Brown (_Philosophy of the Mind_, pp. 67, 68) denies that
consciousness is a faculty: and Sir W. Hamilton complains of
'Reid's degradation of consciousness into a special faculty.'
_Notes to Reid's Works_, pp. 223, 297, 373. M. Cousin (_Hist. de
la Philosophie_, II. Série, vol. i. p. 131) pronounces
consciousness to be 'phénomène complexe;' and at p. 94, 'la
_condition_ nécessaire de l'intelligence c'est la conscience:'
while a still later writer (_Jobert's New System of Philosophy_,
vol. i. p. 25) declares that 'we have the consciousness of our
consciousness--this is certain.' The statement in Alciphron,
Dialogue vii. (_Berkeley's Works_, vol. i. pp. 505, 506) is equally
unsatisfactory: and what still further perplexes the question is
the existence of what is now recognised as 'double consciousness.'
See on this extraordinary phenomenon _Elliotson's Physiology_,
pp. 367-369, 1165; _Mayo's Physiology_, pp. 195, 196; _Prichard's
Treatise on Insanity_, pp. 450, 451; _Carpenter's Human
Physiology_, p. 379.

[13] This requires explanation. Consciousness is infallible as to the
_fact_ of its testimony; but fallible as to the _truth_. That we
are conscious of certain phenomena, is a proof that those phenomena
exist in the mind, or are presented to it; but to say that this
demonstrates the truth of the phenomena is to go a step further,
and not only offer a testimony, but also pass a judgment. The
moment we do this, we introduce the element of fallibility; because
consciousness and judgment put together cannot be always right,
inasmuch as judgment is often wrong.

The late Blanco White, a thinker of considerable subtlety, says: 'The important distinction between _libertas a necessitate_ and _libertas a coactione_, is seldom attended to. Nothing whatever can _force_ my will: every man is more or less conscious of that fact: but at the same time we are, or may be, equally conscious that we are never decided without a motive.' _Life of B. White_, by Himself, 1845, vol. iii. p. 90. But how can a man be conscious 'that nothing whatever _can_ force his will'? This is not consciousness, but judgment: it is a judgment of what may be, not a consciousness of what is. If there is any meaning in the word 'consciousness,' it must refer solely to the present, and can never include future contingencies as to what _may_ be or _can_ be.

[14] As Herder says, 'Was diese Nation ihrem Gedankenkreise
unentbehrlich hält, daran hat jene nie gedacht oder hält es gar
für schädlich.' _Ideen zur Gesch. der Menschheit_, vol. ii. p. 130.

[15] Plato was struck by the extreme difficulty of finding a standard
in the human mind whereby we may test the truth or falsehood of
spectral phenomena and dreams. And the only conclusion to which
this consummate thinker could arrive, was that whatever appears
true to the individual mind is true for him: which, however, is an
evasion of the problem, not a solution of it. See the Theætetus,
where Plato, as usual, puts his own speculations into the mouth of
Socrates. He opens the question at the beginning of sec. 39
(_Platonis Opera_, vol. iii. p. 426, edit. Bekker, Lond. 1826),
[Greek: Mê toinun apolipômen rhson elleipon autou. lepetai de
enupniôn te peri kai nosôn, tôn te allôn kai manias], &c. These are
the supposed sources of error; but Socrates, after discussing them,
and entangling Theætetus in a maze, sums up at the end of sec. 45,
p. 434, [Greek: alêthês ara emoi êh emê aisthêsis.] See further,
p. 515, on the formation of erroneous judgments; and respecting the
assertions made by many of the Greeks that [Greek: pasa phantsia
alêthês] and [Greek: pasa duxa alêthês], compare _Cudworth_,
vol. iii. p. 379, vol. iv. p. 118. For physiological considerations
concerning the preservation of consciousness in dreams and in
insanity, see _Broussais_, _Examen des Doctrines Médicales_,
vol. i. p. 406; his _Cours de Phrénologie_, p. 49; _Esquirol_,
_Maladies Mentales_, vol. i. p. 97, vol. ii. p. 790; _Simon's
Pathology_, p. 204; _Holland's Medical Notes_, p. 434; _Henle_,
_Anatomie Générale_, vol. ii. p. 287; _Burdach_, _Traité de
Physiologie_, vol. v. p. 223. See, too, the passages in Tennemann
which connect this difficulty with the theory of representation
(_Geschichte der Philosophie_, vol. i. p. 357, vol. ii. pp. 119,
159, vol. iii. p. 406, vol. iv. p. 418); and the attempt of
Berkeley (_Works_, vol. i. pp. 93, 101, 176) to turn it into a
defence of his own system, on the ground that our belief respecting
the external world may be as false when we are awake as when we
dream. The solution offered by the Stoics is merely a verbal and
unproved distinction: [Greek: diapherei de phantasia kai phantasma.
phantasma men gar esti dokêsis dianoias oia ginetai kata tous
upnous; phantasia de esti tupôsis en psuchê toutestin alloiôsis,
hôs ho Chrusippos en tê duôdekatê peri psuchês uphistatai.] _Diog.
Laert. de Vitis Philos._ lib. vii. segm. 50, vol. i. p. 395.

Fortunately, however, for the object of this work, the believer in the possibility of a science of history is not called upon to hold either the doctrine of predestined events, or that of freedom of the will;[16] and the only positions which, in this stage of the inquiry, I shall expect him to concede are the following: That when we perform an action, we perform it in consequence of some motive or motives; that those motives are the results of some antecedents; and that, therefore, if we were acquainted with the whole of the antecedents, and with all the laws of their movements, we could with unerring certainty predict the whole of their immediate results. This, unless I am greatly mistaken, is the view which must be held by every man whose mind is unbiased by system, and who forms his opinions according to the evidence actually before him.[17] If, for example, I am intimately acquainted with the character of any person, I can frequently tell how he will act under some given circumstances. Should I fail in this prediction, I must ascribe my error not to the arbitrary and capricious freedom of his will, nor to any supernatural pre-arrangement, for of neither of these things have we the slightest proof; but I must be content to suppose either that I had been misinformed as to some of the circumstances in which he was placed, or else that I had not sufficiently studied the ordinary operations of his mind. If, however, I were capable of correct reasoning, and if, at the same time, I had a complete knowledge both of his disposition and of all the events by which he was surrounded, I should be able to foresee the line of conduct which, in consequence of those events, he would adopt.[18]

[16] Meaning by free will, a cause of action residing in the mind, and
exerting itself independently of motives. If any one says that we
have this power of acting without motives, but that in the
practical exercise of the power we are always guided by motives
either conscious or unconscious--if any one says this, he asserts
a barren proposition, which does not interfere with my views, and
which may or may not be true, but which most assuredly no one has
ever yet succeeded in proving.

[17] That is, according to the phenomenal evidence presented to the
understanding, and estimated by the ordinary logic with which the
understanding is conversant. But Kant has made a most remarkable
attempt to avoid the practical consequences of this, by asserting
that freedom, being an idea produced by the reason, must be
referred to transcendental laws of the reason; that is, to laws
which are removed from the domain of experience, and cannot be
verified by observation. In regard, however, to the scientific
conceptions of the understanding (as distinguished from the Reason)
he fully admits the existence of a Necessity destructive of
Liberty. In Note A, at the end of this chapter, I shall put
together the most important passages in which Kant unfolds this
view.

[18] This is, of course, an hypothetical case, merely given as an
illustration. We never can know the whole of any man's antecedents,
or even the whole of our own; but it is certain that the nearer we
approach to a complete knowledge of the antecedent, the more
likely we shall be to predict the consequent.

Rejecting, then, the metaphysical dogma of free will, and the theological dogma of predestined events,[19] we are driven to the conclusion that the actions of men, being determined solely by their antecedents, must have a character of uniformity, that is to say, must, under precisely the same circumstances, always issue in precisely the same results. And as all antecedents are either in the mind or out of it, we clearly see that all the variations in the results, in other words, all the changes of which history is full, all the vicissitudes of the human race, their progress or their decay, their happiness or their misery, must be the fruit of a double action; an action of external phenomena upon the mind, and another action of the mind upon the phenomena.

[19] The doctrine of providential interference is bound up with that of
predestination, because the Deity, foreseeing all things, must have
foreseen His own intention to interfere. To deny this foresight, is
to limit the omniscience of God. Those, therefore, who hold that,
in particular cases, a special providence interrupts the ordinary
course of events, must also hold that in each case the interruption
had been predestined; otherwise they impeach one of the Divine
attributes. For, as Thomas Aquinas puts it (_Neander's History of
the Church_, vol. viii. p. 176), 'knowledge, as knowledge, does not
imply, indeed, causality; but in so far as it is a knowledge
belonging to the artist who forms, it stands in the relation of
causality to that which is produced by his art.'

The same argument is stated by Alciphron, though not quite so
conclusively; _Dialogue_ vii. sec. 20 in _Berkeley's Works_,
vol. i. p. 515: and as to the impossibility of Omniscience having
new knowledge or an afterthought, see _Hitchcock's Religion of
Geology_, 1851, pp. 267, 328; an ingenious work, but one which
leaves all the real difficulties untouched. Compare _Ritter's Hist.
of Ancient Philos._ vol. iv. pp. 326, 327, with _Tennemann_,
_Gesch. der Philos._ vol. vi. pp. 151, 342-345, vol. ix. pp. 81-94,
vol. xi. p. 178; and in particular, the question raised (vol. viii.
p. 242), 'Ob das Vorherwissen Gottes die Ursache der künftigen
Dinge sey, oder nicht.' It was to meet all this, that some asserted
the eternity of matter, and others the existence of two original
principles, one good and one evil. _Beausobre_, _Histoire de
Manichée_, vol. ii. pp. 145, 146, 252, 336.

These are the materials out of which a philosophic history can alone be constructed. On the one hand, we have the human mind obeying the laws of its own existence, and, when uncontrolled by external agents, developing itself according to the conditions of its organization. On the other hand, we have what is called Nature, obeying likewise its laws; but incessantly coming into contact with the minds of men, exciting their passions, stimulating their intellect, and therefore giving to their actions a direction which they would not have taken without such disturbance. Thus we have man modifying nature, and nature modifying man; while out of this reciprocal modification all events must necessarily spring.

The problem immediately before us, is to ascertain the method of discovering the laws of this double modification: and this, as we shall presently see, leads us into a preliminary inquiry as to which of the two modifications is the more important; that is to say, whether the thoughts and desires of men are more influenced by physical phenomena, or whether the physical phenomena are more influenced by them. For it is evident that whichever class is the more active, should if possible be studied before the other; and this, partly because its results will be more prominent, and therefore more easy to observe; and partly because by first generalizing the laws of the greater power we shall leave a smaller residue of unexplained facts than if we had begun by generalizing the laws of the lesser power. But, before entering into this examination, it will be convenient to state some of the most decisive proofs we now possess of the regularity with which mental phenomena succeed each other. By this means the preceding views will be considerably strengthened; and we shall, at the same time, be able to see what those resources are which have been already employed in elucidating this great subject.

That the results actually effected are extremely valuable is evident, not only from the wide surface which the generalizations cover, but also from the extraordinary precautions with which they have been made. For while most moral inquiries have depended on some theological or metaphysical hypothesis, the investigations to which I allude are exclusively inductive; they are based on collections of almost innumerable facts, extending over many countries, thrown into the clearest of all forms, the form of arithmetical tables; and finally, they have been put together by men who, being for the most part mere government officials,[20] had no particular theory to maintain, and no interest in distorting the truth of the reports they were directed to make.

[20] _Dufau_, _Traité de Statistique_, pp. 75, 148.

The most comprehensive inferences respecting the actions of men, which are admitted by all parties as incontestable truths, are derived from this or from analogous sources; they rest on statistical evidence, and are expressed in mathematical language. And whoever is aware of how much has been discovered by this single method, must not only recognize the uniformity with which mental phenomena succeed each other, but must, I think, feel sanguine that still more important discoveries will be made, so soon as there are brought into play those other powerful resources which even the present state of knowledge will abundantly supply. Without, however, anticipating future inquiries, we are, for the moment, only concerned with those proofs of the existence of a uniformity in human affairs which statisticians have been the first to bring forward.

The actions of men are by an easy and obvious division separated into two classes, the virtuous and the vicious; and as these classes are correlative, and when put together compose the total of our moral conduct, it follows that whatever increases the one, will in a relative point of view diminish the other; so that if we can in any period detect a uniformity and a method in the vices of a people, there must be a corresponding regularity in their virtues; or if we could prove a regularity in their virtues, we should necessarily infer an equal regularity in their vices; the two sets of actions being, according to the terms of the division, merely supplementary to each other.[21] Or, to express this proposition in another way, it is evident that if it can be demonstrated that the bad actions of men vary in obedience to the changes in the surrounding society, we shall be obliged to infer that their good actions, which are, as it were, the residue of their bad ones, vary in the same manner; and we shall be forced to the further conclusion, that such variations are the result of large and general causes, which, working upon the aggregate of society, must produce certain consequences, without regard to the volition of those particular men of whom the society is composed.

[21] Some moralists have also established a third class of actions,
which they call indifferent, as belonging neither to virtue nor to
vice; and hence there arose the famous doctrine of probability,
set up by several eminent Romish casuists, and hotly attacked by
Pascal. But this, if we put aside its worst feature, namely its
practical bearings, is merely a question of definition; inasmuch
as every indifferent act must lean on the side either of evil or
of good, and may therefore be referred to the category to which it
inclines; and certainly every increase of vice diminishes virtue
relatively, though not always absolutely. Among the Greek
philosophers there was a schism on this point: [Greek: Areskei de
autois] (i.e. the Stoics) [Greek: mêden meson einai aretês kai
kakias; tôn peripatêtikôn metaxu aretês kai kakias einai legontôn
tên prokopên]. _Diog. Laert. de Vitis Philosophorum_, lib. vii.
segm. 127, vol. i. p. 445.

Such is the regularity we expect to find, if the actions of men are governed by the state of the society in which they occur; while, on the other hand, if we can find no such regularity, we may believe that their actions depend on some capricious and personal principle peculiar to each man, as free will or the like. It becomes, therefore, in the highest degree important to ascertain whether or not there exists a regularity in the entire moral conduct of a given society; and this is precisely one of those questions for the decision of which statistics supply us with materials of immense value.

For the main object of legislation being to protect the innocent against the guilty, it naturally followed that European governments, so soon as they became aware of the importance of statistics, should begin to collect evidence respecting the crimes they were expected to punish. This evidence has gone on accumulating, until it now forms of itself a large body of literature, containing, with the commentaries connected with it, an immense array of facts, so carefully compiled, and so well and clearly digested, that more may be learned from it respecting the moral nature of Man than can be gathered from all the accumulated experience of preceding ages.[22] But as it will be impossible in this Introduction to give anything like a complete statement of those inferences which, in the actual state of statistics, we are authorized to draw, I shall content myself with examining two or three of the most important, and pointing out the connexion between them.

[22] I say this advisedly: and whoever has examined these subjects must
be aware of the way in which writers on morals repeat the
commonplace and hackneyed notions of their predecessors; so that a
man, after reading everything that has been written on moral
conduct and moral philosophy, will find himself nearly as much in
the dark as when his studies first began. The most accurate
investigators of the human mind have hitherto been the poets,
particularly Homer and Shakespeare; but these extraordinary
observers mainly occupied themselves with the concrete phenomena
of life; and if they analyzed, as they probably did, they have
concealed the steps of the process, so that now we can only verify
their conclusions empirically. The great advance made by the
statisticians consists in applying to these inquiries the doctrine
of averages, which no one thought of doing before the eighteenth
century.