Chapter C: J. Gloucester and Bristol

_July 19, 1871._

FOOTNOTES:

[1] "Philosophy of the Inductive Sciences."

[2] Mr. Wallace, in the "Anthropological Journal," 1864; see also Lubbock's "Prehistoric Times," last chapter.

[3] Moleschott, "Circulation of Life:" Letter XVIII., with Liebig's opinion there quoted.

[4] Kant, "Metaphysics of Ethics."

[5] See, for example, Renouvier, "Science de la Morale," 1869.

[6] "Limits of Philosophical Enquiry." 1868.

[7] Nehem. ix. 6.

[8] See Duke of Argyll's "Reign of Law."

[9] Job xxvi. 14.

[10] Plutarch, "De Justitia."

[11] Buchner.

[12] See Mill on Comte, p. 62, _seq._

[13] Paroles de Philosophic Positive, p. 54.

[14] Janet refers to Nysten's Dictionnaire de Médecine, etc., by Littré and Robin.

[15] Paroles de Philosophie Positive, p. 53.

[16] Harris's Highlands of Œthiopia, vol. iii. p. 63.

[17] While these sheets were passing through the press, I read in the _Pall Mall Gazette_ for April 24th, as follows: One of the Communist papers, the _Montagne_, writes: "Education has made sceptics of us; the Revolution of 1871 is atheistic; our Republic wears a bouquet of immortelles in her bosom. We take our dead to their homes, and our wives to our hearts without a prayer. Priests! throw aside your frocks, turn up your sleeves, lay your hands upon the plough, for a song to the lark in the morning air is better than a mumbling of psalms, and an ode to sparkling wine is preferable to a chanting of hymns. Our dogs that used only to growl when a bishop passed will bite him now, and not a voice will be raised to curse the day which dawns for the sacrifice of the Archbishop of Paris. We owe it to ourselves, we owe it to the world. The Commune has promised us an eye for an eye, and has given us Monseigneur Darboy as a hostage. The justice of the tribunals shall commence, said Danton, when the wrath of the people is appeased; and he was right. Darboy! tremble in your cell, for your day is past, your end is close at hand."

[18] I use this word because if the value of faith and virtue consists in their being a discipline, while this implies the existence of difficulty, it also limits the degree of the difficulty.

[19] "Rudiments," so far from disproving, prove this. A rudiment shows that nature might have given more, but has not done so. Why? Because the further gift would have been useless, for instance, man would not have been benefited by being able to feel with his eye-brows. (See Darwin, "Descent of Man," i. 25.)

[20] Professor Huxley's words are, "In these groups there is abundant evidence of variation--none of what is ordinarily understood as progression; and if the known geological record is to be regarded as even any considerable fragment of the whole, it is inconceivable that any theory of a necessarily progressive development can stand, for the numerous orders and families cited afford no trace of such a process." (p. 245.)

[21] Darwin, "Descent of Man," i. 205.[175]

[22] It is a curious fact that these Ascidians possess a heart and a circulation, but that after the heart has beaten a certain number of times it stops, and then beats the opposite way, so as to reverse the circulation. (Lay Sermons, p. 95.) In what stage of its progress did it so degenerate as to lose this remarkable power?

[23] Darwin, "Descent of Man," i. 22.[176]

[24] There is something of this in animals just as, on the other hand, man is not altogether devoid of instincts. I should have expected this from the teaching of the first chapter of Genesis, which represents men not as a distinct creation but as the last act of creation.

[25] Physically the monkey is man's superior. Anatomists assure us that they can find no very great difference between his brain and ours. His larynx also is as well fitted as ours to produce articulate sounds. So far we are equal. But he has four hands, and we have but two. Read Sir C. Bell's "Bridgewater Treatise upon the Hand," and you will see at once that a vast superiority is implied in this. I can never believe that when, by natural and sexual selection, a creature had been attained possessed of four hands, nature could so degradate in her work as to fall back upon two. No well-bred monkey would have mated with one so deformed.[178]

[26] Lartet, quoted by Darwin, "Descent," i. 51.

[27] The body politic is in fact very much like the natural body. There is a constant waste and a constant repair. The waste may be greater than the repair--and in that case the body dwindles--but the repair may be greater than the waste, in which case there is growth, progress. In both alike real growth can only be by assimilation. The new must be taken up into the old, and become part with it. That which is losing vitality must be put away; but that which is to take its place must become one with the old. After a certain time, however, natural bodies lose their powers of assimilation, and old age and death are the result: I cannot enter into the question how far this is also the case with political bodies.[179]

[28] Animals brought into contact with man attain some small share in this power. The influence of man over domesticated animals is most remarkable. I should doubt whether a wild animal was at all capable of making such a distinction.

[29] I have taken these words from the "Vedanta Philosophy." It teaches that the apparent reality of this world is _māyā_, i.e., deceit, illusion, jugglery: "naught besides _the One_ exists:" the world was made out of nothing and is nothing. "All that is real in this visible, is the God who is invisible." See Ballantyne's "Christianity compared with Hindu Philosophy," pp. xxxi-xxxvii, 43-50.

[30] It is the examination of these moral and spiritual faculties which makes it so probable that man possesses something more than a highly organised body and mental powers, which, though superior in degree, are still of the same kind as those possessed by the animals. And it should be remembered that the proof that man possesses a soul, and that the soul is immortal, is entirely independent of revelation. It is based upon the intelligent study of the facts of psychology. If, however, it is said that man does not really possess, but only seems to possess these faculties, I answer that then nature is a mere deceiver, and its works a sham: and that, consequently, all physical science would be the study of the illusive.

[31] Though we draw a distinction between the natural and the supernatural, this distinction is tenable only when we look at things from below, and not when we look at them from above. We call those processes natural of which we know or might know the secondary causes.

[32] It is no argument against revelation that it does not make us all holy and devout. It is not the law of this present state of things that all men attain to the highest possible physical and mental excellence. All that we can say is, that they ought to aim at nothing less. So neither do all men attain to moral and religious excellence. Equally it ought to be their aim; but why they so often fail in attaining to it is more than any one can answer. The failure of individuals to attain to the highest good possible for the species is one of nature's universal laws. Why this present state of things is so constituted is a mystery, which cannot be solved here; but which will certainly be solved when we have the perfect knowledge promised us in 1 Cor. xiii. 12.

[33] Professor Huxley considers that man is a bungle. At all events he would be glad to be "turned into a sort of clock, and wound up every morning before he got out of bed," on condition that he should always "think what is true, and do what is right." (Lay Sermons, p. 373.) I suppose this means that we should like to be governed by very perfect instincts, but I question whether he would not find his new kind of life dull. At present both right thinking and right doing require of him an effort, which, from the spirit of his writings, I should think he enjoys. But, after all, what he says has a true foundation. Sin is not a necessary part of man's lot. It cleaves to him because he is fallen; and this world apparently offers us a state of moral and religious discipline, by the aid of which, in a future state, we shall be free from sin. But those who do not wish to retrograde would prefer to have this freedom by the force of perfected habits than by the force of instinct.

[34] "Essays and Reviews" (Baden Powell), p. 133. The italics are mine, simply to call attention to the point of the quotation.

[35] De Gen. An. II. iii. 10. See article by Sir Alexander Grant in the _Contemporary_, May, 1871, p. 277.

[36] Since writing the above, I have lighted on the following passage in an able university sermon by one of the lecturers in the present course. I am glad to confirm what had struck my own mind, by quoting the words of so careful a reasoner. In reference to philosophic doubts directed against the idea of design, and the analogy between human and natural productions, he remarks: "This is evidently a very hard question, and if it properly belonged to the province of physical inquiry I should shrink from hazarding any investigation of its merits. But the question has overstepped the boundary of such sciences, and become a branch of philosophy. I may seem obscure in making this assertion, but you will see its truth if you consider for a moment the limit which divides science from philosophy. Sciences are often content to accept their principles, the lower from the higher (as Aristotle puts the case) in an ascending scale up to metaphysic, which, if it is anything at all, is the philosophy of first grounds so far as they are discoverable. While the various kinds of inquiry assume their several grounds as postulates, each keeps its separate and subordinate place. But one prime impulse of the human mind is unification, and thus, in every science, there springs up a tendency to ground itself. The moment this attempt is made, a science becomes a philosophy, and must be tested by the ordinary criteria of philosophic procedure."--_Right and Wrong_, by the Rev. W. Jackson, M.A.

[37] _Westminster Review_, Oct., 1860. Art. on New Christianity.

[38] Mill's "System of Logic," ii., 160.

[39] "The argument in Hume's celebrated Essay on Miracles was very far from being a new one. It had, as Mr. Coleridge has pointed out, been distinctly indicated by South in his sermon on the incredulity of St. Thomas; and there is a remarkable statement of much the same argument put into the mouth of Woolston's Advocate, in Sherlock's Trial of the Witnesses."--Art. on Miracles in Smith's "Dictionary of the Bible."

[40] See Martensen's "Christian Dogmatics," 222.

[41] I must here refer to Dorner's "Doctrine of the Person of Christ," where evidence is afforded of what I say.

[42] See again Martensen's "Christian Dogmatics," 220.

[43] I would also mention "The Divine Origin of Christianity," by John Sheppard. A work less known than it deserves to be.

[44] Wagenseil's Confutation of the Toldoth Jeschu: Sheppard's "Divine Origin of Christianity," ii. 205, _et seq._

[45] Lessons on Christian Evidence, 33.

[46] Celsus in Orig., L. i., § 28.

[47] Hieron, T. ii. 334.

[48] Cyril contra Jul., L. vi., p. 191. See, respecting these and similar passages, Lardner's Credibility, vii. 225, 442, 627.

[49] "Essays and Reviews" (Baden Powell), 107.

[50] That Rénan should treat the Resurrection of Lazarus as a pious fraud, and the one moral blot in the story of Christ, is the greatest literary, as well as moral, blot in his "Vie de Jésus." See Hutton's Essays, i., 297.

[51] See Art. on Miracles in Smith's Dic.

[52] Niebuhr's "Lebensnachrichten," quoted in Luthardt's "Apologetic Lectures," 200.

[53] Mozley's "Lectures on Miracles," 120.

[54] "Lectures on Miracles," 5.

[55] Coleridge's "Friend," iii., 104-6.

[56] Dr. Vaughan's "Christ the Light of the World," 172.

[57] Ad. Gen. 1. i. c. 42, _et seq._

[58] Inst. L. iv. c. 25.

[59] Dorner, in his _Person of Christ_ (Clark's Trans.), ii. 254, dwells upon this subject as unfolded by Athanasius. See also Athanasius' third discourse against the Arians, § 32.

[60] In Johan. Evan. Tract, 16, 24, 49.

[61] See Brachet's "Dictionnaire Etymologique," sub voc: _Developper_.

[62] "Essay on Development," page 35.

[63] I will here quote the words of a great man, who has for many years been one of the chief scientific ornaments of this country, and whose departure from this life, at the ripe age of seventy-nine years, I see, with much sorrow, recorded in the _Times_ of this day.

Speaking of the manner in which the universe has come into its present condition, and is preserved in that condition, and of the possibility of collision amongst the constituent bodies, Sir John Herschel says: "Ages, which to us may well appear indefinite, may easily be conceived to pass without a single instance of collision, in the nature of a catastrophe. Such may have gradually become rarer as the system has emerged from what must be considered as its chaotic state, till at length, in the fulness of time, and under the pre-arranging guidance of that DESIGN which pervades universal nature, each individual may have taken up such a course as to annul the possibility of further destructive interference."--_Outlines of Astronomy_, p. 600.

I quote these words for the sake of the phrase which they contain, and the importance of which it is impossible to exaggerate, "The pre-arranging guidance of that DESIGN which pervades universal nature."

[64] "Le Genie du Christianisme," Bk. iv., chap. v.

[65] "Descent of Man," p. 208.

[66] Report of Evidence, 1870:--

Q. 376. I thought you said Bishop Butler had been excluded?--It is not excluded, but being an optional subject it is one that has been discouraged.

Q. 377. Why?--He is gone out of fashion; I do not know why.

Q. 378. Who makes the fashion?--I suppose the particular set of examiners at one time.

Q. 379. What are the works of Bishop Butler which have so gone out of fashion?--The Analogy and the Sermons were the books which we used to take up.

[67] The subject of this Lecture is touched upon, but not expanded, in the following pregnant passage of Butler's _Analogy_: "The thing objected against this scheme of the Gospel is, that it seems to suppose God was reduced to the necessity of a long series of intricate means in order to accomplish His ends, the recovery and salvation of the world: in like sort as men, for want of understanding or power, not being able to come to their ends readily, are forced to go roundabout ways, and make use of many perplexed contrivances to arrive at them. Now, everything which we see shows the folly of this, considered as an objection against the truth of Christianity. For, according to our manner of conception, God makes use of a variety of means, what we often think tedious ones, in the natural course of providence, for the accomplishment of all His ends. Indeed, it is certain there is somewhat in this matter quite beyond our comprehension: but the mystery is as great in nature as in Christianity."--_Analogy_, Part II., chap. iv.

[68] Philos. of Univ. Hist. i. p. 191.

[69] Manuel d'Histoire, tom. ii. p. 16.

[70] Zeitschrift f. Œgypt. Sp. Nov. 1868.

[71] Colenso. "The Pentateuch and the Book of Joshua."

[72] Gen. xlvi. 27; compare Ex. i. 5.

[73] Gen. xlvi. 7.

[74] Gen. xlvi. 5. The word _taph_ (טף) here, translated "little ones" means "households." The Septuagint translate it by οἰκία [Greek: oikia] or συγγένεια [Greek: sungeneia].

[75] Payne Smith, "Bampton Lectures." p. 89.

[76] History of Old Covenant, vol. ii. p. 149. E. T.

[77] Ex. xii. 40, 41.

[78] Essay on Population, vol. i. p. 8; Encycl. Brit. vol. xviii. p. 340.

[79] It was on the 5th of January, 1771, the _day_ appointed by the high priests, that Oubacha began his march, _with seventy thousand families_. Most of the hordes were then assembled in the steppes, on the left bank of the Volga, and _the whole multitude followed him_."--Hommaire de Hell, Travels, p. 227, E. T.

[80] Num. xxxi. 32, 33.

[81] F. Newman's "Hebrew Monarchy," pp. 160, 161.

[82] "Dictionary of the Bible," ad voc. SHISHAK.

[83] "Geographische Inschriften," vol. ii., p. 32, _et seq._

[84] 2 Kings xv. 19.

[85] 2 Kings xxiii. 29; Ezra vi. 22.

[86] Isaiah xx. 1.

[87] 2 Kings xvii. 6; xviii. 7, 11.

[88] Von Lengerke, "Das Buch Daniel; Einleitung," § 13; p. lxiii. "De Wette, Einleitung in d. Abte Testament," p. 225, a; Davison, "Introduction to the Old Testament," vol. iii. pp. 174-192.

[89] 2 Kings xxv. 23.

[90] Dan. iii. 2. אתשדרפניא translated in our version, "princes," but really the Hebrew equivalent of the Persian _khshatrapa_, "satraps."

[91] Dan. v. 31.

[92] Dan. ix. 1.

[93] See Pusey's "Lectures on Daniel," pp. 124, 125. 3rd edition.

[94] H. N. vi. 27.

[95] Dan. v. 11.

[96] Herod. iii. 31.

[97] De Wette, "Einleitung," p. 267.

[98] Ibid. loc. cit.

[99] Gen. xli. 42, 43.

[100] Dan. v. 29.

[101] Strauss, "Leben Jesu," § 32.

[102] Strauss, "Leben Jesu," § 44.

[103] See Krafft, "Topografie Jerusalems," Inscr. 29.

[104] Strauss, L. J. § 32.

[105] Ibid. § 34.

[106] Those who wish to see the cumulative force of the entire argument will find it in "the Jesus of the Evangelists." It is impossible to compress its reasonings.

[107] See Appendix to "St. John's Testimony to Christ," in Professor Leathes' Boyle Lectures. No one who has not read this can form an idea of the extent of similarity of thought and expression to the fourth Gospel which underlies the Synoptics.

[108] To give precision to the argument, it is necessary to determine its definite character. But it is impossible to do so within the limits of a single lecture.

[109] "Jesus of the Evangelists," chap. x.

[110] See "Jesus of the Evangelists," chap. v.

[111] "Jesus of the Evangelists," p. 381. The entire collection of apocryphal Gospels has been translated by Mr. Cowper. I am sure that their perusal will greatly confirm our faith in the historical character of the true. The order of mind which invented the one could not have invented the other.

[112] "Jesus of the Evangelists," chap. xvii.

[113] Acts xxiv. 27.

[114] 1 Cor. xv. 6.

[115] 1 Cor. xv. 12.

[116] 2 Cor. v. 17.

[117] For evidence as to the authenticity of this Gospel see the Boyle Lectures for 1870, "The witness of St. John to Christ."

[118] 1 Cor. xv. 4.

[119] 1 Cor. xi. 27.

[120] 1 Cor. xv. 4.

[121] 1 Cor. xv. 5-8.

[122] 1 Cor. xv. 9.

[123] 2 Cor. xii. 2.

[124] 1 Gal. ii. 1, and i. 18.

[125] Gal. ii. 20.

[126] Rom. vi. 10.

[127] Rom. vi. 23; i. 3, 4.

[128] Rom. xv. 23.

[129] Rom. i. 8.

[130] Rom. i. 4; vi. 6-9; viii. 34.

[131] Rom. viii. 14, 16, 17.

[132] Rom. v. 1.

[133] Rom. i. 3, 4.

[134] Rom. vi. 3; 1 Cor. i. 13; Gal. iii. 27; cf. 2 Cor. i. 22.

[135] 1 Cor. xi. 23.

[136] 1 Cor. xi. 26.

[137] 1 Cor. i. 17.

[138] Gal. i. 13.

[139] St. Matt. xxviii. 15.

[140] Gal. i. 15, 16.

[141] Acts xxviii. 24.

[142] Acts xxvi. 8.

[143] It must always be remembered that Mohammed learned the best of his morals and his theology from Jews or Christians.

[144] In answer to this theory of development or afterthought it may be said that all the early records, the writings of the Apostles and Evangelists, the writings of the Apostolic fathers, are clear about the Godhead of Christ. It was comparatively late that doubters arose, heretics like Cerinthus and Theodotus, and philosophic Christians like Justin Martyr, Clement of Alexandria, and Origen, accepting the gospel indeed, but diluting it by their reasonings upon it.

[145] The arguments here considered are those propounded in Lecky's "History of European Morals."

[146] The terrible scenes just enacted, and even now enacting, in Paris, almost seem to contradict my words concerning mercy in war, words written and even printed before Paris was burned and wasted. But let us remember that eighty years ago France threw away its Christianity, and took Atheism for its creed; that in the last fifty years it has been slowly and painfully recovering its faith; that Paris has been the centre of the unbelief of Europe; that so, a large portion of its inhabitants have grown up utterly without religion; that, according to a friendly witness, "the people of Paris believe not in any God, nor in any man;"[147] or, according to another statement, "the Communists acknowledge no God, no man, no faith, no hope, nothing but better wages and more pleasure;"[148] that the chief perpetrators of the horrors of the past week not only abhorred Christianity, but murdered priests, only because they were ministers of Christ, and proclaimed Atheism and Materialism to be the very basis of their theory, both in politics and in life. There is nothing to surprise us when we find that those who deliberately cast off religion and humanity, faith in God, and faith in man, fall lower than those who are simply ignorant of the true principles of either. Atheists in the midst of faith are very likely to be much worse than heathens.

[147] _Fortnightly Review_, quoted in _Times_, May 31, 1871.

[148] _Times_, May 31, 1871.

[149] Maclear's "History of the Christian Missions in the Middle Ages," p. 417. Macmillan, 1863.

[150] "Ecce Homo," p. 71. Second edition, 1866.

[151] Platon. Symposium. Steph. iii., 220.

[152] Midway stands Anselm, the father of modern metaphysics, with the scientific demonstration of the two fundamental truths of all religion, the existence of God and the Incarnation.

[153] Pascal, "Fragmens d'une Apologie du Christianisme," in the 2nd vol. of "Pensées du Blaise Pascal." Paris, 1814.

[154] Luthardt (Apologetische Vorträge, in two parts), presents in a form peculiarly adapted for general readers, a very complete survey both of the internal and external evidences. Steinmeyer, Apologetische Vorträge, in three parts, discusses the historical evidence for the miracles, the death and the resurrection of our Lord, with special reference to the latest criticisms. Delitzsch's System der Christlichen Apologetik is of a more exclusively philosophical and dogmatic character. It has been reviewed in the Studien u. Kritiken, by Dr. Sack, of Bonn, whose own work, Christliche Apologetik, 1841, is one of the best on the whole subject of evidences.

[155] It is well known that both Jews and Gentiles admitted that the works were wrought, though they denied that the power came from God. Superstition, then as ever, opposed the faith of which it is the counterfeit.

[156] The most interesting and accessible accounts of this man are given by M. Barthélemi S. Hilaire, "Le Bonddha et sa Religion;" and by M. Ampère, in "La Science et les Lettres en Orient." Siddartha lived about the end of the seventh century, B.C. The name "Sakya Monni" is an appellative, meaning the monk or hermit of the Sakyas, the royal race to which he belonged. The true end of all philosophy and religion in his system is to enter into Nirvana, _i.e._ (according to M. Eugène Burnouf, the highest authority on this subject), the complete annihilation, not only of the material elements of existence, but also, and more specially, of the thinking principle. In this view the majority of Oriental scholars agree; the few who differ, as Colebrook does, identify Nirvana with an endless and dreamless sleep. See M. S. Hilaire, l.c., p. 133. M. Ampère (p. 215) thus characterizes the system, "La fin suprème de l'homme â été de perdre le sentiment de son moi, de renoncer à sa liberté, de s'élever au dessus des affections les plus pures, d'arriver à un état, où il ne restât plus que le _vide_."

[157] The four books of Khung-fu-tseu were written in the second half of the sixth century, B.C. They contain the religions and philosophy of China in a dogmatic form. The second book, called "Tchung yung," represents most fully his moral code, of which the principle is obedience to natural reason, and the rule is observance of the _via media_, with due regard to times and circumstances. In one passage, ccxi., iv., Confucius says a man of strong virtue goes beyond this _via media_ which prescribes indifference and exact conformity to natural law. For a just appreciation of the Confucian system, the reader may consult M. Ampère, "La Science et les Lettres en Orient," p. 98 ff.

[158] For a very remarkable echo of this passage, showing the depth and permanence of such feelings, see the words of Mr. Hutton, quoted further on.

[159] Dante, Inferno, c. iv.

[160] Romans, Corinthians, and Galatians, accepted by all the Tübingen School. (See Mr. Leathes' lecture.)

[161] In addition to the well-known work of Tischendorf, and German, French, and English commentaries, attention may be called to a valuable treatise by P. H. de Groot, of Groningen, "Basilides als erster Zeuge des Johannesevangeliums." Leipzig, 1868. The internal evidence has already been discussed by Dr. Lightfoot, who promises a complete treatise on the subject, with which no one can deal more effectively. Some good points are made by Mr. Hutton in Essays, vol. i.

[162] Essays Theological and Literary, by R. H. Hutton; vol. i., p. 282.

[163] Notice the faint condemnation, if it be a condemnation at all, of the peculiar shame of Athens, as "greatly at variance with modern and Christian _notions_, but in accordance with Hellenic sentiment" (vol. i., p. 482, and compare p. 555).

[164] See the preface to the Republic, in vol. ii. Compare also the words of Socrates on his trial (p. 40 in the Greek, vol. i., p. 354, Jowett); they probably represent his views more truly than the brilliant speculations in the Phædo. One alternative which he seems disposed to accept, viz., that death may be "a sleep like the sleep of him who is undisturbed by dreams," resembles very nearly the Nirvana of Buddhism.

[165] Ritschl shows very conclusively that the Essenian principle was even more exclusive than the Rabbinical, and more antagonistic in principle to Christianity. See Altkatholische Kirche, pp. 179-203.

[166] Within the few last months, Steinmeyer has published a treatise on the history of the resurrection, with reference to the latest criticisms, which I would commend to readers of German. Serious attempts have been made in England to disjoin this cardinal truth from the doctrinal system of St. Paul, attempts which seem passing strange on the part of critics who accept him as a thoroughly truthful man, nay, as an inspired apostle, and who must know that he makes the resurrection the very centre or foundation of his teaching. Even Hegel, the very Corypheus of idealism, declares "Die Auferstehung gehört wesentlich dem Glauben an;" _i.e._, the resurrection belongs essentially to the faith. See "Die Philosophie der Religion," p. 300. In a note on the same page, Hegel shows that he takes it as a real objective event: "wie alles Bisherige in der Weise der Wirklichkeit für das unmittelbare Bewusstsein zur Erscheinung gekommen, so auch diese Erhebung."

[167] Christian Dogmatics, § 63. (Clark.)

NOTES TO

MODERN SCEPTICISM.

NOTES.

ON POSITIVISM.

[168] "Does any one fancy that he sees a solid cube? It is easy to show that the solidity of the figure, the relative position of its faces and edges to each other, are inferences of the spectator--no more conveyed to his conviction by the eye alone than they would be if he were looking at a painted representation of a cube. The scene of nature is a picture without depth of substance, no less than the scene of art; and in the one case, as in the other, it is the mind which, by an act of its own, discovers that colour and shape denote distance and solidity. Most men are unconscious of this perpetual habit of reading the language of the external world, and translating as they read. The draughtsman, indeed, is compelled, for his purposes, to return back in thought from the solid bodies which he has inferred, to the shapes of surface which he really sees. He knows that there is a mask of theory over the whole face of nature, if it be _theory_ to infer more than we _see_. But other men, unaware of this masquerade, hold it to be a fact that they see cubes and spheres, spacious apartments, and winding avenues. And these things are facts to them, because they are unconscious of the mental operation by which they have penetrated nature's disguise....

"Our sensations require ideas to bind them together; namely, ideas of space, time, number, and the like. If not so bound together, sensations do not give us any apprehension of things or objects. All things, all objects, must exist in space and in time--must be one or many. Now space, time, number, are not sensations or things. They are something different from, and opposed to, sensations and things. We have termed them ideas. It may be said they are relations of things, or of sensations. But granting this form of expression, still a _relation_ is not a thing or a sensation; and therefore we must still have another and opposite element, along with our sensations....

"We are often told that such a thing is _a fact_--a fact, and not a theory,--with all the emphasis which, in speaking or writing, tone or italics or capitals can give. We see from what has been said, that when this is urged, before we can estimate the truth, or the value of the assertion, we must ask to whom is it a fact? what habits of thought, what previous information, what ideas does it imply, to conceive the fact as a fact? Does not the apprehension of the fact imply assumptions which may with equal justice be called theory, and which are perhaps false theory? in which case the fact is no fact. Did not the ancients assert it as a fact, that the earth stood still, and the stars moved? and can any fact have stronger apparent evidence to justify persons in asserting it emphatically than this had?"--_Whewell's Philosophy of the Inductive Sciences_, 2nd ed., vol. i., p. 42, _seq._

That the solidity of figures is in truth given by mental judgment, has been often proved experimentally; see for examples, Huxley's Elementary Physiology, Lesson x., 13-16. The experiment with a coin, lens and pin, p. 259, is easy as well as conclusive, but Wheatstone's Pseudoscope more surprising to most observers. Compare on this curious subject Brewster's Natural Magic, Letter v.

[169] It is important to bear in mind that, from an admitted incompetency of our faculties to _know_ the absolute, we cannot infer an impossibility of knowing its _existence_. To know that a thing _is_, and to know _what_ it is, are two totally distinct degrees and sorts of knowledge. The moment this distinction is stated, every one sees its truth; but many persons omit stating it to themselves when they reason upon these difficult subjects.

Ravaisson, after giving a brief account of Herbert Spencer's opinion, goes on to say: "Comment il y a, au fond de toute connaissance, un absolu, auquel correspond, comme son opposé, le relatif, c'est ce qu'établissait, il y a plus de vingt siècles, contre une doctrine déjà régnante alors de relativité et de mobilité universelles, la dialectique platonicienne, qui fraya le chemin à la metaphysique. Elle faisait plus: elle montrait que par cet absolu seul les relations sont intelligibles, parce qu'il est la mesure par laquelle seule nous les estimons. La métaphysique, entre les mains de son immortel fondateur, fit davantage encore: elle montra que cet absolu, par lequel l'intelligence mesure le relatif, est l'intelligence même. C'est ce que redisait Leibniz, lorsque, à cette assertion, renouvelée de la scolastique par Locke, qu'il n'était rien dans l'intelligence qui d'abord n'eût été dans le sens, il répondait: "sauf l'intelligence," et que, avec Aristote, il montrait dans l'intelligence la mesure supérieure du sens."--_Rapport_, p. 66.

Ravaisson then gives interesting extracts from Sophie St. Germain, and proceeds to show how Comte, without admitting any self-contemplating intelligence, and thus inferring the possibility of an Absolute, did in fact pursue the idea of Unity, and extended this idea to the universe,--a principle which, if fully grasped, must be fatal to Positive views. "D'accord maintenant avec Platon, Aristote, Leibniz, il déclarait que l'ensemble étant le resultat et l'expression d'une certaine unité, à laquelle tout concourt et se co-ordonne et qui est le but où tout marche, c'est dans cette unité, c'est dans le but, c'est dans la fin ou cause finale qu'est le secret de l'organisme."--_Rapport_, p. 76.

A special interest attaches to the work of Ravaisson as an authoritative French rating of the philosophic exchange between England and France. It is almost unnecessary to refer for a less abstract account of these relations to the widely known writings of M. Taine.

[170] It should have been stated in the text, as it was in the delivered lecture, that these questions were not forgotten by the eminent Professor. The passages referred to will be found in his eloquent address on the "Scientific use of the Imagination," p. 47, _seq._, or in his volume of collected Essays, p. 163, _seq._ The reader may observe that, both in Professor Tyndall's pages and two sentences back in this lecture, Development is spoken of as a process or law in operation. The various kinds of philosophy which may be engrafted on such a law are severally determined by whatever reply is given to the questions above suggested. It would seem inappropriate here to state the possible relations between a law of development and such consequent (or inconsequent) philosophies. Those who wish to consider them the writer may refer to his little volume entitled "Right and Wrong," for a brief discussion of this subject, and more particularly for the results to natural theology.

The following German sketch of an evolution-philosophy may not be without interest:--"Vermöge einer ewigen Kreisbewegung entstehen als Verdichtungen der Luft unzählige Welten, himmlische Gottheiten, in deren Mittelpunkt die cylinderförmige Erde ruht, unbewegt wegen des gleichen Abstandes von allen Punkten der Himmelskugel. Die Erde hat sich aus einem unsprünglich flüssigen Zustande gebildet. Aus dem Feuchten sind unter dem Einfluss der Wärme in stufenweise Entwickelung die lebenden Wesen hervorgegangen. Auch die Landthiere waren anfangs fischartig und haben erst mit der Abtrocknung der Erdoberfläche ihre jetzige Gestalt gewonnen. Die Seele soll Anaximander als luftartig bezeichnet haben."

Anaximander of Miletus was born about B.C. 610. Consequently he ranks early among European theorizers on development. The extract is from Ueberweg's Grundriss, t. 1, p. 40. Cf. Plutarch de Placit. v. 19, and Sympos viii. qu. 8, with Euseb. Præp. Evang. i. 8.

[171] The sight of a dualism apparently insoluble never fails to suggest some such questions as these: Was it always so? will it be so always? and were I at the centre of the universe, should I see it so now?

There are three possible ways of conceiving otherwise: 1, by reducing mind to matter; 2, by reducing matter to mind; 3, by comprehending both under a higher unity.

We need only write down these issues for common sense to perceive that Nos. 1 and 2 arise from, and end in one-sided speculation. A man who lives shut up amongst machinery is apt to think of his own mind as a machine. Great chemists have ere now taken the human stomach for a laboratory, and were slow in awakening to those physiological facts which put the vital processes of assimilation in a nobler and truer light. Comte began by reducing all sciences to mathematical elements. Afterwards he discovered that to explain a higher order of things by a lower is the essence of materialism.

To a meditative spirit, the inner world is nearer than the outer; and therefore the evidence of its reality is stronger by wanting the weakness of a second link. But active life brings home to us the existence of both; we suffer by defying or neglecting the laws of either; and pain and sorrow are often the advanced guard of much stern unyielding truth. In a world where we all endure the friction of things external, it is hard not to believe in objective as well subjective realities.

The truth is, that the primary question belongs to the practical reason, and can be settled by no other criterion. There is a philosophical maxim that we can never speak of the Divine univocally, but only by analogy, figure, or similitude; the cause being that all attributes belonging to the Infinite require words which, if taken literally, must land us in self-contradiction. How vivid an idea do we gain of Omniscience or Omnipotence by saying that it is "a circle of which the centre is everywhere, the circumference nowhere." And what signifies the obvious inconsistency? Deny the Infinite, try to find a place for its centre or circumference, and the inconsistency remains, together with a host of absurd consequences. When of two hypotheses both cannot, but one must be true, and either position lands us in logical inconsistency, it is easy to see that our theoretical understanding will never clear up the inexplicable issue. A rule by which we live and act becomes the surest touchstone of truth or falsehood.

Let us see whether the two worlds in which we live can be practically treated as one. Suppose a bivouac into which a shell descends, certain in another moment, by physical law, to explode. Is the moral law--the effort of this man or that man to escape--equally certain? Arguing abstractedly, most people would hold it so, yet we know that the fact lies otherwise. There is a fatalism among soldiers--"every bullet has its billet"--as there is among nurses who believe that every epidemic must kill its destined prey. One may have trained himself to wish for death, another is indifferent, a third so undecided that he leaves the event to a doctrine of chances, a fourth is simply capricious. Each by a course of life and action has made or modified his present moment for choice, and any one may or may not draw back from the coming peril. Had the falling shell been a splash from a carriage wheel, every man would have shrunk from it. The latter risk is too simple for human ponderings or human self-direction, and in such cases people act by a proximate straightforward instinct.

But on what principles must he who shrinks from either risk really proceed? He is sure that his own movements are in his own power and contingent. He is equally sure that the movements of shell or mud are absolutely determined in calculable curves, and not at all contingent. Acting on these two conjoint data, he succeeds in avoiding death or dirt; and, whatever theorists may write, he would have perilled his success by acting otherwise. Nay, what is much to our purpose, all theoretical men would themselves act upon the like assumption in all cases of practical consequence and emergency.

Suppose dualism banished from the world in fact as well as in theory, the problems of education ought to be as demonstrable as those of geometry or chemical experiment. The paths of men and of comets being equally calculable, because equally subject to uniform law, how comes it that biography and history abound in the records of grossly falsified predictions? Let the courses of nations be tabulated, and statesmanship is made easy. We must owe it to some egregious oversight that criminal punishments are not invariably deterrent. Perhaps the law of the strongest motive has been neglected; if so, re-enact the code of Draco, and virtue will become universal. Till then the supposition must continue only an unverified hypothesis.

If we go back to our starting-point, and ask, can the practical dualism be reduced to a higher unity? our answer must confess a present condition of ignorance. We are so far from knowing what constitutes the thing we call matter, or what the entity we feel within us--our soul or mind--really is, that we cannot tell how they act and react on each other. We fail in tracing our own sensations from their outward antecedents to their impression on our consciousness; and, _vice versâ_, we cannot follow our energies from the springs of our volitions outward. While thus baffled, the longed-for unity floats before our inward eye like a dim vision of that intuitive faculty which pronounces subject and object to be ultimately identical, or as a revelation of that religious faith which accepts the incomprehensible, and reposes in the bosom of God.

[172] Since Comte's time it has been shown that mental development is no very difficult process, _provided_ we assume that several principles which consciousness distinguishes and sometimes places in antagonism, may be treated as equivalents, and be resolved into each other interchangeably. For example, we have been apt to reverence those who suffered the loss of all things rather than accept the Expedient as the Right, and who died resolute in disallowing the rule of policy to be pleaded _in foro conscientiæ_. We have also in common parlance asserted a distinction between these two principles, while holding that the one claims the other for its assured attendant. Honesty, we said, is the best policy; and we never meant thereby that thorough policy is the best policy. What we did mean was that a regard to expediency fails of the success which a straightforward observance of right deserves, and will at last obtain. But to make mental development easy, antitheses must appear fluent, the noble be convertible with the useful, the human with the merely animal. Thus, when Comte adored Clotilde, and Dante immortalized Beatrice, they rehearsed for a millionth time the loves of preadamite plants. Coleridge used to maintain that the test of a philosophy was its ultimate coincidence with common sense. In the theories under consideration, right is philosophically resolved into the greater happiness of the greater number, and this equivalent exactly coincides with the common sense of starving thinkers who are possessed by a fixed idea that the happiness of the impoverished many is promoted by an opportune pillage of the wealthy few.

It is less easy to verify mental development than to theorize upon it, yet verification may not be impossible! If disbelief in a future life, denial of responsibility, duty, and morality, as opposed to expediency, make sufficient way in the world, and if practice harmonize with speculation, progress may become more evidently regress, and Man be proved a brute animal at last. The promising events in France are patent to every one; a less known, but still more encouraging fact, which we learn on scientific authority, is that certain Basuto tribes have lately adopted the (to them) novel custom of cannibalism.

Pending the hoped-for verification, if an identity of human with animal nature be accepted as provisionally true, it may be as well to anticipate a few of its logical consequences. Eating the flesh of our instinctive congeners ought positively to be discountenanced; or, as men and women are simply animal, all carnivorous human beings should on compulsion become cannibals. Despotism being the form of government adopted by us with general applause, as regards the animal kingdom, it cannot be too soon transferred to our own mismanaged nationalities. In a word, our practices in reference to men, women, beasts, fishes, birds, and reptiles, ought to be made uniform. Above all, the new school-boards should be charged with the education of our poor relations, and the linguistic professors of Oxford and Cambridge be instructed to use every effort for the promotion of a universal language. Charity may be thought by some to begin at home, therefore a commencement may be made with the domesticated irrationals, finches spaniels, cats, hackneys, sheep, mules, all asses, all pigs, and all monkey favourites. It is just possible that volatile creatures unaccustomed to habits of reflection (some tribes of light-minded birds, for example) may find abstract ideas and declarative sentences a little difficult. Yet, after all, it need not be such a long step in the case of contemplative owls; and we may then apply the old proverb, "Il n'y a que le premier pas qui coûte." At all events, the "Simious process," so successful in our world of fashion, will be likely to suffice with every well-disposed chimpanzee; the circle of knowledge will continually widen until the world of animals becomes identified with the world of man. Then, but not till then, the astonished psychologist may cease his useless labours, and record the inauguration of a new era by acknowledging

"Omnia jam fient fieri quæ posse negabam;"

or, still more conclusively,

"Thinking is but an idle waste of thought,
And nought is everything, and everything is nought."

ON SCIENCE AND REVELATION.

[173] In an answer to this lecture by "Julian," it is replied that "Belief is the easiest thing possible for weak and ignorant minds." But Julian by belief means _acquiescence_; and every church-goer is aware that the worthlessness of mere acquiescence is constantly being urged upon them from the pulpit. It holds the same relation to faith that respectability--_i.e._, acquiescence in the ordinary standard of morality--holds to holiness. The subject is too difficult to be discussed adequately in a note; but in my first Bampton Lecture I have shown how belief, though gained by a struggle, is equally possible for the unlearned and the learned, but in every case it has to be won by an effort (Mal. xi. 12).

[174] "Julian" asserts that there ought not to be any difficulty. "There ought not to be the least shadow of doubt whether a given book is from God or not" (p. 5): "If the handwriting of Jehovah in the Scriptures be doubtful, it cannot be divine." But, as Bishop Butler has shown in his "Analogy," there are no difficulties, as regards Revelation, different in kind from those which we daily encounter in common life. "Julian's" easy assertions involve a tremendous difficulty; for what he virtually affirms is that God ought to have acted, in matters of religion, in an entirely different way from that in which He has acted in the ordinary constitution of this world. The whole question turns upon something quite as much out of "Julian's" depth as it is out of mine; namely, what was God's purpose in creating man. By the study of "the constitution and course of nature," and of what is said in Holy Scripture, I arrive at the conclusion that God has, for some wise purpose, been pleased to place man here in a state of discipline. Such a state implies the existence of difficulties; the greatness and degree of these difficulties we can know solely by experience, being able only to guess at the reasons which have made a state of probation necessary for us. But the difficulties must not be insuperable; for if they were, then this present state would be a discipline no longer.

[175] Mr. Darwin, in his "Descent of Man" (i. 201-206), enumerates the several stages through which man is supposed to have passed, of which the first stage is an imaginary "group of animals, resembling in many respects the larvæ of our present Ascidians, which diverged into two great branches--the one retrograding in development, and producing the present class of Ascidians, the other rising to the Vertebrata." He further describes these Ascidians as "hardly appearing like animals, and consisting of a simple, tough, leathery sack, with two small projecting orifices." I must own that in Mr. Darwin's book I can find no proof either of the degradation of the present race of Ascidians or of the development of their cousins, whom Mr. Darwin has summoned into existence to serve his purpose, into apes. The work is full of interesting facts and ingenious speculations, but the speculations can scarcely be said to have consistency enough to merit the name even of a theory.

[176] If this struggle existed, it seems unaccountable that we do not find creatures in every stage of evolution. We must suppose that these Ascidian larvæ existed by millions--at all events, many thousand species of animals exist, all according to this theory, evolved from them; and, as many have failed and become our present Ascidians, and others were content to remain as they were, the number of possible starters in this race must have been vast. Reasonably, then, we should expect to find creatures in every stage of progress, and at the head numbers pressing closely on man. Instead of this, we find an empty space between each several order, and that between man and the animal second in the race is enormous. "The difference between the mind of the lowest man and that of the highest animal is immense" (Darwin, i. 104).

[177] A monkey must walk, and does so quite as frequently as man, but he walks very ill. "The gorilla runs with a sidelong shambling gait, but more commonly progresses by resting on its bent hands. The long-armed apes occasionally use their arms like crutches: ... yet they move awkwardly, and much less securely than man" (Darwin, i. 143). Now the theory of revolution would require that, before men and monkeys separated from some common ancestor, their configuration was the same. How and when did the hands become feet, or, _vice versâ_, the feet hands?

[178] I do not think that "Julian" can have observed this note. For he retorts upon me that dogs, monkeys, and jackdaws have a conscience, and that what I deduce from it as regards men, would justify a similar conclusion as regards cats and dogs. But I had already pointed out that whatever appearance of the higher moral qualities is to be observed in animals is apparently the result of contact with man. It is part of the present constitution of things that certain animals have been domesticated, and over these the "dominion" given to man (Gen. i. 28) is very large. I cannot see how any animal could be domesticated if it were quite incapable of quasi-moral qualities. I see then no difficulty in a domestic animal having a sort of conscience: without it a dog could scarcely be faithful. And note, too, that this rudimentary conscience in a dog implies responsibility in it quite as much as man's more perfect conscience does in man. The dog's responsibility is to his master; to whom is his master responsible? Still, as regards these rudiments of conscience, I cannot see any real proof for more than a very curious influence of man's qualities upon those of animals brought into contact with him. With Mr. Darwin (i. 89) I hold that "man only can with certainty be ranked as a moral being;" and that as regards conscience "man differs profoundly from the lower animals" (_ib._) I do not hold, however, as "Julian" imagines, that conscience is an unerring guide. The exact contrary is implied in Matt. vi. 23. Conscience needs more than itself to guide men aright.

[179] "Julian" considers that I must be "one of those who believe a stop occurs in the middle of the second verse of Gen. i., which severs the preadamite world from the world as it now is." I answer that I am one of those who know a little Hebrew, and I am therefore aware that the verb rendered _was_ in verse 2 is not a copula, but means continued existence. As regards the geologic notions ascribed to me by "Julian," I can only express my regret that scientific men should persist in ascribing to theologians mere nonsense. Nothing is easier than to slay men of straw, but is it worth the trouble? I would recommend him to read a discussion upon the Mosaic record in the last chapter of [Mr. Capes'] "Reasons of Returning to the Church of England." He would then see that the opinions of theologians are not so puerile as he supposes.

ON MIRACLES.

[180] The publishers have asked me whether I have any remarks to make on "Julian's" Reply. A few lines will be sufficient for all I have to say.

"Julian" quotes (page 16) a sentence within inverted commas, as mine, which the reader will in vain search for in my Lecture.

He, on page 17, attributes to me, for the purpose of exciting ridicule, a statement which I never dreamed of making. Yet he adds: "The words are Dr. Stoughton's, and you may read them for sixpence."

He concedes the point maintained in the first twenty-six pages of my Lecture, by remarking: "We do not say that miracles are improbable or impossible."

Although I distinctly explain that my argument in the remainder of the Lecture is confined to the miracles ascribed to Christ, "Julian" simply indulges in an attack on the authenticity and genuineness of the Pentateuch. He concludes by saying: "The New Testament stands on no better foundation, although we need not enter on that question now." Most people will think this was the very question on which "Julian" ought to have entered, in answer to a Lecture on "The Miraculous Evidences of Christianity."

* * * * *

Exception has been taken to what I have said respecting remarkable coincidences between natural events and historical facts (p. 200). Some of my remarks, as the foot-note indicates, were suggested by one of the most thoughtful of modern Continental divines. I therefore subjoin the following passage:--

"There is a mysterious harmony between the natural and the moral, between facts of nature and facts of history, manifest in what we call the 'wonderful' (_mirabile_), as distinct from what is properly called the 'miraculous' (_miraculum_). While the miracle, properly speaking, implies a violation of the laws of nature, the wonderful, which is closely connected with it, is such a coincidence and working together of nature and history as reveals a supernatural result to the religious perceptions, while the natural explanation still holds good for the understanding. The march of Napoleon into Russia, pregnant with results, and the severe winter; the invincible Armada of Philip the Second, and the sudden storm (_afffavit deus et dissiparit eos_), serve as examples of the 'wonderful' in the sense referred to. There is in these things a surprising and unaccountable harmony of nature and history, and yet all is natural; no law is broken, but the coincidence is inexplicable. Wonders such as these continually present themselves to us, both in the world at large and in the lives of individuals. There is, generally speaking, an unaccountable power of nature which plays its part in the historical and moral complications of human life; and it cannot escape the notice of the careful observer that wonderful coincidences often occur, which to reason may appear only as an extraordinary, inexplicable _chance_; to the poet as a profound _play_ of the spirit of the world, and an active presence of a divine phantasy in the world's progress;--combinations which lie beyond the range of rational computation, and which, like genii, scorn the narrow laws of human knowledge;--but in which the Christian discerns the _finger of God_. But he who truly recognizes the finger of God in these strange coincidences must be led on to a recognition of the actually miraculous. The wonderful is only the half-developed, unperfected miracle. The wonderful possesses that ambiguous character, half chance, half providence, half natural, half divine, just because the coincidence of the holy and the natural is external only; and faith must still demand a relation wherein nature and freedom--separate in the usual course of events--shall not only seek one another in wonderful configurations, shall not only approach one another, but be immediately and essentially united; faith must still long for an unequivocal sign, of which it can say, Here is God, and not nature. This sign is given in the sacred history of Christ; a sign which is spoken against, and which is set for the fall of many, and for the rising again of many."--_Martensen's "Christian Dogmatics_," p. 222.

ON MYTHICAL THEORIES OF CHRISTIANITY.

[181] The following quotation from Mr. Lecky, who is a witness of the most unexceptionable character, sets forth in a striking light the solitary grandeur of the character of Christ as it has been depicted in the Gospels. "It was reserved for Christianity to present to the world an ideal character which throughout all the changes of eighteen centuries has inspired the hearts of men with an impassioned love; has shown itself capable of acting on all ages, nations, temperaments, and conditions; has not only been the highest pattern of virtue, but the strongest incentive to its practice; and has exercised so deep an influence that it may be truly said that the simple record of three short years of active life has done more to regenerate and to soften mankind than all the disquisitions of philosophers, and all the exhortations of moralists. This has, indeed, been the well-spring of whatever is best and purest in the Christian life. Amid all the sins and failings, amid all the priestcraft and persecution and fanaticism that has defaced the Church, it has preserved in the example and character of its Founder an enduring principle of regeneration."--Lecky's "History of Morals," vol. ii., p. 9.

Mr. Lecky distinctly admits that it is an historical fact that the Christ of the Gospels has exerted a power compared with which that of all characters, whether real or mythical, has been inconsiderable. A true philosophy must account for this unique power possessed by Jesus Christ. If the character is a fiction, why is it that it has exerted an influence compared with which all other fictions have been feebleness? If Jesus Christ was a great man only, why "has He done more to regenerate mankind than all the disquisitions of philosophers, and all the exhortations of moralists"? Why has He left immeasurably behind Him all other great men who have ever lived? The historical truth of the Divine character portrayed in the Gospels adequately accounts for this mighty influence. Nothing else does. A character which leaves every other human character indefinitely behind it, must belong to the supernatural, not to the natural, order of things. It is a moral and spiritual miracle. To suppose that such a character has been generated by the slow and gradual action of natural laws, contradicts alike the acts of history and the principles of philosophy. Nature recognizes no mighty leaps in her order of production.

Watson & Hazell, Printers, London and Aylesbury.

Transcriber's Notes:

Punctuation and spelling were made consistent when a predominant preference was found in this book; otherwise they were not changed.

Simple typographical errors were corrected; occasional unbalanced quotation marks retained.

Ambiguous hyphens at the ends of lines were retained.

Greek words are shown in Greek and then in English transliterations that are indicated by [Greek: ] and were added by the Transcribers. Accent mark errors in Greek text have been remedied.

The original book used both footnotes (at the bottom of each page) and endnotes (at the end of the book). The footnotes have been numbered in a single sequence and moved nearly to the end of the book, just before the endnotes. There are 14 endnotes, the first of which is identified here as 168.

Typographical inconsistencies in the identifications of the footnotes have been corrected, but the original endnote anchors (in the main text) 176-180 (originally 9-13) appear to have been numbered "1" too high. Also, anchor 180 originally was numbered 1 instead of 13, and endnote 180 (originally 13) is associated with a chapter that contains no endnote anchors. Anchor 181 (originally 14) is correct.

One footnote (146 in this eBook) contains anchors to footnotes of its own (147 and 148 in this eBook). They appear as separate footnotes, immediately after their parent.

Page 145: "in a neutral sense. If I speak of" The period was printed as a comma.