Chapter I: Preface

This little book is an attempt to present Reid in a fresh light, and in his relations to present-day thought. It deals with the Scottish chapter in that enduring alternation between agnostic despair and endeavour after perfect insight which seems to be a law of the philosophic progress of mankind. Thomas Reid, home-bred and self-contained, is the national representative, in the eighteenth century, of the _via media_ between these extremes. In the concluding chapter I have looked at the philosophical appeal to inspired data of Common Sense, in the wider light of the theistic philosophy of the universe, and not merely as part of an inductive science of the human mind. This connects the theistic postulate of spiritual reason, as the foundation of human experience, with Reid’s appeal to the ultimate but often dormant necessities of human nature, a subject treated more fully in my _Philosophy of Theism_ (1896).

For valuable unpublished material—more indeed than I could avail myself of within narrow limits—I am indebted to Miss Hilda Paterson, the guardian of manuscript remains and other relics of her ancestor, preserved at Birkwood, in Reid’s native country of the Dee. I also owe much to Mr. R. S. Rait, now of New College, Oxford, the historian of the Universities of Aberdeen, whose research has done much to illustrate his _alma mater_ in the North. And I am indebted to Dr. Davidson, the Professor of Logic, and to Mr. Anderson, the Librarian, of the University of Aberdeen, for documents to which the space at my disposal forbids more than an occasional reference.

Those who desire to study further the chapter in the history of European philosophy in which Reid’s name is prominent, may be referred to Cousin’s critical appreciation in his _Philosophie Écossaise_ (1857), and to Professor Andrew Seth’s Balfour Lectures on ‘Scottish Philosophy’ (1885), in which the Scottish and German answers to Hume are compared. The industry of the late Dr. M’Cosh has collected, in his _Scottish Philosophy_ (1875), interesting particulars regarding our national philosophers from Hutcheson to Hamilton.

A. C. F.

UNIVERSITY OF EDINBURGH, _21st February 1898_.

CONTENTS

PAGE

CHAPTER I

BOYHOOD AND ANCESTRY: STRACHAN AND THE VALLEY OF THE DEE, 1710-1722 9

CHAPTER II

AT MARISCHAL COLLEGE, 1722-1737 18

CHAPTER III

NEW MACHAR AND DAVID HUME, 1737-1751 30

CHAPTER IV

OLD ABERDEEN: A REGENT IN KING’S COLLEGE, 1751-1764 43

CHAPTER V

UNIVERSAL SCEPTICISM VERSUS INSPIRED COMMON SENSE: AN ‘INQUIRY
INTO THE HUMAN MIND ON THE PRINCIPLES OF COMMON SENSE,’ 1764 56

CHAPTER VI

GLASGOW COLLEGE: THE PROFESSOR OF MORAL PHILOSOPHY, 1764-1780 72

CHAPTER VII

IN PHILOSOPHICAL RETIREMENT: AUTHORSHIP IN OLD AGE, 1780-1795 103

CHAPTER VIII

INSPIRED COMMON SENSE AND CAUSATION: ACTIVE OR MORAL POWER IN MAN 118

CHAPTER IX

THE END, 1796 126

CHAPTER X

RETROSPECTIVE AND CRITICAL 133

CHAPTER XI

REID IN THE NINETEENTH CENTURY: DEVELOPMENT OF THE COMMON SENSE
PHILOSOPHY: REID IN FRANCE: REID AND HAMILTON: REID AND
SCOTO-HEGELIAN IDEALISM: ETHICAL OR THEISTIC FINAL FAITH 144

THOMAS REID