the man who did more than all his predecessors to extend the pomœrium of worldly knowledge, before he addressed himself to theological science, to be one of the atmospheres which encompass and surround the sun, and to act as the medium by means of which he becomes present with all terrestrial objects,-storing up in its bosom the light and heat, which are more properly his emanations. He has further shown that light, by being tempered in various ways with shade, gives rise to such modifications as result, through the action of the ether, in the sense of various colours, and that the ether is fitted to act on the eye, because the body in general is formed on the model of the physical universe, and the eye especially is adapted to the nature of light. Reason sees clearly every one of these particulars.

If now we tender reason as witness to these different points, will the idealist accept its testimony? Will he admit, for example, that there is a subtler atmosphere than our air, adapted for influx into the eye? No; his chosen witnesses speak of nothing but the sensation of light; and he rules out everything which, we will not say contradicts them, but which goes beyond them. Try him in one of his favourite arguments. He will prove to you by the puerile experiment of pressing one of the eye-balls and seeing two moons, that there is no other moon but what exists in sensation.* But as two moons exist in his sensations, ask him if he really believes that there are two moons. He renounces his reason so far as to admit the preposterous idea. Then, when the pressure is removed, one moon passes out of existence? He will not refuse the inference. He will add, to be sure, One of the moons which existed in my sensation has ceased to exist. But how about the body supposed to be in the heavens, composed of land and water, and some 1,800 miles in diameter? It is non-existent, for such a body never was in any one's sensations. What, then, of all the proofs from reason that such a globe exists? In the name of the senses, he snaps his fingers at them. Now, we contend that the point in issue is to be decided by the witness thus summarily rejected. The moment reason is consulted, it assures us that there are external causes for our sensations. It sees what they are; determines their nature and properties; sees their enchainment. Sitting upon a throne above the senses, it sees also clearly that they are mere intruders, when they would have their voice heard about causation of any kind, the whole thing lying above their sphere. In truth, the passage from sensation to the outward world lying through the reason, which the *Collier, Clavis, p. 21.

idealist has cast behind his back, it is no wonder that he finds no way of getting at that world. There is no such way for him. Nature, at the beginning, placed him before an open field, marked as yet, indeed, with no track, but still practicable. Instead of taking his way across it, he wheels his chariot round, and finds himself with an impassable gulf before him; thereupon, planting himself upon its brink, he says to his fellows-"Look at this chasm, it is a thousand feet wide, leap over it at one bound, and explore the objects at the other side, or else hold with me that they do not exist." The wiser among them reply" We cannot cross in the way that you propose; but we will find the way of getting over it in our own fashion." Thereupon, leaving the teacher of nothingness in his despair, they turn their backs on the gulf; and proceeding to the hill of Reason, a great way off, they hew the trees which grow abundantly upon it, and transport them to the brink of the great gulf, where no such materials existed, and then with help of the iron which they find there and shape into instruments, they form them into beams and boards, and so construct a bridge. This bridge they cross, and forthwith find themselves in a country abounding with an immense variety of objects, all beautifully irradiated by the light of science, which they are never tired of looking at and revisiting. No one can find his way directly from sensation to an external world independent of sensation; but every one can find his way to it by a circuit through the reason, that is to say, every one who has not solemnly renounced reason as a guide in the matter.

We may fairly conclude from all that has been said, that the difficulties of idealism all come from looking outward and downward, instead of looking inward or upward; and so that they are of the same kind with the difficulty, which many minds have, to believe that time never had a beginning, and that space is not unlimited. It is a fallacy from which the mind that has formed its thought by that primary false, "the senses bear witness only to sensations," will not extricate itself without much trouble, just as it is not easy all at once to detach a burr from a lace veil. But to those who have never learned to sophisticate their natural intelligence, I may seem to have spent too many words in exposing it; but, in truth, it is no easy matter to prove a perception against those who deny it. And a fallacy is somewhat like a fox; you can easily trace him to his hole, and be satisfied that he is in it, but to get the caitiff out may, perchance, cost you some hard digging.

I have purposely avoided arguments founded on the reductio ad absurdum. On that principle, a thousand ways of refutation open up

immediately before any one who would impugn the sophism that has been engaging us; and he has only to choose among them. To give only one example: if objects exist only in the sensations of the mind, then they exist in the mind, and not out of it, since the mind and its sensations are one. Now, as the eye does exist out of the mind (unless body is mind and mind is body), it follows that the things we see must exist in coming from within, before they come to the eye, and that the eye contributes nothing to them. Thus a man's eyes serve him just as much for seeing as if they were of glass. Such, logically, is the teleology to which the metaphysics of Berkeley conduct us. And from this alone it is easy to see with how much reason Swedenborg speaks of "the visionaries who are called idealists."*

A. E. F.

THE PURPOSE OF LIFE.

No. VI.

IN that world of final decision where the real and essential get an unchecked expression, all the assumed graces of character have no worth. The polish that disguises, but fails to eradicate the bitterness of the heart wears rapidly off there; and the curtain of genial politeness that hides so often a rooted malice, will be drawn aside, and disclose in some, perhaps, the utter opposition between the appearance on the surface and the reality beneath it. Our value, there, is appraised with an inevitable accuracy, and wholly from the solid elements of permanent character which remain as the out-come of what we have felt, thought, spoken, and done in the days of our time-life. We do not take our place in that retributive world for special acts done, or words spoken. The deeds which have delved themselves deeply into the history of this world, the great words which have been uttered here, by poet, philosopher, and orator, are not, there, any ground of special preference. What has interwoven itself with the texture of the spirit, the habitual good deeds that give it beauty, or the rooted evil that disfigures it, these determine our place, for they fix our character. It is true that every deed has its influence upon the soul, and every spoken word leaves behind an impress on the sensitive organization of the speaker. But it is the result of the formative influence of these upon the nature of man voluntary and intellectual that is appreciated in the world of decision.

True it is that many things may hang about the nature of a good man which are rather accretions than outgrowths, and which conceal,

Divine Providence, 46.

THE PURPOSE OF LIFE.

405

more than they express what he essentially is; and there are seeming virtues which, though they may temper the violence of a vicious nature are not its exponents. But if goodness has gathered such force and solidity from the habits and principles of life as to make it master of the spirit, then will that goodness tending outward to a full expression of itself, affect the dispersion of all adventitious evils, and stand revealed, at length, in its own beauty. And if evil has seized the centre of the soul and reigns as tyrant there, then will that also in rushing wildly outward to a complete assertion of its dominion, carry away all those loose restraints that a seeming virtue has imposed. For, since that other world is so constituted as to be wholly retributive, as to redress the dislocation and disorder that prevail in this imperfect state, its dominant law, nay, the vital atmosphere of the place, compels, at length, the appearance to be at one with the reality. All eyes and faces, all gestures, tones, and words must express the thing that is; and what we are preponderantly and essentially we must be wholly. The habit of heart, mind, and life which our probation has fixed will come forth as angel or devil, in every feature, look, gesture, tone, and word. There will be no mistake when character itself pronounces judgment.

What we are, then, is our heaven or hell. And when the Word teaches faith in truth, firm trust in the Lord's good providence, obedience to His commandments,-when it gives us to see the happiness that lies before the children of God, it is teaching indirectly that men are here to establish in themselves, by the Lord's help, such a nature that faith, trust, and obedience may become native to the soul. For if faith in God and His truth is not with us, no arbitrary hand withholds the gift, but a hard worldliness shuts the soul against it; if firm trust in Providence can find no foothold in our vacillating souls, it is because we rely upon ourselves and our schemes too much to give place to this holy trust; and if obedience has no place in us, it is because rebellious passions make it impossible. All goodness, wisdom, and peace are offered to us through that Word, and the non-fulfilment of the needful conditions alone prevents acceptance. Thus the whole work of life is included in the narrow circumference of our own nature. When that work is well done we freely receive all good from God, and freely give to others; we rightly worship, and we rightly serve.

If this be so, we cannot be too well informed of the original condition of that nature upon the ultimate quality of which our eternity depends. Is it such as to be in accordance with those laws of order, by obedience to which man reaches the fullness of his spiritual strength and beauty? or is it such as to rebel against these laws, and to prefer the deformity

and weakness of spiritual disease? If the former were the case human nature and the divine law would meet as friends, for the commands of the law would find a ready response in the spirit prepared to obey. Life would, then, be a regular and unobstructed growth, and the spirit would gradually unfold and develope in substance and form, until, at the time of its maturity, the body would fall off and leave the spirit standing in its own world. To hear would be to obey; the heart would utter its "Yea" to the good, its "Nay" to the evil, and the intellect would be at one with the heart. But if the latter be the case, then, life is not a growth but a struggle; it is not like the peaceful development of a free people, but the long war of slaves against tyrants, to be followed, at length, by that freedom in which orderly progress is possible. And if to-day our human nature is so inverted as to make that supreme which should be lowest, that the base which should be the summit, then, to consult that nature as to the manner of its own government would not be wiser than to give to bandits the power to elect the judges and appoint the police. We cannot trust the decisions of a disordered nature; what that calls good and evil, true and false, happy and miserable, will not be so to a healthy soul. If, indeed, our nature as it exists to-day could be trusted, if its instincts were pure, and its judgments wise, then would the utilitarian have a much sounder basis for his theory of morality, than, at present, he possesses.

In truth experience daily forces upon us the conviction that we cannot now confide in our volitions unfailingly, or claim for our reason the faculty of a swift and sure intuition. By our hereditary nature we are wrong both as to heart and head. For we begin by loving self in the first place, the world as minister to self, and by regarding that as the highest wisdom which best quickens the intellect to minister most effectively to these masters of the soul. So long as revelation leaves us untaught, or when we reject its teaching, we accept the decision of the senses that we live and move here, of ourselves; that life is one with the organization it animates; that the man ceases when the bodily tent he lives in falls; and that the purpose of life is to fill full the cup of enjoyment, for that to-morrow the heart may cease to beat under the hand of the mysterious terror called death. We need not call to witness the whole course of human history, red as it is with blood, wrapped as it is in the flame and smoke of war, that man left alone loves only himself, loves others only as they serve himself, and calls that power and wisdom which helps him to enslave others to himself. For to us, in our own land, yea in our own home and heart, we shall, if we look with a faithful eye, find quite enough to show that this is true.

very

near