obscure it was! Out of its midst came natural objects. O, the stillness, O, the darkness! Out of its midst came forth the fount of life,-perfect in subtlety. Out of its midst came consciousness, so that from then till now, the knowledge of all this remains, and we are enabled to see all that has happened in the world, pass in review before us. Should it be asked how it is that I have this knowledge of the beginning of all things, I give all that I have now written as my answer." 1 Yet it is rather an unprofitable rhapsody; we know nothing of "the Beginning."

Socrates on the Infinite." Wonder," says Socrates, “is very much the affection of a philosopher, for there is no other beginning of philosophy than this." 2

Carlyle on the Infinite.-Amongst moderns, Carlyle, perhaps, has most clearly seen the Divine significance of wonder. "Wonder is the basis of worship; the reign of wonder is perennial, indestructible in man; only at certain stages (as the present), it is for some short season, in partibus infidelium. That progress of science which is to destroy wonder and in its stead substitute Mensuration and Numeration, finds small favour with Teufelsdröckh, much as he otherwise venerates these two latter processes.

"Shall your science," exclaims he, " proceed in the small chink-lighted, or even oil-lighted, underground workshop of Logic alone; and man's mind become an Arithmetical Mill, whereof Memory is the Hopper, and mere tables of sines and tangents, codification and treatises of what you call political economy, are the Meal? And what is that science which the scientific head alone, were it screwed off and (like the Doctor's in the Arabian Tale) set in a basin to keep it alive, could prosecute without shadow of a heart, but one other of the mechanical and menial handicrafts, for which the scientific head (having a soul in it) is too noble an organ? I mean that thought without

1 The Tao-Tih-King, c. xxi.

2 Theaetetus, 32.

reverence is barren, perhaps poisonous; at best dies like cooking with the day that called it forth; does not live like sowing, in successive tilths and wide-spreading harvests, bringing food and plenteous increase to all time.

"In such wise does Teufelsdröckh deal hits, harder or softer, according to ability; yet ever as we would fain persuade ourselves, with charitable intent. Above all that class of Logic-choppers and treble-pipe scoffers, and professed enemies to wonder; who in these days so numerously patrol as night-constables about the Mechanics' Institute of Science, and cackle like true old-Roman geese and goslings round their Capitol, on any alarm or on none; nay, who often as illuminated sceptics, walk abroad into peaceable society, in full daylight, with rattle and lantern, and insist on guiding you and guarding you therewith, though the sun is shining, and the street populous with mere justice-loving men. That whole class is inexpressibly

wearisome to him.

he perorates:

Hear with what uncommon animation

"The man who cannot wonder, who does not habitually wonder (and worship), were he President of innumerable Royal Societies and carried the whole Mecanique Celeste and Hegel's Philosophy, and the epitome of all Laboratories and Observatories with their results, in his single head, is but a pair of spectacles, behind which there is no eye. Let those who have eyes look through him, that he may be useful.

"Thou wilt have no mystery; wilt walk through thy world by the sunshine of what thou callest truth, or even by the hand-lamp of what I call Attorney-Logic, and explain all and account for all, or believe nothing of it? Nay, thou wilt attempt laughter; who so recognises the

1 Some confusion here in the thinking. Reverence itself is a product of thought. Irreverence results from defect of thought. The more thought regarding the Universe, the more reverence; the less thought, the less

reverence.

unfathomable, all-pervading domain of Mystery, which is everywhere under our feet and among our hands; to whom the Universe is an Oracle and Temple as well as a Kitchen and Cattle-stall, he shall be a delirious mystic; to him, thou with sniffing charity wilt protrusively offer thy handlamp, and shriek, as one injured, when he kicks his foot through it? Armer Teufel ! Wert thou not born? Wilt thou not die? Explain me all this, or do one of two things: Return into private places with thy foolish cackle; or, what were better, give it up and weep, not that the reign of wonder is done, and God's World all disembellished and prosaic, but that thou hitherto art a Dilettante and Sand-blind Pedant."1

Conclusion of the matter.-In a word, we are finite; and in all its attempts and attacks upon the Infinite, the finite is simply baffled and driven back in chaotic confusion. Speculatively, the highest thing we can do, is to stand over against the Infinite in the high consciousness of intelligent, though limited, recognition. The philosopher realising his finitude, must leave the Infinite alone-speculatively. "A world of false and pestilent and presumptuous reasoning, by which philosophy and theology are now equally discredited, would be at once abolished in the recognition of this rule of prudent nescience." 2 "The Power which the Universe manifests to us, is utterly inscrutable." 3

5. Summary of this Chapter.-It clearly appears, then, I think, that the Universe stands to us intellectually, in one or other of these four relationships: either as―

I. The Known; or

II. The Knowable; or

III. The Unknowable through inaccessibility of evidence; or

IV. The Unknowable in itself, the Inscrutable,

the Mysterious.

1 Sartor Resartus, Bk. i. c. x.

2 Hamilton: Discussions, p. 621.

3

Spencer First Principles, p. 46.

:

Provinces to which the Philosopher should confine his operations. The student, then, ought clearly to confine hist operations within the fields of I. and II. Intellectually, he might as well get bitten by a mad dog as trudge off with his horn-lantern, tapes, callipers and compasses to explore the territories of III. and IV. Sound Sense will teach him to regard both of these latter regions not merely as terra adhuc incognita, but as terra likely to remain incognita. Far better for a philosopher to play with a child's rattle than set off upon any expedition into the Infinite. If the Universe were hung with turnip-lanterns, instead of suns and systems, he could not fully explain it, all turnips and candles even, being, in the last resort, inscrutable.

In the year 1553, the Company of Merchant Adventurers was chartered for "the discovery of regions, dominions, islands and places unknown"-a perfectly reasonable proceeding in those days: but no philosopher need charter himself to explore the Infinite. All that he can profitably do is to consider what may be properly inferred from what he actually knows,-actually experiences, as to what is beyond and above experience.1

1 What Hamilton called Ontology, or "Inferential Psychology" (Lectures, vol. i. p. 125)-logical deductions from facts of consciousness. "An articulate knowledge of the necessary implications of axiomatic truth." Cook: Monday Lectures (2nd Series), p. 58.

CHAPTER VI

WE MUST OBSERVE THE DISTINCTION BETWEEN NECESSARY AND CONTINGENT TRUTH

It is very important that the philosopher should note the great distinction that exists between Truth Necessary and Truth Contingent. This distinction will be found to yield great consequences, more especially in the Science of Religion.

The distinction observed by Plato.-This distinction seems to have been observed, vaguely, at least, as far back as Plato, who, in the Timaeus, discrimates between that "which is ever existent" and has no generation, and that "which is in a state of generation or becoming." The former, he says, "is apprehended by reflection united with reason," and "always subsists according to sameness": whilst the latter is, as he phrases it, only "perceived by opinion united with irrational perception." 1

In the Introduction of Alcinous to the Doctrine of Plato, it is said that Reason is twofold. "One part of it is conversant with things perceptible by the mind; the other about things perceptible by a sense; of which the one conversant with things perceptible by the mind is science and scientific reason; but the other conversant with things perceptible by a sense, is opinionative and opinion. From whence the scientific possesses a firmness and stability, as being conversant with principles firm and stable; but the credible and opinionative possess probability as being conversant about things not stable." 2

1 Timaeus, ix.

2 Introduction of Alcinous, c. iv.