NOTES TO BOOK FIRST
ON CHAPTER I
(1) We must distinguish between certainty and truth: there are intimate relations between them, yet they are very different things. Truth is the conformity of the intellect with the object. Certainty is a firm assent to a real or apparent truth.
Certainty is not truth, but it must at least have the illusion of truth. We may be certain of what is false, but not unless we believe it to be true.
There is no truth so long as there is no judgment; for without judgment there is only perception, but no comparison of the idea with the thing; and without comparison there can be neither conformity nor discrepancy. If we conceive a mountain a thousand miles high, we conceive a thing that does not exist; but we do not err so long as we do not assert the existence of the mountain. If we affirm it, there is opposition between our judgment and the reality: this constitutes error. The object of the intellect is truth; therefore, we at least require the illusion of truth in order to be certain: our intellect is weak; hence its certainty is liable to error. The first is a law of the intellect, the second a proof of its frailty.
Philosophy, or, rather, man, cannot rest content with appearances, but demands reality; if any one be convinced that he has only the appearance, or if he even doubt of it, he loses his certainty, for it admits appearances only on condition of their being disguised.
ON CHAPTER II
(2) Even Pyrrho did not doubt of every thing as some pretend; he admitted sensations so far as passive, and resigned himself to the consequences of these impressions, and yielded to the necessity of conforming in practice to what they indicated. No one ever yet denied appearances: it is reality that is disputed; some hold that man must be content with saying it appears; others that he can go so far as to say it is. It is useful to preserve this distinction, as it prevents confusion of ideas in the history of philosophy, and conduces to render clear the question of certainty. Thus of the three questions: is there certainty? on what is it founded? how is it acquired? the first is resolved alike by all the schools, so far as it relates to a fact of our soul: by only admitting appearances, they admit the certainty of them.
ON CHAPTER III
(3) In order to form clear ideas of the development of the understanding, and the other faculties of our soul, the reader may refer to what we advanced in our work, entitled The Criterion, and particularly to the chapters I., II., III., XII., XIII., XIV., XVIII., and XXII.
ON CHAPTER IV
(4) We subjoin the passages from St. Thomas on the unity and multiplicity of ideas, to which we referred in the text. We believe the friends of solid and profound metaphysics will read them with great pleasure.
"In omnibus enim substantiis intellectualibus, invenitur virtus intellectiva per influentiam divini luminis. Quod quidem in primo principio est unum et simplex, et quanto magis creaturæ intellectuales distant a primo principio, tanto magis dividitur illud lumen, et diversificatur, sicut accidit in lineis a centro egredientibus. Et inde est quod Deus per suam essentiam omnia intelligit: superiores autem intellectualium substantiarum, etsi per plures formas intelligant, tamen intelligunt per pauciores et magis universales et virtuosiores ad comprehensionem rerum propter efficaciam virtutis intellectivæ, quæ est in eis. In inferioribus autem sunt formæ plures et minus universales, et minus efficaces ad comprehensionem rerum, in quantum deficiunt a virtute intellectiva superiorum. Si ergo inferiores substantiæ haberent formas in illa universalitate, in qua habent superiores, quia non sunt tantæ efficaciæ in intelligendo, non acciperent per eas perfectam cognitionem de rebus, sed in quadam communitate, et confusione, quod aliqualiter apparet in hominibus. Nam qui sunt debilioris intellectus, per universales conceptiones magis intelligentium, non accipiunt perfectam cognitionem, nisi eis singula in speciali explicentur. (P. 1n, Q. 892, A. 1°.)
"Intellectus quanto est altior et perspicacior tanto ex uno potest plura cognoscere. Et quia intellectus divinus est altissimus, per unam simplicem essentiam suam omnia cognoscit; nec est ibi aliqua pluralitas formarum idealium, nisi secundum diversos respectus divinæ essentiæ ad res cognitas; sed in intellectu creato multiplicatur secundum rem quod est unum secundum rem in mente divina, ut non possit omnia per unum cognoscere; ita tamen quod quanto intellectus creatus est altior, tanto pauciores habet formas ad plura cognoscenda efficaces. Et hoc est quod Dio. dicit, 12, cœ. hier. quod superiores ordines habent scientiam magis universalem in inferioribus. Et in lib. de causis dicitur, quod intelligentiæ superiores habent formas magis universales; hoc tamen observato, quod in infimis angelis sunt formæ adhuc universales in tantum, quod per unam formam possunt cognoscere omnia individua unius speciei: ita quod illa species sit propria, uniuscujusque particularium secundum diversos respectus ejus ad particularia, sicut essentia divina efficitur propria similitudo singulorum secundum diversos respectus; sed intellectus humanus qui est ultimus in ordine substantiarum intellectualium habet formas in tantum particulatas quod non potest per unam speciem nisi unum quid cognoscere. Et ideo similitudo speciei existens in intellectu humano non sufficit ad cognoscenda plura singularia; et propter hoc intellectui adjuncti sunt sensus quibus singularia accipiat. (Quodlib. 7, A. 3.)
"Respondeo dicendum, quod ex hoc sunt in rebus aliqua superiora, quod sunt uni primo, quod est Deus, propinquiora et similiora. In Deo autem tota plenitudo intellectualis cognitionis continetur in uno, scilicet in essentia divina, per quam Deus omnia cognoscit. Quæ quidem intelligibilis plentitudo, in intelligibilibus creaturis inferiori modo et minus simpliciter invenitur. Unde oportet, quod ea quæ Deus cognoscit per unam, inferiores intellectus cognoscant per multa; et tanto amplius per plura, quanto amplius intellectus inferior fuit. Sic igitur quanto angelus fuerit superior, tanto per pauciores species universitatem intelligibilium apprehendere poterit, et ideo oportet quod ejus formæ sint universaliores, quasi ad plura se extendentes unaquæque eorum. Et de hoc, exemplum aliqualiter in nobis perspici potest: sunt enim quidam, qui veritatem intelligibilem capere non possunt; nisi eis particulatim per singula explicatur. Et hoc quidem ex debilitate intellectus eorum contingit. Alii vero qui sunt fortioris intellectus, ex paucis multo capere possunt." (P.1a, Q. 55a A. 3°.)
ON CHAPTER V
(5) Here is the idea of Condillac's man-statue explained by himself: "To gain this object we imagined a statue internally organized like ourselves, and animated with a mind deprived of every sort of ideas. We also supposed its exterior composed wholly of marble, to allow it the use of none of its senses, and we reserved to ourselves the liberty to open them at our pleasure to the different impressions of which they are susceptible.
"We thought we ought to commence with smell, because of all the senses this is the one which least contributes to cognitions of the mind. Next we had to examine the others, and after having considered them apart and together, we saw the statue become an animal able to attend to its own preservation.
"The principle that determines the development of its faculties is simple; even sensations contain it; for, all being of necessity either agreeable or the contrary, the statue is interested in enjoying some and shunning others. The reader will now be convinced that this interest suffices to give occasion to the gradations of the will and the understanding. Judgments, reflection, desires, passions, are only sensations variously transformed. This is why it seemed to us useless to suppose the soul to have received immediately from nature all the sensations with which it is endowed. Nature has given us organs which show us by pleasure or pain what we ought to seek or to avoid; but here she stops, and leaves to experience the task of leading us to contract habits, and finish the work she has commenced.
"This object is new, and shows all the simplicity of the ways of the Author of nature. Is it not a thing worthy of our admiration thus to see, from man's sensibility to pleasure or pain, spring up in him ideas, desires, habits, and talents of various kinds?" —Traite des Sensations. Dessein de l'ouvrage.
What we admire in Condillac is not his system, but his candor; and we wonder yet more that, for a time, he should have had numerous followers of his so poor and superficial system. The author proposes the difficulty, that as there is in our soul nothing but transformed sensations, it is strange that brutes, which also have sensations, should not be endowed with the same faculties as man. Can the reader imagine what profound reason the French philosopher assigned? We doubt it very much. It is a curious thought: "the organ of touch is less perfect in brutes, and consequently it cannot be to them an occasional cause of all the operations which we observe in ourselves." He did well to adopt the motto: nec tamen quasi Pythius Apollo!
ON CHAPTER VI
(6) The works of the scholastics are worth reading on these points. Treating of the object of science, they are at once exact and profound. It is not easy to think of any thing concerning the classification of truths not explained or indicated by them.
ON CHAPTER VII
(7) Let us not be thought to judge too severely of the forms adopted by the German philosophers. It is well known how Madame de Staël speaks of them; but happily we can cite in our favor a more competent judge. Schelling, one of the chiefs of German philosophy, says: "The Germans have so long philosophized among themselves, as to gradually depart more and more, in their thoughts and their words, from what is universally intelligible; and the degree of departure therefrom has almost come at last to be the measure of philosophical ability. Examples are not wanting to us. As families which separate from general society, and live wholly among themselves, among other repulsive singularities, come to use expressions intelligible only to themselves, so is it with the Germans in philosophy; and after vain efforts to spread the Kantian philosophy out of Germany, they renounced the attempt to make themselves intelligible to other nations; they became accustomed to regard themselves as the chosen people of philosophy, forgetting that the primary end of philosophy, – an end often neglected, but not the less to be sought for on that account, – is to gain universal consent, by making themselves universally intelligible. This is not to say that we must judge works of thought like exercises in style; but all philosophy not intelligible to all civilized nations, and accessible in every language, cannot, for this reason alone, be the universal and true philosophy." —Schelling's Judgment of V. Cousin, and the state of French and German Philosophy in general. 1834. p. 4.
Schelling flatters himself that German philosophy is about to take a better course with respect to clearness, and adds: "The philosophical writer who, for tens of years past, was unable to depart from the terms and forms of the school, without loss of his scientific reputation, may hereafter emancipate himself from this restraint. He will seek depth of thought; and an absolute incapacity to express himself with clearness, will no longer be regarded as the mark of talent and philosophical inspiration." We have nothing to add to this passage; we would only remind its author that: mutato nomine, de te fabula narratur.
ON CHAPTER VIII
(8) The perusal of Schelling's work on Ideal Transcendentalism leaves no doubt as to his view of this identity, which at bottom neither is nor can be any thing else than pantheism; yet, for the sake of truth, we will allow that Schelling seems to have modified his doctrine, or to have feared its consequences, if we are to consider the indications found in his discourse at the opening of his course of philosophy, at Berlin, the 13th of November, 1841. We there find the following passage, worthy of the attention of all thinking men: "The difficulties and obstacles of all kinds, against which philosophy contends are visible, and in vain would we attempt to dissemble them. Never was there a more powerful reaction against philosophy on the part of real and active life than at this present epoch; and this proves philosophy to have penetrated even to the vital questions of society, those concerning which no one can rest indifferent. So long as a philosophy is only in the first stages of formation, taking the first steps in its march, no one cares for it, except philosophers themselves; other men await the last word of philosophy, since it is important to the general public only in its results.
"We confess that we ought not to take as the practical result of a solid and profoundly meditated philosophy whatever it may please any body to designate as such: were it so, the world would be subjected to doctrines the most repugnant to sound morality, even such as sap its foundation. No! No one judges of philosophy by the practical conclusions drawn by ignorance or presumption. Moreover, lest deception on this point be possible, the public should reject a philosophy which has such results, without examining or even judging it in its principles; it should say that it cannot understand the depth of these questions, or the artificial and intricate march of the arguments; but without pausing here it should promptly decide that a philosophy leading to such conclusions cannot be true in its principles. What the Roman moralist said of the useful: nihil utile nisi quod honestum, is equally applicable to the investigation of truth: no philosophy that respects itself will allow that it leads to irreligion. Yet actual philosophy is in such a state, that, however much it promises a religious result, no one admits it; for deductions drawn from it convert the dogmas of the Christian religion into a vain phantasmagory.
"As to this, some of its most faithful disciples are openly agreed; be the suspicion well founded or not, its existence suffices, and this opinion is established.
"But active life in the last result is always right; and so philosophy is exposed to great risks. They who war on one philosophy are not far from condemning all philosophy; they say in their heart, there is no longer philosophy in the world. I myself am not exempt from these condemnations, since it is pretended that it is I, who first gave impulse to this philosophy which is at present so badly judged of, because of its religious results.
"How shall I defend myself? Certainly I would never attack a philosophy for its last results; but I would judge it in its first principles, as every philosophical mind should. It is moreover well enough known that I have shown myself little satisfied with the philosophy of which I speak.
"The moral and spiritual worlds are so divided that any point of union for an instant should be a motive of satisfaction. Besides to destroy, is a very sad thing when there is nothing wherewith to replace the thing destroyed. 'Do it better yourself,' we say to one who can do nothing but criticize.
"I therefore consecrate myself entirely to the mission with which I am charged; for you I will live; for you I will labor without ceasing while there remains in me the breath of life, and while He permits me, without whose permission not a hair can fall from our head, and yet less a deeply felt word proceed from our mouth. He, without whose inspiration not one lucid idea can shine on our mind, nor one thought of truth and liberty illumine our soul."
This passage shows the embarrassment of the German philosopher's position, and the irreligious consequences attached to his doctrines. It is consoling to see him pay some homage to truth; but it is afflicting to see him still pretend to save its inconsequence.
ON CHAPTER IX
(9) In these latter days there have not been wanting some to count the illustrious Malebranche among the partisans of pantheism. We cannot conceive how M. Cousin could say; "Malebranche est avec Spinoza le plus grand disciple de Descartes. Comme lui il a tiré des principes de leur commun maître les conséquences que ces principes renfermaient. Malebranche est à la lettre Spinoza chrétien." (Fragments Philosophiques. T. 2me. p. 167. Ed. 3ieme.) We repeat that we cannot conceive how any one, who had read ever so little of the great metaphysician's works, should assert such a paradox. The slightest glance at his writings suffices to show in them the most lofty spiritualism united with profound respect for the dogmas of our most holy religion. When we treat of the various philosophical systems of the origin of ideas and the problem of the universe, we shall have other occasions to vindicate the wise and pious author of the Investigation de la Verité. Yet we were unwilling to pass by the present occasion without doing him the justice to defend him from imputations, which he would, were he living, repel as intolerable calumnies. Who would have thought when he wrote those works, on every page of which we find, God, the mind, the Christian religion, eternal truth, and original sin, with frequent texts from the sacred Scriptures and St. Augustine, that he would ever be ranked with Spinoza, with the absurd epithet of Christian Spinoza? Such is at times the sad lot of great men, thus to be held as chiefs of sects they abhorred. Malebranche styled Spinoza, l'impie de nos jours, and M. Cousin dares call Malebranche the Christian Spinoza.
ON CHAPTER X
(10) We are not ignorant of the difficulties to which Leibnitz's systems are subject; but it is necessary to show that in this great man's mind the erroneous doctrines of modern Germans had no place. "Et c'est ainsi," he says, in his Monadologie (No. 38), "que la dernière raison des choses doit être dans une substance necessaire, dans laquelle le détail des changmens ne soit qu'eminemment, comme dans la source, et c'est ce que nous appelons Dieu. Or cette substance étant une raison suffisante de tout ce détail, lequel est aussi lié partout, il n'y a qu'un Dieu, et ce Dieu suffit.
"On peut juger aussi que cette substance suprême qui est unique, universelle, et necessaire, n'ayant rien hors d'elle qui en soit indépendant, et étant une suite simple de l'être possible, doit être incapable de limites et contenir tout autant de realité qu'il est possible.
"D'où il s'ensuit, que Dieu est absolument parfait, la perfection n'étant autre chose, que la grandeur de la realité positive prise précisément en mettant à part les limites ou bornes dans les choses qui en ont. Et là, où il n'y a point de bornes, c'est-à-dire, en Dieu, la perfection est absolument infinie.
"Il s'ensuit aussi que les créatures ont leur perfections de l'influence de Dieu, mais qu'elles ont leurs imperfections de leur nature propre, incapable d'être sans bornes. Car c'est en cela qu'elles sont distinguées de Dieu.
"Il est vrai aussi, qu'en Dieu est non seulement la source des existences, mais encore celle des essences, en tant que réelles, ou de ce qu'il y a de réel dans la possibilité."
In his dissertation on the Platonic philosophy he combats the pantheistic tendencies of Valentine Weigel, in these words: "Valentinum Weigelium, qui non tantum vitam beatam peculiari libero per Deificationem explicat, sed et passim mortem et quietem hujusmodi commendat, vellem cum aliis Quietistis suspicionem similis sententiæ non dedisse. * * * Spinoza aliter eodem tendebat; ei una substantia est, Deus; creaturæ ejus modificationes, et figuræ in cera continue per motum nascentes et pereuntes. Ita ipsi, perinde ut Almerico, anima non superest, nisi per suum esse ideale in Deo ut ibi ab æterno fuit.
"Sed nihil in Platone animadverto, unde colligam, animos propriam sibi substantiam non servare; quod etiam sane philosophanti extra controversiam est, neque intelligi contraria potest sententia, nisi Deum et animam corporea fingas, neque enim aliter ex Deo animas, tanquam particulas divellas; sed talis de Deo atque anima notio, aliunde absurda est." (Leibnitz. Epist. ad Hanschium de Philos. Platon.)
So far was Leibnitz from deeming the tendency to pantheism an elevated philosophy, that, as we have just seen, he considered it the result of a rude imagination. It is very remarkable that under an historical as under a metaphysical aspect Leibnitz agrees with St. Thomas; both express the same ideas in very similar words. The holy doctor asks if the soul is made from the substance of God, and there takes occasion to examine the origin of the error, and says: "Respondeo dicendum, quod dicere animam esse de substantia Dei, manifestam improbabilitatem continet. Ut enim ex dictis patet, anima humana est quandoque intelligens in potentia, et scientiam quodammodo a rebus acquirit, et habet diversas potentias; quæ omnia aliena sunt a Dei natura, qui est actus purus, et nihil ab alio accipiens, et nullam in se diversitatem habens, ut supra probatum est.
"Sed hic error principium habuisse videtur ex duabus positionibus antiquorum. Primi enim, qui naturas rerum considerare inceperunt, imaginationem transcendere non valentes, nihil præter corpora esse posuerunt. Et ideo Deum dicebant esse quoddam corpus, quod aliorum corporum judicabant esse principium. Et quia animam ponebant esse de natura illius corporis, quod dicebant esse principium, ut dicitur in primo de anima, per consequens sequebatur quod anima esset de substantia Dei. Juxta quam positionem etiam Manichæi, Deum esse quamdam lucem corpoream existimantes, quandam partem illius lucis animam esse posuerunt corpori alligatam. Secundo vero processum fuit ad hoc quod aliqui aliquid incorporeum esse apprehenderunt; non tamen a corpore separatum, sed corporis formam. Unde et Varro dixit quod Deus est anima, mundum intuitu, vel motu et ratione gubernans: ut Augu. narrat 7 de Civit. Dei. Sic igitur illius totalis animæ partem, aliqui posuerunt animam hominis: sicut homo est pars totius mundi; non valentes intellectu pertingere ad distinguendos spiritualium substantiarum gradus, nisi secundum distinctiones corporum. Hæc autem sunt omnia impossibilia, ut supra probatum est, unde manifeste falsum est animam esse de substantia Dei." (P. 1a, Q. 90a, A. 1o.)