busied themselves in increasing its terrors as an engine against the Christian faith, that they might have the merit of displaying a chivalrous resistance. The presumptions thus formed and fostered, caused a vigorous investigation into the grounds of all belief, and many good and able men were startled to find that it was necessary to admit many of the positions assumed by their subtle antagonist, and that they must employ the vigorous logic they had brought to the field, in stoutly fortifying a position he did not attack. They found "the metaphysical arguments inconclusive," and "the moral arguments, and those derived from the analogy of nature, equally strong and convincing:" and that useful and beautiful system of natural theology, which has been enriched by the investigations of Derham, Tucker,[1] and Paley, gave place to obscure investigations into first causes, and idle theories on the grounds of belief, which generally landed the philosophers in a circle of confusion, and amazed the reader with incomprehensibilities. One of the most clear and original of the chapters of the Treatise on Human Nature, has provided us with a curious practical instance of the pliability of the sceptical philosophy of Hume. In treating the subject of cause and effect, Mr Hume, with fidelity to his previous division of perceptions, found nothing in the effect produced on the mind by any two phenomena, of which the one received the name of cause, the other that of effect, but two impressions, and no connexion betwixt them, but the sequence of the latter to the former; attributing our natural belief that the one is a cause, and the other its effect, to the habit of the mind in running from the one impression to that which is its immediate sequent, or precedent; denying that we can have any conception of cause and effect beyond those instances of which the mind has had experience, and which habit has taught it ; and, finally, denying that mankind can penetrate farther into the mystery, than the simple knowledge that the one phenomenon is experienced to follow the other. Men of undoubtedly pure religious faith have maintained the justness of this system as a metaphysical one, and it has found its way into physical science, as a check to vague theories, and the assumption of conjectural causes: in a memorable instance, it was however attacked as metaphysically subversive of a proper belief in the Deity as a first cause. The persons who maintained this argument, were answered, that an opposite supposition was morally subversive of a necessity for the constant existence and presence of the Deity; because, if "a cause had the innate power within it of producing its common effect, the whole fabric of the universe had an innate power of existence and progression in its various changes, which dispensed with the existence of a supreme regulator."
The second volume of the Treatise on Human Nature, discusses the passions on the principles laid down at the commencement of the previous volume. The subjects here treated, while they are not of so strikingly original a description as to prompt us to enlarge on their contents, may be a more acceptable morsel to most readers, and certainly may be perused with more of what is termed satisfaction, than the obscure and somewhat disheartening investigations of the pure metaphysician. Of the usual subtilty and acuteness of the author they are of course not destitute ; but the theatre of investigation does not admit of much abstraction, and these qualities exercise themselves on subjects more tangible and comprehensible, than those of the author's prior labours.
The production of the Treatise on Human Nature, stands almost alone in the history of the human mind ; let it be remembered that the author had just reached that period of existence when the animal spirits exercise their strongest
- ↑ Not Josiah, but Abraham Tucker, who, under the assumed name of "Search," wrote a book on the light of nature, in 9 vols., 8vo. An unobtrusive and profound work, not very inviting, and little read, which later philosophers have pillaged without compunction.
