works usually are, is remarkable chiefly for the large proportion of
psychological matter which it contains. In these parts of the book
Hutcheson mainly follows Locke. The technicalities of the subject
are passed lightly over, and the book is readable. It may be specially
noticed that he distinguishes between the mental result and its verbal
expression [idea—term; judgment—proposition], that he constantly
employs the word “idea,” and that he defines logical truth as “convenientia
signorum cum rebus significatis” (or “propositionis convenientia
cum rebus ipsis,” Syn. Metaph. pars i. cap 3), thus implicitly
repudiating a merely formal view of logic.
III. Aesthetics.—Hutcheson may further be regarded as one of the earliest modern writers on aesthetics. His speculations on this subject are contained in the Inquiry concerning Beauty, Order, Harmony and Design, the first of the two treatises published in 1725. He maintains that we are endowed with a special sense by which we perceive beauty, harmony and proportion. This is a reflex sense, because it presupposes the action of the external senses of sight and hearing. It may be called an internal sense, both in order to distinguish its perceptions from the mere perceptions of sight and hearing, and because “in some other affairs, where our external senses are not much concerned, we discern a sort of beauty, very like in many respects to that observed in sensible objects, and accompanied with like pleasure” (Inquiry, &c., sect. 1). The latter reason leads him to call attention to the beauty perceived in universal truths, in the operations of general causes and in moral principles and actions. Thus, the analogy between beauty and virtue, which was so favourite a topic with Shaftesbury, is prominent in the writings of Hutcheson also. Scattered up and down the treatise there are many important and interesting observations which our limits prevent us from noticing. But to the student of mental philosophy it may be specially interesting to remark that Hutcheson both applies the principle of association to explain our ideas of beauty and also sets limits to its application, insisting on there being “a natural power of perception or sense of beauty in objects, antecedent to all custom, education or example” (see Inquiry, &c., sects. 6, 7; Hamilton’s Lectures on Metaphysics, Lect. 44 ad fin.).
Hutcheson’s writings naturally gave rise to much controversy. To say nothing of minor opponents, such as “Philaretus” (Gilbert Burnet, already alluded to), Dr John Balguy (1686–1748), prebendary of Salisbury, the author of two tracts on “The Foundation of Moral Goodness,” and Dr John Taylor (1694–1761) of Norwich, a minister of considerable reputation in his time (author of An Examination of the Scheme of Morality advanced by Dr Hutcheson), the essays appear to have suggested, by antagonism, at least two works which hold a permanent place in the literature of English ethics—Butler’s Dissertation on the Nature of Virtue, and Richard Price’s Treatise of Moral Good and Evil (1757). In this latter work the author maintains, in opposition to Hutcheson, that actions are in themselves right or wrong, that right and wrong are simple ideas incapable of analysis, and that these ideas are perceived immediately by the understanding. We thus see that, not only directly but also through the replies which it called forth, the system of Hutcheson, or at least the system of Hutcheson combined with that of Shaftesbury, contributed, in large measure, to the formation and development of some of the most important of the modern schools of ethics (see especially art. Ethics).
Authorities.—Notices of Hutcheson occur in most histories, both of general philosophy and of moral philosophy, as, for instance, in pt. vii. of Adam Smith’s Theory of Moral Sentiments; Mackintosh’s Progress of Ethical Philosophy; Cousin, Cours d’histoire de la philosophie morale du XVIII e siècle; Whewell’s Lectures on the History of Moral Philosophy in England; A. Bain’s Mental and Moral Science; Noah Porter’s Appendix to the English translation of Ueberweg’s History of Philosophy; Sir Leslie Stephen’s History of English Thought in the Eighteenth Century, &c. See also Martineau, Types of Ethical Theory (London, 1902); W. R. Scott, Francis Hutcheson (Cambridge, 1900); Albee, History of English Utilitarianism (London, 1902); T. Fowler, Shaftesbury and Hutcheson (London, 1882); J. McCosh, Scottish Philosophy (New York, 1874). Of Dr Leechman’s Biography of Hutcheson we have already spoken. J. Veitch gives an interesting account of his professorial work in Glasgow, Mind, ii. 209-212. (T. F.; X.)
HUTCHINSON, ANNE (c. 1600–1643), American religious
enthusiast, leader of the “Antinomians” in New England,
was born in Lincolnshire, England, about 1600. She was the
daughter of a clergyman named Francis Marbury, and, according
to tradition, was a cousin of John Dryden. She married William
Hutchinson, and in 1634 emigrated to Boston, Massachusetts,
as a follower and admirer of the Rev. John Cotton. Her orthodoxy
was suspected and for a time she was not admitted to the church,
but soon she organized meetings among the Boston women,
among whom her exceptional ability and her services as a nurse
had given her great influence; and at these meetings she discussed
and commented upon recent sermons and gave expression
to her own theological views. The meetings became increasingly
popular, and were soon attended not only by the women but
even by some of the ministers and magistrates, including Governor
Henry Vane. At these meetings she asserted that she, Cotton
and her brother-in-law, the Rev. John Wheelwright—whom
she was trying to make second “teacher” in the Boston church—were
under a “covenant of grace,” that they had a special
inspiration, a “peculiar indwelling of the Holy Ghost,” whereas
the Rev. John Wilson, the pastor of the Boston church, and
the other ministers of the colony were under a “covenant of
works.” Anne Hutchinson was, in fact, voicing a protest against
the legalism of the Massachusetts Puritans, and was also striking
at the authority of the clergy in an intensely theocratic community.
In such a community a theological controversy inevitably
was carried into secular politics, and the entire colony was
divided into factions. Mrs Hutchinson was supported by
Governor Vane, Cotton, Wheelwright and the great majority of
the Boston church; opposed to her were Deputy-Governor John
Winthrop, Wilson and all of the country magistrates and
churches. At a general fast, held late in January 1637, Wheelwright
preached a sermon which was taken as a criticism of
Wilson and his friends. The strength of the parties was tested
at the General Court of Election of May 1637, when Winthrop
defeated Vane for the governorship. Cotton recanted, Vane returned
to England in disgust, Wheelwright was tried and banished
and the rank and file either followed Cotton in making submission
or suffered various minor punishments. Mrs Hutchinson
was tried (November 1637) by the General Court chiefly for
“traducing the ministers,” and was sentenced to banishment;
later, in March 1638, she was tried before the Boston church
and was formally excommunicated. With William Coddington
(d. 1678), John Clarke and others, she established a settlement
on the island of Aquidneck (now Rhode Island) in 1638. Four
years later, after the death of her husband, she settled on Long
Island Sound near what is now New Rochelle, Westchester
county, New York, and was killed in an Indian rising in August
1643, an event regarded in Massachusetts as a manifestation
of Divine Providence. Anne Hutchinson and her followers
were called “Antinomians,” probably more as a term of reproach
than with any special reference to her doctrinal theories; and
the controversy in which she was involved is known as the
“Antinomian Controversy.”
See C. F. Adams, Antinomianism in the Colony of Massachusetts Bay, vol. xiv. of the Prince Society Publications (Boston, 1894); and Three Episodes of Massachusetts History (Boston and New York, 1896).
HUTCHINSON, JOHN (1615–1664), Puritan soldier, son of
Sir Thomas Hutchinson of Owthorpe, Nottinghamshire, and
of Margaret, daughter of Sir John Byron of Newstead, was
baptized on the 18th of September 1615. He was educated at
Nottingham and Lincoln schools and at Peterhouse, Cambridge,
and in 1637 he entered Lincoln’s Inn. On the outbreak of the
great Rebellion he took the side of the Parliament, and was
made in 1643 governor of Nottingham Castle, which he defended
against external attacks and internal divisions, till the triumph
of the parliamentary cause. He was chosen member for
Nottinghamshire in March 1646, took the side of the Independents,
opposed the offers of the king at Newport, and signed the death-warrant.
Though a member at first of the council of state, he
disapproved of the subsequent political conduct of Cromwell
and took no further part in politics during the lifetime of the
protector. He resumed his seat in the recalled Long Parliament
in May 1659, and followed Monk in opposing Lambert, believing
that the former intended to maintain the commonwealth.
He was returned to the Convention Parliament for Nottingham
but expelled on the 9th of June 1660, and while not excepted
from the Act of Indemnity was declared incapable of holding
public office. In October 1663, however, he was arrested upon
suspicion of being concerned in the Yorkshire plot, and after
a rigorous confinement in the Tower of London, of which he
published an account (reprinted in the Harleian Miscellany,
vol. iii.), and in Sandown Castle, Kent, he died on the 11th of
September 1664. His career draws its chief interest from the
Life by his wife, Lucy, daughter of Sir Allen Apsley, written
