assertion is likewise made, because no one can pretend to have discovered the first of secondary causes. In another view the Cause is looked upon as implying nothing more than an antecedent phænomenon, and that these phænomena, under the names of Cause and Effect, are continued in an endless chain of successive connexions. For example, when we hear a clock strike, if we attend to the chains of successive causes-to go no farther back-they may be traced in the stroke of the hammer, which causes the vibration of the bell, which causes the undulatory movement among the particles of the air, which causes a vibratory motion on the organs of hearing and on the brain; a certain sensation follows, and the soul perceives that the clock has struck. Now, for the production of this ultimate effect, we may observe not only one, but three distinct chains of what the ancients would call Causes. 1st. The chain of the material substances whose matter is in contact with one another, and without which matter the phænomenon could not have been produced, viz. the matter of the hammer, of the bell, of the air, of the auditorial nerve, of the sensorium,* and these are the successive Material causes. Again, each of these portions of matter is indued with certain qualities, without which also the effect could not have been produced; and these depend upon what the ancients would call the form, and they consist of the form, texture, elasticity, vibratory and other qualities of the bell, of the air, nerve, &c. These are the Formal causes. To these must be superadded the particular accidents by which they are affected, viz., the fall of the hammer, the vibration of the bell, and the others, by which motion is successively communicated: and of this chain of causes each accident is nothing else than motion, modified by the body through which it passes, and may be regarded as a proximate Efficient cause. In this phænomenon, therefore, we may trace the Material, Formal, and Efficient Causes of the ancients; all which are necessary for the production of the effect: and we may * I use the term as Newton uses it, and not as Leibnitz in his dispute with Clarke. the subject perceive that the ancient and modern doctrines upon of Causation may not be inconsistent with one another: but we must carefully distinguish whether the Cause be defined as the Accident itself, or the Instrument affected with the accidentthe Vibration of the bell, or the Bell in the act of vibrating. Such is a general view of this phænomenon: but we may observe still something more, relating to that Bond of connexion which has been so great a stumbling-block among the moderns. When we come more narrowly to inspect this triplicated chain of Causes, between each link there is a joint, if I may so call it: for instance, the aggregate motion of the hammer is, in the bell, converted into atomic motion. Now this cannot be performed simultaneously, though the manner or law according to which it is performed, escapes the observation of our senses. This is the Latens Processus, or the latent process which Bacon is so anxious to have investigated; and it is often noticed among the ancients, particularly by Plato in the Parmenides and Phædo. The Latens Schematismus of Bacon, the latent form or structure, refers to the latent properties of the bodies, or other unknown circumstances, through which motion is communicated. And as grosser bodies are said to be incapable of contact, a kind of Latens Schematismus at every joint in the chain, becomes also an object of inquiry. The inquiry into the Efficient cause, the Matter, the latent process, and the latent structure, constitutes Physics, according to the notions of Bacon; which differs but little from the ancient doctrine. But, if we combine the two, we shall have Physical science to consist in investigating the Nature and the Continuity of the Material, Formal, and Efficient causes, together with the Laws according to which the chain of efficient causes is propagated, and this, not only in the Links but in the Joints.* If it were done To this might be objected, that the common example of the ancient causes, viz. of a founder casting a statue, does not quadrate with what I have advanced; for in the example, the Efficient cause a quo is the Founder, the Material ex quo is the brass, the Formal in quo is the shape. A more attentive consideration, however, will show that it is only a particular case of the more general that I have taken. The Platonists added to the above the Ideal or Exemplary cause, through the successive links only, we should in a manner have perfected the grand outline of science, through the more delicate parts, the latent processes, and forms, and substances, at the joints, which constitute the bonds of connexion, should forever be concealed. Yet they need not be despaired of. If it should be asked why it is thus to be presumed a priori, that this triplicated chain of causes is continued throughout nature, the only answer to it is this, that in every branch of science which has been investigated, and is thoroughly understood, such is the case; and as we can only reason but from what we know, we reason by analogy, from this known to the unknown, and draw a strong presumption in its favour. It may be false, and it cannot be proved otherwise till all science is perfected; but the burden of finding and demonstrating an exception lies with its opponents, who might thus confute or limit it. In modern experimental Philosophy it is often laid down as a maxim, that the laws of nature are the only proper objects of human inquiry and all investigation of causes is stifled by the dogma which maintains, that human nature is incapable of investigating their nature-a strange fallacy, which seems to be an ignoratio elenchi. The laws of nature, or general facts, as they are called-under which obscure expressions are often included the qualities of bodies as well as their matter and the accidents by which they are affected—may be sufficient for the mathematician, as they afford the data from which his propositions may depend. He can rise no higher than his data; nor is it within the compass of his science to prove any simple physical proposition.* In the brilliant discoveries of Sir Isaac Newton certain general laws and qualities of matter gathered by induction, together with the common principles of mathematics, form the data from which the propositions of the Principia depend. And the discoveries. secundum quod, according to which it is fashioned, which commonly related to the metaphysical, and not to the physical forms. It might also be objected, that the Vacuum, Gravity &c. are at variance. I speak of them presently. * We often meet with such attempts: all the mathematical proofs of the parallelogram of forces, for instance, are vicious, and merely augments in a circle. deduced by mathematical operations may be pushed on by his successors to a greater degree of accuracy and approximation to the truth than they have been already, yet are they merely deductions and links in the descending chain and calculations of effects. But among the data themselves is where we must look for any great advancement of science. In those branches of science which have attained to any degree of perfection, such as Mechanics, Acoustics and some others, we are not content with the mere fact, but we attend to the successive links in the chain of accident, tracing the motion whence it is derived, and to what it is communicated; and investigating also the law according to which it is propagated: and we trace also the chain of being, in the existence and contact of its matter, and in its qualities and form, as in the example of the Bell. But, notwithstanding the mighty strides which modern science has taken in the Operative division of Philosophy, it is manifest what little real progress has been made in the Speculative division in the ascending scale; though every step therein opens almost a new era of discovery. I will now turn to the Result. That Matter or Substance, by which Qualities are supported, exists, is one of the prime articles of belief among mankind, though its existence can only be inferred from the qualities which it upholds. And it is in this branch, by the chemical resolution of compound substances into more simple substances, that science has of late years made its greatest advancement. : Chief of the Qualities of Matter were resolved by the ancients into its Form and by the union of Form with Matter the Sensible world was supposed to be produced. As I endeavour to bring forward those parts only of the ancient philosophy which may be turned to account, I omit mention of their ingenious metaphysical speculations upon the nature of Form and Matter, Bound and the Boundless, and shall merely observe that the system would naturally tend to resolve all the qualities of Matter Y Y into the primary ones of its Extension, Form, and the absolute Hardness or Impenetrability of its component parts, substance, or atoms.* Besides the obvious formal qualities of matter, there are certain other qualities, which may be termed supposititious, assumed or occult,† inasmuch as the words Elasticity, Colour, Inertia, Gravity, and many others, are words conventionally assumed to express some unknown causes of effects which have been traced no higher, but which still remain desiderata to which the attention of science should be directed; for they may perhaps be resolved into some immediate formal cause, or into several intermediate' links in the chain of accidental causes, latent processes &c. Sir Isaac Newton thus attempted to resolve the elasticity of Light, as far as it concerned Reflection, into a latent process, the attractions of a fluid upon the surfaces of bodies. * Of the ancients, the Epicureans alone are supposed to have held the existence of atoms: if I mistake not, the Pythagoreans did likewise, though not such a wilful democracy of Atoms as that of Epicurus; nor am I aware that any of the ancients held the infinite divisibility of matter. Neither of these opinions, perhaps, can be brought to the test of proof, we can rest only in analogy; but I think the accuracy of the results and calculations upon the Atomic Theory, plainly induce us to prefer the atomic opinion, upon the same grounds that our faith in the law of Gravitation is strengthened, by the accuracy with which the Planetary movements coincide with their calculated courses, i. e. it rests upon observation. The conclusion also, drawn by analogy in favour of atoms, from a substance, always dividing and compounding at the same angle, is far superior to an argument drawn from the infinite divisibility of a mathematical line; inasmuch as it is a fair analogy between two physical propositions: the latter is only a mathematical illustration of a physical proposition; they are not at all of the same kind; the subject under consideration is purely material, the illustration purely ideal. The same may be said of Euler's ingenious argument, " All matter is endued with extension. It therefore possesses all the qualities of extension: one of which is infinite divisibility." For it does not follow that because all matter is endued with extension in the concrete, that it has all the properties of extension in the abstract; only that it might have had, if it had pleased God to make it so. The occult qualities of Aristotle are not the nonsense usually fathered upon him; but I prefer the word supposititious, i. e. hypothetical, not only to avoid offence, but in better keeping with what I have written upon theory and hypothesis. |