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XII.

OF THE

TIC PHI

LOSOPHY.

arguing for reasoning, and definitions for facts, till the intellect is at last disabled, by its own habitual. sophistry and verbal conflicts, from discerning the HISTORY realities of nature, from knowing their relations, or SCHOLASdesiring to trace them, and from modestly studying the actual properties of things. Hence the natural philosopher and the metaphysical logician have been always distinct characters; the last mostly conversant with words, and the first seeking only after facts. The perception of this effect led lord Bacon to call the human mind from argument to observation, from dispute to experiment, and from dialectic sophistry to philosophical induction. The more we meditate on the subject, we shall feel that artificial logic is always tending to create that most useless of all characters, à verbal polemic. In like manner all schools and societies of debate operate to create a verbal sophistry of mind, distinct from sound judgment, or from the attainment of truth. They fix the eye on the victory, not on the just thought; and too often make the discussion a personal battle for a personal success. Philosophical induction must never be confounded with logical discussion, from which it is quite distinct, as well in form and spirit as in utility. and purpose.

IV. The scholastic logic also withered and suppressed the noblest part of man-the sensibilities of the sympathizing heart: it was equally uncongenial with the ever-interesting pictures of the rich, the impressive, and the elegant fancy.

The schoolmen contended that their art teaches us to dissolve every species of sophism: 74 this may be true; but it no less instructs and enables the sophist

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74 Omneque genus sophismatis docet dissolvere.' W.Occham, Log. p. 1,

HISTORY OF

BOOK to frame his sophisms; it equally qualifies the asVI. saulter and the assailed; it makes the artillery of LITERARY defence as abundant and as vigorous as the artillery ENGLAND. of attack; it caused the resistance to be as agile and as pertinacious as the charge; and it was, therefore, really useless to the cause of truth. Whoever reads their contests about the universals, whether these had a real existence, or were only terms, will fully see that logic has been, and ever will be, of small benefit in the discovery of what is true. It is like the science of military tactics, as useable by one side as by the other; and can be, and has always been, applied to support the worst cause as well as the best. The factitious art of logical reasoning seems, therefore, to deserve little patronage among mankind. The cultivation of a sound judgment, which, like good taste and virtue, depends not upon argument, syllogisms, definitions or sophistry, is that which logic rather confuses than assists, and which must arise from other disciplines and superior studies.

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The schoolmen very highly estimated their dialectic skill. Logic,' says Occham, is the most apt instrument of all the arts; and without which, no science can be perfectly possessed. It is not, like the manual instruments of the mechanic, consumed by use; but, on the contrary, it receives continual increase from the studious exercise of it on every other art or science. As a workman gains a more perfect knowlege of his tools by using them, so a scholar, who has learnt the solid principles of logic, will apply his labors more effectually in every other science, the more skill he has acquired in the dialectic art.' His ancient editor goes farther he thinks,

975

75. Occ. Log. p. 1.

XII.

OF THE

"that no one can have access to knowlege or wisdom CHAP.
unless he has first trained himself in the art of logic.
It detects all error, and disperses all darkness; it HISTORY
directs the exertion of human reason, as light does SCHOLAS-
our bodily movements; without it, things arise like the TIC Pur-
dreams of the sick, or the fictions of the poets.'

1976

But the professors of every art or science, even down to the dancing-master, are too prone to vaunt the superiority of their favorite studies.

LOSOPHY.

All these discussions, and the great minds that waged this dialectic warfare, have now fallen into that vast tomb of oblivious time to which all that is useless or mischievous is finally consigned. No one, indeed, could press the art of arguing farther than these acute men attempted and effected. They did all that logic could do. Their object was to reason, with its most irrefragable formulas, to conclusions that could not be shaken; and they were perpetually building up and throwing down their own and each other's logical fabrics, with unwearied activity and reciprocal success. They accomplished all that the use of words could achieve; and they abundantly shew us, that systems and forms of logic are little else than combinations of terms, by which truth and falsehood may be equally supported.

Sound judgment can exist no where without right opinions and adequate information; as these occur, it successively grows, strengthens and amplifies. But, that logic as often impedes as assists its formation, the world's daily argumentations, continual controversies, endless theories, and most logically reasoned compositions, on all sides of every disputed question, satisfactorily intimate to the dispassionate 70 Occ. Log. p. 1.

P

HISTORYOF

BOOK observer. Every wrong opinion that we adopt preVI. cludes a correct judgment, as far as that can operate; LITERARY but logic is as often allied to wrong opinions as to ENGLAND. right ones, and leads us astray from truth more frequently than it conducts us to it. It makes definitions to suit its inferences, and then argues triumphantly on the fetters which it imposes.

Ill effects

Nothing is a greater blessing than sound judg ment; no quality is more rare; none is less likely to be artificially made; no one is more injured by factitious argumentation. Logic may fabricate a wrangler, but not a judge.

The definitions of logic are much valued and reof logical definitions. Commended, but no part of logic is more productive of deception and sophistry, nor more applicable to them, than these have been, and can be always made to become.

When any thing is reduced into a definition, it is, in fact, dwindled and cut down into so many words as compose the definition. In these words the thing defined is afterwards contemplated; on these it is discussed; and the attack and the defence become entirely on them. The actual thing is seen no more, but in the defining terms; and the debate upon it, after they are submitted to, becomes a conflict of words against words; and as equivocations, subtleties, distinctions, disputes, arguments and phrases may be pursued on words without any end, all logical definitions are themes of perpetual battle, and defences of all sorts of sophistry. The sophist, who has a peculiar result to establish, has only to frame his definition so as to suit best the verbal deduction of the inference he contemplates; and if he can persuade his antagonist to adopt his definition, he begins

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his discussion with an assurance of victory, tho, in CHAP.
fact, his victorious inference is the victory of his de-
finition, not of the truth..

XII.

HISTORY

OF THE.

LOSOPHY.

Definitions are thus the inventions of logicians SCHOLAS-
seeking victory in a controversy; not the discoverers TIC PHI-
of truth. They are the weapons of battle, not the
instruments of judgment. A definition can only be
a just one, when it is a full description of all that
relates to the thing defined; less than this, is but
a selection of a part, and the substitution of that for
the whole. It cannot, therefore, be used without de-
lusion; for it withdraws the mind from the totality
to the fragment; and confines the consideration to
an imperfect, narrow, partial and interested view of
a small portion of the subject, that ought to be seen
and treated of in all its fulness and reality, unbroken
and unchained. But on this statement it is obvious,
that as far as truth is the object, no definitions would
be ever used as limitations of the reasoning; for as

soon as they are applied to limit, they begin to hood-
wink and deceive. A logical definition is a contro-
́versial device, creating a battle of words, and used
principally for the purpose of a personal triumph.
Hence, the verbal wrangler always seeks to get his
questions reduced to definitions; because, after that,
the dispute ceases to be an investigation of the truths
of the thing defined, and becomes a battle of words
on the terms to which it has been contracted, and on
which the most ingenious verbal debater is most sure
of the argumentative triumph.

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The true use of definitions is that for which they are used in the natural sciences; that is, as names, marks, tickets or indexes, pointing the attention to what is alluded to, and thereby separating it from

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