History of Civilization in England, Vol. 1 of 3

391

Simson was appointed in 1711; and even before he began to lecture, he drew up ‘a translation of the three first books of L'Hospital's Conic Sections, in which geometrical demonstrations are substituted for the algebraical of the original, according to Mr. Simson's early taste on this subject.’ Trail's Life and Writings of Robert Simson, 1812, 4to. p. 4. This was probably the rudiment of his work on Conic Sections, published in 1735. Montucla, Histoire des Mathématiques, vol. iii. p. 12. On the difference between the ancient and modern schemes, there are some ingenious, though perhaps scarcely tenable, remarks in Dugald Stewart's Philosophy of the Mind, vol. ii. pp. 354 seq. and p. 380. See also Comte, Philosophie Positive, vol. i. pp. 383–395. Matthew Stewart, the mathematical professor at Edinburgh, was the father of Dugald. See, respecting him and his crusade against the modern analysis, Bower's History of the University of Edinburgh, vol. ii. pp. 357–360, vol. iii. p. 249; and a strange passage in First Report of the British Association, p. 59.

392

One of Simson's great reasons for recommending the old analysis, was that it was ‘more elegant’ than the comparatively modern practice of introducing algebraic calculations into geometry. See Trail's Simson, 1812, 4to. pp. 27, 67; a valuable work, which Lord Brougham, in his hasty life of Simson, calls, ‘a very learned and exceedingly ill-written, indeed hardly readable’ book. Brougham's Men of Letters and Science, vol. i. p. 482, 8vo. 1845. Dr. Trail's style is clearer, and his sentences are less involved, than Lord Brougham's; and he had moreover the great advantage of understanding the subject upon which he wrote.

393

Sir James Mackintosh (Dissertation on Ethical Philosophy, p. 208) says of Hutcheson, ‘To him may also be ascribed that proneness to multiply ultimate and original principles in human nature, which characterized the Scottish school till the second extinction of a passion for metaphysical speculation in Scotland.’ There is an able view of Hutcheson's philosophy in Cousin, Histoire de la Philosophie, I. série, vol. iv. pp. 31 seq.; written with clearness and eloquence, but perhaps overpraising Hutcheson.

394

On its influence, see a letter from Mackintosh to Parr, in Memoirs of Mackintosh, by his Son, vol. i. p. 334. Compare Letters from Warburton to Hurd, pp. 37, 82.

395

Which is added to his Theory of Moral Sentiments, edit. 1822, 2 volumes. Compare a letter which Smith wrote in 1763 on the origin of language (in Nichols's Literary Illustrations of the Eighteenth Century, vol. iii. pp. 515, 516), which exhibits, on a small scale, the same treatment, as distinguished from a generalization of the facts which are supplied by a comprehensive comparison of different languages. Dr. Arnold speaks slightingly of such investigations. He says, ‘Attempts to explain the phenomena of language a priori seem to me unwise.’ Arnold's Miscellaneous Works, p. 385. This would lead into a discussion too long for a note, but it appears to me that those a priori inferences are, to the philologist, what hypotheses are to the inductive natural philosopher; and if this be the case, they are extremely important, because no really fruitful experiment ever can be made unless it is preceded by a judicious hypothesis. In the absence of such an hypothesis, men may grope in the dark for centuries, accumulating facts without obtaining knowledge.

396

See, for instance, his attempt to prove, from general reasonings concerning the human mind, that there was a necessary relation in regard to the order in which men promulgated the system of concentric spheres and that of eccentric spheres and epicycles. History of Astronomy, in Smith's Philosophical Essays, 1795, 4to. pp. 31, 36, which it may be convenient to compare with Whewell's Philosophy of the Inductive Sciences, 1847, vol. ii. pp. 53, 60, 61. This striking fragment of Adam Smith's is probably little read now; but it is warmly praised by one of the greatest living philosophers, M. A. Comte, in his Philosophie Positive, vol. vi. p. 319.

397

The two writers who have inquired most carefully into the method which political economists ought to follow, are Mr. John Mill (Essays on Unsettled Questions of Political Economy, 1844, pp. 120–164) and Mr. Rae (New Principles of Political Economy, 1834, pp. 328–351). Mr. Rae, in his ingenious work, objects to Adam Smith that he transgressed the rules of the Baconian philosophy, and thus prevented his inferences from being as valuable as they would have been if he had treated his subject inductively. But Mr. Mill, with great force of reasoning, has proved that the deductive plan is the only one by which political economy can be raised to a science. He says, p. 143, political economy is ‘essentially an abstract science, and its method is the method a priori;’ and at p. 146, that the a posteriori method is ‘altogether inefficacious.’ To this I may add, that the modern theory of rent, which is now the corner-stone of political economy, was got at, not by generalizing economical facts, but by reasoning downwards after the manner of geometricians. Indeed, those who oppose the theory of rent, always do so on the ground that it is contradicted by facts; and then, with complete ignorance of the philosophy of method, they infer that therefore the theory is wrong. See, for instance, Jones on the Distribution of Wealth, 8vo. 1831: a book containing some interesting facts, but vitiated by this capital defect of method. See also Journal of Statistical Society, vol. i. p. 317, vol. vi. p. 322; where it is said that economical theories should be generalized from statistical facts. Compare vol. xvii. p. 116, vol. xviii. p. 101.

398

A striking instance has lately come to light of the sagacity with which Hume employed this method. See Burton's Life and Correspondence of Hume, vol. ii. p. 486; where we find, that immediately Hume had read the Wealth of Nations, he detected Smith's error concerning rent being an element of price: so that it now appears that Hume was the first to make this great discovery, as far as the idea is concerned; though Ricardo has the merit of proving it.

399

The historical facts he introduces are merely illustrations; as any one will see who will read The Natural History of Religion, in Hume's Philos. Works, Edinb. 1826, vol. iv. pp. 435–513. I may mention, that there is a considerable similarity between the views advocated in this remarkable essay and the religious stages of Comte's Philosophie Positive; for Hume's early form of polytheism is evidently the same as M. Comte's fetichism, from which both these writers believe that monotheism subsequently arose, as a later and more refined abstraction. That this was the course adopted by the human mind is highly probable, and is confirmed by the learned researches of Mr. Grote. See his History of Greece, vol. i. pp. 462, 497, vol. v. p. 22. The opposite and more popular opinion, of monotheism preceding idolatry, was held by most of the great earlier writers, and is defended by many moderns, and among others by Dr. Whewell (Bridgewater Treatise, p. 256), who expresses himself with considerable confidence: see also Letters from Warburton to Hurd, p. 239. Compare Thirlwall's History of Greece, vol. i. p. 183, Lond. 1835, with the ‘einige Funken des Monotheismus’ of Kant, Kritik der reinen Vernunft, in Kant's Werke, vol. ii. p. 455.

400

That is to say, he treated historical facts as merely illustrative of certain general principles, which he believed could be proved without the facts; so that, as M. Schlosser (History of the Eighteenth Century, vol. ii. p. 76) well says, ‘History with Hume was only a subordinate pursuit, only a means by which he might introduce his philosophy,’ &c. Considering how little is known of the principles which govern social and political changes, there can be no doubt that Hume was premature in the application of this method; but it is absurd to call the method dishonest, since the object of his History was, not to prove conclusions, but to illustrate them: and he therefore thought himself justified in selecting the illustrations. I am simply stating his views, without at all defending them; indeed, I believe that in this respect he was seriously in the wrong.

401

A writer of great authority has made some remarks on this, which are worth attending to: ‘Ce fut alors que les Jésuites pénétrèrent dans la Chine pour y prêcher l'évangile. Ils ne tardèrent pas à s'apercevoir qu'un des moyens les plus efficaces pour s'y maintenir, en attendant le moment que le ciel avoit marqué pour éclairer ce vaste empire, étoit d'étaler des connoissances astronomiques.’ Montucla, Histoire des Mathématiques, vol. i. p. 468; and see vol. ii. pp. 586, 587. Cuvier delicately hints at the same conclusion. He says of Emery: ‘Il se souvenait que l'époque où le christianisme a fait le plus de conquêtes, et où ses ministres ont obtenu le plus de respect, est celle où ils portaient chez les peuples convertis les lumières des lettres, en même temps que les vérités de la religion, et où ils formaient à la fois dans les nations l'ordre le plus éminent et le plus éclairé.’ Cuvier, Eloges Historiques, vol. iii. p. 170. Even Southey (History of Brazil, vol. ii. p. 378) says: ‘Missionaries have always complained of the fickleness of their converts; and they must always complain of it, till they discover that some degree of civilization must precede conversion, or at least accompany it.’ And see to the same effect, Halkett's Notes on the North American Indians, pp. 352, 353; and Combe's North America, vol. i. p. 250, vol. ii. p. 353.

402

This is curiously illustrated by the fact, that the 25th of March, which is now called Lady-day, in honour of the Virgin Mary, was, in Pagan times, called Hilaria, and was dedicated to Cybele, the mother of the gods. Compare Blunt's Vestiges of Ancient Manners, 8vo. 1823, pp. 51–55, with Hampson's Medii Ævi Kalendarium, 8vo. 1841, vol. i. pp. 56, 177.

403

On this interesting subject, the two best English books are, Middleton's Letter from Rome, and Priestley's History of the Corruption of Christianity; the former work being chiefly valuable for ritual corruptions, the latter work for doctrinal ones. Blunt's Vestiges of Ancient Manners is also worth reading; but is very inferior to the two treatises just named, and is conceived in a much narrower spirit.

404

The large amount of Paganism which still exists in every Christian sect, forms an argument against an ingenious distinction which M. Bunsen has made between the change of a religion and that of a language; alterations in a religion being, as he supposes, always more abrupt than those in a language. Bunsen's Egypt, vol. i. pp. 358, 359.

405

It was necessary, says M. Maury, that the church ‘se rapprochât davantage de l'esprit grossier, inculte, ignorant du barbare.’ Maury, Légendes Pieuses du Moyen Age, p. 101. An exactly similar process has taken place in India, where the Puranas are to the Vedas what the works of the Fathers are to the New Testament. Compare Elphinstone's History of India, pp. 87, 88, 98; Wilson's Preface to the Vishnu Parana, p. 7; and Transactions of Bombay Society, vol. i. p. 205. So that as M. Max Müller well expresses it, the Puranas are ‘a secondary formation of Indian mythology.’ Müller on the Languages of India, in Reports of British Association for 1847, p. 324.

406

The doctrines of Luther were first preached in Sweden in 1519; and, in 1527, the principles of the Reformation were formally adopted in an assembly of the States at Westeraas, which enabled Gustavus Vasa to seize the property of the church. Geijer's History of the Swedes, part i. pp. 110, 118, 119; Mosheim's Ecclesiastical History, vol. ii. p. 22; Crichton and Wheaton's History of Scandinavia, vol. i. pp. 399, 400. The apostasy proceeded so favourably, that De Thou (Histoire Univ. vol. xiii. p. 312) says, in 1598, ‘Il y avoit déjà si long-tems que ce culte étoit établi en Suède, qu'il étoit comme impossible de trouver, soit parmi le peuple, soit parmi les seigneurs, quelqu'un qui se souvînt d'avoir vu dans ce roïaume l'exercice public de la religion catholique.’

407

On the state of things in 1838, see some curious, and indeed shameful, details in Laing's Sweden, 8vo. London, 1839. Mr. Laing, though himself a Protestant, truly says, that in Protestant Sweden there ‘is inquisition law, working in the hands of a Lutheran state-church, as strongly as in Spain or Portugal in the hands of a Roman Catholic Church.’ Laing's Sweden, p. 324. In the seventeenth century, it was ordered by the Swedish Church, and the order was confirmed by government, that ‘if any Swedish subject change his religion, he shall be banished the kingdom, and lose all right of inheritance, both for himself and his descendants… If any bring into the country teachers of another religion, he shall be fined and banished.’ Burton's Diary, vol. iii. p. 387, 8vo. 1828. To this may be added, that it was not till 1781 that Roman Catholics were allowed to exercise their religion in Sweden. See Crichton's History of Scandinavia, Edinb. 1838, vol. ii. p. 320. See also, on this intolerant spirit, Whitelocke's Journal of the Swedish Embassy, vol. i. pp. 164, 412, vol. ii. p. 312.

408

We see a good instance of this in the case of the Abyssinians, who have professed Christianity for centuries; but, as no pains were taken to cultivate their intellect, they found the religion too pure for them: they, therefore, corrupted it, and, down to the present moment, they have not made the slightest progress. The accounts given by Bruce of them are well known; and a traveller, who visited them in 1839, says: ‘Nothing can be more corrupt than the nominal Christianity of this unhappy nation. It is mixed up with Judaism, Mahommedanism, and idolatry, and is a mass of rites and superstitions which cannot mend the heart.’ Kraff's Journal at Ankobar, in Journal of Geographical Society, vol. x. p. 488; see also vol. xiv. p. 13: and for a similar state of things in America, see the account of the Quiché Indians, in Stephens's Central America, vol. ii. pp. 191, 192. Compare Squier's Central America, vol. i. pp. 322, 323, with Halkett's North-American Indians, pp. 29, 212, 268. For further confirmation of this view, in another part of the world, see Tuckey's Expedition to the Zaire, pp. 79, 80, 165.

409

I use the word literature, not as opposed to science, but in its larger sense, including everything which is written – ‘taking the term literature in its primary sense, of an application of letters to the records of facts or opinions.’ Mure's History of the Literature of Greece, vol. iv. p. 50.

410

Compare Tocqueville, Démocratie en Amérique, vol. ii. p. 130, with some admirable remarks on the Sophists in Grote's History of Greece, vol. viii. p. 481. Sir W. Hamilton, whose learning respecting the history of opinions is well known, says, ‘Precisely in proportion as an author is in advance of his age, is it likely that his works will be neglected.’ Hamilton's Discussions on Philosophy, p. 186. Thus, too, in regard to the line arts, Sir Joshua Reynolds (Fourth Discourse, in Works, vol. i. p. 363) says, ‘Present time and future may be considered as rivals; and he who solicits the one, must expect to be discountenanced by the other.’

411

Hence the intellectually exclusive and, as M. Neander well terms it, ‘aristocratic spirit of antiquity.’ Neander's History of the Church, vol. i. pp. 40, 97, vol. ii. p. 31. This is constantly overlooked by writers who use the word ‘democracy’ loosely; forgetting that, in the same age, democracies of politics may be very common, while democracies of thought are very rare. For proof of the universal prevalence formerly of this esoteric and aristocratic spirit, see the following passages: Ritter's History of Ancient Philosophy, vol. i. p. 338, vol. iii. pp. 9, 17; Tennemann, Geschichte der Philosophie, vol. ii. pp. 200, 205, 220; Beausobre, Histoire Critique de Manichée, vol. ii. p. 41; Matter, Histoire du Gnosticisme, vol. i. p. 13, vol. ii. pp. 83, 370; Sprengel, Histoire de la Médecine, vol. i. p. 250; Grote's History of Greece, vol. i. p. 561, vol. iv. p. 544; Thirlwall's History of Greece, vol. ii. p. 150, vol. vi. p. 95; Warburton's Works, vol. vii. pp. 962, 972, 4to. 1788; Sharpe's History of Egypt, vol. ii. p. 174; Cudworth's Intellect. System, vol. ii. pp. 114, 365, 443, vol. iii. p. 20.

412

Locke has noticed this ‘learned ignorance,’ for which many men are remarkable. See a fine passage in the Essay on Human Understanding, book iii. chap. x. in Locke's Works, vol. ii. p. 27, and similar remarks in his Conduct of the Understanding, vol. ii. pp. 350, 364, 365, and in his Thoughts on Education, vol. viii. pp. 84–87. If this profound writer were now alive what a war he would wage against our great universities and public schools, where innumerable things are still taught which no one is concerned to understand, and which few will take the trouble to remember. Compare Condorcet, Vie de Turgot, pp. 255, 256 note.

413

The statistics of this sort of literature would prove a curious subject for inquiry. No one, I believe, has thought it worth while to sum them up; but M. Guizot has made an estimate that the Bollandist collection contains more than twenty-five thousand lives of saints; ‘à en juger par approximation, ils contiennent plus de 25,000 vies de saints.’ Guizot, Histoire de la Civilisation en France, vol. ii. p. 32. It is said (Ledwich's Antiquities of Ireland, p. 62) that of St. Patrick alone, there were sixty-six biographers before Joceline.

414

For, as Laplace observes, in his remarks on the sources of error in connexion with the doctrine of probabilities, ‘C'est à l'influence de l'opinion de ceux que la multitude juge les plus instruits, et à qui elle a coutume de donner sa confiance sur les plus importants objets de la vie, qu'est due la propagation de ces erreurs qui, dans les temps d'ignorance, ont couvert la face du monde.’ Bouillaud, Philosophie Médicale, p. 218.

415

M. Guizot (Civilisation en France, vol. ii. pp. 171, 172) thinks that, on the whole, the seventh was even worse than the eighth; but it is difficult to choose between them.

416

Some of the results of Latin being colloquially employed by the monks are judiciously stated in Herder's Ideen zur Geschichte der Menschheit, vol. iv. pp. 202, 203. The remarks on this custom by Dugald Stewart refer to a later period. Stewart's Philosophy of the Mind, vol. iii. pp. 110, 111.

417

‘C'est à la contrebande que le commerce doit de n'avoir pas péri sous l'influence du régime prohibitif; tandis que ce régime condamnait les peuples à s'approvisionner aux sources les plus éloignées, la contrebande rapprochait les distances, abaissait les prix, et neutralisait l'action funeste des monopoles.’ Blanqui, Histoire de l'Economie, Politique en Europe, Paris, 1845, vol. ii. pp. 25, 26.

418

The 19 Geo. II. c. 34, made ‘all forcible acts of smuggling, carried on in defiance of the laws, or even in disguise to evade them, felony without benefit of clergy.’ Blackstone's Commentaries, vol. iv. p. 155. Townsend, who travelled through France in 1786, says, that when any of the numerous smugglers were taken, ‘some of them are hanged, some are broken upon the wheel, and some are burnt alive.’ Townsend's Spain, vol. i. p. 85, edit. 1792. On the general operation of the French laws against smugglers in the eighteenth century, compare Tucker's Life of Jefferson, vol. i. pp. 213, 214, with Parliamentary History, vol. ix. p. 1240.

419

In a work of considerable ability, the following account is given of the state of things in England and France so late as the year 1824: ‘While this was going forward on the English coast, the smugglers on the opposite shore were engaged, with much more labour, risk, and expense, in introducing English woollens, by a vast system of fraud and lying, into the towns, past a series of custom-houses. In both countries, there was an utter dissoluteness of morals connected with these transactions. Cheating and lying were essential to the whole system; drunkenness accompanied it; contempt for all law grew up under it; honest industry perished beneath it; and it was crowned with murder.’ Martineau's History of England during Thirty Years' Peace, vol. i. p. 341, 8vo. 1849.

420

For evidence of the extraordinary extent to which smuggling was formerly carried, and that not secretly, but by powerful bodies of armed men, see Parliamentary History, vol. ix. pp. 243, 247, 1290, 1345, vol. x. pp. 394, 405, 530, 532, vol. xi. p. 935. And on the number of persons engaged in it, compare Tomline's Life of Pitt, vol. i. p. 359: see also Sinclair's History of the Public Revenue, vol. iii. p. 232; Otter's Life of Clarke, vol. i. p. 391. In France, the evil was equally great. M. Lemontey says, that early in the eighteenth century, ‘la contrebande devenait une profession ouverte, et des compagnies de cavalerie désertèrent tout entières leurs étendards pour suivre contre le fisc cette guerre populaire.’ Lemontey, Essai sur l'Etablissement monarchique de Louis XIV, p. 430. According to Townsend, there were, in 1786, ‘more than 1500 smugglers in the Pyrenees.’ Townsend's Journey through Spain, vol. i. p. 84.

421

Archbishop Whately says, what hardly any thinking man will now deny, ‘If oaths were abolished – leaving the penalties for false witness (no unimportant part of our security) unaltered – I am convinced that, on the whole, testimony would be more trustworthy than it is.’ Whately's Elements of Rhetoric, 8vo. 1850, p. 47. See also on the amount of perjury caused by English legislation, Jeremy Bentham's Works, edit. Bowring, vol. ii. p. 210, vol. v. pp. 191–229, 454–466, vol. vi. pp. 314, 315; Orme's Life of Owen, p. 195; Locke's Works, vol. iv. p. 6; Berkeley's Works, vol. ii. p. 196; Whiston's Memoirs, pp. 33, 411–413; Hamilton's Discussions on Philosophy and Literature, pp. 454, 522, 527, 528. Sir W. Hamilton sums up: ‘But if the perjury of England stands pre-eminent in the world, the perjury of the English Universities, and of Oxford in particular, stands pre-eminent in England,’ p. 528. Compare Priestley's Memoirs, vol. i. p. 374 and Baker's Life of Sir Thomas Bernard, 1819, pp. 188, 189.

422

‘L'observation rigoureuse de ces loix seroit destructive de tout commerce; aussi ne sont-elles pas observées rigoureusement.’ Mémoire sur les Prêts d'Argent, sec. xiv., in Œuvres de Turgot, vol. v. pp. 278, 279. Compare Ricardo's Works, pp. 178, 179, with Condorcet, Vie de Turgot, pp. 53, 54, 228.

423

Aided by the church. Ecclesiastical councils contain numerous regulations against usury; and, in 1179, Pope Alexander ordered that usurers were not to be buried: ‘Quia in omnibus ferè locis crimen usurarum invaluit; ut multi negotiis prætermissis quasi licitè usuras exerceant; et qualiter utriusque testamenti pagina condemnetur, non attendunt: ideò constituimus, ut usurarii manifesti nec ad communionem recipiantur altaris, nec Christianam, si in hoc peccato decesserint, accipiant sepulturam, sed nec oblationem eorum quisquam accipiat.’ Rog. de Hoved. Annal. in Rerum Anglicarum Scriptores post Bedam, p. 335, Lond. 1596, folio. In Spain, the Inquisition took cognizance of usury. See Llorente, Histoire de l'Inquisition, vol. i. p. 339. Compare Ledwich's Antiquities of Ireland, p. 133.