On the Philosophy of Discovery, Chapters Historical and Critical

1. Any assertion of analogy between physical and religious philosophy will very properly be looked upon with great jealousy as likely to be forced and delusive; and it is only i...

The _History of the Inductive Sciences_ was published in 1837, and the _Philosophy of the Inductive Sciences_ in 1840. In 1843 Mr. Mill published his _System of Logic_, in which...

(I.) 1. _General Remarks._--It is a matter of some difficulty to speak of the character and merits of this illustrious man, as regards his place in that philosophical history wi...

1. _Harvey._--We have already seen that Bacon was by no means the first mover or principal author of the revolution in the method of philosophizing which took place in his time;...

That necessary truth is progressive;--that science is the idealization of facts, and that this process goes on from age to age, and advances with the advance of scientific disco...

1. _Character of the Practical Reformers._--We now come to a class of speculators who had perhaps a greater share in bringing about the change from stationary to progressive kno...

1. Bold and extensive as had been the anticipations of those whose minds were excited by the promise of the new philosophy, the discoveries of Newton respecting the mechanics of...

1. I have spoken, a few chapters back, of the Reaction against the doctrines of the Sensational School in England and France. In Germany also there was a Reaction against these...

The philosophy of Kant, as I have already said, involved a definite doctrine on the subject of the Fundamental Antithesis, and a correction of some of the errors of Locke and hi...

1. _Causes of Delay in the Advance of Knowledge._--In the insight possessed by learned men into the method by which truth was to be discovered, the fourteenth and fifteenth cent...

We have already seen that Patricius, about the middle of the sixteenth century, announced his purpose of founding anew the whole fabric of philosophy; but that, in executing thi...

I shall now take the liberty of noticing the views published by a contemporary writer; not that it forms part of my design to offer any criticism upon the writings of all those...

In the _History of the Sciences_ I have devoted a Book to the state of Science in the middle ages, and have endeavoured to analyse the intellectual defects of that period. Among...

We now come to a philosopher of a very different character, who was impelled to declare his dissent from the reigning philosophy by the abundance of his knowledge, and by his cl...

1. When Locke's _Essay_ appeared, it was easily seen that its tendency was to urge, in a much more rigorous sense than had previously been usual, the ancient maxim of Aristotle,...

1. Man's powers and means of knowledge are so limited and imperfect that he can know _little_ concerning God. It is well that men in their theological speculations should recoll...

Francis Bacon and his works have recently been discussed and examined by various writers in France and Germany as well as England[197]. Not to mention smaller essays, M. Bouille...

The doctrine that necessary truth is progressive is a doctrine very important in its bearing upon the nature of the human mind; and, as I conceive, in its theological bearing al...

(_Moral Sciences._)--1. Both M. Comte and Mr. Mill, in speaking of the methods of advancing science, aim, as I have said, at the extension of their methods to moral subjects, an...

1. One of the most conspicuous points in Aristotle's doctrines as bearing upon the philosophy of Science is his account of that mode of attaining truth which is called _Inductio...

1. In the constant opposition and struggle of the schools of philosophy, which consider our Senses and our Ideas respectively, as the principal sources of our knowledge, we have...

In the last Chapter but one I stated that Schelling propounded a Philosophy of the Absolute, the Absolute being the original basis of truth in which the two opposite elements, I...

There would be small advantage in beginning our examination earlier than the period of the Socratic School at Athens; for although the spirit of inquiry on such subjects had awa...

In a preceding chapter I have spoken of Sir William Hamilton as the expositor, to English readers, of modern German systems, and especially of the so-called "Philosophy of the U...

Thus while Plato was disposed to seek the essence of our knowledge in Ideas alone, Aristotle, slighting this source of truth, looked to Experience as the beginning of Science; a...

1. The Doctrine of Ideas. 2. The Doctrine of the One and the Many. 3. The notion of the nature and aim of Science. 4. The survey of existing Sciences.

these Tables has its proper form of expression, familiar among the cultivators of science; and the analysis which our Tables display, is commonly performed in men's minds, when...

The views of Aristotle with regard to the foundations of human knowledge are very different from those of his tutor Plato, and are even by himself put in opposition to them. He...

The Romans had no philosophy but that which they borrowed from the Greeks; and what they thus received, they hardly made entirely their own. The vast and profound question of wh...

1. We have hitherto spoken of the Fundamental Antithesis as the ground of our speculations concerning the material world, at least mainly. We have indeed been led by the physica...

1. _General Remarks._--In the rise of Experimental Philosophy, understanding the term in the way just now stated, two features have already been alluded to: the disposition to c...

By the examination of the elements of human thought in which I have been engaged, and by a consideration of the history of the most clear and certain parts of our knowledge, I h...

I have noticed certain additions to Physical Science made by the Arabians; namely, in Astronomy[45]. The discovery of the motion of the Sun's Apogee by Albategnius, and the disc...

[Footnote 67: I will give a specimen. _Opus Majus_, c. viii. p. 35: "These two kinds of philosophers, the Ionic and Italic, ramified through many sects and various successors, t...

(2) The necessity of Mathematics in Divine Things.--1°. This study has occupied holy men: 2°. Geography: 3°. Chronology: 4°. Cycles; the Golden Number, &c.: 5°. Natural Phenomen...