The Scottish Philosophy [220]
{368} for their sons, and were proud of the pleasant, the accomplished, and public- spirited man who now came to live among them. His manners were genial; he had acquired a very varied knowledge; he was a ready and instructive talker and an eloquent speaker. The consequence was that he became a favorite in the best society of the place, and, it is to be added, spent too much of his time in dining out, and in entertaining the citizens by his humor and his sparkling conversation.
But he was an able and a most successful teacher, expounding his views with great clearness and fire, and creating a taste for the study, even among the mercantile classes, but especially among the ministers of religion, subscribing and non-subscribing, in Ulster. His lectures were at first carefully written out; but, as years rolled on, he became less dependent on his papers, and expanded like a flood on his favorite topics, and had difficulty in compressing his superabundant matter in the limited course allowed him. He collected for the college a vast number of books published from the time of Locke down to his own day in mental philosophy: these were subsequently bought by the Queen's College. He continued a popular and useful member of society and of his college down to his death, March 9,1829. His lectures were edited by his colleague, Dr. Cairns, and published in 1834. These published lectures scarcely do justice to him, as they are taken from his manuscripts written in the early years of his college life, and do not contain the oral illustrations and emendations which be was accustomed to pour forth from day to day in his class-room.
At the basis of his whole system, we discover the threefold division of the intellectual faculties by Mylne into sensation, memory, and judgment. Yet his lectures were of a more quickening and comprehensive character than those of his preceptor. We discover, too. that as Dr. Brown's views were given to the world, Professor Young grafted many of the living buds of that ingenious analyst on the old and drier stock. He is obliged like Stewart, and unlike Mylne, - - who used to speak of that "undescribed and undescribable faculty of the mind" denominated common sense, -- to call in fundamental laws of belief, and places among these causation and personal identity. "Experience itself does not reveal to reason the relation of cause and effect." "Cause is not that only which in a particular instance precedes a change; but that which, in similar circumstances, we believe must always have been followed by a similar change, and will always be so followed in future: our belief in the relation of cause and effect thus presents us with a universal truth." "The belief is irresistible and is derived from an instinctive principle in our nature." He says "another important idea connected with the fundamental laws of belief is that of personal identity." " If we ask why each of us believes in his own identity, or regards the feelings which he formerly experienced as belonging to the same person which he now calls himself, does not the very statement of the question show its absurdity? Is it not obvious that, even in the casual expressions which we employ, we take the fact for granted by the use of the pronouns, I and he? It is to be referred. therefore, to a primary law of our nature."
He dwells fondly on the senses, in the operation of which he took a keen {369} interest. He holds that, in perception, there is involved sensation, memory, and judgment. There are sensations; they are remembered; and then a judgment pronounced that the sensations must have a cause, which cause is body. "All our sensations are connected with the conviction of certain external things as their cause; and things which are independent of us, because we cannot command their existence by our volition." "We not only believe that, in the act of perception, we are conscious of knowing two different things, matter and mind, which are at the moment distinct; but we believe that they are permanently distinct and independent." It is not
But he was an able and a most successful teacher, expounding his views with great clearness and fire, and creating a taste for the study, even among the mercantile classes, but especially among the ministers of religion, subscribing and non-subscribing, in Ulster. His lectures were at first carefully written out; but, as years rolled on, he became less dependent on his papers, and expanded like a flood on his favorite topics, and had difficulty in compressing his superabundant matter in the limited course allowed him. He collected for the college a vast number of books published from the time of Locke down to his own day in mental philosophy: these were subsequently bought by the Queen's College. He continued a popular and useful member of society and of his college down to his death, March 9,1829. His lectures were edited by his colleague, Dr. Cairns, and published in 1834. These published lectures scarcely do justice to him, as they are taken from his manuscripts written in the early years of his college life, and do not contain the oral illustrations and emendations which be was accustomed to pour forth from day to day in his class-room.
At the basis of his whole system, we discover the threefold division of the intellectual faculties by Mylne into sensation, memory, and judgment. Yet his lectures were of a more quickening and comprehensive character than those of his preceptor. We discover, too. that as Dr. Brown's views were given to the world, Professor Young grafted many of the living buds of that ingenious analyst on the old and drier stock. He is obliged like Stewart, and unlike Mylne, - - who used to speak of that "undescribed and undescribable faculty of the mind" denominated common sense, -- to call in fundamental laws of belief, and places among these causation and personal identity. "Experience itself does not reveal to reason the relation of cause and effect." "Cause is not that only which in a particular instance precedes a change; but that which, in similar circumstances, we believe must always have been followed by a similar change, and will always be so followed in future: our belief in the relation of cause and effect thus presents us with a universal truth." "The belief is irresistible and is derived from an instinctive principle in our nature." He says "another important idea connected with the fundamental laws of belief is that of personal identity." " If we ask why each of us believes in his own identity, or regards the feelings which he formerly experienced as belonging to the same person which he now calls himself, does not the very statement of the question show its absurdity? Is it not obvious that, even in the casual expressions which we employ, we take the fact for granted by the use of the pronouns, I and he? It is to be referred. therefore, to a primary law of our nature."
He dwells fondly on the senses, in the operation of which he took a keen {369} interest. He holds that, in perception, there is involved sensation, memory, and judgment. There are sensations; they are remembered; and then a judgment pronounced that the sensations must have a cause, which cause is body. "All our sensations are connected with the conviction of certain external things as their cause; and things which are independent of us, because we cannot command their existence by our volition." "We not only believe that, in the act of perception, we are conscious of knowing two different things, matter and mind, which are at the moment distinct; but we believe that they are permanently distinct and independent." It is not