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Realistic Philosophy Defended in a Philosophic Series
Realistic Philosophy Defended in a Philosophic Series Author:James McCosh Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: INTRODUCTION. DIVERS ASPECTS OF FIRST PRINCIPLES. The aim of this Part of the Philosophic Series is to treat historically the chief topics which have been ... more »discussed dia- lectically in the previous Numbers. The special doctrine to be thus illustrated is that of first principles. The discus- eion on this subject began with Locke's denial of Innate Ideas in the First Book of his Essay on Human Understanding, published in 1690, and has been continued ever since, particularly by such original writers as Hume, Kant, and Herbert Spencer. Our work would be incomplete without a historical and critical review of these leaders of thought. All of them have exposed prevailing errors, and all of them have caught glimpses of important truth ; I have to add that all of them have promulgated serious error. Can we by any magnetic process draw out the pure metal and allow the dross to sink ? Our notices will be critical as well as historical. But in criticism there are always principles involved, and these ought always to be formally stated, that all may perceive the ground proceeded on, and be able to sit in judgment on the critic. This I propose to do in this Introductory Section. Believing as I do in first truths, I am convinced thatthere has been confusion in the account given of them, and consequent errors in the conclusions drawn. Much clearness may be imparted by attending to certain distinctions which I would thus illustrate. If we are considering the subject of gravitation, we may look first at it in its actual operations as seen by the senses, say, in a body falling to the ground ; secondly, as a deep law in the very nature of bodies ; and thirdly, the expression of that law by Tsew- ton. We may in like manner, in inquiring into a fundamental law of the human mind, regard first...« less