solution, but is a most frivolous and irrelevant question. We thus, then, fix for Dr. Brown and many other philosophers the first horn of our dilemma. If by "perceptioni they understand "sensation merely, they no doubt hit the true facts and their true explanation, but then they entirely miss, as we shall see, the question properly at issue, and instead of grappling with it, they explain to us that which stands in need of no explana

tion.

But by "perception," Dr. Brown and other philosophers probably understand something more than "sensation." If so, what is the additional fact they understand by it? When we have found it, we will then fix for them the other horn of our dilemma.

When animals and young children are sentient, there is in them, as we have all along seen, nothing more than sensation. The state of being into which they are cast is simple and single. It is merely a certain effect following a certain cause. There is in it nothing whatsoever of a reflex character. A particular sensation is, in their case, given or induced by its particular external cause, and nothing more is given. Indeed, what more could we rationally expect the fragrant particles of a rose to give than the sensation of the smell of a rose? Here then, the state into which the sentient creature is thrown begins, continues, and ends, in simple unmixed sensation, and that is all that can be said about it.

But when we ourselves are sentient, we find the state of the fact to be widely different from this. We find that our sentient condition is not, as is the case in children and animals, a monopoly of sensation, but that here a new fact is evolved, over and above the sensation which makes the phenomenon a much more complicated and extraordinary one. This new and anomalous phenomenon which accom. panies our sensations, but which is, at the same time, completely distinct from them is the fact of our own personality-the fact and the notion denoted by the word "I." Surely no one will maintain that this realisation of self, in conjunction with our sensations, and as distinguished from the objects causing them, is the same fact as these sensations themselves. In man, then, there is the notion and the reality of himself,

as well as the sensation that passes through him. In other words, he is not only sentient, like other animals, but unlike them, he is sentient with a consciousness, or reference to self, of sensation ;-two very different, and, as we have already seen, and shall see still further, mutually repugnant and antithetical states of existence.

This consciousness of sensation, then, is the other fact contained in perception; and it is an inquiry into the nature and origin of this fact, and of it alone, that forms the true and proper problem of psychology when we are busied with the phenomena of perception; because it is this fact, and not the fact of sensation, which constitutes man's peculiar and distinctive characteristic, and lies as the foundation-stone of all the grander structures of his moral and intellectual being.

We now then ask:-Have Dr. Brown and other philosophers entertained the problem as to the origin and import of this fact-the fact, namely, of consciousness, as distinguished from the fact of sensation, passion, &c.and have they thus grappled with the true question at issue? We answer: That if they have, then have they grossly falsified the facts of the case. For it is not the fact, that the consciousness of sensation is "induced, either directly or indirectly, by its external cause," or by any cause whatsoever. Sensation, no doubt, is induced by its external cause, but consciousness is altogether exempt from the law of causality, as we shall very shortly prove by a reference to experience itself. In fine, then, the dilemma to which Dr. Brown, and, we believe, all other theorists on the subject of perception may be reduced, stands thus: Are they, primo loco, right in their facts?-then they are wrong in the question they take up. Or, secundo loco, do they hit the right question?then they falsify, ab initio, the facts upon whlch its solution depends. In other words, in so far as their statement of facts is true, they take up a wrong question, inasmuch as they explain to us the origin of our sensations when they ought to be explaining to us the origin of our consciousness of sensations, or the notion of self which accompanies them. Or, again, supposing that they take up the right question; then their statement of facts is false, inasmuch as their assumption

that our consciousness of sensation falls under the law of causality is totally unfounded, and may be disproved by an appeal to a stricter and more accurate observation.

The erection of this dilemma places us on a vantage ground from which we may perceive at a glance both what we ought to avoid and what we ought to follow. On the one hand, realising the true facts, we can avoid the fate of those who expend their labour on a wrong question; and, on the other hand, hitting the right question, we can also avoid the fate of those who wrecked its solution upon false facts.

We can now steer equally clear of the Scylla of an irrelevant problem, and the Charybdis of fictitious facts. Perception is, as we have seen, a synthesis of two facts, sensation, namely, and consciousness, or the realisation of self in conjunction with the sensation experienced. The former of these is possessed in common by men and by animals; but the latter is peculiar to man and constitutes his differential quality, and is therefore, the sole and proper fact to which our attention ought to direct itself when contemplating the phenomena of perception.

We have already had occasion to establish and illustrate the radical distinction between consciousness, on the one hand, and sensation on the other, or any other of those "states of mind," as they are called, of which we are cognisant. We showed that consciousness is not only distinct from any of these states, but is diametrically opposed, or placed in a direct antithesis to them all. Thus, taking for an example, as we have hitherto done, the smell of a rose, it appears that so long as the sensation occasioned by this object remains moderate, consciousness, or the realisation of self in union with the feeling, comes into play with out any violent effort. But suppose the sensation is increased, until we almost

"die of a rose, in aromatic pain," then we affirm that the natural tendency of this augmentation is to weaken or obliterate consciousness, which, at any rate, cannot now maintain its place without a much stronger exertion. We do not say that this loss of selfpossession, or possession of self, always happens even when human sensations are most immoderate; but we affirm that in such circumstances there is a natural tendency in man to lose his consciousness or to have it weakened; and that when he retains it, he does so by the counteracting exercise of an unnatural, that is, of a free and moral power; and we further maintain that this tendency, or law, or fact of hu

manity, which is fully brought to light when our sensations, emotions, &c., are rendered very violent, clearly proves that there is at bottom a vital and ceaseless repugnancy between consciousness and all these "states of mind," even in their ordinary and more moderate degrees of manifestation, although the equipoise then preserved on both sides may render it difficult for us to observe it. Had man been visited by much keener sensations, and hurried along by much stronger passions, and endowed with a much more perfect reason, the realisation of his own personality, together with the consequences it involves, would then have been a matter of much greater difficulty to him than it now is; perhaps it would have amounted to an impossibility. Even as it is, nothing can be more wonderful than that he should evolve this antagonist power in the very heart of the floods of sensation which, pouring in upon all sides, are incessantly striving to overwhelm it; and, secure in its strength, should ride, as in a life-boat, amid all the whirlpools of blind and fatalistic passion, which make the life of every man here below a sea of roaring troubles.

We now avail ourselves of the assistance of this antagonism,-which has thus been established as fact by experience,-in order to displace the false fact generally, we might say universally, asssumed in our current metaphysics, namely, that consciousness, or

the fact and notion denoted by the word I," comes into manifestation at the bidding, and under the influence, of the objects which induce the sensations accompanying it.

One fact admitted on all hands is, that our sensations are caused by certain objects presented to our senses; another fact assumed on all hands is, that our consciousness of sensations falls under the same law, and is likewise induced by the presence of these objects. But consciousness and sensation are each other's opposites, and exists as thesis and antithesis-therefore, according to this doctrine, we find two contradictory effects attributed at the same moment to the same cause, and referred to the same origin -just as if we were to affirm that the same object is at the same moment and in the same place the cause at once of light and of the absence of light, or that the sun at one and the same instant both ripens fruit and prevents it from ripening. To illustrate this by our former example, for a variety of illustrations adds nothing to the clearness of an exposition, let us suppose a sentient being to experience the smell of a rose. So long as this being's state is simply sentient, its sensation is absorbing, effective, and complete; but as soon as consciousness, or the realization of self blends with this feeling, it from that moment becomes weaker and less perfect. It is no longer pure and unalloyed, and consequently its integrity is violated, and its strength in some degree impaired :-yet, according to our ordinary psychologists, the same object, namely, the rose, which induces the strength of the sensation, also brings along with it that suspension or weakening of the sensation which con

sciousness is. We are called upon to believe that the same cause at the same moment both produces and destroys a particular effect-a creed too contradictory and unintelligible to be easily embraced when thus plainly exposed. If a particular object induce a particular sensation, surely the suspension of that sensation, or in other words, the consciousness which impairs it, and prevents it from being all-absorbing, cannot be induced by the same cause. And besides, if our consciousness depended on our sensations, passions, or any other of our "states of mind," would not its light kindle, and its energy wax in proportion as they were brightened and increased? We have seen, however, that the reverse of this is the case, and that consciousness never burns more faintly than during man's most vivid paroxysms of sensation and of passion.

This argument, which is, however, rather a fact presented to us by experience than an inference, entirely disproves the dependency of man's consciousness upon the external objects which give birth to his sensations. It thus radically uproots that false fact by which man is made the creature and thrall of causality in his intercourse with the outward world, and the passive recipient of its impressions. At the same time the displacement of this false fact opens up to us a glimpse of that great truth, the view and realization of which it has hitherto obstructed the liberty of man. In order to get a nearer and clearer prospect of this grand reality, let us extirpate still more radically the spurious fact we have been dealing with, until not a fibre of it remains to shoot forth anew into sprouts of error.

were forced to postulate something in man, either physical or hyperphysical, for the objects of external natnre to act upon. Thus, in order to allow the law of causality an intelligible sphere of operation, and at the same time to lift man out of the mire of a gross materialism, they devised or assumed a certain spiritualized or at.

him to become "I" then. When he was first born he was just as sensitive as hee ver was afterwards-no doubt more so- but for long his sensations continued pure and unalloyed. After a time, however, they were found to be combined with the notion and reality of self-a new notion and reality altogether. The human Being has now become ego; from a thing he has become a person. But what new circumstances were there in his sensations, or their exciting causes, by which they brought about this new fact and phasis of existence? The metaphysician cannot answer us. He must admit that the sensations and their causes remain, after the manifestation of the ego, precisely what they were before it came into existence, and therefore, that they can never account for its origin.

But we have already, in the preceding chapter, disproved still more effectually the fact, that the ego comes into existence in consequence of the influence of external objects. We there showed that consciousness not only does not manifest itself in obedience to their action, but that it actually tends to be suppressed and obliterated thereby. Now, consciousness is the very essence and origin of the ego-consciousness creates the ego-without consciousness no man would be "I." Therefore the ego is also exempt from the influence of outward objects, and manifests itself, and maintains its place, not in consequence, but in spite of them. Consciousness developes and preserves itself by refusing to take part or identify itself with the sensation, passion, or whatever it may be, that is striving to enslave the man; and the ego, which is but the more personal and vital expression of consciousness, exists merely by refusing to imbibe the impressions of external things. Thus, so far is it from being true that outward objects take effect upon me, that "I," in truth, only am by resisting and refusing to be impressed by their action.

When an effect or impression is produced on any substance, whether it be motion, as in the case of a struck billiard ball, or sensation, as in the case of animals and men, the substance impressed is either conscious of the impression, as is the case with men; or unconscious of it, as is the case with animals and billiard balls. If it be unconscious of the impression, then being

filled and monopolized by the same, it never rises above it, but yielding to its influence, it becomes altogether the slave of the law of causality, or of the force that is working on it.— But if this substance be conscious of the impression made upon it, then it is absolutely necessary, in the eye of reason, that a portion of this being should stand aloof from the impression-should be exempt from the action of the object causing it-in short, should resist, repel, and deny it in the exercise of a free activity; otherwise, like animals and inferior things, being completely absorbed and monopolized by the influence present to it, it would no more be able to become conscious of it than a leaf can comprehend the gale in which it is drifting along, or the tiger the passion which impels him to slake his burning heart in blood. It is obvious, that the point in man at which he becomes aware of his impressions must be free from these impressions, and must stand out of their sphere, otherwise it would be swallowed up by them, and nothing save the impressions would remain. But man is not made up of mere impressions- passions, sensations, "states of mind, or whatever they may be. He is not ingulfed and borne along in their vortices.There is a point from which he looks down upon them all, and knows himself to be free. He stands within a circle more impregn: ble than the enchanter's ring-a circle which, however much they may assault it, they cannot overpass; and this point or circle of freedom--this true life of humanity is that which, in the case of each man, is "I."

This view disposes of a question which has been ever regarded as forming the opprobrium of metaphysics.We allude to the problem respecting the mode and nature of the intercourse which takes place between the external universe and man-or, as metaphysicians say, "Mind." This question is now given up-not because it has been solved-not because it is regarded as too contemptible and irrelevant to be entertained by speculative philosophy, but, proh pudor! because it is considered insoluble, inscrutable, and beyond the limits of the human faculties.Oh, ye metaphysicians! ye blind leaders of the blind! How long will ye be of seeing and understanding that there is no communication at all be