carried any further. After the failure of this project he turned his steps to Berlin once more; and here, though not till a further period of uncertain struggle had been gone through, he succeeded at last in finding congenial employment in literature. Besides numerous contributions to periodicals, he produced several independent works-some in elucidation of Jewish thought, some in discussion of the philosophical problems of his time. Of the former class the most important is a commentary on the 'More Nevochim' of Maimonides; among the latter a chief place is assigned to his 'Versuch über die Transcendentalphilosophie.' It was during his final residence in Berlin that Maimon first became acquainted with the works of Kant. The 'Kritik of Pure Reason' had indeed been before the world for nine or ten years prior to this time, but Maimon had never in his roving career enjoyed an opportunity of examining the work. After it had been studied he set himself to write his essay on the 'Transcendental Philosophy.' The essay was shown in writing to Marcus Merz, the well-known friend and disciple of Kant, and through him it was forwarded to the philosopher at Königsberg. After a while Kant replied that his numerous occupations had prevented him from looking through the work at first, and that he had been on the point of returning it unread with an excuse, when he happened to glance over a few pages, and was at once struck with the conviction that not only had none of his opponents understood him or the question at issue so well, but few could show the same keenness of insight into such questions.' It is true that Kant's matured opinion of Maimon's work after its publication was less favourable; but this was perhaps counterbalanced by another incident. A copy of the work was sent for review to the Jena Literaturzeitung.' A long time passed without any notice appearing; and on inquiry being made as to the cause of the delay, a reply was received to the effect that the editor had tried three of the ablest speculative thinkers among his contributors, but that all had declined to undertake the work as being beyond their powers. Here the writer closes the story of his strange career; but it may be added that, after the many vicissitudes through which he had passed, he found a home in the house of a friendly Graf Kalkreuth, at whose country-seat he died on November 22, 1800.* J. CLARK MURRAY. *Fischer's Geschichte der Neudren Philosophie,' vol. v. p. 130. 95 ART. VI.-The Admissions of Agnosticism. Can the Old Faith live with the New? or, the Problem of UNDER the above somewhat cumbrous title this able and original writer has given us a new eirenicon between religion and science. 'The Old Faith' is, of course, Biblical Christianity, and 'the New Faith' is modern science, of which Evolution is the most characteristic doctrine. The argument professes to be only hypothetical, not taking Evolution as proved, but arguing that if it is proved it will in no way contradict the Old Faith.' But though the author makes no claim to any special knowledge of physical science, we can scarcely doubt that he believes Evolution to be true; and indeed there is little reason for any reticence on this subject on the part of theological writers, since Evolution has been accepted to the full by Professor Drummond in his 'Natural Law in the Spiritual World'—a book which has been eagerly welcomed by those who regard themselves as orthodox according to not only an English, but a Scottish standard of orthodoxy. The subject of Dr. Matheson's work is, however, by no means confined to the theological bearings of Evolution; and, indeed, the main question of Faith versus Agnosticismthe question whether the nature of our thinking faculty and the conditions of our knowledge leave room for faith-goes far deeper than any question of physical science. In some respects the work before us reminds us of Bishop Temple's Bampton Lectures on Agnosticism and Faith. But the contrast is more conspicuous than the resemblance. It is no disparagement to say that the bishop's work is not an original one. His merit consists in having seized the best ideas on the subject that were floating in the intellectual atmosphere. He has mastered them thoroughly, made them his own, and given them adequate literary form and expression; but we do not think there is anything in his lectures which can be regarded as a totally new contribution to thought. In Dr. Matheson's book, on the contrary, we constantly perceive the thinker at work. The different parts are of very unequal value, as is inevitable in such a book; but in the best parts, if not throughout the entire work, the anthor appears to have thought out his subjects for himself, and taken an original view of everything. Of course we do not mean that he has been anticipated by no previous thinker. This in such a work would be impos sible, and we think we perceive a remarkable coincidence between one of Dr. Matheson's most valuable speculations and some of the ideas which Max Müller has placed at the beginning of his 'Lectures on the Origin and Growth of Religion.' Both writers are compelled to endeavour to answer the question which stands at the beginning of every possible attempt at a philosophy of religion, What is the nature of the faculty whereby we apprehend that which is directly made known neither in external observation nor in internal consciousness? Self is made known in consciousness, and the external world in observation; but whence comes an idea of that which underlies and transcends them both, in which they move and have their being;-of the Infinite, the Divine? We believe that Kant referred this to a distinct elementary principle of the reason, not to be further accounted for. The Gnostics of the fourth century of Christianity maintained that God is made known only to particular men, or to men at particular times, and only in virtue of a specially imparted power of vision. This doctrine has never become extinct, and it appears to be implied in the view of conversion which has been lately set forth with extraordinary ability and eloquence in Professor Drummond's Natural Law in the Spiritual World.' Opposed to the Gnostic view is the Agnostic, which maintains that the existence of any faculty for knowing God is a delusion, and that we must resign ourselves to total and hopeless ignorance of all that transcends the data furnished to our thought in observation and consciousness. Both Dr. Matheson and Max Müller are opposed alike to Gnosticism and to Agnosticism. Against the Agnostic, they maintain that we have a faculty by which we may attain to knowledge of that which Müller calls the Infinite, and Matheson the Divine; and against the Gnostic they maintain that there is no special faculty or power, and no need for any, whereby to attain to supersensible and spiritual knowledge, but that such knowledge is to be attained by the natural and right use of our ordinary powers. It was said by John Stuart Mill, apparently without perceiving the importance of the admission, that 'the laws of nature cannot account for their own origin;' nor, we may add, for their own existence. Sensible experience suggests questions which it cannot answer, nor find any data for answering. So soon as man learns to ask, Whence is the order of things, the framework of the universe? or, if it has existed from eternity, what is the ground of its existence? What is the invisible and intangible Power which has its visible and sensible manifestations in the sun, and in the wind, and in the changes of the seasons?-in the act of asking such questions as these, man has already recognised the existence of that which underlies and transcends the sensible universe, and, by definition, belongs to a supersensible world. The thought of the Invisible is suggested by the perception of the visible. And, as the visible is finite, the Invisible is conceived as the Infinite. This, in as few words as possible, is Dr. Matheson's account of the beginning of the religious ideas. But we must quote the striking words in which he sums up the result of his inquiry What we want now to emphasize is the fact that the process by which we arrived at this conclusion was itself a purely natural process. We did not reach it by any transcendentalism, we do not come to it by any mysticism; we were driven to it by the barred gate of our own experience. It was the limits of our own senses that compelled us to seek a solution of the universe which invoked the presence of a Power beyond them. Experience, and nothing but experience, was the source of our information that nature was inadequate to account for her own existence. No transcendental logic, no mystical power of abstraction, no special faculty conversant with the things beyond experience, would ever in this matter have possessed one tithe of the authority which was wielded by the testimony of experience itself, when it told us that the domain of visible nature was too narrow and limited to account for what we see (p. 56). Compare with this the following from Max Müller We have accepted the primitive savage with nothing but his five senses. These five senses supply him with a knowledge of finite things; our problem is how such a being ever comes to think or speak of anything not finite, but infinite. I answer, without any fear of contradiction, that it is his senses which give him his first impression of infinite things, and force him to the admission of the Infinite. Everything of which his senses cannot perceive a limit is to a primitive savage, or to any man in an early stage of intellectual activity, unlimited or infinite. Man sees-he sees to a certain point, and there his eyesight breaks down. But exactly where his sight breaks down, there presses upon him, whether he likes it or not, the perception of the unlimited or the Infinite. It may be said that this is not perception, in the ordinary sense of the word. it is, but still less is it mere reasoning. In perceiving the Infinite, we neither count, nor measure, nor compare, nor name: We know not what it is, but we know that it is, and we know it because we actually feel it, and are brought in contact with it. No more The more we advance the wider no doubt grows our horizon; but there never is, and never can be, to our senses a horizon, unless as standing between the visible and finite on one side, and the invisible and 'infinite on the other. The Infinite therefore, instead of being merely a late abstraction, is merely implied in the earliest manifestations of our sensuous knowledge (Hibbert Lectures, pp. 38, 39). Matheson's treatment of the problem is not altogether identical with Müller's, but still less do they exclude or contradict each other; on the contrary, they confirm each other. Müller begins from visual perception, Matheson from thought. But the materials of thoughts are derived from perception-that which is presented in perception is represented in thought: between perception and thought there is no definite boundary; and if the process of apprehending the Invisible and Infinite is begun in the act of perception, it will be carried forward in thought. Let us consider the point to which we have now attained in the light of modern philosophy. It may be urged that Infinite is a word of magnitude, and that any discussion involving considerations of magnitude raises the question of the nature of space and time-the question whether they are realities of the universe or only forms of thought. Our conviction is that they are realities of the universe which have become forms of thought-forms of thought which are so because they first were realities of the universe. This question, however, is not raised in Dr. Matheson's work, and we do not intend to discuss it now, We go on to consider the conception of the Invisible, to which both Matheson and Müller have led us. This is substantially identical with the Unknowable of that modern philosophy which is formulized in the writings of Herbert Spencer; a Power or Force which is self-existent, indestructible, and eternal; the ground of the existence of all things, and of which the universe of matter and mind is but a manifestation-the essential nature of which we know and can know nothing. So far as they go, these conclusions as to the ultimate reality of the universe will meet with the assent of Christian believers; but those who stop there, and assert that no further knowledge is possible, call themselves not believers, but Agnostics. Such Agnosticism as this, however, is not mere blank ignorance, but the first step out of ignorance. Dr. Matheson says To know that we know nothing, is already to have reached a fact of knowledge. When a man says, with Mr. Herbert Spencer, that the Power which rules the universe is inscrutable to him, he is not merely making a statement that he knows nothing about it-he is making a positive and not a negative statement; he is declaring that the Power which rules the universe has awakened within him a sense of mystery; has caused him to become conscious of a barrier to his own consciousness (p. 356). But, as we have just seen, the philosophy which calls itself |