forms of thought by the mind the relations of cause and effect are assumed in this act as really and objec- tivelj' behjnging to it in the view of all beings. 13ut, according to the possibility suggested, the relation of cause and effect may be just as unreal in the operations of the mind itself as we may suppose it to be in the phenomena which we conceive under that relation. Though necessarily employed in human thinking, that relation may be merely contingent upon the operation of that thinking, and may not belong to the constitu- tion of the soul as viewed or known by any other being, whether creature or Creator (comp. Porter, Human In- tellect).
The subjectively creative activity of the reason as- sumed by Kant was taken as the leading principle in the systems of J. G. Fichte, Schelling, and Hegel, re- sulting in extreme forms of idealism. The views of Sir William Hamilton are closely related to those of Kant. He holds that we have native cognitions which are both universal and necessary. The necessity of a cog- nition may, however, be either positive or 7iegative, It may either result from the power of the thinking prin- ciple, or from the p)oicerlessness of the same to think otherwise. " To the positive cognitions belong the no- tion of existence and its modifications, the principles of identity, contradiction, and the intuitions of space and time." All these are discerned by the mind by a neces- sity which positively pertains to the objects discerned, and in the reality of which the mind absolutely confides. To negative cognitions belong the relations of substance and phenomena , and of cause and effect. These are nec- essary by virtue of the inability of the mind to think otherwise, and do not represent a positive relation. This necessity is embraced under his Law of the Conditioned. These cognitions are only true relatively.
Observing that such acute philosophers as Kant and Hamilton failed to find, either wholly or in part, posi- tive assurance of certainty and reality for our knowl- edge, others have been incited to avoid, instead of meet- ing the difiiculties, by seeking this assurance from an- other source. Jacobi and Schleiermacher found it in faith and feeling. Even Kant himself turns from the uncertainty of the pure speculative intellect to what he calls the practical reason, and rests upon the simple categorical imperative of duty. The practical reason commands unconditional faith in duty, without our asking or seeking any reasons or grounds. It com- mands us to believe in God as a true and perfect being. As such he will not deceive his creatures. Therefore we may implicitly trust the apiriori intuitions and judg- ments of the thinking reason which he has created. We may be sure that those fundamental truths are real, and that our knowledge in its forms and conceptions corresponds to the forms under which the world of reality exists. Hamilton also, following Kant and Schleiermacher, while asserting that we cannot think tlie infinite and unconditioned, yet concedes that we hiow the same hy faith. Those who distinguish faith or feeling from the intellect, as an ultimate source of knowledge and ground of certainty, assume that the act of this faith or feeling is not intellectual, whereas it is in fact pre-eminentlj' an intellectual act and power, conditioning all the special acts and cognitions of which the mind is capable. Some of the more recent Ger- man philosophers, as Chalyba^us, and I-otze especially, rest their confidence in the fundamental assumptions of the human intellect upon ethical grounds. " We must believe," they say, " that Nature is benevolent in her indications, and therefore true. We assume that goodness and veracity regulate both the objective rela- tions of the universe which we study, and the subjec- tive constitution of the intellect which interprets it. For those reasons we rely upon the categories both of thought and being." In treating of the relations of nihilism to the views of Kant and subsequent philos- ophers, wc have had occasion to notice the idea of the relativity of our knowledge as involving something of
NIHILISM
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NIHILISM
nihilism, or nescience. This idea has become a promi- nent doctrine in modern philosophy, and has been held and applied in dilFerent ways by Ulrici and others in Germany ; liy Mansel in his Limits nfBelir/ious T/iouf/ht ; by jMill, Tyndall, Huxley, and Herbert Spencer. It is the doctrine that the mind does not perceive things, but the relations of things — of things utterly unknown in themselves. In controverting the views of those adopting this doctrine, it is admitted by Dr. McCosh and others that there are senses in which man's knowl- edge is relative. He can know, for instance, only so far as he has a capacity of knowing. In this sense man's knowledge is all relative to himself. A man who lias no eyes cannot know color. There is the farther truth that man has the capacity of discovering rela- tions between himself and other things, and between one thing and another. Again, it is also true that he cannot know all things; he cannot know all about any one thing. But when it is said that we know relations onh', and not things, it is replied that " it is inconceiv- able that we should know relations between things un- known. Relations between things unknown can never yield knowledge. If the things were to cease, there would be no relation ; and if the things were unknown, there would be no relations known. If the sun and earth were unknown to me, I could never know a relation be- tween them. A relation is a relation of things known — so far known — known by reason of that relation. We know in what relation we stand to God, because we so far know God and know ourselves. The subtlest form of infidelity in our daj' proceeds on the principle that man knows nothing of the nature or reality of things, or that he can know nothing except relations between things unknown. It makes human reason proclaim that it cannot discover any truth beyond and above the phenomena of sentient experience. It does not deny directly that there is a God, but it declares that God, if there be a God, is and must be unknown. In meet- ing this fundamental scepticism, we need to maintain the veracity of the human faculties, and to show that the same powers which guide correctly in the business of life and in the pursuits of science are legitimately fitted to conduct to a reasonable belief in One presiding over the works of Nature and providentially guiding our lot."