"He who, believing that the search for truth can never be offensive to the God of truth, pursues his way with an unswerving energy, may not unreasonably hope that he may assist others in their struggle towards the light, and may in some small degree contribute to that consummation when the professed belief shall have been adjusted to the requirements of the age, when the old tyranny shall have been broken, and the anarchy of transition shall have passed away."-Lecky's History of Rationalism.

"In the present state of science, of all subjects that on which we know least is, perhaps, the connection of our bodily and mental nature, the action of the one on the other," &c.-Professor the Rev. Baden Powell.

"Metaphysics revolve in an endless circle of abstractions, ethics have scarcely made any permanent advance since the introduction of Christianity." -Times, January 1st, 1866.

"All our conceptions are based on the implied postulate that the world is as it appears. * * The advance of knowledge consists in the substitution of accurate conceptions for natural ones."-Man and his Dwelling Place, by James Hinton.

"It remains for philosophers to place Physiology and Mental and Moral Philosophy in the same position as positive science reached by induction."-H. G. Atkinson, F.G.S.

"Men rarely recount facts simply as they happened, but mingle their own opinions with them; more especially if the facts are above their comprehension, and connected with religious interests."—Spinoza.

"There are few delusions that a man cannot be brought to believe if they injure neither his stomach nor his purse."-Times, April 27th, 1863.

"If the Critic speaks, it is not to tell the reader what the Philosopher thinks, but what he thinks of the Philosopher: a quite uninteresting matter." -Fortnightly Review.

LONDON:

LONGMANS, GREEN, READER, AND DYER.

THE RIGHT OF TRANSLATION IS RESERVED.

265. i. 35.

W. F. TAUNTON, PRINTER, COVENTRY.

PREFACE.

THE doctrine of Philosophical Necessity, notwithstanding its supposed horrible tendency to sap the foundation of morals, has been elevated from the regions below, where, according to Milton, its discussion furnished fit occupation and amusement for devils only, -to form the base of Social Science. Philosophical Necessity is only another name for "Law" or a fixed order of Nature in the department of Mind, and there can be no Social Science without it. This I have endeavoured to make plain in my work on "The Philosophy of Necessity," and it is my purpose now to show that the doctrine of the Correlation and Persistence of Forces, when thought out to its legitimate consequences, gives us a Science of Psychology based on Physiology, by which alone we can attain to the same command over mind, as we already have over physical force. The Irishman's direction for making a cannon, "Take a long hole, and pour metal round it," has been followed by

Metaphysicians in making their canons, and the "method"

has produced results such as might have been expected. Consciousness, their round hole, has no substantial existence out of the individual mind reflecting upon it, and it is difficult to pour metal round it, and the canons so founded result only in the ipse dixit of the founder, which every succeeding philosopher thinks is necessary to burst before he proceeds to cast any of his own. Mind is force, and it must be studied as all other forces are, as well as by "reflection on consciousness," and then Metaphysics may take the place to which it is entitled at the head of all other Sciences.

The Correlation of Forces shows that in the cycle of forces we can always return to the same starting point without a break, and the Persistence of Force shows that this is always done without loss; now these truths, not stopping short in Physics, but carried, as they ought to be, into the higher field of Mind, furnish, I think, the most probable explanation of "the Phenomena of Modern Spiritualism," at the present time so much puzzling earnest investigators. My speculations however are given only as speculations; I have no wish to dogmatise, I merely present an hypothesis to be rejected or affirmed by observation and experience. History now has shown that we must not be deterred from the acceptance of any truth from its supposed consequences. Friar Bacon was cast into prison as a magician by the Superior of his Order, and the mysteries of physical science were treated then very much as the mysteries of mental science are now. Mr.

Lewes says, (Fortnightly Review, Feb. 1, 1866), "We are warned against Materialism as cold and desolating. The real warning should be against materialism as erroneous; in point of fact, we do not find materialists are cold and desolated, any more than spiritualists are hot and happy." We must not ask then, "To what will this lead? but is it true?" No truth is really at variance with other truth, and if it should appear to be so, we must be content to wait till we understand the whole matter. We are not bound, however, to attach every new truth to some old error or superstition and then wait till we can reconcile the two, before we reason it out to its legitimate consequences: this would be to make it powerless and inoperative. Thus Professor Mansel, in the Contemporary Review, No. 5, for May, 1866, says, 66 Eternity and continuous duration immutability and creation in time-perfect action, yet unexhausted power to act-everlasting purpose and accessibility to prayer -general law and special providence-complete fore-knowledge co-existing with human freedom, these several elements together into a consistent whole, yet we can believe that they are capable of combination:" but I confess I find in myself no such wonderful power of belief; on the contrary, the propositions appear to me as contradictory as that a thing may be and may not be at the same time. Some of the propositions may lie beyond our depth, but I certainly cannot conceive how an occurrence can be fore-known which is contingent, that is, if man is really

we cannot combine