:

mind gives animal motion to the body, or in other words, is a generic name for the affections and passions. These he thinks are formed by the motion in the head termed conception being communicated to the heart, and there either helping or impeding the vital motion if they help it, they produce the pleasurable affections-if they impede it, the painful. Perhaps the most important feature in his metaphysics is, that he ascribes the origin of all our ideas to the senses, on which he argues with great force and ingenuity, though he takes care to avoid all consideration of that numerous class of ideas which spring from what Locke denominates reflection.

From this brief analysis it will be seen that Hobbes's fame as a metaphysician cannot rest on this fantastic and arbitrary theory. It is not to his constructive metaphysics, but to his detection of the errors of others, and to his occasional remarks, that we are to look for his excellence. Imbued with a thorough contempt for the scholastic philosophy, he at once rejected the theory of visible species, audible species, &c., which had so long infested the European seats of learning. He too was cne of the first who pointed out the fallacy of the doctrine of innate ideas; and although the theory which he substituted in its stead is defective in one essential particular, it was yet a great stride in advance of the metaphysical speculations of the age, and paved the way for that more accurate account of the origin of our knowledge, which has immortalized the name of Locke. Locke, indeed, stands under considerable obligations to Hobbes, though by no means so great as many have been led to suppose, and he was certainly very free from the charge of Hobbism brought against him by Shaftesbury, and some of the French philosophers.

Hobbes's moral and political opinions are so interwoven, that they cannot easily be considered apart. His system rests upon the assumption of which he brings no manner of proof whatever-that mankind having no other motive in their actions than self-interest, are at war one with another in a state of nature. In this state the principles of right and wrong, justice and injustice, have no existence, and every man has a right to every thing, even to his neighbour's life, provided he has the power to obtain it, no matter by what fraud or violence. There are, however, in this state, certain laws of nature, i. e. precepts answerable to reason, of which the more important are,—that every man, in order to obtain peace, be willing to lay down this right to all things, contenting himself with such a share of liberty as other men shall agree to possess, and that men keep their covenants. Hence it is necessary that all bodies of men, when giving up their right to every thing, should appoint some one person to rule over them; and as the covenant is made not with the ruler, but with one another, it follows that subjects can never rebel against the person they have chosen, or vest the power in any other, or enter into any new covenant without his permission, because the sovereign, having entered into no covenant, can break none, and consequently the subject can have no pretence for breaking that into which he has entered. Having established his commonwealth so far, he next proceeds to show, that the person in whom the power is vested must have unlimited authority; that he alone ought to determine the question of peace or war; to appoint the laws; to decree the life or death of his subjects without even assigning a cause; to

administer their property; in short, that subjects ought to be footballs, and kings the players. And not only is the sovereign to have power over their fortunes and lives, but over their minds also. He alone is to appoint the doctrines and opinions which are to be held; to decree what is morally right and what wrong, what just and what unjust; to determine whether God shall be worshipped or not; and every man is bound to receive these orders as the will of God, and to obey them accordingly, unless God has made to him a special revelation to the contrary. The reason assigned for lodging in the hands of the king these attributes of the Divine Being, is, that peace, to obtain which is the grand object of all societies of men, can be much better preserved in this way than by allowing the subject a voice in the government.

From this brief outline, it will be seen that Hobbes is not, as those who have not read him generally suppose, an advocate of the right divine of kings. He is a utilitarian, and advocates this monstrous system, because he believes, or professes to believe, that the operation of it would be conducive to the general happiness of mankind. It would be an endless task to point out its numerous fallacies and inconsistencies, its assumed principles and inconsequent conclusions; nor do we believe that doctrines, so palpably opposed to reason, nay, to the first principles of human nature, require any confutation. We cannot, however, refrain from stating the masterly refutation which Cudworth has given, of what is probably the leading fallacy, and without which, all the rest must certainly fall to the ground: we mean the proposition, that right and wrong do not exist previous to the formation of society, and that subsequently the only just measure of right and wrong is the command of the sovereign. This doctrine originally, we believe, propounded by Protagoras, and after him zealously adopted by Epicurus, Cudworth confutes, by the simple and undeniable proposition, that the qualities of things exist not by will but by nature; that is to say, the will can never cause the natural and essential qualities of things to change, without, at the same time, changing the things themselves. The will may create, but can never change, the essential qualities. Thus a right-angled triangle may be created, but the right angle can never be removed without changing the triangle into something else than a right-angled one. Now, nothing can exist without a certain nature, or being inherent in it; therefore, right and wrong have a certain nature; and since the mere will cannot change the nature, it cannot change the nature of right or wrong; or, in other words, the will can never make an action just or unjust, which is not so by nature. Hence, it undeniably follows, that the distinction between right and wrong is essential, universal, and absolutely unchangeable by any authority, divine or human. A fuller confutation than this can hardly be required; those who wish to see other parts of the system overthrown, may consult Clarendon's Survey, &c. of the Leviathan,' Cumberland's De Legibus Naturæ,' Cudworth's Eternal and Immutable Morality,' Harrington's Oceana,' Clarke on the Being and Attributes,' &c. Of Hobbes's religious opinions it will be unnecessary to say much, since their pernicious, anti-scriptural tendency has been already incidentally depicted in our outline of his political creed. His opponents have charged him with atheism, but of this we have no evidence in his writings, since he everywhere acknowledges the existence of a first great cause, who possesses

power over us as his creatures. It cannot, however, be denied, that his system inevitably leads to practical atheism. Were the doctrines he inculcates true, God would be shorn of his brightest attributes, and reduced to a dark ideal existence, almost unconnected with, and powerless over the world. Revelation would be a phantasm without any r right to demand our belief, and religion a mummery, without God as its author, or salvation as its aim. He acknowledges the existence of a future state of rewards and punishments; to attain the former of which it is only necessary to obey implicitly the enactments of the civil power, and to put faith in Christ,- -a faith which we are by no means required to evince by works, or even to profess, unless such works and profession be permitted by the sovereign.

The united wit of a generation could scarcely have devised more false and ruinous doctrines than these. Their metaphysics, as Mr Stewart has well remarked, “would reduce man to the level of a brute.” Their politics would transform him, from a rational free-born being, to a mass of animated clay; and their religion would make him either an infidel or a hypocrite. We are not, however, to judge of Hobbes's talents from the doctrines he inculcates. His writings can be duly estimated only by thinking men. They are the product of a mind rich in natural resources, though not well-stocked with acquirements;-amazingly acute in discovering flaws in the arguments and theories of others, though by no means capable of building up a solid and lasting system itself; so subtle and penetrating, that the reader is amazed to find the same intellect evolving fallacies and absurdities;—and possessing an extraordinary power of arranging and combining its thoughts in the lucidus ordo, which is one true characteristic of a great mind. His grand fault was, that in spite of his contempt for the schoolmen, he adopted their method of philosophizing in preference to the Baconjan, and having laid down certain principles without attempting to establish their truth, followed these out until he got involved in a maze of error, from which even his genius failed to extricate him. His leading doctrines are, therefore, almost all erroneous, and many of them absurd, yet, in the defence of them, he exhibits such originality of mind, and acuteness of thought; lays open, at a single glance, such clear views of human nature, and scatters here and there such striking truths, as amply repay the time spent in perusing him. It may truly be said that many single sentences in his works have furnished matter for the elaborate disquisitions of less powerful minds. The reader is like the ancient chemist searching for the philosopher's stone; the grand object of his pursuit flies from before him,-instead of any great truth or well-established system on which his mind may rest, he meets with fantastic and arbitrary theories,-yet, ever and anon, he lights upon some valuable precept, or is led to the discovery of some important truth, which more than recompenses him for the labour undergone. His style is perhaps the finest model of philosophical composition. Fluent and sometimes brilliant, yet adapted to the dignity of his subject,— always powerful, and oftentimes eloquent,-concise without ruggedness, and clear without diffuseness,-it hits the happy medium between the harshness and dryness of mathematical demonstration affected by Spinoza and others, and that wearisome verbosity in which some of our modern metaphysicians delight.

Of Hobbes as a man, our estimate must be much less favourable Vain to a ridiculous excess of his talents,-unable to endure contradic tion,-contemptuous towards his opponents,-expecting all men to bow implicitly to his decisions, while he himself would listen to none,— pertinacious in adhering to his opinions, even after they had been proved by mathematical demonstration to be incorrect, an advocate of doctrines in theory which his life denied in practice,- -a deserter of his country whenever her troubles began,-a deserter of his sovereign ex. iled in a foreign land,—in youth, licentious,10-in manhood, selfish and arrogant,-in old age, morose and obstinate, he presents a lamentable instance of the insufficiency of mere talent to constitute a true philosopher.

As we have already mentioned his principal works, it will be unnecessary to repeat them here. There is no complete edition of them; but the largest collections are the one printed at Amsterdam during his life-time, and one published at London, 1758, in a folio volume, entitled the Moral and Political works of Thomas Hobbes.' Both are now very scarce and valuable. The Leviathan' has been several times reprinted, but not of late years.

John Milton.

BORN A. D. 1608.-DIED A. D. 1674.

JOHN MILTON, the champion of English liberty, and the glory of English literature, was born in London on the 9th of December, 1608. His ancestry was respectable in descent, and possessed considerable property; but the father of our poet, having displeased his father by embracing the doctrines of the reformation, had been disinherited by him, and compelled to gain his subsistence in the profession of the law, in which, however, he realised such a fortune as enabled him soon to retire from business into the country. The mother of our poet is said by Wood, on the authority of Aubrey, to have been a Bradshaw; but her own grandson, Phillips, in his life of Milton, affirms that she was a Caston, and of Welsh descent. Milton's father had enjoyed the education of a gentleman at Christ-church, Oxford; and that he continued attached to elegant literature throughout his life, is apparent from the beautiful Latin verses in which his son has addressed him. He was also a capital musician, and a voluminous composer of music. His scientific skill has been praised by Hawkins and Burney, and it would appear that he sometimes composed the words of his madrigals and songs.

Young Milton received his first instruction at the hands of a private tutor. The person selected for this charge was Thomas Young, whom Aubrey contemptuously describes as "a puritan in Essex, who cutt his haire short." That the puritan tutor so conducted himself as to win the respect and affection of his pupil, we have good evidence in the writings of the latter. From the tuition of Mr Young, Milton was re

10 This is very delicately hinted in the Vita Hobbesii, "Etate adhuc intra juventutis terminos constanti liceat rerum fateri) nec abstemius fuit nec usooyuvos.”