does not take place by local motion, as Democritus asserted; but by this, that something is drawn from power into act."

It does not belong to our purpose to consider either the theological or the metaphysical doctrines which form so large a portion of the treatises of the schoolmen. Perhaps it may hereafter appear, that some light is thrown on some of the questions which have occupied metaphysicians in all ages, by that examination of the history of the progressive sciences in which we are now engaged; but till we are able to analyse the leading controversies of this kind, it would be of little service to speak of them in detail. It may be noticed, however, that many of the most prominent of them refer to the great question,— "What is the relation between actual things and general terms?" Perhaps in modern times, the actual things would be more commonly taken as the point to start from; and men would begin by considering how classes and universals are obtained from individuals. But the schoolmen, founding their speculations on the received modes of considering such subjects, to which both Aristotle and Plato had contributed, travelled in the opposite direction, and endeavoured to discover how individuals were deduced from genera and species;-what was "the principle of individuation." This was variously Thus Bonaventura"

stated by different reasoners.

15 Deg. iv. 573.

solves the difficulty by the aid of the Aristotelian distinction of matter and form. The individual derives from the form the property of being something, and from the matter the property of being that particular thing. Duns Scotus', the great adversary of Thomas Aquinas in theology, placed the principle of individuation in “a certain positive determining entity," which his school called Hæcceity, or thisness.

Thus Peter is an individual, because his humanity is combined with Petreity." The force of abstract terms is a curious question, and some remarkable experiments in their use had been made by the Latin Aristotelians before this time. In the same way in which we talk of the quantity and quality of a thing, they spoke of its quiddity".

We may consider the reign of mere disputation as fully established at the time of which we are now speaking; and the only kind of philosophy henceforth studied was one in which no sound physical science had or could have a place. The wavering abstractions, indistinct generalisations, and loose classifications of common language, which we have already noted as the fountain of the physics of the Greek schools of philosophy, were also the only source from which the schoolmen of the middle ages drew their views, or rather their arguments: and though these notional and verbal relations were invested with a most complex and pedantic techni

cality, they did not, on that account, become at all more precise as notions, or most likely to lead to a single real truth. Instead of acquiring distinct ideas, they multiplied abstract terms; instead of real generalisations, they had recourse to verbal distinctions. The whole course of their employments tended to make them, not only ignorant of physical truth, but incapable of conceiving its nature.

Having thus taken upon themselves the task of raising and discussing questions by means of abstract terms, verbal distinctions, and logical rules alone, there was no tendency in their activity to come to an end, as there was no progress. The same questions, the same answers, the same difficulties, the same solutions, the same verbal subtleties, sought for, admired, cavilled at, abandoned, reproduced, and again admired,-might recur without limit. John of Salisbury 18 observes of the Parisian teachers, that, after several years' absence he found them not a step advanced, and still employed in urging and parrying the same arguments; and this, as Mr. Hal

18 He studied logic at Paris, at St. Geneviève, and then left them. "Duodecennium mihi elapsum est diversis studiis occupatum. Jucundum itaque visum est veteres quos reliqueram, et quos adhuc Dialectica detinebat in monte, (Sanctæ Genovefæ) revisere socios, conferre cum eis super ambiguitatibus pristinis; ut nostrum invicem collatione mutua commetiremur profectum. Inventi sunt, qui fuerant et ubi; neque enim ad palmam visi sunt processisse ad quæstiones pristinas dirimendas, neque propositiunculam unam adjecerant. Quibus urgebant stimulis eisdem et ipsi urgebantur." &c. Metalogicus, lib. ii. cap. 10.

lam remarks", "was equally applicable to the period of centuries." The same knots were tied and untied; the same clouds were formed and dissipated. The poet's censure of "the Sons of Aristotle," is as just as happily expressed

They stand

Locked up together hand in hand;
Every one leads as he is led,

The same bare path they tread,

And dance like Fairies a fantastic round,

But neither change their motion nor their ground.

It will, therefore, be unnecessary to go into any detail respecting the history of the school philosophy of the thirteenth, fourteenth, and fifteenth centuries. We may suppose it to have been, during the intermediate time, such as it was at first and at last. An occasion to consider its later days will be brought before us by the course of our subject. But, even during the most entire ascendency of the scholastic doctrines, the elements of change were at work. While the doctors and the philosophers received all the ostensible homage of men, a doctrine and a philosophy of another kind were gradually forming: the practical instincts of man, their impatience of tyranny, the progress of the useful arts, the promises of alchemy, were all disposing men to reject the authority and deny the pretensions of the received philosophical creed. Two antagonist forms of opinion were in existence, which for some time went on detached, 19 Middle Ages, iii. 537.

and almost independent of each other; but, finally, these came into conflict, at the time of Galileo; and the war speedily extended to every part of civilized Europe.

3. Scholastic Physics.-It is difficult to give briefly any appropriate examples of the nature of the Aristotelian physics which are to be found in the works of this time. As the gravity of bodies was one of the first subjects of dispute when the struggle of the rival methods began, we may notice the mode in which it was treated 20. "Zabarella maintains that the proximate cause of the motion of elements is the form, in the Aristotelian sense of the term: but to this sentence we," says Keckerman, "cannot agree; for in all other things the form is the proximate cause, not of the act, but of the power or faculty from which the act flows. Thus in man, the rational soul is not the cause of the act of laughing, but of the risible faculty or power." Keckerman's system was at one time a work of considerable authority: it was published in 1614. By comparing and systematising what he finds in Aristotle, he is led to state his results in the form of definitions and theorems. Thus, "gravity is a motive quality, arising from cold, density, and bulk, by which the elements are carried downwards." "Water is the lower intermediate element, cold and moist." The first theorem concerning water is, "The moistness of

20 Keckerman, p. 1428.