permanency; he may be possessed of grounds of belief to a certain extent, such as have been mentioned; and still we may suppose him incapable of reasoning. His knowledge would be greatly limited, it is true, without that noble faculty, but he would know something; his conciousness would teach him his own existence; his senses convey to him intimations of external origin; the testi-. mony of others furnish various facts, that had come within their observation. But happily man is not limited to the scanty knowledge, which would come in by these sources alone; he can compare as well as experience; and can deduce conclusions.

But there is this worthy of notice, that the reasoning power, although it exists in man, and is a source of belief and a foundation of knowledge, is necessarily built upon principles, which are either known or assumed.— This is seen in the most common and ordinary cases of the exercise of this susceptibility. And it will be found also on examination, that one assumption may be resolved into another, and again into another, until we arrive at certain ultimate truths, which are at the foundation of all reasoning whatever. It is important, therefore, to inquire, what general assumptions, having particular reference to the reasoning power and absolutely essential to its action, are to be made.-And these will be found to be two in number; one having special relation to the past, and the other to the future.

§. 24. No beginning or change of existence without a cause.

The one, which has a relation to the past, and is the foundation of all reasonings, having a reference to any period antecedent to the present moment, may be stated as follows; that there is no beginning or change of existence without a cause. This principle, like others which have been mentioned, we may well suppose to be universally admitted. When any new event takes place, men at once inquire the cause; as if it could not possibly have happened without some effective antecedent.

And such being the general and unwavering reception

of the principle before us, it would seem to follow clearly, that there are grounds for it in the human constitution. A reliance on any principle whatever, so firm and general as is here exhibited, is not likely to be accidental. And when we inquire what these grounds are, we shall not fail to come to the conclusion, that the proposition in question is supported by an original intimation or feeling, which is utterly inseparable from our mental nature, and which is made known to us by consciousness alone.

But some will ask, Is it certain, that we cannot arrive at this truth by a process of reasoning ?—And in reference to this inquiry, we see no ground for dissenting from the following remarks of Dr. Reid, which will appear the better founded, the more they are examined. Speaking on this subject, he says, "I am afraid, we shall find the proof by direct reasoning extremely difficult, if not altogether impossible. I know of only three or four arguments, that have been urged by philosophers, in the way of abstract reasoning, to prove, that things, which begin to exist, must have a cause. One is offered by Mr. Hobbes, another by Dr. Samuel Clarke, another by Mr. Locke. Mr. Hume in his Treatise of Human Nature has examined them all; and, in my opinion, has shown, that they take for granted the thing to be proved; a kind of false reasoning, which men are very apt to fall into, when they attempt to prove what is self-evident."*

The feeling or belief, therefore, which is implied in the proposition, that there is no beginning or change of existence without a cause, is an original one, directly resulting from our nature. Still it is in our power to give some account of the circumstances, in which it arises.

§. 25. Occasions of the origin of the primary truth of effects and causes.

The mind embraces the elementary truth, which we are considering, at a very early period. Looking round upon nature, which we are led to do more or less from the commencement of our being, we find every thing in mo*Reid's Intellectual Powers, Essay VI.

tion. Non-existence is converted into life; and new forms are imparted to what existed before. The human mind, which is essentially active and curious, constantly contemplates the various phenomena, which come under its notice; observing not only the events and appearances themselves, but their order in point of time, their succession. And it is led in this way to form the belief, (not by deduction but from its own active nature,) that every new existence and every change of existence are preceded by something, without which they could not have happened.

Undoubtedly the notion, as in many other cases, is comparatively weak at first, but it rapidly acquires unalterable growth and strength; so much so that the mind applies it without hesitation to every act, to every event, and to every finite being. And thus a foundation is laid for numberless conclusions, having a relation to whatever has happened in time past. It is true, that the verbal proposition, by which our belief in this case is expressed, is not always, nor even generally brought forward and stated in our reasonings on the past, but it is always implied.

This primary truth is an exceedingly important one. By its aid the human mind retains a control over the ages that are gone, and subordinates them to its own purposes. It is susceptible in particular of a moral and religious application. Let this great principle be given us, and we are able to track the succession of sequences upward, advancing from one step to another, until we find all things meeting together in one self-existent and unchangeable head and fountain of being. But there it stops. The principle will not apply to God, since He differs from every thing else, which is the object of thought, in being an existence equally without change and without beginning.

§. 26. Matter and mind have uniform and fixed laws.

It is necessary to assume also particularly in connection with the reasoning power, that matter and mind have uniform and permanent laws.

This assumption, as well as the preceding, is accordant

with the common belief of mankind. All men believe, that the setting sun will ariseagain at the appointed hour; that the decaying plants of autumn will revive in spring, that the tides of ocean will continue to heave as in times past, and the streams and rivers to flow in their courses. If they doubted, they would not live and act, as they are now seen to do.

This belief in the uniformity and permanency of the laws of nature does not arise at once; but has its birth at first in some particular instance; then in others, till it becomes of universal application. In the first instance the feeling in question, which we express in various ways by the terms, anticipation, faith, expectation, belief, and the like, is weak and vacillating; but it gradually acquires strength and distinctness. And yet this feeling, so important in its applications, is the pure work of nature; it is not taught men, but is produced within them; the necessary and infallible product and growth of our mental being; a sort of unalienable gift of the Almighty to every man, woman, and child; arising in the soul with as much certainty and as little mystery as the notions, expressed by the words, power, wisdom, truth, order, or other elementary states of the mind. It is true, it is an expectation or belief, directed to a particualr object, and, therefore, is not easily susceptible of being expressed by a single term, as in the case of the ideas just referred to; but the circumstance of its being expressed by a circumlocution does not render the feeling itself less distinct or real than others.— As, therefore, the strong faith, which men entertain, in the continuance of the laws of creation, is the natural and decisive offspring of that mental constitution, which God has given us, there is good ground for assuming the truth. of that, to which this faith relates, and to regard it as a principle in future inquiries, that matter and mind are governed by uniform laws.

It may be further added, that it is not necessary to call the belief, which is at the foundation of this assumption, either an intuitive perception or an instinct, as some have done, but merely a thought, an idea, a state of the mind;

since the only difference between this, and expectation or belief in other cases, results from the nature of the object, towards which it is directed, and the occasions, on which it arises; and does not concern the nature of the feeling itself.

§. 27. This primary truth not founded on reasoning.

But perhaps it is again objected, that we can arrive at the great truth under consideration without assuming it as something ultimate, as something resulting from our constitution; and that nothing more is wanting in order to arrive at it, than a train of reasoning.-The sun, it is said, rose to-day, therefore he will rise to-morrow: Food nourished me to day, therefore it will do the same to-morrow; The fire burnt me once, therefore it will again.

But it demands no uncommon sagacity to perceive, that something is here wanting, and that a link in the chain of thought must be supplied, in order to make it cohere. The mere naked fact, that the sun rose to-day, without any thing else being connected with it affords not the least ground for the inference, that it will rise again; and the same may be said of all similar instances. Now the link, which is wanting in order to bind together the beginning and the end in such arguments as have been referred to, is the precise assumption, which has been made, and which is held to be as reasonable as it is necessary, because it is founded on an acknowledged, universal, and elementary feeling of our nature. And we may here affirm with perfect confidence, that, without making this assumption, the power of reasoning cannot deduce a single general inference, cannot arrive at so much as one general conclusion either in matter or mind.

But the moment we make the assumption, a vast foundation of knowledge is laid. Grant us this, (to which we are fully entitled by virtue of that elementary belief, which the Author of our being has uniformly called forth in the human mind in his appointed way,) that nature is uniform in her laws; then give us the fact, that food nourished us to-day, or that the sun rose to-day, or any other fact of