Page:Ferrier's Works Volume 1 - Institutes of Metaphysic (1875 ed.).djvu/30

 served up to him raw. Truth is the ultimate end of philosophy: hence a system of philosophy ought to be true. The formation of reason (as affected by the discharge of its proper function, which is the ascertainment and concatenation of necessary principles and conclusions) is the proximate end of philosophy; hence a system of philosophy ought to be reasoned. Philosophy, therefore, in its ideal perfection, is a body of reasoned truth.

§ 3. Of these obligations the latter is the more it is more proper that philosophy should be reasoned, than that it should be true; because, while truth may perhaps be unattainable by man, to reason is certainly his province, and within his power. In a case where two objects have to be overtaken, it is more incumbent on us to secure the one to which our faculties are certainly competent, than the other, to which they are perhaps inadequate. Besides, no end can be so important for man as the cultivation of his own reason.

§ 4. This consideration determines the value of a system of philosophy. A system is of the highest value only when it embraces both of these requisitions—that is, when it is both true and reasoned. But a system which is reasoned without being true, is always of higher value than a system which is true without being reasoned.