Page:Ferrier's Works Volume 3 "Philosophical Remains" (1883 ed.).djvu/463

Rh of matter, then, its proper location in the human mind, or has it not? Does its existence depend upon our existence, or has it a being altogether independent of us?

Now that, and that alone, is the point to decide which our natural belief should be appealed to; but Dr Reid did not see this. His appeal to the conviction of common sense was premature. He appealed to this belief without allowing scepticism and idealism to run their full course; without allowing them to confound the psychological analysis, and thus bring us back to a better condition by compelling us to accept the fact, not as given in the spurious analysis of man, but as given in the eternal synthesis of God. The consequence was, that Reid's appeal came to naught. Instead of interrogating our belief as to the objective existence of the perception of matter (the proper question), the question which he brought under its notice was the objective existence of matter per se, matter minus perception. Now, matter per se, or minus perception, is a thing which no belief will countenance. Reid, however, could not admit this. Having appealed to the belief, he was compelled to distort its evidence in his own favour, and to force it, in spite of itself, to bear testimony to the fact which he wished it to establish. Thus Dr Reid's appeal not only came to naught, but, being premature, it drove him, as has been said and shown, to falsify the primitive convictions of our nature. Scepticism must indeed be terrible when it could