Page:Ferrier's Works Volume 3 "Philosophical Remains" (1883 ed.).djvu/483

Rh business of all science to displace the apparent and to establish the real; and, in doing this, speculative philosophy merely follows the example and analogy of her brethren.

This, I say, is the distinction on which is founded the science of metaphysics, as I endeavour to inculcate them. While, on the other hand, I venture to say that our antecedent Scottish philosophy recognises no such distinction; or rather virtually denies that any such discrepancy exists. It accepts as true and real and ultimate the deliverances of our mere apparent thinking, without considering whether there is not a real thinking at the back of this apparent thinking, by which all its decisions might be altered or reversed. In a word, I hold that the real operations of our minds are just as little apparent on the surface of our ordinary consciousness as the real revolutions of the heavenly bodies are apparent to the eye of the ordinary and uninstructed observer. While, on the contrary, our antecedent philosophy is of opinion that our apparent is our real thinking, or that there is no real thinking carried on in the human mind of a character totally different from the apparent thinking which is there transacted. It is on this ground that our antecedent philosophy lays claim to the title of common sense; an appellation which may be conceded to it, if by common sense is meant only the deliverance of our apparent thinking.