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146  them apart it shows that reason is baffled in its attempts adequately to conceive either of them. It is in this way that Sir W. Hamilton and Mr Mansel achieved what they conceive to be a great triumph in proclaiming, or, as they think, in proving the impotency of human reason. But what if the conceptions thus set in opposition to each other are not conceptions at all, but are mere moments or elements of conception? If they are so—and I believe that they are so—that would make a great difference. The antagonism would no longer exist, or, if it existed, it would be a very different kind of antagonism from that for which Hamilton and Mansel contend. It would be an antagonism building up one indivisible conception, and, therefore, an antagonism essential to the very life and essence of reason itself, and not an antagonism by which reason is placed at variance with itself, and thus confounded, disabled, and paralysed.

 

1. next inquirer with whom we have to deal in our survey of the history of ancient philosophy is Empedocles of Agrigentum.

The philosophical remains of Empedocles consist of some fragments of a poem , or concerning nature; for, like Xenophanes and Parmenides, he recorded his opinions in verse. This didactic poem is rather physical and physiological than 