Page:Mind (Old Series) Volume 11.djvu/441

 440 NEW BOOKS. Pascal". Pascal, he contends, was a sceptic only in appearance. The appearance of scepticism was produced by his taking in his Apology the line of appealing to the heart rather than the intellect. To make the ground clear for this appeal, he balances one philosophical doctrine against another, " dogmatism, for example, against " scepticism," showing that it is impossible to decide on rational grounds for either ; and, in general, he tries to bring out the mutual contradictions of philosophical systems. With respect to philosophy, therefore, he might be called a sceptic ; but he is not to be placed among the philosophers, but among the Christian saints, or, if the term is preferred, mystics ; and his " sceptical " method is one that had been employed before, in particular by the Fathers of the Church. He makes use of this method because his aim, like theirs, is not simply to furnish a proof of religion, but to convert unbelievers. It is an error to suppose, as Lange does, that from being a philosophical sceptic he became a believer in revealed religion on grounds of faith ; that, as has been fre- quently represented, he was a kind of "Romantic" of the 17th century, who, to escape doubt, threw himself upon faith by a movement of reaction. On the contrary, his philosophical " scepticism " was really the result of an increased intensity of faith. He at first accepted the philosophical proofs of religion, but afterwards came to hold demonstration in contempt as com- pared with appeals to the heart and to the will. And the doctrine of Pascal is no more sceptical than his method is in reality. For, while he rejects equally " scepticism " and " dogmatism," the scepticism he rejects is the true scepticism, but the dogmatism he rejects is the false dogmatism, the dogmatism, namely, of philosophical systems that undertake to prove independently what can only be accepted as revealed. Philosophic de Stuart Mill. Par HENKI LAURET, Professeur agre'ge" de Philosophie, Docteur es Lettres. Paris: F. Alcan, 1886. Pp. 448. This book on the philosophy of J. S. Mill is divided into an expository part (pp. 17-260) in four chapters, entitled " Psychology," " Logic," " Morals," " Idealist Positivism and Humanitarian Religion"; and a critical part (pp. 263-445), of which the first four chapters deal with the subjects of the exposition in the same order, while ch. v. furnishes a general con- clusion. The substance of the criticism of Mill's psychology and logic is that he recognises no activity of the Ego. For the rest, he is neither a con- sistent nominalist nor empiricist. No consistently empiricist logic, indeed, is possible ; for " consequent empiricism " is " the anarchy of thought " (p. 322). But it is in his treatment of questions of morals and religion that Mill is most inconsistent. Here his aspirations are always opposed to the doctrines he professes (p. 375). His great merit, apart from his work in the theory of politics and in political economy, is to have constructed a "philosophy of association" when before him there was only a "psy- chology of association ". " In spite of the insufficiency of association- ism," the author concludes, "Stuart Mill will remain as an illustrious representative of contemporary empiricism, which will have the honour of having enriched the philosophia perennis with two new data Habit and Heredity." La Peur. Etude psycho-physiologique par A. Mosso, Professeur a 1'Universite' de Turin. Traduit de I'ltalien par Friux H^NNENT, Membre du Conseil supe'rieur de 1'Instruction publique. Avec figures dans le texte, Paris: F. Alcan, 1886. Pp. 179. This translation, from (already) the third Edition of Prof. Mosso's La Paura (see MIND, vol. x. 619), should give still wider currency to the very brightly written and interesting book of an original scientific investigator.