A critical examination of M. Cousin's lectures on Locke

William Henry Stanley Monck

Sujets

• Cousin
• Locke

Informations

• Publié par: les_archives_du_savoir
• Nombre de lectures: 8
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 10 Mo

Extrait

Digitized by the Internet Archive
in 2007 with funding from
IVIicrosoft Corporation
http://www.archive.org/details/criticalexaminatOOmoncrichCK^
CRITICAL EXAMINATIONA
•M. COUSIN'S
LOCKE.LECTURES ON
A\qLLIAM II. MOiNCK, A.B.S.
ETHIC.-i.MEDALMST IN LOGICS ANDSCIENCE SUHOLAU AXD FIRST GOLD
TKINITY COLLKGE, DUBLIN.
PART I
OF THl"^;V^
DUBLIN:
WILLIAM M^GEE, 18, NASSAU-STREET.
ROBERTS.LONDON: LONGMAN, GREEN, LONGMAN &
1862./37^.9V
N(^
Pl-?^
DUBLIN :
BUUNSWICK KTHEET.6 & 7, CHEATPREFACE
More than four years ago, the author of the present
treatise read a paper before the Undergraduate Philo-
"sophical onSociety M. Cousin's Criticism of Locke,"
in which of the viewsmost here advocated were main-
tained. He cannot, therefore, be censured for rushing
into print without having sufficiently matured his
views, and considered the justice of them while,; at
the same time, the present essay is so enlarged, that
the original paper forms but a small fraction of its
contents. Its object may be briefly explained. For
some time past M. Cousin's lectures on Locke have
formed a portion of the Undergraduate Course in this
University, and it is impossible to deny tliat they are,
in many respects, suited thisfor purpose. M. Cousin's
style is at once clear, lucid, and elegant, conveying
the most profound distinctions in philosophy in
language almost wholly free from the crabbed techni-
calities of the schoolman or the Kantian. It attracts
the youthful student, where a greater affectation of
philosophical precision would only repel him but it;
attiacts without substituting imagination for reflec-
tion, or leaving the facts of consciousness to soar
among the clouds. Nor can it be denied that it
embodies much of what is valuable in modern philo-rUEFACE.4
since the time of Locke and if the highestsophy ;
" (piXoao^iaobject of the metaphysician be to teach 'ov
in noaWa 0f\o(7o0eii/," M. Cousin certainly possesses,
of setting his readersordinary degree, the power
forget the high reputationa-thinking nor should we;
the somewhat lavish encomiumsof the lecturer, and
his the highest philosophicalbestowed on work by
authorities in the United Kingdom. But to these
great merits are joined still greater defects. If the
work of M. Cousin embodies almost all that is solid
in the philosophy of Locke's opponents, it overlooks
is inalmost every important truth that inculcated
the Essay on the Human Understanding—if it is of
great value as a philosophical treatise, as a criticism
it is, I apprehend, absolutely worthless—if the author
is thoroughly acquainted with the philosophy which
he advocates, is ofhe utterly ignorant that which he
undertakes to refute while in his eagerness to subvert;
the real or imagined doctrines of Locke, he is not
unfrequently betrayed into assertions most damaging
to himself, and indeed to all true philosophy. It is
therefore, I think, of no small importance that these
defects should be thoroughly exposed, and that the
youthful student, when about to profit by what is
sound in these lectures, should be provided with an
antidote against what is unsound. The general
dissatisfaction with which M. Cousin's criticisms have
been regarded for some years past in this University
may seem to render the task which I have undertaken
almost a superfluous one but that dissatisfaction has;
as yet scarcely found its appropriate expression in