which we now commonly assign to them: in this sense they may be attributed to Locke,35 Whenever the human mind, which occupies a merely receptive attitude towards sense-impressions, and even the formation of complex ideas, proceeds to fix by means of words the abstract ideas it has acquired, and to connect these words arbitrarily with thoughts, it enters upon the path where there is no longer the certainty of natural experience. The further man gets from the sensible, the more liable is he to error; and it is nowhere so common as in language. So soon as the words are treated as adequate pictures of things, or are confounded with real picturable things, while they are really only arbitrary signs for certain ideas which must be used with great care, the field is opened to innumerable errors. Locke's criticism of the understanding turns into a criticism of language, which in its main idea is probably of higher value than any other portion of the system. In fact, the way was paved by Locke to the important distinction of the purely logical from the psychologico-historical element of speech; but, apart from 76 The image of the "tabula, in qua nihil est actu scriptum" occurs in Aristotle, De Anima, iii. c. 4. In Locke, book ii. c. i. § 2, the mind is regarded simply as "white paper," but without any reference to the Aristotelian antithesis of potentiality and actuality. This antithesis is, however, just in this case of great importance, since the Aristotelian potentiality' of receiving all kinds of characters is conceived as a real property of the tablet, not as mere conceivability or absence of hindering circumstances. Aristotle therefore stands closer to those who, like Leibniz, and, in a deeper sense, Kant, do not, indeed, suppose that these are complete ideas in the soul, but that the conditions are present from which, upon contact with the external world, exactly that phenomenon will result which we call to have ideas, and with those pecu liarities that constitute the nature the previous labours of the philologists, has as yet scarcely been demanded as essential. And yet by far the majority of the conclusions which are generally applied in the philosophical sciences are logical fallacies, because of the constant confusion of notion and word. And so the old Materialistic view of the merely conventional force of words turned with Locke into the effort to make words merely conventional, because only when thus limited have they a fixed sense. In the last book Locke examines the nature of truth and of our cognitive faculties. Truth is the correct combination of signs (words, e.g.) forming a judgment. Truth in mere words can be nothing but a chimera. The syllogism has little use, for our thought always mediately or immediately directs itself to particulars. "Revelation' can give us no simple idea, and therefore cannot really extend our knowledge. Belief and thought are so related that the latter alone is decisive, so far as it goes; yet there are certain things which Locke' finally admits transcend the reason, and are therefore objects of belief. Strength of conviction, however, is no sign of truth; even of revelation the reason must judge, and enthusiasm is no evidence of the divine origin of a doctrine. Great influence was, moreover, exercised by Locke's "Letter on Toleration" (1685-92), "Thoughts on Education" (1693), the "Essay on Government" (1689), and the "Reasonableness of Christianity" (1695); but only a portion of these writings belong to the history of Materialism. With certain glance Locke had discovered the point in which the hereditary medieval institutions were rotten— the confusion of politics and of religion, and the diversion of political force to the maintenance or suppression of doctrines and opinions.77 It is obvious that if the object at 77 Also as regards the idea that the State should afford the liberty of expression in religious opinion, Locke had been forestalled by others, among whom Thomas More (in the Utopia, 1516) and Spinoza must be speci ally mentioned. Here again, then, his importance (comp. Note 74) is not so much due to originality as to the timely and fruitful carrying out of ideas which corresponded to the altered conditions of society. As to which Locke aimed were once attained-if Church and State were separated and universal toleration in matters of doctrine introduced-that the position of Materialism would be also necessarily changed. The earlier hide-andseek fashion in which its doctrines were expounded, and which lasted till late in the eighteenth century, had gradually to disappear. The simple cloak of anonymousness was longest retained; but even this was discarded, as at first the Netherlands, and later the country of Frederick the Great, offered a safe asylum to the freethinkers, until at length the French Revolution gave the death-blow to the old system. Among the English freethinkers who took up and carried further the ideas of Locke, none stands nearer to Materialism than John Toland, who was perhaps the first to conceive the notion of basing a new religious cultus upon a purely Naturalistic, if not Materialistic, doctrine. In his treatise,"Clidophorus," that is, the 'key-bearer,' he refers to the practice of the ancient philosophers to set forth an exoteric and an esoteric teaching, of which the former was intended for the general public, but the latter only for the circle of initiated disciples. Referring to this, he interjects, in the thirteenth chapter of the treatise, the following remarks :— "I have more than once hinted that the External and Internal Doctrine are as much now in use as ever; tho' the distinction is not so openly and professedly approv'd as among the Antients. This puts me in mind of what I was told by a near relation to the old Lord SHAFTESBURY. The latter, conferring one day with Major WILDMAN about the many sects of Religion in the world, they came to this conclusion at last: that notwithstanding those infinite divisions caus'd by the interest of the priests and the ignorance of the people, ALL WISE MEN ARE OF THE SAME RELIGION; whereupon a Lady in the room, who seem'd to the exceptions he makes to the rule ists and Catholics, comp. Hettner, of toleration with reference to Athe- i. 159 ff. mind her needle more than their discourse, demanded with some concern what that Religion was? To whom the Lord SHAFTESBURY strait reply'd, MADAM, WISE MEN NEVER TELL." Toland approves this proceeding, but thinks that he can suggest a way in which universal truth-speaking may be made possible :-"Let all men freely speak what they think, without being ever branded or punish'd but for wicked practises, and leaving their speculative opinions to be confuted or approv'd by whoever pleases; then you are sure to hear the whole truth, and till then but very scantily, or obscurely, if at all." Toland himself has frankly enough expressed his esoteric doctrine in the anonymous "Pantheistikon" (Cosmopolis, 1720). He demands in this treatise the entire laying aside of revelations and of popular beliefs, and the construction of a new religion which agrees with philosophy. His God is the universe; from which everything is born, into which everything returns. His cultus is that of truth, liberty, and health, the three things most highly prized by the wise man. His saints and fathers are the masterspirits and most excellent authors of all times, especially of classical antiquity; but even they form no authority to chain the free spirit of mankind.' The president cries in the Sokratic liturgy, 'Swear by no master's word!' and the answer comes back to him from the congregation, 'Not even by the word of Sokrates! '78 78 For fuller information as to Toland, especially as to his first work, which connects itself closely with Locke, "Christianity not Mysterious," 1696, see in Hettner, Literaturg. d. 18 Jahrh., i. S. 170 ff. The most striking features' of the 'Sokratic Liturgy' are given by Hettner in the same place, S. 180 ff. Hettner has also quite rightly referred to the connection of English Deism with Freemasonry. Here, too, may be indicated the special point, that Toland treats his cultus of the 'Pantheists' distinctly in the sense of the esoteric doctrine of philosophy, as the cultus of a secret society of illuminati. The initiated may at the same time give way to a certain extent to the crude ideas of the people, which, as contrasted with them, consists of children who have not yet attained the years of discretion, if only they succeed, through their influence in the State and in society, in rendering fanaticism harmless. These thoughts are expressed chiefly in the appendix, "De Duplici Pantheistarum Philosophia." The following striking passage from the In the "Pantheistikon," however, Toland expresses his views with so much generality, that his Materialism does not appear decided. What he takes from Cicero (Acad. Quaest., i. c. 6, 7) as to the being of nature, the unity of force and matter (vis and materia), is, in fact, rather Pantheistic than Materialistic; on the other hand, we find a Materialistic theory of nature laid down in two letters to a Spinozist, which are appended to the "Letters to Serena" (London, 1704). The lady who thus gives her name to the letters is Sophie Charlotte, Queen of Prussia, whose friendship with Leibniz is well known, and who had also graciously received Toland (who spent many years in Germany), and listened with interest to his views. The three first letters of the collection, which were actually addressed to Serena, are general in their nature; yet Toland expressly observes in the preface that he has corresponded with the noble lady on other and much more interesting subjects, but that he possesses no fair copy of these letters, and therefore adds the two other letters. The first of these contains a refutation of Spinoza, based on the impossibility of explaining from the Spinozistic system the motion and internal variety of the world and its constituent parts. The second letter handles the kernel of the whole question of Materialism. It might be called 'Kraft und Stoff,' if it were not that we must consider the title it actually bears, 'Motion Essential to Matter,' to be even clearer. We have repeatedly seen how deeply the old notion of second chapter of this appendix ("Pantheistikon," Cosmopolis, 1720, p. 79 ff.) may here find a place : 66 At cum superstitio semper eadem sit vigore, etsi rigore aliquando diversa; cumque nemo sapiens eam penitus ex omnium animis evellere, quod nullo facto fieri potest, incassum tentaverit: faciet tamen pro viribus, quod unice faciendum restat; ut dentibus evulsis et resectis unguibus, non ad lubitum quaquaversum noceat hoc monstrorum omnium pes Viris simum ac perniciosissimum. principibus et politicis, hac animi dispositione imbutis, acceptum referri debet, quidquid est ubivis hodie religiosae libertatis, in maximum literarum, commerciorum et civilis concordiae emolumentum. Superstitiosis aut simulatis superum cultoribus, larvatis dico hominibus aut meticulose piis, debentur dissidia, secessiones, mulctae, rapinae, stigmata, incarcerationes, exilia et mortes." |