[861] P. 22, 23.
100. It would be easy to quote many paragraphs of uncommon vivacity and acuteness from this forgotten treatise. The style is eminently spirited and eloquent; a little too figurative, like that of Locke, but less blameably, because Glanvil is rather destroying than building up. Every bold and original thought of others finds a willing reception in Glanvil’s mind, and his confident, impetuous style gives them an air of novelty which makes them pass for his own. He stands forward as a mutineer against authority, against educational prejudice, against reverence for antiquity.[862] No one thinks more intrepidly for himself; and it is probable that, even in what seems mere superstition, he had been rather misled by some paradoxical hypothesis of his own ardent genius, than by slavishly treading in the steps of others.[863]
[862] “Now, if we inquire the reason why the mathematics and mechanic arts have so much got the start in growth of other sciences, we shall find it probably resolved into this as one considerable cause, that their progress hath not been retarded by that reverential awe of former discoveries, which hath been so great a hindrance to theorical improvements. For, as the noble Lord Verulam hath noted, we have a mistaken apprehension of antiquity, calling that so which in truth is the world’s non-age. Antiquitas sæculi est juventus mundi. ‘Twas this vain idolising of authors which gave birth to that silly vanity of impertinent citations, and inducing authority in things neither requiring nor deserving it.—Methinks it is a pitiful piece of knowledge that can be learned from an index, and a poor ambition to be rich in the inventory of another’s treasure. To boast a memory, the most that these pedants can aim at, is but a humble ostentation.” P. 104.
[863] “That the fancy of one man should bind the thoughts of another, and determine them to their particular objects, will be thought impossible; which yet, if we look deeply into the matter, wants not its probability.” P. 146. He dwells more on this, but the passage is too long to extract. It is remarkable that he supposes a subtle æther (like that of the modern Mesmerists), to be the medium of communication in such cases; and had also a notion of explaining these sympathies by help of the anima mundi, or mundane spirit.
101. Glanvil sometimes quotes Lord Bacon, but he seems to have had the ambition of contending with the Novum Organum in some of its brilliant passages, and has really developed the doctrine of idols with uncommon penetration, as well as force of language. “Our initial age is like the melted wax to the prepared seal, capable of any impression from the documents of our teachers. The half-moon or cross are indifferent to its reception; and we may with equal facility write on this rasa tabula Turk or Christian. To determine this indifferency our first task is to learn the creed of our country, and our next to maintain it. We seldom examine our receptions, more than children do their catechisms, but by a careless greediness swallow all at a venture. For implicit faith is a virtue, where orthodoxy is the object. Some will not be at the trouble of a trial, others are scared from attempting it. If we do, ’tis not by a sun-beam or ray of light, but by a flame that is kindled by our affections, and fed by the fuel of our anticipations. And thus, like the hermit, we think the sun shines nowhere but in our cell, and all the world to be darkness but ourselves. We judge truth to be circumscribed by the confines of our belief and the doctrines we were brought up in.”[864] Few books, I think, are more deserving of being reprinted than the Scepsis Scientifica of Glanvil.
[864] P. 95.
His Plus Ultra. 102. Another bold and able attack was made on the ancient philosophy by Glanvil in his “Plus Ultra, or the Progress and Advancement of Knowledge since the days of Aristotle, 1668.” His tone is peremptory and imposing, animated and intrepid, such as befits a warrior in literature. Yet he was rather acute by nature, than deeply versed in learning, and talks of Vieta and Descarte’s algebra so as to show he had little knowledge of the science, or of what they had done for it.[865] His animosity against Aristotle is unreasonable, and he was plainly an incompetent judge of that philosopher’s general deserts. Of Bacon and Boyle he speaks with just eulogy. Nothing can be more free and bold than Glanvil’s assertion of the privilege of judging, for himself in religion;[866] and he had doubtless a perfect right to believe in witchcraft.
[865] Plus Ultra, p. 24 and 33.
[866] P. 142.
Dalgarno. 103. George Dalgarno, a native of Aberdeen, conceived, and, as it seemed to him, carried into effect the idea of an universal language and character. His Ara Signorum, vulgo Character Universalis et Lingua Philosophica, Lond., 1661, is dedicated to Charles II. in this philosophical character, which must have been as great a mystery to the sovereign as to his subjects. This dedication is followed by a royal proclamation in good English, inviting all to study this useful art, which had been recommended by divers learned men, Wilkins, Wallis, Ward, and others, “judging it to be of singular use for facilitating the matter of communication and intercourse between people of different languages.” The scheme of Dalgarno is fundamentally bad, in that he assumes himself, or the authors he follows, to have given a complete distribution of all things and ideas; after which his language is only an artificial scheme of symbols. It is evident that until objects are truly classified, a representative method of signs can only rivet and perpetuate error. We have but to look at his tabular synopsis to see that his ignorance of physics, in the largest sense of the word, renders his scheme deficient; and he has also committed the error of adopting the combinations of the ordinary alphabet, with a little help from the Greek, which, even with his slender knowledge of species, soon leave him incapable of expressing them. But Dalgarno has several acute remarks; and it deserves especially to be observed, that he anticipated the famous discovery of the Dutch philologers, namely, that all other parts of speech may be reduced to the noun, dexterously, if not successfully, resolving the verb substantive into an affirmative particle.[867]