HISTORY OF CIVILIZATION IN ENGLAND.
BY
HENRY THOMAS BUCKLE.
IN THREE VOLUMES.
VOL. III.
NEW EDITION.
TORONTO:
ROSE-BELFORD PUBLISHING COMPANY,
60 YORK STREET.
1878.
ANALYTICAL TABLE OF CONTENTS.
| CHAPTER I. | |
| CONDITION OF SCOTLAND TO THE END OF THE FOURTEENTH CENTURY. | |
| PAGE | |
| Scotland and Spain are very dissimilar in regard to loyalty | [1] |
| But are very similar in regard to superstition | [4] |
| The Scotch unite liberality in politics with illiberality in religion.This is the largest and most important fact in their history; and the restof the Volume will be occupied in investigating its causes | [5] |
| Influence of physical geography | [5–7] |
| Roman invasion of Scotland | [7–9] |
| Irish invasion of Scotland | [9] |
| Norwegian invasion of Scotland | [11–12] |
| English invasion of Scotland | [12–17] |
| The injury which these invasions inflicted upon Scotland stopped thegrowth of towns, and thereby favoured the power of the nobles | [18] |
| The power of the nobles was still further favoured by the physicalstructure of the country | [19–20] |
| And by the weakness of the Crown | [20–21] |
| Hence their authority had, before the close of the fourteenth century,become enormous. The Crown, completely overshadowed by them, could deriveno aid from the citizens, because, owing to the circumstances just mentioned,there were no cities | [21–23] |
| For, industry was impossible, and the commonest arts were unknown | [23–26] |
| Evidence of the scanty population of the Scotch towns | [26–30] |
| They were too feeble and insignificant to elect their own magistrates | [32–33] |
| The municipal element being thus imperfect, the only ally, which theCrown could possibly find, was the Church | [34–35] |
| Hence, a coalition between the kings and the clergy against the nobles | [34] |
| The clergy were the only body who could withstand the nobles. Causes ofthe great influence of the clergy | [35–44] |
| CHAPTER II. | |
| CONDITION OF SCOTLAND IN THE FIFTEENTH AND SIXTEENTH CENTURIES. | |
| Early in the fifteenth century, the alliance between the Crown and theChurch against the nobles, became obvious | [45] |
| James I. attacked the nobles, and favoured the Church; hoping thereby toestablish the supremacy of the throne | [46–47] |
| But his policy failed, because it was opposed by the operation of generalcauses | [47–48] |
| Besides failing, it produced his own destruction | [49] |
| Power of the Douglases, who were at the head of the southern nobility | [49–50] |
| James II. murdered the chiefs of that family | [51–52] |
| The Crown, in its efforts against the nobles, was encouraged by the clergy;and before the middle of the fifteenth century, the Church and thearistocracy were completely estranged from each other | [52–54] |
| James III., like James II. and James I., allied himself with the clergyagainst the nobles | [55–56] |
| Their power, however, was too deeply rooted to be shaken; and in 1488,they put the king to death | [55] |
| Still, and notwithstanding these successive failures, James IV. followed thesame policy as his predecessors | [56] |
| So did James V. Consequently the nobles imprisoned him, and ejected theclergy from all offices in the state | [57] |
| In 1528, James V. escaped; the Crown and the Church regained the ascendant,and the principal nobles were banished | [58] |
| From this moment, the nobles hated the Church more than ever. Their hatredbrought about the Reformation | [58–59] |
| Active measures of the government against the nobles | [60–61] |
| The nobles revenged themselves by becoming Reformers | [62] |
| James V., on the other hand, threw himself entirely into the arms of the Church | [62–63] |
| As the nobles took the opposite side, and as the people had no influence,the success or failure of the Reformation in Scotland was simply a question of the success or failure of the aristocratic power | [65–68] |
| In 1542, the nobles openly refused obedience to James V.; and their treatmentof him at this critical period of his life, broke his heart | [68–69] |
| Directly he died, they regained authority. The clergy were displaced, andmeasures favourable to Protestantism were adopted | [69–72] |
| In 1546, Cardinal Beaton was assassinated, and Knox began his career | [74–75] |
| Subsequent proceedings of Knox | [76–77] |
| While Knox was abroad, the nobles established the Reformation | [78] |
| He returned to Scotland in 1559, by which time the struggle was nearly over | [79] |
| In 1559, the queen regent was deposed; the nobles became supreme; and, in1560, the Church was destroyed | [80–84] |
| Immediately this revolution was completed, the nobles and the preachersbegan to quarrel about the wealth of the Church | [84] |
| The nobles, thinking that they ought to have it, took it into their own hands | [85–88] |
| Thereupon, the Protestant preachers said that the nobles were instigated bythe devil | [88–90] |
| Morton, who was at the head of the nobility, became enraged at theproceedings of the new clergy, and persecuted them | [91–92] |
| A complete rupture between the two classes | [93] |
| The clergy, finding themselves despised by the governing class, united themselvesheartily with the people, and advocated democratic principles | [93] |
| In 1574, Melville became their leader. Under his auspices, that greatstruggle began, which never stopped until, sixty years later, it producedthe rebellion against Charles I. | [94] |
| The first manifestations of this rebellious spirit was the attack on thebishops | [94] |
| In 1575, the attack began. In 1580, episcopacy was abolished | [96–97] |
| But the nobles upheld that institution, because they loved inequality forthe same reasons which made the clergy love equality | [97–100] |
| Struggle between the upper classes and the clergy respecting episcopacy | [100–103] |
| In 1582, James VI. was imprisoned; and his captivity was justified by theclergy, whose democratic principles were now openly proclaimed | [103–104] |
| Violent language used by the clergy against the king and against the nobles | [104–109] |
| Their leader, Melville, personally insulted the king, and they were probablyprivy to the Gowrie conspiracy in 1600 | [110] |
| Still, the clergy, notwithstanding the indecency of their conduct, conferredthe greatest of all boons upon Scotland, by keeping alive and nurturing thespirit of liberty | [111–114] |
| CHAPTER III. | |
| CONDITION OF SCOTLAND DURING THE SEVENTEENTH AND EIGHTEENTH CENTURIES. | |
| In 1603, the King of Scotland became also King of England, and determinedto use his new resources in curbing and chastising the Scotch clergy | [115–122] |
| His cruel treatment of them | [122–124] |
| In 1610, James, backed by the power of England, forced episcopacy uponScotland. Courts of High Commission were also set up | [125–127] |
| Tyrannical conduct of the bishops | [127–129] |
| Meanwhile, a reaction was preparing | [129–132] |
| In 1637, the reaction declared itself, and, in 1638, the bishops wereoverthrown | [132–133] |
| The movement being essentially democratic, could not stop there, but quicklyspread from the Church to the State. In 1639, war was made upon Charles I.by the Scotch, who, having defeated the king, sold him to the English, whoexecuted him | [134–136] |
| The Scotch, before they would crown Charles II., compelled him to humblehimself, and to confess his own errors and the errors of his family | [136–137] |
| But, after Charles II. mounted the throne of England, he became powerfulenough to triumph over the Scotch. He availed himself of that power tooppress Scotland even more grievously than his two predecessors had done | [137–140] |
| Happily, however, the spirit of liberty was strong enough to baffle hisattempts to establish a permanent despotism | [140] |
| Still, the crisis was terrible, and the people and their clergy wereexposed to every sort of outrage | [141–146] |
| Now, as before, the bishops aided the government in its efforts to enslaveScotland. Being hated by the people, they allied themselves with the Crown,and displayed the warmest affection towards James II., during whose reigncruelties were perpetrated worse than any previously known | [147–150] |
| In 1688, another reaction, in which the Scotch again freed themselves fromtheir oppressors | [151] |
| The only powerful friends of this bad government were the Highlanders | [151] |
| Reasons which induced the Highlanders to rebel in favour of the Stuarts | [151–153] |
| The Highland rebellions of 1715 and 1745 were not the result of loyalty | [153–159] |
| After 1745, the Highlanders sank into complete insignificance, and theprogress of Scotland was uninterrupted | [159] |
| Beginning of the trading spirit | [160–161] |
| Connexion between the rising of the trading spirit and the abolition, in1748, of hereditary jurisdictions | [161–162] |
| The abolition of these jurisdictions was a symptom of the declining powerof the Scotch nobles, but not a cause of it | [161] |
| One cause of the decline of their power was the union with England, in 1707 | [162–167] |
| Another cause was the failure of the Rebellion of 1745 | [167] |
| The nobles being thus weakened, were, in 1748, easily deprived of their rightof jurisdiction. In this way, they lost the last emblem of their old authority | [169–170] |
| This great democratic and liberating movement was aided by the growth ofthe mercantile and manufacturing classes | [171–172] |
| And their growth was itself assisted by the Union with England | [172] |
| Evidence of the rapid progress of the industrious classes in the first halfof the eighteenth century | [173–183] |
| During the same period, a new and splendid literature arose in Scotland | [183–184] |
| But, unfortunately, this literature, notwithstanding its bold and inquisitivespirit, was unable to diminish national superstition | [184–186] |
| It is the business of the historian to ascertain the causes of its failure.If he cannot do this, he cannot understand the history of Scotland | [186] |
| The first and most essential quality of an historian, is a clear perceptionof the great scientific doctrine of Law. But whoever seeks to apply thisdoctrine to the whole course of history, and to elucidate, by its aid, themarch and theory of affairs, is met by obstacles which no single mind canremove | [186–190] |
| CHAPTER IV. | |
| AN EXAMINATION OF THE SCOTCH INTELLECT DURING THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY. | |
| The rest of the Volume will be occupied with a still closer investigation ofthe double paradox presented by the history of Scotland; namely, 1st, thatthe same people should be liberal in politics, and illiberal in religion;and, 2nd, that the free and sceptical literature which they produced in theeighteenth century, should have been unable to lessen their religiousilliberality | [191] |
| Their religious illiberality was the result of the immense power possessedby their clergy in the seventeenth century. The causes of that power willbe examined in the present chapter | [192] |
| The failure of their literature in diminishing this illiberality duringthe eighteenth century, was the result of the peculiar method of theinquiry adopted by the Scotch philosophers. The causes of the universaldiffusion of that method, the nature of the method, and the consequencesof it, will be examined in the next chapter, which will conclude theVolume | [192–193] |
| Circumstances in the seventeenth century favourable to the influence ofthe Scotch clergy | [193–197] |
| While the English war against Charles I. was essentially political, theScotch war against him was essentially religious | [197–200] |
| Though this was the effect of Scotch superstition, it was also a cause ofits further progress | [201–202] |
| Hence, in the seventeenth century, secular interests were neglected, andtheological ones became supreme. Illustration of this, from the zeal ofthe people to hear sermons of inordinate frequency and of terriblelength; so that they passed the greater part of their lives in what wereerroneously termed religious exercises | [203–206] |
| The clergy availed themselves of these habits to extend and consolidatetheir own authority | [205–206] |
| Their great engine of power was the Kirk-Session. Tyranny of theKirk-Sessions | [206–210] |
| Monstrous pretensions of the clergy | [210–212] |
| Cases in which it was believed that these pretensions were upheld andvindicated by miracles | [212–220] |
| The clergy, becoming elated, indulge in language of extraordinaryarrogance | [221–227] |
| They asserted that miracles were wrought in their behalf, and often ontheir persons | [228–229] |
| Effect of these proceedings upon the Scotch mind | [230–232] |
| The clergy, to intimidate the people, and bring them completely undercontrol, advocated horrible notions concerning evil spirits and futurepunishments | [232–243] |
| With the same object they propounded notions more horrible still,respecting the Deity, whom they represented as a cruel, passionate, andsanguinary Being | [245–252] |
| They moreover declared that harmless and even praiseworthy actions weresinful, and would provoke the Divine wrath | [251–262] |
| To prevent such imaginary sins, the clergy made arbitrary regulations,and punished those who disobeyed them, sometimes by flogging, andsometimes by branding with hot irons, and sometimes in other ways | [262–263] |
| Specimens of the sins which the clergy invented | [264–268] |
| The result was, that all mirth, all innocent gaiety, all demonstrationsof happiness, and nearly all physical enjoyments, were destroyed inScotland | [268–269] |
| Hence, the national character was mutilated. For, the pleasures of thebody are, in our actual condition, as essential a part of the greatscheme of life, and are as necessary to human affairs, as are thepleasures of the mind | [269–271] |
| But the clergy, by denouncing these pleasures of the senses, do what theycan, in every country, to diminish the total amount of happiness of whichhumanity is susceptible, and which it has a right to enjoy | [271–275] |
| In no Protestant country have the clergy pushed these narrow and unsocialtenets so far as in Scotland | [275–276] |
| Indeed, in some respects, the Scotch clergy were more ascetic than thoseof any branch of the Catholic Church, except the Spanish; since theyattempted to destroy the affections, and to sever the holiest ties ofdomestic love | [276–279] |
| CHAPTER V. | |
| AN EXAMINATION OF THE SCOTCH INTELLECT DURING THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY. | |
| The Scotch philosophical literature of the eighteenth century, was areaction against the theological spirit of the seventeenth | [281] |
| But the peculiarity of the philosophy which now arose, is that, insteadof being an inductive philosophy, it was a deductive one | [281–282] |
| This is well worthy of notice; because the inductive method beingessentially anti-theological, it might have been expected that theopponents of the theological spirit would have followed that method | [282–284] |
| The truth, however, was, that the theological spirit had taken such holdof the Scotch mind, that it was impossible for the inductive method togain a hearing | [284–289] |
| Hence, the secular philosophy of the eighteenth century, though new inits results, was not new in the method by which those results wereobtained | [289] |
| In this respect, Scotland is similar to Germany, but dissimilar toEngland | [289–290] |
| Summary of the most important distinctions between induction anddeduction | [291] |
| The whole of the Scotch philosophy, physical as well as metaphysical, isdeductive | [291] |
| Hutcheson's philosophy | [292–304] |
| Its results and tendency | [292–299] |
| Its method | [299–304] |
| Adam Smith's philosophy | [304–330] |
| His Theory of Moral Sentiments and his Wealth of Nations aredifferent parts of one subject. To understand either, we must study both | [304–305] |
| His deductive method depended upon a suppression of premisses | [304–309] |
| Account of his Theory of Moral Sentiments | [309–314] |
| Account of his Wealth of Nations | [314–330] |
| Hume's philosophy | [331–349] |
| His want of imagination | [331–332] |
| Importance and novelty of his doctrines | [333–337] |
| His method was eminently deductive; and he, like Adam Smith, cared littlefor experience | [337–341] |
| Hence, his injustice to Bacon, whose method was diametrically opposed tohis own | [338–339] |
| His Natural History of Religion | [342–348] |
| Comparison between the method of this work, and the method employed byCudworth | [348] |
| Reid's philosophy | [349–361] |
| His timidity made him look at the practical tendency of speculativedoctrines, instead of confining himself to the question of their truth orfalsehood | [349–354] |
| But a philosopher should deem it his business to ascertain new truths,without regard to their consequences | [349–350] |
| Reid attacked Hume's method, because he disliked the results to whichthat method had led | [354–355] |
| And yet, in raising his own philosophy, he followed the very same methodhimself | [355–359] |
| Estimate of the value of what Reid effected | [359–360] |
| Opposition between the method of Reid and that of Bacon | [360–361] |
| In physical philosophy, the deductive method was equally prevalent inScotland | [361–seq.] |
| The laws of heat | [362] |
| Indestructibility of force. Interchange of forces | [362–365] |
| Black's philosophy | [367–377] |
| His theory of latent heat prepared the way for subsequent discoveries | [367–371] |
| His method was deductive, and does not come under any of the rules of theBaconian philosophy | [371–372] |
| He reasoned from his principles speculatively, instead ofoccupying himself with a long course of experiments | [372–377] |
| To do this was to indulge the imagination, which is deemed dangerous bythe inductive school of English physicists. But, in the pursuit of truth,we need all our powers; and the advance of physical science is retardedby our neglect of the imaginative and emotional faculties | [377–382] |
| Black, therefore, did immense service by giving free scope, to theimagination. The same plan was pursued by his successor, Leslie | [383] |
| Leslie's philosophy of heat | [383–388] |
| He derived great aid from poetry | [385] |
| And was unjust to Bacon, whose inductive views he disliked | [388] |
| Fire and water are the two causes which have altered, and are stillaltering, the crust of the earth. The supposition that volcanic actionwas formerly more powerful than at present, is quite consistent with thedoctrines of an unbroken sequence of events, and of the uniformity ofnatural laws | [388–390] |
| The action of fire and water on the crust of the earth, may be studieddeductively, by computing separately the probable operation of each. Orthey maybe studied inductively, by observing their united effects, andrising from the effects to the causes; while the deductive plan is todescend from the causes to the effects | [390–391] |
| Of these two methods, the English followed the inductive; the Scotch andGermans followed the deductive | [391] |
| English geology founded by William Smith | [391–393] |
| German geology founded by Werner | [393–395] |
| Scotch geology founded by Hutton | [396] |
| The English observed effects in order to ascertain causes. The Germans,assuming water to be the cause, reasoned from it to the effects. TheScotch, assuming heat to be the cause, made its principles the first stepin their argument | [391–396] |
| Reasons which made the Scotch geologists argue from the principles ofheat, instead of, like the German geologists, arguing from the principlesof water | [396] |
| Though Hutton founded the theory of metamorphic rocks, and ascribed suchimmense importance to heat, he would not take the trouble of examining asingle region of active volcanos, where he might have seen those veryoperations of nature, respecting which he speculated | [398] |
| But, by a deductive application of the principles unfolded by Black, hearrived at a conclusion concerning the consolidation of strata by heat | [399–400] |
| That conclusion was entirely speculative, and unsupported by experience | [399] |
| Though experiment might perhaps verify it, no one had yet made the trial;and Hutton was too averse to the inductive method to undertake theinvestigation himself | [400–401] |
| Sir James Hall afterwards took the matter up, and empirically verifiedthe great idea which Hutton had propounded | [401–402] |
| Watt's invention of the steam-engine, and discovery of the composition ofwater | [402–406] |
| Contrast between the method by which he, as a Scotchman, discovered thecomposition of water, and the opposite method by which the Englishman,Cavendish, made the same discovery at the same time | [404–406] |
| Nature of the evidence of the supposed difference between the organic andinorganic world. Life is probably a property of all matter | [406–410] |
| Assuming, however, for the purposes of classification, that the organicworld is fundamentally different from the inorganic, we may divideorganic science into physiology and pathology | [410–412] |
| The two great Scotch pathologists are Cullen and John Hunter. Hunter,having a larger mind than Cullen, was also a physiologist | [412] |
| Account of Cullen's philosophy | [413–427] |
| His love of theory | [413] |
| Theory, though necessary in science, is dangerous in practice | [414–416] |
| Difference between the science of pathology and the art of therapeutics | [417–418] |
| Comparison between the method of Cullen's pathology and the methodemployed by Adam Smith | [417–419] |
| Cullen's theory of the solids | [420–seq.] |
| He refused to inquire into the truth of the principles from which heargued | [421–422] |
| His conclusions, like his premisses, represent only a part of the truth,and were extremely one-sided. Still, their value is unquestionable,forming, as they did, a necessary part of the general progress | [423–424] |
| His theory of fever | [424–426] |
| His nosology | [426–427] |
| The philosophy of John Hunter | [428–458] |
| His grandeur, and, unfortunately, his obscurity of language | [428–430] |
| In his mind, the inductive and deductive methods struggled for mastery.Their conflict oppressed him. This is one of the causes of the darknessof his thoughts and consequently of his style | [429–432] |
| His natural disposition was towards deduction | [432] |
| But circumstances made him inductive, and he collected facts withuntiring industry | [432–434] |
| By this means he made a large number of curious physiological discoveries | [434–436] |
| He traced the history of the red globules of the blood, and arrived atthe conclusion that their function is to strengthen the system ratherthan to repair it | [436–437] |
| Long after his death, this inference was corroborated by the progress ofmiscroscopical and chemical researches. It was especially corroborated byLecanu's comparison of the blood in different sexes, and in differenttemperaments. | [439] |
| Hunter's inquiries concerning the movements of animals and vegetables | [439–441] |
| He recognized the great truth that the sciences of the inorganic worldmust be the foundation of those of the organic | [443] |
| His object was, to unite all the physical sciences, in order to showthat, the operations of nature being always uniform, regularity prevailseven amidst the greatest apparent irregularity | [443–444] |
| Hence, aiming chiefly at a generalization of irregularities, hisfavourite study was pathology | [444] |
| In his pathological inquiries, he took into account the malformations ofcrystals | [445] |
| As a physiologist, he was equalled or excelled by Aristotle; but as apathologist, he is unrivalled for the grandeur of his views | [446–447] |
| In pathology, his love of deduction was more obvious than in physiology | [447] |
| His pathological speculations respecting the principles ofaction and the principles of sympathy | [448–452] |
| But his English contemporaries, being eminently inductive, so dislikedhis method, that he exercised scarcely any influence over them | [453] |
| This is the more observable, because his discoveries respecting diseasehave caused him to be recognized as the founder of modern surgery, andthe principal author of the doctrines now taught in the medicalprofession | [454–457] |
| Such were the great results achieved by Scotchmen in the eighteenthcentury. Difference between this splendid literature and the wretchedproductions of the Scotch mind in the seventeenth century. | [458–460] |
| Notwithstanding this difference, the deductive method was supreme in bothcenturies | [461] |
| The deductive method strikes the senses less than the inductive. Hence,induction being more accessible to average understandings, is morepopular than deduction. Hence, too, the teachings of an inductivephilosophy are more likely to affect national character than the teachingof a deductive philosophy | [461–464] |
| Theology forms the only exception to this rule | [464–465] |
| The Scotch literature of the eighteenth century, being essentiallydeductive, was, on that account, unable to affect the nation. It was,therefore, unable to weaken national superstition | [465–469] |
| Superstition and religious illiberality still existing in Scotland | [469–471] |
| The notions countenanced there respecting the origin of epidemics.Correspondence which, in consequence of those notions, took place, in1853, between the Scotch Church and the English Government | [471–476] |
| These superstitions are eminently irreligious, and are everywherebecoming effaced, as physical science advances. Nothing else can touchthem. Hence the gradual liberation of the human mind from the slavish andunmanly fears by which it has long been oppressed | [476–482] |
HISTORY OF CIVILIZATION IN ENGLAND.