[278:1] Inquiry concerning Human Understanding, sect. viii.
[283:1] This matter seems on another occasion to have passed under his own view. In the "Dialogues concerning Natural Religion" he makes Philo say, "Strong and almost incontestable proofs may be traced over the whole earth, that every part of this globe has continued for many ages entirely covered with water. And though order were supposed inseparable from matter, and inherent in it, yet may matter be susceptible of many and great revolutions through the endless periods of eternal duration." That even Hume's argument makes allowance for miracles having some time or other existed, and that it can only be urged against this or that individual statement of an unnatural occurrence, is the weapon which Campbell wields with chief effect in his admirable dissertation.
[284:1] "Let us try how his manner of argument on this point can be applied to a particular instance. For this purpose I make the following supposition. I have lived for some years near a ferry. It consists with my knowledge that the passage boat has a thousand times crossed the river, and as many times returned safe. An unknown man, whom I have just now met, tells me in a serious manner that it is lost; and affirms, that he himself, standing on the bank, was a spectator of the scene; that he saw the passengers carried down the stream and the boat overwhelmed. No person, who is influenced in his judgment of things, not by philosophical subtleties, but by common sense, a much surer guide, will hesitate to declare, that in such a testimony I have probable evidence of the fact asserted."—Dissertation on Miracles, 46-47.
[285:1] Perhaps the earliest in date of these is, "An Essay on Mr. Hume's Essay on Miracles," by William Adams, M.A. chaplain to the Bishop of Llandaff, 1751.
[285:2] Warburton says to Hurd, on 28th September, 1749,—"I am strongly tempted to have a stroke at Hume in passing. He is the author of a little book called 'Philosophical Essays;' in one part of which he argues against the being of a God, and in another (very needlessly you will say,) against the possibility of miracles. He has crowned the liberty of the press: and yet he has a considerable post under the government. I have a great mind to do justice on his arguments against miracles, which I think might be done in a few words. But does he deserve notice? Is he known among you? Pray answer these questions. For if his own weight keeps him down, I should be sorry to contribute to his advancement to any place but the pillory." Letters from a late Rev. prelate to one of his friends, 1808, p. 11.
[286:1] Sect. iii.
[287:1] Preliminary Dissertation, Note T.
[287:2] "Quandoque remeniscitur aliquis incipiens ab aliqua re, cujus memoratur, a quâ procedit ad alium triplici ratione. Quandoque quidem ratione similitudinis, sicut quando aliquis memoratur de Socrate, et per hoc, occurrit ei Plato, qui est similis ei in sapientia; quandoque vero ratione contrarietatis, sicut si aliquis memoretur Hectoris, et per hoc occurrit ei Achilles. Quandoque vero ratione propinquitatis cujuscunque, sicut cum aliquis memor est patris, et per hoc occurrit ei filius. Et eadem ratio est de quacunque alia propinquitate, vel societatis, vel loci, vel temporis, et propter hoc fit reminiscentia quia motus horum se invicem consequuntur."—Aquinatis Comment. in Aristot. de Memoria et Remeniscentia; edit. Paris, 1660, p. 64. The scope of Aquinas' remarks have more reference to mnemonics or artificial memory than to association. They explain how a man, remembering what he did yesterday, may pass to the remembrance of what he did the day before, &c.
[288:1] See Dr. Brown's commentary on the history of theories of association, in his thirty-fourth Lecture. Sir William Hamilton, the highest living authority on these subjects, while he thinks that Aristotle has not got justice for the extent to which he has anticipated Hume and others in relation to this matter, does not think there is the slightest ground for the charge of plagiarism, and observes to me that Coleridge's own remarks on association are merely an adaptation from the German of Maas.
[289:1] 8vo, printed for A. Millar. It is in the Gentleman's Magazine list for November.