Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Vol. 1. No 1, June 1850

by Various

dr. reid.

In answer to these metaphysical lunacies, Dr. Reid has contended that, for all reasoning, there must be some first principles from whence such reasoning originates, and which must necessarily be incapable of proof or they would not be first principles; and that facts so irresistibly ingrafted upon human belief as the existence of mind and matter, must be assumed for truths, and reasoned upon as such. All that these skeptics have said of the outer and the inner world may, with equal justice, be applied to every other radical truth. Who can prove his own personal identity? A man may think himself a clergyman, and believe he has preached for these ten years last past; but I defy him to offer any sort of proof that he has not been a fishmonger all the time ... ever doubt that all reasoning must end in arbitrary belief; that we must, at last, come to that point where the only reply can be, "I am so—this belief is the constitution of my nature—God willed it." I grant that this reasoning is a ready asylum for ignorance and imbecility, and that it affords too easy a relief from the pain of rendering a reason: but the most unwearied vigor of human talents must at last end there; the wisdom of ages can get no further; here, after all, the Porch, the Garden, the Academy, the Lyceum, must close their labors.

Much as we are indebted to Dr. Reid for preaching up this doctrine, he has certainly executed it very badly; and nothing can be more imperfect than the table of first principles which he has given us—an enumeration of which is still a desideratum of the highest importance. The skeptics may then call the philosophy of the human mind merely hypothetical; but if it be so, all other knowledge must, of course, be hypothetical also; and if it be so, and all is erroneous, it will do quite as well as reality, if we keep up a certain proportion in our errors: for there may be no such things as lunar tables, no sea, and no ships; but, by falling into one of these errors after the other, we avoid shipwreck, or, what is the same thing, as it gives the same pain, the idea of shipwreck. So with the philosophy of the human mind: I may have no memory, and no imagination—they may be mistakes; but if I cultivate them both, I derive honor and respect from my fellow-creatures, which may be mistakes also; but they harmonize so well together, that they are quite as good as realities. The only evil of errors is, that they are never supported by consequences; if they were, they would be as good as realities. Great merit is given to Dr. Reid for his destruction of what is called the ideal system, but I confess I can not see the important consequences to which it has yet led.

puns.

I have mentioned puns. They are, I believe, what I have denominated them—the wit of words. They are exactly the same to words which wit is to ideas, and consist in the sudden discovery of relations in language. A pun, to be perfect in its kind, should contain two distinct meanings; the one common and obvious; the other, more remote; and in the notice which the mind takes of the relation between these two sets of words, and in the surprise which that relation excites, the pleasure of a pun consists. Miss Hamilton, in her book on Education, mentions the instance of a boy so very neglectful, that he could never be brought to read the word patriarchs; but whenever he met with it he always pronounced it partridges. A friend of the writer observed to her, that it could hardly be considered as a mere piece of negligence, for it appeared to him that the boy, in calling them partridges, was making game of the patriarchs. Now, here are two distinct meanings contained in the same phrase; for to make game of the patriarchs is to laugh at them; or to make game of them is, by a very extravagant and laughable sort of ignorance of words, to rank them among pheasants, partridges, and other such delicacies, which the law takes under its protection and calls game; and the whole pleasure derived from this pun consists in the sudden discovery that two such different meanings are referable to one form of expression. I have very little to say about puns; they are in very bad repute, and so they ought to be. The wit of language is so miserably inferior to the wit of ideas, that it is very deservedly driven out of good company. Sometimes, indeed, a pun makes its appearance which seems for a moment to redeem its species; but we must not be deceived by them; it is a radically bad race of wit. By unremitting persecution, it has been at last got under, and driven into cloisters—from whence it must never again be suffered to emerge into the light of the world.

importance of being able to despise ridicule.

I know of no principle which it is of more importance to fix in the minds of young people than that of the most determined resistance to the encroachment of ridicule. Give up to the world, and to the ridicule with which the world enforces its dominion, every trifling question of manner and appearance; it is to toss courage and firmness to the winds, to combat with the mass upon such subjects as these. But learn from the earliest days to insure your principles against the perils of ridicule: you can no more exercise your reason, if you live in the constant dread of laughter, than you can enjoy your life, if you are in the constant terror of death. If you think it right to differ from the times, and to make a stand for any valuable point of morals, do it, however rustic, however antiquated, however pedantic it may appear—do it, not for insolence, but seriously and grandly—as a man who wore a soul of his own in his bosom, and did not wait till it was breathed into him by the breath of fashion. Let men call you mean, if you know you are just; hypocritical, if you are honestly religious; pusillanimous, if you feel that you are firm: resistance soon converts unprincipled wit into sincere respect; and no after-time can tear from you those feelings which every man carries within him who has made a noble and successful exertion in a virtuous cause.

bulls and charades.

A bull—which must by no means be passed over in this recapitulation of the family of wit and humor—a bull is exactly the counterpart of a witticism: for as wit discovers real relations that are not apparent, bulls admit apparent relations that are not real. The pleasure arising from bulls, proceeds from our surprise at suddenly discovering two things to be dissimilar in which a resemblance might have been suspected. The same doctrine will apply to wit and bulls in action. Practical wit discovers connection or relation between actions, in which duller understandings discover none; and practical bulls originate from an apparent relation between two actions which more correct understandings immediately perceive to have none at all. In the late rebellion in Ireland, the rebels, who had conceived a high degree of indignation against some great banker, passed a resolution that they would burn his notes; which they accordingly did, with great assiduity; forgetting, that in burning his notes they were destroying his debts, and that for every note which went into the flames, a correspondent value went into the banker's pocket. A gentleman, in speaking of a nobleman's wife of great rank and fortune, lamented very much that she had no children. A medical gentleman who was present observed, that to have no children was a great misfortune, but he thought he had remarked it was hereditary in some families. Take any instance of this branch of the ridiculous, and you will always find an apparent relation of ideas leading to a complete inconsistency.

I shall say nothing of charades, and such sort of unpardonable trumpery: if charades are made at all, they should be made without benefit of clergy, the offender should instantly be hurried off to execution, and be cut off in the middle of his dullness, without being allowed to explain to the executioner why his first is like his second, or what is the resemblance between his fourth and his ninth.