defined—the Ego as it places and offers itself by thesis and antithesis. According to Kant, it is the necessary science of the laws and causes of spontaneous reason. Cicero says that philosophy is rerum divinarum et humanarum causarumque, quibus hæ res continentur, scientia; and this is, perhaps, the popular notion of the word, so that all scientific studies are included in the general term of philosophy. Thus we speak of the philosophy of history, the philosophy of language, the philosophy of manufactures, of laws, and so forth. A writer of the name of Mr. Robert Hooke tries to impress upon his readers the vast extent of philosophy in the following curious dissertation:
“The history of potters, tobacco-pipe makers, glass-grinders, looking-glass makers or foilers, spectacle-makers and optic-glass makers, makers of counterfeit pearl and precious stones, bugle-makers, lamp-blowers, color-makers, color-grinders, glass-painters, enamellers, varnishers, color-sellers, painters, limners, picture-drawers, makers of babies’ heads, of little bowling stones or marbles, fustian-makers, music-masters, tinsey makers and taggers; the history of school-masters, writing-masters, printers, bookbinders, stage-players, dancing masters and vaulters, apothecaries, chirurgeons, seamsters, butchers, barbers, laundresses, and cosmetics, etc., etc. (the true nature of each of which being exactly determined), will hugely facilitate our inquiries in philosophy.”
By most scholastics philosophy is defined as a cognitio certa et evidens. These are the words of Goudin, and we observe that they are adopted by Father Lepidi in the first volume of his new work. Gonzales, however, demurs to assent to this, for the reason that in philosophy many questions are discussed of which we have neither evidence nor certainty. The objection is inserted and responded to in Father
Lepidi’s book, and also in the works of Goudin. The proper and primary object of philosophy is certain and evident; it treats of questions that are obscure only secondarily and consequenter. Nevertheless, Gonzales prefers to define philosophy as cognitio scientifica et rationalis Dei, mundi et hominis, quo viribus naturalibus per altiores causas seu principia habetur. In the latter words of the definition he is in conformity with the rest of his school, but in the first part—that is, in the genus of the definition—he differs from them.
The essence of philosophy being determined, at least in the sense in which the author is going to treat of it, we are next invited to decide upon a suitable division. The older scholastics had divided it into four parts: logic; physics, whose object was ens mobile, or all changeable nature; metaphysics, which treated of being in the abstract, and all concrete objects which transcend the powers of the senses; and ethics. Some added a fifth part—namely, mathematics. Goudin’s definition of philosophy seems capable of embracing this science also; however, he disposes of it, whether consistently or not we need not stop to inquire.
Later Christian writers, who have adhered in the main to the doctrines of the scholastics, have somewhat varied their division. Physics in its details is excluded from philosophy strictly so called, while in its more universal relations it is considered as belonging to metaphysics. Thus the science of the laws of the world is called cosmology, and the science of the soul, its essence, its faculties, and its operations, is called psychology. Cosmology and psychology, together with theodicy or natural theology, are the subdivisions of special metaphysics,
while the science of being is called ontology or general metaphysics.
However, Gonzales refuses to grant that psychology belongs properly to metaphysics, because, although the soul of which it treats is beyond the ken of the senses, yet the operations of the soul depend upon them and are recognized by them. He determines, therefore, that this science belongs as much to ethics and to logic as to metaphysics: to metaphysics, inasmuch as it treats of the essence of the soul; to logic, as it regards the faculties of cognition; to ethics, as far as it concerns the moral power. Later on, when Gonzales comes to treat of psychology ex professo, he suggests that it should be either reduced again to physics or made a distinct and special portion of philosophy. Such is the unsatisfactory consideration of the question by men eminent for their science. We see in the newly-issued volume of Father Lepidi’s philosophy that in his division he leaves out altogether the words physics and metaphysics, and proposes the following heads: logic, general ontology, cosmology, anthropology, natural theology, and ethics. This mode of division seems to us, with all due deference to Bishop Gonzales and other writers, the most satisfactory. Moreover, it is explained by Father Lepidi in a most logical manner, based as it is upon two incontrovertible philosophical maxims. Before we leave this subject of the division, we will mention that proposed by the late Canon Sanseverino in his great work, which, unfortunately, was never completed. He considers philosophy under a twofold aspect, subjective and objective. Subjective philosophy is divided into four branches—logica, dynamilogia, idealogia,
and criteriologia. Objective philosophy has also four parts—naturalis theologia, cosmologia, anthropologia, ethica. We observe that he is one with Father Lepidi in discarding the use of those vague terms of which we have spoken.
Father Gonzales has published his work in three volumes, the first of which comprises the tractates of Logic and Psychology. In the Logic we have noticed nothing particular to be mentioned, excepting its completeness and the exceeding clearness with which the subjects are treated. The treatise of Psychology, however, has greatly interested us, and is the best we have seen. It is divided into two parts, empiric and rational. Psychologia empirica treats of the powers of the soul, and we notice in a few instances a deviation from the explicit doctrine of Goudin. For instance, those species or representations of objects which are received in the cognitive senses, are stated by Gonzales to be immaterial and spiritual, while Goudin has said that they are material. It might, perhaps, be suggested that these species may be called immateriales negative. This epithet is allowed by the author to be applied to the anima of brutes; and as the species we speak of belong to animal life, they must be of the same nature. Cognition is a vital act, and all vitality is above the condition of that which is merely material. A very recent writer has implied that St. Thomas distinguishes immaterial and spiritual existences. We do not remember to have noticed such a distinction in his works. Perhaps the writer makes allusion to the doctrine that some operations of material beings transcend the qualities of matter—v.g., sensitive cognition. Yet these operations