Elements of the philosophy of the human mind. By Dugald Stewart. Rev. and abridged, with critical and explanatory notes, for the use of colleges and schools. By Francis Bowen ...

440 -REA SONING AND DEDUCTIVE EVIDENCE.
ancholy to reflect, that a writer, who, in his earlier years, had
so admirably unfolded the mighty influence of language upon
our speculative conclusions, should have left behind him, in one
of his latest pub[;cations, so memorable an illustration of his
own favorite doctrine.
It was manifestly with a view to the more complete establishment of the same theory, that Condillac undertook a work,
which has appeared since his death, under the title of La Lang ue des C'alculs; and which, we are told by the editors, was
only meant as a prelude to other labors, more interesting and
more difficult. From the circumstances which they have stated,
it would seema that the intention of the author was to extend to
all the other branches of knowledge, inferences similar to those
whicl lie has here endeavored to establish with respect to mathematical calculations; and much regret is expressed by his
firiends, that he had not lived to accomplish a design of such
incalculable importance to human happiness. I believe I may
safely venture to assert, that it was fbrtunate for his reputation
lie proceeded no further; as the sequel must, from the nature
of the subject, have afforded, to every competent judge, an experimental and palpable proof of the vagueness and fallaciousness of those views by which the undertaking was suggested.
In his posthumous volume, the mathematical precision and
perspicuity of his details appear to a superficial reader to reflect
some part of' their own light on the general reasonings with
which they are blended; while to better judges, these reasonings come recommended with many advantages and with much
additional authority, from their coincidence with the doctrines
of the Leibnitzian school.
Condillac's doctr ine anticipated by Hobbes. - It would probably have been not a little mortifying to this most ingenious and
respectable philosopher, to have discovered, that, in attempting
to generalize a very celebrated theory of Leibnitz, he had
stumbled upon an obsolete conceit, started in this island upwards of a century before. "VWhen a man reasoneth," says
Hobbes, "he does nothing else but conceive a sum total, from
addition of parcels; or conceive a remainder from subtraction