Contemporary Literature [pp. 549-569]

562 CONTEMPORARy LITERATURE. [July,
subject may be a comparative failure in one of these respects, and a comparative success in the other. It may present, and profess to present,
nothing beyond the merest commonplaces of the science. But it may do
this in a manner which greatly facilitates instruction in the undisputed elements of the science concerned, while it sheds no light on any disputed or
doubtful point; no new light of any sort whatever. On the other hand, many
of the ablest writers in the physical and metaphysical sciences, whose treatises
make positive additions to our knowledge and understanding of them; nay,
which become the head-springs of thought, the recognized sources, authorities,
or expositions of certain schools of doctrines, or of certain great drifts of discussion and controversy, are worse tban useless as text-books for the ordinary
class-room. Samples of these are Kant's Logic and Critique of Pure Reason;
Edwards on the Will and the Nature of Virtue, and others which will readily
be recalled. They may, by their power of original discussion, contribute
powerfully to mould the opinions and thinking of philosophic schools. But
because they were addressed to those presumed to be already trained and
cultured in the department concerned, they are wholly beyond the capacity
of beginners and young students.
Nor is this all. These great original treatises are very apt to be mainly or
altogether upon some single branch, or a few closely related branches, of the
science they deal with, as on the will, the conscience, the nature of virtue,
or either speculative ethics or practical ethics alone-the one exclusively of
the other-and hence unsuited to advantageous use in a course which, instead
of confining itself to or exhausting any section of a given science, takes a
brief and comprehensive view of its elements in themselves and their mutual
relations. And some which are prepared for text-books, even by experienced
and successful teachers, have partaken too much of this peculiarity. They
have spent themselves more in the defense and exposition of some special
theory, metaphysical or psychological, than in developing the various parts of
the science, pure and applied, in due order and proportion. Thus, Dr. Hopkins' Moral Science has for its leading aim the establishment and elucidation
of his happiness theory of virtue. Calderwood's Hand-book of Ethics is
more prominently a defense of the intuitional, as opposed to the sensuous or
empirical origin of our knowledge, and this as furnishing a foundation for the
intrinsic and anti-utilitarian character of virtue, than any adequate exposition of pure and applied ethics as a whole. As such these treatises are
in place for advanced students, for aid in the investigation of the special subjects they handle, for prize and fellowship contestants, but are ill adapted to
the elementary yet comprehensive courses of our American colleges, much
more of schools, male or female, high or low. On the other hand, such
works having the name and character of original contributions to this science,
and having acquired permanent influence and prominence in forming philosophical schools, as those of Locke on the Understanding, and of Reid on the
Intellectual, and Active and Moral Powers, are, with occasional omissions and
supplements, well fitted for use as text-books; certainly they were so in their
day, however antiquated now, in virtue of that simplicity and clearness,
which served not to destroy but to reveal their depth.