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CHA P. XV.

The APOLOGY.

N attack levelled fo openly and directly against a system of Univerfal Logic fanctioned by the authority of Aristotle and made venerable by its antiquity, and which has led the difcipline of this feat of learning for many ages, which maintains a kind of perfection in the opinion of many, holds a doubtful sway in the minds of fome, and is totally discarded by very few, may, I fufpect, offend the ears of moft of thofe who hear me, and found from this place, as the voice of blafphemy and rebellion and it will be fairly expected, that a charge fo folemn and unqualified fhould either be fubftantiated by fome evidence, or elle relinquished, or, at leaft, that fome apology should be made.

My APOLOGY is (if the love of Truth need an apology—a love which, as it thinks, it fears, no ill,) that I could not pursue the plan of these Lectures, of which the different Methods of Reafoning form the most effential part, without incurring the displeasure of the fchool-logic by noticing its defects. I am unwilling, I confefs, to relinquish the charge, because I am perfuaded in my own mind that it is juft, till otherwise convinced, and I am open to fair conviction and that my Apology may be fomething more than mere form and ceremony, at which my mind revolts as much as it loves the truth, I will endeavour to fubftantiate it, by bringing forward a proof or example of the falsehood and abfurdity of the Ariftotelian Dialectic, on which the school-discipline has been formed in every part of fcientific learning.

THE criterion of all found logic is, that it lead to truth; and the great exception which I have taken to the Topical or Dialectic Reasoning of the Stagyrite, is from the very hafty and unphilofophical method he

prescribes

prefcribes of forming the General Propofitions, Axioms, or Maxims, as the Principles from which all contingent and probable conclufions are to be drawn for, if they be infirmly and illogically framed, all Syllogifm of every kind will either conclude falfely, or unphilofophically at beft, owing it to accident, to conjecture, or to fophiftry, and not to found argument, if the conclufion should happen to prove true.

One of the universal fourfes, among a few others, from which Ariftotle, out of his wonderful invention, directs these Dialectical Propofitions to be formed into the Principles of probable reafoning, and that one of the least exceptionable, is the Rule ' of Contraries or Oppofites,' which he has

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* Ενδοξον δὲ καὶ ἐν παραβολῆ φανεῖται ΤΟ ΕΝΑΝΤΙΟΝ ΠΕΡΙ ΤΟΥ ΕΝΑΝΤΙΟΥ. Top. lib. i. cap. 1o. This Rule is triumphantly brought forward by his great modern champion to overfet a Principle of the Newtonian philofophy. It was in this way the ancients ar'gued concerning oppofite things; and particularly that great mafter of the Reasoning Art, Aristotle, who in his book of Topics, has taught us, that, if two things be 'oppofite, oppofite things will follow from them. Ariftotle expreffes the Rule of Reasoning in his short • way

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exemplified and illuftrated by a favourite inftance and the point to which I would direct your attention, is the Example of a Propofition forined from this Rule, which he means to be universal in its operation (for he has directed that all these Propofitions are to be as univerfal as poffible,') and which affects in its operation an interefting and important part of moral fcience-For example,' fays he, if it be a duty to wish well, and to do

good to our friends it is equally a duty to • wish ill, and to do evil to our enemies.'

The Propofition which forms the first part of the Oppofition It is a duty to wish well,

“way thus: Εἶ τὸ ἐναντίον ἐναντίῳ, καὶ τὸ ἐναντίον ἐναν

Tí. Ancient Metaphyfics 2 vol. p. 338.

το

See this 10th chapter of the 1ft book of Topics De Propofitione Dialectica.

» Ληπτέον δὲ, ὅτι μάλιςα καθόλα πάσας τὰς προτάσεις, καὶ τὴν μίαν, πολλὰς ποιητέον· οἷον, ὅτι τῶν ἀντικειμένων at sun. Ibid. Top. lib. i. cap. 14.

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Οἷον, εἰ τὰς φίλους δεῖ εὖ ποιεῖν, καὶ τὰς ἐχθρὸς δεῖ κακῶς· φανείη δ ̓ ἂν καὶ ἐναντίον τὸ τοὺς φίλους εὖ ποιεῖν, TW THs in Joe's xans. Ibid. lib. i. cap. 10.

See this favourite Rule of Contraries further illuftrated by the fame Example in the 7th chapter of the 2d book of Topics.

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and to do good to our friends,is, indeed, univerfally true: but the fecond, which from this great Rule of Contraries, Aristotle determined to be equally true-It is also a duty 'to wish ill, and to do evil to our enemies,. unfortunately for his Dialectic Reafoning upon this important fubject, happens to be univerfally false in every moral fenfe; and, by its application, has introduced many mischievous and fatal errors in practical philofophy. One might, indeed, be induced to conclude, and that from a principle and mode of reasoning more probable than those which are delivered in his Dialectics, that ONE, who despised fuch vague philofophy, had this falfe and pernicious axiom, which had made fuch havoc in the moral fyftem, in his omniscient mind, when he pronounced to his auditors upon the mount the following divine inftruction, "Ye have heard that it “hath been said, Thou shall love thy neighbour, and hate thine enemy: But I fay unto you, Love your Enemies: Bless them that curfe you: Do good to them that hate you: “ and pray for them that despitefully use you, Z3

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