looking into the Oxford treatises on this science, we were surprised to find, that this, among other important matters, had in all of them been overlooked. This may, in part, enable us to surmise how Mr. Hampden could have so misconceived so elementary a point, as to have actually reversed the doctrine, not only of Aristotle, but of all other philosophers. A few words will be sufficient to illustrate the nature of the error.

In the thirteenth chapter (Pacian division) of the second book of the Posterior Analytics, Aristotle treats of the manner of hunting out, as he terms it, the essential nature (Tò Tí ẻotɩ, quidditas) of a thing, the enunciation of which nature constitutes its definition. This may be attempted in two contrary ways. By the one, we may descend from the category, or higher genus of the thing to be defined, dividing and subdividing, through the opposite differences, till we reach the genus under which it is proximately contained; and this last genus, along with the specific difference by which the genus is divided, will be the definition required. By the other, we may ascend from the singulars, contained under the thing to be defined (which is necessarily an universal), by an exclusion of their differences, until we attain an attribution common to them all, which attribution will supply the definition sought.-The former of these is, after Plato, called by Aristotle, and logicians in general, the method of Division; the higher genus being regarded as the (universal) whole, the subaltern genera and species as the (subject) parts into which it is divided. The extension here determines the totality.—The latter, which is described but not named by Aristotle, is variously denominated by his followers. Some, as his Greek commentators, taking the totality as determined by the comprehension, view the singulars as so many (essential) wholes, of which the common. attribute or definition is a part, and accordingly call this mode of hunting up the essence the Analytic; others again, regarding the genus as the whole, the species and individuals as the parts, style it the Compositive, or Synthetic, or Collective;1 while

1

1 “In one respect," says Aristotle, "the Genus is called a part of the Species; in another, the Species a part of the Genus." (Metaph. L. v. c. 25, t. 30. Compare Phys. L. iv. c. 5 (3) t. 23; and Porph. Intr. c. 3, § 39.) In like manner, the same method, viewed in different relations, may be styled either Analysis or Synthesis. This, however, has not been acknowledged; nor has it even attracted notice, that different logicians and philosophers, though severally applying the terms only in a single sense, are still at cross purposes with each other. One calls Synthesis what another calls Analysis-one calls Progression what another calls Regression; and this both in an

others, in fine, looking simply to the order of the process itself, from the individual to the general, name it the Inductive. These last we shall imitate.

Now, in the chapter referred to, Aristotle considers and contrasts these two methods.-In regard to Division (8-20) he shows on the one hand (against Plato, who is not named), that this process is not to be viewed as having any power of demonstration or argument;' and on the other (against Speusippus, as we learn from Eudemus, through the Greek expositors), that it is not wholly to be rejected as worthless, being useful, in subservience always to the other method of induction, to insure that none of the essential qualities are omitted-that these qualities alone are taken-and that they are properly subordinated and arranged. In reference to the Inductive method, which is to be considered as the principal, he explains its nature, and delivers various precepts for its due application. (§ 7, 21, etc.)

This summary will enable the reader to understand Mr. Hampden's perversion of Aristotle's doctrine.-In the first place: that gentleman is mistaken, in supposing that the philosopher applies the term Induction to any method of investigating the definition discussed by him in the chapter in question. The word does not once occur.-In the second place: he is still farther deceived, in thinking that Aristotle there bestows that name on a descent from the universal to the particular; whereas in his philosophy—indeed in all philosophies-it exclusively pertains to an ascent from the particular to the universal.-In the third place: he is wrong, in imagining that Aristotle there treats only of a single method, for he considers and contrasts two methods, not only different, but opposed. In the fourth place: he is mistaken, in understanding,

2

cient and modern times. We ourselves think it best to regulate the use of these terms by reference to the notion of a whole and parts, of any kind. This we do, and do professedly. Mr. Hampden, but probably without intending it, does the same: in one part of the passage we have quoted, speaking of Division (his logical induction), as an "analysis;" in another, describing it as "synthetical." [The total omission of the distinction of Comprehension and Extension (though this be the very turning point of logic), by former Oxford logicians, is remarkable in itself, and has been the cause, as is here exemplified, of much error and confusion. Dr. Whately, indeed, not only overlooks the distinction, but he often reverses the language in which it is logically expressed.]

1 This he had elsewhere done; Pr. Analyt. 1. i. c. 31. Post. Analyt. 1. ii. c. 5, et alibi.

2 Mr. Hampden's error, we suspect, originates in the circumstance that Pacius (whom Duval follows in the Organon) speaks, in his analytic argument of the chapter, of a methodus divisiva and a methodus inductiva; and that Mr. Hampden, using Duval's

as applied to one contrary, the observations which Aristotle applies, and which are only applicable, in expounding the reverse. For example: he quotes in the note, as pertinent to Division, words of the original relative to induction; and the instance (from the definition of Magnanimity) adduced to illucidate the one method, is in reality employed by Aristotle to explain the other. —In the fifth place: his error is enhanced, by seeing in his own single method the subordinate of Aristotle's two; and in lauding as a peculiarly important part of the Aristotelic philosophy, a process in the exposition of which Aristotle has no claim to originality, and to which he himself, here and elsewhere, justly attributes only an inferior importance.-In the sixth place in contradiction equally of his whole philosophy and of the truth of nature, the Stagirite is made to hold that our highest abstractions are first in the order of time; that our process of classification is encentric, not eccentric; that a child generalizes substance and accident before egg and white.

"The

Mr. Hampden's statement of the Inductive method being thus the reverse of truth, it is needless to say that the etymological explanation he has hazarded of the term (eπaywyn) must be erroneous.-But even more erroneous is the pendant by which he attempts to illustrate his interpretation of that term. άπaywуń, Abduction spoken of by Aristotle (Anal. Prior. ii. c. 25), is just the reverse-a leading away, by the terms successively brought from the more accurate notion conveyed by a former one." The Abduction, here referred to, is no more such a "leading away" than it is a theft. It is a kind of syllogism-of what nature we can not longer tresspass on the patience of our readers by explaining. For the same reason we say nothing of some other errors we had remarked in Mr. Hampden's account of that branch of the Aristotelic philosophy which we have been now considering.

edition, in his extemporaneous study of the subject, not previously aware that there are two opposite methods of investigating the definition, took up the notion that these were merely a twofold expression for the same thing. Mr. Hampden is an able man: but to understand Aristotle in any of his works, he must be understood in all; and to be understood in all, he must be long and patiently studied by a mind disciplined to speculation, and familiar with the literature of philosophy.

V.-DEAF AND DUMB.

HISTORY OF THEIR INSTRUCTION, IN REFERENCE TO DALGARNO.

(JULY, 1835.)

The works of GEORGE DALGARNO, of Aberdeen, 4to. Reprinted at Edinburgh: 1834.

In taking up this work, we owe perhaps some apology for the deviation from our ordinary rules; inasmuch as it is merely a reprint of ancient matter, the publication also not professedly reaching beyond the sphere of a private society-the Maitland Club. We are induced, however, to make a qualified exception in favor of this edition of Dalgarno's Works, in consideration of the extreme rairity of the original treatises, added to their high importance; and because the liberality of the editors (Mr. Henry Cockburn and Mr. Thomas Maitland), has not limited their contribution merely to members of that society, but extended it to the principal libraries of the kingdom, and, we believe, to many individuals likely to feel an interest in its contents. We shall, however, relax our rule only to the measure of a very brief

notice.

Dalgarno's Works are composed of two treatises: the first entitled-" Ars Signorum, Vulgo Character Universalis et Lingua Philosophica. Londini: 1661;" the second-"Didascalocophus, or the Deaf and Dumb Man's Tutor; to which is added a Discourse of the Nature and Number of Double Consonants: both which Tracts being the first (for what the Author knows) that have been published upon either of the subjects. Printed at the Theatre in Oxford, 1680.”

Of the author himself, all that is known is comprised in the following slight notice by Anthony a Wood. "The reader may be pleased to know, that one George Dalgarno, a Scot, wrote a

book entitled Ars Signorum, &c., London, 1661. This book, before it went to press, the author communicated to Dr. Wilkins, who, from thence taking a hint of greater matter, carried it on, and brought it up to that which you see extant. This Dalgarno was born at old Aberdeen, and bred in the University at New Aberdeen; taught a private grammar school, with good success, for about thirty years together, in the parishes of S. Michael, and S. Mary Magdalen, in Oxford; wrote also Didascalocophus, or the Deaf and Dumb Man's Tutor; and dying of a fever, on the 28th of August, 1687, aged sixty or more, was buried in the North body of the Church of S. Mary Magdalen." (Athenæ Oxon., Vol. II., p. 506). With the exception of an accidental allusion to his treatise on Signs, by Leibnitz, in a letter to Mr. Burnet of Kemney, from whom he had probably received that work of a fellow Aberdonian, and some slight traditionary statements by the German historians of literature, the memory of Dalgarno had wholly perished, when attention was again awakened to the originality and importance of his speculations by the late Mr. Dugald Stewart, in various passages of his writings; and these having suggested to the editors the idea of the present reprint, they are very properly collected in their preliminary statement, as the best of testimonies to its importance.

In speaking of Dalgarno's two treatises, we shall reverse their chronological as well as natural order, and take them in what appears to us the order of their practical interest.

To appreciate the high and peculiar value of our author's treatise on the education of the Deaf and Dumb, it is necessary to take a survey of what had actually been accomplished in this important department of applied psychology, previous to the appearance of his treatise. A regular history of this branch of education, with extracts from the writings of its earlier promoters, now in general extremely rare, would form an interesting present, both to the speculative and to the practical philosopher. In the total absence of such a work, we may be pardoned in throwing briefly together a few scattered notices, which have accidentally crossed us in the course of other inquiries.

In deducing a history of the progress in the art of educating the deaf and dumb, there are certain separate points of accomplishment which it is proper to distinguish. These are: 1°, The teaching the pupil to understand, by the motions of the lips, &c. the speech of those around him; 2°, To communicate his own