hearing him say on the last day of the term that he had been suffering much, and thought that he had the gout in the stomach. During the vacation the illness grew upon him, the paroxysms of pain became intense and almost insupportable; for a long time he was able to take almost no nourishment, and even water was rejected. On the last day of April, nearly a fortnight before his death, the following entry was made in his journal, and was the last thing, I believe, that he ever wrote. Being now exercised with great pain, appearing in occasional paroxysms, which threaten the immediate extinction of life, I desire to record my gratitude to God for all....... [his] mercies to myself and my family. In view of the uncertain issue of this sickness, I desire humbly to cast myself upon God, humbly to implore his forgiveness of my sins through Jesus Christ, and to express a cheerful hope that should I be called away, it will be to my heavenly Father's house, where are many mansions, and where, as I humbly trust, the deceased members of my family are already gathered: in a certain sense and under the great Captain, having prepared the way." The hand that wrote these words, and with some difficulty, as the writing shows, was soon unable to write more. The body, amid sharp pains, and nearly without aliment, clung to the earth, while the soul, having overcome the dread of death, and being sustained by Christian hope, was longing for release from its prison. Rest came at length, early on Friday morning, May 13th. The funeral services were held at the house the day after. As a touching close, the Senior Class, each member of it in turn, threw the earth into the grave. I cannot close this tribute to my deceased friend and colleague, without a word to the students who hear me, and espe cially to those who have been under his instructions. My friends, a life like Professor Olmsted's is full of encouragement to those who are entering life, for it shows that a man with a steady will and sound principles makes himself what he is, that it is not patronage, nor favoring circumstances, which determine his position and usefulness, but the character which he has acquired, and the abilities which he has im proved by his own painstaking. It is true Divine Providence by illness, or in some other way, can baffle us and defeat our plans; but with this limitation, you may determine to be a useful man, as you may to be a good man and an honorable. Nay, you may determine to be a successful man, if you rightly measure your powers, use your resources to advantage, stand up against difficulties resolutely, and put trust in God. His success in life was due to his character, under God's smile. Follow him, and true success will attend on you also. PROF. OLMSTED'S PRINCIPAL PUBLICATIONS. 1817. Thoughts on the Clerical Profession, in four Numbers.-Religious Intelligencer, Vol. 1. Memoir of President Dwight.-Port Folio. 1819. On the Diamond.-Raleigh Star. 1820. Two Notices in the Am. Jour. of Science, Vol. 2. 1822. Catalogue of Rocks and Minerals of North Carolina.-Am. Jour. of Science, Vol. 5. 1824. On the Preparation of Mortar.-Proc. of N. C. Board of Agriculture. Essays on the advantage of a Geological Survey of the State of North 1825. On the Gold Mines of North Carolina.-Am. Jour. of Science, Vol. 9. 1826. On the present state of Chemical Science.-Am. Jour. of Science, Vols. 11 and 12. 1827. Oration before the Phi Beta Kappa Society, Yale College. 8vo. Review of Dick's Christian Philosopher.-Monthly Christian Spectator, 1829. On Hail Storms.-Am. Jour. of Science, Vol. 18. 1830. Review of Davy's Salmonia.-Quarterly Christian Spectator, Vol. 11. Review of the Scientific Life and Labors of Sir H. Davy.-Am. Jour. of Science, Vol. 17. 1831. Elements of Natural Philosophy, Vol. 1. 8vo. 1832. Memoir of Eli Whitney.-Am. Jour. of Science, Vol. 21. Elements of Natural Philosophy, Vol. 2. 8vo. School Philosophy. 12mo. 1833-9. On the Meteoric Shower of November, 1833, &c.-Am. Jour. of Science, Vol. 25, &c. 1835-6. On the Zodiacal Light and Meteors.-Am. Jour. of Science, Vols. 27, 29. 1835-7. On the Aurora Borealis.-Am. Jour. of Science, Vols. 29, 32. 1837. Observations on the use of Anthracite Coal.-American Almanac, Vol. 8. 1839. Introduction to Astronomy, for College Students. 8vo. (Last revised edition, 1854.) On the New Haven Tornado of July, 1839.—Am. Jour. of Science, Vol 37. 1840. Beau Ideal of the Perfect Teacher.-Am. Inst. of Instruction. 1841. School Astronomy. 12mo. Letters to a Lady on Astronomy (Massachusetts School Library.) 12mo. 1842. Memoir of Ebenezer Porter Mason. 12mo. 1843. Memoir of Gov. Treadwell.-Am. Quarterly Register, Vol. 15. Reminiscences of Professor Alexander M. Fisher.—New Englander, Vol. 1. 1844. Rudiments of Natural Philosophy and Astronomy. 18mo. An edition of the same, in raised letters, for the use of the blind. 4to. Series of Papers in N. Y. Journal of Commerce and N. Y. Observer on Protection from Lightning. 1847. Thoughts on LeVerrier's Planet.-New Englander, Vol. 5. Revelations of the Microscope.-New Englander, Vol. 5. 1848. Riches of the Natural World.—New Englander, Vol. 6. Review of Sir John Herschel's Observations at Cape of Good Hope.-Am. 1849. Memoir of Roger Sherman.-Sprague's American Literary Magazine, Vol. 4. The World made for Man.-New Englander, Vol. 7. 1850. On some points of Electrical theory; and On the Aurora Borealis, etc.Proceedings of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. 4th Meeting, New Haven. 1852. On the Zodiacal Light.—Proc. Amer. Assoc. 6th Meeting, Albany. 1854. Review of Silliman's Travels in Europe.-New Englander, Vol. 12. Review on the Plurality of Worlds.-New Englander, Vol. 12. 1855. Review of Maury's Wind and Current Charts.-New Englander, Vol. 13. Wilmington Gunpowder Explosion.-Proc. Amer. Assoc. 9th Meeting, Providence. 1856. Democratic Tendencies of Science.-Barnard's Journal of Education, Vol. 1. Gift of Teaching.-Peters's Journal of Education, Vol. 1. On the Secular Period of the Aurora Borealis.-Smithsonian Contributions, Vol. 8. 1857. On the American Association for the Advancement of Science.-Barnard's Journal of Education, Vol. 3. Address Commemorative of William C. Redfield.—Amer. Jour. of Science, 2d ser. Vol. 23, and Proc. Amer. Assoc. 11th Meeting, Montreal. Barnard's Jour. of Education, Vol. 4. 1858. Analysis of the Character of President Dwight as a Teacher.—Barnard's Jour. of Education, Vol. 5. The Divine Love of Truth and Beauty.—New Englander, Vol. 16. 1859. Meteorology of Palestine.-New Englander, Vol. 17. ARTICLE II.-THE LIMITS OF RELIGIOUS THOUGHT. The Limits of Religious Thought examined in Eight Lectures delivered before the University of Oxford, in the year 1858, on the Bampton Foundation. By HENRY LONGUEVILLE MANSEL, B. D., &c., &c. First American, from the Third London, Edition. With the Notes translated. Boston: Gould & Lincoln. 1859. pp. 364. MR. MANSEL is an admiring disciple of Sir William Hamilton, and one of the editors of his posthumous works. He is not, however, a man who takes his views on trust. He thinks for himself, and his book discovers a vigor of thought and an extent of erudition which have our sincere respect. He differs from his master on some important points, as, for example, on the subject of causality, where he applauds Hamilton's refutation of previous theories, but is not satisfied with Sir William's own hypothesis which resolves the intellectual phenomenon of causality into the mind's inability to think a new existence, or an absolute commencement. But, notwithstanding his occasional divergence from the great Scottish philosopher, there is little in "The Limits of Religious Thought" which a thorough student of the Notes on Reid, and the Essay on the Philosophy of the Conditioned, might not anticipate. In fact, the book is an application of Hamilton's doctrines in mental science to the neighboring province of theology. It is a supplement and expansion of the brief but pregnant utterances which are scattered through his recently published Lectures and former writings, on the nature of our religious knowledge. The fundamental principle of this system is, that our knowledge is confined to the limited, or the conditioned, or the finite. The unconditioned is not and cannot be an object of conception or positive thought. The unconditioned is a generic term and comprises the Infinite and the Absolute. The Absolute denotes that which is free from all necessary relation to any other being,-which is free from every relation as a condition of existence. The Infinite denotes that which is free from all possible limitation; than which a greater is inconceivable, and which, therefore, can become possess ed of no attribute which it had not from eternity. Now it is claimed that the Infinite and Absolute are inconceivable, incapable of being compassed in thought, the knowl edge of them being contrary to the conditions under which alone intelligence is possible. They involve simply the negation of conceivability. Thus the mind can conceive space; but it cannot conceive space as absolutely bounded; that is, as a whole, beyond which there is no further space. This, it is said, is verified by the appeal to consciousness and by other evidence. On the other hand, the mind cannot conceive space as infinite, as without limits. "You may launch out in thought beyond the solar walk, you may transcend in fancy even the universe of matter, and rise from sphere to sphere in the region of empty space, until imagination sinks exhausted; -with all this what have you done? You have never gone beyond the finite, you have attained at best only to the indefinite, and the indefinite, however expanded, is still always the finite." So we cannot conceive of space as absolutely divided, that is, of an indivisible part; nor can we conceive of space as infinitely divisible. Both the maximum and minimum of space are incomprehensible. Yet, in each of these cases, we are presented with contradictory propositions, one of which must therefore be true. Space is either infinitely extended or absolutely bounded; and space is either infinitely divisible, or there is an absolute minimum. By a similar process we should reach the same results in respect to Time and Degree, "the three species of quantity which constitute the relations of existence." What is the conclusion then? That conception or positive thought is between two poles; there being on either side an inconceivable. The repugnance of the two inconceivables to one another necessitates (by the logical law of excluded middle) the conviction that one or the other is real. The inference is inevitable that the limits of our thought are not the limits of existence. The mind is shown to be weak, but is not convicted of deceit. Here it is that Hamilton differs from Hamilton's Lectures on Metaphysics, p. 527. |