ON THE PHILOSOPHY OF THE MIND. BY JAMES DOUGLAS, ESQ. OF CAVERS. EDINBURGH: ADAM AND CHARLES BLACK; LONGMAN, ORME, BROWN, GREEN, & LONGMANS, LONDON. MDCCCXXXIX. INTRODUCTION. THE Philosophy of the Mind is of recent origin, and of slow growth. Its genuine materials are therefore very scanty. Most works upon the mind are chiefly occupied in refuting former errors, and these errors being derived from ancient theories, the true Philosophy of the Mind, though conducted on very different principles, still continues to be involved in some degree in the disputes of Metaphysics. A brief notice of the history of Speculative Opinions is therefore useful, both as indicating the sources of several errors which still prevail, and as accounting for the slight and partial attention which the genuine study of the subject has yet received. All our knowledge is gained by experience, and even this truth we must learn by experience too; it is a hard lesson, and slowly taught by the disappointment of some thousands of years, and many writers have not yet learned it, that the mind can only acquire some knowledge of itself by slow and patient B |