Chapter XXXIV · (continued 3)

The aim of his speculations was to extinguish the scheme of materialism; he thought that, when matter was expelled out of nature, sceptical and impious ideas would have no ground to stand upon. But in the hands of subsequent thinkers, his principles have yielded very different results.

Berkeley wrote a fine pleasing style, and contributed much to excite the philosophic mind in England and Scotland. Indeed, he said himself that his reasonings had been nowhere better understood than among a club of young Scotchmen in Edinburgh.

In conclusion, the period covered in this volume has been exceedingly important in the history of Scotland. After the Union of the Crowns, the king’s power was vastly increased, and one of the baneful results of this was that the kings used their power to enforce their own religious and political views upon the people, and attempted to extinguish their freedom of thought and speech, and their civil rights. Hence the Covenanting struggle, and after the Restoration the long and severe persecution of the Covenanters; yet, despite all the harassments of war, of persecution, and oppression, the Covenanters executed their work heroically and successfully, and contributed considerably to the Revolution of 1688, and to the freedom of the British people. Peace and glory to the memory of the heroes, who boldly faced danger, privation, and death for the tenets of their faith! The proceedings connected with the passing of the Union were narrated; and an account of the subsequent disaffection in Scotland, and the risings of 1715 and 1745 was presented. A detailed and exhaustive account of the social condition of the people, and the introduction of manufactures, the progress of industry and commercial enterprise were given. I then treated the ballad and Jacobite literature and other branches, historically, and noted the progress of science, of education, and art. In the closing chapter, I have presented an outline of European Thought, in which the systems of Bruno, Descartes, Spinoza, Leibnitz, Hobbes, Locke, Shaftesbury, and others are concisely expounded, in order to show the historic relations of the philosophy which subsequently arose in Scotland.