Note a — Chapter I

The language of this paragraph is the language of ordinary life. In Coleridge's "Table Talk," for example, the subject of Man's distinguishing prerogative of Immortality is discussed by the great speaker, and his nephew's note of the discussion is headed "Materialism." There appears, indeed, considerable difficulty in finding a precise expression for the form of belief, or unbelief, commonly called Materialism. Most people speak of it as of some clear and well-defined theory until they begin seriously to investigate its rationale. Investigators are then apt to become loud in their complaints of its inexactness. Take by way of instance the following example. Speaking of "the doctrines of Materialism," Lord Brougham remarks: "The vague and indistinct form of the propositions in which they are conveyed affords one strong argument against their truth. It is not easy to annex a definite meaning to the proposition that mind is inseparably connected with a particular arrangement of the particles of matter; it is more difficult to say what they mean who call it a modification of matter; but to consider it as consisting in a combination of matter, as coming into existence the instant that the particles of matter assume a given arrangement, appears to be a wholly unintelligible collocation of words."—(Discourse of Natural Theology, p. 102).

Under such circumstances it may seem difficult for many a Materialist to describe himself as the adherent of a distinct or closely reasoned system. The main point we would submit for his earnest consideration is the question whether his hypothesis lands him in certain subtle refinements concerning the nature and connection of Force, Mind, and those generalized facts which have been called the primary properties of Matter,—or whether it leads him onward to the opinions described in the text. Looking at the subject in this light, we might feel inclined to draw a broad distinction between mere scientific Materialism and the Materialistic doctrines of sceptical philosophy.