ll-beloved.

FOOTNOTES:

[5] By the Pragmatic Sanction, promulgated during the first pregnancy of
Christina, in May 1830.

THE VISIBLE AND TANGIBLE.

A METAPHYSICAL FRAGMENT.

Those who have made their way through the German systems of idealism,
from Kant to Hegel--destined in a future age to form one of the most
curious chapters in the history, or romance, of philosophy--have
probably, for the most part, come to the conclusion of their task, with
the profound impression of the futility of the study of metaphysics,
which, full of labour, is yet fruitless as idleness. _L'art de s'egarer
avec methode_--such it has been wittily defined, and such our Teutonic
neighbours have been resolved to demonstrate it. Yet, this is not
altogether the impression, we think, which such a course of study ought
to produce: a better lesson may be drawn from it. There is, after all, a
right as well as a wrong method of philosophising. The one leads, it may
be, but to a few modest results, of no very brilliant or original
character, yet of sterling value and importance. The other may conduct
to startling paradox, to applauded subtleties, to bold and novel
speculations, but baseless, transient, treacherous. It evidently
requires something more than intellectual keenness; it requires the
virtue of forbearance, and a temperate spirit, to adhere to sober
rectitude of thought, and eschew the temptations that a daring and
self-willed philosophy displays. Such is the lesson which these "follies
of the wise" ought to inculcate. They should lead us to intrench
ourselves more securely than ever within the sound rules for the
investigation of truth.

Philosophise men will--men must. Even the darkest paths, and the most
labyrinthine of metaphysics, must be perpetually trodden. In vain is it
proclaimed that they lead back only to the point of ignorance from which
they started; in vain is it demonstrated that certain problems are
indemonstrable. If the same race of men lived for ever upon the earth,
such inextricable problems might at length be set at rest. But each new
generation finds them as fresh and attractive as if they had never been
touched, never probed and tortured by fruitless examination; to each
generation they appear in all the unabated charms of mystery; to each
generation must their solution at least be shown to be unattainable. In
vain you write over the portal _Lasciate ogni speranza_! there is always
a band of _youth_ newl