on the Modern System of Materialism,' in which the impotence of matter is maintained; as also in another, entitled 'Miscellaneous Reflections on Priestley’s account of Hartley’s Theory of the Human Mind.’ Then we have 'Observations on the Utopia of Sir Thomas More.' A short essay 'On Power,'[1] in March 1792, was his last metaphysical performance: it sums up his conclusions regarding our conception of causation, as regulated by the Common Sense. 'Observations on the Danger of Political Innovation,' suggested by the Revolution in France, were read in the Society on November 1794.
This last Essay is characteristic. It presses a distinction between two political attitudes that are apt to be confounded—the one speculative, dealing with abstractions, treating the facts of the case and history as irrelevant; the other practical, taking account of the actual conditions, therefore disposed to modify its ideals by a due regard to what has been and now is. The first asks what that organisation of society is, which, abstractly considered, is most favourable to progress: the other cautiously considers how the inherited political organism may with least friction be adapted to the changed conditions of the social evolution. Reid assumes this last as his attitude, arguing that the British Constitution encourages continuous orderly evolution, not sudden revolution, and that this is illustrated in its history since 1688. At first, he had looked with sanguine hope to the French Revolution, but, like Edmund Burke, who shortly before had been Rector of Glasgow University, his hope gave place to fear. It is interesting that it was the Vindiciæ Gallicæ of Sir James Mackintosh that had inspired him with the hope; for, according to his daughter,
- ↑ Birkwood mss.
