Brett - A history of psychology. / Vol. III Ancient and Patristic

Muirhead Library of Philosophy

A HISTORY OF PSYCHOLOGY

Muirhead Library of Philosophy

PHILOSOPHY OF MIND AND PSYCHOLOGY
In 17 Volumes

A HISTORY OF PSYCHOLOGY

Modern Psychology

Volume III

GEORGE SIDNEY BRETT

First published 1921 by Routledge

Published 2013 by Routledge

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ISBN 13: 978-0-415-29610-6 (hbk)

A HISTORY OF PSYCHOLOGY

BY

GEORGE SIDNEY BRETT

M.A. (OXON.)

Professor of Philosophy in the University of Toronto

VOL. III

MODERN PSYCHOLOGY

First published in 1921

(All rights reserved)

CONTENTS

NOTE

The scope and purpose of this volume, together with the general principles of construction, have been explained in the preface to the second volume, to which this volume conforms. In view of the complexity of the subject and the fact that its problems cease to be capable of purely historical treatment as one approaches the most recent period, the attention of the reader is directed to the remarks made on this topic in the second volume (pp. 57).

. BEFORE the year 1411, when the University of St. Andrews was founded, the young Scotsman went either to Paris or to Oxford for his education. About 1265 John Baliol had founded a college at Oxford, and occasionally a student was bold enough to brave the perils of a journey to Oxford and the treatment he met with there after he reached it. But the attractions of Paris seem to have been more alluring, and the greater number down to 1411 preferred France as a country less foreign than England. At Paris several Scotch teachers made some reputation; the national distinctions would, of course, be no barrier to a common understanding, while Latin was the language of academic instruction. The fifteenth century saw the rise of colleges at Glasgow and Aberdeen, as well as that already mentioned at St. Andrews. At the end of the sixteenth century another college (Marischal) was founded at Aberdeen, and Edinburgh University came into existence (1582).

The early constitutions of these universities followed the models of Paris and Louvain. The scope of the teaching and the material were, consequently, identical with those of the later medival period. In the time of James II the Faculty of Arts at Glasgow prescribed in Logic the works of Aristotle and in Philosophy more Aristotle, namely the eight books of physics, the psychological treatises and some others. The history of the struggles out of which the Scotch system of education finally emerged would not be in place here. A new scheme put out in 1640 prescribed Aristotles De Anima as a subject for the fourth-year course, but in 1695 the commissioners of the universities made a vigorous protest in favour of home products: each university was directed to produce a treatise, and the whole collection of treatises, four in number, was to be revised and adopted by the commissioners. The scheme finally lapsed, and Scotland resigned the task of creation: fortunately it began at the same time to develop.

We have now reached the beginning of the eighteenth century, and with it a new era marked by that most revolutionary change, the change from the Latin to the vernacular language. Francis Hutcheson (16941746) was the first to take this step which at once gave him a distinct position. Hutcheson was a pupil of Gerschom Carmichael, and it would be unfair to speak of Hutcheson as a self-made teacher; he was made by Carmichael and always bore the impress of Carmichaels teaching both in his preference for ethical subjects and his tendency to move away from the old system. It was Carmichael who united in his training and his developed thought the old and the new; through him Scotland was led to oppose Hobbes on questions of politics and adopt Locke in its mental philosophy. All this made for culture, and it is as culture that we must estimate the Scotch philosophy of this period. Its traditions kept it close to the best work of antiquity; its vitality enabled it to assimilate what was relatively new material. Hutcheson naturally felt the charm of Shaftesbury, for Shaftesburys spirit was Hellenic and his novelty had a classic flavour; in both cases it was the bottle rather than the wine that was new.