SUBSTANCE. In general usage substance means a solid. In philosophical speculations it has undergone tho fate of most general terms, and has been tortured into all possible shades of meaning. In physical speculations it ,has usually been taken as an equivalent to matter ; but in metaphysical speculations its meaning, as sanctioned by the highest authorities, has remained truo to its etymon (sub-stans, that which stands under phenomena). This meaning will be rendered iptelligible by the notion of some Hindu philosophers, who supposed Om world to rest on the back of an elephant, and that the elephant stood on the back of a tortoise; what supported the tortoise, they omitted to explain. In adopting their theory, wo may add that that which the tortoise stood upon was substance.
As wo know that all phenomena must depend upon nouinena, of which they are only the manifestation ; or, to use the language of the schoolmen, as all accidents must be accidents of something, and must depend on that something for their existence, so in pushing our analysis to its limit, we must finally arrive at a point to which we can give no antecedent, which we arc forced to assume as final, and as standing under or supporting the whole, and this we call substance. It is the fundamental fact of all existence. We can never know it, for we only know phenomena, which are its appearances. We can never conceive it, for the first attempt to conceive it brings it within the sphere of onr ideas, which are only those of phenomena. We can never imagine it; but we are compelled to assume it. It its to us a logical fact, not a noumenal one. Necessary as the basis of all specula tion, as the "point" in mathematics, .but, like the point, for ever a mere logical distinction. It is needful for all men to know that this substance is, with respect to the mind, a merely logical distinction from its attributes ; and it is needful also to know that as the mind can never transcend the sphere of its action, and consequently never know more than the attributes, all that it can predicate of substance must be false, for substance is to it a mere negation ; if it would affirm anything of substance, it must inevitably affirm it by its attributes,• which it alone can know, positively.
It is from inattention to this latter fact that metaphysicians have blundered and misunderstood each other so constantly. You cannot
conceive a point which has neither length nor breadth ; you must assume it. You cannot conceive substance shorn of its attributes, because those attributes are the sole staple of your conceptions ; but you must assume it. Analyse as you will, you can never get beyond a vague and negative conception of a certain substratum, which, whenever you attempt to realise it, you must invest with attributes. Glass is a substance, at least is called so in common language. Analyse it, and you will find that it is no substance—that it is merely the co existence of flint and alkali. Your substance then has vanished with the analysis. It was found to be flint and alkali, nothing more ; no distinct element, no substratum was discovered. Where then was your glass substance ? The glass was a mere mode of existence of two particles of flint and alkali; it was in itself nothing, it had no existence apart from those particles, it had no substratum. Analyse the flint in the same way, and you will find the flint to be in itself no substance, but a mode of existence of some ether particles. And yet the mind refuses to admit that this analysis could be so continued ad infinitum, thus reducing everything to mere phenomena ; it is impelled to stop somewhere, and to ask, "attributes of and there where it stops it recognises substance. Hence Spinoza's definition of substance being existence itself.
Fichte, the most scientific expositor of idealism, has denied all sub stance except that of the Ego, and he says, " Attributes synthetically united give substance, and substance analysed gives but attributes; a continued substratum, a supporter of attributes is an impossible con ception." (` Wissenschaftslehre.) Granted an impossible conception, but not therefore an impossible fact. Fichte assumes that the sub jective conception—the idea—is the complete correlation and adequate comprehension of the whole objective fact ; and if this point be admitted, his system is irrefutable, for attributes being obviously mental conditions, and as beyond them we are conscious of nothing, so nothing but what they affirm can exist. Interrogate consciousness, and you will get no answer that will apply to a substance. It knows only attributes.