The Sun.
London, England, 1829-11-25 00:00:00

" Keepsake," the first part of the tragedy, " The
House of Aspen," taken by Sir Walter Scott from
the " Sagen der Vor Zeit," a collection of tales
by onr worthy fellow-citizen, M. Leonhard Wachter,
whose lectures on the history of the Commerce of
Hamburg we lately announced. The editor of the
Gleaner promises to publish the whole tragedy in
the succeeding number.

It is with much pleasure that we notice the
satisfactory report we have heard of the progress
the University of London has made in its num-

bars since the opening of the present Session.—
In the Medical Classes, especially, a considerable

augmentation has taken place, as well as in the
department of Law; and if the chairs of Foreign

and Oriental Literature have not been attended by

so great a concourse as the characters of their

Professors deserve, there is, nevertheless, no

reason to fear that their popularity is on the de-
crease. The attendance given at the various,
lectures has, on the whole, equalled the expec-

Cations of the Council and friends of the esta-

blishment ; and though sufficient funds for the

eompletion of the wings of the building have not
yet been raised, we trust the Council will not

cease to confide in the merits of their plan, and

imitate the example of those ROman citizens,

who were taught "never to despair of the for
tunes of th• Republic."

The greater praise is due to the Founders of
the London University, because their friendly
deportment to the more recent and rival institu-
tion of King's College is an evidence of the sin-
gleness of purpose with which they have la-
boured to supply the intellectual wants of the
rising generation of this metropolis. Party
spirit might have suggested much ground for
hostility to a College formed in as direct an op.
position to the original University, as the
schools Of BELL were to those Of LANCASTER ;
but inasmuch as the two kinds of schools have,

happily, for some years, been working together
for good, it is to be hoped, also, that the two
Universities, however different may have been
the circumstances of their conception, may

spring into life, and grow to maturity with great
strength, and may rival each other only in the
earnestness of their endeavours to diffuse sound

[earning and knowledge amongst our youthfu'

countrymen.

It is somewhat remarkable that the Profes-
sorships of History and of Moral Philosophy in
the London University should have so long
remained unfilled. That great difficulties have
been experienced by the Council in the disposi-

tion of them, we can well believe, and that a
division of opinion has existed, we have
also heard ; especially with reference to the
latter appointment. Among the Council are
several gentlemen of distinguished attainments,
whose bias towards the Utilitarian System of
Philosophy, as it is called, has led them to
insist on the expediency of the Professor being
of that school ; which has, on the other hand,
been strenuously opposed by the more in-
fluential members, whose views are ge-
nerally in accordance with those lately
expressed by the Edinburgh Review on
this head, and nho are desirous of avoiding
nothing so much as the semblance of making
the University a partizan of the levelling and
sceptical doctrines inculcated by the philoso-
phers of the BENTHAM school. Besides this,
the total disregard into which Moral Philosophy
has fallen among us, has made the selection of
a competent Englishman no easy task. The
last lamp of mental science may be said to have
gone out with the much-honoured DUGALD
STEW ART ; and though we have Divines of
ample learning in their own profession, yet to fix
a Clergyman in the Philosophical chair would
be its almost inevitable ruin, from the confusion
that must ensue between the Theology and
Ethics, that would be sure to be blended in the
lectures to be delivered. For ourselves, we
greatly lament the disrepute into which Meta-
physics, or the science of mind, has fallen in this
country ; and we are therefore the more anxious
that so good an occasion as the London Uni-
versity Lectureship should not be either ne-
glected or perverted. To prevent this, in our
humble judgment, the only course is, to appoint
a Professor, not of Moral Philosophy generally,
which leaves him the liberty of inculcating his
own favourite system, but to prescribe to him
simply the duty of teaching the History of Phi-
losophy, from the earliest known indications of
it down to the present day. By a knowledge
of the multitude of metaphysical systems that
have divided mankind, young men will obtain,
if they learn nothing else, an enlargement of
their mental powers—a habit of judging can-
didly and charitably of opinions contrary to their
own—and a lesson to abstain from dogmatizing,
or imagining that truth does not extend beyond
the compass of their individual notions. Meta-
physics are grievously neglected in England—
their very name is a bugbear ; and hence the
explanation of the question so often asked—why
our morals are in so unsettled a state ? But
it is absurd to dispute concerning the merits of
the Utilitarian, or any other Philosophy, unless
our metaphysical principles are first agreed on ;
for, as SCHLEGEL said to Madame DE STAEL,
" L'un depend de l'autre." The importance
therefore of making a beginning in teaching the
science of mind is great and urgent ; and if the
Council of the University of London would
eondescend to consider our suggestion, we feel