The second characteristic which strikes me in the state of the human understanding in the eighteenth century, is the universality which marked the spirit of free inquiry. Previously, and particularly in the sixteenth century, inquiry had been exercised in a limited and defined field, having for its objects religious questions, or political and religious questions mixed up together, but never extending its pretensions to all subjects. On the contrary, the characteristic of the free inquiry of the eighteenth century is its universality: religion, politics, pure philosophy, man and society, moral and material nature, all became at once the subjects of investigation, doubt, and system; ancient ideas were cast away, and new ones arose in their stead. It was a movement which penetrated to all quarters, though springing from one and the same impulse. This movement had, furthermore, a peculiar characteristic, which has not, perhaps, been twice exhibited in the history of the world--namely, that it was purely speculative. In former times, action had promptly participated with speculation in all human revolutions. Thus, in the sixteenth century, the religious revolution had commenced by ideas and discussions purely intellectual, but it had speedily gathered into events. The leaders of intellectual parties had rapidly grown into the leaders of political parties, and the realities of life had mingled with the operations of intellect. It had thus happened in the English revolution of the seventeenth century. In France, in the eighteenth century, we perceive the human mind exercising itself on all things, on ideas which, being closely interwoven with the real interests of existence, ought to have had the most prompt and potential influence. And yet the leaders and actors in those great debates remained apart from every sort of practical activity, appearing as mere speculators, who observed, judged, and delivered their opinions, without ever interfering in events. At no epoch has the government over facts or external realities been so completely distinct from that over mind. The separation of the mental and physical orders of things was not real in Europe before the eighteenth century. For the first time, perhaps, the mental order was developed, utterly apart from the material. This was an important fact, and it is one which has exercised a prodigious influence over the course of events. It gave to the ideas of the time a singular character of ambitiousness and inexperience; for never was philosophy more eager to rule the world, or at the same time less conversant with it. A day was sure to come when a conflict would arise, when the intellectual movement would pass into external facts; and as they had been so totally separated, the shock was violent, the amalgamation more difficult. {240}