of studying the problems of metaphysics; forming the radical
difference between the two great schools into which
metaphysicians are divided. One of these I shall call for
distinction, the _introspective_ method; the other, the
_psychological_. M. Cousin observes that Locke went wrong
from the beginning, by placing before himself, as the
question to be first resolved, the origin of our ideas.
This (he says) was commencing at the wrong end. The proper
course would have been to begin by determining what the
ideas now are; to ascertain what it is that Consciousness
now tells us; postponing till afterwards the attempt to
frame a theory concerning the origin of any of the mental
phenomena.

'I accept the question as M. Cousin states it; and I contend
that no attempt to determine what are the direct revelations
of Consciousness can be successful, or entitled to any
regard, unless preceded by what M. Cousin says ought only to
follow it--an inquiry into the origin of our acquired ideas.
For we have it not in our power to ascertain, by any direct
process, what Consciousness told us at the time when its
revelations were in their pristine purity. It only offers
itself to our inspection, as it exists now, when those
original revelations are overlaid and buried under a
mountainous heap of acquired notions and perceptions.

'It seems to M. Cousin, that if we examine with care and
minuteness our present states of Consciousness,
distinguishing and defining every ingredient which we find
to enter into them--every element that we seem to recognize