G. W. F. Hegel: Lectures on the History of Philosophy
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2. JAMES BEATTIE.

James Beattie, born 1735, was a professor of moral philosophy in Edinburgh and Aberdeen, and died in 1803. He likewise made common-sense the source of all knowledge. "The common-sense of the plain human understanding is the source of all morality, of all religion, and all certainty. The confirmation of common-sense must be added to the testimony of our senses. The truth is what the necessities of my nature call upon me to believe. Belief signifies conviction in the case of truths which are certain, in that of those which are probable, approbation. The truth which is certain is known by means of intuition, the probable truth by means of proofs."⁽¹⁾ Such convictions as are quite certain form the basis of actions.

1. Rixner: Handbuch der Geschichte der Philosophie, Vol. III. § 120, pp. 261, 262; cf. James Beattie: Essays on the nature and immutability of Truth, &c. (Edinburh, 1772), Pt. I., chap. i., pp. 18-31 (translated into German, Copenhagen and Leipzig, 1772, pp. 24-42); chap. ii. Sect. 2, pp. 37-42 (pp. 49-55), &c.