Its General Character.
There is still another view of the nature of man which, from Its extensive and long-continued influence, demands consideration. According to this view, man is defined to be, The manifestation of the general principle of humanity in union with a given corporeal organization. This view has been held in various forms which cannot here be severally discussed. It is only the theory in its more general features, or in the form in which it has been commonly presented. that our limits permit us to examine. It necessarily assumes that humanity, human nature as a general principle of a form of life, exists antecedently (either chronologically or logically) to individual men. “In the order of nature,” says Dr. Shedd, “mankind exists before the generations of mankind; the nature is prior to the individuals produced out of it.”1 It exists, also, independently and outside of them. As magnetism is a force in nature existing antecedently, independently, and outside of any and all individual magnets; and as electricity exists independently of the Leyden jars in which it may be collected or through which it is manifested at present; as galvanism exists independently of any and all galvanic batteries; so humanity exists antecedently to individual men and independently of them. As an individual magnet is a given piece of soft iron in which the magnetic force is present and active, and as a Leyden jar is simply a coated jar in which electricity is present, so an individual man is a given corporeal organization in which humanity as a general life or force is present. To the question what is human nature, or humanity generically considered, there are different answers given. It is said to be a res, an essence, a substance, a real objective existence. It is some-thing which exists in time and space. This is the common mode of statement. The controversy between realists and nominalists, in its original and genuine form, turned upon this point. The question which for ages occupied to so great an extent the attention of all philosophers, was, What are universals? What are genera and species? What are general terms? Are they mere words? Are they thoughts or conceptions existing in the mind? Are the things expressed by general terms real objective existences? Do individuals only exist; so that species and genus are only classes of individuals of the same kind; or are individuals only the revelations or individualizations of a general substance which is the species or genus? According to the early and genuine realists, and according to the modern speculative philosophers, the species or genus is first, independent of and external to the individual. The individual is only “a subsequent modus existendi; the first and antecedent mode [in the case of man] being the generic humanity of which this subsequent serial mode is only another aspect or manifestation.”2
Precisely, as just stated, as magnetism is antecedent to the magnet. The magnet is only an individual piece of iron in and through which generic magnetism is manifested. Thus the realist says, “Etsi rationalitas non esset in aliquo, tamen in natura remaneret.”3 Cousin quotes the complaint of Anselm against Roscelin and other nominalists, “de ne pas comprendre comment plusieurs hommes ne sont qu’un seul et même homme, — nondum intelliget quomodo plures homines in specie sint unus homo.”4 The doctrine of his “Monologium” and “Proslogium” and “Dialogus de veritate,” Cousin says, is “que non-seulement il y a des individus humains, mais qu’il y a en autre le genre humain, l’humanité, qui est une, comme il admettait qu’il y a un temps absolu que les durées particulières manifestent sans le constituer, une vérité une et subsistante par elle-même, un type absolu du bien, que tous les biens particuliers supposent et réfléchissent plus ou moins imparfaitement.”5 He quotes Abélard as stating the doctrine which he opposed, in the following words: “Homo quædam species est, res una essentialiter, cui adveniunt formæ quædam et efficiunt Socratem: illam eamdem essentialiter eodem modo informant formæ facientes Platonem et cætera individua hominis; nec aliquid est in Socrate, præter illas formas informantes illam materiam ad faciendum Socratem, quin illud idem eodem tempore in Platone informatum sit formis Platonis. Et hoc intelligunt de singulis speciebus ad individua et de generibus ad species.”6 According to one theory, “les individus seuls existent et constituent 1’essence des choses;” according to the other, “1’essence des individus est dans le genre auquel ils se rapportent; en tant qu’ individus ils ne sont que des accidents.”7 All this is sufficiently plain. That which constitutes the species or genus is a real objective existence, a substance one and the same numerically as well as specifically. This one general substance exists in every individual belonging to the species, and constitutes their essence. That which is peculiar to the individual, and which distinguishes it from other individuals of the same species, is purely accidental. This one substance of humanity, which is revealed or manifested in all men, and which constitutes them men, “possesses all the attributes of the human individual; for the individual is only a portion and specimen of the nature. Considered as an essence, human nature is an intelligent, rational, and voluntary essence; and accordingly its agency in Adam partakes of the corresponding qualities.”8 “Agency,” however, supposes “an agent; and since original sin is not the product of the individual agent, because it appears at birth, it must be referred to the generic agent, — i.e., to the human nature in distinction from the human person or individual.”9