“ Pascal had already shown how philosophical scepticism might be employed as a bulwark for faith, and Glanvill follows in the same track. The philosophic endeavour to cognize the whole system of things by referring all events to their causes appears to him to be from the outset doomed to failure. For if we inquire into this causal relation we find that though we know isolated facts, we cannot perceive any such connexion between them as that the one should give rise to the other. ”

“ GLANVILL (or Glanvil) , JOSEPH (1636–1680) ; English philosopher, was born at Plymouth in 1636, and was educated at Exeter and Lincoln colleges, Oxford, where he graduated as M.A. in 1658. After the Restoration he was successively rector of Wimbush, Essex, vicar of Frome Selwood, Somersetshire, rector of Streat and Walton. In 1666 he was appointed to the abbey church, Bath ”

“ See C. Rémusat, Hist. de la phil. en Angleterre, bk. iii. ch. xi.; W. E. H. Lecky, Rationalism in Europe (1865) , i. 120–128; Hallam’s Literature of Europe, iii. 358–362; Tulloch’s Rational Theology, ii. ”