{"collection":"scripture-revelation","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_35772/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_35772","id":"gutenberg_35772","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/35772","summary":null,"tags":["Category: History - Modern (1750+)","Category: History - Religious","Category: Philosophy & Ethics","Category: Religion/Spirituality","Religion and science"],"text":"</pre>\n\n\n\nProduced by David E. Brown, Bryan Ness and the Online\nDistributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This\nfile was produced from images generously made available\nby The Internet Archive)\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nRELIGION AND SCIENCE\n\n\n\n\nRELIGION AND SCIENCE\n\nFROM GALILEO TO BERGSON\n\nBY\n\nJOHN CHARLTON HARDWICK\n\n  \"Philosophy will always be hard, and what it promises even in the end\n  is no clear theory nor any complete understanding or vision. But its\n  certain reward is a continual evidence and a heightened apprehension\n  of the ineffable mystery of life, of life in all its complexity and\n  all its unity and worth.\"\n\n  F. H. BRADLEY, _Essays in Truth and Reality_, p. 106.\n\n\nLONDON\n\nSOCIETY FOR PROMOTING CHRISTIAN KNOWLEDGE\n\nNEW YORK: THE MACMILLAN CO.\n\n1920\n\n\n\n\nTO\n\nMY FATHER\n\n\n\n\nPREFACE\n\n\nThe chapters which follow are not intended as even a slight sketch of\nthe history of Thought since the Renaissance. Their object is more\nmodest, i.e. to illustrate the thesis that mankind, being \"incurably\nreligious,\" insists (however hopeless the enterprise may sometimes seem)\nupon interpreting the universe spiritually.\n\nThus it is quite natural that only a few typical names should find their\nplaces here: and often no sufficient reason may appear for one being\nincluded rather than another. For instance, in the tenth chapter, T. H.\nGreen, F. H. Bradley, and A. J. Balfour are mentioned, while Martineau\nand the Cairds are passed over. Needless to say, there was no doctrinal\nprejudice here. Again, in the fourth chapter, Pascal is dealt with at\nsome length, but Boehme, an equally important thinker, is ignored. And\nso on.\n\nI should like to acknowledge here my obligation to Dr. Mercer, Canon of\nChester, for his advice upon books, especially with regard to material\nfor the final chapters. Also to the Rev. H. D. A. Major, Principal of\nRipon Hall, for suggestions about the general plan of the book; and to\nthe Rev. E. Harvey (a mathematical graduate of Trinity College, Dublin,\nat present studying medicine) for valuable information about the present\nposition of psychic research.\n\n                                                              J. C. H.\n\n  ALTRINGHAM, _March 23rd, 1920_.\n\n\n\n\nCONTENTS\n\n\n    CHAPTER I\n    INTRODUCTORY                                                    PAGE\n\n      Religion and Science defined. \"Accurate and systematic\n      knowledge\" necessarily affects our \"attitude to life.\" Can\n      our systematised knowledge sanction a religious attitude?\n      This the \"religious problem.\" Religious harmony of Middle\n      Ages. Will it return?                                            1\n\n    CHAPTER II\n    THE DISSOLUTION OF THE OLD SYNTHESIS\n\n      The old World-Scheme described. Aquinas and Scholasticism.\n      Cusanus criticises conventional ideas of space. The\n      New Astronomy of Copernicus. Bruno and an infinite\n      universe. Galileo's telescope. The New Physics and an\n      automatic universe. The New Logic                                8\n\n    CHAPTER III\n    GROWTH OF THE MECHANICAL THEORY\n\n      The New Science creates a New Philosophy. Universality\n      of Mechanics. Importance of Harvey's discovery. Descartes\n      extends the mechanical theory to cover physiology and psychology.\n      Hobbes and a naturalistic ethic. Newton extends the\n      operation of law from the earth to the heavens. Religious\n      attitude of these thinkers. Significance of their thought       18\n\n    CHAPTER IV\n    SEVENTEENTH-CENTURY REACTIONS\n\n      A Law of Thought. Spinoza. A Mechanical Universe\n      spiritually interpreted. _Natura Naturans_, what it means.\n      The _Ethics_. Spinoza's mysticism. His personality. Leibniz\n      and a philosophy of personality. His monads. Pascal. His\n      significance. _The Pensees._ The eternal protest of religion.\n      Man defies the universe. Results                                28\n\n    CHAPTER V\n    RISE OF AN ANTI-RELIGIOUS SCIENCE\n\n      Anti-clericalism in eighteenth-century France. Voltaire's\n      propaganda. Diderot and the Encyclopaedists. Holbach's\n      _System of Nature_. Laplace's astronomy. Lavoisier and the\n      New Chemistry. Dalton's atomic theory. Results for religion     42\n\n    CHAPTER VI\n    RISE OF GERMAN IDEALISM\n\n      Importance, for the mechanical view, of Locke's theory of\n      knowledge. Weakness of speculative philosophy. Rise of the\n      \"critical\" philosophy. Kant. He seeks to solve the problem:\n      How is knowledge possible? Kant's view of the mind's\n      function in knowledge. Mechanism a \"form of thought,\"\n      subjective not objective. Kant's view of reality. Can we\n      know reality? The two worlds                                    52\n\n    CHAPTER VII\n    THE ROMANTIC MOVEMENT\n\n      Kant clears the ground for a new philosophy. Significance\n      of Rousseau. His attitude to culture. The new philosophy in\n      Germany, its goal. Fichte. Hegel a rationalistic-romanticist.\n      His method. Hegelianism. Significance for religious thought\n      of Schleiermacher. The autonomy of religion and religious\n      experience                                                      62\n\n    CHAPTER VIII\n    MECHANISM AND LIFE\n\n      Rise of bio-chemistry and bio-physics in Germany. Significance\n      of these movements. The Origin of Species. Lamarck.\n      The new geology. Darwin. Results of his theory                  74\n\n    CHAPTER IX\n    MATERIALISM AND AGNOSTICISM\n\n      Early decline of Romanticism in Germany. Comte and the\n      \"positive\" philosophy. Materialism in Germany. Darwinism\n      and the \"argument from design.\" Haeckel. Spencerian\n      evolutionism. Spencer's moral idealism. His philosophy of\n      religion. Agnosticism. Rise of philosophic pessimism.\n      Significance of Nietzsche                                       84\n\n    CHAPTER X\n    REACTIONS IN PHILOSOPHY\n\n      German idealism naturalised in England by Coleridge and\n      Carlyle. These writers described. _Sartor Resartus._ Idealism\n      at Oxford, T. H. Green. F. H. Bradley. Balfour's plea for a\n      philosophy of science. Revival of Idealism in Germany.\n      Lotze. His view of \"values\" and reality                         98\n\n    CHAPTER XI\n    SOME RECENT TENDENCIES IN PHILOSOPHY\n\n      A new philosophy of Science. Mach on \"Economy of\n      Thought.\" \"Abstractness\" and artificiality of scientific\n      method. Boutroux and natural law. James' view of the\n      mind carried further by Bergson. His view of the intellect.\n      What it can, and what it cannot, do for us. Intuition.\n      Indeterminism and Pluralism. Leibniz revived. Ward's\n      philosophy of personality                                      110\n\n    CHAPTER XII\n    SOME RECENT TENDENCIES IN SCIENCE\n\n      The \"New\" Physics. New theories of matter. The \"New\"\n      Biology. Driesch and neo-vitalism. The \"New\" Psychology.\n      \"Spiritualism.\" The outlook for the future                     125\n\n    CHAPTER XIII\n    SOME FINAL CONSIDERATIONS\n\n      History of Thought supplies no material for dogmatising.\n      Yet a progress of ideas is evident. Permanency of \"spiritual\"\n      view of reality. Its continual revival. Sabatier's saying.\n      Need of freedom, alike for religion and for science            137\n\n\n\n\nRELIGION AND SCIENCE\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER I\n\nINTRODUCTORY. RELIGION AND SCIENCE\n\n\nNumerous attempts to define religion have made it evident that religion\nis indefinable. We may, however, say this much about it, that religion\nis _an attitude towards life_: a way of looking at existence. It is\ntrue that this definition is too wide, and includes things which are not\nreligion--there are certain attitudes to life which are definitely\nanti-religious--that of the materialist, for instance. However, it will\nserve a purpose, and we can improve upon it as we proceed. It is a\nmistake to put too much faith in definitions: at any rate it is better\nto have our definitions (if have them we must) too wide than too narrow.\n\nScience is, fortunately, much easier to define. _Accurate and systematic\nknowledge_ is what we mean by science--knowledge about anything,\nprovided that the facts are (so far as possible) accurately described\nand systematically classified. Professor Karl Pearson, the highest\nauthority on the principles of scientific method and theory, writes:\n\n\"The man who classifies facts of any kind whatever, who sees their\nmutual relation and describes their sequences, is applying the\nscientific method and is a man of science. The facts may belong to the\npast history of mankind, to the social statistics of our great cities,\nto the atmosphere of the most distant stars, to the digestive organs of\na worm, or to the life of a scarcely visible bacillus. It is not facts\nthemselves which make science, but the method by which they are dealt\nwith. The material of science is co-extensive with the whole physical\nuniverse, not only that universe as it now exists, but with its past\nhistory and the past history of all life therein. When every fact, every\npresent or past phenomenon of that universe, every phase of present or\npast life therein, has been classified, and co-ordinated with the rest,\nthen the mission of science will be completed.\"[1]\n\nScience, then, is systematic and accurate knowledge; and when we have\nsystematic and accurate knowledge about everything there is to be known,\nthe programme of science will be complete. This is only to say that the\ntask it has set itself is one that will never end.\n\nSo much, then, for our definitions. Religion is \"an attitude to life\":\nscience is \"systematic and accurate knowledge.\" How does the one affect\nthe other? What are the relations between the two? That is the topic\nwhich will occupy our attention during the chapters that follow. To\nanswer the question properly will involve a certain amount of\nacquaintance with the history of ideas. We must first put the\npreliminary question: How, as a matter of fact, have men's scientific\nideas affected their religious ideas (or _vice versa_) in times past?\nHaving tried to answer this question, we shall be in a better position\nto approach the religious problem as it presents itself to-day.\n\nMeanwhile a few remarks of a general character will not be out of place.\nIt is evident that \"science\" can hardly fail to affect \"religion.\"\nSystematised knowledge necessarily affects an individual's (or a\nsociety's) attitude to life--either by broadening and elevating that\nattitude, or by debasing it. Our knowledge, or what we believe to be\nsuch, tends to create certain preconceptions which make our minds\nhostile to certain beliefs or ideas. A man reared from his cradle on\nmechanical science will tend to regard miracles with suspicion; if he be\nlogical (as he generally is not) freedom of the will, even in the most\nlimited sense, will appear chimerical. Nor will his general attitude to\nlife remain unaffected by his views on these points.\n\nSystematised knowledge may thus conceivably come into conflict with the\npresuppositions or the ideals of some particular religion. It is then\nthat a \"religious problem\" arises. A religion indissolubly associated\nwith a geocentric conception of the universe would tend to become\ndiscredited as soon as that conception had been disposed of by\n\"systematic knowledge.\" Science may even tend to produce an attitude to\nlife hostile not only to a particular religion but to _all_ religion. If\nmaterialism should ultimately be found to be consistent with systematic\nand accurate knowledge, it is difficult to see how any attitude to life\nwhich could be appropriately described as \"religion\" could survive. The\nreligious problem would then, at any rate, cease to trouble us. The\nreligious apologists would be free to turn their attention to matters of\nmore moment. But it is not only with the cessation of religion that the\nreligious problem slumbers. There are certain happy periods when\nreligion flourishes undisturbed by obstinate questionings. These\nclassical ages of religion exist when systematised knowledge seems to\nsupport the contemporary religious outlook--when science and religion\nspeak with one voice. Such unanimity seems to us to-day too good to be\npossible, but that is only because our own age is exceptional--not\nbecause those happier ages were exceptional; they, in fact--if we trace\nhistory backwards--would seem rather to have been the rule.\n\nPrimitive man, it would seem, was troubled by no discords of the kind\nwhich disturb our peace. His systematic knowledge--such as it was--was\nentirely in accord with his religion, the two were, in fact, in his case\npractically one. His science _was_ his religion. It may not have been\nvery sound science, nor very elevated religion, but it served his\npurpose admirably. He was too busy with the struggle for survival to\nindulge in speculation. His religion was severely practical, and he was\nfaithful to it because experience seemed to indicate that it paid.\n\nBut the Stone Age hardly deserves (in spite of its freedom from\nreligious difficulties) to be described as one of the classical ages of\nreligion; absence of struggle does not necessarily mean richness of\nlife. There are ages which better deserve that appellation. There are\ntimes when all existing culture--even of a high level--is closely\nassociated with the current religion, endorses its ideals, sanctions its\nhopes, puts the stamp of finality upon its faith. Such an age cannot\nperhaps hope to be permanent; for life means movement, and movement\nupsets equilibrium, and human knowledge tends to increase faster than\nthe human mind can adapt itself to it or digest it. But such ages are\nlooked back upon with regret when they are past, they shed a golden\nradiance over history, their tradition lingers, they even leave behind\nthem monuments of art and literature which are the wonder, and the\ninimitable models, of succeeding generations.\n\nSuch an epoch was that which left to us our Gothic cathedrals. These are\nthe creation of one of those classic ages \"when all existing culture is\ncast or bent in obedience to the religious idea.\" When scientist,\nscholar and ecclesiastic spoke with one voice and listened to one\nmessage; when prince and peasant worshipped together the same\ndivinities; when to be outside the religious community was to be cut off\nfrom the brotherhood of mankind. \"The Church\" was then co-extensive with\ncivilisation: those without the fold were barbarians, hardly worthy of\nthe name of man.\n\nThat time of splendid harmony, however, is now past; no lamentations\nwill restore it. We have reached another world.\n\nBut it need not remain only a memory; it ought also to serve as an\ninspiration. The conditions of affairs during the classic ages of\nreligion, however impossible at the moment, must remain our ideal. Head\nand heart must some day speak again with one voice, our hopes and\nbeliefs must be consistent with our knowledge. Science must sanction\nthat attitude towards existence which our highest instincts dictate.\n\nIt is only too likely that this consummation is yet distant. Yet even if\nour generation has to reconcile itself to spiritual and moral discord,\nit should never overlook the existence of a happier ideal, and even the\npossibility of its fulfilment. Fortunately for the interests of\nreligion, men feel they _must_ effect some kind of a reconciliation\nbetween the opposing demands which proceed from different sides of their\nnature. Each for himself tries to approximate science and religion, and\nthe struggle to do this creates in each individual spiritual life.\nTension sometimes creates light, and struggle engenders life. So long as\nthere are men sufficiently _interested_ in religion to ask for a\nsolution of its problems, religion will remain superior to the\ndisintegration towards which all discord, if unchecked, proceeds.\n\nIt is sometimes said that the religious harmony of the Middle Ages, of\nwhich we have spoken, having been due to imperfect knowledge, is never\nlikely to repeat itself, unless we sink back into the ignorance of\nbarbarism: and (it is urged) we know too much to be at peace. Having\ntasted of the fruits of knowledge, the human race is cast forth from its\nParadise. This view is unduly pessimistic. There is no valid reason for\nexcluding the possibility that our knowledge of reality and those ideal\nhopes which constitute our religion may actually coincide. Religion and\nscience, approaching the problem of existence from contrary directions,\nmay independently arrive at an identical solution. That the two actually\ndo attack the enigma from different sides has led many people to regard\nthe two as hostile forces. Such is not the case. Religion and science\nregard reality from different angles, but it is the same reality that is\nthe object of their vision, and the goal of their search.\n\nReligion looks at existence as a whole, and attempts to determine its\nmeaning and value for mankind. Religion, we may say, stands at the\ncentre of existence, and regards reality from a central position.\n\nThe province of science, on the other hand, is not to take so wide a\nsurvey, but to gain knowledge piece-meal: to locate points inductively,\nand thus to plot out the curve which we believe existence constitutes.\nIf the _loci_, as they are successively fixed, seem to indicate that the\ncurve is identical with the circle which religion has already\nintuitively postulated, the problem of existence would have been solved.\nScience and religion working by different methods would have described\nthe same circle. When science has completed its circle, its centre may\nbe found to stand just at the point where religion has always\nconfidently declared it to be. Knowledge and faith will then, and not\ntill then, be one.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER II\n\nTHE DISSOLUTION OF THE OLD SYNTHESIS\n\n\nWe have seen that there are classic religious periods when faith and\nknowledge have seemed to approximate to one another. The Middle Ages in\nEurope constituted such a period; no \"Religion _v._ Science\" controversy\ncould then be said to exist; the best scientific knowledge of the time\nseemed to sanction the popular religious notions. Learned and lay\nthought in the same terms; the wolf lay down with the lamb.\n\nTHE OLD WORLD-SCHEME.--It is important to grasp the main features of a\nworld-scheme which as late as the fifteenth century passed everywhere\nwithout criticism.\n\nThe father of it was Aristotle. His conception of the universe rested\nupon the plain contrast, which strikes the unsophisticated observer,\nbetween the unembarrassed and regular movements of the heavenly bodies\nand the disordered agitations of sublunary things. Hence the heavenly\nregion was eternal, and the region of earth transitory: yonder, the\nmotions that take place are eternal and regular; here, motion and rest\nalternate, nothing \"continueth in one stay.\"\n\nAt the centre of the universe stands Earth: hence we mount through three\nsublunary strata to the region of the celestial ether, which is purer\nas distance from the Earth increases.\n\nThese strata form three concentric \"spheres\" which, solid yet\ntransparent (like crystal), revolve around the earth. The first contains\nthe moon--like a fly in amber; the second, the sun; the third, the fixed\nstars; which last sphere is also the first of several successive\nheavens, the highest of which is the seat of Deity.\n\nThis Aristotelio-Ptolemaic system[2] formed a coherent framework for\nbiblical world-notions. Here too, earth stands still while sun and stars\nrevolve; here, too, the seat of Deity is the highest heaven. This was an\nuniverse where men could feel their feet on firm ground; their minds\nfound rest in those simple and definite notions which make religious\nconceptions easy to understand and accept; their imaginations were not\nyet disturbed and disquieted by thoughts of space and time without end\nand without beginning.\n\nAQUINAS.--Such was the \"world of nature,\" the theatre for that \"world of\ngrace\" which Revelation spoke of, and which led eventually to the\neternal \"world of glory\" in which the faithful should have their\nportion. _Natura_, _gratia_, _gloria_ was the ascending series (like\nanother set of celestial spheres), and the whole economy was elaborated\ninto a logical system, known to the historians of thought as\nScholasticism: a philosophy which found its most perfect and memorable\nexpression in Thomas Aquinas (1227-74), the _doctor angelicus_ of\nCatholic theology, canonised less than fifty years after his death. The\n_Summa Philosophica_, where Aquinas deals with the rational foundations\nof a Christian Theism, and the _Summa Theologica_, where he erects his\nelaborate structure of theology and ethics, together constitute \"one of\nthe most magnificent monuments of the human intellect, dwarfing all\nother bodies of theology into insignificance.\"[3] In him the erudition\nof an epoch found its spokesman; he was the personification of an\nintellectual ideal. To his contemporaries he stood beyond the range of\ncriticism. In the _Paradiso_ (x.8.2) it is St. Thomas who speaks in\nheaven.\n\nNevertheless, the Scholastic world-scheme, though based on \"the evidence\nof the senses, the investigations of antiquity, and the authority of the\nChurch,\" and though Aquinas had set the seal of finality upon it, was\ndestined to gradual discredit and ultimate extinction.\n\nDISINTEGRATION BEGINS.--It was open to attack on two sides. _Either_\nobservations or calculations might be brought forward, conflicting with\nit, or making another conception possible or probable: _Or_ the validity\nof conventional ideas of space might be disputed.\n\nThe latter type of criticism was the first to occur. Nicholas Cusanus\n(1401-1464), an inhabitant of the Low Countries, subsequently bishop and\ncardinal, developed unconventional notions about Space. He suggested\nthat wherever man finds himself--on earth, sun, or star--he will always\nregard himself as standing at the centre of existence. There is, in\nfact, no point in the universe which might not appropriately be called\nits centre, and to say that the earth stands at the centre is only (what\nwe should now call it) an anthropomorphism. So much for _place_; and\nsimilarly with _motion_. Here, too, there is no absolute standard to\napply: motion may exist, but be unnoticed if there be no spot at\nabsolute rest from which to take bearings.\n\n\"We are like a man in a boat sailing with the stream, who does not know\nthat the water is flowing, and who cannot see the banks: how is he to\ndiscover whether the boat is moving?\" Cusanus, in fact, denies the\nfundamental Aristotelian dogma that the earth is the central point of\nthe universe, because, on general grounds, there _can_ be no absolute\ncentral point. This gave a shock to the \"geocentric theory\" from which\nit never recovered.\n\nWorse shocks, however, were to come. The name of the man who actually\n(as Luther complained) turned the world upside down, is notorious\nenough. Poles and Germans alike have claimed the nationality of Nicolaus\nCopernicus (1473-1543); who, having been a student at Cracow and in\nItaly, became a prebendary in Frauenburg Cathedral.\n\nTHE NEW ASTRONOMY.--The general criticisms of Cusanus were elaborated by\nCopernicus. The senses cannot inform us (when any motion takes place)\n_what_ it is that moves. It may be the thing perceived that moves, or\nthe percipient--or both. And it would be _possible_ to account for the\nmovements of celestial bodies by the supposition that it is the earth\nthat moves, and not they. Copernicus' whole work consisted in the\nmathematical demonstration that this hypothesis could account for the\nphenomena as we observe them. In fact, when these demonstrations were\neventually published (it was only on his death-bed that Copernicus\nreceived a copy of his book--and he had already lost consciousness) they\nwere introduced by a discreet preface, which intimated that the whole\nthing might safely be regarded as a _jeu d'esprit_ on the part of an\neccentric mathematician. And this editorial _caveto_, though written by\nanother hand, preserved the Copernican theories from the notoriety that\nmight otherwise have attended, and afterwards did attend, them.\n\nCopernican conceptions were semi-traditional. The sun displaces the\nearth as the central point of the universe: around it revolve the\nplanets--including the earth; and, at an immeasurable distance, is the\nimmovable heaven of the fixed stars. Copernicus left it an open question\nwhether or no the universe was infinite. It remained for his successor,\nthe greatest of the Renaissance thinkers, Giordano Bruno (1548-1600) to\ndeclare it to be limitless, and to contain an infinity of worlds like\nour own. The fixed stars became, for him, suns surrounded by planets.\nThe traditional distinction between the celestial and sublunary spheres\nhad vanished. The bewilderment and indignation excited by these ideas,\nrevolting to the conscience of his time, cost their author his life.\n\nGALILEO.--The criticism of the old world-conceptions was, however, to be\nbased on yet more sure ground by one who relied, not on general\nconsiderations, but on observation and experiment. Galileo (1564-1642)\nstudied philosophy, physics, and mathematics at Pisa; and as professor\nexpounded the old astronomy long after he had ceased to regard it as\nadequate. Not until 1610, after he had constructed a telescope and\nobserved the satellites of Jupiter, did he openly confess his adherence\nto the system of Copernicus. The observation of sun-spots and the phases\nof Venus confirmed his opinion.\n\nAristotelian astronomers declined to witness these phenomena through his\ntelescope, and perhaps Galileo was right in observing with a sigh that\nwere the stars themselves to descend from heaven to bear him witness his\ncritics would remain obdurate.[4]\n\nIt was not until 1632 that a complete exposition of the conflict between\nthe two world-systems was produced by Galileo. It took the form of a\ndialogue between three speakers--conservative, mediating, and extreme.\nThe views of the author, however, were not sufficiently concealed, the\nbook was prohibited, and Galileo summoned to Rome, and upon threat of\ntorture, subdued into a recantation and a promise not to offend in the\nfuture. That Galileo perjured himself is not open to doubt, nor did he\nchange his convictions. A subsequent work, surreptitiously printed in\nHolland, contained the same heresies expressed with less reserve.\n\nTHE NEW PHYSICS.--It might be said, then, that the fabric of the\nuniverse had been reconstructed by the thinkers whose explorations we\nhave hitherto followed. This achievement, however, though sufficiently\nstartling in itself, was not the only, and perhaps not the most\nimportant, of their performances. The question still awaited solution:\n_By what forces and laws is the new world-system maintained in\nactivity?_\n\nThe traditional reply had been that the universe was kept in motion by\nthe operation of the Deity. While the truth of this reply was not\nquestioned by the advocates of the \"new\" science, it did not seem to\nthem to dispel the obscurity surrounding certain points about which they\nrequired information. It was Galileo who observed that the appeal to the\ndivine will explains nothing just because it explains everything. It\ntakes the inquirer back too far--behind those details of method which\narouse his speculative interest.\n\nThis desire to understand those methods of operation which natural\nobjects appear to follow, led philosophers to enunciate certain \"laws\"\nabout them. These served as \"explanations\" of particular classes of\nphenomena. It was the phenomena of _motion_ that especially attracted\ntheir attention; and many ingenious experiments were performed by\nGalileo, in particular, which led him to conclusions which then seemed\nparadoxical, but now serve as axioms of physical science; for \"the laws\nof motion contain the key to all scientific knowledge of material\nnature.\" When Galileo, after careful experiment, established the\nproposition that a body can neither change its motion of itself, nor\npass from motion to rest, the fundamental \"law of inertia\"--of such\nincalculable importance to the development of modern physics--had been\nestablished.\n\nAN AUTOMATIC UNIVERSE.--A proposition of this kind may not at first seem\nto involve important philosophical or theological consequences. But we\nonly have to consider that it provided a natural explanation of the\ncontinued and untiring motion of the heavenly bodies. It did not, it is\ntrue, explain how that motion arose; but the motion being \"given,\" it\nhad now been shown how it would, in the absence of obstructions, be\nperpetual. In fact, speculations of this kind opened up the way to the\n_mechanical_ explanation of nature, a theory which had been already\nspeculatively held by Leonardo da Vinci, who is already convinced that\n\"necessity is the eternal bond, the eternal rule of Nature.\"\n\nSCIENCE AND MATHEMATICS.--It was not only, however, the spectacle of a\nsystem running automatically that suggested to observers a mechanical\ntheory to explain it. There was also the fact that phenomena were\nobserved to occur in accordance with certain simple mathematical laws.\nGalileo's experiments with falling bodies led him to foreshadow\nprinciples which were afterwards elaborated and fully demonstrated by\nNewton, who may be said to have been the first to construct a mechanical\nuniverse. The principle had already been formulated by a contemporary of\nGalileo--Johannes Kepler--in the axiom _ubi materia, ibi geometria_.\n\nRESULTS.--The thinkers whose speculations have engaged us were indeed\nresponsible for creating a revolution in ideas. For a finite universe\nwhose centre was the earth, and which was kept in motion by the\noperation of the Deity, they had substituted the conception of\nillimitable space sown with innumerable systems like our own; and had\ncreated the beginning of a mechanical conception of nature.\n\nTHE NEW LOGIC.--But it was not only the scientific dogmas of the old\nsystem that had been so rudely overthrown--the very principles upon\nwhich those dogmas rested had been submitted to a destructive criticism.\nThe new science produced a new logic. This order of events is not\nunusual: first, the new scientific discoveries, and then in the wake of\nthe discoverers, comes the innovating critic who systematises the\nlogical or scientific methods to which the new knowledge seems to have\nbeen due. First, Kepler and Galileo, who used the \"inductive\" method,\nand then Lord Bacon of Verulam (1561-1626), who discovered the inductive\nlogic, and established it as a system.\n\nFRANCIS BACON.--Bacon's doctrine may be summarised by his own epigram,\n\"If a man begin with certainties, he shall end in doubts; but if he be\ncontent to begin with doubts, he shall end in certainties.\" Which is\nreally a criticism of what is known as the a priori method, whereby the\ninquirer starts with certain predefined theories to which all phenomena\nmust conform, and which all experience must verify. If facts will not\nsuit the particular theory, so much the worse for the facts: one could\nalways disregard them, and apply a blind eye to Galileo's telescope.\nSuch is always the procedure of the dogmatic mind, which is already so\ncertain of the truth of its notions that no evidence can persuade it to\nthe contrary. But it is not by such means that knowledge is advanced,\nand it was for a reversal of these that Bacon pleaded.\n\nLeonardo da Vinci had already anticipated the Baconian logic (which did\nnot wait for Bacon until it was applied) when he laid down the\nproposition that wisdom was the daughter of experience, and rejected all\nspeculations which experience, the common mother of all sciences, could\nnot confirm. Hence, knowledge was the product of time; the process of\ncollecting material for a judgment must often be slow, but the results\nwere worth the labour--these would not be speculative, but true. Nor\nneed it be supposed that Bacon excluded imagination from playing a part\nin increasing knowledge, he did not plead _only_ for a mechanical\ncollection of material. It is imagination which in face of abundant\nmaterial creates the hypothesis which accounts for it being what it is.\nAnd he was prepared to admit the value of preliminary hypotheses which\nmight be replaced as further facts were collected, or as insight became\nmore clear. Here, too, Bacon describes the method followed by modern\nscience.\n\nPRESTIGE OF NEW METHODS.--And so, by the time when Bacon had laid down\nhis pen after writing the _New Logic_, the work of discrediting the old\nsystem, elaborated with such ingenious industry by Aquinas, was\ntolerably complete. The new science had begun already to be fruitful in\nresults, both practical and speculative. The successors of Galileo and\nof Bacon applied the new principles with vigour, and reached astonishing\nresults. Justified by these, the new methods secured a prestige which\nhas not decreased for three centuries.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER III\n\nGROWTH OF THE MECHANICAL THEORY\n\n\nDECLINE OF SCHOLASTICISM.--By the time of Lord Bacon, the Scholastic\nphilosophy might have been described as extinct; it no longer survived\nas a living system. The loss was a serious one to mankind, which was\npoorer by the discrediting of an authoritative body of thought, a\npossession it seems ill able to dispense with. The Baconian philosophy\nwas an imperfect substitute; it was little more than a system of\nenquiry, a manual of scientific procedure, for Bacon himself was not in\nthe philosophical sense a profound or constructive thinker, though he\nwas one of those men of talent who can give utterance to the tendencies\nof an epoch.\n\nTHE NEW PHILOSOPHY.--The task, however, of constructing a new philosophy\nof the universe was courageously taken in hand by a succession of\nthinkers, and the energy of thought which the great problem generated is\ncharacteristic of perhaps the most vigorous century of European\nhistory--the seventeenth.\n\nThe tendency of the new discoveries in science had not been obscure, and\nModern Philosophy starts with an attempt to represent the universe as a\nself-working machine--a co-ordinated whole, throughout which the\nprinciples of mathematics are universally valid. The trend of ideas set\nin motion by the new discoveries in astronomy seemed to point in this\ndirection. But to introduce mechanics into the celestial regions, though\nan important step, was but a beginning. Mechanics must be _universally_\nvalid--even in the human body--or the new teaching was vain. Exceptions\nmay prove a rule, but they destroy a philosophy.\n\nTHE SUBJUGATION OF PHYSIOLOGY.--It was an Englishman who provided the\nnecessary facts to fill the gravest gap in the mechanical theory. It was\nalready known in the previous century that the blood of animals\ncirculated throughout the body; the existence and use of veins and\nheart-valves was also known, but it was William Harvey (1578-1657) who\ndiscovered the heart to be the organ responsible for _maintaining_ the\ncirculation of the blood, by purely mechanical means. This was a fact of\nthe utmost significance. In the sphere of physiology, where theories\nabout mysterious powers of blood or soul had been hitherto\nauthoritative, it effected a revolution. Indeed it is true to say that\nHarvey \"is to physiology what Galileo was to physics.\" He proved that\n\"the general laws of motion are valid within as well as without the\norganism\"--an important extension of the mechanical theory.\n\nDESCARTES.--Among the leading men who accepted Harvey's theory, one of\nthe first was Rene Descartes (1596-1650). Well might this thinker\nwelcome it, for it was a most important contribution to the imposing\nphilosophic fabric for which he was industriously collecting materials.\nDescartes, apart from his philosophical speculations, is an interesting\ncharacter, being a Frenchman of noble birth who was educated by the\nJesuits, saw something of contemporary life in Paris, served as a\nmilitary officer in Holland and Germany, and made some original\ndiscoveries in mathematics.\n\nThe mathematical mind, accustomed as it is to deal with highly abstract\nideas, takes kindly to metaphysics. And it very often solves the mystery\nof the universe by expressing all its contents in mathematical terms.\nSuch, at least, was Descartes' method. The simplest and clearest ideas\nwhich we can have of anything are mathematical, i.e. extension and\nmobility. And it is by concentrating our attention upon this simple and\nmathematical aspect of things that we shall arrive at a proper\nunderstanding of all that goes on in the material world.\n\nUNIVERSALITY OF MATHEMATICS.--A phenomenon was, in Descartes' eyes,\n\"explained\" only when a \"cause\" which is its exact _mathematical\nequivalent_, has been indicated. The \"cause\" and the \"effect\" are two\nsides of a mathematical equation (_Causa aequat effectum_). Anything\nthat happens in the material world (the fall of a stone, the beat of a\nheart, the rising of the sun) is really nothing more than a\nredistribution of portions of that sum of motion which, once generated\nat the Creation, has remained unaltered, and unalterable, in the\nuniverse ever since. The sum of motion is constant, there can be no\naddition to or subtraction from it. In this sense it would be true that\n\"there is nothing new under the sun\": only ever-new distributions of the\nold.\n\nTHE UNIVERSE A MACHINE.--Once assume that all phenomena can be\ninterpreted in terms of motion, and add the proposition (already\nenunciated by Galileo) that motion once set going will proceed for ever,\nunless some impediment from outside intervenes, and the mechanical view\nof the universe is complete. The universe is a machine, i.e. a thing\nthat works (1) according to mathematical principles, (2) automatically.\n\nELABORATIONS OF THE MECHANICAL THEORY.--The importance of Descartes lies\nnot in his having invented this conception (we have already seen it in\nthe hands of Leonardo da Vinci, Galileo, and others), but in his having\nelaborated it. This he did in two directions: (1) he attempted to supply\na mechanical theory of the evolution of the world-system; _i.e._ to show\nhow the heavenly bodies came into being by natural and mechanical\nprocesses; (2) he applied the mechanical theory to organisms; animals\nand men were complex machines. (Here, as we have seen, the discovery of\nHarvey was of prime importance.)\n\nIt is hardly necessary to describe at length Descartes' mechanical\ntheory of the evolution of the world-system, though an interest attaches\nto it as being the ancestor of the modern \"nebular hypothesis.\" Matter\nin whirling motion around fixed centres is the original _datum_ from\nwhich Descartes evokes the universe. With regard to the mechanical\ntheory of organisms, Descartes developed it at some length in various\ntreatises. All the functions and actions of animals were regarded by him\nas entirely involuntary and mechanical. \"That the lamb flees at the\nsight of a wolf happens because the rays of light from the body of the\nwolf strike the eye of the lamb, and set the muscles in motion by means\nof the 'reflex' currents of the animal spirits.\"\n\nIn the case of human beings, owing to the phenomenon of \"consciousness,\"\nDescartes felt compelled to assume a \"soul\"--a _thinking_ substance in\nreciprocal action with the _material_ substance (of the brain). This,\ntoo, is an anticipation of the modern theory of \"psycho-physical\nparallelism.\"\n\nCARTESIANISM.--The ideas of Descartes had considerable influence among\nhis contemporaries, and Cartesianism, as it was called, became\nfashionable in intellectual circles. It developed a tendency towards\nfree enquiry and independent thought; and it was even more significant\nas an atmosphere than as a system of ideas. Though in this respect too,\nit was both important and vital; as we have observed, modern mechanical\ntheories find their parent in Descartes.\n\nNor was it only, we may remark, among philosophers and men of science\nthat Cartesian ideas were popular; they were accepted and elaborated by\nthe religious thinkers who hoped to harmonise and humanise theology and\nscience. Pascal, Bossuet and Fenelon, the finest minds in the French\nChurch, were eager Cartesians.[5]\n\nThis aspect of the matter, i.e. the significance of Cartesianism for\nreligion, we can for the present postpone.\n\nRESULTS SO FAR.--Successive breaches in the Scholastic system have now\nbeen noted. Copernicus had introduced a new astronomy, Galileo a new\nphysics, Descartes (with the help of Harvey) a new physiology, and the\nbeginnings of a new psychology.\n\nCONTRIBUTIONS OF HOBBES.--The step that remained was taken by an\nEnglishman, Thomas Hobbes (1588-1679), who attempted to provide a system\nof ethics and a theory of politics upon a purely naturalistic basis.\nHobbes was a particularly energetic thinker. He worked out a psychology\nof the feelings, which reduced everything to the impulse of\nself-preservation and the instinct for power. Men were induced by these\ninstincts to agree to certain rules of conduct, for the sake of\nexpediency. Social life seems essential if men are to live together--the\ninstinct of self-preservation demands it--and social life in turn\ndemands certain renunciations: thus fidelity, gratitude, forbearance,\njustice, etc., must be practised.\n\nThus Hobbes attempted to banish all mysterious or obscure forces from\nmorality, which was the characteristic and inevitable product of human\nnature and human circumstances. This way of looking at things seemed\nstrange to all, and even revolting to some, of Hobbes' contemporaries.\nAs the mystical powers of motion which the Scholastics had believed in\nwere banished by the new physics and the new physiology, so the new\npsychology could allow of no mystical faculty which can decide in all\nproblems of good and evil.\n\nWith Hobbes, then, a naturalistic view of the universe may be said to\nhave been tolerably complete: it embraces physics, psychology, and\nethics. There still remained, of course, a number of gaps in scientific\nknowledge, and consequently any philosophy based thereupon could not yet\nbe regarded as secure. These gaps, however, as research proceeded and\nsuccessive discoveries were made, tended to diminish both in size and\nquantity.\n\nNEWTON.--The seventeenth and the early eighteenth centuries were\nfruitful in revelations of this kind, and natural knowledge steadily and\neven rapidly progressed. And one thinker, who may be regarded as a link\nbetween the seventeenth century and that which succeeded it, may now\nclaim our attention.\n\nThe name of Newton (1642-1727) is as familiar to Englishmen as that of\nShakespeare, and the discovery by him of the \"law of gravitation\" is one\nof those scraps of information which we acquire, and perhaps fail to\nunderstand, in early childhood.\n\nNewton's scientific method is a no less important aspect of his work\nthan its results. The _Principia_, in which he gave his discovery to the\nworld, is \"a model for all scientific investigations which has never\nbeen surpassed.\" It was, indeed, a brilliant application of the\nprinciple of inferring the unknown from the already known, without any\ndogmatic leaps in the dark. The principle with which he began was that\nwhat is true in the narrower spheres of experience (e.g. in the case of\nan apple falling) is true also in the wider spheres (e.g. in the\nmovements of the celestial bodies). He then made a careful mathematical\ndeduction of what would happen in the case of the planets, assuming that\nthe laws of falling bodies on the earth were applicable to them also.\nAnd he concluded by showing that what would happen according to\nmathematics under this assumption _actually does happen_. The conclusion\nfollows that the same force, i.e. \"attraction,\" operates in both cases.\nIt is no wonder that this final and successful operation was performed\nby Newton \"in a state of excitement so great that he could hardly see\nhis figures.\"\n\nSIGNIFICANCE OF HIS DISCOVERY.--The philosophic importance of the\ndiscovery that the motions of the planets may be explained by the \"law\nof gravitation\" was twofold. In the first place, it now became possible\nto understand how the universe held together (a problem which the new\nastronomy had not solved); and in the second place, the theory\nconstituted a large extension of the mechanical view. It demonstrated\nthat \"the physical laws which hold good on the surface of the earth are\nvalid throughout the universe, so far as we can know anything of it.\"\nThus the area of existence in which physical law held good was at once\ninfinitely widened. The mechanical theories of Galileo, Descartes, and\nothers, not only received confirmation, but became more comprehensive\nthan before.\n\nSo that Newton may be said to have put the finishing touch upon the\nachievements of his predecessors, and to have crowned their labours with\nsuccess. And his work has the characteristic of permanency: his\n\"gravitation formula\" has stood the test of time. \"It still stands\nthere,\" says a careful and authoritative writer, \"as almost the only\nfirmly established mathematical relation, expressive of a property of\nall matter, to which the progress of more than two centuries has added\nnothing, and from which it has taken nothing away.\"[6]\n\nRELIGIOUS COROLLARIES.--It would be a profound mistake to assume that\nthe creators of the mechanical view, as it has hitherto met us, were\nanimated by any hostility to religion. Nor did they believe their\ntheories to involve any disastrous consequences in that sphere.\n\nThe new astronomy of Copernicus had actually been made the basis of a\nspiritual view of the universe by the profound genius (both\nphilosophical and religious) of Giordano Bruno. And the fact that the\necclesiastical authorities rejected his view need not divest it of\nimportance or of value in our eyes. Bruno's own faith was not disturbed\nby the infidelity of his persecutors. \"Ye who pass judgment upon me\nfeel, maybe, greater fear than I upon whom it is passed,\" were his last\nwords to them. Had they _believed_, they need not have been afraid, and\nmight have been content with the policy of Gamaliel.\n\nAs for Descartes and Hobbes, their notions were no doubt distasteful to\nconservative minds (the Jesuits were no friends to either), but\nDescartes regarded himself, and would fain have been regarded by others,\nas a good Catholic; and Hobbes, theologically, was what in these days we\nmight call a Liberal Protestant. Cartesianism, as we have seen, came to\nbe a name for a type of thought which studied to harmonise science and\ntheology, and one of the most profound religious geniuses of any\nage--Pascal, was (as we have seen) a Cartesian.\n\nAs for Newton, his view of the universe was essentially a religious one,\nthough he did not allow theological speculations to intrude upon his\nstrictly scientific work. His attitude is indicated by a reply to the\ninquiry of a contemporary theologian as to how the movements and\nstructure of the solar system were to be accounted for.\n\n\"To your query I answer that the motions which the planets now have\ncould not spring from any natural cause alone.... To compare and adjust\nall these things together (i.e. quantities of matter and gravitating\npowers, etc.) in so great a variety of bodies, argues the cause to be\nnot blind and fortuitous, but very well skilled in mechanism and\ngeometry.\"[7]\n\nStill, the mechanical view contained within it sinister possibilities;\nand the instincts of conservative thinkers were not altogether at fault.\nThe mechanical view in itself need not be hostile to a spiritual and\nrational religion (though it is fatal to most forms of superstition);\nand yet that view can be used in the interests of anti-religious\nprejudice--and, as we shall see, it was so used, and with considerable\neffect.\n\nMeanwhile, however, we shall pass on to consider the work of three\nthinkers who are typical of a revolt from what was in danger of becoming\nthe all-absorbing tyranny of mechanics. This reaction (for so it may be\ntermed) we shall proceed, in the following chapter, to examine.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IV\n\nSEVENTEENTH-CENTURY REACTIONS\n\n\nA LAW OF THOUGHT.--Whenever a tendency of thought has been vigorously\nprosecuted for any length of time, a reaction invariably displays\nitself. This rule is illustrated by the history of thought in the\nseventeenth century. Mechanical categories, as we have seen, had been\nsteadily extending themselves for the better part of two centuries, and\nwith the materialism of Hobbes the process seemed fairly complete.\n\nMeanwhile, however, human thought began to explore other avenues. Though\nreaction from mechanical ways of thinking did not (at any rate, in the\ncircles with which we are concerned) take the form of an obscurantist\nretreat into prejudice or superstition, the results of the new science\nand its attendant mechanistic philosophy served as a base for further\nexplorations. The principles which Descartes and Hobbes had laid down\nwere criticised by being carried out to their logical conclusions.\n\nSPINOZA.--The philosopher with whom we shall first concern ourselves was\na Jew of Spanish extraction, living in what was then the freest country\nin Europe--Holland. Spinoza (1632-1677) was undoubtedly the greatest\nthinker of his own age, which was highly fertile in that respect, and he\nstill stands as one of the most notable figures in the long history of\nEuropean thought. Not only is his outlook comprehensive, and his thought\nmany-sided, but his standpoint was \"detached\" to a degree hitherto\nunknown. He was untainted, so far as a human being ever can be, by\n\"anthropomorphism\"; he endeavoured to transcend the merely human\noutlook. Here is always the dividing line between the great and the\nmerely mediocre thinker.\n\nSPINOZA'S METHOD.--Spinoza's philosophical ancestry may be traced back\nto Bruno, whose acquaintance we made in a previous chapter, but in whose\ncompany we did not long remain. This highly original mind had already,\nby the doctrine of the infinitude and the divinity of nature, shown how\nthe concept of God and the concept of nature might be closely bound up\ntogether. By similar means, Spinoza hoped to indicate the reality of the\nspiritual, without disturbing the mechanical world-conception which the\nnew science and new philosophy had created between them. He wished\nsomehow to find God not outside, but _in_ Nature; not in disturbances of\nthe order of Nature, but _in that order itself_.\n\nTHE TERM NATURE.--It would be a misapprehension to suppose that the\nterms \"God\" and \"Nature\" are regarded by Spinoza as interchangeable,\nthough his numerous critics were accustomed to declare that this was the\ncase. On the contrary, Spinoza, in order to anticipate the\nmisunderstanding which he saw might arise on this point, reintroduced\ninto philosophy a pair of terms which the Scholastics had long before\nbrought into currency, but which had since fallen out of\nfashion--_Natura naturans_ and _Natura naturata_. We might perhaps\ntranslate the former of these, \"Creative Nature,\" and the latter,\n\"Created Nature.\" _Natura naturans_ is equivalent to \"Nature as a\ncreative power,\" or \"The creative power immanent in Nature.\" _Natura\nnaturata_ is equivalent to \"Nature as it is when created,\" or \"The\nresults of the creative power immanent in Nature.\" And the _Natura\nnaturans_ is active in the _Natura naturata_ at all points: the creative\npower is immanent in creation. As Spinoza puts it in one of his letters:\n\n\"I assert that God is (as it is called) the immanent, not the external\ncause of all things. That is to say, I assert with Paul, that in\nGod all things live and move.... But if any one thinks that the\n_Theologico-Political Treatise_ (one of his works) assumes that God\nand Nature are one and the same, he is entirely mistaken.\"[8]\n\nThus, for Spinoza, the order of nature, which had seemed to so many of\nhis contemporaries, from the religious point of view, such a devastating\nconception, as leaving no room for the spiritual, was itself only\nexplicable if interpreted spiritually.\n\n\"Whatever is, is in God, and nothing can exist or be conceived without\nGod\" (_Ethics_ i. 15) sums up his attitude. All things may be, as the\nnew science taught, 'determined' but they are determined \"by the\nnecessity of the divine nature\" (_Ethics_ i. 29).\n\nTHE \"ETHICS.\"--Spinoza may rightly be termed a man of one book. In his\n_Ethics_ is to be found a complete and final expression of his\nphilosophy. \"How boundless,\" says Goethe of this great book, \"is the\ndisinterestedness conspicuous in every sentence, how exalted the\nresignation which submits itself once for all to the great laws of\nexistence, instead of trying to get through life with the help of\ntrivial consolations; and what an atmosphere of peace breathes through\nthe whole!\"\n\nAccording to its teaching the true happiness and highest activity of men\nis to be found in what Spinoza terms \"the intellectual love of God.\" The\nphrase seems to have been used to designate that full and clearer\nknowledge which is aware that we ourselves and all the conditions of our\nlife are determined by the infinite Nature, by God Himself, who moves in\nus as well as in all things acting upon us. The initiated no longer\nregard themselves as single, isolated, impotent beings, but as included\nin the divine nature. Themselves and all things are seen under the form\nof eternity. This thought is, according to Spinoza, the fruit of the\nhighest activity of the human mind; this is the _amor intellectualis\ndei_; and the supreme good for man.\n\nHis doctrine of immortality is bound up with this intellectual form of\nreligious mysticism--knowledge of God involves participation in His\nimmortality:\n\n\"Death is the less harmful the more the mind's knowledge is clear and\ndistinct, and the more the mind loves God.... The human mind may be of\nsuch a nature that the part of it which we showed to perish with the\nbody may be of no moment to it in respect to what remains.\"\n\nHe who is \"affected with love towards God\" has a mind \"of which the\ngreater part is eternal.\" Thus the soul achieves its emancipation by\nidentifying itself with God--who is the object of its knowledge and\nlove. The path is arduous, and the closing passage of the _Ethics_\nadmits this:\n\n\"If the road I have shown is very difficult, it can yet be discovered.\nAnd clearly it must be very hard when it is so seldom found.... But all\nexcellent things are as difficult as they are rare.\"\n\nSPINOZA AND RELIGION.--It is interesting to note that Spinoza, though a\n\"free-thinking\" Jew, adopts towards the fundamental dogma of\nChristianity an attitude which approximates to the classical expression\nof it in the Fourth Gospel. He held that \"God's eternal wisdom, which\nreveals itself in all things, and especially in the human mind, has\ngiven a special revelation of itself in Christ.\"\n\nPerhaps his ethic, like that of the Stoics, with whom he had so much in\ncommon, was better adapted to satisfy the needs of the philosopher than\nof the ordinary man. But, in the seventeenth century, it was the\nphilosophers and learned men that were in need of a spiritual\ninterpretation of the universe; common men had theirs already, in the\ntraditional pietism which philosophers are often too ready to despise.\nTo Spinoza--and this is one of the many indications of the genuine\nprofundity of his thought--the simple believers seemed already to be in\npossession of too much of the truth for it to be desirable or profitable\nfor them to indulge in speculation. To the question of his landlady at\nthe Hague as to whether she could be saved by the religion which she\nprofessed, his reply was that her religion was good, that she should\nseek no other, and that she would certainly be saved by it if she led a\nquiet and pious life.\n\nSPINOZA'S PERSONALITY.--The figure of Spinoza stands as one of the most\nimposing and attractive in the whole history of philosophy, and his was\nan unworldliness, a simplicity, and a humility purely Franciscan. Like\nall Jews then, he knew a trade--that of lens grinding--and by this he\nwas able to live frugally, while he elaborated his thought. He dedicated\nhis life to the labour of quiet contemplation; nor was he ambitious of\nrecognition, which indeed generally came to him in the form of abuse. He\ndid not escape \"the exquisite rancour of theological hatred,\" but it was\nhis belief, and the conviction inspired his life, that--\n\n\"Neither riches, nor sensuous enjoyment, nor honours, can be a true good\nfor man\"; but on the contrary, \"that the only thing which is able to\nfill the mind with ever-new satisfaction is the striving after\nknowledge, by means of which the mind is united with that which remains\nconstant while all else changes.\"\n\n\"The God-intoxicated,\" was the name given to Spinoza long afterwards in\nGermany. He died (like St. Francis) at forty-five, worn out with the\ntoil of thought. And it renews one's faith in the perspicacity of\ncommonplace people to learn that his barber, sending in a bill after the\ndeath of the philosopher, alluded to his late customer as \"Mr. Spinoza\nof blessed memory.\" It was left to a contemporary theologian to describe\nhim as \"an unclean and foul atheist.\"\n\nLEIBNIZ.--Spinoza had taken over from Descartes and Hobbes their\nmechanical and determinist conception of nature, though he gave to it,\nas we have seen, an interpretation of his own. His attitude was a blend\nof that rationalism and mysticism which were characteristic of so much\nseventeenth century thought. A far more complete reaction, however,\ndisplays itself in the system of a contemporary of Spinoza's--Gottfried\nWilhelm Leibniz (1646-1716); who, when already a youth, had become an\nenthusiastic devotee of the new science; the study of Kepler, Galileo\nand Descartes caused him to feel as though \"transported into a different\nworld.\" Though a German by birth, Leibniz lived continuously in France,\nand wrote habitually in the language of that country.\n\nCONTRAST TO SPINOZA.--Spinoza and Leibniz stand as examples of two\ndistinct methods of eluding the despotism of mechanics--methods which\nwill meet us again in the course of our survey. Spinoza accepts the\nmechanical view as being inevitable and even desirable, but subjects it\nto a spiritual interpretation--he regards it as the way in which the\n_Natura naturans_ works.[9] Leibniz, on the other hand, viewed existence\nfrom an entirely different standpoint. He was bold enough to reject the\nmechanical view altogether; or rather he preferred to regard it as a\nconvenient abstraction, or a useful formula, which might reflect certain\naspects of reality, but could not do justice to its concrete richness\nand complexity.\n\nA PHILOSOPHY OF INDIVIDUALS.--Leibniz's criticism of Descartes and the\nmechanical school proceeded along different lines from that of Spinoza,\nwho, as we have seen, accepted the mechanical view as the basis of his\nspeculation.\n\nAn axiom of that view was (as we know) the conservation of motion. For\nthis conservation of _motion_, Leibniz substitutes the conservation of\n_force_ as being logically the more fundamental concept. True reality,\naccording to him, is not _motion_ itself, but the _force which is its\ncause_. Force and existence became for him identical terms; to work and\nto exist were the same. That force is the true reality, Leibniz\nexpressed in the language of his time by saying, \"Force is substance,\nand all substance is force\"--a proposition which would not be repudiated\nby modern science--and upon this statement his philosophy is built.\n\nBut it was not \"force in general\" or some \"universal force\" that was\nregarded by him as the final reality: Leibniz was not a forerunner of\nHerbert Spencer. Reality for him consisted in _individual centres of\nforce_--a multitude of individual and independent beings, each with its\nown idiosyncrasy, and following its own lines. Existence was, in fact,\nfor him, _individual_. It was the _individual_ centres of force--not\n_general_ principles, universal substances, laws or forces--that make up\nreality.\n\nDOCTRINE OF MONADS.--This view of reality was formulated by Leibniz in\nhis famous doctrine of \"monads.\" \"Monad\" was the technical name applied\nby him to those absolute individuals which he regarded as constituting\ntrue reality. The word, meaning \"unity,\" was simple and appropriate. And\nhe declared that the \"monad,\" to be rightly understood, must be regarded\nas analogous to our own souls. This principle of analogy was described\nby Leibniz as _mon grand principe des choses naturelles_. Thus reality\nwas interpreted by him not in physical but in psychical terms, or if the\nexpression be preferred, in terms of personality.[10]\n\nOf these \"monads\" there exist, according to this view, infinitely many\ndegrees. In fact all existence differs only in degree from our own.\nEven between mind and matter there is only a quantitative and not a\nqualitative gulf. For there are sleeping, dreaming, and more or less\nwaking monads; and matter is a form of unconscious mind; the monads\nwhich compose material objects being \"minds without memory,\" \"momentary\nminds.\"\n\nLet Leibniz speak for himself:--\n\n\"Each portion of matter is not only infinitely divisible, but is also\nactually subdivided without end.... Whence it appears that in the\nsmallest particle of matter there is a world of creatures, living\nbeings, animals, entelechies, souls. Each portion of matter may be\nconceived as like a garden full of plants, or like a pond full of\nfishes.... Thus there is nothing fallow, nothing sterile, nothing dead\nin the universe....\"[11]\n\nLeibniz may indeed be said to have been the first to outline a theory of\n\"panpsychism\" (as it is termed), according to which there is nothing\nthat is not, in its degree, alive. As we shall have occasion to observe,\nLeibniz was here (as elsewhere) a forerunner of much recent philosophy.\n\nThe significance of the Spinozist and Leibnizian systems of thought,\nthough regarding existence from such diverse standpoints, was, for\npractical purposes the same. Both alike led out, though by different\npaths, beyond the mechanical theory of the universe. They, indeed,\nrepresent two types of thought which attempt to reach the same end by\ndifferent methods. Their counterparts will meet us again as this history\nproceeds.\n\nPASCAL.--But before passing out from the seventeenth century, one\nthinker ought to detain us; for from more than one point of view he was\na notable personality, and of first-rate importance in the history of\nreligious, as distinct from purely philosophical thought. He was indeed\none of those figures who are distinguished among distinguished men of\nall times.\n\nBlaise Pascal was born in 1623, and was a boy of precocious mathematical\nability. By the age of twelve he is said to have worked out\nindependently most of the first and second books of Euclid; at sixteen\nhe wrote a treatise on Conics which attracted the attention of\nDescartes; at nineteen he completed a calculating machine--a device that\nhad never been dreamt of before. At this point it is not surprising to\nlearn that his health broke down.\n\nPascal is not a systematic philosopher; but his acute intellect was\nunited to an inner restlessness of soul. Neither science nor philosophy\ncould bring him peace, for his needs were far deeper than any merely\nrational systematisation of ideas could satisfy. Some have said of him\nthat he was fundamentally a sceptic, but one for whom religious faith\nwas essential; certainly in him were united an acute critical faculty\nand an intense religious experience. Perhaps the two are not so\nincompatible after all.\n\nTHE \"PENSEES.\"--Pascal is chiefly famous for two works, the _Lettres\nProvinciales_ and the _Pensees_. The former is controversial literature,\nbut yet a classic of the French language: in sum, it is an attack on the\nJesuits; but it need not here detain us, for with theology, as such, we\nare not concerned, and still less with ecclesiastical systems. The\n_Pensees_ is a collection of fragments, the material for an Apology for\nChristianity which was never written. The autograph MS. preserved in\nthe _Bibliotheque Nationale_ at Paris \"is made up of scraps of paper of\nall shapes and sizes, written often on both sides ... and dealing with\nall sorts of subjects.\" One is reminded of the mythical scraps of\nmanuscript from which the genius of Carlyle distilled the philosophy of\nthe sagacious Teufelsdroech.\n\nBut it is in these detached fragments that Pascal has expressed his\nspiritual and intellectual struggles; they contain his philosophy of\nlife. And, however unsystematic in arrangement, they do reveal a fairly\ndefinite temper and attitude of mind.\n\nPASCAL'S PHILOSOPHY.--In the first place, the _Thoughts_ voice a\nreaction against the \"Cartesian intellectualism\" which was then the\nprevalent tendency in scientific and philosophical circles. \"The last\nattainment of reason is to recognise that there is an infinity of things\nbeyond it\" might perhaps have been published by Pascal's predecessors.\n\"To laugh at philosophy is to be a true philosopher\" would have seemed\nlike blasphemy or nonsense to most of his contemporaries, but it was\nneither of these.\n\nBehind sayings of this description lay the strong conviction that mere\nlogic was incapable of probing the depths of existence. \"The heart has\nits reasons of which reason knows nothing,\" is sound psychology, and not\nscepticism or obscurantism. Of course it all depends what one means by\n\"reason.\" Too many of Pascal's contemporaries applied the word to a more\nor less shallow rationalism utterly opposed to a spiritual view of\nthings, whereas reason properly understood is \"the logic of the whole\npersonality.\"[12]\n\nThat Pascal was no mere narrow anti-rational obscurantist is evident,\nnot only from his own extraordinary insight, but from his continual\nreiteration of his idea that the essential dignity of man lies in his\nthought:\n\n\"All bodies, the firmament, the stars, the earth and its kingdoms, are\nnot worth the smallest mind, for a mind knows them, and itself, and\nbodies know nothing.\"\n\nHere lies the true greatness of man. In respect of material bulk he is\nnothing, but his thought cannot be measured. \"Man is only a reed, the\nfeeblest reed in nature, _but he is a thinking reed_.\" The saying has\nbecome famous, and the words that follow are hardly less so; they remove\nthe overpowering and crushing incubus of man's illimitable material\nenvironment, which, since Copernicus, had weighed upon thinkers like a\nnightmare:\n\n\"Were the universe to crush him, man would still be more noble than that\nwhich slays him, because he knows that he dies, and the advantage that\nthe universe has over him: of this the universe knows nothing. Thus all\nman's dignity lies in his thought.\"[13]\n\nPASCAL'S PESSIMISM.--It has been said that an unbridgeable gulf lies\nbetween those who believe and those who disbelieve in mankind. It is to\nthe latter category that Pascal belongs. His faith in the dignity of man\nis paradoxically associated with a realisation of his weakness and\nimbecility:\n\n\"What a chimera, then, is man! What an oddity, what a monster, what a\nchaos, what a subject of contradiction, what a prodigy! Judge of all\nthings, senseless earth-worm; depository of truth, cloaca of\nuncertainty and error; the glory and the refuse of the universe.\"\n\n\"We desire truth, and find in ourselves only uncertainty; we seek\nhappiness, and find only misery and death. We are unable not to wish for\ntruth and happiness, and incapable either of certainty or felicity.\"\n\nIn fact, we may say that Pascal was the first, in an age of exaggerated\nreverence for logic (the _damnosa hereditas_ of the Scholastic\ntheologians) to understand that the best arguments for religion are the\nfacts of human experience, and the conditions of human life.\n\n\"In vain, O men, do ye seek within yourselves the cure for your\ntroubles! All your knowledge can only teach you that it is not within\nyourselves that ye find the true or good!\" Here we have the language of\nreligious experience. The result of Augustine's meditation upon life was\nthe same: _Inquietum cor nostrum dum requiescat in te._ It is a tongue\nthat the \"psychic man\" can never understand; it seems to him\naffectation; such language is foreign to the easy optimism of an age of\nconfidence. Indeed Pascal, though so intensely modern, is a stranger,\nand his words often enigmas to our time.\n\n_Vanitas vanitatum_ is thus the verdict that he passes upon human\nexperience. \"The last act is tragic, however fine the comedy of all the\nrest.\"\n\nSIGNIFICANCE OF PASCAL.--It is not as a systematic thinker that Pascal\nis of importance to the historian of thought. He typifies that more or\nless inarticulate and unreasoned revolt which the arrogance and optimism\nof a new science or a new philosophy arouse against themselves. He\nvoices the eternal protest that it is not by bread alone that men live.\nAs is generally the case with such protests, the pessimism of Pascal\nwas no doubt exaggerated; but exaggeration is necessary if minds are to\nbe impressed; and those who feel strongly see only one side of a\nquestion.\n\nRESULTS.--Thus in the three figures that have passed before us, we see a\nthreefold protest against that exclusion of the spiritual from the human\nview of life. Spinoza, the pantheist, sees God everywhere;[14] Leibniz\nfinds in every recess of nature the principle of personality; Pascal\nfinds the only cure for human frailty and misery in religion.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER V\n\nRISE OF AN ANTI-RELIGIOUS SCIENCE\n\n\nATMOSPHERIC CONDITIONS.--As we have seen, a mechanical view of the\nuniverse was not felt by thinkers like Descartes or Newton, or even\nHobbes, to involve any consequences that were necessarily hostile to\nreligion. The new science sometimes might be anti-theological, because\nthe current theology still seemed too much infected with Scholasticism,\nbut it was not, in the hands of its most notable exponents,\nanti-religious. Science had no quarrel with religion as such, nor even\nwith a rational type of theology.\n\nOf course the new views aroused many suspicions, and did not escape\ncriticism at the hands of Church authorities, both Protestant and\nCatholic. And (as we have seen) some early scientists paid very dearly\nfor their allegiance to the spirit of scientific enquiry; but as time\nwent on, actual persecution became impossible, morally and practically.\nBut theologians were never, during the seventeenth century at least,\nquite reconciled to a science and a philosophy which seemed to them to\nbe leading men towards areas quite uninhabitable for religion. But in\nspite of suspicions on either side, and the prevalence of some measure\nof intolerance, it cannot be said that relations between the scientists\nor philosophers and the theologians were very seriously strained until\nwell on in the eighteenth century.\n\nANTI-RELIGIOUS PROPAGANDA.--That this comparatively pacific state of\naffairs came to an end was the fault, primarily, at least, neither of\nthe theologians nor of the scientists. A different atmosphere gradually\nbegan to envelop and to embitter the controversy. Orthodox religion,\nespecially in Catholic countries, came to be associated with political\nreaction, and the most envenomed onslaughts began to be made upon what\nseemed to be the chief stronghold of a discredited regime. Especially\nwas this the case in France, where corrupt political conditions were\naggravated by the intense social misery which they had created.\n\nThus France became the cradle of the phenomenon known as\nanti-clericalism, which is the product not so much of disbelief in a\ncreed as of hatred of a system; it was the correlative of a Church in\nwhich religion was extinct, for genuine Catholicism had been rooted out\nof France early in the eighteenth century, just as Protestantism had\nbeen drowned in blood a century before.[15]\n\nSCIENCE POPULARISED.--In two respects France, during the second half of\nthe eighteenth century, was far in advance of other countries. No other\nliterature of that age can be compared with the French for the skill and\ncharm with which scientific views were expressed. There was no lack of\nfirst-rate propagandists. And not only in the popularisation, but in\nthe systematic teaching of science, France for a long period led the\nway.[16] Whereas the history of English or German literature of the\neighteenth century could be written almost without reference to science,\nit is with scientific problems that the names of some of the most\nbrilliant French _litterateurs_ are associated. And whereas in England,\nscientific men worked (in spite of the existence of the Royal Society)\nmore or less in isolation, in France the savants have always been a\nbrotherhood.[17]\n\nVOLTAIRE.--One of the most notorious names associated with the type of\npropaganda referred to is that of Voltaire (1694-1778). Voltaire's\npolemic cannot be described as anti-religious, for he himself was a\ntheist. It was, rather, political in character. The object of his attack\nwas the Catholic Church as existing in France in his day, which he\nregarded as the chief surviving obstacle to human progress. _Ecrasez\nl'infame_ was his motto; and if this seems a trifle fanatical, let us\nnot forget, as an acute critic has observed, \"that what Catholicism was\naccomplishing in France in the first half of the eighteenth century was\nnot anything less momentous than the slow strangling of French\ncivilisation.\"[18]\n\nVoltaire was an industrious and prolific writer (his works are numbered\nby scores), but he was also a master of French prose, and he was\nuniversally read. From the point of view of the history of European\nthought his importance lies in his popularisation in France of the\nNewtonian physics.[19] _Newtonisme_ was a word coined by him, and became\nassociated with a mechanical view of nature. He also conducted a\nvigorous polemic against certain religious notions, then current, but\nnow out-of-date, and which need not here detain us. Voltaire was an\nanti-clerical, but he was not hostile to religion; he was chiefly\nregarded as an exponent of English (i.e. progressive) ideas.\n\nLA METTRIE.--An advance in the materialistic direction was taken,\nhowever, by La Mettrie (1709-1751), who approached the problem from the\nside of physiology (he was a physician by profession). His two important\ncontributions were _Histoire naturelle de l'ame_ (1745), and _L'Homme\nMachine_ (1748). The titles are sufficient to indicate the scope of\nthese works. That of the latter points back to Descartes, who had\napplied the mechanical theory to animals only, and not to man. La\nMettrie extended his application to include man. The implications of\nthis theory did not escape La Mettrie's contemporaries.\n\nDIDEROT AND HIS ENCYCLOPAEDIA.--A definite period in the history of\nthought is certainly marked by the successful attempt on the part of a\ngroup of progressive thinkers, to extend the circle open to scientific\nideas by the publication of an Encyclopaedia which should contain all the\nlatest knowledge and speculation. The credit for this notable\nperformance was due to Diderot, who in spite of immense difficulties,\nwhich were aggravated by the ecclesiastical authorities and the\nsupporters of reaction in general, carried the work through to a\ntriumphant conclusion. The first volume appeared in 1751. The work was\ncomposed with an eye to current prejudices; the language was guarded,\nbut the anti-clerical tendency of the whole was by no means obscure.\nDiderot, however, did not obtrude in the Encyclopaedia the definitely\nanti-religious opinions which he had developed and which are revealed in\nhis correspondence.\n\nHOLBACH.--A disciple of the Encyclopaedist--Holbach, a young German\nsettled in Paris--was bolder than his master, and published, under the\nname of a savant who had recently died, a book which became widely\nnotorious, and has been called the Bible of materialism--the _Systeme de\nla Nature_ (1770). Like Voltaire's _Elemens_, and La Mettrie's _L'Homme\nMachine_, it was published in Holland. \"The book is materialism reduced\nto a system. It contains no really new thoughts. Its significance lies\nin the energy and indignation with which every spiritualistic and\ndualistic view was run to earth on account of its injuriousness both in\npractice and in theory,\"[20] is the estimate of a distinguished and\nimpartial writer.\n\nRumour gave the credit of its authorship to Diderot, who was so\ndisturbed by the compliment as hastily to leave Paris for the frontier.\nHis admiration of it is, however, recorded. After proclaiming his\ndisgust at the contemporary fashion of \"mixing up incredulity and\nsuperstition,\" he observes that no such fault is to be found in the\n_System of Nature_. \"The author is not an atheist in one page, and a\ndeist in another. His philosophy is all of a piece.\"\n\nCertainly to those with an appetite for negative dogmatism the work left\nnothing to be desired. The following passage indicates the attitude and\nmethod of the author, who, in the matter of style, did not fall short of\nthe French tradition:\n\n\"If we go back to the beginning, we shall always find that ignorance and\nfear have created gods; fancy, enthusiasm or deceit has adorned or\ndisfigured them; weakness worships them; credulity preserves them in\nlife; custom regards them, and tyranny supports them in order to make\nthe blindness of men serve its own ends.\"\n\nThe philosophy of religion which inspired these sentences may appear to\nus sufficiently crude. And indeed an impartial reader will have to\nconfess that much of this eighteenth century polemic against religion,\nhowever well-intentioned, is singularly wide of the mark. It is all\ncharacterised by an imperfect knowledge of the psychological foundations\nof religion, and quite devoid of what is now termed the \"historic\nsense.\" The faults of Voltaire and Holbach, however, were those of their\nage, which was often short-sighted in its recognition of facts, and\nsuperficial in its reasoning from them. Even Dr. Johnson, who found this\nsection of contemporary French literature so distasteful, never laid his\nfinger upon its real weakness; the fundamental fallacies upon which it\nrested escaped him. He, like Voltaire and the rest, was a child of the\nage.\n\nPROPAGANDA NOT SCIENCE.--It is very doubtful whether the genuine\nscientists, who devoted themselves not to propaganda but to research,\ncould have been ready to sanction the uses to which their own\ndiscoveries were put. From the exhaustive references of Lange in his\n_History of Materialism_ (Engl. Trans., Vol. II, pp. 49-123), it is\nevident that \"the extreme views of La Mettrie, Diderot, and Holbach\ncannot be fathered on any of the great scientists or philosophers, but\nwere an attempt to supply scientific principles to the solution of\nphilosophical, ethical, or religious questions, frequently for practical\nand political purposes.\"[21]\n\nThere are certainly risks attached to the popularisation of the results\nof scientific research. Theories have to be presented with an appearance\nof finality which does not legitimately belong to them, and sometimes in\na somewhat startling aspect, otherwise the reader is left cold, for it\nis excitement rather than genuine information that attracts the\nmajority. As a judicious writer has observed:\n\n\"No ideas lend themselves to such easy, but likewise to such shallow\ngeneralisations as those of science. Once let out of the hand which uses\nthem in the strict and cautious manner by which alone they lead to\nvaluable results, they are apt to work mischief. Because the tool is so\nsharp, the object to which it is applied seems to be so easily handled.\nThe correct use of scientific ideas is only learnt by patient training,\nand should be governed by the not easily acquired habit of\nself-restraint.\"[22]\n\nSCIENTIFIC PROGRESS.--Alongside of this rigorous propaganda, which\nprepared the way for the upheaval of 1789, genuine scientific progress\nwas being made, especially in the regions of Astronomy, Botany and\nChemistry. The ideas of Newton were taken up and elaborated by means of\nmore efficient mathematical processes--especially the theory of\ninfinitesimals--by the distinguished astronomer, Laplace, in his\n_Systeme du Monde_ (1796), and in the successive volumes of his\n_Mechanique Celeste_ (1799-1825), which has been called a new\n_Principia_.\n\nImportant advances in chemistry are associated with the name of\nLavoisier (1743-1794), who introduced into that science a principle\nwhich has become axiomatic, and which to-day remains the foundation of\nall work in the laboratory. To Lavoisier belongs the merit of\nintroducing what is known as the \"quantitative method\" into chemistry,\nand thus establishing that science upon the exact--that is to say\nmathematical--basis, where it now rests and putting exact research in\nthe place of vague reasoning. His principle was that _in all chemical\ncombinations and reactions, the total weight of the various ingredients\nremains unchanged_; there is (in spite of appearances) neither loss nor\ngain of actual matter. \"The quantity of matter is the same at the end as\nat the beginning of every operation.\" It was Lavoisier who finally\nestablished the correct theory of combustion; that it consisted in the\ncombination of a special element called oxygen, with other bodies or\nelements.\n\nTHE ATOMIC THEORY.--Lavoisier had opened a door to researches which\nnaturally led the way to the establishment of the atomic theory of\nmatter on an experimental, and not merely a theoretical basis. That\ntheory is indeed nothing more than the elaboration of Lavoisier's own\nprinciple. John Dalton (1766-1844), a Manchester quaker, published in\n1810 his _New System of Chemical Philosophy_, where highly important\nconclusions are drawn both from Lavoisier's facts and from experimental\nresults of other chemists. Of these, Dalton gave an account and an\nexplanation which has ever since been the soul of all chemical\nreasoning. This explanation is known as his Atomic theory.\n\nThe two facts of which Dalton's theory is an explanation are as follows.\n_First_ (Lavoisier's fact), that the total weight of substances remains\nalways the same, be they combined in ever so many different ways.\n_Second_, that all substances, be they in large or in small quantities,\ncombine with each other, or separate from each other, in definite and\nfixed proportions. The theory of Dalton was that these combinations take\nplace between independent particles of matter, which are indestructible\nand indivisible. These \"atoms\" of the various elements have definite\nweights which are responsible for the proportion in which they are found\nto combine. These facts of proportion in combination, or \"chemical\naffinity,\" could not be accounted for by the theory which regards matter\nas \"continuous,\" but only by the opposite theory that it is \"discrete\"\n(i.e. divided up into particles).\n\nPHILOSOPHICAL COROLLARIES.--These strictly scientific theories\nassociated with the name of Laplace, Lavoisier, and Dalton tended to\nstrengthen in the popular estimation, the philosophical conclusions of\nwriters like Holbach. The scientists themselves remained \"agnostic\" with\nregard to questions that lay outside their scope: they maintained here\nthe correct attitude for scientific research. The question put by\nNapoleon to Laplace, why he had not introduced the name of God into the\n_Mechanique Celeste_, was out of place, and deserved the crushing reply\nit received. Scientific research is not concerned with questions of\nphilosophy.\n\nStill, it did not escape popular attention that the old pillar of a\nmechanistic view of the universe now seemed to be reinforced by another.\nThe theory of _the conservation of energy_ was now supplemented by that\nof the _indestructibility of matter_ (Lavoisier). And to crown all, the\nold atomic theory, which Lucretius had made the foundation of his\ndogmatic materialism, was now re-established on an experimental basis.\n\nSo far as physical science was concerned, the situation seemed menacing\nto a religious view of life. Men felt that they inhabited a world of\nindestructible matter, moved by a certain measure of force, unchangeable\nand fixed. The prison of determinism and matter was closing around\nthem.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VI\n\nRISE OF GERMAN IDEALISM\n\n\nAN UNSTEMMED TIDE.--In spite of those important reactions of thought\nwhich we have associated with the name of Spinoza, Leibniz, and Pascal,\nthe mechanical view had not ceased, as the last chapter has shown us, to\nextend itself during the eighteenth century, when it became highly\nfashionable in progressive circles.\n\nCOMMON-SENSE PHILOSOPHY.--The strength of this mechanical view lies in\nthe fact that it stands on the shoulders of a natural science which\nitself has its feet firmly planted on the irrefragible rock of\nsense-experience. The mechanical view thus rests, in the last resort,\nupon the belief (which is held everywhere with confidence by plain men)\nthat sense-experience is a sound foundation for knowledge.\n\nThe importance of this belief had been recognised by the English\nphilosopher, Locke (1632-1704), who in his _Essay concerning Human\nUnderstanding_ (1690), lays it down that all human knowledge is based,\nultimately, upon sense-experience. This highly important work had an\nimmense influence, and, under Locke's tutelage, many thinkers regarded\nwith suspicion any knowledge which might seem not to be derivable, in\none way or another, from that source.\n\nAs the strength of Samson lay in his unshorn hair, so the strength of\nthe mechanical theory lay, and still lies, in the acceptance of Locke's\ntheory of human knowledge, i.e. that it is all derived from the senses.\nAnd the Delilah who can shear away Locke's conclusions, leaves Samson\nhelpless; mechanical materialism becomes a discredited theory. Hence the\ntruth of the saying that the problem of knowledge is the preliminary\nquestion for philosophy.\n\nWEAKNESS OF SPECULATIVE PHILOSOPHY.--Spinoza and Leibniz may be said to\nhave dispensed with this foundation. Taking the scientific knowledge of\ntheir time for granted, they drew certain conclusions therefrom; but\ntheir results, however imposing, were felt to be the result rather of\nspeculation than of reason. Such was the more or less unexpressed\nestimate of their work. It was undervalued, for both Spinoza and Leibniz\nwere thinkers of the first calibre; and yet there was some justice in\nthe charge. By the end of the eighteenth century the days of merely\nspeculative philosophy were past.\n\nTHE CRITICAL PHILOSOPHY.--The time was ripe for a new metaphysic--for a\nfresh step forward in philosophic method. That step was taken by the\ncelebrated Immanuel Kant, who is the originator of what is known, in the\nhistory of thought, as the Critical Philosophy.\n\nThe word _critical_ signifies a particular method of approaching the\nproblem of existence, a method which must be contrasted with that of the\n_speculative_ philosophy, of which Spinoza and Leibniz are examples.\n\nThe critical philosophy, before attempting (as Spinoza had done) to\ntackle the problem of _existence_, first attacked the problem of\n_knowledge_. Before asking _What is the truth?_ it put the preliminary\nquestion, _What are the means at man's disposal for reaching the\ntruth?_ It prefaced all philosophical enquiry by an examination into the\nnature and scope of human thought. Such was the preparatory\ninvestigation which was to place metaphysics upon a secure and\nscientific foundation. For the new philosophy, the gateway to all sound\nknowledge is the reflection of the human mind upon itself. \"Know\nthyself,\" is its advice to the inquiring spirit of man. Here, if\nanywhere, is to be found the philosopher's stone.\n\nIMMANUEL KANT.--The celebrated Immanuel Kant was born at Koenigsberg in\n1724, and died in his native town in 1804. Between those dates he lived\nthe industrious and uneventful life of a university professor. The Seven\nYears' War and the French Revolution left him undisturbed, though not\nunmoved. He was a man of quiet, regular habits, and his fellow-townsmen\nwould set their clocks by his daily promenade.[23] But the adventurous\noriginality of his thought serves as a contrast to this peaceful\npicture.\n\nKant, indeed, laid the foundations of philosophy afresh. With\ncharacteristic insight, he went to the very root problem of all, and\nchallenged human thought itself. Before we can know anything, we must\nfirst of all demand the credentials of the instrument by which knowledge\nis gained. Before asking, _What_ do I know? the preliminary question\nshould be, _How_ do I know? Otherwise we cannot say whether we are in a\nposition to give any answer to those ultimate problems, the answers to\nwhich constitute philosophy.\n\nIt is far from easy to present Kant's criticism of knowledge at once\nsimply and accurately. This philosopher has a not undeserved reputation\nfor obscurity, and had he written in any other language than German, he\nwould perhaps have found no readers.\n\nTHE PROBLEM OF KNOWLEDGE.--It had already been realised by the\npredecessors of Kant that what is called \"sense-experience\" is a less\nsimple process than it seems, and that our senses cannot be said to\nreveal to us any object as it actually _is_. John Locke himself was not\nthe first to point out that the so-called \"secondary qualities\" of any\nmaterial object (i.e. colour, taste, etc.) are produced just as much by\nthe person who perceives, as by the object which is perceived. Galileo,\nDescartes, and Hobbes, besides others, had been aware of this fact,\nwhich indeed becomes evident to the most superficial analysis of\nsense-experience.\n\nThe \"primary qualities,\" i.e. density, extension, etc., continued to be\nregarded as subsisting _in_ the objects themselves, and independently of\nany perceiving consciousness. But even this view did not prove\npermanent, and it was the episcopal philosopher, George Berkeley\n(1685-1753) who demonstrated in his _New Theory of Vision_ that not even\n_these_ qualities could rightly be regarded as subsisting independently.\n\nThus it had already been realised, long before Kant wrote his _Critique\nof Pure Reason_ (published, 1781), that our senses are far from\nrevealing to us things as they _are_; it is only the _appearances_ of\nthings and not the _things themselves_ that the senses present to us.\nIndeed, as is well known, the Scotch philosopher David Hume (1711-1776),\nwho was a master in the art of raising problems, extended this line of\ncriticism until it reached to pure scepticism. He put the question, If\nall our knowledge is derived from sense-experience, and _if_\nsense-experience only supplies us with appearance and not reality, what\ndegree of trustworthiness can there be in human knowledge? And he was\nnot afraid to give the logical answer--None. Hume may thus be said to\nhave brought things to an impasse. As a matter of fact, what he had done\nwas to refute Locke's theory of knowledge (i.e. that it is derived\nentirely from sense-experience) by means of a _reductio ad absurdum_.\n\nTHE KANTIAN CRITICISM.--Kant says that it was Hume who \"awoke him from\nhis dogmatic slumbers.\" By this he meant that Hume made him realise that\nit was no use indulging in philosophic speculation generally, or\nlistening to the speculations of others, until \"the Problem of\nKnowledge\" was satisfactorily solved. To this problem Kant applied\nhimself. And recognising Locke to be the _fons et origo malorum_, he\nsubjected his theory of human knowledge to a close analysis, and exposed\nit as being fallacious.\n\nFar from sense-experience being responsible for all our knowledge, Kant\nproved that important elements of knowledge are quite independent of\nsense-experience; especially was this so in the case of certain\nmathematical propositions. (Hence the question, How is pure mathematics\npossible? was put by Kant at the beginning of his philosophy.)\n\nBut it is neither necessary nor desirable to enter into the arguments by\nmeans of which Kant proved his thesis, which was that the human mind\ncontains in itself certain principles of knowledge (e.g. the idea of\ncause and effect, the ideas of mathematics, and so on) which it does not\nowe to sense-experience.\n\nKANT'S COPERNICAN HYPOTHESIS.--Kant called these principles of\nknowledge, _forms of thought_ or _categories_. The name, perhaps, is\nirrelevant to our purpose; all that we need to understand is that Kant\nturned the tables upon Locke. Locke said that the mind was a _tabula\nrasa_ which passively received impressions from outside. Kant said that\nthe mind is nothing of the kind; it is not passive, but active; it does\nnot \"receive\" whatever is offered, it \"selects\" what it wants; and _it\nimposes its own \"forms of thought\" upon the outside world_.\n\nPhotography had not been invented at the time of this controversy, but\nKant might have said: The mind is not a photographic plate receiving\nimpressions from without, it rather resembles the lens which impressions\nmust pass through, and be transformed by, before they can create a\npicture.\n\nKant had, in fact, by this theory, instituted a revolution. His new\ndogma was: _The mind is the mould into which all our knowledge must be\ncast; and the constitution of our mind predetermines the shape that our\nknowledge takes._\n\nThus Kant had discovered that not only sensuous perception, but rational\nunderstanding also, has its forms and presuppositions. Just as we become\naware of objects only by means of senses which perhaps hide or distort\nas much as they reveal; so also our rational knowledge is conditioned by\nthe nature of our understanding, which dictates to reality the \"forms\"\nunder which it can be understood and known.\n\nMECHANISM UNDERMINED.--How did this affect the mechanical theory? The\nconnection is obvious. Mechanism is nothing but one of the forms of\nthought that the mind imposes on phenomena. Just as Copernicus had\ndiscovered that it is due to our position on the earth that the heavenly\nbodies _appear_ to move round us, so Kant had discovered that it is due\nto the nature of our senses and understanding that we perceive things in\nspace and time, and understand them as being mechanically determined.\nThe space and time, and the mechanical determinism are not in the\nthings, _but in our minds_. The fact is that we can only grasp things\nunder these forms. Space, time, mechanical causation are forms and laws,\n_not_ of nature, _but of the human intellect_, which is so constituted\nas to see things in this way.\n\nThus those axioms of science and of mathematics which lie at the base of\nall exact knowledge, and which had hitherto been regarded as\n_objective_, i.e. as inherent in the nature of things, were shewn by\nKant to be, as a matter of fact, _subjective_, that is (in Kant's own\nphrase) \"they express the conditions under which alone we are able to\napprehend or understand the object.\" Thus all knowledge is conditioned\nby our nature, by the framework, so to speak, not only of our senses but\nof our minds.\n\nIn this way the mechanical view was outflanked; that view certainly\nseems to us inevitable and certain, but this is due to the constitution\nof our minds; the world seems to us to be determined, just as it seems\nblue to a person wearing blue spectacles. But there is no sufficient\nreason for supposing that it _is_ either determined or blue. The law of\nmechanical causation is an axiom, but it is a subjective axiom.\n\nAPPEARANCE AND REALITY.--This may not seem much of an advance on Hume's\nposition. Human knowledge still seems precarious, if we assume the mind\nto be a kind of dictator which imposes its own laws upon nature. And\nKant indeed frankly admitted that neither our senses nor our reason were\nable to reveal to us things as they _are_, but only things as they\n_seem_; we grasp _appearance_, not _reality_, and (to use Kant's\nphraseology) _phenomena_ not _noumena_. Thus Kant cut away the ground\nfrom under all rationalistic _dogmatism_; he shewed its presumptuous\nfutility.\n\nTHE PATHWAY TO REALITY.--Kant, however, did not remain satisfied with\nthe negative results of his critical philosophy, valuable as these were.\nReality, it is true, lies out of range of the human reason, but it is\nnot entirely inaccessible to us, and scepticism about the ultimate\nnature of things is not the necessary corollary of Kant's, as it was of\nHume's, philosophy.\n\nKant drew a distinction between the \"Theoretical Reason,\" which his\n_Critique of Pure Reason_ had dealt with, and the \"Practical Reason,\"\nwhich he discusses in his _Critique of Practical Reason_ (1788).\n\nTHE \"PRACTICAL REASON.\"--By the \"practical reason\" Kant meant the moral\nconsciousness, and the law of the \"practical reason\" is the moral law,\nthe fulfilment of which constitutes duty. This law springs neither from\noutside authority nor from experience; it is autonomous. And it is upon\nthe existence of this autonomous moral consciousness that Kant plants\nhis foothold in his endeavour to find a refuge from the philosophic\nagnosticism to which his analysis of the \"theoretical reason\" had led;\nand upon this rock he founded his belief in \"God, Freedom, and\nImmortality.\"\n\nBy means of his \"practical reason,\" man gets into touch with that real\nworld, which his \"theoretical reason\" is unable to reach. In fact, the\n\"practical reason\" itself (or moral consciousness) is an element in\nman's nature which belongs to the _real_, as opposed to the _phenomenal_\nworld. For man himself is a citizen of both worlds, and has (so to\nspeak) a dual nature, a foot on either shore. He is an inhabitant both\nof the world of mechanical phenomena, and of the \"timeless world of\nfreedom,\" which lies altogether outside of all mechanical conceptions.\n\nKANT AND RELIGION.--\"Religion we must seek in ourselves, not outside\nourselves,\" is a saying of Kant's that gives the clue to his general\nattitude.\n\nIt is only in that world which cannot be interpreted mechanically (i.e.\nthe inner world of freedom of which we never cease to be conscious) that\nwe may seek, or can hope to find the source of religion. It is not the\nspectacle of the mechanically determined world of nature, but the\ndemands of the moral consciousness that create religion.\n\nFor instance, it is the gulf that yawns between the ideal commands of\nthe moral law, and the actual possibilities (so poor and meagre) of\nfulfilling and satisfying them, that creates, in the view of Kant, the\nneed of God and immortality. These alone can guarantee the realisation\nof the ideal claims of the moral consciousness.\n\nRELIGIOUS FAITH.--Thus the \"practical reason\" leads on to convictions\nconcerning what lies beyond the limits defined by the \"theoretical\nreason.\" The nature of the demands of the moral consciousness give us an\ninsight into the nature of the super-phenomenal (transcendental,\nnoumenal) world. That world must be of such a kind as to sanction and\nguarantee our moral ideals; it must be friendly and not hostile or\nindifferent to those ideals which man cherishes, but which his\n\"phenomenal\" experience seems to contradict. Thus we see the truth of\nthe saying that \"The universe as a moral system is the last word of the\nKantian philosophy.\"[24]\n\nKANT'S INFLUENCE.--Kant was one of those thinkers who are responsible\nfor turning the stream of thought into fresh channels. Through his\nresearches into the nature of human knowledge, he discovered the\nconditions upon which it rests, and defined the limits beyond which it\ncannot pass. Thus, once for all, he put an end to dogmatism.\n\nAnd to Kant also belongs the credit of having established the reality\nand validity of _inner_ experience. The rock upon which his philosophy\nis built is no external fact or event--nothing in time or space--but the\nmoral consciousness itself. And thus he restores, as the central\ninterest of philosophy, the human individual, with all his experiences\nof need, of hope, and of insight. Personality is the principle of his\nphilosophy. In this he is the true successor of the Reformation.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VII\n\nTHE ROMANTIC MOVEMENT\n\n\nKANT AND AFTER.--With Kant the hey-day of rationalism terminated. He had\nput an end to the superficial psychology upon which it rested. For the\nrationalists, the life of the mind had consisted in _intellectual\nideas_; but a more careful analysis indicated the presence of\ndeeper-lying elements, which had hitherto been disregarded; there\nexisted other important constituents besides the intellectual.\n\nKant's criticism of \"pure reason\" did much to discredit the old view;\nand by founding his philosophy upon the non-intellectual \"moral\nconsciousness,\" he heightened the prestige of feeling as against reason\n(in the narrow and limited sense of that word).\n\nThus Kant is not undeservedly called the father of a philosophy which\nsucceeded him, and which was based upon the idea of the supremacy of\nfeeling. But, at the same time, that title is more accurate as an\nestimate of another philosopher of rather different characteristics.\n\nROUSSEAU.--Jean Jacques Rousseau (1712-1778) was a man of unique genius\nwhose figure occupies a prominent position not only in the annals of\nphilosophy, but in social, political, and literary history. Even more\nthan Voltaire was he responsible for sowing seeds of thought which bore\nfruit in the events of the Revolution. And indeed, it is as the author\nof the notorious _Contrat Social_ that he is most widely known.\n\nROUSSEAU'S \"SENSIBILITY.\"--Rousseau was one of those philosophers whose\ncharacter is the formative element which gives shape to their doctrines.\nHis was a profoundly emotional temperament. He left behind him an\ninvaluable document which lays bare all the psychological sources of his\nphilosophy. The _Confessions_ reveal to us a man highly sensitive and\nmorbidly introspective, the slave of unreasoning impulses and passions.\nIn the eyes of some short-sighted persons, these first-hand revelations\nwill obscure or cast doubt upon the capacity and genius of the man, for\nthey do little to prejudice opinion in his favour.\n\nHE DEFIES THE ZEITGEIST.--Rousseau's profound originality lies in his\nhaving dared to dispute a dogma to which the prestige of an axiom then\nattached. He endeavoured to undermine the popular faith in scientific\nand philosophic culture. He went right back to Pascal, who, a century\nbefore, had raised the question as to the value of scientific knowledge\nfor personal life, by proclaiming \"The whole of philosophy is not worth\nan hour's study.\"\n\nRousseau's first philosophical work was occasioned by the offer of a\nprize on the part of a provincial academy for a thesis on the problem\n\"Whether the restoration of the sciences and arts has contributed to\npurify manners?\" \"The question pierced Rousseau's soul like a flash of\nlightning.\" He felt (he tells us) that he saw a new world, and felt a\nnew man; he saw no longer the world of culture, of science, of\nphilosophy (which he felt to be as artificial as it was ineffective and\nvain), but the _real_ world of personality, of living feeling, of the\ninner life. It flashed upon him that it was the primitive and elementary\nfeelings, the great and simple relations of life, which gave to\nexistence its value. The rest was superficial and irrelevant.\n\nROUSSEAU AND RELIGION.--The intellectualist is ever the aristocrat.[25]\nVoltaire and the philosophers of the \"enlightenment\" spoke of the\nunenlightened multitude as _la canaille_. Its beliefs were\nsuperstitions. Rousseau knew that the things which men have in common\nare more vital than those in which they differ, and the primitive\ninstincts of the race which we all share, are the most important part of\nour nature.\n\nAmong these primitive instincts, indomitable and irrepressible, is the\ninstinct of religion. Thus Rousseau transferred the religious problem\nfrom the sphere of external observation and explanation of the world (to\nwhich the rationalists had promoted or degraded it), back to inner\npersonal feeling. This marked an epoch in the philosophy of religion.\n\nMoreover, Rousseau was able to write in a convincing fashion of\nreligion, because (and here he differed from the intellectuals of his\nday) he had personal experience of what it meant. Hence wherever he\nalludes to religion his language has the ring of sincerity; it is always\nspontaneous, and sometimes it is passionate and poetic. His religious\nexperience took the form of nature-mysticism, undogmatic (because\nnon-intellectualist), but rich and deep:\n\n\"I can find no more worthy adoration of God than the silent admiration\nwhich the contemplation of His works begets in us, and which cannot be\nexpressed by any prescribed acts.... In my room I pray seldomer and\nmore coldly; but the sight of a beautiful landscape moves me, I cannot\ntell why. I once read of a certain bishop, who, when visiting in his\ndiocese, encountered an old woman whose only prayers consisted in a sigh\n'Oh!' The bishop said to her, 'Good mother, always pray like that; your\nprayer is worth more than ours.' My prayer is of that kind.\"[26]\n\nHere we have one form of the religious spirit; for the mystic it is\nalways true that \"there is neither speech nor language.\" The mystic and\nthe dogmatist stand at opposite poles, for dogmatism is always an\nattempt at definition even when that which is to be defined is\nindefinable; and here is to be found the common denominator between Kant\nand Rousseau. The former, by his analysis of reason, discredited\ndogmatism: the latter, by his apotheosis of feeling, contributed towards\nthe same result.\n\nROMANTICISM IN GERMANY.--This strong movement of feeling, created on the\none hand by Kant's _Critique_, and by the mysticism of Rousseau, took\ndifferent forms in the two countries to which these two philosophers\nbelonged. In France the new philosophy became the hot-bed of\nrevolutionary ideas; whereas in Germany it found vent in a ferment of\nspeculative systems, and in an outcrop of artistic production. It\nproduced the philosophies of Fichte, Schelling, and Hegel, and the prose\nand poetry of Goethe and Schiller.\n\n\"It was the age of 'beautiful souls' and of 'noble hearts'; men believed\nthemselves capable of the highest things; the immediate needs of the\nheart were set over against reason ... under many successive forms\nRomanticism prevailed in literature, effecting the re-birth of human\nfancy after the long labour of intellect.\"[27]\n\nTHE GOAL OF PHILOSOPHY.--Philosophic young Germany had set itself an\nambitious programme. Kant, indeed, had cleared the ground for them, but\nhis warnings that an eagle cannot soar beyond the atmosphere which\nsupports it, were disregarded.\n\nThe philosophy of Kant himself was felt by the successors to be lacking\nin the _idea of totality_--in the conception of a whole. His division of\nexistence into Appearance and Reality seemed to indicate a certain lack\nof finish in his philosophy; and they set themselves to explore the root\nof reality which to Kant seemed undiscoverable, but in which the\nsensuous and super-sensuous worlds are united, and from which they have\nemerged. This task became and remained the grand problem of philosophy\nfor a whole generation of thinkers. All externality, isolation, and\ndivision were to disappear, all existence must be shown to be but\ndegrees and phases of the one infinite reality. Spinoza's work had to be\ndone again in the light of increased psychological knowledge.\n\nFICHTE.--Of the thinkers who addressed themselves to this ambitious\ntask, only two need be considered here; and these are chosen because\nthey attacked the problem from different directions.\n\nIn the first place, Johann Gottlieb Fichte (1762-1814), who had been the\nfirst to lay down the programme of thought with explicitness, realised\nand admitted that the task which philosophy had set itself was beyond\nthe powers of any logical train of thought. The \"higher unity\" of\nexistence, the demonstration of which was the goal of philosophy,\ncould be reached only by a process of intellectual intuition,[28]\nit must be guessed or divined; for it presents itself (and this is\na characteristically \"Romanticist\" idea) to the human mind in the\nimmediacy of feeling, and not by discursive thought.\n\nIt was of the essence of Fichte's philosophy, as it had been of\nSpinoza's, that a point may be attained where the mind feels itself to\nbe at one with the truly real, and only when this point is reached--i.e.\n_sub specie aeternitatis_, will it arrive at and retain the conviction\nof the universal order and unity of existence. From this standpoint, and\nfrom this alone, does it become possible to grasp \"the meaning of those\ndualities and contrasts which we find around and in us, the differences\nof self and not-self, of mind and matter, of subject and object, of\nappearance and reality, of truth and semblance.\"\n\nHEGEL.--It has been said, perhaps with justice, that \"philosophy is the\nfinding of bad reasons for what we believe upon instinct.\" The remark\nmight seem, at least in the eyes of some, to be particularly applicable\nto the work of Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (1770-1831). Not because\nhis arguments are bad, but because he attempted to establish by strict\nlogic the conclusions which Fichte sought to reach by means of\nintuition, and which perhaps are only attainable by that method. Hegel\nattempted to climb, by a strict process of reasoning, to the position\nfrom which the Fichtean landscape might spread itself below as a\nlogical whole: he claimed to be a reasoner as well as a seer. And\nthereby he may be said to have furnished \"the programme of thought for a\ncertain class of intellects which will never die out.\"\n\nThus Hegel was something of a hybrid, and may be described as a\nrationalistic-romanticist. Nor are his arguments the easiest to\nunderstand. \"The only thing that is certain,\" writes a commentator\nwho stands at an opposite philosophical pole, \"is that whatever you\nmay say of his procedure, some one will accuse you of misunderstanding\nit. I make no claim to understanding it; I treat it merely\nimpressionistically.\"[29] And this is all we can do here.\n\nHEGEL'S METHOD.--Hegel proceeds by means of what he calls the\n_Dialectical Method_. He understands by \"dialectic\" (1) a property of\nall our _thoughts_ in virtue of which, each particular thought\nnecessarily passes over into another; and also (2) a property of\n_things_, in virtue of which every particular thing necessarily belongs\nto, or is related to, all other things. A thing \"by itself\" is nothing.\n\nHence a similarity or parallelism between the _method of thought_ and\nthe _nature of things_. Logic is of the nature of things. The way in\nwhich thought reaches truth is also the way in which things exist. Hegel\nexpressed this in his well-known saying \"the real is the rational, and\nthe rational is the real.\" Perhaps more poetically or obscurely the same\nproposition is expressed by declaring: \"When we think existence,\nexistence thinks in us,\" and \"The pulse of existence itself beats in our\nthinking.\"\n\nHegel's logic may, in fact, be described as an attempt to conceive the\nmovement of thought as being at the same time the law of the universe.\nLogic (to repeat what we said before) is of the nature of things:\nreality is rational, and what is rational is real.\n\nThus logic for Hegel did not mean (as it meant for Kant) the forms or\nlaws of thought: it signified the very core of reality. For all that\nKant knew, reality might or might not be rational: all he asserted was\nthat the human mind rationalised reality (or parts of it). For Hegel,\nlogic or reason was the living and moving spirit of the world. The\nessence of reality and the essence of thought were one. The absolute\nreality was spirit.[30]\n\nHEGELIANISM.--Hegel's philosophy may be described as an attempt to reach\nthe standpoint of religious mysticism by means of purely rational\nprocesses. It is the finding of rational grounds for supra-rational\nintuitions. The attempt is laudable, and, in the eyes of many, it was\nsuccessful. And, as we shall see, Hegelianism had an important future,\nespecially in England; nor, as a system of thought, is it yet extinct.\nIts central conception is that which, in one shape or another, will\nnever cease to appeal to mankind--that existence is, at bottom,\nspiritual in character--that spirit is the only ultimate reality.\n\nThat Hegelianism provides a rational basis for a spiritual religion is\nobvious enough; nor is it necessary to indicate the possibilities of\nlinking up the Christian doctrine of the Logos with a philosophy for\nwhich Reason was the very core and ground of existence. Hegel may indeed\nbe said to have laid the foundation of Christian theology afresh; or\nrather to have restored what was best in the old theology, and given it\nthe prestige of modernity.\n\nRELIGION AND PHILOSOPHY.--In fact, for Hegel as for all rationalists\nwhose attitude is also religious, religion and philosophy were two forms\nof the same thing. Religion contains philosophic truths under the form\nof imagination: philosophy contains religious truth under the form of\nreason. The difference is one of form only, not of content. This had not\nbeen the view of Rousseau, nor is it the deepest view; and it was not\nthe view of a thinker of the Romantic school who did more than any\nindividual among his predecessors to bring the religious problem to the\npoint where it now stands.\n\nSCHLEIERMACHER.--While the sun of Romanticism was at its zenith, the\nspirit of Kant's critical philosophy was kept alive by a thinker of as\ndeep spiritual and intellectual insight as Hegel himself.\n\nFriedrich Ernst Daniel Schleiermacher (1768-1834) brought the religious\nproblem down from those altitudes to which Romanticist metaphysics had\nraised it, to what Kant had called \"the fertile bathos of experience.\"\nHe approached religion from the side of inner experience, the point of\nview of psychology. The profound insight of Kant had already shown that\nthis was the direction on which future thought would travel, by tracing\nback the religious problem to a _personal need_ more clearly and\npenetratingly than ever before--a need set up by the incongruity of the\nreal and the ideal.\n\nHIS VIEW OF RELIGIOUS IDEAS.--Just as Rousseau, owing to his own\nreligious experience, was in a better position to attack the religious\nproblem than the philosophers of the \"enlightenment,\" so Schleiermacher\nhad the advantage of some Romanticists. As a boy, he had been put to\nschool with the Moravians, and throughout his own life he never ceased\nto declare that the years spent among them had been of vital importance\nto the development of his views. In 1801 he writes:\n\n\"My way of thinking has indeed no other foundation than my own peculiar\ncharacter, my inborn mysticism, my education as it has been determined\nfrom within.\"\n\nAnd his own experience of religion established in him the conviction\nthat the innermost life of men must be lived in feeling, and that this\nalone can bring man into immediate relation to the highest. His\nacceptance of Kant's criticism of reason led him to understand that\nintellectual concepts, in the religious sphere, (i.e. dogmas) must\nalways be of secondary importance: _experience_ comes first. And his\nprofound originality lies just here, and it is just here that\nSchleiermacher stands out as the forerunner of the modern view. He it\nwas who first made it evident that religious ideas derive their validity\nfrom that inner experience which they are an attempt to describe. If a\ndogma is an expression of an experience felt by man in his innermost\nlife, it is a _valid_ dogma, even if philosophic criticism hesitates to\nsanction it.[31]\n\nWHAT IS RELIGION?--The distance of this position from that of the\neighteenth century intellectualism which regarded religion either as a\nform of philosophy or of superstition, is obvious. Schleiermacher\nattacks two intellectualist prejudices in particular: (1) That according\nto which religion is conceived of primarily as a doctrine (either\nrevealed, or grounded on reason), and (2) That which regards religion as\nmerely a means towards morality.\n\nReligion, according to Schleiermacher, has an existence independent of\n(though, no doubt, associated with) philosophy, superstition, or\nmorality. Its essence consists neither in speculation nor in action, but\nin a certain type of feeling, of inner experience. Schleiermacher\ncharacterised this particular type of feeling as _a feeling of\ndependence_: the immediate consciousness that everything finite exists\nin and through the infinite, everything temporal in and through the\neternal.\n\nThat Schleiermacher should have described the specifically religious\nfeeling in this particular way is comparatively irrelevant so far as our\npresent purpose is concerned. The point of importance is that he was the\nfirst to recognise the _independence_ of religion, to see in it a\nlegitimate and natural form of human activity, which exists, not for the\nsake of knowledge or of morality, but for its own sake, and on its own\naccount.\n\nHere, though Hegel took a different view, Schleiermacher is one in\nspirit with the Romantic school; indeed, he may be said to have drawn\nthe logical conclusions of Romanticism. The independence and originality\nof religion is the necessary consequence of a philosophy which set\nitself against the unbalanced intellectualism of the \"enlightenment.\"\n\nThe permanent significance of Romanticism lies here: That it discredited\nonce for all the notion that there is only one road to reality--that of\nlogic. It is not only philosophy, but religion and art that remove the\nveil which hides the supra-sensible world from us. And to close our eyes\nto the facts of religious experience, or to attempt to discredit them by\nthe application of irrelevant terms such as \"superstition,\" is not only\nto display ourselves as philistines, but also to forsake the highest\ntraditions of science--veneration for experience, and the realms of\nfact.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VIII\n\nMECHANISM AND LIFE\n\n\nRECAPITULATORY.--We have already observed the mechanical theory, in the\nhands of Descartes, expanding itself to cover organisms and the\nphenomena of life, and in La Mettrie's _L'Homme Machine_, reducing even\nhuman beings to the status of automata. These theories were, however,\nknown to be insecurely based upon somewhat hasty generalisations, for,\nin point of fact, the science of biology was as yet in its infancy; the\n_data_ for a complete vindication of the mechanical position were as yet\nwanting.\n\nADVANCE OF BIOLOGY.--Biological science, however, during the first half\nof the nineteenth century made considerable advances, and research\ncontinually kept bringing to light facts which seemed to substantiate\nthe brilliant, if premature, hypothesis of Descartes. It will not be\nnecessary for us to do more than take hasty note of certain important\ndevelopments.\n\nIt was in 1828 that the German chemist Whoeler (1800-1882) for the first\ntime in biological history prepared an organic compound (urea) from\ninorganic materials--an achievement universally recognised to be of the\nutmost significance. As a distinguished historian of the science of\nchemistry puts it:\n\n\"This discovery destroyed the difference which was then considered to\nexist between organic and inorganic bodies, viz. that the former could\nonly be formed under the influence of vegetable or animal vital forces,\nwhereas the latter could be artificially produced.\"[32]\n\nTen years later another German, Schleider (1804-1881) propounded the\ncellular theory of the structure and growth of plants, a theory which\nwas soon extended to animal organisms by Schwann (1810-1882). The\npublication of this famous theory was described by a contemporary as \"a\nburst of daylight\"; it indeed illuminated what had hitherto been buried\nin mystery and mythology--the structure and method of growth of plants\nand animals. It seemed to render superfluous any form of the old\nconception of a \"vital force\" to explain the phenomena of growth, if it\ncould now be assumed that the cells automatically absorbed outside\nmaterial, increased in number by the division of individuals, and built\nup the organism by continual repetition of this process.\n\nSchwann was also responsible for initiating a number of minute\nphysiological investigations which led to a far more intimate knowledge\nof the action of nerves and muscles, and interpreted these in mechanical\nterms. \"Investigations which were carried on with all the resources of\nmodern physics regarding the phenomena of animal movements, gradually\nsubstituted for the miracles of the 'vital forces' a molecular\nmechanism, complicated, indeed, and likely to baffle our efforts for a\nlong time to come, but intelligible, nevertheless, as a mechanism.\"[33]\n\nSubsequent researches, notably of Helmholtz (1821-1895) and Meyer, lent\nstrong support to this interpretation. The conception of the\nconservation of energy (an important axiom of the mechanical theory) was\nsuccessfully applied by them to the economy of organisms. The organism\nwas found not to _create_ energy, but only to contain remarkably\nefficient means of deriving it from materials absorbed as food. Thus\nanimal warmth and the power of motion are originally \"sunlight\ntransformed in the organism of the plant,\" and afterwards appropriated\nby the animal. The power with which we move our limbs is as much the\nproduct of combustion as is the power of a steam engine, the only\ndifference being that the organism is, of the two, the more efficient\nconverter of energy.\n\nTHE MECHANICAL THEORY SUBSTANTIATED.--Thus, whether biologists were\nconsidering the _structure_ or the _behaviour_ of organisms, they were\narriving at the same conclusions. The structure was revealed as physical\nand chemical structure, and the behaviour as the resultant of familiar\nphysical and chemical processes. Hence biology came to be regarded as a\ncompartment of physics and chemistry, for life itself was nothing but a\ncomplex physical or chemical phenomenon. Life could thus be\nsatisfactorily expressed in terms of matter and energy. The speculations\nof Descartes seemed to be established by experimental science.\n\nTHE FINAL OBSTACLE.--The situation, already satisfactory to those whose\nhope it was to see the mechanical theory impregnably established, was\nmarred, however, by one untoward circumstance. The phenomena of organic\nstructure, growth, and behaviour having been reduced to order, and\nexpressed in terms of physics and chemistry, certain important facts\nstill resisted explanation, and stood out as a last stronghold of the\nolder view.\n\nTHE ORIGIN OF SPECIES.--The existence of definite forms of animal and\nvegetable life, whose infinite variety and complexity was continually\nbeing increased by research[34]--still remained a mystery. How did these\ninnumerable species naturally and automatically come into being? was the\nquestion that must be satisfactorily answered before the mechanical view\ncould be held to cover all the facts.\n\nThe direction in which to look for a reply had been indicated by a\nnumber of thinkers. The French naturalist Buffon, the philosopher Kant,\nand the poet Goethe--besides other thinkers--had already in the\neighteenth century familiarised the idea that species are not immutable,\nbut that, by some means or other, new forms of life are derived from\npre-existing ones. The conception had gained a firm foothold in England,\nwhere it was hospitably entertained by Mr. Herbert Spencer, and where it\nformed the staple of a book which caused a good deal of controversy in\nits day, and which is not yet forgotten.[35]\n\nLAMARCK.--The evolutionary idea, however, though attractive to\nphilosophers, and even to men of science, was insufficient as an\nexplanation of the origin of species so long as the processes of\ntransformation remained obscure. Naturalists could not accept an\nhypothesis for which there seemed to be such imperfect evidence. An\ningenious French scientist, J. Baptiste de Lamarck (1744-1829) had\nindeed, in 1809, propounded the theory--ever since known by his\nname--that the use or disuse of particular organs might, after a long\nseries of generations, result in the formation of new species. (The\nideas denoted by the words \"environment,\" \"adaptation,\" \"acquired\nhabits\"--now so familiar--may be said to have been introduced by him).\nBut the scientific prejudices of the time were against Lamarck's\ntheories, and he had to lament their inhospitable reception. Indeed\nLamarck's critics did not hesitate to exercise their powers of ridicule,\nor to make fun of the giraffe who derived his long neck from the\nattempts of his ancestors to browse on high trees. Darwin himself talks\nof \"Lamarck's nonsense,\" and of his \"veritable rubbish\"--language,\nhowever, which he was subsequently able to retract.\n\nTHE NEW GEOLOGY.--Perhaps the most stubborn obstacle which Lamarckian\ntheories had to meet was the current prejudice as to the age (or youth)\nof the earth. Contemporary geologists were by no means prepared to grant\nLamarck the illimitable periods of time which his transformation\nprocesses seemed to require. Consequently it is not surprising that the\nnew theories, perhaps for the first time, received a measure of justice\nat the hands of one who himself became responsible for a revolution in\nthe science of geology.\n\n\"I devoured Lamarck _en voyage_,\" writes Charles Lyell, describing a\njourney from Oxford in 1827. \"His theories delighted me more than any\nnovel I ever read, and much in the same way, for they address themselves\nto the imagination.... That the earth is quite as old as he supposes,\nhas long been my creed.\"[36]\n\nIn spite of the fascination of these theories, however, Lyell was not\ncarried away by them, and it was not for some years that he estimated\nthem at their true value. Meanwhile the new geology made its appearance\nwith the publication of the three volumes of his own _Principles of\nGeology_, between 1829 and 1833. The significance of the book for\nbiological speculation--for theories of the origin of species--lay in\nits thesis that the present condition of the earth is the product of\ngeological processes incalculably long. Hitherto the \"catastrophic\ntheory\" had been dominant--the notion that a series of immense\ncatastrophic events (like the Deluge) had been responsible for the\npresent condition of the earth's surface. For this Lyell substituted his\n\"Evolutionary Theory,\" according to which the almost invisibly slow\ngeological processes which we may now see operating around us, are\ntypical of the behaviour of the crust of this planet for incalculable\nperiods of time; for even the slowest changes, if sufficient time is\nallowed them, are capable of producing the most stupendous results.\nLyell may be said to have extended the age of the earth _ad infinitum_.\nJust as Galileo removed all barriers of space, Lyell removed those of\ntime. Their joint achievement was to present to humanity a universe\ninfinite both in space and time--a staggering conception.\n\nRESULTS OF LYELL'S THEORY.--Though Lyell's boldness disturbed a good\nmany of his contemporaries, those biologists who were engaged upon\nseeking the origin of species were thankful to one who had removed the\nchief obstacle to the solution of their difficulties. They were now\nrelieved of one embarrassment: Lyell gave them the power to draw on the\nBank of Time to any extent; bankruptcy was no longer possible.[37]\n\nIndeed, Lyell seems himself to have been convinced of the evolutionary\norigin of species (though the mode of its operation still remained a\nmystery for him no less than for the biologists themselves). In fact, it\nbecame quite evident that the idea of \"continuity\" which the _Principles\nof Geology_ had established in the inorganic world, must be equally\napplicable to the organic world.\n\nDARWIN.--The theory of a common descent of species had occurred, as\nearly as 1837, to an enthusiastic student of Lyell's writings, who was\nalso a personal friend. Charles Darwin had collected much geological,\nbotanical, and zoological matter on his voyage with the _Beagle_ round\nthe world, and continued for twenty years to accumulate an immense\nvolume of _data_ to substantiate a theory which had first suddenly\nsuggested itself to him in 1838 as the result of reading for amusement\nMalthus' _Essay on the Principle of Population_.\n\nThis celebrated book, first published in 1798, had attempted to describe\nthe forces which ensure the multiplication, or check the increase of\npopulation. The proposition laid down by Malthus was that population\ntends to vary with the means of subsistence. He had studied his problem\nfrom a social or political point of view, but the same principle was\nseen by Darwin to apply to all living creatures. Two forces are seen\neverywhere in conflict: (a) the luxuriant powers of reproduction\npossessed by and exercised by each species; (b) the difficulties and\nobstacles by which the species tend to be eliminated. The contest\nbetween the powers of reproduction and those of elimination--this\n\"over-production\" and \"crowding-out\"--is what was afterwards termed the\n\"struggle for existence.\"\n\n\"NATURAL SELECTION.\"--Darwin's momentous theory was that this struggle,\nproceeding for untold ages, had resulted in the continual formation of\nnew species. Granted that the numerous offspring of any individual\nmember of a species tend to vary, those variations survive which happen\nto be best fitted to cope with the environment. These in their turn\nleave offspring, the variations and the selections are repeated, and so\non _ad infinitum_; and the result is that entirely new species are\nformed by a long process of insignificant changes. This, briefly put, is\nthe celebrated theory of \"Natural Selection.\"\n\nThe habit of scientific caution was characteristic of Darwin, who at\nfirst would not write down \"even the briefest sketch\" of his hypothesis,\nbut devoted nearly twenty years to the accumulation of evidential\n_data_. His friends continually warned him that he would be forestalled,\nand this actually occurred, as is well known, in 1858, when the book\nwhich was to give the new theory to the world was already half written.\nThe naturalist, Alfred Russell Wallace, on a collecting expedition in\nthe East Indies, \"in a flash of insight\" while sick with fever, found\nthe same solution of the mystery that had puzzled biologists so long.\nWallace's letter to Darwin, containing the abstract of his theory, came\n\"like a bolt from the blue.\"\n\nThe behaviour of the two men was worthy of the highest traditions of\nscientific research. The matter was put into the hands of Lyell, and\nWallace's paper, together with certain extracts from Darwin's\nunpublished notes, were read before the Linnean Society, and the\npreparation of Darwin's book was hurried on. In November, 1859, _The\nOrigin of Species_ was published.\n\nRESULTS OF DARWIN'S THEORY.--The importance (for the general trend of\nthought) of this joint achievement of Darwin and Wallace was\nconsiderable, and could not but be regarded as an extension of the\nmechanical theory. The origin of species might still to some extent\nremain mysterious (for \"natural selection\" was soon realised to be only\none of many factors at work in evolution), yet the area of mystery was\npatently reduced, and the \"inexplicable\" driven further back. A formula\nhad been provided, which seemed to be as valid, and likely to prove as\npermanent and fruitful in biological research as Newton's law of gravity\nhad been in the realm of physics.\n\nIn point of fact, Darwin had only substituted new problems of\n\"variation\" and \"heredity\" for the old one of the diversity of species;\nbut an impression was created by the new discoveries that a purely\nmechanical explanation of the origin of life and even of mind was within\nreach.\n\nTHE DESCENT OF MAN.--With regard to \"mind,\" the impression was\nre-inforced by Darwin's next book--the _Descent of Man_, where the gap\nbetween man and the animals was finally bridged. The work was merely an\nextension of the principles previously applied by him, and as a theory\nit had been present to Darwin's mind as far back as 1837. As soon as he\nhad become \"convinced that species were mutable productions,\" he could\nnot \"avoid the belief that man must come under the same law.\"[38]\nIndeed the Descent was nothing more than a corollary to the _Origin\nof Species_. The earlier work contains the whole of Darwinism.\n\nTHE POSITION REACHED.--And with the full publication of Darwin's\ntheories a point was reached when a more or less consistently\nmaterialistic position seemed possible. The foundations of such a\nposition had been strengthened by the scientific atomism of Dalton, and\nthe results of German research in the field of _organic_ chemistry\nseemed to open up possibilities of expressing even life in terms of\nmatter. And, finally, the evolutionary hypothesis had reduced some of\nthe most obscure biological problems to manageable proportions. The\nprospects for a purely naturalistic philosophy were phenomenally\nbright.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IX\n\nMATERIALISM AND AGNOSTICISM\n\n\nFROM SCIENCE TO PHILOSOPHY.--The record of certain important scientific\ndiscoveries has occupied us in two recent chapters, and it is now time\nto examine the philosophic results that were drawn from them. It is true\nthat the generalisations drawn from the results of scientific research\nwere sometimes hasty, and not always sanctioned by the gifted minds to\nwhom these results were due; yet they were assured a popular reception,\nand exercised an immense influence. It is not always the most accurate\nthinkers whose ideas gain the widest currency.\n\nDISCREDIT OF ROMANTICISM.--The Idealistic movement in philosophy which\nwe have seen flourishing in Germany at the beginning of the nineteenth\ncentury, had begun, after the lapse of a generation, to decline.[39] The\ncauses of decline, as often happens, were in part, at least, other than\nintellectual. Hegelianism had become associated with political reaction,\nand \"a philosophy has lost its charm when it enters the service of\nabsolutism.\" And a rising spirit of enterprise in commerce and industry\nalso contributed to a change of attitude, for as material interests\ndevelop, men have less leisure for speculation, and often lose their\ntaste for ideals. Probably there should also be taken into account the\nsentimentality that had attached itself to Romanticism and with which\nmen were sated. This revolt has its most pointed expression in the prose\nwritings of the poet Heine, who attacks with satiric bitterness \"the new\ntroubadours, so morbid and somnambulistic, so high-flown and\naristocratic, and altogether so unnatural.\"\n\nMETAPHYSICS REJECTED.--The reaction against the philosophy of\nRomanticism took the form of a complete revolt against speculative\nphilosophy. But instead of going back to Kant, and taking up a\nvigorously critical attitude, it took refuge in the prejudices of\n\"common sense.\" The new movement must be associated in the first place\nwith a French thinker, Auguste Comte (1798-1857), who made the attempt\nto substitute scientific and _positive_ knowledge for the vague\nspeculations which had hitherto passed for philosophy. He was, in fact,\nthe founder of that system of ideas known as Positivism, which (as we\nshall see) gained great vogue later, especially in England. Comte's\ndoctrine was that, all spheres of Nature now being brought under the\nsway of positive science, the time had arrived for men, when\nconstructing their conceptions of life and the world, to reject all but\nsuch ideas as positive science can accept. The age of theology and\nspeculation was past; the new age of positive science, where both\nimagination and argumentation should be subordinate to observation, was\nat hand. Comte, as is well known, became the founder of what he hoped\nmight develop into a new Catholicism--the \"Religion of Humanity,\" and an\natmosphere of moral idealism permeates his thought.\n\nGERMAN EXTREMISTS.--In Germany, the home of Romanticism, the revolt took\na radical shape in the hands of writers like Ludwig Feuerbach (1804-72)\nand Buechner. \"I unconditionally repudiate absolute, self-sufficing\nspeculation--speculation which draws its material from within,\" says the\nformer, in the Introduction to his _Essence of Christianity_[40] (1841)\nand asserts that he \"places philosophy in the negation of philosophy.\"\nBuechner, a far less acute thinker than Feuerbach, adopts a similar\nattitude, protests against pedantry, and appeals (the appeal is always\ndangerous) to common sense:\n\n\"Expositions which are not intelligible to an educated man are scarcely\nworth the ink they are printed with. Whatever is clearly conceived can\nbe clearly expressed.\"\n\nIt is not surprising that the book _Force and Matter_ (1855)--in the\npreface to which these sentiments are expressed--went through sixteen\neditions in thirty years and was translated into most European\nlanguages. It is an extreme expression of the most thorough-going\nmaterialism, and the circumstance that its conclusions were acceptable\nneither to cautious scientists nor to critical philosophers, did not\ncompromise its authority with the general public. As was only natural,\nfor materialism is a creed for which the evidence is all on the surface,\nand to which the objections, being less obvious, escape notice. And\nBuechner's pleas for intelligibility and clearness, though in some sense\njustified by the inconceivable pedantry of much German metaphysics, was,\nin point of fact, only a form of cant; for \"there are difficulties\nlying in the subject-matter itself which cannot be banished from the\nsphere of philosophy.\" Appeals to popular prejudices are not a more\nlegitimate form of philosophic, than of scientific controversy; serious\nthinkers do not thus stoop to the expedients of the politician.\n\nEFFECTS OF DARWIN'S THEORY.--It would be a serious mistake, then, to\nimagine that materialistic naturalism had to wait for the publication of\nthe _Origin of Species_ (1859) before it could become a formidable\ntheory. And yet the appearance of Darwin's book had important effects,\nand among these is to be reckoned a certain weakening of the old\n\"Argument from Design,\" according to which the complexity and delicacy\nevident everywhere in the world of nature, could not be attributed to\nchance, but pointed to the existence and activity of a divine Designer.\nPaley, during the eighteenth century, had elaborated the argument with a\nwealth of detailed instances of \"contrivance\":\n\n\"The pivot upon which the head turns, the ligament within the socket of\nthe hip-joint, the pulley or trochlear muscles of the eye; the\nepiglottis, the bandages which tie down the tendons of the wrist and\ninstep,\" and so on.\n\nAnd it was not so much the doubt cast by it upon the separate creation\nof particular species that was the disturbing element in Darwin's\nhypothesis (few men now regarded the book of _Genesis_ as a manual of\nnatural science, or faith in it, as such, as a matter of religious\nobligation); it was rather that the new doctrine of \"natural selection\"\nseemed to invalidate the \"argument from design.\" Design or chance had\nbeen the alternatives offered by Paley, and chance only had to be\nmentioned to be rejected; but Darwin made it possible to escape from the\ndilemma. He showed how, if certain conditions were granted, the whole\nprocess of the manufacture of species would naturally and inevitably\nfollow. Neither design nor chance was the explanation: there was another\nalternative, _the influence of environment_. Thus Paley's instances of\nelaborate \"contrivance\" were explained by Darwin as instances of\nadaptation. The environment under which these organs had developed had\nmade them what they were; they could not, under the given circumstances,\nhave been different. As a very lucid writer puts it:\n\n\"Before Darwin's great discovery, those who denied the existence of a\nContriver were hard put to it to explain the appearance of contrivance.\nDarwin, within certain limits and on certain suppositions, provided an\nexplanation. He showed how the most complicated and purposeful organs,\nif only they were useful to the species, might gradually arise out of\nrandom variations, continuously weeded by an unthinking process of\nelimination.\"[41]\n\nDARWINISM EXPLOITED.--In fact, it became evident that popular\nmaterialism had been strongly reinforced by the new biology; and though\nDarwin himself was cautious in adding philosophic or religious\ncorollaries to his own propositions, some of his more eager disciples\ndid not hesitate to fill in his blanks, and to draw conclusions which\nthe master was too conservative, too blind, or perhaps too scientific to\nsanction.\n\nThe distinguished zoologist Haeckel (1834-1919) may be reckoned the most\nnotable amongst these. He was one of the first German scientists to give\nhis adherence to Darwin, who seems to have considered him too zealous a\ndisciple. \"Your boldness sometimes makes me tremble,\" he wrote (November\n19, 1868). It is not every scientist who can perceive the limits of an\nhypothesis, or who insists so conscientiously as Darwin did, upon the\nnecessity for its verification.\n\nHERBERT SPENCER.--Though there were not wanting in England writers to\nexploit Darwinian theories in the interests of a narrow secularism,\ntheir work was not of first-rate importance, and need not detain us. A\nnew evolutionary philosophy was, however, worked out by a conscientious\nthinker of a different calibre--Mr. Herbert Spencer. He indeed may be\ndescribed as the Aristotle of a new world-view. He attempted to\nco-ordinate and unify all human knowledge, and to present the world with\na final philosophy based upon the _data_ supplied by natural science. To\nthis ambitious task he devoted a lifetime of patient work, broken by\nintervals of ill-health. In 1850 the _System of Synthetic Philosophy_\nwas projected; its _First Principles_ were published in 1862, but it was\nnot until 1896 that the gigantic enterprise was complete.\n\nSpencer was inspired neither by hostility to religion in general, nor to\nChristianity in particular. The motive of his work was a more honourable\none. He felt, with many of his contemporaries, that the foundations of\nthe old religion were no longer secure, and that the old sanctions of\nmorality were already gravely compromised; and he wished to supply a new\ncreed and a new discipline in the place of these. His principal objects\nwere social and ethical. And in this important respect he may be\nassociated with Comte. Both were sociologists and moralists before they\nwere philosophers, which accounts for their overlooking and\nunderestimating various important philosophic difficulties.\n\nA few remarks about Spencer's system are here not out of place. He\nattempted to reduce experience to a unity by seeking evidence for the\nexistence of a single and universal _law_. This unifying principle he\nfound in a general law of evolution. He formulated this law in language\nwhich is perhaps less obscure than it seems, and which practically\namounts to this, that there is a perpetual process going on which\nreduces disorder to order, undifferentiated sameness to specialised\nvariety.[42]\n\nThe _First Principles_ was published before the _Origin of Species_, and\nthe confirmation which Darwin's work supplied to Spencer's theory must\nhave recommended the latter to the minds of scientifically trained\nthinkers. Moreover, Spencer sanctioned a hopeful outlook; evolutionary\noptimism was an attractive and an idealistic, as well as a reasonable\nphilosophy. It demanded the subordination of the individual to society,\nit urged the necessity of self-discipline and of industry, and pointed\n(if these conditions were fulfilled) to a brighter future, and to a new\nhumanity. The generous idealism of the following passage is\ncharacteristic of Spencer's outlook, and of those who thought--and\nhoped--with him; it occurs at the end of his _Principles of Ethics_:\n\n\"The highest ambition of the beneficent will be to have a share--even\nthough an utterly inappreciable and unknown share--in 'the making of\nMan.'... As time goes on, there will be more and more of those whose\nunselfish end will be the further evolution of Humanity. While\ncontemplating from the heights of thought that far-off life of the race\nnever to be enjoyed by them, but only by a remote posterity, they will\nfeel a calm pleasure in the consciousness of having aided the advance\ntowards it.\"\n\nSpencer, then, evidently deserves the important place that he occupies\nin the history of thought. For though he was forced, for lack of those\nfinal scientific results which he vainly hoped might soon be\nforthcoming, to leave some vital gaps in his scheme,[43] he had made an\nimposing attempt to systematise and unify all human experience. And his\nattempt to base an idealistic morality upon sure grounds of natural\nscience was valuable and important.\n\nSPENCER'S PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.--At the same time, Spencer could not\nremain satisfied with a mere _description_ of natural phenomena, however\ncomplete and comprehensive such description might seem; he desired to\noffer, besides this, an _explanation_ of these phenomena--how did they\ncome to be, and how do they continue to exist? To provide this\nexplanation, Spencer postulated the existence of an Unknown Power which\nis at once the origin and the sustaining ground of everything. This\npower he regarded as lying quite out of range not only of the human\nsenses, but of the human intellect. It was not only unknown but\n_unknowable_. This celebrated doctrine of the Unknowable is not the\nleast interesting or important part of Spencer's system, and it is\nperhaps more germane than any other speculation of his to our present\nsubject, as this _terra incognita_ was allotted by him to religion as\nits peculiar province. He hoped that the undisputed possession and\noccupation by religion of this territory might put an end to its\nperpetual conflict with science, and substitute for this a reasonable,\nif not cordial, understanding. Science might contentedly appropriate the\nsphere of the knowable, and leave to religion the undefined and perhaps\ninfinite area of the unknowable; and he hoped this division of labour\nwould be both fruitful and permanent.\n\nTHE VICTORIAN AGNOSTICS.--Through this doctrine of the Unknowable,\nHerbert Spencer was the father of that form of belief or disbelief which\nwas pertinently named Agnosticism by the most celebrated of its\nexponents--Huxley. This combination of Positivism in science with\nAgnosticism in religion and philosophy, became highly popular in a wide\ncircle in England during the last third of the nineteenth century,\nespecially among the scientifically educated. Leslie Stephen, with the\npride of a disciple and the pardonable zeal of a propagandist, claimed\nfor it the distinction of being \"the religion of all sensible men.\"\n\nThis austere faith owed much to the qualities of those who preached it.\nTheir wide culture, their power of literary expression,[44] their\nintellectual vigour, and above all their moral earnestness and social\nenthusiasm recommended what had otherwise seemed a barren and\nunpromising creed. The generous humanitarian sympathies of Comte\nsupplied the idealistic elements without which no faith can become\npopular, and the apparent stability of its scientific basis seemed to\nthose impatient of speculative doubt, a great rock in a desert of\nshifting sand. This new scientific Humanism had an immense vogue, and\nits effects upon national life were, on the whole, of a quite healthy\ncharacter. Occasional lapses into intolerance, no doubt, occurred; but\nmuch may be excused in the self-confidence of a new faith, not yet\ntested by the experiences and the criticisms of years.\n\nTHEOLOGICAL POLEMICS.--The attacks of orthodox apologists upon this new\norientation, though carried through with the best intentions, were too\noften conducted on mistaken lines and certainly on too narrow a front. A\nparticular theory of scriptural inspiration (now widely abandoned), and\nof the miraculous, seemed to obsess the controversialists. Nor were the\nAgnostics (it must be confessed) any more alive to the real issues.\nHence, to the modern student, an oppressive atmosphere of deadness and\nsterility seems to brood over these vigorous but superannuated polemics;\nand hence the complete oblivion into which this literature has fallen.\nThe saying is profoundly true that \"nothing so quickly waxes old as\napologetics.\" Even the contributions to the subject by so accomplished a\njournalist as Huxley--his _Essays on Science and Christian\nTradition_--can only be read by those whom an almost Teutonic industry\ncharacterises. Once so eagerly perused and earnestly pondered, the\ncontroversial literature of this interesting epoch (which now seems so\nremote) reposes on the higher shelves of libraries, accumulating the\npeaceful dust of oblivion. These projectiles have, in fact, done their\nwork, and if they have proved less fatal than was hoped by those who\nlaunched them, they were dispatched with good intentions, and their\nexplosion cleared the air.\n\nThe most effective method of attack would have been to suggest that what\nwas good in the new system was as old as Christianity, and that the rest\nwas disputable science and still more disputable philosophy. The latter\nhalf of this task was, as we shall subsequently find, creditably\nperformed by an important school of critical thinkers. But its former\nhalf, i.e. the task of proving that what was valuable in the new\nHumanism, was Christian--might, one would suppose, have been more\nsuccessfully performed by the official champions of orthodoxy. These\nmight have left science to the scientists, to have left off advertising\ntheir own incompetence in that sphere by passages of arms such as took\nplace between Bishop Wilberforce and Huxley at the Oxford meeting of the\nBritish Association in 1860, which are never very desirable, and always\ndiscreditable to the discomfited party.[45]\n\nILLOGICALITY OF NATURALISTIC IDEALISM.--In point of fact, \"the religion\nof all sensible men\" (in spite of its philosophic weakness) was\nequivalent to Christian stoicism; its social enthusiasm, its\nhumanitarianism, its conscientious truthfulness, were the fruit of a\nstock grown on Christian soil. Its ethical presuppositions were entirely\nChristian, nor were they sanctioned (in spite of Herbert Spencer's\nelaborate apologetic) by the new biology. Nietzsche was a far more\nlegitimate child of Darwinism than was Huxley. Indeed, towards the close\nof his life, some doubts invaded the mind of the latter, and he was\nconstrained by an intellectual sincerity which does him and his school\nthe highest credit, to utter a word of warning. We refer to his famous\n_Romanes Lecture_ of 1894.\n\nThe thesis of this important utterance was that the field of human\ninterests is a narrow heritage carved out from a hostile environment\ninto which it is destined one day to relapse. It is a cultivated garden\nwith the wilderness all around; created only at the cost of infinite\nsacrifice and perpetual toil, and preserved only with difficulty. The\nimplacable jungle seeks everywhere to encroach on the borders of the\nclearing, whose ultimate engulfment can only be postponed, not\nprevented. Two quotations may suffice:\n\n\"Let us understand, once for all, that the ethical progress of society\ndepends, not on imitating the cosmic process, still less in running away\nfrom it, but in combating it.\"\n\n\"The theory of evolution encourages no millennial expectations. If, for\nmillions of years, our globe has taken the upward road, yet, sometime,\nthe summit will be reached, and the downward route will be commenced.\nThe most daring imagination will hardly venture upon the suggestion that\nthe power and intelligence of man can ever arrest the procession of the\ngreat year.\"[46]\n\nPESSIMISM.--Coming, as it did, at the end of a generation of dogmatic\noptimism, this pronouncement is symptomatic of a certain disillusionment\nwhich had already begun to mar the fair picture of Positivist prophecy.\nThe human race seemed destined to an ambiguous future; the parabola of\nprogress would one day reach its summit, and the fall begin. At last\nupon our planet the episode of Life would pass, and be neither forgotten\nnor remembered; the world would sink into the eternal silence, from\nwhich for one transitory and insignificant moment, it had awakened.[47]\n\nNIETZSCHE.--As might have been expected, it was in Germany that the\nlogical conclusions of a naturalistic outlook were drawn. Here,\nphilosophic pessimism had already been introduced by Schopenhauer\n(1788-1860), and his disciple Nietzsche was not afraid to formulate a\nscheme of ethics based on the conception of \"the survival of the\nfittest,\" and equivalent to an apotheosis of barbarism. The virtues of\nself-assertion, ruthlessness, and pride were to eradicate the vices of\nabnegation, pity, and humility. Christian morality was a disease;\nChristianity itself was the appropriate product of the degenerate epoch,\nand of the loathsome environment that gave it birth. This radical\nthinker, free from English \"compromise,\" could be satisfied with no\nmorality which was parasitic upon Christianity. He had clearness of\nvision to see whither the naturalistic road would carry its pious\nwayfarers. To him the moral idealism of Spencer was moonshine or\nstupidity--\"the milk of pious sentiment.\"\n\nSIGNIFICANCE OF NIETZSCHE.--Nietzsche has come in for a fair share of\nabuse, but it is only just to say that philosophy stands heavily\nendebted to this thinker. He was not afraid to draw logical\nconclusions, and to put questions which more conventional philosophers\nhad preferred should remain in the background.\n\nIt is well for a moralist to arise, once in a generation, who will clear\nhis own mind of cant and, without undue respect for the conventions,\napproach the really fundamental questions in a spirit of sincerity. The\nextravagant impieties of Nietzsche may have shocked his hearers, but\nthey have cleared the air. He exposed, perhaps with too little\n_finesse_, the nakedness of Naturalism, and tore off that mantle of\nidealism under which it had been masquerading. And he may be said, by so\ndoing, to have written _finis_ at the foot of a chapter in the history\nof philosophy.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER X\n\nREACTIONS IN PHILOSOPHY\n\n\nVICISSITUDES OF IDEALISM.--At the beginning of the last chapter we\nnoticed the early collapse of idealism in Germany. But the prophets\nof Romanticism, when they were no longer honoured at home, found an\nhospitable reception elsewhere, and especially in England. Indeed,\neven before the prestige of idealism had begun to decline in Germany,\nEnglishmen had been introduced to it by the writings and translations\nof S. T. Coleridge (1772-1834) and Thomas Carlyle (1795-1881). These\ntwo popularisers of German ideas were _litterateurs_ rather than\nprofessional philosophers, but for that very reason their vogue and\ninfluence were the wider.\n\nCOLERIDGE.--Coleridge was in spirit a genuine Romanticist; being, as\nwere some of the most notable of the German school--e.g., Goethe and\nSchiller--a poet as well as a philosopher. In his _Biographia Literaria_\nhe has left behind the story of his intellectual and spiritual\ndevelopment. He acknowledges his debt to Kant, to the Romanticists, and\nin particular to Schelling, whose \"intuitionism\" was naturally congenial\nto him. Coleridge was never able to embody his philosophical creed in\nany single work; he does not seem to have possessed the necessary power\nof application. He was unfortunate in being a man of weak character,\nand his ineffectiveness struck his contemporaries. But in spite of these\ndisadvantages--his sentimentality, the lack of clearness of his thought,\nhis weakness for opium--he certainly exercised an important influence,\nespecially in the realm of theology. His ideas, though vague, were\ncalculated to awaken the speculative habit, and, introduced as they\nwere, to a wide circle, were fruitful and stimulating. English theology\nhad been, in the eighteenth century, of an arid kind, and the English\nphilosophical tradition lacked, for the most part, appreciation of those\ndeeper aspects of reality which had appealed to German thinkers.\nColeridge, by introducing German speculation to his countrymen, was able\n\"to free theology of some of its narrowness, and to deepen and enlarge\nthe spiritual outlook of his age.\"[48]\n\nTHOMAS CARLYLE.--Carlyle was a man of a very different temper, whose\nattitude towards Coleridge was \"half contemptuous, half compassionate.\"\nA typically Carlylean characterisation of him may be found in the _Life\nof Sterling_:\n\n\"He was thought to hold--he alone in England--the key of German and\nother Transcendentalisms.... A sublime man, who alone in those dark days\nescaped from black materialisms and revolutionary deluges with God,\nFreedom, Immortality, still his. The practical intellects of the world\ndid not much heed him, or carelessly reckoned him a metaphysical\ndreamer; but to the rising spirits of the young generation he sat there\nas a kind of Magus, girt in mystery and enigma....\"\n\n\"The good man ... gave you the idea of a life that had been full of\nsufferings ... the deep eyes, of a light hazel, were as full of sorrow\nas inspiration; confused pain looked mildly from them, as in a kind of\nmild astonishment. The whole figure and air, good and amiable otherwise,\nmight be called flabby and irresolute; expressive of weakness under\npossibility of strength.... He spoke as if preaching--preaching\nearnestly and hopelessly the weightiest things.\"\n\nCarlyle himself had all the character and industry that Coleridge\nlacked, and it was another side of German idealism that had appealed to\nhim. The Scotchman was of the same fibre and stock as that other\nhalf-Scotchman, Kant. Here was the source from which he had drawn his\ninspiration. We see in Carlyle the same moral earnestness, the same\n\"toughness\" of thought, the same absence of \"sentimental moonshine.\"\nFrom Kant, too, he derives a vigorous independence of thought, a\nreligious respect for individuality, a horror of shams and affectation.\nKant was a true child of the Reformation, and Carlyle is a genuine\ndisciple.\n\nIn a single important respect, however, he differed from (and improved\nupon) his master. Kant lacked, or at least did not display, the saving\ngrace of humour; in Carlyle this quality looks out from every\npage--keen, satirical, sometimes bitter, sometimes grotesque; he\nridiculed his own generation, its vices, its prejudices, its\nsuperstitions.\n\nSARTOR RESARTUS.--For our purpose, _Sartor Resartus_--that profound and\nhumorous book--is Carlyle's masterpiece: here all the characteristic\nKantian doctrines may be found.\n\nThe \"philosophy of clothes\"--which is the quaint title behind which\nKantian idealism is made to masquerade--starts from the thought that\njust as an acquaintance with his clothes will not reveal to us the man,\nso an acquaintance with _phenomena_ (which is all that science can claim\nto give us) cannot reveal to us the real ground of existence, which\nremains an inscrutable mystery. We must \"look on clothes till they\nbecome transparent,\" if we could understand reality.\n\n\"To the eye of vulgar Logic what is man? An omnivorous biped that wears\nbreeches. To the eye of pure Reason what is he? A Soul, a Spirit, and\ndivine Apparition.\"\n\nAnd so with Nature; to science it is a mechanism, to the understanding\nheart it is \"the living garment of God.\"\n\n\"It is written, the Heavens and the Earth shall fade away like a\nVesture; which indeed they are: the Time-Vesture of the Eternal.... The\nwhole External Universe and what it holds is but Clothing....\"\n\nThe visible world is but a symbol of a profound and awful reality; and\nall Nature's products, in their degree, symbols as well: but of these,\nman is the highest. \"The true SHEKINAH is Man: where else is the GOD'S\nPRESENCE manifested, not to our eyes only, but to our hearts, as in our\nfellow-man?\"\n\nThis leads up to the essential doctrine of the Kantian system: that man\nis a creature of two worlds, who has a foot in either; hence in the\nphenomenal world he can never find satisfaction.\n\n\"Man's Unhappiness, as I construe, comes of his Greatness; it is because\nthere is an infinite in him, which, with all his cunning, he cannot\nquite bury under the Finite. Will the whole Finance Ministers and\nUpholsterers and Confectioners of modern Europe undertake, in\njointstock company, to make one Shoeblack Happy? They cannot accomplish\nit, above an hour or two, for the Shoeblack also has a Soul quite other\nthan his Stomach....\"\n\n\"There is in man a HIGHER than Love of happiness: he can do without\nhappiness and instead thereof find Blessedness! has it not been to\npreach forth this same HIGHER that sages and martyrs ... have spoken and\nsuffered; bearing testimony to the God-like that is in man?\"\n\nCARLYLE'S INFLUENCE.--In spite of Carlyle's strange literary mannerisms\nand his grotesquely Germanic phrases, his writings had great\nattractiveness for those of his contemporaries who felt themselves\nsmothered by the materialism and utilitarianism of early Victorian\nEngland. He was able to re-vitalise idealism amongst them. Moreover he\nappealed strongly to those to whom the Coleridgean speculations were\nuncongenial. The strongly developed _moral_ element, both in his\nwritings and in his own somewhat stern and austere personality--what\nTaine called his \"puritanism\"--appealed strongly to a certain side of\nEnglish feeling. His countrymen felt that his was a native genius that\nthey could understand. In fact we may say that the influence of Carlyle,\nespecially among the young and generous minded, has been incalculable in\nextent and invaluable in quality. Spiritual life in England stands under\na deep obligation to him.\n\nROMANTICISM AT OXFORD.--Englishmen were thus not entire strangers to\nGerman idealism, which had possessed its interpreters in the earlier\nhalf of the nineteenth century. Not, however, until it had experienced a\ndecline in Germany (a reaction which occupied our attention in the last\nchapter), did Romanticism become naturalised in England by being\nadopted in academic circles.\n\nAmong the most notable of English idealists was T. H. Green--fellow and\ntutor of Balliol College, Oxford. In this thinker we have a widely\ndifferent type of mind from that of either Coleridge or Carlyle. He was\na thinker rather than a poet or a prophet, and he belonged to what we\nhave noticed as the intellectualist--i.e. Hegelian--wing of Romanticism.\n\nGreen's chief work was his _Prolegomena to Ethics_ (published\nposthumously in 1883), where arguments, which were familiar to those\nacquainted with Hegel, presented themselves. Green begins with an\nanalysis of experience, and leads to the conclusion that Nature--if by\nit we mean \"the connected order of experience\"--implies \"something other\nthan itself, as the condition of its being what it is.\" And \"of that\n'something' we are entitled to say, positively, that it is a\nself-distinguishing consciousness\" (section 52).\n\nIf these conclusions be valid, the bottom falls out of Naturalism, for\nif nature \"implies something other than itself,\" it does not stand\nalone; and that nature _does_ stand alone is the beginning and end of\nall naturalist theory. And, furthermore, this \"something other than\nitself,\" which Nature involves, is \"a self-distinguishing\nconsciousness\"; i.e. something to which we can attribute personality.\n\nGREEN AND SPENCER CONTRASTED.--This theory has only to be compared with\nthat of Herbert Spencer for a fundamental difference to declare itself.\nThe two systems do indeed adopt as axiomatic the conception of the\nuniformity and unity of nature, which works in accordance with a single\nlaw. But Spencer saw in that law the expression of a blind force, an\nunknowable power, of which it would be no more and no less true to say\nthat it was \"spiritual\" than that it was \"material.\" But for Green the\nlaw was the expression of a spiritual principal analogous to our own\nintelligence--a manifestation (to use theological language) of God.\n\nF. H. BRADLEY.--Undoubtedly the most notable of English Hegelians is F.\nH. Bradley, whose metaphysical essay, _Appearance and Reality_, was a\nwork of genuine originality. The book is not of a type to make much\nappeal outside academic circles, though it is written in an easy and\nattractive style: its results may seem, to the unsophisticated reader,\nsomewhat too ambiguous. \"Ultimate Doubts\" is the title of the last\nchapter, and \"It costs us little to find that in the end Reality is\ninscrutable,\" is a remark not uncharacteristic of the author. Yet this\nreally profound thinker and acute reasoner played an important part in\nhelping to discredit that negative dogmatism which was so much in vogue\nduring his own lifetime. He pointed out the limits beyond which natural\nscience could not transgress without lapsing into \"dogmatic\nsuperstition.\"\n\n\"Too often the science of mere Nature, forgetting its own limits and\nfalse to its true aims, attempts to speak about first principles. It\nbecomes transcendent, and offers us a dogmatic and uncritical\nmetaphysics\" (p. 284).\n\nThough the fault has not always been on the side of the scientists:\n\"Metaphysics itself, by its interference with physical science, has\ninduced that to act, as it thinks, in self-defence, and has led it, in\nso doing, to become metaphysical. And this interference of metaphysics I\nwould admit and deplore, as the result and the parent of most injurious\nmisunderstanding.... So long as natural science keeps merely to the\nsphere of phenomena and the laws of their occurrence, metaphysics has no\nright to a single word of criticism\" (p. 285).\n\nThis critical handling of the problem of the relations of science and\nphilosophy did much to draw attention to the confusion of thought lying\nat the base of much popular materialism. It began to be realised that\nthe principles of physical science are only fruitful of good results in\nthe sphere properly belonging to them; and that the uncritical use of\nthese principles results in a hybrid philosophy, which is neither sound\nscience nor rational metaphysics.\n\nA. J. BALFOUR.--Before Bradley's essay was published, a somewhat similar\nline of criticism had been developed by Mr. A. J. Balfour in his\n_Defence of Philosophic Doubt_ (1879). Its title sounds unpromising, but\nthe book voiced a demand for a rational philosophy of science which was\npractically non-existent at that time; and consequently, in the absence\nof any adequate examination of the principles of science, uncritical\ndogmatism flourished quite unchallenged. Balfour, elsewhere, indicates\nthe objects with which he wrote the book--to elicit from the disciples\nof natural science a _rationale_ of their method:\n\n\"A full and systematic attempt, first to enumerate, and then to justify,\nthe presuppositions on which all science finally rests, has, it seems to\nme, still to be made. After the critical examination which I desiderate\nhas been thoroughly carried out, it may appear that at the very root of\nour scientific system of belief lie problems of which no satisfactory\nsolution has yet been devised.\"[49] Thus Balfour drew attention to the\nfact that the common-sense philosophy of naturalism rested upon a tacit\nagreement to overlook certain important problems which are the\nindispensable preliminaries to any thinking which can be called\ncritical, or lay claim to be regarded as philosophy in the strict sense.\nThat some of these problems seem artificial, and the questions raised by\nthem gratuitous, to the eye of \"common sense\" is an irrelevant\nconsideration, for \"nothing stands more in need of demonstration than\nthe obvious.\"\n\nNATURALISM CHECKED.--Thus Bradley and Balfour between them, merely by\nadopting a critical attitude, created an embarrassing situation for\nnaturalism. Between them these writers administered a serious check to\nthat naively uncritical dogmatism which, backed by the prestige of\nnatural science, had sought to impose itself on the world as a new\northodoxy less liberal, in some ways, than the old.\n\nNor did they stop short at negative criticism, but substituted\n(according to the idealistic tradition) a spiritual view of reality for\nthe mechanistic materialism that had become so popular. _Appearance and\nReality_ is a book of which the trend might seem too obscure, but it\nends with a note that is definite enough:\n\n\"Outside of spirit there is not, and there cannot be, any reality; and,\nthe more that anything is spiritual, so much the more is it veritably\nreal,\" are Bradley's closing words.\n\nAs for Balfour, he leads his readers up to a point which he describes as\n\"the threshold of Christian Theology.\" And having propounded the\nperplexities in which the \"common sense\" philosophy (on which naturalism\ndepends) is involved, he says:\n\n\"I do not believe that any escape from them (the perplexities) is\npossible, unless we are prepared to bring to the study of the world the\npresupposition that it was the work of a rational Being, who made _it_\nintelligible, and at the same time made _us_, in however feeble a\nfashion, able to understand it.\"[50]\n\nREVIVAL OF IDEALISM IN GERMANY. LOTZE.--We have perhaps dwelt at too\ngreat length upon the backwash of the idealistic wave in England, for\nidealism is not a native philosophy amongst us; possibly, because we are\nnot metaphysically-minded in the same sense as are the purer Teutonic\nbreed. And it is time to pass on to pay a brief tribute to the work of a\nGerman philosopher who accepted the mechanical theory in its totality,\nwithout sacrificing what we may call the spiritual values of existence.\n\nHermann Lotze (1817-1881) was inclined to feel that the weakness of\nRomanticism lay in a tendency to despise or overlook what Kant had\ncalled \"the fertile bathos of experience.\" The Romanticists had too\noften neglected natural science, which, in the shape of naturalistic\nmaterialism, had its revenge by destroying them. Buechner was the Nemesis\nof an idealism which was at once vague and sentimental.\n\nLOTZE'S \"MICROCOSMOS.\"--Lotze's attitude and method are conspicuous in\nhis well-known work, which took him eight years to complete\n(1856-1864)--the _Microcosmos_. After guiding his readers \"through the\nrealms of natural phenomena and historical evolution,\" thus constructing\na sufficiently stable basis out of _facts_--he leads them on to an ideal\nworld composed of what he calls \"values.\"\n\nHis position may thus be summarised: The world presents itself to the\nobserver in three aspects--(1) The world of individual \"things,\" which\nare bewildering and intricate; (2) the laws (i.e., \"laws of nature\")\nwhich the human intellect has discovered among them, thus finding\nregularity and order; (3) the \"values\" which the human soul applies to\nthings, and which it is the human task to cultivate.\n\nThis world of ideals or values (3) is that for the sake of which the\nworlds of phenomena and law (1 and 2) exist. These (1 and 2) constitute\nrespectively the material _in_ which, and the forms _through_ which, the\nworld of \"values\" is to be realised.[51]\n\nThus phenomena and law are the raw material out of which \"values\" are\ncreated; and these \"values\" themselves constitute (in the eyes of Lotze)\na higher reality. Thus the central doctrine of his system is that the\ntruly Real is what has supreme worth: it is _worth_ that creates\nreality. The paradoxicality of this may make it difficult to accept; but\nLotze is only expressing in his own way the fundamental thesis of all\nforms of idealism, that \"the ideal is the real\"; that the world of\nphenomena is secondary to and dependent upon a \"world of spirit,\" or an\n\"ideal world.\"\n\nLotze himself in the introduction to the _Microcosmos_, expresses what\nis at once the foundation and the kernel of his system: he says it is\nhis purpose to show \"_how absolutely universal is the extent_, and at\nthe same time how _completely subordinate the significance, of the\nmission which mechanism has to fulfil in the structure of the world_.\"\n(E.T., p. xvi.)\n\nMechanism is universal, _because_ it is the raw material, so to speak,\nout of which reality is to be made. That reality can be expressed in\nterms of mechanism is true, just as a poem can be described as a scrap\nof paper scratched upon with a pen; but this reduction of reality to its\nlowest terms, ends by emptying reality of content. Mechanism is a\n_universal_ feature, but it is a _subordinate_ feature, of reality.\nNature requires, if we are to arrive at the truth about it, not only to\nbe described and analysed, but also interpreted in the light of the idea\nof _value_ or _worth_.\n\nLOTZE AND THEOLOGY.--Lotze's theories exercised an important influence\nupon the development in Germany and elsewhere of a type of theology\nknown as Ritschlianism. Albrecht Ritschl, a disciple of Lotze, attempted\nto dissociate religion from metaphysics, and to base it upon \"judgments\nof value.\" Christian dogma, for instance, is an attempt to express, in\nphilosophical terms, _the unique value to humanity of the moral and\nreligious consciousness of Christ_. So far as a dogma is faithful to\nthat central idea, and makes a genuine attempt to express it, so\nfar--and so far only--is it true.\n\nThis type of theology, uniting itself with certain philosophical\ntendencies which will engage our attention later, became the basis of\nwhat was known as the Modernist movement in the Roman Catholic Church.\n\nCONCLUSIONS.--Thus in the nineteenth century, in England (and indeed on\nthe continent also) the idealistic attitude, though it sometimes might\nseem compromised, was never submerged; in spite of the materialistic\noutlook of an age only too preoccupied with scientific discovery and\ncommercial expansion.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XI\n\nSOME RECENT TENDENCIES IN PHILOSOPHY\n\n\nTHE PHILOSOPHY OF SCIENCE.--In the last chapter we heard A. J. Balfour\ncomplaining of the absence of \"a full and systematic attempt, first to\nenumerate, and then to justify, the presuppositions on which all science\nfinally rests.\" And Mr. F. H. Bradley also drew attention to the absence\nof any critical philosophy of science in England. The need was for\nscientific standpoints to be investigated _de novo_; and the process\nhad, as a matter of fact, already been begun on the Continent.\n\nMACH.--Ernst Mach, Professor of Physics at Prague, and subsequently\nProfessor of Physics at Vienna (thus combining the roles of scientist\nand metaphysician--always a highly instructive and fruitful combination)\nhad as early as 1863 laid it down as the task of science to give \"an\neconomic presentation of the facts.\" By which phrase he meant that\nscience takes account only of the salient features of phenomena,\nselecting only those which seem strictly serviceable to its own purpose.\n\nSCIENCE \"ABSTRACT\" OR \"SELECTIVE.\"--Mathematical science (which is the\n\"pure\" science _par excellence_) deals not--as is generally\nsupposed--with \"things,\" but with _certain selected aspects_ of things.\nFor example, for purposes of arithmetic, every leaf on a tree is an\n\"unit\" (i.e. all are \"identical\"); but, in point of fact, there exist no\ntwo leaves that are alike, as Leibniz, long ago, pointed out. Again, for\ngeometrical purposes two fields may be regarded as of like area; but no\ntwo fields are, or ever have been, so.\n\nThus mathematics--where scientific method is seen at its\npurest--proceeds by deliberately disregarding individuality; it regards\nthe differences between individuals as non-essential, and irrelevant to\nits purpose.\n\nECONOMY OF THOUGHT.--And mathematical science is justified in acting in\nthis way. This method, highly abstract as it is--in fact, just because\nit is highly abstract--leads to invaluable results. It's justification\nis that it is _economical of thought_; disregarding all irrelevant\nconsiderations, it is able, by using a short-cut, to reach its goal. Did\nthe mathematician have to take into consideration all the manifold and\ncomplex aspects of each concrete \"thing\" (whether it be leaf, or field,\nor lever, or what not) with which he deals, he would never be able to\ncut his way through the jungle. His method of abstraction carries him at\nonce to his goal.\n\nMACH ON THE \"MECHANICAL VIEW.\"--Mach's criticism of the mechanical view\nof nature proceeded upon similar lines. He termed that view\n\"analogical,\" by which he meant that mechanical \"laws of nature\" serve\nus as formal patterns to which the processes of nature may (for\nconvenience sake) be represented as conforming. A clear account, though\nnot a _complete_ account, of all physical processes may be given in\nterms of mechanical \"law.\"\n\nAnd in fact it remains a question, Mach observed, \"whether the\nmechanical view of things, instead of being the profoundest, is not in\npoint of fact, the shallowest of all.\"[52]\n\nSCIENCE NOT INVALID BUT INCOMPLETE.--This line of criticism of\nscientific method--i.e. that it deals with abstractions and analogies\nrather than with _things_, for the sake of economy and convenience of\nthought--does not deprive science of validity, but only invalidates that\nsuperficial dogmatism which had crept into so many investigations. A\ncritical estimate of scientific methods makes it evident how much and\nhow little we have the right to expect from them. They will enable us to\ngive a simple description of _phenomena_ as they are seen when reduced\nto their simplest terms of matter and motion; but of ultimate and final\ncauses they will tell us nothing.\n\n\"The system of conceptions by which the exact sciences try to describe\nthe phenomena of nature ... is symbolic, a kind of shorthand,\nunconsciously invented and perfected for the sake of convenience and for\npractical use ... the leading principle is that of Economy of Thought\"\n(Merz, Vol. III, p. 579).\n\nBOUTROUX.--This criticism of the mechanical method of dealing with\nreality was seconded by Boutroux's criticism of the principle of Natural\nLaw. Emile Boutroux (1845-1918)--Professor at the Sorbonne--in two\nimportant treatises, examines with great minuteness this aspect of the\nscientific method. In the earlier of these works, _The Contingency of\nthe Laws of Nature_ (1879) he suggests that these laws only give, so to\nspeak, the _habits_ which things display. They constitute, as it were,\n\"the bed in which the stream of occurrence flows, which the stream\nitself had hollowed out, although its course has come to be determined\nby this bed\" (Hoeffding, _Modern Philosophers_, p. 101).\n\nIn his _Natural Law in Science and Philosophy_ (1895), Boutroux lays it\ndown that the laws of nature, as science describes them, may indeed\nrepresent, but are by no means identical with, the laws of nature as\nthey really are. The laws of science are true, not absolutely but\nrelatively, i.e. are not elements in, but symbols of, reality. The\nnotion that everything is \"determined\" (i.e. the opposite of\n\"contingent\"), though absolutely indispensable to the mechanical theory,\nis nevertheless a way of looking at things rather than a faithful\npicture of reality--a way in which we see things rather than the way\nthings exist in themselves.\n\nAs Boutroux himself puts it in his final chapter: \"That which we call\nthe 'laws of nature' is the sum total of the methods we have discovered\nfor adapting things to the mind, and subjecting them to be moulded by\nthe will.\"\n\nRESULTS.--Here we have Boutroux approaching very closely to the\nstandpoint of Mach; indeed the theories of the two men are complementary\nto one another. For Mach, the mechanical view is a way of looking at\nthings, distinctly useful for understanding and using them--an \"economy\nof thought.\" For Boutroux, the determinist view is also a way of looking\nat things that is useful for the same purposes.\n\nThus the interpretation of reality in terms of mathematics and\n\"unalterable law,\" is artificial; an abstract way of thinking which\ndeals not with reality itself but with certain deliberately selected\naspects of it.\n\nRISE OF A NEW PHILOSOPHY.--This examination of the principles of natural\nscience was the beginning of what afterwards proved to be a revolution\nin thought. What had been more or less negative criticism in Mach and\nBoutroux, became the basis of a new philosophy in the hands of William\nJames and Bergson. The names, and even the ideas, of these two original\nthinkers are familiar far outside strictly philosophical circles, and it\nwill almost be possible to presume upon a certain acquaintance with them\non the part of our readers.\n\nWILLIAM JAMES.--James himself, like Mach, was led to philosophy by the\nroad of scientific investigation. He was a psychologist, and it is as\nthe author of his _Principles of Psychology_ that his name will be\nremembered. This work is notable as containing the first complete\napplication of the Darwinian theory to the evolution of mind. Mental\naction is there represented as a capacity developed by the organism to\nenable it to deal with its environment. As an exponent of James puts it:\n\n\"The mind, like an antenna, feels its way for the organism. It gropes\nabout, advances and recoils, making many random efforts and many\nfailures; always urged into taking the initiative and doomed to success\nor failure in some hour of trial.\"[53]\n\nThe corollary which attaches to propositions of this kind is that\nknowledge in all its varieties and developments arises from _practical\nneeds_. And the mind (here is an echo of Mach) _selects_ those aspects\nof reality which concern it, and out of that selected material makes up\na new (mental) world of its own. Which world is far from being a\n\"picture\" of reality, but which is \"symbolic\" of it (here is another\nmemory of Mach).[54]\n\nThis view obviously cuts the ground from under dogmatic materialism. The\nworld which that philosophy regards as _reality_, is, to the critical\neye, a collection of abstractions, a mental creation arising out of the\npractical needs of life.\n\nHENRI BERGSON.--This line of criticism, that of the evolutionary\npsychologist, opened up by James, has been carried to extreme lengths by\nthe French philosopher Bergson. \"Dig to the very roots of nature and of\nmind\" is his advice. He begins by asking, How, as a matter of history,\nhas human intellect developed? He then, and then only, proceeds to put\nthe question (which uncritical thinkers always put _first_), What can\nthe intellect do for us?\n\nHis theory of the origin of intellect is the same as that of William\nJames. Life (through the evolutionary process) has produced it. But the\nconclusion that he draws from this hypothesis is that _the intellect,\nbeing itself a product of life, or a form of life, cannot understand the\nwhole of life_. This thesis is elaborated with a wealth of illustration\nand erudition, both scientific and philosophic, and with a literary\ngrace and charm possible only for a Frenchman, in the famous work\n_Evolution Creatrice_ (1907).\n\nBERGSON'S ADVANCE ON MACH AND JAMES.--Those thinkers who had made a\nserious attempt at a philosophy of science, had demonstrated that the\n\"mechanical view\" of nature was a mental abstraction, and not a complete\nrepresentation of reality. Such is the debt of philosophy to the\nresearches of Mach, Boutroux, James, and others who worked along their\nlines.\n\nBut it remained for Bergson to demonstrate that the mechanical view was\n_the inevitable product of the mental processes which we describe by the\nword \"intellect.\"_\n\nThe path which led Bergson to this goal will have to be briefly\nindicated by us.\n\nCHARACTERISTICS OF THE INTELLECT.--What is the \"intellect,\" to which we\nlook in vain for any _complete_ explanation of existence? This is the\npreliminary question.\n\nOur intellect is, as James had taught, a faculty developed by the\nevolutionary process in our species to enable it to deal with its\n_material_ environment. And Bergson was the first to point out that as a\nconsequence of its having been developed for this particular purpose\n(i.e., dealing with a _material_ environment), intellect is \"never quite\nat its ease, never entirely at home, except when it is working upon\ninert matter.\" If it has to deal with \"living\" matter, it \"treats it as\ninert, without troubling about the life that animated it.\"\n\nSuch is the first characteristic of the intellect: it feels at home in\ndealing with dead matter, and living matter it prefers to treat \"as\ninert.\"\n\nAnother characteristic of intellect is that, just as it treats the\nliving as if it were non-living, so it prefers to treat the mobile as\nthough it were motionless. Motion is a thing which the intellect simply\ncannot grasp; it has to treat it artificially, and represent a process\nwhich in reality is continuous and indivisible, as discontinuous and\ndivisible--a succession of points, out of which no magic can conjure\nmotion. Philosophy became aware of this as soon as it opened its eyes.\nHence the paradox of Zeno, that Achilles will never overtake the\ntortoise, if the latter once gets a start. For if space and time are\ninfinitely divisible (as intellect holds them to be), by the time\nAchilles has reached the tortoise's starting point, the tortoise has\nalready got ahead of _that_ starting point, and so on _ad infinitum_;\nthe interval between them being endlessly diminished, but never\ndisappearing.\n\nZeno's paradox arises because of an innate fault in the \"intellectual\"\nmethod of dealing with motion; a method which Bergson calls\n\"cinematographical,\" because it regards a single movement as a\nsuccession of infinitely small motions. That method is hopeless; and if\nwe expect to understand motion by its means,\n\n\"You will always experience the disappointment of the child, who tries,\nby clapping its hands together to crush the smoke. The movement slips\nthrough the interval, because every attempt to reconstitute change out\nof states implies the absurd proposition that movement is made up of\nimmobilities.\"[55]\n\nSo that the intellect is best fitted to deal, not with living and\nmoving, but with dead and motionless matter. Of the latter it can form a\nclear idea; but in dealing with the former, it finds itself at a loss;\nit has to abstract the life and the motion from what lives or moves, and\nwhat it cannot grasp, it must treat as non-existent.\n\nBERGSON'S ANTI-INTELLECTUALISM.--A penetrating remark of James' will\nhelp us, at this point, to understand the significance for philosophy\nof these new theories.\n\n\"In spite of sceptics and empiricists, in spite of Protagoras, Hume, and\nJames Mill, rationalism has never been seriously questioned, for its\nsharpest critics have always had a tender place for it in their hearts,\nand have obeyed some of its mandates. They have not been consistent,\nthey have played fast and loose with the enemy, and Bergson alone has\nbeen radical.\"[56]\n\nBergson's philosophy is, in fact, a reaction against intellectualism or\nrationalism; by which is meant the theory that pure reason is competent\nby its nature to give a complete and exhaustive account of reality.\n\nBut according to Bergson, intellect, which is a faculty developed to\nenable men to subdue and turn to advantage their material environment,\nand which is, as it were, \"fascinated by the contemplation of inert\nmatter,\" will not reveal the true meaning and nature of existence; it\ngives us \"a translation of life in terms of inertia,\" and can do no\nmore.\n\nThis criticism of the intellect (if it be sound), though it does not\ninvalidate the work of that faculty in its own proper sphere,\nnecessarily involves its discredit as a key to the unlocking of the\nfinal mysteries of life and of being. These things lie outside its\nprovince. \"Whether it wants to treat of the life of the body, or the\nlife of the mind, it proceeds with the rigour, the stiffness, and the\nbrutality of an instrument not designed for such use.\"[57]\n\nINTELLECT AND INSTINCT.--Since intellect, by its methods, has induced\nmen to turn their backs on reality, and to look on abstractions\ninstead, the only hope of reaching reality is through an entire change\nof method and direction. There is, according to Bergson, a\nnon-intellectual variety of knowledge, which (from his point of view) it\nwas a kind of original sin ever to depart from; an original sin which\nhas vitiated all our philosophic thinking from the days of Plato.\n\nThis variety of knowledge is more original and fundamental than any\nwhich the processes of the intellect, vitiated as these are by certain\ninherent perversions, can give us. Intellect cannot correct itself; we\nmust call in the aid of some other faculty if we would understand\nreality.\n\nBergson finds this faculty in what he calls \"instinct.\" According to\nhim, consciousness has developed in two divergent directions--instinct\nand intellect; and the difference between these is not one of intensity\nor degree, but of _kind_.[58]\n\nThey are two divergent developments of the same original consciousness,\nof which common origin they both retain traces, for they are not\nentirely dissimilar, nor is either of them ever found in a pure state.\n\nIntellect is characteristic of man. Instinct is most highly developed\namong certain insects, notably the _hymenopterae_ (i.e., bees and\nants).[59]\n\nBLINDNESS OF INTELLECT.--And the difficulty of the philosophical problem\nfor man arises from the anomalies of his own constitution (as\ninterpreted by Bergson in the light of his theory of instinct and\nintellect). As he puts it:\n\n\"There are things that Intelligence (or intellect) alone is able to\nseek, but which, by itself, it will never find. These things instinct\nalone could find; but it will never seek them.\" (_Creative Evolution_,\np. 159).\n\n\"If the consciousness which slumbers in instinct were to wake up ... if\nwe knew how to question it, and if it knew how to reply, it would\ndeliver to our keeping the most intimate secrets of life.\"\n\nThus Bergson regards it as impossible that intellect should ever supply\nus with the complete truth about reality; there are things, e.g. life\nitself--which altogether elude its grasp.\n\nINTUITION.--The situation, however, is not entirely hopeless. Man\npossesses some measure of instinct, which, when it has \"become\ndisinterested, self-conscious, and capable of reflecting upon its\nobject,\" Bergson calls intuition. By means of this faculty, man is able,\ndarkly perhaps but not ineffectually, to grope his way towards an\nunderstanding of reality.\n\nCHARACTERISTICS OF THE NEW PHILOSOPHY.--Just as the criticisms of\nCusanus and others freed thought from an incubus which seemed likely to\nprevent its further development, so the movement initiated by Mach and\nculminating (for the present) in Bergson, has done much to discredit \"a\ncertain new scholasticism that has grown up during the latter half of\nthe nineteenth century around the physics of Galileo, as the old\nscholasticism grew up around Aristotle.\"[60]\n\nMechanical determinism was characteristic of much nineteenth-century\nthought in Europe, not only amongst materialists, but also, in certain\ncases, amongst idealists as well. Against this aspect of contemporary\nphilosophy, the work of James and Bergson has been a revolt.\n\"Indeterminism,\" i.e. a belief in the reality of freedom and\nspontaneity, is an essential part of their system. Their indeterminism\nis indeed the necessary and logical accompaniment of their\nanti-intellectualism. For determinism is \"a fabrication of the\n_intellect_,\" a device which makes reality more manageable, more\namenable to logic, more easily systematised. Freedom, like life and\nmotion, eludes the categories of the intellect.\n\nTHE MECHANICAL VIEW ASSAILED.--Such are the lines upon which the new\ncriticism of the mechanical view (the most radical criticism it has had\nto meet since Kant) proceeds. That view, and the idea of predetermined\nhuman action which it involves, is an inevitable product of an intellect\nnaturally incapable of understanding freedom and spontaneity. These, as\nthey destroy its scheme of thought, it casts out as an illusion.\n\"Incorrigibly presumptuous,\" it insists on interpreting freedom by means\nof those notions which suit inert matter alone, and therefore always\nperceives it as necessity. So that all life, far from being subjected to\nmechanical necessity, as had seemed the inevitable conclusion of\nnaturalistic philosophy, was spontaneity (so to speak) materialised and\nembodied:\n\n\"All the living hold together, and all yield to the same tremendous\npush. The animal takes its stand on the plant, man bestrides animality,\nand the whole of humanity ... is one immense army galloping beside and\nbefore and behind each of us in an overwhelming charge, able to beat\ndown every resistance and clear the most formidable obstacles, perhaps\neven death.\"[61]\n\nWe have indeed travelled a long way from the austere abstractions of Mr.\nHerbert Spencer. The new evolutionism is very different from the old. It\nsubstitutes for \"mechanism\" another conception--that of \"dynamism,\"\naccording to which the process of evolution is something undetermined\nand impredictable--\"creative,\" in fact. The world of organic life is\nembodied \"creative activity,\" and what this \"creative activity\" is, we\nourselves experience every time we act freely.\n\nPLURALISM.--The philosophy of Bergson is a reaction against the\nmechanical evolutionism (i.e. naturalism) of the nineteenth century.\nClosely allied with it is another movement of thought, known as\n_pluralism_. This, too, is a reaction, not so much against naturalism,\nas against certain forms of idealism.\n\nIdealism, it will be remembered, seeks to interpret reality in terms of\nmind or spirit. And it does this in certain cases--notably in the case\nof F. H. Bradley--by regarding all _phenomena_ as forms or aspects of\nthe one absolute mind or spirit.\n\nThis has seemed to many thinkers a philosophy too abstract and too\nremote from the world of experience. Hence the question arose whether it\nmight not be possible to interpret nature in terms of mind without being\ncompelled to take refuge in the abstractions of \"absolutism.\" And\npluralism is an attempt to solve the problem.\n\nLEIBNIZ REVIVED.--Leibniz' system of \"monads,\" the nature of which will\nhardly have been forgotten, has been the model to which philosophers\nhave looked in constructing their new system. And the \"Monadology\" may\nbe taken as the type to which all modern attempts to construct a\n\"pluralistic\" philosophy more or less conform.\n\nThe essence of \"pluralism\"--whether Leibnizian or other--lies in the\nproposition that there exists an indefinite variety of beings, some\nhigher, some lower than ourselves. The pluralist agrees with the\nidealist in declaring that the essence of reality is _spirit_, but\ndiffers from him in declining to allow independent spirits to be\nabsorbed by an \"all-devouring Absolute.\"\n\nPLURALISM AND THEISM.--William James himself, in a work _A Pluralistic\nUniverse_ (1909) outlined a philosophy of spirit radically opposed to\n\"Absolute Idealism,\" which he subjects to a good deal of criticism.\nAnother important work, written from a similar point of view, is\nProfessor James Ward's _Pluralism and Theism_ (1911).[62]\n\nWith regard to modern pluralism, the notable features are two. In the\nfirst place, it is a philosophy of _personality_, which it regards as\nthe most fundamental form of reality; and also, that it is _theistic_ in\na sense peculiar to itself. It believes in a God who may be termed the\nsupreme monad, i.e. the head of a system of monads; but whose power may\nbe said, in certain respects, to be limited. And indeed some such\nposition seems to be the _logical_ conclusion that follows from the\npremises with which pluralists start, and also (we may add) from the\nfacts of experience.[63]\n\nPluralists unite in affirming that their God is (what they deny the\nidealistic Absolute to be) the God of the religious consciousness. James\nelaborates this thesis with his usual resourcefulness and skill. The\ncontroversy, however, is one into which it does not seem necessary for\nus to enter. Pluralism and idealism are or may be both definitely\nspiritual philosophies, and perhaps they appeal to different types of\nmind. We, at any rate, shall not undertake to judge between them. Both\nalike are preferable to dogmatic naturalism.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XII\n\nSOME RECENT TENDENCIES IN SCIENCE\n\n\nSCIENTIFIC METHOD.--In the last chapter, attention was drawn to some\nimportant attempts to supply science with a sound philosophy of method,\ni.e. to give a critical account of those processes, logical and\notherwise, which issue in what is called \"scientific knowledge.\"\n\nThe general results of these attempts was to re-enforce the validity of\nsound scientific method _within its own sphere_. But, at the same time,\nit was felt likely to prove an unreliable guide elsewhere.\n\nTHE NEW PHYSICS.--Meanwhile, while the logic of science was being\nscrutinised by philosophers, scientific research was itself going\nsteadily forward, and fresh discoveries of a highly important nature\nwere coming to light. In the sphere of physical science, more\nespecially, revolutions of Copernican proportions quietly took place.\n\nThe whole subject of physics is of a highly technical nature, quite\nunsuitable for discussion here, and, indeed, entirely beyond the range\nof the present writer.\n\nTo indicate the nature of the discoveries which were made, however,\ninvolves few technicalities: though the method by which these were\ndemonstrated and established must remain obscure to all but mathematical\nspecialists.\n\nCOLLAPSE OF THE ATOMIC THEORY.--Dalton's theory of atoms was described\nin a previous chapter. It is hardly possible to exaggerate the\nimportance attached by materialists, ever since Lucretius, to the\nconception of indivisible and indestructible atoms. It was regarded as\nintegral to materialism, and never was the prestige of this theory\nhigher than during the nineteenth century, which \"will go down in\nscientific history as the era of the atomic theory of matter.\"\n\nTowards the close of the century, the theory collapsed. Atoms were found\nto be neither indivisible nor indestructible; and the process of the\nbreaking up of the atom has actually been observed.\n\nAs is very generally known, it is in the case of a particular element,\n_radium_, that this phenomenon occurs. That substance, wherever it\noccurs, is undergoing a continual process of disintegration; radium\natoms are continually breaking up into more elementary bodies.\n\nWere it not for the fact that radium itself is the product of the\ndisintegration of another element, it would be impossible to account for\nits survival. It continually evaporates (the life of radium is only 2500\nyears) but it is as continually renewed by the infinitely slower\ndisintegration of uranium.\n\nELECTRONS.--The particles into which the radium atom disintegrates are\nknown as _electrons_. And according to the new theory of matter, not\nonly radium atoms, but the atoms of all the other elements (hitherto\nregarded as irreducible) are composed of electrons, differently grouped.\nThe radium atom is infinitely more unstable than the atoms of the other\nelements; but it is possible to conceive of the disintegration of these\nalso. They are all alike composed of the same elementary\nparticles--different compounds of the same primitive substance.\n\nMATTER A FORM OF ELECTRICITY.--And the most remarkable part of the new\ntheory is that these primitive particles of which material atoms are\ncomposed, are themselves the units which constitute what we call\n\"electricity.\" Thus matter and electricity are now expressed in common\nterms--they are regarded as different manifestations of the same\nsubstance. And of the two conceptions--matter and electricity--it is the\nlatter that is the more simple and fundamental. As a high authority puts\nit:\n\n\"Whereas through the greater part of the nineteenth century, 'matter'\nwas the concept which was looked upon as fundamental in physical\nscience, and of which there was a curious accidental property called\nelectricity, it now appears that electricity must be more fundamental\nthan matter, in the sense that our more elementary matter must now be\nconceived as a manifestation of extremely complex electrical\nphenomena.\"[64]\n\nAs to whether the electrons themselves, in their turn, are irreducible\nunits, there may be room for doubt. According to Professor J. Larmor the\nelectron is \"a nucleus of intrinsic strain in the ether.\"[65] If this\nview be sound, matter may be regarded as a manifestation of the ether;\n\"a persistent strain-form flitting through an universal sea of ether.\"\nAs to the nature of the ether, that is a subject of speculation among\nphysicists. It is variously described as an \"elastic fluid,\" and as \"a\nfairly close packed conglomerate of minute grains in continual\noscillation.\"[66] It may indeed be said that modern physical theories\nhave succeeded in reducing matter, which seems comparatively knowable,\nto a substance of which little is known and, therefore, of which much\ncan be postulated; it can be called sub-natural, or super-natural,\naccording to taste.\n\nWe may, perhaps, satisfy ourselves with the words of Professor Tait: \"We\ndo not know, and are probably incapable of discovering, _what_ matter\nis\"; and \"The discovery of the ultimate nature of matter is probably\nbeyond the range of human intelligence.\"[67]\n\nAnd yet we can agree with Mr. Arthur Balfour when he says[68] \"we know\ntoo much about matter to be materialists.\" That, in itself, a generation\nago would have been regarded as a large admission from the standpoint of\nphysical science.\n\nRESULTS OF THE NEW PHYSICS.--The reduction of knowable and tangible\nmatter to intangible electricity or unknowable ether may not seem to be\nmuch of an advance from the point of view of those who are interested in\nestablishing a spiritual theory of the universe. But electricity is a\nspecies of energy which can be expressed in terms of will--which is the\nonly kind of energy that we are acquainted with at first hand. \"What is\nobjectively energy is subjectively will; or, in other words, manifested\nenergy is the visibility of will.\"[69] And so far as the \"unknowable\"\nether is concerned, it gives less scope to those powers of dogmatism,\nthe exercise of which characterised scientists of the old materialistic\nschool; and it is the habit of oracular pronouncements which does the\nharm, by rendering any intellectual or spiritual progress impossible. In\nany case, whatever be the substitute which is to replace the old theory,\nwe may congratulate ourselves, with Professor J. S. Haldane, that \"we\nhave parted once for all with the notion of a real and self-existent\nMaterial universe; and we must remember where we now are.\"[70]\n\nTHE NEW BIOLOGY.--But if the results of the new physics have been\ndisturbing to those who had hoped that materialism was a finally\nestablished theory, the results of recent biological research have been\nequally embarrassing to them. The anti-mechanistic trend of recent\nbiological theory is only too evident. The organism is regarded no\nlonger by the majority of biologists as fully explicable in terms of\nmechanics and chemistry. To quote Professor Haldane again, \"The main\noutstanding fact is that the mechanistic account of the universe breaks\ndown completely in connection with the phenomena of life.... In the case\nof life, the facts are inconsistent with the physical and chemical\naccount of phenomena.\"[71]\n\nThe organism can no longer be regarded as even an extremely complex kind\nof machine; that word will not cover the facts, and biologists are\ncompelled to look elsewhere for a less misleading terminology. To\ndescribe the organism as a machine, is to give to that word a very\ncomprehensive connotation. For the organism is a machine different in\nkind from any that has been constructed by man; it is \"a self-stoking,\nself-repairing, self-preservative, self-adjusting, self-increasing,\nself-producing engine.\"[72]\n\nTHE RESEARCHES OF DRIESCH.--Just as modern physics is concerned with the\ninfinitely small--the ultra-microscopic, in fact--so modern biologists\nare concentrating attention upon microscopic organisms, where life is\nseen at its lowest terms, and where (if anywhere) they may expect to\ndiscover what are the _differentia_ of life, i.e. what are the qualities\nthat distinguish living organic from inorganic matter. Perhaps the most\nnotable of the researches conducted in this sphere, of recent years,\nhave been those of Professor Driesch, who expounded his results in the\n_Gifford Lectures_ for 1907-1908 (_The Science and Philosophy of the\nOrganism_).\n\nThe phenomena upon which Driesch lays considerable stress are those\nwhich occur upon a division of certain living embryos. An embryo, when\ncut in half, displays remarkable powers of self-adjustment and continued\ndevelopment. Each half can, as it were, regulate itself, and make a\nfresh start; a process which results in two self-contained organisms,\nthough of smaller size than would have resulted from a single undivided\norganism. The cells which compose the organism seem able to adapt\nthemselves to whatever demands are made upon them. Like workmen building\na bridge, all of them _can_ do every single act--if need arise--and the\nresult of their labours is a perfect bridge, even if some of the workmen\nfall sick or are killed or injured in an accident.\n\nDriesch sums up the results of his researches by saying:\n\n\"There is something in the organism's behaviour--in the widest sense of\nthe word--which is opposed to an inorganic resolution of the same (i.e.\nto its complete expression in terms of chemistry and physics), and which\nshows that the living organism is more than a sum or aggregate of its\nparts; that it is insufficient to call the organism 'a typically\ncombined body' (i.e., a machine), without further explanation.\"[73]\n\nTHE PROBLEM OF LIFE.--The problem is: What is it in an organism which\ncauses it to behave in a fashion so impossible for any machine? To\nanswer this question satisfactorily would be to have solved the mystery\nof life. Biologists do not answer the question; they do not say what\nthis peculiar potency is, but they give it a name. Driesch calls it\n_entelechy_, i.e. \"purposiveness,\" and he also speaks of _psychoids_,\ni.e. \"primitive minds.\" Names do not carry us very far; but the mere\nfact that biologists have gone to the trouble of providing a name, is\nimportant. It constitutes an admission on their part that there is\nsomething mysterious about the organism; for it has been a principle of\nmodern science since the days of Galileo never to appeal to mysterious\ncauses if known ones can be found. The _deus ex machina_ method seems to\nthem fundamentally unsound, and so it is. If every difficulty were\nconsidered solved merely by the word \"mystery,\" knowledge would never\nadvance. Labelled ignorance is still ignorance. It is not names, but\nthings that are important. But in this particular instance the\napplication of the name _entelechy_ indicates that, in the opinion of\nsuch an authority as Driesch, at any rate, something exists which no\nmerely physical or chemical term can completely describe. And Driesch\nis typical of the trend of much modern biology. It is only the very\nextreme optimists who now look for a final explanation of the living\norganism in terms of physics and chemistry.\n\nRESULTS OF THE NEW BIOLOGY.--But if life resists all attempts to reduce\nit to matter and motion, we are confronted with the breakdown of the\nmechanical theory of the universe, which has been slowly but\nprogressively elaborated since the days of Leonardo da Vinci, and\napplied impartially to the organic and the inorganic spheres. But this\nultra-dogmatic theory now seems too cramped to contain the facts; even\nscientists resent the claims of materialist-mechanical orthodoxy. Some\nindeed adopt not merely a critical, but a provocative attitude, and seek\nto discredit the prestige of mechanics. Professor J. S. Haldane not only\nvindicates the freedom, but prophesies the speedy advance of biology to\na position of pre-eminence. Not only are biological phenomena\nirreducible to terms of mechanics, but it is mechanics that will have to\nbe re-interpreted in terms of biology.\n\n\"It is at least evident that the extension of biological conceptions to\nthe whole of nature may be much nearer than seemed conceivable even a\nfew years ago. When the day of that extension comes, the physical and\nchemical world as we now conceive it--the world of atoms and\nenergy--will be recognised as nothing but an appearance ... it will\nstand confessed as a world of abstractions like that of the pure\nmathematicians.\"[74]\n\nTHE NEW PSYCHOLOGY.--Not only physical and biological, but psychological\nscience will contribute very largely to the reconstruction of view which\nis now taking place. Particular attention is due to those branches of\npsychology which deal experimentally with the subconscious, with\ninstincts, with the phenomena of thought transference, psychotherapy,\nand of so-called \"spiritualism.\" In none of these spheres can research\nyet be said to have proceeded far enough to justify the luxury of\ndogmatising over results. Considerable confusion of opinion may still\nexist, but it is now generally recognised that there is a wide sphere of\nresearch in psychical regions which is practically a _terra incognita_.\nAnd those most competent to judge of results seem to be most cautious in\ntheir statements. We are in the position of not knowing what a day may\nbring forth; and an expectant agnosticism with regard to many problems\nis perhaps the right attitude to adopt. The somewhat arrogant negations\nof the last generation are now out of place; they were never, in the\nstrict sense, scientific, and they are now demodes. It is extremely\ndifficult to imagine a return to the view which dismisses \"mind\"\nfrom the universe as being an obscure by-product of matter, or a\ncomparatively insignificant \"epiphenomenon\" accompanying certain obscure\nchemical or mechanical processes. The old theories, gratifying in their\nsimplicity, will no longer cover the facts.\n\nPSYCHICAL RESEARCH.--One particular branch of experimental psychology,\nwhich has attracted a large measure of public attention, calls for a few\nremarks. The attempt has been made to give experimental proof of the\nexistence of \"disembodied spirits,\" human or otherwise. The whole\nsubject, exceptionally exposed as it is to the influence of prejudices\nof various kinds, requires to be treated with great caution, and it is\ninadvisable, in the present condition of the problem, to make dogmatic\nstatements in any direction.\n\nWhat appears to be certain is that the occurrence is well established of\nvarious _phenomena_ which it is extremely difficult to explain in\naccordance with our present knowledge of matter, of space, or of mental\naction.\n\nThe occurrence of such phenomena is no longer disputed; but it is over\nthe _explanation_ of them that controversy is active. And it seems quite\ncertain that the very least in the way of concessions that these new\nfacts will force from conservative scientists is _a radical revision of\ncurrent notions of the range of human mental action_. The mind is\nevidently capable of producing certain effects--even upon matter--which\nwould have seemed incredible a short while ago.\n\nSo much is the least that may be expected. But in the view of many\ncompetent and highly scientific observers, some far more radical\nrevision of our notions may be necessary. Some scientists of good repute\n(e.g. Sir Oliver Lodge, in England, and Flammarion and others on the\nContinent) are convinced that the facts can only adequately be explained\nby reference to another world--interlocked, as it were, with this.[75]\nAnd it has to be admitted that this, what may be called more \"advanced\"\nexplanation, is more in accordance than the other with a rather\nuniversal tradition or assumption of mankind in all ages.\n\nIt will be easily seen that the whole subject is one of the most extreme\ndifficulty. There is a general hesitancy in accepting what is called the\n\"spirit hypothesis,\" so long as any other can be found; a hesitancy\njustified in view of the extreme complexity of the world we live in\n(where so much is even yet unknown), and in view of the great difficulty\nwhich there seems to be in adducing _exact_ proofs of the \"spirit\ntheory.\"\n\nA REASONABLE ATTITUDE.--We shall, no doubt, be wise at present to refuse\nto cry \"Proven,\" and whilst admitting that all things are\npossible--perhaps even probable--to await with patience the results of\nfurther investigation.\n\nIt has to be admitted that, while many people are superstitious and\neasily attracted by picturesque theories, there are others who are as\nprejudiced, in their way, against new ideas, as were those astronomers\nwho, being committed to Ptolemaic views, refused to look through\nGalileo's telescope. It is not only theologians who have, in the history\nof thought, been guilty of obscurantism. In the early days of hypnotic\nexperiments the scientific world in general \"pooh-poohed\" the idea of\nhypnotism; and it took a considerable time before it would allow itself\nto be convinced that such a thing was possible. Facts, in the end, were\ntoo strong even for prejudice. It is facts, eventually, that decide\nmatters; and, no doubt, before a very long period has elapsed,\nsufficient facts will have accumulated to allow the scientific world to\nform more definite and better-grounded opinions than are possible\nto-day.\n\nMeanwhile, the ordinary man will do well to remember that the universe\nis really a very wonderful place, and that the knowledge of the wisest\nof us about it can only be described as infinitesimal. The traditions of\nnineteenth-century materialism are still strong amongst us, even with\nthose who are least conscious of them. But there are more things in\nheaven and earth than are dreamt of in that philosophy.\n\nRESULTS.--These new conceptions of matter, of life, and of mind, which\nare the products of the new physics, the new biology, and the new\npsychology respectively, may be confidently left to themselves to work\nout their own salvation. They have the strength of youth. What is\nevident is that we have crossed the threshold of a new era in the\nhistory of science. The outlook of the future will be as different from\nthat of the recent past as was the new science of Galileo, Descartes,\nand Newton from the dogmatic but fanciful notions which the Scholastic\ntheologians had borrowed from Aristotle, and sought to impose as a\npermanent revelation.\n\nThe current of thought is never stayed. The future is obscure, but one\nthing is certain, that the coming generations will see catastrophic\nchanges in the outlook of science; and the materialistic and mechanistic\n_weltanschauung_, which lately seemed so formidable, may soon become as\nsuperannuated as astrology. The theory which overshadowed the religious\nlife of a century, and which had become more and more menacing as\nscientific knowledge increased in extent and popularity, has fallen into\ndiscredit. Its prestige will not revive.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XIII\n\nSOME FINAL CONSIDERATIONS\n\n\nVALUE OF THE HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.--It may perhaps be felt that our\nprotracted excursion has not advanced us far beyond the position at\nwhich we stood in the opening chapter. Indeed, the history of philosophy\nmay seem not to establish any very definite conclusions; and those who\nstudy the subject in the hope that it will supply them with material for\ndogmatising are likely to be disappointed. We have to reconcile\nourselves to the fact that the riddle of the universe has as yet\nreceived no final solution at the hands of the metaphysicians. It is\nonly too evident that, as the poet says:\n\n  \"Our little systems have their day,\n  They have their day, and cease to be.\"\n\nAnd yet it would be an error to suppose that this lack of finality about\nphilosophical opinion, or the want of unanimity among philosophers,\nindicates that no progress has been made. There are certain landmarks in\nthe history of philosophy--such as Kant's _Critique of Pure\nReason_--which mark a point behind which we shall not again regress\n(assuming that our culture and civilisation is preserved). Even if we\nhave not grasped the whole truth about things yet, we are still\njustified in assuming that we are gradually, if painfully, getting\nnearer to the goal.\n\nBut surely we are entitled to believe that it is not the crude appetite\nfor metaphysical dogma that attracts men to the history of philosophy.\nIts fascination rather resembles that of the history of religion: both\nare, as it were, Odysseys of the human spirit; nor is there any activity\nof man that has not its appeal to the human heart: for _cor ad cor\nloquitur_.\n\nAnd, again, we should reflect that those who ask for final conclusions,\nforget that the _search_ for truth may be, in and for itself, of the\nhighest spiritual value. The best starting-point for the history of\nphilosophy is a famous passage from Lessing.\n\n\"Not the truth which is at the disposal of every man, but the honest\npains he has taken to come at the truth make the worth of a man. For not\nthrough the possession, but through the pursuit of truth do his powers\nincrease, and in this alone consists his ever-increasing perfection.\nPossession makes us quiet, indolent, proud.... If God with all truth in\nHis right hand, and in His left the single, unceasing striving after\ntruth, even though coupled with the condition that I should ever and\nalways err, came to me and said, 'Choose!' I would in all humility clasp\nthis left hand and say, 'Father, give me this! Is not pure truth for\nThee alone?'\"[76]\n\nBut there is another respect in which some knowledge of the history of\nthought may be an important advantage. It may not bestow upon us the\nliberty of dogmatising ourselves, but it does bestow upon us a certain\nimperturbability in the face of the dogmatisms of others. Airs of\nsystematic omniscience, \"the pride of a pretended knowledge,\" will leave\nus unimpressed and undismayed. The latest pretentious product of\npopular philosophy will, in the majority of cases, be recognised as an\nold heresy in a new garb; \"new\" thought will not impress (at least, by\nits novelty) those who know that it is old.\n\nBut it is against the crudities of materialistic naturalism that even a\nslight acquaintance with the history of ideas will form an antidote. The\nvarious exposures of it, from Hume and Kant to Bergson, will be to some\nextent familiar; and it will be a recognised fact that its chief popular\nattraction is at the same time its chief philosophic weakness; and this\nis that it is nothing more or less than a systematisation of the\nprejudices of common sense. \"As a theory of first principles, the best\nthat can be said of its pretensions is that they are ridiculous.\"[77]\n\nSOME DEDUCTIONS FROM HISTORY.--But, it may be asked, what definite\nconclusions have the foregoing chapters to offer? Some, if we are not\nmistaken, of a genuinely positive character. It will be necessary to\nrecall certain facts and reflections to the minds of our readers.\n\nIn the early chapters we noted the rise of an independent science, and\nthe collapse of the medieval world view with which popular religious\nnotions were associated so closely, that many conservative thinkers\nexpected to see both involved in a common ruin. Science seemed to\nthreaten the existence of a religion bound up with conceptions of space\nand of force which were being brought into discredit.\n\nThese misgivings turned out, however, to be ill-founded. Certain\nadvantages, no doubt, of simplicity and definiteness, which had\nbelonged to the old notions, had been irrecoverably lost; but thinkers\nlike Giordano Bruno showed that the conception of an infinite universe\nwas by no means hostile to religion; but that, on the contrary, it might\nbe a conception of the highest spiritual value. Such are the sentiments\nexpressed in some sonnets which precede Bruno's dialogue \"On the\nInfinite Universe.\"\n\n\"It seemed to Bruno as if he had never breathed freely until the limits\nof the universe had been extended to infinity, and the fixed spheres had\ndisappeared. No longer now was there a limit to the flight of the\nspirit, no 'so far and no further'; the narrow prison in which the old\nbeliefs had confined men's spirits had now to open its gates and let in\nthe pure air of a new life.\"[78]\n\nThe scientific did not seem to him incompatible with a fundamentally\nreligious conception of the world, at least for those who were not\nafraid \"to take ship upon the seas of the infinite.\"\n\nDANGERS OF THE \"MECHANICAL VIEW.\"--Thus it was not _science_ that was\nhostile to religion. This was not the case until science began to be\nassociated with a certain fairly definite philosophy of a mechanistic,\nand later of a materialist, description. Religion could not have\nsurvived the final establishment of such a philosophy as this, for the\nindispensable element in a religious attitude of life is the idea that\n_somehow there lies behind things a power or essence that has something\nin common with our own natures_--something that can, without an abuse of\nlanguage, be called personal. Any philosophy that rules out this idea\ncreates an atmosphere in which religion cannot breathe.\n\nAnd it was just this atmosphere that the mechanistic view, unless\namplified by considerations of another kind (as it was e.g. in the case\nof Spinoza) tended to create.\n\nTHE \"MECHANICAL VIEW\" NEVER UNCHALLENGED.--And with regard to this\nmechanistic philosophy, we have to observe that it never seems to have\ncommended itself, as a final and complete solution, to the best minds.\nIn the seventeenth century, it will be remembered, the mechanical\nconception was transcended (though in entirely different ways) by\nSpinoza and by Leibniz, and the religious consciousness of the age, in\nthe person of Pascal, protested against it.\n\nAnd although, during the eighteenth century, this philosophy persisted,\nand was considerably reinforced (with the help of further discoveries in\nthe realm of physics) by the school of Holbach and Diderot, yet it had\nstill to face the radical criticism of Kant. This criticism, as we shall\nremember, indicated that the mechanical view is a way in which the human\nmind--owing to its constitution--regards phenomena. If it is to\nunderstand them, the human mind cannot help viewing them in that\nfashion; it must subject things to the mould in which all its thought is\ncast. Mechanism is the _medium_ through which the mind understands\nphenomena. It belongs not to the things in themselves, but to our way of\nunderstanding them. And attached to this radical criticism of mechanical\nnotions, was an idealistic philosophy of the most genuinely religious\nand spiritual character. Kantian idealism is one of those contributions\nto human thought behind which we shall not again regress. It is a\nphenomenon of incalculable value and importance.\n\nThe immediate results of Kant's critical idealism was a luxuriant\ngrowth of a spiritual type of philosophy upon the ground he had cleared\nand prepared. Romanticism may be regarded as a revolt of those sides of\nhuman nature upon which the tyranny of mechanism pressed\nhardest--religion, speculation, poetry, music, art. \"You may expel\nnature with a pitchfork, but she persists in returning.\" The Horatian\nremark is true also of the human mind; you may try to weed out religion\nand poetry, but your success will only be temporary; for nature herself\nis more persistent than the most earnest of materialists and (what is\nmore) she outlives him.\n\nAnd with regard to the materialist or mechanistic view, it is highly\ninteresting to note that its greatest attraction has consisted in\nsomething which, strictly speaking, is not its own property. In the\neighteenth century in France, and in the nineteenth century in Germany\nand England, the popularity of this view was derived from its altogether\nillegitimate association with a high moral and social idealism, which\n(it is only too evident) had been borrowed--without sufficient\nacknowledgment--from the Christian tradition. The rather self-conscious\natheism (for instance) of Shelley or Byron--which they had presumably\nderived from Diderot and his contemporaries--was less a denial of God\nthan an affirmation of the rights of humanity. This generous philosophy\nof revolt from contemporary tyranny and pharisaism is atheistic only in\nname. The callous and cynical powers, both political and ecclesiastical,\nthat were the object of their bitter attacks were the embodiments of\natheism, for \"He alone is the true atheist to whom the predicates of the\nDivine Being, e.g. love, wisdom, justice, are nothing.\"[79]\n\nTHE PRESENT SITUATION.--During the nineteenth century the mechanical\nview received some accession of strength owing to the reduction of\nbiology to what seemed like subjection. But, at the same time, an\nidealistic philosophy had taken a strong hold in England, and towards\nthe end of the century critical students of scientific method cast doubt\nupon the _finality_ of the mechanical view. They regarded it as\nartificial, abstract, and symbolic only of reality. This critical\nmovement may be associated with the names of Mach, Boutroux, and\n(perhaps above all) of Bergson.\n\nMoreover, towards the end of the century, a number of new facts in\nphysics, biology, and psychology came to light and tended to discredit\nthe mechanical view as a final explanation of reality. The\nindestructibility of matter, even the conservation of energy and of mass\n(corner stones of the mechanico-materialist view) began openly to be\nquestioned, not by metaphysicians, but by men of science themselves. The\nfoes of materialism were those of its own household.[80]\n\nThus assailed from without by the philosophers, and from within by the\nscientists themselves, the mechanical view, after a reign of three\ncenturies (disturbed though these may have been by successive\nrebellions) seems destined to disappear. It may indeed subsist as an\napproximate and convenient way of regarding reality, of which it will no\nlonger pretend to give an absolute and complete account. It will\ncontinue to reign as a constitutional monarch, but the days of its\ntyranny are at an end. And it is not unlikely that future generations\nwill look with surprise upon our respect for a theory which to them will\nwear something of the same aspect as medieval astrology now presents to\nourselves.\n\nSOME DEDUCTIONS.--If the history of thought showed no other results than\nthe impaired prestige of naturalism, it would be worth attention and\nstudy. The facts undoubtedly compromise that prestige, for history\nindicates that at no period has naturalism been able to impose itself\npermanently. If there has been a movement in that direction, it has\nelicited a corresponding reaction. The human mind seems unable to remain\nsatisfied with the negations which systematised common sense seeks to\nimpose upon it. There is an instinctive appetite in humanity for a\nspiritual view of things, and Sabatier was undoubtedly right in\nobserving that mankind is \"incurably religious.\" Neither Hobbes, nor\nHolbach, nor Buechner, with the best will in the world, can exorcise from\nthe human heart that instinct which seeks for itself personal relations\nwith the universe--which sees a mind behind phenomena. This is one of\nthose instincts of which it is true that the more you repress them the\nmore insurgent they become--they will have their way in the end.\n\nThus naturalism, blind to the mutilation of our nature of which it is\nguilty, is psychologically unsound. And yet, our nature is not so easily\nmutilated after all. Naturalistic dogmatism has it in its power to\ncreate an atmosphere which is unhealthy for religion, but that growth\nhas its roots too deep for it to be easily destroyed. Springing as it\ndoes from the depths of our nature, it will prove as permanent as\nhumanity itself.\n\nThis is not to deny that this type of dogmatism may do, as it actually\nhas done, a great deal of harm. A plant may be strong and vigorous, but\nunder unceasing bitter weather, it will tend to become discouraged.\nOtherwise it would not be worth while to write criticisms of naturalism.\n\nFREEDOM.--Perhaps the best service we can do is to protest against\nindulging an appetite for negative dogmatism. Such an attitude is a\nnegation of the freedom of thought. And it is in an atmosphere of\nfreedom that both religion and science flourish best. A hard and fast\nnaturalistic outlook may prove, and actually has proved, an incubus from\nwhich even scientists themselves may pray to be delivered.\n\nNor has religion always enjoyed that full measure of freedom which is\nindispensable to its vigorous life. The curious and sad fact is that the\nhuman mind seems to delight in creating prisons for itself. The\nscientific spirit created a mechanico-materialistic scheme which has\nended by becoming the enemy of scientific research, and which (besides\nthis) asks, as a sacrifice, the mutilation of our spiritual instincts.\n\nAnd so with religion. The religious instinct (like the scientific) tends\nto create its prisons. The pride of, a pretended knowledge reduces to a\nmechanical scheme the mysteries of life and death; it provides\nsuperficial standardised solutions for the problems of existence.\n\nOf course, it is clear enough, that in religion as in science, we\ncannot, even if we would, start each of us from the beginning. We have\nto accept and to revere the riches of knowledge and experience\naccumulated by those who have gone before. And yet, in religion as in\nscience, life consists in movement; we must go forward. The past may be\nan inspiration, but it must not be the limit of our thought, or it\nbecomes an incubus. The glance must be forward not backward; the stream\nflows, and we are borne on its bosom. Humanity, like an explorer, has\nits face set towards the unknown. Both science and religion are children\nof freedom, without which the creative spirit in man is crushed.\n\nAnd here, with this note of warning (though perhaps rather of\nencouragement) we may close.\n\n\n\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n\n[1] _The Grammar of Science_, pp. 12, 13.\n\n[2] Ptolemy of Alexandria: 127-151 A.D.\n\n[3] J. M. Heald in art. \"Aquinas\" in _Encyclopaedia of Religion and\nEthics_.\n\n[4] Monks and theologians were betrayed into some controversial\nasperities. \"Ye men of Galilee, why stand ye gazing up into heaven\"\nformed the appropriate text for a sermon by a Dominican.\n\n[5] In spite of this, however, Descartes' works, in 1663, appeared in\nthe Index of forbidden books: and his doctrines were banned by Royal\ndecree from the French universities. Jesuit influences, which were not\nat all favourable to _native_ religion in France (or elsewhere!), may\nhave been responsible for this obscurantist policy.\n\n[6] Merz, _History of European Thought in the Nineteenth Century_, Vol.\nI, p. 384.\n\n[7] Quoted by Ward, _Naturalism and Agnosticism_, p. 4.\n\n[8] Hoeffding, _History of Modern Philosophy_, Vol. I, p. 315.\n\nIt may set the scruples of some at rest to be reminded that Aquinas\nhimself applied the term _Natura Naturans_ to God as the cause of all\nexistence. Eckhart and Bruno had made a similar application of it (cf.\nMartineau, _Study of Spinoza_, p. 226).\n\n[9] Here we may note, by way of an anticipation, a truth that Kant\nafterwards was the first to grasp clearly: that it is only when the\nmechanism of phenomena is proved, that religion can be purged of\nmaterialism.\n\n[10] Cf. letter to Arnauld, quoted by Hoeffding, I, p. 347: \"The\nsubstantial unity presupposes a complete, indivisible being. Nothing of\nthis kind is to be found in figure or motion ... but only in a soul or a\nsubstantial form similar to that which we call an 'I.'\"\n\n[11] The _Monadology_ (quoted by Pattison, _Idea of God_, p. 180).\n\n[12] Inge, _Christian Mysticism_, p. 19.\n\n[13] Cf. \"With space the universe encloses me and engulfs me like an\natom, but with thought I enclose the universe.\" A great saying.\n\n[14] Novalis called him \"the God-intoxicated\": a bold phrase.\n\n[15] We refer, of course, to the promulgation of the Bull _Unigenitus_,\nprocured from Pope Clement XI by the Jesuits; when their opponents, the\nJansenists \"of all professions and classes, were subjected to\nimprisonment, confiscation, and every species of oppression\" (Jervis,\n_Student's History of France_, p. 415).\n\nThe manoeuvre is characterised by another historian as a \"struggle of\nnarrow-minded fanaticism, allied to absolutely unscrupulous political\nambition, against all the learning and virtue which the French clergy\nstill possessed\" (Chamberlain, _Foundations of the Nineteenth Century_,\nVol. II, p. 379).\n\n[16] Even before the age of the Revolution, Paris possessed many great\nschools. The _College de France_ was founded in 1530; there was the\n_College et Ecole de Chirurgie_, the _Jardin des Plantes_, the _Ecole\nroyale des Mines_, etc. (cf. Merz, _History of European Thought_, Vol.\nI, p. 107).\n\n[17] Merz says of Newton: \"In his own country that fruitful\nco-operation which can only be secured by an academic organisation and\nby endowment of research was wanting\" (I, p. 99). As late as 1740 the\nwhole revenue of the Royal Society was only L232 _per annum_.\n\n[18] Morley, _Voltaire_, p. 41.\n\n[19] He published his _Elemens de la Philosophie de Newton_ in 1738.\n\n[20] Hoeffding, Vol. I, p. 481.\n\n[21] See note in Merz, Vol. I, p. 145.\n\n[22] Merz, Vol. I, p. 143.\n\n[23] The receipt and perusal of Rousseau's _Emile_, are said to have\ninterrupted the walk on one occasion, to the great astonishment of the\nKoenigsbergers.\n\n[24] Pringle Pattison, _Idea of God_, p. 26.\n\n[25] \"Atheism is aristocratic,\" was the reply of Robespierre to one who\nmocked at his _Etre Supreme_.\n\n[26] _Confessions_, Book XII.\n\n[27] Hoeffding, Vol. II, p. 9.\n\n[28] Fichte's word is _Anschauung_, for which the English language\npossesses no exact equivalent. It \"implies something akin, though\nperhaps superior to, seeing or perceiving by means of the senses,\" and\nit approaches less closely to \"inspiration\" than does the English word\n\"intuition.\" The term acquired a meaning somewhat akin to the _amor\nintellectualis Dei_ of Spinoza, which we have met before. (See note in\nMerz, III, p. 445.)\n\n[29] William James, _A Pluralistic Universe_, p. 92.\n\n[30] Here again a certain ambiguity surrounds the German word. _Geist_\nis inadequately translated by either \"mind\" or \"spirit\": it comprises\nthe meaning of both words (cf. Merz, III, p. 466).\n\n[31] This does not mean that what is not good enough for philosophy is\ngood enough for religion. The idea behind Schleiermacher is that what\nphilosophy cannot sanction, religious experience _can_ sanction. And it\nhas to be remembered that, as a follower of Kant, he assigned very\ndefinite limits to the powers of philosophy. He was not an\nHegelian--Hegel's and Schleiermacher's views of the religious problem\nare quite incompatible--the one believed, the other did not believe,\nthat reason could solve that problem.\n\n[32] Kopp, _Geschichte der Chemie_, Vol. I, p. 442 (quoted by Merz, Vol.\nI, p. 191).\n\n[33] Merz, Vol. I, p. 218.\n\n[34] According to one authority (Judd, in his _Coming of Evolution_) the\nnumber of known species of plants and animals must be placed at 600,000\n(p. 10).\n\n[35] _Vestiges of Creation_, published anonymously in 1844, passed\nthrough nine large editions by 1853. The author was Robert Chambers\n(1802-71), a geologist.\n\n[36] _Life and Letters_, Vol. I, p. 168 (_vide_ Judd, _Coming of\nEvolution_, p. 89).\n\n[37] As a matter of fact, biologists soon demanded more than even\nLyell's geology could give them. Recent discoveries about the nature of\nmatter have, however, further extended the possible age of our planet.\n\n[38] Darwin, _Life_, Vol. I, p. 93.\n\n[39] \"If we wish to fix a definite point to describe as the end of the\nidealistic period in Germany, no such distinctive event offers itself as\nthe French Revolution of July, 1830\" (Lange, _History of Materialism_,\nE.T., Vol. II, p. 245).\n\n[40] A famous book which, though negative in its conclusions, places its\nauthor alongside Schleiermacher as one of the founders of the modern\nscience of Religious Psychology.\n\n[41] Balfour, _Theism and Humanism_, p. 36.\n\n[42] \"Evolution is an integration of matter and concomitant dissipation\nof motion, during which the matter passes from an indefinite incoherent\nhomogeneity to a definite coherent heterogeneity, and during which the\nretained motion undergoes a parallel transformation.\"\n\n[43] Spencer confessed that of the _Synthetic Philosophy_ \"two volumes\nare missing,\" the two important volumes on Inorganic Evolution, leading\nto the evolution of the living and of the non-living (cf. criticisms by\nProfessor James Ward in his _Naturalism and Agnosticism_, Lecture IX).\n\n[44] For an instance of the masterly work turned out by this school and\nof the attractiveness of their propaganda, read Huxley's lecture, \"On a\nPiece of Chalk,\" delivered to the working men of Norwich during the\nmeeting of the British Association in 1868.\n\n[45] For this famous encounter, see _Life of Huxley_, Vol. I, pp.\n179-89, and _Life of J. R. Green_, pp. 44, 45.\n\n[46] As we shall subsequently find, this cosmic pessimism is less well\ngrounded than Huxley believed. Still, Spencer's own scientific\npresuppositions were the same as Huxley's, so that the passage remains a\npertinent criticism of the Evolutionary Philosophy as elaborated by him.\n\n[47] It is instructive to observe that a similar note of latent\npessimism is struck by the last notable survivor of the School we have\nendeavoured to describe. Viscount Morley at the end of his\n_Recollections_ (1917), questioned as to the outcome of those generous\nhopes entertained with such confidence by his contemporaries, is\ncompelled to ejaculate with philosophic brevity, _circumspice_, as he\ncontemplates a spectacle of unparalleled horror.\n\n[48] Storr, _Development of English Theology in the Nineteenth Century_,\np. 329. See which book for a valuable chapter upon Coleridge.\n\n[49] _Foundations of Belief_, p. 98.\n\n[50] _Foundations of Belief_, p. 309.\n\n[51] For this summary of Lotze's doctrine, see Merz, Vol. III, p. 615\nand ff.\n\n[52] Quoted by Ward in _Pluralism and Theism_, p. 103. For a brief yet\nadequate treatment of Mach's criticisms see Hoeffding's _Modern\nPhilosophers_, pp. 115-21.\n\n[53] R. B. Perry, _Present Philosophical Tendencies_, p. 351.\n\n[54] It is impossible to go deeper into James' \"theory of knowledge\"\nwithout using technical language. A few of his own phrases, however, may\nhelp to elucidate things. \"Abstract concepts ... are salient aspects of\nour concrete experiences which we find it useful to single out\"\n(_Meaning of Truth_, p. 246).\n\nElsewhere he speaks of them as things we have learned to \"cut out\" from\nexperience, as \"flowers gathered,\" and as \"moments dipped out from the\nstream of time\" (_A Pluralistic Universe_, p. 235).\n\nI owe these quotations to Perry, op. cit.\n\n[55] _Creative Evolution_, p. 325.\n\n[56] _A Pluralistic Universe_, p. 237.\n\n[57] _Creative Evolution_, p. 174.\n\n[58] i.e. Intellect is not (as it is generally represented to be) a\ndeveloped form of instinct, nor instinct an embryonic form of intellect.\n\n[59] The extraordinary and miraculous phenomena of instinct--especially\nas celebrated by the distinguished French scientist Fabre--cannot be\nrightly understood by trying to interpret them in terms of intellect.\nThis is to misread them completely.\n\n[60] Bergson's characterisation of Spencerian Evolutionism (_Creative\nEvolution_, p. 391).\n\n[61] _Creative Evolution_, p. 286.\n\n[62] Other notable pluralists in England are F. C. S. Schiller and Dr.\nMacTaggart.\n\n[63] The _logical_ conclusion, we say, though this may not be the\nultimate truth about the matter. The most attractive theories are often\nthe most superficial.\n\n[64] Professor Cunningham in Pearson's _Grammar of Science_, Part I, p.\n356.\n\n[65] Quoted by W. C. D. Whetham in his _Recent Development of Physical\nScience_, p. 280. No reference is given by him.\n\n[66] One theory attributes the existence of matter to occasional misfits\namong these grains.\n\n[67] Quoted by Bishop Mercer. _Problem of Creation_, Appendix B.\n\n[68] In _Theism and Humanism_.\n\n[69] Mercer, op. cit., p. 106.\n\n[70] _Mechanism, Life, and Personality_ (1913), p. 81.\n\n[71] Op. cit. pp. 64, 66.\n\n[72] Professor J. Arthur Thomson, in an article entitled, \"Is there one\nScience of Nature?\" (_Hibbert Journal_, Oct., 1911).\n\n[73] _The Science and Philosophy of the Organism_, Vol. II, p. 338.\n\n[74] Op. cit. p. 101.\n\n[75] Other names of distinguished scientists holding this view are: Sir\nW. Crookes the Physicist and Sir W. F. Barrett, F.R.S., in England, Dr.\nHodgson and Prof. James Hyslop in America, Lombroso in Italy, Richet in\nFrance.\n\n[76] From his _Duplik_. Quoted by Hoeffding, _History of Philosophy_,\nVol. II, p. 21.\n\n[77] F. H. Bradley on \"Phenomenalism\" (_Appearance and Reality_, p.\n126).\n\n[78] Hoeffding, op. cit., Vol. I, p. 129.\n\n[79] Feuerbach, _Essence of Christianity_, p. 21.\n\n[80] We now learn that conceptions of space of a highly unorthodox\ncharacter are entertained by physicists and mathematicians, as the\nresult of recent researches in the sphere of the gravitation of light.\n\n\n\n\nINDEX\n\n\n  Agnosticism, 92\n\n  Anti-clericalism, 43\n\n  Aquinas, 9 f., 30 _n._\n\n  Aristotle, 8, 136\n\n  Atomic theory, the, 49\n    collapse of, 126\n\n\n  Bacon, Lord, 16 f.\n\n  Balfour, A. J., 105 f., 110, 128\n\n  Bergson, 115-121, 143\n\n  Berkeley, 55\n\n  Boutroux, 112 f., 143\n\n  Bradley, F. H., 104 f., 110, 122, 139\n\n  Bruno, 12, 25, 29 f., 140\n\n  Buechner, 86, 144\n\n  Buffon, 77\n\n\n  Carlyle, Thomas, 38, 99-102\n\n  Coleridge, S. T., 98 f.\n\n  Comte, 85, 89, 92\n\n  Copernicus, 11, 22, 25, 58\n\n  Cunningham, Prof., 127\n\n  Cusanus, 10\n\n\n  Dalton, 49, 83, 126\n\n  Darwin, 80-83, 87 f.\n\n  Descartes, 19-22, 26, 37, 43, 55, 74, 136\n\n  Design, Argument from, 87 f.\n\n  Diderot, 45 f., 48, 141, 144\n\n  Driesch, 130 f.\n\n\n  Eckhart, 30 _n._\n\n  Encyclopaedia, The, 45\n\n  Electrons, 126\n\n\n  Feuerbach, 85, 95\n\n  Fichte, 65-67\n\n\n  Galileo, 12-15, 22, 55, 79, 136\n\n  Goethe, 30, 65\n\n  Green, T. H., 103 f.\n\n\n  Haeckel, 88\n\n  Haldane, Prof. J. S., 129, 132\n\n  Harvey, William, 19, 22\n\n  Hegel, 67-70\n\n  Heine, 85\n\n  Helmholtz, 75\n\n  Hobbes, 22, 26, 43, 55, 144\n\n  Holbach, 46-48, 141, 144\n\n  Hume, 55 f., 58\n\n  Huxley, 92 f., 95\n\n\n  Inge, 38 _n._\n\n\n  James, William, 114 f., 123\n\n  Jansenists, the, 43 _n._\n\n  Jesuits, the, 22 _n._, 26, 37, 43 _n._\n\n  Johnson, Dr., 47\n\n\n  Kant, 53-61, 66, 70, 77, 85, 137, 141\n    and Hegel compared, 69\n    and Locke compared, 57\n    and Rousseau compared, 65\n\n  Kepler, 15\n\n\n  Lamarck, 77\n\n  La Mettrie, 45, 48, 74\n\n  Lange, 47, 84\n\n  Laplace, 48 f.\n\n  Larmor, Prof. J., 127\n\n  Lavoisier, 49 f.\n\n  Leibniz, 33-36, 41, 52 f., 122, 141\n\n  Leonardo da Vinci, 14, 16, 132\n\n  Lessing, 138\n\n  Locke, 52 f., 55 f.\n\n  Lodge, Sir O., 134\n\n  Lotze, 107-109\n\n  Lyell, 78-80\n\n\n  Mach, 110-114, 143\n\n  Malthus' _Essay on Population_, 80\n\n  Meyer, 75\n\n  McTaggart, 123 _n._\n\n  Modernism, 109\n\n  Monads, 35 f., 122\n\n\n  \"Natural Selection,\" 81, 87\n\n  Newton, 23-26, 43, 44 _n._, 48, 82, 136\n\n  Nietzsche, 94, 96 f.\n\n\n  Paley, 87\n\n  Pascal, 22, 36-41\n\n  Pearson, Prof. Karl, 1\n\n  Pessimism, 95\n\n  Positivism, 85, 95\n\n\n  Ritschl, 109\n\n  Rousseau, 54 _n._, 62-65, 80\n\n\n  _Sartor Resartus_, 100\n\n  Schelling, 65\n\n  Schiller, 65\n\n  Schiller, F. C. S., 123 _n._\n\n  Schleider, 75\n\n  Schleiermacher, 70-72\n\n  Spencer, Herbert, 35, 77, 89-92, 122\n\n  Spinoza, 28-33, 41, 52 f., 67, 141\n\n  \"Spiritualism,\" 133-136\n\n  Stephen, Leslie, 92\n\n\n  Tait, Prof., 128\n\n  Thomson, Prof. J. A., 130 _n._\n\n\n  Voltaire, 44 f.\n\n\n  Wallace, Alfred Russell, 81 f.\n\n  Ward, Prof. James, 26 _n._, 91 _n._, 123\n\n  Whoeler, 74\n\n\n  Zeno's paradox, 117\n\n\n\n\n  Printed in Great Britain at\n  _The Mayflower Press, Plymouth._ William Brandon & Son, Ltd.\n\n\n\n\nTRANSCRIBER'S NOTES:\n\n\nPassages in italics are indicated by _italics_.\n\nPunctuation has been corrected without note.\n\nSpelling, grammatical and typographical errors have been corrected in\nthe text:\n\n    Page 68: \"understand\" changed to \"understands\"\n    Page 70: \"fom\" changed to \"from\"\n    Page 128: \"subjectly\" changed to \"subjectively\"\n    Page 138: \"Odyssies\" changed to \"Odysseys\"\n\nInconsistencies in spelling and hyphenation have been retained from the\noriginal.","title":"Religion and Science from Galileo to Bergson","tradition":"scripture-revelation","translated_text":null,"word_count":39097}