[Footnote 1: Cf. on Wagner, Fr. v. Hausegger, Wagner und Schopenhauer, 1878. [English translation of Wagner's Prose Works by Ellis, vol. i., 1892.—TR.]]

[Footnote 2: "D. Strauss, the Confessor and the Author"; "On the Advantage and Disadvantage of History for Life"; "Schopenhauer as an Educator"; "R. Wagner in Bayreuth."]

[Footnote 3: Human, All-too-human, new ed., 1886; The Dawn, Thoughts on Human Prejudices, 1881; The Merry Science, 1882; So spake Zarathustra, 1883-84; Beyond Good and Evil, 1886; On the Genealogy of Morals, 1887, 2d ed., 1887; The Wagner Affair, 1888, 2d ed., 1892; Goetzendaemmerung, or How to Philosophize with the Hammer, 1889.]

[Footnote 4: Cf. H. Kaatz, Die Weltanschauung Fr. Nietzsches, I. Kultur und Moral, 1892.]



CHAPTER XV.

PHILOSOPHY OUT OF GERMANY.

%1. Italy.%

The Cartesian philosophy, which had been widely accepted in Italy, and had still been advocated, in the sense of Malebranche, by Sigismond Gerdil (1718-1802), was opposed as an unhistorical view of the world by Giambattista Vico,[1] the bold and profound creator of the philosophy of history (1668-1744; from 1697 professor of rhetoric in the University of Naples). Vico's leading ideas are as follows: Man makes himself the criterion of the universe, judges that which is unknown and remote by the known and present. The free will of the individual rests on the judgments, manners, and habits of the people, which have arisen without reflection from a universal human instinct. Uniform ideas among nations unacquainted with one another are motived in a common truth. History is the development of human nature; in it neither chance nor fate rules, but the legislative power of providence, in virtue of which men through their own freedom progressively realize the idea of human nature. The universal course of civilization is that culture transfers its abode from the forests and huts into villages, cities, and, finally, into academies; the nature of the nations is at first rude, then stern, gradually it becomes mild, nay, effeminate, and finally wanton; at first men feel only that which is necessary, later they regard the useful, the convenient, the agreeable and attractive, until the luxury sprung from the sense for the beautiful degenerates into a foolish misuse of things. Vico divides antiquity into three periods: the divine (theocracy), the heroic (aristocracy), and the human (democracy and monarchy). The same course of things repeats itself in the nations of later times: to the patriarchal dominion of the fanciful, myth-making Orient correspond the spiritual states of the migrations; to the old Greek aristocracy, the chivalry and robbery of the period of the Crusades; to the republicanism and the monarchy of later antiquity, the modern period, which gives even the citizens and peasants a share in the universal equality. If European culture had not been transplanted to America, the same three-act drama of human development would there be playing. Vico carries this threefold division into his consideration of manners, laws, languages, character, etc.

[Footnote 1: Vico: Principles of a New Science of the Common Nature of Nations, 1725; Works, in six volumes, edited by G. Ferrari, 1835-37, new ed.. 1853 seq. On Vico cf. K. Werner, 1877 and 1879. [Also Flint's Vico, Blackwood's Philosophical Classics, 1884.—TR.]]

If Vico anticipates the Hegelian view of history, Antonio Genovesi (1712-69), who also taught at the University of Naples, and while the former was still living, shows himself animated by a presentiment of the Kantian criticism.[1] Appreciating Leibnitz and Locke, and appropriating the idea of the monads from the one and the unknowableness of substance from the other, he reaches the conviction—according to statements in his letters—that sense-bodies are nothing but the appearances of intelligible unities; that each being for us is an activity, whose substratum and ground remains unknown to us; that self-consciousness and the knowledge of external impressions yield phenomena alone, through the elaboration of which we produce the intellectual worlds of the sciences. For the rest, Genovesi thus advises his friends: Study the world, devote yourselves to languages and to mathematics, think more about men than about the things above us, and leave metaphysical vagaries to the monks! His countrymen honor in him the man who first included ethics and politics in philosophical instruction, and who used the Italian language both from the desk and in his writings, holding that a nation whose scientific works are not composed in its own tongue is barbarian.

[Footnote 1: In the following account we have made use of a translation of the concluding section of Francesco Florentine's Handbook of the History of Philosophy, 1879-81, which was most kindly placed at our disposal by Dr. J. Mainzer. Cf. La Filosofia Contemporanea in Italia, 1876, by the same author; further, Bonatelli, Die Philosophic in Italien seit, 1815; Zeitschrift fuer Philosophic und philosophische Kritik, vol. liv. 1869, p. 134 seq.; and especially, K. Werner, Die Italienische Philosophic des XIX. Jahrhunderts, 5 vols., 1884-86. [The English reader may be referred to the appendix on Italian philosophy in vol. ii. of the English translation of Ueberweg, by Vincenzo Botta; and to Barzellotti's "Philosophy in Italy," Mind, vol. in. 1878.—TR.]]

The sensationalism of Condillac, starting from Parma, gained influence over Melchiore Gioja (1767-1828; Statistical Logic, 1803; Ideology, 1822) and Giandomenico Romagnosi (1761-1835; What is the Sound Mind? 1827), but not without experiencing essential modification from both. The importance of these men, moreover, lies more in the sphere of social philosophy than in the sphere of noetics.

Of the three greatest Italian philosophers of this century, Galluppi, Rosmini, and Gioberti, the first named is more in sympathy with the Kantian position than he himself will confess. Pasquale Galluppi[1] (1770-1846; from 1831 professor at Naples) adheres to the principle of experience, but does not conceive experience as that which is sensuously given, but as the elaboration of this through the synthetic relations (rapporti) of identity and difference, which proceed from the activity of the mind. Vincenzo de Grazia (Essay on the Reality of Human Knowledge, 1839-42), who holds all relations to be objective, and Ottavio Colecchi (died 1847; Philosophical Investigations, 1843), who holds them all subjective, oppose the view of Galluppi that some are objective and others subjective. According to De Grazia judgment is observation, not connection; it finds out the relations contained in the data of sensation; it discovers, but does not produce them. Colecchi reduces the Kantian categories to two, substance and cause. Testa, Borelli (1824), and, among the younger men, Cantoni, are Kantians; Labriola is an Herbartian.

[Footnote 1: Galluppi: Philosophical Essay on the Critique of Knowledge, 1819 seq.; Lectures on Logic and Metaphysics, 1832 seq.; Philosophy of the Will, 1832 seq.; On the System of Fichte, or Considerations on Transcendental Idealism and Absolute Rationalism, 1841. By the Letters on the History of Philosophy from Descartes to Kant, 1827, in the later editions to Cousin, he became the founder of this discipline in his native land.]

Antonio Rosmini-Serbati[1] (born 1797 at Rovereto, died 1855 at Stresa) regards knowledge as the common product of sensibility and understanding, the former furnishing the matter, the latter the form. The form is one: the Idea of being which precedes all judgment, which does not come from myself, which is innate, and apprehensible by immediate inner perception (essere ideale, ente universale). The pure concepts (substance, cause, unity, necessity) arise when the reflecting reason analyzes this general Idea of being; the mixed Ideas (space, time, motion; body, spirit), when the understanding applies it to sensuous experience. The universal Idea of being and the particular existences are in their being identical, but in their mode of existence different. In his posthumous Theosophy, 1859 seq., Rosmini no longer makes the universal being receive its determinations from without, but produce them from its own inner nature by means of an a priori development. Vincenzo Gioberti[1] (born 1801 in Turin, died 1852 at Paris) has been compared as a patriot with Fichte, and in his cast of thought with Spinoza. In place of Rosmini's "psychologism," which was advanced by Descartes and which leads to skepticism, he seeks to substitute "ontologism," which is alone held capable of reconciling science and the Catholic religion. By immediate intuition (the content of which Gioberti comprehends in the formula "Being creates the existences") we cognize the absolute as the creative ground of two series, the series of thought and the series of reality. The endeavors of Rosmini and Gioberti to bring the reason into harmony with the faith of the Church were fiercely attacked by Giussepe Ferrari (1811-76) and Ausonio Franchi (1853), while Francesco Bonatelli (Thought and Cognition, 1864) and Terenzio Mamiani (1800-85; Confessions of a Metaphysician, 1865), follow a line of thought akin to the Platonizing views of the first named thinkers. The review Filosofia delle Scuole Italiane, called into life by Mamiani in 1870, has been continued since 1886 under the direction of L. Ferri as the Rivista Italiana di Filosofia.

[Footnote 1: Rosmini: New Essay on the Origin of Ideas, 1830 (English translation, 1883-84); Principles of Moral Science, 1831; Philosophy of Right, 1841.] [Footnote B: Gioberti: Introduction to the Study of Philosophy, 1840; Philosophical Errors of A. Rosmini, 1842; On the Beautiful, 1841; On the Good, 1842; Protology edited by Massari, 1857. On both cf. R. Seydel, Zeitschrift fuer Philosophie, 1859.]

The Thomistic doctrine has many adherents in Italy, among whom the Jesuit M. Liberatore (1865) may be mentioned. The Hegelian philosophy has also found favor there (especially in Naples), as well as positivism. The former is favored by Vera, Mariano, Ragnisco, and Spaventa (died 1885); the Rivista di Filosofia Scientifica, 1881 seq., founded by Morselli, supports the latter, and E. Caporali's La Nuova Scienza, 1884, moves in a similar direction. Pietro Siciliani (On the Revival of the Positive Philosophy in Italy, 1871) makes the third, the critical, period of philosophy by which scholasticism is overthrown and the reason made authoritative, commence with Vico, and bases his doctrine on Vico's formula: The conversion (transposition) of the verum and the factum, and vice versa. Subsequently he inclined to positivism, which he had previously opposed, and among the representatives of which we may mention, further, R. Ardigo of Pavia (Psychology as Positive Science, 1870; The Ethics of Positivism, 1885; Philosophical Works, 1883 seq.), and Andrea Angiulli of Naples (died 1890; Philosophy and the Schools, 1889), who explain matter and spirit as two phenomena of the same essence; further, Giuseppe Sergi, Giovanni Cesca, and the psychiatrist, C. Lombroso, the head of the positivistic school of penal law.

%2. France.%

Among the French philosophers of this century[1] none can compare in far-reaching influence, both at home and abroad, with Auguste Comte,[2] the creator of positivism (born at Montpellier in 1798, died at Paris in 1857), whose chief work, the Course of Positive Philosophy, 6 vols., appeared in 1830 42. [English version, "freely translated and condensed," by Harriet Martineau, 1853.]

[Footnote 1: Accounts of French philosophy in the nineteenth century have been given by Taine (1857, 3d ed., 1867); Janet (La Philosophie Francaise Contemporaine, 2d ed., 1879); A. Franck; Ferraz (3 vols., 1880-89); Felix Ravaisson (2d ed., 1884); the Swede, J. Borelius (Glances at the Present Position of Philosophy in Germany and France, German translation by Jonas, 1887); [and Ribot, Mind, vol. ii., 1877].]

[Footnote 2: On Comte cf. B. Puenjer, Jahrbuecher fuer protestantische Theologie, 1878; R. Eucken, Zur Wuerdigung Comtes und des Positivismus, in the Aufsaetze zum Zellerjubilaeum, 1887; Maxim. Bruett, Der Positivismus, Programme of the Realgymnasium des Johanneums, Hamburg, 1889; [also, besides Mill, p. 560, John Morley, Encyclopedia Britannica, vol. vi. pp. 229-238, and E. Caird, The Social Philosophy and Religion of Comte, 1885.—Tr.]]

The positive philosophy seeks to put an end to the hoary error that anything more is open to our knowledge than given facts—phenomena and their relations. We do not know the essence of phenomena, and just as little their first causes and ultimate ends; we know—by means of observation, experiment, and comparison—only the constant relations between phenomena, the relations of succession and of similarity among facts, the uniformities of which we call their laws. All knowledge is, therefore, relative; there is no absolute knowledge, for the inmost essence of facts, and likewise their origin, the way in which they are produced, is for us impenetrable. We know only, and this by experience, that the phenomenon A is invariably connected with the phenomenon B, that the second always follows on the first, and call the constant antecedent of a phenomenon its cause. We know such causes only as are themselves phenomena. The fact that our knowledge is limited to the succession and coexistence of phenomena is not to be lamented as a defect: the only knowledge which is attainable by us is at the same time the only useful knowledge, that which lends us practical power over phenomena. When we inquire into causes we desire to hasten or hinder the effect, or to change it as we wish, or at least to anticipate it in order to make our preparations accordingly. Such foresight and control of events can be attained only through a knowledge of their laws, their order of succession, their phenomenal causes. Savoir pour prevoir. But, although the prevision of facts is the only knowledge which we need, men have always sought after another, an "absolute" knowledge, or have even believed that they were in possession of it; the forerunners of the positive philosophy themselves, Bacon and Descartes, have been entangled in this prejudice. A long intellectual development was required to reach the truth, that our knowledge does not extend beyond the cognition of the succession and coexistence of facts; that the same procedure must be extended to abstract speculation which the common mind itself makes use of in its single actions. On the other hand, the positive philosophy, notwithstanding its rejection of metaphysics, is far from giving its sanction to empiricism. Every isolated, empirical observation is useless and uncertain; it obtains value and usefulness only when it is defined and explained by a theory, and combined with other observations into a law—this makes the difference between the observations of the scholar and the layman.

The positive stage of a science, which begins when we learn to explain phenomena by their laws, is preceded by two others: a theological stage, which ascribes phenomena to supposed personal powers, and a metaphysical stage, which ascribes them to abstract natural forces. These three periods denote the childhood, the youth, and the manhood of science.

The earliest view of the world is the theological view, which derives the events of the world from the voluntary acts of supernatural intelligent beings. The crude view of nature sees in each individual thing a being animated like man; later man accustoms himself to think of a whole class of objects as governed by one invisible being, by a divinity; finally the multitude of divinities gives place to a single God, who creates, maintains, and rules the universe, and by extraordinary acts, by miracles, interferes in the course of events. Thus fetichism (in its highest form, astrolatry), polytheism, and monotheism are the stages in the development of the theological mode of thought. In the second, the metaphysical, period, the acts of divine volition are replaced by entities, by abstract concepts, which are regarded as realities, as the true reality back of phenomena. A force, a power, an occult property or essence is made to dwell in things; the mysterious being which directs events is no longer called God, but "Nature," and invested with certain inclinations, with a horror of a vacuum, an aversion to breaks, a tendency toward the best, a vis medicatrix, etc. Here belong, also, the vegetative soul of Aristotle, the vital force and the plastic impulse of modern investigators. Finally the positive stage is reached, when all such abstractions, which are even yet conceived as half personal and acting voluntarily, are abandoned, and the unalterable and universally valid laws of phenomena established by observation and experiment alone. But to explain the laws of nature themselves transcends, according to Comte, the fixed limits of human knowledge. The beginning of the world lies outside the region of the knowable, atheism is no better grounded than the theistic hypothesis, and if Comte asserts that a blindly acting mechanism is less probable than a world-plan, he is conscious that he is expressing a mere conjecture which can never be raised to the rank of a scientific theory. The origin and the end of things are insoluble problems, in answering which no progress has yet been made in spite of man's long thought about them. Only that which lies intermediate between the two inscrutable termini of the world is an object of knowledge.

It is not only the human mind in general that exhibits this advance from the theological, through the metaphysical, to the positive mode of thought, but each separate science goes through the same three periods—only that the various disciplines have developed with unequal rapidity. While some have already culminated in the positive method of treatment, others yet remain caught in the theological period of beginnings, and others still are in the metaphysical transition stage. Up to the present all three phases of development exist side by side, and even among the objects of the most highly developed sciences there are some which we continue to regard theologically; these are the ones which we do not yet understand how to calculate, as the changes of the weather or the spread of epidemics. Which science first attained the positive state, and in what order have the others followed? With this criterion Comte constructs his classification of the sciences, in which, however, he takes account only of those sciences which he calls abstract, that is, those which treat of "events" in distinction from "objects." The abstract sciences (as biology) investigate the most general laws of nature, valid for all phenomena, from which the particular phenomena which experience presents to us cannot be deduced, but on the basis of which an entirely different world were also possible. The concrete sciences, on the other hand (e.g., botany and zooelogy), have to do with the actually given combinations of phenomena. The former follow out each separate one of the general laws through all its possible modes of operation, the latter consider only the combination of laws given in an object. Thus oaks and squirrels are the result of very many laws, inasmuch as organisms are dependent not only on biological, but also on physical, chemical, and mathematical laws.

Comte enumerates six of these abstract sciences, and arranges them in such a way that each depends on the truths of the preceding, and adds to these its own special truths, while the first (the most general and simplest) presupposes no earlier laws whatever, but is presupposed by all the later ones. According to this principle of increasing particularity and complexity the following scale results: (i) Mathematics, in which the science of number, as being absolutely without presuppositions, precedes geometry and mechanics; (2) Astronomy; (3) Physics (with five subordinate divisions, in which the first place belongs to the theory of weight, and the last to electrology, while the theory of heat, acoustics, and optics are intermediate); (4) Chemistry; (5) Biology or physiology; (6) Sociology or the science of society. This sequence, which is determined by the increasing complexity and increasing dependence of the objects of the sciences, is the order in which they have historically developed—before the special laws of the more complicated sciences can be ascertained, the general laws of the more simple ones must be accurately known. It is also advisable to follow this same order of increasing complexity and difficulty in the study of the sciences, for acquaintance with the methods of those which are elementary is the best preparation for the pursuit of the higher ones. In arithmetic and geometry we study positivity at its source; in the sociological spirit it finds its completion.

Mathematics entered on its positive stage at quite an early period, chemistry and biology only in recent times, while, in the highest and most complicated science, the metaphysical (negative, liberal, democratic, revolutionary) mode of thought is still battling with the feudalism of the theological mode. To make sociology positive is the mission of the second half of Comte's work, and to this goal his philosophical activity had been directed from the beginning. Comte rates the efforts of political economy very low, with the exception of the work of Adam Smith, and will not let them pass as a preparation for scientific sociology, holding that they are based on false abstractions. Psychology, which is absent from the above enumeration, is to form a branch of biology, and exclusively to use the objective method, especially phrenology (to the three faculties of the soul, "heart, character, and intellect," correspond three regions of the brain). Self-observation, so Comte, making an impossibility out of a difficulty, teaches, can at most inform us concerning our feelings and passions, and not at all concerning our own thinking, since reflection brings to a stop the process to which it attends, and thus destroys its object. The sole source of knowledge is external sense-perception. In his Positive Polity Comte subsequently added a seventh fundamental science, ethics or anthropology.

Sociology,[1] the elevation of which to the rank of a positive science is the principal aim of our philosopher, uses the same method as the natural sciences, namely, the interrogation and interpretation of experience by means of induction and deduction, only that here the usual relation of these two instruments of knowledge is reversed. Between inorganic and organic philosophy, both of which proceed from the known to the unknown, there is this difference, that in the former the advance is from the elements, as that which alone is directly accessible, to the whole which is composed of them, while in the latter the opposite is the case, since here the whole is better known than the individual parts of which it consists. Hence, in inorganic science the laws of the composite phenomena are obtained by deduction (from the laws of the simple facts inductively discovered) and confirmed by observation; in sociology, on the other hand, the laws are found through (historical) experience, and deductively verified (from the nature of man as established by biology) only in the sequel. Since the phenomena of society are determined not merely by the general laws of human nature, but, above all, by the growing influence of the past, historical studies must form the basis of sociological inquiry.

[Footnote 1: Cf. Krohn: Beitraege zur Kenntniss und Wuerdigung der Soziologie, Jahrbuecher fuer Nationaloekonomie und Statistik, New Series, vols. i. and iii., 1880 and 1881.]

Of the two parts of sociology, the Statics, which investigates the equilibrium (the conditions of the existence, the permanence, and the coexistence of social states), and Dynamics, which investigates the movement (the laws of the progress) of social phenomena, the first was in essence established by Aristotle. The fundamental concept of the Statics is the consensus, the harmony, solidarity, or mutual dependence of the members of the social organism. All its parts, science, art, religion, politics, industry, must be considered together; they stand in such intimate harmony and correlation that, for every important change of condition in one of these parts, we may be certain of finding corresponding changes in all the others, as its causes and effects. Besides the selfish propensities, there dwell in man an equally original, but intrinsically weaker, impulse toward association, which instinctively leads him to seek the society of his fellows without reflection on the advantages to be expected therefrom, and a moderate degree of benevolence. As altruism conflicts with egoism, so the reason, together with the impulse to get ahead, which can only be satisfied through labor, is in continual conflict with the inborn disinclination to regulated activity (especially to mental effort). The character of society depends on the strength of the nobler incentives, that is, the social inclinations and intellectual vivacity in opposition to the egoistic impulses and natural inertness. The former nourish the progressive, the latter the conservative spirit. Women are as much superior to men in the stronger development of their sympathy and sociability as they are inferior in insight and reason. Society is a group of families, not of individuals, and domestic life is the foundation, preparation, and pattern for social life, Comte praises the family, the connecting link between the individual and the species, as a school of unselfishness, and approves the strictness of the Catholic Church in regard to the indissolubility of the marriage relation. He remarks the evil consequences of the constantly increasing division of labor, which makes man egoistic and narrow-minded, since it hides rather than reveals the social significance of the employment of the individual and its connection with the welfare of the community, and seeks for a means of checking them. Besides the universal education of youth, he demands the establishment of a spiritual power to bring the general interest continually to the minds of the members of all classes and avocations, to direct education, and to enjoy the same authority in moral and intellectual matters as is conceded to the astronomer in the affairs of his department. The function of this power would be to occupy the position heretofore held by the clergy. Comte conceives it as composed of positive philosophers, entirely independent of the secular authorities, but in return cut off from political influence and from wealth. Secular authority, on the other hand, he wishes put into the hands of an aristocracy of capitalists, with the bankers at the head of these governing leaders of industry.

The Dynamics, the science of the temporal succession of social phenomena, makes use of the principle of development. The progress of society, which is to be regarded as a great individual, consists in the growing predominance of the higher, human activities over the lower and animal. The humanity in us, it is true, will never attain complete ascendency over the animality, but we can approach nearer and nearer to the ideal, and it is our duty to aid in this march of civilization. Although the law of progress holds good for all sides of mental life, for art, politics, and morals, as well as for science, nevertheless the most important factor in the evolution of the human race is the development of the intellect as the guiding power in us (though not in itself the strongest). Awakened first by the lower wants, the intellect assumes in increasing measure the guidance of human operations, and gives a determinate direction to the feelings. The passions divide men, and, without the guidance of the speculative faculty, would mutually cripple one another; that which alone unites them into a collection force is a common belief, an idea. Ideas are related to feeling—to quote a comparison from John Stuart Mill's valuable treatise Auguste Comte and Positivism, 3d ed., 1882, a work of which we have made considerable use—as the steersman who directs the ship is to the steam which drives it forward. Thus the history of humanity has been determined by the history of man's intellectual convictions, and this in turn by the three familiar stages in the theory of the universe. With the development from the theological to the positive mode of thought is most intimately connected, further, the transition from the military to the industrial mode of life. As the religious spirit prepares the way for the scientific spirit, so without the dominion of the military spirit industry could not have been developed. It was only in the school of war that the earliest societies could learn order; slavery was beneficial in that through it labor was imposed upon the greater part of mankind in spite of their aversion to it. The political preponderance of the legists corresponds to the intermediate, metaphysical stage. The sociological law (discovered by Comte in the year 1822) harmonizes also with the customary division which separates the ancient from the modern world by the Middle Ages.

In his philosophy of history Comte gives the further application of these principles. Here he has won commendation even from his opponents for a sense of justice which merits respect and for his comprehensive view. The outlooks and proposals for the future here interspersed were in later writings[1] worked out into a comprehensive theory of the regeneration of society; the extravagant character of which has given occasion to his critics to make a complete division between the second, "subjective or sentimental," period of his thinking, in which the philosopher is said to be transformed into the high priest of a new religion, and the first, the positivistic period, although the major part of the qualities pointed out as characteristic of the former are only intensifications of some which may be shown to have been present in the latter. Beneath the surface of the most sober inquiry mystical and dictatorial tendencies pulsate in Comte from the beginning, and science was for him simply a means to human happiness. But now he no longer demands the independent pursuit of science in order to the attainment of this end, but only the believing acceptance of its results. The intellect is to be placed under the dominion of the heart, and only such use made of it as promises a direct advantage for humanity; the determination of what problems are most important at a given time belongs to the priesthood. The systematic unity or harmony of the mind demands this dominion of the feelings over thought. The religion of positivism, which has "love for its principle, order for its basis, and progress for its end," is a religion without God, and without any other immortality than a continuance of existence in the grateful memory of posterity. The dogmas of the positivist religion are scientific principles. Its public cultus with nine sacraments and a large number of annual festivals, is paid to the Grand Etre "Humanity" (which is not omnipotent, but, on account of its composite character, most dependent, yet infinitely superior to any of its parts); and, besides this, space, the earth, the universe, and great men of the past are objects of reverence. Private devotion consists in the adoration of living or dead women as our guardian angels. The ethics of the future declares the good of others to be the sole moral motive to action (altruism). Comte's last work, the Philosophy of Mathematics, 1856, indulges in a most remarkable numerical mysticism. The historical influence exercised by Comte through his later writings is extremely small in comparison with that of his chief work. Besides Blignieres and Robinet, E. Littre, the well-known author of the Dictionnaire de la Langue Francaise (1863 seq.) who was the most eminent of Comte's disciples and the editor of his Collected Works (1867 seq.), has written on the life and work of the master. Comte's school divided into two groups—the apostates, with Littre (1801-81) at their head, who reject the subjective phase and hold fast to the earlier doctrine, and the faithful, who until 1877, when a new division between strict and liberal Comteans took place within this group, gathered about P. Laffitte (born 1823).[2] The leader of the English positivists is Frederic Harrison (born 1831). Positivistic societies exist also in Sweden, Brazil, Chili, and elsewhere. Positivism has been developed in an independent spirit by J.S. Mill and Herbert Spencer.

[Footnote 1: Positivist Catechism, 1852 [English translation by Congreve, 1858, 2d ed., 1883]; System of Positive Polity, 4 vols., 1851-54 [English translation, 1875-77]. Cf. Puenjer, A. Comtes "Religion der Menschheit" in the Jahrbuecher fuer protestantische Theologie, 1882.]

[Footnote 2: On this division cf. E. Caro, M. Littre et le Positivisme, 1883, and Herm. Gruber (S.J.), Der Positivismus vom Tode Comtes bis auf unsere Tage, 1891.]

The following brief remarks on the course of French philosophy may also be added. Against the sensationalism of Condillac as continued by Cabanis, Destutt de Tracy (see above, pp. 259-260), and various physiologists, a twofold reaction asserted itself. One manifestation of this proceeded from the theological school, represented by the "traditionalists" Victor de Bonald (1818), Joseph de Maistre (1753-1821; St. Petersburg Soirees, 1821), and F. de Lamennais (1782-1854), who, however, after his break with the Church (Words of a Believer, 1834) developed in his Sketch of a Philosophy, 1841 seq., an ontological system after Italian and German models. The other came from the spiritualistic school, at whose head stood Maine de Biran[1] (1766-1824; On the Foundations of Psychology; his Works have been edited by Cousin, 1841, Naville, 1859, and Bertrand) and Royer Collard (1763-1845). Their pupil Victor Cousin (1792-1867; Works, 1846-50), who admired Hegel also, became the head of the eclectic school. Cousin will neither deny metaphysics with the Scotch, nor construe metaphysics a priori with the Germans, but with Descartes bases it on psychology. For a time an idealist of the Hegelian type (infinite and finite, God and the world, are mutually inseparable; the Ideas reveal themselves in history, in the nations, in great men), he gradually sank back to the position of common sense. His adherents, among whom Theodore Jouffroy (died 1842) was the most eminent, have done special service in the history of philosophy. From Cousin's school, which was opposed by P. Leroux and J. Reynaud, have come Ravaisson, Saisset, Jules Simon, P. Janet (born 1823),[2] and E. Caro (born 1826; The Philosophy of Goethe, 1866). Kant has influenced Charles Renouvier (born 1817; Essays in General Criticism, 4 vols., 1854-64) and E. Vacherot (born 1809; Metaphysics and Science, 1858, 2d ed., 1863; Science and Consciousness, 1872).

[Footnote 1: Cf. E. Koenig in Philosophische Monatshefte, vol. xxv. 1889, p.160 seq.]

[Footnote 2: Janet: History of Political Science in its Relations to Morals, 1858, 3d ed., 1887; German Materialism of the Present Day, 1864, English translation by Masson, 1866: The Family, 1855; The Philosophy of Happiness, 1862; The Brain and Thought, 1867; Elements of Morals, 1869 [English translation by Corson, 1884]; The Theory of Morals, 1874 [English translation by Mary Chapman, 1883]; Final Causes, 1876 [English translation by Affleck, with a preface by Flint, new ed., 1883].]

Among other thinkers of reputation we may mention the socialist Henri de Saint-Simon (1760-1825; Selected Works, 1859), the physiologist Claude Bernard (1813-78), the positivist H. Taine (1828-93; The Philosophy of Art, English translation by Durand, 2d ed., 1873; On Intelligence, 1872, English translation by Haye, 1871), E. Renan (1823-92; The Life of Jesus, 1863, English translation by Wilbour, Philosophical Dialogues and Fragments—English, 1883), the writer on aesthetics and ethics J.M. Guyau (The Problems of Contemporary Aesthetics, 1884; Sketch of an Ethic without Obligation or Sanction, 1885; The Irreligion of the Future, 1887), Alfred Fouillee (The Future of Metaphysics founded on Experience, 1889; Morals, Art, and Religion according to Guyau, 1889; The Evolutionism of the Idea-Forces, 1890), and the psychologist Th. Ribot,[1] editor of the Revue Philosophique (from 1876).

[Footnote 1: Ribot: Heredity, 2d ed., 1882 [English translation, 1875]; The Diseases of Memory, 1881 [English translation, 1882]; The Diseases of the Will, 1883 [English. 1884]; The Diseases of Personality, 1885 [English, 1887]; The Psychology of Attention, 1889 [English, 1890]; German Psychology of To-day, 2d ed., 1885 [English translation by Baldwin, 1886].]

%3. Great Britain and America.%

Prominent among the British philosophers of the nineteenth century[1] are Hamilton, Bentham, J.S. Mill, and Spencer. Hamilton is the leading representative of the Scottish School; Bentham is known as the advocate of utilitarianism; Mill, an exponent of the traditional empiricism of English thinking, develops the theory of induction and the principle of utility; Spencer combines an agnostic doctrine of the absolute and thoroughgoing evolution in the phenomenal world into a comprehensive philosophical system.[2] In recent years there has been a reaction against empirical doctrines on the basis of neo-Kantian and neo-Hegelian principles. Foremost among the leaders of this movement we may mention T.H. Green.

[Footnote 1: Cf. Harald Hoeffding, Einleitung in die englische Philosophie unserer Zeit (Danish, 1874), German (with alterations and additions by the author) by H. Kurella, 1889; David Masson, Recent British Philosophy, 1865, 3d ed., 1877; Ribot, La Psychologie Anglaise Contemporaine, 1870, 2d ed., 1875 [English, 1874] Guyau, La Morale Anglaise Contemporaine, 1879 [Morris, British Thought and Thinkers, 1880; Porter, "On English and American Philosophy," Ueberweg's History, English translation, vol. ii. pp. 348-460; O. Pfleiderer, Development of Theology, 1890, book iv.—TR.]]

[Footnote 2: Cf. on Mill and Spencer, Bernh. Puenjer, Jahrbuecher fuer protestantische Theologie, 1878.]

The Scottish philosophy has been continued in the nineteenth century by James Mackintosh (Dissertation on the Progress of Ethical Philosophy, 1830, 3d ed., 1863), and William Whewell (History of the Inductive Sciences, 3d ed., 1857; Philosophy of the Inductive Sciences, 1840, 3d ed., 1858-60). Its most important representative is Sir William Hamilton[1] of Edinburgh (1788-1856), who, like Whewell, is influenced by Kant. Hamilton bases philosophy on the facts of consciousness, but, in antithesis to the associational psychology, emphasizes the mental activity of discrimination and judgment. Our knowledge is relative, and relations its only object. Consciousness can never transcend itself, it is bound to the antithesis of subject and object, and conceives the existent under relations of space and time. Hence the unconditioned is inaccessible to knowledge and attainable by faith alone. Among Hamilton's followers belong Mansel (Metaphysics, 3d. ed., 1875; Limits of Religions Thought, 5th ed., 1870) and Veitch. The Scottish doctrine was vigorously opposed by J.F. Ferrier (1808-64; Institutes of Metaphysics, 2d ed., 1856), who himself developed an idealistic standpoint.

[Footnote 1: Hamilton: Discussions on Philosophy and Literature, 1852, 3d ed., 1866; Lectures on Metaphysics, 2d ed., 1860, and on Logic, 2d ed., 1866, edited by his pupils, Mansel and Veitch; Reid's Works, with notes and dissertations, 1846, 7th ed., 1872. On Hamilton cf. Veitch, 1882, 1883 [Monck, 1881].]

In the United States the Scottish philosophy has exercised a wide influence. In recent times it has been strenuously advocated, chiefly in the spirit of Reid, by James McCosh (a native of Scotland, but since 1868 in America; The Intuitions of the Mind, 3d ed., 1872; The Laws of Discursive Thought, new ed., 1891; First and Fundamental Truths, 1889); while in Noah Porter (died 1892; The Human Intellect, new ed., 1876; The Elements of Moral Science, 1885) it appears modified by elements from German thinking.

Jeremy Bentham[1] (1748-1832) is noteworthy for his attempt to revive Epicureanism in modern form. Virtue is the surest means to pleasure, and pleasure the only self-evident good. Every man strives after happiness, but not every one in the right way. The honest man calculates correctly, the criminal falsely; hence a careful calculation of the value of the various pleasures, and a prudent use of the means to happiness, is the first condition of virtue; in this the easily attainable minor joys, whose summation amounts to a considerable quantum, must not be neglected. The value of a pleasure is measured by its intensity, duration, certainty, propinquity, fecundity in the production of further pleasure, purity or freedom from admixture of consequent pain, and extent to the greatest possible number of persons. Every virtuous action results in a balance of pleasure. Inflict no evil on thyself or others from which a balance of good will not result. The end of morality is the "greatest happiness of the greatest number," in the production of which each has first to care for his own welfare: whoever injures himself more than he serves others acts immorally, for he diminishes the sum of happiness in the world; the interest of the individual coincides with the interest of society. The two classes of virtues are prudence and benevolence. The latter is a natural, though not a disinterested affection: happiness enjoyed with others is greater than happiness enjoyed alone. Love is a pleasure-giving extension of the individual; we serve others to be served by them.

[Footnote 1: Bentham: Introduction to the Principles of Morals and Legislation, 1789; new ed., 1823, reprinted 1876; Deontology, 1834, edited by Bowring, who also edited the Works, 1838-43. The Principles of Civil and Criminal Legislation, edited in French from Bentham's manuscripts by his pupil Etienne Dumont (1801, 2d ed., 1820; English by Hildreth, 5th ed., 1887), was translated into German with notes by F.E. Beneke, 1830.]

Associationalism has been reasserted by James Mill (1773-1836; Analysis of the Phenomena of the Human Mind, 1829), whose influence lives on in the work of his greater son. The latter, John Stuart Mill,[1] was born in London 1806, and was from 1823 to 1858 a secretary in the India House; after the death of his wife he lived (with the exception of two years of service as a Member of Parliament) at Avignon; his death occurred in 1873. Mill's System of Logic appeared in 1843, 9th ed., 1875; his Utilitarianism, 1863, new ed., 1871; An Examination of Sir William Hamilton's Philosophy, 1865, 5th ed., 1878; his notes to the new edition of his father's work, Analysis of the Phenomena of the Human Mind, 2d ed., 1878, also deserve notice. With the phenomenalism of Hume and the (somewhat corrected) associational psychology of his father as a basis, Mill makes experience the sole source of knowledge, rejecting a priori and intuitive elements of every sort. Matter he defines as a "permanent possibility of sensation"; mind is resolved into "a series of feelings with a background of possibilities of feeling," even though the author is not unaware of the difficulty involved in the question how a series of feelings can be aware of itself as a series. Mathematical principles, like all others, have an experiential origin—the peculiar certitude ascribed to them by the Kantians is a fiction—and induction is the only fruitful method of scientific inquiry (even in mental science). The syllogism is itself a concealed induction.

[Footnote 1: Cf. on Mill. Taine, Le Positivisme Anglais, 1864 [English, by Haye]; the objections of Jevons (Contemporary Review, December, 1877 seq., reprinted in Pure Logic and other Minor Works, 1890; cf. Mind, vol. xvi. pp. 106-110) to Mill's doctrine of the inductive character of geometry, his treatment of the relation of resemblance, and his exposition of the four methods of experimental inquiry in their relation to the law of causation; and the finely conceived essay on utilitarianism, by C. Hebler, Philosophische Aufsatze, 1869, pp. 35-66. [Also Mill's own Autobiography, 1873: Bain's John Stuart Mill, a Criticism, 1882; and T.H. Green, Lectures on the Logic, Works, vol. ii.—TR.]]

When I assert the major premise the inference proper is already made, and in the conclusion the comprehensive formula for a number of particular truths which was given in the premise is merely explicated, interpreted. Because universal judgments are for him merely brief expressions for aggregates of particular truths, Mill is able to say that all knowledge is generalization, and at the same time to argue that all inference is from particulars to particulars. Inference through a general proposition is not necessary, yet useful as a collateral security, inasmuch as the syllogistic forms enable us more easily to discover errors committed. The ground of induction, the uniformity of nature in reference both to the coexistence and the succession of phenomena, since it wholly depends on induction, is not unconditionally certain; but it may be accepted as very highly probable, until some instance of lawless action (in itself conceivable) shall have been actually proved. Like the law of causation, the principles of logic are also not a priori, but only the highest generalizations from all previous experience.

Mill's most brilliant achievement is his theory of experimental inquiry, for which he advances four methods: (1) The Method of Agreement: "If two or more instances of the phenomenon under investigation have only one circumstance in common, the circumstance in which alone all the instances agree is the cause (or effect) of the given phenomenon." (2) The Method of Difference: "If an instance in which the phenomenon under investigation occurs, and an instance in which it does not occur, have every circumstance in common save one, that one occurring only in the former; the circumstance in which alone the two instances differ, is the effect, or the cause, or an indispensable part of the cause, of the phenomenon," These two methods (the method of observation, and the method of artificial experiment) may also be employed in combination, and the Canon of the Joint Method of Agreement and Difference runs: "If two or more instances in which the phenomenon occurs have only one circumstance in common, while two or more instances in which it does not occur have nothing in common save the absence of that circumstance, the circumstance in which alone the two sets of instances differ is the effect, or the cause, or an indispensable part of the cause, of the phenomenon." (3) The Method of Residues: "Subduct from any phenomenon such part as is known by previous inductions to be the effect of certain antecedents, and the residue of the phenomenon is the effect of the remaining antecedents." (4) The Method of Concomitant Variations: "Whatever phenomenon varies in any manner whenever another phenomenon varies in some particular manner, is either a cause or an effect of that phenomenon, or is connected with it through some fact of causation." When the phenomena are complex the deductive method must be called in to aid: from the inductively ascertained laws of the action of single causes this deduces the laws of their combined action; and, as a final step, the results of such ratiocination are verified by the proof of their agreement with empirical facts. To explain a phenomenon means to point out its cause; the explanation of a law is its reduction to other, more general laws. In all this, however, we remain within the sphere of phenomena; the essence of nature always eludes our knowledge.

In the chapter "Of Liberty and Necessity" (book vi. chap, ii.) Mill emphasizes the position that the necessity to which human actions are subject must not be conceived, as is commonly done, as irresistible compulsion, for it denotes nothing more than the uniform order of our actions and the possibility of predicting them. This does not destroy the element in the idea of freedom which is legitimate and practically valuable: we have the power to alter our character; it is formed by us as well as for us; the desire to mould it is one of the most influential circumstances in its formation. The principle of morality is the promotion of the happiness of all sentient beings. Mill differs from Bentham, however, from whom he derives the principle of utility, in several important particulars—by his recognition of qualitative as well as of quantitative differences in pleasures, of the value of the ordinary rules of morality as intermediate principles, of the social feelings, and of the disinterested love of virtue. Opponents of the utilitarian theory have not been slow in availing themselves of the opportunities for attack thus afforded.[1] A third distinguished representative of the same general movement is Alexander Bain, the psychologist (born 1818; The Senses and the Intellect, 3d ed., 1868; The Emotions and the Will, 3d ed., 1875; Mental and Moral Science, 1868, 3d ed., 1872, part ii., 1872; Mind and Body, 3d ed., 1874).

[Footnote 1: On the relation of Bentham and Mill cf. Hoeffding, p. 68: Sidgwick's Outlines, chap. iv. Sec. 16; and John Grote's Examination of the Utilitarian Philosophy, 1870, chap. i.]

The system projected by Herbert Spencer (born 1820), the major part of which has already appeared, falls into five parts: First Principles, 1862, 7th ed., 1889; Principles of Biology, 1864-67, 4th ed., 1888; Principles of Psychology, 1855, 5th ed., 1890; Principles of Sociology (vol. i. 1876, 3d ed., 1885; part iv. Ceremonial Institutions, 1879, 3d ed., 1888, part v. Political Institutions, 1882, 2d ed., 1885, part vi. Ecclesiastical Institutions, 1885, 2d ed., 1886, together constituting vol. ii.); Principles of Ethics (part i. The Data of Ethics, 1879, 5th ed., 1888; parts ii. and iii. The Inductions of Ethics and The Ethics of Individual Life, constituting with part i. the first volume, 1892; part iv. Justice, 1891). A comprehensive exposition of the system has been given, with the authority of the author, by F.H. Collins in his Epitome of the Synthetic Philosophy, 1889.[1] The treatise on Education, 1861, 23d ed., 1890, his sociological writings, and his various essays have also contributed essentially to Mr. Spencer's fame, both at home and abroad. The First Principles begin with the "Unknowable." Since human opinions, no matter how false they may seem, have sprung from actual experiences, and, when they find wide acceptance and are tenaciously adhered to, must have something in them which appeals to the minds of men, we must assume that every error contains a kernel of truth, however small it be. No one of opposing views is to be accepted as wholly true, and none rejected as entirely false. To discover the incontrovertible fact which lies at their basis, we must reject the various concrete elements in which they disagree, and find for the remainder the abstract expression which holds true throughout its divergent manifestations. No antagonism is older, wider, more profound, and more important than that between religion and science. Here too some most general truth, some ultimate fact must lie at the basis. The ultimate religious ideas are self-contradictory and untenable. No one of the possible hypotheses concerning the nature and origin of things—every religion may be defined as an a priori theory of the universe, the accompanying ethical code being a later growth—is logically defensible: whether the world is conceived atheistically as self-existent, or pantheistically as self-created, or theistically (fetichism, polytheism, or monotheism), as created by an external agency, we are everywhere confronted by unthinkable conclusions. The idea of a First Cause or of the absolute (as Mansel, following Hamilton, has proved in his Limits of Religious Thought) is full of contradictions. But however widely the creeds diverge, they show entire unanimity, from the grossest superstition up to the most developed theism, in the belief that the existence of the world is a mystery which ever presses for interpretation, though it can never be entirely explained. And in the progress of religion from crude fetichism to the developed theology of our time, the truth, at first but vaguely perceived, that there is an omnipresent Inscrutable which manifests itself in all phenomena, ever comes more clearly into view.

[Footnote 1: Cf. also Fiske's Outlines of Cosmic Philosophy, 2 vols., 1874. Numerous critiques and discussions of Spencer's views have been given in various journals and reviews; among more extended works reference may be made to Bowne, The Philoesophy of Herbert Spencer, 1874; Malcolm Guthrie, On Mr. Spencer's Formula of Evolution, 1879, and the same author, On Mr. Spencer's Unification of Knowledge, 1882; and T.H. Green, on Spencer and Lewes, Works, vol. i.—TR.]

Science meets this ultimate religious truth with the conviction, grasped with increasing clearness as the development proceeds from Protagoras to Kant, that the reality hidden behind all phenomena must always remain unknown, that our knowledge can never be absolute. This principle maybe established inductively from the incomprehensibility of the ultimate scientific ideas, as well as deductively from the nature of intelligence, through an analysis of the product and the process of thought. (1) The ideas space, time, matter, motion, and force, as also the first states of consciousness, and the thinking substance, the ego as the unity of subject and object, all represent realities whose nature and origin are entirely incomprehensible. (2) The subsumption of particular facts under more general facts leads ultimately to a most general, highest fact, which cannot be reduced to a more general one, and hence cannot be explained or comprehended. (3) All thought (as has been shown by Hamilton in his essay "On the Philosophy of the Unconditioned," and by his follower Mansel) is the establishment of relations, every thought involving relation, difference, and (as Spencer adds) likeness. Hence the absolute, the idea of which excludes every relation, is entirely beyond the reach of an intelligence which is concerned with relations alone, and which always consists in discrimination, limitation, and assimilation—it is trebly unthinkable. Therefore: Religion and Science agree in the supreme truth that the human understanding is capable of relative knowledge only or of a knowledge of the relative (Relativity). Nevertheless, according to Spencer, it is too much to conclude with the thinkers just mentioned, that the idea of the absolute is a mere expression for inconceivability, and its existence problematical. The nature of the absolute is unknowable, but not the existence of a basis for the relative and phenomenal. The considerations which speak in favor of the relativity of knowledge and its limitation to phenomena, argue also the existence of a non-relative, whose phenomenon the relative is; the idea of the relative and the phenomenal posits eo ipso the existence of the absolute as its correlative, which manifests itself in phenomena. We have at least an indefinite, though not a definite, consciousness of the Unknowable as the Unknown Cause, the Universal Power, and on this is founded our ineradicable belief in objective reality.

All knowledge is limited to the relative, and consists in increasing generalization: the apex of this pyramid is formed by philosophy. Common knowledge is un-unified knowledge; science is partially unified knowledge; philosophy, which combines the highest generalizations of the sciences into a supreme one, is completely unified knowledge. The data of philosophy are—besides an Unknowable Power—the existence of knowable likenesses and differences among its manifestations, and a resulting segregation of the manifestations into those of subject and object. Further, derivative data are space (relations of coexistence), time (relations of irreversible sequence), matter (coexistent positions that offer resistance), motion (which involves space, time, and matter), and force, the ultimate of ultimates, on which all others depend, and from our primordial experiences of which all the other modes of consciousness are derivable. Similarly the ultimate primary truth is the persistence of force, from which, besides the indestructibility of matter and the continuity of (actual or potential) motion, still further truths may be deduced: the persistence of relations among forces or the uniformity of law, the transformation and equivalence of (mental and social as well as of physical) forces, the law of the direction of motion (along the line of least resistance, or the line of greatest traction, or their resultant), and the unceasing rhythm of motion. Beyond these analytic truths, however, philosophy demands a law of universal synthesis. This must be the law of the continuous redistribution of matter and motion, for each single thing, and the whole universe as well, is involved in a (continuously repeated) double process of evolution and dissolution, the former consisting in the integration of matter[1] and the dissipation of motion, the latter in the absorption of motion and the disintegration of matter. The law of evolution, in its complete development, then runs: "Evolution is an integration of matter and concomitant dissipation of motion; during which the matter passes from an indefinite, incoherent homogeneity to a definite, coherent heterogeneity; and during which the retained motion undergoes a parallel transformation." This is inductively supported by illustrations from every region of nature and all departments of mental and social life; and, further, shown deducible from the ultimate principle of the persistence of force, through the mediation of several corollaries to it, viz., the instability of the homogeneous under the varied incidence of surrounding forces, the multiplication of effects by action and reaction, and segregation. Finally the principle of equilibration indicates the impassable limit at which evolution passes over into dissolution, until the eternal round is again begun. If it may be said of Hegel himself, that he vainly endeavored to master the concrete fullness of reality with formal concepts, the criticism is applicable to Spencer in still greater measure. The barren schemata of concentration, passage into heterogeneity, adaptation, etc., which are taken from natural science, and which are insufficient even in their own field, prove entirely impotent for the mastery of the complex and peculiar phenomena of spiritual life.

[Footnote 1: Organic growth is the concentration of elements before diffused; cf. the union of nomadic families into settled tribes.]

Armed with these principles, however, Mr. Spencer advances to the discussion of the several divisions of "Special Philosophy." Passing over inorganic nature, he finds his task in the interpretation of the phenomena of life, mind, and society in terms of matter, motion, and force under the general evolution formula. This procedure, however, must not be understood as in any wise materialistic. Such an interpretation would be a misrepresentation, it is urged, for the strict relativity of the standpoint limits all conclusions to phenomena, and permits no inference concerning the nature of the "Unknowable." The Principles of Biology take up the phenomena of life. Life is defined as the "continuous adjustment of internal relations to external relations." No attempt is made to explain its origin, yet (in the words of Mr. Sully) it is clear that the lowest forms of life are regarded as continuous in their essential nature with sub-vital processes. The evolution of living organisms, from the lowest to the highest, with the development of all their parts and functions, results from the co-operation of various factors, external and internal, whose action is ultimately reducible to the universal law.

The field of psychology is intimately allied with biology, and yet istinguished from it. Mental life is a subdivision of life in general, and may be subsumed under the general definition; but while biological truths concern the connection between internal phenomena, with but tacit or occasional recognition of the environment, psychology has to do neither with the internal connection nor the external connection, but "the connection between these two connections." Psychology in its subjective aspect, again, is a field entirely sui generis. The substance of mind, conceived as the underlying substratum of mental states, is unknowable; but the character of those states of which mind, as we know it, is composed, is a legitimate subject of inquiry. If this be carefully investigated, it seems highly probable that the ultimate unit of consciousness is something "of the same order as that which we call a nervous shock." Mind is proximately composed of feelings and the relations between feelings; from these, revived, associated, and integrated, the whole fabric of consciousness is built up. There is, then, no sharp distinction between the several phases of mind. If we trace its development objectively, in terms of the correspondence between inner and outer phenomena, we find a gradual progress from the less to the more complex, from the lower to the higher, without a break. Reflex action, instinct, memory, reason, are simply stages in the process. All is dependent on experience. Even the forms of knowledge, which are a priori to the individual, are the product of experience in the race, integrated and transmitted by heredity, and become organic in the nervous structure. In general the correspondence of inner and outer in which mental life consists is mediated by the nervous organism. The structure and functions of this condition consciousness and furnish the basis for the interpretation of mental evolution in terms of "evolution at large, regarded as a process of physical transformation." Nevertheless mental phenomena and bodily phenomena are not identical, consciousness is not motion. They are both phenomenal modes of the unknowable, disparate in themselves, and giving no indication of the ultimate nature of the absolute. Subjective analysis of human consciousness yields further proof of the unity of mental composition. All mental action is ultimately reducible to "the continuous differentiation and integration of states of consciousness." The criterion of truth is the inconceivability of the negation. Tried by this test, as by all others, realism is superior to idealism, though in that "transfigured" form which implies objective existence without implying the possibility of any further knowledge concerning it,—hence in a form entirely congruous with the conclusion reached by many other routes.

Sociology deals with super-organic evolution, which involves the co-ordinated actions of many individuals. To understand the social unit, we must study primitive man, especially the ideas which he forms of himself, of other beings, and of the surrounding world. The conception of a mind or other-self is gradually evolved through observation of natural phenomena which favor the notion of duality, especially the phenomena of sleep, dreams, swoons, and death. Belief in the influence of these doubles of the dead on the fortunes of the living leads to sorcery, prayer, and praise. Ancestor-worship is the ultimate source of all forms of religion; to it can be traced even such aberrant developments as fetichism and idolatry, animal-, plant-, and nature-worship. Thus the primitive man feels himself related not only to his living fellows, but to multitudes of supernatural beings about him. The fear of the living becomes the root of the political, and the fear of the dead the root of the religious, control. A society is an organic entity. Though differing from an individual organism in many ways, it yet resembles it in the permanent relations among its component parts. The Domestic Relations, by which the maintenance of the species is now secured, have come from various earlier and less developed forms; the militant type of society is accompanied by a lower, the industrial type by a higher stage of this development. Ceremonial observance is the most primitive kind of government, and the kind from which the political and religious governments have differentiated. Political organization is necessary in order to co-operation for ends which benefit the society directly, and the individual only indirectly. The ultimate political force is the feeling of the community, including as its largest part ancestral feeling. Many facts combine to obscure this truth, but however much it may be obscured, public feeling remains the primal source of authority. The various forms and instruments of government have grown up through processes in harmony with the general law. The two antithetical types of society are the militant and the industrial—the former implies compulsory co-operation under more or less despotic rule, with governmental assumption of functions belonging to the individual and a minimizing of individual initiative; in the latter, government is reduced to a minimum and best conducted by representative agencies, public organizations are largely replaced by private organizations, the individual is freer and looks less to the state for protection and for aid. The fundamental conditions of the highest social development is the cessation of war. The ideas and sentiments at the basis of Ecclesiastical Institutions have been naturally derived from the ghost-theory already described. The goal of religious development is the final rejection of all anthropomorphic conceptions of the First Cause, until the harmony of religion and science shall be reached in the veneration of the Unknowable. The remaining parts of Mr. Spencer's Sociology will treat of Professional Institutions, Industrial Institutions, Linguistic Progress, Intellectual, Moral, and Aesthetic Progress.

The subject matter of ethics is the conduct termed good or bad. Conduct is the adjustment of acts to ends. The evolution of conduct is marked by increasing perfection in the adjustment of acts to the furtherance of individual life, the life of offspring, and social life. The ascription of ethical character to the highly evolved conduct of man in relation to these ends implies the fundamental assumption, that "life is good or bad according as it does, or does not, bring a surplus of agreeable feeling." The ideal of moral science is rational deduction: a rational utilitarianism can be attained only by the recognition of the necessary laws—physical, biological, psychological, and sociological—which condition the results of actions; among these the biological laws have been largely neglected in the past, though they are of the utmost importance as furnishing the link between life and happiness. The "psychological view," again, explains the origin of conscience. In the course of development man comes to recognize the superiority of the higher and more representative feelings as guides to action; this form of self-restraint, however, is characteristic of the non-moral restraints as well, of the political, social, and religious controls. From these the moral control proper has emerged—differing from them in that it refers to intrinsic instead of extrinsic effects—and the element of coerciveness in them, transferred, has generated the feeling of moral compulsion (which, however, "will diminish as fast as moralization increases").

Such a rational ethics, based on the laws which condition welfare rather than on a direct estimation of happiness, and premising the relativity of all pains and pleasures, escapes fundamental objections to the earlier hedonism (e.g., those to the hedonic calculus); and, combining the valuable elements in the divergent ethical theories, yields satisfactory principles for the decision of ethical problems. Egoism takes precedence of altruism; yet it is in turn dependent on this, and the two, on due consideration, are seen to be co-essential. Entirely divorced from the other, neither is legitimate, and a compromise is the only possibility; while in the future advancing evolution will bring the two into complete harmony. The goal of the whole process will be the ideal man in the ideal society, the scientific anticipation of which, absolute ethics, promises guidance for the relative and imperfect ethics of the transition period.

Examination of the actual, not the professed, ideas and sentiments of men reveals wide variation in moral judgments. This is especially true of the "pro-ethical" consciousnesses of external authorities, coercions, and opinions—religious, political, and social—by which the mass of mankind are governed; and is broadly due to variation in social conditions. Where the need of external co-operation predominates the ethics of enmity develops; where internal, peaceful co-operation is the chief social need the ethics of amity results: and the evolution principle enables us to infer that, as among certain small tribes in the past, so in the great cultivated nations of the future, the life of amity will unqualifiedly prevail. The Ethics of Individual Life shows the application of moral judgments to all actions which affect individual welfare. The very fact that some deviations from normal life are now morally disapproved, implies the existence of both egoistic and altruistic sanctions for the moral approval of all acts which conduce to normal living and the disapproval of all minor deviations, though for the most part these have hitherto remained unconsidered. Doubtless, however, moral control must here be somewhat indefinite; and even scientific observation and analysis must leave the production of a perfectly regulated conduct to "the organic adjustment of constitution to [social] conditions."

The Ethics of Social Life includes justice and beneficence. Human justice emerges from sub-human or animal justice, whose law (passing over gratis benefits to offspring) is "that each individual shall receive the benefits and evils of its own nature and its consequent conduct." This is the law of human justice, also, but here it is more limited than before by the non-interference which gregariousness requires, and by the increasing need for the sacrifice of individuals for the good of the species. The egoistic sentiment of justice arises from resistance to interference with free action; the altruistic develops through sympathy under social conditions, these being maintained meanwhile by a "pro-altruistic" sentiment, into which dread of retaliation, of social reprobation, of legal punishment, and of divine vengeance enter as component parts. The idea of justice emerges gradually from the sentiment of justice: it has two elements, one brute or positive, with inequality as its ideal, one human or negative, the ideal of which is equality. In early times the former of these was unduly appreciated, as in later times the latter, the true conception includes both, the idea of equality being applied to the limits and the idea of inequality to the benefits of action. Thus the formula of justice becomes: "Every man is free to do that which he wills, provided he infringes not the equal freedom of any other man "—a law which finds its authority in the facts, that it is an a priori dictum of "consciousness after it has been subject to the discipline of prolonged social life," and that it is also deducible from the conditions of the maintenance of life at large and of social life. From this law follow various particular corollaries or rights, all of which coincide with ordinary ethical concepts and have legal enactments corresponding to them. Political rights so-called do not exist; government is simply a system of appliances for the maintenance of private rights. Both the nature of the state and its constitution are variable: the militant type requires centralization and a coercive constitution; the industrial type implies a wider distribution of political power, but requires a representation of interests rather than a representation of individuals. Government develops as a result of war, and its function of protection against internal aggression arises by differentiation from its primary function of external defense. These two, then, constitute the essential duties of the state; when war ceases the first falls away, and its sole function becomes the maintenance of the conditions under which each individual may "gain the fullest life compatible with the fullest life of fellow-citizens." All beyond this, all interference with this life of the individual, whether by way of assistance, restraint, or education, proves in the end both unjust and impolitic. The remaining parts of the Ethics will treat of Negative and Positive Beneficence.

If J.S. Mill and Spencer (the latter of whom, moreover, had announced evolution as a world-law before the appearance of Darwin), move in a direction akin to positivism, the same is true, further, of G.H. Lewes (1817-78; History of Philosophy, 5th ed., 1880; Problems of Life and Mind, 1874 seq).

Turning to the discussion of particular disciplines, we may mention as prominent among English logicians,[1] besides Hamilton, Whewell, and Mill, Whately, Mansel, Thomson, De Morgan, Boole (An Investigation of the Laws of Thought, 1854); W.S. Jevons (The Principles of Science, 2d ed., 1877); Venn (Symbolic Logic, 1881; Empirical Logic, 1889), Bradley, and Bosanquet. Among more recent investigators in the field of psychology we may name Carpenter, Ferrier, Maudsley, Galton, Ward, and Sully (The Human Mind, 1892), and in the field of comparative psychology, Lubbock, Romanes (Mental Evolution in Animals, 1883; Mental Evolution in Man, 1889), and Morgan (Animal Life and Intelligence, 1891). Among ethical writers the following, besides Spencer and Green, hold a foremost place: H. Sidgwick (The Methods of Ethics, 4th ed., 1890), Leslie Stephen (The Science of Ethics, 1882), and James Martineau (Types of Ethical Theory, 3d ed., 1891). The quarterly review Mind (vols. i.-xvi. 1876-91, edited by G. Croom Robertson; new series from 1892, edited by G.F. Stout) has since its foundation played an important part in the development of English thought.

[Footnote 1: Cf. Nedich, Die Lehre von der Quantifikation des Praedikats in vol. iii. of Wundt's Philosophische Studien; L. Liard, Les Logiciens Anglais Contemporains, 1878; Al. Riehl in vol. i. of the Vierteljahrsschrift fuer wissenschaftliche Philosophie, 1877 [cf. also appendix A to the English translation of Ueberweg's Logic.—TR.].]

German idealism, for which S.T. Coleridge (died 1834) and Thomas Carlyle (died 1881) endeavored to secure an entrance into England, for a long time gained ground there but slowly. Later years, however, have brought increasing interest in German speculation, and much of recent thinking shows the influence of Kantian and Hegelian principles. As pioneer of this movement we may name J.H. Stirling (The Secret of Hegel, 1865); and as its most prominent representatives John Caird (An Introduction to the Philosophy of Religion, 1880), Edward Caird (The Critical Philosophy of Immanuel Kant, 1889; The Evolution of Religion, 1893), both in Glasgow, and T.H. Green (1836-82; professor at Oxford; Prolegomena to Ethics, 3d ed., 1887; Works, edited by Nettleship, 3 vols., 1885-88).[1] In opposition to the hereditary empiricism of English philosophy—which appears in Spencer and Lewes, as it did in Locke, Berkeley, and Hume, though in somewhat altered form—Green maintains that all experience is constituted by intelligible relations. Knowledge, therefore, is possible only for a correlating self-consciousness; while nature, as a system of relations, is likewise dependent on a spiritual principle, of which it is the expression. Thus the central conception of Green's philosophy becomes, "that the universe is a single eternal activity or energy, of which it is the essence to be self-conscious, that is, to be itself and not itself in one" (Nettleship). To this universal consciousness we are related as manifestations or "communications" under the limitations of our physical organization. As such we are free, that is, self-determined, determined by nothing from without. The moral ideal is self-realization or perfection, the progressive reproduction of the divine self-consciousness. This is possible only in terms of a development of persons, for as a self-conscious personality the divine spirit can reproduce itself in persons alone; and, since "social life is to personality what language is to thought," the realization of the moral ideal implies life in common. The nearer determination of the ideal is to be sought in the manifestations of the eternal spirit as they have been given in the moral history of individuals and nations. This shows what has already been implied in the relation of morality to personality and society, that moral good must first of all be a common good, one in which the permanent well-being of self includes the well-being of others also. This is the germ of morality, the development of which yields, first, a gradual extension of the area of common good, and secondly, a fuller and more concrete determination of its content. Further representatives of this movement are W. Wallace, Adamson, Bradley; A. Seth is an ex-member.

[Footnote 1: Cf. on Green the Memoir by Nettleship in vol. iii. of the Works.]

The first and greatest of American philosophical thinkers was the Calvinistic theologian Jonathan Edwards (1703-58; treatise on the Freedom of Will, 1754; Works, 10 vols., edited by Dwight, 1830). Edwards's deterministic doctrine found numerous adherents (among them his son, who bore his father's name, died 1801) as well as strenuous opponents (Tappan, Whedon, Hazard among later names), and essentially contributed to the development of philosophical thought in the United States. For a considerable period this crystallized for the most part around elements derived from British thinkers, especially from Locke and the Scottish School. In 1829 James Marsh called attention to German speculation [1] by his American edition of Coleridge's Aids to Reflection, with an important introduction from his own hand. Later W.E. Channing (1780-1842), the head of the Unitarian movement, attracted many young and brilliant minds, the most noted of whom, Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-82), became a leader among the New England transcendentalists. Metaphysical idealism has, perhaps, met with less resistance in America than in England. Kant and Hegel have been eagerly studied (G.S. Morris, died 1889; C.C. Everett; J. Watson in Canada; Josiah Royce, The Spirit of Modern Philosophy, 1892; and others); and The Journal of Speculative Philosophy, edited by W.T. Harris, has since 1867 furnished a rallying point for idealistic interests. The influence of Lotze has also been considerable (B.P. Bowne in Boston). Sympathy with German speculation, however, has not destroyed the naturally close connection with the work of writers who use the English tongue. Thus Spencer's writings have had a wide currency, and his system numbers many disciples, though these are less numerous among students of philosophy by profession (John Fiske, Outlines of Cosmic Philosophy, 1874).

[Footnote 1: Cf. Porter, op. cit.]

In the latest decades the broadening of the national life, the increasing acquaintance with foreign thought, and the rapid development of university work have greatly enlarged and deepened the interest in philosophical pursuits. This is manifested most clearly in the field of psychology, including especially the "new" or "physiological" psychology, and the history of philosophy, though indications of pregnant thought in other departments, as ethics and the philosophy of religion, and even of independent construction, are not wanting. Among psychologists of the day we may mention G.S. Hall, editor of The American Journal of Psychology (1887 seq.), G.T. Ladd (Elements of Physiological Psychology, 1887), and William James (Principles of Psychology, 1890). The International Journal of Ethics (Philadelphia, 1890 seq.), edited by S. Burns Weston, is "devoted to the advancement of ethical knowledge and practice"; among the foreign members of its editorial committee are Jodl and Von Gizycki. The weekly journal of popular philosophy, The Open Court, published in Chicago, has for its object the reconciliation of religion and science; the quarterly, The Monist (1890 seq.), published by the same company under the direction of Paul Carus (The Soul of Man, 1891), the establishment of a monistic view of the world. Several journals, among them the Educational Review (1891 seq., edited by N.M. Butler), point to a growing interest in pedagogical inquiry. The American Philosophical Review (1892 seq., edited by J.G. Schurman, The Ethical Import of Darwinism, 1887) is a comprehensive exponent of American philosophic thought.

%4. Sweden, Norway, Denmark, and Holland.%

In Sweden an empirical period represented by Leopold (died 1829) and Th. Thorild (died 1808), and based upon Locke and Rousseau, was followed, after the introduction of Kant by D. Boethius, 1794, by a drift toward idealism. This was represented in an extreme form by B. Hoeijer (died 1812), a contemporary and admirer of Fichte, who defended the right of philosophical construction, and more moderately by Christofer Jacob Boestrom (1797-1866), the most important systematic thinker of his country. As predecessors of Boestrom we may mention Biberg (died 1827), E.G. Geijer (died 1846), and S. Grubbe (died 1853), like him professors in Upsala, and of his pupils, S. Ribbing, known in Germany by his peculiar conception of the Platonic doctrine of ideas (German translation, 1863-64), the moralist Sahlin (1877), the historian, of Swedish philosophy[1] (1873 seq.) A. Nyblaeus of Lund, and H. Edfeldt of Upsala, the editor of Boestrom's works (1883).

[Footnote 1: Cf. Hoeffding, Die Philosophie in Schweden in the Philosophische Monatshefte, vol. xv. 1879, p. 193 seq.]

Boestrom's philosophy is a system of self-activity and personalism which recalls Leibnitz and Krause. The absolute or being is characterized as a concrete, systematically articulated, self-conscious unity, which dwells with its entire content in each of its moments, and whose members both bear the character of the whole and are immanent in one another, standing in relations of organic inter-determination. The antithesis between unity and plurality is only apparent, present only for the divisive view of finite consciousness. God is infinite, fully determinate personality (for determination is not limitation), a system of self-dependent living beings, differing in degree, in which we, as to our true being, are eternally and unchangeably contained. Every being is a definite, eternal, and living thought of God; thinking beings with their states and activities alone exist; all that is real is spiritual, personal. Besides this true, suprasensible world of Ideas, which is elevated above space, time, motion, change, and development, and which has not arisen by creation or a process of production, there exists for man, but only for him—man is formally perfect, it is true, but materially imperfect (since he represents the real from a limited standpoint)—a sensuous world of phenomena as the sphere of his activity. To this he himself belongs, and in it he is spontaneously to develop the suprasensible content which is eternally given him (i.e., his true nature), namely, to raise it from the merely potential condition of obscure presentiment to clear, conscious actuality. Freedom is the power to overcome our imperfection by means of our true nature, to realize our suprasensible capacities, to become for ourselves what we are in ourselves (in God). The ethics of Boestrom is distinguished from the Kantian ethics, to which it is related, chiefly by the fact that it seeks to bring sensibility into a more than merely negative relation to reason. Society is an eternal, and also a personal, Idea in God. The most perfect form of government is constitutional monarchy; the ideal goal of history, the establishment of a system of states embracing all mankind.

J. Borelius of Lund is an Hegelian, but differs from the master in regard to the doctrine of the contradiction. The Hegelian philosophy has adherents in Norway also, as G.V. Lyng (died 1884; System of Fundamental Ideas), M.J. Monrad (Tendencies of Modern Thought, 1874, German translation, 1879), both professors in Christiania, and Monrad's pupil G. Kent (Hegel's Doctrine of the Nature of Experience, 1891).

The Danish philosophy of the nineteenth century has been described by Hoeffding in the second volume of the Archiv fuer Geschichte der Philosophie, 1888. He begins with the representatives of the speculative movement: Steffens (see above), Niels Treschow (1751-1833), Hans Christian Oersted (1777-1851; Spirit in Nature, German translation, Munich, 1850-51), and Frederik Christian Sibbern (1785-1872). A change was brought about by the philosophers of religion Soeren Kierkegaard (1813-55) and Rasmus Nielsen (1809-84; Philosophy of Religion, 1869), who opposed speculative idealism with a strict dualism of knowledge and faith, and were in turn opposed by Georg Brandes (born 1842) and Hans Broechner (1820-75). Among younger investigators the Copenhagen professors, Harald Hoeffding[1] (born 1843) and Kristian Kroman[2] (born 1846) stand in the first rank.

[Footnote 1: Hoeffding: The Foundations of Human Ethics, 1876, German translation, 1880; Outlines of Psychology, 1882, English translation by Lowndes, 1891, from the German translation, 1887; Ethics, 1887, German translation by Bendixen, 1888.]

[Footnote 2: Kroman: Our Knowledge of Nature, German translation, 1883; A Brief Logic and Psychology, German translation by Bendixen, 1890.]

Land (Mind, vol. iii. 1878) and G. von Antal (1888) have written on philosophy in Holland. Down to the middle of the nineteenth century the field was occupied by an idealism based upon the ancients, in particular upon Plato: Franz Hemsterhuis (1721-90; Works, new ed., 1846-50), and the philologists Wyttenbach and Van Heusde. Then Cornelius Wilhelm Opzoomer[3] (1821-92; professor in Utrecht) brought in a new movement. Opzoomer favors empiricism. He starts from Mill and Comte, but goes beyond them in important points, and assigns faith a field of its own beside knowledge. In opposition to apriorism he seeks to show that experience is capable of yielding universal and necessary truths; that space, time, and causality are received along with the content of thought; that mathematics itself is based upon experience; and that the method of natural science, especially deduction, must be applied to the mental sciences. The philosophy of mind considers man as an individual being, in his connection with others, in relation to a higher being, and in his development; accordingly it divides into psychology (which includes logic, aesthetics, and ethology), sociology, the philosophy of religion, and the philosophy of history. Central to Opzoomer's system is his doctrine of the five sources of knowledge: Sensation, the feeling of pleasure and pain, aesthetic, moral, and religious feeling. If we build on the foundation of the first three alone, we end in materialism; if we leave the last unused, we reach positivism; if we make religious feeling the sole judge of truth, mysticism is the outcome. The criteria of science are utility and progress. These are still wanting in the mental sciences, in which the often answered but never decided questions continually recur, because we have neither derived the principles chosen as the basis of the deduction from an exact knowledge of the phenomena nor tested the results by experience. The causes of this defective condition can only be removed by imitating the study of nature: we must learn that no conclusions can be reached except from facts, and that we are to strive after knowledge of phenomena and their laws alone. We have no right to assume an "essence" of things beside and in addition to phenomena, which reveals itself in them or hides behind them. Pupils of Opzoomer are his successor in his Utrecht chair, Van der Wyck, and Pierson. We may also mention J.P.N. Land, who has done good service in editing the works of Spinoza and of Geulincx, and the philosopher of religion Rauwenhoff (1888).

[Footnote 1: Opzoomer: The Method of Science, a Handbook of Logic, German translation by Schwindt, 1852; Religion, German translation by Mook, 1869.]

On the system of the Hungarian philosopher Cyrill Horvath (died 1884 at Pesth) see the essay by E. Nemes in the Zeitschrift fuer Philosophie, vol. lxxxviii, 1886. Since 1889 a review, Problems of Philosophy and Psychology, has appeared at Moscow in Russian, under the direction of Professor N. von Grot.



CHAPTER XVI.

GERMAN PHILOSOPHY SINCE THE DEATH OF HEGEL.

With Hegel the glorious dynasty which, with a strong hand, had guided the fate of German philosophy since the conclusion of the preceding century disappears. From his death (1831) we may date the second period of post-Kantian philosophy,[1] which is markedly and unfavorably distinguished from the first by a decline in the power of speculative creation and by a division of effort. If previous to this the philosophical public, comprising all the cultured, had been eagerly occupied with problems in common, and had followed with unanimous interest the work of those who were laboring at them, during the last fifty years the interest of wider circles in philosophical questions has grown much less active; almost every thinker goes his own way, giving heed only to congenial voices; the inner connection of the schools has been broken down; the touch with thinkers of different views has been lost. The latest decades have been the first to bring a change for the better, in so far as new rallying points of philosophical interest have been created by the neo-Kantian movement, by the systems of Lotze and Von Hartmann, by the impulse toward the philosophy of nature proceeding from Darwinism, by energetic labors in the field of practical philosophy, and by new methods of investigation in psychology.

[Footnote 1: On philosophy since 1831 cf. vol. iii. of J.E. Erdmann's History; Ueberweg, Grundriss, part iii. Sec.Sec. 37-49 (English translation, vol. ii. pp. 292-516); Lange, History of Materialism; B. Erdmann, Die Philosophie der Gegenwart in the Deutsche Rundschau, vols. xix., xx., 1879, June and July numbers; (A. Krohn,) Streifzuege durch die Philosophie der Gegenwart in the Zeitschrift fuer Philosophie und philosophische Kritik, vols. lxxxvii., lxxxix., 1885-86; (Burt, History of Modern Philosophy, 1892), also the third volume of Windelband's Geschichte der neueren Philosophie, when it appears.]