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EDINBURGH : EDMONSTON & DOUGLAS.

SCHWEGLER'S

HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY

ECINEÜRGH : PRINTED BV T. AND A. CONSTABLE,
FOB

EDMONSTON AND DOUGLAS.

LONDON HAMILTON, ADAMS, AND CO.

CAMBRIDGE MACMILLAN AND CO.

GLASOOW JAME.S MACLEHOSE.

HANDBOO

OF THE

ISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY

BY DR. ALBERT SCHWEGLER.

TRANSLATED AND ANNOTATED BY

JAMES HUTCHISON STIRLING, LL.D.

ACTHOU OF ' THE SECRET OF HEGEL,' ETC.

' My highest wish is to find within,
The God whom I find everpvhere without.'

Kepler.

FIFTH EDITION

CAREFULLY COMPARED WITH THE EIGHTH GERMAN EDITION, 1873,
AKD CORRECTED ACCORDINGLT.

-b^^

EDINBURGH: "^^^[^

EDMONSTON & DOUGLAS.

1874.

CONTENTS.

trais'slator's preface, ....
preface to the third edition, .
sketch of the life of schwegler,

i. — general idea of the history of philo

SOPHY, ....
IL— DIVISION OF THE SUBJECT, .
HI.— A PRELIMINARY VIEW OF PRE-SOCRATIC

PHILOSOPHY,
IV.— THE EARLIER IONIC PHILOSOPHERS,
v.— THE PYTHAGOREANS,
VI.— THE ELE ATICS,
Vn. — HERACLITUS,
Vin.— EMPEDOCLES,
IX. — THE ATOMISTS,

X. — ANAXAGORAS,
XI.— THE SOPHISTS,

XII.— SOCRATES, ....
XIII.— THE INCOMPLETE SOCRATTCS,
XIV.— PLATO, ....

XV.— THE OLDER ACADEMY,
XVI.— ARISTOTLE, . ....
XVn.— STOICISM, ....

XVUI. — EPICUREANISM,
XIX.— SCEPTICISM AND THE LATER ACADEMY,

XX.— THE ROMANS,
XXI. — NEO-PLATONISM,
XXn. —CHRISTIANITY ANT) SCHOLASTICISM,
XXIII.— TRANSITION TO MODERN PHILOSOPHY,
XXIV.— DESCARTES, ....

TAGF.

ix
xi

XV
1

123

131

134

137

138

143

146

156

CONTENTS.

XXV, — GEULINX AND MALEBRANCIIE,
XXVI.— SPINOZA,

XXVII.— IDEALISM AND REALISM, .
XXVIII, — LOCKE,
XXIX. — HUME,

XXX.— CONDILLAC,
XXXI. — HELVETIUS,
XXXII.— FRENCH ILLUMINATION AND MATERIALISM
XXXIIL— LEIBNITZ, .
XXXIV.— BERKELEY,
XXXV. — WOLFF,

XXXVI.— THE GERMAN ILLUMINATION,
XXXVII.— TRANSITION TO KANT,
XXXVIII.— KANT,
XXXIX.— TRANSITION TG THE POST-KANTIAN PHILO
SOPHY, .
XL. — JACOBI,
XLL— FICHTE,
XLII.— HERBART, .
XLIII. — SCHELLING,
XLIV.— TRANSITION TO HEGEL,
XLV.— HEGEL,

ANNOTATIONS,

I.— GENERAL IDEA OF THE HISTORY OF PHILO
SOPHY, ....
II. AND III. — DIVISION AND PRELIMINARY VIEW,
IV. — THE EARLIER IONIC PHILOSOPHERS,

v.— THE PYTHAGOREANS,
VI. —THE ELEATICS,
VII. — HERACLITÜS,
VIII. — EMPEDOCLES,
IX. — THE ATOMISTS,
X. — ANAX AGORAS,
XL— THE SOPHISTS,
XIL— SOCRATES, .
Xm. —PLATO,
XIV.— ARISTOTLE,
XV. — THE POST- ARISTOTELIAN PHILOSOPHY,

COXTEXT.^.

.»a(;k

XVI. — TRANSITION TO MODERN PHIU»80rnT,

4U3

XVII.— DESCARTES, .

404

XVIII.— MALEBRANCHE,

407

XIX.— SPINOZA,

408

XX.— HOBBES,

411

XXL— JOHN LOCKE,

413

XXU.— DAVID HUME,

415

XXnL— LEIBNITZ,

41Ö

XXIV.— BERKELEY, .

417

XXV.— KANT,

422

XXVI.— JACOBI,

426

XXVn.— FICHTE,

427

XX VIII.— HERBART, .

428

XXEX.— SCHELLDsG, .

428

XXX.— HEGEL,

42y

SUPPLEMENTARY NOTES—

I.— WHY THE HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY ENDS

WITH HEGEL, AXD NOT WITH COMTE, 446

n.— MR. LEWES'S ACCUSATION OF ATHEI.SM

AGAINST HEGEL, . . . .468

ni.— PANTHEISM AND PAGANISM, . . 473

INDEX, ....... 477

TEANSLATOE'S PEEFACE.

THE reader will readily understand that this transla-
tion is a work of gratitude. The assistance of this
little book to the student of Philosophy I have elsewhere
nronounced 'indispensable;' and this is the result of a
genuine experience. The resolution being once taken,
again, to introduce the work to an English public, it
appeared right that this should be effected by a new and
native translation, rather than by the mere reproduction
of a foreign one. Of the merits of this latter, Mr. Seelye's
American translation, I cannot say a word : my transla-
tion has been executed without my seeing it, and in
absolute independence generally. Perhaps I may be
allowed to say this, however, that I am informed by the
German publisher that the American translation follows
the first German edition, * whilst the present fifth edition
contains a variety of improvements and additions.' From
the same authority, writing some months ago, I learn that
' of the German issue 20,000 copies have been already
sold, certainly a rare event in the case of a rigorously
scientific book, and the best proof of its excellence.' How
this ' excellence ' has originated will be understood at
once, when we consider that Schwegler, a remarkably
ripe, full man, and possessed of the gift of style, wrote
this History, so to speak, at a single stroke of the pen, as,
in the first instance, an article for an Encyclopaedia. A
first, almost extemporized, draught of this nature usually

X TRANSLATORS PREFACE.

constitutes the hajjpiest core for a larger and separate
work. But originate as it may, the fact of this excellence
is certain. The work has been already translated both
in America and Denmark ; its sale in its own country
has, for such works (as we have seen), been unexampled ;
and we learn from Professor Erdmann (Preface to his
Grundriss of the History of Philosophy) that its extraor-
dinary success with students has given rise to various
imitations. What I have found it myself, I have in-
dicated in the opening of the Annotations at page 345.

As regards either the translation or the annotation, I
know not that there remains anything to be said here.
The reader will perhaps dislike the coinage &ee;i< / but he
cannot dislike it more than I do myself, and if existent
could have served the turn, it would never have happened.
This I believe to be the only coinage, however, and it will
be found fully explained in the note on the Eleatics at
page 359. I had intended to say a word in deprecation
of Mr, Lewes's distinction in reference to what he calls
the objective and the subjective methods, as well as of
his general view of Philosophy. For this, space at jfre-
sent faUs however, and I must hope for another oppor-
tunity. The reader will probably not be surprised if I
say now, nevertheless, that I regard neither distinction
nor view as possessed of a vestige of foundation.
Edinburgh, September 1867.

In this, the second edition, the annotation will be found
completed, and an Index added. Prefixed also there is a
sketch of the Life of Schwegler, epitomized from the bio-
graphical notice of him which, written by his friend Zeller,
the illustrious historian of Greek Philosophy, is inserted
in the third volume of Schwegler's Roman History.

Edinburgh, February 1868.

PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION.

ADVANTAGE has been taken of the present oppor.
tunity for the introduction into the body of the
work of a considerable number of corrections which were
found necessary. Some of these it has been planned to
signalize here, and one or two others may be at the
same time referred to.

The phrase ' Gothic dome,' page 154, has been objected
to, as itself Gothic, seeing that, in English, dome means
cupola^ and there is no such thing in Gothic archi-
tecture. My reply is simple : In using the phrase, the
translator had really not a cupola but a cathedral-interior
in his eye, and he sees no reason against extending the
English dorne into the German Dam, domus, to say nothing
of dcofxa, being, presumably, the warrant in the one case
as in the other.

At page 218, line 18 from top, the two words notions
and without will be found hitherto to have accidentally
exchanged places. The occurrence and its rectification
are very simple matters ; still the former made such con-
fusion of the sense that it went far to lead one of our
most distinguished metaphysicians almost up to an accu-
sation of misunderstanding, on the part of the translator,
of one of Kant's most common and salient dicta.

The Greek phrase translated at page 362 by * the more
is tlie thought^ perhaps scarcely bears the addition of the
article {Hhe^) to the noun * tJiought,^ vorjfxa in the original

xii PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION,

being without a to, and Zeller having translated it by
Gedanke alone without the so usual der. The 'the,'
nevertheless, seems to let in quite a satisfactory light, if
at all admissible.

I have hazarded the expression, at page 399, that * in
Germany the discussion of the order, dates, and authen-
ticity of the Platonic dialogues,' will probably settle in
the end into Schwegler's * relative ruling,' * though not
original to him.' I have been requested to explain that
such a settlement gets, in the progress of the discussion,
less and less likely ; Ueberweg, Schaarschmidt, and
others, reasoning cogently against the legitimacy of
ascribing to Plato several most important dialogues
usually so ascribed. I may remark, in this coimexion,
that I was lately struck with the strong things said in
advance (though not, probably, of Socher in 1820) by the
illustrious Whewell, specially of the Parmenides.

It is necessary, by a word here on Schwegler's * His-
tory of Greek Philosophy,' to supply an omission in the
sketch of the life of Schwegler abridged from Zeller.
This work has been printed, since the lamented death of
its author, under the able editorship of Dr. K. Köstlin,
whose various additions are so felicitously conceived and
conveyed in the very spirit of his deceased friend that it
would be difficult or impossible to recognise and distinguish
them. This, too, has proved a success, and has been so
much relished by Schwegler's fellow-countrymen, as to
have passed into another (and by Köstlin much improved)
edition. I am disposed to consider it an unexcelled
work. Schwegler knows and can accomplish the exact
to perfection, and the exact is at once full to the fullest,
and short to the shortest. Schwegler's exaxit, indeed, can
also be characterized as clear to the clearest. Now, of
such exactitude the history in question may be regarded
as a perfect specimeiL Ueberweg, in reference to the
book the translation of which is now before the reader
(and since which translation it [1873] counts three more

PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION, xiii

editions in Germany), may be found speaking of *tlie
introduction, generally acknowledged to be excellent
in its kind, by which Schwegler, too early lost to us by
a premature death, rendered an inestimable service
to the study of the history of philosophy ; ' and we
have abeady seen in what terms Zeller refers to his
'gift of style,' and the other perhaps unrivalled excel-
lences of Schwegler. Well, in no work ever written
by Schwegler can these excellences be found in greater
perfection than in this 'History of Greek Philosophy.'
It is the story of a man who has long digested all,
and gives easy emission to all without the neces-
sity of either changing or repeating a word. There
is not a word too much, indeed, in the whole book, and
not a line that is not intelligible at sight : it is the last
triumph of the plainness of ripe knowledge. Plato and
Aristotle are here reduced into that easy every-day bulk
of common-sense that any hand can grasp. It is this
luminous succinctness of Schwegler that extends to him
a ready triumph, so far, over all his brother historians.
Erdmann possesses a harnessed dialectic of expression
that is peculiarly masterly and all his own, but it often
escapes the reader by the very attention which for inter-
pretation it demands, and his work is at least three times
the size of this present book of Schwegler' s. Much the
same thing, so far as magnitude is concerned, may be said
of Ueberweg's Ground-plan of the history of philosophy,
while, as regards style, however excellent, however faith-
ful, however careful, be the writing of Ueberweg, it is
not the brilliantly transparent, and yet perfectly full
expression of Schwegler. Kor, on the whole, despite the
brevity, can either Erdmann or Ueberweg be said to
excel Schwegler in point of matter — discounting the fact,
that is, that both the former treat of, what Schwegler
does not, the middle-age philosophy, the subordinate
followers of the greater modems, and the post-Hegehan
German contributions. The middle-age philosophy cer*

xiv PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION.

tainly deserves to be kno-wn, and the history of schools
is at least curious, but I am not sure, great though some
of the names be, that there is much profit to be drawn
from what has yet followed Hegel anywhere. For this
middle-age philosophy, and for their own merits other-
wise, both the work of Erdmann and that of Ueberweg
ought to be translated into English, and I am glad that
we may soon expect this service, at least as regards one of
them, ueberweg, at the hands of a distinguished American.
For myself, I should have been glad to have translated
the middle age part of Ueberweg's introduction (as a quite
excellent and, indeed, indispensable work), and after
that (and what I have already done) I know no German
books, on the history of philosophy, which I should be at
all tempted to translate, unless the history of Greek
philosophy by Schwegler, and, perhaps above all, the his-
tory of philosophy by the master himself, HegeL

Edinburgh, May 1871.

SKETCH OF THE LIFE OF SCHWEGLER.

ALBERT SCHWEGLER, a Suabian, like Hegel and
so many other deeper Germans of late, was bora
Febmary 10, 1S19. His father, a country clergyman,
•who, with scanty means, did his best for his family,
began himself the education of the boy, and subjected
him, in general, to a discipline so severe that it left its
marks on his character, and was borne in his memory
for life. In his seventeenth year, Schwegler, as a
student of theology, entered the university of Tübingen.
Here he greatly distinguished himself. His intellect
was unusually quick, ready, and retentive ; his industry
constant, his perseverance iron : he took many prizes,
and, where certain essays were concerned, not without
the higher compliment of express thanks. His univer-
sity career accomplished, though amid many hardships,
for his father's death in 1839 left a family, always
straitened, in the most pressing difficulties, Schwegler
— passing by Munich, Prague, and Vienna — went to
Berlin, in the hope not only of scientific but of pecu-
niary profit. In this he was disappointed, and, visiting
Holland, Belgium, and the Ehine, he returned home
in a few months, to be presently found in Tübingen
again, supporting himself as he could by services in a
village church, by correcting the press, and by literature.
One success in the last capacity enabled him (having
qualified himself as a jmvatlm doeens in 1843) to spend
some months in Italy, principally at Rome. On his
return in 1847, he received the appointment of a Libra-

xvi SKETCH OF THE

rian, and, in 1848, that of Extraordinary Professor of
Komau Literature and Archaeology, in the Evangelical
Seminary of Tubingen.

The literary works of Schwegler are as follows : —
His first appearance in print was with an essay in memory
of Hegel, in the Journal for the Elegant World (1839).
In 1841, he published his prize essay, Montanism and
the Christian Church of the Second Century, an excellent
work, which had immediate success. In 1842, he criti-
cised Neander's work on the 'Apostolic Era ' in the Ger-
man, and the 'latest Johannine Literature' in the
Theological Year-books. In this last periodical he
also wrote several valuable papers after his return to
Tübingen. Here, too, he became, in 1843, the editor
of the Annals of the Present, and in this capacity
wrote many admirable political papers. In 1845, his
Post-Apostolic Age was published, and that work was
followed by the Clementine Homilies in 1847, and the
Eusebian Church History in 1852. In 1847 and 1848
we have his Metaphysic of Aristotle, and in the former
year the first issue of his Handbook of the History of
Philosophy, in the Stuttgart Encyclopaedia. His latest
work was the Roman History, which at his death was
left incomi)lete. Of these works, the most important
are Montanism, the Post-Apostolic Age, the History of
Philosophy, the Aristotle, and the Roman History; but
the tact and judgment, the courage and considerate-
ness, the consistent adhesion to principles, the manly
ripeness, the truth, penetration, and largeness of poli-
tical perception, the clearness, power, and brilliancy
of style, the irresistible polemic, which he dis-
played as editor of the Annals of the Present, demon-
strated that Schwegler had the capacity likewise of
becoming a master among Publicists. The work on
Montanism showed acute intellect and much penetrative
power of erudite research ; it gave to think to the most
accomplished judges. The Post- Apostolic Age was writ
ten in six months, and this fact, in view of the excel'

LIFE OF sen WEGLER. xvii

lence of the work itself (a -work not final in its sphere,
however), bespeaks that * iron industry, that ease of ex-
pression, and that complete mastery of the material, of
which, and in an extraordinary degree, Schwegler might
justly boast.' The Aristotle is characterized by accuracy
and acuteness in selection and correction of the text,
by successful interpretation of difficult passages, and by
penetrating exposition of philosophical ideas. Beside
the commentary of Bonitz it will always retain its own
value. Of the * short history of philosophy' Zeller tells
us that by its ' spirited, luminous, and easy treatment of
the subject it won for itself such approbation, that in
the course of ten years three large editions, amounting
to no less than 7000 copies, were found necessary,' — a
success which, as we know, the next ten years have only
increased. It is the Roman History, however, that has
most attracted the admiration of experts — an admiration
all the keener for the background of regret over the in-
completeness left by the \mtimely death, Schwegler,
it would seem, possessed, and in an extraordinary degree,
all the leading qualifications that are requisite in an
historian. ' His clear understanding,' says Zeller, * to
wli-^JT distinct ideas were a necessity, could as little
dispense with the terra firma of facts, as his vivid ima-
gination with the visible shapes of the actual. The
collecting of masses of materials was a delightful em-
ployment for his learned industry, as their analysis for
his penetration and sagacity. His power of comprehen-
sive survey was most specially attracted by the con-
sideration, his architectonic talent by the scientific
arrangement, his gift of style by the description, of
historical situations and combinations.' Accordingly, the
Roman History, in its kind, is a work of the greatest ex-
cellence. Zeller, in its reference, speaks of such trans-
parency, of such complete control of the materials, of
such assured insight, of such power of narrative, as must
make every one regret to see * so grandly-planned, so

masterly-executed a work, left there a fragment only.'

xviii LIFE OF SCHWEGLER.

At school, Schwegler was a quick, lively, kindly boy,
docile, attentive, and industrious. As a youth, he was
impetuous, generous, and high-spirited, proud, indignant
at successful baseness, and eager for the truth. His,
however, was a precocious nature, and in manhood he
was already old. The disappointments of the world had
soon set in, and he was withdrawn into silence and
reserve. Still, within that cold and hard exterior, beat
one of the warmest and softest of hearts. We have the
evidence for this in his early friendships, in his filial
and brotherly aflfection, and in his love for children.
The first look of Schwegler gave what was harsh in
him ; thickset, and above the middle height, there
was a gloomy expression over his eyes ; he was strongly
jawed also, and his mouth was severely closed. The
yellowish hue of the smooth-shaven face contributed to
the same efi'ect. Otherwise, however, Schwegler's fea-
tures were good. There were blue eyes and a fair-
arched forehead under his light-brown locks. Hia nose
was fine and regular ; his mouth had eloquence on its
curves, and his chin was classically rounded. When
the ice was thawed, one saw in him good-nature, — one
saw in him humour. Beneath all the apparent pride and
bitterness lay love and the necessity for love, the longing
for sympathy, for disclosure. In life he was long un-
fortunate, and he died so young. On the morning of
the 5th of January 1857, he had lectured from eight to
nine as usual ; half-an-hour later he was found insensible
on the floor of his study, and next day he died. On the
9th, the empty hull was laid in the ground. How fast
we flit I

HANDBOOK OF THE HISTOKY
OF PHILOSOPHY.

HANDBOOK OF THE HTSTOEY
OF PHILOSOPHY.

I. — General Idea of the History of Philosophy,

PHILOSOPHY is reflection, the tliinking consideration
of things. This definition exhausts not the idea of
philosophy, however. Man thinks in his practical activi-
ties as well, where he calculates the means to the attain-
ment of ends ; and all the other sciences — those even
which belong not to philosophy in the stricter sense —
are of the nature of thought. By what, then, does phi-
losophy distinguish itself from these sciences ? By what
does it distinguish itself, for example, from the science of
astronomy, or from that of medicine, or of jurisprudence ?
Not, certainly, by the difference of its matter. Its mat-
ter is quite the same as that of the various empirical
sciences. Plan and order of the universe, structure and
function of the human body, property, law, politics, — all
these belong to philosophy quite as much as to their
respective special sciences. What is given in experience
— actual fact — that, their material, is the material of
philosophy also. It is not, then, by its matter that pbi-
losophy distinguishes itself from the empirical sciences,
but by its form, by its method,— so to speak by its mode
of knowing. The various empirical sciences take their
matter directly from experience ; they find it ready to
hand ; and as they find it, they accept it. Philosophy,
on the contrary, accepts not what is given in experience
as it is given, but follows it np into its ultimate grounds,
regarding each particular fact only in relation to a final
principle, and as a determinate link in the system of
knowledge. But just so it strips from such particular
fact — which to our senses seems but a something given —

2 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY,

this its character of independency, individualness, and
contingency. In the sea of empirical particulars, in the
confused infinitude of the contingent, it establishes the
universal, the necessary, the all-pervading law. In
short, philosophy considers the entire empirical finite in
the form of an intelligently articulated system.

From this it follows that philosophy (as the thought
totality of the empirical finite) stands to the empirical
sciences in a relation of reciprocity, alternately condition-
ing, and conditioned by them. It is as idle, therefore,
to expect at any time the completion of philosophy, as
the completion of empirical science. Philosophy exists
rather in the form of a series of various historical philo-
sophies, which, exhibiting thought in its various stages
of development, present themselves hand in hand with
the general scientific, social, and political progress. It is
the subject-matter, the succession, and the internal con-
nexion of these philosophies which it is the business of
the history of philosophy to discuss.

The relation in which the various systems stand to one
another is thus already indicated. As man's historical
life in general, even considered from the point of view of
a calculation of probabilities, is made coherent by an idea
of intellectual progress, and exhibits, if with interrup-
tions, still a sufficiently continuous series of successive
stages ; so the various historical systems (each being but
the philosophical expression of the entire life of its time),
constitute together but a single organic movement, a
rational, inwardly-articulated whole, a series of evolu-
tions, founded in the tendency of mind to raise its natu-
ral more and more into conscious being, into knowledge,
and to recognise the entire spiritual and natural universe
more and more as its life and outward existence, as its
actuality and reality, as the mirror of itself.

Hegel was the first to enunciate these views, and to
regard the history of philosophy in the unity of a single
process ; but the fundamental idea, though true in prin-
ciple, has been perhaps overstrained by him, and in a
manner that threatens to destroy, as well the freedom of
the human will, as the notion of contingency, or of a cer-
tain existent unreason. Hegel holds the succession of
the systems in history to be the same as that of the cate-
gories in logic. Let us but free, he says, the fundamental
thoughts of the various systems from all that attaches to
their mere externality of form or particularity of applica-

GENERAL IDEA. 3

tion, and we obtain the various steps of the logical no-
tion (being, becoming, particular being, individual being,
quantity, etc.) ; while, conversely, if we but take the logi-
cal progress by itself, we have in it the essential process
of the results of history.

But this conception can neither be justified in prin-
ciple nor established by history. It fails in principle ;
for history is a combination of hberty and necessity, and
exhibits, therefore, only on the whole, any connexion of
reason, while in its particulars, again, it presents but a
play of endless contingency. It is thus, too, that nature,
as a whole, displays i-ationality and system, but mocks
all attempts at a priori schemata in detail. Further, in
history it is individuals who have the initiative, free sub-
jectivities,— what consequently, therefore, is directly
incommensurable. For, reduce as we may the indi-
vidual under the influence of the universal, in the form
of his time, his circumstances, his nationality, etc., — to
the value of a mere cipher, no free-will can be reduced.
History, generally, is no school-sum to be exactly cast up ;
there must be no talk, therefore, of any a priori construc-
tion in the history of philosophy either. The facts of
experience will not adapt themselves as mere examples
to any ready-made logical schema. If at all to stand a
critical investigation, what is given in experience must
be taken as given, as handed to us ; and then the rational
connexion of this that is so given must be referred to
analysis. The speculative idea can be expected at best
— and only for the scientific arrangement of the given
material — to afford but a regulative.

Another point of view which contradicts Hegel's con-
ception is this : the historical development is almost
always different from the logical. Historically, for ex-
ample, the origin of the state was the desire of protec-
tion from violence and fraud ; while logically, on the
other hand, we are to find it, not in natural anarchy, but
in the idea of justice. So it is here also : whilst the logi-
cal progress is an ascent from the abstract to the con-
crete, that of the history of philosophy is almost always
a descent from the concrete to the abstract, from sense
to thought, — a freeing of the abstract inner from the
concrete outer of the general fonns of civilisation, and of
the traditional religious and social conditions in which
he who would philosophize finds himself placed. The
system of philosophy proceeds synthetically ; ita history

4 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

— the history of thought — analytically. With greater
justice we may maintain the exact contrary of the
Hegelian thesis, and assert that what is first in itself is
precisely last for us. We find the Ionic philosophy, for
example, beginning, not with being as an abstract
notion, but with what is most sensuous and concrete,
with the material notion of water, air, etc. Even the
being of the Eleatics, and the becoming of Heraclitus, are
not pure forms of thought, but impure notions, materially
coloured conceptions. On the whole, the demand is
futile, to refer each philosophy, according as it historic-
ally appears, to a logical category as its central principle,
and simply for this reason, that the majority of these
philosophies have for object the idea, not in its abstrac-
tion, but in its realization in nature and man, and for
the most part, consequently, rest not on logical but
on physical, psychological, and ethical questions. Hegel
ought not, therefore, to have limited the comparison of
the historical, with the systematic evolution to logic, but
to have extended it to the whole system of philoso-
phical science. The Eleatics, Heraclitus, the Atomists —
and so far, certainly, the Hegelian logic corresponds to
the Hegelian history of philosophy — display such logical
category on their front; but then, Anaxagoras, the
Sophists, Socrates, Plato, Aristotle ? Should we force,
nevertheless, on these philosophies a central principle,
and reduce, for example, that of Anaxagoras to the notion
of design, that of the Sophists to the notion of show
{Schein), and that of Socrates to the notion of the good,
which in part is impossible without violence, there arises
the new difficulty that then the historical order of these
categories no longer corresponds to that which they pos-
sess in logic. In point of fact, indeed, Hegel attempts
not any complete realization of his main idea, but even
on the threshold of Greek philosophy has already aban-
doned it. Being, becoming, individual being, — the
Eleatics, Herachtus, the Atomists, — thus far the parallel,
as said, extends, but not farther. Not only there follows
now Anaxagoras with the notion of a designing mind,
but even from the first the two series agree not. Hegel
would have been more consistent, had he entirely re-
jected the Ionic philosophy (for matter is no logical cate-
gory), and had he assigned to Pythagoras a place — seeing
that the categories of quantity follow those of quality —
c^ter the Eleatics and the Atomists. In short, he would

DIVISION OF THE SUBJECT. 5

have been more consistent logically, had he put chrono-
logy entirely to the rout. Resigning this i)retension,
then, we must content ourselves if, in reproducing to
thought the course which reflection has taken as a whole,
there exhibit itself, on the main historical stations, a
rational progress, and if the historian of philosophy, sur-
veying the serial development, find really in it a j)hiloso-
phical acquisition, the acquisition of a new idea ; but we
shall be caiitious of applying to each transition and the
whole detail the postulate of immanent law and logical
nexus. History marches often in serpentine lines, often
apparently in retreat. Philosophy, especially, has not
unfrequently resigned some wide and fruitful territory,
in order to turn back on some narrow strip of land,
if only all the more to turn this latter to account.
Sometimes thousands of years have expended themselves
in vain attempts, and brought to light only a negative
resiüt. Sometimes a profusion of philosophical ideas is
compressed into the space of a single generation. Here
reign no unalterable, regularly recurrent laws of nature ;
history, as the domain of free-will, will only in the last
of days reveal itseK as a work of reason.

n. — Division of the Subject.

ON the limits and division of the subject a few words
may suflSce. Where and when does philosophy
begin? After what has been said, manifestly there
wehere an ultimate principle, an ultimate ground of exist-
ence, is first philosophically sought. Consequently with
the philosophy of the Greeks. The Oriental (Chinese and
Indian) so-called philosophy (rather theology or mytho-
logy), and the mythical cosmogonies of Greece itself at
first, fall thus outside of our (more limited) undertaking.
"With us, as with Aristotle, the history of philosophy
begins with Thales. For similar reasons we exclude also
Scholasticism, or the philosophy of the Christian middle
ages; which belongs (being not so much philosophy as
rather a reflecting or a philosophizing within the presup-
positions of a positive religion, and therefore essentially
theology) to the historical science of the Christian dogmas.
What remains separates naturally into two parts :
ancient (Grjeco-Eoman) and modern philosophy. The
inner relations of both epochs wiU (a preliminary com-

6 HI ST OR Y OF PHIL OSOPII Y.

parative characterization being impossible without giving
rise to repetitions) be noticed later, on occasion of the
transition from the one to the other.

The first epoch separates again into three periods :
1. The Pre-Socratic philosophy (Thales to the Sophists
inclusive) ; 2. Soorates, Plato, Aristotle ; 3. The Post-
Aristotelian philosophy (to Neo-Platonism inclusive).

III. — Ä Preliminary View of Pre-Socratic Philosophy.

THE general tendency of Pre-Socratic philosophy is
this, to find a principle of the explanation of nature.
Nature it was — that which is most immediately pre-
sent to us, that which lies nearest the eye, that which
is palpablest — that first attracted the spirit of inquiry.
Under its changeful forms, its multiplex phenomena,
there must lie, it was thought, a first and permanent
fundamental principle. What is this principle ? What,
it was asked, is the primitive ground of things ? Or, more
precisely, what natural element is the basal element ?
An answer to this question constituted the problem of
the earlier Ionic natural philosophers or Hylicists. One
suggested water, another air, and a third a chaotic prim-
eval matter.

2. A higher solution of the problem was attempted by
the Pythagoreans. Not matter in its sensuous concre-
tion, but matter in its formal relations and dimensions,
appeared to them to contain the explanatory ground of
existence. As their principle, accordingly, they adopted
numbers, the signs of relation. * Number is the essence
of all things,' this was their thesis. Number is a middle
term between pure thought and the immediate things of
sense. Number and proportion, indeed, have to do with
matter only so far as it is extended and divided in time
and space ; but still without matter, without something
to be seen, there is no counting, no measuring. This
advance beyond, or elevation over, matter, which is yet
at the same time a cleaving to matter, constitutes the
nature and the position of the Pythagorean principle.

3. Absolutely transcending the given and factual, en-
tirely abstracting from everything material, the Eleatics
enunciated as principle this very abstraction, the nega-
tion of any material dividedness in space and time, that
is, pure being. Instead of the sensuous principle of the

PRE-SOCBÄ TIC PHIL OSOPII Y. 7

Tonics, or of the quantitative principle of the Pytha-
goreans, they proposed, consequently, an inteUhjihle pria-
cijile.

4. And thus there was completed the first or analytic
period of Greek philosophical development, in order to
give place to the second or synthetic j)eriod. The
Eleatics had sacrificed to their principle of pure being
this mundane existence with all its separate existences.
But denial of nature and the world could not possibly be
carried out. The reality of both pressed, against their
wills, in on them, and they had themselves, though only
hypothetically and under protest, been necessitated to
speak of them. But from their abstract being they had
no bridge, no longer any return to the concrete being of
sense. Their principle was to have been an explanatory
ground of existence, of the vicissitude of existence, and
it was none. The problem, to find a principle that
should explain the becoming, the vicissitude of existence,
was left but the more urgent. Heraclitus, then, ap-
peared now with his solution, and asserted for absolute
principle the unity of being and non-being, — becoming.
According to him, it belonged to the very nature of
things that they should be in incessant change, in infi-
nite flux. * All fleets.' We have here, at the same
time, in place of a primitive matter, as with the Ionics,
the idea of a primitive living force, the first attempt to
explain existence and the movement of existence by a
principle that had been anah-tically acquired. After
Heraclitus the question of the cause of becoming re-
mained the chief interest and the motive of philosophical
progress.

5. Becoming is unity of being and non-being. Into
these two moments the Heraclitic principle was by the
Atomists consciously sundered. Heraclitus, namely, had
without doubt enunciated the principle of becoming,
but only as fact of experience ; he had only named,
but not explained, the law of becoming : the point now
was to demonstrate the necessity of that universal law.
Why is the all in constant flux, in eternal movement ?
It was evidently necessary to advance from the indefinite
unity of matter and motive force to a conscious and de-
finite distinction, to the mechanical separation of both.
Thus it was that to Empedodes matter became the
principle of being, fixed and permanent being, while force
became the principle of movement. We have here a

8 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

combination of Heraclitus and Parmenidea. But with
Empedocles the moving forces were as yet but mythical
powers, love and hate ; while, with the Atomists again,
they became a pure un-understood and unintelligible ne-
cessity of nature. And so, therefore, by the method of a
mechanical explanation of nature, becoming was rather
periphrased than explained.

6. Despairing of any mere materialistic explanation of
becoming, or the mundane process, Anaxagoras placed by
the side of matter a world-forming intelligence ; he con-
ceived mind as the ultimate causality of the world and of
the order and design that appeared in it. A great prin-
cii)le was thus won for philosophy, — an ideal principle.
But Anaxagoras failed to give his principle any complete
realization. Instead of an intellectual conception of the
universe, instead of an ideal derivation of existence, he is
found to offer again, at last, only mechanical theories ;
his ' world-forming reason ' amounts really only to the
first impact, to the motive force ; it is but a deiLS ex ma-
china. Despite his surmise, then, of a higher principle,
Anaxagoras, like his predecessors, is still a physicist.
Mind did not manifest itself to him as a veritably supra-
natural power, as the free organizing soul of the universe.

7. Further progress now is characterized thus. The
distinction between mind and nature becomes definitely
understood ; and the former, as contrasted with the
latter, is recognised as the relatively higher. This was
the work of the Sophists. Their action was to entangle
in contradictions such thought as had not yet emancipated
itself from the objects of sense, from the datum of tradi-
tion, or from the datum of authority. In the first, and
indeed somewhat boyish, consciousness of the superiority

"of subjective thought to the objectivity (in sense, tradi-
tion, and authority) by which it had been hitherto over-
mastered, they flung both elements wildly together. In
other words, the Sophists introduced, in the form of a
general religious and political Aufklärung (illumination),
the principle of subjectivity, though at first only nega-
tively, or as destroyer of all that was established in the
opinions of existing society. And this continued till
Socrates opposed to this principle of empirical subjectivity
that of absolute subjectivity, or intelligence in the form
of a free moral will, and asserted, as against the world of
sense, thought to be the positively higher principle, and
the truth of all reality. With the Sophists, as character-

EARLIER IONIC PHILOSOPHERS. 9

istic of the dissolution of the etorliest philosophy, our
tirst period is closed.

IV. — The Earlier Ionic Philosophers.

T HALES. — At the head of the Ionic physicists, and at
the head, therefore, of philosophy in general, the an-
cients, with tolerable unanimity, place Thales of Miletus
(640-550, B.c.), a contemporary of Croesus and Solon. The
proposition to which he owes his place in the history of
philosophy is this : ' The principle [the first, the primitive
ground) of all things is water ; all comes from water,
and to water all returns.' This assumption, however, in
regard to the original of things, is no advance in itself
beyond the position of the earlier mythical cosmogonies.
Aristotle, in noticing Thales, speaks of several ancient
• theologians ' (meaning, no doubt. Homer and Hesiod),
who had ascribed to Oceanus and Tethys the origin of all
things. The attempt, then, to establish his principle in
freedom from the mythic element, and so to introduce
scientific procedure, — it is this, and not the principle
itself, which procures for Thales the character of initiator
of philosophy. He is the first that trod the ground of
the interpretation of nature on principles of the under-
standing. How he made good his proposition cannot now
be exactly determined. He was probably led to his hj^o-
thesis, however, by the observation that moisture con-
stituted the germ and nourishment of things, that it
developed heat, that it was in general the formative,
life-giving, and life-possessing element. Then, from the
condensation and rarefaction of his primitive element, he
derived further, as it seems, the changes of things. The
process itself he has certainly not determined with any
greater precision.

Such, then, is the philosophical import of Thales. A
speculative philosopher in the more modern manner he
assuredly was not, and philosophical literature being yet
alien to the time, he does not appear, for prciSrvation of
his opinions, to have resorted to writing. In consequence
of his reputation for ethico-political wisdom, he is included
among the seven sages, and the characteristics which
the ancients relate of him certainly testify specially to
his practical understanding. It is reported of him, for
instance, that he was the first to calculate an eclipse of

10 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

the sun, that, in order to enable Croesus to cross the
Halys, he effected a diversion of that river, and that he
performed other similar feats. In regard to the state-
ments of later authorities, that he had asserted the unity
of the world, advanced the idea of a world-soul or of a
world-forming spirit, taught the immortality of the soul,
etc., these are to be regarded as beyond doubt but un-
historical transpositions of later ideas to a much less de-
veloped stand-i)oint.

2. ANAXiMA>rDER. — Auaximaudcr of Miletus, who is
described by the ancients sometimes as a disciple and
sometimes as a contemporary of Thales, but who, under
every supposition, was somewhere about a generation
younger than he, endeavoured still further to develop
the principle of the latter. He defined his primitive
matter, in connexion with which he is supposed to be the
first who used the term principle [apxn), as the 'eternal,
infinite, indefinite ground, from which, in order of time,
all arises, and into which all returns,' as that which
comprehends and rules all the spheres of the universe,
but which, underlying every individual form of the finite
and mutable, is itself infinite and indefinite. How we
are to think this principle of Anaximander is a question
in dispute. It was certainly not one of the four usual
elements. As certainly, again, it was not something
immaterial, but was probably conceived by Anaximander
as primal matter not yet sundered into its individual
elements, the 'prius in time, the chemical indifi"erence of
our modern elementary contraries. In this respect, such
primitive matter is doubtless ' unlimited ' and ' indefi-
nite,' or neither qualitatively defined nor quantitatively
limited. It is by no means on that account, however, to
be regarded as a pure dynamical principle, as, for in-
stance, the friendship and hatred of Empedocles, but only
as a more philosophical expression for the thought which
the ancients endeavoured to represent by the supposition
of chaos. Accordingly, Anaximander conceives the
original contraries of heat and cold (as bases of the ele-
ments and of life) to separate from his primitive matter
by virtue of an eternal movement immanent in it ; and
in this way it is clearly proved that his primitive matter
is only the undeveloped, vmdivided potential being of
these elemental contraries.

3. Anaximenes. — Anaximenes, a disciple or a contem-
porary of Anaximander, returned in some degree, to the

THE PYTHAGOREANS. 11

fundamental views of Tbales, in so far as be conceived

i1u' jirinciple of the universe to be the 'unlimited, all-

nracing, ever-moving air,' from which by rarefaction

<■) and condensation (water, earth, stone), everything

' is formed. The fact of the air surrounding the

>le world, and of the breath being the condition of

x.ic, seems to have led him to this hypothesis.

4. Retrospect. — The three earliest Ionic philosophers
have thua, and to this their entire pliilosoi)hy reduces it-
self, (a) sought the universal primitive matter of existence
in general ; (6) found this in a material substrate ; and
(c) given some intimations in regard to the derivation
from this primitive matter of the fundamental forms of
nature.

V. — The Pythagoreans,

IKE Position of this School. — The Ionic philosophy,
I as we have seen, developed a tendency to abstract
from the immediately given, individual quality of matter.
We have the same abstraction, but on a higher stage,
when the sensuous concretion of matter in general is
looked away from ; when attention is turned no longer
to the qualitative character of matter, as water, air,
etc., but to its quantitative character, its quantitative
measure and relations ; when reflection is directed, not
to the material, but to the form and order of things as
they exist in space. But the specific nature of quantity
is wholly expressed in numbers, or, as we may also term
it, in the cipher. Now this is the principle and the
position of the Pythagoreans.

2. HiSTOEiCAL Features. — The numerical system in
question is referred to Pythagoras of Samos, who is said
to have flourished between the years 540 and 500 B.c.
The later years of his life, however, were passed at
Crotona, in Graecia Magna ; where, with a view to the
social and political regeneration of the cities of Lower
Italy, disturbed at that time by the strifes of parties, he
founded a society, the members of which bound them-
selves to purity and piety of Hfe, to the closest reciprocal
friendship, and to co-operation in maintaining the mora-
lity and discipline, the order and harmony, of the whole
community. What is handed down to us concerning
the life of P5i;hagoras, his travels, his political influence
in Southern Italy, etc., is so thoroughly interwoven with

12 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY,

traditions, legends, and palpable fables, that on no point
are we certain of having historical ground beneath us.
Nor is this unintelligible when we consider, not only the
partiality of the Pythagoreans themselves for the myste-
rious and the esoteric, but especially the fact that his
Neo-Platonic biographers, Porphjrry and lambHchus, have
written his life in the manner of an historico-philosophi-
cal romance. The same uncertainty obtains as regards
his doctrine, and specially his share in the number-
theory ; which is nowhere attributed by Aristotle to him
specially, but only to the Pythagoreans in general ; from
which we may suppose that it had received its comple-
tion only within the entire society. The accounts with
reference to his school acquire some degree of security
only towards the time of Socrates, or a hundred years
after his own death. To the few points of light in
this connexion belong the Pythagoreans, Philolaus and
Archytas, the latter a contemporary of Plato, and
the former mentioned in the Phcedo. We possess the
doctrine of the school also only in the shape into
which it has been brought by these, and by Eurytus ;
for none of their predecessors has left anything in writ-
ing.

3. The Pythagorean Principle. — The fundamental
thought of the Pythagoreans was that of proportion and
harmony : this idea is to them, as well the principle of
practical life, as the supreme law of the universe.
Their cosmology regarded the world as a symmetrically
arranged whole, that united in harmony within itself all
the varieties and contrarieties of existence. This view
especially announces itself in the doctrine that all the
spheres of the universe (the earth among them), move
in prescribed paths around a common focus, the central
fire, from which light, heat, and life radiate into the
whole world. This idea, that the world is, in definite
forms and proportion, an harmoniously articulated whole,
has for its metaphysical foundation and support the
Pythagorean number-theory. It is through numbers
that the quantitative relations of things, as extension,
magnitude, figure (triangle, square, cube, etc.), distance,
combination, etc., properly receive each its own indi-
vidual quality. All forms and proportions of things are
referred at last to number. So, then, it was concluded,
as there exists nothing whatever without form and
measure, number is necessarily the principle of things

THE PYTHAGOREANS. 13

themselves, as well as of the order which they exhibit in
the workl. The accounts of the ancients are not agreed
as to whether number was considered by the Pythago-
nans an actually material or a merely ideal principle,
that is, a primitive form, according to which all had been
(irdered and disposed. Even the relative statements of
Aristotle seem mutually contradictory. Sometimes he
speaks in the one sense, and sometimes in the other.
Later writers have supposed, therefore, that the theory
had undergone several forms of development, and that,
accordingly, there had been Pythagoreans of both
opinions, now that numbers were material substances,
ami now that they were only the archetypes of things.
We have a hint in Aristotle too, that indicates how we
may unite the two opinions. Originally the Pythago-
reans, without doubt, held number to be the stuflF, the
inherent essence and substance of things ; and so it is
that, in this reference, Aristotle ranks them with the
Hylicists or Ionic physicists, and roundly says of them :
' They held things to be numbers ' {Meta. i. 5, 6). But,
again, as these Hylicists identified not their 1/X77, their
materia — water, for example — directly with any particular
individual of actual sense, but looked at it only as the
materia priina, or prototype, of the several individual
things, so numbers were capable of being regarded as
similar prototjrpes, and Aristotle, in that reference, might
justly say of the Pythagoreans : *They held numbers to
be more adequate prototypes of existence than water, air,
etc' Should there stul appear to remain, nevertheless,
any uncertainty in the expressions of Aristotle in regard
to the meaning of the Pythagorean number-theory, its
source can only lie in this, that the Pythagoreans them-
selves had not made the distinction between an ideal and
a material principle, but had contented themselves with
the general proposition that number was the principle of
things, that all was number.

4. The Principle in Operation. — From the nature
of the principle, we readily expect that its application in
explanation of the various real spheres will end in a mere
empty, barren symbolism. In discriminating number,
for example, into its two kinds of odd and even, as into
its inherent antithesis of limited and imlimited, and then
in applying these distinctions to astronomy, music, psy-
chology, ethics, etc., there arose such combinations as
these : One is the point, two the line, three the plane.

14 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY,

four the solid, five the quality, etc., or the soul is a har-
mony, and equally so virtue, etc. Not only philosophi-
cal, but even historical interest disappears here ; and it ia
intelligible how unavoidably the ancients themselves have,
in the case of such arbitrary combinations, furnished us
with the most discrepant accounts. Thus we hear that
justice was to the Pythagoreans now three, now four,
now five, and now nine. Naturally, in the case of so
loose and arbitrary a mode of philosophizing, a great
diversity of individual views will arise earlier than in
other schools; some preferring one interpretation of a
given mathematical form, and some another. What
alone has any truth or importance in this arithmetical
mystic is the leading thought that law, order, and agree-
ment obtain in the affairs of nature, and that these rela-
tions are capable of being expressed in number and
measure. But this truth the Pythagoreans have hidden
away among the phantasies of a fanaticism at once un-
bridled and cold.

If we except the movements assigned to the earth and
stars, there is but little of scientific merit in the physics
of the Pythagoreans. Their ethics, too, are deficient.
What has been transmitted to us in that respect is
characteristic rather of the life and discipline of their
peculiar society, than of their philosophy. The whole
tendency of the Pythagoreans, in a practical aspect, was
ascetic, and aimed only at a rigid castigation of the
moral principle. Their conception of the body as a prison
of the soul, which latter, for its part, belonged to loftier
regions, their tenet of the transmigration of souls into
the bodies of animals, from which only a pure and pious
life delivered, their representations of the severe penalties
of the other world, their prescript that man should regard
himseK as property of God, that he should obey God in
all things, that he should strive after likeness with God, —
ideas which Plato has considered and further developed,
especially in the Phcedo, — are all capable of being alleged
in proof.

YI.—The Eleatica.

RELATION OF THE Eleatio Principle to the
Pythagorean. — If the Pythagoreans made mate-
rial substance, so far as it is quantitative, multiplex,
and consistent of parts, the basis of their philosophy,

THE ELBA TICS. 16

niul abstracted consequently only from its definite ele-
lutMitary quality, the Eleatics now went a step farther,
niul, drawing the last consequence of this abstracting
jMoccss, took for })rincii)le a total abstraction from every
linite particular, from all change, from all vicissitude of
existence. If the Pj'thagoreans still held fast by the
Jonti of space and time, the negation of this, the nega-
tion, that is, of all dividedness in space and successive-
lu'ss in time, has now become the fundamental thought
of the Eleatics. ' Only being is, and non-being (becom-
ing) is not at all.' This being is the pure characterless,
changeless, general ground, not being that is contained
in becoming, but being with exclusion of all becoming,
bi'ing that is pure being and only to be comprehended in
thought.

Eleaticism is consequently monism, so far as it endea-
vours to reduce the manifold of existence to a single
ultimate principle ; but it falls into dualism so far as it
can neither carry out the denial of the phenomenal world
of finite existence, nor deduce this world from the pre-
supposed general ground of pure being. The phenomenal
world, though explained to be only inessential null show,
still is ; there must be left to it (sensuous perception
refusing to be got out of the way), the right of existence
at least hypothetically ; there must be procured for it, if
even under protest and proviso, a genetic explanation.
This contradiction of an unreconciled dualism between
pure and phenomenal being is the point where the Eleatic
philosophy discloses its own insufficiency ; though not
seen at first in the beginning of the school, under Xeno-
phanes. The principle, together with its consequences,
developed itself only in course of time ; running through
three successive periods, which distribute themselves to
three successive generations. The foundation of the
Eleatic school belongs to Xenophanes, its systematic
development to Parmenides, its completion, and in part
its resolution, to Zeno and Melissus (which latter we
here omit).

2. Xenophanes. — Xenophanes, a native of Colophon
in Asia Minor, but who had emigrated to the Phocsean
colony of Elea (in Lucania), a younger contemporary of
Pythagoras, is the originator of the Eleatic tendency.
He seems the first to have enunciated the proposition, * aU
is one,' without specifying further, however, whether
this unity be intellectual or material. Directing hi»

16 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY,

regards to the world as a whole, says Aristotle, he called
God the one. The Eleatic 'One and All' {^v koI irav)
had still with him a theological, or a religious character.
The idea of the unity of God, and the polemic against
the anthropomorphism of the popular religion, this is his
starting-point. He is indignant at the delusion that the
gods were born, had human voices, shape, etc., and he
inveighs against Homer and Hesiod for that they have
imputed to the gods robbery, adultery, fraud, etc. God
with him is all eye, understanding, ear; unmoved, un-
divided, undistui'bed ; ruling all through thought ; and
like to men neither in form nor understanding. In this
manner, mainly intent on diverting from God all terms
and predicates of finitude, and establishing his unity and
immutableness, he enunciated at the same time this his
true nature as the highest philosophical principle without
however negatively carrying it out, by polemically turn-
ing it against finite being.

3. Parmenides. — The special head of the Eleatic
school is Parmenides of Elea, a disciple, or at all events
an adherent, of Xenophanes. However little has been
transmitted to us for certain of the circumstances of his
life, yet all antiquity is unanimous in the expression of
its veneration for the Eleatic sage, and in admiration of
the depth of his intellect, and of the earnestness and
sublimity of his character, and the phrase, ' a Parmeni-
dean life ' became later, amongst the Greeks, pro-
verbial.

Parmenides, like Xenophanes before him, gave his
philosophy to the world in the shape of an epic poem,
of which some considerable fragments are still preserved
to us. It is divided into two parts. In the first part
Parmenides discusses the notion of being. Raising him-
self far above the unreasoned conception of Xenophanes,
he directly opposes this notion, pure simple being, to all
that is multiplex and mutable, as to what is non-beent
and consequently unthinkable ; and excludes from being
not only all origination and decease, but also all elements
of time and space, and all divisibility, diversity, and
movement. This being he declares to be unbecome and
imperishable, whole and sole, immutable and illimitable,
indivisibly and timelessly present, perfectly and univer-
sally self -identical ; and he appropriates to it, as single
positive character (for previous characters had only been
negative) — thought : ' being and thought are' to him

THE ELEA TICS. 17

*one and the same.' In contrast to the deceptive and
illusory ideas of multiplicity and change in the ])heuo-
mena of sense, he designates the pure thought that is
directed to this being as alone the true and infallible
knowledge. Nor does he hesitate to regard as non-beent
and as illusion what mortals consider truth, namely origin
and decease, perishable existence, multiplicity and diver-
sity, change of place, and alteration of quality. We
must be on our guard, then, against taking the one of
Parmenides for the collective unity of all that is.

Thus far the first part of the Parmenidean poem.
After the proposition, that only being is, has been deve-
loped in its negative and positive relations, we naturally
believe the system at its end. But there follows now a
second part which occupies itself hypothetically with the
explanation and physical derivation of the non-beent,
that is, of the phenomenal world. Though firmly con-
^'inced that, in truth and reason, only the one is, Par-
menides is unable to escape the recognition of a pheno-
menal and mutable complex. He prefaces, therefore, —
as, compelled by sensuous perception, he passes to the dis-
cussion of the phenomenal world, — this second part, with
the remark, that truth's discourse and thought are now
ended, and henceforth it is only mortal opinion that is to
be considered. Unfortunately this second part has come
down to us very incomplete. This much may be gathered :
he explains the phenomena of nature by the mixture of
two immutable elements, designated by Aristotle as heat
and cold, fire and earth. Of these Aristotle remarks
further, he collocates the hot with the beent, the other
with the non-beent. All things are made up of these
antitheses : the more fire, so much the more being, life,
consciousness ; the more cold and immobility, so much
the more lifelessness. The principle of the unity of all
being is only preserved in this way, that in man the
sensitive and intellective substance, body and soul, are,
according to Parmenides, one and the same.

It need scarcely be remarked, that between the two
parts of this philosophy, the doctrine of being and the
doctrine of seeming, no scientific inward connexion has
place. "What in the first part Parmenides directly denies,
and even declares incapable of being spoken, the non-
beent, the multiplex and mutable, this he grants in the
second part as at least existent in human conception.
But it is clear that the non-beent could not exist even

18 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

in conception, if it existed not altogether and through-
out ; and that the attempt to explain a non-beent of
conception completely contradicts any exclusive acknow-
ledgment of the beent. This contradiction, the undemon-
strated collocation of the beent and the non-beent, of the
one and the many, was attempted to be surmounted by
the disciple of Parmenides, Zeno, who sought, supported
by the notion of being, dialecticaUy to eliminate sensuous
knowledge and the world consequently of the non-beent.
4. Zend. — The Eleatic Zeno, bom about 500 b.c., a
disciple of Parmenides, dialecticaUy developed the doc-
trine of his master, and carried out, the most rigorously of
all, the abstraction of the Eleatic one as in contrast to
the multiplicity and natural qualitative individuality of
the finite. He justified the doctrine of the one, sole,
simple, and immutable being by indirect method, through
demonstration of the contradictions in which the ordinary
beliefs of the phenomenal world become entangled. If
Parmenides maintained that only the one is, Zeno, for
his part, polemically showed that there is possible
neither (1.) multiplicity, nor (2.) movement, because these
notions lead to contradictory consequences. (1.) The
many is an aggregate of units, of wbich it is made up ;
but an actual unit (a unit that is not again multiple) is
necessarily indivisible ; but what is indivisible has no
longer any magnitude (else, of course, it might be divid-
ed) ; consequently the many cannot have any magni-
tude, and must be infinitely little. Would we evade
this conclusion (on the ground that what has no magni-
tude is the same as nothing) then we must grant the
manies (the units of the many) to be seK-dependent
qvnnta. But a self-dependent quantum is only what has
itself magnitude, and is separated from other quanta by
something again that has also magnitude (as otherwise
it would coalesce with them). These separating quanta
again must (for the same reason) be separated, from those
which they separate, by yet others, and so on ; all,
therefore, is separated from all by infinitely numerous
quanta ; all limited, definite magnitude disappears, there
is nothing in existence but infinite magnitude. Further,
if there is a many (a multiple of parts) it must be in
respect of number, limited ; for it is just as much as it
is, no more, and no less. But the many must be equally
unlimited in respect of number ; for between that which
is (any one part viewed as independent quantum)^ there

IIEIUCLITUS. 19

is always, again, a third (a tertium quid, meaning the
necessarily inferred separating quantum), and so on ad
injinitum. (2.) A moving body must before reaching
term, accomplish one half of the distance to it, but of
this half again it must previously accomplish the half,
and so on ; in short it must pass through infinite spaces,
whicli is impossible ; consequently there is no getting
from one spot to another, no movement ; motion can
never get a start, for every space-part required to be de-
scribed, sunders again into iu finite space-parts. Further,
at rest means to be in one and the same place. If we
divide the time, then, during which an arrow flies into
moments (each a now), then the arrow in each of these
moments (that is, now), is only in one place ; therefore,
it is always at rest, and the motion is merely apparent.
On account of these arguments, which first directed
attention — and at least in part justly — to certain difii-
culties and antinomies involved in the infinite divisibi-
lity of matter, space, and time, Zeno is named by Aris-
totle the originator of dialectic. By Zeno, Plato too
has been essentially influenced.

Zeno's philosophy, however, as it is the completion
of the Eleatic principle, so also is it the beginning of its
end. Zeno took up the antithesis of being and non-
being so abstractly, and overstrained it so, that the
inner contradiction of the principle became mucli more
glaringly prominent with him than even with Parmenides.
For the more consequent he is in the denial of an exist-
ence of sense, so much the more striking must the con-
tradiction seem, on one side to apply his whole philoso-
phic faculty to the refutation of sensuous beUef, and on
the other side to oppose to it a doctrine which destroys
the possibility of the false existence itself.

Vn. — Heraclitus.

T) ELATION OF the Heraclitic to the Eleatic
XL Principle. — Pure being and phenomenal being,
the one and the many, faU, in the Eleatic principle,
apart from each other : the attempted monism results
in an ill-concealed dualism. Heraclitus reconciles this
contradiction by enunciating as the truth of being and
non-being, of the one and the many, the at once of both,
— becoming. If the Eleatics persist in the dilemma, the

20 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

world is either beent or non-beent, Heraclitus answers,
It is neither of them, because it is both of them.

2. Historical Characteristics. — Heraclitus of Ephe-
sus, by his successors surnamed the Dark, flourished
about the year 460 b.c., or later than Xenophanes, and
nearly contemporaneously with Parmenides. He was
the deepest of the pre-Socratic philosophers. His philo-
sophical thoughts are contained in a work, ' On Nature,'
of which a few fragments still remain. This work, made
difficult by the abrupt transitions, the intensely pregnant
expression, and the philosophical originality of Heracli-
tus himself, perhaps also by the antiquatedness of the
earliest prose, became, for its unintelligibleness, very
soon proverbial. Socrates said of it, ' that what he
understood was excellent, what not he believed to be
equally so ; but that the book required a tough swim-
mer.' Later writers, particularly Stoics, have commen-
tated it.

3. The Principle of Becoming. — As principle of
HeracHtus, the idea is unanimously assigned by the an-
cients, that the totality of things is in eternal flux, in
uninterrupted motion and mutation, and that their per-
manence is only illusion. * Into the same river,' a saying
of his ran, * we go down, and we do not go down. For,
into the same river no man can enter twice ; ever it dis-
perses itself and collects itself again, or rather, at once it
flows-in and flows-out.' Nothing, he said, remains the
same, all comes and goes, resolves itself and passes into
other forms ; out of all comes all, from life death, from
the dead, life ; there is everywhere and eternally only
this one process of the alternation of birth and decay.
It is maintained, not without reason, then, that Heraclitus
banished peace and permanence out of the world of
things, and when he accuses ears and eyes of deception,
he doubtless means in a like reference, that they delude
men with a show of permanence where there is only
uninterrupted change.

It is in further development of the principle that
Heraclitus intimates that all becoming is to be conceived
as the result of opposing adversatives, as the harmonious
conjunction of hostile principles. If what is did not con-
tinually sunder into contrarieties, which are distinguished
from each other, which oppose each other, partly driving
off and supplanting one another, partly attracting and
supplementing, and flowing over into one another, all —

IIERACLITUS. 21

all actuality and life — would cease and decease. Hence
tlie two familiar dicta — ' Strife is the father of things,'
and ' The one, sundering from itself, coalesces with itself,
like the harmony of the bow and the lyre.' That is,
there is unity in the world only so far as the life of the
world parts into antitheses, in the conjunction and con-
ciliation of which, indeed, this very unity consists.
Unity presupposes duality, harmony discord, attraction
repulsion, and only by the one is the other realized.
'Join together,' runs another of his dicta, * whole and
uuwhole, congruous and incongruous, accordant and dis-
cordant, then comes from all one, from one all.'

4. Fire, — In what relation to this principle of becom-
ing stands now the principle of fire, which is likewise
ascribed to Heraclitus ? Heraclitus, says Aristotle, made
fire the principle, as Thales water, and Anaximenes air.
But ob\aously we must not understand this statement aa
if Heraclitus, like the Hylicists, had made fire the pri-
mitive matter or element. He who ascribes reality only
to becoming itself, cannot possibly collocate with this
becoming an additional elementary matter as funda-
mental substance. When, therefore, Heraclitus names
the world an ever-living fire that, in due measure and
degree, extinguishes itself and again kindles itself, when
he says, all is exchanged for fire and fire for all, as things
for gold and gold for things, he can only understand by
this that fire, this restless, all-consuming, all-transmut-
ing, and equally (in heat) all-vivifying element, represents
the constant force of this eternal alteration and transfor-
mation, the notion of life, in the most \dvid and energetic
manner. We might name fire in the Heraclitic sense as
a symbol or manifestation of the becoming, if it were not
also with him at the same time substrate of the move-
ment, that is to say, the means of which the power of
motion, that is precedent to all matter, avails itself for
the production of the living process of things. Heracli-
tus then explains the multiplicity of things by the arrest-
ment and partial extinction of this fire, in consequence
of which it condenses itself into material elements, first
air, then water, then earth. But this fire acquires
equally again the preponderance over these obstructions,
and rekindles itself afresh. These two processes of extinc-
tion and ignition in this fire-power, alternate, according
to Heraclitus, in perpetual rotation with each other ; and
he taught, therefore, that in stated periods the world

22 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

resolves itself into the primal fire, in order to re-create
itself out of it again. Moreover, also, fire is to him,
even in individual things, the principle of movement, of
physical as of spiritual vitality ; the soul itself is a fiery
vapour ; its power and perfection depend on its being
pure from all grosser and duller elements. The practical
philosophy of Heraclitus requires that we should not
follow the deceitful delusions of sense which fetter us to
the changing and the perishable, but reason ; it teaches
us to know the true, the abiding in the mutable, and
especially leads us tranquilly to acquiesce in the neces-
sary order of the universe, and to perceive, even in that
which seems to us evil, an element that co-operates to
the harmony of the whole.

5. Transition to the Atomists. — The Eleatic and the
Heraclitic principles constitute the completest antithesis
to each other. If Heraclitus resolves all permanent
existence into an absolutely fluent becoming, Parmenides
resolves all becoming into an absolutely permanent
being, and even the senses, eye and ear, to which the
former imputes the error of transmuting the fleeting be-
coming into a settled being, are charged by the latter
with the false opinion which drags immovable being into
the process of becoming. We may say, accordingly, that
being and becoming are the equally justified antitheses
which demand for themselves mutual equalization and
conciliation. Heraclitus conceives the phenomenal world
as existent contradiction, and persists in this contradic-
tion as ultimate. That which the Eleatics believed
themselves obliged to deny, becoming, was not explained
by being siii ^ly maintained. The question ever recurs
again, Why is all being a becoming ? Why is the one
perpetually sundered into the many ? The answer to this
question, that is to say, the explanation of the becoming
from the preconceived principle of the being, is the posi-
tion and the problem of the philosophy of Empedocles
and of the Atomists.

VIII. — Empedocles.

GENERAL Survey. — Empedocles of Agrigentum, ex-
tolled by antiquity as statesman and orator, as
physicist, physician, and poet, even as prophet and worker
of miracles, flourished about the year 440 B.c.. was conse-

EMPEDOCLES. 23

qnently later than Parinenicles and Heraclitus, and wrote
a poem on nature, which is preserved to us in pretty
large fragments. His philosophical system may bo
briefly characterized as an attempt at a combination be-
tween Eleatic being and Heraclitic becoming. Proceed-
ing from the Eleatic thought, that neither what had
previously not been could become, nor what was perish,
he assumed, as imperishable being, four eternal, self-
subsistent, mutually inderivative, but divisible primal
matters (our own four elements). But, at the same time,
combining herewith the Heraclitic principle of process in
nature, he conceives his four elements to be mingled and
moulded by two moving forces, the uniting one of friend-
ship, and the disuniting one of strife. At first the four
elements existed together, absolutely one with each other,
and immovable in the Sphairos, that is, in the pure and
perfect globe-shaped divine primitive world, where
friendship maintained them in unity, till gradually strife^
penetrating from the periphery into the inner of the
Sphairos, that is, attaining to a disintegrating power,
broke up the unity, whereby the world of contrarieties
in which we live began to form itself.

2. The four Elements. — With his doctrine of the four
elements, Empedocles unites himself, on the one hand, to
the series of Ionic physicists, and on the other hand, he
separates himself from these by his elementary four, as
originator of which he is pointedly designated by the
ancients. He distinguishes himself from the old Hylicists
more definitely in this way, that he attributes to his four
'radical elements' an immutable being, by virtue of
which they arise not out of each other, nor pass over into
each other, and in general are capable not of any change
in themselves, but only in theii* mutual composition. All
that is called origination and decease, all mutation, rests
therefore only on the mingling and unmingling of these
eternal primitive elements ; all the inexhaustible multi-
plicity of being on their various relations of intermixture.
All becoming is thus now thought only as change of
place. (Mechanical as opposed to dynamical explanation
of nature.)

3. The two Forces. — Whence becoming now, if in
matter itself there lie no principle and no ground ex-
planatory of change ? As Empedocles neither denied
change, like the Eleatics, nor placed it, like Heraclitus,
as an immanent principle in matter, there remained

24 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

nothing for him but to set beside matter a moving force.
But, again, the antithesis of one and many attaching to
his predecessors (and which called for an explanation)
laid him under an obligation also to attribute to this
moving force two originally different directions, — on one
side a separating or repulsive tendency, and on the other
an attractive one. The sundering of the one into many
and the conjoining of the many into one, alone pointed to
an opposition of forces which already Heraclitus had
recognised. Tf Parmenides, now, with his principle of
unity, so to speak, had adopted love for principle, and if
Heraclitus, with his principle of the many, had selected
strife, Empedocles makes here also, as principle of his own
philosophy, the combination of both. He has not, it
is true, exactly determined for his two forces their spheres
of action as in mutual relation. Although, in propriety,
friendship is the attractive, strife the repulsive force,
nevertheless we find Empedocles at another time treat-
ing strife as the tendency of union and creation, and love
as that of separation. And, in effect, the truth is that,
in such a movement as becoming, any thorough disunion
of a separating and a uniting force, is an impossible abs-
traction.

4. Relation of the Philosophy of Empedocles to
THOSE OF THE Eleatics AND OF Heraclitüs. — In placing
by the side of matter, as element of being, a moving
force, as element of becoming, the philosophy of Empe-
docles is evidently a conciliation, or more properly a
collocation, of the Eleatic and the Heraclitic principles.
The systems of these two classes of predecessors he has
woven into his own philosophy in equal shares. With
the Eleatics, he denies origination and decease, that is,
transition of what is, into what is not, and of what is not,
into what is ; with Heraclitus he has an equal interest in
the explanation of change. From the former source he
takes the permanent immutable being of his primitive
matters ; from the latter, the principle of a moving force.
With the Eleatics, finally, he places true being in origi-
nal undistinguished unity as Sphairos ; with Heraclitus,
again, he conceives the world we possess as the continual
product of conflicting forces. It is with justice, then,
that he has been described as an eclectic, who united,
but not quite consequently, the fundamental ideas of his
two immediate predecessors.

THE ATOMISTS. 25

JX.— TJie Atomists.

THE FüüNT)ERS. — Like Empedocles, tlie Atomists,
Leucippus and Democritus, endeavoured to eflfeet a
combination of the Eleatie and Heraclitic principles, but
in another way. Democritus, the younger and better
known of the two, bom of wealthy parents, in the Ionian
colony of Abdera, about 4C0 b.c., travelled extensively
(he was the greatest polymath before Aristotle), and gave
to the world the riches of his gathered knowledge in a
series of writings, of which, however, only a very few
fragments have come down to us. For splendour and
music of eloqiience Cicero compares Democritus to Plato.
He lived to a great age.

2. The Atoms. — Instead of assuming, like Empedocles,
an aggregate of qualitatively determinate and distinct
primitive matters as original source, the Atomists derived
all phenomenal specific quality from a primeval infinitude
of original constituents, which, alike in quality, were un-
like in quantity. Their atoms are immutable material
particles, extended but indivisible, and differing from
each other only in size, shape, and weight. As existent,
but without quality, they are absolutely incapable of any
metamorphosis or qualitative alteration, so that, as with
Empedocles, all becoming is but local alteration ; plurality
in the phenomenal world is only to be explained by the
various figures, order, and positions of the atoms, which
present themselves, too, united in various complexions.

3. The Plenum akd the Vacuuini. — The atoms, to
be atoms, that is, simple and impenetrable units, must be
reciprocally bounded off and separated. There must exist
something of an opposite nature to themselves, that re-
ceives them as atoms, and renders possible their separa-
tion and mutual independence. This is empty space, or,
more particularly, the spaces existent between the atoms,
and by which they are kept asunder. The atoms, as
something beent and ßlled ; empty space, as what is void
or non-beent, — these two characters represent only in a
real, objective manner, what the moments of the Hera-
clitic becoming, being and non-being, are as logical
notions. Objective reality accrues thus to empty space
as a form of the beent not less than to the atoms, and
Democritus expressly maintained, as against the Elea«
tics, ' being is by nothing more real than nothing.*

26 HI ST OR Y OF PHILOSOPH Y.

4. Necessity. — With Democritus, as with Emperlocles,
and even more, there occurs the question as to the v)hence
of mutation and movement. What is the reason that
the atoms take on these multiform combinations, and
])roduce the wealth of the inorganic and organic worlds ?
Democritus tinds this in the nature of the atoms them-
selves, to which the vacuum affords room for their alter-
nate conjunctions and disjunctions. The atoms, vari«
ously heavy, and afloat in empty space, impinge on each
other. There arises thus a wider and wider expanding
movement throughout the general mass ; and, in conse-
quence of this movement, there take place the various
complexions, like-shaped atoms grouping themselves with
like-shaped. These complexions, however, by very
nature, always resolve themselves again ; and hence the
transitoriness of worldly things. But this explanation
of the formation of the world explains in effect nothing ;
it exhibits only the quite abstract idea of an infinite
causal series, but no sufficient ground of all the pheno-
mena of becoming and mutation. As such last ground
there remained, therefore (Democritus expressly oppos-
ing the foOj, reason, of Anaxagoras), only absolute pre-
destination or necessity [avdy kt]), which, as in contrast
to the final causes of Anaxagoras, he is said to have
named t^x^^ chance. The resiütant polemic against the
popular gods, the idea of whom Democritus derived
from the fear occasioned by atmospheric and stellar
phenomena, and an ever more openly declared atheism
and naturaUsm, constituted the prominent peculiarity of
the later Atomistic school, which, in Diagoras of Melos,
the so-called atheist, culminated in a complete sophistic.

5. Position of the Atomtsts. — Hegel characterizes this
position thus : ' In the Eleatic philosophy, being and non-
being are as in mutual contradiction, — only being is, non-
being is not. In the Heraclitic idea being and non-being
are the same, both are together, or becoming is predicate
of the beent. Being and non-being, again, conceived as
objects for the perception of sense, constitute the anti-
thesis of the plenum and the vacuum. As the abstract
universal, Parmenides assumes being, Heraclitus pro-
cess, the Atomists individual being (individuality as in
an atom).' So much is correct here, that the predicate of
individual being is certainly pertinent to the atoms ; but
then the thought of the Atomists, and perhaps, of Empe-
docles, is rather this, that, under presupposition of these

ANAXaOORAS. 27

individual unqualified substances, there be explained the
l'.>;=;sibility of mutation. To that end, the side which is
;i verse from the Eloatic principle, that of non-being or the
A "id, is formed and perfected with no less care than the
side which is related to it, the primitive independence of
tho atoms, namely, and their want of quality. The Ato«
mists in this way constitute a conciliation between Hera-
tlitus and the Eleatics. Their atoms, for example, are,
ou the one hand, in their indivisible oneness, Eleatic, but,
j on the other, in their composite plurality, Heraclitic.
Their absolute filledness, again, is Eleatic, while a real
non-being, the vacuum, is Heraclitic. Lastly, the denial
of becoming, or of origination and decease, is Eleatic,
whereas the assertion of motion and of infinite power of
combination is Heraclitic. Than Empedocles, at all
events, Democritus has much more consequently worked
out his thought ; nay, we may say that he has completed
the mechanical explanation of nature : his are the ideas
that constitute the main ideas of every Atomistic theory
up even to the present day. The radical defect, for the
rest, of all such theories, was already signalized by Aris-
totle, when he pointed out that it is a contradiction to
assume the indivisibility of what is corporeal and spatial,
and so derive what is extended from what is not ex-
tended, as well as that the unconscious, motiveless neces-
sity of Democritus banishes from nature any notion of a
final cause. It is this latter fault, common as yet to all
the systems, which the next system, that of Anaxagoras,
begins, by its doctrine of a designing intelligence, to re-
move.

X. — A naxagoras.

PERSONAL. — Anaxagoras, bom in Clazomenae about
the year 500, scion of a rich and noble house, again
one of those who, in the exclusive investigation of nature
and its laws, recognise the purpose of their life, took up,
soon after the Persian war, his abode in Athens, and
lived a considerable time there, till, being accused of
blasphemy, he was forced to flee to Lampsacus, where he
died, much respected and highly honoured, at the age of
seventy-two. It was he who transplanted philosophy to
Athens, which thenceforward became the centre of
Grecian culture. By his personal relations also, espe-
cially with Pericles, Euripides, and other men of mark, he

28 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

exercised a decided influence on the progress of the time.
The accusation of blasphemy was itself a proof of this ;
for it was raised, doubtless, by the political opponents of
Pericles. Anaxagoras wrote a work * On Nature,* which
was widely current in the time of Socrates.

2. His relation to Predecessors. — The system of
Anaxagoras rests wholly on the presuppositions of his
predecessors, and is simply another attempt to solve the
problem which they had set up. Like Empedocles and
the Atomists, Anaxagoras, too, denies becoming in the
proper sense. * The Greeks,' runs one of his phrases,
' erroneously assume origination and destruction, for
nothing originates and nothing is destroyed ; all is only
mixed or unmixed out of pre-existent things ; and it were
more correct to name the one process composition, and
the other decomposition.' From this view, separation of
matter and of moving force follows, for him as well as
for his predecessors. But it is here that Anaxagoras
strikes off in the direction peculiar to himself. Hitherto
the moving force plainly had been imperfectly conceived.
The mythical powers of love and hate, the blind neces-
sity of the mechanical theory, explained nothing; or at
least, whatever they .explained, they certainly explained
not the existence of design in the process of nature.
It was consequently seen to be necessary that this
notion of design should be identified with that of the
moving power. This Anaxagoras accomplished by his
idea of a world-forming intelligence {vov%) that was abso-
lutely separated and free from matter, and that acted on
design.

3. The principle of voOs. — Anaxagoras describes this
intelligence as spontaneously operative, unmixed with
anything, the ground of all motion, but itself unmoved,
everywhere actively present, and of all things the finest
and purest. If these predicates, in part, rest still on
physical analogies, and disclose not yet the notion of im-
materiality in its purity, the attribute, on the other hand,
of thought and conscious action on design, which Anaxa-
goras ascribed to the vovt, leaves no doubt of the dis-
tinctly ideahstic character of his principle otherwise.
He remained standing by the mere statement of his main
thought, nevertheless, and procured not for it any fulness
of completion. The explanation of this lies in the origin
and genetic presuppositions of his principle. It was only
the necessity of a moving cause, possessed at the same

A2^AXAG0nAS. 29

time of desiguing activity, that had brought him to the
idea of an immaterial j)rinciple. His vovs is in strictness,
therefore, only a mover of matter : in this function its
entire virtue is almost quite exhausted. Hence the
unanimous complaints of the ancients (especially of Plato
and Aristotle), of the mechanical character of his doctrine.
Socrates relates in Plato's Phcedo that, in the hope of
being brought beyond merely occasional or secondary
causes and up to final causes, he had applied himself to
the work of Anaxagoras, but, instead of any truly teleo-
logical explanation of existence, had found everywhere
only a mechanical one. And, like Plato, Aristotle also
complains that Anaxagoras named indeed mind as ulti-
mate principle of things, but, in explanation of existent
phenomena, sought its aid onl^^ as deus ex machina, —
there, that is, where he was unable to deduce their neces-
ijity from any natural causes. Anaxagoras thus, then, has
rather postulated than demonstrated mind as the power
in nature, as the truth and reality of material existence.

Side by side with the vovs^ and equally original with it,
there stands, according to Anaxagoras, the mass of the
primitive constituents of things : * all things were to-
gether, infinitely numerous, infinitely little ; then came
the yovs and set them in order.* These primitive con-
stituents are not general elements, like those of Empe-
docles, fire, air, water, earth (which to Anaxagoras are
already compound and not simple materials) ; but they
are the identical, infinitely complex materials, constitu-
tive of the individual existent things (stone, gold, bone-
stiuff, etc., and hence, by succeeding writers, called
o/jLOLo/xepi] or d/ioLOfiipcLai^ like parts, parts, that is, like to
their wholes), ' the germs of all things,' pre-existent there,
infinitely small, infinitely simple, and in perfectly chaotic
intermixture. The povs brought movement into this
inert mass in the form of a vortex that perpetuates itself
for ever. This vortex separates the like parts and brings
them together, not however, to the complete exclusion of
all intermixture of like with unlike ; rather, * in all there
is something of all,' or each thing consists for the most
part of its own likes so to speak, but contains within
it representatives of all the other primitive constituents
as welL In the case of organized beings, more especially,
we have the presence of the matter-moving povs, which,
as animating soul, is immanent in all living beings (plants,
animals, men), but in different degrees of amount and

30 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY. .

power. In this way we see that it is the business of the
vov$ to dispose all things, each in accordance with its own
nature, into a universe, that shall comprehend within it
the most manifold forms of existence, and to enter into,
and identify itself with this universe as the power of in-
dividual vitality.

4. Anaxagoras as the termination and close of the
Pre-Socratic Realism. — With the j'oOs, with the acqui-
sition of an immaterial principle, the realistic period of
early Greek philosophy concludes. Anaxagoras brings all
preceding principles into unity and totality. His chaos
of primitively intermingled things represents the infinite
matter of the Hylicists ; the pure being of the Eleatics
is to be found in his vodt, as both the becoming of Hera-
clitus and the moving forces of Empedocles in his shaping
and regulating power of an eternal mind ; and in his like
parts or homoeomeries we have the atoms. Anaxagoras
is the last of an old and the first of a new series of deve-
lopment ; the one by the proposition, the other by the
incompleteness and persistently physical nature, of his
ideal principle.

XI.— The SapJiists.

RELATION OF THE Sophists to the earlier Philo-
sophers.— The preceding philosophers all tacitly
assume that our subjective consciousness is in subordi-
nation and subjection to objective actuality, or that the
objectivity of things is the source of our knowledge. In
the Sophists a new principle appears, the principle of sub-
jectivity ; the view, namely, that things are as they seem
to us, and that any universal truth exists not. The way
was prepared for this position, however, by the philosophy
that preceded it. The Heraclitic doctrine of the flux of
all things, Zeno's dialectic against the phenomenal world,
offered weapons enough for the sceptical questioning of
all stable and objective truth, and even in the vovs of
Anaxagoras, thought was virtually opposed to objectivity
as the higher principle. On this new-won field now the
Sophists disported, enjoying with boyish exuberance the
exercise of the power of subjectivity, and destroying,
by means of a subjective dialectic, all that had been
ever objectively established. The individual subject
recognises himself now as the higher existence and vali-

TUE SOPHISTS. 31

dity when opposed to the ohjective world, when opposed,
particularly, to the laws of the state, to inherited cus-
tom, to religious tradition, to popular belief ; he seeks to
prescribe his laws to the objective world, and, instead of
seeing in the given inherited objectivity, the historical
realization of reason, he perceives in it only an unspiri-
tualized dead material on which to exercise his own
freedom. What characterizes the Sophists, then, is illu-
minated reflection. They have no philosophical system ;
for their doctrines and dicta display often so very popular
and trivial a character, that they would on that account
deserve no place whatever in the historj' of philosophy.
Neither can they be said to compose, in any usual sense,
a school; for Plato mentions, for example, under the
common appellation of ' Sophists,' a very great many
different individuals. "\Miat distinguishes them, then, is
a spiritual movement of the time, M-ith many ram idea-
tions, and with its roots in the entire social, political,
and rehgious character of Hellenic life then — in short, it
is the Greek Äujklärun<jy the Greek illain'tnation,

2. Relation of the Sophists to the general lite of
i THK TIME. — The Sophists are theoretical! j' what, during
: the Peloponnesian war, Greek political life was practically.
I Plato justly remarks in the Hepublic that the doctrines
I of the Sophists express properly only the same principles
; which guided the practice of the multitude in their civil
I and social relations, and that the hate with which they
I were persecuted by actual statesmen, precisely proves the
j jealousy with which the latter saw in them as it were
I the rivals and mar-plots of their own policy. If, in fact,
: the absoluteness of the empirical subject (that is, the
■ opinion that the single ego may determine quite at its
own discretion what shall be true, just, good) is the
principle of the Sophists theoretically, then in the boimd-
less egotism that existed at that time in all the depart-
ments of life, both public and private, we have but the
i same principle practically appHed. Public life was become
j an arena of passion and self-seeking ; the party -strifes,
I which agitated Athens during the Peloponnesian war,
had blunted and stifled the moral sentiment ; every one
accustomed himself to set his own private interest above
i that of the state and of the common good, and to seek in
liis own self-will and his own advantage the standard of
his action and the principle of his guidance. The axiom
of Protagoras, man is the measure of all things, was in

,12 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

practice only all too truly followed, while the influence
of rhetoric in public assemblies and decisions, the corrup-
tion of the masses and their leaders, the weak points
which cupidity, vanity, and party-spirit betrayed to the
crafty, oflFered only all too much occasion for its exercise.
What was established, and had come down so, had lost
its authority, political regulation appeared as arbitrary
restriction, moral principle as a resvdt of calculated
political training, faith in the gods as human invention
for the intimidation of free activity, piety as a statute of
human origin which every man had a right to alter by the
art of persuasion. This reduction of the necessity and
universaHty of nature and reason to the contingency of
mere human appointment, is mainly the point where the
Sophists are in contact with the general consciousness of
the cultivated classes of the time ; and it is impossible
to decide what share theory had here, and what practice ;
whether the Sophists only found practical life in a theo-
retical formula, or whether the social corruption waa
rather a consequence of the destructive influence which
the Sophists exercised over the entire circle of the opinion?
of their contemporaries.

Nevertheless it would be to mistake the spirit of his-
tory, did we only condemn the epoch of the Sophists, and
not allow it a relative justification. The peculiarities
described were in part necessary results of the whole
historical development. That belief in the popular reli-
gion so precipitately collapsed, this was only because the
religion itself possessed no longer any inner moral vali-
dity. Mythological example might be alleged in justifi-
cation or excuse of the greatest vices and the vilest
actions ; and even Plato, however much a friend to
ancestral piety and faith, accuses the poets of having
corrupted the moral sentiments of the people by the un-
worthy representations they had spread abroad in regard
to the world of gods and heroes. It was inevitable too
that advancing science should disturb tradition. The
Hylicists from of old lived in open hostility to the popu-
lar religion, and the more convincingly they demonstrated
in analogies and laws the natural causes of many things
in which the direct action of divine power had been
hitherto recognised, the more readily would the educated
classes come to doubt of all their previous convictions, i
It was no wonder, then, if this altered spirit of the time]
penetrated into every province of art and poetry, if ii

THE SOPHISTS. 33

sculpture, quite in analoijy with the rhetorical arts of the
Sophists, the sentimental took the place of the high style,
and if Euripides, the Sophist of tragic poets, brought
upon the stage the entire philosophy of the day with all
its mannerism of moral reflection, and made his charac-
ters, not the supporters of an idea like his predecessors,
but only excitants of momentary emotion or other stage
elToct.

3. Tendencies op the Sophists. — The Greek Sophists,
like the French illuminati of the last century, displayed
an encyclopaedic universality of knowledge, and any dis-
tinct classitication of them in accordance with the single
idea of the historical movement, becomes on this account
very difficult. The Sophists rendered general culture
universal. Thus Protagoras was celebrated as a teacher
of morals, Gorgias as a rhetorician and pohtician, Prodicua
as a grammarian and etymologist, and Hippias as a poly-
math. This last, besides his astronomical and mathe-
matical studies, occupied himself even with a theory of
mnemonics. Some set themselves for task the art of
education, others the exposition of the ancient poets.
The brothers Euthydemus and Dionysodorus made war
and military exercises the object of instruction. Several
of them, Gorgias, Prodicus, Hippias, fulfilled ambassa-
dorial functions. In short, the Sophists were to be
found, each according to his individuality, in all the pro-
fessions, in all the spheres of knowledge ; what alone
was common to them all was method. Then tLeir rela-
tion to the cultivated public, their striving after popu-
larity, notoriety, and pecuniary emolument suggests the
inference that their studies and activities were, for the
most part, directed and determined, not by any objective
scientific interest, but by external considerations. "Wan-
dering from town to town with that migratory tic so
characteristic of the later, more special Sophists, announc-
ing themselves as thinkers by profession, and looking in
all their operations mainly to good pay and the favour of
the rich, they naturally chose questions of general interest
and pubhc advantage, though at times also the private
fancies of particular rich men, as the objects of their
discourse. Their special strength, therefore, lay much
more in formal quickness, in subjective displays of readi-
ness of wit, in the art of being able to rhetorize, than in
positive knowledge. Their only instruction in morals
consisted either in disputatious word-catching, or in

34 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY,

hollow rhetorical show ; and even when their information
rose to polymathy, mere phrasing on the subjects re-
mained the main point. It is thus we find Hippias in
Xenophon boasting of being able to say always some-
thing new on any matter. Of others we are expressly
told that they did not consider it necessary to have any
knowledge of the facts in order to speak in any required
manner on any subject, or answer any question on the
spur of the moment. Many of them, again, made it a
point to hold measured discourse on the most insignificant
objects possible — salt, for instance. In all of them, in-
deed, we see that the thing considered was but the means,
while it was the word was the end ; and we cannot
wonder that they descended in this respect to that empty
external trickery which Plato in the Phcedrm subjects
to so keen a criticism, and specially because of its want
of seriousness and principle.

4. The historical significance of the Sophists as
BEGARDS Culture. — The scientific and moral defects of
the Sophists call attention of themselves, and require not,
therefore — especially now that certain later historians
have, with overstrained zeal, painted their dark side in
the blackest colours, and brought forward a very serious
charge of frivolity, immorality, love of pleasure, vanity,
selfishness, empty disputatiousness, and the false show of
learning — any further exposition at our hands ; but what
has been generally overlooked here is the merit of the
Sophists historically as regards culture. If they possessed,
as has been said, only the negative merit of having called
forth the opposition of Socrates and Plato, then the im-
mense influence and the lofty reputation of so many of
them, as well as the revolution they produced in the
thought of an entire nation, were phenomena inexplicable.
It were inexplicable, for example, how Socrates could
attend the discourses of Prodicus, and advise others to
the same, if he did not acknowledge his grammatical
contributions, and his merits in the interests of a healthy
logic. In his rhetorical attempts, Protagoras also made
many successful hits, and feHcitously determined particu-
lar grammatical categories. On the whole, the Sophists
introduced a profusion of general knowledge among the
people, scattered a mass of fruitful and suggestive germs,
called forth investigations into language, logic, and the
theory of cognition, laid a foundation for the methodic
treatment of many branches of human inquiry, and

THE SOPHISTS. 35

partly originated, partly advanced, tliat admirable intel-
lectual life of Athens then. Their linguistic service is
their greatest. Of Attic prose we may regard them as
the creators and improvers. They are the first who
made style, as such, the object of attention and study,
and instituted more special inquiry into measure and
rhythm, as into the art of rhetorical expression. Only
with them, and excited by them, is the commencement
of Attic eloquence ; and Antiphon and Isocrates, the
latter the founder of the most flourishing school of rhe-
toric, are outshoots of the Sophists. There are grounds
enough, then, surely, for not regarding the entire product
of the time as a mere symptom of corruption.

5. The individual Sophists. — The first who is said to
have been named Sophist in the given sense is Protagoras
of Abdera, who flourished about the year 440 B.c. He
taught — and was the first person who demanded payment
for doing so — in Sicily and Athens. From this latter
town he was banished as a blasphemer ; and his book on
the gods was burned in open market by the public crier.
It began with the words : — ' As for the gods, I am unable
to know whether they are or whether they are not : for
there is much that prevents us from knowing these things,
as well the obscurity of the subject as the shortness of the
life of man.' In another work he developed his theory of
cognition or incognition. Proceeding from the Heraclitic
hypothesis of perpetual flux, and specially applj^ng it to
the individual subject, he taught that man is the measure
of all things, of those things that exist, that they are,
and of those things that do not exist, that they are not.
That, namely, is true for the percipient subject, what-
ever, in the perpetual flux of things and himself, he at
any moment perceives and feels. For theory, then,
there exists no other relation to the external world
than sensation of sense, and for practice, no other than
the gratification of sense. But now, as perception and
sensation are with countless people countlessly diverse,
and excessively various even in one and the same per-
son, there resulted from this the further consequence,
that there are in general no such things as any objective
aflirmations or determinations whatever ; that opposed
assertions in regard to the same object are to be received
as equally true ; that we may dispute j^ro and contra
on all things and everything with equal authority ; and
that neither error nor refutation of error can possibly

36 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

take place. This proposition, that there is nothing
absolute, that all is an affair of subjective conception,
opinion, arbitrary will, found its application, at the hands
of the Sophists, chiefly to justice and morality. Nothing
is by nature (0t;ö-et) good or bad, but only by positive
statute or agreement (j'Ö/ac^) ; and therefore we may
make law, or regard as law whatever we please, whatever
the advantage of the moment brings with it, whatever
we have the strength and skill to realize. Protagoras
himself appears not to have attempted any logically
consequent completion of these propositions in practice ;
for, according to the testimony of the ancients, an
estimable personal character cannot be denied him, and
even Plato (in the dialogue under his name) contents
himself with imputing to him complete ignorance of the
nature of morality, whereas the later Sophists are (in the
Oorgias and Philebus) accused by him of immorality
in principle.

After Protagoras, Oorgias was the most celebrated
Sophist. He came (427) during the Peloponnesian war
from Leontium in Sicily to Athens, in order to represent
there the cause of his native town, then oppressed by
Syracuse. In Athens, after having brought his affairs
to a successful issue, he dwelt some time, and later in
Thessaly, where he died about the same time as Socrates.
The swashbuckler ostentation of his external appearance
is more than once mockingly mentioned by Plato. A like
character marked his occasional speeches, which sought
to dazzle by poetical ornaments, flowery metaphors,
unusual phraseology, and a multitude of previously un-
known figures of rhetoric. As a philosopher he at-
tached himself to the Eleatics, especially to Zeno, in
order that, with their dialectical schematism as basis,
he might demonstrate that nothing exists, or if some-
thing exists, that it cannot be known, or if it can be
known, that it cannot be communicated. His work
then bore, characteristically enough, the title, — ' Of the
Non-existent, or of Nature. ' The proof of the first proposi-
tion— namely, that nothing exists, since whatever were
assumed to exist can neither be something existent nor
something non-existent, because something existent must
have either originated or not originated, neither of which
alternatives is possible to thought — rests principally on
the assumption that everything that actually is holds of
space, or is corporeal and local, and is therefore the ulti-

THE SOPHISTS. 37

mate, self-negating consequence, the self-resolution of
the preceding physical philosophy.

The later Sophists, in the consequences they drew,
advanced with unhesitating audacity far beyond Gorgias
and Protagoras. They were for the most part free-
thinkers, whose views could only tend to destroy the
national religion, laws, and observances. In this con-
nexion, Critias the tyrant, Polus, and Thrasymachus are
specially to be named. The two latter openly charac-
terized might as the law of nature, the unrespecting
gratification of desire as the natural right of the stronger,
and the institution of restrictive laws as the cimning
invention of the weaker ; and Critias, the ablest but the
cruellest of the thirty tyrants, described, in a poem,
faith in the gods as the invention of crafty politicians.
Hippias of Elis, the polymath, bears a better character,
although, perhaps, not behind the others in vain-glory
and the mania of ostentation. But of them all the best
was Prodicus of Ceos, from whom comes the proverb,
•wiser than Prodicus,' and of whom Plato, nay even
Aristophanes, speaks not without respect. Particularly
well known among the ancients were his parenetic com-
positions on the choice of the road in life (Hercules
at the parting of the ways, adopted by Socrates in
Xenophon's Memorabilia, ii. 1), on worldly goods and
the use of them, on life and death, etc., discourses in
which he displays a chastened moral feeling and fine ob-
servation of life, although, in consequence of the want
of a higher ethical and scientific principle, he must be
placed inferior to Socrates, as whose predecessor he has
been sometimes designated. The still later generations
of Sophists, as they appear in Plato's Euthydemus, had
sunk to common buffoonery and a disgraceful greed of
money; their dialectical arts they expressed in certain for-
mulas for syllogisms of a captious and sophistical nature.

6. Transition to Socrates, and Character of the
FOLLOWING Period. — The right of the Sophists is the right
of subjectivity, of self-consciousness (that is to say, the
demand that all that is to be acknowledged by me shaU
establish itseK as reasonable to my consciousness) ; its
unright is the regarding of this subjectivity as only finite,
empirical, egoistic subjectivity (that is to say, the demand
that my contingent will and personal opinion shall have
the decision of what is reasonable) ; its right is to have
established the principle of free-will, of self-conviction,

38 II I ST OR Y OF PHIL 0 SOP II Y.

its unright is to have set upon the throne the contingent
will and judgment of the individual. To complete the
principle of free-will and self-consciousness into its
truth, and by the same means of reflection, with which
the Sophists had been able only to destroy, to win a veri-
table world of objective thought, an absolute import,
to set in the place of empirical subjectivity absolute or
ideal subjectivity, objective will, and rational thought,
— this now was the task which Socrates undertook, and
achieved. Instead of empirical subjectivity, that abso-
lute or ideal subjectivity should be made the principle,
this means, that it is announced as known and acknow-
ledged fact, that the true standard of all things is not
my, this single person's, opinion, pleasure, and will ; that
it does not depend on my or any other empirical subject's
good-will and election what is to be true, right, and
good, but that what is to decide here is certainly my
thought, but also my thought, or that which is rational
in me. My thought, my reason, however, is not some-
thing specially appertaining to me, but something com-
mon to all rational beings, something universal ; and so
far as I comport myself as a rational, thinking being, my
subjectivity is a universal subjectivity. But every
thinking being has the consciousness that what he holds
for right, duty, good, is not merely so to him, but that
it is so also for every rational being, and that conse-
quently his thought has the character of universality, a
universal validity, in a word, objectivity. This, there-
fore, is, as opposed to that of the Sophists, the stand-
point of Socrates, and on this account there begins with
him the philosophy of objective thought. What Socrates
could do in contradistinction to the Sophists was this,
to bring it about that reflection should lead to the same
results as had been previously realized in unreflecting
faith and submission, and that the thinking man should,
of free consciousness and his own conviction, judge and
act in the same manner as life and established custom
had hitherto unconsciously dictated to ordinary persons.
That undoubtedly man is the measure of all things, but
man as a universal, thinking, rational man — this is the
fundamental thought of Socrates, and the philosophy of
Socrates is by virtue of this thought the positive comple-
ment of the Sophistic principle.

With Socrates begins the second period of Greek philo-
sophy. It realizes itself in three great philosophical

SOCRATES. 39

systems, the originators of which, connected personally
also in the relation of teachers and taught, represent
three successive generations — Socrates, Plato, Aristotle.

XII. — Socrates.

HIS Personality. — In Socrates, the new philoso-
l^hical principle appears as a personal character.
His philosophy is wholly individual practice ; life and
doctrine cannot in his case be separated. A full exposi-
tion of his philosophy is therefore essentially biography ;
and what Xenophon records as the particular doctrine of
Socrates, is for this reason only an abstraction of the
Socratic character, as expressed in casual conversation.
As such archetj'^pal personahty, Plato in especial has con-
ceived his master. The glorifying of the historical
Socrates is the motive particularly of his later and riper
dialogues, and of these the Banquet is the noblest apo-
theosis of the personal Socrates, as the incarnated Eros,
of love to philosophy realized in a character.

Socrates was born in the year 469 B.c. ; he was the
son of Sophroniscus, a statuary, and of Phaenarete, a
midwife. He was brought up in his youth to his father's
calling, and not without success. As late as the time
of Pausanias, who saw them, there existed on the Acro-
polis three statues of draped Graces, which were desig-
nated as works of Socrates. For the rest, there is little
known historically of the formation of his character.
He avaued himself, indeed, of the lessons of Prodicus
and the musician Damon, but he stands in no relation to
any philosopher proper, either before or at the same time
as himself. All that he became was due to himself, and
for that very reason he constitutes a chief crisis of
ancient philosophy. He has been named by some a
disciple of Anaxagoras, and by others of the Hylicist
Archelans ; but the one statement is demonstrably false,
and the other at least improbable. Other means of cul-
ture than those oflFered by the place of his birth he seems
never to have sought. With the exception of a holiday
trip, and the expeditions to Potidaea, Delium, and Amphi-
polis, in which he served, he was never out of Athens.

How early Socrates may have begun to devote him-
self to the teaching of youth, can — the date of the Del-
phic oracle which pronounced him the wisest of men

40 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

being unknown, — be only approximately inferred from
the time of the first representation of the Clouds of
Aristophanes, "which took place in the year 423. In the
productions of his disciples, he appears almost invariably
as already elderly, or even old. His manner of instruct-
ing was quite free and easy, conversational, popular,
taking its occasions from what was nearest and plainest,
borrowing examples and illustrations from things of
every day (his contemporaries reproached him with al-
ways speaking of pack-asses, smiths, cobblers, and cur-
riers), quite the oi)posite of the pretentious ostentation
of the Sophists. It is thus we find him on the market-
place, in the gymnasia, and workshops, occupied early and
late, in discoursing on life and the purpose of life with
yodths, with younger men and older men, in convicting
them of their own ignorance, and in rousing within them
the slumbering seeds of knowledge. In every human
endeavour, were it directed to the affairs of the state or
to the affairs of the house, to business, to knowledge, or
to art, he knew always, magister as he was of spiritual
obstetrics, how to find points of connexion for the
quickening of true knowledge and moral seK-reflection,
how frequently soever his attempts miscarried, or were
rejected with bitter contempt, and requited with hatred
and ingratitude. But inspired by a clear conviction
that a thorough amendment of the state must proceed
from a sound instructing of youth, he remained, to the
vocation he had chosen, true to the last. Wholly Greek
in these relations to the rising generation, he loves to call
himself the most zealous eroticist, Greek also in this,
that in comparison with those free relations of friendship,
domestic life was with him quite in the background.
Nowhere does he bestow any great attention on his wife
and children ; the notorious, if even much exaggerated
shrewishness of Xantippe allows us a glimpse of no un-
interrupted domestic felicity.

As man, as a practically wise man, Socrates is depicted
by all the authorities in the brightest colours. ' He was,'
says Xenophon, ' so pious, that he did nothing without
the sanction of the gods ; so just that he never wronged
any one even in the least degree ; so much master of
himself that he never preferred the agreeable to the
good ; so wise that in deciding on the better and the
worse he never failed,' in short, he was 'the best and
happiest man that could possibly exist,' (Xenoph. Mem,

SOCBA TES. 41

L 1. 11 ; IV. 8. 11). "NVhat, however, invests liis person
with so attractive a peculiarity, is the happy combination
and harmonious blending of his characteristic qualities
as a whole, the ])erfection of an equally universal and
thoroughly original nature. In this many-sided tact,
this skill to reconcile in one harmonious whole the
most contradictory and incompatible qualities, in his
triumphant superiority to human weakness, in a word,
in his consummate originality, he is best represented
in the brilhant panegyric of Alcibiades, in the Banquet
of Plato. But even in the more sober description
of Xenophon we find him everywhere a classic shape,
a man replete with the finest social qualities, full
of Attic urbanity, infinitely removed from all gloomy,
anxious asceticism, a man as doughty in battle as in the
drinking-bout, with all his self-reflection and all his self-
control moving in the most unconstrained freedom, a
consummate type of the happiest Athenian era, without
the sourness, the unsociableness, the morbid self-seclusion
of later men, a pious and peaceful exemplar of genuinely
human excellence. A particularly characteristic feature
is the 'demonic ' element which he attributed to himself.
He beheved himself to receive from an inner divine
voice, premonitions in regard to the success and unsuc-
cess of men's undertakings, warnings of this and of that.
It was the fine, deep, divining tact and instinct of a pure
Boul, that saw clearly into life, and involuntarily pre-
saged the good and the consequent everywhere, even in
the most individual emergency, that announced itself in
these warnings, and nothing could have been more erro-
neous than the endeavour of his accusers to construe this
demonic reference into a denial of the national gods, and
an attempt at the introduction of new divinities. There
certainly lay in this, that with Socrates this oracle of
inner prophecy assumed the place of the established
means of prediction and augury, which was already an
advance to an inwardness of individual judgment alien
as yet to the Grecian mind. But this advance was an
involuntary one ; Socrates himself still held by the an-
cient form of faith in a transcendent revelation ; he was
without opposition to the prevailing ideas, and conformed
therefore perfectly to the national religion in general, al-
though it had taken on with him the more philosophical
form of a belief in a supreme intelligence of the universe,
that ordered all things with design.

42 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

2. Socrates and Aristophanes. — Through the entire
mode and manner of his personality, Socrates appears
to have early acquired a universal notoriety. Nature had
already furnished him with a striking exterior. His
broad, bent, upturned nose, his great prominent eyes,
his bald pate, his thick stomach, gave him a striking re-
semblance to Silenus, a comparison which is wrought
out in Xenophon's Banquet with lively fun, in Plato's,
with equal ingenuity and penetration of thought. This
singular figure was made still more remarkable by his
shabby clothes, his want of shoes, his peculiar gait, his
trick of standing still frequently and of throwing his
eyes about. With all this it cannot seem strange to us
that the Athenian comedy should have seized for itself
so striking a personality. In the case of Aristophanes
there was present yet another and a peculiar element.
Aristophanes, namely, was the most devoted admirer of
the good old times, the enthusiastic panegyrist of ances-
tral institutions and polity. As his chief eflfort is always
to awaken and quicken again in the people the desire for
these good old times, so his passionate hatred is directed
against all the modern tendencies in politics, art, and
philosophy, against that growing illumination [Auf-
klärerei), that advances hand in hand with a degenerat-
ing democracy. Hence his envenomed ridicule of Cleon
the demagogue (in the Knights), of Euripides the melo-
dramatic poet (in the Frogs), of Socrates the Sophist (in
the Clouds). The last, as representative of a quibbling
pernicious philosophy, must appear equally destructive
to him as in politics the party of the movement that un-
scrupulously trampled under foot aU the inheritance of
antiquity. And thus, then, it is the leading thought of
the Clouds to expose Socrates to public contempt as
representative of the teaching of the Sophists, of a use-
less, idle, youth-corrupting, manners-and-morals-under-
mining, sham wisdom. The motives of Aristophanes in
this may, from a politico-ethical point of view, be found
excusable, but they are not justifiable. It is certainly
true that Socrates had much formal likeness to the
Sophists, but no such circumstance is sufficient to justify
Aristophanes' picture of him, a picture into which all the
characteristic features of the Sophists, even the vilest
and hatefullest, are introduced, but without interfering
with the success of the resemblance. The Clouds can be
regarded only as a lamentable misunderstanding, as a

SOCRATES. 43

wrong prompted by the blindness of passion ; and Hegel,
when he attempts a defence of the proceedings of Aristo-
phanes, forgets that the comic poet may caricature, but
without having recourse to manifest calumny. The
whole politico-social tendency of Aristophanes, in gener.'<l,
rests on a great misunderstanding of historical progress.
The good old times, as he pictures them, are a fiction.
As little as an adult can ever again become a child by
course of nature, so little does it lie in the power of pos-
sibility to bring back by main force the unreflecting
obedience and simple nalvctd of the infancy of a people,
into an ase in which reflection has eaten into and licked
up all spontaneous instinct, all unconscious pious inno-
cence. Aristophanes himself pronounces the impossibi-
lity of such return, when in mad humour, with cynical
mockery, he abandons to ridicule all authorities, human
and divine, and so gives proof that, however worthy the
patriotic background of his comic extravagance may be,
even he stands no longer on the level of ancestral virtue,
that even he is the son of his time.

3. The Condemnation of Socrates. — Four-and-twenty
years later, Socrates fell a sacrifice to the same confound-
ing of his objects with those of the Sophists, and to the
same tendency to restore by violent means the political
faith and pious trust of the past. After he had lived
many years, occupying himself in his wonted way at
Athens, after the storms of the Peloponnesian war and
the despotism of the thirty tyrants had passed over this
state, after democracy had boon restored in it, he was
summoned, in the seventieth year of his age, into court,
and accused of denying the national divinities, introduc-
ing new gods, and seducing the young. His accusers
■were, Melitus, a young poet, Anytus, a demagogue,
and Lycon, an orator, three men insignificant in every
respect, but, as it appears, not prompted, nevertheless,
by any motive of personal enmity. The result of the
accusation was the condemnation of Socrates. Reject-
ing all opportunities of flight, but allowed by a fortunate
accident thirty days of the society of his friends in
prison, he drank the poison appointed by the State, and
died in the year 399 B.c.

The first motive of his accusation was, as said, his
identification with the Sophists, the actual belief that his
teaching and influence were characterized by the same
dangerous principles, in a political aspect, by which the

44 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

Sophists had already given rise to so much evil. To this
all the three articles in the accusation point, though
manifestly resting on misunderstandings : they are
exactly the same as those by which Aristophanes sought
to exjjose the Sophist in the person of Socrates. Seduc-
tion of the young, introduction of new principles of
morality, of new modes of education and discipline, —
these charges were precisely those which had been brought
against the Sophists, and it brings light to find that
one of the three accusers, Anytus, appears in Plato's
Meno as a bitter foe to the Sophists and their methods
of instruction. Denial of the national gods is quite simi-
larly situated ; it was as accused of this that already
Protagoras had had to flee from Athens. Even five
years after the death of Socrates, Xenophon, who had
not been present at the trial, thought it necessary to
write his Memorabilia in defence of his master, so uni-
versal and inveterate was the prejudice against him.

There was present also another, and perhaps more
decisive element, a political one. Socrates was no aristo-
crat, but he was too firm of character ever to lend him-
self to an accommodation with the humours of the
sovereign masses, and too truly convinced of the neces-
sity of a lawful and intelligent control of political afi"airs,
to be able to make friends with the Athenian democracy
as it was. Nay, to this latter, from his whole mode of
life, he could only seem a bad citizen. He had never
employed himself in State affairs ; only once, as chief
president of the Prytanes, had he filled a public office,
and then only to fall into opposition to the will of the
people and of those who held power (Plat. Apol. p. 32 ;
Xenoph. Mem. i. 1. 18) ; for the first time in his life he
ascended the tribune in his seventieth year, on the occa-
sion of his OWE accusal (Plat. Apol. p. 17). There was
added to this, that he allowed only men of knowledge
and discrimination to be entitled to administer State
affairs ; that on every occasion he spoke against democratic
institutions, especially election by ballot ; that he gave
the Spartan State the decided preference over the Athe-
nian ; and that by his intimate relations with the former
heads of the oligarchical party, he excited the mistrust
of the democrats (Xenoph. Mem. i. 2. 9). Amongst
other men of oligarchical, Spartan -favouring tendencies,
Critias, one of the thirty, had been his disciple, and
Alcibiades no less — two men who had wiought the

SOCEÄTES. 45

Athenian people so mucli woe. When we see it per«
fectly authenticated that two of his accusers were consi-
derable men of the democratic party, and further that
his judges were men who had taken flight at the time of
the thirty, and who had subsequently overthrown the
sway of the oligarchy, we find it more intelligible how
tbey, in pronouncing sentence against the accused, be-
lieved themselves to be acting in the interest of the
democratic principle, especially besides as appearances
enough could be brought against him. That they pro-
ceeded with such rapidity and haste cannot surprise us
in the case of a generation which had grown up during
the Peloponnesian war, and a people that rushed as quickly
to violent resolutions as they again repented them. Nay,
when we consider, that Socrates scorned to have recourse
to the usual forms and expedients of the capitally
accused, and to wdn the compassion of the people by
lamentation and flattery, that, in the proud confidence of
his innocence, he bade defiance to his judges, we shall
rather on the contrary be inclined to wonder that his
condemnation was carried only by a majority of from three
to six. And even then he had it in his power to avoid
the sentence of death, had he, in the appraising of his
punishment, but consented to bow himself before the
award of the sovereign people ; but as he scorned to
seek to mitigate the penalty by the exchange (to a fine,
perhaps) allowed him by custom, because this would
have been to acknowledge himself guuty, this defiance
of the condemned so exasperated, as was to be expected,
the excitable Athenians, that it is quite intelligible how
eighty of the judges who had previously voted for his
acquittal, now voted for his death. And thus an accusa-
tion, in the first instance perhaps, only intended to
humble the aristocratic philosopher, and compel his ac-
knowledgment of the competence and majesty of the
people, had a result the most deplorable, and afterwards
bitterly repented by the Athenians themselves.

Hegel's view of the fate of Socrates, when he sees in
it a tragical collision of equally legitimate forces, the
tragedy of Athens, and apportions blame and blameless-
ness to each side equally, is not borne out historically,
as neither Socrates can be exclusively regarded as only
representative of the modern spirit, of the principle of
free-will, of subjectivity, of inwardness, nor his judges
as champions of the ancient Attic obedience to established

4G HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

observance. This is not so in tlie former case, for So-
crates, although his principle was incompatible with that
of old Greek observance, stood yet so much on the basis
of the traditional that the accusations brought against
him were in this shapß groundless and false. Nor is this
any more so in the latter case, for at that time, subsecu-
tive to the Peloj^onnesian war, the ancient principle and
piety had long shown themselves in the entire people
canker -eaten, and had given place to the new ideas ; and
the prosecution of Socrates is rather to be regarded as an
attempt to restore by force, at the same time with the an-
cient constitution, the dead-letter as well of ancient custom
and inherited mode of thought. The blame consequently
is not to be equally distributed to the two sides, and the
conclusion must remain this, that Socrates fell a sacrifice
to a misunderstanding, to an unwarranted reaction.

4. The Sources of the Socratic PniLOSGPHy. — It is
an old and well-known controversy as to whether Xeno-
phon or Plato is to be regarded as having drawn histori-
cally the truer and completer image of Socrates, and as
being the source of the Socratic philosophy. This question
comes more and more to be decided in favour of Xenophon.
It has been frequently attempted, indeed, as well in more
ancient as in more modern times, to disparage Xenophon's
Memorabilia as a shallow and incompetent authority, be-
cause their homely and nothing less than speculative mat-
ter appeared to afford no satisfactory motives for such a
revolution in the realm of spirit as is attributed to So-
crates, for the lustre which invests his name in history,
or for the role which Plato assigns to hiim ; further,
this opinion has been maintained, because the Memora-
bilia bear on their face an apologetic purpose, and the
defence they contain concerns not so much the philoso-
pher as the man ; finally because they were supposed to
give the impression that they had degraded philosophical
statement into the unphilosophical style of the common
understanding. There were distinguished thus an exoteric
and an esoteric Socrates, the former drawn from Xeno-
phon, the latter from Plato. But the giving of precedence
to Plato over Xenophon has, in the first place, no his-
torical right on its side, so far as Xenophon presents
himself as an historian and asserts a claim to historical
axithenticity, while Plato, on the contrary, only in a few
passages expressly gives himself out as an historical
narrator, but by no means wishes all the rest that is put

SOCRÄ TES. 47

into the mouth of Socrates to be regarded as authentic
speech and utterance of this latter ; and we possess no
historical right, therefore, to view at will what belongs
to Plato as belonging also to Socrates ; secondly, the
subordination of Xeuophon rests for the most part on the
false conception that Socrates had a philosophy, that is
a speculative philosophy, on an unhistorical mistaking of
the limits by which the philosophical character of So-
crates was necessarily conditioned and opposed. There
was not even a Socratic doctrine, but only a Socratic
life ; and just in this we have the explanation of the
disparate philosophical directions of his followers.

5. General Character of the Socratic Phtloso-
PHiziXG. — The philosophizing of Socrates is conditioned
and determined by its antithesis partly to the preceding
philosophy, partly to the teaching of the Sophists.

The pre-Socratic philosophy was in essential character
an investigation of nature. With Socrates, mind for the
first time turns on its own self, on its own essential nature,
but it does this in the directest fashion, in that it regards
itself as active, or as endowed with morality. The posi-
tive philosophizing of Socrates is exclusively of an ethical
nature, exclusively an inquiry into virtue, and so exclu-
sively and one-sidedly this, that, as is always the way on
the appearance of a new principle, it even announced itself
as a despising of the preceding endeavour, of natural
philosophy and mathematics. Placing all under the point
of view of direct moral furtherance, Socrates found in
'irrational' nature so little worth study, that he could
conceive it rather in a common teleological manner only as
external means to external ends. Nay, as he says in
Plato's Phoedrus, he never goes out into the country for a
walk as there is nothing to be learned from fields and trees.
Knowledge of one's-self, the Delphic yv^dL ceavrSv^ this
appeared to him as the single problem worthy of a man,
as the starting-point of all philosophizing. All other
knowledge he called so insignificant and worthless, that
he purposely boasted of his ignorance, and conceived that
his pronounced superiority in wisdom to other men must
lie in the fact that he, for his part, hiew his ignorance
(Plat. Apd. p. 21, 23).

The other side of the Socratic philosophizing is its op-
position to the philosophy of the time. He understood
his task here, and saw that it consisted in placing him-
self on the same ^ound as the Sophists themselves,

48 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

and in conquering them through themselves, through
their own principle. That he shared their position has
been already observed. Many of his opinions, particu-
larly the propositions that no one intentionally does
wrong, and that whoever intentionally lies, or otherwise
does wrong, is better than he who should do the same
unknowingly, — bear at the fii-st glance a quite Sophistic
stamp. The higher tenet of the Sophists, that all moral
action must be a conscious action, is not less his. But,
whilst the Sophists made it their business, by means of
subjective reflection, to confound and subvert all estab-
lished prescripts, and render impossible aU objective
standards, Socrates recognised thought as the act of the
universal, the free objective idea as the measure of all
things, and so brought back duty and all moral action
in general, from the opinion and caprice of the indi-
vidual, to the true principle, the principle of universal
objective spirit. It was under guidance of this idea of
an absolutely true cognition, that he endeavoured to
establish by thought unconditioned universal moral as-
signments, and to acquire possession of a rational objec-
tivity that should be absolutely fixed, absolutely certain
in itself, and perfectly independent of the self-will of the
individual. Hegel's expression for this is, that Socrates
set Moralität in the place of Sittlichkeit (the subjective
morality of individual conscience in place of the objective
morality of societary observance). Hegel, that is, distin-
guishes Moralität as the conscious, reflecting right-doing
that rests on internal principles, from Sittlichkeit as the
spontaneous, natural, half unconscious (almost instinctive)
virtue that rests on obedience to established custom (use
and wont, natural objective law, that is at bottom,
according to Hegel, rational, though not yet subjectively
cleared, perhaps, into its rational principles). This ethi-
cal endeavour of Socrates had for logical presupposition,
the method of definition, that is, the ascertainment and
establishment in any matter of the notions involved.
Xenophon relates {Älem. iv. 6. 1), that Socrates was
uninterruptedly employed in trying to find the * what '
of everything ; and Aristotle says expressly {Meta. xii.
4), that two merits must be conceded to Socrates, the
method of induction, and logical definitions (definitions of
the implied notions, the universals), two things which
constitute the foundation of science. How both cohere
with the principle of Socrates, we shall presently see.

SOCBA TES. 40

6. The Socratic Method. — Of the Socratic method we
must uuderstand that, in contrast to what is now called
methoii, it rose not in the consciousness of Socrates for-
mally as method, and in abstraction, therefore, from every
concrete case, but that it had spontaneously grown up
with the very mode and manner of his philosophizing,
which last aimed not at the communication of a system,
but at the schoohng of the individual himself into philo-
sophical thought and life. His method was only the
subjective art he ai)plied in his pedagogical procedure,
only the manner that was peculiar to him in his philo-
sophical intercourse in actual life.

The Socratic method has two sides, the one negative
and the other positive. The negative one is what is
known as the Socratic irony. Making beUeve to be
ignorant, namely, and seeming to solicit information from
those with whom he conversed, the philosopher would
unexpectedly turn the tables on his seeming instructors,
and confound their supposed knowledge, as well by the
unlooked-for consequences which he educed by his inces-
sant questions, as by the glaring contradictions in which
they were in the end by their own admissions landed. In
the perplexity in which one is placed when one finds one's-
self not to know what one supposed one's-self to know,
this supposed knowledge itself executes, we may say, on
its own self, its own process of destruction« By way of
gain, however, the rejiresentative of the supposed know-
ledge becomes mistrustful of his own presuppositions, of
his accustomed fixed ideas ; ' what we knew has refuted
itself,' — this is the refrain of the most of these dialogues.

But, were this all, the outcome of the Socratic method
would be only to know that we do not know; and, in-
deed, both in Xenophon and in Plato, a great part of the
dialogues ostensibly does stop with only this negative re-
sult. There is, in effect, another moment, however, by
means of which the irony loses its merely negative look.

This positive side of the Socratic method is the maleU'
tic (that is, maieutic or obstetric art). Socrates likened
himself, namely, to his mother Phgenarete, who was a
midwife, because, if no longer able to bear thoughts him-
self, he was stul quite able to help others to bear them,
as well as to distinguish those that were sound from
those that were unsound (Plat. Thecet. p. 149). The
nature of this spiritual midwifery will be more distinctly
seen, if we consider that the philosopher, by means of

60 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

his incessant questioning and the resultant disentangle-
ment of ideas, possessed the art of ehciting from him
with whom he conversed a new and previously unkno^vn
thought, and so of helping to a birth his intellectual throes.
A chief means here was his method of induction, or the
transformation of the conception ( Vorstellung) into the
notion {Begriff). Proceeding, for example, from some
certain concrete case, and, at the same time, assisting
himself by connexion with the most usual conceptions,
the most trivial and commonplace facts of sense, the
philosopher contrived, ever comparing particular with
particular, and so gradually separating * and casting out
what was contingent and accidental, to bring to con-
sciousness a universal truth, a universal discernment,
that is, to form notions (universals) . To find the notion
of justice, of fortitude, for instance, departure was taken
from several particular examples of justice, of fortitude,
and from them the universal nature, the notion of these
virtues, abstracted. From this we see what the Socratic
induction aimed at, — ^logical definition. I define a notion
when I tell its what^ its nature, its tenor, import, or con-
tained meaning. I define the notion of justice, when I
exhibit the logical unity of its various forms in actual
experience, what is common to all of them. And this
was the object of Socrates. * To investigate the nature
of virtue,' says Aristotle {Eud. Eth. i. 5), 'appeared to
Socrates the problem of philosophy, and for this end
he inquired what is justice, what fortitude (that is, he
demanded the essence, nature, the notion of justice), for
all virtue was to him knowledge.' In what connexion
this his method of definition, or of the formation of
notions, stood with his practical objects, is from this
easily to be inferred. He sought the notion of each
separate virtue, justice for instance, only because he was
convinced, namely, that the knowledge of this notion,
that a clear perception of it, was the surest guide for every
particular case, for every particular moral relation. All
moral action, he believed, must proceed from the notion
as something consciously known and understood.

In accordance with this, the Socratic method may be
described as the art of finding, by means of induction,
in a certain sum of given particular cases, their under-
lying and supporting, or fundamental universal, their
logical unity. This method has for its presupposition
the acknowledgment that the true nature of the objects

SOCIiATES. 51

in the world lies in thought, and can be discovered by
thought ; that the notion is the true being of things.
We see from this how the Platonic theory of ideas was
but an objectivizing of this method, which method, in
the case of Socrates, is as yet but a subjective knack
or skill, Plato's ideas are but Socrates' universala
(generalized notions), conceived as real definite exist-
ences. Aristotle, then [Muta. xiii. 4), precisely hits
the relation of the method of Socrates to the ideas of
Plato, when he says : * Socrates did not consider the
wnivei-sals as particular substances separately existent ;
this was Plato's work, who forthwith named them ideas.'
7. The Socratic Doctrine of Virtue. — The only posi-
tive tenet which has come down from Socrates is, that vir-
tue is knowledge, wisdom, intellectual discernment. In
other words, virtue is an act that proceeds from a clearly
understood recognition of the notion of whatever any
particular action contemplates, of the ends, means, and
conditions that belong to this action, and not, therefore,
any merely innate or mechanically acquired power and
ability. Action without perception is a contradiction, and
destroys itself ; action with perception carries straight
to the mark. Consequently, there can be nothing bad
that happens wäth perception, and nothing good that
happens without perception. Defect of perception it
is that leads men into vicious acts. There follows from
this the further proposition, nobody is willingly wicked ;
the wicked are wicked against their own wills. Nay
more, whoever knowingly does wrong is better than he
who does so unknowingly ; for in the latter case, as
knowledge is wanting, virtue in general must also be
wanting, while in the former case, were it supposed pos-
sible, virtue would be only temporarily injured. Socrates
would not admit that anybody could know the good
without immediately doing it. The good was not to
him, as it was to the Sophists, an arbitrary law, but that
on which unconditionally depended the well-being of the
individual as well as of the race, and this, because it was
alone an intellectual act. Thus, too, that he who desired
liis own happiness, should at the same time knowingly
neglect it, amounted to him to a logical contradiction ; for
to his mind, the good doing followed as necessarily from
the good knowing, as the logical conclusion from the logi-
cal premises. The proposition that virtue is knowledge,
has for logical consequence the unity and identity of all

52 HISTOBY OF PHILOSOPHY.

virtues, so far as the intellectual perception that condi-
tions the right act is universally one and the same, let it
be directed to what objects it may. The «ame proposi-
tion again has for practical consequence the teachable-
ness of virtue ; and it is because of this teachableness that
virtue is something universally human, something through
instruction and practice to be attained to by every one.
With these three propositions, which comprise all that
can be called Socratic philosophy, Socrates laid the first
stone of a scientific theory of morals, which accordingly
dates only from him. No more than the first stone, how-
ever; and partly because he attempted no completion of
his principle in all its details, no realization of a concrete
moral theory, but often, in good old fashion, referred
only to the laws of the state, or to the unwritten laws of
universal usage ; partly also because he not unfrequently
supported his ethical principles on external, utilitarian,
eudsemonistic motives, that is, on the particular advan-
tages and profitable results of virtue ; a manner, how-
ever, in which we do not the less miss the more strictly
scientific treatment. Although the obligation to morality
lay for him in the fact that man, as a thinking reasonable
being, must, unless indeed he would fall below himself, act
with rational judgment and purpose, still he stood withal
completely on the platform of his day, and conceived
virtue at the same time as the road to the realization of
the specific objects of well-being, happiness, content-
ment, power, and honour. These objects he received as
experience gave them to him, without comprehending
them again in a higher collective object ; he summoned
to one and the same virtue in all the spheres of action,
but he left these spheres themselves still lying in that
empirical contingency which they possess for our ordinary
consciousness and conviction in the practice of life. An
exaltation over sensuous greeds and cravings, a freedom
from desire such as lifts man nearest to God, a calm of
mind whose equilibrium is never to be ruffled, a glad
consciousness of undiminished strength and integrity of
soul — these, in his own person, no doubt, he exhibited
as the highest happiness, and thus already identified the
notions of virtue and felicity. But he expressed this, not
as a universal, but as an individual principle ; he lived
too much in the old way of looking at things to be able
to deny the authority of actual concrete ends, and to
sacrifice them to his personal ideal of happiness.

THE INCOMPLETE SOCRATICS. 53

XIII. — The Incomplete Socratics.

THEIR Relation to the Socratio Doctrine. — The
death of Socrates was the transfigiiration of the life
of Socrates into au archetypal universal or universal arche-
type, which, as inspiring principle, acted henceforth in
many directions. This conception of Socrates as general
exemplar, we find, indeed, to be the common character of
the first Socratic schools. That a universal, absolutely
true end must gxiide mankind, this was the necessary con-
sequence of the Socratic principle, which declares it the
business of man to give his action unity and law through
thought. But as there appeared in answer to the ques-
tion. In what does this end consist ? no complete, scien-
tific Socratic system, but only a life, the life of Socrates,
80 many-sided, and now but closed, all came necessarily
to the mode of regarding this life, to the subjective con-
ception of the personality of Socrates, which, as is natu-
ral to anticipate, would in various be variously reflected.
Socrates had many scholars, but no school. There are
three of these reflexes or types which have specially be-
come historical. These are the Cynic, Cyrenaic, and
Megaric schools, founded on the conceptions of Anti-
sthenes, Aristippus, and Euclid respectively. Each of
these three conceptions possesses a true moment of the
Socratic character, but, separated from each other, they
break asunder what in the master lay blended together
in harmonious unity, and enunciate isolated elements of
the Socratic character as the true nature of the whole.
They are thus, all of them, one-sided, and give a false
picture of Socrates, the blame of which, however, is not,
in fact, specially theirs. They too are proofs — Aristippus
being obliged to return to Protagoras, and Euclid to the
Eleatics, the one for a theory of knowledge, and the
other for a metaphysic — of the unfinished, unmethodic,
subjective character of the Socratic philosophizing ; and
in their own defects and one-sidednesses, they disclose in
part only the original defects and weak points which
clung to the teaching of their master.

2. Antisthenes and the Cynics. — As strict literal ad-
herent of the doctrine, and as zealous, nay coarse and often
caricaturing, imitator of the manner, Antisthenes stands
nearest his master. He was at one time a disciple of
Gorgias, and himself a Sophistic teacher ; but he attached

54 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

himself, apparently in advanced life, to Socrates, becom-
ing liis most inseparable attendant ; and, after his death,
founded a school in the Cynosarges, a gymnasium in-
tended for those who, like him, were not full-blooded
Athenian citizens, whence (or, according to others, from
their mode of life) his disciples and adherents received
later the name of Cynics. The teaching of Antisthenes
is only an abstract expression for the Socratic moral
ideal. Like Socrates, he regarded a moral life as the
ultima;te end of mankind, as necessary, nay as alone suf-
ficient for happiness ; and, like Socrates too, he held
virtue to be knowable, teachable, and one. But the
ideal of virtue, as it is before him in the person of So-
crates, consists for him only in freedom from desires (in
his very exterior he imitated the beggar, carrying staff
and wallet), and consequently in the neglect of all other
spiritual interests. Virtue to him is only directed to the
avoidance of evil, that is to say, of those desires and
greeds which bind us to enjoyments, and it stands not in
need, therefore, of any dialectical argumentation, but
only of Socratic strength. The wise man is to him suf-
ficient for himself, independent of all, indifferent to mar-
riage, family, and State (a quite unancient characteristic),
as also to riches, honour, and enjoyment. In this rather
negative than positive ideal of Antisthenes, we com-
pletely miss the fine humanity and universal openness of
the master, and still more any turning to advantage of
the fertile dialectical elements which lay in the Socratic
philosophizing. Cynicism, as was natural, took on later
a more decided disregard of all knowledge, a yet greater
contempt for public propriety, and became often a dis-
gusting and shameless caricature of the spirit of Socrates.
Such, particularly, was Diogenes of Slnope, the only
disciple that persisted in remaining by his master, when
Antisthenes drove all the others away from him. These
Cynics, who have been happily called the Capuchins oi
the Greek world, retained, in their high estimation of
virtue and philosophy, let us say, a memory of their
original ; but they sought virtue, according to their own
expression, ' by the shortest way,' in a life according to
nature, that is, in seclusion to self, in complete indepen-
dency and freedom from desire, in renunciation of art
and science, and of every definite end in general. The
wise man, they said, is master over all his wants and de-
sires, without weakness, free from the fetters of societary

THE INCOMPLETE SOCRA TICS: 65

law and societary custom, — the peer of the gods. An easy
life, Diogenes averred, is assigned by the gods to him "vrho
restricts himself to what is necessary, and this true
philosophy is attainable by every one through endurance
and the power of renunciation. Philosophy and philoso-
phical interest alike vanish in the case of such beggar-
philosophy ; what we have from Diogenes are but anec-
dotes and sarcasms.

We see, then, that the ethics of the Cynic school be-
came lost in thoroughly negative and preventative pre-
scripts, a legitimate result of the original defect of a
concrete positive context and systematic completion on
the part of the Socratic theory of morals. Cynicism ia
the negative side of Socraticism,

3. Akistippus and the Cyrenaics. — Aristippus of
Cyrene, up to the death of Socrates considered one of his
adherents, but styled a Sophist by Aristotle — this probably
because he took money for his lessons — appears in Xeno-
phon as a man devoted to pleasure. The practical address
with which he could adapt himself to circumstances, and
the knowledge of mankind, by which he was enabled to
procure himself under all relations the enjoyments of good
living and luxury, were well known to the ancients. In
his intercourse with courtesans and courtiers, at a dis-
tance from political cares in order not to be dependent,
and mostly in foreign countries in order to be able to
withdraw himseK from all clogs of connexion, he endea-
voured to realize his maxim of conforming circumstances
to self, not self to circumstances. However little such
a man appears to merit the name of a Socratic, he pos-
sesses nevertheless two points of contact with his master
which are not to be overlooked. Socrates had pro-
nounced ^^[^tue and felicity as co-ordinately the highest
human end. That is to say, he had given the highest
authority to the idea of moral action ; but, stating it
only in an undeveloped abstract form, he had been un-
able to find any other foundation for the obhgatoriness
of the moral law in any concrete case, than a eudsemo-
nistic one, through reflection on the advantages of mora-
lity. This side now it was that Aristippus held fast and
raised into a principle per se ; pronouncing pleasure to be
the ultimate aim of life, the supreme good. But now,
this pleasure, as Aristippus understands it, is only the
special, present, bodily sensation of pleasui-e, not happi-
ness as a condition that comprehends the entire life ; and

66 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY,

consequently, according to him, all moral limitations
and obligations are, as against this pleasure, of no account.
Nothing is wicked, shameful, godless, if it procures plea-
sure ; what denies this is mere opinion and prejudice (as
with the Sophists). But when Aristippus, as means for
the attainment and preservation of enjoyment, recom-
mends judgment, self-control, and moderation, the
power to resist the mastery of any special desire, and in
general the cultivation of the mind, he demonstrates that
the spirit of Socrates is not wholly extinct in him, and
that he deserves the name of a jssewcio-Socratie, which
Schleiermacher gives him, not without further consi-
deration.

The remaining members of the Cyrenaic school. Theo-
dorus, Hegesias, Anniceris, we can only briefly notice.
The further development of the school hinges wholly on
the more particular definition of the pleasure to be
aimed at ; that is to say, on the question, whether it is
to be understood as sensation of the moment or condi-
tion to last, as spiritual or bodily, as positive or negative
(that is, mere absence of pain). Theodorus declared for
the supremacy of that mental joy which arises from
judgment, and from the ability, in all relations of life,
to direct one's-seK in perception of a rational purpose,
and in freedom from all the bonds of prejudice and
superstition. Hegesias found a pure life of pleasure
unattainable, and, therefore, not to be sought. Pre-
vention of pain, with exertion of every faculty, was,
according to him, the aim of the sage, and the only one
that was left us, for life was full of evils. Lastly,
Anniceris taught that withdrawal from family and so-
ciety is incapable of being realized, that the true aim
rather is to get from Hfe as much enjoyment as can be
got, and as for the occasional bitter that arises in the
course of our efforts for friends and country, to take it
too into the bargain ; that is, he endeavoured to recon-
cile again the principle of pleasure with those demands
of life and circumstances, to which it stood in such ir-
reconcilable antagonism.

4. EgcLiD AND THE Megarics. — Combination of dia-
lectical with ethical elements is the character of all the
imperfect Socratic schools : the distinction is only this,
that here ethics subserve dialectics, there dialectics
ethics. The former is particularly the case with the
Megaric school, whose special peculiarity was designated

THE INCOMPLETE SOCR A TICS. 57

by the ancients as a combination of the Socratic and
Eleatic urinciples. The idea of the good is the same
thing ethically as that of being physicaUy. It was only
a Socratic transformation of the Eleatic doctrine, then,
when Euclid of Megara maintained that only that which
is beeut, self- identical, and one with itself, is good (true
in itself), and that only this good is, while all change,
plurality, dividedness, that is opposed to this good, is
only apparent. This self -identical good, however, is not
sensuous but intellectual being, truth, reason, which for
man also is the only good. The only end, as Stilpo of
the same school taught later, is reason and knowledge,
with perfectly apathetic indifiference to all that has no-
thing in common with knowledge of the good. This
plainly is but a one-sided exaggeration of the tendency of
Socrates towards a thinking consideration of things, with
concomitant peace of mind, and is only a finer, more in-
tellectual Cynicism.

Any further infonnation about Euclid is meagre, and
cannot be more particularly prosecuted here. The Me-
garic school, under various leaders, continued to propa-
gate itself for some time, but without living force, and
without any independent principle of organic develop-
ment. The later Megaric Eristic, indeed, constitutes the
transition to Scepticism, as Cynicism led to Stoicism,
and the Hedonism of the Cyrenaics to the Creed of Epi-
curus. Their sophisms and paralogisms, for the most
part polemically directed in the manner of Zeno against
sensuovis opinion and experience, were familiar to the
ancients, and much spoken of.

5. Plato as the completed Socratic. — The attempts
which we have seen hitherto to buud further on the
the main pillars of the Socratic doctrine, being from the
very beginning without any thriving germ of life, ended
fruitless, resultless. The complete Socrates was under-
stood and represented by only one of his disciples, Plato.
Proceeding from the Socratic idea of knowledge, he col-
lected into a single focus all the elements and rays of
truth which lay scattered, not only in his master, but
in the philosophers before him, and made of philosophy
a whole, a system. That thought is the true being, and
alone real, this proposition was understood by the Me-
garic school only abstractly, and by Socrates only as prin-
ciple. The latter, indeed, proposed cognition by means
of universal notions only as a postulate, and gave it no

68 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

further development. His philosophizing is not a system,
but only seed and germ of logical analysis and philoso-
phical method. Systematic exposition and analysis of
the absolutely valid notions, of the world of ideas, this
was left for Plato.

The Platonic system is the objectivized Socrates, the
conciliation and fusion of all previous philosophy.

UlY.— Plato.

PLATO'S Life.— (a.) His youth.— Tlsito, the son of
Ariston, and descendant of a noble Attic family, was
born in the year 429 b.c., the year in which Pericles died,
the second year of the Peloponnesian war, a year so unfor-
tunate for the Athenians. Born thus in the centre of Gre-
cian culture, and son of an ancient and noble house, he
received an education befitting his circumstances, although
with the exception of the useless names of his teachers, we
possess no information on the history of his earliest instruc-
tion. That the growing youth preferred the seclusion of
philosophy to the career of politics may seem strange, see-
ing that he must have had, we should think, many induce-
ments to the latter. Critias, for example, one of the
Thirty, was the cousin of his mother, while his uncle was
Charmides who subsequently met his death on the same
day with Critias, fighting on the side of the oligarchical
tyrants of Athens against Thrasybulus. Nevertheless,
he never once publicly appeared as a speaker in the
assembly of the people. In view of the commencing de-
generation and extending corruption of his country, too
proud to court the favour of the manj'^-headed rabble,
more inclined, upon the whole, to Dorism than to De-
mocracy and Athenian political life as it was, he pre-
ferred to make science his occupation, rather than fall,
vainly fighting as a patriot with inevitable misfortune, a
martyr to his convictions. The Athenian State he con-
sidered lost ; and he thought it useless to bring another
sacrifice to its unavoidable ruin. (&.) His spiritual ap-
prenticeship.— Plato was twenty years of age when he
first attended Socrates, and he passed eight years in his
society. Except some anecdotes unworthy of credence,
we possess no particulars in regard to this period. There
is only a passing mention of Plato in the Memorabilia of
Xenophon (ni. 6) ; it is sufficient to indicate, however, a

PLATO. 59

greater tban usual intimacy between the disciple and his
master. Plato himself, in the dialogues, reveals notliing
of his personal relations to Socrates, only once {Phccd.
p. 59) does he even name himself among the more par-
ticular friends of Socrates. But what influence he re-
ceived from Socrates, how he recognised in him the
perfected portrait of a wise man, how he found not only
in his teaching but in his Hfe and actions the fruitfullest
philosophical germs and hints, what significance in gene-
ral the j>ersonality of his master in its authority as
exemplar had for him — this he has suflBciently demon-
strated in his writings, by putting his own far more de-
velo])ed philosophical system into the mouth of his
teacher as the centre of the dialogues, and the arbiter of
the conversation, (c.) His travels. — After the death of
Socrates (399 B.c.), fearing to be involved in the reaction
that had now set in against philosophy, Plato, in the
thirtieth year of his age, quitted, with other friends of
Socrates, his native city, and took up his abode at Me-
gara, with his former fellow-disciple, Euclid, the founder
of the Megaric school (compare xiii. 4). Hitherto a
pure disciple of Socrates, he became now, in consequence
of intercourse with the Megarics, among whom a peculiar
philosophical direction, a modification of the teaching
of Socrates, had already declared itself, infinitely stimu-
lated and enriched. "We shall see again how far this
sojourn at Megara was of influence, in the formation of
his philosophy, especially in the dialectic founding and
completing of his ideas. An entire period of his literarj'
activity, an entire group of his dialogues, finds satisfactory
explanation only in the spiritual impulses he had received
here. From Megara Plato travelled to Cyrene, Egypt,
Magna Graecia, and Sicily. In Magna Graecia he was intro-
duced into the Pythagorean philosophy, which was then
at its perfection. His stay among the Pythagoreans was
very important for him : as man he gained in practical
discernment, in interest in hfe, and in a regard for public
concerns, and the afi'airs of society ; as philosopher, in
scientific stimulus and literary motive. Traces of Pytha'
gorean philosophy run throughout the entire series of his
latest literary productions. In especial, his dislike to
public and political life seems to have been much modi-
fied by his intercourse with the Pythagoreans. Whilst
the Thecetetus still signalizes in the directest manner
the incompatibility of philosophy with public life,

60 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

the later dialogues, especially the Repuhlic, and even the
Statesman in which the Pythagorean influence appears
already begun, return by preference to reality again ;
and the familiar proposition, Rulers ought to be philo-
sophers, is a very characteristic expression for this
later modification in the philosophical mood of Plato.
His visit to Sicuy led to his acquaintance as well with
the elder Dionysius, as with Dion, his brother-in-law.
The ways of the philosopher, it is true, agreed ill with
those of the tyrant. Plato is said to have attracted his
displeasure to such a degree that his life was in danger.
After nearly ten years of travelling, Plato, in his fortieth
year (388 or 389), returned to Athens, {d.) Plato as head
of the academy : the period of mastership (that is, after
his Lehrjahre and Wanderjahre, we have now his Meis-
terjahre).— After his return, Plato soon drew around him
a circle of disciples. The place in which he taught was
the Academy, a gymnasium outside Athens, where he
possessed a garden belonging to his inheritance from his
father. Of information in regard to the external history
of his school and later Kfe, we have scarcely any. His life
passed smoothly, interrupted only by two other voyages
to Sicily, where meanwhile the younger Dionysius had
attained sovereignty. This second and third sojourn at
the Syracusan court are pregnant with events and vicissi-
tudes ; they show us the philosopher in the most multi-
form positions and circumstances, as described by Plutarch
in the life of Dion. For his philosophical character,
however, these voyages are only so far important, as,
according to all probability, Plato availed himself of the
opportunities they offered for putting his political theory
into practice. To that end he endeavoured to realize in
Sicily his ideal of the State, and, by a philosophical
education of the new ruler, to unite philosophy and
government in one and the same hand, or at least, in
some manner or other, by means of philosophy, to effect
a wholesome reform of the Sicilian constitution in an
aristocratic direction. His efforts were fruitless; cir-
cumstances were unfavourable, and the character of the
young Dionysius, * one of those mediocre natures which
in their halfness aspire to fame and distinction, but are
incapable of any depth or of any earnestness,' disap-
pointed the expectations which Plato, on the report of
Dion, had believed himself warranted to entertain of him.
As concerns Plato's philosophical activity in the academy

PLATO. CI

we are stnick at once by the change it manifests in the
position of })hilo8ophy to public life. Instead of making
philosophy, like Socrates, an object of social conversation
and of ordinary intercourse, instead of entering into
philosophical discourse in the streets and other public
places with every one who was that way inclined, he
lived and worked in retirement from the business of tlie
outside world, confined to the circle of his disciples. In
proportion as philosophy grows now into a system, and
systematic form comes to be considered essential, philo-
sophy itself ceases to be popular, begins to demand a
scientific preparatory knowledge, and to become an afi'air
of the school, a something esoteric. The reverence of
the name of philosopher, and especially of Plato's, was
still so great, however, that, as is related, the proposal
was made to him by various States to frame for them a
code of laws ; and he is said to have actually done this
in several instances. Surrounded by a crowd of true
disciples, even women among them in the attire of men,
the object of unboimded homage, up to the last moment
in possession of undiminished mental power, he reached
the advanced age of eighty-one years. The latest period
of his life appears to have been troubled by certain dif-
ferences and divisions in the school, for which Aristotle
is particularly named as responsible. While engaged
writing, or, according to others, at a marriage -feast, he
was overtaken by death as by a gentle slumber in the
year 347 B.C. His remains were laid in the Ceramicus,
not far from the Academy,

2. History of the Inner Development of the Writ-
ings AND Philosophy of Plato. — That the Platonic
philosophy is essentially an historical development, that it
is not to be conceived as completed at once in the form of
an individual system, to which a variety of writings are
as supplementary fragments, but that the several writings
are rather stages of evolution, as it were stations passed
and left behind in the intellectual progress of the philo-
sopher— this is an extremely important point of view for
the correct understanding of the Platonic writings.

The philosophical and literary activity of Plato falls
into three periods, which may be variously designated.
In reference to chronology or biography, they are the
periods of apprenticeship, travel, and mastership (or of
Lehrjahre, Wanderjahre, and Meisterjahre as already
named). In reference again to the dominant outer influ-

62 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY,

ence and points of junction respectively present in each,
these periods are the Socratic, the Heraclitico-Eleatic, and
the Pythagorean. In reference lastly to their subject-
matter, they are respectively the antisophistico-ethical,
the dialectical or conciliative, and the systematic or con-
structive periods.

The first period, the Socratic, is characterized exter-
nally by the predominance of a certain imitative dramatic
element, and internally in relation to the philosophical
stand-point, by the adoption of the method and chief
matter of Socrates. Not yet acquainted with the results
of the older inquiries, and, from the Socratic point of
view, rather repelled than attracted by the study of the
history of philosophy, Plato restricts himself as yet to
analytic treatment of the notions, especially the ethical
ones, and to such an imitation of his master as is still
philosophically incomplete, though certainly beyond any
mere repetition of what had been got verbally by rote.
His Socrates betrays not any other view of life or philo-
sophical attainment than the historical Socrates of Xeno-
phon has possessed. His efforts too, like those of his
contemporary fellow-disciples, are directed principally to
practical wisdom, while his polemic, like that of Socrates,
concerns the want of scientific knowledge prevalent in
life, the Sophistical superficiality and defect of principle,
infinitely more than the antagonistic teudencies of philo-
sophy. The whole period displays still an eclectic and
protreptic character. The highest point in which the
dialogues of this group culminate, is the desire, still
thoroughly Socratic indeed, to establish the certainty of
absolute principles, the existence in and for itself (the
objective reality) of the good.

Plato's historical development, certainly, would take
on quite another character, were the views of some later
inquirers in reference to the place of the Phoedrus to be
considered right. If the Phoedrus, namely, were Plato's
first work, this circumstance would from the beginning
bespeak for Plato quite another course of culture than
could possibly be anticipated on the part of a simple dis-
ciple of Socrates. The allusions in this dialogue to the
pre-existence of the soul and its periodical migrations, to
the affinity of earthly to heavenly truth, to divine inspi-
ration as in contrast to human reflection, the erotic
notion, the Pythagorean ingredients, — all this is so dis-
crepant from the original considerations of Socrates, that

PL A TO. 63

it would require us to place in the very beginning of his
pldlosophical development the greatest part of what
Plato had creatively struck out only in the course of hia
entire career. This improbability itself, and, still more,
numerous other objections, pronounce for a much later
composition of this dialogue. The Phcedrtis being set
aside, the history of Plato's development runs pretty well
thus : —

The short dialogues, which treat in a Socratic manner
Socratic theories and questions are (those of them that
are genuine) the earhest. The Charviides, for example,
discusses temperance, the Lysis friendship, the Laches
fortitude, Hippias minor yolnntary and intentional wrong-
doing, the ßrst Alcihiades the moral and intellectual
requisites of a statesman, etc. The youthfulness and im-
maturity of these dialogues, the disproportionate expen-
diture of scenic display as compared with the matter in
them, the scantiness and feebleness of this matter, the
indirect manner of the inquiry, that ends not in any posi-
tive result, the formal analytic handling of the discussed
notions, — all this vouches for the early or maiden
character of these lesser dialogues.

As special type of the Socratic period, the Protagoras
may be taken. In this dialogTie, when Plato directs his
entire polemic against the Sophists, and concerns himself
more especially with their external procedure, their con-
temporary influence, and their peculiar method as op-
posed to that of Socrates, without entering more deeply
into the grounds and character of their philosophy itself,
when further, occupied now with what is philosophical
in the stricter sense, he exclusively discusses, and in the
manner of indirect inquiry, the Socratic idea of virtue in
its various aspects, as knowledge, as one, and as teach-
able (compare xii. 7), — there are exhibited to us, and in
the clearest fashion, the tendency, character, and defects
of the first period.

The third and highest stage of this period (the Prota-
goras standing for the second), is represented by the
Gorgias, written shortly after the death of Socrates.
Directed against the Sophistical identification of virtue
and pleasure, of the good and the agreeable, or, what
is the same thing, against the affirmation of an absolute
moral relativity, this dialogue proves that the good, far
from owing its origin only to the right of the stronger,
and so only to the caiirice of the subject, is something

64 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

existent in and for itself, objectively valid, and conse-
quently alone veritably useful, and that, therefore, the
standard of pleasure must give place to the higher
standard of the good. It is in this direct thetical po-
lemic against the Sophistic principle of pleasure, this
tendency towards something fixed, permanent, and
secure against subjective self-will, that the superiority
of the Gorgias to the Protagoras principally consists.

In the first or Socratic period, the Platonic philoso-
phizing became ripe and ready for the reception of Eleatic
and Pythagorean categories. With help of these catego-
ries, to struggle up to the higher questions of philosophy,
and so to free the philosophy of Socrates from its involu-
tion with practical life, — this was the task of the second
period.

The second period, the dialectic or Megaric, is
characterized externally by a retrocession of the form
and poetic animation, not unfrequently by obscurity and
stylistic diflSculties ; while inwardly it is characterized by
the dialectical formation of the ideal theory, in concilia-
tion and amalgamation with the thought of the Eleatics.

Plato was brought into relation, through his journey to
Megara, with opponents, through his voyage to Italy,
with other philosophical tendencies, with whom and with
which he was bound to come to an understanding before
being able to raise the principle of Socrates into its true
significance. It was thus he was led to acquire the philo-
sophical theories of the older thinkers, for the study of
which, in view of the absence at that time of any literary
publicity, the requisite appliances were not yet in exist-
ence at Athens. By means of a settlement with these
different positions, such as had already been attempted
by his elder feUow-disciples, he sought, transcending the
narrow limits of mere ethical inquiry, to penetrate into
the ultimate grounds of knowledge, and perfect the So-
cratic art of universalization into a science of it, into the
theory of the ideas. That all human action depended on
knowledge, and that all knowledge depended on its uni-
versal or notion, to these results Plato was already able
to advance by a scientific generalization of the Socratic
doctrine. But to introduce now this Socratic cognition
through notions into the circle of speculative thought, to
establish the notional unities dialectically as the element
of permanence in the vicissitude of the phenomenal, to
discover the foundations of knowledge, which, so to speak.

PLATO. 65

h.i(i only been turned by Socrates, to grasp the theoriea
of opponents direct in their scientific grounds, and follow
them up into their ultimate roots, — this is the problem
which the Megaric dialogues set themselves to resolve.

At the head of this group stands the Theatetm. Its
main contents are a polemic against the Protagoreaa
theory of cognition, against the identification of thought
and sensuous perception, or against the assumption of an
absolute relativity of all knowledge. A% the Oorgias,
before it, sought to ascertain and establish the absolute
principle of ethical ideas, so now the TheceUtus, ascend-
ing from practice to theory, seeks to ascertain and estab-
lish the absolute principle of logical ideas, of those ideas
which underlie all perception and all thought, — in a
word, it seeks to ascertain and establish the objectivity
of truth, a realm of knowledge that is independent of
sensuous perception, that is immanent to thought. Such
ideas are to him the universal notions, likeness, unlike-
ness, identity, difiference, etc.

The ThecEtetus is followed by the trilogy of the So-
phist, the Statesman, and the Philosopher, with which
the Megaric group is completed. The object of the first
of these dialogues is to investigate the notion of show
(Schein, appearance), that is to say, of non-being ; that
of the last, — represented by the Parmenides, — the notion
of being ; and both are explanations come to with the
views of the Eleatics. Plato, indeed, after having come
to recognise the universal notions and the logical categories
as what is permanent in the outward mutability, could
not fail to have his attention awakened to the Eleatics,
who by an opposite path had reached the same result, —
that in unity, namely, Hes all true substantiality, and that
to plurality, as such, there can attach no true being. De-
veloping this leading thought of the Eleatics into its con-
sequences, in which the Megarics had already preceded
him, it would necessarily be all the easier for him to
advance to the elevation of his abstract universal notions
(ideas), into metaphysical substances. On the other hand,
it would be impossible for him, unless he were prepared
entirely to surrender the plurality of existence, to be
satisfied with the immobility and exclusiveness of the
EHeatic one, and he would be obliged rather, by means of a
dialectical development of the Eleatic principle, to attempt
to show that the one must at the same time be an organ-
ized and co-articulated whole that included the plurality

66 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

witliin its own unity. The SopJust, in demonstrating the
existence of show or of non-being (that is to say, the
plurality of the ideas, and their nature to possess specific
quality each only in a mutual contrast of pairs that are
counterparts, results due to the presence of negation), dis-
cusses this double relation to the Eleatic principle polemi-
cally- as against the latter. ITie Parmenides again —
in demonstrating the Eleatic one, by virtue of its own
logical consequence, to strike round into its reverse, and
undergo diremption into plurality — effects the same ob-
ject irenically. The internal progress of the ideal theory
in the Megaric group is therefore this, that the ThecetC'
tus makes good, as against the Heraclitico-Protagorean
doctrine of an absolute becoming, the permanent, objec-
tive reality of the ideas ; the Sophist again their recipro-
cal relation and susceptibility of combination ; and the
Parmenides finally their entire dialectic complex, their
relation to the phenomenal world, and their self -concilia-
tion (fusion) with the latter.

The third period begins with the return of the philoso-
pher to his native country. It unites the perfection of
form of the first with the deeper philosophical substance
of the second. The memories of his young years appear
at that time to have arisen anew before the soul of Plato,
and to have again imparted to his literary faculty its long-
unwonted freshness and fulness, whilst at the same time
his experience of foreign countries, and his acquaintance in
particular with the Pythagorean philosophy, had enriched
his mind with a wealth of images and ideals. This re-
vival of old memories announces itself specially in this,
that the writings of this group return with preference
and love to the personality of Socrates, and manifest the
entire Platonic philosophy to be in a measure, but a
glorifying of the Socratic theory, but an exaltation of
the historical Socrates into the idea. In contrast to the
two former periods, the third is characterized externally,
hand in hand with the growing influence of Pythagorean-
ism, by an increasing predominance of the mythic form,
and internally, in speculative reference, by the application
of the ideas to the concrete spheres of psychology, ethics,
and natural science. That the ideas are objective reali-
ties, the seat of all substantiality and truth, as conversely
that the phenomena of sense are copies of these, — this
theory is now no longer argued, but is assumed as proved,
and is made principle or dialectical basis of the discus-

PL A TO. 67

sion of the real disciplines. Combined with this is the
ten(KMicy to conjoin into the totality of a system the
8ej>.irate disciplines hitherto divided, as well as inwardly
to fuse together all the previous principles of philosopliy,
that is, the ethical of Socrates, the dialectical of the
Eleatics, and the physical of the Pythagoreans.

Thus the Ph(Edrus, which is Plato's inaugural pro-
gramme on opening of his Academic career, and the
BatKiuet, which is connected with it, attempt — both
starting from the erotic notion as the veritable philoso-
phical germ — to subject the rhetorical theory and prac-
tice of the time to a critique on principles, in order to
show, in contrast to both, that only exclusive devotion to
the idea, the true Eros, affords that understood and
settled stability of a scientific principle which is alone in
a condition to secure us from subjectivity, absence of
principle, and crudeness. Thus, too, the remaining
greater works are but similar attempts, as the Phcedo, to
found the immortality of the soul on the ideal theory, the
PJiUehus to apply the highest categories of the system to
the notions of pleasure and the supreme good, and finally
the closing and consummating works of the Republic and
the Timoexis to determine the true character of the state
and of nature, of the physical and the spiritual universe.

Having thus delineated the history of the inner deve-
lopment of the Platonic philosophy, we turn now to its
systematic exposition.

3. Division of the Platonic System. — Plato himself
having given us no systematic exposition of his philosophy,
no classifying principle realized in actual application,
but only the history of his thought, or only the exposi-
tion of his philosophical development, we find ourselves
reduced here to mere hints. From these, various pro-
posals have resulted, as now a division of the Platonic
system into theoretical and practical sciences, and again
into philosophies of the beautiful, the good, and the true.
Better than these, perhaps, is another division, which
has some support in certain ancient intimations. Some
of the ancients say, namely, that Plato first collected
the various parts of philosophy from their dispersion
among the earlier philosophers, and so obtained three
parts of philosophy, — logic, physics, ethics. The exacter
statement is certainly that of Sextus Empiricus, that
Plato virtually employed this classification, but had not
definitely expressed it; it is only his disciples Xenocrates

«8 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

and Aristotle who shall have expressly recognised this
distribution. The Platonic system is at least suscep-
tible of being, without violence, arranged into the three
parts named. Several dialogues there are, it is true,
which combine together, some more and some less, all
three at once, — logic, ethics, and physics. Nay, even in
those in which Plato is occupied with special disci-
j)lines, we find always the one flowing into the other,
])hysic8 issuing in ethics, ethics returning to physics, and
dialectic finally pervading the whole. Still, particular
dialogues there undoubtedly are, in which this ground-
plan can be distinctly recognised. That the Timceus ia
predominatingly physical, as the Republic is predominat-
ingly ethical, admits not of a doubt. And if dialectic is
exclusively represented in no single dialogue, the Megaric
group at least, which closes in the Parmenides, and
which constitutes, even according to the external in-
timation of Plato, a connected tetralogy, pursues the
common purpose of an exposition as well of science as
of its object (being), and is in its matter, therefore, de-
cidedly dialectical. Seeing, then, that Plato must, by the
very course of previous philosophy, have been naturally
led to this tripartite division, that Xenocrates is not
likely to have invented it, and that Aristotle assumes it
as universally known, we cannot hesitate to adopt it as
gronnd-plan in an exposition of the Platonic system.

We have no clearer declaration in Plato in regard
to the order of the parts either. The first place belongs
evidently, however, to dialectic, as the foundation of
all philosophy ; and Plato himself, while he gives the
general prescript {Phoed. p. 99, and Phcedr. p. 237), to
begin in every philosophical investigation with the de-
termination of the idea, does afterwards actually discuss
all the concrete spheres of science from the point of view
of the ideal theory. The position of the other two parts
would seem still more doubtful. As, however, physics
culminate in ethics, while, conversely, ethics, in the in-
quiry into the animating principle (soul) of nature, have
physics for foundation, the latter will necessarily precede
the former.

From philosophy the mathematical sciences have been
expressly excluded by Plato. He considers them, in-
deed, as educational means for philosophical thought
(Pep. VII. 526), as a necessary step in knowledge, with-
out which no one can ever attain to philosophy

PL A TO. 69

{Thil. VT. 510) ; but still to him mathematics is not philo-
sophy, for the former presujiposes the priucijjles of the
latter, as if they were already kno\rn to all, and "without
giving any account of them, — a mode of procedure which,
in pure science, is inadmissible ; mathematics, too, haa
recourse in its proofs to visible pictures, although it is not
of these that it treats, but of what is seen by the under-
standing alone {Ibid.) It stands then to him in the
middle between correct opinion and pure science, clearer
than the one, obscurer than the other {Ibid. vu. 533).

4. The Platonic Dialectic. — (a.) Idea of dialectic. —
Dialectic or logic has been used by the ancients mostly in
a very wide sense, by Plato frequently as interchangeable
with philosophy. Nevertheless he treats it at other times
as only a branch of phüosophy. He separates it as science
of the eternal and immutable from physics as science of
the mutable, of what never is, but always only becomes.
He separates it also from ethics, so far as the latter con-
sider not the good in and for itself, but only in its con-
crete application in morals and the state. Dialectic is still
thus, in a measure, philosophy in the more eminent sense
of the word, whilst physics and ethics add themselves to
it as two less exact sciences, as it were as not yet of the
nature of completed philosophy. Plato expressly defines
dialectic in the usual sense of the word, as the art of
developing knowledge conversationally by question and
answer {Bep. ^^I. 534). But the art of correct commu-
nication in conversation being at the same time to Plato
the art also of correct thought, as indeed the ancients
generally could not separate thought and speech, and
every process of thought was for them a living discourse,
we find him also defining dialectic as the science of duly
conducting discourse, and duly joining or disjoining the
genera of things, the universal notions {Soph. p. 253 ;
P/icedr. p. 266). Dialectic is for him twofold then, to
know what can be joined, what not ; and to know how
;o divide, how to combine. If along with this latter de-
in ition we consider that, for Plato, the universal notions,
;he ideas, are alone what is veritably actual, veritably
Deent, we shall find a third definition, which also not un-
'requently appears in Plato (particularly Phil-eb. p. 57), and
s not by any means discrepant, this, namely, that dialectic
3 the science of the beent, of the veritable, of the ever-
asting self -identical, — in a word, that it is the science of
Ü1 the other sciences. So conceived, it may be briefly

70 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

designated as tlie science of what absolutely is, or of
the ideas.

{h.) What is science ? {aa.) In contradistinction to sen-
sation and sensuous conception. — The discussion of this
question, as against the sensualism of Protagoras, is the
business of the Thecetetus. Protagoras said, namely,
that all knowledge is perception, and that both are one
and the same. From this it followed — consequences
which Protagoras himself drew — that the things are as s
they appear to me to be, that perception or sensation is i
infallible. But as again perception and sensation are
with countless people countlessly diverse, as even in the
case of one and the same individual they are extremely
variable, it follows further, that there are no objective
assignments or predicates whatever, that we can never
say what anything is in itself, that all notions, big, little,
light, heavy, more, less, have only a relative signification,
and that consequently the universals likewise, as them-
selves but reductions of the changeful many, are devoid
of all permanence and consistence. In opposition to this
Protagorean thesis, Plato calls attention to the following
contradictions and counter-instances : — Firstly, The Pro-
tagorean proposition leads to the most startling conse-
quences. Being and seeming, knowledge and perception
namely, being one and the same, then any irrational
brute that is capable of perception is equally the measure
of all things ; and instinctive sentiment, as the expression
of my subjective experience, of my condition for the
moment, being infallible, then there is no longer possible
any instruction, any scientific discussion, any debate, or
any refutation. Secondly, The Protagorean proposition is
a logical contradiction. For according to it Protagoras
must call right whoever calls him wrong ; since indeed,
as is maintained by himself, nobody perceives or feels
incorrectly, but, on the contrary, everybody quite correctly.
The pretended truth of Protagoras, therefore, is true for
nobody, not even for himself. Thirdly, Protagoras anni-
hilates all knowledge of the future. What / hold to be
useful, namely, does not on that account necessarily prove
itself such in result. For, as what is useful always refers
to the future, and as men, taken individually, do not pos-
sess in themselves any necessary standard for estimating
the future, but one man more, another less, the infer-
ence is clear, that it is not man simpliciter, but only the
wise man that can be regarded as a criterion. Fourthly,

PLATO. 71

The theory of Protagoras demolishes perception itself.
Perception according to him depends on s^ for one another
(a reciprocity, a synthesis) of perceived object and per-
cciWng subject, and is the common product of both.
But the objects, in his \ieyf also, are in such uninterrupted
flux and motion, that it is impossible to fix them whether
in seeing or in hearing. This absolute mutability ren-
ders all knowledge of sense, and, consequently, all know-
lodge in general — both being identical to Protagoras —
impossible. Fifthly^ Protagoras knows not the a priori
element of knowledge. It results from an analysis of
sensuous perception, that not the whole sum involved in
any one act of perception is produced or introduced by
the action of the senses, but rather that, besides this
sensuous action, there are implied as well certain intel-
lectual functions, and, consequently, an independent
sphere of extra-sensuous knowledge. We see with the
eyes and hear with the ears ; but, to conjoin these per-
ceptions, thus acquired by means of different organs,
and to embrace them in the unity of self-consciousness, —
neither is this an affair of the senses. But further : we
compare the various perceptions of sense with one an-
other, and this is a function also which cannot be per-
formed by the senses themselves, for it is impossible for
us to receive through sight the perceptions of the ear, or
conversely. Of the perceptions themselves finally, we
afiirm qualities, such as being and non-being, likeness
and unlikeness, identity and difference, etc. , which plainly
cannot be derived by means of sense itself. These quali-
ties, to which belong also the good and the bad, beauty
and the reverse, etc., constitute a peculiar sphere of
knowledge, which the soid itself creates in independency
of all perception of sense, and through its own spontaneous
action. In other dialogues Plato introduces, in his polemic
against sensualism, the ethical moment as well. W •
must, he says (in thciSo^A.), make better men of those whc-
materialize all things, and who maintain what is tangible
to be alone true, before they can become susceptible of
knowledge. Then, however, they will see the truth of the
soul, acknowledge justice and reason in it, and admit that
these are real things, albeit neither tangible nor visible.

(6&). Knowledge in relation to opinion. — Opinion (crude
conception, feeling, instinctive conviction) is just as little
identical with knowledge as perception of sense. Incor-
rect opinion falls of itseK to the ground ; but even cor-

72 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

rect opinion cannot be maintained as truth proper, for
(Thecetet.) it may be produced by the art of the orator
without being legitimately describable as on that account
true knowledge. Correct opinion, if materially true, is
formally inadequate, and stands therefore in the middle be-
tween knowledge and non-knowledge, participant of both.

{cc.) Science in relation to thought. — As against the
Protagorean sensualism, there has been already proved,
on the part of the soul, and in independence of sensuous
perception and sensation itself, a power of investigating
the universal abstractedly, and of grasping in thought
that which truly is. There are thus two sources of
knowledge, on one side external sensation with inner in-
stinctive opinion, and on the other rational thought.
The former of these is employed on what is in constant
process, in constant change, on what, as purely moment-
ary, is in perpetual transition from the was through the
now into the will be [Parm. p. 152) ; and is, consequently,
a source of troubled, impure, and uncertain knowledge.
Thought, on the contrary, is employed on the permanent,
on that which neither begins nor ends, but always in like
manner is (Tim. p. 51). There are two sorts of things,
says the Timceus (p. 27, seq.), one ' that always is, and be-
comes not, and one that always becomes, and never is.
The former, that, namely, which is always in the same
state, is apprehended through reflection by means of
reason ; the other, again, which comes to be and ceases
to be, but properly never is, is apprehended through
opinion by means of sensuous perception, and without
reason. * True knowledge, therefore, comes only from the
pure and wholly inner activity of the mind, freed from
the body and all sensuous troublings and disturbances
{Phoed. p. 65). The soul in this state perceives things
in their purity, as they are {Phced. p. 66) in their eternal
essence, in their own immutable nature. Hence it is
that the desire of death, the longing to escape from the
body as an obstacle to true knowledge, and to become
pure spirit, is portrayed in the Phcedo (p. 64) as the true
mood of a x>hilosopher. Science, after all this, then, is
the thought of the veritably beent, or of the ideas. Dia-
lectic, as the art of joining and disjoining ideas, is the
organ of their apprehension, the means of their discovery
and recognition ; and, conversely, the ideas are the true
object of dialectic.

(c.) The ideal theory in its genesis. — The Platonic ideal

PL A TO. 7»

theory is the common product of the Socratic method of
notit)iKil formation (universalization), of the Horaclitic
principle of an absohite becoming, and of the Eleatic
doctrine of an absohite being. Plato owes to the first
the idea of notional knowledge, to the second the con-
ception of the sensuous world as mere becoming, to the
third the assumi)tion of a sphere of absolute reality.
Plato connects the ideal theory elsewhere (in the Philebus),
with the Pythagorean thought that all consists of unity
and plurality, of the limited and the unlimited. To come
to an understanding with the principles of Heraclitus
and the Eleatics is the object of the Theostetus, the Sophist,
and the Parmenides. This is accomplished in the Thece-
tetus polemically against the princii)le of an absolute be-
coming ; in the Sophist polemically against the principle
of abstract being ; and in the Parmenides irenically in re-
lation to the Eleatic one. Of the ThecBtetuswe have just
spoken ; in the Sophist and Parmenides the progress of
the ideal theory is constituted as follows : —

The purpose of the dialogue so-named is ostensibly
to demonstrate the Sophist as a caricature of the j)hilo-
sopher ; in truth, however, to establish the reality of
mere show or of the non-beent ; and speculatively to
discuss, therefore, the relation of being and of non-being.
The teaching of the Eleatics had ended in the rejection
of all sensuous knowledge, and in the declaration of what
we believe ourselves to percci-ce as regards a plurality of
things, or a becoming, to be mere show. Here the contra-
diction was plain, of directly denying non-being, and yet
admitting its existence in human conception. Plato de-
monstrates this contradiction at once, by explaining that
any apparent knowledge which should furnish us with a
false object or a false conception were impossible, if
thought in general of the false, the untrue, the non-
existent, were impossible. This, Plato continues, is pre-
cisely the greatest difficulty in thinking non-being, that
he who denies it is obliged quite as much as he who
affirms it, to contradict himseK. For although it is
incapable of being expressed, or of being thought whether
as one or as many, yet he who speaks of it is compelled
to concede to it both characters. If we grant a false
opinion to exist, we at least presuppose the conception of
non-being ; for only that opinion can be named false that
either declares the non-existent existent, or the existent
non-existent. In short, if a false conception actually

74 BISTOR Y OF PHIL OSO PH Y.

exists, a non-existent, in truth and actuality, also exists.
Having established iii this way the reality of non-being,
Plato proceeds to discuss the relation of being and non-
being, or the relation of notions in general, their capacity
of combination, and their antithesis. If, namely, non-
being has no less reality than being, and being no more
than non-being, — if, for example, the not-large be as
real as the large, then every notion may in the same
way be expressed as the side of an antithesis, and
recognised as at once beent and non-beent. It is beent
in reference to itself, as what is identical with it-
self ; it is non-beent in reference to each of the innu-
merable other notions which may be referred to it, and
with which it cannot enter into communion, as being
different from them. The notions of the identical {ravrbv)
and the other {ddrepov), express the form of the antithe-
sis in general : they are the universal formulas of com-
bination for all notions. This reciprocal relation of
notions, as at once beent and non-beent, by means o1
which they become arranged together, is the foundation
of the art of dialectic, the business of which is to decide
what notions shall be combined together, and what not.
Plato shows by example of the notions being, motion ( =
becoming), and rest (= quasi-üxed being, mortal state),
what results from the combination of notions and their
reciprocal exclusion of one another. Of the notions
named, for instance, those of motion and of rest cannot
be combined together, but, with the notion of being,
either may. The notion of rest is, therefore, in refer-
ence to itself, beent ; in reference to motion non-beent,
or other. Thus, the ideal theory, its general establish-
ment having been attempted in the Thecetetus, through
demonstration of the objective reality of the ideas, is
now, in the Sophist, developed into the doctrine of the
community of notions, that is of their reciprocal subordi-
nation and co-ordination. The category that conditions
these reciprocal relations is the category of non-being, or
the other. The fundamental thought of the Sophist,
then, that neither is being without non-being, nor non-
being without being, may, in modern phraseology, be
expressed thus : negation is not non-being, but determi-
nateness, and, conversely, all determinateness, and con-
creteness of notions, all affirmativeness, is only through
negation, through exclusion, contrariety ; the notion of
antithesis is the soul of the philosophical method.

PLATO. 76

As positive consequence, and as a further development
of the Eleatic priucijile, we Lave now tbe ideal theory in
the Pm-inen'tdes. The burden of this dialogue being jiut
into the mouth of Parmenides himself, the Platonic doc-
liiue is thus, even in its external form, presented as the
special xieyf of the Eleatic philosopher. No doubt, the
1. iding thought here, namely, that the one is not think-
;il)le without the many, nor the many without the one,
luit that both necessarily presujipose and mutually con-
dition each other, stands in direct contradiction to the
I'^leatic doctrine. Still, Parmenides, in attempting to
discuss and explain, in the first part of his poem, the one,
and in the second (though according to his own protesta-
tion only in deference to erroneous opinion), the world of
the many, had himself, in a certain way, i)ostiüated an
inner conciliation between these seemingly incoherent
]>art8 of his system; and to that extent, therefore, the
Platonic ideal theory is justified in giving itself out
iis a further development, and as the true s^nse of
the Parmenidean philosophy. This dialectical concilia-
tion between the one and the many, Plato attempts in
four antinomies, which ostensibly have only a negative
result, so far as they demonstrate, that on assumption
as well as on rejection of the one, contradictions follow.
The positive sense of these antinomies, which, however,
can only be got by means of inferences that are not
made by Plato himself, but left by him to the reader's
activity, is as follows : — The first of the antinomies
shows that the one, if conceived in abstract contradiction
to the many, is not even one, that is, that it is unthink-
able. The second shows, that in this case the reality of
the many is also unthinkable. The third shows that the
one, or the idea, cannot be thought, as not being, since
of the absolutely non-existent there can neither be notion
nor predicate, and since, if non -being be excluded from
all community with being, all coming to be and ceasing
to be, all likeness and unHkeness, all conception and ex-
planation of it are also denied. The fourth, lastly, shows,
that the not-one cannot be thought without the one, the
many not without the idea. What now is Plato's object
in this discussion of the dialectical relation between the
notions of the one and the many ? Does he intend by
the notion of the one only to render clear, as it were by an
example, the method of the dialectical manipulation of
the notions : or is the discussion of this notion itself the

76 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

special object of the exposition ? Plainly the latter must
be the case, if the dialogue is not to end resultless, and
its two parts are not to rest without inner connexion. But
how comes precisely this notion of the one to be treated
by Plato in a special inquiry ? If we will remind our-
selves that the Eleatics had, in the antithesis of the one
and the many, contemplated the antithesis of the true
and the phenomenal, that Plato likewise regards his ideas
as unities of the multiplex, as what in the many is one
and identical, using indiscriminately, indeed, ' idea ' and
* the one,' as synonymous, and defining dialectic the art
of combining the many into unity {Rep. vii. 537), we shall
perceive that the one which is the object of inquiry in the
Parmenides is the idea in general, that is, in its logical
form, and that in the dialectic of the one and the many,
Plato consequently seeks to exhibit the dialectic of the idea
and the phenomenal world, or to determine and establish
dialectically the correct view of the idea as the unity in
this phenomenal world. Proof being led in the Par-
menides, on the one hand, that the many cannot be
thought without the one, and, on the other hand, that
the one must be such as comprehends within itself the
many, there results, on the one hand, that the being of
the phenomenal world, or of the many, has only so far
truth as the one, the notion, is in it, and, on the othei
hand, that the notion, in order to be capable of existence
in the phenomenal world, actually is of such a nature as
not to be an abstract one, but multiplicity in unity.
Matter — this is the indirect result of the Parmenides —
has, as the indeterminate, infinitely divisible mass, no
actuality ; it is in relation to the world of ideas non-
beent : and, if indeed the ideas, as what truly is, obtain
in it their manifestation, still all that is real in the mani-
festation is the idea itself : the world of manifestation
holds from the world of ideas that shines into it its en-
tire existence in fee, and being comes to it only so far as
its import is the notion.

{d.) Positive exposition of the ideal theory. — The ideas
may, according to the various sides of their historical
connexion, be defined as the common element in the
manifold, the universal in the individual, the one in the
many, the fixed and permanent in the mutable. In a
subjective reference, they are principles of cognition,
certain in themselves and inderivative from experience,
the in-born regulatives of all our knowledge. In an ob-

PL A TO. 77

joctive reference, they are the immutable principles of
existence and the world without, incorijoreal, indivisibK%
simple unities, that are present in whatever may in any
way prove itself self-subsisteut. The ideal theory origi-
nates in the desire to express the essence of things, what
( ach thing veritably is, to state iu notions what of being
1^ identicjj with thought, to comprehend the real world
- an intellectual world organized within itself. Aristotle
1 xpressly assigns this desire of scientific cognition as mo-
tive of the Platonic theory of ideas. 'Plato,' he says
(Meta. XIII. 4), 'came upon his ideal theory, because he
\\ as convinced of the truth of the Heraclitic view of the
things of sense, and regarded them as an eternal flux.
Hut if, Plato reasoned, there is to be a science or scientific
knowledge of anything, there must, together with the
things of sense, exist other entities possessed of stability;
for there can be no science of the fleeting.' It is for the
idea of science, then, that the reality of the ideas is de-
manded ; but this can only be possible if the notion is
the ground of all being. This is the opinion of Plato.
Neither a true knowing nor a true being is for him pos-
sible without the absolute notions, the ideas.

What now does Plato understand by idea ? That not
only the ideal notions of the beautiful and the good are
for him ideas, appears from what has been said. An
idea, as the name alone (eZSoj) intimates, has always
place wherever a general notion of species and genus
has place. Thus Plato speaks of the idea of a bed, of a
table, of strength, of health, of the voice, of colour, of
ideas of mere relation and quality, of ideas of mathe-
matical figures, nay, even of ideas of the non-beent, and
of what is in its nature only a contradiction to the idea,
as depravity and vice. In a word, there is always an idea
to be assumed whenever a many is designated by the
same appellative, by a common name {Hep. x. 696) ; or, as
Aristotle has it {Meta. xii. 3), Plato assumed for every
class of existence an idea. Plato expresses himself in
this sense in the opening of the Parmenides. The j'oung
Socrates is there asked by Parmenides what he takes for
an idea ? Socrates then enumerates the moral ideas,
those of the just, the beautiful, the good, without condi-
tion ; he also admits, but with hesitation, the physical
ideas, as of man, fire, water. As for ideas of what is
only formless mass, or only part in something else, such
as hair, filth, and diit, these he will not admit, but is

*i6 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

advised by Parmenides, that when philosophy shall have
taken full possession of him, ho will no longer despise
such things, that is, he will perceive how even they,
though in a remoter manner, participate in the idea.
Here, at least, the demand is expressed, to assume no
sphere of being as abandoned of the idea, to vindicate
for rational cognition even what is apparently the most
irrational and contingent, and to comprehend all that
exists as an existence of reason.

(e.) The relation of the ideas to the world of sense. — In
analogy with the various definitions of the idea are the
various designations which Plato uses for the things of
sense and the world without. The latter he names the
many, the divisible, unlimited, indeterminate, and mea-
sureless, that which becomes, the relative, the big and
little, the non-beent. The question, however, in what
relation the two worlds of sense and of the ideas stand
to each other, Plato has answered neither satisfactorily
nor in agreement with himself. When he characterizes,
as is most usual, the relation of things to the notions as
one of participation, or when he speaks of things as
copies or adumbrations of the ideas whicb are then as
archetypes, the main difficulty of the ideal theory is,
by such figurative expressions, not removed, but only
concealed. The difficulty lies in the contradiction, that
Plato now grants the reality of becoming and of its
sphere, and again declares the ideas, these stable and
ever self-identical substances to be alone what is actual.
Formally, indeed, Plato is so far consistent with himself
that he designates crass matter not as positive substrate,
but as the non-beent, and expressly protests that the
sensuous is not for him beent, but only like to what is
beent [Rep. x. 597). Consistent with this also is the
demand of Parmenides that a completed philosophy
should find, even in the smallest particular, the idea as
that which is knowable in the material world, and that
in the latter there should be left behind no remnant of
an existence incommensurable with thought, but that all
dualism should be got rid of. Finally Plato, in many of
his expressions, would seem to regard the phenomenal
world as only subjective appearance, as product of sub-
jective conception, of a confused mode of conceiving
the ideas. In this view the phenomena as opposed to the
ideas are quite deprived of self-subsistency ; beside
these they are no longer anything but the idea itself in

PL A TO. 7«

the form of non-Wing ; the phenomenal world holds
from that of the ideas which shines into it, its whole
existence in fee. But when again Plato names the sen-
saous element a mixture of the element of self with that
of the other or non-being (Tim. p. 35) ; when he calls
the ideas vowels which, chainlike, pen'ade all things
{Soph. p. 253) ; when he thinks to himself the possibility
of matter exhibiting resistance to the creative power of
the ideas (Tim. p. 56) ; when he gives intimations of a
malevolent worW-soul (Laics, x. 896), and of an nndirine
natural principle in the world (States, p. 268) ; when he
conceives in the Phado the relation between body and
soul as quite heterogeneous and antagonistic, — there re-
mains, even after withdrawal of the mythical form, as in
the Tim<Tus, and of the rhetorical, as in the Phcedo,
enough to substantiate the contradiction which was
pointed out above. It is most observable in the Timceus,
Here Plato, in figuring the world of sense to be formed
by the Creator on the model of the ideas, assumes for
this world-forming power of Demiurgus, something at
bottom that is adapts to receive into itself the image of
the ideas. This something is compared by Plato himself
CO the material which artisans work up (whence the later
name HyU) ; he describes it as completely indefinite and
formless, but as capable of copying in itself all kinds of
forms, as invisible and shapeless, a something that is hard
to be defined; and indeed it actually refuses to be exactly
defined at any time by Plato. The actuality of matter is
thus denied ; and even when Plato compares it to space, he
considers it only as place of the sensuous world, as its nega-
tive condition ; it participates in being only as receiving
into itself the ideal form. But it is still the objective
manifestation of the idea ; the visible world arises through
the mixture of the ideas with this substrate, and when
matter is. according to its metaphysical term, designated
the ' other,' it is, as result of the dialectical discussions,
with logical necessity, quite as much beent as non-beent.
As Plato concealed not this difficulty from him? elf, he
was eont«ntetl to speak in similes and metaphors of a pre-
supposition which he was as little able to dispense with
as intelligibly conceive. He was unable to dispense with
it, without either raising himself to the notion of an ab-
solute creation, or considering matter as latest emanation
of the absolute spirit, as basis of his self-conciliation
with himself, or directly declaring it to be subjective

80 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

appearance. The Platonic system is tlius a futile struggle
against dualism.

(/.) The idea of the good, and the Divine Being. — If the
truth of existence is expressed in the notions, and these
again are so related that a higher notion comprehends
and combines within it several lower ones, and in such
a manner that, proceeding from one, we may find all the
rest {Meno, p. 81), the ideas must constitute as a whole
an articulate organism, a graduated series, in which a
lower term must always present itself as basis and pre-
supposition for the next higher. This series now must
terminate in an idea which shall require for its support no
higher idea or presupposition. This highest idea, the
' ultimate in cognition,' the presupposition of the rest,
itself without presupposition, is for Plato the idea of the
good, that is, of the metaphysical, not the moral good
{Rep. vn. 517).

What, however, this absolute good is, Plato undertakes
to show, as he says himself, only in copy. * As the sun
is the cause of sight, and cause not only of the visibility
of things, but of their generation and growth, so the
good is of such power and beauty that it is not only
cause of science for the soul, but source of being and of
truth for everything that is an object of science ; and as the
sun is not itself either seeing, or what is seen, but stands
above them, so likewise the good is not itself science and
truth, but is over both, and both are not the good, but
only the goodly ' {Rep. vi. 506). The idea of the good
excludes all presupposition, so far as it has unconditional
worth, and to all else gives worth. It is the ultimate
ground at once of knowledge and of being, of reason and
of what is reasoned, of subjective and objective, of ideal
and real, but it ia itself raised above this disjunction
{Rep. VI. 508-517). Actual derivation, however, of the
various other ideas from the single idea of the good,
Plato has not attempted ; he proceeds here quite empi-
rically ; a class of existence is assumed as given, is re-
ferred to its common quality, and the latter is then
expressed as idea. Nay, in having hypostasized the
individual ideas, and thereby declared them each fixed
and complete in itself, he has prescinded any reciprocal
derivation of them, and rendered directly impossible any
immanent progress from the one to the other.

In what way, now, this idea of the good, and the ideas
in general, are, in Plato's view, related to God, is a dif •

PLÄ TO. 81

ficult question. AU things considered, it must be behl
probable that Plato conceived both (God and the idea of
the good) as identical ; but whether he understood again
the su[)remo cause more specifically as a personal being
or not, is a question that hardly admits of any quite
definite answer. The system itself excludes, in consist-
ency, any personality of God. For if only the universal
(the ideas) is what veritably is, the absolute idea, or
God, must also be absolutely universal. But that Plato
himself consciously drew this consequence, can as
little be maintained as the contrary proposition, that
he was with definite philosophical consciousness a theist.
For if, on the one hand, mythically or popularly, he
makes mention, in innumerable places, of God, or the
gods, this very plurality of gods proves that he is speak-
ing then in the sense of the traditional religion ; while,
on the other hand, whenever his discourse is rigorously
philosophical, he assigns to the personality of God a very
insecure place beside the ideas. The probability is, then,
that he never definitely put to himself the entire question
of the personality of God ; that he allowed himself to en-
tertain the religious idea of God as his own natural con-
viction ; that, in an ethical interest, he even vindicated
it as against the anthropomorphism of the mythological
poets {Republic, Laws) ; that he attempted to estabhsh it
from the facts of design in nature and of a universally
diffused belief in God [Laws) ; but that philosophically
he made no use of it.

5. The Platonic Physics. — [a.) Nature. — Through the
notion of veritable being, which, conceived as the good,
is the presupposition of aU teleological explanation of
nature, and through the notion of becoming, which is
the fundamental quality of nature, dialectics pass into
physics. As belonging to the sphere of reasonless, sen-
suous perception, nature cannot claim, however, the
same minuteness of consideration as dialectics. Plato
would seem, then, to have applied himself to physical
inquiries with less affection than to those of ethics and
dialectics, and that too only in his later years ; he has
devoted to them, indeed, only a single dialogue, the
Timceus, and has gone to work therff much less inde-
pendently than anywhere else, that is to say, almost
wholly in the manner of the Pythagoreans. The diffi-
culty of the Timceus is augmented by its mythical form,
which provoked, indeed, the ancient commentators them-

82 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

selves. Tf we take the description it gives simply as it
offers itself, however, we find it to assume, first, before
the creation of anything, a world-former (Demiurgus),
as moving dehberatiug principle ; and then, beside him,
on the one hand the ideal world (which, ever self -identi-
cal, remains immovable as the eternal archetype), and on
the other, a chaotic, formless, lawless, fluctuating mass,
which holds within it the germs of the material world,
but without yet possessing any definite form or sub-
stance. With these two elements, the Creator composes,
next, the soul of the world, that is, the invisible dyna-
mical principle of order and motion in the world (which
is conceived, however, as extended in space). Demiurgus
spreads out now this world-soul like a colossal net or
frame, throughout the whole extent which the world
is afterwards to occupy ; dividing it into the two spheres
of the fixed stars and the planets, and the latter again
into the seven special circles. Then the material world,
— first realized through development of the chaotic mass
into the four elements, — is built into this frame ; and,
finally, by formation of the organic world its inner
completion is accomplished. In this cosmogony of the
TimcBus, it is hard to discriminate between what is
mythical and what philosophical; it is particularly
difficult to decide, for instance, how far the succession of
the creative acts in time, or what is historical in the con-
struction, is to be considered as mere form. The mean-
ing of the world-soul is clearer. In the Platonic system
generally, the soul is the middle term between the ideas
and what is corporeal, the medium by virtue of which
the material element is formed and individualized, ani-
mated and ruled ; in short, the medium by which it is
raised from confused plurality into organic unity, and so
retained. Quite in the same way, numbers are to Plato
a middle term between the ideas and the world, so far as
through them the sum of material existence is brought into
definite, quantitative relations of multitude, magnitude,
figure, parts, position, distance, etc., — in other words, is
arithmetically and geometrically disposed, — instead of ex-
isting as a limitless and distinctionless mass. Both of
these functions are united in the world-soul : it is the uni-
versal medium between the ideas and matter ; the grand
world-schema to which the latter on the great scale owes
its formation and articulation ; the mighty cosmical
power by which it (in the heavenly bodies, for example) is

FLA TO. 83

riaincd in the given arrangement, moved (made to re-
iilvo), and raised by such movement in law into a real copy
t the ideas. Plato's explanation of nature, in contrast to
hv earlier mechanical ones, is thoroughly teleological ;
t is constructed according to the idea of the good.
'lato conceives the world as the work of unenvious
iviue goodness, which wills to create what shall be like
Deniiurgus, by model of the eternal ideas, has
»med it in j)erfection. Endowed with life and reason
iirough the soul that is immanent in it, destined to en-
ure throughout all time and never to become old, it is
.itlial the infinitely beautiful, the infinitely divine copy of
lu^ L,'ood. Made in the image of perfection, it corresponds

0 the sole, all-embracing, and essential one, and is itself
ne ; for an infinite number of worlds cannot be thought
is conceivable and actual. For the same cause it has the
3rm of a globe, the most perfect and imiform of shapes,
nd which comprehends all others ; its motion also is that
f a circle, because, as return into itself, that movement
! tlie likest of all to the movement of reason. The de-
iils of the TimceuSy the derivation of the four elements,
tie distribution of the seven planets in conformity to the
lusical octave, the conception of the stars as immortal
aperior beings, the representation of the earth as at rest

1 the middle of the world — an idea which was subse-
uently developed through subsidiary hypotheses into
18 Ptolemaic system, — the reduction of all the forms of
latter to those of geometry, the classification of animated
eings in accordance with the four elements into beings
if fire or light (gods and demons), of air, of water, and
if earth, the discussions on organic nature, and especi-
Uy on the structure of the human body, can here only
e mentioned. These matters possess i>hilosophical in-
3rest, not so much in consequence of their substantial
alue — for they only expose the entire insufficiency of
he natural philosophy of the period — as of the main
onception that the world is the product and copy of
sason, that it is an organism of order, harmony, and
eauty, that it is the self-realization of the good.

(&.) 27ie Soul. — The theory of the soul, so far as it
nters not into the discussion of applied morality, but
inly considers the foundations of the moral act, is the
ompletion, the cope-stone of the Platonic physics. The
ladividual soul possesses the same nature and character
s the universal soul ; and it belonged to the perfection

84 HIS TOR Y OF PHIL OSO P II Y.

of the world, that there should be a plurality of souls,
through which the principle of reason and of life might
be individualized in a plenitude of particular beings.
The soul in itself is indestructible, and, through reason,
in which it participates, of a divine nature ; it is by ita
very principle destined for the cognition of the divine
and eternal, for a pure blissful life in the contemplation
of the ideal world. But its union with a material body is
no less essential ; the race of perishable beings was, for
completion of the genera of things, necessarily also repre-
sented in the universe, and through that life in the body
which devolves on the individual soul. The soul, as
united with the body, participates in its motions and
changes, and is in this reference akin to the perishable,
being subject to the fluctuation of the conditions of sen-
suous life, and to the influence of sensuous feelings and
greeds. It cannot consequently maintain itself in its pure
divinity, but sinks from the celestial to the earthly,
from the divine to the mortal. The conflict between the
higher and the lower principle has its seat in the indivi-
dual soul ; intelligence succumbs to the power of sense ;
the absolute dualism of idea and reality, which in the
great whole of the world disappears into unity, comes
here into full actuality. The soul, on the one hand,
sways and controls the body ; but, on the other hand,
the body no less sways and controls the soul, which is
then debased into the lower life of sense, into forgetful-
ness of its higher origin, into mere finitude of perception
and will. This interaction of soul and body is brought
about by a lower, sensuous faculty, and Plato distin-
guishes, therefore, two constituents of the soul, one
divine and rational, the other mortal and irrational. It
is between these two that courage (öy/xos, courage, coeur,
heart), as intermediating link, appears. Courage is
nobler, indeed, than sensiious appetite, but because it
manifests itself also in children, and even in brutes, and
frequently allows itself to be blindly hurried on without
reflection, it belongs, like sense, to the natural side in
man, and must not therefore be confounded with reason.
The «oul, consequently, is to Plato, during its connexion
with the body and the world of sense, placed in a con-
dition utterly inadequate to its proper being. In itself
divine, possessed of true knowledge, independent, free, it
is in life the reverse, weak, sensuous, passive to the
influences of the bodily nature, betrayed into evil and

PL A TO, 86

" ''^ sin by all the disqiiietiules, lusts, passions, contests,
oh arise to it from the preponderance of the sensuous
oiple, from the necessity of physical self-preservation,
i from the struggle for possession and enjoyment. A
iim sense of its higher origin, a longing for its home, the
\\ . I Id of ideas — this, indeed, remains to it, and announces
if in love to knowledge, in enthusiasm for beauty
>s)y in the battle of the spirit to become lord of the
v. But this very longing proclaims that the soul's
true life is not this })resent sensuous existence, but
lirs rather in the future, in the future that follows its
I ration from the body. The soul which had given
iiMlf up to sense incurs the penalty of migration into
lu w bodies, it may be even into lower forms of existence
from which it is only delivered, when, in the course of
time, it has recovered its purity. The pure soul, which
has stood the proof of association with the corporeal world
untainted, returns at death into the state of bUssful repose,
but only, after once more tasting it, to resume afresh the
life of the body. The Platonic descriptions of these future
states of the soul do not alwaj's agree, indeed ; the
Phcedrus and the Phcedo, the Pepuhlic and the Timceus, dif-
fer from each other in many respects ; but Plato, like the
Pjrthagoreans, is in earnest with them. It is really his
opinion that the process of the world, the history of the
universe, has no other import than this perpetual transi-
tion of Psyche between the higher and the lower, the
di%ane and the human world. Psyche is of too noble a
nature only to begin with this life and then vanish ; she
is divine and immortal ; but she is not pure being as the
idea is, she has in her something of the character of the
* other ; ' she is at once spiritual and unspiritual, free
and unfree ; these two contradictory elements of her being
attain to manifestation in that alternation of higher and
lower states, in the form of a succession in time. The
soul exhibits the enigma of an equal inclination to the
ideal and the sensuous ; and this enigma, according to
Plato, finds its answer in this theory of the nature
and destiny of the soul itself. All this seems very alien
to Socrates ; the Socratic postulate that man shall act
not from sense but from intellect, appears transformed
here into a speculative philosopheme that purports to
explain whence there is in man the union of both, sense
and reason. But precisely in this closing concentration of
his entire philosophy into the single point of the ethical

86 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

nature and destiny of the soul, does Plato manifest him-
self as a true disciple of his master, whose veritable
vocation it had been to kindle in his pupil this lofty ideal
of the sublimity of the soul in comparison with sense.

6. The Platonic Ethics. — ^The question in Plato'a
ethics (which ethics are nothing else than the ideal theory
practically applied) is — with him as well as with the
other Socratics — to ascertain and establish the summum
bonum, the end or aim, which it shall be the object of
all will and of all action to realize. It is in accordance
with this principle (the summum bonum) that the theory
of virtue is determined, which again forms the founda-
tion of the theory of the state as the objective actualiza-
tion of the good in human society.

{a.) The supreme good. — What is the ultimate end is
the simple result of the entire idea of the Platonic
system. Not life in the non-being, the perishableness,
the changefulness of sensuous existence, but exaltation
into true, into ideal being, is, whether in its own nature
or in its relation to the soul, that which is the good
absolutely. The task and destiny of the soul is flight from
the inward and outward evils of sense, purification and
emancipation from corporeal influence, the striving to
become pure, just, and like withal to God {Thecet,
Phcedo) ; and the path to this is withdrawal from sensuous
imaginations and appetites, retirement into thought,
into the cognition of truth, in a word, philosophy.
Philosophy, for Plato as for Socrates, is not something
merely theoretical, but the return of the soul into its
true being, the spiritual new birth, in which it regains
its lost knowledge of the ideal world and a consciousness
of its own loftier origin, of its pristine exaltation over
the world of sense. In philosophy, spirit purifies itself
from all sensuous admixture, it comes to its own self, it
regains the freedom and peace of which it had been de-
prived by its immersion in matter. It was natural that,
with this view, Plato should ofi'er the most determined
opposition to the Sophistico-Cyrenaic hedonism ; to the
refutation of which the Gorgias and the Philebus are
especially dedicated. It is demonstrated in these that
pleasure is something insubstantial and indefinite, from
which no order or harmony can result to life, that it is
something exceedingly relative, transforming itself readily
into pain, and all the more pain the more boundlessly it
is worshipped ; and that it is a contradiction to seek to

PLATO. 87

]n;t pleasure, this that is inwardly worthless, above the
I'owor ami virtue of the soul. Ou tlie other side, Plato
nowise approves, nevertjieless, any more in his practical
than iu his theoretical philosojihy, of the Cyuico-Megaric
abstraction, which, besides cognition, will recognise nothing
positive, — no concrete spiritual acti\nty, no special science
or art, as well as no relinemeut of life by means of a
lawful pleasure. The concrete sciences and arts, and
those kinds of enjoyment which interfere not with the
harmony of si)iritual life, those pure, innocent, passion-
less, unsophisticated delights that arise from intellectual
and natural beauty, — these have their rights as well as
pure philosophy. The good is not a life consisting merely
of knowledge or merely of pleasure, but one commingled
of both, though still such that knowledge presides in it as
that element which introduces measure, order, and rationa-
lity of will and action. A certain vacillation, however,
is not to be denied in Plato's views with respect to the
highest good. As sensuous existence is for him, at one
time, only ])ure non-being, the mere disturbance and
distortion of ideal being, and at another time the fair
copy of its ideal archetj'pe, so there appear in the ethics
at one time an inclination to a quite ascetic conception
of sense as the single fountain of evil and sin (Phcedo),
and at another time a more positive view {Banquet, Phi-
lebus), which designates a life without enjoyment as too
abstract, monotonous, spiritless, and therefore allows its
0"wn right to the beautiful equally with the good.

(&.) Virtue. — In his theory of virtue, Plato is at first
quite Socratic. That virtue depends on knowledge [Pro-
tagoras), and is, therefore, capable of being taught
(Aleno), this wdth him is established ; and as for its unity,
though it must have resulted to him from his later dia-
lectical investigations, that the one is at the same time
many and the many at the same time one, and that
consequently virtue may be regarded not more as one
than as many, he still, by predilection, accentuates,
nevertheless, the unity and natural connexion of all the
Wrtues. Particularly in the preliminary dialogues is it
his object to depict each of the indi^ädual virtues as com-
jirehending in it the sum of all virtue. In classifying the
virtues, Plato assumes, for the most part, the popular
quadruplicity which he found current ; only for the first
time in the Republic (rv. 441) does he attempt their
scientific derivation through reduction to his psycho-

88 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY,

logical trij)licity. The virtue of reason is wisdom, the
guiding and tempering virtue ; for in the soul it is reason
that must rule. The virtue of the heart is courage,
reason's auxiliary ; or it is the heart that, imbued with
true knowledge, approves itself in the struggle against
pleasure and pain, as the correct judge of what is fear-
ful or not fearful. The virtue of sensuous appetite,
by which the latter is reduced to its proper measure, is
temperance. Finally, that virtue, to which falls the due
ranging and ranking of the single faculties reciprocally,
the regulatrix of the soul, and, therefore, the bond and
the unity of the other three virtues, is justice.

The virtue of justice it is also which, as it conjoins in
itself all the other threads of virtue, leads beyond the
sphere of individual life, and founds the totality of a
moral world. Justice * in large letters,' morality as actu-
alized in the life of society, — this is the state. Only here
does the demand for a perfected harmony of human life
become real. In and through the state it is that there
takes place for reason the complete working-up of its
own material.

(c.) The State. — The Platonic state is usually regarded
as a so-called ideal, as a chimera, the product indeed of a
brain of genius, but amongst men, as in this sublunary
world they once for all are, entirely impracticable. Plato
himself, it is supposed, shall have viewed the matter
not otherwise, and — his Republic being but the sketch of
the pure ideal of a pohtical constitution — shall, in the Xaws,
as this work itself expressly declares, have intended to
prefigure that which is actually practicable, and to fur-
nish, from the point of view of ordinary consciousness,
an applied philosophy of the state. But this, firstly,
was not Plato's own opinion. Although he does himself
undoubtedly declare that the state which he has described
is not likely to be found on earth, and is only an arche-
type in heaven for the instruction of the philosopher (ix.
592), yet he requires that its realization be asymptotically
approached ; nay, he investigates the conditions and
means under and through which such a state may be
possibly accomplished ; and so it is, also, that his parti-
cular institutions are largely directed against the various
vices which must inevitably arise from the various
characters and temperaments of men. To a philosopher
like Plato, who only in the idea sees the actual and true,
a constitution alien to the idea could only appear as the

PLATO. 89

untrue ; and the usual theory that makes him com|>o8e
his Jiepublic Arith a consciousness of its impracticability,
entirely mistakes the position of the Platonic philosophy.
Further, the question whether such a state as that of
Plato is possible and the best, is, in itself, inapposite and
irrelevant. The Platonic state is the Greek idea of a
state in general, presented in the form of a narrative.
But the idea, as the rational import at everj' moment of
the world's history, is, — just because it is an absolute
actuality, the essential and the necessary in the
existent, — no idle and impotent ideal. The true ideal
is not to be actual, but is actual, and alone actual ;
that an idea should be too good for existence, or em-
pirical reality too bad for an idea, this were a fault of
the ideal itself. Plato, then, did not deal in the manu-
facture of abstract theories ; the philosopher cannot over-
leap his time, but must recognise and comprehend it
only according to its own genuine significance. This did
Plato ; he stands quite on the level of his day ; it is
Greek political life raised into the idea that constitutes
the genuine burthen of the Platonic Republic. In it
Plato has exhibited Grecian morality on its substantial
side (side of instinctive observance). If the Platonic
republic appeared mainly as an ideal irreconcilable with
empirical reality, it is not the ideality, but rather a de-
fectiveness in ancient political life that is to blame
for this. It is the restrictedness of personal subjective
freedom that, before the Greek states began to break
up in license, constituted the characteristic of the
Hellenic political view. Thus in Plato, too, poli-
tical morality has the character of suhstantial'ity (cus-
tomary observance, not conscious action on subjective
discernment and conviction). The institutions of his
state, whatever ridicule and censure they may have pro-
voked even from the ancients, are only consequences,
which, dravm with inexorable necessity, result from the
idea of the Grecian state, so far as that state, in its
differences from the states of modern times, granted,
neither to the corporations nor to the citizens individiv
ally, any legal sphere of action independent of itself.
The principle of subjective freedom failed. This non-
recognition of the subject, Plato, as against the destruc-
tive tendencies of the time, and in a rigorously logical
manner, has certainly made the principle of his own ideal
state.

90 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

The general cliaracter of the Platonic state is, as said,
the sacrifice, the exclusive abandonment of the individual
to the universal, to the political element, — the reduction
of moral to political virtue. Political observance shall, so
Plato wills it, become universal, and attain to an immut-
able existence ; the principle of sense shall everywhere be
checked, and subjugated to that of intelligence. But if
this is to be so, then a universal, a i)olitical authority
must undertake the training of all to virtue, or the con-
servation of public morals ; and all subjective self-will,
every egotistic end, must disappear in the collective
will and in the collective end. So powerful is the prin-
ciple of sense in men, that only by the might of common
institutions, only by the suppression of all subjective acti-
vity for private interests, only by the disappearance of the
individual in the universal, can it be neutralized. Virtue
is possible — and consequently true well-being — only by
these means. Virtue must be real in the state, only so
will it become real in the individual citizen. Hence the
severity and rigour of the Platonic political idea. In a
perfect state all should be in common to all, — joy and
sorrow, even eyes and ears and hands. All men shall
have scope only as universal men. For the realization of
this perfect unity and universality, there must be the
disappearance of all individuality and particularity.
Private property and domestic life (in place of which a
community of goods and women appears), education and
instruction, the choice of professional and other avoca-
tions, even all the remaining activities of the individual
in art and science — all this must be sacrificed to the end
of the state, and intrusted to the guidance and control
of the presiding authorities. The individual must be
contented to claim only that good which belongs to
him as a component particle of the state. The Platonic
construction of the ideal state descends, therefore, even
to the minutest details. The two formative means of
the higher ranks, gymnastics and music, the study of
mathematics and philosophy, the selection of musical in-
struments and metre of verse, the bodily exercises and
the military service of the female sex, the arrangement of
marriages, the age at which any one may study dialectics,
or contract wedlock, or beget or bear children — on all
these matters Plato has given the exactest prescripts and
instructions. The state is for him only a huge educa-
tional establishment, a single family on the great

,^1

PLATO. 91

scale. Even lyrical poetry Plato will have jjractised
only under the supervision of judges. Epic and dramatic
])oetry (uay Homer and Ilesiod themselves !) shall be
banished from the state, the one because it excites and
misleads the mind, the other because it pro])agate3 de-
basing representations of the gods. With like rigorism
the Platonic state proceeds against physical defects :
feeble children, or children born imperfect, are to be
cast out ; the sick arc not to be tended and nourished.
We find here the main antithesis of the ancient states by
nature to the modern states by law. Plato recognised
not the knowledge, will, and purpose of the individual,
and yet the indi\'idual has a right to demand this. To
reconcile the two sides — the general end and the indi-
vidual end — to combine with the greatest possible omni-
potence of the state the greatest possible freedom of the
conscious individual will, this was the problem reserved
for the modern state.

The political institutions of the Platonic state are de-
cidedly aristocratic. Grown up in aversion to the extra-
vagances of the Athenian democracy, Plato prefers an un-
limited monarchy to all other constitutions, but still only
Buch a one as shall have for its head a consummate ruler,
a perfected philosopher. The saying of Plato is familiar,
that only when philosophers shall become rulers, or when
those who are at present rulers shall philosophize fully
and truly, and shall unite political power and philosophy
together, will it be possible to elevate the state to its true
purpose (v. 473). That there should only be one nder,
this appears to him just, because there are so few men
possessed of political wisdom. In his Laws, Plato re-
nounces this ideal of a perfect ruler, who as a living law
shall have power to govern the state according to his
own unrestrained authority, and prefers as the best, those
mixed constitutions which combine in themselves both
something of monarchy and something of democracy. It
is the aristocratic tendency of the Platonic political ideal
which gives rise further to the sharp distinction of the
various classes, and the entire exclusion of the third from
any share in pohtical life proper. Psychologically, Plato
in strictness has only a bipartition into the senses and
the intellect, into mortal and immortal ; politically also
he has only a similar division into the government and
its subjects. This distinction is proclaimed the neces-
sary condition of every state ; but, in analogy with the

52 IIISTOJRY OF PHILOSOPHY. f

psychological middle term of the heart, there is interca-
lated, between the ruling class and the working class, the
middle term of the fighting class. We have thus three
classes, that of the rulers, correspondent to reason, that
of the warriors correspondent to heart, and that of
the workers correspondent to appetite. To these three
classes belong three several functions : to the first the
function of legislation, of acting and consulting for
the universal ; to the second the function of defending
the common weal against enemies from without ; to
the third the function of providing for the material
singular, for the daily want, as in agriculture, the
raising of cattle, and the building of houses. Through
each of the three classes and its functions there accrues
to the state a special virtue : through the class of rulers
wisdom, through the class of warders or warriors cour-
age, through the class of workers temperance, which, as
securing obedience to the rulers, is peculiarly the virtue
of this last class. From the due union of these three
virtues in the general life of the state, there arises justice,
a virtue, consequently, which represents the systematic
articulation of the totality, the organic distribution of
the whole into its moments. With the lowest class, that
of manual labourers, Plato occupies himself the least ; for
the state it is only jin instrument. Even legislation and
the administration of justice in reference to the labouring
mass of the people, he holds for inessential. The dis-
tance between rulers and warders is less marked ; Plato
rather, as if reason were but the highest development of
courage, allows, in analogy with the fundamental psycho-
logical bipartition, the two classes to pass over into each
other, in appointing that the oldest and best of the
warders shall be - selected for rulers. The education of
the warders, therefore, shall be carefully planned and
administered by the state, in order that with them the
principle of courage, without forfeiting the energy pecu-
liar to it, may be imbued with reason. The most virtu-
ous, and dialectically the most accomplished among the
warders, are, immediately on completion of their thirtieth
year, to be taken apart, tried, and ordered to the dis-
charge of ofiices. When in these they have again ap-
proved themselves, they are in their fiftieth year to be
raised to the highest rank, and to be held bound in
duty, if they have realized the idea of the good, to sub-
stantiate that exemplar in the state, yet so that each,

PLATO. 93

oiily wlien bis turn comes, shall undertake the control
of the state, but shall devote to philosophy the rest of hia
time. By means of these dispositions the state shall
l>e exalted into an unconditional sovereignty of reason
under guidance of the idea of the good.

7. Reiuospect. — With Plato, Greek philosophy has
attained to the culminating point of its development.
The Platonic system is the lirst complete scientific con-
struction of the entire natural and spiritual universe
under guidance of a jdulosophical principle ; it is the first
tyjie and pattern of all higher speculation, of all meta-
physical as well as of all ethical idealism. Reared on the
simple foundation of Socrates, the idea of philosophy has
here for the first time gained an all-embracing realiza-
tion. The spirit of philosophy has, indeed, raised itself
here into full consciousness of itself, a consciousness
which first awoke in Socrates only as a dim and uncer-
tain instinct. The eagle flight of the genius of Plato
required to add itself before there could be unfolded into
f IÜ1 reality that for which Socrates had been able only to
clear the way. At the same time, nevertheless, with
Plato, philosophy exhibited an idealistic antithesis to the
given actuality, an antithesis which, lying more in the
character of its originator and in his relation to the time,
than in the nature of the Greek spirit, demanded the
supplement of a more realistic theory of things. This
was supplied by Aristotle.

XV. — The Older Academy.

IN the older academy the spirit that prevailed was not
one of invention. With the exception of a few
attempts at continuation, we find only standstill, and a
gradual retrogression of the Platonic philosophizing.
After the death of Plato, Speusippus, his nephew, taught
in the academy for the period of eight years ; Xenocrates
succeeded him ; and Polemon, Crates, and Grantor fol-
lowed. We find ourselves in a time now in which express
educational institutions for higher culture are established,
and the earlier teacher transfers the succession to the
later. The older academy, so far as can be gathered from
the scanty records, was characterized in general by a
predominance of the tendency to erudition, by the in-
crease of Pythagorean elements, — particularly as regards

94 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

the Pythagorean number-theory, with which were con-
nected the high estimation of the mathematical sciences
(especially arithmetic and astronomy), and the regression
of the ideal theory,- and finally by the coming into
vogue of fantastic demonological conceptions, in which
worship of the stars played a principal part. At a later
period efifoi-ts were made to return again to the unso-
phisticated doctrine of Plato. Grantor is named as the
first expounder of the Platonic writings.

As Plato was the only true disciple of Socrates, so in
turn the only true disciple of Plato was, though by his
fellows accused of infidelity, Aristotle.

To him we pass at once for the demonstration, as
well of his true relation to Plato, as of his advance be-
yond Plato, and within Plato's own philosophy. (Com-
pare XVI. 3, c. aa.)

XVI.— Aristotle.

LIFE AND Writings of Aristotle. — Aristotle was
born at Stagira, a Greek colony in Thrace, in the
year 385 b.c. Nicomachus, his father, was the physician
and friend of Amyntas, king of Macedonia. The former
relation may have influenced the scientific pursuits of
the son ; the latter his subsequent call to the Mace-
donian court. Early deprived of his parents, he came
in his seventeenth year to Athens ; and here in Plato's
society he remained twenty years. Of his personal
relations to Plato there are several rumours, — some
favourable, as that Plato, for his unceasing study, shall
have called him the reader, and, comparing him with
Xenocrates, shall have said, the latter requires the
spur, the former the bridle, — some also unfavourable.
Among the latter is the reproach of ingratitude to his
master, and although the most of the anecdotes in this
connexion deserve Httle credit, — especially as we find
Aristotle on friendly terms with Xenocrates, even after
the death of Plato, — yet the author Aristotle cannot
be altogether acquitted of a certain unscrupulousness
towards Plato and the philosophy of Plato, which is
still capable, perhaps, of a certain psychological explana-
tion (through indication, that is, of human motive).
Aristotle, after the death of Plato, went with Xeno-
crates to the court of Hermeias, prince of Atarneus
in Mysia, whose sister Pythias he took to wife, when

ARISTOTLE. 95

Ilnmeiaa fell beneath the peiTuly of the Persiana.
' '»T the death of Pj'thias he married Herpyllis, by
m he had his son Niconiachua. lu the year 343,
ho waa appointed by Philip, king of Macedon, to
fiuperinteud the education of his sou Alexander, then
thirteen j'eara old. Father and son honoured him
^• 'hly, and the latter subsequently assisted his studies
ii royal munificence. When Alexander set out on
the Persian expedition, Aristotle took up bis abode
in Athens, teaching in the Lyceum, the only gj-^m-
nasium left open for him ; for the Academy and the
Cyuosarges were alreatly occupied, the one by Xeno-
crates and the other by the Cynics. His school de-
rived its name. Peripatetic, from the shady walks
(TTfp^TraTot) of the Lj'ceum, in which Aristotle was ac-
customed to walk about as he philosojihized. He is
said to have lectured in the morning to his more ad-
vanced disciples on abstruser science {acroamatic inves-
tigation), and in the evening to a larger audience on
the discipUnes which concern a more general education
(exoteric discourses). After the death of Alexander,
with whom latterly he had fallen out of favour, being
accused (probably from political motives) of blasphemy
by the Athenians, he left their city, where he had taught
for thirteen years, in order, as he expressed it, that
they might not sin a second time against philosophy.
He died in the year 322 at Chalcis in Euboea.

Aristotle left behind him an unusual miütitude of
writings, of which the fewer number (a sixth perhaps),
but incomparably the more valuable, have come down to
us : in such a state, nevertheless, as leaves room for
many doubts and difficulties. The account given by
Strabo, it is true, of the fate of the Aristotelian writings,
and of the damages received by them in the cellar at
Scepsis in Troas, has been proved a fable, or at least to
be limited to the original manuscripts : but the fragment-
ary, sketch-like appearance of several of them, and these
the most important, as the Metaphysics, the repeated revi-
sion and reconstruction of the same treatise, as the Ethics,
the disorder and striking repetitions in single works,
the distinction made by Aristotle himself between writ-
ings acroamatic and writings exoteric, — all this leads to
the conjecture that we have before us for the most part
but redactions of oral discourses at the hands of pupils.

2. Gen'eral Character and Classification of the

96 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

Aristotetltan PniLOSOPHY. — With Aristotle, philosophy,
which in Plato's hands remained popular both in form
and matter, becomes universal, freed from its Hellenic
specialty. The Platonic dialogue is metamorphosed into
dry prose. In the place of poetic drapery and myths
we have a cold fixed technical dialect ; the faculty
which in Plato was intuitive is in Aristotle discursive ;
the direct vision through reason of the one is replaced in
the other by reflection and logic. Turning from the
Platonic unity of being, Aristotle prefers to direct his
regards to the variety of the world ; he seeks the idea only
in its concrete realization, and seizes the individual fact in
its characteristic quality and differences, rather than in
its relation to the idea. He receives with equal interest the
fact of nature, or of history, or of the soul of man. But he
proceeds always by reference to what is individual ; he re-
quires always a datum, on occasion of which to unfold his
thoughts ; it is always what is empirical and matter-of-fact
that solicits his speculation and leads it forward. His whole
philosophy is a description of the given and empirical,
and only because it takes this up in its totality, takes up
its synthesis, only because it carries the induction com-
pletely out, does it deserve the name of a philosophy.
Only as the absolute empiricist is it that Aristotle is the
true philosopher.

This character of the Aristotelian philosophy explains
in the first place its encyclopaedic tendency, inasmuch as
all the facts of experience have, as such, equal claims on
observation. Hence Aristotle is the founder of several
sciences unknown before him : he is not only the founder
of logic, but the founder also of natural history, of empi-
rical psychology, and of the theory of morals.

The love of facts in Aristotle explains further his pre-
dominating inclination for physics ; for nature is what is
most a fact, what is most undeniably there. It coheres
with this, too, that Aristotle is the first philosopher, who
(in his own way) deigned to bestow on history any exact
attention. The first book of the Metaphysics is the first
attempt at a history of philosophy, just a&lina Politics are
the first critical history of the various forms and consti-
tutions of the state. As through criticism of his prede-
cessors in the one, so through criticism of the pre-existent
constitutions in the other, does he lay the ground for his
own theory, which he desires to appear always only
as the consequence of historical fact.

ARISTOTLE. 97

It is clear from this that likewise the method of Aris-
totle must be different from that of Plato, lie ])roceed3,
not synthetically and dialectically like the latter, but
almost exclusively analytically and regressively, that is to
say, passing ever backwards from what is concrete to its
ultimate grounds and jjrinciples. If Plato took his stand
on the idea, in order from that position to elucidate and
explain the data of experience, Aristotle, on the contrary,
takes his stand on these data in order to discover in
them and demonstrate in them the idea. His method,
therefore, is induction, that is, the derivation of general
inferences and results from a sum of given facts and
phenomena, while his exposition is the usual rakonne-
ment, a dispassionate estimate of facts, phenomena,
circumstances, and possibilities. He bears himself mostly
only as a thoughtful observer. Renouncing any expecta-
tion of uuiversahty and necessity in his conclusions, he is
contented to have established an ajiproximate truth, and
pleased to have reached the greatest possible i)robability.
He frequently declares, that science relates not merely to
the immutable and necessary, but also to what usually
happens : beyond its province, he says, there is only the
contingent. Philosophy has consequently for him the
character and the value of a calculation of probabilities,
and his mode of exposition assumes not unfrequently
only the form of a dubious counting up. Hence no trace
of the Platonic ideals. Hence his dislike to imaginative
flights and poetic figures in philosophy, a dislike which
on one hand led him, indeed, to a fixed philosophical
terminology, but was the occasion, on the other, of a
frequent misinterpretation of those who had preceded
him. Hence, too, in the sphere of action his invariable
submission to the existent fact.

With the empirical character of Aristotle's philoso-
phizing, there coheres finally the disjointed nature of
his writings, their want of any systematic classifica-
tion and division. Always advancing from particular
fact to particular fact, he takes each region of reality
by itself, and makes it the object of a special treatise ;
but he omits for the most part to demonstrate the
threads by which the parts might mutually cohere and
clasp together into the whole of a system. He obtains
thus a plurality of co-ordinated sciences, each of which
has its independent foundation, but no highest science
which should comprehend all. A leading and con-

98 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY,

necting thought is doubtless present ; all his writings
follow the idea of a whole ; but in the exposition
systematic arrangement fails so much, each of his works
is so much an independent monograph, that we are often
jjcrplexed by the question, What did Aristotle himself
consider a part of philosophy and what not ? Nowhere
does he supply either scheme or skeleton, seldom any
concluding results or general summaries ; even the
various classifications which he proposes for philosophy
differ very much the one from the other. Sometimes he
distinguishes practical and theoretical science, sometimes
he places with these a third science, named of artistic
production, and sometimes he speaks of three parts,
ethics, physics, and logic. Theoretical philosophy itself,
again, he divides at one time into logic and physics, and
at another into theology, mathematics, and physics.
None of these classifications, however, has he expressly
adopted in the exposition of his system ; he sets in
general no value on them, he even openly declares his
aversion to the method by divisions at all, and it is
only from considerations of expediency that we, in ex-
pounding his philosophy, adopt the Platonic trichotomy.
3. Logic and Metaphysics. — (a.) Notion and relation of
both. — The name Metaphysics is a creation of the Aristo-
telian commentators. Plato's word for it was Dialectics,
and Aristotle uses instead of it the phrase * first (funda-
mental) philosophy,' while physics in a like connexion are
for him ' second philosophy.' The relation of this first
philosophy to the other sciences is defined by Aristotle
as follows. Every science, he says, selects for investiga-
tion a special sphere, a particular species of being, but
none of them applies itself to the notion of being as such.
There is a science necessary, therefore, which shall make
an object of inquiry on its own account, of that which the
other sciences accept from experience, and, as it were,
hypothetically. This is the ofl&ce of the first philosophy,
which occupies itself, therefore, with being as being,
whereas the other sciences have to do with special con-
crete being. Metaphysics constituting, then, as this
science of being and its elementary grounds, a presupposi-
tion for the other disciplines, are, naturally, first philoso-
phy. If there were, namely, says Aristotle, only physic '1
beings, physics would be the first and only philosophy :
but if there is an immaterial and unmoved essence,
which is the ground of all being, there must be a.rio

ARISTOTLE. 00

earlier, .ind, as earlier, universal philosophy. This first
Mill now of all being is God, and for that reason
lotle sometimes also calls his first i)hilosoph3- theology.
it is difläcult to define the relation between this first
!)hilosopliy as the scieueo of ultimate grounds, and that
tcience which, usually named the logic of Aristotle, is
"ound to receive its exposition in the writings in-
•Judeil together under the title of Organou. Aristotle
las not himself precisely determined the relations of these
sciences, though, perhaps, it is the incomplete state of the
Metaphysics that is partly to blame here. As, however,
lie includes both sciences under the name logic ; as he ex-
pressly calls the investigation of the essence of things (vir.
^7), and of the theory of ideas (xiii. 5), logical investiga-
tion ^ as he seeks to establish at full in the Metaphysics
[iv.) the logical principle of contradiction as the absolute
Sresupposition (condition) of all thinking, speaking, and
»hilosophizing ; as he appropriates the inquiry into the
irocess of proof to the same science which has also to
nquire into essence (iii. 2, iv. 3) ; as he discusses the
[categories (to which he had previously devoted a special
ook incorporated with the Organon) over again in the
etaphysics (v.), — this much at all events may be raaiu-
ed with safety, that the inquiries of the Organon
ere not for him directly divided from those of the
etaphysks, and that the usual separation of formal
igic and of metaphysics had not a place in his mind,
though he has omitted any attempt to bring them closer.
I (&.) Logic. — The business of logic, natural or scientific, as
acuity or as art, is to be able to prove through syllogisms,
0 form syllogisms, and to pronounce on .syllogisms ; but
yllogisms consist of propositions, and propositions of no-
ions. It is in accordance, then, with these points of view,
rhich belong naturally to the position, that Aristotle, in
lie various books of the Organou, discusses the details of
ogic and dialectics. The first essay in the Organoid is 'The
Categories,' an essay which, by treating the various notions
•roper, the universal predicates of being, constitutes the
irst attempt at an ontology. Aristotle enumerates ten of
hese — substance, quantity, quality, relation, where, when,
losition, possession, action, passion. . The second essay
reats of language as expression of thought ('i)e Interpre-
atione '), and discusses the various parts of discourse, as
depositions and sentences. The third treatise consists of
he 'Analytic Books,' which show how conclusions may

100 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

be referred to their principles, and arranged according to
their premises. The first (prior) Analytics contain in two
books the general theory of the syllogism. Syllogisms,
again, are in matter and purpose Hither apodictic, pos-
sessed of certain and rigorously demonstrable truth, or
dialectic, directed to what is probable and disputable, or,
lastly sophistic, intended to deceive by a false show of
correctness. Apodictic arguments, and consequently
proof in general, are treated in the two books of the
second (posterior, last) Analjrtics, dialectic in the eight
books of the Topics, and sophistic in the essay on * The
Sophistical ElenchV

Further details of the Aristotelian logic are, — through
the usual formal exposition of this science, for which Aris-
totle has furnished almost the entire material (hence Kant
was able to say that logic, since Aristotle, had not made
any step forwards nor any backwards), — known to every-
body. Present formal logic is in advance of Aristotle only
in two respects : first in adding to the categorical syllogism,
which Aristotle alone contemplated, the hypothetical and
disjunctive ones ; and, second, in supplementing the three
first figures by the fourth. But the defect of the Aristote-
lian logic, which was excusable in its founder, — its wholly
empirical procedure, namely, — has not only been retained
by the present formal logic, but has been even raised into
a principle through the un- Aristotelian antithesis of the
forms thinking, and the matter thought. Aristotle's
object, properly, was only to collect the logical facts in
reference to the formation of propositions and the process
of syllogisms ; and he has supplied in his logic only a natu-
ral history of finite thought. However much, then, this
attaining to a consciousness of the logical operations of
the understanding, this abstracting from the materiality
of ordinary thought, is to be valued, the striking want in
it of all scientific foundation and derivation must at the
same time be recognised. The ten categories, for ex-
ample, though discussed, as observed, in a special work,
are simply enumerated vidthout any assignment of a prin-
ciple, whether of foundation or of classification. It is
for him only a fact that there are so many categories,
nay, they are even differently stated in different works.
In the same way, the syllogistic figures are taken up only
empirically ; he regards them as only modes and relations
of formal thought, and persists in this position within
the logic of the understanding simi)l5'', though he declares

ARISTOTLE. 101

syllogism to be the single form of science. Neither
lis Metaphysics nor in his Physics, does he a])ply the
iial syllogistic niles which he develops in the Onja-
: a clear proof that he has duly wrought into his
.em neither the theory of the categories, nor his
lytic in general. In sliort, his logical inquiries enter
into the development of his philoso})hical thoughts,
have for the most part only the value of a prelimi-
v linguistic investigation,

.) Metaphysics. — Of all the writings of Aristotle,

Metaphysics present the least the appearance of a

•lected whole, but rather that of a collection of

lehes, which follow indeed a certain main idea, but

in inner uaion and complete development. Seven

ciiief groups may be distinguished here — (1.) A criticism

of the previous philosophical systems from the point of

view of the four Aristotelian principles (Book i.) ; (2.) A

statement of the aporias or philosophical preliminary

questions (iiT.) ; (3.) The principle of contradiction (iv.) ;

(-4.) The definitions (v.) ; (5.) A discussion of the notion

of substance {ovaia), and of logical essence (the ri ^v

dvai), or of the notions matter (CX??), form (elöos), and of

Ithe composite thing {cvv6\ov) that is formed of both

t(vii., nil.) ; (6.) Potentiality and actuaUty (ix.) ; (7.) The

divine spirit that, unmoved itself, moves all (xii.); (8.)

To this there is added the polemic against the Platonic

theory of ideas and numbers, which pervades the entire

Metaphysics, but which is more particularly the business

of Books XIII. and xrv.

{aa.) The Aristotelian criticism of the Platonic Ideal
Theory. — It is in Aristotle's opposition to the Platonic
ideal theory that the specific difference of the two
systems is to be sought. Aristotle, indeed, returns, on
every opportunity that presents itself (especially Meta. i.
and xni.), to this his antithesis to the Academics. Plato
had conceived^ the idea (or ideas) of all that is real, but
the idea, if true, had still no movement for him ; it was
not yet wrought into life and the process of nature. It
was thus rather itself finite, had the phenomenal world,
however much against Plato's own will, opposed to it in
independent being, and possessed not in its own self the
principle of this being. Aristotle means this when he
objects to Plato that his ideas are only * things of sense
immortalized and eternalized,' and that they are incom-
petent to explain the being and becoming of nature. In

1 02 HI ST on Y OF PHIL OSOPII T,

order to escape these consequences he himself attributes to
mind an original connexion with the outward phenomena;
he characterizes the relation of the two as that of the
actual to the possible, of form to matter, he conceives
thought as the absolute reality of matter ; matter as
thought in itself (potential). His objections to the
Platonic theory, Aristotle reasons out in the following
manner : —

Leaving out of view that Plato had led no competent
proof of the objective reality of the ideas, in independ-
ence of the things of sense, and that his theory is un-
verified, this theory is, in the first place, completely
sterile, as it offers no explanatory reason of existence.
The ideas are devoid of any special independent matter
of contents. We need only remember how they origin
nate. In order to save the possibility of science,
Plato had attempted to set up certain substances,
independent of sense, uncoloured by its stream. But
for this purpose, nothing else offered itself to him than
the individual units beside him, the things of sense.
He assumed these, therefore, but in a universalized form
as ideas. And thus it happens that his ideas are so little
different from the actual units of sense that participate
in them. The ideal duality and the empirical duality
have one and the same import. We may easily con-
vince ourselves of this by challenging the adherents of
the ideas to say definitely what theii- imperishable sub-
stances specially are beside the things of sense which
participate in them. The entire distinction between
them is limited to an in itself which attaches to the
latter : instead of a man, a horse, we have a man in him-
self, a horse in itself. Only on this formal alteration does
the ideal theory rest : the finite import (constitution of
the object) remains, it is only expressed as an eternal
one. This objection, that in the ideal theory the sen-
suous is in strictness only assumed as unsensuous and
distinguished with the predicate of immutability, is,
as already remarked, understood by Aristotle in this
way, that he calls the ideas, * etea-nalized things of
sense,' not as if they were actually something sen-
suous, something in space, but because the sensuous
individual is in them immediately enunciated as a
universal. He compares them in this connexion to
the gods of the anthropomorphistic popular religion.
As these are nothing else than deified men, so those

ARISTOTLE. 103

arc nothing else tlinn potentiated things of nature,
what is sensuous exalted into wliat is not sensuous. It
is this ' synonymousness' of the ideas and the corroapon-
dont tilings of scuBe, which gives to the assumption of
the ideas the appearance of a superfluous and cuni])cr-
some dujdicatiou of the objects that are to be ex])lained.
Why shouhl we take the same thing twice? Why, be-
sides the two and the three of sense, assume a two and
three in the idea? Aristotle intimates, therefore, that
the adherents of the ideal theory, in supposing an idea
for every class of things in nature, and in bringing for-
ward, by means of this theor}', a double series of sen-
suous and unsensuous substances under one and the same
name, appear lo him like men who should be of o])inion
that it is not equally easy to count with few numbers
and with many, and should accordingly increase their
numbers before proceeding to calculations in hand.
Or, to take it once again, the ideal theory is a tautolog}',
and as an explanation of natural existence wholly fruit-
less. 'Towards knowledge of the individual things that
participate in the idea, these ideas themselves give no
assistance, since, indeed, they (ideas) are not immanent in
them, but sundered from them.' Equally barren the ideas
are seen to be when considered in relation to the origi-
nation and dissolution of the things of sense. They pos-
sess not any principle of the genesis of this movement.
There is no causality in them either to produce change or
to explain its actual existence. In themselves immobile
and without process, they could bring about, did any
influence at all belong to them, no result but a complete
standstill. According to the Phcedo, indeed, the ideas
are causes of being as well as of becoming, but, de-
spite the ideas, nothing becomes wdthout a moving force,
and, in their separation from the subject of the becom-
ing, the ideas are none such. This indifference of the
ideas to the process of actuality, their unyielding remote-
ness, is, under application of the categories potentiality
and actuality, further described by Aristotle as the mere
potentiality, possibility, virtuality which belongs to them
in contrast to the actuality which fails them. The inner
contradiction of the ideal theory is briefly this, that it
enunciates an individual directly as a universal, and,
conversely, the universal, the genus as what is at the
same time numerically individual, or that it expresses the
idea, on the one hand, as a separate specific individual.

104 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY. \

and, on the other hand, as participant, and consequently
as universal (generic). Although, then, the ideas are
originally generic notions, univeraals, originating in the
demonstration and fixation of the one in the many, of the
permanent in the mutable, of the veritably beent in the
phenomenally existent, still, being at the same time, ac-
cording to the Platonic assumption, separate substances,
they are quite incapable of definition. That is, neither
definition nor derivation is possible of anything that is
absolutely singular, a wholly peculiar individual unit ;
and the reason is that words — and only through words
is definition possible — are by very nature universal and
applicable to a variety of objects, and, consequently, that
all predicates by which I may attempt to assign the de-
termination of any particular object, are, for this speci-
fic object, not specific, and cannot be specific. Tho
supporters of the ideal theory, then, are not in a position
logically to determine any idea; their ideas are indefinable,
Plato has left in complete obscurity the relation in gene-
ral of things to the ideas. He terms the ideas arche-
types, and supposes things to participate in them ; but
such expressions are only hollow poetical metaphors.
How are we to conceive this * participation ' in, this
copying of, these patterns thus remote, absent in an alien
region ? It is in vain to seek in Plato any definite expla-
nation here. It is wholly unintelligible how and why
matter comes to participate in the ideas. To explain it
at all, recourse must be had, in addition to the ideas, to
another and a higher principle, which should hold in it
the cause of this * participation ' of things, for without
any principle of movement it is impossible to get to
understand the 'participation.' In every case there
must be assumed, in addition to the idea (of man, for
example), and in addition to the sensuous manifestation
(a certain individual man, say), and as common to both,
a tertium, a third, in which both should be united ;
that is to say, as Aristotle usually couches this ob-
jection, the ideal theory involves the supposition of
a 'third man.' The immanence of the universal in the
singular, this is the result of the Aristotelian critique of
the ideas. However sound it was in Socrates to insist
on the discovery of the universal as the true soul of the
individual, and on the consequent assignment of the
logical definition (for without the universal no science is
possible), the Platonic theory that would transform these

ARISTOTLE. 105

generic notions into real, individual substances, existing
inde|>endently and by themselves, is quite unsound. A
universal, a genus, a sjtecies, is not a thing that exists
alongside of, or apart from, the singular, the individual.
A thing and its notion cannot be separated from each
other. With all these conclusions, Aristotle, nevertheless,
is so little opposed to the principle of Plato (namely that
the universal is alone the veritably beent, the truth of in-
dividual things), that he has rather only relieved it of its
•ccomj^anying abstraction, and more deeply reconciled
it with the world of sense. Despite all apparent an-
tagonism to his master, his main proposition is the same
: as Plato's namely, that the true nature of a thing [to tL
(<mv, TO ri 9jv dvai) is known and shown only in the
notion. But still for him the universal, the notion, must
be as little separated from the particular exemplification
of it in sense, as form from matter ; and essence or sub-
stance {oiala) in its strictest sense is for him only that
which is not predicated of anything else, but of which all
else is predicated — whatever, namely, is a ^Ai« thing [rö^e
Ti), an individual thing, a special unit, not a universal

(66.) The four Aristotelian principles or causes, and
the relation of form, and matter. — From the critique of the
Platonic ideas, there directly result the two main char-
acteristics of the Aristotelian system, and which to-
gether constitute its cardinal point ; they are form (elooj)
and matter 'CXt;). Aristotle, for the most part, it is
true, when he aims at completeness, enumerates four
metaphysical principles or causes, — the formal, the mate-
rial, the efficient, and the finaL In the case of a house,
for example, the building materials are the matter, the
idea of it the form, the efficient cause the builder, and
the actual house the end (final cause). These four prin-
ciples of all being, however, will be found on closer
inspection to reduce themselves to the single antithesis
of matter and form. In the first place, the notion of the
efficient cause coincides with that of the two other ideal
principles (form and end). The efficient cause, namely,
is what conducts the transition of potentiality into actu-
ality (entelechie), or the realization of matter into form.
In all movement, however, of an luiactual into an actual,
the latter is the logical (notional) prius, and the logical
(or notional) motive of the movement itself. The effi-
cient cause of matter is consequently the form. Thus man
is the efficient cause of man ; the form of the statue in

lOG HISTORY OF PIIILOSOPIIY.

the understanding (artistic jihantasy) of the sculptor U
the cause of the movement through which the statue
comes into being ; health in the mind of the physician
precedes the process of cure. In a certain way, therefore,
health is the medical art, and the form of a house archi-
tectural art. But the efficient, or first cause, is equally
identical with the final cause or end, for this (the end) is
the motive of all becoming and of all movement. The
builder is the efficient cause of the house, but the efläcient
cause of the builder is the end to be accomplished, the
house. In these examples it is already evident that the
principles of form and end also coincide, so far as both
are conjoined in the notion of actuality {ivipyeia). For
the end of everything is its completed being, its notion,
or its form, the development into full actuality of what-
ever is potentially contained in it. The final cause of
the hand is its notion ; that of the seed the tree, which
is the true nature of the seed. There remain to us,
therefore, only the two principles, which pass not into
each other, matter and form.

Matter is, for Aristotle, conceived in its abstraction
from form, as what is without predicate, determination,
distinction ; what is permanent subject in all becoming,
and assumes the most contradictory forms ; what how-
ever in its own being is different from everything that is
become, and has in itself no definite form whatever ;
what then is everything in possibility, but nothing in
actuality. As the wood the bench, and the brass the
statue, so there underlies every determinate a materia
prima, a first matter. Aristotle takes credit to himself
for having resolved wdth this notion of matter the much-
vexed question of how anything can originate, inasmuch
as what is can neither originate from what is, nor from
what is not. For not from what directly is not, but
only from what in actuality is not, that is to say, only
from what potentially is, can anything originate. Pos-
sible (potential) being is as little non-being as it is actu-
ality. Every existing thing of nature is therefore a
possibility that has attained to actuality. Matter is
to Aristotle, accordingly, a much more positive substrate
than to Plato, who pronounced it the absolutely non-
beent. This explains how Aristotle could conceive
matter, in contradistinction to form, aa a positive nega-
tive, as a counterpart to form, and designate it as posi-
tive negation [a-Tiprjcns).

ARISTOTLE. 107

As matter with potentiality, so/on?? coincides \\'ith ac-
tuality. It is that which converts undistinguished, inde-
terminate matter into a definite, a (his {robe rt), an «actual ;
it is the specific virtue, the completed activity, the soul
of ever^i-hing. What Aristotle calls form, then, is not to
be confounded with what is to us perhaps/afor?. An am-
putated hand, for example, has still the external ahape of a
hand, but to Aristotle it is only a hand in matter, not in
form ; an actual liand, a hand in form, is only what can
fulfil the special function of a hand. Pure form is what,
without matter, in truth is (t6 ri ^v thai), or the notion of
true being, the pure notion. Such pure form exists not,
however, in the kingdom of definite being : every given
being,, every individual substance [ovala), everything that
is a this, is a compound rather of matter and form, a avuo-
\ov. Matter, then, it is that prevents the existent from
being pure fonn, pure notion ; it is the ground of the
becoming of plurality, multiplicity, and contingency ; it
is at the same time what prescribes to science its limit.
For an individual thing cannot be known in proportion
as it contains matter. From this it follows, however,
that the antithesis between matter and form is a fluent
one. What in one reference is matter, is in another
form. Wood in relation to the finished house is matter,
in relation to the growing tree, form ; the soul in rela-
tion to the body is form, in relation to reason, which is
the form of the form (elSos etSous), it is matter. In this
way, the totality of existence must constitute a gra-
duated scale, of which the lowest degree will be a first
matter [irpdyrr] HXr]) entirely without form, and the highest
a last form entirely without matter (pure form — the
absolute, di\'ine spirit). What finds itself between these
extremes will be in the one direction matter, in the other
form, which amounts to a continual self-translation of the
former into the latter. This (the foundation of the Aris-
totelian theory of nature) is the conception, — first come
upon in the analytic method of observing nature, — that
all nature is an eternal gi-aduated conversion of matter into
form, an eternal breaking out into life, on the part of this
inexhaustible primeval substrate, in higher and higher
ideal formations. That all matter should become form, all
possibility actuality, all being knowing, this is, indeed, at
once the impracticable postulate of reason and the aim
of all becoming — impracticable, since Aristotle expressly
maintains that matter, as privation of form, as cT^ptjacs,

108 HISTORY OF PIIILOSOPIIY.

can never wholly attain to actuality, nor consequently to
understanding. So, then, the Aristotelian system ends
also in an insurmountable dualism of matter and form.

[cc). Potentialitij and Actuality {dvua/xis and iuipyeia). —
The relation of matter to form has, logically taken, mani-
fested itself as the relation of potentiality to actuality.
Aristotle first invented these terms (in their philosophi-
cal sense), and they are what is most characteristic of his
system. In the movement of potential being into actual
being we have the explicit notion of becoming, as in the
four principles generally an explication of this notion into
its moments. The Aristotelian system, consequently, is
one of becoming ; and thus in him (as in Plato the prin-
ciple of the Eleatics), there returns, but in richer and con-
creter form, the principle of Heraclitus. Aristotle, then,
has made an important step here towards subjugation
of the Platonic dualism. If, as possibility of form, mat-
ter is reason in process of becoming, then the antithesis
between idea and world of sense is at least in principle
or potentially surmounted, so far as it is one single being,
but only on different stages, that exhibits itself in both,
in matter as well as in form. The relation of the poten-
tial to the actual, Aristotle illustrates by the relation of
the raw material to the finished article, of the proprietor
to the builder, of the sleeper to the waker. The seed is the
tree potentially, the tree the seed actually ; a potential
philosopher is the philosopher not philosophizing ; the
better general is potentially the conqueror even before
the battle ; space potentially is divisible ad infinitum :
in general that is potential, whatever possesses a prin-
ciple of movement, development, change ; whatever, un-
hindered from without, will through its own self be.
Actuality or entelechie, again, applies to the accom-
plished act, the attained goal, the consummated reality
(the mature tree, e.g., is the entelechie of the seed),
that actuosity in which the action and its completion
coincide, as to think, to see (he thinks and he has thought,
he sees and he has seen, are identical) ; whereas in acts
which involve a becoming, as to learn, to go, to get well,
the two (the act and its completion) are divided. In this
conception of the form (or idea) as actuality or entele-
chie,— in its connexion, that is, with the movement of
becoming, — there lies the chief distinction between the
system of Aristotle and the system of Plato. To Plato
the idea is stable, self-subsistent being, the opposite of

ARISTOTLE. 109

motion and becoming ; to Aristotle it is the eternal i»ro-
duot of becoming, eternal energy, activity in couii)lete<l
actnality, the goal that is in every instant attained by
the movement of the i/j-»7-S('(/" (potentiality) to tIie/or-i7-
self (actuality), not a fabricated and finished being, but
such as is eternally being produced.

{dd.) T fie absolute, divhie spirit. — Aristotle has attempted,
from various points of view, but especially in connexion
with the relation of potentiality and actuality, to deter-
mine the idea of the absolute spirit, or as he also names
it, the tirst mover, (a.) The cosmological form. — The
actual is always earlier than the potential, not only in
its notion — for I can affirm poAver only in connexion
with its activity — but also in time, for the potential be-
comes actual only through an actuating something (the
uneducated becomes educated through the educated) :
this leads to the inference of a first mover, who is pure
actuosity. Or, motion, becoming, a causal series, is only
jiossible, if a princijile of motion, a mover, pre-exists ; this
principle of motion, however, must be such that its very
nature is actuality, since what only potentially exists may
quite as well not pass into actuality, and not be, there-
fore, a principle of movement. All becoming postulates,
consequently, an eternal, iinbecome Being, who, himself
unmoved, is principle of movement, the first mover.
{h.) Ontological form. — Even from the very notion of po-
tentiality it results that the eternal and necessarily exis-
tent Being cannot be merely potential. For what
potentially is, may as well not be as be ; but what pos-
sibly is not, is perishable. What, therefore, is abso-
lutely imperishable is not potential, but actual. Or, were
potentiality the first, there might possibly exist nothing
at aU, which contradicts the notion of the absolute, to be
that which cannot not be. (c.) Moral form. — Potentiality
is alwa5^s the possibility of the opposite. Who has the
j»ower to be well has also the po-wer to be ill : in actu-
ality, again, no one is at once well and ill. Consequently
actuality is better than potentiality, and the former alone
accrues to the Eternal. [d.) So far as the relation of
potentiality and actuality is identical with that of mat-
ter and form, these arguments for the existence of a
Being who is pure actuality, may be put in this shape
also : — The supposition of an absolutely formless matter
{irpicTT] v\r]) postulates that of an absolutely matterless
form {vpZ'Tov elSos) at the other extreme. And since the

no HISTORY OF PlIILOSOPIIY.

\^
notion of form divides into the three fundamental dis-
tinctions of the efficient, the notional, and the final cause,
the eternal Being ia also, similarly, absolute efficient
principle (first-mover, irpurou klvovv), absolute notion
(purely intellif^fible, pure tL Tjv eluai.), and absolute end
(primitive good).

AU other ])redicate3 of the prime mover or supreme :

principle result from these premises with rigorous neces- *

sity. He is one, since the ground of the plurality, the
multiplicity of being, lies in matter, and he is unparti-
cipant of matter. He is immovable and immutable, as 1

otherwise he were not possibly the absolute mover, the ]

cause of all process. As actuose self-end, as entele-
chie, he is life. As absolutely immaterial, and free from
nature, he is at once intelligence and intelligible. He is
active, that is, he is thinking intelligence, becaiise he
is in his very nature pure actuality. He is intelligence
that thinks its own self, because the divine thought can-
not have its actuality out of itself, and because, if he
were the thought of another than himself, he could reach
actuality only by a necessary commencement from poten-
tiality. Hence Aristotle's famous definition of the abso-
lute, that it is the thought of thought {ud-rjaLs vorjaeios),
the personal unity of thinking and thought, of knowing
and known, the absolute subject-object. Meta. xii. 7
contains a rehearsal of these attributes of the divine spirit,
and an almost hymnic description of the ever-blessed God,
who, in eternal peace, in eternal self -fruition, knows him-
self as the absolute truth, and is in want neither of
action nor of virtue.

As appears from this statement, Aristotle, although
led to it through many consequences of his system, and
in many movements preparing for it, has not completely
deduced the idea of his absolute spirit, and still less
satisfactorily reconciled it with the conditioning bases and
presuppositions of his philosophy. It makes its appear-
ance in the twelfth book of the Ifetaphysics quite asser-
torically, nay unexpectedly, without the aid of any
further induction. It suffers, too, under important diffi-
culties. Why the ultimate ground of movement, which
properly is all that his absolute spirit is, must be also
thought as a personal being, it is impossible to see. " It
is impossible to see also how there can be something that
is a moving cause and yet itself unmoved ; a cause of all
becoming, that is, of all origination and decease, and yet

ARISTOTLE, 111

itself permanent, self-identical energy ; a |.rincii)lo of
movement, ami yet itself without potentiality : for what
moves must at least stand iu a relation of action and re-
action with what is moveil. On the whole, Aristotle haa
not, as already appears from these contradictions, with
completeness and consistency established the relation be-
tween God and the world, tsiuce indeed he characterizes
the absolute spirit one-sidedly only as contemplative theo-
retical reason, and excludes from him, as the perfected
end, all action (which were to presuppose au unperfected
end), any right motive of activity in regard to the world
fails. In his only theoretical relation, he is not even
truly the first mover ; extra-mundane and unmoved, aa
in essential nature he is, he enters not at all with his
activity into the life of the world ; and as on its side
matter is never quite resolved into form, there manifests
itself here too the ujireconciled dualism between the
divine spirit and the incognisable in-itsclf (potentiality)
of matter. The objections which Aristotle makes to the
god of Anaxagoras apply in part to his own.

4. The Aristotelian Physics. — The physics of Aris-
totle, taking up the largest part of his writings, con-
tinue the consideration of the rise of matter into form,
of the graduated series which nature, a living being, de-
scribes in order to become an individual soul. All pro-
cess, namely, has an end in view ; an end, however, ia
form, and the absolute form is the spirit. It is with due
consequence, then, that Aristotle recognises the end and
centre of terrestrial nature in the realized form, man,
and man-male. Everything sublunary else is, as it were,
only nature's failure to produce a male man, a surplus-
age due to the inability of nature always to master
matter and mould it into form. Whatever attains not to
the universal end of nature must be regarded as defec-
tive, and is in strictness an exception or an abortion.
Thus it even appears a false birth to Aristotle when the
child resembles not the father ; and the birth of a female
child is for him only a smaller degree of falsity, which
aiises from this that the procreating man, as formative
principle, possessed not strength enough. In comparison
with man, Aristotle regards woman generally as some-
thing maimed, and the other animals he finds in a greater
degree deficient. Did nature act wdth full consciousness,
these imperfect and incompetent formations of nature,
these failures, were inexplicable ; but she is an artist that

1 1 2 II I STÖR Y OF PHIL OSO P II Y.

works only on unconscious instinct, and completes not her
work with clear perceijtion or rational reflection.

(a.) In his physical books, Aristotle considers the uni-
rersal conditions of all natural existence — motion^ space,
time. These physical principles he reduces, also, to the
metaphysical principles of potentiality and actuality.
Motion is defined, accordingly, as the action of what
potentially is, and consequently as mediatrix between
potential being and entirely realized actuality. Space is
defined as the possibility of motion, and possesses the
quality, therefore, of being — potentially, not actually, —
divisible ad infinitum. Time, as the measure of motion,
equally divisible ad infinitum., and numerically expressible,
is the numbering of motion in reference to an earlier and
a later. All three are infinite, but the infinite that dis-
plays itself in them is only potentially, not actually, a
■whole : it contains not, but is contained, which is misun-
derstood by those who are accustomed to extol the infi-
nite as if it embraced all and contained all, because it
possesses a certain similarity to a whole.

(6.) Aristotle derives from the notion of motion his
theory of the entire universe as set out in his books De
Ccelo. As uninterrupted, uniform, and self-complete,
the circular is the most perfect motion. The world, then,
as a whole, is conditioned by this motion ; it is globe-
shaped and self-contained. For the same reason, how-
ever,— namely, that the motion which returns into itself is
better than any other, — that sphere in this globe-shaped
vmiverse is the better which is participant of the more
perfect movement, and placed consequently in the peri-
phery, while that is the worse which is disposed around
the centre. The former is the heaven, the latter the
earth, and between both there is also the sphere of the
planets. Heaven, as seat of spheral movement and of im-
perishable order," is nearest to the first moving cause, and
stands directly under its influence ; it consists not of
perishable matter, but of higher element, the ether ; and
in it the ancients sought the godhead, guided by a true
tradition of vanished wisdom. Its parts, the stars, are
impassive, changeless, and eternal beings ; who, occupied
for ever in untroubled employment, have received the
better part ; and are, though not capable of being clearly
understood, certainly much more divine than man.
Under the sphere of the fixed stars, comes the lower
sphere of the planets, among which Aristotle enumerates.

ARISTOTLE. 113

besides the five usually acknowledged by the ancients,
*' t sun and the moon. This sphere is less near in })osi-

:i to what is perfect. Unlike that of the fixed stars,
it is move<l, not to the right, but in an opposite direction,
and in oblique courses. It, too, possesses its divine
movers, who also are spiritual and immortal beings.
Lastlj', in the middle of the world there is the earth ; the
farthest removed from the prime mover, and the least
participant of di\'inity consequently ; the sphere — under
influence of the planets, and especially of the sun — of a
constant interchange of origin and decease, but exhibit-
ing even in this infinite process, a copy of the eternity of
heaven. There are thus assumed as necessary for the
explanation of nature three species of beings, represent-
ing, at the same time, three degrees of perfection : an
immaterial being, that, itself unmoved, imparts move-
ment, namely, the absolute spirit or God ; secondly, a
being that moves and is moved — though not without
matter — eternally, imperishably, in a constantly uni-
form circle, the super-terrestrial region of heaven ; and
lastly, in the lowest sjihere, the perishable beings of
earth, to which belongs only the passive role of receiving
movement.

(c.) Nature in the stHcter sense, as scene of elemental
action, exhibits to us a progressive transition of the
elements into plants, and of plants into animals.
The lowest step is occupied by the inanimate things of
nature, pure products of the intermixing elements, and
possessing their entelechie consequently only in the
particular relations of the combination of these ele-
ments ; whilst their energy, on the other hand, expresses
itself only in their tendency towards a position in the
universe adapted to them, which gained, they there rest.
Such mere external entelechie is not the property of
animate existences ; in them the motion by which they
attain to actuality dwells inwardly as organizing prin-
ciple, and continues as conservative activity to act in
them, even after complete organization ; in short, they
possess soul, for soul is the entelechie of an organic
body. Soul we find operative in plants only as force
of conservation and nutrition; the plant has no other
function or vocation than to noiuish itself and pro-
pagate its kind. In animals, which also exhibit a gra-
duated series according to the mode of their propagation,
the soul appears as sensitive. Animals have senses, and

114 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

are capable of locomotion. The human soul, finally, is
nutritive, sensitive, and cognitive.

{d.) Man, as goal of universal nature, is the central and
combining ganglion of the various grades in which the
life of nature exhibits itself. The classifying principle of
animate nature in general, therefore, will be necessarily
that also of the faculties of the soul. If nutrition (vege-
tation) fell to plants, sensation to animals, and locomo-
tion to the higher animals, all three belong to the human
soul. Of these the one preceding is always condition of
necessity and presupposition in time to the one succeeding,
and the soul itself is properly nothing else than the unifi-
cation of these various functions of organic life into a single
common designful activity, the designing unity or ente-
lechie of the organic body. The soul is related to the body
as form to matter ; it is animating principle. Simply for
this reason the soul cannot be thought without the body;
neither can it exist by itself, and with the body it
ceases to be. It is different, however, with the fourth
power, with thought or reason {vovs), which constitutes
what is specific in man. This is essentially different
from the soul, it is no product of the lower faculties, it
la not related to them as mere higher developmental
stage, as soid to body perhaps, as end to instrument, as
actuality to possibility, as form to matter ; but, as pure
intellectual principle, it requires not the intervention of
any boduy organ, it stands not in connexion with the
bodily functions, it is absolutely simple, immaterial, self-
subsistent, it is what is divine in man ; it comes, as being
no result of lower processes, from elsewhere into the
body, and is equally again separable from it. There cer-
tainly exists a connexion between thought and sensation;
for the sensations, at first externally separated according
to the various organs of sense, meet inwardly in a
centre, a common .sense, where they are transformed into
images and conceptions, and further again into thoughts.
And it might seem from this as if thought were only a
result of sensation, as if the intelligence were only pas-
sively determined, nay, Aristotle himself distinguishes
between an active and a passive (receptive) reason,
which latter is only gradually developed into thinking
cognition. (In place here is the proposition erroneously
ascribed to Aristotle, Nihil est in intellectu, quod nor>
fuerit in sensu, as well as the widely knovni, but muc?
misunderstood, comparison of the soul to a tabuk

ARISTOTLE. HO"

rasa. This latter moans only that as the tabula rasa is
a book poteutially but not actually, so human reason
is at lirst not actually but potentially cognitive ; or
thought i>osscssea the universal notions within itself in
principle, so far as it is capable of forming thein, but not
in actuality, not definitely developed.) But this passivity
presupposes rather an activity ; for if thought in its
actuality, as cognition, becomes all forms, and conse-
quently all things, it must make itself aU. that it becomes,
and the passive reason has therefore an active one as
moving principle behind it, by means of which it be-
comes that which in itself it is. This active reason is
reason in its purity, which as such is independent of and
unafifected by matter, and consequently even on the death
of the body is unconcerned, and, as universal reason,
continues eternal and immortal. Thus here, too, the
Aristotelian dualism breaks out. Obviously, this active
intelligence is related to the soul as God to nature ; the
sides stand in no essential mutual relation. As the
divine spirit becomes not truly part of the universal life,
neither does the human spirit become truly part of the
life of the senses ; though defined as immaterial and in-
susceptible of outer influence, as soul it is still to be
supposed connected with matter ; though pure, self-cog-
nising form, it is still to be supposed di£Ferent from the
di\'ine spirit, which has been similarly characterized ; the
deficiency of conciliation as well on the one side as the
other, the human as well as the divine, is in these cir-
cumstances not to be mistaken.

5. Aristotle's Ethics. — (a.) Relation of the ethics to
the physics. — Led here, too, by his tendency to natiire,
Aristotle has united ethics more closelj' with physics than
his two predecessors Socrates and Plato did. K Plato
found it impossible to discourse of the good in the aflfairs
of man without being obliged to introduce the idea of the
good in itself, Aristotle, on the contrary, held that the
good in itself, the idea of the good, was of no assistance
towards a knowledge of the good that was practicable in
actual life, the good for us. Only the latter, morality in
the life of man, not the good on the great scale as in re-
lation to the universe, was for him the object of ethics.
Hence Aristotle prefers to consider the good in its rela-
tion to the actual constitution of man, as the aim
appointed by nature herself ; he conceives the moral
element as flower, as . etherealization, spiritualization of

1 1 6 11 1 STÖR Y OF PHILOSOPH Y.

the physical, rather than as something purely intellec-
tual ; virtue as normal development of natural instinct
rather than as dependent on knowledge. That man is a
political animal by nature, this for him is the premiss and
the fundamental presupposition for any theory of the
state. This conjunction of the ethical with the physical
element explains the polemic of Aristotle against the
Socratic notion of virtue. Socrates, looking for the
foundation of morals in the action of intelligence as in
superiority to sense, had set virtue and knowledge as
one. But this, in the opinion of Aristotle, were to de-
stroy the pathological moment that is planted by nature
herself in every moral action. It is not reason that is
the first principle of virtue, but the natural sensations,
inclinations, and appetites of the soul, without which
action were not to be thought. The provision of nature,
the impulse which in the beginning instinctively seeks
natural good, and to which moral insight is only subse-
quently added, this is the first ; only from natural virtue
does that of morality arise. Aristotle, for the same
reason, also disputes the teachableness of virtue. It is not
through cultivation of knowledge, according to him, but
through exercise — exercise directing natural inclination
and impulse to the good, accustoming them to the good,
weaning them from the bad — that virtue is realized.
We become virtuous through the practice of virtue, as
through the practice of music and architecture we be-
come musicians and architects. Virtue is no mere know-
ledge of the good, but confirmation in it, conviction,
principle. But principle is only the result of usage to
the good, and that requires again persistent exercise
and perpetual discipline. Judgment is certainly neces-
sary for knowledge of the good, and its application in
detau ; but it cannot produce a virtuous will ; nay, it
is rather conditioned by the latter, for a vicious will
corrupts and misleads judgment. Man, then, is good
through three things : through nature, through habit,
and through reason. Aristotle is, in these respects,
directly opposed to Socrates. Whust the latter, viewing
morality and nature as opposed, made moral action the
result of rational insight ; the former, holding both to be
steps of development, makes rational insight in moral
things a result of moral action.

(6.) The summum bonum. — All action has an end in
view; but every end cannot be only again means to

ARISTOTLE. 117

another end ; tliere must be a last and highest end, there
must be something to be striven to for its own sake,
something that is good absolutely, something that is
best. We are at least agreed on the name of this,
which name is Happiness. But about the notion of
happiness there is still question. If it is asked, What
constitutes happiness ? — the answer can only be, That
must depend on the peculiar nature of man, and consist
in a course of action which, flowing from this peculiar
nature, exalts it into such i)erfect actuality as brings
with it the feeling of entire satisfaction. But sensuous
feeling is not what is peculiar to man, for this he shares
with the lower animals ; it is intelligence. The pleasure
derived from the gratification of sense may constitute the
bliss of the brute, then ; but it is certainly not that
which is essential to man. What is specially human is
the exercise of reason rather. Man, by nature and in-
telligence, is formed for action, for rational action, for
rational application of his natural powers and faculties.
That is his destination and his happiness ; to the active,
action, the unobstructed, successfully continued exercise
of that activity to which nature calls, is always highest
and best. Happiness, therefore, is such a weU-being as
is also well-doing, and such a well-doing as yields, in
unobstructed energy and natural activity, the highest
satisfaction. Action and pleasure are inseparably united
then, by a natural bond, and constitute in their union, if
carried out throughout an entire life, happiness. Hence
the Aristotelian definition of happiness, that it is a per-
fect activity in a perfect life.

But if from this description, Aristotle appears to have
considered action in accordance with nature sufficient for
happiness and sufficient for itself, he does not, at the
same time, conceal from himself the dependence of hap-
piness on competent means and other advantages, the jjos-
session of which is not necessarily within our power. He
declares, indeed, that moderate means suffice, and that
only unusually great misfortunes are worth regarding,
but he holds at the same time that riches, friends, chil-
dren, noble birth, personal beauty, etc., are more or less
necessary conditions of happiness, which, then, depends in
part on contingencies. This moment of the Aristotehan
theory has its foundation naturally in his empirical ten-
dencies. Carefully pondering every consideration which
universal experience appears to furnish, he pronounces

118 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

exclusively neither for virtue and rational action nor
for external fortune, because fact testifies to the condi-
tionedness of the one by the other ; and he is in this free
from the one-sidedness of later authorities, who deny to
externality any application in happiness.

(c.) Notion of virtue. — As results from the Aristotelian
polemic against Socrates, virtue is the product of fre-
quently repeated moral action ; it is a quality won
through exercise, an acquired moral ability of the soul.
The nature of this ability may be characterized as fol-
lows : — Every act accomplishes something as its work ;
but a work is imperfect if either in defect or excess.
The act itself, therefore, will be similarly imperfect either
by defect or excess ; nor will an act be perfect unless it
attain to a right proportion, to the due middle between
too much and too little. Virtue in general, then, may
be defined as observation of the due mean in action, not
the arithmetical mean, the mean in itself, but the mean
for us. What, namely, is enough for one man, is not so
for another. The virtue of a man is one thing, but that
of a vnfe, a child, a slave, quite another. In like man-
ner there must be consideration of time, circumstances,
and relations. To that extent, indeed, the determina-
tion of the due mean will always involve uncertainty.
But in the absence of any exact and infallible prescript,
it is practical judgment that must pronounce ; and in
efi'ect that is the due mean which the man of understand-
ing considers such.

That there must be as many virtues as there are rela-
tions of life, follows of itself from the very notion of
virtue. As man, too, falls ever into new circumstances,
in which it is often hard to determine the proper
course of action, any exact enumeration of the various
particular virtue3 is impossible (in contrast to Plato),
and therefore not to be discussed. Only so far as
there are certain constant relations in life will it be
possible to assign also certain leading virtues. One con-
stant human relation, for example, is that of pleasure and
pain. The moral mean in this reference, then, or neither
to fear pain, nor yet not to fear it, will be fortitude.
The due mean in regard to pleasure, again, as between
apathy and greed, will be temperance. In social life the
mean between the doing of wrong and the suffering of
wrong, between selfishness and weakness, is justice. In
the same way many other virtues may be characterized ;

ARISTOTLE. 119

and it can be demonstrated in all of them that they oc-
cupy the middle between two vicea, which are oiipnsed
to each other, the one by defect, the other by excess.
The details of the Aristotelian scheme here possess much
psychological and practical value, but less philosophical.
Aristotle derives the notions of his virtues from current
speech rather than from the realization of any classifying
principle ; his specification of the virtues of practical life
remains in particular destitute of any systematic deduc-
tion and arrangement. The most scientific perhaps is his
classification of virtues into ethical and dianoetical, that
is, into such as concern the affections and passions, and
such as concern the intellect, theoretical or practical.
The latter as the virtues of voOj, of what is highest in
man, are superior in his estimation to the former ; wis-
dom, ^e<j}pla, is what is best and noblest ; and life in it,
philosophy, the supreme degree of felicity. But precisely
in this class of virtues the criterion of a mean is found to
be inapplicable ; they stand quite unconnectedly beside
each other, in the same dualistic manner in wbich reason
stands to the other faculties of the soul.

(d.) The State. — Neither virtue nor happiness, accord-
ing to Aristotle, can be attained by the individual him-
self. Moral development and moral activity, as well as
the procuring of the necessary external means, are con-
ditioned by e- regulated life in common, within which the
individual obtains education in the good, the protection
of the law, the assistance of others, and opportunity for
the practice of virtue. Even by nature man is bom for
a life in common ; he is a political being ; life for him is
only possible with his fellows. The state, then, is higher
than the individual, higher than the family ; individuals
are only accidental parts of the political whole. Aris-
totle at the same time is far from entertaining the abs-
tract conception of this relation wbich belongs to Plato ;
the latter's politics, rather, he expressly opposes. With
him also the business of the state is to rear its citizens
into good men, to raise human life into its perfection ;
but without prejudice to the natural rights of the indi-
vidual and the family, of the thine and the mine, of per-
sonal liberty. The state, he says, is not unity, but
essentially plurality of individuals and smaller communi-
ties ; this it has to recognise, and it has to effect also by
law and constitution that virtue, humanity, shall become
as universal as possible, as well as that political power

120 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

shall remain in the hands of the virtuous citizens. Of
the various political forms, Aristotle gives the preference
to constitutional monarchy and aristocracy, that is, to
the state, in which not riches and not number of heads
ride, but all such citizens as are possessed of competent
property, as have been educated in all moral integrity,
and as are capable of protecting and administering the
whole. That state is the best in which the virtue,
whether of one or of many, governs. For the rest, Aris-
totle will not support any political form as the only true
one. The question, he thinks, is not of any political
ideal, but of what is most advisable at the time, under
the given natural, climatical, geographical, economical,
intellectual, and moral relations. Thus here, too, he is
true to the character of his entire philosophy — critically
and reflectingly to advance, that is, only on the ground
of experience, and, despairing of the attainment of any
absolute good or true, to keep in view what are relatively
such, namely, the probable and the practicable.

6. The Peripatetic School. — The school of Aristotle,
named Peripatetic, can, in consequence of the relative want
of independency in its philosophizing, which accordingly
was not of great or universal influence, be only mentioned
here. Theophrastus, Eudemus, Strato are the most cele-
brated leaders of it. In the usual manner of philosophical
schools, it restricted itself almost entirely to the explica-
tion and exacter completion of the Aristotelian system.
Any attempts to extend it concerned, in view of its ten-
dency to the cultivation of material knowledge, natu-
rally only the empirical spheres, that of physics especi-
ally, with neglect and disregard of the more speculative
principles. Strato, the ' physicist,' went the farthest
in this direction ; . he abandoned the dualism of Aristotle
between the intelligent and the natural principle of
things, and upheld nature as the one, sole, all-productive
(even of thought), all-formative might of existence.

7. Transition to the Post- Aristotelian Philosophy.
— The productive power of Grecian philosophy is, contem-
poraneously and in connexion with the general decline of
Grecian hfe and intellect, exhausted with Aristotle. In-
stead of the great and universal systems of a Plato and
an Aristotle, we have now one-sided subjective systems,
correspondent to the general breach between the subject
and the objective world, which characterizes, in political,
religious, and social life, this last epoch of Greece, the

ARISTOTLE. 121

time after Alexander the Great. The principle of sub-
ji ctivity, that tirst showed itself in the Sophists, stands
ii'iW after long struggles triumphant over the ruins of
(irecian politics and Grecian art. The indiNndual has
I inancipated himself from society and the state. The
simple trust of the subject in the given world is com-
]ilotely at an end ; the question henceforward is of the
realization and satisfaction of the indi\'idual subject, now
autonomic and secluded to himself. This progressive
coui-se of the universal spirit is also seen in philosophy.
It, too, is no longer handled in a purely scientific, any more
than in a purely political, interest ; it becomes rather
means for the subject, and aims to procure him, what is
no longer possible on the part of the sinking religion and
morality of the state, a philosophical conviction in reference
to the highest religious, moral, and philosophical problems,
a fixed theory of the universe for life and action, acquired,
too, only through free thought. All now, even logic and
physics, is looked at from this practical point of view ;
the former shall extend to the subject a secure know-
ledge to raise him above all disquieting doubt ; the latter
shall supply the necessary explanations in regard to the
ultimate grounds of existence, God, nature, humanity, in
order that man may know how to relate himself to all
things, what to fear or hope from the world, and in what
to place his happiness in accordance with the nature of
things. In one respect, consequently, the Post-Aristo-
telian systems denote a spiritual progress ; they are in
earnest with philosophy, which is to be in place now of
religion and tradition, which is to afford truth for life
itself, which is to be creed, dogma, con\'iction, by which
the subject shall consistently determine his entire life
and action, in which he shall find his peace, his happiness.
Ajid the result is that now above all things certainty is
aimed at, definitive knowledge. The effort is towards a
fixed foundation ; the transcendentalism of the Platonic
idealism, and the hypothetical philosophizing of Aristotle,
are abandoned ; position is taken on the realistic terrain
of immediate outer and inner experience in order to reach
thence a theory of things that shall be logically estab-
lished, and that shall leave nothing undecided. The en-
deavour in particular is to abolish the dualism of the
Platonico-Anstotelian philosophy, and finally solve the
problem of the reduction of all the differences and con-
trarieties of existence, subject and object, spirit and

122 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

mi^tte^, to a single ultimate ground. Philosophy shall
explain all ; nowhere shall there be left any hiatus, any
uncertainty, any halfness. On the other hand, again,
there fails even so to the Post- Aristotelian philosophy,
all simple scientific devotion to the object ; it is a dog-
matism that demands truth only for the subject, and ia
therefore one-sided. It no longer allows free scope to
the interest itself, to cognition, but it accentuates the
subjective consequence of thought ; it seeks truth in the
consequent realization of a single principle throughout
the universal sphere of existence. Hence there presents
itself opposite this dogmatism, and with equal decision,
a scepticism that denies the possibility of all real know-
ledge, and in which the negative tendencies of the
Sophistic and Megaric eristic are developed up to their
extremest consequences.

The chief system of the Post- Aristotelian period is
Stoicism. In it subjectivity appears as universal, think-
ing subjectivity (compare xi. 6). Precisely this over-
mastering grasp of the universality of subjectivity, of
thought, and in superiority to all that is particular and
individual, it adopts for principle both in theory and
practice. Every particular existential detail is only pro-
duct of the all-reason that lives and works throughout
the system of the universe ; reason, one and universal,
is the essential principle of things. Thus, too, the voca-
tion of man is no other than to be universal subjectivity
exalted above every circumstance, and to seek his well-
being only in a life according to nature and reason, not
in external things, or individual enjoyment. The direct
contrary of this is maintained by Epicureanism. In it
the subject retires into the individuality of pleasure, into
the bliss of philosophical repose, enjoying the present,
free from care and inordinate desire, and interested in
the objective world only so far as it extends means
for the satisfaction of his individuality proper. Scep-
ticism agrees with these two systems in aiming at the
undisturbedness and unmovedness of the subject by
anything external ; but it would attain this in negative
wise, through indifference to the objective world, through
resignation of all definite knowledge and particular will.

The same character of subjectivity, finally, is exhibited
by the last of the ancient philosophical systems, Neo-Plo.to-
nism ; for here, too, the exaltation of the subject to the
absolute forms the cardinal point of the system. Even,

STOICISM. 123

indeed, when Neo-PlAtonism speculates objectively in
regard to God and hia relation to the finite, this, too,
has its motive in the desire to demonstrate the graduated
transition from the absolute object to the personality of
man. Here, too, then, the dominant principle is the in-
terest of subjectivity, and the greater wealth of objective
B])ecifications has its ground only in the enlargement of
subjectivity into the absolute.

XVIL— Stoicism.

THE founder of the Stoic School is Zeno, bom in
Citium, a town of Cyprus, about the year 340, not
of pure Greek, but of Phoenician extraction. Deprived
of his property by shipwreck, but impelled as well by
inclination, he took refuge in philosophy. He was pupil
first of Crates the Cynic, then of Stilpo the Megaric, and
lastly of Polemo the Academic. After having passed
twenty years in this manner, convinced at length of the
necessity of a new philosophy, he opened, in an arcade at
Athens, a school of his own. This arcade was named, from
the paintings of Polygnotus with which it was decorated,
the ' many-coloured portico ' (Stoa Poecile) ; whence those
who attended the new school were called ' philosophers of
the Porch.' Zeno is said to have presided over the Stoa
for fiftj'-eight years, and to have voluntarily ended his life
at a great age. His abstemiousness and the severity of
his morality were famous amongst the ancients ; his self-
denial became proverbial. The monument to his memory,
erected by the Athenians at the instigation of the Mace-
donian king Antigonus, contained the fine encomium,
'His life corresponded to his precepts !' Zenos succes-
sor in the school was Cleanthes of Assos, in Asia Minor,
a faithful follower of the tenets of his master. Cleanthes
was succeeded by CJirysippus, who was bom at Soli in
Cilicia, and died about the year 208 ; he was so pre-
eminently the support of the Stoa, that it used to be
said, 'If Chrysippus were not, the Stoa were not.' At
all events, as, for all the later Stoics, he was an object
of exalted veneration, and almost infallible authority,
he must be regarded as the most eminent originator of
their doctrine. He was so fertile a writer that, as it is
said, he composed no fewer than 705 books, his habit,
indeed, being to discuss the same proposition repeatedly,

124 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

and to support it by a vast number of extracts from other
works, especially those of the poets, by way of testi-
monies and examj)le8. But of all his works not any are
left to us. Chrysippus closes the series of philosophers
who founded the Stoa. Subsequent chiefs of the school,
as Payicetius, the friend of the younger Scipio (his cele-
brated book on duties was wrought by Cicero into his
own work of the same name), and Poaidonius (whom
Cicero, Pompey, and others attended), proceeded more
eclectically.

Among the Stoics, philosophy was in the closest union
with practical life. Philosophy is for them wisdom in a
practical interest ; it is the exercise of virtue, the train-
ing-school of virtue, the science of those principles by
which a virtuous life shall form itself. All science, art,
instruction that is only for its own sake, is to them but a
superfluous accessory ; man has nothing to strive for but
wisdom, wisdom in divine and human things, and adapt
his life accordingly. Logic supplies the method for at-
taining to true knowledge ; physics teach the nature
and order of the universe ; and ethics draw thence the
inferences for practical life.

What is most remarkable in their logic, and most
characteristic of the dogmatic nature of the Post-Aristo-
telian philosophy, is the quest of a subjective criterion
of truth that may assure the determination of true and
false ideas. All our knowledge, according to the Stoics,
springs from actual impressions on us of the external
things, from the objective experiences of sense, which are
then combined into notions by the understanding.
Knowledge, then, is not due to the subject, but to the
object, and therefore is it true. As it is possible, how-
ever, that ideas of our subjective imagination may mingle
with the true perceptions produced in us by things, the
question comes, -how are we able to separate the two
sorts of consciousness — by what distinguish the true as
true, the false as false ? The criterion here is the irre-
sistible evidence, the power of conviction, with which
an idea forces itself on the soul. In regard to any idea
which possesses evidence of this nature, which involun-
tarily compels the soul to the recognition of its truth, it
is to be assumed that it is no mere imagination, but the
product of a real object. Any other criterion than this
'striking evidence' is impossible, for we know things
only through the medium of our impressions. This

STOICISM. 125

Jtoic theory of cognition, then, occupies a middle place
>etween empiricism and idealism. Only experience of
lense is certain ; but whether there be something actually
>erceived, is only decided by the irresistible impression of
aruth which the experience brings with it for the subject.
In their ■physics, in which they essentially follow Hera-
:1itu8, the Stoics distinguish themselves from their pre-
iecessors, especially Plato and Aristotle, chiefly by their
4gorously applied axiom that nothing incoqioreal exists, |
;hat everything substantial — that all things are corporeal
as in logic they held that all knowledge is due to percep-
;ion of sense). This sensualism or materialism of the
Stoics looks strange beside their general itlealistico-moral
tendency. Nevertheless it is quite in keeping with their
dogmatic stand -point : an ideal entity is not objective,
not substantial enough for them ; the relations and func-
tions of things are ideal, but the things themselves must
possess bodily reality. At the same time it appeared
impossible to them that anj'thing ideal could act on any-
"thing corporeal, anything spiritual on anything material,
or conversely. What things mutually act must be of
like siibstance ; spirit, divinity, the soul consequently is
a body, but only of another sort than matter and the
ontward body. The immediate consequence of this i
effort of the Stoics to abolish all dualism between the
spiritual and the material is their pantheism. If Aris-
totle, before them, had divided the divine being from
tlie world, as the pure eternal form from the eternal
matter, the Stoics could not in consistency admit this
separation, excluding as it did all real operation of God
on the world. To separate God from matter appeared
to them a false self -substantiation of the world, and so,
like force and its manifestation, they made God and
the world one. Matter is the passive foundation of
tilings, the primal substrate of divine activity — God is
the active and formative power of matter, immanent in
it and essentially combined with it. The world is God's
body, God the world's soul. Thus, then, the Stoics con-
ceived God and matter as one substance identical with j
itself, called matter when considered on its passive and
mutable side, God on the side of its active and ever
self-identical power. The world has no independent
existence, it is not self-subsistent finite being ; it is
jnoduced, animated, ruled by God : it is a prodigious
living thing (i'wo^), the rational soul of which is God.

126 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

All ia it is equally divine, for the divine power equally
pervades all. In it God is the eternal necessity which
subjects all to unalterable law, the rational providence
which duly forms and frames all, the perfect wisdom
which upholds the order of the universe, commands and
rewards the good, forliids and corrects the bad. Nothing
in the world can isolate itself, nothing quit its nature aud
its limit ; all is unconditionally bound to the order of
the whole, of which the principle and the might are God.
Thus, in the physics of the Stoics, we see mirrored the
rigorously law-directed spirit of their philosophy ; like
Heraclitus, they are the sworn foes of all individual self-
will. This principle of the unity of all being, brought
them into connexion with HeracUtus in another respect ;
like him they conceived the being of God, already (as
said) corporeal to them, as the fiery, heat-giving power,
which, as such, is life in the world, but equally resumes
all life into itself, in order to give it forth again, and so
on ad infinitum (compare vii. 4). They called God,
now the spiritual breath that permeates nature, now
the art-subserving fire that forms or creates the uni-
verse, and now the aether, which, however, was not
different to them from the principle of fire. In conse-
quence of this identification of God and the world, in agree-
ment with which the entire evolution of the universe was
assumed, further, as but a development of the divine
life, the remaining theory of existence acquired a very
simple form. AU in the world appears to them inspired
by the divine life, coming into special existence out of
the divine whole, and returning into it again, and thus
bringing to pass a necessary cycle of constant origination
and decease, in which, perpetually recreating itself, only
the whole is permanent. On the other hand, again,
within the whole no single unit is in vain, nothing is
without an end, in every actual existence there is reason.
Even evü (within certain limits) belongs to the perfection
of the whole, as it is the condition of virtue (injustice, for
example, of justice) ; the system of the universe could not
possibly be better or fitter for its purpose than it is.

The ethics of the Stoics are very closely connected with
their physics. In the latter, the rational, divinely insti-
tuted order of the universe has been demonstrated.
Here now their ethics come in, referring the entire moral
rectitude of life, and consequently the highest law of
human action, to the rationality and order of universal

STOICISAf. 127

nature, and asserting tlie supreme good, or tlie supremo
eiul of our endeavours, to be an ailaptaiiou of our lifo
to tho universal laM', to the harmony of the world, to
nature. 'Follow nature,' or 'live in agreement with
nature,' this is the moral principle of the Stoics. More
]'!ocisely : live in agreement with thy own rational
nature, so far as it is not corrupted and distorted
Ity art, but remains in its natural simplicfty ; be kuow-
iuL;ly and williugly that which by nature thou art, a
rational part of the rational whole, be reason and in
reason, instead of following unreason and thy own parti-
cular self-wiU. Here is thy destination, here thy happi-
ness, as on this path thou avoidcst every contradiction to
thy own nature and to the order of thmgs without, and
providest thyself a life that glides along undisturbed in
a smooth and even stream.

From this moral principle, which involves at the same
time the Stoic conception of virtue, all the peculiaritiea
of the developed theory, follow with logical necessity.
yd.) The relation between virtue and pleasure. Through
the postulate of a life in accordance with nature, the
unit is placed in subjection to the whole ; every per-
sonal end is excluded, and consequently the most perso-
nal,— pleasure. Pleasure as a remission of that moral
t nergy of the soul, which alone is happiness, coidd seem
to the Stoics only as an interruption to life, as evil. It
is not in accordance with nature, it is no end of nature,
was the opinion of Cleanthes ; and if other Stoics relaxed
eomething of this severity, in allowing it to be regarded
as in accordance with nature or even as a good, they still
maintained that it possessed no moral worth, and was no
end of nature, that it was something only accidentally
connected with the due and proper operation of nature,
that it was no active but only a passive condition of the
soul. The whole austerity of the Stoic moral theory lies
here : every personal consideration is rejected, every
external end is to be looked on as alien to mora-
lity ; wise action, that is the only end. There directly
coheres with this (&.) the opinion of the Stoics in regard
to material goods. Virtue, the sole end of man as a
rational being, is also his sole happiness, his sole good :
only the inner reason and strength of the soul, only
will and action in conformity with nature, can render
man happy, and supply him with a counterpoise to the
contingencies and obstructions of external life. It follows,

128 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

in simple consequence from this, that external goods,
health, wealth, etc., are, one and all of them, indiflFerent;
they contribute nothing to reason, nothing to the great-
ness and strength of tlie soul ; they may be used as well
rationally as irrationally; they may issue in grief and
they may issue in joy ; they are not, therefore, anything
really good ; only virtue is profitable ; to want or to lose
external possessions affects not the happiness of the vir-
tuous ; even the so-called external evus are no evils, the
only evil is vice, the unreason which is contrary to
nature. The Stoics, diflfering in this respect from their
predecessors the Cynics, grant that there are diflferences
in these external things ; that some of them, though
certainly not morally good, have * a certain value,' are
* preferable ' to others ; and that this preferableness,
so far as it contributes to a life in accordance with
nature, may be reckoned into the general moral account.
Thus the wise man, when offered his choice, prefers
health and riches to sickness and poverty; and in so
preferring he follows a rational reason, for health and
riches are more favourable to action, and consequently to
virtuous action, than their contraries. But he regards
them not as positive goods, for they are not that highest
good to which all is to be sacrificed. They are inferior
to the possession of virtue itself, in respect of which, in-
deed, they come not at all into account. It is seen from
this distinction between the good and the preferable, how
the Stoics were always bent on taking the good only in
its highest sense, and on excluding from it everjrthing re-
lative, (c.) This abstract apprehension of the notion of
virtue announces itself further in their abrupt antithesis
of virtue and vice. Virtue is reasonableness, due action
according to the nature of things ; vice is contrariety to
reason, that perversity which is in contradiction to nature
and truth. The action of man is either, as they further
argue, rational and free from contradiction, or it is not
so. In the first case he is virtuous ; in the second, how-
ever inconsiderable may be his contradiction to reason
and nature, he is vicious. He only is good, who is per-
fectly good ; vicious is every one who is irrational or
wrong in any one point, who is subject, for example, to
any appetite, affection, passion, fault, or who commits a
fault. There is no transition from contradiction to free-
dom from contradiction, there is no middle term between
them, any more than between truth and falsehood. It

STOICISM. 129

was but the same doctrine when the Stoics afllirmed that
really faultless moral action is only possible through the
possession of entire virtue, a perfect perception of the
gooti, and a |>erfect ]X)wer of its realization. Virtue is
capable of lx>iii^ ]>ossessed only wholly, or else not at all,
and consequently we are only then moral when we pos-
sess it wholly. Akin to this is the further Stoic para-
dox, that all good actions are equally right, and all bad
ones eqxially wrong, that there are no degrees of good |
and bad, of virtue aiid vice, but that there is between
both an absolut« and essential contrast. The Stoics
allowed here only, that k^l acts, — such acts as substan-
tially coincide with the law of virtue, without ha\'ing
directly risen from this law as source, — lie in the middle
between virtue and vice, but are morally worthless. (</.)
Th^ special th':ory of ethical action was completely elabo-
rated by the later Stoics, who were thus the founders of
all deontological schemes. Virtue consists, according to
them, in absolute judgment, absolute control of the soul
over pain, absolute mastery of desire and lust, absolute l
justice that treats all only according to its worth in the
system of things. Duties are respectively duties to self
and duties to others. The former concern the presenta-
tion of self, with pursuit of all that agrees and avoidance
of all that disagrees with nature and reason. The latter
concern the relations of individuals socially, who have to
guide themselves according to the principles of their
social nature, and fulfil in one another's regard all the
resultant duties of justice and humanity. The state is
likewise an emanation from the social nature of man.
The separation of men into a variety of hostile states, is
a contradiction to the notion of the state ; but the entire
race ought to form a single community with the same
principles and laws. Thus Stoicism originated the idea
of cosmopolitisHL (e.) The picture of the wise man forms
the conclusion of the teaching of the Stoics. This, as
pattern and model for action, is to be a representation of
the ideal of virtue in its most rigorous form, and of the
absolute fehcity that is given with it. The wise man is
he who actually possesses a true knowledge of divine
and human things, as well as the absolute moral percep- *
tion and strength that flow from it, and who by conse-
quence unites in himself every conceivable perfection of
humanity. Any more special realization of this ideal
seems paradoxical, as such absolute perfection is quite

130 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

incapable of union with the idea of the individual.
Precisely here, however, the Stoics laid most stress, inas-
much as the elevation of the subject to virtue, a virtue
that is pure and entire, is the postulate that pervades
their whole ethical system, and specifically distinguishes
it from the Aristotelian requisition of merely individual
and relative virtues. The wise man, they said, knows
all that there is to know, and understands it better than
any one else, because he possesses a true constitution of
soul, and a true knowledge of the nature of things. He
alone is the true statesman, lawgiver, orator, educator,
critic, poet, physician ; whilst the unwise man remains
always raw and unformed, let him possess what ac-
quirements he may. The wise man is without fault or
failing, as he always uses reason, and thinks all in its
rational connexion. On the same account, nothing sur-
prises, nothing terrifies him ; he falls not into weakness
or passion. He alone is the true fellow-citizen, fellow-
man, kinsman, and friend, because he alone perfectly
knows and fulfils the duties which these relations in-
volve. In the same way, the wise man, as he possesses
the good as his own law within himself, is free from all
restriction of external law and established observance :
he is king, lord of his action, for from the same cause he
is responsible only to himself. No less free is he, by his
character and his virtue, in reference to business and
vocation ; he can move with ease in every sphere of life ;
he is rich, for he can procure himself all that he wants,
and dispense with all that he is without ; he is happy
under all circumstances, for he has happiness in himself,
in his virtue. The unwise, again, do not in truth possess
all the internal and external goods which they seem and
suppose themselves to possess, because they possess not
the indispensable condition of true happiness, perfection
'of soul. In this thought, that inner moral integrity is
the necessary basis of all qualification for action and of
all true happiness, lies the truth of this Stoical doctrine.
It equally displays the abstraction, however, in which
the whole system is involved ; this wisdom is an unreal
ideal, as indeed the Stoics themselves admitted ; it is a
general notion of perfection which, inapplicable to life,
proves that its supporters had only one-sidedly adopted
for principle the universality of subjectivity. The sub-
ject, that is, if formerly only an accident of the state,
is now to be absolute. But just so his reality disappears

EPICUREANISM. 131

into the mist ami vapour of an abstract itloaL The nu-rit
o\ the Stoic i)hilosoi)hy, nevertheless, is that, in an age of
liii, they held fast by the moral idea, and, through ex-
iision of the political element from morahty, estab-
lished the latter as an independent special science.

XV III. — Epku rean ism.

NEARLY contemporaneously with the Stoa, or a
little earlier, there arose the Epicurean schooh
Its founder, Epicurus, the son of an Athenian who had
emigrated to Samos, was born 342 b.c., six years after
the death of Plato. Of his youth and culture little that
is trustworthy is known. In his thirty-sixth year, he
opened at Athens a philosophical school, over which he
presided till his death (in the year 270 b.c.) His dis-
ciples and adherents formed a private society, which was
held together by a close tie of friendship (after Alex-
ander, social life comes now in place of the falling poli-
tical life). Epicurus himself compared his society to that
of the Pythagoreans, though it placed not, like theirs,
its means in a common fund, since, as Epicurus was
accustomed to say, one true friend must trust another
true friend. Epicurus's moral character has been fre-
quently assailed ; but his life, according to the most
credible testimony, was in every respect blameless, and
he himself alike amiable and estimable. Much of what
is reported about the ofifensive sensuality of the Epicu-
rean sty is in general to be considered calumny. Epi-
cui'us wrote a great many works, more even than Aris-
totle, less only than Chrysippus. He himself prepared
the way for the disappearance of his greater works, by
reducing the sum of his philosophy to short extracts,
which he recommended his disciples to get by rote.
These extracts have been for the most part preserved
to us.

The tendency of Epicurus is very distinctly character-
ized in his definition of philosophy. He denominated it
an activity which realizes a happy life through ideas and
arguments. It has essentially for him, therefore, a prac-
tical object, and it results, as he desires, in ethics
which are to teach us how to attain to a life of felicity.
The Epicureans did, indeed, accept the usual division of
philosophy into logic (called canonic by them), physics,

132 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

and ethics. But logic, limited to the investigation of
the criteria of truth, was considered by them only aa
ancillary to physics. Physics, again, existed only for
ethics, in order to secure men from those vain terrors of
empty fables, and that superstitious fear which might
obstruct their happiness. In Epicureanism, we have
still, then, the three ancient parts of philosophy, but in
reverse order, logic and physics being only in the service
of ethics. To this last we shall limit the present exposi-
tion, the others being but of small scientific interest,
and the physics especially, while very incomplete and
incoherent in themselves, being nothing but a return to
the atoms of Democritus.

With Aristotle and the other philosophers of his time,
Epicurus, as said, sought the summum honum in felicity of
life. But happiness in his view consists in nothing but
pleasure. Virtue, he declares, can have no value in itself ^
but only so far as it offers liS something — an agreeable
life. The question now, then, is the more exact defini-
tion of pleasure, and here Epicurus differs in essential
points from his predecessors the Cyrenaics (compare
XIII. 3). (a.) While Aristippus viewed the pleasure of
the moment as the object of human effort, Epicurus
holds this object to be the permanent tranquil satisfac-
tion that is the enduring condition of an entire life.
True pleasure, therefore, is a subject of calculation and
reflection. Many a pleasure must be rejected, as pre-
paring us only pain ; many a pain must be accepted as
preparing us only a greater pleasure, [h. ) As the wise
man seeks his supreme good not for the moment, but for
the whole of life, spiritual joy and sorrow, which, as
memory and hope, embrace the past and the future,
evidently claim more of his consideration than the
fleshly pleasure and pain which are only temporary.
But the joy of spirit consists in the imperturbable tran-
quillity of the wise man, in the feeling of his inner worth,
of his superiority- to the blows of fate. Thus Epicurus
could truly say that it is better to be sad with reason
than without reason glad ; and that the wise man may
exist in happiness even amid tortures. Nay, it was
allowable for him (in this a true follower of Aristotle)
to place pleasure and happiness in the closest union with
virtue, and maintain the one to be inseparable from the
other, happiness impossible without virtue, and virtue
impossible without happiness. For the same reason,

Er IC UREA KI SM. 1 33

frioiulslnp was to him, though held by the Cyrcnaica
to 1)0 superlhious, a chief meana of happiness ; and this
it is as an enduring, life-ghaddening, hfe-embellishing
union of congenial natures, and as conferring so a lasting
satisfaction which the joys of sense can not procure,
(c.) When other hedonists declared the positive feeling
of pleasure, raised, too, to the highest pitch of intensity, to
bo the highest good, Ei)icurus, keeping before him tlie
possibility of a well-being that should extend over the
whole of life, could not agree with them. He demands
not for a happy lifo the most exquisite pleasures ; he
recommends, on the contrary, sobriety and temperance,
contentment with little, and a life generally in accord
with nature. He protests against the false interpretation
of his doctrine, that represents him to recommend as the
greatest good the sensual enjoyments of the voluptuary
and the debauchee ; he boasts to be willing to vie with
Ju}>iter himself in happiness, if allowed only plain bread
and water ; and he even abhors those gratifications
which necessitate expense, not perhaps for their own
sakes, but for the e\'ils with which they are attended.
Not, indeed, that the Epicurean sage will live like a
Cynic : he will enjoy wherever he can harmlessly enjoy ;
he will also endeavour to procure himself the means of
living with decency and comfort. Still the ■vs'ise man
can dispense with these finer enjoyments, even though
not obliged to do so, for he possesses within himself the
greatest of his satisfactions, he enjoys within himself the
truest and the most stable joy, — tranquillity of soul,
impassibility of mind. In opposition to the positive
pleasure of some hedonists, the theory of Epicurus ends
rather in the recommendation of negative pleasure, so far
as he regards freedom from pain as already pleasure, and
advises the efforts of the sage to be preferably directed to
the avoidance of the disagreeable. Man, says Epicurus,
is always plotting in his heart not to suflFer or to fear
pain ; if he has accomplished this, nature is satisfied ;
positive delights cannot augment happiness, but only
complicate it. Happiness to him, accordingly, is some-
thing simple, and easy to be attained, if man will but
follow nature, and not destroy or imbitter for himself
his own life by inordinate demands, or else by the foolish
fear of evils in supposition. To the e\^ls which we are
not to dread, belongs, before all, death. It is no evil not
to live. And so the wise man fears not death, before

134 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

which most men tremble : for if we are, it ia not,
if it is, we are not ; when it is present we feel it not,
for it is the end of all feeling, and what cannot harm us
when j)resent, that need not trouble us in the future.
The teaching of Epicurus tends ever indeed to enjoin the
pure subjective endeavour to secure for the individual
peace and contentment in life ; he knows nothing of a
moral destiny in man ; but he has ennobled the antique
conception of pleasure to the full of its capacity.

Epicurus crowns his general view by his doctrine of the
gods, to whom he applies his ideal of hapjjiness. The
gods lead, he thinks, in human form, but without human
wants, and without permanent bodies, in the empty
interspaces of the infinite worlds, an untroubled, unalter-
able life, whose bliss is insusceptible of increase. From
this bliss of the gods he infers that they can have nothing
to do with the superintendence of our affairs : for bliss is
peace ; they trouble neither themselves nor others ; and
therefore they are not to be regarded as objects of super-
stitious and disquieting terrors. These inert gods of Epi-
curus, these imperturbable and yet unstable forms, these
bodies which are not bodies, do, indeed, fit in but poorly
with the rest of the system ; still it is the happiness of
man that is consulted here also, the gods are disarmed
of their terrors, and yet preserved in such modified shape
as serves rather to confirm than refute the Epicurean
creed.

XIX. — Scepticism and the Later Academy.

THE conclusion of all these subjective tendencies is scep'
ticism, manifesting itself in the complete destruction
of the bridge between subject and object, in the denial of
all objective knowledge, science, truth, in the complete
retirement of the sage into himself and his subjective ex-
perience. But there is a distinction between the elder
scepticism, the later Academy, and subsequent scepticism.
1. The elder Scepticism. — The head of the older sceptics
is Pyrrho of Elis, a contemporary of Aristotle. Our chief
informant in regard to Pyrrho's opinions, is, — he himself
having left nothing in writing, — his disciple and adherent
Timon of Phlius, the satirist or sillographist (author,
that is, of a satirical poem on the whole of Greek philo-
sophy up to that time). The tendency of these sceptical

SCEPTICISM AND THE LATER ACADEMY. 135

philosophers •was, like tliat of the Stoics and Epicureans,
proximately a practical one : philosophy shall conduct ua
to happiness. But to live happy, we must know how
things are, and how, consequently, wc must relate our-
selves to them. They answered tlie first question in this
way : What thiiigs really are, lies beyond the sphere of
our knowledge, since we perceive not things as they are,
but only as they ap]icar to us to be ; our ideas of them
are neither true nor false, anything definite of anything;
cannot be said. Neither our perceptions nor our ideas of
things teach lis anything true ; the o{)posite of every pro-
position, of every enunciation, is still possible ; and hence,
in regard to one and the same thing, the contradictorj'
views of men in general, and of professed philosophers in
particular. In this impossibility of any objective know-
ledge, of science, the true relation of the philosopher to
things is entire suspense of judgment, com])lete reserve
of all positive opinion. In order to avoid all definite ex-
pressions, the sceptics on all occasions availed themselves,
therefore, of doubtful phrases : it is possible, it may be,
perhajis, as it seems to me, I know nothing for certain
(to which they carefully added, nor do I know even this
for certain that I know nothing for certain). In this sus-
pense of judgment, they believed their practical end, happi-
ness, attained : for, like a shadow, imperturbability of soul
follows freedom from judgment, as if it were a gift of for-
tune. He who has adopted the sceptical mood of thought,
lives ever in peace, without care and without desire, in
a pure apathy that knows neither of good nor evil. Be-
tween health and disease, between life and death, difference
there is none — in this sheer antithesis, Pyrrho is under-
stood to have enunciated the axiom of sceptical apathy.

It lies in the nature of the case that the sceptics ob-
tained the matter of their conclusions chiefly by means
of a polemical discussion of the views and investiga-
tions of the dogmatists. But their supporting grounds
were shallow, and appear to be partly dialectical blunders
readily refuted, and partly empty subtleties. To the older
sceptics is ascribed the employment of the following ten
sceptical tropes (points or arguments), which, however, were
probably collected and perfected, neither by Pyrrho nor
Tim on, but by ^^nesidemus, who, as it appears, flourished
shortly after Cicero. The sceptical reservation of opinion
made appeal (1.) to the varieties of the feelings and sensa-
tions of living beings in general ; (2.) to the bodily and

136 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

mental diversities of men, by reason of which things ap«
pear different to different persons; (3.) to the varjung
accounts of the senses themselves in regard to things,
and to the uncertainty as to whether the organs of sense
are competent or not ; (4.) to the dependence of our
perceptions of things on our different bodily and niental
states ; as well as (5.) on the various positions of things
to us and to each other (distance, etc.) ; (6.) to the fact
that we know nothing directly, but all only through some
extraneous medium (air, etc.) ; (7. ) to the varying im-
pressions of the same thing by varying quantity, tempera-
ture, colour, motion, etc. ; (8.) to the dependence of our
impressions on custom, the new and strange affecting us
differently from the common ; (9.) to the relativity of
all notions, predicates in general expressing only relations
of things to each other or to our perceptions of them ;
(10.) to the diversity of the customs, manners, laws,
religious conceptions, and dogmatical opinions of men.

2. The later Academy. — In consequence of its contest
with the Stoics, in especial. Scepticism, when introduced
into the Platonic school (first by Arcesilaus, 316-241),
obtained greater importance than in the contributions
of the Pyrrhonists. Here it sought its supports prin-
cipally in the authority of the writings of Plato, and
in the traditions of his oral teaching. Arcesilaus would
never have been able to assume and maintain his chair
in the Academy, had he not entertained himself and
communicated to his discijiles the conviction that his
tenet of a suspense of judgment was essentially in
agreement with those of Socrates and Plato, and that by
banishment of dogmatism, he was only restoring the
pristine and true dialectic signification of Platonism.
His action was further influenced by the opposition
entertained by him to the harsh dogmatism which,
pretending to be in every respect an improvement on the
Platonic teaching, was but just set up in the Stoa.
Hence the remark of Cicero, that Arcesilaus directed all
his sceptical and polemical attacks against Zeno, the
founder of the Stoa. He particularly disputed the Stoic
theory of cognition, alleging against it that even false
perceptions may induce perfect conviction, that all per-
ception, indeed, leads only t© opinion, and not to know-
ledge as such. Accordingly, he denied the existence of
any criterion by which truth might be accurately dis-
criminated. Whatever truth our opinions might contain,

THE ROMANS. 137

we could never, he thought, he certain of it. It was in
this sense that he said, ' We can know nothing, not even
this itself, that we know nothing.' In the moral S]»here,
however, in the love of the good and the hatred of the
bad, he demanded that we should follow the course of
probability, that course namely that showed for itself the
most and the best reasons : so we should act rightly and
be happy, for that was the course of action which accorded
with reason and the nature of things. Of the subsequent
leaders of the New Academy we can mention here only
Camfades (214-129), whose whole philosophy, however,
almost exclusively consisted in his polemic against the
logic, theology, and physics of the Stoics. His positive
contribution was an attempt to introduce a doctrine of
method for probable thought, or a theory of philosophical
probability which should determine the various grades of
it ; for to Cameades also probability was a necessity in
practical life. Later still, the Academy tended more, in
a retrograde direction, to an eclectico-dogmatic doctrine.
3. Later Scepticism. — Scepticism proper was once
more revived at the time of the total decline of Greek
philosophy. Of this period the most important sceptics,
or at least promoters of scepticism, are JEnesidemus,
Agrippa (later than .^nesidemus, and who principally
insisted on the necessity of leavingnothing without proof,
at the same time that the proof itself demanded again
proof, and so on usque ad infinituvi), and Sextus Empiri-
cus (a Greek physician, that is, of the Empirical sect),
who lived probably in the first half of the third century
after Christ. The last is the most considerable, as we
possess from him two writings of genuine historical value
(the Pyrrhonic Hypotypose^ in three books, and his work
Adversus Mathematicos in nine), in which he has expounded
at full all that ancient scepticism could contrive to bring
forward against certainty in knowledge.

XX. — The Romans.

THE Romans have no share of their own in the deve-
lopment of philosophy. After an interest in Greek
philosophy and literature began among them, — after the
embassy to Rome, on the part of Athens, of the three
distinguished representatives of Attic culture and elo-
quence, Cameades the Academic, Critolaus the Peripa-

138 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

tetic, and Diogenes the Stoic, — and after tlie closer
connexion of the two States in consequence of the con-
version (a few years later than the embassy) of Greece
into a province of Home, almost all the more important
Greek systems of philosoi)hy, especially the Epicurean
(Lucretius) and the Stoic (Seneca), flourished and found
adherents among the Romans, but without receiving from
them any actual philosophical improvement. The uni-
versal character of the lioman philosophizing is eclec-
ticism, which very strikingly exhibits itself in the .case
of the most important and influential of philosophical
writers among the Romans, Cicero. Nevertheless, the
popular philosophy of this and other thinkers of a similar
bent is not, despite its want of originality, independency,
and rigour, to be too lightly estimated ; for it led to the
introduction of philosophy as a constituent element in
culture generally.

XXI. — Neo-Platonism.

IN Neo-Platonism the spirit of antiquity made its last
desperate attempt at a philosophical monism which
should put an end to the dualism between subjectivity
and objectivity. It makes this attempt on the one hand
from the position of subjectivity, and stands in this re-
spect on the same plane with the other Post-Aristotelian
subjective philosophies (compare xvi. 7). On the other
hand, again, it aims at the establishment of objective
principles in regard to the highest notions of metaphysics,
in regard to the absolute — it aims, indeed, at the estab-
lishment of a system of absolute philosophy, and in this
respect is a counterpart of the Platonico-Aristotelian
philosophy, with which it connects itself externally also
in professing to be a revival of the pristine Platonism.
On both aspects, then, it constitutes the close of ancient
philosophy ; it represents the final gathering-in, but not
less the exhaustion of antique thought and the dissolu-
tion of ancient philosophy.

The first, and, at the same time, the most important
representative of Neo-Platonism, is Plotinus of Lycopolis
in Egypt. He was a disciple of Ammonius Saccas, who
taught Platonic philosophy at Alexandria in the begin-
ning of the third century, but left behind him nothing in
writing. Plotinus (205-270 A.D.) taught philosophy at

XEO ■ PL A T0XIS2r. 1 39

Rome from the ago of forty. He explained his views in
a serioa of hastily written, ill-connected tractates, whicli,
after his death, and in obedience to his directions, Por-
V^'y^Jy t'^iö most celebrated of his disciples (born 233,
taught also at Rome philosophy and eloquence), arranged
and edited in six Euneads (jiarts consisting of nine books
each). From Rome and Alexandria, the Neo-Platonism
of riotinus passed, in the fourth century, to Athena, where
it established itself in the Academy. Among the Neo-
Platonists of the fourth century, Porj)hyTy's disciple
lavibliclitts, among those of the fifth Prochis (412-485),
possessed pre-eminently the respect of the school. With
the disa]ipearance of Paganism before the triumphant
advance of Christianity, this last blossom of Greek philo-
sophy, in the course of the sixth century, faded too.
The common characteristic of the whole of the Neo-
Platonic philosophers is the tendency to enthusiasm, to
theosophy, and theurgy. The most of them addicted
themselves to sorcery, and the more eminent professed to
enjoy divine communications, to foresee the future, and
to perform miracles. They bore themselves then as
hierophants quite as much as philosophers ; with the
unmistakable endeavour to found — as Pagan antitype of
Christianity — a philosophy which should be at the same
time a universal religion. In the following exposition of
Neo-Platonism we confine ourselves more particularly to
Plotinus.

(a.) The Subjective Condition of Ecstasy. — The re-
sult of the philosophical attempts that had preceded Xeo-
Platonism was scepticism, recognition of the inadequacy
of the Stoic and the Epicurean wisdom in the practice of
life, an absolutely negative relation to all positive theo-
retical acquisitions. But scepticism was in this way
brought only to the contrary of what it aimed at. It had
aimed at complete apathy on the part of the sage, but
what it was brought to was the necessity of a perpetual
opposition in refutation of all positive allegations, not the
repose which was to follow scepticism, but an unappeas-
able unrest. This absolute dispeace of consciousness that
strives to absolute peace could lead only to the longing
to be freed from this dispeace itself, the longing for a
conclusion that, secure from every sceptical objection,
should absolutely satisfy. This longing for absolute
truth found its historical expression in Neo-Platonism.
The individual seeks to become master of the absolute,

140 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

to embrace it, to hold it immediately within himself, that
is, to attain to it, not through objective knowledge, not
through any dialectical process, but directly through his
own inner mystical subjective exaltation, in the form of
immediate vision, of ecstasy. Knowledge of the true,
Plotinus maintains, is not won by proof, not by any in-
termediating process, not so that objects remain outside
of him who knows, but so that all difference between the
knowing and the known disappears ; it is a vision of
reason into its own self ; it is not we who have vision of
reason, but reason that has vision of its own self ; in no
other manner can fruition of it be reached. Nay, even
this vision of reason, within which subject and object are
still opposed to each other as different from each other,
must itself be transcended. The supreme degree of cog-
nition is vision of the supreme, the single principle of
things ; in which all separation between it and the soul
ceases ; in which this latter, in divine rapture, touches
the absolute itself, feels itself filled by it, illuminated
by it. He who has attained to this veritable union with
God, despises henceforth even that pure thought which
he formerly loved, because it was still after all only a
movement, and presupposed a difference between the seer
and the seen. This mystical absorption into divinity
or the One, this trance or swooning into the absolute,
is what gives so pecuUar a character to Neo-Platonism
as opposed to the Greek philosophical systems proper.

(&.) The Cosmical Principles. — In close connexion
with this rapture-theory of the Neo-Platonics stands
their doctrine of three cosmical principles. To the two
already assumed cosmical principles of a (world-) soul
and a (world-) reason, they added a third and higher
principle, as ultimate unity of all differences and contra-
rieties, in which, consequently (simply to be this), differ-
ence must be resolved into the pure simplicity of essential
being. Reason is not this simple principle, for in it the an-
tithesis of thinking, — of thinker and thought, and of the
movement from the first to the last, — still exists ; reason
has the nature of the many in it ; but the one as prin-
ciple must precede the many (unity precede variety); if
then there is to be a unity of the totality of being,
reason must be transcended for the absolute one. This
primal being is now variously named by Plotinus ; he
calls it the first, the one, the good (see xrv. 4. f), what
stands above the beent (the beent disappears for him into

NEO-PL A TON ISM. 141

an accessory notion of reason, and forms, nnited with
itason, in the co-ordination of the highest notions, only
tim second step or grade), names truly through wlucli
riotinus hopes not adequately to express the nature of
tli;it primitive one, but only liguratively shadow it out.
Thought and will he allows it not, because it is in want
»f nothing, can require nothing; it is not energy but
above energy ; life is not a predicate of it ; nothing beent,
no thing and no being, none of the most universal cate-
gories of being can be attributed to it ; all other negative
determinations are incompetent in its regard : in short,
it is something unspeakable, iinthinkable. Plotinus is
whoUy bent on thinking his first principle as absolute
unity, excludent of all and every determinateness that
woidd only render it finite, and therefore, as in itself,
independent of all connexion with everything else. He
is unable to maintain this pure abstraction, however,
when be sets himself afterwaixls to show how from the
first principle there become or emanate aU the others,
and primarily the two other cosmical ones. In order to
obtain a beginning for his theory of emanation, he finds
himself compelled to assume and to think his first prin-
ciple, in its relation to the second, as a creative or gene-
rative one.

(c.) The Neo-Pl atoxic Theory of Emanatiox. —
Every such theory, and the Neo-Platonic as well, assumes
the world to be an efiluence or eradiation of God, in such
manner that the remoter emanation possesses ever a lower
degree of perfection than that which precedes it ; and
represents consequently the totality of existence as a
descending series. Fire, says Plotinus, emits heat, snow
cold, fragrant bodies exhale odours, and every organized
being, so soon as it has reached maturity,, generates what
is like it. In the same manner, the all-perfect and eter-
nal, in the exuberance of its perfection, permits to ema-
nate from itself what is equally everlasting and next itself
the best, — reason, which is the immediate reflexion, the
ectype of the primeval one. Plotinus is rich in images
to make it conceivable that, in this emission or produc-
tion of reason, the one loses nothing and nomse weakens
itself. After the one, reason possesses the greatest per-
fection. It contains within itself the world of ideas, the
all of immutable, veritable being. Of its sublimity and
glory we may gain some conception, if we attentively
consider the world of sense, its vastness and magnificence.

142 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

the harmony of its everlasting motion, and then elevate
our thoughts to its archetype, to the being of the intel-
ligible world, contemplating intelligible things in their
pure imperishable essence, and acknowledging intelligence
as their creator and preserver. In it there is no past, no
future, but only an eternal present, and no more any
dividedness of space than any changeableness of time ;
it is the true eternity which time but copies. As reason
from the one, so from reason again, and equally without
change on its part, there emanates the eternal soul of the
world. This soul is the ectype of reason : filled with
reason, it realizes the latter in a world without : it re-
presents the ideas in external sensible matter, which
(matter), unqualified, indefinite, non-beent, is, in the scale,
the last and lowest of emanations. In this manner the
universal soul is the fashioner of the visible world, form-
ing it as material copy of its own self, penetrating and
animating it, and moving it in circle. The series of
emanations closes here, then, and we have reached, as was
the intention of the theory, in an uninterrupted descent
from highest to lowest, what is but a copy of true being,
the world of sense.

The individual souls, like the soul of the world, are
amphibia between the higher element of reason and the
lower of sense, now involved in the latter, and the desti-
nies of the latter, and now turning to their source, reason.
From the world of reason, which is their true and proper
home, they have descended, each at its appointed time,
reluctantly obedient to an inner necessity, into the cor-
poreal world, without, however, wholly breaking with
the world of ideas : rather they are at once in both, even
as a ray of light touches at once the sun and the earth.
Our vocation, therefore — and bere we reach again the
point from which, in the exposition of the Neo-Platonic
philosophy, we started — can only be a turning of our
senses and our endeavours to our home in the world of
the ideas, emancipation of our better self from the bond-
age of matter, tbrough mortification of sense, through
ascesis. Once in the ideal world, however, that reflexion
of the primal beautiful and good, our soul reaches thence
the ultimate end of every wish and longing, ecstatic
vision of the one, union with God, unconscious absorp-
tion— disappearance — in God.

The Neo Platonic philosophy, it will now be seen, is
monism, and the completion, consequently, of ancient

CIIRISTIAXITY AND SCHOLASTICISM. 143

philosophy, so far as it would reduce the totality of being
to a single ultimate ground. As able, however, to lind
its highest ])rinciple, from which all the rest are derived,
not through self-consciousuesa and natural rational ex-
planation, but only through ecstasy, mystic annihilation
of self, ascesis, theurgy, it is a desperate overleaping of
all— and, consequently, the self-destruction of ancient —
philosophy.

XXn. — Ckristianity and Scholasticism.

THE Christian Idea. — The character of Greek intellec-
tual life at the time of its fairest bloom was the direct
'"impendence of the subject on the object (nature, the state,
-.) The breach between them, between spirit and
ture, had not yet begun ; the subject had not yet re-
ted himself into himself, not yet comj)rehended him-
self in his absolute significance, in his infinitude. After
Alexander the Great, with the decline of Greece, this
breach appeared. Surrendering the objective world, self-
consciousness drew back into itself, but only with the
downfall of the bridge between them. Truth, all element
of divinity, must now appear to consciousness, not yet
duly deepened, as ahen and remote ; and a feeling of un-
happiness, of unappeasable longing, take the place of
that fair unity between spirit and nature which had
been characteristic of the better periods of Grecian poli-
tical and intellectual life. A last desperate attempt to
reach the alienated divine life, to bring the two sides
violently together, by means of transcendent speculation
and ascetic mortification, by means of ecstasy and swoon,
was made by Neo-Platonism ; it failed, and ancient philo-
80])hy sank in complete exhaustion, ruined in the attempt
to conquer duahsm. Christianity took up the problem :
nay it proclaimed for principle the very idea which ancient
thought had been unable to reaUze, annulment of the
alienation (farness) of God, the substantial unity of God
and man. That God became man — is, speculatively, the
fundamental idea of Christianity, an idea which is ex-
pressed practically, too (and Christianity from the fii-st
had a practically religious character), in the redemption
(reconciliation) and the call for regeneration (that is, of a
purification and religious transformation of sense in con-
trast to the merely negative action of a&cesis). Prom this

144 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

it is that monism has remained the character and the fun-
damental tendency of the whole of modern philosophy.
And in truth modern philosophy began at that precise
point at which ancient philosophy ended : the withdrawal
of thought, of self-consciousness into its own self, this,
which was the stand-point of the post-Aristotelian philo-
sophy, constitutes in Descartes the starting-point of
modern philosophy, which advances thence to the logical
resolution of that antithesis beyond which ancient philo-
sophy had been unable to pass.

2. Scholasticism. — Christianity, in the Apologists of the
second century and the Alexandrine Fathers, related itself
very early to the philosophy of the time, especially Pla-
tonism. Then, later, in the ninth century, attempts were
made, through Scotus Erigena, at a combination with Neo-
Platonism. But it was only in the second half of the
middle ages, or from the eleventh century downwards,
that there developed itself — in the proper sense — a Chris-
tian philosophy, the so-called Scholasticism.

The character of Scholasticism is conciliation between
dogma and thought, between faith and reason. When the
dogma passes from the Church, where it took birth, into the
school, and when theology becomes a science treated in
universities, the interest of thought comes into play, and
asserts its right of reducing into intelligibleness the dogma
which has hitherto stood above consciousness as an exter-
nal, unquestionable power. A series of attempts is now
made to procure for the doctrines of the Church the form
of a scientific system. Of such systems the first is that
of Petrus Lomhardus (d. 1164) in his four books of SeU'
fences, a work which, on the part of later scholastics, gave
rise to very numerous commentaries. All these systems
assumed as infallible presupposition that the creed of the
Church was absolutely true (no Scholastic system ever
transgressed this presupposition) ; but they were all guided
at the same time by a desire to comprehend this revealed,
positive truth, to rationalize the dogma. " Credo ut in-
telligam," this dictum of Anselm, the beginner and foun-
der of Scholasticism (born about 1035, Archbishop of
Canterbury from 1093), was the watchword of the whole
movement. In the resolution of its problem. Scholasti-
cism applied, indeed, the most brilliant, though mostly
only formal, syllogistic acuteness, and gave rise to mighty
doctrinal structures, not unlike in complicated bulk to the
huge domes of Gothic architecture. The universal study

ClIRISTIAXITY AND SCHOLASTICISM. 145

of Aristotle, named par excellence ' the philoaophcr,*
who hjul several of the most im]>ortant Scholastics for
commentators, and who was highly popular at the same
time among the Arabians {Avicentia and Averroes), sup-
plied a terminology and schematic points of view for
method. The zenith of Scholasticism is constituted by
these indisputably greatest masters of the art and method,
Thomas Aquinas {d. 1274, a Dominican), and Duns Scotus
(d. 1308, a Franciscan), — the founders of two schools,
into which the entire movement was thenceforward
divided ; the one proclaiming the understanding {intellec-
tus) as principle, the other will {voluntas) ; both through
this antithesis of the theoretical and the practical prin-
ciples, leading to two tendencies essentially different.
Just here, however, the decline of Scholasticism began : its
zenith was the turning-point to dissolution. The ration-
ality of the dogma, the unity of reason and faith, this was
the presupposition tacitly adopted ; but this presupposition
fell to the ground, and the whole foundation of Scholastic
metaphysics was in principle abandoned, the moment Duna
Scotus transferred the problem of theology to the practi-
cal sphere. With the separation of theory and practice,
and still more with the separation in nominalism (see 3)
of thought and thing, philosophy became divided from
theology, reason from faith : reason took position above
faith, above authority (Modern Philosophy), and the re-
ligious consciousness broke with the traditional dogma
(the Reformation).

3. Nominalism and Realism. — Hand in hand with the
development of Scholasticism in general, proceeded that
of the antithesis between nominalism and realism, an anti-
thesis the origin of which is to be found in the relation of
Scholasticism to the philosophy of Plato and Aristotle.
The nominalists were those who held universal notions
{universalia) to be mere names, flatus vocis, empty con-
ceptions without reality. With nominalism, there are no
general notions, no genera, no species : all that is, exists
only as a singular in its pure individuality ; and there is no
such thing as pure thought, but only natural conception
and sensuous perception. The realists again, by example
of Plato, held firm by the objective reality of the uni Ver-
sals [universalia ante res). The antithesis of these opinions
took form first as between Roscelinus and Anselra, the for-
mer as nominalist, the latter as realist ; and it continues
henceforth throughout the whole course of Scholasticism.

146 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

There began, however, as early aa Ahelard (b. 1079)
an intermediate theory as well nominalistic as realistic,
which after him, with unimportant modifications, remained,
on the whole, the dominant one {universalia in rebus). In
this view the universal is only conceived, only thought,
but even so it is no mere product of consciousness ;
no, it possesses also objective reality in the things them-
selves, nor could it be abstracted from them, unless it
were virtually contained in them. This identity of being
and of thought is the presupposition and foundation on
which the entire dialectic industry of the Scholastics
rests. All their arguments found on the assumption that
whatever is syllogistically proved has exactly the same
constitution in actuality that it has in logical thought.
If this presupposition fell, there fell with it the whole
basis of Scholasticism ; leaving nothing for thought —
thus at fault as regards its own objectivity — but to with-
draw into its own self. In effect this self-produced dis-
solution of Scholasticism made its appearance in William
Ockam (d. 1347), the widely-influential reviver of nomi-
nalism, which, powerful in the very beginning of Scholas-
ticism, and now more powerful as opposed to a form of
thought that was no longer growing but exhausted, with-
drew the foundations from the whole structure of scho-
lastic dogmatism and plunged it hopelessly in ruin.

XXIII. — Transition to Modern Philosophy.

THE struggle of the new philosophy with scholasticism,
protracted throughout the entire fifteenth century
in a series of intermediate events, reaches its termina-
tion negatively in the course of the sixteenth, and posi-
tively in the first half of the seventeenth century.

1. The Fall of Scholasticism. — The proximate cause
of this altered spirit of the time we have just seen :
it is the internal decline of scholasticism itself. As soon
as the tacit presupposition, which underlay the theology
and whole method of scholasticism, — the rationality of the
dogma, namely, or the applicability of scientific demon-
stration to the matter of revelation, — was broken up, the
entire structure, as already remarked, fell helplessly to
the ground. The conception directly opposed to the
principle of scholasticism, that it was possible for the
same thing to be at once true to the dogma and false or

THANSITJOX TO MODERN PHILOSOPH Y. 147

t least indemonstrable to reason, — a point of view apjdied
by the Aristotelian Pompoiiatius (14G'2-15.'iO) to the im-
mortality of the soul, and later by Viniitii (see below) to
the great problems of philo80]>hy, — became, however much
it was resisted by the church, ever more and more uni-
versal, and brought with it a conviction of the impossibility
of reconciling reason and revelation. The feeling that
philosophy must be emancipated from its previous state
of pupüage and servitude strengthened ; a struggle to-
warda greater independency of research awoke ; and,
though none durst turn as yet against the church itself,
attempts were made to shake the authority of the main
pillar of scholasticism, the philosophy of Aristotle, or
what was then considered such. (Particularly distin-
guished here was PetTus Pamiis, 1515-1572, massacred on
the Eve of St. Bartholomew.) The authority of the
church declined more and more in the opinion of the
nations, and the gi'eat systems of scholasticism ceased to
be continued.

2. Eesults of Scholasticism. — Xotwithstanding all
this, scholasticism was not without excellent results.
Although completely in the service of the church, it
originated in a scientific interest, and awoke consequently
the spirit of free inquiry and a love of knowledge. It
converted objects of faith into objects of thought ; raised
men from the sphere of unconditional belief into the
sphere of doubt, of search, of understanding ; and even
when it sought to establish by argument the authority
of faith, it was really estabhshing, contrary to its own
knowledge and will, the authority of reason : it brought
thus another principle into the world, diflFerent from that
of the ancient church, the principle of intellect, the self-
consciousness of reason ; or at least it prepared the way
for the triumph of this principle. The very defects of
the scholastics, their many absurd questions, their thou-
sandfold useless and arbitrary distinctions, their curiosi-
ties and subtilities, must be attributed to a rational
principle, to the spirit of inquiry, the longing for light,
which, oppressed by the authority of the church, was
able to express itself only so, and not otherwise. Only
when left behind by the advancing intelligence of the
time, did scholasticism become untrue to its original
import, and unite its interests with those of the church,
exhibiting itself then, indeed, as the most violent oppo-
nent of the new and better spii-it.

148 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

3. The Revival of Letters. — A chief instrument of
that change in the spirit of the time, which marks the
beginning of a new epoch for philosophy, was the revival
of classical literature. The study of the ancients, especi-
ally of the Greeks, had, in the course of the middle ages,
ceased to be cultivated. The philosophy of Plato and of
Aristotle was, for the most part, known only through
Latin translations or secondary sources. All sense for
beauty of form or taste in expression had died out. Of
the spirit of classical life there was not left even a dream.
But this was altered now, chiefly by the arrival in Italy
of certain learned Greeks, fugitives from Constantinople.
Under their influence the study of the ancients in the
original sources came again into vogue ; the newly dis-
covered printing-press multiplied copies of the classics ;
the Medici drew scholars to their coui-t ; in particular
Bessarion (d. 1472) and Ficimis (d. 1499) were influential
in bringing about a better acquaintance with ancient
philosophy. And so gradually a band of men classically
educated opposed itself to the stereotyped, uncritical,
tasteless manner in which the sciences had been hitherto
cultivated ; new ideas came into circulation ; and the free,
universal, thinking spirit of antiquity was born afresh.
Classical studies found a fruitful soil in Germany also.
Meuchlin (b. 1455), Melanchthon, and Erasmus were their
advocates ; and the humanistic party, in its hostility to
the scholastic aims, belonged to the most decided in-
fluences that were now in favour of the advancing cause
of the Reformation.

4. The Reformatio:n-. — All the new elements — the
struggle against scholasticism, the interests of letters, the
striving for national independency, the endeavours of the
state and the corporations to emancipate themselves from
the church and the hierarchy, the direction of men's
minds to nature and actuality, above all the longing on
the part of consciousness for autonomy, for freedom
from the fetters of authority — all these elements found
their raUying-point and their focus in the German Refor-
mation. Originating primarily in national interests and
interests of religious practice, falling early too into an erro-
neous course, and issuing in a dogmatic ecclesiastical one-
sidedness, the Reformation was still in its principle and
genuine consequences a rupture of thought with authority,
a protest against the shackles of the positive, a return of
consciousness from its self-alienation into itself. Thought

! TRANSITION TO MODERN PHILOSOPHY. 149

ii'turiu'il from the yonder to the here, from the extra-
niuiuhiiie to the iutra-muudane : nature and the moral
l.iws of nature, humanity as such, one's own heart, one's
wn conscience, subjective conviction, in short, the riglits
of the subject began at last to assume some value.
Marriage, if considered hitherto not indeed immoral, but
vt-'t inferior to self-denial and celibacy, appeared now as
something divine, as a law of nature imposed by God
himself. Poverty, too, appeared no longer an object in
itself ; though previously considered 8ui)erior to riches,
and though the contemplative life of the monk had hitherto
ranked higher than the worldly activity of the layman
supported by the labour of his hands, Keligious freedom
assumed the })lace of obedience (the third vow of the
church) : monkhood and priesthood had come to an end.
Id the same way, with reference to knowledge, man re-
turned to himself from the alien region of authority. He
had become convinced that within himself must the
entire work of salvation be accomplished ; that recon-
ciliation and grace were his own business, and indepen-
dent of the interposition of priests ; that he stood to God
iu a direct relation. In his belief, in his conviction, in
the depths of his own soul, he found his only true
being. As then Protestantism sj)rang from the same
spirit as the new philosophy, it presupposes the closest
connexion with this latter. Naturally, however, there
will be a special distinction between the manner in which
the new spirit realizes itself as religious principle, and
that in which it realizes itself as scientific principle.
But, as said, in both, in the Protestantism of religion as
well as in the Protestantism of reason, this principle is
one and the same ; and in the progress of history both
interests are found to advance hand in hand. For, the
reduction of religion to its simple elements (a reduction
which Protestantism had once for all begun, but which
it had only carried forward to the Bible, and there left),
must of necessity be continued farther, and closed only
with the ultimate, original, supra-historical elements, —
that is, with reason, reason that knows itself the source
of all philosophy as of all religion.

5. The Growth of the Natural Sciences. — To all
these movements, which are to be regarded not only as
signs and symptoms, but as causes of the various revolu-
tions of the epoch, there is yet another to be added,
which very much facilitated and assisted the emancipa«

150 HISTORY OF PIIILOSOPHY.

tion of i)hilosoj)hy from the fetters of tlie church, and
that is, the coming into existence of natural science, and
of the observation of nature by the method of experience.
Tt is an epoch of the most penetrating and fruitful dis-
coveries in the pro\'ince of nature. The discovery of
America and that of the maritime route to the Eastern
Indies, had already widened the visible horizon ; but still
greater revolutions are associated with the names of
Copernicus (d. 1543), and Kepler (d. 1631), and Oalileo
(d. 1G42), — revolutions which could not possibly remain
without influenee on the prevalent idea of the uni-
verse, and the entire mode of thought of the time, and
which more especially produced a mighty inroad on the
authority of the church. Scholasticism, withdrawn from
nature and the world of experience, blind to that which
lay at its feet, had lived in a dreamlike intellectualism ;
but nature was restored to honour now, and became, in
her majesty and her glory, in her fulness and her endless-
ness, again the immediate object of contemplation ; while
natural investigation demonstrated itself as an essential
object of pliilosophy, and empirical science consequently
as a universal human interest. From this epoch empirical
science dates its historical importance ; and only from this
epoch does it possess a continuous history. The conse-
quences of the new movement admit of an easy estimate.
Scientific inquiry not only destroyed a variety of trans-
mitted errors and prejudices, but, what was highly impor-
tant, it turned the thoughts and attention of men to the
mundane, to the actual ; fostering and encouraging the
habit of reflection, the feeling of self-dependence, the
awakened spirit of scrutiny and doubt. The position of a
science of observation and experiment presupposes an in-
dependent self -consciousness on the part of the individual,
a wresting of himself loose from authority and the creed of
authority, — in a word, it presupposes scepticism. Hence
the originators of modern philosophy. Bacon and Des-
cartes, began with scepticism ; the former in requiring an
abstraction from aU prejudices and preconceived opinions
as condition of the study of nature, and the latter in his
postulate, to doubt at first all. No wonder that between
natural science and ecclesiastical orthodoxy there pre-
sently broke out an envenomed struggle, — a struggle
which was to cease only with the overthrow of the
latter.

6. Bacon of Verulam. — The philosopher who, for

TRAXSITIOX TO MODERX PHILOSOPH Y. 151

])rmciple, consciously adopted experience, or an obscrv-
i<j; and experimenting investigation of nature, and that,
M>, iu express contrast to scliolastieism and the previous
method of science, and who, on that account, is fre-
([uently placed at the head of modern philosophy, is (the
just named) Bacon, Baron of Verulam (b. 1561, Lord-
Keeper of the Great Seal, and Lord Chancellor under
James 1., subsequently disgraced, d. 1C'2G — a man not
witliout weaknesses of character).

The sciences, says Bacon, have hitherto found them-
selves iu a most deplorable condition. Philosophy, lost
iu barren and fruitless logomachies, has, during so many
centuries, produced not a single work or experiment
capable of bringing anj'' actual advantage to the life of
the race. Logic hitherto has subserved rather the con-
lirmation of error than the investigation of truth. How
is this ? From what does this poverty of the sciences in
the past proceed ? From this, tliat they have been sepa-
rated from their root in nature and experience. Several
causes are responsible for this : first, the old and inveterate
prejudice that man would derogate from his own dignity,
tlid he occupy himself much or long with experiments
and the things of matter ; secondly, superstition, and
the blind fanaticism of religion, >vliich in every age has
proved itself the irreconcilable foe to natural science;
thirdly, the exclusive attention of the Romans to morals
and politics, and of the better heads among Chris-
tians to these and to theology ; fourthly, the veneration
of antiquity and the overwhelming authority of certain
philosophers ; lastly, a certain despondency and despair
of being able to overcome the many and great difficulties
which oppose themselves to the investigation of nature.
To all these causes the depression of the sciences is to
be traced. \Yhat is wanted now, then, is a thorough
renewal, regeneration, and reformation of the sciences
from their lowest foundations upwards : we must find at
all costs, a new basis of knowledge, new principles of
science. This reformation and radical cure of the sciences
is dependent on two conditions : objectively, on the re-
duction of science to experience and the study of nature ;
subjectively, on the purification of the mind and intellect
from all abstract theories and transmitted prejudices.
These conditions united yield the true method of natural
science, which is no other than the method of induction.
On correct induction depends the salvation of science.

152 HISTOR Y OF PHILOSOPH Y.

Bacon's philosophy is comprised in these propositions.
His historical import, then, is in general this, that he
directed anew the observation and reflection of his contem-
poraries to actual fact, proximately to nature ; that he
raised experience, which hitherto had been only matter
of chance, into a separate and independent object of
thought ; and that he awoke a general consciousness of its
indispensable necessity. To have established the prin-
cij)le of empirical science, of a thinking exploration of
nature, this is his merit. But still only in the proposing
of this principle does his import lie : of any contained
matter of the Baconian philosophy, we can, in rigour, not
speak ; although he has attempted (in his work De Aug-
mentis Scientiarum), a systematic encyclopaedia of the
sciences on a new principle of classification, and has
scattered through his writings a profusion of fine and
fertile observations (which are still in vogue for mottoes) .

7. The Italian Philosophers of the Transition
Period. — With Bacon there must be mentioned some
others who prepared the way for the introduction of the
new philosophy. First of all a series of Italian philoso-
phers who belonged to the second half of the sixteenth
and first half of the seventeenth century. With the ten-
dencies of the period already described, these philoso-
phers cohere in two ways : firstly, in their enthusiasm
for nature, an enthusiasm which, with all of them, has
more or less of a pantheistic character (Vanini, for ex-
ample, entitled one of his writings, ' Of the wonderful
Secrets of the Queen and Goddess of Mortals, Nature '),
and secondly, in their devotion to the ancient systems
of philosophy. The best known of them are these :
Cardan (1501-1575), Campanella (1568-1639), Giordano
Bruno (-1600), Vanini (1586-1619). They were all men
of passionate, enthusiastic, impetuous nature ; wild, un-
settled character ; roving and adventurous life : men
animated by an intense thirst for knowledge, but who
gave way withal to extravagant wildness of imagina-
tion, and to a mania for secret astrological and geo-
mantic arts ; on which account they passed away without
leaving any fruitful or enduring result. They were all
persecuted by the hierarchy ; two of them (Bruno and
Vanini) perished at the stake. In their entire historical
appearance they are, like the eruptions of a volcano,
rather precursors and prophets, than originators and
founders of a new era of philosophy.

TliAXSITJOX TO MODERN PHILOSOPHY. 153

The most important of them is Giordano Bruno. He
revived the old (Stoic) idea, that the world is a living
being, and that a single soul pervades the universe. The
burthen of all his thoughts is the deepest enthusiasm for
nature, and for the reason which lives and works in nature.
This reason, according to him, is the artiticer within, who
fashions matter, and reveals himself iu the shapes of the
world. Out from the interior of the root, or of the seed-
grain, he causes the stems to spring, from these the
branches, from the branches boughs, and so on to buds
and leaves and flowers. All is inwardly i)lanued, pre-
pared, and perfected. In the same way does this univer-
sal reason, from its place within, recall the sap from
the fruits and the blossoms, to the branches, etc, again.
The world is thus an infinite animal in which all lives
and moves in the most varied manner. Bruno charac-
terizes the relation of reason to matter quite in the Aris-
totelian way : they are to each other as form and matter,
as actuality and potentiality ; neither is without the other ;
form is the internal impelling power of matter, matter
as infinite possibility, as infinitely formable, is the mother
of all forms. The other side of Bruno's philosophizing,
his theory of the forms of knowledge (Topic), which takes
up the greater part of his writings, as of smaller philo-
sophical value, shall be here omitted.

8. Jacob Böhm. — Like Bacon in England, and Bruno
in Italy, Böhm bespeaks in Germany the same movement
of transition that is now before us. Each of the three in
a manner that is characteristic of his nationality : Bacon
as champion of empiricism, Bruno as representative of a
poetic pantheism, Böhm as father of theosophical mys-
ticism. In depth of principle, Böhm belongs to a much
later period ; but in imperfection of form he retrocedes to
the time of the middle-age mystics ; while, in an historico-
genetic point of view, again, he is connected with the
German Reformation and the various Protestant elements
at that time in ferment. We shall best place him among
the precursors and prophets of the new era.

Jacob Böhm was born in 1575, at Altseidenburg, not
far from Görlitz, in Upper Lusatia. His parents were
poor country-people. When a boy he herded the cattle ;
"when older, and after he had learned in the village-school
to read and barely write, he was apprenticed to a shoe-
maker in Görlitz ; and finally, having accomplished his
travels as journeyman, he settled down, in 1594, at Gör-

154 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

litz, as master of liis trade. He had experienced revela-
tions or mysterious visions even in his youth, but still
more at a later period, when the longing for truth took
possession of him, and his soul, already disquieted by the
religious conflicts of the time, found itself in a state of
highly-wrought excitement. Besides the Bible, Böhm
had read only a few mystic books of theosophic and
alchemistic import, for example, those of Paracelsus.
Now, then, that he set himself to the writing down of
his thoughts, or, as he called them, his visions (illumina-
tions), the want of all previous culture at once disclosed
itself. Hence the painful struggling of the thought with
the expression, which not unfrequently, nevertheless, at-
tains to dialectic point and poetic beauty. In conse-
quence of his first work Aurora, composed in the year
1612, Böhm fell into trouble with the rector at Görlitz,
Gregorius Richter, who publicly denounced the book from
the pulpit, and even reviled the person of its author.
He was prohibited by the magistrates from the writing of
books, an interdict which he observed for years, till at
length the edict of the spirit became all too strong in
him, and he resumed composition. Böhm was a plain,
quiet, gentle, and modest man. He died in 1624.

It is exceedingly difficult to give in a few words any
statement of the theosophy of Böhm, inasmuch as Böhm
has been able to give birth to his thoughts, not in the
form of thoughts, but in that of sensuous figures, of ob-
scure images of nature, and for the expression of them
has frequently availed himself of the strangest and most
arbitrary expedients. There reigns in his writings a
twilight, so to speak, as in a Gothic dome,^ into which the
light falls through windows variously stained. Hence
the magical eflfect which he produces on many minds.
The main thought of Böhm's philosophizing is this : that
self -distinction, inner diremption, is the essential charac-
ter of spirit, and consequently of God, so far as God is to
be conceived as spirit. To Böhm God is a living spirit
only if, and so far as, he comprehends within himself
difference from himself, and through this other, this
difference within himself, is manifest, is an object, is a
cognising consciousness. The difference of God in God
IS alone the source of his and of all actuosity and sponta-
neity, the spring and jet of self -actuating life, that out of
its own self creates and produces consciousness. Böhm is
exhaustless in metaphors to render intelligible this nega-

1 See Preface, p. xi,

TRANSITION TO MOD URN PHILOSOPH Y. 155

tivity in God, this self-difTerentiation and sclf-externali-
zation of God into a world. Vast width without end, he
saya, stands in need of a straitness and confiningness in
which it may manifest itself ; for in width without con-
finement manifestation were im]>ossible : there must,
therefore, be a drawing-in and a cloaing-in through which
a manifestation may be realized. See, he elsewliere ex-
claims, were will only of one sort, then mind had only
one quality, and were a moveless thing, that lay ever
still, and did nothing further tlian always one and the
same thing ; there wore no joy in it, neither any art nor
science of severals, and there were no wisdom ; all were
a nothing, and there were pro])erly no mind nor will to
anything, for all were only the sole and single. It can-
not be said, then, that the entire God is in a single will
and a single being : there is a diflference. Nothing with-
o\it contrariety can become manifest to itself ; for were
there nothing to resist it, it would proceed perpetually
of itself outwards, and would not return again into it-
self ; but if it enter not again into itself, as into that
out of which it originally went, nothing is known to it
of its primal being. Böhm expresses the above thought
quite i)erfectly, when, in his answer to theosophical ques-
tions, he says : the reader is to understand that in Yes
and No consist all things, be they divine, diaboHc, ter-
restrial, or however they may be named. The One, as the
Yes, is pure power and love, and it is the truth of God,
and God himself. He were incognisable in Himself, and
in Him there were no joy or upliftingness, nor yet feeling,
•without the No. The No is a counter-stroke of the Yes,
or of the truth, in order that the truth may be manifest
and a something, wherein there may be a contrarium,
wherein there may be the eternal love, mo^'ing, feeling,
and willing. For a one has nothing in itself that it can
will, unless it double itself that it may be two ; neither
can it feel itself in oneness, but in twoness it feels itself.
In short, without difference, without antithesis, without
duaUty, there is, according to Böhm, no knowledge, no
consciousness possible ; only in its other, in its oppo-
site (that is yet identical with its own being), does some-
thing become clear and conscious to itself. It lay at
hand to connect this fundamental idea, the thought of a
one that in itself differentiated itself, with the doctrine
of the Trinity ; and the trinitarian schema accordingly,
in many an application and illustration, underlies Böhm's

156 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

conception of the divine life and diflferentiating process.
Schelling afterwards took up anew these ideas of Bohm's,
and i)liilosopliically reconstructed them.

Were we to assign to the theosophy of Böhm a place
in the history of the development of later philosophy
correspondent to the inner worth of its principle, we
should most appropriately set it as a complement oyer
against the system of Si)inoza. If Spinoza teaches the re-
flux of everything finite into the eternal One, Böhm de-
monstrates the efilux, the issue, of the finite out of the
eternal One, and the inner necessity of this efflux and
issue, inasmuch as, without self-diremption, the being of
this One were rather a non-being. Compared with Des-
cartes, Böhm has certainly more profoundly seized the
notion of self-consciousness and the relation of the finite
to God. His historical position, however, is in other re-
spects much too isolated and exceptional, his form of
statement much too troubled, to allow us to incorporate
him without any hesitation in a series of systematic
evolutions otherwise continuous and genetically coherent.

X'KIV.— Descartes.

THE originator and father of modem philosophy is
Descartes. "Whilst, on the one hand, like the
thinkers of the transition-period, he has completely
broken with previous philosophy, and once again con-
sidered all from the very beginning ; he has, on the other
hand, again, not merely, like Bacon, proposed a principle
that is only methodological ; or, like Böhm and the con-
temporary Italians, given expression to philosophical
glances without methodic foundation ; but b£- has, from
the stand-point of entire freedom from presupposition,
introduced a new, positive, materially full, philosophical
principle, and then endeavoured to develop from it, by
method of continuous proof, the leading propositions of
a system. The want of presupposition and the new-
ness of his principle constitute him the originator, its
inner fruitfulness the founder of modern philosophy.

Ilen^ Descartes (Kenatus Cartesius), was born in 1596
at La Haye in Touraine. Already in his early years, dis-
satisfied with the prevalent philosophy, or rather alto-
gether sceptical in its regard, he resolved, on completion
of his studies, to bid adieu to all school learning, and

DESCARTES. 157

henceforward to gain knowledge only from himself and
the great bo(,>k of the world, from nature and tho ol)Scr-
vatiou of man. When twenty years of age, he exchanged
the life of science for the life of tlio camp, serving as a
volunteer first under Maurice of Orange, and afterwards
under Tilly. The inclination to philosophical and mathe-
matical inquiries was too powerful in him, however, to
allow him permanently to quit these. In 1621, the
design of a reformation of science on a firmer foundation,
being now, after long internal struggles, ripe within him,
he left the army ; passed some time in various pretty ex-
tensive travels ; maile a considerable stay in Paris ; aban-
doned finally his native country in 1 629 ; and betook
himself to Holland, in order to live there unknown and
undisturbed wholly for philosophy and the prosecution of
his scientific projects. In Holland, though not without
many vexatious interferences on the part of fanatical
theologians, he lived twenty years, till in 1649, in conse-
quence of an invitation on the part of Queen Christina of
Sweden, he left it for Stockholm, where, however, he died
the very next year, 1650.

The subject-matter of the philosophy of Descartes, and
the course it took in his own mind, may be concisely
stated in the following summary : —

{a.) If- we are ever to establish any fixed and per-
manent article of knowledge, we must begin with the
foundation, we must root out and destroy every presup-
position and assumption to which from our childhood we
may have been accustomed, — in a word, we must doubt all
things that appear even in the least degree uncertain.
We must not only doubt, therefore, of the existence of the
things of sense, since the senses often deceive, but even
of the truths of mathematics and geometry : for however
certain the proposition may appear, that the sum of two
and three is five, or that a square has four sides, we can-
not know whether any truth of knowledge is at all in-
tended for us finite beings, whether God has not created
us rather for mere opinion and error. It is advisable,
therefore, to doubt all, nay, even to deny all, to assume
alias false. (6.) Ij^thus assuming everything as false,
in regard to which any doubt can be at all entertained,
there is one tb'ng, nevertheless, that we cannot deny :
this truth, namely, that we ourselves, we who so think,
exist. Precisely from this rather, that I assume all things
as false, that I doubt all things, there evidently follows

158 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

Qiy owu existence, the existence even in doubting, of the
subject that doubts. The propositioo, consequently,
I think, therefore I am {Coyito, ergo hum), is the first,
most certain proposition that meets every one who
attempts to philosophize. On this most certain of
all propositions depends the certainty of all other
articles of knowledge. The objection of Oassendi, that
existence may be equally well inferred from every
other human function, as from that of thought, — that
it may be equally well said, I walk, therefore I am,
— does not apply, for of none of my actions am I abso-
lutely certain, unless of my thought, (c.) From the pro-
j)osition, I think, therefore I am, there follows further
now the whole constitution of the nature of spirit. In
investigating, namely, who then are we, who thus hold
all things for false that are dififerent from us, we see
clearly that, without destroying our personality, we can
think away from ourselves everything that belongs to us,
except our thought alone. Thought persists, even when
it denies all else. There cannot belong any extension,
therefore, any figure, or anything else that the body may
possess, to our true nature : to that there can belong
thought only. 1 am, then, essentially a thinking being,
or thinking being simply, that is to say, spirit, soul, in-
teUigence, reason. To think is my substance. The mind,
then, can be perfectly and clearly known in itself, in its
own independency, without any of the attributes that
attach to the body ; in its notion there is nothing that
belongs to the notion of body. It is impossible, conse-
quently, to apprehend it by means of any sensuous con-
ception, or to form to one's-seK a picture of it : it is
apprehended wholly and solely through pure intelligence.
{d.) From the proposition, I think, therefore I am, there
follows still further the universal rule of aU certainty.
I am certain that, because I think, I exist. What is it
that gives me the certainty of this proposition ? Evi-
dently nothing else than the clear perception that it is
impossible for any one to think and not be. From this,
then, there follows of itself, and for all other know-
ledge, the criterion of certainty : that is certain, what-
ever I recognise as clearly and evidently true, whatever
my reason recognises as true with the same irresistible
distinctness as the above cogito ergo sum. (e.) This rule,
however, is only a principle of certainty, it does not sup-
ply me yet with a knowledge of the body of truth. We

DESCARTES. 169

reAnew, therefore» under application of the rule, all our
thoughts or ideas, in order to discover something that
shall bo objectively true. Bijt our ideas are partly in-
nate, partly contributed from without, partly formed
by ourselves. Amongst them all we find that of God
eminent and first. The question occurs, Whence do we
get this idea ? Evidently not from ourselves : this idea
can only be implanted in us by a being that possesses in
his own nature the complete fulness of every perfection ;
that is, it can be implanted in \is only by an actually
existent God. On the question, how is it that I am
capable of thinking a nature more perfect than my own ?
I find myself always driven to this answer, that I must
have received it from some being, whose nature actuallii
is more perfect. All the attributes of God, the more I
contemplate them, demonstrate that the ideas of them
could not be produced by me alone. For although I
may possess the idea of a substance, as I am a substance,
the same reason would dispossess me of the idea of infinite
substance, as I am only finite substance. Such an idea
as infinite substance can be produced in me only by an
actually infinite substance. And let it not be thought
that the notion of the infinite is acquired by means of
abstraction and negation, as darkness, it may be, is nega-
tion of light ; for I see rather that the infinite has more
reality than the finite, and that therefore the notion of
the infinite must, in a certain sort, be earlier in me than
that of the finite. But if this clear and distinct idea,
which I have of infinite substance, possesses more objec-
tive reality than any other, neither is there any other of
which I can possibly have less reason to doubt. It re-
mains, then, knowing, as I now do, that it is from God
that the idea of God has come to me, only to investigate
in what manner it has come. It cannot possibly have
been acquired through the senses, whether consciously
or unconsciously ; for ideas of sense originate in external
affections of the organs of sense, and it is self-evident
that no such origin can be predicated of it. Neither can
I have invented it, for I can as little add to, as subtract
from it. But as we have seen, if it is not contributed
from without, and if it is not formed by myself, it must
be innate — just as the idea of my own self is innate. The
first proof that can be led for the existence of God, then,
is, that I find the idea of God existing in me, and that of
this existence there must be a cause. Further, I infer

160 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

the existence of God from my own imperfection, and, in
particular, from my knowledge of it. For as I am ac-
quainted with certain perfections which belong not to ray-
self, there must evidently exist a being more perfect than
T am, on whom I, for my part, depend, and from whom I
have received whatever I possess. The best and most
evident proof for the existence of God, finally, ,is the
proof that follows from the very notion of him.. My
mind, in observing amongst its various ideas one that is
the most eminent of all, that namely of the most perfect
being, perceives also that this idea not only possesses,
like all the rest, the possibility of existence, that is, con-
tingent existence, but that it likewise involves necessary
existence. Just as I infer for every possible triangle that
equality of its three angles to two right angles which lies
in the idea of the triangle in general, so from the neces-
sary existence that belongs to the idea of the most perfect
being, do I infer his actual existence. No other idea that
I possess involves necessary existence, but from this idea
of the Supreme Being, necessary existence is, without con-
tradiction, inseparable. It is only our prejudices that
prevent us from seeing this. Because we are accustomed,
namely, in the case of all other things, to separate the
notion of them from the existence of them, and because
also we often form ideas in our own fancy, it is easy for
us, in regard to the Supreme Being, to fall into doubt as
to whether this idea too be not one of the fancied ones,
or at least such as does not in its notion involve existence.
This proof is essentially different from that of Anselm of
Canterbury, as disputed by Thomas, the reasoning of which
is this : — * Consideration demonstrates the word God to
mean that which must be thought as what is greatest ;
but to be in actuality as well as in thought, is greater
than to be in thought alone ; therefore, God exists not
only in thought, but in fact.' But this conclusion is
manifestly vicious, and we ought to infer instead, There-
fore God must be thought as existing in fact ; from which
proposition plainly the reality of his existence is no neces-
sary result. My proof, on the other hand, is this : what-
ever we clearly and distinctly perceive to belong to the
true and unalterable nature of anything, to its essence,
its form, that may be predicated of it. Now we found,
on investigating God, that existence belongs to his true
and unalterable nature, and, therefore, we may legi-
timately predicate existence of God. In the idea of the

DESCARTES. 161

most perfect being necessary existence is involved, not
because of any fiction of our understanding, but because
existence belongs to his eternal and unalterable nature.
(/.) This result, the existence of God, is of the greatest
consequence. At first it was obligatory on us to re-
nounce all certainty, and to doubt of everything, becaus«
we knew not whether error belonged not to the nature of
man, whether God had not created us to err. But now
we know, by reference to the innate idea and the neces-
sary attributes of God, that he })osse8se3 veracity, and
that it were a contradiction did he deceive us or cause in
us error. For even if the abihty to deceive were re-
garded as a proof of superiority, the will to deceive would
be certainly a proof of wickedness. Our reason conse-
quently can never apprehend an object that were pos-
sibly untrue, so far, that is, as it is apprehended, or so
far as it is clearly and distinctly known. For God were
justly to be named a deceiver, had he given us so per-
verted a judgment that it took falsehood for truth. And
thus the absolute doubt with which we began is now re-
moved. All certainty flows for us from the being of God.
Assured of the existence of an undecei^'ing God, it is
enough, for the certainty of any knowledge, that we
clearly and distinctly know its object, {g.) From ihe
true idea of God there result the princij^les of natural)
philosophy, or the theory of the duality of substance.
That is substance which requires for its existence the
existence of nothing else. In this (highest) sense only/
God is substance. God as infinite substance has the'
ground of his existence in himself, is the cause of him-
self. The two created substances, on the contrary,
thinking substance and bodily substance, mind and mat-
ter, are substances only in the less restricted sense of the
term ; thej may be placed under the common definition,
that they are things requiring for their existence only the
co-operation of God. Each^of _these two substaiices has
an attribute constitutive of its nature and being, and to
which all its other characteristics may be collectively re-
duced. Extension is the attribute and being of matter;
thought is the being of spirit. For everjiihing else that
may be predicated of body presupposes extension, and is
but a mode of extension, while, similarly, everything
that we find in sj'irit is only a modification of thought.
A substance to which thought directly appertains is
called spirit, a substance which is the immediate sub-

162 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

Btrate of extension is called body. Thought and exten-
sion are not only dififerent from each otEer, J^ut it is the
very nature of these substances to negate each, other ; for
spirit is not only cognizable without the attributes of
body, but it is in itself the negation of the attributes of
body. Spirit and body are essentially diver8e,_and possess
nothing in common, (/t.) In an antkropological reference
(to omit the physics of Descartes, as only of subordinate
interest philosophically), there results from this anta-
gonistic relation between spirit and matter, a similar
antagonistic relation between soul and body. Matter
being essentially extension, spirit essentially thought, and
neither having anything in common, the union of soul
and body can only be conceived as a mechanical one.
The body, for its part, is to be regarded as an automaton
artificially constructed by God, as it were a statue
or a machine formed by God of earth. In this body
there dwells the soul, closely, but not inwardly, con-
nected with it. The union of the two is but a forcible
collocation, since both, as seK-subsistent factors, are not
only different from each other, but essentially opposed to
each other. The self-dependent body is a completed
machine, in which the accession of the soul alters nothing ;
the latter, indeed, may produce certain additional move-
ments in the former, but the wheel-work of this machine
remains as it was. The indwelling thought alone dis-
tinguishes this machine from others ; and the lower ani-
mals, consequently, as unpossessed of self-consciousness
and thought, are necessarily assigned only the same rank
as other machines. It is here, now, that the question of
the seat of the soul becomes of interest. H body and soul
are mutually independent, essentially opposed substances,
it wiU be impossible for them to interpenetrate and per-
vade each other; contact of any kind, indeed, will be im-
possible between them unless by force, and in a single
point. This point in which the soul has its seat is not to
Descartes the whole brain, but only the inmost part of it,
a small gland in tbe midst of its substance, which is named
the pineal gland. The proof of this assumption depends on
the circumstance that all the other parts of the brain are
double, and consequently disqualified from acting as
organ of the soul, which, so provided, would necessarily
perceive things in a twofold manner. There is no other
spot in the body capable of uniting impressions equally
with the pineal gland, and tWs gland, therefore, is the

DESCARTES. 163

capital scat of the soul, and the locus of formation for all
our thoughts.

Having thuB developed the leading ideas of the Carte-
sian system, we shall now concisely recapitulate the
characteristics of its historical and philo80])hical i)osition.
Descartes is the founder of a new epoch in x^liilosophy,
because, ßrfifhj, he enunciated the postulate of an entire
removal of any iiresupposition. Tliia^absolute i)rotcst
maintained by Descartes against the acceptance of any-
tiding for true, because it is so given to us, or so found
by U87 and not something determined and established by
thought, became thenceforward the fundamental prin-
ciple of the moderns. Pescartes first proposed, secondli/,
th^principle of self -consciousness, of the pure, self-subsis-
tent ego, or the conception of mind, thinking substance, as
inclividual self, as a singular ego — a new principle, a con-
ception unknown to antiquity. Descartes, thirdly, gave
complete distinctness to the antithesis of being and
though t,^ existence and consciousness ; and announced the
conciliation of this antithesis as a philosophical problem
— the problem, for the future, of all modern philosophy.
But these great ideas, distinctive of an epoch in the history
of philosophy, are suggestive, at the same time, of the ~-^
philosophical defects of the Cartesian gystem. Eix^tlyi--^
Descartes empirically assumed the constituents of his sys-
tem, particularly his three substances. It appears, indeed,
from the protest with which the system begins, that
nothing ready-given or ready-found is to be assumed,
but that all is to be deduced from thought. But this
protest is not so serious in the event ; what has been
apparently set aside is taken up again unchanged,
once the principle of certainty has been made good.
And hence it is that Descartes ßnds ready to hand,
directly given, as well the idea of God as the two sub-
stances. In order to deduce them, he appears, indeed,
to abstract from much that is empirically present, but
when he has abstracted from everything else, the two
substances remain behind in the end simply as residue.
That -is, then, they are empirically assumed. It is a
second defect that Descartes isolates the two sides of the
antithesis, thought and being, in their mutual relation.
He makes both, * substances ; ' elements, that is, which
mutually exclude and negate each other. The being of
matter he places only in extension, or in pure self-
excludedness ; that of spirit only in thought, or intension,

164 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

pure self-includedness. They stand opposed to each
other like centrifugal and centripetal forces. But with
such a concej)tion of spirit and matter any internal assi-
milation of them becomes impossible ; where the two
sides meet and unite, as in man, this they are enabled to
do only by a forcible act of creation, only by the divine
assistance. Descartes, nevertheless, demands and en-
deavours to find a conciliation of the two sides. But
precisely the inability really to overcome the dualism of
his position is the third and capital defect of his sys-
tem. It is true that in the statement, * I think, there-
fore I am,' or ' I am thinking,' the two sides, being and
thinking, are conjoined together, but then they are so
conjoined only to be established as mutually independent.
To the question, How does the ego relate itself to what is
extended ? it can only be answered, As thinking, that is,
as negative, as excludent. And thus for the conciliation
of the two sides there remains only the idea of God.
Both substances are created by God, both are held to-
gether by the wül of God, and through the idea of God
is it that the ego obtains the certainty of the existence
of what is extended. God is thus, in a measure, a deus
ex machina, in order to bring about the unity of the ego
with the matter of extension. The externality of any
such process is obvious.

It is this defect in the system of Descartes that acts as
conditioning motive to the systems that follow.

XXV. — Geulinx and Malebranche.

DESCABTES had placed mind and matter, conscious-
ness and the world, in complete separation from
each other. Both are for him substances, independent
powers, mutually exclusive contraries. Spirit (that is to
say, in his conception, the simple self, the ego) is essen-
tially what distinguishes itself from, what excludes, mat-
ter,— what abstracts from sense. Matter, on the other
hand, is essentially what is opposed to thought. But the
relation of the two principles being thus determined, the
question involuntarily occurs. How then is it possible for
any connexion to have place between th.em ? Both being
absolutely different, nay, mutually opposed, how is it pos-
sible for the affections of the body, on the one hand, to
act on tlie soul, and bow, on the other hand, is it pos-

OEULIXX AXD MALEBRAXCIIE. 165

Bible for the volitions of the soul to act on the body ? It _
was at this point that the Cartesian Arnold Otidhix
(born 1025 at Antwerp, died 10G9 as Professor of Pliilo-
Bophy at Leydon), took np the system of Descartes in
order to procure for it a more consistent form. For his
£art, Geulinx ia of opinion that neither the soul acts
directly on the body, nor the body directly on the soul.
Not the former : siuce I can at discretion manifoldly de-
termine or influence my body, but I am not the cause of
this, for I know not how it happens, I know not in what
manner influence is propagated from my brain to my
limbs, and I cannot possibly suppose myself to do that in
regard to which I am unable to understand how it is
done. But if I am unable to produce movement within
my body, still less must I be able to produce movement
■without my body. I am only a spectator of this world,
then ; the only action that is mine, that remains for me,
is contemplation. But this very contemplation can only
take place mysteriously. For how do we obtain our per-
ception of an external world ? The external world can-
not possibly act directly on us. For, even if the external
objects cause, in the act of vision sa\% an image in my
eye, or an impression in my brain, as if in so much wax,
this impression, or this image, is stül something corporeal
or material merely ; it cannot enter into my spirit,
therefore, which is essentially disparate from matter.
There is nothing left us, then, but to seek in God the
means of uniting the two sides. It is God alone wbo can
conform outer to inner, inner to outer ; who, convert-
ing external objects into internal ideas, — ideas of the
soul, — can render visible to the latter the world of sense,
and realize the determinations of the will within into
facts without. Every operation, then, that combines outer
and inner, the soul and the world, is neither an effect
of the spirit nor of the world, but simply an immediate
act of God. TMien I exercise volition, consequently, it is
not from my will, but from the will of God that the pro-
posed bodily motions follow. On occasion of my will,
God moves my body ; on occasion of an affection of my
body, God excites an idea in my mind : the one is but the
occasional cause of the other (and hence the name, Occa-
sionalism, of this theory). My will, nevertheless, moves
not the mover to move my limbs ; but he who im-
parted motion to matter, and assigned it its laws, even
he created my will also, and he has so united together

166 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

these most diverse things, material motion and men-
tal volition, that, when my will wills, such a movement
follows as it wills, and when the movement follows,
my will wills it, not that either, however, acts or exerts
physical influence on the other. On the contrary, just
as the agreement of two watches which go so perfectly
together, that both strike exactly the same hour at once,
results not from any mutual influence on their part, but
simply from the fact that they were both set together ;
so the agreement of the bodily motion and the mental
volition depends only on that sublime artificer who has
produced in them this inexplicable community. Geulinx,
then, it is obvious, has only brought the fundamental
dualism of Descartes to its ultimate point. If Descartes
called the union of soul and body a violent collocation,
Geulinx calls it, in so many words, a miracle. The strict
consequence of such a conception, then, is, that there is
possible not any immanent, but only a transcendent prin-
ciple of union.

2. Analogous to the theory of Geulinx, and equally at
the same time only a consequence and further extension
of the philosophizing of Descartes, is the philosophical
position of Nicholas Malebranche (born at Paris 1638 ; en-
tered, at the age of twenty-two, the congregation de Vora-
toire, determined to the prosecution of philosophy by the
writings of Descartes ; died, after many troubles with
theological opponents, 1715).

Malebranche takes his point of departure from the
Cartesian view of the relation between soul and body.
These are rigorously distinguished from each other,
and in tlieir essence mutually opposed. How does the
soul (the ego) attain, then, to a knowledge of the exter-
nal world, to ideas of corporeal things? For only in the
spiritual form of ideas is it possible for external, and, in
particular, material things, to be present in spirit ; or the
soul cannot have the thing itself, but only an idea of it,
the thing itself remaining without the soul. The soul
can derive these ideas neither from itself, nor from
things. Not from itself : for any power of gene-
rating the ideas of things purely from its own self, can-
not be ascribed to the soul as a limited being ; what ia
merely an idea of the soul does not on that account
actually exist, and what actually exists depends not for
its existence and apprehension on the goodwill of the
soul ; the ideas of things are given to us, they are no pro-

QEULINX ÄND MALEBRANCIIE. 167

duction of our own thought. But just aa littlo does tl)e
soul derive theao ideas from tho things thcniselvca. It is
impossible to think that impressions of material things
take j)lace on the soul, which is immaterial, not to mention
that these infinitely numerous and complex impressions
would, in impinging on one another, reciprocally derange
and destroy one another. The soul, then, — there is no
other resource, — must see things in a third something
that is above the antithesis, that is, in God. God, the
absolute substance, contains all things in himself, he sees'
all things in himself according to their tnie nature and
being. For the same reason in him, too, are the ideas of
all things ; he is the entire world as an intellectual or
ideal world. It is God, then, who is the means of medi-
ating between the ego and the world. In him we see
the ideas, inasmuch as we ourselves are so completely
contained in him, so accurately united to him, that wo
may call him the place of spirits. Our volition and our
sensation in reference to things proceed from him ; it is
he who retains together the objective and the subjective
worlds, which, in themselves, are separate and apart. —

The philosophy of Malebranche, then, in its single
leading thought that we see and know all things in God,
demonstrates itself to be, like the occasionalism of Geu-
linx, a special attempt to overcome i\e dualism of the
Cartesian philosophy on its own principles and under its
own presuppositions.

3. Two defects or inner contradictions of the philo-
sophy of Descartes are now apparent. Descartes con-
ceives mind and matter as substances, as mutually ex-
clusive contraries, and sets himself forthwith to find their
union. But any union in the case of such presupposi-
tions can only be one-sided and external. Thought and
existence being each a substance, must only negate
and mutually exclude each other. Unnatural theories,
like the above, become, then, unavoidable consequences.
The simplest remedy is this, to abandon the presupposi-
tion; to remove its independency from either contrary,
to conceive both., not as substances, but as forms of
the manifestation of a substance. This remedy is parti-
cularly indicated and suggested by another circumstance.
According to Descartes, God is the infinite substance, — in
the special sense of the word, the only substance. Mind
aßd matter are also, indeed, substances, but only in re-
lation to each other ; while in relation to God, again,

1 GS II I STÖR Y OF PHIL OSOPII Y.

they are dependent and not substances. Tliia, properly
epeäkmg, is a contradiction. It were more consistent to
eay, that neither the thinking individuals nor the material
things, are anything self-subsistent, but only the one
substance, — God. God only has real being ; whatever
being attaches to finite things is unsubstantial, and they
themselves are but accidents of the one true substance.
Malebranche approaches this conclusion ; the corporeal
world is at least for him ideally sublated into God, in
whom are the eternal archetypes of all things. It is
Spinoza, however, who, logically consequent, directly
"enunciates this conclusion of the accidentality of the finite
and the exclusive substantiality of God. His system,
then, is the truth and completion of that of Descartes.

XKYL— Spinoza.

BAEUCH SPINOZA was born in Amsterdam on the
24th of November 1632. His parents, Jews of
Portuguese extraction, were well-to-do tradespeople, and
gave him the education of a scholar. He studied with
diligence the Bible and the Talmud. He soon ex-
changed, however, the study of theology for that of
physics and the works of Descartes. About the same
time, having long broken inwardly with Judaism, he broke
with it outwardly also, without, however, formally em-
bracing Christianity. In order to escape the persecutions
of the Jews, who had excommunicated him, and with
whom his life was in danger, he left Amsterdam and be-
took himself to Rhynsburg, near Leyden, but settled
finally at the Hague, where, wholly absorbed in scienti-
fic pursuits, he lived in the greatest seclusion. He earned
his living by the polishing of optical glasses, which bis
friends disposed of. The Elector of the Palatinate, Carl
Ludwig, made him an offer of a philosophical chair at
Heidelberg, with the promise of complete liberty of
opinion ; but Spinoza declined it. Delicate by nature,
suffering from ill-health for years, Spinoza died of con-
sumption on the 21st of February 1677, at the early age
of forty-four. The cloudless purity and sublime tran-
quillity of a perfectly wise man were mirrored in his life.
Abstemious, satisfied with little, master of his passions,
never immoderately sad or glad, gentle and benevolent,
ot a character admirably pure, he faithfully followed the

SPIXOZA. 169

doctrines of his philosophy, even in his daily life. His
chief work, the Kthic, was published the year he died.
He would have liked probably to have published it in hia
lifetime, but the hateful name of Atheist must have de-
terred him. His most intimate friend, Ludwig Mayer, a
physician, in accordance with his will, superintended the
publication after his death.

The system of Spinoza is supix)rted on three fundamen-
tal notions, from which all the others follow with mathe-
matical necessity. These notions are those of substance,
attribute, and mode.

(a.) Spinoza starts from the Cartesian dcüoitiou of 6ub*
S^iillfiiß : substance is that which, for its existence, stands
in need of nothing else. This notion of substance being
assumed, there can exist, according to Spinoza, only a
single substance. What is through its own self alone is
necessarily infinite, \inconditioned and unlimited by any-
thing else. Spontaneous existence is the absolute power
to exist, which cannot depend on anj^hing else, or find
in anything else a limit, a negation of itself ; only un-
limited being is self-subsisteut, substantial being. A
plurality of infinites, however, is impossible ; for one
were indistinguishable from the other, .\_pljitality of_
substances, as assimied by Descartes, is necessarily, there-
fore, a contradiction. It is possible for only one sub-
stance, and that an absolutely infinite substance, to exist.
The given, finite reality necessarily presupposes such
single, self-existent substance. It were a contradiction,
that only the finite, not the infinite, should have exist-
ence ; that there should be only what is conditioned and
caused by something else, and not also what is self-
existent and self-subsistent. The^jibsolute substance is
rather the real cause of all and every existence ; it alone
isi actual, unconditioned being ; it is the sole \artue of
existence, and through this virtue everything finite is :
without it tliere is nothing, with it there is all ; all reality
is comprehended in it, as, beside it, self-dependent being
there is none ; it is not only cause of all being, but it is
itself all being ; every special existence is only a modifi-
cation (individualization), of the universal substance itself,
which, by force of inner necessity, expands its own in-
finite reality into an immeasurable quantity of being,
and comprises within itself every possible form of exist-
ence. Xliis one substance is named by Spinoza God.
As is self-evident, then, we must leave out of view Lere

170 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

the Christian idea of God, the conception of an individual,
spiritual personality. Spinoza expressly declares that he
entertains quite a different idea of God from Christians ;
he distinctly maintains that all existence, material exist-
ence included, springs directly from God as the single
substance ; and he laughs at those who see in the world
aught but an accident of the divine substance itself.
He recognises in the views of these a dualism which
would annul the necessary unity of all things — a self-
substantiation of the world, which would destroy the sole
causality of God. The world is for him no product of
the divine will that stands beside God, free : it is an
emanation of the creative being of God, which being is,
by its very nature, infinite. God, to Spinoza, is only
the substance of things, and not anything else. The
propositions, that there is only one God, and that the
substance of all things is only one, are to him identical.

What properly is substance now ? What is its positive
nature ? We have here a question that from the position
of Spinoza is very hard to answer. Partly for this reason,
that a definition, according to Spinoza, must include the
proximate cause (be genetic) of what is to be defined,
whilst substance, as increate, can have no cause exter-
nal to itself. Partly, again, and chiefly for this reason,
that to Spinoza, all determination is negation [omnis de-
terminatio est negatio, though only an incidental expres-
sion, is the fundamental idea of the entire system), for
determination implies a defect of existence, a relative
non-being. Special, positive designations, then, would
only reduce substance to something finite. Declarations
in its regard, consequently, must be only negative and
provisory, as, for example, it has no external cause, is not
a many, cannot possibly be divided, etc. Spinoza is re-
luctant to say even that it is one, because this predicate
may be easuy taken as numerical, and then it might ap-
pear as if another, the many, were opposed to it. Thus
there are left only such positive expressions as enunciate
its absolute relation to its own self. It is in this sense
that Spinoza says of it, it is the cause of itself, or its
nature implies existence. And it is only another ex-
pression for the same thought when he calls substance
eternal, for by eternity he imderstands existence itself,
so far as it is conceived as following from the definition
of the object, in the same sense in which geometricians
speak of the eternal qualities of figures. Spinoza applies

SPIXOZA. 171

to substance tho predicate infinite also, so far as the notion
of iutiuitude is iilontical to liim with the notion of tnio
being, with the absohite affirmation of existence. In tho
same manner tho aHegation, that God is free, expresses
only what the others express, to wit, negatively, that all
external force is excluded, and positively, that God is in
agreement with himself, that his being corresponds to
the laws of his nature.

In sum, there is only one infinite substance, excludent
of all determination and negation from itself, the one
being in every being, — God.

[b.) Besides infinite substance or God, Descartes had
assumed tvro derivative and created substances, the one
spirit or thought, the other matter or extension. These
also re-appear here as the two ground-forms under which
Spinoza subsumes all reality, — the two ' attributes' in
which the single substance reveals itself to us, so far as
it is the cause of all that is. BLow now, — this is the per-
plexing question, the Achilles' heel of the Spinozistic
system, — are these attributes related to the infinite sub-
stance ? Substance cannot wholly disappear in them ; else
iflvere determinate, limited, and in contradiction, there-
fore, to its own notion. If then these attributes do not ex-
haust the objective being of substance, it follows that
they are determinations in which substance takes form
for the subjective apprehension of understanding ; or for
behoof of understanding all is once for all divided into
thought and extension. And this is the conception of
Spinoza. An .attribute is for him what understanding
perceives in substance as constitutive of its nature. Th.e
two attributes are therefore determinations, whicb ex-
press the nature of substance in these precise forms, only
for perception. Substance itself being unexhausted by
any such specialties of form, the attributes must be con-
ceived as but expressions of its nature for an understand-
ing that is placed apart from it. That such understanding
should perceive substance only under these precise two
forms is indifferent to substance itself, which impHciter
possesses an infinitude of attributes. That is to say, all
possible attributes, not limitations, may be assumed for
substance. It is only the human understanding that in-
vests substance with the two specially mentioned, and
exclusively with these two, for of all the notions of the
understanding, they are the only ones actually positive
or expressive of reality. To the understanding, sub-

172 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

stance is thought, then, considered under the attribute
of thought, and extension, considered under the attribute
of extension. In a word, the two attributes are but empi-
rically derived determinations, that are incommensurate
besides with the nature of substance. Substance stands
behind them as the absolute infinite which cannot be com-
prehended in any such special notions. The attributes
explain not what substance really is ; and in its regard
consequently appear contingent. Spinoza fails to supply
any principle of union between the notion of absolute
substance and the particular manner in which it mani-
fests itself in the two attributes.

In their own natural relation, the attributes, as with
Descartes, are to be directly opposed to each other.
They are attributes of one and the same substance, it is
true, but each is independent in itself, as independent,
indeed, as the very substance which it is supposed reali-
ter to represent. Between thought and extension, then,
spirit and matter, there can be no mutual influence ;
what is material can only have material causes, what is
spiritual only spiritual ones, as ideas, volition, etc.
Neither spirit, consequently, can act on matter, nor
matter on spirit. Thus far, then, Spinoza adheres to the
Cartesian severance of spirit and matter. But, as re-
ferred to the notion of the single substance, both worlds
are equally again one and the same ; there is a perfect
agreement between them, a thorough parallelism. One
and the same substance is thought as present in both at-
tributes— one and the same substance in the various forms
of existence under either. * The idea of the circle and
the actual circle are the same thing, now under the at-
tribute of thought and again under that of extension.'
From the one substance there proceeds, in effect, only
a single infinite series of things, but a series of things in
a variety of forms, even after subjection primarily to one
or other of the forms of the attributes. The various
things exist, like substance itself, as well under the ideal
form of thought, . as under the real form of extension.
For every spiritual form there is a correspondent cor-
poreal one, as for every corporeal form a correspondent
spiritual one. Nature and spirit are different, indeed,
but they are not isolatedly apart : they are everywhere
together, like type and antitype, like things and the
ideas of things, like object and subject, in which last the
object mirrors itseK, or what realiter is, idealiter reflects

SPINOZA. 178

itself. The world were not the product of a single sub-
Btauec, if these two elements, thought and extension,
were not, at every point in inseparable identity, united
in it. I^iunoza subjects, in particular, the relation between
bo4y and soul to the idea of this inseparable unity of
emrit and matter, a unity which, according to him, per-
vades the whole of nature, but in various grades of per-
fection. And here we have his simple resolution of the
problem, which, from the point of view of Descartes, waa
sqjdifficult, and even inexplicable. la. man» as every-
where else, extension and thou^jht (the latter, in his case,
not only as feeling and perception, but as self-conscious
reason) aye together and insepaiable. The soul is the
consciousness that has for its objects the associated body,
and through the intervention of the body, the remaining
corporeal world, so far as it affects the body ; the body
is the real organism whose states and affections con-
sciously reflect themselves in the soul. But any influence
of the one on the other does not for this very reason
exist ; söiü_and_body are the same thing, but expressed
in the one case only as conscious thought, in the other
as material extension. They differ only in form, so far
as the nature and life of the body, so far, that is, as the
various corporeal impressions, movements, functions,
which obey whoUy and solely the laws of the material
organism, spontaneously coalesce in the soul to the unity
of consciousness, conception, thoiight.

(c.) Th» speoial individual forms which are ideas or
material things, according as they are considered under
the attribute of thought or under the attribute of exten-
sion, receive their explanation at tlie hands of Spinoza by .
reference to the notion of accident, or, as he names it, _
^odus. By modi we are to understand, then, the various
iidividual finite forms, in which infinite substance particu-
l^izes itself. The modi are to substance what the waves
are to the sea — shapes that perpetually die away, that
never are. Nothing finite is possessed of a self-subsist-
ent individuali^Ey; The finite individual exists, indeed,
^cause the iiulimited productive power of substance
must give birth to an infinite variety of particular finite
forms; but it has no proper reality, — it exists omly jn
s_ubstance. Finite things are only the last, the most
subordinate, tHe'mbst external terms of existence, in
which the universal life gives itself specific forms, and
thejr bear the stamp of finitude in that they are suV

174 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

jected, without will, witliout resistance, to the causal
chain that pervades this world- The divine substance is
free only in the inner essence of its own nature, but in-
dividual things are not free, they are a prey to all the
others with which they are connected. This is their
finitude, indeed, that they are conditioned and deter-
mined, not by themselves, but by what is alien to them.
They constitute the domain of pure necessity, within
which each is free and independent only so far as power
has been given it by nature to assert itself against the
rest, and maintain intact its own existence and its pro-
per and peculiar interests.

These are the fundamental notions, the fundamental
features of the system of Spinoza. As for his jyractkal
philosophy, it may be characterized in a few words. Its
main propositions follow of necessity from the metaphysical
principles which we have just seen. And for first example
we have the inadmissibleness of what is called free-will.
For, man being only modus, what is applicable toltEe"
o^ers is applicable to him ; he is involved in the infinite
series of conditional causes ; and free-will, therefore, can-
not be predicated of him. His will, like every other bodily
function, must be determined by something, whether an
impression from without or an impulse from within.
Men ^believe themselves free, simply beoawse they are
conscious of their own acts, but not of the motives of
them. In the same way, the notions, which we usually
connect with the words good and bad, rest on an error,
as foUows at once from the simple notion of the absolute
divine cause. Good and bad are not anything actual in
things themselves, but only express relative notions sug-
gested to us by our own comparison of things one with
another. We form for ourselves, namely, from the ob-
servation of particular things, a certain general conception,
and this conception we continue to regard as if it were a
necessary rule for all other particular things. Should
now some single individual clash with our general
conception, that indiAadual would be regarded as imper-
fect, and as in disagreement with its own nature. Sin,
then,thebad, is only relative, and not positive, for nothing
happens contrary to the wiQ of God. It is a mere nega-
tion or privation, and appears something positive only
to our finite minds. There is no bad to God. What,
then, are good and bad ? That is good which is useful
to us, that bad which prevents us from attaining to the

SPINOZA. 175

good. That, again, ia useful which jirocures us gn-atcr
reality, which preserves aud promotes our being. Our
true being, however, is reason ; reason is the inner nature
of our soul ; it is reason that makes us free ; for it is
from reason that we possess the motive and tlie power to
resist the molestations of things from without, to deter-
mine our own action according to the law of the due pre-
servation and promotion of our existence, and to place
ourselves as regards all things in a relation adequate to
our nature. What, consequently, contributes to our
knowledge, that alone is useful. But the highest know-
ledge is the knowledge of Cod. The highest virtue of the
soul is to know and love God. From knowledge of God
there arises for us the supreme happiness and joy, the
bhss of the soul : it gives us peace in the thought of the
eternal necessity of all things ; it delivers us from all dis-
cord and discontent, from all fruitless struggling against
the finitude of our own being ; it raises us from life in
sense to that life in intellect, which, freed from all the
troubles and the trials of the perishable, is occupied only
with itself and with the eternal. Felicity, then, is not
the reward of virtue, — it is virtue itself.

\Vhat ia true aud great in the philosophy of Spinoza is,
that everything individual, as finite, is merged by it in
the gulf of substance. With regard immovably directed
tothe Eternal One, to God, it loses sight of all that to
the common mind passes for real. But its defect is, that
it fails truly to convert this negative^'gulf of substance
into the terra firma of positive existence and actual life.
It is with justice, then, that the substance of Spinoza has
been compared to the den of the lion, where there are
many steps to, but few from. The existence of the phe-
nomenal world, the reality of the finite, if perishable, if
null, is still not explained by Spinoza. We cannot see
what this finite world of null appearance is here for ;
any living connexion to God fails. The substance of
Spinoza is exclusively a principle of identity ; it is not
a principle of diflFerence. Keflection, in its reference,
proceeds from the finite to the absolute, but not also
from the latter to the former ; it clasps together the
many into a selfless unity in God ; it sacrifices all indi-
vidual existence to the negative thought of unity, instead
of enabling this unity, by a living evolution into concrete
variety, to negate its own barren negativity. The sys-
tem of Spinoza is the most abstract monotheism that can

176 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

possibly be conceived. It is not by accident, then, that
Spinoza, ä Jew, lias, in explanation of the universe, once
more revived the idea of its absolute unity : such idea is,
in some sort, a consequence of his nationality, an echo of
the East.

s--- XXVII. — Idealism and Realism.

WE stand now by a knot-point, a ganglion, a commis-
sure, in the onward course of philosophy. Des-
cartes had demonstrated the antithesis of thought and
existence, of mind and matter, and had postulated a
principle of resolution for it. This resolution succeeded
ill with him, however, for he had placed the two sides of
the antithesis in their greatest possible mutual isolation,
he had assumed both as substances, as independent,
imutually negating powers. The successors of Descartes
sought a more satisfactory solution ; but the theories to
which they found themselves compelled, only showed the
jnore plainly the imtenableness of the entire presupposi-
' ition. Spinoza, finally, abandoned the false presupposi-
Ition, and stripped each of the ojiposing sides of its inde-
pendent substantiality. In the infinite substance, spirit
and matter, thought and extension, are now one. But
they are not one in themselves ; and only as one in them-
selves were there a true unity of both. That they are in
substance one avails them little, for to substance itself
they are indifi'erent, that is, they are not immanent
differences of substance. "With Spinoza, too, then, they
are absolutely separated from one another. The reason
of this isolation is simply that Spinoza has not suffi-
ciently disembarrassed himself of the presuppositions and
dualism of Descartes, — he, too, looks on thought as only
thought, on extension as only extension, and this con-
ception of them necessarily excludes the one from the
other. If an inner principle of union is to be found for
them, this abstraction of each must be broken up and
removed. In the opposed sides themselves must the re-
conciliation be accomplished. There are, consequently,
two ways possible, either from the position of the
material side, to explain the ideal, or from that of the
ideal side to explain the materiah And in effect both
ways were almost simultaneously attempted. From this
point begina each of the two 'series of views which have

LOCKE. 177

divided the intpllectual world since, that, namely, of
Idealism one-siderlly on the one hand, and that of
Jiealiam (empiricism, sensiualism, materialism), equally
oue-sidedly on the other.

XXYUl.— Locke,

TFIE originator of the realistic series, the father <k
modern materialism and empiricism, was the Eng-
lish Jofin Locke. He possessed a precursor, indeed, in
his countryman, Thomas Jlobhes (15S8-1679) ; whom,
however, we merely mention in this place, aa his in-
fluence concerned rather the history of political science.

John Locke was born at Wrington in 1632. His early
studies were directed to philosophy, and, in particular, to
medicine. His delicate health, however, precluded the
practice of the latter ; and, little interrupted by any claims
of business, he lived a life of merely literary activity. Not
without considerable influence on his life and circum-
stances was his connexion with the celebrated statesman
Lord Ashley, afterwards Earl of Shaftesbury, in whose
house he was always welcome, and where he enjoyed
intercourse with the most distinguished men in England.
In the year 1670, at the instigation of some of his friends,
he sketched the first plan of his celebrated Essay concern-
ing Human Understanding. The complete work, however,
was published only in 1690. Locke died in 1704, at the
age of seventy-two. Precision and clearness, perspicuity
and distinctness, are the characteristics of his writings.
Acute rather than deep in his thinking, he is true to the
character of his nationality. The fundamental thoughts
and chief results of his system are now elements of popu-
lar or general information everywhere, especially in Eng-
land ; but we are not to forget on that account that he was
the first to give scientific position to that standard of intel-
ligence, and that he occupies, therefore, however much his
principle may fail in any internal capability of develop-
ment, a legitimate place in the history of philosophy.

Locke's philosophy (that is, his theory of knowledge,
for that is the scope of his entire inquiry) rests on two
thoughts, the subjects of constant repetition : first (nega-
tively), that there are no innate ideas ; and second (posi-
tively), that all our knowledge springs from experience.

Many are of opinion, says Locke, that there are innate

178 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

ideas, received into the soul at birth, and brought with it
into the world. In proof of these ideas, they appeal to
the universal existence of them in every human being,
without exception. But, even granting this to be the
fact, it would prove nothing, if the universality of the
agreement could be explained otherwise. But the al-
leged fact is not fact. Principles, universally admitted,
there are none such, — whether in the theoretical or in
the practical world. Not in the practical world, — for
the spectacle of the various uations, and at the various
periods of their history, teaches us that there is no moral
rule observable by all. Not in the theoretical world, —
for even the propositions which have the greatest preten-
sions to universal validity, as ' What is, is,' or, • It is im-
possible for the same thing to be and not to be,' are not
by any means universally admitted. Children and idiots
have no conception of these principles, and neither do
the uneducated know anything about such abstract pro-
positions ; how, then, can they be implanted in them by
nature ? "Were ideas innate, we should all, of necessity,
be aware of them even from our earliest childhood. For
'to be in the mind ' is the same thing as * to be known.'
The reply that these ideas are implanted in the mind,
only it is unconscious of them, is therefore a mani-
fest contradiction. As little is gained by the plea, that,
80 soon as men make use of their reason, they become
conscious of these principles. This allegation is simply
false, because said axioms come much later into conscious-
ness than many other particulars of knowledge, and chil-
dren, for example, give numerous proofs of their exercise of
reason before they know that a thing cannot possibly be,
and not be. It is certainly correct to say that nobody
attains to a consciousness of the principles in question
without reason ; but it is untrue that, with the first act
of reason, they become present to consciousness. The
first facts of knowledge, rather, are not general principles,
but particular instances (impressions). The child knows
that sweet is not bitter, long before it understands the
logical proposition of contradiction. Whoever atten-
tively reflects, will hardly maintain that the particular
propositions, 'sweet is not bitter,' for instance, — flow
from the general Ones. Were these latter innate, they
ought to constitute for the child, the first elements of
consciousness, for what nature has implanted in the soul
must plainly be earlier present to consciousness, than

LOCKE. 179

what she has not implanted. The existence of innate
ideas, conscciuontly, whether theoretical or practical, is an
assumption as much to he rejected as that of an innate
existence of arts and science». The understanding (or
the soul) is in itsi^.lf a tabula rasa, a void surface, a blank
l)age on which nothing has been written.

How, then, does the mind acquire its ideas ? They are
due to exj)erience, on which all knowledge is founded, —
on which, indeed, as its principle, all knowledge depends.
Experience, however, is in itself twofold : it is either the
perception of the external objects through the special
senses, in which case it is named sensation ; or it is the
perception of the internal operations of the soul, in which
case it is named the internal sense, or, better, reflection.
Sensation and reflection furnish the understanding with
all its ideas. These faculties are to be regarded as the
single window by which the light of the ideas falls into
the camera obscura of the mind. The external objects
supply the ideas of sensible qualities ; the internal object
again, the life of the soul, supplies the ideas of its own
operations. The problem of the philosophy of Locke,
then, is to derive and explain the ideas generally, by a
reference to these two sources. They are divided, in the
first place, into the simple and the complex. Simple ideas
are such as the mind receives from elsewhere, in the same
manner as a mirror receives the images of the objects
jivesented to it. They are partly such as reach the mind
through a single sense, as ideas of colour through sight,
of sound through hearing, and of solidity, or impenetra-
bility, through touch ; partly such as are contributed by
several senses, as the ideas, for instance, of extension and
motion, which are due to the senses of touch and sight
combined ; partly such as are derived from reflection, as
tlie ideas of thought, and of will ; partly such, finally, as
spring from sensation and reflection together, as the
ideas, for example, of power, unity, succession, etc.
These simple ideas constitute the materials, as it were
the letters, of all our knowledge. As language now, by
means of various combinations of the single letters, forms
syllables and words, so the mind, by means of various
combinations of the simple ideas, forms the compound or
complex ideas. These may be reduced to three classes,
to ideas, namely, of modes, of substances, and of relations.
The ideas of the first class consist of the modifications of
space (distance, linear measure, immensity, surface, figure,

180 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

etc.), of time (duration, eternity), of thought (perception,
memory, abstraction), of number, and so on. In parti-
cular, Locke subjects to a strict examination the notion oj
substance. He explains its origin in this way : we learn
as well from sensation as reflection, that a certain num-
ber of simple ideas frequently present themselves to-
gether. Being unable to think, now, these simple ideas
as self-supported, we accustom ourselves to conceive a
self-subsistent substrate as their basis, and to this sub-
strate we give the name of substance. Substance is the
unknown something which is thought as the vehicle of
such qualities as produce in us the simple ideas. It follows
not, however, that substance, though product of our own
subjective thought, does not at the same time exist with-
out us. It is rather distinguished from all the other com-
plex ideas, by the fact that it does possess an objectively
real archetype without us ; while these, spontaneously
formed by the mind, are devoid of any correspondent
reality. What the archetype of substance is, we know
not ; we only know the attributes of substances. From
the notion of substance Locke passes, in the last place, to
that of relation. A relation takes place whenever the
mind so unites two things that on observation of the one
it immediately reverts to the other. All things are cap-
able of being placed in relation by the understanding, or,
what is the same thing, of being converted into relatives.
It is thus impossible completely to enumerate relations.
Locke considers, therefore, only a few of the more impor-
tant relations, that of identity and difference among
others, but above all, cause and effect. The idea of this
relation arises on our perception of how something,
whether a substance or a quality, begins to exist in con-
sequence of the action of another something. Thus far
the ideas ; to the combinations of which, further, we owe
the conception of knowledge in general. Knowledge, in-
deed, is related to the simple and complex ideas as a pro-
position to its -component letters, syllables, and words.
It follows from this that our knowledge extends not beyond
the range of our ideas, and, consequently, of experience.

These are the principal thoughts of Locke's philosophy ;
and its empiricism is obvious in them. The mind to it
is in itself void, a mere mirror of the external world, a
dark room into which the images of the things without
fall, without any contribution or action on its part ; its
entire contents are due to the impressions made on it by

HUME. ISl

material tilings. Nihil est in inteUcdu, quod non fucrit
i» ««7J,<iM, is the watchword of the position. And if
iA'»cke undoubtedly pronounces iu these propositions the
]>recodence of matter to mind, he makes the same 0[)ini()u
still more manifest when he thinks it possible, nay, pro-
bable, that the soul is a material substance. The converse
possibility, that material are subordinate to spiritual
things as but a species of the latter, is not entertained by
Locke. The soul to him, then, is but secondary to mat-
ter, and he takes his place on that position of realism
which has been already characterized (xxvii.). Locke, it
is true, has, in the prosecution of his views, not always
remained consistent to his principles. Empiricism in his
hands is not, in several respects, a perfect structure.
We can see already, however, that the subsequent course
of this mode of thinking will incline towards a complete
denial of the ideal factor.

The empiricism of Locke, so well adapted as it is to the
character of his nation, soon became, in England, the
dominant philosophy. As occupying the general position,
we may name Isaac Newton, the great mathematician
(1642-1727), Samuel Clarke, a disciple of Newton's, prin-
cipally interested in moral philosophy (1675-1729) ;
further, the English moralists of this period, William
Wollaston (1659-1724), the Earl of Shaftesbury (1671-
1713), Francis Hutcheson (1695-1747); and even oppo-
nents of Locke, as Peter Brown (d. 1735).

XXIX.—ffume,

LOCKE, as just remarked, was neither consistent nor
successful in the completion and realization of em-
piricism. Although assigning material things a decided
superiority to the thinking subject, he made thought, in
one respect (in the notion of substance), the prescribing
power of the objective world. Of all the complex ideas
constructed by subjective thought, one alone, substan-
tiality, possesses for Locke an exceptional character of
objective reality ; whilst the others, purely subjective,
are devoid of any correspondent objectivity. Subjective
thought does not only introduce a notion of its own for-
jnation, substance, into the objective world, but it asserts,
as correspondent to this notion, an objective relation, an
objective connexion of things themselves, an existent

182 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

rationality. In this reference, subjective reason stands,
in a certain sort, as dominant over the objective world ;
for the relation of substantiality is not immediately de-
rived from the world of sense, — it is no product of sen-
sation and perception. On a position purely empirical
— and such is the position Locke himself assumes — it
was an inconsistency to allow substantiality an objective
validity. If the mind is in itself a dark empty room, a
blank sheet of paper; if its entire provision of objective
knowledge consists merely of the impressions made on it
by material things ; then the notion of substantiality must
be also declared a merely subjective conception, an arbi-
trary conjunction of ideas ; and the subject must be com-
pletely emptied and deprived of the last support on which
to found any claim of superiority to the world of matter.
This step in the direction of a self-consistent empiricism
was, in his critique of Causality, taken by Hume.

David Hume was born at Edinburgh in 1711. En-
gaged in his youth in the study of law, and then in mer-
cantile pursuits, he devoted himself, at a later period,
exclusively to history and philosophy. His first literary
attempt attracted scarcely any attention. His Essays, —
of which there eventually appeared, from 1742 to 1757,
five volumes, — experienced a more favourable reception.
Hume has discussed in these a variety of philosophical
subjects ; in the manner of a thoughtful, cultivated, and
polished man of the world ; to the consequent neglect of
any rigorous systematic connexion. After his appoint-
ment as librarian, at Edinburgh, in the year 1752, he
commenced his celebrated History of England. He was
afterwards Secretary of Legation at Paris, where he made
the acquaintance of Rousseau ; and in 1767 he became
Under-Secretary of State, an oflBce, however, which he
held only for a short time. His latter years were spent at
Edinburgh, in the enjoyment of a tranquil and contented
retirement. He died in 1776.

The middle-point of the philosophizing of JEume is his
^ritique of the notion of causality. Locke had already
expressed the thought that we owe the notion of sub-
stance to the custom of always seeing certain modes ta-
gether. This thought was taken up seriously by Hume.
How do we know, he asks, that two things stand to each
other in the relation of causality ? We know it neither a
priori, nor from experience : for knowledge a priori extend-
ing only to what is identical, and the effect being different

HUME. 183

from the cause, the former cannot be discovered in the lat-
ter ; and experience, again, exhibits to us only a setjuence
of two events in time. All our reasonings from experi-
ence, therefore, are founded solely on custom. Because
^we are accustomed to see that one thing follows another
in time, we conceive the idea that it mu8t follow, and
from it ; of a relation of succession we make a relation
of causality. Connexion in time is naturally something
different, however, from connexion in causality. ^In this
notion we exceed experience, then, and proceed to the
creation of ideas for which in strictness we have no autho-
rity! 1 What holds good of causahty holds good also of
all the other relations of necessity. We find we do pos-
sess other such notions, as, for example, that of power and
its realization. Let us ask how we obtain this idea, or the
idea of necessary connexion in general. Not possibly
through sensation, for external objects may show us indeed
simultaneous co-existence, but not necessary connexion.
Perhaps, then, through reflection ? It certainly seems, as
if we might get the idea of power from observing that the
organs of the body obey the volitions of the mind. But
since neither the means by which the mind acts on the
body are known to us, nor all the organs of the body yield
obedience to the mind, it follows that, even as regards a
knowledge of these operations, it is to experience that we
are driven ; and as experience again is, for its part, able
to exhibit only frequent co-existence, but no real con-
nexion, it results that we obtain the notion of power, as
that of all necessary connexion in general, only from being
accustomed to certain transitions on the part of our ideag^
All notions expressive of a relation of necessity, all sup-
posed cognitions of an objective connexion in things, rest
at last, consequently, only on the association of ideas.
From the denial of the notion of substantiality there fol-
lowed for Hume the denial of that also of the ego itself.^
Self, or the ego, did it really exist, would be substantial,
a persistent vehicle of inherent qualities. But as our
notion of substance is something merely subjective, with- 7
out any objective reality, it results that there is no cor-J
respondent reality for our notion of the ego either. The
self or ego is nothing else, in fact, than a complex of
numerous swiftly succeeding ideas, under which complex
we then suppose placed an imaginary substrate, named
by us soul, self, or ego. The self or ego, therefore, ^
rests wholly on an illusion. In the case of such pre-_/

1 84 HI ST OR Y OF PHIL OSOPH Y.

Buppositions, there cannot be any talk naturally of the
immortality of the soul. The soul being only a complex
of our ideas, necessarily ceases with these, and conse-
quently, therefore, with the movements of the body.

After these propositions, which represent the principal
thoughts of Hume, there is no call for any further argu-
mentation to prove that Hume's scepticism was but a
more consistent following out of Locke's empiricism. If
^^ we owe all our knowledge to perception of sense, then all
determinations of universality and necessity must, in
logical result, disappear ; for they are not contained in
sensation.

'XXSi.—Condillac.

TO carry out the empiricism of Locke into its ultimate
consequence, into sensualism and materialism, — this
is the task which has been assumed by the French. Though
grown on a soil of English principles, and very soon uni-
versally prevalent there, empiricism could not possibly
be developed amongst the English into the extreme form
which presently declared itself among the French, — that
is, into the complete destruction of all the foundations of
the moral and religious life. This last consequence was
not congenial to the national character of the English.
On the contrary, as early as the second half of the eigh-
teenth century, there appeared, in opposition not only to
the scepticism of Hume, but even to the empiricism of
Locke, that reaction which is named Scottish Philosophy
{Beid, 1704-1796, Beattie, Oswald, Dugald Stewart, 1753-
1828). The aim of this philosophy was to establish, in
contradistinction to the Lockian tabula rasa and the
Humian despair of any necessity of reason, certain prin-
ciples of truth innate or immanent in the subject ; and
this (in a genuinely English manner), as facts of experi-
ence, as facts of the moral instinct and healthy human
understanding (common sense) ; as an element empirically
so given, and discoverable by means of observation of
ourselves, and reflection on our ordinary consciousness.
In France, on the other hand, political and social circum-
stances had so shaped themselves in the course of the
eighteenth century, that we can recognise writings which
drew relentlessly the ultimate practical consequences of
the position, — systems, namely, of a materialistic theory

COXDILLAC. 1S5

f the World and of a deliberately reasoned egoistic mo-
rality,— only as natural results of the universal corruption.
The declaration of a great lady in regard to the system
oi Helvetius, that it only 6j>oke out the secret of everj--
benly, is, in this connexion, familiarly known.

The sensualism of the Abb6 de Condillac stands closest
to the empiricism of Locke. Condillac was bom at Gre-
noble in 1715. In his earliest writings an adherent of
the theory of Locke, he subsequently went further, and
endeavoured to make good a philosophical position of his
own, Made member of the French Academy in 176S, he
died in 1780. His collected writings, which bes])eak
moral earnestness and religious feeUng, compose twenty-
three volumes,

Condillac, in agreement with Locke, began from the
]>roposition, that all our knowledge springs from expe-
rience, Whust Locke, however, assumed two sources of
this em])irical knowledge, sensation and reflection, or ex-
ternal and internal sense, Condillac contended for the
reduction of both to one, of reflection to sensation. Re-
flection is for him equally sensation ; all mental processes,
even will and the combination of the ideas, are in his eyes
only modified sensations. The realization of this concep-
tion, the derivation of the various mental faculties from
external sense, — this constitutes the main interest and the
main matter of Condillac's philosophy. He endeavours
to demonstrate his leading idea by reference to an ima-
ginary statue, in which, — organized internally indeed like
a human being, but destitute at first of any ideas, — one
sense after another is conceived gradually to awake and
to fill the soul with the various impressions. Man as in-
debted for all his knowledge and for all his motives to
external sensation, appears, in this mode of \'iewing
him, quite on the footing of one of the lower animals.
In consistency, therefore, Condillac calls men perfect ani-
mals, and the other animals imperfect men. He stul
shrinks, however, from denial of the existence of God,
and equally from assertion of the materiality of the soul.
These, the ultimate consequences of sensualism, were
taken by others after him ; and they lie suÄciently on
the surface. For if sensualism maintains, that truth, or
what really is, can only be perceived by the senses, we
need but take this proposition objectively to have the
thesis of materialism : only what is sensuous is, there is
no being but material being.

186 IIISTOEY OF PHILOSOPHY.

XXXl.—IIelvetim.

THE moral consequences of the sensualistic position
were drawn by Helvetius. Let theoretic sensual-
ism declare, that all our knowledge is determined by
external sensation, then practical sensualism adds the ana-
logous proposition, that all our volition as well is deter-
mined by external sensation, by the requirements of sense.
The satisfaction of our sensuous desires was set up by
Helvetius accordingly as the principle of morals.

Helvetius was born at Paris in 1715. Appointed in his
twenty-third year to the post of a Farmer-General, he
found himself, at an early period of life, in possession of
an opulent income. Nevertheless, after a few years, he
resigned his place in consequence of the many unpleasant
complications in which it involved him. The study of
the writings of Locke decided his philosophical creed.
Helvetius wrote his famous book De V Esprit in the rural
retirement that followed the resignation of his post. It
appeared in 1758, and excited, both at home and abroad,
great, and often favourable attention, but brought him
also much bitter persecution, especially from the priests.
Helvetius miist have thought it fortunate, however, that
they were satisfied with attempting to crush the book.
The rural tranquillity in which he passed the later years
of his life was only internipted twice : once by a jour-
ney to Germany, and again by a voyage to England. He
died in 1771. His personal character was estimable, full
of good-nature and love to his fellows. In his post of
Farmer-General, he was benevolent to the poor, and
sternly opposed to the exactions of his subordinates. His
works are written with perspicuity and elegance.

Self-love, interest, says Helvetius, is the lever of all
our actions. Even our purely intellectual activities, our
desire of knowledge, our traffic in ideas, spring from the
love of self. But all self-love tends in the end only to
bodily enjoyment; All our actions, therefore, mental and
other, have no source or spur but the gratification of
sense. And in this there is already indicated where the
principle of morality is to be sought. It is absurd to
expect men to do the good for the sake of the good. This
is as little in their power as to will the bad for the sake
of the bad. If, then, morality is not to remain com-
pletely fruitless, it must return to its empirical source.

THE FliEXCH ILLUMIXATIOX. is7

and dare to proclaim as its principle tlie true principle of
i\\\ action, animal feelini:;, pleasure and pain, self-interest.
As therefore true legislation })rocure8 obedience to th«
laws by the stimulus of punishment and reward, by self-
interest ; 80 that only is the true moral principle which,
regarding the duties of mankiml as results of self-love,
demonstrates the general nature of what is forbidden ua
to be the producing of disgust, etc., in short, of pain.
If morality bring not men's interest into play, — if it re-
sist them, — then plainly it will be necessarily fruitless.

XXXII. — French Illumination and Materialism.

IT has been already remarked (xxx.), that the pushing
of empiricism to an extreme, as realized in France,
has a very close connexion with the general social and
political condition of the French people at the time that
precedes the Revolution. The struggle characteristic of
the middle ages, the external, dualistic relation to the
church, was continued in Catholic France to the confusion
and corruption of aU the interests of life. Men's minds
were demoralized everywhere, especially under the influ-
ence of a dissolute court ; the state was become an unre-
strained despotism ; the church had sunk into an equally
hypocritical and tyrannical hierarchy. All substance and
worth, then, having disappeared from the spiritual world,
there was left nothing but nature ; in the form, too, of
an un spiritualized mass, of matter ; and an object for
man only as it was subservient to his sensuous greeds
and needs. It is, however, not specially the extreme of
materialism that constitutes the characteristic of the
French illumination. The common character of the
so-called Philosophes of the eighteenth century in France,
is rather their tendency to oppose all the tyranny and
corruption that were then prevalent in morals, reli-
gion, and the state. They directed their polished and
sparkling, rather than strictly scientific critical polemic,
against the entire world of received opinions, of the tra-
ditional, the given, the positive. They endeavoured to
demonstrate the contradiction in which all that was estab-
lished in church and state stood to the irrefutable de-
mands of reason. "What was received and unquestioned^
this — if unable to justify its existence in the sight of
reason — they strove to shake in the belief of the world

188 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

at the same time that they vindicated for man, rational
man, the full consciousness of his native freedom. Truly
to aj)preciate the immeasurable merit of these men, we
must realize to ourselves the condition of things against
which their attacks were directed : the licentiousness of
a miserable court that demanded slavish obedience ; the
tyranny and hypocrisy of a priesthood rotten to the core,
that insisted on blind submission ; the degradation of a
disintegrated church that exacted veneration — in short,
an administration of the state, a dispensation of justice,
a condition of society that must revolt to the utmost
every intellectual principle, and every moral feeling of
man. To have exposed to hatred and contempt the
baseness and worthlessness of existing interests, sum-
moned the minds of men to indifference for the idols of
the world, and awakened them to a consciousness of their
autonomy — this, of these men, is the imperishable glory,

2. The most brilliant and influential spokesman of this
period is Voltaire (1694-1778). Not a professed philo-
sopher, but an infinitely versatile writer, and an unsur-
passed master of expression, he acted more powerfully
than any of the philosophers of the time on the whole
mode of thought of his age and nation. Voltaire was
not an atheist. On the contrary, he considered belief
in a Supreme Being so absolutely essential that he
said, if there were no God, it would be necessary to
invent one. As little did he deny the immortality of
the soul, though he frequently expressed doubts of it.
The atheistic materialism of a La Mettrie he looked upon
as mere stupidity. In these respects, then, he is far from
occupying the position of his philosophical successors.
On the ether hand his heart's hatred is to the positive of
religion, — the simply dictated. He regarded the destruc-
tion of hierarchical intolerance as his special mission, and
he left no stone unturned in order to accomplish this pas-
sionately cherished end. His indefatigable struggle
against all positive religion, by advancing information
generally, however^ essentially prepared the way for the
later opponents of spiritualism.

3. Markedly more sceptical is the relation of the
Encyclopcedists to the principles and presuppositions of
spiritualism. The philosophical Encyclopsedia originated
by Diderot (1713-1784), and edited by him in conjunction
with D'Alembert, is a remarkable monument of the
spirit which prevailed in France in the generation before

THE FREXCII ILLUMIXATIOX. ISO

the Revoluti(ni. It was the pritlo of France at that time,
because it spoke ojit, in a brilliant, xmiversally accessible
form, its own inmost convictions. With the keenest wit, it
reasoned out of the state law, out of morality free-will, out
of nature God, and all this only in interrupted, and for the
most part half-apprehensive hints. In the otherwritings of
Diderot we find considerable pliilosophical talent combined
with a certain depth of earnestness. Still his philosophi-
cal views cannot be easily assigned or accurately deter-
mined ; for both they themselves were of very gradual
growth, and Diderot trusted himself to express them not
without accommodation and reserve. On the whole, how-
ever, his mode of thought ap})roached, in the course of its
development, nearer and nearer to the extreme of the
prevailing philosophical tendency. A deist in his earlier
writings, the drift of those subsequently produced amounts
to the belief that all is God. At first a defender of the
immateriality and immortality of the soul, he perempto-
rily declares at last, that only the genus endures, that in-
dividuals pass, and that immortality is nothing but life
in the remembrance of posterity. The consequent extreme
of materialism, Diderot, however, refused to accept :
from that he was rescued by his moral earnestness.

4. The last word of materialism, nevertheless, was, with
unhesitating hardihood, spoken out by Diderot's contem-
porary, the physician La Mettrie (1709-1751). Anything
spiritual, namely, is now a delusion, and physical enjoy-
ment is the chief end of man. As for belief in a God in
the first place, La Mettrie pronounces it equally ground-
less and profitless. The world will never be happy till
Atheism is universal. Only then shall we have no more
religious wars ; only then will those fearfulest of fighting
men, the theologians, disappear, and leave the world they
have poisoned to return to itself. As for the soul, there
can be no philosophy but materialism. All the observa-
tions and experiments of the greatest physicians and philo-
sophers pronounce for this. Soul is nothing but an
empty name, which gets sense only when understood as
that part of the body that thinks. This is the brain,
which has its fibres of cogitation, as the legs have their
muscles of motion. That man has the advantage of the
lower animals, is owing, firstly, to the organization of his
brain, and, secondly, to the education it receives. Man,
otherwise, is an animal like the rest, — in many respects
inferior to them. Immortality is an absurdity. The

190 HISTORY OF PIIILOSOPIIY.

soul, aa a part of the body, goes with the body. At
death all is 'up,' la farce estjouee! Moral : let us enjoy
while we can, and never throw a chance away.

5. What La Mettrie threw out with levity and a grin,
the Systeme, de la Nature, as the representative book of
philosophical materialism, endeavoured to establish with
the seriousness and precision of science, — the doctrine,
namely, that nothing exists but matter, and mind is either
naught, or only a finer matter.

The SysUme de la Nature appeared pseudonymously in
London, in the year 1770, under the name of the deceased
Mirabaud, secretary of the Academy. Without doubt it
originated in the circle of beaux esprits who frequented
the table of Baron Holbach, and took its tone from Dide-
rot, Grimm, and others. Whether it was Holbach him-
self, or his domestic tutor Lagrange, or several together,
who wrote the work, it is impossible now to decide. The
book is not a French book : the writing is tame and
tedious.

There is nowhere anything, says the Systeme de la
Nature, but matter and motion. Both are inseparably
combined. When matter is at rest, it is at rest only as
prevented from moving ; it is not itself a dead mass.
There are two sorts of motion, attraction and repulsion.
From these two we have the various other motions, and
from these, again, the various combinations, and so, con-
sequently, the entire multiplicity, of things. The laws
according to which these actions take place are eternal
and immutable. The most important results are these : —
{a.) The materiality of man : man is no equivoque, as is
erroneously supposed, of mind and matter. K we ask, for
instance, what then is this thing that is called mind, the
usual answer is, that the most accurate philosophical in-
vestigations demonstrate the motive principle in man to
be a substance which, in its essence, is incomprehensible
indeed, but which is known, for all that, to be indivis-
ible, unextended, invisible, etc. But how are we to find
anything definite or conceivable in a being that is but a
negation of all that constitutes knowledge — a being, the
very idea of which is but the absence of aU idea what-
ever ? Moreover, how is it explicable, on the supposition
in view, that a being, not material, itself, can act on, and
give movement to, beings which are material, although
plainly there can exist no point of contact between them ?
The truth is, that those who distinguish their soul from

THE FEEXCII ILL UM IX A TION. 101

their body, only distinguish tlieir brain from tlieir
body. Thought is only a modification of the brain,
as M'ill is but another modification of the same corporeal
organ. (6.) On a ])ar with this duplication of himself
into soul and body, there is in man another chimera —
belief in the existence of a God. This belief has its origin,
like the assumption of a soul, in a false distinction of mind
from matter, in an unwarrantable doubling of nature.
Man referred the evils he experienced, and of which he
was unable to detect the natural causes, to a God, a God
which he had fabled for himself. Fear, suflFering, igno-
rance,— these, then, are the sources of our first ideas of a
God. We tremble, because our forefathers, thousands of
years ago, trembled before us. This is not a circumstance
to create any favourable pre-judgment. But it is not
only the cruder conception of God that is worthless, the
more elaborate theological theory is equally so, for it ex-
plains not one single phenomenon of nature. It is full,
too, of absurdities, for in ascribing moral attributes to
God, it humanizes him, and yet, by means of a mass of
negative attributes, it would, at the very same moment,
distinguish him, and in the most absolute manner, from
all other beings. The true system, the system of nature,
is consequently Atheism. Such a creed requires, on the
one side, education, and, on the other, courage ; for it is
not the possession as yet of all, nor even of many. If
by atheist there is understood a man who believes only
in dead matter, or if by God, the moving power in nature,
then, certainly, a single Atheist cannot possibly exist,
unless he were a fool. But if by Atheist is understood
one that denies the existence of an immaterial being, of
a being whose imaginary qualities can only disturb man-
kind, then, in that sense, there are Atheists, and there
would be still more of them, were a sound understand-
ing general, and did a true idea of nature more com-
monly obtain. But Atheism being truth, it must be
spread. There are many, it is true, who having rescued
themselves from the yoke of religion, stul believe in its
necessity for the herd, in order to keep it in bounds.
But this is nothing else than to poison a man to prevent
him from abusing his gifts. Any deism is necessarily
but a direct step to superstition, for pure deism is a
position not possibly tenable, (c.) With such presupposi-
tions there can be no talk of the immortality and free-
will of man. Man is not different from the other things

192 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

of nature. Like them, he is a link in the indissoluble
chain, a blind tool in tlie hands of necessity. Did any-
thing possess the ability to move itself, that is, to produce
a motion not referable to any other cause, it would have
power to bring to a stop the motion of the universe ; but
that is impossible, for the universe is an infinite series of ne-
cessary motions, which continue and propagate themselves
to all eternity. The assumption of individual immortality
is a nonsensical hypothesis. For to maintain that the soul
endures after the destruction of the body, is to maintain
that a function may remain when its organ has disap-
peared. Other immortality there is none than that of
fame in the future, {d.) The results, practically, of the
theory, afibrd a powerful support to the system of nature ;
and the utility of a theory is always the best criterion of
its truth. Whilst the ideas of theologians can only dis-
quiet and torment man, the system of nature relieves him
from all such anxieties, teaches him to enjoy the present,
and furnishes him with that apathy for the compliant
bearing of his lot, which everybody must esteem a hap])i-
ness. Morality, to be practical, must be founded on self-
love, on interest ; it must be able to show the individual
in what his well-understood advantage lies. That man
who follows his own interest so that other men for their
interest must contribute to his, is a good man. A system
of self-interest, then, promotes the union of mankind
mutually, and consequently also true morality.

This consistent dogmatic materialism of the Systeme de
la Nature is the utmost extreme of the empirical ten-
dency, and closes, consequently, the systems of abstract
realism that began with Locke. The derivation and ex-
planation of the ideal from and by the material world,
initiated by Locke, have terminated in materialism, in
the reduction of the spiritual to the material principle,
in the denial of spirit generally. We have now, before
going further to consider, as already intimated (xxvii.),
the other or idealistic series which runs parallel with
the realistic one. ' And at its head is Leibnitz.

XXXIIL — Leibnitz.

IF empiricism was animated by a desire to subordinate
mind to matter, to materialize mind, idealism will
seek, on the contrary, to spiritualize matter, or so to con-

LEIBNITZ. 193

striie the idea of spirit, that matter shall bo subsumed
mulor it. If to the former, spirit was nothing but a
finer matter, matter to the latter will prove itself, cou-
versel)', only erassilied spirit (or, as Leibnitz expresses
it, only ' confused ideation '). The one, indeed, was, iu
logical consistency, driven to the proposition, There are
only material things ; the other, again (in Leibnitz and
Berkeley), will take stand by the opposed result. There
are only spirits (souls), and the thoughts of spirits (ideas).
For the one-sided realistic stand-point, material things
were the veritable substantial element ; while, contrari-
wise, for the correspondent realistic stand-point, this
element will be only sjjiritual beings, egos. Spirit
was to one-sided realism in itself empty, a tabula rasa,
dependent on the external world for its entire provision.
One-sided idealism, on the contrary, will strive to the
proposition, That nothing can come into the soul, that is
not at least preformed within it, That all its knowledge
must be derivative from itself. To the former mode of
view, knowledge was a passive relation ; to the latter, it
will appear an active one. Lastly, if abstract realism pre-
fer to explain the becoming and eventuality of nature
by real grounds, or mechanically {UHomme Machine
is the title of a work by La Mettrie), abstract idealism
will seek its explanation, ex contrario, in ideal grounds,
or teleologically. Or if the former asked, by predilection,
for efficient causes, and often even ridicided the demand
for final causes, it will be to these that the latter will
direct its principal aim. The notion of design, in short,
the teleological harmony of all things (pre-established
harmony), vnW. now be looked to for the means of union
between spirit and matter, between thinking and being.
In this way the stand-point of the philosophy of Leib-
nitz may be briefly characterized.

Gottfried Wilhelm Leibnitz was bom in 1646 at Leipsic,
where his father held a professor's chair. Having chosen
Law for his profession, he entered the university in 1661 ;
he defended, in 1663, for the degree of Doctor of Philo-
sophy, his dissertation De Principio Lndividui (a charac-
teristic thesis when we regard his subsequent philosophiz-
ing) ; thereafter he went to Jena, later to Altdorf, where
he took the degree of Doctor of Laws. A chair of juris-
prudence offered him in Altdorf he declined. His further
career is an erratic, busy life of movement, chiefly at
courts, where, as an accomplished courtier, he was em-

194 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY,

ployed in the most multiform affairs, diplomatic and other.
In the year 1672 he went to Paris, charged in effect
with a commission to persuade Louis Xiv. to attempt
the conquest of Egypt, and so divert that monarch's
dangerous military inclinations from Germany. From
Paris he passed to London ; thence, in the capacity of
councillor and librarian of the learned Catholic duke,
John Frederic, to Hanover, where he spent the most of
his remaining life, not without the interniption, how-
ever, of numerous journeys to Vienna, Berlin, etc. He
stood on terms of intimacy with the Prussian Queen,
Sophia Charlotte, a talented lady who gathered around
her a circle of the most eminent savants of the period,
and for whom Leibnitz, at her own instigation, had
xmdertaken the composition of his Theodicee. His pro-
posal for the institution of an academy in Berlin obtained
effect in 1700, and he became its first president.
Similar proposals in regard to Dresden and Vienna were
without result. By the Emperor Charles vi., he was
made a member of the imperial aulic coimcil in 1711, and
raised to the rank of Baron. Soon afterwards he made
a considerable stay at Vienna, where, at the suggestion
of Prince Eugene, he composed his Monadologie. He
died in 1716. Leibnitz, after Aristotle, is the poly-
math of the greatest genius that ever lived. He united
the greatest, the most penetrating power of intellect
with the richest and most extensive erudition. Ger-
many has a special call to be proud of him, for, after
Jacob Böhm, he is the first important philosopher whom
we Germans can claim. Through him philosophy was
naturalized among us. Unfortunately, partly the mul-
tiplicity of his engagements and literary undertakings,
partly his wandering way of life, prevented him from ac-
complishing any connected exposition of his philosophy
as a whole. His views are chiefly set out only in short
occasional papers, or in letters, and generally in French.
For this reason an inwardly coherent summary of his
philosophy is by no means easy, although none of his
opinions can be said to be isolated from the rest, but all
of them stand in suflBciently exact connexion with each
other. The following are the main points of view : —

1. The System of Monads. — The fundamental charac-
teristic of the teaching of Leibnitz is its difference from
that of Spinoza. Spinoza had made the one universal
substance the single positive element in existence. Leib-

LEIBNITZ. 190

nitz, too, takes the notion of substance for the founda-
tion of his jiliilosophy, but ho cleliues it differently ;
coneeiviug substance as eminently the living activity, the
working force, and adducing as example of this force a
bent bow, which asserts its i)ower so soon as all external
obstacles are withdrawn. That active force constitutes
the quality of substance, is a i)ro})Osition to which Leib-
nitz always returns, and with which the other elements
of his philosophy most intimately cohere. This is appli-
cable at once to the two fiu'ther determinations of sub-
stance (also quite opposed to the theory of Spinoza),
firstly, that substance is individual, a monad, and,
secondly, that there is a jdurality of monads. Substance,
in exercising an activity similar to that of an elastic body,
is essentially an excludent power, repulsion : but what
excludes others from itself is a personality, an individu-
ality or individuunif a monad. But this involves the
second consideration, that of the jilurality of the monads.
It is impossible for one monad to exist, unless others
exist The notion of an individuum postulates individua,
which, as excluded from it, stand over against it In
antithesis to the philosophy of Spinoza, therefore, the
fundamental thesis of that of Leibnitz is this : there is a
plurality of monads which constitutes the element of all
reality, the fundamental being of the whole physical and
spiritual universe.

2. The Exacter Specification of the Monads is
the next consideration. The monads of Leibnitz are, in
general, similar to the Greek atoms. Like the latter, they
are punctual unities, insusceptible of influence from with-
out, and indestructible by any external power. If simi-
lar, they are also, however, dissimilar, and in important
characteristics. Firstly, the atoms are not distinguished
from one another ; they are qualitatively alike : the
monads, on the other hand, are qualitatively different ;
each is a special world apart ; none is like the other.
To Leibnitz, no two things in the world are quite alike.
Secondly, the atoms, as extended, are divisible ; the
monads, on the contrary, are actual (indivisible) points,
metaphysical points. In order not to be repelled by this
proposition (for it is natural to object that no aggregate
of inextended things, like the monads, can ever account
for extended things), it is necessary for us to recollect
that Leibnitz regards space, not as real, but only as con-
fused subjective conception. Thirdly, the monad is a

196 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

living spiritual being, a soul. In the atomists there is
nothing whatever of this idea ; but with Leibnitz it plays
a very important part. Everywhere in the world, there
is to Leibnitz life, living individuality, and living con-
nexion of individualities. The monads are not dead, as
mere extended matter is ; they are self-subsistent; self-
identical, and indeterminable from without. Considered
(a.) in themselves, however, they are to be thought as
centres of living activity, living mutation. As the
human soul, a monad of elevated rank, is never, even
when unconscious, free from the action of at least ob-
scure thought and will, so every other monad continually
undergoes a variety of modifications or conditions of
being, correspondent to its own proper quality. Every-
where there is movement, nowhere is there dead rest.
And (&.) as it is with the human soul, which sympathizes
with all the varying states of nature, which mirrors the
universe, so it is with the monads universally. Each —
and they are infinitely numerous — is also a mirror, a
centre of the universe, a microcosm : everything that is
or happens is reflected in each, but by its own spontane-
ous power, through which it holds ideally in itself, as if
in germ, the totality of things. By him, then, who shall
look near enough, all that in the whole huge universe
happens, has happened, or wiU happen, may, in each in-
dividual monad, be, as it were, read. This livingness of
the monads themselves, and of their relation to the rest
of the world, is more particularly characterized by Leib-
nitz in this way, that he represents the life of the monads
to consist in a continuous sequence of perceptions, that
is, of dimmer or clearer ideas of their own states, and of
those of all the rest ; the monads proceed from percep-
tion to perception ; aU, consequently, are souls ; and that
constitutes the perfection of the world.

3. The pre-established Harmony. — The universe,
then, is but sum of the monads. Everything, or every-
thing that is composite, is an aggregate of monads.
Every body is an organism, not a single substance but a
complex of substances, a plurality of monads, just as a
machine, even in its minutest parts, consists of machines.
Leibnitz compares bodies to a fish-pond, the component
parts of which live, though it cannot be said that the
pond itself lives. The usual conception of things is thus
completely turned upside down ; from the point of view
of the monadology, it is not the body, the aggregate,

LEIBNITZ. 197

lliat is the substantial element, but its constituent parts.
There is no such thing as matter in the vulgar sense of in-
sensible extension. Hom' tlien are we to think the inner
connexion of the universe ? In the following manner.
Every monad is a percipient being, but each is different
from each. This difference, plainly, must be essentially
a difference of perception ; there must be as many various
degrees of perception as there are monads, and these de-
grees may oe arranged in stages. A main distinguishing
difference is that of the more confused and the more dis-
tinct cognition. A monad of the lowest rank {une monade
toute nue), is one that just conceives and no more, that
has its place, that is, on the stage of the most confused
cognition. Leibnitz compares this state to a swoon, or to
our condition in a dreamless sleep, in which we are not
indeed without ideas (else we should have none on
awaking), but in which the ideas neutralize themselves
by their own number, and never attain to consciousness.
This is the stage of inorganic nature, on which the life of
the monads expresses itself only in the form of motion.
Those are higher monads in which thoiight is formative
vitality, but still without consciousness. This is the stage
of plants. It is a further advance in the life of the
monads when they attain to sensation and memory,
which is the case in the animal world. Whilst the in-
ferior monads only sleep, the animal monads dream.
When the soul rises to reason and reflection it is named
spirit. The distinction of the monads, then, is that,
though each mirrors the whole universe and the same
universe, each at the same time mirrors it differently, the
one less, and the other more perfectly. Each contains
the entire universe, entire infinitude within itself. Each,
then, resembles God in this, or is a parvus in suo genere
deus. The difference is this onlj% that God knows all
"with perfect distinctness, whOe the monads perceive with
less or more confusion. The limitation of any one monad,
then, consists not in its possessing less than any other, or
even than God, but in its possessing the common fund in a
more imperfect manner, inasmuch as it attains not to a dis-
tinct knowledge of all. So conceived, the universe affords
lis a spectacle, as well of the greatest possible unity, as of
the greatest possible variety ; for if each monad mirrors the
same universe, each also mirrors it differently. But this is
-a spectacle of the greatest possible perfection, or of absolute
harmony. For variety in unity is harmony. In another

1 98 HI ST OR Y OF PHILOSOPH Y.

respect also the universe is a system of harmony. Since
the monads act not on one another, and each follows the
laws of its own being, there is a risk of the inner agree-
ment of the universe being disturbed. In what manner
is this risk precluded ? In this way, that each monad
stands in living relation to the whole universe and the
same universe, or that the universe and the life of the
universe are completely reflected in each. In conse-
quence of this reciprocal correspondency of their percep-
tions, the alterations of all the monads are mutually
parallel ; and precisely in this (as pre-established by God)
consists the harmony of the all.

4, What is the relation of God now to the monads ?
What part does the notion of Ood play in the system of
Leibnitz ? One certainly, without much to do. In strict
consistency, Leibnitz ought not to have entertained any
question of Theism ; for in his system the harmony of
the whole must be regarded as having taken the place of
God. He usually designates God as the suflBcient reason
(la raison süffisante) of all the monads. But he commonly
regards the final cause of a thing as its sufficient reason.
Leibnitz, then, on this question, is not far from identify-
ing God with the absolute final cause. At other times he
designates God as the primitive simple substance, or as
the single primitive unity, or again as pure immaterial
actuality, actus pur us (the actuality of the monads, on
the other hand, is matter, an actuality — a nisus, appetitio
— not in pure freedom, but limited, obstructed, by a prin-
ciple of passive resistance to the movement of sponta-
neity), or even again as monad (this however in evident
contradiction to his other specifications). It was a hard
matter for Leibnitz to bring — without abandoning the
presuppositions of both, — his monadology and his Theism
into unison. If he assume the substantiality of the
monads, he runs the risk of losing their dependence on
God, and in the opposite case, he relapses into Spino-
zism.

5. The Eelation of Sotjl and Body admits of a par-
ticular explanation with reference to the pre-established
harmony. On the presuppositions of the Monadologie,
this relation might easily appear enigmatic. If one
monad cannot act on another, how is it possible for the
soul to act on the body, to put it in motion, to guide it
in motion ? The pre-established harmony solves this
problem. Soul and body certainly do follow, each in

LEIBNITZ. 199

independence of the other, the laws of its own being, —
the body, laws that are mechanical ; the soul, laws tliat
are cuds. But God has instituted so harmonious an
a<;reement of the two factors, so complete a ])aralleli8m
of both functions, tliat, in point of fact, there is a perfect
unity of soul and body. There are, says Leibnitz, three
views of the relation between soul and body. The first,
the usual one, assumes a mutual action of both. This
^^ew is untenable ; for between spirit and matter there
can be no reciprocity. The second, that of occasional-
ism (XXV. 1), attributes this reciprocity to the continual
assistance of God ; but that is as much as to make God
a Deus ex machina. There remains, then, for the solu-
tion of the problem only the assumption of a pre-estab-
lished harmony. Leibnitz illustrates these three views
by the following example. Let us suppose two watches,
the hands of which alwaj'S indicate exactly the same
time. This agreement may be explained, firstly, by the
assumption of an actual union between the hands of both
watches, in such a manner that the hands of the one
draw those of the other along with tliem (the usual
view) ; secondly, by assuming that a watchmaker always
sets the one watch by the other (the occasionalistic view) ;
and finally, by a third assumption, that both watches
possess so complete a mechanism, that each, though in
perfect independence, goes also in perfect agreement
with the other (the pre-established harmony). That the
soul is immortal (indestructible), follows of itseK from
the nature of the theory. Properly there is no such
thing as death. What is called death consists only in
the loss to the soul of a part of the monads which con-
stituted the machine of its body, at the same time that
the living principle returns to a condition similar to that
which it possessed before it ajipeared on the theatre of
the world.

6. On the Theory of Knowledge the consequences
of the Monadologie have a very important bearing. As,
with reference to ontology, the philosophy of Leibnitz is
conditioned by its opposition to Spinozism, so with
reference to the theory of cognition, it is conditioned by
its opposition to the empiricism of Locke. Locke's
inquiry into the human understanding interested Leib-
nitz without satisfying him ; and, in his Nouveavx Essai-^,
he set on foot, therefore, a counter inquiry, in which he
was led to defend innate ideas. Bub Leibnitz freed thi>i

200 HIS TOR Y OF PHILOSO PH Y.

hypothesis from the imperfect conception of it which had
justified the objections of Locke. Innate ideas are not
to be supposed expliciter and consciously, but only im-
pliciter and potentially, contained in the soul. The soul
has power to bring them into existence out of its own
self. All thoughts are properly innate : they come not
into the soul from without, but are produced by it from
its own self. An external influence on the soul is incap-
able of being thought ; even for the sensations of sense,
it is not in want of any outer things. If Locke compares
the soul to a blank sheet of paper, Leibnitz, for his part,
compares it to a block of marble in which the veins pre-
figure the shape of the statue. The usual contrast
between rational and empirical knowledge shrinks for
Leibnitz, therefore, into the graduated difference- of less
or more distinctness. Amongst the innate theoretical
ideas, two, as principles of all cognition and of all
reasoning, occupy for Leibnitz the first rank, — the pro-
position of contradiction {principium contradictionis), and
the proposition of the suflScient reason {principium rationis
sußcientis). To these, as a proposition of the second
rank, he adds the principium indiscernibilium, or the pro-
position that there are not in nature two things per-
fectly alike.

7. The theological opinions of Leibnitz are expressed
at fullest in his Theodicie. This, however, is his
weakest book, and stands only in a very loose connexion
with his remaining philosophy. Originating in the re-
quest of a lady, it belies this origin neither in its
form nor in its matter. Not in its form, for in its striv-
ing to popularity of statement it becomes diflfuse and
unscientific. Not in its matter, for it carries further its
accommodation to the positive dogma and the presuppo-
sitions of theology than the scientific principles of the
system permit. Leibnitz discusses in this work the rela-
tion of God to the world, in order to demonstrate design
in this relation, and vindicate God from the imputation
of having, in his works, done anything without purpose,
or against reason. Why has the world precisely tins
form ? God surely might have made it quite different
from what it is. Without doubt, Leibnitz replies, God
saw the possibility of infinite worlds ; but out of them
aU he chose this. This is the famous doctrine of a best
of all possible worlds, according to which any more per-
fect world than the existent world is impossible. But

BURKE LEV. 201

how, then ? Does not the existence of evil contradict
tliis ? In answer to this ohjection, Leibnitz distinguishes
evil into three sorts, — into ineta})hysical evil, physical
evil, and moral evil. Metaphysical evil, or the imperfec-
tion and tinitude of things, is as inseparable from finite
existence, and therefore unconditionally willed by God,
necessary. Physical evil (pain, etc.), is certainly not un-
conditionally willed by God, but only conditionaUy, as in
the form of punishment, or of corrective. Moral evil, or
the bad, can, on the contrary, not be willed by God. To
explain its existence, then, and remove its apparent con-
tradiction to the notion of God, Leibnitz tries several
shifts. He says, at one time, that the bad is only per-
mitted by God as a conditio sine qua nan, for without the
bad there were no free will, and without free will there
were no virtue. At another time he reduces moral to
metaphysical evil. The bad, he says, is not anything
real ; it is only absence of perfection, negation, limita-
tion : it plays the same part as shading in a painting, or
dissonance in music, neither of which lessens the perfection
present, but enhances it by contrast. At another time,
again, he distinguishes between what is material and what
fonnal in an act that is bad : the material element of sin,
or the power to act, comes from God ; but the formal
element, or what is bad in the act, belongs to man, is
the result of his limitation : or, as Leibnitz sometimes ex-
presses it, of his eternal self-predestination. In no case
is the harmony of the imiverse disturbed by the bad.

These are the fundamental ideas of the philosophy of
Leibnitz. The preceding exposition will have substan-
tiated the general summary which heads the section.

XXKIY.— Berkeley.

IDEALISM in Leibnitz has not yet reached its ultimate
extreme. On the one hand, indeed, space, motion,
material things, were to him phenomena that existed
only in confused perception ; but, on the other hand, the
existence of the material world was not directly denied
by him ; rather, on the contrary, its essential reality was
acknowledged in the very conception of the world of
monads. The world of sense is supposed to possess in
the monads its fixed and substantial foundation. And
thus, then, Leibnitz, idealist though he be, has not yet

202 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

quite broken with realism. To have declared corporeal
existences mere phenomena, mere subjective perceptions
or conceptions without foundation of objective reality, or,
in other words, entirely to have denied the reality of an
objective world of sense, — this would have been the ulti-
mate consequence of a perfectly pure idealism. This
consequence — the idealistic counterpart of the realistic
extreme, materialism — was taken by Oeorge Berkeley
(b. in Ireland 1685, made bishop 1734, d. 1753). We
must therefore rank him — as completer of idealism — in
the same series as Leibnitz, although he stands in no
external connexion with the latter, but is related rather
to the empiricism of Locke.

Our sensations, says Berkeley, are altogether subjec-
tive. "When we believe ourselves to feel or perceive in-
dependent external objects, that is an error : what we
so feel and perceive are only our sensations and percep-
tions themselves. It is evident, for example, that neither
the distance, nor the size and form of objects are, pro-
perly, through the sensations of sense seen : these quali-
ties we infer rather in consequence of having experienced
that a certain sensation of sight is attended by cer-
tain sensations of touch. What we see are only colours,
light, dark, etc., and it is therefore altogether untrue to
say thayfc we see and feel one and the same thing. In the
case, then, ot the very sensations to which we attach the
most specially objective character, we are still within our-
selves. The proper objects of our mind are only our own
aflfections, and all objective ideas, therefore, are but our
own sensations. An idea can just as little as a sensation
exist apart from the subject of it. What are called things
consequently exist only in our percipient mind : their
esse is a mere percipi. Almost all philosophers are mis-
led by the fundamental error of conceiving material things
to exist apart from the mind that perceives them, and of
failing to see that things are only something mental. How
could material things possibly produce anything so utterly
different from themselves as sensations and perceptions ?
There exists not, then, any material external world :
only spirits exist, thinking beings whose nature consists of
conception and volition. But whence then do we receive
our sensations, which come to us without our help, which
are not products of our own will, like the forms of phan-
tasy ? We receive them from a spirit superior to our own
(for only a spirit were able to produce ideas in us), we

WOLFF. 203

receive tlicin from Cod. God, tlien, gives ua the ideas ;
but it were a contradiction for a being to communicate
ideas and yet have none : tho ideas consequently, whicli
we receive from God, exist in God. In God they may be
caUed archetypes, in us eetypes. This theory, according
to Herkeley, nevertheless, does not deny to objects a
reality independent of us ; it denies only the possibility
of their existing anywhere but in a mind. Instead,
therefore, of speaking of a connected nature in which tlie
sun (say) were the cause of heat, etc., we ought to ex-
press ourselves with accuracy thus : through the visual
sensation, God announces to us that we shall soon expe-
rience a tactual one of heat. By nature we must under-
stand, therefore, only the succession or co-existence of
ideas ; by laws of nature, again, the constant order in
whicli they accompany or follow one another, that is,
the laws of their associations. This consistent pure
idealism is, in its complete denial of matter in the strict
sense, the surest way, according to Berkeley, of destroy-
ing scepticism and atheism.

XXXV.— Woff.

THE idealism of Berkeley remained naturally with-
out any further development. The philosophy of
Leibnitz, on the other hand, found continuation and re-
arrangement at the hands of Christian Wolff (b. 1679 at
Breslau ; removed, by a cabinet-order of Nov. 8, 1723,
from his chair of philosophy at Halle, after a long course
of disagreement with the theological professors there,
because the doctrines he taught were opposed to the
revealed truth of the Word of God, and required, under
penalty of the halter, to quit the Prussian territory within
forty-eight hours ; then Professor in Marburg, recalled
by Frederic ii. immediately on his accession to the throne ;
subsequently raised to the rank of Baron of the Empire ;
d. 1754). In his main thoughts (with omission, it is true,
of the bolder ideas of his predecessor) he adhered to the
philosophy of Leibnitz, — an adhesion which he himself
admits, though he resists the identification of his philo-
sophy with that of Leibnitz, and rejects the name Philo-
Sophia Leibnitio -Woißana, originated by his disciple
Bilfinger. Wolff's historical merit is threefold. He was
the first, in especial, to claim again, in the name of philo-

204 HISTORY OF PIIILOSOPJIY,

sophy, the entire field of knowledge — the first wlio at-
tempted to construct again a systematic whole of doc-
trine, an encyclopedia of philosophy in the highest sense
of the word. If he has not indeed contributed much
new material to the work, he has at least skilfully availed
himself of that already provided to his hand, and ar-
ranged it with a certain architectonic spirit. Secoödly,
he again made philosophical method as such an object of
attention. His own method, indeed, as the mathemati-
cal (mathematico-syllogistic) method recommended by
Leibnitz, is a method quite external to the matter ; but
even this platitudinizing formalism (for example, the
eighth theorem in Wolffs Elements of Architecture runs
thus : * A window must be wide enough to allow two
persons to place themselves conveniently at it,' a theo-
rem which is then proved thus : ' It is a common custom
to place one's-self at a window, and look from it in com-
pany with another person. As now it is the duty of the
architect to consult in all respects the intentions of the
builder (Sect. 1), he will necessarily make the window
wide enough to allow two persons to place themselves
conveniently at it — q. e. c^,'), even this formalism pos-
sesses the advantage of rendering philosophical mat-
ter more readily intelligible. "Wolff, finally, first taught
philosophy to speak German, an accomplishment which
it has never since unlearned. To him (after Leibnitz, to
whom the first impulse is due) belongs the merit of hav-
ing for ever raised the German language into the organ
of philosophy.

As regards the matter and scientific classification of the
Wolfian philosophy, the following remarks may suffice.
"Wolff defines philosophy to be the science of the possible,
as such. Possible is what involves no contradiction.
"Wolff defends this definition from the reproach of assump-
tion. He does not pretend by it, he says, that he or any
philosopher knows all that is possible. He means by it
only to claim for philosophy the whole field of human
knowledge j and he thinks it always better, in defining
philosophy, to have in view the highest perfection of
which it is capable, however much it may, in actuality,
fall short of it. Of what does this science of the possible
consist ? "Wolff, relying on the empirical fact, that there
are in us two faculties, one of cognition and another of
volition, divides philosophy into two great branches,
into theoretical philosophy (an expression, however.

WOLFF. 205

vhicb is first employed by his disciples) or metaphysics,
aud into j)ractical philosojihy. Lo^ic precedes both as
I)ropa'ileutical of the study of ])hilosophy iu general
Metaphysics, again, are subdivided into {a.) Ontology,
(b.) Cosmology, (c.) Psychology, (d.) Natural Theology ;
while the subdivisions of practical philosophy are
(a.) Ethics (the object of which is man as man), (b.) Eco-
nomics (the object of which is man as member of the
family), and (c) Politics (the object of which is man as
member of the state).

Ontolcxji/, then, is the first part of meta})hysics. It
treats of what are now called categories, of those radical
notions of thought which as applicable to all objects,
must be first investigated. Aristotle was the first to pro-
pose a table of such principles, but he had got at his
categories only emi)irically. Nor does it succeed much
better with the ontology of WolflF, which looks like a
])hilosophical vocabulary. At the top of it Wolff places
the proposition of contradiction : the same thing cannot
at once be and not be. The notion of possibility comes
next. Possible is what involves no contradiction. That
is necessary, the contrary of which is a contradiction j
that contingent, the contrary of which is equally possible.
All that is possible, though only imaginary, is something ;
while whatever neither is, nor is possible, is nothing.
When one thing is made up of many things, the former
is a whole, the latter are parts. The magnitude of any-
thing lies iu the number of its parts. If one thing A im-
plies something that renders it intelligible why another
thing B is, then that in A that renders B intelligible is
the ground of B, The whole A that contains the ground
is a cause. What contains the ground of its other quali-
ties is the principle (nature) of the thing. Space is the
order of things that are together ; place the special man-
ner in which one thing exists simultaneously with all
others. Motion is change of place. Time is the order
of what is successive, etc. (b.) Cosmology. — Wolff de-
fines the world to be a series of mutable things which
exist beside and follow after one another, but as a whole
are so connected with one another that the one always
contains the ground of the other. Things are connected
together either in space or time. The world, by reason
of this universal connexion, is one, a compound. The
mode of composition constitutes the nature of the world.
This mode is incapable of change. Ingredients can

206 HISTORY OF PIIILOSOPJIY.

neither be added to it, nor taken from it. All altera-
tions in the world must arise from its own nature. In
this reference the world is a machine. Events in the
world are only hypothetically necessary, so far, that is,
as those that preceded them have been so and so ; they
are contingent, so far as the world might have been con-
stituted dififerently. As regards the question whether
the world has a beginning in time, Wolff vacillates. As
God is independent of time, the world again eternally in
time, the latter cannot be eternal in the same manner as
God. Neither space nor time is to Wolff anything sub-
stantial. A body is what is composed of matter, and
possesses moving force. The forces of a body are named
collectively its nature, and the sum of all beings is nature
in general. What has its ground in the nature of the
world, is natural ; what not, is supernatural, or a miracle.
Wolff treats, lastly, of the perfection and imperfection of
the world. The perfection of the world lies in this, that
all things, whether simultaneous or successive, mutually
agree. But as everything has its own special rules, each
individual must dispense with as much perfection as is
necessary to the symmetry of the whole, (c.) Rational
psychology. — ^What in us is conscious of its own self, that
is soul. The soul is conscious of other things also. Con-
sciousness is distinct or indistinct. Distinct conscious-
ness is thought. The soul is a simple, incorporeal sub-
stance. It possesses the power of perceiving the world.
In this sense a soul may be conceded to the lower ani-
mals ; but a soul possessed of understanding and will, is
spirit, and spirit is the possession of man alone. A spirit
which is in union with a body is properly a soul, and
this is the distinction between man and the superior
beings. The movements of the soul and those of the
body mutually agree by reason of the pre-established
harmony. The freedom of the human will consists in
the power to choose which of two possible things appears
the better. But the will does not decide without motives ;
it always chooses that only which it esteems preferable.
The will would appear thus to be compelled to act by its
ideas ; but the understanding is not compelled to accept
something as good or as bad ; and neither is the will,
therefore, under compulsion, but free. Our souls, as
simple, are indivisible, and therefore imperishable ; the
lower animals, however, being devoid of understanding,
are incapable after death of reflecting on their bj'past

TUE GERMAN ILLUMIXATION. 207

life. Only the human soul is cajiablo of this, and only
the human soul, therefore, ia immortal, (d.) Natural
T/irology. — Wolff here proves the existence of God by the
cosmological argument. God might have created many
worlds, but (his world he created as the best. This world
is called into existence by the will of God. His intention
in creating it was the expression of his perfection. The
evil in the world springs not from the will of God, but
from the limited nature of human things. God permits
it only as means to the good.

This biief aphoristic exposition of Wolff's metaphysics
will show how closely it is related to that of Leibnitz.
The latter loses, however, in speculative depth, in con-
sequence of the exclusively popular form (form of wider-
stand'uuj proper) which it receives at the hands of Wolff.
What vrith. Wolff recedes most into the background is the
specific peculiarity of the monadology : his simple beings
are not concipient like the monads, but return more to
the nature of the atoms : hence in his case numerous in-
consistencies and contradictions. His special metaphysi-
cal value lies in the ontology, to which he has given a
much more accurate development than his predecessors.
A multitude of technical terms owe to him their forma-
tion and introduction into the language of philosophy.

The philosophy of Wolff, clear and readily intelligible
as it was, more accessible, moreover, than that of Leib-
nitz, in consequence of being composed in German, soon
became popular philosophy, and acquired an extensive in-
fluence. Among those who have made themselves meri-
torious by its scientific extension, are particularly to be
mentioned Thümmiiig {1681-1128), BiJßnger {IQ93-11 50),
Baumeister (1708-1785), Baumgarten (of aesthetic renown,
1714-1762), and Meier (1718-1777), the disciple of Baum-
garten.

XXXVL — The German Illumination.

UNDER the influence of the Leibnitz- Wolfian philo-
sophy, but without any scientific connexion with
it, there arose in Germany, during the second half of the
eighteenth century, a popular philosophy of an eclectic
nature, the many forms of which have been compre-
hended under the general name of the German illumina-
tion. The importance of this movement consists less in

208 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

its relation to the history of philosophy than in its rela-
tion to the history of general culture : for it is at for-
mation and information, the intellectual production of
I)eople of liberal minds {Basedow), that it aims ; and thus
enlightened reflection, intelligent moralization (in solilo-
quies, letters, morning meditations, etc.), is the form in
which it philosophises. It is the Qerman counterpart of
the French illumination. As the latter closes the realistic
series with its own extreme, materialism or objectivity
devoid of mind, so the former brings the idealistic series
to an end in its tendency to an extreme of subjectivity
from which all objectivity has been banished. To people
of this way of thinking, the empirical individual ego, as
such, ranks as the absolute, as exclusive authority ; for it
they forget all else, or rather all else has value for them
only in proportion as it relates to the subject, subserves
the subject, contributes to the advancement and inter-
nal satisfaction of the subject. It is thus that the
question of the immortality of the soul is now the chief
philosophical problem (in which reference Mendelssohn,
1729-1786, is particularly to be named as the most im-
portant individual in the movement) ; the eternal dura-
tion of the soul is the chief object of interest ; the more
objective ideas or articles of faith, as the personality of
God, for instance, are not by any means questioned, but
in general, little interest can be felt in them, for that
nothing can be known of God is now a fixed conviction.
Both being of subjective interest, scientific attention is
bestowed in the second place on moral i)hilosophy [Oarve,
1742-1798, Engel, 1741-1802, Ahht, 1738-1766) and
sesthetics (particularly Sulzer, 1720-1779). In general
the consideration of what is profitable, of the particular
end, is what occupies the foreground ; utihty is the spe-
cial criterion of truth ; what serves not the subject, ad-
vances not the interests of the subject, is thrown aside. In
harmony with this intellectual tendency is that towards a
predominatingly teleological mode of viewing nature {Rei-
marus, 1694-1765), as well as the eudaemonistic character
of the ethical principles in vogue. The happiness of the
individual is regarded as the highest principle, as the
supreme end {Basedow, 1723-1790). Reimarus wrote a
work on the ' advantages ' of religion, and endeavoured
to prove in it that the tendency of religion is not to in-
jure earthly enjoyments, but rather to add to them. In
the same way Steinhart (1738-1809) laboured in several

TRANSITION TO KANT, 209

works to establish the thesis, that all wisdom consists iu
tlie attainment of happiness, that is of enduring pleasure,
and that the Christian religion, far from forbidding this, is
itself a sjstem of eu daemon ism. For the rest, there was
entertained towanls Christianity only a moderate respect ;
any claim, on its part, to an authority that might seem dis-
agreeable to the subject (as in the dogma of a Hell) was
resisted ; the desire, on the whole, was to replace the posi-
tive dogma, so far as possible, by natural religion ; Reima-
rus, for example, the most zealous defender of theism and
natural theology, is the author also of the WolffcnhUttel
Fragments. The new-won consciousness of his own rights
was exercised by the subject in criticising the positive and
traditional element (the evangelical history), and in ration-
alizing the supernatural Finally, the subjective character
of the period, reveals itself in the prevalent literary man-
nerism of autobiographies, confessions, etc. ; the isolated
ego is an object to itself of admiring study (Rousseau,
1712-1778, and his Confessions) ; it holds the mirror up to
its own particular states, its own sentiments, its own excel-
lent intentions — a coquetting with its own self that often
rises to morbid sentimentality. From what has been said,
then, it will now appear that the extreme of subjectivity
constitutes the character of the illumination in Germany.
This illumination, therefore, forms the completion and the
close of the previous idealistic tendency.

XKXYll.— Transition to Kant.

IDEALISM and realism, the objects of our attention
for some time now, have both ended in one-sided
extremes. Instead of reconciling from within, as it were,
the contradiction of thought and existence, they have
both issued in a denial of the one or the other factor.
To realism matter was one-sidedly the absolute, to
idealism the empirical ego, extremes both which threat-
ened to convert philosophy into unphilosophy. In Ger-
many, as in France, indeed, it had sunk to the flattest
popular philosophy. But now Kant appeared, and again
united in a common bed the two branches that, isolated
from each other, seemed on the point of being lost in the
sands. Kant is the great restorer of philosophy, again
conjoining into unity and totality the one-sided philo-
sophical endeavours of those who preceded him. Poleml-

210 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

•cally or irenically he ia related to all of them, to Locke
as much as to Hume, to the Scottish philosophers not less
than to the earlier English and French moralists, to the
Leibnitz-Wolfian philosophy as well as to the materialism
of the French, and the eudaemonism of the German illumi-
nation. As regards his relation, in particular, to the
one-sided realistic and idealistic tendencies, it was consti-
tuted as follows. While, on the one hand, empiricism
assigned to the ego, in subordination to the world of
sense, a role of pure passivity, and while idealism, on the
other hand, assigned to it, in superiority to the world of
sense and in its sufficiency for its own self, a role of pure
activity, Kant, for his part, endeavoured to harmonize
the pretensions of both. He proclaimed the ego, as prac-
tical ego, free and autonomous, the unconditioned arbiter
of itself, if as theoretical ego, receptive certainly, and con-
ditioned by the world of sense. Further, he proclaimed
the existence of both sides in the theoretical ego itself ;
for if it is true with empiricism, that experience is the
only field of knowledge, that to experience we owe all the
matter of knowledge, it is equally true with idealism
that there exists in our knowledge, notwithstanding, an
a priori factor, that we use notions in experience, inderi-
vative from experience, but provided for experience a
priori in the mind.

In order still further to facilitate a general view of the
vast and complicated structures which compose the philo-
sophy of Kant, we proceed to add a preliminary ex-
planation of its fundamental notions, together with a
concise exposition of its chief propositions and chief re-
sults. As object of his critical inquiry, Kant took the
function of cognition in man, or, more simply, the origin
of our experience. It is as exercising this scrutiny of
cognition, that his philosophy is critical, is criticism.
Again, it is in consequence of Kant having called his con-
sideration of the relation of cognition to the objects of
cognition a transcendental reflection that his philosophy
has received the further name of transcendental ; and
that to Kant is a transcendental (this word is to be dis-
tinguished from transcendent), cognition, ' which has to
do not so much with the objects, as with our knowing of
the objects, so far as there is any possibility of an a priori
knowing of them.' The mentioned scrutiny now occurs
in the Kritik of Pure Reason, and yields the following
refcults. All cognition is the product of two factors, —

TR ÄS SIT ION TO KANT. 211

tlie cognising subject and the cognised objects. The ono
factor, the external object, contributes the material, tho
empirical material, of knowledge ; the other factor, the
subject, contributes the form, — those notions, namely, by
virtue of which alone any connected knowledge, any
synthesis of individual perceptions into a whole of ex-
perience, is possible. Were there no external world,
there were no j)erceptions ; and were there no a priori
notions, these perceptions were an indefinite plurality
and vnmines», without mutual combination, and without
connexion in the unity of an understood whole. In that
case there would not be any such thing as experience.
Therefore : whilst perceptions without notions are blind,
and notions without perceptions are void, cognition
(knowledge) is a union of both, in this way, that it fills
up the frames of the notions with the matter of experi-
ence, or disposes the matter of experience into the net of
the notions. Nevertheless, we do not know things as
they are in themselves. First, because of the forms
native to the mind, that is, because of the categories.
In adding to the given manifold of perception, as the
matter of cognition, our own notions as its form, we
must, it is plain, produce some change in the objects :
these objects, evidently, are not thought as they are in
themselves,, but only as we apprehend them ;. they appear
to us only as modified by categories. Besides this there is
another subjective addition. In the second place, that is,
we cognise things not as they are in themselves, because
the very perceptions which we embrace in the frames of
our notions, are not pure and uucoloured, but have been
equally obliged to traverse a subjective medium, time
and space namely, which are the universal forms of all
objects of sense. Space and time are also subjective ad-
ditions, then, forms of sensuous perception, and no less
native to the mind than the a priori notions, the cate-
gories themselves. "Whatever is to be perceived, must
be perceived in time and space ; without them perception
is impossible. It follows, then, that we only know ap-
pearances, not things themselves, in their own true
nature, as divested of space and time.

If these propositions of Kant be superficially taken, it
may appear as if the Kantian criticism were nowise sub-
stantially in advance of the empiricism of Locke. Never-
theless, it is in advance, even if for nothing else than the
investigation of the a priori notions. That the notions

212 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

cause and eflFect, substance and accident, and others, the
like, which the human mind finds itself obliged to think
into all perceptions of sense, and under which it really
thinks everything that it does think, — that these arise
not from sensuous experience, this Kant is compelled to
acknowledge as well as Hume. For example, when aflfec-
tions reach us from several directions, when we perceive
a white colour, a sweet taste, a rough surface, etc., and
now speak of a single thing, a piece of sugar perhaps, it
is only the manifold of the sensations that is given us
from without, while the notion of imity cannot come to
us through sensation, but is a notion added to the mani-
fold, a category. But Kant now, instead of denying the
reality of these notions, took a dififerent step, and assigned
to the mental activity (which suppHes these forms of
thought to the matter of experience) a special and pecu-
liar province. He demonstrated these forms of thought
to be immanent laws of the intellect, necessary principles
of action in the understanding that are essential to every
experience, and he endeavoured to attain the complete
system of them by an analysis of the faculty of thought.
(They are twelve in number : unity, plurality, totality ;
reality, negation, limitation ; substantiality, causality,
reciprocity ; possibility, actuality, necessity.) Kant's
philosophy, then, is not empiricism, but idealism. It is
not that dogmatic idealism, however, which transfers all
reality to conception, but rather a critical subjective
idealism that distinguishes in the conception (perception)
an objective and a subjective element, and vindicates for
the latter a place as important in every act of cognition
as is that of the former.

From what has been said, there result — and the one
in consequence of the other — the three chief propositions
under which the Kantian cognitive theory may be com-
prehended : 1. We know only appearances, not things in
themselves. The empirical matter that comes to us from
without is, in consequence of our own subjective addi-
tions (for we receive this matter first of all into the sub-
jective frames of time and space, and then into the
equally subjective forms of the innate notions), so worked
up and relatively altered that, like the reflection of a
luminous body variously bent and broken by the surface
of a mirror, it no longer represents the thing itself, in its
original quality, pure and unmixed. 2. Nevertheless,
experience alone is ourßeld of knowledge, and any science

TRANSITION TO KANT. 213

of the uncou(litio7}e<l does not exii^t. And naturally so :
for as every act of cognition is a product of empirical
matter and intellectual form, or is founded on the co-
operation of sense and understanding, any cognition of
things is impossible where the factor of empirical matter
fails. Knowledge through intellectual notions alone is
illusory, inasmuch as, for the notion of the unconditioned,
which umlerstanding sets up, sense is unable to show the
unconditioned object which should correspond to it. The
question, therefore, which Kant placed at the head of his
entire critique. How are synthetic judgments (judgments
of extension as in contradistinction to analytic judg-
ments, judgments of explanation), possible a priori?
can we, a priori, by thought alone, extend our know-
ledge beyond experience of sense? is knowledge of the
supersensuous possible ? — must be answered by an un-
conditional No. 3. If, nevertheless, human cognition
\cill overstep the limits of experience assigned to it, that
is to say, if it icill become transcendent, then it can only
involve itself in the greatest contradictions. The three
idcd-'i of reason — namely, (a.) the psychological idea of an
absolute subject, that is, of the soul or of the immor-
tality ; (p.) the cosmological idea of the world as totality
of all conditions and phenomena; (c. ) the theological
idea of an all-perfect being — are so much without appli-
cation to empirical reahty, so much mere fabrications of
reason, regulative, not constitutive principles, to which
no objective sensuous experience corresponds, that they
rather lead — if applied to experience, or conceived, that
is, as actually existent objects — to the most glaring logi-
cal errors, to the most striking paralogisms and sophisms.
Kant has attempted to demonstrate these errors, whether
unavoidable contraflictions of reason with its own self,
or only subreptions and false conclusions, in the case of
all the ideas of reason. By way of example, let us take
the cosmological idea. Directly reason, in reference to
this idea, in reference to the cosmical whole, proceeds to
give utterance to its transcendental dicta, directly it seeks
to apply, that is, the forms of the finite to the infinite, it
is at once seen, that in all cases the antithesis of the dic-
tum is quite as demonstrable as the thesis. The thesis.
The world has limits in space and a commencement in
time ; the antithesis, The world has no limits in space
and no commencement in time : these propositions are
both susceptible of an equal proof. It follows, conse-

214 IIISTOBY OF PHILOSOPHY. }

quently, that speculative cosmology is but an assumption
of reason. The theological idea, for its part again, rests
on mere logical subreptions and vicious conclusions, as
(with great acuteness) was proved by Kant in the case of
the various arguments hitherto dogmatically proposed for
the existence of God. It is impossible, therefore, in the
theoretical sphere, and with perfect stringency in all re-
spects, to prove and comprehend the existence of the soul
as a real subject, the existence of the world as a single
system, and the existence of God as a supreme being :
the metaphysical problems proper lie beyond the limits
of philosophical knowledge.

This is the negative of the Kantian philosophy : its
supplementing positive is to be found in the Kritik of
Practical Reason. If mind, theoretically or cognitively,
is under condition and control of the objects of sense —
no complete act of knowledge being possible without an
element of perception, — practically, or as regards action,
it directly transcends the given element (the motive of
sense), it is determined only by the categorical imperative,
by the moral law, by its own self, and is therefore free
and autonomous. The ends it pursues are such as it —
a moral spirit — gives itself. External objects are no
longer arbiters and masters for it ; it has no longer to
adapt itself to them when it would become participant of
truth ; it is they now must serve it, mere selfless (uncon-
scious) means for the reaUzation of the moral law. If the
theoretical spirit was bound to the phenomenal world in
its blind obedience to mere necessity, the practical spirit,
on the contrary, belongs, through its relation to the abso-
lute end, through its own essential freedom, to a purely
intelligible, to a supersensuous world. This is Kant's
practical idealism, which directly leads to the three (as
theoretical verities previously declared insufficient) prac-
tical postulates — the immortality of the soul, the freedom
of the will, and the existence of God. So much by way
of introduction : We proceed now to the more systematic
exposition of the philosophy of Kant.

XXXVIIL— ^an«.

IMMANUEL KANT was born, April 22, 1724, at
Königsberg in Prussia. His father, an honest, worthy
saddler, and his mother» a woman of piety and intelli-

KANT. 1115

üonce, exercised over him from his onrliest years a
wholesome influence. lu the year 1740 he entered tho
xiniversity as a student of theology, but ai)plied himself
by inclination to the study of philosophy, mathematics,
and physics. He opened his literary career in his twenty-
third year, 1747, with an essay ' Tlioiights on the true Es-
timate of Motive Forces.' For several years, he was obliged
by circumstances to act as domestic tutor in vanous families
in the neighbourhood of Königsberg. In the year 1755 he
settled at the university as a private lecturer (where he re-
mained as such for fifteen years), and gave courses of logic,
metaphysics, physics, mathematics, and, at a later period,
of morals, anthropology, and physical geography, mostly
in the sense of the Wolfiau school, though not without aa
early expression of his doubts wüth respect to dogmatism.
At the same time, after the publication of his first disser-
tation, he was indefatigable as an author, although his
decisive great book, the Kritik of Pure Reason, appeared
only in his fifty-seventh year, 1781, and was followed by
his Kritik of Practical Reason in 1788, as by his Kritik of
Judgment in 1790. In the year 1770, at the age of forty-
six, he became an ordinary professor of logic and meta-
physics, the duties of which position he continued actively
to carry on till 1797, after which year he was prevented
from lecturing by the increasing frailties of age. Calls to
Jena, to Erlangen, to Halle, he declined. Soon the noblest
as well as the most studious of knowledge thronged
from the whole of Germany to Königsberg, in order to
place themselves at the feet of the Prussian sage. One
of his admirers, Reuss, professor of philosojihy at Wiirz-
burg, and who was able to make only a very short stay
at Königsberg, entered the room of Kant with the words :
* He had come no less than 760 miles just to see him and
speak to him.' During the last seventeen years of his
life he occupied a small house with a garden in a retired
part of the town, where he was able to pursue his own
quiet and regular mode of life without disturbance. He
lived extremely simply, but liked a good table and a com-
fortable social meal. Kant was ncA'er out of his own pro-
vince— never as far even as Dantzic. His longest journej^s
were to neighbouring country houses. Nevertheless he
acquired by the reading of descriptions of travels a very
accurate knowledge of the surface of the globe, as indeed
is specially proved by his lectures on physical geography.
He was well acq^uainted with all Rousseau's works, and the

216 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

Emile, in particular, on its first appearance, prevented
him for several days from taking his usual walks. Kant
died February 12, 1804, in the eightieth year of his age.
He was of middle size, slenderly built, with blue eyes,
and always healthy, till in his old age he became childish.
He never married. A strict regard for truth, pure in-
tegrity, and simple modesty distinguished his character.

Though Kant's great, era-making work, the Kritik of
Pure Reason, only appeared in 1781, its author had in
smaller works long been making efforts in the same direc-
tion ; and this was particularly the case with his inaugii
ral dissertation * On the Form and Principles of the Sen-
sible and the Intelligible World,' which was published
in 1770. The internal genesis of his critical position was
attributed by Kant especially to Hume. * It was reflec-
tion on David Hume that several years ago first broke
my dogmatic slumber, and gave a completely new direc-
tion to my inquiries in the field of speculative philo-
sophy.' The critical idea first developed itself in Kant,
then, on the occasion of his abandonment of the dogmatic
metaphysical school, the Wolfian philosophy, in which he
had been educated, for the study of empiricism in the
sceptical form which had been impressed upon it by
Hume. * Hitherto,' says Kant at the close of his Kritik
of Pure Reason, * there was no choice but to proceed
either dogmatically like WolfiF, or sceptically like Hume.
The critical path is the only one that is still open. If
the reader has had the courtesy and the patience to travel
it thus far in my society he may now contribute his
help towards the conversion of this footpath into a high-
way, by which, what many centuries were unable to
effect, what, indeed, was impossible before the expiration
of the present century, there shall be attained complete
satisfaction for human reason in that which has always
occupied its curiosity, but always hitherto in vain.'
Kant, lastly, possessed the clearest consciousness of
the relation of criticism to all preceding philosophy. He
compares the revolution effected by himself in philosophy
to that effected by Copernicus in astronomy. * Hitherto
the assumption was, that all our knowledge must adapt
itself to the objects ; but every attempt to ascertain any-
thing in regard to them a priori by notions, in order to
extend our knowledge, was by such a presupposition
necessarily rendered vain. Suppose we now try, then,
whether better success may not attend us in the pro-

KAXT. 217

blenis of metaphysics, if we assume objects to he under a
necessity of luiapting themselves to the nature of our
cognition. The i)roj»o8al, at all events, evidently harmo-
nizes better with the desired possibility of an a priori
knowledge which should be able to determine something
in regard to objects before they were yet given to us. It is
with us here as it was at tirst with the idea of Copernicus,
who, dissatisfied with the theory of the heavens, on the
assumption that the starry host circled round the specta-
tor, tried whether it would not succeed better, as regarded
explanation, if, on the contrary, he supposed the spec-
tator to move and the stars to remain at rest.' In these
words, the principle of subjective idealism is expressed in
the clearest manner and with the most perfect conscious-
ness.

In the succeeding exposition of the Kantian philosophy
we follow, as the most appropriate, the course which has
been taken by Kant himself. Kant's principle of di\'ision
and disposition is a psychological one. All the faculties
'^f the soul, he says, may be reduced to three, which three
admit not of being again reduced to any other. They
Jire, cognition, emotion, will. For all the three the first
contains the principles, the regulating laws. So far as
cognition contains the principles of its own act, it is
theoretical reason. So far again as it contains the prin»
ciples of will, it is practical reason. And so far, lastly,
as it contains the principles of the emotion of pleasurö
and pain, it is a faculty of judgment. The Kantian philo-
sophy (on its critical side) falls thus into three Kritiken
(critiques) : 1. The Kritik of (pure) Theoretic Reason ; 2.
The Kritik of Practical Reason ; and 3. The Kritik of
Judgment.

I. — The Kritik of Pure Reason.

The Kritik of Pure Reason, says Kant, is the ground-
plan of all our possessions through pure reason (of
all that we can know a priori), systematically arranged.
What are these possessions ? What is our contribution
to the effecting of an act of perception ? With this ob-
ject before him, Kant passes under review the two main
stadia of our theoretical consciousness, the two main
factors of all cognition : sense and understanding. First,
then, what is the a priori possession of our perceptive
faculty, so far as it is sensuous, and, second, what is the

218 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

a "priori possession (applicable in perception) of our under-
standing? The first question is considered in the tran-
scendental jEsthetic (a term which is to be taken naturally
not in its usual, but in its etymological import, as
* science of the a priori principles of sense ') ; the second,
in the transcendental Logic (specially in the Analytic).
Sense and understanding, namely — explanatorily to pre-
mise this — are the two factors of all perceptive cognition,
the two stems, as Kant expresses it, of knowledge, which
spring, perhaps, from a common but unknown root.
Sense is the receptivity, understanding the spontaneity
of our cognitive faculty ; by means of sense, which alone
aflFords us intuitions (in the signification of the sensuous
perceptive elements), are objects given to us ; by means
of understanding, which forms notions, are objects thought
(but still in a perceptive reference). Notions witho^it
intuitions (perceptive elements strictly sensuous) are
empty : without notions such intuitions (or perceptions)
are blind. Perceptions (proper) and notions constitute
the mutually complementary constituents of our intel-
lectual activity. What now are the a priori ('lying
ready in the mind from the first '), principles of our
sensuous, what those of our thinking faculty, in the
operation of cognition? The first of these questions is
answered, as said, in

1 . The transcendental ^Esthetic. — To anticipate at once
the answer : the a priori principles of sense, the innate
forms of sensuous perception, are space and time. Space,
namely, is the form of external sense by means of which
objects are given to us as existent without us, and as ex-
istent also apart from and beside one another. If we
abstract from all that belongs to the matter of sensation
(in any perception), there remains behind only space, as
the universal form into which all the materials of the ex-
ternal sense dispose themselves. If we abstract from all
that belongs to the matter of our inner sense, there re-
mains the time which the mental movement occupied.
Space and time are the ultimate forms of external and
internal sense. That these farms are contained a priori
in the human mind, Kant proves, first directly in what
he calls the metaphysical exposition, from the nature of
the very notions of them, and, second, indirectly, in what
he calls the transcendental exposition, by demonstrating
that, unless these notions were really a priori, certain
sciences of undoubted truth would be altogether impos-

KAXT. 219

sible. (1.) T\\e mcta physical exposition ha.s to show, (a.)
that time and space are given a priori, [b.) that both,
nevertheless, belong to sense (to the 'aesthetic,' then),
and not to the understanding (not to the ' logic '), that is
to say, that they are percei)tion8 (proper), and not con-
ceptions (notions), {a.) That space and time are a priori
is evident from this, that every experience, if only to be
able to take place, always presui)poaes time and space as
already existent. I perceive something external to my-
self : but this external to myself presupposes space.
Further, I have sensations either together or after one
another : these relations, it is obvious, presuppose the
existence of time, [b.) Space and time are not on this
account, however, notions, but forms of sensuous percep-
tion, or simply perceptions. For general notions contain
their particulars only under them, and not as parts in
them ; whereas all particular spaces and all particular
times are contained in space and time generally. (2.) In
the transcendental exposition Kant makes good his indi-
rect proof by showing that certain universally accepted
sciences are inconceivable -vNnthout assuming the a-priority
of space and time. Pure mathematics is only possible,
if space and time are pure and not empirical perceptions.
Kant, therefore, placed the whole problem of the tran-
scendental aesthetic in the single question. How are the
pure mathematical sciences possible? Time and space,
says Kant, are the element in which pure mathematics
moves. But mathematics takes it for granted that its
propositions are necessary and universal. Necessary and
universal propositions, however, can never originate in
experience ; they must have a foundation a priori : time
and space, consequently, from which mathematics takes
its principles, cannot possibly be given a posteriori, but
necessarily a priori, as pure (non-empirical) intuitions or
perceptions of — general not special — sense. There is,
therefore, an a priori knowledge, a science founded on
a priori grounds ; and he who would deny this must
deny at the same time the possibility of mathematics.
But if the foundations of mathematics are a priori per-
ceptions, it is natural to infer further that there will also
be a priori notions, and the possibility consequently of a
pure science of metaphysics, consisting as well of the a
priori perceptions as of the a priori notions. This is the
positive result of the transcendental sesthetic, and with
this positive side there is connected, precisely enough, a

220 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

negative one. Perception, or direct, immediate cognition,
is possible to us only through sense, the universal forms
of which are only space and time. But as these intuitions
or perceptions of space and time are not (externally) ob-
jective relations, but only subjective forms, a certain
subjective element must be held to mingle in all our per-
ceptions : we perceive not things as they are in them-
selves, but only as they appear to us tlirough this
subjectivo-objective medium of space and time. This is
the sense of the Kantian dictum that we know not things
in themselves, but only appearances. It were too much
to assert, however, that all things are in space and time.
This is so only /or us, and in such manner too, that all
appearances of outer sense are in space as well as in time,
whereas all appearances of inner sense are only in time.
Kant by no means intends, however, to convey by this,
that the world of sense is a mere show. What he main-
tains, he says, is, transcendentally, the subjective ideality,
but, empirically nevertheless, the objective reality of
space and time. Things without us as certainly exist as
we ourselves, or our own states within us : only they
exhibit themselves to us not as, independent of space and
time, they are in themselves. As regards the thing in
itself that lies behind the appearance of sense, Kant, in the
first edition of his work, expressed himself as if it were
possible that it and the ego might be one and the same
thinking substance. This thought, which Kant only
threw out as a conjecture, has been the source of the
whole subsequent evolution of philosophy. That the ego
is affected, not by an alien thing in itself, but purely by
its own self, — this became the leading idea of the system
of Fichte. In his second edition, however, Kant ex-
punged the conjecture.

Space and time being discussed, the transcendental
aesthetic is at an end : it is now ascertained what is a
priori in sense. But the mind of man is not contented
with the mere receptivity of sense : it does not merely
receive objects, but applies to them its own spontaneity,
embracing them in its intelligible forms, and striving to
think them by means of its notions (still possibly in a per-
ceptivereierence). The investigation of these a p^on notions
or forms of thought, 'lying ready in the understandingfrom
the first,' like the forms of space and time in the sensible
faculty, is the object of the transcendental analytic (which
forms the first part of the transcendental logic).

KAXT. 221

2. The transcendental A nahjtic. — The first task of the
analytic will be the discovery of the pure intelligible
notions. Aristotle has already attempted to construct
such a table of categories ; but, instead of deriving them
from a common ])rinciple, he has merely empirically
taken them up as they came to hand : he has committed
the error also of including s|>rtce and time among them,
which, however, are not intelligible, but sensible forms.
Would we have, then, a comjilete and systematic table of
all pure notions, of all the a priori forms of thought, we
must look about us for a principle. This principle, from
which the pure notions are to be deduced, is the logical
judgment. The primitive notions of understanding may
be completely ascertained, if we will but completely ex-
amine all the species of judgments. This examination
Kant accomplishes by means of ordinary logic (which,
however, is a priori in its nature as well as a demons-
trated doctrine for thousands of years). In logic there
are four species of judgments, namely, judgments of

Quantity. Quality. Relation. Modality.

Universal, Affirmative, Categorical, Problematic,

Particular, Negative, Hypothetical, Assertoric,

Singular. Intinite or Limitative. Disjunctive. Apodictic.

From these judgments there arises an equal number of
primitive pure notions, the categories, namely, of

Quantity. Quality. Relation. Modality.

Totality, Reality, Substance and Accident, Possibility and

Impossibility,
Plurality, Negation, Causality and Dependence, Existence and

Non-existence,
Unity. Limitation. Community (reciprocity). Necessity and

Contingency.

From these twelve categories, in combination with each
other (or with the pure vwdi of sense), all the other pure
or a priori principles may be derived. The adduced
categories having demonstrated themselves to be the a
priori possession of the intellect, these two consequences
follow : (1.) These notions are a prioi-i, and possess,
therefore, a necessary and universal validity ; (2.) jjer se
they are empty forms, and obtain filling only by percep-
tions. But as our perception is only a sensuous one,
these categories have validity only in application to
sensuous perception, which, for its part, is raised into
experience proper (perfected perception), only by being
taken up into the pure notions (and so brought to an ob-

222 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

jective synthesis). And here we arrive at a second
question : How does this take place? How are oLjects
(at first mere blind blurs of special sensation, and the
perceptive forms of general sense), subsumed under the
♦impty intelligible forms (and so made, for the first time,
properly objects) 1

This subsumption would have no di£&culty if objects
and notions were homogeneous. But they are not so.
The objects, as coming into the mind through sense, are
of sensuous nature. The question is, then, How can
sensible objects be subsumed under intelligible notions ?
how can the categories be applied to objects ? how can
principles be assigned in regard to the manner in which
we have to think (perceive) things in correspondence with
the categories ? This application cannot be direct, a
third something must step between, which shall unite in
itself as it were both natures, which, on one side, then,
shall be pure, or a priori, and on the other side sensuous.
But such are the two pure perceptions of the transcen-
dental aesthetic, such are time and space, especially the
former, and such are time and space alone. A quality of
time, such as simultaneousness, is, as a priori, on one side
homogeneous with the categories ; while on another side,
inasmuch as all objects can only be perceived in time, it
is homogeneous with objects. In this reference Kant calls
the quality of time a transcendental schema, and the use
to which the mind puts it, he calls the transcendental
schematism of the pure intellect. The schema is a pro-
duct of imagination, which spontaneously determines
inner sense so ; but the schema is not to be confounded
with the mere image. The latter is always an individual
perception ; the former, on the contrary, is a universal
form which imagination produces as picture of a category,
through which this category itself becomes capable of
application to the appearance in sense. For this reason
a schema can exist only in the mind, and can never be
sensuously perceived. If, looking closer now at this
schematism of the understanding, we ask for the tran-
scendental time-quality of each category, the answer is
this : (1.) The relation of time that constitutes the schema
of quantity is series in time or number, — a conception that
consists of the successive addition of like unit to like
unit. The pure notion of magnitude I cannot otherwise
conceive than by figuring in imagination a succession of
units. If I arrest the movement in the very beginning,

KAXT. 223

1 have uuity ; if I allow it to continue longer, i)lurality ;
and if I allow it to continue without limit, totality. The
notion of magnitude, then, is ai>plicable to appearances
of sense only through the scheme of this homogeneous
succession. (2.) The contents of time constitute the schema
of quality. If I would ai)i)ly the pure notion of reality
(due to logical quality) to anything sensuous, I conceive
to myself a idled time, a contained matter of time. Ileal
is what tills time. Similarly to conceive the pure notion
of negation, I figure an empty time. (3.) The categories
of relation find their schemata in the order of time. For
if I want to conceive a determinate relation, I call up
always a determinate order of things in time. Substan-
tiality appears thus as j)ermanence of reality in time,
causality as regular sequence in time, reciprocity as
regular co-existence of the states of one substance with
the states of another. (4.) The categories of modality
derive their schemata from connexion with time as a
whole, that is, from the manner in which an object belongs
to time. The schema of possibility is agreement with
the conditions of time in general ; the schema of actual-
ity is existence in a certain time ; the schema of neces-
sity is existence in all time.

We are now, then, equipped with all the appliances
necessary for the subsumption of sensible appearances
(phenomena) under intelligible notions, or for the ajiplica-
tion of the latter to the former, in order to show how, from
this application, experience, coherent cognitive percep-
tion, results. We have (1.) the various classes of categories,
of those a priori notions, namely, Avhich, operative for the
whole sphere of perception, render possible a synthesis
of perceptions in a whole of experience. And we have
(2.) the schemata through which to apply them to the
objects of sense. With every category and its schema
there is cotjjoined a special mode of reducing the objects
of sense under a universal form of intellect, and, conse-
quently, of bringing unity into cognition. Or with every
category there are principles of cognition, a priori rules,
points of view, to w^hich the objects of sense must be sub-
jected in order to perfect them into a coherent experience.
These principles, the most universal synthetic judgments
regulative of experience, are, in correspondence with the
four categorical classes, as follows : — (1.) All objects of
sense are, as only apprehended in time and space, in their
form magnitudes, quanta, multiples, supplied by the

224 jr IS TORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

concejttion of a definite space or a definite time, and conse-
quently extensive mafjnititdea or wholes consistent of parts
successively added. All perception depends on our ima-
gination apprehending objects of sense as extensive
magnitudes in time and space. For this reason too, then,
all perceptions vi^ill be in subjection to the a priori laws
of extensive quantity, to those of geometrical construc-
tion, for instance, or to that of the infinite divisibility,
etc. These principles are the axioms of intuition or gene-
ral perception — laws obligatory on perception as a whole.
(2.) In reference to reality, all objects of sense are inten-
sive magnitudes, inasmuch as without a greater or less
degree of impression on sense, no definite object, nothing
real, could be at all perceived. This magnitude of reality,
the object of sensation, is merely intensive, or determin-
able according to degree, for sensation is not anything
extended either in space or time. All objects of percep-
tion are intensive as well as extensive magnitudes, and
subjected to the general laws of the one not less than to
those of the other. All the powers and qualities of things,
accordingly, possess an infinite variety of degrees, which
may increase or decrease ; anything real has always some
degree, however small; intensive may be independent of
extensive magnitude, etc. These principles are the antici-
pations of sensation, rules which precede all sensation, and
prescribe its general constitution. (3.) Experience is pos-
sible only through the conception of a necessary connec-
tion of perceptions ; without a necessary order of things
and their mutual relation in time, there cannot be any
knowledge of a definite system of perceptions, but only
contingent individual perceptions, (a.) The first principle
in this connexion is, that amid all the changes of pheno-
mena, the substance remains the same. Where there is
nothing permanent, there cannot be any definite relation
of time, any duration of time ; if in the conditions of a
thing, I am to assume one certain condition as earlier or
later, if I am to distinguish these conditions in time, I
must oppose the thing itself to the conditions it under-
goes, I must conceive it as persistent throughout all the
vicissitudes of its own conditions, that is, I must con-
ceive it as self -identical substance, {b.) The second prin-
ciple here is. That all mutations obey the law of the
connexion of cause and effect. The consequence of seve-
ral conditions in time is only then a fixed and determin-
ate one, when I assume the one as cause of the other, or

KANT. 225

as necessarily preceding it in obedience to a rule or law,
the other as effect of the former, or as necessarily succeed-
ing it ; determinate eucecssion in time is only possible
through the relation of causality ; but without a deter-
minate succession in time there were no experience ; the
causal relation consequently is a principle of all empirical
knowledge ; only this relation it is that produces con-
nexion in things ; and without this relation we should
only have incoherent subjective states. (c. ) A third
principle further is, that all co-existent substances are in
complete reciprocity ; only what acts in community is de-
termined as inseparably simultaneous. These three prin-
ciples are the analogies of experience, the rules for cognising
the relations of things, without which there were for us
mere piece-meal units, but no whole, no nature of things.
(4.) The postulates of empirical thought correspond to the
categories of modality, (a.) What agrees with the for-
mal conditions of experience is possible, or may exist.
{b.) What agrees with the material conditions of experi-
ence is actual, or does exist, (c.) What is connected with
actual existence through the universal conditions of ex-
perience, is necessary, or must exist. These are the only
possible and authentic synthetic judgments a priori,
the first lines of all metaphysics. But it is to be rigidly
understood, that of all these notions and principles we can
make only an empirical use, or that we can apply them,
never to things in themselves, but always only to things
as objects of possible experience. For the notion ^vith-
out object is an empty form ; an object can be found for
it again only in perception ; and, lastly, perception, the
pure perceptions of time and space, can acquire filling
only through sensation. Without reference to human
experience, the a priori notions and principles, therefore,
are but a play of the imagination and understanding with
their own ideas. Their special function is, that by their
means we are able to spell actual perceptions, and so read
them as experience. But here we encounter an illusion
which it is hard to avoid. As, namely, the categories are
not derived from sense, but have their origin a priori, it
easily seems as if they might be extended beyond sense
in their application also. But this idea, as said, is an
illusion. Of a knowledge of things in themselves, of
noumena, our notions are not capable, inasmuch as, for
their filling, perception provides only appearances (phe-
nomena), and the thing in itself is never present in any

226 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

possible experience ; our knowledge is restricted to phe-
nomena alone. To have confounded the world of pheno-
mena with the world of uoumena, this is the source of
all the perplexities, errors, and contradictions of meta-
physics hitherto.

Besides the categories, which in strictness are intended
only for experience, although, indeed, they have been
often erroneously applied beyond the bounds of experi-
ence, there are certain other similar notions which from
the first are calculated for nothing else than to deceive,
notions which have the express function to transgress the
bounds of experience, and which therefore may be named
transcendent. These are the fundamental notions and
propositions of former metaphysics. To investigate these
notions, and to strip from them the false show of objec-
tive knowledge, this is the business of the second part of
the transcendental logic, or of the transcendental dialectic.

3. The transcendental Dialectic. — Reason is distinguished
from understanding in the more restricted sense. As the
understanding has its categories, reason has its ideas.
As the understanding forms axioms from the notions,
reason from the ideas forms principles in which the
axioms of the understanding reach their ultimate unity.
The first principle of reason is, to find for the conditioned
knowledge of understanding the unconditioned, and so
complete the unity of knowledge in general. Reason,
then, is the facidty of the unconditioned, or of principles.
As it refers, however, not to objects directly, but only
to understanding, and to the judgments of understand-
ing concerning objects, its true function is only an imma-
nent one. Were the ultimate unity of reason understood,
not merely in a transcendental sense, but assumed as an
actual object of knowledge, this were, on our part, a
transcendent use of reason ; we should be applying the
categories to a knowledge of the unconditioned. In this
transcendent or false use of the categories originates the
transcendental show (Schein) which amuses us with the
illusion of an enlargement of understanding beyond the
boimds of experience. The detection of this transcenden-
tal show is the object of the transcendental dialectic.

The speculative ideas of reason, derived from the three
forms of the logical syllogism, the categorical, the hypo-
thetical, and the disjunctive, are themselves threefold : —

(1.) The psychological idea, theidea of the soul as a think-
ing substance (the objectof preceding rational psychology).

KANT. 227

(2.) The cosmological idea, the idea of the worhl aa
totality of all phenomena (the object of preceding cosmo-
logy)-

(3.) The theological idea, the idea of God as ultimate
condition of the possibility of all things (the object of
preceding rational theology).

Through these ideas, in which reason attempts to apply
the categories to the unconditioned, it gets only entangled
in unavoidable show and deception. This transcenden-
tal show, or this optical illusion of reason, displays itself
variously in the various ideas. In the psychological
ideas reason commits a simple paralogism {the paralogisms
of pure reason) : in the cosmological ideas it is the fate of
reason to find itself compelled to make contradictory asser-
tions (the antinomies) : and in the theological ideas reason
is occupied with a void ideal {the ideal of pure reason).

(a.) The psychological idea, or the paralogisms of pure
reason.^-'SS^ha.t Kant propounds under this rubric is in-
tended completely to subvert the traditional rational
psychology. This doctrine viewed the soul as a psychi-
cal thing with the attribute of immateriality ; as a simple
substance with the attribute of indestructibility ; as an
intellectual, numerically identical substanoe with the pre-
dicate of personality; as an inextended thinking substance
with the predicate of immortality. All these statements
are, according to Kant, subreptions, peiitiones principii.
They are derived one and all of them from the simple ' I
think : ' but the * I think ' is neither perception nor notion ;
it is a mere consciousness, an act of the mind which attends,
unites, supports all perceptions and notions. This act of
thought now is falsely converted into a thing ; for the
ego as subject, the existence of an ego as object, as soul,
is substituted ; and what applies to the former analyti-
cally is transferred to the latter synthetically. To be
able to treat the ego as an object and apply categories in
its regard, it would have required to have been empiri-
cally given in a perception, which is impossible. From
this it follows, too, that the arguments for the immor-
tality rest on sophisms. I can certainly ideally separate
my thought from my body, but it by no means follows
on that account that my thought, if really separated from
the body, would continue. The result that Kant claims
for his critique of rational psychology is this : There is
no rational psychology as a doctrine which might pro-
cure us an addition to the knowledge of ourselves, but

228 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

only as a discipline which sets insurmountable bounds to
speculative reason in this field, in order, on the one hand,
that we may not throw ourselves into the lap of a soul«
less materialism, and on the other hand that we may not
lose ourselves in the fanaticism of a spiritualism that is
inapphcable to life. We may view this discipline, too,
as admonishing us to regard the refusal of reason per-
fectly to satisfy the curious in reference to questions that
transcend this life as a hint of reason's own to withdraw our
attempts at knowledge from fruitless extravagant specu-
lation, and apply them to the all-fruitful practical field.

(Ö.) The antinomies of cosmology. — For a complete list
of the cosmological ideas, we require the cue of the cate-
gories. In (1.) a quantitative reference to the world,
time and space being the original quanta of all percep-
tion, it were necessary to determine something in regard
to their totality. (2.) As regards quality, some conclu-
sion were required in reference to the divisibility of mat-
ter. (3.) On the question of relation, we must endeavour
to find for all the effects in the world the complete series
of their causes. (4.) As for modality, it were necessary
to understand the contingent in its conditions, or, in other
words, the absolute system of the dependency of the con-
tingent in the phenomenal world. Reason, now, in at-
tempting a determination of these problems, finds itself
involved in contradiction with its own self. On each of
the four points contradictory conclusions may be proved
with equal validity. As (1.) the thesis : The world has a
beginning in time and limits in space ; and the antithe-
sis ; The world has neither beginning in time nor limits
in space. (2.) The thesis : Every compound consists of
simples, nor does there exist in the world anything else
than simples and their compounds ; and the antithesis :
No compound consists of simples, nordoesthere exist in the
world anything that is simple. (3.) The thesis : Causality
according to the laws of nature is not the only one from
which the phenomena of the world may be collectively
derived, there is required for their explanation a caus-
ality of free-will as well ; and the antithesis : Free-will
there is none, all happens in the world solely by law of
nature. Lastly, (4.) the thesis : There is something in
the world, which, either as its part or as its cause, is an
absolutely necessary being ; and the antithesis : Neither
within the world nor without the world does there exist
any absolutely necessary being as its cause. This dia-

KANT. 229

lectical conflict of the cosmological ideas demonstrates its
own nullity.

(c.) The ideal of pure reason or the idea of Ood. —
Kant shows first of all how reason attains to the
idea of an all-perfect being, and then directs himself
against the attempt of former metaphysicians to prove the
existence of this all-perfect being. His critique of the
traditional arguments for the existence of God is essen-
tially as follows : — (1.) The ontological proof reasons thus :
There is j)0ssible a being the most real of all. But in all
reality, existence is necessarily included ; if I deny this
existence, then, I deny the possibility of a being the most
real of all, which is self-contradictory. But, rejoins
Kaut, existence is nowise a reality, or a real predicate,
that can be added to the notion of a thing ; existence is
the position of a thing with all its qualities. But the
suppression of existence suppresses not one single signifi-
cate of a notion. Though, then, it possess every one of
its significates, it does not on that account possess exist-
ence also. Existence is nothing but the logical copula,
and nowise enriches the (logical) comprehension of the
subject. A hundred actual crowns, for example, contain
no more than a himdred possible ones : only for my
means are the cases diflferent. A being the most real of
all may, consequently, be quite correctly thought as the
most real of all, even when also thought as only possible,
and not as actual. It was therefore something quite un-
natural, and a mere revival of school-wit, to propose to
dig out of an arbitrary idea the existence of its corre-
spondent object. All the pains and trouble, then, of this
famous argument are only lost ; and a man is no more
likely to be made, by mere ideas, richer in knowledge,
than a merchant in means by the addition to his balance
of a few ciphers. While the ontological proof reasoned
to necessary existence, (2.) the cosmological proof takes
its departure from necessary existence. If anything
exists, there must exist an absolutely necessary being as
its cause. But I myself at all events exist, therefore
there exists also an absolutely necessary being as my
cause. This proof, so far, is now criticised by reference
to the last of the cosmological antinomies. The conclu-
sion perpetrates the error of inferring from the pheno-
menal contingent a necessary being in excess of experience.
But were this inference even allowed, it implies no God.
It is reasoned further, then, that it is possible only for

230 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY,

that being to be absolutely necessary who is the sum of
all reality. But if we invert this proposition and say,
that being who is the sum of all reality is absolutely ne-
cessary, we are back in the ontological proof, with which,
then, the cosmological must fall also. The cosmological
proof resorts to the stratagem of producing an old argu-
ment in a new dress, in order to have the appearance of
appealing to two witnesses. (3.) But if, in this way,
neither notion nor experience is adequate to prove the
existence of God, there is still left a third expedient, to
begin, namely, with a specific experience and so deter-
mine whether it may not be possible to conclude from
the frame and order of the world to the existence of a
supreme being. This is the object of the physlco-
theological proof, which, taking its departure from the
existence of design in nature, proceeds, in its main
moments, thus : everywhere there is design ; design in
itself is extrinsic or contingent as regards the things of
this world ; there exists by necessity, therefore, a wise
and intelligent cause of this design ; this necessary cause
is necessarily also the most real being of all beings : the
most real being of all beings has consequently necessary
existence. Kant answers, the physico-theological proof
is the oldest, the clearest, and the fittest for common
sense ; but it is not apodictic. It infers from the form
of ^the world a cause proportioned to the form. But even
so w^ have only an originator of the form of the world,
only an architect of the world : we have no originator
of matter, we have no author and creator of the univers^.
In this strait a shift is made to the cosmological argu-
ment again, and the originator of the form is conceived
as the necessary being whom things imply. "We have
thus an absolute being whose perfection corresponds to
the perfection of the universe. In the universe, how-
ever, there is no absolute perfection ; we have thus, then,
only a very perfect being ; and for a most perfect being
we must have recourse once more to the ontological
argument. The teleological argument, then, implies the
cosmological ; the cosmological the ontological ; and out
of this circle the metaphysical demonstration is unable
to escape. *'l^he ideal of a supreme being, accordingly,
is nothing else than a regulative principle of reason which
leads us to view all connexion in the world, as if it were
due to an all-suflBcient necessary cause, as source of unity
and foundation of the rule of explanation ^ in which case,

KANT. 231

indeed, it is unavoidable that in consequence of a trau-
Bcendental subreption, we should mistake a merely for-
mal principle for a constitutive one, and hypostasize it
withal into a creative absolute intelligence. In truth,
however, a supreme being constitutes, so far as the specu-
lative exercise of reason is concerned, a mere but fault-
less ideal, a notion which is the close and the crown of
human knowledge, but whose objective reality, never-
theless, can, with apodictic certainty, neither be proved
nor refuted.

The preceding critique of the ideas of reason leaves
one more question to answer. If these ideas are witliout
an objective value, why do they exist in us? Being
necessary, they will possess, of course, their own good
reason. And this good reason has jusji^been pointed out
on occasion of the theological idea. v^"'hough not consti-
tutive, they are regulative principles/ In arranging our
mental faculties, we never succeed better than when we
proceed * as if ' there were a soul. The cosmological idea
gives us a hint to regard the world * as if ' the series of
causes were in6njte, without exclusion however of an in-
telligent cause. The theological idea enables us to con-
sider the entire world-complex under the point of view
of an organized unity^ In this way, then, these ideas, if
not constitutive principles to extend our knowledge be-
yond the bounds of experience, are regulative principles
to arrange experience and reduce it under certain hy])o-
thetical unities. If they compose not an organon for the
discovery of truth, they still constitute — the whole three
of them, psychological, cosmological, and theological — a
canon for the simplification and system atization of our
collective experiences.

Besides their regulative import, the ideas possess also
a practical one. There is a species of certainty, which,
though not objectively, but only subjectively competent,
is pre-eminently of a practical nature, and is called belief
or conviction. If the liberty of the will, the immortality
of the soul, and the existence of God, are three cardinal
tenets, such that, though not necessary for knowledge,
they are still urgently pressed on us by reason, then
without doubt they will have their own value in the
practical sphere as regards moral conviction. This con-
viction is not logical, but moral certainty. As it rests,
then, entirely on subjective grounds of the moral feeling,
I cannot say, It is morally certain, but only, I am morally

232 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

certain that there is a God, etc. That is to say, belief in
God and another workl is so interwoven with my moral
feeling, that, as little as I run risk of losing this latter,
BO little am I apprehensive of being deprived of the for-
mer. With this we are already within the sphere of
practical reason.

II. — The Kritik of Practical Reason.

With the Kritik of Practical Reason we enter an entirely
different world, in which reason is amply to recover all
that has been lost in the theoretical sphere. The problem
now is essentially, almost diametrically, different from the
problem then. The speculative Kjritik had to examine
whether pure reason is adequate to an a priori knowledge
of objects : the object of the practical Kritik is to exa-
mine whether pure reason is capable of an a priori deter-
mination of the will in reference to objects. The question
of the former concerned the a priori cognisableness of
objects : that of the latter concerns, not the cognisableness
of objects, but the motives of the will, and all that is
capable of being known in the same connexion. All
therefore, in the Kritik of Practical Reason presents itself
in an order precisely the reverse of the Kritik of Pure
Reason. The primitive determinants of cognition are
perceptions ; those of volition are principles and notions.
The Kritik of Practical Reason must begin, therefore, with
the moral principles, and, only after their establishment,
proceed to any question of the relation of practical reason
to sense. The results, too, of these two Kritiken are
opposed the one to the other. If in the theoretical
sphere, because reason that sought the thing in itself be-
came transcendent, (perceptionless), the ideas remained
only on the whole negative, the contrary is now the case
in the practical sphere. In this sphere the ideas demon-
strate themselves true and certain, in a manner direct
and immanent, without once quitting the limits of self-
consciousness and inner experience. The question here
is of the relation of reason, not to outer things, but to an
internal element, the will. And the result is, that reason
is found to be capable of influencing the will purely from
its own self, and hence now the ideas of free-will, immor-
tality, and God, recover the certainty which theoretical
reason had been unable to preserve to them.

That there is a determination of the will by pure rea-

KANT. 23S

son. or that reason has ]>ractical reality, this is not irame-
diatoly certain, inasmuch as tlio actions of men aj)i»e.ir
conilitioned, in the lirst instance, by the sensuous motives
of ]>lea3uro and pain, of passion and inclination. The
Kritik of Practical Reason will require to examine, then,
whether these determinants of will are actually the only
ones, or whether there is not also a higher active faculty
in which not sense, but reason, gives law, and where
will follows not mere incentives from without, but obeys
in pure freedom a higher practical principle from within.
The demonstration of all this belongs to the analytic of
practical reason, while to the dialectic of practical reason
it belongs to consider and bring to resolution the anti-
nomies which result from the relation between the prac-
tical authority of pure reason, and that of the empirical
instigations of sense.

1. Analytic. — The reality of a higher active faculty
in us, is made certain by the fact of the moral law,
which is nothing else than a law spontaneously imposed
on the will by reason itself. The moral law stands high
above the lower active faculty in us, and, with an in-
ward irresistible necessity, orders us, in independence of
every instigation of sense, to follow it absolutely and un-
conditionally. AU other practical laws relate solely to
the empirical ends of pleasure and happiness ; but the
moral law pays no respect to these, and demands that
we also shall pay them none. The moral law is no hypo-
thetical imperative that issues only prescripts of profit
for empirical ends ; it is a categorical imperative, a law,
universal and binding on every rational will. It can de-
rive consequently only from reason, not from animal
will, and not from individual self-wul ; only from pure
reason, too, and not from reason empirically conditioned :
it can only be a commandment of the autonomous, one,
and universal reason. In the moral law, therefore,
reason demonstrates itself as practical, reason has direct
reality in it. The moral law it is that shows pure
reason to be no mere idea, but a power actually deter-
minative of will and action. This law it is, also, that
procures perfect certainty and truth for another idea, the
idea of free-will. The moral law says, ' Thou canst, for
thou shouldst,' and assures us thus of our own freedom,
as indeed it is, in its own nature, nothing but the will
itself, the will in freedom from all sensuous matter of
desire, and constituting therefore our very highest law

234 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

of action. But now there is the closer question, What,
then, is it that practical reason categorically commands ?
For an answer to this question we must first consider the
empirical will, the natural side of mankind.

Empirical will consists in the act of volition being
directed to an object in consequence of a pleasure felt in
it by the subject ; and this pleasure again roots in the
nature of the subject, in the susceptibility for this or that,
in natural desires, etc. Under this empirical will must be
ranked all appetition for any precise object, or all mate-
rial volition ; for nothing can be an object of subjective
will unless there exist a natural sensibility in conse-
quence of which the object is not indififerent, but suggests
pleasure to the subject. All material motives of will
come under the principle of agreeableness or felicity, or,
in the subject, of self-love. The will, so far as it follows
such, is dependent on, and determined by, empirical
natural ends, and is, consequently, not autonomous, but
heteronomous. But from this it follows that any law of
reason unconditionally obligatory on all rational beings,
must be totally distinct from all material principles, must
contain, indeed, nothing material whatever. Material
principles are of empirical, contingent, variable nature.
For men are not at one about pleasure and pain, what is
pleasant to one being unpleasant to another ; and even
were they at one in this respect, the agreement would only
be contingent. Material motives, consequently, are not
capable, like laws, of being considered binding on every
one ; every single subject is at liberty to select other
motives. Subjective rules of action are named by Kant
maxims of volition, and he censures those morahsta who
set up such maxims as universal moral principles.

Maxims, nevertheless, though not the supreme prin-
ciple of morality, are yet necessary to the autonomy of
the will, as without them there were no definite object
of action. Only union of the two sides, then, can con-
duct us to a true principle of morals. To that end the
maxims must be relieved of their limitation, and enlarged
into the form of universal laws of reason. Only those
maxims must be adopted as motives which are suscep-
tible *^f being made universal laws of reason. The supreme
principle of morals is consequently this : act so that the
maxim of youi vdil may be capable of being regarded as
a principle of universal validity, or so that from the
thought of your maxim as a law universally obeyed, no

KANT. 2.35

contradiction results. All material moral principles, as
only of empirical, sensuous, heteronomous nature, are ex-
cluded by this formal moral principle : in it there is a
law provided that raises the will above the lower motives,
a law that reduces all wills to unanimity, a law that,
binding on all rational beings, is consequently the one
true law of reason itself.

A further question now is, what induces the will to act
according to this auj^reme law of reason ? The answer of
Kant is, that the only spring of human will must be the
moral law itself, or respect for it. An action in accord-
ance with the law, but only for the sake of felicity or
sensuous inclination, and not purely for the sake of the
law itself, gives rise to mere legality, not to morality.
The inclinations of sense, taken collectively, are self-love
and self-conceit. The former is restricted by the moral
law, the latter completely quashed. Whatever quells
our self-conceit, however, whatever humbles us, must
appear to us extremely estimable. Such being the action
of the moral law, then, respect will be the positive feel-
ing entertained by us in regard of the moral law. This
respect is indeed a feeling, but it is no feeling of mere
sense, no pathological feeling ; on the contrary, it is an
intellectual feeling produced by consciousness of the pi-ac-
tical law of reason, and is directly opposed to the other.
This respect again is, on one side, as subjection to law,
pain, but on the other side, as the subjection is that of
our own reason, pleasure. Respect, awe, is the only
feeling which beseems man in presence of the moral law.
Natural love to it is not to be expected from men who,
as sensuous beings, are subjected to many passions which
resist the law : love to the law, then, can only be re-
garded as a mere ideal. The moral purism of Kant — that
is, his anxiety to purge the motives of action from all the
greeds of sense — ends thus in rigorism, or the gloomy
view that duty can only be reluctantly performed. It is
this exaggeration that is pointed to in a well-known
Xenium of Schiller's. The following scruple of conscience,
namely,

' 'Wüling serve I my friends all, but do it, alas, with affection ;
And so gnaws me my heart, that I'm not virtuous yet —

Schiller answers thus,

'Help, except this, there is none: you must strive with might to

contemn them,
And with horror perform then what the law may enjoin.'

236 HISTOBY OF PHILOSOPHY.

2, Dialectic. — Pure reason must always have its dia-
lectic, for it lies in its nature to demand the uncondi-
tioned for the given conditioned. Thus, too, then,
practical reason demands for the conditioned goods
which influence the action of man, an unconditioned
supreme good. What is this summum bonum ? If the
ultimate good, the fundamental condition of all other
goods be understood by it, then it is virtue. But virtue
is no completed good, for finite rational beings require,
as sentient, felicity. The greatest good is then only
complete, therefore, when the greatest felicity is united
with the greatest virtue. How now are these two
moments of the greatest good mutually related ? Are
they analytically or synthetically combined ? The for-
mer was the opinion of the greater number of the ancient,
especially Greek, moral philosophers. They either re-
garded felicity, like the Stoics, as accidental moment in
virtue, or virtue, like the Epicureans, as accidental
moment in felicity. Felicity, said the Stoics, is the con-
sciousness of virtue ; virtue, said the Epicureans, is the
consciousness of the maxim that leads to felicity. But,
says Kant, an analytic union is impossible in the case of
two such heterogeneous notions. A synthetic union, con-
sequently, can alone take place between them, a causal
union, namely, in such manner that the one is cause and
the other effect. Practical reason must regard such a
relation as its greatest good, and must propose the thesis,
therefore : virtue and felicity are to be correspondently
connected as cause and eflFect. But this thesis founders
at once on actual fact. Neither of them is the direct
cause of the other. Neither is the desire of felicity
motive to virtue, nor is virtue the efficient cause of feli-
city. Hence the antithesis : virtue and felicity are not
necessarily correspondent, and are not mutually related
as cause and effect. Kant finds the solution of this anti-
nomy in the distinction between the sensible and the
intelligible world. In the world of sense virtue and feli-
city are certainly not correspondent ; but rational beings,
noumenally, are citizens of a supersensuous world where
conflict between virtue and felicity does not exist. Here
felicity is always adequate to virtue ; and with his trans-
lation into the supersensuous world man may expect as
well the realization of the supreme good. But, as ob-
served, the supreme good has two constituents ; (1.)
supreme virtue, and (2.) supreme felicity. The necessary

KANT. 237

realization of the first moment postulates the iinmortaUO/
0/ the sojil, that of the second the existejice of Qod.

(1.) For tlio supreme good, there is required in tlio
first place perfected virtue, holiness. But now no sensuous
being can be holy. A being composed of reason and
sense is only capable of approaching in an infinite series
nearer to holiness as to an ideal But such infinite ])ro-
gress is only possible in an infinite duration of personal
existence. If then the supreme good is to be realized,
the soul's immortality must be presupposed.

(2.) For the supreme good there is required, in the
second place, perfected felicity. Felicity is the condition
of a rational being in the world, for whom everything
happens according to his wish and his will. But this can
only be realized when entire nature agrees with his ob-
jects, and this is not the case. As active beings we are
not causes of nature, and the moral law affords no
ground for a connexion of morality and felicity. Still
we ought to, or we are to endeavour to promote the
supreme good. It must be possible therefore. The
necessary union of these two moments is consequently
postulated, that is to say, the existence of a cause of
nature distinct from nature, and which will constitute
the ground of this union. A being must exist, as com-
mon cause of the natural and the moral world ; such a
being withal as knows our minds, an intelligence, and,
according to this intelligence, distributes to us felicity.
Such a being is God.

Thus from practical reason there flow the idea of im-
mortality and the idea of God, as previously the idea of
free- will The idea of free-will derived its reality from
the possibility of the moral law ; the idea of immortality
derives its reality from the possibility of perfected virtue,
and that of God from the necessity of perfected felicity.
These three ideas, therefore, which to speculative reason
were insoluble problems, have acquired now, in the field
of practical reason, a firmer basis. Nevertheless, they
are not even now theoretical dogmas, but, as Kant names
them, practical postulates, necessary presuppositions of
moral action. My theoretical knowledge is not extended
by them : I know now only that there are objects corre-
spondent to these ideas, but of these objects I know no-
thing more. Of God, for example, we possess and we know
no more than this idea itseli. Should we construct a
theory of the supersensuous founded on categories alone.

238 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

we should only convert theology into a magic lantern of
chimeras. Practical reason, nevertheless, has still pro-
cured us certainty as regards the objective reality of
these ideas which theoretical reason was obliged to leave
in abeyance, and so far therefore the former has the ad-
vantage. This respective position of the two faculties has
been wisely calculated in reference to the nature and
destiny of man. For the ideas of God and immortality
remaining dubious and dark theoretically, introduce not
any impurity into our moral principles through fear or
hoi)e, but leave free scope for awe of the law.

So far the Kantian critique of practical reason. By
way of appendix we may here give a summary of Kant's
religious views as expressed in his work, Religion within
the Limits of Pure Reason. The fundamental thought of
this work is the reduction of religion to morals. Between
morals and religion there may exist a double relation :
either the former founds on the latter, or the latter on
the former. In the first case, however, fear and hope
would become the motives of moral action : there re-
mains for us, then, only the second way. Morality leads
necessarily to religion, for the supreme good is neces-
sarily the ideal of reason, and is capable of being realized
only by God ; but religion must not by any means alone
impel us to virtue, for the idea of God ought never to
become a mere moral motive. Religion is to Kant the
recognition of all our duties as commandments of God.
It is revealed religion when through it I must first of all
know that something is a commandment of God before I
can also know that it is my duty : it is natural religion
when I must first of all know that something is a duty
before I can know that it is a commandment of God. A
church is an ethical community which has for object the
fulfilment and the greatest possible realization of the
moral prescripts, — an association of such as with united
efforts will resist sin and advance morality. The church,
so far as it is not an object of possible experience, is the
invisible church : it is then a mere idea of the union of
all good men under the moral government of God. The
visible church, again, is that church which represents the
kingdom of God on earth, so far as that is possible by man.
The requisites, and consequently the criteria of the true
visible church (which dispose themselves according to
the table of the categories, because this church is one
given in experience), are as follows: (a.) With reference

KANT. 239

to quantity, the cliurch must possess totality or unirev'
eality, and, though divided indeed into contingent
opinions, must still he estahlished on such principles as
necessarily unite all these opinions in a single church.
(6.) The quality of the true visihle church is jmrity,
1X9 it is animated only hy moral motives at the same
time that it is })urilied as well from the fatuousness
of superstition as from the mania of fanaticism. (c.)
The relation of the memhers of the church reciprocally
rests on the principle of liherty. The church is a free
gtate, therefore ; neither a hierarchy nor a democracy,
but a free, universal, permanent 8i)iritual union, {d.) In
modality, the church aims at immutability of constitu-
tion. The laws themselves must not be changed, though
the right of modification be reserved for more contingent
arrangements that concern administration alone. What
alone is able to constitute the foundation of a universal
church is moral, rational behef, for only such belief is
capable of being communicated to every one with con-
\nction. But in consequence of the peculiar weakness of
hiunan nature, this pure belief can never be counted on
as the sole foundation of a church ; for it is not easy to
convince mankind that striving to virtue, a good Kfe, is
all that is required by God : they suppose always that
they must render to God a particular traditional worship,
in regard to which all the merit depends on the render-
ing of it. For the establishment of a church, therefore,
there is still necessary an historical and statutory belief
that is founded on certain facts. This is the so-called
creed. In every church, then, there are two elements,
the pure moral, rational belief, and the historico-statu-
tory creed. On the relation of these two elements it
depends, whether a church shall possess worth or not.
The statutory is in function always only the vehicle of
the moral element. Whenever the statutory element
becomes an independent object, claims an independent
authority, the church sinks into corruption and unreason ;
whenever the church assumes the pure belief of reason it
is in the way to the kingdom of God. This is the distinc-
tion between true worship and false worship, religion and
priestcraft. The dogma has value only so far as it has a
moral core. Without this moral belief the apostle Paul
himself would have hardly put faith in the legends of the
creed. The doctrine of the Trinity, for example, con-
tains, in the letter, absolutely nothing for practice.

240 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY,

Whether three or ten persons are to be worshipped in the
Godhead, is indifferent, inasmuch as no difference of rule
results tlienco for the conduct of life. Even the Bible
and the interj)retation of the Bible are to be placed
under the moral point of view. The revealed documents
must be interpreted in accordance with the universal
rules of rational religion. Reason is in matters of reli-
gion the supreme interpreter of Scripture. Such inter-
pretation may in reference to the text often appear forced :
nevertheless it must be preferred to such a literal inter-
pretation as yields nothing for morality, or is directly
opposed to ethical principles. The possibility of such
moral interpretation, without distortion of the literal
sense, lies in the fact of the instinct to moral religion
having been always present in the reason of man. The
representations of the Bible have only to be divested of
their mystical husk (and Kant has given examples
of this in his moral interj)retations of the most impor-
tant dogmas) in order to obtain a universal rational
sense. The historical element of the sacred writ-
ings is in itself indififerent. The riper reason becomes,
the more it is capable of being satisfied with the exclu-
sive moral interpretation, the less indispensable become
the statutory dogmas of the creed. The transition of the
creed into a purely rational faith, is the coming of the
kingdom of God, towards which, however, we can draw
near only in an infinite progress. The actual realization
of the kingdom of God ia the end of the world, the close
of history.

III. — The Kritik of Judgment.

Kant sketches the notion of this science as follows.
The two mental faculties which have been hitherto con-
sidered, are those of cognition and volition. As regards
the former (cognition), that only understanding is pos-
sessed of constitutive a priori principles, was proved in
the Kritik of Pure Reason. As regards the latter (voli-
tion), that only reason is possessed of constitutive a
priori principles, was proved in the Kritik of Practical
Reason. Whether judgment now, as middle-term be-
tween understanding and reason, supplies its object, the
emotion of pleasure and pain, as middle-term between
cognition and volition, with constitutive (not merely regu-
lative) a priori principles of its own, — this is what the

KAXT. 241

Kritik of Judgment has to determine. Thia faculty,
judgment, is by virtue of its peculiar function a middle-
term between understanding (simple apprehension) as
faculty of notions, and reason (reasoning) as faculty of
jirinciples (syllogistic premises). Theoretical reason has
taught us to comprehend the world only according to laws
of nature : practical reason has disclosed to us a moral
world in which all is under the control of liberty. There
were, then, an insurmountable cleft between the kingdom
of nature and the kingdom of liberty (free-will), should
judgment prove unable to replace this cleft by the notion
of a common ground of unity for both. The warrant of
such expectation lies in the notion of judgment itself.
The function of this faculty being to think the particular
as contained under a universal, it will naturally refer the
empirical plurality of nature to a 8U|>erseDsual transcen-
dental principle as ground of unity to this plurality.
This principle, as object of judgment, will, therefore, be
the notion of design in nature, for design is nothing else
than this supersensual unity which constitutes the reason
of the reality of objects. Then all design, all realization
of a proposed end, being attended with satisfaction, it
"will be easily imderstood why judgment has been said to
contain the laws for the emotion of satisfaction and dis-
satisfaction.

Adaptation in nature, however, may be either subjec-
tively or objectively conceived. In the first case, I ex-
perience pleasure or pain directly on the presentation of
an object, and before I have formed any notion of it.
An emotion of this nature can be referred only to a har-
monious relation subsisting between the form of the
object and the faculty that perceives it. Judgment in
this subjective aspect is cesthetic judgment. In the second
case I form first of all a notion of the object, and then
decide whether the object corresponds to this notion.
That my perception should find a flower beautiful, it is
not necessary that I should have formed beforehand a
notion of this flower. But to find contrivance in the
flower, to that a notion is necessary. Judgment as the
facility cognisant of objective adaptation is named teleO'
logical judgmen t.

1. Critique of ceMhetic judgment. — (a.) Analytic. — The
analj-tic of aesthetic judgment is diNÜded into two prin-
cipal parts, the analytic of the beautiful and the analytic
of the sublime.

242 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

To discover on what tlie naming of an object beautiful
depends, we must analyse the judgments of Taste as the
faculty that is cognisant of the beautiful. (1.) In
(juality the beautiful is the object of a satisfaction that is
wholly disinterested. This disinterestedness distinguishes
the satisfaction of the beautiful as well from that of the
agreeable as from that of the good. In the agreeable and
in the good also, I am interested. In the case of the
agreeable my satisfaction is accompanied by a feeling of
desire. My satisfaction in the good is at the same time
motive to my will for the realization of it. Only in the
case of the beautiful is my satisfaction free from interest-
edness. (2.) In quantity the beautiful gives a universal
satisfaction. As regards the agreeable every one is con-
vinced that his pleasure in it is only a personal one ; but
whoever says, This picture is beautiful, expects every one
else to find it so. Nevertheless, this decision of taste
does not arise from notions ; its universality, there-
fore, is merely subjective. My judgment is not that all
objects of a class are beautiful, but that a certain parti-
cular object will appear beautiful to all beholders. The
judgments of taste are singular judgments. (3.) As re-
gards relation the beautiful is that in which we find the
form of adaptation without conceiving at the same time
any particular end of this adaptation. (4.) In modality,
the beautiful is, without notion, object of a necessary satis-
faction. Every consciousness may be at least conceived
as capable of causing pleasure. The agreeable actually
does cause pleasure. But the beautiful must cause plea-
sure. The necessity of the aesthetic judgment, then, is a
necessity of the agreement of all in a judgment which is
regarded as example of a universal rule, which rule again
it is impossible to assign. The subjective principle which
underlies the judgments of taste, therefore, is a sensus
communis that determines only by feelings and not by
notions what should please or displease.

Sublime is what is absolutely or beyond all comparison
great, — that compared with which all else is small.
But there is nothing in nature that may not be surpassed
by yet a greater. The infinite alone is absolutely great,
and the infinite is only to be found in ourselves as idea.
The sublime is not properly in nature, then, but is only
reflected from the mind to nature. We call that sublime
in nature which awakens in us the idea of the infinite.
As with the beautiful, it is principally quality that is in

KAXT. 243

question, so with the sublime it is principally quantity ;
and this quantity is either magnitude of extension (the
mathematical sublime) or magnitude of power (the dyna-
mical sublime). In the sublime the satisfaction concerns
formlessness rather than form. The sublime excites a
powerful mental emotion, and gives pleasure only through
j)aiu, or by occasioning a momentary feeling of obstructed
vitality. The satisfaction of the sublime, then, is not so
much positive pleasure, as rather wonder and awe, — what
may be called negative pleasure. The moments of the
aesthetic ai)preciatiou of the sublime are the same as in
that of the beautiful. (1.) In quantitative reference that
is stiblime which is absolutely great, and in comparison
with which all else is small. The aesthetic estimation of
magnitude, however, does not lie in number but in the
mere perception of the subject. The magnitude of a
natural object, in the comprehension of which imagina-
tion vainly exerts its entire faculty, infers a supersensual
substrate great beyond all measure of sense, and with
which properly the feeling of the sublime is connected.
It is not the object, the raging sea, for example, that is
sublime, but rather the mental emotion of him who
contemplates it. (2.) As regards quality, the sublime
creates not pleasure like the beautiful, but rather in
the first instance pain, and only through pain pleasure.
The feeling of the inadequacy of imagination in the
aesthetic estimation of magnitude produces pain ; but
again the consciousness of our independent reason in its
superiority to imagination produces pleasure. Sublime,
then, in this respect is that which in its opposition to
the interest of the senses directly pleases. (3.) As con-
cerns relation, the sublime causes nature to appear as a
power in relation to which we possess nevertheless a
consciousness of our superiority. (4.) As for modality,
our judgments in reference to the sublime are as neces-
sarily valid as those in reference to the beautiful — with
this difiFerence only, that the former are accepted by others
with greater diflSculty than the latter, because for our
sense of the sublime culture and developed moral ideas
are necessary.

(b.) Dialectic. — A dialectic of oesthetic judgment is pos-
sible, like every other dialectic, only where there are
judgments that pretend to an a priori universality. For
dialectic consists in the contrariety of such judgments.
The antinomy of the principles of taste depends on the

244 II I ST OR Y OF PHIL OSO P II Y.

two opposed momenta of the relative judgment, that it
is purely subjective, and yet claims universality. Hence
the two commonplaces : In matters of taste there can be no
dispute ; and, Tastes differ. This gives rise to the follow-
ing antinomy, (1.) Thesis : The judgment of taste ia
not founded on notions, otherwise dispute were possible
(proofs might be led). (2.) Antithesis : The judgment of
taste ia founded on notions, otherwise, despite its diver-
sity, dispute were impossible. This antinomy, says
Kant, is only an apparent one, and disappears as soon as
the two propositions are more precisely understood. The
thesis, namely, should run so : The judgment of taste ia
not founded on definite notions, or, it is not susceptible
of strict proof ; the antithesis again so : The judgment of
taste is founded on a notion ; but an indefinite notion,
that, namely, of a supersensual substrate of the pheno-
mena. In this construction there is no longer any con-
tradiction between the two propositions.

Now, at the close of the inquiry, an answer is possible
for the question : does the adaptation of things to our
judgment of them (their beauty and sublimity), lie in us
or in them ? .Esthetic realism assumes that the supreme
cause of nature has wiUed the existence of things which
should appear to imagination as beautiful and subKme.
The organized forms are the principal witnesses for this
view. But, again, even in its merely mechanical forms,
nature seems to testify such a tendency to beauty, that
it is possible to believe in a mere mechanical production
even for those more perfect forms as well, and the adap-
tation, consequently, would lie, not in nature, but in us.
This ia the position of idealism, and renders possible an
explanation of the capacity to pronounce a priori on the
beautiful and the sublime. The highest mode of view-
ing the aesthetic element, however, ia to regard it as a
symbol of the moral good. And thus, in the end, taste,
like religion, is placed by Kant as a corollary to morals.

2. Critique of teleological judgment. — In the preced-
ing, the subjectively aesthetic adaptation of the objects
of nature has been considered. But these objects stand
to each other also in a relation of adaptation. This ob-
jective adaptation is now to be the consideration of teleo-
logical judgment.

(a.) Analytic of teleological judgment. — This analytic
has to determine the kinds of objective (material) adap-
tation. These are two : an external, and an internal

KAXT. 245

External adaptation, as it designates merely the utility
of one thing for another, is only something relative. The
sand, for example, deposited on the sea-shore is good for
l>ine-tree8. For animals to live on the earth, the latter
must ])roduce the necessary nourishment, etc. These
examples of external adaptation show that the means in
such a case possess not atlaptation in themselves, but
only contingently. The sand is not understood in conse-
quence of it being said that it is means for pine-trees : it
is intelligible per se quite apart from any notion of use.
The earth produces not food because men must neces-
sarily live on the earth. In short, this external or rela-
tive adaptation is to be understood by a reference to the
mechanism of nature alone. Not so the internal adap-
tation, wliich exhibits itself principally in the organic
products of nature. These are so constituted that each
of their parts is end, and each also instrument or means.
In the generative process the product of nature generates
itself as a genus ; in the process of growth the product
of nature produces itself as an individual ; in the pro-
cess of formation each part of the individual produces
its own self. This organism of nature is inexplicable by
mere mechanical causes : it admits of being explained
only teleologically, or by means of final causes.

(ö.) Dialectic. — This antithesis of natural mechanism
and of teleology, it is the business of the dialectic of
teleological judgment to reconcile. On the one side we
have the thesis : All production of material things must
be held possible only according to mechanical laws. On
the other side the antithesis is : Some products of
material nature cannot be held possible on the mere
supposition of mechanical laws, but demand for their
explanation the existence of final causes. If these two
propositions were assumed as constitutive (objective)
principles for the possibility of objects themselves, they
would contradict each other ; but as mere regulative
(subjective) principles for the investigation of nature
they are not contradictory. Earlier systems treated the
notion of design in nature dogmatically ; they either
affirmed or denied it as — with reference to nature — an
actual thing in itself. We, however, aware that teleo-
logy is only a regulative principle, are indifferent as to
whether internal adaptation belongs to nature or not :
we maintain only that our judgment must regard nature
as implying design. "We look the notion of design, so to

246 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY,

speak, into nature, leaving it quite undetermined whether,
perhaps, another understanding, not discursive like our
own, might not find any such notion quite unnecessary
for the comprehension of nature. Ours is a discursive
understanding, that, proceeding ever from the parts, con-
ceives the whole as product of them. The organic pro-
ducts of nature, therefore, in which, on the contrary, the
whole is originating principle and prius of the parts, it
cannot otherwise conceive than under the point of view
of the notion of design. Were there, however, an in-
tuitive understanding which should recognise in the uni-
versal the particular, in the whole the parts, as already
co-determined, such an understanding would, without
resorting to the notion of design, comprehend the whole
of nature by reference to a single principle.

If Kant had been but serious with this notion of an
intuitive understanding, as well as with the notion of
immanent adaptation, he would have surmounted in
principle the position of subjective idealism, to escape
from which he had made several attempts in his Kritik
of Judgment. In effect, however, he has only casually
suggested these ideas, and left their demonstration to his
successors.

XXXIX. — Transition to the Post- Kantian Philosophy.

THE Kantian philosophy soon acquired in Germany an
almost absolute sovereignty. The imposing bold-
ness of its general position, the novelty of its results, the
fertility of its principles, the moral earnestness of its
view of the universe, above all, the spirit of liberty and
moral autonomy which breathed in it, and which power-
fully supported the tendencies of the time, procured it a
reception equally enthusiastic and universaL It excited
an interest in philosophical inquiries that extended itself
throughout all the educated classes, and in such propor-
tions as were never before witnessed in any other nation.
In a short time a numerous school sprang up around it,
and there were soon few universities in Germany where
it was not represented by talented disciples. It pre-
sently exerted an important influence on all departments
of science and literature, particularly on theology, morals,
and the liberal sciences [Schiller). The majority of the
writers, however, of the Kantian school, confine them-

THE POSTKAXTIAN rillLOSOPll Y. 247

selves to popular explanatory apj)licationR of the received
doctrine, and even the most talented and independent of
the supporters or imi)rover8 of the Critical Philosophy
(as Jieinhohl, 175S-1813 ; Bardili, 1761-1808; Schulze,
Beck, Fries, Krug, Bou(erweck), sought only to lind for it
a firmer basis of support, or to remove from it certaiu
faults and defects, or to demonstrate its position generally
in a manner more logical and exact. Among those who
continued and further developed the Kantian philosophy
there are only two men, Fichte and Herbart, who havo
earned the prominence of an epoch-making position, and
the praise of actual progress ; while amongst its oppo-
nents (Hamann, Herder), only one man, Jacobi, was of
philosophical importance. These three philosophers,
therefore, are next to be considered ; but, before enter-
ing on the exacter analysis, we shall premise a brief pre-
liminary characterization of their relation to Kant.

(1.) Kant had critically annihilated dogmatism; his
Kritik of Pure Reason had for result the theoretic inde-
monstrability of the three ideas of reason, — God, free-
will, and immortality. True, he had recalled in a practi-
cal interest (as postulates of practical reason), these very
ideas which had just been banished in a theoretical one.
But as postulates, as mere practical presuppositions, they
aflford no theoretic certainty, and remain exposed to
doubt. In order to remove this uncertainty, this despair
of knowledge, which appeared to be the end of the
Kantian philosophy, Jacobi, a younger contemporary of
Kant's, opposed as antithesis to the position of criticism
the position of the philosophy of belief. Certainly the
highest ideas of reason, the eternal, the divine, are not
to be attained or proved by means of demonstration :
but this indemonstrableness, this inaccessibleness, is the
very nature of the divine. For certain apprehension of
the highest, of what lies beyond understanding, there is
but one organ, — feeling. In feeling therefore, in in-
tuitive cognition, in belief, Jacobi expected to fijid that
certainty which Kant had in vain laboured to attain
through discursive thought.

(2.) Fichte bears to the Kantian philosophy the rela-
tion of direct consequence, as Jacobi that of antithesis.
The dualism of Kant, which represents the ego, now as
theoretical ego in subjection to the external world, and
now as practical ego in superiority to it, in other words,
now as receptive and now as spontaneous in regard of

?48 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

objectivity— this dualism Fichte eliminated by being in
earnest with the primacy of i)ractical reason, by regard-
ing reason as exclusively practical, as will, as spontaneity,
and by conceiving its theoretical, receptive relation to
objectivity as only lessened power, as only a limitation
imposed by reason itself. For reason, so far as it is
practical, objectivity there is none unless what shall be
due to itself. The will knows no fixed existence, but
only what is to be or ought to be. That truth is any
definite object is thus denied, and the unknown thing-
in-itself must of itself, as an unreal shadow, fall to the
ground. ' All that is, is ego,' this is the principle of the
Fichtian system ; which system, therefore, exhibits sub-
jective idealism in its consequence and completion.

(3.) Whilst Fichte's subjective idealism found its con-
tinuation in the objective idealism of Schelling, and in
the absolute idealism of Hegel, there sprang up contem-
poraneously with these systems a third result of the
criticism of Kant, the philosophy of Herhart. It con-
nects, however, rather aubjectivo-genetically than ob-
jectivo-historically with the philosophy of Kant, and
occupies in principle, for the rest, all historical conti-
nuity being broken down in its regard, only an isolated
position. Its general basis is to this extent Kantian,
that it also adopts for problem, a critical investigation
and construction of subjective experience. We have
given it a place between Fichte and Schelling.

XL. — Jacohi.

FRIEDRICH HEINRICH JACOBI was bom in 1743
at Düsseldorf. His father intended him for busi-
ness. After having studied at Geneva (and acquired there
a taste for philosophy), he undertook the business of his
father ; but gave it up again on becoming Jülich -Bergian
acting councillor of the exchequer and commissioner of
customs, as well as privy councillor at Düsseldorf. At
Düsseldorf, or at his country-seat, Pempelfort, in the
neighbourhood, he spent the greater part of his life ; de-
voting himself, in by-hours, with zeal and interest, to
philosophy ; gathering around him, from time to time,
in his summer quarters, a variety of friends ; keeping
up his connexion with the absent ones by means of a
constant correspondence ; and renewing old acquaint-

JACOBl. 249

ftTiceships, or forming fresh ones, tl)ronc;li ocp.\sinn.'il
journeys. In the year 1804 he -was called to the newly-
founded Academy of Sciences at Munich, where, in 1819,
having been President of the Academy from 1807, he
died. Jacobi was amiable and talented, a man of action,
and a poet as well as a j^hilosopher ; hence in the last
caj>acity his want of logical order and precision in the
expression of thought. His writings form not a syste-
matic whole ; but are in their character occasional, com-
posed ' rhapsodically, as the grasshopper jumps,' and
generally in the shape of letters, dialogues, and novels.
' It was never my object,' he says himself, ' to construct
a system for the school ; my writings sprang from my
innermost life, they followed an historical course ; in a
certain way I was not the author of them, not with my
own will so, but under compulsion of a higher and irre-
sistible power.' This want of systematic connexion and
nnity of principle renders the due statement of Jacobi's
philosophy difficult. "We adopt the three following
points of view as the best for our purpose : (1.) Jacobi's
polemic against indirect, mediate, or conditional know-
ledge ; (2.) his principle of direct or intuitive knowledge ;
(3.) his position to contemporary philosophy, especially
that of Kant.

(1.) Jacobi place3 his negative point of departure in
Spinoza. In his essay On the System of Spinoza, in Letters
to Moses Mendelssohn (1785), 'he again drew public atten-
tion to the quite forgotten philosophy of Spinoza. The
correspondence is introduced thus : — Jacobi discovers
that Lessing was a Spinozist and communicates this to
Mendelssohn ; Mendelssohn refuses to believe it ; and so
then the further historical pro and contra develops itself.
The positive philosophical affirmations contained in this
essay may be reduced to three : (1.) Spinozism is fatal-
ism and atheism. (2.) Every method of philosophical
demonstration conducts to fatalism and atheism. (3.)
In order to escape these we must set limits to de-
monstration, and acknowledge that belief is the element
of all human knowledge. (1.) Spinozism is atheism,
for the cause of the world is to it not a person, not a
being endowed with reason and will, and action on
design, and therefore not a God, It is fatalism, for it
asserts the human will to be only erroneously considered
free. (2.) This atheism and fatalism, however, are only
the necessary results of all philosophical demonstration.

250 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPH Y.

To comprehend a thing is, Jacobi says, to deduce it from
its proximate causes : it is to find for the actual the pos-
sible, for the conditioned the unconditioned, for the direct
the indirect. We comprehend only what we can explain
from something else. And so our intellection proceeds
in a chain of conditioned conditions, and this concatena-
tion forms a natural mechanism, in the exploration of
which our understanding has its immeasurable field. As
long as we desire to comprehend and prove, we must
assume for every object ever a higher one which con-
ditions it ; where the chain of the conditioned ceases,
there cease also comprehension and proof ; unless we
abandon demonstration, we reach no infinite. If philo-
sophy would with the finite understanding seek to grasp
the infinite, it must drag down the divine into finitude.
All philosophy as yet is in this strait ; and yet it appears
self- evidently absurd to attempt to discover conditions
for the unconditioned, to convert the absolutely neces-
sary into a possible, in order to be able to construe it.
A Ood that were capable of proof were no God, for the
ground of proof must always be higher than that which
is to be proved ; the latter, indeed, can hold its real-
ity only in fee of the former. If the existence of God
is to be proved, consequently, God must consent to be
deduced from some ground which were at once before
God and above God. Hence Jacobi's paradox : It is the
interest of science that there should be no God, no super-
natural, supramundane being. Only on the hypothesis
that there is nothing but nature, that nature alone is
what is self-subsistent and all in all, is it possible for
science to reach its goal of perfection, or to flatter itself
with the hope of being able to become adequate to its
object, and itself all in all. This, then, is the conclusion
which Jacobi draws from the * drama of the history of
philosophy : ' ' There is no philosophy but that of Spinoza.
Whoever can suppose that all the works and ways of men
are due to the mechanism of nature, and that inteUigence
has no function but, as an attendant consciousness, to
look on, — him we need no longer oppose, him we cannot
help, him we must leave go. Philosophical justice has
no longer a hold on him ; for what he denies cannot be
philosophically proved, nor what he asserts philosophi-
cally refuted.' In this emergency what resource is there ?
' Understanding, isolated, is materialistic and irrational ;
it denies mind, and it denies God. Reason, isolated, is

JACOB/. 261

idealistic and illogical ; it denies nature, and makes itself
God.' But this being so we are driven to ask (3.) for
another mode of cognising the supersensual, and this is
belief. This flight from finite cognition to belief, Jacobi
calls the salfo mortale of hiunan reason. Every certainty
which may require to be understood, demands another
certainty ; and this regression necessitates at last an im-
mediate certainty, which, far from requiring grounds and
reasons, shall even absolutely exclude these. But such
feeling of certainty as dci)ends not on reasons of the un-
derstanding is belief. The sensuous and the super-
sensuous we know only through belief. All human
knowledge originates in revelation and belief.

These conclusions of Jacobi, contained in his letters on
Spinoza, could not fail to give universal umbrage to the
German philosophical world. He was reproached with
being an enemy of reason, a preacher of blind faith, a
scorner at once of science and philosophy, a fanatic, a
papist. In order to repel these reproaches, and justify the
position he had assumed, he wrote, in 1787, a year and
a half after the publication of this work on Spinoza, his
dialogue entitled David Hume on Faith, or Idealism and
Realism, in which he more definitely and fully developed
his principle of faith, or of immediate (intuitive) know-
ledge.

(2.) First of all, Jacobi distinguishes between his faith,
and faith on authority. Blind belief is such as is sup-
ported not on rational grounds, but on the authority of
another. This is not the nature of his belief, which is
supported rather on the inmost conviction of the subject
himself. His belief again is no arbitrary imagination :
we may imagine all manner of things, but to conceive a
thing real, for that there is required an inexplicable con-
viction of feeling which we can only call belief. Of the
relation in which belief stands to the various aspects of
hiiman cognition, Jacobi, who is nowise consistent in his
terminology, expresses himself vacillatingly. In his
earlier terminology he placed belief (or, as he also named
it, the faculty of belief) beside sense or receptivity, and
opposed it to understanding and reason, which two facul-
ties as synonymous he identified with the finite and con-
ditioned knowledge of preceding philosophy. Later,
however, by the example of Kant, he opposed reason to
understanding, calling that now reason that had been
previously named sense and belief. Belief of reason, in-

252 HISTORY OF rillLOSOPHY.

tuition of reason, is now the organ for apprehension of
the siipersenauous. As such it stands opposed to under-
standing. There must be assumed to exist in us a higher
faculty, to which what is true in and beyond the pheno-
mena of sense, must, in a manner that is beyond the ken
of sense and understanding, make itself known. Opposed
to the explanatory understanding, we must acknowledge
a non-explanatory, positively revelatory, unconditionally
deciding reason or belief of reason. As there is a per-
ception of sense, so also there must be a perception of
reason, against which latter demonstration will as little
avail as against the former. In excuse of the expression
a perception of reason, Jacobi refers to the absence of
any other that were preferable. Language, he says, pos-
sesses no other terms for the denotation of the mode and
manner in which our a^l-teeming feeling masters what is
inaccessible to the senses. Should any one aflßrm that
he knows something, he may be justifiably asked whence
or how he knows it ; and then he is inevitably compelled
to appeal either to the sensation of sense or to senti-
ment of mind, the latter being as superior to the former
as man to the brute. And so, says Jacobi, I ad-
mit without hesitation that my philosophy founds on
feeling, pure objective feeling, the authority of which is
to me the highest authority. The faculty of feeling is
the highest faculty in man ; it is that which specifically
distinguishes him from the brute ; it is identical with
reason, or from the faculty of feeling (sentiment) reason
wholly and solely arises. Of the antithesis, in which,
with this principle of intuitive cognition, he stood to pre-
ceding philosophy, Jacobi possessed a perfectly clear con-
sciousness. * There has arisen,' he says, in the introduction
to his collected works, * since Aristotle, an increasing
effort on the part of the schools to subordinate, nay even
to sacrifice immediate to mediate knowledge, the faculty
of perception on which all is originally founded to the
faculty of reflection, conditioned as it is by the action of
abstraction, the archetype to the ectype, the substance to
the word, reason to understanding. Nothing is hence-
forth to be considered here that has not demonstrated
itself, twice demonstrated itself, now in perception, and
now in the notion, now in matter of fact, and again in
its image, the word, and only in the word, indeed, is the
matter of fact to be conceived truly to lie and actually to
be cognised. But every philosophy that assumes a re-

JACOB I. 253

flective reason alone must disappear at last in a nullity
of knowledge. Its end is nihilism.

(3.) Wliat position Jacobi, in consequence of his jirin-
ciple of belief, would assume to the philosophy of Kant,
may be surmised from what has been already said. Ja-
cobi, indeed, has explained himself in this reference,
partly in the dialogue ' David Hume' (particularly in the
appendix to it which treats of ' the transcendental ideal-
ism,') and partly in the essay on The Attempt of Kri-
ticismus to bring Reason to Understanding (1801). The
relation concerned may be reduced to the following three
heads : (1.) Jacobi dissents from the Kantian theory of
sensuous cognition. He defends, instead, the position of
empiricism, maintains the truth of sensuous j>erce])tion,
and denies the apriority of time and space. He repre-
sents Kant as attempting to prov^e that objects as well as
the relations of objects are mere determinations of our
own selves, and wholly inexistent in externality to us.
For even if it be said that there is something correspon-
dent to our perceptions as their cause, what this some-
thing is still remains unknown to us. On Kan^,'s theory
the laws of perception and thought are destitute of any ob-
jective validity, or our entire knowledge contains nothing
whatever of an objective nature. But it is absurd to
assume that the phenomena disclose nothing of the truth
that is concealed behind them. On such an assumption
it were better entirely to eliminate the unknown thing-
in -itself, and carry idealism out to its natural conclusion.
' Kant cannot in consistency assume objects for the im-
pressions on our minds : he ought to maintain the most
decided idealism.' (2.) Jacobi essentially, on the other
hand, assents to the Kantian critique of the understand-
ing. Like Jacobi, Kant too maintained the incompetency
of the understanding to knowledge of the supersensuous,
and the possibility of any apprehension of the highest
ideas of reason only by belief. Jacobi conceives the main
merit of Kant to lie in the clearing away of the ideas as
logical phantasms and mere products of reflection. ' It
is easy for understanding, forming notions of notions from
notions, and so gradually rising to ideas, to fancy that,
by means of these mere logical phantasms, wbich surpass
for it the perceptions of sense, it too possesses not only
the power but the most manifest vocation really to tran-
scend the world of sense and attain in its flight to a
higher science, a science of the supersensuous, and that

254 II I STORY OF nilLOSOPHY.

is independent of perception. This error, this self-decep-
tion, was detected and destroyed by Kant. And thus
there was obtained, in the first place, at least room for
genuine rationalism. This is, in truth, the great achieve-
ment of Kant, and the foundation of his immortal glory.
The sound sense of our Sage, however, saved him from
fading to perceive that this room would of necessity
directly transform itself into an abyss for the swallowing
up of all knowledge of the truth, unless — a God appeared.
Here it is that my opinions and the opinions of Kant
meet.' Jacobi, however, (3.) does not quite accept the
Kantian denial to theoretic reason of any capacity for
objective knowledge. He censures Kant for lamenting
the inability of human reason to demonstrate theoreti-
cally the reality of its ideas. Kant, to him, is still thus
in bondage to the dream that sees the indemonstrability
of the ideas to lie not in their own nature, but in the
inadequacy of our faculties. And so it was that Kant
was compelled to seek in the practical field a sort of
scientific demonstration : a shift and circuit that to every
deeper thinker must appear absurd, all proof in any such
case being at once impossible and unnecessary.

Jacobi extends not his favour for Kant to the post-
Kantian philosophy. The pantheistic tendency of the
latter was peculiarly repugnant to him. ' For Kant,
that deep thinking, candid philosopher, the words God,
free-will, immortality, religion, had quite the same mean-
ing that they possess, and have always possessed, for
common-sense in general. Kant played no tricks with
them. It gave offence that he irrefutably demonstrated
the inadequacy to these ideas, of all speculative philo-
sophical proofs. For the destruction of the theoretical
proofs he made amends by the necessary postulates of
pure practical reason. And by this expedient, according
to his own assertion, philosophy was perfectly relieved ;
and the good, which it had always hitherto missed, at
length happily reached. But now, critical philosophy's
own daughter (Fichte), makes a god of the moral order
of the universe, a god, then, expressly without conscious-
ness and personality. These bold words, which were
quite openly and unhesitatingly spoken, excited, indeed,
some little apprehension. But the alarm soon ceased.
Directly afterwards, indeed, when the second daughter of
the critical philosophy (Schelhng), completely withdrew
what had been left sacred by the first-— the distinction

FICHTE. 2M

between natural and moral philosophy, between liberty
and necessity, and without farther preamble declared
nature alone all aud nothing above nature, the result
was no astonishment at all : this second daughter is an
inverted or beatified Si)inozi8m, an ideal materialism.'
The latter expression in reference to Schelling, with
which, in the same work, other and severer allusions
were connected, provoked the latter's well-known reply
(Schelling's Memorial of the Work : On Divine Things,
1S12).

Throwing back a critical glance now on the philosophi-
cal position of Jacobi, w^e may designate its distinctive
pecidiarity to be the abstract separation of understanding
and feehng. These Jacobi was unable to bring to agree-
ment. ' In my heart,' he says, * there is light, but
directly I would bring it into the understanding, it dis-
appears. Which of the two elements is the true one ?
That of the understanding, which displays indeed forms
that are firm, but behind them only a bottomless abyss ?
Or that of the heart, which, lighting with promise up-
wards, fails still in definite knowledge ? Is it possible
for the h\iman mind to attain to truth, unless through
iinion of both elements into a single light ? And is such
a union attainable without the intervention of a miracle ? '
When now, however, Jacobi, in order to reconcile this
difference of the heart and the understanding, attempted
to replace mediate (finite) cognition by immediate (in-
tuitive) cognition, he only deceived himself. That very
immediate cognition, which is supposed by Jacobi to be
the special organ of the supersensuous, is in truth medi-
ate, has ah-eady described a series of subjective inter-
mediating movements, and can pretend to immediacy
only in entire oblivion of its own nature and origin.

XLl.— Fichte.

JOHANN GOTTLIEB FICHTE was born in 1762 at
Eammenau in Upper Lusatia. A Silesian nobleman
interested himself in the boy, and placed him first with
a clergyman and then at the institute of Schulpforte.
In his eighteenth year, Michaelmas 1780, Fichte entered
the university of Jena as a student of theology. He
soon found himself attracted to the study of philosophy ;
aud the system of Spinoza in particular took a powerful

256 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

hold on him. The straits of his external position served
only to harden his will and his energy. In the year
1784, and afterwards, he held the position of tutor in
various families in Saxony, but, on applying in 1787 for
the situation of country pastor there, he was rejected in
consequence of hia religious views. He was obliged now
to quit his native country, to which he was devotedly ri
attached, and accept a tutorship in Zürich, where he
made the acquaintance of his future wife, a niece of
Klopstock's. He returned in Easter of 1790 to Saxony,
and assumed the position of a privatim docens in Leipzig.
Here he became acquainted with the philosophy of Kant
in consequence of being engaged to give private lessons
to a student of his system. In the spring of 1791 we
find him, as a family-tutor again, in Warsaw, and shortly
afterwards in Königsberg, whither he had gone to make
acquaintance with Kant, whom he enthusiastically ad-
mired. Instead of a letter of introduction he handed
to Kant hia Critique of all Revelation^ a work com-
posed by him in four weeks. Fichte attempted, in this
work, to deduce from practical reason the possibility of
a revelation. He proceeds not quite a priori, however,
but under a certain empirical condition — this, namely,
that it be presumed that man has fallen into such moral
ruin that the moral law has lost all its influence on will,
or, in short, that all morality is extinct. In such a case,
it is reasonable to expect on the part of God, as moral
regent of the universe, the communication to men of pure
moral principles through the medium of the senses, or
the revelation of himself as lawgiver to them by means
of a special and appropriate manifestation in the world of
sense. An actual revelation would be here, then, a pos-
tulate of practical reason. Even the possible matter of
such a revelation Fichte attempted to determine a priori.
We stand in need of no knowledge but that of God, free-
will, and immortality ; the revelation, therefore, wiP -
substantively contain nothing more. But, on the ont
hand, it will contain these doctrines in an intelligible v
form ; and, on the other, it will not invest them in such \
symbolical dress as will claim for itself unlimited rever-
ence. This tractate, which appeared anonymously in
1792, excited the greatest attention, and was universally
regarded as a work of Kant's. It was partly the cause
of Fichte — then in Zürich for the celebration of his mar-
riage— receiving soon afterwards (in 1793) a call to the

FICHTE.

chair of pliilosophy at Jena, which Reinhold, invited
to Kiel, had juat vacated. At this time, also, Ficht«
]>ubli8hed his anonymous Contrihutions in Correction o/
the JtuhjmenU of the Public on the French devolution, a
work which sat batlly on the memories of the govern-
ments. Fichte entered on his new oflSce at Easter in
1794, and speedily saw his reputation established. In a
series of publications (the Wissenschaftslehre api)eared in
1794, the Saturrecht in 1796, and the Sittenlehre in 1798),
he endeavoured to approve and complete his new prin-
ciple in transcendence of that of Kant ; and exercised in
this manner a powerful inlluence on the scientific move-
ment in Germany, and all the more that Jena was one
of the most flourishing universities, and the focus then
of all energizing intellects. Here Fichte stood in inti-
mate relation with Goethe, Schiller, the Schlegels, W.
Humboldt, and Hufeland. Unfortunately in a few years
these relations came to a rupture. In 1795 Fichte had
become co-editor of Kiethammer's Philosophical Journal.
Forberg, rector at Saalfeld, a contributor, offered, in
1798, for insertion in this journal, an article on 'the
determination of the notion of religion.' Fichte, who
had advised against it, was still induced to insert it, but
he premised an introduction ' on the grounds of our faith
in a divine government of the world,' the purpose of
which was to remove or lessen auything that might ap-
pear ofifensive in the article itself. Both contributions,
however, were followed by a vehement cry of atheism.
The Electorate of Saxony confiscated the journal through-
out its territories, and despatched a requisition to the
Ernestine Dukes, the common protectors of the University
of Jena, for the caDing of the author to account, and the
infliction of condign punishment on conviction. Fichte, in
answer to the edict of confiscation, published (1799) a jus-
tification of himself in his Appeal to the Public : a Work
which Petitions to be Read before it is Confiscated. With
reference to his own government, he vindicated himself
in the Formal Defence of the Editors of the Philosophi-
cal Journal against the Accusations of Atheism. The
government of Weimar, which desired to consider as well
him as the Electorate of Saxony, procrastinated with
its decision. Meantime Fichte, however, having been
secretly informed, rightly or wrongly, that it was in-
tended to make an end of the whole afi'air by dismissing
the accused with a reprimand for their imprudence, wrote,

258 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

in his desire either for legal conviction or signal satisfac-
tion, a private letter to a member of the government, in
which he declared his resolution to send in his resigna-
tion in case of a reprimand, and concluded with the
threat that several of his friends would with him quit
the University, and found a new one elsewhere in Ger-
many. The government accepted this declaration as a
letter of resignation, thereby indirectly pronouncing the
reprimand as inevitable. Religiously and politically
suspect, Fichte looked about him in vain for an asylum.
The Prince of Rudolstadt, to whom he turned, refused
him his protection, and even in Berlin his arrival (1799)
at first excited commotion. Here, in familiar intercourse
with Friedrich Schlegel, and also with Schleiermacher and
Novalis, his views gradually modified themselves. The
Jena catastrophe had diverted him from the one sided
moral position which, by example of Kant, he had
hitherto occupied, to the sphere of religion ; and now it
was his endeavour to reconcile religion with his position
in the Wissenschaftslehre, through adoption of a certain
mysticism (second form of the philosophy of Fichte).
After he had lectured privately, and delivered philosophi-
cal discourses in Berlin for several years, he received, in
1805, on the recommendation of Beyme and Altenstein
to the Chancellor of State (Hardenberg), a chair of philo-
sophy at Erlangen, with the permission at the same time
of returning to Berlin in winter to lecture, as usual, to
a general audience, on philosophical subjects. Thus, in
the winter of 1807-8, while a French marshal governed
Berlin, and while the voice of the orator was often
drowned by the noise of the enemy's drums in the
street, he delivered his celebrated ' addresses to the Ger-
man nation.' Fichte promoted in the most zealous
manner the establishment of the Berlin University : for
only to a complete change of the system of education
did he look for the regeneration of Germany. On the
opening of the new university in 1809, he was made
dean of the philosophical faculty the first year, and
rector the second. On the outbreak of the war of
liberation, Fichte, both by word and by deed, took the
liveliest interest in it. His wife in attending the
wounded and sick contracted a nervous fever : she, in-
deed, was saved ; but her husband fell under the same
malady, and died on the 28th of January 1814, before
completion of his fifty-second year.

FICHTE. 259

Tn the following cxi)osition of his ])lnlo8ophy we cIIh-
tinguish, lirst of all, between the two (internally different)
periods, that of Jena and that of Berlin. Under the lirst
period, again, we have the Wissenschaf tslehre in one divi-
sion, and Fiehte's pructieal philosophy in another.

I. — The PniLosornY of Fichte ix its Earlier Form.

(1.) Fichte s theoretical philosophy, or his Wissenschqfls-
lehre (theanj of hiowlecije, (jnosolo(jy). — That Fiehte's
subjective idealism is only the consequence of the prin-
ciples of Kant, has been already (xxxix.) briefly ex-
plained. It was unavoidable that Fichte should wholly
reject Kant's incognizable (but, nevertheless, supposed
real) thing-in-itself, and should refer that outer impact
which Kant attributed to these things in themselves, to
the inner action of the mind itself. That only the ego
is, and that what we regard as its limitation by external
objects, is but its own self-limitation — this is the funda-
mental thesis of the Fichtian idealism.

Fichte himself lays the foundations of his gnosology
thus : — In every perception there are present at once an
ego and a thing, or intelligence and its object. Which
of the two sides shall be reduced to the other ? Abstract-
ing from the ego the philosopher obtains a thing-in-itself,
and is obliged to attribute the ideas to the object ; ab-
stracting from the object again, he obtains only an ego
in itself. The former is the position of dogmatism, the
latter that of idealism. Both are incapable of being re-
conciled, and a third is impossible. "We must choose one
or the other then. To assist decision, let us observe the
following : (1.) The ego is manifest in consciousness ;
but the thing-in-itself is a mere fiction, for what is in
consciousness is only a sensation, a feeling. (2.) Dog-
matism undertakes to explain the origin of an idea ; but
it commences this explanation with an object in itself ;
that is, it begins with something that is not and never is
in consciousness. But what is materially existent pro-
duces only what is materially existent — being j^roduces
only being — not feeling. The right consequently lies with
idealism, which begins not with being (material exist-
ence), but with intelligence. To idealism intelligence is
only active, it is not passive, because it is of a primitive
and absolute nature. For this reason its nature is not
being (material outwardness), but wholly and solely

260 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY,

action. The forms of this action, the necessary system
of the acts of intelligence, we must deduce from the prin-
ciple (the essential nature) of intelligence itself. If we
look for the laws of intelligence in experience, the source
from which Kant (in a manner) took his categories, we
commit a double blunder, — (1.) In so far as it is not de-
monstrated why intelligence must act thus, and whether
these laws are also immanent in intelligence ; and (2.) In
so far as it is not demonstrated how the object itself
arises. The objects, consequently, as well as the prin-
ciples of intelligence are to be derived from the ego
itself.

In assuming these consequences, Fichte believed him-
self to be only following the true meaning of the tenets
of Kant, ' What my system specially is, whether, as I
believe, genuine Kriticismus duly followed out, or however
otherwise it may be named, is nothing to the point.'
Fichte maintains his system to entertain the same view
of the subject as that of Kant, and he conceives the
numerous adherents of the latter to have only misunder-
stood and misrepresented their master. In his second
introduction to the Wissenschaftslehre (1797) Fichte grants
these expositors of the Kritik, of Pure Reason that this
work contains passages in which Kant demands sensations,
given to the subject from without, as material conditions
of objective reality. He shows, however, that these pas-
sages are wholly irreconcilable vfdth innumerable asser-
tions of the Kritik (to the effect that there cannot be any
talk whatever of any operation on the part of a transcen-
dental object in itself and external to us) — if by source
of sensations anything else be understood than a mere
thought. * So long,' Fichte continues, * as Kant does not
in so many words expressly declare that he derives sen-
sations from the impress of a thing-in-itself, or, to use his
own terminology, that sensation is to be explained by
reference to a transcendental object independently exis-
tent without us, I will not consent to believe what these
expositors tell us in regard to Kant. Should he, how-
ever, make this declaration, then I will rather believe that
the Kritik of Pure Reason is a work of chance, than that
it is a product of intellect.' The aged Kant did not let
the public wait long for his answer, however. In the
announcement-sheet of the Allgemeine Literaturzeitung
(1799), he formally, and with much emphasis, rejected
the Fichtian improvement of his system, protested against

FICHTE. 261

all intcr]"irotntion of liis writings on any assumed spirit,
and stood by the letter of his theory as contained in
the Kritik of reason. Reinhold in reference to this re-
marks : * Since Kant's public declaration as regards the
jthilosophy of Fichte, it is no longer susceptible of doubt,
but that Kant conceives his system himself, and wants
others to conceive it, quite dilTerently from the manner
in which Fichte has conceived it. But the most that we
can conclude from this is, that Kant himself does not
consider his system inconsequent because it assumes a
something external to subjectivity. It by no means
follows, however, that Fichte is -wrong in declaring
the system in question to be inconsequent because of
this assumption.' That Kant himself had a feeling of
this inconsequence is proved by his alterations in the
second edition of the Kritik of Pure Keason, where the
idealistic side of his system is made decidedly to recede
behind the empirical one.

The general stand-point of the Wissenschaft $lehr€2i\)'^Q^rB
in what has been said : it would make the ego its prin-
ciple, and from the ego it would derive all the rest. That
we are to understand by this ego, not the particular in-
dividual, but the universal ego, universal reason, need
hardl}-- be remarked. Egoity and individuality, the pure
and the empirical ego, are entirely different ideas.

As concerns the form of the Wissenschaf tdehre we have
yet to premise the following. The Wissenschaftslehre Ta\i9>t
according to Fichte find an ultimate principle from which
all others shall be derived. This principle must be directly
certain in its own self. And unless our knowledge is to
be made up of mere incoherent fragments, such a prin-
ciple there must be. But again, as any such principle is
plainly insusceptible of proof, there is nothing left for us
but trial. We must institute an experiment, and only in
that way is a proof possible. That is, if we do find a
proposition to which we may reduce all others, this pro-
position is the principle sought. Besides the first propo-
sition, however, two others may be thought, of which the
one, unconditioned in matter, is conditioned in form by,
and dependent on, the first, whilst the other is the reverse.
These three axioms, finally, will be so related to each
other, that the second shall be the opposite of the first,
and the third the result of both. On this plan, and in
accordance with the previous exposition, the first abso-
lute axiom will start from the ego, the second oppose to

262 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

it a thing or a non-ego, and the third bring the ego into
reaction against the thing or the non-ego. This Fiehtian
method {Thesis, Antithesis, Synthesis), like that of Hegel
after it, is a combination of the analytic and sjmthetic
methods. Fichte has the merit of having been able by
means of it to be the first to deduce all the i)hilosophical
fundamental notions from a single point, and to bring
them into connexion, instead of only taking them up
empirically, like Kant, and setting them down in mere
juxtaposition. Commencement is made with a funda-
mental synthesis ; in this synthesis opposite» are looked
for by means of analysis ; and these opposites are then
re-united in a second, more definite (richer, concreter)
synthesis. But analysis will again detect opposites even
in this second synthesis. There is thus a third synthesis
necessary, and so on, till at last opposites are reached
which can only be approximately conjoined.

We are now at the threshold of the Wissenschaftslelire,
which falls into three parts : {a.) first principles of the
whole science, (&.) the foundations of theoretical know-
ledge, and (c.) the foimdations of practical (moral) science.

The first principles are, as said, three in number : one
absolutely unconditioned, and the others relatively so.
(1.) The absolutely original, directly unconditioned, first
principle must express that action which is known in fact
to underlie all consciousness, and alone render it possible.
This principle is the proposition of identity, A = A. This
proposition remains behind and will not be thought
away when we abstract from all the empirical forms of
consciousness. It is a fact of consciousness and must
therefore be universally admitted ; but at the same
time, it is not, like every other empirical fact of
consciousness, something conditioned, but, as free act,
it is something unconditioned. When we maintain
too that without any further ground this proposition
is certain, we ascribe to ourselves the power of tak-
ing something/or granted. We do not take for granted
in it that A is, but only that A is, if A is. It is the/orm
of the proposition only which we consider, and not the
matter of it. In matter, then, the proposition A = A is
conditioned (hypothetical) : it is unconditioned only in
form, only in vis nexus. Should we seek a proposition
unconditioned in matter as well as in form, then in place
of A we must substitute the ego (and to this we have a
perfect right, for the connexion of subject and predicate

FICHTE. 2G3

pronounced by the judgment A = A is in the ego and
the work of the ego). The proposition A = A, conse-
quently, is thus transformed into the new proposition, ego
= ego. This Litter j)roposition now is not only uncon-
ditioned in form but also in matter. Wliile it was im-
possible for us to say with reference to A = A, that A is,
we can now say with reference to ego = ego, that the
ego is, I am. It is the explanatory ground of all facts of
empirical consciousness that before anything can be
given in the ego, the ego itself must be given. This
directly self-determined, self-grounded ground is the
ground of all action in the human mind, and is conse-
quently, pure, inherent, independent activity. The ego
assumes itself, and it is by this mere self-assumption ; it
is, only because it has assumed itself. And conversely,
the ego assumes its existence by virtue of its mere exist-
ence. It is at once the agent and the product of the
action. I am is the expression of the only possible origi-
nal act. In a logical point of view we have in the first
principle of the Wissenschaftskhre (A = A) the law of
identity. From the proposition A = A, we proceeded to
the proposition ego = ego. The latter, however, derives
not its validity from the former, but contrariwise. The
ego is the 2>rius of all judgment, and is the foundation of
the 7iexus of subject and predicate. The logical law of
identity originates, therefore, in the ego = ego. In a
metaphysical point of view we obtain from the first pro-
position of the Wissenschoftshhrt the category of reality.
This we obtain by abstracting from the particular matter
concerned, and by reflecting merely on the mode of action
of the human spirit. All categories are deduced from the
ego as the absolute subject. (2.) The second fundamen-
tal principle, which, conditioned in matter but uncon-
ditioned in form, is as little susceptible of proof or
derivation as the first, is equally a fact of empirical
consciousness : it is the proposition non-A is not = A.
This proposition, as a spontaneous conclusion, an origi-
nal act, is unconditioned in form like the first, nor
can it be derived from the first. It is conditioned in
matter, because, if a non-A is to be established, there must
be first assumed an A. But let us consider this princii)lf
more narrowly. In A = A the form of the act was
thesis, statement ; but here it is antithesis, counter-state-
ment. The power of direct, absolr.te counter-statement
(contraposition) is assumed, and this contraposition is, in

264 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

form, an absolutely possible act, that is unconditioned
and independent of any higher ground. But, in matter,
antithesis (contraposition) presupposes thesis (position) :
if any non-A. is to be granted, A must be previously
granted. What non-A is, is not made known to me by
the possibility of absolute contraposition as such. I
know only that non-A must be the opposite, the couiiter-
part of some certain thing A. What non-A is, conse-
quently, I know only under the condition of knowing A.
But the ego is A, or in the ego A has absolute position.
There is originally nothing else in position (seen and
granted) but the ego, and only the ego is directly and ab-
solutely in position (seen and granted). Absolute contra-
position consequently is possible only of the ego. But
what is contraposed to the ego — its opposite and counter-
part— is the non-ego. Opposed to the ego is its absolute
counterpart, a non-ego : this is the second fact of empiri-
cal consciousness. Whatever belongs to the ego, the
counterpart of that must, by virtue of simple contraposi-
tion, belong to the non-ego. From this proposition, now
(ego is not = non-ego) we obtain the logical law of con-
tradiction, as from the first that of identity. Metaphy-
sically, too, we obtain from this proposition, by abstracting
from the particular act of judgment concerned, and
merely referring to the form of the inference, the cate-
gory of negation. (3.) The third fundamental principle^
conditioned in form only, is almost entirely susceptible
of proof, because there are now two propositions for its
determination. With every step we approach nearer to
the sphere in which all is susceptible of proof. The third
principle is conditioned in form and unconditioned in
matter : that is to say, the problem for the act, which it
expresses, is given in the two preceding propositions, but
not also its solution. This latter results unconditionally
and absolutely from an arbitrary decision of reason. The
problem which the third principle has to solve is the re-
conciliation, namely, of the contradiction implied in the
other two. On the one hand the ego is completely sub-
lated by the non-ego : position is impossible for the ego,
so far as the non-ego is in position. On the other hand,
the non-ego has position only in the ego, in consciousness :
the ego, consequently, is not sublated by the non-ego ;
after all the sublated ego is not sublated. The result
now, then, is non-A = A. In order to resolve this con-
tradiction which threatens to destroy the identity of oir

FICHTE. 265

consciousness, the only absolute fundament of our know-
ledge, we must tind an X, by virtue of which correctness
will be still j)ossil)le for the tirat two j)rinciples without
prejudii'c to the identity of consciousness. The opposites,
the ef;o and the non-ego, must be united, set equal, in
consciousness without mutual neutralization ; they must
be taken up into the identity of the one sole consciousness.
IIow, now, may beinij and non-being, reality and nega-
tion, be thought together without mutual destruction ?
They must mutually limit each other. Limit then, is the
X required : this is the required original action of the
ego, and, thought as category, it is the category of deter-
mination or limitation. But in limitation the category
of quantity is already implied : for to limit anji;hing is to
sublate its reality by negation not in whole but in j^^^'^^-
In the notion of limit, consequently, there lies, besides
the notions of reality and negation, that also of divisi-
bility, of the susceptibility to quantity in general.
Through the action of limitation, as well the ego as the
non-ego is assumed as divisible. Further, there results
from the third principle, as from the two former, a logi-
cal law. Abstraction being made from the matter, the ego
and non-ego, and only the form of the union of opposites
through the notion of divisibility remaining, we have,
namely, the logical proposition of ground or reason, which
may be expressed in the formula, A in part = non-A,
non-A in part = A. The ground is ground of relation so
far as each opposite is identical with the other in some
single significate (nota), while it is ground of distinction
again, so far as each equal is opposed to the other in some
single significate. The complex now of what is uncondi-
tionally and absolutely certain is in these three principles
exhausted. They may be comprised in the following for-
mula : In the ego I oppose to the divisible ego a divisible
non-ego. No philosophy transcends this proposition, but
all true philosophy must accept it ; and iu accepting it,
philosophy becomes Wissenschaftslehre. All that is hence-
forth to present itself in the system of knowledge must be
derived thence, and in the first place the further divisions
of the Wissenschaftslehre itself. In the proposition that
ego and non-ego mutually limit each other, there are
these two elements : (1.) the ego exhibits itself as limited
by the non-ego (that is to say, the ego is cognitive) ; (2.)
conversely the ego exhibits the non-ego as limited by the
ego (that is to say, the ego is active). These propositions

266 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

are the foundation, the one of the theoretical, the other of
the practical part of the Wissenschaftslehre. The latter
part is problematical at firat : for a non-ego limited by an
active ego does not at first exist, and we have to wait for
its realization in the theoretical part.

The elements of theoretical knowledge present a con-
tinuous series of antitheses and syntheses. The funda-
mental synthesis is the proposition that the ego is
determined by the non-ego. Analysis demonstrates in
this proposition two subordinate mutually opposed pro-
positions : (1.) the non-ego, as active, determines the
ego, which is in so far passive. But as all action must
originate in the ego, it is (2.) the ego itself that is
absolutely self-determinative. We have here the con-
tradiction of action and passion at once on the part of
the ego. As, then, this contradiction would subvert the
above proposition, and by consequence also the unity of
consciousness, we are under the necessity of finding a
point, a new synthesis, in which the apparent opposites
may be reconciled. This is accomplished by reconciling
in the notion of divisibility the notions of action and
passion, falling as they do under those of reality and
negation. The propositions, * The ego determines,' ' The
ego is determined,' coalesce in the proposition, 'The ego
partly determines itself, and is partly determined.' But
more, both are to be thought as one and the same. With
greater precision then ; as many parts of reality as the
ego determines in itself, so many parts of negation does
it determine in the non-ego, and, conversely, as many
parts of reality as the ego determines in the non-ego, so
many parts of negation does it determine in itself. This
determination is reciprocal determination or reciprocity.
In this way Fichte is found to have deduced the last of
Kant's .three categories of relation. In the same manner
(namely, by synthesis of analysed antitheses), he con-
tinues to deduce the remaining two categories of this
class, or those of causality and substantiality . For ex-
ample : so far as the ego is determined, is passive, the
non-ego possesses reality. The category of reciprocity,
then, in which it is indifferent which side is one or the
other, is brought to this form that the ego is passive, and
the non-ego active. But the notion expressive of this re-
lation is the notion of causality. That to which activity
is ascribed is called cause (the primitive reality) ; that to
which passivity is ascribed, effect j and both in union

FICHTE, 2G7

constitute an action or operation. Again, the ego dotor-
mines itself. This ia a contradiction : (1.) The ego de-
termines itself, it is what acts ; (2.) It doterinines itself,
it is what ia acted on. Thus, in a single relation and
action, reality and negation are at once ascribed to it.
Solution for snch a contradiction as this is only possil)le
in such mode of action as is action and ]>assion at once :
the ego must through action determine its passion, and
through passion its ai'tion. The solution implies recourse,
then, to the aid of the notion of quantity. All reality is
in the ego first of all as absolute quantum, as absolute
totality, and the ego so far may be compared to a
great circle. A determinate quantum of action, or a
limited sphere within the great circle of action, is reality
indeed, but compared with the totality of action it is
negation of this totality, or passion. Here we have the
solution sought : it lies in the notion of substantiality.
So far as the ego is considered to comprehend the entire
compass, the totality of realities, it is substance ; so far
as it is referred to a determinate sphere of the entire
compass, it is accidental. No accident can be thought
without substance, for to be able to recognise anything
as a determinate reality, it must be first referred to real-
ity in general or substance. Substance is thought vicissi-
tude in general : the accident is a determinate that
changes place with what itself changes. Originally there
is only a single substance, the ego. In this single sub-
stance all possible accidents, and therefore all possible
realities, are contained. Ego alone is the absolute in-
finite : I think, I act, is already limitation. Fichte's
philosophy is therefore Spinozism, but, as Jacobi felici-
tously named it, an inverted, idealistic Spinozism.

Glancing back, we perceive that Fichte has abolished
the objectivity which Kant had left. Only the ego is.
But the ego presupposes a non-ego, and so, therefore, a
sort of object. How the ego accomplishes the determi-
nation of tliis object, it is now the business of the theo-
retical Wissenschaf tslehre to demonstrate.

In regard to the relation of the ego to the non-ego,
there are two extreme views, according as we begin with
the notion of causality or witli that of substantiality.
(1.) Beginning with the notion of causality there is as-
sumed in the passion of the ego an action of the non-
ego. The passion of the ego must have a ground. This
ground cannot be in the ego, which assumes for itself

268 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY,

.action only. It is consequently in the non-ego. Here,
then, the difference between action and passion is not
conceived as merely quantitative (passion as diminished
action), but the passion is opposed qualitatively to the
action : a prc8uj)posed action of the non-ego is therefore
the real ground of the passion in the ego. (2.) Begin-
ning with the notion of substantiality, the action of the
ego is assumed to imply also a passion in the ego. Here
the passion is in quality nothing but action, a diminished
action. Whilst, then, by the first view, the passive ego
has a ground qualitatively diflFerent from the ego, or a
real ground, it has, by the second view, only a quanti-
tatively diminished action of the ego for its ground, or it
has an ideal ground. The first view is dogmatic realism,
the second dogmatic idealism. The latter maintains : all
reality of a non-ego is simply a transference from the
ego. The former maintains : transference is impossible,
unless there previously exist an independent real non-ego,
a thing-in-itself. There is thus an antithesis, to be re-
solved only in a new synthesis. Fichte attempts this
synthesis of idealism and realism, through the interme-
diate system of the critical idealism. For this purpose
he endeavours to show that the ideal ground and the
real ground are one and the same. Neither the mere
action of the ego is ground of the reality of the non-ego,
nor the mere action of the non-ego ground of the pas-
sion of the ego. The two are to be thought together
thus : on the action of the ego there presents itself, but
not without help of the ego, an opposed principle of re-
pulsion (the Anstoss — the plane of offence), which bends
back the action of the ego, and reflects it into itself.
This repelling principle consists in this, that the subjec-
tive element cannot be farther extended, that the radiat-
ing activity of the ego is driven back into itself, and
self -limitation results. What we call objects are nothing
but the various breakings of the action of the ego against
an incomprehensible obstacle, and these affections of the
ego are then transferred by us to something external to
us, or are conceived by us as things occupying space.
The Fichtian principle of reflexion consequently is in the
main the same thing as the Kantian thing-in-itself, only
that it is conceived by Fichte as a product from within.
Fichte proceeds next to deduce the subjective faculties
of the ego, which, theoretically, mediate or seek to medi-
ate between the ego and the non-ego, — imagination, con«

FICHTE. 260

ception (sensation, perception, feeling), understanding,
jiulguient, reason, antl, in connexion with tliese, the enb-
jective jirojectiona of j)erception, time, and space.

Wo stand now before the third part of the Wis/^en-
Kcha/tdeJirc, or the ea:positionof Oie practical sphere. We
left the ego an intelligence. But that the ego is intelli-
gent at all, is not brought about by the ego, but by some-
thing external to the ego. We were unable to conceive
the possibility of a perceptive intelligence unless by pre-
supposing an obstruction and reflexion of the action of
the ego, striving otherwise into the infinite and the inde-
finite. The ego, accordingly, is, as intelligence, depen-
dent on an indefinite and wholly indefinable non-ego, and
only through and by means of such a non-ego is it in-
telligence. But this limit must be broken through. The
ego, in all its attributes, is still to be supposed as abso-
lutely self-aflSrmed, and completely independent there-
fore of any possible non-ego whatever, but as intelligence
it is finite, dependent ; the absolute ego and the intelli-
gent ego, consequently, though still to be supposed one
and the same, are mutually opposed. This contradiction
may be remedied only by assuming that the ego, as in-
susceptible of passion, and possessed only of absolute
action, does itself spontaneously determine the still un-
known non-ego to which the reflexion {Anstoss) is attri-
buted. The limit which the ego, as theoretical ego,
opposed to itself in the non-ego — this limit the same ego
as practical ego must endeavour to withdraw, that is, it
must endeavour to reabsorb into itself the non-ego (or
comprehend it as self-limitation of the ego). The Kant-
ian supremacy of practical reason is in this way realized.
The transition of the theoretical into the practical part,
the necessity of the advance from the one to the other, is
more particularly represented by Fichte thus : The busi-
ness of the theoretical part was to conciliate ego and non-
ego. To this end, middle term after middle term was
intercalated without success. Then came reason with
the absolute decision, * Inasmuch as the non-ego is incap-
able of imion with the ego, non-ego there shall be none,'
whereby the knot was not undone indeed, but cut. It is
thus, then, the incongruity between the absolute (prac-
tical) ego and the finite (intelligent) ego that necessitates
the transition from the theoretical to the practical sjihere.
Nor does the incongruity wholly disappear even in tho
practical sphere : action is but an infinite striving to sur-

270 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

mount the limit of the non-ego. The ego, as practical,
tends, indeed, to transcend the actual world, to found an
ideal world, such a world as would exist if all reality were
the product of the ego : but this striving remains en-
cumbered with finitude, partly because of the ego itself
in its reference to objects (which objects are finite), and
])artly because the intelligence (the conscious affirming
and realizing of itself as itself on the part of the ego), re-
mains perpetually conditioned by an opposing non-ego
that checks its action. It is our duty at once, and an
impossibility to strive to reach the infinite. Neverthe-
less just this striving united to this impossibility ia the
stamp of our destiny for eternity.

And thus, then (so Fichte sums up the results of the
Wissenschaftslehre), the entire nature of finite rational
beings is comprehended and exhausted. An original idea
of our absolute being ; efi'ort towards reflection on our-
selves in accordance with this idea ; limitation not of
this efi'ort, but of our actual definite existence (which is
only realized by this limitation), through an opposing
principle, a non-ego, or in general through our own fini-
tude ; consciousness of self and in particular of our prac-
tical efi'ort ; determination of our intelligence, accordingly,
and through it of our actions ; enlargement of our limits
progressively ad infinitum.

(2.) Pichte's Practical Philosophy. — Fichte applies the
j)rinciples which he has developed in his Wissenschafts-
lehre to practical life, and particularly to his theory
of rights and duties. With methodic rigour here, too, he
seeks to deduce all, without accepting from experience (as
mere fact so found) anything unproved. Thus, in these
practical interests, even a plurality of persons is not pre-
supposed, but first of all deduced ; nay that man is pos-
sessed of a body is deduced — not certainly stringently.

The theory of right or rights (natural law), Fichte
founds on the notion of the individual. He first deduces
the notion of right as follows. A finite rational being
cannot realize himself without ascribing to himself a free-
dom of action. But this ascription involves the existence
of an external world of sense, for a rational being cannot
ascribe action to himself without implying the existence
of an object to which this action is to be directed. More
particularly still, this freedom of action in a rational being
presupposes other rational beings ; for without them he
would be uncouscious of it. We have thus a plurality of

FICHTE. 271

iVee individuals, each possessing a sphere of free action.
This co-existence of free individuals is impossible without
a relation of right (law). Retaining each his own 8i)hure
with free^ioni, but with limitation of himself, they recog-
nise each other as free and rational beings. This relation
of a reciprocity in intelligence and freedom between ra-
tional beings — according to which each limits his freedom
by leaving possible the freedom of the others, on condi-
tion that these others similarly limit themselves in return
— is a relation of right (natural law). The first i)rincij)le
here then runs thus : Limit your freedom by the notion
of that of all the other rational beings (persons) with
■whom you may come into connexion. After investiga-
tion of the api)licability of this j)rinciple and consequent
deduction of the corporeal part or anthropological side of
man, Fichte proceeds to the special theory of right (juris-
prudence). It falls into three parts : (1.) Kights which
depend on the mere notion of personality, are primitive
rights. Primitive right is the absolute right of the per-
son to be only a cause in the world of sense, and no mere
means. This gives (a.) the right of personal freedom,
and (6.) the right of property. But still every relation
of particular persons is conditioned by the reciprocal re-
cognition of these. Each has to limit the quantum of
his freedom in behoof of that of the rest ; and only so
far as another respects my freedom, have I to respect
his. In order to assure the right of the person, then,
there must be assumed a mechanical force for application
to the case in which the other does not respect my primi-
tive rights, and this is (2.) the right of coercion. Coercive
or penal laws demand that the volition of everj"- unjust
end shall be followed by its own contrary, that every
unjust will shall be annihilated, and right restored in its
integrity. For the estabhshment of such penal law, and
such universal coercive authority, the free indi^■iduals
must enter into a mutual contract. But such contract is
only possible in a commonweal. Natural law, then, the
relation of right (justice) between man and man presup-
poses {3.) political rights, namely (a.) a free contract on
the part of the political im.its as a mutual guarantee of
rights ; (6.) positive laws, a political legislature, through
which the common will of all becomes law ; (c.) an execu-
tive power, a political authority which realizes the com-
mon will, and in which, therefore, the private and the
general -will are synthetically united. Fichte's conclud-

272 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

ing result here is this : on the one side there is the State
of reason (philosophical jurisprudence), on the other, the
State as it actually exists (positive juristic and political
principles). But there arises thus the problem, to make
the actual State more and more adequate to the rational
State. The science which contemplates this approxima-
tion is politics. Complete adequacy to the idea is not to
be expected on the part of any actual State. Every poli-
tical constitution is legitimate, provided only it renders
not impossible the progress to a better. Wholly illegi-
timate is only that constitution which would maintain all
as it now is.

The absolute ego of the Wissenschaftslehre sunders in
the Rechtslehre (theory of rights) into an infinite number
of persons : to restore unity is the problem of the Sitten-
lehre (theory of duties). Rights and morals are essen-
tially different. Right (justice) is the external necessity
to do something or to omit something in order not to
infringe the liberty of others : the internal necessity
to do or to omit something quite independently of
external motives constitutes morality. And as the
system of rights arose from the conflict of the tendency
to freedom in one subject with the tendency to freedom
in another subject, so the system of duties arises similarly
from a conflict, not however from any external conflict,
but, on the contrary, from an internal conflict of different
motives in one and the same person. (1.) Every rational
being strives to independency, to freedom for the sake of
freedom. This is the fundamental and pure spring of
action, and it supplies at once the formal principle of
morals, the principle of absolute autonomy, of absolute
independency of all that is external to the ego. But (2.)
as a rational being in actual existence is empirical and
finite, as by force of nature he assumes his own self as a
corporeal being to which a non-ego opposes itself, there
dwells in him beside the pure spring another and empiri-
cal spring, the instinct of self-preservation, the instinct of
nature, the aim of which is not freedom but enjoyment.
This instinct of nature supplies the material, eudaemonis-
tic principle of a striving for enjoyment for the sake of
enjoyment. These springs seem mutually contradictory ;
but from a transcendental point of view they are one and
the same primitive spring of human action. For even the
instinct of self-preservation is an emanation of the ten-
dency of the ego* towards action, and it cannot be d©-

FICHTE. 273

ßtroyetl : destruction of the instinct of nature would ]>e
followed by the destruction of all definite effort, of all
conscious action. The two principles are to ])e united,
then, but in such a manner that the natural shall be sub-
ordinated to the pure principle. This union can only
occur in an act which in matter looks (in obedience to the
natural princijde) to the world of sense ; but in \iltimato
end (obeying the pure principle) to an entire emanci])a-
tion from the world of sense. Neither mere negative
withdrawal from the world of objects, in order to be a
pure self-subsistent ego, nor yet mere stri\'ing to enjoy-
ment is the })roblem, but a positive action on the world
of sense so that the ego shall always become freer, its
power over the non-ego greater, and the supremacy of
reason over nature more and more reahzed. This striving
to act free in order always to become more free, is, in its
combination of the pure and the natural principle, the
moral or practical motive. The end of moral action
is placed in infinitude, however ; it can never be reached,
for the ego can never possibly become wholly independent
of any limitation, so long as it is destined to remain an
intelligence, a self-conscious ego. The nature of the morai
act is consequently to be defined thus. All action must
consist of a series of acts, in continuing which the ego
may be able to regard itself as always approaching to
absolute independency. Every act must be a term in
this series ; no act is indifferent ; to be always engaged
in an act that lies in this series, this is our moral voca-
tion. The principle of morals therefore is, Fulfil con-
tinually your vocation ! It belongs, in a formal, sub-
jective reference, to moral action, that it is an intelligent,
free action, an action in accordance with ideas : in all that
you do, be free, in order to become free. "We ought blindly
to follow neither the pure nor the natural spring. We ought
to act only in the clear conviction of our vocation or duty.
We must do our duty only for the sake of duty. The
blind impulses of uncorrupted instinct, sympathy, com-
passion, benevolence, etc., do indeed, in consequence of
the original identity of the natural and the pure principle,
advance the same interests as the latter. But as natural
impulses they are not moral ; the moral motive possesses
causality as if it possessed none, for it says, Be free !
Only through free action according to the notion of his
absolute vocation is a rational being absolutely self-de-
pendent ; only action on duty is such a manifestation of

274 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

a purely rational being. The formal condition of the
morality of our acts, therefore, is, Act always up to the
conviction of your duty ; or, Act according to your con-
science. The absolute criterion of the correctness of our
conviction is a feeling of truth and assurance. This in-
stinctive feehng never deceives, for it only exists when
there is perfect harmony of the empirical with the pure,
original ego. Fichte now develops his system of special
duties, which, however, we shall here omit.

The religious opinions of Fichte are contained in the
above-mentioned essay, On the ground of our Belief in
a Divine Oovernment of the World, as well as in his writ-
ten defences which followed. The moral order of the
universe, says Fichte, is that Divinity which we assume.
By right action this divine element becomes alive and
actual in us. Only under presupposition of it, presup-
position, that is, of the moral end being capable of reali-
zation in the world of sense by means of a higher order,
is each of our acts performed. Faith in such order is the
complete and perfect faith ; for this moral order, actually
operative in life, is itself God : we neither require any
other god, nor can we comprehend any other. "We pos-
sess no ground of reason for going beyond this moral
order of the universe, and assuming, on the principle of
concluding from the derivative to the primitive, that
there is also a particular being who is the cause of it. Is
this order, then, at all contingent in its nature ? It is
the absolute ^rs^ of all objective knowledge. But even
granting your conclusion, what properly have you as-
sumed in it ? This being is to be supposed different from
you and the world, it is to be supposed to act in the latter
in obedience to ideas ; it is to be supposed consequently
capable of ideas, possessed of personality, of conscious-
ness ? What then do you call personality, consciousness ?
Without doubt that which you have found in yourself,
which you have known only in experience of yourself,
and which you have named only from experience of your-
self. But that it is absolutely impossible for you to
think this being without limitation and finitude, the
slightest attention to the construction of the notion will
readily show you. By the mere attribution of the predi-
cate you convert it into what is finite, into a being that
is the fellow of yourself ; and you hare not, as you in-
tended, thought God, but only multiplied your own self
in thought. The notion of God as a particular substance

FICHTE. 27a

is coutradiotorj' and impossible. God veritably exists
only in the form of a moral order of the universe. All
belief in any divine element that involves more than this
notion is to me a horror, and utterly unworthy of a
rational being. Morality and religion are here, as with
Kant, naturally one : both are a grasping to the 8U])er.
sensual, the one by action, the other by belief. This
' religion of a happy right-doing ' we find further deve-
loped by Fichte in his AVTitten defences against the accu-
sation of atheism. He even maintains in these that
nothing but the principles of the new pliilosoj)hy is cap-
able of restoring to men their lost sense of religion, and
of revealing the true nature of the teachings of Christ.
This he endeavours to demonstrate particularly in his
Appeal to the public, where he says : To answer the
questions, Wliat is good ? What is true ? this is the aim
of my philosophical system. Tho,fc system maintains
first of all that there is something absolutely true and
good ; there is something that to the free flight of
thought is restrictive and authoritative. A voice that
may not die proclaims to man that something is his duty,
which do he must, and for no other reason. This prin-
ciple in our nature opens to us an entire new world ; we
receive from it a higher existence, which, completely
independent of nature, has its foundations wholly and
solely in ourselves. This absolute self-sufficiency of
reason, this perfect emancipation from dependency, I
will name it blessedness. As the single but infallible
means of blessedness, conscience points out performance
of my duty. An immovable conviction is laid within
me, therefore, that there exists a law, an established
order which renders blessedness a necessary result of the
pure moral character. That the man, who would main-
tain the dignity of his reason, must establish himself on
faith in this order of a moral universe, must regard each
of his duties as a provision of that order, must consider
all their results as good, as blessed, and joyfully submit to
it, — this, absolutely necessary, is the essence of religion.
Create within you the spirit of duty, and you will know
God, and, whilst you appear to others as in the world of
sense, you will, in your own self, know yourself to be,
even here below, already in the life etemaL

276 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY,

IT. — The Puilosophy of Fichte in its Later Form.

All that Fichte has contributed of importance to specu-
lative philosophy is contained in the system which has
been just considered. After quitting Jena, however, this
system underwent a gradual modification in conseqiience
of several influences. It was naturally difficult to pre-
serve so uncompromising an idealism as that of the Wis-
senschaftslehre ; again the intercurrent nature-philosophy
of Schelling remained not without eflFect on Fichte's own
mode of thought, although he denied this, and fell into a
bitter dispute with Schelling in regard to it ; and lastly,
his private, not quite easy, external circumstances, may
have tended to modify his general views of the world.
Fichte's writings of this second period are for the most
part of a popular nature, and calculated for a general
audience. They bear all of them the stamp of his keen
spirit and of his lofty manly moral nature. They want,
however, the originality and the scientific rigour of his
earlier writings. Even those among them which are
more particularly scientific, satisfy not the demands for
genetic construction and philosophical method, made
earlier by Fichte himself with so much earnestness both
on himself and others. His teaching now, indeed, has
so much the appearance of a loosely connected intertex-
ture of old subjectivo-idealistic views, and of new ob-
jectivo -idealistic ones, that Schelling was justified in
characterizing it as the most thorough syncretism and
eclecticism. The distinction of his new position, namely,
is, that — with points of resemblance to Neo-Platonism in
it — he attempts to transform his subjective idealism into
objective pantheism, or the ego of his earlier philosophy
into the absolute, into the notion of God. God, the idea
of whom he had formerly placed only at the end of his
system in the equivocal shape of a moral order of the
universe, became now the absolute beginning and the
single element of his philosophy. This philosophy took
on in this manner, then, quite another colour. Religious
gentleness assumed the place now of moral severity ; in-
stead of the ego and duty, life and love became the prin-
ciples of his philosophy ; in room of the keen dialectic of
the Wissenschaftslehre a predilection for mystical and figu-
rative modes of expression manifested itself. Especially
characteristic of this second period is the leaning to re-

FICHTE, 277

ligion and to Christianity, chiefly in the work, Guidance
to a Blessed Life, Fichte maintains here that his new
doctrine is the doctrine of Christianity, and j)articularly
of the Gospel of John. This Gospel Fichte insisted on
reg;u-diug at that time as the only genuine authority on
Christianity, because the other apostles, remaining lialf
Jews, had left standing the fundamental error of Jewry,
its doctrine of a creation in time. Fichte attributed
special worth to the first part of the prologue of John :
in it the creation of the world out of nothing is refuted,
and the true conception of a revelation equally eternal
with God, and necessarily given with his being, enun-
ciated. What, on the other hand, is said in the prologue
of the incarnation of the Logos in the person of Christ,
possesses for Fichte only an historical import. The ab-
solute and eternally true position is, that, at all times
and in every one without exception, who vitally perceives
his unity with God, and who really and in deed devotes
Lis entire individual life to the divine life within him —
in him the eternal word, quite in the same manner as in
Jesus Christ, becomes flesh and receives a personally
sensuous and hvunan form. The entire commimity of
the faithful, the first born as well as the later bom,
coalesce in the one common vital source of all, the God-
head, And so, then, Christianity, its end attained, coin-
cides once more with absolute truth, and proclaims
that all require to come into unity with God. So long
as a man wants to become something for himself, God
comes not into him, for no man can become God. So
soon, however, as he annuls himself perfectly, completely,
and to the last root, there remains but God alone, and
He is All in AIL Man cannot make for himself a God ;
nevertheless himself, as the negation proper, he can
annid, and then he is merged in God.

The result of his advanced philosopLizing, Fichte sums
up, briefly and clearly, in the following verses, which we
take from two of Lis postLumous sonnets : —

' Th' undying One
Lives as thou liv'st, and sees in all thou see'st,
Nought is but God ; and God is nought but life.
Quite clear the veil is raised from thee, and lo 1
'Tis self : let die, then, this destructible ;
And henceforth God -»ill live in ail thy strife.
Consider what surs-ives this strife below ;
Then will the veü as veil be visible,
And all revealed thou'lt see celestial life.'

278 JUS TOBY OF PHILOSOPH Y.

XLll.—IIerhart.

A PECULIAR, in many respects estimable, continua-
tion of the philosophy of Kant was attempted by
Johann Friedrich Herbart (b. 1776 at Oldenburg; 1805,
Professor of Philosophy at Göttingen; 1808, Kant's suc-
cessor at Königsberg ; 1833, recalled to Göttingen, where,
1841, he died). The philosophy of Herbart distinguishes
itself from most of the other systems in this way, that it
sets not up an idea of reason as its principle, but, like
the Kantian, finds its problem in a critical investigation
and construction of subjective experience. It, too, is
criticism, but with results that are at once peculiar, and
altogether different from the Kantian. For this reason,
from its very principle, it occupies, in the history of
philosophy, an isolated position : almost all the earlier
systems, instead of appearing as moments of the one true
philosophy, are to it mistakes. It is particularly charac-
teristic of it that it is eminently hostile to the post-
Kantian philosophy of Germany, especially to Schelling's
philosophy of nature, in which it can see only a delusion
and a cobweb of the brain. In comparison with the
philosophy of Schelling, indeed, it would rather declare
its agreement with the philosophy of Hegel, although the
latter is its polar opposite. We give a brief exposition
of its leading ideas.

(1.) The foundation and starting-point of philosophy
is, to Herbart, the common view of things, knowledge
gained by the method of experience. A philosophical
system is nothing more than an experimental scheme, by
means of which some particular thinker attempts to
answer certain questions which he has put to himself.
Every question that is to be proposed in philosophy must
consider wholly and solely the given facts, or rather
must owe to them its suggestion ; for the sole basal field
of certainty for man, is experience alone. With it is
every beginning in philosophy to be made. Thought
must submit to the notions of experience : they shall
lead it, not it them. Thus, then, experience is wholly
and solely the object and foundation of philosophy;
what is no given fact, that cannot be an object of
thought ; and it is impossible to realize any knowledge
in excess of the limits of experience.

(2.) The facts of experience are certainly the basis of

HERB ART. 279

philosophy ; b\it, as simply ready -found, they are still
without it. Tlie question occurs, What is the lirst fact,
the beginning of philosophy ? Thought has iirst to f reo
itself from exi)erience, to make clear to itself the diffi-
culties of the investigation. The hegninlnrj of philosophij,
where thought raises itself above the element that is
simply given, is therefore deliberative doubt, or scejms.
There is a lower and a higher scepticism. The lower
doubts only that things are so constituted as they appear
to us ; the higher transcends the general phenomenal
form, aud asks whether there be anything at all existent
there. It doubts, for example, the succession of time ;
it asks, in regard to design in natural objects, whether it
belongs to them, or is simply thought as in them, etc.
And thus we gradually attain to an expression of the pro-
blems which constitute the interest of metaphysics. The
result of scepticism is thus not negative, but positive.
Doubt is nothing but the thinking of the notions of ex-
perience, and these are the burthen of philosophy.
Scepticism by means of this reflection enables us to per-
ceive that the notions of experience, though referent to
a given factum, do not possess, nevertheless, an import
that is thinkable, that is free from logical absurdities.

(3.) Metaphysics, to Herbart, is the science of what
is intelligible in experience. Thus far, namely, we have
reached perception of two truths. On the one side it is
seen that the sole basis of philosophy is experience, and
on the other that scepsis has shaken the credibility of
experience. First of all, then, this sce])si3 must be con-
verted into a precise knowledge of the metaphysical pro-
blems. Notions are obtruded on us by experience which
are incogitable ; that is to say, they are thought indeed
by our ordinary understanding, but this thought is only
a confused and obscure thought, that does not distinguish
and compare the contradictory attributes [notce, logical
significates). Skilled thought, on the contrary, logical
analysis, finds in the notions of experience (time, space,
origination, motion, etc.), contradictions, contradictory,
mutually negating characters {notce). What are we to
do then? These notions cannot be rejected, for they are
given to us, and we can only hold by what is given ;
neither can they be accepted, for they are incogitable,
logically impracticable. The only measure that is left
us is — to transform them. Transformation of the notions
of experience^ the elimination of their contradictions, is

280 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

the special act of speculation. Thus it is scepsis that
has brought forward the more special problems, and it is
the resolution of the contradictions of these that is the
business of metaphysics. The most important of these
problems are those of inherence, mutation, and the ego.

The relation between Herbart and Hegel is here par-
ticularly evident. As regards the contradictory nature
of the categories and notions of experience both are
agreed. But in the next step they separate. Inherent
contradiction, says Hegel, is the very nature of these
notions, as of all things in general : becoming, for example,
is essentially unity of being and non- being, etc. That,
rejoins Herbart, is impossible so long as the principle of
contradiction still retains its authority. That the notions
of experience present contradictions, that is no fault of
the objective world, but of subjective perception, which
must redress its erroneous construction by a transforma-
tion of these notions and an elimination of their contra-
dictions. Herbart accuses the philosophy of Hegel of
empiricism, in that it accepts from experience these con-
tradictory notions unaltered ; and, notwithstanding dis-
cernment of their contradictory nature, regards them,
just because they are empirically given, as justified, and
even, on their account, transforms the science of logic
itself. Hegel and Herbart are related as Heraclitus and
Parmenides (vi. and ni).

(4.) From this point Herbart proceeds in the following
manner to his ' reals.* The discovery, he says, of con-
tradictions in all our notions of experience has that in it
to lead to absolute scepticism, to despair of truth. But it
is evident at once that if the existence of any basis of rea-
lity is to be denied, appearance also (sensation, perception,
thought) is sapped and ruined. But that being inadmis-
sible, we must grant this proposition : so much appear-
ance, so much proof of reality. To experience as given we
certainly cannot ascribe any true, any absolutely existent
reality ; it is not independent per se, it is in, or through,
or by occasion of, another. True being (reality) is an abso-
lute being, that, as such, excludes all relativity, all depen-
dency ; it is absolute position, which we, for our part, have
not to produce, but recognise. So far as this position is
to be supposed to imply a something, reality belongs to it.
What veritably is, therefore, is always a quale, a some-
thing, which is regarded as real. In order, now, that this
real may correspond to the conditions which are implied

II Eli DART 2S1

In tlie notion of the absolute position, its xthat must be
thought, (a.) as absohitoly i)03itive or affinu;itive, tliat is
to say, as without negation or limitation, M'hich would
cancel the absoluteness ; (6.) *3 absolutely simple, or as not
a jilurality ami not subjected to inner antitheses ; (c.) as
insusceptible of any quantitative determinations, that is
to say, not as a quanium, divisible, extended in time and
space, nor yet as a continuuvu It is alwaj'S to be kept in
view, too, that this absolute reality is not merely a reality
thought, but one that is self-subsistent, self-dependent,
and therefore only for the recognition of thought. The
notion of this reality constitutes the entire foundation of
the metaphysics of Herbart. One example of this. The
first problem to be resolved by metaphysics is the problem
of inherence — the thing and its qualities. Every object
of perception appears to the senses as a complex of seve-
ral quahties. But all these qualities are relative. We
say, sound, for example, is the quality of a body. A body
sounds — but not without air ; what now is this quality
in airless space ? A body is hea\'j', but only on the earth.
It is coloured, but not without light ; how then about
this quality in the dark ? Plurality of qualities, again,
is incompatible with the unity of the object. If we ask,
what is this thing, the answer is, the sum of its qualities :
it is soft, white, sonorous, hea\'y, but the question was
of a one, not of a many. The answer tells what it has,
not what it is. The catalogue of qualities, moreover, is
always incomplete. The what of a thing, therefore, can
consist neither in the several qualities, nor in their com-
bination. The only answer that remains is : a thing is
that unknown x, whose position is represented by the
positions implied in the various qualities ; in short, it is
substance. For if we abstract from the qualities of a
thing in order to see what the thing qidte in its own seK
is, we find nothing left at last, and we perceive that it
was only the complex of qualities, only their combina-
tion into a whole, that we regarded as the particular thing.
But inasmuch as every appearance points to a particular
reality, and we must assume, consequently, as many
realities as there are appearances, the obvious conclusion
is that we have to regard the basis of reality that under-
lies a thing and its qualities, as a complex of realities, a
complex of many simple substances or monads, of which
monads the quality besides is difiFerent in the difiFerent
(monads). The grouping of these monads repeated in

282 HISTORY OF PniLOSOPHY.

experience is considered by us as a thing. Let us briefly
consider now what modification this conception of posi-
tion (reality) entails on the main metaphysical notions.
The notion of causality, in the first place, for example, is
evidently no longer able to maintain its usual form. In
its regard, in point of fact, we perceive at most the suc-
cession in time, but not the necessary connexion of ' the
cause with the effect. The cause itself can neither be
transcendent, nor immanent ; for, in the first case, real
actions of one real upon another real contradict the notion
of absolute reality, and, in the other case, substance
would require to be thought as one with its qualities,
which contradicts the conclusions relative to a thing and
its qualities. As little can the reason why particular
natures are found together be expected from the notion
of the real, for the real is absolutely unalterable. Caus-
ality it is impossible to explain otherwise, then, than by
conceiving the many reals (which underlie the qualities)
to be an equal number of causes of an equal number of
appearances, each independently. With causality the
problem of change coheres. As, however, there exists to
Herbart no inner change, no self-determination, no becom-
ing or life, — as the monads are and remain unchange-
able in themselves, they do not become different in quality,
they are different the one from the other, from the first,
and each of them preserves its own quality without altera-
tion. A solution for the problem of change, then, can
only be sought in a theory of the disturbances and self-
preservations of the monads. But if all that can be
called, not merely apparent, but actual change, in the
monads is to be reduced to ' self-preservation,' as the last
glimmer of action and life, the question still is, how will
you explain at least the appearance of change ? For an
answer it is necessary to have recourse to two expedients,
first, that of contingent aspects, and, second, that of in-
tellectual space. The contingent aspects, a conception
borrowed from mathematics, import, and in reference to
the special problem, that the same notion may, without
the least alteration in itself, take on in relation to others
a variety of values ; thus the same straight line may be
regarded as radius or as tangent, the same note as in
harmony or not in harmony. By help of this conception,
then, it is possible so to regard what actually takes place
in the case of a monad brought into contact with others
opposed to it in quality, that an actual change shall on

II ERB ART. 2S3

the one hand appear to be affirmed, while on the other
the monad itsolf shall remain absohitely unaltered. (A
grey colour, for examjtle, boaide black ia white, beside
white, black, without any change of its quality.) The
expedient of intellectual space, again, originates in the
necessity to think the monads aa well together as not
together. Through its api)lication elimination is accom-
plished particularly of the contradictions in the notion of
motion. Lastly, it ia evident that the notions of matter
and the ego (the transformation or psychological explana-
tion of which is the remaining business of metaphysics)
are, like the preceding, no less self-contradictory than in-
compatible with the fundamental real ; for it is im])03-
sible to derive material extension from inextended
monads, and with the loss of matter there follows that
also of the usual (apparent) notions of time and space,
while as regards the ego, it is not possible for its notion
either, representing as it does that of a thing with many
changeable qualities (states, powers, faculties), to be ad-
mitted without transformation.

Herbart's 'reals' remind of the atoms of Democritua
(IX. 2), the 'one' of Parmenides (vi.), and the monads of
Leibnitz. As penetrable, however, they are distinguished
from the atoms. Herbart's reals are as capable of being
conceived in the same space, aa mathematical points of
being thought in the same spot. In this respect they
have a greater resemblance to the Eleatic One : both are
simple, and occupy an intellectual space. But then the
reals differ from the one, not only as many, but as various,
and even opposed. The resemblance of the reals to the
monads of Leibnitz has been alreafly alluded to ; the lat-
ter, however, are essentially intelligent (percipient, con-
cipient, ideating) ; they are beings with inner states ;
whereas to Herbart intelligence belongs as little as every
other state to the fundamental real itself.

(5.) The physics and psychology connect with the meta-
physics. The first explains, in accordance with the third,
such matters as repulsion, attraction, atBnity, etc. The
second relates to the soul, the ego. The ego is firstly a meta-
physical problem, as involving contradictions. Again, it
is a psychological problem, explanation of its genesis being
required. Firstly, then, those contradictions come to be
considered which lie in the identity of the subject and
the object. The ego affirms itself and is consequently
an object to itself. The object affirmed, however, is idea-

284 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

tical with the subject aflQrming. The ego consequently
is, as Fichte says, a subject-object, and as such full of
the most perplexing contradictions ; for the subject and
the object can never be thought as identical without
contradiction. The ego, however, is once for all given ;
we cannot turn our backs upon it ; what is left then
is to free it from contradiction. This is possible by
regarding the ego as intelligence, and the various sen-
sations, thoughts, etc., as the various appearances.
The solution here, then, is the same as in the case
of inherence. The thing was regarded in that case
as a complex of as many reals as there are qualities ;
and, inner being substituted for outer qualities, the
ego is not differently situated. What we call ego,
therefore, is nothing but the soul. As a monad, as an
absolute real, the soul is simple, eternal, indissoluble, in-
destructible, and, consequently, immortal in duration.
From this position Herbart directs his polemic against
the ordinary psj^chology that attributes certain powers
and faculties to the souL What takes place in the soul
is nothing but self-preservation, a process that differs and
varies only in reference to the difference and variety of
the other reals. These reals, coming into conflict with
the monad that is soul, are the causes of the various states
of the latter — of all that apparently infinite multiplicity
of sensations, ideas, affections. This theory of self-pre-
servation is the entire basis of the psychology of Herbart.
What ordinary psychology calls feeling, thinking, per-
ceiving, are but specific varieties in the self-preservation
of the soul ; they represent no special conditions of the
inner real, but only relations of the reals generally, rela-
tions which, pressing in at once from a variety of direc-
tions, partly neutralize, partly intensify, and partly
modify one another. Consciousness is the sum of
these relations, borne by the soul to the other monads.
Neither the relations nor the correspondent ideas, how-
ever, are equally definite ; as said, neutralizations, inten-
sifications, modifications take place, and a general
interaction results, which admits of being calculated by
the principles of statics. The neutralized ideas are not
conceived wholly to disappear either ; they remain as it
were at the door of consciousness, till, through combina-
tion with others like themselves, they attain the due
intensity and are enabled to enter with recognition.
This movement of the ideas, which is excellently described

11 ERB ART. 285

by ITcrbart, is capable of being submitted to the prin-
ciples of mechanies ; and we may form a conce])tion now
of what is known as Herbart's application of mathematics
to empirical psychology. The repressed ideas, of which,
darkly operative at the door of consciousness, we are
only half aware, are the feelings. These announce them-
selves, according as their tendency inwards has more or
less success, as desires. Increased by the hope of fruition
the desires are will. Will is not any special faculty of
the soul, but depends on the relation of the predominant
ideas to the rest. Energetic decision, the character of the
man, results from the duration in consciousness of a cer-
tain mass of ideas to the weakening of others, or their
repulsion to the door of consciousness.

(6.) The value of the philosophy of Herbart lies in its
psychology and metaphysics. The other spheres of the
spirit of man, law, morals, politics, art, religion, are for
the most part in its case but very poorly furnished. Not
that excellent relative remarks are altogether wanting,
but they cohere ill with the speculative principles of the
system. Herbart expressly isolates the particular philo-
sophical sciences, and rigorously separates, in especial,
theoretical and practical philosophy. He censures the
attempts at unity in philosophy, and ascribes to them a
variety of errors ; for logical, metaphysical, and sestheti-
cal forms are to him essentially disparate. The objects
of ethics and of aesthetics as a whole, concern an imme-
diate evidence, while to metaphysics, in which all know-
ledge is gained only by the elimination of error, any such
evidence is, in its very nature, alien. The aesthetical prin-
ciples, on which practical philosophy founds, are to Her-
bart independent of the reality of any object, and come
forward of themselves, even in the greatest metaphysical
darkness, with intuitive certainty. The moral elements,
he says, are pleasing and displeasing relations of will.
He thus establishes practical philosophy entirely on
aesthetic judgments. These are involuntary and intuitive,
and attach to objects the predicate of appro vableness or
disapprovableness without proof. It is in this conclusion
that the difference between Herbart and Kant is seen at
its greatest.

On the whole the philosophy of Herbart may be de-
scribed as an extension of the monadology of Leibnitz,
fuU of patient ingenuity, but devoid of inward fertility,
or any germ of movement.

2S6 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

XLlll.—Schelling.

SCHELLING originates in Fichte ; and without f urtlier
introduction we may proceed at once to an exposi-
tion of his philosophy, inasmuch as its derivation from
the Fichtian forms part of the history of its growth, and
is characterized there.

Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph Schelling was born at Leon-
berg in Würtemherg, on the 27th of January 1775.
Endowed with unusual precocity, he entered the theolo-
gical seminary of Tübingen in his fifteenth year, and
applied himself partly to the study of philology and
mythology, partly and especially to that of the philo-
sophy of Kant. During this period he was in personal
relations with Hölderlin and Hegel. He appeared very
early as an author : first on taking his degree of master
of arts, namely, in 1792, with a dissertation on the third
chapter of Genesis, in which he gives an interesting philo-
sophical interpretation of the Mosaic account of the FalL
In the following year, 1793, he contributed to the Me-
morabilien of Paulus his essay of a kindred nature,
Myths and Philosophemes of the Earliest Times. In the
last year of his stay at Tübingen (1794-95) we have his
two philosophical works : On the Possibility of a Form of
Philosophy in general, and Of the Ego as Principle of
Philosophy, or of the Unconditioned in Human Knowledge,
On completing his university course, Schelling went to
Leipzig in the capacity of tutor to the Barons von Kiede-
sel, and shortly afterwards to Jena, where he became
Fichte's disciple and fellow-labourer. On Fichte's re-
moval from Jena, he was appointed in his place as teacher
of philosophy, and began, gradually abandoning the posi-
tion of Fichte, to develop more and more his own ideas.
At Jena he edited the Journal of Speculative Physics, and,
in conjunction with Hegel, the Critical Journal of Philo-
sophy. In 1803 he was removed as Professor of Philo-
sophy to Würzburg, and in 1807 to Munich, in the capacity
of ordinary member of the newly instituted Academy of
Sciences there. A year later he became General Secre-
tary of the Plastic Arts, and, later still, on the establish-
ment of the university of Munich, one of its professors.
After Jacobi's death, he was made President of the
Academy at Munich, but removed in 1841 to Berlin,
where he gave several courses of lectures, particularly on

SCHELL I XO. 287

tbe ' Philosophy of Mythology,' and on that of ' Revela-
tion.' For many years Schelling ])ublishcd nothing of
imiwrtance, and only after his death, ■which took j)lace
at Kagaz on the '20th of August 1854, did the j)ublication
(completed in ISGH of his later works commence. Ten
volumes ci>m]>rise his earlier writings (some of them mi-
published in his lift-time), and four others his concluding
lectures. The philosophy of Schelling is no finished and
completed system to which his various works are but as
component }»arts : like the philosophy of Plato, it is
essentially a history of development, a series of progres-
sive stages, through which the philosopher himself
passed. Instead of systematically com])letingthe various
sciences in agreement with his general princi})le, Schelling
eeemed always beginning again with the beginning,
always labouring at new positions, new foundations,
mostly, like Plato, in connexion with earlier philoso-
phemes (Fichte, Spinoza, Neo-Platonism, Leibnitz, Jacob
Böhm, Gnosticism), which he endeavoured to assimilate,
one after the other, into his own system. An exposition
of his philosophy, therefore, has to guide itself accor-
dingly, and to take up its several periods singly, pursuant
to the succession of the various groups of bis writings.

1. — First Period :
SchelUng^s Derivation from Fichte.

Schelling's starting-point was Fichte, to whom, in his
earliest writings, he openly adhered. His work On the
Possibility of a Form of Philosophy is intended to de-
monstrate the necessity of an ultimate principle, as first
proclaimed by Fichte. His other work. On the Ego, again,
shows how the ultimate ground of our knowledge lies
only in the ego, and how every true philosophy conse-
quently must be idealism. If our cognition is to have
any reality, there must be a point possible in which idea-
lity and reality, thought and being, shall coincide and be
identical ; and if cognition, in consequence of the exist-
ence of a higher principle that conditioned it, were not
itself highest, it could not possibly be absolute. Fichte
regarded this work as a commentary on his WliseU'
achaftslelire ; it contains hints, nevertheless, of Schelling's
own later position, especially in the accent laid on the
unity of knowledge, on the necessity of the various
eciences becoming in the end one. The Letters on Dog-

288 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

matism and Criticism, 1795, are a polemic against those
followers of Kant, who lapse from the eritico-idealistic
position of the master back into the ancient dogmatism
again. In a series of articles in the journal of Nietham-
mer and Fichte, Schelling gave, 1797-98, a general view
of the latest philosophical literature — also from Fichte'a
position. But still he begins here to direct his attention
to a philosophical deduction of nature, if as yet, Fichte-
like, only from the nature of the ego. The same views
were further developed in his Ideas towards a Philosophy
of Nature, 1797, and in his work On the World-Soul,
1798. The leading thoughts of the last three works are
as follows. The origin of the notion of matter lies in the
nature and action of the mind. Mind, namely, is the
unity of a limiting and an unlimited force. Limitless-
ness would render consciousness as impossible as an ab-
solute limitedness. Feeling, perception, cognition is con-
ceivable only if the force that tends into limitlessness
become limited by an opposing force, and this latter in
turn be relieved of its limits. Mind is but the antagon-
ism of these two forces, or the perpetual process of their
relative unity. Nature is similarly situated. Matter as
such is not the prius, but the forces of which it is the
unity. It is to be conceived only as continual product
of attraction and repulsion, the primitive forces, and not
as inert mass. But force is as it were what is imma-
terial in matter. It is that which may be compared to
the mind. Matter and mind, then, exhibiting the same
conflict of opposed forces, must themselves be capable of
union in a higher identity. But the mental organ for
the apprehension of nature is perception, which possesses
itself of space — space limited and filled by the forces of
attraction and repulsion — as object of outer sense. Thus
the inference was necessary for Schelling, that there is the
same absolute in nature as in mind, and that their har-
mony is no mere reflexion of thought. ' Or if you main-
tain that it is we .who only transfer this idea to nature,
then never upon your soul has any dream dawned of what
for us nature is and should be. For we will not allow
nature only to agree contingently (as it were through
interposition of a third something), with the laws of in-
tellect, but necessarily and originally, and maintain her,
not only to express, but to realize these laws, and to
be nature and to be called nature, only in so far as she ac-
complishes this.' 'Nature shall be the visible soul, soul

SCHELLINO. 289

the invisiblo nature. And here, then, in tlie abwolute
identity of soul within us and of nature without ua, must
lie resohitiou of the ])roblt'm as to the ])os8ibility of an
external nature.' This thought that nature, matter, is
the actuose unity of attraction and repulsion, in the same
manner as mind is the unity of tendencies limiting and
unlimited, that the repulsive force of matter corresponds
to the positive unlimited element of mind, and the attrac-
tive to the negative or limiting one — this idealistic de-
duction of matter from the nature of the ego prevails
throughout the writings of this period. Nature aj)i)ears
thus as the counterpart of the mind, and produced by the
mind, only that the mind may, through its agency, at-
tain to a pure perception of itself, to self-consciousness.
Hence the series of grades in nature, in which all the
stations of intellect on its way to self-consciousness are
externally stereotyped. In the organized world espe-
cially, it is that intellect contemplates its own self-pro-
duction. For this reason there is something symbolical
in everything organic ; every plant is a corporealized
throb of the souL The main peculiarities of organic
growth, self-formation from within outwards, adaptation
of means to ends, variety of interpenetration of form and
matter, are all so many leading features of the mind. As
in the mind there is an infinite effort towards self-
organization, so also on the part of the external world
must a similar tendency display itself. The entire sys-
tem of the universe, therefore, is a species of organiza-
tion, formed from a centre outwards, and rising ever
from lower to higher stages. In accordance with this
point of view, then, the great endeavour of the philo-
sophy of nature must be to construe into unity the life of
nature which has been sundered and dislocated by natural
philosojihy into an innumerable variety of forces. ' It
is needless pains, taken by many people, to prove how
wholly diflferent in their actions fire and electricity are.
Everybody knows that who has ever seen or heard any-
thing of either. But in our inmost soul we strive to
unity of system in knowledge ; we are impatient of the
importimity that obtrudes a special principle for every
special phenomenon ; and we believe ourselves only there
to catch a sight of nature, where, in the greatest com-
j)lexity of phenomena, we discover at the same time the
greatest simplicity of law, and in the most lavish prodi-
gality of effects the strictest economy of means. There«

290 III ST OR Y OF PHIL OSOPII Y.

fore attention is due to every thought, even though still
crude and incomplete, that tends to the simplification of
l)rinciples : if for nothing else, it at least serves for im-
])ul8ion to inquiry, and to exploration of the hidden
tracks of nature.' The scientific investigation of nature
showed a particular bias during this period, to the adop-
tion of a duality of forces as dominant there. In mecha-
nics, Kant had given a theory of the antithesis of attrac-
tion and repulsion ; in chemistry, the phenomena of
electricity, abstractly conceived as positive and negative,
were assimilated to magnetism ; in physiology, there
was the antagonism of irritability and sensibility, etc.
etc. As against these dualities, now, Schelling pressed
forward to the unity of all opposites, of all dualities, not
to the abstract unity, but to the concrete identity, the
harmonious concert and co-operation of the whole hetero-
geneous variety. The world is the actuose unity of a
positive and a negative principle, ' and these two oppos-
ing forces, in conflict or in coalition, lead to the idea of
a world-organizing, world-systematizing principle, the
soul of the universe.'

In the work on the World-Soul, Schelling made great
progress towards an autonomic conception of nature. In
such soul nature possesses a special, immanent, intelligible
principle. The objectivity, the independent life of nature
is recognised thereby in a manner that is impossible to the
consistent idealism of Fichte. In this direction Schel-
ling continued to advance, and distinguished presently
with perfect consciousness transcendental philosophy and
nature-philosophy as the two sides of philosophy in
general. The addition to idealism of a complementary
philosophy of nature was a decided advance on the part
of Schelling beyond the position of the Wissenschaftslehre.
"With it, then, — though Schelling still continued to em-
ploy the method, and to believe himself true to the spirit,
of Fichte, — ^we pass into a second stadium of his philo-
sophizing.

2. — Second Period :

Distinction of Philosophy into Philosophies of Nature and

of Mind {Spirit).

This position is principally represented in the follow-
ing works : First Sketch of a System of Nature- Philosophy,
1799 ; Introduction to this work, 1/99 ; articles in the

SCIIELLIXO. 2ÖI

Jourual of Speculative Physics, 2 vols., 1800-1801 ; StjH'
Urn of Transcendental Jdealinin, 1800. The two parts of
philosophy Scholliiig distinguishes thus. All knowledge
rests on the agreement of a subject with an object.
Nature is the sum of objectivity, as the ego, or intelli-
gence, is the sum of what is subjective. There are two
ways of joining the two sides. Either assuming nature
to be the })rius, we ask, how does intelligence come to
be added to it (that is, we resolve nature into pure de-
terminations of thought — philosophy of nature); or as-
suming the subject to be the pritus, we ask, how are the
objects produced from the subject — transcendental i)hilo-
sophy. All philosophy must endeavour to construct either
intelligence out of nature, or nature out of intelligence.
As transcendental philosophy subordinates the real to the
ideal, so the philosophy of nature endeavours to deduce
the ideal from the real. Both, however, are but the poles
of one and the same knowledge, and they mutually seek
each other : hence the one leads necessarily only to the
other.

(a.) Philosophy of Nature. — To philosophize on nature
is as much as to create nature, to raise it out of the dead
mechanism in which it appears sunk, to animate it as it
were with freedom, and render possible for it its own
spontaneous evolution. And what then is matter but
the extinguished spirit? Nature, accordingly, being but
the Wsible organism of our minds, wül be able to pro-
duce nothing but what follows reason and law. But it
is to destroy all idea of nature from the first, to assume
the design exhibited by it to result from without, in con-
sequence of the understanding of some other being acting
on it. A perfect demonstration of the intelligible world
as present in the laws and forms of the sensible world,
and again a perfect comprehension of these laws and
forms by means of the intelligible world, a demonstra-
tion, consequently, of the identity of the worlds of nature
and of thought — this it is the business of the philosophy
of nature to accomplish. Its beginning, indeed, is im-
mediate experience ; primarily we know nothing but
from experience ; so soon, however, as I perceive the
inner necessity of a proposition of experience, this propo-
sition is already a priori. Empiricism enlarged into un-
conditionedness is the philosophy of nature. The lead-
ing ideas of this philosophy Schelling enunciates thus : —
Kature is an oscillation between productivity and product,

292 HISTORY OF PITILOSOPHY.

continually passing into definite forms and products, but
equally also productively passing beyond these. This os-
cillation points to a duplicity of the princij)les by which
nature is maintained in constant activity and preserved
from exhausting itself, and coming to term in precise
I)roductg. Universal duality, then, must be the prin-
ciple of all interpretation of nature. The first principle
of a philosophical theory of nature is, to look for polarity
and dualism everywhere. On the other hand, again, all
consideration of nature must end in recognition of the
absolute unity of the whole, a unity, however, which
is to be discerned in nature only on one of its sides.
Nature is, as it were, the instrument by which absolute
unity eternally makes real all that has been pre-formed
in the absolute mind. The absolute, then, is completely
to be perceived in nature, although the world of exter-
nality produces only in series, only successively and in
infinite gradation, what is at once and eternally in the
world of truth. Schelling treats the philosophy of nature
in three sections : (1.) Proof is to be given that, in its
original products, nature is organic ; (2.) the conditions
of an inorganic nature are to be deduced ; and (3.) the
reciprocity of organic and inorganic nature is to be demon-
strated. (1.) Organic nature is deduced thus : In an
absolute sense nature is nothing but infinite activity, in-
finite productivity. Were this to realize itself unchecked,
there were produced at once with infinite velocity an ab-
solute product, whereby empirical nature were unex-
pressed. But if the latter is to be expressed, if there are
to be finite products, then it will be necessary to assume
that the productive activity of nature is checked by an
opposed retarding activity, also existent in nature. A
series of finite products is the consequent result. But
the absolute productivity of nature aiming at an absolute
product, these several products are only apparent pro-
ducts, each is immediately transcended again by nature
in order, through an infinite series of fijiite products, to
satisfy the absoluteness of the inner productivity. In
this eternal production of the finite, then, nature appears
as a living antagonism of two opposed forces, one pro-
moting and the other retarding. The latter acts also in
infinite multiplicity ; the original productive force has to
contend, not merely with a simple checking action, but
with an infinity of reactions, which may be named thö
primitive qualities. Thus then every organic being is a

SCHELLINO. 293

permanent expression of the conflict of the mutually dis-
turbing and limiting actions of nature. And this, namely
the primal limitednesa and obstructedneÄS of the forma-
tive actions of nature, explains why each organization,
instead of attaining to an absolute product, continues
only to reproduce itself ad infinitum. Here, too, lies the
importance of the relation of sex in the organic world.
XLtixea the products of the latter, it compels them ever
to return to their own gratle, and reproduce it only. In
such reproduction, nature considers not individuals
but the genus. The individual is repugnant to nature,
whose desire is the absolute, and whose endeavour is ever
to express it. The individual products, therefore, which
exhibit the activity of nature as stationary, may be re-
garded only as unsuccessful attempts to express the ab-
solute. The genus is the end of nature, then, the indivi-
dual but the means. So soon as the former is secure,
nature abandons the latter, and works for its destruction.
The dynamical gradation of organic nature is divided and
classified by Schelling according to the three fundamen-
tal functions of organized existences : — (a.) power of
reproduction ; (b.) irritability ; (c.) sensibility. Those
organisms stand highest in which sensibility is highest ;
those lower in which irritability predominates ; lastly,
reproduction appears in its greatest perfection where
sensibility and irritability are almost lost. Nevertheless,
these forces are woven into each other throughout the
whole of nature, and consequently it is only a single
organization which ascends there from plants to men«
(2.) Inorganic nature is opposed to organic. The nature
of the inorganic world is conditioned by that of the
organic. If the constituents of the latter are productive,
those of the former are unproductive. If in the one, it
is only the genus that is fixed, in the other it is the indi-
vidual, to which there belongs no reproduction of the
genus. Inorganic nature, as opposed to organic, is
necessarily a multiplicity of materials which are not
related together otherwise than as being at once apart
from and beside each other. In short, inorganic nature
is mere mass — mass held together by a cause that is
without, — gravity. Like organic nature, it has its grades
nevertheless. What in organic nature is process of re-
production, is in inorganic nature process of chemistry
(as, for example, combustion) ; what is there irritability
is here electricity ; what in the one is sensibility, the

294 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

highest organic grade, is in the other magnetism, or the
highest inorganic grade. And thus we have already (3.)
the reciprocity of the organic and the inorganic worlds. The
result to which every true philosophy of nature must
come is, that the difference between organic and in-
organic nature exists in nature only as an object, while
nature again as originally j)roductive soars over both. If
the functions of organization are only possible under pre-
supposition of an inorganic world without, the two
worlds must have a common origin. We can only ex-
plain this by assuming the existence of inorganic nature
to imply a higher dynamic order of things to which it is
subjected. There must be a third something that con-
nects again organic with inorganic nature, a medium that
supports the continuity of both. The identity of an
ultimate cause must be assumed, by which, as by a com-
mon soul (world-soul), universal nature, organic and
inorganic, is animated ; a single principle which, fluc-
tuating between organic and inorganic nature, and pre-
serving the continuity of both, constitutes the first cause
of all alteration in the one, and the ultimate ground of all
activity in the other. "We have here the idea of a uni-
versal organism. That it is a single organization which
xinites the organic and inorganic worlds we saw above
in the parallelism of the gradations of both worlds.
What in inorganic nature is the cause of magnetism,
causes in organic nature sensibility ; and this latter is
but a higher potence of the former. Duplicity from iden-
tity, as it appears in the organic world in the form of sen-
sibility, so in the inorganic world it appears in the form
of magnetism. The organic world, then, is in this man-
ner but a higher stage of the inorganic ; it is one and the
same dualism which, from magnetic polarity up through
the phenomena of electricity, and the difi"erences of
chemistry, presents itself also in the organic world.

(6.) Transcendental Philosophy. — Transcendental philo-
sophy is naturc'philosophy made inward. The entire
series, which we have described as it presents itself in
the object, repeats itself as a successive development
in the perceiving subject. The peculiarity of transcen-
dental idealism, we are told in the preface, is, that it
necessitates, so soon as it is accepted, a reproduction, as
it were, of all knowledge from the beginning. What
has long passed for established truth must submit to
proof anew, and issue from it, in the event of success, at

SCHELLINO, 295

least in a quite other shape and form. The various parts
of philosophy, and philosophy itself, must be exhibited
in a single continuity as the advancing history of con-
sciousness to which the deposits of experience serve for
memorial and document. Exposition of this consists
in a gradation of intellectual forms, by means of which
the ego rises to consciousness in its highest potence.
Exact statement of the parallelism between nature and
intelligence is possible neither to transcendental philo-
sophy nor to the philosophy of nature apart, but to both
united : the one is to be regarded as the necessary
counterpart of the other. The princijile of the sub-
divisions of transcendental philosophy results from its
problem, to reproduce anew all knowledge, and to test
anew all prejudices and established opinions. The pre-
judices of ordinary opinion are, in general, two : — (1.)
That there exists without us, and independent of us, a
world of things which is perceived as it is. To elucidate
this prejudice is the problem of the first part of the
transcendental philosophy (theoretical philosophy), (2.)
That we can at will affect the objective world in accord-
ance with ideas originating freely in us. The solution
of this problem is practical philosophy. But these two
problems involve us (3.) in a contradiction. How is
mastery of the world of sense possible to thought, if in-
telligence, in its very origin, is but the slave of the
objects ? And, conversely. How is agreement possible
between intelligence and things, if the latter are to be
determined according to the former ? The solution of
this problem, the highest in transcendental philosophy,
is the answer to the question, How are we at once to
think intelligence as in subjection to objects, and objects
as in subjection to intelligence ? This it is impossible
to think, unless the faculty which produced the objective
world be originally identical with that which expresses
itself in will ; unless, therefore, the same faculty which
in will is consciously productive, be in the production of
the world, unconsciously productive. To prove this
identity of the conscious and unconscious energies is the
problem of the third part of the transcendental philo-
sophy, or of the science of natural design and art. The
three parts named completely correspond, consequently,
to the three Kritiken of Kant — (1. ) Theoretical philosophy,
beginning with the highest principle of knowledge, con-
sciousness, develops thence the history of the latter in its

296 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

principal epochs and stations, namely, sensation, percep-
tion, productive perception (as producing matter), exter-
nal and internal perception (with deduction of space, time,
and the Kantian categories), abstraction (distinction of in-
telligence from its own products), absolute abstraction or
absolute will The absolute act of will introduces ua
into (2.) Practical philosophy. Here the ego is no longer
merely perceptive or unconscious, but it is consciously
productive, or it realizes. As an entire nature originated
in the primitive act of self-consciousness, a second nature
will now be found to spring out of the second, or that of
the free determination of self, and this second nature it
is the object of practical philosophy to deduce. Schel-
ling follows in the sequel almost entirely the doctrine of
Fichte, but concludes with such admirable remarks on
the philosophy of history as demonstrate an advance on
Fichte. The moral order of the universe is not enough
to insure the free action of intelligence its return. For
this order is itself the product of the various subjects
acting, and exists not where these act contrary to the
moral law. It can neither be anything merely subjective,
like the moral order of the universe, nor yet any mere
submission to law on the part of objective nature, that
insures free action its return, and brings it about that,
from the completely lawless play of the freedom of the
individuals, there issues at last, for the entire family oi
free beings, an objective, rational, and harmonious result.
A principle superior at once to subject and object must
be the invisible root of this harmony of both which action
demands : this principle is the absolute which is neither
subject nor object, but the common root and the uniting
identity of both. The free action of the genus of rational
beings, realizing itself in that element of subjective and
objective harmony which is the eternal production of the
absolute, is history. History, consequently, is nothing
but the realization of that perpetually progressive har-
mony of subject and object, the gradual manifestation
\nd revelation of the absolute. In this revelation there
are three periods. The first is that in which power re-
veals itself only as destiny, blindly holds down freedom,
and destroys, coldly and unconsciously, all that is greatest
and noblest. This is the tragic historical period, a period
of brilliancy, but of the disappearance as well of the mar-
vels of the old world and of its dynasties, of the noblest
humanity that ever flourished. The second historical

sc II EL LING. 297

|>eriod is th.at in which tho former blind power maiiifosts
itself now as nature, and the obscure law of necessity ap-
pears transformed into an open natural law, which com-
pels the unbridled caprice of individual will to obey a
plan of universal culture conducting in the end to a
union of the peoples, to a universal state. This period
begins with the advance of the mighty Roman republic.
The third period will be that in which what was fate and
nature in the former periods will manifest itself as pro-
vidence, while the dominion of fate and nature will be
seen to have been but tlie imperfect beginning of the
gradual revelation of providence. When this period will
begin it is impossible for us to say. But when it is, God
is. (3.) Philosophy of Art. — The problem of transcendental
philosophy is the concord of object and subject. This
concord was realized in history (with which practical
philosophy closed) either not at all, or only as infinite
progress. But now the ego must succeed in actually
perceiving this concord or identity, which constitutes its
deepest self. If now, then, all conscious action is design-
ful, coalescence on its part with unconscious action is
only possible in what, being designful in itself, has been
without designfulness produced. Such a product is
nature ; we have here the principle of all Teleology in
which alone it is possible to find a solution of the given
problem. What is distinctive of nature is that, though
but bh'nd mechanism, it is still designfid, that it exhibits
an identity of conscious subjective and of conscious ob-
jective action : in it the ego beholds its own innermost
self, which indeed only consists in this identity. But in
nature the ego regards that identity as only objective and
external to itself : it must be enabled to perceive it also
as such that its principle lies in the ego itself. Such per-
ception is artistic perception. As the product of nature
is an unconscious product that is like to a conscious
one, so the product of art is a conscious product that is
like to an unconscious one. To teleology, then, we must
add (Esthetics. The contradiction of the conscious and
the unconscious, which without cessation perpetuates
itself in history, and which is unconsciously resolved in
nature, finds conscious resolution in the work of art.
Here at last intelligence reaches a perfect perception of
its own self. The feeling that accompanies this percep-
tion is a feeling of infinite satisfaction : all contradictions
are removed, all mysteries revealed. The unknown

293 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

Bomething that brings the objective and the conscious
action into unexpected harmony, is nothing else than that
absolute, that immutable identity which upholds exist-
ence. The veil, with which it obscures itself for others,
it lays aside for the artist, and impels him involuntarily
to the production of his works. Thus art is the one and
eternal revelation ; there is no other ; it is the miracle
that must convince us of the absolute reality of that
supreme principle which never becomes objective itself,
but is the cause nevertheless of all that is objective. And
so it is that art stands higher than philosophy, for only
in art does the intellectual perception attain objectivity.
Art is what is highest for the philosopher, for it opens as
it were the holy of holies to him, where in eternal and
primeval union there burns as in a flame what in nature
and history is separated, and what in life and action as well
as in thought miist be eternally divided. From this we
are enabled to understand too, that philosophy, as philo-
sophy, can never acquire a universal authority. The single
recipient of absolute objectivity is art, and with art con-
sciously productive nature perfects and completes itself.

The ' transcendental idealism' is Schelling's last work
written in the method of Fichte. Its principle is a
decided advance on the position of Fichte. What to
Fichte was an inconceivable limit of the ego, becomes
for Scheiling a necessary duplicity dependent on the
simple nature of the ego. If Fichte contemplated the
union of subject and object as only infinite asymptotical
progress, Scheiling contemplates its actual present reali-
zation in the work of art. God, whom Fichte conceived
only as object of a moral belief, has become for Scheiling
a direct object of ajsthetic intuition. This his difference
from Fichte could not long escape Scheiling. It was im-
possible for him to remain unconscious of the fact that
he stood no longer on the level of subjective, but had
passed to that of objective idealism. Having then ad-
vanced beyond Fichte in his antithesis of transcendental
philosophy and the philosophy of nature, it was only
consequent that he should proceed a step further and place
himself on the indifference-point of both, that he should,
now adopt for principle the identity of ideality and reality,
of thought and existence. This was the principle of
Spinoza before him, and to this philosopher of identity,
consequently, he felt himself powerfully attracted. In-
stead now of the method of Fichte, he adopted Spinoza's

sen ELL I XO. 290

mathematical one, to wliicli be ascribed the greatest evi-
dence of demonstration.

3. — Third Period :

The Period of Spinozism or of the IinVifference of the

Ideal and lieaL

Tlie principal i;mting3 of this period are : An Exposi-
tion of my System of Philosophy (Journal of Speculative
Physics, II. 2) ; the second and enlarged edition of the
Jdea^ towards a Philosophy of Nature^ 1803 ; the dialogue
Bruno, or on the Divine and Xatiiral Principle of Things,
1802 ; Lectures on the AI ethod of Academical Study, 1803 ;
New Journal of Speculative Physic'f, 1802-3, three parts.
Schelling's new position is perfectly characterized in the
definition of reason, which he has placed at the beginning
of the treatise first named : I call reason absolute reason,
or reason so far as it is thought as total indifference of
subjective and objective. The ability to think reason is to
be presumed in every one ; to think it as absolute, or to
reach the position required, the thinking subject must be
abstracted from. For him who accomplishes this abstrac-
tion reason immediately ceases to be something subjec-
tive as it is generally conceived to be. Nay, it cannot
be any longer thought even as something objective, for
something objective, or something thought is only pos-
sible in relation to a thinker. The abstraction, then,
converts it into that true j;2-i7seZ/(virtuality, or absolute),
which precisely coincides with the indifference-point of
subjective and objective. The position of philosophy la
the position of reason ; the cognition of philosophy is a
cognition of things as they are in themselves, that is to
say, as they are in reason. It is the nature of philo-
sophy wholly to eliminate all succession in time and
separation in space, all difference generally, imported
into thought by imagination, and to see in things only
that by wbich they express absolute reason, not, how-
ever, so far as they are objects for such reflection as
merely follows the laws of mechanism and in time. All
is in reason, and besides reason there is nothing. Reason
is the absolute. Any objections to this allegation can
derive only from our being accustomed to see things not
as they are in reason, but as they appear. Everything,
that is, IS essentially identical, and one with reason. It
is not reason that makes an externality to itself, but

300 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

only the false use of reason, which is conjoined with the
inability to forget the subjective element within our-
selves. Reason is absolutely one and self-identical. The
supreme law for the being of reason, and, as there is
nothing but reason, for aJl being, is the law of identity.
Between subject and object, then, one and the same
absolute identity expressing itself in both, there is pos-
sible, not a qualitative, but only a quantitative difiFerence
(a distinction of more or less), so that nothing is either
simply object or simply subject, but in all things subject
and object are unite(^ although in various proportions
with preponderance now of the one and now of the other.
But the absolute being pure identity of subject and ob-
ject, quantitative difiference must fall outside of this
identity, that is, into the finite. As the fundamental
form of the infinite is A = A, so that of the finite is
A = B (combinations, that is, of subject and object in
various proportions). But in ifcse^ nothing is finite, for
identity is the single in-itself. So far as there is difiFer-
ence in individual things, identity exists in the form of
indiflTerence. Were we able to take in at a glance all
that is, we should perceive in all a perfect quantitative
equipoise of subjectivity and objectivity, or pure identity.
In individual things, no doubt, there is a preponderance
now on the one side and now on the other, but on the
whole this is compensated. The absolute identity is ab-
solute totality, the universe itself. In itself there is no
individual existence or individual thing. Without tota-
lity there is nothing in itself; and if anjrthing is per-
ceived outside of totality, this is possible only as result
of an arbitrary separation of the individual from the
whole, the product of retiection and the source of all
errors. Essentially, there is the same absolute identity
in every part of the universe. The universe consequently
is to be conceived as a line, the centre of which is A = A,

-I-
the one end A = B (that is a preponderance of subjec-

+
tivity), and the other end A = B (or a preponderance of
objectivity), so, nevertheless, that even in the extremes
there is still relative identity. The one side is reality or
nature, the other ideality. The real side develops three
potences (a potence is a definite quantitative difiFerence of
subjectivity and objectivity). (1.) The first potence is
matter and gravity — the greatest overweight of the ob-

seil EL LI XO. 301

ject. (2.) The second potence is light (A') — an inward
(aa gi*avity was an outward) perception of nature. Light
is a highor movement of subjectivity. It is the absolute
identity itself. (3.) The third potence is the common
product of light and gravity, organization (A'). Organi-
zation is as original as matter. Inorganic nature as such
does not exist : it is actually organized, and for the
organization which proceeds from it as from the original
seed. Each body's organization is this body's interior
become outward ; earth itself becomes plant and animal.
Organic does not form itself out of inorganic, but is from
the first at least potential in it. What lies now before
us apparently as inorganic matter is the residuum of the
organic metamorphosis, what was unable to become orga-
nic. The brain of man is the highest result of the entire
organic metamorphosis of the earth. From the preced-
ing, Schelling continues, it will have been seen as well
that we maintain the internal identity of all things, and
the potential presence of all in all, as that we regard so-
called dead matter as only a plant-world and an animal-
world asleep — a world, however, that animated by the
being of absolute identity may still possibly awake at
some future time. Schelling breaks oflF here, leaving the
correspondent potences of the ideal sphere undeveloped.
Elsewhere, however, we have these latter stated thus :
(1.) Knowledge, the potence of reflection ; (2.) Action,
the potence of subsumption ; (3.) Reason, the unity of
reflection and subsumption. These three potences repre-
sent: (1.) As the true, the assimilation of matter into
form; (2.) As the good, the assimilation of form into
matter ; (3.) As the beautiful, or the work of art, the
absolute assimilation and unification of form and matter.
In order to attain cognition of the absolute identity,
Schelling even attempts to construct a new method.
Neither the analytic nor the synthetic method appeared
to him applicable for this purpose, both concerning finite
cognition. Even the mathematical method he left ofiF by
degrees. The logical forms of common acceptation, nay,
even the usual metaphysical categories, appeared to him
now, too, as insufficient. As initial point of true cogni-
tion, Schelling indicated intellectual perception. Percep-
tion generally is an identifying of thought and being.
When I perceive an object, the being of this object and
my thought of it are for me absolutely the same thing.
But in ordinary perception unity is assumed between

302 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPH Y.

thought and some particular sensuous existence. In the
perception of reason, intellectual perce])tiün, on the con-
trary, it is the absolute subject-object, that is perceived,
or identity is assumed between thought and being in
general, all being. Intellectual perception is absolute
cognition, and absolute cognition must be thought as
such that in it thinking and being are no longer opposed.
Intellectually to ])erceive directly within yourself the
same indifiference of ideality and reality which you per-
ceive, as it were, projected out of you in time and space,
this 18 the beginning and the first step in philosophy.
This veritably absolute cognition is wholly and solely in
the absolute itself. That it cannot be taught is evident.
We do not see, either, why philosophy should be under
any obligation to concern itself with this inability. It is
advisable, rather, on all sides, to isolate from common
consciousness the approach to philosophy, and to leave
open neither footpath nor highroad from the one to the
other. Absolute cognition, like the truth it contains, has
no true contrariety without itself, and admits not of being
demonstrated to any intelligence ; neither does it admit
of being contradicted by any. It was the endeavour of
Schelling, then, to reduce intellectual perception to a
method, and this method he named construction. Of
this method, the possibility and necessity depended on
this, that the absolute is in all, and all is the absolute.
The construction itself was nothing else than a demon-
stration of how, in every particular relation or object, the
whole is absolutely expressed. Philosophically to con-
strue an object, then, is to point out that in it the entire
inner structure of the absolute repeats itself.

In accordance with the position of identity or indiffer-
ence, Schelling attempted an encyclopaedic construction
of all the philosophical disciplines in his Lectures an the
Method of Academical Study (delivered 1802, appeared
1803). Under the form of a critical review of the uni-
versity curriculum, they afford a summary and connected
but popular statement of his philosophy. The part most
worthy of remark in them is the attempt at an historical
construction of Christianity. The incarnation of God is
an eternal incarnation. The eternal Son of God, born of
the being of the father of all things, is the finite itself, as
it is in the eternal perception of God. Christ is only the
historical, sensuously-seen pinnacle of the incarnation ;
as an individual he is quite intelligible from the circum •

SCIIELLINQ. ?m

stances of the period. God being eternally independent

of all time, it is inconceivable that he should have as-
sumed luiman nature in anj' specific moment of time.
Christianity, as it is in time, exoteric Christianity, corre-
sponds not to its idea, and has only to expect its comple-
tion. A main obstacle to this completion was and is the
so-called Bible, ■which besides, as regards true religious
substance, is inferior to some other religious writings. (!)
A new birth of esoteric Christianity, or a new and higher
religion, in which philoso])hy, religion, and poetry shall
be fused into unity, this must be the i)roduct of the
future. The last statement contains already a hint of
the 'revelation-philosophy,' and of the Johannine era
announced in it. Similar other allusions occur also in
the same work. Thus Schelling j)laces in the beginning
of history a sort of golden age. It is inconceivable, he
says, that man as he now appears, should have been of
himself able to raise himself from instinct to conscious-
ness, from animality to rationality. The present race of
men must have been preceded, then, by another, immor-
talized in the ancient legend under the figure of gods and
heroes. An origin for religion and civilisation is intelli-
gible only in the lessons of superior natures. I hold
civilisation to have been the primal condition of man-
kind, and the institution of states, of sciences, of reli-
gion, and of arts, to have been contemporaneous, or
rather one and the same : these things, indeed, were not
then veritably sundered, but in perfect interpenetration,
as they will be again in the last days. ScheUing is only
consistent, then, when he regards the symbols of mytho-
logy, which we find to be historically first, as revelations
of supreme cognition — and here, again, we have a step
to the subsequent * philosophy of mythology.'

The mystical element, which we find expressed in
these historical views, asserts itself henceforward more
and more in Schelling. This mystical tendency was
partly the result of his unsuccessful attempt to find an
appropriate form, an absolute method, for the expres-
sion of his philosophical ideas. All nobler mysticism
depends on the impossibility of adequately expressing
infinite matter in a logical form. And so it was that
Schelling, after he had restlessly flung himself into every
method, soon sickened of that of construction also, and
henceforth completely abandoned himself to the bound-
less course of his own phantasy. Partly, again, hia

304 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

philosopbical views had gradually undergone a transfor-
mation. From the speculative science of nature he turned
more and more to the philosojjhy of mind, and his defi-
nition of the absolute changed accordingly. If the ab-
solute had hitherto been to him the indifference of ideality
and reality, preference was now given to the former in
reference to the latter, and ideahty became the funda-
mental attribute of the absolute. Ideality is the prim,
ideality, secondly, determines itself within itself to rea-
lity, which as such consequently is only third. The for-
mer harmony of spirit and nature is broken up, and
matter appears as the negative of spirit. In thus distin-
guishing from the absolute the universe as its antitype,
Schelling has decidedly abandoned the position of Spino-
zism and passed to another.

4. — Fourth Period :

The Mystic or Neo-Plaionic Form of the Philosophy of

Schelling.

The writings of this period are : — Philosophy arid
Religion, 1804 ; Exposition of the True Relation of
Naturer Philosophy to the amended Fichtian Views, 1806;
Annals of Medicine (co-edited with Marcus), 1805-1808.
From the position of indifference, as has been said, the
absolute and the universe were identical, nature and
history were immediate manifestations of the absolute.
But now Schelling accentuates the difference between
them, and in order most strikingly to express the sepa-
ratedness of the world, he quite neo-Platonically repre-
sents it, in the first work named, as originating in a
rupture, in a downfall from the absolute. From the
absolute to the actual there is no continuous transition ;
the origin of the material world is only conceivable as a
complete break-off from the absolute by direct separa-
tion. The absolute is the only reality ; finite things are
not real. The existence of the latter, then, cannot de-
pend on a communication of reality made to them by
the absolute, but on their very distance, on their very
downfall from the absolute. The reconciliation of this
downfall, God's completed realization, is the goal of
history. To this idea, there are then added some othei
conceptions of a neo-Platonic complexion. Thus we have
the myth of Psyche falling from intellectuality to sense,
Hud this fall even Platonically described as the punish-

SCHELLINO. 305

ment of selfnesa. Then we have the kindred myth of a
palingenosia and migration of bouIs, which soula, accord-
ing as thej' have more or less laid aside self here below,
and puritied themselves into identity with the infinite,
either begin a higher life on better stars, or, satu-
rated with matter, are driven down into still lower
regions. Particularly neo-Platonic are the high estima-
tion and mystico-symbolical interpretation of the Greek
mysteries (begun even in the Bruno\ as well as the
opinion that religion, if it would preserve uninjured its
pure ideality, can never exist otherwise than esoterically
or in the form of mysteries. The same thought of &
loftier unification of religion and philosophy pervades
the whole of the "writings of this period. AU true experi-
ence, says Schelling, is religious. The existence of God
is an empirical truth, nay, the ground of all experience.
Religion, indeed, is not philosophy ; but a philosophy
which should not unite in holy harmouy religion with
science, were certainly none. Something higher than
science I certainly do know. And if to science there
are only two ways open, that of analysis or abstraction
and that of synthetic deduction, then all science of the
absolute is denied. Speculation is the whole — vision, con-
templation of everytlung, that is, in God. Science itself
is valuable only so far as it is speculative, so far as it is
contemplation of God as he is. A time will come, how-
ever, when the sciences will more and more disappear,
and immediate cognition assert itself. Only in the
highest science does the mortal eye close, and then it is
no longer man that sees, but eternal sight itself that has
come to see in him.

With such theosophical views, Schelling was naturally
directed to the older mystics, whose writings he now
began to study. In his polemic against Fichte, Schel-
ling replies to the reproach of mysticism as follows : —
Among the learned of one or two centuries past, there
was a tacit understanding not to go beyond a certain
point, where the genuine spirit of science was left to the
unlearned. These, because they were unlearned, and had
incurred the envy of the learned, were styled visionaries.
But many a professed philosopher might be glad to
exchange his entire rhetoric for the fulness of heart and
soul that is present in the writings of these very vision-
aries. I, then, would not be ashamed of the name of
such a visionary. Nay, I will endeavour to give a foun-

306 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

dation to the reproach : hitherto I have not properly
fitudiecl the writings of these men, negligence has been
the cause. Sclielling failed not to make good these
words. And it was especially to the kindred Jacob
Böhm that he henceforward more and more directed him-
self. Study of Böhm, indeed, is already apparent in the
writings before us. One of Schelling's most celebrated
works (and which appeared soon afterwards), that on free-
will {Philosophical Inquiries into the Nature of Human
Free-will^ 1809), is altogether built on Böhm. With it
begins the last period of Schelling's philosophizing.

5. — Fifth Period :

Attempt at a Theogony and Cosmogony in agreement

with Jacob Böhm.

With Böhm, Schelling had much in common. To both
speculative cognition was a sort of immediate perception.
Both employed a mixture of abstract and sensuous forms,
a medley of logical precision and phantastic colouring.
Both were alike, finally, in a speculative relation. A lead-
ing thought with Böhm was the self-diremption of the ab-
solute. Taking the divine substance as at first the form-
less unqualified infinite and incomprehensible, that which
was foundationless, Böhm conceived it further, in the
feeling of its own abstract infinite being, to shrink into
finitude, into the ground or centre of nature, where in
their dark torture-chamber, the qualities separate from
each other, where at last from the hard contrition of these
qualities the lightening springs, which then, as spirit, or
principle of light, dominates and illuminates the strug-
gling powers of nature, until God, raised by the basis
from his unbasedness, or by the ground from his un-
groundedness, into the light of the spirit, lives and moves
in an eternal realm of bliss. This theogony of Böhm's is
strikingly in harmony with the present views of Schelling.
As Böhm conceived the absolute to be the primal formless
baselessness, or groundlessness, Schelling, as we have
seen already, figured it as indifference. As Böhm too
proceeded to distinguish this all-unbasedness from the
basis or nature, and from God as the light of the spirit,
so Schelling apprehends the absolute now as what,
externalizing itself, returns from this self-externaliza-
tion into a higher unity with its own self again. We
have thus already indicated the three moments in the

sen ELL I so. 307

history of Ctxl whicli constitutes the interest of the work
ou free-will alre:uly named : — (1.) God as indifference, or
as primal baselessness, foundationlessness, groundless-
ness, the unfounded void ; (2.) God as diremption into
existence and ground (basis), ideal and real; (3.) Con-
ciliation of this diremption and transformation of the
original indifference into identity. Tlie first moment in
the divine life is that of pure indifference or distinction-
lessness. This that precedes all existence may be named
the primal ground or unground (groundlessness, founda-
tionlessness). The unground is no ])roduct of the anti-
theses, nor are these implicit in it, but it is a special
being devoid of all antithesis, and therefore such that it
possesses no predicate but predicatelessness. Real and
ideal, darkness and light, can never as antitheses be pre-
dicated of the unground : only as non-antitheses, in a
neither the one nor the other, is it possible to enunciate
them of it. From this indifference now duality breaks
forth: the unground parts into two equally eternal begin-
nings, in order that ground and existence may become
one in love, or in order that the lifeless and indefinite
indifference may rise into the living and definite identity.
As there is nothing before or besides God, God must have
the ground of his existence within himself. B\it this
ground is not merely logical as a notion, but real, as a
something actual and to be distinguished from existence
in God : this ground is nature in God, distinguishable
from God, but inseparable from God. In it, then, is
neither understanding nor will, but only the craving for
them ; it is the longing to give birth to itself. But the
ground longingly moving thus, like a heaving sea, in
obedience to some dark and indefinite law, there arises
in God himself, correspondent to this first stirring of the
divine existentiality in the ground, an inner reflexive
perception in which — no object being possible for it but
God himself — God beholds himself in his own image.
This perception is God bom in God himself, the eternal
Word in God (Gospel of John, i.), which rises on the
night of the ground like light, and bestows understand-
ing on its dark longing. This understanding united with
the ground becomes free creative will. Its work is the
setting in order of nature, the previously lawless ground ;
and from this transformation of the real by the ideal
there comes the creation of the world. In the evolution
of the world there are two stadia: — (1.) The birth of light,

308 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

or tlie gradual developmont of nature up to man ; (2.)
The birth of spirit, or man's development in history. (1.)
The development of nature in grades depends on a conflict
of the ground with the iinderstanding. Originally the
ground endeavoured to shut itself in to its own self,
and independently to produce all from its own self alone ;
but its products without understanding were without
stability and fell again to the ground, a creation which
we still behold in the extinct plants and animals of the
prehistoric world. But even in the sequel the ground
yields only gradually to the understanding, and every
such step towards light is marked by a new class of be-
ings. In every natural existence there are, therefore,
two principles to be distinguished : first, the dark prin-
ciple, through which natural existences are separated
from God, and possess a particular will ; secondly, the
divine principle of understanding, or of the universal
will. In irrational natural existences, these two prin-
ciples, however, are not yet moulded together into unity,
but the particular will is mere rage and greed in them,
whilst the universal will, quite apart from the individual
will, is operative as mere external natural power, as con-
trolling instinct. Only (2.) in man are the two prin-
ciples united as they are united in the absolute. But in
God they are inseparable, while in man they are not only
separable, but must separate, in order that there may be
a difference of man from God, and that God, as opposed
to man, may be revealed as that which he is, as unity of
both principles, as spirit that subdues the difference, as
love. Just this separableness of the universal and par-
ticular wills is the possibility of good and evil. The good
is the subordination of the particular to the universal
will, and the inversion of this the true relation is evil.
In this possibility of good and evil, man's free will con-
sists. Empirical man, however, is not free ; his whole
empirical condition is determined by -an intelligible act
antecedent to time. As man acts now, he must act ;
but nevertheless he is free in act, because from eternity
he has freely made himself what he now necessarily is.
From the very beginning of creation, the will of the self-
substantiating ground has brought along with it the self-
will of the creature for the production of the antithesis,
in the subjugation of which God may realize himself as
the reconciling unity. In this universal excitation of
evil, man has involved himself in self-will and selfishness ;

SCIIELLING. 309

hence in all men evil as nature, and yet in each as his
own free act. The history of man depends, on the great
scale, on this conflict of self-will and universal will, as the
history of nature on the conflict of the ground and the
understanding. The various stages which evil as histo-
rical power describes in battle with love, constitute the
j>eriod8 of universal history. Christianity is the middle-
}»oint of history. In Christ the principle of love became
jversoually opposed to evil in the person of man. Christ
was the mediator in order to restore to its highest position
the connexion of creation with God ; for only the personal
can be the saviour of the personal. The end of the world
is the reconciliation of self-will and love, the dominion of
universal will, so that God is all in alL The indifference of
the beginning is then raised into the absolute identity.

In his reply to Jacobi (1812), Schelling gave a further
justification of this his idea of God. He endeavours to
repel Jacobi's accusation of naturalism, by demonstrating
that the true idea of God is a union of naturalism and
theism. Naturalism would think God as ground (imma-
nent) ; theism as cause of the world (transcendent) : the
truth is the union of both characters. God is at once
cause and ground. It nowise contradicts the notion of
God that he should be conceived, so far as he reveals
himself, to proceed out of himself from imperfection to
perfection, to develop himself : imperfection is perfec-
tion itself, but as in process of becoming. The stages of
the process are necessary, in order to exhibit on all sides
the fulness of perfection. Unless there be a dark ground,
a nature, a negative principle in God, there can be no
talk of a consciousness of God. As long as the God of
modern theism remains a simply single being, that is to
be supposed purely essential, but is in fact only essence-
less ; as long as there is not recognised in God an actual
duality, and a limitative and negative power that is
opposed to the expansive and afl&rmative one, so long will
the denial of a personal God be but scientific candour.
It is universally and absolutely impossible to think a be-
ing possessed of consciousness who has not been brought
into limitation by a negative power within himself — as
universally and absolutely impossible as to think a circle
without a centre.

Schelling's letter to Eschenmayer, in the Universal
Journal by Germans for Germans, may be regarded as an
elucidation of the views contained in the work on free

310 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

will, and in the reply to Jacobi, Tn this letter he ex-
presses himself more plainly than he had previously done
as to what is to be understood by ground, and as to his
justification for speaking of a ground in God. After this
communication, there occurred a pause in the literary
activity of Schelling. It was publicly rumoured, indeed,
that the printing of an unusually great work, entitled
The Ages of the World, had begun ; but also again that
Schelling had recalled and destroyed the proofs. The
title had seemed to give promise of a philosophy of his-
tory ; and the description of the short essay On the
Qods of Samothrace (1815), as supplementary to the
work itself, made it seem likely, at the same time, that
in it great stress would be laid on the development of
the religious consciousness. Now, indeed, that in Schel-
ling's collected works we have the printed treatise itself,
we see that the Past, that is to say, what is to be thought
as previous to nature, constitutes the theme of the first
book (existent in the eighth volume of the collected
works, in the form which Schelling may have given to
it about the year 1815) ; that it is nature itself that,
under the title of the * Present,* is to be considered the
subject of the second book ; and that, lastly, surmises of
the Future were the material of the third book. For the
rest, it is evident that at least the main features of the
later doctrine of potences had even then taken fixed
shape in the mind of Schelling. A quite extraordinary
sensation was produced — Stahl and Sengler having
called public attention to the new turn in the views of
Schelling — by the preface which he prefixed in the year
1834 to H. Becker's translation of a work of Cousin's.
This not only because he spoke in it so bitterly of
Hegel, who, he said, had quite misunderstood the sense
of the Identitätssystem, but because he now openly de-
clared that, while his entire earlier system formed but
one half, and that the negative one, of philosophy, there
required to be added, as complement to it, the second or
positive half, in which the method should not be any
longer one of pure a priori construction, but should adopt
in part the process so exclusively applied by empiricism.
In a similar manner, but with somewhat less bitterness
to Hegel, he expressed himself in the address with which
he opened his lectures at Berlin in 1841. And as a con-
viction soon obtained that Schelling would hardly bring
himself to lay his Berlin discourses before a wider circle,

SCHELL I NG. 311

attempts were made — after i)ublication of the extracts
of Fruuensfaclt and others, but especially of the report of
Ur. Paulus, which latter Schelling'a own action for piracy
seemed to authenticate — })artly to exponnd and partly
critically to judge the new doctrine. That these were
only partially correct appeared, when, after Schelling'a
(loath, his sons made public, as well the introduction to the
Philosophy of M ijthologij a.^ the Philosophy of Revelation.
These works enable us to form a pretty complete concep-
tion of the latest shape which philosoi)hy assumed with
Schelling. Quite, namely, as in the work on free-will, and
the other works immediately subsequent, that, which in
his third period had been named the absolute indiflference,
is designated as the prius of nature and mind, nay as the
prius of God, so far as it is that in God which is not (yet)
God. Then it is shown how from this pre-notion of God,
substituted by pantheism for the usual notion, the true
notion of God is reached, the notion, that is, of true
monotheism, which supplants pantheism by rendering
pantheism latent within it. In this progression of the
notion of God, there are distinguished now three moments,
or, as SchelHng, in his earlier manner, prefers to name
them, potencea : first, the ability-to-be {das Sein-hön-
nende), which, as it not yet i«, is characterized by the
sign minus, and usually named — A. It is ground or even
nature in God, the dark that awaits illumination, what
was called in the work on free-will the hunger for exist-
ence, nameable also the subject of being or potential
being (AnsicJisein). To this mere ability to be there stands
opposed as its pure contrary (consequently, -I- A), pure
being which is wdthout all potentiality {Können) ; which,
as the former was mere subject, is not even subject, but
only predicate and object ; which, too, as the former was
a self and within itself, is rather what is without itself
or external to itself, and not what denies (or withdraws)
itself. Both constitute the presupposition to — what is
excluded by them — the third, ± A, in which the in-itself
and the without-itself (potentiality and actuality), or
subjectivity and objectivity, unite, so that it may be
named what is by itself (what is at home with itself),
what is master of itseK. This third now, which, as — Ä,
has the first, and therefore the best claim to the predi-
cate of being, is most appropriately designated spirit.^

' That the non-being — A should now be alluded to as specially
being is sufficiently perplexing ; but, in addition, the sentence itaeif

31 2 HI ST OR Y OF PHILOSOPH Y,

God, as unity of these three, is still far from being tri-
vine, but is as yet only the all-one, in which notion there
lies but the root of the Trinity. The progress to the
Trinity, at the same time also to the universe that is dis-
tinguished from God, proceeds in this way that — A,
which was non-being, is made explicit as such. To this,
however, — because only what is as non-being is capable
of being made explicit, — it is necessary to presuppose
that — A was previously exi)licit as being, but was over-
mastered by the opposing + A. The appearance of this
contradiction {Spannung), which follows not from the
nature, but from the will of God, has — as in it properly
the relation of the two potences has reversed itself ( — A
having become being, and + A potentiality, or ability to
be, or power) — for its product the conversion of the
original relation, and so of the unum versum (universe) ;
but just so it serves also to this, that, above both as
now transformed, +A is God as self -possessing actual
spirit : theogonic and cosmogonic processes here fall
together. The latter manifests a series of stages in
which the various relations of the two potences are
demonstrated by the philosophy of nature. In the
human consciousness, which is the last term of the
series, the contention of the potences reaches its end.
The powers from whose conflict the world arose, repose
in the inner of the human spirit, which for this very
reason is really the microcosm. Through the Prome-
thean deed of the apprehension of self as ego, the hitherto
only ideal world becomes, in externality to God, a real
one, the vocation of which is to subordinate itself to
what it left ; whereby naturally this latter, previously
transmundane, becomes now supramundane. The path
to this consummation describes the various progressive
relations of the ego, which, referring itseK theoretically
to the natural, and practically to the moral law, and,
freed by the latter, elevates itself into an artistic and
contemplative enjoyment, in which that becomes object
for it that is characterized by Aristotle as the thinking
of thinking, and by later philosophy as the subject-object,
— the final cause of the world, or God as first principle of
the world.

The course here is designated by Schell ing as the

is, either in pointing or otherwise, ungi-ammatical. As the smallest
emendation possible, a comma has been added. The reader should
know that this and the next paragraph are not by Schwegler. —See
Annotation. — T.

)\ I

sc II EL LI NO. 313

progress towards God. Beginning with the first con-
ditions of all-being, passing to the action of the poteuces
in production of a divided and in itself graduatetl being,
proceeding to the self-assertion of the ego that thereby
isolates itself from God, the result of the doctrine is that
the ego declares itself as not the tirst principle, and sub-
ordinates itself to the isolated God, whom, in the end,
it acknowledges as this principle. In the end : hitherto,
then, we have philosophized towards Go*.l, and therefore
without God ; it has been shown that none of the stages
hitherto considered, neither knowledge of nature, nor
life in the state, nor contemplative absorption, yields
an ultimate satisfaction ; philosophy, therefore, can be
named, because of this negative result, only negative
philosophy. As hitherto wholly conditioned by thought
too, it may be fitly named rational philosophy. But
thought being without power to create reality, to bestow
existence, the end of rational philosophy is only God as
idea. But the power that fails thought is possessed by
wili "Will postulates an active God, lord of all being,
who will practically resist the schism that has actually
appeared. This longing for an actual God is religion,
and philosophy, in receiving religion for its object,
assumes quite a new character : it is become positive
philosophy. It has no longer its previous rational char-
acter, when it considered only how the problem was pos-
sibly to be thought ; but as religion roots in the action
of free-will its aim now is to explain religion as it actually
occurs, and to show how all relates itself when God, con-
ceived as only found at the end of the negative philosophy,
is made principle with derivation of all from him, whereas
previously the course had been to him. The philosophy
of religion, which is not to be confounded with a so-called
religion of reason, has for object partly the incomplete,
partly the completed religion. It is first, then, Philo-
sophy of Mythology, and then Philosophy of Revelation.
In the former Schelling attempts to show, how it is to be
explained that men, not otherwise insane, should have
submitted themselves to ideas which represented the
sacrifice of a son, for example, as duty ; and, again, how
it is possible that such ideas should appear, even from a
Christian point of view, preferable to complete irreligi-
oosness. Schelling intimates that the forces dominating
these men and people, and regarded by them as God, must,
from the point of view of the highest religion, be re-

314 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

cognised aa at least moments in God, The primitive form
of religion, namely, which may, because no polytheism is
yet present, and humanity is pervaded by God, be called
Monotheism (but an abstract one) ia followed by the
crisis which is one with the progression of the nations,
and in which there repeats itself in the consciousness of
man, the same process of the potencea which (in exter-
nality and priority to consciousness), gave rise to the
natural atagea. Hence the parallelism between these lat-
ter and the mythological stages, which has led many to
see in mythology only a disguised physical philosophy.
Philoaophy shows now that the mythological process
consists in the individual potences taking possession of
consciousness, instead of the all-one as previously in
primitive monotheism, and the first step is that where
consciouanesa knows itself as under dominion of the re-
volutions of the heavens, a form which may be named
astral religion or Sabeism. Mythology, reaching, aa
Greek, its flourishing point, we find there again all the
notions of the earlier stages. Thus Uranua ia the
god of the conaciousnesa, which appears first in the
process. The second stage, on which the first potence
( — A) is reduced to passivity by the second ( + A ), is
represented in Greek mythology by the emasculation of
Uranus. In this reference it ia characteristic that the
Greek Herodotus, where he mentions this moment of the
mythological process (a moment stereotyped among the
Babylonians and Arabians) introduces Urania and her
son Dionysua. On this second atage stand now very
various religions, as well those which wholly merge them-
selves in the mythological process (Phoenician, Egyptian,
Indian, etc.), as also those, like Budhism and the dualism
of the Persians), which would fix the process on certain
points. The Greek displays the highest stage of mytho-
logy : nay, in the mysteries, in which it begins to make
its peculiar nature clear to itself, it properly transcends
itself, and so it is that the consideration of the mysteries
is the best introduction to the philosophy of revelation.
The special problem of the latter is to explain from its
premisea the person of Christ which is the matter proper
of all Christianity. The action of Christ before his be-
coming man, his incarnation, and, lastly, the mediation so
accomplished, are considered ; the point of view being
always held fast, however, that the mythological process
is the presupposition and in the end the presage of what

TRANSITION TO REO EL. 315

in Christ becomes actual. The completion of his work
prepares the way for the third potenco, spirit, through
the action of which the Church, as explication of Christ,
exists. The three periods of the Church are prefigured
by the principal apostles, Peter, Paul, and John. The two
lirst periods, Cathohcism and Protestantism, have already
elapsed : the third, the Christianity of John, is now ap-
proaching.

There is indisputably something grandiose in this at-
tempt to conij)rehend the whole process of the world, and
of its inner and outer history, as the self-mediation of
God with himself, and to unite pantheism and theism in
the higher notion of God as at once free and in subjection
to development ('monotheism'). How closely this last
phase of the philosophy of Schelling approaches the
Hegelian which in its way also adopts for principle the
notion of a process of the absolute through mediation of
negation, will appear at once from the statement of
Hegel, to which we proceed.

XLTV. — Transition to Hegel.

THE radical defect of the philosophy of Schelling, as
seen in its development with relation to Fichte, is
the abstractly objective manner in which it conceived
the absolute. This was pure indiflference, identity ;
there was (1.) no possibility of transition from it to the
definite, the real ; and hence Schelling afterwards fell
into a complete dualism between the absolute and the
world of reality. In it (2.) mind had been obliged to
yield its supremacy to nature ; or the one was equated
with the other, and the pure objective indifference of
ideality and reality was placed above both, that is, then,
above the former. From reflection on this one-sidedness,
the Hegelian philosophy arose. Hegel, in opposition to
Fichte and agreement with the position of Schelling, held
that it is not anything individual, not the ego, that is
the prius of all reality, but, on the contrary, something
universal, a universal which comprehends within it every
individual. But then he conceived this universal not as
indifference, but rather as development, as a universal in
which the principle of difference is immanent, and which
uncloses itself into the entire wealth of the actuality ex-
hibited by the worlds of mind and of matter. Nor is the

316 niSTOEY OF PHILOSOPHY.

absolute to Hegel merely something objective, as it were
the negative extinction of being and of thinking, of real-
ity and ideality, in a neutral third : the universal, that
underlies all, is rather only one of the terms of this dis-
junction, the ideal one. The idea is the absolute, and all
actuality is only a realization of the idea. Above there
is nothing higher than the idea, and without there is no-
thing further : it is the idea that actualizes itself in every
individual of the total whole. The universe is no in-
difference of ideality and reality ; rather it is that reality
into the infinite forms of which the idea (in order not
to be a mere unreal abstraction), unfolds itself, without,
however, losing itself in them, but, on the contrary, with
return from them back into its own self in the form of a
rational soul, and so, as conscious, self -thinking idea, tc
exist in its true form, in a form adequate to its own
inner and essential being. Thus Hegel restores to
thought its own right. Thought is not one existential
form of the absolute beside others; it is the absolute
itself in its concrete unity of self ; it is the idea come
back to itself — the idea that knows itself to be the truth
of nature and the i)Ower in it. The Hegelian philosophy
constitutes thus, then, the diametrical opposite to the
philosophy of Schelling that preceded it. If the latter
became ever more and more realistic, more and more
Spinozistic, more and more mystic, more and more
dualistic, the former, on the contrary, was again idealis-
tic, rationalistic, a pure monism of thought, a pure
reconciliation of the actual and the intellectuaL If
Schelling substituted objective for subjective idealism,
Hegel supersedes both by an absolute idealism, that is
again to subordinate the natural to the intellectual ele-
ment, but equally at the same time to embrace both as in-
wardly one and identical.

As regards form, the Hegelian philosophy is in its method
equally essentially distinguished from ito predecessor.
The absolute is to Hegel not being (a definite, fixed some-
thing), but process, explicitation of differences and anti-
theses, which, however, are not independent, or self-
subsistently opposed to the absolute, but constitute,
individually and collectively, only moments within the
self-evolution of the absolute. This necessitates a de-
monstration, then, that the absolute is possessed within
itself of a principle of progress from difference to differ-
ence, which differences stiU form only moments within

TRANSITIOX TO TIEGEL. 317

it. It is not we who are to brine; differences into the
absolute, but it is the absolute itself which must produce
them ; whilst they, for their parts, must apain resolve
themselves into the whole, or demonstrate themselves as
mere moments. This it is the object of the Hegelian
method to make good. Its position is : every notion has
in itself its own opposite, its own negation ; is oue-8ide<l,
and pushes on into a second, which second, the op])o8ite
of the first, is as yter a« equally one-sided with the first.
In this way it is seen that both are only moments of a
thinl notion, which, the higher unity of its two prede-
cessors, contains in itself both, but in a higher form that
combines them into unity. This new notion, again, once
assumed as established, similarly demonstrates itself as
but a one-sided moment, that also pushes forward to
negation, and through negation to a higher unity, and so
on. This self-negation of the notion is to Hegel the
genesis of all differences and antitheses, which, for their
parts, are never anything fixed or self-subsistent, as the
reflecting understanding supposes, but only fluent mo-
ments of the immanent movement of the notion. And
80 it is also with the absolute itself. The universal,
which is the ground of everj'thing particular, is such
only in this way, that it (the universal), as such, is only
something one-sided, and is of itself impelled into nega-
tion of its abstract universality by means of conereter
particxdarity (definiteness). The absolute is not a simple
one something, but a system of notions which owe their
origin just to this self -negation of the original universal.
This S3'stem of notions is then collectively in itself again
an ahstractum, that is impelled forward into negation of
its merely notional (ideal) being, into reality, into the
real self-subsistence of the differences (nature). But here
again, in nature, there is the same one-sidedness of being
but moment and not itself the whole, and thus, therefore,
the self subsistence of the real element also resolves itself,
and this element is resumed into the imiversality of the
notion in the form of self -consciousness, of thinking spirit,
which comprehends and unites "within itself both notional
(logical) and real (natural) being, in a higher ideal unity
of the universal and the particular. This immanent
spontaneous evolution of the notion is the method of
HegeL It wül not, Hke the method of Fichte, merely
subjectively propose a thesis, antithesis, and sjiithesis,
but it wül follow and watch the course of the thing itsell

318 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

It will not produce being (existence), but what in itself
already is, that it will reproduce for thought and con-
sciousness. It will understand all in its own immanent
connexion, which connexion is but a consequence of the
inner necessity, by virtue of which there is manifested
everywhere this production of diflference from identity,
and of identity from difference, this living pulse of the
coming and the going of the antitheses.

The clearest expression of his difference from Schelling
18 given by Hegel in his Phenomenology of the Mind
(spirit), the first work in which he appeared (1807) as
philosophizing on his own account, his place previously
having been that of an adherent of Schelling. In sum he
brings it together into the following three mots : In
Schelling's philosophy the absolute appears as if it liad
been shot out of a pistol ; it is but the night in which all
cows are black ; its expansion into a system again is no
more than the proceeding of a painter who has on his
palette two colours only, red and green, the one to be used
on demand of historical pieces, the other on that of land-
scapes. The first hit here refers to the manner in which
the idea of the absolute is attained, instantaneously, that
is, by means of intellectual perception, — a spring which
in the phenomenology became under the hands of Hegel
a graduated and methodic progress. The second hit con-
cerns the mode of conceiving and expressing the absolute
thus attained, wholly as absence of all finite differences,
namely, but not at the same time as within itself the
immanent production of a system of differences. Another
expression of Hegel for this is, that all turns on thinking
and enunciating the absolute (the true), not as substance
(negation of all determinateness), but as subject (excita-
tion and production of finite differences). The third hit
is meant for the way in which ScheUing carried out his
principle in practical reference to the concrete matter of
natural and spiritual fact, by applying to objects, namely,
a ready-made schema (to wit, the antithesis real and
ideal), instead of allowing the thing itself spontaneously
to unfold and particularize itself. The school, particu-
larly of Schelling, was conspicuous for its activity in this
schematizing formalism, and to it specially applies what
Hegel further remarks in the preface to the Phenomeno-
logy : * "When this formalism intimates, let us say, that
mind is electricity, or an animal azote, it is natural that
the uninitiated should gape with wonder, and admire in

TliAXSITIOy TO HEOEL. 310

the intimation the profundity of genius. But the trick
of such BAgacity is as soon leanietl, as it is easy to prac-
tise ; and '\\^ repetition becomes as insupportable as the
repetition of a detected juggling trick. This method of
labelling everything in heaven and in earth, in nature
and in man, with the couple of terms of the general
schema, converts the universe into a huckster's shop,
with its tiers and its rows of closed ticketed boxes.'

The special object of the phenomenology was, by a
development of consciousness in its essential principle,
to establish what was to Hegel the absolute cognition, —
to demonstrate this cognition, indeed, to be but the high-
est step and stage of consciousness. Hegel gives in this
work a history of consciousness as it appears in time
(hence the title), an evolution of the epochs of the growth
of consciousness on its way to philosophical knowledge.
The inner development of consciousness is realized by the
particular state, in which it may at any time exist, be-
coming always objective (known) to it, and by this know-
ledge of its own being raising it always into a higher and
higher state. The phenomenology attempts to show how
and by what necessity consciousness ascends from stage
to stage, from in-itself to for-itself (from implicitness to
explicitness), from being to knowing. The beginning is
taken with the lowest stage, with immediate (intuitive,
natural) consciousness. Hegel has entitled this chapter,
' Sensible certainty, or opinion and the this.^ On this
stage, to the questions of "What is the this or the here ?
and, What is the noxo ? the answer of the ego is — Here is
a tree ; now, it is night. Let us but turn round, how-
ever, and the here is not a tree, but a house, while if we
lay aside the second answer, in order to look at it later,
the noxD is found to be no longer night, but noon. The
thiSy then, becomes a not-this, that is, a universal, a
general notion. And necessarily so, for when I say
' this bit of paper,' I say something universal and not
particular, as each and every bit of paper is a ' this bit
of paper.' In this inner dialectic lies the transition of
direct sensible certainty into perception. And so each
stage in the consciousness of the philosophizing subject
involving itself in contradictions, and through this
immanent dialectic rising ever into a higher one, the
evolution continues, till, with the complete elimination
of contradiction, all strangeness between subject and
object disappears, and the soul comes to perfect self-

320 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY. ^

cognition, and perfect self -certainty. Briefly to name
the several stages, consciousness first appears as sen-
suous certainty ; then as perception, the object of
which is a thing with its qualities ; further, again, as
understanding, apprehension of objects as principles
reflected into themselves, or as discrimination between
force and manifestation of force, noumenon and phe-
nomenon, outer and inner. Next, consciousness, —
which in the object and its qualities has now recog-
nised its own self, its own pure essential nature, for
which consequently the other as other is eliminated —
becomes the self-identical ego, the truth and certainty of
itself, self-consciousness. Self-consciousness then, as
universal self-consciousness or reason describes another
series of successive stages, until it appears as spirit,
reason that, filled and identified with the rationality of
existence and the outer world, dominates the natural
and spiritual universe as its kingdom, in which it knows
itself at home. Spirit rises through the stadia of
instinctive observance, information and enlightenment,
morality and general moral views, to religion ; and re-
ligion itself, lastly, terminates, in its consummation as
revealed religion, in the absolute cognition. On this last
stage being and thinking are no longer apart, being is no
longer the object of thinking, but the object of thinking
is now thinking itself. Science is nothing but intelli-
gence truly cognising its own self. In the closing words
of the Phenomenology, Hegel tbiis glances back on the
road that has been travelled : * The goal, absolute cogni-
tion, or spirit (intelligence) that knows itself as spirit,
has for its path the inward assimilation and conservation
of spirits (the subordinate stages), as they are in them-
selves, and achieve the organization of their empire. Their
conservation, on the side of their free actual manifestation
in the form of contingency, is history, while on the side
of their logically understood organization, it is the science
of cognition as it phenomenally presents itself in time.
Both together, history logically understood, form the
record and the Calvary of the absolute spirit, the reality,
truth, and certainty of its throne, without which it were
the sole and lifeless eremite ; only —

" From the goblet of this spirit-empire,
Foams for it its infinitude." '

For the rest, the march of the Phenomenology is not

HEOEL. 821

yet a strictly scientific one ; it is the first genial applica-
tion of the ' absolute method,' interesting and sugges-
tive in its critique of the forms of * phenomenal cognition,'
but, in the dis])osal and arrangement of the ojmleut
dialectical and historical material on which it operates,
it is arbitrary.

HLV.— Tiegel

GEORG WILHELM FRIEDRICH HEGEL was born
at Stuttgart on the 27th of August 1770. In hia
eighteenth year he entered the university of Tübingen,
with a view ultimately to the study of theology. As
student he attracted no particular attention : it was the
youthful Schelling who here at that time outshone all
his contemporaries. After having been a domestic tutor
successively in Switzerland and at Frankfort-on-the-Maine,
he qualified himself for the academical career at Jena ia
ISOl. He ranked at first as an adherent and supporter
of the philosophy of Schelling. And in this sense we
find written his tractate of the same year, on the ' DiflFer-
ence between the Philosophical Systems of Fichte and
Schelling.* Soon afterwards, indeed, he openly joined
Schelling in the editing of the Critical Journal of Philo'
sophy (1802-3) to which he contributed a variety of im-
portant articles. He had but small success at first as an
academic teacher, and though appointed to a professorship
in 1805, the pohtical catastrophe that presently burst
over Germany soon deprived him of it again. On the day
of the battle of Jena, amid the thunder of the artillery, he
wrote the last words of the Phenomenology of the Spirit,
his first great, original book, the crown of his Jena
career. Some time afterwards he was wont to speak of
this work (wliich appeared in 1807) as his voyage of
discovery. From Jena, Hegel went to Bamberg ; and
there — being in want of all other means of subsistence
— he edited for two years the local political journal. In
the autumn of 1808 he became rector of the academy
at Nürnberg. It was in this capacity that — slowly
maturing aU his works, and only properly beginning his
literary career when Schelling had already ended his —
he composed (1812-16) his Logic. In the year last
named, he received a call to a chair of philosophy at
Heidelberg, where, in 1817, he published his Encyeln-
pcedia of iJie Philosophical Sciences, in which he expounded

322 JJISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

for the first time the whole of his system. The fulness
of his fame and activity, however, properly dates only from
his call to Berlin in 1818. Here there rose up around him
a numerous, widely-extended, and, in a scientific point of
view, exceedingly active school ; here, too, he acquired,
from his connexion with the Prussian bureaucracy, as well
political influence for himself as the credit for his system
of a state-philosophy : not always to the advantage of
the inner freedom of his philosophy, or of its moral
worth. Still, in his Moral and Political Philosophy,
published in 1821, Hegel rejects not the fundamental
principles of the modern political system ; he demands
popular representation, liberty of the press, open law-
courts, trial by jury, and administrative independency of
corporations. In Berlin, Hegel prelected on almost all
the branches of philosophy. His various courses of lec-
tures were published after his death, by his friends and
disciples. His delivery as a lecturer was hesitating,
embarrassed, and without ornament, but not without a
peculiar charm as the immediate expression of deep and
labouring thought. The relaxation of social intercourse
he sought rather among plain and unoflScial people than
in the company of the great ; he had no liking to shine
in salons. In the year 1830, he was made rector of the
university, and fulfilled the duties of the office in a more
practical manner than previously Fichte. Hegel died of
cholera on the 14th November 1831, the anniversary of
the death of Leibnitz. He lies in the same graveyard as
Solger and Fichte, close beside the latter, and not far
from the former. The publication of his collected writ-
ings and lectures was commenced in 1832 : — Vol. 1. The
Smaller Treatises ; 2. The Phenomenology; 3-5. Logic;
6-7. The Encyclopaedia ; 8. The Moral and Political
Philosophy; 9. The Philosophy of History; 10. The
Lectures on Esthetics; 11-12. The Philosophy of
Religion ; 13-15. The History of Philosophy ; 16-18. The
Miscellaneous Works. Rosenkranz has written his Life.
The internal classification of the Hegelian system is,
in consequence of the course taken by thought in it, a
tripartite one: — (1.) The development of those pure
universal notions, or thought-determinations which, as it
were a timeless prius, underlie and form the foundation
of all natural and spiritual life, the logical evolution of
the absolute — the Science of Logic ; (2.) The development
of the real world, nature, in its particularizedness and ex-

HEQEL, 323

temalizcdness — the Philosophy of Nature ; (3.) 1'he de-
velopment of the ideal world, or of the concrete 8j)irit that
is actualized in Rights, Morals, Politics, Art, Religion,
Science — the Philosophy of tlie Spirit. These three i>art3
of the system represent at the same time the three
moments of the absolute method, Position, Negation, and
Unity of both. The Absolute is, firstly, pure immaterial
thought ; secondly, it is heterization of pure thought,
disruption of thought into the infinite atomism of time
and space — nature ; thirdly, it returns out of this its
self-externalization and self-alienation back into its own
self, it resolves the heterization of nature, and only in
this way becomes at last actual, self-cognisant thought,
Spirit.

I. The Science of Logic.

The logic of Hegel is the scientific exposition and
development of the pure notions of reason, — of those
notions or categories which underlie all thought and all
being, and which are as well the fundamental factors of
subjective cognition, as the indwelling soul of objective
reality, — of those ideas in which the spiritual and the
natural have their point of coincidence. The realm of
logic, says Hegel, is truth as it is in its own self, and
without veU. It is, as he also figuratively says, the
exposition of God as he is in his eternal essence before
the creation of the world or of a single finite being. It
is thus, no doubt, a realm of shadows; but these
shadows are — in freedom from all material crassitude —
the simple ultimate principles, into the diamond net of
which the entire universe is built.

For a beginning of the collection and discussion of
these pure notions, we have to thank several philoso-
phers, as Aristotle in his Categories, Wolff in his Onto-
logy, Kant in his Transcendental Analytic. But by
these they were neither completely enumerated, nor
critically tested, nor yet derived from a principle, but only
empirically taken up and lexicologically treated. In con-
trast to this procedure, Hegel sought (1.) completely to
collect these notions ; (2.) critically to test them (that
is, to exclude all but pure, unsensuous thought) ; and
(3.) — what is the most characteristic peculiarity of the
Hegelian logic — diaiectically to deduce them the one from
the other, and develop them into an internally articu-
lated system of pure reason. Fichte, before Hegel,

324 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

had accentuated the necessity of a deduction on the
part of reason, — purely out of its own self, and perfectly
free from any pre-supposition, — of the entire system of
knowledge. This thought Hegel seizes, but in an ob-
jective fashion. His beginning ia not with certain
highest axioms in which all further development is
already implicitly contained, and serves consequently
simply for their more particular characterization ; but,
taking stand on what requires no further support of
proof, on the simplest notion of reason, that of pure
being, he deduces thence, in a progress from abstracter
to concreter notions, the complete system of pure, rational
knowledge. The spring of this evolution is the dialec-
tical method that advances from notion to notion through
negation.

All position, says Hegel, is negation ; every notion
has in it the opposite of itself, in which it passes forward
to its own negation. But, again, all negation is position,
afl&rmation. When a notion is negated^ the result is not
forthwith a mere nothing, a pure negative, but on the
contrary a concrete positive ; there results, in fact, a
new notion, and one, too, that is enriched by the negation
of the preceding one. The negation of the unit, for ex-
ample, is the notion of plurality. In this manner, nega-
tion is made by Hegel the vehicle of the dialectic progress.
Each notion ia no sooner aflBrmed than it is again negated,
and of this negation the product ia a higher and a richer
notion. This method, at once analytic and synthetic,
Hegel uses throughout the entire system of knowledge.

We proceed to a brief summary of the Hegelian logic.
It separates into three parts, — the doctrine of Being, the
doctrine of Essence (essential nature), and the doctrine of
the Notion*

1, The Doctrine of Being.

(a.) Quality.— :-Th& beginning of scientific cognition is
the direct, immediate, indeterminate notion of Being. In
its entire want of logical comprehension, complete vacancy,
it stands before thought with precisely the same mean-
ing as simple negation, Nothing. These two notions,
consequently, are not more absolutely opposed than
absolutely identical ; each of them disappears immedi-
ately into the other. This oscillation, or disappearance
of the one into the other, is pure Becoming^ which more

HEQEL, 325

specially is Origination, as transition from Nothing to
Being, while, as transition from Being to Nothing, it is
Decease. Tlie precij»itation of this process of coming to
be ami ceasing to be into a simple unity at rest, is recog-
nisable Stale (Da/ieyn^ Thereness, So-neas). State is Being,
with an element of definitenessi, or it is Quality, and
more specially still Bcality, Limited State. Limited State
excludes other (or others) from itself. This reference to
self which is conditioned by negative relation to other
(or others), is named B ein cj -for -self (independent, self-
contained individuality). This Being-for-self, that refers
itself only to its own self, and is repellent to aught else,
is One (the unit). But through this repulsion, the One
directly affirms (imj)lie8) Many ones. But the many
ones are not different the one from the other. The one
is what the other is. The Many are, therefore, One.
But the One is equally the Many. For its exclusion is
affirmation of its opposite, or it thereby virtually affirms
itself as plurality. Quality, through this dialectic of
Attraction and Repuhion, passes into Quantity; for in-
difference to the qualitative speciality, indiflference to
difference, is Quantity.

(6.) Quantity. — Quantity concerns magnitude, and as
Buch is indifferent to Quality. So far as the Magnitude
contains many distinguishable units in it, it is Discrete,
or exhibits the moment of Discretion ; so far, again,
as the many units are homogeneous, the Magnitude, aa
without distinction, is Continuous, or it exhibits the
moment of Continuity. Each of these two characters is
at the same time identical with the other ; discretion
cannot be thought without continuity, continuity not
without discretion. Actuality of quantity, or limited
quantity, is the Quantum. In the quantum the momenta
of unity and plurality are also contained ; it is an
amount of units, — that is, Kurnber. Opposed to quan-
tum or extensive magnitude stands intensive magnitude
or Degree. In the notion of degree, which implies
always a certain singleness of power, virtue, or deter-
minateness, Quantity returns to Quality. The union of
Quantity and Quality is Measure.

(c.) Measure (proportion) is a qualitative quantum, a
quantum on which the quality depends. An example of
this quantitative force, on which the actual so-ness of
the particular object wholly rests, is temperature, which,
in relation to water, decides whether this latter shall

326 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

remain water or become either ice or steam. Here the
qvxintum of the heat actually constitutes the quality of
the water. Quality and quantity, consequently, are per-
petually interchanging characters, and in a being, a third
something, which is itself dififerent from its own directly-
apparent what and how much. This negation of the
directness and immediacy, this quality (or something)
which is independent of the directly-present existential
form, is Essence. Essence is Being-within-self, a being
in internality to self, and so self-diremption of being,
being that is reflected into itself. Hence the duplicity
of all the distinctive characters of essence.

2. The Doctrine of Essence.

(a.) Essence as such. — Essence, as reflected being, is
reference to self only in that it is reference to other.
This being is called reflected in analogy with the reflexion
of light, which impinging in its rectilinear course on the
surface of a mirror, is thrown back from it. In the same
way, then, as reflected light is something mediated or
aflärmed (posited) by its reference to other (that is, to
something else), reflected being is such an entity as is
shown to be mediated by, or founded on, another.
When philosophy proposes for its problem, consequently,
cognition of the essence of things, the immediate (directly
presentant) being of these things is thereby assumed to
be mere rind or veil behind which the essence is con-
cealed. In the very speaking of the essence of an object,
therefore, we necessarily reduce its immediate being
(that is in contrast to the essence, but without which
it were impossible to think the essence), to something
merely negative, to appearance (Schein). Being shines,
shows, or appears by {an) essence. Essence, conse-
quently, is being (the outward being) shining, showing,
or appearing away into its own self. Essence, as against
the Appearance, yields the notion of the Essential ; what
only shines or appears by {an) essence is the Inessential.
But inasmuch as the Essential only is as in relation to
the Inessential, the Inessential is itself Essential ; the
Essential is quite as much in want of the Inessential, as
the Inessential of the EssentiaL The consequence is,
then, that each appears by {an) the other ; or there
takes place between them that mutual relation which we
name reflexion. In this whole sphere, then, we have to

HEOEL. :V27

do with determinations of reflexion, with characters such
that either iudicatea tlie other, and is incogitablo with-
out the other (for exampk», positive and negative, ante-
cedent and consequent, thing and quahty, matter and
form, force and operation of force). Wo have thus
again in the evohitiou of Essence the same characters
as in the evolution of Being, but now they are in a
reflected form, and no hiuger direct or immediate. For
Being and Nothing, we have now Positive and Nega-
tive, for State {Dasein) Existence {Ezistenz)^ etc.

Essence is reflected Being, reference to self, which is
through a medium of reference to other, another which
appears by {an) it. This reflected reference to self we
term Identity (which, in the so-called first law of thought,
the axiom of identity A = A, is only incompetently and
abstractly expressed). As reference to self, which is
equally distinction of it from itself, Identity essentially
contains and implies the character of Difference, Direct,
external diflference is Diversity. Diflference as such, the
essential difference, is Conti-ariety {Positive and Negative).
The self- contrariety of essence is Contradiction. The
contrariety of identity and diflference is reconciled in the
notion of Ground. In distinguishing itself from itself,
namely, essence is firstly the essence that is identical
with itself, Ground, and, secondly, the essence that is
distinguished or ejected from itself, the Consequent. In
the category of ground and consequent, then, the same
thing, the essence, is twice put : the ground and what it
grounds are the same matter, and so it is a hard pro-
blem to define the ground otherwise than by the conse-
quent, and conversely. Their separation, then, is merely
an arbitrary abstraction, but just for this reason also
(the identity of both), any application of this category is
properly a formalism. A reflection that demands grounds,
would simply see the same thing twice, now in its im-
mediate, direct appearance, and again in its posititious-
ness, afiSrmedness, through the ground.

{h.) Essence and Manifestation. — The Manifestation is
no longer essence-less appearance, but appearance that is
fiUed-up, full-filled, implemented by essence. There is no
appearance without an essence, and no essence that
passes not into manifestation. It is one and the same
matter that is taken now as essence and now as mani-
festation. In reference to essence in manifestation, the
positive moment that was pre\äously termed ground is

828 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

noAV called Matter^ the negative one Form. Every
essence is unity of matter and form, that is, it exists.
Existence, namely, ia contradiatinction to immediate
(unreflected) Being, is the terra which we give to that
being which is produced by the ground, — that is, to
grounded, or founded, being (being that is reflected to
an antecedent source). Essence as existent is called
Thing. In the relation of the Thing to its Properties,
the relation of form and matter is repeated. The Pro-
perties exhibit the thing on its formal side : in matter it
is Thing. The relation between the Thing and its Pro-
perties is usually designated by the verb Have (the thing
has properties), in contradistinction to immediate one-
ness of being. Essence as negative reference to itself
and repelling itself from itself into Reflexion-into-other
is Force and Exertion (its operation). This category has
it in common with the other categories of essence, that
in it one and the same matter is twice put. The Force
can be explained only by the Exertion, the exertion only
by the force, and hence any explanation that resorts to
this category is but a movement in tautologies. To con-
sider force as incognisable is but a self-deception of the
understanding in regard to its own act. The category of
force and exertion finds higher expression in the category
of Inner and Outer. The latter stands higher, for Force
to exert itself requires a solicitation, whereas the Inner
is Essence of itself (spontaneously) manifesting itself.
These two co-efficients. Inner and Outer, are also iden-
tical ', neither is without the other. What a man, for
example, is inwardly in his character, that is he also
outwardly in his action. The truth of this relation,
consequently, is rather the identity of Inner and Outer,
of Essence and Manifestation, that is :

(c.) Actuality. — Besides (unreflected) Being and Exist-
ence we have Actuality, then, as a third stage of being.
In Actuality, the Manifestation of Essence is adequate
and complete. Veritable Actuality, therefore (as distin-
guished from Possibility and Contingency), is necessary
being, rational Necessity. The notorious propos of Hegel,
— All that is actual is rational, and all that is rational is
actual, — is seen, with such a meaning as is given here to
' Actuality,' to be simple tautology. "What is necessary,
regarded as its own ground (a ground or origin, then,
that is identical with itself), is Substance. The side of
manifestation, what is inessential in the case of Substance,

HEQEL. 829

contingent iu the case of the Necessary, is constituted by
the Accidents. The Accidents are no longer to Substance,
as Manifestation to Essence or Outer to Inner, an adequate
representation ; they are only transitory atTections of
Substance, contingent and mutable phenomenal forms,
like waves of the sea in relation to the water of the sea.
They are not produced by substance, but rather disap-
pear in it as their ground- The relation of Substantiality
passes into the relation of Causality. In this relation
one and the same matter is twice put, once as Caz/xe
and again as Effect. The cause of heat is heat, and its
effect is again heat. Eflfect is a higher notion than the
accident of substantiality, for it is actually contraposed
to the cause, and the cause itself, passes over into the
eflfect. So far, however, as in the relation of causality,
either side j)resupposes the other, the truth is rather a
relation such that in it either side is caiise and eflfect at
once — Reciprocity. Reciprocity is a higher relation than
causality, inasmuch as there is no such thing as a true
causality : there is no eflfect without counter-eflfect, no
action without counter-action (reaction).

With the category of Reciprocity we quit the sphere
of Essence. All the categories of essence have displayed
a duplicity ; but in reciprocity the duplicity of cause
and eflfect has collapsed to unity. Now, then, instead of
duplicity we have again unity, identity with self. Or
we have again a Being (or a sort of being) that exhibits
diremption into several self-subsistent factors, which
factors, however, are immediately identical with the
being itself. This Unity of the Immediacy (the self-
subsistency) of Being with the self -diremption of Essence
is the Notion.

3. The Doctrine of the Notioru

Notion is that in the other that is identical with itself ;
it is substantial totality, the moments of which {Singular^
Particular), are themselves the whole (the Universal), — a
totality which no less gives free scope to the difference than
it resumes it again into unity within itself. The Notion
is (a.) Subjective notion, the unity of the many in its own
self, expressed as in the moment of Form, and in abs-
traction from the Matter. It is (6.) Objectivity, notion
in the shape of Immediacy, as external unity of self-de-
pendent existences. It is (c.) Idea, the notion that is no

330 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

Ies8 objective itself than it reduces the objectivity of
sense into unity with itseif, — that is no less immanent in
the object, than independently existent as punctual unity
of all reality.

(a.) IVie subjective notion contains the moments of
Universality (identity with itself in the difiference), Parti-
cularity (the diflfere need n ess that remains in identity with
the universal) and Singularity (the independent indi-
viduality that unites within itself the universal and the
particular, the genus and the species). The universal
independently expressed is the notion as such. This
one-sidedness is remedied by statement of the universal
as inherent in a singular, or as predicate of a subject ;
that is, by the Judgment. The judgment enunciates the
identity of the singular with the universal, and by con-
sequence, the sundering of the universal into independent
individuals that are identical with it, — the self-diremp-
tion of the notion. In the judgment the notion expresses
itself in that aspect of itself, by virtue of which it is not
something abstract (like substance, cause, force), but
concrete and definite, immanent in individual existences,
and continuing itself far and wide into a world of such.
The one-sidedness of the judgment — the expression of
the singular as immediately identical with the universal,
and the consequent veritable sundering of both (the
universal has more extension than the singular, the
singular is concreter than the universal) — is relieved in
the Syllogism (the close, or taking-together). In it
universal and singular become commediated (united) by
the particular, which steps between both as mediate
notion. The syllogism, consequently, exhibits the uni-
versal as, through its particularization, it realizes itself
in the singular ; or otherwise expressed, it exhibits the
singular as, through mediation of the particular, it is in
the universal. In short, the syllogism first perfectly
demonstrates the nature of the notion to be distinction
of itself in itself into a maniness of being, within which
the singular is through virtue of its particularity, as well
self- substantially opposed to the universal, as closed
together into identity with it. From what precedes, then,
the notion is not something merely subjective, but some-
thing that, in the totality of being comprehended under
it, is possessed of reality : so considered the notion is the
objective notion.

(6.) Objectivity is not outward being as such, but an

HEQEL. XW

outward being complete within itself, and intelligibly
conditionod. Its first form is Mcchanlsni, the co-exist-
ence of independent individuals which, mutually iudiÜ'er-
cnt, are kept together in the unity of a whole (aggregate)
only by a common bond. This indifference eliminates
itself in Chevwm, the mutual attraction, interpenetra-
tion, and neutralization of independent individuals which
unite to a whole. But the unity here is only the nega-
tive one of the resolution of units into a whole ; the
third form of objectivity is, therefore, Teleoloji/, the
End (corres]>oudent to the syllogism viewed as close),
the notion that realizes itself, that subordinates being
into means for itself, and that preserves and fullils itself
in this process of the sublation of the indei)endency of
things. The defect in the notion of End is, that it has
objectivity still opposed to it as something alien ; but this
defect corrected, we have the notion of End as immanent
in objectivity, — the notion that perA'ades objectivity,
that fulfils and realizes itself in it, — in a word, the Idea.

(c.) The Idea is the highest logical definition of the
absolute. It is neither the merely subjective, nor the
merely objective notion, but the notion that, immanent
in the object, releases it into its complete independency,
but equally retains it in unity with itself. Its immediate
form is Life, organism, the immediate unity of the object
with the notion, which latter pervades the former as
its soul, as principle of vitality. But the notion is at the
same time not expressed in its own form here. The
idea as such, then, opposing itself to the object, is
Cognition, the finding of itself again on the part of the
notion in objecti\nty (Idea of the True), the realiz-
ing of itself into objectivity, in order to resolve the
independency of the object, and raise reality into in-
telligibility (Idea of the Good). This over-against each
other of the Idea and the Object is, however, one-sided ;
cognition and action necessarily presuppose the identity
of subjective and objective being. The highest notion,
consequently, is the Absolute Idea, the unity of Life and
Cognition, the universal that thinks itself, and thinkingly
realizes itself in an infinite actuality, from which, as its
immediacy, it no less distinguishes itself again.

The Idea, releasing itself accordingly into this immedi-
ate actuality, is Nature, from which returning into itself,
and consciously closing itseK together with itself, it is
Spirit.

332 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

II. — The Philosophy of Nature.

Nature is the idea in the form of hetereity (otherwise-
ness) — the notion that has issued from its logical abstrac-
tion into real particularization, and that so, consequently,
has become external to its own self. The unity of the
notion, then, has become concealed in nature ; and, in
assuming for problem the following up of intelligence
as concealed in nature, or the self-development of
nature into spirit, philosophy must not forget that self-
extemalization, sunderedness, out-of-itself-ness, consti-
tutes the character of nature as such ; that the products
of nature possess not yet any reference to themselves, or
are not yet correspondent to the notion, but riot in
unrestricted and unbridled contingency. Nature is a
Bacchantic God, uncontrolled by, and unconscious of,
himself. It offers, then, no example of an intelligibly
articulated, continuously ascendant gradation. On the
contrary, it everywhere mingles and confounds the
essential limits by intermediate and spurious products
which perpetually furnish instances in contradiction of
every fixed classification. In consequence of this im-
potence on the part of nature to hold fast the moments
of the notion, the philosophy of nature is constantly
compelled, as it were, to capitulate between the world of
the concrete individual products and the regulative of
the speculative idea.

Its beginning, middle, and end are prescribed for the
philosophy of nature. Its beginning is the first or im-
mediate characteristic of nature, the abstract universality
of its self-externality, — Space and Matter. Its end is the
disimprisonment of spirit from nature, in the form of
rational, conscious individuality, — Man. To demonstrate
the connecting middle-terms between the two, to follow
up step by step the ever more and more successful
attempts of nature to rise in humanity to seK-conscious-
ness — this is the problem which the philosophy of nature
has to resolve. In this process nature describes three
stadia. It (nature) is : —

(1.) Matter and the ideal system of matter : Mechanics.
Matter is nature's self -externality in its most universal
form. In it, nevertheless, we have already manifested
that tendency to individuality which constitutes the red
Strand in the philosophy of nature, — the nisua of gravita-

HEQEL. 333

tion. Gravity is the self-internality (the being within
self) of matter, its longing to come to itself, the first trace
of subjectivity. The centre of gravity of a body is the
oneness which it seeks. The same tendency towards
reduction of multiplicity into individuality is the funda-
mental principle of universal gravitation, of the whole
solar system. Centrality, the constituent notion of
gravity, is here a system, and that, too, — so far as the
form of the orbits, the velocity of the movements, or the
revolutionary periods are reducible to mathematical laws,
— a system of real rationality.

(2.) Matter, however, is not yet possessed of indivi-
duality. Even in astronomy, it is not the bodies as such
that interest us, but their geometrical relations. Every-
where here it is quantitative, not qualitative conditions
that are considered. Matter, nevertheless, has in the
solar system, found its centre, its self. Its abstract, dead,
dull self -includedness has resolved itself to form. Matter,
as qualified matter, then, is the object of Physics. In
physics we have to do with matter which has particu-
larized itself into a body, into individuality. Under this
head we consider inorganic nature, its forms and their
reciprocal relations.

(3.) Organics. — Inorganic nature, the subject of phy-
sics, destroys itself in the chemical process. In this pro-
cess, namely, losing all its properties (cohesion, colour,
lustre, resonance, transparency, etc.), the inorganic body
demonstrates the fleetingness of its existence and this
relativity constitutes its being. The sublation of the
chemical process is organism and life. The animate body
is always in act, indeed, to relapse into the chemical pro-
cess. Oxygen, hydrogen, salts, tend ever to appear, but
are always again eliminated. The animate body resists
the chemical process till it dies : life is self-preservation,
self -end (its own object). Nature, then, attaining to in-
dividuality in physics, advances to subjectivity in
organics. As life the idea describes three stages : —

(a.) The first, as geological organism, or as mineral
kingdom, is the universal effigies of life. Still the mineral
kingdom is rather the result and residuum of a past life
and process of formation. The primitive mountain is the
arrested crystal of life ; the earth of geology is a gigan-
tic corpse. The life of the present, the life that re-
creates itself eternally afresh, the first stir of subjectivity
breaks forth only

334 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

(h.) in the vegetable organism, the world of plants.
The plant has attained to the processes of growth, assimi-
lation, and generation. But it is not yet a totality co-
articulated into its own self. Every part of the plant is
the entire individual, every branch the whole tree. The
parts are indiflferent in regard to each other : the corolla
may be the radix, the radix corolla. In the case of the
plant, then, the true self-involution of individuality is not
yet attained to : to that there is necessary the absolute
unity of an Individuum. This unity, — singular, or indi-
vidual, concrete subjectivity, — we have first of all only

(c.) in the animal organism, the animal kingdom. TTie
animal organism alone possesses uninterrupted intussus-
ception, spontaneous movement, sensation, and, in its
higher types, voice and internal warmth. In its highest
type, lastly, in man, nature, or rather the spirit that
works in nature, has taken itself together into conscious
unity in an ego. And so spirit now, become a free
rational self, completes its dehverance from Nature.

III. — The Philosophy of Spirit (Mind).

1. The Subjective Spirit.

Spirit is the truth of nature, the resolution of its alien-
ated outwardness, the attainment to identity with self.
Its nature, then, is : formally, freedom, or the capabihty
of abstracting from everything ; materially, the power to
reveal itself as spirit, as conscious reason, to erect a
structure of objective rationality, to assume for its domain
the universe of mind. But, in order to know itself as
reason and all reason, in order to render nature more
and more negative, spirit has at the same time, in a
similar way to nature, a series of grades to describe,
a series of liberating acts to perform. Proceeding
from nature, from the externality of which it wrests
itself into independency, it is in the first instance
Soul, or natural spirit, and, as such,' the object of
Anthropology in the narrower sense. As this natural
spirit it lives the universal planetary life that is the
common condition ; and is in subjection, consequently,
to the difference of climates, to the vicissitudes of
the seasons, and the changes of the day. It is sub-
mitted also to the influence of geographical position, and
must accept the peculiarities of race. Again, it under-
goes the modification of national type, and is affected by

IIEQEL. 336

the way of living and the bodily form. These natural
conditions, nioroover, exercise a control also over the in-
tellectual and moral character. Lastly, there must be
considered here the natnral peculiarity of the individual
subject, in disposition, temi>erament, character, fam'ily
idiosyncrasy, etc. To these we must add, too, the
natural variations of age, sex, sleep, etc. Spirit every-
where here is still absorbed in nature, and this inter-
mediate condition between sleep in nature and individu-
ality is Sensation, the blind groping of the spirit in its
unconscious and unintelligent individuality. A higher
stage of sensation is Feeling, sensibility, as it were sensa-
tion into self, in which the individuality of self appears.
Feeling, in its perfected form, is the feeling of Belf (self-
possession). The feeling of self, inasmuch as the sub-
ject of it is at once absorbed into the speciality of his
own sensations, and collected within himself as subjec-
tive unit, constitutes the first step to Consciousness.
The ego appears now as the pit in which the various
sensations, perception?, conceptions, ideas, are put
away — the ego that is present with them all, that is the
centre in which they all concur. Spirit, as conscious,
as conscious individuality, as ego, is the object of the
Phenomenology of consciousness (which, in smaller com-
pass, reappears here as intermediate between anthropo-
logy and psychology).

Spirit was an individuum so long as it was inter-
woven with natiire ; when it has stripped off nature it is
consciousness, or an ego. Distinguishing itself from
nature, it has retired consequently into its own self ;
and that with which it was pre\'iously identified, what
was its own (telluric, national, etc.) speciality, confronts
it now as its external world (earth, nation, etc.) The
awakening of the ego, therefore, is the creative act of
objectivity as such ; and, conversely, only by reference
to objectivity, and as opposed to objectivity, is it that
the ego, in conscious subjectivity, does awake. The
ego, thus in front of objectivity, is consoiousuess in the
narrower sense of the word. Consciousness becomes
Self-consciousness by rising through the successive steps
of immediate sensuous Opinion, Perception {Wahrnehm-
ung), and understanding, to the pure thought of per-
sonality, to knowledge of itself as 'the free ego. Self-
consciousness, again, becomes the Universal or Eational
Self-consciousness in this way, that in consequence of its

336 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY. '

endeavours to appropriate objectivity and obtain recog-
nition as a free subject, it falls into conflict with other
self-consciousnesses, enters thus into a war of extermina-
tion with them, but, out of this bellum omnium contra
omnes (the violent beginning of the State), emerges in the
end as a common consciousness that has found the due
mean between despotism and servitude, that is to say,
as the veritably universal, rational self-consciousness,
national self-consciousness, no longer negatively selfish
towards its neighbour, but acknowledging the identity
of this neighbour with itself, is actually free ; it has
itself in its neighbour present to itself, and has burst
asunder the limitation to its own natural egoism. Now
that it has subdued the nature and subjectivity in its
ownself, we have spirit as spirit ; and as such it is the
object of Psychology.

Spirit here is first of all Theoretical spirit or Intelli.
gence, and then Practical spirit or Will. It is theoretical,
as relating itself to the rational object as something given,
and as exhibiting it as its ; practical, as freeing from
the one-sided form of subjectivity, and converting into
objectivity, the subjectivized theoretical matter (truth),
which it now holds and directly wills as its own. The
practical, so far, is the truth of the theoretical spirit.
The theoretical on its way to the practical spirit describes
the stages of Perception {Anschauung), Conception, and
Thought. Will, for its part, again, through Appetite,
Desire, and Passion, reaches Free-wilL The existence of
free-will is Objective Spirit, — civil and political institutes,
the State. In rights, morals, politics, freedom is realized
— ^the rational will brought into external objectivity, into
existence in real universal forms of life (institutions), —
reason or the idea of the Good made actual. All the in-
stincts and motives of nature return now moralised and
established as ethical institutes, as Rights and Duties (the
sexual instinct as Marriage and Family, the instinct of
revenge as legal Penalty, etc.).

2. The Objective Spirit.

(a.) The immediate existence of free-will, free-will as
actual and as actually and universally (legally) recog-
nised in its freedom, is Legal Bight. The individual,
80 far as he is capable of rights, so far as he possesses
and exercises rights, is a Person. The rule of right,

IIEQEL. 337

then, is, Be a persoa and respect others aa persons.
As a person man gives himself an external sphere of
freedom, a substrate iu regard to M'hich he may realize
Lis will : Property, Possession. As a person I have tlio
right of property, the absolute right of appropriation,
the right to set my will on everything, which thereby
becomes mine. But I have equally the right to dis-
possess myself of my projKjrty in favour of another
person. This is effected in the sphere of right by Con-
tract, and iu it is freedom, liberty of disjiosal in regard
to property, first perfectly realized. The relation of
contract is the first stej) to the State, only the ßrat step,
however ; for to define the State as a contract of all with
all is to degrade it into the category of private right and
private property. It depends not on the will of the indi-
vidual whether he shall live in the State or not. The
relation of contract concerns private property. In con-
tract as voluntary agreement there lies the possibility of
the subjective will individualizing itself against right in
itself or the universal will, the division of the two wills
is Wrong (civil wrong — delinquency, fraud, crime). This
division demands a reconcihation, a restoration of right
or of the universal will as against its temporary sublation
or negation occasioned by the particular will. The right
that thus restores itself as against the particular will,
the negation of wrong, is penalty (punishment). Theories
that found the right of penalty on purposes to prevent,
deter, intimidate, or correct, mistake the nature of penalty.
Prevention, intimidation, etc., are finite ends, i.e., mere
means, and these, too, uncertain means. But an act of
justice cannot be degraded into any mere means : justice
is not exercised, in order that anything but itself be at-
tained and realized. The fulfilment and self-manifesta-
tion of justice is an absolute end, an end unto its own self.
The special considerations which have been mentioned can
come to be discussed only in reference to the modality of
the penalty. The penalty which is realized in the person
of a criminal is his right, his reason, his law, under which,
then, he is justly subsumed. His act falls on his own
head. Hegel defends even capital punishments, then, the
repeal of which appears to him untimely sentimentality.
(6.) The antithesis of the universal and the particular
will transferred within the subject, constitutes Morality.
In morality the freedom of the will develops itself into
the spontaneity of the subject ; it is the negation of the

338 HISTORY OF PIIILOSOPUT.

externality of the legal element; it is will gone into its own
self, and determining its own acts by reference to specific
purposes, and its own conviction in regard to right and
duty. The position of morality is the right of subjective
will, of free ethical decision, the position of conscience. In
right proper the consideration was not of my principle or
design, but now there occurs question of the motive of will,
of the intention. Hegel calls this position of moral reflec-
tion, of action conditioned by a reference to motives and
duty, — Morality, in contradistinction to Sittlichkeit, or sub-
Btantial observance. This position has three moments :
(1.) The moment of the Purpose, so far as only the
internal state of knowledge and will on the part of the
agent comes into consideration, — so far as I accept the
responsibility of an act only to the extent that the result
is chargeable to my knowledge and will (imputation) ;
(2.) The moment of Motive and the gratification of one's
own subjective sense of the right, so far as I recognise
as mine not only the purpose but the motive of the pur-
pose, and so far as I possess the right to realize my con-
victions, and to insist on consideration for my own well-
being (this last is not simply to be sacrificed to abstract
justice) ; (3.) The moment of the Good, so far as it is to
be expected that the subjective wiU (for the very reason
that, reflected into itself, it is the deciding will) shaU
maintain its subjective ends in unity with the universal
will. The Good is the union of the particular subjective
will with the universal objective will, or with the notion
of will ; it is willed reason. Opposed to it is the Bad,
the resistance of the subjective will to the universal,
the attempt to make absolute its own individual self
and self-will ; it is willed unreason.

(c.) In the sphere of morality, will and the good are
still only abstractly related ; the will as free is still pos-
sibility of the bad ; the good, therefore, is as yet only a
something that is or ought to be, it is not yet actual.
Morality consequently is but a one-sided position. A
higher position is that of established observance {Sittlich-
keit), which is the concrete identity of will and the good.
In it the good becomes a something actual : it obtains
the form of ethical institutions within which the will
dwells : in this manner the good becomes to conscious-
ness a second nature, and morality is converted into
character, into living principle, into the ethical spirit.

IIEQKL. 339

The ethical spirit is first immediate or existent in
natural form, as Marriage and the Family. Three mo-
ments enter into marriage, which ought not to be sepa-
rated, but which, nevertheless, are very often erroneously
isolateil. Marriage is: (1.) A relation of sex, and rests
on tlie difference of the sexes ; the societary or institu-
tional element in it is, that the subject, instead of being
isolated, has his being in his natural universality, in hia
relation to the genus. (2.) It is a relation of Right,
particularly in the community of property. (3.) It ia
a spiritual communion of love and confidence. Hegel,
however, lays no great weight on this subjective moment
of sentiment in the concluding of a marriage : in the life
of matrimony mutual inclination wäll soon grow. It is
move ethical that the intention to marry should consti-
tute the begiiming, and that the personal inclination
filiould be allowed to follow. For marriage is proxi-
mately a duty. Hegel, therefore, would have divorce
made as difficult as possible. For the rest Hegel develops
and describes the being of the family with deep ethical
feeling.

The family in enlarging into a plurality of families
grows into civil society, the members of which, although
independent and individual, are associated into unity by
their wants, by the external ordinances of police, and by
the establishment of law and authority generally for the
protection of person and property. Hegel distinguishes
civil society from the State in disagreement with the
majority of Publicists, who, in regarding the security of
p>roperty and personal freedom as the principal purpose
of the State, reduce the latter to a mere municipality.
But from the principle of municipal association (civil
society), union from mutual necessities, and for the pre-
servation of natural rights, war is not intelligible. On
the platform of municipal (civil) society, each is for him-
self, independent, an end unto himself. All else is for
him means only. The State, on the contrary, knows not
independent individuals, each of whom contemplates and
pursues only his own advantage : in the State the whole
is the end, and the individual the means. For the ad-
ministration of justice, Hegel, in contrast to those who
refuse to our days the function of legislation, demands
written, intelligible, and universally accessible laws ; and,
in addition, as regards the exercise of judicial authority,
open courts and trial by jury. As concerns the organi-

340 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

zation of civil society, Hegel manifests a decided prefer-
ence for corporate life. Marriage-sanctity, and honour
in the cori)orations — these, he says, are the two moments,
with which the disorganization of society connects itself.

The interests of the individual sublating themselves
into the idea of an ethical whole, the muncipality passes
into the State. The State is the actuality of the Ethical
Idea, the Ethical Spirit as it controls the action and
knowledge of the individuals that are contained in it.
The various States themselves finally, entering as indi-
viduals into a mutual relation of attraction or repulsion,
display in their destiny, in their rise and in their fall,
the process of Universal History.

In his conception of the State, Hegel has a decided
leaning to the ancient political idea which completely
subordinates the individual, the right of subjectivity, to
the will of the State. The omnipotence of the State in
its antique sense — this, before all, is held fast by Hegel.
Hence his aversion to modern liberalism, to the claims,
criticisms, and pretensions to know better on the part of
individuals. The State to him is the rational ethical
substance, within which the life of the individual must
find itself, — it is existent reason to which the subject
must with free vision adapt himself. The best constitu-
tional form Hegel holds to be a limited monarchy, as ex-
emplified in the English constitution ; to which Hegel
especially leant, and which he doubtless had in view in
his famous phrase The king is the dot on the i. An in-
dividual is required, thought Hegel, who shall say yes,
who shall prefix an ' I will ' to the decrees of the State,
who shall be, as it were, the point of formal decision.
* The personality of the State,' he says, ' is only actual
as a person, a monarch.' Hegel advocated, therefore,
the hereditary monarchy. But he places at its side, as
mediating element between the people and the prince,
the various orders of the privileged classes, — not indeed
for the control or restriction of the government, not for
the preservation of the rights of the people, but only in
order that the people may understand that the govern-
ment is being well carried on, that the consciousness of
the people may participate in it, that the State may enter
into the subjective consciousness of the people.

The various states and the individual national spirits
lapse into the flood of Universal History. The conflict,
the triumph and defeat of the various national spirits,

HEGEL. 341

the transition of tlie UTiiversal spirit from one peo])le to
another — tliis is the thesis of Universal History. The evo-
lution of universal history is usually connected with a
dominant poople, in whom dwells the universal spirit,
correspondeutly develo]>ed, and as against which the
spirits of the other ])eople3 are without right. Thus the
spirits of the peoples encompass the throne of the abso-
lute Spirit as witnesses and ornaments of the glory, and
as co-operating to the realization, of the latter.

3. The Absolute Sjnrit.

Spirit is absolute, so far as it has returned from the
sphere of objectivity into itself, into the ideality of cog-
nition, into the perception of the absolute idea as the
truth of all being. The subjugation of natural subjec-
tivity by means of ethical and political observance is the
path by which spirit ascends to this pure freedom, to the
knowledge of its ideal substance as the Absolute. The
first stage of the absolute spirit is Art, the immediate
view of the idea in objective actuality ; the second,
Eeligion, the certainty of the idea as what is above all
immediate reality, as the absolute power of being, pre-
dominant over all that is individual and finite ; the third,
Philosophy, the unity of the two first, the knowing of
the idea as the absolute that is no less pure thought than
immediately all-existent reality.

(rt.) Art. — The absolute is immediately present to sens-
uous i)erception in the beautiful or in art. The beauti-
fid is the shining of the idea through a sensuous medium
(stone, colour, sound, verse), the realization of the idea
in the form of a finite manifestation. To the beautiful
(and its sub-species the beautiful as such, the sublime,
and the ludicrous) there always belong two factors, the
thought and the material ; but both are inseparably
together ; the material expresses nothing but the thought
that animates and illuminates it, and of this thought it is
only the external manifestation. The various forms of
art depend on the various combinations that take place
between the matter and the form. In the symbolical
form of art, matter predominates ; the thought struggles
through it only with pain and difficulty in order to bring
the ideal into manifestation. In the classical form of
art, the ideal has conquered its adequate existence in the
material : form and matter are mutually absolutely com-

342 HISTORY OF PIIILOSOPJIY.

mensiirate. Where finally spirit predominates, and the
matter is reduced to a mere sign and show, through and
beyond which the spirit ever breaks and struggles further
" — here we have the romantic form of art. The system
of the individual arts coheres also with these varieties of
form in art generally, but difference in the former is
proximately conditioned by difiference in the material.
(1.) The beginning of art is Architecture. It belongs essen-
tially to the symbolical form, the sensuous material being
greatly in excess in its case, and the true adequacy of
form and matter being still to seek. Its material is stone
arranged in obedience to the laws of gravitation. Hence
the character that belongs to it of mass and massiveness,
of silent gravity, of oriental sublimity. After Architec-
ture comes (2.) Sculpture, still in subjection, indeed, to a
stiff and unyielding material, but an advance, nevertheless,
from the inorganic to the organic. Forming it into body,
it converts the matter into a mere veliicle simply ancillary.
In representing body, this building of the soul, in its
beauty and purity, the material completely disappears
into the ideal ; not a remnant of the crasser element is
left that is not in service to the idea. Nevertheless the
life of the soul, feeling, mood, glance — these are beyond
sculpture. The romantic art, Kar' e^oxhv, (3.) Painting
is alone equal to them. Its medium is no longer a coarse
material substrate but the coloured plane, the spiritual
play of light ; it produces only the show of solid dimen-
sion. Hence it is capable of expressing the whole scala
of feelings, moods, and actions — actions full of dramati-
cal movement. The perfect sublation of space, however,
is (4.) Music. Its material is tone, the inner trembling
of a sonorous body. Music quits consequently the world
of sensuous perceptions and acts exclusively on inner
emotion. Its seat is the womb and the well of the emo-
tional soul whose movement is within itself. Music is
the most subjective of arts. But the tongue of art is
loosened at last only in (5.) Poetry or the literary art ;
poetry has the privilege of universal expression. Its
material is no longer sound simply, but sound as speech,
sound as the word, the sign of an idea, the expression of
reason. Poetry shapes not this material, however, in com-
plete freedom, but in obedience to certain rhythmico-musi-
cal laws of verse. All the other arts return in poetry :
the plastic arts in the epos which is the large complacent
narrative of picturesque national events; music in the

HEGEL. 343

ode which is the lyrical expression of the inmost soul ; tho
unity of both in the drama, which exhibits tho conflict
of individuals, absorbed in the interests of opposing sides.

(6. ) Religion. — Poetry forms the transition of art into
religion. In art the idea -was present for perception, in
religion it is present for conception. The burthen of all
religion is the inward exaltation of the soul to the Abso-
lute as the all-comprehending, all-reconciling substance
oi existence, the knoM'ing of himself on the part of the
subject as in unity with God. All religions seek unity
of the divine and human. The rudest attempts in this
direction occur (1.) in the natural religions of the East.
God in tbem is still natural power, natural substance,
before which the finite, the individual, disappears as a
nullity. A loftier idea of God we find (2.) in the reli-
gions of spiritual individuality, in which the divine is
regarded as subject, — as sublime subjectivity full of
wisdom and might in Judaism, the religion of sublim-
ity ; as galaxy of plastic divine forms in the Greek
religion, the religion of beauty ; as absolute political
purpose in the Roman religion, the religion of the under-
standing or of expediency (means to an end). Positive
reconciliation of God and the world is only attained at
last, however, (3.) in the Revealed or Christian religion,
which, in the person of Christ, contemplates the God-
Man, the reahzed unity of the Divine and the human,
and apprehends God as the self -externalizing (self-incar-
nating) idea that from this eiternalization eternally
returns into itself, — that is to say, as the Tri-une God.
The spiritual import, therefore, of the Revealed or
Christian Religion is the same as that of the Speculative
Philosophy, only that it is expressed there in the mode
of conception, in the form of a history, here in the mode
of the notion. But with abstraction from the form of
religious conception, we have the position of the

(c.) Absolute Philosophy y of thought that knows itself
as all truth, that reproduces from itself the entire
natural and spiritual universe, — that thought the evolu-
tion of which is precisely the system of Philosophy — a
sphere of spheres self-closed.

With Schelling and Hegel the history of philosophy
ends. The succeeding efforts, partly to advance the
previous idealism, partly to find new principles, belong
to the present, and not yet to history.

ANNOTATIONS.

TnK general purpose of these notes in the first instance
was to complete the information of the student. To
that end they were to have been guided by considera-
tions : 1. Explanatory ; 2. Critical ; and 3. Supplemen-
tary. The tirst consideration, naturally, would concern
whatever terms or doctrines seemed to require a word of
illustration ; while the last would refer, evidently, to
any additions to the statements of Schwegler that might
appear eligible. Critically, again, the intention was, as
regards statement, to have compared the text of Schwe-
gler, 1, with the original jiliilosophers ; 2, with Hegel ;
and 3, with the German Zeller, Erdmann, and Ueberweg,
with the English Maurice, Butler, Lewes, Grote, Ferrier,
and with the European Brandis. It presently appeared,
however, that this scheme was out of all proportion to
the nature and dimensions of Schwegler's, or any other,
compend. Nay, what has been done will show that, in
the end, even much more moderate views proved imprac-
ticable—so far, that is, as concerns a c 'vxplete annotation
of the t€xt of Schwegler. As, however, works that are
intended to exhaust the alphabet, have generally achieved
the bulk of their labour with the first half-dozen letters,
so, here, notes that terminate with the Sophists, may
prove serviceable even in the very latest sections.^ The
result of my critical comparison is, that Schwegler's
is at once the fullest and the shortest, the deepest and
the easiest, the most trustworthy and the most elegant,
compendium that exists in either language. (Of any
French compendium up to the date I know not.) Hegel's
interpretation of the history of philosophy, which, if the
darkest, is also the most valuable in existence, is of course
the backbone of all the others that are of any importance,

1 The reference is to the first edition. The notes are now com-
pleted.

340 ANNOTATIONS.

and will, in all })robal>ility, remain such for several gene-
rations to come, or until a new philosophy has removed
another seal from the vision of Humanity into its own
past. Brandis, Ueberweg, Zeller, Erdmann have, with
Schwegler, worthily done their parts in expanding into
the necessary breadth, or contracting into the necessary
point, whether for intelligil)lenes3 or comprehensiveness.
Nor are these the only Germans who have laboured in
the same service. Others, also historians of philosoi)hy,
some before, some since Hegel, such as Brucker, Buhle,
Tennemann, Wendt, Ast, llixner, Schleiermacher, Ritter,
Marbach, Braniss, Sigwart, Reinhold, Fries, Trendelen-
burg, Chalybaeus, Michelet (and these are not all), may
be at least named. In this connexion the Germans, in-
deed, are so exhaustive and complete, whether as regards
intelligence or research, that they have left the English
absolutely nothing to do but translate their text and
copy their erudition into notes, so that of the latter
those are the best who are the faithfulest to the former.
Would only that the faithfulness of any of them were
always a satisfactory faithfulness ! This I may say,
however, that, had Ferrier lived, he had it in him — pos-
sibly with one exception — infinitely to outshine them all.
The others have each his own merit, nevertheless. But-
ler's Lectures are eloquent and interesting, and the Notes
of their most accomplished and competent Editor are
accurate and valuable. The work of Professor Maurice
ought to be read by every one, as well for the extensive
reading it indicates, as for the admirable spirit and
fascinating facility in which it is written. {During this
annotation, I have had all the parts of the ' Moral and
Metaphysical Philosophy ' beside me, only, unfortu-
nately, not the First.) It were superfluous to praise
the writing, the erudition, or the labour of Mr. Grote.
As regards his German guides, however, I could have
wished that he had been always as true to their insight
as he is to their erudition ; I confess, indeed, that it was
a particular pain to me to perceive that Mr. Grote's philo-
sophy extended only to what of Aufklärung the Germans
contained, and not to — the last lesson — their correction
of it. In availing myself, for the conclusory note on
Comte, of Mr. Mill's first essay on that writer in the
Westminster Review, I have enjoyed the guidance of his
calm, impartial faculty. One can always praise the
* History ' of Mr. Lewes for its clearness and intelligible-

GENERAL IDEA. 317

Hess. It is uneven, however — probably from the circnm-
Btamx^s of its genesis — and reminds of the himpy glass
that we see in cottage windows. Be the book as it may,
it is always a j)leasure to recognise the kindly and candid
nature of the man. Mr. Lewes,* as regards Hegel, i)ro-
fesses to be unchanged in opinion, and to have expressed
in his last edition the same views as in his earlier ones.
One can see, however, both an improved interest in, and
an improved understanding of, Hegelian dicta — Being
and Nothing, for example, — and one would like to believe,
notwithstanding his intimations to the contrary, that
some recent English works on German philosophy have
not been quite wholly in vain for Mr. Lewea, whether as
regards Hegel or as regards Kant.

I. — General Idea of the History of Philosojihy.

AS regards expression there does not seem much in
this section that requires explanation. The phrase
what is given, or what is given in experience, refers to
what is usually expressed in English by what is just
found, or what we just find to he so and so : that is, then,
the direct fact that stands before sense. Philosophy,
like the sciences usually so called, is dependent for an
object of consideration, in the first place, on what the
senses supply. Philosophy, however, is not to be under-
stood as a result of ordinary induction. Philosophy has,
in a tieneral reference to the whole vast universe, to do
sim|.ily with the connective tissue, so to speak, that not
only supports, but even in a measure constitutes, the
various organs : this connective tissue may be viewed as
a * diamond net ' sunk into the empirical body or mass.
Now to arrive at this supporting (or even constitutive)
diamond tree or net, philosophy is not dependent on in-
duction, but has a method of its own. This must be
always borne in mind, even when the connexion of philo-
sophy with the sciences is insisted on.

Zeller will be found to support Schwegler in disputing
the Hegelian correlation of philosophy and the history
of philosophy. This is possible to neither, however, in
the state of his convictions, without an involuntary con-
tradiction, as is seen at once when we find that both,
despite what they say, w^ould still reduce the history of

1 History of Philosophy, Pref., p. vii. and voL iL p. 556, last note
{3d edn.)

348 ANNOTATIONS.

])hilosophy to organization, — that is, to reason, — or, in
other words, to philosophy. If history, indeed, were to
be regarded as mere contingency, wliich, consequently,
conditioned thought, and were not conditioned by it,
then the fundamental princij)le of the Hegelian philo-
sophy, and that philosophy itself, would require to be
abandoned. Eather than this, surely it is better to
account for lacunce by the unavoidable imperfections
both of philosophy and the history of philosophy as yet.
It is perfectly well known to Zeller, as it was to
Schwegler, that externality, as externality, is to Hegel,
in its very nature, notion and necessity, contingent and
fortuitous. Hegel could not expect, therefore, either
nature (which is externality in space), or history (which
is externality in time), to constitute, in its own form, a
system or a progress that should present a single intel-
lectual scheme. Nay, his own express words are {Oesch.
d. Phil. i. p. 326) : — * Although the evolution of philo-
sophy in history must correspond to the evolution of
logical philosophy, there will still be loci in the latter,
which disappear in the historical movement.' Never-
theless, he held nature and history to be substantially or
at bottom but the one the exemplification and the other
the evolution of thought ; and he called to his students,
as they would be * serious with the belief of a divine
government of the world,' to trust in the possibility of
philosophy demonstrating this. Without presupposition,
indeed, of a progressive organic idea to underlie all his-
tory, whether political, religious, or philosophical, what
meaning were there in the universe at all ? And with-
out presupposition of this meaning, what were philo-
sophy ? It were absurd to try to think what has no
thought in it. That Hegel's chain of logical categories
can only partially and interruptedly be demonstrated to
underlie the phenomenal contingency, whether of nature
or of history — it is patent that this must have been as
evident to Hegel himself as to his two critics, and it
follows from his own principles that he would not have
claimed more. The idea, if not constitutively, or even in
strictness, regulatively, is at least substantively present in
history. Distortion in time Hegel himself admits. That
Zeller should demand the ' logical Gerippe,'' the * red
strand of necessity,' and Schwegler the conception of
the philosophy of history as * unity of a single process,'
which Hegel demands, and yet that both should make

DIVISJOX AND PRELIMIXA li Y VIE W. 3 10

believe to reject Hegel — this, plainly, ia but gratuitoua
contradiction. In Schwcgler, indeed, this contradiction
is a coutrailiction in terms ; for bow can tbat M'hich La
'true in princij>le ' be also ' unjustifiable in principle' ?
It is to miss Hogel not to see everywhere the single
necessity of reason. The (philosophically) i)erfectly ripe
Erdmanu maintains in bis historical GrunJriss that • in
all philosophies only the one philosophy unfolds itself.'
To Ferrier, too, the history of pbilosophy is but ' phil-
osophy itself taking its time.''

II. AND III. — Division and Preliminary View.

ANY terms in these sections for which illustration may
be desirable will find a more suitable place again.
The exclusion of all the ])relimiuary discussions that
usually precede Thales, will be felt a boon by most
readers, as will also the elimination of Scholasticism.
What is known of Oriental philosophy is best studied in
the works specially occupied with it. I would earnestly
recommend all students, if possible, however, to read the
introduction to Zeller's comprehensive work on the his-
tory of philosophy among the Greeks. Of this work^
Ferrier says that ' it is too much pervaded, particularly
in those places where clearness is most required, by that
obscurity, indeed, I may say, un intelligibility, which
seems to be inseparable from the philosophical lucubra-
tions of our Teutonic neighbours.' With this opinion I
cannot at all agree ; he who runs may read the section
in question, or, indeed, any section in the whole book,
and with perfect intelligence. As for Scholasticism,
when one considers that the printed writings of Albertus
Magnus, Thomas Aquinas, and Duns Scotus alone occupy
fifty-one folio volumes, one feels glad to be dehvered
from it, and for so good a reason as that of Schwegler.
The reader ought to know, however, that the study of
Scholasticism has now come into full mode, not only in
Germany but also in France. In this country, too, we
see the same tendency in the Patristic studies of Dr.
Donaldson and others. The most complete students here
seem to be Prantl, Haur^au, Erdmann, Ueberweg, Huber,
Stockl, and others : in Erdmann's admirable Grundriss
there is an ample original study. It is obnous, in-
deed, that the union at once of oriental and occidental

'A50 ANNOTATIONS.

principles in the principle of Christianity, and then the
gradual evolution of the last during so many ages of
seclusion to the supersensual world will constitute a study
of great interest. Erdmann views the Theosophy of the
middle ages as a necessary complement to the Cosmo-
sophy of the ancients, and both as equally necessary for
the completion of modern philosophy. More on this sub-
ject cannot well be said here. As for the preliminary
view, the reader will gain by a return to it after he has
gone through the whole of pre-Socratic philosophy. At
the beginning of 4, we read that the ' first or analytic,'
is now to give place to the 'second or synthetic period,'
and yet we are told, at the end of it, that the first prin-
ciple of the new period is analytically acquired and, in its
application, i:\iefirst of the sort ! One is apt to replace
analytically by synthetically here ; but we find from p.
107 that to Schwegler that is analytic which is obtained
from observation of nature. Now Heraclitus was pro-
bably led to his principle so, and his was certainly a
first attempt to explain * the movement of existence.'
Yet the attempt itself was a synthesis (of being and non-
being).

IV. — The Earlier Ionic Philosophers.

I HAVE compared the brief statements of Schwegler
here with the longer ones of Hegel, Zeller, Grote,
Lewes, etc., and can assure the reader that they contain
all that in my view of it is worth knowing on the sub-
ject. In Hegel, for example, though Schwegler's five para-
graphs are represented by twenty-four pages, this result
is, for the most part, attained by a wider extension rather
than by a greater fulness, in the matter of dates, events,
authorities, quotations, and what is called in general
the literature of the subject. There is certainly in Hegel
as well a fuller and freer discussion of the pertinent
doctrines ; but even so Schwegler's reader has little to
gain, imless as regards interesting glimpses into Hegel's
own philosophy, to which, perhaps, we shall refer again.
The recently published * Lectures on Greek Philo-
sophy,' by the late lamented Professor Ferrier, will well
reward perusal by the British reader here, so far as
perfect lucidity and general charm of statement are con-
cerned. A similar praise can always be extended to Mr.

THE EA RLIER IONIC PIIILOSOPIIEIiS. 351

Lewes, and the relative ])aragra])h8 of Mr. G rote's Plato
constitute an exceedingly able conipend. Zeller is
quite complete, as usual, in details and references ; and
Erdniann reflective and exact. Mr. Grote seems oftenest
to ditler from the rest in tlie matter of dates : his dato
for Thales, for examjile, is G-0-5G(), B.c., while Hegel and
Erdmann agree with Sehwegler, to whom the others also
come nearer though differing somewhat among them-
selves.

The most important difference, however, is that of
Ritter as regards the place of Anaximander, a difference
which is adopted ])y Mr. Lewes and Professor Butler.
Of this difference, it is enough to remark, j)erhap9, that
it seems universally abandoned now, and that the reasons
alleged by ZeDer and Erdmann are surely quite suffi-
cient.

Sehwegler and Hegel ai)pear less comj)lete than the
others only in reference to Diogenes of Apollonia. Mr.
Lewes remarks (vol. i. p. 10) that ' Hegel, by a strange
oversight, says that we know nothing of Diogenes but
the name.' Now (for his part, Sehwegler says nothing
at all of Diogenes), what Hegel does say is this : —
* Diogenes of Apollonia, Hippasus, Archelaus are also
named as Ionic philosophers; we know only their names,
however, and that they adhered to one or other of the prin-
ciples.^ If any one will examine the state of the case as
regards Diogenes in what is said of his age and opinions,
and in the manner in which, as a philosopher, he is
characterized by the two main authorities, Diogenes
Laertius and Aristotle, he will have no dificulty in per-
ceiving that there was no 'oversight' with Hegel ; that,
on the contrary, he was quite aware both of what he
did and of his reasons for what he did. Schleiermacher
it was who had called particular attention to this Dio-
genes ; it is explanation, but not justification, to say
that Hegel, while averse to disturb his Ionic cycle of
three, would not be apt to feel less averse in a case
where Schleiermacher was concerned. FuU justification,
however, is extended by this, that whatever additional
knowledge Diogenes may seem to possess in consequence
of H^-ing as late as Anaxagoras, he really was, philo-
sophically, no more than an adherent of Anaximenes.
Any philosophical advance attributed to Diogenes over
Anaximenes, the latter, according to Hegel, already pos-
sessed. Erdmann will be found not to dissent from this

352 A jVNO TA Tl ONS.

view ; and even ScLleiermaclier in the end came to re«
gard Diogenes as a * principlosen Eklektiker,* whose
place was among tho Sophists and Atomists. In fact,
to interpose this Diogenes between Anaximenes and the
Pythagoreans is to produce on the history of i)hilo8ophy
the effect of a disturbing upthrow. This being the case,
and as he contains no principle of his own, but only mixes
up those of Anaximenes, Anaxagoras, etc., I hold Schweg-
ler to be perfectly right in not even naming him. Diogenes
certainly refers to many j)hy8ical details that may prove
peculiarly interesting to Mr. Grote and Mr. Lewes ; but
these details belong not to philosophy proper ; and if
Diogenes is to be admitted, why not also Hippo, Idaeus,
etc.? Contrary to the opinion of Mr. Lewes, then, it is
for critical, and not * uncritical,' reasons, that Diogenes
of ApoUonia should be ' made to represent no epoch
whatever.' Referring to the unsuccess of the earlier
Greek philosophers, Mr. Lewes observes, *but, as Mr.
Grote remarks, the memorable fact is that they made
the attempt.' The remark belongs to Zeller (see vol. i.
p. 156).

In connexion with the Ionics, Hegel names Pherecydes,
of whom it is enough to know, however, that he is said
to have been the teacher of Pythagoras.

V. — The Pythagoreans.

AFTER due comparison of the various authorities, 1
am disposed to claim for Schwegler here also
complete presentation of the fruit. Zeller, who has 150
pages for Schwegler's 3, runs out in them into great
breadth of reference and discussion ; but, after all, there
is the same result. Erdmann passes from the Physio-
logists to the Mathematicians by a transition that is very
ingenious : — * If all multiplicity,' he says, ' is explained
by thickening and thinning, the mind that reflects and
reasons with itself, must pass to the result, that all
differences of nature have become distinctions for it of
the simpler and the more manifold, the less and the
more, that is, distinctions of number.' This he equally
ingeniously connects with Plato's one and many.
Ferrier's statement of the Pythagoreans, — well-written,
as usual, like the other English statements, — is inferior
to his previous one on the Ionics. Some of his remarks

THE PYTIIAGOliEANS. 353

are incorrect, and his illustrations out of ])lace. Hegel
opposes, more than once, Aristotle and Sextus Empiricus,
as the genuine students of, and authorities on, Pytha-
goras, to his neo-Platonic biograjjliera as the spurious
ones ; Ferrier opjjoses Aristotle as the genuine to Sextus
Empiricus as the ueo-Platouic and the spurious. Ferrier
Las probably found Hegel even more than usually un-
yielding here. Here, indeed, Hegel is both unyielding
and difluse (4G pa<;es), but of the greatest value both as
regards the Pythagorean philosophy and his own. What
a world of living reality we are in when we read an
original writer, a princeps ! One feels this when one
})asse8 from the rest, however genuine each may be in
his way, to Hegel. (It is pleasant to see Mr. Lewes
contrive to extract an occasional little edge from amid
the impracticable blocks of this Sphinx, — as when he
speaks of an Egj-^pt unable to measure its own pyramids
by help of their shadows, as having little to teach a so-
skilled Thales, or of how we are to understand Pytha-
goras' new term of philosopher.)

Of the Thaletic proposition, that water is the principle
or absolute, Hegel — to go back a step or two — remarks,
that it is the beginning of philosophy. His reasons for
this are two : 1, that water (so regarded) is a universal ;
and, 2, that it is real, or exists in rerum natura. It is a
universal, for all other things are referred to, or resolved
into it ; and, in such a position, it only is, and can only
be, a Oedanke (which is not only a thought, but as a
thought truly is, a Ge-danke, a putting or bringing together
of things). Philosophy, then, has, in the conception of
Thales, at last found its beginning ; for the principle of
philosophy must not be abstract, but concrete, — that is, at
once universal and particular. Such evidently would be the
nature of water, could all things be demonstrably reduced
to it. This will render intelligible, perhaps, some of
Hegel's apparently impenetrable utterances under Thales :
as when in reference to the formlessness of the principle
(and water is formless) he saj-^s, * While to the senses
each thing stands there in its own individuality, now
(according to Thales, that is) objective actuality is to be
placed in the notion that reflects itself into itself, or is
itself to be put as notion : water is in its notion {Begriff
— what it implies) life, and so appears in mental (spiritual)
wise.' The last point refers plainly to water as process.
It throws light on the word speculative to be told that

354 ANNOTATIONS.

water (in the present reference, that is) has not sensuous
but only speculative universality ; the latter because it
is now in the form of notion, and the elements of sense
are as it were sublated into it. It is evident, too, that,
as water is here regarded as at once universal and real,
the Thaletic proposition expresses the absolute as unity
of thought and being [Einheit des Gedankens und Seyns).
Again, it is instructive to be told that the principle, if
true, cannot remain an idle universal but must possess
capacity of transition into the particular. There \aform
as well as matter ; there must be provision for the differ-
ence, or there must be an absolute difference. Here how-
ever, the only difference, the only expression of form,
being thickening and thinning, distinction is merely quan-
titative, merely external and inessential, and set up by
another, or produced from without ; * it is not the inner
difference of the notion in its own self.' These remarks
may be regarded as hints towards Hegel's own purposes :
when he explains the world to us, it will be by a principle
that is real, that is universal, and that possesses within
itself capacity of difference into all that is. We under-
stand him then, when he finds the principle of Anaxi-
mander an advance on that of Thales, for it is no longer

• a certain finite something, but a universality that negates
the finite.' Hegel enables us to regard Anaximander as
the earliest Darwinian : he conceives man to develop
from a fish, etc., 'Develop {Hervorgehen),^ says Hegel,

* comes forward in recent times also ; it is a mere after
one another in time — a form, with which a man often be-
lieves himself to say something brilliant ; but for aJl
that there is no necessity, no thought, no notion in it.*
Would not one think Hegel had read Darwin ?

As regards Anaximenes also, Hegel notices the advance
from the material to the true or spiritual element. But
it is here (under the Pythagoreans), probably, that we
shall find the most enlightening remarks of any yet. Mat-
ter, which even before was, as reflexion into conscious-
ness, a thing of .consciousness, is now wholly withdrawn.
With much that the Pythagorean numbers represent
Hegel agrees ; but numbers are still external, stiff, im-
movable, without process in themselves, and he demon-
strates them to be incapable of expressing the absolute
form. Such symbols are to Hegel hard, and he exclaims
that ' nothing has the softness of thought but thought
itself.' • Short in his own way,' then, as he says himself

THE PYTHAGOREANS. 355

if Aristotle, he 'deinolishos' the chcaj) profundity that lies
in the symbolism of numbers. * Numbers,' he says, ' have
been much used as cxj)ression8 of ideas. This on one side
bas a look of dej)th. For that another meaning is im-
plied in them than they immediately present, is seen at
)nce ; but how mueh is implied in them is known neither
i)y him who proposes, nor by him who tries to understand,
IS, for instance, in the case of the witches' rhyme (one
time one) in Goethe's Faust. The more obscure the
thoughts, the deeper they seem ; the thing is that what
s most essential, but also what is hardest, namely, the
expression of one's-self in definite notions, precisely that
the proposer spares himself.' It is impossible to tell,
le says again of the latter Pythagoreans, ' how much
they toiled, as well to exjtress philosophical thoughts in
I numerical system, as to understand those expressions
R'hich they received from others, and to discover in them
jvery possible meaning.' But the curious point is that
Hegel himself adopts this very numerical symbolism, bo
ar as it suits the system I It is only, indeed, when that
igreement fails, that the .agreement of Hegel fails also,
rhe moment it does fail, however, his impatience breaks
)ut. The one, the two, the three, he contentedly, even
warmly and admiringly, accepts, nay, * as far as five,' he
lays, ' there may well be something like a thought in
lumbers, hut on from six there are simply arbitrary deter-
ninations ! *

Hegel is quite consistent with himself, however, and
relieves numbers, to the extent he says, applicable in
ixpression of the absolute relation. ' Everything, ' he
lays, ' is essentially only this, that it has in it oneness
md twoness, and as well their antithesis as their con-
lexion, ' and this is intelligible to every one who perceives
;hat oneness stands for identity, and twoness for differ-
mce. He points out that the Trinity is only unintelli-
pible when conceived as three separate numerical units,
vliile speculatively it involves an absolute and divine
iense : 'it would be a strange thing if there were no
lense in what for two thousand years has been the
loliest Christian idea.' But people do not know what
;hey themselves say. When they say matter, they per-
3eive not that they have named what can exist in
;hought alone, and what, therefore, is immaterial.

I cannot resist extracting further one or two exoteric
passages that are in Hegel's best manner. In regard to

356 ANNOTATIONS.

the Pythagorean injunction to review morning and even-
ing our actions of the past day, etc., he says, ' True
discipline is not this vanity of directing so much atten-
tion to itself, and of occupying itself with itself as an
individual ; but that self-forgettingness that absorbs
itself in the thing itself, and in the interest of the uni-
versal : it is only this considerateness in regard to the
thing in hand that is necessary, while that dangerous,
useless anxiousness destroys freedom.' Hegel naturally
is better pleased with the Pythagorean prescript to * stop
chatter and take to learning ; ' he says, * This duty, to
keep-in one's talk can be named an essential condition of
all culture and all learning ; one must begin by becom-
ing capable of taking up the thoughts of others, and of
renouncing one's own fancies. It is usually said that the
understanding is developed by questions, objections,
answers, etc. ; in effect, however, it is not thus /orwec?,
but externally made. Man's inwardness is what is won
and widened in true culture ; he grows not poorer in
thoughts or in quickness of mind by silently containing
himself. He learns rather thereby ability to take up, '
and acquires perception of the worthlessness of his own
conceits and objections ; and as the perception of the '
worthlessness of such conceits grows, he breaks himself
of the having of them.' The hecatomb sacrificed by
Pythagoras on discovery of the theorem that bears
his name is highly relished by Hegel : * it was a feast
of spiritual cognition — at cost of the oxen ! ' He
never thinks of the mathematicians quoting Ovid in
proof of Pythagoras' prohibition of animal slaughter,
and in consequent disproof of the possibility of the
eacrifice.

In reference to the peculiar external habits and dresa
of Pythagoras, he says very sensibly, ' These are no
longer of any consequence ; we allow ourselves to be
guided by the general custom and fashion, because it is
quite indifferent not to have a will of one's own here :
we give the contingent a prize to the contingent, and
obey that external rationality that just consists in iden-
tity and universality.'

A tolerable instance of Hegelian ingenuity occurs also,
in a previous section, with reference to Aristotle's colla-
tion of the water of Thales with the oath of the gods by
the Styx : — * This ancient tradition is susceptible of a
speculative interpretation. When something cannot be

rilH KLEÄ TICS. 357

roved, — that is, when objective inonstratiou faila, aa in
efeicnce to a payment the receii)t, or in refereiue to au
,ct the witnesses of it, — then tlie oath, this certihcation
f myself, must, as an object, declare that my evidence
absolute truth. As now, by way of conti rmation, one
wears by what is best, by what is absolutely sure, and
A the gods swore by the subterranean water, there seems
be implied here this, that the essential principle of
)ure thought, the innermost being, the reality in which
lonsciousuess has its truth, is water ; I declare, as it were,
iiis pure certainty of my own self as object, as God.'
Dhis (without mention of Hegel) is found exceedingly
»rell rendered by Ferrier.

VI.— T^Ae Ehatks.

' A "WORD on Melissus will comiilete the list of these.
J\_ Melissus, a Samian like Pythagoras, a friend of
Heraclitus and probably a disciple of Parmenides, a
Statesman, an admiral, etc., flourished about 444 B.c.
He wrote a book in prose on nature, fragments of which
have been preserved by Simplicius, and collected by
Brandis. ;^lelissus appears to have reached considerably
more definiteness than Parmenides ; but, on the whole,
the import is in both the same. Hegel says, ' What
Xenophanes began, Parmenides and Melissus improved,
and what these taught Zeno completed.' The Editor of
Butler's Lectures objects that * Melissus rather corrupted
than " completed" the Eleatic system.' Corrupted con-
trasts with Hegel's * improved [xceiter ausgebildet),'' and
is not justified by the very reference in support. Aris-
totle's reproach of ' a little more rough' in the metaphysics
(or the word 'coarse' elsewhere) probably applies, as
Hegel thinks, to the manner rather than to the matter of
Melissus. Zeller and Erdmann, both implying a certain
advance on the part of Melissus, seem to admit to his
prejudice only a colour, so to speak, caught by him from
simple contact with his adversaries the Physicists.
Zeller holds him essentially to agree both with Par-
menides and Zeno, though he refers at the same time to
his * not quite insignificant deviation from Parmenides.*
This deviation, however, is limited to the doctrine of the
infinitude of the One, and does not extend to the materi-
ality of the One, which latter is no doctrine of Melissus,

358 A NNO TA TIONS.

but simply an inference of Aristotle. Zeller, it is true,
even while quoting Melissus himself on the One being
without body, extension, or parts, seems to justify
Aristotle in this very inference, as well as to conceive
the reproach of Aristotle to relate both to the assump-
tion of the infinitude of the One on the part of Melissus
and to his relative reasoning in stipport. Hegel, how-
ever, as we have seen, evidently thinks very highly of
Melissus, and is at pains to defend him. He says that
the fragments of Melissus contain the same thoughts and
arguments as those of Parmenides, only * in part some-
thing more developed {etwas ausgeführter).^ Of the pseudo-
Aristotelian work, further, he says with reference to that
part of it that is now universally held to concern
Melissus, * There is in it more reflection and a dialectic
more finished in form than — judging by their verses — we
might expect not only from Xenophanes but even from
Parmenides.' He talks of its ' cultured ratiocination,' its
* order,' its ' precision.' But what is more to the purpose,
he points out that, with reference to the pure principle,
Being or One, the distinction of matter and thought falls
away, while, as regards the unlimitedness of Melissus and
the limitedness of Parmenides, it is Parmenides and not
Melissus who is in fault : * This limitedness of the One
would, in effect, directly contradict the philosophy of
Parmenides ' . . . * but the poetical diction of Par-
menides is not always exact ' . . . * and his doctrine of
opinion was more against Being as principle of thought
than was the case with Melissus.' In general, indeed, Hegel
finds reconciliation in thought for much that is contra-
dictory in expression to Zeller. Thus Hegel takes no
offence at the pseudo-Aristotle describing the Eleatic
One as 'globe-shaped,' 'neither limited nor unlimited,'
' neither moved nor unmoved,' etc., whereas Zeller cannot
wrest himself free from the contradictions implied. Mr.
Lewes finds it ' difficult to understand the Rational unity
as limited by itself;' but, unlike Zeller, he finds the
idea of a sphere to resolve the contradiction. The ego,
too, it is worth pointing out, is such a sphere, it is the
absolute limit ; and yet it is absolute unlimitedness.

We pass to a word on the Eleatic argumentation, and
the terms it involves. As for the former (the argumen-
tation), it is shortly this : — What la, can neither originate
in that which it is, nor in that which it is not ; for in
the one case, movement there were none, and in the

THE ELE A TICS. 359

other, movement were impossible. This is the i)r(>l»lcia
of origination in general, and conccma diiliculties which,
apart from Hegel, still exist. In ultimate abstraction, it
may (suggestively, perhaps) stand thus : — Neither iden-
tity can issue from identity, nor difference from differ-
ence ; for in the lirst case there were no difference, and
in the second no identity. The one-sided conclusion of
the Eleatica here was that there is only identity (Being),
and that difference (Non-being) tliere is none. As regards
terms now, then, the meaning of beiint and non-be'tnt will
perhaps present no difficulty. Betnt with its Saxon root
and its Latin termination, to say nothing of the diaeresis,
is an ugly mongrel, and non-heiint is still worse. Both
have been avoided as much as possible, and would gladly
have been dispensed with. It may be said, why not have
adopted existent and non-existent ? But when it is con-
sidered that the beent is, strictly, the non-existent, and
the existent the non-beent, it wül be readily seen that
this could not have been always possible. That which
truly is in the life of this great universe could not, the
Eleatics thought, be existent, for the existent, as an ever-
changeful becoming, contains an element of difference or
negation. It must, then, be described as only beent, as
possessed of identity or affirmation alone. This distinc-
tion was identified by Plato with that which separates
the ideas from the world of sense. The genera of things,
the ideas, as unchangeable, replaced for him the pure
being of the Eleatics, while things themselves, as mere
becoming and perpetual change, were but the non-beent,
the simply existent. "We may illustrate this by referring
to astronomy. The sun, planets, comets, etc., are existent
astronomy, they are in continual change, they never re-
turn twice the same ; but their science, their laws, are
beent astronomy. And as it was to Plato, so it is to
HegeL The main principle in the physiology of Virchow
is the connective tissue (the Bindegewebe). This tissue
80 rtms through the anatomical frame that the rest of it
(organs and all) are but contained in, or even constituted
by it. Philosophy — in priority to Virchow — had endea-
voured to demonstrate the sustentation of the whole crass
universe in even such a diamond net of connective tissue
under the name of * Logic' The meaning of the terms
in question will now, then, be completely plaiiL No ob-
ject is exposed to the senses that is not a process. The
same sun never shone twice. Leibnitz says of things:

3G0 A NNO TA Tl ON 8.

semper generantur, et nunquam sunt. The Eleatics,
then, simply refused to believe in this changeable!) ess aa
the principle of the world : they assumed a One in the
universe, beside which all change (diflference, negation,
non-being) must be but appearance and subjective mis-
take. The signification indicated as assigned to being
here in contradistinction from becoming is held fast by
Schwegler pretty well throughout. Opposed to the. ele-
ment of thought, however, being takes on a sense of
palpable, tangible, durable breadth. Examples of such
sense of the word will be found especially in the sections
on Fichte and Herbart. Professor Ferrier gives very
felicitous expression (vol. i. p. 82) to the distinction be-
tween being and non-being : — ' This antithesis is merely
a variety of expression for the antithesis between reason
and sense : or if we may distinguish between the two
forms of the opposition, we may say that the one expres-
sion, the permanent and the changeable, or the ^u and
the TToXXd, denotes the antithesis in its objective form;
the other expression, reason and sense, denotes the an-
tithesis in its subjective form.' The iv and TroXXd are
Platonic (firstly Pythagorean) forms, but what is said
perfectly applies. Another excellent glance of Mr. Fer-
rier is this (p. 85) : — ' Whatever epithet or predicate is
applied to one of the terms of the antithesis, the counter-
predicate must be applied to the other term.' At page
87 also we have some felicitous illustration. It may be
well, at the same time, to place a remark here in refer-
ence to Ferrier's test of philosophical truth, that it is
truth, namely, * for all and not for some,' truth for all
intelligence, not truth for such only as is accompanied
by senses like our own. This appears everywhere in
Ferrier as the criterion he has derived from the Germans
in regard to necessary thought. This is not to name the
distinction concerned rightly, however, which is that of
being (the necessary, permanent, underlying and pervad»
ing, connective tissue of ideas) and of non-being or be-
coming (the contingent vicissitude of sensuous things).
Hegel knows only one kind of thought, and believes that
that thought can only have these senses. Ferrier seems
to accept the possibility, not only of senses, but even of
an intelligence, different from ours.

Mr. Lewes, when he says (vol. i. p. 55) that the asser-
tion non-being is impossible, * amounts to saying that
non-existence cannot exist : a position which may appear

TUB ELBA TICS. 361

extremely trivial to tlie reader not versed in nietaj)Ly8i-
cal pursuits,' etc., would seem not to have the true dis-
tinction between being and non-being very clearly before
him. The same atithor, alone mentioning Hegel's ai)i)a-
rently well-founded doubts as to the j)ro()f8 of Xeno-
phaues' connexion with Klea, disagrees very widely with
Hegel as regards interj)retation of the text of Aristotle
that (Metaph. I. 5) represents Xenophanes as looking els
t6v 6Xov ovpavbv. * The state of his (Xenophanes') mind
(says Mr. Lewes, vol. i. p. 44) is graphically painted in
that one ])hrase of Aristotle's : " casting his eyes up-
wards at the immensity of heaven, he declared that the
One is God," Overarching him was the deep blue, in-
finite vault, immoveable, unchangeable, embracing him
and all things; that he proclaimed to be God.' Mr.
Lewes then proceeds to strengthen and widen this posi-
tion by further poetic hypostasis of the physical sky.
Hegel, on the other hand, who also indeed talks of a
Blau€j translates the passage thus : — * but, looking into
the whole heaven — as we say into the air [i'ls
Blaue hinein) — he said, God is the One.' Hegel's
reading of the whole passage, indeed, may be re-
presented as running thus. Parmenides ha\Tng said
that the One was limited, and Melissus that it was un-
limited, Xenophanes, for his part (in Aristotle's words),
ovd^v 5i€aa(p-fjvi<x€i/, nowise declared or determined, nor
seemed to tend to either opinion, but, looking round
him generally, said, the One is God. Compared with the
context which concerns a comparison of opinions, this in-
terpretation of Hegel seems reasonable, Zeller, also
(vol. i. p. 372, 1, and p. 385, 1), appears to support the
same view, though he speaks of the vault of heaven in
the text of the latter page. Mr. Lewes differs (vol. L
p. 53) from other critics in his translation of a celebrated
text of Parmenides. Perhaps it may be well, however,
to refer to Zeller's note (vol. i. p. 414), since, though
probably settling the matter, it is not mentioned by !Mr.
Lewes. Aristotle, no doubt, quotes the text in question
as relevant to the subject of the relativity of judgments
of sensation : and it is certainly very natural to quote an
Eleatic as arguing against sense or non-being. But surely
Mr. Lewes introduces quite a new idea when he conceives
Parmenides to have in mind the dependence of thoxiglit on
organization. Kef erring to the varjing opinions of man-
kind, Parmenides says, as is the mixture of the two ele-

3C2 A NNO TA TIONS.

ments (the wann and the cold) in men, so is their thought
(knowledge), with the o]>viou8 inference that 56fa, sensu-
ous opinion, is not trustworthy. It is not the modern con-
ception of organization then that Parmeuides has in mind,
but simply the variety of our actual states, and as ex-
plained by variety of intermixture in his two elements.
With this interpretation it is quite in harmony that Par-
meuides should have conceived, even after disappearance
of the warm element, sensation to remain in the corpse,
though only of the cold and dark ; but will such concep-
tion harmonize with the idea of organization, with the
idea of thought as resultant from organization ? It is a
bold statement, then, this, that Parmenides *had as dis-
tinct a conception of this celebrated theory as any of his
successors,' and it seems unnatural to propose for the
simple words to yap ttX^ov icrrl vbiqixa (for the more is the
thought), a translation so cumbrous as this, * the highest
degree of organization gives the highest degree of thought.'
It is very improbable that any such conception ever
occurred to Parmenides. Zeller accepts (and Hegel, by
quoting and translating the whole passage, already coun-
tenanced him in advance) the equivalent of Theophrastus
for vb irX^ou, rb virepßdWov namely, and interprets the
clause itself thus : — 'The preponderating element of the
two is thought, occasions and determines the ideas ; ' that
is, as is the preponderating element (the warm or the
cold) so is the state of mind. In short, the more is the
thought is the linguistic equivalent of the time, for accord-
ing to the more is the thought,^ Mr. Lewes, further, in
prosecution of the same view, translates and explains in
his own way (vol. i. p. 56), the celebrated verses of Par-
menides that seem to assert the identity of being and
thought. (They will be found at page 346, vol. i. of But-
ler's Lectures, translated by the Editor.) Hegel, too,
{Gesch. d. Phil. P. i. p. 274), translates the same verses,
and adds his interpretation. It is almost amusing to see
the diflference : while Mr. Lewes conceives that what is
referred to is ' the identity of human thought and sensa-
tion, both of these being merely transitory modes of exist-
ence,' Hegel boldly exclaims, 'That is the main thought ;
thought produces itself, and what is produced is a thought ;
thought is therefore identical with its being, for there is
nothing besides being, that grand aflärmation.' Hegel
also adds from Plotinus, — * Parmenides adopted this con-
ception inasmuch as he placed not Being in sensuous

1 See Preface, p. xi.

THE EL E A TICS. 3G3

things ; for identifying being with thought, he maintained
it to bo immutable.' In this view of tlie identity iu
question, thought plainly is no mere transitory modo of
existence, but, like Being itself, immutable. As we have
seen, indeed, to Plato and to Hegel it is Being. Mr.
Grote, too, is worth quoting on this identity of being
and thought. At p. 23, vol i. of hia ' Plato,' he says :
♦ Though he and others talk of this Something as an Ab-
solute {i.e. apart from or independent of hia own think-
ing mind), yet he also uses some juster language (to yap
avTÖ yoelv (anv re Kal elvai), showing that it is really rela-
tive.' Mr. Grote implies here that the meaning of Par-
menides is, not that being and thinking are identical, but
that the ehai, the object, depends on, or is relative to,
the voeiv, the subject. The bold nonchalant air of a mat-
ter of course with which, though knowing all the relative
opinions, he thus assumes his own as the only one, is
striking, and reminds of Mr. Buckle.

The learned Editor of Professor Butler's Lectures
(vol. i. p. 348, note) is disposed to assert for Xenophanes
not Pantheism, but pure Monotheism ; and no one who
gives the interpretation to the words of Xenophanes,
which is natural to us, can fail to sjTnpathize with him.
But the other opinion must, I apprehend, be deferred to.
The notion of Xenophanes was doubtless developed from
the object of perception before him ; it was a reduction
of the phenomenal world, as it were, to a vis naturce, to a
natural power, not to an extra-mundane spirit in relation
to whom that phenomenal world were but as accident of
his might. Then the natural character of the Greek
gods, and the physical nature of all preceding philosophy
must be considered. This view, indeed, seems to have
been that of the various ancient authorities. Hegel says
{Op. cit. p. 263), ' We know of God as a spirit ;' and he
proceeds to designate the position of Xenophanes * as an
immense step in advance . . . for Greeks who had before
them only the world of the senses, and these gods of
phantasy.'

Schwegler's statement of the Zenonic antinomies is easy
and sufficient, Mr. Lewes, while vindicating its own
fairness for the third argument of Zeno in reference to
motion, pronounces it nevertheless a fallacy, and even in-
deed supposes himself to demonstrate it as no less. ' The
original fallacy, ' he says, ' is in the supposition that
Motion is a thing superadded, whereas, as Zeno clearly

3G4 ANNOTATIONS.

saw, it is only a condition. In a falling stone there is not
the "stone," and a thing called "motion;" otherwise
there would be also another thing called " rest." But
both motion and rest are names given to express condi-
tions of the stone.' And what of that ? It is not pro-
bable that Zeno could have blinded himself to the problem
that pressed by so simple an expedient as * motion is a
condition^ not a thing.' Call it a condition if you like, he
might have said, all that I say is, that it is a condition,
the notion of which involves a contradiction. And cer-
taiidy Mr. Lewes's allusion to a stone now at rest and
now in motion does not remove the contradiction, or even
— any more, that is, than the walking of Diogenes, which
Mr. Lewes himself drives out of court — apply to it. Nay,
in the very next sentences, Mr. Lewes would seem to
accept what under the name of a fallacy he leads us to
suppose he has just rejected. ' But both motion and rest
are names given to express conditions of the stone (or of
Diogenes !) Even rest is a positive exertion of force.
Rest is force, resisting an equivalent and opposing force.
Motion is force triumphant. It foUows that matter is
always in motion ; which amounts to the same as Zeno's
sajdng, there is no such thing as motion.' Mr. Lewes's
conclusion we see then is, that there is no such thing as
rest, that matter is always in motion. That is to him a
substantial truth, and he admits that Zeno's saying
amounts to it ; yet his single object all the time has been
to expose the 'original fallacy.' Perhaps a 'fallacy' on
the 'subjective method,' is now *a fact' on the 'objec-
tive method ? ' But why then did Mr. Lewes resist the
latter method at the hands, or rather at the legs of
Diogenes ? Then, apart from this, it does not at all assist
the matter that the category of motion should be trans-
ferred to the category of force, for the question recurs
then again. What is force ? In fact, what is not only
motion, or rest, or force, or condition, but what is even * a
thing,' what a thousand other interests the like, the Logic
of which would be specially useful to us, and which is to
be found in Hegel alone ?

A similar conceptive mode of thought attends us, not
only in regard to what Mr. Lewes says further, but in
regard to what he cites from Mr. Mill. Mr. Mill, as-
signing to Hobbes the credit of the original distinction,
would solve the * Achilles ' fallacy by pointing out that
Zeno has confounded in it * length of time* with * num-

THE EL E A TICS. 305

her of aidnlivisions in /i;;j<',' or ^ an \i\ßnitc timc^ with 'o
Urne which is infinitely divinf>le.' Mr. Lewes heriMipon
Tery projterly remarks (not without debt, possibly to
Hegel or some comuientator of Hegel *) that Aristotle
had named the same distinction when he oj)p()sed the
actualli/ finite to the pottntiiilly infinite. It is not, then,
with reference to the substantial correctness of the dis-
tinction (for Aristotle's distinction is certainly correct,
while those of Hobbes and Mr. Mill are essentially iden-
tical with it), but with respect to that absence of the
due logical terms which give not only the true names,
but the true precision of notion, or simply the true
notion, that we refer to the desirableness of an in-
creased knowledge of Hegel's Lorjic in England. In this
reference, indeed, we can see already the superiority of
the answer of Aristotle to that of Mr. Mill. To oppose
potentiality to actuality, namely, is, so far as generaliza-
tion or its language is concerned, a great advance on
the opposing of subdivisions of time to length of time.
Aristotle, in other words, has reached the notion in its
abstraction ; while Mr. Mill (though perfectly successful
in eflfect) has reached the notion only in — so to speak —
its sensuous concretion (figurative conception). Con-
sultation of Hegel, however, would still very much im-
prove intelligence here, not only for the light he brings
to the position of Aristotle, but for that he brings also
to the position in general It is to Hegel, indeed, that
we must look for the true light on all the paradoxes of
Zeno, and it is to be hoped that the reader will not
neglect him. Meantime, explaining that the general
procedure of Hegel is to oppose the concrete to the abs-
tract, we may summarize the special relative details not
too incorrectly perhaps thus : — Quantity is a necessary
notion of reason, and it occurs deduced in its own place in
the science of abstract reason or logic. Now, it is the very
nature of quantity, and as deduced, that it should have
two moments, one of discretion (Mr. Mill's * subdivision^)
and one of continuity (Mr. Mill's * length^). Any dls-
cretum is, as quantitative, a continuum, but, as a con-
tinuum, it contains again a possibility of discretion, and
again of continuity, and so on endlessly. This and so on
endlessly constitutes the spririous infinite, an infinite that
only seems infinite, or only is infinite to sensuous opinion
which is blind to its own procedure. That is, if I see

* See the Secret of Hegel, vol. i. Pref. p. liL vol. ii. pp. 269-271 ; but
* commentator of Hegel ' must now be gladly withdrawn (see Mr. Lewes,
1. p. 64, 4th edn.).

360 ANNOTATIONS.

only continuity, and again only discretion, and yet
again only continuity, and so on, pause there is none.
But wliy should I thus vainly alternate the two
moments and deceive myself? The whole relation is
there once for all before me. Quantity is there once
for all before me full-summed in its two moments. It
is but self-deception when I take the two moments after
one another, now this exjtlicit, that implicit, and again
that explicit, this implicit. The spurious infinite is quite
gratuitous then, the true infinite, the whole, is present
and summed in the notion quantity. As regards the
problems of Zeno in point, then, we oppose the concrete
to the abstract. Quantity implies, we say, in its very
notion (a notion duly deduced in place), discretion and
continuity. In the ' Achilles,* while the continuity is
presupposed or implicit, the discretion is alone exposed or
explicit ; hence the difficulty. The solution, then, is :
we are not limited to any one moment, but may set
quantity imder either. Motion, unable to escape from
quantity, readily traverses the quantum. Hegel, then,
as we see, answers Zeno by showing that he was cor-
rect, but one-sided ; while Mr. Mill, on the other hand,
answers for his part by simply advancing the opposite
one-sidedness : he does not, like Hegel, prince of thinkers
as he was, bring the whole, and in its place. I may
observe that it is not different with the general Eleatic
problem before us. The whole Eleatic difficulty is the
separation of the two inseparables, identity and differ-
ence. Mr. Lewes is a great stickler for the principium
identitatis, and believes, as Sir William Hamilton does,
that Hegel confounds logic when he talks of identity and
difference in the same breath. But it requires simply
consideration to see that to explain is not to say, identity
is identity, but difference is identity.

Mr. Grote, while very luminously stating the Zenonic
arguments, appears to me very unsatisfactory both as
regards special points and the general position. It adds
to the unsatisfactoriness, indeed, that, taken in detail, Mr.
Grote's assertions are for the most part correct. Hegel
states the general position thus : — 'That there is motion,
that there is such a manifestation, — that is not the ques-
tion. That there is motion is as sensuously certain as
that there are elephants. In that sense it never occurred
to Zeno to deny motion. (So far there is no difference in
Mr. Grote ; but the unsatisfactory element is that he

TJIE ELEATICS. 367

does not amunmcc himself to the same cfTect as follows.)
The question rather is of the trntli of motion, or motion,
indeed, is tt) be held untrue (in Zeno's view, that is), ])c-
causo the notion of it involves a eontradiction ; and by
this he means to say that rti-itable bciiuj cannot })e predi-
cated of it.' If for motion here wo read plurality, wo
shall understand clearly that the general object of Zena
"waa to retort on the opponents of the Meatic unity, no
less difficulties than those they objected to it. Mr. Grote
— to notice a by-point — uses for the Being or the One the
term Ens. Now, in the first place, does not this uncouth
term mislead ? Does it not distort, or impregnate w ith
a chimera, the quite homely thought of the Eleatics? Is
not, indeed, what I may call the humanity of the position
quite lost in it? This humanity is, as I say, the quite
homely thought that this great universe must be a Oue^
of which consequently only atfirmation can be predicated,
while negation must be denied. With this idea of a
single life, of a single being before them, what w, they
thought, cannot be this coming and this going that sense
apprehends ; there must be that which is, in the midst of
it all, and it alone is. Surely this very natural concep-
tion does not naturally house in so strange a monster as
Ens. Does it not transport us to the quiddities of the
schoolmen rather, or to the ten sons and Ens their father
in Milton ? But — returning — what Zeno says generally
then is this : — The changeableness and plurahty of the
everyday world is supposed to contradict the conception
of the universe as a single vmchangeable being ; and I
admit that both cannot be correct. Parmenides, however,
has, for his part, established the reasonableness of the
supposition of unity, and I wiU now, for my part, prove
to you that these elements, change and plurality, involve
contradictions, and are therefore incorrect, or vmtrue to
reason. Now the main peculiarity of Mr. Grote is sug-
gested here. The opponents of the Eleatics are repre-
sented in the above to be those who, in Mr. Grote' s own
phrase, regarded the hypothesis of Parmenides as * obvi-
ously inconsistent with the movement and variety of the
phenomenal world.' Now this inconsistency is certainly,
somewhat perplexingly, an ingredient with Mr. Grote too,
but stiU he holds the adversaries of Zeno to be * advocates
of absolute plurality and discontinuousness,' to be 'those
who maintained the plurality of absolute substances, each
for itself, with absolute attributes, apart from the fact of

368 ANNOTATIONS.

Bcnse, and independent of any sensuous subject.' It
must be said, liowever, that in this opinion Mr. Grote
stands alone. Mr. Grote himself mentions Tennemann as
disagreeing with him ; and of all the authorities, English
or German, mentioned in these notes, not one supposes
* the reasoning of Zeno' to have been otherwise directed
than, as Tennemann holds, 'against the world of sense.'
The general conception of the Eleatic position in this
reference is, in the words of Erdmann, that * cognition of
sense is deceptive ;' and Mr, Grote seems to share it in
regard to all the Eleatics, Zeno alone excepted. Nay,
what was the meaning of the promenade of Diogenes, and
was not he an opponent of Zeno? Surely he at least
took Zeno to deny the truth of sensuous motion. It is
with this view in his mind, however, that Mr. Grote
says, in reference to the mulct which, sonorous in the
bushel, is insonorous in the grain, that Zeno is not rea-
soning about 'facts of sense, phenomenal and relative,
but about things in themselves, absolute and ultra-
phenomenal realities.' Yet, again, is not this self -con-
tradictory? Wbat, then, is motion? And, in the
immediate case, what is sound ? Can we suppose that
Zeno, when he argued about motion, referred to some-
thing ' absolute and ultra-phenomenal,' and not to what
was only sensuously distinguishable ? Or that the sound
he had in view was not the special one knowledge pecu-
liar to the ear, but sound in itself, sound absolute and
ultra-phenomenal ? The truth is that what Zeno wants
to point out in reference to the millet, as everywhere
else, is simply the contradiction which the fact of sense
involves or seems to involve, or, as Erdmann says, that
the senses cannot keep up with reason. So it was under-
stood by Aristotle, whose answer to Zeno (hi regard to
vibrations, impressibility, etc.) is, on that understanding,
as Mr. Grote himself admits, perfectly valid. Though
one man cannot lift a ton, a hundred men may, and each
man will lend his ovra. impulse. As with these, then, so
with the millet. One grain when it falls is not heard, a
bushel is, but each grain of the bushel contributed its
own share to the general vibration. Nor is the truth
here, though in reference to a sensuous fact, relative, but
absolute — absolute by the absoluteness of an analytic or
identical proposition. If the fall of the thousand grains
produced a certain vibration, it is absolutely certain that
eacb grain was there for its own. It is this relativity,

THE ELEATICS. 3G9

however, which Mr. Orote ha-s alone in mind, and we
shall take it up by itself aa a whole presently. Here wo
see that the resolution on the part of Mr. Grote to find
Zeuo arguing for this relativity in the modem sense has
led him not only to convert Zeno's opponents into abso-
lutists, but to be very gratuitously unjust to Aristotle.
Zeno's proof of contradiction in the facts of sense that
related to the millet held good only so long as the con-
tradiction was not explained ; Aristotle explained it ; but
Mr. Grote rejects the explanation because, alone of all
mankind, he believes Zeno not to have been reasoning
against the world of sense. But hostility to the solutions
of Aristotle is not, on the part of Mr. Grote, limited to
the millet problem : it is repeated in the rest. P. 100,
Mr. Grote says in a note, — ' These four arguments
against absolute motion caused embarrassment to Aiis-
totle and his contemporaries ; ' but that is more than the
sentence he quotes from Aristotle warrants. The predi-
cate ' absolute,' attached to ' motion,' is Mr. Grote's own,
while the sentence itself gives no warrant whatever to
the supposition that the 'embarrassment' was not re-
solved.* P. 103, Mr. Grote says: — 'But the purport of
Zeno's reasoning is mistaken, when he is conceived as
one who wishes to delude his hearers by pro\'ing both
sides of a contradictory proposition. His contradictory
conclusions are elicited with the express purpose of dis-
proving the premisses from which they are derived. For
these premisses Zeno himself is not to be held respon-
sible, since he borrows them from his opponents : a cir-
cumstance which Aristotle forgets, when he censures the
Zenonian arguments as paralogisms, because they assimie
the Continua, Space and Time, to be discontinuous or
divided into many distinct parts. Now this absolute
discontinuousness of matter, space, and time was not ad-
vanced by Zeno as a doctrine of his own, but is the very
doctrine of his opponents, taken up by him for the pur-
pose of showing that it led to contradictory consequences,
and thus of indirectly refuting it. The sentence of Aris-
totle is thus really in Zeno's favour, though apparently
adverse to him.* Opposite this, in the margin, we have
the words, ' Mistake of supposing Zeno's rediictiones ad
absurdum of an opponent's doctrine to be contradictions
of data generalized from experience.' "We have here the
gratuitous conversion of Zeno's opponents into absolutists,
and imfaimess to Aristotle clearly expressed. No one

* Aristotle only says :— "There are four arguments of Zeno's about
Motion •which bring difficulties to those resolving them [\vov<nv).'

370 ANNOTATIONS.

attributes to Zeno any * wish to delude his hearers by
proving both sides of a contradictory proposition.' The
sensuous phenomenon was simply generally supposed to
contradict the Eleatic noumenon, and Zeno merely sought
to show in defence that it contradicted itself. Properly,
then, his 'conclusions' are not elicited for 'disproving'
any 'premisses,' but to demonstrate incongruities in the
sensuous facts objected to him. Zeno, certainly, is not
to be held responsible for the facts of sense which were
the only premises he borrowed from his opponents ; but
quite as certainly Aristotle forgot nothing when he ob-
jected to Zeno that ho assumed space and time to be
infinitely divided ; for that was the very thing that Zeno
did assume. In very truth * the absolute discon,tinu-
ousness of matter, space, and time,' was ' advanced by
Zeno as a doctrine of his own,' and it precisely was not
' a doctrine of his opponents.' At least, unless Mr. Grote
can disprove it, the historical fact is, that Zeno is the
first who signalized what is called the * infinite divisi-
bility,' and he was led to it in the search of arguments
that would throw doubt on the sensuous change and the
sensuous plurality of the world of sense. The infinite
divisibility was his property then, and not that of his
opponents ; that of his opponents, on the contrary, was
the finite divisibility, the simple motion of sense. But
what are we to understand as Mr. Grote's own belief in
regard to the infinite divisibility? Are we to suppose
him to believe, as he seems to say, that leading to con-
tradictory consequences it indirectly refutes itself? A
few years ago there was no dearer toy in the hands of
the Aufklärung than the mathematical proof of infinite
divisibility; are we to suppose that the adherents of
that movement have authoritatively issued their de par le
roi that the infinite divisibility is now refuted and aban-
doned ? I fear there will be a good many grumblers in
camp, for the mathematical proof is stul there, however
much ' relativity ' would seek to ignore all proof what-
ever, even perhaps its own. This is a point on which the
Aufklärung will find itself obliged to make up its mind,
and in so doing it will be led into the realms of truth at
last. What Zeno wished to reduce to absurdity, then,
was the fact of motion as * generalized from experience,*
and not the infinite divisibility as doctrine of his oppon-
ents. Nay, this doctrine was expressly his, and it was
expressly opposed to the generalization from experience.

IIERÄCLITUS. 371

Aristotle's sentence, then, was really adverse to Zouo,
anil not even apjmrently in his favour. Aristotle, in
truth, has very fairly met the general argumentation of
Zcuo. De Quincey and Sir William Hamilton, excellent
Germans, excellent Grecians, both failed to see this in
Aristotle, but it escaped not the iron tenacity of Hegel,
whom, as we have seen, Mr. Lowes shows good sense in
following.

Before concluding this note, I may observe that in
Bayle's argument against Aristotle's Zcnonic solution
(See Hegel, Cesch. d. Phil. i. p. 291), there is a circum-
stance that does not come readily to the surface. Bayle
attributes to motion the power of actual infinite divi-
sion : * Car le mouveraent est une chose, qui a kv m6me
vertu que la division ; il touche une partie de I'espace
sans toucher Tautre, et ü touche toutes les unes apriis les
autres ; n'est-ce pas les distinguer actuellement ?' At
first sight this is quite as puzzling as the proof of the geo-
metrician ; solution is impossible indeed to any position
but that of Hegel. The very language of Bayle, indeed,
names a miracle ; finite motion is capable of infinite
touch, infinite division !

VII. — Heraclittbß.

OF terms here, perhaps the only one that requires a
word is becoming. * This is the only word in our lan-
guage,' says Ferrier, * which corresponds to the yLypd/xevov
(or ytyyeadai) of the Greeks, but it is an unfortunate word
in being both inexpressive and ambiguous. It often
stands for the proper, the decent. Of course that is not
the sense in which it is here used. It is used in some sort
of antithetical relation to Being, a relation which we
must endeavour to determine. For in these two words,
i<TTi and yiyveTai., dv and yiyvöfievov, centres the most car-
dinal distinction in the Greek philosophy, a distinction
corresponding in some degree to our substantial and
phenomenal.'

For 460, 500 b.c. is probably preferable as the date
when Heraclitus flourished (not was born, as ^Mr. Lewes
says — evidently by a slip of the pen). Mr. Lewes is origi-
nal, but not en\'iably so, in representing Heraclitus to
regard * the senses as the sources of all true knowledge.'
The truth, on universal authority, would seem to be com-

372 ANNOTATIONS.

pletely the reverse. Mr. Ferner corrects Mr. Lewes'a
statement on this point, and gives otherwise a very suc-
cessful account of the philosopliy of Heraclitus. Zeller
says, that * the stories told by Diogenes of the misanthropy
of Heraclitus are worthless, to say nothing of the salt-less
phrase, that while Democritus laughed at all, Heraclitus
wept at all.' The schoolboy conceit of the deep Heraclitus
and the universal Democritus being the one the crying and
the other the laughing philosopher, is surely picturesque
to nobody now ; surely it is (as Zeller says) uncommonly
* salt -less.' Mr. Grote gives a very full, accurate, and, as
usual, felicitous summary of all that is known as regards
the doctrines of Heraclitus ; but he seems, on the whole,
to remain, as it were, outside in his case, and to refuse to
accept his lesson (as regards universal reason) in the way
it is accepted by the most and the best. Hegel ascribes
to Cicero the attribution to Heraclitus of intentional ob-
scurity ('Cicero, Nat. Deor. L 26, etc., has a mauvaise id^e,
as is often the case with him, etc.') ; and Mr. Grote says
something similar to this ; but the attribution is not
restricted to Cicero ; it is to be found at least repeated in
Diogenes Laertius.

Vni. — Empedocles.

COMPARISON with the other historians will demon-
strate the excellent taste and judgment of Schweg-
ler in this section. About the place of Empedocles, his
value, the position of his philosophy, etc., there are many
disputes, and we have little but these to read anywhere
else under his name. But Schwegler avoids all that, and
assigns quietly what is at once reasonable and correct.
Hegel, though following the usual order in his lectures,
was in the habit of characterizing Empedocles as the pre-
cursor of Anaxagoras ; his reason being that there was
in Empedocles a certain ' stammer,' as Aristotle said, of
the idea of design. Michelet, then, in editing Hegel's
History of Philosophy, actually places Empedocles im-
mediately before Anaxagoras, assigning (ingeniously) as
additional reason that Empedocles, vacillating between
the one of Heraclitus and the many of Leucippus and
adopting both as his presuppositions, constitutes in this
very vacillation and adoption the transition to the causal
unity of Anaxagoras. Hegel is very short on Empedocles,

EMPEDOCLES.—TllE ATOMISTS. 373

' at he is lotl to use several phrases that throw welcome

_ ht on his owu views. P>clmanu fiiula in Eiupedoclcs

.1 synthesis of all the philosophers that preceded him

t rom Thales to Heraclitus without exclusion of a single

k. Mr. Grote does Empedocles full justice. Mr.

wea has once again a position of unenviable singularity

re ; placing Empedocles even after Anaxagoras. But

rely Hegel's understanding of Aristotle, both as regards

i' time when Anaxagoras wrote, and the mere a])proach

i the part of Empedocles to the great conception of

sign, cannot well be resisted. Zeller too (i. p. 707),

. epts the interpretation of Hegel, and gives (i. 558, 4)

reasons for the position usiiaUy assigned to Empedocles

^vhich one can hardly refuse. In truth Zeller and Hegel,

1 in connexion with Aristotle and Plato, are quite irre-

c.otible. Erdmann, too, supports the same view, as also —

a name we may mention to Mr. Lewes — Thomas Taylor.

One recurs again with satisfaction to the simplicity, yet

competent fulness, of Schwegler.

IX. The Atomists.

MR. LEWES holds Hegel to regard Democritus ' as
the successor of Heraclitus, and the predecessor
of Anaxagoras.' This, however, is not more correct than
a preceding allegation, that the same Hegel held Empe-
docles to be 'the precursor of the Atomists.' The state-
ments are self-discrepant, and if correct, would rest only
on the formality of external arrangement. Hegel directly
names Empedocles * a Pythagorean Italic that inclined to
the Ionics,' and, as we have seen, he preferred to con-
sider his doctrines directly before those of Anaxagoras.
Then whatever external place be assigned to Leucippus
and Democritus, Hegel says of these that, ' in continuing
the Eleatic school, they incline to the Italics,' Mr.
Lewes differs in a more important respect from Hegel's
view of Atomism, when he seems to regard it, as he did
that of Heraclitus, as a sensational system. ' Ideality of
sense,' Hegel calls the main feature in Atomism : the
' atom and the nothing ' appear to him ' ideal principles,'
and surely with reason. It is a harder saying of Hegel
when he describes Atomism as ' showing universal
quality or transition to the universal ; ' but this is a
deeply meaning characterisation of the fact that the

374 ANNO TA TIONS.

Atomistic principle was a universal with transition to tlie
particular, or that the universal atom was adequate to
explain all particular manifestations. Hegel asserts, in
opposition to Tennemann who represents atomism to be
'recognition of the empirical world as the only objec-
tively real world,' that * the atom and the void are not
emj)irical things : Leucippus says, it is not by the senses
that we know the true ; and thereby he originated an
idealism in the higher sense, not a merely subjective one.'
The difiference of Hegel from all the others is that he not
only reports, but thinks what he reports ; and thus his
history has a value to which that of all the others is in-
significant. Space fails here, however, for any further
exemplification of his strangely meaning writing, of which
the section before us is fulL

Mr. Lewes says, — *The Atomism of Democritus has
not been sufficiently appreciated as a speculation. Leib-
nitz, many centuries afterwards, was led to a doctrine
essentially similar ; his celebrated " Monadologie" is but
Atomism with a new terminology.' Section xxxiii. will
show to the reader how very groundless this statement
essentially is. Again : * Not only did these thinkers
concur in their doctrine of atomism, but also, as we have
seen, in their doctrine of the origin of knowledge : a co-
incidence which gives weight to the supposition that in
both minds one doctrine was dependent on the other.'
Mr. Lewes ascribes to the Atomists a quite Lockian
theory of knowledge : are we to suppose then that Leib-
nitz also participated in such a theory ?

Mr. Grote's statement of the Atomists is faithful, full,
and well-arranged. Modem relativity, however, is the
only philosophical position of which he still indicates ap-
probation. Hegel attributes it as 'a great merit ' to
Leucippus that he ' distinguished between the universal
and the sensible, the primary and the secondary, the
essential and the inessential qualities.' Mr. Grote is
of another way of thinking : ' Theophrastus,' he says,
* denies this distinction altogether : and denies it with
the best reason : . not many of his criticisms on Democri-
tus are so just and pertinent as this one.' A distinction
entertained by such thinkers as Kant and Hegel is not to
be so summarily dismissed, though plainly the absolute-
ness of the primary qualities will not suit the taste of a
Relativist.

ANAXJOORAS. 375

X. — A^iaxogoras.

]71R0M the axiom that only ' like can act upon likr,^
_ Anaxagoraa, we are told by Mr, Lewes (i. p. 101),
formed his homceomcrice. This is difilcult to reconcile
with Mr. G rote's statement from Theophrastus that Anaxa-
goras exjilaiued sensation by the action of unlike upon
unlike. This latter, indeed, and not the former, has been
universall}' regarded as his special principle — (see Zeller
vol. i. p. Gi)9). Surely, too, Mr. Lewes is very imhappy in
assuming Aristotle to have regarded the system of Anaxa-
goras as inferior to that of Empedocles. Aristotle (see
Zeller, vol. i. 558, 4) almost uniformly depreciated Empe-
docles, while everybody knows that Anaxagoras, in com-
parison with the rest, struck him as a sober man among
random babblers. Socrates, too, similarly expresses
himself in the Phcedo, and by all the latest and best
German authorities Anaxagoras is represented as the
initiator of that transference of the problem from matter
to mind which directly introduced the subjective theories
of the Sophists, and the objective philosophies of Socrates,
Plato, and Aristotle. Mr. Lewes protests against the
application by Hegel of such a name as eclectic to Anaxa-
goras. Hegel, as with such reality and depth of know-
ledge was alone possible to him, places and characteiizes
Anaxagoras as I have indicated. In fact, if he saw
'land' in Heraclitus, in Anaxagoras he sees 'light ;' and
he assigns to the latter an influence at once original and
supereminent. It is possible, for all that, that he may
have used the word eclectic in reference to Anaxagoras,
but, if so, I know not where. Mr. Lewes attributes to
Anaxagoras the distinction that * the senses perceive
phenomena, but do not and cannot observe noumena,^ and
this distinction he calls ' an anticipation of the greatest
discovery of psychology, though seen dimly and confus-
edly by Anaxagoras. ' Are we to understand, then, that
the greatest discovery of psycholgy is, that the senses
cannot find quality in the unqualified, taste in the taste-
less, sound in the soimdless, colour in the colourless, etc. ?
Is it so certain that dimness to such an insight would be
inferiority ?

Many other points one might discuss with Mr. Lewes,
but for the sake of space they must be omitted. "We
may remark, however, that at page 79 he seems to agree

376 ANNOTATIONS.

with Mr. Grote's low estimate of the Nous, while at page
83 he quotes Simplicius in such a manner as to restore
that principle to all its pristine dignity. To Mr. Grote's
estimate alluded to we now pass. There is nothing in the
fragments of Anaxagoras now remaining, Mr. Grote says,
to justify the belief that the author himself proposed
the Nous * (according to Aristotle's expression) as the
cause of all that was good in the world, assigning other
agencies as the causes of all evil (Mr. Grote's reference
is Aristotle's well-known locus that characterizes Anaxa-
goras as a sober man among babblers, because he had
seen that neither material principles nor a mere moving
force could account for the beauty and adaptation of the
course and structure of the universe, and had accordingly
proposed in room of these a thinking being, an intelli-
gence ; as for Anaxagoras "assigning other agencies," etc., I
can see no hint of this in Aristotle, who, indeed (Metaph.
xii. 10), actually blames Anaxagoras for not having made
a contrary to the good, etc. Mr. Grote proceeds :) It is
not characterized by him as a person — not so much as
the Love and Enmity of Empedocles. It is not one but
midtitudinous, and all its separate manifestations aie
alike, differing only as greater or less. It is in fact
identical with the soul, the vital principle or viiality,
belonging not only to all men and animals, but to all
plants also. It is one substance, or form of matter
among the rest, but thinner than all of them (thinner
than even fire or air), and distinguished by the peculiar
characteristic of being absolutely unmixed. It has mov-
ing power and knowledge, like the Air of Diogenes the
Apolloniate : it initiates movement, and it knows about
all the things which either pass into or pass out of com-
bination. It disposes or puts in order all things that
were, are, or will be ; but it effects this only by acting
as a fermenting principle. . . . Anaxagoras appears to
conceive his Nous as one among numerous other real
agents in Nature, material like the rest, yet differing
from the rest. . , . (He agrees with Zeller) that the
Anaxagorean Nous is not conceived as having either im-
materiality or personality.' This, then, evidently is a
very low estimate of the Nous. Despite the express
cause assigned by Aristotle for his selecting of Anaxa-
goras, the principle of this Anaxagoras shall be but a
material one among the rest ! How differently Anaxa-
goras himself seems to speak ! Nous to him is infinite,

ANAXAOOBAS. 377

.alvsohite, mixed with nothing, alono by itself, the purest
and subtlest of all things ; it is omniscient and omni-
l>otent ; it is dominant especially in what has soul,
wliether greater or less ; it has disposed all things
into a world ; nothing is separated from another bub
Nous ; all Nous is similar, both the greater and the less ;
but no other thing is similar to another. That is how
Anaxagoras himself expresses himself. Then snrely it
is quite evident from what Socrates says in the PJicedo
that the imderstanding of the countrymen of Anaxa-
goras was that his principle was a designing mind.
Nor does Aristotle dissent from this, but, on the con-
trary, he confirms it by a hundred expressions. The
voice of antiquity in general, indeed, is wholly to the
same effect. So with the modems — so with Hegel in
particular, who in Anaxagoras sees * light ' at last, and
the immediate transition to the subjective thought of Pro-
tagoras and the objective thought of Socratee. Mr. Grote
stands alone — alone against the world — unsupported,
as we shall presently see, even by Zeller. But a theo-
logical principle re-appearing in Anaxagoras after so many
philosophers, and even in the alnaost scientific age of
Diogenes and Democritus, would not have been to the
mind of Auguste Comte, and so neither is it to the
mind of Mr. Grote. Theology, Metaphysics, Illumination,
that is the cotirse of things in which Mr. Grote believes
in general, and that is the course of things which Mr.
Grote would see in Greece. Socrates is the most en-
lightened of Greeks, and to him the transition must be
influences of information only, not Anaxagoras with his
disturbing Nous, but Diogenes, Democritus, Zeno, and
Gorgias the Leontine. Surely, however, no one can
honestly weigh even the very erudition of the notes of
the Germans — say of Zeller alone — and entertain any
doubt as to what the nature of his belief should be. It
is unnecessary to foUow ^Mr. Grote into aU the particulars
of what I hold to be his general distortion of the principle
of Anaxagoras. With one or two of the main props the
whole fabric falls. Any one reading Mr. Grote alone
would go away with the belief that Zeller denied the
immateriality and the personality of the Nous ; but this
would — really — be a mistake, and I do not believe any
one would be more discontented with it than Zeller him-
self. Yet ZeUer uses the words — in such a context, how-
ever, as converts them into something very different from

378 ANNOTATIOXS.

\vhat they seem in the note of Mr. Grote. Zeller's de-
scription of the Nous is to this cflFect : — * It (vol. i. p. 679)
ia a thinking being, a spirit, the ordering and moving
force that from the homceomeric materials creates the
world. The Anaxagorean fragments do not in any
general manner declare the reasons of this assumption,
hut these are impHed in the qualities which distinguish
the Nous from the materials. These qualities are. three,
unity, power, and knowledge. The Nous is alone, un-
mixed with anything, separate from all, for only in free-
dom from any foreign element can it have power over all.
It is of all things the finest and purest. . . . Absolute
power over matter, further, belongs to the Nous, from
which proceeds all movement of matter, unlimited
knowledge finally it must possess, for only so will it be
able to order all for the best. The Nous, consequently,
must be simple, as otherwise it could not be omnipotent
and omniscient, and it must be these to be the fashioner
of the world ; the fundamental feature of the doctrine of
the Nous, and the one to which the ancients give the
greatest prominence, lies in the notion of the world-
forming power. We must assume therefore that this is
essentially the point from which Anaxagoras was led to
his doctrine. He was unable to explain motion from
mere matter, and still less the motion under law of the
beautiful and designful universe, nor would he appeal to
uninteUigible necessity or to chance, and so he assumed
an incorporeal being, the source of movement and arrange-
ment.' Zeller further admits Anaxagoras to have had in
mind the analogy of the human intelligence, and so far to
have conceived his Nous as in some sort personal {für-
sichseiendes, erkennendes Wesen) ; but he does not believe
at the same time Anaxagoras to have possessed quite
pure conceptions either of the immateriality or of the
personality of the Nous. There can be no doubt that
Anaxagoras had immateriality in his eye despite the de-
fects which he (Zeller) signalizes. These defects are that
the Nous is described imperfectly in general, and in par-
ticular as only a, finer matter, and participant of the
extension of things. But in a note Zeller tells us that
these objections are founded partly on 'the words the
finest of aU things, partly and particularly on what is
said of the existence of the Nous in things.' Now, neither
objection has any weight. People believe now-a-days
that the soul is immaterial, and yet many, so believing.

AXAXAGOnAS. ;{7D

would not licsitato to talk of it aa the finest or subtlest
thing of all. Why, the word liore (or Jiuent is literally
the most free from Inisk, a metajihor surely very mucli
in place in reference to what was incorporeal. As for
the presence of the Nous in things in such manner that
these might appear to possess parts of it, and that * greater
or less Nous ' might be spoken of in their reference, a
precisely similar mode of speech might legitimately be
used by any modern Thcist. God is, and God is reason,
and all things, equally participant in reason, do in a cer-
tain sort at the same time exhibit it vneqttalb/. Against
the personality of the Nous, Zeller brings forward no
other objections. In fact the whole negative of ZeUer is
merely the charge of imperfection, and, only supported
as it is, must be pronounced a very small one. A similar
negative he indicates as possible in the case of Aristotle,
and yet he urges it not, but refers to this very possibility
as pleading for Anaxagoras. Nay, as regards the passage
quoted by Mr. Grote, Zeller says in the note that he has
not the smallest reason for denying a theistic element in
the doctrine of Anaxagoras, and it is incorrect that he has
denied it : * this only I have maintained, and maintain,
that the breach between spirit and nature "was begun but
not completed by Anaxagoras, that the Nous was not
conceived as a subject actually independent of nature,
but, if on one side as incorporeal and intelligent, still on
another side as an element distributed to the indi\'idual
beings, and operative in the manner of a natural power.'
Apart from the slightness of Zeller's own supporting
grounds, and apart from all that can be urged for the
purely intellectual character of the Nous from Plato,
Aristotle, and elsewhere, it is evident that we might still
accept Zeller's general conclusion without being untrue
to the universal conviction on the subject. In short,
Zeller's position will now be understood, as weU as the
impossibility of his sympathizing in the smallest degree
with the general description of Mr. Grote in reference to
a Nous that is not so personal as the Empedoclean Love
and Hate, that is a matter among the rest, that has only
knowledge, etc., as the Air of Diogenes, that acts only as
a fermenting principle, that simply * stirs up * rotatory
motion, that is one among numerous other real agents,
etc. Neither do I think that ZeUer would judge other-
wise than Plato, Aristotle, and Hegel judged of Anaxa-
goras' ' application ' of his princii>le, that it was one,

380 ANNOTATIONS.

namely, that went pretty rauch 'into the air.' But
though he could not apply it, Anaxagoras certainly pro-
j)0sed the principle, and it was a universal and prepon-
derating principle, and no mere equal among many equals,
in the application of all of which Anaxagoras was quite
' consistent ' according to Mr. Grote, and quite free from
the known charges of Plato and Aristotle, to an opposite
efifect. The conclusion of the whole matter is that of
Schwegler, that the Nous was an immaterial principle,
but still physically conditioned.

'Kl.—The Sophists.

THE attention of the reader is particularly solicited to
this section, and to the transition to Socrates ; for
it is here that we begin to get a clear view of the lesson
of philosophy — the distraction, namely, between subjec-
tivity and objectivity, and our consequent duty.

There are many passages in Schwegler which leave us
without difficulty as to how the subjective side is to be
understood. In section xxiii., for example, he speaks
thus : — ' The feeling that philosophy must be emanci-
pated from its previous state of pupilage and servitude
strengthened ; a struggle towards greater independency
of research awoke ; and though none durst turn as yet
against the church itself, attempts were made,' etc. . . .
' It originated in a scientific interest, and awoke conse-
quently the spirit of free inquiry and a love of know-
ledge ; it converted objects of faith into objects of
thought ; raised men from the sphere of unconditional
belief into the sphere of doubt, of search, of understand-
ing,' ... * Another principle was thus brought into the
world, the authority of reason, the principle of intellect,'
. . . 'the spirit of inquiry, the longing for light, the
advancing intelligence of the time,' . . . ' the longing on
the part of consciousness for autonomy, for freedom from
the fetters of authority,' . . . ' a rupture of thought with
authority, a protest against the shackles of the positive, a
return of consciousness from its seK- alienation into self,'
... * nature and the moral laws of nature, humanity as
such, one's own heart, one's own conscience, subjective
conviction, in short, the rights of the subject began at
last to assume some value.' . . . * Scientific inquiry not only
destroyed a variety of transmitted errors and prejudices,

TUE SOPHISTS. 3S1

1 at. what was liicbly important, it turned the thoughts
iid attention of men to the mundane, to the actual ; fos-
tering and encouraging the habit of reflection, the feeling
of self-dependence, the awakened spirit of scrutiny anil
doubt : the position of a science of observation and ex-
periment presupposes an independent self-consciousness
on the part of the individual, a wresting of himself loose
from authority and the creed of authority, — in a word, it
presupposes scepticism : hence the originators of modem
philosophy, Bacon and Descartes, began with scepticism.*
In reading these ])hrases, would not every one fancy that
it was Mr. Buckle wrote them, and not Schwegler ?
They strike, indeed, the very key-note of tlie central
thought of Buckle, and, from end to end, I know not
that there is anj-thing else to be found in Buckle. That
' awakened spirit of scrutiny and doubt ' is the very
voice of him. It is not a voice restricted to Mr. Buckle,
however, but belongs to Mr. Grote as well What it insists
on, then, is wholly the 'rights of the subject.' These
rights the reader will probably perfectly iinderstand from
the quotations made for him : he will do well, however,
to read the whole section, as well as those on Socrates,
Plato, the French Illumination, the German Illumination,
and probably others that may of themselves occur to him.
Generally as regards the Sophists, I presume I may hold
it as established fact that Mr. Grote's vindication of them
founds on their ' advanced thinking,' and particularly
on their supposed defence of the rights of the subject.
It was Hegel who began this vindication of the Sophists,
and Mr. Grote's reason was Hegel's reason. Hegel has
been followed in this by every German historian of
weight who has written after him. Brandis and Ritter,
it is true, take a somewhat darker Nnew of the indivi-
duals concerned, but Zeller, Schwegler, Erdmann, etc.,
all literally follow Hegel. ^Ir. Grote, then, is evidently
right so far. But this so far is only one half. Defence
of the rights of the subject, this is one half of the action
of the Sophists, and in this they are defensible, justifiable,
laudable. Denial of the rights of the object, again, this
is the other half of the action of the Sophists, and in that
they are indefensible, unjustifiable, and positively censur-
able. Now Hegel and the rest see this latter half quite
as clearly, and fail not to make it quite as prominent
as the other one. Nay, the English historians to whom
we are in the habit of referring in these notes, have,

382 ANNOTATIONS.

one and all of them, tliough only perhaps more or less
imperfectly, given name to this same half, — one and all
of them, except Mr. Grote. Mr. Grote alone accentuates
the rights of the subject and a warranted relativity: Mr.
Grote alone forgets, knows not, or names not, the rights
of the object and a warranted irrelativity. But surely
in these days, when M. Comte himself, with the appro-
bation of Mr. Mill and Mr. Lewes, insists on the one sole
duty of aflSrmation and construction, it is out of place
and an anachronism, for Mr. Grote to insist only on the
duty of the negative, on the Aufklärung, pure and simple,
as it existed a hundred years ago, and as — with only a
change for the weaker and the worse — it has been revived
by Mr. Buckle. Surely it is time to leave these unhappy
Priests alone ; surely, in these days of agitation against
Decalogues and Confessions of Faith, the sin of the Priests
is no longer that of unpliancy to the Aufklärung ! But,
as is evident, space for discussion fails, and it must suffice
to oppose to Schwegler's expression of the rights of the sub-
ject, the same authority's expression of the rights of the
object. We can only select, indeed, a few phrases from
the section on the Sophists as follows : — ' The Sophists
introduced, in the form of a general religious and political
Aufklärung (illumination) the principle of subjectivity,
though at first only negatively, or as destroyer of all that
was established in the opinions of existing society ; and
this continued till Socrates opposed to this principle of
empirical subjectivity that of absolute subjectivity, or
intelligence in the form of a free moral wül, and asserted,
as against the world of sense, thought to be the positively
higher principle, and the truth of all reality.' ... * The
right of the Sophists is the right of subjectivity, of self-
consciousness (that is to say, the demand that all that is
to be acknowledged by me shall establish itself as reason-
able to my consciousness) ; its unright is the regarding of
this subjectivity as only finite, empirical, egoistic subjec-
tivity (that is to say, the demand that my contingent
will and personal opinion shall have the decision of what is
reasonable) ; its right is to have established the principle of
free-wiQ, of self -conviction ; its unright is to have set upon
the throne the contingent will and judgment of the indi-
vidual.' . . . 'To win a veritable world of objective thought,
an absolute import, to set in the place of empirical subjec-
tivity, absolute or ideal subjectivity, objective wül, and
rational thought, — this now was the task which Socrates

THE SOPHISTS. 383

undertook and achieved.' For conviction it would bo
necessary to(|uote the wliole passage ([)p. 37, .38), but these
phrases will stiyko the key-note, and induce tlio reader
to inquire further for himself into what is meant by
'objective thought,' ' universality, universal validity, in a
word, objectivity.' What Ilegel writes in this connexion
is the original of all this, of all that concerns the Sophists
under both aspects, and it is something singularly deep-
working, exhaustive, and true. (Jladly woidd we trans-
late, gladly wotild wo follow up with quotations from
Erdmann and Zeller, but space forbids, and wo must be
content with reference. Mr. Orote leaves us in no doubt
as to his position here, even without consideration of his
expi'ess chapter on the Sophists in his History of Qrecce.
In a note to his Plato (vol. ii. p. 3G1) we read as follows : —
' This is the objection (Subjectivism) taken by Schwegler,
Prantl, and other German thinkers, against the Pro-
tagorean doctrine. . . . These authors both say that the
Protagorean canon, properly understood, is right, but
that Protagoras laid it do-WTi WTongly. They admit the
principle of Subjectivity as an essential aspect of the case
in regard to truth ; but they say that Protagoras was
wrong in appealing to individual, empirical, accidental
subjectivity of each man at every varying moment,
whereas he ought to have appealed to an ideal or uni-
versal subjectivity. "What ought to be held time,
right, good, etc." (says Schwegler), " must be decided
doubtless by me, but by me so far forth as a rational
and thinking being. Now, my thinking, my reason, is
not something specially belonging to me, but something
common to all rational beings, something universal ; so
far therefore as I proceed as a rational and thinking
person, my subjectivity is an universal subjectivity.
Every thinking person has the consciousness that what
he regards as right, duty, good, evil, etc., presents itself
not merely to him as such, but also to every rational
person, and that, consequently, his judgment possesses
the character of universality, universal validity ; in one
word, Objectivity." Here it is explicitly asserted that,
wherever a number of individual men employ their
reason, the specialties of each disappear, and they arrive
at the same conclusions — Reason being a guide imper-
sonal as well as infallible. And this same view is ex-
j)ressed by Prantl in other language, when he reforms
the Protagorean doctrine by saying, " Das Denken ist der

384 ANNOTATIONS.

Mass der Dinge." To me this assertion appears so dis-
tinctly at variance with notorious facts, that I am sur-
prised when I find it advanced by learned historians of
philosophy, who recount the very facts which contradict
it. Can it really be necessary to repeat that the reason
of one man differs most materially from that of another
— and the reason of the same person from itself, at dif-
ferent times — in respect of the arguments accepted, the
authorities obeyed, the conclusions embraced ? The
impersonal Heason is a mere fiction ; the universal Rea-
son is an abstraction, belonging alike to all particular rea-
Boners, consentient or dissentient, sound or imsound, etc.
Schwegler admits the Protagorean canon only under a
reserve which nullifies its meaning. To say that the
Universal Reason is the measure of truth is to assign no
measure at all. The Universal Reason can only make
itself known through an interpreter. The interpreters
are dissentient ; and which of them is to hold the privi-
lege of infallibility ? Neither Schwegler nor Prantl is
forward to specify who the interpreter is who is entitled
to put dissentients to silence ; both of them keep in the
safe obscurity of an abstraction — " Das Denken " — the
Universal Reason. Protagoras recognises in each dissen-
tient an equal right to exercise his own reason, and to
judge for himself. In order to show how thoroughly
incorrect the language of Schwegler and Prantl is, when
they talk about the Universal Reason as unanimous and
unerring, I transcribe from another eminent historian of
philosophy a description of what philosophy has been
('* Une multitude d'hypothfeses . . . une diversity d' opin-
ions . . . des sectes, des partis m§me, des disputes inter-
minables, des speculations steriles, des erreurs," etc. etc.),
from ancient times down to the present.*

We shall not in detail criticise these deliverances (in
which Schwegler* s reader will of himself perceive errors
as regards Protagoras, italics, etc.) ; but a word will prove
useful on the question at stake. The terms subjective
and objective have acquired now so many shades of
meaning that they often perplex. The universal English
sense as yet is, That that is subjective which belongs to
a cognizing subject, and that objective which belongs to
a cognized object. The cognized object, again, if itself
mental, is subjectivo-objective ; if not mental, but (at
least relatively) material, it is objectivo-objective. These
are not the important German senses, however, and they

THE SOPHISTS. 385

are not thoao of the citation from Schwegler. Subjec-
tivity, as there used, is what is mine, antl mine only ; it
is not yours, it is not liis ; it is luiue, and distinctive of
me. Objectivity, again, as used in the same citation, is
neither mine, nor yours, nor his, and yet mine, and
yours, and his ; it is not proper and peculiar to any single
one of us in his own separate and individual ]>er3onality
or originality — it is common to us all in our iini-
versal humanity. In short, the one is acc'ulmn 'mdir'ulul,
the other differentia tjeneris. The element of subjec-
tivity, now, being restricted to A as A, to B as B, etc.,
can only exist as 8ubjectivitj&9, a chaos of miscellanies,
of individual units, of infinite differences. These ditier-
ences must remain for ever ditferent, disjunct, isolated,
beside one another ; for they have nothing in common.
It is otherwise with the element of objectivity. Whüe
subjectivities are insusceptible of comparison, objectivity
may be compared with objectivity, and so at length a
system formed in which we all meet. What is subjective,
then, as incapable of comparison and commxinicaiion, is,
for humanity as humanity, valueless ; while objectivity,
on the contrary, as capable of both, is, in that respect,
alone valuable, and invaluable. Subjective truth, then,
is truth for this subject, or that subject. Objective truth
is truth for this subject and that subject. Evidently,
then, objective truth is independent of the subject as
subject. The object is his filling, his contents ; it is
truly he. He, apart from that object, is empty, nothing ;
but stül it is independent of him. He rather is depen-
dent on it. As a subject his only right wdth reference to
the object, is that he should find it his, that it should
be brought home to his subjective con\'iction. That is
the only truth or right of the principle of subjectivity.
The truth or right of the principle of objectiWty again
is an absolute truth or right : it is binding on every
subject — on every subject whose right of subjectivity
has been adequately respected. For these ideas it is im-
possible to find better expression than that of Schwegler
(xi. 6), as referred to by Mr. Grote. Now, on the prac-
tical side, this is the best outcome of Kant and Hegel ;
this is the outcome of German philosophy ; all else there is
but its application. When we consider that it is this that
is in question in the citation from Schwegler, is not the
naive astonishment of Mr. Grote at such a doctrine posi-
tively amusing ? Helativiti/, according to Mr. Grote, im-

'2 b

386 ANNOTATIONS.

parts, in view of their equal right, universal benignancy
towards all opinions. Here, however, Mr. Grote'a feelings
are too much for him. He is forced to declare his * surprise'
at an assertion * so distinctly at variance with notorious
facts ;' and he cannot help exclaiming, with the air of a
shocked, stunned, but still authoritative preceptor, ' Can
it really be necessary to repeat?' What Mr. Grote
repeats is, that ' the reason of one man differs most
materially from that of another ;' but have not the
Germans an equal right to exclaim to Mr. Grote, * Can it
really be necessary to repeat that the reason of one man
does not differ most materially from that of another, but,
on the contrary, the reason of one man is essentially
identical with that of another ?' It is due to Mr. Grote,
however, to examine his position, as contained in the
overlying text on the Theaetetus more at large.

From this we soon learn that Mr. Grote's general
philosophical creed is that which has been named of
Relativity. One's first difficulty is what is meant by the
term. Relativists in England are now-a-days spoken of
with awe. They have inscribed on the universe the
great principle of relativity, we hear. "When we ask
what this great principle is, however, we are referred to
the appearance of the skin under a microscope, or to the
variety of existent and non-existent opinions, perhaps — in
fact, we are left at last with the word Relativity, and an
empirical example or two. We should like to know
what relativity is, where it begins, how it works itself
out, where it ends, etc., but no one can show us that —
no one thinks of showing us that. This, however, ought
not to be so difficult — Hegel's system is that. An Abso-
lute is impossible without — is only through and for, a
Relative. The Absolute, then, will be the Relativity —
or the System of all existent relativities or relations.
Instead of giving us this complete relativity — relativity
as it is and works — the bones and skeleton of a imiverse
— Mr. Grote gives us this bare phrase only, The implica-
tion of Subject and Object. There can be no object with-
out a subject, says Mr. Grote, and therefore relativity is
the whole and sole philosophy. If the phrase without
the thing relativity dissatisfied, here we are perplexed
with the reason for the general doctrine itself. Surely
it is a commonplace that cognition is impossible without
the coincidence of an object and a subject. So far as I
know, no human being ever denied that. Mr. Grote

THE so PUIS TS. 387

evidently speaks, however, as if tliere were those in the
worhl who pretend to know an absohite, and an absohite
by Mr. Groto is defined (vol. i, j). 23) as ' something
ajiart from or independent of one's own thinking mind.'
This, then, is simply a mistake, Hegel is probably an
absolntist to Mr. Grt>te, bnt Hegel's idea of cognition is
Mr. Grote's own. Inseparability of snbject and object
is one of Hegel's arguments against what is called imme-
diate knotvledge. Hegel, however, did not lind this single
inseparability the instant open Sesame into an entire
new philoso])hy. Hiwi he done here, indeed, as Mr.
Grote has done, we never should have had a philosophy
at all. Sensation without a subject, idea without a sub-
ject, that is impossible, Hegel might have said, but that
is not much, cela va sans dire. The important thing is
to see that sensations and ideas in a subject constitute
the universe, and that philosophy will be an explanation
of these and of it. Philosophy, in short, will have for
result relati\'ity, but relativity — in system.

But when we read on, aud get more familiar with Mr.
Grote's conception of the relation between subject and ob-
ject, we find that Mr. Grote's relati\'ity does not depend
on this relation as a relation at aD. Mr. Grote's relativity
is due not to the relation between the two terms, subject
and object, but wholly and solely to the peculiar nature
of one of the terms, the subject. Mind, it seems, is so
peculiar a Gorgon that it transforms objects into its own
nature ; and so, no two minds being alike, no two objects
are alike, and therefore it is that all is relative. All
this is said a hundred times in the exposition of the
Thesetetus, and quotation is almost superfluous. For
exemplification, however, it is impossible altogether to
dispense with an extract. P. 328, Mr, Grote says : —
* My intellectual activity — my powers of remembering,
imagining, ratiocinating, combining, etc., are a part of
my mental nature, no less than my powers of sensible
perception : my cognitions and beliefs must all be deter-
mined by, or relative to, this mental nature : to the turn
and development which all these various powers have
taken in viy individual case. However multifarious the
mental activities may be, each man has his own peculiar
allotment and manifestations thereof, to which his cogni-
tions must be relative.' And again (p. 335): 'Object is im-
plicated with, limited or measured by, Subject: a doctrine
proclaiming the relativeness of all objects, perceived, con-

nS8 ANNOTATIONS.

ceived, known, or felt — and the omnipresent Involutior
of the perceiving, conceiving, knowing, or feeling Sub-
ject ; the object varying with the subject. " As things
appear to me, so they are to me ; as they appear to you,
so they are to you." This theory is just and important,
if rightly understood and explained.* Mr. Grote's asser-
tion of subjective truth as the only truth cannot then, in
view of such extracts (which might easily be multiplied a
hundredfold), for an instant be doubted. It will be
found, indeed, that the theory spoken of, as * understood
and explained' by Mr. Grote, amounts to the proposition
of Protagoras in its unrestricted sense. Nay, Mr. Grote
is even willing to waive dispute, and accept the Platonic
expression itself in regard to this proposition, on condition
only of a small addition. That every opinion of every man
is true, this, to be perfectly accurate for Mr. Grote, requires
but the simple addition of — to that man himself. It is in
this sense that he says, p. 351, * The dog, the horse, the
new-born child, the lunatic, is each a measure of truth to
himself.' Now, this can only mean that what the man,
the dog, the horse, the new-born child, the lunatic feels,
he feels. But do we need a philosophy of philosophies
to tell us that ? That this theory, if a theory, is 'just,'
there can be no doubt, but * important' — that I fear it must
remain only for Mr. Grote. What is true and right for a
man, is true and right for that man. This, indeed, on its
first aspect, is but an idle tautology, and a man would
as little think of contradicting it as he would think of
contradicting any other identical proposition. The planet
is a planet, the stone is a stone ; we are all agreed on
these truths, and quite as much on these others, that
■what the man, or child, or lunatic, or dog, or horse
feels, he feels. Not one of us, however, would, in such
truths, see progress — the slightest quiver of an advance.
Mr. Grote must mean more, then, than that identity is
identity. But this more can only be that the proposition,
what is true and right to a man, is true and right to that
man, constitutes the single definition of truth, the single
definition of right. The reason of one man differs, Mr.
Grote says, most materially from that of another ; conse-
quently the truth of one man differs most materially from
that of another ; and there is no truth whatever in exist-
ence, but this the truth for each. As a universal reason
is a fiction, so a universal truth is a fiction. This, then,
is the proposition of Protagoras pure and simple. There

TUE SOPIIISrS. 380

is no call for Mr. Crete's üiutological addition ; that tau-
tology is, as said, idle. Mr. Grote docs iu very deed
categorically aver : There is no truth but tlie truth for
each. Truth, then, is as multiform as the particular
miuda. No object is independent of the particular sub-
jects ; these subjects are many, and all different ; and
truth, consequently, is particuhu- to each particular. The
self colours all, the object cannot be 4;iveu xmcoloured,
and each self has its own colour. It is this assumed
necessary subjectivity of all objects that is the source of
the singular alliance of modern Kelativity and modem
Psychology (English both) with Berkeley. These new
allies of Berkeley, however, give a strange material turn
to the idealism of that philosopher : at least, tliey cer-
tainly accentuate the individual subject, and on his
sensuous or material side. It is to be admitted, however,
that the brain may be regarded as ideal, with thought as
relatively a function of it ; and, in that case, we may
hope that the ideal scalpel will be more successful than
the real one in detecting the bridge between what must
stul be called — at least relatively — matter and mind.
Truth, then, is each individual's proper and peculiar
colour, and no two individuals are alike. Neither, then,
are any two colours alike, are any two truths alike.
Each truth, consequently, as equally authentic, is equallj''
legitimate. There is no criterion of truth and right, but
what each particular man feels and thinks — feels and
thinks at the time. Either Mr. Grote's entire speech
goes to this, or, as said, to the most trivial tautolog)\
Well then, if it be so, what is true and right to me in
feeling and thought, shall also be true and right to me iu
will and action ; and as one man is as good as another,
every man has a perfect right to do as he likes. This is
too evidently absurd, however, and, though this is really
what is explicit in the teaching of Mr. Grote, there is
something quite different implicit.

Mr. Grote started with the relation, but presently de-
serted it for one of the extremes, and to it sacrificed the
other. This, indeed, is his single operation : he has de-
stroyed the object before the subject. In reference to
any relation, however, involving, as it necessarily does,
both terms, no one can express either without implying
the other. And this is the case here. In explicating
subjectivity, !Mr. Grote has only been correspondently
implicating objectivity. That is a natural dialectic which

390 ANNOTATIONS.

may be recommended to the attention of every Relativist.
Proofs of this correspondent implication of objectivity
exist, as said, in every sentence of Mr. Grote that — con-
sciously— has no aim but to explicate subjectivity. We
can only take an example or two. ' Comparisons and
contrasts,' he says, p. 341, 'gradually multiplied between
one consciousness and another lead us to distinguish,' etc.
There is, then, necessarily, an element capable of com-
parison and communication in us, and the result of this
process can only be a body of generalized distinctions.
But this element is not possibly the subjective element :
we cannot possibly compare even our smells or our tastes ;
what we can possibly compare are only our thoughts : the
47th proposition of Euclid is the same for all of us.
P. 349, * It is for the reader to judge how far my reasons
are satisfactory to his mind ; ' what does that appeal
amount to ? Why, to this, that both writer and reader
may meet in judgment, that there is a common ground
between them, and that the writer hopes he has been true
to it. Mr. Grote admits (p. 352) all men not to be equally
wise ; but is it possible to talk so without the admission
of a standard? He only who can feel heat qua heat
knows the degrees of it, and so of wisdom. In fact,
the moment you say not equally the principle of sub-
jective relativity is virtually abandoned, a new test,
a new criterion, a new standard, is introduced ; it
is no longer / for myself, but another for me, and
that because he possesses not only subjective wisdom
but objective wisdom. That is, the moment we say
not equally we have left subjectivity, and entered ob-
jectivity. Page 351, Mr. Grote says, that though the
dog, the horse, the new-bom child, the lunatic, etc., is a
measure of truth each to Mmself, it is not declared that
'either of them is a measure of truth to me, to you, or
to any ordinary bystander.' This, explicitly, is the hope-
less tautology already signalized, each is eacb, and the
standard of truth is the individual. As many individuals,
so many standards of truth ; no judge, therefore, and
consequently no sentence. This is the explication, but
the implication is, there is a standard of truth. Each is a
measure of truth to himself, but he is not a measure of
truth to me, etc. (Is this thing to which Mr. Grote ex-
plicitly refers a measure of truth at all ? It were a
strange standard that were a standard only to one ; very
strange standards these where each has his own !) Im-

THE SOPHISTS. 391

pHritly, then, a standard, a measure, that is, a common
stall (lanl, a, comtnon nieasure, ia, re, vera, referred to.
What is it? 'J'he measure for me, for you, for any ordi-
nary bystander, it is precisely that measure that ia alone
truth, that is alone wanted. That the particular senti-
eney is only in the particular sentient is a truism, but it
ia not, in tins reference, (ritfh. The truth, really, is not
that what I feel I feel ; that is subjectivity pure and
simjile ; mi/ feeling, if only mij feeling is worthless, is as
good as & nouens. Truth begins only when what I feel,
another feels, when what I think, another thinks. Then,
and then only, as said, have we entered objectivity,
until the dog, the horse, etc., can introduce us to this
region, we may very well leave them alone. In point of
fact, does the universe allow this measure of truth that
the dog is to himself, the horse to himself, the lunatic to
himself, etc. ? No ; dog, horse, lunatic, have to become,
each in his j)lace, representatives of the measure of reason.
And, as for the child, what is it, that is at all seen in it,
at all honoured in it? Why, reason, universal reason,
man as man. Why is that squalling struggling impotence
held at the font, amid the awe-struck faces of grown
men and grown women, with all the solemnity of cere-
mony, with all the sanctity of religion ? Possibly these
grown men, and women, and all concerned, may seem
fools to Mr. Grote. But the one fact present is, that
that squalling impotence is implicitly a man, is implicitly
reason. Forthat cause is all the gravity of the solem-
nity ; and for this cause, that the child is not a measure
of truth even for itself, do fathers and mothers, and
godfathers and godmothers there take vows to replace its
unreason with their reason till, in the ripeness of time, it
is itself, in reason, a freeman of the universe.

How diflferently the general problem would have
seemed to Afr. Grote had he but made both terms of the
relation, and equally so, explicit I Did it never occur to Mr.
Grote to question what I have called the Gorgonization of
the object on the part of the subject? This Gorgoniza-
tion, it is to be admitted, is the belief of all subjective
idealism — (the object can only be known in me, in the
subject, and therefore it ia subjective, and, if subjective,
ideal) — but still it is capable of question. Does it not
seem absurd to say, that by interposition of mind, by
which alone knowledge is possible, knowledge is at the
same time impossible ? What alone renders something

392 A NNO TA TIONS.

possil)le, alone renders it impossible ! I know, but, be-
cause I know, I do not know ! I see, but, because I see,
I do not see ! Is it a fact, then, that, because both —
subject and object — are present in cognition, the one
must be destroyed by the other, and not that cognition
may be made true, but that it may be made false ? In a
word, is it not worth while to consider the whole antithesis :
an object is known because there is a subject to know
it ; au object is not known because there is a subject to
know it ? But here we can only suggest.

If it is quite true, then, as Mr. Grote says, that the auto-
nomy of each individual mind, the right of private judg-
ment, or as we phrase it, the right of subjectivity, is the
basis of philosophy and the centre of appeal, we must
bear in mind that it is still only a half truth, and that it
is a whole truth only when complemented with the right
of objectivity. A being possessed of reason is not to be
subjected — unless as a last resource — to mechanical force :
his conviction is to be addressed and carried with us.
This, doubtless, lies in the very fact of the cross-exami-
nation of Socrates (to refer to another argument of Mr.
Grote's), but in that fact there lies also more. The maieu-
tic art of the son of Phasnarete the midwife was for a
birth — the second birth — the birth of the object out of
the subject. That is the end of all true maieutics, elimi-
nation of the position of Mr. Grote, and establishment of
that of Socrates — the authority of the universal. Into
the service of the universal, the individual must harness
himself. Though, then, it is my right that I should be
present with my own conviction to whatever truth is pro-
posed, it is the right of this truth also, so to speak, that
it should not be a mere subjectivity, a mere singularity,
a mere peculiarity in a single individual ; it is the right
of this truth that it should be objective — in Mr. Grote's
own language, it is the right of this truth that it should
be reasoned truth. By this phrase, which occurs very
commonly in Mr. Grote, he implicitly abandons the whole
position of subjectivity. Truth to be truth at all must
be reasoned truth. .Mr. Grote has still the difficulty, in-
deed— who is to dictate this reasoned truth ? But in the
case of reasoned truth is any dictator required ? Reason
is a common possession, and we either all already do meet
in reason, or we all shall meet. Mr. Grote's surprise at
opposition on the part of Schwegler and Prantl to ' noto-
rious facts,' was, as we have seen, the naive avowal of a

THE so nils TS. 393

like insight at bottom. Notoiioiis facts, reasoned truth
- — that is objectivity. When Mr. Grote considerH only
the infinitely ditTerent coh)urs of the intinitely dilFereut
snbjocts, ho has before him a world of infinitely different
objects also. But the ditTerence in which we part must
not blind ns to the identity in which we meet. 'I'he world
i>< not an evei shifting chaos of countless particulars only.
There are laws in the world-system. ITie daily life of the
universe and the daily life of man pass, so to speak, in a
maze and mist of the contingent, the relative ; particular
clashes with j)articular, individual with individual, and
the entanglement seems hopeless. Kevertheless, there is
within the maze and mist a solid core which is universal,
and not particular, necessary and not contingent, abso-
lute and not relative. This core, this system, is, in ulti-
mate name, reason ; and it is to this reason, as the com-
mon possession of humanity, that Prautl and Schwegler
appeal. As common possession, it is universal identity
certainly, but as possession of humanity it can hardly be
called impersonal. With reference to the universe, in
general, indeed, this reason cannot be called im])eFsonal,
for it is a life ; neither can it be called infallible, if in-
fallible means fixed, for a life is progress.

But, for reasoned truth, whether dictators be required
or not, do we not possess them ? "What are books for
example ? [The Book, let us only suggest.) The Organon
of Aristotle is, in very truth, not the particular sub-
ject Aristotle ; it is an object — an object received, per-
fected, transmitted : the Organon of Aristotle is therefore
objective incorporation with us. Books ! and who again
is to interpret your books ? Is that, then, really so diffi-
cult ? Do we not all learn our astronomy and mathe-
matics contentedly enough ? Even in other sciences is
the difficulty a want of interpreters ? But, books apart,
and let it be contained where it may, there really is
knowledge objective and common to us all. It is the
very purpose of the Theaetetus to point out this know-
ledge. Mr. Grote ignores this, and will have it that the
TheaBtetus has only a negative result. We can trust
Schwegler, however, and on his authority believe the
Theaetetus to be a demonstration of the fact of objective
knowledge. To the contributions of the senses from
■without there are additions from the faculties within, and.
these additions, comparable the one with the other, are
the same in each of us and alike for us alL These addi-

394 ANNOTATIONS.

tions have in modern tiraea been called categories, and
much has already l^een done towards their discovery and
summation. Space is not exactly a category, but as con-
ceived by Kant, it will illustrate these. The contribu-
tions of special sense, Kant holds to receive their dispo-
sitions in space, as it were by a projection from within.
In space we all agree — even conceive it actually external
— it is an example of an objective truth. So time, so
quantity, etc. But the true answer to Mr. Grote'a ques-
tion about a judge, an interpreter, a dictator, etc., is —
the State.

Where can you get a better proof of relativity than the
State ? — it is never a year the same ! As a life, as pro-
gress, the State must change ; nevertheless it is the true
authority. Even Socrates had to leave all abstract defi-
nition of justice and appeal to the State. Instead of the
State, Mr. Grote seems to advocate individual authority.
This is the only provision for agreement — for approach to
a universal — which I can find in Mr. Grote. 1 may try
to get others to accept my views ; and so a certain esti-
mation ou the part of others, a certain authority in their
eyes, becomes possible for me. Still Mr. Grote speaks of
this authority as something merely subjective ; as some-
thing dependent on the good-pleasure of others. Is it
good-pleasure, then, and not reason that leads me to pre-
fer the better physician, or even the better baker ? Mr.
Grote talks of this tendency in us towards rational autho-
rity, quite in the manner of the Aufklärung, as if it were a
mere subjective tendency, a mere predisposition in us. It
is in this way that Mr. Buckle talks of our superstitions,
our received opinions, our prejudices. Still, what could
be the only ultimate result of this process, even if merely
subjective, as Mr. Grote seems to believe ? Why, this is
Hobbes's helium omnium in omnes, and its result is — the
State. But this result has left that bellum long behind
it, and it were an anachronism to return to it. That
bellum, indeed, was but the initial state of nature. That
we have been delivered from the tyranny of such mere
subjective opinion, and such mere subjective authority —
for this we have to thank the State. The State has a
right of coercion, and in this right, Mr. Grote will
recognise an objective element, a universal in which we
all agree, or which is capable of being brought home to
the subjective conviction of each of us.

There is a period in the history of the State when

THE SOPHISTS. 395

people live in tradition ; that is a j)criod of unreflected
Siftlk'fikt'it, or natural observance. Then there comes a
time wlien the observances are questioned, and Avhen tlio
right or truth they involve is reflected into the subject.
This is a period of Aufklärung, and for Sittlichkeit there
is substituted Moralität, subjective morality : the sub-
ject will approve nought but what he tinds inwardly true
to himself, to his conscience. In this period, then, all
is subjective ; what is holy and authoritative is the
spirit of the subject, and of the subject as independent
individual. But then, evidently, there is no guaraTitee
for the correctness of the spirit ; each refers to his own
spirit, and subject may differ from subject indefinitely,
— agreement there may be none. But Society cannot
exist so ; a system of observances again results, and this
time of reflected observances, that is, of such observances
as approve themselves to the consciousness of every com-
petent subject. The subject now is not, as under Mora-
lität, shut into his own self, but has the enjoyment of
himself objectively, outwardly, as realized in actual ob-
servances, institutions, etc. There is now a reign of
objective reason. Here is a triplet, then, of substantial
worth, in contrast with which the triplet of Comte cannot
conceal how much it is but French precipitate and super-
ficial theorizing. It is referred to here, however, to
make credible how it is that the State may, in its laws
and institutions, in its arts and sciences, in its customs
and manners, constitute the arbiter and dictator of what
is objectively true, objectively right. "What stadium
Mr. Grote occupies in it will be readily perceived. It is
this stadium that prescribes the whole general position of
Mr. Grote, as in his account of the pre-Socratic philo-
soph5% where he disposes all (not without a little com-
pressure in passing to the reason of Heraclitus, the Nous
of Anaxagoras, or the argumentation and place of Zeno)
into the due series that stretches from ancient religious
superstition to modern physical enlightenment, enforcing
always the single duty of the negative to those * early
doses,' which we all ' swallow,' ' of authoritative dogmas
and proofs dictated by our teachers,' On all points, I
have been able to say only a tithe of what I wished to
say, I have done no more, indeed, than indicate, I
trust, however, that regard as I may the objective pro-
duct of Mr, Grote, I have neither been unjust to it, nor
failed in admiration of his owti great subjective ability.

596 ANNOTATIONS.

XII. — Socrates.

IN passing from the first (the Pre-Socratic) to the
second (tlie Socratic) period of the history of an-
cient philosophy there is room for a moment's retro-
spect. In looking back, then, we see that the Ionics
began the philosophical, as in contrast to the mytho-
logical, explanation of existence by the proposal of a
material principle (water, air, etc.) as unity and source
of all things. The Pythagoreans proposed nextly (in
numerical ratios) 2^, formal principle ; and were followed,
in their turn, by the Eleatics, who, in the necessary
affirmative substrate that was conceived to underlie the
negative contingency of existence, sought to replace both
material and formal principles by an intelligible one. As
a truer basis of the all of things, Heraclitus set up, in
lieu of the simple affirmative of Being, the negativo-
affirmative of Becoming. Becoming was no concrete
principle, however, but simply the abstraction of process,
of change, as such. However true a characteristic of
things, it was a naming merely, and not an explaining.
Passing over Empedocles, who was but an imperfect step
in the same direction as, and only partially suggestive to,
Anaxagoras, it was the Atomists now who returned to
an attempt at concrete explanation. Their materials, the
atoms, were certainly an ingenious machinery in inter-
pretation of the being of things. Anaxagoras saw, how-
ever, that the becoming of things, evidently subjected to
law and order, coidd only be unsatisfactorily accounted
for by mechanical necessity and chance, and he pro-
posed, instead, the agency of a designing mind. One can
see, then, that Anaxagoras constituted the completion of
a circle of thought, the completion of an intellectual era,
which, in Hegelian language, may be regarded as corre-
sponding to the moment of simple apprehension. The
next logical moment, then, was plainly that of judgment,
and it was initiated by the Sophists. The Sophists,
namely, were thrown back from the thought that was
pointed to in the universe by Anaxagoras to the thought
as thought that existed in themselves. To that thought,
subjective thought, all things, whether in nature or
society, were now submitted with the necessary result of
a complete Aufklärung, the Grecian Illumination. It is
here that Socrates comes in. His moral purity revolted

SOCHA TES. 307

at the instability and insecurity to wliicli all rules of
conduct wero reduced by the principle of the Sophists.
So influenced, Socrates sought a standard of conduct.
This standard ho conceived himself to find in what wo
may call scientific generaliz;ition. Let us but know, he
thought, tlie universal or generic notion of any duty, and
then wo shall know all forms of tiiat duty, and of neces-
sity practise them. Through generalization, each duty
was, to Socrates, knowable, tcacJuible, and (with all its
forms) one.

In support of the doctrine of objectivity as against
subjectivity and Mr. Grote, contained in the ' Transition
to Socrates,' I may quote Hegel, who, in the sections
[HUt. of PhiV\ on Socrates and the Sophists, speaks often
thus : — 'True thought is such that its import is not sub-
jective but objective, objectivity having the sense here
of substantial universality, and not of external objectivity;
what mind thus produces from its own self must be
produced from it as active in a universal manner, not
from its passions, private interests, and selfish motives ;
man as thinking and as giving himself a universal im-
port, man in his rational nature and universal substan-
tiality, not every man in his particular speciality as this
contingent individual man, is the required measure.'
From Erdmann, too, I may quote this : — ' All truth lies
in the subject, but only so far as he is universal ; not
Traj ävdpwiros, as with Protagoras, but 6 dvOpujiros, as with
Socrates, is the measure of all things, the one being but
7) Cj, the other ö ^e6s ; according to Protagoras, on the
theoretical side, that is true which to me is true, and on
the practical, that good which to me is good ; but in
such subjectivism, all objective, universally valid prin-
ciples lose their meaning, objecti"\äty disappears, in short,
and the subject is left free to turn all as he pleases.'

As regards what is said of Hegel's view of the fate of
Socrates, I may remark that this is, perhaps, unworthy
of Schwegler, who, as in a preceding case, whue indebted
to Hegel for every word he uses, seeks to give himself an
air of originality bj' a slight turn La the application of
the word. The position of Hegel and the position of
Schwegler, despite the apparent opposition of the latter,
are essentially the same. It is to Hegel, in short, that
we owe the deep and perfect exposition of the whole
situation, nor is it quite certain, indeed, that Schwegler
is on the level of it. The respective intercalation wiU

398 A NNO TA TIONS.

be found to contain, it is hoped, a satisfactory elucidation
of the vast, vital, and all-important Hegelian distinction
between Moralität and Sittlichkeit.

Xlll.— Plato.

THERE is but little here that calls for explanation.
The term protreptic, for example, is now not un-
known to dictionaries ; and both it and the earlier par-
enetic may be varied by exhortative. Thetic, again, is
also to be found in dictionaries, and refers to demon-
strations that are not negative or indirect, but, on the
contrary, direct and positive. The phrase non-heing
may sometimes appear perplexing, but it means simply
negation — negation that assumes, so to speak, a positive
virtue, when in relation to the aflSrmation to which it is
opposed. Cold and darkness, for example, are so related
to heat and light. This is what is alluded to in the
words pairs and counterparts, which I have intercalated
into the parenthesis at the top of page 66. Given light,
its counterpart, darkness, is also given ; and such ideas
as motion, rest, heat, cold, likeness, unlikeness, identity,
difiference, discretion, continuity, etc., are similarly
situated. Non-being, the idea of negation, is essential
to any distinction, to any life, to any concrete. Any
aflärmation in this universe is only through negation.
My ego, your ego, any ego, possesses its present affirma-
tion only through preceding negation ; it is by virtue of
what it was, by virtue, that is, of what it is not. The
affirmation of the universe itself is kept alive, so to
speak, only by means of a process of incessant negation.
This introduces us, then, to the same element that we
possess in Hegel, the Logic of whom may be regarded as,
in a certain sort, a completion of — what is only piece-
meal and partial in Plato — the exposition of the ideas.
Plato's main object is to extend and complete the work
of Socrates ; that is, to discover the generic notions, not
only of all moral or practical things (duties), but of all
things whatever, theoretic and BBsthetic as well as prac-
tical. The phrase the idea is often used in a collective
manner for this system of all ideas. It is the ' diamond
net' which underlies and supports the contingent, — the
element of Eleatic Being as against that of Heraclitie
Becoming. The secret of Plato, then, is, in a sort,

ARISTOTLE. 399

simply generalization, and what is meant by Plato's
iiUas, Plato's Ultal theory, etc., is now perfectly intel-
ligible. His main error was to bypostasize the ideas, and
see them only in isolation and separation from the con-
crete. Opinion (56^0, Mtinung, Vorstellung) has a pecu-
liar meaning with the Greeks and Germans ; it is
probably sufEciently explained by the parenthesis
attached to it at the foot of page 71. To the peculiar
German term substantial, which is analogous to Sittlich^
I have added, on page 89, similar explanatory paren-
theses. In Germany, the discussion of the order, dates,
and authenticity of the Platonic dialogues still con-
tinues ; Schwegler's relative ruling (though not original
to him) is exceedingly satisfactory, and all debate \^-ill
probably in the end settle into it^ Hew much the state-
ments of Schwegler are, on all points, conditioned by
the labours of Hegel before him, and how little he de-
sires to conceal this, may be understood from the fact
that what I have marked as a quotation at the foot of
j'age CO is not so marked by Schwegler, and yet it
occurs verhaiim, page 152 of Hegel's second part of the
History of Philosophy.

Xl\ .—Aristotle.

THE pMlosophy of Aristotle is evidently conditioned
by effort to remedy the defects which he himself
signalizes in the philosophy of Plato. In the latter,
noumenon and phenomenon idly confronted each other —
movement there was none : addition of that element, then,
shall now convert the universe into an explained unity.
Aristotle's expedient for this conversion is, in the main,
the single conception of development. Development, how-
ever, is but a more concrete form of the Bceomint: of
Heraclitus ; and thus it is that, if Plato was Eleatic,
Aristotle is in turn Heraclitic. To Aristotle it ajipears
the very nature of what is to pass from potentiality into
actuality. "SMiat is. as potential, is matter ; as actual,
form. The universe, then, is but a gradation between
these extremes. The higher extreme, again, is identical
with the Platonic ideal element, with reason, with the
Good. In this way we see that to Aristotle there is no
disjunction ; the higher element is immanent in the
lower ; the ideas are converted into entekchies, into the

1 See Preface, p. xiL

400 ANNOTATIONS.

ends and notions, into the Bestimmungen (in the double
sense of determinations and destinations), that constitute
the life and very being of things. Thus it is that Aris-
totle, if on one side an absolute empiricist, is, on the
other, an absolute idealist ; and it is quite a similar
general tendency of thought that will be found to condi-
tion his further modification of the Platonic teaching in
the concrete spheres of ethics, physics, the state, etc.
In a certain way, then, the Aristotelian philosophy may
be regarded as but an application of the Platonic principle
to the concrete ; and it is the distinction of potentiality
and actuality (identical with matter and form) that, on
the whole, constitutes its characteristic. Evidently, then,
as Hegel was not without debt to Plato, so neither is he
without perhaps a greater debt to Aristotle. To give the
first example that suggests itself, reference to the 'notion
of development' and that of the 'concrete' at pages 33
and 35 of the first part of the History of Philosophy will
clearly demonstrate this. Such phrases (in Schwegler's
text) as ' thought the absolute reality of matter, ' the
'immanence of the universal in the singular,' a 'being
that is eternally being produced, ' ' a goal that is in every
instant attained by the movement of the in-itself to the
for-itself^ etc., are not less Hegelian than Aristotelian.
Hegel indeed substituted a Heraclitic for an Eleatic
element in the ideas of Plato ; he gave them movement :
issuing the one from the other they constitute in him
but a single process. In this way he but completed the
work of both the Greeks.

At page 94 wlQ be found a peculiar German use of the
term psychological. By a parenthesis I have represented
it to mean indicative of human motive. In his Philoso-
phy of History, pp. 39, 40, the word will be found so
used by Hegel. He defines there this psychological mode
of view, and proceeds : — ' These psychologues apply
themselves in particular to the peculiarities of great
historical figures as individuals. A man must eat and
drink, stands in connexion with friends and acquain-
tances, has feelings and ebullitions of the moment. No
man is a hero to- his valet-de-chambre, is a common pro-
verb ; I added to it — and Goethe repeated the addition
ten years later — not because the hero is not a hero, but
because the valet is a valet. By such psychological
valets,' etc. The word in this sense is not uncommon in
later German writers.

ARISTOTLE. 401

At pa^e 98, motftjiliyBics, as the science of being, will
be found to be distinguished from the other sciences in
such a manner as exj)lain8 the antithesis of finite and
infinite thought, so common in Schwegler and the other
modern Germans. The ordinary sciences, namely, liave
each its own sjihere, its own laws and princi])les. They
are thus the business of finite thought. The result, in
their regard, is only complete within the concrete pre-
suppositions of each. Ivesult is beside result, and none is
the universal result. But 8U])po8e we can account for
being as being, explain how there should be such a fact
as existence at all, and demonstrate the course it will
take, then plainly we are occupied with that which is aU-
embracing and inlinite. Schelling is reported, at page
305, to hold, ' that speculation is the whole, — vision,
contemplation, that is, of everything in God ; science
itself is valuable only so far as it is speculative, so far as
it is contemplation of God as he is.' Speculative thought
has the same sense as infinite thought : it is that thought
which considers being as being, or all things in God.
Spinoza's phrase, sub specie ceternitatis, has the same refer-
ence. That Aristotle shoidd have called his first philo-
sophy theology, then, is now not diflScult to understand.
The speculative of Hegel is also clear ; it is what explana-
torily sublates all things into the unity of God ; or, in gene-
ral, that is speculative, that sublates a many into one (or
vice versa). A speculative })hilosophy, consequently, must
be a chain of mutuallj' sublating counterparts. This will
explain the censure to which, on page 100, Aristotle is
subjected, for having ♦ supplied in his logic only a
natural history of finite thought.' Aristotle, that is, has
only analysed the general forms in or through which
each empirical subject thinks things ; he has separated
things and thoughts, which, limited the one by the other,
are both thus finite ; he has not evolved those great
forms of thought, which, applicable to the universe as a
whole, constitute a universal logic. Aristotle's logic is
but empirically taken up in reference to the thought of
the subject, not speculatively in reference to the thought
of God ; and thus it is finite, and not infinite. Common
modern logic has gone beyond Aristotle, indeed, for it
has sought to divorce things (or matter) altogether from
thoughts (or form). The addition of the fourth figure, I
may remark, by the bye, is regarded neither by Kant nor
Hegel as any improvement on Aristotle (see die falsche

402 ANNOTATIONS.

Spitzfindhjheit der vier syllogUtischen Figuren of the one,
and section 187 of the Encyclopaedia of the other). On
page 102, the phrase *the finite import,' as the paren-
theais attempts to point out, refers to the identity of the
idea and the sensuous thing, when what import consti-
tutes each is considered. They have, in short, the same
import, only the one is called ideal, and the other real.
On page 108, the word Entelechie may prove troublesome :
it refers, however, to what Hegel calls idea, a concrete
which materially realizes a formal notion or purpose.
Life is an idea, an entelechie ; in it the body is the
material realization of the soul or subject which is the
formal element ; they mutually interpenetrate and give
actuality the one to the other. Still relatively to the
body, the soul is eminently the entelechie ; the body is
only for it, it is the true actuality. The word patho-
logical, page 116, is one in frequent use now; it refers to
the element of instinctive feeling, of instinctive sensa-
tional motive. Any other passages, or words, likely to
prove difiicult, I know not in this section, which consti-
tutes, with the preceding one, perhaps the most perfect
portion of the whole book.

XV. — The Post-Aristotelian Philosophy.

THERE is little to be said here, for no explanation
seems wanted. I would only call attention to the
excellence of the description of the fall of Greece (pp.
120-3), for the importance of the lesson it extends to
ourselves. We, too, seem to live at a very similar re-
lative epoch : ' the simple trust of the subject in the given
world is completely at an end.' In the Post- Aristotelian
philosophy, however, there is still a gain for the spirit of
man. This gain is the Roman element ; the individual
is free, respected for himself, a subject on his own
account, a person. Nor in our modern world is there
any want of a similar element. The error now rather is
that the principle of subjectivity is in excess, and requires
to be restored to the control of the universaL If subjec-
tivity has just emptied itself, in morals, politics, and
religion, of an unreßected objectivity, it must now refill
itself (in all these interests) with a.' reflected objectivity.
Perhaps it is hardly worth remarking that, though
Schwegler's excellence is synopsis, reduction, still his

TR A NSITIOX TO MODERN PHILOSOPH Y. 403

fault is that of — occasionally — keeping iij) the note too
long, or of a turn too many. Glimpsea of this, I think,
we can catch in Stoklsin. In these sections, I find no
room for explanation ; reserving criticism also with a
view to space, I pass on to

XVI. — Transition to Modern Philosophy.

}71NGLISH readers will be apt to think Schwegler unjust
\i to Bacon here, and, perhaps, to some extent, not
without reason. It is useless to endeavour to depose Bacon
from his position at the head of modern philosophy : he
certainly first clearly and consciously mooted the emanci-
pating thoughts which are our constitutive element now.
Probably, however. Englishmen place their countryman,
in himself, too high. It is impossible to find a more
careful, more exhaustive, more impartial estimate than
that of Erdraann, and his result is not much higher than
that of Schwegler. The account of Ueberweg is a very
excellent one, and it is to the same effect. Then, as for
Hegel, though he must be allowed to do Bacon great
justice on the whole, he is to be found also speaking
thus : — * As Bacon has always had the praise of the man
who directed knowledge to its true source, experience, so
is he in effect the special leader and representative of
what in England has been called Philosophy, and beyond
which Englishmen have not yet quite advanced ; for
they seem to constitute that people in Europe, which,
limited to understanding of actuality, is destined, like the
huckster and workman class in the State, to live always
immersed in matter, with daily fact for their object, but
not reason.' It is from Hegel, too, that the gibe about
mottoes comes. I may remark also that Hegel supports
j^lmseK with reference to Bacon by a quotation from an
English article {Quarterly Review, vol. xvi,, April 1817,
p. 53), which is really striking. In deprecation of the
ordinary censure of Bacon's character on two points,
Erdmann writes thus : — ' The complete want of fortune,
doubly painful from his high connexions, the mass of debts,
the three-and-twenty years of expectations (perpetually
renewed and perpetually disappointed) of becoming a
salaried, instead of an unsalaried official, would probably
have made, even in a stronger character, the love of
money a habit : the severity with which Bacon has been

404 ANNOTATIONS.

blamed for acting as counsel against liis fallen patron
Essex, and afterwards publishing a report of the process
justifying the Queen, appears unjust to him who knows
how Bacon laboured to bring the Earl to reason and the
Queen to mercy, and reflects, besides, that what the latter
committed to him, he was obliged to execute by virtue of
his office.' Erdmann has a service also to Bacon in his
eye, when he quotes the fallen man's exclamation on his
own sentence : 'Never was there a sentence juster, and
yet never before me had England so honest a Lord
Chancellor.'

I would also bespeak attention for what is said in this
section of Jacob Böhm. We have here the first note of
what is specially and peculiarly German philosophy.
This note is heard in such phrases as, * width without
end, stands in need of a straitness in which it may mani-
fest itself,' etc. What is alluded to, then, is the element
of negativity in God, or the necessity of an absolute
difference even for the realization of his absolute identity ;
and it is perhaps not easy to find any better expression
than that for the main thought of HegeL

XVII. — Descartes.

ERDMANN (even in his Grundriss of the History of
Philosophy) gives a much fuller account of Carte -
sianism and Descartes than Schwegler does. Ueberweg
also is both full and clear. Hegel's statement is hardly
so full as that of either, but he brings to it, as usual,
the singular depth and concentration of his own thought.
For perfection of elaboration, comprehensiveness, and
lucidity at once, Erdmann's exposition is, perhaps,
to be preferred to all of them. From it, however,
I shall borrow only one sentence, referring to Descartes
on the passions : * The soul being possessed of ability to
evoke ideas, and through these give direction to the
animal spirits, has it in its power indirectly to conquer the
passions, as, for example, to neutralize the fear of danger
through the hope of victory.' This seems a hint prac-
tically useful, and yet we read that the philosopher him-
self was, on the death of an illegitimate daughter who
died while a child, unable to console himself. Ueberweg
introduces some acute objections to the main positions

DESCARTES. 405

of Dcsoartcs. Thus he conceives the argumentation con-
nected with the cotjito-sum to involve the assumption
without i>roof of the notion of substance, aa well as of the
individuality of the ego, or of its self-identity and dilTer-
ence from all else. He also objects to this, the first
j>osition of Descartes, that peculiar view of Kant in refer-
ence to an inner sense over which poor Mr. Buckle has
80 stumbled, this, namely, that knowing our own inner
like our outer, only sensuoitshj, we know it not as it is,
but as it seems. Hegel, as against Kant, may be referred
to on the other side. A better objection of Ueberweg's
is the relativity of the subjective criterion of truth (the
clearness and certainty with which, etc.) : 'the truth of
my clear sensuous perception — of the sky, for example
— may be modified and removed by a clear intellectual
insight.' Other objections of Ueberweg are, the negation
that after all lies in the notion of the infinite, the vicious
circle of inferring the existence of God from a knowledge
that depends on him, the destruction of the pineal
gland not necessarily followed by the loss of life or of
thought, the soul's capability of independent existence
not to follow from my clear and distinct idea of its capa-
bility of independent thought, etc. He adduces also the
question of Gassendi, How can extended perceptions
have place in what is inextended? Gassendi, too, is
said by Ueberweg not to have used the amhulo-sum uni-
versally attributed to him ; it appears that Descartes
himself, in replying to the objection of actions in general,
put into the mouth of Gassendi this action in particular.
Another objection of Ueberweg is : — ' In effect we become
conscious of our existence through reflection on our will
earlier thau through reflection on our thought.' But in
the identity of will and thought, this objection cannot
avail much. The most important of all the objections of
Ueberweg relates to the ontological argument (or to the
inference of the being from the thought of God), even
in its psychological form that points to the antithesis of
the perfection of the thought and the imperfection of the
thinker. He says {Orundriss, iii. p. 51) : — 'Descartes
commits here the same error as Anselm, to neglect the
condition of every categorical argument from the defini-
tion, namely, that the position of the subject must be
otherwise certain. . . . Descartes' premises lead logically
only to the unmeaning concluaion, that if God is, existence
accrues to him, and 'd God is feigned, he must be feigned

406 ANNOTATIONS.

as existent. Moreover the Cartesian form of the ontolo-
gical argument has a defect from which that of Anselm
is free,' — the one uses being as a predicate beside other
predicates, the other as a particular kind of being.
Hegel, in his section on Descartes, as everywhere else,
is always forward to defend the metaphysical arguments
for the existence of God, and certainly it is always to be
borne in mind that God is dififerent from all other sub-
jects ; that this difiference, indeed, is, that he cannot be
thought as inexistent, that the very notion of him in-
volves existence. ' Kant,' says Hegel (Hist, of Phil.
iii. p. 309) ' has objected that being is not contained in
thinking, that it is different from thinking. That is true,
but still they are inseparable or constitute a single
identity ; their unity is not to the prejudice of their
difference.' P. 317, * We find this highest idea in us.
If we ask now whether this idea exist, why this is the
idea, that existence is given with it, and to say it is only
a thought, is to contradict the very meaning of the
thought.' P. 321, * An objection to this identity is now
old, Kantian too : that from the notion of the most per-
fect being, there follows no more than that in thought
existence and the most perfect being are conjoined, but
not out (outside) of thought. But the very notion of
existence is this negative of self -consciousness, not out of
thought, but the thought of — the out of thought.' In
another reference, I may quote (p. 311), *It is absurd to
suppose that the soul has thinking in one pocket, and
seeing, willing, etc., in others. . . . Willing, seeing, hear-
ing, walking, etc., are further modifications. . . . Only
when I accentuate that ego is in these as thought, does
it imply being ; for only with the universal is being
united.' Hegel objects, however, to the method and
march of Descartes as being but conceptive, and containing
presuppositions. Throwing light on his own industry,
he says (p. 310) : — ' In Descartes the necessity is not
yet present, to develop the differences from the "I think ;'*
Fichte was the first to go that far, out of this point of
absolute certainty to derive all determinations;' and
p. 328, 'speculative cognition, the derivation from the
notion, the free self-dependent development of the element
itself, was first introduced by Fichte.' ' So now,' p. 312,
'philosophy has got its own ground, thought proceeds,
starts from thought, as what is certain in itself, not from
something external, not from something given, not from

MA LEHR AN CUE. 407

an authority, but directly from this freedom that is con-
tained in the '* I think.'"

XVIII. — Malebranche.

E RDM ANN'S 'Malebranche' occupiea considerable
space, that of Ueberweg but little. The former
remarks of Malebrancho that *it must have been the
self-righteousness of the redeemed Christian which caused
his so rigorous damnation of Spinoza, in whose pan-
theism spirits are moditications of infinite thought, in the
same manner as bodies, with Malebranche, are limitations
of extension : and yet he himself borders very close on
what revolts him in the writings of that *' mis^rabley '
Ueberweg, in the doctrine of Malebranche, regards that
operation of God 'as itself absolutely incomprehensible.'
Hegel has always a very warm side for Malebranche, and
we may remember some of his happiest criticisms in the
Logic in that reference. The main thought of Male-
branche, says Hegel, is, that 'the soul cannot get its
ideas, notions, from external things.' 'God is the place
of spirits, the universal of the spirit, as space is the
universal, the place of bodies.^ ' The soul, consequently,
recognises in God what is in him, bodies so far as he
conceives created beings, because all this is spiritual,
intellectual, and present to the soul. ' ' When we would
think of an)rthing particular, we think first of the uni-
versal ; it is the basis of the particular, as space to things :
all essentiality is before our particular ideas, and this
essentiality is tbe first. ' * We have a clear idea of God,
of the universal ; we can have it only through union with
him, for this idea is not a created one, but in and for
itself : it is as with Spinoza, the one universal is God,
and, so far as it is determined, it is the particular ; this
particular we see only in the universal, as bodies in
space.' ' The spirit perceives all in the infinite ; so little
is this a confused perception of many particular things,
that rather all particular perceptions are only participa-
tions of the universal idea of the infinite : just as God
receives not his being from finite creatures, but, on the
contrary, all creatures only subsist through bim.'
* Thought is only in the union with God.* ' This rela-
tion, this union of our sjiirit with the Word (verbe) of
God, and of our will with his love, is, that we are made

408 A NNO TA TIONS,

in the image of Qod, and in his likeness.' Hegel thus
accentuates expressions of Malebranche, which are pro-
bably more or less assonant to his own views.

XIX. — Spinoza.

ALL the authorities make a primate of Spinoza.
Erdmann gives as complete and exhaustive an
internal synthesis of the whole system as is well con-
ceivable, and Ueberweg, who is quite overwhelming in
his notice of the relative literature, complements it
(Erdmann's statement) by an equally complete and ex-
haustive external analysis. Hegel impregnates, most
interestingly and instructively, the philosophy of Spinoza
with his own. Erdmann's work here, in particular,
however, is, as all but always, a miracle of labour, and of
harnessed expression ; but what specially and peculiarly
distingiiishes him beyond all others, on this occasion, is
that he has, probably, very fairly, detected the secret of
Spinoza. That secret is a particular mathematical image
that underlies all the apparent philosophical generaliza-
tions of Spinoza. I shall take the liberty of working out
this image in my own way, and demonstrate how the main
constituents of the system naturally rise out of it.

Spinoza says. What is, is ; and that is extension and
thought. These two are all that is, and besides these
there is nought. But these two are one : they are attri-
butes of the single substance — God, in whom, then, all
individual things, and all individual ideas {modi of ex-
tension those, of thought these) are comprehended and
have place. (Spinoza, indeed, does at first speak of in-
finite attributes, but he is found in the end virtually to
assume but two.)

Now to Spinoza extension is as geometrical surface,
taken quite generally. But geometrical surface contains
impliciter all possible geometrical infiguration, with all
its possible ideal consequences. With (geometrical) sur-
face, extension, then, there is (geometrical) intelligence,
thought. These two attributes meet in a substantial one
(the whole), and involve an accidental many, the modi,
the particulars of the contained infiguration. These
modi, lastly, result the one from the other; or it is its
own limitation by the rest that makes each.

God, then, is as a vast and slumbering whale, whose

SPIXOZA. 409

infinite surtace is fretted into infinite shapes, which are
the outward bodies that reflect themselves into the
inward ideas. But, further now this infinite surface is
not continuous, but a congeries of atomic movement.
The atoms, the smallest geometrical figures, are various
proportions of motion and rest, and they have their
reflected or ideal counterparts within. But, besides
simple figxires, there are compound ones (a larger por-
tion of surface being taken), and such is the body of
man, to which, therefore, the corres])ondent inner ideaa
will constitute a mind. Mind and body, again, though
correspondent, are independent ; each is its own world
extension can only act on extension, idea on idea.

This, now, is the Spinozistic ground-plan. The under
Ijäng conception is a mathematical one, in which ex
tension and thought [Seyii and Denken, dvai and voe'iv.
reality and ideality) are essentially one. The example
of mathematical figures, indeed, let us remark in
passing, ought to realize the possibility of this scouted
union — which is besides the omnipresent fact. Though
obliged to introduce motion (assumed as deduced from
«xtension), in order to obtain — what he found a neces-
sity— individuals in mutual limitation, Spinoza's con-
ception of causality is mathematical and not dynamical.
His causes are pre-existent reasons, his effects the neces-
sary logical consequences. The prime cause is simply to
him the prime condition, extension namely, over which
hangs, or under which floats, reflected from it, the con-
sequences, the thoughts that are in it. Unbroken ex-
tension, unbroken thought — that is God. Amongst the
interdependent, interacting modi, which are the inter-
secting colours of this heaving life, Man is, in body and
in soul, a result of necessity like the rest.

All specifications and particularizations, in truth, vnll
be found to flow naturally from the few fundamental
materials. Thus God, further, is the immanent, and not
the transient, or transcendent, cause of all things. He is
not personal either, or possessed of will, or of love to man ;
nor free, unless in his own necessity, not acting, therefore,
on design. As the cogitatio irißnita, his thought is not an
understanding even, but is an idea rather than ideas. Man,
again, is partly immortal (in that his basis, namely, must
be an original part and parcel of the divine substance —
so much of the original surface), and partly mortal, for
his personal and individual existence passes. Hi« soul is

410 AX NOTATIONS.

but a knowledge of the states of his body ; he is a thing
among things, that strives to self-preservation against
the obstruction of the rest ; hence the joy of success, the
grief of failure, hence fear and hope, hence love and hate,
hence good and evil. Each, then, seeks his own advan-
tage ; this is his natural right, which falls together,
therefore, with his natural might. But man, after all,
is to man the greatest commodity, and the necessity of
mutual intercourse leads to the resignation of all individual
rights under power of the State. Wrong, now, is what
the State forbids, right what it commands. Of States,
too, the rights are identical with the mights, and treaties
bind only as they profit. The State must not attempt
what it cannot compel ; there should be liberty of con-
science, therefore, but with all outward subjection. The
State, then, should be independent of the convictions of
the individual citizens, and in itself good, whatever they
be. Men are the same as they always have been, and
always will be. The State is they who govern, nor can
these do injustice, but they must stop where threats
and promises cease to avail ; a State's worst enemies
are its own subjects. Political revolutions, nevertheless,
can bring but ruin. Of governments, an aristocratic
republic, with numerous corporations, is to Spinoza the
best. The few, however, are independent of the State — ■
in intellectual freedom. This is acquired through the
the acquisition of adequate ideas, on which follows,
of necessity, and in ratio of the adequacy, intelligent
submission to what is once for all so. Such submission,
again, product of intelligence, is necessarily accompanied
by the idea of God, by love to God ; and that is the
blessedness which virtue not only offers as reward, but
is. For the attainment of this consummation, then,
the single duty is the emendatio intellectust and in this
alone is freedom.

The philosophy of Spinoza, then, is, on the whole, a
clumsy metaphor ; but it is not without thoughts.
These Hegel certainly shows at the clearest, at the same
time that he demonstrates as well the associated fatal
defects. The objections of Ueberweg also are sharply con-
ceived and distinctly stated. Both Hegel and Ueber-
weg, however, understand Spinoza rather dynamically
than mathematically. Hence, on the latter understand-
ing, both their praise and their blame seem to fall wide.
Into the views as well of Hegel as of Ueberweg T

lIOBliES. 411

was prcp:\ro(l to enter at some length, but must, for
the sake of space, forbear. In the statement above,
extension, as ligurable, impl'us itleas : Erdmann sees tljeso
as lent to, not in substance, but he names jtaralMlsm
of modi later. Spinoza's Ethic has, doubtless, deeply
influenced the progress of i)hiloso])hy, especially since
Jacobi recalled attention to it in Germany ; but after
all, perhaps, his work of the greatest JiUtorical import-
ance, is the Tract a tits Theologico-Politiats. The latter
work has constituted the very arsenal of the Aufklä-
rung, whether French or German. Voltaire's wit, and
the erudition of the theological critics of the Fatherland,
are alike indebted to it.

XX.—Hobhes.

THOMAS HOBBES (1588-1679) was educated at
Oxford, became tutor in the Cavendish family,
and travelled on the Continent. As a man, he is said to
Jiave suflFered from a constitutional timidity. He was
in personal relations with Charles n., Bacon, Descartes,
Gassendi, etc. He published a multitude of works, of
which the De Give and the Leviathan are the chief.
His principal views run thus : — Philosophy is knowledge
obtained from a consideration of causes and eflfects.
Religion, therefore, as knowledge obtained from revela-
tion, is excluded from philosophy. Faith and reason
must not be confounded. The Bible is not given to
instruct us as regards nature and an earthly State, but
to teach us the way to a kingdom that is not of this
world. The origin of our knowledge lies in the impres-
sions of sense, and these must depend on certain motions.
Only the subjective state (idea) is known by us, and
not its objective antecedent. The affection of sense
continues after the impression has passed, constituting
memory and imagination. Memory is the seat of ex-
perience, and experience leads to expectation. Hence
prudence. In behoof of memory, marks are invented,
which become signs of communication or words. "Words
as signs become representative of many, and lead to
generalization. To correlate sign and signification is to
understand, but to correlate sign with sign is to calcu-
late, to think, and to reason. A congruous correlation is
truth ; an incongruous, falsehood. Accurate definition of

412 ANNOTATIONS.

words, then, is the first problem, the first philosophy ;
and hence the consideration which follows next, of
Time and Space, Cauae and Effect, Substance and Acci-
dent, etc. Time and space are, to Hobbes, subjective.
Cause and effect depend on motion, as also accidents,
which are resultant affections of sense. Motion, then,
is the main consideration ; and philosophy is secluded to
the corporeal world as what alone exists. Spirits, in-
corporeal substances, are but square circles. God is an
object of philosophy only so far as some good men have
ascribed to Him a corporeal nature. Philosophy, then,
being confined to what is corporeal, considers, first,
natural, and second, artificial bodies ; or is in the one
case natural, and in the other civil, philosophy. Or
philosophy may be more conveniently divided into
First Philosophy (philosophia prima, as just noticed).
Physics, Anthropology, and Politics. Physics include
Mathematics, Astronomy, Physiology, Optics, etc. Aji-
thropology considers cognition, and the invention of
words, as already noticed, and then passes to man in his
ethical capacity. Theory is only for Practice, and gene-
ral utility is the single aim. The value of geometry
even is its application to machinery. The practical
capacity of man is the result of a reaction towards the
attainment of pleasure and the avoidance of pain, which
accompanies sensation generally. The degrees in this re-
action yield the various desires. Deliberation on these
leads to choice and will. The will, as last act of the
movement, is not free, but a passive result of the in-
fluences exerted by impressions, or by signs and words.
The object of desire is good, of aversion evil. Bonum,
jucundum, pulchrum, utile, mean the same thing, and
are but varying relations of what is desirable. Bonum
simpliciter did non potest. Self-preservation is the
supreme good, death the supreme evil. To promote the
one and prevent the other is the first law of nature.
Men, then, at first, each being capable of inflicting this
greatest evil (death) on the other, were pretty well
equal, and all alike free to do what they would. Mutual
fear was the universal condition, Bellum omnium contra
omnes, or Homo homini lupus. But self-preservation
must lead in the end to a treaty of peace, which brings
with it various conditions. Each renounces freedom on
the understanding that all renounce it. This compact
is no result, then, of social instinct or benevolence, but

JOIIX LOCKE. 413

of selfishness and fear. But this compact can be realized
only through the subjection of all to one who will deter
from injury. And in this way, we pass to Politics, or the
State. The sovereign of a State is not its heart, but its
soul. He is the State. The rest are but subjects. They
are by express compact powerless, he is the Leviathan
who swallows them all, the mortal god who sways all
at his will, and is the source of peace and security. Now
only have meum and tuum place, and right and wrong.
Right is what the sovereign commands ; wrong, what he
forbids. Custom is an authority only in submission to
him. Sovereignty can be exercised by a majority, by
few, or by one ; and the State, accordingly, is a Demo-
cracy, an Aristocracy, or a Monarchy. The first was the
first in time. But the answer to the question, Which is
the best ? is, the actually existent one. There must be
no attempt to change ; obedience to the sovereign power
must be absolute and unconditional ; else relapse to the
state of nature were the inevitable result. War is a
remnant of the state of nature. The natural rights
of peoples and persons are the same. A State is a
moral person. In respect of the sovereign, the sub-
ject is without rights of any kind, and the former
is under no control of law. The sovereign is alone
the people. No error so dangerous as a belief in
conscience that might lead to disobedience of the
sovereign. Conscience must preserve the primal con-
tract, and who commands is alone responsible. There
is only one case where disobedience is legitimate ; self-
preservation is the object of the State, and no one is
obliged to commit suicide. Hobbes now proceeds at
great length to refer to the Bible, and in such a way as
recalls Antonio's

' Mark you this, BassaDio,
The devil can cite Scripture for his purpose.

This epitome from Erdmann wiU suggest, perhaps, the
value of the original study.

XXI. — John Locke.

THERE is one point here in regard to which the differ-
ence between the German and the English mind is
placed in the most glaring relief. It is Locke's account of

414 ANNOTATIONS.

suhstance. This notion, because it is not derived from
without, and yet really exists without, appears to the Ger-
mans to be assumed as prescribed by the mind to the ex-
ternal world, which latter then is, in that respect, subject
to the mind, if in all others this latter (in experience) is
subject to it. In Erdmann's language, ' It is a manifest
self-contradiction to expect the mind to subject itself to a
world already in subjection to laws which are its own
(the mind's) product.' Schwegler, pp. 181, 182, expresses
himself quite similarly. This contradiction does not
seem to have occurred either to Locke himself or any
other Englishman. The notion was an obscure one, they
thought, but it undoubtedly corresponded to an outer
fact, the knowledge of which, if obscurely acquired, was
still actually acquired by inference from experience.
Even to Hume the idea of the Germans seems never to
have occurred : his way of it was simply that the mental
notion was unsupported by any basis of fact. The con-
ceptions of the Germans may not the less on that account
be well founded. Erdmann adds to the account of
Locke's theoretical, a very satisfactory statement of his
moral, political, and religious contributions. Ueberweg,
who otherwise correctly characterizes Hegel's difiference
from Locke, complains that he (Hegel) has ' taken up
Locke's philosophy, as well as Kant's criticism, wrong ; '
but it will be difficult to establish either statement.
Things may look strange to us in the light of Hegel, but
that light is not necessarily on that account false. Per-
haps no man will ever understand Kant as deeply as
Hegel did, and I think that he perfectly understands the
position of Locke, even while he objects to it. Hegel is
perfectly just to the advance on the positions of Descartes,
Malebranche, and Spinoza, which that of Locke involves.
What Locke required in their regard he also completely
approves. He even grants the correctness of the principle
of experience, so far as it goes. It is absurd to him to
say otherwise than that experience is the beginning in
time. He only points out that the derivation of the ideas
from experience is no explanation, no verification, either
of them or of it. Locke's procedure, then, is to him a
step to philosophy, but it is not yet philosophy. ' It is
no matter whether the mind or whether experience be the
source ; the question is, is this import in itself true?'
' Are these general ideas true in and for themselves, and
whence come they, not only into my consciousness, into

DAVID HUME. 415

my mind, hnt into thf things thtvi^elves ?^ The Hegelian
»tand-point is accurately indicated in these questions,
nor less the defect of that of Locke. Ueberweg's objec-
tions to Hegel here, then, I must hold to he unfounded.

To Schwegler's list of Enijlish moralists we may add
these : Henry More (1614-1GS7), Kalph Cudworth (1617-
IGSS), Bernard Mandeville (1670-1733), Bishop Butler
(1692-1752), David Hartley (1704-1757), Abraham
Tucker (1705-74), Joseph Briestley (1733-1804), Richard
Price (1723-1791), William P;Uey (1743-1805). Peter
Brown was the Irish Bishop Brown. All the Germans
omit any mention of Paley — one of the most masculine
and truly English of thinkers and writers ! I have spent
a considerable time in collecting materials for the cha-
racterization of the English moralists, but find that to
do justice to the theme would involve an enlargement of
the Handbook beyond all legitimate limits. I pass, there-
fore, at once to

XXll.— David Hume.

OF all the statements of Schwegler, I 'find this the
most meagre and unsatisfactory. It is a mistake
to represent the influence of Hume on German philosophy
as limited to the relation of causality : it extends, on the
contrary, to almost all other cardinal points of philosophy,
as well practical as theoretical Kant's very illustration
about the Copernican notion is suggested by Hume, and
it is this latter's distinction between matters of fact and
relations of ideas that lies at the bottom of the whole
German philosophical movement. I shall transcribe here
a few of the salient expressions of Hegel.

' The progress as regards thought is this : Berkeley
lets all the ideas stand as they are ; in Hume, the anti-
thesis of the sensuous and the universal element has
cleared and more sharply expressed itself, sense being
pronounced by him void of universality. Berkeley does
not make the distinction as to whether there is necessary
connexion in his sensations or not.' ... * Hume com-
pleted Locke anism by drawing attention to this, that on
that stand-point experience is, indeed, the foundation of
what is known, or perception contains all that happens ;
but, nevertheless, universality and necessity are not con-
tained in, nor given us, by experience.' . . . ' Custom

4 IG ANNOTATIONS.

obtains as well in our perception as in reference to law
and morality. These, namely, rest on an instinct, a sub«
jective, but very often deceptive, moral feeling.' . . .
'We have the custom to regard one thing as just and
moral : others have other customs. If, then, truth de-
pends on experience, the element of universality, of
objectivity, comes from elsewhere, or is not verified by
experience. Hume has accordingly declared this species
of universality and necessity to be only subjectively, not
objectively, existing ; for custom is just such a subjective
universality. This is an important and acute observation
in regard to experience as the source of knowledge ; and
it is from this point that the reflection of Kant begins.'

To the representatives of the Scottish philosophy men-
tioned by Schwegler, we may add Lord Kames (1696-
1782), Adam Smith (1723-1790), Adam Ferguson (1724-
1816), Thomas Brown (1778-1820), and Sir William
Hamilton (1788-1856). Professor Ferrier belongs to an
era of thought that was inaugurated by Thomas Carlyle.
On all these men, I was also prepared to speak at large ;
but the limits of the book preclude justice either to them
or to me. Short, but excellent articles under the name
of each will be found in the Bncyclopcedia Britannica and
others. A word on Sir W. Hamilton will be found in the
note on Jacobi. Erdmann, in his first edition, was
hardly satisfactory on the Scottish school, and such a
writer as he cannot afford to be unsatisfactory anywhere ;
for the danger is that he may be doubted even when at
his best. In the second edition of the Grundriss much
of this has been amended, though a Scot might, perhaps,
still wish more space for the Scots. Schwegler reckons
Hutcheson among the English moralists : he is generally
put at the head of the Scottish school. He is a great
writer, and does more than he gets credit for. To
mention one example, the manner in which Kant's best
distinctions in regard to taste are anticipated by him. is
very striking. Some of Schwegler 's happiest feats of
expression will be found in his brief paragraphs on the
French Illumination.

XXIII. — Leibnitz.

SCHWEGLER'S statement here is a very excellent
one. Erdmann's is fuller and perfectly satisfactory.
The student who knows both may justly consider him-

BERKELEY. 417

self instruit. With respect to the Calculus, we may ex-
tract from Ueberweg tlint Newton, inventing in IGO."),
publisheil in 11)87, M'hilo Leibnitz, inventing in l()7r),
published in 1G84, but that the invention of the latter is
in many res]>ect3 preferable. Leibnitz's verdict on the
findings of Locke, Ueberweg states thus : — ' In Locke
certain special truths are not badly expounded ; but on
the main point he has wandered far from correctness,
and he has not attained to a knowledge of the nature of
spirit or of truth. Had he duly weighed the diflerence
between necessary truths, or those dependent on demon-
stration, and those to which we reach in a certain degree
by means of induction, he would have perceived that
necessary truths are capable of proof only through
principles implanted in the mind itself, the so-called in-
nate ideas, because the senses inform us indeed of what
happens, but not of what necessarily happens. He has
not observed, likewise, that the ideas of the beent, of
substance, of identity, of the true and the good, are in-
nate in the mind, because the mind itself is innate to
itself, or comprehends all these in itself. J^^ihil est in
intellectu, quod nonfuerit in sensu, nisi ipse intellectus.'
The student of ])hilosophy will find helps to Hegel in
the Monads, and Best of all Possible Worlds, of Leibnitz.
This world is not to Hegel the product of an arbitrary
fancy, a subjective conceit, a momentary caprice ; it is
to him a necessary result of reason, and, taken in its
entirety, the whole, and the only possible result, of reason.
It does not follow from that, however, that the per-
sonality of God is an untenable conception : the infinite,
the universal monad, is as necessary as the finite and
particular. The same student wiU find much that is said
under "Wolff useful, which want of space forbids me to
signalize.

XXlY.—BerMe]/.

SCHWEGLER is very short on Berkeley, but, to my
mind, he is perfectly accurate. Even when he says
* only spirits exist,' he is surely not inaccurate. For
spirits alone have life ; ideas have no life of their own,
they are only /or spirits. At p. 1S3, however, Schwegler
had already said, * There are only spirits (souls), and the
thoughts of spirits (ideas).' Using a certain double-
entendre^ Berkeley sought to claim for hia doctrine the

418 A NNO TA TIONS.

support of vulgar opinion and of what is called common
sense. Those of his followers, tlierefore, who accept this
douhla-entendre, may fastidiously demur to the correctness
of Schwegler's statement of Berkeley, because, though
he expressly admits that Berkeley's theory does not, for
Berkeley himself, ' deny to objects a reality independent
of us,' he yet uses in its regard such phrases as * a material
external world does not exist,^ 'complete denial of matter,'
etc. Schwegler has as much right, however, to assert
that Berkeley denies^ as they to assert that Berkeley
affirms, matter. Nay, Schwegler has more right, and,
I>roperly speaking, his opponents have, on their side, no
right at all ; for the former uses the word matter in the
sense of noumenal matter — a sense attached to it by man-
kind generally, while the latter use the same word in the
sense of phenomenal matter — a sense attached to it only
by themselves. The little check to free discussion ofifered
by the gratuitous interposition of this dovhle-entendre,
then, causes but a jolt. At the same time, it is to be
admitted, that it may be said, that what the vulgar
believe in, is only phenomenal matter. This, however,
is only a may he said, and concerns a subject that cannot
he introduced into any philosophical arena — the vulgar,
namely. On that head each philosopher has his own
equal warrant to represent the vulgar, while none but
Berkeleian philosophers — and only som£. of these — attach
to it any such belief (as that in a phenomenal matter), a
belief that will be denied to be natural, we may permit
ourselves to say, by all but all readers. The principle of
Berkeley, indeed, is so simple and intelligible, that but
few readers can have any difficulty in inspecting the
general position for themselves. It was presented in a
word or two when speaking of svhjective gorgonization at
page 391 : * the object can only be known in me, in the
subject, and therefore it is subjective, and, if subjective,
idea].' The moment we are made to perceive, in fact,
that what we know of an external world is sensations,
and that sensations are necessarily within, we are made
possessors also of the whole of what is current as Berke-
leianism. What' yoti perceive, say the Berkeleians de
rigueur, is a phenomenal object, and you have no
right to infer a noumenal one. That essentially amounts
to the mentioned gorgonization. I can only perceive an
outer object hy perceiving it : am I to suppose an outer
object for ever denied me, then, by the very medium and

BEIiKELEV. 419

means by which alone it can bo given me ? That I j)er-
ceive = that I do not perceive 1 Berkeley is perfectly
aware of the simplicity of his own ])osition, and, as Keid
points out ( Works, p. 283), apologizes for his own pro-
lixity : 'to what purpose is it to dilate upon that which
may be demonstrated, with the utmost evidence, in a line
or two, to any one who is capable of the least reflection ?'
We can see, then, that the reply of Hamilton, and the
whole school of natural realism, was very natural.
Given a mind, and given an outer object, the latter can
be known to the former only through perception ; but
the mediation which alone effects the knowledge cannot
also exclude it : I am such that I do perceive a real,
outer, independent object. We may suppose this also to
be said by Hamilton, quite irrespective of the ingenious
theory of perception by which he supported it. Indeed
we have only for the nonce to identify ourselves with
this position of Hamilton, and to feel as he felt there, to
sympathize even with his cry about the veracity of con-
ßciousness. Hegel's reply to Berkeley (See Secret of
Hegel, vol. i. p. 425, and vol. ii. p. 165) is quite beside
the reply of Hamilton, and insists only on the ignavia,
the idleness, of the position maintained. Without is
within, says Berkeley. Let it be so, says Hegel, and
philosophy has still to begin. The same things that were
called without or noumenal are now called within or
phenomenal, but, call them as you may, it is their syste-
matic explanation that is wanted. Such systematic expla-
nation, embracing man and the entire round of his ex-
periences, sensuous, intellectual, moral, religious, aesthetic,
political, etc., is alone philosophy, and to that no repe-
tition of without is within, or matter is phenomenal, will
ever prove adequate. Hegel, indeed, returns a score of
times to the utter inefficiency of subjective idealism ;
and that is subjective idealism which converts the ex-
ternal world into an experience within the subject alone.
The Germans, it is true, since Kant, call Berkeleianism
the dogmatic idealism, in allusion to its generally asser-
toric procedure in the transference, as Schwegler says
(p. 212), of all reality to conception (mental experience).
That the idealism of Kant himself was called the critical
or the transcendental idealism depends on this, that it
was the result of a critical inquiry into our faculties,
which inquiry supposed itself to demonstrate in experi-
ence as such the presence of what it called a transcen-

420 ANNO TA TIONS.

dental element — an element, that is, that lay in us but
still came to us in experience. The idealism of Fichte
again, that reduced all to, or deduced all from, the ego
was, ^;ar excellence^ the siihjective idealism. Then Schel-
ling, who gave to the object an equal basis beside the
subject, but still under an idealistic point of view, is
said to have given rise to the objective idealism ; while
Hegel, lastly, because he subordinated all to thour/ht
alone, is styled the founder of the absolute idealism.
Even in England, the stand-point of Berkeley has for
some time been replaced by what is perhaps a simpler
one. That is contained in the works of Carlyle and
Emerson ; and amounts to this, that relatively there is
an external world, but not absolutely; still that this
external world is not given to me from moment to
moment by God himself, but that He, from the first,
has so created me that such a world, from my own very
nature, hangs ever before me. In a religious sense, it is
to be said that this, and the general jjosition of Ber-
keleian or English idealism, has, qiiite apart from the
critique of Hegel, a value all its own. In regard to all
the great spiritual interests, as the existence of God, the
freedom of the will, and the immortality of the soul, it is
of immense consequence to get quit of matter (of course
as ordinarily understood), and with it of materialism. We
may say, indeed, that in the present disintegration of
religion around us, the idealism of Berkeley, of Car-
lyle, and of Emerson, has been to many a man the
focus of a creed, of a fervent and sincere and influen-
tial faith. It is this that makes Berkeley .and idealism
in general so interesting now. Berkeley, indeed, is, in
every point of view, a grand and great historical figure.
Grand and great in himself — one of the purest and most
beautiful souls that ever lived — he is grand and great
also in his consequences. Hamann — an authority of
weight — declares that ' -without Berkeley there had
been no Hume, as without Hume no Kant ; ' and this
is partly the truth. To the impulse of Berkeley
partly, then, it , is that we owe German philosophy !
And great as is this service, it is to the majority of
English and American thinkers much less great than
that which they owe to Berkeley himself, either directly
or indirectly (through Carlyle and Emerson) — especially
in the religious reference already alluded to. When
we add to these considerations, that also of Berkeley's

BERKELEY. «21

mastery of expression, arnl of liia ponernl fascination as
a writer, it is impossible to think of him to whom I'opo
attributes ' every virtue under heaven,' without that
veneration with which the ancients regarded their Plato,
their Democritus, and their lOleatic Parmenides, of
which last, perhaps, the sublimity, jjurity, and earnest-
ness of character approach nearest to those of the
character of Berkeley. It is no wonder, then, that
interest has partially revived of late in the philosophy
of Berkeley, and that we look forward with so much
expectation to that complete edition of his works which
has so long occu[)ied the attention of the eminently-
competent Professor Fräser.^ In the same connection
■we may allude to the many Berkeleian elements that
obtain in the writings of Professor Ferrier.

Having omitted all notice of Bishop Berkeley in the
Secret of Hcgel, I felt that I couhl do no less than repair
that omission here, in a work which, bearing so directly
on German philosophy, owed so much of its materials to
him. I may add, too, that, apart even from the in-
fluence of his earlier writings, there attaches now, in
the present situation of the study of the history of philo-
sophy, a peculiar value to his expressions relative to the
philosophies of the ancients in what may be called hia
latest work, Siris. Here Berkeley displays such an
extensive and correct acquaintance with the philosophy
of the Greeks as must prove surprising to every one who
has had his attention recalled of late to the same sub-
ject. To Mr. Grote we may point out, for instance, that
he says (section 309), *To nnderstand and to be, are,
according to Parmenides, the same thing ; ' and (section
320), 'According to Anaxagoras, there was a confused
mass of all things in one chaos, but mi7id supervening,
iireXduv, distinguished and divided them ;' and to Mr.
Lewes, as in reference to philosophy, that he opines (sec-
tion 3Ö0) that * He who hath not much meditated upon
God, the human mind and the summum bofmm, may
possibly make a thriving earthworm, but will most in-
dubitably make a sorry patriot and a sorry statesman.'
Nay, even with a reference to later philosophy, there are
expressions in this work which equally surprise. Berke-
ley says there of space, for example (section 318), 'If
we consider that it is no intellectual notion, nor yet per-

1 This very perfect edition Ave now possess, and the Editor has more
than satisfied in it every expectation.

422 ANNOTATIONS.

ceived by any of our senses ;' and this is, virtually, all
that, on the same subject, was afterwards said by Kant.
Hegel himself is not unrepresented here, as sections
359-365 will testify. There the English Bishop gives
some hints towards that speculative founding or ground-
ing of the doctrine of the Trinity on which the German
Professor laid afterwards so much stress. In all these
references Berkeley will be found peculiarly admirable
for the spirit of candour and love which he manifests.
For systems, flippantly characterized nowadays as Pan-
theistic or Atheistic, for example, he grudges not, in
the sweetness of his own simple, sincere nature, to vin-
dicate Theism. Altogether, one gets to admire Berkeley
almost more here than elsewhere. The learning, the
candour, and the depth of reflection, are all alike strik-
ing. As compared with Hume, in especial, it is here that
Berkeley is superior ; and tltat not only with reference
to the learning, but with reference to the spirit of faith
and gravity, as opposed to the spirit of doubt and levity.
The most valuable ingredient in Berkeley is, after all,
that he is a Christian.

XXN.—Kant.

BY him who compares the translation with the
original, it will be found that something has
been done in this section (by parentheses or slight
modifications) as well to provide a correct statement
of the views of Kant, as to secure the understanding
of them on the part of the student. Much explanatory
illustration does not seem called for, then ; but, carefully
reading the text, I shall set down here such remarks
as may naturally suggest themselves. The modifications
alluded to will be found chiefly on pages 210, 211, 213,
218, 219, 220, 221, 222, 223, 224, and concern what
I have spoken of as Kant's theory of perception. Much
light into this theory is extended by simply substituting
perception for cognition, the word which is generally used
by others in translating Kant in this reference. A con-
siderable amount of light lies, too, in the substitution of
perception for intuition. The sensations of the various
special senses, received into the universal a priori forms
of space and time, are reduced into perceptive objects,
connected together in a synthesis of experience, by the
categories. These are the broad outlines of the theory

KAXT. 423

named ; hut Kant goes into the construction or realiza-
tion of this theory with great minuteness. This reahzatioa
or construction is scarcely rejiresented in the stateujeut
of Schwegler, and constitutes that deduction of the cate-
gories (and deduction does not mean derivation but juj<ti-
ßcation — a justifying exposition or construction), which
is at once the central and the most difficult {»ortion of
the work of Kant It is here that we have the various
syntheses of imagination^ apperception, etc It is this
deduction, in fact, which puts meaning into that scheme
of categories which, as it stands in Schwegler, is hardly
either intelligible or credible. Kant has often been
charged vrith. mere empiricism in deriving his categories
from formal logic ; but the objectors have mostly ignored
that a priori and demonstrated nature of formal logic on
which Kant always insists so much, and to which I
allude in a parenthetic addition on page 221. Page 215,
in the series of the great works of Kant, I shall be found
to have substituted the Kritik of Judgment for the work
on Religion within the bounds of Pure Beaton. Page 217,
Schwegler says that the KritU: of Pure Reason is the
inventarium of all our possessions through pure reason.
This is an error, as I have pointed out elsewhere, and
I have substituted for inventarium the word ground-plan.
Page 225, Kant speaks of the necessity of a 'whole or
nature of things ;' this strikes the key-note of the great
difference between the Germans and the Positivists in
their modes of ^'iewing existence. The former demand
an intelligible necessary context or synthesis of things ;
the latter admit only an unintelligible conjunction of
bare consequents and bare antecedents that is co-exten-
sive with experience alone. On pages 212 and 216, one
gets a clear glimpse of the difference between the pro-
cedures of Kant and criticism, and those of Hume and
scepticism. Kant would honestly investigate and tabu-
late the sotirce, nature, and extent of all those aporias,
which Hume only summons up as spectres for the con-
fusion of faith. Kant's Copemican allusion was probably
suggested by a passage that occurs in the last paragraph
but two of the first section of Hume's inquiry concerning
Human Understanding. It is of great importance that
the reader should not misunderstand the state of Kant's
conviction in regard to the moral postulates, that is,
to the existence of God, the immortality of the soul,
and the freedom of the wilL Coleridge, it is known,

424 ANNOTATIONS.

doubted Kant's sincerity in their regard. Very un-
fortunately for himself, however, for such a doubt
is a conviction of ignorance. The moral scheme of
Kant is by far the purest that any philosopher has
ever broached. In an act of moral volition, he will
have no pathological element whatever present ; our
rational will shall be absolutely free and autonomous,
and obey no law but its own. Now, if this position
be wholly based on one of the postulates, so rigorous
is it, that it finds, though in a peculiar indirect manner,
the other two to tend against it. Let the existence of
God be once for all absolutely certain, let the immor-
tality of the soul be once for all absolutely certain, then
fear and hope — pathological elements — cannot be pre-
vented from intruding into moral motive, and the purity
of the categorical imperative is vitiated. The immor-
tality of the soul and the existence of God are indeed
for Kant absolutely necessary consequences of our moral
constitution itself, still it is not without satisfaction
that he finds our cognitive faculty, as he thinks, wholly
incompetent to prove, these principles. We cannot prove
these principles, he says, but neither can the enemy
disprove them ; and meantime they have morally pre-
cisely that support and no more which coheres with
their essential interests. "Were this support greater,
were they, once for all, certainties of knowledge, then
the moral law, which is either categorical or naught,
were for ever paralysed. Kant positively hails with
satisfaction, then, as a special and express provision of
God himself, this theoretical uncertainty of the postu-
lates that compels us to take refuge in the practical
world, in the world of morals. Besides the great bene-
fit— the freedom of the moral law — he sees in this
arrangement a discipline also which is to secure us on
one side from irreligious self-abandonment, and on the
other from superstitious fanaticism. It is pleasant
to perceive, however, the warm affection that Tant has
at heart for the argument from design ; he cannot help
availing himself, so far as he can, of the support it
yields ; and it is important to know that it is not
after all the moral, but the intellectual, interest that
compels him to doubt it. To Kant, namely, all that
we know is from within — subjective sensational states
(due certainly to external antecedents which, neverthe-
less, are absolutely unknown) realized into an objective

KANT. 425

syatom of exporionce hy aiibjoetivo intellectual faculties
— evitlently, then, in such a world there is no room for
tlie action on it of a Ood fnun without. Could wo know
the external world, then, if Ciod has made it according
to desiffn and according to beauft/, we should bo able to
know both of these also; but internal sensations syn-
thesized by internal intellections can give no knowledge
of outer things themselves, let alone their design and
beauty. Plainly, tlien, in these respects, Kant must,
in regard of his theoretical world, whatever was tlie
situation of his moral one, have found himself peculiarly
hampered. Hence the Kritik of Judgment. It was
precisely on this Kantian condition of knowledge that
Hegel broke in with his very üercest wrath. What ! the
truth is never possible for us, we must know but
delusions and appearances only ; and of what we do
know, we are only to say we know what has received
filling from impressions of sense ? Great is Hegel's
scorn here, and very grim his laugh at the inability of
poor Kant to believe in the substantiality of the ego,
because it was not a thing, a sensuous thing. It is at
page 227 that Schwegler reports on this matter. There
we see that the ego was to Kant nothing but the simple
reflection *! am,' or »I think;' «the "I think,'" we
hear, ' is neither perception nor notion, but a mere con-
sciousness, etc. . . . falsely converted into a thing.'
What, in this reference, Hegel blew into annihilation
with a breath of his scorn, Coleridge fell down before
and worshipped. Kant's ' I think,' which was neither
perception nor notion, nothing but a bare consciousness,
was to Coleridge the infinite / Am, in whom we live,
move, and have our being ! A great portion of the
Logic of Hegel is taken up with a criticism of the
elements of Kant, and never was there a criticism more
unsparing or more absolutely exhaustive. The para-
logisms that are to subvert the ego, the cosmological
antinomies, the objections to the arguments for the
existence of God, are all subjected by Hegel to a sifting,
to a closeness of scrutiny never before paralleled, and
with satisfactory results for the spiritualist on all
hands. I may allude also to Hegel's statement of Kant
in the Encyclopcedia as perhaps the most powerful and
successful analytic objective synthesis at present in
existence. At page 239, we find Kant's view of the
Trinity, a very difi'erent one from that of Hegel, to

426 ANNOTATIONS.

whom that doctrine was the essential basis of religion.
At page 240, we have Kant's approaches to, but failure
fairly to seize, the notion of immanent adaptation, or of
that intuitive understanding which would recognise in
the universal the particular. The phrase intuitive under-
standing conveyed to Hegel that conception of the all of
things according to which thought and perception were
one — thought not only was in itself (the universal, the
noumenon), but in realization also (the particular, the
phenomenon).

XXVL— /aco&f.

IN the very clear exposition here, room for explanation
there is none. It is a pleasure to see such an
authority as Jacob! able to do full justice to the Kantian
transformation of the ideas of theoretical, into the postu-
lates of practical, reason. In reading this section, the
competent student cannot fail to be impressed by a
sense of how much Sir William Hamilton owes to Jacobi,
especially as regards the intuition of belief. Jacobi is
an admirable stylist ; so it is that stylist hung on stylist,
and that Hamilton drew so much of his knowledge of
the Germans from this source. It must be matter of
regret, indeed, that such a trenchant subjective intellect
as Hamilton's allowed itself, in its own natural im-
patience and impetuosity, to know of the great masters
of German speculation only, for the most part, what exote-
ric writers told him. Hence the undigested fragments
which, now no honour to him, might through labour have
been replaced by what would have given stimulus and
support to thousands. Hamilton's * Conditioned' is an
unfortunate and perverted echo from the same influences.
Nor do I think that either his additions to logic or
his doctrine of common sense will sustain inquiry. His
psychology, however, is not without genuine materials.
He is, perhaps, the only Scottish psychologist of any
veritable historical value since Brown. But, generally,
let Hamilton's objective product be what it may, we
must not forget his great and real subjective ability.
No man that ever lived could draw a distinction to
a sharper edge than Hamilton could ; he has the style
of genius, the temperament of genius, and, with all his
faults, he is, perhaps, a bigger man in the field of mental

FICHTE. A21

philosopliy than any man that has followed him in Croat
Britain (though Ferricr is finer ])erhai)s). It is to l)u
borne in mind, too, that the abovo criticism concerna
only what may bo called Hamilton's ultimate result aa
an original j»hilosopher, and that there is no intention to
undervalue his writings in other respects. These, indeed,
are always brilliant, forcible, clear, and, where informa-
tion ia concerned, both entertaining and instructive.

XyiNll.— Fichte,

THE student, it may be, will find greater diflSculty
here than elsewhere in Schwegler. The unsubstan-
tiality, the airiness of the deduction in general, and of
what concerns contraposition in particular, will probably
be found the source of this. On the first head, indeed,
it is impossible not to wonder, as Kant did, at the busy,
eager, never-doubting Fichte, who will develop the world
from a process, so to speak, of in and in. Only when he
gets to a wholly concrete sphere is it that he becomes at
all satisfactory. Then his method becomes simply a,/orm
that lays out the (concrete) matter clearly before us.
This is seen in the practical sphere, and is there really
valuable. As regards contraposition, the key-note has
been already struck when it was said, that, given a posi-
tive, its negative counterpart is also given, as cold in
reference to heat, etc. The quotation from Professor
Ferrier, already given (p. 360), * Whatever epithet or
predicate is applied to one of the terms of the antithesis,
the counter-predicate must be applied to the other term,'
has this reference. Schwegler's language is, ' Whatever
belongs to the ego, the counterpart of that must, by
virtiie of simple contraposition, belong to the non-ego;'
and again, * As many parts of reality as the ego deter-
mines in itself, so many parts of negation does it de-
termine in the non-ego, and conversely.' I fancy that
the historical value of the method of Fichte will shrink,
in the end, to its influence on HegeL Without the
method of the Wissenschaftslehre, there never would have
been the method of the Logic. When it is said, on p. 260,
that Kant took his categories from experience, I have
added 'in a manner,' referring to the demonstrated and
a priori nature of formal logic as insisted on by Kant, and
already aUuded to. What is said (p. 261) about the

428 ANNOTATIONS.

univei'sal ego, as substituted in the deduction for the
empirical ego, is not satisfactory. Let us generalize as
much as we j)lease, we still know no ego but the empiri-
cal ego, and can refer to none other. That, in the
fragment of the first sonnet, for the sake of uniformity,
I have substituted the second person for the first, will
probably not be taken ill.

XXVlll.— Herhart.

THERE is certainly a great deal in this section that is
striking and ingenious, but in view of the fantastic
and incredible nature of much else, probably our con-
clusion will be the same as that of Schwegler. The sup-
])osition of these ' reals' is the destruction of philosophy.
How can unity, philosophy, be possible if the basis of all
be an underived, heterogeneous, and really unknown
many ? Philosophy is possible only on the supposition
of a single principle that possesses within itself the
capability of transition into aU existent variety and
varieties. Then consider the absurdity of such questions
as ' A body is coloured, but not without light ; how then
about this quality in the dark ?' There is a look of depth
here that may take with some, but I know no parallel to
such a question unless the household mystery of. Where
was Adam when the light went out ? To suppose some-
thing present when its very constituent conditions are
absent, is a return to the noumenon that is without a
quality. Erdmann is incisively clear on Herbart, and
Ueberweg extends us a very satisfactory relative breadth.

XKlX.—ScheUmg.

^HEEE is little to be said here, and any diflSculty
I occurs only in the latest . paragraphs. One likes
the genial glances of Schelling, but one dislikes his
incessant changes. A human being leaping in such a
variety of directions, according to the latest goad, is not
an edifying spectacle. His best contributions are pro-
bably those in analogy with Böhm ; his worst, where he
conceals what be misunderstood in Hegel in vast, vague,
mythological forms that have no merit but such as an
Ossian might claim. The exposition of these last, how-
ever, is the worst in the book ; but for that Schwegler is

HEGEL. 4*20

not to blame. Schelling's works in question liad not
reached complete publication before the untimely death
of Schweglor. The note, p. 311, refers to an unsatis-
factory sentence, which runs thus in the original (p. 2'2'J) :
* JJieses driVe nun, das, wie — A den ersttn so den höchsten
Anspruch darauf hai, das Seiende zusein, wird am passend-
sten mit dem Worte Oeist bezeichnet.' Aa pointed, the
first nominative has no verb ; a comma after — A (as in
the translation) makes the grammar easy, but the sense
diflBcult. To place the das before the — A would make
the sense no better. It would hardly yield cc-mplete
satisfaction even to convert the minus into a plus, or,
indeed, to prefix both. The eighth German edition with-
draws the comma after da-s.

XXX.—Ilcgel.

THE competent reader, who keeps the original before
him, will probably feel pleased with any little turn or
modification which he may find in the translation of this
section. In iii. 2. (b.) (2), for examj)le, he will i)erceive
that, to make the text consistent and intelligible, I was
obliged to refer to Hegel himself. When it is considered
that the life and works of Hegel present themselves, as they
appear on the library shelves, in no less than twenty-two
good-si^ed volumes, it will be readily imderstood that
Schwegler's twenty-eight pages can do but scant justice to
so large an amount of matter. Accordingly they can be
regarded occasionally as onl}' extended contents. (This is
more especially the case, perhaps, with what we have under
the * absolute spirit.') Nevertheless, I regard this state-
ment of Schwegler's as, on the whole, not unsuccessful
in giving a glimpse as well of the matter as the form of
HegeL The 'logic,' though shortened or fore-shortened
into what, I fear, must seem to the unacquainted reader
only caricature, is really in itself, however inadequate as
a complete exposition, a spirited sketch. The four pages
on 'the objective spirit' again, though representative of
two volumes, ' the philosophy of right,' and ' the philo-
sophy of history' (the latter need hardly be mentioned,
however), I positively like, and expect more good from,
whether as regards Hegel or as regards the public, than
from all the rest. The little hint of Schwegler's against
this part of the philosophy of Hegel as a ' State-philo-
sophy,' I would not have the reader to take altogether

430 A NNO TA TIONS.

au 2ne.d de la lettre. By far tLe best lesson the Germaus
can give us lies in the ethical works of Kant, and the
ethical and political ones of Hegel. It is these, however
(with the religious), that, in the case of Kegel, have
excited the shrieks of the German radicals and free-
think(!rs.

What disheartens the student of Hegel is, firstly, the
impossibility of reading in Hegel ; and, secondly, the
difficulty of attaining, in his regard, to a general conclu-
sion. The curious peculiarity, too, on the first head, is
that, open where we may in Hegel, we find him always
engaged in saying pretty well the same thing. Open
where we may, in short, it is always the dialectic we
encounter, and that dialectic is always the same, what-
ever element it may be in act to transform. Nay, there
is also a peculiar dialect to which this dialectic has led,
and which renders it impossible for Hegel to escape into
general and current speech, even when employed on
matters that are not esoteric. This is to be seen even in the
* philosophy of history,' which, of all the representations
of Hegel, is perhaps the easiest. That perpetual abstract
alone, as, for instance, Rome's abstracte Herrschaft, must
have irritated most readers. Not only that, however,
but Hegel seems to have brought from very nature a
tendency to grübeln, to grub and grope and burrow like
a mole in the ground. We see this in the earliest papers
we possess from him ; in those, for example, that relate
to his theological studies when a tutor in Switzerland.
Specimens of these we have in the life by Rosenkranz,
and they seem scarcely human ; they seem constructed
for an understanding that moves only in the interior.
Hegel, at his ripest and best, has attained to a broad
homely Suabian Doric, that, racy with hits, is not un-
kindly, or that, 'stubborned with iron,' can annihilate
roughly with a laugh — to a speech, then, at once force-
ful, plain, and clear ; but he was not, probably, by gift
of nature a stylist. Hodden -grey at his finest, there was
a tendency in him — early in life an eiTort even — to get
muffled and uncouth, and lost from sight in the hopelessly
baroque. Something of this we see at page 320, in the
quotation from the Phenomenology. The figures in which
Hegel would there find air for himself are big and
mouthing and confused ; and he makes no scruple to
stride a cross metaphor. Let it have been as it may,
however, with the style or natural speech of Hegel, tho

HEOEL. 431

impossibility of reading in him is due mainly to his
«lialectic and consequent dialect. "What i8 this diah'ctic,
then, we naturally ask, on which the whole problem
hinges? Let xis but know that, and wc shall have a key
to the dialect, and thence to the whole. The usual
explanation of this dialectic is what we find in Schweglcr,
as in reference to the * absolute method ' ' that advances
from notion to notion through negation,' etc. (see ])p. 317,
323, 324). Now, as discussed elsewhere, I hold this and
all such explanations to be external merely, and to miss
the main point. That point is the notion, the concrete
notion, and in its derivation from Kant ; and that is the
'secret of Hegel.* Hegel, undoubtedly, was not without
debts to Schelling ; but I know not that it was 'from
reflection on the oue-sidedness of Schelling that the
Hegelian philosophy arose.' Schelling's 'nature,' and
his 'absolute,' and his reference to Böhm, did much, it ia
true, for Hegel, but the form of Fichte, and certainly the
matter of Kant did much more. In short, it comes to
this, inspired by their example, Hegel soughtthe one idealistic
principle to which he might reduce all To be in earnest
with idealism, Hegel said to himself, is to find all things
whatever but forms of thought. But how is that possible
without a standard — without a form of thought, that,
in application to things, will reduce them to itself?
What, in fact, is thought — what is its ultimate, its prin-
ciple, its radical? These questions led to the result
that what was peculiar to thought, what characterized
the fimction of thought, what constituted the special
nerve of thought, was a triple nisus, the movement of
which corresponded in its successive steps or moments
to what is named in logic simple apprehension, judgment,
and reason. Simple apprehension, judgment, and reason,
do indeed constitute chapters in a book, but they collapse
in man into a single force, faculty, or virtue, that has
these three sides. That is the ultimate pulse of thought
— that is the ultimate virtue into which man himself
retracts. Let me but be able then, thought Hegel, to
apply this standard to all things in such manner as
shall demonstrate its presence in them, as shall demon-
strate it to be their nerve also, as shall reduce all things
into its identity, and I shall have accomi)lished the one
universal problem. All things shall then be demon-
stratively resolved into thought, and idealism — absolute
ideahsm — definitively established. This is the secret of

432 A NNO TA TIONS.

Hegel, and all the details of the execution, if with effort,
still follow of themselves. The first moment of the
notion is simple ai)prehen8ion, identity, the universal, —
that the beginning of the system, then, as in evolution,
should be pure being, cannot surprise. Those who object
to the beginning with being, indeed, only expose their
ignorance of the principle of Hegel. That principle is the
radicul, the ultimate nerve, the pulse of actual living
thought, and not being and nothing, nor any mere abstract
formula about synthesis, antithesis, position, negation, etc.
These names, indeed, are not inapplicable to the concrete
notion, but they are not that notion, nor can they be
substituted for it.^ Then it shall not be enough to
demonstrate all things to be made on the model of the
notion, but its own inherent triple nisus shall constitute
the movement also ; the means, that is, of transition
between things, or of transformation of one thing into
another. And thus the universe shall be presented as
but a vast system of thought, self-referent to the unity
of a single living pulse. This system is, and is eternal as
it is. Still under explanation all becomes fluent, and
refers itself genetically to the single pulse. That pulse,
in its own movement, is adequate to its own internal
realization, which complete, it is only a necessary result
of the same pulse that it should sunder into an external
realization, and so on. (The phenomenon or shadow of
the noumenon is as necessary as the shadow of light.)
This, then, is the secret of Hegel's dialectic. Let us
come upon it wherever we may, we shall find that the
element concerned, under subjection (as is supposed) to
the process of pure original thought, passes from the
roller of simple apprehension to that of judgment, whence
reason receiving it returns it in a new form, or as a new
element, to simple apprehension again. Or an element
presents itself always at first in its universality or abs-
tract identity, passes into its particularity or abstract dif-
ference, and issues in its singularity or concrete wholeness ;
just as to Hegel a whole act of thought consists of an act of
simple apprehension on an object, followed by another of
judgment, and that finally by a third of reason. The

1 The truth is, at the. same time, that it was substituted for fhem :
Hegel, that is, converted Fichte's artificial abstract receipt for an
a priori deduction into what he conceived the actual pulse of actual
living thought, to the development, as he also conceived or repre-
sented,— but only with enormous labour and ingenuity of construc-
tion,—of the ultiinate or essential system of the universe.

HEGEL, 433

dialectic, then, being but the means that mediates the
transition or transformation of one tiling into another,
may, to a certain extent, be neglected for these thinqs
themselves ? This, to a certain extent, is indeed possible,
but only to a certain extent. Did we altogether neglect
the dialectic that transforms substantiality into causality,
or that that transforms causality into reciprocity, for
example, -we should find that we had not attained the
metaphysic of these notions, the explanation of them.
For it is to be said, that Hegel (possibly even in inde-
pendence of the dialectic) has fairly thought out the
})roblem of all these notions, and the result is contained
in the dialectic. One suspects this dialectic, distrusts it ;
still its power is wonderful. In ap])roaohing in the ' logic,'
for instance, the exposition of the Absolute (an exposition
that does not a]ipear in the Encyclopedia), one is apt to
say to one's-self, What we shall have here will be the old
difl&culty of finite and infinite, that if God is the affirma-
tion of all that is, he is likewise, and even so, its
negation : that will be turned and returned, and advance
there will be none. But let him but honestly live him-
self into the discussion, and he will admit, in the end,
that the Absolute has been very fairly construed into the
Attribute, and the Attribute into the Modus. Still, it
is to be admitted, that to take on one's-self the full
weight of the dialectic is to expose one's-self almost to
insupportable pain. Hegel, then, whether led to it by
the dialectic, or by a previous and independent study,
must be credited with the most satisfactory answers yet
to the whole body of the various metaphysical problems.
The Aristotelian logic he has similarly made once more
alive. Returning to his secret, however, we may again
say that no abstract speech about * negation,' etc., will
ever explain it ; it is simply this, That, in earnest with
idealism, he sought the radical of thought, and applied it,
when found, resolvingly to aU things that are in heaven
or upon earth. This is the true answer, and, however
familiar, however popular, the system of Hegel may
become in the course of generations, in consequence of
the completion of its exposition in such detail as ia
applied, in the Secret of Hegel, to quality and other
sections of the Logic, there never will be an answer in a
single proposition easier or closer. It is this, in the
main, that the present annotator claims to have first
said and demonstrated. In this reference, then, the

2 E

434 ANNOTATIONS.

answer of Schwegler is not satisfactory. His expressions
in regard to Schelling, and Fichte, and Kant, are wide
of, or simply beside, the truth. His explanations about
'negation,' and 'position,' and * opposites,' etc., are
abstractions without a glimpse of the concrete reality
involved. When he says, then (p. 324), ' His (Hegel's)
beginning is not with certain highest axioms in which all
further development is already implicitly contained, and
serves consequently simply for their more particular
characterization ; but, taking stand on what requires no
further support of proof, on the simplest notion of reason,
that of pure being, he deduces thence, in a progress from
abstracter to concreter notions, the complete system of
pure, rational knowledge,' he does not explain, he wholly
misses, the real concrete beginning, and only substitutes
therefor the formal and abstract start. Similarly, when
he speaks (p. 323) of the deduction of the notions, ' the
one from the other,' etc., he has no perception of the one
original central notion to the movement of which the
whole is due. This perception, indeed, is still absent
when his language is otherwise correct. Thus it is correct
to say (p. 317), 'This immanent spontaneous evolution
of the notion is the method of Hegel ;' but still the pro-
position is, so to speak, blind till we know what notion ;
and Schwegler has nowhere extended us that. Again
(p. 316), this is correct and admirably descriptive indeed,
• Thought is not one external form of the absolute beside
others ; it is the absolute itself in its concrete unity of
self ; it is the idea come back to itself — the idea that
knows itself to be the truth of nature, and the power in
it;* but even granting Schwegler to know that existence
is the absolute identity, and in its absolute difference, there is
no hint here of the triple nisus of thought that is the
unseen agency of the whole.

Assuming now, then, that the diflSculty of reading in
Hegel has been sufficiently explained, we pass to the
second circumstance that disheartens his student, and
that is the difficulty, as regards the system, of attaining
to a summary conception of its general result. Where is
God in the system ? it is asked ; and what is its ruling
on the immortality of the soul ? Now, it is to be con-
fessed that doubts as to how to answer these questions
exist even within what is called the school, and some time
will pass, probably, before, to universal satisfaction, they
can be fairly resolved. The creed of Hegel is imdoubtedly

IIEQEL. 435

spiritualism ; it is not materialism. What alono exists
for Hegel, what alono substantially is, is thought. But
then it readily occurs to be objected, It is very true that
all actual existences pass, and that what alone is per-
manent is the intelligible relations and ideas which these
existences express ; but still it is only these existences
that have or had reality, the positive fruition of actual
being, while these so-called permanent ideas are after all
but relations, forms, that, always existing not per »g, but
only per alitul, can never be said to exist in truth at all.
Annihilate the things, and where are your forms ? The
forms of mathematics exist in all things, but without
the things, what were mathematics for a life ? It is this
shadowy universal that, apparently alone the outcome of
Hegel, is the greatest difficulty in his regard ; for if that
be all, then there is for man neither a God nor an immor-
tality, in whom, or which, he can take the smallest interest.
That is pantheism. Only the idea is, all forms are but
its expressions ; they pass, but it endures for ever. It is
this that has substantiated itself in the world ; it is this
that substantiates itself in history. What is, then, is the
idea, the reason of this universe, and it is a system in
itself. The visible iiniverse, indeed, is of this system
but the perishable and ever perishing phenomenon. The
idea is the noumenon, which, timeless and spaceless, alone
is. Man, men, are the necessary singulars in whom this
universal and this particiliar meet and are realized. He
is the concrete in whom are actualized both abstractions.
The highest form of the idea, for example, is ever
corporealized in the arts, sciences, and institutions, in
the religions and philosophies of man. The individual
man perishes, but the majestic spectacle remains. In a
word, thought alone is, and for its own life, its own
growth, it uses up the solidity of things, whose perpetual
death is its perpetual birth. This, as said, is, as I under-
stand it, pantheism ; and it is the most hopeless theory
that has ever been offered to humanity. If this is the
result of Hegel, and if it is to be understood as demon-
strated truth, then, to my \aew, it is the most unfortunate
result that has ever issued, and the disappearance of man,
as but a pithecus intelligens, into the shelves of the rock,
cannot be long to wait for. Idealism and materialism
here fall together with a vengeance, and the only question
that remains between them is, whether are the ideal rela-
tions or the material exemplifications the prius? — a

436 ANNOTATIONS.

question that will be answered 80 soon as it is determined
whether the hen or the egg is first.

' I3o near me when my light is low,
Bo near me when my faith ia dry 1 '

In days of doubt, these are the cries of the faithful.
So it is, then, that, though to me the creed of Hegel
is not that pantheism of despair that gives itself big
words only, there have been times when he rose
before me haggard, wan, his brow wet with the per-
spiration of hopelessness — a hopelessness confessed by
the hollow laughter itself, by the very audacity that
would conceal it. However painful, then, I do not
wonder at, nor seek to hide, the unfortunate experi-
ences of some who at least began with Hegel. Through
what strange series of beliefs or unbeliefs does not Feu-
erbach descend from the logical idea to naked sense !
' Der Mensch ist was er isst,' man is what he eats : the
little gleam of a calembour is the only spiritual consola-
tion that remains to him 1 Oh, the pity of it ! And
what but pity is allowed us as we hang by the couch
of * the invalid of the Rue d'Amsterdam ' over the white
ash of an utter contempt for life, for existence, for
this the necessary outcome of the all, of reason — the
white ash which once was so warm a heart, so eager
and so swift a soul ?

* Hold thou the good : define it well :
For fear divine Philosophy
Should push beyond her mark, and be
Procuress to the Lords of HelL'

But, worst of all, Huge, the bold, brilliant Huge, whose
special merit it was ' to have first introduced the
youth of Halle into the metaphysical depths of the Hege-
lian philosophy,' winds up his destiny by translating
— for Germans ! — that hollow make-believe of windy
conceit, Buckle's Civilisation in England I It is diffi-
cult, indeed, to support Hegel under such a blow as
this last! But is it right to lay wholly at his door
the calamities of the stylists, or the temper of the
time? The fiery heads that light up the day with
the rockets of genius, have yet, in subjective vanity,
subjective impatience, hardly opportunity for the slow
and laborious accumulation of principles. By such men,
then, Hegel is not to be judged, nor by the revolt
of such men is his school destroyed. The historian

HEGEL. 437

üeberweg testifies, to-day even, th.it * the philosophy the
most iu vogue iu the philosophical schools of Germany
is still the Hegelian.' Then as for the temper of the
time, it is for Schopenhauer that life is ' a cheat, and
a uselessly interrupting episoile in the blissful reposo
of nothing,' and Schopenhauer hated Hegel.

We shall not burden Hegel with the whole weight
of his own time, then, nor, should our own lamp, or
the lamps of others, burn as low or as extravagantly
as they may, shall we impute to him alone the blame
of it. This is certain, that if the result of Hegel is
the pantheistic despair in question, his entire industry
has simply stultified itself. The philosophy of Hegel
was avowedly a philosophy of restoration and religious
orthodoxy, and his action throughout was essentially
a reaction against the Aufklärung — against that stri})-
ping naked of all things in heaven or upon earth at
the hands of the modern party of unbelief, and under
guidance of so-called reason or rationalism. The result-
ing anarchy of naked, isolated, unsupported atoms was
plain to him. Only in religious belief is society possible,
he thought. And a nation that believes not in God and
the immortality of the soul, in the supernatural element
generally, must, it appeared to him, even in its own
madness, speedily dissipate and destroy itself. The
negative, then, to Hegel, had now functioned to the
full ; it had done its work ; and it was time for the
aflirmative to step in. His aim, then, was to provide
us with an affirmative body of knowledge, theoretical,
practical, and aesthetic, in which the great truths of
natural and revealed religion should once more regain
their authority, but in harmony with the rights of intel-
ligence and the light of free thought.

In confirmation of this position we may point out, in
the first place, that Hegel must be credited vrith a
perfect faith in his principle. I confess that, for my
part, this principle is still to be verified ; but, very
evidently, it was not so for HegeL He speaks again
and again, and apparently with the most perfect assur-
ance, of philosophy being now at last realized by it ;
whatever be the sphere, indeed, he cannot move a
step without it, and it seems not to have been always
for him a canon of regulation, but sometimes also an
organon of discovery. There are several points of view
in his Jtlsthetic and Philosophy of History, for example,

438 ANNOTATIONS.

to which he appears to have been led in simply prosecut-
ing the dialectic of the notion.

In the second place, I am convinced that Hegel
believed in the existence of God — of God as a subject,
too, and not merely as substance. *God,' he says (Pro-
pcedeutik, page 75), * is the Absolute Spirit, that is to
say, He is the pure essential being that makes Himself
object to Himself, but so only regards Himself; or in
this other that He has become, has directly returned
into Himself, and is identical with Himself. According
to the moments of this being, God is (1.) absolutely
Holy, so far as He is in Himself the absolutely universal
being. He is (2.) absolute Power, so far as He realizes
the All, and preserves the individual in the All, or is
eternal Creator of the Universe. He is (3.) Wisdom, so
far as His power is only holj/ power; (4.) Goodness, so
far as He leaves the individual free in his actuality ;
and (5.) Justice, so far as He eternally restores the
individual to the universal' (through mortification of
self, or sin, that is). 'The position of religion,* he says
again {Hist, of Phil. i. page 87), *is this, that the revela-
tion of the truth, which we receive through it, is a
revelation externally given to man ; hence it is said,
that he must accept it in humility, human reason being
of itself incapable of attaining thereto. The character
of positive religion is, that its truths are, without our
knowing whence or how they have come, and in such
wise that what they contain, as given to us, is conse-
quently above and beyond our reason. Sometime,
through prophet or divine messenger, the truth is de-
clared ; as Ceres and Triptolemus, who introduced till-
age of the soil and wedlock, are therefore honoured
by the Greeks, so were the nations grateful for Moses
and Mahomet. This externality, as regards what indi-
vidual the truth has been given by, is something his-
torical, that for the absolute import in itself is indifiFerent,
seeing that the person is not the import of the doctrine
itself. In the Christian religion, however, this is pecu-
liar, that this person of Christ, His character to be the
Son of God, does itself belong to the very nature of God.
Were Christ for Christians only a teacher, like Pytha-
goras, Socrates, or Columbus, then there were here no
universal divine message, no revelation, no instruction
respecting the nature of God, in regard to which alone
we desire instruction. The truth, no doubt, let it stand

IIEOEL. 439

on whatever stadium it may, must first come to mankind
in an external manner, in the form of a sensuously ])cr-
ceived, actually present object : as Moses caught sight
of Cod in the burning bush, and the Greeks gave them-
pelves a consciousness of their gods in figures of marble
or other such representations. But then, neither in re-
ligion nor philosophy do we, or ought wo to, remain by
this externality. Such form of imagination, or such
historical import, as in the latter case Christ, must for
spirit become spirit, and so cease to be an externality ;
for the mode of externality is not the mode of spirit.
"We are to know God " in spirit and in truth ;" God is
the Universal, the Absolute, the Essential Spirit. As
regards the relation of the human spirit to this spirit,
the following are the characteristics.' And now there
follows as intelligible and at the same time as profound
a speculative exposition of the relation of the finite to
the infinite spirit as can be found in the whole series of
the works of Hegel, and which leaves no doubt of God
being to Hegel a concrete being and no logical abstrac-
turn. It is here that Hegel exclaims, * I am a Lutheran,
and will remain one.' In presence of such things, and
of the innumerable similar intimations that pervade the
whole works of Hegel, it is impossible to believe in
aught but the theism of the writer, or else in his own
unparalleled self-stultification. We may refer in par-
ticular to the Philosophy of Heligion, the Philosophy of
History, and the History of Philosophy. How, other-
wise than on the supposition of his theism, can we
account for Hegel's incessant defence of the various
theological arguments against the objections of Kant,
and, in particular, for those Proofs for the Existence of
God, which he had but completed for the press when the
fatal cholera seized him? The ordinary abstraction of
the deistic itre supreme was certainly rejected by Hegel,
but he had as certainly realized to himself the nature of
the true God with a depth of vision never before exem-
plified. Mr. Lewes's extraordinary mistake in this con-
nexion has a note to itself.

In the third place, it appears to me that the whole
tendency of the writings of Hegel supports belief in the
immortality of the soul. In reply ( Works, xviL p. 226)
to an opponent who professes not to find this doctrine in
the philosophy of Hegel, Hegel himself asks : — ' Is it
not the case that in this philosophy the sjjirit is elevated

440 Ä NNO TA TIONS.

above all those categories which involve Decease, De-
struction, Death, etc., to say nothing of other equally
express declarations?' In fact, we have but to recollect
the warm manner in which Heg^l hails all such cate-
gories as the Infinite, declaring 'that at the name of the
Infinite, there rises to the soul its own light,* at the
same time that he speaks of the melancholy {Trauer) of
the thought of finitude, and, though 'the most, stifif-
necked category of the understanding,' resolves it — we
have but to recollect these and other such expressions,
as that unreality death, the death of the body is the
birth of the spirit, the soul is concrete at death, and has
taken up into itself the freight of the world, and then
the whole express discussion of the subject in the Philo-
sophy of Religion — we have but to recollect all this, I
say, to feel convinced of the perfect loyalty of Hegel to
the 'hope of immortality.' His remarks on Kant's
application of the category of degree to the soul is to the
same effect ; and there is that even in his treatment of
Mesmerism which claims for him a belief in the concrete
existence of the individual in the universal.

In the fourth place, what are we to make of the Vin-
dication of Christianity as the Revealed Religion ? Are
we to believe that Hegel is here a hypocrite ? No, that
is impossible ; Christianity is to Hegel a concrete truth,
and he is nowhere more in earnest than in the specula-
tive founding or grounding of all its dogmas. And the
'speculative' of Hegel is not the 'moral' of Kant, but
the very inmost nerve of religious thought, such as we
find only in our deepest and truest theologians. As
a single token of the nature of his belief, we may state
that the resurrection of Christ is to Hegel an actual
fact. But if Hegel has speculatively demonstrated
the truth of Christianity, what consequences immediately
foUow ? Surely belief in the existence of God and the
immortality of soul among the fi.rst ! What were the
sense, indeed, of an effort to reconcile philosophy and
Christianity as the Kevealed Religion, that yet rejected
all belief in God and the immortality of the soul ?

The one object of Hegel, then, was to support or re-
store belief in God, in the immortality of the soul, and
in the revealed nature of the Christian religion. How-
ever abstract and merely logical, indeed, the terms
Notion and Idea may sound, they as little preclude
belief in the concrete spirit of God as in the concrete

HEGEL. 441

spirit of man. Thought without a thinker 18 inconceiv-
able, and ahsohite thought involves an absolute subject.
It throws light on this one object of Hegel to consider
that it was not the believing but the unbelieving that ho
conceived himself to address. The great thing at last
for Hegel was a good citizen, and for him who was
already that, there was to Hogol's mind no call for philo-
sophy. Thus he tells a M. Duboc who writes to hirn
about his difficulties with the system, that, as a good
head of a house and father of a family, possessed of
a faith that is firm, he has pretty well enough, and may
consider anything further, in the way of philosophy, for
instance, as but a Luxus des Geistes — an inteUeetual
luxury. The philosophy of Hegel, then, was not ad-
dressed to those whose natural moral and religious in-
stincts were already sound, but to those — they are
called 'educated minds,' 'higher souls,' etc. — who had
been disintegrated by the thoughtless 8cei)tical levity,
or, it may be, by the thoughtful sceptical melancholy
of the day. But reconciliation of the discarded concrete
to thowjht, was evidently here the central necessity.
Hence, as we have seen, a scrutiny of thought so pro-
found that it was for the most part unintelligible, and
at the same time apparently so exhaustive that it excited
the absurdest expectations. We have here the elements
for an explanation of the monstrous aberrations of the
'German Critics,' Strauss, Bauer, Ruge, Feuerbach,
and others. Intelligence baffled, at the same time that
speculation seemed absolutely at term, despair could be
the only outcome. But this despair could not be idle,
and all the less that it felt itself pretematurally gifted
by the invincible weapons with which the study of
Hegel, unsuccessful in the main issue as it was, had
abundantly supplied it. Hence that wonderful activity of
attack against all the pillars of religion which for some
years slackened not, and which even yet, especially in
France and England, is not wholly exhausted. Of the
absurd expectations alluded to, Krug's appeal to Hegel
for a deduction of his writing -quill, afifords a good ex-
ample. It is by no means intended to be hinted that
the German Critics nourished any such ridiculous ex-
pectation as this of Krug. Dissatisfaction with the
dialectic and its results; darkness, especially with re-
gard to the main mysteries of life ; belief in the com-
pletion of speculation, and involuntary apprehension of

442 ANNOTATIONS.

its failure — this is all that we would impute to them.
We must not expect too much from Hegel, however, as
a slight consideration of his principle will readily de-
monstrate. What that principle lays out, according to
the immanent tree, is this world ; and Hegel, in restor-
ing the foundations of knowledge, and action, and be-
lief, would not compete with Swedenborg, nor introduce
us into actual experience of the future state or presence
of God. A supernatural element has accompanied man
throughout his whole history ; a supernatural element
is, to the majority of human beings, as obviously present
in the world aa the natural one ; Hegel saw this gene-
ral conviction of humanity, conceived it justified, and
sought to give it logical precision — not without immense
success, but still not without what to a spirit-rapping
age must appear lacunce. This is the brief of the matter;
and so far as any direct (sensuous) knowledge of the
supernatural is concerned, after as before Hegel — and
perfectly with his consent — the ancient mysteries are
mysteries stilL

Hegel's merit, nevertheless, is the vindicatiou of na-
son as against understanding ^ of the faculty that unites
and brings together as against the faculty that separates
and only in separation knows. Nor is this vindication
anywhere more successful than in the religious element.
The relation of finite and infinite is existent fact ; com-
munion, then, identity and yet difference, this was the
necessity to be explained, and we may assume Hegel to
have accomplished it. His unintelligible language, how-
ever, I would animate by the following metaphor, which
may at least render the unio mystica at once credible and
intelligible.

Suppose all that existed in the world were a single drop
of water — space and its contents retracted into that.
Well, evidently, seeing that it is only one drop that is
concerned, there is no room for any considerations of size.
It is indifferent whether we figure the drop as a pin's
point or a pin's head in magnitude. This drop, then,
shall be the Absolute. But this drop now is not more
one than it is many. It is a drop, a one, a single entity,
and yet, whether it be infinitely small or infinitely large,
being a water drop, it consists of an infinitude of droplets
each of which is a one — a drop, quite as much as the
original one, though only subordinate and dependent.
Now even so I can figure Spirit and Spirits, the Monas

ITEOEL. 413

fcnd the Monads. Then further, if we conceive that these
Bjnrits, monads, droplets, are not externalities but inter-
nalities — completed internalitiea — there is room for tlie
additional conception of each of them, the individual
droplets and the universal drop, being phenomenally, say
in the manner of a shadow, sundered or projected into
externalities, an external world, which should apparently
surround all and each of them, though they themselves
were self-retained. * And God said. Let there be light,
and there was light :' the sunmied internality saw before
itself, still self-retained, its own self externalized, and con-
stituting in the fashion of exfemalitij, a boundless out and
out of contingent, material, infinitely various atoms, into
which fell, however, as principle of retention, the shadow
of the original tree of intellect.

' Friendless was the mighty Lord of all
And felt defect ....
From the cup o' th' realm of spirits
Foams now infinitude.'

In this manner I think we may provide a Vorstellung
for the Begriff of the necessary unity of finite and in-
finite, and so that the one shall not unavoidably disappear
before the other, nor the preservation in the spirit- world
of the whole burthen of time — all those innumerable
savages that slaughtered each other for example — any
longer shock. Necessary existence here is necessary exis-
tence there. That Hegel would accept this illustration of
his Triune Notion, it would be too much to say. It will be
allowed, however, to be one at least probably in point.

Independent, then, of the great and undeniable contri-
butions of Hegel to logic, to psychology, to moral and
political philosophy, to aesthetics, to the philosophy of
history, and to the history of philosophy, I think we may
ascribe to him great light on aU the speculative elements
of religion also. In vindicating thought alone as the
substantial element in the universe, he has extended
immense support to every spiritual interest, and it were
well did the Church but recognise in Hegel the most
powerful bulwark that has ever, perhaps, been offered
it. For all that, nevertheless, the work of Hegel is, as
said, human ; and it is impossible for speculation^ im-
possible for theory, to satiate the longing of man. After
Plotinus, as we have seen, in ancient times, speculation
was exhausted, aud men were irresistibly driven to fore«

444 ANNOTATIONS,

a sign — to actual supersession of the laws of nature,
to actual excitation of the deity by practices Thauma-
turgic and Theurgic. The present epoch of the modern
world is, in many respects, very similar to that epoch of
the ancient. As, however, it was the Christian religion
that saved the world then, so it may be the same religion
that shall save the world now. Man must subordinate
himself, confess his limits, once again acknowledge that
the great supernatural verities are for faith and a trial to
his faith, and so once again humble himself in prayer as
the only agent Theurgic and Thaumaturgic that ever will
be allowed him to move Heaven withaL It is the good
Kant — and to Hegel himself his own philosophy is but
Kantian philosophy — that has probably struck the truth
here : we must do our duty for the duty's sake, and not
for any pathological motive which might easily lie in the
ideas of reason (the moral postulates) were they demon-
strated truths and not practical convictions simply — such
convictions as extend the needed twilight to humanity,
and not the sunshine that would blind. At all events it
is to this practical element, to moral and poHtical philo-
sophy, that we would point as the great gain that may be
derived from the Germans. And here at present is pre-
cisely our own weak side. Ever since Reid, at whose heart
lay the interests chiefly of the cognitive element, Ethics,
and the practical sphere generally, have not received that
attention in Great Britain that is their due.^ This was
not always so, however, and must not be any longer so.
We must recall the example of Francis Hutcheson, to
whom belongs, as well in Ethics as Esthetics, an historical
value which has not yet, perhaps, been adequately recog-
nised. Nor is this, as said, a difficulty now. From the
rich and all-embracing quarries of Kant, Fichte, and
Hegel, there are ethical principles to be derived, of the
solidity of which no man can doubt, let his doubts be
what they may of the theoretical principles of the whole
of them. Is it not indeed to Hegel, and especially his

1 The truth of this remark is well illustrated, as these annotations
pass through the press, by Mr. Laurie's praiseworthy Notes on British
Theories of Morals. Mr. Laurie's Notes are limited only to a few
British theories, yet the confusions of British thinkers manifest them-
selves so exasperatingly rife in them that we are reminded of Milton's
horror at the distraction of the Saxon Heptarchy. Man is a moral
being simply because he is a thinking being. That is the germ of the
whole. Hence, in reality, the categorical imperative of Kant, and,
more obviously, the free-will (the relation of the universal and the
particular will) of Hegel.

HEGEL. 445

philosophy of ethics and politics, that Prussia owes that
mighty life and organization slic is now rapidly develop-
ing ? Is it not indeed the grim Hegel that is the centre
of that organization which, maturing counsel in an invis-
ible brain, strikes, lightning-like, with a hand that is
weighted from the mass ? But as regards the vahie of
this organization, it will be more palj)able to many,
should I say, that, while in constitutional England, Pre-
ference-holders and Debenture-holders are ruined by the
prevailing commercial immorality, the ordinary owners
of Stock in Prussian Kail ways can depend on a safe aver-
age of 833 per cent. This, surely, is saying something
for Hegel at last !

The fundamental outlines of Hegel must now, I think,
be evident to every reader. I have gained much from
Hegel, and will always thankfully acknowledge that
much, but, my position in his regard has been simply
that of one, who in making the unintelligible intelligible,
would do a service for the public : I have not sought, and
do not seek, to be considered a disciple. Hegel's great
formal task has been to substitute the actual pulse of
thought for the artificial principle of Fichte. Hence the
Dialectic. This dialectic, it appears to me, has led to much
that is equivocal both in Hegel and in others, and may
become a pest yet. Not for his formal but for his svb-
stantial contributions, then, to logic and metaphysic, to
ethics and politics, to aesthetics, to history, criticism,
science, and religion, is it that Hegel, to my mind, will
have his praise yet. His History of Philosophy alone is
sufficient to stamp him a Colossus of unparalleled work,
a Colossus of the most penetrating and original sagacity.
My task has been to make plain what Hegel meant by
the word Notion. "Whether that Notion be really the
pulse of thought — that is what is still to be verified—
that is what I still doubt. So long as that doubt remains,
I am not properly an Hegelian. My general aim, how-
ever, I conceive to be identical with Hegel's — though on
a level quite incommensurably lower — that, namely, of a
Christian philosopher.

I may add that the position I assign to Hegel is the
position claimed by himself ; and every word of those
very critics, who would lead all into issues absolutely
antagonistic, — every word of Huge, for example, — wiU be
found thoroughly and completely to substantiate this.

44G A NNO TA TJONS.

SUPPLEMENTAKY NOTES.

Why the History of Philosophy ends with Hegel and
not with Comte.

I HOLD Scliwegler to be perfectly right in closing tlie
history of philosophy with Hegel, and not with
Comte. Descriptions of the German philosophical move-
ment since Hegel, such as we possess from the practised
pen of Professor Erdmann, are exceedingly interesting and
instructive ; but when, in other writers, one surveys the
various names that are subsecutive to that of Hegel, one
cannot help * wondering,' like Hegel himself in reference
to Wendt, ' was da Alles als Philosophie au/geführt
wird.* Among these names, however, so far as the Ger-
mans are concerned, and so far as I know, the name of
Comte is not included. It is the French, and, perhaps,
especially the English, who have assumed the vindica-
tion of his claims. Mr. Lewes, for one, fervidly presses
them, and it is thus competent to us to turn our regards
on them. Any consideration of them here, however,
must now be only brief as well as very insufficiently
authoritative in consequence of its dependence on know-
ledge only at second hand.^ Both Mr. Lewes and Mr.
Mill, nevertheless, oflFer us such accounts of Comte as
are at least intended to produce a certain knowledge of
him, and accordingly warrant discussion of his doctrines
80 far. As regards these doctrines, the most valuable
statement contained in the work of Mr. Lewes is that
extracted from Mr. Mill's relative article in the West-
minster Review, and to that article, therefore, I shall, in
the following — indications rather than discussion — on
the whole confine myself. The article is an able one,
calm, clear, and comprehensive : surely we have at least
the means in it of enabling us to do some justice to the
teaching of M. Comte.

1 See p. 467.

S UP PL EM EN T A li Y NO TES. 447

The fundamontal merits attribiitod to M. Comtc are
two in number : 1. His arrangement of the sciences ;
and 2, His so-called law of historical evolution.

I. M, Corate's arrangement of the sciences is into
Abstract and Concrete. The Abstract are Mathematics
(Number, Geometry, Mechanics), Astronomy, Physics
(Barology, Thermology, Acoustics, Optics, Electrology),
Chemistry, Biology, and Sociology. The Concrete again
are * postponed as not yet formed, ' but they are repre-
sented by Mineralogy, Botany, and Zoology.

II. The so-called law of evolution, again, is that
•every distinct class of human conceptions' has, in its
historical development, 'necessarily' exhibited three
successive stages, named, respectively, the Theological,
the Metaphysical, and the Positive. Accordingly, the
single point to which the labours of M. Comte direct
themselves, is the demonstration and establishment of
the method of the ultimate and crowning Positive stage
as the ultimate and crowning Positive method which
henceforth, as alone legitimate, is alone to be adopted.
This method, finally, is the investigation of pheno-
mena simply as phenomena, or simply in their direct
relations of association, whether simultaneous or suc-
cessive, and without consideration of what they may
be in themselves or in their own inner nature. The
Positive method, in short, replaces all 'outlying agencies,'
whether Theological deities or Metaphysical entities by
Positive laws ; which laws, and in their mere pheno-
menal relativity, as alone what can be known, ought
alone to constitute what is sought to be known.

The most superficial glance at the pages of either Mr.
Mill or Mr. Lewes will adequately prove what has just
been said. To Mr. Lewes, for example, the arrangement
of the sciences ' is nothing less than an organization of
the sciences into a Philosophy ;' and he frequently
speaks of the ' famous loi des trois Hats ' as * Comte's
discovery of the Law of Evolution ;' while he evidently
regards these two 'integral parts,' with the method they
involve, as constitutive of the philosophical achievement
of Auguste Comte. 'These,' he says, ' are his contribu-
tions, his titles to immortal fame,' ' the great legacy he
has left.' Mr. Mill, again, if less enthusiastic, is no less
decided. The arrangement of the sciences, for instance, he
styles ' a very important part of M. Comte's philosophy,'
a classification, which, if the best classification is that

448 ANNOTATIONS.

which is grounded on the properties the most important
for our purposes, ' will stand the test ; ' and in the same
connexion, he speaks of ' that wonderful systematization
of the philosophy of all the antecedent sciences,' which
is a ' great i)hilosophical achievement.' The so-called
law of evolution, again, he I'egards as *the most fun-
damental of the doctrines which originated with M.
Comte,' 'the key to M. Comte's other generalizations,
all of which are more or less dependent on it,' 'the
backbone, if we may so speak, of his philosophy,' etc.
And as concerns the general conclusion in reference to
a Positive method, his expressions of satisfaction are in-
cessant : ' belief in invariable laws constitutes the Posi-
tive mode of thought,' and this mode of thought is to
M. Comte, with the approbation of Mr. Mill, ' the funda-
mental doctrine of a true philosophy.' Evidently, then,
it is not without warrant that we assume the titles of
M. Comte to the place of a princeps in philosophy to
depend on his demonstrating the law of evolution, and
philosophizing the sciences, to the general result of the
Positive principle or method ; and this, all consideration
apart of the necessarily numerous merits in detau of a
WT-iter so gifted as M. Comte. On this understanding
we proceed to the statement of a few objections.

Of the classification of the sciences we remark, in the
ßi'st place, that it is confessedly incomplete. The latter
half is even written up a possibility merely, while in the
former, a capital subdivision (Barology, etc.) is admitted
to remain independent of the general principle. In the
second place, this general principle itself, whUe the most
common and the least recondite, is at the same time the
most vague and the least discriminative expedient of
classification in existence. To take the simpler first
and the more complicated last, is, on every question of
arrangement, the first suggestion of every child of Adam.
Grocers, drapers, apothecaries, the cook in the kitchen,
the school-girl that sets up housekeeping on some wall
or doorstep — these and a score more are there for the
proof. As regards vagueness, again, it will be sufficient
to point out that the distinction involved is only quanti-
tative ; it is simply a less or more ; it is wholly inappli-
cable to, it is wholly inexplicative of, quality. In the
third place, the distinction of abstract and concrete, as
applied to the two chief classes, is really a misnomer.
The second class certainly considers existents, and the

S um ILMEX TA li Y XO TES. 449

first only exis^^Nr^.but this distinrtion — and it is now only
truly named — is either not properly a distinction of abs-
tract and concrete at all, or it is a difTerent abstract and
concrete froia that already used, and this difTerence, which
is alone signiticant, is alone unsignalized. In the fourth
place, this unsignalized difference, or this assumed iden-
tity between the general and the particular princijde of
division, is itself a blot. In this way, in truth, there
are not two principles, a general and a particular, but
only one — a less or more of quantity ; and to stop at
the end of the first half-dozen less or more concretes,
and bar them oflf from the second half-dozen similarly
less or more concretes, naming the former abstract
alone and the latter concrete alone, is at once arbi-
trary and idle, gratuitous and absurd. In the ßfth
place, there is no element of necessity present to
guarantee either the adequacy, completeness, or, so
to speak, foundedness of the division. Comte, like
Xenophanes, baa simply looked d$ t6v 5\ov ovpavbv.
That is, he has simply opened his eyes and taken up
what he found to hand. Attempt at a demonstrated be-
ginning there is none. I, Auguste Comte, ^n^i number
to be what is most abstract, and I accordingly place it
so. If you doubt me, go and look for yourself. Such
procedure certainly satisfies the wants of many in Eng-
land ; nevertheless it is but arbitrary and empiricaL
— {Apropos of this word empirical, let me remark, that,
with the writers on Comte, it does not mean what it
means here, something known by mere experiment of
sense, but something generalized from individual experi-
ence, as, for instance, a proverb might be.) If the begin-
ning then is empirical, so also is the transition, and so
also the end. Why does Geometry follow Number, or
Mechanics Geometrj'-, or Astronomy Mechanics, or Physics
Astronomy, or Mineralogy Sociology ? And how is the
enumeration known to be complete ? Have we not
here a mere arbitrary breccia ? That extension should
follow number or motion extension, where is the reason
of this in the nature of the case ? That ^L Comte places
them so because he finds an ascending series of complexity
in them, is not difficult to be said ; but whence, in such
things, this ascending series of complexity ? Many Eng-
lishmen, as said, are satisfied with the fact ; those, bow-
ever, who are accustomed to Hegel, demand the reason of
the fact, the necessity of the fact. In iihe sixth place,

450 ANNOTATIONS.

the division generally has no title to superiority whether
as regards doctrine or as regards classification. It is im-
possible to believe, for example, that it will be found ex-
pedient in practice to begin education with Mathema-
tics, pass on to Astronomy, Physics, Chemistry, Bio-
logy, Sociology, and end with Mineralogy, Botany, and
Zoology. A complete view of the objects of study may
surely be more easily attained by simply glancing from
the periphery to the centre, from nebula and star, and
sun and planet, through the air to the earth, and from
the earth to the ego. Empirically, at least, such glance
is a great convenience, whatever order of study be the
right one, and, in that respect, it is hard to see that M.
Comte's classification possesses any advantage over the
empirical one suggested.

But, further, Mr. Mill himself signalizes such grave
defects in the classification of M. Comte as the omission
from it of Logic and Psychology, and a reference to Kant
and Hegel vsdll probably enable us to see more clearly its
general insufficiency. The chapter of Kant's Kritik on
the Architectonic of Pure Reason, begins thus : — * By an
architectonic I understand the art of systems. Systema-
tic unity being the means of first raising common know-
ledge into science, or of converting a mere aggregate of
such knowledge into a system. Architectonic is the
theory of the Scientific in our knowledge generally, and
necessarily belongs therefore to the theory of method.
The facts of our knowledge in general must, under con-
trol of reason, constitute not a rhapsody but a system,
in which alone they can have power to support and pro-
mote the essential objects of reason. By a system, again,
I understand the manifold of individual facts in subjec-
tion to a single idea. This idea is that of the form of a
whole, so far as through this whole, as well the amount of
the manifold as the position of its parts mutually, is a
priori determined. Such scientific idea includes therefore
the object and the form of the whole which is in congruity
with it. From the unity of the general object (purpose) to
which all the parts, mutually related in its idea, refer, it re-
sults that every part is, on occasion of a knowledge of the
rest, capable (if absent) of being missed, and that no con-
tingent addition or indeterminate amount of perfection,
without possession of its own a priori defined limits, is
possible. The whole is therefore articulated {articulatio)
and not simply amassed {coacervatio) ; it may indeed

SUPPLEMEXTA li V XOTES. 451

Inoro.iso inwardly {per intus susccpfioneni), but not out-
wardly {})<T ajiposifionciu), just like the body of au ani-
mal whose growth adds no member, but, without change
of proportion, renders each stronger and abler for its pur-
poses.' Kant goes on to define a technical unity to be
' such as is proposed empirically in obedience to objects
that only contingently present themselves, and cannot
therefore, in their constitutive amount be a priori known ;
while an architectonic nnity is ' such as results from an
idea, where reason a priori foretells, and does not merely
empirically expect the particular objects.' It is only the
architectonic unity that is competent to science. The
rest of the chapter will recompense perusal. It is in
consequence of a thorough assimilation of all these ideas
of Kant that Hegel now oflfers us his classificationa For
the Hegelian * Philosophy of the Sciences,' in especial,
we refer to the * Philosophy of Nature,' and for a
counterpart to ' Sociology ' to the ' Philosophy of Right.*
As regards the sciences, the great divisions are at once
Mechanics, Physics, and Organics. Hegel, however,
points to no empirical expediency, or mere external
quantitative increase, in justification of these rubrics : he
demonstrates his beginning, he demonstrates his transi-
tion, and he demonstrates his end. The subdivision of
the first division, and similarly demonstrated, runs thus ;
Mathematical Mechanics, Finite Mechanics (GraWty),
and Absolute Mechanics (Astronomy). These again are
further subdivided. Physics rigorously divided and sub-
divided in obedience to the same scientific principles
embrace Chemistry, Electricity, Optics, etc., while Orga-
nics concern Geological, Vegetable, and Animal Organism.
It is only in reason and consistency that what in Hegel
corresponds to Sociology constitutes but a portion of
what relates to the whole subject of mind and the mani-
festations of mind. This portion, however, occupies a
volume for itself, and this volimie may be confidently
pronounced the most perfect and complete body of juris-
prudential, ethical, and political principles at present in
existence. We have not space for exposition, but in com-
parison with the little that has been indicated, perhaps
the unguaranteed, contingent, fragmentary, and really
miscellaneous nature of the Comtian classification will be
now allowed. Mr. Mill says ' it is always easy to find
fault with a classification ; ' but we beg to add that it is
always easy to propose one, and that an easier propoai-

452 A NliO TA T10N8.

tion was never oflFered than, The simplest first ! Any
real internal dependence of a later on an earlier, of
Chemistry on Geometry or Astronomy, for example, we
very much doubt. Though more complicated, too, the
later cannot always be said to be more ' arduous ' than
the earlier ; nor is it even apparent that the method of
the earlier, though naturally never unwelcome^ is really
a necessary presupposition for the study of the' later.
But the reader can satisfy himself here with a glance
at the table for himself. In conclusion, bearing in mind
that a logical division is natural, and not artificial, or
that it is accomplished by a principle exhaustive of
what is divided and taken from what is divided, we
would point to the success of Hegel in these respects,
and the failure of Comte. We pass now to Comte's
second merit.

Is it true that every distinct class of human conceptions
has — historically — been first Theologically, then Meta-
physically, and lastly Positively regarded ? On the Theo-
logical head, it is no special merit of M. Comte to have
pointed out the characteristics of the Polytheistic ages.
All that has been said by Comte in that reference has
been said a thousand times long before him. It is natu-
ral to early men to hypostasize the various powers of
nature : of that there can be no doubt ; and all that con-
cerns the rise of Fetichism into Monotheism has been
exhausted, and from various points of view. Religious,
Political, and ^^Esthetic, by Hegel. That every class of
human conceptions, nevertheless, has experienced a theo-
logical stage, can evidently not be entertained, and Mr.
Mill himself admits as much. Was man's cooking, or
clothing, or decorating, or hunting, or fishing, or count-
ing, or measuring first of all theological, then? Was
there a theological first to Geometry (Mr. Mill says no),
or Geology, or Geography, or Zoology, or Botany, or
Optics, or Acoustics, or Chemistry, or Anatomy, or
Mineralogy, or Logic, or Agriculture, or Ai'chitecture,
or Music, or Drawing, or Grammar, or Philology, or
Phrenology, or Political Economy? The supposition is
absurd, and there is no merit whatever in the theological
suggestion of M. Comte but what belongs to the philo-
sophy of religion in general — a philosophy that is ex-
plained to us by very difi"erent writers from M. Comte.
Let ingenuity do what it may in disproof, it will remain
ingenuity merely.

suprLKMi:xTA n y xo tes. 453

As for the Motajiliysical st;vi;e, how ;ire we to undt-r-
•taiul it ? It ia generally mulerstood as if all the
philosophers from Thales to Hegel belonged to it and
exemplilied it. 1 take leave to say that this ia not so.
We aro tohl that on the theological stage things were
regarded aa gods, and on the metajjhysical aa ' powers,
forces, virtues, essences, occult qualities, considered as
real existences, inherent in but distinct from the con-
crete bodies in which they reside,' ' aa impersonal entities
interposed between the governing deity and the phe-
nomena, and forming the machinery through which
these are immediately produced.* But is this the con-
ception of a single philosopher from Thales to Hegel ?
Thales thought that water was ])robably the basis of all
things, which were but more or less rarefied or condensed
foiins of it : if for this idea, Thales is to be held to have
looked on water as an unknown noumenon, and to be
regarded accordingly as a metaphysician, what are we to
say of the modern chemist who would think himself, not
a Metapiiysician, but the luckiest Savant in the world,
covdd he but reduce all the elements in existence to the
single or even double HO ? And is it really different
with the other Ionics, Anaximander, Anaximenes, etc. ?
The Pythagoreans who w^ould account for the order and
symmetry of the universe by mathematical ratios, did
they hold by metaphysical essences then ? The Eleatics
were only of opinion that all the multiplicity of this vast
but orderly universe must be referable to a single prin-
ciple that remained, and really had quite as little to do
with essences and virtues as Comte himself. Considera-
tion of the other pre-Socratics yields the same result —
even the Love and Hate of Empedocles were in effect
but metaphors for Attraction and Repulsion. Then as
regards Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, the aim of the whole
three of them was but generalization, and generalization
as it is understood by ourselves. Nor will I for one see
inferiority in them for that of the two elements which
constitiite the universe — sensation and reflection — they
chose the nobler as the truer. Even the Reahsm of the
Schoolmen, if a belief in the prius of the thought, was
no belief of an unknown thing within the object. Then
coming down to modem times, what philosopher of the
whole series was in quest of 'impersonal entities inter-
posed between the governing deity and the phenomena?'
Why, not one. Such was not the quest of Bacon, or of

454 ANNOTATIONS.

Descartes and Spinoza, or so to name their quest -vrould
be but to belie it. Did Hume demand * occult qualities'
or ' impersonal entities,' or Locke, or Condillac ? Is the
Leibnitzian theory of the universe by means of the
hypothesis of ideating monads really such as the Com-
tians would have us believe ? As for Kant, his noumena
are not the Comtian absurdities ; and of Hegel, who
would simply account for the universe as it stands, by
reference to a single principle that is a known constitu-
ent of it, we need not speak. What Comte describes as
metaphysical, then, is absolutely foreign to metaphysics.
The slightest consideration, indeed, will demonstrate the
weakness of the entire position. Both Mr. Mill and Mr.
Lewes labour under a paucity of relative illustrations,
and are both obliged to have recourse to what is suppo-
sititious, ofiFering occasion enough for a satirical humour
were there but space. Why, even as regards that view
of things which is termed metaphysical, there never was
a time in the world's history when it was more prevalent
than at present. A vastly greater number of eflfects,
and infinitely more extraordinary effects, are now known
and speculated on in reference to agents than in the
whole of previous history. Look to the action of
Chloroform, of Opium, of Hydrocyanic Acid, of Strych-
nine, of the saliva or what else of the mad dog and
the snake. Do we even, when we record the phe-
nomena of these things in all their co-existences and
relations, think that we have attained to the philosophy
of them ? No, for all these relations, and for all these
co-existences, there is a reason^ and it is only when we
know this reason, and not the mere relations or co-exist-
ences themselves, that we possess philosophy. In the
mere talk now-a-days of invariable antecedents, and in-
variable consequents, is causality, then, once for all re-
moved and done with ? The word invariable restores the
whole problem, and it is scarcely credible that this
should not be seen. Were there merely antecedents and
consequents, trouble there would be none ; but the
thing is that these antecedents and consequents are in-
variable, and we must ask why. It is absurd to suppose
that water extinguishes flame by a mere relation of an-
tecedent and consequent, and without the nexus of a
reason. What Comte means by Metaphysical then, is,
in brief, Causal, and it is quite untrue that either he or
Hume, or anybody else, has as yet eliminated it. But

SUPPLEMENTARY NOTES. 4r..T

this determines what we have to say on the third or
positive staixe, and it is the third or positive stage which is
in reality the whole of Comtianism,

The affirmation of this stage is that we have simply to
determine the succession and co-existence of phenomena
without question of anything but the phenomena and in
these relations. Now, only so far as it eliminateJi caus-
ality, is this affirmation different from the principle of
empirical inquiry that has ever at any time obtained.
It was wholly by a reference to the relations of pheno-
mena that Thales said water, Anaximenes air, Pytha-
goras numbers, Parmenides the One, Heraclitus process,
Democritus atoms, Anaxagoras Nous, and the Socratics
general ideas. Nor is it different among the moderns,
who to the inquiring methods of the ancients add only
that of express and calculated experiment. This oiüy is,
of course, much, but it is neither conditioned nor in-
creased by Comte. Comte probably re-introduces in effect
the whole body of metaphysics when he sanctions the
questioning of nature by preliminary hypotheses, and even
with him causality is only absent in name when invari-
ability is present in fact. We have only space at present,
however, for a word on this latter, causality. Cause, as
Hume interprets it, means, Mr. Mill asserts, ' the invari-
able antecedent,' and * this is the only part of Mr. Hume's
doctrine which was contested by his great adversary,
Kant.' I cannot agree with either position. Hume, in
custom, argued in effect, for the variability of causality ;
this was his express sceptical object indeed ; and it was
not the invariability which Hume saw in causality that
Kant contested, but, on the contrary, the variability, —
the variability, that is, which Hume, as it were, sought
sceptically to insinuate into causality, by resting the
(supposititious) necessary connexion which its idea seemed
to involve on habit, custom, and the resultant subjective
expectation. "We are in the habit, Hume said, of finding
things together, and so we expect still to find them
together, but the invariability thus ascribed is but that
of our own expectation. It is not objective, it is merely
subjective, Kant, in reply, simply demonstrated that
the proposition. Every change must have a cause, is
not subjective but objective. The Comtians may, indeed,
say that their invariability is but the invariability of
subjective expectation and not of objective fact ; but
habit is quite inadequate to the objective relations, in

456 ANNOTATIONS.

trust of which they construct science, and assort * savoir'
to be '])rcvoir.' Hume himself is not different: under
the * necessary connexion' of reason which he always
overtly denies, he always latently presupposes a * constant
conjunction ' of nature. But properly studied nature and
o'eason are identical : and, in ultimate instance, it is the
latter that gives its force and virtue to causality, mere
finite or subordinate category as it may be. This drop
of white acid falls on this white wood, and the latter
blackens. The wood is burned. Have we nothing here
but an invariable antecedent and an invariable conse-
quent ? Is there no nexus of reason that explains and
demonstrates the invariability or why the wood is burned ?
The wood is water and carbon, the water has united with
the acid and left the carbon — black. That surely is a
reason. That in the process a higher category than that
of causality, reciprocity namely, is exemplified, by no
means eliminates the reason. This reason is always,
That difiference is identity. A cause, then, is the rational
antecedent of a consequent, and philosophy is, in all
cases, nothing but the demonstration of this rationality
which, of course, is not always explicit. There is really
no gain, then, in the substitution of invariability for
causality, but perhaps only much subjective suflBciency
(as in Mr. Buckle) on one's own advancement. When
one has generalized the action of fire, is it really simpler
to say that fire has such and such invariable consequents,
than to say that it has such and such a nature ? What is
there in the word nature so used to terrify us ? Nature
is but the identity into which the various consequents are
reflected — simply that and no more — and that is a neces-
sary mental act — that, indeed, is a necessary material
fact, or there is nothing in existence that is not as well
reflexion into itself as reflexion into other things, or
more briefly still, a reflexion of its own difi"erences into
its own identity. The nature of an object is in point of
fact simply the notion of it, and the notion of an object
is the truth of an object. When we talk of nature in
general, too, what is really implied is no ' imaginary
being' which Mr. Mill would have us eliminate, but
simply the system or rational all of things. Mankind,
the Comtians may depend on it, will continue to talk of
nature in general and of a nature of things. And have
not things a nature ? How but by knowledge of its
nature, of the sort of efi'ects and consequents it is compe-

SUPPLEMEXTÄUY NOTES. 457

tent to initiato, is it posaihle for tlu> i>liy.sici:in of cxitcri-
euce to obtaiu a cousequcnt from a drug which the lattor
was never known to possess before ? Or would this
]>bysician rc;ison better, if he resohitely kejjt his drug a
bare self-identical antecedent, undeepeneil, unconcreted
into a nature by retiexion into it of its own various con-
sequents ? The truth of the matter is, that the word
phenomeim^ as we are instructed to use it by tlie Tosi-
tivists, is really tantamount to noumena. Phenomena
are not to be regarded as relations of things, that is, l)ut
as themselves things, as themselves noumena. Or, a])art
from the other, apart from the relation in which alone
these two terms have sense, either is the other. Pheno-
menon is as untrue as noumenon when understood as more
than the one half of a relation. Predication is not truer
than the subjects of predication. I know a great many
consequents of this sulphuric acid, these consequents are
the nature of it, constitute the notion of it ; it is the
noumenon, the subject, into which they, the phenomena,
the predicates, are reflected. That the phenomena too
do not exhaust the noumenon is evident from this, that,
in other relations, it yet may be found in connexion with
many additional consequents. It is not necessary, how-
ever, that the noumenon should be more than this. The
noumenon is simply the subject of the qualities, it is not
a mysterious entity apart from the qualities, and cap-
able of being possessed apart, of being known apart. Iti8
absurd to expect to know a thing, not only when quali-
fied, but when unqualified. In very truth, it is the Posi-
tivists themselves who make such a mistake as this, who
suppose that there are under the qualities noumena,
things in themselves, that may be known otherwise,
— that is, under other qualities. Mr. Lewes, for one, is
plainly of belief that we do not know things in them-
selves, inasmuch as we know them only through
sensations. What is that but the assumption of
unknown noumena, and does it at all mend the
matter to say. Yes, but we will not speak of them ?
How different Hegel, who was one of the first to ex-
plode such an absurdity as an unqualified noumenon.
To Hegel there was but one noumenon, and all else was
but its phenomena, though, as it were, amongst the very
phenomena, there were reflexions of the noumenon,
the subject itself, on various stages. It is worth whue
considering that the conception of a sum, a group, an

458 ANNOTATIONS.

aggregate of phenomena, is inadequate to fact. There
exists no such sum, group, or aggregate in nature.
Consider a crystal of blue vitriol, it is blue, it is trans-
parent, it is acrid, it is hard, it is smooth. But you
cannot say of it that it has one quality here and another
there. No, where one quality is, there also are all the
others, let them be as numerous as they may. Its
acridity cannot be separated from its transparency,
wherever it is transparent, it is also acrid wherever
acrid, it is also transparent, etc. So with all the other
qualities : they mutually interpenetrate and pervade
each other ; they exist all of them in the same spot, in
a single individual or indivisible point. That point,
then, to which the qualities are referred, is an inside to
their outside. This point, indeed, in which all the qua-
lities coincide and are identical, which then is as an
internal knot colligating them all, can be very well seen
to occupy the relative place of subject. So is it with
the entire universe : from a drop of water or a grain of
sand, up to the sun in the firmament, things are not
aggregates, but subjects, of qualities. Bare predication
nowhere exists. Just as it is impossible to find subjects
unsupplied with predicates, so it is impossible to find
predicates unsupplied with subjects. Grammar is truer
to philosophy than Comte, and pretends not to convert
the world into a flight of adjectives. It will not abandon
its nouns. True it is, at the same time, that a noun
without adjectives is a non-ens, but not less a non-ens is
an adjective without a noun. The constitution of things
is once for all so. The analogy of the ego penetrates
everywhere, and embraces all. A subjectivity without
a constituent objectivity were zero, but an objectivity
without a sublating subjectivity were, at bottom, equally
absurd. The proposal of Comte, then, to know pheno-
mena only, is simply impracticable. How can we pos-
sibly know nothing but outsides ? No phenomenon but
is itself, as said, only one-half of a relation, nor exists
without its complementing and realizing other, the
noumenon. Not that it follows, however, as has also
been said, that this noumenon is some concealed and
mysterious special entity, capable, perhaps, of being
taken out, and looked at for itself. Such irrational and
absurd imaginations we have only to impute to ourselves.
Hegel, at all events, has not the slightest intention of
erecting, as Mr. Mill seems to fancy, * a mere creation of

S UPPLEMEX TA R Y XO TES. 459

the mind into a test or norma of external tnitli.' For
his part, indeeil, Hegel is peculiarly opj)03ed to the as-
sumption of occult forces ; he quotes Newton, an (with
the approbation of Mr. Mill) Reid does, in reproLatiitn of
the assumption of attraction and re])ulsion as jihysical
forces ; and even blames him for having been untrue to
this his own requisition. Still, nevertheless, the demand
that we should confine our attention to abstract self-
identical outsides belongs not to Hegel. Abstract im-
mediacy, apart from evolution and inner determinateness,
is not to him hiowledge. What knowle«lge would there
be, indeed, were we restricted to the bare smell, taste,
colour, sound, or feel, then and there present, without
the impregnation of Vermittelung ? Nay, is not the
'rery attitude that follows from the demand dangerous
to humanity ? To empty ourselves of all within, to rise
to the mere surface, and spread ourselves there, thin,
clear, an outside merely ; is it not this — surface, mere
surface — that breeds that sufficient look so offensive in
Mr. Buckle ? No, metaphysics and religion cannot be
banished ; for they are in very truth essential humanity
itself. Mr. !Mill himself asserts the one to be necessary,
and does not reject the other. No less indeed than em-
pirical science, they must always be cultivated. Without
them what idle, shallow acquirement would not this
science itself become ! Nay, even in a linguistic point
of view, what would this science become if in description
of it we were required to banish all metaphorical speech,
if attractions, and repulsions, and affinities, were all pro-
scribed? External phenomena can hardly ever be repro-
duced to thought unless in the language of the Vorstellung.
As to that, indeed, if it were only the Vorstellung that
the Positivists resisted, and if in its place they were only
minded to substitute the Begriff, something Hke a show of
reason would not be absent. But there is even to be no
B^gT'ff ) no, there is to be nothing but * the naif repro-
duction of the phenomenon as the reason for itself.' So,
then, we are to have but a Chinese world of miscellaneous
self- identities, with no possible law at last — naive self -iden-
tical reproduction could have no other ultimate result —
but Mr. Buckle's ' important' law of averages ! But this
is impossible, tlds is not the truth, all is reflected, repro-
duction there is none, change is the rule. In all our in-
quiries we still seek, indeed, the dpx^ ^^ ^^^ Ionics ; we still
apply the mathematics of the Pythagoreans ; we still desiie

460 ANNOTATIONS,

to refer the raultii)licity of existence to a single life; we still
Bee that unity, however, with Heraclitus, to be movement,
perpetual afhrmation through perpetual negation ; we still
name, with Anaxagoras, this unity Nous too ; and we
still seek with Socrates, and Plato, and Aristotle to re-
solve this Nous into its constituent ideas, leaving a theo-
retical and practical system of knowledge for all the
generations of men. So far, then, as it were not an in-
vestigation of effects and counter-effects, the Coratian
phenomenal inquiry would vanish into mere phraseology.
It is to be admitted at the same time that explanation by
such categories as causality and reciprocity is confined
only to the physical field, and that final explanation must
resort to a higher principle. This final method, however,
remains as yet shut up in the books of a single individual,
and cannot find exposition here.

Such, then, is the result of our analysis of the merits
that are claimed for M. Comte. It is impossible to attri-
bute value, or even originality, to any of them. If
ninety-nine people out of the hundred, asked to examine
a child in geography, grammar, arithmetic, Latin, French,
etc., would say, Let us begin with the most elementary
branches, what pretence is there for claiming for Comte
any unusual merit in resorting to so common and natural
an expedient, so poorly and imperfectly applied too ?
His so-called law of evolution, again, exists not as named
and considered by him, and is but a fragmentary reflexion
— where it has any truth, as when it asserts philosophy
to be preceded by mythology, monotheism by polythe-
ism, fetichism, etc. — from the vast generalizations of
Hegel. His principle, lastly, of restriction to phenomena
is but the finicality of formalism itself, and tends to
make us walk on air, while we are emptied of the filling
of our concrete humanity. But neither things nor
ourselves, fortunately, are convertible into mere out-
sides.

Besides the main merits of M. Comte, however, there
are other particular ones which now demand a word. In
relation to his arrangement of the sciences, for example,
there is not only his ' Logic ' of these, but his creation of
an alleged new science, that of Sociology ; while, in re-
lation to his law of evolution, there is its application into
a Philosophy of History. On the first head, unfortun-
ately, Mr. Mill, though he finds here M. Comte's very
greatest achievement, does not enable us to say much.

SUPPLKMF.XTÄRY XOTES. 401

We conclude, liowcver, tliat what it involves is no Logic
of the sciences in aii Hegelian sense, bnt an enlightened
generalization of the resources of empirical investigation
in a Baconian sense. We may cordially allow every re-
lative merit claimed without prejudice to our general
position. As regards Sociology again, it will be found,
as Mr, Mill admits, that the only important part of tliis
alleged new science must, under the name of Statics, be
resigned to Aristotle and others, while that part of it
that is named Dynamics seems to refer to little more
than the already discussed law of evolution. How M,
Comte was led to a different treatment here (referring to
man historically, and not psychologically) will readily
appear by looking to his principle. How could he get
the point of view of bare phenomena and bare rela-
tions otherwise ? From any other point of view man
was too noumenal a being to suit his objects. As regards,
lastly, the philosophy of history, Mr. Mill, to whom this
is Comte's second greatest achievement, supplies us with
more information. Nevertheless, though the relative
survey of historical facts contain much, doubtless, that is
enlightened, ingenious, and interesting, we gather from it
no reason to alter the main conclusion. Rather we see
in it much to confirm it. The method, for example, is
plainly that of ordinary rais&nnement : with a probable
here and ^natural there, the hardest facts are expected to
resolve themselves and flow for us. On the whole, how-
ever, we may allow the merits claimed for M. Comte
with reference to all the heads here without departing
from our general position. That Comte was a man
of ability and acquirement there is no wish to deny.
Mathematical and scientific accomplishments he certainly
possessed ; and many excellent ideas, many large, liberal,
tolerant views, he must be cordially acknowledged to
express in detaiL Still, nevertheless, even in Mr.
MiU's eyes the negative of Comte must be named a large
one. One-haK of the work of Comte he seems, indeed,
totally to reject, while in the other half he certainly finds
faults enow. He signalizes deficiency, incompleteness,
unsuccess, in the classification of the sciences, failures no
less in the institution of Sociology, and many errors of
detail with regard to the law of evolution, while he dis-
putes his originality in regard to the very principle of
Positivism. Both Mr. Mill and Mr. Lewes find further
much in M. Comte generally that is exaggerated, inaccu-

462 ANNO TA TIONS.

rate, extravagant, arbitrary, absiud, and ridiculoa«, and
with this, what is said of hia lite aud character seems very
excellently to cohere. He wa a delicate lad, that stood
apart from the games of his comrades ; but insurgent and
indocile, he tired out his teachers by his pertinacity of argu-
mentativeness and egotism. His married life was a single
scene of French bickering. Madame did not understand
the cordes intimes of Monsieur, nor Monsieur Madame'a.
Egotism is always unequally yoked. It may appear
cruel to allude to Comte's actual attacks of insanity, but
they are still elements in the calculation. Lastly, we
may refer to his exquisitely French Platonic passion for
Madame de Vaux, that ended in his exaltation into the
intensely self-confident Pontiff of an extravagant and
ridiculous new religion, with its stupid catechisms, calen-
dars, and what not. As is evident, we have only space
to indicate, but whoever will take the trouble to read
what Mr. Mill and Mr. Lewes write of Comte, will
find all that is indicated amply illustrated and con«
firmed.

Professor Ferrier quotes Mr. Morell to this effect : —
*No one, for example, who compares the philosophic
method of ScheUing with the " Phuosopbie positive" of
Auguste Comte, can have the slightest hesitation as to
the source from which the latter virtually sprang.'
Comte's fundamental idea is then asserted to be * precisely
the same as that of Schelling,' in whom is found also ' the
whole conception of the afliiliation of the sciences in
the order of their relative simplicity, and the expansion
of the same law of development so as to include the ex-
position of human nature and the course of social pro-
gress.' These assertions of Mr. Morell are perhaps too
sweeping, but there can be no doubt that in the Germans
who preceded M. Comte much matter is to be found
which might have proved suggestive to him. "We have
already seen how analogous to the triplets of Hegel were
even the fundamental triplets of Comte, Theology, Philo-
sophy, Positivism; Fetichism, Polytheism, Monotheism,
etc. ; but many other Hegelian indications are not want-
ing even in the short summary of Mr. MilL Here, for
example, are a few eminently Hegelian traits: — 'The
human beings themselves, on the laws of whose nature
the facts of history depend, are not abstract or universal,
but historical human beings, already shaped, and made
what they are, by human society :' ' the vulgar mode of

SU PPL EMEXTA R Y XO TES. 403

using history, by lookiug in it for parallel cases, as if any
cases were jxirallel ;^ 'the state of every i)art of the
social whole at any time, is intimately connected with
the contemporaneous state of all the others ; religious
belief, philosophy, science, the fine arts, the industrial
arts, commerce, navigation, government, all are in close
natural dependence,' etc. ; ' M. Comte confines himself to
the main stream of human progress, looking only at the
races and nations that led the van, and regarding as the
successors of a jyeople not their actual descendants, but those
who took up the thread of progress after them ;' ' the vul-
gar mistake of supposing that the course of history has
no tendencies of its own, and that great events usually
proceed from small causes,* etc. etc. Then with Comte
as with Hegel, the main object of philosophy at present
is a reconstruction of human society, and on those objec-
tive principles, too, which are not always pleasing to the
rather negatively and wholly subjectively di8])0sed rela-
tivists, such as Mr. Mill and Mr. Grote. Thus the
teaching of Comte on the family, women, marriage,
etc., is essentially the same as that of Hegel, and in its
objective necessity all but directly opposed to the sub-
jective freedom of the Aufklärung. Then Comte plainly
sees and reprobates the modern atomism of M'hich we hear
80 much in Hegel, and is quite as anxious as he to co-
articulate it again under the universal. He talks of the
great productions of art which we might expect from
such objective reconstruction, 'when one harmonious
vein of sentiment shall once more thrill through the
whole of society, as in the days of Homer, of uEschylus,
of Phidias, and even of Dante.' It is admirably charac-
teristic also of the German influence on Comte that he is
wholly opposed to what is ' merely negative and destruc-
tive,' and for that reason excludes from the seats of
honour the philosophes of the French Aufklarung. Many
other Hegelian analogies in Comte will be found at
pp. 379-382 of Mr. Mill's essay. In short, when we
consider that Comte's titles to fame consist in his
classification and logic of the sciences, in his socio-
logical generalizations, and historical analysis, we have
no difficulty in deciding that the praises in these
references, so copiously heaped on Comte as the first
and only, will yet in the end be transferred to the
entire quarry of these and a thousand completer ex-
cellences more — HegeL Comtianism, in fact, bears to

464 A NNO TA TIONS.

Hegclianism a relation very similar to that of Mahome«
tanisin to Christianity. Kapid as is the spread of the
one when compared with the other, its reign, neverthe-
less, will, in view of its incomplete, flushed, fragmentary
nature, prove but short-lived and partial. Nor need we
regret its advent in England : it will always prove intro-
ductory, and we have nothing to fear from it, now that
its atheism and materialism have been by Mr. Mill
almost formally withdrawn. That a knowledge of Comte
should precede a knowledge of the earlier Hegel, cannot
in the circumstances surprise. Comte evidently writes
heavily, but he writes at the same time in French, and
exoterically. Even to his own countrymen, Hegel, for
the most part, remains still a sealed book. Comtianism
will probably be in full leaf in England when Hegelianism
has done little more than broken ground. Hegel, how-
ever, is all that Comte only aims at, and it is time that
he should be known. How one shivers for their own
shame, when one hears, in reference to Hegel, the crude
propos of one's own superiors — Mr. Mill and Mr. Lewes !
These we have not space to exemplify. Mr. Mill, we
may say, however, talks somewhere of Germany making
convulsive efforts to wrest itself from the groove of the
false metaphysical method : are we then in advance of
Germany ? is Germany in any respect behind ma ? Is
not the truth rather this, that at this moment Germany
leads the whole world even in empirical science ? Can
any empirical science be named, indeed, for which Ger-
many writes not the text-books ? Is it not the dis-
coveries of her inquirers that are alone bruited among us ?
And to what is this superiority owing ? Why, to
nothing else than the superior faculties, the superior
ideas, and the superior terms, which have resulted from
the hard discipline of German philosophy. Mr. Mill
talks too as if Hegel were an example of metaphysics, as
this term is understood by Comte ; and at the same time
seems, with Mr. Lewes, to regard his method as subjec-
tive and a priori. There cannot be a greater mistake ;
nay, the reverse is the truth, and Herbart even reproaches
Hegel with empiricism. As said, the latter is as adverse
as Comte himself to the impregnation of nature and the
things of nature with metaphysical creatures : very far from
that, he would reduce all to the simple notion. His method
is not properly named a priori, however. No, if syn-
thetic, it is no less analytic, and has always empirical

SUPPLEMENTARY NOTES. 465

fact below it. It may be described, indeed, as the ex-
haustive deduction of a single, actually existent jjrinciple
that has been inductlvehj acquired. The preceding induc-
tion is but superseded by the universality of the deduc-
tion ; or to attain the analysis, we have but to reverse
the synthesis. The peculiar objective analysis, however,
that conducts and, in completeness and correctness,
guarantees the deduction, is, in fact, the foundation of a
new method, which yet awaits, I may say, verification,
and it were much to be wished that the faculty of Mr.
Mill were available here. In the meantime, we may say
this : Hegel, all consideration of his princi})le and method
ai)art, has produced on all human interests, theoretical,
practical, and aesthetic, a body of generalized knowledge,
which, for comprehensiveness and accuracy, for i)0wer
of penetration and power of reduction, has never been
approached. Nor, after Kant, who, instigated by
Hume on all the fields, set the example, is this a
wonder.

It is impossible here to do any justice to the theme,
but there is another phase of the Hegelian philosophy to
which I should like to call the attention of most modern
philosophers. To Comte, and I suppose almost every-
body at present, the universe is a vast magazine of un-
accountable facts. WTience or how they came, these
facts, we know not ; our business is to inquire into them
as they are, and adapt ourselves, accordingly. This is
pretty well the position of Mr. LlilL It is not necessary
to suppose either that things will always remain as thej
are : the relations of things may vary in nature ; the>
may vary, they do vary, in a sociological aspect ; it is
enough for us, at any time, to know them as they are.
and follow the consequent expediency. Possibly even
elsewhere in space, things and relations may be quit«-
difiFerent. "We must trust our acquired necessities ol'
thought only so long as the facts that led to them re-
main beneath them ; for any necessity but what habit
begets on experience exists not. In such a world, then,
it is the business of society to leave the individual to the
unfettered exercise of his highest faculties. It is not
the business of society to dictate to this individual his
beliefs ; it is a question of the greatest delicacy, indeed,
if, and how, and how far, it may interfere even to assist
him ; or it is best, perhaps, not to interfere at aU.
This, as said, is pretty well the position of I»Ir. MiU ;

466 ANNOTATIONS.

and while it contains some elements that do not preclude
a junction in the end with the results of Hegel, it cer-
tainly contains others that render such junction for ever
hopeless. These latter concern what I may call Mr.
MUl's absolute relativity ; that the nature of things can-
not be depended on, that it may vary in space, it may
vary in time, and that we have simply to know it — its
succession and co-existence of antecedents and conse-
quents— here and novi. If there be in effect, namely, no
nature of things, that is, no principle of reason that
underlies and permeates them, or if Mr. Mill's invaria-
bility of co-existence and succession be one that is valid
only here and now (and Mr. Mill hardly allows to either
a validity and breadth coincident with general human
experience) — if there be no nature, no reason, no neces-
sary and absolute invariability of the relations of things,
then, for Mr. Mill any junction with Hegel must for
ever remain impossible. But, these apart, there are
other elements in Mr. Mill not hostile to a junction with
Hegel. Mr. Mill stiU insists on the thinking of things.
Now, things and thinking — observe the etymological con-
nexion— are all that exists. There is nothing but under-
standing and sensation, or thought andsense. Explanation,
then, which is the need of unity, would reduce the one side
to the other, and Mr. MiU's thinking of things would have
precisely this result, were but things in their relations
supposed mvariable. On that supposition, indeed, such
thinking could only result in a system of thought which
would be the true nature of these things, these things
in truth, or the truth of these things. Now that truth,
the want of Mr. Mill, is the sole want of Hegel also.
As it might result to Mr. Mill it were a posterius,
but this posterius being alone the truth of things, were
evidently in fact the priv^ of them. That prius, then,
however arrived at, is the system of Hegel ; and it
is to Hegel's attitude here that attention is specially
invited. That sensible without he believes to be
identical with this intelligible within : both meet and
coincide in that systematic and necessary prius, which is
reason and the system of reason. Id fact, the one is
outside, the other is inside, and reason is the name of
the whole. Existence, that is, is but the evolution of
reason. To Hegel, then, there is not in nature, as there
is to Mr. Lewes, * a Fatality which must be accepted : *
that fatality itself he would explain, he would reduce to

S UPPLEMENTÄ RY NO TES. 467

reason. It is with the same thougbt in Lis mind as Mr.
Lewes that Mr. Mill says : 'If the universe had a begin-
ning, its beginning by the very conditions of the case,
was supernatural ; the laws of nature cannot account for
their own origin.* The arbitrariness, the caj)rice which
Mr. Mill feigns here as the origin of things is precisely
what Hegel resists : necessity of reason that origin must
have been, place it where you may. Hegel, in short,
believes — with all its differences before him — in the iden-
tity (unity) of reason, and, so believing, he has subjected
all things to the test of reason, and has exhibited to us
for result, not only the philosophy of the universe as in
space, but the philosophy of the universe as in time also.
From which last element it is, in particular, that the in-
terests of natural and revealed religion are the closing
verities of the entire system. But this must suffice.

[Since writing the above with reference to Comte, 1
have had an opportunity of consulting the six volumes of
his Cours de Philosophie Positive. I have said (p. 464)
'Comte evidently writes heavily.' This is the only
phrase I would, on the whole, withdraw. M. Comt«-.
certainly indulges in sentences that, for a Frenchman,
are sometimes both loaded and long ; nevertheless, his
works must be pronounced throughout lucid. For the
rest, I am disposed, in general, to stand by the original
finding. As we have seen, Mr. Mill and Mr. Lewes
place the merit of M. Comte in what we may call his
/orm — ^in his classification of the sciences, his law des
trois itats, and his abstract phenomenalism (positivism),
namely. In this I cannot agree with them : to me
Comte's form is valueless, and what value he possesses
depends on his matter. In regard to the whole of that
matter, I am not an expert, and will not judge. It is
for a Sir "William Thomson and others to tell us whether
Comte has made any contributions to Mathematics,
Astronomy, Physics, Chemistry, and Biology, or not.
On the merits of M. Comte's additions to a knowledge
of Sociology, I have already given the opinion of Mr.
ISIill. My own conclusion here is this : — I find M.
Comte, in the first place, very French. He excites our
imaginations by the most enormous promises of new
marvels, unheard of glories ; and, for the most part, like
the thimblerigger, he only covers a pea. In the second
place, I should say that M. Comte occupies too individual,

408 ANNOTATIONS.

too imperfectly-prepared a place to be able to give us a
system of Sociology. But, in the tliird place, I must
avow, that for tlie student of the principles of politics at
present, there are in the physique sociale of M. Oomte
many suggestions of unquestionable importance.]

II.

Mr. Lewes' s accusation of Atheism against Hegel.^

IN reference to the following paragraph contained in
the new edition of Mr. Lewes's History of Philosophy
(vol. ii. p. 545), I wish to correct a mistake, which any
tyro in general (not necessarily Hegelian) German could
correct quite as well as myself. This mistake has now
stood before the world, in the pages of Mr. Lewes, more
than twenty years ; it is at once singularly inaccurate
and signally unjust, and it is high time to correct it.
The paragraph in question runs thus : —

* Hegel admits the proposition (being and non -being are
the same) to be somewhat paradoxical, and is fully aware
of its openness to ridicule ; but he is not a man to be
scared by a paradox, to be shaken by a sarcasm. He is
aware that stupid common sense will ask, " Whether it
is the same if my house, my property, the air I breathe,
this town, sun, the law, mind, or (iod, exist or not ? "
Certainly a very pertinent question ; how does he answer
it? "In such examples," he says, "particular ends, —
utility, for instance, — are understood, and then it is asked
if it is indififerent to me whether these useful things exist
or not? But, in truth, philosophy is precisely the doc-
trine which is to free man from innumerable finite aims
and ends, and to make him so indifferent to them that it
is really all the same whether such things exist or not."
Here we trace the Alexandrian influence ; except that
Plotinus would never have had the audacity to say that
philosophy was to make us indifferent to whether God
existed or not ; and it must have been a slip of the pen
which made Hegel include God in the examples ; a slip
of the pen> or else " the rigour of his pitiless logic," of
which his disciples talk.'

This is a tolerably fair example of the treatment of

Hegel, not by Mr. Lewes alone, but by everybody else

1 Already published in the British Controversialist for Nov. 1867, this
note is retained here, not as properly pertinent now to Mr. Lewes, but
for its general usefulness.

S UPPLEMEXTA RY NO TES. 409

who does not understand him. If ITegel is supposed, on
the grounds alleged, to have said that it was ' indilTerent
whether God existed or not,* then there is the same
authority for supposing him to have said, that it was in-
different whether law {Rtcht) existed or not, and whether
the mind {Geist) existed or not. Had this occurred to
Mr. Lewes, surely he would have looked again before
committing himself to so hazardous an assertion ; for
even to him we may assume it as certain that Hegel
could not have been indifferent as to whether Recht ex-
isted or not, or as to whether Geist existed or not. There
are in Hegel even external placards which assert the
objective existence of Recht, and the absolute existence
of Geist, at all events. There is here, then, an anterior
improbability so strong that of itself it is quite enough to
refute Mr. Lewes'a assertion in advance. It will be only
fair to Mr. Lewes, however, to allow that — apparently
at least — there must be some excuse for his mistake;
for it is a mistake that has also been committed by A.
Gratry, Prfitre de I'Oratoire de I'lmmacul^e Conception,'
and it is a mistake that, on occasion of this Gratry, has not
been accurately corrected, even by such a man as Rosen-
kranz, who, as all the world knows, is the * Hegelianer
par excellence.^ It will clear the issues to quote at once
from Rosenkranz in reference to M. Gratry's work
{Logique, Paris, 1855, 2 tomes), as follows : —

' This French priest wishes to prove, that, according to
Hegel, philosophy seeks to take from man all interest
for right, for his soul, nay, for God himself, and reduce
him to indifference towards these. I. 194, he exclaims,
** Comprenez-le, nous somraes ici k I'origine m6me de
I'esprit de sophisme ; disons mieux, nous sommes ici au
fond de I'abime, ä la naissance de I'esprit des t6n&bres.
L'esprit de sophisme est un mot trop faible, qui nomme
peu son objet ; I'esprit des ten^bres est le vrai mot. Ce
mot th^ologique devient ici rigoureusement philosophique
et scientifique. L'origine de I'esprit des t^nebres est
done celle-ci : tuer l'äme ; la rendre absolument indiffer-
ente ä I'existence, ou ä la non-existence du monde, de la
justice, de la v6rit§, de l'äme elle-m^me, de Dieu ! Lui
6ter, comme le dit Hegel, tout int^rSt en ces choses ; la
d^livrer de I'inter^t de la raison pratique dont parle Kant,
cet int^r^t d'amour pour la j ustice et pour la v6rit^, qui
est, nous I'avons d^montr6, le ressort m^me du precede
dialectique, selon Platon et tous les philosophes. Quand

470 ANNOTATIONS.

le ressort est brisö, quand I'Ume est morte, il n'y a plus
de proced6 dialectique ; la raison pure, isolöe, abstraite,
döracinöe, devient de fait, comme lo vent Hegel, indiffer-
ente ci l'ßtre et au ngant, etc." For these fearful conse-
quences M. Gratry cites from Hegel's Works (vi. 172)
the following passage : " It needs no great expenditure
of wit to make the proposition, that being and nothing
are the same, ridiculous, or rather to bring forward
absurdities, with the untrue declaration that they are
consequences and applications of that proposition ; as,
for example, that it is consequently the same thing,
whether my house, my means, the air we breathe, this
town, the sun, right, spirit, God, exist or not. ... In effect,
philosophy is just this doctrine to free man from an infinite
number of finite ends and aims, and to make him so indif-
ferent to them that it is quite the same to him whether
such things exist or not." M. Gratry translates this pass-
age, and, at the end of the citation, full of indignation, he
italicises the words, "qu'il soit absolument indifferent,
que ces choses soient ou ne soient pas." Every one who
understands German will be able to refer the words,
"such things," only to the preceding "number of finite
ends and aims ;" the priest of the Oratory of the Imma-
culate Conception understands as amongst these the soul,
right, God. Are they not the things named directly
previously? Of course, no one wiU call finite (infinite?)
ends and aims things ; at the same time a certain plau-
sibility remains, because those objects are mentioned
shortly before. But does not Hegel himself say, that
it is an untrue consequence to infer from the proposition of
the identity of the notions being and nothing, that it is
quite the same whether the sun, right, spirit, God, exist
or not ? Does he not expressly reject, therefore, the
consequence which M. Gratry draws in order to secure
his damnation ? Does not the accusation, then, fall to
pieces of itself ? But, dear reader, do you not observe
these points in the midst of M. Gratry's citation from
Hegel ? What must they denote ? An omission. And
in Hegel how is the omission supplied? Thus: "In
such examples there are assumed partly particular ends,
as the use, perhaps, which something has for me, and
then it is asked if it is indifferent to me whether what is
useful exist or not." Here, then, now do we not at last
see how it is that Hegel comes to speak of finite ends
and aims, towards the existence or non-existence of which

SUPPLEMENTARY NOTES. 471

philosophy has to render humanity indifferent? Why
has M. (iratry desired to exchido that sentence ? Evi-
dently because otherwise he would not have been able to
draw his inferences ; because he as a priest of the Christian
religion, would have been obliged to remember that it
belongs to the Christian also to raise himself above the
finitude of the mere useful, and to exclaim with the Holy
Singer, "If I have thee, Lord, what need I ask more of
heaven or earth ! " Were such an accusation to be made
in ordinary life, and in another sphere, it would certainly
be branded as falsehood and calumny.' — (Rosenkranz,
Metaphysik, pref., xxiii.)

The agreement, then, between ^I. Gratry and Mr.
Lewes is so striking, that they probably both owe their
information to the same source, — possibly M. Ott. I am
not satisfied with the solution of Rosenkranz, however,
and think he might havo exjdained the matter much more
easily and convincingly, had he but looked more closely
at his text. Let the reader observe the quotation from
Hegel, the beginning of which runs, 'In such examples
there are assumed partly {zum theil) particular ends, as
the use, perhaps,' etc. Now, it is the touch of that partly
that shall resolve for us the whole difficulty. Under the
regimen of that partly, namely, there is included aU that
concerns finite references, while under the regimen of a
second partly [zum theil) there is included all that con-
cerns infinite references. Nay, the termination of the
discussion of the finite, and the transition to that of the
infinite references are made unescapably prominent by a
dash. Of the objects under the regimen of the second
partly, Hegel now speaks thus : ' Partly, however, it is
ends essential in themselves, absolute existences and
ideas, which are assumed under th3 category of being or
non-being ; such concrete objects are something quite
else than only existent or non-existent, etc., . . . these
categories are quite inadequate to the nature of such
objects, etc.' There can be no doubt, then, that Hegel
perfectly well knew the nature of his own examples,
discussing them under two categories, of which the
former applied to finite ends and aims, such as 'my
house,' *my means,' etc., and the latter only to 'essential
aims,' 'absolute existences and ideas,' such as 'right,'
* soul,' ' God.' Any just reader, then, that looked only to
the spirit of the passage, would, as Rosenkranz argues,
never for a moment have imagined that Hegel meant to

472 A NNO TA TIONS.

enumerate law, the soul, God, as among those things
which philosophy was to render us indifi'erent to. But
Hegel, as Rosenkranz has failed to point out, does not
trust himself to correctness of spirit and kindly inter-
pretation on the part of his reader; no, by absolute
accuracy of letter, he renders himself independent of his
reader, and sets misconstruction at defiance. What has
been said is probably enough ; but luckily we have a
light wholly irresistible in the passage itself, as it occurs
in the first edition of the • Encyclopaedie.* This passage
i shall now translate, and so set the matter definitively
beyond dispute. In reference to the question, then,
• whether it is the same if my house, my property, the
air I breathe, this town, sun, the law, mind, or God,
exist or not,' we are to understand the answer of Hegei
in his^r«^ edition to run thus : —

* Here, then, are assumed partly [zum theil) particular
ends, as the use which something has for me, and then it
is asked whether it is indifferent to me that what is useful
should exist or notl In efifect philosophy is just this
doctrine, to free man from an infinite number of finite
ends and aims, and render him so indifferent to them,
that it is quite the same to him whether such things
exist or not. Further, as regards the air, sun, or law,
God, it is mere want of thought to consider stich essential
ends, absolute existences and ideas, under the category oj
being. Such concrete objects are something quite else than
only existent or non-existent. Meagre abstractions, like
being and nothing, — and they are, being but the categories
of the beginning, the most meagre abstractions possible,
— are inadequate to express the nature of the objects
alluded to.'

One sees that the important word for the right under-
standing of the passage from Hegel is that partly, which
quite trenchantly and unmistakably discriminates between
essential and inessential existences ; the essential exist-
ences being not only God, law, the soid, etc, but even
(only in the first edition, however) the sun and the air.
What one Hkes least in Mr. Lewes, then, is that he has
omitted this all -important partly. By this omission he
has certainly rendered himself as obnoxious to all the
hard things said by Rosenkranz as the priest of the
immaculate conception himself. We, however, shall not
say these hard things of Mr. Lewes ; Mr. Lewes is a
perfectly open, unaffected gentleman, and one of the

S um EM EX TA n Y XO TES. 473

clearest, most widoly-inforracil, and consequently usc-
fulost writers whom we now possess ; and we will siuiply
believe that he failed to perceive the importance of tho
word, and, so failing, omitted it for the sake of the
greater simplicity and clearness of the sentence.

In conclusion, when it is considered that what is con-
cerned is au accusation of such a doctrine as atheism,
by such a man as Mr. Lewes, against such a man as Hegel,
and in a work that has gone through three editions, and
been for more than twenty years, probably, the most
popular English history of philosophy, perhaps I shall bo
held excused for seeking in this manner to contradict and
correct. For the rest, as has been demonstrated already,
Hegel is not only a Theist, but a Christian.

iir.

Pantheism and Paganism.

THE heresy of the German critics is, perhaps, quite ag
active in England at present as the positivism of
Comte, and may excuse a word. So far as I know, however,
this heresy is not represented here by any direct disciplo
of the school, but only by one or two men of genius, who
seem to draw their inspiration from the semi-French
Heine and the wholly French Hugo. The leading trait
of these Englishmen is an air of brusque bravery that
seems to say, *Pah ! it is cowardly to whine over our lost
immortality, let us go out into the air and enjoy life!*
It will be enough here, however, to mention them and
this ; it is a phase of mind sufficiently incomplex, and
may be left for the present to take on of itself the inevi-
table *pale cast of thought,' I shall confine myself to a
few remarks on the German movement in which they
indirectly root. Pantheism and Paganism are the best
terms for it. All the essentials of religion, namely, are
for it void : personal God, there is none ; immortality,
there is none. AVhat is, is the idea — thought that has
realized itself in nature and in man, and so realizes itself
for ever. There is one grand life, that, dumb, yet speaks ;
that has its accents in the perishable individ ual ; that,
nought, is alL It is this aloue we are to see and
honour! it is for this we are cheerfully to live, it
is for this we are cheerfully to die, secure in this that
it must live, and that in owt own death, loss there ia

474 A NNO TA TI0N8.

none, for it alone is truth. This, so far as I can make it
out, is what may be called the religious core of the Ger-
man critics. This, however, is not their true support.
Their true support, rather, is the simple conviction of
subjective su})eriority, and the consequent equally sim-
ple spirit of battle. What could support a Diderot or a
D'Holbach but indignation at the darkness, at the miser-
able ignorance of those around them, and the resolution
to dispel it ? As with them, so with the heretical Ger-
man critics. Blind to all but their propagandism, they
rush to the front to enlighten us; they never linger be-
hind to enlighten themselves. It might be worth their
while, however, to put to themselves the question. Is
'Humanismus,' is humanity, is man at all possible without
a belief in the immortality of the soul and the existence
of God ? Truly, we are on the brink of the most fearful
crisis in the whole world's history. Knowledge is to be
all in all. And what is that knowledge ? Why, that as
water is contained in a sponge, thought is contained in
the material universe and perpetually recreates it !
Man's duty is to know this, and, knowing this, to work.
That is all : let the German critics have their own way,
and I do not see anything else they could add. I do not
know that they could add science even ; for anything
Baconian they declare to be beneath them. Then work ?
Millions of the most pallid and undeniable slaves of both
sexes, shut up in sickly factories and bakeries for the
world's back and the world's belly, with no consolation
but that so they keep alive — the Idea ! This idea is
simply monstrous — a Moloch of the most insatiable maw.
Besult there can be none — unless Europeans are capable
of returning to an Egyptian bondage under a Pharaoh
again — but the suicide of the race. It is really scarcely
intelligible that a Huge should be eloquent about science
and philosophy, and liberty and humanity, and all for
service under a blind, dumb, invisible idol, whose only
function is to victimize everything, to gorge upon all.
If it is not a person, but only a something that is to go
on living and growing in this world, then it is of no con-
sequence whether that something be called ideal or be
called material. It is but a thing under either name ;
and that its necessary realization should only be in suc-
cessive generations of millions of individual men makes
the matter not a whit better, conceive them even working
'perfectly.

SUPPLEMENTARY NOTES. 41 Ty

The great source of tliis despair of the German critics
— for it is evidently but despair, and the wliitest that
ever fell — is, as I have said already, not Hegel, but only
their own obstinately self-willed rejection of Hegel.
Hegel, himself, has, in the most o]>en manner, professing
adhesion to an enlightened and progressive conservatism
in pohtics, conducted his whole system into the sanctuary
of the Christian Religion. Nor is this denied ; it is only
rejected. But why should it be rejected ? To me it
a]»pears that it is precisely this part of his work that should
evoke for Hegel a heartfelt and irresistible io triumphe !
No doubt, in many respects, Hegel's Logic is his capital
achievement. It is to be borne in mind, however, that,
though containing much that is of material importance,
it is still principally formal. Its first note, after all is
said, will never ring quite true ; existence of some kind
and existence of no kind are not the same, even should we
see that existence of no kind is a non-ens, and not in
verum natura, and consequently that, so far as matter
{Inhalt) is concerned, it is the same svpjwsition, the
same ultimate generalization that existence of any kind,
existence in general, is. But if the start be but an
artifice and a convenience, is it at all ascertained yet
that the means of progress, the dialectic, is in any re-
spect better ? I confess, for my part, that I have more
satisfaction in the Philosophy of the Spirit, in the Moral
and Political Philosophy, and in the History of Philo-
sophy than in the Logic. Nay, of the Logic itself, its
value to me consists only in its ministrations to spiritu-
alism, I cannot give myself up simpliciter to the Ent-
Wickelung, and I distrust the transcendental rapture with
which many Germans discuss both Plato and Hegel in
this connexion. The former's idea, it will be remem-
bered, for example, I have described on the whole as
only the formal universal {das Formell- Allgemeine), only a
generic notion, though it may be admitted that there are
in Plato partial efforts towards a single plastic element or
energy, a single all of thought, whose distinctions were
constitutive pairs of fluent notions. Then, as said, the
success of the Logic, which would precisely realize and
complete these efforts of Plato, is not yet certain, and
the general principle remains still to be verified. Here,
however, it is that Hegel, if ever anywhere, is unduly
influenced by the ancients, and lays a misleading stress
on the abstract universal. Not but that he is in a mea-

476 ANNOTATIONS.

sure compelled to tliis by the very nature of the abstract
logical sphere in which for the time ho moves. Concrete
spirit, nevertheless, must be seen to be something more
than abstract logic ; which latter, indeed, is only valuable
as leading to the former. To transfix matter with logical
categories till it disappears (should that be possible), is
not to me a great work, in itself, as it is to Ruge, but in
its consequences — in its support, that is, to all the great
interests of religion. Neither gods nor men are in very
truth logical categories. And so it is, that should the
Logic, or any other part of the work of Hegel fail us here,
we are not, for a moment, to suppose that our hopes are
■ — therefore — at term. No man is final ; neither Plato,
nor Aristotle, nor Kant, nor Hegel. Existence is here
within us, there without us, for us as it was for them :
we too may turn to read the countenance of our common
mother. An idealism that only, so to speak, strikes seed-
matter into seed-thought, were but materialism; could even
such materialism as this, then, be proved of Kant and Hegel,
we should not allow it to appal us. No ; let the pre-
tensions of these men be what they may, let their dark-
nesses be what they may, we shall never allow the former
to declare the latter final. But, happily, there is no need
for this ; Kant and Hegel are the very truest supports
that philosophy has ever yet extended to the religious
interests of humanity. Pantheism and Paganism, then,
are not, on any account, terrors to us, and most sincerely
do we wish the German critics a prosperous deliverance
from the blank whiteness of their own most horrible
despair.

INDEX.

Abbt, 208.

Abelard, 146.

Absolute, 65, 138, 139, 315, 316, 323,
363, 368, 886, 433, 442.

Abstract, 365, 366.

Abstraction. 6, 11, 15.

Acaderflics, 101.

Academy, 93, 94, 139.

Accident, 329.

AchiUes (the), 19, 364, 365, 366.

Acroaniatic, 95.

Actuality, 101, 102, 108, 109, 328, 365,
399, 400.

Actus Purus, 198.

Adaptation, 245.

.^nesidemus, 135, 137.

.älsthetic (Transcendental), 218, 220.

.aesthetics, 285, 297.

Agreeable (the), 242.

Agrippa, 137.

Air, 11, 376, 379, 396.

Albertus Magnus, 349.

Alcibiades, 44.

Alcibiades (the), 63.

Alexander (the Great), 98, 121, 131, 143.

Altenstein, 258.

America, 150.

Ammonius Saccas, 138.

Amyutas, 94.

Analogies of experience, 224.

Analysis, 7, 350.

Anal^-tic, aesthetic, 241.

practical, 233.

teleological, 244.

transcendental, 221.

Anaxagoras, his life, 27 ; relations to
predecessors, 28 ; his principle of
vov?, 28 ; as close of Pre-Socratic
Philosophy, 30; Note on, 375-380;
mentioned, 4, 8, 26, 39, 111, 351, 352,
371. 373, 395, 396, 421, 455, 460.

Anaximander, 10, 351. 354, 453.

Anaximenes, 10, 21, 351, 352, 354, 453,
455.

Anniceris, 56.

Annotations (these), Ht5.

Anselm, 144, 145, 406, 4';6.

Anstoss, 268, 2t;9.

Anthropology, 335, 336.

Anthropomorphism, 10, 81.

Anticipations of sensation, 224.

Antigonus, 123.

Antinomies, 75 ; Kant's, 213, 227, 2S8:
Zeno's, 363, 364.

Antiphon, 35.

Antisthenes, 53-55.

Antithesis, 20, 21, 74, 76, 163, 360.

Anvtus, 43, 44.

Apathy, 135, 137.

Apodictic, 100.

Apologists, 144.

Aporias, 101, 423.

Appearances, 212, 220, 326.

A priori, 71, 210, 217-226.

Arabians (the), 145.

Arcesilaus, 136.

'Apxn, 10.

Archelaus. 39, 351.

Architectonic, 450, 451.

Architecture, 342.

Archytas, 12.

Aristlppus, 63, 55, 56, 132.

Ariston, 58.

Aristophanes, 37, 40, 42, 43, 44.

Aristotle, his life and •writings, 94;
character and classification of his
philosophy, 95 ; his Logic and Meta-
physics, 98 ; his critique of Plato,
101 ; his four causes and the relation
of form and matter, 105 ; potentiality
and actuality, 108 ; the absolute,
divine spirit, 109 ; the Physics, 111 ;
the Ethics, 115 ; the summum ho-
num, 116 ; notion of virtue, 118 ;
the State, 119 ; the Peripatetic
school, 120 ; Transition to the Post-
Aristotelian Philosophy, 120 ; Note
on, 399-402 ; mentioned, 4, 5, 6, 9, 12,
13, 17, 19, 21, 27, 29, 39, 48, 50, 51,
55, 61, 68, 77, 93, 125, 130, 131, 132,

478

INDEX.

134, 138, 145, 147, 148, 194, 205, 221,

2r)2, 828, 851, 353, 355, 356, 357, 358,

361, 365, 808, 369, 870-380, 893, 453,

460, 461, 476.
Arrow (the flying), 19.
Art, 841, 842.
Asjiects (contingent), 282.
Assistance (the divine), 104.
Association, 183.
Ast, 846.
Atheism, 26, 188, 189, 100, 191, 192, 202,

468-473.
Athens, 27.
Atoms, 25, 283.
Atomistic, 7.
Atomists, its founders, 25 ; the atoms,

25 ; the plenum and the vacuum, 25 ;

necessity, 26 ; their position, 26 ;

Note on, 873 ; mentioned, 4, 7, 8, 22,

28, 852, 896.
Attic prose, 35.
Attraction, 325.

Attribute, 171, 172, 173, 408, 433.
Aufklärung, 8, 31, 42, 346, 370, 381, 382,

394, 395, 896, 411, 437, 463.
Autonomous, 233.
Averroes, 145.
Avicenna, 145.
Axioms of Intuition, 224.

Bacon, 150-153, 156, 381, 403, 404, 411,

453 464.
Banquet (the), 39, 41, 42, 67.
Bardili, 247.
Basedovr, 208.
Baumeister, 207.
Baumgarten, 207.
Bayle, 371.
Seattle, 184.
Beauty, 241, 425.
Beck, 247.
Becker, 310.
Becoming, 7, 19-23, 66, 72, 324, 360, 371,

396, 898.
Beent, Pref., 16, 17, 359.
Begriff, 50, 353. See also Notion.
Being, 7, 14-19, 22, 23, 26, 65, 72-74, 98,

324, 347, 359, 360-367, 371, 396, 398,

401, 406.
Being-for-self, 325.
Beings (four classes of), 83,
Belief, 231, 247, 251.
Berkeley, 193, 201-203, 389, 415, 417-422.
Bessarion, 148.
Bil finger, 207.
Bindegewebe, 359.

Böhm, 153-156, 194, 287, 306, 404, 428.
Books, 393.
Bouterweck, 247.
Bow and LjTe, 21.
Brandis, 345, 346, 357, 381.
Braniss, 346.
Brown (Bishop), 181, 415.

Brown (Thomas), 416, 428.

Brucker, 346.

IJruno, 152, 153.

Buckle, 368, 381, 882, 394, 405, 436, 456,

459.
Buhle, 346.
Butler (Bishop), 415.
Butler's Lectures, 345, 346, 351, 357,

362, 863.

Calculus (th«), 417.

Campanella, 152.

Canonic, 131.

Cardan, 152.

Carlyle, 416, 420.

Cameades, 137.

Categories, 99, 100, 212, 221, 280, 323,

394, 423.
Categorical Imperative, 214, 233.
Causality, 182, 183, 205, 212, 224, 266,

282, 329, 409, 455.
Causes (Aristotle's four), 105-108.
Certainty (moral), 231.
Chalybseus, 346.
Chance, 26.
Chaos, 10.
Channides, 58.
Charmides (the), 63.
Chemism, 331.
Christianity, 139, 143, 144, 209, 277, 30*J,

302, 314, 815, 343, 350, 355, 433, 440,

444, 475.
Chrysippus, 123, 131.
Church, 238, 239, 443.
Cicero, 24, 124, 135, 136, 138, 372.
Citizen (a good), 441.
Clarke, 181.

Classes (in Plato's state), 92.
Classification, 450, 451, 452.
Cleanthes, 123, 127.
Cleon, 42.
Clouds (the) 40, 42.
Cogito-sum, 405.
Cognition, 35, 65, 113, 114, 124, 13t>,

210, 253, 331, 374, 393, 424.
Cold, 10, 17.
Coleridge, 423, 425.
Columbus, 438.
Common sense, 184, 418.
Complexions, 25, 26.
Composition, 23, 28.
Comte, 346, 377, 382, 395, 446-467, 468
Conception, 50, 70, 71, 364, 365, 406.
Concrete, 365, 366.
Condensation, 9, 11.
Condillac, 184, 185, 454.
Conduct (standard of), 397.
Consciousness, 163, 284.
Consequent, 327.
Constitutive, 231, 240, 245, 34a
Contingency, 328.
Continuity, 325, 365, 366.
Contract, 337.

INDEX.

479

3oTitracUotlon, 99, 101, 200, 205, 280,

I position, 427.

iries, 10.

irielv, 20, 21. 327.

iiioan notlou, 21Ö, 415, 423.

Micus, 150.

i«a1 principles, 140.

i^onv, 82, 306.

logical. 109, 205, 213, 227.

sophy, 850.

Tjiarts, 66, 398.

i:e, 84.

:i. 810.
r, 93, 94.

- (the Acac'.emlc), 93.

> (the Cvnic), 123.

: ion. 124, 158, 405.
Mlia.s. 87, 44, 58.
:'riticism. 138. 216, 260, 279.
's (the German), 436, 441, 473-476.

iu9, 137.

;n 9, 10.

orth, 415.

, 53. 54, 55, 57, 87, 95, 128, 133.
3j~uosarges, 54. 95.
^yrenaic, 58, 55, 56, 57, 86, 132, 133.

yALEMBERT, ISS

Jaiuon, 39.

3ar\vin, 354.

3eath. 133, 199.

deduction, 423.

Definition. 48, 50, 101.

Degree, 825.

3eiuiiirg:iis, 79, 82, 83.

Democritus, 25, 132. 283, 372, 373, 374,
877, 421, 455.

Demonic dement in Socrates, 41.

Deont-ology, 129.

De Quincey, 871.

Descartes, his life, 156 ; his pMlosophy,
157 ; his doubt, 157 ; his proposition,
157, 158 ; our spiritual nature, 158 ;
his criterion, 158 ; the idea of God,
159 ; the veracity of Grod, 161 ; his
substances, 161 ; the seat of the soul,
162 ; his principles recapitulated and
criticised, 163, 164 ; Note on, 404-407 ;
mentioned, 144, 150, 165, 166, 167, 168,
169, 172, 173, 176, 381, 411, 414, 454.

Design, 8, 81, 241, 245, 279, 372, 873,
396, 421, 424.

Dens ex machina, 8, 29, 81, 164, 199.

Development, 354, 399, 400.

Diaporas, 26.

Dialectic, 18, 19, 30, 64, 66-69, 72, 75,
76, 98, 100, 226, 236, 324, 430-433,
445, 475.

Diamond net, 323, 347, 359, 398.

Diderot, 188-190, 474.

Difference, 65, 71, 354, 355, 359, 366,
404, 434.

Diopene« of Apollonla, 351, 352, 376,

877, 879.
Diogenes Laertiu«, S.M, 872.
Diogenes of Sinonc, 54, 55, 364, 368.
Diogenes the Btolc, 138.
Dion, 60.

Dionysius (the elder), 60.
Diunysius (the younger). 60.
Diony.-^odorus, 83.
Dis(Mj)line (true), 856.
Discretion, 325, 865, 866
Diversity. 327.

Divisibility. 865, 369. 370, 871.
Division (philosophical), 67, 98.
Dogmatism, 259.
Don.ildson, Dr., 349.
Dorism, 44. 58.

Double-entendre (Berkeley's), 418.
Doubt, 157. 279.
Dress, 356.
Du.alism, 15, 19, 80, 87, 121, 125, 138,

164.
Duboc, 441.
Duns Scotus, 145, 349.
Duties, 129, 272. 273, 274, 397, 410.
Dynamical sublime, 243.

Earth, 11, 17.

East Indies, 150.

Eclectic, 24, 138, 352, 375.

Economics, 205.

Ecstasy 139

Ego, 183, 220, 247, 248, 259-277, 280,

283, 284, 285. 2-^7. 425.
Eleatics, 4, 6, 7, 14-19, 22-27, 30, 36. 53,

57, 62, 64, 67, 73, 75, 357-371, 373,

396, 898, 399, 400, 453.
Elements (the four), 23, 82.
Emanation, 141.
Emerson, 420.
Empedocles, 7, 8, 10. 22-24, 25-28, 30,

372. 373, 375, 376, 379, 396, 453.
Empirical, 449.

Empiricism, 125. 152, 153, 187, 210, 253.
Encyclopaedia, 188.
Encyclopaedists, 1, 33, 188.
Engel, 208.
English (the), 403.
Enneads, 139.
Ens, 867.

Entelechie, 105, 108, 113, 399, 402.
Epicureanism, 122, 131-134, 135, 138,

139.
Epicurus, 57, 131-134.
Epochs (historical), 5, 6.
I Erasmus, 148.
Erdmann, Pref., 345, 346, 349, 350-352,

357, 363, 373, 3S1, 382, 397, 403, 404,

407, 408, 411, 413, 414, 416, 446.
! Eristic, 57, 122.
' Eros, 39, 67, 85.

Eschenmayer. 306.
, Esse-percipi, 202.

ISO

INDEX.

Kssnnco, 82(5.

Kssontial, '.Vld.

Kthics, 14, 22, 35, 47-52, 65, 66-69, 86-92,
98, 115-120 124, 131-134, 205, 285, 444.

Ethics (Aristotlo's), 95.

Kuclid, 53, 50-58, 6<>.

Eudaiinonisin, 55, 210. Sec also Happi-
ness, Felicity, Virtue, etc.

Eudemus, 120.

Eugene (Prince), 194.

Euripides, 27, 33, 42.

Eurytus, 12.

Euthydemus, 33.

Euthydemus (the), 37.

Evil, 126, 133

Evolution (Law of), 447, 452.

Exertion, 328.

Existence, 328, 369, 434,

Exoteric, 95.

Experience, 151, 210, 212, 253, 278, 414,
415, 416.

Explanation, 366.

Explicit, 366.

Extension, 161, 408, 409.

External World, 202.

Externality, 348.

Faculties, Kantfs three, 217.

Family (the), 339.

Fanaticism, Pythagorean, 14.

Fate of Socrates, 397.

Fathers (the), 144.

Fear and Hope, 238.

Feeling, 247, 251, 285.

Felicity, 234, 236.

Female (the). 111.

Ferguson, 416.

Ferrier, 345, 346-9, 350, 352, 853, 357,
360, 371, 372, 416, 421, 427, 462.

Feuerbach, 436.

Ficinus, 148.

Fichte, his life, 265-259 ; his philosophy
— earlier form, 259-275 ; later form,
276 ; his practical philosophy, 270 ;
Note on, 427 ; mentioned, 220, 247,
254, 278, 286, 287, 288, 290, 296, 298,
305, 315, 317, 321, 322, 323, 360, 406,
420, 482, 444, 445.

Final Cause, 105-108.

Fire, 11, 17, 21, 126.

Flux, perpetual, 20, 30.

Forberg, 257.

Force, 328.

Forces 23

Form, 1 Ol', 102, 105-108, 328, 354, 399,
400.

Fräser, Professor, 421.

Frauenstädt, 311.

Freewill, 233, 336.

French Revolution, 187.

Illumination, 187-192.

Friendship, 133.

Fries, 247, 346.

Frogs (the). 42.

Galileo, 150.

Ganc, 208.

Gassendi, 158, 405, 411.

Gedanke, 353.

Generalization, 397.

Geology, 3.33.

German Philosoi)hy, 404, 420.

Geulinx, 104-166.

Gnosology, 259-270.

Gnostics, 287.

Yvit>di (TfauToi/, 47.

God, the notion of, etc., 16, 80, 81, 99,
101, 109, 110, 111, 125, 126, 142, 1.54,
155, 156, 158, 159, 160, 167, 168, 169,
175. 185, 188, 189, 190, 191, 192, 198,
201, 202, 208. 209, 213, 214. 229, 230,
237, 254. 274, 275, 306-315, 361, 362,
363, 379. 401, 404-409, 417, 434, 438,
439, 473-476.

Gods, their vices, etc., 16, 26, 35, 134.

Goethe, 257, 355.

Good (the), 57, 63, 64, 67, 69. 80. 87, 115,
127. 174, 201, 242.

Gorgias, 33, 36, 63, 377.

Gorgias (the), 36, 63, 64, 65, 86.

Gorgonization, 387. 391. 392, 418.

Graces, the three, of Socrates, 39.

Gratry, 469.

Gravity, 332.

Greece, Fall of, 402.

Greek Fugitives (the), 148.

Grimm, 190.

Grote, Mr., 346. 346, 350-352, 363, 366
397, 421, 463.

Ground, 205, 327.

Hamanx, 247, 420.

Hamilton, Sir W., 366, 371, 416, 419, 426,
427.

Happiness, 65, 64, 67, 86, 116-118, 127
135, 172, 175.

Harmony, the Pre-established, 196-198w

Hartley, 415.

Hate, 8, 10, 23

Haureau, 349.

Heart, 84.

Heaven, 112.

Hedonism, 57, 86.

Hedonists, 133.

Hegel, Transition to, 315 ; his life, 321
his works and system, 322 ; th(
Logic, 323 ; doctrine of Being, 324
of Essence, 326 ; of the Notion
329; philosophy of Nature, 332
of Spirit, 834 ; subjective Spirit
334 ; objective Spirit. 386 ; abso
lute Spirit, 341 ; Note on, 429-445
mentioned, 2, 3, 4, 26, 43, 45, 48, 24S
278, 280, 286, 310, 345-366, 371-375
377, 379, 381, 382, 385, 387, 397-41C
414, 415, 417, 419, 420, 422, 425. 42e

IXDEX.

4SI

427 440, 449. 450 454. 457. 459, 461-

4o8. 473-476.
HetJt'sias, 5i>,
lleiuc, 436, 473.
Hell, 209.

Helvctins. 1S6. 1S7. 190.
lieraclitus, his historical relation, 19 ;

his chiiractcristic'8. 20 ; his iirincijile,

20 ; flre, 21 ; transition from, 22 ;

Note on. 371 ; mentioned, 4, 7. 8, 23-

27. 30, 35. 66, 73, 77, 125, 126, 280.

850, 357, 371-373, 375, 395, 396. 398

899. 400. 455. 460.
Herbart, his life, 278 ; his philosophy,

278 ; his basis, 278 ; his procedure,

279 ; his metjii>hysics, 279 ; his reals, ;

280 ; his psychologj-, 283 ; hi.s ethics, !
285 ; Note on, 428 ; mentioned, 247,
860, 428, 464.

Herder, 247.
Hermeias, 94, 95.
Ilerodotus, 314.
Herpvllis, 95.
Hesiod, 9, 16, 91.
Heteronomous, 234.
Hippasus, 351.
Hippias, 33, 36, 37.
Hippias minor (the), 63.
Hippo, 352.

Histories of Philosophy, 345, 346.
History, 96, 340, 341, 348.
Hobbes, 177, 364, 365, 394, 411-413.
Hölderlin, 286.
Holbach, 190, 474.
Homer, 9, 16, 91.
Homoeomeries, 29, 375.
Hope, 238.
Huber, 349.
llufeland, 257.
Hugo, 473.
Humboldt, 257.

Hmne, 1S1-1S4. 210, 212, 216, 251, 414-
416, 420. 422. 423, 454. 455, 456, 465.
Hutcheson, 181, 416, 444.
Hyle, 79.

Hylicists, 6, 13, 21, 23, 30, 32.
Hypostasis, SO.

Iamblichus, 12, 139.

Idseus 352

Idea, 76, 77-89, 101-105, 108, 316, 329,

331. 398, 402.
Ideal, 89, 227, 229.
Idealism, 125, 176, 192-209. 210, 212,

217, 244, 248, 251, 253, 259, 287, 291,

294-298, 299-304, 316, 374, 391, 419,

420, 431, 435, 476.
Ideality, 315-316.
Ideas, 51, 64-68, 70, 72-89, 101-105, 177-

179, 202, 359, 39S, 399.
Ideation confused, 193.
Identity, 65, 71, 827, 355, 359, 366, 404,

434.

Illumination, 8, 31, 187-192, 207-20».

210, 381, 416.
Immaterial jirinciplo, 30.
Immediacy, 329.

Immortality, 10,67, 84, 439, 4-JO.
Imperativo, categorical, 214, i;33, 421
lm]ilicit, 3(!6.
Imi>ort nnite, 402.
Induction, 4cS, 50, 151.
Inflnitc, 10, 365, 366, 401.
Inherence, 280, 281.
In itaelf, 299.
Inner, 328.
Intellect, 8, 10.
IntellectuR, 145.
Intelligible, i)rinciple, 7, 396.
Intuition, 224, 247, 251.
Intuitive understanding, 426.
Ionics, 4, 6, 7, 9-11, 23, 350, 352, 37 i,

396, 453, 459.
Irony, Socratic, 49.
I.socrates, 35.
Italics, 11, 373.

Jacobi, 247-255, 267, 286, 306, 411, 41().

426, 427.
John, St., 277, 315.
Judgment, 330.
Judnmeut, Kritik of, 215, 217, 24C

246.
Judgment, iEsthetic, 241.
Judgment, Teleological, 241, 244.
Judgments of explanation (analytic),

213.
Judgments of extension (sjTithetic),

213.
Judgments of sensation, 361.

Kame3, Lord, 416.

Kant, Transition to, 209 ; life, 214 ;
Kritik of Pure Reason, 217 ; the
Transcendental .Esthetic, 218 ; the
Transcendental Analytic, 221 ; the
Transcendental Dialectic, 226 ; the
Ideas of Reason, 226 ; Psychological
Idea, 227 ; Cosmological Idea and
Antinomies, 228 ; Theological Idea,
or Idfeil of Pure Reason, 229 ; the
Kritik of Practical Reason, 232 ; Prac-
tical Analytic, 233 ; Practical Dia-
lectic, 236 ; Religion witliin the
limits of Pure Reason, 238; Kritik
of Judgment, 240; iE^thetic Critique.
241 ; Teleological Critique, 244 ; Note
on, 422-426 ; mentioned, 100, 249,
251, 253-262, 266, 267, 275, 278, 285,
286, 288, 290, 295, 323, 347, 374, 385,
394, 401, 405, 406, 414-416, 419, 422-
4-26, 427, 430, 431, 434, 439, 444, 450,
451, 454, 455, 465,476.

Kepler, 150.

Klopstock, 256

Kuights (the), 42.
H

482

INDEX.

Knowledge, 51, 57, 64. 190, 249, 251,
259-270. See also Cognition.

Kritik of Pure Reason, 210, 215, 216,
217-232.

Kritik of Practical Reason, 214, 215,
217 232-238

Kritik of Jiulj^'inent, 215, 217, 240-240.

Krug, 247, 441.

Laches (the), 03.

La Grange, 190.

La Mettrie, 188, 189, 190, 193.

Laurie, Mr., 444.

Laws (the), 88, 91.

Legality, 235.

Leibnitz, his life, 192 ; the monads,
194 ; pre-established harmony, 196 ;
idea of God, 198 ; soul and body, 198 ;
theory of knowledge, 199 ; the ThCo-
dic6e, 200 ; Note on, 416 ; mentioned,
190, 191, 201, 202, 203, 204, 207, 210,
283, 285, 287, 322, 859, 374, 454.

Leucippus, 24, 272-274.

Lewes, Mr., Pref., 345-347, 350-353,
358, 300-365, 371-375, 382, 421, 439,
446, 447, 454, 457, 461, 462, 464, 466-
473.

Life, 331.

Locke, his life, 177 ; innate ideas, 177 ;
origin of ideas, 179 ; his followers,
181 ; Note on, 413-415 ; mentioned,
181-186, 192, 199, 210, 211, 374, 417,
454.

LofTomotion, 113, 114.

Logic, 67-69, 98-101, 124, 131, 132, 221,
323.

Love.' 8, 10, 23,376,379.

Lucretius, 138.

Lyceum, 95.

Lycon, 43.

Lysis (the), 63.

Magnitude, 205, 325.

Maieutics, 49, 392.

Male (the). 111.

Malebranche, 164-168, 407-408, 414.

Man, 31, 35, 113-115, 409.

Mandeville, 415.

Manifestation, 327.

Many, 19, 325.

Marbach, 346.

Marcus, 304.

Marriage, 339.

Materialism, 125, 184, 188-192, 210.

Mathematics, 68, 69, 98.

Matter, 6, 76, 79, 82, 101, 102, 105-108,

164, 166, 167, 171-173, 288, 293, 328,

354, 355, 399, 400, 418.
Matters of fact, 415.
Maurice, Mr., 345, 346.
Maxims of volition, 234.
Mayer, 169.
Means competent, 117.

Measure, 325.

Mechanical explanation, 23, 27.

Mechanics, .331, 3:J2.

Medici (the), 148.

Megarics, 53, 56-58, 59, 64, 05, 87, 122.

Meier. 207.

Melauchthon. 148.

Mclissus. 15. 357, 358, 361.

Mfclitus, 43.

Mendelssohn, 208, 249.

Meno (the), 44.

Metaphysic, 98-111, 205, 218, 226; 279,

401, 453.
Metaphysics (Aristotle's), 95. 99, 101.
Method. 49, 262, 316-318, 323, 431, 434.
Michelet, 346, 372.
Mill, Mr., 346, 364-366, 382, 446-448,

450-467.
Millet (problem), 308, 369.
Milton, 367.
Mind, 8. 28-30, 164, 166, 167. 171-173,

288-298. 375, 396. 421.
Modes, 179.
Modus, 173, 408, 433.
Monads, 194-196, 281, 282, 374.
Monism, 15, 19, 138, 144.
Monotheism, 363.
Moralität. 48, 337, '395, 398.
Moral awe, 235, 228.
Moral law, 233.

Moral proof for God's existence, 237.
Morals, 52. See also Ethics.
More, Henry, 415.
Morell, Dr., 462.
Motion, 112, 205, 363-371, 378.
Motives, 233, 234.
Movement in matter, 10, 17, 18, 22, 23,

26, 28.
Music, 342.
Mutation, 280, 282.
Mysticism, 153, 304.
M>-thical cosmogonies, 5, 9.
Mj'thological explanation, 396,
Mj'thology, 306-315.

Naturalism, 26.

Nature, 81, 113, 288, 331, 332, 348.

Nature, works on, 20, 23, 28, 36.

Necessity, 8, 26, 328, 415.

Negation, 317, 324, 398.

Negative, 327.

Negativity, 404.

Neo-Platonism, 6, 12, 122, 138-144, 276,

287. 304.
Newlon, 181, 417, 459.
Nicomachus, 94, 95.
Niethammer, 257, 288.
Nihil est in intellectu, etc., 114, 181,

184, 417.
Nominalism, 145-147.
'Söfj.w, 36.

Non-being, 26, 65, 66, 72-74, 398.
Nothing, 25, 824.

IM) EX.

4S3

Notion. 4R, ^0. 61. «4. fl.^. 60, 103 105,
MJ), 317, 3'2d, 31)0, 431, 434, AA'l, 443,
44.').

Noumonal. 22.'.. ST.'i, 41S, 457.

Nous. 2S, .S7Ü 380, 3U5.

Novalis, 258.

Number, 6, 11, 82, 825, 852, 854, 355,
3it(}.

Nutiition, 113, 114.

Oath of tho Gods, 356.

Objectivitv. 8, 37, 88, 65, 06, 120-123,

212. 329, 330, 380-3iV>, 397, 402.
Objei'ts, A process, 359.
Obstetrics, spiritual, 40.
Occam, 146.
Occasionalism, 165.
Oceanus, 9.

OctAve, the musical, S3.
Omnis detcrminado, etc., 170.
One, 15 16, 19, 65, 66, 75, 76, 87, 325,

852, 359-361, 367, 372.
Ontological, 205, 405, 406.
Opinion, 69, 71, 365, 399.
Optimism, 201.
Organics, 333.
Organon (the). 99, n93.
Origination, 106, 325.
Ossian, 428.
Oswald, 184.
Ott. 471.
0\id, 356.

Paganism, 473-476.

Painting, 342,

Paley, 415.

Paiiaetius, 122.

Paracelsus, 154.

Paradoxes of Zeno, 365.

Paralogisms of Pure Reason, 227.

Pareuetic, 37, 398.

Parmenides, 8, 15, 16-18, 20, 22-24, 26,

75, 77, 78, 280, 283, 357, 358, 361, 302,

367 421 455.
Parmenides (the), 65, 66, 68, 73, 75-77.
Participation, 78.
Particular, 354.
Passions (the) 404.,
Pathological, 402, 424.
Paulus, 2S6, 311.
Pausanias, 39.
Penalty, 337.
Percei)tion, theory of, 422.

of Reason, 252.

Periods, philosophical, 6.

Peripatetic, 95, 120.

Personality, 336, 402.

Peter, St., 315.

Petrus Lombardus, 144.

Phsedo (the), 12, 14, 07, 72, 79, 85, 103,

375, 377.
Phsedrus (the\ 34, 47, 62, 63, 67, 85.
Plisenarete, 30, 49, 392.

Phenomenal world, etc., 7, 15, CO, 76,

78, 101, 225, 432.
rhenomciuilogy (the), 818 321, 335, 330.
I'herecvdt'.s, 352.
I'hilebus (the), 30, 67, 73, 86.
Philolaus, 12.
Philosopher, 853.
Philosophy, 39, 60. 80, 93, 96, 97, OS,

131, 174, 204, 20.0, 341, 343, 347 34«),

403, 406, 414, 428.

Anaxagorenn, 8, 27.

Atomistic, 7, 25.

Commencement of, 5, 896.

Divisions of, 2U4 205.

Eleatic, 6, 14.

Empedoclean, 7, 22.

Finst. 98.

German, 404, 420.

Heniclitic, 7, 19.

Histories of, 345, 346.

Uistor>' of (General Idea of the),

1-5, 347-349.

Ionic, 6, 9.

Modem (Transition to), 145-156,

403.

Oriental, 6, 849.

Post- Aristotelian, 120-137, 402

Post-Kantian (Transition to\ 240.

Practical, 14, 22, 35, 67, 98, 174,

205, 214, 232, 270, 285, 336, 444.

Pre-Socratic, 6-39, 396.

Pythagorean, 6, 11.

Scholastic, 5, 144-148, 349.

Scottish, 184, 416.

Second, 98.

Sophistic, 8, 30.

Theoretical, 67, 98, 204.

^o-ei, 36.

Physics, 12, 14, 66-69, 81, 98, 111-115,
124, 125, 131, 132, 333.

Pineal gland, 162, 405.

Plato, his life, 58 ; development of his
writings, etc., 61 ; division of his
system, 67 ; his dialectics, 69 ; hi.s
physics, 81 ; his ethics, 86 ; retro-
spect, 93 ; Note on, 398-399 ; men-
tioned, 4, 6, 12, 14, 19, 25, 29, 31,
32, 34, 36, 37, 39, 42, 44, 46, 47, 49,
51, 57, 94, 96 98, 101-105, 106, 108,
115, 118-121, 125, 1.31, 136, 138, 144,
145, 148, 287, 475, 476.

Pleasure, 86, 133.

Plenum, 25, 26.

Pliuv, 134.

Plotinus, 138, 139-141, 302, 443, 463.

Plurality, 65, 66.

Plutarch, 60.

Poetry, 342.

Polemo, 93.

Politics, 96, 205, 271, 272.

Pol us, 37.

Pol}-gnotus, 123.

PoljTnath, 25, 33, 37, 13-i,

484

INDEX.

PoinT'cy, 124.

I'oiiipoiiatius, 147.

Pope, 421.

rorcli or Portico, 123.

Porphyry, 12, 139.

PosidoTiius, 124.

Position absolute, 280, 281, 282,

Positive, 327.

Positivism, 423, 447-4G7.

Possibility, 204, 205, 328.

Post- Aristotelian philosophy, 120-137,

402.
Post-Kantian philoso])hy, 246.
Postulates of em])irical thought, 225.
Postulates, practical, 214, 237, 247,

423, 424, 426, 444.
Potentiality, 101, 102, 108, 109, 365,

399, 400.
Practical philosophy, 14, 22, 35, 67, 98,

174, 205, 214, 232, 270, 285, 336, 444
Prantl, 349, 383, 384, 392, 393.
Prayer, 444.

Pre-Socratic philosophy, 6-39, 396.
Presupposition, 163.
Price, 415.
Priestley, 415.
Primal matter, 10, 106.
Printing press, 148.
I'rinciple of morals, 234, 273, 424.
Principles, material, formal, and intel-
ligible, 396.
Probability, 137.
Proclus, 139.
Prodicus, 33, 34, 37, 39.
Properties, 328,
Property, 337.

Proposition of Descartes, 115.
Propositions, 99.
Protagoras, 31, 33-36, 44, 53, 70, 71, 377,

382, 383, 384, 388, 397.
Protagoras (the), 36, 63, 64, 66,
Protreptic, 62, 398.
Prvtanes, 44.
Psyche, 85, 304,
Psychology, and psychological, 66, 205,

206, 213, 217, 226, 283, 335, 336, 375,

389, 400, 405.
Ptolemaic system, 83.
Pyramids, 353.
Pyrrho, 134-136.
Pythagoras, 11, 15.
Pythagoreans, 4, 6, 11-15, 59, 60, 62, 64,

66, 67, 73, 85, 93, 94, 131, 352, 353, 356,

357, 360, 396, 438, 453, 455, 459.
Pythias, 94, 95.

QUADRUPLICITY, 87.

Qualities, primary, etc., 374.
Quality, 324.
Quantity, 325, 365, 366.
Quantum, 18, 325.

Raison süffisante, 198.

Raisonnement, 96.

Ramus, 147.

Ilarefaction, 9, 11.

Rationalism, 437.

Realism, 30, 47, 145-147, 170-192, 209,

210, 244, 251, 299-304, 316.
Reality, 315, 316, 325.
Rcal.s, 280-285, 428.
Rea.son, 28-31, 127, 140-142, 232, 372,

379, 383, 384, 395, 417, 442.

Ideas of, 213, 226-232, 237, 247, 253.

Reciprocity, 225, 266, 329.

Reflection, 179.

Reflexion, 326.

Reformation, 145, 148, 149.

Regulative, 230, 240, 245, 348.

Reid, 184, 419, 444, 454.

Reimarus, 208, 209.

Reinhold, 247. 261.

Reuchlin, 148.

Reuss, 215.

Relations of ideas, 415.

Relativity, 63, 65, 70, 368-370, 374, 380-

396.
Religion, 238, 240. 341, 343, 438.
Republic (the), 31, 60, 67, 68, 85, 87-89.
Repulsion, 325.
Reserve, 135, 136, 137.
Revelation, 306-315.
Revival of letters, 148.
Right, 270-273, 336.
Ritter, 346, 351, 381.
Rixner, 346.

Romans, the, 137, 138, 402.
Roscelinus, 145.
Rosenkranz, 322, 430, 4()9-472
Rousseau, 182, 209, 215.
Ruge, 436, 445, 474, 476.
Rulers ought to be philosophers, 60. 91

Sage (the), 54, 55, 129, 130.

Salto mortale, 251.

Scepsis, 279.

Scepticism, 8, 30, 31, 37, 57, 122, 134.
139. 150, 202.

Scepticism, Elder, 134,

Later, 137.

Schelling, his life, 286 ; his philosophy,
first period, 287 ; second period, 290 ;
philosophy of nature, 291 ; transcen-
dental philosophy, 294 ; philosophy
of art, 297 ; third period, 299 ; fourth
period, 304 ; fifth period, 306 ; Note
on, 428; mentioned, 156, 248, 254,
255, 276, 278, 315, 316, 318, 321, 343,
401, 420, 428, 429, 431. 434, 462.

Schema, Transcendental, etc., 222.

Schiller, 235, 246, 257.

Schlegel, 257, 258.

Schleiermacher, 56, 258, 346, 351, 352.

Scholasticism, 5, 143-147, 349.

School, the Peripatetic, 120.

Schoolmen, 453.

IXDKX.

48.-)

Scliopcnhaues, 437.

>c'liulzo, 247.

Sohwc^lor, Ills lift», xl. ; works, xii ;
c.hariutcr, xiii ; iloath. xiv. ; iiifii-
tioiieil. rrof.,343, ;i4G 3:>2. 300, 3o;{,
S72, 873, 3S0-3.S;). 392. 3y3. 3y7, 3«»,
401-404, 414-41S, 423, 42:>. 427.

Soionce, Cl>, 72, 77 ; natural. 141), i:>0.

yoijMues, the classificatiuu of, 447, tcq.

Scipio, 124.

IScotus Erigena, 114.

!Sculi>ture, 342.

Secret of Uogel, 3C5, 419, 433.

Seolye, Pref.

iSelf. 1S3.

Self-love, 1S6, 1S7, 192, 234.

iSeeining, 17.

!<eiiei-a, 13S.

Sengler. 310.

Sensation, 35, 70, 71, 113, 114, 17l',
ISO.

Sensations, 202.

Sense, common, 184.

Sense, inner, 405.

Senses (the), 371, 373, 374, 375.

Sensualism, 125, 1S4, ISo, 1S7.

Sentences of Lombai-d, 144.

Seven SageS (the), 9.

Sextus Empiricus, 67, 137, 353.

Shaftesbury, 177.

Show (Schein), 65, 66, 73.

Sight, 202.

SigWiu-t, 346.

Silence 356.

Sillographist, 134.

Siniplicius, 357, 376.

Sittlichkeit, 4S, 33S, 395, 39S, 399.

Smith, Adam, 41ü.

Sociology, 460.

Socrates, transition to, 37 ; his person-
ality, 39 ; Socrates and Aristophanes,
42 ; condemnation of Socrates, 43 ;
sources of his philosophy, 46 ; its
general character, 47 ; the Socratic
method, 49 ; doctrine of virtue, 51 ;
Note on, 396 ; mentioned, 4, 6, S, 12,
20, 28, 29, 34, 36, 53-59, 61-67. 73, 77,
85. 87, 93, 94. 104, 115, 116, 118. 136,
375, 377, 380-382, 392, 394, 398, 438,
453, 460.

äocratics, the incomplete, 53.

3olger, 322.

Solon, 9.

Sophist (the>, 65, 66, 73, 74.

Sophistic, 100.

Sophists, their relation to predecessors,
30 ; to the general life of the time,
31 ; their tendencies, 33 ; their his-
torical significance, 34 ; the indi-
vidual Sophists, 35 ; Note on, 380 ;
mentioned, 4, 6. 8, 37. 38, 39, 47, 48,
51, 56. 62, 63, 64, 73, 86, 121, 122, 352.
375, 396, 397.

Sojiljroniscus. fi9.

Soul. 14. 17. 62, 79, 83. 85, 114, 102,

ISO. 188-192. 198. 20&, 209.
Sound, 308.
Space, 112, 205, 211, 218, 220, 253, 2b2,

283. 369, 370, 3H4. 421.
Si-eculative, 353, 4ol, 40Ö.
Si>eu.sippu.s, 93.
Sphairos, 23.
Spinoza, his life, 108 ; puhstance, 169 ;

the attributes, 171 ; the modi, 173 ;

his practical iihilosoi)hy, 174 ; Note

on, 40S ; mentioned. 156, 249. 251,

255, 207, 267, 295-304, 316, 401,407,

414, 454.
Spirit, 331 ; the absolute divine, 109,

110, 111.
SUigira, 94.
St.ahl, 310.
Star- worship, 94.
State, 67, 80 93, 119, 120, 272, 337, 339,

340, 394, 395, 410
State ^So-ness!. 325.
State-philosophy, 429.
Statesman (the), 60, 05.
Steinhart, 208.
STf'pTjais, 100, 107.
Stewart, Dugald, 184.
Stilpo, 57.

Stoa Pcecilö, 123, 136.
Stöckl, 349.
Stoicism, 20, 57, 122-131, 135, 137, 138,

139, 403.
Stones, 11.
Strabo, 95.
Strato, 120.
Strife, 21.

Sty, Epicurean, 131.
Style, 35.
St^•x, 356.
Subjectivity, 8, 30, 31, 65, 66, 120-123,

212, 329, 380 396, 3^7, 402.
Sublime, 241, 242, 243.
Substance, 101, 101, 1.69, 179, 180, ISl,

328, 408, 414.
Substantial, 399.

Substantiality, 89, 212, 224, 26G, 267.
Sulzer, 208.

Summum bonnm, 86, 116-118, 132, 236.
SvfoAo»'. 101, 107.
Supernatural, 442.
Suspense, 135-137.
Swedenborg, 442.
Swimmer, Delian, 20.
Syllogism, 99, 100, 330.
Symbolism Pythagorean, 13, 14.
Synthetic, 7, 213, 223. 350, 37b.
Systeme de la Nature, 190.

T.^BtJLA rasa, 114, 179, 193.
Taste, 242.
TavTov, 74.

Taylor, Thomas, 373.

486

INDEX.

Telcological, 29, 81, 83, 331.

TertiuvKjuid, 18.

Tcniiciiiaim, 34Ö, 308, 374.

Tcthys, 9.

Tlmlcs. 5, 6, 0, 10, 21, 319-351, 353-356,

38Ö, 393.
Tli^odicee, 194, 200, 201.
Tlieodorus, 56.
Tlioogony, 306.

Theologians, certain ancient, 9.
Theology, 98, 99, 205, 207, 213, 227.
Theophrastus, 120, 362, 374, 375.
Theoretical, 67, 98.
Theosophy, 350.
Thetic, 398.
Theurgy, 139, 143, 444.
Thing, 328.

Thing-in-itself, 220, 259.
Thirty (the), 43, 58.
This (the), 319.
Thomas Aquinas, 145, 349.
Thomson, Sir W., 467.
Thought, 8, 26, 28, 51, 72, 158, 161, 408.

409, 431, 432.
Thought and Being, 16, .53, 362, 363.
Thought, infinite, 401.
Thrasybulus, 58.
Thrasymachus, 37.
Thiimming, 207.

Tiraaeus (the), 67, 68, 72, 79, 81-85.
Time, 112, 205, 211, 218-220, 253, 279,

283, 364, 369, 370.
Timon, 134, 135.
Touch and sight, 202.
Transcendental, 210, 218.
Transformation, 279.
Transmigration, 14, 62.
Trendelenburg, 346.
Trinity, 155, 355, 422, 425, 426.
Triplicity, 88, 98.
Tropes, 135.
True, the, etc. , 67.
Truths, necessary, 417.
Tucker, Abraham, 415.

Ueeerweo, 345-346, 349, 403, 404, 405,
407, 408, 410, 414, 415, 417, 428, 437.
Understanding, intuitive, 246, 426.
— and reason, 442

Uniomystka, 442.
Unity, 65, 66, 428.
Unity of God, 16, 80, 81, 99, 101, 109-

111, 125, 126, 142, 154-156, 158-160,

167-169, 175.
Unity of thought, etc., 354, 409, 421.
Universal, 26, 329, 354, 373, 374, 397.
Universality, 415.
Universals, 48, 50, 04, 65, 69, 103-105,

145.
Universe, 359, 309, 417.

Vacuum, 25, 26.

Vanini, 147, 152.

Vaux, Madame de, 402.

Vegetable world, 334.

Veracity of God, 101.

Vice, 128.

Virchow, 359.

Virtue and virtues, 47, 51, 52, 54, 63,

86-88, 116, 118-119, 124, 127, 128, 132,

175, 236.
Vision, theory of, 202.
Voltaire, 188, 411.
Voluntas, 145.
Vorstellung, 50.
Vortex, 26, 29.

"Water, 9, 11, 353, 396.

Warm and cold, 362.

Wendt, 346, 446.

Whole and parts, 205.

Will, 174, 233, 285, 405.

Wise man, the, 54, 55, 129, 130.

Wissenschaftslehre, 259-270.

Wolff, 203-207, 210, 323, 417.

Wollaston, 181.

World, theories of, 12, 81.

World-soul, 79, 82, 140-142, 288-298.

Wrong, 337.

Xantippe, 40.

Xenia, Schiller's, on Kant, 235.
Xenocrates, 67, 68, 93, 94, 95.
Xeuophanes, 15, 20, 357, 358, 361, 363,

449.
Xenophon, 34, 37, 39-42, 44-49, 55, 58, 62.

Zeller, Pref., 345-351, 357, ^358, 361,
362, 372, 373, 375, 376-379, 381, 382.

Zeno. the Eleatic, 15, 18, 19, 30, 36, 57,
363-371, 377, 395.

Zeno (the Stoic), 123, 136.

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18 EDMONSTON AND DOUGLAS,

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Doctor Antonio.

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20 EDMONSTON AND DOUGLAS,

Seven Years of a Life.

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'Cakes, Leeks, Puddings, and Potatoes.'

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Culture and Religion.

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Studies in Poetry and Philosophy.

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A Memoir of the late Sir James Y. Simpson, Bart. M.D.

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"One of the most charming, instructive, and useful biographies extant."—
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" Will be much read and admired." — Edinburgh Medical Journal.

Archaeological Essays by the late Sir James Y. Simpson,

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The Four Ancient Books of Wales,

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^^ PRIXfKS STREKT, EIUNBrROH. 21

The Coronation Stone.

»y WII.I.IAM F 8KKNK. Sniftll 4to. With 1 11 imt ration»« \n Photojfr«vhT «tkI
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Fordim's Chronicle of the Scottish Nation.

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Sketches of Highland Character. " nm the queys waa goot.")

With Seven Full-ra^e Illustratioii.s l.y W. RALSTON. Engraved by William
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" Nothing can be happier or truer to nature than the artist's representations.
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The Sermon on the Mount.

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Disinfectants and Disinfection.

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Life and "Work at the Great Pyramid.

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An Equal-Surface Projection for Maps of the World, and

its Application to certain Anthropological Questions. By C. PIAZZI SMYTH,
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Britain's Art Paradise ; or, Notes on some Pictures in the

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Saskatchewan and the Rocky Mountains.

Diary and Nan-ative of Travel, Sport, and Adventure, during a Journey through
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Sir "Walter Scott as a Poet.

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Ruined Castles, Monuments of Former Men, in the Vicinity

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Scottish Liturgies of the Reign of James VI., from MSS. in

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Memoir of Sir James Dalrymple, First Viscount Stair,

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History Vindicated in the Case of the "Wigto^wn Martyrs.

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Dugald Stewart's Collected Works.

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Vol. I.— Dissertation. Vols. II. HI. and IV.— Elements of the Philosophy
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Lectures on Political Economy. Vol. X. — Biographical Memoirs of Adam
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The Procession of Pope Clement VII. and the Emperor

Charles V., after the Emperor's Coronation at Bologna, on the 24th February 1.530,
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Bart., M.P. In one vol. large folio. [In preparation.

Jerrold, Tennyson, Macaulay, and other Critical Essays.

By JAMES HUTCHISON STIRLING, LL.D., Author of 'The Secret of Hegel.'
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Songs of the Seasons.

By THOMAS TOD STODDART, Author of 'The Angler's Companion.' Crown
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88 PIUNCKS STKEKT, EDINBURGH. 23

Christ the Consoler;

Or, S. riptun s. Uyiniis, and rrayoiH. for Times of Troublo nnd Sorrow. Selected and
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4to, price lis. Od.

Outlines of Scottish Archaeology.

Hy Rkv, a. SUTilERLAND. I'Juio, sewed, profusely Illustrated, laice Is.

Memoir of James Syme, late Professor of Clinical Surgery in

the University of Kdinbur-li. Hy ROBKRT I'ATEKSON. M.D.. President of the
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Works by the late Professor Syme.

Obskkvations in Ci.iNU al .Si kckrv. J^ccund Edition. Svo, price 8s, 6d.
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On Diseases of the Rectum. Svo, 4s. price 6d.
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The History of English Literature.

THE STANDARD EDITION. By H. TAINE, D.C.L. Translated by Hesrv van
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7s. Od. each ; also kept in half-calf, half-morocco, and full tree-calf bindings, suit-
able for Presentation and School Prizes.

"The most interesting and the most philosophical history that has been written
of English literature." — Globe.

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England."— S;ie<:<a/or.

"Deserves a conspicuous place in every library tilled with the immortal works
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Thermodynamics.

By P. G. TAIT, Professor of Natural Philosophy in the University of Edinburgh.
New and enlarged edition. [In preparation.

Sales Attici :

Or, The Maxims, Witty and Wise, of Athenian Tragic Drama. By D'ARCY WENT-
WORTH THOMPSON, Professor of Greek in Queen's College, Galway. Fcap. Svo,
price 9s.

Two Little Rabbits, or the Sad Story of Whitetail.

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Hand-Book of the Education (Scotland) Act, 1872.

Containing— I. A digest of the Act, with subjects grouped for the convenience of
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24 EDMONSTON AND DOUGLAS.

poratcd Acts, Iii<lii.strial Schools' Act, etc., and Index. By JAMES TOD, Advo-
cate. Fifth Edition. Crown 8vo, price 58.

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Travels by Umbra, svo, price lOs. 6d.
Hotch-Pot.

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The Merchant's Sermon and other Stories.

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A History of the Battle of Bannockburn, fought A.D. 1314.

With Map and Armorial Bearings, and Notices of the principal Warriors who
engaged in that Conflict. By ROBERT WHITE, Author of ' A History of the
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Dante's— The Inferno.

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Researches on Colour-Blindness.

With a Supplement on the danger attending the present system of Railway and
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"Wordsworth's Tour in Scotland in 1803, in company with

his Sister and S. T. Coleridge ; being the Journal of Miss WORDSWORTH,
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" If there were no other record of her than those brief extracts from her Journal
during the Highland Tom-, which stand at the head of several of her brother's
poems, these alone would prove her possessed of a large portion of his genius.
Larger extracts from them occur in the poet's biography and in the edition of the
Poems of 1857, and often they seem nearly as good as the poems they introduce.
Might not that wonderful Journal ) even yet be given entire, or nearly so, to the
world?" — North British Review.

An Historical Sketch of the French Bar, firom its Origin to

the Present Day. By ARCHIBALD YOUNG, Advocate. Demy Svo, price 7s. 6d.

" A useful contribution to our-knowledge of the leading French politicians of
the present day. " — Saturday Review.

Notes on the Scotch Salmon Fishery Acts of 1862 and 1863.

With Suggestions for their Improvement. By ARCHIBALDiYOUNG, Advocate,
Commissioner of Scotch Salmon Fisheries, &c. (fee. Svo, price Is. 6d.

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