FOOTNOTES:

"that the whole would not be what it is were not precisely this finite purpose left in its own uniqueness to speak precisely its own word—a word which no other purpose can speak in the language of the divine will";[394:15]

but one must have a zest for such participation, and a heart for the divine will which it profits. Indeed, so much is this religion a love of life, that it may, as in the case of the Romanticists, be a love of caprice. Battle and death, pain and joy, error and truth—all that belongs to the story of this mortal world, are to be felt as the thrill of health, and relished as the essences of God. Religion is an exuberant spirituality, a fearless sensibility, a knowledge of both good and evil, and a will to serve the good, while exulting that the evil will not yield without a battle.

[349:1]ByAbsolute Idealismis meant that system of philosophy which defines the universe as theabsolute spirit, which is the humanmoral,cognitive, orappreciative consciousnessuniversalized; or as theabsolute, transcendental mind, whose state ofcomplete knowledgeis implied in all finite thinking.

[352:2]Plato:Timæus, 29. Translation by Jowett.

[359:3]Plato:Symposium, 202. Translation by Jowett.

[359:4]Emerson:Essays, Second Series, pp. 65-66.

[364:5]Emerson:Op. cit., p. 25.The possibility of conflict between this method of nature study and the empirical method of science is significantly attested by the circumstance that in the year 1801 Hegel published a paper in which he maintained, on the ground of certain numerical harmonies, that there could be no planet between Mars and Jupiter, while at almost exactly the same time Piazzi discovered Ceres, the first of the asteroids.

[364:5]Emerson:Op. cit., p. 25.

The possibility of conflict between this method of nature study and the empirical method of science is significantly attested by the circumstance that in the year 1801 Hegel published a paper in which he maintained, on the ground of certain numerical harmonies, that there could be no planet between Mars and Jupiter, while at almost exactly the same time Piazzi discovered Ceres, the first of the asteroids.

[368:6]McTaggart:Studies in Hegelian Dialectic, p. 181.

[369:7]Green:Prolegomena to Ethics, p. 15.

[370:8]Plato:The Sophist, 248. Translation by Jowett.

[382:9]Hegel:Encyclopädie, § 45, lecture note. Quoted by McTaggart:Op. cit., p. 69.

[382:10]Hegel:Encyclopädie, § 50. Quoted by McTaggart:Op. cit., p. 70.

[385:11]Royce:Conception of God, pp. 19, 43-44. This argument is well summarized in Green's statement that "the existence of one connected world, which is the presupposition of knowledge, implies the action of one self-conditioning and self-determining mind."Prolegomena to Ethics, p. 181.

[387:12]Kant:Critical Examination of Practical Reason. Translated by Abbott inKant's Theory of Ethics, p. 180.

[391:13]Quoted from McTaggart:Op. cit., pp. 231-232.

[393:14]Emerson:Op. cit., pp. 30-31.

[394:15]Royce:The World and the Individual, First Series, p. 465.

Liability of Philosophy to Revision, Due to its Systematic Character.

§195. One who consults a book of philosophy in the hope of finding there a definite body of truth, sanctioned by the consensus of experts, cannot fail to be disappointed. And it should now be plain that this is due not to the frailties of philosophers, but to the meaning of philosophy. Philosophy is not additive, but reconstructive. Natural science may advance step by step without ever losing ground; its empirical discoveries are in their severalty as true as they can ever be. Thus the stars and the species of animals may be recorded successively, and each generation of astronomers and zoölogists may take up the work at the point reached by its forerunners. The formulation of results does, it is true, require constant correction and revision—but there is a central body of data which is little affected, and which accumulates from age to age. Now the finality of scientific truth is proportional to the modesty of its claims.Items of truth persist, while the interpretation of them is subject to alteration with the general advance of knowledge; and, relatively speaking, science consists in items of truth, and philosophy in their interpretation. The liability to revision in science itself increases as that body of knowledge becomes more highly unified and systematic. Thus the present age, with its attempt to construct a single comprehensive system of mechanical science, is peculiarly an age when fundamental conceptions are subjected to a thorough reëxamination—when, for example, so ancient a conception as that of matter is threatened with displacement by that of energy. But philosophy isessentially unitary and systematic—and thussuperlatively liable to revision.

The One Science and the Many Philosophies.

§196. It is noteworthy that it is only in this age of a highly systematic natural science thatdifferentsystems are projected, as in the case just noted of the rivalry between the strictly mechanical, or corpuscular, theory and the newer theory of energetics. It has heretofore been taken for granted that although there may be many philosophies, there is but one body of science. And it is still taken for granted that the experimental detail ofthe individual science is a common fund, to the progressive increase of which the individual scientist contributes the results of his special research; there beingrivalschools of mechanics, physics, or chemistry, only in so far asfundamental conceptionsorprinciples of orderly arrangementare in question. But philosophy deals exclusively with the most fundamental conceptions and the most general principles of orderly arrangement. Hence it is significant of the very task of philosophy that there should be many tentative systems of philosophy, even that each philosopher should project and construct his own philosophy. Philosophy as the truth of synthesis and reconciliation, of comprehensiveness and coördination, must be a living unity. It is a thinking of entire experience, and can be sufficient only through being all-sufficient. The heart of every philosophy is a harmonizing insight, an intellectual prospect within which all human interests and studies compose themselves. Such knowledge cannot be delegated to isolated co-laborers, but will be altogether missed if not loved and sought in its indivisible unity. There is no modest home-keeping philosophy; no safe and conservative philosophy, that can make sure of a part through renouncing the whole. There is nophilosophy without intellectual temerity, as there is no religion without moral temerity. And the one is the supreme interest of thought, as the other is the supreme interest of life.

Progress in Philosophy. The Sophistication or Eclecticism of the Present Age.

§197. Though the many philosophies be inevitable, it must not be concluded that there is therefore no progress in philosophy. The solution from which every great philosophy is precipitated is the mingled wisdom of some latest age, with all of its inheritance. The "positive" knowledge furnished by the sciences, the refinements and distinctions of the philosophers, the ideals of society—these and the whole sum of civilization are its ingredients. Where there is no single system of philosophy significant enough to express the age, as did the systems of Plato, Thomas Aquinas, Descartes, Locke, Kant, Hegel, and the others who belong to the roll of the great philosophers, there exists ageneral sophistication, which is more elusive but not less significant. The present age—at any rate from its own stand-point—is not an age of great philosophical systems. Such systems may indeed be living in our midst unrecognized; but historical perspective cannot safely be anticipated. It is certain that no living voice is known to speakfor this generation as did Hegel, and even Spencer, for the last. There is, however, a significance in this very passing of Hegel and Spencer,—an enlightenment peculiar to an age which knows them, but has philosophically outlived them. There is a moral in the history of thought which just now no philosophy, whether naturalism, or transcendentalism, realism or idealism, can fail to draw. The characterization of this contemporary eclecticism or sophistication, difficult and uncertain as it must needs be, affords the best summary and interpretation with which to conclude this brief survey of the fortunes of philosophy.

Metaphysics. The Antagonistic Doctrines of Naturalism and Absolutism.

§198. Since the problem of metaphysics is the crucial problem of philosophy, the question of its present status is fundamental in any characterization of the age. It will appear from the foregoing account of the course of metaphysical development that two fundamental tendencies have exhibited themselves from the beginning. The one of these is naturalistic and empirical, representing the claims of what common sense calls "matters of fact"; the other is transcendental and rational, representing the claims of the standards and ideals which are immanent in experience, and directly manifested inthe great human interests of thought and action. These tendencies have on the whole been antagonistic; and the clear-cut and momentous systems of philosophy have been fundamentally determined by either the one or the other.

Thus materialism is due to the attempt to reduce all of experience to the elements and principles of connection which are employed by the physical sciences to set in order the actual motions, or changes of place, which the parts of experience undergo. Materialism maintains that the motions of bodies are indifferent to considerations of worth, and denies that they issue from a deeper cause of another order. The very ideas of such non-mechanical elements or principles are here provided with a mechanical origin. Similarly a phenomenalism, like that of Hume, takes immediate presence to sense as the norm of being and knowledge. Individual items, directly verified in the moment of their occurrence, are held to be at once the content of all real truth, and the source of those abstract ideas which the misguided rationalists mistake for real truth.

But the absolutist, on the other hand, contends that the thinker mustmeansomething by the reality which he seeks. If he had it for the looking,thought would not be, as it so evidently is, a purposive endeavor. And that which is meant by reality can be nothing short of the fulfilment or final realization of this endeavor of thought. To find out what thought seeks, to anticipate the consummation of thought and posit it as real, is therefore the first and fundamental procedure of philosophy. The mechanism of nature, and all matters of fact, must come to terms with this absolute reality, or be condemned as mere appearance. Thus Plato distinguishes the world of "generation" in which we participate by perception, from the "true essence" in which we participate by thought; and Schelling speaks of the modern experimental method as the "corruption" of philosophy and physics, in that it fails to construe nature in terms of spirit.

Concessions from the Side of Absolutism. Recognition of Nature. The Neo-Fichteans.

§199. Now it would never occur to a sophisticated philosopher of the present, to one who has thought out to the end the whole tradition of philosophy, and felt the gravity of the great historical issues, to suffer either of these motives to dominate him to the exclusion of the other. Absolutism has long since ceased to speak slightingly of physical science, and of the world of perception.It is conceded that motions must be known in the mechanical way, and matters of fact in the matter-of-fact way. Furthermore, the prestige which science enjoyed in the nineteenth century, and the prestige which the empirical and secular world of action has enjoyed to a degree that has steadily increased since the Renaissance, have convinced the absolutist of the intrinsic significance of these parts of experience. They are no longer reduced, but are permitted to flourish in their own right. From the very councils of absolute idealism there has issued a distinction which is fast becoming current, between the World of Appreciation, or the realm of moral and logical principles, and the World of Description, or the realm of empirical generalizations and mechanical causes.[402:1]It is indeed maintained that the former of these is metaphysically superior; but the latter is ranked without the disparagement of its own proper categories.

With the Fichteans this distinction corresponds to the distinction in the system of Fichte between the active moral ego, and the nature which it posits to act upon. But theneo-Fichteansareconcerned to show that the nature so posited, or the World of Description, is therealm of mechanical science, and that the entire system of mathematical and physical truth is therefore morally necessary.[403:2]

The Neo-Kantians.

§200. A more pronounced tendency in the same direction marks the work of theneo-Kantians. These philosophers repudiate the spiritualistic metaphysics of Schopenhauer, Fichte, and Hegel, believing the real significance of Kant to lie in his critical method, in his examination of the first principles of the different systems of knowledge, and especially in his analysis of the foundations of mathematics and physics.[403:3]In approaching mathematics and physicsfrom a general logical stand-point, these neo-Kantians become scarcely distinguishable in interest and temper from those scientists who approach logic from the mathematical and physical stand-point.

Recognition of the Individual. Personal Idealism.

§201. The finite, moral individual, with his peculiar spiritual perspective, has long since been recognized as essential to the meaning of the universe rationally conceived. But in its first movement absolute idealism proposed to absorb him in the indivisible absolute self. It is now pointed out that Fichte, and even Hegel himself, means the absolute to be a plurality or society of persons.[404:4]It is commonly conceded that the will of the absolute must coincide with the wills of all finite creatures in their severalty, that God wills in and through men.[404:5]Corresponding to this individualistic tendency on the part of absolute idealism, there has been recentlyprojected apersonal idealism, orhumanism, which springs freshly and directly from the same motive. This philosophy attributes ultimate importance to the human person with his freedom, his interests, his control over nature, and his hope of the advancement of the spiritual kingdom through coöperation with his fellows.[405:6]

Concessions from the Side of Naturalism. Recognition of Fundamental Principles.

§202. Naturalism exhibits a moderation and liberality that is not less striking than that of absolutism. This abatement of its claims began in the last century with agnosticism. It was then conceded that there is an order other than that of natural science; but this order was held to be inaccessible to human knowledge. Such a theory is essentially unstable because it employs principles which define a non-natural order, but refuses to credit them or call them knowledge. Theagnostic is in the paradoxical position of one who knows of an unknowable world. Present-day naturalism is more circumspect. It has interested itself in bringing to light that in the very procedure of science which, because it predetermines what nature shall be, cannot be included within nature. To this interest is due the rediscovery of the rational foundations of science. It was already known in the seventeenth century that exact science does not differ radically from mathematics, as mathematics does not differ radically from logic. Mathematics and mechanics are now being submitted to a critical examination which reveals the definitions and implications upon which they rest, and the general relation of these to the fundamental elements and necessities of thought.[406:7]

Recognition of the Will. Pragmatism.

§203. This rationalistic tendency in naturalism is balanced by a tendency which is more empirical, but equally subversive of the old ultra-naturalism. Goethe once wrote:

"I have observed that I hold that thought to be true which isfruitful for me. . . . When I know my relation to myself and to the outer world, I say that I possess the truth."

Similarly, it is now frequently observed that all knowledge ishumanly fruitful, and it is proposed that this shall be regarded as the very criterion of truth. According to this principle science as a whole, even knowledge as a whole, is primarily a human utility. The nature which science defines is an artifact or construct. It is designed to express briefly and conveniently what man may practically expect from his environment. This tendency is known aspragmatism. It ranges from systematic doctrines, reminiscent of Fichte, which seek to define practical needs and deduce knowledge from them, to the more irresponsible utterances of those who liken science to "shorthand,"[407:8]and mathematics to a game of chess. In any case pragmatism attributes to nature a certain dependence on will, and therefore implies, even when itdoes not avow, that will with its peculiar principles or values cannot be reduced to the terms of nature. In short, it would be more true to say that nature expresses will, than that will expresses nature.[408:9]

Summary, and Transition to Epistemology.

§204. Such, then, is the contemporary eclecticism as respects the central problem of metaphysics. There arenaturalisticandindividualistictendencies inabsolutism;rationalisticandethicaltendencies innaturalism; and finally the independent and spontaneous movements ofpersonal idealismandpragmatism.

Since the rise of the Kantian and post-Kantian philosophy, metaphysics and epistemology have maintained relations so intimate that the present state of the former cannot be characterized without some reference to the present state of the latter. Indeed, the very issues upon whichmetaphysicians divide are most commonly those provoked by the problem of knowledge. The counter-tendencies of naturalism and absolutism are always connected, and often coincide with, the epistemological opposition between empiricism, which proclaims perception, and rationalism, which proclaims reason, to be the proper organ of knowledge. The other great epistemological controversy does not bear so direct and simple a relation to the central metaphysical issues, and must be examined on its own account.

The Antagonistic Doctrines of Realism and Idealism. Realistic Tendency in Empirical Idealism.

§205. The point of controversy is the dependence or independence of the object of knowledge on the state of knowledge; idealism maintaining that realityisthe knower or his content of mind, realism, that being known is a circumstance which appertains to some reality, without being the indispensable condition of reality as such. Now the sophisticated thought of the present age exhibits a tendency on the part of these opposite doctrines to approach and converge. It has been already remarked that the empirical idealism of the Berkeleyan type could not avoid transcending itself. Hume, who omitted Berkeley's active spirits, no longer had any subjective seat orlocus for the perceptions to which Berkeley had reduced the outer world. And perceptions which are not the states of any subject, retain only their intrinsic character and become a series of elements. When there is nothing beyond, which appears, and nothing within to which it appears, there ceases to be any sense in using such terms as appearance, phenomenon, or impression. The term sensation is at present employed in the same ill-considered manner. But empirical idealism has come gradually to insist upon the importance of the content of perception, rather than the relation of perception to a self as its state. The termselementandexperience, which are replacing the subjectivistic terms, are frankly realistic.[410:10]

Realistic Tendency in Absolute Idealism. The Conception of Experience.

§206. There is a similar realistic trend in the development of absolute idealism. The pure Hegelian philosophy was notably objective. The principles of development in which it centres were conceived by Hegel himself to manifest themselves most clearly in the progressions of nature and history. Many of Hegel's followers have been led by moral and religious interests to emphasizeconsciousness, and, upon epistemological grounds, to lay great stress upon the necessity of the union of the parts of experience within an enveloping self. But absolute idealism has much at heart the overcoming of relativism, and the absolute is defined in order to meet the demand for a being that shall not have the cognitive deficiencies of an object of finite thought. So it is quite possible for this philosophy, while maintaining its traditions on the whole, to abandon the termselfto the finite subject, and regard its absolute as a system of rational and universal principles—self-sufficient because externally independent and internally necessary. Hence the renewed study of categories as logical, mathematical, or mechanical principles, and entirely apart from their being the acts of a thinking self.

Furthermore, it has been recognized that the general demand of idealism is met when reality is regarded as not outside of or other than knowledge, whatever be true of the question of dependence. Thus the conception ofexperienceis equally convenient here, in that it signifies what is immediately present in knowledge, without affirming it toconsist inbeing so presented.[411:11]

Idealistic Tendencies in Realism. The Immanence Philosophy.

§207. And at this point idealism is met by a latter-day realism. The traditional modern realism springing from Descartes was dualistic. It was supposed that reality in itself was essentially extra-mental, and thus under the necessity of being either represented or misrepresented in thought. But the one of these alternatives is dogmatic, in that thought can never test the validity of its relation to that which is perpetually outside of it; while the other is agnostic, providing only for the knowledge of a world of appearance, an improper knowledge that is in fact not knowledge at all.

But realism is not necessarily dualistic, since it requires only that being shall not be dependent upon being known. Furthermore, since empiricism is congenial to naturalism, it is an easy step to say that nature is directly known in perception. This first takes the form of positivism, or the theory that only such nature as can be directly known can be really known. But this agnostic provision for an unknown world beyond, inevitably falls away and leavesreality as that which is directly known, but not conditioned by knowledge. Again the termexperienceis the most useful, and provides a common ground foridealistic realismwithrealistic idealism. A new epistemological movement makes this conception of experience its starting-point. What is known as theimmanence philosophydefines reality as experience, and means by experience the subject matter of all knowledge—not defined as such, but regarded as capable of being such. Experience is conceived to beboth in and outof selves, cognition being but one of the special systems into which experience may enter.[413:12]

The Interpretation of Tradition as the Basis for a New Construction.

§208. Does this eclecticism of the age open any philosophical prospect? Is it more than a general compromise—a confession of failure on the part of each and every radical and clear-cut doctrine of metaphysics and epistemology? There is no final answer to such a question short of anindependent construction, and such procedure would exceed the scope of the present discussion. But there is an evident interpretation of tradition that suggests a possible basis for such construction.

The Truth of the Physical System, but Failure of Attempt to Reduce All Experience to it.

§209. Suppose it to be granted that the categories of nature are quite self-sufficient. This would mean that there might conceivably be a strictly physical order, governed only by mechanical principles, and by the more general logical and mathematical principles. The body of physical science so extended as to include such general conceptions as identity, difference, number, quality, space, and time, is the account of such an order. This order need have no value, and need not be known. But reality as a whole is evidently not such a strictly physical order, for the definition of the physical order involves the rejection of many of the most familiar aspects of experience, such as its value and its being known in conscious selves. Materialism, in that it proposes to conceive the whole of reality as physical, must attempt toreduce the residuum to physical terms, and with no hope of success. Goodness and knowledge cannot be explained as mass and force, or shown to be mechanical necessities.

Truth of Psychical Relations, but Impossibility of General Reduction to Them.

§210. Are we then to conclude that reality is not physical, and look for other terms to which we may reduce physical terms? There is no lack of such other terms. Indeed, we could as fairly havebegunelsewhere. Thus some parts of experience compose the consciousness of the individual, and are said to be known by him. Experience so contained is connected by the special relation of being known together. But this relation is quite indifferent to physical, moral, and logical relations. Thus we may be conscious of things which are physically disconnected, morally repugnant, and logically contradictory, or in all of these respects utterly irrelevant. Subjectivism, in that it proposes to conceive the whole of reality as consciousness, must attempt to reduce physical, moral, and logical relations to that co-presence in consciousness from which they are so sharply distinguished in their very definition. The historical failure of this attempt was inevitable.

Truth of Logical and Ethical Principles. Validity of Ideal of Perfection, but Impossibility of Deducing the Whole of Experience from it.

§211. But there is at least one furtherstarting-point, the one adopted by the most subtle and elaborate of all reconstructive philosophies. Logical necessities are as evidently real as bodies or selves. It is possible to define general types of inference, as well as compact and internally necessary systems such as those of mathematics. There is a perfectly distinguishable strain of pure rationality in the universe. Whether or not it be possible to conceive a pure rationality as self-subsistent, inasmuch as there are degrees it is at any rate possible to conceive of a maximum of rationality. But similarly there are degrees of moral goodness. It is possible to define with more or less exactness a morally perfect person, or an ideal moral community. Here again it may be impossible that pure and unalloyed goodness should constitute a universe of itself. But that a maximum of goodness, with all of the accessories which it might involve, should be thus self-subsistent, is quite conceivable. It is thus possible to define an absolute and perfect order, in which logical necessity, the interest of thought, or moral goodness, the interest of will, or both together, should be realized to the maximum. Absolutism conceives realityunder the form of this ideal, and attempts to reconstruct experience accordingly. But is the prospect of success any better than in the cases of materialism and subjectivism? It is evident that the ideal of logical necessity is due to the fact that certain parts of knowledge approach it more closely than others. Thus mechanics contains more that is arbitrary than mathematics, and mathematics more than logic. Similarly, the theory of the evolution of the planetary system, in that it requires the assumption of particular distances and particular masses for the parts of the primeval nebula, is more arbitrary than rational dynamics. It is impossible, then, in view of the parts of knowledge which belong to the lower end of the scale of rationality, to regard reality as a whole as the maximum of rationality; for either a purely dynamical, a purely mathematical, or a purely logical, realm would be more rational. The similar disproof of the moral perfection of reality is so unmistakable as to require no elucidation. It is evident that even where natural necessities are not antagonistic to moral proprieties, they are at any rate indifferent to them.

Error and Evil Cannot be Reduced to the Ideal.

§212. But thus far no reference has been made to error and to evil. These are the terms whichthe ideals of rationality and goodness must repudiate if they are to retain their meaning. Nevertheless experience contains them and psychology describes them. We have already followed the efforts which absolute idealism has made to show that logical perfection requires error, and that moral perfection requires evil. Is it conceivable that such efforts should be successful? Suppose a higher logic to make the principle of contradiction the very bond of rationality. What was formerly error is now indispensable to truth. But what of the new error—the unbalanced and mistaken thesis, the unresolved antithesis, the scattered and disconnected terms of thought? These fall outside the new truth as surely as the old error fell outside the old truth. And the case of moral goodness is precisely parallel. The higher goodness may be so defined as to require failure and sin. Thus it may be maintained that there can be no true success without struggle, and no true spiritual exaltation except through repentance. But what of failure unredeemed, sin unrepented, evil uncompensated and unresolved? Nothing has been gained after all but a new definition of goodness—and a new definition of evil. And this is an ethical, not ametaphysical question. The problem of evil, like the problem of error, is as far from solution as ever. Indeed, the very urgency of these problems is due to metaphysical absolutism. For this philosophy defines the universe as a perfect unity. Measured by the standard of such an ideal universe, the parts of finite experience take on a fragmentary and baffling character which they would not otherwise possess. The absolute perfection must by definition both determine and exclude the imperfect. Thus absolutism bankrupts the universe by holding it accountable for what it can never pay.

Collective Character of the Universe as a Whole.

§213. If the attempt to construct experience in the special terms of some part of experience be abandoned, how is reality to be defined? It is evident that in that case there can be no definition of reality as such. It must be regarded as a collection of all elements, relations, principles, systems, that compose it. All truths will be true of it, and it will be the subject of all truths. Reality is at least physical, psychical, moral, and rational. That which is physical is not necessarily moral or psychical, but may be either or both of these. Thus it is a commonplace of experience that what has bulk andweight may or may not be good, and may or may not be known. Similarly, that which is psychical may or may not be physical, moral, or rational; and that which is moral or rational may or may not be physical and psychical. There is, then, an indeterminism in the universe, a mere coincidence of principles, in that it contains physical, psychical, moral, logical orders, without being in all respects either a physical, a psychical, a moral, or a logical necessity.[420:13]Reality or experience itself is neutral in the sense of being exclusively predetermined by no one of the several systems it contains. But the different systems of experience retain their specific and proper natures, without the compromise which is involved in all attempts to extend some one until it shall embrace them all. If such a universe seems inconceivably desultory and chaotic, one may always remind one's self by directly consulting experience that it is not only found immediately and unreflectively, but returned to and lived in after every theoretical excursion.

Moral Implications of such a Pluralistic Philosophy. Purity of the Good.

§214. But what implications for life would becontained in such a philosophy? Even if it be theoretically clarifying, through being hospitable to all differences and adequate to the multifarious demands of experience, is it not on that very account morally dreary and stultifying? Is not its refusal to establish the universe upon moral foundations destructive both of the validity of goodness, and of the incentive to its attainment? Certainly not—if the validity of goodness be determined by criteria of worth, and if the incentive to goodness be the possibility of making that which merely exists, or is necessary, also good.

This philosophy does not, it is true, define the good, but it makes ethics autonomous, thus distinguishing the good which it defines, and saving it from compromise with matter-of-fact, and logical or mechanical necessity. The criticism of life is founded upon an independent basis, and affords justification, of a selective and exclusive moral idealism. Just because it is not required that the good shall be held accountable for whatever is real, the ideal can be kept pure and intrinsically worthy. The analogy of logic is most illuminating. If it be insisted that whatever exists is logically necessary, logical necessity must be made to embracethat from which it is distinguished by definition, such as contradiction, mere empirical existence, and error. The consequence is a logical chaos which has in truth forfeited the name of logic. Similarly a goodness defined to make possible the deduction from it of moral evil or moral indifference loses the very distinguishing properties of goodness. The consequence is an ethical neutrality which invalidates the moral will. A metaphysical neutrality, on the other hand, although denying that reality as such is predestined to morality—and thus affording no possibility of an ethical absolutism—becomes the true ground for an ethical purism.

The Incentive to Goodness.

§215. But, secondly, there can be no lack of incentive to goodness in a universe which, though not all-good, is in no respect incapable of becoming good. That which is mechanically or logically necessary, and that which is psychically present,may be good. And what can the realization of goodness mean if not that what is natural and necessary, actual and real, shall be also good. The world is not good, will not be good, merely through being what it is, but is or shall be made good through the accession of goodness. It is this belief that the real is notnecessarily, but may be, good; that the ideal is not necessarily, but may be, realized; which has inspired every faith in action. Philosophically it is only a question of permitting such faith to be sincere, or condemning it as shallow. If the world be made good through good-will, then the faith of moral action is rational; but if the world be good because whatever is must be good, then moral action is a tread-mill, and its attendant and animating faith only self-deception. Moral endeavor is the elevation of physical and psychical existence to the level of goodness.

"Relate the inheritance to life, convert the tradition into a servant of character, draw upon the history for support in the struggles of the spirit, declare a war of extermination against the total evil of the world; and then raise new armies and organize into fighting force every belief available in the faith that has descended to you."[423:14]

Evil is here a practical, not a theoretical, problem. It is not to be solved by thinking it good, for to think it good is to deaden the very nerve of action; but by destroying it and replacing it with good.

The Justification of Faith.

§216. The justification of faith is in the promiseof reality. For what, after all, would be the meaning of a faith which declares that all things, good, bad, and indifferent, are everlastingly and necessarily what they are—even if it were concluded on philosophical grounds to call that ultimate necessity good. Faith has interests; faith is faithingoodness or beauty. Then what more just and potent cause of despair than the thought that the ideal must be held accountable for error, ugliness, and evil, or for the indifferent necessities of nature?[424:15]Are ideals to be prized the less, or believed in the less, when there is no ground for their impeachment? How much more hopeful for what is worth the hoping, that nature should discern ideals and take some steps toward realizing them, than that ideals should have created nature—such as it is! How much better a report can we give of nature for its ideals, than of the ideals for their handiwork, if it be nature! Emerson writes:

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