have not been altogether in vain. The deeper thinkers are pretty nearly
agreed that the Absolute is not to be identified with its appearances.
How far they can bring home this view in practical form to the
intelligence of man is another matter. Plato doubtless saw the truth in
a sort of beatific vision, but the tide of speculation ebbed after his
death, and its healing waters never inundated the deserts of mediaeval
thought. The discursive weakness in which the speculation of the
transcendental Philosophy seems to dissipate itself makes us fear a
similar decline. Metaphysics must receive the assistance of the great
speculative achievement of Physics. It must realise that Science can
postulate a Reality unperceived and unqualified by the conditions of
sense, but in terms of which Science can explain the whole phenomena of
the sensible presentation in their objective aspect,--explain these as
transmutations of Reality, proceeding in accordance with the general
mathematical laws under which Reality transmutes itself.
It may be said that reason requires us to think that the Universe is a
unity. Where do you embrace within Reality, in such a view of it,
Intelligence, Volition, Feeling? We answer: Of course, obviously
Reality, as postulated by Physics, does not contain these. But the Real
Thing postulated by Physics is but one aspect of the whole, and may be,
must be, merged in a higher Reality--of which phenomena, on the one
hand, and Thought, Conation, Feeling on the other, are the appearances.
That involves a further advance, the attainment of a higher degree of
Truth which would bridge the Dualism of Thought and Existence, of Self
and Not-self, of Spirit and Nature, and whilst, on the one hand, such
Reality must fundamentally be a-logical, on the other hand Energy may
owe its energy to Spirit.
In the dualism which we must, in experience, recognise, we notice one
fundamental distinction: quantification, measurability, appear the
attributes of the physical; quality, ideality, of the spiritual. The
apprehension, therefore, of the doctrine of Energy should accomplish in
clarity and security the abolition of the intolerable contradictions
which have hitherto involved the search for Reality amid its
appearances. We think it suggests the most satisfying explanation of the
distinction which separates, and the principle which relates Ideality
and Externality, and should obviate the almost childish efforts of
transcendentalists to expound the relation of the Mind to a body which
is involved in, and which is yet--for the individual--distinguished,
they cannot tell us how, from the whole system of Nature.
Of course, neither Thought nor Volition, as such, can be the absolute
Reality. They, like Physical Force, are but transmutations, affections,
phases of Reality. Nor, again, is Energy, as a quality, a correct
description of the Absolute, as such. The Absolute, as such, we cannot
describe; but in studying, as Physics does, the relations of physical
phenomena and stating these in terms of Reality, it conveniently gives
Reality a name appropriate to its own standpoint.
Metaphysics rightly declines to be required to study special branches of
Science. Nothing but grotesque absurdity ensues when this precaution is
overlooked. Yet Metaphysics has hitherto thought itself the better of a
little logic, and in the future it will have to grasp the scientific
conception of Reality. There is nothing else for it; and, after all, it
is remarkable how far the most fundamental conceptions of Metaphysics
are dependent on a physical origin.
Surely it is of primary importance to realise the effect upon our
conceptions of Space and Extension of the doctrine of the transmutations
of Energy. Even the profoundest metaphysicians have seemingly failed to
explain how Space, Matter, and Extension are related with Reality. You
cannot ignore this difficulty by saying that these are the working
conceptions of particular branches of Physical Science. But when you
realise that physical phenomena, even the most permanent and rigid, are
by scientific demonstration but transmutations of the real thing, you
may then understand that Space, Body, and Extension are but the laws and
conditions of the process. As appearances, and within the realm of
phenomena, they seem still what they have always seemed. So much we
still concede without diminution or obscurity; and at the same time we
can harmonise them as they could never be harmonised before with
postulated Reality.
It is the same with Time. The facts of memory would seem to imply that
there is no succession in the Absolute. We are always present at all
times of our life. In recollecting a past event we are contemplating no
mere image, but the actual past event itself. Our chronometry depends on
the annual motion of the Earth round the Sun. It has thus a purely
physical basis.
We might illustrate the application of the doctrine of Energy to every
department of Metaphysics. But such is not the object of the present
essay. We merely desire to indicate briefly some of the many aspects of
the theory, and if only we have been able to suggest a line of inquiry,
the primary object of this essay has been attained.
FOOTNOTES:
[81:1] Originally printed in 1898, now revised and rewritten.
_Printed by_ MORRISON & GIBB LIMITED, _Edinburgh_
_BY THE SAME AUTHOR_
THE
DYNAMIC FOUNDATION
OF KNOWLEDGE
_Crown 8vo. 330 pp. 6s. net_
"Mr. Philip, a thinker of considerable acuteness, expounds further the
dynamic theory of knowledge which he propounded in 'Matter and Energy'
and the 'Doctrine of Energy.' What we are really sensible of in the
external world is mutation; but the consciousness of our own activity
suggests the existence of something behind phenomena. The reality which
sustains experience is found to be, in essence, power--power conceived
as an energy containing within itself the principle of its own
evolution; an energy constantly transmuting itself, and in its
transmutations furnishing the entire presentation of sense. The
universal application of this concept unifies science or the knowledge
of nature; and the dynamic theory is applied by Mr. Philip to life,
economics, and education."
_Times._
"Well written, and contains much sound analysis of perception and the
like, with much that is debatable but suggestive and
stimulating."--_Nature._
"The argument is conducted with great ability and thoroughness, and the
writer reveals a most accurate acquaintance with the results of both
science and philosophy."--_Glasgow Herald._
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