effect that the system of fixed stars might be regarded as a group of
molecules in an infinitely larger whole which we should have to conceive
of as a unitary organism, Paulsen says: “Indeed, there is no objection to
regarding a planet as a ganglion of the world-brain. Is it too large? No.
Why should not the world-brain have bigger cells than an animal brain. Or
is its composition inappropriate? Why? We find in it the same materials,
carbon, oxygen, nitrogen, iron, phosphorus, and so forth, and also
innumerable interactions similar for all we know to those that take place
in a ganglion. Who knows how striking would be the resemblance of their
structures, if we could but see a ganglion under a sufficiently powerful
magnifying glass.”
These ideas are mere possibilities and are presented as such, but we
cannot attribute to them any philosophical, scientific, or religious
importance. Our idea of “a world-soul” or, better, of God, is different
and we avoid purposely anything that can be constructed upon the basis of
a vague hypothesis.
We ourselves reject pantheism, the view which identifies God and the
All for reasons which we need not repeat here. We call our view of
God entheism, and in forming our idea of God we purposely avoid such
fantastical assumptions as considering the possibility of solar systems
being molecules in the organism of a huge world-animal. Granted the
truth of this view, the mere possibility of which we cannot deny,
this extraordinary creature or world-animal would not be God, its
will would not be our moral authority; it would not be the eternal,
the immutable, the ground of all being, the ultimate rule of action,
and the omnipotent universal law of existence: it would merely be a
creature like ourselves, only immeasurably bigger, evolving like other
animals and subject to the same or analogous or perhaps similar wants,
disappointments, sufferings, and joys as ourselves. What a miserable God
such a world-being would be; we know nothing of him and he knows nothing
of us. His will and aspirations would have even less influence upon our
aspirations, than, for instance, the hopes of a man upon the molecular
groupings in his tissues, we being only the parasites upon the crust
of an atom of his tissues. We have presented our view of the subject
in Vol. III, No. 2, pp. 249-257, of _The Monist_, in the third part of
the article “Panpsychism and Panbiotism,” with reference to a similar
hypothesis incidentally touched upon as a possibility of monistic theism
by Professor Romanes.
We simply state the difference between our position and that of Professor
Paulsen concerning the nature of a world-soul without intending to make
more of it than he does himself; for, if we are not mistaken, it is with
him a mere suggestion.
We conclude our review with a passage which shows Professor Paulsen’s
attitude toward Christianity, which more than anything else proves the
general agreement of his work with ours. He says:
“The Christian faith is not a philosophical system, not a theological
dogma and still less the residue of an old superstition, but the
immediate and living certainty of the heart concerning the nature of the
good and its importance in real life. This faith can be to-day the same
as it was in Luther’s, or St. Augustine’s, or the apostles’ time who saw
Jesus with their own eyes bodily. If Christianity, did indeed consist of
a number of doctrines and opinions, it would certainly be true, as some
claim, that it has been dead a long time, for doctrines and opinions are
not long-lived. If Christianity really did consist of the belief in the
creation of the world five thousand years ago out of nothing, the rib
story of Eve, the story of Eden and the fall, etc., etc., ... then indeed
it would be impossible for a thinking man of to-day to be a Christian.
But all that is not the faith of Christianity, it is not the religion of
Jesus. And if all the leaders of all the confessions declare that this
is the Christian faith and that he who does not believe all these things
can have no part in Christ, their proposition must be rejected as untrue.
No one can be saved by believing these things; while the request of the
church to believe in certain opinions set forth by men has expelled
many an honest man.... In the life and death of Jesus I have learned to
understand the meaning of life and I call God and the revelation of God
that which makes my life possible and explains to me the significance of
my life.... Is such a faith compatible with the above-mentioned monistic
world-conception? My answer is, By all means.”
This is Professor Paulsen’s solution of the problem of a reconciliation
of science and religion—and we add that it is ours too.
P. C.
FIRST STEPS IN PHILOSOPHY. By _William Mackintire Salter_. Chicago: C. H.
Kerr & Co. 1892. Price, $1.00. Pages, 155.
This little book is divided into two parts: (1) Physical, (2) Ethical.
In the first, Mr. Salter discusses the conception of matter; in the
second, that of duty. Mr. Salter’s philosophical position is epitomised
in a sentence which he quotes from Herbert Spencer. This sentence states,
that, “what we are conscious of as properties of matter, even down to
its weight and resistance, are but subjective affections produced by
objective agencies which are unknown and unknowable.” Mr. Salter’s
philosophical position, accordingly, is, first, Idealism, and, second,
Agnosticism.
In ethics, Mr. Salter’s view embraces Utilitarianism, or Hedonism, and
Intuitionism, both of which, he says, are incomplete in themselves, and
must be supplemented by other elements. Utilitarianism makes happiness
the ultimate end; Intuitionism, virtue; and Mr. Salter adds, such an end
must embrace the “realisation of _all_ our capacities.” Mr. Salter’s
ethical position has been before discussed in our journals.
If we study Mr. Salter’s philosophical views, we shall find that his
theory is a reproduction of Berkeley’s analysis of the data of knowledge,
embellished by the results of modern physiological psychology. Yet Mr.
Salter’s theory, although it everywhere shows the traces of a close study
of Berkeley’s views, presents the strange historical anomaly of undoing
Berkeley’s work. Berkeley’s undoubted aim was to place knowledge on a
basis of fact and refute, in a philosophical manner, the agnosticism,
metaphysicism, and transcendentalism prevalent in his day. But Mr. Salter
adds to Berkeley’s results the very things that Berkeley sought to
overthrow, and thus renders the latter’s analysis (and consequently his
own) in need of an equivalent analysis.
Take, for instance, the above-quoted sentence from Herbert Spencer, to
which Mr. Salter assents. “Objective agencies,” “unknown and unknowable”!
Is this consistent? All knowledge is a knowledge of sensations, a
knowledge _of_ and _in_ the mind, says the idealist, and we cannot, by
any process of ratiocination, arrive at things “outside” the mind. Yet he
himself, it seems, arrives at a knowledge of “objective agencies” outside
the mind (pp. 65, 69), and, what is more wonderful, at agencies that are
“unknown” and “unknowable.” Surely, this is not abiding by an analysis
of the facts of sensation (Berkeley). It is as unrational a procedure to
infer metaphysical objective agencies, as it is to infer a metaphysical
substratum “matter,” which last is the error of the realist.
Again, take the notion of cause. Here, also, the same unwarrantable
abandonment of the facts of sensation, i. e. of _all that is_, is evident.
At the end of an analysis, in which he shows that “all the choir of
Heaven and the furniture of the earth,” and “all which it inhabit,”
retreat and vanish in mind, Mr. Salter asks: “But is there absolutely
nothing real and objective left? So far as sensible phenomena are
concerned, we must answer, No, absolutely nothing is left; the whole
sensible (material) world is but an effect upon ourselves. But,” he adds,
“it would be a hasty inference,” on these grounds, “to say that nothing
whatever is left.” And when asked “what is left,” he answers, “all that
causes sensation.” We can never know scientifically what these causes
are, but “we have an inextinguishable faith” _that_ they are, “there
being no particular thing we are more sure of than that for every event
(and every sensible phenomenon is an event, viz., in ourselves) there is
some kind of explanation or cause.” To sum up: The theory of “sensible or
physical idealism”[85] implies a “supersensible or metaphysical realism.”
In the theory of sensible idealism things only exist as sensations;
“only exist, that is, _save in their supersensible or transcendental
causes_”—which, says the author, we must always add.
What is a cause? Cause is an abstraction. An abstraction from what? from
a real, physical world, or from a metaphysical, transcendental world?
Plainly, from our real world, from Mr. Salter’s world of “sensible
reality.” By what philosophical warrant, then, is this concept applied to
a world from which it has not been derived and to which it surely cannot
apply! It is wrong to speak of a cause of the All. The All has no cause,
just as it has no weight.
All these difficulties arise from the notion that there are two kinds
of knowledge and two kinds of existences. Idealism, to be consistent,
must be absolute; Mr. Salter’s idealism is not absolute. This is exactly
the criticism that the reading of his book at once forces on one. All
knowledge is knowledge of sensations, i. e. of reality; things not
accessible to sensation are not real, they do not exist; consequently,
all entities transcendental, metaphysical, and supersensible do not
exist. This is the conclusion to which any philosophy, idealism, realism,
or what not _must_ lead.
Nowadays, few people dispute the fundamental thesis of idealism (of
course, expressed in different terms from those of Mr. Spencer’s
sentence). In a sense, it is established. Its only drawback is, that its
“establishment” accomplishes nothing. It leaves the problem of philosophy
where it found it.[86] Reality is still reality. The same difficulties
and perplexities exist. The universe still mocks us. And foremost among
the riddles that the world opposes to man, stands that eternal query:
“What is mind?” Mr. Salter’s views of this question will show us what
contributions his theory is likely to make to philosophy.
Mr. Salter defines mind as “that which experiences sensations and
thoughts, or, more simply, that which feels and thinks.” It is not
feeling, not thinking, but _that which_ feels and thinks. It is thus an
agent, a subject. It is difficult to understand how this notion of mind
is come at, without self-contradiction. In their origin, all notions
of mind-subjects, mind-essences, mind-agencies, and so forth, are
materialistic. They must be volatilised and stripped of their substantial
attributes, if they are to take a place in an idealistic philosophy, and
then, as they “cannot be ranged along with the sensible phenomena of
which the mind takes cognisance,” there is but one realm left to exist
in, which is the transcendentalistic.
All this comes from carrying the abstraction by which “mind” is reached,
to mathematically infinite limits. In this abstraction the world retreats
and fades away into nothingness. And what is left? Not a single idea
or fact by which we can fix our abstraction. Mind is all, and mind is
nothing. It is not matter, not time, not space—not even a mathematical
point, which we expect it to become in its infinitely contracting
perspective. It has no attributes, no qualities; it is nothing and
nowhere. This conception of mind, Mr. Salter says, is only mysterious as
we _make_ it so, by careless and inaccurate thinking. And Mr. Salter is
right. It would require much careless thinking to make such a conception
mysterious. A thing or notion that cannot be defined, placed, or brought
into connection with any other thing or notion in the world, is not
_mysterious_, but simply does not exist. In that respect, it is as plain
as day.
The same confusion exists in the discussion which disposes of the query,
“_Where_ is mind?” The idealist, in Mr. Salter’s sense, does not admit
that the mind is in, or in anywise spatially connected with, the brain.
The question, _where_ is mind? he says, has no meaning, any more than
the question, what is the color of a pleasure? This is true. Mind is an
abstraction. In this sense it has no spatial existence. But the phenomena
from which this abstraction has produced itself, _are_ linked with
phenomena which have spatial existence, and in this sense the mental
processes are not mysterious nothings and nowheres. When I lose that
group of sensations called my leg, I know that, generally, I have lost
the feeling of my leg. So, also, when a certain part of that group of
sensations called my brain is destroyed, I know that I shall then have
lost my power of memory or of speech or of motion. I may also experiment
with other groups of sensations called dogs and cats, which I know have
mental powers. In the light of these facts it is not correct, either in
philosophy or common sense, to say that mental processes are absolutely
independent of locality. I know that my thoughts are not connected
with the group of sensations I call the moon, and I know they are not
connected with that group of sensations that I call Mr. Smith. I am
always aware of them as connected with that group of sensations which I
call “myself.”
Mr. Salter, in fact, half recognises this. He says, “The mind _is_
dependent on the body in the sense that our general power of sensation
and thought is connected with those sensations we call our body.” Yet,
“why this should be so is mysterious.” Indeed! One is inclined to ask
Mr. Salter here, what species of explanation or knowledge he wishes
of this phenomenon. Is explanation, or knowledge, something more than
the recognition and seeing of a plain connection between the groups of
sensations that constitute reality? In Mr. Salter’s analysis, all the
facts of the world are mysterious. Why a thing is as it is and is not
other than it is, is mysterious. He utterly fails to understand why
the power of perceiving colors is linked with the particular group of
sensations he calls his eye, and why it should not just as well be linked
with some other group or no group at all.
Why do I see with my eye? Why do I not see with my hand or with the hairs
of my head, or why do I not eat with my elbow, instead of my mouth?
Why do not stones fall upwards? Why do not magnets point towards the
East? Why do not the planets move about Jupiter or Saturn? Mr. Salter’s
question makes a jumble of the whole universe.
It is not the object of science or philosophy to find out why things are
not what they are, but to find out what they are. In this inquiry the why
and wherefore, properly understood, will evolve themselves.
Science simply concerns itself with the connection of the groups of
sensations which the idealist, and for that matter every one else, calls
reality. It cannot concern itself with anything else. All other things
are artificial and self-made existences. Nothing exists but reality
and the connections of reality. To seek for any other connections than
those that exist is absurd and futile. And to seek for any other causes
or cause of relations than such as really are is also futile. Before we
speak of the knowledge of a thing we must analyse and define our notion
of knowledge, and before we speak of the cause of a thing we must analyse
and define our notion of cause. In our view, the relation which Mr.
Salter doubts, is so intimately and inextricably one, that the causal
relation disappears. Neither is the cause of the other. We may, for the
purposes of inquiry, start from either as our general concept, but we
should never go so far as utterly to expel from reality the other. True
science and philosophy are neither idealistic nor materialistic, but
_real_. The two positions are extreme positions, and each is useful only
as a safeguard against the errors of the others. Reality is reality;
that is the main thing. Whether it is idealistic or materialistic is of
minor consequence. Besides reality there is nothing; its negation is
non-existence.
We do not wish in these criticisms to repudiate all that is in Mr.
Salter’s book. A great many of its reflections are helpful and
suggestive. We may refer, for example, to the passages in which the body
is regarded as a gradually decreasing wall of separation between that
part of reality which is known subjectively and that part which is known
objectively. This is really a unitary view. We believe, however, that if
Mr. Salter would carefully analyse the notions of knowledge, explanation,
cause, effect, and, therefore, the notion of reality, he would not
push his philosophy to the mysterious extreme at which it finally
arrives, and he would absolutely reject such unscientific conceptions
as supersensible realism, metaphysical realism, and supersensible
or transcendental causes. These render the reading of his book as a
philosophical help unsatisfactory, and leave the mind even more confused
and perplexed than it was before. However, all discussions of this sort
have their value, and Mr. Salter’s book possesses a virtue which few
other philosophical productions can boast of: it is very short. The
author’s pleasant style will also add to the pleasure of its perusal, and
if read critically the book will evoke much helpful thought.
T. J. MCCORMACK.
A REVIEW OF THE SYSTEMS OF ETHICS FOUNDED ON THE THEORY OF EVOLUTION. By
_C. M. Williams_. New York and London: Macmillan & Co. 1893.
This is a book, the perusal of which will leave the earnest student of
moral science full of disappointment. Not at all that it manifests any
lack of ability or information. On the contrary, it is at once clearly
and entertainingly written, and at the same time packed with notes and
comments that are full of interest and instruction.
The course of the book may be briefly stated. The first part, comprising
nearly half of its six hundred pages, is devoted to the statement of
the ethical doctrines maintained by thirteen prominent writers, whose
views have been formed more or less under the influence of the theory of
evolution, viz.: Darwin, Wallace, Haeckel, Spencer, Fiske, Rolph, Baratt,
Stephen, Carneri, Höffding, Gizycki, Alexander, and Paul Ree. The rest
of the book is the review of our author. This review is conducted under
the topical heads: The Concepts of Evolution; Intelligence and End;
The Will; Thought, Feeling, and Will in Evolution; Egoism and Altruism
in Evolution; Conscience; Moral Progress in History; The Results of
Ethical Inquiry on an Evolutional Basis; and The Ideal and the Way of Its
Attainment.
These are all topics of great interest and importance, and the author
has brought to the consideration of them a mind fully stored and
entirely competent. But we look in vain for that discourse and criticism
which above all other matters relating to moral science those who are
interested in human welfare crave from those who tender their reflections
upon ethical topics.
The great need of moral science is the discovery and certification of its
basis. It is a need that far transcends the scope of mere moral science,
for upon its right determination depends the right determination of a
multitude of questions that deeply involve the welfare of humanity. It
is a need that is not merely crying to be supplied. It is absolutely
wailing. Could it only be rightly determined, mankind would fast enough
orient itself in the course of evolution and with undissipated energy
work out its best possible development. But undiscovered or uncertified
it balks all process, save only that mechanical, halting, stumbling
process that has hitherto obtained; a process that is, as all may
observe, one that has little if any inward coördination, but is full of
inability and cross-purposes. Since it was the professed purpose of
our author to review a number of the more prominent systems of ethics,
which he esteems to be founded on the theory of evolution, his failure
to notice and to comment upon so conspicuous a feature of moral science
would naturally lead a reader, unversed in the works noticed, to suppose
that those works had altogether slighted this topic. Such is, however,
not the case. With the exception of perhaps Darwin and Wallace, all
the writers reviewed by our author have given more or less attention
to this matter, and they have left us in no doubt as to the positions
which they severally hold. Most of them are Hedonists of one sort or
another. Haeckel, Carneri, Rolph, and Alexander are, we believe, the only
exceptions.
But a more serious criticism upon the work under notice is suggested by
its very title. That title as much as says that the various works which
are reviewed by our author are “founded” upon the theory of evolution, at
least in so far as their ethical doctrines are concerned.
Now, what is the theory of evolution? What is its essential nature?
Does not its very form consist in the affirmation of an eternal secular
mutation, in which there is no discontinuity whatever? It says that
existence in sum and in every detail is eternal and continuous process.
It uncompromisingly forbids all suppositions of any absolute beginning,
or of any absolute end, or of any absolutely final adjustment. Hence, no
system of ethics can with truth be said to be “founded” upon the theory
of evolution that ignores or forgets this essential character of it.
Now, when we turn to the consideration of the various “systems” which
our author supposes to be “founded” upon the theory of evolution, we
find them, one and all, occupied more or less with suppositions of ends.
All are forecasting some “ideal” condition, which, being attained, all
chances of retrogression will be foreclosed and all possibilities of
betterment will be exhausted. In other words, they suppose an attainment
of death, or rather an attainment of a death-in-life more utterly
horrible than any actual death can possibly be. The very first condition
for an ethics that will be truly evolutional must be the fit and full
recognition of a boundless horizon to evolution in morals as well as in
all else. Emerson perceived the truth when he said in “The Sphynx”:
“Profounder, profounder
Man’s spirit must dive;
To his aye rolling orb
No goal will arrive.
The heavens that now draw him
With sweetness untold,
Once found; for _new_ heavens
He spurneth the old.”
And at present, the most serious efforts to establish a truly
clear-sighted ethics of evolution, with an unequivocal disavowal of any
and all Hedonism, is made by the editors of _The Monist_. It, indeed,
is the key-note of the missionary work that characterises all the
publications of The Open Court Publishing Co.