These Lectures were delivered in Cambridge during the Lent Term of last
year, on the invitation of a Committee presided over by the Master of
Magdalene, before an audience of from three hundred to four hundred
University men, chiefly Under-graduates. They were not then, and they
are not now, intended for philosophers or even for beginners in the
systematic study of philosophy, but as aids to educated men desirous of
thinking out for themselves a reasonable basis for personal Religion.
The Lectures--especially the first three--deal with questions on which
I have already written. I am indebted to the Publisher of _Contentio
Veritatis_ and the other contributors to that volume for raising no
objection to my publishing Lectures which might possibly be regarded as
in part a condensation, in part an expansion of my Essay on 'The
ultimate basis of Theism.' I have dealt more systematically with many
of the problems here discussed in an Essay upon 'Personality in God and
Man' contributed to _Personal Idealism_ (edited by Henry {x} Sturt) and
in my 'Theory of Good and Evil.' Some of the doctrinal questions
touched on in Lecture VI. have been more fully dealt with in my volume
of University Sermons, _Doctrine and Development_.
Questions which were asked at the time and communications which have
since reached me have made me feel, more even than I did when I was
writing the Lectures, how inadequate is the treatment here given to
many great problems. On some matters much fuller explanation and
discussion will naturally be required to convince persons previously
unfamiliar with Metaphysic: on others it is the more advanced student
of Philosophy who will complain that I have only touched upon the
fringe of a vast subject. But I have felt that I could not seriously
expand any part of the Lectures without changing the whole character of
the book, and I have been compelled in general to meet the demand for
further explanation only by the above general reference to my other
books, by the addition of a few notes, and by appending to each chapter
some suggestions for more extended reading. These might of course have
been indefinitely enlarged, but a long list of books is apt to defeat
its own purpose: people with a limited time at their disposal want to
know which book to make a beginning upon.
The Lectures are therefore published for the most {xi} part just as
they were delivered, in the hope that they may suggest lines of thought
which may be intellectually and practically useful. I trust that any
philosopher who may wish to take serious notice of my views--especially
the metaphysical views expressed in the first few chapters--will be
good enough to remember that the expression of them is avowedly
incomplete and elementary, and cannot fairly be criticized in much
detail without reference to my other writings.
I am much indebted for several useful suggestions and for valuable
assistance in revising the proofs to one of the hearers of the
Lectures, Mr. A. G. Widgery, Scholar of St. Catherine's College,
Cambridge, now Lecturer in University College, Bristol.