There have sprung up within the last two years not less than four
American magazines of progressive thought, which now compete in the
proposition of their religious and philosophical conceptions to the
world. These four magazines are, in the chronological order in which
they were founded, _The Monist_, _The International Journal of Ethics_,
_The Philosophical Review_, and _The New World_. _The Monist_ represents
that world-conception which takes its stand upon facts and systematises
facts into a unitary view. Thus it recognises the methods of science
as the methods of all knowledge, to the exclusion of supernatural
revelation, or intuitionalism, or any kind of mysticism. But _The Monist_
does not rest satisfied with this. _The Monist_ preaches a religion; and
the prophets of this religion are not only the great ethical teachers
of mankind, but everybody who reveals truth, Kant and Comte, Kepler,
Copernicus, Darwin, and all living representatives of scientific inquiry.
Thus _The Monist_ is a magazine that points out the religious import of
science and philosophy.
_The International Journal of Ethics_ follows in the same line in so
far only as it has nothing to say to the old orthodox conceptions of
religion. It tries to teach a higher morality, but in establishing ethics
it pursues quite another course. It is the organ of the Ethical Societies
and the leaders of the Ethical Societies are confident that they can have
ethics not only without theology but also without religion, science, or
philosophy. They consider the world-conception of a man as something
indifferent, or unessential, in ethics, and by proposing a non-committal
policy with respect to religious and philosophical views, they expect
to be the better fitted to preach good conduct. (Philadelphia:
_International Journal of Ethics_, 118 S. Twelfth Street.)
_The Philosophical Review_ represents a philosophical conception
which has still a strong hold upon the Universities on this side of
the Atlantic. Transcendentalism, metaphysicism, and that theological
philosophy which still operates with supernatural quantities, or at
least has not discarded the dualistic features of supernaturalism, are
represented in its columns. Certainly they are well represented and by
their best upholders of the present time, and authors of more modern and
positivistic views are not excluded. Exactly so in _The Monist_, the
representatives of metaphysicism and those who still believe in the dual
existence of man, in his self, or ego, and his transcendental existence
are welcome; but there is nevertheless a fundamental difference in the
world-conception of the two magazines. (Boston, New York, Chicago: Ginn &
Co.)
_The New World_ is the latest new-comer in the field of magazine
literature, and we welcome its appearance most cordially. There are
strongly marked differences between _The New World_ and _The Monist_,
for the former is a theological magazine that deepens religion with the
assistance of philosophy while the latter, rather the reverse, is a
philosophical magazine that widens philosophy and applies it to practical
life so as to become a religion. But for that very reason _The New World_
seems to meet _The Monist_ half way. _The New World_ is an offshoot of
modern theology. Its contributors come largely from the ranks of the
maturest unitarian thinkers. They practically accept the principles of
criticism and scientific inquiry and thus they are approaching rapidly
that common goal of human thought, which _The Monist_ propounds as the
leading maxim of philosophy and religion, namely, to regard nature as the
only revelation and experience as our guide in life; to base religion
upon and to derive ethics from a critically-sifted statement of facts.
(Boston: Houghton, Mifflin & Co.)
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