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diff --git a/9304-h/9304-h.htm b/9304-h/9304-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..b65d1f5 --- /dev/null +++ b/9304-h/9304-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,5196 @@ +<?xml version="1.0" encoding="iso-8859-1"?> + +<!DOCTYPE html + PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" + "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd" > + +<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" lang="en"> + <head> + <title> + Initiation Into Philosophy, by ©mile Faguet + </title> + <style type="text/css" xml:space="preserve"> + + body { margin:5%; background:#faebd0; text-align:justify} + P { text-indent: 1em; margin-top: .75em; margin-bottom: .75em; } + H1,H2,H3,H4,H5,H6 { text-align: center; margin-left: 15%; margin-right: 15%; } + hr { width: 50%; text-align: center;} + .foot { margin-left: 20%; margin-right: 20%; text-align: justify; text-indent: -3em; font-size: 90%; } + blockquote {font-size: 97%; font-style: italic; margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%;} + .mynote {background-color: #DDE; color: #000; padding: .5em; margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 95%;} + .toc { margin-left: 10%; margin-bottom: .75em;} + .toc2 { margin-left: 20%;} + div.fig { display:block; margin:0 auto; text-align:center; } + div.middle { margin-left: 20%; margin-right: 20%; text-align: justify; } + .figleft {float: left; margin-left: 0%; margin-right: 1%;} + .figright {float: right; margin-right: 0%; margin-left: 1%;} + .pagenum {display:inline; font-size: 70%; font-style:normal; + margin: 0; padding: 0; position: absolute; right: 1%; + text-align: right;} + pre { font-style: italic; font-size: 90%; margin-left: 10%;} + +</style> + </head> + <body> + + +<pre> + +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Initiation into Philosophy, by Emile Faguet + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Initiation into Philosophy + +Author: Emile Faguet + +Translator: Home Gordon + + +Release Date: November, 2005 [EBook #9304] +This file was first posted on September 19, 2003 +Last Updated: May 8, 2013 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK INITIATION INTO PHILOSOPHY *** + + + + +Text file produced by Ted Garvin, Thomas Hutchinson and PG Distributed +Proofreaders + +HTML file produced by David Widger + + + + +</pre> + + <div style="height: 8em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h1> + INITIATION INTO PHILOSOPHY + </h1> + <h2> + By Émile Faguet + </h2> + <p> + <br /> + </p> + <h3> + Of the French Academy + </h3> + <h5> + Author of "The Cult Of Incompetence,"<br /> "Initiation Into Literature," + etc. + </h5> + <p> + <br /> + </p> + <h4> + Translated from the French by Sir Homer Gordon, Bart. + </h4> + <p> + <br /> + </p> + <h5> + 1914 + </h5> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + <b>CONTENTS</b> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_PREF"> PREFACE </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0002"> <b>INITIATION INTO PHILOSOPHY</b> </a> + </p> + <p> + <br /> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_PART"> <b>PART I. ANTIQUITY</b> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0001"> CHAPTER I. BEFORE SOCRATES </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0002"> CHAPTER II. THE SOPHISTS </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0003"> CHAPTER III. SOCRATES </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0004"> CHAPTER IV. PLATO </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0005"> CHAPTER V. ARISTOTLE </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0006"> CHAPTER VI. VARIOUS SCHOOLS </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0007"> CHAPTER VII. EPICUREANISM </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0008"> CHAPTER VIII. STOICISM </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0009"> CHAPTER IX. ECLECTICS AND SCEPTICS </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0010"> CHAPTER X. NEOPLATONISM </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0011"> CHAPTER XI. CHRISTIANITY </a> + </p> + <p> + <br /> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_PART2"> <b>PART II. IN THE MIDDLE AGES</b> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0012"> CHAPTER I. FROM THE FIFTH CENTURY TO THE + THIRTEENTH </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0013"> CHAPTER II. THE THIRTEENTH CENTURY </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0014"> CHAPTER III. THE FOURTEENTH AND FIFTEENTH + CENTURIES </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0015"> CHAPTER IV. THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY </a> + </p> + <p> + <br /> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_PART3"> <b>PART III. MODERN TIMES</b> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0016"> CHAPTER I. THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0017"> CHAPTER II. CARTESIANS </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0018"> CHAPTER III. THE ENGLISH PHILOSOPHERS OF THE + SEVENTEENTH CENTURY </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0019"> CHAPTER IV. THE ENGLISH PHILOSOPHERS OF THE </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0020"> CHAPTER V. FRENCH PHILOSOPHERS OF THE EIGHTEENTH + CENTURY </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0021"> CHAPTER VI. KANT </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0022"> CHAPTER VII. THE NINETEENTH CENTURY: GERMANY </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0023"> CHAPTER VIII. THE NINETEENTH CENTURY: ENGLAND + </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0024"> CHAPTER IX. THE NINETEENTH CENTURY: FRANCE </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0030"> INDEX OF NAMES </a> + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_PREF" id="link2H_PREF"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + PREFACE + </h2> + <p> + This volume, as indicated by the title, is designed to show the way to the + beginner, to satisfy and more especially to excite his initial curiosity. + It affords an adequate idea of the march of facts and of ideas. The reader + is led, somewhat rapidly, from the remote origins to the most recent + efforts of the human mind. + </p> + <p> + It should be a convenient repertory to which the mind may revert in order + to see broadly the general opinion of an epoch—and what connected it + with those that followed or preceded it. It aims above all at being <i>a + frame</i> in which can conveniently be inscribed, in the course of further + studies, new conceptions more detailed and more thoroughly examined. + </p> + <p> + It will have fulfilled its design should it incite to research and + meditation, and if it prepares for them correctly. + </p> + <h3> + E. FAGUET. + </h3> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0002" id="link2H_4_0002"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h1> + INITIATION INTO PHILOSOPHY + </h1> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_PART" id="link2H_PART"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + PART I. ANTIQUITY + </h2> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0001" id="link2HCH0001"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER I. BEFORE SOCRATES + </h2> + <p> + Philosophical Interpreters of the Universe, of the Creation and + Constitution of the World. + </p> + <p> + PHILOSOPHY.—The aim of philosophy is to seek the explanation of all + things: the quest is for the first <i>causes</i> of everything, and also + <i>how</i> all things are, and finally <i>why</i>, with what design, with + a view to what, things are. That is why, taking "principle" in all the + senses of the word, it has been called the science of first principles. + </p> + <p> + Philosophy has always existed. Religions—all religions—are + philosophies. They are indeed the most complete. But, apart from + religions, men have sought the causes and principles of everything and + endeavoured to acquire general ideas. These researches apart from + religious dogmas in pagan antiquity are the only ones with which we are + here to be concerned. + </p> + <p> + THE IONIAN SCHOOL: THALES.—The Ionian School is the most ancient + school of philosophy known. It dates back to the seventh century before + Christ. Thales of Miletus, a natural philosopher and astronomer, as we + should describe him, believed matter—namely, that of which all + things and all beings are made—to be in perpetual transformation, + and that these transformations are produced by powerful beings attached to + every portion of matter. These powerful beings were gods. Everything, + therefore, was full of gods. His philosophy was a mythology. He also + thought that the essential element of matter was water, and that it was + water, under the influence of the gods, which transformed itself into + earth, air, and fire, whilst from water, earth, air, and fire came + everything that is in nature. + </p> + <p> + ANAXIMANDER; HERACLITUS.—Anaximander of Miletus, an astronomer also, + and a geographer, believed that the principle of all things is <i>indeterminate</i>—a + kind of chaos wherein nothing has form or shape; that from chaos come + things and beings, and that they return thither in order to emerge again. + One of his particular theories was that fish were the most ancient of + animals, and that all animals had issued from them through successive + transformations. This theory was revived for a while about fifty years + ago. + </p> + <p> + Heraclitus of Ephesus (very obscure, and with this epithet attached + permanently to his name) saw all things as a perpetual growth—in an + indefinite state of becoming. Nothing is; all things grow and are destined + to eternal growth. Behind them, nevertheless, there is an eternal master + who does not change. It is our duty to resemble him as much as we can; + that is to say, as much as an ape can resemble a man. Calmness is + imperative: to be as motionless as transient beings can. The popular + legend runs that Heraclitus "always wept"; what is known of him only tends + to prove that he was grave, and did not favour emotionalism. + </p> + <p> + ANAXAGORAS; EMPEDOCLES.—Anaxagoras of Clazomenae, above all else a + natural philosopher, settled at Athens about 470 B.C.; was the master and + friend of Pericles; was on the point of being put to death, as Socrates + was later on, for the crime of indifference towards the religion of the + Athenians, and had to take refuge at Lampsacus, where he died. Like + Anaximander, he believed that everything emerged from something + indeterminate and confused; but he added that what caused the emergence + from that state was the organizing intelligence, the Mind, just as in man, + it is the intelligence which draws thought from cerebral undulations, and + forms a clear idea out of a confused idea. Anaxagoras exerted an almost + incomparable influence over Greek philosophy of the classical times. + </p> + <p> + Empedocles of Agrigentum, a sort of magician and high-priest, almost a + deity, whose life and death are but little known, appears to have + possessed an encyclopaedic brain. From him is derived the doctrine of the + four elements, for whereas the philosophers who preceded him gave as the + sole source of things—some water, others air, others fire, others + the earth, he regarded them all four equally as the primal elements of + everything. He believed that the world is swayed by two contrary forces—love + and hate, the one desiring eternally to unite, the other eternally to + disintegrate. Amid this struggle goes on a movement of organization, + incessantly retarded by hate, perpetually facilitated by love; and from + this movement have issued—first, vegetation, then the lower animals, + then the higher animals, then men. In Empedocles can be found either + evident traces of the religion of Zoroaster of Persia (the perpetual + antagonism of two great gods, that of good and that of evil), or else a + curious coincidence with this doctrine, which will appear again later + among the Manicheans. + </p> + <p> + PYTHAGORAS.—Pythagoras appears to have been born about B.C. 500 on + the Isle of Elea, to have travelled much, and to have finally settled in + Greater Greece (southern Italy). Pythagoras, like Empedocles, was a sort + of magician or god. His doctrine was a religion, the respect with which he + was surrounded was a cult, the observances he imposed on his family and on + his disciples were rites. What he taught was that the true realities, + which do not change, were numbers. The fundamental and supreme reality is + <i>one</i>; the being who is one is God; from this number, which is one, + are derived all the other numbers which are the foundation of beings, + their inward cause, their essence; we are all more or less perfect + numbers; each created thing is a more or less perfect number. The world, + governed thus by combinations of numbers, has always existed and will + always exist. It develops itself, however, according to a numerical series + of which we do not possess the key, but which we can guess. As for human + destiny it is this: we have been animated beings, human or animal; + according as we have lived well or ill we shall be reincarnated either as + superior men or as animals more or less inferior. This is the doctrine of + <i>metempsychosis</i>, which had many adherents in ancient days, and also + in a more or less fanciful fashion in modern times. + </p> + <p> + To Pythagoras have been attributed a certain number of maxims which are + called the <i>Golden Verses</i>. + </p> + <p> + XENOPHANES; PARMENIDES.—Xenophanes of Colophon is also a + "unitarian." He accepts only one God, and of all the ancient philosophers + appears to be the most opposed to mythology, to belief in a multiplicity + of gods resembling men, a doctrine which he despises as being immoral. + There is one God, eternal, immutable, immovable, who has no need to + transfer Himself from one locality to another, who is <i>without place</i>, + and who governs all things by His thought alone. + </p> + <p> + Advancing further, Parmenides told himself that if He alone really exists + who is one and eternal and unchangeable, all else is not only inferior to + Him, but is only a <i>semblance</i>, and that mankind, earth, sky, plants, + and animals are only a vast illusion—phantoms, a mirage, which would + disappear, which would no longer exist, and <i>would never have existed</i> + if we could perceive the Self-existent. + </p> + <p> + ZENO; DEMOCRITUS.—Zeno of Elea, who must be mentioned more + especially because he was the master of that Gorgias of whom Socrates was + the adversary, was pre-eminently a subtle dialectician in whom the sophist + already made his appearance, and who embarrassed the Athenians by captious + arguments, at the bottom of which always could be found this fundamental + principle: apart from the Eternal Being all is only semblance; apart from + Him who is all, all is nothing. + </p> + <p> + Democritus of Abdera, disciple of Leucippus of Abdera (about whom nothing + is known), is the inventor of the theory of atoms. Matter is composed of + an infinite number of tiny indivisible bodies which are called atoms; + these atoms from all eternity, or at least since the commencement of + matter, have been endued with certain movements by which they attach + themselves to one another, and agglomerate or separate, and thence is + caused the formation of all things, and the destruction, which is only the + disintegration, of all things. The soul itself is only an aggregation of + specially tenuous and subtle atoms. It is probable that when a certain + number of these atoms quit the body, sleep ensues; that when nearly all + depart, it causes the appearance of death (lethargy, catalepsy); that when + they all depart, death occurs. We are brought into relation with the + external world by the advent in us of extremely subtle atoms—reflections + of things, semblances of things—which enter and mingle with the + constituent atoms of our souls. There is nothing in our intelligence which + has not been brought there by our senses, and our intelligence is only the + combination of the atoms composing our souls with the atoms that external + matter sends, so to speak, into our souls. The doctrines of Democritus + will be found again in those of Epicurus and Lucretius. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0002" id="link2HCH0002"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER II. THE SOPHISTS + </h2> + <p> + Logicians and Professors of Logic, and of the Analysis of Ideas, and of + Discussion. + </p> + <p> + DOCTRINES OF THE SOPHISTS.—The Sophists descend from Parmenides and + Zeno of Elea; Gorgias was the disciple of the latter. By dint of thinking + that all is semblance save the Supreme Being, who alone is real, it is + very easy to arrive at belief in all being semblance, including that + Being; or at least what is almost tantamount, that all is semblance, + inclusive of any idea we can possibly conceive of the Supreme Being. To + believe nothing, and to demonstrate that there is no reason to believe in + anything, is the cardinal principle of all the Sophists. Then, it may be + suggested, there is nothing for it but to be silent. No, there is the + cultivation of one's mind (the only thing of the existence of which we are + sure), so as to give it ability, readiness, and strength. With what + object? To become a dexterous thinker, which in itself is a fine thing; to + be also a man of consideration, listened to in one's city, and to arrive + at its government. + </p> + <p> + The Sophists accordingly gave lessons, especially in psychology, + dialectics, and eloquence. They further taught philosophy, but in order to + demonstrate that all philosophy is false; and, as Pascal observed later, + that to ridicule philosophy is truly philosophical. They seem to have been + extremely intellectual, very learned, and most serious despite their + scepticism, and to have rendered Greece the very great service of making a + penetrating analysis—the first recorded—of our faculty of + knowledge and of the limitations, real, possible, or probable, of that + faculty. + </p> + <p> + PROTAGORAS; GORGIAS; PRODICUS.—They were very numerous, the taste + for their art, which might be called philosophical criticism, being + widespread in Attica. It may be believed, as Plato maintains, that some + were of very mediocre capacity, and this is natural; but there were also + some who clearly were eminent authorities. The most illustrious were + Protagoras, Gorgias, and Prodicus of Ceos. Protagoras seems to have been + the most philosophical of them all, Gorgias the best orator and the chief + professor of rhetoric, Prodicus the most eminent moralist and poet. + Protagoras rejected all metaphysics—that is, all investigation of + first causes and of the universe—and reduced all philosophy to the + science of self-control with a view to happiness, and control of others + with a view to their happiness. Like Anaxagoras, he was banished from the + city under the charge of impiety, and his books were publicly burnt. + </p> + <p> + Gorgias appears to have maintained the same ideas with more moderation and + also with less profundity. He claimed, above all, to be able to make a + good orator. According to Plato, it was he whom Socrates most persistently + made the butt of his sarcasms. + </p> + <p> + Prodicus, whom Plato himself esteemed, appears to have been principally + preoccupied with the moral problem. He was the author of the famous + apologue which represented Hercules having to choose between two paths, + the one being that of virtue, the other of pleasure. Like Socrates later + on, he too was subject to the terrible accusation of impiety, and + underwent capital punishment. The Sophists furnish the most important + epoch in the history of ancient philosophy; until their advent the + philosophic systems were great poems on the total of all things, known and + unknown. The Sophists opposed these ambitious and precipitate + generalizations, in which imagination had the larger share, and their + discovery was to bring philosophy back to its true starting point by + affirming that the first thing to do, and that before all else, was to + know our own mind and its mechanism. Their error possibly was, while + saying that it was the first thing to do, too often to affirm that it was + the only thing to do; still the fact remains that they were perfectly + accurate in their assurance that it was primary. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0003" id="link2HCH0003"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER III. SOCRATES + </h2> + <p> + Philosophy Entirely Reduced to Morality, and Morality Considered as the + End of all Intellectual Activity. + </p> + <p> + THE PHILOSOPHY OF SOCRATES.—Of Socrates nothing is known except that + he was born at Athens, that he held many public discussions with all and + sundry in the streets of Athens, and that he died under the Thirty + Tyrants. Of his ideas we know nothing, because he wrote nothing, and + because his disciples were far too intelligent; in consequence of which it + is impossible to know if what they said was thought by him, had really + been his ideas or theirs. What seems certain is that neither Aristophanes + nor the judges at the trial of Socrates were completely deceived in + considering him a Sophist; for he proceeded from them. It is true he + proceeded from them by reaction, because evidently their universal + scepticism had terrified him; but nevertheless he was their direct + outcome, for like them he was extremely mistrustful of the old vast + systems of philosophy, and to those men who pretended to know everything + he opposed a phrase which is probably authentic: "I know that I know + nothing;" for, like the Sophists, he wished to recall philosophy to earth + from heaven, namely from metaphysics to the study of man, and nothing + else; for, like the Sophists, he confined and limited the field with a + kind of severe and imperious modesty which was none the less contemptuous + of the audacious; for, finally, like the Sophists, but in this highly + analogous to many philosophers preceding the Sophists, he had but a very + moderate and mitigated respect for the religion of his fellow-citizens. + </p> + <p> + According to what we know of Socrates from Xenophon, unquestionably the + least imaginative of his disciples, Socrates, like the Sophists, reduced + philosophy to the study of man; but his great and incomparable originality + lay in the fact that whereas the Sophists wished man to study himself in + order to be happy, Socrates wished him to study himself in order to be + moral, honest, and just, without any regard to happiness. For Socrates, + everything had to tend towards morality, to contribute to it, and to be + subordinated to it as the goal and as the final aim. He applied himself + unceasingly, relates Xenophon, to examine and to determine what is good + and evil, just and unjust, wise and foolish, brave and cowardly, etc. He + incessantly applied himself, relates Aristotle—and therein he was as + much a true professor of rhetoric as of morality—thoroughly to + define and carefully to specify the meaning of words in order not to be + put off with vague terms which are illusions of thought, and in order to + discipline his mind rigorously so as to make it an organ for the + ascertainment of truth. + </p> + <p> + HIS METHOD.—He had dialectical methods, "the art of conferring," as + Montaigne called it, more or less happy, which he had probably borrowed + from the Sophists, that contributed to cause him to be considered one of + them, and exercised a wide vogue long after him. He "delivered men's + minds," as he himself said—that is, he believed, or affected to + believe, that the verities are in a latent state in all minds, and that it + needed only patience, dexterity, and skillful investigation to bring them + to light. Elsewhere, he <i>interrogated</i> in a captious fashion in order + to set the interlocutor in contradiction to himself and to make him + confess that he had said what he had not thought he had said, agreed to + what he had not believed he had agreed to; and he triumphed maliciously + over such confusions. In short, he seems to have been a witty and teasing + Franklin, and to have taught true wisdom by laughing at everyone. Folk + never like to be ridiculed, and no doubt the recollection of these ironies + had much to do with the iniquitous judgment which condemned him, and which + he seems to have challenged up to the last. + </p> + <p> + HIS INFLUENCE.—His influence was infinite. It is from him that + morality became the end itself, the last and supreme end of all philosophy—the + reason of philosophy; and, as was observed by Nietzsche, the Circe of + philosophers, who enchants them, who dictates to them beforehand, or who + modifies their systems in advance by terrifying them as to what their + systems may contain irreverent towards itself or dangerous in relation to + it. From Socrates to Kant and thence onward, morality has been the Circe + of philosophers, and morality is, as it were, the spiritual daughter of + Socrates. On the other hand, his influence was terrible for the religion + of antiquity because it directed the mind towards the idea that morality + is the sole object worthy of knowledge, and that the ancient religions + were immoral, or of such a dubious morality as to deserve the desertion + and scorn of honest men. Christianity fought paganism with the arguments + of the disciples of Socrates—with Socratic arguments; modern + philosophies and creeds are all impregnated with Socraticism. When it was + observed that the Sophists form the most important epoch in the history of + ancient philosophy, it was because they taught Socrates to seek a + philosophy which was entirely human and preoccupied solely with the + happiness of man. This led a great mind, and in his track other very great + minds, to direct all philosophy, and even all human science, towards the + investigation of goodness, goodness being regarded as the condition of + happiness. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0004" id="link2HCH0004"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER IV. PLATO + </h2> + <p> + Plato, like Socrates, is Pre-eminently a Moralist, but he reverts to + General Consideration of the Universe and Deals with Politics and + Legislation. + </p> + <p> + PLATO A DISCIPLE OF SOCRATES.—Plato, like Xenophon, was a pupil of + Socrates, but Xenophon only wanted to be the clerk of Socrates; and Plato, + as an enthusiastic disciple, was at the same time very faithful and very + unfaithful to Socrates. He was a faithful disciple to Socrates in never + failing to place morality in the foremost rank of all philosophical + considerations; in that he never varied. He was an unfaithful disciple to + Socrates in that, imaginative and an admirable poet, he bore back + philosophy from earth to heaven; he did not forbid himself—quite the + contrary—to pile up great systems about all things and to envelop + the universe in his vast and daring conceptions. He invincibly established + morality, the science of virtue, as the final goal of human knowledge, in + his brilliant and charming <i>Socratic Dialogues</i>; he formed great + systems in all the works in which he introduces himself as speaking in his + own name. He was very learned, and acquainted with everything that had + been written by all the philosophers before Socrates, particularly + Heraclitus, Pythagoras, Parmenides, and Anaxagoras. He reconsidered all + their teaching, and he himself brought to consideration a force and a + wealth of mind such as appear to have had no parallel in the world. + </p> + <p> + THE "IDEAS."—Seeking, in his turn, what are the first causes of all + and what is eternally real behind the simulations of this transient world, + he believed in a single God, as had many before him; but in the bosom of + this God, so to speak, he placed, he seemed to see, <i>Ideas</i>—that + is to say, eternal types of all things which in this world are variable, + transient, and perishable. What he effected by such novel, original, and + powerful imagination is clear. He replaced the Olympus of the populace by + a spiritual Olympus; the material mythology by an idealistic mythology; + polytheism by polyideism, if it may be so expressed—the gods by + types. Behind every phenomenon, stream, forest, mountain, the Greeks + perceived a deity, a material being like themselves, more powerful than + themselves. Behind every phenomenon, behind every thought as well, every + feeling, every institution—behind <i>everything, no matter what it + be</i>, Plato perceived an idea, immortal, eternal, indestructible, and + incorruptible, which existed in the bosom of the Eternal, and of which all + that comes under our observation is only the vacillating and troubled + reflection, and which supports, animates, and for a time preserves + everything that we can perceive. Hence, all philosophy consists in having + some knowledge of these Ideas. How is it possible to attain such + knowledge? By raising the mind from the particular to the general; by + distinguishing in each thing what is its permanent foundation, what it + contains that is least changing, least variable, least circumstantial. For + example, a man is a very complex being; he has countless feelings, + countless diversified ideas, countless methods of conduct and existence. + What is his permanent foundation? It is his conscience, which does not + vary, undergoes no transformation, always obstinately repeats the same + thing; the foundation of man, the eternal idea of which every man on earth + is here the reflection, is the consciousness of good; man is an + incarnation on earth of that part of God which is the will for good; + according as he diverges from or approaches more nearly to this will, is + he less or more man. + </p> + <p> + THE PLATONIC DIALECTIC AND MORALITY.—This method of raising oneself + to the ideas is what Plato termed dialectic—that is to say, the art + of discernment. Dialectic differentiates between the fundamental and the + superficial, the permanent and the transient, the indestructible and the + destructible. This is the supreme philosophic method which contains all + the others and to which all the others are reduced. Upon this metaphysic + and by the aid of this dialectic, Plato constructed an extremely pure + system of morality which was simply an <i>Imitation of God</i> (as, later + on, came the Imitation of Jesus Christ). The whole duty of man was to be + as like God as he could. In God exist the ideas of truth, goodness, + beauty, greatness, power, etc.; man ought to aim at relatively realizing + those ideas which God absolutely realizes. God is just, or justice lies in + the bosom of God, which is the same thing; man cannot be the just one, but + he can be a just man, and there is the whole matter; for justice comprises + everything, or, to express it differently, is the characteristic common to + all which is valuable. Justice is goodness, justice is beautiful, justice + is true; justice is great, because it reduces all particular cases to one + general principle; justice is powerful, being the force which maintains, + opposed to the force which destroys; justice is eternal and invariable. To + be just in all the meanings of the word is the duty of man and his proper + goal. + </p> + <p> + THE IMMORTALITY OF THE SOUL.—Plato shows marked reserve as to the + immortality of the soul and as to rewards and penalties beyond the grave. + He is neither in opposition nor formally favourable. We feel that he + wishes to believe in it rather than that he is sure about it. He says that + "it is a fine wager to make"; which means that even should we lose, it is + better to believe in this possible gain than to disbelieve. Further, it is + legitimate to conclude—both from certain passages in the <i>Laws</i> + and from the beautiful theory of Plato on the punishment which is an + expiation, and on the expiation which is medicinal to the soul and + consequently highly desirable—that Plato often inclined strongly + towards the doctrine of posthumous penalties and rewards, which + presupposes the immortality of the soul. + </p> + <p> + PLATONIC LOVE.—Platonic love, about which there has been so much + talk and on which, consequently, we must say a word, at least to define + it, is one of the applications of his moral system. As in the case of all + other things, the idea of love is in God. There it exists in absolute + purity, without any mixture of the idea of pleasure, since pleasure is + essentially ephemeral and perishable. Love in God consists simply in the + impassioned contemplation of beauty (physical and moral); we shall + resemble God if we love beauty precisely in this way, without excitement + or agitation of the senses. + </p> + <p> + POLITICS.—One of the originalities in Plato is that he busies + himself with politics—that is, that he makes politics a part of + philosophy, which had barely been thought of before him (I say <i>barely</i>, + because Pythagoras was a legislator), but which has ever since been taken + into consideration. Plato is aristocratic, no doubt because his thought is + generally such, independently of circumstances, also, perhaps, because he + attributed the great misfortunes of his country which he witnessed to the + Athenian democracy; then yet again, perhaps, because that Athenian + democracy had been violently hostile and sometimes cruel to philosophers, + and more especially to his own master. According to Plato, just as man has + three souls, or if it be preferred, three centres of activity, which + govern him—intelligence in the head, courage in the heart, and + appetite in the bowels—even so the city is composed of three + classes: wise and learned men at the top, the warriors below, and the + artisans and slaves lower still. The wise men will govern: accordingly the + nations will never be happy save when philosophers are kings, or when + kings are philosophers. The warriors will fight to defend the city, never + as aggressors. They will form a caste—poor, stern to itself, and + redoubtable. They will have no individual possessions; everything will be + in common, houses, furniture, weapons, wives even, and children. The + people, finally, living in strict equality, either by equal partition of + land, or on land cultivated in common, will be strictly maintained in + probity, honesty, austerity, morality, sobriety, and submissiveness. All + arts, except military music and war dances, will be eliminated from the + city. She needs neither poets nor painters not yet musicians, who corrupt + morals by softening them, and by making all feel the secret pang of + voluptuousness. All theories, whether aristocratic or tending more or less + to communism, are derived from the politics of Plato either by being + evolved from them or by harking back to them. + </p> + <p> + THE MASTER OF THE IDEALISTIC PHILOSOPHY.—Plato is for all thinkers, + even for his opponents, the greatest name in human philosophy. He is the + supreme authority of the idealistic philosophy—that is, of all + philosophy which believes that ideas govern the world, and that the world + is progressing towards a perfection which is somewhere and which directs + and attracts it. For those even who are not of his school, Plato is the + most prodigious of all the thinkers who have united psychological wisdom, + dialectical strength, the power of abstraction and creative imagination, + which last in him attains to the marvellous. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0005" id="link2HCH0005"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER V. ARISTOTLE + </h2> + <p> + A Man of Encyclopedic Learning; as Philosopher, more especially Moralist + and Logician. + </p> + <p> + ARISTOTLE, PUPIL OF PLATO.—Aristotle of Stagira was a pupil of + Plato, and he remembered it, as the best pupils do as a rule, in order to + oppose him. For some years he was tutor to Alexander, son of Philip, the + future Alexander the Great. He taught long at Athens. After the death of + Alexander, being the target in his turn of the eternal accusation of + impiety, he was forced to retire to Chalcis, where he died. Aristotle is, + before all else, a learned man. He desired to embrace the whole of the + knowledge of his time, which was then possible by dint of prodigious + effort, and he succeeded. His works, countless in number, are the record + of his knowledge. They are the <i>summa</i> of all the sciences of his + epoch. Here we have only to occupy ourselves with his more especially + philosophical ideas. To Aristotle, as to Plato, but more precisely, man is + composed of soul and body. The body is composed of organs, a well-made + piece of mechanism; the soul is its final purpose; the body, so to speak, + results in the soul, but, in turn, the soul acts on the body, and is in it + not its end but its means of acting upon things, and the whole forms a + full and continuous harmony. The faculties of the soul are its divers + aspects, and its divers methods of acting; for the soul is one and + indivisible. Reason is the soul considered as being able to conceive what + is most general, and in consequence it forms within us an intermediary + between ourselves and God. God is unique; He is eternal; from all eternity + He has given motion to matter. He is purely spiritual, but all is material + save Him, and He has not, as Plato would have it, <i>ideas</i>—immaterial + living personifications—residing in His bosom. Here may be + perceived, in a certain sense, progress, from Plato to Aristotle, towards + monotheism; the Olympus of ideas in Plato was still a polytheism, a + spiritual polytheism certainly, yet none the less a polytheism; there is + no longer any polytheism at all in Aristotle. + </p> + <p> + HIS THEORIES OF MORALS AND POLITICS.—The moral system of Aristotle + sometimes approaches that of Plato, as when he deems that the supreme + happiness is the supreme good, and that the supreme good is the + contemplation of thought by thought—thought being self-sufficing; + which is approximately the imitation of God which Plato recommended. + Sometimes, on the contrary, it is very practical and almost mediocre, as + when he makes it consist of a mean between the extremes, a just measure, a + certain tact, art rather than science, and practical science rather than + conscience, which will know how to distinguish which are the practices + suitable for an honest and a well-born man. It is only just to add that in + detail and when after all deductions he describes the just man, he invites + us to contemplate virtues which if not sublime are none the less + remarkably lofty. + </p> + <p> + His very confused political philosophy (the volume containing it, + according to all appearance, having been composed, after his death, of + passages and fragments and different portions of his lectures) is + specially a review of the divergent political constitutions which existed + throughout the Greek world. The tendencies, for there are no conclusions, + are still very aristocratic, but less radically aristocratic than those of + Plato. + </p> + <p> + THE AUTHORITY OF ARISTOTLE.—Aristotle, by reason of his + universality, also because he is clearer than his master, and again + because he dogmatises—not always, but very frequently—instead + of discussing and collating, had throughout both antiquity and the Middle + Ages an authority greater than that of Plato, an authority which became + (except on matters of faith) despotic and well-nigh sacrosanct. Since the + sixteenth century he has been relegated to his due rank—one which is + still very distinguished, and he has been regarded as among the geniuses + of the widest range, if not of the greatest power, that have appeared + among men; even now he is very far from having lost his importance. For + some he is a transition between the Greek genius—extremely subtle, + but always poetic and always somewhat oriental—and the Roman genius: + more positive, more bald, more practical, more attached to reality and to + pure science. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0006" id="link2HCH0006"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER VI. VARIOUS SCHOOLS + </h2> + <p> + The Development in Various Schools of the General Ideas of Socrates, + Plato, and Aristotle. + </p> + <p> + THE SCHOOL OF PLATO; THEOPHRASTUS.—The school of Plato (not + regarding Aristotle as belonging entirely to that school) was continued by + Speusippus, Polemo, Xenocrates, Crates, and Crantor. Owing to a retrograde + movement, widely different from that of Aristotle, it dabbled in the + Pythagorean ideas, with which Plato was acquainted and which he often + appreciated, but not blindly, and to which he never confined himself. + </p> + <p> + The most brilliant pupil of Aristotle was Theophrastus, naturalist, + botanist, and moralist. His great claim to fame among posterity, which + knows nothing of him but this, is the small volume of <i>Characters</i>, + which served as a model for La Bruyère, and before him to the comic poets + of antiquity, and which is full of wit and flavour, and—to make use + of a modern word exactly applicable to this ancient work—"humour." + </p> + <p> + SCHOOLS OF MEGARA AND OF ELIS.—We may just mention the very + celebrated schools which, owing to lack of texts, are unknown to us—that + of Megara, which was called the Eristic or "wrangling" school, so marked + was its predilection for polemics; and that of Elis, which appears to have + been well versed in the sophistic methods of Zeno of Elea and of Gorgias. + </p> + <p> + THE CYNIC SCHOOL; ANTISTHENES; DIOGENES.—Much more important is the + Cynic school, because a school, which was nothing less than Stoicism + itself, emanated or appeared to emanate from it. As often happens, the + vague commencements of Stoicism bore a close resemblance to its end. The + Stoics of the last centuries of antiquity were a sort of mendicant friars, + ill-clothed, ill-fed, of neglected appearance, despising all the comforts + of life; the Cynics at the time of Alexander were much the same, + professing that happiness is the possession of all good things, and that + the only way to possess all things is to know how to do without them. It + was Antisthenes who founded this school, or rather this order. He had been + the pupil of Socrates, and there can be no doubt that his sole idea was to + imitate Socrates by exaggeration. Socrates had been poor, had scorned + wealth, had derided pleasure, and poured contempt on science. The cult of + poverty, the contempt for pleasures, for honours, for riches, and the + perfect conviction that any knowledge is perfectly useless to man—that + is all the teaching of Antisthenes. That can lead far, at least in + systematic minds. If all is contemptible except individual virtue, it is + reversion to savage and solitary existence which is preached: there is no + more civilization or society or patriotism. Antisthenes in these ideas was + surpassed by his disciples and successors; they were cosmopolitans and + anarchists. The most illustrious of this school—illustrious + especially through his eccentricity—was Diogenes, who rolled on the + ramparts of Corinth the tub which served him as a house, lighted his + lantern in broad daylight on the pretext of "searching for a man," called + himself a citizen of the world, was accused of being banished from Sinope + by his fellow-countrymen and replied, "It was I who condemned them to + remain," and said to Alexander, who asked him what he could do for him: + "Get out of my sunshine; you are putting me in the shade." + </p> + <p> + CRATES; MENIPPUS; ARISTIPPUS.—Crates of Thebes is also mentioned, + less insolent and better-mannered, yet also a despiser of the goods of + this world; and Menippus, the maker of satires, whom Lucian, much later, + made the most diverting interlocutor of his amusing dialogues. In an + opposite direction, at the same epoch, Aristippus, a pupil of Socrates, + like Antisthenes, founded the school of pleasure, and maintained that the + sole search worthy of man was that of happiness, and that it was his duty + to make himself happy; that in consequence, it having been sufficiently + proved and being even self-evident, that happiness cannot come to us from + without, but must be sought within ourselves, it is necessary to study to + know ourselves thoroughly (and this was from Socrates) in order to decide + what are the states of the mind which give us a durable, substantial, and, + if possible, a permanent happiness. Now the seeker and the finder of + substantial happiness is wisdom, or rather, there is no other wisdom than + the art of distinguishing between pleasure and choosing, with a very + refined discrimination, those which are genuine. Wisdom further consists + in dominating misfortunes by the mastery of self so as not to be affected + by them, and in dominating also pleasures even whilst enjoying them, so + that they may not obtain dominion over us; "possessing without being + possessed" was one of his mottoes which Horace thus translated: "I strive + to subject things to myself, not myself to things." This eminently + practical wisdom, which is only a highly-developed egoism, is that of + Horace and Montaigne, and was expressed by Voltaire in verses that were + sometimes felicitous. + </p> + <p> + THE SCHOOL OF CYRENE.—Aristippus had for successor in the direction + of his school, first his daughter Arete, then his grandson. The + Aristippists, or Cyrenaics (the school being established in Cyrene), + frankly despised the gods, regarding them as inventions to frighten women + and little children. One of them, Euhemerus, invented the theory, which in + part is false and in part accurate, that the gods are simply heroes, + kings, great men deified after their death by the gratitude or terror of + the populace. As often happens, philosophic theories being essentially + plastic and taking the form of the temperament which receives them, a + certain Cyrenaic (Hegesias) enunciated the doctrine that the supreme + happiness of man was suicide. In fact, if the object of man is happiness, + since life affords far fewer joys than sorrows, the philosophy of + happiness is to get rid of life, and the sole wisdom lies in suicide. It + does not appear that Hegesias gave the only proof of sincere belief in + this doctrine which can be given by anyone professing it. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0007" id="link2HCH0007"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER VII. EPICUREANISM + </h2> + <p> + Epicureanism Believes that the Duty of Man is to Seek Happiness, and that + Happiness Consists in Wisdom. + </p> + <p> + MORAL PHILOSOPHY.—Continuing to feel the strong impulse which it had + received from Socrates, philosophy was now for a long while to be almost + exclusively moral philosophy. Only it divided very sharply in two + directions. Antisthenes and Aristippus were both pupils of Socrates. From + Antisthenes came the Cynics; from Aristippus the philosophers of pleasure. + The Cynics gave birth to the Stoics, the philosophers of pleasure to the + Epicureans, and these two great schools practically divided all antiquity + between them. We will take the Epicureans first because, chronologically, + they slightly preceded the Stoics. + </p> + <p> + EPICURUS.—Epicurus, born at Athens a little after the death of + Plato, brought up at Samos by his parents who had been forced to + expatriate themselves owing to reverses of fortune, returned to Athens + about 305 B.C., and there founded a school. Personally he was a true wise + man, sober, scrupulous, a despiser of pleasure, severe to himself, <i>in + practice</i> a Stoic. As his general view of the universe, he taught + approximately the doctrine of Democritus: the world is composed of a + multitude of atoms, endowed with certain movements, which attach + themselves to one another and combine together, and there is nothing else + in the world. Is there not a first cause, a being who set all these atoms + in motion—in short, a God? Epicurus did not think so. Are there + gods, as the vulgar believe? Epicurus believed so; but he considered that + the gods are brilliant, superior, happy creatures, who do not trouble + about this world, do not interfere with it, and are even less occupied, + were it possible, with mankind. Also they did not create the world, for + why should they have created it? From goodness, said Plato; but there is + so much evil in the world that if they created it from goodness, they were + mistaken and must be fools; and if they willingly permitted evil, they are + wicked; and therefore it is charitable towards them to believe that they + did not create it. + </p> + <p> + EPICUREAN MORALITY.—From the ethical point of view, Epicurus + certainly attaches himself to Aristippus; but with the difference that + lies between pleasure and happiness. Aristippus taught that the aim of + life was intelligent pleasure, Epicurus declared that the aim of life was + happiness. Now, does happiness consist in pleasures, or does it exclude + them? Epicurus was quite convinced that it excluded them. Like Lord + Beaconsfield, he would say, "Life would be almost bearable, were it not + for its pleasures." Happiness for Epicurus lay in "phlegm," as Philinte + would put it; it lay in the calm of the mind that has rendered itself + inaccessible to every emotion of passion, which is never irritated, never + moved, never annoyed, never desires, and never fears. Why, for instance, + should we dread death? So long as we fear it, it is not here; when it + arrives, we shall no longer fear it; then, why is it an evil?—But, + during life itself, how about sufferings?—We greatly increase our + sufferings by complaints and by self-commiseration. If we acted in the + reverse way, if when we were tortured by them we recalled past pleasures + and thought of pleasures to come, they would be infinitely mitigated.—But, + of what pleasures can a man speak who makes happiness consist in the + exclusion of pleasures? The pleasures of the wise man are the satisfaction + he feels in assuring himself of his own happiness. He finds pleasure when + he controls a passion in order to revert to calmness; he feels pleasure + when he converses with his friends about the nature of true happiness; he + feels pleasure when he has diverted a youth from passionate follies or + from despair, and brought him back to peace of mind, etc.—But what + about sufferings after death? They do not exist. There is no hell because + there is no immortality of the soul. The soul is as material as the body, + and dies with it. + </p> + <p> + You will say, perhaps, that this very severe and austere morality more + nearly approaches to Stoicism than to the teaching of Aristippus. This is + so true that when Horace confessed with a smile that he returned to the + morality of pleasure, he did not say, as we should, "I feel that I am + becoming an Epicurean," he said, "I fall back on the precepts of + Aristippus;" and Seneca, a professed Stoic, cites Epicurus almost as often + as Zeno in his lessons. It may not be quite accurate to state, but there + would not be much exaggeration in affirming, that Epicureanism is a + smiling Stoicism and Stoicism a gloomy Epicureanism. In the current use of + the word we have changed the meaning of Epicurean to make it mean + "addicted to pleasure." The warning must be given that there is no more + grievous error. + </p> + <p> + THE VOGUE OF EPICUREANISM.—Epicureanism had an immense vogue in + antiquity. The principal professors of it at Athens were Metrodorus, + Hermarchus, Polystratus, and Apollodorus. Penetrating to Italy + Epicureanism found its most brilliant representative in Lucretius, who of + the system made a poem—the admirable <i>De Natura Rerum</i>; there + were also Atticus, Horace, Pliny the younger, and many more. It even + became a political opinion: the Caesarians were Epicureans, the + Republicans Stoics. On the appearance of Christianity Epicureanism came + into direct opposition with it, and so did Stoicism also; but in a far + less degree. In modern times, as will be seen, Epicureanism has enjoyed a + revival. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0008" id="link2HCH0008"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER VIII. STOICISM + </h2> + <p> + The Passions are Diseases which can and must be Extirpated. + </p> + <p> + THE LOGIC OF STOICISM.—Stoicism existed as a germ in the Cynic + philosophy (and also in Socrates) as did Epicureanism in Aristippus. Zeno + was the pupil of Crates. In extreme youth he opened a school at Athens in + the Poecile. The Poecile was a portico; portico in Greek is <i>stoa</i>, + hence the name of Stoic. Zeno taught for about thirty years; then, on the + approach of age, he died by his own hand. Zeno thought, as did Epicurus + and Socrates, that philosophy should only be the science of life and that + the science of life lay in wisdom. Wisdom consists in thinking justly and + acting rightly; but to think justly only in order to act rightly—which + is quite in the spirit of Socrates, and eliminates all the science of + research, all consideration of the constitution of the world as well as + the total and even the details of matter. Therein is Stoicism more narrow + than Epicureanism. + </p> + <p> + In consequence, man needs clear, precise, and severe "logic" (the Stoics + were the first to use this word). Armed with this weapon, and only + employing it for self-knowledge and self-control, man makes himself wise. + The "wise man" of the Stoic is a kind of saint—a superman, as it has + since been called—very analogous to his God. All his efforts are + concentrated on safeguarding, conquering, and suppressing his passions, + which are nothing save "diseases of the soul." In the external world he + disregards all the "things of chance"—everything, that is, that does + not depend on human will—and considers them as non-existent: the + ailments of the body, pangs, sufferings, misfortunes, and humiliations are + not evils, they are things indifferent. On the contrary, crimes and errors + are such evils that they are <i>equally</i> execrable, and the wise man + should reproach himself as severely for the slightest fault as for the + greatest crime—a paradoxical doctrine which has aroused the warmth + of even respectful opponents of Stoicism, notably Cicero. + </p> + <p> + MAXIMS OF THE STOICS.—Their most frequently repeated maxim is + "abstain and endure"; abstain from all evil, suffer all aggression and + so-called misfortune without rebelling or complaining. Another precept + widely propagated among them and by them, "Live according to nature," + remarkably resembles an Epicurean maxim. This must be made clear. This + precept as they interpreted it meant: adhere freely and respectfully to + the laws of the universe. The world is a God who lives according to the + laws He Himself made, and of which we are not judges. These laws surround + us and compel us; sometimes they wound us. We must respect and obey them, + have a sort of pious desire that they should operate even against + ourselves, and live in reverent conformity with them. Thus understood, the + "life in conformity with nature" is nothing else than an aspect of the + maxim, "Endure." + </p> + <p> + PRINCIPAL STOICS.—The principal adepts and masters of Stoicism with + and after Zeno were Cleanthes, Chrysippus, Aristo, and Herillus in Greece; + at Rome, Cato, Brutus, Cicero to a certain degree, Thrasea, Epictetus + (withal a Greek, who wrote in Greek), Seneca, and finally the Emperor + Marcus Aurelius. Stoicism rapidly developed into a religion, having its + rites, obediences, ascetic practices, directors of conscience, examination + of conscience, and its adepts with a traditional dress, long cloak, and + long beard. It exerted considerable influence, comparable (comparable + only) to Christianity, but it penetrated only the upper and middle classes + of society in antiquity without descending, or barely descending, to the + masses. Like Epicureanism, Stoicism had a renaissance in modern times in + opposition to Christianity; this will be dealt with later. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0009" id="link2HCH0009"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER IX. ECLECTICS AND SCEPTICS + </h2> + <p> + Philosophers who Wished to Belong to No School Philosophers who Decried + All Schools and All Doctrines. + </p> + <p> + THE TWO TENDENCIES.—As might be expected to happen, and as always + happens, the multiplicity of sects brought about two tendencies, one + consisting in selecting somewhat arbitrarily from each sect what one found + best in it, which is called "eclecticism," the other in thinking that no + school grasped the truth, that the truth is not to be grasped, which is + called "scepticism." + </p> + <p> + THE ECLECTICS: PLUTARCH.—The Eclectics, who did not form a school, + which would have been difficult in the spirit in which they acted, had + only this in common, that they venerated the great thinkers of ancient + Greece, and that they felt or endeavoured to feel respect and toleration + for all religions. They venerated Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, Epicurus, + Zeno, Moses, Jesus, St. Paul, and loved to imagine that they were each a + partial revelation of the great divine thought, and they endeavoured to + reconcile these divergent revelations by proceeding on broad lines and + general considerations. Among them were Moderatus, Nicomachus, Nemesius, + etc. The most illustrious, without being the most profound—though + his literary talent has always kept him prominent—was Plutarch. His + chief effort, since then often renewed, was to reconcile reason and faith + (I am writing of the polytheistic faith). Perceiving in mythology + ingenious allegories, he showed that under the name of allegories covering + and containing profound ideas, all polytheism could be accepted by the + reason of a Platonist, an Aristotelian, or a Stoic. The Eclectics had not + much influence, and only pleased two sorts of minds: those who preferred + knowledge rather than conviction, and found in Eclecticism an agreeable + variety of points of view; and those who liked to believe a little in + everything, and possessing receptive but not steadfast minds were not far + from sceptics and who might be called affirmative sceptics in opposition + to the negative sceptics: sceptics who say, "Heavens, yes," as opposed to + sceptics who always say, "Presumably, no." + </p> + <p> + THE SCEPTICS: PYRRHO.—The Sceptics proper were chronologically more + ancient. The first famous Sceptic was a contemporary of Aristotle; he + followed Alexander on his great expedition into Asia. This was Pyrrho. He + taught, as it appears, somewhat obscurely at Athens, and for successor had + Timon. These philosophers, like so many others, sought happiness and + affirmed that it lay in abstention from decision, in the mind remaining in + abeyance, in <i>aphasia</i>. Pyrrho being accustomed to say that he was + indifferent whether he was alive or dead, on being asked, "Then why do you + live?" answered: "Just because it is indifferent whether one lives or is + dead." As may be imagined, their favourite sport was to draw the various + schools into mutual opposition, to rout some by the rest, to show that all + were strong in what they negatived, but weak in what they affirmed, and so + to dismiss them in different directions. + </p> + <p> + THE NEW ACADEMY.—Scepticism, albeit attenuated, softened, and less + aggressive, reappeared in a school calling itself the New Academy. It + claimed to adhere to Socrates—not without some show of reason, since + Socrates had declared that the only thing he knew was that he knew nothing—and + the essential tenet of this school was to affirm nothing. Only the + Academicians believed that certain things were probable, more probable + than others, and they are the founders of probabilism, which is nothing + more than conviction accompanied with modesty. They were more or less + moderate, according to personal temperament. Arcesilaus was emphatically + moderate, and limited himself to the development of the critical faculties + of his pupil. Carneades was more negative, and arrived at or reverted to + scepticism and sophistry pure and simple. Cicero, with a certain + foundation of Stoicism, was a pupil, and one of the most moderate, of the + New Academy. + </p> + <p> + AENESIDEMUS; AGRIPPA; EMPIRICUS.—Others built on experience itself, + on the incertitude of our sensations and observations, on everything that + can cheat us and cause us illusion in order to display how <i>relative</i> + and how miserably partial is human knowledge. Such was Aenesidemus, whom + it might be thought Pascal had read, so much does the latter give the + reasons of the former when he is not absorbed in faith, and when he + assumes the position of a sceptic precisely in order to prove the + necessity of taking refuge in faith. Such was Agrippa; such, too, was + Sextus Empiricus, so often critical of science, who demonstrates (as to a + slight extent M. Henri Poincaré does in our own day) that all sciences, + even those which, like mathematics and geometry, are proudest of their + certainty, rest upon conventions and intellectual "conveniences." + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0010" id="link2HCH0010"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER X. NEOPLATONISM + </h2> + <p> + Reversion to Metaphysics. Imaginative Metaphysicians after the Manner of + Plato, but in Excess. + </p> + <p> + ALEXANDRINISM.—Amid all this, metaphysics—namely, the effort + to comprehend the universe—appears somewhat at a discount. It + enjoyed a renaissance in the third century of our era among some teachers + from Alexandria (hence the name of the Alexandrine school) who came to + lecture at Rome with great success. Alexandrinism is a "Neoplatonism"—that + is, a renewed Platonism and, as considered by its authors, an augmented + one. + </p> + <p> + PLOTINUS.—Plotinus taught this: God and matter exist. God is one, + matter is multiple and divisible. God in Himself is incomprehensible, and + is only to be apprehended in his manifestations. Man rises not to + comprehension of Him but to the perception of Him by a series of degrees + which are, as it were, the progressive purification of faith, and which + lead us to a kind of union with Him resembling that of one being with + another whom he could never see, but of whose presence he could have no + doubt. Matter, that is, the universe, is an emanation from God, as perfume + comes from a flower. All is not God, and only God can be God, but all is + divine and all participates in God, just as each of our thoughts + participates of our soul. Now, if all emanates from God, all also tends to + return to Him, as bodies born of earth, nourished by earth, invigorated by + the forces proceeding from the earth, tend to return to the earth. This is + what makes the harmony of the world. The law of laws is, that every + fragment of the universe derived from God returns to Him and desires to + return to Him. The universe is an emanation from the perfect, and an + effort towards perfection. The universe is a God in exile who has + nostalgia for himself. The universe is a progressive descent from God with + a tendency towards reintegration with Him. + </p> + <p> + How does this emanation from God becoming matter take place? That is a + mystery; but it may be supposed to take place by successive stages. From + God emanates spirit, impersonal spirit which is not spirit of this or + that, but universal spirit spread through the whole world and animating + it. From spirit emanates the soul, which can unite itself to a body and + form an individual. The soul is less divine than spirit, which in turn is + less divine than God, but yet retains divinity. From the soul emanates the + body to which it unites itself. The body is less divine than the soul, + which was less divine than spirit, which was less divine than God; but it + still possesses divinity for it has a form, a figure, a design marked and + impressed with divine spirit. Finally, matter without form is the most + distant of the emanations from God, and the lowest of the descending + stages of God. God <i>is</i> in Himself; He thinks in pure thought in + spirit; He thinks in mixed and confused thought in the soul; He feels in + the body; He sleeps in unformed matter. The object of unformed matter is + to acquire form, that is a body; and the object of a body is to have a + soul; and the aim of a soul is to be united in spirit, and the aim of + spirit is to be absorbed into God. + </p> + <p> + Souls not united to bodies contemplate spirit and enjoy absolute + happiness. Other souls not united to bodies, but solicited by a certain + instinct to unite themselves to bodies, are of ambiguous but still very + exalted nature. Souls united to bodies (our own) have descended far, but + can raise themselves and be purified by contemplation of the eternal + intelligence, and by relative union with it. This contemplation has + several degrees, so to speak, of intensity, degrees which Plotinus termed + hypostases. By perception we obtain a glimpse of ideas, by dialectics we + penetrate them; by a final hypostasis, which is ecstasy, we can sometimes + unite ourselves directly to God and live in Him. + </p> + <p> + THE PUPILS OF PLOTINUS.—Plotinus had as pupils and successors, + amongst others, Porphyry and Iamblichus. Porphyry achieves little except + the exposition of the doctrine of his master, and shows originality only + as a logician. Iamblichus and his school made a most interesting effort to + revive exhausted and expiring paganism and to constitute a philosophic + paganism. The philosophers of the school of Iamblichus are, by the way, + magicians, charlatans, miracle-mongers, men as antipositivist as possible. + Iamblichus himself sought to reconcile polytheism with Neoplatonism by + putting in the centre of all a supreme deity, an essential deity from whom + he made a crowd of secondary, tertiary, and quaternary deities to emanate, + ranging from those purely immaterial to those inherent in matter. The + subtle wanderings of Neoplatonism were continued obscurely in the school + of Athens until it was closed for ever in 529 by the Emperor Justinian as + being hostile to the religion of the Empire, which at that epoch was + Christianity. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0011" id="link2HCH0011"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER XI. CHRISTIANITY + </h2> + <p> + Philosophic Ideas which Christianity Welcomed, Adopted, or Created How it + must Give a Fresh Aspect to All Philosophy, even that Foreign to Itself. + </p> + <p> + CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHY AND MORALITY.—Christianity spread through the + Empire by the propaganda of the Apostles, and more especially St. Paul, + from about the year 40. Its success was extremely rapid, especially among + the populace, and little by little it won over the upper classes. As a + general philosophy, primitive Christianity did not absolutely bring more + than the Hebrew dogmas: the unity of God, a providential Deity, that is, + one directly interfering in human affairs; immortality of the soul with + rewards and penalties beyond the grave (a recent theory among the Jews, + yet one anterior to Christianity). As a moral system, Christianity brought + something so novel and so beautiful that it is not very probable that + humanity will ever surpass it, which may be imperfectly and incompletely + summed up thus: love of God; He must not only be feared as He was by the + pagans and the ancient Jews; He must be loved passionately as a son loves + his father, and all things must be done for this love and in consideration + of this love; all men are brethren as sons of God, and they should love + one another as brothers; love your neighbour as yourself, love him who + does not love you; love your enemies; be not greedy for the goods of this + world, nor ambitious, nor proud; for God loves the lowly, the humble, the + suffering, and the miserable, and He will exalt the lowly and put down the + mighty from their seats. + </p> + <p> + Nothing like this had been said in all antiquity, and it needs + extraordinary ingenuity (of a highly interesting character, by the way), + to find in ancient wisdom even a few traces of this doctrine. + </p> + <p> + Finally, into politics, so to speak, Christianity brought this novelty: + there are two empires, the empire of God and the empire of man; you do not + owe everything to the earthly empire; you are bound to give it faithfully + only what is needed for it to be strong and to preserve society; apart + from that, and that done, you are the subject of God and have only to + answer to God for your thoughts, your belief, your conscience; and over + that portion of yourself the State has neither right nor authority unless + it be usurped and tyrannical. And therein lay the charter of individual + liberty like the charter of the rights of man. + </p> + <p> + As appeal to the feelings, Christianity brought the story of a young God, + infinitely good and gentle, who had never cursed, who had been infinitely + loved, who had been persecuted and betrayed, who had forgiven his + executioners, and who died in great sufferings and who was to be imitated + (whence came the thirst for martyrdom). This story in itself is not more + affecting than that of Socrates, but it is that of a young martyr and not + of an old one, and therein lies a marked difference for the imagination + and emotions of the multitude. + </p> + <p> + THE SUCCESS OF CHRISTIANITY.—The prodigious rapidity of the success + of Christianity is easily explicable. Polytheism had no longer a great + hold on the masses, and no philosophic doctrine had found or had even + sought the path to the crowd; Christianity, essentially democratic, loved + the weak and humble, had a tendency to prefer them to the great ones of + this world, and to regard them as being more the children of God, and was + therefore received by the masses as the only doctrine which could replace + the worm-eaten polytheism. And in Christianity they saw the religion for + which they were waiting, and in the heads of Christianity their own + protectors and defenders. + </p> + <p> + ITS EVOLUTION.—The evolution of Christianity was very rapid, and + from a great moral doctrine with a minimum of rudimentary metaphysics it + became, perchance mistakenly, a philosophy giving account, or desirous of + giving account of everything; it so to speak incorporated a metaphysic, + borrowed in great part from Greek philosophy, in great part from the + Hebrew traditions. It possessed ideas on the origin of matter, and whilst + maintaining that God was eternal, denied that matter was, and asserted + that God created it out of nothing. It had theories on the essence of God, + and saw Him in three Persons, or hypostases, one aspect of God as power, + another as love, and the other as intelligence. It presented theories on + the incarnation and humanisation of God, God being made man in Jesus + Christ without ceasing to be God. It conceived new relationships of man to + God, man having in himself powers of purgation and perfection, but always + needing divine help for self-perfection (theory of grace). And this he + must believe; if not he would feel insolent pride in his freedom. It had + ideas about the existence of evil, declaring in "justification of God" for + having permitted evil on earth, that the world was a place of trial, and + that evil was only a way of putting man to the test and discovering what + were his merits. It had its notions on the rewards and penalties beyond + the grave, hell for the wicked and heaven for the good, as had been known + to antiquity, but added purgatory, a place for both punishment and + purification by punishment, an entirely Platonic theory, which Plato may + have inspired but did not himself entertain. Finally, it was a complete + philosophy answering, and that in a manner often admirable, all the + questions that mankind put or could ever put. + </p> + <p> + And, as so often happens, that has proved a weakness and a strength to it: + a weakness because embarrassed with subtle, complicated, insoluble + questions wherein mankind will always be involved, it was forced to engage + in endless discussions wherein the bad or feeble reasons advanced by this + or that votary compromised the whole work; a strength because whoever + brings a rule of life is practically compelled to support it by general + ideas bearing on the relations of things and to give it a place in a + general survey of the world; otherwise he appears impotent, weak, + disqualified to give that very rule of life, incapable of replying to the + interrogations raised by that rule of life; and finally, lacking in + authority. + </p> + <p> + SCHISMS AND HERESIES.—Right or wrong, and it is difficult and highly + hazardous to decide the question, Christianity was a complete philosophy, + which was why it had its schisms and heresies, a certain number of sincere + Christians not resolving the metaphysical questions in the way of the + majority. Heresies were innumerable; only the two shall be cited which are + deeply interesting in the history of philosophy. Manes, an Arab (and + Arabia was then a Persian province), revived the old Zoroastrian doctrine + of two principles of good and evil, and saw in the world two contending + gods, the God of perfection and the god of sin, and laid upon man the duty + of assisting the God of goodness so that His kingdom should come and cause + the destruction of evil in the world. From him proceeded the Manicheans, + who exerted great influence and were condemned by many Councils until + their sect died out, only to reappear or seem to reappear fairly often in + the Middle Ages and in modern times. + </p> + <p> + Arius denied the Trinity, believing only in one God, not only unique, but + in one Person, and in consequence denied the divinity of Jesus Christ. He + was perpetually involved in controversies and polemics, supported by some + Bishops, opposed by the majority. After his death his doctrine spread + strangely. It was stifled in the East by Theodosius, but was widely + adopted by the "barbarians" of the West (Goths, Vandals, Burgundians, + Lombards). It was revived, more or less exactly, after the Reformation, + among the Socinians. + </p> + <p> + ROME AND CHRISTIANITY.—The relations of Christianity with the Roman + government were in the highest degree tragic, as is common knowledge. + There were ten sanguinary persecutions, some being atrocious. It has often + been asked what was the cause of this animosity against the Christians on + the part of a government which tolerated all religions and all + philosophies. Persecutions were natural at Athens where a democracy, + obstinately attached to the local deities, treated as enemies of the + country those who did not take these gods into consideration; persecutions + were natural on the part of a Calvin or a Louis XIV who combined in + themselves the two authorities and would not admit that anyone in the + State had the right to think differently from its head; but it has been + argued that they were incomprehensible on the part of a government which + admitted all cults and all doctrines. The explanation perhaps primarily + lies in the fact that Christianity was essentially popular, and that the + government saw in it not only plebeianism, which was disquieting, but an + organisation of plebeianism, which was still more so. The administration + of religion had always been in the hands of the aristocracy; the Roman + pontiffs were patricians, the Emperor was the sovereign pontiff; to yield + obedience, even were it only spiritually, to private men as priests was to + be disobedient to the Roman aristocracy, to the Emperor himself, and was + properly speaking a revolt. + </p> + <p> + A further explanation, perhaps, is that each new religion that was + introduced at Rome did not oppose and did not contradict polytheism, the + principle of polytheism being precisely that there are many gods; whereas + Christianity denying all those gods and affirming that there is only one, + and that all others must be despised as non-existent, inveighed against, + denied, and ruined or threatened to destroy the very essence of + polytheism. It was not a variation, it was a heresy; it was more than + heretical, it was anarchical; it did not only condemn this or that + religion, but even the very tolerance with which the Roman government + accepted all religions. Hence it is natural enough that it should have + been combated to the utmost by practically all the Emperors, from the most + execrable, such as Nero, to the best, such as Marcus Aurelius. + </p> + <p> + CHRISTIANITY AND THE PHILOSOPHERS.—The relations of Christianity + with philosophy were confused. The immense majority of philosophers + rejected it, considering their own views superior to it, and moreover, + feeling it to be formidable, made use against it of all that could be + found beautiful, specious, or expedient in ancient philosophy; and the + ardour of Neoplatonism, which we have considered, in part arose from + precisely this instinct of rivalry and of struggle. At that epoch there + was a throng of men like Ernest Havet presenting Hellenism in opposition + to Christianity, and Ernest Havet is only a Neoplatonist of the nineteenth + century. + </p> + <p> + A certain number of philosophers, nevertheless, either on the + Jewish-Christian side or on the Hellenic, tried some reconciliation either + as Jews making advances to Hellenism or as Greeks admitting there was + something acceptable on the part of Sion. Aristobulus, a Jew (prior to + Jesus Christ), seems to have endeavoured to bring Moses into agreement + with Plato; Philo (a Jew contemporary with and surviving Jesus Christ and + a non-Christian), about whom there is more information, throughout his + life pursued the plan of demonstrating all the resemblances he could + discover between Plato and the Old Testament, much in the same way as in + our time some have striven to point out the surprising agreement of the + Darwinian theory with Genesis. He was called the Jewish Plato, and at + Alexandria it was said: "Philo imitates Plato or Plato imitates Philo." + </p> + <p> + On their side, later on, certain eclectic Greeks already cited, Moderatus, + Nicomachus, Nemesius, extended goodwill so far as to take into account, if + not Jesus, at least Moses, and to admit Israelitish thought into the + history of philosophy and of human wisdom. But, in general it was by the + schools of philosophy and by the ever dwindling section of society priding + itself upon its philosophy that Christianity was most decisively repulsed, + thrust on one side and misunderstood. + </p> + <p> + CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHERS.—Without dealing with many others who belong + more especially to the history of the Church rather than to that of + philosophy, the Christians did not lack two very illustrious philosophers + who must receive attention—Origen and St. Augustine. + </p> + <p> + ORIGEN.—Origen was a native of Alexandria at the close of the second + century, and a pupil of St. Clement of Alexandria. A Christian and a + Platonist, in order to give himself permission and excuse for reconciling + the two doctrines, he alleged that the Apostles had given only so much of + the Christian teaching as the multitude could comprehend, and that the + learned could interpret it in a manner more subtle, more profound, and + more complete. Having observed this precaution, he revealed his system, + which was this: God is a pure spirit. He already has descended one step in + <i>spirits</i> which are emanations from Him. These spirits are capable of + good and evil. When addicted to evil, they clothe themselves with matter + and become souls in bodies;—which is what we are. There are others + lower than ourselves. There are impure spirits which have clothed + themselves with unclean bodies; these are demons. Now, as the fallen + brethren of angels, we are free, less free than they, but still free. + Through this freedom we can in our present existence either raise or lower + ourselves. But this freedom does not suffice us; a little help is + essential. This help comes to us from the spirits which have remained + pure. The help they afford us is opposed by the efforts of the utterly + fallen spirits who are lower in the scale than ourselves. To combat these + fallen spirits, to help the pure spirits who help us, and to help them to + help us, such is our duty in this life, which is a medicine, the medicine + of Plato, namely a punishment; sterile when it is not accepted by us, + salutary when gratefully accepted by us, it then becomes expiation and in + consequence purification. The part of the Redeemer in all this is the same + as that of the spirits, but on a grander and more decisive plane. King of + spirits, Spirit of spirits, by revelation He illumines our confused + intelligence and fortifies our weak will against temptation. + </p> + <p> + ST. AUGUSTINE.—St. Augustine of Tagaste (in Africa), long a pagan + exercising the profession of professor of rhetoric, became a Christian and + was Bishop of Hippo. It is he who "fixed" the Christian doctrine in the + way most suitable to and most acceptable to Western intelligence. Instead + of confusing it, more or less intentionally, more or less inadvertently, + with philosophy, he exerted all his great talents to make the most precise + distinction from it. Philosophers (he says) have always regarded the world + as an emanation from God. Then all is God. Such is not the way to reason. + There is no emanation, but creation; God created the world and has + remained distinct from it. He lives in it in such a way that we live in + Him; in Him we live and move and have our being; He dwells throughout the + world, but He is not the world; He is everywhere but He is not all. God + created the world. Then, can it be said that before the world was created + God remained doing nothing during an immense space of time? Certainly not, + because time only began at the creation of the world. God is outside time. + The eternal is the absence of time. God, therefore, was not an instant + before He created the world. Or, if it be preferred, there was an eternity + before the birth of the world. But it is the same thing; for eternity is + the non-existence of time. + </p> + <p> + Some understand God in three Persons as three Gods. This polytheism, this + paganism must be rejected. But how to understand? How? You feel in + yourself several souls? No. And yet there are several faculties of the + soul. The three Persons of God are the three divine faculties. Man has + body and soul. No one ought to have doubts about the soul, for to have + doubts presupposes thought, and to think is to be; above all things we are + thinking beings. But what is the soul? Something immaterial, assuredly, + since it can conceive immaterial things, such as a line, a point, surface, + space. It is as necessary for the soul to be immaterial in order to be + able to grasp the immaterial, as it is necessary for the hand to be + material in order that it can grasp a stone. + </p> + <p> + Whence comes the soul? From the souls of ancestors by transmission? This + is not probable, for this would be to regard it as material. From God by + emanation? This is inadmissible; it is the same error as believing that + the world emanates from God. Here, too, there is no emanation, but + creation. God creates the souls in destination for bodies themselves born + from heredity. Once the body is destroyed, what becomes of the soul? It + cannot perish; for thought not being dependent upon the senses, there is + no reason for its disappearance on the disappearance of the senses. + </p> + <p> + Human liberty is an assured fact; we are free to do good or evil. But then + God has not been able to know in advance what I shall do to-day, and in + consequence God, at least in His knowledge, has limitations, is not + omnipotent. St. Augustine replies confusedly (for the question is + undoubtedly insoluble) that we have an illusion of liberty, an illusion + that we are free, which suffices for us to acquire merit if we do right + and demerit if we do wrong, and that this illusion of liberty is a + relative liberty, which leaves the prescience of God, and therefore His + omnipotence, absolute. Man is also extremely weak, debilitated, and + incapable of good on account of original sin, the sin of our first + parents, which is transmitted to us through heredity and paralyses us. But + God helps us, and this is what is termed grace. He helps us gratuitously, + as is indicated by the word "grace"—if He wishes and when He wishes + and in the measure that He wishes. From this arises the doctrine of + "predestination," by which it is preordained whether a man is to be saved + or lost. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_PART2" id="link2H_PART2"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + PART II. IN THE MIDDLE AGES + </h2> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0012" id="link2HCH0012"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER I. FROM THE FIFTH CENTURY TO THE THIRTEENTH + </h2> + <p> + Philosophy is only an Interpreter of Dogma. + </p> + <p> + When it is Declared Contrary to Dogma by the Authority of Religion, it is + a Heresy. + </p> + <p> + Orthodox and Heterodox Interpretations. + </p> + <p> + Some Independent Philosophers. + </p> + <p> + DOGMA.—After the invasion of the barbarians, philosophy, like + literature, sought refuge in monasteries and in the schools which prelates + instituted and maintained near them. But the Church does not permit the + free search for truth. The truth has been established by the Fathers of + the Church and fixed by the Councils. Thenceforth the philosophic life, so + to speak, which had never been interrupted, assumed a fresh character. + Within the Church it sheltered—I will not say disguised—itself + under the interpretation of dogma; it became a sort of respectful + auxiliary of theology, and was accordingly called the "handmaid of + theology," <i>ancilla theologiae</i>. When emancipated, when departing + from dogma, it is a "heresy," and all the great heresies are nothing else + than schools of philosophy, which is why heresies must come into a history + of philosophy. And at last, but only towards the close of the Middle Ages, + lay thought without disturbing itself about dogma and no longer thinking + about its interpretation, created philosophic doctrines exactly as the + philosophers of antiquity invented them apart from religion, to which they + were either hostile or indifferent. + </p> + <p> + SCHOLASTICISM: SCOTUS ERIGENA.—The orthodox philosophy of the Middle + Ages was the scholastic. Scholasticism consisted in amassing and in making + known scientific facts and matters of knowledge of which it was useful for + a well-bred man not to be ignorant and for this purpose encyclopaedias + were constructed; on the other hand, it consisted not precisely in the + reconciliation of faith with reason, not precisely and far less in the + submission of faith to the criticism of reason, but in making faith + sensible to reason, as had been the office of the Fathers of the Church, + more especially St. Augustine. + </p> + <p> + Scotus Erigena, a Scotsman attached to the Palatine Academy of Charles the + Bald, lived in the eleventh century. He was extremely learned. His + philosophy was Platonic, or rather the bent of his mind was Platonic. God + is the absolute Being; He is unnamable, since any name is a delimitation + of the being; He <i>is</i> absolutely and infinitely. As the creator of + all and uncreated, He is the cause <i>per se</i>; as the goal to which all + things tend, He is the supreme end. The human soul is of impenetrable + essence like God Himself; accordingly, it is God in us. We have fallen + through the body and, whilst in the flesh, we can, by virtue and more + especially by the virtue of penitence, raise ourselves to the height of + the angels. The world is the continuous creation of God. It must not be + said that God created the world, but that He creates it; for if He ceased + from sustaining it, the world would no longer exist. God is perpetual + creation and perpetual attraction. He draws all beings to Himself, and in + the end He will have them all in Himself. There is predestination to + perfection in everything. + </p> + <p> + These theories, some of which, as has been seen, go beyond dogma and form + at least the beginning of heresy, are all impregnated with Platonism, + especially with Neoplatonism, and lead to the supposition that Scotus + Erigena possessed very wide Greek learning. + </p> + <p> + ARABIAN SCIENCE.—A great literary and philosophical fact in the + eighth century was the invasion of the Arabs. Mahometans successively + invaded Syria, Persia, Africa, and Spain, forming a crescent, the two + points of which touched the two extremities of Europe. Inquisitive and + sagacious pupils of the Greeks in Africa and Asia, they founded everywhere + brilliant universities which rapidly acquired renown (Bagdad, Bassorah, + Cordova, Granada, Seville, Murcia) and brought to Europe a new quota of + science; for instance, all the works of Aristotle, of which Western Europe + possessed practically nothing. Students greedy for knowledge came to learn + from them in Spain; for instance, Gerbert, who developed into a man of + great learning, who taught at Rheims and became Pope. Individually the + Arabs were often great philosophers, and at least the names must be + mentioned of Avicenna (a Neoplatonist of the tenth century) and Averroes + (an Aristotelian of the twelfth century who betrayed tendencies towards + admitting the eternity of nature, and its evolution through its own + initiative during the course of time). Their doctrines were propagated, + and the ancient books which they made known became widely diffused. From + them dates the sway of Aristotle throughout the middle ages. + </p> + <p> + ST. ANSELM.—St. Anselm, in the eleventh century, a Savoyard, who was + long Abbot of Bec in Normandy and died Archbishop of Canterbury, is one of + the most illustrious doctors of philosophy in the service of theology that + ever lived. "A new St. Augustine" (as he has been called), he starts from + faith to arrive at faith after it has been rendered sensible to reason. + Like St. Augustine he says: "I believe in order to understand" (well + persuaded that if I never believed I should never understand), and he adds + what had been in the thought of St. Augustine: "I understand in order to + believe." St. Anselm proved the existence of God by the most abstract + arguments. For example, "It is necessary to have a cause, one or multiple; + one is God; multiple, it can be derived from one single cause, and that + one cause is God; it can be a particular cause in each thing caused; but + then it is necessary to suppose a personal force which must itself have a + cause and thus we work back to a common cause, that is to say to a single + one." + </p> + <p> + He proved God again by the proof which has remained famous under the name + of the argument of St. Anselm: To conceive God is to prove that He is; the + conception of God is proof of His existence; for every idea has its + object; above all, an idea which has infinity for object takes for granted + the existence of infinity; for all being finite here below, what would + give the idea of infinity to the human mind? Therefore, if the human brain + has the idea of infinity it is because of the existence of infinity. The + argument is perhaps open to difference of opinion, but as proof of a + singular vigour of mind on the part of its author, it is indisputable. + </p> + <p> + Highly intellectual also is his explanation of the necessity of + redemption. <i>Cur Deus Homo?</i> (the title of one of his works) asked + St. Anselm. Because sin in relation to an infinite God is an infinite + crime. Man, finite and limited in capacity, could therefore never expiate + it. Then what could God do to avenge His honour and to have satisfaction + rendered to Him? He could only make Himself man without ceasing to be God, + in order that as man He should offer to God a reparation to which as God + He would give the character of infinitude. It was therefore absolutely + necessary that at a given moment man should become God, which could only + be done upon the condition that God made Himself man. + </p> + <p> + REALISTS; NOMINALISTS; CONCEPTUALISTS.—It was in the time of St. + Anselm that there arose the celebrated philosophic quarrel between the + "realists, nominalists, and conceptualists." It is here essential to + employ these technical terms or else not to allude to the dispute at all, + because the strife is above all a war of words. The realists (of whom St. + Anselm was one), said: "The ideas (idea of virtue, idea of sin, idea of + greatness, idea of littleness) are realities; they exist, in a spiritual + manner of course, but they really exist; they are: there is a virtue, a + sin, a greatness, a littleness, a reason, etc. (and this was an exact + reminiscence of the ideas of Plato). It is indeed only the idea, the + general, the universal, which is real, and the particular has only the + appearance of reality. Men do not exist, the individual man does not + exist; what exists is 'man' in general, and individual men are only the + appearance of—the coloured reflections of—the universal man." + The nominalists (Roscelin the Canon of Compiègne, for instance) answered: + "No; the general ideas, the universals as you say, are only names, are + only words, emissions of the voice, labels, if you like, which we place on + such and such categories of facts observed by us; there is no greatness; + there are a certain number of great things, and when we think of them we + inscribe this word 'greatness' on the general idea which we conceive. + 'Man' does not exist; there are men and the word humanity is only a word + which to us represents a collective idea." + </p> + <p> + Why did the realists cling so to their universals, held to be realities + and the sole realities? For many reasons. If the individual alone be real, + there are not three Persons in the Godhead, there are three Gods and the + unity of God is not real, it is only a word, and God is not real, He is + only an utterance of the voice. If the individual is not real, the Church + is not real; she does not exist, there only exist Christians who possess + freedom of thought and of faith. Now the Church is real and it is not only + desirable that she should be real, but even that she alone should possess + reality and that the individuals constituting her should exist by her and + not by themselves. (This is precisely the doctrine with regard to society + now current among certain philosophers: society exists independently of + its members; it has laws of its own independently of its members; it is a + reality on its own basis; and its members are by it, not it by them, and + therefore they should obey it; M. Durckheim is a "realist.") + </p> + <p> + ABELARD of Nantes, pupil of the nominalist, William of Champeaux, learned + man, artist, man of letters, an incomparable orator, tried to effect a + conciliation. He said: "The universal is not a reality, certainly; but it + is something more than a simple word; it is a conception of the mind, + which is something more than an utterance of the voice. As conception of + the mind, in fact, it lives with a life which goes beyond the individual, + because it can be common to several individuals to many individuals, and + because in fact it is common to them. The general idea that I have and + which I have communicated to my hearers, and which returns to me from my + hearers, is more than a word since it is a link between my hearers and + myself, and an atmosphere in which I and my hearers live. Is the Church + only to be a word? God forbid that I should say so. She is a bond between + all Christians; she is a general idea common to them all, so that in her + each individual feels himself several, feels himself many; although it is + true that were she not believed in by anyone she would be nothing." At + bottom he was a nominalist, but more subtle, also more profound and more + precise, having a better grasp of what William of Champeaux had desired to + say. He shared in his condemnation. + </p> + <p> + Apart from the great dispute, his ideas were singularly broad and bold. + Half knowing, half guessing at ancient philosophy, he held it in high + esteem; he found there, because he delighted in finding there, all the + Christian ideas: the one God, the Trinity, the Incarnation, the imputation + of the merits of the saints, original sin; and he found less of a gulf + between ancient philosophy and Christianity than between the Old and the + New Testament (this is because the only Christianity known to Abelard, not + the primitive but that constituted in the fourth century, was profoundly + impregnated with Hellenism). He believed the Holy Ghost to have revealed + Himself to the wise men of antiquity as well as to the Jews and the + Christians, and that virtuous pagans may have been saved. The moral + philosophy of Abelard is very elevated and pure. Our acts proceed from + God; for it is impossible that they should not; but He permits us the + faculty of disobedience "in order that virtue may exist," to which it + tends; for if the tendency to evil did not exist, there would be no + possibility of effort against evil, and if no efforts, then no virtue; + God, who cannot be virtuous since He cannot be tempted by evil, can be + virtuous in man, which is why He leaves him the tendency to evil for him + to triumph over it and be virtuous so that virtue may exist; even if He + were Himself to lead us into temptation, the tendency would still be the + same; He would only lead us into it to give us the opportunity for + struggle and victory, and therefore in order that virtue might exist; the + possibility of sin is the condition of virtue, and in consequence, even in + the admission of this possibility and above all by its admission, God is + virtuous. + </p> + <p> + The bad deed, furthermore, is not the most considerable from the point of + view of guilt; as merit or demerit the intention is worth as much as the + deed and he is criminal who has had the intention to be so (which is + clearly according to the Gospel). + </p> + <p> + HUGO DE SAINT-VICTOR; RICHARD.—Abelard possessed perhaps the + broadest and greatest mind of the whole of the Middle Ages. After these + famous names must be mentioned Hugo de Saint-Victor, a somewhat obscure + mystic of German origin; and the not less mystical Richard, who, + thoroughly persuaded that God is not attained by reason but by feeling, + taught exaltation to Him by detachment from self and by six degrees: + renunciation, elevation, impulsion, precipitation, ecstasy, and + absorption. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0013" id="link2HCH0013"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER II. THE THIRTEENTH CENTURY + </h2> + <p> + Influence of Aristotle His Adoption by the Church. Religious Philosophy of + St. Thomas Aquinas. + </p> + <p> + ARISTOTLE AND THE CHURCH.—From the thirteenth century, Aristotle, + completely known and translated into Latin, was adopted by the Church and + became in some sort its lay vicar. He was regarded, and I think rightly, + as of all the Greek thinkers the least dangerous to her and as the one to + whom could be left all the scientific instruction whilst she reserved to + herself all the religious teaching. Aristotle, in fact, "defended her from + Plato," in whom were always found some germs of adoration of this world, + or some tendencies in this direction, in whom was also found a certain + polytheism much disguised, or rather much purified, but actual and + dangerous; therefore, from the moment when it became necessary to select, + Aristotle was tolerated and finally invested with office. + </p> + <p> + ST. THOMAS AQUINAS.—As Aristotelian theologians must be cited + William of Auvergne, Vincent of Beauvais, Albertus Magnus; but the + sovereign name of this period of the history of philosophy is St. Thomas + Aquinas. St. Thomas Aquinas wrote several small works but, surpassing them + all, the <i>Summa</i> (encyclopaedia) which bears his name. In general + philosophy St. Thomas Aquinas is an Aristotelian, bending but not + distorting the ideas of Aristotle to Christian conceptions. Like + Aristotle, he demonstrated God by the existence of motion and the + necessity of a first motive power; he further demonstrated it by the + contingent, relative, and imperfect character of all here below: "There is + in things more or less goodness, more or less truth." But we only affirm + the more or less of a thing by comparing it with something absolute and as + it approaches more or less to this absolute; there is therefore an + absolute being, namely God—and this argument appeared to him better + than that of St. Anselm, which he refuted. + </p> + <p> + HIS CONCEPTION OF NATURE.—He showed the whole of nature as a great + hierarchy, proceeding from the least perfect and the most shapeless to the + most complete and determinate; from another aspect, as separated into two + great kingdoms, that of necessity (mineral, vegetable, animal), and that + of grace (humanity). He displayed it willed by God, projected by God, + created by God; governed by God according to antecedent and consequent + wills, that is, by general wills (God desires man to be saved) and by + particular wills (God wishes the sinner to be punished), and the union of + the general wills is the creation, and the result of all the particular + wills is Providence. Nature and man with it are the work not only of the + power but of the goodness of God, and it is by love that He created us and + we must render Him love for love, which is involuntarily done by Nature + herself in her obedience to His laws, and which we must do voluntarily by + obedience to His commandments. + </p> + <p> + THE SOUL.—Our soul is immaterial and more complete than that of + animals, for St. Thomas does not formally deny that animals have souls; + the instinct of animals is the sensitive soul according to Aristotle, + which is capable of four faculties: sensibility, imagination, memory, and + estimation, that is elementary intelligence: "The bird picks up straw, not + because it gratifies her feelings [not by a movement of sensibility], but + because it serves to make her nest. It is therefore necessary that an + animal should perceive those intuitions which do not come within the scope + of the senses. It is by opinion or estimation that it perceives these + intuitions, these distant ends." We, mankind, possess a soul which is + sensibility, imagination, memory, and reason. Reason is the faculty not + only of having ideas, but of establishing connections and chains of + connection between the ideas and of conceiving general ideas. Reason + pauses before reaching God because the idea of God precisely is the only + one which cannot be brought to the mind by the interrelation of ideas, for + God surpasses all ideas; the idea of God is given by faith, which can be + subsequently helped by reason, for the latter can work to make faith + perceptible to reason. + </p> + <p> + Our soul is full of passions, divisible into two great categories, the + passions of desire and those of anger. The passions of desire are rapid or + violent movements towards some object which seems to us a good; the + passions of anger are movements of revolt against something which opposes + our movement towards a good. The common root of all the passions is love, + for it is obvious that from it are derived the passions of desire; and as + for the passions of wrath they would not exist if we had no love of + anything, in which case our desire not coming into collision would not + turn into revolt against the obstacle. We are free to do good or evil, to + master our evil passions and to follow those of which reason approves. + Here reappears the objection of the knowledge God must have beforehand of + our actions: if God foresees our actions we are not free; if free, we act + contrary to his previsions, then He is not all-powerful. St. Thomas makes + answer thus: "There is not prevision, there is vision, because we are in + time whereas God is in eternity. He sees at one glance and instantaneously + all the past, present, and future. Therefore, He does not foresee but see, + and this vision does not hinder human freedom any more than being seen + acting prevents one from acting. Because God knows our deeds after they + are done, no one can plead that that prevents our full liberty to do them; + if He knew them before it is the same as knowing them after, because for + Him past, present, and future are all the same moment." This appears + subtle but is not, for it only amounts to the statement that in speaking + of God time must not be mentioned, for God is as much outside time as + outside space. + </p> + <p> + THE MORAL SYSTEM OF ST. THOMAS.—The very detailed and circumstantial + moral system of St. Thomas may thus be summarized: there is in conscience, + first, an intellectual act which is the distinction between good and evil; + secondly, an act of will which leads us to the good. This power for good + urges the practice of virtue. There are human virtues, well known to the + ancient philosophers, temperance, courage, wisdom, justice, which lead to + happiness on earth; there are divine virtues, inspired in man by God, + which are faith, hope, and charity, and they lead to eternal happiness. We + practise the virtues, when we are well-disposed, because we are free; but + our liberty and our will do not suffice; it is necessary for God to help + us, and that is "grace." + </p> + <p> + FAITH AND REASON.—On the question of the relation of reason to + faith, St. Thomas Aquinas recognizes, or rather proclaims, that reason + will never demonstrate faith, that the revealed truths, the Trinity, + original sin, grace, etc., are above reason and infinitely exceed it. How, + then, can one believe? By will, aided by the grace of God. Then henceforth + must no appeal be made to reason? Yes, indeed! Reason serves to refute the + errors of the adversaries of the faith, and by this refutation to confirm + itself in belief. The famous <i>Credo ut intelligam</i>—I believe in + order to understand—is therefore true. Comprehension is only + possible on condition of belief; but subsequently comprehension helps to + believe, if not more, at least with a greater precision and in a more + abundant light. St. Thomas Aquinas here is in exactly the position which + Pascal seems to have taken up: Believe and you will understand; understand + and you will believe more exactly. Therefore an act of will: "I wish to + believe"—a grace of God fortifying this will: faith exists—studies + and reasoning: faith is the clearer. + </p> + <p> + ST. BONAVENTURA; RAYMOND LULLE.—Beside these men of the highest + brain-power there are found in the thirteenth century mystics, that is, + poets and eccentrics, both by the way most interesting. It was St. + Bonaventura who, being persuaded, almost like an Alexandrine, that one + rises to God by synthetic feeling and not by series of arguments, and that + one journeys towards Him by successive states of the soul each more pure + and more passionate—wrote <i>The Journey of the Soul to God</i>, + which is, so to speak, a manual of mysticism. Learned as he was, whilst + pursuing his own purpose, he digressed in agreeable and instructive + fashion into the realms of real knowledge. + </p> + <p> + Widely different from him, Raymond Lulle or de Lulle, an unbridled + schoolman, in his <i>Ars magna</i> invented a reasoning machine, analogous + to an arithmetical machine, in which ideas were automatically deduced from + one another as the figures inscribe themselves on a counter. As often + happens, the excess of the method was its own criticism, and an enemy of + scholasticism could not have more ingeniously demonstrated that it was a + kind of mechanism. Raymond de Lulle was at once a learned man and a + well-informed and most enquiring naturalist for whom Arabian science held + no secrets. With that he was poet, troubadour, orator, as well as very + eccentric and attractive. He was beloved and persecuted in his lifetime, + and long after his death still found enthusiastic disciples. + </p> + <p> + BACON.—Contemporaneously lived the man whom it is generally the + custom to regard as the distant precursor of experimental science, Roger + Bacon (who must not be confused with Francis Bacon, another learned man + who lived much nearer to our own time). Roger Bacon, a Franciscan friar, + occupied himself almost exclusively with physical and natural science. He + passed the greater portion of his life in prison by reason of alleged + sorcery and, more especially, perhaps, because he had denounced the evil + lives of his brethren. He had at least a presentiment of almost all modern + inventions: gunpowder, magnifying glass, telescope, air-pump; he was + distinctly an inventor in optics. In philosophy, properly speaking, he + denounced what was hollow and empty in scholasticism, detesting that + preference should be given to "the straw of words rather than to the grain + of fact," and proclaiming that reasoning "is good to conclude but not to + establish." Without discovering the law of progress, as has too often been + alleged, he arrived at the conclusion that antiquity being the youth of + the world, the moderns are the adults, which only meant that it would be + at our school that the ancients would learn were they to return to earth + and that we ought not to believe blindly in the ancients; and this was an + insurrection against the principle of authority and against the idolatry + of Aristotle. He preached the direct study of nature, observation, and + experiment with the subsequent application of deduction, and especially of + mathematical deduction, to experiment and observation. With all that, he + believed in astrology; for those who are in advance of their time none the + less belong to it: but he was a very great man. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0014" id="link2HCH0014"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER III. THE FOURTEENTH AND FIFTEENTH CENTURIES + </h2> + <p> + Decadence of Scholasticism. Forebodings of the Coming Era. Great + Moralists. The Kabbala. Sorcery. + </p> + <p> + DECADENCE OF SCHOLASTICISM.—The fourteenth century dated the + decadence of scholasticism, but saw little new. "Realism" was generally + abandoned, and the field was swept by "nominalism," which was the theory + that ideas only have existence in the brains which conceive them. Thus + Durand de Saint-Pourçain remains famous for having said, "To exist is to + be individually," which at that epoch was very audacious. William of + Ockham repeated the phrase with emphasis; there is nothing real except the + individual. That went so far as to cast suspicion on all metaphysics, and + somewhat on theology. In fact, <i>although a devout believer</i>, Ockham + rejected theology, implored the Church not to be learned, because her + science proved nothing, and to content herself with faith: "Science + belongs to God, faith to men." But, or rather in addition, if the + ministers of God were no longer imposing because of their ambitious + science, it was necessary for them to regain their sway over souls by + other and better means. It was incumbent on them to be saintly, to revert + to the purity, the simplicity, and the divine childishness of the + primitive Church; and here he was virtually a forerunner of the + Reformation. + </p> + <p> + Ockham was indeed one of the auxiliaries of Philip the Fair in his + struggle with the Holy See, suffered excommunication, and sought refuge + with the Duke of Bavaria, the foe of the Pope. + </p> + <p> + BURIDAN: THE LIBERTY OF INDIFFERENCE.—Realists and nominalists + continued their mutual strife, sometimes physically even, until the middle + of the fifteenth century. But nominalism always gained ground, having + among other celebrated champions, Peter d'Ailly and Buridan; the one + succeeded in becoming Chancellor of the University of Paris, the other in + becoming its Rector. Buridan has remained famous through his death and his + donkey, both alike legendary. According to a ballad by Villon, Buridan + having been too tenderly loved by Joan of Navarre, wife of Philip the + Fair, was by his order "thrown in a sack into the Seine." By comparison of + dates, the fact seems impossible. According to tradition, either in order + to show the freedom of indifference, or that animals are mere machines, + Buridan declared that an ass with two baskets full of corn placed one on + each side of him and at equal distance from him, would never decide from + which he should feed and would die of starvation. Nothing of the kind is + to be found in his works, but he may have said so in a lecture and his + pupils remembering it have handed it down as a proverb. + </p> + <p> + PETER D'AILLY; GERSON.—Peter d'Ailly, a highly important + ecclesiastic, head of the College of Navarre, chevalier of the University + of Paris, Cardinal, a leader in the discussions at the Councils at Pisa + and Constance, a drastic reformer of the morals and customs of the Church, + did not evince any marked originality as a philosopher, but maintained the + already known doctrines of nominalism with extraordinary dialectical + skill. + </p> + <p> + Among his pupils he numbered Gerson, who was also Chancellor of the + University of Paris, another highly zealous and energetic reformer, a more + avowed enemy of scholasticism and mysticism, of exaggerated austerity and + astrology, eminently modern in the best sense of the word, whose political + and religious enemies are his title of respect. He was the author of many + small books devoted to the popularization of science, religion, and + morality. To him was long attributed the <i>Imitation of Jesus Christ</i>, + which on the whole bears no resemblance to his writings, but which he + might very well have written in old age in his retreat in the peaceful + silence of the Celestines of Lyons. + </p> + <p> + THE KABBALA.—From the beginning of the fifteenth century the + Renaissance was heralded by a revival of Platonism, both in philosophy and + literature. But it was a Platonism strangely understood, a quaint medley + of Pythagoreanism and Alexandrinism, the source of which is not very clear + (the period not having been much studied). Then arose an incredible + infatuation for the Kabbala—a doctrine which was for a long while + the secret of the Jews, brooded over by them so to speak during the + darkness of the Middle Ages, in which are to be found traces of the most + sublime speculations and of the basest superstitions of antiquity. It + contained a kind of pantheistic theology closely analogous to those of + Porphyry and Iamblichus, as well as processes of magic mingled with + astrology. The Kabbalists believe that the sage, who by his astrological + knowledge is brought into relation with the celestial powers, can affect + nature, alter the course of phenomena, and work miracles. The Kabbala + forms part of the history of the marvelous and of occult science rather + than of the history of philosophy. Nevertheless men of real learning were + initiated and were infatuated, among them the marvelous Pico della + Mirandola, Reuchlin, not less remarkable as humanist and Hebraist, who + would have run grave risk at the hands of the Inquisition at Cologne if he + had not been saved by Leo X. Cardan, a mathematician and physician, was + one of the learned men of the day most impregnated with Kabbalism. He + believed in a kind of infallibility of the inner sense, of the intuition, + and regarded as futile all sciences that proceeded by slow rational + operations. He believed himself a mage and magician. From vanity he spoke + of himself in the highest terms and from cynicism in the lowest. Doubt has + been cast on his sincerity and also on his sanity. + </p> + <p> + MAGIC.—There were also Paracelsus and Agrippa. Paracelsus, like + Cardan, believed in an intense light infinitely superior to bestial + reasoning and calls to mind certain philosophy of intuition of the present + day. He too believed himself a magician and physician, and effected cures + by the application of astrology to therapeutics. Agrippa did the same with + yet stranger phantasies, passing from absolute scepticism through + mysticism to magi and demonology; in his own time and in subsequent + centuries enjoying the reputation of a devil incarnate as man. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0015" id="link2HCH0015"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER IV. THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY + </h2> + <p> + It Is Fairly Accurate to Consider that from the Point of View of + Philosophy, the Middle Ages Lasted until Descartes. + </p> + <p> + Free-thinkers More or Less Disguised. + </p> + <p> + Partisans of Reason Apart from Faith, of Observation, and Of Experiment. + </p> + <p> + THE FREEDOM OF PHILOSOPHY: POMPONAZZO.—The freedom and even the + audacity of philosophy rapidly increased. Learned and convinced + Aristotelians were bent, either from sheer love of truth or from a more + secret purpose, on demonstrating to what extent Aristotle, accurately + read, was opposed to the teaching of the Church. For instance, Pomponazzo + revealed that nothing could be drawn from Aristotle in favour of the + immortality of the soul, in which he himself believed fervently, but in + which Aristotle did not believe, hence it was necessary to choose between + the Church and Aristotle; that without the immortality of the soul there + could be no rewards beyond the grave, which was entirely his own opinion, + but whoever should desire to offer excuses for Aristotle could say it was + precisely the existence of punishments and rewards which deprived virtue + of existence, which did away with virtue, since the good that is done for + the sake of reward or from fear of punishment is no longer good; that, + still according to Aristotle, there could never be miracles; that he, + Pomponazzo, believed in all the miracles recorded in the Scriptures; but + that Aristotle would not have believed in them, and could not have + believed in them, a fact which demanded consideration, not assuredly in + order to reject belief in miracles, but in order not to bestow on + Aristotle that confidence which for so long had been too readily placed in + him. + </p> + <p> + In the same way, he took up again the eternal question of the prescience + of God and of human liberty, and showed that no matter what had been said + it was necessary to choose: either we are free and God is not omnipotent, + or God is omnipotent and we are not free. To regard as true this latter + hypothesis, towards which the philosopher evidently leans, would cause God + to be the author of evil and of sin. It would not be impossible for God to + be the author of evil as an essential condition of good, for if evil were + not to exist then there could not be good; nor would it be impossible that + He should be the author, not of sin, but of the possibility of sin in + order that virtue might be possible, there being no virtue where it is + impossible to commit sin; but therein lies a mystery which faith alone can + solve, and which Aristotle at any rate has not solved, therefore let us + not place reliance on Aristotle. + </p> + <p> + This disguised freethinker, for he does not appear to me to be anything + else, was one of the most original thinkers of the period intermediate + between the Middle Ages and Descartes. + </p> + <p> + MICHAEL SERVETUS; VANINI.—Such instances of temerity were sometimes + fatal to their authors. Michael Servetus, a very learned Spanish physician + who perhaps discovered the circulation of the blood before Harvey, + disbelieved in the Trinity and in the divinity of Jesus, and, as he was a + Platonist, perceived no intermediaries between God and man save ideas. + Persecuted by the Catholics, he sought refuge at Geneva, believing Calvin + to be more merciful than the Inquisitors, and Calvin burned him alive. + </p> + <p> + Vanini, half a century later, that is at the commencement of the + seventeenth, a restless, vain, and insolent man, after a life full of + sudden changes of fortune, and yet distinguished, was burnt alive at + Toulouse for certain passages in his <i>De admirandis ... arcanis</i>, and + for having said that he would not express his opinion on the immortality + of the soul until he was old, a Jew, and a German. + </p> + <p> + BRUNO; CAMPANELLA.—Giordano Bruno, an astronomer and one of the + first to affirm that the sun was the centre of the world, professed, + despite certain precautions, a doctrine which confused God with the world + and denied or excluded creation. Giordano Bruno was arrested at Venice in + 1593, kept seven years in prison, and finally burnt at Rome in 1600. + </p> + <p> + Campanella, likewise an Italian, who spent twenty-seven years in a dungeon + for having conspired against the Spanish masters of his country, and who + died in exile in Paris in 1639, was a sceptic in philosophy, or rather an + anti-metaphysician, and, as would be said nowadays, a positivist. There + are only two sources of knowledge, observation and reasoning. Observation + makes us know things—is this true? May not the sensations of things + which we have be a simple phantasmagoria? No; for we have an internal + sense, a sense of our own, which cannot deceive us, which affirms our + existence (here is the <i>Cogito</i> of Descartes anticipated) and which, + at the same time, affirms that there are things which are not ourselves, + so that coincidently the ego and the non-ego are established. Yes, but is + this non-ego really what it seems? It is; granted; but what is it and can + we know what it is? Not without doubt, and here scepticism is unshakable; + but in that there is certitude of the existence of the non-ego, the + presumption is that we can know it, partially, relatively, very + relatively, while we remain infinitely distant from an absolute knowledge, + which would be divine. Therefore let us observe and experiment; let us + make the "history" of nature as historians make the history of the human + race. And this is the simple and solid philosophy of experiment. + </p> + <p> + But Campanella, like so many more, was a metaphysician possessed by the + devil of metaphysics, and after having imperiously recommended the writing + of only the history of nature, he himself wrote its romance as well. Every + being, he said (and the thought was a very fine one), exists on condition + of being able to exist, and on condition that there be an idea of which it + is the realization, and again on condition that nature is willing to + create it. In other words, nature can, knows what she wishes, and wishes. + Now all beings, in a greater or less degree according to their perfection + or imperfection, feel this triple condition of being able, knowing, and + wishing. Every being can, knows, and wishes, even inorganic matter (here + already is the world as will and representation of Schopenhauer), and God + is only absolute power, absolute knowledge, and absolute will. This is why + all creative things gravitate to God and desire to return to Him as to + their origin, and as the perfection of what they are: the universe has + nostalgia for God. + </p> + <p> + Campanella was also, as we should say nowadays, a sociologist. He made his + "Republic" as Plato had made his. The Republic of Campanella was called + the <i>City of the Sun</i>. It was a community republic, leavened with + aristocracy with "spiritual power" and "temporal power" somewhat after the + manner of Auguste Comte. Campanella was a great sower of ideas. + </p> + <p> + FRANCIS BACON.—Francis Bacon, lawyer, member of Parliament, Lord + Chancellor of England, personal friend of James I, friend, protector, and + perhaps collaborator with Shakespeare, overthrown as the result of + political animosity and relegated to private life, was a very learned man + with a marvellous mind. Like his namesake, Roger Bacon, but in an age more + favourable to intellectual reform, he attempted a sort of renewal of the + human mind (<i>Instauratio Magna</i>) or at least a radical revolution in + the methods and workings of the human mind. Although Francis Bacon + professed admiration for many of the thinkers of antiquity, he urged that + it was wrong to rely on them because they had not sufficiently observed; + one must not, like the schoolmen, have ideas <i>a priori</i>, which are + "idols," and there are idols of tribe, of party, of school, of eras; + intentions must not be perceived everywhere in nature, and we must not, + because the sun warms, believe it was created to warm, or because the + earth yields nourishment believe her creation was for the purpose of + feeding us, and that all things converge to man and are put at his + service. It is necessary to proceed by observation, by experiment, and + then by induction, but with prodigious mistrust of induction. Induction + consists in drawing conclusions from the particular to the general, from a + certain number of facts to a law. This is legitimate on condition that the + conclusion is not drawn from a few facts to a law, which is precipitate + induction, fruitful in errors; but from a very large number of facts to a + law, which even then is considered as provisional. As for metaphysics, as + for the investigation of universal law, that should be entirely separated + from philosophy itself, from the "primary philosophy" which does not lead + to it; it has its own field, which is that of faith: "Give to faith what + belongeth to faith." In the main he is uninterested in metaphysics, + believing them always to revolve in a circle and, I do not say, only + believes in science and in method, but has hope only from knowledge and + method, an enthusiast in this respect just as another might be about the + super-sensible world or about ideas, saying human knowledge and human + power are really coincident, and believing that knowledge will support + humanity in all calamities, will prolong human life, will establish a new + golden age, etc. + </p> + <p> + Moreover, let there be none of that eternal and unfounded fear that + knowledge will cause the disappearance of the religious feeling. With + profound conviction and judging by himself, Bacon said: "A little + philosophy inclineth a man's mind to atheism, but depth in philosophy + bringeth a man's mind about to religion." Such is true philosophy, + "subordinate to the object," attentive to the object, listening to the + voices of the world and only anxious to translate them into human + language: "that is true philosophy which renders the voices of the world + the most accurately possible, like an echo, which writes as if at the + dictation of the world itself, adding nothing of its own, only repeating + and <i>resounding</i>." + </p> + <p> + And, as a man is always of his time, he believed in alchemy and in the + possibility of transmuting base metals into gold. But note how he + understood it: "To create a new nature in a given body or to produce new + natures and to introduce them ... he who is acquainted with the forms and + modes of super-inducing yellowness, weight, ductility, fixity, fluidity, + solution, and the rest, with their gradations and methods, will see and + take care that these properties be united in some body, whence its + transformation into gold may follow." Modern chemistry, with scientific + methods highly analogous to those which Bacon indicated or foresaw, has + not made gold, which is not a very useful thing to do, but has done + better. + </p> + <p> + THOMAS HOBBES.—At the end of the sixteenth century, another + Englishman, Thomas Hobbes, began to think. He was, above all else, a + literary man and a sociologist; he translated Thucydides and Homer, he + wrote <i>Leviathan, or the Matter, Form, and Power of a Commonwealth</i>, + which is a manual of despotism, demonstrating that all men in a natural + state were beasts of prey with regard to one another, but that they + escaped this unpleasant fate by submission to a prince who has all rights + because he is perpetually saving his subjects from death, and who can + therefore impose on them whatever he pleases, even scientific dogma or + religious beliefs. Merely regarded as a philosopher, properly so called, + Hobbes has an important position in the history of ideas. Like Francis + Bacon, but more rigorously and authoritatively, he began by separating + metaphysics and theology from philosophy. Philosophy is the art of + thinking. That which is not sensible—mind, soul, God—cannot be + thought: can only be believed; philosophy does not deny all that; merely + it does not concern itself therewith. Here is the whole of positivism + established in principle. What we can think is what we feel. Things are + known to us only through sensations; a thought is a sensation, the human + mind is a compound of sensations. + </p> + <p> + No; for I can think of a thing without hearing, seeing, feeling it, etc. + </p> + <p> + This is because we have memory, which is itself a sensation; it is a + sensation which prolongs itself; to remember is to feel that one has felt; + it is to feel a former sensation which the brain is able to preserve. We + think only by combining current sensations with other current sensations, + or much more often indeed, thanks to memory, by combining current + sensations with older ones, or former sensations with each other. This is + but a fragile basis for knowledge and thought, for sensation is only a + modification of ourselves caused by an external object, and consequently + gives us nothing at all of the external object, and of itself the external + world is eternally unknown to us; but we combine with each other the + illusions that the external world deposits in us through the delusive or + doubtful intermediary of our senses. + </p> + <p> + When the sensation thus combined with other sensations has become thought, + then ideas begin to exist. They are products of sensation detached from + sensation. They are interassociated by laws that are obscure, yet which + can be vaguely perceived. They awake, so to speak, and call to one + another; every time an idea previously acquired reappears, it is followed + by the thought which accompanied it when it was acquired. In a + conversation a traitor is spoken of. Someone asks what was the value of a + piece of silver in ancient times. This appears incoherent; really it is a + natural and simple association of ideas in which there are few + intermediate steps. The person who listened as the traitor was mentioned + thought of Judas, who was the first traitor of whom he had heard, and of + the thirty pieces of silver, the price of the betrayal by Judas. The + association of ideas is more or less close, more or less loose; it is + disconnected in dreams, irregular in musing, close directly it is + dominated and in consequence directed by an end pursued, by a goal sought; + for then there is a desire to attain which associates nothing of itself, + but which, eliminating all ideas that are not pertinent to the end + pursued, permits only the association of those which have relation to it. + </p> + <p> + Seeing in the human soul only successive impulses arising from those first + impulses which are the sensations, Hobbes does not believe we are free to + do what we wish; we are carried away by the strongest impulse of our + internal impulses, desire, fear, aversion, love, etc. Nevertheless we + deliberate, we consider different courses to pursue and we decide on the + one we desire to choose. No; we do not deliberate, we only imagine we + deliberate. Deliberation is only a succession of different feelings, and + to the one that gains the day we give the name of volition. "In the + [so-called] deliberation, the final desire or the final fear is called + will." Therefore liberty has no more existence among men than among + animals; will and desire are only one and the same thing considered under + different aspects. + </p> + <p> + UTILITARIAN MORALITY.—Henceforth there is no morality; without the + power to will this and not to will that, there is no possible morality. + Hobbes retorts with "utilitarian morality": What man should seek is + pleasure, as Aristippus thought; but true pleasure—that which is + permanent and that which is useful to him. Now it is useful to be a good + citizen, a loyal subject, sociable, serviceable to others, careful to + obtain their esteem by good conduct, etc. Morality is interest rightly + understood, and interest rightly understood is absolutely blended with the + morality of duty. The criminal is not a criminal but an idiot; the honest + man is not an honest man but an intelligent one. Observe that a man is + hardly convinced when preached to in the name of duty, but always + convinced when addressed in the name of his own interest. + </p> + <p> + All this is fairly sensible; but from the time that freedom ceases there + can be no morality, <i>not even utilitarian</i>; for it is useless even + from the point of view of his own interests, to preach to a man who is + only a machine moved by the strongest force; and, if he be only that, to + lay down a moral code for him either from the point of view of his own + interests, or from that of morality, or from that of the love of God are + things which are the same and which are as absurd the one as the other. + All philosophy, which does not believe in human liberty, yet which + enunciates a system of morality, is in perpetual contradiction. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_PART3" id="link2H_PART3"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + PART III. MODERN TIMES + </h2> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0016" id="link2HCH0016"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER I. THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY + </h2> + <p> + Descartes. Cartesianism. + </p> + <p> + DESCARTES.—The seventeenth century, which was the greatest + philosophic century of modern times and perhaps of any time, began with + René Descartes. Descartes, born at La Haye in Touraine in 1596, of noble + family (his real name was des Quartes), was educated by the Jesuits of the + college of La Flèche, followed the military profession for several years, + then gave himself up to mathematics and became one of the greatest + mathematicians of Europe, traveled all over Europe for his own amusement + and instruction, wrote scientific and philosophical works, of which the + most famous are the <i>Discourse on</i> METHOD, the <i>Meditations</i>, + and the <i>Rules for the Control of the Mind</i>, resided sometimes in + Paris, sometimes in Holland, and finally, at fifty-four years of age, + unhappily attracted by the flattering invitations of Queen Christina of + Sweden, proceeded to Stockholm, where he succumbed in four months to the + severity of the climate. He died in February, 1650. + </p> + <p> + THE SYSTEM OF DESCARTES.—In the works of Descartes there are a + general system of philosophy, a psychology, and a method. This order is + here adopted because of the three, in Descartes; it is the third which is + the most important, and which has left the most profound traces. The + foundation of the system of Descartes is belief in God and in the goodness + of God. I say the foundation and not the starting-point. The + starting-point is another matter; but it will be clearly seen that the + foundation is what has just been stated. The starting-point is this: I do + not believe, provisionally, in anything, not wishing to take into account + what I have been taught. I doubt everything. Is there anything I cannot + doubt? It seems to me there is: I cannot doubt that I doubt. Now if I + doubt, I think; if I think, I am. There is one certainty, I am. + </p> + <p> + And having arrived there, Descartes is at a dead stop, for from the + certitude of one's own existence nothing can be deduced save the certitude + of one's existence. For instance, shall I believe in the existence of + everything that is not myself? There is no reason why I should believe in + it. The world may be a dream. But if I believe in God and in a God of + perfect goodness, I can then believe in something outside of myself, for + God not being able to deceive Himself or me, if He permits me to see the + external world, it is because this external world exists. There are + already, therefore, three things in which I believe: my own existence, + that of God, and that of the universe. Which of these beliefs is the + fundamental one? Evidently, the one not demonstrated; the axiom is that + upon which one rests to demonstrate everything except itself. Now of the + three things in which Descartes believed, his own existence is + demonstrated by the impossibility of thinking or feeling, without feeling + his own existence; the other is demonstrated by the existence of a good + God; the existence of a good God is demonstrated by nothing. It is + believed. Hence belief in a good God is Descartes' foundation. This has + not been introduced in order that he may escape from the <i>I am</i> at + which he came to a stop; that belief certainly existed previously, and if + he had recourse to it, it was because it existed first. Without that, he + had too much intellectual honesty to invent it for a particular need. He + had it, and he found it as it were in reserve when he asked himself if he + could go beyond <i>I am</i>. Here was his foundation; all the rest would + complete the proof. + </p> + <p> + THE EXISTENCE OF GOD.—Although Descartes rests on God as being his + first principle, he does not fail to prove His existence, and that is + begging the question, something proved by what has to be proved. For if + Descartes believed only in something outside himself because of a good + God, that Being outside himself, God, he can prove only because of the + existence of a good God, who cannot deceive us, and thus is God proved by + the belief in Him. That is begging the question. Descartes does not fail + to prove the existence of God by superabundance as it were; and this, too, + in itself indicates clearly that faith in God is the very foundation of + the philosophy of Descartes. After having taken it as the basis of + reasoning, he takes it as the goal of reasoning, which indicates that the + idea of God, so to speak, encircled his mind and that he found it at every + ultimate point of thought. + </p> + <p> + He proves it, therefore, first by an argument analogous to that of St. + Anselm, which is this: we, imperfect and finite, have the idea of a + perfect and infinite Being; we are not capable of this idea. Therefore it + must have come to us from a Being really perfect and infinite, and hence + this perfect Being exists. + </p> + <p> + Another proof, that of God regarded as cause. First: I exist. Who made me? + Was it myself? No, if it had been myself I should have endowed myself with + all the perfections of which I can conceive and in which I am singularly + deficient. Therefore it must be some other being who created me. It was my + parents. No doubt, but who created my parents and the parents of my + parents? One cannot go back indefinitely from cause to cause, and there + must have been a first one. + </p> + <p> + Secondly: even my own actual existence, my existence at this very moment, + is it the result of my existence yesterday? Nothing proves it, and there + is no necessity because I existed just now that I should exist at present. + There must therefore be a cause at each moment and a continuous cause. + That continuous cause is God, and the whole world is a creation + perpetually continued, and is only comprehensible as continuous creation + and is only explicable by a Creator. + </p> + <p> + THE WORLD.—Thus sure of himself, of God, and of the world, Descartes + studies the world and himself. In the world he sees souls and matter; + matter is substance in extensions, souls are substance not in extension, + spiritual substance. The extended substance is endowed with impulse. Is + the impulse self-generated, are the bodies self-impelled? No, they are + moved. What is the primary motive force? It is God. Souls are substances + without extension and motive forces. In this respect they are analogous to + God. They are united to bodies and act on them. How? This is an + impenetrable mystery, but they are closely and substantially united to the + bodies, which is proved by physical pains depressing the soul and moral + sufferings depressing the body; and they act on them, not by creating + movements, for the quantity of movements is always the same, but by + directing the movements after this fashion or that. Souls being spiritual, + there is no reason for their disaggregation, that is, their demise, and in + fact they do not die. + </p> + <p> + It is for this reason that Descartes lays such stress on animals not + having souls. If they had souls, the souls would be spiritual, they would + not be susceptible to disaggregation and would be immortal. "Save atheism, + there is no doctrine more dangerous and detestable than that," but animals + are soulless and purely mechanism; Descartes exerts himself to prove this + in great detail, and he thus escapes avowing the immortality of the souls + of animals, which is repugnant to him, or by allowing that they perish + with the bodies to be exposed to the objection: "Will it not be the same + with the souls of men?" + </p> + <p> + THE FREEDOM OF THE SOUL.—The human soul is endowed with freedom to + do good or evil. What proof is there of this freedom? First, the inward + feeling that we have. Every evident idea is true. Now, not only have we + the idea of this freedom, but it would be impossible for us not to have + it. Freedom "is known without proofs, merely by the experience we have of + it." It is by the feeling of our freedom, of our free-will that we + understand that we exist as a being, as a thing which is not merely a + thing. The true <i>ego</i> is the will. Even more than an intelligent + being, man is a free individual, and only feels himself to be a man when + feeling himself free, so that he might not believe himself to be + intelligent, nor think himself sensible, etc., but not to think himself + free would for him be moral suicide; and in fact he actually never does + anything which he does not believe himself to be free to do—that is, + which he does not believe that he might avoid doing, if he so wished. + Those who say, "It is simply the feeling that it is better for ourselves + which tends to make us do this instead of doing that," are deeply in + error. They forget that we often prefer the worst for ourselves in order + to prove to ourselves that we are free and therefore have no other <i>motive + power than our own freedom</i>. (And this is exactly what contemporaneous + philosophy has thus formulated: "Will is neither determinate nor + indeterminate, it is determinative.") "Even when a very obvious reason + leads us to a thing, although morally speaking it is difficult for us to + do the opposite, nevertheless, speaking absolutely, we can, for we are + always free to prevent ourselves from pursuing a good thing clearly known + ... provided only that <i>we think it is beneficial thereby to give + evidence of the truth of our free-will</i>." It is the pure and simple + wish to be free which <i>creates an action;</i> it is the all-powerful + liberty. + </p> + <p> + As has been happily observed, in relation to the universe the philosophy + of Descartes is a mechanical philosophy; in relation to man the philosophy + of Descartes is a philosophy of will. As has also been remarked, there are + very striking analogies between Corneille and Descartes from the point of + view of the apotheosis of the will, and the <i>Meditations</i> having + appeared after the great works of Corneille, it is not so much that + Corneille was a Cartesian, as that Descartes was a follower of Corneille. + </p> + <p> + PSYCHOLOGY OF DESCARTES.—Descartes has almost written a psychology, + what with his <i>Treatise on the Passions</i> and his letters and, + besides, certain passages in his <i>Meditations</i>. The soul thinks and + has passions. There are three kinds of ideas, the factitious, the + adventitious, and the innate; the factitious ideas are those which the + imagination forms; the adventitious ideas are those suggested by the + external world through the intermediary of the senses; the innate ideas + are those constituting the mind itself, the conditions under which it + thinks and apart from which it cannot think: we cannot conceive an object + not extended, nor an object apart from time, nor anything without a cause; + the ideas of time, space, and cause are innate ideas; we cannot conceive + ourselves as other than free; the idea of liberty is an innate idea. + </p> + <p> + The soul has passions; it is therein that, without dependence on the body, + it has intimate relations with and is modified by it, not radically, but + in its daily life. There are operations of the soul which cannot strictly + be termed passions, and yet which are directed or at least <i>influenced</i> + by the body. Memory is passive, and consequently memory is a species of + passion. The lively sensations which the body transmits to the brain leave + impressions (Malebranche would say "traces"), and according to these + impressions the soul is moved a second or a third time, and that is what + is called memory. "The impressions of the brain render it suitable to stir + the soul in the same way as it has been stirred before, and also to make + it recollect something, just as the folds in a piece of paper or linen + make it more suitable to be folded anew as it was before than if it had + never been thus folded." Similarly, the association of ideas is passive, + and in consequence is a kind of passion. The association of ideas is the + fact that thought passes along the same path it has already traversed, and + follows in its labyrinth the thread which interlinks its thoughts, and + this thread is the traces which thoughts have left in the brain. In + abandoning ourselves to the association of ideas, we are passive and we + yield ourselves freely to a passion. That is so true that current speech + itself recognizes this: musing is a passion, it is possible to have a + passion for musing, and musing is nothing else than the association of + ideas in which the will does not intervene. + </p> + <p> + THE PASSIONS.—Coming to the passions strictly speaking, there are + some which are of the soul and only of the soul; the passion for God is a + passion of the soul, the passion for liberty is a passion of the soul; but + there are many more which are the effects of the union of the soul with + the body. These passions are excited in the soul by a state of the body or + a movement of the body or of some part of the body; they are "emotions" of + the soul corresponding to "movements" of the machine. All passions have + relation to the desire for pleasure and the fear of pain, and according as + they relate to the former or the latter are they expansive or oppressive. + There are six principal passions, of which all the rest are only + modifications: admiration, love, desire, joy, having relation to the + appetite of happiness; hatred, sadness, having relation to the fear of + pain. "All the passions are good and may become bad" (Descartes in this + deviates emphatically from Stoicism for which the passions are simply + maladies of the soul). All passions are good in themselves. They are + destined (this is a remarkable theory) to cause the duration of thoughts + which would otherwise pass and be rapidly effaced; by reason of this, they + cause man to act; if he were only directed by his thoughts, unaccompanied + by his passions, he would never act, and if it be recognized that man is + born for action, it will at the same time be recognized that it is + necessary he should have passions. + </p> + <p> + But, you will say, there can be good passions (of a nature to give force + to just ideas) and evil passions. + </p> + <p> + No, they are all good, but all also have their bad side, their deviation, + rather, which enables them to become bad. Therefore, in each passion no + matter what it be, it is always possible to distinguish between the + passion itself, which is always good, and the excess, the deviation, the + degradation or corruption of this passion which constitutes, if it be + desired to call it so, an evil passion, and this is what Descartes + demonstrates, passion by passion, in the fullest detail, in his <i>Treatise + on the Passions</i>. + </p> + <p> + THE PART OF THE SOUL.—If it is thus, what will be the part of the + soul (the soul is the will)? It will be to abandon itself to good + passions, or more accurately to the good that is in all passions, and to + reduce the passions to be "nothing more than themselves." In courage, for + example, there is courage and temerity. The action of the will, + enlightened by the judgment, will consist in reducing courage to be + nothing but courage. In fear, there is cowardice and there is the feeling + of self-preservation which, according to Descartes, is the foundation of + fear and which is a very good passion. The action of the soul is to reduce + fear to simple prudence. + </p> + <p> + But <i>how</i> will the will effect these metamorphoses or at least these + departures, these separations, these reductions to the due proportion? <i>Directly</i> + it can effect <i>nothing</i> upon the passions; it cannot <i>remove</i> + them; it cannot even remove the baser portions of them; but it can + exercise influence over them by the intermediary of reasoning; it can lead + them to the attentive consideration of the thought that they carry with + them, and by this consideration modify them. For instance, if it is a + question of fear, the soul forces fear to consider that the peril is much + less than was imagined, and thus little by little brings it back to simple + prudence. + </p> + <p> + Note that this method, although indirect, is very potent; for it ends by + really transforming the passions into their opposites. Persuade fear that + there is less peril in marching forward than in flight and that the most + salutary flight is the flight forward and you have changed fear to + courage.—But such an influence of the will over the passions is + extraordinarily unlikely: it will never take place.—Yes, by habit! + Habit too is a passion, or, if you will, a passive state, like that of + memory or the association of ideas, and there are men possessed only of + that passion. But the will, by the means which have been described, by + imposing an act, a first act, creates a commencement of habit, by imposing + a second confirms that habit, by imposing a third strengthens it, and so + on. In plain words, the will, by reasoning with the passions and reasoning + with them incessantly, brings them back to what is good in them and ends + by bringing them back there permanently, so that it arrives at having only + the passions it desires, or, if you prefer it, for it is the same thing, + at having only the passion for good. Morality consists in loving noble + passions, as was later observed by Vauvenargues, and that means to love + all the passions, each for what is good in it, that is to reduce each + passion to what real goodness is inherent in it, and that is to gather all + the passions into one, which is the passion of duty. + </p> + <p> + THE METHOD OF DESCARTES.—As has been observed, not only had + Descartes influence through all that he wrote, but it was by his method + that he has exerted the greatest and most durable sway, and that is why we + conclude with the examination of his method. It is all contained in this: + to accept nothing as true except what is evident; to accept as true all + that is evident. Descartes therefore made evidence the touchstone of + certainty. But mark well the profound meaning of this method: what is it + that gives me the assurance of the evidence of such or such an idea? How + shall I know that such an idea is really evident to me? Because I see it + in perfect clearness? No, that does not suffice: the evidence may be + deceptive; there can be false evidence; all the wrong ideas of the + philosophers of antiquity, save when they were sophists, had for them the + character of being evident. Why? Why should error be presented to the mind + as an evident truth? Because in truth, in profound truthfulness, it must + be admitted that judgment does not depend upon the intelligence. And on + what does it depend? On will, on free-will. This is how. No doubt, error + depends on our judgment, but our judgment depends on our will in the sense + that it depends on us whether we adhere to our judgment without it being + sufficiently precise or do not adhere to it because it is not sufficiently + precise: "If I abstain from giving my judgment on a subject when I do not + conceive it with sufficient clearness and distinction, it is evident that + I shall not be deceived." Evidence is therefore not only a matter of + judgment, of understanding, of intelligence, it is a matter of energetic + will and of freedom courageously acquired. We are confronted with evidence + when, with a clear brain, we are capable, in order to accept or refuse + what it lays before us, of acting "after such a fashion," of having put + ourselves in such a state of the soul that we feel "that no external force + can constrain us to think in such or such a way." + </p> + <p> + These external forces are authority, prejudices, personal interest, or + that of party. The faculty of perceiving evidence is therefore the triumph + both of sound judgment in itself and of a freedom of mind which, supposing + probity, scrupulousness, and courage, and perhaps the most difficult of + all courage, supposes a profound and vigorous morality. Evidence is given + only to men who are first highly intelligent and next, or rather before + all else, are profoundly honest. Evidence is not a consequence of + morality; but morality is the <i>condition</i> of evidence. + </p> + <p> + There is the foundation of the method of Descartes; add to it his advice + on the art of reasoning, which even in his time was not at all novel, but + which with him is very precise; not to generalize too hastily, not to be + put off with words, but to have a clear definition of every word, etc., + and thus a sufficient idea of it will be obtained. + </p> + <p> + Now first, to this method Descartes was unfaithful, as always happens, and + often accepted the suggestions of his magnificent imagination as the + evidences of his reason; secondly, the touchstone of evidence is certainly + the best, but is far from being infallible (and Vico has ridiculed it with + as much sense as wit) and the freest mind can still find false things + evident; yet, thirdly, favouring freedom of research self-controlled, + individual and scornful of all authority, the method of Descartes has + become a banner, a motto, and a flag for all modern philosophy. + </p> + <p> + DESCARTES THE FATHER OF MODERN PHILOSOPHY.—And from all that the + result has been that all modern philosophy, with few exceptions, has + recognised Descartes as its parent—that individual evidence, if it + may be thus expressed, favouring temerity and each believing himself + closer to the truth the more he differed from others, and consequently was + unable to suspect himself of being subject to influences, individual + evidence has provided a fresh opportunity for self-deception; finally, + that Descartes, by a not uncommon metamorphosis, by means of his system + which he did not follow, has become the head or the venerated ancestor of + doctrines which he would have detested and which he already did detest + more than all others. Because he said that evidence alone and the free + investigation of evidence led to truth, he has become the ancestor of the + sceptics who are persuaded that surrender must be made only to evidence + and that evidence cannot be found; and he has become the ancestor of the + positivists who believe that evidence certainly exists somewhere, but not + in metaphysics or in theodicy, or in knowledge of the soul, of + immortality, and of God, branches of knowledge which surpass our means of + knowing, which are in fact outside knowledge. So that this man who + conceived more than any man, this man who so often constructed without a + sure foundation, and this man, yet again, as has been aptly said, who + always thought by innate ideas, by his formula has become the master and + above all the guarantor of those who are the most reserved and most + distrustful as to philosophic construction, innate ideas, and imagination. + This does not in the least diminish his brilliant merit; it is only one of + those changes of direction in which the history of ideas abounds. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0017" id="link2HCH0017"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER II. CARTESIANS + </h2> + <p> + All the Seventeenth Century was under the Influence of Descartes. + Port-Royal, Bossuet, Fénelon, Malebranche, Spinoza, Leibnitz. + </p> + <p> + CARTESIAN INFLUENCE.—Nearly all the seventeenth century was + Cartesian, and in the general sense of the word, not only as supporters of + the method of evidence, but as adherents of the general philosophy of + Descartes. Gassendi (a Provençal, and not an Italian), professor of + philosophy at Aix, subsequently in Paris, was not precisely a faithful + disciple of Descartes, and he opposed him several times; he had leanings + towards Epicurus and the doctrine of atoms; he drew towards Hobbes, but he + was also a fervent admirer of Bacon, and so approached Descartes, who + thought very highly of him, though impatiently galled by his criticisms. + After the example of Epicurus he was the most sober and austere of men, + and of the two it was Descartes rather than he who was Epicurean in the + common use of the word. According to a tradition, which to my mind rests + on insufficient proof, he was an instructor of Molière. + </p> + <p> + All the thinkers of the seventeenth century came more or less profoundly + under the Cartesian influence: Pascal, Bossuet, Fénelon, Arnauld, and all + Port-Royal. This influence was to diminish only in the eighteenth century, + though kept up by the impenitent Fontenelle, but outweighed by that of + Locke, to reappear very vigorously in the nineteenth century in France in + the school of Maine de Biran and of Cousin. + </p> + <p> + MALEBRANCHE.—A separate niche must be made for the Cartesians, + almost as great as Descartes, who filled the seventeenth century with + their renown,—the Frenchman Malebranche, the Dutchman Spinoza, and + the German Leibnitz. Pushing the theories of Descartes further than + Descartes would himself in all probability have desired to, from what + Descartes had said that it was only <i>through God</i> that we perceived + accurately, Malebranche declared that it was only <i>in God</i> that we + perceived accurately, and fundamentally this is the same idea; it can only + be deemed that Malebranche is the more precise: "God alone is known by + Himself [is believed in without uncertainty]; there is only He that we can + see in immediate and direct perspective." All the rest we see in Him, in + His light, in the light He creates in our minds. When we see, it is that + we are in Him. Evidence is divine light. He is the link of ideas. (And + thus Malebranche brought Plato near to Descartes and showed that, without + the latter being aware of it, they both said the same thing.) God is + always the cause and as He is the cause of all real things, He is cause + also of all truths, and as He is everywhere in real objects, He is also + everywhere in the true ideas which we can have, or rather in which we can + participate. When we seek a truth we pray without thinking we do so; + attention is a prayer. + </p> + <p> + In the same way, from the saying of Descartes that the universe is a + continuous creation, Malebranche deduced or rather concluded that our + thoughts and actions are acts of God. There can be no action of the body + on the soul to produce ideas; that would be inconceivable; but on the + occasion, for instance, of our eyes resting on an object, God gives us an + idea of that object, whether in conformity or not we cannot tell; but at + any rate He gives us that idea of the object which He wishes us to have. + </p> + <p> + There is no action of our soul on our body; that would be inconceivable. + But God to our will adds a force having a tendency towards goodness as a + rule, and to each of our volitions adds a force tending to its execution + and capable of executing it. + </p> + <p> + Then, when our will is evil and we execute it, does God sin in our name? + </p> + <p> + Certainly not; because sin is not an act; it consists in doing nothing; it + consists precisely in the soul not acting on the body; therefore it is not + a force but a weakness. Sin is that God has withdrawn Himself from us. The + sinner is only a being who is without strength because he is lacking in + grace. + </p> + <p> + The principle of morality is the respect for order and the love of order. + That makes two degrees, the first of which is regularity and the second + virtue. To conform to order is highly rational but without merit (<i>e.g.</i>, + to give money to the poor from habit or possibly from vanity). To love + order and to desire that it should be greater, more complete, and nearer + to the will of God, is to adhere to God, to live in God, just as to see + rightly is to see in God. All morality, into the details of which we will + not enter, evolves from the love of order. The universe is a vast + mechanism, as was stated by Descartes, set in motion and directed by God—that + is to say, by the laws established by God; for God acts only by general + dispositions (which are laws) and not by particular dispositions. In other + words, there exists a will, but there are no volitions. + </p> + <p> + MIRACLES.—But then you will say there are no miracles; for miracle + is precisely a particular will traversing and interrupting the general + will. + </p> + <p> + To begin with, there are very few miracles, which therefore permits order + to subsist; it would be only if there were incessant miracles that order + would be non-existent. Next, a miracle is a warning God gives to men + because of their weakness, to remind them that behind the laws there is a + Lawgiver, behind the general dispositions a Being who disposes. Because of + their intellectual weakness, if they never saw any derogation from the + general laws they would take them to be fatalities. A miracle is a grace + intervening in things, just as grace properly so-called intervenes in + human actions. And it is not contradictory to the general design of God, + since by bringing human minds back to the truth that there is a Being who + wills, it accustoms them to consider all general laws as permanent acts, + but also as the acts of the Being who wills. The miracle has the virtue of + making everything in the world miraculous, which is true. Hence the + miracle confirms the idea of order. Therein, perhaps alone, the exception + proves the rule. + </p> + <p> + SPINOZA.—Spinoza, who during his life was a pure Stoic and the + purest of Stoics, polishing the lenses of astronomical telescopes in order + to gain his living, refusing all pensions and all the professorial + positions offered to him, and living well-nigh on nothing, had read + Descartes and, to conform to the principle of evidence, had begun by + renouncing his religion, which was that of the Jews. His general outlook + on the world was this: There is only one God. God is all. Only He has His + attributes—that is to say, His manners of being and His modes, that + is His modifications, as the sun (merely a comparison) has as its manners + of being, its roundness, colour, and heat, as modifications its rays, + terrestrial heat, direct and diffused light, etc. Now God has two + attributes, thought and extension, as had already been observed by + Descartes; and for modifications He has exactly all we can see, touch, or + feel, etc. The human soul is an attribute of God, as is everything else; + it is an attribute of God in His power. It is not free, for all that comes + from God, all that <i>is of God</i>, is a regular and necessary + development of God Himself. "There is nothing contingent" [nothing which + may either happen or not happen]. All things are determined, by the + necessity of the divine nature, to exist and to act in a given manner. + There is therefore no free-will in the soul, the soul is determined to + will this or that by a cause which is itself determined by another and + that by another, and so on to infinity. + </p> + <p> + Nevertheless we believe ourselves to be free and according to the + principle of evidence we are; for nothing is more evident to us than our + liberty. We are as intimately convinced of our liberty as of our existence + and we <i>all</i> affirm, I am free,—with the same emphasis that + Descartes affirms: I am. I am and I am free are the two things it is + impossible for man to doubt, no matter what effort he makes. + </p> + <p> + No doubt, but it is an illusion. It is the illusion of a being who feels + himself as cause, but does not feel himself as effect. Try to imagine a + billiard ball which feels it moves others, but which does not feel that it + is moved. What we call decision is an idea which decides us because it + exercises more power over us than the others do; what we term deliberation + is a hesitancy between two or three ideas which at the moment have equal + force; what we name volition is an idea, and what we call will is our + understanding applied to facts. We do not want to fight; we conceive the + idea of fighting and the idea carries us away; we do not want to hang + ourselves; we have the obsessing idea of hanging ourselves and this + thought runs away with us. + </p> + <p> + HIS MORAL SYSTEM.—Spinoza wrote a system of morality. Is it not + radically impossible to write a system of morality when the author does + not believe in free-will? The admirable originality of Spinoza, even + though his idea can be contested, is precisely that morality depends on + belief in the necessity of all things—that is, the more one is + convinced of this necessity so much the more does one attain high morality—that + is, the more one believes oneself free the more one is <i>immoral</i>. The + man who believes himself free claims to run counter to the universal + order, and morality precisely is adherence to it; the man who believes + himself free seeks for an individual good just as if there could be an + individual good, just as if the best for each one were not to submit to + the necessary laws of everything, laws which constitute what is good; the + man who thinks himself free sets himself against God, believes himself God + since he believes himself to be creator of what he does, and since he + believes himself capable of deranging something in the mechanism and of + introducing a certain amount of movement. As a matter of fact, he does + nothing of the kind; but he believes that he does it, and this mere + thought, false and low as it is, keeps him in the most miserable condition + of life; to sum up, a man who believes himself free may not perhaps be an + atheist, but he is ungodly. + </p> + <p> + On the contrary, the man who does not believe himself free believes he is + in the hands of God, and that is the beginning of wisdom and the beginning + of virtue. We are in the hands of God as the clay is in those of the + potter; the mad vase would be the one which reproached the potter for + having made it small instead of big, common instead of decorative. It is + the beginning of wisdom to believe oneself in the hands of God; to see + Him, to see Him the least indistinctly that we can, therein lies the + highest wisdom; we must see His designs, or at least His great design and + associate ourselves with it, thus becoming not only part of Him, which we + always are, but a conscient part of Him. + </p> + <p> + This is the love of God, and the love of God is virtue itself. We ought to + love God without consideration of the good He can do us and of the + penalties He can inflict upon us; for to love God from love of a + beneficent God or from fear of a punitive God is not to love God but to + love oneself. + </p> + <p> + THE PASSIONS.—We have our passions as enemies and as obstacles to + our elevation to this semi-perfection. It is they which cause us to do + immoral acts. "Immoral," has that a meaning from the moment that we do + nothing which we are not obliged to do? Yes, just as when led by our + deceitful mind we have arrived necessarily at a false idea, the fact of + this thought being necessary does not prevent it from being false; we may + have been led by necessity to commit a villainous action, but that does + not prevent its being immoral. The passions are our imperfections, + omissions, gaps in a soul which is not full of the idea of God and of + universal order and the love of God and of universal order, and which, in + consequence, lives individually—that is, separated from the + universe. + </p> + <p> + The passions are infinite in number and Spinoza, in a bulky volume, + furnished a minute and singularly profound description of the principal + ones alone, into the details of which we regret that we cannot enter. The + <i>Ethics</i> of Spinoza is an incomparable masterpiece. + </p> + <p> + The study of the passions is very salutary, because in studying them one + gets so detached from them that one can perceive their emptiness, their + meanness, and their puerile, nay, even bestial character. It might even be + added that the mere thought of studying them is already an act of + detachment in reference to them. "Thou wouldst not seek Me, hadst thou not + already found Me," said God to Pascal. "Thou wouldst not make + investigations about us, hadst thou not already quitted us," the passions + might say to the philosopher. + </p> + <p> + SANCTIONS OF MORALITY.—What are the sanctions of morality? They are + necessary sanctions; just as everything is necessary and may even be said + to be mechanical. There is neither merit nor demerit and the criminal is + not culpable; only he is outside order, and everything must be in order. + "He who is maddened by the bite of a mad dog is certainly innocent; yet + anyone has the right to suffocate him. In the same way, the man who cannot + govern his passions by fear of the law is a very excusable invalid; yet he + cannot enjoy peace of mind, or the knowledge of God, or even the love of + God, and it is necessary that he perish." Through death he has re-entered + within order. + </p> + <p> + But does the sanction of beyond-the-grave exist, and is the soul immortal, + and are we to be rewarded therein in another life? The conclusion of + Spinoza on this matter is hesitating, but at the risk of misrepresenting + it, which I fear to do, it seems to me that it can be thus summed up—<i>The + soul makes itself immortal</i>, in proportion as by the knowledge and love + of God it participates more in God. In proportion it makes itself divine; + and approaching perfection, by the same progress it also approaches + immortality. It is conceivable that by error and sin it kills itself, and + by virtue renders itself imperishable. This immortality is not or does not + seem to be personal, it is literally a definite re-entry into the bosom of + God; Spinozian immortality would therefore be a prolongation of the same + effort which we make in this life to adhere to universal order; the + recompense for having adhered to it here below is to be absorbed in it + there, and in that lies true beatitude. Here below we ought to see + everything from the point of view of eternity (<i>sub specie aeternitatis</i>), + and this is a way of being eternal; elsewhere we shall be in eternity + itself. + </p> + <p> + LEIBNITZ.—Leibnitz possessed a universal mind, being historian, + naturalist, politician, diplomatist, scholar, theologian, mathematician; + here we will regard him only as philosopher. For Leibnitz the basis, the + substance of all beings is not either thought or extension as with + Descartes, but is force, productive of action. "What does not act does not + exist." Everything that exists is a force, either action or tendency to + action. And force, all force has two characteristics: it desires to do, it + wishes to think. The world is the graduated compound of all these forces. + Above all there is the supreme force, God, who is infinite force, infinite + thought; by successive descents those base and obscure forces are reached + which seem to have neither power nor thought, and yet have a minimum of + power and even of thought, so to speak, latent. God thinks and acts + infinitely; man thinks and acts powerfully, thanks to reason, which + distinguishes him from the rest of creation; the animal acts and thinks + dimly, but it does act and think, for it has a soul composed of memory and + of the results and consequences of memory, and by parenthesis + "three-fourths of our own actions are governed by memory, and most + frequently we act like animals"; plants act, and if they do not think, at + least feel (which is still thought), though more dimly than animals; and + finally in the mineral kingdom the power of action and thought slumber, + but are not non-existent since they can be transformed into plants, + animals, and men, into living matter which feels and thinks. + </p> + <p> + Therefore, as was later on to be maintained by Schopenhauer, everything is + full of souls, and of souls which are forces as well as intelligences. The + human soul is a force too, like the body. Between these two forces, which + seem to act on one another and which certainly act in concert in such + fashion that the movement desired by the soul is executed by the body or + that the soul obviously assents to a movement desired by the body, what + can be the affinity and the relation, in what consists their concurrence + and concord? Leibnitz (and there was already something of the same nature + suggested by Descartes) believes that all the forces of the world act, + each spontaneously; but that among all the actions they perform there + exists an agreement imposed by God, a concord establishing universal + order, a "preestablished harmony" causing them all to co-operate in the + same design. Well, then, between the soul, this force, and the body, this + force also, this harmony reigns as between any force whatever in nature + and one and all of the others; and that is the explanation of the union + and concord between the soul and the body. Imagine two well-constructed + clocks wound up by the same maker; they indicate the same hour, and it + might appear that this one directs the other, or that the other directs + the first. All the forces of the world are clocks which agree with each + other, because they have been regulated in advance by the divine + clockmaker, and they all indicate the eternal hour. + </p> + <p> + THE RADICAL OPTIMISM OF LEIBNITZ.—From all these general views on + matter, on mind and on the mind, Leibnitz arrived at a radical optimism + which is the thing for which he has since been most ridiculed, and by + which, at any rate, he has remained famous. He believes that all is good, + despite the evil of which no one can dispute the existence; and he + believes that all is the best <i>possible</i> in the best of <i>possible</i> + worlds. In fact, God is supreme wisdom and supreme goodness; that was + quite evident to Descartes, who in the matter of evidence was not easily + satisfied. This perfect wisdom and perfect goodness could choose only what + is best.—But yet evil exists! Diminish it as much as you choose, it + still exists.—It exists by a necessity inherent in what is created. + Everything created is imperfect. God alone is perfect; what is imperfect + is by its definition evil mingled with good. Evil is only the boundary of + good, where God was compelled to stop in creating beings and things other + than Himself, and if He had created only according to absolute goodness, + He could have created only Himself. And that is the precise meaning of + this phrase "the best of possible worlds"; the world is perfect so far as + that which is created, and therefore imperfect, can be perfect; so far as + what is not God can be divine; the world is God Himself as far as He can + remain Himself whilst being anything else than Himself. THE THREE EVILS.—Let + us distinguish in order to comprehend better. There are three evils: the + metaphysical, the physical, and the moral. Metaphysical evil is this very + fact of not being perfection; it is natural enough that what emanates only + from perfection should not be perfection. Physical evil is suffering; God + cannot <i>will</i> suffering, desire it, or cherish it; but He can permit + it as a means of good, as a condition of good; for there would be no moral + good if there were not occasion for struggle, and there would be no + occasion for struggling if physical evil did not exist; imagine a + paradise; all the inhabitants merely exist and never have cause to show + the slightest endurance, the least courage, the smallest virtue. And + finally, as to moral evil, which is sin, God can even less desire that it + should exist, but He can admit its existence, <i>allow it to be</i>, to + afford men occasion for merit or demerit. Nothing is more easy than to + criticize God whilst considering only a portion of His work and not + considering it as a whole. He must have created it to be a whole and it is + as a whole that it must be judged. And precisely because the whole cannot + be comprehended by anyone, "hold thy peace, foolish reason," as Pascal + said, and judge not or judge <i>a priori</i>, since here it is not + possible to judge by experience; and declare that the Perfect can have + willed only the most perfect that is possible. + </p> + <p> + THE POSSIBLE AND THE IMPOSSIBLE.—There still remains the fundamental + objection: to reduce God to the conditions of the possible is to limit + Him, and it is useless to say that God is justified if He has done all the + good possible. He is not; the words "possible" and "impossible" having no + meaning to Him who is omnipotent, and by definition infinite power could + effect the impossible. + </p> + <p> + Yes, Leibnitz replies, there is a metaphysical impossibility, there is an + impossibility in the infinite; this impossibility is absurdity, is + contradiction. Could God make the whole smaller than the part or any line + shorter than a straight one? Reason replies in the negative. Is God + therefore limited? He is limited by the absurd and that means He is + unlimited; for the absurd is a falling away. It is therefore credible that + the mixture of evil and good is a metaphysical necessity to which I will + not say God submits, but in which He acts naturally, and that the absence + of evil is a metaphysical contradiction, an absurdity in itself, which God + cannot commit precisely because He is perfect; and no doubt, instead of + drawing this conclusion, we should actually see it, were the totality of + things, of their relations, of their concordance, and of their harmony + known to us. + </p> + <p> + The optimism of Leibnitz was ridiculed specially in the <i>Candide</i> of + Voltaire, ingeniously defended by Rousseau, magnificently defended by + Victor Hugo in the following verses, well worthy of Leibnitz: + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "Oui peut-être au delà de la sphère des nues, + Au sein de cet azur immobile et dormant, + Peut-être faites-vous des choses inconnues + Où la douleur de l'homme entre comme élément." +</pre> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0018" id="link2HCH0018"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER III. THE ENGLISH PHILOSOPHERS OF THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY + </h2> + <p> + Locke: His Ideas on Human Liberty, Morality, General Politics, and + Religious Politics. + </p> + <p> + LOCKE.—Locke, very learned in various sciences—physics, + chemistry, medicine, often associated with politics, receiving + enlightenment from life, from frequent travels, from friendships with + interesting and illustrious men, always studying and reflecting until an + advanced old age, wrote only carefully premeditated works: his <i>Treatise + of Government</i> and <i>Essay on the Human Understanding</i>. + </p> + <p> + Locke appears to have written on the understanding only in order to refute + the "innate ideas" of Descartes. For Locke innate ideas have no existence. + The mind before it comes into contact with the external world is a blank + sheet, and there is nothing in the mind which has not first come through + the senses. What, then, are ideas? They are sensations registered by the + brain, and they are also sensations elaborated and modified by reflection. + These ideas then commingle in such a manner as to form an enormous mass of + combinations. They are commingled either in a natural or an artificial + manner. In a natural manner, that is in a way conforming to the great + primary ideas given us by reflection, the idea of cause, the idea of end, + the idea of means to an end, the idea of order, etc., and it is the + harmony of these ideas which is commonly termed reason; they become + associated by accident, by the effects of emotion, by the effect of + custom, etc., and then they give birth to prejudices, errors, and + superstitions. The passions of the soul are aspects of pleasure and pain. + The idea of a possible pleasure gives birth in us to a desire which is + called ambition, love, covetousness, gluttony; the idea of a possible pain + gives birth in us to fear and horror, and this fear and horror is called + hatred, jealousy, rage, aversion, disgust, scorn. At bottom we have only + two passions, the desire of enjoyment, and the fear of suffering. + </p> + <p> + THE FREEDOM OF MAN.—Is man free? Appealing to experience and making + use only of it and not of intimate feeling, Locke declares in the + negative. A will always seems to him determined by another will, and this + other by another to infinity, or by a motive, a weight, a motive power + which causes a leaning to right or left. Will certainly exists—that + is to say, an exact and lively desire to perform an action, or to continue + an action, or to interrupt an action, but this will is not free, for to + represent it as free is to represent it as capable of wishing what it does + not wish. The will is an anxiety to act in such or such a fashion, and + this anxiety, on account of its character of anxiety, of strong emotion, + of tension of the soul, appears to us free, appears to us an internal + force which is self-governed and independent; we feel consciousness of + will in the effort. This tension must not be denied, but it must be + recognised as the effect of a potent desire which the obstacle excites; + this tension, therefore, is an indication of nothing except the potency of + the desire and the existence of an obstacle. Now this desire, so potent + that it is irritated by the obstacle, and, so to speak, unites us against + it, is a passion dominating and filling our being; so that we are never + more swayed by passion than when we believe ourselves to be exercising our + will, and in consequence the more we desire the less are we free. + </p> + <p> + It is not essential formally and absolutely to confound will with desire. + Overpowered by heat, we desire to drink cold water, and because we know + that that would do us harm we have the will not to drink; but although + this is an important distinction it is not a fundamental one; what incites + us to drink is a passion, what prevents us is another passion, one more + general and stronger, the desire not to die, and because this passion by + meeting with and fighting another produces in all our being a powerful + tension, it is none the less a passion, even if we ought not to say that + it is a still more impassioned passion. + </p> + <p> + LOCKE'S THEORY OF POLITICS.—In politics Locke was the adversary of + Hobbes, whose theories of absolutism have already been noticed. He did not + believe that the natural state was the war of all against all. He believed + men formed societies not to escape cannibalism, but more easily to + guarantee and protect their natural rights: ownership, personal liberty, + legitimate defence. Society exists only to protect these rights, and the + reason of its existence lies in this duty to defend them. The sovereign + therefore is not the saviour of the nation, he is its law-maker and + magistrate. If he violates the rights of man, he acts so directly contrary + to his mission and his mandate that insurrection against him is + legitimate. The "wise Locke," as Voltaire always called him, was the + inventor of the Rights of Man. + </p> + <p> + In religious politics he was equally liberal and advocated the separation + of Church and State; the State, according to him, should not have any + religion of its own, its province being only to protect equally the + liberty of all denominations. Locke was discussed minutely by Leibnitz, + who, without accepting the innate ideas of Descartes, did not accept the + ideas through sensation of Locke, and said: "There is nothing in the + intelligence which has not first been in the senses," granted ... "except + the intelligence itself." The intelligence has not innate ideas born ready + made; but it possesses forms of its own in which the ideas arrange + themselves and take shape, and this is the due province of the + intelligence. And it was these forms which later on Kant was to call the + categories of the intellect, and at bottom Descartes meant nothing else by + his innate ideas. Locke exerted a prodigious and even imperious influence + over the French philosophers of the eighteenth century. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0019" id="link2HCH0019"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER IV. THE ENGLISH PHILOSOPHERS OF THE + </h2> + <h3> + EIGHTEENTH CENTURY + </h3> + <p> + Berkeley: Highly Idealist Philosophy which Regarded Matter as + Non-existent. + </p> + <p> + David Hume: Sceptical Philosophy. + </p> + <p> + The Scottish School: Common Sense Philosophy. + </p> + <p> + BERKELEY.—To the "sensualist" Locke succeeded Berkeley, the + unrestrained "idealist," like him an Englishman. He began to write when + very young, continued to write until he was sixty, and died at + sixty-eight. He believed neither in matter nor in the external world. + There was the whole of his philosophy. Why did he not believe in them? + Because all thinkers are agreed that we cannot know whether we see the + external world <i>as it is</i>. Then, if we do not know it, why do we + affirm that it exists? We know nothing about it. Now we ought to build up + the world only with what we know of it, and to do otherwise is not + philosophy but yielding to imagination. What is it that we know of the + world? Our ideas, and nothing but our ideas. Very well then, let us say: + there are only ideas. But whence do these ideas come to us? To explain + them as coming from the external world which we have never seen is to + explain obscurity by denser darkness. They are spiritual, they come to us + without doubt from a spirit, from God. This is possible, it is not + illogical, and Berkeley believes it. + </p> + <p> + This doctrine regarded by the eyes of common sense may appear a mere + phantasy; but Berkeley saw in it many things of high importance and great + use. If you believe in matter, you can believe in matter only, and that is + materialism with its moral consequences, which are immoral; if you believe + in matter and in God, you are so hampered by this dualism that you do not + know how to separate nature from God, and it therefore comes to pass that + you see God in matter, which is called pantheism. In a word, between us + and God Berkeley has suppressed matter in order that we should come, as it + were, into direct contact with God. He derives much from Malebranche, and + it may be said he only pushes his theories to their extreme. Although a + bishop, he was not checked, like Descartes, by the idea of God not being + able to deceive us, and he answered that God does not deceive us, that He + gives us ideas and that it is we who deceive ourselves by attributing them + to any other origin than to Him; nor was he checked, like Malebranche, by + the authority of Scripture, which in Genesis portrays God creating matter. + He saw there, no doubt, only a symbolical sense, a simple way of speaking + according to the comprehension of the multitude. + </p> + <p> + DAVID HUME.—David Hume, a Scotsman, better known, at least in his + own times, as the historian of England than as a philosopher, nevertheless + well merits consideration in the latter category. David Hume believes in + nothing, and, in consequence, it may be said that he is not a philosopher; + he has no philosophic system. He has no philosophic system, it is true; + but he is a critic of philosophy, and therefore he philosophizes. Matter + has no existence; as we know nothing about it, we should not say it + exists. But we ourselves, we exist. All that we can know about that is + that in us there is a succession of ideas, of representations; but <i>we</i>, + but <i>I</i>, what is that? Of that we know nothing. We are present at a + series of pictures, and we may call their totality the <i>ego</i>; but we + do not grasp ourselves as a thing of unity, as an individual. We are the + spectators of an inward dramatic piece behind which we can see no author. + There is no more reason to believe in <i>oneself</i> than in the external + world. + </p> + <p> + INNATE IDEAS.—As for innate ideas, they are simply general ideas, + which are general delusions. We believe, for instance, that every effect + has a cause, or, to express it more correctly, that everything has a + cause. What do we know about it? What do we see? That one thing follows + another, succeeds to another. What tells us that the latter proceeds from + the former, that the thing B must necessarily come, owing to the thing A + existing? We believe it because every time the thing A has been, the thing + B has come. Well, let us say that every time A has been (thus far) B has + come; and say no more. There are regular successions, but we are + completely ignorant whether there are causes for them. + </p> + <p> + THE LIBERTY AND MORALITY OF HUME.—It results from this that for Hume + there is no liberty. Very obviously; for when we believe ourselves free, + it is because we believe we can fix upon ourselves as a cause. Now the + word "cause" means nothing. We are a succession of phenomena very + absolutely determined. The proof is that we foresee and nearly always + accurately (and we could always foresee accurately if we completely knew + the character of the persons and the influences acting on them) what + people we know will do, which would be impossible if they did as they + wished. And I, at the very moment when I am absolutely sure I am doing + such and such a thing because I desired to, I see my friend smile as he + says: "I was sure you would do that. See, I wrote it down on this piece of + paper." He understood me as a necessity, when I felt myself to be free. + And he, reciprocally, will believe himself free in doing a thing I would + have wagered to a certainty that he would not fail to do. + </p> + <p> + What system of morality can Hume have with these principles? First of all, + he protests against those who should deduce from his principles the + immorality of his system. Take care, said he wittily (just like Spinoza, + by the way), it is the partisans of free-will who are immoral. No doubt! + It is when there is liberty that there is no responsibility. I am not + responsible for my actions if they have no connection in me with anything + durable or constant. I have committed murder. Truly it is by chance, if it + was by an entirely isolated determination, entirely detached from the rest + of my character, and momentary; and I am only infinitesimally responsible. + But if all my actions are linked together, are conditional upon one + another, dependent on one another, if I have committed murder it is + because I am an assassin at every moment of my life or nearly so, and + then, oh! how responsible I am! + </p> + <p> + Note that this is the line taken up by judges, since they make careful + investigation of the antecedents of the accused. They find him all the + more culpable if he has always shown bad instincts.—Therefore they + find him the more responsible, the more he has been compelled by + necessity.—Yes. + </p> + <p> + Hume then does not believe himself "foreclosed" in morality; he does not + believe he is forbidden by his principles to have a system of morality and + he has one. It is a morality of sentiment. We have in us the instinct of + happiness and we seek happiness; but we have also in us an instinct of + goodwill which tends to make us seek the general happiness, and reason + tells us that there is conciliation or rather concordance between these + two instincts, because it is only in the general happiness that we find + our particular happiness. + </p> + <p> + THE SCOTTISH SCHOOL: REID; STEWART.—The Scottish School (end of the + eighteenth century) was pre-eminently a school of men who attached + themselves to common sense and were excellent moralists. We must at any + rate mention Thomas Reid and Dugald Stewart. They were bent especially on + opposing the transcendent idealism of Berkeley and the scepticism of David + Hume, also in some measure Locke's doctrine of the blank sheet. They + reconstituted the human mind and even the world (which had been so to + speak driven off in vapour by their predecessors), much as they were in + the time of Descartes. Let us believe, they said, in the reality of the + external world; let us believe that there are causes and effects; let us + believe there is an <i>ego,</i> a human person whom we directly apprehend, + and who is a cause; let us believe that we are free and that we are + responsible because we are free, etc. They were, pre-eminently, excellent + describers of states of the soul, admirable psychological moralists and + they were the ancestors of the highly remarkable pleiad of English + psychologists of the nineteenth century. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0020" id="link2HCH0020"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER V. FRENCH PHILOSOPHERS OF THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY + </h2> + <p> + Voltaire a Disciple of Locke. + </p> + <p> + Rousseau a Freethinking Christian, but deeply Imbued with Religious + Sentiments. + </p> + <p> + Diderot a Capricious Materialist. + </p> + <p> + D'Holbach and Helvetius Avowed Materialists. + </p> + <p> + Condillac a Philosopher of Sensations. + </p> + <p> + VOLTAIRE; ROUSSEAU.—The French philosophy of the eighteenth century, + fairly feeble it must be avowed, seemed as if dominated by the English + philosophy, excepting Berkeley, but especially by Locke and David Hume, + more particularly Locke, who was the intellectual deity of those Frenchmen + of that epoch who were interested in philosophy. + </p> + <p> + Whenever Voltaire dealt with philosophy, he was only the echo of Locke + whose depths he failed to fathom, and to whom he has done some injury, for + reading Locke only through Voltaire has led to the belief that Locke was + superficial. + </p> + <p> + Rousseau was both the disciple and adversary of Hobbes, as often occurs, + and dealt out to the public the doctrines of Hobbes in an inverted form, + making the state of nature angelic instead of infernal, and putting the + government of all by all in the place of government by one, invariably + reaching the same point with a simple difference of form; for if Hobbes + argued for despotism exercised by one over all, Rousseau argued for the + despotism of all over each. In <i>Émile</i>, he was incontestably inspired + by the ideas of Locke on education in some degree, but in my opinion less + than has been asserted. On nearly all sides it has been asserted that + Rousseau exercised great influence over Kant. I know that Kant felt + infinite admiration for Rousseau, but of the influence of Rousseau upon + Kant I have never been able to discover a trace. + </p> + <p> + DIDEROT; HELVETIUS; D'HOLBACH.—It was particularly on David Hume + that Diderot depended. The difference, which is great, is that David Hume + in his scepticism remained a grave, reserved man, well-bred and discreet, + and was only a sceptic, whilst Diderot was violent in denial and a man of + paradoxes and jests, both impertinent and cynical. + </p> + <p> + It is almost ridiculous in a summary history of philosophy to name as + sub-Diderots, if one may so express it, Helvetius and D'Holbach, who were + merely wits believing themselves philosophers, and who were not always + wits. + </p> + <p> + CONDILLAC.—Condillac belongs to another category. He was a very + serious philosopher and a vigorous thinker. An exaggerated disciple of + Locke, while the latter admitted sensation <i>and</i> reflection as the + origin of ideas, Condillac admitted only pure sensation and transformed + sensation—that is to say, sensation transforming itself. The + definition of man that he deduces from these principles is very celebrated + and it is interesting: "The <i>ego</i> of each man is only the collection + of the sensations that he feels and of those his memory recalls; it is the + consciousness of what he is combined with the recollection of what he has + been." To Condillac, the idea is a sensation which has fixed itself and + which has been renewed and vivified by others; desire is a sensation which + wishes to be repeated and seeks what opportunity offers for its renewal, + and the will itself is only the most potent of desires. Condillac was + voluntarily and systematically limited, but his system is well knit and + presented in admirably clear and precise language. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0021" id="link2HCH0021"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER VI. KANT + </h2> + <p> + Kant Reconstructed all Philosophy by Supporting it on Morality. + </p> + <p> + KNOWLEDGE.—Kant, born at Königsberg in 1724, was professor there all + his life and died there in 1804. Nothing happened to him except the + possession of genius. He had commenced with the theological philosophy in + use in his country, that of Wolf, which on broad lines was that of + Leibnitz. But he early read David Hume, and the train of thought of the + sceptical Scotsman at least gave him the idea of submitting all + philosophic ideas to a severe and close criticism. + </p> + <p> + He first of all asked himself what the true value is of our knowledge and + what knowledge is. We believe generally that it is the things which give + us the knowledge that we have of them. But, rather, is it not we who + impose on things the forms of our mind and is not the knowledge that we + believe we have of things only the knowledge which we take of the laws of + our mind by applying it to things? This is what is most probable. We + perceive the things by moulds, so to speak, which are in ourselves and + which give them their shapes and they would be shapeless and chaotic were + it otherwise. Consequently, it is necessary to distinguish the matter and + the form of our knowledge: the matter of the knowledge is the things + themselves. The form of our knowledge is ourselves: "Our experimental + knowledge is a compound of what we receive from impressions and of what + our individual faculty of knowing draws from itself on the occasion of + these impressions." + </p> + <p> + SENSIBILITY; UNDERSTANDING; REASON.—Those who believe that all we + think proceeds from the senses are therefore wrong; so too are those wrong + who believe that all we think proceeds from ourselves. To say, Matter is + an appearance, and to say, Ideas are appearances, are equally false + doctrines. Now we know by sensibility, by understanding, and by reason. By + sensibility we receive the impression of phenomena; by the understanding + we impose on these impressions their forms, and link them up together; by + reason we give ourselves general ideas of things—universal ones, + going beyond or believing they go beyond the data, even when linked up and + systematized. + </p> + <p> + Let us analyse sensibility, understanding, and reason. Sensibility already + has the forms it imposes on things. These forms are time and space. Time + and space are not given us by matter like colour, smell, taste, or sound; + they are not perceived by the senses; they are therefore the forms of our + sensibility: we can feel only according to time and space, by lodging what + we feel in space and time; these are the conditions of sensibility. + Phenomena are thus perceived by us under the laws of space and of time. + What do they become in us? They are seized by the understanding, which + also has its forms, its powers of classification, of arrangement, and of + connection. Its forms or powers, or, putting it more exactly, its active + forms are, for example, the conception of quantity being always equal: + through all phenomena the quantity of substance remains always the same; + the conception of causality: everything has a cause and every cause has an + effect and it is ever thus. Those are the conditions of our understanding, + those without which we do not understand and the forms which within us we + impose on all things in order to understand them. + </p> + <p> + It is thus that we know the world; which is tantamount to stating that the + world exists, so far as we are concerned, only so long as we think so. + Reason would go further: it would seize the most general, the universal, + beyond experience, beyond the limited and restricted systematizations + established by the understanding; to know, for instance, the first cause + of all causes, the last and collective end, so to speak, of all purposes; + to know "why is there something?" and "in view of what end is there + something?" in fact, to answer all the questions of infinity and eternity. + Be sure that it cannot. How could it? It only operates, can only operate, + on the data of experience and the systematizations of the understanding, + which classify experience but do not go beyond it. Only operating upon + that, having nothing except that as matter, how could it itself go beyond + experience? It cannot. It is only (a highly important fact, and one which + must on no account be forgotten)—it is only a sign, merely a + witness. It is the sign that the human spirit has need of the absolute; it + is itself that need; without that it would not exist; it is the witness of + our invincible insistence on knowing and of our tendency to estimate that + we know nothing if we only know something; it is itself that insistence + and that tendency: without that it would not exist. Let us pause there for + the moment. Man knows of nature only those impressions which he receives + from it, co-ordinated by the forms of sensibility, and further the ideas + of it which he preserves co-ordinated by the forms of his understanding. + This is very little. It is all, if we consider only pure reason. + </p> + <p> + PRACTICAL REASON.—<i>But</i> there is perhaps another reason, or + another aspect of reason—to wit, practical reason. What is practical + reason? Something in us tells us: you should act, and you should act in + such a way; you should act rightly; this is not right, so do not do it; + that is right, do it. As a fact this is uncontestable. What is the + explanation? From what data of experience, from what systematization of + the understanding has our mind borrowed this? Where has it got it? Does + nature yield obedience to a "you ought"? Not at all. It exists, and it + develops and it goes its way, according to our way of seeing it in time + and space, and that is all. Does the understanding furnish the idea of + "you ought"? By no means; it gives us ideas of quantity, of quality, of + cause and effect, etc., and that is all; there is no "you ought" in all + that. Therefore this "you ought" is purely human; it is the only principle + which comes exactly from ourselves only. It might therefore well be the + very foundation of us.—It may be an illusion.—No doubt, but it + is highly remarkable that it exists, though nothing gives it birth or is + of a nature to give it birth. An illusion is a weakness of the senses or + an error of logic and is thus explained; but an illusion in itself and by + itself and only proceeding from itself is most singular and not to be + explained as an illusion. Hence it remains that it is a reality, a reality + of our nature, and given the coercive force of its voice and act, it is + the most real reality there is in us. + </p> + <p> + THE CATEGORICAL IMPERATIVE.—Thus, at least, thought Kant, and he + said: There is a practical reason which does not go beyond experience and + does not seek to go beyond it; but which does not depend on it, is + absolutely separated from it, and is its own (human) experience by itself. + This practical reason says to us: you ought to do good. The crowd call it + conscience; I call it in a general way practical reason, and I call it the + categorical imperative when I take it in its principle, without taking + into account the applications which I foresee. Why this name? To + distinguish it clearly; for we feel ourselves commanded by other things + than it, but not in the same way. We feel ourselves commanded by prudence, + for instance, which tells us: do not run down that staircase <i>if</i> you + do not wish to break your neck; we feel ourselves commanded by the + conventions which say: be polite <i>if</i> you do not wish men to leave + you severely alone, etc. But conscience does not say <i>if</i> to us: it + says bluntly "you ought" without consideration of what may or may not + happen, and it is even part of its character to scorn all consideration of + consequences. It would tell us: run down that staircase to save that child + even at the risk of breaking your neck. Because of that I call all the + other commandments made to us hypothetical imperatives and that of + conscience, alone, the categorical or absolute imperative. Here is a + definite result. + </p> + <p> + MORALITY, THE LAW OF MAN.—Yet reflect: if the foregoing be true, + morality is the very law of man, his especial law, as the law of the tree + is to spread in roots and branches. Well. But for man to be able to obey + his law he must be free, must be able to do what he wishes. That is + certain. Then it must be believed that we are free, for were we not, we + could not obey our law; and the moral law would be absurd. The moral law + is the <i>sign</i> that we are free. Compared to this, all the other + proofs of freedom are worthless or weak. We are free because we must be so + in order to do the good which our law commands us to do. + </p> + <p> + Let us examine further. I do what is right in order to obey the law; but, + when I have done it, I have the idea that it would be unjust that I should + be punished for it, or that I should not be rewarded for it, that it would + be unjust were there not concordance between right and happiness. As it + happens, virtue is seldom rewarded in this world and often is even + punished; it draws misfortune or evil on him who practises it. Would not + that be the sign that there are two worlds of which we see only one? Would + not that be the sign that virtue unrewarded here will be rewarded + elsewhere <i>in order that there should not be injustice?</i> It is highly + probable that this is so. + </p> + <p> + But for that it is necessary that the soul be immortal. It is so, since it + is necessary that it should be. The moral law is accomplished and + consummated in rewards or penalties beyond the grave, which pre-suppose + the immortality of the soul. All the other proofs of the immortality of + the soul are worthless or feeble beside this one which demonstrates that + were there no immortality of the soul there would be no morality. + </p> + <p> + GOD.—And, finally, if justice is one day to be done, this supposes a + Judge. It is neither ourselves who in another life will do justice to + ourselves nor yet some force of circumstances which will do it to us. It + is necessary to have an intelligence conceiving justice and a will to + realise it. God is this intelligence and this will. + </p> + <p> + All the other proofs of God are weak or worthless beside this one. The + existence of God has been deduced from the idea of God: if we have the + idea of God, it is necessary that He should exist. A weak proof, for we + can have an idea which does not correspond with an object. The existence + of God has been deduced from the idea of causality; for all that is, a + cause is necessary, this cause is God. A weak proof, for things being as + they are, there is necessity for ... cause; but a cause and a <i>single</i> + cause, why? There could be a series of causes to infinity and thus the + cause of the world could be the world itself. The existence of God has + been deduced from the idea of design well carried out. The composition, + the ordering of this world is admired; this world is well made; it is like + a clock. The clock supposes a clock-maker; the fine composition of the + world supposes an intelligence which conceived a work to be made and which + made it. Perhaps; but this consideration only leads to the idea of a + manipulation of matter, of a demiurge, as the Greeks said, of an + architect, but not to the idea of a <i>Creator;</i> it may even lead only + to the idea of several architects and the Greeks perfectly possessed the + idea of a fine artistic order existing in the world when they believed in + a great number of deities. This proof also is therefore weak, although + Kant always treats it with respect. + </p> + <p> + The sole convincing proof is the existence of the moral law in the heart + of man. For the moral law to be accomplished, for it not to be merely a + tyrant over man, for it to be realised in all its fullness, weighing on + man here but rewarding him infinitely elsewhere, which means there is + justice in all that, it is necessary that somewhere there should be an + absolute realizer of justice. God must exist for the world to be moral. + </p> + <p> + Why is it necessary for the world to be moral? Because an immoral world + with even a single moral being in it would be a very strange thing. + </p> + <p> + Thus, whilst the majority of philosophers deduced human liberty from God, + and the spirituality of the soul from human liberty, the immortality of + the soul from human spirituality, and morality from human immortality, + Kant starts from morality as from the incontestable fact, and from + morality deduces liberty, and from liberty spirituality, and God from the + immortality of the soul with the consequent realization of justice. + </p> + <p> + He has effected an extraordinarily powerful reversal of the argument + generally employed. + </p> + <p> + THE INFLUENCE OF KANT.—The influence of Kant has been incomparable + or, if you will, comparable only to those of Plato, Zeno, and Epicurus. + Half at least of the European philosophy of the nineteenth century has + proceeded from him and is closely connected with him. Even in our own day, + pragmatism, as it is called—that is, the doctrine which lays down + that morality is the measure of truth and that an idea is true only if it + be morally useful—is perhaps an alteration of Kantism, a Kantian + heresy, but entirely penetrated with and, as it were, excited by the + spirit of Kant. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0022" id="link2HCH0022"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER VII. THE NINETEENTH CENTURY: GERMANY + </h2> + <p> + The great reconstructors of the world, analogous to the first philosophers + of antiquity. + </p> + <p> + Great general systems: Fichte, Schelling, Hegel, etc. + </p> + <p> + FICHTE.—Fichte, embarrassed by what remained of experience in the + ideas of Kant, by the part, restricted though it was, which Kant left to + things in the external world, completely suppressed the external world, + like Berkeley, and affirmed the existence of the human <i>ego</i> alone. + Kant said that the world furnished us with the matter of the idea and that + we furnished the form. According to Fichte, form and matter alike came + from us. What then is sensation? It is nothing except the pause of the <i>ego</i> + encountering what is not self, the impact of the <i>ego</i> against what + limits it.—But then the external world does exist, for how could our + mind be encountered by nothing and there be an impact of our mind against + nothing?—But this non-self that encounters self is precisely a + product of self, a product of the imagination which creates an object, + which projects outside us an appearance before which we pause as before + something real which should be outside us. + </p> + <p> + This theory is very difficult to understand, but indicates a very fine + effort of the mind. + </p> + <p> + Yet outside ourselves is there anything? There is pure spirit, God. What + is God? For Fichte He is moral order (a very evident recollection of + Kant). Morality is God and God is morality. We are in God, and it is the + whole of religion, when we do our duty without any regard to the + consequences of our actions; we are outside God, and it is atheism, when + we act in view of what results our actions may have. And thus morality and + religion run into one another, and religion is only morality in its + plenitude and complete morality is the whole of religion. "The holy, the + beautiful, and the good are the immediate apparition [if it could be] in + us of the essence of God." + </p> + <p> + SCHELLING.—Schelling desired to correct what, according to him, was + too radical in the idealism of Fichte. He restored the external world; for + him the <i>non-ego</i> and the <i>ego</i> both exist and the two are <i>nature</i>, + nature which is the object in the world regarded by man, the subject when + it regards man, subject and object according to the case; in itself and in + its totality neither subject nor object, but absolute, unlimited, + indeterminate. Confronting this world (that is nature and man) there is + another world which is God. God is the infinite and the perfect, and + particularly the perfect and infinite will. The world that we know is a + debasement from that without our being able to conceive how the perfect + can be degraded, and how an emanation of the perfect can be imperfect and + how the non-being can come out of being, since relatively to the infinite, + the finite has no existence, and relatively to perfection, the imperfect + is nothing. + </p> + <p> + It appears however that it is thus, and that the world is an emanation of + God in which He degrades Himself and a degradation of God such that it + opposes itself to Him as nothing to everything. It is a fall. The fall of + man in the Scriptures may give an idea, however distant, of that. + </p> + <p> + HEGEL.—Hegel, a contemporary of Schelling, and often in + contradiction to him, is the philosopher of "<i>becoming</i>" and of the + idea which always "becomes" something. The essence of all is the idea, but + the idea in progress; the idea makes itself a thing according to a + rational law which is inherent in it, and the thing makes itself an idea + in the sense that the idea contemplating the thing it has become thinks it + and fills itself with it in order to become yet another thing, always + following the rational law; and this very evolution, all this evolution, + all this becoming, is that absolute for which we are always searching + behind things, at the root of things, and which is <i>in</i> the things + themselves. + </p> + <p> + The rationally active is everything; and activity and reality are + synonyms, and all reality is active, and what is not active is not real, + and what is not active has no existence. + </p> + <p> + Let not this activity be regarded as always advancing forward; the + becoming is not a river which flows; activity is activity and + retro-activity. The cause is cause of the effect, but also the effect is + cause of its cause. In fact the cause would not be cause if it had no + effect; it is therefore, thanks to its effect, because of its effect, that + the cause is cause; and therefore the effect is the cause of the cause as + much as the cause is cause of the effect. + </p> + <p> + A government is the effect of the character of a people, and the character + of a people is the effect also of its government; my son proceeds from me, + but he reacts on me, and because I am his father I have the character + which I gave him, more pronounced than before, etc. + </p> + <p> + Hence, all effect is cause as all cause is effect, which everybody has + recognized, but in addition all effect is cause of its cause and in + consequence, to speak in common language, all effect is cause forward and + backward, and the line of causes and effects is not a straight line but a + circle. + </p> + <p> + THE DEISM OF HEGEL.—God disappears from all that. No, Hegel is very + formally a deist, but he sees God in the total of things and not outside + things, yet distinct. In what way distinct? In this, that God is the + totality of things considered not in themselves but in the spirit that + animates them and the force that urges them, and because the soul is of + necessity in the body, united to the body, that is no reason why it should + not be distinct from it. And having taken up this position, Hegel is a + deist and even accepts proofs of the existence of God which are regarded + by some as hackneyed. He accepts them, only holding them not exactly as + proofs, but as reasons for belief, and as highly faithful descriptions of + the necessary elevation of the soul to God. For example, the ancient + philosophers proved the existence of God by the contemplation of the + marvels of the universe: "That is not a 'proof,'" said Hegel, "that is not + a proof, but it is a great reason for belief; for it is an exposition, a + very exact although incomplete account rendered of the fact that by + contemplation of the world the human mind rises to God." Now this fact is + of singular importance: it indicates that it is impossible to think + strongly without thinking of God. "When the passage [although + insufficiently logical] from the finite to the infinite does not take + place, it may be said that there is no thought." Now this is a reason for + belief.' + </p> + <p> + After the same fashion, the philosophers have said "from the moment that + we imagine God, the reason is that He is." Kant ridiculed this proof. + Granted, it is not an invincible proof, but this fact alone that we cannot + imagine God without affirming His existence indicates a tendency of our + mind which is to relate finite thought to infinite thought and not to + admit an imperfect thought which should not have its source in a perfect + thought; and that is rather an invincible belief than a proof, but that + this belief is invincible and necessary in itself is an extremely + commanding proof, although a relative one. + </p> + <p> + HIS POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY.—The philosophy of the human mind and + political philosophy according to Hegel are these. Primitive man is mind, + reason, conscience, but he is so only potentially, as the philosophers + express it; that is to say, he is so only in that he is capable of + becoming so. Really, practically, he is only instincts: he is egoist like + the animals [it should be said like the greater part of the animals], and + follows his egoistical appetites. Society, in whatever manner it has + managed to constitute itself, transforms him and his "becoming" commences. + From the sexual instinct it makes marriage, from capture it forms + regulated proprietorship, out of defence against violence it makes legal + punishment, etc. Hence-forth, and all his evolution tends to that, man + proceeds to substitute in himself the general will for the particular + will; he tends to disindividualize himself. The general will, founded upon + general utility, is that the man be married, father, head of a family, + good husband, good father, good relative, good citizen. All that man ought + to be in consideration of the general will which he has put in the place + of his own, and which he has made his own will. That is the first advance. + </p> + <p> + It is realized (always imperfectly) in the smallest societies, in the + cities, in the little Greek republics, for example. + </p> + <p> + Here is the second advance. By war, by conquest, by annexations, by more + gentle means when possible, the stronger cities subdue the weaker, and the + great State is created. The great State has a more important part than the + city; it continues to substitute the general will for the particular + wills; but, <i>in addition,</i> it is an idea, a great civilizing idea, + benevolent, elevating, aggrandizing, to which private interests must and + should be sacrificed. Such were the Romans who considered themselves, not + without reason, as the legislators and civilizers of the world. + </p> + <p> + THE IDEAL FORM OF STATE.—Putting aside for a while the continuation + of this subject, what political form should the great State take to + conform to its destiny? Assuredly the monarchical form; for the republican + form is always too individualist. To Hegel, the Greeks and even the Romans + seem to have conceded too much to individual liberty or to the interests + of class, of caste; they possessed an imperfect idea of the rights and + functions of the State. The ideal form of the State is monarchy. It is + necessary for the State to be contracted, gathered up, and personified in + a prince who can be personally loved, who can be reverenced, which is + precisely what is needed. These great States are only really great if they + possess strong cohesion; it is therefore necessary that they should be + nationalities, as it is called—that is, that they should be inwardly + very united and highly homogeneous by community of race, religion, + customs, language, etc. The idea to be realized by a State can only be + accomplished if there be a sufficient community of ideas in the people + constituting it. However the great State will be able to, and even ought + to, conquer and annex the small ones in order to become stronger and more + capable, being stronger, of realizing its idea. Only this should be done + merely when it is certain or clearly apparent that it represents an idea + as against a people which does not, or that it presents a better, greater, + and nobler idea than that represented by the people it attacks. + </p> + <p> + WAR.—But, as each people will always find its own idea finer than + that of another, how is this to be recognized?—By victory itself. It + is victory which proves that a people ... was stronger than another!—Not + only stronger materially but representing a greater, more practical, more + fruitful idea than the other; for it is precisely the idea which supports + a people and renders it strong. Thus, victory is the sign of the moral + superiority of a people, and in consequence force indicates where right is + and is indistinguishable from right itself, and we must not say as may + already perhaps have been said: "Might excels right," but "Might is right" + or "Right is might." + </p> + <p> + For example [Hegel might have said], France was "apparently" within her + rights in endeavouring to conquer Europe from 1792 to 1815; for she + represented an idea, the revolutionary idea, which she might consider, and + which many besides the French did consider, an advance and a civilizing + idea; but she was beaten, <i>which proves</i> that the idea was false; and + before this demonstration by events is it not true that the republican or + Caesarian idea is inferior to that of traditional monarchy? Hegel would + certainly have reasoned thus on this point. + </p> + <p> + Therefore war is eternal and must be so. It is history itself, being the + condition of history; it is even the evolution of humanity, being the + condition of that evolution; there-fore, it is divine. Only it is + purifying itself; formerly men only fought, or practically always, from + ambition; now wars are waged for principles, to effect the triumph of an + idea which has a future, and which contains the future, over one that is + out of date and decayed. The future will see a succession of the triumphs + of might which, by definition, will be triumphs of right and which will be + triumphs of increasingly fine ideas over ideas that are barbarous and + justly condemned to perish. + </p> + <p> + Hegel has exercised great influence on the ideas of the German people both + in internal and external politics. + </p> + <p> + ART, SCIENCE, AND RELIGION.—The ideas of Hegel on art, science, and + religion are the following: Under the shelter of the State which is + necessary for their peaceful development in security and liberty, science, + literature, art, and religion pursue aims not superior to but other than + those of the State. They seek, without detaching the individual from the + society, to unite him to the whole world. Science makes him know all it + can of nature and its laws; literature, by studying man in himself and in + his relations with the world, imbues him with the sentiment of the + possible concordance of the individual with the universe; the arts make + him love creation by unravelling and bringing into the light and into + relief all that is beautiful in it relatively to man, and all that in + consequence should render it lovely, respected, and dear to him; religion, + finally, seeks to be a bond between all men and a bond between all men and + God; it sketches the plan of universal brotherhood which is ideally the + last state of humanity, a state which no doubt it will never attain, but + which it is essential it should imagine and believe to be possible, + without which it always would be drawn towards animality more and much + more than it is. + </p> + <p> + The Hegelian philosophy has exercised an immense influence throughout + Europe not only on philosophic studies, but on history, art, and + literature. It may be regarded as the last "universal system" and as the + most daring that has been attempted by the human mind. + </p> + <p> + SCHOPENHAUER.—Schopenhauer was the philosopher of the will. + Persuaded, like Leibnitz, that man is an epitome and a picture of the + world, and that the world resembles us (which is hypothetical), he takes + up the thought of Leibnitz, changing and transforming it thus: All the + universe is not thought, but all the universe is will; thought is only an + accident of the will which appears in the superior animals; but the will, + which is the foundation of man, is the foundation of all; the universe is + a compound of wills that act. All beings are wills which possess organs + conformed to their purpose. It is <i>the will to be</i> which gave claws + to the lion, tusks to the boar, and intelligence to man, because he was + the most unarmed of animals, just as to one who becomes blind it gives + extraordinarily sensitive and powerful sense of hearing, smell, and touch. + Plants strive towards light by their tops and towards moisture by their + roots; the seed turns itself in the earth to send forth its stalk upwards + and its rootlet downward. In minerals there are "constant tendencies" + which are nothing but obscure wills; what we currently term weight, + fluidity, impenetrability, electricity, chemical affinities, are nothing + but natural wills or inconscient wills. Because of this, the diverse wills + opposing and clashing with one another, the world is a war of all against + all and of <i>everything</i> literally against <i>everything</i>; and the + world is a scene of carnage. + </p> + <p> + The truth is that will is an evil and is the evil. What is needed for + happiness is to kill the will, to destroy the wish to be.—But this + would be the end of existence?—And in fact to be no more or not to + be at all is the true happiness and it would be necessary to blow up the + whole world in an explosion for it to escape unhappiness. At least, as + Buddhism desired and, in some degree, though less, Christianity also, it + is necessary to make an approach to death by a kind of reduction to the + absolute minimum of will, by detachment and renunciation pushed as far as + can be. + </p> + <p> + NIETZSCHE.—A very respectful but highly independent and untractable + pupil of Schopenhauer, Nietzsche "turns Schopenhauer inside out" as it + were, saying: Yes, assuredly the will to be is everything; but precisely + because of that it is essential not to oppose but to follow it and to + follow it as far as it will lead us. But is it not true that it will lead + to suffering? Be sure of that, but in suffering there is an intoxication + of pain which is quite comprehensible; for it is the intoxication of the + will in action; and this intoxication is an enjoyment too and in any case + a good thing; for it is the end to which we are urged by our nature + composed of will and of hunger for existence. Now wisdom, like happiness, + is to follow our nature. The happiness and wisdom of man is to obey his + will for power, as the wisdom and happiness of water is to flow towards + the sea. + </p> + <p> + From these ideas is derived a morality of violence which can be + legitimately regarded as immoral and which, in any case, is neither + Buddhist nor Christian, but which is susceptible of several + interpretations, all the more so because Nietzsche, who was a poet, never + fails, whilst always artistically very fine, to fall into plenty of + contradictions. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0023" id="link2HCH0023"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER VIII. THE NINETEENTH CENTURY: ENGLAND + </h2> + <p> + The Doctrines of Evolution and of Transformism: Lamarck (French), Darwin, + Spencer. + </p> + <p> + TRANSFORMISM AND EVOLUTION.—The great philosophic invention of the + English of the nineteenth century has been the idea, based on a wide + knowledge of natural history, that there never was creation. The animal + species had been considered by all the philosophers (except Epicurus and + the Epicureans) as being created once and for all and remaining + invariable. Nothing of the kind. Matter, eternally fruitful, has + transformed itself first into plants, then into lower animals, then into + higher animals, then into man; our ancestor is the fish; tracing back yet + more remotely, our ancestor is the plant. Transformation (hence the name + <i>transformism</i>), discrimination and separation of species, the + strongest individuals of each kind alone surviving and creating + descendants in their image which constitute a species; evolution (hence + the name <i>evolutionism</i>) of living nature thus operating from the + lowest types to the highest and therefore the most complicated; there is + nothing but that in the world. + </p> + <p> + LAMARCK; DARWIN; SPENCER.—The Frenchman Lamarck in the eighteenth + century had already conceived this idea; Darwin, purely a naturalist, set + it forth clearly, Spencer again stated it and drew from it consequences of + general philosophy. Thus, to Spencer, the evolutionist theory contains no + immorality. On the contrary, the progressive transformation of the human + species is an ascent towards morality; from egoism is born altruism + because the species, seeking its best law and its best condition of + happiness, perceives a greater happiness in altruism; seeking its best law + and its best condition of happiness, perceives that a greater happiness + lies in order, regular life, social life, etc.; so that humanity raises + itself to a higher and yet higher morality by the mere fact of adapting + itself better to the conditions of the life of humanity. Morality develops + physiologically as the germ becomes the stem and the bud becomes the + flower. + </p> + <p> + As for religion it is the domain of the unknowable. That is not to assert + that it is nothing. On the contrary it is something formidable and + immense. It is the feeling that something, apart from all that we know, + surpasses us and that we shall never know it. Now this feeling at the same + time maintains us in a humility highly favourable to the health of the + soul and also in a serene confidence in the mysterious being who presides + over universal evolution and who, no doubt, is the all-powerful and + eternal soul of it. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0024" id="link2HCH0024"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER IX. THE NINETEENTH CENTURY: FRANCE + </h2> + <p> + The Eclectic School: Victor Cousin. + </p> + <p> + The Positivist School: Auguste Comte. + </p> + <p> + The Kantist School: Renouvier. + </p> + <p> + Independent and Complex Positivists: Taine, Renan. + </p> + <p> + LAROMIGUIÈRE: ROYER-COLLARD.—Emerging from the school of Condillac, + France saw Laromiguière who was a sort of softened Condillac, less + trenchant, and not insensible to the influence of Rousseau; but he was + little more than a clear and elegant professor of philosophy. + Royer-Collard introduced into France the Scottish philosophy (Thomas Reid, + Dugald Stewart) and did not depart from it or go beyond it; but he set it + forth with magnificent authority and with a remarkable invention of clear + and magisterial formulae. + </p> + <p> + MAINE DE BIRAN.—Maine de Biran was a renovator. He attached himself + to Descartes linking the chain anew that had for so long been interrupted. + He devoted his attention to the notion of <i>ego</i>. In full reaction + from the "sensualism" of Condillac, he restored a due activity to the <i>ego</i>; + he made it a force not restricted to the reception of sensations, which + transform themselves, but one which seized upon, elaborated, linked + together, and combined them. For him then, as for Descartes, but from a + fresh point of view, the voluntary deed is the primitive deed of the soul + and the will is the foundation of man. Also, the will is not all man; man + has, so to say, three lives superimposed but very closely inter-united and + which cannot do without one another: the life of sensation, the life of + will, and the life of love. The life of sensation is almost passive, with + a commencement of activity which consists in classifying and organizing + the sensations; the life of will is properly speaking the "human" life; + the life of love is the life of activity and yet again of will, but which + unites the human with the divine life. By the ingenious and profound + subtlety of his analyses, Maine de Biran has placed himself in the front + rank of French thinkers and, in any case, he is one of the most original. + </p> + <p> + VICTOR COUSIN AND HIS DISCIPLES.—Victor Cousin, who appears to have + been influenced almost concurrently by Maine de Biran, Royer-Collard, and + the German philosophy, yielded rapidly to a tendency which is + characteristically French and is also, perhaps, good, and which consists + in seeing "some good in all the opinions," and he was eclectic, that is, a + borrower. His maxim, which he had no doubt read in Leibnitz, was that the + systems are "true in what they affirm and false in what they deny." + Starting thence, he rested upon both the English and German philosophy, + correcting one by the other. Personally his tendency was to make + metaphysics come from philosophy and to prove God by the human soul and + the relations of God with the world by the relations of man with matter. + To him God is always an augmented human soul. All philosophies, not to + mention all religions, have rather an inclination to consider things thus: + but this tendency is particularly marked in Cousin. In the course of his + career, which was diversified, for he was at one time a professor and at + another a statesman, he varied somewhat, because before 1830 he became + very Hegelian, and after 1830 he harked back towards Descartes, + endeavouring especially to make philosophic instruction a moral + priesthood; highly cautious, very well-balanced, feeling great distrust of + the unassailable temerities of the one and in sympathetic relations with + the other. What has remained of this eclecticism is an excellent thing, + the great regard for the <i>history</i> of philosophy, which had never + been held in honour in France and which, since Cousin, has never ceased to + be so. + </p> + <p> + The principal disciples of Cousin were Jouffroy, Damiron, Emile Saisset, + and the great moralist Jules Simon, well-known because of the important + political part he played. + </p> + <p> + LAMENNAIS.—Lamennais, long celebrated for his great book, <i>Essay + on Indifference in the Matter of Religion</i>, then, when he had severed + himself from Rome, by his <i>Words of a Believer</i> and other works of + revolutionary spirit, was above all a publicist; but he was a philosopher, + properly speaking, in his <i>Sketch of a Philosophy</i>. To him, God is + neither the Creator, as understood by the early Christians, nor the Being + from whom the world emanates, as others have thought. He has not created + the world from nothing; but He has created it; He created it from Himself, + He made it issue from His substance; and He made it issue by a purely + voluntary act. He created it in His own image; it is not man alone who is + in the image of God, but the whole world. The three Persons of God, that + is, the three characteristics, power, intelligence, and love are found—diminished + and disfigured indeed, but yet are to be found—in every being in the + universe. They are especially our own three powers, under the form of + will, reason, sympathy; they are also the three powers of society, under + the forms of executive power, deliberation, and fraternity. Every being, + individual or collective, has in it a principle of death if it cannot + reproduce however imperfectly all the three terms of this trinity without + the loss of one. + </p> + <p> + AUGUSTE COMTE.—Auguste Comte, a mathematician, versed also in all + sciences, constructed a pre-eminently negative philosophy in spite of his + great pretension to replace the negations of the eighteenth century by a + positive doctrine; above all else he denied all authority and denied to + metaphysics the right of existence. Metaphysics ought not to exist, do not + exist, are a mere nothing. We know nothing, we can know nothing, about the + commencement or the end of things, or yet their essence or their object; + philosophy has always laid down as its task a general explanation of the + universe; it is precisely this general explanation, all general + explanation of the aggregate of things, which is impossible. This is the + negative part of "positivism." It is the only one which has endured and + which is the <i>credo</i> or rather the <i>non credo</i> of a fairly large + number of minds. + </p> + <p> + The affirmative part of the ideas of Comte was this: what can be done is + to make a classification of sciences and a philosophy of history. The + classification of sciences according to Comte, proceeding from the most + simple to the most complex—that is, from mathematics to astronomy, + physics, chemistry, biology to end at sociology, is generally considered + by the learned as interesting but arbitrary. The philosophy of history, + according to Comte, is this: humanity passes through three states: + theological, metaphysical, positive. The theological state (antiquity) + consists in man explaining everything by continual miracles; the + metaphysical state (modern times) consists in man explaining everything by + ideas, which he still continues to consider somewhat as beings, by + abstractions, entities, vital principle, attraction, gravitation, soul, + faculty of the soul, etc. The positive state consists in that man explains + and will explain all things, or rather limits himself and will limit + himself to verifying them, by the links that he will see they have with + one another, links he will content himself with observing and subsequently + with controlling by experiment. Also there is always something of the + succeeding state in the preceding state and the ancients did not ignore + observation, and there is always something of the preceding state in the + succeeding state and we have still theological and metaphysical habits of + mind, theological and metaphysical "residues," and perhaps it will be + always thus; but for theology to decline before metaphysics and + metaphysics before science is progress. + </p> + <p> + Over and above this, Comte in the last portion of his life—as if to + prove his doctrine of residues and to furnish an example—founded a + sort of religion, a pseudo-religion, the religion of humanity. Humanity + must be worshipped in its slow ascent towards intellectual and moral + perfection (and, in consequence, we should specially worship humanity to + come; but Comte might reply that humanity past and present is venerable + because it bears in its womb the humanity of the future). The worship of + this new religion is the commemoration and veneration of the dead. These + last conceptions, fruits of the sensibility and of the imagination of + Auguste Comte, have no relation with the basis of his doctrine. + </p> + <p> + RENOUVIER.—After him, by a vigorous reaction, Renouvier restored the + philosophy of Kant, depriving it of its too symmetrical, too minutely + systematic, too scholastic character and bringing it nearer to facts; from + him was to come the doctrine already mentioned, "pragmatism," which + measures the truth of every idea by the moral consequence that it + contains. + </p> + <p> + TAINE.—Very different and attaching himself to the general ideas of + Comte, Hippolyte Taine believed only in what has been observed, + experimented, and demonstrated; but being also as familiar with Hegel as + with Comte, with Spencer as with Condillac, he never doubted that the need + of going beyond and escaping from oneself was also a fact, a human fact + eternal among humanity, and of this fact he took account as of a fact + observed and proved, saying if man is on one side a "fierce and lascivious + gorilla," on the other side he is a mystic animal, and that in "a double + nature, mysterious hymen," as Hugo wrote, lay the explanation of all the + baseness in ideas and actions as well as all the sublimity in ideas and + actions of humanity. Personally he was a Stoic and his practice was the + continuous development of the intelligence regarded as the condition and + guarantee of morality. + </p> + <p> + RENAN.—Renan, destined for the ecclesiastical profession and always + preserving profound traces of his clerical education, was, nevertheless, a + Positivist and believed only in science, hoping everything from it in + youth and continuing to venerate it at least during his mature years. Thus + formed, a "Christian Positivist," as has been said, as well as a poet + above all else, he could not proscribe metaphysics and had a weakness for + them with which perhaps he reproached himself. He extricated himself from + this difficulty by declaring all metaphysical conceptions to be only + "dreams," but sheltered, so to say, by this concession he had made and + this precaution he had taken, he threw himself into the dream with all his + heart and reconstituted God, the immortal soul, the future existence, + eternity and creation, giving them new, unforeseen, and fascinating names. + It was only the idea of Providence—that is, of the particular and + circumstantial intervention of God in human affairs, which was intolerable + to him and against which he always protested, quoting the phrase of + Malebranche, "God does not act by particular wills." And yet he paid a + compliment, which seems sincere, to the idea of grace, and if there be a + particular and circumstantial intervention by God in human affairs, it is + certainly grace according to all appearances. + </p> + <p> + He was above all an amateur of ideas, a dilettante in ideas, toying with + them with infinite pleasure, like a superior Greek sophist, and in all + French philosophy no one calls Plato to mind more than he does. + </p> + <p> + He possessed a charming mind, a very lofty character, and was a marvellous + writer. + </p> + <p> + TO-DAY.—The living French philosophers whom we shall content + ourselves with naming because they are living and receive contemporary + criticism rather than that of history, are MM. Fouillée, Théodule Ribot, + Liard, Durckheim, Izoulet, and Bergson. + </p> + <p> + THE FUTURE OF PHILOSOPHY.—It is impossible to forecast in what + direction philosophy will move. The summary history we have been able to + trace sufficiently shows, as it seems to us, that it has no regular + advance such that by seeing how it has progressed one can conjecture what + path it will pursue. It seems in no sense to depend, or at all events, to + depend remarkably little, at any period, on the general state of + civilization around it, and even for those who believe in a philosophy of + history there is not, as it appears to me, a philosophy of the history of + philosophy. The only thing that can be affirmed is that philosophy will + always exist in response to a need of the human mind, and that it will + always be both an effort to gather scientific discoveries into some great + general ideas and an effort to go beyond science and to seek as it can the + meaning of the universal enigma; so that neither philosophy, properly + speaking, nor even metaphysics will ever disappear. Nietzsche has said + that life is valuable only as the instrument of knowledge. However eager + humanity may be and become for branches of knowledge, it will be always + passionately and indefatigably anxious about complete knowledge. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0030" id="link2H_4_0030"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + INDEX OF NAMES + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + A + + Aelard + Aenesidemus + Agrippa + Agrippa, Cornelius + Ailly, Peter d' + Albertus Magnus + Alexander the Great + Anaxagoras + Anaximander + Anselm, St. + Antisthenes + Apollodorus + Arcesilaus + Arete + Aristippus + Aristo + Aristobulus + Aristophanes + Aristotle + Arius + Arnauld + Atticus + Augustine, St. + Averroes + Avicenna + + B + + Bacon, Francis + Bacon, Roger + Beaconsfield + Bergson + Berkeley + Bonaventura, St. + Bossuet + Bruno, Giordano + Brutus + Buridan + + C + + Calvin + Campanella + Cardan + Carneades + Cato + Champeaux, William of + Charles the Bald + Christina of Sweden + Chrysippus + Cicero + Cleanthes + Clement, St., of Alexandria + Comte, Auguste + Cnodillac + Corneille + Cousin, Victor + Crantor + Crates + + D + + Damiron + Darwin + Democritus + Descartes + Diderot + Diogenes + Durand de Saint-Pourçain + Durckheim + + E + + Empedocles + Epictetus + Epicurus + Euhemerus + + F + + Fénelon + Fichte + Fontenelle + Fouillée + Franklin + + G + + Gassendi + Gerbert + Gerson + Gorgias + + H + + Harvey + Havet, Ernest + Hegel + Hegesias + Helvetius + Heraclitus + Herillus + Hermarchus + Hobbes, Thomas + Holbach, d' + Horace + Hugo, Victor + Hugo de Saint-Victor + Hume, David + + I. Iamblichus + Izoulet + + J + + James I + Jesus Christ + Joan of Navarre + Jouffroy + Justinian + + K + + Kant + + L + + La Bruyère + Lamarck + Lamennais + Laromiguière + Leibnitz + Leo X + Leucippus + Liard + Locke + Louis XIV + Lucian + Lucretius + Lulle, Raymond + + M + + Maine de Biran + Malebranche + Manes + Marcus Aurelius + Menippus + Metrodorus + Moderatus + Molière + Montaigne + Moses + + N + + Nemesius + Nero + Nicomachus + Nietzsche + + O + + Ockham, William of + Origen + + P + + Paracelsus + Parmenides + Pascal + Paul, St. + Pericles + Philips the Fair + Philo + Pico della Mirandola + Plato + Pliny the Younger + Plotinus + Plutarch + Poincaré, Henri + Polemo + Polystratus + Pomponazzo + Porphyry + Prodicus + Protagoras + Pyrrho + Pythagoras + + R + + Reid, Thomas + Renan + Renouvier + Reuchlin + Ribot, Théodule + Richard de Saint-Victor + Roscelin + Rousseau, J. J. + Royer-Collard + + S + + Saisset, Emile + Schelling + Schopenhauer + Scotus Erigena + Seneca + Servetus, Michael + Sextus Empiricus + Shakespeare + Simon, Jules + Socrates + Spencer, Herbert + Speusippus + Spinoza + Stewart, Dugald + + T + + Taine, Hippolyte + Thales + Theodosius + Theophrastus + Thomas Aquinas, St. + Thrasea + Timon + + V. Vanini + Vauvenargues + Vico + Villon + Vincent of Beauvais + Voltaire + + W + + William of Auvergne + Wolf + + X. Xenocrates + Xenophanes + Xenophon + + Z + + Zeno (of Citium) + Zeno (of Elea) + Zoroaster +</pre> + <div style="height: 6em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's Initiation into Philosophy, by Emile Faguet + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK INITIATION INTO PHILOSOPHY *** + +***** This file should be named 9304-h.htm or 9304-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/9/3/0/9304/ + + +Text file produced by Ted Garvin, Thomas Hutchinson and PG Distributed +Proofreaders + +HTML file produced by David Widger + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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