EDITOR'S TABLE. 



847 



note is tliat the abler men who have lat- 

 terly ventured to cope with his thought 

 no longer disparage him. In this re- 

 spect there is a marked change of tone 

 on the part of his critics. They recog- 

 nize that his work has in it great ele- 

 ments of valuable influence, worthy of 

 cordial praise and even of emphatic 

 eulogy. 



This more liberal spirit is well illus- 

 trated in a recent English criticism of 

 Spencer's doctrines that is attracting at- 

 tention. Principal Fairbairn, of Brad- 

 ford, was appointed to deliver the 

 *'Muir Lectures" at the University of 

 Edinburgh last winter, and recognizing 

 the growing influence of the synthetic 

 philosophy he devoted three of these 

 lectures to an examination of it. They 

 were reported at the time, and awak- 

 ened so much interest that the author 

 was led to make an extended restate- 

 ment of his case, which has appeared 

 in the July and August numbers of the 

 " Contemporary Review." 



Dr. Fairbairn is a subtle and thor- 

 oughly trained metaphysician, and he 

 devotes himself mainly to an attack 

 upon the introductory portion of Spen- 

 cer's scheme, where he discusses the 

 limits of knowledge to find the true 

 sphere of philosophy. With Dr. Fair- 

 bairn's general argument we have here 

 no concern, but are interested in its 

 opening passage, which reads as fol- 

 lows: 



Mr. Herbert Spencer's philosophy has at 

 least one conspicuous merit it can claim to 

 be the most comprehensive, or rather ambi- 

 tious, of English philosophies. It is, in its 

 psychology, distinctively English and empir- 

 ical ; but, in its spirit and endeavor, distinc- 

 tively encylopedic and transcendental. In 

 many respects its constructive and compre- 

 hensive character entitles it to cordial admira- 

 tion and praise. Its outlook, backward, for- 

 ward, and outward, is so immense that it 

 powerfully affects the imagination, which the 

 traditional philosophy of England has, with 

 the splendid but only the more illustrative 

 exception of Berkeley, been too prosaic and 

 narrow to touch or to stir. To conceive a sys- 

 tem so positive and universal as Mr. Spencer's 



is in itself an education to an age, and its ex- 

 traordinary influence is an evidence that the 

 modem intellect is neither so skeptical nor so 

 critical as it is said to be, but loves, as intel- 

 lect ever has done, to believe a system, stated 

 in terms it thinks it understands, that prom- 

 ises to explain the universe presented to its 

 senses and represented in its thought. The 

 English mind has been rather inclined to 

 make merry over the philosophies of Ger- 

 many, especially the Hegelian, which has so 

 adventurously essayed to fit the universe into 

 its dialectic network; but the approbation 

 which has greeted Mr. Spencer's attempts at 

 a "synthetic philosophy" is proof enough 

 that the English contempt for transcendental- 

 ism is due to insular peculiarities, not to say 

 ignorance, rather than to intellectual disabil- 

 ity or insufficient sympathy with constructive 

 aims. His system, indeed, seems so little 

 metaphysical, so concrete, intelligible, real, 

 it so speaks the language of science, is made 

 so striking by brilliant generalizations, and 

 so vivid by abundant, even superabundant 

 illustrations, that it has come, to a people in- 

 clined by their mental habits to despise meta- 

 physics and respect science, almost as a reve- 

 lation of the true nature and method of crea- 

 tion. 



This is a novel strain for an adver- 

 sary of Spencer. It is no small compli- 

 ment to pay a system of thought that 

 its largeness and power are attested by 

 its influence upon the national mind, 

 and that even during its promulgation. 

 It may seem ungracious not to accept 

 so generous a statement as wholly sat- 

 isfactory ; but, in accounting for the 

 "remarkable influence" ascribed to 

 Spencer's system. Dr. Fairbairn seems 

 strangely to have missed what we re- 

 gard as its most important element. 

 He recognizes its ambitious claims and 

 its specious character, which make their 

 appeal to a deficient national culture ; 

 but he was not ignorant that this sys- 

 tem has in it also sterling elements 

 which have made their successful ap- 

 peal to the most sober and thoroughly 

 instructed minds of England. Admis- 

 sions made in the course of his discus- 

 sion, if placed at its threshold, would 

 have very materially altered the com- 

 plexion of the opening passage we have 

 quoted. 



