42 Wisconsin Academy of Sciences^ Arts^ and Letters. 



of the final conception. In accordance with the laws of think- 

 ing, this general term is reached bj successive omissions of 

 particularizing attributes, until at last we reach Being — the 

 absolute summum genus, wholly free from individual attrib- 

 utes, and thereby embracing everything possible to thought, 

 whether material or immaterial. But this summum germs 

 must be predicable of this whole. Matter and mind may thus 

 be reduced to a single category, and the physical and the 

 intellectual finally coalesce in this last generalization. Mater- 

 ialism and idealism thus differ merely in the degree of gener- 

 alization reached — or rather they both agree in avoiding the 

 final generalization which identifies both matter and mind. 

 Materialism must always deal with the individual, for matter 

 can appear under no other form. Idealism must always rest 

 upon the general, for thought, to be thought, must state a 

 generalization. Each, however, finds its explanation in the 

 other, and both are harmonized by the applicjition of the law 

 of intellectual action above given. Matter and Mind are com- 

 plementary, not incompatible. They differ with each other, but 

 they agree in being similarly related to a third term. Matter is 

 objective ; it is thought taking form, becoming individual, man- 

 ifesting itself in space. Mind is subjective. The one appeals 

 to the senses ; the other is known only to the consciousness. 



Science reaches its full development only when it includes 

 both physical and intellectual phenomena within its scope. 

 Every step which it takes carries it further from the purely 

 physical, and brings it nearer the purely intellectual — that is 

 the development of physical science is from the individual 

 towards the general, and it reaches its end, its completion,, 

 only when the last distinction, that of subjective and objective, 

 has disappeared in the last possible generalization. When 

 the objective has been identified with the subjective, the 

 distinction between Mind and Matter has been obliterated, and 

 we have reached the Supreme intelligence — the "I Am" of 

 Scripture — simple Being. 



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