THE CHALLENGE TO THE TRADITIONAL IDEAL OF SCIENCE 461 



Scheler, strongly affirmed the aporetic character of reality. 

 Thought points beyond the known to the transintelligible, to 

 the irrational; we have no right to regard the universe as a 

 cosmos, rational in its essence, but, on the contrary, it must be 

 admitted to be, for us at least, deeply irrational. 



Among many of the Existentialists we find, although for dif- 

 ferent motives, this theme of the irrationality of the universe, 

 presented in its extreme form — Sartre, Camus — as a nauseating 

 absurdity; a dramatic expression of such sentiments may be 

 found not only in the plays of Sartre, but in Beckett's Waiting 

 for Godot. Not all Existentialists would deny that the universe 

 is a cosmos, but they are at one in their opposition to abstract 

 types of thought, and in rejecting the traditional notion of 

 science as altogether unfitted for philosophy. Instead of the 

 cold intellectual approach to reality, they favor the way of 

 inner, lived experience, as much affective as cognitive, for this 

 alone can grasp the individual in his reality and uniqueness; 

 and they see philosophy as obliging him who engages in it to 

 commit himself by his free choice and fully responsible decision 

 to a genuine and authentic form of existence, by which he can 

 create his own essential being. Although this philosophy is 

 centered on man, yet many of the Existentialists see the human 

 consciousness as open towards being, and thus prepare the way 

 for a return to metaphysics; this is particularly true of Hei- 

 degger, Marcel, and Lavelle, who cannot be fully characterised 

 as an existentialist. 



Within the Catholic world, there are indications that several 

 philosophers no longer regard the traditional notion of phi- 

 losophy as adequate, or suited to the needs of modern man. 

 This is most evident in such Catholic Existentialists as Marcel 

 and Lavelle; but before them, Blondel envisaged a philosophy 

 of the concrete, concerned with the individual, and centered 

 on the notion of action. Following the lead of Gratry and 

 Olle-Laprune, he conceived philosophy in the Platonic fashion 

 as the response of the whole man, who should philosophize with 

 his whole soul, to his actual situation, of which his faith is an 

 essential element. Gilson agrees with his notion of philosophy 



