1889.] 5UO [Cope. 



III. CniTICAL. 



The system outlined in the preceding pages falls within the field already 

 cultivated by Schopenhauer and especially by Hartniann. This is distin- 

 guished from those occupied by the older metaphysicians in the impor- 

 tant function assigned to will. The older schools, both idealistic and real- 

 istic, occupied themselves chiefly with the discussion of the principles of 

 cognition. The philosophy of evolution requires something more than 

 this. If there be anything beyond the world and human life on it, it can 

 be only discovered by an investigation of the nexus between mind and mat- 

 ter. And if there be any nexus at all, in which the mind is not entirely 

 subordinate, it is will. If there be any directive principle at the bottom 

 of evolution it is to be found by research in this direction. 



What this will is in its essence I have attempted to show in the preced- 

 ing pages. It is regarded as the realization of thought, as is done by Hart- 

 mann ; or as the expression of energy, the degree and nature of whose 

 rationality depends on mental conditions. But the system differs totally 

 from the two philosophies in question in being a philosophy of the con- 

 scious and not a " philosophy of the unconscious." Automatic and un 

 conscious will are derived from the conscious by cryptopnoy, and not the 

 reverse. The result is thus theistic and not atheistic, and optimistic and 

 not pessimistic. It is the Darwino-Hartmannian system inverted. For 

 although Hartmann's system promises progress through pain, as must 

 any system of evolution, it does not furnish any rational basis for progres- 

 sive evolution, but is essentially retrogressive, pessimistic, and nihilistic. 

 It is Darwinian and not Lamarckian. 



As regards the fundamental doctrine of Spencer, the relativity of 

 knowledge, the present method brings us to the result, that the scope of 

 such relativity diminishes directly as the generalization in constitution 

 of the physical basis of mind. For this method postulates the existence 

 of mind as prior and not subsequent to organization, a fact demonstrated 

 by organic evolution. And although so long as there is a physical basis 

 there is no "absolute" in action, the will is sufficient for creative func- 

 tions, both subjective and objective; 



FROC. AMEK. PHILOS. SOC. XXVI. 130. 3l PRINTED NOV. l8, 1889. 



