xx SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS 263 



like an ox and an ass yoked in the same team but 

 as naturally and necessarily related, or perhaps as in 

 some deep sense identical ? This is a programme hard 

 to comprehend and hard to follow, but it has formed 

 part of the noble endeavours of idealism. Idealism 

 tells us that " such a being as man is, in such a world 

 as the present," would not be more spiritual without 

 his body. He is spiritual just because he is a human 

 being human body and human soul. Idealism holds 

 that the animal functions, recognised in the life of man 

 as " hunger and love" are no more anti-spiritual than 

 spiritual, but rather the raw material of spirituality, of 

 moral goodness, of character ; life being the discipline 

 and the ripening of character. It tells us that reason is 

 the fulfilment (as well as the transformation) of nature ; 

 that man is the meaning, and therefore the goal, of the 

 cosmic process which is seen in this world. What lover 

 of humanity, what believer in its Divine goal, would 

 refuse assent to this interpretation of man's place in 

 the present world ? 



Not soul helps flesh more now than flesh helps soul. 



This is evolutionism, but a very different evolutionism 

 from that studied in the previous pages. It would have 

 been impossible therefore to try to bring in " Hegel " as 

 well as "Darwin" in our present study. The new 

 social philosophy, if it follows these lines, may be 

 found to furnish not very much in the way of dogmatic 

 sociology. Jt may well turn out that, on fuller reflec- 

 tion, the a priori scheme of "all possible societies" 

 will shrink into very small compass, that the general 

 programme formulated by wise teachers will be notably 

 vague. That will not matter greatly. The wise social 

 philosopher will not claim that the one fount of wisdom 



