66 



PHILOSOPHICAL THOUGHT. 



53. from the historical point of view have the effect of 



Renuucia- . . 



tion in seemingly exonerating the thinking mind of the mdi- 



recentphilo- e 



vidual or of the age from that heavy responsibility 

 which the leading thinkers of former times felt to rest 

 on their shoulders. 



Thus it has come about that the greater part of the 

 philosophical writings of the last quarter of the century 

 exhibit an entirely different character from those be- 

 longing to the earlier part of our period. 1 In the 

 earlier period we meet with a great array of compre- 

 hensive philosophical systems which approach con- 

 fidently and hopefully the great world-problem ; and 

 although these systems belong mostly to Germany, we 

 find, somewhat later, France and England taking prom- 

 inent part in the attempt to unite all knowledge into 

 all-embracing systems the systems of Positivism and 

 Evolution and to arrive at formulae which should, as 

 it were, lead to a solution of all the great practical 

 problems of life and society. It is perhaps safe to say 

 that all these systems have had their day, that the 



1 When in 1876 the late Prof. 

 Croom Robertson, with the gen- 

 erous support of A. Bain, started 

 the quarterly review 'Mind,' he 

 induced prominent thinkers of the 

 different countries to write sum- 

 mary accounts of the state of phil- 

 osophy with them. These are to 

 be found in the two first volumes, 

 and are still well worth reading, 

 notably those by Mark Pattison 

 (Oxford), H. Sidgwick (Cambridge), 

 Veitch (Scotland), Q. C. Robertson 

 (London), Th. Ribot (France), and 

 W. Wundt (Germany). Before 

 that time Ravaisson had written 

 a highly interesting report on 



French philosophy (1867), and M. 

 Boutroux has taken up the subject 

 for the last third of the century in 

 the ' Revue de Metaphysique et de 

 Morale' (1908). In the same 

 volume will be found articles on 

 the philosophical movement in 

 other countries. For German con- 

 temporary thought the publication 

 of a memorial to Kuno Fischer, 

 entitled ' Die Philosophic im 

 Beginn des 20t*n Jahrhunderts ' 

 (1904), is to be recommended, also 

 the earlier publication of Lexis, 

 ' Die deutschen Universitiiten ' 

 (vol. i., Article by J. Baumann, 

 p. 427, 1893). 



