OF REALITY. 



423 



in 2. 



Some sys- 



cautious way of proceeding which I allude to, we are at 

 the same time bound to acknowledge that this period 

 is poor in creative efforts and new aspects of thought, 

 and that to the small extent that such have made their 

 appearance, they stand outside of, and sometimes 

 opposition to, the orderly movement of thought, being 

 frequently stigmatised by representatives of the latter as oi 

 unscientific and uncritical. 1 



In recent times this difference, which we may call the 

 difference between the critical and the dogmatic attitude, 

 has been much influenced by the requirements of aca- 

 demic instruction. This has variously laid the greater 

 stress upon one of the two requisites of higher culture : 

 the imparting, on the one side, of a strict mental dis- 



1 Examples of this are to be 

 found in all the three countries, 

 but most in Germany. During the 

 last fifty years three names have 

 risen to celebrity in philosophical 

 literature, which, in the beginning, 

 were either neglected or denounced 

 and even violently denied a place 

 by the ruling philosophy of the age. 

 They are : Schopenhauer, von Hart- 

 mann, and Nietzsche. All three 

 gained a considerable influence over 

 the philosophic thought of their age 

 and country before adequate notice 

 was taken of their writings in aca- 

 demic circles or in some of the prom- 

 inent works on History of Modern 

 Philosophy. There is, however, no 

 doubt that Schopenhauer contri- 

 buted, probably more than any 

 other individual thinker, to counter- 

 act a one-sided Intellectualism, to 

 prepare the way for that Voluntar- 

 ism which is a characteristic feature 

 of recent thought. Von Hartmann's 

 reputation has latterly rested more 

 on his critical and historical writ- 

 ings, some of which are of the first 

 order, than on the idea of the 



Unconscious which played such a 

 prominent part in his earliest work. 

 And, so far as Nietzsche is con- 

 cerned, it is interesting to note 

 that he has, after being violently 

 proclaimed unphilosophic, gained 

 at last a place among the ' Grosse 

 Denker' (ed. E. von Aster, 2 vols. 

 1912), an honour not vouchsafed to 

 thinkers like Comte, Lotze, or 

 Spencer. In France, leaving out 

 such eccentric thinkers as, e.g., 

 Saint - Simon and Proudhon, we 

 have, in recent times, the remark- 

 able writings of Jean Marie Guyau ; 

 and, in this country, a group of 

 | writers who have had a marked in- 

 influeuce on philosophic thought, 

 though the fundamental principles 

 of their teaching are so little defined 

 that it is difficult to do them justice 

 in an account of the methodical 

 philosophical thought of the cen- 

 tury. They are : Coleridge, Carlyle. 

 and Ruskin. A real appreciation 

 of their views belongs to the sec- 

 tion which should treat of poetical 

 and religious thought. 



