OF REALITY. 507 



on the Continent of Europe. The Universal substance 

 of Spinoza, the Monads and pre-established Harmony of 

 Leibniz, the Categorical Imperative of Kant, the Active 

 Principle of Fichte, the Absolute of Schelling and Hegel, 

 the Will of Schopenhauer, and the World of Worths as 

 distinguished from the World of Forms of Lotze, all 

 these terms have become the embodiment of conceptions 

 towards which the thinkers of to-day have to take up 

 definite individual positions. Alongside of this array 

 of abstract terms, through which philosophical thought 

 has striven to express its conception of the supreme and 

 truly Real, there stands the notion of a personal Deity. 

 Through the whole of the professedly religious specula- 

 tion of the ages, it is preserved in unaltered words which 

 have the sanction of antiquity and tradition. Much 

 thought has been bestowed upon the relation which 

 exists, or should exist, between the one unaltered re- 

 ligious and the many fluctuating philosophical concep- 

 tions. A school of thinkers has arisen, notably abroad, 

 whose main object has been to vindicate the meaning 

 and deeper sense contained in the belief in a personal 

 Deity and a Divine World-order, in the face of the many 

 difficulties which beset every attempt to make it the foun- 

 dation of a consistent and reasoned philosophical creed. 



Among these difficulties two are conspicuous, and 

 have been the subject of much speculation. The first 4 6 . 

 refers to the idea of Personality. It has been main- Personality. 

 tained that personality implies limitation, and the prob- 

 lem has been, how to reconcile the idea of an infinite 

 and omnipotent Being with that limitation which seems 

 to adhere to our notions of individuality and personality. 



