OF REALITY. 



515 



The position which, on the other side, Wundt takes 

 up is, it seems to me, again different both from that of 

 Spencer and from that of Lotze. He did not start his 



and improving the definition, pro- 

 duces a knowledge of what we 

 mean" (Lotze, 'Metaphysik,' p. 

 33). The process, on the other 

 side, which is employed by Spencer 

 to reach his conception of the 

 Absolute, is that of abstraction. 

 By generalising and refining more 

 and more the conceptions suggested 

 by common-sense and scientific re- 

 search we arrive at a highest prin- 

 ciple of unity, but this is only 

 definable by removing all defini- 

 tions and distinctions with which 

 common-sense and science operate. 

 As being and remaining purely 

 negative the Absolute is therefore 

 for us unthinkable except as a limi- 

 tation or as the opposite to every 

 determination which we are accus- 

 tomed or obliged to make. Al- 

 though therefore Spencer speaks of 

 this Absolute or ultimate ground 

 as something eminently Real, even 

 as " the background of our con- 

 sciousness," it is a thought which, 

 not only for scientific but also for 

 philosophical purposes, we have 

 entirely to put aside. That this 

 is not actually carried out in his 

 elaborate system of philosophy, 

 which deals only with the Know- 

 able, we shall have ample oppor- 

 tunity to show in subsequent 

 chapters, notably when dealing 

 with the conception of Nature as 

 a whole (the cosmological problem) 

 and with the foundation of Ethics. 

 For the moment I desire only to 

 point out how the two ways of 

 dealing with the problem of the 

 truly Real or the Absolute may 

 be described as exemplifying the 

 two opposite ways of contemplat- 

 ing things based respectively upon 

 what Comte termed the esprit 

 d'ensemble and the esprit de detail. 

 The former I have repeatedly re- 

 ferred to as the synoptical view 



which generates but is essentially 

 opposed to the combined processes 

 of analysis and subsequent syn- 

 thesis. It is true that, all scientific 

 and philosophical reasoning being 

 carried out only by adult minds, 

 and among these only by such as 

 have attained to a high proficiency 

 in defining, distinguishing, and 

 neatly putting together again, the 

 natural beginning or starting- 

 point is always an enormous mass 

 of separate observations, thoughts, 

 or conceptions present, within 

 larger or narrower regions, to the 

 mind of the thinker. But that 

 this mass of detail, cleanly separ- 

 ated and neatly to be put together 

 again, is itself the result of a 

 long process of mental develop- 

 ment which must have started 

 from a confused and bewildering, 

 yet eminently vivid and real, pre- 

 sentation of the whole what in 

 recent psychology is termed the 

 presentation - continuum or the 

 stream of consciousness is just 

 as much a matter of fact as the 

 opposite assertion that fruitful 

 and useful thought only begins 

 when this fundamental psychical 

 reality has been consciously or 

 unconsciously dissected and dis- 

 integrated. And thus the differ- 

 ence between the two ways of 

 philosophising consists in this, 

 that the philosophy of the Know- 

 able considered it unnecessary to 

 bring into its manifold investiga- 

 tions that supreme reality which 

 it acknowledges but keeps out of 

 sight ; whereas thinkers belonging 

 to the other side maintain that this 

 underlying reality must be continu- 

 ally before the mind of the thinker, 

 as without it even a correct descrip- 

 tion, not to say an interpretation of 

 the world which surrounds us and 

 is within us, is impossible. 



