OF THE UNITY OF THOUGHT. 727 



problems of philosophy and of the burning questions of 

 the day. Among these he has specially dealt with the 

 psychological, the ethical, and the sociological problems. 

 The other recent doctrines may contain valuable prin- 

 ciples capable of systematic treatment, and affording help 

 in solving the two supreme philosophical problems: the 

 formal one of a unification of knowledge or thought, and 

 the more substantial one of furnishing a reasoned creed 

 which should afford a reconciliation of the scientific and 

 the religious aspects. It is quite evident that they all 

 move under the sign of Evolution : also that they feel 

 the necessity of enlarging and deepening the Spencerian 

 conception of Evolution by the importation of some 

 principle of progress. But, though the system of 

 Wundt does clearly supply the latter, it does not seem 

 as if his special conception of development has proved to 

 be generally acceptable. 



The end of the nineteenth century thus found itself 

 confronted with the problem which existed in the 

 beginning : the problem of reason and faith or of science 

 and religion. Though this supreme and unsolved prob- 

 lem does not appear in the same light as it did to 

 thinkers in the beginning of the century, the need of a 

 solution is now more generally felt. The easy solutions 

 given by French thinkers during the revolutionary period 

 are now nowhere acceptable. The problem has been 

 fully realised in this country also, where it had hardly 

 presented itself at all a hundred years ago. It is to a 

 large extent through having recognised the deep import- 

 ance of this problem that German philosophy has received 

 so much attention and gained so much influence outside 



