224 HUMANISM xn 



approximating to that of Energeia. Indeed the chief 

 difference at present is that whereas Energeia avowedly 

 and consciously stands for a theory of substance, Energy 

 still seems to crave for a backbone of substantiality. 

 Thus the scientific auguries seem favourable to a reform 

 of the conception, while an inveterate error may well be 

 judged to be decrepit when its patrons discover it to be 

 of no avail. 



Alike in philosophic and in scientific circles then, it 

 seems to be pretty generally agreed that the old view of 

 Substance is worthless. It lingers on chiefly because 

 reconstruction has not kept pace with criticism. And 

 yet Lotze s criticism of Substantiality brings him (un 

 consciously it would seem) very close to the Aristotelian 

 conception. After pointing out the uselessness of the 

 substratum view he declares l that &quot; it is not in virtue of 

 a substance contained in them that things are, they are 

 when they are able to produce the appearance of their 

 being such a substance.&quot; It is thus out of the behaviour 

 of a thing that we construct its essence, and this should 

 properly be regarded, not as an intrinsic power but rather 

 an immanent and individual law which maintains its 

 identity and guides its varying reactions in its dealings 

 with the other members of the cosmos. Lotze s con 

 struction is excellent so far as it goes, but still entangled 

 in polemic against the catchwords which it is striving to 

 supersede. And so he hardly makes plain what is this 

 individual law, and how the illusion of an underlying 

 substance is produced. It is better, therefore, to start at 

 once from Aristotle on the straight road to truth, than 

 to attain it after devious wanderings among the paths of 

 error. 



VIII 



The Aristotelian conception of Energeia is our best 

 starting - point because it affords no foothold for an 

 unknowable substratum. Indeed of such a view of 



1 Metaphysics, 37. 



