PHILOSOPHY, MENTAL. 



527 



most important which can occupy human thought 

 God, the world, man, and their relations in general. 

 Its end is the highest knowledge which can be 

 attained of these subjects. With reference to its 

 subjects, Cicero called it the " science of things 

 human and divine." Many modern philosophers have 

 called it the " science of the fundamental truths of 

 human knowledge," or the "science of the essence 

 of things;'' others the " science of ideas," believing 

 that through them we come to the knowledge of 

 the essence of tilings, and, as all ideas centre in the 

 idea of the absolute, the "science of the absolute" 

 (thus it is called by the school of Schelling). Con- 

 sidered with regard to its end, namely, the attain- 

 ment of the knowledge of which we have spoken, 

 and the intellectual action by which this end is to 

 be effected, it has been designated as the " science 

 of reason." To philosophize, therefore, means, to 

 reflect intelligently on the most elevated subjects of 

 human knowledge, and to represent clearly and co- 

 herently the ideas thus attained. The latter is re- 

 quired to constitute philosophy a science, which 

 necessarily requires system. The middle ages called 

 this science sapieritia sacularis, as contradistinguish- 

 ed to theology, or revelation, that is, the Christian 

 religion, whose origin is referred immediately to 

 God. The various views of the great aim of philo- 

 sophythe relation of the infinite to the finite, the 

 absolute to the conditional, of man to nature, &c. 

 form the ground of the various philosophical systems, 

 Jvhose mutual connexion is shown by the history of 

 philosophy. 



II. Division of Philosophy. Philosophy may be 

 divided into pure philosophy, or philosophy strictly 

 so called, which forms general notions, and investi- 

 gates the laws of the mind, and applied philosophy, 

 which applies the results of the former to the sub- 

 jects of experience. To the latter belong, lor ex- 

 ample, psychology, pedagogics (see Pedagogue], 

 politics. Philosophy, properly so called, was gene- 

 rally divided by the ancients into logic, or dialectics 

 (as the doctrine of the possibility, form, and method 

 of philosophy) ; physics (at a later period metaphy- 

 sics,} the science of the ultimate causes of all being ; 

 and ethics, the science of the moral nature and 

 destiny of man. In modern times, the division of 

 philosophy into theoretical and practical has been 

 the most general. The theoretical or speculative 

 philosophy was considered to have for its object the 

 investigation of the highest truths respecting God, 

 the world, nature and mind ; the practical, their 

 application. But it was soon seen how little the 

 latter idea was adapted to the sciences comprehend- 

 ed under practical philosophy ; and this was then 

 defined to be the science of action, or of the moral 

 nature of man in particular. Some, therefore, call 

 theoretical philosophy the explanatory or illustrative 

 philosophy, as it has for its object that which exists 

 without our aid, and is the subject of our know- 

 ledge ; while they term practical philosophy the im- 

 perative, or preceptive, as it gives precepts for the 

 regulation of human action. Esthetics (q. v.), 

 which originated at a later period, has been consi- 

 dered, at times, as belonging to the practical, at 

 times to the theoretical philosophy. Where philoso- 

 phy confines itself merely to the knowledge of the 

 action of the human mind, theoretical philosophy is 

 the science of the laws of conceiving and knowing 

 (aesthetics, in this case, as being the science of taste, 

 or rather the science of the rules for judging of the 

 beautiful, has been adiled to it), and practical philo- 

 sophy the science of the laws of acting, or of lawful 

 acting. But this view very easily sinks into form- 

 alism, by letting the objects of knowledge escape 

 out of sight, whiie we reflect on its laws. At least, 



it will be acknowledged, that the science of the lawg 

 and criteria of knowledge is rather an introduction 

 to theoretical philosophy than theoretical philosophy 

 itself. Those who define the latter in the last-men- 

 tioned manner, consider logic and metaphysics 33 

 belonging to theoretical philosophy, ethics and na- 

 tural law to practical. Finally, philosophy may also 

 b divided, with reference to the three highest ideas 

 of man, the ideas of the true, of the good, and of 

 the beautiful, into theoretical, practical, andffisthe- 

 tical philosophy. 



III. History of Philosophy is the relation of the 

 most important attempts to realize the ideas of phi- 

 losophy, or, according to Tennemann, the pragmati- 

 cal representation of the gradual development of 

 philosophy as a science. It is of great value, as one 

 of the most important branches of the history of hu- 

 man civilization, and from the aid which it affords to 

 philosophical genius, because it presents the most 

 important problems of philosophy in their true mean- 

 ing, extent and connexion, illustrates the various 

 philosophical systems, and affords a survey of the 

 progress and aberrations of the human mind, which 

 teaches the most instructive lessons. The history of 

 philosophy is commonly divided into the ancient, 

 middle, and modern. Some divide it into the Greek 

 (including the Greek philosophy in tiie Roman em- 

 pire) and the modern European. In this division, 

 the philosophy of the middle ages forms, as is obvi- 

 ous, the transition. The first period begins with the 

 Greek, because, though the disposition to philoso- 

 phize is confined to no particular nation, but is in- 

 herent in all, so that every tribe forms philosophical 

 notions as soon as its religious conceptions pass over 

 into reflection, and its feelings into doubt, yet philo- 

 sophy was first studied scientifically by the Greeks 

 The philosophic notions of the inhabitants of the 

 East must be mentioned in such a history, principally 

 as introductory, and with reference to their connex- 

 ion with the Greek philosophy, in which many Ori- 

 ental notions were incorporated. Tennemann char- 

 acterizes the first period (that of the Greek and Ro- 

 man philosophy) as the period of the free striving of 

 reason for the knowledge of the ultimate causes of 

 nature and liberty. It forms a whole in itself, which, 

 to a certain degree, carries in it the germs of all the 

 subsequent philosophies. The Greek mind elevated 

 itself through poetry to philosophy. The theogonies, 

 cosmogonies and gnomes formed the introduction to 

 philosophy, and connected it with religion. In the 

 first division of this period the youth of philosophy, 

 in which reflection was not yet systematized nor se- 

 parated from poetry inquirers strove to solve the 

 question respecting the origin of nature and the ori- 

 ginal matter of the world ; a. in the Ionian school 

 (beginning with Thales, 610 B. C.), by reflection on 

 nature and the origin of natural things, or the first 

 existence ; further, b. by imaginary conceptions, as 

 in the case of Pythagoras and his school (the Italian) ; 

 c. by the dialectfcal opposition of reason and experi- 

 ence in the Eleatic (q. v.) school ; and, d, by the, 

 union of both in the atomic school. Socrates (about 

 422 B. C.) opposed the notions of the Sophists, which 

 threatened to destroy moral principle, and turned his 

 inquiries to the moral nature and destiny of man, in 

 which many of his pupils followed him. Philosophy 

 thus received quite a new direction, which was first 

 made manifest in a systematic form by his pupils, 

 particularly Plato and Aristotle. The second divi- 

 sion of the first period begins, therefore, with So- 

 crates and his pupils : a. Plato (the founder of the 

 academy, and, b. Aristotle, (the founder of the peri- 

 patetic school. It is characterized by a systemat'c 

 striving to embrace all the objects of philosophy. 

 Plato laid the foundation of a systematic philosophy ; 



