192 



CHAPTER III. 



OF THE SOUL. 



philo 1 - 



again con? ht 



I HAVE had in the past many occasions to refer to 

 the difference of scientific and philosophical thought. 

 Entering now on a more detailed review of the progress 

 of philosophical thought during the nineteenth century, 

 it will be of use to emphasise again this difference. 

 Philosophical thought proceeds invariably with the 

 object of arriving at a comprehensive view of the sub- 

 ject it deals with and ultimately of the totality or 

 connection of things. 1 Although therefore philosophical 



1 As I shall have repeated occa- 

 sion to urge this distinction, which 

 has become better defined in the 

 course of the century, it may be of 

 interest to note how two leading 

 thinkers in the beginning of our 

 period gave expression to this 

 idea. Foremost stands Goethe, who 

 with remarkable insight uncon- 

 sciously anticipated many of the 

 leading thoughts of the century 

 which followed him. In that well- 

 known tract, first published in the 

 year 1790, on the ' Metamorphosis 

 of Plants ' (' Versuch die Metamor- 

 phose der Pflanzen zu erklaren,' 



Gotha, 1790), he became a pioneer 

 in a line of thought which at that 

 time was rare, and which was fully 

 recognised only when the pheno- 

 mena of descent and environment, 

 i.e., of the contiguity in time and 

 space or of the " Together " of 

 things natural, had been brought 

 into view, mainly through Darwin, 

 in natural science. In subsequent 

 writings, notably in the revision and 

 republication of this tract in later 

 years, we find a clear expression of 

 the two aspects which nature pre- 

 sents to the contemplating mind, 

 the purely scientific on the one side, 



