OF THE SOUL. 237 



They formed the recognised groundwork, and were 

 accepted by the philosophical teachers in the form of 

 truths be it of natural or of revealed religion and as 

 little analysed as the axioms of geometry or natural 

 philosophy were analysed in their respective lecture 

 rooms. This exclusion of what, on the Continent, was 

 considered to be included in the task of the mental 

 philosopher, really formed the strength of the Scottish 

 school, through which it has become the founder of 

 British psychology, i.e., of psychology proper, excluding 

 though not uninfluenced by metaphysics on the one 

 side and natural science on the other. French as well 

 as German thinkers having, unlike their Scottish con- 

 temporaries, assumed an independent attitude with 

 regard to traditional beliefs as taught in the ruling 

 churches of their countries, had to seek and establish 

 that metaphysical or rational groundwork which con- 

 temporary thinkers in Scotland found ready made, and 

 which they, on their part, had little inducement either 

 to challenge or to prove. The consequence was that 

 in Germany, in certain schools, for a considerable time, 

 psychology was entirely neglected in favour of meta- 

 physics, and that in France the spiritualistic school con- 

 ducted a continued search for metaphysical principles. 



II. 



The far-reaching influence which the idealistic philo- 31. 

 sophy of Germany had on the conception of all philoso- psychology. 

 phical problems has shown itself prominently also with 



