730 PHILOSOPHICAL THOUGHT. 



principles, quite spontaneously conceived the idea that 

 by following out their line of reasoning a solution of the 

 philosophical problem could be attained where and when 

 Idealism had failed. In fact, they thought that circum- 

 spection i.e., looking outside and around would be 

 more helpful than introspection. There is also no doubt 

 that idealistic thinkers had, in an unwarranted manner, 

 made tacit and surreptitious use of notions which be- 

 long exclusively to the material sciences. The natural- 

 istic school of thought worked in the commencement 

 mainly with the conception of Life as the highest uni- 

 fying principle in nature, and when the older formula of 

 a " vital force " could not be logically defined it was 

 driven to a purely mechanical construction of reality. 

 This line of reasoning found its consummation in the 

 system of Herbert Spencer. In this system the natural- 

 istic train of thought came to a limit as the idealistic 

 had apparently come to a limit a generation earlier in 

 the system of Hegel. 



In parenthesis it may be noted that on the idealistic 

 side Schopenhauer alone had not discarded the " Thing 

 in Itself," but had incorporated it in his dualistic system 

 by defining it as the Will in analogy with the active 

 principle of the human mind ; on the other side, Comte 

 had not reduced biology to mechanism, but had main- 

 tained that the living creation could only be understood 

 by the vue d'ensemble i.e., by resorting to a mental 

 principle. 



This inroad of naturalism into what we may term the 

 philosophy of mind did not contaminate British thought 

 to the same extent. Though by Hartley a mechanical 



