THE EATIONALE OF PHILOSOPHICAL THOUGHT. 745 



development, the logical of Hegel and the mechanical 

 of Spencer, have given to their followers abundant 

 occupation. Starting in both cases with the object of 

 illustrating and verifying an abstract canon of thought, 

 their eyes have been arrested by the incomparably 

 greater interest which the region of facts presented to 

 them, and, held by this interest, they have gradually 

 forgotten the dry formula which started them on their 

 journey. Hence the great accession to actual know- 

 ledge of historical and physical facts which resulted in 

 both cases. Yet, with this accumulation of new know- 

 ledge, the philosophical problem was not solved. There 12. 



The philo- 



still remained the question : What do we mean when sopwcai 



problem 



we speak of Mind or of the Absolute ? Similarly, the 

 modern doctrine of Evolution leaves unanswered the 

 question : What is it that evolves ? What, e.g., is the successors. 

 real essence of life and progress ? 



So far as Hegel is concerned, the principal merit of 

 his philosophy in the history of modern Thought seems 

 to be that he formulated two definite problems, the 

 problem of defining the Absolute or Ultimate Eeality, 

 and the further problem of finding an intellectual path- 

 way by which to reach it. The first he provisionally 

 solved by describing the Eeality as Spirit or Mind ; the 

 second by his dialectical method. And the modern 

 idealistic movement of Thought started in this country 

 by taking up these problems as defined by Hegel, trying 

 to do his work over again with the help of the deeper 

 insight that had been gained through science and history 

 on the one side, through logical and psychological studies 

 on the other. 



