768 PHILOSOPHICAL THOUGHT. 



of the age : in science to extreme specialisation, in 

 philosophy, to a discussion of separate logical, meta- 

 physical, and ethical problems, such as have occupied us 

 in the preceding volumes. Nobody nowadays would 

 venture to rewrite either the ' Kosmos ' or the ' Micro- 

 cosmus ' ; the field in either case seems too large, the 

 material too overwhelming. And yet the process of 

 32. unification of thought has in neither case been arrested. 



Unification 



of thought Let us for a moment try to understand by what means 



not arrested 



by failure, this process has been or can be successfully carried on. 



And first, let us look at scientific thought. Whilst 

 the range of facts and phenomena has enormously in- 

 creased, a few highest principles or generalisations, such 

 as have occupied our attention during the first section 

 of this work, representing the uniformities termed 

 natural laws, have suggested themselves to the human 

 intellect they have enabled naturalists to put into 

 order and describe in more or less simple terms the 

 otherwise bewildering variety of facts and events which 

 surrounds us. The comparative unity or system of 

 nature arrived at in this way is a purely logical one, 

 which through application and actual verification, through 

 calculation and prediction of unknown facts and future 

 events, has received the impress of reality, leading our 

 thoughts and regulating our conduct in the outer world. 

 The success attained in this region of thought and know- 

 ledge has been so great that natural philosophers have 

 attempted to construct systems of philosophy by elevat- 

 ing one or two among the accepted leading principles 

 to the supreme position as expressions of the innermost 

 essence of things. Such principles are, notably, the 



