118 Herbert Spencer's Synthetic Philosophy. 



ABSTRACT OF THE DISCUSSION. 



MR. RAYMOND S. PEEEIN : 



As I have listened to the lecture of the evening, I have experienced, 

 in common, I have no doubt, with a great many in this audience, an 

 impression of being overwhelmed with an avalanche of philosophic 

 terms. The speaker has impressed us with the store of knowledge 

 which he has acquired, but he has left us confused and unhappy. A 

 few simple truths clearly and properly presented would have resulted 

 in something more practical in the way of information than this ab- 

 struse philosophical discussion. I am a great admirer of Herbert 

 Spencer, who has undoubtedly given us the most remarkable philo- 

 sophical system of the present century. On its objective side its mode 

 of procedure has been scientific, and it is in effect a synthesis of all 

 the special sciences. But I am no admirer of Kant ; and in so far as 

 Spencer has borrowed from Kant, I can not accept his conclusions as 

 rational and valid. To one who is familiar with the philosophy of 

 Plato, Kant's Critique of Pure Reason is a roaring farce. Mr. Spencer 

 has apparently accepted his conclusion that there is a Ding an sich 

 behind phenomena an absolute Being which is to us unknowable. 

 But if it is unknowable, how do we know that there is any such abso- 

 lute Being ? This conclusion is not the result of scientific analysis, but 

 of metaphysical speculation. The truly scientific procedure in phi- 

 losophy would be, instead of resolving all things into an unknowable 

 substance, to discover analytically what is the common content of all 

 phenomena those which are called mental as well as those which are 

 called physical. The only quality or principle common to all known 

 modes of being is motion. Motion is a principle of life and mind as 

 well as of material things. Absence of motion would be absolute death 

 or nonentity. In the ultimate analysis we reach this principle of mo- 

 tion or life everywhere, and we are therefore justified in positing it as 

 the supreme reality in the place of the unknowable of Mr. Spencer. 



ME. WILLIAM H. BOUGHTON : 



The comprehensive, just, judicious, and judicial paper to which we 

 have listened to-night has yielded to us all the pleasure which a model 

 review can give, and leaves nothing for criticism of matter or method. 



But it may be of interest to call attention to some conclusions of Mr. 

 Spencer which he may not have established upon as firm a foundation 



