but its roots may be found in a very much earlier period, being im- 

 plicit even in the Presocratics and attaining importance in the work 

 of Socrates, Plato and Aristotle. Nor is the problem one which 

 has lost interest for the present, for the formation of concepts and 

 their relation to so-called individual things is a very important 

 modern question. In the Mediaeval Ages, there were, at first, 

 two positions taken, one of which claimed that the concepts or the 

 universals are ante rent and constitute in themselves reality. The 

 advocates of this view were called realists. The other party said 

 the universals are derived from individual things by abstraction 

 and are therefore post rem. The universals are mere words, names 

 (nomina), and so they were called nominalists. An outstanding 

 attempt at a reconciliation of these positions is known as concep- 

 tualism, which, as advocated by Abelard, claimed that universalia 

 sunt in rebus. Conceptualism was really a synthesis of the two 

 opposing views with a special emphasis, however, upon the fact that 

 the universals exist in the individuals and are therefore realities. 

 The result of the controversy was, by no means, favourable to the 

 realists, and, when William of Occam, following the example of 

 Roscelin of an earlier date, championed nominalism, it was to the 

 great discomfiture of realism. But the Church considered its very 

 foundations in regard to its hierarchical organization as well as in 

 regard to its dogmas to be attacked when realism was in danger. 

 For, since the great dogmas of the Church and its institutions were 

 ideas, considered as fundamental realities, their validity seemed 

 lost when the universal ideas were regarded as merely names. 

 This, applied for example to the dogma of the Trinity, became a 

 serious matter. So it came that Occam incurred the condemnation 

 of the Church, and philosophy, with its nominalistic tendencies, for 

 long in slavery to theology was gladly given its liberty. 



But philosophy seemed unable to carry on an independent in- 

 vestigation; it could not so soon appreciate the possibilities of a new 

 position and a new freedom, and so it exchanged the authority of 

 the Church for that of Aristotle, appropriating his conclusions 

 rather than his spirit of inquiry, a procedure which meant a less 

 servile position, perhaps, but one which just as effectually hindered 

 its achieving any real results. The consequences of this un- 

 fortunate step were extremely important in the succeeding cen- 



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