298 The Origin of a 'Thing' and its Nature 



§ 12. The Oi'igin of the Universe ; Further Problems 



On the view developed in this paper, the question of 

 the ultimate origin of the universe may still come up for 

 answer. Can there be an ultimate stopping-place any- 

 where in the career of the thing-world as a whole ? Does 

 not our position make it necessary that at any such stop- 

 ping-place there should be some kind of filling drawn from 

 yet antecedent history to give our statement of the con- 

 ditions of origin any distinguishing character ? It seems 

 to me so. To say the contrary would be to do in favour of 

 the prospective categories what we have been denying the 

 right of the naturalist to do in favour of those of retrospect. 

 Neither can proceed without the other. The only way to 

 treat the problem of ultimate origin is not to ask it as an 

 isolated problem. Lotze says that the problem of philoso- 

 phy is to require what reality is, not how it is made ; and 

 this will do if we remember that we must exhaust the 

 empirical 'how' to get a notion of the empirical 'what,' 

 and that there still remains over the 'prospect ' which the 

 same author has hit off in his famous saying, ' Reality is 

 richer than thought.' To desiderate a what which has no 

 how — this seems as contradictory as to ask for a how in 

 terms of what is not. It is really this last chase of the 

 ' how ' that Lotze deprecates — and rightly. 



Certain further applications:^ to the discussion oi free- 

 dom ; to the discussion of ideals ; criticism of the general 

 concept of law from this point of view ; applications in 



1 Questions suggested to the members of the Psychological Seminary for 

 discussion. A further development of the point of view of this paper by one 

 of the members of the Seminary, Professor W. M. Urban, is to be found 

 in the Psychological Review, January, 1896, pp. 73 ff. 



