INTRODUCTION 



of pain," or of evil, vanishes. Of the workings 

 of an unknowable and inscrutable Power it is 

 obviously not rational to complain. Nor need 

 we be troubled to try to justify what we are ab- 

 solutely certain not to be able in any sense to 

 understand. Thus our positive attitude towards 

 the Unknowable is relieved of the entangle- 

 ments which a Theodicy would entail. We know 

 that the Unknowable is immeasurably above \xSy 

 and that it is more universally significant for us 

 than any phenomenal object can be, since we 

 absolutely depend upon it for all that we are. 

 Accordingly, when we finally generalize our 

 ethical instincts and seek for fulness of life in 

 the highest sense, we feel (if one may borrow 

 Schleiermacher's phrase) a Sense of Depend- 

 ence upon the Unknowable, which gives to 

 our search for this fulness of life a certain asso- 

 ciation with a feeling of reverence for the Abso- 

 lute. And this is religion, — something which 

 the mere phenomena in their endless variety can 

 neither give nor take away. Such is Fiske^s clos- 

 ing assertion of his position so far as the present 

 book goes. 



22' In the final chapter of the work, entitled 

 " The Critical Attitude of Philosophy," Fiske 

 discusses in a decidedly independent way the 

 spirit which the " Cosmic Philosophy " culti- 

 vates towards the education of the public, 



c 



