XVlll ANALYSIS OF CONTENTS. 



I'AGE 



physical or pseudo-metaphysical. § 3. The latter mis- 

 applies the methods of science to ultimate questions. 

 But (i) the principles of the sciences involve contradic- 

 tions which philosophy has to solve. And (2) this 

 method explains the higher by the lower, which is im- 

 possible, and then denies the higher. (3) Its strength 

 lies in its appreciation of the continuity of things and 

 its accumulation of data. § 4. The metaphysical method 

 rightly protests against the explanation of the higher 

 by the lower, but merely asserts their difference, while 

 their connection is wanted. § 5. By denying the con- 

 tinuity of higher and lower it either regards them as 

 antagonistic, and ends in dualism and pessimism, e.g., 

 Platonism, or, § 6, it ignores the lower altogether, like 

 the Eleatics and Hegel. § 7. The fact is that the 

 method is abstract, and that first principles which are 

 abstractions are all false, all the more (§ 8) when they 

 are picked up at random. § 9. The true method is 

 metaphysical, but concrete. It explains the lower by the 

 higher, but admits their connection. Metaphysics to 

 be derived from the sciences. § 10. Its difficulties; (i) 

 scarcity of precedents, § 11 (2) Our imperfect know- 

 ledge of the lower, and § 12 (3) Our imperfect attain- 

 ment of the higher, which remains unimaginable to the 

 lower. § 13. These defects limit its achievements, yet, 

 ,^ 14, much light may be derived from the new data of 

 science. 



Chapter VII. The Metaphysics of Evolution . .170 



§ I. The theory of evolution, like all others, must be 

 based on ultimate principles, i.e., metaphysics. § 2. It 

 is a special case of the historical method, which assumes 

 the reality of history, and so of time. Also (§ 3) that 

 the past has caused the present, and that things have 

 had an origin. But how if causal connexion is an illu- 

 sion, and the infinity of time renders a beginning 

 incredible ? Hence the historical method assumes a 

 real beginning of things, or at least of their history. 

 § 4. Evolutionism shares these assumptions, and adds 

 the assertion that history proceeds from the simple to 

 the complex. § 5. By erecting this fact into a universal 

 principle evolutionism becomes metaphysical and philoso- 

 phic, as in Spencer. § 6. Evolution as a history of all 



