156 THE METHOD OF PHILOSOPHY. 



the higher and the lower, to break in two the unity 

 of the universe, to open an impassable abyss between 

 here and hereafter, so that they that would pass 

 from earth to heaven cannot pass from facts to 

 metaphysics, while those who breathe the unsubstant- 

 ial air of metaphysical meditation can never reach 

 the gross but solid facts. To assert the diffei'e7ice 

 between the higher and the lower is not enough ; 

 we require a method which will also bring out their 

 connection. 



% 5. After this breach in the law of continuity, 

 and the assertion of the utter difference of higher 

 and lower, the method of abstract metaphysics 

 develops in two ways. 



If it retains any consciousness of the lower earthly 

 plane at all, the difference between the higher and 

 the lower becomes accentuated into antagonism. 

 The spiritual becomes the supernatural, the pheno- 

 menal becomes the unreal, the body is opposed to 

 the soul in everlasting conflict, man to God and 

 earth to heaven. There results, first, an irreconcil- 

 able dualism of the higher and lower, and in the 

 end the lower or physical plane is regarded as the 

 sphere of the principle of evil. It is well known 

 how near many Manichaean heresies, as well as 

 certain forms of orthodoxy, come to making the 

 Devil the ruler of the world, from whose dominion 

 the individual can only escape by special miraculous 

 grace, and the whole ascetic view of life, once so 

 widely prevalent, really results from the same tend- 

 ency. And that these consequences are not due 

 to the bias of individuals, but inherent in the method, 

 is shown also in the history of pre-Christian philo- 

 sophy. In their asceticism and contempt for the 

 material the Neo-Platonists yielded not a whit to 



