INTRODUCTORY. 37 



of the word has been carried out have, in many in- 

 stances, led to problems for which the exact or math- 

 ematical methods do not suffice. The question still 

 awaits a universally approved answer : " Where and 

 how can the thinking mind grasp the whole of that 

 region which we broadly define as the life of the 

 mind ? " Many ways and many answers have 

 suggested themselves. The history of Philosophical • 



Thought is mainly concerned with tracing and explain- 

 ing them. 



Having thus arrived at a crude definition of the task 

 which the history of philosophical Thought has to fulfil, 

 the question arises how the whole subject can be con- 

 veniently grouped and divided. The courses of philoso- 

 phical Thought have been so numerous and intricate, 

 crossing and recrossing each other so frequently, that the 

 historian has no little difficulty in choosing a starting- 

 point. Histories of philosophy have indeed been written so. 



^ r r J Histories of 



in great number.^ They have generally taken up the pwiosophy. 



^ By far the greater part of the I come upon a second period of phil- 

 ■work has been done by German 

 historians, among whom during the 

 nineteenth century the most prom- 



osophical historiography in the more 

 comprehensive and finished works 

 of E. Zeller (' Die Philosophie der 

 ineut are— H. Ritter (' Geschichte | Griechen,' 3 vols., 1844-52, and sub- 

 der Philosophic,' 12 vols., 1836-53, sequent editions much enlarged), 

 of which several parts have been I Kuno Fischer (' Geschichte der 



republished), Chr Aug. Brandis 

 {' Handbuch der Geschichte der 

 Griechisch-Romischen Philosophic,' 

 1835-60, and a smaller work in 2 

 vols., 1862-64), J. E. Erdmann 

 {' Versuch einer Wissenschaftl. 

 Darstellung der neuer. Philos.,' 

 1834 - 53). After these pioneer 

 works, written under the influence 



neuern Philosophie,' 8 vols., 1854- 

 99), and a new work by Erdmatm 

 (2 vols., 1865, and subsequent edi- 

 tions) embracing the whole history 

 of Philosophy. The three last- 

 mentioned works are all inspired 

 by the Hegelian philosophy, from 

 the stricter formulfe of which the 

 authors have gradually emancipated 



of Schleiermacher and Hegel, had j themselves, most of all Zeller, who 



to some extent cleared the ground, , was much influenced by Strauss 



laid bare the sources and amassed an and, together with him, by modern 



enormous amount of material, we scientilic notions. After these 



