65. 

 French and 

 English 



18-i PHILOSOPHICAL THOUGHT. 



of a system of philosophy which emphasises progress 

 and evolution, should concern himself so little about 

 other earlier or later lines of thought ; in one word, 

 that he should show so little genuine historical interest 

 or critical spirit. The followers of Herbert Spencer 

 might retort that, if their master was deficient in the 

 spirit of historical criticism, contemporary German 

 philosophy on the other side was suffocated by it, and 

 that the only original thinker in Germany after the 

 middle of the century, Hermann Lotze, was likewise 

 averse to the historical method and treated the history 

 of philosophy in a purely subjective manner. 



From the German point of view, the contemporary 

 philos^ophy philosophies of France and England are mostly unscien- 

 the German tific in tlic larger sense of the word, which is identical 



sense. 



with saying that they have till quite recently been 

 uncritical. This does not imply that they have not 

 occasionally produced brilliant ideas, or that they have 

 not succeeded every now and then in coining philosophical 

 terms which have become the shibboleths of great schools 

 of thought and instruments for the handling of large 

 and original conceptions. The reasons why French and 

 English thought has been deficient in that methodical, 

 continuous, and exhaustive treatment which characterises 

 German philosophical and historical learning during the 

 nineteenth century are manifold. For a long time after 

 David Hume had discouraged metaphysics, the philo- 

 sophical interest in England centred in definite prob- 

 lems, mostly suggested by the social and industrial 

 condition of the nation, or reverted to an analysis of the 

 data of common-sense, preparing the way and gathering 



