Theories of Development 235 



to believe that the general appeals to the human mind 

 earlier than does the particular. The experience, which 

 really lay at the bottom of this abstract speculation, 

 had been unconscious, in so far as no conscious attempt 

 at systematic study of nature had been made. 



2. Wearied by these futile attempts to solve the 

 ultimate problems of existence, a few vigorous thinkers, 

 like Bacon, Hobbs, Locke, began to call for a return 

 to nature even in matters of thought; very much as a 

 highly artificial social system had called forth the 

 same general appeal. 



The result was a shifting of philosophical inquiry, 

 from the purely metaphysical questions of existence, 

 in general, to the problems of knowledge. How 

 much can a mind, constituted as the finite human mind 

 is, positively know concerning those ultimate prob- 

 lems? Can a complex system of logic, whereby the 

 mind builds up a world of subjective reality, definitely 

 solve the problem of external reality? Attention was 

 thus turned to the human mind itself. 



3. As could be expected, the method of psycho- 

 logical study was that of introspection alone. Con- 

 sciousness was considered; and, under the influence 

 of the notion of free will, was thought to be some- 

 thing other and higher than any attribute of matter, 

 and capable of an independent development. A sub- 

 jective idealism was thus developed which not only 

 regarded ideas as inborn or innate, but which even 

 refused to acknowledge the value of sense impressions. 



4. A reaction to the intuitive, metaphysical, and ideal- 

 istic psychology made its appearance simultaneously 

 with important advances in biological science. The 

 study of development of organic beings not only 

 showed that the existence of inborn ideas was an 

 absurdity, but that a considerable period of develop- 

 ment precedes the appearance of those general ideas 

 thought to be inborn. It was Locke who first sug- 



