MODKKNISM AND TliAMTIOXAL C'll KISTIAXITY. 



79 



" But this subject has also a reverse side, which is generally 

 much too little accentuated. Finally true is it that the still 

 far bolder assertion, namely, that the supposed world-picture 

 represents absolutely truly 'actual' Nature in every point, 

 without exception, is not in any manner to be refuted. For 

 in order even to enter on a proof to the contrary it would be 

 necessary to be able to say something' with certainty about 

 'actual' Nature — but this confessedly is altogether out of the 

 question. Here, as we see, a monstrous void lies before us 

 into which no science may ever penetrate, and the filling up of 

 this void is not the business of the Pure .Reason, but of the 

 Practical — the business of a sane view of the world. 



" Little as such a view of the world may be susceptible of 

 scientific proof, we may safely rely upon it that it will stand 

 fast against every storm, so long as it remains in agreement with 

 itself and with the facts of experience. But let us not delude 

 ourselves with the idea that it is possible, even in the most 

 exact of all sciences of Nature, to make any progress entirely 

 without a concept of the world, that is, altogether without 

 unprovable hypotheses. Even in Physics the statement is valid, 

 one cannot be saved without Faith — at least, faith in a certain 

 reality outside ourselves." 



The German philosophy subsequent to. the Kantian proceeds 

 on the assumption that no dualistic concept is necessary to 

 explain consciousness. Consciousness needs no "Nature in 

 itself " as an exciting cause of its activity, everything is in the 

 sphere, of consciousness. A world outside consciousness is, to 

 some of the successors of Kant, unthinkable. 



It is to this philosophy that Canon Streeter appeals in his 

 Preface to Foundations, and Mr. W. H. Moberly contributes to 

 this work an article on " God and the Absolute," in which 

 he endeavours to sketch out, on the basis, presumably, of 

 Hegelianism, a philosophy in which the religious difficulties 

 of the day may be met. He does not seem satisfied with 

 his own conclusions, and adds at the end with com- 

 mendable frankness his misgivings. "We have raised," he 

 says, " a very ambitious problem, and our suggestions towards 

 its solution are, at the best, fragmentary and unsatisfying. 

 The reader can hardly avoid feeling this, for the writer him- 

 self feels it strongly." The philosophy which is to form a 

 basis for Modernist theology is, therefore, yet to seek, and if 

 the view cited above as to a world limited to subjective 

 experience is any guide to the trend of scientific thought, 

 the great fabric of Monism, built up with much labour by 



