Chapter XIV: Part 14

Freedom of thought is always the best soil for a peaceful evolution but any system that binds the consciences of men and ties their ideas down to the average level of a certain age will be as dangerous as a boiler without a valve. There are periods of instability in history when the strengthening of the conservative spirit by imposing fetters upon the consciences of men appears useful and almost a condition for the development of some kind of a civilisation. This found expression in the historic legends of Lycurgus and Solon, binding their countrymen by oath not to alter the laws of the state. But these periods are after all ephemeral, and we ought to know by this time that we cannot bid the sun stand still or check the spirit of progress and the growth of mankind. There are nations which develop slowly because they rush into innovations, but there are other nations which have gone to the wall because of over-conservatism through which they were induced to suppress the freedom of thought and to deny the right of doubting the absolute validity of the prevailing world-conception.

The proposition of Justice Schiffer to bind the conscience of the judge by an oath of allegiance to that world-conception which is at present recognised as orthodox, is actually a law in the constitution of the church, and conflicts in the consciences of clergymen are of a common occurrence. The opinion that a clergyman who has ceased to believe in certain dogmas of his church has to resign this position is very common among freethinkers as well as orthodox believers. At first sight this seems to be the only choice left to a man of honesty and a lover of truth. I held this opinion myself for a long time. There is nevertheless another view of the subject which caused me to change my opinion entirely, and I am glad to perceive that such a man as Mr. Moncure D. Conway who held himself a position in the church and having grown more and more liberal has retired from active service, declares most emphatically that a clergyman who has grown liberal should not resign but stay in the church and wait till the church forces him to leave his position. This is an honest course, a clergyman has a right to pursue it and he will thereby open the eyes of his fellow-men; he will further the interests of mankind, and people will thus be enabled to judge better whether or not it is just to impose these burdens upon the pastors of the church.

Let us consider the case more closely. First, the oath which a young clergyman gives at his ordination is a promissory oath, and like all promissory oaths it holds good on the supposition that all the main conditions remain the same. If a man promises and binds himself by an oath to start to-morrow morning on a journey he does so on the supposition that it will be possible. So far as he can foresee it is possible, but incidents may happen which will make it impossible to-morrow. A promissory oath will be a weight on the conscience if it has to be broken, but it has no legal force. Thus soldiers swear an oath of allegiance to their king, and under ordinary circumstances there will be no cause for doubt as to the propriety of remaining faithful to the oath. But many cases of great perplexity will appear when a civil war splits a nation in twain so that brother stands against brother and faithfulness to the king may be the most degrading felony toward one’s highest and holiest ideals, perhaps also toward one’s bodily parents and nearest kin. Who does not recollect the sad end of Ludwig II, king of Bavaria. When the mind of the unfortunate monarch was too much deranged to leave him in possession of his royal power, a commission of several authorised men went to the castle where he resided to place him under the care of a physician. The king refused to receive the commission and ordered his faithful guards by whom he was surrounded to seize the commission, gouge out their eyes and treat them otherwise in the most outrageous way. The commission not being protected were for a moment in great danger, but happily the guards perceiving the seriousness of the situation did not execute the king’s orders and we might say,—broke their oath.

Did they really break their oath? No, they did not, for when they were sworn to obey their sovereign master and lord, it was supposed that the king was and would remain in his right mind. He became insane and this changed the situation entirely.

The oath of allegiance which the ministers of a church swear at their ordination is made in the bona fide conviction on both sides,—the church on the one side and the man that takes orders on the other side,—that the dogmas to which he pledges his troth are the truth. The oath holds good so long as a minister believes that the dogmas of the church are the truth; it still holds good so long as he considers it possible that they may be true. But the oath to believe them ceases to bind in the sense in which it was demanded as soon as a minister sees clearly that they are not true and that their truth is an actual impossibility. It ranks in the same category as the oath of allegiance to a sovereign who has become insane.

But the case is more complex still. If promissory oaths have no legal force because in certain cases a man would have to act against the letter of the oath, have these oaths no binding power whatever, as soon as a minister recognises the incongruity of the church belief with truth? I should say that they have a binding power, yet this binding power must be sought not in the letter but in the spirit of the oath.

One of the most prominent of juridical authorities, Prof. Rudolf von Jhering, has written a book entitled “Der Zweck im Recht.” He finds that all laws, all wills, all decrees have a purpose, and this purpose is their spirit. There are laws worded so badly that obedience to the letter of the law would under certain and unforeseen circumstances enforce exactly the contrary of that which the law was made for. Instances of this kind are of not an uncommon occurrence especially with regard to wills; testators and their legal advisors being often unable to formulate their intentions in a logical shape. Jhering maintains that a judge in construing a will, a decree, or a law has to find out the intention and purpose of the testator, the magistrate that gave the decree, or the legislator, and it is this intention or purpose with which his decisions have to agree. Supposing however that this purpose of a will or a law is wrong in itself or nonsensical, a judge has to construe it so that it will have sense. If the purpose is criminal the whole transaction is illegal, if it is irrational or illogical, it has to be interpreted so as to make it rational and logical. If it has reference to antiquated views, customs or institutions it has to be adapted to the corresponding modern views and to existing conditions.

An instance from practical life will explain the last point. There are many institutions in Northern Germany which were founded as cloisters or monasteries. The nuns and monks have been engaged partly in teaching, partly in attending to the sick, and in other useful purposes. The funds of these institutions exist still, and serve now those purposes directly which they have served formerly indirectly through the service of nuns and monks. Most of them are employed for the maintenance of schools, some of them as hospitals, others as homes for unmarried daughters of government officials or for homeless aristocratic ladies without means, etc. These changes have been wrought by history as the natural consequence of new conditions. Many of them were made in actual violation of the letter of the testators’ will; yet they were made bona fide with the intention to remain faithful to its spirit? The question is not what a testator intended his will to be half a millennium ago, but what he would intend it to be in the living present, knowing all the changes which the progress of the times have wrought and having progressed with the times.

Before we answer the question, What is the purpose of the minister’s oath? we should first see clearly, what is the purpose of the church. Is the purpose of the church really to be sought in the propaganda of some absurd dogmas? Or does not rather the preaching of these dogmas itself serve a purpose?

The dogmas of Christianity were some time ago supposed to be the indispensable instruments of ethical instruction. All the churches are educational institutions to inculcate the moral ought on the basis of a popular world-conception. The church of England for instance is a national institute and it is not true that one church party has the right to impose its religious conception upon the rest of the nation. When the church was founded some crude notions were taken to be absolute truths and no man can at the present time be required to believe these crudities. All institutions are conservative but most conservative are the courts of justice and the church. The conservatism of jurisprudence is characterised in the saying which appears to be its leading principle _fiat justicia et pereat mundus_. Jurisprudence too often forgets that the dispensation of justice serves the purpose of sustaining life, of promoting the general welfare and enhancing the prosperity of the community; it overlooks the spirit and clings to the letter.

Our justices are inclined to believe that if a new world-conception arises, (which by the bye will as we believe not be materialistic nor will it destroy the idea of moral responsibility, although it may change our views about guilt,) their whole system of jurisprudence will break down. They are afraid of a _pereat justicia et vivat mundus_. Justice Schiffer is not at all anxious to prove the truth of the old world-conception, he is satisfied with proving that the new world-conception is incompatible with the old view of justice. Criminal law means punishment and punishment presupposes the idea of guilt. He argues:

“The question remains whether the conflict between the new and the old world-conception could be avoided by adapting our views of justice to the new world-conception; yet this question is to be denied, for the notions of guilt and punishment belong to each other according to logical, ethical, and moral principles. To punish without assuming guilt is as nonsensical as it is immoral.”

It would lead us too far here to show that moral responsibility still subsists on the supposition of a strict determinism and that the criminal law with its punishments will not be abolished in the future. Yet there is no doubt that our views of punishment will have to be changed; indeed they have changed and how much they have changed, can be learned by a comparison of an execution of to-day with one of a few hundred years ago. The idea of punishment in the sense of inflicting pain as a retribution has gone and it has gone forever. There is no more burning of the criminal with hot irons, or twitching with hot tongs, or tearing out his tongue, or stretching on the wheel. The criminal is executed with as little pain to him as possible. Why this change? Because a new world-conception has entirely altered our views of punishment and it is going to alter them still more. Penology is not to be based upon sentimentality as some so-called philanthropists intend to do; nevertheless it is to and it will become humane because we have abandoned the old conception of guilt which as Justice Schiffer correctly states was a fundamental idea in the old jurisprudence, and this antiquated conception of guilt has partly but not as yet entirely been overcome.

The church is in a position similar to that of the criminal law courts. A change of our world-conception has set in and the church is not as yet adapted to the change. The church having found it necessary for its purpose of preaching ethics to insist on the belief in a world-conception which demonstrates a moral world order, now attempts to perpetuate certain errors of our ancestors’ conception of this moral world-order.

The oath of a clergyman having been asked and given bona fide on the supposition that the dogmas of the church were the truth, holds good still, but it must be construed as in similar cases a judge would have to construe a faulty will or an ill-worded law. It has to be construed in the spirit and not in the letter.

Clergymen who have grown liberal should not leave the church. It is their duty to stay in the church and to make their influence felt to broaden the spirit of the church. If the church removes them from their position, they yield to the authority at present in power, but they should not yield without a struggle, to be conducted on their part modestly but firmly, with reverence toward their authorities, with tact and decency, but fearlessly and bravely, for they are fighting not only for their personal interests but for the progress of mankind, they are fighting for the holiest treasures of the church—for truth.

The abolition of these burdens on the consciences of the clergy would be a natural consequence of repeated struggles. Let a pastor be bound to respect his church authorities, to obey them in all matters of administration, let him be bound to revere the ecclesiastical traditions of which he should never speak lightly, but do not prescribe to him a belief of any kind. Pledge him to serve the truth, to speak the truth and to live the truth; and that simple pledge will have more weight than the requirement to believe dogmas which, his superiors know but too well can no longer be believed literally but must be taken _cum grano salis_.

Christ says concerning the observances insisted upon by the Scribes and Pharisees: “They bind heavy burdens and grievous to be borne: and lay them upon men’s shoulders.” This passage is applicable also to the present system of ordination. Christ’s saying is read in the churches and it is, as most of his words are, as new to-day as it was at his time, but who thinks of its application to our present system of burdening the consciences of men?

P. C.

A COMMENT BY PROF. F. MAX MÜLLER CONCERNING THE DISCUSSION ON EVOLUTION AND LANGUAGE.

_To the Editor of The Monist:_

I must thank you and Professor Romanes for the frank and searching criticism to which you have both subjected my article on “Thought and Language,” published in _The Monist_. You have shown that you care for truth and not for victory, and you have carefully abstained from any personal remarks which are so apt to embitter scientific controversy and in consequence to render its chief object, the discovery of more truth, illusory. We all have the same object, we all want to know what is true—why then should we not all work together, listen to friendly criticism, accept useful advice, confess our mistakes, and work as hard as we can in the special field allotted to each of us.

As soon as I find a little more leisure, I shall not fail to reply fully to both your articles. At present I only write to you to defend myself against an undeserved charge brought against me by Professor Romanes. I had said that Professor Romanes had no right to speak of men like Noiré, Huxley, Herbert Spencer, to say nothing of Hobbes, with an air of superiority. Professor Romanes replies that he never mentioned Mr. Herbert Spencer at all, that it would have been well for me, if, before condemning his supposed treatment of Herbert Spencer, Huxley, and Noiré, I had looked at his Index. This is a serious charge. It would show a want of accuracy unpardonable in a scholar. It is true, Mr. Herbert Spencer’s name does not occur in the Index. But on p. 230 we read: “So here again we meet with additional proof, were any required, of the folly of regarding the copula as an essential ingredient of a proposition.” Now it is well known that it is Mr. Herbert Spencer who regards the copula as an essential ingredient of a proposition. I have shown that the facts of language are against Mr. Herbert Spencer, but I should not therefore think it right to charge him with folly. This will show that if I wrote without Index, I did not write without book.

Yours truly,

F. MAX MÜLLER.

Oxford, Oct. 28, 1891.

BOOK REVIEWS.

SYNOPTIKER. APOSTELGESCHICHTE. Bearbeitet von Professor _H. J. Holzmann_. Zweite verbesserte und vermehrte Auflage. Freiburg, i. B.: Akademische Verlagsbuchhandlung von J. C. B. Mohr. 1892.

This book is the first volume of the “Hand-Commentar zum Neuen Testament” edited by the Professors H. Holtzmann, R. A. Lipsius, P. W. Schmiedel, and H. v. Soden.

No better man could have been selected for the first part of this great work than Prof. H. J. Holtzmann, who is not only a theologian of most comprehensive scholarship but also has devoted his energies to this special subject. He has lectured regularly for a number of years at the university of Strassburg six or eight times weekly on the synoptic gospels and three times weekly on the Acts. The principle of his method has been laid down in a former work of his, viz. “Lehrbuch der historisch-kritischen Einleitung in das Neue Testament.” The present book contains an enormously voluminous material condensed into a comparatively small space of 448 pp. large octavo. The author being a theologian his attitude toward his subject is naturally reverent, paying an unreserved homage to the greatness of Jesus. Yet at the same time his investigations are strictly scientific and in accordance with the rules of criticism as employed in any historical investigation. It is no exaggeration to consider Professor Holtzmann’s work as representative in the highest degree; it embraces the most complete knowledge at present attainable and that too in a most concise form as a practical handbook with parallel tables and indexes of reference for students of the New Testament.

The author first formulates “the synoptic problem,” which has been solved after innumerable vain attempts by the so-called “Marcus-Hypothesis,” which is at present considered as satisfactory, because it alone fulfils every condition and explains all the difficulties. Holtzmann regards the figure of Christ as historical. The impression of his powerful personality was a living presence in the first congregation at Jerusalem. But all the interest centred in his words. The words of their Lord were faithfully preserved by oral tradition. Sentences so short and yet so pregnant with meaning as “Blessed are the peacemakers,” or “Ye are the salt of the earth,” “But let your communication be, Yea, yea: Nay, nay, etc.,” are so impressive that whoever has heard them once, will never forget them. The interest in the word was soon complemented by an interest in facts and events which was much later followed by an interest in dogma. The first differences among the Christians originated through the mission among the heathens. The gentile Christian became indifferent concerning the Jewish traditions and clung with all his religious enthusiasm to the Christ as his saviour. Christianity became a cosmic religion while the Jewish Christians still looked upon Christ as the Messiah of the people of Israel. The Jewish view of Christianity is represented by Matthew, the gentile view by Luke. Mark however does not show any development of dogma. According to Papias, the Apostle St. Peter had whenever it became necessary for an explanation of the words of Christ, occasionally told certain events of the life of Jesus; which were afterwards written down by Mark. We find in Mark, Matthew, and Luke the same building stones, but how differently arranged! Mark shows evidence of relating real facts of history, he begins with John the Baptist, tells us how Jesus became baptised, how he preached the kingdom of God; according to Mark, Jesus does not declare himself as the Messiah from the beginning. His activity grows by degrees, his disciples increase, he heals the sick, and it is from the mouth of these that he was first proclaimed as the Messiah. He becomes a power among the people and makes himself offensive to the authorities who consider him as dangerous and attempt to take his life. Jesus forbids those whom he heals to proclaim that he is the Messiah. He sends out his disciples not to preach him as the Messiah, but to proclaim the kingdom. At last in Peter the idea dawns that prompts him to declare: “Thou art the Christ.” Yielding before the persecution of his enemies, Jesus travels North and East and here he accustoms himself to the idea of a suffering son of man. His self-confidence increases and he travels courageously to Jerusalem where, as he could foresee, he would meet his fate. The drama of his life culminates in his word “ἐγώ εἰμι” (1462) in which he reveals his self-consciousness as being the Messiah. Being triumphantly hailed in Jerusalem by people of Galilee and such as believed in him he hastened his doom. It is not likely that Jesus could have publicly been held to be the Messiah for any length of time, for the Roman police was wont to suppress such movements without discrimination. They did not stop to investigate the case as to the character or motive of the movement whether or not it was purely religious or political. They never tolerated any “son of David” or “king of Israel” who held any influence over large masses of the people.

While Mark still preserves the development of Jesus’s messianic consciousness, Luke as well as Matthew have entirely obliterated it. According to Mark, Jesus proclaims the kingdom; Matthew and Luke make him preach his person. They make Jesus proclaim himself as the Messiah from the very beginning and his command not to speak it out openly given to those whom he healed and also to his disciples has no sense here. Matthew has a liking for cabalistic numbers, there are three times seven generations the names of which are not without doing violence to historical facts adjusted to the pattern, there are three temptations, seven parables, etc. Throughout we notice reflection, purposive selection of the material, and artificial adjustment to a plan. The book has a tendency to show that Jesus was the King of Israel predicted by the prophets and in the psalms. Luke on the other hand has also a dogmatic programme. It is the gospel of gentile Christianity as founded by Paul.

The critical school finds adversaries among theologians as well as unchristian thinkers, both of whom are apt to speak of fraud when religious books are written with certain dogmatic tendencies. Professor Holtzmann objects to such a view of the development of Christianity. He says that a religion which did not rouse sufficient enthusiasm to develop a religious poetry would be very poor and lifeless. Even the apocrypha of the New Testament are evidence of the vigor of the new religion, although we must be aware of the fact that the Church showed good judgment when adopting its canon to accept those which were full of moral meaning and to reject those which were mere myth without any deeper significance.

We have given this abstract of one part of Holtzmann’s work with the omission of all the learned by-work for those not familiar with theological investigation. Similar results are obtained by an inquiry into the origin of the Acts. The apostles were the first and living representatives of the Christ. Out of the interest in the apostles’ words grew an interest in their actions and lives, and there are a great many writings of this subject preserved. One only has been received into the canon.

It is impossible to follow Professor Holtzmann into the details of his work, but we can warmly recommend it as the best compendium existing, not only for the student of theology but for everybody who is interested in the results of the scientific criticism of the synoptic gospels and the Acts.[51]

κρς.

SCHRIFTEN DER GESELLSCHAFT FUER PSYCHOLOGISCHE FORSCHUNG. Heft 2. Ueber Aufgaben und Methoden der Psychologie. By _Hugo Münsterberg_. Leipsic: Ambr. Abel. 1891.

In this monograph Professor Münsterberg prepares the way for greater and more important work. His aim is to define the province of psychology and to investigate the methods which have to be employed. Psychology is not philosophy; accordingly the consideration whether there is a reality of an outside world does not belong here. The psychologist is not bound to wait till this and other metaphysical questions are decided with certainty; the reality of the outside world has simply to be assumed together with its cognisability.

What means ‘to explain’? “To explain means simply to render clear that which is not clear or to reduce the unknown to the known, the complex to the simple (p. 104).... It is an indispensable presupposition of any natural science to consider nature as being capable of explanation (_erklärbar_), and this presupposition means that natural processes can be perfectly separated into most simple mechanical processes. This presumption can be realised to-day only on the basis of the atom-conception. It is accordingly not an experience, but a postulate of natural science to derive the whole material world-process from the mechanism of atoms. A description becomes an explanation in the measure in which it approaches this aim” (p. 105). The question is, whether in psychology, description can be supplanted by explanation, whether laws can be stated instead of mere rules.

Professor Münsterberg takes that ground in psychology which as it appears to us is the only tenable ground, viz. that feelings are not motions and cannot be explained as converted physical processes. Professor Münsterberg says: “A sensation, a feeling, a will can never fill even the very smallest space. What is extended in space can never itself be a state of consciousness. To the psychologist this distinction is now a matter of course, so much so that it is difficult to call to one’s mind how much trouble it cost to acquire this insight. The object of psychology accordingly can never be an object in space, it can never be a process of motion, accordingly, even brain-irritation can under no circumstances ever become the object of psychology” (p. 97). Psychology has to investigate the psychical phenomena of the individual consciousness (p. 102), it has to separate it into its elements, i. e. those ingredients which are no longer divisible; which being done, psychology searches for the rules for the combinations of these psychical elements and shows us the different complex contents which are formed in this way by the elements up to that totality of single combinations which is given us as the contents of our spiritual personality (p. 103).

“The question is, (1) Are there psychological processes in us, the development of which presents itself with immediate certainty as necessary, and (2) can we reduce all the individual and with them all the spiritual phenomena to such spiritual processes recognised as necessary? The first question can be affirmed, although only in a limited sense, and the second question must be unequivocally denied, thus making an immediate explanation of psychical phenomena impossible” (p. 107). The first question is to be affirmed in a limited sense, because “if certain premises are thought, the conclusion, it appears to us as a necessity, can be thought thus and not otherwise” (p. 108). But this is “a logical and not a psychological necessity.” To actually think the conclusion depends upon the will to think it. The will actually existing, the logical necessity becomes a psychological, for “the connection between the willing and the willed (_zwischen Willen und Gewolltem_) always appears to us as necessary.... Where there is inner will there is an inner necessity.” Now, in order to make explanations in the physical world, we supplement that which has been actually observed with not-observed connections. But we cannot, according to Münsterberg, in an analogous way supplement in the world of psychical phenomena the conscious states with any other kind of states which are not conscious, thus referring our spiritual life and acts of will to unconscious processes, for “the very nature of psychical states is consciousness, i. e. a state of being conscious. _Ihr Sein ist das bewusst-sein...._ A state of consciousness, says Münsterberg, which is not conscious, is comparable not to a body which is not perceived, but to one which does not exist. Accordingly unconscious psychical phenomena do not exist. All psychical phenomena are directly given and the reduction of their combinations in a certain way through hypothetical psychological supplements is once for all excluded” (p. 110).

We agree in all the main positions with Professor Münsterberg, but in the last mentioned point we disagree. Professor Münsterberg limits psychical states or feelings to states of consciousness without considering that there are subconscious and even unconscious feelings. By consciousness we understand those feelings alone which are concentrated so as to be connected with the ego, i. e. the present centre of consciousness. We assume that even the spinal ganglions of the brainless frog are feeling if the skin is irritated, but this feeling can never become conscious, it can no more be telegraphed to the central station so as to become co-ordinated with other feelings which are registered in the brain. The objection may be raised, We do not know whether the ganglion is feeling; and I should answer, I call feeling anything that is of the same nature as the elements of which consciousness consists, and we have all reasons to assume that there is such an elementary psychical accompaniment of the ganglionic irritations, and that consciousness rises from many such elements through their co-ordinate combination in the brain. Isolated feelings are never conscious, and consciousness is a co-operative system of feeling. This distinction between consciousness and feeling is a mere matter of terminology. If we find another terminology more practical we are willing to surrender ours. Yet such a distinction between consciousness and feeling seems to be necessary for a proper description of the psychical facts. The assumption of subconscious states and even of unconscious feelings is a great help in explaining the phenomena of consciousness. But unless we are grossly mistaken, our disagreement is merely apparent, for Professor Münsterberg, rejecting the idea of a psychological explanation, believes in the parallelism of psychical and physical phenomena. “The physical acts” (he says on p. 125) “reducible to mechanical axioms can be explained through causation, the psychical acts follow one another without inner necessity. If we connect both, we are enabled to transfer the necessity-connection of the physical upon the psychical and offer thus an explanation where otherwise description only was possible.” But in doing this, have we not supplemented those psychical elements which appear as conscious states by other psychical elements which have not entered into that combination which makes them actually conscious? It is an hypothetical addition for the sake of explanation, a _Hilfsconstruction_ just as much as the supposition of the existence of atoms or electric currents or other physical phenomena which are not directly observed, but indirectly in their effects only.

Supplements are necessary for explanation wherever the immediate facts do not contain all the elements of a certain process. If an observable phenomenon has not its conditions in observable facts we hypothetically assume unobservable facts as its causes. But we may incidentally remark that description and explanation are not different in kind, but in degree. Explanation is an exhaustive description set forth in its greatest possible simplicity. An exhaustive description enumerates all the determinative factors of a process and it drops everything that is of no account, so that information is imparted with the greatest economy as well as completeness. An exhaustive description is a reliable guide to preascertain the outcome of a process, and reveals in this way the identity in the change, the continuity of the process and the conservation of matter and energy in their transformations, or, in other words, it reveals the necessity of the result. There is perhaps no natural science in which the processes can be exhaustively described without hypothetical supplements and so the science of psychology forms no exception to the general rule.

The aim of psychology in its wider sense will be “to separate all the contents of consciousness into their elements, to state their laws of combination, and to seek in an empirical way for the diverse elementary psychical contents, their correspondent physiological irritations, in order to explain in this way mediately from the coexistence and succession of physiological irritations the purely psychological laws of combinations which as such are unexplainable” (p. 127).

Our objection to this view resembles much some of the objections which Professor Münsterberg himself makes when speaking of the availability of the mathematical method so-called. He says: “Measuring and counting of psychological phenomena have been made repeatedly, directly as well as indirectly, and it has been proved that mathematics can be applied to psychology.... Nevertheless it would be a misuse of the word if we named these numerical descriptions an ‘application of the mathematical method.’ If an historian of literature counts the poems and dramas of authors, if he also calculates how long it took them to write their literary products, who would call his work a mathematical history of literature? Even astronomy would be no mathematical science if we counted only the stars in the sky.” If the aim of psychological explanation were as Professor Münsterberg here asserts to be reached through the explanation of physiological states only, we should say, that the physiological method were alone admissible in psychology, a principle to which our author rightly objects. Psychical states sometimes demand a physiological explanation, and we cannot understand psychology without having a certain amount of physiological knowledge. Nevertheless, the explanation of psychical states and the necessity of certain connections must be understood mainly from the psychical elements themselves. Psychical elements, i. e. feelings, as has been explained on other occasions, have acquired and constantly do acquire meaning. This meaning which appears in sensation-symbols and thought-symbols and which is different in the different forms of feeling (correspondent to different forms of nervous action), creates a new domain,—the domain of spirit,—and thus psychical states are changed into spiritual facts. Suppose for instance that a merchant receives his mail; he opens a letter containing some important news which sets at once all his nerves into irritation, makes him neglectful of all other things in order to attend with great haste to one special affair. How can we explain this instance, or any other spiritual act through a consideration of physiological conditions. Is it not the meaning alone which special sense-impressions convey that produces the extraordinary effects? The physiologist would as little be able to detect this meaning through an analysis of the sense-impressions, as an electrician would be to understand the import of a telegram when measuring the strength of the electric current in the telegraph wires. The combinations of the purely psychical states may after all not be quite unexplainable, while their physiological concomitants are in many cases insufficient to account for spiritual interconnections.

In discussing the methods of psychology Professor Münsterberg rejects the speculative and the mathematical methods; he claims a great importance (and we agree with him) for self-observation. But self-observation is no easy task; it requires a high degree of training. “He who does not understand botany cannot make observations of plant-life. The same things which call into play certain associations in the botanist are also seen by the layman, but they remain unobserved. Self-observation is in a similar way ... not without its presuppositions; it is dependent upon a rich store of ready associations” (p. 164).

Psychological investigations under natural conditions are classified by Münsterberg according to their objects, as those of the normal man, the child, the savage, the insane, the animal, etc. In experimental psychology, psychopetal, psychofugal, and psychocentral processes are distinguished. For psycho-physiological investigations we have besides, (1) the immediate experiment in the laboratory, (2) the method of anatomy, (3) of comparative anatomy, (4) and of physiology. Professor Münsterberg concludes with an appeal to institute special professorships of psychology, which is at present a mere branch of philosophy. It takes all the energy of one man to keep abreast with the progress of psychological investigation. “No medical man, no lawyer, no theologian, or educator should enter into practical life without having passed an examination in psychology ... the growing generation of children, the sick, the criminal, and the comfort-seeking souls of mankind have to suffer if teachers, physicians, judges, and preachers are ignoramuses in the matter of human soul-life.... But here also the gods have placed sweat before virtue.”

κρς.

LA PHILOSOPHIE DU SIÈCLE. By _E. de Roberty_. Paris: Félix Alcan.

The author of the present work, which forms a volume of the Library of Contemporary Philosophy, is one of those disciples of the founder of French positivism who, while following in his footsteps to a certain point, do not hesitate to diverge from the beaten track when they think their leader has gone astray in his philosophic quest. M. de Roberty speaks of Comte with reverence as his first guide and his best master, and he finds in the very contradictions of the Master the germ of his own conception of the general trend of philosophic development.

The fundamental thesis of the present work is that the three contemporaneous philosophic systems, those of Criticism, Positivism, and Evolutionism, are merely varieties of a single species, as strictly parallel manifestations of a common stock of beliefs and general hypotheses. The basic identity of the thought of this century is shown by the ever increasing convergence of the great leading ideas, as exhibited in the prevailing theories of knowledge, by the preponderance of relativism, and of agnosticism. It reveals itself, especially in the similar conceptions formed by the most varied systems, not only of the essential characters of philosophy, its method, and the ends it ought to pursue, but also of the scientific laws which govern its evolution. We cannot follow the author through his discussion of all these points and we must therefore restrict ourselves to the most salient features of his argument.

Modern philosophy is represented by three principal schools: Criticism which originated with Kant, Positivism founded by Comte, and Evolutionism introduced by Spencer. These three systems had a common ancestry, that of sensualism. The critical philosophy is the legitimate heir of sensuous idealism, and the positive philosophy the immediate descendant of sensuous materialism. The evolution philosophy is itself rooted in sensualism, but it is really a conciliator of the two great philosophies which preceded it, Criticism and Positivism. This conclusion, which appears to us just, is supported by various considerations to which reference here is not necessary. M. de Roberty bears testimony to the influence of the philosophy of Kant over the development of the evolutionist conception, which could be applied to society only by giving an apparent universality to the mechanical hypothesis. This was accomplished by Spencer, as it had been done to some extent by Comte. The popularity of the evolution philosophy is explained by the author as due to its admixture of agnosticism with a monism which captivates the masses “by the audacious assertion that it has raised all veils and resolved all enigmas.” Kant, Comte, and Spencer have equally seized this characteristic trait of the genius of our century. They each treat, says M. de Roberty, of the most transcendent problems of metaphysics, and place them carefully under the cover of the experimental method. Let us add that they are each different expressions of that genius, which marks the progress of the mental evolution of mankind.

The second part of M. de Roberty’s work deals in the first place with the conceptions of philosophy, its nature and its end, framed by the three great modern systems. The confusion generally made between philosophy and science is first pointed out, the evil of which arises from the fact that allowance is not made for the progress of scientific knowledge. The author is strongly inclined to favor the idea of the general equivalence of science and philosophy, in the sense that every effect is identified with its cause. But as the effect is always modified with its cause, neither the content not the general conception of philosophy can remain unchangeable. Philosophy becomes thus the co-ordination of the sciences in view of their general and abstract finality—by which is meant simply the last term of an evolution—a conception of the world.

In what do the conceptions of philosophy held by the criticist, the positivist, and the evolutionist, differ from that formulated by M. de Roberty? He affirms that they all entertain certain errors of method derived chiefly from ancient metaphysics. The prototype is found in Kant, who says that philosophy is a system of universal acquirements formed of abstract notions, and that it has for its aim the passage of our understanding from sensible to suprasensible knowledge. The latter is the _a priori_, the permanent and verifiable hypothesis, for each of them. It is the transcendental element which all modern philosophy has derived from the past, and which forms the bond of alliance between faith and knowledge. Of the three postulates of Spencer, the universal hypothesis is in the first, an Unknowable Force. The other two belong to psychology, proving that the English evolutionist, like Comte, confounds science with philosophy, which to him, as to his predecessors, is a simple theory of knowledge.

Philosophy is a method which conducts to a conception of the world. But, says M. de Roberty, modern philosophies fail in that they deal with hypotheses. Now, although hypothesis is the soul of the special sciences, for philosophy it must always be a purely mental recreation. To render valid the universal hypothesis constructed by philosophers, it would be necessary that the sum of the final truths of science should include the sum of the phenomena which constitute nature.

We cannot follow the author through his ingenious criticisms of Spencer’s great synthetic formula, to which he devotes the twelfth chapter of the present work, and which he characterises as the perfect type of the universal unverifiable hypothesis. Nor can we do more than give a passing glance at his views of the psychology of the three modern systems of philosophy. He affirms that the metaphysical transformation by criticism of psychology into philosophy left hardly anything to the special science. To positivism is due the conception of psychology as forming an integral part of biology, which has led to the important psycho-physical experiments of the present day. But the biological analysis of the individual should be followed by social analysis, the study of mental manifestations in society, in connection with which should be created a special concrete science to embrace the higher psychology, as pointed out by the author in his work “La Sociologie.” Science, art, and industry are a projection into the external world of the thinking, feeling, acting subject, and psychology ought also to be thus projected by fusion with biology, or with biology and sociology, which it is necessary to study if we would discover psychic laws.

In the chapter on the Supremacy of Science, the author affirms that the philosophy which will result from the progress of psychology and sociology will present a striking contrast with all known metaphysical forms, but it will always remain a world-conception, and it will have to submit to the law of correlation which explains the character and destinies of its predecessor. Agnosticism, which invites men to bend before the _Deus ignotus_ of all religions, marks the fatal termination of ancient anthropomorphism, influenced by a progressive knowledge, and thus appears as the final integration of all theology. It also represents, however, the condition of incognisance to which the opposite state will succeed when the cycle of abstract sciences is completed and a really scientific psychology formed. Then hypotheses as to universal causes will receive their psychological solution, and it will remain for philosophy only to confront and co-ordinate them with the general results of other sciences. Having arrived at this point M. de Roberty formulates the conclusion that Philosophy and Science are terms which connote two principle _species_ in the vast _genus_ designated by the single term _knowledge_. The most marked trait of future philosophy will be the distinction of these two species, as their confusion was the most general character of the philosophy of the past. Philosophy and science will then be perfectly identified, but the identity will be general and not specific. Thus philosophy will not be positive in the sense of Comte, it will never _completely_ identify itself with science.

In his last chapter, entitled “The Intellectual Series,” M. de Roberty continues his criticism of the views of Comte as to the law of the evolution of philosophy. He shows that, so far from this being the most general law of intellectual evolution, and therefore the supreme law of all social phenomena, philosophy is only one of three intermediate terms, the others being art and industry, by the aid of which the evolution of scientific ideas acts on the ensemble of the social evolution. The intellectual evolution is the direct consequence of the social fact, but the social evolution is subject to the laws of intellectual evolution, which embrace four great classes of conceptions, answering to the four well recognised groups of facts known as science, philosophy, art, and industry. We have here the same series of special evolutions as those supposed by Comte, with the important change, however, marked by the inversion of the first two members of the series. In this relation, the author affirms that Comte’s law of the three states is false so far as concerns the evolution of the sciences, and is of very secondary importance as regards the evolution of philosophy and the two succeeding evolutions.

The author concludes his work with a criticism intended to show that the principal defects of Comte’s system arise from the confusion previously insisted on in relation to the first terms of the intellectual series, science and philosophy. That confusion is exhibited in the statement that among the ancients philosophy was developed before science and art. M. de Roberty, moreover, declares Comte’s theory that the industrial development is the point of departure of modern civilisation, leads to a complete subversion of the logical and historical. Instead of the useful or the proper being, as that theory would require, the foundation of the good and this, in its turn, the germ of the true, the true is the foundation of the beautiful, and of the good and the useful. But the true is more complex than supposed by Comte. It possesses at least two aspects, science and philosophy, which may be really distinguished, although the line which separates them is yet undetermined.

We have given a summary of M. de Roberty’s general argument, instead of referring to particular propositions which may be open to criticism, because his work appears to us a very valuable contribution towards the elucidation of the important question as to the position of philosophy in relation to science. We shall look with much interest for the appearance of the author’s two further works which he announces as supplementary to the present one. That on Agnosticism is already in the press. The subject of the other work is Monism, which M. de Roberty characterises as “the chimerical pursuit which has essayed, through the ages, to fix the so-called unity of things, the extra or supralogical identity of phenomena.” This hypothetical monism of philosophy is dealt with incidentally in the present work. The “supralogical identity of phenomena” is a different kind of monism from that of _The Monist_.

Ω.

UEBER BEWEGUNGSEMPFINDUNGEN. Inaugural-Dissertation zur Erlangung der Doctorwürde vorgelegt der hohen philosophischen Facultät der Albert-Ludwigs-Universität zu Freiburg i. B. By _Edmund Burke Delabarre_ of Massachusetts. Freiburg in Baden: Hch. Epstein, 1891.

Dr. Edmund Burke Delabarre introduces himself to the world of science with an excellent monograph on motion-sensations, based upon careful observations which were made in Professor Münsterberg’s psychological laboratory at Freiburg i. B. The subject of the dissertation is of great importance and there is much confusion prevalent at present even among the most prominent authorities. It appears to us that Dr. Delabarre has adopted the right view and he certainly defends it with great ability. Professor Wundt rejects in his Physiological Psychology all the theory of the so-called “muscle-sense” and admits that there is some truth in the three explanations devised as an explanation of our consciousness of performed motions, which thus would be a complex of (1) pressure-sensations, (2) specific muscle-sensations, and (3) innervation-sensations. This third kind of sensations is of a very hypothetical nature. The term signifies that, when muscles are innervated we are supposed to have a direct sensation of the innervation in the central nerve-organs; and this view is objected to by Münsterberg, who says that “a brain irritation which is not accompanied with centripetal effects or central after-effects of former muscular activity has its physiological consequences but excites no conscious states.” Thus, according to Dr. Delabarre, without the motion of the sense-organs, i. e. muscular activity, there is no consciousness; all consciousness derives its data from the periphery. Dr. Delabarre goes over the whole field of the literature of the subject and weighs all pros and cons. He finds that all cases are intelligible without the supposition of central innervation-sensations. He admits that the term muscle-sense is vague, but he believes that the term having been generally introduced may be retained. He defines it as that complex of sensations which results from muscular activity.

The second part of the dissertation contains the reports of the experiments, describing the instruments used and the methods employed.

We are informed that Dr. Delabarre has been appointed to the chair of psychology in Brown University.

κρς.

LE NIHILISME SCIENTIFIQUE. I. Dialogue entre le Doctor Oudèn et L’Etudiant Ti son Neveu. Rapporté par _P. Van Bemmelen_. Leide: E. J. Brill, 1891.

Dr. Oudèn’s nephew thus summarises the scientific, or rather “philosophic” views of his uncle: “There is no God, but there is the world. In this world there are neither souls, nor mind, nor life; there is only matter and its elementary forces. Nevertheless these forces do not exist; there is only movement, the sole function of matter, which is inert. In its turn, matter has no reality; it is composed of geometrical points which are susceptible of movement. But as there is neither time nor space, there is no movement.” Nothingness is thus reached, but beyond is illusion, the _maja_ of the Hindoos, which explains all our conceptions of nature including that of our own being. This scientific _maja_ is not the semblance of a real world, but that of a world which does not exist, so that illusion and nothingness are the same thing. From which it follows that there is no illusion and no mind to be deceived! Mr. Van Bemmelen’s opuscule is an ingenious _jeu d’esprit_, evidently intended to exhibit a certain phase of speculation as a _reductio ad absurdum_.

Ω.

DIRITTO SOCIALE TENTATIVO IN BOZZA. Dell’Avv. _Pietro Pellegrini_. Borga a Mozzano. 1891.

There is no denying the activity of the statesmen and scholars of modern Italy in the cause of radical, social reconstruction and, as remarked by a recent traveller in Italy, in the “building up again a Commonwealth, founded on high principles of right and equality.” “Diritto Sociale,” in Italian jurisprudence, of course, relates to municipal and positive law, in its social-economical and social-political aspects. But, in a country with the municipal and political traditions of Italy, this “Diritto Sociale,” even in modern times, exhibits a tendency to crystallise into a kind of concrete, social religion. The Avvocato Signor Pietro Pellegrini, the learned author of this book, appears to feel deeply concerning the present condition of this branch of jurisprudence in Italy.

In his preface the author says, that during the present century legal science has not made any very substantial progress; that the revolution of the last century, while asserting the famous rights of man, forgot the rights of juridic persons, of corporations, and law became an _individualista_—or, individualiser. On the strength of his juridic personality man thereupon engaged in a struggle for his rights on the vast social field, but he found himself alone—an individual and nothing more. As such, he could not form a juridic, social organism, but he merely sought to adapt himself to an actual, external juridic organisation, differing but slightly from old-time despotism. On this basis the State still continues to create municipal and positive laws, more or less adapts them to the facts of reality, arbitrarily creating juridic persons and administrative bodies, such as the _mandamenti_, _circondarii_, _provincie_ of the modern Italian kingdom—all of which are only hybrid administrative _entia_, that do not in the least satisfy a number of local public needs; and therefore, there is no harmony between individual men and the juridic persons, between the public administrative entia and the State, and there is bloody war among the States themselves.