>^- ^ 
 
 BL 
 
 51 
 
 .A226 
 
 1890 
 
 C.2 
 
Skelf- 
 
 ('i.1,na 
 
 
 PRINCETON, N. J. 
 
 BL 51 .A226 1890 C.2 
 Abbot, Francis Ellingwood, 
 
 1836-1903. 
 The way out of agnosticism 
 
*'^ 
 
yV\^ 
 
THE 
 
 WAY OUT OF ag:n^osticism 
 
 OR THE 
 
 PHILOSOPHY OF FREE RELIGION 
 
Bg tJjE Same ^utf)or. 
 
 SCIEN^TIFIC THEISM. 
 
 Third Edition. 
 12mo. Cloth. 242 Pages. Sent, post-paid, on receipt of $2.00 by 
 
 LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY, 
 254 Washington Strket, Boston, Mass. 
 
 Press Notices ivill be found at the end of this volume. 
 
THE 
 
 WAY OUT OF AGNOSTICISM 
 
 OK THE 
 
 PHILOSOPHY OF FREE RELIGION 
 
 BY 
 
 / 
 
 FRANCIS ELLINGWOOD ABBOT, Ph.D. 
 
 Late Instructor in Philosophy in Harvard UNivERsiir 
 
 BOSTON 
 LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY 
 
 1890 
 
Copyright, 1889 and 1890, 
 By Francis Ellingwood Abbot. 
 
 5Snibtrsitg ^ress : 
 John Wilson and Son, Cambridge. 
 
NOTE. 
 
 The following papers (with the exception of the Introduction) 
 are based on notes of forty-one lectures delivered in 1888, in the 
 " Advanced Coui'se, Philosophy 13," Harvard University. Origi- 
 nally published during the year 1889 as a series of contributions 
 to a monthly periodical in Boston, they are now addressed, not to 
 those who are impatient of serious thought or incapable of follow- 
 ing a close and continuous argument, but to those (and their name 
 is legion) who, though able and willing to think, have been dis- 
 tressed or dismayed by the seeming inability of theistic writers in 
 this age to meet and defeat agnosticism on its own professed 
 ground, — the ground of science and philosophy. By a wholly 
 new line of reasoning, drawn exclusively from those soui'ces, this 
 book aims to show that, in order to refute agnosticism and establish 
 enlightened theism, nothing is now necessary but to philosophize 
 that very scientific method which agnosticism barbarously mis- 
 understands and misuses. Of the success of the perhaps unwise 
 attempt to show this in so small a compass, the educated public 
 must be the judge. But it may be well to quote here these wise and 
 true words of Arnold Toynbee, one of the noblest young men of the 
 century, whose early death was a calamity to England and to the 
 world : — • 
 
 "Had liberal theologians in England combined more often with 
 their undoubted courage and warmth definite philosophic views, 
 religious liberalism would not now be condemned as offering nothing 
 more than a mere sentiment of vague benevolence. Earnest and 
 thoughtful people are willing to encounter the difficulty of mastering 
 some unfamiliar phrases of technical language, when they find they 
 are in possession of a sharply defined intellectual position upon which 
 their religious faith may rest." 
 
 F. E. A. 
 
 Cambridge, Mass., Feb. 10, 1890. 
 
INTRODUCTION.* 
 
 In its relation to religion, the century now drawing to 
 its close is emphatically the Age of Agnosticism. All the 
 leaders of its characteristic thought have more or less con- 
 sciously, more or less completely, broken with Christianity, 
 — that is, broken with that venerable theory of the uni- 
 verse for which the Christian theology and the Qhristian 
 church have definitely stood for nearly two thousand years. 
 But these leaders are paralyzed when it comes to construct- 
 ive thought. They have no other theory of the universe to 
 propose ; they aim at none ; they agree, if they agree on any- 
 thing, that no theory of the universe is possible. What is 
 known as the "philosophy of evolution," certainly so far as 
 its great champions and expounders are concerned, strictly 
 limits itself to a mere knowledge of "phenomena," and 
 strictly denies all possible knowledge of ''"noumena"; it 
 formulates a mode of happening, a uniformity of process, a 
 law of co-existence and sequence, but claims to demonstrate 
 the impossibility of comprehending ultimate causes, or of 
 arriving at any theory of the universe as an intelligible 
 unity. Whether the phenomenal universe is the product of 
 intelligence or of unintelligence, — whether the human being 
 is a creative first cause or a mere link in an endless and 
 eternal chain of effects, and whether his conscious existence 
 ceases at death, or continues beyond the grave, — all these 
 vital questions, fundamental to any real theory of the uni- 
 verse, it declares to be necessarily and absolutely unanswer- 
 able. God, Freedom, and Immortality, the supreme interests 
 of human thought and human life alike, — these, to the evo- 
 
 * This Introduction appeared in The New Ideal for January, 1889, under 
 the caption, "Creative Liberalism." 
 
viii Introduction. 
 
 hition-philosophy in its present form, are insoluble problems, 
 the eternal rock-barriers of the ever-restless ocean of human 
 speculation. Every form of the evolution-philosophy which 
 is founded on " the Unknowable " is founded on agnosticism, 
 or denial of the possibility of any comprehensive theory of 
 the universe ; and agnosticism is the j)revalent philosophy 
 of liberalism in the nineteenth century. 
 
 This statement needs no proof, for it simply records a 
 fact of observation, patent to every onlooker. A single sig- 
 nificant illustration of it is enough. 
 
 The two most successful novels of the past summer hinge 
 on the conflict between traditional Christianity and modern 
 liberalism. In "E-obert Elsmere" and in "John Ward, 
 Preacher," portraits are painted of the modern liberal, as 
 seen by keen-eyed observers ; and in each case the liberal is 
 an agnostic. 
 
 Says Kobert Elsmere, only a few days before his death : 
 *' I often lie here, Elaxman, wondering at the way in which 
 men become the slaves of some metaphysical word — person- 
 ality, or intelligence, or what not ! What meaning can they 
 have as applied to God ? Herbert Spencer is quite right. 
 We no sooner attempt to define what we mean by a Per- 
 sonal God than we lose ourselves in labyrinths of language 
 and logic. But why attempt it at all ? I like that French 
 saying : ' Quand on me demande ce que dest que Dieu, je 
 V ignore ; quand on ne vie le demande pas, je le sais tres- 
 bien ! ' No, we cannot realize Him in words — we can only 
 live in Him, and die to Him ! " 
 
 Helen Ward expresses no less clearly the same bewilder- 
 ment and defeat of thought : '' But, after all, this question 
 of eternal punishment is such a little thing, so on the out- 
 side of the great puzzle ! One goes in, and in : Why is sin, 
 which is its own punishment, in the world at all ? What 
 does it all mean, anyhow ? Where is God, and why does He 
 let us suffer here, with no certainty of a life hereafter ? Why 
 
Introduction. 
 
 IX 
 
 does He make love and death in the same world ? Oh, that 
 is so cruel, — love and death together ! Is He, at all ? Those 
 are the things, it seems to me, one has to think about. But 
 why do I go over it all ? We can't get away from it, can 
 we ? " And again : <' To some of us God is only another 
 name for the power of good, — or, one might as well say 
 force, and that is blind and impersonal ; there is nothing 
 comforting or tender in the thought of force. How do you 
 siippose the conviction of the personality of God is reached ?" 
 And once again, when, after the death of her beloved hus- 
 band, a friend tries to comfort her by saying — "It is so 
 much happier for him now ; he must see so clearly ; and 
 the old grief is lost in joy,"- — -Helen answered wearily: 
 "No, you must not say those things to me. I cannot feel 
 them. I am glad he has no pain ; in an eternal sleep there 
 is at least no pain. But I must just wait my life out, Gifford. 
 I cannot hope ; I dare not. I could not go on living, if I 
 thought he were living somewhere, and needing me. No, 
 it is ended. I have had my life." 
 
 The deep pathos of these two noble works of fiction, far 
 truer to life as it is than many so-called biographies, lies in 
 the remorseless fidelity with which, perhaps unconsciously 
 and unintentionally, they expose the intellectual beggar- 
 liness of liberalism in its present unfledged state. Such 
 dearth of great ideas, such piteous poverty of comprehen- 
 sion, as is exhibited in the mental condition of these two 
 typical liberals, simply shows that liberalism, so far as it 
 claims to be the custodian of high truth, is to-day infinitely 
 inferior to the Christian mythology which it has displaced. 
 Periods of revolution are doubtless necessary, but only by 
 way of transition to periods of higher construction ; and, if 
 liberalism could by any possibility fall permanently into the 
 arrested development of agnosticism, it would be no heir of 
 the future. Eobert Elsmere and Helen Ward, lovely and 
 noble as personal characters, represent, as agnostic thinkers, 
 
X 
 
 Introduction. 
 
 the lowest and crudest, because the least intellectual, type of 
 liberalism. It is an awful tragedy of the human soul, when 
 its holiest affections and impulses and aspirations, guided 
 no longer by the ancient superstitions which, in whatever 
 coarse and prickly envelope, contained nevertheless most 
 precious thoughts, are bereft of all other guidance, gasp- 
 ing for life in the exhausted receiver of mere vacuity of 
 thought. 
 
 This merely negative attitude of mind, this emptiness of 
 all positive ideas respecting the supreme problems which 
 man is set to solve, is indeed the present characteristic of 
 liberalism, but only because liberalism is at the very begin- 
 ning of its career. Agnosticism, in itself considered, is noth- 
 ing but intellectual bewilderment, confusion of thought, a 
 mere temporary defeat and despair of human reason in the 
 presence of questions which it has not yet learned how to 
 answer. When liberalism once comes to understand itself, 
 — when it once discovers how to go to work, how to handle 
 these questions, how to synthesize the facts and laws which 
 modern science has established beyond reasonable doubt, — 
 then it will see its way clear to a theory of the universe 
 founded upon modern knowledge, and will no longer fancy 
 its mission to mankind discharged by merely overthrowing 
 a theory of the universe founded upon ancient superstition. 
 The era of constructive or creative liberalism is fated to 
 come ; and what it will create is necessarily a new theory of 
 the universe, without which no religious movement can live. 
 The real moral of "Eobert Elsmere" and "John Ward, 
 Preacher," has been as yet drawn by no one ; the real lesson 
 of the helpless and hopeless liberalism they too justly de- 
 pict is deeper than any of the critics have as yet perceived. 
 Briefly pvit, it is this : men must either learn to think more 
 profoundhj, or else unlearn to feel. 
 
 That is the dilemma to which agnosticism reduces the 
 human spirit. If all knowledge of God, Freedom, and 
 
Introduction. xi 
 
 Immortality is impossible to man, the only escape from in- 
 tolerable anguish, in the constant presence of pain and death, 
 must lie in a stoical suppression of the power to feel — in a 
 desperate resolve to think and feel no more, but to extinguish 
 all deep thought and all high feeling through frantic self- 
 absorption in the soulless details of life. Yet what an im- 
 possible escape ! In every noble nature, deep thought and 
 high feeling have become a necessity ; the only possible es- 
 cape for such lies in deeper thought and higher feeling. 
 Here is revealed the supreme duty of modern liberalism to 
 press resolutely forward, away from agnosticism, to a pos- 
 itive, scientific, all-comprehensive theory of the universe. 
 It is infinitely false that such a theory is unattainable. The 
 agnosticism which professes to prove its unattainability is 
 nothing but one of two things — either intellectual imbecil- 
 ity or intellectual cowardice. The one unpardonable sin of 
 the intellect is to despair of itself. Liberalism has always 
 stood for freedom — freedom from dogma and freedom from 
 ecclesiastical control. Well and good : let it always stand 
 for that ! But now it must stand for truth as well, and for 
 the power of human reason to attain the truth. To liberal- 
 ism alone can poor humanity, losing day by day its hold upon 
 the Christian theory of the imiverse, look for a new theory 
 that may guide its thought and life. The paramount duty 
 of construction and creation to which liberalism is now called 
 is that of working out such a theory, bravely, hopefully, pa- 
 tiently, reverently, devotedly ; and The New Ideal will 
 justify itself to the world, if it proves itself to be that New 
 Thought which is the world's deepest and most imperative 
 need. 
 
THE PHILOSOPHY OF FREE RELIGION. 
 
 I. 
 
 It is with no little hesitation and reluctance that, yield- 
 ing to the editor's urgency, I undertake the difficult task of 
 attempting to write out, in as simple and untechnical a 
 manner as the nature of the subject permits, an outline of 
 the theory of the universe which, if I mistake not, lies la- 
 tent and implicit in the scientific method, and which must 
 become explicit, whenever this method shall be faithfully 
 applied to the great problems of philosophy. The reasons 
 why I should not undertake the task are numerous and 
 formidable. First and foremost, perhaps, is the fact that, al- 
 though the ground-plan of this theory is already thorough- 
 ly matured, the literary execution of it is as yet scarcely 
 even begun, and from want of opportunity may never be 
 completed ; and it seems almost absurd to present the 
 abridgment of a work which does not yet exist to be 
 abridged. Next, the impossibility of doing justice to any 
 philosophy by discarding its appropriate diction, suppress- 
 ing its necessary subtilty of distinction, and curtailing its 
 indispensable reasoning, renders such an attempt almost a 
 crime against philosophic truth itself. Further, the fit 
 place of publication would naturally be some journal spe- 
 cially devoted to philosophy, rather than a journal like 
 The New Ideal, which does not address itself in partic- 
 ular to a philosophic audience. Again, the agnosticism so 
 widely diffused among liberals at the present day makes 
 me gravely doubt the utility of any such publication ; the 
 thought is suited to no self-satisfied ignorance, but to the 
 
2 The Philosophy of Free Relig-ion. 
 
 determined, keen, hopeful spirit of investigation, to the 
 spirit which counts present failure as only a stepping-stone 
 to future success, to the spirit Avhich is fixed, resolute, in- 
 domitable in the effort to wrest knowledge from Nature, 
 and which repudiates the imbecile philosophy that founds 
 itself upon " the Unknowable " and pretends to set up 
 '' limits of human knowledge " in a universe everywhere 
 penetrable by patient and persistent reason ; in short, it is 
 not to those who believe a theory of the universe impos- 
 sible, but to those who know that a sound theory of it is 
 inevitable, whenever science ripens into philosophy, that I 
 can look with any expectation of intelligent sympathy. 
 Lastly, I am painfully aware that to state my results brief- 
 ly and without due argumentation must subject me, how- 
 ever unanswerable and conclusive the necessarily omitted 
 reasons for them may be, to groundless charges of assump- 
 tion, presumption, dogmatism. These considerations (with 
 others needless to mention) are quite sufficient to render 
 the proposed undertaking anything but a source of pleas- 
 urable anticipation to myself. 
 
 Nevertheless, there are reasons on the other side which 
 have led me to consent to make the attempt, whatever the 
 consequences may prove to be. Chief among them is the 
 wish to render some little help to the brave and devoted 
 editor of The New Ideal, in whatever way he himself 
 judges he most wants help, and to further as far as 2:)0ssible 
 his bold enterprise of giving once more to liberalism a 
 journal of high constructive aims and earnest helpfulness 
 to man. Moreover, there is in my own mind a lurking 
 hope that even now, scattered here and there, may be found 
 spirits already eager to welcome the higher thought of the 
 future, already prepared to demand an interpretation of the 
 fact of Evolution Avhich shall be freed from the humiliat- 
 ing and entangling alliance with phenomenism, agnosticism, 
 or know-nothingism, and already ripe for the reception of a 
 
The Philosophy of Free Religion. 3 
 
 thoroughly free philosophy, at once grounded in science 
 and culminating in the loftiest moral and religious ideals. 
 To the young I look for such spirits as these, for in the 
 young is the hope of the world. There is no possible re- 
 demption for mankind from the political, commercial, in- 
 dustrial, and social immoralities of the present, except in 
 the speedy development of ideals which shall fire the souls 
 of the rising generation to give battle to this hydra-headed 
 monster of corruption, and fight it down in the power of 
 the higher life ; and the power of the higher life is the power 
 of the higher thought. Here, in this crying need of a higher 
 thought than agnosticism has ever given or can ever give, 
 lies the necessity of a new, constructive, non-agnostic lib- 
 eralism ; and I cannot resist the call to do my little part in 
 answering the deepest need of my own time. 
 
 So much for the reasons why I should gladly, yet must 
 not, refuse the task now laid upon me. 
 
 In justice, however, to all concerned, let it be distinctly 
 understood at the very outset that the theory of the uni- 
 verse now to be advanced, as the intellectual foundation 
 of a New Ideal of Liberalism, claims no other support 
 than its own inherent and evident truth. It does not claim 
 to be the philosophy of The New Ideal or of its editor j 
 no one is authorized to declare this except the editor him- 
 self, and he must not be held responsible for anything said 
 in this series of papers, unless he himself sees fit to ap- 
 prove it explicitly in words of his own. It would be un- 
 fair and ungenerous to him, if, merely because he has urged 
 me to write the series, I should allow it to be imagined 
 that I am in any sense his authorized representative or 
 spokesman; and it would be equally unjust to myself, to 
 the depth and strength of my own convictions, if I should 
 allow it to be imagined that this theory of the universe 
 needs any other corroboration than manifest congruity with 
 the facts of the universe itself. 
 
4 The Philosophy of Free Religion. 
 
 Furthermore, in entitling tliese papers " The Philosophy 
 of Free Religion," it must not be understood that I claim 
 for them the sanction of the Free Religious Association, or 
 of any of its officers or members. These must speak for 
 themselves ; I do not speak for them at all. But I do 
 claim the right to call by that name the philosophy which, 
 in my own mind, had begun to shape itself, and which, in 
 the Christian Examiner of September, 1865, and March, 
 1866, had begun to utter itself, before the Free Religious 
 Association was organized, — the philosophy which, sub- 
 stantially the same as now, though less matured in form, 
 impelled me in 1867 to join in the founding of that Asso- 
 ciation, — the philosophy which impelled me in 1869 to be- 
 come the editorial founder of " The Index, A Weekly Paper 
 Devoted to Free Religion," in entire independence of the 
 Free Religious Association, — the philosophy which im- 
 pelled me in 1880 to procure the donation of The Index to 
 the Free Religious Association by the Index Association, — 
 and the philosophy which impelled me in 1886, in the last 
 issue of The Index itself, to protest against the transfer of 
 its "good-will" to a new journal which straightway justi- 
 fied the protest by devoting itself avowedly to "Mo- 
 nism and Agnosticism ... as positive and negative 
 aspects of the one and only rational scientific philosophy." 
 The title of this series of articles seems to me appropriate 
 because they aim to develop the philosophy which must 
 (consciously or unconsciously) underlie any and every free 
 religious movement or institution : namely, the philosophy 
 which results from the faithful application of the scientific 
 method to the universe as a whole. They aim to sketch 
 this necessary philosophy, as a theory of the universe logic- 
 ally involved in the scientific method itself, but not yet 
 historically evolved from it in the intellectual conscious- 
 ness of the world ; they cannot, therefore, claim to repre- 
 sent the present convictions of any one except the writer, 
 
Tlie Philosopluj of Free Religion. 5 
 
 but they do claim to indicate tlie necessary philosophical goal 
 of the great movement of modern scientific thought. And 
 by this claim they must stand or fall. 
 
 What remains of this first article of the series must be 
 devoted to a concise statement of the beginning and the 
 end of the road now opening before us, in order that the 
 reader may know exactly what to expect. 
 
 I. The universal results of the special sciences, including 
 the method commoii to them all, are the only possible data of 
 philosophy or universal science. 
 
 This principle, which alone can give to universal human 
 reason a firm foothold in reality as universal human expe- 
 rience, is the necessary beginning-point of all philosophy 
 which deserves to be called scientific. It means that phi- 
 losophy cannot begin until the innumerable individuals of 
 the human race have accumulated a common stock, great or 
 small, of universal knowledge which has been proved, 
 tested, or verified by their universal experience, and from 
 which all the errors of individuals have been eliminated. 
 It means that this common stock of verified knowledge of 
 the universe, gained through long ages of experience and 
 clarified by science, is the only solid ground of reality 
 upon which philosophy can build ; and that the only legit- 
 imate business of philosophy is to organize, systemize, and 
 make the most of this universally verified knowledge — to 
 combine the fragmentary and disconnected data of the 
 special sciences in such a way as to unite them in one har- 
 monious, comprehensive, and trustworthy theory of the 
 universe as a whole. 
 
 II. The universe is known as at once infinite machine, 
 infinite organism, and infinite person — as mechatiical in its 
 apparent form and action, organic in its essential constitution, 
 
6 The Philosophy of Free Relirjion. 
 
 and personal in its innermost being : it is the eternallij self- 
 evolving and self-involving unity of the Absolute Meal and 
 the Absolute Ideal in God. 
 
 This principle, which alone can give to universal human 
 experience an intelligible unity m universal human reason, 
 is the necessary end or outcome of all philosophy which de- 
 serves to be called scientific. It means that philosophy 
 cannot end in the Infinite Impersonal without stultifying 
 reason and experience at once, — that the Infinite Imper- 
 sonal is below even the Finite Personal, and immeasurably 
 below the Infinite All-Person, — that the Infinite Super- 
 personal (or unknown and transcendent God) must include 
 the Infinite All-Person (or known and immanent God), pre- 
 cisely as this includes the infinite organism and the infinite 
 machine, — that the Infinite Impersonal can only be the 
 false dream of an Infinite Sub-personal, — and that to iden- 
 tify a universe containing finite personalities with an Infi- 
 nite Sub-personal is to wreck all possibility of conceiving 
 Being as One, by making its oneness a self-contradictory 
 thought. In other words. Infinite Impersonal Being is an 
 impossible conception which never has been, and never can 
 be, thought by any one ; to think Infinite Being, however, is 
 the necessity of all philosophy, and it can only be thought 
 as at once infinitely mechanical, infinitely organic, and in- 
 finitely personal. 
 
 III. The universe itself, as eternally self-evolving and 
 self-involvifig unity of the Absolute Real and the Absolute 
 Ideal in God, is the Ethical Realization of the Infinite Di- 
 vine Ideal, which reflects itself in the Finite Human 
 Ideal as the sun reflects itself in the deio-drop ; and the 
 splendor of its reflection is piroportioned to the intelligent, 
 free, loyal, and loving obedience of the human soul to it, as 
 at once the supreme laiv of Human Nature and the sujyreme 
 known law of Universal Nature. 
 
The Pliilosophij of Free Religion. T 
 
 This principle is the only one which can give universal 
 and necessary objective validity to the Moral Law, kindle 
 such an " enthusiasm of humanity " as shall illumine both 
 the inner and the outer life with divine radiance, or furnish 
 an adequate and indestructible foundation either to Ethics 
 or to Religion ; and it can only be derived from the theory 
 of the universe which has been indicated above. These 
 papers aim to trace the main lines of rational connection 
 between the beginning and the end of this Philosophy of 
 Free Religion, and thereby help to lay solid intellectual 
 foundations for a new and true Ideal of Humanity — in the 
 conviction that no ideal can ever become practicable, unless 
 it first becomes comprehensible. 
 
8 The Fhllosoiihy of Free Religion. 
 
 II. 
 
 § 1. The foundation or beginning-point of all genuinely 
 scientific philosophy, as already intimated, is the principle 
 that the taiiversal results of the special sciences, including 
 the method common to them all, are the only 2>osslble data of 
 jjhilosophg as universal science. 
 
 In other words, philosophy cannot begin by throwing 
 away the vast treasure of universal human knowledge, 
 gathered by the cooperative and long-continued experience 
 of mankind, in order to construct it afresh from the sole 
 standpoint of individual consciousness. Such a reconstruc- 
 tion is impossible without using, in the very process itself, 
 that knowledge which the individual has previously learned 
 from others, from mankind ; it is, therefore, a manifest, un- 
 deniable, and philosophically fatal "begging of the ques- 
 tion." For this reason (not to mention many others for 
 which here there is no room), the famous formula of Des- 
 cartes, " I think, therefore I am," recognized by all compe- 
 tent writers as the foundation of so-called modern j^hiloso- 
 phy, represents a beginning-point which does not really 
 begin ; the very words in which it is expressed, and with- 
 out which it could not be clearly thought at all, whether 
 French, Latin, or English, Avere learned from others, and 
 transmit knowledge to the individual which he tries in vain 
 to sweep from his own mind, in order to make a fresh be- 
 ginning from his immediate self-consciousness and philoso- 
 phize without the necessity of acknowledging indebtedness 
 to his fellow-men. The common experience of mankind 
 has accumulated an immense fund of common knowledge, 
 which enters more or less into the education of every indi- 
 vidual ; he spends years in learning this before he can pos- 
 
The Philosophy of Free Religion. 9 
 
 sibly begin to philosophize on his own account, and is never 
 able to separate it wholly from what he acquires through 
 his independent activity. " Common sense " designates the 
 crude mass of this common knowledge, mixed with much 
 error; "science," in the form of numerous special sciences 
 which sift out the error, establish the truth, and make fresh 
 discoveries, each in the special direction of its own limited 
 line of investigation, designates the purified mass of this 
 common knowledge, freed from the crudities of "common 
 sense," but left still in a disjointed and unorganized con- 
 dition; " philosophy," just so far as it deserves its name, 
 designates that more profound and comprehensive thinking 
 which combines the fragmentary data of all the special 
 sciences, blends them into one rational whole, and consti- 
 tutes the organized mass of this common knowledge, freed 
 not only from the crudities of "common sense," but also 
 from the fragmentariness, half-views, and inevitable lim- 
 itations of "science" itself. In other words, "common 
 sense " studies the universe, but only with reference to the 
 immediate needs of practical life ; "science" studies it with 
 reference to the needs of exact knowledge, but only in 
 arbitrarily limited fields, provinces, or parts ; " philosophy " 
 studies it in its wholeness, totality, or unity, not only with 
 reference to the needs of exact knowledge (universal 
 science), but also with reference to those of practical life 
 (ethics). Hence no individual can possibly limit the foun- 
 dation of philosophy to the mere data of his own im- 
 mediate consciousness, since these are themselves founded 
 on the data of " common sense " and "science" alike, and 
 presuppose that common knowledge which he has previous- 
 ly more or less learned from the human race in general. 
 There is no help for it : philosophy must begin by taking 
 the existence and reality of Universal Human Knowl- 
 edge as its own given fact, datum, material, subject-matter, 
 foundation, — or it can never begin at all. 
 
10 The Philosophy of Free Religion. 
 
 § 2. But where is this universal human knowledge stored ? 
 Where is it to be found ? Where does it exist as a con- 
 crete reality ? For, if philosophy founds upon a mere ab- 
 straction, it will itself be a mere abstraction in the end. 
 
 Universal human knowledge exists in Universal Lit- 
 erature, using the term in a sense so broad as to include 
 every permanent record or register of human thought. It 
 is only through covimunication (that is, the "making com- 
 mon ") that individual knowledge enters into, or adds to, 
 the great stock of common knowledge, and thereby univer- 
 salizes itself in a true sense. Uncommunicated individual 
 knowledge perishes with the individual; only commun- 
 icated knowledge can become general or universal. Not all 
 literature is knowledge ; all completely universalized knowl- 
 edge, however, derives its universality from its incorpora- 
 tion into literature, and exists in literature alone. For lit- 
 erature, in its essence, is not the mere material instruments 
 of communication, but rather the meaning which was orig- 
 inally put into these things by living intelligences, and 
 which, if it had not been put into them, could never be ex- 
 tracted from them by other living intelligences. It is not 
 true that the reader gets from a book only what he himself 
 freely constructs in the reading by the activity of his own 
 mind. Not a little trash of this sort has been said and 
 printed ; but whoever receives a letter from a distant friend 
 may easily know, if he will, that he receives from it inform- 
 ation or knowledge which he himself could not possibly 
 have originated or constructed in his own mind. Univer- 
 sal literature is, so to speak, the whole mass of letters or 
 extant correspondence which has been bequeathed by the 
 past to the present; it constitutes now the capitalized 
 knowledge of the human race, and grows in bulk from age 
 to age by the additions of each new generation. It consists, 
 not in parchment or paper as such, but in the essential 
 meaning, the objective thought, the new grouping of old 
 
The Philosophy of Free Religion. 11 
 
 symbols so as to make them express new ideas, which orig- 
 inated in the mind of the writer, and now reaches the mind 
 of the reader through these outward signs alone. The me- 
 dium is material, but the message is intellectual. This is 
 the true '' telepathy " (not a whit less wonderful because it 
 is a fact of commonest experience), by which human con- 
 sciousness commtmicates with human consciousness through 
 that which is not human consciousness. The meaning com- 
 municated must pass through some material medium, vehi- 
 cle, or bearer, or it could never be communicated at all ; and 
 the bearer of universal human knowledge, that is, the total 
 message which man in the past has sent to man in the pres- 
 ent, is universal literature. 
 
 § 3. Now universal literature, being that by which alone 
 human knowledge can completely universalize itself, de- 
 pends upon Universal Language, as a world-wide fact. 
 The plurality of languages in no wise obscures this fact. 
 There is a universal grammar which finds in every language 
 universal parts of speech, universal modes of combining 
 them in judgments or universal propositions, and universal 
 elements of the latter in Universal Terms. Every word, 
 in every language, no matter what may be its grammatical 
 function, is essentially and necessarily a universal term ; 
 that is, it must be of universal application, or it would be 
 utterly useless as a word. 
 
 § 4. Thus we find that the universal human knowledge 
 which supplies to philosophy its only possible datum, sub- 
 ject-matter, or foundation, is all contained in universal lit- 
 erature, or, in the last analysis, in universal terms. The 
 results of science must be permanently stored in this form, 
 and can only be found in this form. Museums, laboratories, 
 observatories, and all other machinery of science, are only 
 so many feeders of literature, and exist for the sake of li- 
 braries, as so many treasure-houses of human discovery, 
 study, thought; and all the libraries in the world, con- 
 
12 The Philosophy of Free Religion. 
 
 sidered in their essence, are only a vast mass of universal 
 terms. Hence philosophy cannot take the first step towards 
 comprehension of the results of science, or of the method 
 which has produced them, without first comprehending what 
 universal terms really are ; and the actual underpinning of 
 every possible philosophy, whether the fact is admitted or 
 not, consists in its consciously or unconsciously adopted 
 doctrine of universal terms — in its Theory of Ukivek- 
 SALS. So much penetration as it shows in its Theory of 
 Universals, so much, and no more, will it show in its inter- 
 pretation of the Scientific Method, and this will exactly 
 measure its worth to mankind in all time to come. In truth, 
 the Scientific Method involves the Scientific Theory of 
 Universals, and the Scientific Theory of Universals involves 
 the Scientific Method; and henceforth philosophy has no 
 legitimate business whatever except to interpret more pro- 
 foundly, develop more highly, and apply more searchingly, 
 rigorously, and universally, that perfect method of science 
 by which man has mastered all he really knows of the uni- 
 verse he inhabits. The first great task of philosophy, then, 
 is to lay deep and solid foundations for the expansion and 
 ideal perfection of human knowledge in a bold, new, and 
 true Theory of Universals. For so-called modern philos- 
 ophy rests complacently in a Theory of Universals which 
 is thoroughly mediaeval or antiquated, and shows itself 
 daily more and more powerless to construct a theory of the 
 universe tenable in the light of modern knowledge. There 
 is no room here for any criticism of the past, or even of 
 any adequate exposition of the Scientific Theory of Univer- 
 sals itself ; but it is necessary to make a compact state- 
 ment which shall give at least a glimpse of its three chief 
 aspects. 
 
 § 5. The first form of the Universal is the universal term 
 or Word. A few primitive words, radicals, or roots, at first 
 used indiscriminately, gradually developed into distinct 
 
The Philosophy of Free Religion. 13 
 
 parts of speech, and through phonetic modification, addition 
 of prefixes or suffixes, composition, or other modes of inter- 
 nal or external change, gave rise at last to the numberless 
 words of existing languages, the relations and affiliations of 
 which are studied by comparative philology. Every word 
 has its own genealogy, reaching far back into pre-historic 
 ages ; it lives a universal life quite independent of the in- 
 dividuals who successively use it, and constitutes a per- 
 manent organic product of a permanent organic community 
 of speaking beings. Its universal life lies in its universal 
 use by the community, to express some constant, or imper- 
 ceptibly changing, universal meaning. 
 
 § 6. The second form of the Universal is the universal 
 meaning, conception, or Concept. Just as all speaking is 
 only a combination of words into sentences, so all thinking 
 is only a combination of concepts into judgments or propo- 
 sitions. The concept is a permanently organized and grow- 
 ing thought, entering into countless judgments formed by 
 the individual mind, yet always retaining substantially the 
 same organic form. This permanent organic constitution 
 of the concept, quite independent of the individual minds 
 which successively form and use it, is the most significant 
 fact about it ; for the permanent and independent constitu- 
 tion of concepts alone explains the permanence and inde- 
 pendence of words, as bearers of common concepts of the 
 race, and demonstrates an ultimate origin of the concept 
 which is independent of any and every individual as such. 
 Every concept lives a universal life in the individual mind, 
 appearing and re-appearing as a fixed or constant element 
 in conscious thinking ; its universal life lies in its univer- 
 sal use by the individual mind, as the essential meaning of 
 its corresponding word ; and this essential meaning is neces- 
 sarily determined by the nature of the what-is-meant. 
 
 § 7. The third form of the Universal is the universal 
 what-is-meant: that is, the universal classes or kinds of 
 
14 The Philosojjhy of Free Religion. 
 
 things, tlie universal genera and species under which all 
 known existences are discovered by science, or, in one word, 
 the Genus. Here we come to the very bottom of all philo- 
 sophical analysis. Science claims to know real existences, 
 to declare their real classes or kinds, and, at least to some 
 extent, to explain their real mutual relations, interactions, 
 and affiliations. The total results of all the special sciences 
 may be summed up in two words : classification and genesis. 
 Indeed, the one word classification suffices, for genesis 
 means only the derivation of class from class, or kind from 
 kind. Nothing is known by itself alone ; it is known only 
 through its kind. The essential constitution of every genus is 
 that of viany things in one hind, one hind in many things: 
 the unity and the multiplicity are known inseparably to- 
 gether. Hence the genus is in no sense an abstraction, but 
 the concrete totality of many realities in one reality ; and 
 this essentially organic constitution of the genus is the uni- 
 versal luhat-is-meant of the concept, just as the concept is 
 the universal meaning of the word. Science itself may be 
 defined as Knowledge of the Genus : that is, knowledge 
 of the universe, as the highest kind which includes all other 
 kinds. 
 
 § 8. Thus the genus is the universal kind ; the concept 
 is the universal thought of the universal kind ; the word is 
 the universal expression of the universal thought of the 
 universal kind. There are here three distinct grades, or 
 ascending orders, of universality : objective universality in 
 the genus, subjective universality in the concept, and ob- 
 jective-subjective universality in the word. To borrow the 
 terms of mathematics, the genus is a universal of the first 
 power, the concept a universal of the second power, and the 
 word a universal of the third power; and, just as the cube 
 and the square of any quantity presuppose the first power, 
 so the word and the concept presupj^ose the genus. The 
 word speaks the concept, and the concept thinks the genus ; 
 
The Philosophy of Free Religion. 15 
 
 at the bottom of all, conditioning the very possibility of 
 concept and word, lies the genus, as the only possible unit 
 of known existence. If science is not the knowledge of 
 objectively real genera or kinds, then there is no real 
 knowledge, and a philosophy of the universe is impossible. 
 But, if science is indeed such knowledge, then the Scientific 
 Theory of Universals (here scarcely more than hinted at) is 
 the Atomic Theory of Philosophy ; and the Genus, the Con- 
 cept, and the Word are the Ultimate Molecules of 
 Universal Human Knowledge. 
 
16 The Fhilosophy of Free Religion. 
 
 III. 
 
 § 9. The importance of the Theory of Universals in the 
 past, present and future clevelojoment of philosojohic thouglit 
 cannot be overstated. Every philosophy has grown out of 
 some form of tliis tlieory, consciously adopted or unconscious- 
 ly inherited, as its very life-germ; and every philosophy 
 must follow out the line of development which its own 
 peculiar form of the theory marks out for it beforehand. 
 The character of its Theory of Universals moulds, controls, 
 and predetermines the character of its Theory of Knowledge 
 and its Theory of Being ; and it is the union or fusion of 
 these three theories in one comprehensive whole which 
 constitutes a philosophy. Ignoring, therefore, all minor 
 distinctions, it is necessary at least to glance at three great 
 and fundamentally different forms of the Theory of Uni- 
 versals, which for convenience may be styled the Greek, 
 the German, and the American. 
 
 § 10. The Greek theory recognizes the Universal in 
 its threefold reality as the Genus, the Concept, and the 
 Word, although without sufficiently distinguishing these 
 one from another. It teaches that the Individual Thing is 
 alone real, as the unit of existence and of knowledge alike ; 
 but it also teaches that the Universal, as sum of all the 
 real characteristics or marks which are common to all things 
 of one kind, exists whole and entire in each individual thing 
 of that kind, and alone constitutes its intelligible reality as 
 a fact in Nature. This is at least to conceive the Genus as 
 depending on man neither for its existence nor for its in- 
 telligibility, — as being the real intelligible essence of the 
 individual thing in itself, and, as svich, an ultimate origin 
 of the Concept and the Word. Hence this undeveloped 
 
The Philosophy of Free Religion. 17 
 
 Greek theory, teaching the Reality of the Universal in the 
 Individual Thing, has been for centuries fittingly denom- 
 inated Realism. 
 
 § 11. The German theory recognizes the Universal as 
 the Concept and the Word, but denies it altogether as the 
 Genus, — denies it, that* is, as a reality in a real ISTature 
 known by Man, yet independent of him. It teaches that 
 the Individual Thing in Nature, even if it exists, cannot be 
 known either in itself or in any of its real relations, internal 
 or external. It teaches that the Universal is absolutely 
 nothing but the work of human reason, has no real existence 
 except as the Concept and the Word, and, as such, has noth- 
 ing to do with individual things in themselves, which can- 
 not possibly be known to exist. It teaches that the Con- 
 cept and the Word have no ultimate origin but Man, and 
 that the notion of real intelligible genera in Nature, existing 
 independently of Man, is a monstrous fiction of mere un- 
 tutored imagination or "common sense." Hence the Ger- 
 man theory, teaching the Mere Ideality of the Universal in 
 the Concept and the Word, completely extinguishes, merges, 
 or absorbs the Genus in the Concept or Idea, and has long 
 been fittingly denominated Conceptualism or Idealism. 
 
 In this German theory of Universals lies the deep, secret, 
 and generally unsuspected source of all modern Agnosticism, 
 a result which was uncritically accepted, ready-made, by 
 Spencer and Huxley from Hamilton and Mansel, borrowed 
 by Hamilton and Mansel from Kant and the post-Kantian 
 Idealists, and originally developed by Kant out of Hume 
 and other adherents of Scholastic Nominalism. 
 
 § 12. The American or Scientific Theory of Universals, 
 like the Greek theory, recognizes the Universal in its three- 
 fold reality, but in a much fuller, higher, and profounder 
 sense. The Word is the Universal of Speech ; the Con- 
 cept is the Universal of Thought; the Genus is the 
 Universal of Being. The Word speaks the Concept, and 
 
18 Tlte Philosojihy of Free Religion. 
 
 the Concept thinks the Genus ; the content or meaning of 
 the Word is identical with the constitution of the Concept, 
 and the constitution of the Concept (provided this be veriti- 
 able or scientifically true) is identical, so far as it goes, with 
 the constitution of the Genus. The Genus itself is not a 
 mere sum of characteristics or marks common to all things 
 of one kind, and therefore real in a lower sense than the 
 things themselves; on the contrary, it is tlie self-related 
 organic wliole of onany real things in one real kind, and 
 therefore precisely as real or concrete as they. So defined, 
 the Genus, or Universal of Being, and not the Individual 
 Thing as such, is alone real. It alone is the real unit of 
 all known existence, and therefore constitutes an indispen- 
 sable co-factor with the understanding in originating the 
 Concept and the Word; while the individual thing can 
 neither exist nor be known out of necessary relation to its 
 kind, but can exist and be known only in, with, and through 
 its kind, which, again, can exist and be known only in, with, 
 and through a higher kind. What is known through the 
 Concept and the Word is never the independent, isolated, 
 or unrelated thing, nor yet the common essence of many un- 
 related things as a mere abstraction, but always the concrete 
 kind of many interrelated things as one self-related reality. 
 Hence it is not true, as the Greek theory teaches, that the 
 Universal exists whole and entire in each individual of the 
 same kind ; on the contrary, it exists only in all the individ- 
 uals of that kind, as necessarily united in the Genus or 
 Universal of Being. Neither is it true, as the German theory 
 teaches, that the Universal has no real or intelligible exist- 
 ence in things in themselves, that is, in Nature as a reality 
 independent of Man ; for this is to deny the very possibility 
 of science, as verified knowledge of such real Nature. 
 Hence the American theory, teaching the Reality of the 
 Universal in the Concrete Kind or Genus, as the Sole Object 
 of the Scientific Concept and Sole Meaning of the Scientific 
 
The Philosophy of Free Religion. 19 
 
 Word, and thereby preserving all the truth, while correcting 
 the errors, of both Greek and German theories, is fittingly 
 denominated Sciextific Realism. 
 
 § 13. These three fundamental forms of the Theory of 
 Universals, therefore, may be shortly contrasted as fol- 
 lows : — 
 
 * I. The Greek theory teaches that the Indiv.idual Thing- 
 in-itself is the ultimate reality, but that the Universal 
 is also real, in a lower sense, as the known essence of the 
 Individual Thing-in-itself. 
 
 II. The German theory denies that the Individual 
 Thing-in-itself is known at all, and teaches that the Uni- 
 versal is real only in the Concept and the Word. 
 
 III. The American theory teaches that the Universal 
 is equally real in the Word, the Concept, and the Genus ; 
 and that the Individual Thing and the Universal Kind are 
 known, each in and ivith and through the other, in the 
 Genus-in-itself. The Word, the Concept, and the Genus 
 are the ultimate molecules of universal human knowledge ; 
 and universal human knowledge itself, in its purified 
 form as science, is all reducible in the last analysis to 
 Knowledge of the Genus, — that is, to knowledge of the 
 innumerable genera, classes, or kinds of existence which 
 together constitute the Universe or Highest Kind (summum 
 genus). 
 
 Thus each of the three theories determines in a different 
 way the Object of Knowledge, and thereby predetermines 
 a different Theory of Knowledge and Theory of Being. 
 To the Greek theory, the sole object of knowledge is tlce 
 Universal in the Individiial Thh\g. To the German theory, 
 the sole object of knowledge is the Universal in the Con- 
 cept or Idea. To the American theory, the sole object of 
 knowledge is the Universal Kind and the Individual Thing 
 as necessarihj correlated in the Real Genus-in-itself. 
 
 § 14. For all present purposes, it must suffice to exhibit, 
 
20 The Philosophy of Free Beligio 
 
 n. 
 
 Avithoiit criticism or argument, these three theories side 
 by side, and leave the thoughtful reader to be arguer or 
 critic for himself. The American or Scientific Theory of 
 Universals underlies and supports the whole fabric of modern 
 science. Science presents itself as exact and verified knowl- 
 edge of genera, classes, or kinds of real existence, at all 
 times observable and verifiable in the Universe as the su- 
 preme Genus. This knowledge embraces a vast body of 
 scientific concepts, expressed in scientific words ; and the 
 truth of each concept depends absolutely on the identity of 
 its constitution, so far as it goes, with that of the genus 
 which is its correlate or object. 
 
 § 15. But the identity of constitution between a sub- 
 jective concept and an objective genus requires that there 
 should be something in common between thoughts and 
 things — something which may exist indifferently in either. 
 Such a common term is found in the Inherent System of 
 Relations or Immanent Relational Constitution; for 
 relations may subsist indifferently between things or be- 
 tween thoughts, and therefore be the same in both. For 
 instance, the relation or ratio between the circumference 
 and diameter of a circle chalked on a blackboard is pre- 
 cisely the same as the relation or ratio between the circum- 
 ference and diameter of a circle conceived in imagination ; 
 both relations inhere necessarily in the constitution of the 
 circle as a circle, wherever found, and are necessarily iden- 
 tical. In other words, equal ratios are one and the same 
 ratio. Aristotle recognized the truth of this princijile un- 
 equivocally two thousand years ago, when he said that, in 
 such cases, "equality is unity." If this principle is true, 
 then the immanent relational constitution of a concept may 
 be strictly and absolutely identical, so far as it goes, with 
 the immanent relational constitution of a genus. 
 
 § 16. The Scientific Theory of Universals, therefore, 
 which science presupposes in every statement of cosmical 
 
The Philosophy of Free Religion. 21 
 
 fact or cosmical law, necessarily involves the great, pro- 
 found, and all-embracing principle of the Objectivity of 
 Relations : namely, the principle that relations are no less 
 real, discoverable, verifiable, and intelligible in the objective 
 world than they are in subjective thought. The real object 
 of every scientific concept is a self -related genus in Nature ; 
 and the possibility of observing and verifying it is the ab- 
 solute condition of the possibility of science. The whole 
 business of science is to observe, verify, and understand 
 real genera in Nature, • — that is, to discover them ; it does 
 not attempt the impossible task of proving the possibility 
 of its own discovery, since every such proof is a manifest 
 begging of the question. The only philosophy, therefore, 
 which either does or can harmonize itself with science is 
 that which defends the discoverability of real genera in 
 Nature, or (what is the same thing precisely) recognizes 
 objective generic relations as the intelligible essence of a real 
 environment not dependent on man either for its existence or 
 for its intelligibility. Such a philosophy is that which founds 
 upon Scientific Eealism, as opposed to Philosophical Ideal- 
 ism; and no other can justly lay claim to the epithet 
 "modern." 
 
 § 17. No philosophy, it is triie, can demonstrate by pure 
 reasoning that the Genus exists, since all reasoning, how- 
 ever pure, assumes the existence of the Genus. But science 
 has already demonstrated its existence in the only possible 
 way, not by pure reasoning, but by observation and verifi- 
 cation. If observation and verification cannot demonstrate 
 the real existence of the Genus, philosophy itself, in any 
 sane sense of the word, is annihilated; for philosophy has 
 nothing to work with except concepts, and, since concepts 
 can think nothing whatever but genera, the doubt or denial 
 of genera is the destruction of all concepts themselves. 
 The legitimate work of philosophy is to take from science 
 the concepts it has already acquired by scientific observation 
 
22 The Philosojjhij of Free Religion. 
 
 and verification, to combine them in new and higher concepts 
 through philosophic hypothesis, and to confirm philosophic 
 hypothesis by philosophic verification, — in a word, to dis- 
 cover still larger genera than are presented in the limited 
 fields of investigation of the special sciences, and thereby 
 to increase knowledge of the whole real vmiverse. Philoso- 
 phy, in truth, is only the completion or higher evolution of 
 science itself, and can never attain to any higher hind of 
 certitude than that to which science has already attained. 
 This recognition of the results of science as the foundation 
 of philosophy is not to "beg the question," "take the uni- 
 verse for granted," or "build on mere baseless assumption"; 
 for the existence of the Genus has been long ago demon- 
 strated by science in the only possible way, to wit, by 
 observation and verification. The sole " postulate " of phi- 
 losophy is the Truth of Science — which is disputable by 
 no educated man ; and, at bottom, the truth of science is 
 the truth of the Scientific Theory of Universals. 
 
The Philosophy of Free Religion. 23 
 
 IV. 
 
 § 18. It lias been thus far shown that the real object of 
 knowledge is not, as the Greek Theory of Universals teaches, 
 the " tode ti " or Individual Objective Thing-in-itself ; 
 nor yet, as the German Theory teaches, the "Vorstellung" 
 or Universal Subjective Concept-in-itself ; but rather, 
 as the American or Scientific Theorv teaches, the Univer- 
 SAL Objective Genus-in-itself. That is to say, the real 
 object of knowledge is not the concept at all (though this, 
 too, may become a real object of knowledge), but that which 
 is really known by means of the concept : namely, the Real 
 Universal Kind of Heal Individual Things, inter- 
 nally so self-related as to constitute one essential whole out 
 of many essential parts, and rendered intelligible through 
 this real internal self-relation. 
 
 § 19. Against this determination of the object of knowl- 
 edge may be arrayed the current notions of the '' relativity 
 of knowledge." This doctrine, a truism or a falsity accord- 
 ing as it is conceived, is too often made to take account only 
 of the cognitive relation between the object and the subject, 
 ignoring altogether the internal self-relatedness of the ob- 
 ject in itself — which is the main part of the business. The 
 argument commonly founded on it is that, since the object 
 can only be known in relation to the subject, and since man's 
 knowing-faculty is necessarily limited and imperfect, there- 
 fore man can know nothing of the object as it is in itself 
 This conclusion is far too large for the premises. From 
 these it only follows that man's knowledge of the object is 
 limited and imperfect — which is true ; it does not follow 
 that man knows nothing of the object as it is in itself — 
 which is false. The above conclusion makes two enormous 
 
24 The Philosoplxy of Free Religion. 
 
 assumptions : that the object as known must of necessity- 
 be totally different from the object as it is in itself, and that 
 the object as it is in itself cannot be known at all, unless it 
 is known wholly. Neither of these assumptions has any 
 foundation in reason or in fact. Just so far as man discovers 
 the real internal self-relatedness of the object, just so far he 
 knows it as it is in itself; for to know it " in itself" can 
 only mean to know it in its internal relations. Science, 
 which is his verified knowledge both of external and inter- 
 nal relations of the object, is at once the measure and the 
 proof of his knowledge of it as it is in itself. 
 
 Eationally interpreted, the doctrine of the '< relativity of 
 knowledge" means merely that man can know the object 
 so far only as he has the capacity to know it — which is 
 surely a very innocent proposition ; but to interpret it as 
 meaning that man cannot at all know the object as it is in 
 itself is to commit the absurdity of denying the very possi- 
 bility of human knowledge. For "not to know the object 
 as it is in itself " is either (1) to know it as it is not in itself, 
 which would be absolute error, or else (2) not to know it at 
 all, which would be ahsohite ignorance. To one or the other 
 of these all human knowledge is reduced by the common 
 interpretation of the doctrine of the " relativity of knowl- 
 edge." The world needs a wiser doctrine. 
 
 § 20. So important to a truly scientific theory of the 
 universe is thorough comprehension of the Scientific Theory 
 of Universals, and, in particular, of the principle of the In- 
 telligible Heality of the Genus-in-itself, that a single 
 clear and simple illustration of this principle will be no 
 waste of space. Let us take the "family" as an easily 
 conceived instance of the real genus in itself. 
 
 In modern civilized communities, the political unit is the 
 individual ; but the social unit, as distinguished from the 
 political unit, is the family, since society as such consists 
 only of complete and incomplete families. The married 
 
The Philosophy of Free Religion. 25 
 
 individual is a member in each of two complete families — 
 that from which he sprang and that which he himself founds. 
 The unmarried individual is an actual member of the family 
 from which he sprang, and also a possible founder and 
 member of a new family of his own ; hence he must be re- 
 garded as existing partly in a complete, and partly in an 
 incomplete family. 
 
 Every complete family as such is essentially and neces- 
 sarily composed of several individual members — father, 
 mother, and one or more children. The father is related 
 to the mother as husband, and the mother to the father as 
 wife ; their reciprocal relation is marriage. The father and 
 mother are both related to the children as parents, and the 
 children to the father and mother as offspring ; their recip- 
 rocal relation is parentage, on the one side, and filiation, on 
 the other. The children are related to each other as brothers 
 and sisters : their relation is that of brotherhood or sister- 
 hood. Father, mother, and children, although separate in- 
 dividuals, are constituted a real family by these interrela- 
 tions of marriage, parentage, filiation, brotherhood, and 
 sisterhood ; these family relations themselves, in their total- 
 ity, make up the family constitution, and are precisely as 
 real as the individuals related, inhering in the family as 
 such and as a whole, and subsisting neither in any one in- 
 dividual member nor in any outside observer. If there is 
 to be either a real father, a real mother, or a real child, then 
 there must be a real family of all three ; there can be no 
 father without a mother and a child, no mother without a 
 father and a child, no child without a father and a mother. 
 Nay, more : no individual as such can exist except as a 
 member of some family precisely as real as himself; the 
 reality of his family is the absolute condition of his own 
 reality, and, vice versa, the reality of several individuals is 
 the absolute condition of the reality of the family. All 
 individuals compose the genus family. All families com- 
 
26 The Philosophy of Free Religion. 
 
 pose the genus society. All societies compose the genus 
 mankind. All individuals = all families = all societies = 
 all mankind. 
 
 In this union and interrelation of many in one and one 
 in many, in this immanent relational constitution by which 
 many individuals exist and are indissolubly united in one 
 kind, lies the very essence of the family as such ; it is this 
 system of inherent relations, precisely as real as the in- 
 dividuals related, and wholly independent of any outside 
 observer, which constitutes the intelligible and essential 
 reality of the family as a genus in itself. Every family 
 must be relationally constituted in order either to he a family 
 or to he known as one ; every genus must be relationally 
 constituted in order either to he a genus or to he known as 
 one. Immanent in the very nature of being, this principle 
 of the objectivity or reality of generic relations is the 
 absolute condition of the possibility of a Wohld-Ordek ; 
 and, immanent in the very nature of knowledge, it is no 
 less the absolute condition of the possibility of a World- 
 Science. 
 
 § 21. Now in order to escape from the dense fog of error 
 which, generated by the doctrine of the exclusive subjec- 
 tivity of relations, has settled heavily down over so-called 
 modern philosophy under the malign influence of the 
 German Theory of Universals, let us imagine an outside 
 observer, as knowing subject, set in actual relation to a par- 
 ticular family, as object known. 
 
 I. First of all, it is to be noted that the observer and the 
 family are, numerically considered, two distinct and independ- 
 ent realities. So far as they are now related in the mere 
 act of knowledge, one is the subject and the other is the 
 object of this act; to this extent they are reciprocally de- 
 pendent, — that is, the present act of knowledge is condi- 
 tioned upon their being brought into present relationship. 
 But, so far as they exist in themselves, neither subject nor 
 
The Philosopliy of Free Religion. 21 
 
 object is at all dependent upon the other ; the observer is 
 intelligent in himself, independently of the family, and the 
 family is intelligible in itself, independently of the observer. 
 The present relationship of knowledge is necessary neither 
 to the intelligence of the subject nor to the intelligibility 
 of the object, nor yet to the real existence of either. 
 
 II. Next, it is to be noted that ivhat the subject knoics of 
 the object, in the present relationship, is identical with the 
 concept which results from that relationship. If the ob- 
 server's knowledge is real (that is, if it is neither error nor 
 ignorance mistaken for knowledge), then his concept of the 
 family reproduces subjectively and accurately the objective 
 relational constitution of the family. What the observer 
 knows is, not his own concept, but the family itself ; the 
 concept is simply his knowledge of it. Otherwise, the 
 family would not be the object at all — which it must be in 
 the case supposed. As self-conscious, the observer doubtless 
 knows his own knowledge, too ; but his knowledge of the 
 family, if real, is primarily knowledge of the family itself, 
 and only secondarily of the concept of the family. 
 
 III. Further, it is to be noted that the degree, quantity, 
 and quality of the observer's knowledge of the family, in 
 the case supposed, depend on tivo conditions : (1) on the 
 fulness and accuracy of his previous knowledge of the real 
 genus " family " in general, and (2) on the fulness and ac- 
 curacy of his observation of this family in particular. If 
 the observer were only a child, he would know little of the 
 real family constitution in general, and would necessarily 
 form a very vague and inadequate concept of this particular 
 family ; and so, likewise, if he were a chance visitor from 
 some planet where babies grow on trees or fall in raindrops. 
 Only he who already possesses profound knowledge of a real 
 kind will quickly and thoroughly comprehend a new case of 
 that kind, and then only if he keenly and comprehensively 
 observes it. The adequacy of a concept to its object must 
 
28 The Philosojyhij of Free Religion. 
 
 always depend on previous thorough understanding of the 
 genus to which the object belongs, and of the lower and 
 higher genera to which this genus is related in Nature. 
 Our observer can " know " the family, as object, on no other 
 terms than these. The price of all knowledge is experience^ 
 and this price he must pay. 
 
 IV. Lastly, it is to be noted that the concept (that is, the 
 observer's actual knowledge of the family) is a product of 
 two equallg real cof actors, the observer and the family as 
 subject and object. The observer is intelligent in himself, — 
 more or less so according to his native capacity and the 
 amount of his previously acquired knowledge ; the family 
 is intelligible in itself, — its intelligibility (since all rela- 
 tions as such are essentially intelligible) being simply the 
 necessary consequence of its relational constitution. The 
 concept, as actual present knowledge of the family by the 
 observer, results from bringing an intelligent subject into 
 actual relationship with an intelligible object ; it is deter- 
 mined to be what it is, and not otherwise, by the united 
 determinant influences of both. Certainly, if the object 
 did not impress, affect, or act upon the subject in some way 
 or other, it could never be known by the subject at all, and 
 the concept would not in the least degree reproduce its re- 
 lational constitution ^ which the concept incontrovertibly 
 does, if it is real knowledge of the object at all. Hoiv this 
 result comes to pass is a difficult problem, to be solved, if 
 possible, by the Theory of Knowledge ; but that it comes 
 to pass is an undeniable fact, if any real knowledge exists 
 at all. Whatever theory may be advanced to explain the 
 '< origin of knowledge," every such theory must recognize 
 the truth that subject and object are equally real co-factors 
 in all real knowledge, or else must come under the ban of 
 all theories which despise and falsify facts. The influence 
 of the object is proved by the fact that real knowledge of it 
 exists ; the influence of the subject is proved by the fact 
 
The Philosophy of Free Religion. 29 
 
 tliat this real knowledge is limited and imperfect. But the 
 very limitation of real knowledge of the object in itself is 
 proof that siich real knowledge exists ; for nothing can be 
 limited that is not itself real. 
 
 § 22. Now let us inquire how the observer, as subject, 
 and the family, as object, would be related, if the German 
 Conceptualist Theory of Universals (namely, that the sub- 
 jective universal concept, or " Vorstellung," and not the 
 objective universal genus, is the real object of knowledge) 
 were true. 
 
 It follows from the German Theory that, like husband 
 and wife in the old common law, the observer and the family 
 are one, and the observer is that one. According to this 
 theory, the concept is the only real object of knowledge ; 
 the genus cannot be admitted to have any reality at all, as 
 distinguished from the concept. But the concept of the 
 family, in the case supposed, exists nowhere but in the ob- 
 server's mind; hence the family, so far as it really exists, 
 exists only in the observer's mind, and cannot exist at all 
 outside of the observer himself. 
 
 The only apparent or plausible escape from this absurd 
 conclusion is to argue that the family at least exists in the 
 concepts of many observers, and therefore must exist out- 
 side of any particular observer. But to this argument the 
 reply is obvious and crushing : namely, that " many ob- 
 servers," if thus unguardedly and most naively conceded 
 to exist, would necessarily constitute a real objective genus, 
 independent of our particular observer and all his concepts ; 
 and that, if one such real genus may exist and be known as 
 separate from his concept of it, it is preposterously illogical 
 to refuse to recognize another such genus in the family. 
 The German Theory of Universals has but one logical ter- 
 minus — Solipsism, or the philosophy which denies all real 
 existence except to the solitary philosopher himself. 
 
 In short, the German Theory, if logically adhered to, 
 
30 The Philosophy of Free Religion. 
 
 altogether absorbs or extinguishes the object in the subject, 
 the family in the observer, the universe in the theorist, and 
 destroys thereby the possibility of any real or scientific 
 linoicledge ; while, if not logically adhered to, it is totally 
 worthless for science and philosophy alike. Further criti- 
 cism of it is unnecessary here. The Scientific Theory of 
 Universals, applied in practice, is the Scientific Method j 
 and that will be the subject of our next paper. 
 
The Philosophij of Free Religion. 31 
 
 V. 
 
 § 23. What is the Scientific Method ? Nothing is 
 more common or more confusing than a loose, vague, and 
 indeterminate use of this phrase. It is the object of the 
 present paper to give definiteness and scientific precision 
 to a much abused expression, by showing that the Scientific 
 Method is neitlier more nor less than the Universal 
 Leakning-Process — the process by which man, individual 
 or collective, has learned everything which he now knows ; 
 and, further, by showing that this universal learning-process 
 is neither more nor less than the Scientific Theory of 
 Universals applied in Practice to the Acquisition 
 OF Knowledge. 
 
 § 24. If science is real knowledge of the universe, — 
 that is, neither ignorance nor error mistaken for knowledge, 
 — then, self-evidently, the '■'■ method " of science is nothing 
 but the way in which that knowledge has been acquired. It 
 is no mystery ; it is the familiar process by which we have 
 learned whatever we really know. Common-sense applies this 
 process clumsily on a small scale ; the separate sciences 
 apply it skilfully on a large scale, but in arbitrarily limited 
 fields of investigation ; philosophy, or World-Science, 
 applies it skilfully on the largest scale to the universe as a 
 whole. The fundamental identity of the learning-process 
 in common-sense, in science, and in philosophy, — in other 
 words, the absolute unity and continuity of method in all 
 acquisition of knowledge, — is the constitutive and distinc- 
 tive principle of scientific philosophy as such. 
 
 Nothing could be more unscientific, unphilosophic, or dis- 
 astrous to the cause of ripe reason, than the contempt for 
 so-called " common thinking " which is fostered by the un- 
 
32 The PhilosopJaj of Free Religion. 
 
 modernized philosophy grounded on the German Theory of 
 Universals. Common thinking is only immature and inac- 
 curate thinking ; but the maturest and most accurate think- 
 ing must first pass through the stage of immaturity and in- 
 accuracy. The difference is one of degree only, not of kind. 
 There is but one universe, whose particular phenomena 
 change, but whose essential laws are unchanging ; there is 
 but one Itnnian reason, whose special applications vary, but 
 whose essential laws are unvarying ; the fundamental unity 
 of the universe and the fundamental unity of human reason 
 logically necessitate a fundamental unity of method in the 
 application of human reason to the universe. Hence it is a 
 thoroughly irrational and incredible supposition that there 
 should be any philosophic method whatever which is funda^ 
 mentally different from the Scientific Method. The abso- 
 lute unity and continuity of method in all acquisition of 
 real knowledge is, we repeat, the first principle of a genu- 
 inely scientific philosophy. 
 
 § 25. Consider once more, in the light of all that has 
 preceded, how the Scientific Theory of Universals determines 
 necessarily the Object of Knowledge, and then note how 
 this determination of the object of knowledge explains the 
 one and only possible way of acquiring knowledge — the 
 universal learning-process or Scientific Method. 
 
 I. As already shown at length, the complete object of 
 knowledge is never the Individual Thing, never the Univer- 
 sal Concept, but always the Universal Genus. The Genus 
 is the unity of many individual things reciprocally related 
 in one universal kind ; and the intelligible essence of the 
 Genus is this internal relational system of the whole as a 
 whole. The Genus may or may not be related, as a present 
 object of knowledge, to a present subject of knowledge, in 
 a present act of knowledge ; but this non-essential and tran- 
 sient relation to a subject in no wise affects or changes the 
 internal self-relatedness in which the intelligible essence 
 
The Philosophy of Free Religion. 33 
 
 of the Genus consists. Nothing but this internal and per- 
 manent relational constitution of the Genus-in-itself can 
 explain the fact that, whenever it becomes an object of 
 knowledge, many independent minds or subjects of knowl- 
 edge derive essentially one and the same concept from it. 
 This significant and pregnant fact did not escape the eagle 
 eye of Kant himself, when he said ( Prolegomena, § 18 ) : 
 "There would be no reason why the judgments of other 
 minds should necessarily agree with my own judgments, 
 were it not that the unity of the object to which these 
 judgments all refer, and with which they all agree, requires 
 them all to agree one with another." If Kant had only 
 adhered to this profound insight into the independent, im- ' 
 manent, and determinant constitution of the object as a 
 knoivn thing-in-itself, and if he had not constantly neutral- 
 ized it by declaring the thing-in-itself unknoivahle, the Ger- 
 man Theory of Universals would not have been for a 
 hundred years the chief obstacle to the progress of philos- 
 ophy. 
 
 II. The Concept is not an intermediate third term be- 
 tween the object and the subject of knowledge, but is itself 
 the very act or relation of knowledge between them. The 
 knowing an object is itself the concept of it. Even a false 
 concept is only partially false — the false combination of 
 elements separately true. Nothing could have been more 
 unfortunate for philosophy than the clumsy " hypostasis," 
 or transformation of a mere act or relation into a thing, by 
 which the Concept has been set up in German metaphysic 
 as itself the only real object of knowledge. The perma- 
 nence of conceptual knowledge' is a fact due to memory ; 
 but this fact does not wipe out the other facts that the ob- 
 ject of all knowledge is the genus known, and that knowledge 
 perishes when the genus is forgotten. 
 
 III. To the question, " What is that ? " the invariable 
 answer is, " A book," " A house," '' A tree," or some other 
 
34 The Philosophy of Free Religion. 
 
 kind of things — a genus always. The amount of informa- 
 tion imparted by the answer is measur-ed by the amount of 
 knowledge respecting that kind of things already possessed 
 by the inquirer. Nothing whatever is or can be known as 
 absolutely single or unrelated, that is, as out of its kind. 
 The only possible answer to the question, " What is that 
 thing ? " is to tell the kind to which that thing belongs. 
 Know the kind, and the thing is so far known ; know all 
 the kinds to which it belongs, and the thing would be abso- 
 lutely or exhaustively known. If absolute or exhaustive 
 knowledge of anything is unattainable by man, the reason 
 is that his knowledge of the innumerable kinds of things is 
 necessarily incomplete. But it is much to know in what 
 knowledge consists — much to know that knowledge is al- 
 ways of the thing through its kind and the kind through 
 its things : in a word, that its object is necessarily and in- 
 variably the Genus-in-itself. For it is the fact of the inde- 
 pendent, permanent, and immanent self-relatedness of the 
 Genus-in-itself which renders the universe intelligible ; and 
 it is thorough understanding and appreciation of this fact 
 which render a philosophy of the universe possible, nay, 
 inevitable. Science has already accumulated abundant ma- 
 terials for a comprehensive world-conception : nothing is 
 now needed but ability to comprehend them. 
 
 § 26. From all this it follows that the learning-process, 
 identical in common-sense, science, and philosophy, must be 
 the patient and continuous Discovery of Genera by Ex- 
 perience. If the internal self-relatedness of the Genus 
 exists independently of human reason, yet is knowable and 
 discoverable by it, then the only possible learning-process 
 must be the Observation of Nature. Such has been 
 from the beginning the Scientific Method ; and this is noth- 
 ing but reducing to practice the Scientific Theory of Uni- 
 versals, namely, that the real object of knowledge is the 
 Genus alone. As so often happens, practice has gone in 
 
The Philosophy of Free Religion. 35 
 
 advance of theory ; yet theory alone ultimately explains 
 practice. Scientific practice took for granted the existence 
 and knowableness of genera and species, and their discover- 
 ability by observation. Indifferent to all philosophical 
 skepticism, it resolutely set to work to discover them ; and 
 the result has been such a vast accumulation of indubitable 
 knowledge of Nature as to confound and overawe skepti- 
 cism itself. In making the initial assumption of knowable 
 and discoverable genera in Xature, and in employing obser- 
 vation and experiment as its means of investigation, science 
 has only improved upon the immemorial method of common- 
 sense — the method which every child necessarily adopts 
 in its earliest acquisition of knowledge, the method which 
 every man adopts in the world of affairs, the method which 
 every skeptic himself adopts in his ordinary life. And it 
 turns out in the end that this practical anethod, tested by a 
 thoroughly modernized theory of universals, is at bottom 
 the only philosophical method — the only possible f ounda,- 
 tion of a scientific philosophy. 
 
 For from the German Theory of Universals, that the 
 real object of knowledge is the Concept alone, it follows 
 that the whole learning-process consists in the mere Dis- 
 covery OF Concepts by Consciousness and the Develop- 
 ment OF Concepts by Pure Reason, independently of 
 real genera and species in Nature as a known thing-in-itself . 
 Hence Kant unequivocally declares ( Prolegomena, § 3G ) : 
 "The [human] understanding does not derive its own 
 a priori laws from Nature, but prescribes them to it." 
 Again ( § 38) : " The unity of objects is determined merely 
 by the [human] understanding, and indeed according to 
 conditions which lie in its own constitution ; and thus the 
 [human] understanding is the origin of the universal order 
 of Nature, since it comprehends all phenomena under its 
 own laws," etc. In other words, Nature, as a reality ex- 
 isting independently of the human understanding, has no 
 
36 The Philosophy of Free Religion. 
 
 discoverable unity or order whatever, and is absolutely un- 
 knowable in itself. This is a flat denial of the results of 
 science, which consist in verified discoveries of an imma- 
 nent and generic order and unity of Nature, known by, but 
 in itself independent of, the human understanding. Thus 
 the German Theory of Universals, denying all knowledge 
 of real genera in themselves, denies the truth of science, 
 and the possibility of any method by which the immanent 
 constitution of Nature may be learned by man ; and there 
 we leave it. 
 
 § 27. Now the Scientific Method, whether practised un- 
 skilfully and narrowly by common-sense, skilfully and 
 broadly by science, or profoundly and comprehensively by 
 philosophy, consists in three essential steps. 
 
 I. Observation. Man observes Nature, and thereby 
 gradually discovers its real genera. Since the real object 
 of knowledge is invariably the Genus-in-itself, there must 
 be observation and comparison of many individual things 
 before the generic relations which unite them in one natural 
 kind can be even in part discovered, — that is, before knowl- 
 edge as such begins. These generic relations ramify far 
 beyond the reach of exhaustive observation by man. Hence 
 result the actual limitation and imperfection of human 
 knowledge, on the one hand, and, on the other hand, the 
 absurdity of setting up any arbitrary or fixed limits of 
 human knowledge, so long as there is a possibility of 
 making further observation, or of inventing artificial aids 
 to observation, or of strengthening and developing the ob- 
 serving powers themselves. Grant the existence of observ- 
 ing powers in Man and the existence of genera to be observed 
 in Nature, and science is possible; deny either factor of 
 human knowledge, and science is impossible. It is wholly 
 immaterial to the truth of science whether we can, or cannot, 
 frame a Theory of Knowledge which shall explain exactly 
 and fully in what observation itself consists. How we ob- 
 
The Philosophy of Free Religion. 37 
 
 serve may be doubtful ; that we observe is indubitable. 
 Kant reasons that we have no faculty by which to observe 
 things in themselves, and therefore cannot know them ; sci- 
 entific philosophy reasons that we do know genera in them- 
 selves, and therefore must have faculties by which to observe 
 them. The very first step in learning anything is Observa- 
 tion, and common-sense, science, and philosophy alike would 
 be impossible without it. 
 
 II. Hypothesis. Man not only observes real genera 
 in being, but also creates ideal generalizations in thought. 
 By imagination, inference, and reasoning, he combines the 
 data of observation into tentative concepts of possible real 
 kinds. All reasoning is classification. Deduction is reason- 
 ing from the constitution of the universal kind to that of 
 its individual things ; induction is reasoning from the con- 
 stitution of the individual things to that of their universal 
 kind. The syllogism itself, the universal type and instru- 
 ment of all reasoning, aiSrms both in premises and in con- 
 clusion the reality of generic relations, and absolutely 
 presupposes the truth of the Scientific Theory of Univer- 
 sals. Hypothesis, the only means by which man can freely 
 enlarge his intellectual horizon, is itself a mere bridge 
 between initial observation and final observation. For no 
 hypothesis as such is knowledge; but hypothesis becomes 
 knowledge, when new experience has set upon it the seal of 
 its own confirmation. 
 
 III. ExPEKiMENTAL VERIFICATION. This is the testing 
 of hypothesis by fresh observation. If an ideal generaliza- 
 tion, subjected to this crucial test, proves to have been a 
 genuine anticipation of experience, it can only be because 
 fresh observation at last finds the real genus which the ideal 
 generalization anticipated, and to the discovery of which it 
 successfully guided. This is the essence of all Verification, 
 the last step of the Scientific Method, the confirmation of 
 hypothesis by fresh observation, the discovery in Nature of 
 
38 The Thilosopliy of Free Religion. 
 
 a real genus which an ideal generalization sagaciously di- 
 vined in thought. The Scientific Method begins with Ob- 
 SERVATioi«r, proceeds with Hypothesis, and ends with 
 Fresh Observation in Experimental Verification; 
 and what it observes, what it anticipates, what it verifies, — 
 in one word, what it learns, — is invariably the Real 
 Genus-in-itself. 
 
 § 28. Thus the Scientific Method, or the universal learn- 
 ing-process by which all human knowledge is acquired, is 
 neither more nor less than the Scientific Theory of Univer- 
 sals reduced to practice. The doctrine of the Eeal Genus- 
 in-itself, as discovered by the Scientific Method, is the 
 Theory of Being ; and that will be the subject of our next 
 paper. 
 
The Philosopluj of Free Eeligion. 39 
 
 VI. 
 
 § 29. The Scientific, Modem, or American Theory of 
 Universals, which results necessarily from analysis of the 
 Scientific Method, is Scientific Eealism, as opposed to 
 Philosophical Idealism; and it determines the subdi- 
 vision of scientific philosophy into its three great depart- 
 ments, the theories of Being, of Knowing, and of Doing. 
 The Scientific Theory of Being results from analysis of the 
 Genus-in-itself, and constitutes Ontology or Constructive 
 Realism, as opposed to all forms of Constructive Idealism. 
 The Scientific Theory of Knowledge results from analysis 
 of the Concept, and constitutes Psychology or Critical 
 Realism, as opposed to all forms of Transcendental or 
 Critical Idealism. The Scientific Theory of Conduct results 
 from analysis of the Word, and constitutes Anthroponomy 
 (including Ethics, Politics, and Art in its widest sense). 
 Sociology, or Ethical Realism, as opposed to all forms of 
 Ethical Idealism. The Scientific Theory of the Universe, 
 as the absolute union of Being, Knowing, and Doing in the 
 One and All, results from comprehension of these three 
 theories in complete organic unity, and constitutes Organic 
 Philosophy, Scientific Theology, or Religious Realism, as 
 opposed to all forms of Religious Idealism. 
 
 § 30. The problem of the scientific theory of Being is to 
 determine, so far as it can be determined by the philosoph- 
 ical use of the scientific method, the actual constitution of 
 the universe as a whole, that is, as the Highest Known Kind 
 of Real or Concrete Being; and thereby to form a Scien- 
 tific AVorld-Conception. 
 
 § 31. In order to grasp the full meaning of this problem, 
 let us take, for example, a familiar instance of the known 
 
40 The Philosophy of Free Itelujiun. 
 
 kind in the human race. The words " Man," " Humanity/' 
 and "Mankind," although in popular use employed vaguely 
 and almost interchangeably, will serve our turn, if for 
 present purposes we may be permitted to limit their signi- 
 fication by precise definitions. 
 
 By " Man," then, let us understand the Conckete Indi- 
 vidual ; that is, any and every living member of the human 
 race in the fulness of his individual reality, including, on 
 the one hand, all that is peculiar to him as a particular man, 
 and, on the other hand, all that is common to him with 
 other men in general. 
 
 By " Humanity," let us understand the Abstract Class 
 Essence, including only the universal nature which is com- 
 mon to all men as a class, and excluding all that is peculiar 
 to each particular man as an individual. " Humanity " thus 
 expresses what we all know as "human nature," which 
 everybody recognizes as a mere abstraction by itself alone, 
 and which nobody nowadays mistakes for an independent 
 reality ; it is real, but real only as existing in all real men. 
 
 Lastly, by " Mankind," let us understand the Conckete 
 Universal Kind or Genus, the human race as a whole, 
 including all concrete individuals with all their individual 
 peculiarities, and including, therefore, that universal 
 " human nature" which, though a mere abstraction by itself 
 alone, is nevertheless completely realized in each real indi- 
 vidual, and in the race as a real whole of real individuals. 
 
 § 32. These definitions bring out clearly the fact that 
 "Humanity," the abstract class essence, is realized equally 
 in the individual, " Man," and in the genus, " Mankind " ; 
 it constitutes that by Avhich we reason from one to the 
 other. Such is necessarily the case with every genus. In 
 every genus, the constitution of the Concrete Individual 
 and the constitution of the Concrete Kind reciprocally 
 make known or reveal each other, just so far as each real- 
 izes and contains the Abstract Class Essence. True, 
 
The Philosophy of Free Religion. 41 
 
 the individual lias his individual peculiarities, such as his 
 "face" or ''make " of individual features as a whole, which 
 is never exactly duplicated in any other individual ; while 
 the genus equally has its generic peculiarities, such as 
 heredity, bisexuality, gregariousness, and all other attributes 
 which can exist only through the social correlation of many 
 individuals in one kind. These peculiarities are not com- 
 mon both to genus and to individual ; but the abstract class 
 essence, unreal by itself alone, yet realized in both, is 
 common to both. Hence the constitutions of the genus as 
 genus and of the individual as individual, containing equally 
 this common identical element, necessarily repeat, reflect, 
 or reveal each other to that extent; knowledge of this 
 common element in one is necessarily knowledge of it in 
 the other also. The individual is a known fact ; society is 
 no less a known fact ; but each is known only throvigh the 
 other, and what makes either known is what makes both 
 known at the same time. This is the reason why, in gen- 
 eral, the individual thing can be known only through its 
 kind, and the kind only through its individual things. 
 Upon this great principle of the Eeciprocal Eevelation 
 OF Thing and Kind rests, on the one hand, the possibil- 
 ity of Induction, or reasoning from the constitution of indi- 
 vidual things to that of their universal kind, and, on the 
 other hand, the possibility of Deduction, or reasoning from 
 the constitution of a universal kind to that of its individual 
 things. It is the antecedent condition, not only of all scien- 
 tific hypothesis, but even of the syllogism itself, the uni- 
 versal type and instrument of all reasoning whatever. It 
 is safe to say, therefore, that no principle, whether in formal 
 or in applied logic, has a firmer foundation in science, nay, 
 in the eternal constitution of reason itself, than this princi- 
 ple which results from analysis of the Real Genus-in-itself : 
 namely, The Individual Concrete Thing and the Uni- 
 versal Concrete Kind Heveal Each Other through 
 
42 The Thilosojyhy of Free Religion. 
 
 THE Abstract Class Essence which is common to both. 
 On its logical side, this principle is the Fundamental Law 
 of Human Knowledge; on its ontological side, it is the 
 Fu7idamQntal Law of the Natural Self -Rev elation of Being 
 to Thought. It constitutes, therefore, the foundation of the 
 Scientific Theory of Being, 
 
 § 33. Now it is precisely this profound and irrefutable 
 principle, this indispensable basis of all science and all 
 reasoning, this necessary constitution of the Real Genus 
 which renders the universe intelligible by mind, that Agnos- 
 ticism unwittingly aud blunderingly violates. Philosoph- 
 ical, conceptualistic, or idealistic Agnosticism builds in vain 
 on the exploded German Theory of Universals (see §§9- 
 22), and needs no further notice here. Popular Agnosti- 
 cism, however, which has no Theory of Universals and 
 therefore no Philosophy at all, professes to build on the 
 facts of science, and to be as realistic as science itself. 
 While it claims scientific knowledge of genera and species 
 in Nature, as real kinds of real things, it at the same time 
 denies all scientific knowledge of Nature in its infinite 
 unity, as the supreme Kind of Kinds, — denies, that is, the 
 possibility of a Scientific World-Conception. It thus 
 proves itself totally incapable of perceiving that, from the 
 mere logical nature of the case, scientific knowledge of finite 
 genera-in-themseloes is 7iecessarily, just so far, scientific 
 knowledge of the Infinite Genus-in-itself — totally incajiable 
 of perceiving that two in one hand and tivo in the other 
 hand constitute four in both hands. In other words, popu- 
 lar Agnosticism possesses all the elements of a Scientific 
 World-Conception, but does not possess synthetic ability 
 enough to put them together or see the whole in the sum 
 of the parts. 
 
 For, precisely as the individual thing is related to its 
 kind, so is the kind related to its superior kind, this to the 
 kind next superior, and so on till that highest kind of all is 
 
The Philosophy of Free Religion. 43 
 
 reached which is identical with ISTature, the Universe, the 
 One and All of Existence, — with Infinite Real Being ; and, 
 precisely as the constitution of the lowest kind is manifested 
 or revealed in the constitution of the lowest individual 
 thing of that kind through the abstract class essence which 
 is common to both, so is the constitution of the supreme 
 Kind of Kinds, or Infinite Real Being, manifested or revealed 
 in the constitution of the whole vast chain of kinds down 
 to that individu'um which closes the series, be it atom, 
 ether-unit, monad-soul, or what it may. The minimum of 
 real knowledge, therefore, is, just so far, real knowledge of 
 the constitution of the Universe in its unity, totality, and 
 infinitude. In other words, the nature of the Infinite Whole 
 reveals itself necessarily in the nature of each and all of its 
 infinitesimal parts and each and all of its included kinds, in 
 proportion to the relative elevation of each part or kind in 
 the scale of being. This not only is so, but must be so, if 
 the Scientific Theory of Universals is true ; and there is no 
 truth in science or in human reason, if that theoiy is false. 
 It is logically impossible to deny all scientific knowledge of 
 the Universe in its infinite unity without at the same time 
 denying all scientific knowledge of it in its infinite multi- 
 plicity ; for knowledge of the least of its parts is, jDrecisely 
 to that extent, knowledge of the whole. If popular Agnos- 
 ticism only had enough philosophy to understand and follow 
 out the logic of its own denials, it would be a mad plunge 
 into bottomless, shoreless, sky less Ignorance — the suicide 
 of reason itself in a delirium of cowardice and self-distrust. 
 From this self-annihilation it escapes only by contradicting 
 itself more stoutly and more unblushingly than the Athana- 
 sian Creed ; and for this reason alone it is safe to predict 
 that the reign of the Agnostic Creed over modern liberalism 
 will be short. 
 
 § 34. In its simplest form, then, the problem of the 
 Scientific Theory of Being is: " What kind of a Universe is 
 
44 The Philosojihy of Free Religion. 
 
 this ? " Either the Universe is of no kind at all (which is 
 absurd), or else its kind must be determined and discovered 
 in strict accordance with the known universal law of all 
 kinds : namely, the Becijn'ocul Revelation of Thing and 
 Kind through the Abstract Class Essence which is common 
 to both. The problem can be solved only on the principle 
 that the essential constitution of the Universe more or less 
 repeats, reflects and reveals itself in miniature in the con- 
 stitution of each of the innumerable concrete kinds of which 
 it is itself the absolute unity, although it cannot completely 
 reveal itself except to itself in this same absolute unity. It 
 is not necessary that all of these kinds contained within 
 the Universe should be known by man, in order to enable 
 him to attain real knowledge of the constitution of the 
 Universe as a whole, and thereby to form a scientific world- 
 conception; real knowledge of any of these kinds is, just 
 so far, real knowledge of the Universe as the supreme 
 Kind of Kinds, and, the better its internal subordinate 
 kinds are known, so much the greater will be man's knowl- 
 edge of the supreme Kind of Kinds itself. Hence the 
 orderly progress of science is the natural growth of man's 
 knowledge of Infinite Being, and constitutes Revelation 
 in that strictly natural sense of the word in which alone 
 science can employ it. 
 
 Anything arbitrary, miraculous, or supernatural, anything 
 beyond or contrary to experience, anything inconsistent 
 with known fact or known law, anything incapable of veri- 
 fication by ascertained congruity with the already ascer- 
 tained Order of Nature, would be utterly inadmissible in 
 scientific philosophy, and therefore utterly inadmissible 
 here. For this reason the thoroughly transcendental con- 
 ception of the " Unknowable," in any other sense than that 
 of the Non-Existent or the Nonsensical, must be rigorously 
 excluded as a mere superstition, since it confessedly denotes 
 that which is beyond all possible knowledge or experience. 
 
The Philosophy of Free Religion. 45 
 
 The Unknown, however, must be admitted to be as certainly 
 real as the Known, since every step in the triumphant 
 march of science, every discovery in tlie long history of 
 man, has essentially consisted in the conversion of tlie Un- 
 known into the Known, and since thus, by the widest possi- 
 ble induction, the reality of the Unknown has been estab- 
 lished beyond all controversy as an object of perpetually 
 possible experience. No "transcendental" conception — 
 no conception, that is, which transcends actual or possible 
 experience — can be recognized as legitimate in scientific 
 philosophy; there is no such thing, therefore, as "Tran- 
 scendental Realism " — a name which is self -contradictory, 
 and hence utterly deroid of meaning. 
 
 It remains now to apply the principle of the Reciprocal 
 Revelation of Thing and Kind to the solution of the problem 
 of the Scientific Theory of Being : " What kind of a Uni- 
 verse is this ? " 
 
 § 35. The Universe, as the supreme Kind of Kinds 
 which contains all other kinds within itself, is the real 
 genus-in-itself in its absolute and all-comprehensive mode 
 of Infinite Being. It cannot, therefore, exist as one 
 among many universes of like nature ; it must be the One 
 and All, or it is not the universe. Hence the multiplicity 
 involved in the essence of every kind as such must be found, 
 in the case of the supreme Kind of Kinds, not outside of, 
 but within, its own infinite unity ; that is, the constitution 
 of the Universe as a whole cannot be discovered by com- 
 paring it with other infinite wholes (but one infinite whole 
 being possible), but only by studying the constitution of 
 its own finite parts. Each known part reveals one real 
 character of the whole ; all the known parts together reveal 
 all the real characters of the whole which have thus far 
 come within the reach of human knowledge. Whatever 
 parts or characters remain still unknown can only supple- 
 ment, never subvert, the reality of those already known. 
 
46 The Philosophy of Free Religion. 
 
 Otherwise knowledge itself is an absolute impossibility, 
 science is all an illusion, and, as Pindar sang, "Man is a 
 shadow's dream." 
 
 § 36. Kow each of the real and concrete forms of exist- 
 ence which are known to man, boundless as their number 
 and variety may appear, falls nevertheless under one or 
 another of three great categorical Types of Eeal Being : 
 namely, the Machine, the Organism, and the Person. 
 The grounds of this division cannot be given at present; 
 they will sufficiently manifest themselves in the course of 
 what follows. The original question, "What kind of a 
 Universe is this ? " becomes now the more definite question, 
 " To which of the three great types of real being, Machine, 
 Organism, or Person, does the Universe belong ? " The 
 subject of our next paper will be to consider whether the 
 Machine alone constitutes an adequate basis for a scientific 
 world-conception. 
 
The Philosophy of Free ReJlgioyi. 47 
 
 VII. 
 
 § 37. The real essence of the individual thing and the 
 real essence of the universal kind more or less repeat, exem- 
 plify, and manifest each other through the abstract class 
 essence which is common to both. This fundamental law 
 of the Eeciprocal Revelation of Thing and Kind (see 
 §§ 31, 32) is inherent in the constitution of every real genus- 
 in-itself ; it is equally inherent in the constitution of every 
 concept. Hence it constitutes, on the one hand, the Law 
 OF THE Natural Self-Eevelation of Being to Thought. 
 and, on the other hand, the Absolute Condition of Hu- 
 man Knowledge ; and the scientific method is the practi- 
 cal application of it in the study of Nature, The abstract 
 class essence of a kind, determined exactly (though never 
 exhaustively) by the scientific method, is identical, as a sys- 
 tem of relations, with the Scientific Concept of that kind, 
 and, by means of scientific nomenclature, receives measura- 
 bly exact verbal embodiment in the Scientific Definition. 
 Upon the possibility of this exact determination and dis- 
 crimination of real kinds in the real system of Nature, giving 
 rise to a complete hierarchy of scientific concepts of abstract 
 class essences, depends unconditionally the possibility of all 
 Scientific Classification. Science would vanish into 
 Nescience, if these principles of Scientific Eealism could be 
 overthrown. 
 
 § 38. Now the great system of natural classification, 
 carried as far as possible by the various special sciences in 
 their various limited fields of investigation, must be carried 
 still further by scientific philosophy or World-Science, and 
 culminates in the discovery of Three Primordial Types 
 OF Real Being in Nature, so far as Nature has yet come 
 
48 The Philosophy of Free Religion. 
 
 within the scope of the investigating faculties of mankind. 
 The physical sciences find their ultimate concrete unit in 
 the Atom, as individualized out of universal cosmical Ether, 
 — the physiological or biological sciences in the Cell, as 
 individualized out of universal living Protoplasm, — and the 
 psychological or moral sciences in the Self, as individual- 
 ized out of universal human Mind; but they find their 
 proximate concrete units respectively in the Machine, the 
 Organism, and the Person. It is upon these three Natural 
 Types of Eeal Being, as actually known in human experi- 
 ence, that scientific philosophy must found its only possible 
 scientific world-conception or Idea of Nature. 
 
 § 39. Let us, then, begin by determining exactly the 
 scientific concept of the Machine, as we find it actually and 
 concretely presented in human experience, in order to dis- 
 cover how far it throws light upon the total constitution of 
 Nature ; that is, how far it is scientifically legitimate, in 
 accordance with the law of the reciprocal revelation of thing 
 and kind, to conceive the Universe in its unity as a Machine. 
 
 § 40. Professor T. M. Goodeve {The Elements of Mech- 
 anism, London, 1886), begins his treatise with the follow- 
 ing definition : " A Machine is an assemblage of moving 
 parts, constructed for the purpose of transmitting motion or 
 force, and of modifying, in various ways, the motion or 
 force so transmitted." 
 
 A distinguished physicist, in a private letter to the writer 
 under date of June 6, 1889, gives another definition, sub- 
 stantially identical with the preceding, but in some respects 
 more precise from an exclusively mechanical point of view : 
 " My definition of a Machine is a collocation of matter having 
 for its function the transference of motion or the transforma- 
 tion of motion." 
 
 It will be noticed by keen critics that, in these definitions, 
 (1) the Machine is only vaguely conceived as a unit, and (2) 
 that the expressions '' constructed for the purpose " and 
 
The Philosophy of Free Religion. 49 
 
 "having for its function" both introduce extra-mechanical 
 conceptions — the former a conception which is strictly 
 psychological, and the latter a conception which is strictly 
 physiological (not here mathematical). It is possible to 
 devise a rigorously mechanical definition, as follows : — 
 
 A Machine is a material Whole of collocated material 
 Parts, by which, both as Whole and as Parts, Motion is either 
 transferred or transformed. 
 
 § 41. For all the uses of mechanics or physics, this last 
 definition is quite sufficient, because these sciences very 
 properly limit their consideration of the Machine to its ex- 
 clusively physical and mathematical relations, which have 
 nothing to do with the questions, " Who made it ? " and 
 " What was it made for ? " They are satisfied, therefore, 
 with an extremely imperfect and mutilated concept of the 
 Machine ; their special problems never involve that concept 
 in its fulness and integrity, as it is derived from all actual 
 experience. The anthropological sciences, however, such 
 as sociology, archaeology, or political economy, could not 
 advance a step, if they were limited to that skeleton concept 
 of a purely Abstract Machine, transcending all actual 
 and possible experience, which satisfies all the require- 
 ments of physics or mechanics ; it is the Real Machine, 
 not the ghost of it, — or rather the full and integral 
 concept of the Eeal Machine as drawn from human 
 experience, not this same concept with essential parts 
 omitted, — which alone can satisfy the requirements of the 
 anthropological sciences. Hence we find two widely differ- 
 ent concepts of the Machine, one lopped or truncated in 
 physics and mechanics, the other rounded and complete in 
 anthropology, yet both equally scientific and equally useful 
 as the basis of sound scientific inferences. 
 
 §42. For instance, take the axe- — a tool being only a 
 very simple case of the Machine. 
 
 Physics would consider the axe in use (an axe not in use 
 
50 The Philosophy of Free Religion. 
 
 ■would cease to be a Machine at all) as being only a mass of 
 matter in motion, and doing work in the communication of 
 motion to some other mass of matter — would calculate its 
 momentum, or quantity of motion, as the product of its mass 
 by its velocity, and its striking force, or kinetic energy, as 
 the product of half its mass by the square of its velocity. 
 That is, physics wovild conceive the axe solely as a link in 
 the great chain of physical causes and effects — would recog- 
 nize it only as under the law of causality, and ignore it 
 altogether as under the law of finality — would treat it ex- 
 clusively as a material fact, and refuse all inquiry into its 
 origin or purposes as involving extra-physical conceptions 
 and problems. And this eviscerated concept of the Abstract 
 Machine, being sufficient for all purely physical problems, 
 would be all that is properly admissible into the science of 
 pure physics. 
 
 Bvit anthropology would consider the axe only as a Eeal 
 Machine — would conceive it as essentially a tool or weapon 
 constructed by man, and constituted as a causal means to 
 some definite human end, such as chopping wood or killing 
 an enemy. This is the concept of the axe in its essence and 
 its integrity, as a E-eal Machine known in human experience. 
 If a stone axe-head were found buried deeply in some ancient 
 alluvial deposit, archaeology would take it to be a cogent 
 proof of the existence of man himself as its maker in im- 
 memorial antiquity, and would reconstruct out of it a whole 
 past of palaeolithic or neolithic savagery. This inference 
 of archaeology would be precisely as sound, scientific, and 
 necessary as any possible inference of physics, and would 
 lead to this general anthropological definition : — 
 
 A Machine is a Causal Means between Man and some 
 definite IIuTnan End, both external to the Machine itself 
 
 Is it not plain that, in order to understand the Real 
 Machine in its integrity, as opposed to the Abstract Machine 
 in its partiality, science itself requires us to supplement the 
 
The Pliilosophy of Free Religion. 51 
 
 physical with the anthropological concept of it, at least so 
 far as to recognize the causal and the teleological elements 
 as equally essential in its constitution ? 
 
 § 43. Scientific philosophy, however, must see further 
 than physics, anthropology, or any other special science. 
 Franklin described man as " the tool-making animal " ; and 
 the construction of machinery in general unquestionably 
 lies at the foundation of all civilization. From the simple 
 tool, such as the axe, the needle, or the fork, up to the 
 vastest and most complicated machine, such as the printing- 
 press, the Jacquard silk-loom, the ship, the factory, the 
 cathedral, the railroad, the telegraph, or the city, the con- 
 struction of machinery, as the practical work of intelligence 
 in the subjection of external Nature to man, is, in one point 
 of view, at once the cause and the effect of all human progress 
 in the knowledge of Nature ; for, in telescope, microscope, 
 spectroscope, laboratory, observatory, museum, or library, 
 science, no less than industry and commerce, depends upon 
 the Keal Machine. 
 
 But man is not the only animal which makes machines. 
 Honeycombs, ant-hills, spider-webs, birdsnests, beaver-dams, 
 fox-burrows, — all such constructions are essentially ma- 
 chines; nay, even climbing-plants convert projections or 
 mere roughnesses of contiguous surfaces into ladders or 
 machines for raising themselves into the sunlight. It 
 matters not whether the end which a given machine effects 
 originates in human reason, in animal instinct, or in the 
 depths of organic constitution as such : the essence of the 
 Eeal Machine is to ynediate causally between an Organism 
 and its End, and whatever does that is a Eeal Machine. 
 
 § 44. Let us see, then, whether it may not be possible 
 to comprehend all the elements of truth contained in the 
 physical and the anthropological definitions of the Machine 
 in a higher philosophical definition. It is the aim of physics 
 to include only the strictly causal element in its concept. 
 
52 The Philosojjhy of Free Religion. 
 
 and carefully to exclude from it all recognition of the teleo- 
 logical element; hence the result is a definition of the 
 Abstract Machine, quite adequate to all the problems of 
 physics, but totally inadequate to problems involving the 
 Real Machine. It is the aim of anthropology to include in 
 its concept both the causal and the teleological elements so 
 far as they relate to man, but no further ; hence the result 
 is a definition of the Eeal Machine, adequate to the prob- 
 lems of anthropology, but inadequate to all higher problems. 
 It is the aim of scientific philosophy, however, to include 
 in its concept ample recognition of both of the equally essen- 
 tial elements, causal and teleological, and, by scrupulously 
 adapting it to all known forms of the Eeal Machine, to 
 render the concept itself adequate to whatever problems 
 actual human experience may present. Hence we may 
 accept the following as a partial and provisional philosoph- 
 ical definition : — 
 
 A Eeal Machine is a material Whole of collocated mate- 
 rial Parts, constriicted by an Organism as a Causal Means 
 to some definite Organic End of its ow7i, and so constituted 
 throughout as to effect this End by either transferring or 
 transforming Motion. 
 
 §45. This concept of the Machine, as is self-evident, 
 contains all the essential elements of the physical and the 
 anthropological concepts, but is more comprehensive than 
 either. It recognizes fully the physical or causal element, 
 and thereby completely includes the Abstract Machine of 
 physics ; it recognizes fully the teleological element, and 
 thereby converts the Abstract Machine of physics into tile 
 Eeal Machine of anthropology ; it universalizes the Eeal 
 Machine of anthropology so as to relate it to tlie whole 
 organic kingdom, shows that the concepts of the Machine 
 and of the Organism are universally, necessarily, and insep- 
 arably connected, and thereby raises both concepts to the 
 level of scientific philosophy. • 
 
The Philosopluj of Free Religion. 53 
 
 But still something is wanting to a complete comprehension 
 of the Real Machine. What is the nature of this universal, 
 necessary, and inseparable connection between the Machine 
 and the Organism ? Pressing onward to find an answer to 
 this question, we are led to a discovery of supreme impor- 
 tance : namely, that the constitiitions of the Machine and of 
 the Orr/anism involve each the other, and therefore are intel- 
 ligible each through the other alone. 
 
 § 46. In the light of this principle, the Real Machine 
 appears in a strikingly new aspect. When it is said in 
 common speech, "The man cuts the grass," "The man 
 shoots the bird," or " The man writes the letter," the ex- 
 pression is not literally true ; for it is the scythe that cuts, 
 the gun that shoots, the pen that writes. But there is a 
 profound truth in the common phrases. For the man and 
 the scythe, the man and the gun, the man and the pen, con- 
 stitute together, in each case, a larger organic whole ; and 
 it is really this larger organic whole, this Self-Extended 
 Organism, which does the act. The scythe, the gun, and 
 the pen are, in truth, only so many artificial prolongations 
 and special modifications of the hand ; and by these, as 
 causal means, the man himself is enabled to perform acts 
 otherwise impossible. That is to say, the scythe, the gun, 
 or the pen, — in general, the Real Machine, — is only an 
 Artificial and Separable Organ for Self-Extension 
 OF THE Organism. When not used, it is only a function- 
 less lump of matter ; when used, it derives from the Organ- 
 ism a transient and artificial life as a temporary Organ ; its 
 only life lies in its use, and lasts only so long as it is used. 
 
 § 47. Still more striking, in the light of the same prin- 
 ciple, is the new aspect in which the Organism itself appears. 
 Every single organ in the Organism appears in a new aspect 
 as itself a Natural Machine, since it invariably functions 
 as a causal means between the entire Organism and somo 
 definite Organic End. But, instead of originating in any 
 
54 The Thilosophy of Free Religion. 
 
 constructive process of which the Organism as a whole is 
 conscious, the single organ originates in that unconscious 
 process of self-evolution by which the Organism as a whole 
 comes into being through the inwardly constructive forces 
 of Nature. Hence the Organism itself, as a unitary com- 
 plex of organs which mediates causally between itself and 
 all its own Organic Ends, necessarily appears in a new aspect 
 as, in truth, a Self-Making and Self-Working Natural 
 Machine. 
 
 § 48. Thus we find ourselves led irresistibly, by a chain 
 of conclusive scientific reasoning, to this complete and final 
 philosophical definition of the Real Machine : — 
 
 A Real Ifachine is a material Whole of collocated material 
 Parts, constructed by an Organism as a Causal Means to 
 some definite Organic End of its own, and so constituted 
 throughout as to effect this End hy either transferring or 
 transforming Motion. Every Real Machine is either artifi- 
 cial or natural, the Artificial Real Machiiie being an Ai-tifi- 
 cial Organ of the Natural Organism, and the Natural Real 
 Machine being the Natural Organism itself ; and every Real 
 Organism, is a Self-Making and Self- Working Real Macliine. 
 
 It remains, in our next paper, to consider what will be 
 the result of applying the concept of the Machine, as suc- 
 cessively elaborated by physics, by anthropology and by sci- 
 entific philosophy, to the formation of a Scientific World- 
 Conception or Theory of Being. 
 
The Fhilosopluj of Free Religion. 55 
 
 YIII. 
 
 § 49. The science of arithmetic conceives the one and 
 the many as mere relations of quantity in Abstract Number, 
 and disregards altogether the Real Things without which 
 no relations of number can be real. The science of geom- 
 etry conceives the point, the line, the surface, and the solid 
 as mere relations of quantity in Abstract Form, and dis- 
 regards altogether the Real Substance without which no 
 relations of form can be real. In general, the sciences of pure 
 mathematics form no concepts except those of Abstract 
 Quantity, Kumber, and Form, out of which no scientific 
 world-conception could possibly be constructed except that 
 of a purely Abstract Univeksb ; for they rigorously sup- 
 press or exclude all concepts of Real Substance as essentially 
 non-mathematical. 
 
 The sciences of chemistry and physics, however, while 
 adopting and using the mathematical concepts of Abstract 
 Quantity, Number, and Form, introduce new concepts of 
 their own in those of Real Matter as Mass or Molecule, Real 
 Motion, and Real Force or Energy. Chemistry deals with 
 the molecular motions and forces of matter, physics with its 
 molar motions and forces ; both sciences, however, agree in 
 rejecting from their concepts all recognition of the relation 
 of End and Means, and including in them recognition of the 
 relation of physical Cause and Effect alone. Hence the 
 physical or chemico-physical concept of Real Substance is 
 that of the Abstract Machine alone, not of the Real Ma- 
 chine in its wholeness at all (see §§ 40-48). 
 
 These skeleton concepts of mathematics, mechanics, phys- 
 ics, and chemistry are perfectly true as far as they go, and 
 no one can think mathematically or physically except by 
 
56 The Thilosopliy of Free Religion. 
 
 taking and using them as they are. Not the slightest doubt 
 or slur is here meant to be cast upon the right to employ 
 strictly mathematical concepts alone in mathematics, or 
 strictly physical concepts alone in physics ; the progress of 
 science would be rendered difficult, perhaps impossible, with- 
 out that division of labor which can be effected only by the 
 legitimate use of abstractions. But no possible use of ab- 
 stractions which separate what is really inseparable can lead 
 to a scientific theory of Eeal Being as a whole. When it 
 comes to that, scientific concepts drawn from reality in all 
 the fulness and integrity of actual human experience can 
 alone avail to frame a really scientific world-conception, a 
 truly philosophic Idea of Nature ; and philosophy, or uni- 
 versal science, is just as much entitled, nay, just as much 
 necessitated as any special science to frame concepts of its 
 own, provided that in framing them it scrupulously follows 
 the scientific method. 
 
 § 50. Now the physical concept of the Abstract Machine, 
 like the mathematical concept of Abstract Quantity, can, if 
 applied to the formation of a world-theory, yield only the 
 concept of an Abstract Universe ; it can never yield more 
 than certain elements, fragmentary and few, of the concept 
 of the Eeal Universe. Eefusing as it does all considera- 
 tion of the relation of End and Means, and recognizing 
 only the relation of Cause and Effect, the science of physics 
 has no principle save the principle of causality upon which 
 it can claim to ground a cosmical theory. It must conceive 
 all events whatever as exclusively physical events, as noth- 
 ing but motions in masses of matter ; and it must explain 
 all sequence in these motions as governed exclusively by 
 physical causation. No other concept than this of a purely 
 Abstract Universe, in which nothing can ever manifest itself 
 except the monotonous reign of iron physical necessity, can 
 possibly be extracted from the Abstract Machine of i)hysics. 
 But let us see whether this abortive concept of universal 
 
The Philosophy of Free Religion. 57 
 
 physical necessity alone can maintain itself under a close 
 and keen scrutiny. 
 
 § 51. If, for instance, all the motions of matter which 
 occur throughout Space at any given instant of Time coiild 
 be comprehended as one infinitely complex motion, pure 
 physics would conceive this one complex motion as the phys- 
 ical resultant or effect of a similar complex motion in the 
 instant next preceding ; and all motions in the history of 
 the cosmos would thus be reduced to a single concatenated 
 series reaching back into a limitless past, — an infinite re- 
 gress in which each term would be at once an effect to its 
 antecedent and a cause to its consequent. In this case 
 (which is simply an attempt to conceive the Abstract Ma- 
 chine as the Abstract Universe), what rational notion could 
 be formed of the causal nexus itself, as uniting antecedent 
 and consequent ? The Abstract Machine is abstracted from 
 the Real Machine, tacitly even by physics ; but an Abstract 
 Universe would necessarily be in itself all in all, and there 
 could be, therefore, no Real Universe, more inclusive than 
 itself, from which to abstract it. If physical causality, then, 
 were the sole real principle of the universe, what must be 
 the nature of the causal relation itself ? 
 
 § 52. M. Deschanel (Elementary Treatise on Natural Phi- 
 loso2)hy, Everett's revised sixth edition, New York, 1883) 
 defines Force as follows : " Force may be defined as that 
 which tends to produce motion in a body at rest, or to pro- 
 duce change of motion in a body which is moving. . . We 
 obtain the idea of force through our oivn conscious exercise 
 of muscular force, and we can approximately estimate the 
 amount of a force (if not too great or too small) by the 
 effort %ohich toe have to make to resist it ; as when we try 
 the weight of a body by lifting it." 
 
 M. Naville (Modern Physics, Downton's translation, Edin- 
 burgh, 1884, p. 35) similarly says : " The idea of force has 
 its origin in the action which we exert upon our organs, and 
 
58 The Thilosophy of Free Religion. 
 
 by our organs upon foreign bodies. If we take aivay 
 \_abstract'\ the sense of an initial and free poiver, there re- 
 mains the idea of a simple motive power. This power, 
 separated [abstracted^ from its immediate consciousness, is 
 no longer conceivable than in the manifestation of its effects ; 
 and therefore force, as it is considered in physics, has no 
 other determination possible than the motion which it 
 produces.". . . " The doctrine of the inertia of matter is the 
 centre of all the conceptions of modern physics. . . Inertia 
 excludes from matter all power of its own, other than that 
 which relates to the occupation of place and to motion ; it 
 therefore reduces the conception of bodies to mechanical 
 elements " (Ibid. p. 42). Countless passages of like tenor 
 might be cited. The italics in these passages are oiirs. 
 
 Conscious Effokt, then, is the only experiential origin 
 and ground of our concept or rational notion of Force in 
 Nature, as efficient cause, effectuating energy, or dynamical 
 antecedent of the consequent " effect " — the ex faction, " that 
 which is out-made (from within the cause itself)." Now 
 this something within the "efficient" or "out-making" 
 cause which is* " out-made " in the " effect " is, in every case 
 of conscious effort, a preconceived end. We are utterly 
 incapable of making any conscious effort except in order to 
 do something, to accomplish some preconceived end ; we, 
 as conscious causes or forces in Nature, necessarily n7iit6 
 in ourselves both preconceived end and executive energy, as 
 the absolutely essential elements of every effort ; and we 
 know nothing of our own executive energy except as we 
 exercise it in putting forth or executing the preconceived 
 end. In all effort, the two elements of end and energy are 
 indissolubly united. So far as it can be understood through 
 conscious effort, therefore. Force in Nature is the executive 
 energy which puts forth some preconceived end into out- 
 ward fact : THE Eeal Cause Out-Makes the Preconceived 
 End in the Eeal Effect, and the Real Effect is the 
 
The 'Philosophy of Free Religion. 59 
 
 Out-Made Preconceived End of the Eeal Cause. Hence 
 the two concepts of Efficient Causality and Finality 
 are inextricably interlinked and united in that of Eeal 
 Conscious Effort, as two inseparable elements of one 
 rational notion ; and, since the concept of Motive Force, or 
 Dynamic Cause, is confessedly derived, even in physics, 
 from Real Conscious Effort alone, as its only origin and 
 ground in human experience, it cannot he formed at all as 
 a rational notion, if either of these inseparable elenients is 
 arbitrarily suj^^iressed. 
 
 § 53. From these results it follows that the concept of 
 an Abstract Universe founded upon that of the Abstract 
 Machine is, if taken absolutely, not only irrational, but 
 impossible ; for it destroys itself. As we have just seen. 
 Causality and Finality are intelligible only through each 
 other, and neither by itself alone is intelligible at all ; hence 
 an infinite regress of causes and effects from which all rela- 
 tion of ends and means should be rigorously excluded would 
 be rigorously unthinkable, because empty and nonsensical. 
 Looked at externally, such a series would show no causal 
 nexus whatever, no principle of rational connection among 
 the terms ; nothing would be observable but mere sequence 
 or time-succession. It is only when looked at from within 
 that a principle of rational connection and unity is discov- 
 erable in the indissoluble Pinion of caiisaUty and finality. 
 In the case of an infinite regress of causes and effects with 
 no ends and means, the only possible experiential concept 
 of Motive Force, Kinetic Energy, or Dynamical Cause 
 would be irretrievably broken up, and would therefore 
 disappear ; the relation of cause and effect would itself 
 vanish together with that of end and means ; nothing would 
 be left but the relation of antecedent and consequent — 
 mere sequence or time-succession. All communication of 
 motion from body to body would, as Descartes discovered, 
 become essentially incomprehensible. In trying to isolate 
 
60 The PhilosopliTf of Free Religion. 
 
 the Principle of Motion as Cause and Effect without End 
 and Means, physics would extinguish Causality by suppres- 
 sing Finality and Efficiency at once ; its own principle of the 
 Abstract Cause would slip through its fingers altogether, 
 and it would retain nothing but the principle of Succession 
 IN Time. Hence the Abstract Universe of physics wov;ld 
 lose all principle of rational unity whatever, and crumble 
 away into the impalpable dust of an infinitude of Atoms, 
 whose motions would manifest no other coherence than 
 that of a mere irrational Time-Seeies. 
 
 § 54. A sufficient proof of this conclusion is the con- 
 firmation of it given by the history of human thought ; for, 
 whenever the attempt has been made to conceive the course 
 of Nature causally, but not teleologically, the inevitable 
 result has been, as in the case of Descartes, Hume, Comte, 
 John Stuart Mill, and countless others, to deny efficient 
 causality altogether, and to resolve the causal nexus into 
 the relation of mere invariable antecedence and consequence. 
 But the result of this perfectly logical procedure is a denial 
 of all real unity in Nature : the infinite series of motions 
 in matter becomes a mere time-series, without any rational 
 or comprehensible connection among the terms, and Nature 
 itself breaks up into a chaos of atoms, an infinitude of 
 material units, moving externally according to no discov- 
 erable or intelligible law. This is the suicide of all cosmical 
 science, including physics itself. The One is lost irrecov- 
 erably in the infinitely Many ; and the only possible Theory 
 of Being which remains is that of chaotic and irrational 
 Pluralism. 
 
 § 55. In fine, physics alone can never become philosophy. 
 The Abstract Machine (the Keal Machine from which it is 
 abstracted being tacitly recognized in the background, 
 though not directly employed, by physics itself) is a legit- 
 imate scientific concept, indispensable in purely physical 
 problems. But the concept of an Abstract Universe as an 
 
The Pliilosopliy of Free Religion. 61 
 
 Absolute Unit, with no recognition whatever of a Real 
 U7iiverse from wldch to abstract {t,^a,n Abstract Universe 
 with no unifying principle but that of an Abstract Cause, 
 which, being just as emjitij of causal efficiency as it is of 
 causal finality, excludes all real communication of motion, — 
 this concept is at once a scientific absurdity and a phi- 
 losophical monstrosity, and cannot possibly maintain itself 
 in reason. Since a mere time-series is in no sense a causal 
 conception, the causal nexus must be conceived as including 
 End and jNIeans, or it cannot be conceived at all. We repeat, 
 physics alone can never become philosophy ; for to start 
 with the Abstract Machine, and to proceed with no other 
 principle than the principle of the Abstract Cause, is to end 
 with an Abstract Universe in Absolute Pluralism as the 
 Theory of Being. But Absolute Pluralism is overt repudia- 
 tion of that absolute unity in m,ultiplicity which is the 
 essential aim of all philosophy. 
 
 § 56. What Theory of Being, then, can be logically and 
 philosophically developed out of the Real Machine of 
 anthropology ? Briefly, nothing but Absolute Dualism. 
 If anthropology aspires to become philosophy, it can climb 
 no higher than Theological Anthkopomokphism. 
 
 Human art cannot originate the materials it works with, 
 but finds them originally given in external Nature. The 
 man is here, the machine is there ; even when in active use, 
 the machine acquires no higher spatial unity with the }nan 
 than that of mere collocation or juxtaposition. For all that 
 anthropology alone can see, the two are absolutely two, not 
 one ; it is only from the loftier standpoint of scientific phi- 
 losophy that a profound underlying oneness of the two 
 comes to light (see §§ 46-48). To anthropology, the ma- 
 chine and its maker or user are fundamentally and uncon- 
 ditionally two, external to each other ; and the anthropo- 
 logical concept of the Real Machine is, therefore, an essen- 
 tially dvialistic one. 
 
G2 The Philosopliy of Free Religion. 
 
 Now this human dualism of Machine and Maker, if 
 applied to the formation of a world-theory, can lead only to 
 dualism on a larger scale — to the irredeemably anthropo- 
 morphic conception of God and the Universe as essentially 
 external to each other and fundamentally independent of 
 each other. For instance, Descartes, the great Dualist 
 founder of so-called modern philosophy, ''beholds the entire 
 universe as a single immense machine, whose wheels and 
 springs were arranged at the beginning, in the simplest 
 manner, by an Eternal Hand " (M. Thomas, Eloge de Des- 
 cartes, crowned by the French Academy in 17G5, and pre- 
 fixed to Cousin's (Envi'es de Descartes, I. 34). It avails 
 nothing to introduce the principle of "fiat creation," or 
 absolute origination of a universe out of nothing by a mere 
 command ; for this principle violates every law of Being 
 and of Thought alike, reconciles no discord, possesses no 
 element of intelligibility, and is absolutely valueless in 
 philosophy. The introduction of it into philosophy (for 
 instance, in the " natural theology " of Butler, Baley, and 
 so many others) has only availed to discredit the principle 
 of teleology itself, and to postpone the development of a 
 truly scientific conception of teleology in jSTature. 
 
 The anthropological concept of the Real Machine is 
 perfectly valid in anthropology itself ; but, Avhen it is 
 applied to philosophy and developed into the cosmological 
 doctrine of Absolute Dualism, its fundamental limitations 
 and defects are brought to light in its failure to fulfil the 
 essential philosophical ideal — to discover the principle of 
 absolute nnitij hi multipllcitij. Dualism is only I'luralism 
 written small — Pluralism reduced to its lowest terms; 
 what tells against the latter tells also, though in a less 
 degree, against the former. Philosophy cannot attain its 
 goal in anthropology ; anthropology alone, like physics 
 alone, can never become philosophy. 
 
 § 57. Now, precisely as the Abstract Machine of physics 
 
The Philosophy of Free Religion. 63 
 
 can become nothing but Absolute Pluralism in philosophy, 
 and ?is the Real Machine of anthropology can become noth- 
 ing but Absolute Dualism in philosophy, so the Eeal 
 Machine of scientific philosophy can become nothing but 
 Absolute Monism, 
 
 That the real universe is in some sense one, is beyond 
 dispute ; the absolute unity of the universe, or, as it is more 
 usually and more loosely phrased, the "uniformity and 
 universality of natural laws," is the necessary presupposi- 
 tion of all scientific investigation. Further, that this one 
 real universe is in some sense a machine, has long been a 
 scientific truism. But in what sense ? Is it an Artificial 
 Machine or a Natural Machine ? Anthropological Dual- 
 ism, applying too literally the analogies of human art, con- 
 ceives it as an Artificial Machine, and explains it as the 
 "handiwork," not of a natural, but of a supernatural 
 " Maker," a " Great Artificer." But- scientific philosophy 
 has shown (see §§ 43-48) that every Artificial Machine is 
 really an Artificial and Separable Organ of a N^atural 
 Organism ; and it is self-evident that there can be no Nat- 
 ural Organism outside of Nature itself. Hence the universe 
 cannot be an Artificial Machine at all : it can only be a 
 Natural Machine. But the only known Natural Machine 
 is the Self-Making and Self -Working Machine — that 
 is, the Real Organism. Consequently, if the Universe is a 
 Real Machine at all (and all science proves that it is so), 
 there is no logical escape from the conclusion that it is at 
 the same time a Real Organism. 
 
 § 58. The case thus far may be briefly summed up as 
 follows : Nature, or the Universe, being by scientific proof 
 and unanimous confession a Real Machine in some sense, 
 the only logical escape from the conclusion that it is the 
 artificial handiwork of a supernatural and anthropomorphic 
 Artificer, separate from Nature in space and disparate 
 from Nature in kind or essence, lies in the counter-conclu- 
 
64 The Philosophy of Free Religion. 
 
 sion that it is the natural result of its own self-evolving, 
 self -directing, and self-sustaining Immanent Enekgy. There 
 are but three alternatives: (1) the Chaotic Abstract 
 Universe of physics and Absolute Pluralism ; (2) the 
 Artificial Eeal Universe of anthropology and Absolute 
 Dualism ; and (3) the Natural Real Universe of scien- 
 tific philosophy and Absolute Monism. Out of these three 
 alternatives (the only possible ones from the standpoint of 
 scientific realism), the third alone is congruous with all 
 human experience, and alone exhibits the legitimate devel- 
 opment of the principle of Cosmical Evolution. The 
 very concept of " evolution " is essentially organic ; it is 
 derived from the organism alone, applies to the organism 
 alone, and is utterly meaningless, unless the Infinite 
 Universe is scientifically Known as a Eeal Organism- 
 in-Itself. The self -contradictory conjunction of Evolution 
 and Agnosticism in the so-called " philosophy " of the nine- 
 teenth century is a mere freak of the hour ; for in Agnos- 
 ticism there is neither acute reasoning nor intrinsic reason- 
 ableness — nothing but exploded metaphysics, melancholy 
 misunderstanding, crippling prejudice, confusion of thought, 
 or blank unthinkingness. The philosophy of the future, 
 founded upon the scientific method, must be organic through 
 and through, and build upon the known organic constitution 
 of the noumenal universe as the assured result of science 
 itself. 
 
 It remains to show that, precisely as the Universe cannot 
 be a Eeal Machine without being at the same time a Eeal 
 Organism, so it cannot be a Eeal Organism without being 
 at the same time a Eeal Person. This will be the subject 
 of the following and concluding paper. 
 
The Philosophy of Free Religion. 65 
 
 IX. 
 
 § 59. Until the foregoing reasoning has been refuted 
 root and branch, it may without presumption be taken as 
 rationally established that the Infinite Universe is at once 
 a Real Machine and a Real Organism. It remains to show 
 that THE Infinite Universe is at once a Real Machine, 
 A Real Organism, and a Real Person. 
 
 § 60. These three categorical types of Real Being, or 
 three primordial kinds which naturally and necessarily 
 reveal the Supreme Kind of Kinds (see §§ 31-33), are not 
 related to each other as co-ordinate and mutually exclusive 
 species, but rather as successively rising grades of com- 
 plexity in immanent relational constitution — a conception 
 perfectly familiar in natural science, as illustrated, for ex- 
 ample, in Agassiz' Methods of Study in Natural History 
 (16th ed. p. 91) : " This gradation in [embryological] growth 
 corresponds to the gradation of rank in adult animals, as 
 established upon comparative complexity of structure." In 
 the order of terrestrial evolution, the Machine first appeared 
 as mere matter in motion, then the Organism as plants and 
 animals, and lastly the Person as man ; and this order of 
 succession in time corresponds with the gradation of rank 
 in complexity of constitution and with the serial evolution 
 of forms in the scale of being. There is no arbitrary or 
 complete transition : the Organism remains still a Machine, 
 and the Person remains still both Machine and Organism. 
 
 § 61. In the constitution of the Person, therefore, as 
 we know it in ourselves, we find the constitutions of the 
 lower grades or types included and united in a thoroughly 
 harmonious working system. The distinctive feature of 
 
GG The Philosophy of Free Helir/ion. 
 
 the Machine is the mechanical principle of Causality, as 
 governing the propagation of motion through a material 
 whole of collocated material parts, external one to another ; 
 the distinctive feature of the Organism is the principle of 
 Finality, as governing the motion and application of organ 
 to function in a constant mediation between the Organism 
 and its organic ends ; the distinctive feature of the Person 
 is the principle of conscious self-determination or self- 
 conscious Morality, as governing the free formation of 
 ends and means in relation to other selves, and reflexively 
 judging both these ends and their execution through motion 
 in relation to universal rights and duties in a state of soci- 
 ety. These three distinctive features of the Machine, the 
 Organism, and the Person are indissolubly united in every 
 human Person as such ; the three principles of Causality, 
 Finality, and Morality are all rooted and regnant in the 
 personal constitution, never interfering or colliding with 
 each other in their respective spheres of operation, but har- 
 monizing perfectly in all personal life. If these three 
 principles thus harmonize perfectly in the constitution and 
 life of Man, why may they not, mutatis mutandis, harmon- 
 ize perfectly in the constitution and life of Nature? If 
 Nature is already known to possess the mechanical and the 
 organic constitutions, why may it not possess the personal 
 constitution as well ? Nay, if the Thing and the Kind 
 naturally and necessarily reveal each other's essential con- 
 stitution (see §§ 31-33), and if the Machine and the Organ- 
 ism, as Things, are already proved to reveal the essential 
 constitution of Nature, as their Highest Kind, why is there 
 not a rational necessity that the Person, also, as a higher 
 Thing, shall still more reveal it ? Why is it not self- 
 evident that Nature, as Eternal Archetype, necessarily 
 reveals itself in the Machine, the Organism, and the Per- 
 son, as its primordial Ectypes in Space and Time ? Why 
 is it not self-evident that the Person, which sums up the 
 
The Philosophy of Free Religion. 67 
 
 three in one, is the Ectype of Ecttpes, — in a word, that 
 Human Nature is the Supreme Revelation of God ? 
 
 § 62. These are, at the very least, reasonable questions ; 
 and they deserve a very reasonable and respectful answer. 
 Incredible, and even unintelligible, as it may seem at first 
 sight that this boundless system of Nature, this illimitable 
 Universe of Real Being, should be essentially and at bottom 
 One Infinite Person, reflection speedily dissipates the 
 swarm of hasty misapprehensions. Images start up of 
 particular machines, organisms, persons ; the disparity 
 between these and Nature as a whole is overwhelmingly 
 obvious. Then comes rational meditation, gradually sift- 
 ing out the essential from the non-essential ; and the under- 
 lying identity of constitution, the natural revelation of 
 the Kind in the Thing, begins at last to force itself into 
 rational recognition with irresistible power. To conceive 
 the Universe as a Machine is not to imagine it under the 
 form of an enormous steam-engine, but rather to compre- 
 hend that the omnipresent causal energy of Nature, pro- 
 ducing all motions of matter, whether of masses or of 
 molecules, as dynamical effects, works invariably under the 
 law of Mechanical Causality. To conceive the Universe as 
 an Organism is not to picture it as a gigantic animal, but 
 rather to comprehend that the omnipresent causal-organic 
 energy of Nature, directing all motions of matter, as causal 
 means, to the realization of Nature's eternal end of Evolu- 
 tion, works invariably under the law of Organic Final- 
 ity. So, too, to conceive the Universe as a Person is not 
 to portray it as a colossal man, but rather to comprehend 
 that the omnipresent causal-organic-personal energy of Nat- 
 ure, being conscious of itself and its own eternal end of 
 Self-Evolution through Self-Involution, and execut- 
 ing this end through the successive and gradual creation of 
 Finite Machines, Finite Organisms, and Finite Selves 
 within its own Infinite Self, works invariably under 
 
68 The Philosophy of Free Religion. 
 
 the law of Ideal Morality. It is impracticable here to 
 unfold these thoughts in full ; they are now barely hinted 
 at, in order to clear the way for a thoughtful and unpreju- 
 diced consideration of the thesis that the Universe is, and 
 must be, a Real Person. 
 
 § 63. The Finite Artificial Machine, or artificial organ 
 constructed by a natural organism, is external in space both 
 to the constructor, or user, and to the effect which it is 
 constructed to produce ; it mediates between the two as a 
 causal means outside of both, as, for instance, the chisel 
 between the sculptor and the statue, or the printing-press 
 between the printer and the book, or the army between the 
 conqueror and his conquest. It is owing to this constitu- 
 tional externality in space that physics can so easily conceive 
 the Abstract Machine — can so easily, in abstract thought, 
 make a pseudo-separation between the two elements of 
 cause and effect, on the one hand, and of end and means, 
 on the other; for both the preconceived end in the mind of 
 the maker and the realized end in the material world are 
 equally external to the Machine as a mediator between the 
 two, and what separates them, yet links them together, is 
 the mediating chain of physical causes and effects in the 
 motions of the Machine itself. Hence physics can readily 
 disregard both preconceived and realized ends, and confine 
 itself exclusively to mere motion and its laws ; and hence, 
 too, the legitimacy and utility of the Abstract Machine as 
 a physical concept, which serves to simplify, and thereby 
 helps to solve, purely mechanical problems. 
 
 But, in the case of the Universe as an Infinite Natural 
 Machine, no such externality in space obtains, and no such 
 abstraction of the causal from the final relation is possible 
 at all, unless the Abstract Universe is recognized as neces- 
 sarily implying the Real Universe from which to abstract 
 it. The Real Universe, as a Real Natural Machine, must 
 be absolutely all-inclusive ; both causal and final relations, 
 
The Philosophy of Free Religion. 69 
 
 inseparable in the complete constitution of every Eeal 
 Machine, must be strictly and wholly within the all-inclu- 
 sive Universe ; there can be here neither external maker 
 nor external effect — both maker and effect must be inter- 
 nal only. In other words, if the Infinite Universe is a 
 Real Machine at all, it must be, not merely a Real Machine, 
 but also a Self-Making and Self-Working Real Machine — 
 that is, a Real Organism : the Infinite Universe cannot 
 BE A Real Machine without being a Real Organism, 
 TOO. If the principles and premises of scientific realism 
 are sound, the argument here is more than probable — it is 
 demonstrative. 
 
 § 64. Now precisely as stringent a rational necessity 
 inheres in the next step of the argument : namely, that the 
 Infinite Universe cannot be a Real Organism without being 
 a Real Person, too. 
 
 The Finite Natural Organism, or Real Machine con- 
 structed by Nature, is both Cause and Effect of Itself and 
 End and Means to Itself: it is the Self-Making and Self- 
 Working 3Iachine {% H). This is no new conception; it 
 was foreshadowed in Aristotle's well-known doctrine of the 
 soul as an "entelecheia," and fully developed in Kant's 
 profound analysis of the Organism as a " Naturzweck " — 
 a natural whole in which whole and parts are reciprocally 
 Cause and Effect, End and Means (Kritik der Urtheilskraft, 
 §§ 65, Q>Q>). But Kant overlooked another essential charac- 
 teristic of the Organism which is even more jDrofoundly 
 significant and instructive. He failed to analyze its Total 
 Organic End as two-fold : (1) as Indwelling or Immanent 
 End, and (2) as Outgoing ok Exient End. The Imma- 
 nent End of the Organism is Self-Evolution, partly rec- 
 ognized in the common proverb that " self-preservation is 
 the first law of Nature " : this Kant saw. But the Exient 
 End is Self-Devotion — devotion of self to the preserva- 
 tion and evolution of the higher self or species, to which 
 
70 The Philoso2')hy of Free Religion. 
 
 the individual Organism is related as the organ or organic 
 cell is related to the Organism itself : this Kant did not see. 
 Nevertheless, this principle of the Exient End (clearly 
 illustrated in the reproductive system) unites the individ- 
 ual Organism to its kind as a larger and inclusive Organ- 
 ism, unites this in turn, as a new individual, to a higher 
 kind, and so on indefinitely. Thus the Exient End appears 
 as a teleological principle of unity and intelligibility 
 throughout the whole of Nature. The Immanent End 
 gives to the Organism no " Others," but merely its " Self " ; 
 the Exient End gives to it " External Others," or a higher 
 self in a Not-Self, as a separate, bvit normally necessary, 
 complement to its own being. These two eq\ially essential 
 elements of the Total Organic End are equally wrought 
 into the very warp and woof of the organic constitution 
 itself. 
 
 But, in the case of the Universe as the Infinite Natural 
 Organism, the Total Organic End ceases to be dualistically 
 separable as literally Immanent and Exient, inasmuch as 
 the Infinite can have no " External Others." The principle 
 of Immanency and Exiency, notwithstanding, remains in 
 the strictly monistic distinction between Self as One Whole 
 (principle of Self-Evolution) and Self as Many Parts or 
 Internal Others (principle of Self-Devotion) ; just as the 
 Finite Natural Organism exists as One Organism of Many 
 Organs or Cells, in which each alike, organism and cell, 
 not only lives its own true life unsubverted and unin- 
 fringed by that of the other, but also devotes its own real 
 life to that of the other. Hence, in the Infinite, Self and 
 Not-Self are numerically identical. But Numerical Iden- 
 tity of Self and Not-Self, Subject and Object, constitutes 
 the Unity of Self-Consciousness in the Person. Con- 
 sequently, THE Infinite Universe cannot be a Eeal 
 Organism without being a Real Person, too. 
 
 Thus we are led to discover the Law of the Correla- 
 
The Philosophy of Free Religion. 71 
 
 TiON AND Ultimate Identity of all Keal Types in the 
 Person. 
 
 § G5. The same momentous conclusion, forced upon us 
 above by studying the constitutions of the Machine and 
 the Organism as concrete realities, is no less forced upon us 
 by studying the laws of Causality and Finality as their 
 real principles. 
 
 The idea of all Force or Might in Nature being confes- 
 sedly derived, even in physics, from human experience of 
 Conscious Effort, these inevitable consequences follow from 
 §§51-55: — 
 
 I. The Efficient or Out-Making Cause necessarily 
 contains within itself the Preconceived End ; the Effect 
 OR Out-Made Result necessarily contains within itself the 
 Realized End ; and the Causal Bond is itself the Ener- 
 getic Realizing End in Effort. 
 
 II. Therefore, the principle of Efficient or Mechani- 
 cal Causality necessarily contains within itself the prin- 
 ciple of Organic Finality. 
 
 Similarly, the idea of all Right in Nature being derived 
 from human experience of Conscience, these inevitable 
 consequences follow from § 64 : — 
 
 I. The Immanent Organic End is Self-Evolution, or 
 Ethical Egoism ; the Exient Organic End is Self-Devo- 
 tion, or Ethical Altruism ; and the Total Organic End 
 is Harmony of Ethical Egoism and Ethical Altruism 
 IN Character. 
 
 II. The lower Finite Organism realizes its Character, of 
 which Nature is conscious, in Ethical Unconsciousness ; 
 the higher Finite Organism realizes its Character in Ethi- 
 cal Consciousness of Limited Freedom; the Infinite 
 Organism of Nature realizes its Character in Ethical 
 Consciousness of Illimitable Freedom. 
 
 III. Therefore, the principle of Organic Finality neces- 
 
72 The Philosophy of Free Relirjion. 
 
 sarily contains within itself the principle of Freedom, 
 Self-Determination, ok Ideal Morality. 
 
 § 66. This magnificent result, that Caiisalitij involves 
 Finality and Finality involves Morality, — in other words, 
 that the three supreme and constitutive principles of the 
 Eeal Universe are at bottom one, from the heliocentric 
 point of view, in the one principle of Absolute Person- 
 ality, — is analogous to the vast modern generalizations (1) 
 that all forms of Matter are at bottom one in Identity of 
 Substance, (2) that all manifestations of Force are at bot- 
 tom one in Identity of Energy, and (3) that all stages of 
 cosmical change are at bottom one in Identity of Evolu- 
 tionary Process. To these it adds (1) that all immanent 
 relational constitutions, whether of machine, organism, or 
 person, are at bottom one, in the personal constitution, in 
 Identity of Essence, and (2) that all natural laws are at 
 bottom one in Identity of Principle. It therefore con- 
 stitutes the crowning discovery of the Scientific Method, 
 necessary to complete the demonstration of Absolute Mon- 
 ism, in the Law of the Correlation and Ultimate 
 Identity op All Eeal Principles in Personality. 
 Who could overestimate the value or importance of such a 
 result ? The ultimately inevitable scientific identification 
 of all physical, biological, and psychological forces, as uni- 
 versally correlated and mutually convertible forms of one 
 eternal and omnipresent Force, means, in the light of this 
 transcendently sublime law, not the degradation of all 
 forces to the level of blind mechanical necessity, but the 
 elevation of all forces to the height of intelligent spiritual 
 freedom. This is the natural and unforced evolution of 
 Science itself, through the philosophized Scientific Method, 
 into the Philosophy of Free Religion. 
 
 § 67. In this way it is made clear, to any one who has 
 capacity to comprehend and patience to master the argu- 
 ment, that the Infinite Universe cannot be a Real Machine 
 
The Philosoxtliy of Free Religion. 73 
 
 without being a Real Organism, and cannot be a Real Or- 
 ganism without being a Real Person ; and that this philo- 
 sophical last conclusion is just as certain as the scientific 
 first premise that the Universe is indeed a Machine. This, 
 then, in briefest form, is the Scientific World-Concep- 
 tion, as Absolute Monism or Scientific Theism : — 
 
 Mechanical Causality, ot the Law of Motion^ Organic 
 Finality, ot the Law of Life, and Ideal Morality, or the 
 Law of Holiness, Justice, and Love, — the three eternal and 
 all-pervasive Real Principles by which the whole known 
 Universe exists, — are at bottom One in the Real Principle 
 of Omnipresent Self- Conscious Energy or Absolute Per- 
 sonality, and constitute the Unity of the Universe in 
 THE Essential Being and Life of God, as at once Infi- 
 nite Machine, Infinite Organism, and Infinite Per- 
 son. 
 
 § 68. Whatever higher truth lies unrevealed in the 
 boundless mystery of the Unknown, this Truth of the 
 Known stands fast as the eternal foundation of the Real 
 Universe. If any one should contemn the idea of the All- 
 Person, thus conceived, how meanly, alas, must he think 
 of moral personality itself — how blindly must he despise 
 the dignity, the majesty, the sublimity of his own nature 
 as Man ! 
 
 § 69. Real Personality, finite and relative in Man, 
 infinite and absolute in Nature, is thus the last word of 
 Science and Philosophy — the first word of Ethics and 
 Religion ; for Man's moral nature is necessarily rooted and 
 included in his personal nature, and his personal nature is 
 necessarily rooted and included in that of the All which 
 it dimly, yet supremely, reveals. There is no other central 
 unifying principle, whether in thought or in action, whether 
 in the life of the individual or in the life of society, by 
 which the Real may be known or the Ideal may be embodied. 
 There is no other central unifying principle by which Man 
 
74 The Philosophy of Free Religion. 
 
 may develop or reform either himself or society, or by 
 which the all-diviuizing Enthusiasm of Humanity may be 
 kindled in his soul, or by which the world may be redeemed 
 from its mountain-load of injustice, suffering, and sin. 
 Think highly, think reverently, think devotedly, brother- 
 men, of that Moral Ideal which is the very core, law, 
 and life of your own personality, and which could be to 
 you no law of august, all-commanding obligation, of trans- 
 cendent and eternal authority, were it not identical with 
 the innermost Law of Nature by which the planets roll, 
 the sun shines, the Universe itself exists. For that divine 
 passion for the Finite Ideal which makes the hero, the 
 reformer, the prophet, the saint, is but a spark of that 
 eternal and ethereal fire which burns at the very heart of 
 Being, and keeps God himself true to his own Infinite 
 Ideal. 
 
 § 70. That thus the ultimate ground of all Art, Science, 
 Philosophy, Ethics, and Religion, in strict accordance with 
 the Scientific Method, is proved to lie in the immanent 
 relational constitution of the Supreme Genus-in-Itself, or 
 Real Universe, as Absolute Divine Person, — that this 
 innermost nature of the known Cosmos as All-Person is 
 most profoundly revealed in the distinctively personal, 
 ethical, or spiritual nature of Man, — that "Man's Place in 
 Nature" is that of a free and loyal Servant of the 
 Divine Ideal, and that all his duties, hopes, joys, loves, 
 aspirations, activities, destinies, depend upon his discover- 
 ing intelligently and fulfilling freely the exact function in 
 Nature and in Human Society which this unalterable 
 Divine relationship assigns to him, — these things will 
 explain themselves to the quick-Avitted, and cannot be am- 
 plified or emphasized now. 
 
 § 71. The time has come to close this series of papers, 
 which is merely a partial prospectus of what may be hoped 
 to find hereafter a more appropriate place and a far better 
 
The Philoso'phy of Free Religion. 75 
 
 form. Its aim has been to show the way o^^t of Agnosti- 
 cism into the sunlight of the predestined Philosophy of 
 Science. The labor of writing these too closely packed 
 articles will be well repaid, if here and there some thought- 
 ful spirit has caught even a glimpse of the sublime vistas 
 of truth waiting to be revealed to mankind by the philo- 
 sophic use of the Scientific Method. Said Kalph Waldo 
 Emerson, America's greatest prophet : " There is a state- 
 ment of religion possible which makes all skepticism ab- 
 surd." Is there not such a statement lying latent and im- 
 plicit in the Philosophy or Free Religion ? 
 
PRESS NOTICES 
 
 OF 
 
 SCIENTIFIC THEISM. 
 
 The work is, we think, an important addition to the literature of the 
 subject. It treats of Theism from a new point of view, and by means of 
 original methods. The treatise is, in a certain sense, original. . . . lu 
 its polemic against Phenomenism and its assertion of Realism, it opens 
 up a discussion of the utmost importance. ... It is evident that, in this 
 argument, Dr. Abbot is right, and the idealists and sensists wrong. . . . 
 A book as full of thought as this furnishes innumerable topics for inquiry 
 and criticism. If every position taken by Dr. Abbot cannot be main- 
 tained, his book remains an original contribution to philosophy of a high 
 order and of great value. — Dr. James Freeman Clarke, in the Unitarian 
 Review. 
 
 Tins is a notable book. It is notable both for wliat it is and for what 
 it indicates, namely, returning health and sanity in pliilosophic tliought. 
 . . . Wliatever one may tliink of tlie position in wiiicli tlie argument of 
 "Scientific Theism" culminates, one cannot but be impressed with the 
 deep insight, the clear intellect, the moral fervor of the author. Who- 
 ever has the interests of philosophy at heart will welcome tliis masterly 
 attempt to effect a reconciliation between philosopliy and modern science. 
 No thorough-going idealist, to be sure, will be satisfied with a book which 
 so powerfully assails his fundamental. positions. . . . We cannot but be 
 thankful for this strong and well-reasoned protest against the agnosticism 
 so current in our times. — Prof. H. A. P. Torrey, in the Andover Review. 
 
 The phrase " Scientific Theism " expresses in itself a subject of great 
 interest. We do not so much wisli to write a careful review of Dr. 
 Abbot's very vigorous work as to discuss in connection with it the topic 
 brought forward by it. This discussion will be guided by the view pre- 
 sented by Dr. Abbot. The strong assertion of Realism with which the 
 book opens we heartily accept, with this slight exception, tliat the 
 author seems to us to lay undue emphasis on the unfortunate effects of 
 
78 Press Notices of Scientific Theism. 
 
 Nominalism in preparing tlie way for Idealism. . . . These quotations 
 are perhaps sufficient to give the central idea of Dr. Abbot, the one we 
 wish to consider, — that tlie universe is an organism animate in every 
 part with the inbiding Divine Presence. It is very plain that this con- 
 ception furnishes to the mind of the author — it may also to many other 
 minds — a very quickening spiritual interpretation of the world, bringing 
 his thoughts and feelings in close contact with God. Every portion of 
 the book makes this very j)la.'m. — Ex- President John Bascom, in the New 
 Englander and Yale Review. 
 
 In thus calling attention to the Noniinalistic current in jihilosophical 
 thought, and tracing it from its source to its latest issues, Mr. Abbut lias 
 done a real service. The justice of his complaint must also be allowed, 
 that the significance of the Noniinalistic principle has not hitherto been 
 appreciated by the historians of philosophy. Further, his detection of a 
 Nominalistic vein in Kant is just and important. . . . This vindication 
 of the objective standpoint of science and this account of tlie real nature 
 of the distinction between the noumenon and phenomenon are excellent. 
 The principle of " Relationism," if properly understood, is undeniably 
 true, and must supersede all merely "subjective" principles. — Pjo/". 
 James Seth, in Mind. 
 
 Ces ouvrages de quatre pliilosophes contemporains, dont deux, ou 
 peutetre trois, appartiennent a I'Ame'rique, et un a la Russie, repre'sentent 
 de remarquables efforts de construction nie'taphysique et morale dus a 
 des penseurs inde'pendants et profonds qui ont re9u diversement I'influ- 
 ence des doctrines en conflit a notre e'poque : positivisme, mate'rialisme, 
 ide'alisme, pessimisme, e'volutionisme, et se sont fait des croyances philo- 
 sophiques en dehors de toute e'cole. . . . Le systeme de M. Abbot est 
 une espece du genre positivisme, en ce qu'il prend dans la science les 
 fondements de la philosophic ; niais cette espece differe des autres, ou des 
 plus connues, par le caractere affirmatif de ses conclusions sur des points 
 de metaphysique an sujet desquels le positivisme, a son debut, professait 
 I'ignorance invincible et pre'tendait observer la neutralite' en refusant 
 d'examiner. — HI. Renouvier, in La Critique Philosophique. 
 
 Un penseur americain tres distingu^, M. Francis EUingwood Abbot, 
 a combattu avec une grande force, dans un ouvrage re'cent, la the'orie de 
 ITnconnaissable, et esquisse une sorte de religion scientifique qui nous 
 parait un heureux amendement a celle de M. Spencer. L'exposc' som- 
 niaire de sa doctrine servira de complement assez naturel a celui du 
 pre'cedent systeme. ... La pensee de M. Abbot m'a paru assez j)rofonde 
 et assez originale pour me'riter d'etre reproduite littcralement. Le 
 Theisme Scientifique est, depuis les stoiciens, la plus bardie tentative pour 
 fairs de I'univers un Dieu revOtu de justice, de bonte, de nioralite'. 
 
Press Notices of Scientific Theism. 79 
 
 M. Abbot va meme plus loin que le stoicisme : il fait de I'univers une 
 personne. Ce qui donne a son systeme un interet et une importance 
 exceptionnels, c'est, nous Tavons dit, qu'il se presente conime une appli- 
 cation rigoureuse de la methode qui a conduit la science h, de si mer- 
 veilleux resultats. — M. Ludovic Carrau, in La Philosophie Religieuse en 
 Anrjleterre (Paris: Felix Alcan. ISSS). 
 
 Mr. Abbot has presented us with a brilliant and enticing argument, and 
 many who, after a careful reading and study of his book, still feel them- 
 selves compelled to hesitate and wait, will admit its strong persuasiveness 
 and charm ; wliile others will doubtless be induced through its means to 
 abandon at once their old agnostic doubts. — Chicago Unicersitij. 
 
 These lofty and valuable conclusions he obtains by a process of 
 reasoning which is in the main sound, and founded upon sound premises. 
 Tlie book, as we have said, must take an honorable place in the literature 
 of the subject. — Boston Literary IVorld. 
 
 Dr. r. E. Abbot's new book, the " Science of Theism," confirms the 
 opinion of the few best able to judge that he is tlie ablest philosopliical 
 thinker in America, and that his work seems to be the foundation of that 
 deeper religion of the future, sure to come, which will satisfy both the 
 head and the heart of man. — Boston Sunday Herald, editorial. 
 
 This work, by one of the first living minds, is a profound attempt to 
 place theism on tlie immovable ground of modern science. — Montreal 
 
 Star. 
 
 Although offered as but a sketch of the most prominent features of 
 the " riiilosophy of Science," Dr. Abbot's exposition in his Part I. is so 
 comprehensive, so critical and scholarly, and so suggestive, that he may 
 find, as Darwin did when he brought out the " Origin of Species " as 
 preliminary to a great work, that he has done enough already to found 
 a scliool of investigation and to establish himself as the master of a new 
 departure, profoundly original and significant, in the highest form of 
 research. — Boston Transcript. 
 
 Since the immortal treatises of Darwin himself, which have been so 
 grievously misunderstood, we have not had a treatise which meets so well 
 the demands of all science nnd all religion as does Dr. Abbot's " Thei?m." 
 lie does explicitly and positively what Darwin did by implication. The 
 great Darwin gave us the right method of studying visible Nature ; Dr. 
 Abbot extends the tlieory and method to the universe, to the human 
 mind, to God. Sucli a book should make an epoch in the intellectual 
 history of our country. The book is a very great performance. — Boston 
 Beacon. 
 
80 Press Notices of Scientific Theism. 
 
 Dr. Abbot ha8 come forward witli a discussion of tlie problem that 
 is destined to make an epoch in the world of thought, — a discussion 
 which, as the result of twenty-five years of consecutive thinking, is 
 marked by such masterly grasp of the whole issue, and such clearness 
 of analysis and reconstructive power in dealing with it, that no thought- 
 ful man or woman can afford to pass it by. . . . Only once in a great 
 wiiile does a work of such moment appear. . . . For many years now 
 powerful intellects have turned away from the realms of theology, once 
 liaunted by such minds as those of Dante, Thomas Aquinas, and Pascal ; 
 but of tiie fact tiiat in this little book there are laid the foundations of 
 what may again dower the barren and prosaic world with sublime the- 
 ologies, the work of grand and sanely imaginative intellects, there can 
 be little question. — /iey. Francis Tiffanij, in the Boston Herald. 
 
 It bears evidence throughout of wide reading and close thinking: 
 every page throbs with brain-force. ... He has a fervent faith that 
 right thinking is necessary to right feeling and right action ; and that 
 religion, in order to be redeemed from the effeminate sentimentalisra 
 and empty ceremony into which it has in modern times so largely fallen, 
 must come again under the sway, as in previous epochs of the world, 
 of a robust system of thought. This necessary system of thought, he 
 believes, is furnished by science and the scientific method ; and to prove 
 this position is, in general, the theme and motive of his book. . . . What- 
 ever might be said on some of the special points of Mr. Abbot's argu- 
 ment, his book starts from the riglit ground, and proceeds by the right 
 method, and reaches essentially the right end. It is a masterful treat- 
 ment of its high theme, and can but have great weight toward the 
 establishing of the religious philosophy that is to come as the product 
 of science, — of science in its large sense, as applied to the whole uni- 
 verse of matter and mind. ... It hns science at its back, and, with that 
 support, its leading ideas will, we believe, eventually win the battle. . . . 
 The larger book, of which the preface to this hints, we earnestly hope 
 may yet come. But, even if it does not, this one just as it is, notwith- 
 standing these minor defects, deserves not only a kind, but a proud, 
 welcome from all lovers of high and free thinking on great themes. — 
 TieiK William J. Potter, in the Boston Index. 
 
 There could hardly be a greater opposition than that of such a scheme 
 as this to such a scheme as that which is furnished by Mr. Frederic 
 Harrison, when he says : " For all that we know to the contrary, man is 
 the creator of the order and harmony of the universe, for he has imagined 
 it." Spencer, who disagrees with Harrison so much concerning the 
 nature of religion, agrees with him perfectly in this, and they both 
 agree with Kant. Dr. Abbot's theory is therefore a new departure of 
 
Press Notices of Scientific Theism. 81 
 
 commanding interest and importance. ... At a time wlien " Retreat 
 upon Kant " is so generally the philosophic order for the day, it is 
 certainly invigorating and refreshing to hear this voice of manly oppo- 
 sition ; and it does not seem to me by any means impossible that we 
 have seen with our eyes a man from whom will date anotiier epoch in 
 pliilosopliy, bright with such faith and hope as have not been upon the 
 earth since Parker gave to Kant's abstractions the positive warmth and 
 color of his individual genius for religion. — Rev. J. W. Chadwick, in the 
 BrooMi/n Union. 
 
 No one need resort to mere compliments in expressing very great ad- 
 miration of the argument here set forth, if not entire assent. Tiie few 
 who knOw Dr. Abbot as a speculative tliinker expect, when they open 
 this book, more than they could justly expect from any other American 
 philosopher. They look for the evidence of thorough training in the 
 " discipline " of philosophy, and of a wide and deep knowledge of the 
 masters of thought, which have yet not been able to overburden or 
 destroy a natural metaphysical ability of the purest strain. They look 
 for clearness and exactness of expression, the virtues commonly deemed 
 most alien to metaphysics. They look for a vigorous exposure of the 
 idols of the hour, and, above all, for the most substantial constructive 
 work. Tiiese things are all found here, and we trust tliat the few will 
 become a multitude. Dr. Abbot has the one quality which should com- 
 mand the attention, at least, of the many : he is an intense believer. He 
 has faith in natural science, which, indeed, is in no lack of devotees to- 
 day ; and he has as much faith in religion, which has now no super- 
 abundance of real friends ; and his two faiths are thorougidy one. . . . 
 Realistic evolution will inevitably triumph over all other theories. But 
 there are two forms of it, the mechanical and the organic ; and in the 
 establishment of the profounder, the organic, view Dr. Abbot puts forth 
 all his strength in what must be considered the most satisfactory chapter 
 of the book. His analysis of the idea of machinery, and his exposure of 
 its glaring insufBciency to account for tlie life and growth of the uni- 
 verse, are extremely cogent. . . . We cannot deny the necessary revolu- 
 tion in philosophy which Scientific Realism, as here stated, should effect. 
 We hope it will soon come, and that Dr. Abbot will receive for this book, 
 and larger books hereafter, the just meed of his very high deserts as a 
 philosopher. ..." Scientific Theism " is one of the great books of our 
 generation. — Rev. N. P. Gitman, in the Christian Register. 
 
 Dr. Abbot has confined his essay to two hundred and twenty pages, 
 which are crammed with strong, vigorous thought. . . , This book clears 
 away much confusion and error, and it seems to us the most valuable 
 
82 Press Notices of Scientific Theism. 
 
 contribution to the philosopliy of religion yet made. ... Dr. Abbot has 
 done a grand work, which must have an important effect on the religious 
 tiiought of the present century. — Omaha Republican. 
 
 In his rejection of agnosticism, Mr. Abbot is the strongest antagonist 
 Herbert Spencer has yet met with, and he is quite competent to enter 
 into combat witii a thinker so able. . . . His book is one of the ablest 
 which has recently appeared in behalf of science. It is well calculated 
 to work a new revolution in the doctrine of evolution, and to work out 
 the philosophy based upon it in a deeper and surer manner than ever 
 before. It must attract attention everywhere for its close reasoning 
 and for its breadth of piiilosophic grasp on the problems involved. The 
 author manifests a power of philosopliic insight wiiich has been denied 
 to such men as Herbert Spencer. — A'ef. George W. Cooke, in the New 
 York Daij Star. 
 
 It is a strongly characterized and scholarly piece of work, doing lionor 
 to American thought; and it is much to be desired that the world should 
 see the system developed in its entirety. —P/o/ C. L. Peirce, in the New 
 York Nation. 
 
 We are not usually much attracted by books on scientific theism. Too 
 commonly they are attempts to make use of the general interest in sci- 
 ence to call attention to some not very original or profound speculations 
 about religion. The result often is a syncretism of poor science and 
 worse theology. Such a prejudice cannot attach itself to any work from 
 the pen of Mr. Abbot. Many of us remember his striking article on 
 " Space and Time," published in the "North American Review " in 18G4, 
 which, as he tells us, was partly the germ of the present work. Tliat 
 article showed such philosophic insight and originaHty, and sucli a grasp 
 of the question, as to lead us to hope for further discussions of the same 
 quality. Our wish is at last gratified in the small but very valuable 
 treatise before us. — Boston Dailij Advertiser. 
 
 Dr. Abbot's scheme of thought has a decided claim to recognition as 
 a striking contribution to current philosopliy. — London Academy. 
 
 We even doubt whether any humnn being could come to real belief in 
 God by this road. We do not intend by this to suggest that the work 
 done by Mr. Abbot is badly done or is unnecessary. It is neither. It is 
 well done, and it is necessar}' to be done ; for it is ver}' desirable that 
 the clever philosophical agnostic should be taken on his own ground, 
 and pushed into a corner. Any one who wants to see this done should 
 read Mr. Abbot's book. — London Inquirer. 
 
Press Notices of Scientific Theism. 83 
 
 This one thing Dr. Abbot seems to us to have done : he has made 
 Herbert Spencer's doctrine of the "Unknowable" antiquated. It lias 
 passed into tlie realm of the obsolete and the nonsensical. . . . To us, 
 then, the great achievement of tlie book is the clear statement and dem- 
 onstration of the scientific method as applied to the external world, and 
 its application to the problems of philosophy. . . . We hesitate to say 
 of all what we gladly say of the "ground principle": that being estab- 
 lished, the rest will come ; and it will come the sooner and the safer 
 because this one man has patiently wrestled with the problem for twenty 
 years, and is willing now to devote the remainder of his life to the con- 
 sideration of the questions involved in the hopes of the human heart. 
 Such praise, inadequate as it may seem, is what few men in a generation 
 deserve. — Rev. George Batchelor, in the Unitarian Review. 
 
Prmcetun Theoloqic.il Semm.iry-Speer Libr.iry 
 
 1 1012 01130 5762 
 
 Date Due 
 
 i\s^.. I 
 
 =t 
 
 
rk