Modern French Philosophy

_A study of the Development since Comte._

by J. Alexander Gunn, M.A., PH.D.

_Fellow of the University of Liverpool; Lecturer in Psychology to the
Liverpool University Extension Board_

WITH A FOREWORD BY
HENRI BERGSON

_de l’Academie francaise et de l’Academie des
Sciences morales et politiques_

T. FISHER UNWIN, LTD.
LONDON: ADELPHI TERRACE

_First published in 1922._
_(All rights reserved)_

TO
MY TEACHER
ALEXANDER MAIR
PROFESSOR OF PHILOSOPHY IN THE UNIVERSITY OF LIVERPOOL
AS A SMALL TOKEN OF ESTEEM
AND AN ACKNOWLEDGMENT OF HIS INSTRUCTION

Contents

 FOREWORD BY HENRI BERGSON
 PREFACE

 CHAPTER I. ANTECEDENTS
 CHAPTER II. MAIN CURRENTS SINCE 1851
 CHAPTER III. SCIENCE
 CHAPTER IV. FREEDOM
 CHAPTER V. PROGRESS
 CHAPTER VI. ETHICS
 CHAPTER VII. RELIGION
 CONCLUSION

 BIBLIOGRAPHY
 COMPARATIVE TABLE
 INDEX




“Mais il n’y a pas que cette France, que cette France glorieuse, que
cette France révolutionnaire, cette France émancipatrice et initiatrice
du genre humain, que cette France d’une activité merveilleuse et comme
on l’a dit, cette France nourrie des idées générales du monde, il y a
une autre France que je n’aime pas moins, une autre France qui m’est
encore plus chère, c’est la France misérable, c’est la France vaincue
et humiliée, c’est la France qui est accablée, c’est la France qui
traîne son boulet depuis quatorze siècles, la France qui crie,
suppliante vers la justice et vers la liberté, la France que les
despotes poussent constamment sur les champs de bataille, sous prétexte
de liberté, pour lui faire verser son sang par toutes les artères et
par toutes les veines, oh! cette France-là, je l’aime.”—GAMBETTA,
_Discours_, 29 _September_, 1872.

“Les jeunes gens de tous les pays du monde qui sont venus dans les
campagnes de France combattre pour la civilisation et le droit seront
sans doute plus disposés à y revenir, apres la guerre chercher la
nourriture intellectuelle. Il importe qu’ils soient assurés de l’y
trouver, saine, abondante et forte.”—M. D. PARODI, _Inspecteur de
l’Académie de Paris, 1919_.




FOREWORD


_Je serais heureux que le public anglais sût le bien que je pense du
livre de M. Gunn, sur la philosophie francaise depuis 1851. Le sujet
choisi est neuf, car il n’existe pas, à ma connaissance, d’ouvrage
relatif à toute cette période de la philosophie française. Le beau
livre que M. Parodi vient de publier en français traite surtout des
vingt dernières années de notre activité philosophique. M. Gunn,
remontant jusqu’à Auguste Comte, a eu raison de placer ainsi devant
nous toute le seconde moitié du siècle passé. Cette période de
cinquante ans qui a précédée notre vingtième siècle est d’une
importance capitale. Elle constitue réellement notre dix-neuvième
siècle philosophique, car l’oeuvre même de Maine de Biran, qui est
antérieure, n’a été bien connue et étudiée qu’à ce moment, et la
plupart de nos idées philosophiques actuelles ont été élaborées pendant
ces cinquante ans._

_Le sujet est d’ailleurs d’une complication extrême, en raison du
nombre et de la variété des doctrines, en raison surtout de la
diversité des questions entre lesquelles se sont partagés tant de
penseurs. Dr. Gunn a su ramener toutes ces questions à un petit nombre
de problèmes essentiels : la science, la liberté, le progrès, la
morale, la religion. Cette division me paraît heureuse. Elle répond
bien, ce me semble, aux principales préoccupations de la philosophie
francaise. Elle a permis à l’auteur d’être complet, tout en restant
simple, clair, et facile à suivre._

_Elle présente, il est vrai, un inconvénient, en ce qu’elle morcelle la
doctrine d’un auteur en fragments dont chacun, pris à part, perd un peu
de sa vitalite et de son individualité. Elle risque ainsi de présenter
comme trop semblable à d’autres la solution que tel philosophe a donnée
de tel problème, solution qui, replacée dans l’ensemble de la doctrine,
apparaîtrait comme propre à ce penseur, originale et plus forte. Mais
cet inconvénient était inévitable et l’envers de l’avantage que je
signalais plus haut, celui de l’ordre, de la continuité et de la
clarté._

_Le travail du Dr. Gunn m’apparaît comme tout à fait distingué. Il
témoigne d’une information singulièrement étendue, précise et sûre.
C’est l’oeuvre d’un esprit d’une extrême souplesse, capable de
s’assimiler vite et bien la pensée des philosophes, de classer les
idées dans leur ordre d’importance, de les exposer méthodiquement et
les apprécier à leur juste valeur._

 H. Bergson

[These pages are a revised extract from the more formal _Rapport_ which
was presented by M. Bergson to the University of Liverpool].




PREFACE


This work is the fruit of much reading and research done in Paris at
the Sorbonne and Bibliothèque nationale. It is, substantially, a
revised form of the thesis presented by the writer to the University of
Liverpool for the degree of Doctor in Philosophy, obtained in 1921. The
author is indebted, therefore, to the University for permission to
publish. More especially must he record his deep gratitude to the
French thinkers who gave both stimulus and encouragement to him during
his sojourn in Paris. Foremost among these is M. Henri Bergson, upon
whose _rapport_ the Doctorate was conferred, and who has expressed his
appreciation of the work by contributing a Foreword for publication.

Mention must also be made of the encouragement given by the late M.
Emile Boutroux and by the eminent editor of the well-known _Revue de
Métaphysique et de Morale_, M. Xavier Léon, a leading spirit in the
_Société de Philosophie_, whose meetings the writer was privileged to
attend by invitation. Then MM. Brunschvicg, Levy-Bruhl, Lalande, Rey
and Lenoir, from time to time discussed the work with him and he must
record his appreciation of their kindness.

To Professor Mair of Liverpool is due the initial suggestion, and it
has been felt a fitting tribute to his supervision, criticism,
encouragement and sympathy that this book should be respectfully
dedicated to him by one of his grateful pupils. In the labour of
dealing with the proofs, the writer has to acknowledge the co-operation
of Miss M. Linn and Mr. J. E. Turner, M.A.

*    *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *


The method adopted in this history has been deliberately chosen for its
usefulness in emphasising the development of ideas. A purely
chronological method has not been followed. The biographical system has
likewise been rejected. The history of the development of thought
centres round problems, and it progresses in relation to these
problems. The particular manner in which the main problems presented
themselves to the French thinkers of the second half of the nineteenth
century was largely determined by the events and ideas which marked the
period from 1789 to 1851. For this reason a chapter has been devoted to
Antecedents. Between the Revolution and the _coup d’état_ of Napoleon
III., four distinct lines of thought are discernible. Then the main
currents from the year 1851 down to 1921 are described, with special
reference to the development of the main problems. The reconciliation
of _science_ and _conscience_ proved to be the main general problem,
which became more definitely that of Freedom. This in itself is
intimately bound up with the doctrines of progress, of history, of
ethics and religion. These topics are discussed in a manner which shows
their bearing upon each other. The conclusion aims at displaying the
characteristics of French thought which reveal themselves in the study
of these great problems. Its vitality, concreteness, clearness,
brilliance and precision are noted and a comparison made between French
thought and German philosophy.

From a general philosophical standpoint few periods could be so
fascinating. Few, if any, could show such a complete revolution of
thought as that witnessed since the year 1851. To bring this out
clearly is the main object of the present book. It is intended to serve
a double purpose. Primarily, it aims at being a contribution to the
history of thought which will provide a definite knowledge of the best
that has been said and thought among philosophers in France during the
last seventy years. Further, it is itself an appeal for serious
attention to be given to French philosophy. This is a field which has
been comparatively neglected by English students, so far as the
nineteenth century is concerned, and this is especially true of our
period, which is roughly that from Comte to Boutroux (who passed away
last month) and Bergson (who has this year resigned his professorship).
It is the earnest desire of the writer to draw both philosophical
students and lovers of France and its literature to a closer study and
appreciation of modern French philosophy. Emotion and sentiment are
inadequate bases for an _entente_ which is to be really _cordiale_
between any two peoples. An understanding of their deepest thoughts is
also necessary and desirable. Such an understanding is, after all, but
a step towards that iternationalisation of thought, that common fund of
human culture and knowledge, which sets itself as an ideal before the
nations of the world. _La philosophie n’a pas de patrie! Les idées sont
actuellement les forces internationales._

J. A. G.

THE UNIVERSITY,
        LIVERPOOL,
            _December_, 1921




CHAPTER I
(INTRODUCTORY)
ANTECEDENTS


HISTORICAL SURVEY OF THE MAIN CURRENTS FROM THE REVOLUTION OF 1789 UP
TO 1851.

After the Revolution—The Traditionalists: Chateaubuand, De Bonald, De
Maistre, Lamennais, Lacordaire

_Main Currents:_

1. Maine de Biran.

2. The Eclectics: Cousin, Jouffroy.

3. The Socialists: Saint-Simon, Fourier and Cabal, Proudhon and Blanc.

4.Positivism: Auguste Comte.




CHAPTER I
ANTECEDENTS

This work deals with the great French thinkers since the time of
Auguste Comte, and treats, under various aspects, the development of
thought in relation to the main problems which confronted these men. In
the commencement of such an undertaking we are obliged to acknowledge
the continuity of human thought, to recognise that it tends to
approximate to an organic whole, and that, consequently, methods
resembling those of surgical amputation are to be avoided. We cannot
absolutely isolate one period of thought. For this reason a brief
survey of the earlier years is necessary in order to orient the
approach to the period specially placed in the limelight, namely
1851-1921.

In the world of speculative thought and in the realm of practical
politics we find reflected, at the opening of the century, the work of
the French Revolutionaries on the one hand, and that of Immanuel Kant
on the other. Coupled with these great factors was the pervading
influence of the Encyclopædists and of the thinkers of the
Enlightenment. These two groups of influences, the one sudden and in
the nature of a shock to political and metaphysical thought, the other
quieter but no less effective, combined to produce a feeling of
instability and of dissatisfaction at the close of the eighteenth
century. A sense of change, indeed of resurrection, filled the minds
and hearts of those who saw the opening of the nineteenth century. The
old aristocracy and the monarchy in France had gone, and in philosophy
the old metaphysic had received a blow at the hands of the author of
the Three Critiques.

No better expression was given to the psychological state of France at
this time than that of Alfred de Musset in his _Confession d’un Enfant
du Siècle_. _Toute la maladie du siècle présent_ (he wrote) _vient de
deux causes; le peuple qui a passé par ’93 et par 1814 porte au cœur
deux blessures. Tout ce qui était n’est plus; tout ce qui sera n’est
pas encore. Ne cherchez ailleurs le secret de nos maux._[1] De Musset
was right, the whole course of the century was marked by conflict
between two forces—on the one hand a tendency to reaction and
conservatism, on the other an impulse to radicalism and revolution.

 [1] The extract is taken from _Première partie_, ch. 2. The book was
 published in 1836. Somewhat similar sentiments are uttered with
 reference to this time by Michelet. (See his _Histoire du XIXe
 Siècle_, vol. i., p. 9).


It is true that one group of thinkers endeavoured, by a perfectly
natural reaction, to recall their fellow-countrymen, at this time of
unrest, back to the doctrines and traditions of the past, and tried to
find in the faith of the Christian Church and the practice of the
Catholic religion a rallying-point. The monarchy and the Church were
eulogised by Chateaubriand, while on the more philosophical side
efforts on behalf of traditionalism were made very nobly by De Bonald
and Joseph de Maistre. While they represented the old aristocracy and
recalled the theocracy and ecclesiasticism of the past by advocating
reaction and Ultramontanism, Lamennais attempted to adapt Catholicism
to the new conditions, only to find, as did Renan later, that “one
cannot argue with a bar of iron.” Not the brilliant appeals of a
Lacordaire, who thundered from Notre Dame, nor the modernism of a
Lamennais, nor the efforts in religious philosophy made by De Maistre,
were, however, sufficient to meet the needs of the time.

The old traditions and the old dogmas did not offer the salvation they
professed to do. Consequently various groups of thinkers worked out
solutions satisfactory to themselves and which they offered to others.
We can distinguish clearly four main currents, the method of
introspection and investigation of the inner life of the soul, the
adoption of a spiritualist philosophy upon an eclectic basis, the
search for a new society after the manner of the socialists and,
lastly, a positive philosophy and religion of humanity. These four
currents form the historical antecedents of our period and to a brief
survey of them we now turn.

*    *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *

I

To find the origin of many of the tendencies which appear prominently
in the thought of the second half of the nineteenth century,
particularly those displayed by the new spiritualistic philosophy
(which marked the last thirty years of the century), we must go back to
the period of the Revolution, to Maine de Biran (1766-1824)—a unique
and original thinker who laid the foundations of modern French
psychology and who was, we may note in passing, a contemporary of
Chateaubriand. A certain tone of romanticism marks the work of both the
literary man and the philosopher. Maine de Biran was not a thinker who
reflected upon his own experiences in retreat from the world. Born a
Count, a Lifeguardsman to Louis XVI. at the Revolution, and faithful to
the old aristocracy, he was appointed, at the Restoration, to an
important administrative position, and later became a deputy and a
member of the State Council. His writings were much greater in extent
than is generally thought, but only one important work appeared in
publication during his lifetime. This was his treatise, or _mémoire_,
entitled _Habitude_, which appeared in 1803. This work well illustrates
Maine de Biran’s historical position in the development of French
philosophy. It came at a tome when attention and interest, so far as
philosophical problems were concerned, centred round two “foci.” These
respective centres are indicated by Destutt de Tracy,[2] the disciple
of Condillac on the one hand, and by Cabanis[3] on the other. Both were
“ideologues” and were ridiculed by Napoleon who endeavoured to lay much
blame upon the philosophers. We must notice, however, this difference.
While the school of Condillac,[4] influenced by Locke, endeavoured to
work out a psychology in terms of abstractions, Cabanis, anxious to be
more concrete, attempted to interpret the life of the mind by reference
to physical and physiological phenomena.

 [2] Destutt de Tracy, 1754-1836. His _Elements of Ideology_ appeared
 in 1801. He succeeded Cabanis in the Académie in 1808, and in a
 complimentary _Discours_ pronounced upon his predecessor claimed that
 Cabanis had introduced medicine into philosophy and philosophy into
 medicine. This remark might well have been applied later to Claude
 Bernard.


 [3] Cabanis, 1757-1808, _Rapports du Physique et du Morale de
 l’Homme_, 1802. He was a friend of De Biran, as also was Ampère, the
 celebrated physicist and a man of considerable philosophical power. A
 group used to meet _chez Cabanis_ at Auteuil, comprising De Biran,
 Cabanis, Ampère, Royard-Collard, Guizot, and Cousin.


 [4] Condillac belongs to the eighteenth century. He died in 1780. His
 _Traité des Sensations_ is dated 1754.


It is the special merit of De Biran that he endeavoured, and that
successfully, to establish both the concreteness and the essential
spirituality of the inner life. The attitude and method which he
adopted became a force in freeing psychology, and indeed philosophy in
general, from mere play with abstractions. His doctrines proved
valuable, too, in establishing the reality and irreducibility of the
mental or spiritual nature of man.

Maine de Biran took as his starting-point a psychological fact, the
reality of conscious effort. The self is active rather than
speculative; the self is action or effort—that is to say, the self is,
fundamentally and primarily, will. For the Cartesian formula _Cogito,
ergo sum,_ De Biran proposed to substitute that of _Volo, ergo sum_. He
went on to maintain that we have an internal and immediate perception
of this effort of will through which we realise, at one and the same
time, our self in its fullest activity and the resistance to its
operations. In such effort we realise ourselves as free causes and, in
spite of the doctrine of physical determinism, we realise in ourselves
the self as a cause of its own volitions. The greater the resistance or
the greater the effort, the more do we realise ourselves as being free
and not the absolute victims of habit. Of this freedom we have an
immediate consciousness, it is _une donnée immédiate de la conscience._

This freedom is not always realised, for over against the tendency to
action we must set the counter-tendency to passivity. Between these two
exists, in varying degrees of approach to the two extremes, _habitude_.
Our inner life is seen by the psychologist as a field of conflict
between the sensitive and the reflective side of our nature. It is this
which gives to the life of this _homo duplex_ all the elements of
struggle and tragedy. In the desires and the passions, says Maine de
Biran, the true self is not seen. The true self appears in memory,
reasoning and, above all, in will.

Such, in brief, is the outline of De Biran’s psychology. To his two
stages, _vie sensitive_ and _vie active_ (_ou réflexive_), he added a
third, _la vie divine_. In his religious psychology he upheld the great
Christian doctrines of divine love and grace as against the less human
attitude of the Stoics. He still insists upon the power of will and
action and is an enemy of the religious vice of quietism. In his
closing years De Biran penned his ideas upon our realisation of the
divine love by intuition. His intense interest in the inner life of the
spirit gives De Biran’s _Journal Intime_ a rank among the illuminating
writings upon religious psychology.

Maine de Biran was nothing if not a psychologist. The most absurd
statement ever made about him was that he was “the French Kant.” This
is very misleading, for De Biran’s genius showed itself in his
psychological power and not in critical metaphysics. The importance of
his work and his tremendous influence upon our period, especially upon
the new spiritualism, will be apparent. Indeed he himself foresaw the
great possibilities which lay open to philosophy along the lines he
laid down. “_Qui sait,_” he remarked,[5] “_tout ce que peut la
réflection concentrée et s’il n’y a pas un nouveau monde intérieur qui
pourra être découvert un jour par quelque ‘Colomb métaphysicien.’_”
With Maine de Biran began the movement in French philosophy which
worked through the writings of Ravaisson, Lachelier, Guyau, Boutroux
and particularly Bergson. A careful examination of the philosophy of
this last thinker shows how great is his debt to Maine de Biran, whose
inspiration he warmly acknowledges.

 [5] Pensées, p. 213.


But it is only comparatively recently that Maine de Biran has come to
his own and that his real power and influence have been recognised.
There are two reasons for this, firstly the lack of publication of his
writings, and secondly his being known for long only through the work
of Cousin and the Eclectics, who were imperfectly acquainted with his
work. Upon this school of thought he had some little influence which
was immediate and personal, but Cousin, although he edited some of his
unpublished work, failed to appreciate its originality and value.

So for a time De Biran’s influence waned when that of Cousin himself
faded. Maine de Biran stands quite in a different category from the
Eclectics, as a unique figure at a transition period, the herald of the
best that was to be in the thought of the century. Cousin and the
Eclectic school, however, gained the official favour, and eclecticism
was for many years the “official philosophy.”

II

This Eclectic School was due to the work of various thinkers, of whom
we may cite Laromiguière (1756-1837), who marks the transition from
Condillac, Royer-Collard (1763-1845), who, abandoning Condillac, turned
for inspiration to the Scottish School (particularly to Reid), Victor
Cousin (1792-1867), Jouffroy (1796-1842) and Paul Janet (1823-1899),
the last of the notable eclectics. Of these “the chief” was Cousin. His
personality dominated this whole school of thought, his _ipse dixit_
was the criterion of orthodoxy, an orthodoxy which we must note was
supported by the powers of officialdom.

He rose from the Ecole Normale Supérieure to a professorship at the
Sorbonne, which he held from the Restoration (1815 to 1830), with a
break of a few years during which his course was suspended. These years
he spent in Germany, to which country attention had been attracted by
the work of Madame de Staël, _De l’Allemagne_ (1813). From 1830 to the
beginning of our period (1851) Cousin, as director of the Ecole Normale
Supérieure, as a _pair de France_ and a minister of state, organised
and controlled the education of his country. He thus exercised a very
great influence over an entire generation of Frenchmen, to whom he
propounded the doctrines of his spiritualism.

His teaching was marked by a strong reaction against the doctrines of
the previous century, which had given such value to the data of sense.
Cousin abhorred the materialism involved in these doctrines, which he
styled _une doctrine désolante_, and he endeavoured to raise the
dignity and conception of man as a spiritual being. In the Preface to
his Lectures of 1818, _Du Vrai, du Beau et du Bien_ (Edition of 1853),
published first in 1846, he lays stress upon the elements of his
philosophy, which he presents as a true spiritualism, for it
subordinates the sensory and sensual to the spiritual. He upholds the
essentially spiritual nature of man, his liberty, moral responsibility
and obligation, the dignity of human virtue, disinterestedness,
charity, justice and beauty. These fruits of the spirit reveal, Cousin
claimed, a God who is both the author and the ideal type of humanity, a
Being who is not indifferent to the welfare and happiness of his
creatures. There is a vein of romanticism about Cousin, and in him may
be seen the same spirit which, on the literary side, was at work in
Hugo, Lamartine and De Vigny.

Cousin’s philosophy attached itself rather to the Scottish school of
“common sense” than to the analytic type of doctrine which had
prevailed in his own country in the previous century. To this he added
much from various sources, such as Schelling and Hegel among the
moderns, Plato and the Alexandrians among the ancients. In viewing the
history of philosophy, Cousin advocated a division of systems into four
classes—sensualism, idealism, scepticism and mysticism. Owing to the
insufficiency of his _vérités de sens commun_ he was prone to confuse
the history of philosophy with philosophy itself. There is perhaps no
branch of science or art so intimately bound up with its own history as
is philosophy, but we must beware of substituting an historical survey
of problems for an actual handling of those problems themselves.
Cousin, however, did much to establish in his native land the teaching
of the history of philosophy.

His own aim was to found a metaphysic spiritual in character, based
upon psychology. While he did not agree with the system of Kant, he
rejected the doctrines of the empiricists and set his influence against
the materialistic and sceptical tendencies of his time. Yet he cannot
be excused from “opportunism” not only in politics but in thought. In
order to retain his personal influence he endeavoured to present his
philosophy as a sum of doctrines perfectly consistent with the Catholic
faith. This was partly, no doubt, to counteract the work and influence
of that group of thinkers already referred to as Traditionalists, De
Bonald, De Maistre and Lamennais. Cousin’s efforts in this direction,
however, dissatisfied both churchmen and philosophers and gave rise to
the remark that his teaching was but _une philosophie de convenance_.
We must add too that the vagueness of his spiritual teaching was
largely responsible for the welcome accorded by many minds to the
positivist teaching of Auguste Comte.

While Maine de Biran had a real influence upon the thought of our
period 1851-1921, Cousin stands in a different relation to subsequent
thought, for that thought is largely characterised by its being a
reaction against eclecticism. Positivism rose as a direct revolt
against it, the neo-critical philosophy dealt blows at both, while
Ravaisson, the initiator of the neo-spiritualism, upon whom Cousin did
not look very favourably, endeavoured to reorganise upon a different
footing, and on sounder principles, free from the deficiencies which
must always accompany eclectic thought, those ideas and ideals to which
Cousin in his spiritualism had vaguely indicated his loyalty. It is
interesting to note that Cousin’s death coincides in date with the
foundation of the neo-spiritual philosophy by Ravaisson’s celebrated
manifesto to idealists, for such, as we shall see, was his _Rapport sur
la Philosophie au Dix-neuvième Siècle_ (1867). Cousin’s spiritualism
had a notable influence upon several important men—e.g., Michelet and
his friend Edgar Quinet, and more indirectly upon Renan. The latter
spoke of him in warm terms as un _excitateur de ma pensée_.[6]

 [6] It is worth noting that two of the big currents of opposition,
 those of Comte and Renouvier, arose outside the professional and
 official teaching, free from the University which was entirely
 dominated by Cousin. This explains much of the slowness with which
 Comte and Renouvier were appreciated.


Among Cousin’s disciples one of the most prominent was Jouffroy of the
Collège de France. The psychological interest was keen in his work, but
his _Mélanges philosophiques_ (1883) showed him to be occupied with the
problem of human destiny. Paul Janet was a noble upholder of the
eclectic doctrine or older spiritualism, while among associates and
tardy followers must be mentioned Gamier, Damiron, Franke, Caro and
Jules Simon.

III

We have seen how, as a consequence of the Revolution and of the cold,
destructive, criticism of the eighteenth century, there was a demand
for constructive thought. This was a desire common not only to the
Traditionalists but to De Biran and Cousin. They aimed at intellectual
reconstruction. While, however, there were some who combated the
principles of the Revolution, as did the Traditionalists, while some
tried to correct and to steady those principles (as De Biran and
Cousin), there were others who endeavoured to complete them and to
carry out a more rigorous application of the Revolutionary watchwords,
_Liberté_, _Egalité_, _Fraternité_. The Socialists (and later Comte)
aimed at not merely intellectual, but social reconstruction.

The Revolution and the War had shown men that many changes could be
produced in society in a comparatively short time. This encouraged bold
and imaginative spirits. Endeavours after better things, after new
systems and a new order of society, showed themselves. The work of
political philosophers attempted to give expression to the socialist
idea of society. For long there had been maintained the ecclesiastical
conception of a perfect social order in another world. It was now
thought that humanity would be better employed, not in imagining the
glories of a “hereafter,” but in “tilling its garden,” in striving to
realise here on earth something of that blessed fellowship and happy
social order treasured up in heaven. This is the dominant note of
socialism, which is closely bound up at its origin, not only with
political thought, but with humanitarianism and a feeling essentially
religious. Its progress is a feature of the whole century.

The most notable expression of the new socialistic idea was that of
Count Henri de Saint-Simon (1760-1825), a relative of the celebrated
Duke. He had great confidence in the power of science as an instrument
for social reconstruction, and he took over from a medical man, Dr.
Burdin, the notions which, later on, Auguste Comte was to formulate
into the doctrines of Positivism. Saint-Simon’s influence showed itself
while the century was young, his first work _Lettres d’un Habitant de
Genève_ appearing in 1803. In this he outlined a scheme for placing the
authoritative power of the community, not in the hands of Church and
State, but in a freely elected body of thinkers and _artistes_. He then
endeavoured to urge the importance of order in society, as a
counterpart to the order erected by science in the world of knowledge.
To this end was directed his _Introduction aux Travaux scientifiques du
Dix-neuvième Siècle_ (1807-8). He also indicated the importance for
social welfare of abandoning the preoccupation with an imaginary
heaven, and pointed out that the more social and political theory could
be emancipated from the influence of theological dogmas the better. At
the same time he quite recognised the importance of religious beliefs
to a community, and his sociological view of religion foreshadowed
Guyau’s study, an important work which will claim our attention in due
course.

In 1813, Saint-Simon published his _Mémoire sur la Science de l’Homme_,
in which he laid down notions which were the germ of Auguste Comte’s
_Law of the Three Stages_. With the peace which followed the Battle of
Waterloo, a tremendous stimulus was given in France to industrial
activity, and Saint-Simon formulated his motto “All by industry and all
for industry.” Real power, he showed, lay not in the hands of
governments or government agents, but with the industrial class.
Society therefore should be organised in the manner most favourable to
the working class. Ultimate economic and political power rests with
them. These ideas he set forth in _L’Industrie_, 1817-18, _La
Politique_, 1819, _L’Organisateur_, 1819-30, _Le Système industriel_,
1821-22, _Le Catéchisme des Industriels_, 1822-24. Since 1817 among his
fellow- workers were now Augustin Thierry and young Auguste Comte, his
secretary, the most important figure in the history of the first half
of the century.

Finding that exposition and reasoned demonstration of his ideas were
not sufficient, Saint-Simon made appeal to sentiment by his _Appel aux
Philanthropes_, a treatise on human brotherhood and solidarity. This he
followed up in 1825 by his last book, published the year of his death,
_Le Nouveau Christianisme_. This book endeavoured to outline a religion
which should prove itself capable of reorganising society by
inculcating the brotherhood of man in a more effective manner than that
of the Christian Church. _Fraternité_ was the watchword he stressed,
and he placed women on an equal political and social footing with men.
He set forth the grave deficiencies of the Christian doctrines as
proclaimed by Catholic and Protestant alike. Both are cursed by the sin
of individualism, the virtue of saving one’s own soul, while no attempt
at social salvation is made. Both Catholics and Protestants he labelled
vile heretics, inasmuch as they have turned aside from the social
teaching of Christianity. If we are to love our neighbour as ourselves
we must as a whole community work for the betterment of our fellows
socially, by erecting a form of society more in accord with Christian
principles. We must strive to do it here and now, and not sit piously
getting ready for the next world. We must not think it religious to
despise the body or material welfare. God manifests Himself as matter
and spirit, so Religion must not despise economics but rather unite
industry and science as Love unites spirit and matter. Eternal Life, of
which Christianity makes so much, is not to be sought, argued
Saint-Simon, in another world, but here and now in the love and service
of our brothers, in the uplift of humanity as a whole.

Saint-Simon believed in a fated progress and an inevitable betterment
of the condition of the working classes. The influence of Hegel’s view
of history and Condorcet’s social theories is apparent in some of his
writings. His insistence upon organisation, social authority and the
depreciative view of liberty which he held show well how he was the
real father of many later doctrines and of applications of these
doctrines, as for example by Lenin in the Soviet system of Bolshevik
Russia. Saint-Simon foreshadowed the dictatorship of the proletariat,
although his scheme of social organisation involved a triple division
of humanity into intellectuals, artists and industrials. Many of his
doctrines had a definite communistic tendency. Among them we find
indicated the abolition of all hereditary rights of inheritance and the
distribution of property is placed, as in the communist programme, in
the hands of the organising authority. Saint-Simon had a keen insight
into modern social conditions and problems. He stressed the economic
inter-relationships and insisted that the world must be regarded as
“one workshop.” A statement of the principles of the Saint- Simonist
School, among whom was the curious character Enfantin, was presented to
the _Chambre des Députés_ in the critical year 1830. The disciples seem
to have shown a more definite communism than their master. The
influence of Saint-Simon, precursor of both socialism and positivism,
had considerable influence upon the social philosophy of the whole
century. It only diminished when the newer type of socialist doctrine
appeared, the so-called “scientific” socialism of Marx and Engels.
Saint-Simon’s impulse, however, acted powerfully upon the minds of most
of the thinkers of the century, especially in their youth. Renouvier
and Renan were fired with some of his ideas. The spirit of Saint-Simon
expressed itself in our period by promoting an intense interest in
philosophy as applied to social problems.

Saint-Simon was not, however, the only thinker at this time with a
social programme to offer. In contrast to his scheme we have that of
Fourier (1772-1837) who endeavoured to avoid the suppression of liberty
involved in the organisation proposed by Saint-Simon.

The psychology of Fourier was peculiar and it coloured his ethical and
social doctrine. He believed that the evils of the world were due to
the repression of human passions. These in themselves, if given liberty
of expression, would prove harmonious. As Newton had propounded the law
of the universal attraction of matter, Fourier endeavoured to propound
the law of attraction between human beings. Passion and desire lead to
mutual attraction; the basis of society is free association.

Fourier’s _Traité de l’Association domestique et agricole_ (1822),
which followed his _Théorie des Quatre Mouvements_ (1808), proposed the
formation of associations or groups, _phalanges_, in which workers
unite with capital for the self-government of industry. He, like Saint-
Simon, attacks idlers, but the two thinkers look upon the capitalist
manager as a worker. The intense class- antagonism of capitalist and
labourer had not yet formulated itself and was not felt strongly until
voiced on behalf of the proletariat by Proudhon and Marx. Fourier’s
proposals were those of a _bourgeois_ business man who knew the
commercial world intimately, who criticised it and condemned the
existing system of civilisation. Various experiments were made to
organise communities based upon his _phalanges_.

Cabet, the author of _Icaria_ (1840) and _Le nouveau Christianisme_,
was a further power in the promotion of socialism and owed not a little
of his inspiration to Robert Owen.

The most interesting and powerful of the early socialist philosophers
is undoubtedly Proudhon (1809- 1865), a striking personality, much
misunderstood.

While Saint-Simon, a count, came from the aristocracy, Fourier from the
_bourgeoisie_, Proudhon was a real son of the people, a mouthpiece of
the proletariat. He was a man of admirable mental energy and learning,
which he had obtained solely by his own efforts and by a struggle with
poverty and misery. Earnest and passionate by nature, he yet formulated
his doctrines with more sanity and moderation than is usually supposed.
Labels of “atheist” and “anarchist” have served well to misrepresent
him. Certainly two of his watchwords were likely enough to raise
hostility in many quarters. “God,” he said, “is evil,” “Property is
theft.” This last maxim was the subject of his book, published in 1840,
_Qu’est-ce que la propriété_? (_ou, Recherches sur le principe du droit
et du gouvernement_) to which his answer was “_C’est le vol!_” Proudhon
took up the great watchword of _Egalité_, and had a passion for social
justice which he based on “the right to the whole product of labour.”
This could only come by mutual exchange, fairly and freely. He
distinguished between private “property” and individual “possession.”
The latter is an admitted fact and is not to be abolished; what he is
anxious to overthrow is private “property,” which is a toll upon the
labour of others and is therefore ultimately and morally theft. He
hated the State for its support of the “thieves,” and his doctrines are
a philosophy of anarchy. He further enunciated them in _Système des
Contradictions économiques_ (1846) and _De la Justice_ (1858). In 1848
he was elected a _député_ and, together with Louis Blanc and Pierre
Leroux, figured in the Revolution of 1848. Blanc was a man of action,
who had a concrete scheme for transition from the capitalist régime to
the socialist state. He believed in the organisation of labour,
universal suffrage and a new distribution of wealth, but he disapproved
strongly of the dictatorship of the proletariat and of violent
revolution. Proudhon expressed his great admiration for Blanc.

The work of both of these men is a contradiction to the assertion put
forward by the Marxian school that socialist doctrine was merely
sentimental, utopian and “unscientific” prior to Marx. Many of the
views of Proudhon and Blanc were far more “scientific” than those of
Marx, because they were closer to facts. Proudhon differed profoundly
from Marx in his view of history in which he saw the influence of ideas
and ideals, as well as the operation of purely economic factors. To the
doctrine of a materialistic determination of history Proudhon rightly
opposes that of a spiritual determination, by the thoughts and ideals
of men.[7] The true revolution Proudhon and Blanc maintained can come
only through the power of ideas.

 [7] Indeed, it is highly probable that with the growing
 dissatisfaction with Marxian theories the work of Proudhon will come
 into greater prominence, replacing largely that of Marx.
    On the personal relations of Proudhon with Marx (1818-1883), who
    was nine years younger than the Frenchman, see the interesting
    volume by Marx’s descendant, M. Jean Longuet (Député de la Seine),
    _La Politique internationale du Marxisme_ (_Karl Marx et la
    France_) (Alcan).
    On the debt of Marx to the French social thinkers see the account
    given by Professor Charles Andler in his special edition of the
    Communist Manifesto, _Le Manifeste Communiste_ (_avec introduction
    historique et commentaire_), (Rieder), also the last section of
    Renouvier’s Philosophie analytique de l’Histoire, vol. iv.


All these early socialist thinkers had this in common: they agreed that
purely economic solutions would not soothe the ills of society, but
that moral, religious and philosophic teaching must accompany, or
rather precede, all efforts towards social reform. The earliest of
them, Saint-Simon, had asserted that no society, no system of
civilisation, can endure if its spiritual principles and its economic
organisation are in direct contradiction. When brotherly love on the
one hand and merciless competition on the other are equally extolled,
then hypocrisy, unrest and conflict are inevitable.

IV

The rise of positivism ranks with the rise of socialism as a movement
of primary importance. Both were in origin nearer to one another than
they now appear to be. We have seen how Saint-Simon was imbued with a
spirit of social reform, a desire to reorganise human society. This
desire Auguste Comte (1798-1857) shared; he felt himself called to it
as a sacred work, and he extolled his “incomparable mission.” He
lamented the anarchical state of the world and contrasted it with the
world of the ancients and that of the Middle Ages. The harmony and
stability of mediaeval society were due, Comte urged, to the spiritual
power and unity of the Catholic Church and faith. The liberty of the
Reformation offers no real basis for society, it is the spirit of
criticism and of revolution. The modern world needs a new spiritual
power. Such was Comte’s judgment upon the world of his time. Where in
the modern world could such a new organising power be found? To this
question Comte gave an answer similar to that of Saint-Simon: he turned
to science. The influence of Saint-Simon is here apparent, and we must
note the personal relations between the two men. In 1817 Comte became
secretary to Saint-Simon, and became intimately associated with his
ideas and his work. Comte recognised, with his master, the supreme
importance of establishing, at the outset, the relations actually
obtaining and the relations possible between science and political
organisation. This led to the publication, in 1822, of a treatise,
_Plan des Travaux scientifiques nécessaires pour réorganiser la
Société_, which unfortunately led to a quarrel between the two friends,
and finally, in 1824, to a definite rupture by which Comte seems to
have been embittered and made rather hostile to his old master and to
have assumed an ungenerous attitude.[8] Comte, however, being a proud
and ambitious spirit, was perhaps better left alone to hew out his own
path. In him we have one of the greatest minds of modern France, and
his doctrine of positivism is one of the dominating features of the
first half of the century.

 [8] In considering the relations between Saint-Simon and Comte we may
 usefully compare those between Schelling and Hegel in Germany.


His break with Saint-Simon showed his own resources; he had undoubtedly
a finer sense of the difficulties of his reforming task than had
Saint-Simon; moreover, he possessed a scientific knowledge which his
master lacked. Such equipment he needed in his ambitious task, and it
is one of the chief merits of Comte that he _attempted_ so large a
project as the Positive Philosophy endeavoured to be.

This philosophy was contained in his _Cours de Philosophie positive_
(1830-1842), which he regarded as the theoretic basis of a reforming
political philosophy. One of the most interesting aspects of this work,
however, is its claim to be a positive _philosophy_. Had not Comte
accepted the Saint-Simonist doctrine of a belief in science as the
great future power in society? How then comes it that he gives us a
“_philosophie_ positive” in the first place and not, as we might
expect, a “_science_ positive”? Comte’s answer to this is that science,
no less than society itself, is disordered and stands in need of
organisation. The sciences have proceeded to work in a piecemeal
fashion and are unable to present us with _une vue d’ensemble_. It is
the rôle of philosophy to work upon the data presented by the various
sciences and, without going beyond these data, to arrange them and give
us an organic unity of thought, a synthesis, which shall produce order
in the mind of man and subsequently in human society.

The precise part to be played by philosophy is determined by the
existing state of scientific knowledge in the various departments and
so depends upon the general stage of intelligence which humanity has
reached. The intellectual development of humanity was formulated
generally by Comte in what is known as “The Law of the Three Stages,”
probably that part of his doctrine which is best known and which is
most obvious. “The Law of the Three Stages” merely sets down the fact
that in the race and in the individual we find three successive stages,
under which conceptions are formed differently. The first is the
theological or fictitious stage, in which the explanation of things is
referred to the operations of divine agency. The second is the
metaphysical or abstract stage when, for divinities, abstract
principles are substituted. In the third, the scientific or positive
stage, the human mind has passed beyond a belief in divine agencies or
metaphysical abstractions to a rational study of the effective laws of
phenomena. The human spirit here encounters the real, but it abstains
from pretensions to absolute knowledge; it does not theorise about the
beginning or the end of the universe or, indeed, its absolute nature;
it takes only into consideration facts within human knowledge. Comte
laid great emphasis upon the necessity of recognising the relativity of
all things. All is relative; this is the one absolute principle. Our
knowledge, he insisted (especially in his _Discours sur l’Esprit
positif_, 1844, which forms a valuable introduction to his thought as
expressed in his larger works), is entirely relative to our
organisation and our situation. Relativity, however, does not imply
uncertainty. Our knowledge is indeed relative and never absolute, but
it grows to a greater accord with reality. It is this passion for
“accord with reality” which is characteristic of the scientific or
positivist spirit.

The sciences are themselves relative and much attention is given by
Comte to the proper classification of the sciences. He determines his
hierarchy by arranging them in the order in which they have themselves
completed the three stages and arrived at positivity. Mathematics,
astronomy, physics, chemistry, biology and sociology are his
arrangement. This last named has not yet arrived at the final stage; it
is but a science in the making. Comte, indeed, himself gives it its
name and founds it as the science of society, science applied to
politics, as was first indicated in his scheme of work and early ideas
of reform.

Comte strongly insists upon the social aspect of all knowledge and all
action. He even goes to the extent of regarding the individual man as
an abstraction; for him the real being is the social being, Humanity.
The study of human society has a double aspect, which is also a feature
of the other sciences. As in biology there is the study of anatomy on
the one hand and of physiology on the other, so in sociology we must
investigate both the laws which govern the existence of a society and
those which control its movements. The distinction is, in short, that
of the static and the dynamic, and it embraces in sociological study
the important conceptions of order and of progress. Comte very rightly
stressed the idea of progress as characteristic of modern times, but he
lamented its being divorced from that of order. He blamed the
conservative view of order as responsible for promoting among
“progressives” the spirit of anarchy and revolution. A positive
sociology would, Comte maintained, reconcile a true order, which does
not exclude change, with real progress, a movement which is neither
destructive nor capricious. Comte here owes a debt in part to
Montesquieu and largely to Condorcet, whose _Esquisse d’un Tableau
historique des Progrès de l’Esprit humain_ (1795) did much to promote
serious reflection upon the question of progress.

We have already noted Comte’s intense valuation of Humanity as a whole
as a Supreme Being. In his later years, notably after 1845, when he met
his “Beatrice” in the person of Clotilde de Vaux, he gave to his
doctrines a sentimental expression of which the Religion of Humanity
with its ritualism was the outcome. This positivist religion
endeavoured to substitute for the traditional God the Supreme Being of
Humanity—a Being capable, according to Comte, of sustaining our
courage, becoming the end of our actions and the object of our love. To
this he attached a morality calculated to combat the egoism which tends
to dominate and to destroy mankind and intended to strengthen the
altruistic motives in man and to raise them to the service of Humanity.

We find Comte, at the opening of our period, restating his doctrines in
his _Système de Politique positive_ (1851-54), to which his first work
was meant to serve as an Introduction. In 1856 he began his _Synthèse
subjective_, but he died in 1857. Comte is a singularly desolate
figure; the powers of officialdom were against him, and he existed
mainly by what he could gain from teaching mathematics and by a pension
raised by his admirers in England and his own land.

The influence of his philosophy has been great and far- reaching, but
it is the _spirit_ of positivism which has survived, not its content.
Subsequent developments in science have rendered much of his work
obsolete, while his Religion has never made a great appeal. Comte’s
most noted disciple, Littré (1801-1881), regarded this latter as a
retrograde step and confined himself to the early part of his master’s
work. Most important for us in the present work is Comte’s influence
upon subsequent thinkers in France, notably Taine, and we may add,
Renan, Cournot, and even Renouvier, although these last two promoted a
vigorous reaction against his philosophy in general. He influenced his
adversaries, a notable testimony. Actually, however, the positivist
philosophy found a greater welcome on the English side of the Channel
from John Stuart Mill, Spencer and Lewes. The empiricism of the English
school proved a more fruitful soil for positivism than the vague
spiritualism of Cousin to which it offered strong opposition.
Positivism, or rather the positivist standpoint in philosophy, turned
at a later date to reseek its fatherland and after a sojourn in England
reappears as an influence in the work of French thinkers near the end
of the century—e.g., Fouillée, Guyau, Lachelier, Boutroux and Bergson
express elements of positivism.

We have now passed in review the four main currents of the first half
of the century, in a manner intended to orient the approach to our
period, 1851-1921. Without such an orientation much of the subsequent
thought would lose its correct colouring and perspective. There is a
continuity, even if it be partly a continuity marked by reactions, and
this will be seen when we now examine the three general currents into
which the thought of the subsequent period is divided.




CHAPTER II
MAIN CURRENTS SINCE 1851


Introductory: Influence of events of 1848-1851—Reactionary character of
Second Empire—Disgust of many thinkers (e.g., Vacherot, Taine, Renan,
Renouvier, Hugo, Quinet)—Effects of 1870, the War, the Commune, and the
Third Republic.

General character of the Philosophy of the Period—Reaction against both
Eclecticism and Positivism.

THE THREE MAIN CURRENTS.


I. Positivist and naturalist current turning upon itself, seen in
Vacherot, Taine, and Renan.

II. Cournot, Renouvier, and the neo-critical philosophy.

III. The New Spiritual Philosophy, to which the main contributors were
Ravaisson, Lachelier, Boutroux, Fouillée, Guyau, Bergson, Blondel, and
Weber.




CHAPTER II
MAIN CURRENTS

The year 1851 was one of remarkable importance for France; a crisis
then occurred in its political and intellectual life. The hopes and
aspirations to which the Revolution of 1848 had given rise were
shattered by the _coup d’état_ of Louis Napoleon in the month of
December. The proclamation of the Second Empire heralded the revival of
an era of imperialism and reaction in politics, accompanied by a
decline in liberty and a diminution of idealism in the world of
thought. A censorship of books was established, the press was deprived
of its liberty, and the teaching of philosophy forbidden in
_lycées_.[1]

 [1] The revival of philosophy in the _lycées_ began when Victor Drury
 reintroduced the study of Logic.


Various ardent and thoughtful spirits, whose minds and hearts had been
uplifted by the events of 1848, hoping to see the dawn of an era
expressing in action the ideals of the first Revolution, _Liberté_,
_Egalité_, _Fraternité_, were bitterly disappointed. Social ideals such
as had been created by Saint-Simon and his school received a rude
rebuff from force, militarism and imperialism. So great was the mingled
disappointment and disgust of many that they left for ever the realm of
practical politics to apply themselves to the arts, letters or
sciences. Interesting examples of this state of mind are to be found in
Vacherot, Taine, Renan and Renouvier, and, we may add, in Michelet,
Victor Hugo and Edgar Quinet. The first of these, Vacherot, who had
succeeded Cousin as Professor of Philosophy at the Sorbonne, lost his
chair, as did Quinet and also Michelet, who was further deprived of his
position as Archivist. Hugo and Quinet, having taken active political
part in the events of 1848, were driven into exile. Disgust,
disappointment, disillusionment and pessimism characterise the attitude
of all this group of thinkers to political events, and this reacted not
only upon their careers but upon their entire philosophy. “With regard
to the Second Empire,” we find Renan saying,[2] “if the last ten years
of its duration in some measure repaired the mischief done in the first
eight, it must never be forgotten how strong this Government was when
it was a question of crushing the intelligence, and how feeble when it
came to raising it up.”

 [2] In his Preface to _Souvenirs d’Enfance et de Jeunesse._


The disheartening end of the Empire in moral degeneracy and military
defeat only added to the gloominess, against which the Red Flag and the
red fires of the Commune cast a lurid and pathetic glow, upon which the
Prussians could look down with a grim smile from the heights of Paris.
Only with the establishment of the Third Republic in 1871, and its
ratification a few years later, does a feeling of cheerfulness make
itself felt in the thought of the time. The years from 1880 onwards
have been remarkable for their fruitfulness in the philosophic field—to
such an extent do political and social events react upon the most
philosophical minds. This is a healthy sign; it shows that those minds
have not detached themselves from contact with the world, that the
spirit of philosophy is a living spirit and not merely an academic or
professional product divorced from the fierce realities of history.

We have already indicated, in the treatment of the “Antecedents” of our
period, the dominance of Eclecticism, supported by the powers of
officialdom, and have remarked how Positivism arose as a reaction
against Cousin’s vague spiritualism. In approaching the second half of
the century we may in general characterise its thought as a reaction
against both eclecticism and positivism. A transitional current can be
distinguished where positivism turns, as it were, against itself in the
work of Vacherot, Taine and Renan. The works of Cournot and the
indefatigable Renouvier with his neo-criticism mark another main
current. Ultimately there came to triumph towards the close of the
century a new spiritualism, owing much inspiration to De Biran, but
which, unlike Cousin’s doctrines, had suffered the discipline of the
positivist spirit. The main contributors to this current are Ravaisson,
Lachelier, Fouillée and Guyau, Boutroux, Bergson, Blondel and Weber.
Our study deals with the significance of these three currents, and
having made this clear we shall then discuss the development of thought
in connection with the various problems and ideas in which the
philosophy of the period found its expression.

In his _Critique of Pure Reason_ Kant endeavoured, at a time when
speculation of a dogmatic and uncritical kind was current, to call
attention to the necessity for examining the instrument of knowledge
itself, and thereby discovering its fitness or inadequacy, as the case
might be, for dealing with the problems which philosophy proposes to
investigate. This was a word spoken in due season and, however much
subsequent philosophy has deviated from the conclusions of Kant, it has
at least remembered the significance of his advice. The result has been
that the attitude adopted by philosophers to the problems before them
has been determined largely by the kind of answer which they offer to
the problems of knowledge itself. Obviously a mind which asserts that
we can never be sure of knowing anything (or as in some cases, that
this assertion is itself uncertain) will see all questions through the
green-glasses of scepticism. On the other hand, a thinker who believes
that we do have knowledge of certain things and can be certain of
thiss, whether by objective proof or a subjective intuition, is sure to
have, not only a different conclusion about problems, but, what is
probably more important for the philosophic spirit, a different means
of approaching them.

Writing in 1860 on the general state of philosophy, Renan pointed out,
in his Essay _La Métaphysique el son Avenir_[3] that metaphysical
speculation, strictly so-called, had been in abeyance for thirty years,
and did not seem inclined to continue the traditions of Kant, Hegel,
Hamilton and Cousin. The reasons which he gave for this depression of
the philosophical market were, firstly, the feeling of the
impossibility of ultimate knowledge, a scepticism of the instrument, so
far as the human mind was concerned, and secondly, the rather
disdainful attitude adopted by many minds towards philosophy owing to
the growing importance of science—in short, the question, “Is there any
place left for philosophy; has it any _raison d’être_?”

 [3] Essay published later (1876) in his _Dialogues et Fragments
 philosophiques_. Cf. especially pp. 265-266.


The progress of the positive sciences, and the assertions of many that
philosophy was futile and treacherous, led philosophy to give an
account of itself by a kind of _apologia pro vita sua_. In the face of
remarks akin to that of Newton’s “Physics beware of metaphysics,” the
latter had to bestir itself or pass out of existence. It was, indeed,
this extinction which the more ardent and devoted scientific spirits
heralded, re-iterating the war-cry of Auguste Comte.

It was a crisis, in fact, for philosophy. Was it to become merely a
universal science? Was it to abandon the task of solving the problems
of the universe by rapid intuitions and a _priori_ constructions and
undertake the construction of a science of the whole, built up from the
data and results of the science of the parts—_i.e._, the separate
sciences of nature? Was there, then, to be no place for metaphysics in
this classification of the sciences to which the current of thought was
tending with increasing impetuosity? Was a science of primary or
ultimate truths a useless chimera, to be rejected entirely by the human
mind in favour of an all-sufficing belief in positive science? These
were the questions which perplexed the thoughtful minds of that time.

We shall do well, therefore, in our survey of the half century before
us, to investigate the two problems which were stressed by Renan in the
essay we have quoted, for his acute mind possessed a unique power of
sensing the feeling and thought of his time. Our preliminary task will
be the examination of the general attitude to knowledge adopted by the
various thinkers and schools of thought, following this by an inquiry
into the attitude adopted to science itself and its relation to
philosophy.

I

With these considerations in mind, let us examine the three currents of
thought in our period beginning with that which is at once a
prolongation of positivism and a transformation of it, a current
expressed in the work of Vacherot, Taine and Renan.

Etienne Vacherot (1809-1897) was partially a disciple of Victor Cousin
and a representative also of the positivist attitude to knowledge. His
work, however, passed beyond the bounds indicated by these names. He
remained a convinced naturalist and believer in positive science, but,
unlike Comte, he did not despise metaphysical inquiry, and he sought to
find a place for it in thought. Vacherot, who had won a reputation for
himself by an historical work on the Alexandrian School, became tne
director of the Ecole Normale Supérieure, an important position in the
intellectual world. He here advocated the doctrines by which he sought
to give a to metaphysics. His most important book, _La Métaphysique et
la Science_, in three volumes, appeared in 1858. He suffered
imprisonment the following year for His liberal principles under the
Empire which had already deprived him of his position at the Sorbonne.

The general attitude to knowledge adopted by Vacherot recalls in some
respects the metaphysical doctrines of Spinoza, and he endeavours to
combine the purely naturalistic view of the world with a metaphysical
conception. The result is a profound and, for Vacherot, irreconcilable
dualism, in which the real and the ideal are set against one another in
rigorous contrast, and the gap between them is not bridged or even
attempted to be filled up, as, at a later date, was the task assumed by
Fouillee in his philosophy of _idées-forces_. For Vacherot the world is
a unity, eternal and infinite, but lacking perfection. Perfection, the
ideal, is incompatible with reality. The real is not at all ideal, and
the ideal has no reality.[4] In this unsatisfactory dualism Vacherot
leaves us. His doctrine, although making a superficial appeal by its
seeming positivism on the one hand, and its maintenance of the notion
of the ideal or perfection on the other, is actually far more
paradoxical than that which asserts that ultimately it is the ideal
only which is real. While St. Anselm had endeavoured to establish by
his proof of the existence of God the reality of perfection, Vacherot,
by a reversal of this proof, arrives at the opposite conclusion, and at
a point where it seems that it would be for the ideal an imperfection
to exist. The absolute existence of all things is thus separated from
the ideal, and no attempt is made to relate the two, as Spinoza had so
rigorously done, by maintaining that reality _is_ perfection.[5]

 [4] It is interesting to contrast this with the attitude of the new
 spiritualists, especially Fouillée’s conception of idees-forces, of
 ideas and ideals realising themselves. See also Guyau’s attitude.
                    “_L’idéal n’est-il pas, sur la terre où nous sommes
                    Plus fécond et plus beau que la réalité?”
                                        —Illusion féconde_.


 [5] Vacherot contributed further to the thought of his time, notably
 by a book on religion, 1869, and later in life seems to have become
 sympathetic to the New Spiritualism, on which he also wrote a book in
 1884.


The influence of Vacherot was in some measure continued in that of his
pupil, Hippolyte Taine (1828-1893), a thinker who had considerable
influence upon the development of thought in our period. His ability as
a critic of art and literature was perhaps more marked than his purely
philosophical influence, but this is, nevertheless, important, and
cannot be overlooked.

Taine was a student of the Ecole Normale, and in 1851 was appointed to
teach philosophy at Nevers. The _coup d’état_, however, changed his
career, and he turned to literature as his main field, writing a work
on La Fontaine for his doctorate in 1853. In the year of Comte’s death
(1857) Taine published his book, _Les Philosophes français du XIXe
Siècle_, in which he turned his powerful batteries of criticism upon
the vague spiritualism professed by Cousin and officially favoured in
France at that time.[6] By his adverse criticism of Cousin and the
Eclectic School, Taine placed his influence upon the side of the
positivist followers of Comte. It would, however, be erroneous to
regard him as a mere disciple of Comte, as Taine’s positivism was in
its general form a wider doctrine, yet more rigorously scientific in
some respects than that of Comte. There was also an important
difference in their attitude to metaphysics. Taine upheld strongly the
value, and, indeed, the necessity, of a metaphysical doctrine. He never
made much of any debt or allegiance to Comte.

 [6] See his chapter xii. on “The Success of Eclecticism,” pp. 283-307.
 Cousin, he criticises at length; De Biran, Royer-Collard and Jouffroy
 are included in his censures. We might mention that this book was
 first issued in the form of articles in the _Revue de l’Instruction
 publique_ during the years 1855, 1856.


In 1860 a volume dealing with the _Philosophy of Art_ appeared from his
pen, in which he not only endeavoured to relate the art of a period to
the general environment in which it arose, but, in addition, he dealt
with certain psychological aspects of the problem. Largely as a result
of the talent displayed in this work, he was appointed in 1864 to tne
chair of the History of Art and Æsthetics in the Ecole des Beaux-Arts.

Taine’s interest in philosophy, and especially in psychological
problems, was more prominently demon strated in his book _De
l’Intelligence_, the two volumes of which appeared in 1870. In this
work he takes a strict view of the human intelligence as a mechanism,
the workings of which he sets forth in a precise and cold manner. His
treatment of knowledge is akin, in some respects, to the doctrines of
the English Utilitarian and Evolutionary School as represented by John
Stuart Mill, Bain and Spencer. The main feature of the Darwinian
doctrine is set by Taine in the foreground of epistemology. There is,
according to him, “a struggle for existence” in the realm of the
individual consciousness no less than in the external world. This inner
conflict is between psychical elements which, when victorious, result
in sense-perception. This awareness, or _hallucination vraie_, is not
knowledge of a purely speculative character; it is (as, at a later
date, Bergson was to maintain in his doctrine of perception)
essentially bound up with action, with the instinct and mechanism of
movement.

One of the most notable features of Taine’s work is his attitude to
psychology. He rejects absolutely the rather scornful attitude adopted
with regard to this science by Comte; at the same time he shatters the
flimsy edifice of the eclectics in order to lay the foundation of a
scientific psychology. “The true and independent psychology is,” he
remarks, “a magnificent science which lays the foundation of the
philosophy of history, which gives life to physiology and opens up the
pathway to metaphysics.”[7] Our debt to Taine is immense, for he
initiated the great current of experimental psychology for which his
country has since become famous. It is not our intention in this
present work to follow out in any detail the purely psychological work
of the period. Psychology has more and more become differentiated from,
and to a large degree, independent of, philosophy in a strictly
metaphysical meaning of that word. Yet we shall do well in passing to
note that through Taine’s work the scientific attitude to psychologv
and its many problems was taken up and developed by Ribot, whose study
of English Psychology appeared in the same year as Taine’s
_Intelligence_. Particularly by his frequent illustrations drawn from
abnormal psychology, Taine “set the tone” for contemporary and later
study of mental activity of this type. Ribot’s later books have been
mainly devoted to the study of “the abnormal,”and his efforts are
characteristic of the labours of the Paris School, comprising Charcot,
Paulhan, Binet and Janet.[8] French psychology has in consequence
become a clearly defined “school,” with characteristics peculiar to
itself which distinguish it at once from the psychophysical research of
German workers and from the analytic labours of English psychologists.
Its debt to Taine at the outset must not be forgotten.

 [7] De l’Intelligence, Conclusion.


 [8] By Charcot (1825-1893), _Leçons sur les Maladies du Système
 nerveux faites à la Salpêtrière_ and _Localisation dans les Maladies
 du Cerveau et de la Moelle épinière_, 1880.
    By Ribot (1839-1916), _Hérédité, Etude psychologique_, 1873, Eng.
    trans., 1875; _Les Maladies de la Mémoire, Essai dans la
    Psychologie positive_, 1881, Eng. trans., 1882; _Maladies de la
    Volonté_, 1883, Eng. trans., 1884; _Maladies de la Personnalité_,
    1885, Eng. trans., 1895. Ribot expressed regret at the way in which
    abnormal psychology has been neglected in England. See his critique
    of Bain in his _Psychologie anglaise contemporaine_. In 1870 Ribot
    declared the independence of psychology as a study, separate from
    philosophy. Ribot had very wide interests beyond pure psychology, a
    fact which is stressed by his commencing in 1876 the periodical _La
    Revue philosophique de la France et de l’Etranger_.
    By Binet (1857-191!), _Magnétisme animal_, 1886; _Les Altérations
    de la personnalité_, 1892; _L’Introduction à la Psychologie
    expérimentale_, 1894. He founded the review _L’Année psychologique
    in 1895_.

By Janet (Pierre), born 1859 now Professeur at the Collège de France,
_L’Automatisme psychologique_, 1889; _Etat mental des Hystériques_,
1894; and _Neuroses et Idées-fixes_, 1898. He founded the _Journal de
Psychologie_.

By Paulhan, _Phénomenes affectifs and L’Activité mentale_.

To the fame of the Paris School of Psychology must now be added that of
the Nancy School embracing the work of Coué.


The War and the subsequent course of events in France seemed to deepen
the sadness and pessimism of Taine’s character. He described himself as
_naturellement triste_, and finally his severe positivism developed
into a rigorous stoicism akin to that of Marcus Aurelius and Spinoza.
This attitude of mind coloured his unfinished historical work, _Les
Origines de la France contemporaine_, upon which he was engaged for the
last years of his life (1876-1894). It may be noticed for its bearing
upon the study of sociological problems which it indirectly encouraged.
Just as Taine had regarded a work of art as the product of social
environment, so he looks upon historical events. This history bears all
the marks of Taine’s rigid, positive philosophy, intensified by his
later stoicism. The Revolution of 1789 is treated in a cold and stern
manner devoid of enthusiasm of any sort. He could not make historical
narrative live like Michelet, and from his own record the Revolution
itself is almost unintelligible. For Taine, however, we must remember,
human nature is absolutely the product of race, environment and
history.[9]

 [9] Michelet (1798-1874), mentioned here as an historian of a type
 entirely different from Taine, influenced philosophic thought by his
 volumes _Le Peuple_, 1846; _L’Amour_, 1858; _Le Prêtre, La Femme et la
 Famille_, 1859; and _La Bible de l’Humanité_, 1864. He and his friend
 Quinet (1803-1875), who was also a Professor at the College de France,
 and was the author of _Génie des Religions_, 1842, had considerable
 influence prior to 1848 of a political and religious character. They
 were in strong opposition to the Roman Catholic Church and had keen
 controversies with the Jesuits and Ultramontanists.


In the philosophy of Taine various influences are seen at work
interacting. The spirit of the French thinkers of the previous
century—sensualists and ideologists—reappears in him. While in a
measure he fluctuates between naturalism and idealism, the
predominating tone of his work is clearly positivist. He was a great
student of Spinoza and of Hegel, and the influence of both these
thinkers appears in his work. Like Spinoza, he believes in a universal
determination; like Hegel, he asserts the real and the rational to be
identical. In his general attitude to the problems of knowledge Taine
criticises and passes beyond the standpoints of both Hume and Kant. He
opposes the purely empiricist schools of both France and England. The
purely empirical attitude which looks upon the world as fragmentary and
phenomenal is deficient, according to Taine, and is, moreover,
incompatible with the notion of necessity. This notion of necessity is
characteristic of Taine’s whole work, and his strict adherence to it
was mainly due to his absolute belief in science and its methods, which
is a mark of all the positivist type of thought.

While he rejected Hume’s empiricism he also opposed the doctrines of
Kant and the neo-critical school which found its inspiration in Kant
and Hume. Taine asserted that it is possible to have a knowledge of
things in their objective reality, and he appears to have based his
epistemology upon the doctrine of analysis proposed by Condillac. Taine
disagreed with the theory of the relativity of human knowledge and with
the phenomenal basis of the neo-critical teaching, its rejection of
“the thing in itself.” He believed we had knowledge not merely relative
but absolute, and he claimed that we can pass from phenomena and their
laws to comprehend the essence of things in themselves. He endeavours
to avoid the difficulties of Hume by dogmatism. While clinging to a
semi-Hegelian view of rationality he avoids Kant’s critical attitude to
reason itself. We have in Taine not a critical rationalist but a
dogmatic rationalist. While the rational aspect of his thought commands
a certain respect and has had in many directions a very wholesome
influence, notably, as we have remarked, upon psychology, yet it proves
itself in the last analysis self-contradictory, for a true rationalism
is critical in character rather than dogmatic.

In Taine’a great contemporary, Ernest Renan (1823-1892), a very
different temper is seen. The two thinkers both possessed popularity as
men of letters, and resembled one another in being devoted to literary
and historical pursuits rather than to philosophy itself.

Renan was trained for the priesthood of the Roman Catholic Church. He
has left us a record of his early life in _Souvenirs d’Enfance et de
Jeunesse_. We there have an autobiography of a sincere and sensitive
soul, encouraged in his priestly career by his family and his teachers
to such a degree that he had conceived of no other career for himself,
until at the age of twenty, under the influence of modern scientific
doctrines and the criticism of the Biblical records, he found himself
an unbeliever, certainly not a Roman Catholic, and not, in the ordinary
interpretation of that rather vague term, a Christian. The harsh,
unrelenting dogmatism of the Roman Church drove Renan from
Christianity. We find him remarking that had he lived in a Protestant.
country he might not have been faced with the dilemma.[10] A _via
media_ might have presented itself in one of the very numerous forms
into which Protestant Christianity, is divided. He might have exercised
in such a sphere, his priestly functions as did Schleiermacher. Renan’s
break with Rome emphasises the clear-cut division which exists in
France between the Christian faith (represented, almost entirely by the
Roman Church) and _libre-pensée_, a point which will claim our
attention later, when we come to treat of the Philosophy of Religion.

 [10] Cf. his _Souvenirs d’Enfance et de Jeunesse_, p. 292.


Having abandoned the seminary and the Church, Renan worked for his
university degrees. The events of 1848-49 inspired his young heart with
great enthusiasm, under the influence of which he wrote his _Avenir de
la Science_. This book was not published, however, until 1890, when he
had lost his early hopes and illusions. In 1849 he went away upon a
mission to Italy. “The reaction of 1850-51 and the _coup d’état_
instilled into me a pessimism of which I am not yet cured,” so he wrote
in the preface to his _Dialogues et Fragments philosophiques_.[11] Some
years after the _coup d’état_ he published a volume of essays (_Essais
de Morale et de Critique_), and he showed his acquaintance with Arabic
philosophy by an excellent treatise on _Averroes et l’Averroisme_
(1859). The following year he visited Syria and, in 1861, was appointed
Professor of Hebrew at the Collège de France. He then began his
monumental work on _Les Origines du Christianisme_, of which the first
volume, _La Vie de Jésus_, appeared in 1863. Its importance for
religious thought we shall consider in our last chapter; here it must
suffice to observe its immediate consequences. These were terrific
onslaughts from the clergy upon its author, which, although they
brought the attention of his countrymen and of the world upon Renan,
resulted in the Imperial Government suspending his tenure of the chair.
After the fall of the Empire, however, he returned to it, and under the
Third Republic became Director of the Collège de France.

 [11] Published only in 1895. The preface referred to is dated 1871.


Renan, although he broke off his career in the Church and his
connection with organised religion, retained, nevertheless, much of the
priestly character all his life, and he himself confesses this: “I have
learned several things, but I have changed in nowise as to the general
system of intellectual and moral life. My habitation has become more
spacious, but it still stands on the same ground. I look upon my
estrangement from orthodoxy as only a change of opinion concerning an
important historical question, a change which does not prevent me from
dwelling on the same foundations as before.” He indeed found it
impossible to reconcile the Catholic faith with free and honest
thought. His break with the Church made him an enemy of all
superstition, and his writings raised against him the hatred of the
Catholic clergy, who regarded him as a deserter. In the customary terms
of heated theological debate he was styled an atheist. This was grossly
unfair or meaningless. Which word we use here depends upon our
definition of theism. As a matter of fact, Renan was one of the most
deeply religious minds of his time. His early religious sentiments
remained, in essence if not in form, with him throughout his life.
These were always associated with the tender memories he had of his
mother and beloved sister and his virtuous teachers, the priests in the
little town of Brittany, whence he came. Much of the Breton mysticism
clung to his soul, and much of his philosophy is a restated,
rationalised form of his early beliefs.

As a figure in the intellectual life of the time, Renan is difficult to
estimate. The very subtilty of his intellect betrayed him into an
oscillation which was far from admirable, and prevented his countrymen
in his own day from “getting to grips” with his ideas. These were
kaleidoscopic. Renan seems a type, reflecting many tendencies of the
time, useful as an illustration to the historian of the ideas of the
period; but for philosophy in the special sense he has none of the
clearly defined importance of men like Renouvier, Lachelier, Guyau,
Fouillée, Bergson or Blondel. His humanism keeps him free from
dogmatism, but his mind fluctuates so that his general attitude to the
ultimate problems is one of reserve, of scepticism and of frequent
paradox and contradiction. Renan seems to combine the positivist scorn
of metaphysics with the Kantian idealism. At times, however, his
attitude is rather Hegelian, and he believes in universal change which
is an evolving of spirit, the ideal or God, call it what we will. We
need not be too particular about names or forms of thought, for, after
all, everything “may be only a dream.” That is Renan’s attitude, to
temper enthusiasm by irony, to assert a duty of doubt, and often,
perhaps, to gain a literary brilliance by contradictory statements.
“The survey of human affairs is not complete,” he reminds us, “unless
we allot a place for irony beside that of tears, a place for pity
beside that of rage, and a place for a smile alongside respect.”[12]

 [12] Preface to his _Drames philosophiques_, 1888.


It was this versatility which made Renan a lover of the philosophic
dialogue. This literary and dramatic form naturally appealed strongly
to a mind who was so very conscious of the fact that the truths with
which philosophy deals cannot be directly denied or directly affirmed,
as they are not subject to demonstration. All the high problems of
humanity Renan recognised as being of this kind, as involving finally a
rational faith; and he claimed that the best we can do is to present
the problems of life from different points of view. This is due
entirely to the peculiar character of philosophy itself, and to the
distinction, which must never be overlooked, between knowledge and
belief, between certitude and opinion. Geometry, for example, is not a
subject for dialogues but for demonstration, as it involves knowledge
and certitude. The problems of philosophy, on the contrary, involve
“_une nuance de foi_,” as Renan styles it. They involve willed
adhesion, acceptance or choice; they provoke sympathy or hate, and call
into play human personality with its varying shades of colour.

This state of _nuance_ Renan asserts to be the one of the hour for
philosophy. It is not the time, he thinks, to attempt to strengthen by
abstract reasoning the “proofs” of God’s existence or of the reality of
a future life. “Men see just now that they can never know anything of
the supreme cause of the universe or of their own destiny. Nevertheless
they are anxious to listen to those who will speak to them about
either.”[13]

 [13] From his Preface to _Drames philosophiques_.


Knowledge, Renan maintained, lies somewhere between the two schools
into which the majority of men are divided. “What you are looking for
has long since been discovered and made clear,” say the orthodox. “What
you are looking for is impossible to find,” say the practical
positivists, the political “raillers” and the atheists. It is true that
we shall never know the ultimate secret of all being, but we shall
never prevent man from desiring more and more knowledge or from
creating for himself working hypotheses or beliefs.

Yet although Renan admits this truth he never approaches even the
pragmatist position of supporting “creative beliefs.” He rather urges a
certain passivity towards problems and opinions. We should, he argues
in his _Examen de Conscience philosophique_,[14] let them work
themselves out in us. Like a spectator we must let them modify our
“intellectual retina”; we must let reality reflect itself in us. By
this he does not mean to assert that the truth about that reality is a
matter of pure indifference to us-far from it. Precisely because he is
so conscious of the importance of true knowledge, he is anxious that we
should approach the study of reality without previous prejudices. “We
have no right,” he remarks, “to have a desire when reason speaks; we
must listen and nothing more.”[15]

 [14] In his _Feuilles detachées_, pp. 401-443.


 [15] _Feuilles détachées_, p. 402.


It must be admitted, however, that Renan’s attitude to the problems of
knowledge was largely sceptical. While, as we shall see in the
following chapter, he extolled science, his attitude to belief and to
knowledge was irritating in its vagueness and changeableness. He
appeared to pose too much as a _dilettante_ making a show of subtle
intellect, rather than a serious thinker of the first rank. His
eminence and genius are unquestioned, but he played in a bewitching and
frequently bewildering manner with great and serious problems, and one
cannot help wishing that this great intellect of his—and it was
unquestionably great—was not more steady and was not applied by its
owner more steadfastly and courageously to ultimate problems. His
writings reflect a bewildering variety of contradictory moods, playful,
scathing, serious and mocking. Indeed, he replied in his _Feuilles
detachées_ (1892) to the accusations of Amiel by insisting that irony
is the philosopher’s last word. For him as for his brilliant
fellow-countryman, Anatole France, ironical scepticism is the ultimate
product of his reflection upon life. His _Examen de Conscience_
philosophique is his Confession of Faith, written four years before his
death, in which he tries to defend his sceptical attitude and to put
forward scepticism as an apology for his own uncertainty and his
paradoxical changes of view. Irony intermingles with his doubt here
too. We do not know, he says, ultimate reality; we do not know whether
there be any purpose or end in the universe at all. There may be, but
on the other hand it may be a farce and fiasco. By refusing to believe
in anything, rejecting both alternatives, Renan argues, with a kind of
mental cowardice, we avoid the consequence of being absolutely
deceived. He recommended an adoption of mixed belief and doubt,
optimism and irony.

This is a surprising attitude in a philosopher and is not
characteristic of great modern thinkers, most of whom prefer belief
(hypothetical although that be) to non-belief. Doubtless Renan’s early
training had a psychological effect which operated perhaps largely
unconsciously throughout his life, and his literary and linguistic
ability seems to have given him a reputation which was rather that of a
man of letters than a philosopher. He had not the mental strength or
frankness to face alternatives squarely and to decide to adopt one.
Consequently he merited the application of the old proverb about being
between two stools. This application was actually made to Renan’s
attitude in a critical remark by Renouvier in his _Esquisse d’une
Classification des Doctrines philosphiques_.[16] Renouvier had no
difficulty in pointing out that the man who hesitates deprives himself
of that great reality, the exercise of his own power of free choice, in
itself valuable and more akin to reality (whatever be the choice) than
a mere “sitting on the fence,” an attitude which, so far from assuring
one of getting the advantages of both possibilities as Renan claims,
may more justly seem to deprive one of the advantages in both
directions. The needs of life demand that we construct beliefs of some
sort. We may be wrong and err, but pure scepticism such as Renan
advocated is untenable. Life, if it is to be real and earnest, demands
of us that we have faith in _some_ values, that we construct _some_
beliefs, _some_ hypotheses, by which we may work.

 [16] Vol. ii., p. 395.


Both Renan and Taine exercised a considerable influence upon French
thought. While inheriting the positivist outlook they, to a great
degree, perhaps unconsciously, undermined the positive position, both
by their interest in the humanities, in art, letters and religion and
in their metaphysical attitude. Taine, beginning with a rigid
naturalism, came gradually to approach an idealistic standpoint in many
respects, while Renan, beginning with a dogmatic idealism, came to
acute doubt, hypotheses, “dreams” and scepticism. Taine kept his
thoughts in too rigid a mould, solidified, while those of Renan seem
finally to have existed only in a gaseous state, intangible, vague and
hazy. We have observed how the positivist current from Comte was
carried over by Vacherot to Taine. In Renan we find that current
present also, but it has begun to turn against itself. While we may say
that his work reflects in a very remarkable manner the spirit of his
time, especially the positivist faith in science, yet we are also able
to find in it, in spite of his immense scepticism, the indications of a
spiritualist or idealist movement, groping and shaping itself as the
century grows older.

II

While the positivist current of thought was working itself out through
Vacherot, Taine and Renan to a position which forms a connecting link
between Comte and the new spiritualism in which the reaction against
positivism and eclecticism finally culminated, another influence was
making itself felt independently in the neo-critical philosophy of
Renouvier.

We must here note the work and influence of Cournot (1801-1877), which
form a very definite link between the doctrines of Comte and those of
Renouvier. He owed much to positivism, and he contributed to the
formation of neo-criticism by his influence upon Renouvier. Cournot’s
_Essai sur le Fondement de nos Connaissances_ appeared in 1851, three
years before Renouvier gave to the world the first volume of his
_Essais de Critique générale_. In 1861 Cournot published his _Traité de
l’Enchaînement des Idées_, which was followed by his _Considerations
sur le Marche des Idées_ (1872) and _Matérialisme_, _Vitalisme_,
_Rationalisme_ (1875). These volumes form his contribution to
philosophical thought, his remaining works being mainly concerned with
political economy and mathematics, a science in which he won
distinction.

Like Comte, Cournot opposed the spiritualism, the eclecticism and the
psychology of Cousin, but he was possessed of a more philosophic mind
than Comte; he certainly had greater philosophical knowledge, was
better equipped in the history of philosophy and had much greater
respect for metaphysical theory. He shared with Comte, however, an
interest in social problems and biology; he also adopted his general
attitude to knowledge, but the spirit of Cournot’s work is much less
dogmatic than that of the great positivist, and he made no pretensions
to be a “pontiff” such as Comte aspired to be. Indeed his lack of
pretensions may account partly for the lack of attention with which his
work (which is shrewd, thoughtful and reserved) has been treated. He
aimed at indicating the foundations of a sound philosophy rather than
at offering a system of thought to the public. This temper was the
product of his scientific attitude. It was by an examination of the
sciences and particularly of the principles upon which they depend that
he formulated his group of fundamental doctrines.

He avoided hasty generalisations or a _priori_ constructions and, true
to the scientific spirit, based his thought upon the data afforded by
experience. He agreed heartily with Comte regarding the relativity of
our knowledge. An investigation of this knowledge shows it to be based
on three principles—order, chance, and probability. We find order
existing in the universe and by scientific methods we try to grasp this
order. This involves induction, a method which cannot give us absolute
certainty, although it approximates to it. It gives us probability
only. There is therefore a reality of chances, and contingency or
chance must be admitted as a factor in evolution and in human history.

Cournot foreshadows many of the doctrines of the new spiritualists as
well as those of the neo-critical school. Much in his work heralds a
Bergson as well as a Renouvier. This is noticeable in his attitude to
science and to the problem of contingency or freedom. It is further
seen in his doctrine that the _vivant_ is incapable of demonstration,
in his view of the soul or higher instinct which he distinguished from
the intelligence, in the biological interest displayed in his work (due
partly to the work of Bichat[17]), and in his idea of a _Travail de
Création_. Unlike Bergson, however, he admits a teleology, for he
believed this inseparable from living beings, but he regards it as a
hazardous finality, not rigid or inconsistent with freedom.

 [17] Bichat (1771-1802) was a noted physiologist and anatomist. In
 1800 appeared his _Recherches physiologiques sur la Vie et la Mort_,
 followed in 1801 by _Anatomie générale, appliquée à la Physiologie et
 à la Médecine_.


The immediate influence of Cournot was felt by only a small circle, and
his most notable affinity was with Renouvier, although Cournot was less
strictly an intellectualist. Like Renouvier he looked upon philosophy
as a “_Critique générale_.” He was also concerned with the problem of
the categories and with the compatibility of science and freedom, a
problem which was now assuming a very central position in the thought
of the period.

Renouvier, in the construction of his philosophy, was partly influenced
by the work of Cournot. In this lone, stern, indefatigable worker we
have one of the most powerful minds of the century. Charles Renouvier
shares with Auguste Comte the first honours of the century in France so
far as philosophical work is concerned. Curiously enough he came from
Comte’s birth-place, Montpellier. When Renouvier was born in 1815,
seventeen years later than Comte, the great positivist was in his
second year of study at the Ecole Polytechnique in Paris. To this great
scientific and mathematical institution came Renouvier, to find Comte
as _Répétiteur_ of Higher Mathematics. He was not only a keen student
of the mathematical sciences but also an ardent follower of
Saint-Simon, and although in later life he lost many of the hopes of
his youth the Saint-Simon spirit remained with him, and he retained a
keen interest in social ethics and particularly in the ideas of
Fourier, Proudhon and Blanc. At the Ecole he met as fellow-pupils Jules
Lequier and Felix Ravaisson.

Instead of entering the civil service Renouvier then applied himself to
philosophy and political science, influenced undoubtedly by Comte’s
work. The year 1848, which saw the second attempt to establish a
republic, gave Renouvier, now a zealous republican, an opportunity, and
he issued his _Manuel républicain de l’Homme et du Citoyen_. This
volume, intended for schoolmasters, had the approval of Carnot,
Minister of Education to the Provisionary Government. Its socialist
doctrines were so criticised by the Chamber of 1849 that Carnot, and
with him the Government, fell from power. Renouvier went further in his
_Gouvernement direct et Organisation communale et centrale de la
République_, in which he collaborated with his socialist friends in
outlining a scheme of communism, making the canton a local power, a
scheme which contained the germ-idea of the Soviet of Bolshevik Russia.
Such ideas were, however, far too advanced for the France of that date
and their proposal did more harm than good to the progressive party by
producing a reaction in wavering minds. Renouvier, through the paper
_Liberté de penser_, launched attacks upon the policy of the
Presidency, and began in the _Revue philosophique_ a serial _Uchronie_,
a novel of a political and philosophical character. It was never
finished. Suddenly, like a bolt from the blue, came, on December and,
the _coup d’état_. The effect of this upon Renouvier was profound.
Disgusted at the power of the monarchy, the shattering of the
republican hopes, the suppression of liberty and the general reaction,
he abandoned political life entirely. What politics lost, however,
philosophy has gained, for he turned his acute mind with its tremendous
energy to the study of the problems of the universe.

Three years after the _coup d’état_, in the same year in which Comte
completed his _Système de Politique_ positive, 1854, Renouvier
published the first volume of his _magnum opus_, the _Essais de
Critique générale_.[18] The appearance of this work is a notable date
in the development of modern French philosophy. The problems therein
discussed will concern us in later chapters. Here we must point out the
indefatigable labour given to this work by Renouvier. The writing and
revision of these essays covered almost the whole of the half century,
concluding in 1897. In their first, briefer form they occupied the
decade 1854-64, and consisted of four volumes only, which on revision
became finally thirteen.[19] These Essays range over Logic, Psychology,
the Philosophy of the Sciences and the Philosophy of History.

 [18] It is interesting for the comparative study of the thought of the
 century to observe that the great work of Lotze in Germany,
 _Mikrocosmos_, was contemporaneous with the _Essais_ of Renouvier.
 Lotze’s three volumes appeared in 1856, 1858 and 1864. The _Logik_ and
 _Metaphysik_ of Lotze should also be compared with Renouvier’s
 _Essais_. Further comparison or contrast may be made with reference to
 the _Logic_ of both Bradley and Bosanquet in England.


 [19] Since 1912 the _Essais de Critique générale_ are available in ten
 volumes, owing to the publications of new editions of the first three
 Essays by A. Colin in five volumes. For details of the original and
 revised publication of the work, see our Bibliography, under Renouvier
 (pp. 334-335).


Having thus laid the foundations of his own throught, Renouvier, in
conjunction with his scholarly friend Pillon, undertook the publication
of a monthly periodical, _L’Année philosophique_, to encourage
philosophic thought in France. This appeared first in 1867, the same
year in which Ravaisson laid the foundations of the new spiritualism by
his celebrated _Rapport_. In 1869 Renouvier published his noteworthy
treatise upon Ethics, in two volumes, _La Science de la Morale_.

The war of 1870 brought his monthly periodical to an untimely end. The
conclusion of the war in 1871 resulted in the establishment, for the
third time, of a republic, which in spite of many vicissitudes has
continued even to this day. With the restoration of peace and of a
republic, Renouvier felt encouraged to undertake the ambitious scheme
of publishing a weekly paper, not only philosophical in character but
political, literary and religious. He desired ardently to address his
countrymen at a time when they were rather intellectually and morally
bewildered. He felt he had something constructive to offer, and hoped
that the “new criticism,” as he called it, might become the philosophy
of the new republic. Thus was founded, in 1872, the famous _Critique
philosophique_, which aimed primarily at the consolidation of the
republic politically and morally,[20] This paper appeared as a weekly
from its commencement until 1884,then continued for a further five
years as a monthly. Renouvier and his friend Pillon were assisted by
other contributors, A. Sabatier, L. Dauriac, R. Allier, who were more
or less disciples of the neo-critical school. Various articles were
contributed by William James, who had a great admiration for Renouvier.
The two men, although widely different in temperament and method, had
certain affinities in their doctrine of truth and certitude.[21]

 [20] In the early numbers, political articles, as was natural in the
 years following 1871, were prominent. Among these early articles we
 may cite the one, “Is France morally obliged to carry out the terms of
 the Treaty imposed upon her by Prussia?”


 [21] On this relationship see James’s _Will to Believe_, p. 143, 1897,
 and the dedications in his _Some Problems of Philosophy_ (to
 Renouvier), and his _Principles of Psychology_ (to Pillon), also
 _Letters of William James_, September i8th, 1892.


Renouvier’s enthusiasm for his periodical did not, however, abate his
energy or ardour for more lasting work. He undertook the task of
revising and augmenting his great work, the _Essais de Critique
générale_, and added to the series another (fifth) Essay, in four
volumes. He also issued in 1876 the curious work _Uchronie_, a history
of “what might have been” (in his view) the development of European
civilisation. Together with Pillon he translated _Hume’s Treatise on
Human Nature_.

Meanwhile the _Critique philosophique_ continued to combat any symptoms
of a further _coup d’état_, and “to uphold strictly republican
principles and to fight all that savoured of Caesar or imperialism.” In
1878 a quarterly supplement _La Critique religieuse_ was added to
attack the Roman Catholic Church and to diminish its power in
France.[22]

 [22] The significance of this effort is more fully dealt with in our
 last chapter.


Articles which had appeared in this quarterly were published as
_Esquisse d’une Classification systématique des Doctrines
philosophiques_ in 1885 in two volumes, the second of which contained
the important Confession of Faith of Renouvier, entitled, _How I
arrived at this Conclusion_.

His thought assumed a slightly new form towards the close of the
century, at the end of which he published, in conjunction with his
disciple Prat, a remarkable volume, which took a prize at the _Académie
des Sciences morales et politiques_, to which rather late in the day he
was admitted as a member at the age of eighty-five. In its title _La
Nouvelle Monadologie_, and method it reveals the influence of Leibnitz.

The close of the century shows us Renouvier as an old man, still an
enormous worker, celebrating his eighty-sixth birthday by planning and
writing further volumes (_Les Dilemmes de la Métaphysique pure_ and its
sequel, _Histoire et Solution des Problèmes métaphysiques_). This
“grand old man” of modern French philosophy lived on into the early
years of the twentieth century, still publishing, still writing to the
last. His final volume, _Le Personnalisme_, was a restatement of his
philosophy, issued when he was in his eighty-ninth year. He died “in
harness” in 1903, dictating to his friend Prat a _résumé_ of his
thought on important points and leaving an unpublished work on the
philosophy of Kant.[23]

 [23] The _résumé_ was published by Prat a couple of years later as
 _Derniers Entretiens_, the volume on the _Doctrine de Kant_, followed
 in 1906.


Renouvier’s career is a striking one and we have sketched it somewhat
fully here because of its showing more distinctly than that of Taine or
Renan the reflections of contemporary history upon the thinking minds
who lived through the years 1848-51 and 1870-71. Renouvier was a young
spirit in the year of the revolution, 1848, and lived right on through
the _coup d’état_, the Second Empire, the Franco-Prussian War, the
Commune, the Third Republic, and he foresaw and perhaps influenced the
Republic’s attitude to the Roman Church. His career is the most
significant and enlightening one to follow of all the thinkers who come
within our period. Let us note that he never held any academic or
public teaching appointment. His life was in the main a secluded one
and, like Comte, he found the University a limited preserve closed
against him and his philosophy, dominated by the declining eclecticism
which drew its inspiration from Cousin. Only gradually did his
influence make itself felt to such a degree that the University was
compelled to take notice of it. Now his work is more appreciated, but
not as much as it might be, and outside his own country he is little
known. The student finds his writings somewhat difficult owing to the
author’s heavy style. He has none of the literary ease and brilliance
of a Renan. But his work was great and noble, animated by a passion for
truth and a hatred of philosophical “shams” and a current of deep moral
earnestness colours all his work. He had considerable power as a
critic, for the training of the Ecole Polytechnique produced a strictly
logical temper in his work, which is that of a true philosopher, not
that of a merely brilliant _litterateur_ or _dilettante_, and he must
be regarded as one of the intellectual giants of the century.

While we see in Positivism a system of thought which opposed itself to
Eclecticism, we find in the philosophy of Renouvier a system of
doctrine which is opposed to both Eclecticism and Positivism. Indeed
Renouvier puts up a strong mental fight against both of these systems;
the latter he regarded as an ambitious conceit. He agreed, however,
with Comte and with Cournot upon the relativity of our knowledge. “I
accept,” he says, “one fundamental principle of the Positivist
School—namely, the reduction of knowledge to the laws of
phenomena.”[24] The author of the _Essais de Critique générale_
considered himself, however, to be the apostolic successor, not of
Comte, but of Kant. The title of _neo-criticisme_[25] which he gave to
his philosophy shows his affinity with the author of the _Kritik der
reinen Vernunft_. This is very noticeable in his method of treating the
problem of knowledge by criticising the human mind and especially in
his giving a preference to moral considerations.[26] It would be,
however, very erroneous to regard Renouvier as a disciple of Kant, for
he amends and rejects many of the doctrines of the German philosopher.
We have noted the fact that he translated Hume; we must observe also
that Hume’s influence is very strongly marked in Renouvier’s
“phenomenalism.”[27] “Renouvier is connected with Hume,” says Pillon,
in the preface he contributed to the translation,[28] “as much as with
Kant. . . . He reconciles Hume and Kant. . . . Something is lacking in
Hume, the notion of law; something is superfluous in Kant, the notion
of substance. It was necessary to unite the phenomenalism of Hume with
the a _priori_ teaching of Kant. This was the work accomplished by
Renouvier.”

 [24] Preface to _Essais de Critique générale_.


 [25] The English word “_criticism_” is, it should be noted, translated
 in French by “_critique_” and not by the word “_criticisme_,” a term
 which is used for the philosophy of the _Kritik_ of Kant.


 [26] In recognising the primacy of the moral or practical reason in
 Kant, Renouvier resembles Fichte.


 [27] Renouvier’s phenomenalism should be compared with that of
 Shadworth Hodgson, as set forth in the volumes of his large work on
 _The Metaphysic of Experience_, 1899. Hodgson has given his estimate
 of Renouvier and his relationship to him in _Mind_ (volume for 1881).


 [28] _Psychologie de Hume : Traité de la Nature humaine_, Renouvier
 Préface par Pillon, p. lxviii.


It may be doubted whether Pillon’s eulogy is altogether sound in its
approval of the “reconciliation” of Hume and Kant, for such a
reconciliation of opposites may well appear impossible. Renouvier
himself faced this problem of the reconciliation of opposites when at
an early age he inclined to follow the Hegelian philosophy, a doctrine
which may very well be described as a “reconciliation of opposites,”
_par excellence_. Dissatisfied, however, with such a scheme Renouvier
came round to the Kantian standpoint and then passed beyond it to a
position absolutely contrary to that of Hegel. This position is frankly
that opposites cannot be reconciled, one or the other must be rejected.
Renouvier thus made the law of contradiction the basis of his
philosophy, as it is the basis of our principles of thought or logic.

He rigorously applied this principle to that very interesting part of
Kant’s work, the antinomies, which he held should never have been
formulated. The reasons put forward for this statement were two: the
principle of contradiction and the law of number. Renouvier did not
believe in what mathematicians call an “infinite number.” He held it to
be an absurd and contradictory notion, for to be a number at all it
must be numerical and therefore not infinite. The application of this
to the Kantian antinomies, as for example to the questions, “Is space
infinite or finite? Had the world a beginning or not?” is interesting
because it treats them as Alexander did the Gordian knot. The admission
that space is infinite, or that the world had no beginning, involves
the admission of an “infinite number,” a contradiction and an
absurdity. Since, therefore, such a number is a pure fiction we _must_
logically conclude that space is finite,[29] that the world had a
beginning and that the ascending series of causes has a first term,
which admission involves freedom at the heart of things.

 [29] It is interesting to observe how the stress laid by Renouvier
 upon the finiteness of space and upon relativity has found expression
 in the scientific world by Einstein, long after it had been expressed
 philosophically.


As Renouvier had treated the antinomies of Kant, so he makes short work
of the Kantian conception of a world of noumena (_Dinge an sich_) of
which we know nothing, but which is the foundation of the phenomena we
know. Like Hume, he rejects all notion of substance, of which Kant’s
noumenon is a survival from ancient times. The idea of substance he
abhors as leading to pantheism and to fatalism, doctrines which
Renouvier energetically opposes, to uphold man’s freedom and the
dignity of human personality.

In the philosophy of Kant personality was not included among the
categories. Renouvier draws up for himself a new list of categories
differing from those of Kant. Beginning with Relation they culminate in
Personality. These two categories indicate two of the strongholds of
Renouvier’s philosophy. Beginning from his fundamental thesis “All is
relative,” Renouvier points out that as nothing can possibly be known
save by or in a relation of some sort it is evident that the most
general law of all is that of Relation itself. Relation is therefore
the first and fundamental category embracing all the others. Then
follow, Number, Position, Succession, Quality. To these are added the
important ones, Becoming, Causality, Finality proceeding from the
simple to the composite, from the abstract to the concrete, from the
elements most easily selected from our experience to that which
embraces the experience itself, Renouvier comes to the final category
in which they all find their consummation-Personality. The importance
which he attaches to this category colours his entire thought and
particularly determines his attitude to the various problems which we
shall discuss in our following chapters.

As we can think of nothing save in relation to consciousness and
consequently we cannot conceive the universe apart from personality,
our knowledge of the universe, our philosophies, our beliefs are
“personal” constructions. But they need not be on that account merely
subjective and individualistic in character, for they refer to
personality in its wide sense, a sense shared by other persons. This
has important consequences for the problem of certitude in knowledge
and Renouvier has here certain affinities to the pragmatist standpoint.

His discussion of certitude is very closely bound up with his treatment
of the problem of freedom, but we may indicate here Renouvier’s
attitude to Belief and Knowledge, a problem in which he was aided by
the work of his friend Jules Lequier,[30] whom he quotes in his second
_Essai de Critique générale_. Renouvier considers it advisable to
approach the problem of certitude by considering its opposite, doubt.
In a famous passage in his second _Essai_ he states the circumstances
under which we do not doubt—namely, “when we see, when we know, when we
believe.” Owing to our liability to error (even seeing is not
believing, and we frequently change our minds even about our “seeing”),
it appears that belief is always involved, and more correctly “we
believe that we see, we believe that we know.” Belief is a state of
consciousness involved in a certain affirmation of which the motives
show themselves as adequate. Certitude arises when the possibility of
an affirmation of the contrary is entirely rejected by the mind.
Certitude thus appears as a kind of belief. All knowledge, Renouvier
maintains, involves an affirmation of will. It is here we see the
contrast so strongly marked between him and Renan, who wished us to
“let things think themselves out in us.” “Every affirmation in which
consciousness is reflective is subordinated, in consciousness, to the
determination to affirm.” Our knowledge, our certitude, our belief,
whatever we prefer to call it, is a construction not purely
intellectual but involving elements of feeling and, above all, of will.
Even the most logically incontrovertible truth are sometimes
unconvincing. This is because certitude is not purely intellectual; it
is _une affaire passionnelle_.[31] Renouvier here not only approaches
the pragmatist position, but he recalls the attitude to will, assumed
by Maine de Biran. For the Cartesian formula De Biran had suggested the
substitution of _Volo, ergo sum_. The inadequacy of the the _Cogito,
ergo sum_ is remarked upon by Lequier, whose treatment of the question
of certainty Renouvier follows. As all demonstration is deductive in
character and so requires existing premises, we cannot expect the
_première vérité_ to be demonstrable. If, from the or certainty, we
must turn to the will to create belief, or certainty, we must turn to
the will to create beliefs, for no evidence or previous truths exist
for us. The _Cogito, ergo sum_ really does not give us a starting
point, as Descartes claimed for it, since there is no proper sequence
from _cogito_ to _sum_. Here we have merely two selves, _moi-pensée_
and _moi-objet_. We need a live spark to bridge this gap to unite the
two into one complete living self; this is found in _moi-volonté_, in a
free act of will. This free act of will affirms the existence of the
self by uniting in a synthetic judgment the thinking-self to the
object-self. “I refuse,” says Renouvier, quoting Lequier, “to follow
the work of a knowledge which would not be mine. I accept the certainty
of which I am the author.” The _première vérité_ is a free personal act
of faith. Certainty in philosophy or in science reposes ultimately upon
freedom and the consciousness of freedom.

 [30] Jules Lequier was born in 1814 and entered the Ecole
 polytechnique in 1834, leaving two years later for a military staff
 appointment. This he abandoned in 1838. He died in 1862 after having
 destroyed most of his writings. Three Years after his death was
 published the volume, _La Recherche d’une première Vérité, fragments
 posthumes de Jules Lequier_. The reader should note the very
 interesting remarks by Renouvier at the end of the first volume of his
 Psychologie rationnelle, 1912 ed., pp. 369-393, on Lequier and his
 Philosophy, also the Fragments reprinted by Renouvier in that work,
 _Comment trouver, comment chercher_, vol. i., on Subject and Object
 (vol. ii.), and on Freedom.


 [31] Lotze employs a similar phrase, eine Gemüths-sache.


Here again, as in the philosophy of Cournot, we find the main emphasis
falling upon the double problem of the period. It is in reality one
problem with two aspects—the relation of science to morality, or, in
other words, the place and significance of freedom.

The general influence of Renouvier has led to the formation of a
neo-critical “school” of thought, prominent members of which may be
cited: Pillon and Prat, his intimate friends, Séailles and Darlu, who
have contributed monographs upon their master’s teaching, together with
Hamelin, Liard and Brochard, eminent disciples. Hamelin (1856-1907),
whose premature and accidental death deprived France of a keen thinker,
is known for his _Essai sur les Eléments principaux de la
Représentation_ (1907), supplementing the doctrines of Renouvier by
those of Hegel.

In the work of Liard (1846-1917), _La Science positive et la
Métaphysique_ (1879), we see a combination of the influence of
Vacherot, Renouvier and Kant. He was also perplexed by the problem of
efficient and final causes as was Lachelier, whose famous thesis _De
l’Induction_ appeared eight years earlier. While Lachelier was
influenced by Kant, he, none the less, belongs to the current of the
new spiritualism which we shall presently examine. Liard, however, by
his adherence to many critical and neo-critical standpoints may be
justly looked upon as belonging to that great current of which
Renouvier is the prominent thinker.

Brochard (1848-1907) is mainly known by his _treatise De l’Erreur_
(1879) and his volumes on Ethics, _De la Responsabilité morale_ (1876),
and _De l’Universalité des Notions morales_ (1876), in all of which the
primacy of moral considerations is advocated in a tone inspired by
Renouvier’s strong moral standpoint. The work _De l’Erreur_ emphasises
the importance of the problem of freedom as being the crux of the whole
question involved in the relation of science and morality. Adhering to
the neo-critical doctrines in general, and particularly to the value of
the practical reason, Brochard, by his insistence upon action as a
foundation for belief, has marked affinities with the doctrines of
Blondel (and Olle-Laprune), the significance of whose work will appear
at the end of our next section.

The phenomenalism of Renouvier was followed up by two thinkers, who
cannot, however, be regarded as belonging to his neo-critical school.
In 1888 Gourd published his work entitled _Le Phénomène_, which was
followed six years later by the slightly more coherent attempt of
Boirac to base a philosophy upon the phenomenalism which expresses
itself so rigidly in Hume. In his book _L’Idée du Phénomène_ (1894), he
had, however, recourse to the Leibnitzian doctrines, which had finally
exercised a considerable influence over Renouvier himself.

III

The reaction against positivism and against eclecticism took another
form quite apart from that of the neocritical philosophy. This was the
triumphant spiritualist philosophy, as we may call it, to give it a
general name, represented by a series of great thinkers—Ravaisson,
Lachelier, Fouillée, Guyau, Boutroux, Bergson and, we may add, Blondel.
These men have all of them had an influence much greater than that of
Renouvier, and this is true of each of them separately. This is rather
noteworthy for, if we exclude Fouillee, whose writings are rather too
numerous, the works of all the other men together do not equal in
quantity the work of Renouvier. There is another point which is worthy
of notice. While Renouvier worked in comparative solitude and never
taught philosophy in any college or university, being, in fact,
neglected by the University of Paris, all the company—Ravaisson,
Lachelier, Fouillée, Guyau, Boutroux and Bergson—had a connection with
the University of Paris in general, being associated with the Sorbonne,
the Collège de France or the important Ecole Normale Supérieure.

The initiator of the spiritualistic philosophy was Ravaisson
(1815-1900), who himself drew inspiration from Maine de Biran, to whose
work he had called attention as early as 1840 in a vigorous article
contributed to the _Revue des Deux Mondes_. This roused the indignation
of Victor Cousin and the eclectics, who in revenge excluded Ravaisson
from the Institute. His independent spirit had been shown in his thesis
_De l’Habitude_ (1838)[32] and his remarkable study of the metaphysics
of Aristotle (1837-1846).

 [32] Reproduced in 1894 in the _Revue de Métaphysique et de Morale_.


Ravaisson’s chief title to fame, however, lies in his famous
philosophic manifesto of 1867, for such, in fact, was his _Rapport sur
la Philosophie en France au XIXè Siècle_. This Report, prepared for the
_Exposition universelle_ at the request of the Ministry of Education,
marks an epoch, for with it began the current of thought which was to
dominate the close of the century. The “manifesto” was a call to free
spirits to assert themselves in favour of a valid idealism. It, in
itself, laid the foundations of such a philosophy and dealt a blow to
both the Eclectic School of Cousin and the followers of Auguste Comte.
Ravaisson wrote little, but his influence was powerful and made itself
felt in the University, where in his office of president of the
_agrégation en philosophie_ he exercised no little influence over the
minds of younger men. His pupils, among whom are to be found Lachelier,
Boutroux and Bergson, have testified to the profound and inspiring
influence which this thinker exercised. A notable tribute to his memory
is the address given by Bergson when he was appointed to take
Ravaisson’s place at the _Académie des Sciences morales et politiques_
in 1904.

Various influences meet in Ravaisson and determine his general attitude
to thought. He reverts, as we have said, to Maine de Biran, whose
insistence upon the inner life he approves. We must examine human
consciousness and make it our basis. We have in it powers of will, of
desire and of love. Ravaisson blends the Aristotelian insistence upon
Thought with the Christian insistence upon Love. In his method he
manifests the influence of the German philosopher, Schelling, whose
lectures he attended at Munich in company with the young Swiss thinker,
Secretan.[33] This influence is seen in his doctrine of synthesis and
his intellectual intuition. Science continues to give us analyses ever
more detailed, but it cannot lead us to the absolute. Our highest, most
sublime knowledge is gained by a synthesis presented in and to our
consciousness, an intuition. Further, he argues that efficient causes,
about which science has so much to say, are really dependent upon final
causes. Spiritual reality is anterior to material reality, and is
characterised by goodness and beauty. Himself an artist, imbued with a
passionate love of the beautiful (he was guardian of sculptures at the
Louvre), he constructs a philosophy in the manner of an artist. Like
Guyau, he writes metaphysics like poetry, and although he did not give
us anything like _Vers d’un Philosophe_, he would have endorsed the
remarks which Guyau made on the relation of poetry and philosophy if,
indeed, it is not a fact that his influence inspired the younger man.

 [33] Charles Secretan (1815-1895), a Swiss thinker with whom Renouvier
 had interesting correspondence. His _Philosophie de la Liberté_
 appeared in 1848-1849, followed by other works on religious
 philosophy. Pillon wrote a monograph upon him.


After surveying the currents of thought up to 1867 Ravaisson not only
summed up in his concluding pages the elements of his own philosophy,
but he ventured to assume the role of prophet. “Many signs permit us to
foresee in the near future a philosophical epoch of which the general
character will be the predominance of what may be called spiritualistic
realism or positivism, having as generating principle the consciousness
which the mind has of itself as an existence recognised as being the
source and support of every other existence, being none other than its
action.”[34] His prophecy has been fulfilled in the work of Lachelier,
Guyau, Fouillée, Boutroux, Bergson, Blondel and Weber.

 [35] _Rapport_, 2nd ed., 1885, p. 275.


After Ravaisson the spiritualist philosophy found expression in the
work of Lachelier (1832-1918), a thinker whose importance and whose
influence are both quite out of proportion to the small amount which he
has written.[36] A brilliant thesis of only one hundred pages, _Du
Fondement de l’Induction_, sustained in 1871, together with a little
study on the Syllogism and a highly important article on _Psychologie
et Métaphysique_, contributed to the _Revue philosophique_ in May of
1885, constitute practically all his written work.[37] It was orally
that he made his influence felt; by his teaching at the Ecole Normale
Supérieure (1864-1875) he made a profound impression upon the youth of
the University and the Ecole by the dignity and richness of his
thought, as well as by its thoroughness.

 [36] Dr. Merz, in his admirable _History of European Thought in the
 Nineteenth Century_, is wrong in regard to Lachelier’s dates; he
 confuses his resignation of professorship (1875) with his death. This,
 however, did not occur until as late as 1918. See the references in
 Mertz, vol. iii., p. 620, and vol. iv., p. 217.


 [37] The thesis and the article have been published together by Alcan,
 accompanied by notes on Pascal’s Wager. The _Etude sur le Syllogisme_
 also forms a volume in Alcan’s _Bibliothèque de Philosophie
 contemporaine_.


Lachelier was a pupil of Ravaisson, and owes his initial inspiration to
him. He had, however, a much more rigorous and precise attitude to
problems. This is apparent in the concentration of thought contained in
his thesis. It is one of Lachelier’s merits that he recognised the
significance of Kant’s work in a very profound manner. Until his thesis
appeared the influence of Leibnitz had been more noticeable in French
thought than that of Kant. It was noticeable in Ravaisson, and
Renouvier, in spite of his professed adherence to Kant, passed to a
Leibnitzian position in his _Nouvelle Monadologie_.

The valuable work _Du Fondement de l’Induction_ is concerned mainly
with the problem of final causes, which Lachelier deduces from the
necessity of totality judgments over and above those which concern
merely efficient causes. On the principle of final causes, or a
ideological conception of a rational unity and order, he founds
Induction. It cannot be founded, he claims, upon a mere empiricism.
This is a point which will concern us later in our examination of the
problem of science.

Lachelier was left, however, with the dualism of mechanism, operating
solely by efficient causes, and teleology manifested in final causes, a
dualism from which Kant did not manage to escape. In his article
_Psychologic et Métaphysique_ he endeavoured to interpret mechanism
itself as a teleological activity of the spirit.[38] He indicates the
absolute basis of our life and experience, indeed of the universe
itself, to be the absolute spontaneity of spirit. In spirit and in
freedom we live and move and have our being. We do not affirm ourselves
to be what we are, but rather we are what we affirm ourselves to be. We
must not say that our present depends upon our past, for we really
create all the moments of our life in one and the same act, which is
both present to each moment and above them all.[39] Here psychology
appears as the science of thought itself and resolves itself into
metaphysics. Here, too, we find the significance of the new
spiritualism; we see its affinity with, and its contrast to, the
doctrines of the older spiritualism as professed by Cousin. Lachelier
here strikes the note which is so clearly characteristic of this
current of thought, and is no less marked in his work than in that of
Bergson—namely, a belief in the supremacy of spirit and in the reality
of freedom.

 [38] It is interesting to compare this with the attitude taken by
 Lotze in Germany.


 [39] _Psychologie et Métaphysique_, p. 171.


The notion of freedom and of the spontaneity of the spirit became
watchwords of the new spiritualist philosophers. Under the work and
influence of Boutroux (1845-1921) these ideas were further emphasised
and worked out more definitely to a position which assumes a critical
attitude to the dogmatism of modern science and establishes a
contingency in all things. Boutroux’s thesis _De la Contingence des
Lois de la Nature_ appeared in 1874 and was dedicated to Ravaisson. His
chief fame and his importance in the development of the spiritualist
philosophy rest upon this book alone. In 1894 he published a course of
lectures given at the Sorbonne in 1892-3, _Sur l’Idée de Loi
naturelle_, which supplements the thesis. Outside his own country
attention has been more readily bestowed upon his writings on the
history of philosophy, of which subject he was Professor. In his own
country, however, great interest and value are attached to his work on
_The Contingency of the Laws of Nature_. In this Boutroux combines the
attitude of Ravaisson with that of Lachelier. The totality of the laws
of the universe manifests, according to him, a contingency. No
explanation of these laws is possible apart from a free spiritual
activity. The stress laid upon contingency in the laws of nature
culminates in the belief in the freedom of man.

The critique of science which marked Boutroux’s work has profoundly
influenced thinkers like Hannequin, Payot and Milhaud,[40] and in the
following century appears in the work of Duhem and of Henri Poincaré,
the noted mathematician, whose books on _La Science et l’Hypothèse_
(1902), _La Valeur de la Science_ (1905), and _Science et Méthode_
(1909) have confirmed many of Boutroux’s conclusions.[41]

 [40] Hannequin’s notable work is the _Essai critique sur L’Hypothèse
 des Atomes_ (1896). Payot’s chief book is _La Croyance_ (1896).
 Milhaud’s critique of science is contained in his _Essai sur les
 Conditions et les Limites de la Certitude logique_ (1894), and in _Le
 Rationnel_ (1898). Duhem’s book is _La Théorie physique_ (1906).


 [41] It is interesting to note that Boutroux married Poincaré’s
 sister, and that his son, Pierre Boutroux, whose education was guided
 by both his uncle and his father, is now Professor at the Collège de
 France. Emile Boutroux was a pupil of Zeller, whose lectures on Greek
 philosophy he attended in Heidelberg, 1868. He expressed to the writer
 his grief at the later prostitution of German thought to nationalist
 and materialist aims. He was Professor of the History of Philosophy in
 Paris from 1888, then Honorary Professor of Modern Philosophy. In 1914
 he gave the Hertz Lecture to the British Academy on _Certitude et
 Vérité_. He was until his death Directeur de la Fondation Thiers, a
 college for post-graduate study, literary, philosophical and
 scientific.


While the new spiritualist current was thus tending to a position far
removed from that of Taine, at the commencement of our period, a
wavering note was struck by the idealist Fouillée (1838-1912), who,
while maintaining a general attitude in harmony with the new doctrines
endeavoured to effect a reconciliation with the more positive attitude
to science and philosophy. In his _philosophie des ideés-forces_[42] he
endeavoured to combine and reconcile the diverging attitudes of Plato
and of Comte. He shows a scorn of the neo-critical though of Renouvier.
He wrote in his shorter life more books than did Renouvier, and he is
conspicuous among this later group of thinkers for his mass-production
of books, which appeared steadily at the rate of one _per annum_ to the
extent of some thirty-seven volumes, after he gave up his position as
_maître de conférence_ at the Ecole Normale owing to ill-health.[43]

 [42] His _Evolutionnisme des Idées-forces_ appeared in 1890, _La
 Psychologie des Idées-forces_ three years later. His _Morale des
 Idées-forces_ belongs to the next century (1907), but its principles
 were contained already in his thesis _Liberté et Déterminisme_.


 [43] He only held this for three years, 1872-75.


Fouillée, with the noblest intentions, set himself to the solution of
that problem which we have already indicated as being the central one
of our period, the relation of science and ethics, or, in brief, the
problem of freedom. This was the subject of his thesis, undoubtedly the
best book he ever wrote, _La Liberté et le Déterminisme_, which he
sustained in 1872.[44] The attitude which he takes in that work is the
keynote to his entire philosophy. Well grounded in a knowledge of the
history of systems of philosophy, ancient and modern, he recognises
elements of truth in each, accompanied by errors due mainly to a
one-sided perspective.[45] He recalls a statement of Leibnitz to the
effect that most systems are right in their assertions and err in their
denials. Fouillée was convinced that there was reconciliation at the
heart of things, and that the contradictions we see are due to our
point of view. Facing, therefore, in this spirit, the problems of the
hour, he set himself “to reconcile the findings of science with the
reality of spirit, to establish harmony between the determinism upheld
by science and the liberty which the human spirit acclaims, between the
mechanism of nature and the aspirations of man’s heart, between the
True which is the object of all science and the Good which is the goal
of morality.”[46]

 [44] This work created quite a stir in the intellectual and political
 world in France just after the war. Fouillée’s book led to an attack
 on the ministry, which did not go so far as that occasioned by
 Renouvier’s volume in 1849. (See p. 61.)


 [45] Fouillée stands in marked contrast to Comte in his general
 acquaintance with the history of ideas. Comte, like Spencer, knew
 little of any philosophy but his own. Fouillée, however, was well
 schooled, not only in Plato and the ancients, but had intimate
 knowledge of the work of Kant, Comte, Spencer, Lotze, Renouvier,
 Lachelier, Boutroux and Bergson.


 [46] This is also the idea expressed at length in his _Avenir de la
 Métaphysique_, 1889.


Fouillée had no desire to offer merely another eclecticism _à la mode
de Cousin_; he selects, therefore, his own principle of procedure. This
principle is found in his notion of _idée-force_. Following ancient
usage, he employs the term “idea” for _any_ mental presentation. For
Fouillée, however, ideas are not _idées-spectacles_, merely exercising
a platonic influence “remote as the stars shining above us.” They are
not merely mental reproductions of an object, real or hypothetical,
outside the mind. Ideas are in themselves forces which endeavour to
work out their own realisation. Fouillée opposes his doctrine to the
evolutionary theory of Spencer and Huxley. He disagrees with their
mechanism and epiphenomenalism, pointing out legitimately that our
ideas, far from being results of purely physical and independent
causes, are themselves factors, and very vital factors, in the process
of evolution. Fouillée looks upon the mechanistic arrangement of the
world as an expression or symbol of idea or spirit in a manner not
unlike that of Lotze.

He bears out his view of _idées-forces_ by showing how a state of
consciousness tries to realise its object. The idea of movement is
closely bound up with the physiological and physical action, and,
moreover, tends to produce it. This realisation is not a merely
mechanistic process but is teleological and depends on the vital unity
between the physical and the mental. On this fundamental notion
Fouillée constructs his psychology, his ethic, his sociology and his
metaphysic. He sees in the evolutionary process ideas at work which
tend to realise themselves. One of these is the idea of freedom, in
which idea he endeavours to find a true reconciliation of the problem
of determinism in science and the demands of the human spirit which
declares itself free. The love of freedom arising from the idea of
freedom creates in the long run this freedom. This is Fouillée’s method
all through. “To conceive and to desire the ideal is already to begin
its realisation.” He applies his method with much success in the realm
of ethics and sociology where he opposes to the Marxian doctrine of a
materialist determination of history that of a spiritual and
intellectual determination by ideas. Fouillée’s philosophy is at once
intellectual and voluntarist. He has himself described it as
“spiritualistic voluntarism.” It is a system of idealism which reflects
almost all the elements of modern thought. In places his doctrine of
reconciliation appears to break down, and the psychological law summed
up in _idées-forces_ is hardly sufficient to bear the vast erection
which Fouillée builds upon it. The idea is nevertheless a valuable and
fruitful one. Fouillée’s respect for positive science is noteworthy, as
is also his great interest in social problems.[47]

 [47] At the end of the century these problems received highly
 specialised attention in the work of the sociologists inspired by
 Comte’s influence. Works of special merit in this direction are:
 tspmas, with his _Société’s animales_ (1876) and Tarde, predecessor of
 Bergson at the Collège de France (1843-1907), with his _Criminalité
 comparée_ (1898) and _Les Lois de l’Imitation_ (1900), also Durkheim’s
 work _De la Division du Travail social_ (1893) and _Les Régles de la
 Méthode sociologique_ (1894), and Izoulet, with his _La Cité moderne_
 (1894). Note those of Levy-Bruhl, Bouglé, and Le Bon.


The importance of the sociological aspect of all problems was
emphasised in a brilliant manner by Guyau (1854-1888), the step-son of
Fouillée. Guyau was a gifted young man, whose death at the early age of
thirty-four was a sore bereavement for Fouillée and undoubtedly a
disaster for philosophy. Guyau was trained by his step-father,[48] and
assisted him in his work. When ill-health forced both men from their
professorships,[49] they lived in happy comradeship at Mentone at the
same time, it is interesting to note, that Nietzsche was residing
there. Equally interesting is it to observe that although Guyau and
Fouillée were unaware of the German thinker’s presence or his work,
Nietzsche was well acquainted with theirs, particularly that of Guyau.
Doubtless he would have been pleased to meet the author of the
_Esquisse d’une Morale sans Obligation ni Sanction_ (1885) and
_L’Irreligion de l’Avenir_ (1887). Editions of these books exist in the
_Nietzsche-Archiv_ bearing Nietzsche’s notes and comments.

 [48] Some authorities are of opinion that Fouillée was actually the
 father of Guyau. Fouillée married Guyau’s mother.


 [49] Guyau taught at the Lycée Condorcet (1874) where young Henri
 Bergson was studying (1868-1878).


Guyau himself has a certain affinity with Nietzsche, arising from his
insistence upon Life and its power; but the author of the delightful
little collection _Vers d’un Philosophe_ (1881) is free from the egoism
expressed in _Der Wille zur Macht_. Guyau posits as his
_idée-directrice_ the conception of Life, both individual and social,
and in this concept he professes to find a basis more fundamental than
that of force, movement or existence. Life involves expansion and
intension, fecundity and creation. It means also consciousness,
intelligence and feeling, generosity and sociability. “He only lives
well who lives for others.” Life can only exist by extending. It can
never be purely egoistic and endure; a certain giving of itself, in
generosity and in love, is necessary for its continuance. Such is the
view which the French philosopher-poet expresses in opposition to
Nietzsche, starting, however, from the concept of Life did Nietzsche.
Guyau worked out a doctrine of ethics and of religion based upon this
concept which will demand our special attention in its proper place,
when we consider the moral and religious problem. He strove to give an
idealistic setting to the doctrines of evolution, and this alone would
give him a place among the great thinkers of the period.

In his doctrine of the relation of thought and action Guyau followed
the _philosophie des idées-forces_. On the other hand there are very
remarkable affinities between the thought of Guyau and that of Bergson.
Guyau is not so severely intellectual as Fouillée; his manner of
thought and excellence of style are not unlike Bergson. More noticeably
he has a conception of life not far removed from the _élan vital_. His
“expansion of life” has, like Bergson’s _évolution créatrice_, no goal
other than that of its own activity. After Guyau’s death in 1888 it was
found that he had been exercised in mind about the problem of Time, for
he left the manuscript of a book entitled _La Genèse de l’Idée de
Temps_.[50] He therein set forth a belief in a psychological,
heterogeneous time other than mathematical time, which is really
spatial in character. In this psychological time the spirit lives. The
year following Guyau’s death, but before his posthumous work appeared,
Bergson published his thesis _Les Données immédiates de la Conscience_
(1889), which is better described by its English title _Time and Free
Will_, and in which this problem which had been present to Guyau’s mind
is taken up and treated in an original and striking manner. In Guyau,
too, is seen the rise of the conception of activity so marked in the
work of Bergson and of Blondel. “It is _action_ and the power of life,”
he insists, “which alone can solve, if not entirely at least partially,
those problems to which abstract thought gives rise.”[51]

 [50] This work was edited and published by Fouillée two years after
 Guyau’s death, and reviewed by Bergson in the _Revue philosophique_ in
 1891.


 [51] _Esquisse d’une Morale sans Obligation ni Sanction_, p. 250.


Bergson, born in 1859, Professor at the Collège de France from 1901 to
1921, now retired, has had a popularity to which none of the other
thinkers of this group, or indeed of our period, has attained. He is
the only one of the new idealists or spiritualists who is well known
outside his own country. For this reason foreigners are apt to regard
him as a thinker unrelated to any special current of thought, an
innovator. Although much is original and novel in his philosophy, his
thought marks the stage in the development to which the spiritualist
current has attained in contemporary thought. The movement of which he
forms a part we can trace back as far as Maine de Biran, to whom
Bergson owes much, as he does also to Ravaisson, Lachelier, Boutroux
and Guyau.

Two important books by Bergson came prior to 1900, his _Time and Free
Will_ (1889) and his _Matter and Memory_ (1896). His famous _Creative
Evolution_ appeared in 1907. It is but his first work “writ large,” for
we have in _Time and Free Will_ the essentials of his philosophy.

He makes, as did Guyau, a central point of Change, a universal
becoming, and attacks the ordinary notion of time, which he regards as
false because it is spatial. We ourselves live and act in _durée_,
which is Bergson’s term for real time as opposed to that fictitious
time of the mathematician or astronomer. He thus lays stress upon the
inward life of the spirit, with its richness and novelty, its eternal
becoming, its self-creation. He has his own peculiar manner of
approaching our central problem, that of freedom, of which he realises
the importance. For him the problem resolves itself into an application
of his doctrine of _la durée_, to which we shall turn in due course.

Bergson insists with Guyau and Blondel upon the primary significance of
action. The importance attached to action colours his whole theory of
knowledge. His epistemology rests upon the thesis that “the brain is an
instrument of action and not of representation,” and that “in the study
of the problems of perception the starting- point should be action and
not sensation.” This is a psychology far different from that of
Condillac and Taine, and it is largely upon his merit as a psychologist
that Bergson’s fame rests. He devoted his second work, _Matter and
Memory_, to showing that memory is something other than a function of
the brain. His distinction between “pure” memory and mere memorising
power, which is habit, recalls the _mémoire_ of Maine de Biran and of
Ravaisson upon _Habit_. Bergson sees in memory a manifestation of
spirit, which is a fundamental reality, no mere epiphenomenon. Spirit
is ever striving against matter, but in spite of this dualism which he
cannot escape, he maintains that spirit is at the origin of things.
This is a difficulty which is more clearly seen in his later book,
_Creative Evolution_. Matter is our enemy and threatens our personality
in its spiritual reality by a tendency to lead us into habit, away from
life, freedom and creativeness.

Further we must, he claims, endeavour to see things _sub specie
durationis in a durée_, in an eternal becoming. We cannot expect to
grasp all the varied reality of life in a formula or indeed in any
purely intellectual manner. This is the chief defect of science and of
the so-called scientific point of view. It tries to fix in concepts,
moulds and solid forms a reality which is living and moving eternally.
For Bergson all is Change, and this eternal becoming we can only grasp
by intuition. Intuition and intellect do not, however, oppose one
another. We are thus led to realise that Life is more than logic. The
Bergsonian philosophy concludes with intuitionism and contingency,
which drew upon it the severe criticisms of Fouillée,[52] who termed it
a philosophy of scepticism and nihilism. Of all the spiritualist group
Fouillée stands nearest the positive attitude to science, and his
strong intellectualism comes out in his criticism of Bergson, who well
represents, together with Blondel, the tendency towards
non-intellectual attitudes inherent in the spiritualist development.
Blondel has endeavoured to treat the great problems, a task which
Bergson has not attempted as yet, partly because he (Bergson) shares
Renan’s belief that “the day of philosophic systems has gone,” partly
because he desires to lay the basis of a philosophy of the spirit to
which others after him may contribute, and so he devotes his attention
to method and to those crucial points, such as the problem of freedom
upon which a larger doctrine must necessarily rest.[53]

 [52] Particularly in his work _Le Mouvement idéaliste et la Réaction
 contre la Science positive_ (cf. .206), 1896, and later in _La Pensée
 et les nouvelles Ecoles anti-intellectualistes_, 1910.


 [53] For a fuller appreciation of the Bergsonian doctrines than is
 possible in such a survey as this, the reader is referred to the
 author’s monograph, _Bergson and His Philosophy_, Methuen and Co.,
 1920.


The current of the new idealism or spiritualism reaches a culminating
point in the work of Blondel (born about 1870), whose remarkable and
noteworthy book _L’Action_ appeared in l893.[54] The fundamental thesis
of the Philosophy of Action[55] is that man’s life is primarily one of
action, consequently philosophy must concern itself with the active
life and not merely with thought. By its nature, action is something
unique and irreducible to other elements or factors. It is not the
result of any synthesis: it is itself a living synthesis, and cannot be
dealt with as the scientist deals with his data. Blondel lays emphasis,
as did Bergson, upon “the living” being unique and inexpressible in
formulae. Intellect cannot grasp action; “one penetrates the living
reality only by placing oneself at the dynamic point of view of the
will.”[56] His words recall Bergson’s attitude to the free act. “The
principle of action eludes positive knowledge at the moment at which it
makes it possible, and, in a word that needs to be better defined, it
is subjectivity.”[57]

 [54] The same year in which the philosophic interest in France,
 growing since 1870, and keener in the eighties, led to the foundation
 of the famous _Revue de Métaphysique et de Morale_ by Xavier Léon. In
 1876 (the same year in which Professor Croom Robertson in England
 established the periodical _Mind_) Ribot had founded the _Revue
 philosophique de la France et de l’Etranger_. These journals, along
 with the teaching in the Lycées, have contributed to make the French
 people the best educated, philosophically, of any people.


 [55] It is interesting to note that this designation has been used by
 its author to replace his original term “_pragmatisme_,” which he
 employed in 1888 and abandoned upon becoming acquainted with the
 theory of Peirce and James, and with their use of the term in another
 manner, with which he did not agree. See _Bulletin de la Société
 française de Philosophie_, 1902.


 [56] _L’ Action_, p. 100.


 [57] _Ibid_., p. 87.


Blondel, however, leads us beyond this subjectivity, for it is not the
will which causes what is. Far from that, he maintains that in so far
as it wills it implies something which it does not and cannot create of
itself; it wills to be what it is not yet. We do not act for the mere
sake of acting, but for some end, something beyond the particular act.
Action is not self-contained or self- sufficing: it is a striving to
further attainment or achievement. It therefore pre-supposes some
reality beyond itself. Here appear the elements of “passion” and
“suffering” due to resistance, for all action involves some opposition.
In particular moral action implies this resistance and a consciousness
of power to overcome the resistance, and it therefore involves a
reality which transcends the sphere in which we act.

Owing to this inequality between the power and the wish, we are obliged
to complete our actions or our activity in general by a belief in a
Reality beyond. It is, however, “a beyond that is within,” a Divine
power immanent in man. This view, Blondel claims, unites the idea of
God “transcendent” with the idea of God as “immanent.” Man’s action
partakes of both, for in so far as it results from his own will it is
immanent; transcendence is, however, implied in the fact that the end
of man’s action as a whole is not “given.” Blondel leads us to a
conception of a religious idealism in which every act of our ordinary
existence leads ultimately to a religious faith. Every action is
sacramental. Blondel and his follower Laberthonnière, who has taken up
this idea from his master in his volume of _Essais de Philosophie
réligieuse_ (1901), go beyond a purely pragmatist or voluntarist
position by finding the supreme value of all action, and of the
universe, not in will but in love. For Blondel this word is no mere
sentiment or transient feeling, but a concrete reality which is the
perfection of will and of intellect alike, of action and of knowledge.
The “Philosophy of Action,” asserts Blondel, includes the “Philosophy
of the Idea.” In the fact of love, he claims, is found the perfect
unity between the self and the non-self, the ground of personality and
its relation to the totality of persons, producing a unity in which
each is seen as an end to others as well as to himself. “Love,” says
Laberthonnière, “is the first and last word of all. It is the
principle, the means and the end. It is in loving that one gets away
from self and raises oneself above one’s temporal individuality. It is
in loving that one finds God and other beings, and that one finds
oneself.” It is, in short, these idealists claim, the _Summum Bonum_;
in it is found the Absolute which philosophers and religious mystics of
all ages have ever sought.

The “philosophy of action” is intimately bound up with the “philosophy
of belief,” formulated by Ollé-Laprune, and the movement in religious
thought known generally as Modernism, which is itself due to the
influence of modern philosophic thought upon the dogmas of the
Christian religion, as these are stated by the Roman Church. Both the
Philosophy of Belief and Modernism are characterised by an intense
spirituality and a moral earnestness which maintain the primacy of the
practical reason over the theoretical reason. Life, insists
Ollé-Laprune in his book _Le Prix de la Vie_ (l885),[58] is not
contemplation but active creation. He urges us to a creative evolution
of the good, to an employment of _idées-forces_. “There are things to
be made whose measure is not determined; there are things to be
discovered, to be invented, new forms of the good, ideas which have
never yet been received—creations, as it were, of the spirit that loves
the good.” This dynamism and power of will is essential. We must not
lose ourselves in abstractions; action is the supreme thing: it alone
constitutes reality.

 [58] This has been followed in the new century by _La Raison et le
 Rationalisme_, 1906. As early as 1880, however, he issued his work _La
 Certitude morale_, which influenced Blondel, his pupil.


A similar note is sounded by the Modernists or Neo-Catholics,
particularly by the brilliant disciple and successor of Bergson, Le
Roy, who in _Dogme et Critique_ (1907) has based the reality of
religious dogma upon its practical significance. We find Péguy (who
fell on the field of battle in 1914) applying Bergsonian ideas to a
fervid religious faith. Wilbois unites these ideas to social ethics in
his _Devoir et Durée_ (1912). In quite different quarters the new
spiritualism and philosophy of action have appeared as inspiring the
Syndicalism of Sorel, who endeavours to apply the doctrines of Bergson,
Ollé-Laprune and Blondel to the solution of social questions in his
_Réflexions sur la Violence_ (1907) and _Illusions du Progrès_ (1911).

It would be erroneous to regard Bergson’s intuitional philosophy as
typical of all contemporary French thought. Following Renouvier,
Fouillée and Boutroux, there prevail currents of a more intellectualist
or rationalist type, to which we are, perhaps, too close to see in true
and historical perspective. The _élan vital_ of French thought
continues to manifest itself in a manner which combines the work of
Boutroux and Bergson with Blondel’s idealism. A keen interest is being
taken in the works of Spinoza, Kant and Hegel, and this is obviously
influencing the trend of French philosophy at the moment, without
giving rise to a mere eclecticism. French thought is too original and
too energetic for that. In addition to these classical studies we
should note the great and growing influence of the work of Durkheim and
of Hamelin, both of whom we have already mentioned. The former gave an
immense impetus to sociological studies by his earlier work. Further
interest arose with his _Formes élémentaires de la Vie religieuse_ in
1912. Hamelin indicated a turning-point from _neo-criticisme_ through
the new spiritualist doctrines to Hegelian methods and ideas.
Brunschwicg, who produced a careful study of Spinoza, wrote as early as
1897 on _La Modalité du Jugement_, a truly Kantian topic. This
thinker’s later works, _Les Etapes de la Philosophie mathematique_
(1912) and the little volume _La Vie de l’esprit_, illustrate a
tendency to carry out the line taken by Boutroux—namely, to arrive at
the statement of a valid idealism disciplined by positivism. The papers
of Berthelot in his _Evolutionnisme et Platonisme_ are a further
contribution to this great end. In the work of Evellin, _La Raison pure
et les Antinomies_ (1907), the interest in Kant and Hegel is again
seen. Noël, who contributed an excellent monograph on Lachelier to the
_Revue de Métaphysique et de Morale_ (that journal which is an
excellent witness in itself to the vitality of contemporary French
philosophy), produced a careful study of Hegel’s Logik in 1897. Since
that date interest has grown along the lines of Boutroux, Bergson and
Blondel in an attempt to reach a positive idealism, which would combine
the strictly positivist attitude so dear to French minds with the
tendency to spiritualism or idealism which they also manifest. This
attempt, which in some respects amounts to an effort to restate the
principles of Hegel in modern or contemporary terms, was undertaken by
Weber in 1903 in his book entitled _Vers le Positivisme absolu par
l’Idéalisme_. Philosophy in France realises to-day that the true course
of spiritual development will be at once positive and idealistic.




CHAPTER III
SCIENCE


INTRODUCTION: The scientific outlook—Progress of the sciences—The
positivist spirit, its action on science, philosophy and literature—The
problem as presented to philosophy.

I. Comte’s positivism—Work of prominent scientists—Position maintained
by Berthelot and Bernard—Renan’s confidence—Vacherot and
Taine—Insufficiency of sciences alone.

II. Cournot and Renouvier attack the dogmatism of science.

III. The neo-spiritualist group continue and develop this attack, which
becomes a marked feature in Lachelier, Boutroux, and Bergson.

Entire change of attitude in the development of the period.

The problem of freedom opened up in the process.




CHAPTER III
SCIENCE

Having thus surveyed the main currents of our period and indicated the
general attitude adopted to knowledge by the various thinkers, we
approach more closely to the problem of the relation of science and
philosophy. The nineteenth century was a period in which this problem
was keenly felt, and France was the country in which it was tensely
discussed by the most acute minds among the philosophers and among the
scientists. French thought and culture, true to the tradition of the
great geometrician and metaphysician Descartes, have produced men whose
training has been highly scientific as well as philosophical. Her
philosophers have been keenly versed in mathematics and physical
science, while her scientists have had considerable power as
philosophical thinkers.

One of the very prominent tendencies of thought in the first half of
the nineteenth century was the growing belief and confidence in the
natural sciences. In France this was in large measure due to the
progress of those sciences themselves and to the influences of Comte,
which was supported by the foreign influences of Kant’s teaching and
that of the English School, particularly John Stuart Mill. These three
great streams of thought, widely different in many respects, had this
in common—that they tended to confuse philosophy and science to such a
degree that it seemed doubtful whether the former could be granted any
existence by itself. Science, somewhat intoxicated by the praise and
worship bestowed upon her, became proud, arrogant and overbearing. She
scorned facts which could not be adapted to her own nature, she ignored
data which were not quantitative and materialistic, and she regarded
truth as a system of laws capable of expression by strict mathematical
methods and formulae*. Hence science became characterised by a firm
belief in absolute determinism, in laws of necessity operating after
the manner of mathematical laws. This “universal mathematic”
endeavoured also to explain the complex by reference to the simple.
Difficulties were encountered all along the line, for experience, it
was found, did not quite fit into rigid formulae*, “new” elements of
experience presented a unique character and distressing discrepancy.
Confidence in science, however, was not shaken by this, for the perfect
science, it was imagined, was assured in a short time. Patience might
be needed, but no doubt was entertained of the _possibility_ of such a
construction. Doubters were told to look at the rising sciences of
psychology and sociology, which, as Auguste Comte had himself
prophesied, were approaching gradually to the “type” venerated—namely,
an exact and mathematical character. Biology, it was urged, was merely
a special branch of physico-chemistry. As for beliefs in freedom, in
art, morality and religion, these, like philosophy (metaphysics)
itself, belonged to the earlier stages (the theological and
metaphysical) of Comte’s list, stages rapidly to be replaced by the
third and final “positive” era.

Such, briefly stated, were the affirmations so confidently put forward
on behalf of science by its devoted worshippers. Confidence in science
was a marked feature of the work written by Renan in the years
1848-1849, _L’Avenir de la Science_. Yet, paradoxical as it may seem,
Renan himself played a large part in undermining this confidence. Yet
the time of his writing this work is undoubtedly the period when the
confidence in science was most marked. By this it is not implied that
an even greater confidence in science has not been professed since by
many thinkers. That is probably true, but the important point is that
at this time the confidence in science was less resisted than ever in
its history. It seemed to have a clear field and positivism seemed to
be getting unto itself a mighty victory.

The cult of facts, which is so marked a characteristic of the
scientific or positivist temper, penetrated, it is interesting to note,
into the realm of literature, where it assumed the form of “realism.”
In his Intelligence we find Taine remarking, “_de tout petits fails
bien choisis, importants, significatifs, amplement circonstanciés et
minutieusement notés, voilà aujourd’hui la matière de toute
science_.”[1] It was also, in the opinion of several writers, the
_matière de toute littérature_. The passion for minute details shows
itself in the realism of Flaubert and Zola, in the psychology of
Stendthal* and the novels of the Goncourts. It was no accident that
their works were so loved by Taine. A similar spirit of “positivism” or
“realism” animated both them and him.

 [1] Preface to _Intelligence_.


With the turn of the half century, however, a change manifested itself
by the fact that the positivist current began to turn against itself,
and our period is, in some respects, what Fouillée has called _la
réaction centre la science positive_.[2] The function of philosophy is
essentially criticism, and although at that period the vitality of
philosophy was low, it nevertheless found enough energy to criticise
the demands and credentials of Science.

 [2] Compare also Aliotta’s book, _The Idealistic Reaction against
 Science_, Eng. trans., 19l4.


The publication of Claude Bernard’s volume _Introduction à la Médecine
experimentale_[3] drew from the pen of Paul Janet, the last of the
Eclectic School dominated by Cousin, an article of criticism which
appeared in the _Revue des Deux Mondes_, and was later published in his
volume of essays entitled, _Les Problèmes du XIXe Siècle_. Although
Janet’s essay reveals all the deficiencies of the older spiritualism,
he makes a gallant attempt to combat the dogmatism and the assumed
finality of Bernard’s point of view and that of the scientists in
general. Janet regarded the sciences and their relation to philosophy
as constituting an important problem for the century and in this
judgment he was not mistaken.

 [3] _Cf_. Livre III., _Science_, chap, i., on “Method in General”;
 chap, ii., on The Experimental Method in Physiology,” pp. 213-279.

I

We have, in our Introductory Chapter, reckoned Auguste Comte among the
influential antecedents of our period. Here, in approaching the study
of the problem of science, we may note that the tendency towards the
strictly scientific attitude, and to the promotion of the scientific
_spirit_ in general, was partly due to the influence of his positivism.
Comte’s intended Religion of Humanity failed, his system of positive
philosophy has been neglected, but the SPIRIT which he inculcated has
abided and has borne fruit. We would be wrong, however, if we
attributed much to Comte as the originator of that spirit. His positive
philosophy, although it greatly stimulated and strengthened the
positive attitude adopted by the natural sciences, was itself in large
measure inspired by and based upon these sciences. Consequently much of
Comte’s glory was a reflected light, his thought was a challenge to the
old spiritualism, an assertion of the rights of the sciences to
proclaim their existence and to demand serious consideration.

Although he succeeded in calling the attention of philosophy to the
natural sciences, yet owing to the mere fact that he based himself on
the sciences of his day much of his thought has become obsolete by the
progress and extension of those very sciences themselves. He tended,
with a curious dogmatism, to assign limits to the sciences by keeping
them in separate compartments and in general by desiring knowledge to
be limited to human needs. Although there is important truth in his
doctrine of discontinuity or irreducible differences, the subsequent
development of the natural sciences has cleared away many barriers
which he imagined to be impassable. There still are, and may always be,
gaps in our knowledge of the progress from inorganic to organic, from
the living creature to self-conscious personality, but we have a
greater conception of the unity of Nature than had Comte. Many new
ideas and discoveries have transformed science since his day,
particularly the doctrines dealing with heat as a form of motion, with
light, electricity, and the radio-activity of matter, the structure of
the atom, and the inter-relation of physics and chemistry.

Comte’s claim for different methods in the different departments of
science is of considerable interest, in view of present-day biological
problems and the controversies of vitalists, mechanists and
neo-vitalists.[4] Although Comte insisted upon discontinuity, yet he
urged the necessity for an _esprit d’ensemble_, the consideration of
things synthetically, in their “togetherness.” He feared that analysis,
the _esprit de détail_ or mathematisation, was being carried out _à
l’outrance_. This opinion he first stated in 1825 in his tract entitled
_Considérations sur les Sciences et les Savants_. On the social side he
brought this point out further by insisting on the _esprit d’ensemble_
as involving the social standpoint in opposition to a purely
individualistic view of human life.

 [4] See, for example, _The Mechanism of Life_, by Dr. Johnstone,
 Professor of Oceanography in the University of Liverpool. (Arnold,
 1921.)


Comte was slow to realise the importance of Ethics as an independent
study. Psychology he never recognised as a separate discipline, deeming
it part of physiology. He gave a curious appreciation to phrenology.
Unfortunately he overlooked the important work done by the
introspectionist psychologists in England and the important work of
Maine de Biran in his own country. One is struck by Comte’s inability
to appreciate the immense place occupied by psychology in modern life
and in particular its expression in the modern novel and in much modern
poetry. An acquaintance with the works of men like De Regnier, Pierre
Loti and Anatole France is sufficient to show how large a factor the
psychological method is in French literature and life. It is to be put
down to Comte’s eternal discredit that he failed to appreciate
psychology. Here lies the greatest defect in his work, and it is in
this connection that his work is now being supplemented. Positivism in
France to-day is not a synonym for “Comtism” at all; the term is now
employed to denote the spirit and temper displayed in the methods of
the exact sciences. For Comte, we must never forget, scientific
investigation was a means and not an end in itself. His main purpose
was social and political regeneration. Positivism since Comte differs
from his philosophy by a keen attention bestowed upon psychology, and
many of Comte’s inadequate conceptions have been enriched by the
introduction of a due recognition of psychological factors.

It is to be noted that Comte died two years before Darwin’s
_chef-d’œuvre_ appeared, and that he opposed the doctrine of evolution
as put forward by Lamarck. Although Comte’s principle of discontinuity
may in general have truth in it, the problem is a far more complicated
one than he imagined it to be. Again, while Comte’s opposition to the
subjectivism of Cousin was a wholesome influence, he did not accord to
psychology its full rights, and this alone has been gravely against the
acceptance of his philosophy, and explains partly the rise and progress
of the new spiritualist doctrines. His work served a useful purpose,
but Comte never closed definitely with the problem of the precise
significance of “positivism” or with its relation to a general
conception of the universe; in short, he confined himself to increasing
the scientific spirit in thought, leaving aside the difficulty of
relating science and philosophy.

Comte stated in his _Philosophie positive_[5] that he regarded attempts
to explain all phenomena by reference to one law as futile, even when
undertaken by the most competent minds well versed in the study of the
sciences. Although he believed in discontinuity he tried to bridge some
gaps, notably by his endeavour to refer certain physiological phenomena
to the law of gravitation.

 [5] Vol. i., pp. 53-56.


The chief work which this undoubtedly great mind accomplished was the
organisation of the scientific spirit as it appeared in his time. Renan
hardly does justice to him in his sarcastic remark in his _Souvenirs
d’Enfance et de Jeunesse_. “I felt quite irritated at the idea of
Auguste Comte being dignified with the title of a great man for having
expressed in bad French what all scientific minds had seen for the last
two hundred years as clearly as he had done.” His work merits more than
dismissal in such a tone, and we may here note, as the essence of the
spirit which he tried to express, his definition of the positive or
scientific attitude to the universe given at the commencement of his
celebrated Cours de _Philosophie positive_. There, in defining the
positive stage, Comte speaks of it as that period in which “the human
spirit, recognising the impossibility of obtaining absolute
conceptions, abandons the search for the origin and the goal of the
universe and the inner causes of things, to set itself the task merely
of discovering, by reasoning and by experience combined, the effective
laws of phenomena—that is to say, their invariable relations of
succession and of similarity.”[6] This positive spirit Comte strove to
express rather than to originate, for it was already there in the
sciences. Undoubtedly his work made it more prominent, more clear, and
so we have to note an interaction between positivism in the sciences
and in philosophy.

 [6] Leçon i.


It is equally important for our purpose to notice that the period was
one rich in scientific thought. The work of Lavoisier and Bichat, both
of whom as contemporaries of Maine de Biran, belong to the former
century, was now bearing fruit. Lavoisier’s influence had been great
over chemistry, which he established on a modern basis, by formulating
the important theory of the conservation of mass and by clearing away
false and fan- tastic conceptions regarding combustion.[7] Bichat, the
great anatomist and physiologist, died in 1802, but the publication of
his works in a completed form was not accomplished until 1854. The work
and influence of the _Académie des Sciences_ are noteworthy features of
French culture at this time. There stands out prominently the highly
important work of Cuvier in anatomy, zoology and palæontology.[8] The
nineteenth century was a period of great scientists and of great
scientific theories. Leverrier, applying himself to the problem of the
motions of Uranus, found a solution in the hypothesis of another
planet, Neptune, which was actually discovered from his calculations in
1846. This was a notable victory for logical and scientific method. In
1809 Lamarck had outlined, prior to Spencer or Darwin, the scheme of
the evolutionary theory (Transformism).[9] Spencer’s work, which
appeared from 1850 onwards, has always commanded respect and attention
in France even among its critics.[10] Interest increased upon the
publication of Darwin’s _Origin of Species_ in 1859, and its
translation into French in 1862. These dates coincide with the rise of
the _Société d’Anthropologie_ de Paris, founded by Broca in the same
year that Darwin’s book appeared. Another translation from Darwin’s
work followed in 1872, _Descendance de l’Homme_, which aroused further
interest in the evolutionary theory. At the same time the work of men
such as Pasteur, Bertrand, Berthelot and Bernard gave an impetus and a
power to science. Poincare belongs rather to the twentieth century.
Pasteur (1822-1895) showed mankind how science could cure its ills by
patient labour and careful investigation, and earned the world’s
gratitude for his noble work. His various _Discours_ and his volume,
_Le Budget de la Science_ (1868), show his faith in this progressive
power of science. In Bertrand (1822-1900), his contemporary who held
the position of Professor of Mathematics at the College de France, a
similar attitude appears.

 [7] Lavoisier perished at the guillotine in 1794, and his death was a
 tragic loss to science.


 [8] Cuvier’s _Anatomie comparée_ appeared in the years 1800-1805,
 following his _Histoire naturelle_ (1798-1799). Later came his
 _Rapport sur les Sciences naturelles_ (1810) and his work _Le Regne
 animal_ (1816).He died in 1832. We may note that Cuvier opposed the
 speculative evolutionary doctrines of Lamarck, with whom he indulged
 in controversy.


 [9] In his work, _Philosophie zoologique, ou Exposition des
 Considérations relatives a l’Histoire naturelle des Animaux_, 2 vols
 Paris, Dentu, 1809.


 [10] His _Social Statics_ was published in 1850, and his _Psychology_
 five years later. His life work, _The Synthetic Philosophy_, extends
 over the period 1860-1896.


One of the foremost scientific minds, however, was Claude Bernard
(1813-1878), a friend of Renan, who held the Chair of Medicine at the
College de France, and was, in addition, the Professor of Physiology at
the Faculté des Sciences at the Sorbonne. Science, Bernard maintained,
concerns itself only with phenomena and their laws. He endeavoured in
his celebrated _Introduction à l’Etude de la Médécine expérimentale_,
published in 1865, to establish the science of physiology upon a sound
basis, having respect only to fact, not owning homage to theories of a
metaphysical character or to the authority of persons or creeds. He
desired to obtain by such a rigorous and precise method, objectivity.
“The experimental method is,” he insists, “the really scientific
method, which proclaims the freedom of the human spirit and its
intelligence. It not only shakes off the yoke of metaphysics and of
theology, in addition it refuses to admit personal considerations and
subjective standpoints.”[11]

 [11] _Introduction à l’Etude de la Médécine expérimentale_, chap. ii,
 sect. 4.


Bernard’s attitude is distinctly that of a positivist, and the general
tone of his remarks as well as his attitude on many special points
agrees with that of Comte. His conclusions regarding physiology are
akin to those expressed by Comte concerning biology. Bernard excludes
any metaphysical hypothesis such as the operation of a vital principle,
and adheres strictly to physicochemical formulas. He accepts, however,
Comte’s warning about the reduction of the higher to terms of the
lower, or, in Spencerian phraseology, the explanation of the more
complex by the less complex. Consequently, he carefully avoids the
statement that he desires to “reduce” physiology to physics and
chemistry. He makes no facile and light-hearted transition as did
Spencer; on the contrary, he claims that the living has some specific
quality which cannot be “reduced” to other terms, and which cannot be
summed up in the formulae of physics or chemistry. The physiologist and
the medical practitioner must never overlook the fact that every living
being forms an organism and an individuality. The physiologist,
continues Bernard, must take notice of this unity or harmony of the
whole, even while he penetrates the interior to know the mechanism of
each of its parts. The physicist and the chemist can ignore any notion
of final causes in the facts they observe, but the physiologist must
admit a harmonious finality, a harmony pre-established in the organism,
whose actions form and express a unity and solidarity, since they
generate one another. Life itself is _creation_; it is not capable of
expression merely in physico-chemical formulae. The creative character,
which is its essence, never can be so expressed. Bernard postulated an
abstract, _idée directrice et créatrice_, presiding over the evolution
of an organism. “_Dans tout germe vivant, il y a une idée créatrice qui
se développe et se manifeste par l’organisation. Pendant toute sa durée
l’être vivant reste sous l’influence de cette même force vitale,
créatrice, et la mort arrive lorsqu’elle ne peut plus se réaliser. Ici
comme partout, tout dérive de l’idée, qui, seule, crée et dirige_.”[12]

 [12] _Introduction à l’Etude de la Médécine expérimentale_, p.151 ff.


The positivist spirit is again very marked in the doctrines of
Berthelot (1827-1907), another very great friend of Renan, who, in
addition to being a Senator, and Minister of Education and of Foreign
Affairs, held the Chair of Organic Chemistry at the Collège de France.
In 1886 he published his volume, Science et Philosophie, which contains
some interesting and illuminating observations upon _La Science idéale
et la Science positive_. Part of this, it may be noted, was written as
early as 1863, in correspondence with Renan, and as a reply to a letter
of his of which we shall speak presently.[13] Berthelot states his case
with a clearness which merits quotation.

 [13] See the _Fragments_ of Renan, published 1876, pp 193-241.
 _Reponse de M. Berthelot_.


“Positive science,” he says, “seeks neither first causes nor the
ultimate goal of things. In order to link together a multitude of
phenomena by one single law, general in character and conformable to
the nature of things, the human spirit has followed a simple and
invariable method. It has stated the facts in accordance with
observation and experience, compared them, extracted their relations,
that is the general facts, which have in turn been verified by
observation and experience, which verification constitutes their only
guarantee of truth. A progressive generalisation, deduced from prior
facts and verified unceasingly by new observations, thus brings our
knowledge from the plane of particular and popular facts to general
laws of an abstract and universal character. But, in the construction
of this pyramid of science, everything from base to summit rests upon
observation and experience. It is one of the principles of positive
science that no reality can be established by a process of reasoning.
The universe cannot be grasped by a _priori_ methods.”

Like Comte, Berthelot believed in the progress of all knowledge through
a theological and metaphysical stage to a definitely scientific or
positive era. The sciences are as yet young, and we cannot imagine the
development and improvement, social and moral, which will accrue from
their triumph in the future. For Berthelot, as for Renan, the idea of
progress was bound up essentially with the triumph of the scientific
spirit. In a Discourse at the Sorbonne given in commemoration of the
fiftieth anniversary of his being appointed Professor at the Collège de
France, we find this faith in science reiterated. “To-day,” he remarks,
“Science claims a triple direction of societies, materially,
intellectually and morally. By this fact the role of the men of
science, both as individuals and as a class, has unceasingly come to
play a great part in modern states.”

These scientific men, Berthelot and Bernard, with whom Renan was on
terms of friendship, had a large influence in the formation of his
thought, after he had quitted the seminary and the Church. As a young
man Renan possessed the positive spirit in a marked degree, and did not
fail to disclose his enthusiasm for “Science” and for the scientific
method. His book _L’Avenir de la Science_, which we have already noted,
was written when he was only twenty-five, and under the immediate
influence of the events of 1848, particularly the socialist spirit of
Saint-Simon and the “organising” attitude of Auguste Comte. It did not,
however, see publication until 1890, when the Empire had produced a
pessimistic temper in him, later accentuated by the Commune and the
Prussian War. The dominant note of the whole work is the touching and
almost pathetic belief in Science, which leads the young writer to an
optimism both in thought and in politics. “Science” constitutes for him
the all-in-all. Although he had just previously abandoned the seminary,
his priestly style remained with him to such a degree that even his
treatment of science is characterised by a mixture of the unction of
the _curé_ and the subtilty of the dialectician. Levites were still to
be necessary to the people of Israel, but they were to be the priests
of the most High, whose name, according to Renan, was “Science.”

His ardour for Science is not confined to this one book: it runs
through all his writings. Prospero, a character who personifies
rational thought in _L’Eau de Jouvence_, one of Renan’s _Drames
philosophiques_, expresses an ardent love for science continually. In
his preface to _Souvenirs d’Enfance et de Jeunesse_ we find Renan upon
the same theme. Quaintly enough he not only praises the objectivity
which is characteristic of the scientific point of view, but seems to
delight in its abstraction. The superiority of modern science consists,
he claims, in this very abstraction. But he is aware that the very
indefatigability with which we fathom nature removes us, in a sense,
further from her. He recognises how science leads away from the
immediacy of vital and close contact with nature herself. “This is,
however, as it should be,” asserts Renan, “and let no one fear to
prosecute his researches, for out of this merciless dissection comes
life.” He does not stay to assure us, or to enlighten us, as to how
that life can be infused into the abstract facts which have resulted
from the process of dissection. Fruitful and suggestive as many of his
pages are, they fail to approach the concrete difficulties which this
passage mentions.

Writing from Dinant in Brittany in 1863 to his friend, Berthelot, Renan
gives his view of the Sciences of Nature and the Historical Sciences.
This letter, reprinted in his _Dialogues et Fragments philosophiques_,
in 1876, expresses Renan’s.views in a clear and simple form upon the
place of science in his mind and also upon the idea of progress, as for
him the two are intimately connected. Extreme confidence is expressed
in the power of science. Renan at this time had written, but not
published, his _Avenir de la Science_. In a brief manner this letter
summarises much contained in the larger work. The point of view is
similar. Science is to be the great reforming power.

The word “Science” is so constantly upon Renan’s lips that we can see
that it has become an obsession with mm to employ it, or a device.
Certainly Renan’s extensive and ill-defined usage of it conceals grave
difficulties. One is tempted frequently to regard it as a synonym for
philosophy or metaphysics, a word which he dislikes. That does not,
however, add to clearness, and Renan’s usage of “Science” as a term
confuses both science and philosophy together. Even if this were not
the case, there is another important point to note— namely, that even
on a stricter interpretation Renan, by his wide use of the term,
actually undermines the confidence in the natural sciences. For he
embraces within the term “Science” not merely those branches of
investigation which we term in general the sciences of nature, but also
the critical study of language, of history and literature. He expressly
endeavours to show in the letter to Berthelot that true science must
include the product of man’s spirit and the record of the development
of that spirit.

Renan assumed quite definitely a positivist attitude to metaphysics.
“Philosophy,” he remarks, “is not a separate science; it is one side of
every science. In the great optic pencil of human knowledge it is the
central region where the rays meet in one and the same light.”
Metaphysical speculation he scorned, but he admitted the place for a
criticism of the human mind such as had been given by Kant in _The
Critique of Pure Reason_.

Kantian also, in its professions at least, was the philosophy of
Vacherot, who stated that the aim of his work, _La Métaphysique et la
Science_, was “the reconciliation of metaphysics with science.”[14]
These dialogues between a philosopher and a man of science, for of such
discussions the book is composed, never really help us to get close to
the problem, for Vacherot’s Kantianism is a profession which merely
covers an actual positivism. His metaphysical doctrines are
superimposed on a severe and rigid naturalism, but are kept from
conflict with them, or even relation with them, by being allotted to a
distant limbo of pure ideals, outside the world which science displays
to us.

 [14] See particularly his statements to this effect in his Preface,
 pp. xxxvii-xl.


Taine, in spite of his severely positive attitude, was a strong
champion of metaphysics. The sciences needed, he claimed, a science of
first principles, a metaphysic. Without it, “the man of science is
merely a _manœuvre_ and the artist a _dilettante_.” The positive
sciences he re- garded as inferior types of analysis. Above them “is a
superior analysis which is metaphysics, and which reduces or takes up
these laws of the sciences into a universal formula.” This higher
analysis, however, does not give the lie to the others: it completes
them.

It was indeed a belief and hope of Taine that the sciences will be more
and more perfected until they can each be expressed in a kind of
generic formula, which in turn may be capable of expression in some
single formula. This single law is being sought by science and
metaphysic, although it must belong to the latter rather than to the
former. From it, as from a spring, proceeds, according to Taine, the
eternal roll of events and the infinite sea of things.

Taine’s antagonism to the purely empirical schools centres round his
conception of the law of causality. He disagrees with the assertion
that this law is a synthetic, a _posteriori_ judgment, a habit, as Hume
said, or a mechanical _attente_, as Mill thought, or a generalisation
of the sensation of effort which we feel in ourselves, as was suggested
by Maine de Biran. Yet he also opposes Kant’s doctrine, in which
causality is regarded as a synthetic _a priori_ judgment. His own
criticism of Hume and Kant was directed to denial of the elements of
heterogeneity in experience, which are so essential to Hume’s view, and
to a denial of the distinction maintained by Kant between logical and
causal relations. Taine considered that all might be explained by
logical relations, that all experience might some day be expressed in
one law, one formula. The _more geometrico_ of Spinoza and the
“universal mathematic” of Descartes reappear in Taine. He even essays
in _L’Intelligence_ to equate the principle of causality (_principe de
raison explicative_) with that of identity.

His attempt to reduce the principle of causality to that of identity
did not succeed very well, and from the nature of the case this was to
be expected. As Fouillée well points out in his criticism of Taine,
both in _La Liberté et le Déterminisme_ and the concluding pages of his
earlier work on Plato,[15] the notion of difference and heterogeneity
which arises in the action of cause and effect can never be reducible
to a mere identity, for the notion of identity has nothing in common
with that of difference. Differences cannot be ignored; variety and
change are undeniable facts of experience. Fouillée here touches the
weak spot of Taine’s doctrine. In spite of a seemingly great power of
criticism there is an underlying dogmatism in his work, and the chief
of those dogmas, which he does not submit to criticism, is the
assertion of the universal necessity of all things. To this postulate
he gives a false air of objectivity. He avoids stating why we do
objectify causality, and he diverts discussion from the position that
this postulate may itself be subjective.

 [15] Vol. 4.


The particular bearing of Taine’s psychology upon the general problem
of knowledge is interesting. He defines perception in _L’Intelligence_
as _une hallucination vraie_. His doctrine of the “double aspect,”
physical and mental, recalls to mind the Modes of Spinoza. In his
attitude to the difficult problem of movement and thought he rests in
the dualism of Spinoza, fluctuating and not enunciating his doctrine
clearly. The primacy of movement to thought he abandoned as too
mechanical a doctrine, and regarded the type of existence as mental in
character. Taine thus passes from the materialism of Hobbes to the
idealism of Leibnitz. “The physical world is reducible to a system of
signs, and no more is needed for its construction and conception than
the materials of the moral world.”

When we feel ourselves constrained to admit the necessity of certain
truths, if we are inclined to regard this as due to the character of
our minds themselves (_notre structure mentale_), as Kant maintained,
Taine reminds us that we must admit that our mind adapts itself to its
environment. He here adopts the view of Spencer, a thinker who seems to
have had far more influence upon the Continent than in his own country.
Although Taine thus reposes his epistemology upon this basis, he does
not answer the question which the Kantian can still put to him—namely,
“How do we know the structure of things?” He is unable to escape from
the difficulty of admitting either that it is from experience, an
admission which his anti-empirical attitude forbids him to make (and
which would damage his dogma of universal logical necessity), or that
our knowledge is obtained by analysing our own thoughts, in which case
he leaves us in a vicious circle of pure subjectivity from which there
is no means of escape.

The truth is that Taine vainly tried to establish a phenomenal
doctrine, not purely empirical in character like that of Hume, but a
phenomenalism wedded to a necessity which is supposed to be
self-explanatory. Such a notion of necessity, however, is formal and
abstract. Rather than accept Taine’s view of a law, a formula, an
“eternal axiom” at the basis of things, we are obliged to postulate an
activity, creative in character, of whose action universal laws are but
expressions. Law, formula, axiom without action are mere abstractions
which can of themselves produce nothing.

Taine’s positivism, however, was not so rigid as to exclude a belief in
the value of metaphysics. It is this which distinguishes him from the
Comtian School. We see in him the confidence in science complemented by
an admission of metaphysics, equivalent to a turning of “positivism” in
science and philosophy against itself. Much heavier onslaughts upon the
sovereignty of science came, however, from the thinker who is the great
logician and metaphysician of our period, Renouvier. To him and to
Cournot we now turn.

II

While Taine had indeed maintained the necessity of a metaphysic, he
shared to a large degree the general confidence in science displayed by
Comte, Bernard, Berthelot and Renan. But the second and third groups of
thinkers into which we have divided our period took up first a critical
attitude to science and, finally, a rather hostile one.

Cournot marks the transition between Comte and Renouvier. His _Essai
sur les Fondements de nos Connaissances et sur les Caractères de la
Critique philosophique_ contains some very calm and careful thought on
the relation of science and philosophy, which is the product of a
sincere and well-balanced mind.[16] He inherits from the positivists an
intense respect for scientific knowledge, and remarks at the outset
that he is hostile to any philosophy which would be so foolish as to
attempt to ignore the work of the modern sciences.

 [16] See in particular the second chapter of vol. 2, _Du Contraste de
 la Science et de la Philosophie et de la Philosophie des Sciences_,
 pp. 216-255.


His work _Matérialisme, Vitalisme, Rationalisme_ is a striking example
of this effort on Cournot’s part, being devoted to a study of the use
which can be made in philosophy of the data afforded by the sciences.
Somewhat after the manner of Comte, Cournot looks upon the various
sciences as a hierarchy ranging from mathematics to sociology. Yet he
reminds the scientists of the insufficiency of their point of view, for
the sciences, rightly pursued, lead on to philosophy. He laments,
however, the confusion of the two, and thinks that such confusion is
“partly due to the fact that in the realm of speculations which are
naturally within the domain of the philosopher, there are to be found
here and there certain theories which can actually be reduced to a
scientific form”[17] He offers, as an instance of this, the theory of
the syllogism, which has affinities to algebraical equations—but this
interpenetration should not cause us, he argues, to abandon or to lose
sight of the distinction between science and philosophy.

 [17] _Essai sur les Fondements de nos Connaissances_, vol. 2, p. 224.


This distinction, according to Cournot, lies in the fact that science
has for its object that which can be measured, and that which can be
reduced to a rigorous chain or connection. In brief, science is
characterised by quantity. Philosophy, on the other hand, concerns
itself with quality, for it endeavours not so much to measure as to
appreciate.

Cournot reminds the apostles of science that quantity, however
intimately bound up with reality it may be, is not the essence of that
reality itself. He is afraid, too, that the neglect of philosophy by
science may cause the latter to develop along purely utilitarian lines.
As an investigation of reality, science is not ultimate. It has limits
by the fact that it is concerned with measurement, and thus is excluded
from those things which are qualitative and incapable of quantitative
expression. Science, moreover, has its roots in philosophy by virtue of
the metaphysical postulates which it utilises as its basis. Physics and
geometry, Cournot maintains, both rest upon definitions which owe their
origin to speculative thought rather than to experience, yet these
sciences claim an absolute value for themselves and for those
postulates as being descriptions of reality in an ultimate sense.

Following out his distinction between philosophy and the sciences,
Cournot claims in a Kantian manner that while the latter are products
of the human understanding the former is due to the operation of
reason. This apparent dualism Cournot does not shrink from maintaining;
indeed, he makes it an argument for his doctrine of discontinuity. The
development of a science involves a certain breach with reality, for
the progress of the science involves abstraction, which ever becomes
more complicated. Cournot here brings out the point which we noticed
was stressed by Renan.[18]

 [18] See above, p. 105.


Reason produces in us the idea of order, and this “idea of order and of
reason in things is the basis of philosophic probability, of induction
and analogy.”[19] This has important bearings upon the unity of science
and upon the conception of causality which it upholds. In a careful
examination of the problems of induction and analogy, Cournot
emphasises the truth that there are facts which cannot be fitted into a
measured or logical sequence of events. Reality cannot be fitted into a
formula or into concepts, for these fail to express the infinite
variety and richness of the reality which displays itself to us.
Science can never be adequate to life, with its pulsing spontaneity and
freedom. It is philosophy with its _vue d’ensemble_ which tries to
grasp and to express this concreteness, which the sciences, bound to
their systematic connection of events within separate compartments,
fail to reach or to show us. Referring to the ideas of beauty and of
goodness, Cournot urges a “transrationalism,” as he calls it, which,
while loyal to the rational requirements of science, will enable us to
take the wider outlook assumed by philosophy.[20]

 [19] _Essai sur les Fondements de nos Connaissances_, p. 384.


 [20] The parallelism of some of Cournot’s ideas here with those
 expressed by Bergson, although they have been enunciated by the later
 thinker in a more decided manner, is so obvious as hardly to need to
 be indicated.


Like Cournot, the author of the _Essais de Critique générale_ was a
keen antagonist of all those who sought to deify Science. It was indeed
this which led Renouvier to give this title to his great work, the
first part of which was published at a time when the confidence in
Science appeared to be comparatively unassailed. We find him defending
philosophy as against the scientists and others by an insistence upon
its critical function.

In examining Comte’s positivism in his work _Histoire et Solution des
Problèmes métaphysiques_, Renouvier points out that its initial idea is
a false one—namely, that philosophy can be constituted by an assembling
together of the sciences.[21] Such an assembly does not, he objects,
make a system. Each science has its own postulates, its own data, and
Science as a whole unity of thought or knowledge does not exist. He
attacks at the same time the calm presumption of the positivist who
maintains that the scientific stage is the final and highest
development. Renouvier is considerably annoyed at this unwarranted
dogmatism and assumed air of finality.

 [21] Book X.: _De l’Etat actuel de la Philosophie en France_, chap.
 1., _De l’Aboutissement des Esprits au Positivisme_, pp. 416-417.


Owing to the excellent training he had received at the Ecole
Polytechnique, and by his own profound study, Renouvier was able on
many technical points to meet the scientists on their own ground. His
third _Essai de Critique générale_ is devoted to a study of “the
Principles of Nature,” in which he criticises many of the principles
and assumptions of mechanism, while many pages of his two previous
_Essais_ are concerned with the discussion of questions intimately
affecting the sciences.[22]

 [22] This is particularly noticeable in the matter printed as
 appendices to his chapters. (_Cf_. the _Logic_, vol 2.)


An important section of his second Essay, _Psychologie rationnelle_,
deals with the “Classification of the Sciences.”[23] Renouvier there
points out that the attempt to classify the sciences in accordance with
their degrees of certainty ends in failure. All of them, when loyal to
their own principles, endeavour to display equal certainty. By loyalty
Renouvier shows that he means adherence to an examination of certain
classes of phenomena, the observation of facts and laws, with the
proposal of hypotheses, put forward frankly as such. He draws a line
between the logical and the physical sciences—a division which he
claims is not only a division according to the nature of their data,
but also according to method. Following another division, we may draw a
line between sciences which deal with objects which are organic, living
creatures, and those which are not.

 [23] Vol. 2, chap. xviii., _De la Certitude des Sciences et leur
 Classification rationnelle_, pp. 139-186, including later observations
 on Spencer.


Renouvier’s line is not, it must be remembered in this connection, a
purely imaginary one. It is a real line, an actual gap. For him there
is a real discontinuity in the universe. Taine’s doctrine of a
universal explanation, of a rigid unity and continuity, is, for
Renouvier, anathema, _c’est la mathématisation a l’outrance_. This
appears most markedly in the pages which he devotes to the
consideration of _la synthèse totale_.

An important section of his _Traité de Logique_ (the first _Essai de
Critique générale_) deals with the problem of this Total Synthesis of
all phenomena.[24] This is a conception which Renouvier affirms to be
unwarrantable and, indeed, in the last analysis impossible. A general
synthesis, an organisation or connected hierarchy of sciences, is a
fond hope, an illusion only of a mind which can overlook the real
discontinuity which exists between things and between groups of things.

 [24] Vol. I, pp. 107-115, and also vol. 2, pp. 202-245.


He sees in it the fetish of the Absolute and the Infinite and the lure
of pantheism, a doctrine to which he opposes his “Personalism.” He
reminds the scientists that personality is the great factor to which
all knowledge is related, and that all knowledge is relative. A law is
a law, but the guarantee of its permanence is not a law. It is no more
easy, claims Renouvier, to say why phenomena do not stop than it is to
know why they have begun. Laws indeed abide, but “not apart from
conscious personalities who affirm them.”[25] Further, attacking the
self-confident and dogmatic attitude in the scientists, Renouvier
reminds them that it is impossible to demonstrate _every_ proposition;
and in an important note on “Induction and the Sciences”[26] he points
out that induction always implies a certain _croyance_. This is no
peculiar, mystical thing; it is a fact, he remarks, which colours all
the interesting acts of human personality. He here approaches Cournot
in observing that all speculation is attended by a certain coefficient
of doubt or uncertainty and so becomes really rational belief. With
Cournot, too, Renouvier senses the importance of analogy and
probability in connection with hypotheses in the world of nature and of
morals. In short, he recognises as central the problem of freedom.

 [25] _Logique_, vol. 2, p. 321.


 [26] Note B to chap. xxxv. of the _Logique_, vol. 2, p. 13.


Renouvier attacks Comte’s classification or “hierarchy” of the sciences
as mischievous and inexact. It is not based, he claims, upon any
distinction in method, nor of data. It is not true that the sciences
are arranged by Comte in an order where they successively imply one
another, nor in an order in which they have come to be constituted as
“positive”.[27]

 [27] This outburst of attack is a sample of Renouvier’s usual attitude
 to Positivism. (_Deuxième Essai_, vol. 2, pp. 166-170.)


He justifies to the scientist the formulation of hypothesis as a
necessary working method of co-ordinating in a provisional manner
varying phenomena. Many hypotheses and inductions of science are,
however, unjustifiable from a strictly logical standpoint, Renouvier
reminds us. His chief objection, however, is that those hypotheses and
inductions are put forward so frequently as certainties by a science
which is dogmatic and surpasses its limits.

Science, Renouvier claims, does not give us a knowledge of the
absolute, but an understanding of the relative. It is in the light of
his doctrine of relativity and of the application of the law of number
that he criticises many of the attitudes adopted by the scientists.
Whatever savours of the Absolute or the Infinite he opposes, and his
view of cause depends on this. He scorns the fiction of an infinite
regress, and affirms real beginnings to various classes of phenomena.
Causality is not to be explained, he urges in his _Nouvelle
Monadologie_, save by a harmony. He differs from Leibnitz, however, in
claiming in the interests of freedom that this harmony is not
pre-established. In meeting the doctrine of the reduction of the
complex to the simple, Renouvier cites the case of “reducing” sound,
heat, light and electricity to movement. This may be superficially
correct as a generality, but Renouvier aptly points out that it
overlooks the fact that, although they may all be abstractly
characterised as movement, yet there are differences between them as
movements which correspond to the differences of sensation they arouse
in us.

Renouvier upholds real differences, real beginnings, and, it must be
added, a reality behind and beyond the appearances of nature. His
_Monadologie_ admits that “we can continue to explain nature
mathematically and mechanically, provided we recognise that it is an
external appearance—that thought, mind or spirit is at the heart of
it.” This links Renouvier to the group of new spiritualists. His
attitude to science is akin to theirs. He does not fear science when it
confines itself to its proper limits and recognises these. It has no
quarrel with philosophy nor philosophy with it. Advance in science
involves, he believes, an advance also in theology and in metaphysics.

The sciences are responsible for working out the laws determining the
development of the Universe. But between Science, an ideal unachieved,
and the sciences which in themselves are so feeble, imperfect and
limited, Renouvier claims that General Criticism, or Philosophy, has
its place. “In spite of the discredit into which philosophy has fallen
in these days, it can and ought to exist. Its object has been always
the investigation of God, man, liberty, immortality, the fundamental
laws of the sciences. ‘All these intimately connected and
interpenetrating problems comprise the domain of philosophy.” In those
cases where no science is possible, this seeming impossibility must
itself be investigated, and philosophy remains as a “General Criticism”
(_Critique générale_) of our knowledge. “It is this notion,” he says,
“which I desired to indicate by banishing the word ‘Philosophy’ from
the title of my Essays. The name ought to change when the method
changes.”[28] Thus Renouvier seeks to establish a “critique” midway
between scepticism and dogmatism, and endeavours to found a philosophy
which recognises at one and the same time the demands of _science et
conscience_.

 [28] _Logique_, vol. 2, p. 352.

III

On turning to the spiritualist current of thought we find it, like the
neo-criticism, no less keen in its criticism of science. The inadequacy
of the purely scientific attitude is the recurring theme from Ravaisson
to Boutroux, Bergson and Le Roy. The attitude assumed by Ravaisson
coloured the whole of the subsequent development of the new
spiritualist doctrines, and not least their bearing upon the problem of
science and its relation to metaphysics.

Mechanism, Ravaisson pointed out, quoting the classical author upon
whom he had himself written so brilliantly (Aristotle), does not
explain itself, for it implies a “prime mover,” not itself in motion,
but which produces movement by spiritual activity. Ravaisson also
refers to the testimony of Leibnitz, who, while agreeing that all is
mechanical, carefully added to this statement one to the effect that
mechanism itself has a principle which must be looked for outside
matter and which is the object of metaphysical research. This spiritual
reality is found only, according to Ravaisson, in the power of goodness
and beauty—that is to say, in a reality which is not non-scientific but
rather ultra-scientific. There are realities, he claims, to which
science does not attain.

The explanation of nature presupposes soul or spirit. It is true,
Ravaisson admits, that the physical and chemical sciences consider
themselves independent of metaphysics; true also that the metaphysician
in ignoring the study of those sciences omits much from his estimate of
the spirit. Indeed, he cannot well dispense with the results of the
sciences. That admission, however, does not do away with the
possibility of a true “apologia” for metaphysics. To Newton’s sarcastic
remark, “Physics beware of metaphysics,” Hegel replied cogently that
this was equivalent to saying, “Physics, keep away from thought.”
Spirit, however, cannot be omitted from the account; it is the
condition of all that is, the light by which we see that there is such
a thing as a material universe. This is the central point of
Ravaisson’s philosophy. The sciences of nature may be allowed and
encouraged to work diligently upon their own principles, but the very
fact that they are individual sciences compels them to admit that they
view the whole “piecemeal”. Philosophy seeks to interpret the whole as
a whole. Ravaisson quotes Pascal’s saying, “_Il faut avoir une pensée
de derrière la tête et juger de tout par là_.” This _pensée de derrière
la tête_, says Ravaisson, while not preventing the various sciences
from speaking in their own tongue, is just the metaphysical or
philosophical idea of the whole.

It is claimed, Aristotle used to say, that mathematics have absolutely
nothing in common with the idea of the good. “But order, proportion,
symmetry, are not these great forms of beauty?” asks Ravaisson. For him
there is spirit at the heart of things, an activity, _un feu primitif
qui est l’âme_, which expresses itself in thought, in will and in love.
It is a fire which does not burn itself out, because it is enduring
spirit, an eternal cause, the absolute substance is this spiritual
reality. Where the sciences fall short is that they fail to show that
nature is but the refraction of this spirit. This is a fact, however,
which both religion and philosophy grasp and uphold.

These criticisms were disturbing for those minds who found entire
satisfaction in Science or rather in the sciences, but they were
somewhat general. Ravaisson’s work inculcated a spirit rather than
sustained a dialectic. Its chief value lay in the inspiration which it
imparted to subsequent thinkers who endeavoured to work out his general
ideas with greater precision.

It was this task which Lachelier set himself in his _Induction_. He had
keenly felt the menace of science, as had Janet;[29] he had appreciated
the challenge offered to it by Ravaisson’s ideas. Moreover, Lachelier’s
acute mind discovered the crucial points upon which the new
spiritualism could base its attack upon the purely scientific
dogmatism. Whatever Leibnitz might have said, creative spontaneity of
the spirit, as it was acclaimed by Ravaisson, could not easily be
fitted into the mechanism and determinism upheld by the sciences.
Ravaisson had admitted the action of efficient causes in so far as he
admitted the action of mechanism, which is but the outcome of these
causes. In this way he endeavoured to satisfy the essential demands of
the scientific attitude to the universe. But recognising the inadequacy
of this attitude he had upheld the reality of final causes and thus
opposed to the scientists a metaphysical doctrine akin to the religious
attitude of Hellenism and Christianity.

 [29] We refer here to the quotation from Janet’s _Problèmes du XIXe
 Siècle_, given above on p. 95. Janet himself wrote on _Final Causes_
 but not Wlth the depth or penetration of Lachelier.


Lachelier saw that the important point of Ravaisson’s doctrine lay in
the problem of these two types of causality. His thesis is therefore
devoted to the examination of efficient and final causes. This little
work of Lachelier marks a highly important advance in the development
of the spiritualist philosophy. He clarifies and re-affirms more
precisely the position indicated by Ravaisson. Lacheher tears up the
treaty of compromise which was drafted by Leibnitz to meet the rival
demands of science with its efficient causes and philosophy with its
final causes. The world of free creative spontaneity of the spirit
cannot be regarded, Lachelier claims (and this is his vital point), as
merely the complement of, or the reflex from, the world of mechanism
and determinism.

He works out in his thesis the doctrine that efficient causes can be
deduced from the formal laws of thought. This was Taine’s position, and
it was the limit of Taine’s doctrine. Lachelier goes further and
undermines Taine’s theories by upholding final causes, which he shows
depend upon the conception of a totality, a whole which is capable of
creating its parts. This view of the whole is a philosophical
conception to which the natural sciences never rise, and which they
cannot, by the very nature of their data and their methods, comprehend.
Yet it is only such a conception which can supply any rational basis
for the unity of phenomena and of experience. Only by seeing the
variety of all phenomena in the light of such an organic unity can we
find any meaning in the term universe, and only thus, continues
Lachelier, only on the principle of a rational and universal order and
on the reality of final causes, can we base our inductions. The
“uniformity of nature,” that fetish of the scientists which, as
Lachelier well points out, is merely the empirical regularity of
phenomena, offers no adequate basis for a single induction.

Lachelier developed his doctrines further in the article, _Psychologie
et Métaphysique_. We can observe in it the marks which so profoundly
distinguish the new spiritualism from the old, as once taught by
Cousin. The old spiritualism had no place between its psychology and
its metaphysics for the natural sciences. Indeed it was quite incapable
of dealing with the problem which their existence and success
presented, and so it chose to ignore them as far as possible. The new
spiritualism, of which Lachelier is perhaps the profoundest speculative
mind, not only is acquainted with the place and results of the
sciences, but it feels itself equal to a criticism of them, an advance
which marks a highly important development in philosophy.

In this article Lachelier endeavours to pass beyond the standpoint of
Cousin, and in so doing we see not only the influence of Ravaisson’s
ideas of the creative activity of the spirit, but also of the
discipline of the Kantian criticism, with which Lachelier, unlike many
of his contemporaries in France at that time, was well acquainted.

He first shows that the study of psychology reveals to us the human
powers of sensation, feeling and will. These are the immediate data of
consciousness. Another element, however, enters into consciousness, not
as these three, a definite content, but as a colouring of the whole.
This other element is “objectivity,” an awareness or belief that the
world without exists and continues to exist independently of our
observation of it. Lachelier combats, however, the Kantian conception
of the “thing-in-itself.” If, he argues, the world around us appears as
a reality which is independent of our perception, it is _not_ because
it is a “thing-in-itself,” but rather it appears as independent because
we, possessing conscious intelligence, succeed in making it an object
of our thought, and thus save it from the mere subjectivity which
characterises our sense-experience. It is upon this fact, Lachelier
rightly insists, that all our science reposes. A theory of knowledge as
proposed by Taine, based solely on sensation and professing belief in
_hallucination vraie_, is itself a contradiction and an abuse of
language. “If thought is an illusion,” remarks Lachelier, “we must
suppress all the sciences.”[30]

 [30] _Psychologie et Métaphisique_, p.151.(See especially the passages
 on pp.150-158.)


He then proceeds to show that if we admit thought to be the basis of
our knowledge of the world, that is, of our sciences, then we admit
that our sciences are themselves connstructions, based upon a
synthetic, constructive, creative activity of our mind or spirit. For
our thought is not merely another “thing” added to the world of things
outside us. Our thought is not a given and predetermined datum, it is
“a living dialectic,” a creative activity, a self-creative process,
which is synthetic, and not merely analytic in character. “Thought,” he
says, “can rest upon itself, while everything else can only rest upon
it; the ultimate _point d’appui_ of all truth and of all existence is
to be found in the absolute spontaneity of the spirit.”[31] Here,
Lachelier maintains, lies the real _a priori_; here, too, is the very
important passage from psychology to metaphysics.

 [31] _Psychologie et Métaphysique_, p. 158.


Finally his treatment of the problems of knowledge and of the
foundations of science leads him to reemphasise not only the reality of
spirit but its spontaneity. He recognises with Cournot and Renouvier
that the vital problem for science and philosophy is that of freedom.
The nature of existence is for Lachelier a manifestation of spirit, and
is seen in will, in necessity and in freedom. It is important to note
that for him it is _all_ these simultaneously. “Being,” he remarks in
concluding his brilliant essay,[32] “is not first, a blind necessity,
then a will which must be for ever bound down in advance to necessity
and, lastly, a freedom which would merely be able to recognise such
necessity and such a bound will; being is entirely free, in so far as
it is self-creative; it is entirely an expression of will, in so far as
it creates itself in the form of something concrete and real; it is
also entirely an expression of necessity, in so far as its
self-creation is intelligible and gives an account of itself.”

 [32] _Ibid_., p. 170.


At this stage something in the nature of a temporary “set-back” is
given to the flow of the spiritualist current by Fouillee’s attitude,
which takes a different line from that of Ravaisson and Lachelier. The
attitude towards Science, which we find adopted by Fouillee, is
determined by his two general principles, that of reconcilation, and
his own doctrine of _idées-forces_. His conciliatory spirit is well
seen in the fact that, although he has a great respect for science and
inherits many of the qualities contained in Taine’s philosophy,
particularly the effort to maintain a regular continuity and solidarity
in the development of reality, nevertheless he is imbued with the
spirit of idealism which characterises all this group of thinkers. The
result is a mixture of Platonism and naturalism, and to this he himself
confesses in his work, _Le Mouvement idéaliste et la Réaction contre la
Science positive_, where he expresses a desire “to bring back Plato’s
ideas from heaven to earth, and so to make idealism consonant with
naturalism.”[33]

 [33] _Le Mouvement idéaliste el la Réaction contre la Science
 positive_, p. xxi.


Fouillée claims to take up a position midway between the materialists
and the idealists. Neither standpoint is, in his view, adequate to
describe reality. He is particularly opposed to the materialistic and
mechanistic thought of the English Evolutionary School, as presented by
Spencer and Huxley, with its pretensions to be scientific. Fouillee
accepts, with them, the notion of evolution, but he disagrees entirely
with Spencer’s attempt to refer everything to mechanism, the mechanism
of matter in motion. In any case, Fouillée claims, movement is a very
slender and one-sided element of experience upon which to base our
characterisation of all reality, for the idea of motion arises only
from our visual and tactual experience. He revolts from the
epiphenomenalism of Huxley as from a dire heresy. Consciousness cannot
be regarded as a mere “flash in the pan.” Even science must admit that
all phenomena are to be defined by their relation to, and action upon,
other phenomena. Consciousness, so regarded, will be seen, he claims,
as a unique power, possessing the property of acting upon matter and of
initiating movement. It is itself a factor, and a very vital one, in
the evolutionary process. It is no mere reflex or passive
representation. On this point of the irreducibility of the mental life
and the validity of its action, Fouillée parts company with Taine. On
the other hand, he disagrees with the idealistic school of thought,
which upholds a pure intellectualism and for whom thought is the
accepted characterisation of reality. This, complains Fouillée, is as
much an abstraction and a one-sided view as that of Spencer.

In this manner Fouillée endeavours to “rectify the scientific
conception of evolution” by his doctrine of _idées-forces_. “There is,”
he says,[34] “in every idea a commencement of action, and even of
movement, which tends to persist and to increase like an _élan_. . . .
Every idea is already a force.” Psychologically it is seen in the
active, conative or appetitive aspect of consciousness. To think of a
thing involves already, in some measure, a tendency toward it, to
desire it. Physiologically considered, _idées-forces_ are found to
operate, not mechanically, but by a vital solidarity which is much more
than mere mechanism, and which unites the inner consciousness to the
outer physical fact of movement. From a general philosophical point of
view the doctrine of _idées-forces_ establishes the irreducibility of
the mental, and the fact that, so far from the mental being a kind of
phosphorescence produced as a result of the evolutionary process, it is
a prime factor in that evolution, of which mechanism is only a symbol.
Here Fouillée rises almost to the spiritualism of Ravaisson. Mechanism,
he declares, is, after all, but a manner of representing to ourselves
things in space and time. Scientists speak of forces, but the real
forces are ideas, and other so-called “forces” are merely analogies
which we have constructed, based upon the inner mental feeling of
effort, tendency, desire and will.[35]

 [34] _La Liberté et le Déterminisme_, p. 97, 4e ed.


 [35] This was a point upon which Maine de Biran had insisted. (See p.
 20.)


The scientists have too often, as Fouillée well points in his work on
_L’Evolutionnisme des Idées-forces_, regarded the concept of Evolution
as all-sufficing, as self-explanatory. Philosophy, however, cannot
accept such dogmatism from science, and asserts that evolution is
itself a result and not in itself a cause. With such a view Fouillée is
found ultimately in the line of the general development of the
spiritual philosophy continuing the hostility to science as ultimate or
all-sufficing. Further developments of this attitude are seen in
Boutroux and in Bergson.

In the work of Boutroux we find a continuation of that type of
criticism of science which was a feature in Ravaisson and Lachelier. He
has also affinities with Renouvier (and, we may add, with Comte),
because of his insistence upon the discontinuity of the sciences; upon
the element of “newness” found in each which prevents the higher being
deduced from the lower, or the superior explained by reference to the
inferior. Boutroux opposes Spencer’s doctrines and is a keen antagonist
of Taine and his claim to deduce all from one formula. Such a notion as
that of Taine is quite absurd, according to Boutroux, for there is no
necessary bond between one and another science. This is Boutroux’s main
point in _La Contingence des Lois de la Nature_.

By a survey of laws of various types, logical, mathematical,
mechanical, physical, chemical, biological, psychological and
sociological, Boutroux endeavours to show that they are constructions
built up from facts. Just as nature offers to the scientist facts for
data, so the sciences themselves offer these natural laws as data to
the philosopher, for his constructed explanation of things which is
metaphysics or philosophy.

“In the actual condition of our knowledge,” he remarks, “science is not
one, but multiple; science, conceived as embracing all the sciences, is
a mere abstraction.” This is a remark which recalls Renouvier’s witty
saying, “I should very much like to meet this person I hear so much
about, called ‘science.’” We have only sciences, each working after its
own manner upon a small portion of reality. Man has a thirst for
knowledge, and he sees, says Boutroux, in the world an “ensemble” of
facts of infinite variety. These facts man endeavours to observe,
analyse, and describe with increasing exactness. Science, he points
out, is just this description.

It is futile to attempt a resolution of all things into the principle
of identity. “The world is full of a number of things,” and, therefore,
argues Boutroux, the formula A = B can never be strictly and absolutely
true. “Nature never offers to us identities, but only resemblances.”
This has important bearing upon the law of causality, of which the
sciences make so much. For there is such a degree of heterogeneity in
the things to which the most elementary and general laws of physics and
chemistry are applied that it is impossible to say that the consequent
is proportional to the antecedent—that is to say, it is impossible to
work out absolutely the statement that an effect is the unique result
of a certain invariable cause. The fundamental link escapes us and so,
for us, there is a certain contingency in experience. There is,
further, a creativeness, a newness, which is unforeseeable. The passage
from the inorganic to the organic stresses this, for the observation of
the former would never lead us to the other, for it is a creation, a
veritable “new” thing. Boutroux is here dealing hard blows at Taine’s
conception. He continues it by showing that in the conscious living
being we are introduced to a new element which is again absolutely
irreducible to physical factors. Life, and consciousness too, are both
creators. The life of the mind is absolutely _sui generis_; it cannot
be explained by physiology, by reflex action, or looked upon as merely
an epiphenomenon. Already Boutroux finds himself facing the central
problem of Freedom. He recognises that as psychological phenomena
appear to contain qualities not given in their immediate antecedents,
the law of proportion of cause to effect does not apply to the actions
of the human mind.

The principle of causality and the principle of the conservation of
energy are m themselves scientific “shibboleths,” and neither of them,
asserts Boutroux, can be worked out so absolutely as to justify
themselves as ultimate descriptions of the universe. They are valuable
as practical maxims for the scientist, whose object is to follow the
threads of action in this varied world of ours. They are incomplete,
and have merely a relative value. Philosophy cannot permit their
application to the totality of this living, pulsing universe. For
cause, we must remember, does not in its strictly scientific meaning
imply creative power. The cause of a phenomenon is itself a phenomenon.
“The positive sciences in vain pretend to seize the divine essence or
reason behind things.”[36] They arrive at descriptive formulæ and there
they leave us. But, as Boutroux well reminds us in concluding his
thesis, formulas never explain anything because they cannot even
explain themselves. They are simply constructions made by observation
and abstraction and which themselves require explanation.

 [36] _Contingence des Lois de la Nature_, p 154.


The laws of nature are not restrictions which have been, as it were,
imposed upon her They are themselves products of freedom; they are, in
her, what habits are to the individual. Their constancy is like the
stability of a river-bed which the freely running stream at some early
time hollowed out.

The world is an assembly of beings, and its vitality and nature cannot
be expressed in a formula. It comprises a hierarchy of creatures,
rising from inorganic to organic forms, from matter to spirit, and in
man it displays an observing intelligence, rising above mere
sensibility and expressly modifying things by free will. In this
conception Boutroux follows Ravaisson, and he is also influenced by
that thinker’s belief in a spiritual Power of goodness and beauty. He
thus leads us to the sphere of religion and philosophy, both of which
endeavour, in their own manner, to complete the inadequacy of the
purely scientific standpoint. He thus stands linked up in the total
development with Cournot and Renouvier, and in his own group with
Lachelier, in regard to this question of the relation of philosophy and
the sciences.

The critique of science, which is so prominent in Boutroux, was
characteristic of a number of thinkers whom we cannot do more than
mention here in passing, for in general their work is not in line with
the spiritualist development, but is a sub-current running out and
separated from the main stream. This is shown prominently in the fact
that, while Boutroux’s critique is in the interests of idealism and the
maintenance of some spiritual values, much subsequent criticism of
science is a mere empiricism and, being divorced from the general
principles of the spiritualist philosophy, tends merely to accentuate a
vein of uncertainty—indeed, scepticism of knowledge. Such is the
general standpoint taken by Milhaud, Payot, and Duhem. Rather apart
from these stands the works of acute minds like Poincaré, Durand de
Gros, and Hannequin, whose discussion of the atomic doctrines is a work
of considerable merit. To these may be added Lalande’s criticism of the
doctrine of evolution and integration by his opposing to it that of
dissolution and disintegration. Passing references to these books must
not, however, detain us from following the main development which, from
Boutroux, is carried on by Bergson.

We find that Bergson, like Boutroux, holds no brief for science, and in
particular he opposes some of its doctrines which have been
dogmatically and uncritically accepted. His work, _Matiére et Mémoire_,
is a direct critique of the scientific postulate of psycho-physical
parallelism which Bergson regards as the crux of the problem at issue
between science and philosophy—namely, that of freedom. He shows that
this theory, which has been adopted by science because of its
convenience, ought not to be accepted by philosophy without criticism.
In his opinion it cannot stand the criticism which he brings against
it. A relation between soul and body is undeniable, but he does not
agree that that relation is one of absolute parallelism. To maintain
parallelism is to settle at once and beforehand, in an unwarrantably _a
priori_ manner, the whole problem of freedom. His intense spiritualism
sees also in such a doctrine the deadly enemy Epiphenomenalism, the
belief that the spiritual is only a product of the physical. He
maintains the unique and irreducible nature of consciousness, and
claims that the life of the soul or spirit is richer and wider than the
mere physical activity of the brain, which is really its instrument.
Bergson asks us to imagine the revolution which might have been, had
our early scientists devoted themselves to the study of mind rather
than matter, and claims that we suffer from the dogmatism of
materialistic science and the geometrical and mathematical conceptions
of “a universal science” or “mathematic” which come from the
seventeenth century, and are seen later in Taine.

The inadequacy of the scientific standpoint is a theme upon which
Bergson never tires of insisting. Not only does he regard a metaphysic
as necessary to complete this inadequacy, but he claims that our
intellect is incapable of grasping reality in its flux and change. The
true instrument of metaphysics is, according to him, intuition.
Bergson’s doctrine of intuition does not, however, amount to a pure
hostility to intellectual constructions. These are valuable, but they
are not adequate to reality. Metaphysics cannot dispense with the
natural sciences. These sciences work with concepts, abstractions, and
so suffer by being intellectual moulds. We must not mistake them for
the living, pulsing, throbbing reality of life itself which is far
wider than any intellectual construction.

By his insistence upon this point, in which he joins hands with several
of his predecessors, Bergson claims to have got over the Kantian
difficulties of admitting the value and possibility of a metaphysic.
There is nothing irrational, he insists, in his doctrine of
metaphysical intuition or “intellectual sympathy”; it is rather
super-rational, akin to the spirit of the poet and the artist. The
various sciences can supply data and, as such, are to be respected, for
they have a relative value. What Bergson is eager to do is to combat
their absolute value. His metaphysic is, however, no mere “philosophy
of the sciences” in the sense of being a mere summary of the results of
the sciences. His intuition is more than a mere generalisation of
facts; it is an “integral experience,” a penetration of reality in its
flux and change, a looking upon the world _sub specie durationis_. It
is a vision, but it is one which we cannot obtain without intellectual
or scientific labour. We can become better acquainted with reality only
by the progressive development of science _and_ philosophy. We cannot
live on the dry bread of the sciences alone, an intuitional philosophy
is necessary for our spiritual welfare. Science promises us well-being
or pleasure, but philosophy, claims Bergson, can give us joy, by its
intuitions, its super-intellectual vision, that vital contact with life
itself in its fulness, which is far grander and truer than all the
abstractions of science. This is the culmination of much already
indicated in Cournot, Renouvier, Ravaisson, Lachelier, and Boutroux,
which Bergson presents in a manner quite unique, thus closing in our
period the development of that criticism and hostility to the finality
and absoluteness of the purely scientific attitude which is so marked a
feature of both our second and third groups, the neo-critical thinkers
and the neo-spiritualists.

*    *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *


Beginning with a glowing confidence in the sciences as ultimate
interpretations of reality, we thus have witnessed a complete turn of
the tide during the develop-* since 1851. Also, in following out the
changes in the attitude adopted to Science, we have been enabled to
discover in a general manner that the central and vital problem which
our period presents is that of Freedom. It will be interesting to find
whether in regard to this problem, too, a similar change of front will
be noticeable as the period is followed to its close.

NOTE.—The reader may be interested to find that Einstein has brought
out some of Boutroux’s points very emphatically, and has confirmed the
view of geometry held by Poincaré. Compare the following statements:
    Boutroux: “Mathematics cannot be applied with exactness to
    reality.” “Mathematics and experience can never be exactly fitted
    into each other.”
    Poincaré: “Formulæ are not true, they are convenient.”
    Einstein: “If we deny the relation between the body of axiomatic
    Euclidean geometry or the practically rigid body of reality, we
    readily arrive at the view entertained by that acute and profound
    thinker, H. Poincaré . . . _Sub specie æterni_, Poincaré, in my
    opinion, is right” (_Sidelights on Relativity_, pp. 33-35).




CHAPTER IV
FREEDOM


INTRODUCTORY: The central problem of our period—The reconciliation of
science with man’s beliefs centres around the question of
Freedom—Unsatisfactoriness of Kant’s solution felt.

I. The positivist belief in universal and rigid determinism, especially
shown in Taine. Renan’s view.

II. Cournot and Renouvier uphold Freedom—Strong logical and moral case
put forward for it.

III. The new spiritualists, Ravaisson and Lacheher, set Freedom in the
forefront of their philosophy—Fouillée attempts a reconciliation by the
idea of Freedom as a determining force—Guyau, Boutroux, Blondel and
Bergson insist on the reality of Freedom—They surpass Cournot and
Renouvier by upholding contingency —This is especially true of Guyau,
Boutroux and Bergson.

Belief in creativeness and spontaneity replace the older belief in
determinism.




CHAPTER IV
FREEDOM

The discussions regarding the relation between science and philosophy
led the thinkers of our period naturally to the crucial problem of
freedom. Science has almost invariably stood for determinism, and men
were becoming impatient of a dogmatism which, by its denial of freedom,
left little or no place for man, his actions, his beliefs, his moral
feelings.

“_La nature fatale offre à la Liberté
Un problème_.”[1]


 [1] Guyau, in his _Vers d’un Philosophe_, “_Moments de Foi_—I.,” _En
 lisant Kant_, p. 57.


It was precisely this problem which was acutely felt in the philosophy
of our period as it developed and approached the close of the century.

In a celebrated passage of his _Critique of Judgment_ the philosopher
Kant had drawn attention to the necessity of bringing together the
concept of freedom and the concept of nature as constructed by modern
science, for the two were, he remarked, separated by an abyss. He
himself felt that the realm of freedom should exercise an influence
upon the realm of science, but his own method prohibited his attempting
to indicate with any preciseness what that influence might be. The
fatal error of his system, the artificial division of noumena and
phenomena, led him to assign freedom only to the world of noumena.
Among phenomena it had no place, but reigned transcendent, unknown and
unknowable, beyond the world we know.

The artificiality of such a solution was apparent to the thinkers who
followed Kant, and particularly was this felt in France. “Poor
consolation is it,” remarked Fouillée, in reply to Kant’s view, “for a
prisoner bound with chains to know that in some unknown realm afar he
can walk freely devoid of his fetters.”

The problem of freedom, both in its narrow sphere of personal free-will
and in its larger social significance, is one which has merited the
attention of all peoples in history. France, however, has been
pre-eminently a cradle for much acute thought on this matter. It loomed
increasingly large on the horizon as the Revolution approached, it
shone brilliantly in Rousseau. Since the Revolution it has been equally
discussed, and is the first of the three watchwords of the republic,
whose philosophers, no less than its politicians, have found it one of
their main themes.

The supreme importance of the problem of freedom in our period was due
mainly to the need felt by all thinkers for attempting, in a manner
different from that of Kant, a reconciliation between science and
morals (_science et conscience_), and to find amid the development of
scientific thought a place for the personality of the thinker himself,
not merely as a passive spectator, but as an agent, a willing and
acting being. Paul Janet, in his essays entitled _Problèmes du XIXe
Siècle_,[2] treating the question of science, asks whether the growing
precision of the natural sciences and “the extension of their
‘positive’ methods, which involve a doctrine or assumption of
infallible necessity, do not imperil gravely the freedom of the moral
agent?” While himself believing that, however closely the sciences may
seem to encroach upon the free power of the human soul, they will only
approach in an indefinite “asymptote,” never succeeding in annulling
it, he senses the importance of the problem. Science may endeavour to
tie us down to a belief in universal and rigid determinism, but the
human spirit revolts from the acceptance of such a view, and acclaims,
to some degree at least, the reality of a freedom which cannot be
easily reconciled with the determinist doctrines.

 [2] Published in 1872.


In the period which we have under review the central problem is
undoubtedly that of freedom. Practically all the great thinkers in
France during this period occupied themselves with this problem, and
rightly so, for they realised that most of the others with which
philosophy concerns itself depend in a large degree upon the attitude
adopted to freedom. Cournot, Renouvier, Ravaisson, Lachelier, Fouillée,
Boutroux, Blondel and Bergson have played the chief part in the arena
of discussion, and although differing considerably in their methods of
treatment and not a little in the form of their conclusions, they are
at one in asserting the vital importance of this problem and its
primacy for philosophy. The remark of Fouillée is by no means too
strong: “The problem which we are going to discuss is not only a
philosophical problem; it is, _par excellence_, _the_ problem for
philosophy. All the other questions are bound up with this.”[3] This
truth will be apparent when, after showing the development of the
doctrines concerning freedom, we come, in our subsequent chapters, to
consider its application to the questions of progress, of ethics and of
the philosophy of religion.

 [3] In his preface to his Thesis _Liberté et Déterminisme_, later
 editions, p. vii.

I

We find in the thought of our period a very striking development or
change in regard to the problem of freedom. Beginning with a strictly
positivist and naturalist belief in determinism, it concludes with a
spiritualism or idealism which not only upholds freedom but goes
further in its reaction against the determinist doctrines by
maintaining contingency.

Taine and Renan both express the initial attitude, a firm belief in
determinism, but it is most clear and rigid in the work of Taine. His
whole philosophy is hostile to any belief in freedom. The strictly
positivist, empiricist and naturalist tone of his thought combined with
the powerful influence of Spinoza’s system to produce in him a firm
belief in necessity—a necessity which, as we have seen, was severely
rational and of the type seen in mathematics and in logic. Although it
must also be admitted that in this view of change and development Taine
was partly influenced by the Hegelian philosophy, yet his formulations
were far more precise and mathematical than those of the German
thinker.

We have, in considering his attitude to science, seen the tenacious
manner in which he clings to his dogma of causality or universal
necessity. All living things, man included, are held in the firm grip
of “the steel pincers of necessity.” Every fact and every law in the
universe has its _raison explicative_, as Taine styles it. He quotes
with approval, in his treatment of this question at the close of his
work _De l’Intelligence_, the words of the great scientist and
positivist Claude Bernard: “_Il y a un déterminisme absolu, dans les
conditions d’existence des phénomènes naturels, aussi bien pour les
corps vivants que pour les corps bruts_.”[4] In Taine and the school of
scientists like Bernard, whose opinions on this matter he voices, no
room is accorded to freedom.

 [4] _De l’Intelligence_, vol. 2, p. 480, the quotation from Bernard is
 to be found in his _Introduction à l’Etude de la Médecine
 expérimentale_, p. 115.


Taine’s belief in universal necessity and his naturalistic outlook led
him to regard man from the physical standpoint as a mechanism, from the
mental point of view a theorem. Vice and virtue are, to quote his own
words, “products just as vitriol or sugar.” This remark having appeared
to many thinkers a scandalous assertion, Taine explained in an article
contributed to the _Journal des Débats_[5] that he did not mean to say
that vice and virtue were, like vitriol or sugar, _chemical_ but they
are nevertheless products, _moral_ products, which moral elements bring
into being by their assemblage. And, he argues, just as it is necessary
in order to make vitriol to know the chemical elements which go to its
composition, so in order to create in man the hatred of a lie it is
useful to search for the psychological elements which, by their union,
produce truthfulness.

 [5] On December 19th, 1872.


Even this explanation of his position, however, did not prevent the
assertion being made that such a view entirely does away with all
question of moral responsibility. To this criticism Taine objected. “It
does not involve moral indifference. We do not excuse a wicked man
because we have explained to ourselves the causes of his wickedness.
One can be determinist with Leibnitz and nevertheless admit with
Leibnitz that man is responsible —that is to say, that the dishonest
man is worthy of blame, of censure and punishment, while the honest man
is worthy of praise, respect and reward.”

In one of his _Essais_ Taine further argued in defence of his doctrine
of universal determination that since WE ourselves are determined—that
is to say, since there is a psychological determinism as well as a
physical determinism—we do not feel the restriction which this
determinism implies, we have the illusion of freedom and act just as if
we were free. To this Fouillée replied that the value of Taine’s
argument was equal to that of a man who might say, “Because _I_ am
asleep, all of me, all my powers and faculties, therefore I am in a
state where I am perfectly free and responsible.” Certainly Taine’s
remark that _we_ are determined had nothing in common with the belief
in that true determinism, which is equally true freedom, since it is
_self_-determination. Taine professed no such doctrine, and rested in a
purely naturalistic fatalism, built upon formulæ of geometry and logic,
in abstraction from the actual living and acting of the soul, and this
dogma of determinism, to which he clung so dearly, colours his view of
ethics and of history. For Taine, “the World is a living geometry” and
“man is a theorem that walks.”

Like Taine, Renan set out from the belief in universal causation, but
he employed the conception not so much in a warfare against man’s
freedom of action as against the theologians’ belief in miracle and the
supernatural. There is none of Taine’s rigour and preciseness in Renan,
and it is difficult to grasp his real attitude to the problem of
freedom. If he ever had one, may be doubted. The blending of
viewpoints, the paradox so characteristic of him, seems apparent even
in this question.

His intense humanism prompted him to remarks in praise of freedom, and
he seems to have recognised in man a certain power of freedom; but in
view of his belief in universal cause he is careful to qualify this.
Further, his intensely religious mind remained in love with the
doctrine of divine guidance which is characteristic of Christian and
most religious thought. Although Renan left the Church, this belief
never left Renan. He sees God working out an eternal purpose in
history, and this he never reconciled with the problem of man’s free
will. The humanist in him could remark that the one object of life is
the development of the mind, and the first condition for this is
freedom. Here he appears to have in view freedom from political and
religious restrictions. He is thinking of the educational problem. His
own attitude to the ultimate question of freedom in itself, as opposed
to determinism, is best expressed in his _Examen d’une Conscience
philosophique_. He there shows that the universe is the result of a
lengthy development, the. beginnings of which we do not know. “In the
innumerable links of that chain,” says Renan, “we find not one free act
before the appearance of man, or, if you like, living beings.” With
man, however, freedom comes into the scheme of things. A free cause is
seen employing the forces of nature for willed ends. Yet this is but
nature itself blossoming to self-consciousness; this free cause
emanates from nature itself. There is no rude break between man with
his free power and unconscious nature. Both are interconnected. Freedom
is indeed the appearance of something “new,” but it is not, insists
Renan, something divorced from what has gone before.

We see in Renan a rejection of the severely deterministic doctrine of
Taine, but it is by no means a complete rejection or refutation of it.
Renan adheres largely to the scientific and positivist attitude which
is such a feature of Taine’s work. His humanism, however, recognises
the inadequacy of such doctrines and compels him to speak of freedom as
a human factor, and he thus brings us a step nearer to the development
of the case for freedom put forward so strongly by Cournot and
Renouvier and by the neo-spiritualists.

II

A very powerful opposition to all doctrines based upon or upholding
determinism shows itself in the work of Cournot and the neo-critical
philosophy. The idea of freedom is a central one in the thought of both
Cournot and Renouvier.

Cournot devoted his early labours to a critical and highly technical
examination of the question of probability, considered in its
mathematical form, a task for which he was well equipped.[6] Being not
only a man of science but also a metaphysician, or rather a philosopher
who approached metaphysical problems from the impulse and data accorded
him by the sciences, Cournot was naturally led to the wider problem of
_probabilité philosophique_. He shows in his _Essai sur les Fondements
de nos Connaissances_ that hazard or chance are not merely words which
we use to cover our ignorance, as Taine would have claimed. Over
against the doctrine of a universal determinism he asserts the reality
of these factors. The terms chance and hazard represent a real and
vital element in our experience and in the nature of reality itself.
Probability is a factor to be reckoned with, and this is so because of
the elements of contingency in nature and in life. Freedom is bound up
essentially with the vitality which is nature itself.

 [6] See his _Essai sur les Fondements de nos Connaissances: “Hazard,”_
 chap. iii.; “_Probabilité Philosophique_,” chap, iv., pp. 71-101; and
 chap. v., “_De l’Harmonie et de la Finalité_,” pp. 101-144.


The neo-critical philosopher, Renouvier, is a notable champion of
freedom. We have already seen the importance he attaches to the
category of personality. For him, personality represents a
consciousness in possession of itself, a free and rational harmony—in
short, freedom personified.

From a strictly demonstrative point of view Renouvier thinks it is
impossible to prove freedom as a fact. However, he lays before us with
intense seriousness various. considerations of a psychological and a
moral character which have an important bearing upon the problem. This
problem, he asserts, not only concerns our actions but also our
knowledge. To bring out this point clearly, Renouvier develops some of
the ideas of his friend, Jules Lequier, on the notion of the autonomy
of the reason, or rather of the reasonable will. In this way he shows
doubt and criticism to be themselves signs of freedom, and asserts that
we form our notions of truth freely, or that at least they are
creations of our free thought, not laid upon us by an external
authority.

More light is thrown on the problem by considering what Renouvier calls
_vertige mental_, a psychopathological condition due to a disturbance
of the rational harmony or self-possession which constitutes the
essence of the personal consciousness. This state is characterised by
hallucination and error. It is the extreme opposite of the
self-conscious, reflective personality in full possession of itself and
exercising its will rationally. Renouvier shows that between these two
extremes there are numerous planes of _vertige mental_ in which the
part played by our will is small or negligible, and we are thus victims
of habit or tendency. Is there, then, any place for freedom? There most
certainly is, says Renouvier, for our freedom manifests itself whenever
we inhibit an action to which we are excited by habit, passion or
imagination. Our freedom is the product of reflection. We are at
liberty to be free, to determine ourselves in accordance with higher
motives. This power is just our personality asserting itself, and it
does not contradict our being, more often than not, victims of habit.
We have it in our power to make fresh beginnings. Renouvier’s disbelief
in strict continuity is here again apparent. We must admit freedom of
creation in the personality itself, and not seek to explain our actions
by trying to ascend some scale of causes to infinity. There is no such
thing as a sum to infinity of a series; there is no such thing as the
influence of an infinite series of causes upon the performance of a
consciously willed act in which the personality asserts its initiative—
that is, its power of initiation of a new series, in short, its
freedom.

Passing from these psychological considerations, Renouvier calls our
attention to some of a moral nature, no less important, in his opinion,
for shedding light upon the nature of freedom. If, he argues, all is
necessary, if all human actions are predetermined, then popular
language is guilty of a grave extravagance and appears ridiculous,
insinuating, as it does, that many acts might have been left undone and
many events might have occurred differently, and that a man might have
done other than he did. In the light of the hypothesis of rigorous
necessity, the mention of ambiguous futures and the notion of “being
otherwise” (_le pouvoir être autrement_) seem foolish. Science may
assert the docrine of necessity and preach it valiantly, but the human
conscience feels it to be untrue and will not be gainsaid. The
scientist himself is forced to admit that man does not accept his
gospel of universal predestination or fatalism. This Renouvier
recognises as an important point in the debate. Strange, is it not, he
remarks, that the mind of the philosopher himself, a sanctuary or
shrine for truth, should appear as a rebellious citadel refusing to
surrender to the truth of this universal necessity. We believe
ourselves to be free agents or, at least beings who are capable of some
free action. However slight such action, it would invalidate the
hypothesis of universal necessity.

If all things are necessitated, then moral judgments, the notions of
right and of duty, have no foundation in the nature of things. Virtue
and crime lose their character; the sentiments and feelings, such as
regret, hope, fear, desire, change their meaning or become meaningless.
Renouvier lays great stress upon these moral considerations.

Again, if everything be necessitated, error is as necessary as truth.
The false is indeed true, being necessary, and the true may become
false. Disputes rage over what is false or true, but these disputes
cannot be condemned, for they themselves are, by virtue of the
hypothesis, necessary, and the disputes are necessarily absurd and
ridiculous from this point of view. Where then is truth? Where is
morality? We have here no basis for either. Looking thus at history,
all its crimes and infamies are equally lawful, for they are
inevitable; such is the result, Renouvier shows, of viewing all human
action as universally predetermined.

The objections thus put forward by Renouvier against the doctrine of
universal necessity are powerful ones. They possess great weight and
result in the admission, even by its upholders, that “the judgment of
freedom is a natural datum of consciousness and is bound up with our
reflective judgments upon which we act, being itself the foundation of
these.”

Yet, we have, Renouvier reminds us, no logical proof of the reality of
freedom. We feel ourselves moved, spontaneously and unconstrained. The
future, in so far as it depends upon ourselves, appears not as
prearranged but ambiguous, open.[7] Whether our judgment be true or
false, we in practical life act invariably on the belief in freedom.
That, of course, as Renouvier admits at this stage of his discussion,
does not prove that our belief is not an illusion. It is a feeling,
natural and spontaneous.

 [7] Cf., later, Bergson’s remark: “The portals of the future stand
 wide open, the future is being made.”


One of the most current forms of the doctrine of freedom has been that
known as the “liberty of indifference.” The upholders of this theory
regard the will as separated from motives and ends. The operation of
the will is regarded by them as indifferent to the claims or influence
of reason or feeling. Will is superadded externally to motives, where
such exist, or may be superimposed on intellectual views even to the
extent of annulling these. Judgment and will are separated in this
view, and the will is a purely arbitrary or indifferent factor. It can
operate without reason against reason. The opponents of freedom find
little difficulty in assailing this view, in which the will appears to
operate like a dice or a roulette game, absolutely at hazard, reducing
man to a non-rational creature. Such a type of will, however, Renouvier
declares to be non-existent, for every man who has full consciousness
of an act of his has at the same time a consciousness of an end or
purpose for this act, and he proposes to realise by this means a good
which he regards as preferable to any other. In so far as he has doubts
of this preference the act and the judgment will be suspended. He must,
however, if he be an intelligent being, pursue what he deems to be his
good—that is to say, what he deems to be good at the time of acting.
Renouvier here agrees with Socrates and Plato in the view that no man
deliberately and knowingly wills what he considers to be evil or to be
bad for him. Virtue involves knowledge, and although there is the
almost proverbial phrase of Ovid and of Paul, about seeing and
approving the better, yet nevertheless doing the worse, it is a general
statement which does not express an antithesis as present to
consciousness at the time of action. The agent may afterwards say

. . . “_Video meliora proboque
deteriora sequor_.”


but at the time of action “the worse” must appear to him as a good, at
any rate then and in his own judgment. Further, beyond these
psychological considerations there are grave moral objections,
Renouvier points out, to admitting “an indifferent will,” for the acts
of such a will being purely arbitrary and haphazard, the man will be no
moral agent, no responsible person. A man who wills apart from the
consideration of any motive whatever can never perform any meritorious
action. Under the conception of an indifferent will the term “merit”
ceases to have a meaning. The theologians who have asserted the
doctrine (indeed, it seems to have originated, Renouvier thinks, with
them) have readily admitted this point, for it opens up the way for
their theory of divine grace or the good will of God acting directly
upon or within the agent. Will and merit are for them quite separate,
the latter being due to the mystical operations of divine favour or
grace, in honour of which the indifference of the will has been
postulated. Philosophers not given to appeals to divine grace, who have
upheld the doctrine of the indifferent will, have really been less
consistent than the theoloians and have fallen into grave error.

Renouvier appeals to the testimony of the penal laws of all nations in
favour of his criticism of an indifferent will. Motive _is_ deemed a
real factor, for men are not deemed to have acted indifferently. Some
deliberation, indeed, is implied in all action which is conscious and
human, some comparison of motives and a conscious, decision. The values
of truth, as well as those of morality are equally fatal to the
indifferentist; for, asks Renouvier, is a man to be regarded as not
determined to affirm as true what he judges to be true?

The doctrine of freedom as represented by that of an indifferent will
is no less vicious, Renouvier affirms, than the opposing doctrine of
universal necessity. The truth is that they both rest on fictions.
“Indifferentism” imagines a will divorced from judgment, separated from
the rational man himself, an unseizable power, a mysterious absolute
cause unconnected with reflection or deliberation, a mere chimera. For
determinism the will is equally a fiction.

A way out of this difficulty is to be found, according to Renouvier, in
viewing the will in a manner different from that of the
“indifferentists.” Let us suppose the will bound up with motive, a
motive drawn from the intellectual and moral equipment of the man.
This, however, gives rise to psychological determinism. The will, it is
argued, follows always the last determination of the understanding.
Greater subtilty attends on this argument against freedom than those
put forward on behalf of physical determinism. Renouvier sees that
there is no escape from such a doctrine as psychological determinism
unless we take a view of the will as bound up with the nature of man as
a whole, with his powers of intellect and feeling. Such a will cannot
be characterised as indifferent or as the mere resultant of motives.

The Kantian element in Renouvier’s thought is noticeable in the strong
moral standpoint from which he discusses all problems, and this is
particularly true of his discussion of this very vital one of freedom.
He is by no means, however, a disciple of Kant, and he joins battle
strongly with the Kantian doctrine of freedom. This is natural in view
of his entire rejection of Kant’s “thing-in-itself,” or noumena, and it
follows therefrom, for Kant attached freedom only to the noumenal
world, denying its operation in the world of phenomena. The rejection
of noumena leaves Renouvier free to discuss freedom in a less remote or
less artificial manner than that of Kant.

If it be true, argues Renouvier, that necessity rules supreme, then the
human spirit can find peace in absolute resignation; and in looking
back over the past history of humanity one need not have different
feelings from those entertained by the geologist or paleontologist.
Ethics, politics and history thus become purely “natural” sciences (if
indeed ethics could here have meaning, would it not be identical with
anthropology? At any rate, it would be purely positive. A normative
view of ethics would be quite untenable in the face of universal
necessity). Any inconvenience, pain or injustice would have to be
accepted and not even named “evil,” much less could any effort be truly
made to expel it from the scheme of things. To these accusations the
defenders of necessity object. The practical man, they say, need not
feel this, in so far as he is under the illusion of freedom and unaware
of the rigorous necessity of all things. He need not refrain from
action.

But this defence of necessity leads those who wish to maintain the case
against it to continue the argument. Suppose that the agent does _not_
forget that all is necessitated, what then? Under no illusion of the
idea of freedom, he then acts at every moment of his existence in the
knowledge that he cannot but do what he is doing, he cannot but will
what he wills, he cannot but desire what he desires. In time this must
produce, says Renouvier, insanity either of an idle type or a furious
kind, he will become an indifferent imbecile or a raving fanatic, in
either case a character quite abnormal and dangerous. These are extreme
results, but between the two extremes all degrees of character are to
be, found. The most common type of practical reason presents an
antinomy in the system of universal necessity. The case for necessity
must reckon with this fact—namely, that the operation of necessity has
itself given rise to ethics which exists, and, according to the case,
its existence is a necessary one; yet ethics constitutes itself in
opposition to necessity, and under the sway of necessity is quite
meaningless. Here is a paradox which is not lessened if we suppose the
ethical position to be an absurd and false one. Whether false or not,
morality in some form is practically as universal as human nature. That
nature, Renouvier insists, can hardly with sincerity believe an
hypothesis or a dogma which its own moral instincts belie continually.

If, on the other hand, truth lies with the upholders of freedom, then
man’s action is seen to have great value and significance, for man then
appears as creating a new order of things in the world. His new acts,
Renouvier admits, will not be without preceding ones, without roots or
reasons, but they will be without _necessary_ connection with the whole
scheme of things. He is thus creating a new order; he is creating
himself and making his own history. Conscious pride or bitter remorse
can both alike be present to him. The great revolutions of history will
be regarded by him not as mystical sweepings of some unknown force
external to himself, but as results of the thought and work of humanity
itself. A philosophy which so regards freedom will thus be a truly
“human” philosophy. Renouvier rightly recognises that the whole
philosophy of history turns upon the attitude which we adopt to
freedom.

In view of the many difficulties connected with the problem of freedom
many thinkers would urge us to a compromise. Renouvier is aware of the
dangers of this attitude, and he brings into play against it his
logical method of dealing with problems. This does not contradict his
statement about the indemonstrability of freedom, nor does it minimise
the weight and significance of the moral case for freedom: it
complements it. Between contradictories or incompatible propositions no
middle course can be followed. Freedom and necessity cannot be both at
the same time true, or both at the same time false, for of the two
things one must be true—namely, either human actions are all of them
totally predetermined by their conditions or antecedents, or they are
not all of them totally predetermined. It is to this pass that we are
brought in the logical statement of the case. Now sceptics would here
assert that doubt was the only solution. This would not realh be a
solution, and however legitimate doubt is in front of conflicting
theories, it involves the death of the soul if it operates in practical
affairs and in any circumstances where some belief is absolutely
necessary to the conduct of life and to action.

The freedom in question, as Renouvier is careful to remind us, does not
involve our maintaining the total indetermination of things or denial
of the operations of necessity within limits. Room is left for freedom
when it is shown that this necessity is not universal. Many
consequences of free acts may be necessitated. For example, says
Renouvier, I have a stone in my hand. I can freely will to hurl it
north or south, high or low, but once thrown from my hand its path is
strictly determined by the law of gravity. The voluntary movement of a
man on the earth may, however slightly, alter the course of a distant
planet. Freedom, we might say, operates in a sphere to which necessity
supplies the matter. Ultimately any free act is a choice between two
alternatives, equally possible, but both necessitated as possibilities.
The points of free action may seem to take up a small amount of room in
the world, so to speak, but we must realise how vital they are to any
judgment regarding its character, and how tremendously important they
are from a moral point of view. So far, claims Renouvier, from the
admittance of freedom being a destruction of the laws of the universe,
it really shows us a special law of that universe, not otherwise to be
explained—namely, the moral law. Freedom is thus regarded by Renouvier
as a positive fact, a moral certainty.

Freedom is the pillar of the neo-critical philosophy; it is the first
truth involved at once in all action and in all knowledge. Truth and
error are not well explained, or, indeed, at all explained, by a
doctrine which, embracing them both as equally necessary, justifies
them equally, and so in a sense verifies both of them. It was this
point which Brochard developed in his work _L’Erreur_, which has
neo-critical affinities. Man is only capable of science because he is
free; it is also because he is free that he is subject to error.[8]
Renouvier claims that “we do not avoid error always, but we always
_can_ avoid it.”[9] Truth and error can only be explained, he urges, by
belief in the ambiguity of futures, movements of thought involving
choice between opinions which conflict—in short, by belief in freedom.
The calculation of probabilities and the law of the great numbers
demonstrates, Renouvier claims, the indetermination of futures, and
consciousness is aware of this ambiguity in practical life. This belief
in the ambiguity of futures is a condition, he shows, of the exercise
of the human consciousness in its moral aspect, and this consciousness
in action regards itself as suspended before indetermination—that is,
it affirms freedom. This affirmation of freedom Renouvier asserts to be
a necessary element of any rational belief whatever. It alone gives
moral dignity and supremacy to personality, whose existence is the
deepest and most radical of all existences. The personal life in its
highest sense and its noblest manifestation is precisely Freedom.
Renouvier assures us that there is nothing mysterious or mystical about
this freedom. It is not absolute liberty and contingency of all things;
it is an attribute of persons. The part played thus freely by
personality in the scheme or order of the universe proves to us that
that order or scheme is not defined or formed in a predetermined
manner; it is only in process of being formed, and our personal efforts
are essential factors in its formation. The world is an order which
becomes and which is creating itself, not a pre-established order which
simply unrolls itself in time. For a proper understanding of the nature
of this problem “we are obliged to turn to the practical reason. It is
a moral affirmation of freedom which we require; indeed, any other kind
of affirmation would, Renouvier maintains, presuppose this. The
practical reason must lay down its own basis and that of all true
reason, for reason is not divided against itself reason is not
something apart from man; it is man, and man is never other than
practical—_i.e._, acting.”[10] Considered from this standpoint there
are four cases which present themselves to the tribunal of our
judgment—namely, the case for freedom, the case against freedom, the
case for necessity and the case against necessity.

 [8] _De L’Erreur_, p. 47.


 [9] _Psychologie rationnelle_, vol. 2, p. 96.


 [10] _Psychologie rationnelle_, vol. 2, p 78.


The position is tersely put in the Dilemma presented by Jules Lequier,
the friend of Renouvier, quoted in the _Psychologie rationnelle_. There
are four possibilities:

To affirm necessity, necessarily. To affirm necessity, freely. To
affirm freedom, necessarily. To affirm freedom, freely.

On examining these possibilities we find that to affirm necessity,
necessarily, is valueless, for its contradictory, freedom, is equally
necessary. To affirm necessity, freely, does not offer us a better
position, for here again it is necessity which is affirmed. If we
affirm freedom necessarily, we are in little better case, for necessity
operates again (although Renouvier notes that this gives a certain
basis for morality). In the free affirmation of freedom, however, is to
be found not only a basis for morals, but also for knowledge and the
search for truth. Indeed, as we are thus forced “to admit the truth of
either necessity or freedom, and to choose between the one and the
other with the one or with the other,”[11] we find that the affirmation
of necessity involves contradiction, for there are many persons who
affirm freedom, and this they do, if the determinist be right,
necessarily. The affirmation of freedom, on the other hand, is free
from such an absurdity.

 [11] _Ibid_., p. 138.


Such is the conclusion to which Renouvier brings us after his wealth of
logical and moral considerations. He combines both types of discussion
and argument in order to undermine the belief in determinism and to
uphold freedom, which is, in his view, the essential attribute of
personality and of the universe itself. He thus succeeded in altering
substantially the balance of thought in favour of freedom, and further
weight was added to the same side of the scales by the new spiritualist
group who placed freedom in the forefront of their thought.

III

The development of the treatment of this problem within the thought of
the new spiritualists or idealists is extremely interesting, and it
proceeded finally to a definite doctrine of contingency as the century
drew to its close. The considerations set forth are usually
psychological in tone, and not so largely ethical as in the
neo-critical philosophy.

Ravaisson declared himself a champion of freedom. He accepted the
principle of Leibnitz, to the effect that everything has a reason, from
which it follows that everything is necessitated, without which there
could be no certitude and no science. But, says Ravaisson, there are
two kinds of necessity—one absolute, one relative. The former is
logical, the type of the principle of identity, and is found in
syllogisms and in mathematics, which is just logic applied to quantity.
The other type of necessity is moral, and is, unlike the former,
perfectly in accord with freedom. It indeed implies freedom, the
freedom of self-determination. The truly wise man can- not help doing
what is right and good. The slave of Passion and caprice and evil has
no freedom. The wise man selecting the good chooses it infallibly, but
at the time with perfect free-will. “It is perhaps because the good or
the beautiful is simply nothing other than love—that is, the power of
will in all its purity, and so to will what is truly good is to will
oneself (_c’est se vouloir soi-même_).”[12]

 [12] _La Philosophie en France_, p. 268.


Nature is not, as the materialists endeavour to maintain, entirely
geometrical—that is to say, fatalistic in character. Morality enters
into the scheme of things and, with it, ends freely striven for. There
is present a freedom which is a kind of necessity, yet opposed to
fatalism. This freedom involves a determination by conceptions of
perfection, ideals of beauty and of good. “Fatality is but an
appearance; spontaneity and freedom constitute reality.”[13] So far,
continues Ravaisson, from all things operating by brute mechanism or by
pure hazard, things operate by the development of a tendency to
perfection, to goodness and beauty. Instead of everything submitting to
a blind destiny, everything obeys, and obeys willingly, a divine
Providence.

 [13] _Ibid_., p. 270.


Ravaisson’s fundamental spiritualism is clear in all this, and it
serves as the starting-point for the thinkers who follow him.
Spiritualism is bound up with spontaneity, creation, freedom, and this
is his central point, this insistence on freedom. While resisting
mechanical determination he endeavours to retain a determination of
another kind—namely, by ends, a teleology or finalism. This is
extremely interesting when observed in relation to the subsequent
development in Lachelier, Boutroux, Blondel and Bergson.

Lachelier’s treatment of freedom is an important landmark in the
spiritualist development. By his concentrated analysis of the problem
of induction he brought out the significance of efficient and final
causes respectively. He appears as the pupil of Ravaisson, whose
initial inspiration is apparent in his whole work, especially in his
treatment of freedom. He dwells upon the fact of the spontaneity of the
spirit—a point of view which Ravaisson succeeded in imparting to the
three thinkers, Lachelier, Boutroux and Bergson. Besides the influence
of Ravaisson, however, that of Kant and Leibnitz appears in Lachelier’s
attitude to freedom. Yet he passes beyond the Kantian position, and he
rejects the double-aspect doctrine which Leibnitz maintained with
regard to efficient and final causes. Lachelier insists that the
spontaneity of spirit stands above and underlies the whole of nature.
This is the point which Boutroux, under Lachelier’s influence, took up
in his _Contingence des Lois de la Nature_. Lachelier, in attacking the
purely mechanistic conception of the universe, endeavoured, as he
himself put it, “to substitute everywhere force for inertia, life for
death and freedom for fatalism.” Rather than universal necessity it is
universal contingence which is the real definition of existence. We are
free to determine ourselves in accordance with ends we set before us,
and to act in the manner necessary to accomplish those ends. Our life
itself, as he shows in the conclusion of his brilliant little article
_Psychologie et Métaphysique_, is creative, and we must beware of
arguing that what we have been makes us what we are, for that character
which we look upon as determining us need not do so if we free
ourselves from habit, and, further, this character is, in any case,
itself the result of our free actions over extended time, the free
creation of our own personality.

While with Ravaisson and Lachelier the concept of freedom was being
rather fully developed in opposition to the determinist doctrines,
Fouillée, in his brilliant and acute thesis on _Liberté et
Déterminisme_, endeavoured to call a halt to this supremacy of Freedom,
and to be true to the principles of reconciliation which he laid down
for himself in his philosophy. He confesses himself, at the outset, to
be a pacifist rather than a belligerent in this classic dispute between
determinists on the one hand and partisans of freedom on the other. He
believes that, on intimate investigation pursued sufficiently far, the
two opposing doctrines will be seen to converge. Such a declaration
would seem to be dangerously superficial in a warfare as bitter and as
sharp as this. It must be admitted that, as is the case with many who
profess to conciliate two conflicting views, Fouillée leaves us at
times without precise and definite indication of his own position.

In contrast to the attitude of Ravaisson and Lachelier Fouillée
inclines in some respects to the attitude of Taine and many passages of
his book show him to be holding at least a temporary brief for the
partisans of determinism. He agrees notably with Taine in his objecting
to the contention that under the determinist theory moral values lose
their significance. Fouillée claims that it is both incorrect and
unfair to argue that “under the necessity-hypothesis a thing being all
that it can be is thereby all that it should be.”[14].

 [14] _La Liberté et le Déterminisme_, p. 51 (fourth edition).


He goes on to point out that the consciousness of independence, which
is an essential of freedom, may be nothing more than a lack of
consciousness of our dependence. Motives he is inclined to speak of as
determining the will itself, while he looks upon the “liberty of
indifference” or of hazard as merely a concession to the operations of
mechanical necessity. The “liberty of indifference” is often the mere
play of instinct and of fatality, while hazard, so far from being an
argument in the hands of the upholders of freedom, is really a
determination made previously by something other than one’s own will.

This is a direct attack upon the doctrines put forward by both Cournot
and Renouvier. Fouillée is well aware of this, and twenty pages of his
thesis are devoted to a critical and hostile examination of the
statements of both Renouvier and his friend Lequier.[15] Fouillée
claims that these two thinkers have only disguised and misplaced the
“liberty of indifference”; they have not, he thinks, really suppressed
it, although both of them profess to reject it absolutely. A keen
discussion between Fouillée and Renouvier arose from this and continued
for some time, being marked on both sides by powerful dialectic.
Renouvier used his paper the _Critique philosophique_ as his medium,
while Fouillée continued in subsequent editions of his thesis, in his
_Idée moderne du Droit_ and also in his acute study _Critique des
Systèmes de Morale contemporains_. Fouillée took Renouvier to task
particularly for his maintaining that if all be determined then truth
and error are indistinguishable. Fouillée claims that the distinction
between truth and error is by no means parallel to that between
necessity and freedom. An error may, he points out, be necessitated,
and consequently we must look elsewhere for our doctrine of certitude
than to the affirmation of freedom. In the philosophy of Renouvier, as
we have seen, these two are intimately connected. Fouillée criticises
the neo-critical doctrine of freedom on the ground that Renouvier mars
his thought by a tendency to look upon the determinist as a passive and
inert creature. This, he says, is “the argument of laziness” applied to
the intelligence. “One forgets,” says Fouillée, “that if intelligence
is a mirror, it is not an immovable and powerless mirror: it is a
mirror always turning itself to reality.”[16]

 [15] _Ibid_., pp. 117-137.


 [16] _La Liberté et le Déterminisme_, p. 129.


On examining closely the difference between Renouvier and Fouillée over
this problem of freedom, we may attribute it to the fact that while the
one thinker is distinctly and rigorously an upholder of continuity, the
other believes in no such absolute continuity. For Fouillée there is,
in a sense, nothing new under the sun, while Renouvier in his thought,
which has been well described as a philosophy of discontinuity, has a
place for new things, real beginnings, and he is in this way linked up
to the doctrine of creative development as set forth ultimately by
Bergson. It will be seen also as we proceed that Fouillée, for all he
has to say on behalf of determinism, is not so widely separated in his
view of freedom from that worked out by Bergson, although at the first
glance the gulf between them seems a wide one.

Fouillée, while attacking Renouvier, did not spare that other acute
thinker, Lachelier, from the whip of his criticism. He takes objection
to a passage in that writer’s _Induction_ where he advocates the
doctrine that the production of ideas “is free in the most rigorous
sense of that word, since each idea is in itself absolutely independent
of that which precedes it, and is born out of nothing, as is a world.”
To this view of the spontaneity of the spirit Fouillée opposes the
remark that Lachelier is considering only the _new forms_ which are
assumed by a mechanism which is always operating under the same laws of
causality. He asks us in this connection to imagine a kaleidoscope
which is being turned round. The images which succeed each other will
be in this sense a formal creation, a form _independent_ of that which
went before, but, as he is anxious to remind us, the same mechanical
and geometrical laws will be operating continually in producing these
forms.

Having had these encounters with the upholders of freedom, and thus to
some degree having conveyed the impression of being on the side of the
determinists, Fouillée proceeds to the task he had set himself—namely,
that of reconciliation. He felt the unsatisfactoriness of Kant’s
treatment of freedom,[17] and he endeavours to remedy the lack in Kant
of a real link between the determinism of the natural sciences and the
human consciousness of freedom, realised in the practical reason.
Fouillée proposes to find in his _idées-forces_ a middle term and to
offer us a solution of the problem at issue in the dispute.

 [17] See above, p. 136.


He begins by showing that there has been an unfortunate neglect of one
important factor in the case—a factor whose reality is frankly admitted
by both parties. This central, incontestable fact is the _idea_ of
freedom. This idea, according to Fouillée, arises in us as the result
Of a combination of various psychological factors, such as notions of
diversity, possibility, with the tendency to action arising from the
notion of action, which thus shows itself as a force. The combination
of these results in the genesis of the idea of freedom. Now the
stronger this idea of freedom is in our minds the more we make it
become a reality. It is an “idea-force” which by being thought tends to
action and thus increases in power and fruitfulness. The idea of
freedom becomes, by a kind of determinism, more powerful in proportion
to the degree with which it is acted upon. Determinism thus reflects
upon itself and in a curious way turns to operate against itself. This
directing power of the idea of freedom cannot be denied even by the
most rigorous upholders of determinism. They at least are forced to
find room in their doctrine for _the idea_ of freedom and its practical
action on the lives of men, both individually and in societies. The
vice of the doctrines of determinism has been the refusal to admit the
reality of the liberating idea of freedom, which is tending always to
realise itself.

The belief in freedom is, therefore, Fouillée claims, a powerful force
in the world. Nothing is a more sure redeemer of men and societies from
evil ways than the realisation of this idea of freedom. So largely is
this the case that indeed the extinction of the _belief_ in freedom
would, he argues, not differ much in consequence from the finding that
freedom was an illusion, or, if it be a fact, its abolition.

Having thus rectified the doctrine of determinism by including a place
within it for _the idea_ of freedom, Fouillée proceeds by careful
analysis to show the error of belief in freedom understood as that of
an indifferent will. This raises as many fallacious views as that of a
determinism bereft of the idea of freedom. The capricious and
indifferent liberty he rejects, and in so doing shows us the importance
of the intelligent power of willing, and also reaffirms the
determinists’ thesis of inability to do certain things. The psychology
of character shows us a determined freedom, and in the intelligent
personality a reconciliation of freedom and determinism is seen to be
effected. Fouillée shows that if it were not true that very largely
what we have been makes us what we are, and that what we are determines
our future actions, then education, moral guidance, laws and social
sanctions would all be useless. Indifferentism in thought is the
reversal of all thought.

Fouillée sees that the antithesis between Freedom and Necessity is not
absolute, and he modifies the warmth of Renouvier’s onslaughts upon the
upholders of determinism. But he believes we can construct a notion of
moral freedom which will not be incompatible with the determinism of
nature. To effect this reconciliation, however, we must abandon the
view of Freedom as a decision indifferently made, an action of sheer
will unrelated to intelligence. Freedom is not caprice; it is, Fouillée
claims, a power of indefinite development.

Yet, in the long and penetrating Introduction to his volume on the
_Evolutionnisme des Idées-forces_, Fouillée points out that however
much science may feel itself called upon to uphold a doctrine of
determinism for its own specific purposes, we must remember that the
sphere of science is not all-embracing. There is the sphere of action,
and the practical life demands and, to a degree demonstrates, freedom.
Fouillee admits in this connection the indetermination of the future,
_pour notre esprit_. We act upon this idea of relative indeterminism,
combining with it the idea of our own action, the part which we
personally feel called upon to play. He recognises in his analysis how
important is this point for the solution of the problem. We cannot
overlook the contribution which our personality is capable of making to
the whole unity of life and experience, not only by its achievements in
action, but by its ideals, by that which we feel both _can_ and
_should_ be. Herein lies, according to Fouillée’s analysis, the secret
of duty and the ideal of our power to fulfil it, based upon the central
idea of our freedom. By thus acting on these ideas, and by the light
and inspiration of these ideals, we tend to realise them. It is this
which marks the point where a doctrine of pure determinism not only
shows itself erroneous and inadequate, but as Fouillee puts it, the
human consciousness is the point where it is obliged to turn against
itself “as a serpent which bites its own tail.”[18] Fatalism is a
speculative hypothesis and nothing else. Freedom is equally an
hypothesis, but, adds Fouillée, it is an hypothesis which is at work in
the world.

 [18] _Evolutionnisme des Idées-forces_, Introduction, p. lxxiv.


In the thought of Guyau there is a further insistence upon freedom in
spite of the fact that his spiritualism is super-added to much which
reveals the naturalist and positive outlook. He upholds freedom and,
indeed, contingency, urging, as against Ravaisson’s teleology, that
there is no definite tendency towards truth, beauty and goodness. At
all times, too, Guyau is conscious of union with nature and with his
fellows in a way which operates against a facile assertion of freedom.
In his _Vers d’un Philosophe_ he remarks:

“_Ce mot si doux au coeur et si cher, Liberté,
J’en préfèrs encore un: c’est Solidarité._”[19]


 [19] _Vers d’un Philosophe, “Solidarité,”_ p. 38.


The maintenance of the doctrine of liberty, which in view of the facts
we are bound to maintain, does away, Guyau insists, with the doctrine
of Providence; for him, as for Bergson, there is no _prévision_ but
only _nouveauté_ in the universe. Guyau indeed is not inclined to admit
even that end which Bergson seems to favour—namely, “spontaneity of
life itself.” The world does not find its end in us, any more than we
find our “ends” fixed for us in advance. Nothing is fixed, arranged or
predetermined; there is not even a primitive adaptation of things to
one another, for such adaptation would involve the pre-existence of
ideas prior to the material world, together with a demiurge arranging
things upon a plan in the manner of an architect. In reality there is
no plan; every worker conceives his own. The world is a superb example,
not of order, such as we associate with the idea of Providence in
action, but the reverse, disorder, the result of contingency and
freedom.

The supreme emphasis upon the reality of freedom appears, however, in
the work of Boutroux and of Bergson at the end of our period. They
arrive at a position diametrically opposed to that of the upholders of
determinism, by their doctrines of contingency as revealed both in the
evolution of the universe and in the realm of personal life. There is
thus seen, as was the case with the problem of science, a complete
“turn of the tide” in the development since Comte.

Boutroux, summing up his thesis _La contingence des Lois de la Nature_,
indicates clearly in his concluding chapter his belief in contingency,
freedom and creativeness. The old adage, “nothing is lost, nothing is
created,” to which science seems inclined to attach itself, has not an
absolute value, for in the hierarchy of creatures contingency, freedom,
newness appear in the higher ranks. There is at work no doubt a
principle of conservation, but this must not lead us to deny the
existence and action of another principle, that of creation. The world
rises from inorganic to organic forms, from matter to spirit, and in
man himself from mere sensibility to intelligence, with its capacity
for criticising and observing, and to will capable of acting upon
things and modifying them by freedom.

Boutroux inclines to a doctrine of finalism somewhat after the manner
of Ravaisson. The world he conceives as attracted to an end; the
beautiful and the good are ideals seeking to be realised; but this
belief in finality does not, he expressly maintains, exclude
contingency. To illustrate this, Boutroux uses a metaphor from
seamanship: the sailors in a ship have a port to make for, yet their
adaptations to the weather and sea en route permit of contingency along
with the finality involved in their making for port. So it is with
beings in nature. They have not merely the one end, to exist amid the
obstacles and difficulties around them, “they have an ideal to realise,
and this ideal consists in approaching to God, to his likeness, each
after his kind. The ideal varies with the creatures, because each has
his special nature, and can only imitate God in and by his own
nature.”[20]

 [20] _La Contingence des Lois de la Nature_, p. 158.


Boutroux’s doctrine of freedom and contingency is not opposed to a
teleological conception of the universe, and in this respect he stands
in contrast to Bergson, who, in the rigorous application of his theory
of freedom, rules out all question of teleology. With Renouvier and
with Bergson, however, Boutroux agrees in maintaining that this
freedom, which is the basis of contingency in things, is not and cannot
be a datum of experience, directly or indirectly, because experience
only seizes things which are actually realised, whereas this freedom is
a creative power, anterior to the act. Heredity, instinct, character
and habit are words by which we must not be misled or overawed into a
disbelief in freedom. They are not absolutely fatal and fully
determined. The same will, insists Boutroux, which has created a habit
_can_ conquer it. Will must not be paralysed by bowing to the assumed
supremacy of instincts or habits. Habit itself is not a contradiction
of spontaneity; it is itself a result of spontaneity, a state of
spontaneity itself, and does not exclude contingency or freedom.

Metaphysics can, therefore, according to Boutroux, construct a doctrine
of freedom based on the conception of contingency. The supreme
principles according to this philosophy will be laws, not those of the
positive sciences, but the laws of beauty and goodness, expressing in
some measure the divine life and supposing free agents. In fact the
triumph of the good and the beautiful will result in the replacement of
laws of nature, strictly so called, by the free efforts of wills
tending to perfection—that is, to God.

Further studies upon the problem of freedom are to be found in
Boutroux’s lectures given at the Sorbonne in 1892-93 in the course
entitled _De l’Idée de la Loi naturelle dans la Science et la
Philosophie contemporaines_. He there recognises in freedom the crucial
question at issue between the scientists and the philosophers, for he
states the object of this course of lectures as being a critical
examination of the notion we have of the laws of nature, with a view to
determining the situation of human personality, particularly in regard
to free action.[21] Boutroux recognises that when the domain of science
was less extensive and less rigorous than it is now it was much easier
to believe in freedom. The belief in Destiny possessed by the ancients
has faded, but we may well ask ourselves, says Boutroux, whether modern
science has not replaced it by a yet more rigorous fatalism.[22] He
considers that the modern doctrine of determinism rests upon two
assumptions—namely, that mathematics is a perfectly intelligible
science, and is the expression of absolute determinism; also that
mathematics can be applied with exactness to reality. These assumptions
the lecturer shows to be unjustifiable. Mathematics and experience can
never be fitted exactly into each other, for there are elements in our
experience and in our own nature which cannot be mathematically
expressed. This Boutroux well emphasises in his lecture upon
sociological laws, where he asserts that history cannot be regarded as
the unrolling of a single law, nor can the principle of causality,
strictly speaking, be applied to it.[23] An antecedent certainly may be
an influence but not a cause, as properly understood. He here agrees
with Renouvier s position and attitude to history, and shows the vital
bearing of the problem of freedom upon the philosophy of history, to
which we shall presently give our special attention.

 [21] _De l’Idée de la Loi naturelle_, Lecture IV., p. 29.


 [22] Compare Janet’s remark, given on p. 136.


 [23] Lecture XIII.


Instead of the ideal of science, a mathematical unity, experience shows
us, Boutroux affirms, a hierarchy of beings, displaying variety and
spontaneity—in short, freedom. So far, therefore, from modern science
being an advocate of universal determinism, it is really, when rightly
regarded, a demonstration, not of necessity, but of freedom. Boutroux’s
treatment of the problem of freedom thus demonstrates very clearly its
connection with that of science, and also with that of progress. It
forms pre-eminently the central problem.

The idea of freedom is prominent in the “philosophy of action” and in
the Bergsonian philosophy; indeed, Bergson’s treatment of the problem
is the culmination of the development of the idea in Cournot, Renouvier
and the neo-spiritualists. In Blondel the notion is not so clearly
worked out, as there are other considerations upon which he wishes to
insist. Blondel is deeply concerned with the power of ideals over
action, and his thought of freedom has affinities to the psychology of
the _idées-forces_. This is apparent in his view of the will, where he
does not admit a purely voluntarist doctrine. His insistence on the
dynamic of the will in action is clear, but he reminds us that the will
does not cause or produce everything, for the will wills to be what is
not yet; it strives for achievement, to gain something beyond itself.
Much of Blondel’s treatment of freedom is coloured by his religious and
moral psychology, factors with which Bergson does not greatly concern
himself in his writings. Blondel endeavours to maintain man’s freedom
of action and at the same time to remain loyal to the religious notion
of a Divine Providence, or something akin to that. Consequently he is
led to the dilemma which always presents itself to the religious
consciousness when it asserts its own freedom—namely, how can that
freedom be consistent with Divine guidance or action? Christian
theology has usually been determinist in character, but Blondel
attempts to save freedom by looking upon God as a Being immanent in
man.

Bergson makes Freedom a very central point in his philosophy, and his
treatment of it bears signs of the influence of De Biran, Ravaisson,
Lachelier, Guyau and Boutroux. He rejects, however, the doctrine of
finality as upheld by Ravaisson, Lachelier and Boutroux, while he
stresses the contingency which this last thinker had brought forward.
His solution of the problem is, however, peculiarly his own, and is
bound up with his fundamental idea of change, or LA DURÉE.

In his work _Les Données immédiates de la Conscience_, or _Time and
Free-Will_, he criticises the doctrine of physical determinism, which
is based on the principle of the conservation of energy, and on a
purely mechanistic conception of the universe. He here points out, and
later stresses in his _Matiere et Mémoire_, the fact that it has not
been proved that a strictly determined psychical state corresponds to a
definite cerebral state. We have no warrant for concluding that because
the physiological and the psychological series exhibit some
corresponding terms that therefore the two series are absolutely
parallel. To do so is to settle the problem of freedom in an entirely
_a priori_ manner, which is unjustifiable.

The more subtle and plausible case for psychological determinism
Bergson shows to be no more tenable than that offered for the physical.
It is due to adherence to the vicious Association-psychology, which is
a psychology without a self. To say the self is determined by motive
will not suffice, for in a sense it is true, in another sense it is
not, and we must be careful of our words. If we say the self acts in
accordance with the strongest motive, well and good, but how do we know
it is the strongest? Only because it has prevailed—that is, only
because the self acted upon it, which is totally different from
claiming that the self was determined by it externally. To say the self
is determined by certain tives is to say it is self-determined. The
essential thing in all this is the vitality of the self.

The whole difficulty, Bergson points out, arises from the fact that all
attempts to demonstrate freedom tend only to strengthen the artificial
case for determinism, because freedom is only characteristic of a self
_in action_. He is here in line on this point with Renouvier and
Boutroux, although the reasons he gives for it go beyond in
psychological penetration those assigned by these thinkers. When our
action is over, says Bergson, it seems plausible to argue a case for
determinism because of our spatial conception of time and the
relationships of events in time. We have a habit of thinking in terms
of space, by mathematical time, not in real time or _la durée_ as
Bergson calls it, the time in which the living soul acts.

Bergson thus makes room in the universe for a freedom of the human
will, a creative activity, and thus delivers us from the bonds of
necessity and fatalism in which the physical sciences and the
associationist psychology would bind us. We perceive ourselves as
centres of indetermination, creative spirits. We must guard our
freedom, for it is an essential attribute of spirit. In so far as we
tend to become dominated by matter, which acts upon us in habit and
convention, we lose our freedom. It is not absolute, and many never
achieve it, for their personality never shines forth at all: they live
their lives in habit and routine, victims of automatism. We have,
however, Bergson urges, great power of creation. He stresses, as did
Guyau, the Conception of Life, as free, expanding, and in several
respects his view of freedom is closer to that of Guyau than to that of
Boutroux, in spite of the latter’s contingency. There is no finalism
admitted by Bergson, for he sees in any teleology only “a reversed
mechanism.”

Obviously the maintenance of such a doctrine of freedom as that of
Bergson is of central importance in any philosophy which contains it.
Our conceptions of ethics and of progress depend upon our view of
freedom. For Bergson “the portals of the future stand wide open, the
future is being made.” He is an apostle of a doctrine of absolute
contingency which he applied to the evolution of the world, in his
famous volume _L’Evolution Créatrice_ (published in 1907). His
philosophy has been termed pessimistic by some in view of his rejection
of any teleological conception. Such a doctrine would conflict with his
“free” universe and his absolute contingency. On the other hand, it
leaves open an optimistic view, because of its freedom, its insistence
upon the possibilities of development. It is not only a reaction
against the earlier doctrines of determinism, it is a deliverance of
the human soul which has always refused, even when religious, to
abandon entirely the belief in its own freedom.

Such is the doctrine of freedom which closes our period, a striking
contrast to the determinism which, under the influence of modern
science, characterised its opening. The critique of science and the
assaults upon determinism proceeded upon parallel lines. In many
respects they were two aspects of the one problem, and in themselves
were sufficient to describe the essential development in the thought of
our half century, for the considerations of progress, ethics and
religion to which we now turn derive their significance largely from
what has been set forth in these chapters on Science and Freedom.




CHAPTER V
PROGRESS


INTRODUCTORY : Freedom and Progress intimately connected—Confidence in
Progress, a marked feature of the earlier half of the nineteenth
century, was bound up with confidence in Science and Reason, and in a
belief in determinism, either natural or divine—Condorcet, Saint-Simon,
Comte and others proclaim Progress as a dogma.

I. The idea of progress in Vacherot, Tame and Renan—Interesting
reflections of Renan based on belief in Reason.

II. Cournot and Renouvier regard Progress in a different light, owing
to their ideas on Freedom—They look upon it as a possibility only, but
not assured, not inevitable—Renouvier’s study of history in relation to
progress and his view of immortality as Progress—No law of progress
exists.

III. The new spiritualist group emphasise the lack of any law of
progress, by their insistence on the spontaneity of the spirit,
creativeness and contingency—Difficulties of finalsm or teleology in
relation to progress as free—No law or guarantee of progress.

CONCLUSION : Complete change from earlier period regarding Progress—New
view of it developed—Facile optimism rejected.




CHAPTER V
PROGRESS

Intimately bound up with the idea of freedom is that of progress. For,
although our main approach to the discussion of freedom was made by way
of the natural sciences, by a critique of physical determinism, and
also by way of the problem of personal action, involving a critique of
psychological determinism, it must be noted that there have appeared
throughout the discussion very clear indications of the vital bearing
of freedom upon the wide field of humanity’s development considered as
a whole—in short, its history. The philosopher must give some account
of history, if he is to leave no gap in his view of the universe. The
philosophy of history will obviously be vastly different if it be based
on determinism rather than on freedom. When the philosopher looks at
history his thoughts must inevitably centre around the idea of
progress. He may believe in it or may reject it as an illusion, but his
attitude to it will be very largely a reflection of the doctrine which
he has formed regarding freedom.

The notion of progress is probably the most characteristic feature
which distinguishes modern civilisation from those of former times. It
would have seemed to the Greeks foolishness. We owe it to the people
who, in the modern world, have been what Greece was in the ancient
world, the glorious mother of ideas. The eighteenth century was marked
in France by a growing belief in progress, which was encouraged by the
Encyclopaedists and rose to enthusiasm at the Revolution. Its best
expression was that given by Condorcet, himself an Encyclopaedist, and
originally a supporter of the Revolution. His _Sketch of an Historical
Picture of the Progress of the Human Mind_ was written in 1793 (while
its author was threatened with the guillotine[1]), published two years
later, and became, in the early years of the nineteenth century, a
powerful stimulus to thought concerning progress. Much of the work is
defective, but it had a great influence upon Saint-Simon, the early
socialists, and upon the doctrines of Auguste Comte, which themselves
are immediate antecedents of our own period. We may note briefly here,
that Condorcet believed in a sure and infallible progress in knowledge
and in social welfare. This is the important doctrine which Saint-Simon
and Comte both accepted from him. His ideal of progress is contained in
the three watchwords of the Revolution, _Liberté_, _Egalité_,
_Fraternité_, particularly the last two. He forecasts an abandonment of
militarism, prophesies an era of universal peace, and the reign of
equality between the sexes. Equality is a point which he insists upon
very keenly, and, although he did not speak of sociology as did Comte,
nor of socialism as did Saint-Simon, he claimed that the true history
of mankind is the history of the great mass of workers: it is not
diplomatic and military, not the record of dazzling deeds of great men.
Condorcet, however, was dogmatic in his belief in progress, and he did
not work out any “law” of progress, although he believed progress to be
a law of the universe, in general, and an undeniable truth in regard to
the life-history of mankind.

 [1] He was ultimately imprisoned and driven to suicide.


Later, his friend Cabanis upheld a similarly optimistic view, and
endeavoured to argue for it, against the Traditionalists, who we may
remember endeavoured to restate Catholicism, and to make an appeal to
those whom the events of the Revolution had disturbed and
disillusioned. The outcome of the Terror had somewhat shaken the belief
in a straightforward progress, but enthusiastic exponents of the
doctrine were neither lacking nor silent. Madame de Staël continued the
thought of Condorcet, thus forming a link between him and Saint-Simon
and Comte. The influence of the Traditionalists and the general current
of thought and literature known as Romanticism, helped also to solve a
difficulty which distinguishes Condorcet from Comte. This difficulty
lay in the eighteenth-century attitude to the Middle Ages, which
Condorcet had accepted, and which seriously damaged his thesis of
general progress, for in the eighteenth century the Middle Ages were
looked upon as a black, dark regress, for which no thinker had a good
word to say. The change of view is seen most markedly when we come to
Comte, whose admiration of the Middle Ages is a conspicuous feature of
his work. While, however, Saint-Simon and Comte were working out their
ideas, great popularity was given to the belief in progress by the
influence of Cousin, Jouffroy, Guizot, and by Michelet’s translation of
the _Scienza nuova_ of the Italian thinker Vico, a book then a century
old but practically unknown in France. For Cousin, the world process
was a result of a necessary evolution of thought, which he conceived in
rather Hegelian fashion. Jouffroy agreed with this fatal progress,
although he endeavoured to reconcile it with that of personal freedom.
Guizot’s main point was that progress and civilisation are the same
thing, or rather, that civilisation is to be defined only by progress,
for that is its fundamental idea. His definition of progress is not,
however, strikingly clear, and he calls attention to two types of
progress—one involving an improvement in social welfare, the other in
the spiritual or intellectual life. Although Guizot tried to show that
progress in both these forms is a fact, he did not touch ultimate
questions, nor did he successfully show that progress is the universal
key to human history. He did not really support his argument that
civilisation _is_ progress in any convincing way, but he gave a
stimulus to reflection on the question of the relationship of these
two. Michelet’s translation of Vico came at an appropriate time, and
served a useful purpose. It showed to France a thinker who, while not
denying a certain progress over short periods, denied it over the long
period, and reverted rather to the old notion of an eternal recurrence.
For Vico, the course of human history was not rectilineal but rather
spiral, although he, too, refrained from indicating any law. He claimed
clearly enough that each civilisation must give way to barbarism and
anarchy, and the cycle be again begun.

Such were the ideas upon progress which were current at the time when
Saint-Simon, Fourier and Comte were busily thinking out their
doctrines, the main characteristics of which we have already noted in
our Introduction on the immediate antecedents of our period. The
thought given to the question of progress in modern France is almost
unintelligible save in the light of the doctrines current from
Condorcet, through Saint-Simon to Comte, for the second half of the
century is again characterised by a criticism and indeed a reaction
against the idea professed in the first half. This was true in regard
to Science and to Freedom. We shall see a similar type of development
illustrated again respecting Progress.

Already we have noted the general aim and object which both Saint-Simon
and Comte had in view. The important fact for our discussion here is
that Saint-Simon, by his respect for the Middle Ages, and for the power
of religion, was able to rectify the defects which the ideas of the
eighteenth century had left in Condorcet’s doctrine of progress.
Moreover, he claimed, as Condorcet had not done, to indicate a “law of
progress,” which gives rise alternately to “organic” and to “critical”
periods. The Middle Ages were, in the opinion of Saint-Simon, an
admirable period, displaying as they did an organic society, where
there was a temporal and spiritual authority. With Luther began an
anarchical, critical period. According to Saint-Simon s law of progress
a new organic period will succeed this, and the characteristic of that
period will be socialism. He advocated a gradual change, not a violent
revolutionary one, but he saw in socialism the inevitable feature of
the new era. With its triumph would come a new world organisation and a
league of peoples in which war would be no more, and in which the lot
of the proletariat would be free from oppression and misery. The
Saint-Simonist School became practically a religious sect, and the
chief note in its gospel was “Progress.”

That the notion of progress was conspicuous in the thought of this time
is very evident. It was, indeed, in the foreground, and a host of
writers testify to this, whom we cannot do much more than mention here.
A number of them figured in the events of 1848. The social reformers
all invoked “Progress” as justification for their theories being put
into action. Bazard took up the ideas of Saint-Simon and expounded them
in his _Exposition de la Doctrine saint-simonienne_ (1830). Buchez, in
his work on the philosophy of history, assumed progress (1833). The
work of Louis Blanc on _L’Organisation du Travail_ appeared in 1839 in
a periodical calling itself _Revue des Progrès_. The brochure from
Proudhon, on property, came in 1840, and was followed later by _La
Philosophie du Progrès_ (1851). Meanwhile Fourier’s _Théorie des Quatre
Mouvements et des Destinées générales_ attempted in rather a fantastic
manner to point the road to progress. Worthless as many of his quaint
pages are, they were a severe indictment of much in the existing order,
and helped to increase the interest and the faith in progress.
Fourier’s disciple, Considérant, was a prominent figure in 1848. The
Utopia proposed by Cabet insisted upon _fraternité_ as the keynote to
progress, while the volumes of Pierre Leroux, _De l’Humanité_, which
appeared in the same year as Cabet’s volume, 1840, emphasised _égalité_
as the essential factor. His humanitarianism influenced the
woman-novelist, George Sand. This same watchword of the Revolution had
been eulogised by De Tocqueville in his important study of the American
Republic in 1834, and that writer had claimed _égalité_ as the goal of
human progress. All these men take progress as an undoubted fact; they
only vary by using a different one of the three watchwords, _Liberté_,
_Egalité_, _Fraternité_, to denote the kind of progress they mean.
Meanwhile, Michelet and his friend Quinet combated the Hegelian
conception of history maintained by Cousin, and they claimed _liberté_
to be the watchword of progress. The confidence of all in progress is
almost pathetic in its unqualified optimism. It is not remarkable that
the events of 1851 proved a rude shock. Javary, a writer who, in 1850,
published a little work, _De l’Idée du Progrès_, claimed that the idea
is the supremely interesting question of the time in its relation to a
general philosophy of history and to the ultimate destiny of mankind.
This is fairly evident from the writers we have cited, without Javary’s
remark, but it is worth noting as being the observation of a
contemporary. With the mention of Reynaud’s _Philosophie religieuse_,
upholding the principle of indefinite perfectability and Pelletan’s
_Profession du Foi du XIXe Siècle_, wherein he maintained confidently
and dogmatically that progress is the general law of the universe, we
must pass on from these minor people to consider one who had a
profounder influence on the latter half of the century, and who took
over the notion of progress from Saint-Simon.

This was Comte, whose attitude to progress in many respects resembles
that of Saint-Simon, but he brought to his work a mental equipment
lacking in the earlier writer and succeeded, by the position he gave to
it in his Positive Philosophy, in making the idea of progress one which
subsequent thinkers could not omit from consideration.

According to Comte, the central factor in progress is the mental.
Ideas, as Fouillée was later to assert, are the real forces in
humanity’s history. These ideas develop in accordance with the “Law of
the Three Stages,” already explained in our Introduction. In spite of
the apparent clearness and simplicity of this law, Comte had to admit
that as a general law of all development it was to some degree rendered
difficult in its application by the lack of simultaneity in development
in the different spheres of knowledge and social life. While
recognising the mental as the keynote to progress, he also insisted
upon the solidarity of the physical, intellectual, moral and social
life of man, and to this extent admitted a connection and interaction
between material welfare and intellectual progress. The importance of
this admission lay in the fact that it led Comte to qualify what first
appears as a definite and confident belief in a rectilineal progress.
He admits that such a conception is not true, for there is
retrogression, conflict, wavering, and not a steady development. Yet he
claims that there is a general and ultimate progress about a mean line.
The causes which shake and retard the steady progress are not
all-powerful, they cannot upset the fundamental order of development.
These causes which do give rise to variations are, we may note in
passing, the effects of race, climate and political and military feats
like those of Napoleon, for whom Comte did not disguise his hatred,
styling him the man who had done most harm to humanity. Great men upset
his sociological theories, but Comte was no democrat and strongly
opposed ideas of Liberty and Equality. We have remarked upon his
general attitude to his own age, as one of criticism and anarchy. In
this he was probably correct, but he quite underestimated the extent
and duration of that anarchy, particularly by his estimate of the
decline and fall of Catholicism and of militarism, which he regarded as
the two evils of Europe. The events of the twentieth century would have
been a rude shock to him, particularly the international conflagration
of 1914-1918. It was to Europe that Comte confined his philosophy of
history and consequently narrowed it. He knew little outside this
field.

He endeavoured, however, to apply his new science of sociology to the
development of European history. His work contains much which is good
and instructive, but fails ultimately to establish any law of progress.
It does not seem to have occurred to Comte’s mind that there might not
be one. This was the question which was presented to the thinkers after
him, and occupies the chief place in the subsequent discussion of
progress.

I

In the second half of the century the belief in a definite and
inevitable progress appears in the work of those thinkers inspired by
the positivist spirit, Vacherot, Taine and Renan. Vacherot’s views on
the subject are given in one of his _Essais de Philosophie
critique_,[2] entitled “_Doctrine du Progrès_.” These pages, in which
sublime confidence shines undimmed, were intended as part of a longer
work on the Philosophy of History. Many of Renan’s essays, and
especially the concluding chapters of his work _L’Avenir de la
Science_, likewise profess an extreme confidence in progressive
development. Yet Taine and Renan are both free from the excessive and
glowing confidence expressed by Condorcet, Saint-Simon and Comte.
Undoubtedly the events of their own time reacted upon their doctrine of
progress, and we have already noted the pessimism and disappointment
which coloured their thoughts regarding contemporary political events.
Both, however, are rationalists, and have unshaken faith in the
ultimate triumph of reason.

 [2] Published in 1864.


The attitude which Taine adopts to history finds a parallel in the
fatalism and determinism of Spinoza, for he looks upon the entire life
of mankind as the unrolling of a rigidly predetermined series of
events. “Our preferences,” he remarks, “are futile; nature and history
have determined things in advance; we must accommodate ourselves to
them, for it is certain that they will not accommodate themselves to
us.” Taine’s view of history reflects his rejection of freedom, for he
maintains that it is a vast regulated chain which operates
independently of individuals. Fatalism colours it entirely. It is
precisely this attitude of Taine which raises the wrath of Renouvier,
and also that of both Cournot and Fouillée, whose discussions we shall
examine presently. They see in such a doctrine an untrue view of
history and a theory vicious and detestable from a moral standpoint,
although it doubtless, as Fouillée sarcastically remarks, has been a
very advantageous one for the exploiters of humanity in all ages to
teach and to preach to the people.

In passing from Taine’s fatalistic view of history to note his views on
progress we find him asserting that man’s nature does not in itself
inspire great optimism, for that nature is largely animal, and man is
ever ready, however “civilised” he may appear to be, to return to his
native primitive ferocity and barbarism. Man is not, according to
Taine, even a sane animal, for he is by nature mad and foolish. Health
and wisdom only occasionally reign, and so we have no great ground for
optimism when we examine closely the nature of man, as it really is.
Taine’s treatment of the French Revolution[3] shows his hostility to
democracy, and he is sceptical about the value or meaning of the
watchwords, “Rights of Man,” or _Liberté_, _Egalité_, _Fraternité_.
This last, he claims, is merely a verbal fiction useful for disguising
the reality, which is actual warfare of all against all.

 [3] _“La Révolution,”_ in his large work, _Les Origines de la France
 contemporaine_.


Yet in spite of these considerations Taine believes in a definitely
guaranteed progress. Man’s lower nature does not inspire optimism, but
his high power of reason does, and it is on this faith in reason that
Taine confidently founds his assertions regarding progress. He sees in
reason the ultimate end and meaning of all else. The triumph of reason
is an ideal goal to which, in spite of so many obstacles, all the
forces of the universe are striving. In this intellectual progress,
this gradual rationalisation of mankind, Taine sees the essential
element of progress upon which all other goods depend. The betterment
of social conditions will naturally follow; it is the spiritual and
mental factor which is the keynote of progress Reason, he contends,
will give us a new ethic, a new politic and a new religion.

Renan shares with Taine the belief in reason and its ultimate triumph.
His views on progress are, however, more discursive, and are extremely
interesting and suggestive. He was in his later years shrewd enough to
discover the difficulties of his own doctrine. Thus although he
believed in a “guaranteed” progress, Renan marks a stage midway between
the idea of progress as held by Comte and Taine on the one hand, and by
Cournot and Renouvier on the other.

His early book, _L’Avenir de la Science_, glows with ardent belief in
this assured progress, which is bound up with his confidence in science
and rationality. “Our creed,” he there declares, “is the reasonableness
of progress.” This idea of progress is almost as central a point in
Renan’s thought as it was in that of Comte, and he gave it a more
metaphysical significance. His general philosophy owes much to history,
and for him the philosophy of history is the explanation of progress.
By this term he means an ever-growing tendency to perfection, to fuller
consciousness and life, to nobler, better and more beautiful ends. He
thinks it necessary to conceive of a sort of inner spring, urging all
things on to fuller life. He seems here to anticipate vaguely the
central conception of Guyau and of Bergson. But, like Taine, Renan
founds his doctrine of progress on rationalism. He well expresses this
in one of his _Drames philosophiques (L’Eau de Jouvence)_, through the
mouth of Prospero, who represents rational thought. This character
declares that “it is science which brings about social progress, and
not progress which gives rise to science. Science only asks from
society to have granted to it the conditions necessary to its life and
to produce a sufficient number of minds capable of understanding
it.”[4] In the preface written for this drama he declares that science
or reason will ultimately succeed in creating the power and force of
government in humanity.

 [4] _L’Eau de Jouvence_, Act 4, Scene I., Conclusion.


These thoughts re-echo many of the sentiments voiced on behalf of
progress by Condorcet, Saint-Simon and Comte. It is interesting,
however, to note an important point on which Renan not only parts
company with them, but ranges himself in opposition to them. This point
is that of socialism or democracy, call it what one will.

In the spring of 1871 Renan was detained at Versailles during the
uproar of the Commune in Paris, and there wrote his _Dialogues et
Fragments philosophiques_, which were published five years later. In
these pages certain doctrines of progress and history are set forth,
notably in the “dialogues of three philosophers of that school whose
ground-principles are the cult of the ideal, the negation of the
supernatural and the investigation of reality.” Renan raises a
discussion of the end of the world’s development. The universe, he
maintains, is not devoid of purpose: it pursues an ideal end. This goal
to which the evolutionary process moves is the reign of reason. But
there are striking limitations to this advance. From this kingdom of
reason on the earth the mass of men are shut out. Renan does not
believe in a gradual improvement of the mass of mankind accompanied by
a general rationalisation which is democratic. The truth is that Renan
was an intellectual aristocrat and, as such, he abhorred Demos. His
gospel of culture, upon which he lays the greatest stress, is for the
few who are called and chosen, while the many remain outside the pale,
beyond the power of the salvation he offers. The development of the
democratic idea he looks upon as thoroughly mischievous, inasmuch as it
involves, in his opinion, degeneration, a levelling down to mediocrity.
In his philosophy of history he adopts an attitude somewhat akin to
that of Carlyle in his worship of Great Men. The end of history is,
Renan states, the production of men of genius. The great mass of men,
the common stuff of humanity, he likens to the soil from which these
Great Ones grow. The majority of men have their existence justified
only by the appearance upon the scene of “Heroes of Culture.” In this
teaching the parallelism to the gospel of the Superman is apparent, yet
it seems clear that although Renan’s man of culture despises the
ignorance and vulgarity of the crowd, he does so condescendingly as a
benefactor, and is free from the passionate hatred and scorn to which
Nietzsche’s Superman is addicted. Nevertheless, Renan’s attitude of
uncompromising hostility to democratic development is very marked. He
couples his confidence in Science to his anti-democratic views, and
affirms the “Herd” to be incapable of culture. Although the process of
rationalisation and the establishment of the kingdom of reason is
applicable only to the patrician and not to the _plebs_, this process
is claimed by Renan to be capable of great extension, not in the number
of its adherents but in the extent of culture. In this final reign of
reason, instinctive action and impulse will be replaced by
deliberation, and science will succeed religion.

His famous letter to Berthelot includes a brief statement of his views
on progressive culture, which, for him, constitutes the sign of
progress. “One ought never,” he writes, “to regret seeing clearer into
the depths.” By endeavouring to increase the treasure of the truths
which form the paid-up capital of humanity, we shall be carrying on the
work of our pious ancestors, who loved the good and the true as it was
understood in their time. The true men of progress, he claims, are
those who profess as their starting-point a profound respect for the
past. Renan himself was a great lover of the past, yet we find him
remarking in his _Souvenirs d’Enfance et de Jeunesse_ that he has no
wish to be taken for an uncompromising reactionist. “I love the past,
but I envy the future,” and he thinks that it would be extremely
pleasant to live upon this planet at as late a period as possible. He
appears jealous of the future and of the young, whose fate it will be
to know what will be the outcome of the activities of the German
Emperor, what will be the climax of the conflict of European
nationalities, what development socialism will take. His shrewd mind
had alreadv foreseen in a measure the possible development of German
militarism and of Bolshevism. He regards the world as moving towards a
kind of “Americanism,” by which he means a type of life in which
culture and refinement shall have little place. Yet, although he has a
horror and a dread of democracy, he feels also that the evils
accompanying it may be, after all, no worse than those involved in the
reactionary dominance of nobles and clergy.

Humanity has not hitherto marched, he thinks, with much method. Order
he considers to be desirable, but only in view of progress. Revolutions
are only absurd and odious, he asserts in _L’Avenir de la Science_, to
those who do not believe in progress. Yet he claims that reaction has
its place in the plan of Providence, for it works unwittingly for the
general good. “There are,” to quote his metaphor, “declivities down
which the _rôle_ of the traction engine consists solely in holding
back.”

Renan thinks that if democratic ideas should secure a clear triumph,
science and scientific teaching would soon find the modest subsidies
now accorded them cut off. He fears the approach of an era of
mediocrity, of vulgarity, in fact, which will persecute the
intellectuals and deprive the world of liberty. He is not thoughtlessly
optimistic; he was far too shrewd an intellect for that. Our age, he
suggests, may be regarded in future as the turning point of humanity’s
history, that point where its deterioration set in, the prelude to its
decline and fall. But he asserts, as against this, that Nature does not
know the meaning of the word “discouragement.” Humanity, proving itself
incapable of progress, but only capable of further deterioration, would
be replaced by other forms. “We must not, because of our personal
tastes, our prejudices perhaps, set ourselves to oppose the action of
our time. This action goes on without regard to us and probably is
right.”[5] The future of science is assured. With its progress, Renan
points out, we must reckon upon the decay of organised religion, as
professed by sects or churches. The disappearance of this organised
religion will, however, result most assuredly in a temporary moral
degeneration, since morality has been so conventionally bound up with
the Church. An era of egoism, military and economic in character, will
arise and for a time prevail.

 [5] Preface to _Souvenirs d’Enfance et de Jeunesse_.


Yet we must not, Renan reminds us, grumble at having too much unrest
and conflict. The great object in life is the development of the mind,
and this requires liberty or freedom. The worst type of society is the
theocratic state, or the ancient pontifical dominion or any modern
replica of these where dogma reigns supreme. A humanity which could not
be revolutionary, which had lost the attraction of “Utopias,” believing
itself to have established the perfect form of existence would be
intolerable. This raises also the query that if progress be the main
feature of our universe, then we have a dilemma to face, for either it
leads us to a _terminus ad quem_, and so finally contradicts itself, or
else it goes on for ever, and it is doubtful then in what sense it can
be a progress.

Renan’s own belief was essentially religious, and was coloured by
Christian and Hebrew conceptions. It was a rationalised belief in a
Divine Providence. He professed a confidence in the final triumph of
truth and goodness, and has faith in a dim, far-off divine event which
he terms “the complete advent of God.” The objections which are so
frequently urged by learned men against finalism or teleology of any
kind whatsoever Renan deemed superficial and claimed, rightly enough,
that they are not so much directed against teleology but against
theology, against obsolete ideas of God, particularly against the dogma
of a deliberate and omnipotent Creator. Renan’s own doctrine of the
Deity is by no means clear, but he believed in a spiritual power
capable of becoming some day conscious, omniscient and omnipotent. God
will then have come to himself. From this point of view the universe is
a progress to God, to an increasing realisation of the Divinity in
truth, beauty and goodness.

The universe, Renan claims, must be ultimately rooted and grounded in
goodness; there must be, in spite of all existing “evils,” a balance on
the side of goodness, otherwise the universe would, like a vast
banking-concern, fail. This balance of goodness is the _raison d’être_
of the world and the means of its existence. The general life of the
universe can be illustrated, according to Renan, by that of the oyster,
and the formation within it of the pearl, by a malady, a process vague,
obscure and painful. The pearl is the spirit which is the end, the
final cause and last result, and assuredly the most brilliant outcome
of this universe. Through suffering the pearl is formed; and likewise,
through constant pain and conflict, suffering and hardship, the spirit
of man moves intellectually and morally onward and upward, to the
completed realisation of justice, beauty, truth and infinite goodness
and love, to the complete and triumphant realisation of God. We must
have patience, claims Renan, and have faith in these things, and have
hope and take courage. “One day virtue will prove itself to have been
the better part.” Such is his doctrine of progress.

II

With Cournot and Renouvier our discussion takes a new form. Renan,
Taine, Vacherot and the host of social and political writers, together
with August Comte himself, had accepted the fact of progress and clung
to the idea of a law of progress. With these two thinkers, however,
there is a more careful consideration given to the problem of progress.
It was recognised as a problem and this was an immense advance upon the
previous period, whose thinkers accepted it as a dogma.

True to the philosophic spirit of criticism and examination which
involves the rejection of dogma as such, Cournot and Renouvier approach
the idea of progress with reserve and free from the confidently
optimistic assertions of the eighteenth and early nineteenth century.
Scorning the rhetoric of political socialists, positivists and
rationalists, they endeavour to view progress as the central problem of
the philosophy of history, to ascertain what it involves, and to see
whether such a phrase as “law of progress” has a meaning before they
invoke it and repeat it in the overconfident manner which characterised
their predecessors. We have maintained throughout this work that the
central problem of our period was that of freedom. By surveying the
general character of the thought of the time, and in following this by
an examination of the relation of science and philosophy, we were able
to show how vital and how central this problem was. From another side
we are again to emphasise this. Having seen the way in which the
problem of freedom was dealt with, we are in a position to observe how
this coloured the solutions of other problems. The illustration is
vivid here, for Cournot and Renouvier develop their philosophy of
history from their consideration of freedom, and base their doctrines
of progress upon their maintenance of freedom.

It is obvious that the acceptance of such views as those expressed on
freedom by both Cournot and Renouvier must have far-reaching effects
upon their general attitude to history, for how is the dogma of
progress, as it had been preached, to be reconciled with free action?
It is much easier to believe in progress if one be a fatalist. The
difficulty here was apparent to Comte when he admitted the influence of
variations, disturbing causes, which resulted in the development of
mankind assuming an oscillating character rather than that of a
straight-forward progress. He did not, however, come sufficiently close
to this problem, and left the difficulty of freedom on one side by
asserting that the operation of freedom, chance or contingency (call it
what we will), issuing in non-predetermined actions, was so limited as
not to interfere with the general course of progress.

Cournot and Renouvier take up the problem where Comte left it at this
point. Each of them takes it a stage further onward in the development.
The fundamental ideas of Cournot we have briefly noted as being those
of order, chance and probability. The relation of these to progress he
discusses, not only in his _Essai sur les Fondements de nos
Connaissances_ and the _Traité de l’Enchaînement d’Idées_, but also in
a most interesting manner in his two volumes entitled _Considérations
sur la Marche des Idées et des Evènements dans les Temps modernes_.
Like Comte, he is faithful, as far as his principles will allow, to the
idea of order. There is order in the universe to a certain degree;
science shows it to us. There is also, he maintains, freedom, hazard or
chance. Looking at history he sees, as did Comte, phenomena which, upon
taking a long perspective, appear as interferences. Pure reason is, he
claims, really incapable of deciding the vital question whether these
disturbances are due to a pure contingency, chance or freedom, or
whether they mark the points of the influence of the supernatural upon
mankind’s development. He refers to the _enchaînement de circonstances
providentielles_ which helped the early Jews and led to the propagation
of their monotheism; which helped also the development of the Christian
religion in the Roman Empire. Hazard itself, he claims,[6] may be the
agent or minister of Providence. Such a view claims to be loyal at once
to freedom and to order.

 [6] _Essai sur les Fondaments de nos Connaissances_, vol. i, chap. 5.


Cournot continues his discussion further and submits many other
considerations upon progress. He claims that it is absurd to see in
every single occurrence the operations of a divine providence or the
work of a divine architect. Such a view would exalt his conception of
order, undoubtedly, but only at the expense of his view of freedom. He
will not give up his belief in freedom, and in consequence declares
that there is no pre-arranged order or plan in the sense of a “law.” He
sets down many considerations which appear as dilemmas to the pure
reason, and which only action, he thinks, will solve. He points out the
difficulty of economic and social progress owing to our being unable to
test theories until they are in action on a large field. He shows too
how conflicting various developments may be, and how progress in one
direction may involve degeneration in another. Equality may be good in
some ways, unnatural and evil in others. Increase of population may be
applauded as a progress from a military standpoint, but may be an
economic evil with disastrous suffering as its consequence. The
“progress” to peace and stability in a society usually involves a
decrease in vitality and initiative. By much wealth of argument, no
less than by his general attitude, Cournot was able to apply the breaks
to the excessive confidence in progress and to call a halt for sounder
investigation of the matter.

Renouvier did much more in this direction. In his _Second Essay of
General Criticism_ he touched upon the problem of progress in relation
to freedom, and his fourth and fifth essays constitute five large
volumes dealing with the “Philosophy of History.” He also devotes the
last two chapters of _La Nouvelle Monadologie_ to progress in relation
to societies, and brings out the central point of his social ethics,
that justice is the criterion of progress. Indeed, all that Renouvier
says regarding history and progress leads up, in a manner peculiarly
his own, to his treatment of ethics, which will claim attention in our
next chapter.

_The Analytic Philosophy of History_ forms an important item in the
philosophical repertoire of Renouvier. He claims it to be a necessary
feature of the neo-critical, and indeed of any serious, philosophy. It
is, he claims, not a branch of knowledge which has an isolated place,
for it is as intimately connected to life as is any theory to the facts
which it embraces. That is not to say, and Renouvier is careful to make
this clear, that we approach history assuming that there are laws
governing it, or a single law or formula by which human development can
be expressed. The “Philosophy of History” assumes no such thing; it is
precisely this investigation which it undertakes, loyal to the
principles of General Criticism of which it, in a sense, forms a part.
In a classification it strictly stands between General Criticism or
Pure Philosophy and History itself.

“History,” says Renouvier, “is the experience which humanity has of
itself,”[7] and his conclusions regarding progress depend on the views
he holds regarding human personality and its essential attribute,
freedom. The philosophy of history has to consider whether, in
observing the development of humanity on the earth, one may assert the
presence of any general law or laws. Can one say legitimately that
there has been development? Is there really such a thing as progress?
If so, what is our idea of progress? What is the trend of humanity’s
history? These are great questions.

 [7] _Introduction à la Philosophie de l’Histoire_, Préface.


The attitude which Renouvier adopts to the whole course of human
history is based upon his fundamental doctrines of discontinuity,
freedom and personality. There are, he claims, real beginnings,
unpredicable occurrences, happenings which cannot be explained as
having been caused by preceding events. We must not, he urges, allow
ourselves to be hypnotised by the name “History,” as if it were in
itself some great power, sweeping all of us onward in its course, or a
vast ocean in which we are merely waves. Renouvier stands firm in his
loyalty to personality, and sees in history, not a power of this sort,
but simply the total result of human actions. History is the collective
work of the human spirit or of free personalities.[8]

 [8] Renouvier’s great objection to Comte’s work was due to his
 disagreement with Comte’s conception of Humanity. To Renouvier, with
 his intense valuation of personality, this Comtian conception was too
 much of an abstraction.


It is erroneous to look upon it as either the fatalistic functioning of
a law of things or as the results of the action of an all-powerful
Deity or Providence. Neither the “scientific” view of determinism nor
the theological conception of God playing with loaded dice, says
Renouvier, will explain history. It is the outcome of human action, of
personal acts which have real worth and significance in its formation.
History is no mere display of marionettes, no Punch-and-Judy show with
a divine operator pulling strings from his concealed position behind
the curtain. Equally Renouvier disagrees with the view that history is
merely an unrolling in time of a plan conceived from eternity. Human
society and civilisation (of which history is the record) are products
of man’s own thought and action, and in consequence manifest
discontinuity, freedom and contingency. Renouvier thus opposes strongly
all those thinkers, such as the Saint-Simonists, Hegelians and
Positivists, who see in history only a fatalistic development. He joins
battle especially with those who claim that there is a fatalistic or
necessitated progress. History has no law, he claims, and there is not
and cannot be any law of progress.

The idea of progress is certainly, he admits, one with which the
philosopher is brought very vitally into contact in his survey of
history. Indeed an elucidation of, this notion might itself be a part
of the historian’s task. If so, the historians have sadly neglected
part of their work. Renouvier calls attention to the fact that all
those historians or philosophers who accept a comforting doctrine of
humanity’s assured progress make very plausible statements, but they
never seem able to state with any clearness or definiteness what
constitutes progress, or what significance lies in their oft-repeated
phrase, “the law of progress.” He rightly points out that this
insistence upon a law, coupled with a manifest inability to indicate
what it is, causes naturally a certain scepticism as to there being any
such law at all.

Renouvier brands the search for any law of progress a futile one, since
we cannot scientifically or logically define the goal of humanity or
the course of its development because of the fact of freedom and
because of our ignorance. We must realise that we, personally at
firsthand, see only an infinitesimal part of humanity’s life on this
planet alone, not to speak of a destiny possible beyond this globe, and
that, at second-hand, we have only evidence of a portion of the great
procession of human events. We do not know humanity’s beginning and
primitive history, nor do we know its goal, if it has one. These
factors alone are grave hindrances to the formulation of any conception
of progress. Reflection upon them might have saved men, Renouvier
observes, from the presumptuous belief in assured progress. We cannot
presume even to estimate the tendencies, the direction of its course,
because of the enormous and ever-increasing complexity of free human
activity.

By his large work on the “Philosophy of History,” Renouvier shows that
the facts of history themselves are against the theory of a universal
and continuous progress, for the record shows us conflict, advance,
retrogression, peoples rising, others degenerating, empires
establishing themselves and passing away by inward ruin or outer
assaults, or both, and civilisations evolving and disintegrating in
their turn. The spectacle does not readily promote an optimistic view
of human development at all, much less support the doctrine of a sure
and certain progress. Renouvier does not blind himself to the constant
struggle and suffering. The theatre, or rather the arena, of history
presents a curious spectacle. In politics and in religion he shows us
that there are conflicts of authority and of free thought, a warfare of
majorities with minorities, a method of fighting issues slightly less
savage than the appeal to pure force, but amounting to what he terms “a
pacific application of the principle of force.” History shows us the
corruption, tyranny and blindness of many majorities, and the tragic
and necessary resort to force as the only path to liberty for
down-trodden minorities. How, Renouvier asks, can we fit this in with a
doctrine of assured progress, or, indeed, progress at all?

Further, he does not find it difficult to show that much unthinking
utterance on the part of the optimists may be somewhat checked by calm
reflection on even one or two questions. For example, Was progress
involved in the change from ancient slavery to the wage-slavery of
modern industrialism? Was Christianity, as Nietzsche and others have
attempted to maintain, a retrogression? Or, again, Was the change from
Greek city life to the conditions of the Middle Ages in any way to be
regarded as a progress?

Renouvier considers it quite erroneous to assert, as did Comte, that
there is a steady and continuous development underlying the
oscillations, and that the variations, as it were, from the direct line
of progress cancel one another or balance each other, leaving, as Renan
claimed, a balance always and inevitably on the side of goodness.

Such a confidence in the great world banking concern Renouvier does not
possess. There is no guarantee that the account of goodness may not be
overdrawn and found wanting. He reminds us sternly and solemnly of the
terrible solidarity which characterises evil. Deceit, greed, lust,
violence and war have an enormous power of breeding each other and of
supporting one another increasingly. The optimistic doctrines of
progress are simply untrue statements of the facts of history, and
falsely coloured views of human nature. It is an appalling error in
“social dynamics” to overlook the clash of interest, the greed of
nation and of class, the fundamental passionate hate and war. With it
is coupled an error in “social statics,” in which faith is put in
institutions, in the mechanism of society. These, declares Renouvier,
will not save humanity; they will, indeed, ruin it if it allow itself,
through spiritual and moral lethargy, to be dominated by them. They
have been serviceable creations of humanity at some time or other, and
they must serve men, but men must not be bound down to serve them. This
servitude is evil, and it has profoundly evil consequences.

Having attacked Comte’s view of progress and of order in its static and
dynamic point of view, Renouvier then brings up his heavy artillery of
argument against Comte’s idealisation of the Middle Ages. To assert
that this period was an advance on the life of the Greek city,
Renouvier considers to be little short of impudence. The art and
science and philosophy of the Greeks are our best heritage, while the
Middle Ages, dominated by a vicious and intolerant Church, with its
infallible theology and its crushing power of the clergy, was a “dead
hand” upon the human spirit. While it provided an organic society, it
only succeeded in doing so by narrowing and crushing the human
intellect. The Renascence and the Reformation proved that there were
essential elements of human life being crushed down. They reached a
point, however, where they exploded.

Not only does Renouvier thus declare the Middle Ages to be a regress,
but he goes the length of asserting that the development of European
history _could_ have been different. This is his doctrine of freedom
applied to history. There is no reason at all for our regarding the
Middle Ages or any such period as necessitated in the order of
mankind’s development. There is no law governing that development;
consequently, had mankind, or even a few of its number, willed and
acted upon their freedom differently, the whole trend of the period we
call the Dark Ages might have been quite other than it was. Renouvier
does not shirk the development of this point, which is a central one
for his purpose. It may seem fantastic to the historians, who must of
course accept the past as given and consequently regard reflection on
“what might have been” as wasted time. Certainly the past cannot be
altered—that is not Renouvier’s point. He intends to give a lesson to
humanity, a stern lesson to cure it of its belief in fatalism in regard
to history. This is the whole purpose of the curious volume he
published in 1876, entitled _Uchronie_, which had as its explanatory
sub-title _L’Utopie dans l’Histoire, Esquisse historique du
Développement de la Civilisation européenne, tel qu’il n’a pas été, tel
qu’il avail pu être_. The book, consisting of two manuscripts supposed
to be kept in the care of an old Dutch monk, is actually an imaginary
construction by Renouvier himself of European history in the period 100
to 800 A.D., written to show the real possibility that the sequence of
events from the Emperor Nerva to the Emperor Charlemagne might have
been radically different from what it actually was.

All this is intended by Renouvier to combat the “universal
justification of the past.” He sees that the doctrine of progress as
usually stated is not only a lie, but that it is an extremely dangerous
one, for it justifies the past, or at least condones it as inevitable,
and thus makes evil a condition of goodness, demoralises history,
nullifies ethics and encourages the damnation of humanity itself. This
fatalistic doctrine, asserts Renouvier with great earnestness, must be
abandoned; freedom must be recognised as operative, and the human will
as making history.There is no law of progress, and the sooner humanity
can come to realise this the better it will be for it. Only by such a
realisation can it work out its own salvation. “The real law lies”,
declares Renouvier,”only in an equal possibility of progress or
deterioration for both societies and individuals.” If there is to be
progress it can only come because, and when, humanity recognises itself
as collectively responsible for its own history, and when each person
feels his own responsibility regarding that action. No acceptance of
events will avail; we must _will_ progress and consciously set
ourselves to realise it. It is possible, but it depends on us. Here
Renouvier’s considerations lead him from history to ethics. “Almost all
the Great Men, men of great will, have been fatalists. So slowly does
humanity emerge from its shadows and beget for itself a just notion of
its autonomy. The phantom of necessity weighs heavily,” he laments,
“over the night of history.”[9] With freedom and a recognition of its
freedom by humanity generally we may see the dawn of better things.
Humanity will then consciously and deliberately make its history, and
not be led by the operations of herd-instinct and fatalistic beliefs
which in the past have so disgraced and marred its record.

 [9] _Psychologie ralionnelle_, vol. 2, p. 91.


The existing condition of human society can only be described frankly,
in Renouvier’s opinion, as a state of war. Each individual, each class,
each nation, each race, is actually at war with others. It matters not
whether a diplomatic state of peace, as it is called, exists or not;
that must not blind us to the facts. By institutions, customs, laws,
hidden fraud, diplomacy, and open violence, this conflict is kept up.
It is all war, says Renouvier. Modern society is based on war,
economic, military or judicial. Indeed, military and naval warfare is a
clear issue, but only a symbol of what always goes on. Might always has
the upper hand, hence ordinary life in modern society is just a state
of war. Our civilisation does not rest on justice, or on the conception
of justice; it rests on power and might. Until it is founded on
justice, peace, he urges, will not be possible; humanity will be
enslaved in further struggles disastrous o itself. This doctrine of the
_état de guerre_, as descriptive of modern society, he makes a feature
of his ethics, upon which we must not here encroach, but may point out
that he insists upon justice as the ultimate social criterion, and
claims that this is higher than charity, which is inadequate as a basis
for society, however much it may alleviate its ills. One of the chief
necessities, he points out, an essential to any progressive measure
would be to moralise our modern notion of the state.[10] In the notes
to his last chapter of the _Nouvelle Monadologie_ Renouvier attacks the
Marxian doctrine of the materialistic determination of history.

 [10] This point was further emphasised by Henri Michel in his work,
 _L’Idée de l’Etat_.


This same book, however, we must note, marks a stage in Renouvier’s own
thought different from his doctrines in the earlier _Essais de Critique
générale_, and this later philosophy, of which the _Monadologie_ and
_Personnalisme_ are the two most notable volumes, displays an attempt
to look upon progress from a more ultimate standpoint. His _théodicée_
here involves the notion, seen in Ravaisson, of an early perfection,
involving a subsequent “fall,” the world now, with its _guerre
universelle_, being an intermediate stage between a perfect or
harmonious state in the past and one which lies in the future.

The march of humanity is an uncertain one because it is free. The
philosophy of history thus reiterates the central importance of
freedom. The actual end or purpose of this freedom is not simply, says
Renouvier, the attainment of perfection, but rather the possibility of
progress. It was this thought which led him on in his reflections
further than any of the thinkers of our period, or at least more
deliberately than any, to indicate his views on the doctrine of a
future life for humanity. So far from this being a purely religious
problem, Renouvier rightly looks upon it as merely a carrying further
afield of the conception of progress.

For him, and this is the significant point for us here, any notion of a
future life for humanity, in the accepted sense of immortality, is
bound up with, and indeed based upon, the conception of progressive
development. It is true that Renouvier, like Kant, looks upon the
problems of “God, Freedom and Immortality” as the central ones in
philosophy, true also that he recognises the significance of this
belief in a Future Life as an extremely important one for religious
teaching; but his main attitude to the question is merely a
continuation of his general doctrine of progress, coupled with his
appreciation of personality. It is in this light only that Renouvier
reflects upon the problem of Immortality. He makes no appeal to a world
beyond our experience—a fact which follows from his rejection of the
Kantian world of “noumena”; nor does he wish the discussion to be based
on the assertions of religious faith. He admits that belief in a Future
Life involves faith, in a sense, but it is a rational belief, a
philosophical hypothesis and, more particularly, according to
Renouvier, a moral hypothesis. He asserts against critics that the
undertaking of such a discussion is a necessary part of any Critical
Philosophy, which would be incomplete without it, as its omission would
involve an inadequate account of human experience.

Renouvier claims that, in the first instance, the question of a future
existence arises naturally in the human mind from the discrepancy which
is manifest in our experience between nature on the one hand and
conscience on the other. The course of events is not in accord with
what we feel to be morally right, and the demands of the moral law are,
to Renouvier’s mind, supreme. He realises how acutely this discrepancy
is sometimes felt by the human mind, and his remarks on this point
recall those of the sensitive soul, who, feeling this acutely, cried
out:

“Ah, Love! could thou and I with Fate conspire
To grasp this sorry Scheme of Things entire,
Would we not shatter it to bits—and then
Re-mould it nearer to the heart’s desire.”


These lines well express the sharpness of Renouvier’s own feelings, and
he claims that, such a conspiracy being impossible, the belief in
Immortality becomes a necessary moral postulate or probability.

The grounds for such a postulate are to be found, he claims, even in
the processes of nature itself. The law of finality or teleology
manifests itself throughout the universe: purpose is to be seen at work
in the Cosmos. It is true that in the lower stages of existence it
seems obscure and uncertain, but an observer cannot fail to see “ends”
being achieved in the biological realm. The functions of organisms,
more particularly those of the animal world, show us a realm of ends
and means at work for achieving those ends. This development in the
direction of an end, this teleology, implies, says Renouvier, a
destiny. The whole of existence is a gradual procession of beings at
higher and higher levels of development, ends and means to each other,
and all inheriting an immense past, which is itself a means to their
existence as ends in themselves. May one not then, suggests Renouvier,
make a valid induction from the destiny thus recognised and partially
fulfilled of certain individual creatures, to a destiny common to all
these creatures indefinitely prolonged?[11]

 [11] _Psychologic rationnelle_, vol. 2, pp. 220-221.


The objection is here made that Nature does not concern herself with
individuals; for her the individual is merely a means for the carrying
on and propagation of the species. Individuals come into being, live
for a time and pass away, the species lives on perpetually; only
species are in the plan of the universe, individuals are of little or
no worth. To this Renouvier replies that species live long but are not
perpetual; whole species have been wiped out by happenings on our
planet, many now are dying out. The insinuation about the worthlessness
of individuals rouses his wrath, for it strikes at the very root of his
philosophy, of which personality is the keynote. This, he says, is to
lapse into Pantheism, into doctrines of Buddhists and of Spinoza.
Pantheism and all kindred views are to be rejected. It is not in the
indefinable, All-existing, the eternal and infinite One, that we find
help with regard to the significance of ends in nature. Ends are to be
sought in the individuals or the species. But while it behoves us to
look upon the world as existing for the species and not the species for
the sake of the world, we must remember that the species exists for the
sake of the individuals in it. It is false to look upon the individuals
as existing merely for the sake of the species.

If we subordinate the individual to the species, sacrificing his
inherent worth and unique value, and then subordinate species to genus
and all genera to the All, we lose ourselves in the Infinite substance
in which everything is swallowed up. Again, Pantheism tends to speak of
the perfection of individuals, and speaks loudly of progress from one
generation to another. But it tells only of a future which involves the
entire sacrifice of all that has worth or value in the past. It shows
endless sacrifice, improvement too, but all for naught. “What does it
matter to say that the best is yet to be, if the best must perish as
the good, to give place to a yet better ‘best’ which will not have the
virtue of enduring any more than the others? Do we offer any real
consolation to Sisyphus,” asks Renouvier, “by promising him
annihilation, which is coupled with the promise of successors capable
of lifting his old rock higher and still higher up the fatal slope, by
offering him the eternal falling of this rock and successors who will
continually be annihilated and endlessly be replaced by others?” The
rock is the personal life. On this theory, however high the rock be
pushed, it always is destined to fall back to the same depth, as low as
if it had never been pushed up hill at all. We refuse to reconcile a
world containing real ends and purposes within it with such a game,
vast and miserable, in which no actor plays for his own sake, and all
the false winners lose all their gains by being obliged to leave the
party while the play goes on for ever. This is to throw away all
individual worth, the value of all personal work and effort, to declare
individuality a sham, and to embrace fatality. It is this mischievous
Pantheism which is the curse of many religions and many philosophies.
Against it Renouvier wages a ceaseless warfare. The individuals, he
asserts exist both for their own sake and worth, also for the sake and
welfare of others. In the person, the law of finality finds its highest
expression. Personality is of supreme and unique value.

This being so, it becomes a necessary postulate of our philosophy, if
we really believe in the significance of personalities and in progress
(which Renouvier considers to have no meaning apart from them), to
conclude that death is but an event in the career of these
personalities. They are perpetuated beyond death.

For Renouvier, as for Kant, the chief arguments for survival are based
on considerations of a moral character, upon the demands of the moral
ideal for self- realisation, for the attainment of holiness or, more
properly, “wholeness.” This progress can only be made possible by the
continued existence after bodily death of the identical personality,
unique and of eternal worth in the scheme of things, capable of further
development than is possible amid the conditions of life as we know it.

We must, however, present to ourselves Immortality as given by the
development of appearances in this world of phenomena, under the
general laws with which we are acquainted to-day, thus correcting the
method of Kant, who placed Immortality in a noumenal world. The
salvation of a philosopher should not be of such a kind. We must treat
Immortality as a Law, not as a miracle. The thinker who accepts the
latter view quits the realm of science—that is, of experience and
reason—to establish a mystic order in contradiction with the laws of
nature. The appeal to the “supernatural” is the denial of nature, and
the appellant ruins his own case by his appeal. If Immortality is a
fact, it must be considered rationally.

Is Death—that is, the destruction of individuals as such, or the
annihilation of personalities—a reality? Renouvier reminds those who
jeer at the doctrine of Immortality that “the reality of death (as so
defined) has not been, and cannot be, proved.” Our considerations must
of necessity be hypothetical, but they can be worthy of rational
beings. We must then keep our hopes and investigations within the realm
of the universe and not seek to place our hope of immortality in a
region where nothing exists, “not even an ether to support the wings of
our hope.”

Renouvier’s general considerations led him to view all individuals as
having a destiny in which their individuality should be conserved and
developed. When we turn in particular to man, these points are to be
seen in fuller light. The instinctive belief in Immortality is bound up
with his nature as a thinking being who is capable of setting up, and
of striving after, ends. This continual striving is a marked
characteristic of all human life, a counting oneself not to have
attained, a missing of the mark.

The human consciousness protests against annihilation. At times this is
very keenly expressed. “At the period of the great aspirations of the
heart, the ecstasy of noble passions is accompanied by the conviction
of Immortality. Life at its highest, realising its richest personality,
protests, in virtue of its own worth, and in the name of the depths of
power it still feels latent in itself, against the menace of
annihilation.”[12] It cries out with its unconquerable soul:

“Give me the glory of going on and not to die!”


 [12] _Psychologie rationnelle_, vol. 2, p. 249.


Renouvier finds a further witness in the testimony of Love—that is to
say, in nature itself arrived at the consciousness of that passion in
virtue of which it exists and assuring itself by this passion, of the
power to surmount all these short-comings and failures. Love casteth
out fear, the dread of annihilation, and shows itself “stronger than
death.” Hope and Love unite in strengthening the initial belief in
Immortality and the “will to survive.”

Renouvier admits that this is _a priori_ reasoning, and speedily _a
posteriori_ arguments can be brought up as mighty battering-rams
against the fortress of immortal life, but although they mav shake its
walls, they are unable to destroy the citadel. Nothing can demonstrate
the impossibility of future existence, whereas the whole weight of the
moral law and the teleological elements at work in the universe are,
according to Renouvier, in favour of such a belief.

Morality, like every other science, is entitled to, nay obliged to,
employ the hypothesis of harmony. Now in this connection the hypothesis
of harmony (or, as Kant styled it, the concurrence of happiness and
virtue necessary to a conception of order) finds reinforcement from the
consideration of the meaning and significance of freedom. For the
actual end or purpose of freedom is not simply the attainment of
perfection, but rather the possibility of progress. Immortality becomes
a necessary postulate, reinforced by instinct, reason, morality, by the
fact of freedom, and the notion of progress. Further, Renouvier feels
that if we posit death as the end of all we thereby give an absolute
victory to physical evil in the universe.

The postulate of Immortality has a certain dignity and worth. The
discussion of future life must, however, be kept within the
possibilities of law and phenomena. Religious views, such as those of
Priestley, by their appeal to the miraculous debase the notion of
Immortality itself. Talk of an immortal essence, and a mortal essence
is meaningless, for unless the same identical person, with his unique
character and memory, persists, then our conception of immortality is
of little or no value. The idea of an indestructible spiritual
substance is not any better or more acceptable. Our notion of a future
life must be based upon the inherent and inalienable rights of the
moral person to persistence and to chances of further development or
progress. Although we must beware of losing ourselves in vain
speculations, which really empty our thought of all its content,
Renouvier claims that we are quite entitled to lay down hypotheses.

The same general laws which we see in operation and which have brought
the universe and the beings in it to the stage of development in which
they now are may, without contradiction, be conceived as operating in
further developments after the change we call bodily death. There is no
incongruity in conceiving the self-same personality continuing in a
second and different organism. Renouvier cites the case of the grub and
the butterfly and other metamorphoses. In man himself he points to
organic crises, which give the organism a very different character and
effect a radical change in its constitution. For example, there is the
critical exit from the mother’s womb, involving the change from a being
living in an enclosure to that of an independent creature. When once
the crisis of the first breath be passed the organism starts upon
another life. There are other crises, as, for instance, the radical
changes which operate in both sexes at the stage of puberty. Just as
the personality persists in its identity through all these changes, may
it not pass through that of bodily death?

The Stoics believed in a cosmic resurrection. Substituting the idea of
progress for their view of a new beginning, Renouvier claims that we
may attain the hypothesis that all human history is but a fragment in a
development incomparably greater and grander. Again, we may conceive of
life in two worlds co-existing, indeed interpenetrating, so that the
dead are not gone far from us into some remote heaven.

But, whatever form we give to our hypothesis regarding progress into
another existence beyond this present one, Renouvier does not easily
allow us to forget that it must be based upon the significance of
freedom, progress and personality supported by moral considerations.
Even this progress is not guaranteed, and even if it should be the
achievement of some spirits there is no proof that it is universal. Our
destiny, he finally reminds us, lies in our own hands, for progress
here means an increased capacity for progress later, while spiritual
and moral indifference will result finally, and indeed, necessarily, in
annihilation. Here, as so often in his work, Renouvier puts moral
arguments and appeals in the forefront of his thought. Progress in
relation to humanity’s life on earth drew from him an appeal for the
establishment of justice: progress in a further world implies equally a
moral appeal. Our duty is to keep the ideal of progress socially and
individually ever before us, and to be worthy of immortality if it be a
fact, rather than to lose ourselves in the mistaken piety of “other-
worldliness.” About neither progress can we be dogmatic; it is not
assured, Renouvier has shown, and we must work for it by the right use
of our freedom, our intelligence and our will.

III

No thinker discussed the problem of progress with greater energy or
penetration than Renouvier. The new spiritualist group, however,
developed certain views arising from the question of contingency, or
the relation of freedom to progress. These thinkers were concerned more
with psychological and metaphysical work, and with the exception of
Fouillée and Guyau, they wrote little which bore directly upon the
problem of progress. Many of their ideas, however, have an indirect
bearing upon important points at issue.

In Ravaisson, Lachelier and Boutroux, we find the question of teleology
presented, and also that of the opposition of spirit and matter. From
the outset the new spiritualism had to wrestle with two difficulties
inherent in the thought of Ravaisson. These were, firstly, the
reconciliation of the freedom and spontaneity of the spirit with the
operations of a Divine Providence or teleology of some kind; and,
secondly, the dualism assumed in the warfare of spirit and matter,
although spirit was held to be superior and anterior to matter. This
last involved a complication for any doctrine of progress, as it
required a primitive “fall” to account for matter, even a fall of the
Deity himself. This Ravaisson himself admits, and he thinks that in
creating the world God had to sacrifice some of his own being. In this
case “progress” is set over against a transcendental existence, and is
but the reawakening of what once existed in God, and in a sense now and
eternally exists. Progress there is, claims Ravaisson, towards truth
and beauty and goodness. This is the operation of a Divine Providence
acting by attracting men freely to these ideals, and as these are
symbols of God himself, progress is the return of the spirit through
self-conscious personalities to the fuller realisation of harmony,
beauty and love—that is, to the glory of God, who has ever been, now
is, and ever shall be, perfect beauty, goodness and love.

Thus, although from a temporal and finite standpoint Ravaisson can
speak of progress, it is doubtful if he is justified in doing so
ultimately, _sub specie æternitatis_. To solve the problem in the way
he presents it, one would need to know more about the ultimate value
and significance of the personalities themselves, and their destiny in
relation to the Divinity who is, as he claims, perfect harmony, beauty
and love. It was this point, so dear to an upholder of personality,
which had led Renouvier to continue his discussion of progress in
relation to history as generally understood, until it embraced a wider
field of eternal destiny, and to consider the idea of a future life as
arising from, and based upon, the conception of progress. It is this
same point which later perplexes Bergson, when he recognises this
self-conscious personality as the ultimate development of the évolution
créatrice, and so constituting in a sense the goal of the spirit,
although he is careful to state that there is no finalism involved at
all. Ravaisson stands for this finalism, however, in claiming that
there are ends. He does not see how otherwise we could speak of
progress, as we should have no criterion, no _terminus ad quem_; all
would be simply process, not progress.

_“Détachement de Dieu, retour à Dieu, clôture du grand cercle cosmique,
restitution de l’universel équilibre, telle est l’histoire du monde.”_
Such is Ravaisson’s doctrine, much of which is akin to, and indeed
re-echoes, much in Christian theology from St. Augustine, with his idea
of an eternal and restless movement of return to the divinity, to the
Westminster divines in their answer to the important query about the
chief end of man, which they considered to be not only to glorify God
but to enjoy Him for ever. This last and rather strange phrase only
seems to have significance if we conceive, in Ravaisson’s manner, of
beauty, truth and goodness as expressions or manifestations of the
Divinity to whom the world-process may freely tend.

For Lachelier the universal process presents a triple aspect, mechanism
which is coupled with finalism and with freedom. These three principles
are in action simultaneously in the world and in the individual. Each
of us is at once matter, living soul and personality—that is,
necessity, finality and freedom. The laws of the universe, so far from
being expressed entirely by mechanical formulae, can only be expressed,
as Ravaisson had claimed, by an approach to harmony and beauty, not in
terms of logic or geometry. All this involves a real progress, a
creativeness, which differs from Ravaisson’s return, as it were, to the
bosom of God.

Boutroux combines the views of Ravaisson and Lachelier by insisting on
freedom and contingency, but maintaining at the same time a
teleological doctrine. Already in discussing his conception of freedom
we have referred to his metaphor of the sailors in the ship. His
doctrine of contingency is directly opposed to any rigid pre-ordained
plan of reality or progress, but it does not prevent the spirit from a
creative teleology, the formation of a plan as it advances. This is
precisely, is it not, the combination of free action and of teleology
which we find in our own lives? Boutroux is thus able to side with
Ravaisson in his claim to see tendencies to beauty and truth and
goodness, the fruits of the spirit, which it creates and to which it
draws us, while at the same time he maintains freedom in a manner quite
as emphatic as Lachelier. He is careful to remind us that “not all
developments are towards perfection.”[13] In particular he dislikes the
type of social theory or of sociology which undervalues the personal
life.[14]

 [13] _Contingence des Lois de la Nature_, p. 127.


 [14] Thus he agrees with Renouvier’s objection to Comte’s view and to
 Communism.


Similar in many ways to the ideas of Ravaisson and of Boutroux are
those expressed by Blondel. He is concerned deeply with the problem of
God and progress, which arises out of his view of the Deity as immanent
and as transcendent. He is quite Bergsonian in his statement that God
creates Himself in us, but he qualifies this by asking the significant
question, “If he does not EXIST how can He create Himself in us.” This
brings us back to Ravaisson’s view. Other remarks of Blondel, however,
recall the doctrine of Vacherot and of Renan, that God is the ideal to
which we are ever striving. “It is a necessity that we should be moving
on, for He is always beyond.” All action is an advance, a progress
through the realm of materialistic determinism to the self-conscious
personality in man, but it is from a transcendent teleology, a Divine
Providence, that this action proceeds.

This is the line of thought pursued by Fouillée, who in many of his
writings gives considerable attention to the doctrines of progress. It
may be doubted, however if he ever surpassed the pages in his _Liberté
et Déterminisme_ and _L’Evolutionnisme des Idées-forces_, which deal
with this point. These are the best expressions of his philosophy, and
Fouillée repeated himself a great deal. We might add, however, his
_Socialism_ and his book on _L’Avenir de la Métaphysique_.

We have observed the importance attached by Comte to his new science of
sociology. Fouillée endeavours to give to it a metaphysical
significance with which Comte did not concern himself. He suggests in
his volume on _La Science sociale contemporaine_ that as biology and
sociology are closely related, the laws common to them may have a
cosmic significance. Is the universe, he asks, anything more than a
vast society in process of formation, a vast system of conscious,
striving atoms? Social science which Fouillée looks upon, as did Comte,
as constituting the crown of human knowledge, may offer us, he thinks,
the secret of universal life, and show us the world as the great
society in process of development, erring here and blundering there in
an effort to rise above the sphere of physical determinism and
materialism to a sphere where justice shall be supreme, and brotherhood
take the place of antagonism, greed and war. The power at the heart of
things, which is always ready to manifest itself in the human
consciousness when it can, might be expressed, says Fouillée, in one
word as “sociability.”

Life in its social aspect displays a _conspiration_ to a common end.
The life of a community resembles a highly evolved organism in many
respects, as Fouillée shows; but although he thus partially adopts the
biological and positivist view of the sociologists, Fouillée does not
overlook the idealistic conceptions of Renouvier and his plea for
social justice. He rather emphasises this plea, and takes the
opportunity to point out that it represents the best political thought
of his country, being founded on the doctrine of the _contrat social_
of Rousseau, of which social theory it is a clear and modern
interpretation.

We may take the opportunity afforded here by Fouillée’s mention of
sociology, in which he was so keenly interested, to observe that the
positivist tendency to emphasise an indefinite progress remained with
most of the sociologists and some of the historians. It is seen in the
two famous sociological works of Tarde and Durkheim respectively, _Les
Lois de l’Imitation_ and _La Division du Travail social_. Two writers
on history deserve mention as illustrating the same tendency: Lacombe,
whose work _De l’Histoire considérée comme Science_ (1894) was very
positivist in outlook, and Xénopol. This last writer, treating history
in 1899 in his _Principes fondamentaux de l’Histoire_,[15]
distinguished cause in history from causality in science, and showed
that white the latter leads to the formation of general laws the former
does not. History has no laws, for it is succession but never
repetition. Much of his book, however, reflects the naturalism and
positivism which is a feature of the sociological writers.[16]

 [15] This work, revised and considerably augmented, was re-issued in
 1905 with the new title, _La Théorie de l’Histoire_.


 [16] It was this which made Enouvier criticise sociology. He disagreed
 with its principles almost entirely. On this, see his notes to “_La
 Justice_,” Part VII. of _La Nouvelle Monadogie_, pp. 527-530.


It was his doctrine of _idées-forces_ and its essential spiritualism or
idealism which distinguished Fouillée’s attitude from that of these
sociologists who were his contemporaries. It was the basis, too, of his
trenchant criticisms of socialism, particularly its Marxian forms.
Fouillée agrees with Comte’s doctrine that speculation or thought is
the chief factor and prime mover in social change. For Fouillée the
idea is always a force; and it is, in this connection, the supreme
force. The history of action can only be understood, he asserts, in
relation to the history of ideas. This is the central gospel of the
_évolutionnisme des idées-forces_. The mental or spiritual is the
important factor. This he opposes to the Marxian doctrine of economic
determinism. Will is, he claims a greater reality than brute forces,
and in will lies the essence of the human spirit. It is a will,
however, which is bound up with reason and self-consciousness, and
which is progressive in character.

Summing up his work, _Histoire générale de la Philosophie_, Fouillée
refers in his Conclusion to the idea of progress as having become the
dominant note in philosophy. He looks upon the history of philosophy
as, in some measure, witness to this. Above the ebb and flow of the
varied systems and ideas which the ages have produced he sees an
advance accomplished in the direction to which humanity is
tending—perfect knowledge of itself or collective self-consciousness
and perfect self- possession. This type of progress is not to be
equated with scientific progress. He points out that in the development
of philosophy, which is that of human reflection itself, two
characteristics appear. The distinction of two kinds or aspects of
truth is seen in philosophy; one section, dealing with logic,
psychology, aesthetic and applied ethics, or sociology, approaches to a
scientific character of demonstrability, while the other section, which
constitutes philosophy in the strict sense of metaphysic, deals with
ultimate questions not capable of proof but demanding a rational faith.
Obviously the same kind of progress cannot be found in each of these
sections. This must be realised when progress in knowledge is spoken
about. He suggests, as illustrative of progress even in the speculative
realm, the fact that humanity is slowly purifying its conception of
God—a point for further notice in our last chapter.

However much Fouillée is concerned with establishing; a case for
progress in knowledge, it is clear that his main stress is on the
progress in self-consciousness or that self- determination which is
freedom. This freedom can only grow as man consciously realises it
himself. It is an _idée-force_, and has against it all the forces of
fatalism and of egoism. For Fouillée quite explicitly connects his
doctrine of freedom with that of altruism. The real freedom and the
real progress are one, he claims, since they both are to be realised
only in the increasing power of disinterestedness and love. He believes
in the possibility of a free progress. Fatality is really egoism, or
produces it.

Fouillée has a rather clear optimism, for he finds in the development
of real freedom a movement which will involve a moral and social union
of mankind. The good- will is more truly human nature than egoism and
selfishness. These vices, he maintains in his _Idée moderne du
Droit_,[17] are largely a product of unsatisfied physical wants. The
ideal of the good-will is not a contradiction of human nature, because,
he asserts, that nature desires and wills its good. More strikingly, he
states that the human will tends ultimately not to conflict but to
co-operation as it becomes enlightened and universalised. He disagrees
with the pessimists and upholds a comparatively cheerful view of human
nature. Egoism is much less deeply rooted than sympathy, and therefore,
he says, war and strife are transitory features of human development.
One contrasts the views of Taine and Renouvier with this, and feels
that man’s history has been, as far as we know it, entirely of this
“transitory” nature, and is long likely to be so.

 [17] _L’Idée moderne du Droit_, Livre IV.


Fouillée’s optimism seems to be overdrawn mainly because of his
doctrine of the _idée-force_. He exaggerates the response which human
nature is likely to make to the ideal good. Even if it be lifted up, it
is not likely to draw _all_ men to it. Yet Fouillée’s social and
ethical doctrines stand entirely upon this foundation. They are
valuable views, and Fouillée is never better than when he is exhorting
his fellows to act upon the ideas of freedom, of justice, of love and
brotherhood. He is right in his insistence upon humanity’s power to
create good- will, to develop a new order. For the good man, he says,
fatality and egoism are obstacles to be overcome Believing in freedom
and in sympathy, he acts to others in a spirit of freedom and love. By
his very belief in universal good-will among men, he assists largely in
creating it and realising it in the world.[18]

 [18] Conclusion to _Liberté et Déterminisme_.


But did not Fouillée, one asks, overrate the number of good men (as
good in his sense), or rather did he not exaggerate the capacities of
human nature to respond to the ideal which he presents? Much of his
confidence in moral and social progress finds its explanation here.

His step-son, Guyau, was not quite so optimistic, although he believed
in a progress towards “sociability” and he adopted many of the
doctrines of the _philosphie des idées-forces_. He attacks cheerful
optimism in his _Esquisse d’une Morale sans Obligation ni Sanction_,
where he remarks[19] that an absolute theory of optimism is really an
immoral theory, for it involves the negation of progress in the strict
and true sense. This is because, when it dominates the mind, it
produces a feeling of entire satisfaction and contentment with the
existing reality, resulting in resignation and acceptance of, if not an
actual worship of, the _status quo_. In its utter obedience to all
“powers that be,” the notions of right and of duty are dimmed, if not
lost. A definitely pessimistic view of the universe would, he suggests,
be in many respects better and more productive of good than an
outrageous optimism. Granting that it is a wretched state in which a
man sees all things black, it is preferable, Guyau thinks, to that in
which all things appear rosy or blue.

 [19] _Esquisse d’une Morale_, p. 10.


Guyau concludes his _Esquisse d’une Morale sans Obligation ni Sanction_
by remarking: “We are, as it were, on the _Leviathan_, from which a
wave has torn the rudder and a blast of wind carried away the mainmast.
It is lost in the ocean as our earth is lost in space. It floats thus
at random, driven by the tempest, like a huge derelict, yet with men
upon it, and yet it reaches port. Perhaps our earth, perhaps humanity,
will also reach that unknown end which they will have created for
themselves. No hand directs us; the rudder has long been broken, or
rather it has never existed; we must make it: it is a great task, and
it is our task.” This paragraph speaks for itself as regards Guyau’s
attitude to the doctrine of an assured progress.

In his notable book _L’Irreligion de l’Avenir_, the importance of which
we shall note more fully when we deal with the religious problem in our
last chapter, Guyau indicates the possibilities of general intellectual
progress in the future. The demand of life itself for fuller expression
will involve the decay of cramping superstitions and ecclesiastical
dogmas. The aesthetic elements will be given a larger place, and there
will be intellectual freedom. Keen as Guyau is upon maintaining the
sociological standpoint, he sees the central factor in progress to be
the mental. “Progress,” he remarks,[20] “is not simply a sensible
amelioration of life—it is also the achievement of a better
intellectual formulation of life, it is a triumph of logic. To progress
is to attain to a more complete consciousness of one’s self and of the
world, and by that very fact to a more complete inner consistency of
one’s theory of the world.” Guyau follows his stepfather in his view of
“sociability” or _fraternité_ (to use the watchword of the Revolution)
as the desirable end at which we should progressively aim—a conclusion
which is but the social application of his central concept of Life.

 [20] Introduction to _L’Irreligion de l’Avenir_.


The next step in human progress must be in the direction of human
solidarity. Guyau thinks it will arise from collective, co-operative
energy (_synergie sociale_). Further progress must involve
simultaneously _sympathie sociale_, a community of fellowship or
comradeship, promoted by education of a true kind, not mere
instruction, but a proper development and valuation of the feelings.
Here art will play its part and have its place beside science, ethics
and philosophy in furthering the ideal harmony in human society. Such
Progress involves, therefore, that the Beautiful must be sought and
appreciated no less than the True and the Good, for it is a revelation
of the larger Life of which we ourselves are part. These ideals are in
themselves but manifestations of the Supreme Vitality.

The same spontaneous vital activity of which Guyau makes a central
doctrine characterises Bergson’s view of reality. He upholds, like
Boutroux, freedom and contingency, but he will not admit finalism in
any shape or form, not even a teleology which is created in the process
of development. He refuses to admit as true of the universal process in
nature and in human history what is certainly true of human life—the
fact that we create ends as we go on living. For Bergson there is no
end in the universe, unless it be that of spontaneity of life such as
Guyau had maintained. There is no guarantee of progress, no law of
development, but endless possibility of progress. Such a view, as we
have already insisted, is not pessimistic. It is, however, a warning to
facile optimism to realise that humanity, being free, may go “dead
wrong.” While Boutroux maintains with Ravaisson that there is at the
heart of things a tendency to superior values such as beauty, goodness
and truth, and while Renan assures us that the balance of goodness in
the world is a guarantee of its ultimate triumph, Bergson, like
Renouvier, gives us stern warning that there is no guarantee in the
nature of things that humanity should not set its heart on other
values, on materialistic and egoistic conceptions, and go down in ruin
quarrelling and fighting for these things. There is no power, he
reminds us, keeping humanity right and in the line of desirable
progress. All is change, but that is not to say that all changes are
desirable or progressive. Here we arrive at a point far removed from
the rosy optimism of the earlier thinkers. Progress as a comfortable
doctrine, confidently accepted and dogmatically asserted, no longer
holds ground; it is seen to be quite untenable.

In Bergson the difficulty which besets Ravaisson reappears more
markedly—namely, the relation of spirit and matter to one another, and
to the power at the heart of things, which, according to Bergson
himself, is a spiritual principle. Here we seem forced to admit
Ravaisson’s view of a “fall” or, as the theologians would say, a
“Kenosis” of the deity in order to create the material universe. Yet in
the processes of nature we see spirit having to fight against matter,
and of this warfare Bergson makes a great point. These considerations
lead to discussions which Bergson has not touched upon as yet. He does
not follow Ravaisson and Boutroux into the realm of theological ideas.
If he did he might have to make admissions which would compromise, or
at least modify, other doctrines expressed by him. He will have none of
Hegel or of the Absolute Idealism which sees the world process as a
development of a Divine Idea. It is new and it is creation; there is no
repetition. Even God himself _se fait_ in the process, and it may be,
suggests Bergson, that love is the secret of the universe. If so we may
well ask with Blondel, “If God _se fait_ in the process, then does he
not already exist and, in a sense, the process with him?” Instead,
however, of reverting to Ravaisson’s view of the whole affair being a
search for, and return to God, Bergson claims that the development is a
purely contingent one, in which a super-consciousness develops by
experiment and error.

Bergson’s God, if he may be so-called, is not so much a Creator, but a
power creative of creators—that is, human personalities capable of free
action. The Deity is immanent in man, and, like man, is ignorant of the
trend of the whole process. The universe, according to Bergson, is a
very haphazard affair, in which the only permanence is change. There is
no goal, and progress has little meaning if it be only and merely
further change, which may be equally regress rather than progress. To
live is not merely to change, but to triumph over change to set up some
values as of absolute worth, and to aim at realising and furthering
these. Apart from some philosophy of values the conception of progress
has little meaning.

Interesting discussions of various aspects of the problem are to be
found in the writings of the sociologist we have mentioned, Durkheim,
particularly _La Division du Travail sociale_, _Le Suicide_ and _Les
Formes élémentaires de la Vie religieuse_. There is an interesting
volume by Weber, entitled _Le Rythme du Progres_, and there are the
numerous books of Dr. Gustave Le Bon.

Although he is not strictly a philosopher in the academic or
professional sense, and his work belongs to literature rather than to
the philosophy of the period, we cannot help calling attention briefly
here, at the conclusion of this chapter, to the genial pessimism of
Bergson’s great literary contemporary, Anatole France, the famous
satirist of our age. His irony on questions like that of progress is
very marked in _L’Ile des Penguins_ and in _Jérôme Coignard_. A remark
from one of his works, this latter, will sufficiently illustrate his
view on progress. “I take little interest,” remarks his character, the
Abbé Coignard, “in what is done in the King’s Cabinet, for I notice
that the course of life is in no way changed, and after reforms men are
as before, selfish, avaricious, cowardly, cruel, stupid and furious by
turns, and there is always a nearly even number of births, marriages,
cuckolds and gallows-birds, in which is made manifest the beautiful
ordering of our society. This condition is stable, sir, and nothing
could shake it, for it is founded on human misery and imbecility, and
those are foundations which will never be wanting.” The genial old Abbé
then goes on to remind socialist revolutionaries that new economic
schemes will not radically change human nature. We easily see the ills
in history and blind ourselves with optimism for the future. Even in
Sorel, the Syndicalist, who has added to his articles on _Violence_
(which appeared in 1907 in the periodical _Le Mouvement socialiste_) a
work on _Les Illusions du Progrès_, we find the same doctrines about
the vices of modern societies, which he considers no better than
ancient ones in their morality; they are filled with more hypocrisy,
that is all. France and Sorel only add more testimony to the utter
collapse of the old doctrine of assured and general progress.

*    *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *


To such a final position do we come in following out the development of
the idea of progress. The early assurance and dogmatic confidence which
marked the early years of the century are followed by a complete
abandonment of the idea of a guaranteed or assured progress, whether
based on the operations of a Divine Providence, or on faith in the
ultimate triumph of reason, or on merely a fatalistic determinism.
Progress is only a possibility, and its realisation depends on
‘humanity’s own actions. Further, any mention of progress in future
must not only present it as quite contingent, but we have to reckon
with the fact that the idea of progress may itself progress until it
resolves itself into another conception less complicated and less
paradoxical, such as “the attainment of a new equilibrium.” Some effort
must be devoted also to a valuation of criteria. Various values have in
the past been confused together, scientific, materialistic, hedonistic,
moral, aesthetic. Ultimately it seems that we shall find difficulty in
settling this apart from the solution offered by Renouvier—namely, that
true progress is not merely intellectual, but moral. It involves not
merely a conquest of material nature but of human nature—a self-
mastery. Progress is to be measured not by the achievements of any
aristocracy, intellectual or other, but by the general social status,
and our criterion of progress must be ultimately that of social
justice. This itself is a term needing interpretation, and to this
question of ethics we now turn.




CHAPTER VI
ETHICS


INTRODUCTION : Difficulties of the moral problem as presented in the
nineteenth century—Recognised as a social problem—Influence of Comte
important in this connection—Other influences—Christianity—Kant—The
practical reason.

I. Taine and Renan—Renan’s critique of Christian morality—Early
socialistic views—Change in his later life—Prefers criterion of beauty
to that of goodness.

II. Renouvier the great moralist of our period—Relation to Kant —His
Science de la Morale—Personality in Ethics—Justice.

III. Fouillée, Guyau, Ollé-Laprune and Rauh pass further from the
Kantian rigorism to an ethic in harmony with the philosophy of
idées-forces of life and action—Humanitarianism of Fouillée and
Guyau—Idées-forces and Morale sans Obligation ni Sanction —Rauh’s
doctrines—Other thinkers.

CONCLUSION: Action and belief—Ethics and Religion.




CHAPTER VI
ETHICS

Moral philosophy is probably the most difficult branch of those various
disciplines of the human spirit summed up in the general conception of
philosophy. This difficulty is one which all the thinkers of our period
recognised. Many of them, occupied with other problems on the
psychological or metaphysical side, did not write explicitly upon
ethics. Yet the problem of ethics, its place, significance and
authority, is but the other side of that problem of freedom which has
appeared throughout this development as central and vital. The ethical
consciousness of man has never been content for long with the assertion
that ethics is a purely positive science, although it has obviously a
positive side. The essence of morality has been regarded as not merely
a description of what exists, but what might, should or ought to exist.
Ethics is normative, it erects or endeavours to outline a standard
which is an ideal standard. This is the characteristic of ethics, and
so long as the moral conscience of humanity, individually and
collectively, does not slumber nor die, it will remain so. This
conflict between the ideal and the real, the positive and normative is
indeed the chief source of pain and conflict to man, but without it he
would cease to be human.

Whatever the difficulties, the philosopher who aspires to look upon
human life as a whole must give _some_ interpretation of this vital
aspect of human consciousness. It is in this connection that a solution
of the problem of freedom is so valuable, for under a purely
determinist and positivist reading of life, the moral sentiments become
mere data for an anthropological survey, the hope and tragedy of human
life are replaced, comfortably perhaps for some, by an interpretation
in which the true significance of ethics is lost.

One of the outstanding features of the discussion upon ethics in our
period is the fact that the social standpoint colours most of the
discussion. This was largely due to the impulse given by Comte and
continued by the sociologists. We have already remarked the importance
which he attached to his new science of society or “sociology.” However
much the development of this branch of study may have disappointed the
hopes of Comte, it has laid a powerful and necessary emphasis upon the
solidarity of the problems of society. As Comte claimed that psychology
could not be profitably studied in the isolated individual alone, so he
insisted that ethics could only be studied with profit from a social
standpoint. This was not forgotten by subsequent thinkers, even by
those who were not his followers, and the main development of the
ethical problem in our period is marked by an increasing insistence
upon sociability and solidarity. Comte was able to turn the thoughts of
philosophers away from pre-occupation with the isolated individual,
conceived as a cold and calculating intellectual machine, a “fiction”
which had engrossed the minds of thinkers of the previous century. He
was able also to indicate the enormous part played by instincts,
particularly “herd-instincts,” by passion and feelings of social hatred
and social sympathy. It was the extension of social sympathy upon which
Comte insisted as the chief good. The great defect of Christianity from
an ethical standpoint was, Comte pointed out, due to its
individualistic ethic. To the doctrine of “saving one’s own soul” Comte
opposed that of the salvation of humanity. The social unit is not the
individual man or woman, it is the family. In that society which is not
a mere association but a union, arising from common interests and
sympathy, the individual realises himself as part of society. The
highest ethical conception, however, arises when the individual,
transcending himself and his family, feels and acts as a member of
humanity itself, not only in his public, but also in his private life.
In the idea of humanity Comte finds the concrete form of that universal
which in the ethic of Kant was the symbol of duty itself.

It was by this insistence on human social solidarity that Comte left
his mark upon the ethical problem. Many of the details of social ethics
given in the last three large volumes of his work are extremely
thoughtful and interesting, in spite of their excessive optimism, but
we can only here indicate what is sufficient for our purpose, his
influence over subsequent thought. That is summed up in the words
“solidarity” and “social standpoint.”

We may observe that the supreme problems in social ethics Comte
regarded as being those of education or mental development and the
“right to work.”[1] He foresaw, as did Renan, that Culture and Economic
Justice were the two _foci_ around which the ethical problems were to
be ranged in the immediate future. He regretted that the proletariat in
their cry for justice had not sufficient culture to observe that they
themselves are not a class apart, however class-conscious they be. They
stand solid with the community, and Comte prophesied that, finding this
out sooner or later, they would have to realise the folly of violent
revolution. Only a positive culture or education of the democracy
could, he believed, solve this social problem, which is there precisely
because the proletariat are not sufficiently, and do not feel
themselves to be, incorporated in the life of the community or of
humanity. Only when they realise this will work be ennobled by a
feeling of service. The Church has a moral advantage here, in that she
has her organisation complete for furthering the conception of service
to God. Comte realised this advantage of religious morality, but he
thought it would come also to “positive” morality when men came to a
conception of service for humanity To this great end, he urged, our
education should be directed, and it should aim, he thought, at the
decline and elimination of militarism which, in Comte’s view
corresponds to the second stage of development (marked also by
theology), a stage to be superseded in man’s development, by an era in
which the war-spirit will be replaced by that of productive service
performed not only _pour la patrie_, but _pour l’humanité_.

 [1] Comte criticised the teaching given to the young in France as
 being “instruction” rather than “education.” This has frequently been
 insisted upon since his time.


In viewing the general influences which bore upon the study of the
ethical problem in our period this stress upon the social character of
morality is supreme, and is the most distinctly marked. But in addition
to the sociological influence there are others which it is both
interesting and important to note briefly. There is the influence of
traditional religious morality, bound up with Christianity as presented
by the Roman Catholic Church. The deficiencies of this are frequently
brought out in the discussion, but in certain of the thinkers, chiefly
the “modernists,” it appears as an influence contributing to a
religious morality and as offering, indeed, the basis of a religion.
Other writers, however, while rejecting the traditional morality of the
Church, lay stress upon a humanitarian ethic which has an affinity to
the idealistic morality preached by the founder of Christianity, a
morality which manifests a spirit different from that which his Church
has usually shown. Indeed, the general tendency of the ethical
development in our period is one of opposition to the ecclesiastical
and traditional standpoint in ethics.

Then there is the influence of Kant’s ethics, and here again, although
Renouvier owed much to Kant, the general tendency is to get away from
the formalism and rigorism of his “categorical imperative.” The current
of English Utilitarian ethics appears as rather a negative influence,
and is rather scorned when mentioned. The common feature is that of the
social standpoint, issuing in conceptions of social justice or
humanitarianism and finding in action and life a concrete morality
which is but the reflection of the living conscience of mankind
creating itself and finding in the claims of the practical reason that
Absolute or Ideal to which the pure reason feels it cannot alone
attain.

I

Taine and Renan were influenced by the outlook adopted by Comte. It
might well be said that Taine was more strictly positivist than Comte.
In his view of ethics, Taine, as might be expected from the general
character of his work and his philosophical attitude, adheres to a
rigidly positivist and naturalist conception. He looks upon ethics as
purely positive, since it merely states the scientific conditions of
virtue and vice, and he despairs of altering human nature or conduct.
This is due almost entirely to his doctrine of rigid determinism which
reacts with disastrous consequences upon his ethical outlook. This only
further confirms our contention that the problem of freedom is the
central and vital one of the period. We have already pointed out the
criticism which Fouillée brought against Taine’s dogmatic belief in
determinism, as an incomplete doctrine, a half-truth, which involves
mischievous consequences and permits of no valuable discussion of the
ethical problem.

More interesting and useful, if we are to follow at all closely the
ethical thought of our period, is it to observe the attitude adopted to
ethics by Taine’s contemporary, Renan.

The extreme confidence which Renan professed to have in “science,” and
indeed in all intellectual pursuits, led him to accord to morality
rather a secondary place. “There are three great things,” he remarks in
his _Discours et Conférences_,[2] “goodness, beauty and truth, and the
greatest of these is truth.” Neither virtue, he continues, nor art is
able to exclude illusions. Truth is the representation of reality, and
in this world the search for truth is the most serious occupation of
all. One of his main charges against the Christian Church in general is
that it has insisted upon moral good to such an extent as to undervalue
and depreciate the other goods, expressed in beauty and in truth. It
has looked upon life from one point of view only—namely, the moral—and
has judged all action by ethical values alone, despising in this way
philosophy, science, literature, poetry, painting and music. In its
more ascetic moods it has claimed that these things are “of the devil.”
Thus Christianity has introduced a vicious distinction which has done
much to mutilate human nature and to cramp the wholesome expression of
the life of the human spirit. Whatever is an expression of spirit is,
claims Renan, to be looked upon as sacred. If such a distinction as
that of sacred and profane were to be drawn it should be between what
appertains to the soul and what does not. The distinction, when made
between the ethical and the beautiful or true, is disastrous.

 [2] _Discours_, dated November 26th, 1885.


Renan considers that of the two, the ethical and the beautiful, the
latter may be the finer and grander distinction, the former merely a
species of it. The moral, he thinks, will give place to the beautiful.
“Before any action,” he himself says in _L’Avenir de la Science_, “I
prefer to ask myself, not whether it be good or bad, but whether it be
beautiful or ugly, and I feel that I have in this an excellent
criterion.”

Morality, he further insists, has been conceived up to now in far too
rigid a manner as obedience to a law, as a warfare and strife between
opposing laws. But the really virtuous man is an artist who is creating
beauty, the beauty of character, and is fashioning it out of his human
nature, as the sculptor fashions a statue out of marble or a musician
composes a melody from sounds. Neither the sculptor nor the musician
feels that he is obeying a law. He is expressing and creating beauty.

Another criticism which Renan brings against the ethic of Christianity
is its insistence upon humility as a virtue. He sees nothing virtuous
in it as it is generally interpreted: quite rightly he suspects it of
hypocritically covering a gross pride, after the manner of the
Pharisees. He gives a place to honest asceticism which has its
nobility, even although it be a narrow, misconceived ideal. Much nobler
is it, he thinks, than the type of life which has only one object,
getting a fortune.

This leads him to another remark on the moral hypocrisy of so many
professedly religious folk. Having an easy substance and possessing
already a decent share of this world’s goods, they devote all their
energies to the pursuit of pleasure or of further superfluous wealth.
From this position they criticise the worker who endeavours to improve
his lot, and have the audacity to tell him in pious fashion that he
must not be materialistic, and must not set his heart on this world’s
goods. It would be laughable were it not so tragic. The whole question
of the relativity of the two positions is overlooked, the whole ethic
of the business ignored. Material welfare is good and valuable, says
Renan, in so far as it frees man’s spirit from mean and wretched
dependence and a cramped life which injures development, physical and
spiritual. These goods are a means to an end. When, therefore, a man,
already comfortably endowed, amasses more and more for its own sake, he
commits both a profane and immoral act. But when a worker endeavours to
augment his recompense for his labour, he is but demanding “what is the
condition of his redemption. He is performing a virtuous action.”[3]

 [3] _L’Avenir de la Science_, p. 83.


Sound as many of these considerations undoubtedly are, they come from
the Renan, who wrote in the years 1848-9 _L’Avenir de la Science_. He
lived long enough to see that these truths had complements, that there
might be, even ethically, another side. In speaking of Progress this
has been noted: in his later years he forecasted the coming of an era
of egoism, of national and industrial selfishness, working itself out
in policies of military imperialism among the nations, and of economic
greed and tyranny among the proletariat. His remarks about the virtuous
action of the worker bettering his lot were inspired by the socialism
of Saint-Simon. Renan did not at that time raise in his own mind the
question of the workers themselves carrying their reaction so far, that
it, although just at first, might reach a point where it became a
dictatorship decreed by self-interest alone. It is in Renouvier that we
find this danger more clearly indicated. In so far as Renan felt it,
his solution was that which he suggested for the elimination of all
social wickedness— namely, the increase of education. He looked upon
wickedness as a symptom of a lack of culture, particularly the lack of
any moral teaching.

It was precisely this point, the education of the democracy, morally no
less than intellectually, which presented a certain difficulty to the
French Republic when, after several unsuccessful attempts, the plan for
state education of a compulsory, gratuitous and secular character was
carried in 1882, largely through the efforts of Jules Ferry.[4]

 [4] In 1848 Hippolyle Carnot had this plan ready. The fall of the
 Ministry, in which he was Minister of Education, was due partly to the
 discussion raised by Renouvier’s book (see p. 61 of the present work).
 With the fall of the Ministry, and in 1851, of the Republic, the
 scheme went too. France had to wait eleven years longer than England
 for free, compulsory education. Her educational problem has always
 been complicated by the attitude of the Roman Catholic Church to
 religious education and its hostility to “lay” schools. Brilliant as
 France is intellectually, there are numbers of her people who do not
 read or write owing to the delay of compulsory state education. The
 latest census, that of 1921, asked the question, “_Savez-vous à la
 fois lire et écrire?_” in order to estimate this number.

II

The great moralist of our period was Renouvier. Not only, as we have
already seen, did ethical considerations mark and colour his whole
thought, but he set forth those considerations themselves with a
remarkable power. His treatise in two volumes on _The Science of
Ethics_ is one of the most noteworthy contributions to ethical thought
which has been made in modern times. Although half a century has
elapsed since its publication on the eve of the Franco-Prussian War,
its intense pre-occupation with the problems which beset our modern
industrial civilisation, its profound judgments and discussions
concerning subjects so vital to the world of to-day (such as the
relations of the sexes, marriage, sex-ethics, civil liberty, property,
communism, state intervention, socialist ideals, nationalism, war, the
modern idea of the State, and international law), give to it a value,
which very few works upon the subject possess. Long as the work is, it
has the merit of thoroughness, and difficulties are not slurred over,
but stated frankly, and some endeavours are made to overcome them.
Consequently, it is a work which amply repays careful study. It is
almost presumption to attempt in a few pages to summarise Renouvier’s
important treatise. Some estimate of its significance is, however,
vital to our history.

The title itself is noteworthy and must at that date have appeared more
striking than it does to us now by its claim that there is a _science_
of ethics.[5] We are accustomed to regard physics, mathematics and even
logic as entitled to the name Sciences. Can we legitimately speak of a
Science of Ethics?

 [5] It is interesting for comparative study to note that Leslie
 Stephen’s _Science of Ethics_ was a much later production than
 Renouvier’s treatise, appearing thirteen years later.


Renouvier insists that we can. Morality deals with facts, although they
are not embraced by the categories of number, extension, duration or
becoming (as mathematical and physical data), but rather by those of
causality, finality and consciousness. The facts “are not the natural
being of things, but the _devoir-être_ of the human will, the
_devoir-faire_ of persons, and the devoir-être of things in so far as
they depend upon persons.”[6] Personal effort, initiative and
responsibility lie at the basis of all ethics. Morality is a
construction, like every science, partly individual and partly
collective; it must lay down postulates, and if it is to justify the
claim to be a science, these postulates must be such as to command a
_consensus gentium_. Further, if ethics is to be scientifically based
it must be independent. In the past this has unfortunately not been the
case, for history shows us ethics bound up with some system of religion
or metaphysics. If ethics is to be established as a science, Renouvier
points out that it must be free from all hypothesis of an irrelevant
character, such as cosmological speculations and theological dogmas.
Renouvier’s insistence upon the independence of ethics was followed up
in an even clearer and more trenchant manner by Guyau in his famous
_Esquisse d’une Morale sans Obligation ni Sanction_.

 [6] _Science de la Morale_, vol. I, p. 10.


Although, generally, ethics has suffered by reason of its alliance to
theological and metaphysical systems, Renouvier affirms that, in this
connection, there is one philosophy which is not open to
objection—namely, the Critical Philosophy of Kant. This is because it
subordinates all the unknown to phenomena, all phenomena to
consciousness, and, within the sphere of consciousness itself,
subordinates the speculative reason (_reinen Vernunft_) to the
practical reason (_praktischen Vernunft_). Its chief value, according
to Renouvier, lies precisely in this maintenance of the primacy of
moral considerations.

Two standpoints or lines of thought which are characteristic of
Renouvier, and whose presence we have already noted in our first
chapter, operate also in his ethics and govern his whole treatment of
the nature of morality and the problems of the moral life. Briefly
stated these are, firstly, his regard for the Critical Philosophy of
Kant; secondly, his view of man as “an order, a harmony of functions
reciprocally conditioned, and, by this fact, inseparable.”[7] As in his
treatment of Certitude, Renouvier showed this to be a psychological
complex into which entered elements not only of cognition, but of
feeling and will, the same insistence upon this unity of human nature
meets us again in his ethics. “Any ethical doctrine which definitely
splits up the elements of human nature is erroneous.”[8] Abstraction is
necessary and useful for any science, even the science of ethics, but
however far we may carry our scientific analysis, we must never lose
sight of the fact that we are dealing with abstractions. To lose sight
of the relationship of the data under observation or discussion is,
indeed, working away from the goal of scientific knowledge.

 [7] _Science de la Morale_ (first edition, 1869), vol. I, p. 189.


 [8] _Ibid_.


“Nothing,” remarks Renouvier in this connection, “has done more to
hinder the spread of Kant’s doctrines in the world than his assertion
that the morally good act must be performed absolutely without
feeling.” In view of man as he is, and in so far as we understand human
nature at all, it seems a vain and foolish statement. For Kant, Duty
was supreme, and the sole criterion of a good act was, for him, its
being done from a consciousness of Duty. He himself had to confess that
he did not know of any act which quite fulfilled this ideal of moral
action. With this view of morality Renouvier so heartily disagrees that
he is inclined to think that, so far from a purely rational act (if we
suppose such an act possible) being praiseworthy, he would almost give
greater moral worth to an act purely emotional, whose “motive” lay, not
in the idea of cold and stern Duty, but in the warm impulses of the
human heart, springing from emotion or feeling alone. Emotion is a part
of our nature—it has its role to play; the rational element enters as a
guide or controlling power. It is desirable that all acts should be so
guided, but that is far from stating, as does Kant, that they should
proceed solely from rational considerations. Ultimately reason and
sentiment unite in furthering the same ends. No adequate conception of
justice can be arrived at which is not accompanied by, and determined
by, correlatively, love of humanity. Kant rigorously excluded from
operation even the most noble feelings, whose intrusion should dim the
worth and glory of his moral act, devoid of feeling. But “without
good-will and mutual sympathy of persons, no society could ever have
established itself beyond the family, and scarcely the family
itself.”[9]

 [9] _Science de la Morale_, vol. I, p. 184.


Renouvier confesses that in most of this treatment of the problem of
ethics he follows Kant[10] and although his admiration for Kant’s work
is not concealed, nevertheless he is not altogether satisfied with it,
and does not refrain from criticism. Indeed this reconstruction of the
Critical Philosophy in a revised version is the main effort of the
neo-critical philosopher, and it is constantly manifest.

 [10] On p. 108 (vol. I) he refers to “_le philosophie que je suis, et
 que j’aimerais de pouvoir suivre toujours_.”


He complains that Kant did not adhere rigorously to his own principles,
but vainly strove to give an objectivity to the laws of the practical
reason by connecting them to metaphysics. But, he says, “on the other
hand I maintain that the errors of Kant can be corrected in accordance
with the actual principles of his own philosophy. I continue my serious
attachment to this great reformer in spite of the very serious
modifications I am endeavouring to make in his work.”[11]

 [11] _Science de la Morale_, vol. I, p. no. 110.


In the opinion of Renouvier, Kant’s work, the _Metaphysic of Morals_,
is marred by its neglect of history in its relation to ethics, by a
disfigured picture of right which does not make it any more applicable
to existing human conditions, also by the rather artificial and
complicated nature of its doctrines. He further reproaches Kant for
excessive rigorism and formalism, accompanied by a vagueness which
prevents the application of much of his teaching. This, it seems to us,
is a reproach which can be hurled easily at most of the ethical
teachers whom the world has seen. The incessant vagueness of
paradoxical elements in the utterances of such teachers has inevitably
compelled their disciples to find refuge in insisting upon a “right
spirit” of action, being devoid of any clear teaching as to what might
constitute right action in any particular case.

The rudiments of morality, according to Renouvier, are found in the
general notion of “obligation,” the sense of ought (_devoir-faire_)
which the human consciousness cannot escape. Any end of action is
conceived as a good for the agent himself; and because of liberty of
choice between actions or ends, or between both, certain of these are
deemed morally preferable. There are certain obligations which are
purely personal, elementary virtues demanded from any rational being.
It is his interest to preserve his body by abstaining from excesses; it
is his interest also to conserve and develop the faculties of his
nature. This is the point upon which Guyau makes such insistence in
common with Nietzsche—the development, expansion and intensification of
life. There are, Renouvier points out, duties towards oneself,
involving constant watchfulness and intelligence, so that the agent may
be truly self-possessed under all circumstances, maintaining an empire
over himself and not falling a constant victim to passion. “Greater is
he that ruleth himself than he that taketh a city,” are not vain words.
This is the rudimentary but essential virtue which Renouvier calls
“virtue militant”—moral courage. Intellectually it issues in Prudence
or Wisdom; on the side of sense and passion it is represented by
Temperance. These duties are present to conscience, which itself arises
from a doubling of consciousness. “We have the empirical person with
his experience of the past, and we have the ideal person—that is to
say, that which we wish to be,”[12] our ideal character. In so far as
we are conscientious we endeavour to bring “what we are” into line with
“what we conceive we should be.” The moral agent thus has duties
towards himself, obligations apart from any relation to or with others
of his kind.

 [12] _Science de la Morale_, vol. I, p. 25.


This elementary morality is “essentially subjective,”[13] but this only
shows us that the most thorough-going individualism does not by its
neglect of others, its denial of altruism, thereby escape entirely from
moral obligations. There are always duties to one’s higher self, even
for a Robinson Crusoe. Frequently it is stated that duties and rights
are co-relative; but Renouvier regards Duty as more fundamental than
Right, which he uses only of man in association with his fellows.
Between persons, right and duty are in a synthesis, but the person
himself has no rights as distinct from duties to himself; he has no
right not to do what it is his duty to perform. From this it follows
that if his personal notion of obligation changes, he has no right
whatever to carry out actions in accordance with his judgments made
prior to his change of conscience, merely for the sake of consistency.
He is in this respect a law to him- self, for no man can act as a
conscience for another. The notion of rights only arises when others
are in question, and only too often the word has been abused by being
employed where simply power is meant, as, for example, in many views of
“natural right.” This procedure both sullies the usage of the term
Right and lowers the status of personality. It is always, Renouvier
claims, to “the inherent worth and force of personality, with its
powers of reflection, deliberation, liberty, self-possession and
self-direction, that one must return in order to understand each and
every virtue.”

 [13] _Science de la Morale_, vol. I, p. 81.


Renouvier’s insistence upon the inherent worth, the dignity and moral
value of personality becomes clearer as he proceeds from his treatment
of the lonely individual (who, it may be objected, is to such an extent
an abstraction, as to resemble a fiction) to associated persons. The
reciprocal relation of two persons brings out the essential meaning of
Justice. Two personalities co-operating for a common end find
themselves each possessed of duties and, inversely therefore, of rights
which are simply duties regarded from the point of view not of the
agent, but of the other party. The neo-critical ethic here brings
itself definitely into line with the principle of practical reason of
the Critical Philosophy. This, says Renouvier,[14] is the profound
meaning of Justice, which consists in the fact that the moral agent,
instead of subordinating the ends of other people to his own, considers
the personalities[15] of others as similar to his own and possessing
their own ends which he must respect. This principle is that which Kant
formulated under the name of “practical obligation” or “supreme
principle.”[16] “Recognise the personality of others as equal in nature
and dignity, as being an end in itself, and consequently refrain from
employing the personality of others merely as a means to achieve your
own ends.”

 [14] _Science de la Morale_, vol. I, pp. 82-83.


 [15] Personality is a better translation, as it avoids the rather
 legal and technical meaning of “person” in English.


 [16] In a footnote to this passage, Renouvier states his own
 preference for “moral obligation” rather than “imperative of
 conscience.”


This doctrine of Personalism is an assertion not only of _Liberté_,
_Egalité_, _Fraternité_ as necessary and fundamental principles, but
also of the value of personality in general and the relativity of
“things.” It constitutes an ethical challenge to the existing state of
society which is not only inclined, in its headlong pursuit of wealth,
its fanatical worship of Mammon, to treat its workers as purely “means”
to the attainment of its end, but further minimises personality by its
legal codes and social conventions, which both operate far more readily
and efficiently in the defence of property than in the defence or
protection of personality. From the ethical standpoint the world is a
realm of ends or persons and all other values must be adjusted in
relation to these.

We have been told by religious ethical teachers that we must love our
neighbour as ourself, and have been reminded by moralists continually
of the conflict between Egoism and Altruism. Renouvier points out that
ultimately obligation towards others is reducible to a duty to oneself.
He does not do this from the point of view of Hobbes, who regarded all
actions, however altruistic they appeared to be, as founded purely upon
self-interest, but rather from the opposite standpoint. “We should make
our duty to others rank foremost among our duties to ourselves.”[17]
This is the transcendent duty through the performance of which we
achieve a realisation of the solidarity of persons, demonstrate an
objective value for our own existence, and gain a fuller and richer
life.

 [17] _Science de la Morale_, vol. I, p. 85.


The idea of personal and moral reciprocity was formulated by the
Chinese and the Greeks; at a later date it reappeared in the teaching
of Jesus. This ancient and almost universal maxim has been stated both
positively and negatively: “Do not to others what you would not have
them do unto you,” “Do as you would be done by.” The maxim itself,
however, beyond a statement of the principle of reciprocity rather
vaguely put, has no great value for the science of ethics. Renouvier
regards it not as a principle of morality but a rule-of-thumb, and he
considers the negative statement of it to be more in harmony with what
was intended by the early ethical teachers—namely, to give a practical
warning against the committing of evil actions rather than to establish
a scientific principle of right action.

Renouvier has shown the origin of the notion of Justice as arising
primarily from an association of two persons. “Reason established a
kind of community and moral solidarity in this reciprocity.”[18] This
right and duty unite to constitute Justice. It is truly said that it is
just to fulfil one’s duty, just to demand one’s right, and Justice is
formed by a union of these two in such a manner that they always
complement one another. Bearing in mind the doctrine of personality as
an end, we get a general law of action which may be stated in these
terms: “Always act in such a way that the maxim applicable to your act
can be erected by your conscience into a law common to you and your
associate.” Now to apply this to an association of any number of
persons—_e g._, human society as a whole—we need only generalise it and
state it in these terms: “Act always in such a way that the maxim of
your conduct can be erected by your conscience into a universal law or
formulated in an article of legislation which you can look upon as
expressing the will of every rational being.” This “categorical
obligation” is the basis of ethics. It stands clear of hypothetical
cases as a general law of action, and “there is no such thing really as
practical morality,” remarks Renouvier, “except by voluntary obedience
to a law.”[19]

 [18] _Ibid_., pp. 79-80.


 [19] _Science de la Morale_, vol. I, p. 100.


The fulfilment of our duties to ourselves generally tends to fit us for
fulfilling our duties to others, and the neglect of the former will
lead inevitably to inability to perform these latter. Our duty to
others thus involves our duty to ourselves.[20]

 [20] The notion of self-sacrifice itself involves also, to a degree,
 the maintenance of self, without which there could be no self to
 sacrifice. History has frequently given examples of men of all types
 refusing to sacrifice their lives for a certain cause because they
 wished to preserve them for some other (and possibly better—in their
 minds at any rate, better) form of self-sacrifice.


Personality which lies at the root of the moral problem demands Truth
and Liberty, and it has a right to these two, for without them it is
injured. They are essential to a society of persons. Another vital
element in society is Work, the neglect of which is a grave immoral
act, for as there is in any society a certain amount of necessary work
to be performed, a “slacker” dumps his share upon his fellows to
perform in addition to their own share. With industrial or general
laziness, and the parasitism of those whose riches enable them to live
without working, is to be condemned also the shirking of intellectual
work by all. Quite apart from those who are “intellectuals” as such, a
solemn duty of work, of thought, reflection and reasoning lies on each
person in a society. Apathy among citizens is really a form of culpable
negligence. The duty of work and thought is so vital and of such
ethical, political and social importance that Renouvier suggests that
the two words, work and duty, be regarded as synonyms. It might, he
thinks, make clearer to many the obligation involved.

Justice has been made clear in the foregoing remarks, but in view of
Kant’s distinction of “large” and “strict” duties, Renouvier raises the
question of the relation of Justice and Goodness. He concludes that
acts proceeding from the latter are to be distinguished from Justice.
They proceed not from considerations of persons as such, but from their
“nature” or common humanity, and are near to being “duties to oneself.”
They are of the heart rather than of the head, proceeding from
sentiments of humanity, and sentiment is not, strictly speaking, the
foundation of justice, which is based on the notions of duties and
rights. There can be, therefore, an opposition of Justice and of
Goodness (Kindness or Love), and the sphere of the latter is often
limited by considering the former. Renouvier recognises the fact that
Justice in the moral sense of recognition and respect for personality
is itself often “constitutionally and legally” violated in societies by
custom, laws and institutions as well as by members of society in their
actions, and he notes that this “legal” injustice makes the problem of
the relation of Justice and Charity excessively difficult.

The science of ethics is faced with a double task owing to the nature
of man’s evolution and history. Human societies have been built upon a
basis which is not that of justice and right, but upon the basis of
force and tyranny—in short, upon war. There is, therefore, for the
moralist the twin duty of constructing laws and principles for the true
society founded upon an ethical basis, that is to say on conceptions of
Justice, while at the same time he must give practical advice to his
fellows living and striving in present society, where a continual state
of war exists owing to the operation of force and tyranny in place of
justice, and he must so _apply_ his principles that they may be capable
of moving this unjust existing society progressively towards the ideal
society.

In our account of Renouvier’s “Philosophy of History” we brought out
his insistence upon war as the essential feature of man’s life on this
planet, as the basis of our present “civilisation.” Here he proclaims
it again in his ethics.[21] War reigns everywhere: it is around us and
within us—individuals, families, tribes, classes, nations and races. He
includes in the term much more than open fighting with guns. The
distribution of wealth, of property (especially of land), wages, custom
duties, diplomacy, fraud, violence, bigotry, orthodoxy, and
persecution, lies themselves, are all, to him, forms of war. Its most
ludicrous stronghold is among men who pride themselves on being at
peace with all men, while they force their idea of God upon other men’s
consciences. Religious intolerance is one, and a very absurd kind of
warfare.[22]

 [21] _Science de la Morale_, vol. I, p. 332.


 [22] Renouvier sums up its spirit in the words: “_Crois ce que je
 crois moi, où je te tue_” (_La Nouvelle Monadologie_).


The principle of justice confers upon the person a certain “right of
defence” in the midst of all this existing varied warfare of mankind.
It involves, according to Renouvier, resistance. The just man cannot
stand by and see the unjust man oppress his fellow so that the victim
is “obliged to give up his waistcoat after having had his coat torn
from him.” Otherwise we must confuse the _just_ with the _saintly_ man
who only admits one law—namely, that of sacrifice. But Renouvier will
have us be clear as to the price involved in all this violent
resistance. It means calling up powers of evil, emissaries of
injustice. He does not found his “right of defence” on rational right;
it is to misconceive it so to found it. We must recognise the use of
violence and force, even in self-defence, as in itself evil, an evil
necessitated by facts which do not conform to the rules of peace and
justice themselves. It is to a large degree necessary, unfortunately,
but is none the less evil and to be frankly regarded as evil, and
likely to multiply evil in the world, owing to the tremendous
solidarity of wickedness of which Renouvier has already spoken in
history. It is the absence of the reign of justice which necessitates
these conflicts, and we have to content ourselves with a conception of
actual “right,” a conception already based on war, not with one of
“rational right” or justice.

Right in the true sense, Renouvier insists, belongs to a state of
peace; in a state of war, such as our civilisation is perpetually in,
it cannot be realised. The objection may be made that Renouvier is then
justifying the means by the end. He emphatically denies this. By no
means is this the case, for “the evil,” he remarks, “which corrects
another evil does not therefore become good; it may be useful, but it
is none the less evil, immoral, or unjust, and what is not just is not
justifiable. Wars, rebellions, revolutions may lessen certain evils,
but they do not thereby cease to be any the less evils themselves.
Morally we are obliged to avoid all violence; a revolution is only
justified if its success gives an indication of its absolute necessity.
We must lament, from the standpoint of ethics or justice, the evil
state of affairs which gives rise to it.[23]

 [23] On this point, it is interesting to compare with the above the
 views of Spinoza in his _Tractatus Theologico-politicus_ and
 _Tractatus-politicus_, and those of T. H. Green in his _Lectures on
 Political Obligation_.


Renouvier devotes a considerable portion of his treatise to problems of
domestic morals, economic questions and problems of a political and
international character. In all these discussions, however, he
maintains as central his thesis of the supremacy of personality.

Under _droit domestique_ he defends very warmly the right of the woman
and the wife to treatment as a personality. He laments particularly the
injustice which usually rules in marriage, where, under a cloak of
legality, the married man denies to his wife a personal control of her
own body and the freedom of self-determination in matters of sexual
intercourse. So unjust and loathsome in its violation of the
personality of woman is the modern view of marriage that Renouvier
considers it little better than polygamy (which is often a better state
for women than monogamy) or prostitution. It is less just than either,
owing to its degradation of the personality of the wife. He remarked
too in his _Nouvelle Monadologie_ that love (in the popular sense),
being so largely an affair of passion and physical attraction, is
usually unjust, and that friendship is a better basis for the
relationship of marriage, which should be, while it lasts among
mankind, one of justice.[24] Consequently, it should involve neither
the idea of possession nor of obedience, but of mutual comradeship.

 [24] See particularly the notes in _La Nouvelle Monadologie_ appended
 to the fourth part, “Passion,” pp. 216-222.


In the economic sphere Renouvier endeavours to uphold freedom, and for
this reason he is an enemy of communism. Hostile to the communistic
doctrine of property, he is a definite defender of property which he
considers to be a necessity of personality. He considers each person in
the community entitled to property as a guarantee of his own liberty
and development. While disagreeing with communism, Renouvier is
sympathetic to the socialist view that property might be, and should
be, more justly distributed, and he advocates means to limit excessive
possession by private persons and to “generalise” the distribution of
the goods of the community among its members. Progressive taxation, a
guarantee of the “right to work” and a complete system of insurance are
among his suggestions. He is careful, however, to avoid giving to the
state too much power.

Renouvier was no lover of the state. While regarding it as necessary
under present conditions, he agrees with the anarchist idealists, to
whom government is an evil. He admits its use, however, as a guarantor
of personal liberty, but is against any semblance of state- worship.
The state is not a person, nor is it, as it exists at present, a moral
institution. One of the needs of modern times is, he points out, the
moralising of the conception of the state, and of the state itself.
Although, therefore, he has no _a priori_ objection to state
interference in the economic sphere, and would not advocate a mere
_laissez-faire_ policy, with its vicious consequences, yet he does not
look with approval upon such interference unless it be “the collective
expression of the personalities forming the community.”

The fact of living in a society, highly organised although it be, does
not diminish at all the moral significance of personality. Rights and
duties belong essentially to persons and to them only. We must beware
of the political philosophy which regards the citizens as existing only
for the state. Rather the state exists, or should exist, for the
welfare of the citizens. In the past this was a grave defect of
military despotisms, and was well illustrated by the view of the state
taken, or rather inculcated, by German political philosophy. In the
future the danger of the violation of personality may lie, Renouvier
thinks, in another direction—namely, in the establishment of
Communistic states. The basic principle of his ethic is the person as
an end in himself, and the treatment of persons as ends. If this be so,
a Communistic Republic which has as its motto “Each for all,” without
also “All for each,” may gravely violate personality and the moral law
if, by constraint, it treats all its citizens and their efforts not as
ends in themselves, but merely means to the collective ends of all.

The moral ideal demands that personality must not be obliterated.
Personality bound up with “autonomy of reason” is the fundamental
ethical fact.[25] In the last resort, responsibility rests upon the
individuals of the society for the evils of the system of social
organisation under which they live. The state itself cannot be regarded
as a moral person. Renouvier opposes strongly any doctrine which tends
to the personalisation or the deification of the state.

 [25] Note that Renouvier prefers this term to Kant’s “autonomy of
 will,” which he thinks confuses moral obligation and free-will.


He combats also the modern doctrines of “nationality,” and claims that
even the idea of the state is a higher one, for it at any rate involves
co-operating personalities, while a nation is a fiction, of which no
satisfactory definition can be given. He laughs at the “unity of
language, race, culture and religion,” and asks where we can find a
nation?[26] War and death have long since destroyed such united and
harmonious groups as were found in ancient times.

 [27] _Science de la Morale_, vol. 2, chap. xcvi, “_Idées de la
 Nationalité et d’Etat_,” pp. 416-427.


In approaching the questions of international morality Renouvier makes
clear that there is only one morality, one code of justice. Morality
cannot be divided against itself, and there cannot be an admission that
things which are immoral in the individual are justifiable, or
permissible, between different states. Morality has not been applied to
these relationships, which are governed by aggressive militarism and
diplomacy, the negation of all conceptions of justice. Ethical
obligation has only a meaning and significance for personalities, and
our states do but reflect the morality of those who constitute them;
our world reflects the relationships and immorality of the states. War
characterises our whole civilisation, domestic, economic and
international. To have inter- national peace, internal peace is
essential, and this pre- supposes the reign of justice within states.
War we shall have with us, Renouvier reminds us, in all its forms, in
our institutions, our laws and customs, until it has disappeared from
our hearts. Treaties of “peace” and federations or leagues of nations
are themselves based on injustice and on force, and in this he sees but
another instance of the “terrible solidarity of evil.”[28] Better it is
to recognise this, thinks Renouvier, than to consider ourselves in, or
even near, a Utopia, whence human greed and passion have fled.

 [28] _Science de la Morale_, vol. 2, p. 474.


We find in Renouvier’s ethics a notable reversion to the individualism
which characterised the previous century. Much of the individualistic
tone of his work is, however, due to his finding himself in opposition
to the doctrines preached by communists, positivists, sociologists,
pessimistic and fatalistic historians, and supporters of the deified
state. Renouvier acclaims the freedom of the individual, but his
individualism is “personalism.” In proclaiming that the basis of
justice and of all morality is respect for personality, as such, he has
no desire to set up a standard of selfish individualism; he wishes only
to combat those heretical doctrines which would minimise and crush
personality. For him the moral “person” is not an isolated
individual—he is a social human being, free and responsible, who lives
with his fellows in society. Only upon a recognition of personality as
a supreme value can justice or peace ever be attained in human society;
and it is to this end that all moral education, Renouvier advocates,
should tend. The moral ideal should be, in practice, the constant
effort to free man from the terrible solidarity of evil which
characterises the civilisation into which he is born, and to establish
a community or association of personalities. Such an ideal does not lie
necessarily at the end of a determined evolution; Renouvier’s views on
history and progress have shown us that. Consequently it depends upon
us; it is our duty to believe in its possibility and to work, each
according to his or her power, for its realisation. The ideal or the
idea, will, in so far as it is set before self-conscious personalities
as an end, become a force. Renouvier agrees on this point with
Fouillée, to whose ethic, founded on the conception of _idées-forces_,
we now turn.

III

The philosophy of _idée-forces_ propounded by Fouillée assumes, in its
ethical aspect, a role of reconciliation (which is characteristic, as
we have noted, of his whole method and his entire philosophy) by
attempting a synthesis of individualism and humanitarianism. It is
therefore another kind of _personnalisme_, differing in type from that
of Renouvier. Fouillée’s full statement of his ethical doctrines was
not written until the year 1907,[29] but long before the conclusion of
the nineteenth century he had already indicated the essential points of
his ethics. The conclusion of his thesis _La Liberté et le
Déterminisme_ (1872) is very largely filled with his ethical views and
with his optimism. Four years later appeared his study _L’Idée moderne
du Droit en Allemagne, en Angleterre et en France_, which was followed
in 1880 by _La Science sociale contemporaine_, where the relation of
the study of ethics to that of sociology was discussed. A volume
containing much acute criticism of current ethical theories was his
_Critique des Systèmes de Morale contemporains_ (1883), which gave him
a further opportunity of offering by way of contrast his application of
the doctrine of _idées-forces_ to the solution of moral problems. To
this he added in the following year a study upon _La Propriété sociale
et la Démocratie_, where he discussed the ethical value and
significance of various political and socialist doctrines. Ethical
questions raised by the problems of education he discussed in his
_L’Enseignement au Point de Vue national_ (1891). At the close of the
century he issued his book on morality in his own country, _La France
au Point de Vue morale_ (1900).[30]

 [29] His _Morale des Idées-forces_ was then published.


 [30] It is interesting to note the wealth of Fouillée’s almost annual
 output on ethics alone in his later years. We may cite, in the
 twentieth century: _La Réforme de l’Enseignement par la Philosophie_,
 1901; _La Conception morale et critique de l’Enseignement_; _Nietzsche
 et l’Immoralisme_, 1904; _Le Moralisme de Kant et l’Amoralisme
 contemporaine_, 1905; _Les Eléments sociologiques de la Morale_, 1905;
 _La Morale des Idées-forces_, 1907; _Le Socialisme_, 1910; _La
 Démocratie politique et sociale en France_, 1910; and the posthumous
 volume, _Humanitaires et Libertaires au Point de Vue sociologique et
 morale_, 1914.


Fouillée endeavours to unite the purely ideal aspect of ethics—that is
to say, its notion of what ought to be, with the more positive view of
ethics as dealing with what now is. His ethic is, therefore, an attempt
to relate more intimately the twin spheres of Renouvier, _l’état de
guerre_ with _l’état de paix_, for it is concerned not only with what
_is_, but with that which _tends_ to be and which _can_ be by the
simple fact that it is _thought_. As, however, what _can_ be is a
matter of intense interest to us, we are inevitably led from this to
consider what _ought_ to be—that is to say, what is better, or of more
worth or value. The ethical application of the philosophy of
_idées-forces_ is at once theoretical and practical, that philosophy
being concerned both with ideas and values.

As in his treatment of freedom we found Fouillée beginning with the
_idea_ of freedom, so here in a parallel manner he lays down the _idea_
of an end of action as an incontestable fact of experience, although
the existence of such an end is contested and is a separate question.
This idea operates in consciousness as a power of will (_volonté de
conscience_). Intelligence, power, love and happiness-in short, the
highest conscious life—are involved in it, not only for us, but for
all. Thus it comes about that the conscious subject, just because he
finds himself confronted by nature and by over-individual ends,
proposes to himself an ideal, and imposes at the same time upon himself
the obligation to act in conformity with this full consciousness which
is in all, as in him, and thus he allows universal consciousness to
operate in his own individual life. Here we have conscience, the idea
of duty or obligation, accounted for, and the principle of autonomy of
the moral person laid down. The ethical life is shown as the conscious
will in action, finding within itself its own end and rule of action,
finding also the conscious wills of others like itself. Morality is the
indefinite extension of the conscious will which brings about the
condition that others tend to become “me.” Through the increasing power
of intellectual disinterestedness and social sympathy, the old formula
“_cogito, conscius sum_” gives place to that of “_conscii sumus_,” and
this is no mere intellectual speculation, but a concrete principle of
action and feeling which is itself akin to the highest and best in all
religions.

One of the features of this ethic is its insistence upon the primacy of
self-consciousness. Indeed, it has its central point in the doctrine of
self-consciousness, which, according to Fouillée, implies the
consciousness of others and of the whole unity of mankind. Emphasising
his gospel of _idées-forces_, he outlines a morality in which the ideal
shall attract men persuasively, and not dominate them in what he
regards as the arbitrary and rather despotic manner of Kant.

By advocating the primacy of self-consciousness Fouillée claims to
establish an ethic which towers above those founded upon pleasure,
happiness and feeling. The morality of the _idées-forces_ is not purely
sentimental, not purely intellectual, not purely voluntarist; it claims
to rest on the totality of the functions of consciousness, as revealed
in the feelings, in intellect and will, acting in solidarity and in
harmony.

He endeavours to unite the positive and evolutionary views of morality
to those associated with theological or metaphysical doctrines,
concerning the deity or the morally perfect absolute. He claims,
against the theologians and on behalf of the positivists, that ethics
can be an independent study, that it is not necessarily bound up with
theological dogmas. There is no need to found the notion of duty upon
that of the existence of God. Our own existence is sufficient; the
voice of conscience is within our human nature. He objects, as did
Nietzsche, to the formality and rigour of Kant’s “categorical
imperative.” His method is free from the legalism of Kant, and in him
and Guyau is seen an attempt to relate morality itself to life,
expanding and showing itself creative of ideals and tending to their
fulfilment.

From the primacy of self-consciousness which can be expressed in the
notion, _Je pense, donc j’ai une valeur morale_, a transition is made
to a conception of values. _Je pense, donc j’evalue des objets_. The
essential element in the psychology of the _idees-forces_ then comes
into play by tending to the realisation of the ideals conceived and
based on the valuation previously made. Finally, Fouillée claims that
on this ethical operation of the _idées-forces_ can be founded the
notion of a universal society of consciences. This notion itself is a
force operating to create that society. The ideal is itself persuasive,
and Fouillee’s inherent optimism, which we have observed in his
doctrine of progress, colours also his ethical theory. He has faith in
men’s capacity to be attracted by the ideals of love and brotherhood,
and insists that in the extension of these lies the supreme duty, and
the ideal, like the notion of duty itself, is a creation of our own
thought. The realisation of the universality, altruism, love and
brotherhood of which he speaks, depends upon our action, our power to
foster ideas, to create ideals, particularly in the minds of the young,
and to strive ever for their realisation. This is the great need of our
time, Fouillée rightly urges.[31] Such a morality contains in a more
concentrated form, he thinks, the best that has been said and thought
in the world-religions; it achieves also that union of the scientific
spirit with the aspirations of man, which Fouillée regards as so
desirable, and he claims for it a philosophical value by its success in
uniting the subjective and personal factors of consciousness with those
which are objective and universal.

 [31] The work of Benjamin Kidd should be compared in this connection,
 particularly his _Social Evolution_, 1894; _Principles of Western
 Civilisation_, 1902; and _The Science of Power_, 1918 (chap, v., “The
 Emotion of the Ideal”).


Similar in several respects to the ethical doctrines of Fouillée are
those of his step-son. Guyau insists more profoundly, however, upon the
“free” conception of morality, as spontaneous and living, thus marking
a further reaction from Kant’s doctrine. Both Fouillée and Guyau
interacted upon one another in their mental relationship, and both of
them (particularly Guyau) have affinities with Nietzsche, who knew
their work. While the three thinkers are in revolt against the Kantian
conception of ethics, the two Frenchmen use their conceptions to
develop an ethic altruistic in character, far removed from the egoism
which characterises the German.[32]

 [32] We find the optimism and humanitarian idealism of the Frenchmen
 surprising. May not this be piecisely because the world has followed
 the gospel of Nietzsche? We may dislike him, but he is a greater
 painter of the real state of world-morality than are the two
 Frenchmen. They, with their watchword of _fraternité_, are proclaiming
 a more excellent way they are standing for an ethical ideal of the
 highest type.


Guyau, after showing in his critique of English Ethics (_La Morale
anglaise contemporaine_, 1879) the inadequacies of a purely utilitarian
doctrine of morality, endeavoured to set forth in a more constructive
manner the principles of a scientific morality in his _Esquisse d’une
Morale sans Obligation ni Sanction_.

He takes as his starting-point the position where John Stuart Mill fell
foul of the word “desirable.” What, asks Guyau, is the supreme desire
of every living creature? The answer to this question is “Life.” What
we all of us desire most and constantly is Life, the most intensive and
extensive in all its relationships, physical and spiritual. In the
principle of Life we find cause and end—a unity which is a synthesis of
all desires and all desirables. Moreover, the concept or the principle
of Life embraces all functions of our nature—those within consciousness
and those which are subconscious or unconscious. It thus relates
intimately purely instinctive action and reflective acts, both of which
are manifestations of Life and can enrich and increase its power.

The purely hedonistic views of the Utilitarians he considers untrue.
Doubtless, he admits, there is a degree of truth in the doctrine that
consciousness tends to pursue the line of greatest pleasure or least
resistance, but then we must remember how slight a part this
consciousness actually plays. Instincts and an intensive subconscious
“will-to-live” are constantly operating. A purely scientific ethic, if
it is to present a complete scheme, must allow for this by admitting
that the purely hedonistic search after pleasure is not in itself a
cause of action, but is an effect of a more fundamental or dominating
factor. This factor is precisely the effort of Life to maintain itself,
to intensify itself and expand. The chief motive power lies in the
“intensity of Life.” “The end which actually determines all conscious
action is also the cause which produces every unconscious action; it is
Life itself, Life at once the most intense and the most varied in its
forms. From the first thrill of the embryo in its mother’s womb to the
last convulsion of the old man, every movement of the being has had as
cause Life in its evolution; this universal cause of actions is, from
another point of view, its constant effect and end.”[33]

 [33] _Esquisse d’une Morale_, p. 87.


A true ethic proceeding upon the recognition of these principles is
scientific, and constitutes a science having as its object all the
means by which Life, material and spiritual, may be conserved and
expanded. Rising in the evolutionary development we find the variety
and scope of action increased. The highest beings find rest not in
sleep merely, but in variety and change of action. The moral ideal lies
in activity, in all the variety of its manifestations. For Guyau, as
for Bergson, the worst vice is idleness, inertia, lack of _élan vital_,
decay of personal initiative, and a consequent degeneration to merely
automatic existence.

Hedonism is quite untenable as a principle; pleasure is merely a
consequence, and its being set in the van of ethics is due to a false
psychology and false science. Granting that pleasure attends the
satisfaction of a desire, pain its repression, recognising that a
feeling of pleasure accompanies many actions which expand life, we must
live, as Guyau reminds us, before we enjoy. The activity of life surges
within us, and we do not act with a view to pleasure or with pleasure
as a motive, but life, just because it is life, seeks to expand. Man in
acting has created his pleasures and his organs. The pleasure and the
organ alike proceed from function—that is, life itself. The pleasure of
an action and even the consciousness of it are attributes, not ends.
The action arises naturally from the inherent intensity of life.

The hedonists, too, says Guyau, have been negligent of the widest
pleasures, and have frequently confined their attention to those of
eating and drinking and sexual intercourse, purely sensitive, and have
neglected those of living, willing and thinking, which are more
fundamental as being identical with the consciousness of life. But
Guyau asserts that, as the greatest intensity of life involves
necessarily its widest expansion, we must give special attention to
thought and will and feeling, which bring us into touch universally
with our fellows and promote the widest life. This expansiveness of
life has great ethical importance. With the change in the nature of
reproduction, involving the sexual union of two beings, “a new moral
phase began in the world.” It involved an expansion not merely
physical, but mental—a union, however crude, of soul.

It is in the extension of this feature of human life that Guyau sees
the ethical ideal. The most perfect organism is the most sociable, for
the ideal of the individual life is the common or social life. Morality
is for him almost synonymous with sociability, disinterestedness, love
and brotherhood, and in it we find, he says, “the flower of human
life.”

All our action should be referred to this moral ideal of sociability.
Guyau sees in the phrase “social service” a conception which should not
be confined to those who are endeavouring in some religious or
philanthropic manner to alleviate the suffering caused by evil in human
society, but a conception to which the acts, all acts, of all members
of society should be related. Like Renouvier, he gives to work an
important ethical value. “To work is to produce—that is, to be useful
to oneself and to others.” In work he sees the economic and moral
reconciliation of egoism and altruism. It is a good and it is
praiseworthy. Those who neglect and despise it are parasites, and their
existence in society is a negation of the moral ideal of sociability
and social service. In so far as the work of certain persons leads to
the accumulation of excessive capital in individual hands, it is likely
to annul itself sooner or later in luxury and idleness. Such an immoral
state of affairs, it is the concern of society, by its laws of
inheritance and possession, to prevent.

Having made clear his principle of morality, Guyau then has to face the
question of its relation to the notion of duty or obligation. Duty in
itself is an idea which he rejects as vague, and he disapproves of the
external and artificial element present in the Kantian “rigorism.” For
Guyau the very power of action contained in life itself creates an
impersonal duty. While Emerson could write:

“Duty says, ‘I must,’
The youth replies, ‘I can,’”


the view of Guyau is directly the converse; for him “I can” gives the
“I must”; it is the power which precedes and creates the obligation.
Life cannot maintain itself unless it grows and expands. The soul that
liveth to itself, that liveth solely by habit and automatism, is
already dead. Morality is the unity of the personality expanding by
action and by sympathy. It is at this point that Guyau’s thought
approaches closely to the _philosophie des idées-forces_ of his
step-father, by his doctrine of thought and action.

Immorality is really unsociability, and Guyau thinks this a better
key-note than to regard it as disobedience. If it is so to be spoken
of, it is disobedience to the social elements in one’s own self—a
mischievous duplication of personality, egoistic in character and
profoundly antisocial. The sociological elements which characterise all
Guyau’s work are here very marked. In the notion of sociability we find
an equivalent of the older and more artificial conception of Duty—a
conception which lacks concreteness and offers in itself so little
guidance because it is abstract and empty. The criterion of
sociability, Guyau claims, is much more concrete and useful. He asks us
to observe its spirituality, for the more gross and materialistic
pleasures fall short of the criterion by the very fact that they cannot
be shared. Guyau’s thought is here at its best. The higher pleasures,
which are not those of bodily enjoyment and satisfaction, but those of
the spirit, which thinks, feels, wills and loves, are precisely those
which come nearest to fulfilling the ideal of sociability, for they
tend less to divide men than to unite them and to urge them to a closer
co-operation for their spiritual advancement. Guyau writes here with
sarcasm regarding the lonely imbecile in the carriage drawn by four
horses. For his own part it is enough to have—

“. . . a Loaf of Bread beneath the Bough,
A Flask of Wine, a Book of Verse—and Thou
Beside me singing in the Wilderness—
And Wilderness is Paradise enow.”


He knows who really has chosen the better part. One cannot rejoice much
and rejoice alone. Companionship and love are supremely valuable
“goods,” and the pleasure of others he recognises as a very real part
of his own. The egoist’s pleasure is, on the other hand, very largely
an illusion. He loses, says Guyau, far more by his isolated enjoyment
than he would gain by sharing.

Life itself is the greatest of all goods, as it is the condition of all
others, but life’s value fades if we are not loved. It is love,
comradeship and the fellowship of kindred souls which give to the
humblest life a significance and a feeling of value. This, Guyau points
out with some tenderness, is the tragedy of suicides. These occurrences
are a social no less than an individual tragedy. The tragic element
lies in the fact that they were persons who were unable to give their
devotion to some object, and the loss of personalities in this way is a
real loss to society, but it is mainly society itself which is to blame
for them.

We need not fear, says Guyau, that such a gospel will promote unduly
the operation of mere animality or instinctive action, for in the
growth of the scientific spirit he sees the development of the great
enemy of all instinct. It is the dissolving force _par excellence_, the
revolutionary spirit which incessantly wages warfare within society
against authority, and in the individual it operates through reason
against the instinctive impulses. Every instinct tends to lapse in so
far as it is reflected upon by consciousness.

The old notion of duty or obligation must, in Guyau’s opinion, be
abandoned. The sole commandment which a scientific and positive ethic,
such as he endeavours to indicate, can recognise, is expressible only
in the words, “Develop your life in all directions, be an individual as
rich as possible in energy, intensive and extensive”—in other words,
“Be the most social and sociable being you can.” It is this which
replaces the “categorical imperative.”

He aptly points out the failure of modern society to offer scope for
devotion, which is really a superabundance of life, and its proneness
to crush out opportunities which offer a challenge to the human spirit.
There is a claim of life itself to adventure; there is a pleasure in
risk and in conflict; and this pleasure in risk and adventure has been
largely overlooked in its relation to the moral life. Such risk and
adventure are not merely a pure negation of self or of personal life,
but rather, he considers, that life raised to its highest power,
reaching the sublime. By virtue of such devotion our lives are
enriched. He draws a touching picture of the sacrifice upon which our
modern social life and civilisation are based, and draws an analogy
between the blood of dead horses used by the ploughman in fertilising
his field, and the blood of the martyrs of humanity, _qui ont fécondé
l’avenir_. Often they may have been mistaken; later generations may
wonder if their cause was worth fighting for; yet, although nothing
truly is sadder than to die in vain, that devotion was valuable in and
for itself.

With the demand of life for risk in action is bound up the impetus to
undertake risk in thought. From this springs the moral need for faith,
for belief and acceptance of some hypotheses. The very divergence or
diversity of the world-religions is not discouraging but rather the
reverse. It is a sign of healthy moral life. Uniformity would be highly
detrimental; it would cease to express life, for with conformity of
belief would come spiritual decline and stagnation. Guyau anticipates
here his doctrine of a religion of free thought, a “non-religion” of
the future, which we shall discuss in our next chapter, when we examine
his book on that subject. In the diversity of religious views Guyau
sees a moral good, for these religions are themselves an expression of
life in its richness, and the conservation and expansion of this rich
variety of life are precisely the moral ideal itself.

We must endeavour to realise how rich and varied the nature of human
life really is. Revolutionaries, Guyau points out, are always making
the mistake of regarding life and truth as too simple. Life and truth
are so complex that evolution is the key-note to what is desirable in
the individual intellect and in society, not a revolution which must
inevitably express the extreme of one side or the other. The search for
truth is slow and needs faith and patience, but the careful seekers of
it are making the future of mankind. But truth will be discovered only
in relation to action and life and in proportion to the labour put into
its realisation. The search for truth must never be divorced from the
active life, Guyau insists, and, indeed, he approaches the view that
the action will produce the knowledge, “He that doeth the will shall
know of the doctrine.” Moreover he rightly sees in action the wholesome
cure for pessimism and that cynicism which all too frequently arises
from an equal appreciation of opposing views. “Even in doubt,” he
exclaims, “we can love; even in the intellectual night, which prevents
our seeing any ultimate goal, we can stretch out a hand to him who
weeps at our feet.”[34] In other words, we must do the duty that lies
nearest, in the hope and faith that by that action itself light will
come.

 [34] _Esquisse d’une Morale sans Obligation ni Sanction_, p. 178.


In the last part of his treatise Guyau deals with the difficult problem
of “sanction,” so ultimately connected with ethics, and, it must be
added, with religion. The Providence who rewards and punishes us,
according to the orthodox religious creed of Christendom, is merely a
personified “sanction” or distributive justice, operating in a
terrestrial and celestial court of assize. Guyau condemns this as an
utterly immoral conception. Religious sanctions, as he has not much
difficulty in showing, are more cruel than those which a man could
imagine himself inflicting upon his mortal enemy. The “Heavenly Father”
ought at least to be as good as earthly ones, who do not cruelly punish
their children. Guyau touches upon an important point here, which will
be further emphasised—namely, the necessity for making our idea of God,
if we have one at all, harmonious with our own ethical conceptions. The
old ideas of the divinity are profoundly immoral and are based on
physical force. This is natural because those views which have survived
in modern times are those of primitive and savage people to whom the
most holy was the most powerful and physically majestic. But, says
Guyau, now that we see that “all physical force represents moral
weakness,” the idea of God the All-terrible, with his hell-fire ready
for the sinful soul, must be condemned as immoral blasphemy itself.
“God,” he remarks, “in damning any soul might be said to damn himself.”

Virtue is really its own reward. No one should be or do good in order
to gain an entry into paradise or to escape the torments of hell. That
is to build morality on an immoral principle and on a belief, not in
goodness as valuable in and for itself, but on a basis of material
self-interest alone, “the best policy.” It is true, Guyau admits, that
virtue involves happiness, but it is not in this sense. A conflict
between “pleasure” and virtue is usually one of higher _versus_ lower
ideals. Virtue is not a precedent to sense-happiness, and in this sense
is not at all equivalent or bound up with happiness, but, as the facts
of life reveal, very often opposed to it.

Guyau opposes the ordinary view of punishment in society and shows that
it is both immoral and socially harmful in its application. It adds
evil to evil, and legal murder is really more absurd than the illegal
murder. Punishment, capital or other, is no “compensation” exacted for
the crime committed, and it never can be such. Attempts to treat and
cure the guilty one would, Guyau suggests, be far more rational, humane
and really beneficial to society itself, which at present creates by
its punishments, especially those inflicted for first offences, a
“criminal class.” One should convert the criminal before punishing him,
and then, Guvau asks, if he is converted, why punish him?

The appeal to justice denoted in the words “To everyone according to
his works” is frequently heard in the defence of punishment. This is an
excellent maxim in Guyau’s opinion, but he is careful to point out that
it is purely one of social economics. It is a plea for a just
distribution of the products of labour, but does not apply at all to
the problem of punishment. In a manner which recalls the remarks of
Renan, Guyau sees in evil-doing a lack of culture, or rather of that
sociability, which comes of social culture, from consciousness of a
membership of society and a solidarity with one’s fellows. In vice and
in virtue alike the human will appears aspiring to better things
according to its lights. As virtue is its own reward, so is evil; and
the moralist must say to the wicked: “Verily they have their reward”
(_Comme si ce n’était pas assez pour eux d’être méchants_).

Guyau comments upon the gradual modifications of punishment from a
social point of view. There was the day when the chastisement was
infinitely worse than the crime itself. Then came the morality of
reciprocity, “an eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth,” an ethic
which represented a high ideal for primitive man to reach, and one to
which, Guyau thinks, we have yet to reach to-day in some spheres of
life. Yet a further moral development will show how foolish, in a
civilised society, are wrath and hatred of the criminal and the cry for
vengeance. Society must aim at ensuring protection for itself with the
minimum of individual suffering. Punishment must be regarded as an
example for the future rather than as revenge or compensation. In the
individual himself Guyau observes how powerful can be the inner
sanction of remorse, the suffering caused by the unrealised ideal. This
is perhaps the only real moral punishment, and it is one which society
cannot itself directly enforce. Only by increasing “sociability” and
social sensitiveness can this sanction be indirectly developed.

Herein lies the highest ethical ideal, far more concrete and living, in
Guyau’s opinion, than the rigorism of a Kant or the “scholastic”[35]
temper of a Renouvier. Charity or love for all men, whatever their
value morally, intellectually or physically, must, he claims, “be the
final end pursued even by public opinion.”In co-operation and
sociability, he finds the vital moral ideal; in love and brotherhood,
he finds the real sanction which should operate.”Love supposes
mutuality of love,” he says; and there is one idea superior to that of
justice, that is the idea of brotherhood, and he remarks with a humane
tenderness “the guilty have probably more need for love than anyone
else.” “I have,” he cries, “two hands—the one for gripping the hand of
those with whom I march along in life, the other to lift up the fallen.
Indeed, to these I should be able to stretch out both hands
together.”[36]

 [35] This is Guyau’s word to describe Renouvier, whom he regards as
 far too much under the influence of Kant.


 [36] _Esquisse d’une Morale sans Obligation ni Sanction_, p. 223.


While Fouillée and, more especially, Guyau were thus outlining an ethic
marked by a strong humanitarianism, a more definitely religious ethic
was being proclaimed by that current of philosophy of belief and of
action which has profoundly associated itself in its later developments
with “Modernism” in the Roman Church. The tendency to stress action and
the practical reason is noticeable in the work of Brochard,
Ollé-Laprune and Blondel, also in Rauh. They agree with Renouvier in
advocating the primacy of the practical reason, but their own reasons
for this are different from his, or at least in them the reasons are
more clearly enunciated. Plainly these reasons lie in the difficulties
of intellectualism and the quest of truth. They propose the quest of
the good in the hope of finding in that sphere some objectivity, some
absolute, in fact, which they cannot find out by intellectual
searching. They correspond in a somewhat parallel fashion to the
philosophy of intuition with its rejection of intellectualism as
offering a final solution. These thinkers desire by action, by doing
the will, to attain to a knowledge of the doctrine. The first word in
their gospel is—

“Im Anfang war die That.”


It is for them the beginning and the end. Their certainty is an act of
belief, which grows out of action and life. It is a curious mixture of
insistence upon life and action, such as we find in Guyau and in
Bergson, coupled with a religious Platonism. Brochard’s work is of this
type. He wrote as early as 1874 on _La Responsabilité morale_, and in
1876 on _L’Universalité des Notions morales_. Three years later
appeared his work _L’Erreur_. Ollé-Laprune and Blondel, who best
represent this tendency, do not like Guyau’s ethics, which lacks the
religious idealism which they consider should be bound up with
morality. This was the thesis developed in the volume _La Certitude
morale_, written by Ollé-Laprune in 1881. “By what right,” says
Ollé-Laprune in his subsequent book _Le Prix de la Vie_ (1895), “can
Guyau speak of a high exalted life, of a moral ideal? It is impossible
to speak so when you have only a purely naturalistic ethic; for merely
to name these things is an implication that there is not only intensity
in life, but also quality. You suppress duty because you can see in it
only a falsely mystical view of life and of nature. What you fail to
realise is that between duty and life there is a profound agreement.
You reduce duty to life, and in life itself you consider only its
quantity and intensity, and regard as illusion everything that is of a
different order from the natural physical order in which you imprison
yourself.”[37]

 [37] _Le Prix de la Vie_, p. 139.


Such a criticism is not altogether fair to Guyau who, as we noted,
proclaimed the superiority of the higher qualities of spiritual life.
It does, however, attack his abandonment of the idea of Duty; and we
must now turn to examine a thinker, who, by his contribution to ethics,
endeavoured to satisfy the claims of life and of duty.

This was Rauh, whose _Essai sur le Fondement métaphysique de la Morale_
appeared in 1890. It had been preceded by a study of the psychology of
the feelings, and was later followed by _L’Expérience morale_ (1903).
In seeking a metaphysical foundation for morality, Rauh recalls Kant’s
_Metaphysic of Morals_. He, indeed, agrees with Kant in the view that
the essence of morality lies in the sentiment of obligation. Belief or
faith in an ideal, by which it behoves us to act, imposes itself, says
Rauh, upon the mind of man as essential. It is as positive a fact as
the laws of the natural sciences. Man not only states facts and
formulates general laws in a scientific manner, he also conceives and
believes in ideals, which become bound up in his mind with the
sentiment of obligation—that is, the general feeling of duty. But
beyond a general agreement upon this point, Rauh does not follow Kant.
He tends to look upon the ethical problem in the spirit which Guyau,
Bergson and Blondel show in their general philosophic outlook. In life,
action and immediacy alone can we find a solution. Nothing practical
can be deduced from the abstract principle of obligation or duty in
general. The moral consciousness of man is, in Rauh’s opinion, akin to
the intuitional perceptions of Bergson’s philosophy. Morality,
moreover, is creating itself perpetually by the reflection of sensitive
minds on action and on life itself. “Morality, or rather moral action,
is not merely the crown of metaphysical speculation, but itself the
true metaphysic, which is learnt only in living, as it is naught but
life itself.”[38] In concluding his thesis, Rauh reminds us that “the
essential and most certain factor in the midst of the uncertainties of
life and of duty lies in the constant consciousness of the moral
ideal.” In it he sees a spiritual reality which, if we keep it ever
before us, may inspire the most insignificant of our actions and render
them into a harmony, a living harmony of character.

 [38] _Essai sur le Fondement métaphysique de la Morale_, p. 255.


Rauh’s doctrines, we claim, have affinities to the doctrines of action
and intuition. That does not imply, however, that the intelligence is
to be minimised—far from this; but the intelligence triumphs here in
realising that it is not all-sufficing or supreme. “The heart hath
reasons which the reason cannot know.” While Fouillée had remarked that
morality is metaphysics in action, Rauh points out that “metaphysics in
action” is the foundation of our knowledge. We must, he insists, seek
for certitude in an immediate and active adaptation to reality instead
of deducing a rule or rules of action from abstract systems.

He separates himself from the sociologists[39] by pointing out that,
however largely social environment may determine our moral ideals and
rules of conduct, nevertheless the ethical decision is fundamentally an
absolutely personal affair. The human conscience, in so far as active,
must never _passively_ accept the existing social morality. It finds
itself sometimes in agreement, sometimes obliged to give a newer
interpretation to old conventions, and at times is obliged to revolt
against them. In no case can the idea of duty be equated simply and
calmly with acquiescence in the collective general will. It must demand
from social morality its credentials and hold itself free to criticise
the current ethic of the community. More often than not society acts,
Rauh thinks, as a break rather than a stimulus; and social interest is
not a measure of the moral ideal, but rather a limitation of it.

 [39] The relation of ethics and sociology is well discussed, not only
 by Durkheim (who, in his _Division du Travail social_, speaks of the
 development of democracy and increasing respect for human
 personality), but also by Lévy-Bruhl, who followed his thesis on
 _L’Idée de Responsabilité_, 1883, by the volume, _La Morale el la
 Science des Moeurs_.


Although the moral ideal is one which must be personally worked out, it
is not a merely individualistic affair. Rauh does not abandon the
guidance of reason, but he objects equally to the following of instinct
or a transcendent teaching divorced from the reality of life. Our guide
must be reflection upon instinct, and this is only possible by action
and experience, the unique experience of living itself. Reason itself
is experience; and it is our duty to face problems personally and
sincerely, in a manner which the rational element in us renders
“impersonal, universal and disinterested.”

Any code of morality which is not directly in contact with life is
worthless, and all ethical ideas which are not those of our time are of
little value. Only he is truly a man who lives the life of his time.
The truly moral man is he who is alive to this spirit and who does not
unreflectingly deduce his rules of conduct from ancient books or
teachers of a past age. The art of living is the supreme art, and it is
this which the great moralists have endeavoured to show humanity.
Neither Socrates nor Jesus wrote down their ethical ideas: they lived
them.

Rauh thus reminds us partly of Guyau in his insistence upon life. He
regards the ethical life at its highest, as one _sans obligation ni
sanction_. Rather than the Kantian obligation of duty, of constraint,
he favours in his second book, _L’Expérience morale_, a state of
spontaneity, of passion and exaltation of the personal conscience which
faces the issue in a disinterested manner. The man who is morally
honest himself selects his values, his ideals, his ends, by the light
which reason gives him. Ethics becomes thus an independent science, a
science of “ends,” which Reason, as reflected in the personal
conscience, acclaims a science of the ideal ordering of life.

Such was Rauh’s conception of rational moral experience, one which he
endeavoured to apply in his lectures to the two problems which he
considered to be supreme in his time, that of patriotism and of social
justice.

These problems were further touched upon in 1896, when Léon Bourgeois
(since noted for his advocacy of the “League of Nations”) published his
little work _Solidarité_, which was also a further contribution to an
independent, positive and lay morality. In the conception of the
solidarity of humanity throughout the ages, Bourgeois accepted the
teaching of the sociologists, and urges that herein can be found an
obligation, for the present generation must repay their debt to their
ancestors and be worthy of the social heritage which has made them what
they are. Somewhat similar sentiments had Been expressed by Marion in
his Solidarité morale (1880). Ethical questions were kept in the
forefront by the society known as _L’Union pour l’Action morale_,
founded by Desjardins and supported by Lagneau (1851- 1894). After the
excitement of the Dreyfus case (1894- 1899) this society took the name
_L’Union pour la Verité_. In 1902 Lapie made an eloquent plea for a
rational morality in his _Logique de la Volonté_, and in the following
year Séailles published his _Affirmations de la Conscience moderne_.
The little _Précis_ of André Lalande, written in the form of a
catechism, was a further contribution to the establishment of a
rational and independent lay morality, which the teaching of ethics as
a subject in the _lycées_ and lay schools rendered in some degree
necessary.[40] This little work appeared in 1907, the same year in
which Paul Bureau wrote his book _La Crise morale des Temps nouveaux_.
Then Parodi (who in 1919 produced a fine study of French thought since
1890[41]) followed up the discussion of ethical problems by his work
_Le Problème morale et la Pensée contemporaine_ (1909), and in 1912
Wilbois published his contribution entitled _Devoir et Durée: Essai de
Morale sociale_.

 [40] The teaching of a lay morality is a vital and practical problem
 which the Government of the Republic is obliged to face. The urgent
 need for such lay teaching will be more clearly demonstrated or
 evident when our next chapter, dealing with the religious problem, has
 been read.


 [41] _La Philosophie contemporaine en France_.


Thus concludes a period in which the discussion, although not marked by
a definite turning round of positions as was manifested in our
discussions of science, freedom and progress, bears signs of a general
development. This development is shown by the greater insistence upon
the social aspects of ethics and by a turning away from the formalism
of Kant to a more concrete conception of duty, or an ethic in which the
notion of duty itself has disappeared. This is the general tendency
from Renan with his insistence upon the aesthetic element, Renouvier
with his claim for justice in terms of personality, to Fouillée, Guyau,
Ollé-Laprune and Rauh with their insistence upon action, upon love and
life.

Yet, although the departure from an intense individualism in ethics is
desirable, we must beware of the danger which threatens from the other
extreme. We cannot close this chapter without insisting upon this
point. Good must be personally realised in the inner life of
individuals, even if they form a community. The collective life is
indeed necessary, but it is not collectively that the good is
experienced. It is personal. In the neglect of this important aspect
lies the error of much Communistic philosophy and of that social
science which looks on society as purely an organism. This analogy is
false, for however largely a community exhibits a general likeness to
an organism, it is a superficial resemblance. There is not a centre of
consciousness, but a multitude of such centres each living an inner
life of personal experience which is peculiarly its own; and these
personalities, we must remember, are not simply a homogeneous mass of
social matter, they are capable of realising the good each in his or
her own manner. This is the only realisation of the good.

In this chapter we have traced the attempt to reconcile _science et
conscience_, after the way had been opened up by the maintenance of
freedom. It was recognised that reason is not entirely pure
speculation: it is also practical. Human nature seeks for goodness as
well as for truth. It is noticeable that while the insistence upon the
primacy of the practical reason developed, on the one hand, into a
philosophy of action (anti-intellectual action in its extreme
development as shown in Syndicalism), the same tendency, operating in a
different manner and upon different data, essayed to find in action,
and in the belief which arises from action, that Absolute or Ideal to
which the pure reason feels it cannot alone attain—namely, the
realisation of God. To this problem of religion we devote our next
chapter.




CHAPTER VII
RELIGION


INTRODUCTION: The religious situation in France in the nineteenth
century—The intellectual and political forces against the Roman
Catholic Church—Its claims, its orthodoxy and tyranny—The
humanitarians—The power of Rome—Church and State—The educational
problem—Clericalism—The cult of Jeanne d’Arc—The lack of a _via media_
between Roman orthodoxy and _libre pensée_—Protestantism negligible.

I. Comte’s effort in his “Religion of Humanity”—Renan and the
Church—Freedom—Denial of supernatural elements in Christianity—_Vie de
Jésus_—Renan not irreligious—Piety—Love and Goodness reveal the
Divine—God the “ideal”—Vacherot and Taine.

II. Renouvier’s efforts, with Pillon, in the _Critique philosophique_
and _Critique religieuse_—His republican theology—Freedom, personality
and God—The deity as finite—God as Goodness and as a Person.

III. Ravaisson’s blend of Hellenism and Christian
thought—Boutroux—Fouillée on the Idea of God—The importance of Guyau’s
_L’Irreligion de l’Avenir_—The decay of dogma and ecclesiasticism—The
term “irreligion” misleading—Sociology and religion-Freedom—Religious
education and tolerance—Modernism and the Church—Loisy and
others—Symbolism and _Fidéisme_.

CONCLUSION: The personal factor in faith—Freedom vital to
religion—Change of attitude since the eighteenth century—Value of
religion—Tendency towards a free religion devoid of dogmas, expressive
of the best aspirations of man’s mind.




CHAPTER VII
RELIGION

It is outside our purpose to embark upon discussions of the religious
problem in France, in so far as this became a problem of politics. Our
intention is rather to examine the inner core of religious thought, the
philosophy of religion, which forms an appropriate final chapter to our
history of the development of ideas.

Yet, although our discussion bears mainly upon the general attitude to
religion, upon the development of central religious ideas such as the
idea of God, and upon the place of religion in the future—that is to
say, upon the philosophy of religion—it is practically impossible to
understand the religious attitude of our thinkers without a brief
notice of the religious situation in France during the nineteenth and
twentieth centuries.

In our Introduction we briefly called attention to the attempt of the
Traditionalists after the Revolution to recall their countrymen to the
Christian faith as presented in and by the Roman Catholic Church. The
efforts made by De Bonald, De Maistre, Chateaubriand, Lamennais and
Lacordaire did not succeed as they had hoped, but, nevertheless, a
considerable current of loyalty to the Church and the Catholic religion
set in. Much of this loyalty was bound up with sentimental affection
for a monarchy, and arose partly from anti-revolutionary sentiments.[1]
It cannot, however, be entirely explained by these political feelings.
There was the expression of a deeper and more spiritual reaction
directed against the materialistic and sceptical teachings of the
eighteenth century. Man’s heart craved comfort, consolation and warmth.
It had been starved in the previous century, and revolution and war had
only added to the cup of bitterness. Thus there came an epoch of
Romanticism in religion of which the sentimental and assumed orthodoxy
of Chateaubriand was a sign of the times. His _Génie du Christianisme_
may now appear to us full of sentimentality, but it was welcomed at the
time, since it expressed at least some of those aspirations which had
for long been denied an expression. It was this which marked the great
difference between the two centuries in France. The eighteenth was
mainly concerned with scoffing at religion. Its rationalism was that of
Voltaire. In the first half of the nineteenth century the pendulum
swung in the opposite direction. Romanticism, in poetry, in literature,
in philosophy and in religion was _à la mode_, and it led frequently to
sentimentality or morbidity. Lamartine, Victor Hugo and De Vigny
professed the Catholic faith for many years. We may note, and this is
important, that in France the only form of Christianity which holds any
sway over the people in general is the Roman Catholic faith. Outside
the Roman Church there is no religious organisation which is of much
account. This explains why it is so rare to find a thinker who owns
allegiance to any Church or religion, and yet it would be wrong to deem
them irreligious. There is no _via media_ between Catholicism and free
personal thought. This was a point which Renan quite keenly felt, and
of which his own spiritual pilgrimage, which took him out of the bounds
of the Church of his youth, is a fine illustration. Many of France’s
noblest sons have been brought up in the religious atmosphere of the
Church and owe much of their education to her, and Rome believes in
education. The control of education has been throughout the century a
problem severely contested by Church and State. More important for our
purpose than the details of the quarrels of Church and State is the
intellectual condition of the Church itself.

 [1] De Maistre regarded the Revolution as an infliction specially
 bestowed upon France for her national neglect of religion—his
 religion, of course. The same crude, misleading, and vicious arguments
 have since been put forward by the theologians in their efforts to
 push the cause of the Church with the people. This was very noticeable
 both in the war of 1870 and that of 1914. In each case it was argued
 that the war was a punishment from God for France’s frivolity and
 neglect of the Church. In 1914, in addition, it was deemed a direct
 divine reply to “Disestablishment.”


This reveals a striking vitality, a vigour and initiative at war with
the central powers of the Vatican, a seething unrest which uniformity
and authority find annoying. How strong the power of the central
authority was, the affair of the Concordat had shown, when forty
bishops were deposed for non-acceptance of the arrangement between
Napoleon and the Pope.[2] Stronger still was the iron hand of the Pope
over intellectual freedom.

 [2] The Revolution had separated Church and State and suppressed
 clerical privilege by the “Civil Constitution of the Clergy” enactment
 of 1790. Napoleon, alive to the patriotic value of a State Church,
 repealed this law and declared the divorce of Church and State to be
 null and void. His negotiations with the Pope (Pius VII.) resulted, in
 1801, in the arrangement known as the _Concordat_, by which the Roman
 Catholic Church was again made the established national Church, its
 clergy became civil servants paid by the State, and its worship became
 a branch of public administration.


Lamennais was not a “modernist,” as this term is now understood, for
his theology was orthodox. His fight with the Vatican was for freedom
in the relations of the Church to society. He pleaded in his _Essai sur
L’indifference en Matière de Religion_ for the Church to accept the
principle of freedom, to leave the cherished fondling of the royalist
cause, and to present to the world the principles of a Christian
democracy. Lamennais and other liberal-minded men desired the
separation of Church and State, and were tolerant of those who were not
Catholic. They claimed, along with their own “right to believe,” that
of others “not to believe.” His was a liberal Catholicism, but its
proposals frightened his co-religionists, and drew upon him in 1832 an
encyclical letter (_Mirari vos_) from the Vatican. The Pope denounced
liberalism absolutely as an absurd and an erroneous doctrine, a piece
of folly sprung from the “fetid source of indifferentism.” Lamennais
found he could not argue, as Renan himself later put it, “with a bar of
iron.” It was the reactionary De Maistre, with his principle of papal
authority,[3] and not Lamennais, whom the Vatican, naturally enough,
chose to favour, or rather to follow.

 [3] As stated in _Du Pape_, 1819.


Thus Lamennais found himself, by an almost natural and inevitable
process, outside the Church, and this in spite of the fact that his
theology was orthodox. He endeavoured to present his case in his paper
_L’Avenir_ and in an influential brochure, _The Words of a Believer_,
which left its mark upon Hugo, Michelet, Lamartine, and George Sand.
His views blended with the current of humanitarian and democratic
doctrines which developed from the Saint-Simonists, Pierre Leroux and
similar thinkers. We have already noted that these social reformers
held to their beliefs with the conviction that in them and not in the
Roman Church lay salvation.

This brings us to a crucial point which is the clue to much of the
subsequent thought upon religion. This is the profound and seemingly
irreconcilable difference between these two conceptions of religion.

The orthodox Catholic faith believes in a supernatural revelation, and
is firmly convinced that man is inherently vile and corrupt, born in
sin from which he cannot be redeemed, save by the mystical operations
of divine grace, working only through the holy sacraments and clergy of
the one true Church, to whom all power was given, according to its
view, by the historic Jesus. Its methods are conservative, its
discipline rigid and based on tradition and authority. Its system of
salvation is excessively individualistic. It holds firmly to this
pessimistic view of human nature, based on the doctrine of original
sin, thus maintaining a creed which, in the hands of a devoted clergy,
who are free from domestic ties, works as a powerful moral force upon
the individual believer. His freedom of thought is restricted; he can
neither read nor think what he likes, and the Church, having made the
thirteenth-century doctrines of Aquinas its official philosophy, hurls
anathema at ideas scientific, political, philosophical or theological
which have appeared since. No half-measures are allowed: either one is
a loyal Catholic or one is not a Catholic at all. In this relentlessly
uncompromising attitude lies the main strength of Catholicism; herein
also is contained its weakness, or at least that element which makes it
manufacture its own greatest adversaries.

While claiming to be the one Church of Jesus Christ, it does not by any
means put him in the foreground of its religion. Its hierarchy of
saints is rather a survival of polytheism; its worship of the Virgin
and cult of the _Sacré Cœur_ issue often in a religious sentimentality
and sensuality promoted by the denial of a more healthy outlet for
instincts which are an essential part of human nature. Tribute,
however, must be paid—high tribute—to the devotion of individuals,
particularly to the work done by the religious orders of women, whose
devotion the Church having won by its intense appeal to women keeps,
consecrates and organises in a manner which no other Church has
succeeded in doing. This is largely the secret of the vigorous life of
the Church, for as a power of charity the Roman Church is remarkable
and deserves respect. Her educational efforts, her missions, hospitals,
her humbler clergy, and her orders which offer opportunity of service
or of sanctuary to all types of human nature—these constitute Roman
Catholicism in a truer manner than the diplomacy of the Jesuits or the
councils of the Vatican. It is this pulsing human heart of hers which
keeps her alive, not the rigid intellectual dogmatism and antiquated
theology which she expounds, nor her loyalty to the established
political order, which, siding with the rich and powerful, frequently
gives to this professedly spiritual power a debasing taint of
materialism.

Against all this, and in vital opposition to this, we have the
humanitarians who, rejecting the doctrine of corruption, believe that
human instincts and human reason themselves make for goodness and for
God. While Catholicism looks to the past, humanitarianism looks
forward, believes in freedom and in progress, and regards the immanent
Christ-spirit as working in mankind. Its gospel is one of love and
brotherhood, a romantic doctrine issuing in love and pity for the
oppressed and the sinful. In the collective consciousness of mankind it
sees the incarnation, the growth of the immanent God. Therefore it
claims that in democracy, socialism and world brotherhood lies the true
Christianity. This, the humanitarians claim, is the true religious
idealism—that which was preached by the Founder himself and which his
Church has betrayed. The humanitarians make service to mankind the
essence of religion, and regard themselves as more truly Christian than
the Church.

In those countries where Protestantism has a large following, the two
doctrines of humanitarian optimism and of the orthodox pessimism
regarding human nature are confused vaguely together. The English mind
in particular is able to compromise and to blend the two conflicting
philosophies in varying degrees; but in the French mind its clearer
penetration and more logical acumen prevent this. The Frenchman is an
idealist and tends to extremes, either that of whole-hearted devotion
to a dominating Church or that of the abandonment of organised
religion. In Protestantism he sees only a halfway house, built upon the
first principles of criticism, and unwilling to pursue those principles
to their conclusion—namely, the rejection of all organised Church
religion, the adoption of perfect freedom for the individual in all
matters of belief, a religion founded on freedom and on personal
thought which alone is free.

Such were the two dominant notes in religious thought in France at the
opening of our period.

Catholicism resisted the humanitarianism of 1848 and strengthened its
power after the _coup d’état_. The Church and the Vatican became more
staunch in their opposition to all doctrines of modern thought. The
French clergy profited by the alliance with the aristocracy, while
religious orders, particularly the Jesuits, increased in number and in
power. Veuillot proclaimed the virtues of Catholicism in his writings.
Meanwhile the Pope’s temporal power decreased, but his spiritual power
was increasing in extent and in intensity. Centralisation went on
within the Church, and Rome (_i.e._, the Pope and the Vatican) became
all-powerful.

Just after the half-century opens the Pope (Pius IX.), in 1854,
proclaimed his authority in announcing the dogma of the Immaculate
Conception of the Virgin Mary.[4] As France had heard the sentence,
_L’Etat, c’est moi_, from the lips of one of its greatest monarchs, it
now heard from another quarter a similar principle enunciated,
L’Eglise, c’est moi. As democracy and freedom cried out against the
one, they did so against the other. Undaunted, the Vatican continued in
its absolutism, even although it must have seen that in some quarters
revolt would be the result. Ten years later the Pope attacked the whole
of modern thought, to which he was diametrically opposed, in his
encyclical _Quanta Cura_ and in his famous _Syllabus_, which
constituted a catalogue of the modern errors and heresies which he
condemned. This famous challenge was quite clear and uncompromising in
its attitude, concluding with a curse upon “him who should maintain
that the Roman Pontiff can, and must, be reconciled and compromise with
progress, liberalism and modern civilisation!” To the doctrine of
_L’Eglise, c’est moi_ had now been added that of _La Science, aussi,
c’est moi_. This was not all. In 1870 the dogma of Papal Infallibility
was proclaimed. By a strange irony of history, however, this
declaration of spiritual absolutism was followed by an entire loss of
temporal power. The outbreak of the war in that same year between
France and Prussia led to the hasty withdrawal of French troops from
the Papal Domain and the Eternal City fell to the secular power of the
Italian national army under Victor Emmanuel.

 [4] This new dogma of the Immaculate Conception of the Virgin must
 not, of course, be confused, as it often is by those outside the
 Catholic Church, with the quite different and more ancient proposition
 which asserts the Virgin Birth of Jesus.


The defeat of France at the hands of Prussia in 1871 issued in a
revival of religious sentiment, frequently seen in defeated nations. A
special mission or crusade of national repentance gathered in large
subscriptions which built the enormous Church of the Sacré Coeur
overlooking Paris from the heights of Montmartre.[5]

 [5] The anti-Catholic element, however, have had the audacity, and
 evidently the legal right, to place a statue to a man who, some
 centuries back, was burned at the stake for failing to salute a
 religious procession, in such a position immediately in front of this
 great church that the plan for the large staircase cannot be carried
 out.


Seeking for religious consolation, the French people found a
Catholicism which had become embittered and centralised for warfare
upon liberal religion and humanitarianism. They found that the only
organised religion they knew was dominated by the might of Rome and the
powers of the clergy. These even wished France, demoralised as she was
for the moment, to undertake the restoration of the Pope’s temporal
power in Italy. Further, they were definitely in favour of monarchy:
“the altar and the throne” were intimately associated in the
ecclesiastical mind.

It was the realisation of this which prompted Gambetta to cry out to
the Third Republic with stern warning, “Clericalism is your enemy.”
Thus began the political fight for which Rome had been strengthening
herself. With the defeat of the clerical-monarchy party in 1877 the
safety of the Republic was assured. From then until 1905 the Republic
and the Church fought each other. Educational questions were bitterly
contested (1880). The power of the Jesuits, especially, was regarded as
a constant menace to the State. The Dreyfus affair (1894- 1899) did not
improve relations, with its intense anti-semitism and anti-clericalism.
The battle was only concluded by the legislation of Waldeck-Rousseau in
1901 and Combes in 1903, expelling religious orders. Combes himself had
studied for the priesthood and was violently anti-clerical. The
culmination came in the Separation Law of 1905 carried by Briand, in
the Pope’s protest against this, followed by the Republic’s
confiscation of much Church property, a step which might have been
avoided if the French Catholics had been allowed to have their way in
an arrangement with the State regarding their churches. This was
prevented by the severance of diplomatic relations between France and
the Vatican and by the Pope’s disagreement with the French Catholics
whose wishes he ignored in his policy of definite hostility to the
French Government.[6]

 [6] Relations with the Vatican, which were seen to be desirable during
 the Great European War, have since been resumed (in 1921) by the
 Republic.


During our period a popular semi-nationalist and semi-religious cult of
Jeanne d’Arc, “the Maid of Orleans,” appeared in France. The clergy
expressly encouraged this, with the definite object of enlisting
sentiments of nationality and patriotism on the side of the Church.
Ecclesiastical diplomacy at headquarters quickly realised the use which
might be made of this patriotic figure whom, centuries before, the
Church had thought fit to burn as a witch. The Vatican saw a
possibility of blending French patriotism with devotion to Catholicism
and thus possibly strengthening, in the eyes of the populace at least,
the waning cause of the Church.

The adoration of Jeanne d’Arc was approved as early as 1894, but when
the Church found itself in a worse plight with its relation to the
State, it made preparations in 1903 for her enrolment among the
saints.[7] She was honoured the following year with the title of
“Venerable,” but in 1908, after the break of Church and State, she was
accorded the full status of a saint, and her statue, symbolic of
patriotism militant, stands in most French churches as conspicuous
often as that of the Virgin, who, in curious contrast, fondles the
young child, and expresses the supreme loveliness of motherhood.[8] The
cult of Jeanne d’Arc flourished particularly in 1914 on the sentiments
of patriotism, militarism and religiosity then current. This was
natural because it is for these very sentiments that she stands as a
symbol. She is evidently a worthy goddess whose worship is worth while,
for we are assured that it was through _her_ beneficent efforts that
the German Army retired from Paris in 1914 and again in 1918. The
saintly maid of Orleans reappeared and beat them back! Such is the
power of the “culte” which the Church eagerly fosters. The Sacré Coeur
also has its patriotic and military uses, figuring as it did as an
emblem on some regimental flags on the battlefield. Meanwhile, the
celebrations of Napoleon’s centenary (1921) give rise to the conjecture
that he, too, will in time rank with Joan of Arc as a saint. His
canonisation would achieve absolutely that union of patriotic and
religious sentimentality to which the Church in France directs its
activities.

 [7] t is interesting to observe the literature on Jeanne d’Arc
 published at this time: Anatole France, _Vie de Jeanne d’Arc_ (2
 vols., 1908); Durand, _Jeanne d’Arc et l’Eglise_ (1908). These are
 noteworthy, also Andrew Lang’s work, _The Maid of Orleans_ (also
 1908).


 [8] Herein, undoubtedly, lies the strong appeal of the Church to
 women.


The vast majority of the 39,000,000 French people are at least
nominally Catholic, even if only from courtesy or from a utilitarian
point of view. Only about one in sixty of the population are
Protestant. Although among cultured conservatives there is a real
devotion to the Church, the creed of France is in general something far
more broad and human than Catholicism, in spite of the tremendously
human qualities which that Church possesses. The creed of France is
summed up better in art, nature, beauty, music, science, _la patrie_,
humanity, in the worship of life itself.[9]

 [9] Those who desire to study the religious psychology of France
 during our period cannot find a better revelation than that given in
 the wonderful novel by Roger Martin du Card, entitled Jean Barois.

I

It was against such a background of ecclesiastical and political
affairs that the play of ideas upon religion went on. Such was the
environment, the tradition which surrounded our thinkers, and we may
very firmly claim that only by a recognition that their religious and
national _milieu_ was of such a type as we have outlined, can the real
significance of their religious thought be understood. Only when we
have grasped the essential attitude of authority and tradition of the
Roman Church, its ruthless attitude to modern thought of all kinds, can
we understand the religious attitude of men like Renan, Renouvier and
Guyau.

We are also enabled to see why the appeal of the Saint-Simonist group
could present itself as a religious and, indeed, Christian appeal
outside the Church. It enables us to understand why Cousin’s
spiritualism pleased neither the Catholics nor their opponents, and to
realise why the “Religion of Humanity,” which Auguste Comte
inaugurated, made so little appeal.[10] This has been well styled an
“inverted Catholicism,” since it endeavours to preserve the ritual of
that religion and to embody the doctrines of humanitarianism. Naturally
enough it drew upon itself the scorn of both these groups. The Catholic
saw in it only blasphemy: the humanitarian saw no way in which it might
further his ends.

 [10] Littré, his disciple, as we have already noted, rejected this
 part of his master’s teaching. Littré was opposed by Robinet, who laid
 the stress upon the “Religion of Humanity” as the crown of Comte’s
 work.


Comte’s attempt to base his new religion upon Catholicism was quite
deliberate, for he strove to introduce analogies with “everything great
and deep which the Catholic system of the Middle Ages effected or even
projected.” He offered a new and fantastic trinity, compiled a calendar
of renowned historical personalities, to replace that of unknown
saints. He proclaimed “positive dogmas “and aspired to all the
authority and infallibility of the Roman Pontiff, supported by a
trained clergy, whose word should be law. Curiously enough he, too, had
his anathemas, in that he had days set apart for the solemn cursing of
the great enemies of the human race, such as Napoleon. It was indeed a
reversed Catholicism, offering a fairly good caricature of the methods
of the Roman Church, and it was equally obnoxious in its tyrannical
attitude.[11] While it professed to express humanity and love as its
central ideas it proceeded to outline a method which is the utter
negation of these. Comte made the great mistake of not realising that
loyalty to these ideals must involve spiritual freedom, and that the
religion of humanity must be a collective inspiration of free
individuals, who will in love and fellowship tolerate differences upon
metaphysical questions. Uniformity can only be mischievous.

 [11] Guyau’s criticisms of Comte’s “Religion of Humanity” in his
 _L’Irreligion de l’Avenir_ are interesting. “The marriage of positive
 science and blind sentiment cannot produce religion” (p. 314; Eng.
 trans., p. 366). “Comtism, which consists of the rites of religion and
 nothing else, is an attempt to maintain life in the body after the
 departure of the soul” (p. 307; Eng. trans., p. 359).


It was because he grasped this vital point that Renan’s discussion of
the religious question is so instructive. For him, religion is
essentially an affair of personal taste. Here we have another
indication of the clear way in which Renan was able to discern the
tendencies of his time. He published his _Etudes d’Histoire religieuse_
in 1857, and his Preface to the _Nouvelles Etudes d’Histoire
religieuse_ was written in 1884. He claims there that freedom is
essential to religion, and that it is absolutely necessary that the
State should have no power whatever over it. Religion is as personal
and private a matter as taste in literature or art. There should be no
State laws, he claims, relating to religion at all, any more than dress
is prescribed for citizens by law. He well points out that only a State
which is strictly neutral in religion can ever be absolutely free from
playing the _rôle_ of persecutor. The favouring of one sect will entail
some persecution or hardship upon others. Further, he sees the iniquity
of taxing the community to pay the expenses of clergy to whose
teachings they may object, or whose doctrines are not theirs. Freedom,
Renan believed, would claim its own in the near future and, denouncing
the Concordat, he prophesied the abolition of the State Church.

The worst type of organisation Renan holds to be the theocratic state,
like Islam, or the ancient Pontifical State in which dogma reigns
supreme. He condemns also the State whose religion is based upon the
profession of a majority of its citizens. There should be, as Spinoza
was wont to style it, “liberty of philosophising.” The days of the
dominance of dogma are passing, in many quarters gone by already,
“Religion has become for once and all a matter of personal taste.”

Renan himself was deeply religious in mind. He was never an atheist and
did not care for the term “free-thinker” because of its implied
associations with the irreligion of the previous century. He stands
out, however, not only in our period of French thought, but in the
world development of the century as one of the greatest masters of
religious criticism. His historical work is important, and he possessed
a knowledge and equipment for that task. His distinguished Semitic
scholarship led to his obtaining the chair of Hebrew at the Collège de
France, and enabled him to write his Histories, one of the Jews and one
of Christianity.

It was as a volume of this _Histoire des Origines du Christianisme_
that his _Vie de Jésus_ appeared in 1863. This life of the Founder of
Christianity produced a profound stir in the camps of religious
orthodoxy, and drew upon its author severe criticisms. Apart from the
particular views set forth in that volume, we must remember that the
very fact of his writing upon “a sacred subject,” which was looked upon
as a close preserve, reserved for the theologians or churchmen alone,
was deemed at that time an original and daring feat in France.

His particular views, which created at the time such scandal, were akin
to those of Baur and the Tubingen School, which Strauss (Renan’s
contemporary) had already set forth in his _Leben Jesu_.[12] Briefly,
they may be expressed as the rejection of the supernatural. Herein is
seen the scientific or “positive” influence at work upon the dogmas of
the Christian religion, a tendency which culminated in “Modernism”
within the Church, only to be condemned violently by the Pope in 1907.
It was this temper, produced by the study of documents, by criticism
and historical research which put Renan out of the Catholic Church. His
rational mind could not accept the dogmas laid down. Lamennais (who was
conservative and orthodox in his theology, and possessed no taint of
“modernism” in the technical sense) had declared that the
starting-point should be faith and not reason. Renan aptly asks in
reply to this, “and what is to be the test, in the last resort, of the
claims of faith is not reason?”

 [12] Written in 1835. Littré issued a French translation in 1839, a
 year previous to the appearance of the English version by George
 Eliot. Strauss’s life covers 1808-1874.


In Renan we find a good illustration of the working of the spirit of
modern thought upon a religious mind. Being a sincere and penetrating
intellect he could not, like so many people, learned folk among them,
keep his religious ideas and his reason in separate watertight
compartments. This kind of people Renan likens in his _Souvenirs
d’Enfance et de Jeunesse_ to mother-o’-pearl shells of Francois de
Sales “which are able to live in the sea without tasting a drop of salt
water.” Yet he realises the comfort of such an attitude. “I see around
me,” he continues, “men of pure and simple lives whom Christianity has
had the power to make virtuous and happy. . . . But I have noticed that
none of them have the critical faculty, for which let them bless God!”
He well realises the contentment which, springing sometimes from a
dullness of mind or lack of sensitiveness, excludes all doubt and all
problems.

In Catholicism he sees a bar of iron which will not reason or bend. “I
can only return to it by amputation of my faculties, by definitely
stigmatising my reason and condemning it to perpetual silence.” Writing
of his exit from the Seminary of Saint Sulpice, where he was trained
for the priesthood, he remarks in his _Souvenirs d’Enfance et de
Jeunesse_ that “there were times when I was sorry that I was not a
Protestant, so that I might be a philosopher without ceasing to be a
Christian.” For Renan, as for so many minds in modern France, severance
from the Roman Church is equivalent to severance from Christianity as
an organised religion. The practical dilemma is presented of
unquestioning obedience to an infallible Church on the one hand, or the
attitude of _libre-penseur_ on the other. There are not the
accommodating varieties of the Protestant presentation of the Christian
religion. Renan’s spiritual pilgrimage is but an example of many. In a
measure this condition of affairs is a source of strength to the Roman
Church for, since a break with it so often means a break with
Christianity or indeed with all definite religion, only the bolder and
stronger thinkers make the break which their intellect makes
imperative. The mass of the people, however dissatisfied they may be
with the Church, nevertheless accept it, for they see no alternative
but the opposite extreme. No half-way house of non-conformity presents
itself as a rule.

Yet, as we have insisted, Renan had an essentially religious view of
the universe, and he expressly claimed that his break with the Church
and his criticism of her were due to a devotion to pure religion, and
he even adds, to a loyalty to the spirit of her Founder. Although, as
he remarks in his _Nouvelles Etudes religieuses_, it is true that the
most modest education tends to destroy the belief in the superstitious
elements in religion, it is none the less true that the very highest
culture can never destroy religion in the highest sense. “Dogmas pass,
but piety is eternal.” The external trappings of religion have suffered
by the growth of the modern sciences of nature and of historical
criticism. The mind of cultivated persons does not now present the same
attitude to evidence in regard to religious doctrines which were once
accepted without question. The sources of the origins of the Christian
religion are themselves questionable. This, Renan says, must not
discourage the believers in true religion, for that is not the kind of
foundation upon which religion reposes. Dogmas in the past gave rise to
divisions and quarrels, only by feeling can religious persons be united
in fellowship. The most prophetic words of Jesus were, Renan points
out, those in which he indicated a time when men “would not worship God
in this mountain nor in Jerusalem, but when the true worshippers would
worship in spirit and in truth.” It was precisely this spirit which
Renan admired in Jesus, whom he considered more of a philosopher than
the Church, and he reminds the “Christians”[13] who railed against him
as an unbeliever that Jesus had had much more influence upon him than
they gave him credit for, and, more particularly, that his break with
the Church was due to loyalty to Jesus. By such loyalty Renan meant not
a blind worship, but a reverence which endeavoured to appreciate and
follow the ideals for which Jesus himself stood. It did not involve
slavish acceptance of all he said, even if that were intelligible, and
clear, which it is not. “To be a Platonist,” remarks Renan, “I need not
adore Plato, or believe _all_ that he said.”[14]

 [13] Renan complains of the ignorance of the clergy of Rome regarding
 his own work, which they did not understand because they had not read
 it, merely relying on the Press and other sources for false and
 biassed accounts.


 [14] _Cf._ Renan’s Essay in _Questions contemporaines_ on “_L’Avenir
 religieux des Sociétés modernes_.”


Renan is in agreement with the central ideas of Jesus’ own faith, and
he rightly regards him as one of the greatest contributors to the
world’s religious thought. Renan’s religion is free from
supernaturalism and dogma. He believes in infinite Goodness or
Providence, but he despises the vulgar and crude conceptions of God
which so mar a truly religious outlook. He points out how prayer, in
the sense of a request to Heaven for a particular object, is becoming
recognised as foolish. ‘As a “meditation,” an interview with one’s own
conscience, it has a deeply religious value. The vulgar idea of prayer
reposes on an immoral conception of God. Renan rightly sees the central
importance for religion of possessing a sane view of the divinity, not
one which belongs to primitive tribal wargods and weather-gods. He
aptly says, in this connection, that the one who was defeated in 1871
was not only France but _le bon Dieu_ to which she in vain appealed. In
his place was to be found, remarks Renan with a little sarcasm, “only a
Lord God of Hosts who was unmoved by the moral ‘délicatesse’ of the
Uhlans and the incontestable excellence of the Prussian shells.”[15] He
rightly points to the immoral use made of the divinity by pious folk
whose whole religion is utilitarian and materialistic. They do good
only in order to get to heaven or escape hell,[16] and believe in God
because it is necessary for them to have a confidant and sonsoler, to
whom they may cry in time of trouble, and to whose will they may
resignedly impute the evil chastisement which their own errors have
brought upon them individually or collectively. But, he rightly claims,
it is only where utilitarian calculations and self-interest end, that
religion begins with the sense of the Infinite and of the Ideal
Goodness and Beauty and Love.

 [15] _Dialogues et Fragments philosophiques_, p. ix.


 [16] One pious individual thought to convert Renan himself by writing
 him every month, quite briefly, to this effect “There is a hell.”


He endeavours in his _Examen de Conscience philosophique_ (1888) to sum
up his attitude upon this question. There he affirms that it is beyond
dispute or doubt that we have no evidence whatever of the action in the
universe of one or of several wills superior to that of man. The actual
state of this universe gives no sign of any external intervention, and
we know nothing of its beginning. No beneficent interfering power, a
_deus ex machinâ_, corrects or directs the operation of blind forces,
enlightens man or improves his lot. No God appears miraculously to
prevent evils, to crush disease, stop wars, or save his children from
peril. No end or purpose is visible to us. God in the popular sense,
living and acting as a Divine Providence, is not to be seen in our
universe. The question is, however, whether this universe of ours is
the totality of existence. Doubt comes into play here, and if our
universe is not this totality, then God, although absent from his
world, might still exist outside it. Our finite world is little in
relation to the Infinite, it is a mere speck in the universe we know,
and its duration to a divine Being might be only a day.

The Infinite, continues Renan, surrounds our finite world above and
below. It stretches on the one hand to the infinitely large concourse
of worlds and systems, and, on the other, to the infinitely little as
atoms, microbes and the germs by which human life itself is passed on
from one generation to another. The prospect of the world we know
involves logically and fatally, says Renan, atheism. But this atheism,
he adds, may be due to the fact that we cannot see far enough. Our
universe is a phenomenon which has had a beginning and will have an
end. That which has had no beginning and will have no end is the
Absolute All, or God. Metaphysics has always been a science proceeding
upon this assumption, “Something exists, therefore something has
existed from all eternity.” which is akin to the scientific principle,
“No effect with- out a cause.”[17]

 [17] _Examen de Conscience philosophique_, p. 412 of the volume
 _Feuilles détachées_.


We must not allow ourselves to be misled too far by the constructions
or inductions about the uniformity and immutability of the laws of
nature. “A God may reveal himself, perhaps, one day.” The infinite may
dispose of our finite world, use it for its own ends. The expression,
“Nature and its author,” may not be so absurd as some seem to think it.
It is true that our experience presents no reason for forming such an
hypothesis, but we must keep our sense of the infinite. “Everything is
possible, even God,” and Renan adds, “If God exists, he must be good,
and he will finish by being just.” It is as foolish to deny as to
assert his existence in a dogmatic and thoughtless manner. It is upon
this sense of the infinite and upon the ideals of Goodness, Beauty and
Love that true faith or piety reposes.

Love, declares Renan, is one of the principal revelations of the
divine, and he laments the neglect of it by philosophy. It runs in a
certain sense through all living beings, and in man has been the school
of gentleness and courtesy—nay more, of morals and of religion. Love,
understood in the high sense, is a sacred, religious thing, or rather
is a part of religion itself. In a tone which recalls that of the New
Testament and Tolstoi, Renan beseeches us to remember that God _is_
Love, and that where Love is there God is. In loving, man is at his
best; he goes out of himself and feels himself in contact with the
infinite. The very act of love is veritably sacred and divine, the
union of body and soul with another is a holy communion with the
infinite. He remarks in his _Souvenirs d’Enfance et de Jeunesse_,
doubtless remembering the simple purity and piety of his mother and
sister, that when reflection has brought us to doubt, and even to a
scepticism regarding goodness, then the spontaneous affirmation of
goodness and beauty which exists in a noble and virtuous woman saves us
from cynicism and restores us to communication with the eternal spring
in which God reflects himself. Love, which Renan with reason laments as
having been neglected on its most serious side and looked upon as mere
sentimentality, offers the highest proof of God. In it lies our
umbilical link with nature, but at the same time our communion with the
infinite. He recalls some of Browning’s views in his attitude to love
as a redeeming power. The most wretched criminal still has something
good in him, a divine spark, if he be capable of loving.

It is the spirit of love and goodness which Renan admires in the simple
faith of those separated far from him in their theological ideas. “God
forbid,” he says,[18] “that I should speak slightingly of those who,
devoid of the critical sense, and impelled by very pure and powerful
religious motives, are attached to one or other of the great
established systems of faith. I love the simple faith of the peasant,
the serious conviction of the priest.”

 [18] _L’Avenir de la Science_, pp. 436, 437; Eng. trans., p. 410.


“Supprimer Dieu, serait-ce amoindrir l’univers?”


asks Guyau in one of his _Vers d’un Philosophe_.’[19] Renan observes
that if we tell the simple to live by aspiration after truth and
beauty, these words would have no meaning for them. “Tell them to love
God, not to offend God, they will understand you perfectly. God,
Providence, soul, good old words, rather heavy, but expressive and
respectable which science will explain, but will never replace with
advantage. What is God for humanity if not the category of the
_ideal_?”[20]

 [19] _“Question,” Vers d’un Philosophe_, p. 65.


 [20] _L’Avenir de la Science_,” p. 476; Eng. trans., p. 445.


This is the point upon which Vacherot insisted in his treatment of
religion. He claimed that the conception of God arises in the human
consciousness from a combination of two separate ideas. The first is
the notion of the Infinite which Science itself approves, the second
the notion of perfection which Science is unable to show us anywhere
unless it be found in the human consciousness and its thoughts, where
it abides as the magnetic force ever drawing us onward and acts at the
same time as a dynamic, giving power to every progressive movement,
being “the Ideal” in the mind and heart of man.

Similar was the doctrine of Taine, who saw in Reason the ideal which
would produce in mankind a new religion, which would be that of Science
and Philosophy demanding from art forms of expression in harmony with
themselves. This religion would be free in doctrine. Taine himself
looked upon religion as “a metaphysical poem accompanied by belief,”
and he approached to the conception of Spinoza of a contemplation which
may well be called an “intellectual love of God.”

II

Like Renan, Renouvier was keenly interested in religion and its
problems; he was also a keen opponent of the Roman Catholic Church and
faith, against which he brought his influence into play in two ways—by
his _néo-criticisme_ as expressed in his written volumes and by his
energetic editing of the two periodicals _La Critique philosophique_
and _La Critique religieuse_.

In undertaking the publication of these periodicals Renouvier’s
confessed aim was that of a definite propaganda. While the Roman Church
profited by the feelings of disappointment and demoralisation which
followed the Franco-Prussian War, and strove to shepherd wavering souls
again into its fold, to find there a peace which evidently the world
could not give, Renouvier (together with his friend Pillon) endeavoured
to rally his countrymen by urging the importance, and, if possible, the
acceptance of his own political and religious convictions arising out
of his philosophy. The _Critique philosophique_ appeared weekly from
its commencement in 1872 until 1884, thereafter as a monthly until
1889. Among its contributors, whose names are of religious
significance, were A. Sabatier, L. Dauriac, R. Allier[21] and William
James.

 [21] Now Dean of the Protestant Faculty of Theology in Paris.


Renouvier’s great enthusiasm for his periodical is the main feature of
this period of his life, although, owing to his tremendous energy, it
does not seem to have interfered with the publication of his more
permanent works. The political and general policy of this journal may
be summed up in a sentence from the last year’s issue,[22] where we
find Renouvier remarking that it had been his aim throughout “to uphold
strictly republican principles and to fight all that savoured of
Caesar, or imperialism.” The declared foe of monarchy in politics, he
was equally the declared foe of the Pope in the religious realm. His
attitude was one of very marked hostility to the power of the Vatican,
which he realised to be increasing within the Roman Church, and one of
keen opposition to the general power of that Church and her clergy in
France. Renouvier’s paper was quite definitely and aggressively
anti-Catholic. He urged all Catholic readers of his paper who professed
loyalty to the Republic to quit the Roman Church and to affiliate
themselves to the Protestant body.

 [22] _La Critique philosophique_, 1889, tome ii., p. 403.


It was with this precise object in view that, in 1878, he added to his
_Critique philosophique_ a supplement which he entitled _La Critique
religieuse_, a quarterly intended purely for propaganda purposes.
“Criticism,” he had said, “is in philosophy what Protestantism is in
religion.”[23] As certitude is, according to Renouvier’s doctrines, the
fruit of intelligence, heart and will, it can never be obtained by the
coercion of authority or by obedience such as the Roman Church demands.
He appealed to the testimony of history, as a witness to the conflict
between authority and the individual conscience. Jesus, whom the Church
adores, was himself a superb example of such revolt. History, however,
shows us, says Renouvier, the gradual decay of authority in such
matters. Thought, if it is really to be thought in its sincerity, must
be free. This Renouvier realised, and in this freedom he saw the
characteristic of the future development of religion, and shows
himself, in this connection, in substantial agreement with Renan and
Guyau.

 [23] _Ibid_., 1873, pp. 145-146.


Renouvier’s interest in theology and religion, and in the theological
implications of all philosophical thought, was not due merely to a
purely speculative impulse, but to a very practical desire to initiate
a rational restatement of religious conceptions, which he considered to
be an urgent need of his time. He lamented the influence of the Roman
Church over the minds of the youth of his country, and realised the
vital importance of the controversy between Church and State regarding
secular education. Renouvier was a keen supporter of the secular
schools (_écoles laïques_). In 1879, when the educational controversy
was at its height, he issued a little book on ethics for these
institutions (_Petit Traité de Morale pour les Ecoles laïques_), which
was republished in an enlarged form in 1882, when the secular party,
ably led by Jules Ferry, triumphed in the establishment of compulsory,
free, secular education. That great achievement, however, did not solve
all the difficulties presented by the Church in its educational
attitude, and even now the influence of clericalism is dreaded.

Renouvier realised all the dangers, but he was forced also to realise
that his enthusiastic and energetic campaign against the power of the
Church had failed to achieve what he had desired. He complained of
receiving insufficient support from quarters where he might well have
expected it. His failure is a fairly conclusive proof that
Protestantism has no future in France: it is a stubborn survival,
rather than a growing influence. With the decline in the power and
appeal of the Roman Catholic Church will come the decline of religion
of a dogmatic and organised kind. Renouvier probably had an influence
in hastening the day of the official severance of Church and State, an
event which he did not live long enough to see.[24]

 [24] It occurred, however, only two years after his death.


Having become somewhat discouraged, Renouvier stopped the publication
of his religious quarterly in 1885 and made the _Critique
philosophique_ a monthly instead of a weekly Journal. It ceased in
1889, but the following year Renouvier’s friend, Pillon, began a new
periodical, which bore the same name as the one which had ceased with
the outbreak of the war in 1870. This was _L’Année philosophique_, to
which Renouvier contributed articles from time to time on religious
topics.

Some writers are of the opinion that Renouvier’s attacks on the Roman
Catholic Church and faith, so far from strengthening the Protestant
party in France, tended rather to increase the hostility to the
Christian religion generally or, indeed, to any religious view of the
universe.

Renouvier’s own statements in his philosophy, in so far as these
concern religion and theology, are in harmony with his rejection of the
Absolute in philosophy and the Absolute in politics. His criticism of
the idea of God, the central point in any philosophy of religion, is in
terms similar to his critique of the worship of the Absolute or the
deification of the State.

In dealing with the question of a “Total Synthesis” Renouvier indicated
his objections to the metaphysical doctrine of an Absolute, which is
diametrically opposed to his general doctrine of relativity. He is
violently in conflict with all religious conceptions which savour of
this Absolute or have a pantheistic emphasis, which would diminish the
value and significance of relativity and of personality. The
“All-in-All” conception of God, which represents the pantheistic
elements in many theologies and religions, both Christian and other, is
not really a consciousness, he shows, for consciousness itself implies
a relation, a union of the self and non-self. In such a conception
actor, play and theatre all blend into one, God alone is real, and he
is unconscious, for there is, according to this hypothesis, nothing
outside himself which he can know. Renouvier realises that he is faced
with the ancient problem of the One and the Many, with the alternative
of unity or plurality. With his usual logical decisiveness Renouvier
posits plurality. He does not attempt to reconcile the two opposites,
and he deals with the problem in the manner in which he faced the
antinomies of Kant. Both cannot be true, and the enemy of pantheism and
absolutism acclaims pluralism, both for logical reasons and in order to
safeguard the significance of personality. In particular he directly
criticises the philosophy of Spinoza in which he sees the supreme
statement of this philosophy of the eternal, the perfect, necessary,
unchanging One, who is the same yesterday, to-day and forever. He
admits that the idea of law or a system of laws leads to the
introduction of something approaching the hypothesis of unity, but he
is careful to show by his doctrine of freedom and personality that this
is only a limited unity and that, considered even from a scientific
standpoint, a Total Synthesis, which is the logical outcome of such an
hypothesis, is ultimately untenable. He overthrows the idols of Spinoza
and Hegel. Such absolutes, infinite and eternal, whether described as
an infinite love which loves itself or a thought thinking thought, are
nothing more to Renouvier than vain words, which it is absurd to offer
as “The Living God.”

Against these metaphysical erections Renouvier opposes his doctrines of
freedom, of personality, relativity and pluralism. He offers in
contrast the conception of God as a Person, not an Absolute, but
relative, not infinite, but finite, limited by man’s freedom and by
contingency in the world of creatures. God, in his view, is not a Being
who is omnipotent, or omniscient. He is a Person of whom man is a type,
certainly a degraded type, but man is made in the image of the divine
personality. Our notion of God, Renouvier reminds us, must be
consistent with the doctrine of freedom, hence we must conceive of him
not merely as a creator of creatures or subjects, but of creative power
itself in those creatures. The relation of God to man is more complex
than that of simple “creation” as this word is usually comprehended,
“It is a creation of creation,” says Renouvier,[25] a remark which is
parallel to the view expressed by Bergson, to the effect that, we must
conceive of God as a “creator of creators.”[26] The existence of this
Creative Person must be conceived, Renouvier insists, as indissolubly
bound up with his work, and it is unintelligible otherwise. That work
is one of creation and not emanation—it involves more than mere power
and transcendence. God is immanent in the universe.

 [25] _Psychologie ralionnelle_, vol. 2, p. 104.


 [26] In his address to the Edinburgh Philosophical Society, 1914.


Theology has wavered between the two views—that of absolute
transcendence and omnipotence and that of immanence based on freedom
and limitation. In the first, every single thing depends upon the
operation of God, whose Providence rules all. This is pure determinism
of a theological character. In the other view man’s free personality is
recognised; part of the creation is looked upon as partaking of freedom
and contingency, therefore the divinity is conceived as limited and
finite.

Renouvier insists that this view of God as finite is the only tenable
one, for it is the only one which gives a rational and moral
explanation of evil. In the first view God is responsible for all
things, evil included, and man is therefore much superior to him from a
moral standpoint. The idea of God must be ethically acceptable, and it
is unfortunate that this idea, so central to religion, is the least
susceptible to modification in harmony with man’s ethical development.
We already have noticed Guyau’s stress upon this point in our
discussion of ethics. Our conception of God must, Renouvier claims, be
the affirmation of our highest category, Personality, and must express
the best ethical ideals of mankind. Society suffers for its immoral and
primitive view of God, which gives to its religion a barbarous
character which is disgraceful and revolting to finer or more
thoughtful minds.

It is true that the acceptance of the second view, which carries with
it the complete rejection of the ideas of omnipotence and omniscience,
modifies profoundly many of the old and primitive views of God.
Renouvier recognises this, and wishes his readers also to grasp this
point, for only so is religion to be brought forward in a development
harmonious with the growth of man’s mind in other spheres. Man should
not profess the results of elaborate culture in science while he
professes at the same time doctrines of God which are not above those
of a savage or primitive people. This is the chief mischief which the
influence of the Hebrew writings of the Old Testament has had upon the
Christian religion. The moral conscience now demands their rejection,
for to those who value religion they can only appear as being of pure
blasphemy. God is neither omnipotent nor omniscient, consequently many
things must be unknown to him until they happen. Foreknowledge and
predetermination on his part are impossible, according to Renouvier.
God is not to be conceived as a consciousness enveloping the entire
universe, past, present and future, in a total synthesis. Such a belief
is mischievous to humanity because of its fatalism, in spite of the
comfortable consolation it offers to pious souls. Moreover, it presents
the absurd view of God working often against himself.

The idea of God, Renouvier shows, arises out of the discussions of the
nature of the universal laws of the universe and from the progress of
personalities. The plausible conceptions of God based on causality and
on “necessary essence” have not survived the onslaughts of Criticism.
The personality of God seems to us, says Renouvier, indicated as the
conclusion and the almost necessary culmination of the consideration of
the probabilities laid down by the practical reason or moral law. The
primary, though not primitive, evidence for the existence of God is
contained in, and results from, the generalisation of the idea of
“ends” in the universe. We must not go bevond phenomena or seek
evidence in some fictitious sphere outside of our experience. In its
most general and abstract sense the idea of God arises from the
conception of moral order, immortality, or the accord of happiness and
goodness. We cannot deny the existence of a morality in the order and
movements of the world, a physical sanction to the moral laws of virtue
and of progress, an external reality of good, a supremacy of good, a
witness of the Good itself. Renouvier does not think that any man,
having sufficiently developed his thought, would refuse to give the
name God to the object of this supreme conception, which at first may
seem abstract because it is not in any way crude, many of its intrinsic
elements remaining undetermined in face of our ignorance, but which,
nevertheless, or just for that very reason, is essentially practical
and moral, representing the most notable fact of all those included in
our belief. This method of approaching the problem of God is, he
thinks, both simple and grand. It is a noble contrast to the scholastic
edifice built up on the metaphysical perfection of being, called the
Absolute. In this conception all attributes of personality are replaced
by an accumulation of metaphysical properties, contradictory in
themselves and quite incompatible with one another. This Absolute is a
pure chimerical abstraction; its pure being and pure essence are
equivalent to pure nothing or pure nonsense.

The fetish of pure substance, substantial cause, absolute being,
whatever it be called, is vicious at all times, but particularly when
we are dealing with the fundamental problems of science. It would be
advisable here that the only method of investigation be that of
atheism, for scientific investigation should not be tainted by any
prejudices or preconceived ideas upon the nature of the divinity.

What really is Atheism? The answer to this query, says Renouvier, is
clear. The idea of God is essentially a product of the moral law or
conscience. An atheist is, strictly speaking, one who does not admit
the reality of this moral order of ends and of persons as valuable in
themselves. Verily, he himself may personally lead a much more upright
life than the loud champions of theism, but he denies the general moral
order, which is God. With the epithet of atheist as commonly used for
those who merelv have a conception of God which differs from the
orthodox view, we are not here concerned. That may be dismissed as a
misuse of the word due to religious bigotry. The fruits of true atheism
are materialism, pantheism and fatalism. Indeed any doctrine, even a
theological doctrine, which debases and destroys the inherent value of
the human consciousness and personality, is rightly to be regarded,
whatever it may _say_ about God, however it may repeat his name (and
two of these doctrines are very fond of this repetition, but this must
not blind us to the real issue)—that doctrine is atheistic. The most
resolute materialists, the most high-minded worshippers of Providence
and the great philosophers of the Absolute, find themselves united here
in atheism. God is not a mere totality of laws operating in the
universe. Such a theism is but a form of real atheism. We must, insists
Renouvier, abandon views of this type, with all that savours of an
Absolute, a Perfect Infinite, and affirm our belief in the existence of
an order of Goodness which gives value to human personality and assures
ultimate victory to Justice. This is to believe in God. We arrive at
this belief rationally and after consideration of the world and of the
moral law of persons. Through these we come to God. We do not begin
with him and pretend to deduce these from his nature by some
incomprehensible _a priori_ propositions. The methods of the old
dogmatic theology are reversed. Instead of beginning with a Being of
whom we know nothing and can obviously deduce nothing, let us proceed
inductively, and by careful consideration of the revelation we have
before us in the world and in humanity let us build up our idea of God.

Renouvier is anxious that we should examine the data upon which we may
found “rational hypotheses” as to the nature of God. The Critical
Philosophy has upset the demonstrations of the existence of God, which
were based upon causality and upon necessary existence (the
cosmological and ontological proofs). Neo-criticism not only
establishes the existence of God as a rational hypothesis, but “this
point of view of the divine problem is the most favourable to the
notion of the personality of God. The personality of God seems to us to
be indicated as the looked-for conclusion and almost necessary
consummation of the probabilities of practical reason.”[27]

 [27] _Psychologie rationnelle_, vol. 2, p. 300.


The admission of ends, of finality, or purpose in the universe is
frequently given as involving a supreme consciousness embracing this
teleology. Also it is argued that Good could not exist in its
generality save in an external consciousness—that is, a divine mind. By
recalling the objections to a total synthesis of phenomena, Renouvier
refutes both these arguments which rest upon erroneous methods in
ontology and in theology. The explanation of the world by God, as in
the cosmological argument, is fanciful, while the ontological argument
leads us to erect an unintelligible and illogical absolute. Renouvier
regards God as existing as a general consciousness corresponding to the
generality of ends which man himself finds before him, finite, limited
in power and in knowledge. But in avowing this God, Renouvier points
him out to us as the first of all beings, a being like them, not an
absolute, but a personality, possessing (and this is important) the
perfection of morality, goodness and justice. He is the supreme
personality in action, and as a perfect person he respects the
personality of others and operates on our world only in the degree
which the freedom and individuality of persons who are not himself can
permit him, and within the limits of the general laws under which he
represents to himself his own enveloped existence. This is the
hypothesis of unity rendered intelligible, and as such Renouvier claims
that it bridges in a marvellous manner the gap always deemed to exist
between monotheism and polytheism—the two great currents of religious
thought in humanity. The monotheists have appeared intolerant and
fanatical in their religion and in their deity (not in so far as it was
manifest in the thoughts of the simple, who professed a faith of the
heart, but as shown in the ambitious theology of books and of schools),
bearing on their banner the signs of a jealous deity, wishing no other
gods but himself, declaring to his awed worshippers: “I am that I am;
have no other gods but me!” On the other hand, the polytheistic peoples
have been worshippers of beauty and goodness in all things, and where
they saw these things they created a deity. They were more concerned
with the immortality of good souls than the eternal existence of one
supreme being; they were free-thinkers, creators of beauty and seekers
after truth, and believers in freedom. The humanism of Greece stands in
contrast to the idolatrous theocracy of the Hebrews.

The unity of God previously mentioned does not exclude the possibility
of a plurality of divine persons. God the one would be the first and
foremost, _rex hominum deorumque_. Some there may be that rise through
saintliness to divinity, Sons of God, persons surpassing man in
intelligence, power and morality. To take sides in this matter is
equivalent to professing a particular religion. We must avoid the
absolutist spirit in religion no less than in philosophy. By this
Renouvier means that brutal fanaticism which prohibits the Gods of
other people by passion and hatred, which aims at establishing and
imposing its own God (which is, after all, but its own idea of God) as
the imperialist plants his flag, his kind and his customs in new
territory, in the spirit of war and conquest. Such a “holy war” is an
outrage, based not upon real religion, but on intolerant fanaticism in
which freedom and the inherent rights of personality to construct its
own particular faith are denied.

Renouvier finds a parallelism between the worship of the State in
politics and of the One God in religion. The systems in which unity or
plurality of divine personality appears differ from one another in the
same way in which monarchal and republican ideas differ. Monarchy in
religion offers the same obstacles to progress as it has done in
politics. It involves a parallel enslavement of one’s entire self and
goods, a conscription which is hateful to freedom and detrimental to
personality. To this supreme and regal Providence all is due; it alone
in any real sense exists. Persons are shadows, of no reality, serfs
less than the dust, to whom a miserable dole is given called grace, for
which prayer and sacrifice are to be unceasingly made or chastisements
from the Almighty will follow. This notion is the product of monarchy
in politics, and with monarchy it will perish. The two are bound up,
for “by the grace of God” we are told monarchs hold their thrones, by
his favour their sceptre sways and their battalions move on to victory.
This monarchal God, this King of kings and Lord of hosts, ruler of
heaven and earth, is the last refuge of monarchs on the earth.
Confidence in both has been shaken, and both, Renouvier asserts, will
disappear and give place to a real democracy, not only to republics on
earth, but to the conception of the whole universe as a republic. Men
raise up saints and intercessors to bridge the gulf between the divine
Monarch and his slaves. They conceive angels as doing his work in
heaven; they tolerate priests to bring down grace to them here and now.
The doctrine of unity thus gives rise to fanatical religious devotion
or philosophical belief in the absolute, which stifles religion and
perishes in its own turn. The doctrine of immortality, based on the
belief in the value of human personality, leads us away from monarchy
to a republic of free spirits. A democratic religion in this sense will
display human nature raised to its highest dignity by virtue of an
energetic affirmation of personal liberty, tolerance, mutual respect
and liberty of faith—a free religion without priests or clericalism,
not in conflict with science and philosophy, but encouraging these
pursuits and in turn encouraged by them.[28]

 [28] The fullest treatment of this is the large section in the
 conclusion to the _Philosophie analytique de l’Histoire_ (tome iv.).
 _Cf_. also the discussion of the influence of religious beliefs on
 societies in the last chapter of _La Nouvelle Monadologie_.

III

Ravaisson, in founding the new spiritual philosophy, professed certain
doctrines which were a blending of Hellenism and Christianity. In the
midst of thought which was dominated by positivism, naturalism or
materialism, or by a shallow eclecticism, wherein religious ideas were
rather held in contempt, he issued a challenge on behalf of spiritual
values and ideals. Beauty, love and goodness, he declared, were divine.
God himself is these things, said Ravaisson, and the divinity is “not
far from any of us.” In so far as we manifest these qualities we
approach the perfect personality of God himself. In the infinite, in
God, will is identical with love, which itself is not distinguished
from the absolutely good and the absolutely beautiful. This love can
govern our wills; the love of the beautiful and the good can operate in
our lives. In so far as this is so, we participate in the love and the
life of God.

Boutroux agrees substantially with Ravaisson, but he lays more stress
upon the free creative power of the deity as immanent. “God,” he
remarks in his thesis, “is not only the creator of the world, he is
also its Providence, and watches over the details as well as over the
whole.”[29] God is thus an immanent and creative power in his world as
well as the perfect being of supreme goodness and beauty. Boutroux here
finds this problem of divine immanence and transcendence as important
as does Blondel, and his attitude is like that of Blondel, midway
between that of Ravaisson and Bergson.

 [29] _La Contingence des Lois de la Nature_, p. 150.


Religion, Boutroux urges, must show man that the supreme ideal for him
is to realise in his own nature this idea of God. There is an
obligation upon man to pursue after these things-goodness, truth,
beauty and love—for they are his good, they are the Good; they are,
indeed, God. In them is a harmony which satisfies his whole nature, and
which does not neglect or crush any aspect of character, as narrow
conceptions of religion inevitably do. Boutroux insists upon the
necessity for intellectual satisfaction, and opposes the “philosophy of
action” in ils doctrine of “faith for faith’s sake.” At the same time
he conceives Reason as a harmony, not merely a coldly logical thing.
Feeling and will must be satisfied also.[30]

 [30] Boutroux has in his volume, _Science et Religion dans la
 Philosophie contemporaine_, contributed a luminous and penetrating
 discussion of various religious doctrines from Comte to William James.
 This was published in 1908.


We have observed already how Fouillée claimed that the ethics of his
_idées-forces_ contained the gist of what was valuable in the world
religions. He claims that philosophy includes under the form of
rational belief or thought what the religions include as instinctive
belief. In religion he sees a spontaneous type of metaphysic, while
metaphysic or philosophy is a rationalised religion.

Nothing in this connection is more important than a rational and
harmonious view of God. This he insists upon in his thesis and in his
_Sketch of the Future of a Metaphysic founded on Experience_. The old
idea of God was that of a monarch governing the world as a despot
governs his subjects. The government of the universe may still be held
to be a monarchy, but modern science is careful to assure us that it
must be regarded as an absolutely constitutional monarchy. The monarch,
if there be one, acts in accordance with the laws and respects the
established constitution. Reason obliges us to conceive of the
sovereign: experience enlightens us as to the constitution.

There can be little doubt that one of the world’s greatest books upon
religion is the work of Guyau, which appeared in 1886, bearing the
arresting title, _L’Irreligion de l’Avenir_. Its sub-title describes it
as an Etude sociologique, and it is this treatment of the subject from
the standpoint of sociology which is such a distinctive feature of the
book. The notion of a _social bond_ between man and the powers superior
to him, but resembling him, is, claims Guyau, a point of unity in which
all religions are at one. The foundation of the religious sentiment
lies in sociality, and the religious man is just the man who is
disposed to be sociable, not only with all living beings whom he meets,
but with those whom he imaginatively creates as gods. Guyau’s thesis,
briefly put, is that religion is a manifestation of life (again he
insists on “Life,” as in his Ethics, as a central conception), becoming
self-conscious and seeking the explanation of things by analogies drawn
from human society. Religion is “sociomorphic” rather than merely
anthropomorphic; it is, indeed, a universal sociological hypothesis,
mythical in form.

The religious sentiment expresses a consciousness of dependence, and in
addition, adds Guyau, it expresses the need of affection, tenderness
and love—that is to say, the “social” side of man’s nature. In the
conception of the Great Companion or Loving Father, humanity finds
consolation and hope. Children and women readily turn to such an ideal,
and primitive peoples, who are just like children, conceive of the
deity as severe and all- powerful. To this conception moral attributes
were subsequently added, as man’s own moral conscience developed, and
it now issues in a doctrine of God as Love. All this development is,
together with that of esthetics and ethics, a manifestation of life in
its individual and more especially social manifestations.

It is the purpose of Guyau’s book not only to present a study of the
evolution of religion in this manner, from a sociological point of
view, but to indicate a further development of which the beginnings are
already manifest—namely, a decomposition of all systems of dogmatic
religion. It is primarily the decay of dogma and ecclesiasticism which
he intends to indicate by the French term _irréligion_. The English
translation of his work bears the title _The Non-religion of the
Future_. Had Guyau been writing and living in another country it is
undoubtedly true that his work would probably have been entitled _The
Religion of the Future_. Owing to the Roman Catholic environment and
the conception of religion in his own land, he was, however, obliged to
abandon the use of the word religion altogether. In order to avoid
misunderstanding, we must examine the sense he gives to this word, and
shall see then that his title is not meant to convey the impression of
being anti-religious in the widest sense, nor is it irreligious in the
English meaning of that word.

Guyau considers every positive and historical religion to present three
distinct and essential elements:

An attempt at a mythical and non-scientific explanation of (_a_)
natural phenomena—_e.g._, intervention, miracles, efficacious prayer;
(_b_) historical facts—_e.g._, incarnation of Buddha or Jesus.
A system of dogmas—that is to say, symbolic ideas or imaginative
beliefs—forcibly imposed upon one’s faith as absolute verities, even
though they are susceptible to no scientific demonstration or
philosophical justification.
A cult and a system of rites or of worship, made up of more or less
immutable practices which are looked upon as possessing a marvellous
efficacy upon the course of things, a propitiatory virtue.[31]

 [31] _L’Irréligion de l’Avenir_, p. xiii; Eng. trans., p. 10.


By these three different and really organic elements, religion is
clearly marked off from philosophy. Owing to the stability of these
elements religion is apt to be centuries behind science and philosophy,
and consequently reconciliation is only effected by a subtle process
which, while maintaining the traditional dogmas and phrases, evolves a
new interpretation of them sufficiently modern to harmonise a little
more with the advance in thought, but which presents a false appearance
of stability and consistency, disguising the real change of meaning, of
view-point and of doctrine. Of this effort we shall see the most
notable instance is that of the “Modernists” or Neo-Catholics in France
and Italy, and the Liberal Christians in England and America.

Guyau claims that these newer interpretations, subtle and useful as
they are, and frequently the assertions of minds who desire sincerely
to adapt the ancient traditions to modern needs, are in themselves
hypocritical, and the Church in a sense does right to oppose them.
Guyau cannot see any satisfactoriness in these compromises and
adaptations which lack the clearness of the old teaching, which they in
a sense betray, while they do not sufficiently satisfy the demands of
modern thought.

With the decay of the dogmatic religion of Christendom which is
supremely stated in the faith of the Roman Catholic Church, there must
follow the non-religion of the future, which may well preserve, he
points out, all that is pure in the religious sentiment and carry with
it an admiration for the cosmos and for the infinite powers which are
there displayed. It will be a search for, and a belief in, an ideal not
only individual, but social and even cosmic, which shall pass the
limits of actual reality. Hence it appears that “non-religion” or
“a-religion,” which is for Guyau simply “the negation of all dogma, of
all traditional and supernatural authority, of all revelation, of all
miracle, of all myth, of all rite erected into a duty,” is most
certainly not a synonym for irreligion or impiety, nor does it involve
any contempt for the moral and metaphysical doctrines expressed by the
ancient religions of the world. The non-religious man in Guyau’s sense
of the term is simply the man without a religion, as he has defined it
above, and he may quite well admire and sympathise with the great
founders of religion, not only in that they were thinkers,
metaphysicians, moralists and philanthropists, but in that they were
reformers of established belief, more or less avowed enemies of
religious authority and of every affirmation laid down by an
ecclesiastical body in order to bind the intellectual freedom of
individuals. Guyau’s remarks in this connection agree with the tone in
which Renan spoke of his leaving the Church because of a feeling of
respect and loyalty to its Founder. Guyau points out that there exists
in the bosom of every great religion a dissolving force—namely, the
very force which in the beginning served to constitute it and to
establish its triumphant revolt over its predecessor. That force is the
absolute right of private judgment, the free factor of the personal
conscience, which no external authority can succeed, ultimately, in
coercing or silencing. The Roman Church, and almost every other
organised branch of the Christian religion, forgets, when faced with a
spirit which will not conform, that it is precisely to this spirit that
it owes its own foundation and also the best years of its existence.
Guyau has little difficulty in pressing the conclusions which follow
from the recognition of this vital point.

Briefly, it follows that the hope of a world-religion is an illusion,
whether it be the dream of a perfect and world-wide Judaism, Buddhism,
Christianity, or Mohammedanism. The sole authority in religious
matters, that of the individual conscience, prevents any such
consummation, which, even if it could be achieved, would be
mischievous. The future will display a variety of beliefs and
religions, as it does now. This need not discourage us, for therein is
a sign of vitality or spiritual life, of which the world-religions are
examples, marred, however, by their profession of universality, an
ideal which they do not and never will realise.

The notion of a Catholic Church or a great world- religion is really
contrary to the duty of personal thought and reflection, which must
inevitably (unless they give way to mere lazy repetition of other
people’s thoughts) lead to differences. The tendency is for humanity to
move away from dogmatic religion, with its pretensions to universality,
catholicity, and monarchy (of which, says Guyau, the most curious type
has just recently been achieved in our own day, by the Pope’s
proclamation of the dogma of papal infallibility), towards religious
individualism and to a plurality of religions. There may, of course, be
religious associations or federations, but these will be free, and will
not demand the adherence to any dogma as such.

With the decay of dogmatic religion the best elements of religious life
will have freer scope to develop themselves, and will grow both in
intensity and in extent. “He alone is religious, in the philosophical
sense of the word, who researches for, who thinks about, who loves,
truth.” Such inquiry or search involves freedom, it involves conflict,
but the conflict of ideas, which is perfectly compatible with
toleration in a political sense, and is the essence of the spirit of
the great world teachers. This is what Jesus foresaw when he remarked:
“I did not come to bring peace, but a sword.” More fully, he might have
put it, Guyau suggests: “I came not to bring peace into human thought,
but an incessant battle of ideas; not repose, but movement and progress
of spirit; not universal dogma, but liberty of belief, which is the
first condition of growth.” Well might Renan remark that it was loyalty
to such a spirit which caused him to break with the Church.

While attacking religious orthodoxy in this manner, Guyau is careful to
point out that if religious fanaticism ls bad, anti-religious
fanaticism is equally mischievous, wicked and foolish.[32] While the
eighteenth century could only scoff at religion, the nineteenth
realised the absurdity of such raillery. We have come to see that even
although a belief may be irrational and even erroneous, it may still
survive, and it may console multitudes whose minds would be lost on the
stormy sea of life without such an anchor. While dogmatic or positive
religions do exist they will do so, Guyau reminds us, for quite
definite and adequate reasons, chiefly because there are people who
believe them, to whom they mean something and often a great deal. These
reasons certainly do diminish daily, and the number of adherents, too,
but we must refrain from all that savours of anti- religious
fanaticism.[33] He himself speaks with great respect of a Christian
missionary. Are we not, he asks, both brothers and humble collaborators
in the work and advance of humanity? He sees no real inconsistency
between his own dislike of orthodoxy and dogma and the missionary’s
work of raising the ignorant to a better life by those very dogmas. It
is a case of relative advance and mental progress.

 [32] He cites a curious case of anti-religious fanaticism at
 Marseilles in 1885, when all texts and scripture pictures were removed
 fromthe schools.


 [33] Guyau’s book abounds in illustrations. He mentions here Huss’s
 approval of the sincerity of one man who brought straw from his own
 house to burn him. Huss admired this act of a man in whom he saw a
 brother in sincerity.


It is with great wealth of discussion that Guyau recounts the genesis
of religions in primitive societies to indicate the sociological basis
of religion. More important are his chapters on the dissolution of
religions in existing societies, in which he shows the
unsatisfactoriness of the dogmas of orthodox Protestantism equally with
those of the Catholic Church. As mischievous as the notion of an
infallible Church is that of an infallible book, literally—that is to
say, foolishly-interpreted. He recognises that for a literal
explanation of the Bible must be substituted, and is, indeed, being
substituted, a literary explanation. Like Renan, he criticises the
vulgar conception of prayer and of religious morality which promotes
goodness by promise of paradise or fear of hell. He urges in this
connection the futility of the effort made by Michelet, Quinet and,
more especially, by Renouvier and Pillon to “Protestantise” France.
While admitting a certain intellectual, moral and political superiority
to it, Guyau claims that for the promotion of morality there is little
use in substituting Protestantism for Catholicism. He forecasts the
limitation of the power of priests and other religious teachers over
the minds of young children. Protestant clergymen in England and
America he considers to be no more tolerant in regard to the
educational problem than the priests. Guyau urges the importance of an
elementary education being free from religious propaganda. He was
writing in 1886, some years after the secular education law had been
carried. There is, however, more to be done, and he points out “how
strange it is that a society should not do its best to form those whose
function it is to form it.”[34] In higher education some attention
should be given to the comparative study of religions. “Even from the
point of view of philosophy, Buddha and Jesus are more important than
Anaximander or Thales.”[35] It is a pity, he thinks, that there is not
a little more done to acquaint the young with the ideas for which the
great world-teachers, Confucius, Zoroaster, Buddha, Socrates, Mohammed,
stood, instead of cramming a few additional obscure names from early
national history. It would give children at least a notion that history
had a wider range than their own country, a realisation of the fact
that humanity was already old when Christ appeared, and that there are
great religions other than Christianity, religions whose followers are
not poor ignorant savages or heathen, but intelligent beings, from whom
even Christians may learn much. It is thoroughly mischievous, he aptly
adds, to bring up children in such a narrow mental atmosphere that the
rest of their life is one long disillusionment.

 [34] _L’Irréligion de l’Avenir_, p. 232; Eng. trans., p. 278.


 [35] _Ibid_., p. 236; Eng. trans., p. 283.


With particular reference to his own country, Guyau criticises the
religious education of women, the question of “mixed marriages,” the
celibacy of the Roman Catholic clergy, and the influence of religious
beliefs upon the limitation or increase of the family.

After having summed up the tendency of dogmatic religion to decay, he
asks if any unification of the great religions is to-day possible, or
whether any new religion may be expected? The answer he gives to both
these questions is negative, and he produces a wealth of very valid
reasons in support of his finding. He is, of course, here using the
term religion as he has himself defined it. The claim to universality
by all world-religions, the insistence by each that it alone is the
really best or true religion, precludes any question of unity. As well
might we imagine unity between Protestantism and the Roman Catholic
Church.

In the “non-religious” state, dogma will be replaced by individual
constructions. Religion will be a free, personal affair, in which the
great philosophical hypotheses (_e.g._, Theism and Pantheism) will be
to a large extent utilised. They will, however, be regarded as such by
all, as rational hypotheses, which some individuals will accept, others
will reject. Certain doctrines will appeal to some, not to others. The
evidence for a certain type of theism will seem adequate to some, not
to others. There will be no endeavour to impose corporately or singly
the acceptance of any creed upon others.

With Guyau’s conception of the future of religion or non-religion,
whichever we care to call it, we may well close this survey of the
religious ideas in modern France. In the Roman Church on the one hand,
and, on the other, in the thought of Renan, Renouvier and Guyau,
together with the multitude of thinking men and women they represent,
may be seen the two tendencies—one conservative, strengthening its
internal organisation and authority, in defiance of all the influences
of modern thought, the other a free and personal effort, issuing in a
genuine humanising of religion and freeing it from ecclesiasticism and
dogma.

A word may be said here, however, with reference to the “Modernists.”
The Modernist movement is a French product, the result of the
interaction of modern philosophical and scientific ideas upon the
teaching of the Roman Church. It has produced a philosophical religion
which owes much to Ollé-Laprune and Blondel, and is in reality modern
science with a veneer of religious idealism or platonism. It is a
theological compromise, and has no affinities with the efforts of
Lamennais. As a compromise it was really opposed to the traditions of
the French, to whose love of sharp and clear thinking such general and
rather vague syntheses are unacceptable. It must be admitted, however,
that there is a concreteness, a nearness to reality and life, which
separates it profoundly from the highly abstract theology of Germany,
as seen in Ritschl and Harnack.

The Abbé Marat of the Theological School at the Sorbonne and Father
Gratry of the Ecole Normale were the initiators of this movement, as
far back as the Second Empire. “Modernism” was never a school of
thought, philosophical or religious, and it showed itself in a freedom
and life, a spirit rather than in any formula;. As Sorel’s syndicalism
is an application of the Bergsonian and kindred doctrines to the left
wings, and issues in a social theory of “action,” so Modernism is an
attempt to apply them to the right and issues in a religion founded on
action rather than theology. The writings of the Modernists are
extensive, but we mention the names of the chief thinkers. There is the
noted exegetist Loisy, who was dismissed in 1894 from the Catholic
Institute of Paris and now holds the chair of the History of Religions
at the College de France. His friend, the Abbé Bourier, maintained the
doctrine, “ Where Christ is there is the Church,” with a view to
insisting upon the importance of being a Christian rather than a
Catholic or a Protestant.

The importance of the Catholic thinker, Blondel, both for religion and
for philosophy, has already been indicated at an earlier stage in this
book. His work inspires most.Modernist thought. Blondel preaches, with
great wealth of philosophical and psychological argument, the great
Catholic doctrine of the collaboration of God with man and of man with
God. Man at one with himself realises his highest aspirations. Divine
transcendence and divine immanence in man are reconciled. God and man,
in this teaching, are brought together, and the stern realism of
every-day life and the idealism of religion unite in a sacramental
union. The supreme principle in this union Laberthonnière shows to be
Love. He is at pains to make clear, however, that belief in Love as the
ultimate reality is no mere sentimentality, no mere assertion of the
will-to-believe. For him the intellect must play its part in the
religious life and in the expression of faith. No profounder
intellectual judgment exists than just the one which asserts “God is
Love,” when this statement is properly apprehended and its momentous
significance clearly realised. We cannot but lament, with
Laberthonnière, the abuse of this proposition and its subsequent loss
of both appeal and meaning through a shallow familiarity. The
reiteration of great conceptions, which is the method by which the
great dogmas have been handed down from generations, tends to blurr
their real significance. They become stereotyped and empty of life. It
is for this reason that Le Roy in _Dogme et Critique_ (1907) insisted
upon the advisability of regarding all dogmas as expressions of
practical value in and for action, rather than as intellectual
propositions of a purely “religious” or ecclesiastical type, belonging
solely to the creeds.

To Blondel, Laberthonnière, and Le Roy can be added the names of
Fonsegrive, Sertillanges, Loyson and Houtin, the last two of whom
ultimately left the Church, for the Church made up its mind to crush
Modernism. The Pope had intimated in 1879 that the thirteenth-century
philosophy of Aquinas was to be recognised as the only official
philosophy.[36] Finally, Modernism was condemned in a Vatican
encyclical (_Pascendi Dominici Gregis_) in 1907, as was also the social
and educational effort, _Le Sillon_.

 [36] This led to revival of the study of the _Summa Theologiæ_ and to
 the commencement of the review of Catholic philosophy, _Revue
 Thomiste_.


Such has been Rome’s last word, and it is not surprising, therefore,
that France is the most ardent home of free thought upon religious
matters, that the French people display a spirit which is unable to
stop at Protestantism, but which heralds the religion or the
_non-religion_ of the future to which Guyau has so powerfully indicated
the tendencies and has by so doing helped, in conjunction with Renan
and Renouvier, to hasten its realisation.

A parallel to the “modernist” theology of the Catholic thinkers was
indicated on the Protestant side by the theology of Auguste Sabatier,
whose _Esquisse d’une Philosophie de la Religion d’après la Psychologie
et l’Histoire_ appeared in 1897[37] and of Menegoz,[38] whose
_Publications diverges sur le Fidéisme et son Application a
l’Enseignement chrétien traditionnel_ were issued in 1900. Sabatier
assigns the beginning of religion to man’s trouble and distress of
heart caused by his aspirations, his belief in ideals and higher
values, being at variance with his actual condition. Religion arises
from this conflict of real and ideal in the soul of man. This is the
essence of religion which finds its expression in the life of faith
rather than in the formation of beliefs which are themselves accidental
and transitory, arising from environment and education, changing in
form from aee to age both in the individual and the race. While LeRoy
on the Catholic side, maintained that dogmas were valuable for their
practical significance, Sabatier and Ménégoz claimed that all religious
knowledge is symbolical. Dogmas are but symbols, which inadequately
attempt to reveal their object. That object can only be grasped by
“faith” as distinct from “belief”—that is to say, by an attitude in
which passion, instinct and intuition blend and not by an attitude
which is purely one of intellectual conviction. This doctrine of
“salvation by faith independently of beliefs” has a marked relationship
not only to pragmatism and the philosophy of action, but to the
philosophy of intuition. A similar anti-intellectualism colours the
“symbolo-fidéist” currents within Catholicism, which manifest a more
extreme character. A plea voiced against all such tendencies is to be
found in Bois’ book, _De la Connaissance religieuse_ (1894), where an
endeavour is made to retain a more intellectual attitude, and it again
found expression in the volume by Boutroux, written as late as 1908,
which deals with the religious problem in our period.

 [37] It was followed after his death in 1901 by the volume _Les
 Religions d’Authorité et la Religion de l’Esprit_, 1904.


 [38] This is the late Eugene Ménégoz, Professor of Theology in Paris,
 not Ferdinand Ménégoz, his nephew, who is also a Professor of Theology
 now at Strasbourg.


Quoting Boehme in the interesting conclusion to this book on _Science
and Religion in Contemporary Philosophy_ (1908) Boutroux sums up in the
words of the old German mystic his attitude to the diversity of
religious opinions. “Consider the birds in our forests, they praise God
each in his own way, in diverse tones and fashions. Think you God is
vexed by this diversity and desires to silence discordant voices? All
the forms of being are dear to the infinite Being himself!”[39]

 [39] It is interesting to compare with the above the sentiments
 expressed in Matthew Arnold’s poem, entitled Progress:

“Children of men! the unseen Power, whose eye
For ever doth accompany mankind,
Hath look’d on no religion scornfully
That men did ever find.


This survey of the general attitude adopted towards religion and the
problems which it presents only serves to emphasise more clearly those
tendencies which we have already denoted in previous chapters. As the
discussion of progress was radically altered by the admission of the
principle of freedom, and the discussion of ethics passes bevond rigid
formulae to a freer conception of morality, so here in religion the
insistence upon freedom and that recognition of personality which
accompanies it, colours the whole religious outlook. Renan, Renouvier
and Guyau, the three thinkers who have most fully discussed religion in
our period, join in proclaiming the importance of the personal factor
in religious belief, and in valiant opposition to that Church which is
the declared enemy of freedom, they urge that in freedom of thought
lies the course of all religious development in the future, for only
thus can be expressed the noblest and highest aspirations of man’s
spirit.



CONCLUSION


The foregoing pages have been devoted to a history of ideas rather than
to the maintenance of any special thesis or particular argument.
Consequently it does not remain for us to draw any definitely logical
conclusions from the preceding chapters. The opportunity may be justly
taken, however, of summing up the general features of the development.

Few periods in the history of human thought can rival in interest that
of the second half of the nineteenth century in France. The discussion
covers the principal problems with which man’s mind is occupied in
modern times and presents these in a manner which is distinctly human
and not merely national. This alone would give value to the study of
such a period. There is, however, to be added the more striking fact
that there is a complete “turning of the tide” manifested during these
fifty years in the attitude to most of the problems. Beginning with an
overweening confidence in science and a belief in determinism and in a
destined progress, the century closed with a complete reversal of these
conceptions.

Materialism and naturalism are both recognised as inadequate, a
reaction sets in against positivism and culminates in the triumph of
spiritualism or idealism. This idealism is free from the cruder aspects
of the Kantian or Hegelian philosophy. The Thing-in-itself and the
Absolute are abandoned; relativity is proclaimed in knowledge, and
freedom in the world of action. Thoughts or ideas show themselves as
forces operating in the evolution of history. This is maintained in
opposition to the Marxian doctrine of the purely economic or
materialistic determination of history. A marked tendency, however, is
manifested to regard all problems from a social stand point. The
dogmatic confidence in science gives way to a more philosophical
attitude, while the conflict of science and religion resolves itself
into a decay of dogma and the conception of a free religion.

We have indicated the problem presented by “_science et conscience_,”
and in so far as we have laid down any thesis or argument in these
pages, as distinct from an historical account of the development, that
thesis has been, that the central problem in the period was that of
freedom. It was to this point which the consideration of science, or
rather of the sciences, led us. We have observed the importance of the
sciences for philosophy, and it is clear that, so far from presenting
any real hostility to philosophy, it can acclaim their autonomy and
freedom, without attempting by abstract methods to absorb them into
itself. They are equally a concrete part of human thought, and in a
deep and real sense a manifestation of the same spirit which animates
philosophy.

By recognising the sciences philosophy can avoid the fallacy of
ideology on the one hand and naturalism on the other. Unlike the old
eclecticism, the new thought is able to take account of science and to
criticise its assertions. We have seen how this has been accomplished,
and the rigidly mechanical view of the world abandoned for one into
which human freedom enters as a real factor. This transforms the view
of history and shows us human beings creating that history and not
merely being its blind puppets. History offers no cheerful outlook for
the easy-going optimist; it is not any more to be regarded as mere data
for pessimistic reflections, but rather a record which prompts a
feeling of responsibility. The world is not ready-made, and if there is
to be progress it must be willed by us and achieved by our struggle and
labour.

The doctrine of immanence upon which the modern tendency is to insist,
in place of the older idea of transcendence, makes us feel, not only
that we are free, but that our freedom is not in opposition to, or in
spite of, the divine spirit, but is precisely an expression of divine
immanence. Instead of the gloomy conception of a whole which determines
itself apart from us, we feel ourselves part, and a very responsible
part, of a reality which determines itself collectively and creatively
by its own action, by its own ideals, which it has itself created. This
freedom must extend not only to our conceptions of history but also to
those of ethics and of religion.

“English philosophy ends in considering nature as an assemblage of
facts; German philosophy looks upon it chiefly as a system of laws. If
there is a place midway between the two nations it belongs to us
Frenchmen. We applied the English ideas in the eighteenth century; we
can in the nineteenth give precision to the German ideas. What we have
to do is to temper, amend and complete the two spirits, one by the
other, to fuse them into one, to express them in a style that shall be
intelligible to everybody and thus to make of them the universal
spirit.”

Such was Taine’s attitude, and it indicates clearly the precise
position of French thought. We are apt to consider Taine purely as an
empiricist, but we must remember that he disagreed with the radical
empiricism of John Stuart Mill. His own attitude was largely that of a
reaction against the vague spiritualism of the Eclectic School,
especially Cousin’s eclecticism, a foreign growth on French soil, due
to German influence. The purely _a priori_ constructions of the older
spiritualism could find no room, and allowed none, for the sciences.
This was sufficient to doom it, and to lead naturally to a reaction of
a positive kind, revolting from all _a priori_ constructions.

It was to combat the excessive positive reaction against metaphysics
that Renouvier devoted his energies, but while professing to modernise
Kant and to follow out the general principles of his Critical
Philosophy, Renouvier was further removed from the German thinker than
he at times seems to have observed. Renouvier must undoubtedly share
with Comte the honours of the century in French Philosophy. Many
influences, however, prevented the general or speedy acceptance of
Renouvier’s doctrines. The University was closed against him, as
against Comte. He worked in isolation and his style of presentation,
which is heavy and laborious, does not appeal to the _esprit_ of the
French mind. Probably, too, his countrymen’s ignorance of Kant at the
time Renouvier wrote his _Essais de Critique générale_ prevented an
understanding and appreciation of the neo-critical advance on
Criticism.

Renouvier commands respect, but he does not appear to be in the line of
development which manifests so essentially the character of French
thought. This is to be found rather in that spiritualism, which, unlike
the old, does not exclude science, but welcomes it, finds a place for
it, although not by any means an exclusive place. The new spiritualists
did not draw their inspiration, as did Cousin, from any German source,
their initial impulse is derived from a purely French thinker, Maine de
Biran, who, long neglected, came to recognition in the work of
Ravaisson and those subsequent thinkers of this group, right up to
Bergson.

This current of thought is marked by a vitality and a concreteness
which are a striking contrast to the older eclectic spiritualism.
Having submitted itself to the discipline of the sciences, it is
acquainted with their methods and data in a manner which enables it to
oppose the dogmatism of science, and to acclaim the reality of values
other than those which are purely scientific. Ignoring _a priori_
construction, or eclectic applications of doctrines, it investigates
the outer world of nature and the inner life of the spirit.

We have said that these ideas are presented, not merely from a national
standpoint, but from one which is deeply human and universal. “_La
Science_,” re-marked Pasteur, “_n’a pas de patrie_.” We may add that
philosophy, too, owns no special fatherland. There is not in
philosophy, any more than in religion, “a chosen people,” even although
the Jews of old thought themselves such, and among moderns the Germans
have had this conceit about their _Kultur_. In so far as philosophy
aims at the elucidation of a true view of the universe, it thereby
tends inevitably to universality. But just as a conception of
internationalism, which should fail to take into account the factors of
nationality, would be futile and disastrous, so a conception of the
evolution of thought must likewise estimate the characteristics which
nationality produces even in the philosophical field.

Such characteristics, it will be found, are not definite doctrines, for
these may be transferred, as are scientific discoveries, from one
nation to another, and absorbed in such a manner that they become part
of the general consciousness of mankind. They are rather differences of
tone and colour, form or expression, which express the vital genius of
the nation. There are features which serve to distinguish French
philosophy from the development which has occurred in Germany, Italy,
England and America.

Modern French thought does not deliberately profess to maintain
allegiance to any past traditions, for it realises that such a
procedure would be inconsistent with that freedom of thought which is
bound up with the spirit of philosophy. It does, however, betray
certain national features, which are characteristic of the great French
thinkers from Descartes, Pascal and Malebranche onwards.

One of the most remarkable points about these thinkers was their
intimacy with the sciences. Descartes, while founding modern
philosophy, also gave the world analytic geometry; Pascal made certain
physical discoveries and was an eminent mathematician. Malebranche,
too, was keenly interested in science. In the following century the
Encyclopaedists displayed their wealth of scientific knowledge, and in
the nineteenth century we have seen the work of Comte based on science,
the ability of Cournot and Renouvier in mathematics, while men like
Boutroux, Hergson and Le Roy possess a thorough acquaintance with
modern science.

These facts have marked results, and distinguish French philosophy from
that of Germany, where the majority of philosophers appear to haye been
theological students in their youth and to have suffered from the
effects of their subject for the remainder of their lives. Theological
study does not produce clearness; it does not tend to cultivate a
spirit of precision, but rather one of vagueness, of which much German
philosophy is the product. On the other hand, mathematics is a study
which demands clearness and which in turn increases the spirit of
clarity and precision.

There is to be seen in our period a strong tendency to adhere to this
feature of clearness. Modern French philosophy is remarkably lucid.
Indeed, it is claimed that there is no notion, however profound it may
be, or however based on technical research it may be, which cannot be
conveyed in the language of every day. French philosophy does not
invent a highly technical vocabulary in order to give itself airs in
the eyes of the multitude, on the plea that obscurity is a sign of
erudition and learning. On the contrary, it remembers Descartes’
intimate association of clearness with truth, remembers, too, his clear
and simple French which he preferred to the scholastic Latin. It knows
that to convince others of truth one must be at least clear to them
and, what is equally important, one must be clear in one’s own mind
first. Clarity does not mean shallowness but rather the reverse,
because it is due to keen perceptive power, to a seeing further into
the heart of things, involving an intimate contact with reality.

French thought has always remained true to a certain “common sense.”
This is a dangerous and ambiguous term. In its true meaning it
signifies the general and sane mind of man free from all that prejudice
or dogma or tradition, upon which, of course, “common sense” in the
popular meaning is usually based. A genuine “common sense” is merely
“_liberté_” for the operation of that general reason which makes man
what he is. It must be admitted that, owing to the fact that philosophy
is taught in the _lycées_, the French are the best educated of any
nation in philosophical ideas and have a finer general sense of that
spirit of criticism and appreciation which is the essence of
philosophy, than has any other modern nation. Philosophy in France is
not written in order to appeal to any school or class. Not limited to
an academic circle only, it makes its pronouncements to humanity and
thus embodies in a real form the principles of _egalité_ and
_fraternité_. It makes a democratic appeal both by its _clarté_ and its
belief that _la raison commune_ is in some degree present in every
human being.

Not only was clearness a strong point in the philosophy of Descartes,
but there was also an insistence upon method. Since the time of his
famous _Discours de la Méthode_ there has always been a unique value
placed upon method in French thought, and this again serves to
distinguish it profoundly from German philosophy, which is, in general,
concerned with the conception and production of entire systems. The
idea of an individual and systematic construction is an ambitious
conceit which is not in harmony with the principles of _liberté_,
_egalité_, _fraternité_. Such a view of philosophical work is not a
sociable one, from a human standpoint, and tends to give rise to a
spirit of authority and tradition. Apart from this aspect of it, there
is a more important consideration. All those systems take one idea as
their starting-point and build up an immense construction _a priori_.
But another idea may be taken and opposed to that. There is thus an
immense wastage of labour, and the individual effort is never
transcended. Yet an idea is only a portion of our intelligence, and
that intelligence itself is, in turn, only a portion of reality. A
wider conception of philosophy must be aimed at, one in which the _vue
d’ensemble_ is not the effort of one mind, but of many, each
contributing its share to a harmonious conception, systematic in a
sense, but not in the German sense. Modern French thought has a dislike
of system of the individualistic type; it realises that reality is too
rich and complex for such a rapid construction to grasp it. It is
opposed to systems, for the French mind looks upon philosophy as a
manifestation of life itself—life blossoming to self-consciousness,
striving ever to unfold itself more explicitly and more clearly,
endeavouring to become more harmonious, more beautiful, and more noble.
The real victories of philosophical thought are not indicated by the
production of systems but by the discovery or creation of ideas. Often
these ideas have been single and simple, but they have become veritable
forces, in the life of mankind.

French thinkers prefer to work collectively at particular problems
rather than at systems. Hence the aim and tone of their work is more
universal and human, and being more general is apt to be more generous.
This again is the expression of _liberte_, _égalité_ and _fraternité_
in a true sense. The French prefer, as it were, in their philosophical
campaign for the intellectual conquest of reality diverse batteries of
_soixante-quinze_ acting with precision and alertness to the clumsy
production of a “Big Bertha.” The production of ambitious systems, each
professing to be the final word in the presentation of reality, has not
attracted the French spirit. It looks at reality differently and
prefers to deal with problems in a clear way, thereby indicating a
method which may be applied to the solution of others as they present
themselves. This is infinitely preferable to an ambitious unification,
which can only be obtained at the sacrifice of clearness or meaning,
and it arises from that keen contact with life, which keeps the mind
from dwelling too much in the slough of abstraction, from which some of
the German philosophers never succeed in escaping. Their pilgrimage to
the Celestial City ends there, and consequently the account of their
itinerary cannot be of much use to other pilgrims.

Another feature of modern French thought is the intimacy of the
connection between psychology and metaphysics, and the intensive
interest in psychology, which is but the imestigation of the inner life
of man. While in the early beginnings of ancient Greek philosophy some
time was spent in examining the outer world before man gave his
attention to the world within, we find Descartes, at the beginning of
modern philosophy, making his own consciousness of his own existence
his starting-point. Introspection has always played a prominent part in
French philosophy. Pascal was equally interested in the outer and the
inner world. Through Maine de Biran this feature has come down to the
new spiritualists and culminates in Bergson’s thought, in which
psychological considerations hold first rank.

The social feature of modern French thought should not be omitted. In
Germany subsequent thought has been coloured by the Reformation and the
particular aspects of that movement. In France one may well say that
subsequent thought has been marked by the Revolution. There is a
theological flavour about most German philosophy, while France, a
seething centre of political and social thought, has given to her
philosophy a more sociological trend.

The French spirit in philosophy stands for clearness, concreteness and
vitality. Consequently it presents a far greater brilliance, richness
and variety than German philosophy displays.[1] This vitality and even
exuberance, which are those of the spirit of youth manifesting a _joie
de vivre_ or an _élan vital_, have been very strongly marked since the
year 1880, and have placed French philosophy in the van of human
thought.

 [1] It is, therefore to be lamented that French thought has not
 received the attention which it deseives. In England far more
 attention has been given to the nineteenth-century German philosophy,
 while the history of thought in France, especially in the period
 between Comte and Bergson, has remained in sad neglect. This can and
 should be speedily remedied.


It would be vain to ask whither its advance will lead. Even its own
principles prevent any such forecast; its creative richness may blossom
forth to-morrow in forms entirely new, for such is the characteristic
of life itself, especially the life of the spirit, upon which so much
stress is laid in modern French philosophy. The New Idealism lays great
stress upon dynamism, voluntarism or action. Freedom and creative
activity are its keynotes, and life, ever fuller and richer, is its
aspiration. _La Vie_, of which France (and its centre, Paris) is such
an expression, finds formulation in the philosophy of contemporary
thinkers.[2]

 [2] The student of comparative thought will find it both interesting
 and profitable to compare the work done recently in Italy by Croce and
 Gentile. The intellectual kinship of Croce and Bergson has frequently
 been pointed out, but Gentile’s work comes very close to the
 philosophy of action and to the whole positive-idealistic tendency of
 contemporary French thought. This is particularly to be seen in
 _L’atto del pensare come atto puro_ (1912), and in _Teoria generalo
 dello spirito come atto puro_ (1916). Professor Carr, the well-known
 exponent of Bergson’s philosophy, remarks in his introduction to the
 English edition of Gentile’s book, “We may individualise the mind as a
 natural thing-object person. . . . Yet our power to think the mind in
 this way would be impossible were not the mind with and by which we
 think it, itself not a thing, not a _fact_, but _act_; . . . never
 _factum_, but always _fieri_.” This quotation is from p. xv of the
 _Theory of Mind as Pure Act_. With one other quotation direct from
 Gentile we must close this reference to Italian neo-idealism. “In so
 far as the subject is constituted a subject by its own act it
 constitutes the object. . . . Mind is the transcendental activity
 productive of the objective world of experience” (pp. 18, 43). Compare
 with this our quotation from Ravaisson, given on p. 75 of this work,
 and the statement by Lachelier on p. 122, both essential principles of
 the French New Idealism.


One word of warning must be uttered against those who declare that the
tendency of French thought is in the direction of anti-intellectualism.
Such a declaration rests on a misunderstanding, which we have
endeavoured in our pages to disclose It is based essentially upon a
doctrine of Reason which belongs to the eighteenth century. The severe
rationalism of that period was mischievous in that it rested upon a
one-sided view of human nature, on a narrow interpretation of “Reason”
which gave it only a logical and almost mathematical significance. To
the Greeks, whom the French represent in the modern world, the term
“NOUS” meant more than this—it meant an intelligible harmony. We would
do wrong to look upon the most recent developments in France as being
anti-rational, they are but a revolt against the narrow view of Reason,
and they constitute an attempt to present to the modern world a
conception akin to that of the Greeks. Human reason is much more than a
purely logical faculty, and it is this endeavour to relate all problems
to life itself with its pulsing throb, which represents the real
attitude of the French mind. There is a realisation expressed
throughout that thought, that life is more than logic. The clearness of
geometry showed Descartes that geometry is not all-embracing. Pascal
found that to the logic of geometry must be added a spirit of
appreciation which is not logical in its nature, but expresses another
side of man’s mind. To-day France sees that, although a philosophy must
endeavour to satisfy the human intelligence, a merely intellectual
satisfaction is not enough. The will and the feelings play their part,
and it was the gteat fault of the eighteenth century to misunderstand
this The search to-day is for a system of values and of truth in action
as well as a doctrine about things in their purely theoretical aspects.

This is a serious demand, and it is one which philosophy must endeavour
to appreciate Salvation will not be found in a mere dilettantism which
can only express ieal indifference, nor in a dogmatism which results in
bigotry and pride. Criticism is required, but not a purely destructive
criticism, rather one which will offer some acceptable view of the
universe. Such a view must combine true positivism or realism with a
true idealism, by uniting fact and spirit, things and ideas. Its
achievement can only be possible to minds possessing some creative and
constructive power, yet minds who have been schooled in the college of
reality. This is the task of philosophy in France and in other lands.
That task consists not only in finding values and in defining them but
in expressing them actively, and in endeavouring to realise them in the
common life.



BIBLIOGRAPHY


I. Works of the Period classified under Authors. (The more important
monographs are cited.) Names of philosophical journals.

II. Books on the Period.

III. Comparative Table showing contemporary German and Anglo-American
Works from 1851 to 1921.

I
WORKS OF THE PERIOD CLASSIFIED UNDER AUTHORS.

BERGSON: _Les Données immédiates de la Conscience_. 1889. English
Translation—_Time and Free-Will._ 1910.
_Matière et Mémoire_. 1896. (E.T.[1] 1911.)
_Le Rire_. 1901. (E.T. 1911.)
_Introduction a la Métaphysique_. 1903. _Revue de Métaphysique et de
Morale_. (E.T. 1913.)
_L’Evolution créatrice_. 1907. (E.T. 1911.)
_L’Energie spirituelle_. 1919. (E.T. 1920.)
Some monographs on Bergson: Le Roy (1912), Maritain (1914) in France,
Meckauer (1917) in Germany, and for the English reader Lindsay (1911),
Stewart (1911), Carr (1912), Cunningham (1916), and Gunn (1920).
BERNARD: _Introduction a l’Etude de la Médecine expérimental_. 1865.
BERTHELOT: _Science et Philosophie_. 1886. BINET: _Magnétisme animal_.
1886.
_Les Altérations de la Personnalité_. 1892.
_L’Introduction à la Psychologie expérimental_. 1894.
(Founded the _Année psychologique_ in 1895.) BLONDEL: _L’Action, Essai
d’une Critique de la Vie et d’une Science de la Pratique_. 1893.
_Histoire et Dogme_. 1904. BOIRAC: _L’Idée du Phénomène_. 1894. BOIS:
_De la Connaissance religieuse_. 1894. BOURGEOIS: _Solidarité_. 1896.
BOUTROUX (EMILE): _De la Contingence des Lois de la Nature_ 1874. (E.T.
1916.)
_De l’Idée de Loi naturelle dans la Science et la Philosophie
contemporaines_. 1895. (E.T. 1914.)
_Questions de Morale et d’Education_. 1895. (E.T. 1913.)
_De l’Influence de la Philosophie écossaise sur la Philosophie
française_. 1897.
_La Science et la Religion dans la Philosophie contemporaine_. 1908.
(E.T. 1909.)
_Rapport sur la Philosophie en France depuis_ 1867. Paper read to Third
Congress of Philosophy at Heidelberg in 1908. _Revue de Métaphysique et
de Morale_. Nov., 1908.
_Etudes d’Histoire de la Philosophie_. (E.T. 1912.)
_The Beyond that is Within_. E.T. 1912. (Addresses.) BROCHARD: _De la
Responsabilité morale_. 1874.
_De l’Universalité des Notions morales_. 1876.
_De L’Erreur_. 1879. BRUNSCHWICG: _La Modalité du jugement_. 1897.
_La Vie de l’Esprit_. 1900.
_Les Etapes de la Philosophie mathématique_. 1912. BUREAU: _La Crise
morale des Temps nouveau_. 1907. CARO: _Le Matérialisme et la Science_.
1868.
_Problèmes de Morale sociale_. 1876. COMTE: _Cours de Philosophie
positive_. 6 vols. 1830-42.
_Discours sur l’Esprit positive_. 1844.
_Système de Politique positive_. 4 vols. 1851-4.
_Catéchisme positiviste._ _Synthèse subjective_ (vol. i.). 1856.
_Note_.—The Free and Condensed Translation of Comte’s Positive
Philosophy in English by Miss Martineau, appeared in two volumes in
1853. Monograph by Lévy-Bruhl. COURNOT: _Essai sur les Fondements de
nos Connaissances et sur les Caractères de la Critique philosophique_
(2 vols.). 1851.
_Traité de l’Enchaînement des Idées fondamentales dans les Sciences et
dans l’Histoire_ (2 vols.). 1861.
_Considérations sur la Marche des Idées et des Evénements dans les
Temps modernes_ (2 vols.). 1872.
_Matérialisme, Vitalisme, Rationalisine: Etude sur l’Emploi des Données
de la Science en Philosophie_. 1875.
_Note_.—A number of the _Revue de Métaphysique et de Morale_ was
devoted to Cournot in 1905. See also the Monograph by Bottinelli and
his _Souvenirs de Cournot_. 1913. COUTURAT: _De l’Infini mathématique_.
_Les Principes des Mathématiques_. CRESSON: _Le Malaise de la pensée
philosophique contemporaine_. 1905. DAURIAC: _Croyance et Realité_.
1889.
_Motions de Matière et de Force_. 1878. DELBOS: _L’Esprit philosophique
de l’Allemagne et la Pensée française_. 1915. DUHEM: _La Théorie
physique_. 1906. DUNAN: _Les deux Idéalismes_. 1911. DURKHEIM: _De la
Division du Travail social_. 1893.
_Les Regles de la Méthode sociologique_. 1894.
_Le Suicide_. 1897.
_Les Formes élémentaires de la Vie religieuse_. 1912. (E. T.) ESPINAS:
_Societés animales_. 1876. EVELLlN: _La Raison pure et les Antinomies_.
1907. FONSEGRIVE: _Morale et Société_. 1907. FOUILLÉE: _La Philosophie
de Platon 2 vols_. 1869. Prize for competition in 1867, on the. Theory
of Ideas, offered by the Académie des Sciences morales et politiques.
“Crowned” after publication by the Académie française. 1871. Second
Edition, revised, and enlarged to four volumes. 1888-9.
_La Liberté et le Determinisme_. 1872. (Doctorate Thesis)
_La Philosophie de Socrate_. 2 vols 1874. Prize in 1868, Académie des
Sciences morales et politiques.
_Histoire générale de la Philosophie_. 1875. New Edition revised and
augmented, 1910.
_Extraits des grands Philosophes_. 1877.
_L’Idée moderne du Droit en Allemagne, en Ingleterre et en France_.
1878.
_La Science sociale contemporaine_. 1880.
_Critique des Systèmes contemporains_. 1883.
_La Propriété sociale et la Démocratie_. 1884.
_L’Avenir de la Métaphysique fondée sur l’Expérience_. 1889.
_L’Evolutionisme des Idées-forces_. 1890.
_L’Enseignement au Point de Vue national_. 1891 (E. T. 1892.)
_La Psychologie des Idées-forces_. 2 vols. 1893.
_Tempérament et Caractère selon les Individus, les Sexes et les Races_.
1895.
_Le Mouvement idéaliste et la Réaction contre la Science positive_.
1895.
_Le Mouvement positiviste et la Conception sociologique du Monde_.
1896.
_Psychologie du Peuple français_. 1898.
_Les Etudes classiques et la Démocratie_. 1898.
_La France au Point de Vue moral_. 1900.
_La Reforme de l’Enseignement par la Philosophie_. 1901.
_La Conception morale et civique de L’Enseignement_.
_Nietzsche et l’Immoralisme_. 1904.
_Esquisse psychologique des Peuples européens_. 1903.
_Le Moralisme de Kant et l’Amoralisme contemporain_. 1905.
_Les Elements sociologiques de la Morale_. 1905.
_La Morale des Idées-forces_. 1907.
_Le Socialisme et la Sociologie réformiste_. 1909.
_La Démocratie politique et sociale en France_. 1911.
_La Pensée et les nouvelles Ecoles anti-intéllectualistes_. 1912.
Posthumous: _Esquisse d’une Interprétation du Monde_.
_Humanitaires et Libertaires_. 1914.
_Equivalents philosophiques des Religions_.
On Fouillée, monograph by Augustin Guyau, son of J. M. Guyau. GOBLOT:
_Traité de Logique_. 1918. GOURD: _Le Phénomène_. 1888.
_La Philosophie de la Religion_. 1911. GUYAU: _La Morale d’Epicure et
ses Rapports avec les Doctrines contemporaines_. 1878. “Crowned” four
years before by the Académie des Sciences morales et politiques.
_La Morale anglaise contemporaine_. 1879. An extension of the Prize
Essay (Second Part).
_Vers d’un Philosophe_. 1881.
_Problèmes de l’Esthétique contemporaine_. 1884.
_Esquisse d’une Morale sans Obligation ni Sanction_. 1885. (E.T. 1898.)
_L’Irréligion de l’Avenir_. 1887. (E.T. 1897.)
Posthumous: _Education et Hérédité_. (E.T. 1891.)
_L’Art au Point de Vue sociologique_.
_La Genèse de l’Idée de Temps_. 1890.
There is a monograph on Guyau by Fouillée. HAMELIN: _Essai sur les
Eléments principaux de la Représentation_. 1907. HANNEQUIN: _Essai
critique sur l’Hypothèse des Atomes_. 1896. IZOULET: _La Cité moderne_.
1894. JANET (PAUL): _La Famille_. 1855.
_Histoire de la Philosophie morale et politique dans L’Antiquité et
dans les Temps modernes._ 2 vols. 1858. Republished as _Histoire de la
Science politique dans ses Rapports avec la Morale_. 1872.
_La Philosophie du Bonheur_. 1862.
_La Crise philosophique_. 1865.
_Le Cerveau et la Pensée_. 1867.
_Eléments de Morale_. 1869.
_Les Problèmes du XIXe Siècle_. 1872.
_La Morale_. 1874 (E T. 1884.)
_Philosophie de la Révolution française_. 1875.
_Les Causes finales_. 1876. (E.T. 1878.)
JANET (PIERRE): _L’Automatisme psychologique_. 1889
_L’Etat mental des Hystériques_. 1894.
_Névroses et Idées-fixes_. 1898.
(Janet founded the _Journal de Psychologie_. 1904). JAVARY: _L’Idée du
Progrès_. 1850. LABERTHONNIÈRE. _Le Dogmatisme morale_. 1898.
_Essais de Philosophie religieuse_. 1901.
_Le Réalisme chrétien et l’Idéalisme grec_. LACHELIER: _Du Fondement de
l’Induction_. 1871.
_Psychologie et Métaphysique_. 1885. Article in _Revue de Métaphysique
et de Morale_, now published with the above.
_Etude sur le Syllogisme_. 1907.
Monograph by Séailles, article by Noël. LACOMBE: _De l’Histoire
considérée comme Science_. 1894. LALANDE: _La Dissolution opposée à
l’Evolution, dans les Sciences physiques et morales_. 1899.
_Précis raisonné de Morale pratique par Questions et Réponses_. 1907.
LAPIE: _Logique de la Volonté_. 1902. LE BON: _Lois psychologiques de
l’Evolution des Peuples_.
_Les Opinions et les Croyances._ 1911.
_Psychologie du Socialisme_. 1899.
_Psychologie des Foules._ (E.T.)
_La Vie des Vérités_. 1914. LEQUIER: _La Recherche d’une Première
Vérité (Fragments posthumes)_. 1865. LE ROY: _Dogme et Critique_. 1907.
LIARD: _Des Définitions géometriques et des Définitions empiriques_.
1873.
_La Science positive et la Métaphysique_. 1879.
_Morale et Enseignement civique_. 1883.
_L’Enseignement supérieure en France_, 1789 à 1889. 1889. LOISY:
_L’Evangile et l’Eglise_. (E.T.) MARION: _La Solidarité morale_. 1880.
MÉNÉGOZ: _Publications diverses sur le Fidéisme et son Application à
l’Enseignement chrétien traditionnel_. 1900. Two additional volumes
later. MEYERSON: _Identité et Réalité_. 1907 MICHELET: _L’Amour_. 1858
_Le Prêtre la Femme et la Famille_. 1859.
_La Bible de l’Humanité._ 1864
MILHAUD: _Essai sur les Conditions et les Limites de la Certitude
logique._ 1894
_Le Rationnel_. 1898. OLLÉ-LAPRUNE: _La Certitude morale_. 1880.
_Le Prix de la Vie_. 1885
_La Philosophie et le Temps présent_. 1895.
_La Raison et le Rationalisme_. 1906. PARODI: _Le Problème morale et la
Pensée contemporaine_. 1910. PASTEUR: _Le Budget de la Science_. 1868
PAULHAN: _Phénomènes affectifs_.
_L’Activité mentale_. 1889 PAYOT: _La Croyance_. 1896. PELLETAN:
_Profession da Foi du XIXe Siècle_. 1852. POINCAIRÉ: _La Science et
l’Hypothèse_. 1902. (E.T. 1905.)
_La Valeur de la Science_. 1905.
_Science et Méthode_. 1909
_Dernières pensées_. PROUDHON: _Qu’est-ce que la Propriété?_ 1840
_Système des Contradictions économiques_. 1846
_La Philosophie du Progrès_. 1851.
_De la Justice_. 1858. RAUH: _Psychologie appliquée à la Morale et à
l’Education_.
_De la Méthode dans la Psychologie des Sentiments_.
_Essai sur le Fondement métaphysique de la Morale_. 1890.
_L’Expérience morale_. 1903. RAVAISSON-MOLLIEN (1813-1900): _Habitude_.
1838. (Thesis.) Reprinted 1894 in _Revue de Métaphysique et de Morale_.
_Aristote_. 1837. Vol. I. Vol. II. in 1846. Development of work crowned
by Académie des Sciences morales et politiques in 1833, when the author
was twenty.
_Rapport sur la Philosophie en France au XIXe Siècle_. 1867.
_La Philosophie de Pascal (Revue des Deux Mondes_. 1887)
_L’Education (Revue bleue_. 1887).
_Métaphysique et Morale (Revue des Deux Mondes_. 1893).
_Le Testament philosophique (Revue des Deux Mondes_. 1901).
_Cf_. Boutroux on Ravaisson (_Revue de Métaphysique et de Morale_.
1900).
Bergson : _Discours à l’Académie des Sciences morales et politiques_.
1904. RENAN: _Averroès et l’Averroisme_. 1852.
_Etudes d’Histoire religieuse_. 1857.
_Essais de Morale et de Critique_. 1851).
_Les Origines du Christianisme_. 1863-83. 8 vols., of which: _Vie de
Jésus_. 1863. (E.T.)
_Questions contemporaines_. 1868.
_La Réforme intellectual et morale_. 1871.
_Dialogues et Fragments philosophiques_. 1870. (E.T. 1883.)
_Drames philosophiques_.
_Souvenirs d’Enfance et de Jeunesse_. 1883. (E.T. 1883.)
_Nouvelles Etudes d’Histoire religieuse_. 1884. (E.T. 1886.)
_Histoire du Peuple d’Israël_. 5 vols. 1887-04. (E.T. 1888-91. 3 vols.)
_L’Avenir de la Science_. 1890. Written 1848-9. (E.T.)
_Feuilles détachées_. 1802.
For monographs on Renan: Allier: _La Philosophie de Renan_. 1895.
Monod: _Renan, Taine, Michelet_. 1894.
Séailles: _Renan_. 1894*. RENOUVIER: _Manuel de Philosophie moderne_.
1842.
_Manuel de Philosophie ancienne_. 1844.
_Manuel républicaine de l’Homme et du Citoyen_. 1848.
_Gouvernement direct et Organisation communale et centrale de la
République_. 1851.
_Essais de Critique générale_. 4 vols. 1854, 1859, 1864, 1864. (On
revision these four became thirteen vols.)
_La Science de la Morale_. 2 vols. 1869.
_1er Essai_, revised: _Traité de Logique général et de Logique
formelle_. 3 vols. 1875.
_2e Essai_, revised: _Traité de Psychologie rationnelle_. 3 vols. 1875.
_Uchronie (L’Utopie dans l’Histoire), Esquisse historique du
Développement de la Civilisation européenne, tel qu’il n’a pas été, tel
qu’il aurait pu être_. 1876.
_Petit Traité de Morale pour les Ecoles laïques_. 1879.
_Esquisse d’une Classification systématique des Doctrines
philosophiques_. 2 vols. 1886.
_3e Essai_, revised: _Les Principes de la Nature_. 1892.
_Victor Hugo, le Poète_. 1893.
_4e Essai_, revised: _L’lntroduction à la Philosophie analytique de
l’Histoire_. 1896.
_5e Essai_, new: _La Philosophie analytique de l’Histoire_. 4 vols. I.
and II. 1806. III. and IV. 1897. (This brought the Essais up to
thirteen volumes.)
_La Nouvelle Monadologie_. 1891). (With L. Prat.) (“Crowned” by the
Académie des Sciences morales et politiques.)
_Victor Hugo, le Philosophe_. 1900.
_Les Dilemmes de la Métaphysique pure_. 1901.
_Histoire et Solution des Problèmes métaphysiques_. 1901.
_Le Personnalisme, suivi d’une Etude sur la Perception externe et sur
la Force_ 1903.
Posthumous:
_Derniers entretiens_. 1905.
_Doctrine de Kant_. 1906.
For his two journals, see under “Periodicals.”
In the latest edition the complete _Essais de Critique générale_ are
only ten volumes, as follows: _Logic_, 2; _Psychology_, 2; _Principles
of Nature_, 1; _Introduction to Philosophy of History_, 1; _and the
Philosophy of History_, 4.
The best monograph is that of Séailles, 1905.
Renouvier’s Correspondence with the Swiss Philosopher, Sécretan, has
been published; _cf_. also _The Letters of William James_. REYNAUD:
_Philosophie religieuse_. 1858. (Third Edition.) RIBOT: _La Psychologie
anglaise contemporaine_. 1870. (E.T. 1873.)
_Hérédité, Etude psychologique_. 1873. (E.T. 1875.)
_La Psychologie allemande contemporaine_. 1879. (E.T. 1886.)
_Les Maladies de la Mémoire, Essai dans la Psychologie positive_. 1881.
(E.T. 1882.)
_Les Maladies de la Volonté_. 1883. (E.T. 1884.)
_Les Maladies de la Personnalité_. 1885. (E.T. 1895.)
_La Psychologie de l’Attention_. 1889. (E.T. 1890.)
_La Psychologie des Sentiments._ 1896. (E.T. 1897.)
_L’Evolution des Idées générales._ 1897. (E.T. 1899.)
_Essai sur l’Imagination créatrice_. 1900.
_La Logique des Sentiments_. 1904.
_Essai sur les Passions_. 1906.
_La Vie inconsciente et les Mouvements_. SABATIER (AUGUSTE): _Esquisse
d’une Philosophie de Religion d’après la Psychologie et l’Histoire_.
1897.
_Les Religions d’Autorité et la Religion de l’Esprit_. 1904. (E.T.)
SABATIER (PAUL): _A propos de la Séparation des Eglises de l’Etat_.
1905. E.T., Robert Dell, 1906 (with Text of the Law). SÉAILLES:
_Affirmations de la Conscience moderne_. 1903. SIMON: _La Liberté de
Conscience_. 1859.
_Dieu, Patrie, Liberté_. 1883. SOREL: _Reflexions sur la Violence_.
1907. (E.T 1916.)
_Illusions du Progrès_. 1911. TAINE: _Les Philosophes français au XIXe
Siecle_. 1857.
_Essais de Critique et d’Histoire_. 1858.
_Philosophie de l’Art_. 2 vols. 1865. (E.T. 1865.)
_Nouveaux Essais de Critique et d’Histoire_. 1865.
_De l’Intélligence_. 2 vols. 1870. (E T. 1871.)
The work _Origines de la France contemporaine_ in 5 vols, 1876-93.
_Histoire de la Littérature anglaise_. 5 vols. 1863. (E.T. by Van Laun.
1887.)
Monographs: De Margerie: _Taine_. 1894.
Monod: _Renan, Taine, et Michelet_. 1894.
Barzellotti: _La Philosophie de Taine._
Boutmy: _H. Taine_. 1897.
Giraud: _Essai sur Taine_. 1901. TARDE: _Criminalité comparée_. 1898.
_Les Lois de l’Imitation_. 1900. VACHEROT: _Histoire de l’Ecole
d’Alexandrie_. 1846-51.
_La Métaphysique et la Science_. 3 vols. 1858.
_La Démocratie_. 1860.
_Essais de Philosophie critique_. 1864.
_La Religion_. 1868.
_La Science et la Conscience_. 1870.
_Le Nouveau Spiritualisme_. 1884.
_Cf_. Parodi on Vacherot, _Revue de Métaphysique et de Morale_. 1899.
WEBER: _Le Rythme du Progrès_.
_Vers le Positivisme absolu par l’Idéalisme_. 1903. WlLBOIS: _Devoir et
Durée: Essai de Morale sociale_. 1912. XÉNOPOL: _Principes fondamentaux
de l’Histoire_. 1899. Revised and reissued in larger form in 1905 as
_La Théorie de l’Histoire_.

 [1] This abbreviation is used throughout for “English Translation.”

PERIODICALS

“LA CRITIQUE PHILOSOPHIQUE,” of Renouvier and Pillon, 1872. to 1884,
weekly; monthly from 1885 to 1889.
“LA CRITIQUE RELIGIEUSE,” 1878-1884 (quarterly). Renouvier.
“REVUE PHILOSOPHIQUE DE LA FRANCE ET DE L’ÉTRANGER,” founded by Ribot
in 1876.
“L’ANNÉE PHILOSOPHIQUE.” 1867-1869. Renouvier and Pillon, refounded in
1890 by Pillon.
“REVUE DE MÉTAPHYSIQUE ET DE MORALE,” founded by Xavier Leon in 1893.
“Crowned” by Académie des Sciences morales et politiques, 1921.
“ANNÉE PSYCHOLOGIQUE,” founded by Beaunet and Binet, 1895.
“REVUE DE PHILOSOPHIE,” founded by Peillaube, 1900.
“REVUE THOMISTE.”
“ANNALES DE PHILOSOPHIE CHRÉTIENNE.” Laberthonnière.
“ANNÉE SOCIOLOGIQUE.” 1896-1912. Durkheim.
“JOURNAL DE PSYCHOLOGIE NORMALE ET PATHOLOGIQUE.” Founded 1904 by Janet
and Dumas.
“BULLETIN DE LA SOCIÉTÉ FRANÇAISE DE PHILOSOPHIE.” From 1901.

II
GENERAL BOOKS ON THE PERIOD.

ALIOTTA: _The Idealistic Reaction against Science_. (E.T. from Italian.
1914.) BARTH: _Die Philosophie der Geschichte als Sociologie_. 1897.
BERGSON: _La Philosophie française_. 1915. BOUTROUX: _Philosophie en
France depuis_ 1867. Report to Congress of Philosophy given in the
_Revue de Métaphysique et de Morale_. 1908.
_La Philosophie_: an Essay in the volume of collected Essays entitled:
_Un Demi-Siècle de la Civilisation française_. 1870- 1915. Pp. 25-48.
(Paris: Hachette. 1916.) DWELSHAUVERS: _La Psychologie française
contemporaine_. 1920. FAGUET: _Dix-Neuvième Siècle_. 1887.
_Politiques et Moralistes du XIXe Siècle_. 1881. FERRAZ: _Etudes sur la
Philosophie en France au XIXe Siècle_. 3 vols. 1882-9.
It is interesting to notice the triple division adopted by Ferraz:
Socialism (under which heading he also groups Naturalism and
Positivism). Traditionalism (Ultramontanism). Spiritualism (together
with Liberalism).
FISCHER: _Geschichte der neuern Philosophie_. 9 vols. FOUILLÉE:
_Histoire de la Philosophie_, Latest Edition, last Chapter.
_Le Mouvement idéaliste et la Réaction contre la Science positive._
1896.
_La Pensée et les nouvelles Ecoles anti-intellectualistes_. 1912.
HÖFFDING: _Modern Philosophers._ (E.T. from Danish. 1915.) LÉVY-BRUHL:
_Modern Philosophy in France_. Chicago, 1899. MERZ: _History of
European Thought in the Nineteenth Century_. 4 vols.
A great work. Very comprehensive, particularly for German and British
thought. PARODI: _La Philosophie contemporaine en France_. 1919.
An excellent treatment of the development from 1890 onwards by a French
thinker. (“Crowned” by Académie.) RAVAISSON: _Rapport sur la
Philosophie en France au XIXe Siècle_. 1867. (Second Edition, 1889.)
This has become an acknowledged classic. RENOUVIER: _Philosophie
analytique de l’Histoire_. (Vol. IV. latest sections.) 1897.
RUGGIERO: _Modern Philosophy_. 1912. (E.T. from Italian. 1921.)
Gives a stimulating account of German, French, Anglo- American and
Italian thought. STEBBING: _Pragmatism and French Voluntarism_. 1914.
TAINE: _Les Philosophes français du XIXe Siècle_. 1857. TURQUET-MILNES,
G.: _Some Modern French Writers: A Study in Bergsonism_. 1921.
Deals mainly with literary figures-e.g., Barres, Péguy, France,
Bourget, Claudel. VILLA: _Contemporary Psychology_. (E.T. from Italian.
1903.)
_L’Idealismo moderno_. 1905. WEBER: _Histoire de la Philosophie
européenne_. (Eighth Edition, 1914.)

* * * * *

The article contributed by Ribot to _Mind_ in 1877 is worthy of notice,
while much light is thrown on the historical development by articles in
the current periodicals cited on p. 338, especially in the _Revue
philosophique_ and the _Revue de Métaphysique et de Morale_.



IIII
COMPARATIVE TABLE

THE CHIEF PHILOSOPHICAL WORKS IN FRANCE, GERMANY, ENGLAND AND AMERICA
FROM 1851 TO 1921.


_FRANCE._ _GERMANY._ _ENGLAND AND AMERICA._ l851     COURNOT: “Essai
sur les Fondements de nos Connaissances.”     1851     FECHNER: “Zend
Avesta.”     1851     MANSEL: “Prolegomena to Logic.” RENOUVIER:
“Gouvernement direct et Organisation communale.”

PROUDHON: “La Philosophie du Progrès.”

1852     MOLESCHOTT: “Der Kreislauf des Lebens.” LOTZE: “Medizinische
Psychologie oder Physiologie der Seele.” 1854     RENOUVIER: “Essai de
Critique générale”(Ier Essai).
1854     FERRIER: “Institutes of Metaphysic.” COMTE completes “Systeme
de Politique positive.”

1855     BÜCHNER: “Kraft und Stoff.”     1855     BAIN: “The Senses and
the Intellect.” FECHNER: “Uber die physikalische und die philosophische
Atomlehre.”     SPENCER: “Principles of Psychology.” CZOLBE: “Neue
Darstellung des Sensualismus.”
1856     COMTE: “Synthèse subjective,” vol. i.     1856     LOTZE:
“Mikrokosmos” (1856-1864).

CZOLBE: “Die Enstehung des Selbstbewusstseins.” 1857     TAINE:
“Philosophes rançais du XIXe Siecle.”
1857     BUCKLE: “History of Civilization in England” (vol. i.). RENAN:
“Etudes d’Histoire religieuse.”     MANSEL: “The Limits of Religious
Thought.” 1858     VACHEROT: “La Métaphysique et la Science.”     1858 
   HAMILTON: “Lectures” (1858-1860). 1859     RENOUVIER: “Deuxième
Essai de Critique generale.”     I859     DARWIN: “Origin of Species.”

1860     FECHNER: “Elemente der Psychophysik.”
1861     COURNOT: “Traité de l’Enchaînement des Idees.”     1861    
FECHNER: “Uber die Seelenfrage.”

1862     HÄCKEL: “Generalle Morphologie” (1862-1866).     1862    
SPENCER: “First Principles.” 1863     RENAN: “Vie de Jésus.”     1863  
  VOGT: “Vorlesungen iiber den Menschen.”     1863     MILL (J. S.):
“Utilitarianism.”

FECHNER: “Die Drei Motive des Glaubens.”
1864     RENOUVIER: “Troisième Essai de Critique générale”; “Quatrième
Essai de Critique générale.”
1865     BERNARD: “Introduction à l’Etude de la Médecine
expérimentale.”     1865     DÜHRING: “Der Wert des Lebens.”     1865  
  HODGSON: “Time and Space.”

CZOLBE: “Die Grenzen und der Ursprung der Menschlichen Erkenntnis.”    
MILL (J. S): “Examination of Sir William Hamilton’s Philosophy.”

HAMILTON: “Lectures on Metaphysics.” STIRLING: “Secret of Hegel.” 1866 
   LANGE: “Geschichte des Materialismus.”
1867     RAVAISSON: “Rapport sur la Philosophie en France au XIXe
Siecle.”     1867     MARX: “Das Kapital.”     1867     BUCKLE:
“History of Civilization in England” ( vol. ii.). 1868     RENAN:
“Questions contemporaines.”     1868     LOTZE: “Geschichte der
Asthetik in Deutschland.”

HÄCKEL: “Natürliche Schöpftungsgeschichte 1869     RENOUVIER: “Science
deU Morale.”     1869     HARTMANN: “Philosophic des Unbewussten.” 1870
    TAINE: “De l’Intelligence.”     1870     RITSCHL: “Lehre von der
Rechfertigung”(1870-1874). 1871     LACHELIER: “Du Fondement de
l’Induction.”
1872     FOUILLÉE: “La LibertcS et la Determinisme,”     1872    
STRAUSS: “Der Alte und der neue Glaube.”     1872     MAURICE: “Moral
and Metaphysical Philosophy.” JANET: “Problemes du XIXe Siecle.”    
NIETZSCHE: “Die Geburt der Tragödie”     WALLACE: “Logic of Hegel.”
COURNOT: “Considerations sur la Marche des Idees.”
1873     RIBOT: “IWredite.” 1873     1973     SIGWART: “Logik”
(1873-1878). 1873     1973     STEPHEN (J. F.): “Liberty,
Equality,Fraternity.” 1874     BOUTROUX: “La Contingence des Lois de la
Nature.”     1874     LOTZE: “Drei Bucher der Logik.”     1874    
SIDGWICK: “Method of Ethics.”

WUNDT: “Physiologische Psychologie.”
BRENTANO: “Psychologie vom empirischen Standpunkt.” 1875     COURNOT:
“Materialisme, Vitalisme,Rationalisme.”
RENOUVIER: Revises first and second “Essais.” 1876     RENAN:
“Dialogues et Fragments philosophiques.”     1876     FECHNER:
“Vorschule der Asthetik.”     1876     BRADLEY: “Ethical Studies.”
JANET: “Les Causes finales.”
GROTE: “Moral Ideals.”


1877     FLINT: “Theism.” 1878     FOUILLEE: “L’Idee du Droit.”    
1878     NIETZSCHE: “Menschliches Allzumenschhches “(1878-1880).    
1878     HODGSON: “Philosophy of Reflection.” 1879     BROCHARD: “De
l’Erreur.”     1879     LOTZE: “Drei Bucher der Metaphysik.”     1879  
  SPENCER: “Data of Ethics.”

HARTMANN: “Phanomenologie des sittlichen Bewusstseins.”     BALFOUR:
“Defence of Philosophic Doubt.” 1880     AVENARIUS: “Kritik der reinen
Erfahrung”(1880-1890)     1880     CAIRD: “Philosophy ol Religion.”
1881     GUYAU: “Vers d’un Philosophe.”     1881     NIETZSCHE:
“Morgenrote.”

1882     NIETZSCHE: “Die frohliche Wissenschaft.”     1882     STEPHEN
(L.): “Science of Ethics.” 1883     NIETZSCHE: “Also sprach
Zarathustra”(1883-1891)     1883     GREEN: “Prolegomena to Ethics.”
DUHRING: “Der Ersatz der Religion.”     BRADLEY: “Principles of Logic.”
WUNDT: “Logik.”
MACH: “Die Mechanik in ihrer Entwicklung.” 1885     GUYAU: “Esquisse
d’une Morale sans Obligation ni Sanction.”
1885     MARTINEAU: “Types o. Ethical Theory.” LACHELIER: “Psychologic
et Métaphysique.”     BOSANQUET: “Knowledge and Reality.” 1886    
GUYAU: “L’Irreligion de l’Avenir.”     1886     MACH: “Analyse der
Empfindungen.”     1886     WARD: “Psychology” (article).

WUNDT: “Ethik.”
NIETZSCHE: “Jenseits von Gut und Böse.” 1887     NIETZSCHE: “Zur
Genealogie der Moral.”     1887     SETH (Pringle-Pattison):
“Hegelianism and Personality.” 1888     EUCKEN: “Die Einheit des
Geisteslebens.”     1888     BOSANQUKT: “Logic.” 1889     BERGSON: “Les
Donnees immediates de la Conscience.”     1889     WUNDT: “System der
Philosophie.”     1889     MARTINEAU: “Study of Religion.” FOUILLEE:
“L’Avenir de la Metaphysique.”     LIPPS: “Grundthatsachen des
Seelenlebens.”     ALEXANDER: “Moral Order and Progress.” JANET
(Pierre): “L’Automatisme psychologique.”

PAULHAN: “L’Activité mentale.” 1890     RENAN: “L’Avenir de la
Science.”     1890     JAMES: “Principles of Psychology.” FOUILLÉE:
“L’Evolutionnisme des Idées-forces.”
RAUH: “Le Fondement métaphysique de la Morale”

1891     SIMMEL: “Moralwissenschaft.” AVENARIUS: “Der menschliche
Weltbegriff.” 1892     RENOUVIER Revises third “Essai.”
1892     PEARSON: “Grammar Of Science.” RENAN “Feuilles détachées.”
1893     DURKHEIM: “De la Division du Travail social.”     1893    
HUXLEY: “Evolution and Ethics.” BLONDEL: “L’Action.”     CAIRD:
“Evolution of Religion” FOUILLÉE: “Psychologie des Idées-forces.”    
BRADLEY: “Appearance and Reality.”

1894     MEINONG: “Werththeorie” (Psychologisch-ethische
Untersuchungen).     1894     FRASER: “Philosophy of Theism” HERTZ:
“Prinzipien der Mechanik.”
1895     FOUILLÉE: “Le Mouvement idéaliste.”
1895     BALFOUR: “Foundations of Belief.” 1896     BERGSON: “Matière
et Mémoire”     1896     EUCKEN: “Der Kampf um einen geistigen
Lebensinhalt.”     1896     STOUT: “Analytic Psychology.” RENOUVIER:
Revises fourth “Essai.”
HOBHOUSE: “Theory of Knowledge.” RENOUVIER: Publishes fifth “Essai” (La
Philosophie analytique de l’Histoire), vols. 1 and 2.     MERZ:
“History of Thought in the Nineteenth Century” (1896-1914).

MACTAGGART: “Hegelian Dialectic.” 1897     RENOUVIER: Ditto, vols. 3
and 4.     1897     HARTMANN: “Kategorienlehre.”     1897     JAMES:
“The Will to Believe SABATIER: “Esquisse d’une Philosophie de
Religion.”     DREWS: “Das Ich als Grundproblem der Metaphysik.”

EHRENFELS: “System der Werttheorie” (1897-1898).

1898     WALLACE: “Natural Theology and Ethics.” 1899     RENOUVIER
(and Prat): “La Nouvelle Monadologie.”     1899     MEINONG: “Uber
gegenstände höheren Ordnung.”     1899     WARD: “Naturalism and
Agnosticism.”


BOSANQUET: “Philosophical Theory of the State.” HODGSON: “Metaphysic of
Experience.” 1900     TARDE: “Les Lois de l’Imitation.”     1900    
PETZOLDT: “Die Philosophie der reinen Erfahrung.”     1900     ROYCE:
“The World and the Individual.” BRUNSCHWICG: “La Vie de l’Esprit.”


1901     EUCKEN: “Das Wesen der Religion.” EUCKEN: “Das Wahrheitsgehalt
der Religion.” 1902     POINCARÉ     1902     COHEN: “System der
Philosophie: Logik.”     1902     JAMES: “Varieties of Religious
Experience.”


CLIFFORD: “Essays and Lectures.” 1903     WEBER: “Vers le Positivisme
absolu par l’Idéalisme.”     1903     BERGMANN: “System des objectiven
Idealismus.”     1903     RUSSELL: “Principles of Mathematics.” RAUH:
“L’Expérience morale.”
SCHILLER: “Humanism.” RENOUVIER: “Le Personnalisme.”

1904     COHEN: “System der Philosophie: Ethik.”     1904    
MACTAGGART: “Hegelian Cosmology.” 1905     POINCARÉ: “Valeur de la
Science.”     1905     MACH: Erkenntnis und Irrtum.”
1906     OLLÉ-LAPRUNE: “La Raison et le Rationalisme.”     1906    
MEINONG: “Die Stellung der Gegenstandtheorie ein System der
Wissenschaften.”     1906     BAILLIE: “Idealistic Construction of
Experience.” DUHEM: “La Théorie physique.”
BALDWIN: “Thought and Things.” 1907     HAMELIN: “Les Eléments
principaux de la Répresentation.”     1907     EUCKEN: “Grundlinien
einer neuen Lebensauschauung.”     1907     SCHILLER: “Studies in
Humanism.” BERGSON: “L’Evolution créatrice.”     EUCKEN: “Hauptprobleme
der Religionsphilosophie.”
EVELLIN: “La Raison pure et les Antinomies.”
LALANDEL “Précis de Morale.” FOUILLÉE: “Morale des Idées-forces.” 1908 
   BOUTROUX: “Science et Religion.”     1908     EUCKEN: “Sinn und
Wertdes Lebens.”

EUCKEN: “Philosophie des Geisteslebens.” MÜNSTERBERG: “Philosophie der
Werte.” 1909     POINCARÉ: “Science et Méthode.”
1909     DEWEY: “Logical Theory.”

1910     REMKHE: “Philosophie als Grundwissenschaft”
1911     DUNAN: “Les Deux Idéalismes.”     1911     EUCKEN: “Konnen wir
noch Christen sein?”     1911     WARD: “Realm of Ends.” 1912    
FOUILLÉE: “La Pensée.”     1912     COHEN: “System der Philosophie:
Æsthetik.”     1912     BOSANQUET: “Value and Destiny of the
Individual” DURKHEIM: “Formes élémentaires de la Vie religieuse.”    
EUCKEN: “Erkennen und Leben.”


1913     BOSANQUET: “Value and Destiny of the Individual.” 1914    
FOUILLÉE: “Humanitaires et Libertaires.”

1915     SORLEY: “Moral Values and the Idea of God.” 1917     LOISY:
“La Religion.”
1918     GOBLOT: “Traité de Logique.” 1919     BERGSON: “L’Energie
spirituelle.”

1920     ALEXANDER: “Space, Time and Deity.” 1921     RUSSELL:
“Analysis of Mind.” MACTAGGART: “Nature of Existence.”