boundaries of individual property after the yearly inundations of the Nile. The nomadic Chaldeans studied astronomy in order to be able to guide their herds. Man tries to solve the riddles of life so as to be able to know how to act and guard his interests, be they temporal or spiritual. The human mind seeks to obtain a clear, consistent, and true insight into the world and life by solving their riddles. The problems are various and manifold. From the earth which we tread to the starstudded vault above, what an immensity of objects for the human intellect to deal with !-what a vast desert of ignorance!-where the human mind is daily endeavouring to discover a new oasis and to make a step forward to penetrate into the secrets of nature and divulge them for the benefit of humanity. But gradually, by trying to escape ignorance, there arises the desire to know. We wish to know for the sake of knowledge, independently of practical use. Man has by nature a desire to know. This desire, deeply rooted in his breast, is indestructible. It is this strenuous impulse, which becomes stronger with the growth of reason, and which seeks to know the high and fundamental truths of life and existence, the reason and connection of things, that causes man to philosophize. He becomes conscious of his ignorance, he doubts, he forms conceptions and ideas, and becomes convinced of their truth. The truth he has thus gained is not confined to the dead kingdom of abstract speculation: it ultimately applies to real, practical life. Philosophy, therefore, is the yearning and striving after knowledge of the hidden causes of things, with the view to the establishment of perfect harmony between our ideas and our actions, to establish a consistency between what we do and what we think. To escape ignorance, to find truth, to expose error that covers itself with the flimsy veil of seeming truth, is its aim in life. The origin and history of the term "philosophy" illustrates this. According to the Greek historian Herodotus, Croesus said to Solon: "I have heard that thou hast travelled over many countries philosophizing"-meaning thereby, trying to acquire knowledge. Pericles used the term "philosophy" as designating the striving after culture. In any case, the word owes its origin to an admission of ignorance and an eager desire for knowledge. Pythagoras (but it is more correct to attribute the saying to Socrates) said: "Wisdom belongs to God alone, man can only strive to know; he can be a lover of wisdom, he can yearn for knowledge and search for truth," which state of mind is clearly defined by the words "philosophy and "philosopher," pinos (philos) being the Greek for "lover," and oopía (sophia) for "wisdom." A sophos, or wise man, on the other hand, was one who distinguished himself in some art or craft. Originally the term was applied to one possessing either a physical or a mental accomplishment-to a musician or a cook, navigator or carpenter; but gradually it came to be applied only to one possessing mental superiority. Socrates thus modestly called himself a philosopher (or wisdom-lover) in distinction to the sophists (or wisdom-mongers), who, like commercial hawkers, travelled about the country and dealt in all sorts of knowledge which they sold for money, and which the buyers also intended for practical use only. Philosophy, then, deals with all possible problems; in a word, with the universe. We divide these problems, however, into three classes, according to the form and subject-matter of the investigation :— (1) The problem of unity or of the fundamental principle, the omnipotent, omnicreative force that animates the universe. This part is called Metaphysics. (2) The problem of plurality, or the manifold manifestations of the world. This is Natural Philosophy. (3) The problem of the individual creatures of which man is to us the most important.1 Psychology, or the knowledge of the mental life of man, deals again (1) with the method of how to think and how to arrive at a true conclusion by means of thought this part is called Logic, and its object is to develope the idea of 1 Anthropology deals with the life of man in all its being and evolution, the life of the body as well as that of the mind. The knowledge of the former is Somatology, or Physiology; that of the latter is Psychology. the True; (2) with the sentiment: this is called Esthetics; it developes the idea of the Beautiful; (3) with the desire this is the domain of Ethics: it turns upon the idea of the Good. "The Psychology of cognition," says Professor Sully,1 "forms the basis of the regulative Science of Logic, which aims at giving us rules by which we may know that we are thinking or reasoning correctly. The Psychology of the feelings underlies Esthetics as the regulative science which seeks to determine the true objective standard of what is beautiful and worthy of admiration.” The conduct of man for the attainment of the good is regulated by duty. Duty presupposes law. Law is either that of nature or dictated by human reason. Hence we have a Philosophy of Law. The problems which turn upon the relations of the individuals to each other form another philosophical discipline called Sociology, which includes also the Philosophy of History. Thus we have the following disciplines of Philosophy :-(1) Metaphysics. (2) Philosophy of Nature. (5) Esthetics. (6) Ethics. (7) Philosophy of Law. Sociology and Philosophy of History. 1 "The Human Mind," p. 12. CHAPTER II METAPHYSICS § 1. THE universe with all its manifestations can be regarded scientifically from two points of view. From one point of view we investigate the forms in which the universe appears to us, i.e. to our senses, leaving aside the unknown and unknowable causes; from the second point of view we consider the very essence of the phenomena, independently of how they affect our senses. The first view is the object of the positive sciences, the second that of Metaphysics. Each science employs certain conceptions as its tools and instruments. It does not, however, question the value of these instruments and utensils which it finds ready for its purpose. They are there, and the fact is sufficient. These conceptions are space, time, quantity, quality, cause, effect, motion, power, matter, form, etc. conceptions applied to things in existence. For all the sciences the cause of a fact is nothing else than another fact, the cause of a movement is another movement; the cause of a sound, for instance, is the movement of the air -it is nothing but another state or condition. Thus the scientists, each in his own branch, investigate the various manifestations, the forms and changes of matter, as they perceive them, without inquiring what matter is or even why it is. All they wish to know is the how. Their sphere of knowledge is limited by the boundary-lines of the finite, by facts based on experience. The human spirit, however, in its inquisitiveness, is not satisfied with this knowledge. The fleeting manifestations which form 6 material, real life cannot exist by themselves; there must be something permanent and eternal, some hidden energy, something similar to our own will when we act or move our body, something Infinite, Everlasting, and Absolute, which is the cause of all reality, and which the language of religion calls God. There should, therefore, be a science which takes as the object of its investigations these very conceptions, of which other sciences avail themselves, but which they have become accustomed to consider as needing no explanation. This science is Metaphysics. It does not deal with the laws and facts of the material world as revealed to our senses, but it discusses the very testimony of the senses, dealing with the essence of things, searching for ultimate reasons. It does not accept facts on the guarantee of common sense alone, but asks for the something unknown upon which other sciences establish themselves unquestioningly. Not content with a knowledge of things which, perhaps, appear to us differently from what they are in reality, Metaphysics wishes to know what is behind or beyond the natural phenomena. We may say that it endeavours to grasp the hidden springs that move the world, that it longs to enter into the mysteries of the great Unknown," and thus to touch the beating pulse of the universe. 66 The same craving and yearning to grasp the Unknown and Mysterious which in uncultured and simple minds result in superstitious beliefs lead the philosopher to metaphysical speculation. Metaphysics thus inquires into the last or first cause, and is the science of the Really Existent. It is that part of Philosophy which occupies itself with the most general questions of philosophic research. § 2. Whether Metaphysics will ever attain its aim, or whether it will remain a beggar on the threshold of the Hall of the great Unknown, only speculating on the nature of its contents, for ever fighting and struggling with the ultimate difficulties of the many riddles of the Universe, are questions to which we do not presume to give an answer. Whether human reason will ever be capable of solving satisfactorily these problems, or |