Introduction to philosophy: an inquiry after a rational system of scientific principles in their relation to ultimate reality

Front matter

Class _

Book.

GpightN?_

Introduction To Philosophy

The kind of philosophy which one chooses depends on the kind of man one is. For a philosophical system is not a dead bit of furniture which one can take to one's self or dispose of, as one pleases ; but it is endowed with a soul by the soul of the man who has it. — Fichte.

Introduction to Philosophy

AN INQUIRY

AFTER

A RATIONAL SYSTEM OF SCIENTIFIC PRINCIPLES

IN

THEIR RELATION TO ULTIMATE REALITY

BY

GEORGE TRUMBULL LADD

PROFESSOR OF PHILOSOPHY IN YALE UNIVERSITY

- PYRI.

<d

Preface

IT is not easy to describe the precise purpose of this book in the few words of an appropriate title. I have, indeed, cherished the hope that it may serve to " introduce " some of its readers to the study of philosophy. Undoubtedly the number is increasingly large who recognize, if only vaguely, the existence of " those riddles " — as said Lotze — " by which our mind is oppressed in life, and about which we are compelled to hold some view or other, in order to be able really to live at all." It is these riddles which form the subjects of philosophical investigation. Among the persons who at least recognize their existence are the young in the later years of our higher institutions of learning. I have therefore had them in mind in writing this treatise.

I have not thought it desirable, however, to put my thoughts into the technical form of a book of instruction for beginners in philosophy. In a subject that deals so largely with problems inviting to reflection and ending, at best, in opinion, there seems to me something unbecoming and even repulsive in the textbook form. Yet I believe that the skilful teacher of philosophy will find this book helpful in bringing its problems, and their discussion from whatever point of view, before his classes.

yiii PREFACE.

But there are many besides the students in our colleges and seminaries who thoughtfully raise and earnestly pursue the philosophical inquiries. To them, too, I would gladly speak a word of sympathy and cheer, and (if possible) hold out a helping hand. Of no other pursuit is it so true as of philosophy, that it has no " royal road." The profoundest reflections of the mightiest intellects and the daily musings and self-questionings of the plainest men and women have all the fundamental things in common here. Freedom and caution, earnestness and modesty, are alike becoming in all. No costly laboratory, no expensive apparatus, no tiresome journeys of exploration, are indispensable in the pursuit of philosophy.

This book is therefore addressed to the laity, at large, as well as to those who are in processes of education. Though much of its language is somewhat foreign to that of common life, the subjects of which it treats are those which lie upon the minds and hearts of all the thoughtful. If to such any of my thoughts can be an introduction, or a vade-mecum, in reflection, my purposes will thus be the more completely attained.

Though this book is called an " Introduction," no special pains have been taken to simplify or popularize its treatment. For those accustomed to think in the lines it follows, its views will, I hope, always be found clearly and candidly expressed. It is not to be expected that these views will all find acceptance with those most competent to judge. For beginners in philosophy some expressions will doubtless seem obscure, or hard to be understood. But, then, reflection is the indispensable method of philosophy ; and he who does not learn to reflect over the meanings which the words employed in philosophical writings bear, cannot hope to make progress in philosophical study. For if, when entering upon this study, the plain and thoughtful man needs no special equipment

PEEFACE. ix

besides his own powers of reflection, the keenest and most showily educated mind cannot dispense with reflection.

Finally, the expert readers — if such the book should find — will not be long in discovering that the so-called " Introduction " is by no means a perfectly colorless affair. Doubtless a system of philosophy (or at least the sketch and protocol of such a system) lies concealed in these pages. If the subject were urged to the point of a confession, it would appear that the author has views of his own to which he wishes to introduce his readers. These views are to a certain large extent positive as well as critical. The attempt has been made, however, to prevent their expression in a form unreasonably and offensively dogmatic. Whether they are sound and defensible, each reader must, on due consideration, judge for himself. But a " system of philosophy " has only been suggested and sketched. The expansion and more detailed discussion of its separate departments by the same hand must abide their time.

GEORGE TRUMBULL LADD.

Yale University, July, 1890.

Chapter I. Introductory

HISTORY AND DEFINITION OF THE TERM "PHILOSOPHY."

THE inquiry, "What is philosophy?" cannot be answered by a direct appeal to history. This is true, whether the appeal be taken to a widespreading and confessedly unscientific usage, or to the conceptions and terminology of authorities in philosophy. Popular expression has much misused the word; it has thus tended in no small degree to produce distrust toward the particular discipline which the word represents. But the writers of philosophical masterpieces have by no means been at agreement on this point. This, too, is one reason for the unfavorable attitude of many cultivated persons toward the pursuit of "metaphysics," technically so called. Men eminent in science, literature, or education are accustomed to identify philosophy with metaphysics ; and by the latter term they understand the sum-total of unverifiable ontological speculations.

If the fullest reasonable allowance be made for the grounds upon which the foregoing misapprehensions are based, a claim to honorable mention can still be made for philosophy, and also a claim to recognition for philosophical study. Nay, more ; we should not despair of showing that this "mother of the sciences " has been scarcely inferior to any other factor in the elevation, ameliorating, and enrichment of the life of literature

l and of conduct. But even the beginnings of such an apologetic argument must be for the present postponed. It will be a more economical course, first of all, to clear from obscurity the conception of philosophy, and to show how the study of philosophy may be most successfully pursued.

It need not be argued in detail that the exact and comprehensive definition of any form of science or of intellectual discipline is no easy task. Life and reality nowhere draw for us perfectly distinct lines. Even the physical and natural sciences find great difficulty in separating their peculiar spheres, and in limiting their particular ends and objects of pursuit within those spheres. Here lies at least one reason why, if we I are to believe Mr. Herbert Spencer, " the sciences cannot be rationally arranged in serial order." In fact, the experts of the " exact sciences " are still at disagreement over important points relating to this matter. Meanwhile, the world of scholars is inquiring whether clearer conceptions of such forms of knowledge as logic and psychology are not possible. A recent writer 1 on the latter of the two has maintained that " psychology cannot be defined at all by reference to a special subject-matter, as can mineralogy and botany."

Philosophy, then, is not necessarily at a great relative disadvantage, if it cannot appeal to common consent in limiting its own domain. Satisfactory definition is one of the latest and finest achievements in the pursuit of any science. Nor is it likely that finished and faultless definition will be reached until human knowledge is itself finished and faultless.

It is not our intention, however, to deny that somewhat peculiar difficulties surround the attempt to formulate a precise conception of the nature of philosophy. Nor do we fear the further confession that the reason for these difficulties is in part the fault of philosophers themselves. For the reason is only partly due to them ; it is also partly due to the nature of the subject. If we speak of philosophy as a " science " at all,

1 Dr. Ward in the Encyclopaedia Britannica (9th ed.) ; art. Psychology.

it can only be to lay emphasis upon a correct method for its study, and a certain ideal certainty aimed at in its conclusions. It will be one result of our inquiry to show that philosophy should not be identified with any form of positive science.

The difficulty of fixing upon an independent domain for philosophy is increased by the recent vigorous growth and wonderful diversifying of the particular sciences. Familiar changes in the use of terms illustrate this truth. Intelligent persons are no longer inclined to speak of physics as " natural philosophy ; " and yet this term has a legitimate birthright. For the speculative thought in whose line of succession we are standing to-day, had its rise in crude theories as to the ultimate constituents of the physical universe. Some, with Thales, said that all things arose from and consist of water; and some, with Anaximander, that the beginning of all things (apxv) was the unlimited (d-rreipov), — that is, " the infinite mass of matter, out of which all things arise." Still others said the ultimate physical principle is air, or " eternally living fire." Others sought a formal or quasi-spiritual " First ; " and this they found in number, through which the totality of things becomes a cosmos, — an orderly and beautiful whole ; or in One Divine Being, " all eye, all ear, all thought ; " or in Mind, " itself mixed with nothing," but acting on matter considered as an inert and compound, but as yet undifferentiated, mass.

It is to physics rather than to metaphysics that inquirers appeal in these days for a speculative solution of questions like the foregoing. But it is nevertheless true that any solution of such questions must always be mingled largely with the prevailing metaphysics. The fact that we assign their discussion to science rather than to philosophy, illustrates the modern tendency to narrow the sphere hitherto occupied by philosophy.

What is true of physics is even yet more true of psychology, as inclusive of both logic and ethics. For this science the complex states of consciousness constitute the problems to be solved. In dealing with these problems psychology presses hard upon philosophy for the right to what the latter formerly considered its peculiar domain. The descriptive and evolutionary science of mind claims the power to explain the genesis of conceptions of real Being and eternal Truth. The ultimate and fundamental forms of thought and belief {semina scientice, semina ceternitatis) are thus brought into the burning focus of the idea of development. In this focus the hitherto stable forms of all Thought and Keality lose their life. Not only Space and Time, but also the ethical and aesthetical Ideals, and even the categories of Thought, are thus apparently reduced to a condition of perpetual change.

With Plato, philosophy moved in the sphere of the Idea. The Platonic Idea (ISea or etSo?) was " a pure archetypal essence, in which those things that are together subsumed under the same concept participate." Both aesthetically and ethically, it was the perfect in its kind ; to it every individual reality remained far and forever inferior. Of all the ideas, the highest (for they were a kingdom) was the Idea of the Good. This Idea is the real cause of all Being and Knowledge, as the sun in the kingdom of ideas. In this sphere of lofty intuitions of supersensible realities did divine philosophy, according to Plato, have its movement and life. But as astronomy with the telescope has banished from the heavens the fixed and musical spheres of the planets, so have psychology and anthropology apparently banished the sphere of the Platonic ideas.

The very conception which Aristotle held of philosophy was unfavorable to the claim for it of a domain distinct from the particular sciences. Psychology and logic recognize in this great Greek their first progenitor. But they treat the Aristotelian categories, and the four principles of his " First Philosophy," — questions set apart by him for metaphysics, — as subjects falling within their scientific domain.

Through the Middle Age", and even into modern times, it was theology which was most closely allied with philosophy. During this period the latter was understood to be ancillary to the former, or rather to the reigning dogmas of the Church. In theory and appearance, theology dominated philosophy. In reality, philosophy controlled and guided theology ; and, finally, having gained her own freedom, undertook the task of freeing her former mistress from the principle of traditional authority. In the general movement of enlarging and diversifying human knowledge, a so-called " science of religion " has arisen. Theology, too, has at length tardily and feebly felt the modern impulse. It has even claimed to be the "science of sciences." How much more of the sphere once recognized as belonging to philosophy is not in this way forever consigned to the particular^ sciences ?

But is it not the peculiar and indefeasible right of philosophy to transact business with the Absolute ? In the construction and defence of this Idea, and in the deduction from it of the forms and laws of all reality, may not philosophy find its legitimate work ? But certain of the particular sciences refuse to surrender even this barren right to philosophy. Psychology attempts to bring the very conception of the Absolute into this same focus of analysis. The conception is pronounced negative, a mere abstraction, with no correlate in reality. The deductive process, by which philosophy once sought to pass from this Idea to the world of concrete realities with which science deals, is shown to have the appearance and not the substance of an argument. Ethics, politics, art, and religion pursue their way, regardless of the once proud philosophy of the Absolute. To it is left only those pale ghosts of conceptions that belong to the death-kingdom of abstract thought.

" Philosophy," says Lotze, " is a mother wounded by the ingratitude of her own children." It is not the ingratitude, however, of denying their maternal origin which wounds her most deeply. The history of the particular sciences, even more than the history of philosophy, shows how much they owe to the philosophic impulse and the philosophic reflection of the race. A wound not only deep but deadly would be inflicted, however, if these sciences should quite deprive philosophy of her rightful domain. Yet, after granting all their claims, what is left out of which to constitute this domain ?

The conception of philosophy, like the conception of science, implies a living historical development. We cannot wholly intrust to Plato and Aristotle the guidance of our minds into the precise and comprehensive idea we are seeking. But in the search we cannot safely overlook the thoughts of these ancient masters in philosophy. Kant, too, as the first who attempted to mark with precision the boundaries between philosophy and the positive sciences, is entitled to great consideration ; and yet we cannot uncritically receive the definition of even so profound a thinker.

The true method of defining the nature of philosophy is therefore perfectly plain. We must consult the history of philosophy and learn the views of its great teachers ; but we must maintain the freedom of criticism in our consultation of history. As children of all the ages, we receive with docility the instructions of the past. As children especially of this age, we must recognize our own right to the effort for an independent point of view. This method will be applied in two ways. A brief sketch of the history of the term " philosophy " will serve to indicate what are the important and permanent factors in the conception of philosophy. A more detailed criticism of the principal forms of definition (particularly in the modern era) will then enable us so to combine these factors as to reach the true and comprehensive definition.

The word " philosophy " 1 and its kindred terms do not occur in Homer or Hesiod. Herodotus (i. 30) represents Croesus as

1 Further information may be found in the following, among other works : TJeberweg, "A History of Philosophy," and an Article in the " Zeitschrift fur Philosophic u. philosoph. Kritik," New Series, vol. xlii., 1863, pp. 185-199 ; Striimpell, " Einleitung in die Philosophic vom Standpunkte d. Geschichte d. Philosophic;" Article by R. Haym, in Ersch und Gruber's " Encycl. d. Wissen. u. Kiinste," hi. 24; Lichtenfels, "Lehrbuch zur Einleitung in d. Philosophic;" Stuckenberg, " Introduction to the Study of Philosophy."

saying to Solon : " I have heard that thou hast travelled, philosophizing, over many lands." Thucydides makes Pericles use the term "to philosophize" in the Funeral Oration (ii. 40), as a striving after intellectual and scientific culture. A statement, probably mythical, concerning the remote and shadowy personality of Pythagoras, refers to him as the first to designate philosophy by the term "science." The thought ascribed to Socrates is well known. In the Platonic Apology (28 E) he calls by the term " philosophizing " that examination of himself and others by which he aimed to destroy the Sophistical conceit of wisdom ; in this he saw the mission of his life. It is with the disciples of Socrates that the term " philosophy " appears with a technical significance. Xenophon refers (Memorabil., I. ii. 31) to certain men who made a business (constituting, perhaps, a school) of "philosophizing."

It is Plato, however, who is the first even to attempt to describe, under the term " philosophy," a definite method and domain of human knowledge, and to give to it by his own labors a comprehensive and systematic treatment. Yet Plato vacillates in his definition, nor does he in practice remain true to any one conception of the subject. In several places 1 he expresses the belief — falsely ascribed to Pythagoras, but probably taught by Socrates — that wisdom belongs to God alone ; while it belongs to man to be rather a lover of wisdom. This wisdom (cro(f>ia) is identical with true knowledge 2 {kiricnr)^, or — as we should say — with science) ; philosophy is the acquisition of such knowledge. 3 It has to do, not with the sensuous, but with the ideal ; and, accordingly, with the eternal and immutably real. Philosophers are worthy, then, to be spoken of as those who " set their affections, in each case, on the really existent ; " 4 or as those who " are able to apprehend that which is always self-identical and immutable." 5

1 Phsedr., 278 d ; Symp., 203 e ; Lysis, 218 a (ed. Steph.).

Elsewhere 1 he speaks of philosophy so as to include under it certain branches of knowledge which we should to-day assign to the particular sciences, — he thus speaks, at least, of "geometry and certain other philosophy."

Philosophy has its spring, according to Plato, in a deep and passionate impulse of human nature. Its root is Eras, — the effort of mortal man to attain the immortal. To reach its proper aim it must pass from what is sensuous to what is intellectual, from the individual to the universal, — to the intuition and understanding of the Idea. 2 Thus philosophy is the elevation of the entire man out of the senses ; it includes all real and valuable knowledge, as well as the pursuit of knowledge in the correct manner. It also secures the fulfilment of moral duties. All other education or culture is merely a preparation for philosophy. 3

These expressions of Plato are sufficiently vague and shifting ; yet they clearly suggest all four of the most important factors in the true conception of philosophy. Two of them, at least, are to be distinguished even previous to the Platonic writings. One of these is the recognition of the profound and noble impulse from which springs the movement of philosophical thought. The truth is indeed expressed by Plato in figures of speech, but it is unmistakably expressed. What is only sensuous as an object, and uncertain opinion as a method, does not satisfy the rational nature of man. He longs, sometimes with the enthusiasm of the lover for his mistress, for communion with the Ideas, — with the eternal verity and real Being which they are.

The world has grown old since Plato's time, and some would have us believe that the passionate but rational impulse to which he appealed has become obsolete. But the philosophic impulse still exists, as vigorous and effective as ever, for its seat is the rational human soul ; and until it fails, philosophy will not fail to have its devotees and to fulfil its mission in the evolution of mind. Unlike any of the particular sciences, it is of the very nature of philosophy to exist with man. If there were no shells, there would be no science of conchology ; if there were no insects, no entomology ; if there were no precious metals, the science of political economy would undergo a great change. But wherever finite reason is, there philosophy as a pursuit and discipline must arise, and run a course of development.

Another factor made prominent by Plato in his inchoate conception may be thus stated: Philosophy is a special and peculiarly certain knowledge of reality. Whatever in each case is the really existent, upon that is the affection of the philosopher set. Whatever is eternal and immutable, this constitutes the object which he strives to grasp and hold. The most hardy Eealist of the present age does not venture to re-establish, in their ancient Platonic form, the kingdom of Ideas. And not a few students of the particular sciences would have us believe that to-day, at least, knowledge can flourish and justify itself at the bar of Eeason without reference to metaphysical reality. It cannot be denied that these sciences may be successfully pursued without bringing to the front the problems with which philosophy deals. Yet each of the greater divisions of science will always have its own peculiar metaphysical assumptions ; and the thought that somehow philosophy includes the search after, and the certification of, a higher and more comprehensive Eeality, still furnishes an essential factor in the definition of philosophy. This factor certainly entered into the Platonic conception.

Another noteworthy element in Plato's definition of philosophy is emphasized whenever he brings this discipline into relation with character and with the life of conduct. The wisdom in which it consists is not, indeed, primarily and chiefly a matter of character and conduct. Plato identifies it (o-o<f)la) with true and certain knowledge {iirta-rrjfi'ri), rather than with disposition or sound judgment in practical affairs (o-axfrpoavvr)'). 1 Later we come upon the definition of Cicero, which identifies it with that wisdom which is a knowledge of human and divine affairs. 2 And yet with Plato neither the method nor the conclusions of philosophy can be separated from practical life. For its successful pursuit a right disposition is indispensable ; when successfully pursued, it is a chief and only effectual means of cultivating a right disposition. To philosophic insight Plato, especially in all his earlier writings, refers the whole round of human virtues. This close connection between philosophical inquiry and the life of character and conduct remains, in spite of all impressions to the contrary, until the present time. It will always endure ; for it belongs to the very nature of philosophy, as issuing from its sources in the soul of man.

The fourth factor in the conception of philosophy, implicitly but insufficiently recognized by Plato, is its dependence upon the particular sciences. Between them and it he does not clearly distinguish; and, indeed, this distinction was not clearly made by any writer until centuries after the time of Plato. But the double sense in which the Greek master and his followers employ the word, recognizes both the fact of a distinction and the fact of the reciprocal dependence of these two forms of knowledge.

With Aristotle philosophy (<$>ikocro$[a, and sometimes arofyia) was identified with science in general ; in its most comprehensive meaning it included things so diverse as mathematics and physics, ethics and politics. 3 The "philosophies," or philosophical sciences, of mathematics, physics, and theology, were called theoretical. 4 But these sciences were, after all, not placed upon precisely the same footing with philosophy proper, in the thought and definitions of this writer. There is a " First

1 Comp. Lichtenfels, Lehrbuch zur Einleitung in die Philosophie, p. 6 f.

Philosophy" (irpcoTr] <pikoao^>ia), and the knowledge of this is the distinguishing pursuit of the philosopher. 1 This pre-eminently philosophical science is the systematic and critical knowledge of the most general and fundamental principles of Being, — the science of Being, as such (to bv y 6v), and not of any particular kind or department of existences. 2 In brief, it is what many would now call " metaphysics," or " ontology." In contrast with this, the special sciences are to be considered only partial.

It is obvious that two of the four important factors of the Platonic conception have been made more prominent in the definitions of Aristotle. Philosophy has especially to do with the fundamental principles of all Eeality ; its object of search is more general than that of any of the particular sciences, not even excepting theology. As compared with any of these sciences, it is universal, first, pre-eminent. It therefore involves some special knowledge of the really true and the really existent. As Paulsen says: "Aristotle indeed thinks he philosophizes when he investigates the natural history of animals, or household economy ; " but Aristotle does not consider such investigation as constituting philosophy in the highest and peculiar meaning of the term.

And yet — so the vacillation of the great Greek in his twofold use of the term seems to say — philosophy and the particular sciences are intimately interdependent. Moreover, as to subject-matter they must cover a common ground; for Aristotle admits no real kingdom of an ideal order existing apart from the individual and concrete realities with which the particular sciences deal. Philosophy must also follow scientific method ; it must be systematic, comprehensive, and yet kept constantly in touch with concrete realities.

After Aristotle, until comparatively recent times, little or no advance was made in the definition of philosophy. The

movement of thought was in this regard rather retrograde. The boundary which Plato began to draw when he distinguished the doctrine of the Ideas from other forms of knowledge, and which Aristotle made clearer when he distinguished "first philosophy" from the other philosophies and sciences, was again obscured by the Stoics. By philosophy they understood all forms of theoretical knowledge, together with its relations to conduct and to practical morality. The Epicureans also emphasized this aspect and application of philosophy, to the exclusion of other factors in its conception. With Seneca philosophy is the "love of wisdom" (sapientice amor), or the " zealous pursuit of virtue " (stadium virtutis) through virtue itself. 1 Epicurus himself is said to have identified philosophy with "the rational pursuit of happiness." 2 Still later, under the Neo-Platonists, the name became synonymous with the esoteric wisdom of sacred myth and theological poetry. Under early Christianity the monks came to be called philosophers, and the doctrines of the Church a philosophy.

The indefiniteness of the term among the Greeks and their somewhat degenerate successors shows — as says Zeller — that the thing itself had scarcely yet appeared as " a specific form of intellectual life." It must be remembered, however, that this lack of definiteness was chiefly due to a failure to distinguish philosophy from the particular sciences. But the conception of " science " also was never clearly formed in the Greek mind. It was indeed rather foreign to their stage of intellectual development. So true is this, that during all the Greek period the conception of philosophy, as respects comprehensiveness and accuracy, was rather in advance of the conception of science. Aristotle was, indeed, a real founder of logic, psychology, ethics, and aesthetics ; but it was only in the Alexandrian period that some of the other particular

sciences attained to the dignity of an independent cultivation, 1 Previously they had all been included in the vague term philosophy. It was centuries after this period, however, before the conception of science was developed.

It would be of little service to our purpose to trace in detail the history of the term " philosophy " from the post- Aristotelian period down to the time of Kant. The Schoolmen did little more than repeat what had been said by Plato and Aristotle. Descartes and his followers, so far as they make any attempt at definition, do not escape the confusion involved in cultivating, not only psychology, but also physics and biology, under the term " philosophy." The three principal works of Descartes himself are a mixture of considerations which would now be ascribed to the theory of knowledge, to theology, and to physics. Spinoza's works made an influential contribution to the speculative treatment of the highest philosophical themes ; but their author does nothing to distinguish philosophy from the particular sciences. The belief, which was fundamental with Leibnitz, compelled him everywhere to unite the theological with the mechanical view of the universe. Philosophy is therefore the result of a speculative union of two corresponding sets of ideas ; but its nature and scope are nowhere clearly defined. The school of Leibnitz as a distinct development culminated with the writings of Christian Wolff. This philosopher advocates a conception of philosophy wider, but less definite and satisfactory, than that of Aristotle. It is " such knowledge of those things that are, or happen, as enables us to understand why they are or happen ; " or it is " the knowledge of things possible, in as far as they are possible." 2