History of Modern Philosophy | Page 4

Time (_a_) Neo-Kantianism, Positivism, and Kindred Phenomena (_b_)
Idealistic Reaction against the Scientific Spirit (_c_) The Special
Philosophical Sciences 4. Retrospect
INDEX
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INTRODUCTION.
In no other department is a thorough knowledge of history so important
as in philosophy. Like historical science in general, philosophy is, on
the one hand, in touch with exact inquiry, while, on the other, it has a
certain relationship with art. With the former it has in common its
methodical procedure and its cognitive aim; with the latter, its intuitive
character and the endeavor to compass the whole of reality with a
glance. Metaphysical principles are less easily verified from experience
than physical hypotheses, but also less easily refuted. Systems of
philosophy, therefore, are not so dependent on our progressive
knowledge of facts as the theories of natural science, and change less
quickly; notwithstanding their mutual conflicts, and in spite of the talk
about discarded standpoints, they possess in a measure the permanence
of classical works of art, they retain for all time a certain relative
validity. The thought of Plato, of Aristotle, and of the heroes of modern
philosophy is ever proving anew its fructifying power. Nowhere do we
find such instructive errors as in the sphere of philosophy; nowhere is
the new so essentially a completion and development of the old, even

though it deem itself the whole and assume a hostile attitude toward its
predecessors; nowhere is the inquiry so much more important than the
final result; nowhere the categories "true and false" so inadequate. The
spirit of the time and the spirit of the people, the individuality of the
thinker, disposition, will, fancy--all these exert a far stronger influence
on the development of philosophy, both by way of promotion and by
way of hindrance, than in any other department of thought. If a system
gives classical expression to the thought of an epoch, a nation, or a
great personality; if it seeks to attack the world-riddle from a new
direction, or brings us nearer its solution by important original
conceptions, by a subtler or a simpler comprehension of the problem,
by a wider outlook or a deeper insight; it has accomplished more than it
could have done by bringing forward a number of indisputably correct
principles. The variations in philosophy, which, on the assumption of
the unity of truth, are a rock of offense to many minds, may be
explained, on the one hand, by the combination of complex variety and
limitation in the motives which govern philosophical thought,--for it is
the whole man that philosophizes, not his understanding merely,--and,
on the other, by the inexhaustible extent of the field of philosophy.
Back of the logical labor of proof and inference stand, as inciting,
guiding, and hindering agents, psychical and historical forces, which
are themselves in large measure alogical, though stronger than all logic;
while just before stretches away the immeasurable domain of reality, at
once inviting and resisting conquest. The grave contradictions, so
numerous in both the subjective and the objective fields, make
unanimity impossible concerning ultimate problems; in fact, they
render it difficult for the individual thinker to combine his convictions
into a self-consistent system. Each philosopher sees limited sections of
the world only, and these through his own eyes; every system is
one-sided. Yet it is this multiplicity and variety of systems alone which
makes the aim of philosophy practicable as it endeavors to give a
complete picture of the soul and of the universe. The history of
philosophy is the philosophy of humanity, that great individual, which,
with more extended vision than the instruments through which it works,
is able to entertain opposing principles, and which, reconciling old
contradictions as it discovers new ones, approaches by a necessary and
certain growth the knowledge of the one all-embracing truth, which is

rich and varied beyond our conception. In order to energetic labor in
the further progress of philosophy, it is necessary to imagine that the
goddess of truth is about to lift the veil which has for centuries
concealed her. The historian of philosophy, on the contrary, looks on
each new system as a stone, which, when shaped and fitted into its
place, will help to raise higher the pyramid of knowledge. Hegel's
doctrine of the necessity and motive force of contradictories, of the
relative justification of standpoints, and the systematic development of
speculation, has great and permanent value as a general point of view.
It needs only to be guarded from narrow scholastic application to
become a safe canon for the historical treatment of philosophy.
In speaking above of the worth of the philosophical doctrines of the
past as defying time, and as comparable to the standard character of
finished works of art, the special reference was to those elements in
speculation which proceed less