Page:Calcutta Review (1925) Vol. 16.djvu/250

1925] Absolute. The truth is the concrete unity of the two. This, it may be noticed, is—

The Rationalist Theory of the World.—Absolute Idealism, therefore, means that the world and its history is the progressive self-development into a world of finite things in space and time, of what is contained potentially in a power which is above space and time, i.e., in Idea,—the evolution being brought about by the energy inherent in the nature of Idea itself, which is the Good of Plato, the realisation of which is reason.

Opposed by the Irrationalist—It is best understood when contrasted with the system to which it is opposed, viz., Realism in philosophy. That word has been used with different shades of meaning but (apart from realism in perception which need not be considered here) they may all be traced back to the following form as being implied in them all. The absolute is not what should be, but what is; and what is, is simply the ‘real’ world as presented in experience. This world, when resolved back into its primitive elements, is found to consist of material (i.e. space-filling) particles in motion. We must assume that these particles together with the motion and direction of motion with which they are endowed, are self-existent and eternal,—as also the space and time in which they move, and their various degrees of moving force. It is useless to speak of reason or purpose in these things; they are antecedent to, and above all reason. We must assume, also, that though the particles are self-existent and each therefore sufficient to itself and independent of all others, yet they have the property of coming into collision in space, of resisting and changing each other’s motions and directions, and of holding one another in equilibrium, and producing compounds more or less stable, and forming themselves into worlds. And we must assume that some of these compounds have the property