Page:Philosophical Review Volume 24.djvu/338

322 There is no compromise with empiricism. "The philosophical method demands complete abstraction from empirical data and from their classes, and a withdrawal into the recesses of the consciousness, in order to fix upon it alone the mind" (p. 9). Psychologically, for example, we may if we please classify certain processes as feelings, but "to classify is not to think philosophically," and such a psychological classification has no place in philosophy. And the relation of philosophy and ethics to history is equally independent. If we wish an empirical and naturalistic discipline it is appropriate to build upon historical material. But if by a science of the practical and of morality is understood a Philosophy and an Ethic, a demand for previous study of history "is an irrational pretension, because the true relation is exactly the opposite: from philosophy to history, not from history to philosophy" (p. 104). Indeed, "when we prove the historical origin of anything, with that very proof we destroy its universal value" (p. 101 ff.).

The philosophy of the practical is considered under three main heads: (1) The general nature of practical activity including (a) its relations to theoretical activity, and (b) its dialectic or the problems of necessity and freedom, good and evil. (2) The special forms of practical activity, namely, economics and ethics. (3) Laws.

Under Part One it is maintained that the theoretical and the practical exhaust the acts of spirit. Feeling, if by this we mean not merely psychological classes but a genuine act of spirit, not only does not exist; it cannot exist. Logical necessity requires two forms, a duality that is unity and a unity that is duality. Practical activity presupposes theoretical activity; the converse thesis that the theoretical depends upon the practical contains this much of truth, that there is unity of the spiritual functions. But pragmatism, "the school of the greatest confusion that has ever appeared in philosophy," confuses certain true theses as to the stimulating effect of the will upon thought, et cetera, with a substitution of the will for the work of "Whoever in thinking says, 'thus I will it,' is lost for truth." In other aspects the independence of the practical is vigorously maintained. So-called practical concepts such as 'good,' and 'ideals,' are sometimes alleged to be presuppositions of will. In fact, judgments of value are posterior to the will. "This is a good thing really means "I will this." The theoretical deals with the existent, the practical creates the future. It is not possible to will the existence of what exists. Volition is not the surrounding world which the spirit perceives; it is a beginning, a new fact. Error is not