Page:Philosophical Review Volume 4.djvu/473

457 and Kant were all trained in a philosophy which was substantially, if not expressly, Scholastic; and it has left its mark upon each, for not only does their reasoning constantly imply familiarity with peculiarly Scholastic conceptions, but the arguments on which they lay most stress are frequently 'scholastic' in the worse sense of the term, i.e., verbal quibbles based on implications assumed to be applicable to the matter in hand. It is this intellectual descent which alone explains, e.g., the important part played in modern philosophy by the conceptions of Substance and Causation; it would be wholly unintelligible if one passed directly from the Greeks to the moderns. And, again, is it not foolish to disregard Scholasticism so long as we use a terminology which is essentially Scholastic? It is clear, then, that Scholasticism is a phenomenon which no thorough student of the philosophic world can afford to neglect. By way of criticism in detail, we may observe that Neo-Scholasticism is still steeped in the old 'faculty-psychology,' and hence is fatally prone to invent a faculty to do the very thing it wants done. It may also be remarked that Dr. Grimmich's array of objections to Darwinism exhibits the common weakness of such objectors, viz., that of implying no alternative method of arranging and explaining the biological facts. Hence biology has to go on using the Darwinian hypothesis, in the hope that something may turn up to remove its difficulties. To alter this state of affairs, the believers in a teleological principle which has determined the course of cosmic development, must not content themselves with merely asserting its existence 'up in the clouds,' but must show how it connects together and illumines the biological facts. Their failure to do so almost excuses Weismann's recent assertion that Natural Selection must contain the solution of certain puzzling phenomena, because it is the only thinkable principle in biology.

F. C. S. S.

The author finds that the main factor in the evolution of a race is its psychological character. This is as fixed and definite as its anatomical character. The highest point in a nation's career is marked by the highest degree of unity of spirit among its members. Decay begins with the dissolution of this unity. The difference between a higher and a lower race does not consist in a difference in average intelligence, but in the fact that the former possesses a few highly developed individuals. The course of evolution is not towards equality, but away from it. The soul of a people determines its art, its institutions, and its religion. Even when these are borrowed from another people, they are transformed to suit the character of the nation that adopts them. Only second in influence are the ideas which, after slow development, sometimes break all the bonds of reason and produce catastrophic results. The laws given in this work are