Page:The Monist Volume 2.djvu/463

Rh eological view of the universe. By this is meant, that philosophical teleology should concentrate itself upon the proof that there is an end of evolution, " that there is an organic unity or purpose binding the whole process into one and making it intelligible in one word, that there is evolution and not merely aimless change, "-such as is supposed in a purely mechanical view of the universe. As to the nature of the end, although the lecturer accepts Hegel's view that all things are relative to man as rational, he cannot accept "the abstraction of the race in place of the living children of men."



This monograph is as it were a self-confession. The author endeavors to attain clearness in his own philosophical standpoint. He looks back upon the path he has traveled and feels that “the solution of the problem attained is fundamentally a personal self-liberation” (Preface, ix). This book is most commendable reading to all idealists and agnostics. It is an interesting and instructive little work, tracing with a keen psychological criticism the vagaries of certain philosophical conceptions, through which not alone the author but the thinkers of mankind in general have strayed. The philosopher begins with what Avenarius calls the “natural world-conception.” But this natural world-conception leads to contradictions and the evil spirit of speculation leads us in a circle through the barren fields of idealism. Avenarius asks: “Is the world really of such a nature that it appears unitary and consistent only to the superficial thinker, while it leads every one astray who attempts to grasp it more precisely in its entirety—the more so the more consistently the thinker proceeds?” (p. xiii.)