Page:The Spirit of Modern Philosophy (1892).djvu/161

Rh of truth we should have desired, a God revealed direct to sense, or a divine order manifest even to our intuitive reason; but something very different. We read, when we enter the new door, as it were a mysterious writing, prepared by unseen and unknown hands, a letter, left for our guidance by a remote and even unknowable guide. The letter contains only the moral law, and the word, “Serve the unseen God as if he were present with you.” That is in the first place all. Upon this and this only, according to Kant, our faith must build. For this, as the inner voice now tells us, is the call that, with all our better nature, we are henceforth minded to obey. Our will is the solution. “Work out the divine,” says the new philosophy. “Build anew the lost spiritual world, which skepticism shattered;” such is the command of Kant’s practical reason. All this is unquestionably a hard doctrine. It is not what we sought. We sought peace, and the philosopher has brought us not peace, but a sword. We sought the joy of God’s presence, and Kant has sent us to work out a divine mission in a wilderness far remote from all absolute insight. And yet, stern as this doctrine is, you must feel its courage and its wisdom. After all, here is at least a part of the truth. Life is not an easy thing; the spiritual life is the hardest of all lives; and of all spiritual gifts, next perhaps to charity itself, insight is surely the most difficult to win. As long as these things are so, Kant’s doctrine will retain its profound ethical and religious significance. But, you will ask, is this, then, wisdom’s last word, “der Weisheit letzter Schluss?” Well, for my part I do not think so. I warn you indeed that in philosophy, if you will go beyond Kant, you must meet new dangers, and must attempt new and venturesome wandering. But for my part I love to wander, far and long, and I hold that there are indeed heights yet to climb that cleave the heavens far above and beyond this dwelling-place of Kant. If you will go with me, we will try