Page:The Spirit of Modern Philosophy (1892).djvu/169

Rh pointing out, it is a very old doctrine; it is the very core of Christian faith. When Paul said to the faithful, “Ye are dead, and your life is hid with Christ in God;” when the fourth Gospel makes the Logos say, “I am the vine, ye are the branches;” when the whole doctrine of the church rested upon the idea of a God revealed in the flesh; when even a simpler and more primitive Christian tradition, that of the first synoptic Gospel, represents the final judgment as dependent upon the principle, “Inasmuch as ye did it unto the least of these, ye did it unto me;” when, finally, the deep mysticism of the historical church represented the faithful as actually feeding upon God’s very essence and living thereby, — what doctrine was this but the very teaching upon which rests the new philosophy which now undertakes to transform Kant’s dark world of faithful and isolated beings into the world of God’s own realization and presence? These moral agents of Kant’s world are not isolated, for, ignorant as they are, they work together. And what better revelation of a divine order than a world where spirits can commune and can work together?

Once more, as you see, the philosopher invents nothing; he only reflects. In reflection he has cast down the dogmas of a blind faith; in reflection he builds anew their rational and eternal significance. So, at least, these German idealists hold. As for me, I am so far, as I just observed, a mere chronicler. This doctrine, too, may be an imperfect speculation. I am not now defending it, but only expounding it. As expositor I present it now before you. So far we find it as an hypothesis. It needs proof. Perhaps it will need further alteration and adjustment. At all events, here is for us a new experience in philosophy, namely, the very essence of Christianity embodied in a speculative theory.