Page:The Spirit of Russia by T G Masaryk, volume 2.pdf/283

Rh but I must insist that his friends and adherents discern in the works of their teacher and master a unity which is in truth non-existent. It cannot reasonably be contended that Solov'ev's greatness and originality lay in an alleged organic synthesis of opposites. Apart from the fact that a synthesis of such opposites cannot possibly be organic, it is in the very failure of the attempt that, in my view, is to be discovered Solov'ev's originality and significance, above all for Russia. Unwillingly did he become a heretic to his own teaching.

A man cannot for four years be a materialist, a positivist, and an atheist, without his thought being thereby affected throughout life. Shortly before his death he was engaged in the simultaneous translation of Kant's Prolegomena and of Plato; and he arranged for the translation, not only of Plato, but likewise of Lange's History of Materialism and of Jodl's History of Ethics—Jodl, the Feuerbachian!

Solov'ev's tendency towards individualism and subjectivism was reinforced by the study of Kant and of German idealism. His primitive materialism and positivism gave expression to a naïve objectivism or realism, and this phase was overcome by Solov'ev with the aid of Kant and idealism. At the same time, however, the study of Schopenhauer, Schelling, and even Hegel, made his mind receptive to slavophil mysticism—the ecclesiastical and religious conditions prevailing in his native land having, of course, a contributory influence. Despite Kant, and with Kant, Solov'ev moved on towards Spinoza, Jacob Boehme, and Baader. He learned from Baader how Kant and Descartes could be epistemologically transcended, or at least made susceptible of an orthodox interpretation. Kant's apriori was transformed into revelation; Kant's thing-by-itself and ens realissimum became the triune God as the highest and only rational being; transcendental idealism took on a new aspect as religious and mystical faith.

Impelled by necessity, Solov'ev moved on to Anselm and his credo ut intelligam; while, from the practical side, at least, Solov'ev had to halt when he came to Augustine. It was necessary that the freedom of man should be reconciled with the influence of the absolute on man, but it cannot be said that Solov'ev was able to give a precise solution of this problem. Basing himself upon Augustine, he was a determinist; but he endeavoured to content himself with psychologically conceivable freedom of choice as an extant datum. Metaphysically, he Rh