Philosophy and Philosophical Studies

Philosophy of the State, History and Religion.

In Plato and Aristotle ethics and politics are indissolubly connected. In other words, seeing that the highest human good is realizable only in a community, the theory of the state as the organ of morality, and itself in its structure and institutions the expression of ethical ideas or qualities, becomes an integral part of philosophy. The difficulty already hinted at, which individualistic systems of ethics experience in connecting particular duties with the abstract prin ciple of duty is a proof of the failure of their method. For the content of morality we are necessarily referred, in great part, to the experience crystallized in laws and institutions and to the un written law of custom, honour and good breeding, which has become organic in the society of which we are members. Plato's Republic and Hegel's Philosophie des Rechts are the most typical examples of a fully developed philosophy of the state, but in the earlier modern period the prolonged discussion of natural rights and the social contract must be regarded as a contribution to such a theory. Moreover, if philosophy is to complete its con structive work, it must bring the course of human history within its survey, and exhibit the sequence of events as an evolution in which the purposive action of reason is traceable. This is the task of the philosophy of history, a peculiarly modern study, due to the growth of a humanistic and historical point of view. Les sing's conception of history as an "education of the human race" is a typical example of this interpretation of the facts, and was indeed the precursor which stimulated many more elaborate German theories. The philosophy of history differs, it will be observed, from the purely scientific or descriptive studies covered by the general title of sociology. Sociology conceives itself as a natural science elucidating a factual sequence. The philosophy of history is essentially teleological; that is to say, it seeks to interpret the process as the realization of an immanent end. It may be said, therefore, to involve a complete metaphysical theory. Social institutions and customs and the different forms of state organization are judged according to the degree in which they pro mote the realization of the human ideal. History is thus repre sented by Hegel, for example, as the realization of the idea of free dom, or rather as the reconciliation of individual freedom and the play of cultured interests with the stable objectivity of law and an abiding consciousness of the greater whole in which we move. So far as the course of universal history can be truly repre sented as an approximation to this reconciliation by a widening and deepening of both the elements, we may claim to possess a philosophy of history. But although the possibility of such a phil osophy seems implied in the postulated rationality of the universe many would hold that it remains as yet an unachieved ideal.

There only remains to be briefly noticed the relation of philos ophy to theology and the nature of what is called Philosophy of Religion. By theology is commonly understood the syste matic presentation of the teaching of some positive or historical religion as to the existence and attributes of a Supreme Being, including his relation to the world and especially to man. But

these topics have also been treated by philosophers and religious thinkers, without dependence on any historical data or special divine revelation, under the title of Natural Theology. Natural Theology is specially associated with the Stoic theories of provi dence in ancient times and with elaborations of the argument from design in the i8th century. But there is no warrant for restricting the term to any special mode of approaching the problems indicated ; and as these form the central subject of metaphysical inquiry, no valid distinction can be drawn between natui ai theology and general metaphysics. The philosophy of religion, on the other hand, investigates the nature of the religious consciousness and the value of its pronouncements on human life and man's relation to the ground of things. Unity, reconciliation, peace, joy, "the victory that overcometh the world"—such, in slightly varying phrases, is the content of religious faith. Does this consciousness represent an authentic insight into ultimate fact, or is it a pitiful illusion of the nerves, born of man's hopes and fears and of his fundamental ignorance? The philosophy of religion assumes the first alternative. The function of philosophy in general is the reflective analysis of experience, and the religious experience of mankind is prima facie entitled to the same consid eration as any other form of conscious activity. The certainties of religious faith are matters of feeling or immediate assurance, and are expressed in the pictorial language of imagination. It be comes the function of philosophy, dealing with these utterances, to relate them to the results of other spheres of experience, and to determine their real meaning in the more exact terms of thought.

The philosophy of religion also traces in the different historical forms of religious belief and practice the gradual evolution of what it takes to be the truth of the matter. Such an account may be distinguished from what is usually called the science of religion by the teleological or metaphysical presuppositions it involves. The science of religion gives a purely historical and comparative account of the various manifestations of the religious instinct without pronouncing on their relative truth or value and without, therefore, professing to apply the idea of evolution in the philo sophical sense. That idea is fundamental in the philosophy of re ligion, which therefore can be written only from the standpoint of a constructive metaphysical theory.

It is, indeed, only from the standpoint of such a theory that the definitions and divisions of the different philosophical disci plines adopted in this article can be said to hold good. But those who, like the positivist, agnostics and sceptics, deny the possibil ity of ontology as a theory of the ultimate nature of things, are still obliged to retain philosophy as a theory of knowledge, in order to justify the asserted limitation or impotence of human reason.