SANTAYANA, GEORGE (1863– ), American philos opher and poet, was born at Madrid. At the age of nine he was taken to America. He received the degree of B.A. from Harvard university in 1886, and served there, first as instruc tor, and then as professor of philosophy, from 1889 to 1912. For a long time his attachment to literature competed with "the love of wisdom." In 1894 he published Sonnets and Other Poems; and at intervals ever since he has issued small volumes of classi cally compact and severely beautiful poetry, warmed with the restrained emotionalism of a Spaniard and an aristocrat, and coloured with the peculiar melancholy of an ex-Catholic who envies the consolations of "that splendid error which conforms better to the impulses of the soul" than life itself can do. His first essay in philosophy was The Sense of Beauty (1896), which even the matter-of-fact Miinsterberg rated as the best American con tribution to aesthetics; five years later appeared Interpretations of Poetry and Religion; then for seven years he worked on his magnum opus, The Life of Reason. These five volumes, Reason in Common Sense, Reason in Society, Reason in Religion, Reason in Art, and Reason in Science, at once lifted Santayana to fame.
In 1912 he abandoned his position at Harvard, and went to live in Europe. Since then he has wandered from country to country, from Oxford and London to Paris and Rome, adding industriously to his philosophical product and repute. In 1923 he issued Scepticism and Animal Faith, as an introduction to "one more system of philosophy"; and in 1927 he published Realms of Essence, as the first of two volumes on Realms of Being. These later works have given form and completeness to a world-view which, in the Life of Reason, modestly announced itself as merely a contemporary application of Aristotle's thought. Epistemo logically, Santayana's position is that idealism is true, but irrele vant and useless. Certainly the only reality is experience; and the "realm of essence" means the colours, forms, tastes, odours, pressures and temperatures which sensation gives, and the ideas, words, images and other interpretative representations which thought weaves around these essential experiences of the flesh. Our belief that these perceptions, by and large, fairly report the "external world" (the "realm of matter") is a form of "animal faith," a rough hypothesis which has the sufficient sanction of pragmatic use, and embodies the concordant element in the experience of all normal men.
Consequently we may accept as real what the senses report, and in every case this is matter. "In natural philosophy I am a decided materialist—apparently the only one living." Matter is far more complex in its structure, and far subtler in its possibil ities, than we supposed ; and to Santayana there is nothing strained in viewing thought as a function quite as natural and corporeal as digestion, and as transitory. "I believe there is nothing im
mortal. . . . No doubt the spirit and energy of the world is what is acting in us, as the sea is what rises in every little wave; but it passes through us ; and cry out as we may, it will move on. Our privilege is to have perceived it as it moved." Mechanism is universal, and prevails even in the inmost recesses of the soul. Consciousness has no causal efficacy; it may see, and enjoy or deplore, the operations of life, but it cannot further or impede them in any way. Despite this materialism and scepticism, Santa yana has discussed the problems and ideals of religion with the sympathy of a poet and the tolerance of a sage. "Religion is human experience interpreted by human imagination. . . . Mat ters of religion should never be matters of controversy. . . . We seek rather to honour the piety and understand the poetry embodied in these fables." In ethics Santayana cleaves to Aristotle : "In Aristotle the ideal has of human nature is perfectly sound : everything deal has a natural basis, and everything natural an ideal fulfilment. His ethics, when thoroughly digested and weighed, will seem perfectly final." A rational morality, based upon secular educa tion and intelligence, would serve for a society of philosophers; but for the majority of mankind morality will have to retain its emotional basis in natural affection and the social training of the home. So too with government : we must put up with the second best, which so admirably accords with our own quality. Democ racy has many faults, but it has the great virtue of providing a more equal opportunity than other forms of government to talent and genius of whatever origin and rank. Perhaps in the distant future men will be sufficiently intelligent to combine aristocracy with democracy, giving the franchise to all, but limiting office to the fit. Till then we must suffer fools gladly.