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something of a scientific spirit, as in criticising Darwinism, the predominance of anti-scientific ideas is continually forcing itself on the reader's attention. The whole argument is, indeed, a kind of petitio principii: natural selection, &c., cannot account for morphological changes, for the upward direction of development, and so on, just because these require the action of will.

It follows from what has been said before that if the mental is to be affirmed in the physical world it must be as a conscious aggregate, that is, as a collective individual mind. How far the method of analogy, which, as we have seen, is all that we can here avail ourselves of, will carry us in informing material objects with conscious life is a nice question about which science is as yet silent. It may,

perhaps, be regarded as certain that we shall never project the region of consciousness beyond the boundaries of nervous organisation. Still we do not as yet know what these are. Finer instruments may reveal a rudimentary nervous apparatus in plants; and there is nothing absurd in the supposition that with growing knowledge we may be led to conjecture the presence of something like such an apparatus even in the structures of the inorganic world. Into this

question, however, our present inquiry hardly leads us. Schopenhauer and Hartmann care nothing about the limits of conscious life. What they want is a trace of a single volition, or current of volition, at this or at that point. On this fragile foundation they can build their ontological edifice, their all-embracing will. The thing to be emphasised here is that all such inference differs toto cælo from the procedure by analogy proper, which infers as a probability something answering to human consciousness wherever there

presents itself an adequate material substratum for those processes of segregation and aggregation, in which, as we have seen, consciousness consists.1

1 In giving an account of Hartmann's doctrine in the Fortnightly Review,' a few months ago, I wrote: The completeness of Hartmann's failure to establish his extra-conscious mind on a foundation of physiological science, may be seen, perhaps, in the fact that no man of scientific reputation has cared to deal with his arguments, whereas men of no great scientific power have not only attempted to upset Hartmann's position, but have really succeeded in doing so. We refer especially to the ratber loose but effective attack made by Dr. Stiebeling in his "Naturwissenschaft gegen Philosophie," which a disciple of Hartmann has thought it well to answer step by step; and to the strictures made on Hartmann's scientific conclusions by W. Tobias in his work, "Die Grenzen der Philosophie." A much more thoughtful demonstration of the untenability of Hartmann's biological assumptions, and of their essentially unscientific nature, may be found in a work entitled "Das Unbewusste vom Standpunkt der Physiologie und Descendenztheorie" (Berlin, 1872).'

In the last work it is suggested that a good part of Hartmann's system was put together before the author had studied Darwin. To this it must now be added that Hartmann's qualifications as a student of natural science have been just tested by no less an authority in biological science than Professor Oscar Schmidt. In a little volume entitled 'Die naturwissenschaftlichen Grundlagen der Philosophie des Unbewussten,' Schmidt examines the basis of natural science which Hartmann boasts of having given to his system, and the result is sufficiently disastrous to Hartmann's pretensions. The critic proves that Hartmann has again and again resorted to writers on biological subjects now recognised as valueless, just as though they were on a level with the latest authorities. He further fastens on Hartmann a number of inaccuracies as to statement of fact which prove that his scientific reading must have been one-sided and hasty. Finally, in an able review of Hartmann's whole method of interpreting biological phenomena, as growth, reproduction, and the development of species, Schmidt brings to light the essentially unscientific character of Hartmann's stand-point. He charges Hartmann with credulity and even an inclination to superstition, and affirms that by the supernatural mechanism of his Unconscious he simply manages to cover with a word an incorrectly observed phenomenon, or what is unknown, that is, not yet sufficiently investigated.' Particularly able is Schmidt's answer to Hartmann's attack on Darwinism. To quote the critic's own concluding words:

"The "Philosophy of the Unconscious" lays claim to possessing a

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principle standing above those of the natural sciences, to contemplating the world from the height of modern research, and to having gained, according to the inductive method, results which extend beyond the knowledge of science.

'We have proved that the "Philosophy of the Unconscious" has not been equal to sifting the facts and data which are at its service, to distinguishing what is doubtful from what is accepted as certain, what is a false interpretation from what is a natural one; nay, that, for the sake of a principle handed down from the past, it sacrificed progress to obsolete theories which have been overpowered by natural science.

'Thus, to its induction there is wanting the first condition, exactness of the assumptions out of which the combination is to be made, and the general laws and principles are to be inferred. The latter, therefore, have no claim on our recognition any more than the deductive conclusions.

The sciences of the organic world, which the "Philosophy of the Unconscious" wishes to take under its wings, decline its protection and even its comradeship. They suffice for themselves. They are so far natural philosophy as they independently, according to their method, draw conclusions respecting the causes and the connection of the phenomenal world.'

CHAPTER IX.

THE SCIENTIFIC BASIS OF PESSIMISM.

(B) THE PESSIMISTS' INTERPRETATION OF MIND.

IN the foregoing chapter, which may appear to the reader as somewhat of a digression, I have sought to show that there is no scientific evidence for the existence of will as a moving principle in physical nature. So far as this attempt has succeeded, one side of the pessimists' scientific construction is undermined and destroyed. Even supposing that life's misery comes from will, we may at least comfort ourselves that this unhappy principle is not yet made out to be the essential nature of all physical things. At most it has a limited existence, and thus a way seems opened up for a possible reduction of evil to something like a moderate quantity.

But now comes another question: Is the will which is known as a factor of conscious minds what Schopenhauer and Hartmann take it to be; and if they have misinterpreted the facts, does this misinterpretation involve as its consequence the fallacious character of the proposition that will is even in ourselves the source of life's misery? Here we are going still deeper, and investigating the very foundations of scientific pessimism. In discussing this part of the pessimists' doctrine, I may very likely appear now and again to be reproducing trite psychological truths; yet, if it

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be found that such truths have been completely overlooked by contemporary writers, it can hardly be superfluous to reaffirm them.

First of all, then, it is evident that both Schopenhauer and Hartmann mean by will something one and substantial, a single permanent substratum in the individual mind. In fact, will is as much an occult faculty or essence as it was in the cumbrous thought of the schoolmen. Now, it may not be unnecessary to remark that modern scientific psychology knows nothing of such an entity. As a science of phenomena and their laws, it confines itself to the consideration of processes of volition, and wholly discards the hypothesis of a substantial will as unnecessary and unscientific. In reviving this idea, the pessimists show that their method is really a metaphysical one, and that their numerous professions of an adherence to the ways of science are erroneous. The manner in which Schopenhauer assumes, without the least investigation of the matter, that by simple introspection we may reach a sub-phenomenal reality in the shape of will, is but one among many illustrations of the essentially amateur character of his science.1 How, the bewildered reader may ask, is this entity reached? Not by ordinary perception, for this is confined to phenomena. Is it, then, a necessary inference from phenomena, an instinctive belief accompanying a perception, or what? Into such questions Schopenhauer does not care to go. At the very outset, where he seems to be seeking firm ground in the facts of psychology,

1 That Schopenhauer was lacking in the essentials of the severe and moderate scientific spirit appears from numerous passages in the biography already referred to. His generalisations are often exceedingly hasty and flimsy, as, for example, that intellect comes from the mother and will from the father.