Recent Spiritualist Philosophy in France [pp. 679-697]

RECENT SPIRITUALIST PHILOSOPHY
.Matter then is only the condition, not the ground, of reality.
The more reality there is in anything, the less there is of mratter;
and in the absolute reality, all matter, that is, all substance,
must disappear. According to these thoroughly Aristotelian
views, 3M. P;avaisson aims to suppress in philosophy the notion
of substance, that is, of a dead and naked substratuni, to which
the attributes of things must attach themselves as accessories.
We can well understand the importance of such. a view if it
were explained, defended and developed. The whole strength
of materialism, for example, resides in the importance, exaggerated perhaps, which the notion of substance has enjoyed
in philosophy. Suppress that notion, and materialism is deprived of all foundation; but just because this negation of the
idea of substance is fundamental, one would like to see it established upon clear and firm grounds. On the contrary, it is
only in passing, in a kind of parenthesis, and by a bold stroke,
that our philosophy cuts off the idea; expect from it no discussion on that point. This is not the way of the masters of philosophy. They prove their positions by right reasons; they defend them against objections by clear arguments; they develop
their consequences by a fertile analysis. Proof, discussion,
development, are the three essential conditions of a rigorously
philosophical method. I admit that before making use of these
processes, one must be able to think, and the philosophy of M.
de Ravaisson is nurtured by strong thoughts; yet these are
nothing but materials, precious materials, which he does not
design to fashion, and which he abandons with a happy unconcern to their uncertain fate.
In like manner, we may speak of another of our author's
ideas, which he borrowed from Aristotle; namely, the distinction
between efficient cause and final cause. He would even go so
far as to assert that at bottom, efficient causes are nothing else
than final causes, and that these last are the only causes in
existence. Important as this doctrine would be if proved, the
proof is jast what is lacking. Once more, I agree that dialectics
is not the whole of philosophy, and even that the thinker is
above the dialectician. But it is necessary to be both. Philosophy is made up of thoughts and arguments. The arguments
without the thoughts are "empty," the thoughts without the
arguments are "blind,"-to quote Kant's celebrated distinction
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