An examination and popular exposition of the hylo-idealistic philosophy / by William Bell M'Taggart.

  • M'Taggart, William Bell, -1919.
Date:
[1884?]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: An examination and popular exposition of the hylo-idealistic philosophy / by William Bell M'Taggart. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    structure and degrees of sensitiveness and intelligence; still, it would be as legitimate to assert that increasing intelligence is the cause of increased complexity of structure, as to assert that complexity of structure is the cause of increased intelligence. Dr. Bliichner, who is one of the most ardent and con- sistent Materialists, says : ^ Though it may be difficult— nay, impossible—to trace in detail the recondite process of this relation, still it appears to us that, on empirical grounds, there can be no doubt as to the fact itself.’ And this is all that can be said. The parallelism, at least, is indisputable, and it is this parallelism which gave rise to the now exploded doctrine of pre-established harmony. Now, though we also must reject that theory as untenable, and as on scientific reasoning we must also reject the idea that one is the cause of the other, would it not solve the difficulty if we admit what I have already pointed out as at least likely—‘ that force, in all its forms, including gravity and vital phenomena, are all functions of matter, impressed upon it by the action of the unknown X, or spirit ’ ? We should then be at one with the deduc- tions of Hylo-Idealism on the one hand, and with the God idea on the other, and whose most complete expres- sion is this : ^ In him [in it] we live and move and have our being.’ I am aware that the introduction of the God idea will pain many so-called Freethinkers, who believe that they have discarded the mummeries and fetters of ages; but before they commence their condemnations and anathemas, I would have them remember that the God idea here postulated, though it be anthropomorphic, in a sense, inasmuch as we rise to the absolute only through the relation in which we stand to it, still all that is really postulated, or is intended to be postulated, is the admission that the absolute may exist—a postulate to which most thinkers will, I am persuaded, give their adhesion.