An Interpretation of Rudolf Eucken's Philosophy

shed from it. He agrees with Edward von Hartmann that the doctrine of selection is inadequate to explain the phenomena of li

alue-the things which have meant so much in the upward development of humanity-would be reduced to mere adjuncts of physical existence. If mental and moral values mean no more than this, they are simply annihilated. But the values of life are something quite other than any physical manifestion; and however much they are conditioned by physical changes it is inconceivable that what is purely physical should be the sole cause of them. Man would never have risen so far above Nature, and become able to be conscious of his own personality and of the meaning of the world, had there not been present from the very beginning some spirit

And humanity, on the whole, has climbed to a height to give some degree of meaning to the life of the day-a meaning superior to physical impressions, and which is able to see somewhat behind, around, and beyond itself. Wherever this happens, it comes about through the presence and activity of the life of the spirit within man. The spiritual life is, then, a poss

ality at all. There must be some core in everything which exists as an individual thing. This individuality is seen more clearly as the scale of existence is mounted. In the organic world each thing lives in a more or less degree its own life, however much that life is conditioned and even hindered by the environment. What is it, then, that keeps the thing together? It is some point of union of elements otherwise scattered. When we come to man we see this more clearly than in the world below him. This core is a kind of Whole made up

s of these, according to the meaning of Eucken, are within the spiritual life itself, and not transcendent in the form presented by Kant or external as presented by Hegel. There is, then, within consciousness a process in many respects analogous to the natural process. And as the meaning of the

uth of Religion and his Kampf um einen geistigen Lebensinhalt. It is important to deal with the concept of the spi

eternal existence in the midst of time; of the presence of an over-world

nnection with its environment that life below man largely obtains its existence. But in man we discover a transition stage from the sensuous to the non-sensuous, and it is in the latter that the meaning of the former can be obtained. The history of civilisation and culture is a history of this all-important fact. The meaning of man is, therefore, not to be found in his relationship to the physical world, but in his own consciousness. Although we may not be aware of it, consciousness is the power which, in the long and slow progress of the ages, has overcome the sensuous and made it subservient to the meaning and value which its own content of experience has presented. The necessity and proof of religion are not then discovered in anyt

en tragedy in our own day. These, as Eucken points out, are "problems concerning our Whence and Whither, our dependence upon strange powers, the painful antitheses within our own soul, the stubborn barriers to our spiritual potencies, the flaws in love and righteousness, in Nature and in human nature; in a word, the apparent total loss of what we dare not renounce-our best and most real treasures."[6] The loss takes place because we have been looking outward instead of inward for support, and prop after prop has given way. This is the situation to-day, and it has been br

he becoming itself. That movement is the resultant of the spiritual potency after experiences in the form of cognition have marked out the path for conation. This conation is an inheritance; it is present in the form of dissatisfaction with the present situation; it moves in the direction of a goal which is marked out by intellect. Now, however much this conation may be analysed, it resists being decomposed into a number of elements which make it up, for any such number, except in the very manner they are united, could not produce the situation. In other words, whatever the history of this conation may be, it is now a unity or whole. Conditioned as it is by the surrounding world and by its own history, in so far as it is this, it is determined; but it is still free in so far as it is capable of becoming a new point of departure for life and of proceeding on its way in a world of spirit. Unless man's nature contained within itsel

al tendency of life is to give a primary place to the world from which we have emerged-the world of physical existence, and also because much of that physical world reigns powerfully within our nature. But when ref

onality will suffer seriously in its evolution, for such an evolution is brought about through the recognition and willing acknowledgment of the breaking forth of a new kind of reality within the spiritual nucleus of life. If the latter alternative is chosen, this nucleus of life is now seen as something quite other than a quality entirely dependent upon the physical or than a mere flowering of the physical; it is seen as a reality higher in its nature than the physical or even than the ordinary life of the individual. Such a situation is forced on man when once he reflects upon the inward meaning of the content of his consciousness. It is true that such questions may be thrust into the background, and consequently inhibited from presenting us with their full value and significance. And it is this which happens only too often in daily life. The constant need of attention to external things, the absorption of the mind in conventionality and custom as these present themselves in the form of a ready-made inheritance-all these occupy so much

tiality for mental evolution was there. And it is this potentiality which is the issue at stake. We have no warrant for stating that it does not exist because it does not lend itself to be verified by the senses. Where does mind manifest itself to the senses? It is something which does not exist in space as a horse or a tree. It may be that consciousness has emanated from simple chemical beginnings and combinations, but it is not a simple or a chemical thing now. We divide worlds into inorganic and organic. The main principle of division is necessitated on account of the fact that some characteristics are present in the former whi

cal life. A Higher and a Lower present themselves to him. The two alternatives force themselves, and there is no third: either this deeper kernel of his life must mean the possibility and, in a measure, the presence of a new land of reality; or, on the other hand, it means no more than a mere epiphenomenon and blossoming of the merely natural life. If the latter view is adopted, the spiritual nucleus of man's nature obtains but slight attention except on the side of its connection with the surrounding organic world, and consequently what this nucleus is in itself as an experience recedes into the background, and descriptions and explanations in scientific or philosophical

nquered. It is of little use entering into this struggle without an acknowledgment-born of an inward necessity-of the spiritual nucleus of our nature. Unless man has accustomed himself to hold fast to this "subtle thing termed spirit" he will soon be swamped in the region of the natural life once more; and when this happens the spiritual nucleus loses the consciousness of its own real subsistence as something higher in its nature than physical things or than the body and the ordinary life of the day. If the enterprise is to issue in anything that is great and good-into a spiritual world with an ever-growing content here and now-an insistence upon the reality of this deeper life coupled with the highes

religion, however often men, failing to reach that kernel, have lived on the husks. But even this very sham notifies some small attempt in the right direction. In modern times-in the various forms of Idealism and Pragmatism-such a need of getting at the core of being and of being convinced that the effort is worth while, has been emphasised again and again. "Launch yourselves with as strong and decided an initiative as possible. Accumulate all the possible circumstances which

ar and no further, merely according to the bond and the duty.' In following God, you follow by what has been, what is ruled and accomplished, but you follow after what is not yet. 'It may be that the gulfs will wash us down'; it may be that the gods of the past will rain upon us brimstone and

ere is only one objection that the empiricist can bring forward, and that is that all such ideals can never be proved to exist as things exist in space. But, as already hinted, is existence in space the only form of existence? Is it not necessary

liam Wallace. It finds its highest reality in an experience born within itself and differentiated for ever from the natural and even the intellectual life. To such a conclusion man is forced; and if the situation is ev

of single factors. These have been tied together in the form of various syntheses. Such various syntheses comprise a larger meaning than what ordinarily happens from moment to moment in connection with the relation of the individual to the external world or, indeed, within the individual's own ordinary life. Many of the isolated, fragmentary experiences of the individual have to give way when tested in the light of any larger synthesis. If this were not so, no commercial, social, civilised life would be possible at all. The more real life is now perceived to be that of the larger meaning and value. The individual, solitary experiences may be legitimate, for they often express wants and needs of the individual which have a certain right to obtain satisfaction. But the extent and limits of these rights have to be measured by some norm or standard other than themselves, or else each individual will proceed on his own course regardless of the righ

n the validity of its mental and moral conclusions over against the objects of sense. Without this insistence no knowledge would progress and be valid. The macrocosm is mirrored and coloured in a mental and moral microcosm. A replica of the external world has a reality in consciousness, and this reality is not a mere photograph of the external, but it is the external as it appears to the meaning it has obtained in consciousness. The meaning of the world is thus something beyond the world itself; it is more than appears at any one moment. If the world were less than this, if the percept could not somehow become a concept, all progress would come to a standstill, and we should be no more than creatures of sensations and percepts which vanished as soon as they appeared. But these do not vanish; they p

rms and standards, already referred to, make their appearance and persist in demanding obedience

ctivity of the soul. Life is now viewed as consisting in a great and constant quest after these religious ideals. It sees its meaning beyond and above the range of mentality or even morality, though it is well that it should pass as often as possible through the gate of the former, and is bound to pass always through the gate of the latter. A break takes place with the "natural self"; the mental life of concepts, though necessary, is now seen as insufficient; and life is now viewed as having a "pearl of great price" before its gaze. Here the stirb und werde of Paul and Goethe becomes necessary. The real education of man now begins. His life becomes guided and governed by norms whose limits cannot be discovered, and which have never been realised in their wholeness on the fa

ronounce judgment on the validity of the proofs possessed within this spiritual realm. The qualifications here are beyond the range of knowledge, although knowledge does not cease to act within such a realm. The experiences here cannot be measured or weighed; and that a certain obscurity is present in them is only what may be expected, considering that the spiritual nature is farther removed from the region of nature

y. What can it do but grant cosmic origin and validity to such ideals? If these ideals a

quired something more than logical arguments in order to establish this truth. The conclusions were based upon a specific (characteristic) religious experience of their own. And such a religious experience was larger and more real t

the foundation of the evolution of the soul, and as the goal towards which he must for ever move. Eucken is unwilling to speculate as to the origin or the goal of this. The centre of gravity of life must be laid in what may be known and experienced between these two poles. There is a certainty which is intermediate between man and the Godhead. It is when

. The whole vision means no less than an entrance into a new kind of world, the scaling to a new kind of existence, and a conquest which will make the pilgrim a participator in that which is Divine. A struggle has to take place, because so much that belongs to the life, on the level where it now stands, belongs to a world below it. Impulses and passions, the narrow outlook, the timidity and hollowness of the "small self"-all these, which have previously remained at the centre of life, have to be thrust to the periphery of existence. So that an entrance into the highest spiritual world is not merely something to know, but far rather something to do and to be. This is the meaning of Eucken's activism. It is not the busying of ourselves over trifles; there is no need of encouragement in that direction. It is rather the inward glance on the nature of the over-individual ideals; it is a deep and constant concentration upon their value and significance, in order that the soul may plant itself on the shores of the over-world. It is in granting a higher mode

are baffled to fight better, sleep to wake" (Browning). Life now becomes alternately a quest and a fruition.[12] The individual has to gather his whole energies together because something great is at stake. This is nothing less than the possession of a new kind of reality. The struggle

he ordinary traditional conception either of God or of religion. Perhaps the majority of mankind is not as yet ready for such a presentation of religion. But I think it may be safely said that it is through some such mode