comprehension of the Ultimate Reality; and, above all, it must in its systematic pursuit, by the scientific method, recognize the ontological value of the judgments, and the ontological validity of the ideals, which are the correlates of these sentiments. Thus, and only thus, can philosophy fulfill its mission, both as harmonizing with one another and with itself the particular sciences, and also as contributing to the betterment and the uplifting of the life of humanity. To bring science, morality, religion, and art, into each other's more intimate presence, to bid them keep peace with one another by showing them that they are all parts of one great truth, all manifestations of that Unity of Spirit which, amid all strifes and destructions of particular realities, abides as the true Life of the World, both of things and of selves,—this is, indeed, no light and easy task, no mission to excite either shallow hopes or unseemly levity. But neither is it a mission about the importance of which one need entertain any doubts; or about the practicability of which, in a way commensurate with all great and ever enduring human enterprises, there is ground for discouragement, much less despair.
The worlds which Kant left apart, because, as he thought, he had demonstrated that they were two, are really one and the same World. Reason is not essentially divided against itself, or afflicted with a remediless disease of natural antinomies. Life has many sides and is full of mysteries. We shall doubtless never compass all its many sides or solve all its mysteries. But the World is a Cosmos,—an orderly Whole, a unitary Being, known by man as like himself, but rationally believed to be, in power, truth, beauty and goodness, infinitely superior to the human Self. To reveal and defend the Unity of the Spirit, as belonging to the Being of this One World, to bring peace to the conceptions and interests which tend to divide and subdivide and set in antagonism the many manifestations of this One Life, and to exemplify this same Spirit in practical ways,—all this may be said to define both the ideal nature and the actual mission of philosophy.
| George Trumbull Ladd |
| Yale University.. |
