take note of the standpoint of all the works dealing with the subject, the Commentary would become so overloaded that it would at least be much more difficult to consult. The valuable material would be entirely lost in a waste of notes and literary references which are usually without value. But the manner in which Vaihinger has performed this second task in the volume before us, might furnish many with a ground for objections, and lead them to wish that the limitation had been still more judicious, i.e., had been much greater. What purpose does it serve to dig up what time has covered with thick dust? Why wake the dead to a brief pretense of life? One might refer to Goethe's saying (in a letter to Eckermann) that "books through books increase, but communion with active laws is pleasing to the mind who knows how to comprehend the simple, to unravel the complex, and explain that which is obscure." Such a spirit, we should imply, is truly philosophical. That which speaks from the Commentary finds its home in dusty libraries.
And the further apprehension might be expressed, that Goethe's saying will apply as well to the result of the Commentary as to its origin. It, again, will give rise to new books attacking and defending it, and so increase the public calamity of the endless making of books, since it abundantly furnishes a ready store of erudition for such attempts. Similar objections might be raised against the Kant bibliography which is now appearing in this journal. But very wrongly!
The true account of the history of philosophy does not consist in a critical exposition of the opinions of some of the most important philosophers, as one might suppose from many text-books, but in a history of the movement of thought. It must, on the one hand, trace the historical development of the problems and of the terminology, and, on the other, sketch the characteristics of the individual periods to which the most various factors contribute their quota. These are the reciprocal connections in which the problems are brought to each other; the problems of life which are prominent in every period of time; the philosophical genius which, nourished by the Zeitgeist, solves its problems and thereby makes possible new points of view with new problems; the way in which these are understood; their influence upon near or remote phases of mental life; the number, significance, and degree of independence of their adherents and disciples; their opponents, opposing or inhibitory currents, etc. For all this the materials can be supplied only by careful and detailed investigation. Before a history in any way
