centuries, and in their full statement in the Nouveaux Essais since its publication in 1765; but it is perhaps in place to say a word by way of commending anew to the attention of the general public, as well as to the attention of young students of philosophy, the philosophical writings of Leibnitz, and the New Essays in particular. It is often said that there is no such thing as philosophy. There is but one chemistry, one geology, one astronomy: as for philosophy, there is no such thing, only a lot of 'philosophies’—Aristotle's philosophy, Descartes' philosophy, Berkeley's philosophy, Hegel's philosophy, and so forth. Philosophy, that is, is declared to be but 'the way the universe strikes any man.' Professor Royce somewhere, in alluding to this charge, has very justly remarked that even granting it to be true, still it would be worth while to acquaint oneself with the way the universe strikes any mind of the first order. In Leibnitz we have such a mind, a mind of remarkable compass, depth, and openness, by universal consent the most comprehensive mind that has appeared since Aristotle. It is a liberal culture in itself to become acquainted with the pregnant thoughts of such a mind—at once comprehensive, sympathetic, and penetrating. Not a page came from Leibnitz's pen on philosophical and theological subjects which does not contain something to awaken and stimulate the thought or fancy, and which does not appeal to some of the higher ranges of man's complex being. Some years ago, when the writer was trying to get a publisher for a little volume of translations of Leibnitz's more suggestive shorter pieces, one of our metropolitan publishers wrote declining to undertake the publication on the ground that there was no call for the outgrown, dead, and buried philosophies of the past. A greater mistake was never made than thus to characterize the speculations of Leibnitz. Master of the thought of the past, as few have been, facing the future with a mind open to all the winds of heaven, interested in every new discovery and eager to push farther the bounds of human knowledge in all spheres, his was a thoroughly 'modern' type of mind. His thoughts have been the seed thoughts for many systems; his works belong to the 'power literature' of the world, that literature which sets men thinking, opens to them new vistas, stimulates to new discoveries, and leads to deeper insights. His writings, therefore, can never grow old or become outgrown.
His philosophy has been described by Kuno Fischer as 'eine ergänzende Philosophie,' and such it is. Through the sympathetic study and complete mastery of the preceding systems, and through
