Word: spinoza
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Dates: during 1890-1899
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...second form of the religious consciousness, and the one into which this first superficial optimism easily passes, is Mysticism of the type exemplified by Spinoza and by the "Imitation." This declares evil to be a necessary truth from the finite and relative point of view, but declares it to be nevertheless in a higher sense, and from the absolute point of view, an illusion. Yet this notion again, as our historical discussion has shown, proves to be very near indeed to a pessimism. The way from Spinoza to Schopenhauer is short...
...tendencies of the Romantic School are found in Friedrich Schlegel. He was a romantic genius, wayward, but not deep. Novalis' was a tender and noble nature, yet fickle and without a truly ideal object. Schelling was also way ward in method and worked back from Fichte and Spinoza. His chaotic idealism won the condemnation of Fichte himself. Schelling was largely influenced by the idol of the Romantic School, Carolina, whose correspondence with him is of great assistance in our study of the time...
Kant's attitude in philosophy is in exact antithesis to Spinoza's. Kant hated all mysticism and did not in the least believe that truth could spring from innate ideas, or be reached through experience. Truth exists for us because we make it. There is a divine world for us because we postulate it, because we act as if it existed. This part of Kant's doctrine is the ossence of common sense, and contains the philosophy of the modern high-minded man of the world. Kant only became difficult to understand when he proceeded to investigate all the world...
Thus Kant and Spinoza are at almost opposite poles of reflection. Each stands for one phase of the higher thought of humanity...
Professor Royce began by saying that this period was one of marked contrast with the time of Spinoza. The seventeenth century trusted to reason but later the world was driven to the study of human nature rather than physical. The lecturer went on to show how valuable is doubt. The skeptic is indispensable. The four great ages of doubt have done the world more good than six centuries of faith...