Page:Philosophical Review Volume 6.djvu/317

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301
REVIEWS OF BOOKS.
[Vol. VI.

frank and own that one is attempting—by a more critical method and with a better understanding of the nature of thought—the old problem of philosophy. If one's investigations in logic lead one to the conclusion that thought can know nothing of reality, one may delude oneself with the plausible fancy that all contaminating contact with reality or metaphysics has been escaped; but if, as with Dr. Cory's work, the outcome is to affirm the complete rationality of experience, it. does not seem worth while to protest so much. Another question which naturally arises is as to the relation of the author's method and result to those of Hegel. Whatever one may think as to Hegel's metaphysics, he certainly attempted a criticism of the categories; and instead of merely placing him with the metaphysicians, it would be more instructive if an author who maintains that the "real is rational" were to compare more closely his own criticism with that of the 'metaphysician,' and show just where and how one remains in experience while the other leaves it.

The historical portion of the work takes its illustrations chiefly from Cartesianism; but it is certainly suggestive, and one need not accept the precise formulation of the Ideas given by the author to find the general analysis a useful method for the classification of metaphysical systems. It is to be hoped that Dr. Gory will work out more thoroughly the positive and constructive portion of his theory; but, from the outline given, it will be seen that his book will take its place among the best works of the newer French movement in criticism and idealism.

J. H. Tufts.

University of Chicago.

Schopenhauer s System in its Philosophical Significance. By

William Caldwell, M.A., D.Sc., Professor of Moral and Social Philosophy, Northwestern University, etc. New York, Charles

Scribner's Sons, 1896.—pp. xviii, 538.

The author of this book, a description of which appeared in the January number of the Review, informs us that it is substantially the outcome of the public lectures delivered by him in the logic classroom of the University of Edinburgh, at the close of his tenure of the Shaw Fellowship, but that he has departed altogether from the lecture form and has presented his matter in the shape of several philosophical essays. Each chapter aims to set forth some particular phase of Schopenhauer's philosophy in its relation to the entire system, and thus to suggest the significance of his thought as an