Page:Mary Whiton Calkins - The Foundation in Royce's Philosophy for Christian Theism (The Philosophical Review, 1916-05-01).pdf/3

—the correspondence of individual purpose with super-individual experience. The outcome is the conception of the Universe as Absolute Self—as All-Knower to whom “is present all possible truth”;^[1] as Infinite Will^[2] realizing itself ‘in the unity of its one life.’ And this ‘Supreme Person’ is, furthermore, conceived as All-Enfolder,^[3] as organic unity of all the myriads of existent partial selves.

The main purpose of this paper, as already stated, is to point out the theistic conceptions inherent in the philosophical system so summarily formulated and, in particular, to emphasize the peculiarly Christian features of the teaching.

I. “God” in the words of the Westminster Catechism “is a Spirit, infinite, eternal, and unchangeable in his being, wisdom, power, holiness, justice, goodness and truth.” In essential conformity with this doctrine, Royce teaches that God is an infinite,^[4] or absolute,^[5] self-conscious^[6] person,^[7] an Individual,^[8] in fact “the only ultimately real individual,” to whom the whole temporal process is eternally present.^[9]

There is no need to argue that the conception of God as spirit, or person, is fundamental to Christian theism but I must make good my assertion that Royce should be interpreted as using the words ‘self-conscious,’ ‘person,’ and ‘individual’ in what is qualitatively the sense in which they are applied to human beings. Christian theism is distinguished from many forms of ‘natural religion’ by its conception of God as essentially like-minded with us human selves. There can be no doubt that this is also Royce’s

1. The Religious Aspect of Philosophy, p. 424²; The Conception of God, pp. 12 f.; The World and the Individual, I, p. 426; Ibid., II, pp. 299, 364; Sources of Religious Insight, p. 134.
2. The Religious Aspect of Philosophy, p. 452; The Spirit of Modern Philosophy, pp. 429 f., 436²; The Conception of God, pp. 13, 202 f., 272; The World and the Individual, I, pp. 597, 461; Ibid., II, p. 398.
3. The Religious Aspect of Philosophy, pp. 435, 441; The Spirit of Modern Philosophy, pp. 373², 379⁴, 418²; The World and the Individual, I, pp. 341, 418³.
4. The Religious Aspect of Philosophy, pp. 434 et al., 483.
5. The Conception of God, and The World and Individual, passim.
6. Ibid., II, p. 336; Conception of God, p. 302.
7. The Spirit of Modern Philosophy, p. 380; The Conception of God, p. 349; The World and the Individual, II. p. 418.
8. Ibid., I., pp. 40
9. Ibid., II.