NI:V HOOKS. I 111 s. And, consequently, the effect on the reader, as in other works of this nature, will probably be felt as unconvincing. The castx are no doubt of groat interest. But statistically they cannot be said to establish anything. Suggestively they niay no doubt have a certain scientific value. A'nc: Ki-klin-niig der Ethik von Spinoza und Darstellung dvr definition PkilotbpMe. By Dr. KICIUKD WAHLE, K.K.O.O. Professor d. Philo- sophie an der Universitat Czernowitz. Wien uud Leipzig, Wilhelm Bratmiuller, 1899. Pp. 212. Price, 3s. net. The author claims to have shown in three articles (quoted, p. 8) as against current interpretations the " naked Naturalism and Positivism of Spinoza". The present work in its interpretative part professes to give a short outline of the main positions of Spinoza, and is intended as a guide to the study of the Ethics. The author complains that K. Fischer had spoken of his previous efforts in a manner calculated to keep the public from studying them : and this has forced him to try once more to obtain a hearing pp. 3-5). 1 Spinoza is " not quite right" ; but the author intends to criticise only so far as criticism is necessary for understanding. More would be super- fluous : for " the right Metaphysics are given in the second part of the work " (p. 7). On the whole the interpretative part (pp. 18-163) is interesting, though by no means so original as Dr. Wahle appears to think. His main position can be indicated by the following quotations: "Spinoza's doctrine is pure Atheism" (p. 80) : "There is nothing supernatural behind Spinoza's Substance. His ' God ' signifies the plainly-given visible All " (p. 34). Spinoza is no Pantheist he believed "der Gott ei mil Hiinden zu 'ii-i'/fi-ii ""the only frame into which all the propositions of the Ethics lit naturally and exactly is that of crude Naturalism " (p. 38 " The human mind ... is nothing but the series of ideas, primarily only a single idea " pp. 26, 45, 76, 77) "Spinoza does not believe in that fabulous Unity of Consciousness of which our Psychologists are still enamoured " (p. 81). [This interpretation of Spinoza's conception of the mind does not, I think, agree with Dr. Wahle's remarks on the distinction between ' A tin ' and ' Passio ' (pp. 87, 88) : and at any rate in this extreme form is not borne out by the text of the Ethics.j " Spinoza is a complete Positivist " (Cf. e.g. pp. 46, 47 and ji<ix.-ti>n . " The whole of the fifth part of the Ethics far from showing that Spinoza was a Mystic agrees completely with the Positivism of the earlier parts " (p. 151). The relation of Substance to the Attributes is simply that of a Thing to its Properties as the ordinary unreflective consciousness conceives it (p. 68). In short. Dr. Wahle is so anxious to clear Spinoza of Mysticism that he makes him the exponent of the barest and crudest common sense. Spinoza's 'God' is certainly not the God of Christianity or Theism: but is as certainly not the ' All ' or the ' Absolute ' in the sense which Dr. Wahle appears to attribute to these terms, i.e., the mere aggregate of things as the unreflective experience of every day takes them. The author's remarks (pp. 50 and 53; about Xntura Xaturan* and Naturata are not clear : and his assertion (p. 57} that " there is no emphasis in Spinoza of a distinction between Indefinite and Infinite leaves the important letter on the Infinite out of account. There are, however, some good remarks on the mode of interpreting u Philosopher 'pp. 6, 9), on the geometrical method (pp. 18-24), and on Spinoza's terminology (pp. 25-29) though the author has not succeeded in justifying all that he says in the latter passage. There is an interesting discussion
