Page:Mind (Old Series) Volume 11.djvu/415

thinking which conceives that God is originally not infinite selfconsciousness, but merely comes to a finite consciousness in men; and which thus fails to see that the evolution of the universe-object, as intelligible system, is explicable only by the universe-subject, as intelligent origin of that system or infinite creative understanding" (p. 168). Because the "infinite organism manifests infinite Wisdom, Power and Goodness, or thought, feeling and will in their infinite fulness, and because these three constitute the essential manifestations of personality, it must be conceived as Infinite Person, Absolute Spirit" (p. 209). The same inference is made from the principle of teleology, stated very well in the "strictly natural and purely organic" sense of "scientific philosophy," a sense, however, which is not "new," but as old as Aristotle.

While there is much that is valuable in this argument, yet, taken as a whole, it is a necessarily unsuccessful attempt to combine the heterogeneous notions of Organism and Self-consciousness. The author says that "the further question, whether this idea of God is Pantheism, is a question of the proper definition of the word": "it certainly holds that the All is God and God the All". There is no doubt that Mr. Abbot himself holds to the theistic position; but the question remains whether he has a right to it, while he retains a conception of the universe as a whole which is radically inconsistent with theism. Still, though we must demur to the general drift of the argument, it is only right to acknowledge the marked ability of certain parts of the discussion, as the remarks on the necessary function of "Anthropomorphism" in thought, the proof of the generic identity of all Intelligence, finite and infinite (p. 148), and the account of the true nature of the distinction between the "immanence" and "transcendence" of God (p. 213).

La Psychologie du Raisonnement. Recherches expérimentales par l'Hypnotisme. Par A. Binet. Paris: F. Alcan, 1886. Pp. 171.

The fusion of mental pathology and mental physiology, to use Dr. Maudsley's terms, is proceeding apace in France. M. Binet's volume follows close on the trilogy in which Prof. Ribot has dealt so ably with the diseases of memory, of volition and of self-consciousness, and has been itself followed by Dr. Ballet's study on diseases of language. All these writers have the merits which we expect in natives of France: clear views clearly expressed, apt illustrations deftly applied, a march of argument admirably fitted both for exposition and persuasion. Whether they have not also the defects of these qualities,—chief among which may be named a certain impatience at residual phenomena which refuse to submit to their formulæ,—need not be here discussed. It is more to our purpose to recognise these merits in their full force in M.