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270 NEW BOOKS. to is recognised by the Intellect as true (materially). Hence three factors in a complete act of judgment : the idea judged (die Urteilsma- terie), the intellectual perception of its truth (der Urteilsgrund) and the volitional recognition of its truth (der eigentliche Urteilsakt). At the close of a remarkably able discussion of the perceptio clara et distincta Dr. Christiansen sums up the process of judgment in its completest form AS follows : The Intellect supplies in the first place the idea, the matter of the judgment, but in no way determines the will to judge. Then the will, in the form of Attention concentrated on the idea and on the interconnexion of its component elements, incites the intellect to a consciousness of the valid grounds of the judgment ; once the clear and distinct perception of the idea is thereby reached, the decision necessarily follows in accordance with an innate tendency of the will. If we pro- ceed to ask how we are to gain objective assurance of the clearness and distinctness of our insight Descartes answers that such assurance is the natural product of that long discipline of doubt whereby all that obscures the natural light of reason rooted prejudices and unmethodical ways of thinking is sifted away. The last section deals with the difficulties which Descartes' rationalism meets so soon as it forsakes the truth- mark of necessary connexion for that of a conformity of thought with its object. Descartes concedes that the existence of finite external object cannot be grasped by us in a purely intellectual way. Finally, he is thrown back for his ultimate guarantee of truth upon the arbitrary will of God. Rational Knowledge is thus found to be rooted in the irrational. It would be hard to overpraise this pamphlet. Fine distinctions and criticisms freshen the work from beginning to end. Though our author's conclusions are in no sense revolutionary they are developed with marked originality, conspicuous clearness and convincing thoroughness. It is the work of an efficient scholar and cannot be too cordially recom- mended. If translated, it would furnish a model Honours text-book for the student of Descartes. W. B. BOYCE GIBSON. Ethik. Von MAX WENTSCHBR. I. Theil. Leipzig, 1902. Pp. xii., 368. The present volume deals only with the fundamental questions of ethical science, the nature of its subject-matter and methods, and its ultimate metaphysical presuppositions, all discussion of special rules and pro- blems of conduct being postponed to a forthcoming second part. Mr. Wentscher treats of the venerable topics to which his book is devoted with a pleasing freshness and individuality none too common in works on Ethics. His leading idea is well indicated by the quotations from Kant and Nietzsche which appear as mottoes on his title-page. The one indispensable pre-requisite of Ethics is the recognition of the reality of human freedom. So far the author is in fundamental accord with Kant whom he regards, in spite of shortcomings and obscurities, as the founder in modern thought of a genuine moral philosophy. He rejects, however, Kant's unfortunate metaphysical interpretation of freedom as a possession of an imaginary "noumenal self". Freedom, to be of practical value, must belong to the self of actual experience. To be free means to be capable, by individual intellectual reflexion, of emanci- pating one's acts from the influence of mere habit, unsystematised impulse, and social tradition, and making one's life into the conscious expression of self-chosen purpose. Freedom is thus not irresponsible