PERSONALISM: A VITAL PHILOSOPHY FRANK WILBUR COLLIER AMERICAN UNIVERSITY James Hastings said "Bowne came by way of philosophy to believe in the God of the Bible." This distinguished and generally accurate scholar made a serious mistake here. Those who know the personal history of Bowne know that it is not true, and those who understand his philosophy would not expect to find this statement to be true. Dr. Bowne was brought up in a Christian community in which there was a Christian church, and his was a Christian family. Hence he breathed in the great fundamental and even traditional teachings of Protestant Christianity from his childhood. His attitude towards life when he left home for college was not very much different from that of the average boy brought up in a Christian home where God is taken for granted, and where the religious attitude is part of the atmosphere of the home. So the late Dr. George P. Fisher of Yale University expressed the truth when he said that Bowne's "Theism" "presents in a condensed but lucid form the mature thoughts of an able and learned philosophical scholar on the foundations of religious faith." And the very first things which came from his pen and found their way into print were in defense of the Christian doctrine of a personal God and of other fundamental things of Christianity." 'Expository Times, November, 1915, p. 85. "The Philosophy of Herbert Spencer, 1874, pp. 23, 226, 258. When young Bowne was finishing his course in New York University he had done such brilliant work in his different studies that almost every one of his teachers tried to persuade him to follow the respective teacher's particular line; but Bowne chose philosophy, and there are good reasons to believe that he made this choice because of his interest in religion. Dr. Charles Parkhurst, former Editor of Zion's Herald, said in his article on Dr. Bowne in the Boston Evening Transcript: "Dr. Bowne's interest in religion is even deeper than his interest in philosophy," and he adds, "Professor Bowne says that he is a born fanatic, but escaped becoming such by having an extra heavy balance-wheel of good sense attached to his machinery. Without this he would have become a fanatical mystic and a mystical fanatic, an uncompromising rigorist and a vigorist. It is because he understands this fanaticism so well that he is so trenchant and effective in dealing with it. A vein of saving common sense and of humor runs through all his writings-here a phrase, there an epithet or sly allusion, an echo from Scripture or literature lighting up many a difficult discussion and making many a point clear which otherwise would be obscure. This is more prominent still in personal intercourse. There is a deep Puritan vein of conscience, a contempt and a lothing for sham, pretense and unmanliness, but the whole is made human and no less effective by the continuous play of humor essentially sunny and optimistic." Almost all of the characteristics here mentioned by Dr. Parkhurst require time for development, and they are generally imbibed in childhood. This is especially true of quotations and allusions to Scripture. Stress is laid upon this matter because it is fundamental in Bowne's system of philosophy that the experience of living men comes first, and reflective thought follows. He defined philosophy as "an attempt to give an account 993 of experience, or it is a mans' way of looking at things,' It is the interpretation of experience. Life was always the big thing with Bowne. As he used to say, “Life is larger than logic." He contrasted what Matthew Arnold called the method of rigor and vigor with what he called the living method, saying, "the former assumes everything to be false until proved true; the latter takes things at their own report, or as they seem until proved false. All fruitful work proceeds on the latter method; most speculative criticism and closet philosophy proceed on the former. Hence their perrennial barrenness." Thus the actual method of living men is to "take our experience as a datum, at once indeducible and undeniable, and seek to interpret it for our own rational peace and satisfaction.' It is for this reason that we have many beliefs which are not held because we have proved them, but which we try to prove because we hold them, and which we insist on holding whether we can prove them or not." And this is justified because life is the sacred thing, and in reality life is only found in the individual; and the individual person for Bowne as for Christ' is the only sacred thing on this earth. It is interesting to note that Kant in that section of his Dialectic of Pure Practical Reason in which he shows that his moral system is in harmony with that of Christianity holds that man is sacred, being "an end in himself."'10 996 Life as it is experienced by the individual person is the basal thing. But immediately second to it is the interpretation of experience. This is what is called philosophy. As Browne puts it: "Philosophy is simply an attempt to give an account of experience, or it is a man's way of 'Personalism, p. 4. "Theory of Thought and Knowledge, p. 3. 'Theism, p. 16. ¶ibid., 35. 'ibid., 35. 'Principles of Ethics, pp. 199-203, 209, 252. 'Lk. 15:3-31. "Kant's Critique of the Practical Reason, Tr. by T. K. Abbott, p. 229. 9911 looking at things." Man being a self-conscious being cannot but reflect, too often very crudely, but nevertheless he does reflect upon his experience. And so even the most ignorant person has his philosophy. As Bowne says: "Every man has a philosophy of some sort, wittingly or unwittingly." The only question is the kind of philosophy one has. "It is not, then, a question of having or not having a philosophy, but of having a good or a bad one. And this question is of great importance, for, while a good philosophy may not have much positive value, a bad one may do measureless harm. Nations may be paralyzed, and individuals may be wrecked, by a fatalistic and pessimistic philosophy." Henry Jones agrees with Bowne in this matter and expresses himself in equally clear language: "The only choice we can have is between a conscious metaphysics and an unconscious one, between hypotheses which we have examined and whose limitations we know, and hypotheses which rule us from behind, as pure prejudices do. It is because of this that the empiricist is so dogmatic, and the ignorant man so certain of the truth of his opinions. 9913 So far,then, two points are clear in Bowne's living method. Men do and must live before they philosophize: they eat, drink, work, enjoy pleasure, and suffer pain. But it is also true that very early in the history of the race and of individuals men begin to reflect upon just what is the meaning of all this eating, drinking, working, enjoying pleasure, and suffering pain. That is, first they must have the experience, and then they find that they instinctively try to understand the experience. But the reflective faculty develops very slowly. As Tennyson expresses it: "Science moves, but slowly slowly, creeping on from point "Personalism, p. 4. "Browning as a Philosophical and Religious Teacher, 35. to point." In the meanwhile men must live, and so they cannot wait for the development of reflective thought; for life is much more than the logical understanding. As Bowne says: "Man is still, conscience, emotion, aspiration; and these are far more powerful factors than the logical understanding. Man is also a practical being, in highly complex interaction with his fellows and with the system of things. Before he argues he must live; before he speculates he must come to some sort of practical understanding with himself, and with his neighbors, and with the physical order."""" That is, philosophy, when it seeks to be something more than logic-chopping, and endeavors to keep in touch with reality and life, must remember that life is always the end and logic can be but a means; for the function of logic "is not to create life or even to justify it, but to formulate it, to understand it, and to help it to self-knowledge.15 This is the actual way living men approach all their problems; and no doubt Bowne, being one of these living men, approached philosophy, as do all men, with all the beliefs which he inherited in the home, in the church, and in the community. Here we see the great significance of institutions for human development." They are the organs of social heredity; and it is through them that the great catholic beliefs of the race, and the conceptions and customs which represent the net result of the thought and experience of the race become the law of the individual." It may seem very shocking to those who imagine that they begin with the self-evident and only move by the sure steps of proof to be told that the method just described is the actual method of living men; and to be told that the "Theory of Thought and Knowledge, p. 376. "Theory of Thought and Knowledge, p. 383. "Theory of Thought and Knowledge, p. 372. "Theory of Thought and Knowledge, p. 372; Personalism, p. 311. |