: so far remote, indeed, that it is not
easy to find any common basis on which to found a criticism. Those who
hold that the mind is moulded into conformity with surrounding things by
the agency of surrounding things, are necessarily at a loss how to deal
with those, who, like Schelling and Hegel, assert that surrounding
things are solidified mind--that Nature is "petrified intelligence."
However, let us briefly glance at Hegel's classification. He divides
philosophy into three parts:--

1. _Logic_, or the science of the idea in itself, the pure idea.

2. _The Philosophy of Nature_, or the science of the idea considered
under its other form--of the idea as Nature.

3. _The Philosophy of the Mind_, or the science of the idea in its
return to itself.

Of these, the second is divided into the natural sciences, commonly so
called; so that in its more detailed form the series runs thus:--Logic,
Mechanics, Physics, Organic Physics, Psychology.

Now, if we believe with Hegel, first, that thought is the true essence
of man; second, that thought is the essence of the world; and that,
therefore, there is nothing but thought; his classification, beginning
with the science of pure thought, may be acceptable. But otherwise, it
is an obvious objection to his arrangement, that thought implies things
thought of--that there can be no logical forms without the substance of
experience--that the science of ideas and the science of things must
have a simultaneous origin. Hegel, however, anticipates this objection,
and, in his obstinate idealism, replies, that the contrary is true; that
all contained in the forms, to become something, requires to be thought:
and that logical forms are the foundations of all things.

It is not surprising that, starting from such premises, and reasoning
after this fashion, Hegel finds his way to strange conclusions. Out of
_space_ and _time_ he proceeds to build up _motion_, _matter_,
_repulsion_, _attraction_, _weight_, and _inertia_. He then goes on to
logically evolve the solar system. In doing this he widely diverges
from the Newtonian theory; reaches by syllogism the conviction that the
planets are the most perfect celestial bodies; and, not being able to
bring the stars within his theory, says that they are mere formal
existences and not living matter, and that as compared with the solar
system they are as little admirable as a cutaneous eruption or a swarm
of flies.[2]

Results so outrageous mig