ligible loom up. Former problems may not have been solved, but they
no longer press for solutions.

Philosophy is no exception to the rule. But it is unusually
conservative--not, necessarily, in proffering solutions, but in clinging
to problems. It has been so allied with theology and theological morals
as representatives of men's chief interests, that radical alteration has
been shocking. Men's activities took a decidedly new turn, for example,
in the seventeenth century, and it seems as if philosophy, under the
lead of thinkers like Bacon and Descartes, was to execute an about-face.
But, in spite of the ferment, it turned out that many of the older
problems were but translated from Latin into the vernacular or into the
new terminology furnished by science.

The association of philosophy with academic teaching has reinforced this
intrinsic conservatism. Scholastic philosophy persisted in universities
after men's thoughts outside of the walls of colleges had moved in other
directions. In the last hundred years intellectual advances of science
and politics have in like fashion been crystallized into material of
instruction and now resist further change. I would not say that the
spirit of teaching is hostile to that of liberal inquiry, but a
philosophy which exists largely as something to be taught rather than
wholly as something to be reflected upon is conducive to discussion of
views held by others rather than to immediate response. Philosophy when
taught inevitably magnifies the history of past thought, and leads
professional philosophers to approach their subject-matter through its
formulation in received systems. It tends, also, to emphasize points
upon which men have divided into schools, for these lend themselves to
retrospective definition and elaboration. Consequently, philosophical
discussion is likely to be a dressing out of antithetical traditions,
where criticism of one view is thought to afford proof of the truth of
its opposite (as if formulation of views guaranteed logical exclusives).
Direct preoccupation with contemporary difficulties is left to
literature and politics.

If changing conduct and expanding knowledge ever required a willingness
to surrender not merely old solutions but old problems it is now. I do
not mean that we can turn abruptly away from all traditional issues.
This is impossible; it would be the undoing of the one who attempted it.
Irrespective of the professionalizing of philosophy,