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Page 19
Hence it is that the negative movement leads to freedom, personality,
and immortality; the neglect to make the movement consigns the
individual to slavery, makes a real "self" impossible, and at death he
has nought that a spiritual realm can claim. The choice is an
all-important one; for, as a recent writer puts it, "In this choice, the
personality chooses or rejects itself, takes itself for its life-task,
or dies of inanition and inertia."
CHAPTER VII
THE PERSONAL AND THE UNIVERSAL
In the last chapter the ascent of the human being from serfdom to
freedom and personality was traced. In doing so it was necessary to make
frequent reference to the Universal Spiritual Life.
When we turn to consider the characteristics of the Universal Spiritual
Life, many problems present themselves. How can we reconcile freedom and
personality with the existence of an Absolute? What is the nature of
this Absolute, and in what way is the human related to it? What place
should religion play in the life of the spiritual personality? These
are, of course, some of the greatest and most difficult problems that
ever perplexed the mind of man, and we can only deal briefly with
Eucken's contribution to their solution.
Can a man choose the highest? This is the form in which Eucken would
state the problem of freedom. His answer, as already seen, is an
affirmative one. The personality chooses the spiritual life, and
continually reaffirms the decision. This being so, it is now no longer
possible to consider the human and the divine to be entirely in
opposition. And the more the spiritual personality develops, so much the
less does the opposition obtain, until a state of spirituality is
arrived at when all opposition of will ceases--then we attain perfect
freedom. "We are most free, when we are most deeply pledged--pledged
irrevocably to the spiritual presence, with which our own being is so
radically and so finally implicated." Thus freedom is obtained in a
sense through self-surrender, but it is through this same self-surrender
that we realise spiritual absoluteness. Hence it is that perfect freedom
carries with it the strongest consciousness of dependence, and human
freedom is only made possible through the absoluteness of the spiritual
life in whom it finds its being.
English philosophers have dealt at length with the question of the
possibility of reconciling the independence of personality and the
existence of an Absolute. From Eucken's point of view the difficulty is
not so serious. When he speaks of personality he does not mean the mere
subjective individual in all his selfishness. Eucken has no sympathy
with the emphasis that is often placed on the individual in the low
subjective sense, and is averse from the glorification of the individual
of which some writers are fond. Indeed, he would prefer a naturalistic
explanation of man rather than one framed as a result of man's
individualistic egoism. The former explanation admits that man is
entirely a thing of nature; the latter, from a selfish and proud
standpoint, claims for man a place in a higher world. There is nothing
that is worthy and high in the low desires of Mr. Smith--the mere
subjective Mr. Smith. But if through the mind and body of Mr. Smith the
Absolute Spirit is realising itself in personality--then there is
something of eternal worth--there is spiritual personality. There will
be opposition between the sordidness of the mere individual will and the
divine will, but that is because the spiritual life has not been gained.
When the highest state of spiritual personality has been reached, then
man is an expression--a personal realisation of the Absolute, is in
entire accord with the absolute, indeed becomes himself divine.
This does not rob the term personality of its meaning, for each
personality does, in some way, after all, exist for itself. Each
individual consciousness has a sanctity of its own. But the
being-for-self develops more and more by coming into direct contact with
the Universal Spiritual Life.
Here, then, we arrive at something that appears to be a paradox. We have
the phenomenon of a being that is free and existing for itself, yet in
some way dependent upon an absolute spiritual life. We have, too, the
phenomenon of a human being becoming divine. How is it really possible
that self-activity can arise out of dependence? Eucken does not attempt
to explain, but contends that an explanation cannot be arrived at
through reasoning. We are forced to the conclusion, we realise through
our life and action that this is the real state of affairs, and in this
case the reality proves the possibility. "This primal phenomenon," he
says, "overflows all explanation. It has, as the fundamental condition
of all spiritual life, a universal axiomatic character." Again he says,
"The wonder of wonders is the human made divine, through God's superior
power." "The problem surpasses the capacity of the human reason." For
taking up this position, Eucken is sharply criticised by some writers.
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