Not only had this idealist movement in its beginnings a predominantly
ethical tone. It was really started in the interest of moral ideals as
well as of intellectual thoroughness; and its contribution of greatest
value to English thought was a work on ethics. The 'Prolegomena
to Ethics' of T.H. Green was a fitting result of his unwearied
controversies in defence of the spiritual nature of man and the
universe. No one is more worthy than he to be called by the Platonic
name a 'friend of ideas,' And he was a friend of ideas because he saw
their necessity for maintaining and realising the higher capacities
of human life. Green's 'Prolegomena' was published in 1883, the year
after his death. And, had I been speaking twenty years ago, I should
have had to emphasise the ethical character of the metaphysics of the
day. His metaphysical thinking, through all its subtleties, never
strayed far from the moral ideal. Owing to his teaching that ideal,
and the general character of the philosophy with which it was
associated, have permeated a great part of the better thought of the
present day, and have influenced its practical activities in various
directions,--social, political, and religious. But the magnetism of
his personality has been removed; and those whose business it is to
test intellectual notions have been impressed by the difficulties
involved in Green's metaphysical positions and in his connexion of
them with morality.
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