The Jersey City news. (Jersey City [N.J.]) 1889-1906, 1894-02-01
A DAY OF DEsoARTEs.
The d Volumes Club Listens to
Professor Bjerregaardess Address.

4 y 0AJ lOOh q uHO oAISAt "a ~Atos
Samuel Nelson, No. 26s Bergen avenue. was
one of unusual interest, as the large attend
ance seemed to indicate. Mrs. Grace Mar
| shall was the hostess of the afternoon, as
sisted in receiving by Mrs. Nelson and the
Misses Nelson,
In addition to the regular papers prepared
and read by members of the club, there was
the unusual advantage of an address by
| Professor Bjerregaarde, the eminent Danish
scholar, upon the philosophy of Rene
Descartes. Professor B~jerregaarde spoke at
some length, and without notes, and al
though he began with the announcement
that his subject was all dry bones, which he
might rattle if he could not put life into
them, the attention of the audience was
held to the last word. While it is mani
testify impossible to do justice to his adj
dress in such brief compass, it
may be summarized as follows-
saying that philosophy may be said to have
originated as to name with Pythageras, and
as to contents with Socrates. The philos-
opher is be who seeks for the uniting princi-
pie of all things. This uniting principle he
may seek in himself, in the world, or beyond
the world, and in accordance with the stand
point. metaphysics may be theological, cos
mological or anthroposophical. The system
of metaphysics transmitted from Socrates
and shaped by Aristotle remained practi-
cally unchanged throughout the long period
extending from classic Greece to the time
when Francis Bacon, Lord Verulam in Eng
land, and Descartes in France, supplemented
by Spinoza and Leibnitz in Germany, broke
loose from the bonds Of tradition and laid the
foundations of a radically different sys-
tenn of philosophy. The new system
was opposed to the old in that it
was reflective, whereas the old was naive; it
no longer took anything for granted. Then,
- Io,- ~-o, <hn vital diparanoo fhot tho
old system rested upon unquestioned author
ity; the church promulgated her doctrines,
the State her DEGREES, from the standpoint of
i~ndisputable dogma; the schoolmen never
dreamed of questioning the infallibility of
this or that authority of trivium. The new
school tore down all this structure, boldly
cut loose from all Intellectual dictation and
constituted each man a centre of truth. Why
this new school should have arisen at this
time Professor B-jerregaarde did not seek to
explain further than by the theory that the
world moves in cycles, suggesting also that
if one should trace this spirit of substitution
of individual Judgment further, one would
find its legitimate outcome in the French
Revolution.
OF this school Descartes was q pioneer.
That his work was so faulty, SO crude, SO
disigured and obscured by errors, is due to
his being the first to hew out new paths.
After him could come others, who could n
did rectify his mistakes and perfect what
was worthy; it was his part to burn out all
the dead stumps in the way of the car of
progress. He boldly doubted everything ex-
cent bare existence, reducing all knowledge
to the bald statement, Cogito, ergo sum-
think. I am conscious, therefore | am. The
Inconsistency of retaining even this much In
a system which casts douot upon everything
else, and should by right regard conscious
ness as not proven, is what may be regarded
as one of the characteristic flaws of his
reasoning. Yet the principle, said the
speaker is one upon which all truth rests.
Each one of us, truly searching for truth to-
day, must utterly cast aside every dogma in
stilled into his mind as authoritative, begin
from the beginning with a fair field and an
earnest love of truth for truths sake, and
not until he has proven all these for himself
won them back, as it were, by his own exer-
tions-5are his beliefs bone of his bone and
flesh of his flesh. Otherwise, they are some
N else's ideas which he has chosen to call
his own.
Descartes. however, did not make the pro-
position tsCogito, ergo sum" the foundation
of his system except as a means of obtaining
the test of certitude-whatever is clearly
and distinctly thought; must be true. OF the
work of Descartes two features received
especial attention-his statement of the
theory of innate principle and the four steps
of his Method. The former is the theory
IudbL tllC1 q AID LII bIO 4AllAlAA I'll oAS
certain inherent and undisputed ideas; as
for example, the idea of perfection; of a be-
ginning of all things, be it known as a First
Cause, Prime Cause, Deity or whatever
name, and in a certain sense, the belief in
immortality. This theory was by no means
new, but Descartes was the first to put it IN
this shape and to insist upon its Importance.
The theory, however, has met with serious
opposition from the materialists, especially
Locke. who, it will be remembered, consid-
cred the human mind a tabnta sasa, ready
for the impressions of circumstance. The
four steps of the Method, briefly stated,
are:-Never accept anything as true until it
becomes evident that it is SO. Divide the
subject into as many parts as possible to en-
sure a closer examination into its substance.
Enter into the work of arrangement with
ardor, passing from the easy to the difficult,
from the simple to the complex. Omit no de-
tail that may be of Importance.
Although Descartes shares with Bacon the
title of the Father of Modern Philosophy,
his work. full of flaws, has been superseded
by those to whom he broke the path. Falling
under Voltaire's shafts of ridicule, his sys-
TEN, as a system, sank to low Importance in
the study OF metaphysics. But it is from
Rene Descartes that modern philosophy owes
much of the impetus that broke it loose from
the shackles Of scholasticism, and made it
possible at least to approximate the attain
ment of knowledge.
The reference made by Prof. Bjerregaarde
to the sstrue t~heosophy" of the age of Para
CELSIUS and his emphatic disavowal of modern
so-cailed theosophy as a mixture of Blavats-
kysm, neo-Buddhism, occultism and ever SO
many other things" aroused so much inter
est that Prof. Bjerregaarde has consented to
talk on .strue theosophy" at the residence of
Mrs. Marcus Beach, Hoboken avenue, Oh
Saturday, February 10.
The afternoon came to a close most pleas
antly by the kindness of Miss Lucy F. Nell
son, who sang several songs.