The dance of life / Havelock Ellis.

  • Ellis, Havelock, 1859-1939.
Date:
1923
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The dance of life / Havelock Ellis. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    that the Intuitionist so often walks hand in hand with the Pragmatist; they are engaged in the same tasks. There is, we have seen, the impulse of science which must work through intelligence ; there is, also, the impulse of religion in the satisfaction of which intelligence can only take a very humble place at the ante-chamber of the sanctuary. To admit, therefore, that reason cannot extend into the religious sphere is absolutely sound so long as we realise that reason has a co-ordinate right to lay down the rules in our sphere of intelligence. But in men of a certain mental type, the two tendencies are alike so deeply implanted that they cannot escape them : they are not only impelled to go beyond intelligence, but they are also impelled to carry intelligence with them outside its sphere. The sphere of intelligence is limited, they say, and rightly ; the soul has other impulses besides that of intelligence and life needs more than knowledge for its complete satisfaction. But in the hands of these people the faculty of “ intuition ” which is to supplant that of intelligence, itself results in a product which by them is called knowledge,” and so spuriously bears the hall¬ mark which belongs to the product of intelligence. But the result is disastrous. Not only is an illegitimate confusion introduced, but by attributing to the impulse of religion a character which it is neither entitled to nor in need of, we merely discredit it in the eyes of intelli- intellect for obtaining knowledge and a method of aesthetic contem¬ plation ; for Croce it is solely aesthetic, and art is at once intuition and expression (by which he means the formation of internal images). For Croce, when the mind “ intuits by “ expressing ” the result is art. There is no “ religion ” for Croce except philosophy.