THE idea expressed in such formulas as “Providence,” the “Logic of Events,” the “Necessity that transcends the individual,” the “History that is stronger than we are,” and other synonyms still, has been, in the past, disparaged as of a transcendental and mythological character. Such it was, unquestionably, and such it may become again. But that does not affect a kernel of real and authentic truth to be discerned in it.

When a poet, for example, sets out to translate his inspiration into words, he usually begins, as is commonly observed, with certain practical aims and intentions, with certain preconceived ideas or methods. And it is also commonly remarked that if he is a true poet, if his inspiration is genuine and strong, he overcomes the obstacles laid in his path by these inadequate aims, intentions, preconceptions; and he writes his masterpiece in spite of them.

As we say, he overcomes them; but not by destroying them, brushing them aside, breaking them down by critical analysis. The opposite is usually the case. The poet thinks he has realised his practical aims and followed his artistic theories—at least to a certain large extent, barring necessary compromises. And how does this illusion arise? It arises, like all illusions, from the pleasure we take in having illusions, and from our determination to create them for ourselves, as sedatives for our misgivings, as solaces for our scruples. “Unhappiness to pleasing fancy facile credence gives,” said Ariosto sententiously. But are the illusions of the poet in question true illusions? No, because they are not recognised as such, and such therefore they cannot be: they are acts of will, useful for the purpose the poet holds in view. Now after the work is done, the critic may examine the process of the poet’s poetic creation, or the artist, turning auto-critic and auto-historian, may do so himself. Then these various acts of will will be called “illusions,” and the poetry itself “reality.” It will be said that the logic of the poetry was sounder than the logic of the poet. It will be said that Providence has guided the poet’s pen without his knowledge and contrary to his intentions. And these things will be well said, and these names well called, provided the critic, if he be of a philosophical turn of mind, understand that it is not a question of reality in the one case and of illusion in the other, but of reality in both cases—of reality on two different planes or in two different forms.

The experience of the thinker is much the same, as may be seen in the instance of Vico. Vico naively set out to construct a philosophical system adapted to Christian Commonwealths; and absorbed in this mission, firm in his own faith, he devised and put to use a number of highly explosive propositions most perilous to his faith. The logic of his thinking proved stronger than his logic as a believer.

And so it is in the moral sphere. Often, our hearts, as we say, give wiser counsel than our heads. We refrain from doing things which our ordinary norms of conduct should require us to do, but which an inner voice somehow forbids (even urging us to do the opposite); and thus our behaviour comes suddenly into conflict with all the principles we have stood for. But later on, as we look back upon what has happened, we lift a prayer of thanksgiving to Providence, which laid its Holy Hand upon our heads and withheld us from the mistake we should logically have made.

Now, in all these cases, the metaphors to which language has recourse in describing them suggest a dualism, and therefore in the nature of the case, a transcendence: man and Logic, man and Providence, man and force majeure. But the dualism and the transcendence exist only in the language; for what is really demonstrated is not a dualism but a dialectical process. It is the dialectic of the Spirit in the variety-unity of its forms, the process whereby poetry, thought, and action, each in its turn, arise, one spiritual form vanquishing, overriding, the other spiritual forms by its sheer assertiveness, but not winning such an easy victory as to dispense with the stratagems of inner spiritual warfare—the “wiles of Reason,” as they have been called.

If now we consider not the particular process of each of these spiritual forms, but the composite process of the mind as a whole, we may quite properly speak of a “Logic of Events,” a “Higher Necessity,” a “Reason,” a “Providence,” which guides human affairs despite individual human beings. For we will simply be drawing a distinction between the positive activity of the Spirit and the Negative, or non-being, which attends this Positive at every moment and which, at every moment, is overpassed thereby. This Negative is not a part of reality, but reality (which, being light, is therefore at the same time darkness). Now figures of speech take the one phase of reality and set it off in opposition to the other. On the one hand we place the human, the earthly, the individual, the mortal; on the other the divine, the heavenly, the universal, the immortal. The metaphor remains metaphorical, but the thought is none the less soundly thought. People may take the metaphor in literal terms and personify it. They may transform the thought into mythology. The fault, however, lies not with the metaphor nor with the thought; but with such loosely thinking people. The idea of Providence is not merely irreprehensible. Even in its emphatic and somewhat poetical form, it carries a great and salutary message, asserting the reality of the Spirit, which means the rationality of the universe, against all systems, whether of sensualistic or naturalistic origin, based on ephemeralism, phenomenalism or arbitrarism. Without this idea, we could never understand a work of art, a philosophy, an action, or history itself; for to understand a thing is to think the intrinsic purpose or reason of its existence, its logic and its necessity, the Providence, in other words, that governs it.

To be sure, the concept of Providence may be perverted into a mythology, as Nature, Evolution, or any other idea, may be. And it happens actually to have come to us from the mythologies and religions, especially from Christianity which has supplied the words and phrases in which it is expressed. But such words and phrases need not give umbrage to the thinker. They linger on in philosophy as escutcheons of a noble lineage of which the philosopher may well be proud!