I have discarded the above titles in my "System of Metaphysics," because I think it is better and less misleading to use plain and unambiguous language.
Section 75. See the note to Chapter XVI.
CHAPTER XX, sections 76-77. One can get an idea of the problems with which the philosophy of religion has to deal by turning to my "System of Metaphysics" and reading the two chapters entitled "Of God," at the close of the book. It would be interesting to read and criticise in class some of the theistic arguments that philosophers have brought forward. Quotations and references are given in Chapter XXXIV.
CHAPTER XXI, sections 78-79. What is said of the science of logic, in Chapter XVI, has, of course, a bearing upon these sections. I suggest that the student examine a few chapters of "The Grammar of Science"; the book is very readable.
CHAPTER XXII, sections 80-82. The reader will find in lectures I and II in Sir William Hamilton's "Lectures on Metaphysics" a discussion of the utility of philosophy. It has a pleasant, old-fashioned flavor, and contains some good thoughts. What is said in Chapters XVI-XXI of the present volume has a good deal of bearing upon the subject. See especially what is said in the chapters on logic, ethics, and the philosophy of religion.
CHAPTER XXIII, sections 83-87. There is a rather brief but good and thoughtful discussion of the importance of historical study to the comprehension of philosophical doctrines in Falckenberg's "History of Modern Philosophy" (English translation, N.Y., 1893); see the Introduction.
We have a good illustration of the fact that there may be parallel streams of philosophic thought (section 87) when we turn to the Stoics and the Epicureans. Zeno and Epicurus were contemporaries, but they were men of very dissimilar character, and the schools they founded differed widely in spirit. Zeno went back for his view of the physical world to Heraclitus, and for his ethics to the Cynics. Epicurus borrowed his fundamental thoughts from Democritus.
On the other hand, philosophers may sometimes be regarded as links in the one chain. Witness the series of German thinkers: Kant, Fichte, Schelling, Hegel, Schopenhauer; or the series of British thinkers: Locke, Berkeley, Hume, Mill. Herbert Spencer represents a confluence of the streams. The spirit of his doctrine is predominantly British; but he got his "Unknowable" from Kant, through Hamilton and Mansel.
At any point in a given stream there may be a division. Thus, Kant was awakened to his creative effort by Hume. But Mill is also the successor of Hume, and more truly the successor, for he carries on the traditional way of approaching philosophical problems, while Kant rebels against it, and heads a new line.