The great services of Ward to religious philosophy in his "Realm of Ends" are, first, his transition from pluralism to theism, and, second, his demonstration anew of the strength of the philosophical argument for immortality.
1. His theistic argument in a nutshell is this, that while there is no road from the One to the Many, there is an open road from the Many to the One, with sign-posts upon the way. We must start with pluralism, says Ward, because no reason can be given why the One, in whatever way conceived, should become the Many. Why should the homogeneous become heterogeneous, or the indeterminate determinate, or why should the absolute become split up into finite spirits? A creation out of nothing cannot, for Ward, solve the problem, for his conception of creation is that of "intellective intuition," in which God as subject is necessary to the existence of the world as object, but the world, from this standpoint, is equally necessary to God.
There is no way of passing, then, from an absolute One to the Many, from singularism to pluralism. We must start with Babel and achieve, if we can, "one language and one speech." In its modern form Pluralism is a revolt alike from nineteenth century Absolutism, which was the dominant school in Germany and England, and from the Naturalism brought to the fore by the advance of scientific research, and interpreting mind in terms of nature. Pluralism has been called a means of escape alike from "Naturalism's desert and the barren summit of the Absolute." The ancient pluralism took the form of atomism, but the concourse of atoms may account for rigidity and uniformity but not for spontaneity. The modern type of pluralism, starting at the level of self-consciousness, posits a multitude of monads or individuals acting towards self-conservation and self-realization, and can, it is believed, do full justice alike to law and contingency, to spontaneity and fixity. The pluralist, operating on the principle of continuity, assumes that there are conscious individuals or monads in various degrees lower than man down to the minimal point of complete unconsciousness; and higher consciousnesses than man up to a being who may be called in a sense supreme, but is never more than one of the many, not inclusive of them, and, however exalted, is never more than primus inter pares.
The modern pluralist as described by Ward is a "pampsychist"; he believes that all existence is soul-like. There is a multiplicity of soul-like beings of various grades of development, some dominating, some serving, "conative and cognitive individuals bent on self-conservation and seeking the good."[180] All existence is soul-like, although, in what we call inorganic matter, these cognitive and conative monads have been largely "denatured" and reduced to the semblance of mechanism and routine. They have become "finished and finite clods, untroubled by a spark."
The pluralist assumes at the outset a multiplicity of soul-like beings; but he cannot explain satisfactorily their inter-action, or their action towards a common end. If, indeed, a pluralistic standpoint were hopelessly infected with contradictions, as the Eleatics might hold, then "the way to theism would be hopelessly barred; for from pluralism speculation really always has and always must begin."[181] Pluralism begins with the many and ends with the many. But did it really begin at the beginning, and does it really reach the end? Pluralism, Ward insists, "points both theoretically and practically [and both forward and backward] beyond itself."[182]
Following Ward in his transition from pluralism to theism, we notice: (1) The pluralist stops with "the totality of a Many in their inter-action regarded as the ultimate reality." But this position "is incomplete and unsatisfying. A plurality of beings primarily independent as regards their existence and yet always mutually acting and reacting upon each other, an ontological plurality that is somehow a cosmological unity, seems clearly to suggest some ground beyond itself. The idea of God presents itself to meet this lack." But this idea of God would be meaningless "unless God were regarded as transcending the Many; so there can be no talk of God as merely primus inter pares."[183] There can be no democratic idea of God, for by its very nature the idea of God implies something unique and incomparable and sovereign. The existence of the Many then looks back to the existence of the One as ground or creator.
The pluralistic view, then, does not, apart from theism, make a unified world; a pluralistic universe is in fact a contradiction in terms. Such a unifying conception as theism affords answers to the subject in relation to the manifold objects of experience; in fact it is doubtful if an absolute pluralism is a possible conception since we never know of the Many apart from the One. Theism, again, in its doctrine of a dominant monad and a supreme world spirit, is in agreement with the generalizations of science. All theories of the derivation of finite spirits, whether evolutionist, creationist, or traducian, agree in deriving the Many from the One.
(2) The coöperation of the Many also points in the direction of the One if, as is generally assumed, this coöperation is towards any common goal. The coöperation, it may be said, is due to chance, a fortuitous concourse of purposes; but if there is a tendency to one end, the question is inevitable, Why should the Many tend towards one end unless they had in the One their source? Theism is reached as the alternative of supposing that the inter-actions of the Many are a mere welter of happenings without meaning or purpose. Evolution and history show an increase of complexity and coöperation, and if all things work together it is natural to believe that all things work together for good. "The God who knows all loves all," and only the immanence of God in the world as defined by theism can give assurance that the pluralist's ideal will be fulfilled.[184] Apart from theistic belief there would be no reason to expect progress on the whole, for "a world entering upon a fresh evolution cannot start where it left off and may even begin in less favourable conditions than before." "In a word, without such spiritual continuity as theism alone seems able to ensure, it looks as if a pluralistic world were condemned to a Sisyphean task. Per aspera ad astra may be its motto, but facilis descensus Averno seems to be its fate."[185]
Further (3) theism enriches and enhances the pluralist's ideal by all the ineffable blessedness that the presence of God must yield. To sum up: "The theoretical demand for the ground of the world, then, as well as the practical demand for the good of the world, is met by the idea of God."[186] As related to the Many the One is the "ultimate source of their being and ultimate end of their ends."[187]
2. While Ward is a Platonist alike in his belief in immortality and in connecting that belief with the doctrines of the preëxistence and transmigration of souls, his general argument for a future life follows the more usual lines. It is based upon both rational and moral grounds and expressed with unusual beauty and power.