BOOK REVIEWS
Scholasticism and Welfare Economics. By Stephen Theodore Worland. Notre Dame, Ind.: University of Notre Dame Press, 1967. Pp. 306. $7.50.
In his Economics of Welfare, regarded by many as the holy writ of welfare economics, the late Professor A. C. Pigou of Cambridge University distinguished clearly between economic welfare and what he called total welfare, the latter to include social, cultural, spiritual (and perhaps military?) , welfare. His book, he claimed, was
restricted to that part of total welfare that can be brought directly or indirectly into relation with the measuring rod of money--economic welfare.
He added that
economic welfare will serve as a barometer or index of total welfare. . . . What we wish to learn is, not how large welfare is, or has been, but how its magnitude would be affected by the introduction of causes which it is in the power of statesmen or private persons to call into being. . . . Any rigid inference from effects on economic welfare to effects on total welfare is out of the question. In some fields the divergence between the two effects will be insignificant, but in others it will be very wide. Nevertheless, I submit that, in the absence of special knowledge, there is room for a judgment of probability (Economics of Welfare, New York: St. Martin's Press, 1929, pp. 11 et seq.).
Such a quotation will serve as a useful starting point for a review of Professor Worland's book; but let it be said from the outset that it is an extremely useful addition to the literature available on welfare economics. Pigou raises early in his great work the central (and as yet unresolved) problem of welfare economics--the relationship which exists, or should exist, between the science of ethics or moral philosophy and that of economics. He also describes the main thrust of welfare economics when he speaks of the " causes which it is in the power of statesmen or private persons to call into being," for welfare economics is concerned with economic policy and not merely with economic analysis. The welfare economist makes no bones about his concern for society and its ills.
The central concept of Pigou's elaborate analysis is that of marginal productivity or utility. The usefulness of the concept is indicated by Professor Worland when he writes that
the distinction between one sector of the economy and another for the purpose of evaluating economic activity and performance reduces to this: Is the marginal
utility generated by an increment of resources in one sector of the economy equal to, less than, or more than, its marginal utility in another sector? (p. 263)
Suffice it to say here that, if the marginal utility of the resources is greater in one sector than it is in another, then it is in the interests of the economy that these resources should be moved. Marginal utility, however, is measurable only in monetary terms; and a movement of resources of any kind may be deemed to be economically desirable as a result of such measurement--even though it is socially undesirable, or at least has socially undesirable overtones. This is the problem. Pigou circumvented it (but did not solve it) by distinguishing between economic and total welfare and postulating his " judgment of probability." Provided one accepts his caveat and the consequent conclusion that a maximization of economic welfare will simultaneously maximize total welfare, one can proceed to accept his general conclusions about economic policy. However, the gap between economic and total welfare cannot be closed merely by an assumption of probability. The recognition of the existence of such a gap, and of its social implications, has led to a further refinement of welfare economics by economists like Nicholas Kaldor and J. R. Hicks, a refinement which is indicated by the term New Welfare Economics and to which Professor Worland devotes a great deal of his attention.
The crux of the question lies in the distribution of purchasing power throughout the economy. The concept of marginal utility is useful to economic analysis, provided one is dealing with a market economy; it is of maximum usefulness to economic policy, when one is dealing with the " perfect market" economy, and welfare economists are constantly concerned with the establishment of such a system. The market, however, is responsive, not to human needs as such but to human wants and demands, that is, demands backed by purchasing power. If purchasing power is inequitably distributed, then the market system cannot, by definition, do other than reflect and continue the inequity. Recognizing this difficulty, the New Welfare Economics came up with the concept of Social Welfare Function, and this involves a more equitable distribution of purchasing power according to the " social significance " of the various sectors, and in them the various groups or persons, in the economy. This is the point of contact between welfare economics and scholasticism, for there is an obvious affinity between the redistribution, or rather the rearrangement, of purchasing power according to " social significance " and the scholastic concept of distributive justice. With such a rearrangement of purchasing power the market system, or, if one prefers, the free enterprise system, comes into its own, and its inequities are eliminated. If the rearrangement according to social significance is made according to what scholastics would call distributive justice, then the convergence is complete.
This is the main theme of Professor Worland's book. He develops his thesis with considerable skill and cogency, and in the process gives us
page 432
an exceptionally lucid analysis of the origins and development of welfare economics, as well as deep appreciation of the scholastic approach to economia. For this reason his book is warmly recommended to students of economics and ethics alike.
It is understandable that he should try to fit some rather disconcerting theories into his main theme. For example: he claims that Adam Smith altered decisively the orientation of political economy by placing the state in a subordinate position and treating the production of goods to be consumed by the population as the basic objective of economic policy. In this his approach was radically different from the mercantilists who preceded him and who were principally concerned with, Professor Worland claims, the enhancement of national prestige and military power. Such a basic distinction between Smith and the mercantilists is difficult to substantiate. After all, one of the best known dicta of Smith is that " defence is better than opulence." It is true that his was a consumption-orientated economy and one that could best operate through the market system (guided, of course, by " the invisible hand "), but for him, as for most of the classical economists after him, " consumption" meant the consumption of the nation-state, and that included military power. Where he differed from the mercantilists was not in the end to be achieved but in the means by which this end might best be achieved. His basic argument was that the policies of the mercantilists were in the long run self-defeating.
Similarly, Professor Worland's suggestion that " as pure moral doctrine utilitarianism provides a point of departure very little different from that required by scholastic natural law " (p. 81) will come as quite a surprise to those familiar with scholasticism, not to mention the utilitarians themselves. It was, after all, the father of utilitarianism in its economic manifestations, Jeremy Bentham, who described natural law theory as " nonsense, nonsense upon stilts." In fact, it was the same Bentham whose definition of the common good as the " greatest happiness of the greatest number " brought about the ultimate confusion between economics and ethics. For if happiness was to be measured in material terms, then the problem reduced itself to finding an economic and political organization wherein material satisfaction would be maximized. It was a short step from there to the decision that that which was economically efficient was taken to be morally good. That which was economically inefficient was taken to be morally bad. Admittedly, Professor Worland is careful to avoid such a confusion, but this is one of the advances of welfare economic analysis; one does not have to claim, as he seems to do, that there never was a basic clash between utilitarianism and natural law theory. Nor does Adam Smith and the whole classical tradition need to be fitted into the picture. It appears to at least one observer that what is involved in the latest recommendations of welfare economists, including Professor Worland,
land, is no less than an utterly radical transformation of the economic scene where markets are retained, not for their inherent worth (which is how the classical economist would have approached them) but because they are indispensable for rational calculation and decision.
But there is a more fundamental matter to be considered, arising not so much from the present work as from the whole course of welfare economic analysis. One has the uneasy feeling that the latter is being made irrelevant by the chain of events both in economic and political life as a whole. The concept of the " perfect market" is the cornerstone of the analysis: it provides it, through the price mechanism, with a standard, a measuring rod, by means of which we can assess the relative merits of different economic policies. What is being increasingly questioned nowadays is not the validity of the analysis but the very existence of the reality upon which it is based. The economic scene is becoming more and more dominated by huge industrial corporations which seem to spend a great deal of time and effort (not to mention money) in trying to do away with the market system altogether--at least as far as their own internal policies are concerned. It is not simply a matter of the accumulation of monopoly power or of a spectacular increase in profits--these could be coped with relatively easily by various forms of government control. Size, as J. K. Galbraith conclusively demonstrates in The New Industrial State, is the inevitable product of technology and of technological change. The time span between the initiation of a particular project and its completion, the enormous resources involved in research and development, the increasing degrees of specialization, and so on, have made planning imperative; and planning involves the superseding of the market. This is done by vertical integration (buying up or controlling the source of raw materials), retail control of the market through modern advertizing techniques, the monopoly position assured by the mere fact of size, and, not by any means least important, the government subsidized research and government guaranteed markets. There is good reason to believe that the market economy, beloved of the classical economists, is vanishing into the mists (into the rubbish-can, Lenin might say!) of history. The enemy of the market, as Galbraith points out, is not ideology or socialism: it is the engineer.
What is needed of economists now is a totally new approach, a totally new analysis which will take such radical developments into account and which will not be so dependent on the existence of the market. For this reason the economists of the western world might do well to pay a great deal of attention to what is presently happening in Russia and Eastern Europe. Marxist economists like Professor Libermann may have more to offer than we realize. After all, they have been endeavoring to cope with the difficulties posed by the absence of free or perfect markets for quite some time.
In his Religion and the Rise of Capitalism, published as long ago as
1926, R. H. Tawney remarked that " the true descendant of the doctrines of Aquinas is the labour theory of value. The last of the Schoolmen was Karl Marx." Professor Worland now invites us to consider the proposition that the true descendant of the doctrines of Aquinas is the theory of New Welfare Economics, and that the last of the schoolmen is, perhaps, J. R. Hicks. There must be a moral here somewhere--especially for those who consider the doctrines of Aquinas to be a closed and barren system! Qui potest capere capiat.
Gabriel P. Bowe, O. P.
Aquinas Institute
River Forest, Illinois
Ethique Générale. By Joseph de Finance, S. J. Rome: Presses de l'Université Grégorienne, 1967. Price 3,000 Lire.
Ethique Générale is a textbook, the author's own translation into French of a previous Latin edition which itself was the fruit of his teaching experience at the Gregorian University in Rome. This alone could easily discourage a suspicious and, to the scholastic form of thought, unsympathetic reader from taking the pains to read some four hundred and forty pages of familiar arguments, names and references. Such at first was the feeling of this reviewer. It persisted almost to the end of the first part of the book, entitled Moral Value. This part is devoted to an analysis of the great ethical systems of the past with the usual prominence given to Kant and the Utilitarians. Such an initial feeling, however, proved to be a false anticipation. Although less conspicuous on the surface, other more recent and still influential ethical currents such as marxism, logical positivism and existentialism are, for the size of the textbook, adequately and critically examined. It is from this analysis also that there gradually emerges the author's central preoccupation: a critical investigation into what constitutes the moral value and obligation to which the universal human consciousness gives an historically unintermittent testimony. The second and the third parts of the book, entitled respectively Moral Order and Beatitude and Morality, complete this investigation and, predictably enough, find the answer to moral value and obligation in God.
Fr. de Finance follows the philosophy of Saint Thomas and endorses his position on all traditionally controversial issues, such as the primacy of the intellect, rational foundation of the law, immutability of the divine will, impossibility of morally indifferent acts in the individual, etc. But he intentionally departs from the formal structure of the Prima Secundae and explains his reasons.
Philosophy, he writes quoting Saint Thomas, is unlike theology. It
studies the creatures in themselves and from them it progresses toward the knowledge of God. Thus, continues the author, " our method will be first analytical and inductive. It will begin with the data of moral conscience and through interpreting them and revealing their ultimate meaning it will reach the principles which will make deduction possible (p. 25)." By ending with the chapter on Beatitude rather than beginning with it, Ethique Générale symbolically admits that it is only an introduction to moral theology which alone can give a satisfactory answer to man's moral query. Such is the author's conclusion and the fact that Saint Thomas himself commented upon but never wrote an ethics seems to support it.
This, however, raises some important questions in regard to both the relationship of ethics to moral theology and the nature of ethics as a science and academic discipline in the present structure of our curricula. Thus, if ethics is only a philosophical introduction to moral theology without ever reaching any scientific conclusions of its own, its position among the sciences becomes shaken, if not, indeed, untenable. In view of this, it is as dangerous to make ethics a department of moral theology as to make it a department of psychology or history of philosophy. In each case the assumption would be that there is no rationally objective evidence as to what is morally good and evil besides the evidence supplied by other sciences or a religious system. A moral dialogue on a purely human and rational level would become impossible and moral scepticism inescapable.
The author, of course, makes no such suggestions, nor does his analysis lead to such conclusions. " Our business," he writes, " is to find out how moral value is related to God and founded in God (p. 198)." The reality of an objective moral order known by natural reason and the reality of the revealed God are clearly stated. It is their relationship that seems to become the formal object of ethics. If such is the case, one can certainly see a continuous need of ethical studies, since new data on man are continuously provided by positive sciences; but one cannot help asking why this should be a specific preoccupation of ethics and not also, or even more specifically, of moral theology. For centuries and in all great cultures ethics and religion have been closely linked. Christianity, moreover, asserts unequivocally that God is the ultimate answer to man's moral questions. There is, therefore, no reason, even if it were possible, for Christian ethics to avoid reference to moral theology. But, then, there still remains the practical question of how to maintain ethics as a special discipline in our academic curricula without excessive anticipation and duplication of moral theology.
Aware of this problem, Fr. de Finance makes a considerable effort in its regard. He is brief on dispositions and virtues, which constitute the central theme of the thomistic moral theology, and more thorough on such subjects as law, rights and conscience. But here also a demarcation line of General Ethics is not easy to draw. A discussion on law and right
is hardly complete outside of a discussion of society, which is the subject of social ethics, and the subject of conscience brings him back into theological waters. But these topics, as well as those of natural law and the unchangeability of moral norms, give him an opportunity, which he takes, to dispel certain contemporary confusions about the meaning of objective morality and to take issue with unfounded criticism of the traditional, especially thomistic, moral theology.
Although there are abundant bibliographical notes in the text, the book lacks a systematic bibliography. There is an index of proper names, but a subject index is also missing. These, however, are minor defects in a book sufficiently updated to be useful both to the students and teachers of ethics.
Janko Zagar, O. P.
St. Albert's College
Oakland, California
The Difference of Man and the Difference It Makes. By Mortimer J. Adler. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1967. Pp. 421 with notes and index. $7.95.
Having read this book carefully, I will be surprised if it does not exert a large and lasting influence over the directions of humanistic thought in our era. Having done extensive research and a little writing concerning the very problem which this book's title so neatly circumscribes, it would be impossible for me not to concur in the author's preliminary assessment of his task: " It will be impossible to review and interpret the literature of this subject without calling attention to the inconsistencies or obscurities of statement and thought that arise from want of an adequate framework of analytical distinctions " (p. 35).
Thus Adler engages the problematic of human uniqueness by first attempting " to set forth, exhaustively, the range of possible answers to a more general question, namely, how any object that we can consider differs from any other " (p. 15). In terms of this general question, Adler reasons in Part I of his study, " The Modes of Difference," that man could differ from other products of the evolutionary process in any of three ways.
He could differ according to what Adler calls an " apparent difference in kind," or, equivalently, a " difference in degree": " when, between two things being compared, the difference in degree in a certain respect is large, and when, in addition, in that same respect, the intermediate degrees which are always possible are in fact absent or missing (i. e., not realized by actual specimens), then the large gap in the series of degrees may confer upon the two things being compared the appearance of a difference in kind " (p. 23).
Again, man could differ according to a " superficial difference in kind ": " an observable or manifest difference in kind may be based on and explained by an underlying difference in degree, in which one degree is above and the other below a critical threshold in a continuum of degrees " (p. 24). Thanks to this critical threshold in the series of degrees, no intermediates are possible with respect to that property in terms of which comparison is being made.
Finally, man might differ as man according to a " radical difference in kind ": " An observable or manifest difference in kind may be based on and explained by the fact that one of the two things being compared has a factor or element in its constitution that is totally absent in the constitution of the other; in consequence of which the two things, with respect to their fundamental constitution or make-up, can also be said to differ in kind " (p. 25). Here it is not a question of a mere critical threshold which marks the difference but of a manifest difference in kind bespeaking an underlying one as well.
And just because delineating the basic issue in this formal or abstract way, by defining and exhausting the alternatives, enables us to determine the kind of evidence required to support each of the possible types of answer " and to determine the conditions under which evidence might some day decisively favor one answer as against the other two " (p. 29), Adler is able to make for his study a claim exactly paralleling in anthropology Kant's claim in metaphysics, " namely, that it provides the basis for understanding and criticizing all the writing that has so far been done on this subject, as well as whatever remains to be written in the future as new evidence accumulates and new theories or arguments develop." Adler provides us, in short, with " a prolegomenon to future research and thinking on this subject" (p. 47). (It might be pointed out that, so far as contemporary discussions are concerned, it would seem that the most important of the above formal distinctions is not that between superficial and radical modes of difference but that between apparent and superficial: it is here that most of the equivocations in the contemporary anthropological literature lie.)
Granted, then, that man might as man differ in any one of the stated possible ways, by which of them does he in fact differ? With the possible lines of evidence thus untangled and set within an adequate frame of analytical distinctions, Adler proceeds in Part II of his book, " The Difference of Man," to survey in the light of presently available evidence the positions set forth by scientists and philosophers who have inquired into the difference of man; and he finds in doing so that " it is impossible for anyone who understands the distinction between difference in degree and difference in kind to assert . . . that a man differs only in degree from other animals."
Whether man's de facto difference in kind is a superficial or a radical
one, however, depends on whether conceptual acts can be identified with events in the nervous system or not. The argument that they can not Adler designates as the " immaterialist" position or " non-identity hypothesis "; while the argument that they can be so identified he calls the " materialist " position or the " identity hypothesis."
Likely to be of particular interest to readers of this review is Adler's demonstration that a tenable and defensible presentation of the position that conceptual acts cannot be identified with nervous events was " first formulated by Aristotle and Aquinas and to my [Adler's] knowledge," can " be found only in the philosophical tradition that stems from them " (pp. 216-7). But this is no point of mere partisan interest; rather is it a very pivotal point on which a grasp of the thrust of Adler's dialectical presentation depends, because " the non-identity hypothesis that I have described as moderate immaterialism--the theory of intellect or mind developed by Aristotle and Aquinas," in addition to being defensible on the basis of all data presently at hand, " appears to be totally neglected in the contemporary discussion " (p. 223) " so far as I can judge from my own fairly extensive reading "--a studied understatement--" of the contemporary literature " (p. 220).
What is most novel in Adler's development of the issue at this decisive juncture is his proposal of an indirect way of resolving the issue either for or against the today generally advocated position of " moderate materialism " termed the " identity (of conceptual thought with nervous events) hypothesis." By " indirect argument" in this context Adler envisages an argument which has simultaneously (1) a "simplicity comforting to those who have little taste or aptitude for philosophical disputation and metaphysical reasoning," and (2) an " immediate intelligibility " in terms of pure empiricism or positivism, being structured exclusively throughout in terms of scientific data or technological results. Adler terms this proposal for indirect resolution of the outstanding issue concerning man's difference " Turing's Game " after the late British mathematician Alan M. Turing; and this proposal amounts to the challenge, which originates with Descartes but which is clearly spelled out anew by Adler for today's technologists, to produce " a machine that can simulate conceptual thought as that is exhibited in the flexible and unpredictable give-and-take of human conversation " (pp. 241-2). Failing that, after repeated and sustained efforts, the logic of disappointed expectations ought (cf. fn. 1, pp. 354-5, fn. 2, pp. 359-60) to result in a progressive undermining of the tenability of the currently dominant materialist position.
But for what there is of feasible alternative to the identity hypothesis, for what its failure to meet the " Cartesian challenge " or successfully play " Turing's game " (within the next 50-100 years) would mean for man and human values, according to Adler's prognostics, we shall be thrown back, not upon Descartes or any other form of Idealism but upon the resources of the Aristotelian-Thomistic tradition.
In the third and final part of his book, " The Difference It Makes," Adler seeks to convey something of the import of the outcome (whether directly or indirectly achieved) to what was portrayed at the conclusion to Part II as " the one remaining issue " in the question as to how man differs. Whether man's difference is superficial or radical--what difference does it make? As Adler has little trouble making clear, it makes a great deal of ethical, scientific, philosophical, religious, and theological difference. Suffice it to remark here simply that at the heart of the difference it makes as to how man differs is the issue on which the moral fabric and quality of human life depends, the issue of human responsibility; since only if man differs according to the mode called radical is there a dimension in human being which provides a ground for praise and blame, a ground for principled as well as expedient conduct in our treatment of other men.
Thus this reviewer would like to suggest that the " new twist" Adler gives to the subject of his book does not so much concern (as suggested by Time's reviewer [January 12, 1968]) any ' asserting that man's nature is defined not only by his difference from the beasts but by his difference from machines,' as it " concerns the somewhat paradoxical character of introducing an argument drawn from Aristotle and Aquinas into the dispute of the mind-body problem as that has developed in modem thought since the time of Descartes " (p. 217); for herewith the suggestion is made that the deepest and truest insights into the nature of man lie in a tradition of thought that is almost entirely neglected in the universities of our era.
John N. Deely
University of Ottawa
Ottawa, Canada
Personality Types and Holiness. By Alexander Roldan, S. J. Trans, by Gregory McCaskey. Staten Island, N. Y.: Alba House, 1967. Pp. 384. $6.50.
The study of the psychology of constitutional or temperamental differences seems to be perennially fascinating, for there is no doubt that there are different basic " types " of people and that an understanding of the varieties, aside from the intellectual satisfaction it would provide, is important and even essential in practical dealings with people. One man's meat is another man's poison, and educators, counselors, salesmen and administrators, to mention a few, have to take this into account. So do spiritual directors, and to serve their need Fr. Alexander Roldan has written his book on personality types and holiness.
However, the psychology of temperamental differences is also one of the most controversial parts of a generally controversial science, and it is safe to say that there is presently no generally acceptable system of classification of basic human types. As a matter of fact, there seems to be no substantial hope that a generally acceptable system can be produced at the present stage of development of psychological sciences, as a result of which, as the author notes, constitutional psychology is largely discounted, especially in the United States. It seems evident, for instance, that early infantile experiences can produce deep attitudes and tendencies which will persist virtually unchanged throughout life, and that these acquired modes of response cannot presently be distinguished from genuine temperamental factors.
The author accepts the three component typology of W. H. Sheldon as the best theory yet proposed, defending it with a number of arguments of convenience, e. g., that it accords with tri-dimensional psychologies of basic human capacities. He seems to give much more weight to the relationships of somatotypes to blastodermic layers than Sheldon himself was willing to do. He sees many congruencies between Sheldon's theory and the theories of other constitutional psychologists, which he accepts as further confirmation of Sheldon. When, however, he applies Sheldon's methods to the problem of determining hagiotypes (basic personality components in relation to Christian spirituality), he reports negative results and falls back on intuitive descriptions which merely parallel Sheldon's types. Thus agapetonia is for viscerotonia, prasotonia for somatotonia, and deontotonia for cerebrotonia (constitutional psychologists are prone to jaw-breaking neologisms--saints typifying one or another spiritual component are hagionorms; Christ is the hyperhagionorm, typifying all components at their best). The third type, incidentally, the deontotonic, which is characterized by high moral rectitude and rigid sense of obligation, would more likely be classified today as having a strong super-ego than as representing a basic constitutional tendency. After determining the hagiotypes, the author gives advice on their spiritual guidance which is reminiscent of classical ascetical treatises, and then he exemplifies the types with well-known saints. In the final chapter of the book he presents Christ as representing the highest degrees of the three components, citing evidences from the Gospels as empirical supports for a position which is, however, basically a theological conclusion.
Michael Stock, O. P.
St. Stephen's College
Dover, Mass.
Facing The Unbeliever. By Maurice Bellet. New York: Herder and Herder, 1967. Pp. 223. $3.95.
In a period of unrivalled preoccupation with the problem of faith, inquiries into unbelief are, if anything, multiplying even faster than those on belief. Heightened interest in unbelief will inevitably influence the demand for new analyses of the theology of faith, updated in view of the sharp confrontation of belief and its opposite number. The essay must eventually take a decidedly dialectical turn, and belief and unbelief must be explicitly compared over a wide range and at various levels. The theological understanding of the patterns of faith in human existence can profit immensely from such an exploration in depth. The approach has yet to be made, but the materials for it are being assembled, and the likelihood that it is imminent increases. The field of unbelief still awaits thorough mapping, but at least a beginning has been made and, most importantly, awareness of the extent and gravity of the problem is measurably greater than ever before. Thus far, however, inquiry and analysis of the phenomena of unbelief, as widespread as they are obscure and ambiguous, have been one-sidedly theological and philosophical. One thinks of the work of Rahner, Metz, Dondeyne, Steeman, Novak, Pieper, and others. Sound empirical studies, by competent political theorists, literary critics, anthropologists, sociologists, and psychologists, are still woefully few and sketchy in character.
Bellet's work is, to my knowledge, unique in subject matter and orientation. The unbeliever of the title is, specifically, the lapsed or defected believer, one who has abandoned or drifted away from a faith once held. Narrowing the arc of vision in this fashion is a distinct aid to accuracy of delineation arid sureness of evaluation, for " the unbeliever " is not one but legion. It is highly useful, not to say imperative, to distinguish from the outset those who have and those who have not professed religious beliefs in a meaningful way and for some substantial period of their lives. Bellet's unbeliever may move, more or less consciously or imperceptibly, to any number of diverse positions, but his point of departure is taken to be that of faith. This is the unbeliever met with most commonly; the " cradle atheist" is a rarity in our society, at least up to the present. Precisely because it is a pioneer work, I daresay a first of its kind, Bellet's essay is at pains to impress one with the tremendous complexity and subtlety of the problem with which it deals. This concern makes for difficult reading, but the effort is worthwhile.
Disillusionment with the inadequacies, real and imagined, of institutional Christianity both exacerbates the incidence of religious disaffection and raises a host of questions about the inner dynamics of unbelief as a post-Christian stance. Bellet grasps the significance of growing unbelief as a threat to those who remain attached to organized religion. He would
page 442
not, presumably, seriously dispute Charles Davis's contention that the crisis of faith is absolutely paramount in the disintegrating situation which faces churchmen at the present moment. Out of this realization, however painful, there emerges the urgency of reflection and a civil exchange of views. There is not much profit, no point, in fact, in rehearsing the hoary polemics that represented standard apologetics until recently. The burden of effort falls largely on the believer, in Bellet's estimate, and it is he who must seize the initiative out of a loving concern for his neighbor's spiritual need. It is not a question of sympathy or commiseration; it should not be supposed that the unbeliever as such is unhappy or has a feeling of inferiority vis-ŕ-vis the believer. Bellet argues convincingly that understanding the other is the primary desideratum, the indispensable prerequisite to a fruitful interrelationship and dependent upon a host of circumstances.
Unbelief can be understood only gradually, moving towards its center from a survey of the contexts in which it develops and seeking to uncover its roots and the many facets under which it reveals itself. Practical action is the goal, approached from two directions at once, to wit, a re-examined and strengthened acceptance of one's own Christian commitment and a personal engagement with the unbeliever in respect and love. The personalist approach is imperative: one's concern, ultimately, is the unbeliever and not merely his unbelief. This complicates the course of action, unavoidably, but the justification is undeniable. Bellet makes a series of practical suggestions, based on his analysis of the nature and causes of unbelief, but with an awareness that, at this point, any steps taken must be somewhat tentative and experimental. The need for psychological probes and sociological investigation is highlighted by the caution and hesitancy with which Bellet is forced to reach his conclusions.
One is on absolutely sure ground in asserting that unbelief is primarily and invariably a life option rather than a speculative position or a doctrinal preference reflectively adopted. By the same token, faith can meet unbelief on equal terms only when it is a free and living choice, realistic and courageous. Believer and unbeliever share, completely and unequivocally, the nature and destiny of man, a common condition which is, itself, both a challenge and a threat. Here, certainly, understanding is necessary, but it is neither easy to achieve nor to be taken for granted. Bellet does not, perhaps, appreciate sufficiently the obstacles which stand in the way of a sustained dialogue with unbelievers. The encounter he envisages is a person-to-person, largely informal and loosely structured relationship, an unofficial contact of human beings. The section on interpreting unbelief, indispensable to fruitful contact, is the most original and most highly provocative in the book. Through the complex tangle of emotional and intellectual factors with which the option of unbelief is confirmed and reinforced, Bellet weaves his way, illuminating from many angles the mystery of man's refusal of faith. In a chapter entitled, " The Masked
Heresy," the subterfuges and tactics one may employ to conceal, even from himself, a real defection from faith are exposed with striking effectiveness. Bellet follows an analysis with observations which are at once critical and constructive; the chapter on the system in which Christian faith is expressed is admirable proof of the author's skill in establishing the need for what he calls a " new language." It is an appeal for a thoroughgoing re-education of Christian consciousness, separating out what is essential to true faith from all that corrupts or confuses it.
Facing the unbeliever calls for " the illumination of life by faith rather than the imposing of faith upon life." Bellet proposes not " things to say " or immediately practical formulas but the vigorous self-expression of living faith through the analysis of human existence as it appears, as it is, for those who live it. The unbeliever is not, in the end, so easily exonerated; he, too, ought to be made to feel the full weight of the responsibility that is his for the course he pursues, the path he has chosen. The literature on the subject of unbelief is growing, becoming more searching and more highly specialized. Facing The Unbeliever is a welcome addition on this side of the Atlantic where so much awaits doing.
John P. Reid, O. P.
Providence College
Providence, R. I.
The Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Paul Edwards, Editor-in-Chief. 8 vols. of approximately 500 pp. each, with index of about 150 pp. in last volume. New York: The Macmillan Company and The Free Press, 1967. $219.00.
By the nature of their task, most encyclopedists--and especially those who prepare specialized encyclopedias--are amateurs. It is rare that such works are issued more than once every fifty years, and when they are prepared, the large staff that is required must be recruited from among those who have little or no experience in encyclopedia construction. The work under review is no exception to this rule, and yet it is truly an admirable contribution to the encyclopedia field. The editors took their task seriously, they planned a comprehensive treatment of philosophy and its history that articulates into about 1500 titles (over 900 of these are biographical entries), and they recruited an outstanding list of over 500 contributors to do the actual writing. The result is a highly competent and up-to-date treatment of philosophy in all its aspects, including its relationships to other fields of knowledge such as theology and religion.
The volumes are very Anglo-Saxon in tone, and most of the contributors
are drawn from the English-speaking world, with heavy accent on the larger universities in the U. S. and Great Britain. Very few Thomists or Catholic thinkers are represented, although the number who did write-- Vernon J. Bourke, Allan B. Wolter, Thomas Gilby, and James A. Weisheipl among them--were more than adequate to the task assigned. The solicitation of contributors, after all, had to follow on the selection of article titles and the assignment of their approximate length, and when this task was completed there was not a vast field of endeavor left for Catholic scholarship. Most of philosophy, for example, is treated as a modern development culminating in analytical philosophy, with the Greek and medieval periods supplying a background against which this development can be understood. The lengths of articles assigned to individual thinkers reflect this viewpoint. Plato, for example, is given about 19 pages and Aristotle about 11; St. Augustine gets 9 pages and St. Thomas Aquinas 11; then Descartes is allotted 10 pages, Leibniz 11, Kant 18, Hegel 15, and Bertrand Russell a generous 23. These, of course, are the longer biographical entries; practically every thinker who can be identified as a philosopher is covered in one way or another, and even when the treatment is brief, ample bibliographies are provided that direct the reader to the best sources for further information.
Logic and its history dominate the topical entries with an expanse of some 120 pages, again reflecting the strong analytical influence. Philosophy of science and psychology are given substantial treatment also. It is in these areas that the encyclopedia will undoubtedly prove of great value, for the expositions are clear and comprehensive, yet written with an interest verging on enthusiasm that is unexpected in such subject matters.
The editors seem generally to have shied away from systematic expositions of the various fields of concentration within philosophy. They prefer, instead, to use the historical and problematical approach, having entries such as " Aesthetics, History of," followed by " Aesthetics, Problems of." They are generally weak on their treatments of the histories of movements within philosophy: " Aristotelianism " gets only three pages, and " Augustinianism " and " Thomism " less than three each, and these are far from adequate expositions. Scholasticism is not given a special entry at all, being accorded only scant treatment in a five-page survey article entitled " Medieval Philosophy." Even " Monism and Pluralism " are held to only two pages (" Dualism " is included as a sub-section), while " Rationalism " gets only six. When it suits the editors' purpose, however, they can be more prolix: " Atheism," for example, is allotted 16 pages and " Atheismusstreit," for some curious reason, three more.
Perhaps because of the analytical emphasis, there are few good articles on concepts in philosophy, or on the history of ideas. Surprisingly enough, there is no entry on " Man " or " Human Nature," and only a short article on " Persons." " Man " is included in the index, but it refers the readers
to a number of articles (mostly on individual thinkers), leaving him the task of making his own synthesis of the matter presented. As may perhaps be expected, there is no article on " Spirit" or on " Soul" (although strangely there is an entry for " Animal Soul"), and the treatment of the " Mind-Body Problem " is rather thin. The human soul is treated explicitly only as a sub-section of the article on " Immortality," admittedly a context in which man's soul should be discussed, but certainly not the exclusive one. An accidental juxtaposition that is perhaps revealing is an exhaustive article on " Gödel's Theorem" following on the heels of a perfunctory treatment of " God, Concepts of."
This is not to say that philosophy of religion is neglected or that personalities and areas of thought of special interest to Catholics are not treated in the encyclopedia. The point is rather one of emphasis. Generally Protestant contributors are favored for specifically religious issues, and the metaphysical underpinnings of Catholic theology are allowed to go by default. Yet phenomenology is treated in a good survey article of 17 pages, and existentialism in an adequate one of eight. Since biographies of living philosophers are included, moreover, all of the important currents in existentialist and phenomenological thought are contained in the encyclopedia in one place or another, and the index is remarkably well constructed to assist the reader in finding them.
There are many articles of great utility to the researcher, and others of general reference will assist the beginner in philosophy. Noteworthy in the latter category are the entries " Philosophical Bibliographies," " Philosophical Dictionaries and Encyclopedias," and " Philosophical Journals." Almost all of the articles are written in a simple expository style that permits their being read and understood by the thoughtful college student.
On the whole, Catholic philosophers and theologians will enthusiastically welcome this comprehensive reference work. Those who feel that " Christian philosophy " (no entry on this!) should have received more favorable treatment may console themselves with the following two reflections. First, the English-speaking Catholic has not always understood what other professional philosophers were saying and not infrequently has been knocking down straw men; now he has at his fingertips a lucid statement of many of the distinctive positions of non-Catholic intellectuals, and he can only benefit from studying them, even if his purpose be narrowly apologetic. Second, if the encyclopedia does not say all that a Catholic thinker might wish, it is truly representative of what English-speaking philosophers are saying in the latter 1960's. For this the editors are surely not to be blamed. They did their work superbly well, and lovers of truth can only stand graciously in their debt.
William A. Wallace, O. P.
Dominican House of Studies
Washington, D. C.
Augustine of Hippo. By Peter Brown. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1967. Pp. 463 with bibliography and index. $10.00.
In an age of intellectual and political turbulence it is both refreshing and reassuring to recall that other men in other times have lived through similar, and perhaps more violent periods of upheaval. Mr. Peter Brown, Fellow of All Souls College, Oxford, serves as an excellent pedagogue as he situates Augustine, the Catholic Bishop of Hippo, in the midst of the ferment that accompanied the dissolution of the Late Roman Empire, and more particularly in the ultimate capitulation to change that occurred on the African frontier.
Perhaps the most remarkable thing about this remarkable book is that Augustine, classically considered either as saint or scholar, comes through as a very real person who reacts in a real way to the demands of his situation. At the risk of using a fatigue-wearied word, the " whole " Augustine lives in these pages acting in his time and reacting to it in turn and thereby influencing the course of Christian thought in the centuries to come.
Of the many questions to which Augustine addressed his attention, that of human freedom emerges as pivotal for both his personal life and his intellectual achievement. In his middle years Manichean determinism was as unacceptable as would be the self-determinism of the Pelagians whom he relentlessly confronted at the close of his life. Like all men, Augustine was on pilgrimage, and he experienced both freedom and its lack within himself. Meditating anew on the writings of St. Paul he discovered the key to his problem's resolution in the notion of delight. As conceptualized, " delight" transcends the naked operation of intellect and will and fuses with them feeling and love as well as something apart from and beyond man himself. The resultant vital capacity goes far beyond man's powers of self-determination, so that he must grow in his freedom, and this growth is accomplished only by healing. It is this healing, the gratia sanans, that brings man to maturity, so that he moves while being moved to that complete freedom that transcends choice, with the result that any alternative is inconceivable.
Not all of the questions that vexed Augustine receive consideration in this biography--and this by deliberate intent of the author--nor are all of the practical problems that beset a rich and varied life treated. Particularly rewarding, however, is the figure which emerges of the scholarly Bishop of Hippo who fought to establish the Roman Church in a Donatist-dominated land and who went on to place his seemingly indelible mark on the whole of the Latin Church itself. The pressure of events convinced Augustine that truth is served not only in scholarly retreat but in the market-place of men and that God's designs are executed in time by the unremitting and uncompromising endeavors of men.
Mr. Brown's accomplishment should serve as a paradigm for those who would assay a biography worth writing. To read this book is a delightful and transforming experience.
William B. Ryan, O. P.
Dominican House of Studies
Washington, D. C.
The One Mediator. Summa Theologiae of St. Thomas Aquinas, vol. 50 (3a. 16-20). Translated with introduction, notes, appendices and glossary by Colman O'Neill, O. P. New York: McGraw-Hill, 1965. Pp. 296. $7.50.
The Names and Titles of Jesus. By Leopold Sabourin, S. J. New York: The Macmillan Company, 1967. Pp. 352. $7.95.
In his theological reflection on the Incarnation in the Summa St. Thomas, after considering the fact of the Incarnation and the qualities of Christ's humanity, treats of the consequences of this union. This section is particularly concerned with Christ's unity and with His relation to the Father and to us. St. Thomas's technical language is not easy to translate into readable English, but Fr. O'Neill's smooth translation helps us to grasp the thought of the Angelic Doctor. It reflects the precision of the Latin text, but it is more concerned with an accurate expression of St. Thomas's thought than with a rigid adherence to the sentence structure and terminology. The notes, while not too extensive, are useful. Of greater value are the six appendices: statements about Christ; unity of existence in Christ; the problem of Christ's autonomy; the merit of Christ; the priesthood of Christ; adoptive sonship. The work also includes a glossary and index.
The work of Father Sabourin, a Canadian Jesuit now teaching at the Biblicum in Rome, appeared in French in 1963. It is not as scholarly or original as his significant Redémption sacrificielle, for the present work is not intended for the scriptural specialist but for the " cultivated public anxious to deepen its faith and eager to learn about the Christology of the New Testament." Since, to the Semitic mind, the name is expressive of the inner reality, Fr. Sabourin explains about fifty names or titles of Jesus in order to introduce the reader to the main lines of New Testament thought about Christ. Each short chapter hints at the erudition of the author, but his clear exposition of the topic is remarkably non-technical. The notes for each chapter give some suggestions for those who wish to examine the question in greater depth. An index of biblical texts adds to the usefulness of the work.
Robert J. Hennessey, O. P.
Dominican House of Studies
Washington, D. C.