Orestes Brownson’s Approach to the Problem of God; a Critical Examination, in the Light of the Principles of St. Thomas Aquinas by Bertin Farrell, C. P. (review)

Book Reviews 63 Orestes Brownson’s Approach to the Problem of God; a Critical Examination, in the Light of the Principles of St. Thomas Aquinas. B y Bertin Far­ rell, C. P. (Washington, D. C. Catholic University press, 1950. Pp. xiii +140.) Fr. Farrell’s doctoral dissertation is, as the sub-title tells us, " a critical examination in the light of the principles of St. Thomas Aquinas.” The author introduces his subject by showing us a good background — the rationalistic spirit of the times combatted by vigorous, even if at times mistaken, defenders of the Church. From this he proceeds to a clear, concise and pertinent account of Brownson’s quest for truth in Presbyterianism, Universalism, Socialism, natural religion, Unitarianism, and finally in the Church. In the body of the work, Fr. Farrell uses five chapters to deal with his, subject. Chapter 1 is an appraisal of scholasticism according to Brownson. Chapter 2 takes up Brownson’s idea of the setting for the problem of God. In this chapter he includes two aspects which determine Brownson’s ap­ proach to the problem of God, and differentiate him from the traditional (Thomistic ?) approach as incorporated in the quinque viae. The first of these aspects is the origin of first principles (p. 24). Brownson agrees with Kant that first principles are synthetic a priori. The second aspect is his divergence from the scholastics (Thomists ?) on the basis of intuitive thought as an act of the object (p. 30). In chapter 3 the author applies these two aspects to the problem of God. He begins with Brownson’s criticism of the quinque viae as founded on Kant’s objection. Brownson takes causality as synthetic a priori (p. 47). Fr. Farrell spends considerable time showing it is analytic, and therefore, necessarily and absolutely true. The author further points out that the existence of God can be proved only from creation, and that Brownson must prove that the intellect has immediate intuition of God. Brownson starts with Kant’s synthetic a priori proposition, and applies his doctrine of intuition to it (p. 63). He places the categories on the part of the object rather than the subject, and hopes to reach objective knowledge in this way. His notion seems to be a Pla­ tonic conception of ideas — they are prior to experience and separate from man (p. 64). The author refutes this by showing that Brownson identifies necessary ideas with necessary being, and consequently, his argument is invalid. Since Brownson is widely accused of and rarely defended from ontologism, Fr. Farrell treats of this philosophy in chapter 4. He considers it according to the philosophia perennis (Thomism?). The last chapter deals with Brownson and ontologism. The author tries to show that Brownson’s doctrine bears unmistakable resemblance to ontologism. Therefore, it cannot safely be taught (p. 97). He uses ex­ trinsic and intrinsic arguments to establish this. In his extrinsic proof he points out that Brownson quotes authors without realizing that they are ontologists (pp. 97-101). As for intrinsic arguments, Brownson’s funda­ mental propositions can be reduced to ontologism, or they really are on- 64 Book Reviews tologistic. The book concludes with a good summary and condemnation of Brownson in the latter’s own words. In a very orderly arrangement of chapters the author justifies his title and objective, scil., a systematic development of Brownson’s approach to the problem of God according to the principles of St. Thomas. It seems "to me he succeeds quite well in making this comparison, and in showing that Brownson fails to measure up to the principles of the Angelic Doctor. He succeeds too in showing that Brownson holds some kind of idealism, since he apparently identifies the ideal with the real. Perhaps he makes an overstatement when he implies (p. 8) that analogy is co-extensive with the philosophia perennis. There are approved scholastics who prove the existence of God and have a complete metaphysics without employing the principle of analogy. Moreover, we do not see why analogy is so funda­ mental to any metaphysics simply because Phelan and Cajetan said so. Furthermore, analogical knowledge seems to be as certain in this work as abstract, indirect...