occasionally to make statements which, if logically developed, would
come perilously near to it; and Emerson's philosophy is more seriously
compromised in this direction. Dionysius is in no such danger, for the
simple reason that he stands too near to Plato. The pantheistic
tendency of mediæval Realism requires a few words of explanation,
especially as I have placed the name of Plato at the head of this
Lecture. Plato's doctrine of ideas aimed at establishing the
transcendence of the highest Idea--that of God. But the mediæval
doctrine of ideas, as held by the extreme Realists, sought to find
room in the _summum genus_ for a harmonious coexistence of all
things. It thus tended towards Pantheism;[182] while the Aristotelian
Realists maintained the substantial character of individuals outside
the Being of God. "This view," says Eicken, "which quite inverted the
historical and logical relation of the Platonic and Aristotelian
philosophies, was maintained till the close of the Middle Ages."

We may also call pantheistic any system which regards the cosmic
process as a real _becoming_ of God. According to this theory, God
comes to Himself, attains full self-consciousness, in the highest of
His creatures, which are, as it were, the organs of His self-unfolding
Personality. This is not a philosophy which commends itself specially
to speculative mystics, because it involves the belief that _time_ is
an ultimate reality. If in the cosmic process, which takes place in
time, God becomes something which He was not before, it cannot be said
that He is exalted above time, or that a thousand years are to Him as
one day. I shall say in my fourth Lecture that this view cannot justly
be attributed to Eckhart. Students of Hegel are not agreed whether it
is or is not part of their master's teaching.[183]

The idea of _will_ as a world-principle--not in Schopenhauer's sense