Philosophy—East and West, the book of the East-West Philosophers’ Conference held at Hawaii in 1939, adds to the growing evidence of a desire for rapprochement in academic circles between America and the Far East. The scope of the book is philosophical and rational, prescinding, that is, from religious questions as such, and seeking to formulate and to organise the common ground of Eastern and Western thought and thus to make more readily accessible to each what one possesses and the other lacks. The project arises from so manifest and natural a tendency—the desire of men to understand one another and so extend their understanding of the world—that any elaborate justification seems uncalled for, and in effect the majority of the Eastern contributors dispense with any such preamble. In the nature of the case the position of the Western philosophers is a more self-conscious one, and the justifications they put forward raise questions more important than the conference itself. It must be added that such a statement intends no disparagement of the book in which the proceedings of the conference are recorded, and is one in which the American contributors themselves would probably agree.

The first question, to which we may defer the answer while using it as a key to unlock others, is this: In what sense can we accept the statement that the traditions neither of the East nor of the West are wholly true or adequate to a full understanding of man? It is a proposition in which the Western and, at least, one of the Eastern contributors explicitly concur, and is in line with the objective of a “planetary philosophy“, in which the same amount of agreement is evident.

“How can prudent foresight be wastefulness? It doesn’t do to talk absurdities!”

It all becomes clear and easy if we once understand that God knows what he is saying ! With what simplification should we not be enriched if we would be persuaded that not one of his words is useless, not one of his commandments thrown at hazard and without a profound reason, that their end, since he loves us, is none other than our greatest good, our surest happiness. And then, that he is always right.

It is not sufficient, in order to put h'm in the wrong, that we should understand the necessity of what he ordains. It may be we lack some of the elements that would enable us to judge. God sees continually, and in the light of eternity, the totality of creation. As for ourselves, have we taken into consideration that our hand held before our eyes suffices to hide from them the narrow section that they embrace of our limited, terrestrial and changing horizon? How then should it not be that the greater part of God’s motives escape us? . . . Before judging God, let us first follow his teaching a little while to discover where it leads.

Let us see what trouble God takes to prove to us, by daily, unfailing experience, that foresight such as we understand it, is a bad speculation, whatever we may think of it.

The Hebrews would not listen to him, and believed themselves well advised to make a provision of manna for the following day, but it began to be full of worms, and it putrified.

Now let us see the effects of this love. Among them first, as 1 said, that Christ took upon himself the debts incurred by our sins and made satisfaction for them. As a figure of this, Holy Scripture tells us that when the whole land of Egypt was destroyed by a plague of locusts, and Moses prayed for a remedy, God sent a burning wind that blew the locusts into the Red Sea where they were all drowned. What does this mean but what the Prophet said of our Lord, “He will put away all our iniquities : and he will cast away all our sins into the bottom of the sea”? (Mich, vii, 19). This was the Red Sea, to show us they were drowned in the sea of Christ’s precious Blood.

The second effect was that our Lord took for himself the sorrow and sufferings and gave us the fruit and merit gained by them. What follows must be told on our knees with eyes raised to heaven, for it was that the Lord did for men what a slave does for his Master. He works all day to earn money which he gives to his owner and is left unpaid for his labour. This is what our most pitiful Redeemer did for us. Could our Lord’s charity have reached further than this? Who could have done this but God, whose goodness and charity surpass our understanding?

From the Editions du Cerf, 229 Boulevard Latour-Maubourg, Paris—7e, we have received copies of new periodicals issued by that publishing-house, already so well-known for La Vie Intellectuelle and La. Vie Spirituelle. They include Fêtes et Saisons, Cahiers de l’Art Sacré, and La Maison Dieu, the quarterly organ of the Centre de Pastorale Liturgique (250 francs for a year’s subscription). From the same source come two new series of books, Lex Grandi and La. Clarté-Dieu. A detailed survey of these encouraging signs from France will appear in an early number of The Life of The Spirit.