“Mr. Macaulay decides on the fate of philosophy with a ready formula, which, like many of the same kind, dazzles by means of words which have nothing behind them,—words which become more obscure and empty the nearer we approach them. He says, Philosophy was made for Man, not Man for Philosophy. In the former case it is practical; in the latter, theoretical. Mr. Macaulay embraces the first, and rejects the second. He cannot speak with sufficient praise of the one, nor with sufficient contempt of the other. According to him, the Baconian philosophy is practical; the pre-Baconian, and particularly the ancient philosophy, theoretical. He carries the contrast between the two to the last extreme, and he places it before our eyes, not in its naked form, but veiled in metaphors, and in well-chosen figures of speech, where the imposing and charming image always represents the practical, the repulsive the theoretical, form of philosophy. By this play he carries away the great mass of people, who, like children, always run after images. Practical philosophy is not so much a conviction with him, but it serves him to make a point; whereas theoretical philosophy serves as an easy butt. Thus the contrast between the two acquires a certain dramatic charm. The reader feels moved and excited by the subject before him, and forgets the scientific question. His fancy is caught by a kind of metaphorical imagery, and his understanding surrenders what is due to it.... What is Mr. Macaulay’s meaning in rejecting theoretical philosophy, because philosophy is here the object, and man the means; whereas he adopts practical philosophy, because man is here the object, and philosophy the means? What do we gain by such comparisons, as when he says that practical and theoretical philosophy are like works and words, fruits and thorns, a high-road and a treadmill? Such phrases always remind us of the remark of Socrates: They are said indeed, but are they well and truly said? According to the strict meaning of Mr. Macaulay’s words, there never was a practical philosophy; for there never was a philosophy which owed its origin to practical considerations only. And there never was a theoretical philosophy, for there never was a philosophy which did not receive its impulse from a human want, that is to say, from a practical motive. This shows where playing with words must always lead. He defines theoretical and practical philosophy in such a manner that his definition is inapplicable to any kind of philosophy. His antithesis is entirely empty. But if we drop the antithesis, and only keep to what it means in sober and intelligible language, it would come to this,—that the value of a theory depends on its usefulness, on its practical influence on human life, on the advantage which we derive from it.