The difference between the philosophies of the two greatest thinkers now flourishing in Italy is due to the natures of their minds. Croce always starts from a distinct problem, from a particular question, and rises to speculative heights partly through the vigour of his own genius and partly through his constant intercourse with Gentile, to whom any particular problem always presents itself from the outset _sub quadam specie Æternitatis_. On the other hand, Gentile starting thus, is led to pursue his researches on the central problem into all its particular and practical applications by a sense of reality so strong that he has been thought to recall Thomas Aquinas, by his vast erudition not only in the history of philosophy, but in the whole historical world. Yet, even apart from this, and from his special interest in all the problems of Law and pedagogy, the influence of Benedetto Croce always compels Gentile to keep in touch with actual reality. Their mutual criticism is perhaps the best example in philosophical history of the creative power of the critic. For except in one instance—where Croce insists upon seeing in his friend’s Actual Idealism the latest form of mysticism—the critic is always continuing the work which he is engaged in reviewing and revealing to the author the germs of truth that lie as yet undeveloped in his theory. The import of Croce’s work is certainly more easily grasped than Gentile’s ideas as they present themselves in his theoretical world. Many Italians are acting on these ideas of Gentile’s who would be unable to formulate them; and that is the most remarkable thing about them. He became a professor at the age of twenty-one, exactly thirty years ago, and as Professor Wildon Carr truly says in his introduction to his own translation of Gentile’s Pure Act—which will be here constantly quoted—he has become famous not only on account of his historical and philosophical writings, but also by the number and fervour of the disciples he has attracted. A born teacher, he loves teaching, and in teaching has acquired much of his knowledge of mind. He never divorces theory from the concrete ground of life; and when he addresses people between 17 and 60 years of age he is constantly forcing them to test in their own actual life the truth of what he is saying.