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CHAPTER VIII
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the two great modern heirs of Hegelian absolutism, the Absolute, which is identity par excellence, is the supreme consummation, and the sole presupposition, of our entire philosophical quest. Furthermore, it (the Absolute) is also said to be the perfect concrete universal. Being completely identical with itself” this 'being' of the concrete universal does not admit
expounded with more effect and enthusiasm than by Mr. Bosanquet”. Space, Time and Deity, Vol. I, p. 233, S. Alexander, (The Humanities Press, New York, 1950). We notice this
enthusiasm'in Bosanquet's own words: “The recognition of this logical form (the concrete universal) as the true type of universality is the key to all sound philosophy." The Principle of Individuality and Value.
It may be doubted, for a moment, that the words "logical form", in the above statement of Bosanquet, do not bring out the ontological significance of the concrete universal. But that they do so will be realised when it is remembered that 'the identity of knowing and being' (and therefore of the
thought' and the thing'), as will be pointed out later in course of this topic (infra, p. 255) forms "the basic principle of all idealism".
This truth of the ontological significance of the concrete universal is further demonstrated by the self-contradictory idealistic argument that the true (the concrete) universal is the perfect 'Individual' and that the only such perfect 'Individual' is of course the supremely 'Real' (the ontological principle), or the Absolute. Cf. “We say then with Bradley, following, of course, Plato and Hegel, that the Individual which, as we have seen, is the only true form of the universal, is the Real.” Bosanquet, op. cit., p. 68, f.n. 3. (See also PL, Vol. II, p. 487). "......the Absolute is the concrete universal”. P. T. Raju's Thought and Reality (George Allen and Unwin, Ltd., London, 1937), p. 174. Hegel no doubt speaks, as already observed (supra, p. 98, f.n. 2) of mere identity as 'pure light' and of mere difference as 'pure night', and of both as 'two voids'. This seems to be opposed to such a description of the Absolute, which is the
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