Like Nietzsche in a few passages, so Wartenberg and Lutoslawski boast of being the representatives of Polish thought, of being the philosophers of the nation based on choice, the nation of the Liberum Veto. Wartenberg regards the world as an ensemble of dynamic relations between substances finite in number ; these substances are wills. While his pluralism owes its origin to Lotze, whom indeed he follows in his evolution towards monism, that of Lutoslawski rather originates in the pluralism of Teichmüller with whose system he deals under the title of Personalism. We shall deal at greater length with Lutoslawski, who was a friend o and correspondent of [William] James. According to him, it was neither Teichmüller, nor Struve, nor Fechner, nor Herbart, nor Lotze, nor James who inspired him with his particular pluralism. The thought of the Liberum Veto, that of the confederations of lords, forms the centre of his philosophy. It is in the name of "our Polishconfraternityy "⁶ that he speaks. He likes to recall the Polish poets or philosophers who drove individualism to its extreme limits : Liebelt, Mickiewicz who chants before God : "I feel immortality ; I create immortality ; what greater thing hast thou been able to accomplish ? My pinions soar to thee," and who ends with the cry : "My strength came thence whence thou hast taken thine, nor do I fear to lose it."

    Lutoslawski's method, a sort of passionate deduction, has no great resemblance to that of the pragmatists ; at times, however, he declares that we must not trust to general formulæ, that they cannot tell us whether, at any given moment, unity or diversity dominates the world. [*] Besides, the voluntaristic aspect of his method may allow us to look upon him as an ally of the pragmatists. Pluralism is incapable of proof or of refutations as is monism. [**] volition is sufficient.

    * However, confer the more recent Conditions Formulas by the American Hubbard. (WPT)
    ** The whole sorts of arguments, of the 'pluralism' versus 'monism', either pluralism or monism and the like seem never to had led anywhere. Any such ideas are only of the descriptions of the world, and any such can be true in some circumstances and untrue in some other. (WPT)

    Starting with the personalism of Teichmüller, Lutoslawski arrives at "that form of individualism called pluralism," as he says, that new "view of the world" which is "its most distinctive property" if we are to believe him. In his opinio, as in that of ames, the problem of unity and diversity is the one fundamental problem, that according to which philosophers should be classified.
    A voluntarist, he declares that his philosophy is an exaltation of the volition. A spiritualist, he sees in the world an ensemble of immortal souls. His spiritualism is but one form of his individualism ; he feels himself a soul, an uncreated immortal soul, recognising according to his Helsingfors thesis, which alone we must here consider, no ruler higher than itself. He adds, and it is not easy to reconcile these statements with a few others, that souls are of various degrees or hierarchies ; like Fechner, he imagines there to be stages in this multiplicity of souls. And it is here that spiritualism becomes spiritism : there exist mysterious communications between souls : what we call the unconscious is the mysterious working of other souls upon our own.

Comment Although this one account of Lutoslawski's work by another looks the finest one of any I have hitherto seen, one might well be careful about accepting any of it verbatim ; none of the authors were infallible, and the representations by one of another often contain some alterations, whether attempts done consciously at corrections, or alterations done unwittingly
    There should be nothing 'mysterious' in communications between souls — these words written by me are communications between me (a soul, or say, "I") and other individuals ('souls' by the definition applied here). All this has nothing to do with any 'unconscious' except : the latter may very truly exist but only as a problem — anything 'unconscious' only obstructs or corrupts the communications or prevents them altogether.
    I am also a trifle skeptical about the term 'spiritism' being used here by the French author (via an English translation that is) ; it seems that the term might not belong. (WPT)

    There must be in the world a superior being ; but the God of the individualist cannot be an omnipotent creator, consequently God can but guide the world without governing it in absolute fashion ; otherwise how is the existence of evil to be explained ? Besides, the idea of an eternity of souls prevents us from believing that God is omnipotent. "I cannot have been created." At times Lutoslawski affirms the existence of God, though only to defy him, as it were, just Mickiewicz did : "Let the universalists await the coming of this God. . . . He may work upon millions of servile beings. . . . I challenge him to become my master." Then again he imagines this God as a powerful friend : "We have almost the same object, and therefore numerous enemies in common."

    So far we have studied this conception of Lutoslawski without introducing the idea of becoming, of the universal effort which animates and moves the world as he imagines it. The sense of my freedom, my power of choice, will set free the world. Through my consciousness of freedom I can affirm the real development of the universe. "For the universalist the plan of the world is already completed. The individualist, on the other hand, believes that all souls advance or retreat freely." Thus the very idea of the incomplete character of the world is, by Lutoslawski as by James, connected with a belief in free-will. A second reason for affirming this growth of the universe is the hypothesis of interferences between our universe and the other universes mentioned by Lutoslawski. Indeed, when we believe the world to be composed of souls, we can no longer believe in the regularity of the laws of Nature. Pluralism, indeterminism, and spiritualism are interconnected.

Comment it does not seem to me that any of this precludes the 'regularity of the laws of Nature' such as seen on the realms of the physical universe — it being as if a playground to which the players are in principle external. (WPT).

    For the very reason that the world appears to him incomplete, a blend of good and evil, the pluralist is brought to believe that the good will be realised only by or efforts, that our very choice between contrasted moral and metaphysical doctrines possess a cosmic meaning and importance. The individual soul "gives its free collaboration to the aims of the whole world." The pluralist will run risks, as James said, will stake his earth life, as Lutoslawski said, "when dealing with high ends, on condition these ends require it."