But most of his followers, influenced by an excessive desire for simplification, have attempted to blend the two into one; and have either merged the spiritual in the corporeal, or virtually annihilated the material by resolving it into the mental.

Hence two distinct, and even opposite forms of Pantheism,--the _material_ or _hylozoic_, and the _ideal_ or _spiritual_.
The former was the first in the order of historical development, so far as modern Europe is concerned.

It was most in accordance with the Sensational Philosophy which prevailed in the school of Condillac,[127] and which continued to maintain its ascendancy until it was assailed by the reviving spirit of Idealism.

It was the characteristic feature of the Atheism of the last century, and was fully exhibited in the "Systeme de la Nature." The recent revival of Idealism has done much to check its progress, but it has not effected its destruction; on the contrary, the theory of Material or Hylozoic Pantheism is an error as inveterate as it is ancient, and it is continually reappearing even in the light of the intellectual and spiritual Psychology of the nineteenth century.
This theory, although it has been propounded as a religious creed, rests mainly on a philosophical dogma.

It is based ultimately on the supposition that nothing exists in the universe except _matter_ and its laws; that _mind_ is the product of material organization; and that all the phenomena of thought, of feeling, of conscience, and even of religion, may be accounted for by ascribing them to certain powers inherent in matter, and evolved by certain peculiarities of cerebral structure.