THE UNIVERSE OF INFORMATION.pdf - ideals

merit of all institutions, of all theories of all political and
social organisation*. On the eve of returning to Brussels once
again, at the end of his short unsatisfactory odyssey in Paris,
he enunciated a credo:
I believe in the great principles of positivism and evolution: the formation
by evolution of things — the relativism of knowledge and the
historical formation of concepts.
As for religion, he had come to believe, along with Spencer,
that there was some great Unknowable which we reach forward
to in the dark. And as for the great work of synthesis
so confidently begun:
I am no longer anything more than a curious amateur who finds it
interesting how things are formed, how ideas grow and develop
(without some superior idea taking precedence) by the simple conflict
of forces (blind, I think) from brute nature up to the world of psychology
and sociology, necessarily taking all sorts of different arrangements
which emerge from the others in an evolutionary fashion.
And I no longer torture myself about a life of intellectual antinomies...
I merely note them.
At Nice he had realised that
the pleasure of having an absolute goal in life, a noble career, a great
task to perform wasn't possible. It was necessary that my thoughts
should plunge to the bottom of the abyss. The ease of despair isn't
possible to one with illusions remaining. Now, with nothing prejudged,
no illusions, no factitious duties — I am free.
BRUSSELS AGAIN, GRADUATION, MARRIAGE
He was, of course, not free, but had matured a little in
Paris. In May 1889 he made a trip to Berlin. His few ecstatic
days there were like a «symphony of love» and Fernande at
last promised to become his wife. But important examinations
were looming up in August. His loss of faith aroused scruples
in him about continuing his studies at the Universite de
Louvain. He decided to transfer to the Universite Libre de
Bruxelles. The last months of 1889 were occupied with some
of the examinations remaining before he could take his degree.
August was enlivened by his father's electoral campaign in
which he seems to have taken some part. Afterwards he visited
Paris again and then Fernande in Berlin. Eventually,
his uncle, Paul Heger, warned him sternly that he could not
expect to pass his examinations by spending a winter in
Paris, as he had resolved to do, and in travelling. Chastened,
Otlet returned to Brussels and the Universite Libre for the
winter term. Early in 1890 he passed two of three examinations
that were left before he could take his degree.
The final examination was in October 1890 and the year
dragged slowly on towards the critical moment with letters
from Fernande occasional bright spots in it. In April he spent
several weeks in Italy. He had learned Italian as a boy and
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