The Divine Lamp

Ultimate grounds are either absolute or relative.  The former are, strictly speaking, alone ultimate, and, as such, constitute the scope of General Philsophy;  whereas the latter are ultimate only in reference to a determinate branch of science, and hence from the scope of Special Philosophies, such as those of matematics, physics, history, politics, art, ect.

Though Rosmini prefers the term ultimate grounds, he does not object to calling them likewise first grounds.  “ultimate grounds,”  he says, “and first grounds  are equivalent expressions, because what is last in the one direction of thought is first in the other.”  Compare the Aristotelian doctrine, that what is first in essence or nature is last in generation, or, as St Thomas puts it, “What is first and better known in its nature is last and less known relatively to us.”  Of the relation of Philosophy to the other sciences  Rosmini says, “The ultimate grounds outside of the world and the ultimate grounds in the world, these form the object of philosophy, which thus occupies the last two and highest steps of the pyramid we have described.  Hence philosophy remains clearly separated from, and elevated above, the other sciences, as the guide and mother of them all.  These form the lower steps of the pyramid, depending upon the highest two and receiving their light from them”