Chapter XXIV

SOME PRACTICAL ADMONITIONS

88. BE PREPARED TO ENTER UPON A NEW WAY OF LOOKING AT THINGS.--We have seen that reflective thought tries to analyze experience and to attain to a clear view of the elements that make it up--to realize vividly what is the very texture of the known world, and what is the nature of knowledge. It is possible to live to old age, as many do, without even a suspicion that there may be such a knowledge as this, and nevertheless to possess a large measure of rather vague but very serviceable information about both minds and bodies.

It is something of a shock to learn that a multitude of questions may be asked touching the most familiar things in our experience, and that our comprehension of those things may be so vague that we grope in vain for an answer. Space, time, matter, minds, realities,--with these things we have to do every day. Can it be that we do not know what they are? Then we must be blind, indeed. How shall we set about enlightening our ignorance?

Not as we have enlightened our ignorance heretofore. We have added fact to fact; but our task now is to gain a new light on all facts, to see them from a different point of view; not so much to extend our knowledge as to deepen it.

It seems scarcely necessary to point out that our world, when looked at for the first time in this new way, may seem to be a new and strange world. The real things of our experience may appear to melt away, to be dissolved by reflection into mere shadows and unrealities. Well do I remember the consternation with which, when almost a schoolboy, I first made my acquaintance with John Stuart Mill's doctrine that the things about us are "permanent possibilities of sensation." To Mill, of course, chairs and tables were still chairs and tables, but to me they became ghosts, inhabitants of a phantom world, to find oneself in which was a matter of the gravest concern.

I suspect that this sense of the unreality of things comes often to those who have entered upon the path of reflection, It may be a comfort to such to realize that it is rather a thing to be expected. How can one feel at home in a world which one has entered for the first time? One cannot become a philosopher and remain exactly the man that one was before. Men have tried to do it,--Thomas Reid is a notable instance (section 50); but the result is that one simply does not become a philosopher. It is not possible to gain a new and a deeper insight into the nature of things, and yet to see things just as one saw them before one attained to this.

If, then, we are willing to study philosophy at all, we must be willing to embrace new views of the world, if there seem to be good reasons for so doing. And if at first we suffer from a sense of bewilderment, we must have patience, and must wait to see whether time and practice may not do something toward removing our distress. It may be that we have only half understood what has been revealed to us.

89. BE WILLING TO CONSIDER POSSIBILITIES WHICH AT FIRST STRIKE ONE AS ABSURD.--It must be confessed that the philosophers have sometimes brought forward doctrines which seem repellent to good sense, and little in harmony with the experience of the world which we have all our lives enjoyed. Shall we on this account turn our backs upon them and refuse them an impartial hearing?

Thus, the idealist maintains that there is no existence save psychical existence; that the material things about us are really mental things. One of the forms taken by this doctrine is that alluded to above, that things are permanent possibilities of sensation.

I think it can hardly be denied that this sounds out of harmony with the common opinion of mankind. Men do not hesitate to distinguish between minds and material things, nor do they believe that material things exist only in minds. That dreams and hallucinations exist only in minds they are very willing to admit; but they will not admit that this is true of such things as real chairs and tables. And if we ask them why they take such a position, they fall back upon what seems given in experience.

Now, as the reader of the earlier chapters has seen, I think that the plain man is more nearly right in his opinion touching the existence of a world of non-mental things than is the idealistic philosopher. The latter has seen a truth and misconceived it, thus losing some truth that he had before he began to reflect. The former has not seen the truth which has impressed the idealist, and he has held on to that vague recognition that there are two orders of things given in our experience, the physical and the mental, which seems to us so unmistakable a fact until we fall into the hands of the philosophers.

But all this does not prove that we have a right simply to fall back upon "common sense," and refuse to listen to the idealist. The deliverances of unreflective common sense are vague in the extreme; and though it may seem to assure us that there is a world of things non-mental, its account of that world is confused and incoherent. He who must depend on common sense alone can find no answer to the idealists; he refuses to follow them, but he cannot refute them. He is reduced to dogmatic denial.

This is in itself an uncomfortable position. And when we add to this the reflection that such a man loses the truth which the idealist emphasizes, the truth that the external world of which we speak must be, if we are to know it at all, a world revealed to our senses, a world given in our experience, we see that he who stops his ears remains in ignorance. The fact is that the man who has never weighed the evidence that impresses the idealist is not able to see clearly what is meant by that external world in which we all incline to put such faith. We may say that he feels a truth blindly, but does not see it.

Let us take another illustration. If there is one thing that we feel to be as sure as the existence of the external world, it is that there are other minds more or less resembling our own. The solipsist may try to persuade us that the evidence for such minds is untrustworthy. We may see no flaw in his argument, but he cannot convince us. May we ignore him, and refuse to consider the matter at all?

Surely not, if we wish to substitute clear thinking for vague and indefinite opinion. We should listen with attention, strive to understand all the reasonings laid before us, and then, if they seem to lead to conclusions really not in harmony with our experience, go carefully over the ground and try to discover the flaw in them. It is only by doing something like this that we can come to see clearly what is meant when we speak of two or more minds and the relation between them. The solipsist can help us, and we should let him do it.

We should, therefore, be willing to consider seriously all sorts of doctrines which may at first strike us as unreasonable. I have chosen two which I believe to contain error. But the man who approaches a doctrine which impresses him as strange has no right to assume at the outset that it contains error. We have seen again and again how easy it is to misapprehend what is given in experience. The philosopher may be in the right, and what he says may repel us because we have become accustomed to certain erroneous notions, and they have come to seem self-evident truths.

90. DO NOT HAVE TOO MUCH RESPECT FOR AUTHORITY.--But if it is an error to refuse to listen to the philosopher, it is surely no less an error to accord him an authority above what he has a right to demand. Bear in mind what was said in the last chapter about the difference between the special sciences and philosophy. There is in the latter field no body of doctrine that we may justly regard as authoritative. There are "schools" of philosophy, and their adherents fall into the very human error of feeling very sure that they and those who agree with them are right; and the emphasis with which they speak is apt to mislead those who are not well informed. I shall say a few words about the dangers of the "school."

If we look about us, we are impressed by the fact that there are "schools" of philosophy, somewhat as there are religious sects and political parties. An impressive teacher sets the mark of his personality and of his preferences upon those who come under his influence. They are not at an age to be very critical, and, indeed, they have not as yet the requisite learning to enable them to be critical. They keep the trend which has been given them early in life, and, when they become teachers, they pass on the type of thought with which they have been inoculated, and the circle widens. "Schools" may arise, of course, in a different way. An epoch-making book may sweep men off of their feet and make of them passionate adherents. But he who has watched the development of the American universities during the last twenty-five years must be impressed with the enormous influence which certain teachers have had in giving a direction to the philosophic thought of those who have come in contact with them. We expect the pupils of a given master to have a given shade of opinion, and very often we are not disappointed in our guess.

It is entirely natural that this should be so. Those who betake themselves to the study of philosophy are men like other men. They have the same feelings, and the bending of the twig has the same significance in their case that it has in that of others. It is no small compliment to a teacher that he can thus spread his influence, and leave his proxies even when he passes away.

But, when we strive to "put off humanity" and to look at the whole matter under the cold light of reason, we may well ask ourselves, whether he who unconsciously accepts his philosophy, in whole or in part, because it has been the philosophy of his teacher, is not doing what is done by those persons whose politics and whose religion take their color from such accidental circumstances as birth in a given class or family traditions?

I am far from saying that it is, in general, a bad thing for the world that men should be influenced in this way by one another. I say only that, when we look at the facts of the case, we must admit that even our teachers of philosophy do not always become representatives of the peculiar type of thought for which they stand, merely through a deliberate choice from the wealth of material which the history of speculative thought lays before them. They are influenced by others to take what they do take, and the traces of this influence are apt to remain with them through life. He who wishes to be entirely impartial must be on his guard against such influences as these, and must distrust prejudices for or against certain doctrines, when he finds that he imbibed them at an uncritical age and has remained under their influence ever since. Some do appear to be able to emancipate themselves, and to outgrow what they first learned.

It is, as I have said, natural that there should be a tendency to form "schools" in philosophy. And there are certain things that make this somewhat uncritical acceptance of a doctrine very attractive.

In the first place, if we are willing to take a system of any sort as a whole, it saves us a vast amount of trouble. We seem to have a citadel, a point of vantage from which we can look out upon life and interpret it. If the house we live in is not in all respects ideal, at least it is a house, and we are not homeless. There is nothing more intolerable to most men than the having of no opinions. They will change one opinion for another, but they will rarely consent to do without altogether. It is something to have an answer to offer to those who persist in asking questions; and it is something to have some sort of ground under one's feet, even if it be not very solid ground.

Again. Man is a social creature, and he is greatly fortified in his opinions by the consciousness that others share them with him. If we become adherents of a "school," we have the agreeable consciousness that we are not walking alone through the maze of speculations that confronts those who reflect. There appears to be a traveled way in which we may have some confidence. Are we not following the crowd, or, at least, a goodly number of the pilgrims who are seeking the same goal with ourselves? Under such circumstances we are not so often impelled to inquire anxiously whether we are after all upon the right road. We assume that we have made no mistake.

Under such circumstances we are apt to forget that there are many such roads, and that these have been traveled in ages past by troops very much like our own, who also cherished the hope that they were upon the one and only highway. In other words, we are apt to forget the lesson of the history of philosophy. This is a serious mistake.

And what intensifies our danger, if we belong to a school which happens to be dominant and to have active representatives, is that we get very little real criticism. The books that we write are usually criticised by those who view our positions sympathetically, and who are more inclined to praise than to blame. He who looks back upon the past is struck with the fact that books which have been lauded to the skies in one age have often been subjected to searching criticism and to a good deal of condemnation in the next. Something very like this is to be expected of books written in our own time. It is, however, a pity that we should have to wait so long for impartial criticism.

This leads me to say a word of the reviews which fill our philosophical journals, and which we must read, for it is impossible to read all the books that come out, and yet we wish to know something about them.

To the novice it is something of a surprise to find that books by men whom he knows to be eminent for their ingenuity and their learning are condemned in very offhand fashion by quite young men, who as yet have attained to little learning and to no eminence at all. One sometimes is tempted to wonder that men admittedly remarkable should have fathered such poor productions as we are given to understand them to be, and should have offered them to a public that has a right to be indignant.

Now, there can be no doubt that, in philosophy, a cat has the right to look at a king, and has also a right to point out his misdoings, if such there be. But it seems just to indicate that, in this matter, certain cautions should be observed.

If a great man has been guilty of an error in reasoning, there is no reason why it should not be pointed out by any one who is capable of detecting it. The authority of the critic is a matter of no moment where the evidence is given. In such a case, we take a suggestion and we do the criticising for ourselves. But where the evidence is not given, where the justice of the criticism is not proved, the case is different. Here we must take into consideration the authority of the critic, and, if we follow him at all, we must follow him blindly. Is it safe to do this?

It is never safe in philosophy, or, at any rate, it is safe so seldom that the exceptions are not worth taking into account. Men write from the standpoint of some school of opinion; and, until we know their prepossessions, their statements that this is good, that is bad, the third thing is profound, are of no significance whatever. We should simply set them aside, and try to find out from our reviewer what is contained in the book under criticism.

One of the evils arising out of the bias I am discussing is, that books and authors are praised or condemned indiscriminately because of their point of view, and little discrimination is made between good books and poor books. There is all the difference in the world between a work which can be condemned only on the ground that it is realistic or idealistic in its standpoint, and those feeble productions which are to be condemned from every point of view. If we consistently carry out the principle that we may condemn all those who are not of our party, we must give short shrift to a majority of the great men of the past.

So I say, beware of authority in philosophy, and, above all, beware of that most insidious form of authority, the spirit of the "school." It cannot but narrow our sympathies and restrict our outlook.

91. REMEMBER THAT ORDINARY RULES OF EVIDENCE APPLY.--What I am going to say in this section is closely related to what has been said just above. To the disinterested observer it may seem rather amusing that one should think it worth while to try to show that we have not the right to use a special set of weights and measures when we are dealing with things philosophical. There was a time when men held that a given doctrine could be philosophically false, and, at the same time, theologically true; but surely the day of such twists and turnings is past!

I am by no means sure that it is past. With the lapse of time, old doctrines take on new aspects, and come to be couched in a language that suits the temper of the later age. Sometimes the doctrine is veiled and rendered less startling, but remains essentially what it was before, and may be criticised in much the same way.

I suppose we may say that every one who is animated by the party spirit discussed above, and who holds to a group of philosophical tenets with a warmth of conviction out of proportion to the authority of the actual evidence which may be claimed for them, is tacitly assuming that the truth or falsity of philosophical dogmas is not wholly a matter of evidence, but that the desires of the philosopher may also be taken into account.

This position is often taken unconsciously. Thus, when, instead of proving to others that a given doctrine is false, we try to show them that it is a dangerous doctrine, and leads to unpalatable consequences, we assume that what seems distasteful cannot be true, and we count on the fact that men incline to believe what they like to believe.

May we give this position the dignity of a philosophical doctrine and hold that, in the somewhat nebulous realm inhabited by the philosopher, men are not bound by the same rules of evidence that obtain elsewhere? That this is actually done, those who read much in the field of modern philosophy are well aware. Several excellent writers have maintained that we need not, even if there seems to be evidence for them, accept views of the universe which do not satisfy "our whole nature."

We should not confuse with this position the very different one which maintains that we have a right to hold tentatively, and with a willingness to abandon them should evidence against them be forthcoming, views which we are not able completely to establish, but which seem reasonable. One may do this with perfect sincerity, and without holding that philosophical truth is in any way different from scientific truth. But the other position goes beyond this; it assumes that man must be satisfied, and that only that can be true which satisfies him.

I ask, is it not significant that such an assumption should be made only in the realm of the unverifiable? No man dreams of maintaining that the rise and fall of stocks will be such as to satisfy the whole nature even of the elect, or that the future history of man on this planet is a thing to be determined by some philosopher who decides for us what would or would not be desirable.

Surely all truths of election--those truths that we simply choose to have true--are something much less august than that Truth of Evidence which sometimes seems little to fall in with our desires, and in the face of which we are humble listeners, not dictators. Before the latter we are modest; we obey, lest we be confounded. And if, in the philosophic realm, we believe that we may order Truth about, and make her our slave, is it not because we have a secret consciousness that we are not dealing with Truth at all, but with Opinion, and with Opinion that has grown insolent because she cannot be drawn from her obscurity and be shown to be what she is?

Sometimes it is suddenly revealed to a man that he has been accepting two orders of truth. I once walked and talked with a good scholar who discoursed of high themes and defended warmly certain theses. I said to him: If you could go into the house opposite, and discover unmistakably whether you are in the right or in the wrong,--discover it as unmistakably as you can discover whether there is or is not furniture in the drawing-room,--would you go? He thought over the matter for a while, and then answered frankly; No! I should not go; I should stay out here and argue it out.

92. AIM AT CLEARNESS AND SIMPLICITY.--There is no department of investigation in which it is not desirable to cultivate clearness and simplicity in thinking, speaking, and writing. But there are certain reasons why we should be especially on our guard in philosophy against the danger of employing a tongue "not understanded of the people." There are dangerous pitfalls concealed under the use of technical words and phrases.

The value of technical expressions in the special sciences must be conceded. They are supposed to be more exact and less ambiguous than terms in ordinary use, and they mark an advance in our knowledge of the subject. The distinctions which they indicate have been carefully drawn, and appear to be of such authority that they should be generally accepted. Sometimes, as, for example, in mathematics, a conventional set of symbols may quite usurp the function of ordinary language, and may enormously curtail the labor of setting forth the processes and results of investigation.

But we must never forget that we have not in philosophy an authoritative body of truth which we have the right to impose upon all who enter that field. A multitude of distinctions have been made and are made; but the representatives of different schools of thought are not at one touching the value and significance of these distinctions. If we coin a word or a phrase to mark such, there is some danger that we fall into the habit of using such words or phrases, as we use the coins in our purse, without closely examining them, and with the ready assumption that they must pass current everywhere.

Thus, there is always a possibility that our technical expressions may be nothing less than crystallized error. Against this we should surely be on our guard.

Again. When we translate the language of common life into the dialect of the learned, there is danger that we may fall into the error of supposing that we are adding to our knowledge, even though we are doing nothing save to exchange one set of words for another. Thus, we all know very well that one mind can communicate with another. One does not have to be a scholar to be aware of this. If we choose to call this "intersubjective intercourse," we have given the thing a sounding name; but we know no more about it than we did before. The problem of the relation between minds, and the way in which they are to be conceived as influencing each other, remains just what it was. So, also, we recognize the everyday fact that we know both ourselves and what is not ourselves. Shall we call this knowledge of something not ourselves "self-transcendence"? We may do so if we wish, but we ought to realize that this bestowal of a title makes no whit clearer what is meant by knowledge.

Unhappily, men too often believe that, when they have come into the possession of a new word or phrase, they have gained a new thought. The danger is great in proportion to the breadth of the gulf which separates the new dialect from the old language of common life in which we are accustomed to estimate things. Many a philosopher would be bereft, indeed, were he robbed of his vocabulary and compelled to express his thoughts in ordinary speech. The theories which are implicit in certain recurring expressions would be forced to come out into the open, and stand criticism without disguise.

But can one write philosophical books without using words which are not in common use among the unphilosophic? I doubt it. Some such words it seems impossible to avoid. However, it does seem possible to bear in mind the dangers of a special philosophical terminology and to reduce such words to a minimum.

Finally, we may appeal to the humanity of the philosopher. The path to reflection is a sufficiently difficult one as it is; why should he roll rocks upon it and compel those who come after him to climb over them? If truths are no truer for being expressed in a repellent form, why should he trick them out in a fantastic garb? What we want is the naked truth, and we lose time and patience in freeing our mummy from the wrappings in which learned men have seen fit to encase it.

93. DO NOT HASTILY ACCEPT A DOCTRINE.--This brings me to the last of the maxims which I urge upon the attention of the reader. All that has been said so far may be regarded as leading up to it.

The difficulty that confronts us is this: On the one hand, we must recognize the uncertainty that reigns in this field of investigation. We must ever weigh probabilities and possibilities; we do not find ourselves in the presence of indubitable truths which all competent persons stand ready to admit. This seems to argue that we should learn to suspend judgment, and should be most wary in our acceptance of one philosophical doctrine and our rejection of another.

On the other hand, philosophy is not a mere matter of intellectual curiosity. It has an intimate connection with life. As a man thinks, so is he, to a great extent, at least. How, then, can one afford to remain critical and negative? To counsel this seems equivalent to advising that one abandon the helm and consent to float at the mercy of wind and tide.

The difficulty is a very real one. It presents itself insistently to those who have attained to that degree of intellectual development at which one begins to ask oneself questions and to reflect upon the worth and meaning of life. An unreflective adherence to tradition no longer satisfies such persons. They wish to know why they should believe in this or that doctrine, and why they should rule their lives in harmony with this or that maxim. Shall we advise them to lay hold without delay of a set of philosophical tenets, as we might advise a disabled man to aid himself with any staff that happens to come to hand? Or shall we urge them to close their eyes to the light, and to go back again to the old unreflective life?

Neither of these counsels seems satisfactory, for both assume tacitly that it does not much matter what the truth is, and that we can afford to disregard it.

Perhaps we may take a suggestion from that prudent man and acute philosopher, Descartes. Discontented with the teachings of the schools as they had been presented to him, he resolved to set out upon an independent voyage of discovery, and to look for a philosophy of his own. It seemed necessary to him to doubt, provisionally at least, all that he had received from the past. But in what house should he live while he was reconstructing his old habitation? Without principles of some sort he could not live, and without reasonable principles he could not live well. So he framed a set of provisional rules, which should guide his life until he had new ground beneath his feet.

When we examine these rules, we find that, on the whole, they are such as the experience of mankind has found prudent and serviceable. In other words, we discover that Descartes, until he was in a position to see clearly for himself, was willing to be led by others. He was a unit in the social order, and he recognized that truth.

It does not seem out of place to recall this fact to the consciousness of those who are entering upon the reflective life. Those who are rather new to reflection upon philosophical matters are apt to seize single truths, which are too often half-truths, and to deduce their consequences remorselessly. They do not always realize the extreme complexity of society, or see the full meaning of the relations in which they stand to the state and to the church. Breadth of view can only come with an increase of knowledge and with the exercise of reflection.

For this reason I advise patience, and a willingness to accept the established order of things until one is very sure that one has attained to some truth--some real truth, not a mere truth of election--which may serve as the basis of a reconstruction. The first glimpses of truth cannot be depended upon to furnish such a foundation.

Thus, we may suspend judgment, and, nevertheless, be ready to act. But is not this a mere compromise? Certainly. All life is a compromise; and in the present instance it means only that we should keep our eyes open to the light, whatever its source, and yet should nourish that wholesome self-distrust that prevents a man from being an erratic and revolutionary creature, unmindful of his own limitations. Prudent men in all walks in life make this compromise, and the world is the better for it.

NOTES

CHAPTER I, sections 1-5. If the student will take a good history of philosophy, and look over the accounts of the different systems referred to, he will see the justice of the position taken in the text, namely, that philosophy was formerly synonymous with universal knowledge. It is not necessary, of course, to read the whole history of philosophy to attain this end. One may take such a text-book as Ueberweg's "History of Philosophy," and run over the summaries contained in the large print. To see how the conception of what constitutes universal knowledge changed in successive ages, compare Thales, the Sophists, Aristotle, the Schoolmen, Bacon, and Descartes. For the ancient philosophy one may consult Windelband's "History of the Ancient Philosophy," a clear and entertaining little work (English translation, N.Y., 1899).

In Professor Paulsen's "Introduction to Philosophy" (English translation, N.Y., 1895), there is an interesting introductory chapter on "The Nature and Import of Philosophy" (pp. 1-41). The author pleads for the old notion of philosophy as universal knowledge, though he does not, of course, mean that the philosopher must be familiar with all the details of all the sciences.

Section 6. In justification of the meaning given to the word "philosophy" in this section, I ask the reader to look over the list of courses in philosophy advertised in the catalogues of our leading universities at home and abroad. There is a certain consensus of opinion as to what properly comes under the title, even among those who differ widely as to what is the proper definition of philosophy.

CHAPTER II, sections 7-10. Read the chapter on "The Mind and the World in Common Thought and in Science" (Chapter I) in my "System of Metaphysics," N.Y., 1904.

One can be brought to a vivid realization of the fact that the sciences proceed upon a basis of assumptions which they do not attempt to analyze and justify, if one will take some elementary work on arithmetic or geometry or psychology and examine the first few chapters, bearing in mind what philosophical problems may be drawn from the materials there treated. Section 11. The task of reflective thought and its difficulties are treated in the chapter entitled "How Things are Given in Consciousness" (Chapter III), in my "System of Metaphysics."

CHAPTER III, sections 12-13. Read "The Inadequacy of the Psychological Standpoint," "System of Metaphysics," Chapter II. I call especial attention to the illustration of "the man in the cell" (pp. 18 ff.). It would be a good thing to read these pages with the class, and to impress upon the students the fact that those who have doubted or denied the existence of the external material world have, if they have fallen into error, fallen into a very natural error, and are not without some excuse.

Section 14. See "The Metaphysics of the Telephone Exchange," "System of Metaphysics," Chapter XXII, where Professor Pearson's doctrine is examined at length, with quotations and references.

It is interesting to notice that a doubt of the external world has always rested upon some sort of a "telephone exchange" argument; naturally, it could not pass by that name before the invention of the telephone, but the reasoning is the same. It puts the world at one remove, shutting the mind up to the circle of its ideas; and then it doubts or denies the world, or, at least, holds that its existence must be proved in some roundabout way. Compare Descartes, "Of the Existence of Material Things," "Meditations," VI.

CHAPTER IV, sections 15-18. See Chapters VI and VII, "What we mean by the External World," and "Sensations and 'Things,'" in my "System of Metaphysics." In that work the discussion of the distinction between the objective order of experience and the subjective order is completed in Chapter XXIII, "The Distinction between the World and the Mind." This was done that the subjective order might be treated in the part of the book which discusses the mind and its relation to matter.

As it is possible that the reader may be puzzled by differences of expression which obtain in the two books, a word of explanation is not out of place.

In the "Metaphysics," for example, it is said that sensations so connect themselves together as to form what we call the system of material things (p. 105). It is intimated in a footnote that this is a provisional statement and the reader is referred to later chapters. Now, in the present book (sections 16-17), it is taught that we may not call material things groups of sensations.

The apparent contradiction is due to the fact that, in this volume, the full meaning of the word "sensation" is exhibited at the outset, and sensations, as phenomena of the subjective order, are distinguished from the phenomena of the objective order which constitute the external world. In the earlier work the word "sensation" was for a while used loosely to cover all our experiences that do not belong to the class called imaginary, and the distinction between the subjective and objective in this realm was drawn later (Chapter XXIII).

I think the present arrangement is the better one, as it avoids from the outset the suggestion that the real world is something subjective--our sensations or ideas--and thus escapes the idealistic flavor which almost inevitably attaches to the other treatment, until the discussion is completed, at least.

CHAPTER V, sections 10-21. See Chapters VIII and IX, "System of Metaphysics," "The Distinction between Appearance and Reality" and "The Significance of the Distinction."

Section 22. See Chapter XXVI, "The World as Unperceived, and the 'Unknowable,'" where Spencer's doctrine is examined at length, and references are given. I think it is very important that the student should realize that the "Unknowable" is a perfectly useless assumption in philosophy, and can serve no purpose whatever.

CHAPTER VI, sections 23-25. See Chapters X and XI, "System of Metaphysics," "The Kantian Doctrine of Space" and "Difficulties connected with the Kantian Doctrine of Space."

It would be an excellent thing for the student, after he has read the above chapters, to take up Kant's "Critique of Pure Reason," and read and analyze the argument of Antinomies I and II, with the Observations appended. One can understand these arguments without being familiar with the "Critique" as a whole; at any rate, the account of Kant's philosophy contained in section 51 of this book will serve to explain his use of certain terms, such as "the laws of our sensibility."

Kant's reasonings are very curious and interesting in this part of his book. It seems to be proved that the world must be endless in space and without a beginning or end in time, and just as plausibly proved that it cannot be either. It seems to be proved that finite spaces and times are infinitely divisible, and at the same time that they cannot be infinitely divisible. The situation is an amusing one, and rendered not the less amusing by the seriousness with which the mutually destructive arguments are taken.

When the student meets such a tangle in the writings of any philosopher, I ask him to believe that it is not the human reason that is at fault--at least, let him not assume that it is. The fault probably lies with a human reason.

Section 26. See Chapter XII, "The Berkeleian Doctrine of Space," in my "System of Metaphysics." The argument ought not to be difficult to one who has mastered Chapter V of this volume.

CHAPTER VII, sections 27-29. Compare Chapter XIII, "System of Metaphysics," "Of Time."

With the chapters on Space and Time it would be well for the student to read Chapter XIV, "The Real World in Space and Time," where it is made clear why we have no hesitation in declaring space and time to be infinite, although we recognize that it seems to be an assumption of knowledge to declare the material world infinite.

CHAPTER VIII, sections 30-32. Read, in the "System of Metaphysics," Chapters V and XVII, "The Self or Knower" and "The Atomic Self."

Section 33. The suggestions, touching the attitude of the psychologist toward the mind, contained in the preface to Professor William James's "Psychology" are very interesting and instructive.

CHAPTER IX, sections 35-36. For a strong argument in favor of interactionism see James's "Psychology," Chapter V. I wish the student would, in reading it, bear in mind what is said in my chapter on "The Atomic Self," above referred to. The subject should be approached with an open mind, and one should suspend judgment until both sides have been heard from.

Section 37. Descartes held that the lower animals are automata and that their actions are not indicative of consciousness; he regarded their bodies as machines lacking the soul in the "little pineal gland." Professor Huxley revived the doctrine of animal automatism and extended it so as to include man. He regarded consciousness as a "collateral product" of the working of the body, related to it somewhat as is the steam-whistle of a locomotive engine to the working of the machine. He made it an effect, but not a cause, of motions. See "System of Metaphysics," Chapter XVIII, "The Automaton Theory: its Genesis."

We owe the doctrine of parallelism, in its original form, to Spinoza. It was elaborated by W. K. Clifford, and to him the modern interest in the subject is largely due. The whole subject is discussed at length in my "System of Metaphysics," Chapters XIX-XXI. The titles are: "The Automaton Theory: Parallelism," "What is Parallelism?" and "The Man and the Candlestick." Clifford's doctrine is presented in a new form in Professor Strong's recent brilliant work, "Why the Mind has a Body" N.Y., 1903.

Section 38. See "System of Metaphysics," Chapter XXIV, "The Time and Place of Sensations and Ideas."

CHAPTER X, sections 40-42. See "System of Metaphysics," Chapters XXVII and XXVIII, "The Existence of Other Minds," and "The Distribution of Minds."

Writers seem to be divided into three camps on this question of other minds.

(1) I have treated our knowledge of other minds as due to an inference. This is the position usually taken.

(2) We have seen that Huxley and Clifford cast doubts upon the validity of the inference, but, nevertheless, made it. Professor Strong, in the work mentioned in the notes to the previous chapter, maintains that it is not an inference, and that we do not directly perceive other minds, but that we are assured of their existence just the same. He makes our knowledge an "intuition" in the old-fashioned sense of the word, a something to be accepted but not to be accounted for.

(3) Writers who have been influenced more or less by the Neo-Kantian or Neo-Hegelian doctrine are apt to speak as though we had the same direct evidence of the existence of other minds that we have of the existence of our own. I have never seen a systematic and detailed exposition of this doctrine. It appears rather in the form of hints dropped in passing. A number of such are to be found in Taylor's "Elements of Metaphysics."

Section 43. The "Mind-stuff" doctrine is examined at length and its origin discussed in Chapter XXXI of the "System of Metaphysics," "Mental Phenomena and the Causal Nexus." It is well worth while for the student to read the whole of Clifford's essay "On the Nature of Things-in-themselves," even if he is pressed for time.

CHAPTER XI, section 44. See "System of Metaphysics," Chapter XV, "The World as Mechanism."

Section 45. See Chapter XXXI, "The Place of Mind in Nature."

Section 46. For a definition of Fatalism, and a description of its difference from the scientific doctrine of Determinism, see Chapter XXXIII, "Fatalism, 'Freewill' and Determinism." For a vigorous defense of "Freewill" (which is not, in my opinion, free will at all, in the common acceptation of the word) see Professor James's Essay on "The Dilemma of the Determinist," in his volume, "The Will to Believe."

Fatalism and Determinism are constantly confused, and much of the opposition to Determinism is attributable to this confusion.

Section 47. See Chapter XXXII, "Mechanism and Teleology."

CHAPTER XII, section 48. The notes to Chapter III (see above) are in point here. It is well worth the student's while to read the whole of Chapter XI, Book IV, of Locke's "Essay." It is entitled "Of our Knowledge of the Existence of Other Things." Notice the headings of some of his sections:--

Section 1. "It is to be had only by sensation."

Section 2. "Instance whiteness of this paper."

Section 3. "This, though not so certain as demonstration, yet may be called 'Knowledge,' and proves the existence of things without us."

Locke's argument proceeds, as we have seen, on the assumption that we perceive external things directly,--an assumption into which he slips unawares,--and yet he cannot allow that we really do perceive directly what is external. This makes him uncomfortably conscious that he has not absolute proof, after all. The section that closes the discussion is entitled: "Folly to expect demonstration in everything."

Section 49. I wish that I could believe that every one of my readers would sometime give himself the pleasure of reading through Berkeley's "Principles of Human Knowledge" and his "Three Dialogues between Hylas and Philonous." Clearness of thought, beauty of style, and elevation of sentiment characterize them throughout.

The "Principles" is a systematic treatise. If one has not time to read it all, one can get a good idea of the doctrine by running through the first forty-one sections. For brief readings in class, to illustrate Berkeley's reasoning, one may take sections 1-3, 14, 18-20, and 38.

The "Dialogues" is a more popular work. As the etymology of the names in the title suggests, we have in it a dispute between a man who pins his faith to matter and an idealist. The aim of the book is to confute skeptics and atheists from the standpoint of idealism.

For Hume's treatment of the external world, see his "Treatise of Human Nature," Part IV, section 2. For his treatment of the mind, see Part IV, section 6.

Section 50. Reid repeats himself a great deal, for he gives us asseveration rather than proof. One can get the gist of his argument by reading carefully a few of his sections. It would be a good exercise to read in class, if time permitted, the two sections of his "Inquiry" entitled "Of Extension" (Chapter V, section 5), and "Of Perception in General" (Chapter VI, section 20).

Section 51. For an account of the critical Philosophy, see Falckenberg's "History of Modern Philosophy" (English translation, N.Y., 1893). Compare with this the accounts in the histories of philosophy by Ueberweg and Hoeffding (English translation of the latter, London, 1900). Full bibliographies are to be found especially in Ueberweg.

It is well to look at the philosophy of Kant through more than one pair of eyes. Thus, if one reads Morris's "Kant's Critique of Pure Reason" (Chicago, 1882), one should read also Sidgwick's "Lectures on the Philosophy of Kant" (N.Y., 1905).

CHAPTER XIII, section 52. It is difficult to see how Hamilton could regard himself as a "natural" realist (the word is employed by him). See his "Lectures on Metaphysics," VIII, where he develops his doctrine. He seems to teach, in spite of himself, that we can know directly only the impressions that things make on us, and must infer all else: "Our whole knowledge of mind and matter is, thus, only relative; of existence, absolutely and in itself, we know nothing."

Whom may we regard as representing the three kinds of "hypothetical realism" described in the text? Perhaps we may put the plain man, who has not begun to reflect, in the first class. John Locke is a good representative of the second; see the "Essay concerning Human Understanding," Book II, Chapter VIII. Herbert Spencer belonged to the third while he wrote Chapter V of his "First Principles of Philosophy."

Section 53. I have said enough of the Berkeleian idealism in the notes on Chapter XII. As a good illustration of objective idealism in one of its forms I may take the doctrine of Professor Royce; see his address, "The Conception of God" (N.Y., 1902).

Mr. Bradley's doctrine is criticised in Chapter XXXIV (entitled "Of God"), "System of Metaphysics."

CHAPTER XIV, section 55. See "System of Metaphysics," Chapter XVI, "The Insufficiency of Materialism."

Section 56. Professor Strong's volume, "Why the Mind has a Body" (N.Y., 1903), advocates a panpsychism much like that of Clifford. It is very clearly written, and with Clifford's essay on "The Nature of Things-in-themselves," ought to give one a good idea of the considerations that impel some able men to become panpsychists.

Section 57. The pantheistic monism of Spinoza is of such importance historically that it is desirable to obtain a clear notion of its meaning. I have discussed this at length in two earlier works: "The Philosophy of Spinoza" (N.Y., 1894) and "On Spinozistic Immortality." The student is referred to the account of Spinoza's "God or Substance" contained in these. See, especially, the "Introductory Note" in the back of the first-mentioned volume.

Professor Royce is a good illustration of the idealistic monist; see the volume referred to in the note above (section 53). His "Absolute," or God, is conceived to be an all-inclusive mind of which our finite minds are parts.

Section 58. Sir William Hamilton's dualism is developed in his "Lectures on Metaphysics," VIII. He writes: "Mind and matter, as known or knowable, are only two different series of phenomena or qualities; as unknown and unknowable, they are the two substances in which these two different series of phenomena or qualities are supposed to inhere. The existence of an unknown substance is only an inference we are compelled to make, from the existence of known phenomena; and the distinction of two substances is only inferred from the seeming incompatibility of the two series of phenomena to coinhere in one."

CHAPTER XV, section 60. The reader will find Descartes's path traced in the "Meditations." In I, we have his sweeping doubt; in II, his doctrine as to the mind; in III, the existence of God is established; in VI, he gets around to the existence of the external world. We find a good deal of the "natural light" in the first part of his "Principles of Philosophy."

Section 61. We have an excellent illustration of Locke's inconsistency in violating his own principles and going beyond experience, in his treatment of "Substance." Read, in his "Essay," Book I, Chapter IV, section 18, and Book II, Chapter XXIII, section 4. These sections are not long, and might well be read and analyzed in class.

Section 62. See the note to section 51.

Section 64. I write this note (in 1908) to give the reader some idea of later developments of the doctrine called pragmatism. There has been a vast amount printed upon the subject in the last two or three years, but I am not able to say even yet that we have to do with "a clear-cut doctrine, the limits and consequences of which have been worked out in detail." Hence, I prefer to leave section 64 as I first wrote it, merely supplementing it here.

We may fairly consider the three leaders of the pragmatic movement to be Professor William James, Dr. F. C. S. Schiller, and Professor John Dewey. The first has developed his doctrine at length in his volume entitled "Pragmatism" (London, 1907); the second, who calls his doctrine "Humanism," but declares himself a pragmatist, and in essential agreement with Professor James, has published two volumes of philosophical essays entitled "Humanism" (London, 1903) and "Studies in Humanism" (London, 1907); the third has developed his position in the first four chapters of the "Studies in Logical Theory" (Chicago, 1903).

Professor James, in his "Pragmatism" (Lecture II), says that pragmatism, at the outset, at least, stands for no particular results. It has no dogmas, and no doctrines save its method. This method means:

"The attitude of looking away from first things, principles, 'categories,' supposed necessities; and of looking towards last things, fruits, consequences, facts." He remarks further, however, that pragmatism has come to be used also in a wider sense, as signifying a certain theory of truth (pp. 54-55). This theory is brought forward in