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AUTHOR: 
 
 SORLEY, WILLIAM 
 RITCHIE 
 
 TITLE: 
 
 MORAL VALUES AND THE 
 IDEA OF GOD... 
 
 PL A CE : 
 
 CAMBRIDGE 
 
 DATE: 
 
 1918 
 
COLUMBIA uNlVFRSITY LiBKARI 
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 Sorlay, WIIHam Ritchie, 1855-1935. 
 
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 livered in ttie University (if \ berdeen in 1914 and 1915, by 
 ^" H. Sorley ... Cambridge [Eng.] The University x>ress, 1918. 
 
 xii. n;M^ p. 23« 
 
 •'J if purpose of the present work is to enquire Into the bearing of 
 ethical ideas upon the view of reality as a whole which we are justified 
 
 In forming." — p. 1. 
 
 Copy in Philosophy, 1918. 
 
 1. Ethics. 2. Worth. 3. Reality. 4. God. i. iiiie. 
 
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 1 
 
 THE GIFFORD LECTURES 
 
 DELIVERED IN THE UNIVERSITY OF 
 
 ABERDEEN IN 19I4 AND 1915 
 
 BY 
 
 W. R. SORLEY, LiTT.D., Ill 
 
 FELLOW OF THK BRmSH ACADEMY 
 
 KNIGHTBRIDGE PROFESSOR OF MORAL PHILOSOPHY 
 
 FFLLOW OF king's COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE 
 
 Cambridge : 
 at the University Press 
 
 New York : 
 
 G. P. Putnam's Sons 
 
 1919 
 
 

 I 
 
 TO THE MEMORY OF 
 
 
 CHARLES HAMILTON SORLEY 
 
 ONE OF MANY THOUSANDS WHO GAVE 
 THEIR LIVES FREELY IN A GREAT CAUSE 
 
 J) 
 
 For they sought a country. 
 
 ■ Make Beauty and make Rest giue place. 
 Mock Prudence loud — and she is gone. 
 Smite Satisfaction on the face. 
 And tread the ghost of Ease upon. 
 Light-lipped and singing press njue hard 
 Over old earth njohich nonjj is nxwrn. 
 Triumphant, buffeted and scarred. 
 By billoivs ho-duled at, tempest-torn, 
 To^ivard blue horizons far anjuay/' 
 
 no 
 
 5 o G ^ 
 
'•i 
 
 THE GIFFORI) TKLbT 
 
 *' T Having been for many years deeply and firmly convinced that 
 the true knowledge of God, that is, of the Being, Nature, and 
 Attributes of the Infinite, of the All, of the First and the Only 
 Cause, that is, the One and Only Substance and Being, and the true 
 and felt knowledge {fiot mere nominal knowledge) of the relations of 
 man and of the ufiiverse to Him, and of the true foundations of all 
 ethics and morals, being, I say, convinced that this knowledge, 
 when really felt and acted on, is the means of man's highest well- 
 being, and the security of his upward progress, I have resolved, 
 from the.' residue' of my estate as aforesaid, to institute andfoujid, 
 in connection, if possible, with the Scottish Universities, lectureships 
 or classes for the promotion of the study of said subjects, and for the 
 teaching and diffusion of sound views regarding them.... 
 
 ''The lecturers appointed shall be subjected to no test of any 
 kind, and shall not be required to take any oath, or to emit nr sub- 
 scribe any declaration of belief, or to make any promise of any kind; 
 they may be of any denomination whatever, or of no denomination 
 at all {and many earnest and high-minded men prefer to belong to 
 710 ecclesiastical denomination); they may be of any religion or way 
 of thinking, or as is sometimes said, they may be of no religion, 
 or they may be so-called sceptics or agnostics or freethinkers, pro- 
 vided only that the 'patrons' will use diligence to secure that they 
 be able reverent men, true thinkers, sincere lovers of and earnest 
 inquirers after truth.... 
 
 "I wish the lecturers to treat their subject as a strictly natural 
 science, the greatest of all possible sciences, indeed, in one sense^ 
 
Vlll 
 
 The Gifford Trust 
 
 the only science, thai uj Infinite Bring, without reference to or 
 reliance upon any supposed special exceptional or so-called miracu- 
 lous revelation .... The lecturers shall be under no restrain f whatever 
 in their treatment / tiuir theme.... 
 
 " The lectures shall he public and popular, that is, open not only 
 to students of the Universities, hut to the whole community without 
 matriculation, as I think that the suhject should be studied and 
 known by all, whether receiving University instruction or not. 
 I think such knowledge, if real, lies at the root of all well-being..., 
 
 ''And my desire and hope is that these lectureships and lectures 
 may promote and advance among all classes of the community the 
 true knowledge of Him Who is, and there is none and nothing 
 besides Him, in Whom we live and move and have our being, and 
 in Whom all things consist, and of man's real relationship to Him 
 Whom truly to know is life everlasting.'" (From Lord Gifford 's 
 Will, dated 21 August, 1885.) 
 
 PRFFXCE • 
 
 I HAVE quoted some sentences from the remarkable 
 document which instituted the Gifford Lectureships, for 
 it contains matter of permanent interest. Lord Gifford 
 was deeply convinced that the knowledge which he 
 sought to promote was of importance for human well- 
 being; he wished to make it accessible to those outside, 
 as well as to those within, academic circles ; he had con- 
 fidence in reason and left his lecturers free to follow 
 whithersoever the argument might lead; and he himself 
 gave a description of the kind of knowledge which he had 
 in view. In this description he coupled "the true founda- 
 tions of all ethics and morals" with "the true knowledge 
 of God." The present work is concerned with the re- 
 lation between these two topics. The point of view from 
 which that relation is regarded is not the most common 
 one ; but neither is it by any means novel. Many phi- 
 losophers have held that ethical ideas have a bearing 
 on the view of the universe which we are justified in 
 forming, and they have allowed their thinking to be 
 influenced by these ideas. Since Kant proclaimed the 
 primacy of the practical reason in a certain regard, this 
 point of view has been adopted by thinkers of different 
 
 schools, and reasons have been urged in its support. 
 
 as 
 
X Preface 
 
 • 
 
 But a systematic investigation of the validity of the 
 procedure is still lacking. We must ask, What is the 
 justification for using ethical ideas, or other ideas of 
 value, in philosophical construction? In what way, if 
 at all, can they be used legitimately? And what effect 
 have they upon our final view of the world ? i\ systematic 
 investigation of these questions has been attempted in 
 the present volume. 
 
 The lectures of which the book consists were 
 delivered in the University of Aberdeen in the sum- 
 mer terms of 19 14 and 191 5. Although nearly a year 
 elapsed between the tenth lecture and the eleventh, the 
 whole is intended to be a continuous argument. In 
 carrying out this argument, no attempt has been made 
 to give a critical survey of contemporary thinking on 
 the topics which arise for discussion. To have done 
 so would have been to extend unduly the length of the 
 book. And a survey of this kind has now been rendered 
 unnecessary by the work of my friend and predecessor 
 in the Gifford Lectureship, Professor Pringle-Pattison. 
 Through criticism of recent philosophy he has elicited 
 a view akin to that which I have reached in another 
 way. Both the similarity and the difference are indi- 
 cated by the title of my book. 
 
 A few days before my appointment to the Gifford 
 Lectureship, I was honoured w4th an invitation to give 
 a course of Hibbert Lectures on Metaphysics at Man- 
 Chester College, Oxford. These lectures were delivered 
 
 V? 
 
 Preface xi 
 
 in the winter of 191 3-14, and for them the greater 
 portion of the material now published was first drafted. 
 This material was revised and enlarged before it was 
 given at Aberdeen ; and the whole has been again 
 revised, with additions in some places and omissions 
 in others, in preparation for the press. In present 
 circumstances it is perhaps unnecessary to apologise 
 for the delay in its appearance. 
 
 My obligations to other writers — not least to those 
 from whom I differ — are too numerous to mention, 
 and they are inadequately acknowledged in footnotes. 
 In conclusion, I should like to express my gratitude to 
 the Senatus of the University of Aberdeen for re-calling 
 me to the University as a Gifford Lecturer. To many 
 old friends in Aberdeen, and especially to Dr Davidson 
 and Dr Baillie, the professors of philosophy, my thanks 
 are due for much kindness and encouragement. 
 
 W. R. S. 
 
 August 1 9 18. 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Preface jx 
 
 I. The Problem 
 
 The problem of the bearing of ethical ideas upon the theory of ultimate 
 
 reality j 
 
 Criticism of the traditional methods of deriving ethics from a metaphysical 
 
 theory g 
 
 1. The method of rationalism lo 
 
 and that of naturalism ......... 14 
 
 2. The dialectic method . . '15 
 
 The need of an independent enquiry into moral values as a preliminary 
 
 towards forming a view of ultimate reality 20 
 
 II. Values 
 
 The attitude of science and the attitude of valuation 
 
 The kinds of value distinguished by their objects or ideals 
 
 1. Happiness 
 
 2. Intellectual Value, or Truth 
 
 3. Aesthetic Value, or Beauty 
 
 4. Moral Value, oj Goodness 
 Formal distinctions between values 
 
 1. Intrinsic and Instrumental 
 Moral and economic values 
 
 2. Permanent and Transient 
 
 3. Catholic and Exclusive . 
 The material conditions of value 
 
 4. Higher and Lower 
 The Scale of Values and the System of Values 
 
 ■23 
 26 
 
 27 
 30 
 31 
 35 
 36 
 36 
 
 37 
 42 
 
 45 
 46 
 50 
 
 51 
 
 III. The Meaning of Value 
 
 The psychological analysis of the moral consciousness as affecting its objec- 
 tive significance ........... 
 
 1. The reduction of the moral consciousness to pleasure-pain 
 
 2. Its reduction to desire ......... 
 
 54 
 58 
 61 
 
XIV 
 
 Contents 
 
 The social history of the moral consciousness as affecting its objective signi- 
 ficance .....•••••••• 
 
 The facts of mental and social history and the question of validity 
 Comparison of the appreciation of value with the scientific description of an 
 
 object ....•••• 
 
 1. The view that value consists in the relation of an object to the state 
 
 of the subject ...••••••• 
 
 2. The view that it is a relation between objects . . . . 
 
 3. The view that it is a quality of an object— a ' tertiary quality' 
 Value as a unique predicate with a definite bearing upon existence 
 
 PAGE 
 
 64 
 68 
 
 72 
 
 73 
 74 
 
 75 
 76 
 
 IV. The Criteria of Moral Value 
 
 Comparison of value-judgments with scientific judgments as regards their 
 reference to existence ....•••••• 
 
 The moral consciousness as one aspect of the consciousness of 
 reality ....••••• 
 
 The universal in morality, and the nature of moral intuition 
 Results of the objectivity of moral judgments .... 
 
 1. That they are universally valid, even although they may not 
 
 cognised ...•••••• 
 
 2. That they can be systematised ..... 
 
 3. That different systems may be compared in respect of their 
 
 prehensiveness ....••• 
 
 Applications of the criterion of comprehensiveness 
 The permanent factor in morality ...... 
 
 be re 
 
 com 
 
 80 
 
 86 
 88 
 92 
 
 93 
 96 
 
 100 
 102 
 106 
 
 V. Value and Personality 
 
 The individual as the subject of value ^^^ 
 
 Distinction of intellectual interests according as they are centred 
 
 in the universal or in the individual no 
 
 Value and the unique . • • • • • • • • ^ 3 
 
 The question whether intrinsic value belongs to things which are not persons 117 
 The value of the moment and the value of the whole life . . • .126 
 How far independent value belongs to the community of persons . .129 
 
 VI. Relative and Absolute Value 
 
 Relativity (that is, relation to the subject) not a characteristic of the moral 
 
 judgment any more than of the scientific judgment .... 133 
 
 Relativity (that is, relatedness within the objective whole) a characteristic of 
 
 the moral judgment as a judgment about reality i39 
 
 Contents 
 
 XV 
 
 page 
 
 Reasons for this view : 
 
 1. What is called good exists or is assumed to exist - . 
 
 2. The assertion of goodness refers to the person's attitude to his 
 
 environment . . . . . . . . 
 
 Hence {a) diversity in applied morality ..... 
 
 and (d) unity of principle or spirit in morality 
 
 The nature of this unity : the unconditional in morality . 
 
 3. The system of moral values as connected with the system of exist 
 
 ing things ......... 
 
 The ethical absolute and the absolute reality ..... 
 
 VII. The Conservation of Value 
 
 The conditions of the realisation of values ..... 
 The discovery of values ........ 
 
 The idea of value consequent upon experience of value . 
 
 The development of moral ideas ..... 
 The production or realisation of values as the fundamental postulate of the 
 moral life .......... 
 
 The attitude of science and the attitude of morality 
 The conservation of values ........ 
 
 How far this postulate may be valid apart from the postulate that the 
 
 existing world is a moral order ..... 
 
 (i) The law of compensation in nature 
 
 (2) The objective validity of values .... 
 
 (3) The independence of values ..... 
 The increase of values ........ 
 
 The mystical way and the way of practical morality 
 
 VIII. Value and Reality 
 
 The connexion of the moral order with existence ..... 
 
 ( 1 ) Ethical ideas as facts of the personal consciousness which determine 
 character and modify the environment ...... 
 
 (2) Ethical ideas as valid for reality ....... 
 
 Comparison of the validity of ethical ideas with that of physical principles . 
 The question thus raised concerning the knowledge of reality : Preliminary 
 
 propositions ........... 
 
 (i) That existence is given in the fact of knowledge . . . . 
 
 (2) That knowledge implies an object distinguished from the subject . 
 
 (3) That the object is not an isolated unit or collection of isolated 
 
 units .•......•••• 
 
 (4) That things and relations between things have equal objectivity in 
 
 knowledge. .......... 
 
 (5) That knowledge of an object implies the possibility of knowledge 
 
 of self . . . . • . • • ■• . . 
 
 139 
 
 . 141 
 
 . 142 
 
 . 144 
 
 . 147 
 
 . 152 
 
 • 157 
 
 159 
 
 i6r 
 161 
 164 
 
 167 
 168 
 
 170 
 
 171 
 
 172 
 
 174 
 
 175 
 178 
 
 181 
 
 1^3 
 
 185 
 189 
 
 191 
 
 192 
 
 195 
 196 
 
 198 
 
 199 
 
 201 
 
XVI 
 
 Contents 
 
 Supplementary Note on certain terms 
 
 1. Existence 
 
 2. Being .... 
 
 3. Reality .... 
 
 4. Relations 
 
 PAGE 
 207 
 207 
 212 
 214 
 215 
 
 IX. The Division of Re 
 
 The portions of reality which appear to have separate 
 
 1. The individuality of selves 
 
 2. The individuality of material things 
 Modified view of the constituents of existing reality 
 The status of relations in reality .... 
 The status of values in reality .... 
 
 The reference in value to personal life . 
 
 ALITY 
 ndividuality 
 
 219 
 219 
 
 222 
 227 
 229 
 
 233 
 234 
 
 X. The Unity of Reality 
 
 The connectedness of apparently independent things . 
 The problem of cognising reality as a whole 
 The method of analysis and synthesis . 
 
 Limits of analysis ...... 
 
 The knowledge of a whole, or synopsis 
 Illustration from the method of art 
 Attitude of philosophers to the question 
 
 Bergson's opposition of intuition to intellect 
 Vision and argument 
 Examples of synopsis . 
 The intuition of self 
 The knowledge of other selves 
 The view of reality as a whole 
 
 242 
 
 243 
 
 243 
 244 
 
 254 
 256 
 
 258 
 261 
 262 
 262 
 265 
 270 
 
 XI. The Interpretation of Reality 
 
 The distinction between description, explanation, and interpretation 
 
 Interpretation as a translation of meaning into better known terms 
 Berkeley's theory of visual language and of meaning in nature 
 This meaning not dependent on the absence of connexion, whether causal 
 or by way of similarity, between the sign and the thing signified 
 
 The discovery of meaning in the world, 
 
 and the finding of this meaning in its values 
 
 The criteria for testing an interpretation of this kind 
 
 The objections taken to this method of interpretation . 
 (i) owing to its use of imagination 
 (2) owing to the difiiculty of verification 
 
 273 
 276 
 
 278 
 
 281 
 285 
 
 287 
 288 
 
 293 
 293 
 295 
 
 Contents 
 
 WW 
 
 Xll 1 HE Theistic Arguments 
 
 The reasons for the disfavour into which these arguments have fallen . 
 
 The historical origin of the idea of God, and the acceptance of that idea by 
 philosophers 
 
 The philosophical problem (to find the idea through which reality is intelli- 
 gible) altered in the arguments to the question whether existence may 
 be predicated of a given idea 
 
 1. The Ontological Argument . 
 Anselm's argument and the criticism of it 
 The significance of the argument . 
 
 2. The Cosmological Argument 
 Hume's objection 
 The force of the argument . 
 
 3. The Teleological Argument . 
 The objections to teleology . 
 
 PAGE 
 301 
 
 302 
 
 307 
 309 
 
 310 
 
 315 
 316 
 
 319 
 
 323 
 .^25 
 326 
 
 XIII. The Moral .Argument 
 
 The insufficiency of the argument from morality alone 
 Conflicting attitudes of Hume and Kant to the argument . 
 
 Conditions of a modified form of the argument 
 
 The validity of the argument dependent upon the kind of moral order sup 
 posed to be exhibited in the world, whether as 
 (i) a system for the production of greatest happiness . 
 or (2) a system for distributing happiness according to merit . 
 or (3) a medium for the attainment and realisation of goodness by free 
 
 persons 
 
 The argument from the moral ideal itself: that it must exist somewhere 
 Validity and existence 
 
 331 
 
 332 
 
 '340 
 
 341 
 345 
 
 346 
 351 
 355 
 
 XIV. Pluralism 
 
 Pluralism as oflfering an explanation (alternative to theism) of the natural 
 
 and moral orders . . . . . . . . . . . ,-§ 
 
 Different forms of pluralism ,50 
 
 Spiritual pluralism . ,52 
 
 Tendency of the theory to solipsism, if interaction of monads excluded . 365 
 
 Its account of the order of nature, if interaction of monads admitted . 368 
 
 Its account of the order of values xii 
 
 Tendency of pluralism back to monism og { 
 
XVlll 
 
 Contents 
 
 XV. Monism 
 
 The explanation of nature ami morality on the view that all reality is one 
 Opposing tendencies to naturalism and to mysticism in monistic systems 
 The distinction of degrees of reality among particular things 
 The explanation of the moral order 
 
 The idea of purpose 
 
 The idea of freedom 
 
 The unfree world characterised 
 The religious side of monism 
 
 XVI. Purpose 
 
 The contrast of purpose and mechanism 
 
 Mechanism, as an abstract scheme .... 
 
 Its limitation to the quantitative aspect of phenomena 
 Mechanism, in the wider sense of the term, as including empirical know 
 ledge of material processes . 
 
 Its application to life and mind . 
 Purpose and the idea of an end . 
 
 Unconscious purpose . 
 
 the meaning of this conception 
 
 Conscious purpose 
 The conception of a universal purpose . 
 
 PAGE 
 
 382 
 
 384 
 
 387 
 
 .39 » 
 
 393 
 
 398 
 
 399 
 
 403 
 
 405 
 406 
 
 407 
 
 408 
 410 
 
 4'3 
 416 
 
 418 
 421 
 416 
 
 free action than 
 
 minism and in 
 
 XVII. Freedom 
 
 Freedom and the causal law : different meanings of this law 
 (i) in its quantitative expression, not more relevant to 
 to conscious action generally 
 
 (2) as meaning uniformity 
 
 (3) as meaning efficiency 
 
 The nature of conscious activity and the thet^ries of dete 
 
 determinism ...... 
 
 Kant's view of freedom 
 
 Conscious action and the time-span 
 Finite freedom : its nature and limits .... 
 
 XVIII. Theism 
 
 Theism as an interpretation of the world, implying purpose and freeaom 
 The theory of deism, as compaied and contrasted with theism 
 
 The idea of a non-interfering God 
 
 The nature of rationalism 
 The world as interpreted by theism 
 
 The interpretation through values 
 
 The problem of evil 
 
 The unitv of realitv as an ethical unity 
 
 429 
 
 432 
 437 
 438 
 
 4.39 
 
 443 
 
 444 
 446 
 
 453 
 4?7 
 
 459 
 462 
 
 464 
 
 465 
 469 
 
 47J 
 
 Contents 
 
 XIX 
 
 XIX. The Idea of God 
 
 The two ways in which the idea of God is reached 
 
 The mutual influence of philosophical ideas and religious experience 
 
 Metaphysical difficulties in the idea of God which has been reached 
 
 The idea of infinity 
 
 The idea of the Absolute ..... 
 The positive idea of God ...... 
 
 Is it anthropomorphic? ..... 
 
 How far it is analogical ..... 
 
 The relation of God and man ..... 
 
 PAGE 
 
 476 
 
 479 
 
 487 
 
 488 
 493 
 495 
 496 
 
 498 
 499 
 
 XX. The Limits of Morality 
 
 Summary of the argument of the book ....... 
 
 J . The distinction between knowledge of the individual and knowledge 
 of the universal ...... 
 
 The individual as the bearer of value 
 
 The order of values and the causal order 
 
 The objectivity of values ..... 
 
 The relation of persons to the moral ideal 
 The factors in a synoptic view of reality 
 
 The problem due to the divergence between the order of existence 
 and the moral order ..... 
 
 The inability of naturalism, pluralism, and monism to expkiin the 
 divergence ....... 
 
 The conditions of a solution 
 
 The theistic conclusion ...... 
 
 The importance of the moral values in the argument . 
 
 The limits of morality 
 
 The interdependence of all values .... 
 
 The connexion of jnorality with the time-process . 
 
 Index 
 
 2. 
 
 3- 
 
 4- 
 
 5- 
 6. 
 
 8. 
 
 9- 
 10. 
 
 505 
 
 505 
 506 
 
 507 
 
 507 
 
 50S 
 
 509 
 
 509 
 
 510 
 512 
 
 513 
 514 
 517 
 519 
 521 
 
 527 
 
I 
 
 THE PROBLEM 
 
 1 HE purpose of the present work is to enquire into 
 the bearing of ethical ideas upon the view of reality as 
 a whole which we are justified in forming. The argu- 
 ment begins with a discussion of values and ends with 
 the idea of God. In this way it reverses the traditional 
 order of procedure which seeks first for an interpreta- 
 tion of reality, founded upon scientific generalisations or 
 upon the conceptions involved in knowledge, and then 
 goes on to draw out the ethical consequences of the 
 view that has been reached. This traditional method 
 has some advantage on the ground of simplicity. It 
 concerns itself at first solely with what is and does not 
 allow itself to be disturbed by the intrusion of the alien 
 'conception of value or of what ought to be. It is true 
 also that the idea a man forms of the nature of things 
 as a whole can hardly fail to affect his view as to what 
 is of highest worth and thus lead on to ethical conse- 
 quences. But, for this very reason, it is necessary that 
 the basis of our theory of reality should be as broad and 
 complete as possible; and it will lack breadth and com- 
 pleteness if moral facts and ideas have been excluded 
 at the outset. The facts of morality as they appear in 
 the world, and the ideas of good and evil found in man's 
 consciousness, are among the data of experience. If we 
 
 S. G. L. I 
 
2 The Problem 
 
 overlook them in constructing our theory of reality, we 
 do so at the risk of leaving out something that is required 
 for a view of the whole, and we shall probably find that 
 our base is too narrow for the structure we build upon 
 it. On this account it is desirable to fix attention on 
 certain data which it has been customary to disregard 
 in forming a philosophical theory and to enquire how 
 far these data have a contribution to make towards 
 determining our ultimate view of reality. 
 
 This way of approach is not altogether new. The im- 
 pulse towards philosophy has often come from morality 
 or religion rather than from science. In Plato's Republic, 
 for instance, the argument rests upon an examination 
 of ethical conceptions and terminates in the idea of the 
 Good as the source of all reality and power. In most 
 systems of philosophy, however, ethical enquiry has 
 been postponed until the fundamental conceptions of 
 reality have been fully elaborated ; and, even where 
 this is not the case, ethical ideas have not been worked 
 methodically into the structure of the system, but have 
 remained suggestions merely or influences which in 
 some degree modified its general character. There was 
 novelty, therefore, in Kant's assertion of the primacy 
 of the practical reason in dealing with the ideas of God, 
 freedom, and immortality. But his view was founded 
 on a contrast between the speculative and the practical 
 reason, which left the former free, or rather compelled, 
 to disregard the data of moral experience as something 
 which lay outside the range of its application, and made 
 the practical reason simply its supplement and correc- 
 tive. This characteristic has persisted with most of the 
 thinkers who have been influenced by Kant's demand 
 
 Metaphysics and Ethics 3 
 
 for a view of reality which will satisfy the moral conscious- 
 ness. They have recognised ethical ideas as providing 
 an additional test of the adequacy of a view of the world, 
 not as forming an essential portion of the data from which 
 such a view should be derived. Perhaps this holds even 
 of Lotze, though, in a remarkable passage, he has for- 
 mulated a doctrine which proclaims a complete break 
 with the traditional method. 
 
 In the conckiding section of his treatise on Meta- 
 
 physic — the last book which he lived to write Lotze 
 
 repeats a dictum with which he had closed his first book 
 — a book w^hich bears the same title as his latest. '* The 
 true beginning of metaphysics lies in ethics," he asserts. 
 ^T admit," he goes on to say, "that the expression is 
 not exact; but I still feel certain of being on the right 
 track, when I seek in that which should be the ground 
 of that which is'' The reflexions on the world and 
 human life contained in his Mikrokosnms shov/ the iiii- 
 portance of this thought for Lotze's philosophy. They 
 ^\v^ some indication, also, of the way in which ideas 
 of worth or value, and, in particular, ethical ideas may 
 be used in interpreting.the world, and of the relations 
 of this mode of interpretation to the account of the 
 connexion of things arrived at by means of scientific 
 conceptions. But he never worked out the system of 
 ethical metaphysics which he adumbrated. He looked 
 forward to a future occasion to justify his view against 
 objections; but for this justification opportunity was 
 denied him. 
 
 His expression of opinion has thus come down to us 
 in questionable shape. It has all the impressiveness that 
 belongs to a belief that, from first to last, informed the 
 
The Problem 
 
 thinking of a philosopher who was careful to respect and 
 carry out the methods and results of science. But it has 
 not been worked into his system, and his words remain 
 the record of a personal belief whose logical position is 
 uncertain. \\'c may be tempted to ask whether we are 
 to takt: them for nothing more than this — an expression 
 of the author's individuality, which w c may accept or 
 reject as our subjective preferences dictate ? If this 
 were all, it would be useless to pursue the matter further. 
 Yet Lotze himself sometimes encourages us to take this 
 view; and the connexion in which the dictum makes 
 its appearance raises a question. His argument is over 
 when he says that the true beginning of metaphysics 
 lies in ethics; and it was not from ethics that his own 
 beginning was made. He began with the difficulties and 
 contradictions that confront the thinker when he tries 
 to understand the connexion of things ; and he overcame 
 these difficulties by postulating an inner substantial unity 
 of all realii) which solves the contradiction of transeunt 
 causation. It is only at the end of his work that he 
 throws out the suggestion that the secret of reality can 
 be revealed only by the ethical 'ought,' and that this 
 should form the starting-point of a metaphysical enquiry. 
 The terms in which the dictum is stated seem pre- 
 cise enough; but they do not pretend to be exact; and, 
 as Lutze himself has not worked out the doctrine, it is 
 unnecessary to lay stress on his form of statement. The 
 view which he indicates is opposed to the prevailing 
 opinion of philosophers, but yet it is sufficiendy familiar 
 at the present day. It is, in short, this : that ethical ideas, 
 or, mure generally, ideas about value or worth, have a 
 certain primacy for, or at least have an important and 
 
 Lotze s Dictum 5 
 
 legitimate bearing upon, the interpretation of reality. 
 This is the postulate expressed in its most general terms; 
 but, as thus expressed, it nii-hit {)e used, and has been 
 used, to cover various meanings. 
 
 One possible meaning may be mentioned in tli, first 
 place, which might be accepted without entaihng any 
 modification of the traditional data or mcUiud of philo- 
 sophy. The function of ethical ideas in interpreting 
 reality may be very real and important ; but a may be 
 in place only after some general view of the n;iti]n' of 
 the world has been established. It is a consequence of 
 theism, iur instance, that liic cosmic |:.rocess is regarded 
 as expressing a divine and therefore good purpose, so 
 that, in the further interpretation oi thai process, ethical 
 ideas have a legitimate and necessary function. Pxit the 
 function of ethical ideas is, in this case, seconder) and 
 consequential: their place and use depend on the prior 
 establishment of theism — to be more precise, of an ethical 
 theism. It would be incorrect to assert th;Lt thi. was 
 all that Lotze meant by his dictum, though it is a view 
 which is definitely suggested by the line of argument 
 in the Metaphysic. But it was not liis full iiK^aninf^; 
 and, if it had been, it would not have been of great sig- 
 nificance. Ii does not put ethics at tlic beeinnurar of 
 metaphysics ; it would not require to be promulgated as 
 marking a divergence from tradiiiunul methods; and it 
 would ignore all the difficulties which arise in attempting 
 to establish an ethical theism without a previous enquiry 
 into ethical facts and principles. It is sininlv to distin. 
 guish it from other and more important meanings of 
 the same general statement that this possible meaning 
 of it has to be referred to at all. 
 

 6 The Problem 
 
 The principle, if it is to be significant of a type of 
 philosophy, must mean that ethical ideas are not merely 
 of importance in philosophical construction, but that 
 they have a place at the basis of the structure — that 
 our metaphysics must be founded on ethics, that in our 
 idea of the 'ought' we are to discover at least a guide 
 to a true idea of the *is.' 
 
 This principle has sometimes been taken as implying 
 or justifying what may be called a subjective ground 
 for determining the nature of objective reality. Here, 
 accordingly, we may distinguish a second meaning which 
 has been put upon the dictum. Ethical ideas have a 
 direct bearing upon practice. What we say ought to be 
 becomes for us a demand that it shall be ; it is poten- 
 tially an object of desire and determines our wishes 
 and conduct. In this way the whole inner world not of 
 obligation only but also of desire and wish combines to 
 make a demand upon reality; and no view of reality is 
 accepted as one in which the whole consciousness can 
 find rest unless it commend itself by satisfying this 
 practical need as well as the demands of the reason. On 
 this ground, it is sometimes held, reality must be not 
 merely what we find it to be, or what our reason con- 
 vinces us that it is, but also what we need or wish or very 
 earnestly desire that it shall be. '' Things," says William 
 James', ''reveal themselves soonest to those who most 
 passionately want them." The statement is true, and 
 he has also given the true reason for it: "for our need 
 sharpens our wit." Things are not what they are be- 
 cause we want them so to be ; but they are revealed 
 to the man who has wit to discover them, and his wit 
 
 ^ A Pluralistic Universe^ p. 176. 
 
 Ethical Data in Metaphysics 
 
 7 
 
 I ' 
 / 
 
 is often sharpened by his need to know. To go fur- 
 ther than this, and to say that reality must satisfy 
 our wants, is to assume beforehand a whole view of 
 the world and of its adaptation to human emotion and 
 desire. It would be to beg the questions which we 
 are setting out to discuss, and it would be to take the 
 less stable factors in human nature as the standard of 
 truth. 
 
 It is therefore important to point out that the dictum 
 that ethics lies at the basis of metaphysics may be 
 interpreted in a third way, which avoids the apparent 
 subjectivity which attaches to the meaning just men- 
 tioned. It may be held that our final view of reality 
 must be based upon experience; that this experience 
 must be taken in its whole range, and must not be 
 arbitrarily limited to the data of perception which in- 
 telligence works up into science ; that the appreciation 
 of moral worth, or of value generally, is as true and 
 immediate a part of our experience as the judgments of 
 perception ; and that it, as well as they, iuiin^ a part of 
 the data of metaphysics. Further, it may be contended 
 that, just as the data of sense-experience are found to 
 manifest certain regularities from which 'laws of nature,' 
 as they are called, may be inferred, so also in our moral 
 experience a certain law or order can be discovered, 
 with a claim to be regarded as objective, which may 
 be compared with the similar claim made on behalf of 
 natural law. If we take experience as a whole, and 
 do not arbitrarily restrict ourselves to that portion of it 
 with which the physical and natural sciences have to 
 do, then our interpretation of it must have ethical data 
 at its basis and ethical laws in its structure. It is the 
 
8 
 
 The Problem 
 
 validity and consequences of this view that I propose 
 to discuss. 
 
 Before entering upon this enquiry it may be well to 
 clear the way bv a short review of the types of thought 
 to which it is opposed and from which, historically, it 
 is a re-action. Kant's doctrine has led to a number of 
 views which differ from one another in detail and even 
 in tLiiidamental points. But all of them might be de- 
 scribed, in his phrase, as asserting and dependinn^ upon 
 the primacy, or at least fundamental importance, of 
 the practical reason. I ii this respect they may be con- 
 trasted will, the prevalent or orthodox tradition of most 
 |)l]iir.^()phical schools. These have attributed primacy to 
 the theoretical reason, and to the practical reason they 
 have assigned a secondary and subsidiary place. In 
 genera], the question of the relation of the practical to 
 the theoretical reason has not been discussed. It has 
 been assumed, as something too obvious for defence or 
 even for statement, that we have first to find out the 
 true nature ^i things, and that the rule and end for 
 conduct and the meaning of value will then be plain. 
 Reason is one, and the theory of reality is expected at 
 the same time to be, or easily to lead to, a theory of 
 goodness. This assumption is not peculiar to one school 
 of philosophy, but is shared by various schools, though 
 each may have a different way of putting the matter. 
 What is common to them all is that an enquiry, which, 
 in data as well as method, is purely theoretical, leads — 
 somehow or other — to ethical results. In this way the 
 ethical principles of Rationalism, of Idealism, and of 
 Naturalism are often arrived at. 
 
 J 
 
 The Ti^ansition from ' is ' to ' ought ' 9 
 
 At a certain point these theories all pass from pro- 
 positions about reality or what ' is' to propositions about 
 goodness or what 'ought Lu be.' They make a transition 
 to a new predicate; and the difficult) for th^ni lies in 
 justifying this transition. This is the crucial question 
 for the whole class of theories which found tin ir rtliii a! 
 doctrines upon a metaphysics which, at the start and 
 up to a certain point, w^as not ethical. W c ma\ describe 
 these systems generally as systems of metaphysical 
 ethics; and, in seeking to understand ihcm, we have to put 
 the question, how do they pass from being to goodness, 
 from 'is' to ' ought '.^ The question is not altogether easy 
 to answer, just because as a rule they do not recognise 
 the difficulty of making the transition and even ignore 
 that a transition to a new order of conceptions is being 
 made. But I think that two methods may be distin- 
 guished, by which the transition has actually been made 
 or attempted. On one of these methods ethics is regarded 
 as simply an application of theoretical or metaphysical 
 principles to a new material — to the material of con- 
 duct or of conscious volition. The relation of ethics to 
 metaphysics is, on this view, similar to the relation oi 
 mechanics to mathematics. Mechanics deals with the 
 application of mathematical laws or foi inula^ to masses 
 and molecules, and in the same way ethics applies meta- 
 physical truths to conduct or volition. Reason is held 
 to become practical by virtue of its new subject-matter, 
 that is to say, by being applied to practice or conduct : 
 the principles remain the same; only the application is 
 different. This is one kind of metaphysical ethics; and 
 it is that which characterises a Rationalist ur iriiellec- 
 tualist school of thought, such as Cartesianism. But 
 
lO 
 
 The Problem 
 
 The Ethical Concept 
 
 II 
 
 a similar method is also frequently adopted by the 
 exponents of that form of scientific philosophy called 
 Naturalism. Another way of proceeding from theo- 
 retical to ethical conceptions may be traced in Idealisms 
 of the Hegelian type or approximating to that type. 
 According to this method we pass from the non-ethical 
 to ethical conceptions by criticism of the former. 1 his 
 criticism, it is held, brings out a meaning which is really 
 implicit in the conceptions with which we started, though 
 it was not at first seen to be there. The dialectic of 
 the notion compels us to advance from the relatively 
 abstract stage in which no ethical content was apparent 
 to the more concrete stage in which an ethical meaning 
 becomes explicit. It is important to understand how 
 these two methods work, and how they deal with the 
 special difficulties which they encounter. They must 
 therefore be considered separately. 
 
 I. The most characteristic of all systems of Ration- 
 alism is that of Descartes and his followers. According 
 to him knowledge is one, and its method is always the 
 same. '^^11 knowledge," he says, *'is of the same nature 
 throughout, and consists solely in combining what is 
 self-evident^" The type to which every kind of know- 
 ledge must conform, if it is to be truly knowledge, is, 
 in his opinion, mathematical demonstration. In mathe- 
 matics we start with self-evident propositions and pass 
 from one proposition to another by means of a chain of 
 reasonincr, each link in which is clearly a true proposi- 
 tion. The chain cannot be endless; that is why a special 
 class of self-evident propositions is needed at the outset. 
 
 ' Regulce ad directionem ingenii, xii ; Philosophical Works, transl. 
 Haldane and Ross, vol. i, p. 47. 
 
 4 
 
 i 
 
 All our ordinary scientific or philosophical propositions 
 depend ultimately upon some primary proposition or pro- 
 positions, assumed as self-evident; but each step which 
 connects the later proposition with the earlier must also 
 be equally evident. We accept the proposition / because 
 it is evident that it follows from q ; and we accept 
 I] because it is evident that it follows from r, and so 
 on ; but sooner or later we must reach a proposition 
 whose truth does not depend on its implication by any 
 other proposition. Descartes speaks sometimes as if 
 there were only one such proposition— the assertion by 
 the thinker of his own conscious existence; and this was 
 certainly for him the only self-evident proposition which 
 had existence as its predicate. But it is clear that he 
 admits as ultimate and self-evident a number of other 
 propositions, such as the mathematical axioms and the 
 axiom of causality. From these self-evident propositions 
 every other scientific truth is arrived at by means of clear 
 and evident steps. 
 
 What then are we to say of the first ethical proposi- 
 tion that enters into a system of thought of this kind— 
 the first proposition, that is to say, that has 'good' or 
 some similar ethical concept as its predicate ? Of two 
 things one: either this proposition is self-evident and 
 without dependence on a preceding proposition, or the 
 only evidence in the case is its implication by some 
 preceding proposition which, ex hypothesi, is not an 
 ethical proposition. If the former is the case, then the 
 ethical proposition marks a new beginning, and is not 
 derived from any set of purely theoretical propositions; 
 and it must be recognised as having independent validity, 
 if not necessarily primacy or control over others, when 
 
12 
 
 The Problem 
 
 I 
 
 The Method of Rationalism 
 
 13 
 
 the thinker proceeds to unify or systematise his know- 
 ledge and attempt an interpretation of things as a whole. 
 Ill the latter case — if it is held to be evident that a 
 certain ethical proposition follows from a non-ethical 
 proposition further questions arise. 
 
 Now the former of these alternatives is adopted by 
 man\' writers who, by reason of their method, may be 
 counted among- the Rationalists. It is the prevailing 
 doctrine of the intuitional moralists and may be found 
 in the Scholastics before them. Certain ethical proposi- 
 tions—such as those that affirm that justice, veracity, 
 and the common welfare are good — are held to be self- 
 evident, not derived from mathematical, causal, or any 
 other purely theoretical propositions. \\ iica this posi- 
 tion is taken up ethics as a science is not made dependent 
 upon metaphysics. It is allowed a place of its own. 
 Ethical truths and truths of theoretical philosophy will 
 be regarded as arrived at in the same way, and they 
 will be dealt with by the same rational methods; but 
 there will be no primacy of one over the other ; if meta- 
 physics is not a result of ethics, neither is ethics derived 
 from metaphysics. And this method, so far as regards 
 ethics, has been often employed by writers like Richard 
 Price, who have not worked out any metaphysical 
 system, as well as by others— Reid, for example— whose 
 ethical doctrine is part of a general philosophical view. 
 Such theories do not derive their ethical principle from 
 an antecedent and non-ethical metaphysics, though any 
 comprehensive or philosophical view of this kind must 
 show in what way ethical and theoretical propositions 
 can be combined into a system. 
 
 If, on the other hand, we take the latter line of 
 
 i4 
 
 thought, and derive ethical truths from non-ethicai pre- 
 misses — as the Cartesians generally, and Geulincx in 
 particular, seem to have wished to do- ilv ri also our 
 ethical |)ropositions must begin somewhere. 1 iiorc must 
 be some proposition which, in our system, contains for 
 the first time an ethical notion; and we shall 'accept 
 this proposition not because, standing by itself, it is 
 self-evident, but because it is implied b\ a preceding 
 proposition which, ex hypothesi, does not (ontain any 
 ethical notion. How is it possible for this to be ? \\ here 
 are the non-ethical premisses which, of themselves, 
 justify an ethical conclusion ? 
 
 This question is never faced, so far as I can make out. 
 Goodness is found in different directions by different 
 thinkers of the same school. Sometimes, as by Geulincx, 
 it is held to belong only to the will, which is powerless 
 to effect changes in the world of sense but is supreme 
 in its own narrow field. Sometimes, as by Spinoza, it 
 is regarded as belonging to the knowledge and realisa- 
 tion of one's own being as a mode of the ultimate reality. 
 But, whatever the subject of our proposition when we 
 say "this being, or this kind of life, or this attitude, is 
 good," the predicate 'good' enters as a new notion which 
 is superadded to, and not derived from, the logical or 
 mathematical or causal relations already involved. Self- 
 evidence may be claimed for the ethical proposition 
 itself, but it is never shown to be logically implied by the 
 antecedent propositions. They have been on a different 
 plane of thought. The assertion of goodness is not really 
 arrived at by deduction from any assertions about exist- 
 ence; it marks the beginning of a new line of thought. 
 Thus it was that the Rationalists of the seventeenth 
 
14 
 
 The Problem 
 
 century failed to get to ethics by way of logical deduction 
 from principles about knowledge and reality which were 
 not themselves ethical and by a method which was 
 imitated from mathematical proof. 
 
 In very much the same way, the Naturalists of the 
 nineteenth century failed in their attempt to reach ethical 
 propositions by an extension of causal propositions. If 
 we take Spencer as representing this view, we may find 
 in him the promise of a new and scientific doctrine in 
 which ethical principles shall have their true place in a 
 universal and systematic philosophy, wherein everything 
 is to be deduced from the doctrine of the persistence of 
 force. But the promise of proof is not kept : it is broken 
 just at the point where its fulfilment would have been 
 of the greatest interest— when consciousness emerges 
 from the play of competing physiological reflexes. After 
 this point the pretence of deduction is cast aside. Causa- 
 tion, however, is still the clue; and we look for the 
 transition from the causal to the ethical judgment. The 
 chain of causation is crossed, however, in Spencer's 
 exposition by a new line of argument, when he quietly 
 assumes as self-evident a proposition which is not causal 
 at all but strictly ethical— the proposition that pleasure 
 and pleasure alone is good. The line of cause and effect 
 is not altogether deserted by him ; and other exponents 
 of evolutionary ethics keep to it more consistently. In 
 all their expositions, however, one truth becomes appar- 
 ent : that as long as the argument is logical it has no 
 ethical consequences ; and that, when ethical proposi- 
 tions enter, they have not been reached by any logical 
 process. It is not always that writers are content, with 
 the naivete of Sir Francis Galton, to formulate the ' new 
 
 The Dialectic Method 
 
 15 
 
 duty' of following evolution ; they more frequently pass 
 from the assertion of a certain evolutionary tendency to 
 the assumption that it has ethical value, without stopping 
 to reflect on the audacious leap they have taken over 
 a lot^ical fenced Nevertheless, their service to clear 
 thought on this subject has been none the less real 
 because it has been unintentional. Their exposition 
 has made clearer than ever the distinction which they 
 have so palpably ignored — the distinction between ' is ' 
 and 'ought,' between existence and value or goodness. 
 And, indirectly, they have done the good service of 
 drawing attention to the tendency to overlook this dis- 
 tinction in other systems of philosophy as well as in 
 their own. 
 
 2. Ethical ideas, we may therefore assert, are not 
 due simply to the application of metaphysical or theoreti- 
 cal conceptions to the subject-matter of conduct. This 
 method of metaphysical ethics will not work. There 
 remains the other and more promising method. Accord- 
 ing to it the purely theoretical conceptions with which 
 metaphysics begins are inadequate to the interpretation 
 of reality, but criticism of them reveals a content which 
 was not present, or at least was not explicit, at the out- 
 set. In this way these initial conceptions lead on by a 
 logical process to the conceptions which express the 
 ethical nature of reality. 
 
 This method has its classical expression in Hegel's 
 dialectic. He passes, by successive steps, from the most 
 formal and empty of all conceptions to the fullest and 
 
 ^ The ethical system of NaturaHsm has been examined in an earlier 
 work, to which reference may be made : see Ethics of Naturalism, 
 2nd ed., 1904. 
 
i6 
 
 The Problem 
 
 most concrete. The logical evolution of the notion be- 
 gins with a conception completely void of content and, 
 by its own characteristic logic, advances to mind or spirit. 
 ''This," says Hegel, "is the supreme definition of the 
 Absolute." ' But " the essential feature of mind or spirit 
 is liberty," and this free mind expresses itself in morality 
 and law\ Questions of difficulty arise at each step of 
 the long argument by which this result is reached. But 
 the method followed is, at least, a conceivable method ; 
 and, as it shows the derivation of the ethical notion, it 
 might appear that an independent study of the latter 
 and of its implications would be unnecessary, and that 
 its meaning is to be ascertained by examining the logical 
 conditions which determine its place in the evolution of 
 
 the notion. 
 
 It is, however, only on one of the possible interpre- 
 tations of a dialectic process that this view of the matter 
 can be maintained. With Hegel himself, we may lay 
 stress on what may be called the intellectual character of 
 the process, and assert that the development of thought 
 is a purely inner development : the might of the notion 
 will then be looked upon as producing from its own 
 nature the whole fulness of the life of the spirit. ' Being ' 
 logically equates with ' nothing,' and yet there^ is a 
 transition from one to the other, and this transition is 
 ' becoming' : and so through the whole gamut of cate- 
 gories until we reach the morality and law of civilised 
 society. Now, if it is the mere might of the notion that 
 is at work here, the last stage must be from the first 
 implicit in the earliest. We shall be compelled to regard 
 the whole process of evolution traced in the dialectic 
 
 1 Encykiopddie, §§ 382, 384, 487. 
 
 The Meaning of * implicit ' 1 7 
 
 as the philosophical analogue of the old biological notion 
 of preformation, according to which the germ contains 
 within itself, in ultra-microscopic minuteness, all the 
 wealth of the organism with which it is continuous. 
 Evolution, as interpreted by the preformation theory in 
 contrast with the theory of epigenesis, is simply the 
 expansion of characters and parts always present but 
 too small at first to be visible. In this sense the full- 
 grown organism was supposed to be implicit in the cell 
 from which it originated. Does 'implicit' have the same 
 meaning when the term is used of the logical evolution .^ 
 Are the spirits of just men made perfect implicit, in this 
 sense, in the bare notion 'being' with which Hegel 
 starts? Is their essence already contained in it, however 
 indistinctly, and however much in need of the micro- 
 scopic power of the Logic to bring it to light? If it is, 
 then it is impossible that this ' being ' so full of charac- 
 ter can be the same as nothing: and the dialectic refuses 
 to march. 
 
 That this view of the dialectic is "a mere caricature" 
 of all that is valuable in Hegel may well be admitted. 
 Hegel himself tried to distinguish his method from the 
 preformation theory of evolution. It is "only ideally 
 or in thought," he said, " that the earlier stage virtually 
 involves the latere" " Before the mind," says Mr Brad- 
 ley, " there is a single conception, but the whole mind 
 itself, which does not appear, engages in the process, 
 operates on the datum, and produces the result'." In 
 this operation the mind must surely impart something 
 from its own fulness ; and in the process it is always 
 
 ^ Encyklopddie^ ^ i6i. 
 
 '^ Principles of Logic, p. 381. 
 
 o. O. L>. 2 
 
i8 
 
 The Problem 
 
 receivinu new data which affect its operation. The 
 mind never has simply a single conception before it, any 
 more than it has ever a simple idea of the Locke-Hume 
 variety. We admit, in this way, that the evolution of 
 the notion resembles epigenesis— that the development 
 of thought includes the assimilation of new experience. 
 And if ''we do this, we give up the old view of logical 
 evolution, as much as the biologists of to-day have given 
 up the old view of organic evolution. We admit the fact 
 of epigenesis. The development of an organism is not 
 a proc^ess of unrolling or expanding material which has 
 been present all along. The organism is related to its 
 environment by give and take, and its growth is con- 
 ditioned by this interaction. Does not something similar 
 hold true of the process by which thought advances to 
 new and more adequate conceptions of reality ? 
 
 If we adopt this view a dialectical development of 
 concepts will still be possible ; but it will not claim to 
 be determined at each stage simply by the mere content 
 of the preceding concepts. The concept will be regarded 
 as having for its function the knowledge ot an object, 
 and its nature will lie in this function. As we ascend 
 from less to more adequate concepts, our test of adequacy 
 will be not merely inner freedom from contradiction, 
 but also ability to describe and interpret reality ; and 
 our concepts will be formed for the purpose ot including 
 the new material which experience presents. From this 
 point of view the relation of concepts and of the sciences 
 becomes intelligible. Mathematical concepts, for ex- 
 ample, do not pretend to exhaust the nature of the real 
 world.' They exhibit certain abstract relations only, and 
 are in this way inadequate to knowledge of reality, and 
 
 i 
 
 Concepts and Experience 
 
 19 
 
 indeed professedly inadequate. But this inadequacy 
 IS not the result of an inherent contradiction or of any 
 defect in the concepts themselves. On the contrary they 
 admit of indefinite elaboration without falling into con- 
 tradiction. It is only if we use them for a purpose for 
 which they are not fitted— if we attempt through them 
 alone to understand any concrete situation— that there 
 is discrepancy between what is to be explained and what 
 is explained. Neither the wish of a man nor the fall of 
 a pebble can be accounted for by mathematics alone. 
 And, while they make plain their own inadequacy to 
 describe the full nature of the concrete, they give no 
 hint as to the kind of concepts by which they have to 
 be supplemented in order to serve this purpose. In the 
 same way. when it is argued that mechanism is inade- 
 quate to account for vital processes, it is not meant that 
 mechanism is a self-contradictory system, but only that 
 It is insufficient for the explanation of certain facts or of 
 certain aspects of facts. And so at each step where one 
 concept is replaced by another. Throughout our pro- 
 cedure intellect never works in vacuo ; it is an effort 
 after the understanding of an object, of reality. For a 
 fuller view of reality new concepts are needed, and these 
 new concepts are not derived, dialectically or otherwise, 
 merely from antecedent concepts. In no case do con- 
 cepts appear out of the empty intellect independently of 
 the material of experience. They are a way of dealing 
 with and ordering such material, and their entry into 
 consciousness is determined thereby. Our intellectual 
 concepts of cause and purpose, for instance, are based 
 upon experiences in our own activity; and the same is 
 true of our ethical concepts. 
 
20 
 
 The Problem 
 
 These reflexions are not put forward as supplying 
 the place of a full examination of metaphysical ethics. 
 But they may serve to prepare the mind for a construc- 
 tive effort of a different kind by showing the fundamental 
 difficulties in the way of any theory which seeks to derive 
 ethical notions from notions which are not ethical, i he 
 same problem confronts all such theories-the problem 
 of accounting for the introduction of an ethical concept 
 into the argument. And, whatever the special method 
 they adopt, these different theories betray the same 
 obscurity at the crucial point. The rationalist hesitates 
 to say whether his first ethical proposition is m its own 
 nature self-evident, or is implied by non-ethical pro- 
 positions. The latter alternative has never been put 
 forward clearly ; and the former alternative allows an in- 
 dependent beginning for ethics. The difficulty is similar 
 if the dialectical evolution of concepts be followed. N on- 
 ethical concepts are inadequate for the description oi an 
 experience which includes moral factors ; they may prove 
 their own inadequacy, but they do not themselves supply 
 the deficiency. The ethical concept could never have 
 been evolved out of non-ethical antecedents and without 
 the help of moral experience ; and this experience must 
 therefore be taken into account by any metaphysics 
 which professes to be ethical. 
 
 The fault which is to be found with metaphysical 
 ethics is, in the end, just this, that its data are insuf- 
 ficient. It tends to disregard that portion of experience 
 which is of greatest importance for its purpose, namely, 
 moral experience. It bases ethics upon metaphysics, 
 and metaphysics is an interpretation of experience ; but 
 it starts from a limited view of experience, and tries to 
 
 Science and Values 
 
 21 
 
 pass to ethical concepts without taking into account 
 those factors in experience which are relevant to the 
 later enquiry, though they may not have been required 
 for the earlier stages. The data of experience which 
 philosophy has to interpret are not limited to sense- 
 perception and the material of scientific knowledge ; 
 they include the facts of desire and volition which are 
 formative forces in the structure of life; and, in addition, 
 they include also the experience of moral approval 
 and disapproval and, generally, the whole appreciation 
 of value. This last is the special region of experience 
 from which ethical concepts arise. It is a marked accom- 
 paniment of the active life— of the life of desire and 
 volition— but it reacts upon and colours the whole of 
 experience. 
 
 It may be allowed that, when we occupy ourselves 
 with this aspect of experience, it has a tendency to divert 
 our attention from the purely logical or purely causal 
 order in which the scientific intelligence regards its 
 objects ; it may thus interfere with the spirit of pure 
 science ; and, for that reason, it may be well to banish 
 sternly from our minds the attitude of moral or 8esthetic 
 appreciation when our purpose is simply to understand 
 the connexions of phenomena. The more severely we 
 keep to the logical and causal points of view the better 
 it will be for our mathematical and physical knowledo-e. 
 The perfection of these sciences depends upon their limi- 
 tation ; and the more perfect they are, the more cleariy 
 are they separated from ethical appreciation, and the 
 more impossible is it to pass directly from the logical or 
 causal to the ethical judgment. The latter is based upon 
 an aspect of experience overiooked or deliberately 
 
22 
 
 The Problem 
 
 disregarded by the sciences, and deals with it by the use 
 of concepts which would have been confusing and irrele- 
 van^in mathematics or physics. But the aspect vvhich 
 science neglects is none the less fundamental in lite. 
 And, when we clearly recognise the importance of this 
 phase of experience— the facts of moral approval and 
 disapproval, that is to say— we are prepared to recognise 
 the unique position of the ethical concept. This justifies 
 an independent beginning for ethics itself, and at the 
 same time leads us to expect that moral experience and 
 ethical ideas may have a contribution of their own to 
 make to the interpretation of the world. 
 
 This formulates our problem. Morality is a factor 
 in experience ; ethical ideas have a place in conscious- 
 ness. Our theory of reality as a whole must take account 
 of these things; and the question concerns the differ- 
 ence which they make in our final view of the world and 
 in the arguments which lead up to that view. To ap- 
 proach this question systematically it will be necessary 
 to devote a litde time to the description of ethical ideas 
 and their place in experience, so that we may be pre- 
 pared to decide whether there is any truth in the dictum 
 that we must seek in that which should be for the ground 
 of that which is. 
 
 II 
 
 VALUES 
 
 1 uiLosoPHY is a result of the contemplative attitude to 
 things, in which man observes them and reasons about 
 them, but does not himself take part in bringing about 
 the events which he seeks to understand. It is born of 
 leisure, therefore. The work of thought may be strenu- 
 ous enough itself; it must necessarily be strenuous to 
 attain its end ; but, for this very reason, it requires a 
 mind aloof from affairs, withdrawn from the ordinary 
 business of life, indifferent to the practical activity which 
 leaves little room for contemplation and disturbs its 
 serenity. The thinker is expected to regard all things 
 with equal mind ; his business is with their nature and 
 connexions only ; he is the servant of truth alone, and, 
 at its demand, it is held that he must put aside the 
 common prejudice in favour of the good or beautiful or 
 useful. 
 
 The growth of science also encourages the same 
 attitude. Science, it is true, is distinguished from philo- 
 sophy by the multiplicity and importance of its practical 
 applications. The present time, beyond all others, is 
 the day of the achievements of applied science, and it 
 is for the sake of its application to the arts of life that 
 science itself is held in honour by an impatient public. 
 The connexion is very close between principles and 
 
24 
 
 Values 
 
 application : the latter would not exist were it not for the 
 former ; and the former would lose encouragement and 
 stimulus— would perhaps never have been recognised 
 —had it not been for their promise of a power over the 
 environment which should minister to man's desires. 
 But, even with a view to their subsequent applications 
 to practical affairs, it is not well that the man of science 
 should have these interests constandy before his eyes. 
 The practical interest is apt to interfere with the theo- 
 retical interest, to make impartiality difficult and to 
 weaken the concentration of mind which successful 
 enquiry needs. Hence the current and familiar speciali- 
 sation. In the foreground is the inventor who ministers 
 to the demands of industry ; behind him stands the 
 scientific enquirer who, by an arduous method, discovers 
 the principles which another puts to practical use. The 
 sphere of values is accordingly assigned to the inventor 
 and taken out of the hands of the scientific discoverer. 
 Further, it is recognised that the world is a process 
 of evolution, or at least that it is in continual change. 
 But mere change cannot be made an object of know- 
 ledge. Thought seeks the permanent within or behind 
 the changes ; and it is only in so far as constant factors 
 can be discovered in it that the changing process be- 
 comes the object of knowledge. The contrast between 
 the flux of experience and conceptual fixity has even 
 led certain thinkers to adopt the view that the intellect 
 necessarily tends to pervert reality by substituting a 
 fixed concept for that which actually is always in process 
 of change or growth. With this view we are not at 
 present concerned. But it is true that science looks 
 for constancies, for the permanent law rather than for 
 
 The Attitude of Valuation 
 
 25 
 
 the changing event. Even if it be true that change is 
 as necessary to permanence as permanence is to change, 
 the preference of science is for the permanent. 
 
 The same attitude is apt to persist even when man 
 and his ideals are the object of reflexion. It is often 
 forgotten that man himself is an agent in the world's 
 changing course, and that his agency is determined by his 
 ideals : that he selects between possible lines of action 
 and that his selection may be determined by his judg- 
 ment of what is good or better. Human agency is thus 
 one of the factors of that world of experience which both 
 science and philosophy set out to explain ; and human 
 agency is affected by conceptions or ideals of value. 
 In this way, values belong to the object which we have 
 to explain when man himself is included among the 
 objects of enquiry. Further, as a fact of mental life, 
 the experience or consciousness of value is as funda- 
 mental as the experience or consciousness of events. 
 Man is not a cognitive being in the first instance, and 
 only thereafter an active being. Knowledge is sought 
 by him in virtue of scfme interest ; and the interest in 
 knowledge for its own sake is a late acquisition. Pri- 
 marily, he seeks to know in order that he may turn his 
 knowledge to some use beyond the mere knowledge: 
 it has to serve to control his environment or to adapt 
 him to it. He wishes to understand a thing- because 
 understanding it will make him in some degree its 
 master. The attitude of valuation, accordingly, may 
 even be said to have priority in the development of 
 mind over the attitude of cognition. 
 
 The primary experience, on which all later views of 
 the world and of self are built, is not perceptive merely. 
 
26 
 
 Values 
 
 it is also appreciative. It involves in every part some 
 consciousness or appreciation of worth or value, as well 
 as the consciousness of objects as existing and changing. 
 The distinction between the two attitudes itself belongs 
 to the growth of mind. The primary experience is at 
 once perceptive and appreciative ; its object is both 
 an existence and a value ; but the two elements have 
 to be discriminated for the sake of understanding and 
 of practice alike. The whole system of scientific know- 
 ledge is arrived at by means of a preliminary abstraction 
 — by restricting attention to the nature and laws of the 
 thincjfs observed and disrerardincr the element of value 
 which they are experienced as somehow possessing or 
 entailino-. And this abstraction is itself a selection de- 
 termined by an interest. By a similar and equally valid 
 abstraction we may concentrate attention on the aspect 
 of value, which is omitted by the sciences, and construct 
 a theory of value which will supplement, and in some 
 sense correspond with, the scientific theory of facts and 
 relations. The final problem will concern the relation 
 of the two systems, when thought seeks in the end to 
 restore the harmony into which it has broken. One of 
 these systems — the scientific view which does not con- 
 cern itself with values — may be regarded as sufficiently 
 well known in its ireneral character. But some account 
 is necessary of the complementary system of values : 
 although that account must be restricted to certain lead- 
 ing features, important for their bearing on the final 
 problem. 
 
 The varieties of value are clearly distinguished only 
 in the mature consciousness ; and their enumeration 
 
 The Kinds of Value 
 
 27 
 
 must not be mistaken for a psychological account of 
 their genesis, any more than a classification of the 
 sciences is to be confused with a psychology of cognition. 
 We have to distinguish kinds of value, not different ways 
 in which we become conscious of value, although we 
 may expect difference in the objects to be correlated 
 with a difference in the conscious attitude to them. And 
 values may be discriminated in different ways according 
 to the principle of division adopted. Some of these ways 
 may be described as formal ; but one distinction has 
 special regard to content, and with this distinction a 
 beginning may be made. 
 
 In the first place, then, values may be distinguished 
 into kinds according to the nature of the objects or ideals 
 to which they have reference or within which they may 
 be included. It is impossible, at the outset, to lay down 
 a principle for determining all the different varieties of 
 value, and the distinctions which we draw may conceal 
 a unity of system which will be disclosed in the course 
 of further analysis. We must start from a preliminary 
 and empirical classification. In this way we may enume- 
 rate happiness, beauty, goodness, and truth as com- 
 prehensive descriptions under which many particular 
 experiences of value may be brought, and as expressive 
 of ideals to which worth is undoubtedly assigned. 
 
 The first of these ideals — happiness — is that which 
 is most commonly in our mouths and appeals most 
 forcibly to the plain man. Almost everyone admits that 
 what contributes to happiness is of value; some are 
 willing to say that this is the very meaning of value. 
 But, when we come to look at the conception happiness 
 more closely, this first view seems to need amendment. 
 
28 
 
 Values 
 
 A man's happiness may consist in realising or m con- 
 templating beautiful things, or in the pursuit of goodness, 
 or in the search for and attainment of truth, or in the 
 gratification of some strong passion, such as the love of 
 power, or in the work-a-day life from which reflexion 
 is banished, or in passing from enjoyment to enjoyment. 
 The content of the notion happiness will differ accord- 
 ing as it signifies one or other of these things, or some 
 combination of them. And a notion which, like this, may 
 mean anything comes very near to meaning nothmg. It 
 becomes a mere form into which any, or almost any, 
 view of the worth of life may be fitted. There is, how- 
 ever, one positive element in the notion happiness, and 
 to this element due regard must be paid. It implies 
 always the simple but positive element pleasure. 
 
 Expressions are occasionally to be met with in some 
 ^^i-iters — Bentham is an example' — which seem to imply 
 that the words pleasant and good have the same mean- 
 ing. But this identification, or apparent identification, 
 of two different ideas is probably due to nothing more 
 than an impatience with any divergence from the 
 doctrine of hedonism. It certainly overlooks a clear 
 distinction. That something is pleasant is a fact of 
 immediate experience— that and nothing more. That 
 this pleasure is good or worthy or has value is a further 
 assertion. This is shown by the fact that it is at least 
 open to dispute whether certain pleasures have value or 
 are in any way good. Malicious pleasure is a case in 
 point. On the one hand it must be held by the hedo- 
 nist that while malice itself is bad, or has negative 
 
 1 E.g., Principles of Morals and Legislation, p. 7 and chap, ii (ed. 
 of 1879). 
 
 Pleasure as a Value 
 
 29 
 
 value, the malicious man's pleasure in his evil deed is 
 an element of good or positive value in the total experi- 
 ence. On the other hand it is maintained that this 
 pleasure has in it no element of good at all— that it 
 even makes the total experience worse than it would 
 have been had the malicious act failed to bring pleasure 
 to the agent or had it stirred in him a conscientious 
 pain. It is not necessary to argue the point on its merits. 
 All that is necessary is to make clear that there is no 
 contradiction in holding that the malice which is accom- 
 panied by pleasure is worse than the malice which is not, 
 or, in other words, that there are some cases of pleasure, 
 which are not in themselves good. Consequently, when 
 the assertion is made that pleasure, or pleasure alone, is 
 of value, the predicate adds something to the subject of 
 the proposition— the meaning is not the same as if one 
 said 'pleasure is pleasant.' The assertion is not a tauto- 
 logy ; and, if hedonism is of any significance as an ethical 
 theory, it is because its fundamental proposition that 
 pleasure alone is of value is a synthetic proposition and 
 not merely analytic or verbal. 
 
 Hedonism is of course a familiar doctrine both in 
 ordinary life and in philosophy. Its philosophical im- 
 portance consists largely in its attempt to make ethics 
 a quantitative science by introducing a single standard 
 by which values of all kinds may be measured. \\ has 
 no difficulty in laying down the principle ; but it has 
 never achieved precision, or gained general assent, in 
 its manner of applying it to the details of life. Spiritual 
 goods cannot be measured against material on the same 
 scale. There is not sufficient evidence to show that a 
 society of Socrateses would experience more pleasure 
 

 30 
 
 Values 
 
 than a society of fools— or, at least, than a society of 
 ordinary people who enjoyed material goods and did 
 not trouble themselves or their neighbours by asking 
 inconvenient questions. The hedonist philosopher has 
 commonly preferred the goods of the mind not because 
 he could prove them to be more pleasant, but because 
 he held them to be more noble. The feeling of pleasure, 
 real and positive as it is. partakes in this connexion of 
 the formality which belongs to the ideal of happiness. It 
 belongs to every kind of value when realised in its 
 fulness, and in some degree belongs to every realisa- 
 .tion of value. It may be regarded as a feeling of value, 
 but it is not a measure or standard of value. Although 
 it accompanies all experiences of value, it does not ex- 
 press their distinctive nature or enable us to discriminate 
 their differences. Accordingly, as pleasure does not 
 explain or measure value, it seems better also not to 
 speak of it as an independent kind of value. It attaches 
 itself to value of every kind, instead of being one kind 
 amongst the others. 
 
 The remainingkindsof value which have been already 
 enumerated are the aesthetic, the moral, and the intel- 
 lectual, corresponding to the traditional ideals of the 
 beautiful, the good, and the true. 
 
 Among these difficulty arises regarding the inclu- 
 sion of intellectual value. It is maintained by an active 
 school of thinkers that truth is simply a concise expres- 
 sion for working efficiency, that it is capable of analysis 
 into certain other values, and that all so-called intellectual 
 values have their real value in relation to some other 
 function than intellectual apprehension. On this view, 
 
 Truth as a halite 
 
 31 
 
 truth, although a value, would not be regarded as one 
 of the fundamental kinds of value. The view appeals 
 for support to the practical interests which determine 
 the beginnings of knowledge. But it overlooks the in- 
 dependent interest in knowing which characterises the 
 maturity of the human mind. Truth has been found to 
 possess a value which is not capable of being resolved 
 into other and practical interests, and w^hich must there- 
 fore be regarded as independent. It is the object and 
 the attainment of intelligence alone and can in this way 
 be distinguished from happiness or goodness or beauty. 
 The proper attitude of the intelligence to a true propo- 
 sition, or to a system of true propositions, is simply belief 
 or assent ; and this is an intellectual attitude different 
 from the mere enjoyment of happiness, the moral ap- 
 proval of goodness, or the artistic admiration of beauty. 
 This difference, however, suggests another question. If 
 we call truth a value, do we not thereby obliterate the 
 distinction with which we started between cocrnition and 
 appreciation .^ The answer to this question seems to be 
 that the true proposition, merely as true, is not a value 
 apart from the intelligence which understands and ap- 
 propriates it. 1 1 is knowledge of truth, or truth as known, 
 that has value. Man as a thinking being finds value in 
 the truth which he seeks ; it may even become the chief 
 aim of his life, and he cherishes it on its own account'— 
 not as something alien to himself, but as completing or 
 perfecting his own intellectual nature. 
 
 Moral and aesthetic values are closely connected — 
 so closely that they have sometimes been identified. 
 But even a little reflexion brings out differences that 
 may not be ignored. In the first place there is a 
 
32 
 
 Vahtes, 
 
 subjective distinction. The mental attitude by which we 
 apprehend or detect beauty is not the same as that in 
 which we become aware of goodness. Both, however, 
 differ from the intellectual attitude in knowledge ; and 
 the term appreciation may be used for both kmds of 
 valuation. But this term covers attitudes of mind which 
 are not the same. Our appreciation of a beautiful sun- 
 set, for example, differs from our appreciation of a good 
 deed or a good character. The former is admiration 
 simply, the latter approval. 
 
 No doubt the attitudes may be combined. Admira- 
 tion of a work of art is often conveyed in terms which 
 express approbation or approval also. Not only do we 
 speak of a good picture or a good artist, but this phrase 
 may indicate not merely admiration of the work, but ap- 
 proval of it and its author. On the other hand, aesthetic 
 terms are used for moral excellence : the Hebrew praised 
 the ' beauty of holiness' ; the Greek conception of koKo- 
 KayaOia signified the union of art and morality at their 
 highest point ; and. in the modern phrase ' a beautiful 
 soul,' a term of aesthetic admiration is used to express 
 high moral approbation. Even in these phrases, how- 
 ever, what is expressed seems to be the combination of 
 two modes of appreciation rather than their identity. 
 The ' beautiful soul ' is an object of aesthetic admiration, 
 but this object is the result of dispositions and activities 
 to which moral approval is appropriate. The moral 
 
 object the soul that is in harmony with the moral ideal 
 
 is also an object of aesthetic admiration : the good, 
 
 when fully realised, is in this case seen to be something 
 that is also beautiful in itself. And, when we use terms 
 of moral approval for the aesthetic object, we can perhaps 
 
 Beauty and Goodness 
 
 33 
 
 discover that our thoughts have passed from the 
 object as beautiful to another aspect of the situation. 
 We do not speak of a sunset as good instead of beautiful, 
 or. If we do, we recognise that we are not using the word 
 'good' m Its ethical meaning. It is more common to 
 apply the term 'good ' to the work of human art and 
 still more common to apply it to the artist ; and in these 
 cases, moral approval may be implied ; but this moral 
 approval is something superadded to aesthetic admira- 
 tion and not identical with it. We admire the work 
 without any thought of how it was done or even who did 
 It ; but when we approve (in the ethical sense) it is with 
 reference to the conscious activity of the artist who used 
 his skill to realise the ideal which he was able to conceive 
 Moreover, instances are also common in which the 
 two attitudes diverge. The same concrete situation may 
 call forth moral approval combined with esthetic depre 
 ciation, or aesthetic admiration combined with moral 
 disapproval. We approve without admiring, or admire 
 and at the same time condemn. The moral character 
 or good deed may be spoiled for our .esthetic sense by 
 awkwardness or lack of grace. Great crimes may call 
 forth our reluctant admiration by the manner in which 
 they are devised and carried out: there was no incon- 
 sistency in De Ouincey's description of 'murder as a fine 
 art. Or a whole career, such as that of Napoleon, may 
 appeal to our aesthetic sense although it is condemned 
 by our moral judgment. 
 
 . In the second place, the distinction between the 
 esthetic and the moral judgment is confirmed when we 
 examine their respective objects. Any work of fine art 
 anything we call beautiful, has a certain independence 
 
 S. G. L. 
 
I 
 
 34 
 
 Values 
 
 and completeness in itself. To use an illustration 
 of Professor Stewart's, " Hermes is dug- up at Olympia, 
 and we find him beautiful as soon as we see him^ The 
 dust of centuries has hidden his beauty, but has not 
 changed it. We may know nothing of his origin or 
 history • who the sculptor was, or what his purpose, 
 when the work was completed, or what temple it was 
 meant to adorn. All these are but accessory circum- 
 stances of interest to the scholar. Knowledge about 
 them may perhaps add to our admiration ; but ignorance 
 of them can do little to impair it ; the eye is satisfied 
 with seeing. The artistic object is something aloof and 
 by itself, like the Platonic ideas-" all breathing human 
 passion far above." Contemplation of it lifts us out of 
 the life of action and thinking, and of their values : 
 Thou, silent form, dost tease us out of thought 
 As doth eternity : Cold Pastoral ! 
 
 When old age shall this generation waste. 
 Thou shalt remain, in midst of other woe 
 Than ours, a friend to man. 
 But Keats mistook its message when he read its lesson 
 as "beauty is truth, truth beauty." This is a confu- 
 sion of values. Beauty is beauty, and that is enough 
 Esthetic contemplation rests upon a certain external 
 and sensuous content, and does not need to go beyond 
 this content either to intellectual meanings or to the con- 
 text of circumstances in which it was produced. The 
 material object is of itself sufficient to provoke and to 
 justify admiring contemplation : even knowledge of the 
 
 1 Cp. H. Rickert, Kulturwissenschaft imd Natitm'issenschaft, 2nd 
 
 ed., p. 75* ./to' 
 
 ' Notes 071 the Nicomachean Ethics of Aristotle, vol. i, p. i»3- 
 
 The Object of Moral Value 35 
 
 artist's purpose is unessential; far less is it necessary to 
 enquire into his state of mind and to know what sort 
 of a man he was. The sensuous object, in form and 
 content, is that to which beauty fundamentally belongs ; 
 when we speak of beauties of mind and character, we 
 are conscious that we are using a^-sthetic terminology in 
 a sense which, if perfectly just, is yet derivative and not 
 fundamental. 
 
 It is different with moral appreciation. Even if our 
 primary moral judgments seem to have an external 
 application, a little criticism makes it clear that the ex- 
 ternal thing has only instrumental goodness and can 
 never have intrinsic goodness. If we speak of a good 
 character, it is clear that the moral approval has respect 
 to the soul and not to the body ; even when we speak 
 of a good deed, reflexion convinces us that the mere 
 overt act whereby things in space change their places 
 is not in itself good or evil ; its value, if it have any, 
 can be instrumental only : that is to say, it is regarded 
 as a cause of w^hat is good, but not as good in itself 
 The action to be appreciated as moral must be taken 
 from its inner side. The rescue from drowning— to use 
 a time-honoured illustration— will be approved or dis- 
 approved according as the intention was to restore to 
 a life of usefulness or to reserve for future torture. We 
 must always go back to the inner aspect of conduct 
 —the intention ; and the intention never stands alone, 
 as something holding for this case only and having no 
 relation to anything else. It is part of a system of con- 
 duct. Thus the approval of a single act or incident is 
 a judgment concerned with the inner life, and apt to be 
 concerned with the whole life. We cannot disregard the 
 
 3—2 
 
36 
 
 Values 
 
 motive — as we do in the case of the artist — or be in- 
 different to what sort of a man the agent was. Moral 
 judgments have not the completeness and independence 
 of aesthetic judgments. From the first, if they do not 
 form a system, they depend upon a system. 
 
 These different kinds of value depend upon a differ- 
 ence in the objects valued. Certain formal distinctions 
 remain which call for explanation. The most obvious 
 and important of these distinctions is that between In- 
 trinsic and Instrumental value. A thing may have value 
 or worth in itself quite apart from anything else to which 
 it leads ; and this is called intrinsic value. On the other 
 hand, when we call a thing good or say that it has value, 
 we are often aware that we use the term not for what 
 the thing is in itself, but because of something else which 
 follows from it as an effect. Thus a surgical operation 
 may be said to be good, not, certainly, because it has any 
 intrinsic worth in itself and apart from its consequences, 
 but because it may be a means of prolonging life or 
 restoring health : and we assume that life and health 
 are good in themselves or (if they are not) that they 
 causally determine something else which is good in itself. 
 Consequendy, where we make use of a proposition which 
 asserts merely instrumental value, value does not, strictly 
 speaking, belong to the subject of the proposition. What 
 we ascribe to that subject is not value but causal effici- 
 ency to bring about something else which is assumed 
 or implied to possess value. Assertions of instrumental 
 value, being thus causal propositions, are at the same 
 time utility-propositions : the thing is said to be useful 
 as leading to something else which is of intrinsic value. 
 
 Intrinsic and Instruniental 37 
 
 The weight of any thorough enquiry must therefore fall 
 upon the conception of intrinsic value, and it might seem 
 that the conception of instrumental value could be dis- 
 missed at once as having to do solely with causal rela- 
 tions. But the case is not so simple ; and some further 
 enquiry is necessary into the relation of instrumental 
 to intrinsic value. 
 
 The science in which the conception of value has 
 been used with greatest effect is <iconomIcs ; and It 
 may be well to consider for a moment the economic 
 conception of value, for in economics ' value ' has a well- 
 defined meaning. The value of any economic good is 
 determined by its relation to other things which can be 
 got in exchange for it ; and when we have in money a 
 general measure of the ratio in which things can be ex- 
 changed for one another, the measurement of value is 
 easy : a thing's value is its price. The term 'value,' in 
 this sense, is what the economist also calls ' value in 
 exchange ' ; it is an instrumental value, a means of gettino- 
 somethlng else ; and to this use the term ' value ' is 
 generally restricted in economic reasoning. To under- 
 stand Its further significance needs a little examination 
 of the concept. The value of any article A consists in 
 its relation to the amounts of other articles (say B, C, 
 and D) or any one or more of them which can be got 
 in exchange for It. The value of B, in the same way, 
 will consist in its relation to t^e amounts of A, C and 
 D, or any one or more of them, which can be got in 
 exchange for It. Similarly of the values of C and D. 
 And, if we measure the value of all commodities by 
 money, then money itself has to be valued in terms 
 of these other commodities : for it, after all, is one 
 
 I 
 
38 
 
 Values 
 
 commodity amongst others. Thus the attempt to define 
 the economic value of any one commodity always lands 
 us, in the long run, in a circle — provided we keep to 
 this meaning of value as instrumental. The circular 
 nature of the definition is only hidden from us because 
 we commonly define the value in relation to a common 
 measure, money, and overlook for the moment the fact 
 that the value of money itself must be defined in relation 
 to other articles. Hence the economic conception of 
 value (that is, of value in exchange) is found on analysis 
 to depend on commodities having some other value 
 than this — a value which is independent of their relation 
 to other commodities. That is to say, value in exchange 
 rests ultimately upon what Adam Smith called ' value 
 in use,' and what Jevons and others after him have called 
 simply ' utility.' The term ' utility ' would not have been 
 retained by economists unless it had been found con- 
 venient ; but it is no more correct here than in some of 
 its ethical uses. It does not clearly distinguish intrinsic 
 value from value in exchange, because the latter is also 
 a kind of utility ; and utility, indeed, should mean use- 
 fulness for something, and thus imply that very reference 
 to another thing which, in this place, it is introduced 
 to avoid. Adam Smith's term Walue in use,' though 
 somewhat clumsy, is really more correct than the simpler 
 term ^utility.' The point which it is desired to bring out 
 is that the commodity has a value in itself, which is not 
 dependent on its relation to other things which it pro- 
 duces or which may be got for it. The people who 
 desire it desire it for its own sake — to use, as Adam 
 Smith says, or simply to enjoy. This value is indepen- 
 dent of exchange ; and when a thing has this value, 
 
 %* 
 
 Economic Valuation 
 
 39 
 
 people are willing to do something or to give up some- 
 thing in order to possess it. The things they do or give 
 up have value in exchange, or instrumental value, and 
 perhaps that only. But this thing, which has a value 
 mdependent of exchange, possesses intrinsic value or , 
 worth— at least from the point of view of economic 
 science. 
 
 The economist has his scale of values, and can adjust 
 all economic goods to their proper places on the scale. 
 But the goods receive their places on the scale not in 
 virtue of their own intrinsic quality, but because of what 
 can be got for them— for what they Mil! bring in money, 
 or according to their relation to some more intricate 
 standard. The economist may recognise intrinsic value 
 as the basis upon which his values rest; but he measures 
 the.se by an external standard: his uhole valuation, 
 therefore, is extrinsic. Tf we attempt to measure things 
 by their intrinsic worth— if, for instance, we rai.se the 
 question of the importance of economic goods in life as 
 a whole— we shall have to seek out some way of deter- 
 mining intrinsic values, which will be entirely different 
 from the scale of the economists and which may assign 
 the highest place to goods unrecognised on the economic 
 scale'. 
 
 An attempt to measure intrinsic values would raise 
 questions hard to answer. Are economic goods, for in- 
 stance, to have a place on this scale } and if so at what 
 point .? Or are they all— the whole material apparatus 
 of life, that is to say— to be regarded as having instru- 
 mental value only } Merely to state this que.stion is to 
 
 ' Cp. 'Ethical Aspects of ^conQm\c%; International Journal of 
 Ethics, vol. XVII (1907), pp. I ff., 317 ff., 437 ff. 
 
feg%!j 
 
 40 
 
 Values 
 
 show that the distinction between intrinsic and instru- 
 mental value is not of such easy application as it seemed 
 to be at the first glance. Obviously, the surgical operation 
 has instrumental value only, .the medical art is good, 
 but not good in itself— only as a means for restoring 
 health or preserving life. But what of health, or long 
 life ? Are these good in themselves, or only as means 
 to happiness, or social efficiency, or some other end ? 
 The mere statement of these questions is suggestive of 
 
 controversy. 
 
 And a further consideration has also to be taken 
 Into account. For a little experience shows us that the 
 same thing may be both an end-in-itself and also a 
 means to something else that has value. Knowledge, 
 for instance, may be good in itself, that is, have intrinsic 
 value; and knowledge may lead to sympathy, and so 
 have instrumental value also. And sympathy may have 
 intrinsic value; but it may also react upon and stimulate 
 knowledge, as well as affect other persons by deeds of 
 beneficence, and thus have at the same time instrumental 
 value. The category of means and end, under which we 
 are striving to understand value, does not give us a 
 single clear line of advance. Just as, in nature, we do 
 not find one thing which is simply cause, and another 
 thing which is simply efi"ect, but interaction is the rule, 
 so here, means and end are interwoven in the complex 
 
 fabric of life. 
 
 The category of means and end is indeed an im- 
 perfect guide for identifying and discriminating values. 
 It is a useful and necessary distinction for our thinking; 
 but life overruns it, and sometimes obliterates it in its 
 continuous process. Where do the means end, and 
 
 The Snmination of 1/ allies 4 1 
 
 where does the end begin ? Is it winning only that is 
 the end of the game .^ or is the game its own end which 
 victory crowns with an added worth .^ The means, it 
 may be said, may in such a case have an intrinsic value 
 of their own in addition to their instrumental value as 
 leading to the end, and the total value of the whole 
 experience will be the sum of the intrinsic values of 
 means and of end. But this does not state the truth 
 fully; the total value cannot be arrived at by mere 
 addition'. It may even be that, in certain experiences, 
 neither the means alone nor the end alone has any 
 intrinsic value. Is it not often the case that you would 
 not play the game at all— that it would have no value 
 for you — unless you had a chance of winning '> and, on 
 the other hand, that you would not value victory at all 
 except as the result of the game .^ What we hold as 
 good may be the end reached in this particular way or 
 by these means. Means and end shade into one another 
 in experience, and no value at all may belong to one 
 of them apart from the other. Or it may be that each 
 has some value in itself, but that the value of the whole 
 realised experience is greater than the sum of the values 
 which would belong to its parts if taken separately. 
 
 Ethical analysis does not stop at the same point 
 as psychological analysis or physical division stops. 
 Generally it stops much earlier. We may proceed with 
 our psychological analysis far beyond the point at which 
 value has disappeared from the factors into which the 
 experience is analysed. The simplest things to which 
 it is possible to assign value may be very complex things 
 in their actual existence; and the whole of which we 
 
 ' Cp. G. E. Moore, PriTicipia Ethica, p. 28. 
 
42 
 
 Values 
 
 can be sure that its full intrinsic value is there to be 
 seen, if we have insight to see it, may be a very com- 
 prehensive whole indeed. 
 
 It is customary to draw a distinction between Per- 
 manent and Transient values. All mental states may be 
 viewed in respect of their duration ; they last for a longer 
 or shorter time, and the time admits of exact measure- 
 ment. Duration has thus a prominent place among the 
 conditions through which Bentham sought to measure 
 the value of a lot of pleasure or pain\ and thereby to 
 transform ethics into a quantitative science. It was in 
 the attempted measurement of intensity that the chief 
 pitfalls for him lay; with duration he seemed to have 
 no difficulty. Taking a second or other short interval 
 as the unit of his reckoninof, he estimated the value of 
 a continuous experience by multiplying its intensity 
 into the number of seconds which it lasted. Even this 
 measurement, however, proceeded upon an assumption 
 — the assumption that the pleasure or pain which was 
 regarded as a continuous experience was of identical 
 intensity throughout its duration; and this assumption 
 is not justified by the facts. Thus even in the measure- 
 ment of duration the hedonic calculus is in difficulties, 
 not because we cannot count time, but because we may 
 not assume that the experience which endures remains 
 of constant intensity. This difficulty may be circum- 
 vented by estimating degrees of permanence in another 
 wav. Instead of looking: to the immediate conscious 
 experience, which varies from moment to moment, we 
 may measure the permanence of the objects to which 
 
 ^ Prificiples of Morals and Legislation (ed. of 1879), P- 29. 
 
 I 
 
 Permanent and Transient 43 
 
 we attribute value, or of the mental dispositions or in- 
 terests which are the conditions of our enjoyment of 
 these objects. The later utilitarians commonly followed 
 this course, and Bentham did not ignore its applications 
 hor them, as for Bentham, value ultimately lay only in 
 the mimediate experience, which is in constant flux • 
 but they recommended their disciples to turn their eyes 
 from It and seek rather the possession of the objects 
 and the cultivation of the interests, from which pleasure 
 normally followed. Although pleasures were transient.' 
 they had sources which were comparatively permanent 
 and which might give stability to human values. 
 
 The attitude recommended by the utilitarians is not 
 necessarily restricted to the hedonic interpretation of 
 value. The attainment of value is alwavs determined 
 by objects, whether material things or other factors in 
 the environment ; it is also conditioned by the disposi- 
 tions and interests of the persons in whom the value 
 IS realised. And in both these respects there mav be 
 varying degrees of permanence. As regards the objec- 
 tive conditions, it has been customary for the proverbial 
 philosopher to depreciate material things-all that is 
 commonly called wealth— as transient and the prey of 
 moth and rust ; our hold on them is without doubt un- 
 certain, and the enjoyment which they yield is apt to 
 dimmish with years. On the other hand social objects, 
 such as "honour, love, obedience, troops of friends," are 
 held to be more lasting, although they too cannot be af- 
 firmed to be permanent, even when the person is worthy 
 of them. It is obvious that, as long as we are dealina 
 with temporal objects, we cannot assert anything more 
 than relative permanence. Only ideal objects, conceived 
 
44 
 
 Values 
 
 as independent of time, can be called permanent in 
 the strict sense. Such are the 'eternal values' of truth, 
 beauty, and goodness; such also is the love of God. 
 
 It may seem easier to draw the distinction trom the 
 side of personal dispositions than from that of their 
 objects ; but here also there are divergent estimates. 
 There is an old controversy between the sensualist and 
 the philosopher as to whose pleasures are the greater, 
 and this controversy has been looked upon as settled 
 only because the philosopher has been allowed to give 
 literary expression to the debate, and has summed up 
 in his own favour. As he puts the case, he alone has 
 experience of the pleasures of knowledge as well as of 
 those of sense, and as he prefers the former his judgment 
 must be accepted without appeal. Perhaps he has not 
 summed up quite fairly; and the sensualist, had he been 
 given a hearing, might have urged that the philosopher 
 had not the requisite sensibility for appreciating sensual 
 pleasures at their full value, and that, as susceptibilities 
 differ, each party should be left the judge of what he 
 likes best. There is no good reply to this rejoinder, 
 so far as regards the intensity of human feelings. But 
 on the question of permanence, the philosopher does 
 seem to stand on firmer ground. Sensual susceptibilities, 
 however carefully nourished, change and wither as the 
 organic life passes youth and maturity ; there is far less 
 diminution of the susceptibility to the values commonly 
 called higher— those of art and letters, of science and 
 of the affections. From the standpoint even of the in- 
 dividual life, they have a degree of permanence which 
 is not shared by the values which the sensualist esteems 
 most highly. 
 
 Catholic and Exclusive 
 
 45 
 
 It follows that there is a certain superiority in this 
 respect of one kind of values over another. A value 
 wears better the more it is independent of material 
 conditions ; the higher values of knowledge, art, and 
 morality are more permanent than those of the sensual 
 life. The distinction remains a relative distinction, due 
 to the greater permanence of the interests to which 
 certain values appeal. And if, as will be argued later, 
 all values belong to the personal life, their permanence 
 must depend upon its permanence. This will hold even 
 of the 'eternal values' of truth, beauty, and goodness. 
 Indeed the phrase 'eternal values' is iiable to be mis- 
 understood. It seems used so as to signify independence 
 of time and therefore of any conscious life which, like 
 the human, is in time. In this sense we might predicate 
 eternity of truth (except in so far as truth is conceived 
 as the possession of an intelligence which functions in 
 time), or of beauty (if we regard beauty as independent 
 of conscious apprehension), but hardly of moral goodness 
 (which involves a state of conscious will). But, although 
 truth and beauty, as thus restricted, are elements in or 
 contributory to value, we do not seem justified in calling 
 them values apart from their realisation in or through 
 conscious life. They are not values till realised, and 
 as realised they can be eternal only if, and in the same 
 sense as, persons are eternal. 
 
 ^ . There is a further distinction between values which 
 is due to what Bentham calls their 'extent.' It relates 
 to the number of persons who may participate in their 
 enjoyment. To this distinction we may give the name 
 of Catholic and Exclusive. By cathoHc values (as the 
 
46 
 
 Values 
 
 term is used here) I mean those in which all men may 
 participate, or those whose enjoyment by one man does 
 not limit or interfere with their equal enjoyment by 
 others. When one man can enjoy a good only by its 
 loss to other men, or by restricting their equal chances 
 of enjoyment, then the value may be called exclusive. 
 The ereat classes of value which have been mentioned 
 — intellectual, moral, a:;sthetic, and emotional — have 
 nothing in their own nature which makes them exclusive. 
 When one man attains truth, or admires beauty, or 
 realises goodness, or even enjoys happiness, there is 
 nothing in his experience which makes it impossible or 
 more difficult for others to do the same. Truth may be 
 passed from mind to mind ; beauty does not wane by 
 being admired ; goodness is infectious ; even happiness 
 radiates from the presence of the happy man, if only 
 outward circumstances do not impose a bar. But if men 
 reeard outward or material circumstances as themselves 
 
 o 
 
 possessed of intrinsic value, then such values, or many 
 of them, are exclusive. The full enjoyment of material 
 goods commonly requires their monopoly. This is most 
 obvious in the case of primary needs — food and clothing 
 and shelter. But it holds of material goods generally 
 that their supply is limited, while desire is boundless. 
 And the industrial civilisation in the midst of which we 
 live has as yet done little to reduce or to counteract the 
 conflict of interests which lies at its base. 
 
 If we admit that material goods have instrumental 
 value only, a further consideration enters. Intrinsic 
 goods have varying degrees of connexion with or 
 dependence upon the material apparatus that may be 
 instrumental towards them. The closer this connexion 
 
 The Material Conditions of halite 47 
 
 is, the greater this dependence, the more difficult will 
 it be for such goods to be realised by many persons, 
 and the greater will be the antagonism between the 
 mterests of one man and the interests of another. On 
 the other hand, the less its dependence on material 
 instruments, the more catholic is any value. It is thus 
 interesting to compare the different degrees of this 
 dependence in the different classes of value. 
 
 Happiness has an obvious connexion with such ex- 
 ternal instruments, though it is not easy to state the 
 connexion in a way free from objection. W^ealth and, 
 in general, the control of the material environment are 
 so constant an object of desire that men are apt to forget 
 that happiness consists in a state of mind and not in the 
 possession of material goods. But it is not altogether 
 independent of these possessions. Nor is ther^e any 
 common standard for determining what that competent 
 measure of external goods is which, in Aristotle's view', 
 IS necessary to happiness: nor, indeed, any ground for 
 assuming that the competent measure is the same for 
 all men. Nor can any general agreement be found 
 amongst the long line of reflective writers who have 
 given their opinions on this subject to the world. On 
 the one hand it has been common to emphasise the in- 
 ward nature of happiness and to minimise its dependence 
 on anything outside a man s own mind. Thus we have 
 Adam Smithy economist as he was, depreciating power 
 and riches as ''enormous and operose machines," which 
 ''keep off the summer shower not the winter storm," 
 and asserting that " in ease of body and peace of mind 
 
 ^ Ethics, book i, chap, x, p. iioi a 15. 
 ^ Moral Stntiments, part iv, chap. i. 
 
48 
 
 Values 
 
 all the different ranks of life are nearly upon a level, and 
 the beggar who suns himself by the side of the highway 
 possesses that security which kings are fighting for." 
 On the other hand a shrewd observer has roundly 
 asserted that threefourths of a man's happiness depend 
 upon his yearly income^ And this, put more graphically 
 and with insight into the fact that it is not only income, 
 but being within your income, that matters, was the 
 simple philosophy of Mr Micawber : ''Annual income 
 twenty pounds, annual expenditure nineteen nineteen 
 six, result happiness. Annual income twenty pounds, 
 annual expenditure twenty pounds ought and six, result 
 misery." In truth, the conception happiness conveys 
 so litde regarding its content or conditions that the 
 controversy hardly admits of a more definite decision 
 than this : that so far as a man's happiness depends on 
 external circumstances it will frequently tend to come 
 into competition with the similar happiness of other 
 
 men. 
 
 This is the general rule ; and it applies to other 
 
 values as well. Knowledge is the same for all, and there 
 
 is nothing in the nature of truth to make it the property 
 
 of one man rather than another: except this, that, before 
 
 it can be attained, it may require a concentration of mind 
 
 and a culture of the intellect which are only possible to 
 
 those who have not only a fit endowment of mental 
 
 faculty but also some amount of freedom from the 
 
 ordinary cares of life and leisure to devote themselves 
 
 to intellectual pursuits. And civilisation has not yet 
 
 managed to produce a society in which this leisure is 
 
 1 I cannot trace the reference, but my recollection is that the 
 assertion occurs in one of Prof. Bain's works. 
 
 The Catholicity of Moral Value 49 
 
 open to all. Those who have it are in a position of 
 privilege to which only a limited number can attain. 
 
 Much the same must be said of the aesthetic values. 
 It is true that in itself beauty is as little envious as any 
 good. It is not made less beautiful by being shared. 
 But it is rarer than we could wish, and to enjoy it the 
 mtervention of material instruments is necessary. Many 
 of the beauties of nature, most of the beauties of art, 
 are as much hidden from the mass of men as are the 
 intellectual delights of the mathematician. They need 
 opportunities for their inspection and culture for their 
 appreciation. They are thus, like the intellectual values, 
 limited by external conditions which the social order 
 has not been able to put within the power of all but 
 reserves for those who are favoured by economic cir- 
 cumstances. 
 
 Moral values are not limited in this way. It is, of 
 course, true that every kind of moral activity is not open 
 to every one, and that circumstances call for different 
 modes of conduct. The particular good deed of one 
 man may make it impossible or unnecessary for another 
 man to perform the same good deed ; but it never puts 
 goodness out of his power, it never interferes with his 
 volition to do the best. Whatever the circumstances 
 there is always a right to be done, a moral value to be 
 realised. The attainment of moral value by one man 
 may act as a stimulus in the same direction upon other 
 men, just as his cultivation of truth or beauty may. 
 But in the latter cases the stimulus may lead to impotent 
 desire — for the instruments of study or of art may be 
 wanting. In morality, on the other hand, there is no 
 such monopoly of means, for the moral law is realised 
 
 o. G. L. . 
 
 4 
 
50 
 
 Values 
 
 by the will alone, and through the will it is manifested 
 in character. Riches and poverty, health and sickness, 
 power and subjection are merely different conditions 
 in which goodness can be cultivated and moral values 
 brought into existence. This universality of the moral 
 value vindicates its rank as the purest and most catholic 
 among the varieties of value. 
 
 Yet another ground of distinction may be mentioned. 
 Values may be divided into higher and lower according 
 to the degree of their importance; and within the higher 
 class we may speak of dominant values. 
 
 This distinction concerns intrinsic values only. It 
 is clear that instrumental values must be measured by 
 the intrinsic values to which they lead and by their 
 effectiveness in leading to them. But, as soon as the 
 question is put regarding the relative importance of in- 
 trinsic values, the difficulties that lie in the way of any 
 solution are apparent. If intellectual values are under 
 consideration, are we to prefer mathematics to biology, 
 economics to metaphysics, or the reverse ? If the ques- 
 tion is esthetic, can we say which art is the highest 
 and by how much ? Or, in morality, can we distinguish 
 kinds of goodness and arrange them in the order of 
 their value (as Reid attempted to arrange the virtues, 
 or as Martineau classified springs of action according 
 to the degree of their moral worth) ? And if happiness 
 be the aim, is it the happiness that depends on the life 
 of sense that comes highest, or that derived from science, 
 or from art, or from good works ? Thus we raise old diffi- 
 cuhies over again. Can we even arrange, in any order 
 of merit, the fundamental classes of value— intellectual, 
 
 The Scale of Values 5 1 
 
 artistic, moral, and emotional } These questions ap- 
 pear unanswerable, and we are tempted to put them 
 aside, and to say that value is value, and there is an 
 end of the matter— that it has no degrees. But if we 
 do take this line, we are confronted with the fact that 
 we are constantly compelled, whether on good grounds 
 or on bad, to make some preference of the kind described 
 —to select one value rather than another when the 
 attainment of both is impossible but a choice between 
 them is open to us. 
 
 There are two ways in which the comparative 
 valuation of values may be attempted. One of these is 
 empirical and quantitative. It starts from the assump- 
 tion that each value has a definite quantity of something 
 which we must just call value and which is always the 
 same in kind, so that all values can be measured by 
 the quantity of it which they contain, and so receive a 
 definite position on the one scale of values. This doncL 
 the whole difficulty vanishes ; this said (it seems to be 
 thought), all theoretical difficulties disappear and only 
 practical difficulties remain. The issue is not so plain 
 as this, however. A scale of values of this kind has been 
 worked out on one hypothesis only — the hypothesis 
 that, in the last analysis, positive value belongs to 
 pleasure only and negative value belongs to pain only.. 
 I cannot in this place examine once more the famous 
 hedonic calculus, and must content myself with assuming 
 that it has been unable to justify itself at the bar of 
 criticism. Other suggestions for a quantitative estimate 
 and single scale of values have still to answer the ques- 
 tion as to the nature of the ultimate something called 
 value which in some instances appears as sensuous, in 
 
 4—2 
 
52 
 
 Values 
 
 others as intellectual, in others as moral, m others as 
 artistic, and so on, but which is supposed to maintain an 
 identical nature under these different forms. 
 
 If we are to compare values at all, we must give up 
 the idea of a scale for that of a system. We shall never 
 eetwhat we want by adding and subtracting quantities. 
 Even if a quantitative process of this sort enters into the 
 estimate, it will only be in the same way as mechanical 
 interactions enter into vital mental and socia processes. 
 It will not give us the clue. The clue will have to be 
 soucrht in the idea of a system to which the values belong. 
 Now the subject of values-that is, the conscious person 
 -when he tries to rationalise his life, does attempt also 
 to systematise his values: partly deliberately, partly un- 
 consciously, he gradually forms a dominating conception 
 which determines his conduct and his view of what is 
 of greatest worth. Under this dominam conception, he 
 ^,111 arrange other conceptions contributory to value in 
 his life, and will negative suggestions which interfere 
 with that value. To take an example: gratitude will be 
 approved as a dispositional attitude ; but some particular 
 instance of gratitude may be inconsistent with the whole 
 svstem of social order, so that this particular act of 
 Jratitude (say, perjury for a benefactor s sake) ought not 
 to be done. Throughout we are concerned not so much 
 with a total worth to be got by adding particulars, as 
 with the worth of a totality. 
 
 We are familiar with many dominant conceptions 
 of value which appeal to the judgments of different men. 
 The voluptuary, the artist, the moralist, the sage, the 
 saint has each his own dominant conception of value. 
 A complete theory of value should be able to determine 
 
 The System of Values 53 
 
 the relative validity of these conceptions; and this 
 would involve two things. In the first place it would 
 be necessary to make clear the universal conditions of 
 value which are valid irrespective of the time place and 
 circumstances of the persons in and by whom value is 
 to be realised. In the second place these general prin- 
 ciples should be shown to be consistent with, and to 
 make possible, different types of value corresponding 
 to differences of endowment and opportunity. There is 
 one dominant value for the artist's life, another for the 
 statesman's, another for the philosopher's. Each pursues 
 his own line of life, and his standard differs from the 
 standards of the others. And yet, behind their difference 
 of thought and of achievement, there may bean identity 
 of principle. There is diversity of gifts, but each gift 
 is the earnest of a realised ideal; there is diversity of 
 ideals, but each ideal is worthy; ''wisdom is justified 
 of all her children." All men, in their various ways, 
 may be guided by the same principle, each seeking to 
 make his life perfect by the highest performance in his 
 power. To determine the way in which different ideals 
 are related to one another in a community of lives that 
 seek the highest value is not an initial problem. Rather 
 is it the crowning work of an ethical theory. Yet, short 
 of this, we shall not be able to give a satisfactory solution 
 of the problem of the scale of values. For that problem 
 has been resolved into another— the problem of the 
 organic unity or systematic whole into which all values 
 enter, and by their relation to which the place and 
 degree of all partial values are determined. 
 
Ill 
 
 THE MEANING OF VALUE 
 
 At this point it is necessary to pause and consider an 
 objection that may be taken to the Hne of argument 
 upon which we are entering. We have discriminated 
 the moral judgment and other judgments of value from 
 the positive judgments about matters of fact and re- 
 lations on which science is based, but have we any right 
 to regard the two classes of judgment as of equal and 
 objective validity? May it not be the case that the factor 
 called worth is derived entirely from a subjective source 
 — from the element of feeling or of desire which accom- 
 panies our judgment ? And, if this is so, are not the whole 
 of our value-judgments, and in particular moral judg- 
 ments, without objective validity ? Are they not simply 
 an expression of feelings of pleasure or pain, or perhaps 
 of movements of desire, on the part of the person who 
 makes the judgment? and is their true implication any- 
 thing more than this — ' I am pleased,' or ' I desire'? 
 The objection indicated in these questions takes the form 
 of offering a psychological explanation of the moral con- 
 sciousness, and generally of the consciousness of value ; 
 and this psychological explanation is then held to de- 
 termine the significance of the consciousness. 
 
 The psychological explanation, it will be noticed, 
 takes one or other of two forms. Sometimes it is the 
 
 Psychological Explanations 55 
 
 feeling of pleasure, at other times it is the experience 
 of desire, that is appealed to. The two methods may 
 be reconciled by those who hold that desire is always 
 directed to something pleasant as pleasant. But this 
 latter doctrine must not be assumed, nor has it been 
 uniformly held either by those who reduce the moral 
 consciousness to pleasure-pain or by those who reduce 
 It to desire. And both these views have been frequently 
 held. The former has its most famous representative in 
 Hume who defined virtue (or goodness) as '' whatever 
 mental action or quality gives to the spectator the 
 pleasing sentiment of approbation^ " ; amongst contem- 
 poraries the same doctrine was maintained by Meinong 
 in his early work on the value-judgment^ On the other 
 hand, a century before Hume, we have both Hobbes^ 
 and Spinoza^ asserting that good is just a name which 
 a man gives to whatever is the object of his desire ; and, 
 at the present day, a similar explanation is given by 
 V. Ehrenfels^ in his treatise on the theory of value, as 
 well as by many other writers. 
 
 A full discussion of these views would require a long 
 
 • Enquiry amcerning the Principles of Morals, app. i, ed. Selby- 
 Bigge, p. 289 ; Essays, ed. Green and Grose, vol. ii, p. 261. 
 
 ' Psychologisch-ethische Untersuchungen zur Werth-theorie (i^^), 
 p. 73-^ This passage, he said afterwards (' Ueber Werthaltung und 
 Wert,' Archiv filr systematische Philosophie, vol. i (1895), P- ?>^^\ 
 '' was intended to imply that an object has greater value for me 
 accordmg as the consciousness of its existence excites in me a more 
 lively feeling of pleasure "—a view which he finds on reflexion to 
 disagree with the facts of experience. 
 Leviathan, part i, chap, vi, p. 24. 
 Ethica, iii, 9 schol. 
 ' System der Werttheorie (1897), vol. I, p. 2. 
 
56 
 
 The Meaning of Value 
 
 psychological enquiry, and my purpose is not psycho- 
 logical. Nothing further can be attempted here than 
 to fix attention on one or two salient points specially 
 connected with the ethical implications of the psycho- 
 logical explanations. If we say that the approval of 
 goodness is simply one kind of pleasure, and that both 
 its force and its validity depend on the degree of that 
 pleasure, then our assertion will have a very immediate 
 and radical bearing on ethics. The same will be the 
 case if we assert that good is just the name we give to 
 an object of desire, and that goodness must therefore be 
 measured by the strength of the desire. These assertions 
 would undoubtedly lead to a fundamental modification, 
 or rather to a complete reversal, of ethical values. And, 
 if any writers make them, it will not be unreasonable to 
 say of them, as Hume said of the controversialists who 
 denied the reality of moral distinctions, that they " may 
 be ranked among the disingenuous disputants^" For 
 such assertions would overlook the elementary facts 
 which we have to explain. Even if the primary basis 
 on which moral apprehension depends is a feeling of 
 pleasure, it is discriminated from other feelings of plea- 
 sure. Stolen fruits may be sweet and pleasant in their 
 sweetness; but the pleasure got from them is not a moral 
 pleasure ; the moral fact enters only when the stolen fruit, 
 though sweet and pleasant to the taste, is also a source 
 of conscientious pain ; and it is this moral pain which 
 needs explanation. In the same way all that we desire 
 may be called good by lis ; but the moral judgment is a 
 discrimination between good and bad desires, and it is 
 
 ^ Enquiry concerning the Principles of Morals, sect, i, ed. Selby- 
 Bigge, p. 169; Essays, ed. Green and Grose, vol. 11, p. 169. 
 
 Origin and Validity 57 
 
 this discrimination which we have to account for. It is 
 only a special kind of pleasures, therefore, or pleasures 
 got from .some special source, that can be identified with 
 moral approval. On the other view, it is only certain 
 desires, or desires for certain classes of objects, that can 
 correcdy be called good. 
 
 Both views of the moral consciousness to which 
 I am referring — both the view which explains it by 
 reference to pleasure and that which explains it by 
 reference to desire — must recognise, and, in general, 
 do recognise the fact that calls for explanation. In all 
 moral experience there is something which cannot be 
 simply identified with pleasure or with desire, but con- 
 tains a differentiating factor which makes it moral and 
 not merely pleasant or desired. This recognised, the 
 purpose of the psychological moralists is perfectly legiti- 
 mate. The moral consciousness is a comparatively late 
 expression, if not of human life, yet of life generally; 
 It appears subsequently to pleasure and subsequently to 
 the active or impulsive consciousness. It is legitimate 
 to try to get at an historical understanding of it by con- 
 necting it causally with one or other or both of these 
 antecedent and more primitive experiences. Accord- 
 ingly, the proper purpose of both views is to discover 
 and trace a line of causal connexion ; their success in 
 this attempt is a strictly psychological question ; the 
 bearing of their results upon the significance of the moral 
 consciousness is a further question. It is this further 
 question that interests us ; but, perhaps unfortunately, 
 it cannot be understood properly without reference to 
 the method of procedure adopted for the solution of the 
 psychological problem ; and as two different methods 
 
58 
 
 The Meaning of Value 
 
 for this solution have issued in the objection that has 
 given us pause, it will be necessary to take notice of 
 both these methods. 
 
 Let us take first the mode of explanation which 
 depends upon the pleasure-pain factor in experience. 
 Moral approbation, according to Hume, is a "pleasing 
 sentiment." But not every pleasing sentiment has the 
 function or nature of moral approbation. The diver- 
 gence between pleasant feeling and moral approval is 
 indeed so marked that pleasure is often regarded with 
 suspicion by the moralist, and in matters of moral de- 
 cision which require delicate discrimination, w^e must 
 lend ear to Aristotle's advice' to beware of the side that 
 leans towards pleasure. Moral approbation, therefore, 
 must be a certain kind of pleasing sentiment, or pleasing 
 sentiment derived from a certain source. And this is 
 recognised by Hume. According to him and many 
 others sympathy is the source of this special sentiment. 
 That is to say, not any pleasing sentiment is equivalent 
 to moral approbation, but only the pleasing sentiment 
 due to sympathy. Or rather (since even this is too wide), 
 the pleasing sentiment of sympathy, when sympathy is 
 defined and limited in certain ways which, for present 
 purposes, do not need to be more particularly char- 
 acterised. Sympathy was taken by Hume' to be a 
 sentiment which ''nature has made universal in the 
 whole species," and which did not admit of further de- 
 rivation. Both later and earlier psychological moralists 
 
 ^ Ethics^ book ii, chap, ix, p. 1 109 b 8. 
 
 - Enquiry concerning the Principles of Morals, sect, i and app. i, 
 ed. Selby-Bigge, pp. 173, 286 ; Essays, ed. Green and Grose, vol. n, 
 pp. 172, 259. 
 
 Feeling and Valuation 
 
 ^o 
 
 have parted company with him at this point, and held 
 that we can trace the genesis of the feeling of sympathy 
 by means of the working of mental association. 1 { this 
 latter vif^w be adopted, we shall have to postulate only 
 the more simple and immediate pleasures such as those 
 of the senses, and we shall then be able to trace the way 
 in which, by the working of the ordinary laws of asso- 
 ciation, pleasure comes to be connected with our repre- 
 sentation of the states of mind of others, and sympathy 
 as a 'pleasing sentiment ' arises. I do not propose to 
 examine the correctness of this psychological derivation. 
 But it may be said, in passing, that Hume and Adam 
 Smith showed a true instinct for essentials in laying 
 great stress on sympathy— the emotional side of the 
 social factor— in morality, though I think that they 
 erred in laying exclusive stress upon it. 
 
 Let us assume then the correctness of the historical 
 account of the genesis of this pleasing sentiment of 
 moral approbation. We must now ask the question, 
 What is the validity of this moral approbation or ap- 
 proval .^ How are we to measure or otherwise appraise 
 It > Must we do so simply by going back to its origin '> 
 If so, then we must remember that its origin (according 
 to the more radical psychologists) is simply pleasure"^ 
 indeed, sensuous pleasure. And, if we are presented 
 with an experience in which (as we may put it) sensuous 
 pleasure points one way and the pleasure of moral appro- 
 bation the other way, then all w^e can do is to compare 
 the two pleasures as pleasures, and the only reasonable 
 course would seem to be to give the preference to the 
 stronger or greater, for we have taken away any other 
 standard. If this solution were adopted, moral judgment 
 
6o 
 
 The Meaning of Value 
 
 would not merely be transformed, it would disappear. 
 But this is not the solution adopted by the psychological 
 moralists to whom I have referred. Explicitly or tacitly 
 they give a preference to the pleasing sentiment of 
 approbation, even although the simultaneous and com- 
 peting source of pleasure which points in a different 
 direction may be very much stronger. The preference, 
 accordingly, is not due to the strength of the pleasure 
 accompanying approval (for Hutcheson's view' that the 
 pleasures of the moral sense are the greatest pleasures 
 we have may be set aside as inconsistent with facts) ; 
 it must therefore be due to its source — in this case, 
 sympathy as against egoistic feeling. That is to say, we 
 are assigning validity to, or rather assuming the validity 
 of, the social factor which enters into our moral conscious- 
 ness, when it is opposed by selfish pleasure or interests. 
 If so, the attempt to trace the historical genesis of that 
 factor has had no effect upon its significance for life or 
 upon the validity of our moral judgment. Historically, 
 we suppose that we have traced social feeling back to 
 its origin in egoistic feeling ; but, in our ethical estimate, 
 we do not express the value of the one in terms of the 
 value of the other. 
 
 Perhaps Herbert Spencer may have had this point 
 in view when he placed origin and value in inverse 
 relation to one another by asserting that "the more 
 complex motives and the more involved thoughts have 
 all along been of higher authority " than the relatively 
 primitive and simple tendencies'. His view is certainly 
 
 ^ Essay on the Nature and Conduct of the Passions and Affections 
 (1728), p. xix. 
 
 - H. Spencer, Principles of Ethics, vol. i, p. 106. 
 
 Desire and Valuatioti 
 
 61 
 
 nearer the truth than the opposite preference of the 
 primitive to the developed ; but it assumes too easily 
 that value increases at each step in evolution, and it 
 , makes too prominent certain formal characteristics of 
 the evolutionary process. When the conception of tem- 
 poral advance in the evolutionary process is confused 
 or identified with the conception good or better— as 
 often happens in Spencer— this error is fundamental. 
 It makes time the test of goodness, and thus (though 
 taking an opposite direction) falls into the same mistake 
 as the view which tries to discover value by tmci ng 
 psychological genesis. The latter view seeks to explain 
 value by priority in time; Spencer's doctrine identifies 
 it with the later moments of time. Both overlook the 
 truth that mere time contains no element of value, and 
 that the relation of value to the time-process is a ques- 
 tion for investigation not for assumption. 
 
 When we turn to the view that the appreciation of 
 moral value is a product of desire — that we approve 
 what we desire — the argument must follow similar lines, 
 although this view perhaps goes deeper than the other. 
 According to the former view we approve what pleases 
 us, or the approval is the same thing as the pleasure; 
 according to this view we approve what we desire: 
 approval does not bring desire after it, but on the con- 
 trary, desire determines approval or is the same thing 
 as approval. This theory lays stress on the active 
 'process of life as the fundamental factor in man's 
 consciousness; and, in this, it is distinguished from 
 the preceding theory which emphasises the passive 
 feeling of pleasure. But the two theories are alike in 
 
62 
 
 The Meaning of Value 
 
 trying to explain moral approval by resolving it into 
 something else; and their methods in large measure 
 correspond. Just as we saw that, if to approve means 
 simply to be pleased, moral distinctions will disappear 
 or be transformed, because morality requires discrimi- 
 nation between things that please, so if good means 
 simply what we desire, then, equally, the concept be- 
 comes otiose or must change its meaning: the problem 
 is not touched regarding the approval of one desire 
 (not always the strongest desire) and the disapproval 
 of others. 
 
 But those thinkers who derive approval from desire 
 seldom rest in this conclusion. They attempt to dis- 
 criminate between desires, and to make a psychological 
 account of the development and systematisation of 
 desires serve the purpose of this discrimination. From 
 this discrimination, in some way or other, the moral 
 approval of one desire and the moral disapproval ot 
 another come into being. Here, again, the psycho- 
 logical problem is legitimate; and there can be no 
 question that the moral approval which discriminates 
 between desires is a later product in consciousness than 
 desire itself. We may say that desire is antecedent, 
 morality consequent. But it does not follow that the 
 moral factor can be accounted for by the factor of desire ; 
 still less does it follow that the latter is the measure of 
 the significance or validity of the former. 
 
 There are factors in the inherited constitution, 
 factors of the nature of instinct, which predetermine 
 the strength and order of the impulses before the 
 appearance of the ideal factor which transforms impulse 
 into desire. A certain though limited measure of order 
 
 The Vahiation of Desires 
 
 63 
 
 is thus to be expected in the life of desire even indepen- 
 dently of morality ; the desires tend to be directed to 
 certain objects or classes of objects, and they vary in 
 strengtii. Reflecting upon them we may group them 
 in certain ways. We may distinguish, for instance, 
 transient desires for objects from those which are con- 
 nected with the permanent needs of life, and among 
 the latter we may distinguish those which are mainly 
 egoistic in their interest from those whose interest is 
 mainly racial or social. But how are we to assess 
 their relative values.^ The strength of the desire 
 cannot supply the place of a standard; for, indeed, 
 strength and value are often opposed: the sensuous 
 interest overpowers the spiritual, the immediate the 
 permanent, the selfish the social. The utility of iiiuial 
 ideas (if the phrase may be allowed) consists in this 
 that they introduce a new standard, a standard of value, 
 by which the standard of strength may be regulated 
 and controlled. They give a preference, as we may put 
 it, to certain desires over others : to the permanent 
 over the transient, to the social over the selfish, to the 
 spiritual over the sensual. The grounds of this prefer- 
 ence are not got out of the mere fact of desire as a 
 conscious active tendency varying in strength. If we 
 say they are to be got out of the different objects to 
 which the desires are directed, then we assign higher 
 value to one object than to another, and our moral judg- 
 ment consists in thus assigning value to the different 
 objects of desire. It is not got out of the desires 
 themselves, but is an appreciation of desire founded 
 upon objective discrimination. 
 
 As in the case of pleasure, so in the case of desire, 
 
64 
 
 ■ The Meaning of Value 
 
 tracing its genesis and development does not determine 
 its validity. This determination, it may be added, 
 becomes prominent in consciousness only by gradual 
 stages ; and it is only because every stage in the pro- 
 cess of growth is small that it has been possible for some 
 moral psychologists to overlook each small advance 
 and to imagine that the whole facts of the mature moral 
 consciousness can be accounted for by their origin. The 
 limits of this method are made clear when we put the 
 question, Why do we assign validity to our moral ap- 
 proval and to moral ideas generally ? To this question 
 the history of their genesis gives no answer. 
 
 The method of psychological enquiry is miscon- 
 ceived and its results are misinterpreted when these 
 are allowed to take the place of an independent investi- 
 gation of value. The experience and judgment of value 
 are undoubtedly mental facts, and psychology may trace 
 their rise and history ; but it does not touch the ques- 
 tion of their validity, any more than the validity of 
 mathematical judgments is affected by the history of 
 their formation. 
 
 Another consideration, however, of a different kind 
 is sometimes regarded as putting ethical enquiry in the 
 strict sense out of court, or as being itself the proper 
 substitute for ancient methods of ethics. This considera- 
 tion is derived not from the psychical history of moral 
 judgments but from their social conditions. The moral 
 consciousness, it is held, is simply a reflexion of the 
 social order, or at least in origin it was so ; and its 
 peculiarities are due to its origin. From this view also 
 there may be derived an objection at the threshold to 
 
 The Social Origin of Morality 65 
 
 the validity of the judgment of value, though it is 
 an objection of another kind than the preceding. It 
 does not resolve value or approval into psychical ele- 
 ments of a different and better known order, !>i,t It 
 traces them to the influence on consciousne.ss of the 
 social environmeiu which controls and directs the 
 mdividual. Value-judgments, it is held, are only an 
 expression of what happens or of what is required 
 socially. 
 
 The facts upon which this view depends are con 
 nected with the varying moral codes which distinguish 
 different tunes and circumstances and difibrent races 
 and they offer an explanation of this variety. Within 
 a given community there is much greater uniformity of 
 moral opinion than there is between one community 
 and another ; and the nearer we go back to primitive 
 and simple forms of social organisation, the greater is 
 the degree of moral uniformity within them, and often 
 at the same time, the more .striking are the moral dif- 
 ferences between one community and another. Each 
 community has its customary code, and the custom of 
 the early tribe contains everything which we now dis- 
 tinguish as law, morality, and custom. There is no 
 law and no morality beyond the custom of the tribe • 
 Its members have no private consciences or indepen- 
 dent rules of right, and nonconformity is unknown or 
 promptly suppressed. The custom of the tribe is ac 
 cordingly. the earliest rule of right, the original moral 
 code ; the members of the tribe feel bound to conform 
 to this custom : if they did not conform, their tribal and 
 therewith their individual existence would be imperilled 
 and they would cease to count as factors in the tribal 
 
 S. G, L. 
 
66 
 
 The Meaning of Value 
 
 consciousness. The judgment of approval or disap- 
 proval, which distinguishes the modern conscience, is 
 a slow development from this implicit acknowledgement 
 of the authority of the tribe. 
 
 In recrard to this question a distinction has to be 
 drawn similar to the distinction already drawn regard- 
 ing the inferences which have been made from the 
 psychological analysis of the moral judgment. We 
 have to ask the question, what general conclusions are 
 estabhshed with greater or less probabiHty regarding 
 the social nature of the moral judgment, and then we 
 have to apply the answer to the very different question 
 of the significance of that judgment. Now, it has been 
 established, with a fair degree of probability, as a uni- 
 versal characteristic of human society, that groups ot 
 men everywhere are in the way of distinguishing be- 
 tween right and wrong, and that, in early societies, the 
 thino-s they call right are identical with the customary 
 actions of the community, the things they call wrong 
 beino- in conflict with these customary actions. That is 
 to say, the content of morality, for men at the early or 
 tribal stage of development, is identical with the con- 
 tent of tribal custom. But there remains an important 
 difference which may be described as a difference of 
 form. The custom of acting in a given way, which is 
 displayed by members of the tribe generally. Is one 
 thing, and not the same thing as the recognition on the 
 part of any individual that that way of acting is a rule 
 binding upon himself. Customary action is performed 
 by the individual even when impulse or desire points in 
 another direction ; and this performance is possible only 
 because the custom of the tribe is recognised as a rule 
 
 Morality and Convention 
 
 67 
 
 binding upon him. This is the beginning of the con- 
 sciousness of moral obligation. The obligation belongs 
 m the first instance only to the content of custom ; but 
 it has potential application of a wider kind. If it had 
 not, moral progress would have been impossible ; there 
 would never have been any morality distinct from cus- 
 tom. It is because men have looked upon custom as 
 binding that they can proceed to criticise it and come to 
 think of a different standard for morality. The theory 
 that morality consists in nothing more than conforming 
 to the social order, or maintaining the social equilibrium^ 
 or promoting social vitality, receives no suppoi i from 
 the historical view that, for the conscience of the early 
 or savage tribesman, morality and social custom had the 
 same content. 
 
 It is, moreover, surprising to find the theory that 
 reduces morality to sociality combined, as it often is, 
 with a practical protest against the conventional morality 
 of the ordinary man of the present day. For conven- 
 tional morality simply means the morality of ordinary 
 opinion, which is in close accordance with prevailing 
 practice. The morality of primitive man was strictly 
 conventional ; the morality of civilised men Is often 
 conventional in a less strict sense (there being always 
 some recognition of the difference between opinion and 
 practice) ; and conventional morality may be used as a 
 term of reproach just because the moral opinion of men 
 is no longer restricted to opinions that are exclusively 
 social in their origin. But the form of moralit) which 
 is most purely conventional Is that In which It Is merely 
 social ; In objecting to any moral doctrine on the ground 
 that It is conventional, the objector admits by implication 
 

 68 
 
 The Meaning of Value 
 
 that the social basis of morality is inadequate and that 
 it stands in need of reflective criticism. 
 
 Morality is not something that has descended out 
 of heaven in perfect and final form. Like everything 
 else that exists it is a development, the successive stages 
 of which admit of being traced historically. By morality 
 We mean the conduct character and ideas of men in 
 their relation to goodness ; and these have grown in 
 precision and in system with the growth of the human 
 mind and the changes of its environment. If a man or 
 a race of men have thought that something is good, 
 then it is a truth— an eternal truth — that they so 
 thought ; but it is not therefore an eternal truth, or 
 true at all, that the thing they thought good was good 
 either then or at any time — only that it seemed so to 
 them. The same holds of other values. Men have' 
 thought certain things beautiful ; and that they so 
 admired them or held them as beautiful is true, though 
 their appreciation may have been defective, and it does 
 not follow that what thev admired as beautiful was 
 really beautiful. At each stage of historical develop- 
 ment, the meaning of the moral judgment is * this is 
 good,' and the meaning of the aesthetic judgment is * this 
 is beautiful.' This meaning may, indeed, be mistaken 
 or erroneous in any given case. But the assumption of 
 the value-judgment is always that there is a value which 
 may be predicated of this or the other situation. And 
 the sio^nificance of the historical evolution of moral 
 opinion depends on this assumption. Were the assump- 
 tion invalid then the proposition ' this is good ' could 
 never be either true or false. It would only express 
 
 The Falidify of the Moral Judgment 69 
 
 some peculiar state of mind of the person making the 
 assertion and would have no possible validity in itself 
 -would be, indeed, simply an emotion put by mistake 
 mto the form of a proposition '. 
 
 As a fact of the mental life, the moral idea makes its 
 appearance in the midst of emotional and impulsive 
 experiences : but it is not itself either a feeling or a 
 stnvmg. Rather it is a selective principle which func- 
 tions as a guide to striving and which may determine as 
 well as be determined by feeling. Feeling and striving 
 are indeed anterior to moral ideas and moral judgment • 
 and the moral order in the mind of man, being later in 
 time, may be described as having arisen out of mental 
 phenomena which were as yet non-moral. In exacdy 
 the same way there were sensation -factors in conscious- 
 ness before there were any judgments of perception- 
 anything that can be called knowledge ; and, as sensation 
 is in this way prior to knowledge, it is possible to hold 
 with the empirical philosophers that knowledge arises 
 out of, or even is derived from, sensation [-he mode 
 of transition from sensation to judgment is a problem 
 for the psychologist; but, whatever solution may be 
 found for this problem, the fact remains that, once we 
 have a judgment, we have before us a question which 
 concerns not the sensations of a subject but the nature 
 of an object. Simiiariy, whatever be the mode of tran- 
 sition from feeling and striving to the moral judgment, 
 once the transition is made we are no longer concerned 
 with subjective emotions but with the validity of the 
 assertion that this or that is good. 
 
 ' As Westennarck thinks, Origin and Development of the Moral 
 Ideas, vol. l, p. i;. 
 
70 
 
 The Meaning of Vahie 
 
 Morality begins with judgments about good and 
 evil, right and wrong, and not simply with emotions — 
 retributive, parental, sympathetic, or what not. Always 
 there are moral judgments as well as moral emotions 
 wherever men are found. What lies behind or before 
 these judgments is matter of speculative, though per- 
 fectly legitimate, hypothesis only. The moral judgment 
 is, in this respect, on the same level as the positive 
 judgment of experience. We may enquire into the psy- 
 chological antecedents of the process of judging. But 
 if we may assume that judgments are either true or 
 false — ^and this assumption is necessary in all scientific 
 enquiry — then the antecedents of the moral judgment 
 do not invalidate its claim to truth anv more than the 
 antecedents of judgments of experience invalidate the 
 same claim on their part. 
 
 Reflexions of the same kind apply to the assertion 
 of the social origin of morality. Habits and a certain 
 order in social conduct are anterior to the moral order, 
 as may be seen from the behaviour and grouping of 
 animals; and the moral order which expresses moral 
 ideas, being later in the time of its appearance, may be 
 described as having arisen out of a non-moral and merely 
 biological order. Biit it does not follow from this that 
 the moral order is merely a more complex stage of the 
 biological ; for it expresses ideas which are foreign to 
 the latter. Morality is related to society much in the 
 same way as science is. If morality is a social product 
 so also is science ; and this feature does not affect the 
 validity of the one any more than it affects the validity 
 of the other. The grounds for the assertion are the 
 same in the two cases. When we say that morality is a 
 
 Morality as a Social Product 
 
 71 
 
 social product we mean, first and chiefly, that the indi- 
 vidual mind left to itself would not have risen to the 
 conception of moral good and evil. But the reason of 
 this limitation does not lie in anything peculiar to the 
 content of good and evil. It is not simply because good 
 and evil are social factors that the limitation holds true. 
 Even if we abstracted altogether from the social content 
 of morality something would remain; something does 
 remain for the ordinary moral consciousness in the 
 relative values of different personal desires or volitional 
 systems. The individual is a system within himself, and 
 the competition and cooperation of his own volitional 
 tendencies provide material for the systematisation of 
 character, for preference of one tendency to another, 
 for moral judgment therefore. Accordingly, were man 
 conceivable as a solitary being, he would in his own life 
 provide the material and opportunity for moral judgment, 
 although, as a matter of fact, he might be incapable of 
 making such judgments. There would remain some- 
 thing, not to be identified with the social life, as the 
 content of moralitv. 
 
 It is not therefore simply owing to its predominantly 
 social content that morality would be impossible for the 
 mere individual. It is rather because the mere indi- 
 vidual would not possess the intellectual characteristics 
 of a self-conscious person. His consciousness of self 
 has been developed and defined only in connexion with 
 his consciousness of other selves ; apart from this social 
 consciousness he would not think of himself as a person 
 — he would have no consciousness of self His ex- 
 perience generally owes its precision and importance 
 to the fact that it can be shared by other observers, and 
 
72 The Meaning of Value 
 
 his truths are recognised as valid because they appeal 
 to others in the same way as to himself. Further, the 
 language in which he expresses his judgments and by 
 means of which he has been able to rise to conceptual 
 knowledge is a social formation, received by him from 
 the social environment and the historical traditions into 
 which he has entered. Apart from all these social influ- 
 ences, the theoretical knowledge of the individual could 
 be as scanty, or rather as non-existent, as his knowledge 
 of morality. 
 
 We cannot, therefore, make the social, any more 
 than the psychical, origin of morality an objection to 
 its validity, unless we are prepared at the same time to 
 allow that the social origin of science is an objection 
 to its validity. The exact sense in which moral judg- 
 ments have objective validity, and their relation in this 
 respect to scientific propositions, is a question that re- 
 mains to be discussed. For the moment it is sufficient 
 to have obviated the objection taken at the threshold 
 to the objectivity of value on the ground of the psycho- 
 logical or historical origin of the judgments of value or 
 because human intercourse is a necessary condition of 
 their formation. 
 
 So far we have been occupied in defending the 
 objective character of judgments of value. Their mean- 
 ing is not that the subject desires a certain object or is 
 pleased with it, any more than the judgment of sense- 
 perception means that he has certain sensations. It is 
 possible that it may be by means of conative or affective 
 experience that we arrive at a judgment of value, just as 
 experience in the way of sensation leads to the judgment 
 
 Value as Relative to the Subject 73 
 
 of sense-perception. But in neither case does the 
 ongm constitute the meaning of the judgment I, ^^,^ 
 cases there is a reference to something beyond the 
 mental state of the subject-to a value which he appre- 
 ciates or to an object which he perceives. The argument 
 has been restricted to the typical case of the moral 
 judgment for it is with morality that we shall be mainly 
 concerned in the sequel, and it is unnecessary to extend 
 the discussion to the other classes of judgments of 
 value. ^ 
 
 The defence of its objectivity brings the appreciation 
 of worth or value into touch with that description of 
 the relations and qualities of things which is given 
 by scientific judgments. And the question accordingly 
 arises whether there is. after all, any fundan.ental 
 distinction between the attitudes of appreciation and 
 description, and whether the judgment of value is not 
 simply the recognition of a relation between existing 
 things, with which science is not concerned, or of an 
 additional quality which they may possess. The view 
 which has been examined in the preceding paragraphs 
 IS indeed one way-and perhaps the most thorough- 
 going way-of identifying the judgment of ^-^hK• win, 
 a judgment of existence, or of reducing ' ought ' to ' is ' 
 On that view the value predicated in the judgment not 
 only arises out of, but can be reduced to, the mode of 
 valuation ; it consists in the relation which some content 
 presented to a subject has to that subject's sensibility 
 thus producing pleasure, or to some desire or system of 
 conative tendencies of the subject, to which it promises 
 satisfaction. That view, accordingly, would explain value 
 as a relation to the subject ; but it has already been show,, 
 
74 The Meanmg of Value 
 
 to be founded upon a confusion between the process by 
 means of which we become aware of value and the value 
 itself of which we become aware. 
 
 Different features are presented by the type of view 
 which explains the meaning of value by resolving it into 
 some kind of objective relation of things. Explanations 
 of this sort are familiar. For instance, we may approve 
 a certain distribution of wealth between the persons 
 engaged in its production, and give as a reason for our 
 approval that the distribution is fair or that it realises 
 justice ; we may say that its, value 'consists just in this 
 fairness or justice, and we may at the same time identify 
 this fairness or justice with a certain objective relation 
 between labour expended and remuneration received. 
 Or asrain, we mav admire a work of art, and hold that 
 its value consists in its beauty and that this beauty can 
 be analysed into certain relations between its component 
 parts. Thus, in these and other cases, the value may 
 appear to consist in relations which actually hold of 
 certain objects. But it does so only because we identify 
 value with the object valued. We would not approve 
 the oriven economic distribution were it not for the 
 fairness of it or those relations in which that fairness 
 consists ; we would not admire the work of art were it 
 not for the harmony it displays or the relations in which 
 that harmony consists. So far the analysis is correct. 
 But the appeal to objective relations only shows that 
 they are the ground of our attributing value to the 
 object; not that they are themselves this value. Justice 
 or fairness may consist in certain objective relations; 
 but the value ascribed to justice is an added predicate 
 over and above these relations. Harmony in the same 
 
 Value as a Quality of ati Object 75 
 
 way may consist in certain objective relations of colour 
 or of tone ; but the value of harmonv does not consist 
 in these relations ; it is a further predicate which charac- 
 terises their presence. 
 
 Seeing that value cannot be reduced to a relation 
 between objects shall we then say that it is a quality of 
 an object much in the same way as its shape and colour 
 are qualities of a material thino- ? We cei'tainlv use the 
 same forms of speech in both cases. We speak of a 
 good man or a beautiful statue just as we do of a yellow 
 orange ; and we say the man is good or the statue is 
 beautiful as we say the orange is yellow and round. 
 The mode of predication is the same ; but there is at 
 least ^ prima facie difference in the way in which good- 
 ness or value belongs to an object from the inherence 
 in a substance of the qualities which are held to make 
 up its nature. The difference has sometimes been re- 
 garded as a difference of level — if we may call it so. 
 As the qualities of matter have been distinguished into 
 primary and secondary, it has been suggested that value 
 is a third kind of quality which may be called a tertiary 
 quality. Now, the objects to which the distinction of 
 primary and secondary applies are all of them material 
 things, that is, they are objects to which intrinsic 
 value can scarcely be attributed ; consequendy, to talk 
 of value as a tertiary quality does little more than set 
 value vaguely apart from what we ordinarily call quali- 
 ties. Further, when the distinction between primary 
 and secondary qualities is regarded as of fundamental 
 validity, it is held to consist in this that the secondary 
 qualities are due to the subjective affection of the per- 
 cipient and are not constitutive of the nature of the 
 
76 
 
 The Meaning of Value 
 
 thing at all : the primary qualities alone are said to 
 be truly qualities of the objectively existing thing 
 and the secondary to be simply mental effects caused 
 by some modification of the primary qualities. If the 
 tertiary qualities were to be defined in accordance with 
 this view, then we should expect them to be one degree 
 further removed from the nature of the object. Like 
 the secondary qualities they would be results which that 
 nature produces in something else, to wit, the mind which 
 appreciates them. They would resemble the secondary 
 qualities in their subjectivity, that is, be mental effects, 
 only a degree more subjectified. And this would lead 
 us back to the subjective explanation of value, which 
 has been already examined and rejected. 
 
 Value is predicated of an object by means of the 
 same verbal form as a quality is predicated ; but there 
 seems to be a difference in the mode of predication 
 which is not brought out by the verbal expression. 
 Qualities may belong not only to existing objects but 
 also to objects which are not conceived as existing, and 
 without any reference to their possible existence. Thus 
 w^e may say that the equilateral triangle has the quality 
 (or property) of being equiangular, just as a particular 
 orange may have the quality yellow ; and in the former 
 case we do not need to refer to any existing triangle, 
 or to a triangle on the hypothesis of its existence. 
 The property belongs to the essence of the equilateral 
 triangle, or follows from its definition, without regard 
 to the consideration whether an equilateral triangle, or 
 any triangle, exists or can exist. But it is not so when 
 goodness or value is predicated. When we say love is 
 good or has value, we mean that love is w^orth existing 
 
 
 Vahte and Qnality nn 
 
 as a living fact ; when we say that a just social order is 
 good, we mean that such a constitution is worth exist- 
 ing or that a social order ought to be constituted in 
 accordance with justice. We are not engaged simply 
 in showing what the concept love or justice implies. 
 The mere concept unless realised in fact is neither good 
 nor evil : it is only as so realised, or on the assumption 
 of Its realisation, that it is called either. Thus when we 
 predicate value of anything, we pass from the mere 
 concept or essence of the thing, with its qualities, to a 
 bearing which this essence has upon existence : it is 
 worth existing or ought to be\ 
 
 Hence, if we are still inclined to speak of value or 
 goodness as a quality of the object to which we ascribe 
 it, we must allow that it is a quality of a quite peculiar 
 kmd. "The heavens," says Meinong^', "are called 
 beautiful in no other sense than that in which they are 
 called blue." He admits one difference, however, in 
 that the experience {Er/ednzs) in the former case is not 
 merely a process of apprehending an object. And this 
 difference goes deeper than he allows. We are not 
 siniply apprehending an object when we predicate value 
 of it ; our predicate, therefore, cannot signify merely a 
 quality of the object, for in that case it would be nothing 
 more than a way of apprehending the object. When 
 we say 'the sky is beautiful' or 'the man is good,' 
 meaning by that an assertion of the worth of the beau- 
 tiful sky or good man, our judgment of value is indeed 
 based upon an apprehension of qualities— the colours of 
 
 ^ Cp. V)rh^x\, Journal of Philosophy, vol. xiii (1916), pp. 449 ff. 
 " ' ' Fur die Psychologie und gegen den Psychologismus in der 
 allgemeinen Werttheorie,' Logos, 111 (1912), p. 11. 
 
78 
 
 The Meaning of Value 
 
 the sky or the voHtlonal attitude of the man. But it is 
 not merely the assertion of these quahties or of another 
 quahty in addition. When we predicate worth or value 
 we assert or imply that the object is worth being or 
 ought to be ; and this is fully recognised by Meinong. 
 But, if this predicate were simply a quality constituting 
 the nature of the object, then the assertion that the 
 object ought to be as it is would be a tautology, as 
 Croce holds the assertion of positive value to be\ Or 
 again, when we call an object bad or ugly we assert or 
 imply that it ought not to be as it is ; and if its negative 
 value were simply one of its constitutive qualities, this 
 assertion would be a logical contradiction, as Croce 
 holds is always the case with the negative value-judg- 
 ment". 
 
 The qualities of an object differ from the value- 
 predicate in this respect that they may belong either 
 to an existing thing or to something which does not 
 exist although it in some sense is, but in either case 
 they have no special bearing upon the existence of the 
 thing of which they are predicated. With value it is 
 not so ; it has a definite bearing upon existence, and 
 can always be stated so as to bring out this reference : 
 the thing is worth existing, or ought to be, or to be m 
 such-and-such a manner. And at the same time, this 
 form distinguishes it from the descriptive propositions 
 of natural science. It cannot be put into words without 
 the unique notion indicated by ' worth ' or ' ought ' or 
 some similar phrase. Value is not reduced to an 
 
 1 ' Ueber die sogenannten Werturteile/ Logos, i (1910-1 1), p. 73. 
 - Ibid., p. 72. Cp. \3xhdja. Journal of Philosophy, xni (1916), 
 
 p. 686. 
 
 Value and Existence 
 
 79 
 
 existential proposition ; but the notion of value always 
 Implies a relation to existence— though a relation to 
 which the natural sciences are indifferent. This 
 Istential reference calls for further discussion. 
 
 ex- 
 
^ 
 
 Valuation and Iniplication 
 
 8i 
 
 \^ 
 
 THE CRITERIA OE MORAL VALUE 
 
 Certain points have been made clear in the preceding 
 discussion: the persistence of value-judgments in our 
 experience; the prominence among these of the moral 
 judgment or appreciation of good and evil; and the irre- 
 ducible significance of these judgments. Their meaning 
 is not explained by searching for their causes in the 
 phenomena of emotion or of desire or in the history of 
 society. The nature and significance of these judg- 
 ments, and of the moral judgment in particular, require 
 some further elucidation. 
 
 The moral judgment is not exhaustive as regards 
 the things concerning which it is passed. The same 
 things may be also the subjects of non-moral or positive 
 judgments. We may say that pleasure or knowledge 
 or justice or love is good; but, in so saying, we allow 
 that these same things may be, and indeed always are, 
 appropriate subjects for judgments of a different kind, 
 which form the basis of the positive sciences. Any- 
 thing which we approve or disapprove morally may 
 also have its causes traced, its structure analysed, and 
 in general its relations to other things investigated. 
 The same holds of other value-judgments. Whatever 
 is valued must have qualities which can be examined 
 scientifically and about which causal and other assertions 
 
 . 
 
 
 can be made, just as, on the other hand, when we have 
 discovered all that can be discovered about the causes 
 of things, the question of their value still remains. The 
 two orders of proposition are concerned with the same 
 subjects, and differ only in their predicates. It is the 
 predicate which brings out the characteristic difference 
 of moral approval or aesthetic admiration as distin- 
 guished from scientific generalisation. 
 
 But, as we have seen, value is not separated from 
 existence. It is even more closely connected with it 
 than certain departments of positive science. These 
 may deal solely with the relation of concepts — or of 
 things which, to use an old term, now once more in 
 common use, subsist only and do not exist. All relations 
 of logical implication are of this order. Thus if I say 
 that the equilateral triangle is equiangular I do not mean 
 that those actually existing three-sided figures whose 
 sides are exactly equal will also enclose equal angles, 
 or that when and if anyone succeeds in constructing a 
 figure with its three sides equal it will also have its three 
 angles equal. These truths follow from my statement ; 
 but the statement itself is not about existing things, but 
 about the relation of concepts or mere subsistents. 
 The assertion is that the concept equilateral triangle 
 implies the concept equiangular triangle — whether such 
 a thing as an equilateral triangle have any existence 
 or not. Can we say the same of ethical propositions ? 
 If the proposition is 'pleasure is good,' or 'knowledge 
 is good,' or Move is good,' is the assertion about the 
 implication of concepts ? Do I mean that the concept 
 pleasure — though pleasure were never experienced by 
 any sentient being — is good ? or that the mere concept 
 
 S. G. L. 6 
 
82 
 
 The Criteria of Moral Value 
 
 knowledge is good, although knowledge had no ex- 
 istence, and no one ever knew anything? Or that love 
 is good, meaning by love simply a concept which has 
 what is called being or subsistence, but does not exist 
 at all, and is not manifested in the emotions or character 
 of living beings ? 
 
 If we think of answering these questions in the 
 affirmative, we have only to realise our meaning to 
 see grounds for hesitation. Consider, for instance, the 
 simplest of them all — pleasure; and let us assume for 
 the moment that pleasant experience is good. But what 
 is meant by saying that pleasure is good .^ It may be 
 a perfectly legitimate general expression for the good- 
 ness that belongs to any and every actual experience of 
 pleasure. But then it refers to actual experiences, and 
 their goodness is not now in question. The question 
 is this : apart from any actual or possible pleasant 
 experience, would pleasure — the bare concept or sub- 
 sistent pleasure— be good .^ To this the answer must 
 be that the mere concept pleasure is neither good nor 
 evil : and the same must be said of love or knowledge 
 or anything else, if used to signify merely a concept 
 and not an existing thing or experience. 
 
 When we predicate goodness or other value, it is 
 always predicated upon the assumption or under the 
 hypothesis of existence. The existence need not be 
 actual or present; but it is only as existing — or if it 
 exists — that the thing is held to be good. ' It would be 
 good for us to be there ' is as fair an example of a moral 
 judgment as ' it is good for us to be here.' But it has 
 also as plain a reference to existence. Only, in the 
 latter case existence is given as actual ; in the former 
 
 The Assumption of Existence 83 
 
 it is merely postulated as possible. When Kant said 
 that there is nothing good without qualification except 
 a good will, and at the same time admitted that perhaps 
 a truly good will had never existed in human history, 
 he yet postulated the good will as a possible existent 
 whose existence, if actualised, would be good. It was 
 to the good will conceived as actual that he attributed 
 goodness, while he also recognised that there mioht be 
 nothing in existence which could thus be called good 
 without qualification. Without the postulate of exist- 
 ence, expressed or implied, actual or hypothetical, the 
 attribution of goodness or of any value would be out of 
 place. This existence need not be asserted ; we do not 
 need to believe in the actual existence of the object, but 
 we must contemplate it as existing. There need not 
 be a judgment, but there must be an assumption^ (as it 
 has been called) of its existence. This assumption may 
 
 1 Ann 
 
 When I pass the judgment ^4 is B ' or ' A is not B,' two factors 
 are included in my mental process : first, the mere positing of the 
 proposition, and secondly, the belief in the statement as true. But 
 propositions may be posited without being believed, and a term is 
 required to describe this attitude. For this purpose Meinong has 
 introduced the term Anuahme, which is commonly translated 'assump- 
 tion.' Assumption occupies a place intermediate between presentation 
 and judgment (Meinong, Ueber Amia/i?nen, 2nd edit., p. 6), but its 
 expression, like the expression of a judgment, is a proposition. The 
 Erlebnis or mental process in assuming will vary according to the 
 purpose in view. The enquirer may formulate a hypothesis of which 
 he is almost convinced and proceed to test it by experiment : this 
 hypothesis is an assumption. Or he may state a hypothesis which he 
 means to dispute, and draw out its consequences till he has completed 
 a reductio ad absur'dum : this hypothesis also is an assumption. An 
 intermediate case is where there is little or no conviction or expecta- 
 tion as to where the truth lies, but each logically possible hypothesis 
 
 6—2 
 
84 
 
 The Criteria of Moral Value 
 
 take various forms. It may be a mere presumption and 
 the question of actual or only possible existence may 
 not even be raised, as when we say ' the punctual per- 
 formance of duty ' is good, without considering" and 
 without needing to consider whether punctual perform- 
 ance of duty is an actual occurrence, or something 
 approximately realised only, or something merely sup- 
 posed to exist. On the other hand, existence may be 
 taken as given, as when we ascribe goodness to some 
 concrete situation or actual person ; and in this case 
 we have an implicit judgment rather than what is 
 
 is formulated in turn and tested with a view to eliciting its truth or false- 
 hood : all these hypotheses are assumptions. Or the encjuirer's interest 
 may lie altogether outside of the question of the truth of the propo- 
 sition. The mathematician, for instance, may work out a system of 
 transcendental geometry on the assumption that space has more than 
 three dimensions, without caring whether it has or can have, and with- 
 out even raising the question. Similarly, imaginative statements, such 
 as the record of incidents in a novel, are assumptions — unless for the 
 author who has persuaded himself of their truth or for the reader who 
 believes them. Assumptions may however lead to judgments. Thus 
 the assumption of /^-dimensional space leads to new systems of propo- 
 sitions : though these propositions themselves need not necessarily 
 be believed — only their implication by the preliminary assumption. 
 Similarly with the work of imagination: the author believes that, 
 assuming the existence of his characters, he has described their 
 actions — not what they actually did, for there were no such persons, 
 but what they would have done had they existed. 
 
 Both the judgment and the assumption are expressed by the pro- 
 position ; but it is possible for there tp be no explicit proposition, and 
 yet for a propositional relation, or an 'objective,' to be taken for 
 granted. Thus Prof. Urban distinguishes from both assumption and 
 judgment the ''primary M\\^\^\.wxh^di presumption of reality" which is, 
 he holds, the essential condition of any appreciation of worth ( Valua- 
 tion^ p. 43). 
 
 i 
 
 The Assmnption of Existence 85 
 
 technically called an assumption. Or the assumption 
 may be definitely formulated without one's committing 
 oneself to belief in it. This assumption is a hypothesis 
 on which we proceed— whether we are going to test it 
 by drawmg out its conclusions, or whether our interest 
 lies outside the truth of the assumption. Thus, when 
 we say perfection is good, or a painless life would be 
 good, or a sinless life would be good, we do not a.ssert 
 that, and do not need to enquire whether, the thing we 
 call good actually exists : what we mean is that it would 
 be good if ,t existed. Accordingly, the existence implied 
 concerning the subject of the value-judgment need not 
 be asserted or believed, but it must at least be assumed 
 Apart from its claim upon existence in some such way 
 nothing is either good or evil. This conclusion points 
 to another result of some importance. Ethics is dis- 
 tmguished from the natural sciences by the fact that 
 Its propositions are value-propositions and not causal 
 propositions : it predicates value, not causation ; and 
 It IS further distinguished from mathematics (and 
 abstract science generally) because its main propo- 
 sitions' are not concerned with the logical implication 
 of concepts. It does not predicate causation, and 
 Its propositions are therefore unlike those of natural 
 science. They assume the existence of their subject, ' 
 
 ' By its main propositions I mean those in which 'good ' or some 
 similar notion is predicated. Other ethical propositions may be con- 
 cerned with the implications of concepts, such as ' where there is no 
 property there is no injustice' and 'no government allows absolute 
 •berty. It was reflexion on propositions of the latter kind alone that 
 led Locke to think it possible to '■ place morality amongst the sciences 
 capable of demonstration " {Essay, book iv, chap, iii, § i8) 
 
86 
 
 The Criteria of Moral Value 
 
 and this marks the difference between ethics and 
 mathematics. 
 
 The moral consciousness is thus one aspect of the 
 consciousness of existing reahty or of something con- 
 templated as existing. In order to be good, or for that 
 matter in order to be evil, a thing must first of all exist. 
 But on the other hand the ground of its goodness lies 
 in something else than its mere existence. Existence 
 of itself does not imply goodness nor does it imply evil. 
 If a reason can be found for saying that a thing is good, 
 then this reason must lie in some quality or relation of 
 the thing; it cannot be due to its mere existence, for 
 otherwise the distinction between good and evil would 
 disappear. The moral order cuts across the actual order 
 of existence as presented in sense-perception and de- 
 scribed by science. Two things therefore hold of the 
 subject of the moral judgment. It must exist or be 
 assumed as existing. But it is called good not merely 
 because it exists, but in virtue of some quality or com- 
 bination of qualities which distinguish it, or some relation 
 in which it stands to other things. Yet these qualities 
 or relations w^ould not be called good unless postulated 
 as existing. The predicate good therefore divides exist- 
 ence (real or possible) into two classes : the things to 
 which this predicate applies and the things to which it 
 
 does not apply. 
 
 So far accordingly, that is, from the examination 
 of the moral consciousness, no support is given to 
 either of two opposed doctrines which are common in 
 metaphysical ethics. One of these doctrines equates 
 goodness with reality; but when reality is used as 
 synonymous with or as implying existence, this doctrine 
 
 The Unreal as Non-moral 
 
 87 
 
 i 
 
 IS faced by the fact that the moral consciousness dis- 
 tinguishes some existing things as good and others as 
 evil. The other and opposed doctrine looks upon good 
 as a quahty which is impHed by certain other quahties 
 merely as such and irrespective of any reference to 
 existence; this doctrine does not allow for the fact, to 
 which equal witness is given by the moral conscious- 
 ness, that goodness does not belong to any quality by 
 itself but only on the assumption of its existence. It is 
 not the mere concept or idea but the existence corre- 
 sponding to the concept, or the realisation of the idea, 
 that forms the subject of the moral judgment. That 
 judgment, therefore, always involves both something 
 assumed as existing and a universal by means of which 
 it is approved or disapproved. 
 
 The view which has been set forth here may be 
 illustrated by an ingenious essay in literary criticism 
 and perhaps gain support from it. In his essay 'On 
 the Artificial Comedy of the Last Century,' Charles 
 Lamb defended the licentious plays of Congreve and 
 Wycherley by arguing that the characters represented 
 in them have no connexion with real life. " It is al- 
 together a speculative scene of things," he said, " which 
 has no reference whatever to the world that is... The 
 whole is a passing pageant, where we should sit as 
 unconcerned at the issues, for life or death, as at the 
 battle of the frogs and mice. But, like Don Quixote, 
 we take part against the puppets, and quite as imperti- 
 nently." The comedies cannot be acted any longer, he 
 says, because we insist on regarding the characters as 
 real men and women instead of the puppets they are. 
 We are unable to enjoy the play just because our 
 
88 
 
 The Criteria of Moral lvalue 
 
 imagination is spoiled by '' the exclusive and all-devour- 
 ing drama of common life, where the moral point is 
 everything." Probably Lamb did not intend his criti- 
 cism to be taken too seriously. He knew that dramatic 
 interest demands at least the illusion of reality and that 
 mere puppets would spoil the illusion. But he wished to 
 justify his own enjoyment in reading the plays, and he 
 saw that, in order to keep moral interests out of the 
 drama, it was necessary at the same time to '' escape 
 from the pressure of reality." He was seeking a moral 
 holiday ; he wished " to take an airing beyond the 
 diocese of the strict conscience" and, ''for a dream- 
 while or so, to imagine a world with no meddling re- 
 strictions." Lamb felt — and his instinct was sound — 
 that the moral holiday must be taken in a region as 
 distinct from the actual world as is fairy land. "Some- 
 where east of Suez" is not far enough away. In our 
 world Qood and evil are insistent ; but outside it, 
 among the puppets of our imagination, we may feign 
 their absence: and indeed they are irrelevant unless the 
 puppets are somehow regarded as human beings with 
 human surroundings. 
 
 We become aware of existence as a particular— a 
 here and now ; from this we pass on to the idea of 
 future existence and backwards to that of past exist- 
 ence ; even when we imagine the existence of something 
 w^ithout assigning definite place and date to it, this idea 
 also is founded on a particular apprehension and 
 distinguished from it only by the loss of its concrete 
 determinateness. Accordingly, seeing that moral judg- 
 ment proceeds on an assumption of existence, we shall 
 
 The Universal in Morality 
 
 89 
 
 expect the system of moral values to be built up 
 gradually upon the basis of particular appreciations. 
 Value resides in the particular. But it does not belong 
 to it in virtue of its mere particularity ; it belongs to 
 the realisation by the particular of a certain character. 
 The full determination of this character would be the 
 completion of an ethical system, or, generally, of a 
 system of values. It has been expressed, so far as 
 moral value is concerned, in different ways by different 
 schools, but chiefly in two ways : sometimes by an idea 
 of the Supreme Good, sometimes by the conception ot 
 a Universal Law or Categorical Imperative. This con- 
 ception and that idea are expressions for the ultimate 
 subject of goodness — for that character or sum of 
 characters which (or some of which) are possessed by 
 everything which is rightly termed good. But neither 
 the idea of a Supreme Good nor the conception of a 
 Universal Law is present — at any rate, explicitly present 
 — in our ordinary moral judgments. And if we attempt 
 to get to our primary moral judgments we find even 
 less trace of this universal conception of the things 
 called good. 
 
 The traditional doctrine of the Intuitional moralists 
 was different from that expressed here. It followed the 
 Scholastic doctrine of morality by representing the moral 
 judgment as arrived at deductively from a general prin- 
 ciple of morality. The particular case (it was supposed) 
 was first of all identified as a member of a class or 
 instance of a principle ; and this class or principle 
 was supposed to be known intuitively as good. The 
 moral syllogism had accordingly a universal principle of 
 morality as its maj.or premiss ; the minor premiss brought 
 
90 
 
 The Criteria of Moral Value 
 
 Moral littuitions 
 
 91 
 
 the particular case under the general principle ; and 
 the conclusion which resulted was the moral judgment. 
 Thus, in spite of the apparent immediateness of the 
 moral judgment, it was represented as the conclusion 
 of a syllogism ; and this conclusion could not have been 
 drawn unless the major premiss— attributing goodness 
 to a universal— had been first of all recognised. In this 
 respect Kant's doctrine resembles the Scholastic or 
 intuitional. According to him all moral judgment is 
 an application of the general principle that goodness 
 belongs only to will in so far as it is determined by the 
 conception of a law which admits of use as a universal 
 principle. Kant does indeed avoid a difficulty which 
 faces the traditional intuitionists— the difficulty which 
 arises from their assumption either of some one general 
 conception (such as happiness or perfection) or of a 
 number of such general conceptions (such as justice, 
 benevolence, and the like) as the ultimate subjects of 
 goodness, independently of all experience of happiness 
 or perfection or justice or benevolence. The difficulty 
 for the intuitionists is that these general conceptions 
 are themselves only formed by the experience of being 
 happy or of seeing or doing just or benevolent actions. 
 All these principles were rejected by Kant as material ; 
 and indeed it is clear that they are arrived at through 
 experience and criticism of life, and cannot therefore 
 be primary elements in the moral consciousness. The 
 principle which he substituted for them was not open 
 to the same objection ; but, as purely formal, it encoun> 
 tered another difficulty, for it was unable to yield any 
 concrete ethical content. Both attempts at a rational 
 ethics thus failed for opposite but corresponding reasons. 
 
 ( 
 
 The traditional intuitionism laid down concrete moral 
 doctrines, but it arrived at these by assuming as primary 
 concepts which are clearly gathered from experience. 
 Kantianism avoided this error, but only to remain shut 
 up to a purely formal doctrine which was without con- 
 nexion with the content of life and thus failed to give 
 a system of moral values. It reduced the principle of 
 morality to the formal proposition that the good will 
 alone is good or that goodness ought to be realised or 
 willed \ 
 
 The universal of morality is contained in particulars 
 and at first concealed by them ; and the moralist's 
 problem is to elucidate the universal by reason of which 
 these particular cases are appropriate subjects for the 
 moral judgment. Goodness is, first of all, recognised in 
 a concrete situation. The moral judgment is in the first 
 instance a perceptive judgment, as Aristotle held" ; and 
 ethical science is based on these perceptive judgments 
 just as natural science is based on the judgments of 
 sense-perception. The data of ethics are accordingly 
 the particular appreciations or judgments of good or 
 evil passed in certain concrete situations. These are 
 moral intuitions, in the literal sense, for they are 
 immediate and of the nature of perception, not the 
 results of reasoning. But they are not intuitions as 
 understood by the Scholastic or modern moralists of 
 the intuitional school : for they are not general propo- 
 sitions, and other moral truths are not derived from 
 them by deduction. Nor have they any infallible claim 
 to truth. In this respect they are on the same level as 
 
 ^ See below, pp. 145 ff. 
 
 ^ Ethics, book vi, chap, viii, p. 1142 a 27. 
 
92 
 
 The Criteria of Moral Value 
 
 the judgments of sense-perception. These judgments, 
 although natural science ultimately depends upon them, 
 may also be mistaken. The square tower seen in the 
 distance appears to be round ; different colours seem 
 the same in a faint light ; we see the sun move across 
 the heavens from east to west. All these are judgments 
 of perception which further perception itself leads us to 
 revise and amend. The illusions of the senses are cor- 
 rected by the means that cause them, that is, by additional 
 sense-perceptions, which make comparison and criticism 
 possible. Similar mistakes and illusions may enter into 
 our judgments of approval and disapproval, and they 
 need to be examined and corrected in the same way. 
 But the possibility of error does not, in one case any 
 more than in the other, imply the impossibility of truth. 
 It only compels an enquiry into the criteria of validity. 
 
 For this enquiry we must use an appropriate method, 
 and the method must have regard to the data at our 
 disposal. It would be inappropriate, for example, to 
 imitate mathematical method, although Descartes re- 
 garded it as the only valid type of thinking. For 
 mathematics begins with definite concepts and pro- 
 ceeds to elaborate the implication of one concept by 
 another ; and for this procedure moral experience does 
 not provide us with the requisite conceptual material. 
 All knowledge which is concerned with the data of 
 experience must follow a different method. It has to 
 bring the content of experience into order, consistency, 
 and system ; and this content requires to be sifted and 
 criticised by thought. The inconsistencies in the data 
 of moral experience make it impossible to hold that the 
 
 The Claim to Validity 93 
 
 propositions which directly express them are always 
 valid. On the other hand these data may not be indis- * 
 criminately rejected, for there is no other material before 
 us. The general validity of moral experience must be 
 accepted in order to make possible the criticism of any 
 portion of it by the assistance of the remainder. The 
 work of thought is to clear away contradiction within 
 the content of morality, to find the underlying harmony, 
 ff there be such a harmony, and to construct a system' 
 It IS, in the first place, a search for principles. 
 
 The variety of moral opinion arises out of an im- 
 mense number of particular judgments of good and evil 
 These judgments have been pronounced upon many 
 different situations and under different conditions. The 
 difficulty is to extract from them general principles which 
 can be relied upon as true expressions of moral value. 
 In confronting this difficulty we must ask whether there 
 are any criteria of validity which can be applied to 
 moral judgments and by which they can be tested. 
 Certain criteria may be sugo-ested. 
 
 I. Every moral judgment claims validity. When 
 I assert 'this is good ' or 'that is evil,' I do not mean 
 that I experience desire or aversion, or that I have a 
 feeling of liking or indignation. These subjective ex- 
 periences may be present ; but the judgment points 
 not to a personal or subjective state of mind but to the 
 presence of an objective value in the situation. What 
 IS implied in this objectivity.^ Clearly, in the first place 
 It implies independence of the judging subject. If my 
 assertion ' this is good ' is valid, then it is valid not for 
 me only but for everyone. If I say ' this is good,' and 
 another person, reflecting on the same situation, says 
 
; 
 
 94 
 
 The Criteria of Moral Value 
 
 * this is not good/ one or other of us must be mistaken. 
 The proposition is either true or false ; it cannot be 
 both. The vahdity of a moral judgment does not depend 
 upon the person by whom the judgment is made. It is 
 impersonal. 
 
 There is another sense in which moral value is 
 sometimes said to be independent of the person. It is 
 said that what is right for me to do must, if all the 
 circumstances are the same, be right for any one else. 
 And this also has been held to be an ethical axiom. 
 But with this axiom — if it be such — we have at present 
 nothing to do. So far as we are concerned an action 
 may be right for A and wrong for B. We have as yet 
 only asserted that the person who passes the judgment 
 is indifferent, not that the person about whom it is 
 passed is indifferent. The latter proposition has to do 
 with a special application of moral value — its applica- 
 tion to the conduct of individual persons. The former 
 proposition is perfectly general, and is a preliminary 
 postulate of the existence of ethics as a system of truths. 
 There can be no ethical truth if the same proposition 
 is valid when asserted by one man and invalid when 
 asserted by another. If the proposition ' A is good' is 
 true, then it is true by whomsoever and whenever it is 
 
 asserted. 
 
 This postulate is inconsistent with one meaning of 
 the favourite phrase ' the relativity of morals.' If moral 
 judgments are simply expressions of a subjective emo- 
 tion, then they are all in a sense correct, for the existence 
 of the emotion is not denied ; but they have no further 
 validity — nor, indeed, meaning. But we have already 
 seen reason to dismiss this view. And my postulate 
 
 Moral Relativity qc 
 
 contains nothing inconsistent with the development of 
 moral ideas or with the fact that different conduct is 
 appropriate to different circumstances, or even to dif- 
 ferent persons in the same circumstances. Customs 
 vary mdefimtely and moral opinion varies with them 
 I here is the greatest difference, for example, between 
 the practice and opinion of the head-hunters of Borneo 
 on the one hand and the practice and opinion of the 
 Society of Friends on the other. The latter condemn 
 the actions which are the daily and admired performance 
 of the former. The head-hunter of Borneo approves 
 with enthusiasm what the follower of George Fox 
 condemns and abhors. Is it possible to institute any 
 iruitfu comparison between ideas and habits so fa.- 
 apart ^ Is it not better simply to discriminate the two 
 stages of social development and say that moral practice 
 and opinion are relative to the social order .^ The Quaker 
 condemns homicide; and this condemnation is bound up 
 with his religious and political creed. The head-hunter 
 follows the way of life of his tribe and conforms to its 
 standards without any thought of general principles, 
 if we seek to realise a special concrete situation which 
 the latter approves, we must put ourselves in his position 
 recognise the facts of his life, and allow for the social 
 pressure that surrounds him. It is difficult for the 
 modern to do this, from the midst of a civilised society 
 in whiali peaceful living is secured, and the necessary 
 means for that security are not obtruded on his notice, 
 i^ut if he IS able to do this, and to apprehend the same 
 situation as the savage, he may still say 'this is wrono-' 
 when the former says ' this is right '-the ^ this ' referrin'o- 
 in both cases to the same situation. When the two 
 
g6 The Criteria of Moral Value 
 
 propositions have thus clearly the same subject, they 
 cannot both be true if they contradict one another. 
 This follows from our postulate. Did it not hold there 
 would be no meaning in the opposition of moral opinion 
 or in the progress of moral ideas. It is only because, m 
 any given situation, there is always a right and a wrong 
 method of reacting upon it, that we can explain the true 
 nature of the relativity of morals. The phrase loses its 
 meaning, because morality loses its meaning, if the same 
 thing may be both right and wrong, good and evil. 
 
 2. This character of objectivity, therefore, and of the 
 universality implied by objectivity, belongs to the moral 
 judgment, as to other judgments. If valid as asserted by 
 me,''it is equally valid for everyone. No proposition can 
 claim to belong to ethics unless it has this objectivity 
 and the resulting universality. But it is a character- 
 istic which, at the same time, brings out the mixture of 
 truth and error in our moral judgments. They all claim 
 validity; bat they cannot all be valid, because they are 
 not all consistent with one another. Any moral judg- 
 ment which is valid must be coherent with all other 
 valid moral judgments : at least it cannot be inconsistent 
 with any. Freedom from contradiction, coherence, and 
 thus possible systematisation are criteria by which the 
 validity of any moral judgment may be tested. If any 
 such judgment is inconsistent with some other judgment 
 known to be valid then it cannot be valid also ; if it is 
 consistent with other valid judgments then it may be 
 valid. And if it is capable of entering into a system of 
 moral judgments along with them and thus harmonising 
 with them, the probability of its validity is increased. 
 This probability may be of various degrees. When 
 
 The Universal in Moral Jndg^nent 97 
 
 the judgment in question is logically implied by other 
 judgments known to be valid, its validity is certain. 
 
 This represents and in its completeness applies to a 
 further stage in the development of moral ideas. So 
 far I have spoken only of the primary moral judgment 
 whose subject is some concrete individual situation— a 
 this or that. And, if we kept to such particular judg- 
 ments, science and system would be impossible : only 
 a multitude of judgments some of which might be es- 
 teemed valid and others invalid ; while the only open- 
 mg for consistency or inconsistency would be between 
 different persons' judgments concerning the same situa- 
 tion. But the moral judgment, even though it concern 
 the particular, always implies a universal. When I say 
 'this IS good,' it is because of some character of the 
 'this' that it is called good. The head-hunter may 
 judge / this is good ' when he displays his first triumph 
 and proves his manhood upon some member of an alien 
 tribe. He does not reflect at all upon the ground of his 
 approval. But, if he did reflect, he might find that what 
 he approved in calling his deed good or right was his 
 attainment of the standard of his fellow-tribesmen— his 
 contribution to the union and power of a community 
 which lived amongst enemies and must be vigilant and 
 strong in order to survive. It is thus in virtue of a 
 universal present in the particular that the particular is 
 approved. The given action is held to be right because 
 it contributes to tribal preservation or strength or unity. 
 When a later or more civilised observer reflects upon 
 the same incident, he looks from a different point of 
 view and sees further. In his eyes the gain to one 
 community has its set-off in the loss to another ; what 
 
 S. G. L. 
 
 7 
 
98 
 
 The Criteria of Moral Value 
 
 strenethens one tribe at the same time weakens another ; 
 the action may even be in his eyes part of a system 
 which keeps every community which practises it in con- 
 stant dancrer of death and with the barest minimum of 
 the o-oods of Hfe. Therefore the same situation which 
 the tribesman welcomes as good, he calls evil. The two 
 judgments upon the same concrete situation contradict 
 one another. But this contradiction may not apply to 
 the underlying grounds of the judgment, if these have 
 been correctly analysed. These may, indeed, be largely 
 identical and differ only in degree of comprehensiveness. 
 The ground of the savage's judgment might be ex- 
 pressed in the proposition ' tribal welfare is good,' and 
 by this would be meant the welfare of this particular 
 tribe, which (as in this case) might imply the hurt of 
 another. The ground of the civilised man's judgment 
 may be ' common welfare is good,' and he will not limit 
 common welfare to the welfare of a particular tribe. 
 Underlying the judgment of both, is the idea of a com- 
 munity and of the common welfare, however differently 
 conceived ; and it is on this account that the predi- 
 cate ' good ' is applicable. But the judgments differ in 
 that the community in view is narrower in the one 
 case than in the other, while common welfare may be 
 differently understood. 
 
 This analysis brings out two points. It shows that 
 moral judgments, which in their first expression flatly 
 contradict one another, may yet have an underlying 
 principle of agreement ; the moral element, when elicited 
 from each judgment, may not show the same opposition 
 as their first statement expressed ; it may even be 
 identical in the two cases. In the second place, the 
 
 System as a Criterion of Validity 99 
 
 criticism of the moral judgment reveals a universal 
 element m its subject ; the subject is not a mere 'this'; 
 It IS a ' this • of a certain determinate kind ; and it is 
 owmg to its character in this respect, that is, to the 
 universal element in it, that it is held to be good 
 or evil. The same universal element may be the 
 underlying ground which makes possible moral judg- 
 ments regarding many different subjects. Criticism 
 will therefore reveal the possibility of systematising 
 moral judgments with respect to the principles which 
 they imply. 
 
 In this way we may arrive at a degree of coherence 
 between moral judgments far closer than any mere 
 absence of contradiction shown by the primary judg- 
 ments on different moral situations. The principles 
 involved in these judgments may be related in a variety 
 ofways-by the kind of objects to which they refer by 
 the degree of generality in which these objects are taken, 
 and so on. If the predicates of two such judgments 
 conflict (if in the one case the predicate is 'good ' and in 
 the other ' evil '), we investigate the principle involved 
 in the subject of each judgment, and from the relation 
 of the two principles, seek to understand the reason for 
 the difference in the predicates. Systematisation will 
 m this way, compel us often to reject the first ex- 
 pression of the moral consciousness, but yet without 
 throwing doubt upon the fundamental validity of that 
 consciousness. 
 
 In this way system becomes a criterion of moral 
 validity. Particular judgments which conflict with a 
 system of judgments must themselves be judged by 
 that system. In such a case we do not merely compare 
 
 7—2 
 
I oo The Criteria of Moral Value 
 
 two judgments, both of which cannot be valid and 
 between which there is room for hesitation and no clear 
 ground for decision. On the one side we have the 
 weight of a systematic whole, on the other the single 
 conflicting judgment standing alone ; and the system 
 of judgments gives a stronger claim to moral validity. 
 If this criterion still seem unsatisfactory, we must re- 
 member that the test is the same as that by which the 
 accuracy of sense-perception is established. What we 
 learn to call illusions of perception are in their imme- 
 diate nature simply perceptions among other percep- 
 tions ; but they conflict with the systematic ordering of 
 the perceptions which lie at the basis of our scientific 
 generalisations ; we are therefore forced to reject their 
 claim to objective validity, and we seek a new expla- 
 nation of them as illusions. 
 
 3. It is possible, however, that the issue may not 
 be between a single judgment on one side and a system 
 of judgments on the other : but that there may be 
 system on both sides. This is certainly to some ex- 
 tent the case in morality, as it also is in science ; and 
 we must proceed to enquire whether there is any further 
 criterion of moral validity by which we may distinguish 
 between system and system. This further test is that 
 of comprehensiveness. It is possible that moral judg- 
 ments may admit of being grouped into a system, so 
 that within the system there is perfect coherence, w^hile, 
 nevertheless, a great mass of moral judgments is left 
 outside this system and in conflict with it, but forming 
 a different system. In such a case of conflict between 
 system and system we may be inclined at first to appeal 
 to a quantitative estimate and to compare the systems 
 
 The Conjlict of Systems 
 
 101 
 
 according to the number of the facts of moral experience 
 which they are able consistendy to explain ; and we 
 may give the preference to the system of greater com- 
 prehensiveness, that is, to the system which is able to 
 explain the greater number of facts. 
 
 Rival moral systems which exempHfy a conflict of 
 this kind are not unknown. Perhaps they are most 
 evident in the department of ethics which has to do 
 with political affairs. Tribal custom was the orlomal 
 moral standard ; and although moral ideas have been 
 ■gradually freed from tribal limitations, the community 
 as nation country or State remains a partial embodiment 
 of morality. So it happens that, even when egoism is 
 not the principle of individual morality, a political egoism 
 often continues to be regarded as the proper standard 
 for the State and its representatives. It Is possible for 
 such a system of Ideas to endure when egoism is seen 
 to be an immoral principle for the individual. The 
 State has a measure of self-sufficiency which the Indi- 
 vidual entirely lacks ; It might still persist If, like the 
 Ireland of Berkeley's Imagination, it were surrounded 
 by a wall of brass sixty cubits high. Thus it happens 
 that, in every powerful State, many thinkers share the 
 view of Bismarck and Treltschke that the only ethical 
 principle which is valid for the guidance of a State's 
 activity is its own preservation and the increase of Its 
 power'. This principle makes It possible to systematise 
 many moral judgments as to w^hat is good and what is 
 evil in political conduct. But it comes into conflict with 
 the corresponding but opposed views of the representa- 
 tives of other States. If the rulers of State A hold that 
 Cp. H. V. Treitschke, Politik (1897), vol. i, p. 100. 
 
102 The Criteria of Moral Value 
 
 che only principle by which political action should be 
 judged is the maintenance and increase of the power 
 of that State, others, in a different country, will hold 
 that the only principle of political ethics is the main- 
 tenance and increase of the power of State B. And the 
 familiar conflict in political morality results. 
 
 Now, if we are to apply the test of comprehensive- 
 ness, it must be allowed to be, at any rate in the first 
 view of it, inadequate. Neither State A nor State B 
 can make any claim to represent a comprehensive uni- 
 versality of interests. One may be larger and more 
 complexly organised than the other, and the ethical 
 principle which it adopts may comprehend a greater 
 number and variety of particular appreciations. In 
 relative comprehensiveness, the principle which takes 
 as its standard the increase of the power of State A 
 may appear to be clearly superior to the principle whose 
 standard is the increase of the power of State B. But 
 this bare quantitative test fails to supply any true 
 moral principle or any criterion between the conflicting 
 principles. 
 
 The test of comprehensiveness will not be satis- 
 factorily met by a process of adding up particulars, and 
 comparing systems according to the number of such 
 particulars which they can include. We must find a 
 principle which will comprehend both the conflicting 
 systems, and by explaining their opposition will justify 
 whatever validity they possess. To revert to the ex- 
 ample. The principle of political egoism is of value on 
 all occasions which concern only the internal policy of 
 a single State ; but in international relations it is inade- 
 quate, not in one case only but in all, because it sets 
 
 Comprehensiveness as a Criterion 103 
 
 different States in opposition to one another. This 
 marks the limits of its validity. It is of no assistance 
 as an ethical principle when the interests of different 
 States conflict. Apart from this conflict we can see in 
 it something that is not really egoism, but is the recog- 
 nition of a larger and common life which has claims 
 upon the thought and activity of its constituent mem- 
 bers. Its underlying principle, we may say, is that of 
 the ethical importance of the organised community 
 and the claim of the latter upon the devotion of its 
 members. But the principle is not vindicated when one 
 such community oppresses another with a view to the 
 increase of its own power. On the contrary, the prin- 
 ciple is misunderstood or relaxed, because the still 
 larger community of the concert of nations or of human 
 society is sacrificed to particularist claims. The criterion 
 of comprehensiveness is fully vindicated only when the 
 moral principle of wider sweep has proved its claim to 
 validity by including the narrower principle which it 
 supplants. It is not sufficient for it to cover a greater 
 number of particular judgments than the competing 
 principle does ; it must take up the competing principle 
 into itself and show the measure of validity which it 
 possesses and then explain the limits of this validity. 
 In general, it will not be a mere contrary of the other 
 principle, but a new principle which includes more than 
 either because it penetrates deeper than they do. Thus 
 the moral particularism which makes the interests of 
 one community the supreme standard of political action 
 cannot be supplanted by the similar particularism of 
 another community, but only by a view of the social 
 principle in morality and of the value which belongs to 
 
I04 The Criteria of Moral P^alue 
 
 particular communities In the social whole which is co- 
 extensive with mankind\ 
 
 In the preceding example we have been concerned 
 with a conflict of ethical ideals, which was due not to 
 difference in the nature or meaning of the ideals them- 
 selves, but to their different range of application ; and 
 a means for resolving this conflict was found in the test 
 of comprehensiveness. Another example may serve to 
 show that the same test will still be of value, even when 
 the conflict is not merely about the application of ethical 
 ideals but concerns their fundamental nature. No dif- 
 ference of moral opinion can be greater than that which 
 distinguishes the two views which may be described 
 respectively as moral materialism and moral asceticism. 
 By materialism in morals I mean the view that the most 
 important things are those that affect the senses and 
 that the highest values are to be found in the satisfac- 
 tion of material wants. The view is not often expressed 
 in serious argument, but it is frequently acted upon, and 
 to adopt it involves a complete ' transvaluation of all 
 values' which must dismiss as illusorv the ideals which 
 have tended to spiritualise human nature. The Invali- 
 dity of this doctrine does not admit of direct demonstra- 
 tion ; it is an ultimate point of view regarding the worth 
 of things. But we may apply to it our previous test and 
 ask. Can it be made finally coherent without disregard- 
 ing essential facts .^ The answer to this question hardly 
 admits of doubt. The view could be carried out syste- 
 matically only by annulling or ignoring almost all the 
 salient facts of moral appreciation : for these express a 
 
 ^ It may be noted that the above paragraphs were written before 
 the outbreak of the present war. 
 
 Comprehensiveness as a Criterion 105 
 
 constant preference of the spiritual over the material or 
 sensuous values. 
 
 On the other hand, the contrary doctrine of asceti- 
 cism recognises the supreme importance of the spiritual 
 values but sees in the whole material apparatus of life 
 only obstacles to their realisation. In emphasising the 
 values which moral materialism ignores, it condemns all 
 the values which the latter admits. Thus this doctrine 
 also Is unable to give a coherent account of values with- 
 out arbitrarily excluding certain factors. Further, in 
 restricting all value to the spiritual factor, it falls Itself 
 into Inconsistency : for the spiritual life needs the 
 support of a material basis, the assistance of material 
 Instruments. Systems of asceticism have sometimes 
 admitted this. But they have commonly maintained 
 that the body and all worldly things are simply a clog 
 to the soul and that the only worthy life Is a study of 
 death ; and in this way they have adopted a conclusion 
 which cuts away the ground for holding that there Is 
 any positive worth in the world. 
 
 The test of comprehensiveness furnishes us with a 
 clue whereby we may penetrate beneath this conflict of 
 views. We may admit the estimate which the ascetic 
 doctrine puts on spiritual values, and yet, at the same 
 time, find a place in our system of values for material 
 goods. As spiritual activities require material instru- 
 ments for their support and expression, the latter must 
 at least have instrumental value ; they cannot be merely 
 obstacles to value ; we must see in them the material 
 through which values have to be realised, and we shall 
 no longer be disinclined to assign them a place within 
 the system of worth. 
 
io6 The Criteria of Moral Value 
 
 The criteria of universality, system, and compre- 
 hensiveness are not always capable of easy application: 
 for our ethical knowledo^e, like our knowledge of causes 
 and effects, is limited. But it may be doubted whether 
 there is more uncertainty in the former than in the 
 latter. In both, general knowledge is founded on par- 
 ticular or perceptive judgments, and the judgments of 
 sense-perception need criticism and revision much in 
 the same way as particular moral judgments do. Nor 
 does the advance of science, any more than the advance 
 of ethics, dispense with the occasional necessity for 
 criticising and discarding preliminary generalisations. 
 Theories which at one time seemed firmly established, 
 such as the Ptolemaic theory in astronomy, or the 
 atomic theory which lasted from the time of Demo- 
 critus almost to the present day, have given place to 
 other theories which include a wider sweep, and a 
 better understanding of each portion, of experience. 
 The progress of moral ideas shows no greater trans- 
 formation. 
 
 Throughout the history of moral ideas, in spite of 
 constant change, we may nevertheless trace a certain 
 persistent content. In each modification the new staee 
 is not entirely new ; it brings out more fully something 
 that was already suggested at an earlier stage. It is 
 a permanent characteristic of the moral consciousness 
 to find value in certain kinds of experience rather than 
 in other kinds. At every critical turn the moral judg- 
 ment pronounces for the superiority of the spiritual to 
 the material in life, and recognises the importance of 
 social ends when confronted by the interests or apparent 
 interests of the self-seeking individual. The higher life 
 
 The Permatient Factor irt Morality 1 07 
 
 and the wider life — the life of spirit and the life for 
 others — these the moral judgment approves with a 
 constancy which is almost uniform. Perhaps it is 
 entirely uniform. The valuation has indeed been re- 
 jected by individuals from time to time — as it was by 
 Thrasymachus in the Republic, as it is at the present 
 day by the followers of Nietzsche. But this rejection 
 is not so much a different interpretation of the moral 
 consciousness, as a revolt against morality. It is a sub- 
 stitution of new values for old, like the magician's offer 
 of new lamps for old in the Arabian tale. The new 
 lamps did not fulfil the same function as the old lamp ; 
 nor do the new values serve instead of the old. For, 
 when we examine them, we find that they are only 
 measurements of strength — physical standards, there- 
 fore — and not criteria of value or moral standards. In 
 spite of the contrasts which we may discover between 
 the ways in which different men and times express these 
 values, their essential nature remains the same. They 
 cannot be understood if we start by denying in toto the 
 validity of the moral consciousness. And a sane criti- 
 cisjn will find both unity of spirit and a principle of 
 growth in its varied manifestations. 
 
V 
 
 VALUE AND PERSONALITY 
 
 \\ E have already seen that all judgments of value 
 depend upon judgments or assumptions of existence. 
 A thing does not need actual existence in order to be 
 declared of value ; but it must at least be assumed to 
 exist. A hundred dollars — to use Kant's illustration in 
 his criticism of the ontological argument — are of value, 
 if they exist in the pocket but not if they are only an 
 idea, something thought about. The proposition *a 
 hundred dollars are of value' means 'a hundred exist- 
 ing dollars are of value ' ; there is no value in the mere 
 thought of a hundred dollars. The same holds when 
 the thing of which we are speaking is of intrinsic value 
 and not merely something of instrumental value, like 
 the hundred dollars. Moral perfection is of value, of 
 supreme value ; but the mere concept ' moral perfec- 
 tion,' apart from any actual realisation of it or approxi- 
 mation to it, is not of value. When we examine it 
 strictly, therefore, the proposition ' moral perfection is 
 of value ' is hypothetical — moral perfection, if realised, 
 is valuable ; or it proceeds on an assumption or pre- 
 sumption of existence : in so far as moral perfection is 
 realised, just so far is there value. The predication of 
 value thus implies or assumes something existing which 
 can be said to possess the value ; the true bearer of 
 
 T/ie Individtial as Subject of Morality 1 09 
 
 value is an existing reality or something conceived as 
 an existing reality. Were there no existence there 
 would be no value ; value out of relation to existence 
 has no meaning. 
 
 Thus, on analysis, we find that the subject or bearer 
 of value is always something which we describe by a 
 concrete term and not by an abstract term. If a general 
 term is used, as when we say, ' money has value ' or 
 ' love has value,' the general term denotes a class of 
 objects : actual coin, for instance, or all those actually 
 and possibly existing states of conscious experience to 
 which we refer when w^e use the term 'love.' That to 
 which we ascribe value is accordingly a singular or group 
 of singulars — an individual being or a combination or 
 series of things which exists or is contemplated as 
 possibly existing. 
 
 This does not make the determination of value 
 possible apart from universals. Universals, as we have 
 seen, are required in order to understand the nature of 
 the individual things in which we are interested in the 
 quest for value. There are also, in the theory of value 
 itself, many propositions of purely universal import. 
 The distinction of the various kinds of value, and of 
 the relations of values to one another, when combined 
 or opposed, may all be set forth in universal propo- 
 sitions ; and they may make up a formal theory of value, 
 which shares the generality of scientific theory. This 
 formal theory, by its generality, belongs to the region of 
 abstraction. It deals with value and the relations of 
 values apart from the things in which value is found 
 and through which only it is realised. But we get at 
 that value onlv in connexion with the individual, with 
 
no 
 
 Value and Personality 
 
 something that exists or is assumed as existing. The 
 predicate 'good' has always an existent or possible 
 existent for its subject. We cannot even say ' good is 
 good.' That would be true only as a mere tautology, 
 and of use for the purpose of emphasis only, but not 
 of information. The mere concept ' good ' is not itself 
 good — it has no value. Accordingly it is only when 
 our business is with the individual, and not where our 
 interest centres in the universal, that the consideration 
 of value enters at all. And thus we come to see how 
 the value-conception and the whole train of thouoht 
 which is connected with it are at once so insistent in our 
 experience (which is of individuals) and yet alien to the 
 procedure and ideas of the physical sciences (which deal 
 with universals). 
 
 Our intellectual interests fall into two distinct classes 
 according as they are centred in the universal or in the 
 individual. In the whole req;ion of what is commonlv 
 called the sciences the interest in the universal is 
 supreme'. What we are in search of is general principles 
 or general laws. The ideal of all the sciences is a state- 
 ment in the form of a mathematical equation, perfectly 
 general in its expression. Things are ' explained ' when 
 they can be expressed by this formula ; and individual 
 things are treated as examples of the general principle. 
 The scientific interest in the individual processes of 
 nature or of the laboratory is to find the law of their 
 action ; and this law is a universal which covers equally 
 an indefinite number of processes. No one of these 
 processes interests us on its own account so long a- we 
 
 ^ Cp. H. Rickert, Kidtiir-ivissenschaft u?id Naturwissenschaft, . nd 
 edit. (1910). 
 
 The Scientific Interest 
 
 1 1 1 
 
 keep to the point of view of the physical and natural 
 sciences. Any one process is as interesting as any other, 
 and its interest depends upon the general principle which 
 it illustrates. The fall of an apple and the orbit of the 
 earth are illustrations of the law of gravitation ; and as 
 such are of equal interest from the point of view of 
 natural science. Here nothing is unique ; repetition 
 shows the law which we aim at formulating. Things 
 and processes are not regarded as individuals or as in- 
 teresting for their individuality— for what distinguishes 
 them from everything else— but for what they have in 
 common with other things or processes. The uniformity 
 of nature is the supreme principle, and individuals are 
 but examples which prove the law or cases which 
 illustrate its operation. 
 
 As long as we keep to this scientific interest thoughts 
 of value do not arise. The pleasure of the quest, the 
 splendour and havoc of the earth, the worth of human 
 life, are all of them considerations which divert the 
 understanding from the purpose of natural science and 
 are irrelevant to its enquiry. The reason why the 
 natural sciences ignore the whole region of values is a 
 good and sufficient reason. Value lies outside their scope 
 because they are concerned with the universal and not 
 with the individual, and the latter is the home of value. 
 But intellectual interest is not restricted to the 
 universal. That restriction is the characteristic of the 
 physical and natural sciences. And there is a region of 
 investigation where the interest terminates in the under- 
 standing of the individual. In biography it is the life of 
 a particular human being, in history the life of a nation, 
 or the stages in the progress of some movement. In 
 
112 
 
 Value and Personality 
 
 these cases the individual is the object of interest, and 
 the universals which we use in the enquiry are merely 
 means towards a true understanding of it. Without 
 universals there would be no knowledge of the indi- 
 vidual just as, on the other hand, there would be no 
 natural science unless there were individual things to 
 suggest and to verify the enquiry for general laws. But, 
 although we must describe the individual by means of 
 general terms, each of which by its generality is equally 
 and indifferently applicable to an indefinite number of 
 other things, yet by and through these universals we 
 seek to comprehend something which is unique, or has 
 happened once for all. The historical person or occur- 
 rence is not regarded as a mere type or as an example 
 of a general principle, but as something whose character 
 as it existed there and then is matter of interest to us, 
 and open to our understanding. 
 
 Into this historical process values may and do enter. 
 In this respect also historical study differs from natural 
 science ; and the difference is due to the different objects 
 —individual and universal— to which they are directed. 
 Neither biography nor history is intelligible without 
 reference to the values which guided the action of in- 
 dividuals or of groups. The deciding feature of a career 
 is commonly the kind of values which appeal to the 
 subject of the career, the degrees of force with which 
 they appeal to him, and his consistency and persistency 
 in their pursuit. It is the same with races and nations ; 
 the national life shows unity and purpose not so much 
 by wealth or power being possessed by the people or 
 equally distributed among them, as by a community of 
 interest such that the same values appeal to all. The 
 
 The Historical Interest 
 
 113 
 
 object valued may be economic prosperity, or military 
 power, or religious belief; and one value may be higher 
 or purer in the judgment of the moralist ; but whatever 
 it is, if it is shared by the great mass of the people, they 
 are united as a nation thereby far more than by mere 
 purity of race or identity of language. Thus, when we 
 are dealing with the individual or community of indi- 
 viduals, we ask questions which natural science rightly 
 looks upon as irrelevant for its purposes. We ask. On 
 what did the man set his heart .^ What were the national 
 aims } What was the end or purpose of the movement 'i 
 Value belongs here, whereas for scientific enquiry the 
 universal law or principle is the only concern, and into 
 it value does not enter. 
 
 It is therefore in the existent, the individual, that 
 value is found, not in the general or universal. Now 
 the mdividual is always unique. How this comes about 
 is not the question : the fact is so. No event repeats 
 another exactly ; as was said of old, ' no one descends 
 twice into the same stream.' And no two individual 
 persons or things are quite alike in all their characters, 
 as Leibniz demonstrated to the gentlemen of the Prus- 
 sian court when he bade them seek in the gardens of 
 Charlottenburg for two blades of grass without con- 
 spicuous differences between them. Heterogeneity in 
 this sense is the mark of nature. Science has the prob- 
 lem set to it of overcoming this heterogeneity by finding 
 general laws which hold true in spite of individual 
 differences ; and for this purpose it must disregard the 
 peculiarities which distinguish any individual thing from 
 every other and make it unique. 
 
 n 
 
 SI 
 
 S. (.7. L.. 
 
 8 
 
114 
 
 Value and Personality 
 
 \[ 
 
 As value belongs to the existent or individual, and 
 as the individual is unique, we tend to think of unique- 
 iness as essential to value. In the class of instrumental 
 values dealt with in economics, rarity contributes to the 
 increase of value ; and when any object of value is not 
 merely rare but a unique specimen of its kind and nothing 
 else can supply its place, its value may be indefinitely 
 enhanced. This estimate extends to intrinsic values also 
 as realised in persons. A man prizes his own individu- 
 ality, and resents any confusion with another self. 
 " Very nice young ladies they both are/' said Admiral 
 Croft, '' I hardly know one from the other " ; but the 
 young ladies would have resented this divided praise. 
 '' Doubles ' usually feel antagonistic to one another. 
 When he is regarded simply as one of a class, as a 
 specimen, a man feels himself robbed of his value ; and 
 he therefore sets store by everything which gives him 
 a character of his own and marks him off from the rest 
 of the world. Repetition, too, is distasteful to him, 
 because this also is a generalising of what he esteems 
 as existing once for all. For this reason the doctrine 
 has never been accepted gladly that life is a recurrence 
 of cycles, and that with the completion of the great 
 year the whole world's history and the lives of the 
 men who make up that history will run once more the 
 course which they have already run and are running 
 now. Value seems to us to be lost if the ' second turn' 
 is a mere reduplication of the first. Who, indeed, would 
 live his life over again if everything were to be repeated 
 exacdy as it was before, and he were to gain nothing 
 from the present adventure ? When you repeat you 
 generalise, and when you generalise you devaluate. 
 
 Value and the Unique 115 
 
 The heartless words - She is not the first^ " are an 
 excuse for evil put into the mouth of Mephistopheles. 
 
 This view represents a very common attitude of 
 mind : an evil thing seems to lose its badness if it is 
 common ; a good is enhanced in value by the rarity of its 
 attainment. Yet I think that the opinion is a mistaken 
 one and that it is based upon a misunderstanding of 
 the true ground for the individuality of value. Evil is 
 not less evil because the like has happened before, any 
 more than your present toothache is less painful because 
 you had one yesterday. It is because Mephistopheles 
 was a sophist that he tried to quiet Faust's conscience 
 with the words '' She is not the first "-only an example 
 of a general rule. An event is not less real because 
 there have been other similar events and we may make 
 certain general propositions which are valid for them 
 all. Each is yet a true individual event. We may 
 choose to consider that or anything else as a mere 
 example of a universal ; but its individuality remains 
 and would remain, even if there were (as there never 
 is) some other event exactly like it. The individual is 
 mdeed unique ; but it is because it is an individual, not 
 because it differs in some points from every other thino-, 
 that it is capable of being the bearer of value. Again,' 
 It is true that a mere repetition of the present life w^'ould 
 seem to us to take away from its value ; but that is 
 because it takes away from its meaning— or at least 
 from the meaning which for the most plrt we find in 
 it. If we have to begin all over again just to reach a 
 point already attained, we lose this meaning, which lies 
 
 Quoted in this connexion in VVindelband's address ' Geschichte 
 und Naturwissenschaft,' Prdliidien, 3rd edit., p. 374. 
 
 8—2 
 
1 1 6 Value and Personality 
 
 in the promise of an attainment in character or in ability 
 which does not pass away with the moment ; and we 
 therefore lose value; for the value of life consists not 
 merely in present achievement but in the fulfilment of 
 purpose-not in mere doing or in present being, but m 
 makin- something which will not be unmade, so that 
 things will never again come to be as if the present had 
 not been If it were not for this view of the whole, 
 which is always implied in our estimate of the value of 
 life if the value of the stretch of life which we can 
 observe were to be estimated simply for and by itself, 
 then this value would not be affected by the fact that 
 somewhere and in some distant age the cycle would 
 begin anew. It is not because our life is a once-for- 
 all that can never be repeated, but because it is an 
 individual life, that it possesses or can possess value. 
 Repetition is abhorrent to us because it implies the 
 transitoriness of attainment, the impermanence of pro- 
 gress the illusoriness of the promise of perfection'. 
 But Lpart from this, things and persons do not lose in 
 value because their like may be found elsewhere or at 
 other times. Given existence, value is always possible ; 
 it attaches itself to uniqueness only because it is the 
 individual that exists and the individual is always 
 unique. 
 
 • So far, the result is that value does not belong 
 to a mere quality or relation or any other universal. 
 A quality or relation or some other universal may be a 
 condition of the presence of value ; but value postulates 
 the existence of something valuable. We must now go 
 
 1 Cp. Bosanquet, The Value and Destiny of the Individual, p. 182. 
 
 lvalues assigned to Things 
 
 117 
 
 on to ask the question. Among the class of existents 
 what members are or may be the bearers of value ? 
 
 In order to decide this question, it will not be 
 necessary to go much beyond the obvious and prima 
 facie distinction of existing beings. On the one hand 
 there are mere things ; on the other hand persons. 
 Perhaps both do not exist in the same way ; but it is 
 enough that both are there, the objects of reflexion and 
 possible claimants of value. Nor is the classification 
 exhaustive. It does not ask how we are to deal with 
 the existence of human societies. And it says nothing 
 of the whole animate world apart from man, which 
 cannot rightly be grouped with the inorganic realm as 
 mere things, nor yet assumed to share the personality 
 of man. This intermediate region causes difficulties 
 of its own, when we come to assign values ; indeed, 
 difficulty rather than safety always lies in the inter- 
 mediate ; and that difficulty can only be overcome by 
 first understanding w^hat holds true of the extremes. 
 
 Does value then belong to the mere thing, that is, 
 to things which are not persons 'i To this question the 
 first answer of common sense is that it does. The 
 interest of the w^orld seems to consist just in the vary- 
 ing values of the things which it comprises. Some 
 things are beautiful, others ugly, some things good, 
 others evil ; and it is for us to make selection between 
 them, and by our activity to add to the goodness and 
 beauty of the world. But when we examine more 
 closely this first answer of common sense, we see that 
 the values which it finds in mere things are — at any 
 rate the great mass of them are — merely instrumental 
 values. What we call the ' goods ' of the world are 
 
ii8 
 
 Value and Persoftality 
 
 appraised in relation to persons — by ministering to 
 their desires, furthering their ideals, or offering scope 
 for their activities. The fruits of the earth are called 
 good if they nourish man or satisfy any human wants ; 
 the forces of nature, the arrangement and order of the 
 world, are valued for their effects on the lives of persons 
 — for the personal and social qualities and conditions 
 which they encourage and foster. Man makes the world 
 his instrument, and seeks in it the means for promoting 
 a human good. These values, therefore, are strictly 
 instrumental values ; and instrumental values — real and 
 necessary as they are — are not in themselves values but 
 only instruments of value or means for its attainment. 
 They are the conditions by which intrinsic values are 
 realised ; and these latter, it would appear, are found 
 only in personal life. 
 
 But is it only of persons, or of things in relation to 
 personal life, that intrinsic value can be predicated } Is 
 it not possible for material things to have a value of 
 their own apart from beings who are able to appreciate 
 that value ? The question could not be fully answered 
 without asking another question, What sort of reality 
 belongs to material things out of all relation to con- 
 sciousness ? and this is a question which it is not 
 desirable to raise at the present moment. If we must 
 content ourselves, then, with a less complete answer to 
 the question, there may be some reason for distinguish- 
 ino- in this matter between the aesthetic and the ethical 
 varieties of value. As regards the former, the question 
 need hardly arise concerning works of art. It is true, 
 as has been said before, that for their appreciation it is 
 not necessary to go behind the work itself and to ask 
 
 Beauty apart from Mind 1 19 
 
 what kind of a man the artist was or what the motive 
 was that guided his work. But nevertheless it is as a 
 product of mind that the statue or the picture or the 
 poem is admired or valued ; it clothes an idea in sensuous 
 material ; and, in its perfection, spirit breathes through 
 the material. But it would be difficult to make and to 
 defend the same statement regarding the beauties of 
 nature. No thought of a divine artist is necessary for 
 their appreciation. Their beauty is there for the seeing 
 eye; and even if the eye is blind to the vision, the 
 beauty (it may be said) remains and only needs the 
 gift of sight on the part of the observer that it may be 
 appreciated. So at least it has been held^; and, from 
 our present point of view, little more can be done than 
 appeal to immediate consciousness. Let us, if we can, 
 suppose conscious factors of every kind to be absent and 
 yet nature somehow to exist. What is that which we call 
 its beauty, when there is no mind expressed in it and no 
 eye to admire -it } Can we say more that there would 
 be a certain arrangement of forms and colours ? We 
 who see it admire it as beautiful, and we call some other 
 arrangement ugly. But if mind were completely ex- 
 truded would there be any ground for attributing greater 
 worth or value to the one order than to the other } It 
 would be of greater value, certainly, were it the expres- 
 sion of an informing mind or were someone there to 
 appreciate it. But these are excluded. We brine mind 
 upon the scene when we say that this particular order 
 would have been worth producing or that it would 
 be rightly admired ; and, unless this can be, said, the 
 arrangements of light and shade, of colour and form, 
 
 ^ G. E. Moore, Principia Ethiai, pp. ^2) ^- 
 
I20 
 
 Value and Personality 
 
 are not themselves values, but only certain of the con- 
 ditions which contribute to there being value. 
 
 But, whatever doubt may be felt regarding the 
 aesthetic values, the point seems clear with regard to 
 moral values — the values with which we are more 
 specially concerned. Goodness — when we distinguish 
 it from beauty and from truth — does not belong to 
 material things, but to persons only. As Hume says 
 in criticising the doctrine of moral relations found in 
 Locke and developed further by Clarke and WoUaston, 
 '' Inanimate objects may bear to each other all the same 
 relations which we observe in moral agents... .A young 
 tree which over-tops and destroys its parent, stands in 
 all the same relations with Nero, when he murdered 
 Agrippina ; and if morality consisted merely in re- 
 lations, would no doubt be equally criminal'." The 
 inference which Hume draws is that moral quality 
 does not belong to the object at all, but to the state of 
 mind which the circumstances produce in the observer. 
 Nero's action produces hatred in those who read of it ; 
 the matricidal growth of the young tree does not : hence 
 the one action is wicked, the other is not. The ex- 
 planation is insufficient; it refers to the difference of 
 subjective re-action in the two cases, but it does not 
 show why it is that the subject re-acts differently. The 
 true explanation must go back to this cause, which, 
 indeed, is not hard to find. We are affected differently 
 because the objects are different, because in the one case 
 we observe the operations of natural forces only and in 
 
 ^ Hume, Enquiry co?icernuig the Principles of Morals, app. i, ed. 
 Selby-Bigge, p. 293 ; Essays, ed. Green and Grose, vol. 11, p. 264. 
 
 Value and the Cosmic Process 
 
 121 
 
 the other we see the conscious and voluntary action of 
 a person. 
 
 The widespread but unreflecti ve application of moral 
 predicates — of 'good' and 'bad' — to the operations of 
 mere things is due to neglect or ignorance of this dif- 
 ference ; and it is really a survival of the primitive 
 animism which attributed to material things a life and 
 mind similar to those of man. Without this support, it 
 is seen to be without ground in the reason of things. 
 Once the physical connexion of events is clearly appre- 
 hended, the causal judgment supplants the moral. It 
 does not, indeed, interfere with the judgment of instru- 
 mental value, for that is stricdy a causal judgment ; but 
 it puts out of court the judgment of intrinsic moral 
 value, which only found admission before because things 
 were not accurately distinguished from persons. 
 
 There is one case of the judgment of value, however, 
 which remains and which applies moral predicates to 
 things ; and that is when nature as a whole is spoken 
 of, and the optimist exclaims 'how good the world is!' 
 or the pessimist says 'how bad!' These judgments, no 
 doubt, often refer as much to the persons in the world 
 as to their natural environment. But the latter is 
 included in the judgment. The hedonist may approve 
 the course of nature as the source of pleasures, or con- 
 demn it for the surplus of pain it brings; others, who 
 are not given over to hedonism in their estimate of 
 values, may applaud the order of the world as under- 
 stood by the human mind or deplore the perplexities 
 which make it unintelligible, or in other ways they may 
 praise or disparage. Sometimes these judgments are 
 little more than a reflexion of the subjective mood of 
 
122 
 
 Value and Personality 
 
 the observer, who describes his own attitude rather than 
 the characteristics of reahty. Yet it must be admitted 
 that they are often more than this : the observer's gaze 
 is turned outward not inward, and he sees the world as 
 objectively good or bad. In so judging it, however, he 
 is not thinking of its material aspects alone. The world 
 to which he refers is the environment in which persons 
 live and in which they seek a response to their desires 
 or ideals. If it seems to respond favourably to the 
 demands made upon it, it is called good ; if, on the 
 other hand, it seems to entail misery or to lead to con- 
 fusion of thought or failure of purpose, as it does in the 
 eyes of the pessimist, then it is called evil. In both 
 cases the moral judgment is passed upon it because of 
 its effect upon persons and their lives ; it is because 
 it defeats their desire for happiness, or their attainment 
 of their ideals, that it is condemned, and because it 
 furthers these that it is approved. In either case it is 
 judged good or bad as an instrument towards personal 
 ends, and the real or intrinsic goodness which it is 
 praised for aiding, or blamed for thwarting, is the good 
 or value of the persons whose fortunes are made or 
 marred by this environment. 
 
 The value-judgments upon nature or the world of 
 insCnimate things are thus properly judgments of instru- 
 mental value, not judgments of intrinsic value. But 
 their instrumental character is sometimes overlooked 
 by optimistic writers and still more often by the pessi- 
 mist. The famous indictment of the order of nature, 
 which is found in J. S. Mill's essay on Nature, is a case 
 in point. "Nature," he says\ *' impales men, breaks 
 ^ J. S. Mill, Three Essays on Religion, p. 29. 
 
 Persons the Subjects of Value 1 23 
 
 them as if on the wheel, casts them to be devoured by 
 wild beasts, burns them to death, crushes them with 
 stones like the first Christian martyr, starves them 
 with hunger, freezes them with cold, poisons them by 
 the quick or slow venom of her exhalations, and has 
 hundreds of other hideous deaths in reserve, such as 
 the ingenious cruelty of a Nabi or a Domitian never 
 surpassed. All this. Nature does with the most super- 
 cilious disregard both of mercy and of justice." In this 
 judgment— and there are pages of similar moral de- 
 nunciation — the reference to the happiness of persons 
 is obvious and intentional. But to probe the causes of 
 unhappiness or misfortune does not justify a moral 
 condemnation of these causes if there was no purpose 
 behind them. It is because Mill personifies nature that 
 he allows himself to use the language of moral denun- 
 ciation ; or because he is arguing against the view that 
 the order of nature is the result of an omnipotent be- 
 nevolent will. The moral judgment upon nature — 
 whether it be a judgment of approval or of disapproval 
 — becomes appropriate when nature is contemplated as 
 the work of a supreme being or person : and it is only 
 when nature is thus contemplated that the judgment is 
 in place. It is to persons, therefore, and not to mere 
 things that the moral predicate can apply'. 
 
 But, while the subject or bearer of value is always 
 found to be in the last resort personality, the living 
 conscious being and not the inanimate thing, it is 
 
 Cp. T. H. Green, Prolegomena to Ethics, § 184 : "Our ultimate 
 standard of worth is an ideal oi personal w^oxXK All other values are 
 relative to values for, of, or in a person." 
 
1 24 lvalue and Personality 
 
 equally true that the thing may be essential for the 
 realisation of the value of which the conscious person is 
 capable. The world is the environment of personal life; 
 ideals have to be realised by making it their instrument ; 
 mind must infuse itself into the mass that the goodness 
 which it conceives may become actual. 
 
 From this point of view history in the widest sense 
 may be looked upon as the gradual process of the 
 spiritualisation of matter ; we shall see in it the suc- 
 cessive steps bv which mind gains the lead, and thmgs 
 become contributory to values. At the beginning, 
 throughout the whole course of inorganic evolution, 
 we can trace causal connexions only; on the level 
 where we ourselves stand we find men acting with 
 more or less clear consciousness of ideals, finding and 
 producing values. Of the intermediate stages— among 
 the lower or sub-human forms of life— it is more difficult 
 to say with certainty whether intrinsic or independent 
 values are to be found. All degrees of life and mentality 
 are there, short of the human. But we can form little 
 idea of their nature. All we can do towards interpreting 
 the behaviour of animals depends upon a comparison of 
 that behaviour with human conduct, and then an un- 
 certain inference by analogy. We sul)tract something 
 from the life of mind as we know it, and attribute the 
 remainder, or aspects of it, to the different species of 
 animals, in proportion as they approach man biologically. 
 We must distinguish two things : value and the 
 consciousness of value. They do not necessarily go 
 together. Health is of value to a man ; but if he is 
 he'althy he thinks little about his health, is hardly con- 
 scious of it at all. Similarly, the wise or just man is 
 
 The Consciousness of P''alue 
 
 125 
 
 not the man most conscious of his wisdom or justice. 
 These values are often most clearly apparent to the 
 observer, when their possessor has hardly any con- 
 sciousness of them himselfor may modestly but sincerely 
 disclaim them. Now to the sub-human consciousness 
 we can hardly ascribe any consciousness of value ; but 
 that will not be a reason for denying the presence of 
 value. The value may still be there, though unrecog- 
 nised by its possessor. " The animal," says \^arisco\ 
 *' cooperates without knowing it to develop life, to 
 increase its value — that is, to render possible to other 
 animals which will come after the realisation of higher 
 values." But this does not make its values merely 
 instrumental for that more developed life. Human 
 values also are preparatory for a higher range of attain- 
 ment. As Varisco says in the same connexion, "life 
 develops itself towards an end which is not in the con- 
 sciousness of any one individual subject, but which goes 
 on realising itself — by means of the conscious aims of 
 the individual subjects." The values which are pro- 
 phetic of the future may be of intrinsic worth in their 
 present realisation, even when realised on the level of 
 the animal consciousness. The animal has a life of its 
 own ; it is for itself ; and in this life and what furthers 
 it value may lie. On the other hand, these values can 
 only be such as we count low on the scale, and can 
 involve little, if anything, more than biological preserva- 
 tion and its attendant feeling. For all those values 
 which we count higher, consciousness is needed of a 
 kind and degree which can hardly be attributed to the 
 animals. They are not mere things, as Kant held they 
 
 ' Varisco, The Gnat Problems^ Engl, transl., p. 152. 
 
126 
 
 Value and Personality 
 
 were ; they have a life and values of their own ; but 
 their life is from moment to moment, probably without 
 clear recollection of the past or anticipation of the future. 
 There is only the slightest evidence for the existence 
 of ' free ideas ' in their mental process ; there is no 
 evidence for their possession of ideals ; and the posses- 
 sion of ideals is a condition of the production of the 
 higher values. For all these higher values, conscious- 
 ness is necessary— not a consciousness of possessing 
 them, perhaps ; but a consciousness of the kind of 
 objects and activities which contribute to them. Wis- 
 dom, for instance, does not involve, on the wise man's 
 part, a consciousness that he is wise; but it does involve 
 a highly developed intelligence. The whole question 
 of the existence of values in sub-human life must there- 
 fore be left without exact determination. They are on 
 the line of potentiality, or of approximation, rather than 
 of actual attainment. The individual centre of life, 
 which is the ground of being-for-oneself, is there and 
 makes the realisation of value a possibility, though the 
 values actually realised may be subordinate and few : 
 but they increase in number and worth as the life 
 approaches the full characteristics of personality. 
 
 Human nature also displays many different grades 
 of value and of capacity for the realisation of value. 
 Different ages, different races, different social and intel- 
 lectual conditions carry with them differences in value. 
 The values appropriate to youth or middle life are not 
 identical with those of childhood or old age ; primitive 
 man finds values in activities and enjoyments which 
 seem, of little account in the estimate of an intellectual 
 
 The Moment and the System 127 
 
 civilisation ; and differences of a similar kind cling to 
 our distinctions of class and profession. We cannot o-et 
 to the unity of value — even of moral value — by a process 
 of abstraction from these differences. If we eliminate 
 everything that belongs to a particular age or race or 
 condition, what is left will be too vague and indefinite 
 to constitute a worthy ideal for human personality. The 
 spirit of morality cannot be found apart from its embodi- 
 ment, but the same spirit may clothe itself in many 
 forms. 
 
 Nor is it allowable to select one special form as our 
 standard and to treat all other forms as ancillary or 
 instrumental thereto. If we did, would not each select 
 his own age, his own race, his own status as the normal, 
 and regard all others as merely means or approximations 
 to this standard ? The category of means and <^nd is 
 always inadequate for the interpretation of personal 
 worth. Carried out in all its narrow completeness it has 
 led to the subjection of race to race and given us the 
 institution of slavery ; it has subordinated class to class 
 and invented the conception of the proletariate ; it has 
 looked upon infancy and youth as without value in 
 themselves and only stages towards manhood, and it 
 has clouded the joy of childhood in more than one 
 generation. It is but an exaggeration of the same view 
 to look upon each stage and moment of life as worthless 
 in itself and as only a means of getting on to the next, 
 which again is treated as a means to a later achieve- 
 ment, until air life is emptied of intrinsic value. It would 
 be strange indeed, as Kant admits\ if the toil and glory 
 
 ^ Idee zu einer ailgemeinen Geschichte, prop. 3, Werke, ed. Harten- 
 stein, vol. iv, p. 146. 
 
1 28 Value and Personality 
 
 of past generations and of the present were without 
 worth of their own and derived all their value from their 
 contribution to an achievement still in the distant future. 
 Intrinsic value should not be denied to any period 
 or to any condition in the life either of the individual 
 or of the race. Each moment even may have its own 
 value\ And yet that value is never altogether inde- 
 pendent ; one moment is not a mere means to the next, 
 but its value is connected systematically or organically 
 with that of other moments in the individual life ; and 
 the individual life, in its value as well as in its causes 
 and effects, is connected with the life of the race. The 
 connexion is not merely instrumental ; it is organic or 
 systematic. Nature and the laws of nature are instru- 
 ments for the realisation of values ; in personal life the 
 values are realised. But it is only a fragmentary value 
 that is realised at any moment ; its meaning and worth 
 depend upon the purpose of the individual life to which 
 it belongs. And the individual life itself and its values 
 are also themselves fragmentary, portions of a still 
 larger whole. Of this larger whole social institutions 
 and the various forms of community are imperfect ex- 
 pressions. Among these communities stands the Church 
 whose life should be consecrated to the service of the 
 higher values, inspiring and organising the purposes 
 an'd efforts of individuals. It may be taken, in its idea, 
 as representing the organised system into which these 
 values and attainments of value enter. Only in relation 
 to such a system could the full meaning and full worth 
 of the individual life and its values be understood. 
 
 ^ W. Dilthey, *Das Wesen der Philosophie,' Kultur der Gegenwart, 
 part I, div. vi, p. 33- 
 
 Self and Society \ 2 9 
 
 I have spoken of the person as the bearer of value; 
 and I have been content to use the word personality in 
 its popular sense, confident in agreement as to its deno- 
 tation, whatever difficulty there may be in its definition. 
 But the question may be raised, Is it only to the indi- 
 vidual person— the subject of an inner life of thought 
 emotion and will— that value belongs ? or does it not 
 also belong to the community of persons— a society or 
 the State— although we cannot attribute to this com- 
 munity an inner life of its own similar and in addition 
 to the inner lives of its various members .^ 
 
 This distinction has to be kept in mind if we speak 
 of the value of a community of persons and not merely 
 of individuals. The community has not a feeling or 
 apprehension of this value over and above the feelings 
 and apprehension of it which belong to its members. 
 Nor can we even say that it has a value separate from 
 the value of the members. That value is shared in and 
 realised by the members— though by them only as 
 forming the community. In the interest of clear think- 
 ing, and to avoid a misplaced mysticism, this much, I 
 think, must be allowed. If we speak of the common 
 consciousness, or general will, or spirit of the time, we 
 must remember that these phrases do not denote a 
 consciousness will or spirit which has an existence apart 
 from and parallel to the minds of individual men. The 
 social mind is realised and real in individual minds and 
 nowhere else. 
 
 But this is only one side of the truth. If society is 
 
 unreal apart from the individual, it is also the case that 
 
 each individual mind is dependent upon the minds of 
 
 others. It is impossible to point to any fragment of the 
 
 s. (;. L. 
 
Value and Personality 
 
 130 
 
 individual's mental content which does not imply, or 
 which is independent of, the intercourse of mmd with 
 mind There remains, indeed, as his own the unity 
 which makes each mind a separate centre of conscious 
 life ■ but even this unity would remam imperlect- 
 indeed, no more than a mere possibihty-sf it were 
 not fixed and defined by opposition and relation to the 
 similar mental unity of others. It is impossible to say 
 even that a man is conscious of his own life as a unity 
 of many factors before he is conscious of similar selves 
 with whom his own self can be contrasted It is not 
 good for man to be alone. It is not possible for him 
 really to be alone. Solitude is an artificial condition 
 which only society makes possible. Into the solitary 
 state the hermit carries a crowd of social memories 
 and an idea of his own Independent self which is really 
 a social construction. When we speak of sell and society, 
 therefore, we are not speaking of two independent 
 existents Personality has been held to be the bearer 
 of value ; but personality itself is a social category : 
 it indicates not merely the individual unity ot hfe and 
 consciousness, but also the social place and function 
 which belong to the person and without which he could 
 
 not be what he is. 
 
 The phrase 'the social mind' is not a mere metaphor 
 But the unity of the social mind is of a different kind 
 from the unity of the individual mind. I he limits of 
 the latter are determined by circumstances which are 
 larcrely social ; but the content is all related to a central 
 pofnt, an inner or subjective unity of feeling striving and 
 apprehension, which is the first condition of there being 
 any mental life at all, and which neither psychology 
 
 Social Personality " 
 
 131 
 
 nor sociology has been able to explain. With the 
 social mind it is different. Its unity is a construct 
 which can be traced historically. Social factors must 
 always be assumed ; but social unity is a growth in 
 time, and it does not start from a principle such as the 
 subject of individual life, without which the existence 
 of his mental experience is inconceivable. 
 
 Thus we find a variety of degrees of social unity 
 from the almost haphazard collection of individuals to 
 the definite forms of a business company, or a trade- 
 union, or the modern State. Their unity is in the 
 making ; and, such as it is, it is determined, not by 
 mere numbers or by common situation, but— if it is a 
 society at all— by community of purpose. It has to 
 create its own organs to carry out its purposes ; it is 
 seldom able to act with the decision and directness of 
 an individual person ; but it does achieve unity through 
 Its purpose and by producing an organisation adequate 
 to Its purpose. It has thus to select means and end, and 
 It can be guided by ideals. The kind of unity which it 
 attains is, therefore, primarily ethical rather than psy- 
 chical. The State-and the same may be said of any 
 community-is a subject of rights and duties. These 
 rights and duties are not the rights and duties of its 
 individual members but of the community itself: even 
 although It be necessary for the community to appoint 
 certain of its number to be its agents in securing and 
 fulfilling them. ^^ 
 
 Seeing that these rights and duties are, in strictness 
 the rights and duties of the society, and not merelv of 
 the members of the society, we must allow that 'the 
 society is or can be a subject of moral value. Moral 
 
 9—2 
 
1 32 P^alne and Personality 
 
 value Is attained by it in fulfilling its duties and in per- 
 forming its function in accordance with its rights ; and 
 there are human values which can be realised only in 
 and by the society : which in this sense— if in this sense 
 only— must be regarded as a person and a bearer of 
 value. 
 
 \'[ 
 
 RELATIVE AND ABSOLUTE VALUE 
 
 1 HE most fundamental of all ethical controversies 
 arises out of the claim to objective validity made in the 
 moral judgment. That judgment asserts that some- 
 thing is good ; and, in justifying this assertion, moralists 
 have sought for some final conception upon which all 
 particular goods may be seen to depend — a chief good, 
 or ultimate end, or categorical imperative. On the other 
 hand, moraHsts of a different school have held that the 
 quest of an absolute must necessarily be fruitless in the 
 domain of morals : that good means good for something 
 or someone — that it is by its very nature a relative 
 conception to which objective validity is assigned only 
 by a mistake or by a convention of strictly limited 
 validity. 
 
 The conception of value, which connects ethical 
 with aesthetic ideas, has perhaps had some influence in 
 confirming the tendency to a relativist interpretation of 
 goodness. But it was introduced into ethics by Herbart 
 with a different purpose in view. He, indeed, Identified 
 ethics with aesthetics, holding that all "value-determi- 
 nations are aesthetic judgments^ " ; but he also held 
 that these value-determinations are something simple, 
 
 ^ J. F. Herbart, Analytische Beleuchtung des Naturrechts und der 
 Morale pref., Werke (1851), vol. viii, p. 216. 
 
134 Relative and Absolute Value 
 
 original, and independent\ and that they are unmixed 
 with any feeling of pleasure or displeasure or with any 
 desired This view has been rejected by the most 
 prominent contemporary exponents of the theory of 
 value. -Every value," said Meinong in his early 
 work=\ - must be value for a subject " ; and v. Ehrenfels 
 is even more emphatic : " Each single value exists only 
 for a definite subject— strictly speaking, for a definite 
 subject at a definite time^"; and again, -We do not 
 desire things because we recognise this mystical incom- 
 prehensible essence ' value ^ in them, but we ascribe 
 value to things because we desire them I" In this sen- 
 tence goodness and, generally, value are made relative 
 to individual desire, just as Meinong had previously 
 made them relative to pleasure and displeasure ; and 
 both views— though in conflict with one another— are 
 at one in opposing the doctrine of an absolute or even 
 objective value. To examine all the arguments on both 
 sides of the question is not possible in this place. But 
 the previous lectures have prepared the way for a critical 
 summary of the state of the case. 
 
 In the theory of morality, as in the theory of know- 
 ledcre, the term 'relative' is used in two diff'erent 
 significations. It may mean relative to the subject who 
 pronounces the judgment whether of value or of fact. 
 Or the relation implied may be to other objective 
 elements, recognition of which is required to give 
 
 ^ Aligemeine praktische Philosophie, introd. § i, Werke, vni, p. 24. 
 
 ' Analytische Beleuchtung,^x<tl, Werke, vni, p. 217. 
 
 "^ Psychologisch-ethische Untersuchtmgen zur Werttheorie, p. 27. 
 
 * System der Werttheorie, vol. i, p- 66. 
 
 ^ Ibid., p. 2. 
 
 Cognitive and Ethical Relativity 1 35 
 
 validity to the judgment. According to the former 
 signification the doctrine of relativity means, in the 
 theory of knowledge, that the object of knowledge is 
 either simply a state of the knower's mind, or else that 
 it is coloured and modified by his subjective forms of 
 perceiving and understanding. And in ethics it means 
 that, when the moral judgment is strictly interpreted, 
 its predicate signifies a state of the subject who passes 
 the judgment, and not a character or predicate of an 
 object independent of the subject. 
 
 This doctrine of ethical relativity or ethical sub- 
 jectivity has already been examined in a former lecture, 
 and little need be added here. But this much may be 
 repeated. The appreciation of value is on the same 
 level as knowledge of things, their qualities and rela- 
 tions. We have no more reason for saying that value 
 is relative because it is appreciated by us than we have 
 for saying that facts are relative because they are 
 apprehended by us. If we take any particular moral 
 judgment, as that this man, or this character, or this 
 attitude is good — let us call it ' A is good ' — then what 
 I mean when I assert ' A is good ' is not that I like or 
 desire A or even that I feel approval in contemplating 
 A, but that this predicate ' good ' does, as a matter of 
 fact, characterise A. The assertion may be wrong or 
 invalid ; but that is its meaning. It is certainly possible 
 to argue that this assertion, thus understood, and all 
 assertions like it, must always be without objective 
 foundation, that they are always based merely on 
 subjective preference. But, if this line of argument 
 be adopted, it is important to remember that it is on 
 all-fours with the argument for the subjectivity of 
 
136 Relative and Absolute Value 
 
 knowledge— with Hume's argument that there is no 
 objective connexion in nature, and that, when we say 
 ur think there is, we are simply misunderstanding the 
 subjective routine of our perceptions. I n both cases the 
 question in debate is fundamental, for it involves the in- 
 terpretation of primary experience. If we say with Hume 
 that ' A is good ' means simply that the contemplation 
 of A gives me a pleasing sentiment of approbation, then 
 undoubtedly we cut at the root of an objective theory 
 of morality. And, equally, if we say with Hume that 
 the proposition ' fire causes heat ' expresses, properly 
 speaking, nothing more than a connexion of ideas m 
 my mind, due to association, then we must with him 
 deny the objective character of natural science. And 
 the denial of an objective morality, equally with the 
 denial of an objective science of nature, follows from 
 the rejection of the plain meaning of the primary judg- 
 ments of experience. 
 
 Subjective knowledge of this sort is no knowledge 
 at all, for it defeats the purpose of knowledge, which is 
 to understand the world— not to understand our under- 
 standing. And subjective morality gives no moral 
 knowledge. For, if the meaning of the position ' A is 
 good' is simply that the person who asserts it has 
 pleasure in contemplating A, it will be possible at the 
 same time for another person, who has displeasure in 
 contemplating A, to say with equal truth 'A is not 
 good.' That is to say, the same proposition 'A is good ' 
 will be true in one man's mouth and false in another's: 
 in other words, there will be no such thing as moral 
 
 truth. 
 
 If this position be adopted I know of no logical 
 
 The IVisli to Believe 
 
 137 
 
 grounds for its refutation. It would indeed be hard 
 to find such where the axiom of non-contradiction itself 
 is plainly disregarded. The assertion of relativity, in 
 the sense of subjectivity, has equal effects upon know- 
 ledge whether fact or goodness be our object : and 
 it results in both cases from an interpretation of 
 primary experience which is opposed to the plain 
 meaning of the propositions which express that ex- 
 perience. 
 
 The main cause which has led to the assertion of 
 moral relativity or subjectivity seems to me to be 
 the variety of moral judgments and the contrariety 
 between the judgments of different persons. A man is 
 indeed inclined to approve what he likes, as well as to 
 like what he approves. Belief or judgment is frequently 
 and markedly deflected by the emotions: though the 
 degree in which it is ' passional ' or emotional has been 
 exaggerated in the interests of a theory. For few men 
 succeed in believing even a tithe of what they wish 
 to believe: else every man would think himself wise 
 and fortunate, handsome and brave. Objective reality 
 is too much for him, and, much as he wishes, he cannot 
 believe it markedly different from what it is. And it is 
 to the objective that he refers in his judgment even 
 when the defects of his information or the strength of 
 his passions makes him judge amiss. It is true that the 
 diversity of moral opinion has encouraged — perhaps 
 led to — the doctrine that all moral judgments are rela- 
 tive in the sense of subjective. But there is a similar 
 diversity In judgments, even scientific judgments, about 
 the actual course of things. Are we to say that this 
 diversity also makes all such judgments subjective ? 
 
138 Relative and Absolute Value 
 
 For instance, in the years following the death of Coper- 
 nicus, and even after the work of Kepler, there was 
 much diversity of opinion on the question whether the 
 earth was the centre of the physical universe or a planet 
 revolving round the sun. This diversity was enough 
 to make ordinary people doubt which proposition was 
 true ; but it was not enough to justify the assertion 
 that his own belief was true for each man — unless we 
 are willing to admit that, before the time of Copernicus, 
 the sun w^ent round the earth and that, some time after 
 his day, a change came about and the earth began to 
 go round the sun. Similarly, there has been great 
 diversity of moral opinion regarding such topics as the 
 burning of widows, and the killing of useless old men 
 or of superHuous female infants ; and, at certain times 
 opinion has differed as to the morality of such customs 
 generally or of particular instances of them. But it does 
 not follow that the two moral judgments 'this is right' 
 and 'this is wrong' could both of them have been 
 correct— that the very same act can have been both 
 
 right and wrong. 
 
 But circumstances alter cases, it may be said, and 
 what was right under one set of conditions may be 
 wrong under another set of conditions. This however 
 is to change the question in dispute. When we put 
 the matter in this way, we are no longer referring to 
 one individual instance, but to a general class of actions. 
 The killing of Caesar, for instance, and the killing of 
 Commodus may be both cases which can be described 
 by the general term tyrannicide ; but the moral quality 
 of the two deeds need not therefore be the same. We 
 must take all relevant circumstances into account for 
 
 Objective Relations 
 
 139 
 
 each moral judgment. And this is what we mean when 
 we say that circumstances alter cases. We are no longer 
 asserting that moral value is relative in the sense of 
 subjective ; but that it depends, or may depend, upon 
 surrounding conditions. That is to say, we are passing 
 from the first meaning of relative to the second. And, 
 indeed, the two meanings are frequently confused when 
 morality is said to be relative. 
 
 This second meaning of relativity does not imply 
 dependence of the object upon the subject observing 
 it ; it asserts relation between this particular object and 
 other factors of the objective whole. If w^e use the term 
 in this sense, relativity will no longer imply any divorce 
 from reality, and w^e shall have to interpret differently 
 the assertion that morality is relative. 
 
 I. In the first place, as we have already discovered, 
 moral value always belongs to an existing reality or to 
 something conceived as existing. ' Good ' is not some- 
 thing that can stand alone or can be assigned as a 
 predicate to some other quality, unless that quality be 
 conceived as existing and therefore as belonging to a 
 concrete whole. When I say ' love is good ' or 'justice 
 is good,' I mean that love as realised in a personal life 
 is good, that justice as manifested in a man's character 
 or in a social order is good. I do not mean that the 
 mere abstract quality love or justice is also good. The 
 mere quality love, conceived abstractedly and without 
 any reference to its realisation in personal life, is not 
 good. I do not think of it as good except on the assump- 
 tion of its existence, that is, of its being a part or 
 character of someone's life. Good cannot be predicated 
 
I40 Relative and Absolute Value 
 
 of the abstract. It belongs only to the concrete— as I 
 have already argued, to persons. 
 
 This position is fundamental as marking the dis- 
 tinction of ethics from the formal and abstract sciences. 
 A mathematical proposition holds true without any 
 postulate or hypothesis about existence. We do not 
 need to assume the existence of triangles in order to 
 make the assertion that the plane triangle encloses two 
 right angles. The plane triangle is an entity mdepen- 
 dent of actual existence ; and equality of enclosed angles 
 to two right angles is a property of this entity. But it 
 is different with the qualities to which we attribute moral 
 value. If I form the abstract concept justice, and treat 
 this concept as an entity with a subsistence of its own 
 apart from its realisation in existence, then it does not 
 , hold of this entity that it is good. What is good is the 
 
 just deed or just man or just social order, 
 ^-j The view which 1 am urging is opposed to the form 
 of idealism which regards such ideas as just, good, 
 beautiful, etc., as alone truly real, and looks upon their 
 manifestation in the concrete— in life and action— as 
 ' unessential or as only a problem troublesome of solution. 
 It is also opposed to the theories of ethics, cognate to 
 this doctrine, which treat justice or love or freedom or 
 pleasure as self-subsistent entities, now combined with 
 existence now separated from it, but capable of possess- 
 ing the quality good or bad quite irrespective of any 
 such connexion. It seems to me that this doctrine pro- 
 ceeds upon a misinterpretation of moral experience and 
 of value-experience generally . When it is made clear 
 to us that by justice, love, pleasure, etc., simple qualities 
 are meant regardless of their presence in any conscious- 
 
 The Environment of Morality 141 
 
 ness, the moral consciousness refuses to call them good 
 or evil. When good or evil is ascribed to them in this 
 way, I suspect that this is due to an oversight — over- 
 sight of the reference to existence always implied in 
 the moral judement. We deal familiarlv with abstrac- 
 tions, forgetful of the reference to concrete reality which 
 they always imply when moral predicates are assigned 
 to them. 
 
 In this sense, therefore, we may assert relativity of 
 moral value. Whatever is held to be good is not a 
 mere quality, but a concrete realisation of this quality. 
 But, in this meaning of the term, relativity does not, 
 as it did in the former meaning, imply any severance 
 from reality. On the contrary it affirms connexion with 
 reality. The quality called good is good only when it 
 stands in such relation to a concrete whole as to form 
 part of, or to be a factor in, that whole. Goodness (and 
 value generally) belongs to reality, or at least to things 
 contemplated as real. 
 
 2. Further, and in the second place, there is another 
 point of view from which morality may be looked upon 
 as relative, without that relativity interfering with its 
 objective character. The thing of value — the person 
 called good — lives in an environment, physical and 
 social. He is called good in virtue of some qualities 
 or characteristics which he possesses or which constitute 
 his nature. And, seeing that he is a living being, these 
 qualities or characteristics are manifested in the way in 
 which he re-acts upon his environment. It is generally 
 owing to his special modes of re-action that he merits 
 and that he receives the tide good. If the environment 
 were different the same attitude to it might not merit 
 
142 Relative and A bsohtte Value 
 
 the same title. It might lose its moral value through 
 being unfitted to the conditions of his life. Here also, 
 then, is relativity. The good is not out of relation to 
 the environment of the person or attitude called good. 
 And this, indeed, follows from the preceding position. 
 It is the concrete person who can be said to be good ; 
 and no person stands alone and unchanging. He is a 
 centre of life and consciousness ; and his conscious life 
 requires an objective environment which he must know 
 and modify ; to live is to react upon and thus to change 
 external surroundings. To understand the individual 
 agent in such a way that we are justified in calling him 
 good, we must have regard to the circumstances which 
 he has to control or modify. 
 
 At the same time this relativity is not complete. 
 It is easy to magnify the importance of circumstances. 
 They determine the particular direction of the good 
 man's attitude rather than its general character, the 
 details rather than the principles of his activity. What 
 it is good or right for him to do may differ in this 
 situation and in that ; but the right action is not deter- 
 mined by the circumstances alone. It results from an 
 attitude to the circumstances of life which adapts itsell 
 to chancrino- conditions in a res^ular and determinate 
 manner ; and in doing so it preserves a certain general 
 uniformity of character. 
 
 Two things therefore have to be distinguished in 
 an enquiry into moral value. In the first place there 
 are the general principles or the general character of 
 goodness ; and in the second place there is the appli- 
 cation of this to persons and to circumstances in 
 
 Diversity in Applied Morality \ 43 
 
 both of which wide differences exist. The powers and 
 disposition of one man may fit him for a very different 
 kind of work from that w4iich is adapted to his neigh- 
 bour, and he may be right in ignoring what is of supreme 
 importance for the other. 7^he artist, the man of science, 
 and the man of affairs realise moral goodness by pur- 
 suing different lines of activity corresponding to the 
 differences in their mental endowment. Of hardly less 
 importance is the environment, natural and social, of 
 man's life. Even apart from the effects of civilisation, 
 a different kind of life is required from the denizen of 
 the polar regions from that which suits the South Sea 
 islander. And each country, civilised or uncivilised, has 
 its own historical tradition which is shared by its citizens 
 and serves to distinouish their interests and even duties 
 from those of foreigners. Further, there are countless 
 differences, economic and social, within the same country, 
 which serve both to limit and to direct the activities of 
 each of its inhabitants in different ways. No man can 
 quite take another's place or live another's life. All 
 these circumstances have to be taken into account when 
 we seek to determine how the highest value can be 
 realised by a given individual or at a given juncture. 
 Conduct in particular cases may raise questions of 
 almost infinite complexity, which seem in strange con- 
 tradiction with the reputed simplicity of moral law. 
 And these difficulties press upon us if we attempt to 
 elaborate and apply a theory of vocation — a doctrine 
 of the way in w^hich each man may employ his powers 
 for the best. 
 
 There is ample evidence, therefore, of moral 
 diversity, of moral relativity. But this diversity is 
 
144 Relative and Absolute Value 
 
 not inconsistent with a unity of principle or of spirit ,- 
 even the relativity may be found, in the long run, to 
 be an expression of a good which deserves the name of 
 absolute. It is true that in morality, as in other subjects, 
 diversity of precept may often appear to be in conflict 
 with unity of principle. And the principle needs very 
 careful statement if this appearance of conflict is to 
 be avoided. The universal claims made by the moral 
 consciousness are apt to be asserted in favour of that 
 system of ethical precepts which, at some given time, 
 regulates and is valid for a particular social system. 
 Moral values have their most prominent application to 
 the actions of men in society. They take the form of 
 precepts obedience to which constitutes the duty of a 
 good citizen ; and these duties are put forward as the 
 sum of the moral law binding upon all men at all times 
 and everywhere. I n formulating the moral law, moralists 
 have, indeed, always attempted to state those funda- 
 mental precepts only which have this universal validity. 
 But, especially when knowledge of different races and 
 conditions was still scanty, it was not easy to distinguish 
 accurately the universal elements in morality from those 
 elements in their application which were due to special 
 circumstances. In many ancient codes— the decalogue 
 is an example— v/e find precepts of limited applicability 
 or even of ceremonial observance combined with other 
 .precepts which penetrate to the root of all morality. 
 And even the modern philosophical moralist of the 
 intuitive school is apt to lay down general principles 
 which seem inappropriate when we try them by the 
 test of extreme cases, and which are often difficult to 
 reconcile with one another. 
 
 The Universal in Morality \ 45 
 
 This failure to reach a clear statement of the per- 
 manent or universal element in morality has encouraged 
 the adherents of relativism in their view that there are 
 no common principles, and that everything depends on 
 the kind of conditions with which a man has to cope. 
 The inference is unjustified, chiefly for the reason that it 
 mistakes the kind of common principles which we have 
 a right to expect. Even if, with Kant, we reduce the 
 essential element in morality to a merely formal principle 
 of rationality, we save something very important from 
 the domain of relativity— namely, the objective duty 
 of meeting circumstances by principle. The good or 
 purely rational will of Kant, although It Is unable to 
 provide a definite system of moral duties. Is not a mere 
 tautologry. It asserts the fundamental principle of the 
 moral life— the obligation to have regard to and to 
 follow the law of duty. This principle Is, and by Itself 
 must remain, merely formal ; guidance in the concrete 
 details of life cannot be deduced from It alone ; and 
 when Kant attempted a derivation of the sort, he o-ave 
 practical significance to the principle only by ignol-Ino- 
 its formality. Yet Kant's words may be read'^as ex"^ 
 pressing the principle which lies behind all concrete 
 duties and gives significance to life as moral and not 
 merely natural. It Is not In impulse or desire— not in 
 the natural causes of action— that value or true worth 
 lies ; the worth of man as a rational being depends 
 upon a point of view which lifts him out of the mere 
 chain of cause and eff"ect, and by its own law makes him 
 the ruler of his impulses and desires — at once subject 
 and sovereign in a realm of ends. In the consciousness 
 of this law of the practical reason, and the moral duty 
 
 s. (;. L. 
 
 10 
 
146 
 
 Relative and Absolute Vahte 
 
 of followin<f it, we have the essence of Kant's ethics. 
 And it can be regarded as unimportant only by those 
 who have already implicitly accepted the same principle, 
 namely this : that, although impulse and desire are 
 powerful determinants of action, morality requires us to 
 turn from them to a principle of a different kind. 
 
 The formality of Kant's principle is disclosed when 
 
 he seeks to apply it to human conduct, and to get out 
 
 of it a distinction between the classes of actions which 
 
 are right and the classes of actions which are wrong. 
 
 Like the intuitional moralist he has his ready-made 
 
 ethical genera — such as beneficence, justice, veracity, 
 
 honesty, and the like — and he has to vindicate these 
 
 by applying his principle to them. Now these general 
 
 concepts of the classes of actions which are right have 
 
 themselves been formed in the course of experience, 
 
 by observation of the ways in which men act in the 
 
 social and natural environment in which they are placed. 
 
 The special conditions of the environment determine 
 
 the ways in which men react to that environment, and 
 
 intluence our classification of such modes of reaction. 
 
 It is here, accordingly, that there is the most obvious 
 
 opening for the influence of external circumstances upon 
 
 our moral ideas ; and this indeed is the region in which 
 
 we find most conspicuous instances of diversity in moral 
 
 opinion. But we must not thus throw ourselves into the 
 
 varieties of outer experience if we are looking lor a 
 
 universal and permanent element in morality. We must 
 
 not expect to find the permanent or universal principle 
 
 in classes of conduct valid for all circumstances; it should 
 
 rather be sought in the moral spirit or purpose which 
 
 may inspire the most diverse conditions without being 
 
 Spirit and Law in Morality 
 
 147 
 
 Itself restricted to any. It is in the spirit of good will 
 of justice, of truth that we must look for ^h 
 elempnf ^r 11 ^^ ^^^ constant 
 
 element of moral value rather than in the precisely 
 
 defined classes of action described by the same o'r simit 
 iidmes. 
 
 For this reason, it would appear that in the concept 
 of v.rtue we get nearer to the essential nature of moral 
 value than we do .n the concept of the duties of man 
 Uuty-the concept of a worth which is also an obli' 
 gauon-certainly belongs to the essence of a being 
 who ,s self-conscious and free, and to whom both the 
 higher way and the lower are open. But duties (in the 
 plural) necessitate the application of this principle to 
 
 for the w.ll because of the intrinsic worth which makes 
 It appeal to our conscience. It is true that the concep- 
 uon o the v.rtues also has been elaborated in connexion 
 with the .social .system ; but the virtues are not like the 
 dut.es, expressed in general rules; and the seat of 
 virtue IS in the personal character-the ultimate bearer 
 of va ue. And it is not in vain that we look for the 
 manifestation of a common spirit in the wealth of 
 detail that characterises the virtuous life. ThrouL^hout 
 -t manifests the control of a lower by a higher_of 
 impulse and selfishness by reason and love-and at the 
 same time a purpose of realising in life the rule of 
 reason and love and of adapting the actual world to 
 this order. \ ^ 
 
 u^ In the affirmation of principle as contrasted with ^ 
 nnpulse we are in presence of a factor in the moral life 
 which might be called absolute-in one sense of that 
 much misused term. It retains its validity unchanged, 
 
 10 — 2 
 
148 Relative and Absolute Value 
 
 whatever be the system of values in which it is dis- 
 played. But it is better to use the term ' absolute ' for 
 that which is complete in itself and without relation to 
 anything beyond. And in this sense the principle is not 
 absolute. On the contrary its significance for life is 
 dependent upon a content — a direction towards or 
 selection of objects on the ground of their worth. What 
 'these worthy objects are, and what the degrees of their 
 worth, the statement of the principle leaves undeter- 
 mined. It requires that the good be pursued and 
 cherished ; it does not settle what things are good. 
 The good which it affirms is simply to hold fast by what 
 is good. Until we know something of what things are 
 good, it remains a mere form ; and its content can only 
 be got from the judgments of good and evil which are 
 based on the primary experiences of value. At the 
 same time it is the principle upon which man's will, so 
 far as it is a moral will, is founded. And, if not absolute, 
 it is unconditional, because it cannot be altered by our 
 value-experiences or their resultant judgments ; and it 
 does not change although the middle axioms of morality 
 may need revision and modification. Its relation to the 
 moral will and to the practical life may be compared 
 with the relation of the axiom of non-contradiction to 
 knowledge. This axiom by itself gives no knowledge 
 of things ; but it rules our thinking so far as our think- 
 ing is valid ; and it is not changed by the progress of 
 science. It is unconditional. Similarly there is an un- 
 conditional good, and it is the will to good. " Nothing 
 can be absolutely valuable," it has been said\ ''except 
 
 J F. Krueger, Begriff des absolut wertvolkn (1898), p. 61. 
 Krueger's exposition, like the above, is based on that of Kant. But 
 
 llie Unconditional Good 
 
 149 
 
 the indispensable subjective condition of all values in 
 general, of all values actually present to anyone or 
 it differs from that set forth here in two respects, (i) Krueger 
 holds that "the psychical capacity or function of valuing {Werten) 
 is the object of the absolutely valid value-judgment or the uncon- 
 ditionally valuable" (p. 61). It appears to me that this valuing, so 
 far as it is merely valuing or appreciating, is not approved uncon- 
 ditionally by the value-judgment : it must be accompanied bv an 
 attitude of will which adopts the valued or appreciated object as its 
 own end. In the unity of the personal life the attitude of apprecia- 
 tion and the attitude of will are not often separated ; but they are 
 distinguishable elements, and they do not always harmonise. Value 
 does not consist in merely feeling or thinking that something is of 
 worth, but in accepting and willing the worthy object as worthy. 
 This criticism is to some extent avoided (though it is not satisfied) 
 by Krueger by the account which he gives of the process of valuing 
 ( Wertung). (2) This forms the second point of difference between 
 his view and that presented here. In his account of the process of 
 valuing he emphasises the conative aspect which is required in order 
 to make the process itself an object of value ; and he does so in a 
 way which largely obviates the previous criticism. But in doing so 
 he does not bring out its essential nature as appreciation (as dis- 
 tinguished from conation). He describes valuings ( Wertunge?i) as 
 simply "dispositions to definite desires" (p. 39), and says that 
 " every striving has the tendency to grow into a valuing " : it leaves 
 a conative disposition behind it so that, on repetition of the former 
 state, the will is again directed to the original goal (p. 47). Now, 
 however the fact of valuing or appreciating may arise, it is not 
 contained in the conative disposition. The growth of a conative 
 disposition is possible without appreciation of it, or of what assists it, 
 as valuable ; bad habits may establish themselves without any such 
 approval or valuing. The valuing is a process which, although it may 
 not be expressed in the form of a judgment, is yet reflex in nature. 
 Even where reflexion is absent, strivings tend to perpetuate them- 
 selves in the form of impulsive or conative dispositions. Here valuing 
 is absent : it is not a function of the merely conative (any more than 
 of the merely emotional) consciousness. 
 
 It may be noted that Krueger uses the term Wertung for the 
 
150 Relative and Absolute Value 
 
 possible in the future." But this subjective condition 
 is a condition of the whole personaHty. It is not simply 
 appreciative, it is also and essentially an active attitude 
 —a striving towards the realisation of the best con- 
 ceived, though the concrete nature of that best may be 
 far from fully defined. 
 
 Unity and variety are accordingly complementary 
 characteristics of m.oral value. The unity is a unity of 
 principle which controls and organises life rationally, 
 by selection of the better, and with a slowly evolving 
 purpose of perfection. The variety is due to causes 
 internal and external — the differences of personal powers 
 and the differences of historical or external conditions. 
 These differences give to morality its manifold appli- 
 cations : to each person a function and therefore a duty 
 which no other person could exactly fulfil ; at each 
 juncture of circumstances something to be done in 
 preference to anything else. The moral universe is 
 thus a universe of infinite variety ; and this variety is 
 dependent on the varieties of what we call the actual 
 
 fundamental process of appreciation. For the same purpose Meinong 
 
 uses the term Werthaltung (commonly translated * valuation ') ; and 
 
 he has reserved the term IVerturigen for those valuations which are 
 
 relativeto assumptions (or to images) and not to judgments of existence 
 
 or non-existence (nor to sense-perceptions), while the feelings essential 
 
 to them are " assumption-quasi-feelings " or "imagination-feelings," 
 
 not "judgment-feelings." In these respects IVertungen, as defined 
 
 by him, differ from Werthaltungen. They can never be entirely 
 
 absent in the appreciation of a thing of worth, whereas Werthaltungen 
 
 may be absent ; but, on the other hand, owing to the relation in 
 
 which imagination-feelings stand to feelings proper, the fundamental 
 
 experience (6^^w«^^W^^///>)ofall value is not WertunghvX Werthaltung 
 
 {Annahmen, 2nd ed., pp. 334-7)- ^^^ "^Y purposes the distinction 
 
 is not of importance. 
 
 71ie Moral Universe 
 
 151 
 
 universe— the universe of persons and things. Here, if 
 we like, is relativity. But, while the diversity of appli- 
 cation depends upon the existential conditions, there is 
 a unity of spirit whose origin cannot be traced to the 
 same source. The details are organised by it in accord- 
 ance with a law which is distinct from that which 
 regulates the actual order of things in time and space. 
 The moral universe has a different principle from that 
 which science describes for the actual universe, though 
 It is only in the actual universe that the moral universe 
 seeks and can find its realisation. And the moral or- 
 ganisation of experience exhibits the same principle 
 throughout its details— a valuation in which the interests 
 of the spiritual and social life are preferred to those of 
 sense and self. Herein we can trace its unity through 
 manifold applications — something permanent and per- 
 sistent, pointing towards a completeness which may 
 deserve the name of absolute. 
 
 The objectivity of the moral judgment may be ^ 
 vindicated along three lines of argument, two of w^hich 
 have already been presented, while the third has been 
 hinted at merely. In the first place, the judgment claims 
 objectivity. It asserts a value which is found in the 
 person or situation (actual or supposed). This is the 
 meaning of the judgment. It is not about a feeling or 
 attitude of, or any relation to, the subject who makes 
 the judgment. Even if we trace its first appearance to 
 an emotional or conative experience of the subject, that 
 does not make the moral value subjective, any more 
 than the dependence of empirical knowledge upon sen- 
 sation makes assertions about existing facts subjective. 
 
152 
 
 Relative and Absolute Value 
 
 In the second place, the moral judgment is universal ; 
 and this in two senses : first, because all who judge 
 correctly must find the same moral ^yalue in any given 
 situation : it is good or bad, whoever\speaks, not good 
 for one bad for another ; and secondly,^ there is a uni- 
 versal element in all moral judgments, p.**ovided these 
 judgments are correct. This universal ek^nient, it is 
 true, is hard to state in the form of a genef^^l propo- 
 sition concerning the good or ill of classes or q?ualities; 
 but it can nevertheless be identified as a commc^i^ spirit 
 and purpose which characterises the good wi^l ^^d 
 through it permeates the whole realm of goodneP^s. In 
 the third place this common or universal elemeVut in 
 croodness will be made clearer if we find that mr^^^^l 
 values are connected in such a way as to form a syst^^^ 
 — not a mere aggregate, but an organic whole — to wh^'ch 
 the name of Chief Good may be properly given. W^^^ 
 have therefore to enquire w^hether moral v-alues are s(^^ 
 related amonest themselves as to form a whole of thi'"^ 
 nature. ^* 
 
 No ethical science exists until we have reachec 1 
 general propositions about good and evil. It is notd- 
 enough to be able to say that this particular experience,e 
 A, is good, or that particular experience, B, is bad."^ 
 We must be able to say, in general, that A, that is, any , 
 A, is good. But much care is needed in order to arrive 
 at these general propositions. Suppose I judge, and/ 
 judge correctly, that some particular experience — calb 
 it B — -is bad. I cannot at once generalise the type of ^ 
 experience and state it in the form of a universal propo- ^ 
 sition. The particular situation is immersed in the fiow ' 
 of experience and can never be repeated ; it cannot be 
 
 The Seaixhfor the Moral Universal 153 
 
 generalised without being modified by abstracting from 
 some of its details, and we are always in danger of 
 abstracting wrongly. Yet clearly there must have been 
 some reason why B was judged bad and not good or 
 indifferent : and we must look for the feature or features 
 in it to which its ethical value was due. Now the 
 situation in question may be one which involved pain ; 
 and our first thought may be that this was the ground 
 of our judgment. ' B is bad ' will, in this event"!* stand 
 for 'pain is bad.' But, before we have settled that this 
 is its meaning and that we are justified m propounding 
 the generalisation that pain is morally evil, we may be 
 confronted with other situations involving pain, which, 
 nevertheless, we hesitate to condemn. We may our- 
 selves experience pain in attempting to follow a difficult 
 argument or to solve a difficult problem, and yet be 
 convinced that this concrete experience is far from a 
 moral evil. In this case, we shall look back at the 
 former experience to see if we can discover its differ- 
 ence, and we may find this difference in the circumstance 
 that, in the former case, the pain was due simply to the 
 ill-will or malevolence of one man to another. And we 
 may, perhaps, now rest satisfied that we have reached 
 the true ground of our original judgment. It is not 
 'pain is bad,' but 'malevolence is bad'; and malevolence 
 means the will to produce pain from a particular kind 
 of motive. The example is not given for its own sake, 
 but to illustrate the truth that when we try to get ethical 
 propositions with general concepts for their subjects 
 these general concepts may have to be somewhat elabo- 
 rately determined, and may be far from simple. 
 
 There is another source of the complexity in moral 
 
 ^ 
 
154 Relative and Absolute Value 
 
 judgments. Such judgments are primarily concerned 
 with actually experienced situations ; and they always 
 imply a reference to existence, real or supposed. Now 
 these experiences are complex and merge insensibly 
 into still larger wholes. Eor our convenience we sepa- 
 rate these wholes into parts which for our purposes may 
 be treated as individuals, and which may even have an 
 individuality of their own. But this individuality is 
 never complete separateness or complete independence. 
 Thus it happens that we express moral judgments about 
 something which we cannot help recognising as complex 
 both in its own structure and in its relations with sur- 
 rounding circumstances. It is possible that its parts, 
 as well as the whole, should have moral value assigned 
 
 to them. 
 
 This was very clearly recognised by the utilitarian 
 moralists. They analysed every concrete situation until 
 they reached those ultimate elements which (according 
 to their theory) alone had moral value — namely, the 
 simple feelings of pleasure and pain. Their method of 
 moral valuation consisted, first of all, in an estimate of 
 the hedonic value of each simple experience ; and then, 
 by the process of adding together the values of the 
 pleasures and subtracting the values of the pains, the 
 pleasure-value (which for them was the ethical value) 
 of the whole in question was reached. Their calculation 
 was very elaborate. But, elaborate as it was, it pro- 
 ceeded on an assumption which unduly simplified the 
 process, and which experience did not warrant. They 
 assumed that addition and subtraction were the only 
 processes required^ — that if we divided a thing into its 
 parts and knew the value of each part, then we could 
 
 Organic Relations of Values 1 55 
 
 thereby calculate the value of the whole. Their pro- 
 cedure was mechanical, as it is called. Now, it is 
 possible to take a machine to bits and then to put 
 the bits together again in their old positions, and the 
 machme does its work as before. It is also possible to 
 take a living body to bits and then to put these bits 
 together again in their old positions ; but thereafter 
 the body does not function as before, because the life 
 has disappeared. This illustrates the difference between 
 a mechanical whole and an organic whole. The former 
 may be regarded as the sum of its parts ; the latter is 
 something more or something other than the sum of its 
 parts. Now when moral value is realised in some con- 
 crete whole, consisting of distinguishable parts, that 
 concrete whole of moral value resembles an organism 
 m this respect, and has been called an organic whole or 
 organic unity \ We cannot get at the value of the whole 
 smiply by adding together the values of its constituent 
 parts. We cannot justly estimate the value of a man's 
 life by summing up the separate values of each particular 
 action he performs or of each particular experience he 
 undergoes ; for the more his life is organised by reason, 
 the more is it the case that each action is not only a 
 factor in the whole but finds its meaning in the whole. 
 Nor can we judge the action of a society of men, with 
 common traditions and a common purpose, simply by 
 adding together the values of the conduct of each taken 
 severally. It might be the case that the action of one 
 taken alone had little or no positive value and was yet 
 an integral and indispensable factor in a valuable whole. 
 The argument may be put simply with the help of 
 
 G. £. Moore, Principia Eihica, p. 30. 
 
156 Relative and Absolute Value 
 
 symbols. We start with an experience which may be 
 called A ; and its distinguishable parts may be symbo- 
 lised as a,, a,, a.^,,.. We are in the habit (let us suppose) 
 of passing moral judgments on each of these parts, 
 and yet we must admit that the judgments are only 
 provisional until we know the whole to which they 
 belong ; a^ cannot be fully estimated without reference 
 to the whole, A, to which it belongs, and apart from 
 the value of that whole. But again, this whole itself 
 does not stand alone. It may be an individual life, and 
 its parts may be the conduct and other expressions of 
 this life's purpose ; but the individual life is passed in 
 a certain medium, and we must know this medium if 
 we would estimate the individual correctly. Or we may 
 be thinking of the action of a group, such as the present 
 cabinet, at some important juncture : when we try, 
 often vainly, to get at their common purpose by ob- 
 serving the actions and sayings of each member of the 
 crroup. But to estimate the value of their common action 
 and purpose, we must take into account all the historical 
 and other conditions in which they are placed : and the 
 value of what they do depends upon the value of the 
 larger purpose which they are, more or less consciously, 
 
 working out. 
 
 Theoretically, there is no point at which we can call 
 a halt. The connexions of each experience are limited 
 only by the limits of the existing universe ; and its 
 values are, in their final estimate, dependent upon the 
 universe of values to which they belong. Short of 
 knowledge of the whole we cannot fully determine the 
 nature of the Chief Good. The absolute after which we 
 strive is always ahead of us and never adequately com- 
 
 The Search for an Absolute 
 
 157 
 
 prehended. For it is absolute, not in its simplicity and "^ 
 separateness, but in its system and completeness. Our ' 
 moral knowledge is not derived by deduction from a '. 
 fixed and certain principle. It grows in amount and in 
 organisation with the growth of our moral experience ; 
 and by criticism of this experience we gradually form' 
 less imperfect conceptions of the realm of ends, or 
 world of values, as a whole. 
 
 I'he search for an absolute good or ethical absolute 
 is carried out on different lines from the more familiar 
 quest for an absolute when ideas of value do not de- 
 termine the procedure. But the one enquiry resembles 
 the other at its crucial points and in its outcome. In 
 the purely theoretical enquiry it is the mere fact that 
 first attracts us and dominates our perception ; and in 
 It, at the first view, we may think ourselves in presence 
 of an absolute. But, as the moment of apprehension 
 passes or as the centre of attention is shifted, our ob- 
 jective fact is found to be merely a portion of a larger 
 whole, just as our perception of it belongs to a wider 
 field and flow of consciousness. Here, therefore, there 
 IS no absolute, but only interrelatedness and dependence 
 of part upon part. Then we desert the particular and 
 seek our absolute in the universal — in laws, or formula, 
 or axioms. But when these are examined, we find that 
 they are always statements of the relations between 
 terms, and that their meaning is unintelligible apart 
 from the terms, while the terms have been arrived at 
 by abstraction from concrete experience. These re- 
 lations may be unconditional, but they are not absolute, 
 if by absolute we mean what is complete. The search 
 
158 
 
 Relative and Absolute P^alue 
 
 for the absolute is unable to stop short of that indi- 
 vidual whole which is related to nothing outside itself 
 because it contains all relations within it. 
 
 Stages similar to these, as we have seen, are gone 
 through in the quest for an ethical absolute. Our first 
 confident assertion of moral right or wrong has been 
 found to lead beyond the immediate experience in order 
 that its significance may be understood and its validity 
 assured. The value of the particular case is determined 
 by its conditions and its issues ; we cannot trust to the 
 mere momentary appreciation as it stands, or may be 
 supposed to stand, alone. When we passed from the 
 particular to the universal, the absolute still eluded us. 
 The axioms and abstract theorems of formal ethics 
 owe their significance to their application to concrete 
 realities. These are parts of the connected structure of 
 reality as a whole; and the values of any portion of this 
 whole may be affected by the relations in which it stands 
 to other portions. Thus, in a system of ethics, our goal 
 would be a whole in which all values are included; and, 
 if this goal is called an absolute, it cannot be related in 
 any external way to the absolute which has been sought 
 along other lines of research. There cannot be two 
 absolutes, one of which, and one of which only, is 
 ethical. We can form a conception of an absolute only 
 as an individual reality which contains harmoniouslv 
 within itself both the actual order and the moral order. 
 
 vn 
 
 'IHE CONSERVATION OF VALUE 
 
 In the preceding lectures so.ne account has been ^iven 
 o he nature of value, of its claim to objective vaC 
 of .ts connexion with the personal life, and of the syste^ 
 of eth,cal values. The problem remains of the bea^^! 
 which tlie results reached have upon the view w2 
 we are entitled to fonn of reality is a whole For my 
 enquiry th,s problem is central; and in the succeediZ 
 pages the relevancy of these nr^Iimin ^"'^'^eeding 
 will I hnn^ K«. preliminary discussions 
 
 will, I hope, become apparent. But one topic remains 
 which IS m the borderland between the pure y ethi a 
 
 cer'; L"""r"""P'^^'^^' ^^^"'"-^'- -d ^ a on 
 
 real- ed '. ""• "^'^^ ^'^''' ^'^'^^^ ^^ discovered 
 realised and maintained. 
 
 One side of this question, and that the most im 
 
 portant, has been made prominent by HofJlin'n h L" 
 
 treatise on The Philosophy of RchJou xT v 
 
 \\W vi^xAr fK r J' ^j i^tngto7z. Accordmp- to 
 
 IS a flTh f ™""^"' ^"d ^^^^^"tial element in religion 
 «s a faith in the conservation of value. He holds tW 
 •f we analyse different typical forms of th etw 
 consciousness, as expressed in creeds and practLe thi! 
 faith w,„ be found underlying them all, though t;': 
 
 ip ofT' 7'^ '^''""- '' '^ '^^ condition andX 
 ape of the religious attitude ; and he accordingly speaks 
 
 of It as an axiom. The axiom of the consefvation of 
 value, in his theory, is to religion what the axiom o he 
 
i6o 
 
 The Conservation of Value 
 
 conservation of energy is to physical science. Of course, 
 it is not axiomatic in the sense of being self-evident, 
 and it might have been better to call it a postulate. It 
 is easy enough to maintain that the * axiom ' does not 
 hold, and even to bring forward facts of experience 
 which seem to throw doubt upon its validity. What is 
 meant by asserting it is that the religious consciousness 
 is vitalised by this assumption, just as physical science 
 carries on its work upon the assumption that the quantity 
 of energy in an isolated physical system remains a con- 
 stant. The latter proposition, also, is not self-evident. 
 It is an anticipation of experience, though an intelli- 
 gent anticipation : for experience confirms it without 
 being able to prove it completely. It is a postulate 
 which directs scientific procedure and which, so far as 
 appears, is justified by the results of that procedure. 
 In the same way the axiom of the conservation of value 
 is a postulate of religion — its fundamental postulate 
 according to Hoffding. It also is an anticipation of 
 experience, and must submit to empirical tests. It is 
 true that experience does not confirm it to the extent 
 to which the axiom of the conservation of energy is 
 similarly confirmed. But neither does experience refute 
 it. The realm of existence is indefinitely great, and, as 
 it unfolds itself to our observation, constantly brings to 
 light new and unexpected situations; at least we can 
 never be justified in asserting dogmatically that these 
 situations will destroy the values which we cherish ; we 
 are therefore justified in holding to the faith in the con- 
 servation of value, seeing that this faith is a matter of 
 life or death for the religious consciousness. Such, in 
 brief, is the doctrine put forward. 
 
 Questions involved ^ 5 j 
 
 The view is worked out in the interests of reliHon 
 But u treats religion as based upon moral experience 
 
 t^ifna; '^ T''"""" '' ''' ''^ -'^'-^ rehgfons no 
 o the nature rehg.ons, or to the latter only in so far as 
 
 cet ion 1 ^' ""-'^P'"^ " ^^^^^^'>^ - ^^hical con- 
 
 ception , as dealing with the conservation of value it 
 
 still comes within the scope of ethics or of the appl 
 cations of ethics. But the problems involved are tidt 
 
 at o o value suggests. There are two aspects to be 
 aken mto account-the subjective and the objective 
 We are concerned with the ideas of value as they are 
 formed and preserved in the human consciousness and 
 he reah.,,on of this value in life ; we must also take 
 nto account not merely the nature and powers of the 
 persons m whom value is reahsed, but also the env Ion 
 mg conditions which determine the limits and prospects 
 of Its preservation and growth. Hence the two aspects 
 of tne subject: the personal aspect and that of thTen 
 ™o„„,e,,,. A„d .ach aspect s„gg«„ ,„-„ ,,J,Z. 
 On the personal side we have to consider both the 
 
 Lttlr'h 'l' '^ "^''^"^'^" '• ^^' ^'- -h- --c^e we 
 must ask whether surrounding conditions will secure 
 
 the persistence of values once produced and whe he 
 
 hey are hkely to aid their growth. We have therefore 
 
 to deal not with one thing only but with four th Igs 
 
 the discovery, the orodurfinn tU • '■^'^^^gs. 
 
 increase of values conservation, and the 
 
 In ethics, as in every intellectual study, reflexion 
 o ows .n the wake of experience. The n^oral Hfe ' e 
 cedes and supphes the n,aterial for n.oral ideas. uZ 
 
 II 
 
1 62 
 
 The Conservation of Value 
 
 take as an example the enumeration of different views 
 about the TOod Hfe which Aristotle orives towards the 
 outset of his Ethics^ — the life of enjoyment, the life of 
 social and political ambition, and the life of thought or 
 science — it is evident that there must have been some 
 experience of lives of these kinds before a man could 
 reflect upon them and choose one or other as his ideal. 
 He must have felt pleasure before he set his mind upon 
 a life of enjoyment, seen social success before he took 
 that as his aim, had some taste of intellectual effort and 
 of the knowledge which is its reward, before he could 
 speak of science as having the highest value. New 
 experience may thus lead to new values — meaning 
 thereby, if not the creation of values, the discovery of 
 them in directions formerly unexplored. The supreme 
 value which Aristotle himself ascribes to the scientific 
 or speculative life is a case in point. Knowledge is not 
 amongst the earliest fruits that ripen in the garden of 
 experience, and at first it was not valued for its own sake, 
 but only as a means towards the attainment of more 
 primitive objects of desire. This is man's first discovery 
 about knowledge : it has instrumental value — helps him 
 to attain many things he wishes and could not get with- 
 out it, and points out short-cuts to things which could 
 otherwise have been reached only by a roundabout way. 
 And this is all the value, perhaps, which most men still 
 put upon knowledge ; probably, it is the only value 
 which it had for mankind in early ages. It was its 
 instrumental value that led to its cultivation; but in its 
 cultivation men came to find intrinsic value: they dis- 
 covered a good for its own sake in what they had at first 
 ^ Ethics^ book i, chap, v, p. 1095 b 17-19. 
 
 The Discovery of rallies 163 
 
 used and regarded as a mere means. Its intrinsic appeal 
 still vanes even amongst those who can appreciate it. 
 ;rhe love o truth," says Leslie Stephen somewhere, 
 .s but a feeble pa.ssion in the best of us." The state- 
 ment of fact does not differ much, but how far apart is 
 the tone of Berkeley's utterance! " Truth is the cry of 
 all, but the game of a few. Certainly, where it is the 
 ch.ef passion, u doth not give way to vulgar cares and 
 views; nor ,s it contented with a little ardour in the 
 ear y time of life; active, perhaps, to pursue, but not .so 
 fit to weigh and revise. He that would make a real 
 progress m knowledge must dedicate his age as well 
 as youth, the later growth as well as first fruits, at the 
 altar of rruth'." These words were written by a man 
 who had spent the best years of his life in work of 
 practical philanthropy. We cannot say of Berkeley as 
 we might of Aristotle or of Spinoza, that for him know- 
 ledge constituted the sole true good, the ultimate value. 
 But he had certainly found in it intrinsic or independent 
 value, not mere utility. To anyone without some share 
 of his experience of the quest for truth and its satis- 
 faction, the assertion of such intrinsic value in knowledo-e 
 .s meanmgle.ss It was discovered slowly in the history 
 of the race, and each man who enjoys it has to discover 
 It lor himself afresh. 
 
 Much the .same holds true of esthetic values It is 
 a commonplace that beauty is found now in scenery 
 which was at one time felt as merely inhospitable and 
 savage, and that the child and the man siek artistic 
 enjoyment in different quarters. We do not need to 
 assert, with the older utilitarians, that the sense of 
 
 ' ^/m, § 368. 
 
 II 
 
I 
 
 1 64 The Conservation of Vahie 
 
 beauty is based on a perception of utility which asso- 
 ciation has turned into other channels. Though it mixes 
 with and is modified by experience of what is useful for 
 practical purposes, the sense of beauty seems from the 
 first to have an intrinsic quality of its own. But there 
 is a gradual change in the esthetic susceptibility to 
 different classes of objects; and ideas of beauty are 
 modified with the modification of cnesthetic experience. 
 
 In the case of moral values also this process of 
 progressive discovery may be observed. We cannot, 
 indeed, go back to a period in the history of the race 
 in which^moral value was not experienced, and of which 
 we might say that men in those days had no moral 
 sense. But both the moral sense itself and the objects 
 on which it sets value have had a history. At first there 
 was no morality distinct from tribal custom ; the indi- 
 vidual conscience reflected simply the ruling behaviour 
 of the society, which thus functioned as a norm of con- 
 duct recognised by each man ; and its object was the 
 agreement or disagreement between the acts of the 
 individual and the prevailing traditional conduct which 
 characterised the members of the tribe generally in 
 their attitude to the more salient or striking conditions 
 of their life. Nowadays morality is often contrasted 
 with convention and not altogether unjustly. But in 
 the beginning it was not so. Morality and convention 
 were coterminous, and in unconventionality lay the sum 
 and substance of immorality. At first, also, conscience 
 was entirely of the nature of a sense of duty or obliga- 
 tion rather than a consciousness of value or good, and 
 it has borne this mark prominently ever since : though, 
 when reflexion awakens, the moral consciousness tends 
 
 N'ew I-iews of Goodness 
 
 165 
 
 to pass beyond the law to the good or value which that 
 law expresses and protects. 
 
 With the rise of reflexion there comes also a change 
 in the objects valued— chiefly by a modification of 
 the tribal or social limits by which they were at first 
 restricted. The circle of duties is widened until It 
 gradually takes In, or is fitted to take in, all man- 
 kind; morality, which was originally tribal, becomes 
 human. And the nature of morality Is purified or re- 
 fined: objectively, the law Is Interpreted by the good 
 to which It tends; subjectively, conformity between 
 overt act and rule Is no longer regarded as sufficient; 
 the Importance of motive Is recognised, and inward 
 harmony with the good Is seen to be required in order 
 that goodness may be fully realised; morality is found 
 to imply a state of the person, to be an Inward posses- 
 sion and not mere correctness of conduct. 
 
 In this way, the history of morality on Its reflective 
 side has consisted largely In a modification and refine- 
 ment of pre-existing values which is sometimes suffi- 
 ciently striking to deserve the name of a discovery of 
 values. At Its earliest stage the root-element, or at 
 least the most prominent element, In morality seems to 
 have been sociality, and sociality of a limited kmd— 
 restricted to the tribe. The subsequent development 
 follows two lines which often cross one another—the 
 extension of the social application to widening circles, 
 and the deepening of the inward spirit of the moral life.' 
 In virtue of the latter, morality becomes much more 
 an affair of character than of conduct. These two- 
 character and conduct— are related to one another as 
 the Inner and outer aspects of life ; and the emphasis 
 
1 66 
 
 The Conservation of Value 
 
 comes to be laid more and more on the inner aspect. 
 The outer aspect is not neglected, but it is seen as the 
 expression of the inner ; the sense of individuality is 
 developed ; ideals of purity, love, heroism, perfection 
 are formed; and all values are found to have their 
 home and to demand realisation in personality. 
 
 In this way every kind of value is or may be related 
 to character and conduct. Truth is an ideal to be 
 realised in a man's intellectual striving; beauty is some- 
 thing that may be produced and enhanced by his mind 
 and hand. All values — the intellectual and the aesthetic, 
 among the rest — have also a share in moral value, 
 because they heighten personal worth and are, to some 
 extent at least, within the reach of personal endeavour. 
 The scholar's life and the life of the artist are examples 
 of the moral life just as much as the lives of the 
 philanthropist or of the ordinary good citizen. Values, 
 once unknown, have been revealed in this way : intrinsic 
 value has been found in instruments, such as know- 
 ledge ; and things of intrinsic value are seen to possess 
 instrumental value also by enhancing personal worth 
 throughout its whole range. There is room for enter- 
 prise, therefore, in morality, even for experiment. But 
 the experimental search for new values takes effect by 
 deepening and widening the old values and not by dis- 
 carding them. The process is a process of growth and 
 development, not of destruction or of revolution. 
 
 The discovery of values is a matter of reflexion or 
 thou<^>^ht, and it follows in the wake of experience. 
 A value is not actual as long as it is merely conceived, 
 merely an idea ; it requires to be realised in experience: 
 
 The Realisation of Values \ 67 
 
 until that has been done, there is (as has been already 
 shown) no value, only a thought or idea of value. Now 
 the practice of morality, as it is carried out in Hfe, means 
 the realisation of such ideas, the production of values. 
 That values can be produced— that from being merely 
 ideal they can be made actual— is the fundamental 
 postulate of the moral life. The amount of value or 
 goodness which actually exists in the world is depen- 
 dent, to some extent at least, upon the volition of man. 
 He can maintain, foster, and increase it. Whatever may 
 be said of the cosmic process at large, his activity, at 
 any rate, can only be explained as purposive ; and in 
 his purpose he treats all existence as material for the 
 production of value. For him the world exists for the 
 sake of personality and its worth. 
 
 The practical attitude, with its postulate of the 
 production of value, is thus in many ways the anti- 
 thesis of the scientific attitude which seeks only the 
 understanding of order. The antithesis may not be 
 complete, but some degree of opposition between the 
 two attitudes must be recognised. The extent of man's 
 mastery over nature is limited: limited in many ways 
 by nature's forces, limited also by the narrowness of 
 human knowledge. As Bacon taught, before man can 
 enter into the kingdom of nature, he must be nature's 
 servant and interpreter'. He must make use of the 
 forces of nature and observe the laws of nature, and in 
 order to do so he must first of all understand them. 
 This understanding is the object of science; and it can 
 be attained only as the result of an impartial study 
 
 Novum Organum, book i, § i. 
 
1 68 
 
 The Coftservation of Value 
 
 which disregards every value but that of truth, and has 
 no preference for good over evil. 
 
 The scientific attitude is therefore one of ethical 
 impartiality or indeed of moral indifference as regards 
 all values but the intellectual. This attitude was not 
 arrived at all at once. It is the result of a distinction 
 which, like all such distinctions, is a matter of con- 
 venience, a means of increasing one's powers by their 
 concentration. Knowledge and practice are closely 
 connected ; knowledge is itself a kind of practice, and 
 has an interest or purpose behind it ; and this interest 
 is frequently, and at first was entirely, an interest in 
 other things than knowledge or truth itself. Indeed 
 knowledge must always proceed by first selecting the 
 object to be known. Even if any one now were so 
 ambitious as, like Bacon\ to take all knowledge for his 
 province, he could not take it or seek it all at once. 
 He must select, in the first instance, what seems to him 
 most in need of interpretation ; and, commonly, the 
 line of enquiry which he selects has some interest for 
 him beyond the pure interest of knowing. But Bacon 
 himself and others of Bacon's time enforced the truth 
 which had escaped many of their predecessors — the 
 truth that the practical interest and the theoretical must 
 be kept distinct, and that both interests will profit by 
 the distinction. Not onlv must the base and the uolv 
 receive equal study with the noble and the beautiful ; 
 but also we must beware of transferring to the processes 
 of nature the forms or categories by which we inter- 
 pret human activity. As science calls nothing common 
 or unclean, so neither may it look for benevolent 
 
 ' Works, ed. Spedding, vol. ui, p. 109. 
 
 The Impartiality of Science 169 
 
 purposes in the cosmic order. The man of science 
 must thmk himself out of that human prejudice which 
 jnterprets all things as made for man— as means for 
 his delectation or instruments for his moral improve- 
 ment. The criticism of final causes, which we find in 
 Bacon and Descartes and still more in Spinoza, was too 
 indiscnmmately applied to all forms of the teleological 
 judgment, but it was justified of the methods against 
 which It was primarily directed. The final causes 
 formerly and currently appealed to in the explanation 
 of nature were indeed like virgins dedicated to God. for 
 they bore no fruit'. The progress of science required 
 that this kind of appeal should be dropped, in order 
 that facts might be investigated by methods which 
 admitted of strict verification. The vindication of this 
 impartial attitude resulted in the long triumph of the 
 mechanical view of nature— a triumph somewhat dis- 
 turbed in our own day by the difficulty of adapting it 
 to the description of vital processes. 
 
 Now this scientific attitude— the attitude of mere 
 observation and inference, with its horror of anthropo- 
 morphic conceptions— cannot give a complete inter- 
 pretation of the world as a whole; for it is obviously 
 insufficient when we take man himself into account. If 
 adequate at all, it is adequate only within a limited 
 range. Man is a part of the whole, and he at least by 
 his activity introduces final causes into the processes of 
 the universe. The effect of this activity may be small 
 in amount as compared with the magnitude of non- 
 human forces; but the question is not a question of less 
 or more, but of the presence or absence of a purposive 
 
 ' Bacon, De Augmentis, in, 5 ; Works, ed. Spedding, vol. 1, p. 571. 
 
1 70 The Conservation of Vahte 
 
 factor. The presence of this element of purpose in man 
 is no proof of its absence everywhere else in the uni- 
 verse ; but all that we have a right to assert at present 
 is that at least one part of the universe does as a matter 
 of fact perform the role of a producer of values. And 
 in acting as a producer of values, man adopts an attitude 
 to nature which is entirely different from his scientific 
 attitude. He seeks to make existence contributory to 
 an increase of worth ; and he uses science itself as a 
 means for this transformation. For science teaches him 
 the conditions under which he must work in this pursuit 
 and helps him to gauge the strength of the forces which 
 are favourable and of those which are hostile to his 
 , purpose. 
 
 The question thus arises whether and how far man, 
 who is an agent in the production of values, has ground 
 for assurance that these values will be maintained or 
 preserved. It is too obvious to need statement that 
 man's power in the universe is small and almost insig- 
 nificant when compared with the great forces of nature. 
 If we trust in the conservation of value within the 
 universe, then we are not trusting in man alone. His 
 good will — even if we can be sure of that — needs the 
 backing of force; and the force that he can exert is not 
 sufficient for the purpose. If realised values are to be 
 conserved — if we are justified in holding to this faith — 
 then this conservation must be due to something in the 
 order of the cosmic forces which is favourable or sympa- 
 thetic to these values, which in a word is on the side of 
 crood against evil, and may be trusted to see to it that 
 crenuine values will not permanently be lost— that good 
 
 Cosmic Indifference lyi 
 
 will triumph in the end. This faith in the conservation 
 of value, therefore, makes a demand upon the universe; 
 and the question of the validity of this demand raises 
 the whole problem of the relation of value to reality— 
 the metaphysical problem to which subsequent lectures 
 will be devoted. I n the remainder of this lecture, I wish 
 to keep to the more strictly ethical ground. 
 
 The meaning of the ' axiom ' may be brought out 
 more clearly by considering how the case would stand 
 if it were not admitted as valid. Let us suppose the 
 laith shaken and abandoned that the cosmic order is 
 on the side of good; let us assume that it is indifferent 
 to all ethical values. The assumption is nothing more 
 than the assumption which science makes as a convention 
 for the limitation of its enquiries, and which materialism 
 and naturalism make as part of a philosophical theory. 
 We must suppose that there is no connexion between 
 the causal sequence of phenomena and ethical values— 
 at least none except such as can be verified by ordinary 
 human experience of the fate of good and evil in the 
 universe. From the time of the Preacher the moral 
 indifference of the universe has been a commonplace 
 of the disillusioned observer; and from the time of Job 
 (and long before his time) the injustice of the universe 
 has been the pessimist's complaint. Their view of the 
 course of the world did not confirm the belief in the 
 conservation of its values. Suppose then we let that 
 belief disappear ; does anything remain which may take 
 its place .^ If the forces of the universe cannot be trusted 
 to conserve values, is there any other way of conceiving 
 the principle of the conservation of value which may as- 
 sure us that there is some element of permanence about 
 
172 
 
 The Consenuition of Value 
 
 the things which we cherish most ? Let us consider the 
 possibilities. 
 
 I. One may perhaps, in the first place, point to 
 what may be called the law of compensation in nature. 
 In the course of history many institutions, many beliefs, 
 many modes of activity, which were held for a time to 
 possess high value, have disappeared, and have been 
 mourned by those to whose devotion they appealed. 
 But yet, when we take a larger view of the course of 
 events, we find that the value has not utterly perished 
 though its objects have changed. New objects and 
 activities of worth have taken the place of old : so that 
 the sum of actual values may even on the whole have 
 been increased by a process w^hich at first and to many 
 seemed to entail nothin^r but disaster. So far as our know- 
 ledge of history goes, there is good ground for holding 
 that this compensatory action has, on the whole, been 
 characteristic of the changes which have taken place 
 within the realm of values. In spite of many and great 
 set-backs the total conditions of the world at the present 
 day are more favourable than they were some thousands 
 of years ago to the production and preservation of 
 values. But faith looks forward not backwards. And 
 the question is whether we have grounds for believing 
 that circumstances will still further improve or even 
 continue as favourable as they have been. And it is 
 here that the trouble arises. According to prevalent 
 scientific opinion, the material conditions which have 
 favoured the preservation of values are not permanent, 
 but only a transitory phase in the career of our planet. 
 In time it will become incapable of supporting human 
 life at all, when the achievements of art and science 
 
 The Law of Conipensation 
 
 173 
 
 and morality will be as if they had never been. Long 
 before that period it will enter upon the downward 
 path, in which material conditions will put increasing 
 difficulties in the way of life and the things worth living 
 for; the struggle for them will become more intense *" 
 and bitter with each generation, until, in the vain effort 
 to preserve life itself, men become forgetful of the things 
 which make it worth living. 
 
 Accordingly, if we depend simply upon what obser- 
 vation enlightened by physical science can tell us of the 
 prospects in store for human life, we are forced to 
 conclude that the law of compensation will not hold 
 indefinitely— that old values will in time cease to be 
 replaced by equal or greater values, and that their place 
 will be taken only by values of inferior worth or by 
 none at all. There may be a long period of comparative 
 security before the decline of values begins to make 
 itself felt ; but the end is sure. Confidence in the 
 permanence of value throughout its changes of form 
 and object can only l)e justified on the assumption that 
 the account of the world given by physical science is 
 incomplete. That confidence, therefore, implies a belief 
 that the ultimate power in the universe is not in- 
 different to what man calls good. It is impossible 
 to hold, as Hoffding does, to the faith in the con- 
 servation of values, and to justify this belief, without 
 being led on to postulate a power and will that con 
 serves them"/ 
 
 Cp. Varisco, The Great Problems, Eng. tr., p. 270: "Value will or 
 will not be permanent according as the divine personality does or does 
 not exist." And he argues further (p. 273), " If values were not per- 
 manent they would not exist. But they do exist.'' But the premiss 
 
1 74 The Conservation of Value 
 
 2. But, at any rate, it may be held in the second 
 place, that whatever may happen in the doubtful future, 
 value is value : we have it and enjoy it now, even it it 
 be about to cease. It mav be that man and all his works 
 are fated to disappear and to leave no trace on the 
 troubled sea of time. But he lives now, and, so long 
 as life lasts, it is better to live well than ill. The present 
 hour is his and he can strive to make it a crowded hour 
 of glorious life. If the hour is to be short all the more 
 reason, it may be said, for making it glorious. The 
 prospect of continuance does not affect present value 
 — whatever our value may reside in. If pleasure is the 
 only good that life has to offer we shall cull the flower 
 of the day, lest the frost blast it during the night ; if 
 there is reason to hope that the end will not come 
 speedily, then we shall take thought for the morrow 
 and lay up goods for many years : if any voice whisper 
 *^thou fool!" we shall answer it with Bishop Butler's 
 reminder that probability is the guide of life and that 
 we must not neglect our chances of tomorrow's enjoy- 
 ment. And if our view of life is on a higher level, 
 whatever of goodness or beauty or truth we can find 
 in experience is surely real as long as it lasts, whether 
 or not it has in it a principle of permanence not shared 
 by material things. If the world were to come to an 
 end tomorrow, yet, today, beauty would remain better 
 than ugliness, truth than error, good than evil. 
 
 This reflexion is sound so far as it goes. Values 
 retain their objective validity, even although we may 
 doubt or disbelieve in the axiom of the conservation of 
 
 of this reasoning would only be admitted by one who had already 
 accepted the conclusion. 
 
 Eternal l\ilues 
 
 ^IS 
 
 value. This axiom is not the foundation of the objective 
 validity of value. On the contrary it is the latter doc- 
 trine which leads us to assert the former. It is because 
 values are objective that we are led to think that the 
 universe, which upholds and contains these objectively 
 valid values, will not carelessly let them go but will 
 provide some means for their permanent realisation. 
 And thus, if we come, on other grounds, to deny this 
 consequence, our doubts are apt to be carried back to 
 the premiss ; and we reject it (as has been often done) 
 not on its own account, or for any weakness in its 
 reasons, but because it seems to lead to a result which 
 we disbelieve. For we have been brought up against, 
 not indeed a logical contradiction, but an incongruity 
 in the universe as conceived by us. We recognise the 
 moral order as an objective order, but yet as something 
 constructed on lines which are different from and irre- 
 concilable with another objective order— that of actual 
 existence. 
 
 3. It is in connexion with considerations of this 
 kind, that we often meet with a third method of main- 
 taining a doctrine of the conservation of value, which 
 shall be independent of any demands on the actual 
 universe in which our lives as individuals are passed. 
 And this solution appeals to speculative minds. What 
 we call the higher values — truth, beauty, goodness- 
 are asserted to be independent of that temporal and 
 distorted manifestation of reality which makes up the 
 world of our ordinary experience. They are eternal 
 verities, eternal values, unaffected by the flux of events 
 and untouched by decay. So far as we realise them in 
 our minds we partake of eternal life. This recognition 
 
176 
 
 The Conservation of Value 
 
 is indeed the immortal part of man\ In it he is at one 
 with the reaHty of which everything else is mere appear- 
 ance. Now, from this point of view, conservation of 
 value in the ordinary sense of the word is not needed. 
 Eternal values do not require to be conserved, for their 
 nature is to be eternal and therefore above the chances 
 and changes of time. 
 
 I nto the metaphysics of this view I do not at present 
 enter. But, even should it be just speculatively, it does 
 not give the kind of assurance that is given by faith in 
 the conservation of values, though it may provide a 
 certain compensation for the lack of that assurance. 
 What was needed, and what Hoffding's 'axiom' affirmed, 
 was an assurance that the realisation of values would not 
 be lost ; and this assurance is not given. It is true that 
 the value we apprehend or enjoy is said to be eternal ; 
 and in apprehending or enjoying it we may be said to 
 partake of this eternity. But it is not contended that 
 the finite minds, which at one time apprehend or enjoy 
 this eternal value, may not afterwards lose it, or that 
 the conditions of the world are and will be such as 
 to preserve its apprehension and enjoyment. What 
 remains is the value itself, eternally valid, w^hatever may 
 happen to its realisation in individuals and societies. 
 And this, again, is only a more speculative assertion of 
 the objectivity of value : an assertion that it is truly 
 real. But there is no assurance that the appearances of 
 reality may not belie it: at the present time, they do to 
 some extent belie it; what security is there that the 
 discrepancy may not increase in the future ? 
 
 There is, however, a modified form of this view 
 
 ' Cp. Spinoza, Ethica, v, 33 ff. 
 
 The Independence of Goodness 1 77 
 
 which brings it more closely into connexion with ex- 
 perience. Moral goodness, at least, it may be said, is 
 mdependent of anything that may happen in the physical 
 world, because it consists simply in a state of will ; and 
 the will may be determined by the pure idea of good- 
 ness, irrespective of all external circumstances. A view 
 of this kind was worked out by the Cartesian Geulincx, 
 whose spirit proved his superiority to the repeated 
 misfortunes of his life ; but it is more familiar to us 
 in the famous doctrine of Kant. This doctrine is not, 
 like the previous, an assertion of the eternal validity or 
 eternal reality of goodness apart from any relation to 
 human consciousness and its conditions. It is an asser- 
 tion of the independence of this very consciousness of, 
 and will to, goodness. Whatever befall in the outer 
 world of physical forces, the good will may remain 
 secure. " Even if it should happen that, owing to special 
 disfavour of fortune, or the niggardly provision of a 
 stepmotherly nature, this will should wholly lack power 
 to accomplish its purpose, if with its greatest effbrts it 
 should yet achieve nothing, and there should remain 
 only the good will..., then, like a jewel, it would still 
 shine by its own light, as a thing which has its whole 
 value in itself. Its usefulness or fruitlessness can neither 
 add nor take away anything from this valued" 
 
 Although all nature is hostile or indifferent, if the 
 mere will of a man is in harmony with moral law or 
 with goodness, then in this harmony moral value is 
 realised. So far Kant's view is true and significant. 
 
 ' Kant, Grundlegung zur Metaphysik der Sitten, sect, i (Abbott's 
 Kanfs Theory of Ethics, p. lo) ; Werke, ed. Hartenstein, vol. iv, 
 
 p. 242 
 
 S. (I. L 
 
 12 
 
178 
 
 The Conservation of Value 
 
 The good will can oppose circumstances, and in this 
 opposition, whatever the issue, achieve a moral triumph. 
 But the very fact that it can oppose them shows that it 
 is related to circumstances. Action cannot be onesided ; 
 circumstances and will interact. Kant's doctrine, in de- 
 nying this psychological truth, drove will out of the world 
 of experience into a purely 'intelligible' region outside 
 the temporal order, so that both individual persons and 
 communities of persons occupy an ambiguous and un- 
 certain position in his scheme of things. Kant's view 
 is adequate as a condition for the moral postulate of the 
 production or realisation of value ; but it does not pro- 
 vide a sufficient substitute for the axiom of the conser- 
 vation of value. Nor, indeed, did he regard it as doing 
 so. It leaves in abrupt opposition the will in which 
 goodness lies and the order of existence ; and his theory 
 of the postulates of the practical reason was intended 
 to reconcile this opposition. 
 
 It is characteristic of the moral, and also of the 
 religious, consciousness to be impressed by the dis- 
 crepancy between ideal and fact. The values which call 
 forth the assent and allegiance of conscience receive 
 but a partial and inadequate realisation in the world of 
 personal and social life, and their position and su- 
 premacy cannot be maintained without a struggle. 
 Moral practice has to be alert and active in order to 
 maintain its ground — lest values once realised in life 
 should afterwards be lost. But it is not restricted to 
 holding what it has won ; it cannot rest content with 
 the mere conservation of value. The very essence of 
 morality lies in the consciousness of an ideal and in the 
 
 The Increase of Value i yg 
 
 endeavour to bring existence into harmony with this 
 Ideal The vakies which have been realised must not 
 be let go ; but their range must be extended over fresh 
 helds of experience, and new means must be sought for 
 extendmg the realm of worth. It appears to nfe that 
 Hoffdmg has not fully expressed the nature of the 
 moral consxiousness, and that he has unduly limited 
 he demands of the religious consciousness, in giving 
 to his ftu^damental axiom the name conservaHon of 
 value. Conscience is never content with the moral 
 status quo: It demands perfection. And the rehVious 
 consciousness would not be satisfied with the retention 
 of the values that have been acquired hitherto ; heaven 
 has been pictured in many different ways, but never as 
 simply a museum of moral progress up to date • life 
 must contain the highest value that can be conceived 
 and not merely the values that have been realised so 
 iar The demand which the religious consciousness 
 •makes always includes the moral demand for the in- 
 creas^e of value : and it is of every increased value 
 and finally of values as fully perfected, that it postulates 
 the conservation. 
 
 The analogy with the scientific axiom of the con- 
 servation of energy, upon which Hciffding lays so much 
 stress, may be illuminating in some respects. The moral 
 prmcple has much the same axiomatic position in 
 religion as the physical has in science ; in both cases it 
 IS of the nature of a postulate under which the work of 
 science and the life of religion respectively are carried 
 on. It IS not an a priori trxxt\i, but the expression of a 
 need-an intelligent anticipation of e.xperience. which 
 awaits verification. So far the analogy is of service ; 
 
 12—2 
 
i8o 
 
 The Conservation of Value 
 
 but in other respects it is apt to be misleading. It 
 suggests that the value of any whole — that of human 
 life, for instance— is, like the energy (say) of the solar 
 system, a fixed quantity which remains the same under 
 various transformations. It is allied with the view that 
 all values are to be measured by their contribution to 
 vitality in the biological sense, and that the biological 
 process may be reduced to physical and chemical terms 
 so that these life- values may be interpreted as quantities 
 of energy \ And this is a wholly misleading suggestion. 
 The moral world is in this respect entirely unlike the 
 physical world. The latter is conceived as always con- 
 sisting of the same quantity both of matter and ot 
 energy. The moral world is not thus fixed in the 
 values it contains. The sum of values is not a constant. 
 It may suffer diminution ; it is also capable of indefinite 
 increase. Like M. Bergson's universe, it is in continual 
 process of creation. What I have called the production 
 of values might, fairly enough, be called a creation. 
 And this production or creation of values, where they 
 had formerly no existence, is, as we have seen, the 
 fundamental postulate of morality ; and the creation it 
 postulates has no assignable limits. This postulate is 
 taken up by the religious consciousness, which asks not 
 merely for the conservation of the values that have 
 already been created, but also for a progressive increase 
 of the values which are worth conserving : even if this 
 increase and conservation should require a new heaven 
 and a new earth. 
 
 1 As regards the view that ' life- values ' are the measure of 'culture 
 values," compare the article of H. Rickert, 'Lebenswerte und Kultur- 
 werte,' Lo^os, \\ (1911-12), pp. 131 ff. 
 
 
 t 
 
 The Mystical PVay 
 
 181 
 
 The mere axiom of conservation— apart from in- 
 crease—of values is better adapted to express the 
 mystical side of religion than that religious attitude 
 which arises out of and consecrates practical morality'. 
 For mysticism morality is essential!) pur-aiive: a pro- 
 cess by which the soul is cleansed from the desires to 
 which the world and the flesh give rise, and fitted to 
 enter the region that lies beyond good and evil. The 
 moral life is therefore for It only a preparatory stage 
 which must be passed before we reach the higher 
 levels ; and once traversed it is left behind. All ethic 
 IS Interimsethik, a means to an experience which is 
 higher than the moral and able to dispense with it. 
 The soul thereafter becomes absorbed in the divine 
 and eternal; and being lifted out of the storm and stress 
 of circumstance leaves these things to their own insig- 
 nificance. They are deceptions, or at least of little 
 account, and unfitted to be the vehicles of eternal value. 
 The world of ordinary life is negated rather than 
 moralised. Nothing is of importance except the inmost 
 consciousness in which self and God meet and are made 
 one. There is no other sphere to which the realm of 
 genuine values may be extended. 
 
 In this respect the mystical way is distinguished 
 from that of practical morality, which seeks to infuse its 
 values into every region of human life, and comes into 
 union with religion In the faith that this enterprise will 
 
 ^ Cp. Hoffding, Philosophy of Reli^w?i, Eng. trans!., p. 258 : 
 "Value can only be preserved by means of changes and transforma- 
 tions.... Only by way of pure mysticism, the logical outcome of which 
 is ecstasy, can we (sometimes) attain to a disregard of this order of 
 things." 
 
1 82 
 
 The Conservation of Value 
 
 not fail. When all is said, however, the mystical life is 
 still a form of human life. It may look upon the human 
 period as only a stage towards an experience of a 
 higher kind in which the tension of individuality is 
 replaced by undisturbed absorption in the One. But in 
 the world of present experience it cannot escape the 
 conditions of finitude. The mystic, as well as the 
 moralist, is bound to recognise the objective validity 
 of those values which lift humanity out of the storm 
 and stress of mundane events, even although he may 
 look for a higher range'of values at life's distant horizon. 
 If the cosmic order does not in some way conserve 
 those values, or compensate for their loss by providing 
 others still greater, then his faith also is vain. However 
 high we set our hopes and ideals, it will be necessary 
 — or, rather, the higher we set them the more will it be 
 necessary — to find a universe whose actual order is 
 able to confirm them. Even for the mystic, therefore, 
 if his mysticism is to be a practical way of life, there is 
 the same need as for the moralist — the need of finding 
 some principle which will make plain the true place of 
 value in the universe of reality. Into the quest for this 
 principle we are now to enter. 
 
 Vlil 
 
 VALUE AND REALITY 
 
 The preceding lectures have been occupied with 
 certain points in the theory of value ; and these points 
 were selected for discussion owing to their bearing on 
 the special problem that lies before us. That problem 
 concerns the contribution which ideas of value, and in 
 particular ethical ideas, have to make to the view oi ihe 
 world as a whole which we are justified in forming. In 
 its mere statement the problem inverts a traditional 
 and customary order of thought. It is the more usual, 
 as it seems the more obvious course, to explain ethical 
 ideas by reference to the nature of things than to take 
 them as a clue for the interpretation of reality. But we 
 have seen the difficulties of the former method. In it 
 the characteristic notion of ethical valuation is never 
 deduced ; it is only introduced surreptitiously. From 
 ' is ' to ^ ought,' from existence to goodness, there is no 
 way that logic has not blocked. The other method, 
 however, remains open to us. 
 
 The contrast of the two methods may be compared 
 with the biological controversy concerning the priori ly 
 of structure or of function. Do we see because we have 
 eyes .^ or is it because we need to see, and have kept 
 on seeing, that there are eyes to see with .^ Here, again, 
 the most obvious answer is that it is the structure that 
 
1 84 
 
 Value and Reality 
 
 determines the function ; but the obvious answer is not 
 necessarily the true one. Our question, indeed, is on a 
 different level from the biological. It has a wider range, 
 and its special reference is not to function merely but 
 to the ethical idea, present in consciousness only, which 
 transforms function into duty. Given the structure of 
 an organ and its environment at any time, it may be 
 possible to determine the organ's function. It is when 
 we ask how the structure came to be what it is that the 
 question of the priority of function arises. But existence 
 and goodness are not related just in this way. Given 
 the structure, as it may be called, of the existing universe 
 as a whole, we should be able to infer certain animal and 
 human functions ; but we should not be able to reach 
 the conception of a good which has objective validity 
 and which the conscious person is under obligation to 
 realise. 
 
 Now, as w^e cannot pass logically from existence to 
 goodness, or from structure to duty, we have to ask 
 whether any way is open from goodness to existence. 
 It is possible for an obstacle that blocks one's path in 
 one direction to be crossed in the opposite direction at 
 a step. Only, as the saying is, we must mind the step. 
 Thus, if I ought to do something and do it, then it now 
 is ; if I see that something would be good and realise 
 it, then I have brought this much goodness into exist- 
 ence. The transition has been made. But the step 
 which we are required to take is a longer step than this. 
 In this case it is only when duty has been done or 
 goodness realised that we have compassed the unity 
 of the two. When, however, I am merely conscious 
 that I ought to do something, then that something is 
 
 Ethical Ideas and Existence 1 8 =; 
 
 not yet done, does not yet exist, and may never exist. 
 We apply the term ' good ' to many things that we only 
 miagine ; and calling them good makes them no nearer 
 existence than they were before. It is clear, therefore, 
 that there are obstacles on the way from ' ought ' to 
 Ms,' from good to existence, just as there are in the 
 opposite direction. 
 
 Ethical ideas form a system of a different order 
 from that of real existence. The ethical system— the 
 ideas of goodness and the relations of these ideas— can 
 be worked out on the mere hypothesis of existence. 
 For its validity it is not necessary that there should be 
 existing objects which manifest the goodness described. 
 Neither here nor elsewhere can we argue directly from 
 idea to existence. Kant's refutation of the ontological 
 argument is fatal to any such naive method of arriving 
 at a doctrine of ethical idealism. At the same time the 
 ethical idea is never without existential connexions ; 
 and such connexions have been already discovered to 
 be of two kinds. In the first place, ethical ideas are 
 facts of the personal consciousness, and they are realised 
 through the will and in the character of persons. They 
 have therefore a place in existent reality ; they belong 
 to that portion of the universe which we call persons ; 
 and a theory of the universe cannot be complete which 
 ignores their existence as facts and forces. In the 
 second place, they claim objective validity ; and this 
 claim is not invalidated by their being conscious ideas, 
 any more than the objective validity of any other kind 
 of knowledge is affected by the fact that the process of 
 knowing is a process in some one's mind. Further 
 consideration of these two aspects of ethical ideas may 
 
1 86 
 
 Vahie and Reality 
 
 bring out the general character of the relation of value 
 to reality. 
 
 '*The one fundamental quarrel," said William James, 
 " empiricism has with absolutism is over [thej repudia- 
 tion by absolutism of the personal and aesthetic factor 
 in the construction of philosophy \" The repudiation is 
 certainly good ground for a philosophical quarrel, but 
 perhaps empiricism itself has not seldom been guilty of 
 the same fault as that for which absolutism is blamed. 
 At any rate it is a fault ; and no philosophy can be 
 complete or true which neglects the fact of personality 
 and the ideas of worth which personality involves. 
 These must be recognised as part of the data which 
 philosophy has to interpret. At the same time, we may 
 not assume (as James was sometimes apt to do) that the 
 presence of ideals or desires justifies an assertion as to 
 their fulfilment or realisation. To do so is to make the 
 subjective interests of the individual into a standard 
 of objective reality. And perhaps it is owing to the 
 fear of falling under this perturbing influence that all 
 forms of monism — intellectualist as well as naturalist — 
 have been inclined to give too scanty recognition to the 
 fact of human personality in the construction of their 
 systems. 
 
 But a recognition of the facts of personal life does 
 not necessitate any departure from an impartial and 
 objective attitude. The facts investigated may be sub- 
 jective facts in the sense that they belong to conscious 
 life and that our knowledge of them depends ultimately 
 upon self-consciousness or introspection. But every 
 . ' ^ Essays in Radical Empiricism, p. 279. 
 
 The Objective Reference in Value 187 
 
 kmd of fact is known only through the subject's power 
 of knowing— conscious facts no more than physical 
 facts. And, whether the facts be of mind or of nature, 
 there need be no difference in the impartial attitude of 
 the thinker towards them. When he makes his own 
 mind or his own ideals his object, his treatment of this 
 object need not be modified by any desire to come to 
 some particular conclusion, for example, to the con- 
 clusion that his ideals have or will have objective 
 realisation. What is required of him is that he should 
 take note of their existence as facts in consciousness 
 and recognise their operation as forces which determine 
 character and help to modify the environment. 
 
 The other respect in which ethical ideas have a 
 contribution to offer to the formation of an adequate 
 view of reality is not so obvious, and it is more con- 
 tentious. It concerns not merely the facts which we call 
 moral and which, as facts of the personal life, have as 
 good a claim to recognition as any other facts, but the 
 principles, ruling ideas, or moral laws which ethical 
 reflexion formulates. In their case the mere fact of 
 their presence in consciousness is a small matter com- 
 pared with their meaning or objective reference. In 
 respect of this meaning have they any legitimate func- 
 tion in the determination of our view concerning the 
 nature of reality } 
 
 The most obvious answer to this question seems to 
 be that moral laws or moral principles are conceptions 
 in accordance with which reality ought to be regulated, 
 but in accordance with which it is not regulated, or 
 with which it agrees in only a very partial manner at 
 best. Goodness, it is said, is one thing and reality 
 
1 88 
 
 Value and Reality 
 
 another ; we must not confuse the two. ReaHty may 
 be good, and in parts it is good ; but it may also be 
 evil, and in parts it is evil. Consequently, as it is of 
 mixed quality ethically, goodness does not belong to it 
 as a whole any more than evil does. Principles or laws 
 of goodness, therefore, can be of no avail in interpreting 
 the nature of things as an actual or real system. This 
 would seem to be the most obvious, as it is the usual, 
 answer to our question. Its positive statements as to 
 the difference between goodness and the actual are also 
 correct, so far as they go. And yet it would be mis- 
 leading and incorrect to take it as a complete solution 
 of the problem. And this for two reasons. 
 
 In the first place, as we have seen, ethical ideas 
 enter into the history of actual existence as efficient 
 factors. The world is a time-process which is in con- 
 stant evolution ; persons are amongst the agents in 
 this process ; and their activity is governed to a greater 
 or less extent by their views as to what is good. In 
 this way ethical ideas come to be literally constitutive 
 of reality as manifested in time. The degree in which 
 they are so may seem to many to be comparatively 
 slight at the present moment: though it is difficult to 
 say how slight or how great it is until we have formed 
 a clear idea of the nature of reality. Further, as we are 
 here concerned with reality as a process in time, we 
 must have regard to the future as well as to the past 
 and the present; and it is at least conceivable that, in 
 the future, the degree in which life will be determined 
 by ethical principles may be increased to an indefinite 
 extent. It may even be increased so far that the pro- 
 cession of the ages, if it could be seen at a single glance, 
 
 The Validity of Values 
 
 189 
 
 might appear as a manifestation of morality; reality 
 might be conceived, in its time-process, as a realisation 
 of goodness. This reflexion, no doubt, is matter of 
 speculation, and it may be taken as merely imaginative. 
 But it serves its purpose here if it illustrates what is 
 ^natter of fact— that ethical ideas are not cut off from 
 reality, but enter into it, and that, even if we look upon 
 the world merely as a system of cause and effect, we 
 shall find goodness as a factor in its constitution. 
 
 The second reason for connecting goodness and 
 reality is independent of the causal efficiency of ethical 
 ideas and of the time-process in which this causal effi- 
 ciency is shown. We have seen, in a previous lecture, 
 that ethical principles do not depend for their validity 
 upon their presence in any particular minds. They have 
 an objective validity which may be compared with the 
 objective validity of the laws of nature. They are not 
 entities with a separate existence of their own ; but 
 neither are such physical principles as the axiom of the 
 conservation of energy or the law of gravitation. Yet 
 the latter are not subjective principles or simply ideas 
 in the mind. They indicate certain aspects of the order 
 of reality as a physical system ; they constitute or help 
 to constitute that system in such a way that existing 
 things manifest this order. We say of them not that 
 they exist, but that they are valid ; but their validity 
 cannot be separated from their implication in reality. 
 To be valid is not the same thing as to exist, but it is 
 to be valid of reality \ so that this validity is included 
 in the nature of reality. 
 
 ^ Cp. J. Ward, The Realm of Ends, p. 227 : ''Validity implies 
 reality and is otherwise meaningless." 
 
I go 
 
 Value and Reality 
 
 Now, if we compare the relation to existing reality 
 of ethical principles with the place in reality of physical 
 principles, we must certainly mark a difference. Ex- 
 isting reality includes as a factor in its system those 
 physical principles which are valid concerning" it ; but 
 it does not necessarily embody ethical principles in the 
 same way. The very nature of moral law may seem to 
 require the possibility of its not being realised in ex- 
 istence. There would be small meaning in the impera- 
 tive of duty, if the nature of things were such that w^hat 
 we say ought to be always were just so. In what sense, 
 then, can it be held that ethical principles are valid for 
 existing reality ? 
 
 This question forces us to ask another, Of what 
 nature is the reality for which ethical principles are 
 asserted to be valid ? Clearly, they do not appeal to 
 that portion or manifestation of reality which is pre- 
 sented to us in the physical universe as it is described 
 by physical science. Of it physical principles are valid 
 in the only way in which principles can be valid of such 
 a universe, that is, by constituting its actual order. 
 But the universe for which ethical principles hold is 
 the universe which is manifested in personal life. And 
 persons are distinguished from material things by being 
 centres of conscious activity whose nature it is to act in 
 pursuit of ends freely selected. Their behaviour is not 
 like that of material things, under laws simply ; it is 
 under the conception of laws. " A thing," it has been 
 said, '* is what it does." But a person is not merely what 
 he does but wiiat he is capable of doing. The law 
 which is valid for him must exhibit its validity by 
 appealing to his rational consciousness without restrict- 
 
 Validity for Personal Life 1 9 1 
 
 ing his freedom. The uniform behaviour, exclusive of 
 all alternative possibilities, which nature exhibits and 
 by which it manifests the validity of physical principles, 
 would be a self-contradictory method for the manifesta- 
 tion of ethical principles by the world of persons, for it 
 would be destructive of the rational freedom which 
 belongs to them as persons. 
 
 As free and rational, persons are also purposeful, 
 seekers of ends. The law which the person recognises 
 as valid for his life is that which tends to the end in 
 which personality Is conceived as reaching its true 
 good. This is an ideal, and its attainment must be 
 looked for In the gradual process by which character is 
 built up and conduct brought into rational order. The 
 moral agent is thus compelled to regard his true per- 
 sonality as consisting not in the actual features of the 
 passing moment but in an is to de—'m something to 
 which he should attain and to which he can at least 
 approximate. This ideal self is conceived as in harmony 
 with the moral values which he recognises, and it is at 
 the same time regarded as the complete realisation of 
 that personality which, throughout life, is always in 
 process of growth '. 
 
 If we would reach a true view of the connexion 
 of value with reality, we must bear these points in mind. 
 The validity of ethical principles and, generally, of ideas 
 of value differs from the validity of physical principles. 
 This difference, however, is not a difference in degree 
 of validity. It is a difference in the reference of the 
 respective classes of principles: ethical principles are 
 
 ^ See below, pp. 239 ff. 
 
1 92 Value and Reality 
 
 valid for persons; physical principles are valid for 
 material things ; and this difference is the ground of 
 the different kinds of validity possessed by each. In 
 summing up these results I am at the same time 
 approaching a first division of reality, from which the 
 further advance of this argument may be made. This 
 first division of reality may be formulated as follows. 
 There are (i) existents, among which we distinguish 
 persons from what may be called simply things; (2) re- 
 lations between existing things, of which relations the 
 ' laws of nature ' may be taken as an example ; and 
 (3) values. 
 
 This first division of reality is, at the same time, a 
 classification of the objects of knowledge; and, as such, 
 it raises certain preliminary questions, with which it is 
 desirable to deal at once, although they can be treated 
 in a summary fashion only. The classification is not 
 founded upon an enquiry into the forms or conditions 
 of knowing, and will not be aftected by such an enquiry 
 unless the latter should lead to a dissociation of know- 
 ledoe from realitv or from existence. Such dissociation, 
 however, was the result of the investigation of the 
 subject-object relation which culminated in Hume. 
 The issue of that enquiry leaves us without any know- 
 ledge properly so called, and only with a succession of 
 transitory impressions and ideas. According to Hume 
 impressions arise out of the unknown ; ideas, however, 
 occur in a certain regular way which can be described 
 by the laws of association ; they have also certain 
 similarities and differences, and even (he thinks) certain 
 quantitative relations, one to another ; but these do not 
 permit of our making any statement about the world of 
 
 Humes Criticism of Knowledge 193 
 
 nature or of mind which can be regarded as havincr 
 objective truth. Hume, whose insight seldom failed hin^, 
 saw that his conclusion involved the disintegration of 
 all knowledge-not merely of theology and metaphysics 
 but also of geometry and natural science'. Had he not 
 been somewhat perfunctory in his examination of one 
 of his classes of the relations of ideas, even knowledge 
 of quantities and of re.semblances would not have been 
 allowed to pass on such easy terms. As it was he 
 recpiied from the results of his analysis, and in his later 
 works tried to tone them down. In his first work he 
 did better ; for there he probed the causes of his own 
 failure. " Did our perceptions," he said, " either inhere 
 m something simple and individual, or did the mind 
 perceive some real connexion among them, there would 
 be no difficulty in the caseV It was because he found 
 no unity of mind or consciousness, that he had to begin 
 with merely transitory and isolated impressions; because 
 there were no objective relations discoverable that he 
 was left with no world at all— only chaos. In all proba- 
 bility Kant had never read the words of Hume which 
 I have quoted ; but his own theory of knowledge was 
 specially directed to a solution of this very difficulty 
 which, said Hume, '• is too hard for my understanding " 
 Kant's doctrine of the unity of consciousness enabled 
 him to dispense with Hume's assumption that "all our 
 
 ■ It is in his later and more popular work. Enquiry concerning 
 Human Understanding, that he attempted to limit to metaphysics and 
 theology the application of the destructive criticism which he had 
 applied to knowledge generally in A Treatise of Human Nature 
 
 ' Treatise of Human Nature, appendix, ed. Selby-Big»e d 6^6 • 
 ed. Green and Grose, vol. ., p. 559. ^ ^° ' ^' ^ ' 
 
 S. G. L. 
 
 13 
 
I g4 Value and Reality 
 
 distinct perceptions are distinct existences" ; his doctrine 
 of the forms of perception and understanding gave a 
 basis for a theory of objective relations. 
 
 This point of view enabled Kant to elaborate a 
 compact and rational system in which the atomism of 
 Hume was overcome. But one of Hume's difficulties 
 was not surmounted by him. Knowledge still remained, 
 if not divorced from reality, at any rate in only proble- 
 matical connexion with it. And the reason for this lies 
 in a similarity between his own starting-point and that 
 of Hume. The latter's enumeration of his perplexities 
 and of their sources was incomplete. Behind the as- 
 sumption that there is no mental or subjective unity of 
 experience (an assumption which treats mind as a 
 fiction), and behind the assumption that the data of 
 experience are isolated units (an assumption which 
 makes objective relations impossible), lay another as- 
 sumption which he inherited from Descartes and Locke. 
 This is the view that the direct objects in knowledge 
 are in all cases mental facts — perceptions, as Hume 
 called them, or what Descartes and Locke called ideas. 
 Kant shared this view, and hence the subjectivism 
 which clings to his system and which he was never able 
 completely to shake off. 
 
 Reid was the first systematic writer who had the 
 courage to question the ideal theory, as he called it, 
 and to work out a doctrine of knowledge founded upon 
 its denial. He held that in knowledge the subject is 
 directly aware of an external reality. There is much 
 debatable matter in his views ; but he had at least the 
 merit of recalling philosophers to an examination of 
 their assumptions. The questions in dispute cover a 
 
 The Knowledge of Existence 1 95 
 
 wide field, and the discussion of them would be in large 
 part irrelevant to our enquiry. But we do need to take 
 our bearings regari:ling them, and to come to some 
 agreement as to the application of such terms as 
 'existence' and 'reality',' and the validity of using 
 them of the object and of the subject of knowledge! 
 To do this I must risk the appearance of dogmatism. 
 But it will at least tend to clearness to state and defend 
 certain epistemological propositions, which will be 
 assumed in the sequel, even although it is not possible 
 at present to give them the full vindication of which 
 they may stand in need. 
 
 I. My first proposition is that existence is given in 
 the fact or act of knowledge. In knowing we are aware 
 of something as there ; of what nature the something 
 IS, and what exactly is implied by ' thereness '—whether! 
 for mstance, it involves spatio-temporal relations— 
 these are subsequent questions. The proposition is 
 simply that, in knowledge, existence is given. There 
 . IS indeed another meaning of knowledge— distinguished 
 in other languages, in French by the use of savoir 
 mstead oi connaitre, in German by wissen as contrasted 
 with kennen, and in English described as knowledge 
 about or knoivledge that in opposition to acquaintance 
 ivit/r. In this sense— in the sense of savoij^, wisse^i, 
 
 ' See the supplementary note on pp. 207 ff. 
 
 / The distinction between acquaintance and knowing about was 
 formulated by John Grote, Exploratio Fhilosophica, part i (1865), 
 pp. 60 fif. More recently its importance has been emphasised by 
 Mr Russell, e.g., in Problems of Philosophy, pp. 71 ff., where universals 
 as well as sense-data are regarded as objects of acquaintance. It is 
 distinctive of (Jrote's view that knowledge is regarded as never 
 completely immediate. He therefore speaks of 'knowledge of 
 
 13—2 
 
196 
 
 Value and Reality 
 
 knowing about or htoiving that—v^^ may deal with 
 abstractions from which the character of existence is 
 deliberately removed. Our knowledge of relations is 
 of this sort ; but it is founded on and arises out of the 
 more fundamental kind of knowledge described as 
 acquaintance or immediate awareness or perception. 
 Here we are aware of something existing. For the 
 assertion that it exists there can be no formal proof ; 
 but if this assertion is denied, there is no other way in 
 which existence can be reached. 
 
 2. The second proposition is derived from the 
 nature of knowledge as a subject-object relation. In 
 knowledge the subject is aware of an object which is 
 other than itself— at least than itself as the subject 
 knowing. Even the reflective consciousness of self 
 which we have in introspection, so far from having a 
 good claim to be regarded as the original and typical 
 case of knowing, attains definiteness only by making 
 the self observed an object to the subject observing, 
 and thus distinguishing it as an other. The view that 
 the primary objects of consciousness are ' mental modi- 
 fications/ and the assertion that the primary certainty 
 in knowledge is to be expressed in the proposition 
 ' sunt cogitationes,' are variations upon the assumption 
 
 acquaintance' rather than 'intuitive' or 'immediate' knowledge. 
 -This knowledge," he says, "is knowledge which, to use a homely 
 expression, would be immediate if it could " ; *' immediate or in- 
 tuitive knowledge is knowledge with the smallest amount of refiecUon 
 possible consistent with its being knowledge." " Knowledge begins 
 when reflection begins, and no earUer, for in immediateness it is 
 dormant " ; " immediateness is confusion or chaos, which reflection 
 begins to crystallize or organise." Exploratio, part 11 (1900), pp. 201, 
 203, 204, 206. 
 
 The Object as an Other igy 
 
 that the mind can know immediately only its own ideas 
 — the assumption that led to the failure of Hume and the 
 difficulties of Kant. It is indeed hard to understand 
 how the subject can know the object, the ego the non- 
 ego. But is it really any harder than to understand 
 how it can know itself.^ Knowledge is certainly a great 
 mystery, which no knowledge can explain. But why do 
 we say that the subject cannot know what is other than 
 and unlike itself '> It Is probably a physiological doctrine 
 concerning the sense-apparatus and the nervous system, 
 coupled with a materialistic view about the seat of the 
 soul In the pineal gland or other spot within the brain, 
 that has made people think that knowledge of mental 
 modifications Is more easily understood than knowledge 
 of anything else. Apart from any consideration of the 
 physiological processes which condition perception, It 
 appears to me that self-knowledge Is a subtler and 
 more elusive process, and harder to understand, than 
 the knowledge of objects which only a sophisticated 
 psychologist would think of describing as 'mental 
 modifications^' 
 
 At the same time the proposition which I am 
 formulating makes no assertion about the nature of 
 the object of which one Is aware In knowledge. It may 
 be mental In nature or It may be physical — the question 
 is left open. Only, knowledge implies something other 
 
 ^ "The subject knows the universe," says Varisco {Great Problems, 
 Eng. tr., p. in), " but only in so far as the universe is enclosed in the 
 subject." How "enclosed".? we may ask. The thing known must 
 be "in " the subject only if by "in " we mean the same as " known 
 by." In any other sense of "enclosure," the assertion involves a 
 spatial or quasi-spatial view of the nature of knowledge. 
 
198 
 
 Value and Reality 
 
 than the subject knowing. Nor does the fact of self- 
 consciousness invalidate this statement ; and this for 
 two reasons. In the first place our normal conscious- 
 ness of self is not a knowledge of the self alone, but of 
 self in commerce with objects ; there is always a con- 
 sciousness of objects other than self, on which the reflex 
 consciousness of self depends. In the second place, in 
 the deliberate process of introspection, in which we try 
 to eliminate other objects from our consciousness (always, 
 perhaps, with incomplete success), the self known is 
 objectified and distinguished from the subject. 
 
 3. The third proposition is that the object of 
 knowledge is not an isolated something. The assump- 
 tion was constantly made by Descartes and Locke that 
 objects of knowledge, or in their language ideas, are 
 given as isolated units; and Hume formulated this 
 assumption in the words that '' all our distinct percep- 
 tions are distinct existences." It is from this assumption 
 that the initial and chief difficulty concerning relations 
 arises: how do these " distinct perceptions" get organ- 
 ised into the system of knowledge ? what unity can 
 there be in a world which consists of all these " distinct 
 existences " ? But the assumption which gives rise to 
 this difficulty is not true to the facts of consciousness. 
 Distinctness is not a primitive — hardly even a normal — 
 feature of our perception or of its objects. In most 
 cases it requires art and pains to achieve it. The hen 
 mesmerised by a chalk line on the ground may be near 
 this state on one level ; the mystic wrapped in the 
 contemplation of God and unconscious of all earthly 
 concerns may be near it on anothisr level. One per- 
 ception — one thought — one ''distinct existence" may 
 
 The Objective Contimtum 199 
 
 form their universe. But, where there is any diversity 
 in consciousness or its objects, distinctness is not 
 attained without difficulty. The process of perceiving 
 or knowing is a complex and changing activity to which 
 many factors contribute without being clearly distin- 
 guished from one another, even when they point to a 
 single end ; and the object of consciousness is also 
 varied and moving ; a few points — or a single point — 
 may be prominent in the field and form its centre : but 
 this centre or prominent feature is not a "distinct 
 existence " ; it is part of the wider whole. P^acts are 
 not given or found as separate isolated existences, as 
 Locke and Hume and some modern realists suppose. 
 Distinctness is attained only by selective and concen- 
 trated attention ; and thus it betrays abstraction and 
 usually a certain artifice. Ideas, as William James 
 picturesquely put it, have ragged edges ; and I may 
 add that their edges are ragged because we have torn 
 them from their context. The same is true of objects. 
 Their distinctness from one another is not absolute but 
 only a matter of degree ; they are all portions of an 
 objective field — an object which we cannot grasp as a 
 whole, but in which we proceed to draw distinctions : 
 these distinctions being in part marked out for us by 
 differences within the objective field, and in part due to 
 our own purposes. Certain things (as we learn to call 
 them), either by their own prominence or owing to our 
 selective purpose, achieve distinctness in the objective 
 field. But even that distinctness is not isolation ; they 
 are connected with, and not absolutely separated from, 
 other portions of the field. 
 
 4. From this follows a fourth proposition. As the 
 
200 
 
 Value and Reality 
 
 things which we distinguish in the objective continuum, 
 and with which we have deahngs practical and cognitive, 
 are not isolated or "distinct existences" but portions 
 of a connected whole, so the relations which we look 
 upon as connecting one thing with another have equally 
 an objective basis. W't^re it not for these relations, or 
 for their foundation in the objective continuum, things 
 would fall apart as isolated units ; and, seeing that 
 things are not isolated units but portions of a whole, 
 their connexions one with another within the whole 
 must exist or be objective just as much as the things 
 themselves. Relations therefore belong to reality as 
 much as things do. 
 
 This fourth proposition, therefore, follows from the 
 preceding. And it has two very important consequences 
 for our theory of knowledge. 
 
 In the first place, it is inconsistent, if not with the 
 Kantian epistemology in any form, 3'et with that version 
 of it which used to be known as Neo-Kantian. The 
 relations, which give order to our knowledge and by 
 means of which we arrive at some understandino- of 
 things, are not forms imposed upon these things by 
 the subject, that is, by the actual subject or ego who 
 knows them'. The dualism of an unrelated matter, 
 somehow presented to the subject, and of immaterial 
 forms of subjective origin which are somehow applied 
 to this material, thus giving birth to objective know- 
 ledge — this dualism must be relinquished. We find 
 things in an order. We do not first supply the order and 
 
 1 'PI 
 
 The reference here, it should be noted, is not to consciousness- 
 in-general, or impersonal consciousness, as conceived, for example, by 
 Rickert ; cp. his Gegeu stand der Erketmtnis, 2nd ed., p. 67. 
 
 The Knowledge of Relations 20 1 
 
 then put the things into it : for without some order 
 there would be no things and no material for them. 
 The subject certainly plays an active part in cognition ; 
 but it plays that part by selecting the object of attention 
 and marking its limits, as much as in formulating its 
 relations. Things and relations equally are selected by 
 the subject out of an objective field in which they are 
 both present. 
 
 In the second place, the proposition has a bearing 
 on the vexed question of internal or external relations. 
 The theory of external relations, it seems to me, is 
 connected with what may be called the atomic doctrine 
 of knowledge. If we start, and are justified in starting, 
 with isolated units, "distinct perceptions" or "distinct 
 existences," then any relation which one such unit can 
 have with another such unit may be something outside 
 its own nature— an external relation. P^or what other 
 relations than external relations can we conceive as 
 belonging to independent isolated units > On the other 
 hand, when we relinquish this atomic theory, and 
 recognise that objective existence, and our perception 
 of it, is a continuum within which and between whose 
 factors we proceed to distinguish, compare, assimilate, 
 and draw many other relations, we see that these re- 
 lations belong to the continuum, or object as a whole, 
 and are within it, just as much as the artificially 
 distinguished things which form the terms of these 
 relations \ 
 
 5. To these four propositions concerning the subject- 
 object relation in knowledge and its existential impli- 
 cation, a fifth proposition should be added in order 
 
 * See further in the supplementary note, below, pp. 215 ff. 
 
202 
 
 Valtie and Reality 
 
 to define the nature and limits of self-knowledge. In 
 attempting- to formulate such a proposition, we are met 
 with a special and grave difficulty. Knowledge is a 
 subject-object relation ; the subject knows the object; 
 but when we speak of the subject knowing itself, are 
 we not using language which is meaningless .^ Know- 
 mg is a relation, and a relation needs two terms, while 
 here we have one term only. Ex vi terminorum what 
 the subject knows must be an object, and therefore it 
 cannot be the subject itself. The subject of knowledge 
 is like the eye which sees all things but itself is invisibfe. 
 This doctrine, which seems to make all psychology 
 impossible, is yet sometimes received with avidity by 
 the psychologist. ''All introspection is retrospection," 
 he says. The object which the knower has before him 
 in introspection is truly an other, something that has 
 been shed from his own life and is now a captit mortmmi, 
 a fragment of the past, and no part of the present living 
 subject of knowing and doing. 1 1 has become something 
 outside the subject-self; it is an other, an object. 
 
 This view has received distinguished support ; but 
 it seems to me to be more specious than true. Even if 
 it be the case that, in the deliberate process of intro- 
 spection, the object before us is the state of mind that 
 has just passed rather than the state at the very moment 
 
 of mtrospective observation — even if this be true yet 
 
 this past state cannot be entirely passed and done aw^ay 
 with, for then there would be nothing to observe. Its 
 traces continue into the present, and it is through their 
 persistence that observation of them is possible. All 
 retrospection, therefore, is introspection— as we may 
 say, converting the psychologist's dictum. And the 
 
 The Knowledge of Self 203 
 
 dialectic which lies behind the dictum and supports it, 
 is equally faulty. Knowledge is indeed a relation ; but 
 It is a unique relation ; and it is pure assumption to 
 assert that, in knowledge, the two terms of the relation 
 cannot stand for the same being— that the knower can- 
 not also be the known. This is simply to assume the 
 impossibility of self-knowledge, not to prove it. If we 
 wish to demonstrate that self-knowledge is impossible, 
 It is a p\mn peiitio prmcipii to set out with the assump- 
 tion that the subject cannot function as its own object. 
 The possibility of self-knowledge can only be under- 
 stood by studying the actual process. 
 
 The view that the ego or self (if there is an ego or 
 self) cannot be known has as its antithesis the view 
 that nothing else can be the direct object of knowledge. 
 This latter view also has been widely held, and is 
 expressed in the assertion that the immediate object 
 of knowledge must always be 'mental modifications,' 
 or ' ideas in the mind '—that is to say, states of the self. 
 • This view has been already criticised, and the only 
 thing that requires to be said now concerning it is that 
 It has one point of agreement with its opposite : the 
 reasons given in favour of it are not taken from an ex- 
 amination of the fact of knowledge so much as from an 
 a priori view of what knowledge must be. The former 
 view was that self-knowledge is impossible because 
 what the subject knows must be an object and there- 
 fore an other. This latter view is that knowledge cannot 
 exist without parity of nature between subject and 
 object, and consequently that subject or mind, being 
 unique in nature, must have states of mind for its 
 immediate object. Discarding both assumptions, we 
 
204 
 
 lvalue and Reality 
 
 have ground for accepting neither extreme— neither 
 that subject-knowledge is impossible, nor that all know- 
 ledge is of subjective states. 
 
 How then shall we draw the line between the object 
 which is known as Self and the object which is known 
 as Other? Shall we say that both are always inter- 
 mingled in our experience ? This also is a familiar 
 view, but never more fully or finely stated than by 
 J. F. Ferrier. He asked the question -'What is the one 
 feature w^hich is identical, invariable, and essential in 
 all the varieties of our knowledoe?" and o-ave the 
 answer in the first proposition of his histitiites of Meta- 
 physic, "Along with whatever any intelligence knows, 
 it must, as the ground or condition of its knowledge, 
 have some cognisance of itself^ 
 
 This proposition, however, is not perfectly simple ; 
 and its contents will repay analysis. 
 
 In the first place, are we to say that, as a matter of 
 fact, knowledge, however it may appear directed to one 
 object only, has always two objects.^ When we are 
 perceiving a tree, is our knowledge really two-fold— of 
 tx^^ plus self, matter mecum'^ Is ''the knowledge of 
 self," in Ferrier s words, actually ''the running accom- 
 paniment to all our knowledge ' " .^ " There is," he says, 
 "a calm unobtrusive current of self-consciousness low- 
 ing on in company with all our knowledge, and during 
 every moment of our waking existence : and this self- 
 consciousness is the ground or condition of all our other 
 consciousness. Nine hundred and ninety-nine parts of 
 our attention may be always devoted to the thino- or 
 business we have in hand: it is sufficient for our 
 
 ^ Institutes of Metaphysic, 2nd ed., p. 8r. 
 
 ' Unobtrusive Self-con scionsjiess ' 205 
 
 argument if it be admitted that the thousandth part or 
 even a smaller fraction, of it is perpetually directed 
 upon ourselves'." 
 
 But if the portion of our attention directed to self 
 is so small a fraction as this, can we be quite sure that 
 It IS an actual constituent of the mental state ? Ferrier 
 hmiself speaks of it as possibly latent%- and 'latent' 
 means that it is not an actual feature of the conscious 
 state, though appropriate conditions will make it such. 
 And this, I think, is where the truth lies: as Kant 
 puts it, the ' I think ' must be capable ^/accompanying 
 all our ideas-^— It is not necessary that it should form an 
 actual part of them all. When I reflect upon a state 
 of knowledge in order to understand what its actual 
 content was, the method of study is retrospective as 
 the psychologists have said ; it is the cognitive state of 
 a moment ago that I study, although I do so by means 
 of the trace which that state has left in my mind. Now 
 so far as I can see, that state does not in all cases con- 
 tain an element of self-consciousness which can be 
 identified as present in it. I may be entirely occupied 
 in the examination of an object of perception, or in 
 thinking about it, without the reflexion entering my 
 mental state that I am so perceiving or so thinking. 
 That reflexion is always there at call— so to speak— a 
 potential element of any cognitive state ; but it is not 
 in all cases an actual element in ii. Ihe iniiii m 
 Ferrier's doctrine and other statements to the same 
 
 ^ Institutes <rf Metaphysic, 2nd ed., p. ^2. 
 '^ loc. cit. 
 
 ' " Das Ic/i denke muss alle meine Vorstellungen begleiten 
 konnenr—Kritik der reinen Vernunft, 2nd ed., p. 132. 
 
 Ill 
 
2o6 
 
 Value and Reality 
 
 effect is that self-consciousness is continuous with con- 
 sciousness, a further development of it. From the first 
 self-consciousness is implied in every conscious state, 
 because it can be brought to light by reflexion. But it 
 is not explicit there, because reflective examination may 
 show that it did not appear m that past state. Its appear- 
 ance means the raising of mental life to a higher level'. 
 Again, in the second place, the reason why Ferrier 
 insists that this self-knowledge in all cases actually 
 accompanies our knowledge of everything else is not 
 that this knowledge of self has, in every case, some 
 additional value of its own ; he admits that it may be 
 so faint as to be negligible (and often, when present, 
 it would seem only to disturb the concentration of 
 attention on the real object of interest at the time) ; 
 but because he thinks that without it there could be no 
 knowledge of any kind whatever. Is this correct .^ Is 
 "this self-consciousness... the ground or condition of all 
 our other consciousness".^ It would be strange if this 
 view were quite correct. For, if it were, we should have 
 to admit that, when our other consciousness is at its 
 clearest and strongest, it is necessary for its ground or 
 condition to be extremely weak and faint. Those who 
 observe external things most distinctly are least dis- 
 turbed by thought or consciousness of self We should 
 need clear evidence to convince us that the conscious- 
 ness of one object always requires to be accompanied 
 by the consciousness of another object, even althou^th 
 that other object is self Surely the true condition of 
 
 ' Grote suggests that in such a state there is acquaintance with 
 self as knowing but not knowledge that one Vi\o^?..-~Exploratio 
 Philosophica, part i,. pp. 60, 6 1 . 
 
 On Certain Terms 
 
 207 
 
 all our knowledge is not a superadded consciousness of 
 self but the fact of its being a consciousness by self 1 1 
 IS the unity of the subject that makes it possible, not a 
 duality m the object. At the same time this objective 
 duality IS never far off-.- reflexion at any moment will 
 call forth the consciousness that this object is my object 
 and this IS self-consciousness. My concluding propo- 
 sition will therefore have to be stated in somewhat 
 different terms from Ferrier's first proposition, and may 
 perhaps be formulated as follows: knowledge of self 
 is distinguished from knowledge of any other object 
 inasmuch as it involves the explicit consciousness as 
 an object of that self whose activity is the condition of 
 knowledge of every kind ; and this consciousness of 
 self is implicit in all our other consciousness. 
 
 SUPPLEMENTARY NOTE 
 
 The terms Existence, Reality, etc, are not usual!)- defined 
 because they cannot be analysed into simpler components' 
 f^ut they have a meaning; and as that meanin<r varies with 
 different writers, and sometimes even with the same writer it 
 may be well to tr)- and make clear the sense in which thev are 
 used in this book. 
 
 I. Existence. Sometimes Existence is said to mean simply 
 position, or position in time and space, or at least in time or 
 position in the context of experience; at other times it is held 
 to involve permanence, or persistence in mind, or it is regarded 
 as a power of operating upon consciousness or as a permanent 
 possibility of sensation. 
 
 The first interpretation seems altogether too vague. It was 
 offered by Kant in his pre-critical treatise Der einaig mo^licke 
 Beweisgrund .zu ewer Defnonstration des Daseins Gottes ( Werke 
 ed. Hartenstein, vol. 11, p. n;). Existence is there called 
 
208 
 
 Value and Reality 
 
 "absolute position' to distinguish it from the result of the 
 process by which a quality is predicated of a thing. So far 
 Kant anticipates his criticism of the ontological argument. If 
 1 assert the proposition 'a triangle has its interior angles equal 
 to two right angles,' Kant would call that relative position. 
 But I can simply posit the concept triangle without making 
 any assertion about it, even that it exists. This is one sense in 
 which 'absolute position' might be used ; and Kant did not at 
 first distinguish this sense from his own in which existence and 
 absolute position are said to have the .same meaning. When 
 he does distinguish them, in his criticism of the ontological 
 argument {Kritik d. r. V., 2nd ed., p. 628), it is by defining 
 wherein this position has place. "Through the concept," he 
 .says, "the object is thought only as in agreement with the 
 general conditions of a possible experience in general"; but 
 when we say that it exi.sts, the object "is thought as contained 
 in the context of the whole of experience." We place it in time 
 and space (or, if it is a mental event in time only) and also in 
 the causal system to which it belongs. This is its position ; and 
 the claim of any object to existence is tested by the questions 
 where? when? what are its causes and effects? If we cannot 
 assign its position in thespatio-temporalorder.or inthe 'context 
 of experience,' we hold the a.s.sertion of its existence to be un- 
 warranted. But does existence therefore mean simply position 
 in this order? The spatio-temporal order, and in general the 
 context of experience, to which we refer, is not an immediate 
 datum of experience, but a later construction. 
 
 We have no e.xperience of space, or time, or causation, by 
 themselves : only of things in space and time and causal inter- 
 action. The spatio-temporal order does not exi.st apart from 
 the things in it ; it is rather a conceptual framework, made 
 homogeneous by our conceptual processes, into which things 
 may be fitted. Unless we had previous experiences of extended 
 and enduring things, we should have no conceptions of space 
 or time; nor any conception of causation unless we had experi- 
 ence of things acting upon one another. Accordingly it would 
 
 Existence as Position 
 
 209 
 
 seem that our first apprehension of things as existing is not 
 
 place them. It ,s also probable that, if we could have formed 
 wouldT. ;T °'''T r'"^ ^""^°"^ apprehension of things ^e 
 
 ex° enc ofTi ?' '''^ °^'^^^ •^'''"^^' -•^"'^ ^ ^° -- 
 
 ex s en e ,s s f^' 7 "^ '°"''=P^"" "^ '""^ -^^ «^ '^eir 
 e.x stence is .st.ll far from complete. On the other hand we mav 
 
 not assume that we first apprehend things as distinct exi te'es 
 
 and causal) to one another. Existing things cannot be apnre 
 hnde except as enduring and extended and as cont™ 
 w,th the.r environment. Such objects, already in a 'context of 
 experience' but with their exact position in this context til 
 undetermined, are apprehended as existing. Subsequent e 
 flexion defines their position in space and time and in tie 
 ^StT^, ''' the conviction of existence preceded tl " 
 
 Ifexi ^ ;„ , "'^ ":' "''"^'^' ^'^'"^^ -<^ fi-t apprehended 
 as e.x sting. the spatial, temporal, and causal .systems are in- 
 tellectual constructions built on this foundatiof, ; afterJIr 
 when a question ari.ses as to the existence of ai v object of 
 thought, the criterion used is whether or not it ha^ a pa ,n 
 tnese systems. Thus we get a convenient test of existence bu" 
 we have not reduced its meaning to simpler terms 
 
 When we say that any object of thought exists a contrast 
 -s suggested with .something that does not^xist. E^eryXc 
 of though, everything we can talk about, is posited in stme 
 ^^^y--has some sort of > being.' as we may call it. Certain 
 objects only have existence. How then are we to discrimina e 
 existence from mere being .^ There is an indication of the 
 answer in the familiar logical distinction of ' universes of dis! 
 cour.se, which differentiates the objects of our thought into 
 various .sy.stems or orders. (The term ' universe ' was used by 
 De Morgan to signify the "range of ideas which is eithe^ 
 expressed or understood as containing the whole matter unde 
 consideration" (/r/^,^,,, ,s,y, p. 4:); the introduction 
 of the term universe ofdi.scour.se' to convey the same meaninc. 
 s. (;. L. ^ 
 
 14 
 
2IO 
 
 Value and Reality 
 
 was, I believe, due to Dr Venn, Symbolic Logic, 1881, p. 128.) 
 It is customar)' to speak of any object of thouf>;ht as ' existing ' 
 in some universe of discourse but not necessarily in that 
 universe which we commonly call the existing universe. It is 
 better, therefore, to say that such objects have ' being' in these 
 other ' universes.' For the universe of discourse may be purely 
 imaginative or fictional or it may be a system of universals, 
 and to such universes we deny existence when 'existence' is 
 used in any sense specific enough to discriminate between 
 existing and non-existing objects. 
 
 To take an example. The object of hallucination is said 
 not to exist, as contrasted with the object of perception which 
 does exist. Now the hallucination and the perception both 
 exist as facts of mind, and are so far of the same order. But, in 
 addition, the object of perception is said to exist, whereas the 
 hallucination has not an existing object. The ground for this 
 statement is that the latter is regarded' as entirely dependent 
 upon the subjective state of mind (it has mental existence 
 only), whereas the former is not so dependent (it has also 
 extra-mental existence). Here existence signifies, negatively, 
 independence of the individual subject, and positively, that the 
 object has a place />/ reriini ?iat?tra or in the 'context of ex- 
 perience.' Here, as before, it is clear that this concept of a 
 i-eruiH Jiatura or context of experience, which is used as a 
 criterion of an object's claim to exist, is itself a comparatively 
 late result of the organisation of our experience. And a further 
 point is brought out. The hallucination is called so because 
 its object simulates an object of perception (that is, an existing 
 object) so that we are liable to mistake one for the other, and 
 consequently our primary apprehension of existence may be 
 mistaken. The only means of correcting the mistake \^ further 
 experience by which we place the objects of hallucination and 
 of perception each in its own order. 
 
 The hallucination is a hallucination because its mental 
 existence is mistaken for an extra-mental existence : there is 
 a confusion of universes of discourse. In organising experience 
 
 Existence as Permanence 2 1 1 
 
 we form a concept of mental existence which we distinguish 
 from that of the world of material things-calling the Tatter 
 external and the former internal. Certain differences may be 
 traced between the two : {a) The material existent has a certain 
 hxity due to its spatial position; although its position may 
 be changed, its spatial extension remains, and the change of 
 position may be traced in relation to the position of other 
 material bodies. (/.) It has a certain permanence, of which we 
 become aware through the power of the individual subject to 
 repeat his experience of it under certain conditions (r) It is 
 trans-subjective, being an object which is common to all normal 
 experients under appropriate conditions. The mental state is 
 contrasted with it in these respects : (^) It is not extended or 
 determmed by spatial relations, {b) As compared with external 
 things It IS transient-though the transience of the mental 
 state IS relative to another \{ more recondite feature of con- 
 sciousness, the permanence of the individual mind U) It is 
 directl)' apprehended by one subject onI>'. These are some of 
 the characteristics which may seem to gxv^ material existents 
 greater precision and even greater certaintv than mental 
 existents. 
 
 On the other hand, in spite of the rapid change of mental 
 states, self or subject \<. a continuous factor in our conscious- 
 ness, whereas our apprehension of material things is after all 
 only intermittent. Hence many philosophers htve been at a 
 loss to justify our assertion of the existence of material thin-s 
 when we are not perceiving them. Hence also have arisen the 
 attempts to explain the material world without ascribing to it 
 an existence independent of our perception. When indepe'iident 
 existence is denied to the external world, an effort may still be 
 made to vindicate in some way its continuous existence m 
 spite of our intermittent perception of it. J. S. Mill's theory of 
 permanent possibilities of sensation is the leading case in point 
 These "groups of possibilities" are regarded as ''the funda- 
 mental reality m nature," and " the reliance of mankind on the 
 real existence of visible and tangible objects, means reliance on 
 
 14—2 
 
I 
 
 212 
 
 Value and Reality 
 
 the reality and permanence of possibilities of visual and tactual 
 sensations, when no such sensations are actually experienced " 
 {Examination of Hamilton s PhilosopJiy, 5th ed.. pp. 232, 233). 
 Existence (as predicated of material things) is thus reduced 
 to a species of the genus possible, its specific differentia being 
 that it becomes actual under assignable conditions. This, 
 which he calls permanence, is for Mill the distinguishing mark 
 of existence. To nearly the same effect Spencer says, "existence 
 means nothing more than persistence" {Principles of Psychology^ 
 § 59). Whatever the value of Mill's theory as a psychological 
 account of belief in an external world, it seems clear that 
 existence is a more fundamental concept than permanence 
 The latter is arrived at only after repeated experiences in which 
 the former has been involved. These experiences of objects, 
 however, are not strictly instantaneous ; they have duration ; 
 and there is no such complete break between one experience 
 and its successor as to make it difficult to understand the 
 formation of the idea of a comparatively permanent object. 
 Permanence, however, is a convenient test not so much of 
 existence or non-existence, as of the extra-mental or merely 
 mental existence of objects. Images are normally transient, 
 changing with the flow of consciousness, whereas objects of 
 sense-perception are comparatively permanent, or, more strictly, 
 are capable of re-instatement in consciousness in accordance 
 with definite conditions. But the tests formerly referred to — 
 position in time, space, and the causal system — do serve to dis- 
 criminate between what exists and what does not exist : for 
 instance, they mark off universals as belonging to a different 
 universe of discourse from that of existing things. They are not 
 the ground of our idea of existence, being themselves dependent 
 on previous perceptions of existents ; but, when an object is 
 not immediately known as existing, they may enable us to 
 infer its existence, by finding its connexion with other existents, 
 thus placing it in the context of an existing system. 
 
 2. Being. We apply the term 'being' to certain objects of 
 thought to which we do not ascribe existence. This distinction 
 
 Being and Existence 2 1 3 
 
 is not found in every language. Plato, for example, was in a 
 difficulty from not having this distinction of terms. He ascribed 
 be,ng or existence to the ideas which are the objects of intellect 
 and could not admit that the individual thu.gs which are objects 
 of sense-perception had being or existence in the same sense • 
 hey anse and decay: they ... not. In modern terminology' 
 we commonly say that the individual things which ue perceiv'' 
 a e. exist or have beu.g, and that the universals which are 
 oojects of thought are or have being, but do not exist Ex't! 
 
 a gxroup of objects of thought which widens indefinitely. These 
 
 U^I'ltT' -:''^T^ ^-- ^ -y varying sS::^ 
 \\ ha that status ,s in each case may be matter of controversy 
 But It would seen, that ^beents' may all be arranged in an ordei^ 
 determined by their connexion with existence. \he blue sky 
 IS an existent; but the quality blue is not apprehended as by 
 Itself an existent. The blue of the sky which I now see is a 
 feature of, or factor in, an existing thing; but this particular 
 blue, in being abstracted from the thing to which it belongs is 
 potentially generalised, thus losing its individualitv and proper 
 existence. Similarly, the concept 'man ' does not exist, on y this 
 that and the other man. ' Man,' like ' blue,' has being only not 
 existence ; but its being is based upon the existents ffom vhich 
 the concept is derived. The same view may be defended for 
 other beents-number, for example-which are further removed 
 by abstraction from existing things, but have reference to them 
 and are illustrated by them. Again, we ascribe being but Z 
 existence to the relations between existing things; Jet these 
 relations are factors in a total existing complex u^ich'i nclud 
 bo h the hings and their relations. Other more formal relations 
 hold of classes and qualities, and these are still further removed 
 from existence ; but they also are based upon the nature 
 of the classes or qualities, and the nature of the classes or 
 qualities is based upon existents. Imaginative or fictional con- 
 cepts present a new combination of qualities and relations 
 founded upon experience of existence of some kind, but com 
 
214 
 
 Value and Reality 
 
 bined in a manner due to subjective interests. And the diversity 
 of possible interests allows of the formation of concepts which 
 are inconsistent with the facts of existence or even with a valid 
 conceptual system. Further, the interest which determines the 
 formation of the concept may be purely private and personal, 
 and there may be no reason for assuming that the 'being' 
 ascribed to the object is independent of the particular subject 
 who forms the concept. It may even have no intelligible 
 meaning, may be merely a combination of letters, like abraca- 
 dabra, or a pseudo-combination of inconsistent qualities, like 
 circular square ; and in such cases we hesitate to ascribe even 
 being to the concept. The reference in a judgment which 
 Meinong calls its 'objective' may also be said to have being ; 
 and here also there is the same kind of connexion (more or less 
 close and more or less accurate) with existence. Reviewing 
 all these cases in which being but not existence is predicated, 
 we see that they range from cases which are almost indis- 
 tinguishable from existence (the being of a feature or quality 
 of an existing thing) to cases inconsistent with existence (the 
 being of a concept which contradicts the conditions of possible 
 experience). The one common characteristic is a certain ob- 
 jectivity ; but tms objectivity may be conferred by the subject 
 only, in positing an idea in his own mind or a proposition 
 formulated by him. 
 
 3. Reality. Here I can only state the sense in which I use 
 the term. In my usage it is nearly equivalent to existence, but 
 with two differences. In the first place, it marks its object off 
 from the imaginary, although the imaginary has always exist- 
 ence as a mental fact. In the second place, reality and real are 
 used not only of the existing things to which, through our per- 
 ceptive and intellectual processes, a measure of independence 
 has been ascribed ; but also to those factors in the conditions 
 and behaviour of existing things to which we do not assign 
 existence by themselves, although without them the things 
 would not be what they are. Thus, for example, gravitation 
 belongs to reality or is real, because without it the physical 
 
 External Relations 
 
 215 
 
 world would not be what it is. Mathematical and logical rela- 
 t.ons are also spoken of as real, because constitutive of the 
 nature of the universe ; and it is argued that values belong, to 
 
 Tve of " r""' """T^ "''^ '■''^"^'■^^'' ■'^^^°"- ' -^P-k' how- 
 ever of reahs.ng a value, meaning by that the process of so 
 
 mod,fymg the nature of existents that the value becomes a 
 feature of existing situations or persons. If I had used some 
 other phrase such as • bringing into actual existence/ there 
 wou d have been more exact consistency with the use of "real '• 
 but there d.d not seem to be so great a danger of ambiguity as 
 to necessuate the discarding of a familiar term for an awkuLd 
 phrase. I do not restrict the use of the term reality to 'ultimate' 
 or fundamental' reality; nor do I use the term in a 'honorific' 
 or eulog,st.c sense ,cp. Urban, >,.-«,,/„//>/,//,,,,./ ^^, ^,^. 
 1917. P- 3 r2). ^ -"' •■ ' 
 
 4- Relations. This seems the most appropriate place for a 
 note explanatory of what was said about externa! relations on 
 
 p.20i,andpreparatoryforsomepartsofthesucceedingargument 
 A portion of the objective continuum, provided it contains 
 diversity within it, may be called a complex. It is not strictly 
 a whole, because it is not isolated from the environing portions 
 of the objective continuum: but it is a whole relatively to the 
 parts which make up its internal diversity. In considerin<r the 
 problem of relations we may restrict ourselves to a complex 
 of this sort, and ask what the nature is of the relations which 
 we find between the parts (these parts being denominated by 
 us things or terms) of this complex. The obvious answer is 
 that the relations are internal to the complex, though they may 
 be external to the distinguished things or terms within this 
 complex. Whether they are thus external is a question uhich 
 cannot be discussed fully here, but I think the answer to it will 
 depend on our ability to get down to absolutely simple thin<Ts 
 or terms. If we can do so, their relations to one another may 
 be found to be external to the terms ; but if we are not dealinc. 
 with simple terms then there is more .scope for the relation 
 being grounded in the nature of the terms. 
 
2l6 
 
 Value mid Reality 
 
 When we sa\' 'the knife is to the left of the book,' we assert 
 a relation 'to the left of which the knife holds to the book. 
 Our reference is to a 'complex object/ as Mr Russell says 
 ( PhilosopJiical Essays, p. 1 82 ; cp. Problerns of Philosophy, p. i 59 ). 
 This complex object he calls 'knife-to-left-of-book.' But it is 
 really more complex than this. It is the knife and the book 
 in certain spatial positions relatively to one another. The knife 
 is at a definite distance to the left of the book, and it is on 
 the same level as the book or else higher or lower than it by 
 a definite amount. Further, each portion of the knife is at 
 a definite (and perhaps different) distance from each por- 
 tion of the book. These details do not interest us, even if we 
 observe them; all that interests us is that every part of the 
 knife is at some distance to the left of the book. We form this 
 concept ^to the left of to describe a i^n-eat many different 
 spatial relations which all agree in this one respect. But the 
 objective ground of the relation is not a universal ' to-the-left- 
 ness,' somewhere within the complex, but just those numerous 
 definite spatial relations which we imperfectly observe and 
 describe. 
 
 It is clear that the relation which we assert is a relation 
 actuall)- found, or at least supposed to be present, within the 
 complex object. To change this relation a change would re- 
 quire to be brought about within this complex object. On the 
 other hand there is nothing in knife or book (apart from their 
 position in the complex) which makes this particular relation 
 'to the left of follow from the nature of either or both (cp. 
 Russell, Journal of Philosophy, vol. VIII, 191 3, p. 159). The 
 knife may be transferred to the right of the book, or to the 
 top of it, or their relative positions may be otherwise changed, 
 without any noticeable change in either knife or book. Hence 
 the nature of the knife, or of the book, clearly does not con- 
 stitute the relation ' to the left of But yet this relation would 
 not hold unless knife and book had natures of a certain kind. 
 If either of them had neither spatial extension nor spatial posi- 
 tion, the relation would be impossible. A ground or condition 
 
 The GroHud of Relations 
 
 217 
 
 of their having such a relation is that both have spatial posi- 
 tion ; that is to say, the relation between them is grounded in 
 their having spatial position. Now, a.s knife and book are 
 impossible except as extended in space, extension in space 
 belongs to their nature. Consequently the relation is grounded 
 in the nature of the terms. The result for this case is that the 
 relation is constituted by W\^ nature of the complex object, and 
 that it is sXso grounded in the natures of the related parts 
 
 Does this hold generall>^ ? So far as I can see, when there 
 is a relation between two existing things, it is always grounded 
 in some characteristic of one or both of them. It may be argued, 
 however (cp. Russell, Journal of Phihsophy^ vol. viii. p.'^isg)' 
 (I) that simple terms could have no relations at all if all rela- 
 tions were grounded in the nature of the terms, and (2 ) that all 
 complexes are made up of simple terms. As regards (i), it 
 seems evident from the example (a point with spatial position 
 only) that a simple term with one characteristic only would 
 owing to that characteristic possess a necessary ground for an 
 infinite number of relations to other terms (that is, points): 
 although the term in the example would not possess the 
 necessary ground for other than spatial relations. (2) The 
 second assertion is commonly regarded as self-evident. Thus 
 Mr Russell holds that the denial of external relations would 
 involve the complexity of every term and that this is a reductio 
 ad absurduni. (Cp. also his Our Knozvledge of the External 
 World, p. 145.) Leibniz formulated the same doctrine in the 
 second proposition of his Monadology : '' There must be simple 
 substances, since there are compounds " ; giving as his reason 
 for the statement that "a compound is nothing but a collection or 
 aggregate of simple things." But the reason given is merely 
 verbal. If by "compound " is meant a combination of simple 
 things which once existed, or even could exist, separately, then 
 it is not self-evident that "there are compounds." Unless 
 "compound" means this, its components may not be simple, [f 
 "compound " means a whole in which analysis discovers variety, 
 then it does not follow that " there must be simple substances." 
 
2l8 
 
 yalue and Reality 
 
 There are really two assumptions in Leibniz's argument: 
 (I) that our analysis can discover simple elements; (2) that 
 these elements, if discovered, would be found to be "simple 
 substances," that \^, capable of independent existence. Grounds 
 are needed to justify both assumptions, for (i) our analysis of 
 existents never reaches absolutely simple elements, and (2) even 
 if we assume that there must be such, they may be incapable 
 of existing otherwise than as elements in a whole. We are not 
 acquainted with existing things which are simple. 
 
 It is always possible to abstract in thought a single quality 
 from an existing thing or complex, and to consider this quality 
 alone. We shall in this way arrive at a simple term but not at 
 a simple existent. 1 do not underrate the importance of the 
 enquiry into relations between terms or entities such as abstract 
 qualities, though my general argument does not require me 
 to enter upon it. But it seems to me that there is a tendency, 
 in defending the doctrine of external relations, to take such 
 abstract entities instead of existents as the terms with which 
 we have to deal, and then to interpret existents after their 
 likeness. Thus Mr Spaulding {The New Realism, p. 479), in 
 defining the doctrine of external relations, gives as its first 
 implication the proposition that '' both a term and a relation 
 are (unchangeable) elements or entities." If so, then the term 
 cannot stand for an existent, for existents are never unchange- 
 able and (so far as our acquaintance goes) never elements. 
 Mr Russell deals so constantly with concrete situations that I 
 doubt his being prepared to accept Mr Spaulding's view. 
 Sometimes, indeed, his discussion of a particular topic {e.g., 
 the way in which he deals with the 'simple things' whose 
 coming together makes a ' fact,' in Our Knowledge of the 
 External World, p. 5 i ) may seem to suggest a similar doctrine ; 
 but I do not think that he has made any statement from which it 
 can be inferred. If it is only the (hypothetical) ultimate simple 
 constituents of reality whose relations are external, then the 
 doctrine of external relations should be re-stated in accordance 
 with this view. 
 
 IX 
 
 THE DIVISION OF REALITY 
 
 1 HE epistemological propositions, which have been 
 formulated and defended, were not put forward as a 
 substitute for a theory of knowledge. But they may 
 serve to explain, and perhaps to justify, a point of view. 
 They clear the ground and enable us to proceed to 
 the consideration of the factors in that first division of 
 reality which has been already set forth in outline. 
 
 The last point reached in these propositions con- 
 cerned the knowledge of self The order of statement 
 was not intended to be significant; yet it is the case 
 that, in the process of our experience, outward things 
 attain a measure of definiteness and explicitness before 
 the conception of the self is clearly formed. This is the 
 order of knowledge: wc look outward towards objects 
 before the mind by a reflex effort turns back upon itself. 
 This reflexion, however, convinces us that self is not 
 just one object amongst others— a later product in time 
 than many and difficult of description by the same 
 terms. We see that, in recognising the self, we are 
 recognising a factor that has been present throughout 
 our experience, and without which no experience at all 
 would have been possible. Self does not need to be 
 known in order that knowledge of anything else may be 
 possible; at least so I have contended. But it must be 
 
220 
 
 The Division of Reality 
 
 there and at work. Its conscious or cognitive activity 
 is always required in order that experience may exist. 
 Perhaps there may. be things, but there can be no 
 objects or known things, without self or subject to 
 make them possible. In nature, therefore, it is prior to 
 all other objects of knowledge; and its place in reality 
 calls for notice in the first place. 
 
 It is by reflexion— by a backward glance — that we 
 arrive at knowledge (or an idea) of the self. But this 
 reflex knowledge is only possible because the life of 
 self precedes it in our immediate experience. And it 
 is not as a mere thinker or knower that self itself is 
 either experienced or known. The problem of know- 
 ledge has been too much with us. and has tended 
 sometimes to obscure our view of the realities which 
 knowledge can reveal. We are occupied with the con- 
 ditions which make it possible for a subject to cognise 
 an object, and we come to think of the self as a mere 
 subject of knowledge— even as a sort of spectator set 
 behind a window, upon whom images of things impinge 
 through the glass. Or we go further and, with Leibniz, 
 say that monads— that is, selves— have no windows, 
 but that each is a microcosm, a little picture of the 
 universe, and that what a man sees is just this picture 
 developing into greater clearness. But it is not thus 
 that self is either experienced or known. It is never 
 the mere subject of knowledge, but always active and 
 acted upon, a participant in the course of reality, creative 
 and created, fashioned by the force of circumstance, 
 moulding things as it works its way through them, and 
 feeling in its own life every emotion of the adventure. 
 Not only have selves windows, therefore ; we may say 
 
 The Individuality of the Self 
 
 221 
 
 that they have doors, through which they go out and 
 in in daily commerce with the things of nature. They 
 are not unspotted by the world. There is no such thing 
 as a pure ego: it is simply an abstract conception of 
 the centre of experience; and the centre is perpetually 
 gathering new experience which expands the circunv 
 ference. In perception idea and science, as well as in 
 emotion desire and volition, it does not merely mirror 
 the world; it adds also to its own life, and gives ful- 
 ness and precision to the ego of experience. 
 
 Ihe nature of this empirical self undergoes con- 
 tinuous modification as fresh factors are added to it, 
 and other details become blurred or fall away; its peri- 
 phery is continually expanding and being defined. 
 Herein unity is always incomplete, though it is always 
 being sought. The true individuality of the self does 
 not rest upon the resemblance or other relations be- 
 tween its successive states as facts of mind; the resem- 
 blance of one mind to another may be never so great, 
 but that has no effect on the consciousness which each 
 man has of his own identity; his individuality is rooted 
 in the common centre of reference in all his states of 
 mind: they are experienced and recognised as his— 
 as one in spite of their differences. The feeling of 
 pleasure or displeasure is, I believe, the experience 
 which brings home to a man most convincingly this 
 identity of the self as a continuous life\ This expe- 
 rience compels him to a subjectivity of attitude which 
 
 ' "A subject without feeling would care nothing for itself or any- 
 thing else— such a subject would have no existence for itself, would 
 not strictly exist at all."— Varisco, The Great Frobiems, Eng. transL, 
 p. 97. 
 
222 
 
 The Division of Reality 
 
 he cannot confuse with the experience of any one else. 
 We can almost imagine that an intelligence without 
 pleasure or pain might confuse his own thoughts or 
 ideas with another's. But pleasure and pain make him 
 feel himself an individual distinct from all others, whose 
 feelings may indeed, as we put it, be shared after a 
 fashion, but still remain unmistakably his own. Joy 
 and sorrow call forth the sense of identity and leave 
 no room for doubt that each has his own individual 
 point of view. 
 
 Herein lies the difference between the self — any 
 self — and a thing. A thing is apprehended by us as a 
 mere object — an object which is not also a subject, at 
 least so far as our knowledw of it oroes. We can find 
 no inner unity in a thing, such that all its changing 
 states have a reference to some central point which 
 affirms its individuality. On what grounds, then, do 
 we speak of the individuality of a thing .^ We ascribe 
 individuality to some artificial product — a statue, for 
 instance — which has been shaped by the hand of man 
 into unity and in which we can recognise the purpose 
 of a mind. Or we may attribute it to some object 
 which stands out in the field of perception with a par- 
 ticularity which engrosses the attention or which makes 
 it resemble a human product — to- the boulder, for in- 
 stance, which the storms of an earlier age have left 
 standing on the bare moor. But we seek it in vain in 
 the block of unhewn marble as it lay in the quarry 
 before it had been touched by pick or chisel. Thus we 
 allow ourselves to treat anything as an individual w^hich 
 will serve our purpose as such, or which stands out 
 distinctly from the midst of a fainter context; and we 
 
 The Individuality of Things 223 
 
 may cease to regard it as an individual when the pur- 
 pose no longer serves, or when its distinctness has 
 faded. Here therefore individuality does not belong to 
 the externa] thing in its own right, but either is con- 
 ferred upon it by mind or marks only a superior degree 
 of distinctness in some part of the objective continuum. 
 If individuality is to mean something more than 
 this there are only two ways in which it can be found 
 in material things. It must be sought either in the 
 smallest parts of which things consist or in the largest 
 whole to which they belong. And neither way leads to 
 any certain result. The atoms, which for long seemed 
 to the physical philosopher to be the ultimate and in- 
 divisible constituents of the material universe, have 
 yielded to scientific analysis and proved themselves no 
 true individuals; nor is there any ground for believing 
 that the electrons of present theory represent the final 
 result of all future analysis. And our search for the 
 complete whole of the physical universe, equally with 
 our search for its smallest parts, seems to lead into the 
 infinite. We may indeed say that the (possibly) in- 
 finitely small atom or electron is an individual, or that 
 the (possibly) infinite material world-whole is an indi- 
 vidual. But both the infinitesimal unit and the com- 
 plete or infinite whole are speculative constructions of 
 our own, and neither of them enters into our experience. 
 In the object as object— the object which is not also 
 subject— no individuality of its own can be found, though 
 an idea may be formed of a hypothetical individualky 
 at the limits of experience. 
 
 The common-sense view of the external world re- 
 gards it as consisting of a number of things, distinct 
 
224 
 
 The Division of Reality 
 
 from one another, but connected together by a variety 
 of relations. This view — we now see — requires modi- 
 fication in its foundation. Not only is the distinctness 
 of thing from thing incomplete; but, such as it is, it is 
 due either to the comparative distinctness of certain 
 parts of a continuous field, or else it is relative to the 
 interests of the persons who perceive and handle the 
 things. Apart from this, there is no clear line of dis- 
 tinction between thing and thing or between one thing 
 and the rest of the material whole. Such distinction 
 as there is is a matter of degree, and altogether without 
 that precise discrimination which marks off one con- 
 scious self from another conscious self and gives it a 
 position of its own within the universe. 
 
 Physical or material science is not concerned with 
 that subjective unity which distinguishes conscious ex- 
 perience, and this is the reason why it never reaches 
 the true individual. Indeed, its proper concern is not 
 with the individual at all, but, as has been already- 
 shown, with the universal — the law. Whether it 
 follows the path of analysis or that of synthesis, its 
 interest is always in the general principles which it may 
 succeed in formulating, not in the particular things 
 which confirm and illustrate these principles. Its own 
 effort after completeness does, however, in spite of its 
 preference for the universal, force it to take account of 
 the individual or to offer some explanation of it. But 
 the individual self always remains a puzzle or a stum- 
 bling-block, something that is never explained, or at 
 most is explained away. As has been remarked, for 
 physical science and for the philosophy founded upon 
 it, spiritual unities are simply interpolations in the text 
 
 Subjective Idealism 'Z2c^ 
 
 of reality '. Science may show how the conceptions have 
 arisen ; but from the true text of the book of nature, as 
 edited by naturalism, they are expunged. 
 
 It may appear perhaps as if, when we start from an 
 opposite point of view and recognise from the outset 
 the subjective unity of experience, a corresponding 
 deadlock will be reached. The case has, indeed, often 
 been put m this way. Start with material things, and 
 you may reach a professedly complete account of the 
 universe, yet one in which mind or subject has no place. 
 1 ake your stand at the point of certainty which your 
 own consciousness reveals, and at the end of your 
 enquiry as at the beginning you will have to recognise 
 that all the objects of your knowledge-" all the choir 
 of heaven and furniture of the earth "—are at bottom 
 only 'mental modifications.' The spectre of Subjective 
 Idealism, it is true, has had its seat very near the desk 
 of many philosophers, and sometimes made them write 
 as If they were disembodied souls. But, in so doing, 
 they have misinterpreted the facts which they expe- 
 rienced and on which their theories were based. What 
 we are conscious of is never the mere or pure subject 
 It always includes something objective and other than 
 the subject. The passage between subject and object 
 IS not blocked in this direction. There is no object (at 
 least within the sphere of our knowledge, the sphere 
 m which all the sciences are included) without a sub- 
 ject. And the subject is never— at least never known 
 or experienced— without an object. Our conscious life 
 has its being in traffic with objects; and this traffic is 
 
 ' VV. Dilthey, ' Wesen der Philosophic,' Kultur der Gegemvart 
 part I, div. vi, p. 59. ' 
 
 15 
 
 o. O. L. 
 
226 
 
 The Division of Reality 
 
 not cognitive merely but practical also. Knowledge is 
 only one feature of those objective dealings with things 
 in which our life consists. 
 
 From the first, therefore, self is knowni as in com- 
 merce with an environment which is other than it; and 
 this environment both gives opportunity for its life and 
 also serves to limit its activities. Although an other, 
 the environment is necessary for the realisation of the 
 self. Further, a portion of this environment functions 
 as its body, is used as the expression of its thoughts 
 and desires, and forms the medium of its communica- 
 tion with the world beyond. Although the body is 
 indissolubly connected with the extra-organic w^orld, so 
 that there is a constant passage of material from one to 
 the other, the former possesses an individuality which 
 the latter does not manifest; and it owes this indivi- 
 duality to its being the direct expression of the life of 
 the subject or mind. Thus men recognise each other's 
 embodiment : other selves are not scattered about 
 vau^uely in the material universe, without any marks to 
 distinguish them ; the primitive animism which sees 
 mind in every physical object is soon discarded ; and 
 we are seldom mistaken in the external appearance of 
 another self. In this way, also, individuality is ascribed 
 to other bodies— to animals and plants — which exhibit 
 the signs of life, although on a lower level than that of 
 human consciousness. It is not because of their external 
 finish, but because that finish is the sign of an inner 
 life, that we treat them as beings with an existence for 
 themselves, and therefore as quasi selves. 
 
 There is still another aspect of the relation betw^een 
 self and environment which calls for attention. Partly 
 
 Things and Persons 
 
 227 
 in imitadon of the environment, partly in contrast with 
 
 ^uilhed f \ ''' '""^^^ "'^ ^'^ '■°-^^- -d distin- 
 guished rom the outer world. The inner world-the 
 
 world of thoughts memories, desires, and ideals-serve 
 
 as a m,rror of the external world, as an earnest of i 
 
 poss.b u,es, as a standard for judging it, and as a guidt 
 
 for our own reactions upon it. It enables us also to 
 
 form the conception of other existents which have not 
 
 selves. The social consciousness as a factor in experi- 
 ence does not arise from these conceptions: but in them 
 we may see the origin of the conception of society a!" 
 d.stmct object. To societies or groups of men we asst-n 
 an ex,stence which is not the same as the existent 
 
 sneak "hi"' — '^uents: and thus we come to 
 speak-whether metaphorically or literally, at least in- 
 telhg,bly of a general will or the social mind. 
 
 1 he foregoing considerations lead us to make cer- 
 tain mod.ficafons in that first division of existents with 
 wh.ch we started. The division into things and persons 
 suggests a correspondence between the two members 
 .^Mch we have not been able to verify. The ground 
 of the apparent duahsm is in the underlying subject- 
 object relation, but that does not justify a separation of 
 he subject-world from the object-world and an asser- 
 
 ZL Z"'t " °''^^'' — PO"dence between 
 
 them. We have no experience of one without the other • 
 and the only mdividualising factor which we have been 
 
 have -"m s' 1 "''t- r '"' '" ^'^ ^"'J*^^^- ^"f^- - 
 have ( I) Selves, wh.ch possess or accrue a material 
 
 ernbodnnent, an inner life, and a social place and func- 
 t.on-to the last of which, in particular, is due their 
 
 15-2 
 
228 
 
 The Division of Reality 
 
 description as persons. (2) Similar unities, on an inferior 
 level, are found throughout the organic world; their 
 inner life, so far as we can form an estimate of it, 
 though it is always markedly below the human in unity 
 and Independence, varies indefinitely from the point 
 nearest the human down to the point at which it is 
 almost impossible to speak of each member as having 
 a life of its own. Their sociality may be at a minimum 
 or it may be so developed as to obscure all indivi- 
 duality. The more nearly they resemble man in bodily 
 organisation and in behaviour the more clearly do we 
 recognise that they cannot be regarded simply as things. 
 The absence of this organisation and of any definite 
 distinction of thing from thing in the inorganic world 
 makes us hesitate to assign inner life to that region 
 after the fashion of hylozoist and panpsychic specula- 
 tion. And a similar but opposite reason— the absence 
 of material embodiment— is one of the reasons which 
 make us hesitate to speak of the social mind or general 
 will as an existent. There remains (3) the region of 
 material things, which we class as existent, but the 
 constituents of which are without the individuality that 
 characterises persons and even quasi-persons. The dis- 
 tinction of thing from thing is largely our distinction, 
 imposed for our purposes or as a record of our im- 
 pressions, upon a material whose own order shows 
 differences, indeed, both in quality and in quantity, but 
 each portion of which merges in its neighbour. Even 
 the animate body, regarded as merely material, retains 
 no permanent distinction from its environment. Its 
 individuality is due to the life or mind expressed 
 through it. 
 
 The Status of Relations 229 
 
 When we turn to the next division of reality— the 
 sphere of relations — we seem to pass into an entirely 
 different domain. Relations are recognised as abstract 
 and universal, not concrete and individual like the 
 members of the preceding group. They share the fate 
 of universals — becoming a subject of controversy which 
 often appears unreal. By one type of idealism— which 
 may be called the Platonic— a higher kind of reality is 
 ascribed to them than any that belongs to particular 
 things. According to another type of idealism, which 
 owes its currency to Kant, they are regarded as super- 
 added by the subject of knowledge to a pre-existino- 
 formless material. Against both these views I seek to 
 maintain the thesis that relations belong to reality as 
 much as things do— and to the same existing reality. 
 
 The universal, such as man, planet, or the like, has 
 not an existence separate from all the particular in- 
 stances of it — from all men or all planets, for example ; 
 its existence is in re, in each of the particulars. This 
 much may be taken for granted here, as indeed the 
 doctrine underlies all that has been said previously. 
 Now relations are in exactly the same case. The rela- 
 tion expressed in the law of gravitation, for example, 
 is a universal, and as such does not possess a separate 
 existence apart from actual attracting bodies. Given 
 •any two bodies at any time, we define their tendency 
 to approach one another in accordance with this for- 
 mula. Here then we have a statement about an actual 
 present relation, defined no doubt by universals — as 
 all individual cases and things are — but descriptive of 
 an actual situation. The law of gravitation is simply a 
 general formula which describes a relation which holds 
 
230 The Division of Reality 
 
 in this case and in all other cases of two material bodies 
 in space. When we discuss the reality of relations, what 
 we are thinking of is not the reality of the general for- 
 mula, but the reality of the relation as it is in this and 
 other particular cases. Just in the same way when we 
 say ' man is mortal ' we do not mean that the concept 
 man dies, but that all individual men die owing to their 
 nature as men. The universal relation may thus have 
 existence in rebus in the same way as the universal 
 species or genus has — provided, of course, we have 
 grounds for asserting that particular instances of the 
 relation in question are actually found. 
 
 If we take things as they are presented in our ex- 
 perience we find that it is impossible to conceive them 
 without the relations in which they stand to one another. 
 Apart from these relations the things could not be said 
 to exist. Even supposing the spectator himself could 
 be unaffected by the abrogation of the 'laws of nature,' 
 there would be no nature for him to observe. Let us 
 imagine for a moment that physical relations were 
 absent — that there were no attraction of one body for 
 another, no cohesion between the particles of a body, 
 no law or principle of combination of atoms into a mole- 
 cule, and no relation of its constituents determining 
 the comparative permanence of the atom. In such a 
 case there would be no perceptible or knowable world. 
 Further, we should have to deny to things any spatial 
 relations to one another and any succession or simul- 
 taneity in time. Would there be any meaning in saying 
 that things, or the world, still existed ? This ultra- 
 Kantian 'thing-in-itself ' would be unintelligible in any 
 fashion ; not only the forms of perception but the cate- 
 
 T kings and Relations 23 1 
 
 gories also would be inapplicable to it ; it could not be 
 thought in anyway. A material thing is inconceivable 
 and impossible apart from relations. Relations are ac- 
 cordingly as necessary to the existence of things, as 
 things are to the existence of relations. Both are re- 
 quired in the constitution of the real. The distinction 
 of relations from things is due to our analysis, not to 
 an actual separation between them. It is true that con- 
 crete things may remain comparatively unchanged while 
 certain relations are altered, but the relations cannot 
 be entirely removed and the things remain. 
 
 It is equally true that relations need things for their 
 validity. It is easy to see that the ' laws of nature,' for 
 mstance, would be without meaning apart from a nature 
 whose laws they are. But it may not be so obvious 
 that the same holds when the things related do not 
 themselves exist. Relations may connect terms which 
 do not denote existing objects and may belong to any 
 conceivable 'universe of discourse.' As already shown \ 
 these terms, to which we ascribe being only but not 
 existence, have been formed by abstraction from objects 
 of concrete experience but are considered apart from 
 their context in reality. To fix these abstractions and 
 facilitate our thinking about them is the chief function 
 of symbols. The symbol itself (whether it stand for an 
 
 existent or an abstraction) is itself an existing object 
 
 a picture or a sound ; but its visible or audible character 
 does not concern us, only its meaning. And the meaning 
 of a symbol (that is, of those symbols which stand for 
 a term not for an operation) may be a material existent 
 or body, or a spiritual existent or mind, or a merely 
 
 ^ Cp. above, pp. 213 f. 
 
232 
 
 The Division of Reality 
 
 fictional or imaginary object, or a quality or any cha- 
 racteristic abstracted from one of these. It is not to 
 signify abstractions only that symbols are used. Without 
 the use of symbols we should have only the most ele- 
 mentary 'knowledge about' objects. The apprehension 
 of relations of every kind, except in its rudiments, is 
 throughout dependent on the use of symbols. But the 
 relations cognised hold not between the symbols, but 
 between the meanings for which these symbols stand. 
 The meaning of a symbol used in a proposition is the 
 object which it signifies, and the meaning of the pro- 
 position lies in its application to the objects of which 
 the terms are symbols. The symbol itself is arbitrary, 
 accepted from tradition or selected for its convenience 
 in manipulation. The thing signified must be known 
 otherwise, either by direct experience, or indirectly by 
 some inference from or refinement of experience. Sym- 
 bolical knowledge, accordingly, and in general all rela- 
 tional knowledge, will be found to rest ultimately upon 
 a basis of immediate, or what Leibniz called intuitive, 
 knowledge. 
 
 But although the ultimate basis of all knowledge 
 may be the same, namel)', immediate experience, its 
 objective reference may vary from the concrete facts of 
 existence to the limits of possible abstraction. At the 
 same time, the use of the same sort of symbols, what- 
 ever the objects symbolised may be, tends to hide the 
 difference between these objects according as they are 
 existents or have merely that degree of being which we 
 can ascribe to abstractions. But, however different may 
 be the universes of discourse in which the objects have 
 their being, the relation always belongs to the same 
 
 Values and Relations 
 
 233 
 
 universe as its terms : if the terms are existents, then 
 the relation is an existing relation ; if the terms are 
 beents only, then the relations belong to the same order 
 of being. In neither case could the relations subsist by 
 themselves without the terms. 
 
 I have spoken of values as a third division of reality; 
 and the classification may seem to stand in need of de- 
 fence. It is not necessary to repeat what has been said 
 already regarding the objectivity of value. But the 
 prejudice as to the subjectivity and relativity of value 
 dies hard, and this chiefly from an ambiguity in the 
 terms. There is a sense in which value may be called 
 both subjective and relative without throwing doubt 
 upon its objectivity or even reality. It is subjective in 
 the sense that it belongs to subjects, that is, selves or 
 conscious persons ; it is not subjective, if by that is 
 meant something due to the mental faculty of the ob- 
 server who appreciates it. In this latter sense also it is 
 not relative ; but we need not deny it that name if all 
 that is meant is that value is not found out of relation 
 to persons. Indeed, the argument of this lecture has 
 led us to expect relatedness everywhere within reality, 
 instead of regarding it as an evidence of unreality. 
 
 Values are indeed similar to relations : as the latter 
 are found in rebus, so the former are always manifested 
 ifi persojiis. There is also a further correspondence. 
 Among relations we distinguished those cases in 
 which the terms are abstract entities from the relations 
 between concrete things. In the same way, there are 
 certain formal propositions about value, amongst which, 
 for example, Sidgwick's ^A^xioms of the Practical 
 
234 
 
 The Division of Reality 
 
 Reason ' might be counted, which may be distinguished 
 from the propositions with * good ' as their predicate, 
 which affirm the goodness of persons in concrete situa- 
 tions. But the real difficulty of my position lies behind 
 this. Let us admit (it may be said) that the value 
 actually realised by persons may fairly be reckoned as 
 part of reality. Yet this is only a small part of the 
 value about which we speak, even of the value which 
 we seek to realise. The latter is at best not yet real ; 
 at worst it will never be real. Taking it at its best 
 even, we cannot at present count it as a part of reality. 
 
 The objection seems conclusive. It w^ould be con- 
 clusive if it were allowable to cut a cross section in 
 reality as it is known to us at the present moment and 
 to take that cross section as representative of the whole. 
 The objection can be overcome — or, at least, its edge 
 may be turned — by showing that this procedure is 
 illegitimate, and that persons cannot be understood by 
 what they have achieved at any given moment : that 
 their nature is to be realisers of value. 
 
 The person cannot be judged merely by his achieve- 
 ments at a given moment. We must take account of 
 what he is and can be as well as of what he does. Why 
 does he approve the goodness of others or blame his 
 own deficiencies? It is because his consciousness, his 
 nature, is in sympathy with the value which he sees, 
 even when he fails to reach it himself It is the ani^na 
 natiiraliter moralis that speaks. He recognises that he 
 has failed to * be himself — his better or moral self. 
 He has afifinity with the ideals which he approves even 
 when he fails to follow them ; the values are his values, 
 and have their root in the nature which he shares with 
 
 The Philosophical Attitude 235 
 
 his social environment. After what has been already 
 said, it is perhaps unnecessary to urge this point further. 
 But the view here stated concerning value generally 
 may be illustrated by a reference to Plato's teaching 
 regarding the relation of the mind to truth. For Plato 
 truth is not merely a property of some propositions, it 
 IS a value ; and philosophy is not merely a manner of 
 thinking, it is a way of life. His description of the 
 philosopher is accordingly connected with the literal 
 meaning of the word philosophy. It is not wisdom that 
 the word signifies, but the love of wisdom \ And in the 
 lover Plato finds the analogue of the philosopher: the 
 soul of a philosopher guileless and true (he says) is as 
 the soul of a lover". The lover who follows and worships 
 beauty is already on the path which leads to philosophy. 
 *'The true order of going... is to use the beauties of 
 earth as steps" towards celestial beauty: going thus 
 *' Irom fair forms to fair practices, and from fair practices 
 to fair notions, until from fair notions he arrives at the 
 notion of absolute beauty, and at last knows what the 
 essence of beauty isl" 
 
 And as love, if it have its way, lands one in philo- 
 sophy, so the philosopher also displays all the features 
 of love. For Love, as the myth has it, is half divine and 
 half human, the offspring of Plenty and Poverty : " He 
 is always poor and anything but tender and fair, as the 
 many imagine him ; and he is hard-featured and squalid, 
 and has no shoes nor a house to dwell in. [But] he is 
 bold, enterprising, and strong, a hunter of men, always 
 weaving some intrigue or other, keen in the pursuit of 
 
 ' Phaedriis, 278 D. ^ /^^-^^ ^49 a. 
 
 ^ Syfnposium, 211 c. (Jowett's transl.) 
 
236 
 
 The Division of Reality 
 
 wisdom, and never wanting resources: a philosopher at 
 all times, terrible as an enchanter, sorcerer, sophist'." 
 He shares the characters of both his parents, allied to 
 the gods and yet among the poorest of the poor. No 
 god or wise man is a seeker after wisdom : he does not 
 need to seek for that which he has already got. And 
 the ignorant and foolish do not seek wisdom, for they 
 do not feel the want of it. Thus the philosopher is in 
 a mean betwixt two, just as Love was born of opposites. 
 '' Wisdom is a most beautiful thing, and love is of the 
 beautiful ; and therefore Love is also a philosopher or 
 lover of wisdom, and being a lover of wisdom is in a 
 mean betwixt the wise and the ignorant. And this 
 again is a quality which Love inherits from his parents; 
 for his father is wealthy and wise, and his mother poor 
 and foolish'." 
 
 The most essential point in this description — so it 
 seems to me — is not the fervour, the passion, the dis- 
 interestedness with which the seeker follows truth as the 
 lover pursues his object. Undoubtedly that is a real 
 characteristic. Plato holds that to the philosopher, as 
 to the lover, all things pale in importance in comparison 
 with one: the world is naught until he possesses the 
 object of his search. But this fervour and disinterested- 
 ness spring from a deeper source. What is it that causes 
 the restless eagerness of the lover ? Plato's mythology 
 is bold enough to answer, It is because the object 
 which he seeks was once part of himself, till a jealous 
 god divided them, and therefore he cannot rest until he 
 has regained what is akin to him by nature. And this 
 is the poetical rendering of the answer to the other 
 ^ Symposium^ 203 d. ^ Ibid., 204 b. 
 
 The Alimfs Affinity with Truth 237 
 
 question. When we ask, What is it that impels the 
 philosopher to his unresting search for truth .^ the reply 
 must be, Because there is a natural affinity between his 
 mind and the truth which he seeks. He is not yet wise, 
 for truth has to be sought ; he can never become com- 
 pletely wise, for there are hindrances to the full view of 
 truth which mortal nature can never finally overcome. 
 But he is not altogether ignorant ; if he were he would 
 have no impulse to philosophy ; he can recognise the 
 truth when he sees it and he is unsatisfied in its absence ; 
 and this shows that his mind is allied to truth and has 
 kinship with it. Therefore the philosopher does not 
 need to wait for truth to come to him from the outside. 
 He is himself active in its pursuit, driven onwards by 
 an impulse which is of identical nature with the goal 
 towards which he presses. 
 
 Conveyed in poetical and mythical imagery, and 
 sometimes only half revealed by it, this is the domi- 
 nating feature in Plato's description of the philosopher. 
 In his speculative activity the philosopher is seeking to 
 realise his own inmost nature ; truth is not something 
 imposed upon him from without ; it is his own reason 
 made manifest. Philosophy is not a passive receptive 
 attitude : it is a life, an active process in which the soul 
 realises what is akin to its own nature — the vision of 
 truth and reality. 
 
 There is of course another view than this, and one 
 opposed to the Platonic. It has been held that in know- 
 ledge the mind is purely receptive or passive, and truth 
 has been regarded as merely a mirroring of an order 
 of nature which is altogether external to it. Bacon gave 
 expression to a doctrine of this sort in his famous 
 
238 
 
 Tlic Division of Reality 
 
 aphorism that into the kingdom of nature as into the 
 kingdom of grace entrance can only be obtained sub 
 persona infant is^. The philosopher, he thinks, must 
 simply wait and watch lor nature's teaching, and to it 
 he must submit his mind. It is true that by this sub- 
 mission he may be able in a measure to reverse the 
 relation and become nature's master. But his mastery 
 extends only to a certain manipulation of nature's forces 
 whereby they may be utilised for works of practical 
 advantage. For practical purposes he seeks control ; 
 but of his philosophical attitude submission is the key- 
 note. The creative function of the mind, which Plato 
 enforces, is ignored or denied by Bacon. He mistrusts 
 the mind left to itself, and forbids any anticipation of 
 nature"'. 
 
 Even for the purposes of scientific enquiry, this 
 doctrine is too narrow. Without the creative function 
 of scientific imagination, the world would have had no 
 Newton or Darwin, no Bacon even. From a wider 
 point of view, it is still more inadequate. Philosophy 
 does not consist in a set of propositions about what goes 
 on outside us. It aims at an understandino- of the whole 
 to which the philosopher himself belongs. In so far as 
 he reaches this understanding he realises a value which 
 he recognises as the completion of his own nature as a 
 seeker after truth. Truth is a value as well as beauty 
 and goodness ; and in the whole of Plato's thinking it 
 is treated as such. The validity of this point of view is 
 
 ^ Nozmm Orgafiufu. i, 68. 
 
 ■^ Some parts of the preceding discussion are taken from an 
 article on ' The Philosophical Attitude/ Jnteniational Journal of 
 Ethics, vol. XX (1910), pp. 152 ff. 
 
 The Miners Affinity with Goodness 239 
 
 still more apparent when goodness, or moral value, is 
 in question ; for the good is recognised as having a 
 claim upon our allegiance : as requiring a doing which 
 moulds our being, making it a realisation of the ideal. 
 It is impossible to look upon this— as some thinkers 
 have looked upon knowledge— as merely the imitation 
 of an external order. It is rather a growing up into the 
 maturity of one's nature. 
 
 Mere things— if we were to think of them alone 
 apart from their place in the whole — would be seen by 
 us as simply a succession of changing events ; a laro-er 
 view might convince us of definite directions in this 
 succession tow^ards increased difterentiation and inte- 
 gration. But, apart from the idea of purpose which the 
 thinker brings to bear upon them, there would be no 
 notion of development in nature as distinct from regular 
 change. It is impossible to think of persons in this way. 
 They are ever seekers, striving for a good which they 
 conceive in different ways, but of which they never lose 
 sight entirely and w^hich guides their search. They do 
 not recognise the mere present as expressing their true 
 nature, for they are always straining beyond the present 
 after a goal. If you ma}- not call a man happy except 
 * in a completed life,' it is equally true that you cannot 
 tell what a man is except his life be complete — complete, 
 not as it is ended by the accident of death, but, as it 
 never is completed, by the realisation of its purpose or 
 ideal. Accordingly, we do not get an adequate under- 
 standing of the world — which is a world of persons '\i 
 
 we judge it simply by its manifestations at any given 
 moment or for some limited period of its temporal ex- 
 istence. Persons refuse to have their nature estimated 
 
240 
 
 The Division of Reality 
 
 by time, for it is deeper than the time in which it is 
 manifested. We have to take into account what at any 
 moment is only an ideal, if there is ground for regarding 
 the reaHsation of that ideal as the completion of person- 
 ality. Ideals, accordingly, may be held to belong to 
 reality as much as do the persons whom they express ; 
 and the problem of understanding reality involves the 
 problem of interpreting these ideals and assigning to 
 them their appropriate place. 
 
 To sum up. In saying that moral values belong to 
 the nature of reality, two things are implied, In the 
 first place, the statement implies an objectivity which 
 is independent of the achievements of persons in inform- 
 ing their lives with these values, and is even independent 
 of their recognising their validity. Whether we are 
 guided by them or not, whether we acknowledge them 
 or not, they have validity : they ought to be our guides. 
 This validity differs from the validity of laws of nature, 
 inasmuch as the latter do actually express the consti- 
 tution of reality in so far as it is material. Moral values 
 hold for personal life in another way ; they ought to 
 enter into its constitution whether they do so or not. 
 Their reality has therefore been called imperative 
 reality ; but the phrase does not explain anything. 
 What is implied so far is that the validity of moral 
 values — seeing it is not derived from their acceptance 
 by the persons for whom they are valid — must have 
 another source. In some way it must belong to the 
 system or order of the universe. To see how this can 
 be, we must look at the second implication of the state- 
 ment that moral values belong to the nature of reality. 
 Reality, whatever other manifestations it may have, 
 
 How P^alue is real 
 
 241 
 
 IS manifested in persons ; they are part of the real 
 universe, and they come to form ideas of moral value 
 and to some extent to frame their lives in accordance 
 with them. Their lives are continuous efforts towards 
 fulfilment of a purpose or purposes ; and in their attain- 
 ment of moral values the nature of persons receives an 
 expression which grows in completeness as value is 
 realised. That is to say, the objective moral value is 
 valid independently of me and my will, and yet is 
 something which satisfies my purpose and completes 
 my nature. 
 
 This second implication of the statement shows us 
 more clearly the way in which value belongs to reality. 
 According to the former implication, the value is ob- 
 jective, but the kind of being which it possesses is 
 conceived as something apart from the existing uni- 
 verse. But this second implication of the statement 
 brings out a connexion. Values characterise personal 
 life as completed or perfected ; they are factors in the 
 fulfilment of purpose, and purpose is an essential trait 
 of personality. It is possible that they may never 
 obtain complete realisation in time. But, even so, they 
 will express the limit towards which the nature of 
 persons points and presses. In this way they belong 
 to the sum total of reality as an existing system. And 
 this connexion resembles that of law to fact in the causal 
 system, with this difference : that the latter relation is 
 exhibited at each instant of time, whereas the realised 
 system of values is the limit towards which personal 
 life tends in its temporal course. 
 
 s. (;. L. 
 
 16 
 
240 The Divis2077 of Reality 
 
 by time, for it is deeper than the time in which it is 
 manifested. We have to take into account what at any 
 moment is only an ideal, if there is ground for regarding 
 the realisation of that ideal as the completion of person- 
 ality. Ideals, accordingly, may be held to belong to 
 reality as much as do the persons whom they express ; 
 and the problem of understanding reality involves the 
 problem of interpreting these ideals and assigning to 
 them their appropriate place. 
 
 To sum up. In saying that moral values belong to 
 the nature of reality, two things are implied In the 
 first place, the statement implies an objectivity which 
 is independent of the achievements of persons in inform- 
 ing their lives with these values, and is even independent 
 of their recognising their validity. Whether we are 
 guided by them or not, whether we acknowledge them 
 or not, they have validity : they ought to be our guides. 
 This validity differs from the validity of laws of nature, 
 inasmuch as the latter do actually express the consti- 
 tution of reality in so far as it is material. Moral values 
 hold for personal life in another way ; they ought to 
 enter into its constitution whether they do so or not. 
 Their reality has therefore been called imperative 
 reality ; but the phrase does not explain anything. 
 What is implied so far is that the validity of moral 
 values — seeing it is not derived from their acceptance 
 by the persons for whom they are valid — must have 
 another source. In some way it must belong to the 
 system or order of the universe. To see how^ this can 
 be, we must look at the second implication of the state- 
 ment that moral values belong to the nature of reality. 
 Reality, whatever other manifestations it may have, 
 
 How Value is real 
 
 241 
 
 is manifested in persons ; they are part of the real 
 universe, and they come to form ideas of moral value 
 and to some extent to frame their lives in accordance 
 with them. Their lives are continuous efforts towards 
 fulfilment of a purpose or purposes ; and in their attain- 
 ment of moral values the nature of persons receives an 
 expression which grows in completeness as value is 
 realised. That is to say, the objective moral value is 
 valid independently of me and my will, and yet is 
 something which satisfies my purpose and completes 
 my nature. 
 
 This second implication of the statement shows us 
 more clearly the way in which value belongs to reality. 
 According to the former implication, the value is ob- 
 jective, but the kind of being which it possesses is 
 conceived as something apart from the existing uni- 
 verse. But this second implication of the statement 
 brings out a connexion. Values characterise personal 
 life as completed or perfected ; they are factors in the 
 fulfilment of purpose, and purpose is an essential trait 
 of personality. It is possible that they may never 
 obtain complete realisation in time. But, even so, they 
 will express the limit towards which the nature of 
 persons points and presses. In this way they beloncr 
 to the sum total of reality as an existing system. And 
 this connexion resembles that of law to fact in the causal 
 system, with this difference : that the latter relation is 
 exhibited at each instant of time, whereas the realised 
 system of values is the limit towards which personal 
 life tends in its temporal course. 
 
 b. (l. L. 
 
 16 
 
X 
 
 THE UNITY OF REALITY 
 
 1 HE attempt at a division of reality has brought out 
 everywhere underlying connexions. The distinct things, 
 of which, at a first view, physical reality seems to be 
 made up, were found to be without definite lines of 
 separation from one another. They form parts within 
 a whole. Without the relations which connect them 
 with one another and with the whole, there would be 
 no things. The relations themselves are within the 
 whole ; in this sense they are internal relations. And 
 if they appear external to particular things, that is be- 
 cause, owing to our practical interests and to the limits 
 of our imagination, we credit the things with a separate- 
 ness which they do not possess. In like manner, the 
 relations imply things as their terms ; here also there 
 is no complete separation ; and the sciences which deal 
 with relations are occupied with one factor of reality 
 abstracted from other factors for the purpose of scien- 
 tific enquiry. Persons, indeed, have an individuality 
 which things do not possess. But their individuality 
 also is imperfect ; it never amounts to independence, 
 or complete separation, of one person from others or 
 from things and relations. For its individuality the 
 self stands in need of objects and their relations and of 
 other selves. It is a growth, never a complete or finished 
 entity ; and its growth is determined and furthered by 
 
 Analysis and Synthesis 243 
 
 ideals or values which the self recognises as its own 
 and yet as transcending its achievement. These values 
 therefore, also belong to reality, but not as something 
 unconnected with the persons by whom they are to be 
 brought into actual existence. 
 
 We are thus driven to the conclusion that the in- 
 dependence which the special sciences ascribe or seem 
 to ascribe to things, to relations, and to persons also, 
 IS a methodical convention which does not correspond 
 exactly with reality. We cannot know a thing as it is 
 if we know it only by itself. \Vhat do they know of 
 anything who only that thing know } The particular 
 object— whether individual existent or relation— is but 
 part of the whole ; and there is a radical vice in any 
 apparent knowledge of it which does not allow for its 
 connectedness with the whole. Yet, it may be urged, 
 how can we know the whole, or even approach a kn^'ow- 
 ledge of it, except by the obvious process of piecing on 
 to one another, bit by bit, our cognitions of the parts .? 
 If, on the one hand, knowledge of the parts seems to 
 require knowledge of the whole, is it not equally or 
 still more obvious, on the other hand, that knowledge 
 of the whole must be made up of knowledge of the 
 parts .^ To this question attention should be given here, 
 because its solution bears upon everything that follows. 
 Scientific investigation proceeds by the dual process 
 of analysis and synthesis. Since the days of Galileo 
 this has been the established and recognised method. 
 And of the two processes analysis is the more funda- 
 mental. We first analyse an object into its elements, 
 and then re-construct it synthetically, or show how it 
 could be re-constructed, out of those elements. There 
 
 16 — 2 
 
244 ^^^^ Unity of Reality 
 
 is no doubt that this double process is essential, and 
 that in many cases it is adequate for science and for the 
 practical purposes which science serves. But the elusive- 
 ness of the search for ultimate elements points to the 
 conclusion that there are certain limits to its adequacy 
 for a full understanding of what takes place. 
 
 In the first place, the object which we set out by 
 analysing is only an arbitrary whole. As a part of the 
 universe it is determined by its position relatively to 
 other things, and it is in a process of constant change 
 owing to its own action and that of the environment. 
 Science, however, proceeds by limiting its enquiries, 
 and scientific manipulation is largely occupied in at- 
 tempting to isolate the object of enquiry from the 
 disturbing influence of surrounding forces, and in pre- 
 serving constant the influences from which it cannot 
 be isolated. But time and again it is found that, for a 
 satisfactory explanation of the object, a wider view than 
 before must be taken of its connexion with other thmgs. 
 Scientific advance is often made by concentrating atten- 
 tion on minute features of a situation which had been 
 previously discussed at large. But it is also sometimes 
 due to taking a step in the opposite direction and 
 widening the survey. The latter method, for instance, 
 was characteristic of the Darwinian revolution ; it arose 
 out of an enquiry in which the changes in the organism 
 were investigated not simply by themselves but syste- 
 matically in their relation to all the conditions, and to 
 the changes in the conditions, of the environment. New 
 knowledge of the part, namely, organic development, 
 resulted from this knowledge of the wider whole — the 
 environment and the organisms it contains. This new 
 
 The Limits of Analysis 245 
 
 knowledge about the organism could not have been 
 obtained except by means of knowledge of the environ- 
 ment, li may be suggested, perhaps, that in this whole 
 process, all that happens is that knowledge of one part 
 is added to knowledge of another part. But the two 
 are investigated together, and the new part introduced 
 — the environment — is something that contains the first 
 part — the organism. It is by means of the wider whole 
 that we come to understand the more limited object. 
 And there is no point at which we can draw a line and 
 say, " Beyond this, knowledge of a wider whole will be 
 of no use in helping us to understand the part." The 
 truer our knowledge of the whole — even of Reality as 
 a whole — the more adequate, ceteris paribus, will be our 
 understanding of any of its parts. 
 
 In the second place, owing to the complexity of 
 nature, our analysis of any existing object is always 
 incomplete, and this incompleteness must affect the 
 process of synthesis. An analysis is complete when 
 we have discriminated all the parts which enter into 
 the composition of the object, when these parts are 
 ultimate units incapable of further analysis, and when 
 we have discovered the relations in which these un- 
 analysable parts singly and in their various combinations 
 stand to one another. The inverse process of synthesis 
 shows how the parts thus distinguished may be re- 
 combined in the same relations as before so as to 
 re-constitute the whole. An analysis is incomplete if 
 any factors have been overlooked in the process, or If 
 the units in which it terminates are not ultimate. But 
 an analysis may be adequate for particular .purposes, 
 scientific or practical, although we have to stop short 
 
246 
 
 The Unity of Reality 
 
 of the discovery of the ultimate units constituting the 
 object and of their ultimate relations. Incompleteness 
 does not mean falsity. If we were on any grounds to 
 discard analysis as giving a false account of reality, we 
 should have to discard the natural sciences. There are, 
 it is true, metaphysical theories which are sometimes 
 understood as having that tendency ; but we are not 
 concerned here with these theories nor with the question 
 whether they have been correctly interpreted as destruc- 
 tive of science. Analysis is assumed as an essential 
 instrument in the sciences and in the process of know- 
 ledge generally, and that is why some enquiry is necessary 
 as to its scope and limits. 
 
 An analysis may be adequate for all apparent pur- 
 poses, although it is not safe to found speculations upon 
 it as if it were complete. The discovery of radium, for 
 instance, showed the incompleteness of previous analyses 
 of the contituents of matter, and had the incidental 
 effect of invalidating an earlier calculation of the age 
 of the earth founded on the conduction of heat. The 
 calculation assumed the completeness of the current 
 analyses of matter, so that the power possessed by 
 radium of generating heat internally was overlooked. 
 A generation ago it might have appeared hyper-critical 
 to have attacked the argument on the ground that there 
 might be substances to be reckoned with having pro- 
 perties so startlingly new as those of radium. But the 
 advance of experimental analysis refuted the underlying 
 assumption. In this case one analysis was discredited 
 by a more complete analysis. And we are never able 
 to say with certainty that an analysis of actual existents 
 is absolutely complete and can be carried no further. 
 
 The Limits of Analysis 247 
 
 Even if we are confident that nothing of importance 
 has been overlooked, we cannot be sure that the elements 
 reached are incapable of further analysis. In physical 
 science we pass from masses to particles, from particles 
 to molecules, from molecules to atoms, from atoms to 
 electrons. There we may be content to rest for the 
 present— but only for the present. Atoms served for 
 many centuries as the ultimate units to which scientific 
 research, though only in a conjectural way, pointed. 
 After less than twenty years' familiarity with electrons, 
 it is too soon to say that they are ultimate units. Indeed, 
 there is no criterion by which we can determine that the 
 units we have reached are ultimate units. And we must 
 take into account the possibility that there are no ultimate 
 units and that matter is infinitely divisible. In this case 
 analysis never can be complete ; in the opposite case, 
 it never is complete, for we have never any sufficient 
 ground for saying that our present units are ultimate. 
 
 Further, analysis discloses not only the parts or 
 elements in a whole but also the relations in which 
 these parts stand to one another and in virtue of which 
 the whole is constituted as it is. Can we say that know- 
 ledge of these relations added to knowledge of the parts 
 provides knowledge of the whole .^ The question has 
 been answered in the affirmative. ''The whole," it has 
 been said\ "is different from the terms and relations 
 taken individually, but it is these parts related:' But 
 this assumption, though obvious enough at first sight, 
 needs examination. Let us suppose a whole, X, which 
 can be analysed exhaustively into three parts, elements, 
 or terms — a, b, c — each of which will have various rela- 
 
 ' Spaulding, The Ne7v Realism, p. 203. 
 
248 
 
 The Unity of Reality 
 
 tions to the others. These relations may be symbolised 
 by R. Is the whole exactly equal to ^ R^ + ^ R<f + ^ R^ ? 
 The answer will depend on the kind of whole with 
 which we are dealing. If we are dealing with a machine 
 or other artificial whole — a clock, for example — we can 
 separate it into various pieces of metal which are placed 
 in certain spatial relations to one another. The mechanic 
 can reconstruct it out of these pieces by putting them 
 together in their proper relations. There is nothing in 
 the clock but the pieces of metal thus related in space. 
 It is true that the clock as a whole has certain properties 
 which do not belong to the separate parts ; but these 
 properties can be predicted by any one who knows 
 the parts and their relations and who has sufficient 
 mathematics. But nature is not limited to mechanical 
 sequences which the mathematician can predict. What- 
 ever his mathematical skill and however great his 
 knowledge of the two separate gases oxygen and 
 hydrogen might be, no chemist could have predicted 
 that their composition in certain proportions would 
 result in a substance with the specific qualities of water. 
 In vital and mental processes it is still clearer that 
 knowledge of the parts and of their relations does not 
 crive knowledge of the nature of the whole. Here we 
 are in presence of what Wundt calls the ' principle of 
 creative resultants\' and we have to wait upon experi- 
 ence for our knowledge. The properties of the whole 
 can be known only from observation of the behaviour 
 of the whole as a whole; analysis does not disclose 
 them. Thus the writer already quoted gives a more 
 
 1 Naturwisseuschaft und Psychologie (concluding section of the 5th 
 edition of his Physiologische Psychologie), pp. 108 f. 
 
 Specific Properties of the IV hole 249 
 
 comprehensive definition of the whole : it ''is the parts 
 and their properties a^id the relations relating the parts 
 a7id the possibly specific properties of the whole ^" 
 Now% it is by its properties that we know the thing, 
 and, in so far as analysis fails to reveal the specific 
 properties of the thing, it fails to give us adequate 
 knowledge of it. As he says later on, analysis must 
 allow " for a whole which is not merely the sum of its 
 parts"." He seems to think that in this way we must 
 "recognise a non-rational element in nature"'." But it 
 is needless to lay blame on nature. Reason is our in- 
 strument for understanding nature ; and nature is not 
 less rational because, in our examination of any thing, 
 we must have regard to the whole, and may receive 
 light from it as well as from its parts. 
 
 These specific properties of the whole are most 
 conspicuous when we turn our analysis upon living or 
 conscious bein2:3\ Whether in livino* cell or in conscious 
 
 ^ Spaulding, The Ahw Realism, p. i6i. 
 
 - Ibid.y p- 239. •' Ibid., p. 241. 
 
 ^ Even in the analysis of conceptual objects we are apt on reaching 
 the elements to lose the way back to the whole and to re-gain it only 
 by putting into each element the nature of the whole. The common 
 analysis of (conceptual) space is an instance. Prof. Spaulding analyses 
 it into the concept point and certain relations, among which betweeti- 
 ness is fundamental. Betweenness is thus defined : " A term j is between 
 two terms x and z with reference to a transitive asymmetrical relation 
 R when .vR>' and vRs." This relation of betweenness, however, 
 holds not only of points in a line but of successive instants in time 
 and of successive notes on the scale. Clearly, therefore, as of course 
 Prof. Spaulding is aware, it does nothing to distinguish space from 
 time or even from the succession of musical notes. The differentia 
 must therefore be got from the concept point. But " point is, perhaps, 
 indefinable," he says {The New Realism, p. 182). Looking forward to 
 his analysis of time, one sees that "instant is, perhaps, indefinable" 
 
250 
 
 The Unity of Reality 
 
 mind, the specific properties— what we mean by ' Hfe ' 
 in the one case, by ' consciousness ' in the other — 
 belong to the whole only and not to the parts or to the 
 relations into which we analyse the whole. The parts 
 and their relations belong to the whole ; but it is more 
 than they ; it possesses properties which belong to it 
 not in virtue of these parts but in virtue of the unity 
 in which they are found. It is difficult to name this 
 principle of unity, for in naming it we tend to treat it 
 as if it were one of the parts of the whole. It is apt to 
 be lost in the analytic process, and it is for this reason 
 that Goethe criticised the method of the analyst : 
 
 *'Wer will was Lebendig's erkennen und beschreiben, 
 Sucht erst den Geist herauszutreiben ; 
 Dann hat er die Theile in seiner Hand, 
 Fehlt leider nur das geistige Band^" 
 
 (p. 190). Now, if both are indefinable, and if (as is the fact) we have 
 no immediate acquaintance with either, how are we to distinguish 
 point from instant, space from time ? Only if point has already in it 
 something that determines it spatially rather than temporarily or 
 otherwise. And this is indeed admitted. Of point he says, " it has a 
 peculiar quale which can be best defined only in terms of that of 
 which it is an element, namely space " (p. 182). That is to say, space 
 is analysed into elements which can only be defined through itself, 
 through the whole. This is seen by the writer who continues, " but 
 that may be to define the term in a circle and to admit it to be in- 
 definable logically." But refusal to define the term is not really a way 
 out of the difficulty. For unless the spatial (piale oi point is recognised, 
 and the temporal quale of instant, there is nothing to distinguish 
 point from instant, and space might have been analysed into the one 
 as readily as into the other. 
 
 * To understand the living w^hole 
 
 They start by driving out the soul ; 
 
 They count the parts, and when all's done, 
 
 Alas ! the spirit-bond is gone. 
 
 Knowledge of the IV hole 251 
 
 The ''spiritual bond" is just that which makes all 
 the difference between a collection of parts and a living 
 whole. But neither in biology nor in psychology has it 
 been found possible to isolate it, or to ''catch it," as 
 Hume puts it, without the parts or "perceptions" which 
 it possesses. It disappears in analysis. And the conse- 
 quent synthesis must share the defects of the analysis: 
 for synthesis can deal only with the elements w^hich 
 analysis has disclosed. 
 
 It would appear then that, if knowledge is restricted 
 to these two complementary processes of analysis and 
 synthesis, it has certain limitations which tend to mis- 
 lead, and thus to thwart the purpose of knowledge. 
 But is it thus restricted '> In our ordinary traffic with 
 things we are not limited in this way. We are not 
 always engaged either in taking a thing to bits or else 
 in putting it together again out of the bits. We have 
 or possess the thing first, and may even use it, as a 
 whole. And the case of knowledge is similar. Before 
 we can analyse an object of knowledge, we must have 
 an object of knowledge to analyse. Nor does our know- 
 ledge begin (as Locke and Hume thought) with isolated 
 elements, which we proceed to put together. It begins 
 (as Professor Ward has shown'), with what may be better 
 described as a contimmm or indefinite whole within 
 which we draw distinctions and note similarities and 
 other relations. The necessary antecedent both of 
 analysis and of synthesis is an immediate consciousness 
 of an object which awaits distinction and definition, but 
 which — seeing that analysis reveals it as a connected 
 manifold — may be described as a whole, however vague 
 * Art. * Psychology,' Emy. Brit., 9th ed. (1886), p. 42 b. 
 
252 
 
 The Unity of Reality 
 
 and indefinite our perception of its structure. The same 
 order may be traced in scientific work. The chemist; 
 for example, receives his compound as a whole, and has 
 some knowledge of it as a whole, before he proceeds to 
 test and analyse it by his exact methods. Here, there- 
 fore, in the region of ordinary experience, we have an 
 instance of a knowledge of things as wholes ; and this 
 knowledge is a condition antecedent both to analysis 
 and to synthesis. It may also have a still more important 
 function as their supplement. 
 
 Attention has been recently drawn by Dr Merz' to 
 the importance of this view of the 'together' or ensemble 
 of things. He has pointed out that it was anticipated 
 by Goethe and Comte, and he has connected its promi- 
 nence in later thought with the widening of biological 
 ideas due to Darwin. To describe this attitude, and at 
 the same time to bring out its contrast with the attitudes 
 of analysis and synthesis, he has adopted the Platonic 
 term synopsis. Analysis sunders a thing into its ele- 
 ments ; synthesis puts these elements together again ; 
 synopsis views the thing as a whole. Synopsis is some- 
 thing more as well as something less than synthesis. 
 Synthesis gives us a whole — or perhaps only a collection 
 — each part of which is distinguishable and has been 
 distinguished ; synopsis contemplates a whole of which 
 the parts may not be distinct. Only analysis can render 
 them distinct ; and, as we have seen, analysis is in danger 
 of losing something in the process — not merely by in- 
 complete enumeration of the elements, but by oversight 
 of the principle of unity, which itself is not one element 
 
 ^ A History of European Thought in the Nineteenth Century^ 
 vol. Ill, pp. 192 flf., vol. IV, pp. 431 ff. 
 
 Synopsis 253 
 
 among others. Now synthesis is the making of a whole 
 out of the elements which analysis yields; consequently, 
 any defect in the analysis is carried over into the syn- 
 thesis, so that the so-called synthesis is often a mere 
 collection and not truly a whole, because the unity has 
 been lost sight of in the analysis'. This defect synopsis 
 does not lie under, because it is not dependent upon an 
 antecedent analvsis. 
 
 At the same time there is no necessary opposition 
 between synopsis and analysis. The view of the whole 
 may be retained, although the parts within that whole 
 are given distinctness and their relation to one another 
 is noted. Analysis is hostile to the synoptic view only 
 when we regard the parts, which analysis discovers and 
 renders prominent, as making up the whole and equiva- 
 lent to it, that is, when we forget the limitations of 
 analysis. If we keep these limitations in mind, then by 
 " holding the parts in our hand," that is, by analysis, we 
 shall yet not lose sight of the ''spiritual bond" w^hich 
 unites them, and our view of the whole — our synopsis 
 — will become clearer and more adequate. 
 
 This union of a view of the whole with command of 
 
 ^ Cp. F. H. Bradley, Essays on Truth and Reality^ p. 176: "At 
 any moment my actual experience, however relational its contents, is 
 in the end non-relational. No analysis into relations and terms can 
 ever exhaust its nature or fail in the end to belie its essence. What 
 analysis leaves for ever outstanding is no mere residue, but is a vital 
 condition of the analysis itself. Everything which is got into the form 
 of an object implies still the felt background against which the object 
 comes, and, further, the whole experience of both feeling and object 
 is a non-relational immediate felt unity. The entire relational con- 
 sciousness, in short, is experienced as falling within a direct awareness, 
 'lliis direct awareness is itself non-relational." 
 
254 
 
 The Unity of Reality 
 
 the details within it is perhaps most conspicuous in the 
 reahii of creative art. Artists do not often reveal the 
 secrets of their mental processes. But there is a letter 
 ascribed to Mozart which gives a remarkable account 
 of the manner of his musical composition. '' The ques- 
 tion is how my art proceeds in writing and working out 
 great and important matters. I can say no more than 
 this, for I know no more and can come upon nothing 
 further. When I am in good form and have good sur- 
 roundings, as in travelling in a carriage, or after a good 
 meal or a walk, and at night when I cannot sleep, then 
 thoughts come to me best and in torrents. Whence and 
 how I know not, and of this can say nothing. Those 
 which please me I keep in my head and hum them aloud, 
 as others have told me. Holding this fast, one follows 
 another (as if a fresh ingredient were needed to make 
 a pasty), then counterpoint, then the sound of different 
 instruments, etc. That fires the mind, provided I am 
 not disturbed ; then it increases, and I enlarge it with 
 greater and greater clearness, and the thing becomes 
 almost complete in my head, even when it is a long 
 piece, so that afterwards I can comprehend it in my 
 mind at a glance (as one does a beautiful picture or a 
 beautiful person), and not bit after bit, as it is heard 
 later on in imagination, but as simultaneous. That is 
 now a treat ! All the finding and making now pass 
 before me only as in a beautiful strong dream. But the 
 over-hearing, thus all together, is still the best. What 
 has thus come about I do not easily forget, and perhaps 
 this is the best gift our God has given me. When it 
 afterwards comes to writing, I take out of the bag of 
 my brain what had previously been gathered into it. 
 
 The Artisfs Experience 255 
 
 Then it gets pretty quickly put down on paper, being 
 strictly, as was said, already perfect, and generally in 
 much the same way as it was in my head before'." 
 
 The process as here presented is from particulars 
 lu the whole and from the whole back again to par- 
 ticulars. It begins with details, coming how or whence 
 the artist knows not, and it ends with the finished com- 
 position written out note by note on paper. But the 
 best of the artist's experience is neither in the first 
 suggestions nor in the writing out, but between these 
 two stages, when all seems heard together and the 
 whole is comprehended at a glance ; and, by his compo- 
 sition, he helps others to share his experience. Perhaps 
 the method of other artists is similar. They express 
 themselves through the details of line or colour or 
 word ; but their expression is controlled by an idea of 
 the whole in which the many are seen as one. Theirs is 
 the higher vision described in the metaphysical poet's 
 address to the soul : 
 
 When wilt thou shake off this Pedantery, 
 
 Of being taught by sense, and Fantasie ? 
 
 Thou look'st through spectacles; small things seeme great 
 
 Below ; Hut up unto the watch-towre get, 
 
 And see all things despoyl'd of fallacies : 
 
 Thou shalt not peepe through lattices of eyes, 
 
 Nor heare through Labyrinths of eares, nor learne 
 
 By circuit, or collections to discerne. 
 
 1 Mozarts Briefe, ed. L. Nohl, 2nd ed., pp. 443-4. (I am indebted 
 to Prof. J. A. Smith for the reference.) The editor explains that the 
 letter as a whole is not genuine, but he has admitted it to his book 
 because it contains " certain valuable expressions of Mozart on his 
 art" (p. 441 n.). 
 
256 
 
 The Unity of Reality 
 
 Philosophers are divided on the question whether 
 this synoptic view is to be recognised as a vahd atti- 
 tude of thought. It is often ignored and sometimes 
 definitely rejected. Descartes, for example, formulated a 
 postulate concerning knowledge which seems to exclude 
 its validity. " All knowledge," he said\ " is of the same 
 nature throughout and consists solely in combining what 
 is self-evident." His idea of a philosophical system 
 seemed to be that it consisted of a long series of propo- 
 sitions of which the first was self-evident and the logical 
 connexion of each of the others with the immediately 
 preceding proposition equally evident. Mathematical 
 demonstration was his standard and exemplar of every 
 kind of proof. Now mathematical method depends upon 
 a preliminary abstraction by which concepts are formed 
 which are taken as the objects upon which its reasonings 
 are directed ; its legitimate application to reality will 
 therefore depend on the degree in which its abstract 
 concepts express the nature of reality. In carrying out 
 his method Descartes started from an immediate con- 
 crete experience — his clear consciousness of himself as 
 a thinking being. He decided that his conviction of 
 his own existence depended on this clear consciousness, 
 and he then proceeded to the generalisation that what- 
 ever could be (thus) clearly thought was true. Along 
 with this general principle (and other general principles 
 which it was supposed to vindicate) went an abstract 
 view of the experience from which he started. 1 he 
 essence of the self was identified with thought, and 
 similarly the essence of matter was identified with 
 
 ^ RegulcB ad directionem ingenii, xii ; Philosophical Works, transl. 
 Haldane and Ross, vol. i, p. 47- ^V- -^bove, p. 10. 
 
 Reason and Understanding 257 
 
 extension. Upon these definitions all his reasonings 
 depend ; and only if the definitions are adequate can a 
 true account of reality be reached by his method. Even 
 if his general principles and his reasonings are valid, it 
 remains to be shown that the definitions adequately 
 express the nature of what really exists and not merely 
 some one quality of it selected more or less arbitrarilv; 
 and if this can be shown it will not be by the same kind 
 of reasoning as he uses to link up his concepts once 
 they have been formed. It will require an insight into 
 the nature of the concrete experience from which the 
 start was made ; as already shown, this insight will be 
 imperfect if it depends solely on analysis ; and the 
 final synthesis of experience as a whole will share this 
 imperfection. 
 
 It is in justifying their view of experience, or of 
 reality, as a whole that many other thinkers have recog- 
 nised the validity of the attitude of thought here called 
 synoptic. The term is derived from Plato, and it de- 
 scribes the view of reality reached by i/qu? or reason as 
 contrasted with that taken by hidvoia or understanding. 
 The same conception is to be found in Spinoza's dis- 
 tinction of scientia intuitiva from 7^atio, and in the 
 distinction between Reason and Understandino- which 
 was drawn by Kant and his successors, especially 
 Schelling and Hegel, and which was popularised in 
 this country by Coleridge ; at the present day it re- 
 appears in M. Bergson's doctrine of Intuition which, 
 as a mode of knowledge, he opposes to analysis and in 
 general to intellect. The synoptic attitude has been in 
 some respects differently conceived by these thinkers ; 
 and their greatest divergence from one another lies in 
 
 S. (i. L. jy 
 
258 
 
 The Unity of Reality 
 
 their views concerning the relation of Reason or In- 
 tuition to Understanding or the process of reasoning. 
 For the most part it is regarded as complementary to 
 the understanding ; and this is the classical view, from 
 Plato onwards. M. Bergson, however, takes a different 
 
 view. 
 
 In the theory of M. Bergson the contrast between 
 intelligence and intuition is made fundamental. And 
 this contrast, as he draws it, has two characteristics : the 
 doctrine of the practical nature of intelligence, and 
 the assimilation of intuition to instinct. With regard to 
 the former doctrine it may be allowed that the under- 
 standing of nature has for its original purpose the control 
 of nature, and that intelligence is strengthened and 
 sharpened by the constant pressure of practical needs 
 and by experience of the advantages got from under- 
 standing them. But this relation between theory and 
 practice does not necessitate the pragmatic explanation 
 that the truth of the theory simply consists in its prac^ 
 tical utility. The correspondence between theory and 
 practice can also be explained on the view that the 
 knowledge proves itself useful in its applications because 
 it is true : the utility does not make it true ; its truth is 
 the ground of its utility. The former explanation is open 
 to the fatal objection that it tends to discredit itself; 
 for, according to it, the truth of the view that truth 
 consists in utility must consist in the utility of this view. 
 It w^ould be difficult to show any practical utility which 
 the explanation possesses ; but if we did succeed in 
 showing such utility, it would be formulated in yet 
 another proposition, whose truth again would have to 
 consist in some practical end supposed to be served by 
 
 Intellect and Practice 
 
 259 
 
 it, and so on indefinitely. But if the truth of the propo- 
 sition does not consist in or depend upon its utility, 
 then we may hold that its utility depends upon its truth : 
 it is useful because it expresses reality or real relations 
 in the form of knowledge, and this brings them within 
 the range, and possibly within the power, of the human 
 mind. Hence the practical uses of knowledge do not, 
 as the pragmatists hold, constitute its truth; nor do 
 they, as M. Bergson has it, interfere with its claim to 
 truth. Our interest in practical issues may and often 
 does limit the extent and scope of our knowledge; but, 
 so far from being an indication of error, their utility in 
 practice is in some degree a verification and guarantee 
 of the truth of intellectual propositions, for it shows that, 
 so far as these practical issues go, they hold for the 
 actual nature of the world w^th which we are in contact. 
 It is because he holds the intellect to be subservient 
 to practice in contact with the physical world that M. 
 Bergson regards it as untrustworthy as a guide to truth. 
 Insight into reality is attained, he thinks, only by the 
 process of intuition which he contrasts with intellect 
 and assimilates to instinct^ Now, instinct is not less 
 but more practical than intellect, not less but more under 
 the thrall of the material environment. Intellect may 
 emancipate itself from this thraldom ; but instinct never 
 does. It always manifests itself in movement. The 
 motor tendency is not all that there is in instinct ; but its 
 characteristic is that the movement follows directly upon 
 the perception, without being preceded by any idea 
 either of the movement itself or of its end. It is this 
 idea of the end which distinguishes intellectual activity, 
 
 L Evohition creatrice, p. 192. 
 
 17 — 2 
 
 1 n 
 
26o 
 
 The Unity of Reality 
 
 and thus opens the way for comparison of ends and 
 control of movements, and ultimately for the emanci- 
 pation of the intellect from its bondage to matter— an 
 emancipation which instinct could not achieve without 
 ceasing to be instinct and taking on the nature of 
 
 intellect. 
 
 The wav in which we form an idea of reality as a 
 whole cannot be assimilated to the working of mstmct. 
 Even to describe it as intuitive may be misleading, for 
 the term has awkward associations. For a whole school 
 of thinkers intuition implies an opposition to experience ; 
 and this opposition must be avoided, for our view of 
 ultimate reality will not be independent of experience, 
 any more than it is of reasoning, in its construction. 
 With the same philosophers and with others, the term 
 indicates a spontaneity of thought which can be admit- 
 ted only with two qualifications — that given factors are 
 always required upon which this spontaneous activity 
 may operate, and that thought is never in any case 
 entirely passive. Yet an indication of the nature of 
 that which we seek may be found in the immediate 
 knowledge which we have in sense-perception and in 
 the consciousness of our own life. Immediate know- 
 ledge is indeed never knowledge of a complete whole, 
 but neither is it knowledge of an exacdy defined and 
 isolated part. Its object is always a continuum, whicli 
 is not absolutely marked off from everything else, which 
 defies exhaustive analysis into its elements, and which 
 is not adequately reconstructed by a synthesis of these 
 elements. At the outset of knowledge, therefore, we 
 have acquaintance with something more than the dis- 
 tinguishable parts into which we afterwards analyse the 
 
 J^ision and Reasoning 
 
 261 
 
 thing known. This knowledge resembles vision, not 
 discourse ; and in this respect our final metaphysical 
 idea will be like it. It will be a view of the world 
 mediated indeed by reasons, but itself more compre- 
 hensive than those reasons; and it will possess the 
 wholeness of the immediate intuition. 
 
 What is it that chiefly interests us in a philosopher? 
 asked William James; and he answered that it is not 
 his arguments but his vision, what he sees in the world 
 or what he sees the world as being, not the logical steps 
 by which he professes to have reached that vision. 
 " A philosophy is the expression of a man's intimate 
 character, and all definitions of the universe are but the 
 deliberately adopted reactions of human characters upon 
 it\" To much the same effect is the definition which 
 Mr Bradley has casually thrown out, " Metaphysics 
 is the finding of bad reasons for what we believe upon 
 instinct-." These are obiter dictciy^nA their precise terms 
 should not be scrutinised too curiously. But they do 
 not stand alone. In one of his latest writings, if not his 
 very latest, Lotze gave expression to a similar view in 
 describing the motives which had determined his own 
 life-i\^ork. " Philosophy is always a piece of life," he 
 said, and '' except in rare cases, a prolonged philo- 
 sophical labour is nothing else but the attempt to justify 
 scientifically a fundamental view of things which has 
 been adopted in early life I" The vision is deeper and 
 more permanent than the scientific apparatus by which 
 
 ^ W. James, A Pluralistic Universe^ p. 20. 
 * Appearance and Reality^ p. xiv. 
 
 '^ ' Philosophy in the last forty years,' Contemporary Review, 
 January 1880, p. 137. 
 
262 
 
 The Unity of Reality 
 
 it is described or defended. Hence a philosopher hke 
 Berkeley may spend his life in the service of a vision 
 which has been shown to him in boyhood. But the 
 early or intuitive apprehension of the truth seen is 
 not the essential point. What is of chief importance is 
 the distinction between the concrete view^ of a whole, 
 which must resemble vision or imagination, and the 
 connexions which we seek to discover by reasoning- 
 between the parts or elements in a whole. And I think 
 that it is this distinction that is mainly in view when a 
 philosopher contrasts reason w^th understanding or in- 
 tuition with analysis. The philosophical synopsis is a 
 process in which imagination is called in to construct a 
 new intuition, based on the facts and connexions laid 
 bare by analysis, but imitating the togetherness or 
 wholeness of perception. 
 
 In knowledge of self we have the leading example 
 
 of that view of an object as a whole which has been 
 
 distinguished from the complementary processes of 
 
 analysis and synthesis. ''There is one reality, at least," 
 
 says M. Bergson, ''which we all seize from within, by 
 
 intuition and not by simple analysis. It is our own 
 
 personality in its flowing through time — our self which 
 
 endures. We may sympathise intellectually with nothing 
 
 else, but we certainly sympathise with our own selves'." 
 
 Only, it is hardly correct to call this process sympathy, 
 
 for it is an experience which is deeper than sympathy, 
 
 seeing that it is not dependent on any reference to 
 
 another. It is an apprehension which is immediate — 
 
 which is lived in the moment that it is known, although 
 
 ^ Introduction to Metaphysics^ Engl- tr., p. 8. 
 
 The Intuition of Self 
 
 263 
 
 it is preserved in memory and clarified by reflexion. 
 In this immediate knowledge of the self we find the two 
 marks of wholeness which are absent from analysis 
 and its results. The psychologist may distinguish and 
 enumerate the factors present at any moment in con- 
 sciousness. The special sensations which form the 
 medium for our connexion with the external world, the 
 organic sensations due to bodily conditions, the impulses 
 and desires which prompt to action, the feelings of 
 pleasure or pain which give tone to each changing 
 state, the succession of images, the connexion of ideas, 
 the mode of thought — these may be described; but we 
 are aware that the whole is not told. All such descrip- 
 tions are general ; they are not minute enough to render 
 the concrete individuality of our life ; in every account, 
 however complete, some elements of the real state are 
 lacking ; the analysis is never quite exhaustive. Even 
 if it is his own mental state that the psychologist is 
 analysing he is aware that his analytical knowledge falls 
 short of his immediate experience ; there is more in his 
 life than there is in his analysis of it. 
 
 In this respect, therefore, the immediate conscious- 
 ness or intuition of self has more claim to be regarded 
 as a whole than all the elements taken together which 
 analysis has discovered in it. And there is something 
 else, of far greater moment, which the analysis must 
 always fail to give. This is more difficult to name : for 
 in naming it we are apt to speak of it as if it were one 
 element amongst the others. But it may be described 
 as the sense of life or the sense of self. It is not one 
 factor amongst others — such as sensation or impulse or 
 feeling. For it is something through which all these 
 
264 
 
 The Unity of Reality 
 
 are— through which they have being. And it is through 
 it that each person has his own Individual being and no 
 other, so that my perception of this sound, say, is entirely 
 distinct from yours, even although the most perfect 
 analysis can find no dissimilarity between their respec- 
 tive contents. Thus all the parts which the analysis 
 distinguishes are really in a whole, and the whole is in 
 all the parts. The '' spiritual bond," as Goethe calls it, 
 is there, but the analyst does not notice it. 
 
 At the same time the method of analysis is not 
 necessarily hostile to the attitude which looks at the 
 whole. Analysis brings out into relief elements which 
 are in the whole and are important for understanding 
 the whole. There is a danger, of course, of seeing only 
 the elements, of regarding them as separate or inde- 
 pendent, and of thinking that they make up the whole. 
 But, if we avoid this danger and never lose sight of 
 the spiritual bond through which the elements are real 
 and one, then our view of the whole is elucidated and 
 its detailed content is recognised without its unity or 
 reality being lost sight of. Even self-knowledge gains 
 in fulness and adequacy by this analysis, that is, by the 
 analysis of the psychologist. This is particularly the 
 case with regard to those factors In the mental life 
 which bring it Into contact with Its environment. For 
 they lie on the circumference of the self, as it were, 
 where self meets other ; and analysis always deals most 
 easily with the region which lies nearest to the surface 
 or circumference; its difficulties increase in penetrating 
 into the inner life; in the centre it is always at a loss ; 
 for when centre or subject is reached there is nothing 
 further to analyse, and the mere analyst is tempted to 
 
 Ininiediate Rxperience of Self 265 
 
 say that there is nothing there at all. Now the self is 
 in continual process of growth ; Its content expands 
 and is modified, and its powers develop in this process. 
 The growth of the self comes with experience, and its 
 occasioning^ cause is contact and traffic with the world 
 of things and other selves. Here, therefore, in the 
 changes which arise at the periphery or circumference 
 of the self, analysis is most effective in displaying the 
 new content, and we are most dependent upon it for 
 forming an adequate Idea of self, x^nalysls may thus 
 contribute new elements to the Idea of the whole, 
 though these elements are nothing apart from the 
 " spiritual bond " that unifies them. 
 
 The idea of self is founded upon immediate experi- 
 ence of self as a unity or whole of conscious life. We 
 do not approach it from the outside : we have Inside 
 acquaintance, because we are it. But our knowledge of 
 anything else — even of other selves — has a different 
 starting-point. It too is founded upon Immediate ex- 
 perience ; but this Immediate experience of an other 
 can only be of the aspect or side of that other which 
 comes into contact with our own life. " No one," said 
 Fechner', " can stand at once at the outside and at the 
 inside of the same thing. Therefore can no mind 
 directly perceive another." Our knowledge of other 
 men starts from the same point as knowledge of inani- 
 mate things, that is to say, it is mediated and conditioned 
 by sense-perception. Hence the difficulty of Interpre- 
 tation. The primitive intelligence, both of the race and 
 of the individual, tends to look upon every other thing 
 
 ^ Elemente der Psychophysik, vol. i, p. 4 ; cp. G. H. Lewes, 
 Problems of Life and Mind^ vol. 11, p. 481. 
 
266 
 
 The Unity of Reality 
 
 as if it were a self; it is animistic, and interprets the 
 other in the likeness of its own self. Even the mature 
 intelligence may for a moment take the cunningly 
 devised image of a man for a human being, though the 
 mistake is easily remedied by observing the way in 
 which the object reacts to a stimulus. But the possi- 
 bility of making a mistake, and of correcting the mistake 
 by observing details, shows that our knowledge of the 
 inner life of another starts from and depends upon 
 the expressions of that life as they come before us in 
 perception. 
 
 Hence, if we compare our idea of an other self with 
 the idea of our own self, differences are apparent. 
 Both are founded upon immediate experience ; but in 
 the one case the immediate experience is of our inner 
 life itself; in the other case it is only of the outward 
 expressions of an inner life. In both cases, however, 
 we are trying to arrive at an idea of an inner life, so 
 that immediate data help us much further in the one 
 case than in the other. In the case of the alien self, we 
 have to depend upon data of sense-perception, as we 
 have not to depend upon them in self-knowledge. These 
 data of sense-perception, indeed, are not apprehended 
 as isolated or distinct units ; their distinctness is due to 
 our own processes of abstraction and analysis ; and 
 there is, of course, always a danger that some important 
 elements may be overlooked in our analysis. But the 
 other and greater danger in analysis — the danger of 
 overlooking the principle of wholeness or unity — does 
 not arise here. And it does not emerge as a danger 
 simply because the principle of unity or spiritual bond 
 does not reside there at all among the external pheno- 
 
 Knowledge of Other Selves 
 
 267 
 
 mena open to our observation. The unity of the other 
 self was not present in the immediate experience from 
 which we started, which was of the nature of sense- 
 perception ; it is an inner principle hid from the imme- 
 diate observation of any other mind. 
 
 How then can we pass from these immediate ex- 
 ternal data, which we call the expressions of another 
 self or mind, to an idea of that self or mind } To do so 
 an mterpretative conception is needed, such as our own 
 self-experience supplies us with. By its means we make 
 the attempt, by a kind of imaginative insight, to view 
 the process from the inside as it is for the self expressed 
 in it. And to this method we may, with Bergson, apply 
 the term intuition, and say that it requires sympathy. 
 "By intuition," he says, "is meant the kind oi intel- 
 lectual sympathy by which one places oneself within 
 an object in order to coincide with what is unique in it 
 and consequently inexpressible \" 
 
 In passing from the data of perception to an inter- 
 pretation of the other self, one or other of two methods 
 may be followed. We may start from the various data 
 in which it is expressed and which our analysis has 
 discriminated, and taking each distinguishable part in 
 turn try to find for it its subjective correspondent — 
 idea, motive, desire, emotion, or the like — and out of 
 these put together synthetically some sort of idea of the 
 other self as a whole. This way is common enough, 
 but it seldom leads to anything like adequate under- 
 standing. And yet it does not avoid the use of inter- 
 pretative conceptions, although it keeps so closely to 
 the elements of the analysis. For each of these elements 
 
 ^ Introduction to Metaphysics, p. 6. 
 
268 
 
 The Unity of Reality 
 
 it has to seek an interpretation in other terms than 
 those first presented— a mental meaning for the external 
 expression. And these mental meanings — whether ideas 
 or desires or feelings — cannot be rendered clearly in- 
 telligible unless we can pierce to the inner principle 
 that determined them. F^or each factor in the expres- 
 sion a fresh reference is made to the mental side ; and 
 the resultant idea of the other man's mind or character 
 is a composite product of these various interpretations 
 
 of particulars. 
 
 But it is not thus that the man of sympathetic genius 
 understands others. He places himself imaginatively 
 within the other's self ; he seems to take the other's 
 place, to see everything from his point of view, to think 
 his thouehts and share his feelings and desires. The 
 former and more conventional attitude starts with each 
 external expression in turn, and keeping to it tries to 
 look inward towards what is happening below the sur- 
 face. The latter attitude also takes its start from the 
 external expression ; but the genius of sympathy con- 
 sists in a swift change of point of view : the observer 
 ceases to be a mere observer, and becomes in thought 
 what he observes : takes his bearings afresh to suit the 
 new position and looks at things from the other man's 
 angle. In doing so he obtains an understanding of the 
 character and conduct of another which is impossible 
 to the observer who restricts himself to noting each 
 separate act and speculating about its motive. At the 
 same time the man of sympathetic genius cannot dis- 
 pense with evidence. His most brilliant insight is 
 always of the nature of hypothesis : it has not behind 
 it the immediate experience of what he seeks to under- 
 
 The Dijficitlties of Synopsis 269 
 
 stand, which everyone has in the case of self-knowledge. 
 Consequently, it must submit to constant testing by 
 empirical data— by the facts, old and new, which con- 
 stitute the external manifestation of the inner life which 
 he studies. 
 
 The further an object is removed in character from 
 the nature of the observer himself, the greater are his 
 difficulties in interpreting its inner life by this process 
 of intellectual sympathy. Hence the risk of failure 
 when we try to catch the elusive ' spirit of the time,' 
 to put ourselves at the mental point of view of children 
 or of prehistoric man, or to understand the inner life of 
 animals or plants. Here — especially in dealing with 
 primitive man and with sub-human life — there is call 
 for imaginaticn, not only to appreciate the different 
 conditions of the environment but also to enter into the 
 different modes of subjective or organic re-action. When 
 the attempt to understand from the inside was extended 
 to the realm of inorganic things, thinking easily de- 
 generated into the empty scholasticism of attributing 
 potencies to things, although these potencies were 
 only abstract terms for describing the physical process. 
 I question altogether the right to attribute an inner 
 side to inorganic things, and I do so on the grounds 
 that there is no direct evidence for it and that they 
 have no permanent individuality of their own. The 
 case of plant life is different : here there is obviously 
 an individual with an inner aspect. But the attempt 
 sympathetically to understand a life which is without 
 consciousness or any kind of feeling is so difficult, that 
 we are often forced to describe this life in terms which 
 have a clear meaning for us only when they imply 
 
270 
 
 The Unity of Reality 
 
 consciousness, and then to admit that nevertheless there 
 is no evidence of the presence of consciousness. Even 
 for the higher regions of animal life, our interpretation 
 is based upon the human consciousness, and we are 
 probably unable to determine exactly the kind of 
 modification of our own consciousness which would 
 be required in order to make it a trustworthy guide 
 for understanding any given type of sub-human life. 
 
 These considerations all point to the conclusion 
 that the synoptic view of reality or of any portion of it 
 cannot be allowed to work alone without danoer to the 
 truth of its conceptions. It must show that its inter- 
 pretation is accurate by submitting to empirical tests — 
 by its ability to give a coherent account of those facts 
 which it is the business of the analytic understanding 
 to exhibit in detail. This is necessary when we seek 
 to understand any particular object. It is also necessary 
 if our purpose is to form some idea of reality as a whole. 
 
 So far, in illustrating and defendingthe synoptic view, 
 I have been dealing chietly with certain finite objects. 
 The objects selected have been those to which a being- 
 for-self and thus an inner life may be ascribed ; and it 
 has been contended that to understand them as wholes, 
 we must seek to penetrate to that inner life so that we 
 may reach the unity which makes into elements of a 
 whole what, judged from the outside only, would be 
 taken as merely parts among which certain regularities 
 may be discovered. But it has also to be pointed out 
 that these finite centres of being are not self-sufficient. 
 Their nature is not simply unrolled from within ; it 
 grows and is formed by means of experience and in 
 
 ■Self and f/ie Enviyonuieut 211 
 
 interaction with the environment. No view of the finite 
 nd,.dua, can be adequate which does not follow I 
 
 usted at n' T' I "' --'-"-nt ; no view can be 
 trusted at all which neglects them entirelv. As was 
 prevous y-^remarked, the greatest advance in 'the general 
 theory of b,ology which has been made since the time 
 of Anstotle, was connected with laying increased stress 
 or Jm ,'.7.°"=^"?^ °f ■'^'"dying the environment of 
 organ.c hfe ,n order to understand the organism We 
 must not restrict attention to the finite individual as if 
 t were an mdei3endent unit; we must also have a view 
 of the w.der whole to which it belono-s 
 . We start with the self But the content of the self 
 ■s due to us experience. Paradoxical as it may seem 
 
 J^egard.ng h.s content as mere 'mental modifications.' 
 
 hiLelfand'"'-? "' ""'""^"■"'^''^'^ P°'"^-^ '^-y«"^ 
 inr? • '""■ u '""■"'"''• '^'■■■"^^^ '^'■"^ '"«'-^ '-^"d more 
 
 .nto relat,on wuh other things. As Spinoza savs "the 
 muKi understands itself better the more things it under- 
 stands m nature'." It is characteristic of Spinoza to 
 regard th,s connexion of mind with its environment as 
 understandnjg- simply, and to lay exclusive stress upon 
 the natural objects which it know.s. But it is unnecessary 
 to follow hmi m these restrictions. The self finds itself 
 m presence of surrounding reality, and has to make its 
 own way ,n it as well as to form ideas about it It is 
 confronted with something that is both an obstacle to its 
 activity and also the medium in and through which its 
 purposes can be realised. It comes also to recognise A 
 
272 The Un ity of Reality 
 
 objective order— or laws of nature— to which it must 
 conform and upon which it can depend. Further it is 
 conscious of itself as one amongst others of the same 
 kind, all living in the same objective world of matter 
 and law. There is no moment in its career at which it 
 is independent of these other selves any more than a 
 time at which it is independent of the external world ; 
 and there is no part of its mental content which is intel- 
 ligible altogether apart from them. And finally the self 
 is conscious of an objective order of values, which de- 
 termine what ought to be sought and avoided and thus 
 give direction to the reactions upon external nature and 
 other selves in which life consists. 
 
 All these are features in the environment of the 
 self; and a comprehensive view of man must take 
 account of him as a factor in this larger whole. Is it 
 possible to gain any view of this whole which shall be 
 not a mere addition of bit to bit of experienced fact, but 
 an understanding of it as a whole — a synopsis ? This 
 is our question. It has been answered in many different 
 ways, and the answers often diverge according to the 
 portion of experience on which the emphasis is laid. 
 The mechanical theory gives an answer which, perhaps 
 without injustice, maybe described as external, assuming 
 the sense-object, or something of the nature of matter 
 behind it, as the sole ultimate reality. Intellectualist 
 systems look upon the understanding which reveals the 
 secrets of things as being at the same time their essential 
 nature. But ethical values also belong to the system of 
 reality ; and a comprehensive view must include them 
 and show their place in the whole. 
 
 XI 
 
 THE INTERPRETATION OF REALi 1 V 
 
 In science and philosophy, and indeed in discourse of 
 every kind, we are concerned with our experience. We 
 are thinking about it or its issues or its conditions. And 
 we speak of the purpose of our thought as being to 
 describe or explain or interpret its object. The use of 
 these different terms indicates differences in our way 
 of thinking or in the end which that thinkincr seeks 
 to achieve. But the differences are not marked with 
 any accuracy, and in common usage the terms are apt 
 to overlap ; nor is there any accepted definition of their 
 exact signification. An attempt may be made, however 
 •to fix their meanings as nearly as possible and in 
 particular to bring out the nature of the process of 
 interpretation. 
 
 A famous argument begins with the supposition 
 that, in crossing a heath, a man finds a watch upon the 
 ground and proceeds to ask himself how it came to be 
 there. The argument has served its purpose and need 
 not be repeated ; but the illustration may be used again 
 Let us suppose that the traveller has never seen a watch 
 before. What are the things which he will seek to find 
 out about it.? He observes its shape and size, the case 
 and glass and dial ; he opens it and sees the internal 
 mechanism, each part of which and the relative positions 
 of the parts may be examined by him. He identifies the 
 
 S. G. L. 
 
 18 
 
274 T^^ hiterpretation of Reality 
 
 different metals, other examples of which may be sup- 
 posed already known to him ; he observes the movements 
 of the sprincr and wheels, and, continuing his examination , 
 finds that the hands on the dial are also in motion and 
 that their movements correspond in a regular way with 
 the motion of the parts inside the case. The record of 
 this examination, or of any portion of it, is a description 
 of the watch. The description may be more or less 
 complete and more or less exact. The primary form of 
 description is an account which will enable us to form 
 a mental picture or image of the object, so that we may 
 be able to identify it at sight. Even this purpose may 
 not be easily achieved when two or more objects re- 
 semble one another closely. A very minute examination 
 might be required to distinguish two blades of grass or 
 two watches turned out at the same factory. Always 
 our descriptions of objects are only approximately com- 
 plete. Besides, completeness may not be our ideal, nor 
 the distinction of this object from others like it our 
 purpose. Our traveller, for instance, may be interested 
 in the different metals which he finds in the watch and 
 his description of it may be an account of the parts of 
 brass and steel and silver or gold which it contains, their 
 shape and weight. Or he may be more particularly 
 interested in the movements which he observes and he 
 may arrive at a highly abstract account of them which, 
 so far as he can see, describes what actually takes place 
 and can yet be set forth in precise mathematical formulae. 
 Further experience will show him that the mechanism 
 of the watch, instead of distinguishing this particular 
 object, is common to a number of other objects which 
 he afterwards meets with. Such a description does not 
 
 Description and Explanation 275 
 
 aim at completeness, though it does aim at exactness. 
 It is abstract in so far as it disregards the qualities 
 of the material substances present and is restricted to 
 their movements; and it is general in that it is equally 
 applicable to an indefinite number of other instances. 
 
 When an explanation, rather than a description, is 
 asked for, the question can usually be put in the form 
 —not What is it that is there.^ but— How did it come 
 about .^ Our traveller, for example, may ask how the 
 watch came to be where it was found, and he may be 
 satisfied with the answer that it was dropped by a pre- 
 vious passer-by in a careless attempt to return it to his 
 pocket. This is the cause of its lying on the heath, and 
 the cause is accepted as a sufficient explanation. Or he 
 may ask how the hands come to move as they do, and 
 he may be satisfied when he finds out that they are con- 
 nected with the internal mechanism in such a way that 
 the winding of the watch issues in a series of movements 
 which determine the position of the hands on the dial. 
 Here again the cause is given and accepted as the 
 explanation. 
 
 According to this view a description tells simply 
 what there is and what is happening, whereas an ex- 
 planation traces events to their causes. The discoverv 
 of the cause would thus give the differentia which marks 
 off an explanation from a description. But, when we 
 press further this method of drawing the distinction, we 
 are faced with the difficulty of determining the nature of 
 a cause. Now the term ' cause,' as commonly defined for 
 the purposes of scientific investigation, signifies nothing 
 more than a certain uniform sequence or order. The 
 explanation therefore would seem to be simply a gene- 
 
 18—2 
 
276 The Interpretation of Reality 
 
 ralised description ; and the only distinction between 
 description and explanation will be that in the latter 
 the event is classified or shown to be a particular 
 instance of a general rule which holds of all similar 
 instances in like conditions. The explanation consists in 
 a reference to the general formula, valid for many other 
 cases, under which the particular event may be brought. 
 This view is the basis of the descriptive theory of 
 scientific concepts. It is not necessary to examine it 
 here' ; but it agrees with what has been already said" 
 as to the interest of science being in the general or 
 universal, not in the individual. 
 
 A different kind of question is put and a different 
 kind of answer expected when the finder of the 
 watch proceeds to ask. Why this complicated piece of 
 machinery ? He may discover, or some one may inform 
 him, that its purpose is to tell the time of day ; and 
 with this answer he may be satisfied; it interprets to 
 him the meaning of the watch. This process of inter- 
 pretation needs further consideration. 
 
 The process of interpretation is exemplified most 
 simply in translating from a foreign language. An 
 explorer discovers an ancient monument inscribed with 
 characters which have, as he suspects, a meaning, but 
 a meaning unintelligible to him. A scholar is then 
 appealed to, who deciphers the inscription and trans- 
 lates it into the vulgar tongue. Here, therefore, three 
 things are involved: first, a meaning expressed in terms 
 which are not understood ; secondly, the translation of 
 
 1 On the meaning of Cause see below, pp. 316 ff., 430 ff. 
 *^ Above, pp. no f. 
 
 The Process of Interpretation 277 
 
 this meaning into intelligible terms ; and thirdly, the 
 scholar, who is the medium of this translation. Nor- 
 mally, therefore, interpretation is a triadic relation, as 
 Royce calls \\.\ and involves the operation of three 
 minds: that of the person who expressed his meaning; 
 that of the person who receives this expression of 
 meaning without being able to understand it ; and that 
 of the mediator who interprets to the second the mean- 
 ing of the first. It is possible, indeed, that the second 
 and third may be the mind of the same person: the 
 explorer may himself discover the meaning of the 
 symbols and then express them to himself in better 
 known terms. Or the first and the third mind in a process 
 of interpretation may be the mind of the same person, 
 expressing itself at successive periods of time : he may 
 first relate a parable and then show its meaning. But 
 what we always have is the expression of a meaning in 
 terms not immediately understood and then the trans- 
 lation of this meaning into another and better known 
 set of symbols. Sometimes both sets of symbols are of 
 the same fundamental kind, as in the translation from 
 one language into another ; sometimes they are of 
 different orders, as when the first expression of the 
 meaning is in the form of a dream or fable, and the 
 second describes actual experience. 
 
 In rendering one language into another, two pro- 
 cesses may be involved — transliteration and translation. 
 When the former is required, the meaning has been 
 expressed at first in a set of visible symbols or letters 
 whose corresponding audible symbols are unknown, 
 and they have to be replaced by other symbols which 
 ^ The Problem of Christia7iit}\ vol. n, p. 140. 
 
278 The Interpretation of Reality 
 
 are familiar to the observer and enable him to pro- 
 nounce the words. The latter process or translation 
 discloses the meaning of the written or spoken words 
 by rendering them into other and familiar words which 
 suggest a succession of images, or a train of thought, 
 or an emotional experience. Even transliteration, how- 
 ever, may by itself serve to reveal a meaning. A reader 
 of poetry who knows no Greek may be attracted by 
 verses in which there are some Greek words and phrases 
 interspersed in the English context, so that his enjoy- 
 ment of the whole is spoiled. Two things are needed 
 by him in such a case — a transliteration of the words 
 so that he may be able to pronounce them and thus 
 appreciate the technique of the work, and a translation 
 of them that he may understand the meaning. But, 
 psychologically, the quality of the sounds is itself part 
 of the meaning. On it depends the rhythm of the line 
 or stanza, and it has a share therefore in the emotional 
 value of the verse. The written characters are mere 
 symbols ; but the spoken words have a technical quality 
 of their own which is of the essence of the poetical effect, 
 as much as the ideas or images which the language 
 signifies and which may need the translator. 
 
 Language is the most familiar example of symbols 
 expressing meaning. But meaning is obviously pos- 
 sessed by other things than words. A picture, a sonata, 
 a knock at the door, may have meaning. So may natural 
 objects : a heavy cloud may mean rain, or a rise in the 
 temperature of the body be a symptom of disease. In 
 Berkeley's theory of vision we have an interpretation 
 of the whole visible world as a system of meanings — 
 an orderly set of visible signs indicative of other, namely, 
 
 Visual Language 
 
 279 
 
 tactual and muscular experiences. '* The proper objects 
 of sight," he says, ''are light and colours with their 
 several shades and degrees ; all which, being infinitely di- 
 versified and combined, do form a language wonderfully 
 adapted to suggest to us the distances, figures, situations, 
 dimensions, and various qualities of tangible objects — 
 not by similitude, nor by inference of necessary con- 
 nexion, but by the arbitrary imposition of Providence, 
 just as words suggest the things signified by them\" In 
 expounding his theory of vision Berkeley spoke as if 
 the objects of touch had an independent existence which 
 the objects of sight did not possess, and this enabled 
 him to bring out the analogy between things seen and 
 a written or spoken language. But he had reached the 
 further conclusion that all sensible objects are in the 
 same way and in the same degree dependent for their 
 being on mind. If the objects of sight were symbols 
 charged with a meaning beyond their content as sense- 
 presentations, a similar meaning might be expected to 
 be revealed bv the other senses, and the whole of nature 
 be interpreted as conveying a meaning. And this was 
 the result of his later thought. ''The phenomena of 
 nature, which strike on the senses and are understood 
 by the mind, do form not only a magnificent spectacle, 
 but also a most coherent, entertaining, and instructive 
 Discourse ; and to effect this, they are conducted, 
 adjusted, and ranged by the greatest wisdom. This 
 laneuaofe or Discourse is studied with different atten- 
 tion, and interpreted with different degrees of skill. 
 But so far as men have studied and remarked its rules, 
 
 ' Alciphron, dial, iv, § 10; cp. Essay toiuards a neiv Theory of 
 Vision^ ^§ 64-66, 140 ff. 
 
28o The Interpretation of Reality 
 
 and can interpret right, so far they may be said to be 
 knowing in nature'." For this is his view of know- 
 ledge: ''We know a thing when we understand it; 
 and we understand it when we can interpret or tell 
 what it signifies"." 
 
 In Berkeley's view of interpretation we may find 
 the triadic relation already described. There is (i) the 
 symbol which expresses a meaning or further experience, 
 (2) the meaning or further experience of which it is the 
 expression or sign, and (3) the rendering of the first 
 into the second, which is the central feature of the 
 interpretation. Xn his earliest statement the first of 
 these consisted simply of visible objects or ideas ; they 
 were taken as signs of more stable tangible objects, 
 which formed their meaning. But, in his later thought, 
 the whole of nature is regarded as a system of sio-ns. 
 What its meaning is is not fully explained ; but it is clear 
 that, in Berkeley's view, it must be sought in the realm 
 of values. Even the '' optic language," he says, '' hath 
 a necessary connexion with knowledge, wisdom, and 
 goodness'." The interpreter of the language of vision 
 is not Berkeley or any particular philosopher, but all 
 men, who from their earliest years have been uncon- 
 sciously learning the connexion of sion and thino- 
 . . *-* & 
 
 signified. '' If we have been all practising this lan- 
 guage, ever since our first entrance into the world : if 
 the Author of Nature constantly speaks to the eyes of 
 all mankind, even in their earliest infancy, whenever 
 the eyes are open in the light, whether alone or in 
 
 ^ Siris^ § 254. 
 ^ Ibid., § 253. 
 ^ Alciphron, dial, iv, § 14. 
 
 Meaning in A' attire 
 
 281 
 
 company : it doth not seem to me at all strange that 
 men should not be aware they had ever learned a 
 language begun so early, and practised so constandy 
 as this of Vision \" Berkeley's part was therefore simply 
 to convince men that, when they thought they saw 
 things immediately, they were really interpreting signs: 
 although, having been doing so all their lives, they had 
 come to confuse the sign with the thing signified, and 
 so to imagine that they were only percipients when 
 they were really also interpreters. If Berkeley's analysis 
 of vision is correct, then all men who use their eyes are, 
 it is clear, also interpreters of what they see. But, when 
 we extend his doctrine, as he himself does, from sio-ht 
 and visible objects to all sensible experience and treat 
 the whole of nature as a system of signs, then it is 
 obvious that we pass beyond the range of the plain 
 man's interpretations and into a region where the in- 
 terpretations even of the experts are not always clear 
 and do not always agree. Thus a problem is set in 
 which the philosopher must act as interpreter and where 
 even the philosopher may not be able to do more than 
 give hints towards a true interpretation. We must 
 therefore examine more closely the nature of the mean- 
 ing which can be attributed to an experience, and also 
 that reference of meaning to its origin in mind which 
 was Berkeley's chief concern. 
 
 Berkeley laid stress on the arbitrariness of the con- 
 nexion between a sign and the thing signified. Visible 
 ideas, he thought, have no connexion with tangible 
 objects either by way of resemblance or by way of 
 
 ^ Alciphron, dial, iv, J^ 11. 
 
282 The Interpretation of Reality 
 
 causation. They may and do serve to bring to our 
 minds tactual experience ; but that meaning must 
 have been imposed arbitrarily just as is the connexion 
 between the word table and the object table. In this 
 way the inference to a mind behind the meaning and 
 expressed in it is made easy. But Berkeley was not 
 fully justified in the use he made of this conception of 
 arbitrariness. Strict arbitrariness can be asserted only 
 when a symbol or technical term is deliberately framed 
 for a particular purpose and is selected solely on the 
 ground of its simplicity and convenience in manipula- 
 tion. Ordinary speech was not framed in this way ; 
 both imitation and direct emotional expression entered 
 into its formation, so that the signs have some connexion 
 both causally and by way of resemblance with the things 
 signified. But this connexion does not in any way inter- 
 fere with their function as signs ; w^hat is needed in 
 order that they may serve as a language is simply their 
 habitual suggestion of a definite meaning, or their coming 
 to be deliberately used to express this meaning. 
 
 Similarly, Berkeley overstates his case when he 
 argues that sight and touch have nothing in common. 
 It is true that there is little or no resemblance betw^een 
 the visible appearance of a table and its ' feel ' to the 
 exploring hand. But the senses have been developed 
 from a common origin, and certain lines of correspon- 
 dence may perhaps be traced throughout the course of 
 this development ; so that an emotional rapport is 
 found to exist between the impressions of different 
 senses : Locke's blind man was not so far out when he 
 said that the colour scarlet must be like the sound of a 
 trumpet; both alike have a rousing or stimulating effect. 
 
 Symbol and Meaning 
 
 283 
 
 In truth, the presence or absence of resemblance or of 
 causal connexion between the sign and thing signified 
 does not affect the meaning. The word ' hum ' is not 
 less effective as meaning the sound made by a bee on 
 the wing because it has some resemblance to that sound ; 
 nor is the visual impression of a round table less truly 
 a sign of the tactual impression because we are able 
 to trace a causal connexion in the development of the 
 two sense-impressions. On the other hand, the symbol 
 77 means the ratio of the circumference to the diameter 
 of a circle without having any connexion with that 
 meaning beyond its 'arbitrary' selection for the purpose 
 by one mathematician and its acceptance by others. 
 Meaning is independent both of resemblance and of 
 causal connexion and need not be affected either by 
 their presence or by their absence. \\ is something 
 beyond the immediate content of the sense-presentation, 
 but it does not follow that it is disconnected causally or 
 otherwise with that content. It is only in the limiting 
 case of the deliberate selection of a symbol for a par- 
 ticular meaning that we find complete absence of such 
 connexion, and in this limiting case the connexion is 
 brought about by the mediation of the human mind. 
 
 The sign, or expression which conveys a meaning, 
 has always some content of its own apart from the 
 meaning or thing signified. Even the mathematical 
 symbol has its visible character on which its convenience 
 depends, so that the formation and selection of symbols 
 is a matter to which anxious care is devoted. And 
 meaning may be conveyed by a portion of experience 
 which has obvious importance of its own apart from this 
 meaning. Visible phenomena, for instance, are not 
 
284 The IiiterpretatioH of Reality 
 
 mere symbols of the tactual experiences which they 
 suggest : as Berkeley put it, they form " a magnificent 
 spectacle" as well as an ''instructive discourse." Indeed, 
 the relation of sign and thing signified can often be 
 reversed. The sight of the objects in a room is a sign 
 of the ' feel ' of them and of the resistance to our move- 
 ments which we might experience in walking about the 
 room : in this way it is a guide to our activity and has 
 meaning for life. But it is equally true that we may 
 explore a dark room by touch and movement and that 
 our tactual impressions teach us what to expect if the 
 light were turned on : tangible phenomena may act as 
 a sign and guide to visual experience, and that will be 
 their meaning in certain circumstances. The relation 
 of sign and thing signified may thus be reversible. The 
 visible appearance means the tangible phenomenon, and 
 the tangible can also mean the visible. The relation in 
 one irreversible direction between a word and the thing 
 or idea it stands for is an inadequate analogy for the 
 wealth of meaning expressed in the w^orld of experience. 
 Further, one bit of experience may be the sign of 
 another, and that of still another, and so on indefinitely. 
 An author expresses a meaning by a series of muscular 
 movements communicated to a pen or pencil ; signs 
 are recorded on paper and the document is transmitted 
 to the printer. For the printer it has a meaning, but 
 not the same meaning as it had for the author or will 
 have for the reader. For the printer it is simply 'copy ' ; 
 each written letter is for him simply the sign of a 
 corresponding type. Other series of muscular and me- 
 chanical movements then ensue, as a result of which 
 the printed book passes into the hands of readers to 
 
 The Interpretation of Nature > 285 
 
 whom the printed signs convey ideas which more or 
 less resemble those which the author wished to convey 
 m preparing his manuscript. We may trace a causal 
 succession throughout this process, and it has been 
 even sometimes imagined that we might be able to 
 give a purely mechanical description of it. But even 
 if we could do so our understanding of it would remain 
 imperfect. Why this process and not another.^ we may 
 ask. The whole is a series of stages in expressing and 
 conveying a meaning, from the first movements which 
 fix that meaning in written signs to the later move- 
 ments which change these signs into others so that the 
 meaning may be more easily and widely apprehended. 
 It begins with a set of ideas which one man wishes to 
 communicate and ends with the apprehension of these 
 ideas by others. What intervenes is a sequence of 
 causes and effects, but it is also a series of si^ns selected 
 simply for the purpose of conveying the meaning — 
 of acting as an intermediary between the mind of the 
 author and the minds of his readers. 
 
 These phenomena which we take as signs of mean- 
 ing are fashioned by human art ; but as we have seen 
 the same process of interpretation may apply to natural 
 phenomena. The presentations of one sense are signs 
 of experiences which the other senses will brino- • 
 together they are signs of an orderly objective world 
 in which our lives are passed and our purposes mani- 
 fested. They reveal the conditions of these purposes 
 and the promise of their fulfilment. All this the envi- 
 ronment comes to mean for us. We find in it an orderlv 
 procession of events, whose issue is not always plain 
 but is continuously being partially revealed as life 
 
286 The Interpretation of Reality 
 
 progresses. The causal order may itself be said to be 
 part of the meaning which we find in it, but it does not 
 exhaust this meaning. Scientific explanation finds regu- 
 larity or uniformity in the scattered fragments of sense- 
 experience, and enables us to predict future experience ; 
 it is thus itself an interpretation, though an interpre- 
 tation restricted within definite limits. Beyond these 
 limits we find other indications of meaning. There are 
 aspects of experience which science does not touch — 
 beauty in the colours which have been scientifically 
 analysed into vibrations of an elastic medium or 
 molecular changes in neural matter ; truth in scientific 
 theorems and elsewhere ; faith, heroism, love in the 
 conduct which the psychologist submits to analysis. 
 These are facts of life as certain as the dance of elec- 
 trons or the principle of the conservation of energy. 
 And they are not separated from the facts of the sen- 
 sible world ; it is only for scientific purposes that they 
 have been distinguished from it. They belong to the 
 complex of our experience, and we can discover their 
 modes of connexion with the other portions of that 
 experience. This connexion is not merely or chiefly an 
 explanation of how these aspects of value arise, or a 
 view of the way in which they are brought out by the 
 process of events and its causal order. They are prin- 
 ciples for the interpretation of experience, and supple- 
 ment the causal principle of explanation. They reveal 
 a meaning in it over and above the regularity and uni- 
 formity with which scientific explanation deals. And 
 the order thus disclosed, in accordance with which our 
 experience may be interpreted, is not of the same 
 fashion as the causal order. It is not limited, for ex- 
 
 Valnes as Meanings 
 
 287 
 
 ample — so we have already found' — by any axiom of 
 conservation. Energy, we are told, is always of the same 
 amount throughout the physical universe : there is no 
 question of more or less. But it is not so with value : 
 its realised amount is subject to the risk of decrease ; 
 but it bears also with it the hope of indefinite increase. 
 
 When we discover values such as beauty or love 
 or truth in certain events, this is a meanino- which the 
 events express to us, and in recognising it we are 
 interpreting them— much in the same way as we inter- 
 pret the meaning of language. The spoken or written 
 words have no meaning to one who does not understand 
 the language; they need an interpreter, in the same 
 way the difference between the assassin and the saint 
 will not be appreciated by any one who is content to 
 describe their conduct scientifically from the point of 
 view of the physicist, the physiologist, or perhaps even 
 of the analytic psychologist. It needs interpretation 
 through the divergent values which ruled the two lives. 
 Our understanding of them and of the way in which 
 they differ from one another is not merely a description, 
 nor is it an account of their temporal, spatial, and causal 
 relations ; it is an interpretation which discovers the 
 meaning of the facts. In this case and wherever we are 
 dealing with human conduct there is meaning behind 
 the actions, and the observers may discover this meaning. 
 Sometimes they can see it more clearly than it appeared 
 to the agents themselves. It is often so in literature 
 and art. There may be more in the picture or the poem 
 than its maker was conscious of putting into it, as, on 
 
 ^ Above, p. 179. 
 
288 The Interpretation of Reality 
 
 the other hand, he may fail fully to convey his meaning 
 owing to imperfect command of his medium. But in 
 all these cases what we have is mind speaking to mind. 
 When we attempt to interpret the non-human environ- 
 ment w^hich lies about us, the same method is followed 
 but it is beset by greater difficulties. We cannot appeal 
 to a mind behind the appearances and ask whether the 
 meaning has been rightly read. Even in works of human 
 art this is not always possible, for the artist may have 
 left no clue to his meaning beyond the work itself; but 
 at least we know that it is the work of a mind that 
 resembles our own. 
 
 It is here that the difficulty lies in interpreting the 
 world of nature. We can discover the orderly connexion 
 of its phenomena and speak of our generalisations as 
 laws of nature, and repeated experience confirms our 
 theories. But where can we find an objective criterion 
 for any further meaning \vhich we may read in it or 
 into it .^ Berkeley's reflexions showed that the orderly 
 connexion of sight and touch has significance for our 
 lives, and that they may be looked upon as sign and 
 thing signified. His view was supported by uniform 
 experience, and at first he dealt only with the relation 
 between two sets of phenomena which were on the 
 same plane of experience — both phenomena of sense. 
 But we seek — and he also sought — to go further than 
 this : to connect sense-phenomena with other and higher 
 levels of experience. And here the appeal to uniform 
 experience is less successful. The older teleologists 
 claimed that all things were made for man, and tried to 
 read the purpose of each natural event. But their prin- 
 ciple was without objective confirmation, and subjective 
 
 Intellecttial Satisfaction 
 
 289 
 
 desire often influenced their interpretation of details 
 I hey were apt to take human needs or desires as the 
 standard for interpreting the world ; relying on unstable 
 factors m man's nature as the key to the whole mystery 
 they courted disillusion. There is an echo of the old 
 method of interpretation in the assertion now often 
 made^ that what the philosopher seeks is satisfaction 
 Even if mtellectual satisfaction be meant, the assertion 
 can hardly be taken without qualification. The mind 
 as Bacon^' said, -is far from being a flat, equal, and 
 clear mirror that receives and reflects the rays without 
 mixture.' The intellect is not only liable to be deflected 
 by the emotions ; its own past history may incline it to 
 accept one group of ideas rather than another. Many 
 men receive intellectual satisfaction from something 
 less or something more than truth— from a neat and 
 simple formula, however f^ir short it may fall of nature's 
 subtlety, or from a theory which fits in with preconceived 
 views or with familiar experience. It is not merely 
 satisfaction that is needed, but reasonable justifiable 
 satisfaction ; and it is not satisfaction but a rational 
 ground for satisfaction that we should seek. Unless 
 our satisfaction is based upon the nature of reality itself, 
 we are apt to read a wrong meaning into experience— 
 a meaning which experience itself will falsify. 
 
 There is more meaning in the world than the orderly 
 connexions which the sciences exhibit. This much is 
 certain. The values, which have been already dealt 
 with, are found by us in the events and order of the 
 
 '^ Even by Mr Bradley, Essays on Truth and Reality, p. 317. 
 - Advancement of Learning, book v, chap, iv ; cp. Works ed 
 Spedding, vol. i, p. 643. ' 
 
 o. G. L. 
 
 19 
 
290 The Interpretation of Reality 
 
 world ; they are the meaning which the world somehow 
 conveys to us. But mistakes are often made in its 
 interpretation. Are there then any means by which 
 we may guide and test our interpretations, not of par- 
 ticular events only but of the world of experience as a 
 whole ? In a former lecture the criteria of moral value 
 have been discussed. It remains to consider what 
 criteria there are for an interpretation of the reality 
 which includes moral values as one factor in its con- 
 stitution. 
 
 In the examples of interpretation already given, one 
 portion of experience has always been interpreted by 
 means of another portion of experience ; and this must 
 always be our method. We cannot get outside experi- 
 ence altogether and interpret the whole by something 
 beyond it — for there is nothing beyond to which we 
 can appeal. The meaning of the whole can be found 
 only within the whole. The appeal is always to ex- 
 perience — but to experience in the widest sense of the 
 word. All possible experience must be included, and 
 even our most ordinary interpretations pass beyond the 
 actual event to the future of which it is prophetic. And 
 all the aspects of experience which we can apprehend 
 must be taken into account — not merely the simple 
 fact as it appears to immediate perception of things 
 without or of states of mind, but all the relations of 
 objective order to which thought extends, including 
 the laws of logic, of nature, and of value. These must 
 be included in forming an idea of reality as a whole. 
 Hence we may see how, although the meaning of the 
 whole is not to be found in anything outside, it may 
 yet be possible to arrive at an interpretation of reality 
 
 Interpretation throttgh Values 291 
 
 by means of those ideas which are partially revealed in 
 It and which have been already shown to possess objec- 
 tive validity. An adequate interpretation will consist 
 in bringing these ideas into their true relation v. ith the 
 realm of existing things. Reality is not separated from 
 existence but it is wider than ii, lor it iiiciudes the ideas 
 through which the meaning or purpose of existing 
 things may be discerned. 
 
 Concepts which go beyond immediate experience 
 are always involved in every account which we give of 
 things— whether that account be called a description, 
 an explanation, or an interpretation. And they have 
 been applied to the whole realm of existence. The 
 mechanical theory of the universe is an account of 
 reality determined by purely logical or mathematical 
 conceptions. Naturalism commonly represents the 
 world as ruled through and through by causal con- 
 nexion. Such accounts may be valid, so far as their 
 positive features go; but they are not exhaustive. 
 They describe facts, and perhaps they explain how 
 facts come to be as they are : and in doing so they 
 utilise ideas or modes of conceiving whose objective 
 validity we are bound to assume. But there is one 
 range of objectively valid ideas which they do not use 
 in the accounts they give of reality, and that is ideas of 
 value. Yet these ideas also have validity as well as the 
 others, and they may not be excluded if our account of 
 reality is to be exhaustive. They are required for its 
 completion. Without them we may be able to answer 
 the questions What.^ and How^ Rut only through 
 them can we expect an answer to the question Why ? 
 They reveal purpose as well as order, and make possible 
 
 19—2 
 
292 The Interpretatio7i of Reality 
 
 a view of reality of the kind which has been described 
 as an interpretation. 
 
 The reason which justifies us in applying moral 
 ideas ill interpreting the world is similar to that which 
 justifies us in understanding it as an orderly and causal 
 system. Moral ideas are not a system of concepts 
 without relation to existence. They apply direcdy to 
 conscious agents, and are realised in the lives of 
 those conscious agents— lives which are immersed in 
 a material environment and thus connected with the 
 whole physical universe. Morality, therefore, is con- 
 nected with the realm of existence. The problem is to 
 show the nature of this connexion. The existing world 
 is the scene on which moral ideas seek manifestation. 
 Can we say that they express the meaning, or part of 
 the meaning, of that world ? 
 
 On the religious view of the world the answer to this 
 question is not in doubt. There may be doubt and diver- 
 gence of view as to the special form the interpretation 
 is to take, as to whether, for example, a particular provi- 
 dence may be asserted ; but there is always confidence 
 that the purpose of God is expressed in the events of 
 the world. His meaning is made manifest there, however 
 slow we may be to discover it. On this view, therefore, 
 we have clearly the disclosure of mind to mind through 
 a medium which needs interpretation. But this clear 
 view is only possible if we have already reached a con- 
 viction of the existence of God. It does not correspond, 
 therefore, with the method of approach in the present 
 argument. We are arguing from experience and the 
 ideas involved in experience to a general conception of 
 reality which may issue in theism, but which does not 
 
 The Fnnction of Imagmatioii 293 
 
 start with the assumption of theism. Accordingly we 
 have first to decide whether the world does express or 
 convey a moral meaning, and only if this question has 
 been decided in the affirmative, may we ask further 
 whether this meaning reveals a Supreme Mind. 
 
 The preceding argument has reached this point. 
 We have seen that in reality as a whole moral values 
 are included, and that these moral values have validity 
 for and are manifested in conscious beings. How these 
 values are related to the realm of existence generally — 
 whether we may speak of them as the meaning which 
 the world expresses in its temporal process, and if so, 
 whether this result implies also a theistic view of the 
 universe — these questions remain. What has been 
 established so far is the legitimacy of an interpretation 
 of this sort if it can be shown to fit the facts. 
 
 The objections which have been taken to any such 
 interpretation of reality as a whole are maiiii\ uv* In 
 the first place, it is said that it is the result of imagina- 
 tion, not of intellectual demonstration, and gives only 
 a fancy-picture of the world, which may have poetic 
 value but is without objective truth. In the second 
 place, it is urged that iL i^, incapable of verification and 
 has therefore no claim to rank with scientific theories. 
 These objections affect an) Luniprehensive or synoptic 
 view of the world, and it is necessary to see how far 
 they are valid. 
 
 I. As regards the former objection, ii is true that 
 a synoptic view of reality needs imagination in its 
 formation, but it doej not follow that it i^ therefore 
 divorced from logic orihat in this respect its method is 
 
294 The Interpretation of Reality 
 
 unscientific. Certainly, logical deduction will not reach 
 to a view of the whole, for deduction is concerned with 
 general trutl.s valid for a class of things, and the object 
 of philosophy is not things in a class but the whole of 
 reality. Even if it be thought that philosophy seeks 
 the universal, then it must be the highest universal — 
 which could not be the conclusion, though it might be 
 the premiss, of a syllogism. Nor can the enquiry be 
 an induction which proceeds from an enumeration of 
 similar cases, for here there are no similar cases : the 
 uni\ erse is one, and there are no other universes with 
 which it may be compared. But a world-view is not 
 therefore independent of these processes of discursive 
 thought. It may be arrived at after a long intellectual 
 process. Behind it and contained in it lie efforts after 
 the apprehension of facts and endeavours to form con- 
 ceptions by which these facts may be described. But 
 it is not a mere transcript of presented facts, and it 
 involves imagination. It does not follow, however, that 
 the idea thus formed is merely a fancy-picture. Science 
 also involves a similar exercise of the imagination. If 
 we take any scientific theory, such as the atomic theory, 
 or the electrical theory of matter, or a general formula 
 such as the postulate of the conservation of energy, it 
 is evident that all these are a great deal more than 
 simply conceptual transcripts of the facts. They all 
 point to something behind or underlying the facts of 
 experience by which the latter may be understood. 
 The conceptions they use, also, differ from the facts 
 perceived. Atoms, electrical units, energy are concepts, 
 which could not be formed wjthout adding to and 
 taking away from the material immediately presented 
 
 Verification in Philosophy 
 
 295 
 
 in perception ; and their formation is the work of 
 imagination. 
 
 Thus the logical constructions of scientific theory 
 involve imao^ination. Nothinof crenericallv different is 
 required in the lurnidiiou of a general philosophical 
 theory, although it may have a wider range than the 
 scientific hypothesis, and it may need insight into ex- 
 perience of a different kind. Neither in science nor in 
 philosophy, is the work of imagination a mere flight of 
 fancy. It arises out of insight into experience. Only, 
 in philosophy, it aims at a more complete view of ex- 
 perience and in particular does not ignore its value- 
 aspect as science very properly does. But the validity 
 of the philosophical theory need not be inferior, nor 
 does it refuse to submit to the tests which can be 
 applied to it. 
 
 2. This brings us to the second objection — that it 
 is incapable of verification. It is chiefly through its 
 capacity for verification that the scientific hypothesis is 
 held to be distinguished from the philosophical and to 
 attain a higher level of certainty. It is worth while 
 therefore to ask what the nature of scientific verifica- 
 tion is and whether it, or any similar process fulfilling 
 the same function, can be applied to a speculative view 
 of reality as a whole. 
 
 It is clear that a scientific hypothesis deals with a 
 more limited range of experience than the philosophical, 
 and that it is consequently easier to bring to bear upon 
 it the test of agreement with facts. The facility for veri- 
 fication is certainly all in favour of science, and is one 
 reason for its steady progress. Philosophy, seeking a 
 more comprehensive view, has a more complex task ; 
 
296 The Interpretation of Reality 
 
 and there are greater difficulties in applying the appro- 
 priate tests. But it does not follow that the nature of 
 these tests is essentially different from those applicable 
 to science. 
 
 Scientific verification is of two kinds. A fact may 
 be discovered which is inconsistent with the hypothesis 
 formed, that is, which cannot be explained or described 
 if the hypothesis be true ; and as the fact cannot be 
 disputed, the hypothesis must in such a case be relin- 
 quished. In this way the refutation of a hypothesis 
 may be effected by the discovery of a single fiict incon- 
 sistent with it. But the same hypothesis would not have 
 been satisfactorily established if the new fact discovered 
 had been in agreement with it. This would add to the 
 probability of its truth, but it would not, in the strict 
 sense of the w-ord, verify it. This agreement of fact with 
 theory is, however, one kind of verification, as the term 
 is used in scientific method ; and, as the facts multiply 
 which agree with the hypothesis, the probability of its 
 truth increases. 
 
 Bqt another kind of verification is conceivable, 
 which, when or if attainable, would be of greater im- 
 portance. Suppose the new fact admitted of one and 
 only one explanation. If it agreed with our hypothesis 
 and disagreed with every other possible hypothesis, 
 then its discovery would be a complete verification of 
 the former. Verification of this kind can be obtained 
 only when every possible hypothesis is before us, so 
 that the new fact can test each of them in turn and 
 refute all but one of them. The method proceeds by 
 exclusion, and its conclusive evidence rests on the 
 assumption that the hypotheses before us are exhaustive 
 
 Methods of Verification 
 
 297 
 
 — that no other is possible with which also the fact 
 might be found to agree. It is seldom if ever that we 
 can be sure that our list of possible explanations is 
 exhaustive, so that probability nearly always enters to 
 disturb complete confidence in the result. The crucial 
 experiment which decides between two conflicting 
 hypotheses and establishes the truth of one ot ihem 
 proceeds on the assumption that no other alternative 
 explanations than those before us are possible. 
 
 Most of the larger generalisations of science admit 
 of verification of the former kind only. They are 
 repeatedly tested by new facts, and our confidence in 
 their validity increases with the range of facts w^hich 
 we find them capable of describing. The general theory 
 of evolution w^hich we owe to Darwin is mainly sup- 
 ported in this way. The same kind of verification is 
 applicable to such a doctrine as that of the conservation 
 of energy. We do not find facts which refute every 
 theory which may imply the increase or disappearance 
 of energy from the physical system. What we do find 
 is that, however extensive and exact our knowledge of 
 facts, we are not compelled to give up the doctrine : 
 within the limits of accuracv of our observations, it is 
 able to describe new facts as well as old. Each exten- 
 sion of our knowledge can be explained in harmony 
 with it. That it describes the facts up to a certain point 
 is certain ; but that it is an accurate account of the 
 energy in the physical universe is not proven, though 
 it may be rendered more and more probable by its 
 agreement with an increasing V'olume of facts. 
 
 Of these two kinds of scientific verification one 
 would give certainty if all possible explanations were 
 
296 The Interpretation of Reality 
 
 and there are greater difficulties in applying the appro- 
 priate tests. But it does not follow that the nature of 
 these tests is essentially different from those applicable 
 to science. 
 
 Scientific verification is of two kinds. A fact may 
 be discovered which is inconsistent with the hypothesis 
 formed, that is, which cannot be explained or described 
 if the hypothesis be true ; and as the fact cannot be 
 disputed, the hypothesis must in such a case be relin- 
 quished. In this way the refutation of a hypothesis 
 may be effected by the discovery of a single fact incon- 
 sistent with it. But the same hypothesis would not have 
 been satisfactorily established if the new fact discovered 
 had been in agreement with it. This would add to the 
 probability of its truth, but it would not, in the strict 
 sense of the word, verify it. This agreement of fact with 
 theory is, however, one kind of verification, as the term 
 is used in scientific method ; and, as the facts multiply 
 which agree with the hypothesis, the probability of its 
 truth increases. 
 
 But another kind of verification is conceivable, 
 which, when or if attainable, would be of greater im- 
 portance. Suppose the new fact admitted of one and 
 only one explanation. If it agreed with our hypothesis 
 and disagreed with every other possible hypothesis, 
 then its discovery would be a complete verification of 
 the former. Verification of this kind can be obtained 
 only when every possible hypothesis is before us, so 
 that the new fact can test each of them in turn and 
 refute all but one of them. The method proceeds by 
 exclusion, and its conclusive evidence rests on the 
 assumption that the hypotheses before us are exhaustive 
 
 Methods of Verification 
 
 297 
 
 — that no other is possible with which also the fact 
 might be found to agree. It is seldom if ever that we 
 can be sure that our list of possible explanations is 
 exhaustive, so that probability nearly always enters to 
 disturb complete confidence in the result. The crucial 
 experiment which decides between two conflicting 
 hypotheses and establishes the truth of one of them 
 proceeds on the assumption that no other alternative 
 explanations than those before us are possible. 
 
 Most of the larofer creneralisations of science admit 
 of verification of the former kind only. They are 
 repeatedly tested by new facts, and our confidence in 
 their validity increases with the range of facts which 
 we find them capable of describing. The general theory 
 of evolution which we owe to Darwin is mainly sup- 
 ported in this way. The same kind of verification is 
 applicable to such a doctrine as that of the conservation 
 of energy. We do not find facts which refute every 
 theory which may imply the increase or disappearance 
 of energy from the physical system. What we do find 
 is that, however extensive and exact our knowledge of 
 facts, we are not compelled to give up the doctrine : 
 within the limits of accuracy of our observations, it is 
 able to describe new facts as well as old. Each exten- 
 sion of our knowledge can be explained in harmony 
 with it. That it describes the facts up to a certain point 
 is certain ; but that it is an accurate account of the 
 energy in the physical universe is not proven, though 
 it may be rendered more and more probable by its 
 agreement with an increasing volume of facts. 
 
 Of these two kinds of scientific verification one 
 w^ould give certainty if all possible explanations were 
 
 t 
 
298 The Ipiterpretatio7i of Reality 
 
 exhaustively known, while the other and more common 
 form gathers confirmation from agreement with new 
 facts but never reaches proof. Can the philosopher as 
 well as the man of science avail himself of either or 
 both these kinds of verification for the criticism and 
 confirmation of his hypotheses ? We are confronted 
 with different theories concerning the ultimate ground 
 or principle of reality, and these theories may be tested 
 by their ability to explain the facts — including under 
 ' facts ' not only the facts of nature and of personal life 
 but the values found in personal life. We might make 
 a list of these theories, and it is conceivable that all but 
 one of them should be refuted by their inadequacy to 
 describe the facts. It is even possible to obtain a set of 
 facts or ideas which may be used as a crucial test for 
 deciding between two different hypotheses concerning 
 the universal order. The ideas of moral value may be 
 used in this way for the refutation of certain theories. 
 But, as in the case of scientific verification, we cannot 
 claim more than probability for the exhaustiveness of 
 our enumeration of possible hypotheses. We have thus 
 in philosophy, just as we have in science, for the most 
 part to rely on the other method of verification which 
 finds the confirmation of a hypothesis in its ability to 
 yield a consistent explanation of the new facts and 
 classes of facts that are brought to our notice. 
 
 The theories about the world which we form have 
 the precision and fixity which are the mark of intel- 
 lectual conceptions. But our experience is a living 
 growing experience, always producing something new 
 which may be used as a test of the adequacy of the 
 theory. Thus the human consciousness, as it makes its 
 
 The Test of Experience 299 
 
 way in the world and seeks to realise its ideals in the 
 environment, produces at every stage in its progress a 
 new challenge to the faith by which it works. The faith 
 has been crystallised into theory ; and both faith and 
 theory must meet the challenge. They are tested by 
 their adequacy to this new experience — to the life 
 which is its source. Often in the history of mankind 
 both the theory and the faith which it expresses in 
 intellectual terms have been shattered in contact with 
 the growing forces of life. At other times the faith may 
 remain intact in its spiritual essence, while the doctrinal 
 forms in which it was expressed are proved inadequate 
 and new forms have to be sought. 
 
 As a scientific theory is held to be verified by its 
 ability to anticipate sense-perceptions, so a philosophical 
 theory may be verified by its power to anticipate ex- 
 perience of a wider kind. The faith which lies behind 
 the theory may consist in an immediate attitude of the 
 individual mind to the meaning of things as a whole 
 and may inspire not only intellectual ideas but also the 
 activity in which the individual shows himself as an 
 agent in the world's progress. And this faith may find 
 its characteristic vindication in its power not merely to 
 anticipate but even to create experience. 
 
 These considerations are only general, but they 
 may suflfice to justify the conclusion that philosophy, 
 however its method may differ from the method of 
 -science, does not depend upon the employment of some 
 irrational faculty of apprehension and that for it also 
 the final test lies in experience. Only, experience must 
 not be limited to the phenomena presented to sense- 
 perception and their causal connexions ; it must include 
 
 / 
 
 i^ 
 
 /■ 
 
300 The Interpretation of Reality 
 
 the values which we recognise and which experience 
 may show : and the view of reaHty which we seek is 
 one which will comprehend and harmonise the causal 
 order with the order of values. One way in which this 
 has been attempted is to give a causal explanation of 
 value itself. This is the way of Naturalism ; and it is 
 assumed here that the theory of naturalism has failed 
 to justify itself logically. But another way lies open, in 
 which the conception of cause is not taken as the only 
 or the highest conception under which the facts of expe- 
 rience may be grouped. Facts are significant of value, 
 so that we may be led to an interpretation of reality in 
 which the causal explanation, without being discarded, 
 is supplemented by the conception of meaning. 
 
 XII 
 
 THE THEISTIC ARGUMENTS 
 
 VJN the theistic view the world is interpreted as ex- 
 pressing the mind of God. But theism has been reached 
 in various ways at different times. The old proofs for 
 the being of God have long since fallen into disfavour; 
 they have passed the stage in which critical minds find 
 them convincing ; and they are approaching the stage 
 in which men generally cease to find them interesting. 
 Opinion has set against them, and is now tending to 
 set away from them altogether as doctrines the life of 
 which has gone out. They were once very much alive, 
 however; and the reason of the changed attitude 
 towards them is itself a question of some interest. This 
 reason is, of course, in the first place, the destructive 
 criticism of Hume, and still more, of Kant. But, 
 although this is the main reason for the neglect of the 
 traditional proofs, it is not a wholly adequate reason. 
 When we look into the Humian and Kantian criticisms 
 we see that they are directed not simply against the 
 old forms of argument, but against any possible argu- 
 ments for a knowledge of the ultimate nature, or of the 
 whole, of things. Now their attack upon metaphysical 
 knowledge generally has not met with the same wide 
 acceptance as their refutations of the particular theo- 
 logical proofs. From the point of view of an agnosticism, 
 such as that in which Kant's first Critique issued, it is 
 
302 
 
 The Theistic Arguments 
 
 clear that the proofs are without vaHdity. But they are 
 discarded or quietly disregarded by many who do not 
 share this Kantian view of the limits of knowledge, and 
 whose own doctrines are equally open to the criticisms 
 of Kant. 
 
 It would seem therefore that Kant's destructive 
 criticism does not altogether explain the existing dis- 
 satisfaction with the traditional proofs. The full expla- 
 nation must be sought further afield, and involves, so 
 it seems to me, the distinction between religious belief 
 and theological argument. In its origin and throughout 
 much of its history, religion (including the belief in 
 God) is independent of the demonstrations of the being 
 of God offered by philosophers and theologians. Hume 
 himself, in his Dissertation on ' The Natural History of 
 Religion,' was perhaps the first clearly to draw attention 
 to the distinction between the historical causes of reli- 
 gious belief and the theoretical arguments which point 
 to theism. He set the example, which has been followed 
 of late with fruitful results, of tracing the early stages 
 of religious belief. He utilised such facts as were at 
 his disposal, and his psychological imagination helped 
 him to fill out the picture. His most important gene- 
 ralisation was that polytheism preceded theism in the 
 order of history. This is an important result, from the 
 philosopher's point of view. It means that the unity of 
 the world-order, which is the first point to be brought 
 out or assumed in the theistic arguments, appears only 
 at a late stage of historical development, and did not 
 give rise to the belief in God. If we compare this 
 result with the view of Hume's earliest English pre- 
 decessor in the field of comparative religion, we cannot 
 
 Traditio7ial Idea of God 303 
 
 fail to be struck by the superior insight of the later 
 writer. Herbert of Cherbury's De Religione Ge?ittltum 
 broke into a new field of enquiry by its survey of faiths 
 and their development; but its general idea is com- 
 pletely rationalistic and unhistorical. The true and 
 rational conception of God, which holds the first or 
 highest place in his thought, must also, he thinks, have 
 been first in time in the minds of the human race. He 
 holds, accordingly, that all faiths which fall short of 
 or go beyond this pure and rational creed are mere 
 aberrations or corruptions — the inventions of a crafty 
 priesthood. Though he was the first to open up the '' 
 field of historical religion which later times have culti- 
 vated both extensively and intensively, Herbert of 
 Cherbury's fundamental thought was really unhistorical. 
 He did not see the necessity for a clear distinction be- 
 tween the historical succession and the logical order 
 
 which is not a succession in time. In this he resembled 
 most of his followers in the age of rationalism, as well 
 as his Scholastic predecessors. And these were the 
 periods in which the traditional proofs were in the 
 ascendant among philosophers and theologians. 
 
 The religious consciousness of those periods — Scho- 
 lastic and Cartesian — had inherited the idea of one 
 God as the creator and ruler of the universe; the his- 
 torical antecedents of this idea and of the religious 
 consciousness generally were unknown to or ignored 
 by the thinkers of the time. The religious idea of God 
 was taken over by philosophy, without question as to 
 its origin, and used for expressing the final explanation 
 of reality which philosophy was able to give. The pro- 
 cedure was not necessarily vicious. There cannot be 
 
304 
 
 The Theistic Argtmietits 
 
 one view valid for religion and another and quite 
 different solution for the philosophical problem. But 
 the procedure must not be followed blindly; philosophy 
 must not take over the religious idea of God without 
 recognising that this idea has been reached on another 
 path from that of rational thought. 
 
 Elsewhere^ I have drawn a distinction between 
 what I have called two ways of theism — the theism of 
 the religious consciousness for which God is in some 
 manner an immediate object ; and the theism of philo- 
 sophical theory in which the idea of God is arrived at 
 by a process of reflective thought and functions as an 
 explanation of reality. The two ways cannot perma- 
 nently diverge and yet each be valid along its own 
 lines: for the religious consciousness is just one aspect 
 of the human consciousness. But they do not display 
 unbroken harmony. Religion is not the monopoly of 
 speculative thinkers, and the object of common worship 
 at any time may be incredible to the man of trained 
 intelliofence. At such times there is strain and conflict 
 between religion and philosophy, and the strain may 
 issue in progress for both. On the other hand, when 
 the religious consciousness and philosophical thinking 
 are directed to the same object, and are at one in their 
 conception of it, we have what is called an age of faith. 
 The Scholastic period is often described as such. The 
 period between Descartes and the latter part of the 
 eighteenth century — the years in which Rationalism 
 was in the ascendant — are not generally described in 
 the same way. They exhibited in an acute form, though 
 on a somewhat limited field, the strain of religious 
 
 ^ Hibbert Journal^ vol. xi (191 3), pp. 567 if. 
 
 i. 
 
 The Idea and its Object 305 
 
 conflict. And yet, as regards the one point I have in 
 view— the conception of God— this period also might 
 be called an age of faith. For philosophy and religion 
 were then very much at one as to the way in which 
 God was understood and in accepting belief in him as 
 valid. 
 
 Thus it happened that, during the period when the 
 theistic arguments, or certain of them, were commonly 
 regarded as sound and convincing, two contemporary 
 characteristics of thought may be noted. In the first 
 place, Kant's criticism had not yet discredited the com- 
 petence of human reason in questions of metaphysics 
 and theology. And, in the second place, the idea of 
 God was present to thinkers in advance of their 
 argument, and regarded by them as a primitive and 
 permanent possession of the human consciousness, so 
 that they were predisposed in favour of the idea. What 
 they had to do was to demonstrate that this idea had 
 a real object. The objections to which the theoretical 
 arguments were subjected first by Hume and after- 
 wards by Kant weakened the arguments themselves. 
 But the views arrived at in Hume's ^ Natural History 
 of Religion ' were fitted to strike at the root of some- 
 thing which Lay behind the arguments— the idea of the 
 one God, which they took over from the common re- 
 ligious consciousness before going on to prove the 
 divine existence. Hume set out to show that this idea 
 was not primitive and not universal, but the offspring 
 of strange superstitions ; and he ended with the sugges- 
 tion that by ^'opposing one species of superstition to 
 another," we should ''set them a-quarrelling ; while we 
 ourselves, during their fury and contention, happily 
 
 S. G. L. 
 
 20 
 
3o6 
 
 The Theistic Arguments 
 
 make our escape into the calm, though obscure, regions 
 of philosophy'"— a region in which we maybe content 
 to suspend our judgment, seeing that " the whole is a 
 riddle, an enigma, an inexplicable mystery." 
 
 The investigations into the origin and history of 
 reiioion which have been carried out since Hume's day 
 have added vasdy to our knowledge, but they have not 
 finally removed that perplexity in which Hume found 
 himself. If we ask what is the bearing of the develop- 
 ment of religion upon the claim to truth made in religion, 
 we find ourselves confronted by two, or even by three, 
 different answers from those whose knowledge of the 
 subject qualifies them to speak. We have, in the first 
 place, the view that religion had its origin in an atti- 
 tude which implied misunderstanding of the causal 
 connexions of things, that its history is only slightly, if 
 at all, related to the truth of its dogmas, and that we 
 are even justified in drawing the inference that, what- 
 ever purposes it may have served in the past or even 
 may serve in the future, it has no grasp upon truth 
 and its object is illusory. In the second place, other 
 enquirers hold that the religious consciousness has had 
 from the beginning a certain connexion with objective 
 reality, and that the history of religion displays, on the 
 whole, a progressive revelation of this reality. These 
 views are direcdy opposed ; but it is possible to hold 
 a third view according to which the history of religion 
 does not justify any kind of inference either to the truth 
 or to the falsity of religious doctrines. 
 
 It does not fall within my plan or my competence 
 to examine these views and to attempt to decide be- 
 1 Hume, Essays, ed. Green and Grose, vol. ii, p. 363. 
 
 The Method of Argument 307 
 
 tween them. But it is relevant to draw attention to 
 them. They may serve to remind us of the limits of 
 our present enquiry when compared with the whole 
 field of the philosophy of religion. And the difference 
 of opinion which they display has a bearing on the 
 method which it behoves us to adopt. Having regard 
 to the varieties of the religious consciousness, and the 
 problems involved in its interpretation, we cannot 
 simply accept from it the idea of God, as we find that 
 idea at certain times or in certain persons, and then 
 proceed to consider the place which that idea occupies 
 in philosophical or reflective thought, and the grounds 
 for holding that it has a real object. But this is just 
 what was done by those who used the traditional argu- 
 ments. They began with an idea of God, which they 
 proceeded to define, for the most part without meeting 
 with much controversy, and then went on to give proofs 
 of the being or existence of God. When doubt or 
 diff"erence arises concerning the idea of God itself, the 
 basis of the argument is shifted, and the proofs them- 
 selves lose their cogency and may even cease to interest 
 us. Thus it becomes necessary to adopt a different way 
 of approaching the question. 
 
 We are seeking to understand reality— if possible, 
 as a whole; and our beginning must be made from 
 reality as it is known to us. We have found that the 
 parts of reality are all connected together; there is no 
 absolutely independent unit among the objects of expe- 
 rience; in this sense, therefore, reality as known to us 
 is a whole. The problem is, How are we to understand 
 this whole.^ This is definitely a philosophical question. 
 
 20- 
 
3o8 
 
 The T heist ic Arguments 
 
 to which theism is one possible answer, namely, that 
 the whole and all its parts are dependent upon one 
 Supreme Mind. Pantheism is another solution and 
 differs from theism in the thoroughness with which it 
 strips the finite many of every vestige of independence 
 or individuality, and in its reluctance to qualify the One 
 as mind. Still another type of solution may be found 
 in the varying forms of Pluralism, which accentuate the 
 reality of the many in a way which contrasts with pan- 
 theism, and either deny the existence of One Supreme 
 Mind or else regard that supreme spirit as oxA^ primus 
 
 inter pares. 
 
 Each of these different theories is an attempt to 
 
 arrive at a view of reality as a whole— what has been 
 
 called a synoptic view. Analysis and synthesis are 
 
 employed in the theoretical process by which they are 
 
 reached, but are insufficient of themselves to form such 
 
 theories'. Nor are they on the same level as scientific 
 
 theories, in which objects are classified and referred to 
 
 the laws or formulae which describe them. They are 
 
 views of the universe as a whole, and the universe 
 
 cannot be put into a class or compared with other 
 
 objects : for there are no other objects, and there is no 
 
 class larger than itself. It is unique, a 'singular event\' 
 
 as Hume called it. Hume's criticism of the cosmo- 
 
 logical argument will be referred to later. But there is 
 
 profound truth in this suggestive comment of his. We 
 
 cannot refer the universe to any class higher or wider 
 
 than itself ; it has no similar and no other ; all classes 
 
 and concepts must be found within it, not outside it. 
 
 ' Hume's word was 'effect'; but the word is misleading as it 
 implies its correlative * cause.' See below, p. 319. 
 
 Their Starting-point 
 
 309 
 
 We are seeking to understand it, and such under- 
 standing must be from within, not from without. We 
 are ourselves parts of the universe, or factors of it, and 
 an outside view of it is impossible. The only under- 
 standing of it possible for us must be an inner view — 
 such as all synopsis is — and the synoptic effort will 
 be a struggle to get as near as possible to the heart of 
 the universe, its inner principle. Thus the problem 
 which confronts us should not be put in the form, Does 
 God exist .^ but rather in the form, How is the universe 
 to be understood and interpreted '^. 
 
 The various theistic arguments commonly put the 
 question in the other way which, I think, is the wrong 
 way. They start with a definition of God, and then 
 distinguish certain lines of argument along each of 
 which we are supposed to arrive at the conclusion that 
 God exists. And each line of argument is supposed to 
 have independent validity and to point to the same 
 conclusion. Further, these lines of argument imitate 
 the part-to-part advance of scientific proof, and the 
 transition in them to a view of reality as a whole is 
 obscure or questionable. We shall therefore expect to 
 find defects in the traditional proofs, though it may 
 turn out that they make important contributions to that 
 view of the whole which we are endeavouring to form. 
 For all the proofs begin from some part in the divided 
 whole of reality and seek in their conclusions to tran- 
 scend the limited or partial and reach the unconditioned 
 or complete. 
 
 This is the case even with the Ontological Argu- 
 ment, though it starts from an idea than which none 
 
3IO 
 
 The Theistic Arguments 
 
 greater can be conceived. It begins with a distinction 
 which, once made, is always hard to reconcile — the 
 distinction between idea and existence. With this dis- 
 tinction both Anselm and Descartes began, and the 
 general view of both is that there is one idea so great 
 as to spurn the distinction and necessitate the existence 
 of its corresponding object. Anselm sought long and 
 earnestly for a simple form of proof, free from learned 
 complexity, which would show that and what God is. 
 And what he found is the following argument^: God 
 is a Being than which no greater can be conceived. 
 Such is our idea of God. But that than which no 
 greater can be conceived cannot be in the understanding 
 alone (that is, it cannot be a mere idea), for if it were 
 only in the understanding, then something further could 
 be conceived as belonging to it, namely, real existence ; 
 and this existence in reality as well as in idea would 
 be a greater thing than ideal existence only. That is 
 to say, if that than which no greater can be conceived 
 were only in the understanding, there would be some- 
 thing still greater than it, which assuredly is impossible. 
 Something, therefore, without doubt, exists than which 
 no greater can be conceived, and it is both in the under- 
 standing and in reality. 
 
 Such is the sum and substance of Anselm's aro-u- 
 ment as he first stated it. It was afterwards re-stated 
 by him in somewhat more technical terms in reply to 
 
 ' See the extracts in Caldecott and Mackintosh's Selections from 
 the Literature of Theism (1904), pp. i-g, and in Daniels, Quelien- 
 teitrage und Untersuchungen ziir Geschichte der Gottesbcweise (Beitrdge 
 zur Geschichte der Phiiosofhie des Mittelaiters, Band viii, Heft 1-2) 
 (1909), pp. 5-20. 
 
 The Ontological Argument 311 
 
 a critic. But even in its first form it cannot be refuted 
 by a reference to the difference between the idea of a 
 hundred dollars and the actual existence or possession 
 of a hundred dollars. Kant's example, as Hegel re- 
 marked', appeals at once to the ordinary undenstandina- 
 for there is nothing the plain man can grasp more' 
 clearly than the difference between the idea of money 
 and money in pocket. Hence the success of Kant's 
 illustration, which has been taken as a sufficient refuta- 
 tion of Anselm's proof Yet it really misses the point 
 of that proof, which was an effort to discriminate be- 
 tween the idea of God and all other ideas. Nor was 
 Kant's argument new. He was anticipated by a con- 
 temporary of Anselm's, Gaunilo by name, who used a 
 more elaborate illustration. And this is the way in 
 which Gaunilo answered Anselm. " Some say that there 
 IS .somewhere in the ocean an Island which— as it is 
 difficult, or rather impossible, to discover what does 
 not exist— is known as the Lost Island. It is fabled 
 to be more amply supplied with riches and all delights 
 m immense abundance than the Fortunate Isknds 
 them.selves. And although there is no owner or in- 
 habitant, yet in every way it excels all inhabited lands 
 m the abundance of things which might be appropriated 
 as wealth. Now, let any one tell me thi.s, and I shall 
 easily understand all that he says. But if he then pro- 
 ceeds to infer: 'You can no longer doubt that this 
 most excellent of islands, which you do not doubt to 
 exist in your understanding, is really in existence some- 
 where, because it is more excellent to be in reality than 
 
 ' Phiiosofhie der Religion, 2nd ed., vol. i, pp. 213-, 4. (Eng. 
 transl., vol. 11, p. 353.) ■ 
 
312 
 
 The Theistic Argumejits 
 
 to be in the understanding only, and unless It were in 
 existence any other land which does exist would be 
 more excellent than it, and so that which you have 
 understood to be the best of islands would not be the 
 best ' — if, I say, he wishes in this way to compel me 
 to assent to the existence of this island, and to suppose 
 that there can be no more doubt about it, either I shall 
 consider that he is in jest, or I shall know not which 
 I ought to consider the more foolish, myself if I grant 
 it to him, or him if he thinks that he has, with any 
 certainty at all, proved the existence of that island. 
 He must first have shown me that its very excellence 
 is the excellence of a thing really and indubitably 
 existing, and not in any degree the excellence of a 
 something false or dubious in my understanding." 
 
 Now this illustration, and the criticism it conveys, 
 are not sufficient to refute Anselm's argument, any more 
 than the hundred dollars comparison is. True, I have 
 an idea of an island than which none is more excellent, 
 as Kant had an idea of a hundred dollars than which 
 there were no better dollars in the bank at Konigsberg 
 or anywhere else. But then you cannot say that there 
 cannot be conceived anything greater than the most 
 excellent of islands, or the best of dollars, and this is 
 how God is conceived. 
 
 Gaunilo's objection, it may be remarked, comes 
 nearer the point than Kant's does. Anselm had argued 
 that existence must belong to one idea, though to one 
 only, namely, the idea of that than which nothing greater 
 can be conceived. To say, as Kant does, that the idea 
 of a hundred dollars does not Involve their existence, 
 ' is quite irrelevant, for we can easily conceive greater 
 
 Anselm s Defence 313 
 
 things than a hundred dollars, and, in a tolerable coinage, 
 any one hundred dollars Is not better than any other. 
 On the other hand, Gaunilo's Idea of a perfect Island 
 was at least the idea of something perfect or complete 
 of its kind. Nothing greater of its kind could be con- 
 ceived. We can however conceive something of a 
 greater kind— perfect of its kind and also of a kind 
 more perfect. And it was only when nothing at all 
 more perfect or greater could be conceived that Anselm's 
 argument applied. Anselm was therefore quite right 
 In replying to Gaunllo that he had missed the point of 
 his argument. 1 1 applies only to the absolutely greatest, 
 not to things like Islands which may be perfect In some 
 limited respect. And he was quite safe In undertaking 
 that, If his critic could apply his argument to anything 
 else, then - I will both find for him that lost Island, 
 and I will give it to him, and secure him against Its 
 ever being lost again." According to Anselm there is 
 only one thing of which It can be said that It cannot 
 be conceived in the understanding without actually 
 existing In reality; and this Is the greatest thing con- 
 ceivable. 
 
 But, although he has given an answer to his critic, 
 this does not mean that Anselm has made out his case. 
 Because anything else can be conceived without also 
 existing, it does not follow that the greatest conceivable 
 cannot be so conceived but must also exist. In the 
 case of everything else, existence can be separated from 
 essence; but not, he urges. In the case of the Idea of 
 God. This Is the doctrine as afterwards put succinctly 
 by Descartes, who asserts that existence follows from 
 the essence of God or the Perfect Being just as equality 
 
3H 
 
 The T heist ic Argimients 
 
 of the sum of its angles to two right angles follows 
 from the essence of a triangle'. Existence, that is to 
 say, is one of the qualities which go to make up per- 
 fection; the all-perfect must possess it as well as the 
 others. This form of the argument, however, is met 
 by the criticism of Kant that existence is not itself a 
 quality or factor in perfection; and this once more might 
 be countered in the same way as before by the asser- 
 tion that what holds in every other case does not hold 
 in the case of the all-perfect or of that than which there 
 can be nothing greater. 
 
 But, although the replies are unsatisfactory, it does 
 not follow that the case of Anselm and Descartes is 
 made out. It is agreed that idea does not involve 
 existence in any case except one: the one case, which 
 is in dispute, being the idea of that than which nothing 
 greater can be conceived, or of the all-perfect. Is there 
 any ground for the assertion that this idea involves 
 existence, although no other idea does? Can we distin- 
 guish in this respect between the idea of the all-perfect 
 being and the idea of a perfect island '^ 
 
 The opposition of views can be put more simply 
 and without technicality by a method of statement in 
 which existence may be applied to bpth the objects 
 compared. When I think of the lost island than which 
 there is no other island more excellent, I may and often 
 do think of it as existing. But because I think of it as 
 existing — vaguely conceived as situated in some un- 
 defined part of the ocean — I am not justified in asserting 
 its existence, nor do I assert that it exists. Similarly, 
 
 ^ Descartes, Meditations^ v ; Philosophical JVorhs, Eng. tr., vol. i, 
 p. 1 8 1. 
 
 Sig7nficance of the Argument 315 
 
 when I think of God than whom there is no being 
 greater, I think of him as existing. But does that jus- 
 tify me in asserting that he does exist .^ It is for Anselm 
 and Descartes to show that it does, and why? And 
 this they are never able to do without going outside 
 the content of the idea with which they started and to 
 which they profess to restrict the argument. 
 
 There are two motives underlying the Ontological 
 Argument, and the intellectual affinities of these two 
 motives are not the same. The first is the demand that 
 our highest ideal, the best and most perfect being which 
 we can conceive, shall not be severed from reality; and 
 it is clearly a mistake to clothe such a demand in the 
 dress of an apodictic proof which can be demonstrated 
 from the mere content of the idea. In type it belongs 
 to what is called the Moral Argument, which will be 
 examined in the next lecture. The other motive is the 
 intellectual desire for completeness in our conceptions ; 
 but here we do not begin with an idea separated from 
 reality, and then proceed to argue that it includes reality. 
 The idea has reality from the first, both as my idea and 
 as based on an apprehension of a reality other than 
 the idea, whether of the world without or of the self 
 as living and active. If what is required is to explain 
 the existence of my idea, the argument passes into the 
 cosmological variety with Descartes, when he asks what 
 can have caused this idea in my mind of an all-perfect 
 being. As significant of reality, again, the idea we have 
 of the real world is found to be inadequate to reality 
 as long as there is anything which it does not com- 
 prehend; and hence it is expanded to the idea of an 
 ens realissimtim or of that than which nothing can be 
 
3i6 
 
 The Theistic Arguments 
 
 greater. In this case also the idea is firmly rooted In 
 existence: the question is whether it has been expanded 
 in a legitimate manner, and especially whether we are 
 logically justified in maintaining that our highest ethical 
 predicates belong to the being that is the ground or 
 principle of the existing world. And this question also 
 belongs to the examination of the cosmological argu- 
 ment, or of its amplification in the teleological argument. 
 
 The Cosmological Argument is not, like the onto- 
 logical argument, faced by the difficulty of making a 
 transition from idea to existence. It begins with the 
 idea of the world, or of portions of it presented to our 
 experience, so that existence is from the first given 
 with the idea. It connects this idea with the conception 
 of God, and uses the conception of cause as the nexus. 
 God is regarded as First Cause of the world. In the 
 argument put forward along these lines, there are four 
 points that seem open to attack and to defence: the 
 validity of the causal concept in general; the validity 
 of applying it to the world as a whole; the validity of 
 calling a halt in the regress of causes, and saying that, 
 at this particular point, we have reached the First Cause ; 
 and the validity of the identification of this First Cause 
 with God. 
 
 Without entering upon these various lines of enquiry, 
 we may look upon the problem in a more direct way 
 and ask, To what kind of conception does the interpre- 
 tation of the world lead us when we try to understand 
 it as a whole ? For this question, also, the critical point 
 is the application and meaning of the causal concept. 
 
 It is particular events or happenings that give rise 
 
 The Cosmological Argument 317 
 
 to the enquiry into causes. We are impressed by a 
 change, a new fact, and ask for its cause. But, even 
 when another event has been identified as the cause, 
 we have not yet reached science — as the man of science 
 understands the word. Science seeks the universal, and 
 utilises the conception of causation only as a means of 
 arriving at a universal law or formula. The ideal of all 
 the sciences is a characteristic that has been attained 
 
 in full measure only by certain branches of physics 
 
 the discovery of a formula which will serve to describe 
 the facts already observed and enable us to predict 
 future facts correctly. The sciences aim at expression 
 in mathematical terms, and, when they have succeeded 
 in finding the appropriate formulae, their work as 
 sciences is done: their universal is reached. If we 
 regard physical science generally as having to do with 
 the world as a whole, in so far as it is material, then 
 its goal will be the discovery of a formula adequate to 
 comprehend and describe all the processes of nature. 
 In this result the time-process becomes unimportant; 
 and the question of a First Cause does not arise, be- 
 cause the causal problem has been transformed and 
 left behind. The one positive result for a more general 
 interpretation is that the physical universe is an orderly 
 system of a very precise kind, its various forms and 
 appearances being capable of determination by a process 
 
 of rational calculation. However it has come to pass 
 
 whether or no it be legitimate to ask the question how 
 it has come to pass — it is a rational system. 
 
 At the same time this order describes for us only 
 one aspect of the actual world. It is, in the last resort, 
 merely quantitative. The qualities of things and their 
 
3i8 
 
 The Theistic Arguments 
 
 differences, the concrete facts of nature and life, remain 
 in their quaHties untouched and undescribed by its 
 formulae. Something has been dropped out in the pro- 
 cess of generalisation by which the formula was reached, 
 as something always is dropped out in every genera- 
 lisation from particular facts. Thus, in any particular 
 sequence of events, we are not merely interested in 
 the theorem that, in the redistribution of energy, its 
 quantity remains constant; this proposition assures us 
 of order, without throwing any light on the particular 
 quality of the events; it does not exclude the possi- 
 bility of the same equation being preserved by another 
 alternative sequence qualitatively different ; and that 
 there should be change at all is, of course, for it an 
 ultimate fact. The formula gives only the quantity 
 or ' how much ' of anything, not its qualitative in- 
 dividuality. 
 
 Now even our physical enquiries (as distinct from 
 their results as finally formulated) are never purely 
 quantitative; they are always concerned with concrete 
 and therefore qualitatively determined facts and se- 
 quences; this is more obviously true of biological and 
 still more obviously of mental and social investigations. 
 These all proceed on the postulate that each new fact 
 or event has its ground or explanation in something 
 antecedent. The world-process — whether in its physical 
 history or in its human history — would be unintelligible 
 apart from this postulate. Whatever our subsequent 
 generalisation and formulation of the result, our en- 
 quiries depend on the postulate that the course of the 
 world is continuous and that its state at any moment 
 finds its explanation, somewhere and somehow, in its 
 
 Himies Objection 319 
 
 immediately preceding state. And, as the time-factor 
 enters here, it is impossible to avoid the antinomy of 
 first beginning or infinite regress. 
 
 Hume's reference to the world as a unique or 
 singular event' has already been mentioned and 
 its significance acknowledged. The use which Hume 
 makes of it is to put out of court any interpretation of 
 the world as a whole or enquiry into its cause. We 
 have no ground, he thinks, for saying that it has any 
 cause. The idea of cause is just a name for our sub- 
 jective tendency to pass to a certain idea when we 
 have frequently had a similar impression in like cir- 
 cumstances. Of two events (that is, strictly, two im- 
 pressions)one— let us say, heat— has frequently followed 
 the other— say, flame. After the sequence has been 
 often enough repeated, then when the impression aflame' 
 recurs, we tend to form the idea ' heat '; and so we say 
 that flame is the cause of heat'-'. 
 
 Now there are two characteristics of this analysis. 
 The first is that the notion cause is made purely sub- 
 jective, descriptive of a process in our own minds, and 
 
 1 (( 
 
 It is only when two species of objects are found to be con- 
 stantly conjoined, that we can infer the one from the other; and 
 were an effect presented, which was entirely singular, and could not 
 be comprehended under any known species, I do not see, that we 
 could form any conjecture or inference at all concerning its cause.... 
 I leave it to your own reflection to pursue the consequences of this 
 principle."— ^;/^///>v co?icer?iing Hu?7ian Utiderstcmding, sect, xi, ed. 
 Selby-Bigge, p. 148 {Essays, ed. Green and Grose, vol. n, p. 122); cp. 
 Dialogues co?icer?iifig Natural Religion, part ii, ed. M'^Ewen, p. 44 
 {Human Nature, ed. Green and Grose, vol. 11, p. 398). 
 
 ^ Hume, Human Nature, book i, part iii, sect. 6, ed. Selby-Bigge, 
 p. 87, ed. Green and Grose, vol. i, p. 7,^^,. 
 
320 
 
 The Theistic Arguments 
 
 that it can have no just claim to be regarded as indi- 
 cating a connexion in objective reality. The second 
 characteristic is that the notion is derived from an 
 accumulation of instances in our experience — frequently 
 described as uniform or invariable sequence. The latter 
 characteristic is clearly much less essential than the 
 former for the interpretation of objective reality: for 
 if causation has no legitimate application to objective 
 reality at all, it is unimportant whether, in its illegiti- 
 mate application, it be derived from experience of a 
 uniform sequence or not. Nevertheless, in his criticism 
 of the cosmological argument, as in his criticisms gene- 
 rally, Hume applies only the superficial feature of the 
 explanation of causation at which he had arrived, and 
 not its more essential character. There has been only 
 one world in our experience, not a number of worlds 
 which might have yielded a uniform sequence, and 
 therefore we can say nothing about its having a cause; 
 whereas he leaves it to be assumed that of any event 
 in the world, where similar events may be found, we 
 may quite properly ask for a cause. In truth, however, 
 his own analysis leaves him no right to do so. Cause 
 is but a customary tendency due to mental association, 
 and the notion is without objective validity. He saw 
 this himself in his first book, where he was in earnest 
 with his subject, and he acknowledged that his theory 
 left all events in the world loose and separate, so that 
 natural science was involved in the same ruin as natural 
 theology. 
 
 Natural science assumes the legitimacy of the causal 
 enquiry not as the consequence of a generalisation from 
 uniform experience, but as a means towards its genera- 
 
 Vlie Causal Sequence 
 
 321 
 
 lisations. And history — whether it be the history of 
 the earth or of nations — can be a subject of investiga- 
 tion only when the causal principle guides each step in 
 our enquiry. Every event has to be understood as 
 arising out of and determined by something antecedent 
 to it. Here time is implied. But even in this meaning 
 of cause, we must note, the notion of power does not 
 seem to be essential ; and the natural sciences have 
 long ago dispensed with it in their doctrine of method. 
 Power is a notion derived from our own conscious ex- 
 perience when changes follow upon voluntary effort. 
 In nature, however, we observe changes only and not 
 the power that produces them. If the world be inter- 
 preted in terms of mind, then it will also be regarded 
 as realising, not only in its regular laws but also in its 
 continuous changes, the idea of a mind to whom this 
 power of realisation will be attributed. But unless and 
 until it is interpreted in terms of mind, it would seem 
 illegitimate to introduce the notion of power in in- 
 vestigating nature. We are limited to the determinate 
 sequence of cause and effect. 
 
 When we follow out this causal sequence, it is clear 
 that we cannot avoid facing the difficulty that either 
 the regress must be infinite or else there must be a 
 stage which is cause only and not effect. What is to 
 be said of this ancient antinomy .^ This much may be 
 asserted of the first alternative. If we say that the 
 regress has gone on from infinity, the position may be 
 maintained; but it is not a solution, it answers no ques- 
 tion, gives no explanation or interpretation of the world 
 or its cause. It simply means postponing any answer 
 sine die. If on the other hand, w^e assert a First Cause, 
 
 S. G. L. 
 
 21 
 
322 
 
 The TJieistic Argiinieuts 
 
 then we must mean by cause something very different 
 from our meaning when we say that the state of the 
 w^orld at one moment is the cause of its state at the 
 next. The cause which is not also an effect is a very 
 different conception from the cause which is also an 
 effect of something else. The distinction is not a mere 
 distinction of time; it is a distinction of the ground or 
 reason. 
 
 The assertion of a First Cause, therefore, really 
 means that our ordinary conception of cause is inade- 
 quate to the explanation of reality as a whole. We 
 have been looking for an explanation by tracing each 
 stao-e back to its antecedent, and we find or think we 
 find in the antecedent the ground of the consequent. 
 But the explanation is always by something else which 
 stands equally in need of explanation, and therefore is 
 no e.xplanation at all until that something else is ex- 
 plained. To say that the regress is infinite does not 
 oive any explanation and only stops the quest for one. 
 To say that there is a First Cause is an awkward ex- 
 pression for the doctrine that the true explanation must 
 be souoht not simplv in anv antecedent, but in some 
 characteristic of the process as a whole. As long as 
 we reo-ard the First Cause as simply accounting for 
 the beginning of the world-history, it fails to account 
 even for that beginning: for we are forced to ask, What 
 made the beginner begin and begin just then? Only 
 the contents of the world can show us that it has a 
 meaning which requires some other kind of explanation 
 than antecedent events. The Cause we seek must be 
 not merely First Cause but Final Cause. 
 
 Bearing these points in mind can we say that the 
 
 The Idea of Order 323 
 
 cosmological argument proves anything.^ And if so 
 what does it prove '> The argument everywhere depends 
 upon the notion of cause. But ' cause ' is used in two 
 different senses, and in one of these senses something 
 essential to the meaning of the term as commonly used 
 has been eliminated. When cause is understood as 
 mathematical physics might use it, causation is reduced 
 to an equation. Not only is the notion of power or 
 force absent from it, but the time- factor also becomes 
 unessential: so that it is probably better not to use the 
 term ' cause ' at all in this connexion. The net result 
 of this mode of enquiry is that the world must be re- 
 garded as an orderly system, whose order is open to 
 our understandmg. Order, therefore, and an adaptation 
 between this order and the human mind are what we 
 have a right to assert about the world. The latter 
 characteristic connects this argument with the teleo- 
 logical. But, even apart from this adaptation, the 
 existence of order raises the central question. Either 
 It IS due to a mind or consciousness by whom it is con- 
 ceived and made manifest in the facts of the world, or 
 it is not. The former alternative gives an explanation 
 of the order in the world, and we understand the ex- 
 planation because mind as we know it in ourselves is 
 also a source of order. But it does not justify us in 
 callmg by the name of God this mind that controls the 
 world until we are satisfied that goodness as well as 
 understanding belongs to it. 1:. the other alternative 
 excluded, however.^ Is it impossible that law or order 
 should itself be the ultimate conception behind which 
 we cannot go.^ The suggestion is that law in nature, 
 or the order of the world, should be regarded as an 
 
 21 — 2 
 
324 
 
 The T heist ic Arguments 
 
 eternal principle, like the Platonic ideas, which in some 
 manner determines the way in which things behave 
 and are known by us. The full difficulties of this mode 
 of explanation become apparent only when we take 
 into account the order of values as well as the order of 
 nature : so that for a decision of the main question we 
 are driven beyond the cosmological argument as com- 
 monly understood. 
 
 Cause has a fuller meaning in the investigation of 
 the historical evolution of nature or of man. When 
 we consider events in their concrete happening, espe- 
 cially when we seek to understand the active process 
 in which life and mind appear and which they strive 
 to dominate, then the time-problem enters; the order 
 of occurrence is no longer unessential; the sequence 
 cannot be reversed ; the cause precedes, and the effect 
 is explained by reference to it. In these enquiries we 
 assume that the present state of anything is to be ex- 
 plained by its antecedent state and by its environment, 
 and as there is no environment for the world as a whole, 
 its present state must be explained simply by its own 
 past. This process of explanation must either go on 
 indefinitely, or else the world must depend upon an 
 ultimate reality to which not the first stage only but 
 every stage of the world's history is due. Here again 
 we are presented with an alternative. But one of the 
 alternatives — that of infinite regress — gives no real ex- 
 planation. If the explanation of one event, or state of 
 the world. A, consists in a reference to a preceding 
 event or state B, then we have not explained A unless 
 B is something that we understand. And if our under- 
 standing of B consists simply in a further reference to 
 
 The Teleological A rgtimeiit 325 
 
 another event or state C, and that requires to be ex- 
 plained in the same way, and so on indefinitely— then 
 we have no explanation at all. The assertion of an 
 infinite regress of causes is only a means of putting off 
 mdefinitely the answer to an awkward question. 
 
 The ultimate reality, to which the other alternative 
 leads us, is not more necessary to explain things in their 
 beginning than to explain any stage in their develop- 
 ment. In respect of their dependence on the ultimate 
 reality, the distinction between the creation and the 
 preservation of things is unessential. The cosmological 
 argument, therefore, so far as it is an applicatio'n of 
 the time-sequence involved in causation, is in this way 
 transcended. It will depend on the view we reach con- 
 cerning reality as a whole whether we assert that the 
 world had a beginning in time or not. In either case we 
 shall have no right to speak of time as a reality or form 
 of reality independent of the ultimate. And when time 
 is taken into account, we shall not look in one direction 
 only. It has been too much the habit to explain the 
 world by a backward view only, in the attempt to reach 
 a first cause. The process fronts the future, and we 
 must ask how far the search for a final cause may con- 
 tribute to its explanation. 
 
 For this reason I do not regard the Teleological 
 Argument (as commonly stated) as being in principle 
 distinct from the Cosmological. We have already seen 
 that the elements of value in the Ontological argument 
 are, also, really interpretative of the world if we take that 
 word in its widest sense as inclusive of man, his know- 
 ledge and his ideals. So that the various traditional 
 
326 
 
 The T heist ic Arguments 
 
 proofs are in essence all of them efforts after the inter- 
 pretation of the world, and may therefore be regarded 
 as forms of the cosmological argument. But the teleo- 
 logical proof has its distinctive character, and that is 
 to found upon certain special features in the contents 
 of the world, those namely which seem to reveal the 
 presence and realisation of purpose, and therefore to 
 justify an inference to intelligence and to benevolence 
 in the ultimate reality of which our world is the mani- 
 festation. It is not possible to do justice here to this 
 important and venerable argument. M[ that can be 
 done is to bring out some leading features of it, as they 
 appear in the light of recent criticism. 
 
 • The teleological argument has commonly been 
 narrowed down to the discovery of certain marked 
 adaptations, sometimes fairly obvious, sometimes more 
 recondite, which are displayed in nature. These are 
 taken to prove the intelligence of the Designer of nature, 
 while their service in supplying the needs of man is 
 held to show his goodness. The argument, as is well 
 known, has been profoundly affected by the progress 
 of knowledge, especially in biology. In the first place, 
 the Darwinian theory of natural selection has had the 
 effect of giving an alternative and entirely different 
 explanation of the facts of adaptation. It is admitted 
 that adaptations to the needs of living beings are a 
 pervasive feature of nature ; but this, it is held, is the 
 result of an age-long, semi-mechanical, process. The 
 organisms which did not display adaptations have been 
 weeded out simply by their inability to survive in the 
 given environment, while those have flourished best 
 which happened to be best suited to their circumstances. 
 
 Natural Selection 
 
 327 
 
 And, in the second place, research, especially into the 
 causes of disease, has revealed countless instances of 
 adaptation whose only human purpose — if we attribute 
 purpose to them — seems to be that they should be the 
 carriers of agony and deaths 
 
 These facts and that theory deal a shrewd and 
 indeed fatal blow to the old-fashioned teleology. The 
 age of Paley and the Bridge water Treatises is past. 
 If teleological reasoning can be justified at all, it must 
 revise its method and premisses in the light of modern 
 biology. And the revision may show that it is possible 
 even for natural selection to vaunt itself overmuch. 
 
 Natural selection may be confidently accepted as a 
 vera causa ; but we must look more closely to see what 
 it does and what it does not do. I have called it semi- 
 mechanical, for it is not entirely mechanical : it always 
 involves non-mechanical, that is, vital processes on the 
 part of the organism under inv^estigation : it assumes 
 heredity, the tendency to variation, and the impulses 
 directed to self-preservation and to race-continuance, 
 which in various ways determine the behaviour of dif- 
 ferent organisms. None of these impulses has been 
 reduced to purely mechanical or to physico-chemical 
 processes. It may be argued therefore that, even if 
 external adaptation is absent, life and therefore purpose 
 are always present and assumed. Further, the environ- 
 ment of every organism and every species is also in 
 
 ^ But this point was not overlooked by Hume, who spoke of 
 "the curious artifices of nature, in order to embitter the life of every 
 living being." — Dialogues concerning Natural Religion^ sect, x, ed. 
 M'^Ewen, p. 126. {Human Nature^ ed. Green and Grose, vol. n, 
 p. 436.) 
 
328 
 
 The T heist ic Arguments 
 
 large measure organic, and therefore exhibits its own 
 internal purposive activities; while there is no proof 
 that even inorganic nature, although a mechanism, may 
 not so far resemble the machines of man's making as 
 to have mind behind it. Taking all the factors there- 
 fore which are implied by the term natural selection, 
 we must admit that they involve something more than 
 mechanism. 
 
 Of equal importance is the fact that there is much 
 that natural selection cannot do. It is limited to life- 
 preservation, it cannot account for wider interests and 
 their growing ascendancy. Thus we have an interest 
 in knowledge, and, led by this interest, w^e may become 
 convinced, for example, that the theory of evolution is 
 true, that is, that our idea on this point has objective 
 validity with regard to the cosmic process. But this 
 theory, or the belief in its truth, does not in any way 
 preserve the lives of those who hold it or give them 
 any appreciable preference in the struggle for existence. 
 The intellectual interest which it exhibits is on a level 
 beyond the operation of natural selection. Here there- 
 fore is something of intellectual value to us, and in- 
 dicative of a harmony between our intelligence and 
 the order of nature; and yet natural selection does not 
 vindicate it. If that is a reason for distrusting it we 
 must relinquish the theory of evolution and with it 
 most of what has been urged in criticism of Paley. But 
 if we still hold to the theory of evolution and reject 
 ordinary teleology, we must nevertheless admit that 
 there is an adaptation (not accounted for by natural 
 selection) between our reason and the actual cosmic 
 order — a design greater than any Paley ever dreamed 
 
 Dysteleology 
 
 329 
 
 of. And it is not of intellect alone, but also of morality 
 and the whole world of intrinsic values, that w^e may 
 have to assert adaptation between our minds and the 
 universal order. 
 
 The order of truth which the intellect discovers and 
 the order of moral values which the reason acknow- 
 ledges are objective characteristics of reality, and they 
 are reflected in the mind of man. Yet natural selection 
 has little to do with their recognition, and nothing at 
 all to do with the presence and power of their higher 
 developments. The selective processes of nature do 
 not specially favour the individuals who cherish these 
 values most highly, or reward them for devoting their 
 lives to the service of such ideals. It is not owing to 
 natural selection, but rather in spite of it, that the mind 
 of man affirms its affinity with truth and beauty and 
 goodness, and, undismayed by opposition, seeks its 
 home among ideals. To them as well as to nature the 
 mind of man is adapted; and this adaptation can neither 
 be explained nor explained away by biological laws. 
 Its significance will occupy us later. 
 
 The second criticism to which I have referred is 
 a more serious objection to teleological reasoning. 
 Throughout the organic world there are many instances 
 of adaptation which have the appearance of being in- 
 genious contrivances for inflicting suffering, and few 
 artifices are more elaborate than those which enable 
 the meanest of organisms to prey upon the lives of 
 men. The facts of dysteleology, as it has been called, 
 cannot be denied; nor is there any royal road to their 
 explanation. They may have been favoured by natural 
 selection; but that does not make it easier to regard 
 
330 
 
 The T heist ic Argiiuients 
 
 nature as manifesting the mind of God. Of these facts 
 in their detail I have no explanation to offer; though 
 I shall have something to say in the next lecture about 
 their general bearing on our problem. But one thing 
 may be admitted at once. The purpose of the world — 
 if it have a purpose — cannot be simply to give the in- 
 habitants thereof what is called a good time. Paley's 
 view of God as an all-wise omnipotent creator, whose 
 sole end in creation was the happiness of his creatures, 
 cannot be the true view. Yet, consistently with the 
 hedonistic philosophy, nothing else can have been his 
 aim; and hence the demand, favoured by J. S. Mill, 
 for a God of limited powers. If the problem of pain 
 can be solved, without denying the unity of power in 
 the universe, it will only be in connexion with a doc- 
 trine of values far removed from hedonism. In this 
 way the second criticism of teleology, as well as the 
 first, leads on to the consideration of the moral argu- 
 ment. 
 
 XIII 
 
 THE MORAL ARGUMENT 
 
 \ 
 
 1 HE three traditional proofs discussed in the last 
 lecture may all be regarded as forms of one of them — 
 the cosmological. Each in a different way is an attempt 
 at an explanation of the world. Even the ontological 
 argument, which stands by itself and has been regarded 
 by Kant as implied in the others, may be looked at 
 from this point of view : for the datum from which it 
 proceeds — the idea of God— is itself a factor in human 
 consciousness and therefore in the world of which man 
 forms a part. And the teleological argument also is 
 allied to the cosmological, and distinguished from the 
 argument that bears this name by proceeding from 
 certain special characteristics of the world-order, and 
 not simply from the fact of there being a world whose 
 existence is to be accounted for. 
 
 The same holds of the Moral Argument, as it is 
 called, to which we now proceed. Morality is a fact in 
 the history of the world, and we have found that moral 
 ideas have an objective validity which is such that 
 reality as a whole cannot be understood w^ithout them. 
 But morality is only one factor in the whole which 
 theism professes to interpret. We cannot take it alone, 
 as something independent of all other features of reality. 
 And, if we do take it by itself, we cannot expect to 
 reach a demonstration of the being of God along this 
 
332 
 
 The Moral Arguinent 
 
 one line of reflexion. The same inadequacy of any 
 single line of argument has been brought out by the 
 examination of the three traditional proofs. They do 
 serve to define our conception of the universe to which 
 we belong ; they bring out the insufficiency of any 
 merely material or naturalistic explanation of it ; but 
 they do not compel the reason to acknowledge that 
 the world reveals a being whom we may properly call 
 God, and, in particular, they fall short of justifying the 
 idea of the goodness of God. If we are justified in 
 speaking of the goodness of God, then this justification 
 may be expected to come from the moral argument. 
 , The moral argument, in the form in which it is 
 
 ^ usually presented, is due to Kant, who regarded it as 
 giving us a practical certainty of the existence of God 
 — a problem which the theoretical reason had left 
 unsolved. " Admitting," he said\ " that the pure moral 
 law inexorably binds every man as a command (not 
 as a rule of prudence), the righteous man may say: 
 I will that there be a God — I firmly abide by this, 
 and will not let this faith be taken from me." " If it 
 be asked," he said in another place-, '' why it is incum- 
 bent upon us to have any theology at all, it appears 
 clear that it is not needed for the extension or correc- 
 tion of our cognition of nature or in general for any 
 theory, but simply in a subjective point of view for 
 religion, i.e, the practical or moral use of our reason. 
 If it is found that the only argument which leads to a 
 definite concept of the object of theology is itself moral, 
 
 ' Kritik der praktische?i Vernunft, book ii, chap, ii, § 2 (Abbott's 
 transl. p. 241). 
 
 * Kritik der Urtheiiskraft, § 91 (Bernard's transl. p. 424). 
 
 Kanfs Argument 
 
 333 
 
 it is not only not strange, but we miss nothing in respect 
 of its final purpose as regards the sufficiency of belief 
 from this ground of proof, provided that it be admitted 
 that such an argument only establishes the being of 
 God sufficiently for our moral destination, i.e. in a 
 practical point of view." That is to say, the moral law, 
 the inexorable fact of duty, requires us to assume the 
 being of God, not as a speculative truth for explaining 
 nature, but as a practical postulate necessitated by the 
 moral reason. 
 
 Kant's argument is open to criticism in detail ; but 
 it is remarkable as the first clear statement of the truth 
 that a metaphysical theory cannot be adequate unless 
 founded on a recognition of the realm of ends, as well 
 as the realm of nature, to which man belongs. The 
 theistic belief, which the pure reason failed to justify, 
 was, he thought, demanded by the practical or moral 
 reason. He must have been aware, however, that it is 
 the facts of morality itself — the distribution of good and 
 evil in the world — that offer the most profound difficulty 
 for any theistic view, that every religion almost has 
 moulded its theory in some way to account for these 
 facts, and that some religions have even been willing 
 to say that the things of time are all an illusion, and 
 others to acknowledge a second and hostile world-power, 
 so that, by any means, if it be possible, God and goodness 
 may be saved together. And, shortly before Kant's own 
 day, the moral objections to theism had been pressed 
 home with unexampled power by David Hume. I will 
 quote some sentences from his Dialogues conceriting 
 Natural Religion, for they contain the gist of all that 
 has been said on this side of the question before or 
 
334 
 
 The Moral Argument 
 
 since. '*In many views of the universe, and of its parts, 
 particularly the latter, the beauty and fitness of final 
 causes strike us with such irresistible force, that all 
 objections appear (what I believe they really are) mere 
 cavils and sophisms ; nor can we then imagine how it 
 was ever possible for us to repose any weight on them. 
 But there is no view of human life or of the condition 
 of mankind, from which, without the greatest violence, 
 we can infer the moral attributes, or learn that infinite 
 benevolence, conjoined with infinite power and infinite 
 wisdom, which we must discover by the eyes of faith 
 alone." " As this goodness [of the Deity] is not ante- 
 cedently established, but must be inferred from the 
 phenomena, there can be no grounds for such an infer- 
 ence, while there are so many ills in the universe, and 
 while these ills might so easily have been remedied, as 
 far as human understanding can be allowed to judge on 
 
 such a subject Look round this universe. What an 
 
 immense profusion of beings, animated and organised, 
 sensible and active ! You admire this prodigious variety 
 and fecundity. But inspect a little more narrowly these 
 living existences, the only beings worth regarding. 
 How hostile and destructive to each other! How in- 
 sufficient all of them for their own happiness ! How 
 contemptible or odious to the spectator ! The whole 
 presents nothing but the idea of a blind Nature, im- 
 pregnated by a great vivifying principle, and pouring 
 forth from her lap, without discernment or parental 
 care, her maimed and abortive children ! " " Epicurus's 
 old questions are yet unanswered. Is God willing to 
 prevent evil, but not able.'^ then is he impotent. Is he 
 able, but not willing .^ then is he malevolent. Is he 
 
 Hume and Kant 
 
 335 
 
 both able and willing.^ whence then is evil .> " "The 
 true conclusion is, that the original source of all things 
 is entirely indifferent to all these principles, and has no 
 more regard to good above ill than to heat above 
 cold, or to drought above moisture, or to light above 
 heavy\" 
 
 How is it, we may ask, that reflexion upon good 
 and evil should lead two great thinkers to such oppo- 
 site results ?— that Hume should regard the power 
 behind nature as a life-force regardless of the fate of 
 its offspring, whereas Kant holds that the righteous 
 man is justified in saying 'T will that there be a 
 God".^ The reason is that they were looking from 
 different points of view. Hume, we may say, had re- 
 gard only to the facts of what men did and what men 
 suffered. His privilege as a sceptic, to which he often 
 appealed, carried some disadvantages with it. He saw 
 the struggle and the pain, the cruelty of the world and 
 the havoc of life, and he hesitated to go behind the 
 facts. Kant may not have shared Hume's view of the 
 morality of nature ; but he would not have been 
 appalled by it. Even if a perfectly good deed had 
 never occurred in the world, he said, his position 
 would still stand secure'. He was not looking upon 
 outward perfo»-mance, but upon the inward law of 
 goodness and the power it revealed in the mind which 
 is conscious of it. His reflexions were not based, like 
 
 ' ^ Dialogues concernijig Natural Religion, parts x, xi, ed. M^Ewen. 
 pp. 141, 158-9, 134, 160. {Human Nature, ed. Green and Grose, 
 vol. II, pp. 443, 452, 440, 452.) 
 
 ^ Grundlegung zur Metaphysik der Sitten, sect. ii. (Abbott's transl. 
 p. 24); IVerke, ed. Hartenstein, vol. iv, p. 255. 
 
336 The Moral Argument 
 
 Hume's, upon the measure in which goodness was 
 actually realised in the world — as to that he would 
 have been willing to admit that it argues nothing for 
 the eoodness of the author of the world. It was the idea 
 of cTOodness, which consciousness revealed to him, that 
 formed his starting-point. He was aware of a moral 
 law whose validity he could not question, and the 
 recognition of which secured him a position above the 
 play of merely natural forces. 
 
 Hence Kant's doctrine of the postulates of the 
 practical reason. The moral consciousness carries with 
 it a demand that reality shall be in accordance with it. 
 And this demand requires us to postulate the freedom 
 of man and his immortality and the existence of the 
 one perfect being or God. We are therefore justified 
 in affirming these as postulates of the moral life. The 
 postulates are all implied in the moral law, but not all 
 with the same degree of directness. Freedom is arrived 
 at in a more immediate way than the other two. It is 
 necessary in order that the moral law may work at all ; 
 the moral consciousness depends upon it so closely 
 that its absence would deprive morality of its basis. 
 Were man not free from the compulsion of impulse 
 and desire he would be unable to take the law as the 
 guide of his will. Freedom is, indeed, just the practical 
 aspect of that which in its rational aspect is moral law. 
 
 The two other postulates are arrived at indirecdy. 
 They are not necessary for the bare validity of moral 
 law. They are required in order to bring about a har- 
 mony between morality and the system of nature — to 
 enable the moral order, which is the order of the ' in- 
 telligible world,' to become actual in the 'world of 
 
 Postulates of the Practical Reason 337 
 
 sense.' The moral law demands perfect obedience from 
 each individual ; and an infinite time is required in 
 order that the individual character with its sensuous 
 desires and inclinations may become fully subject to 
 the categorical imperative: hence Immortality is pos- 
 tulated. The reign of law in nature is not the same 
 thing as the system of moral law ; and the agreement 
 of morality with the laws of actual occurrence can be 
 brought about only by a being who will make happiness 
 follow in the wake of virtue and fashion the order of 
 nature after the pattern of goodness. The crround for 
 postulating the being of God is therefore^his, that 
 without God our moral ideas would not be capable of 
 realisation in the world. We ourselves are unable so 
 to realise them— that is, to make the world-order a 
 moral order— because the causal laws which constitute 
 the world of experience are entirely outside of and 
 indifferent to the ethical laws which make up morality. 
 The being of God is thus introduced by Kant as a 
 means of uniting two disparate systems of conceptions, 
 which have been sundered in his thought. 
 
 The postulate of Freedom alone, as has been said, 
 is required for the possibility of the moral life itself. 
 The two other postulates are required for the complete 
 realisation of morality in the character of a being with 
 sensuous impulses and throughout a system of things 
 that has been exhibited as without ethical qualities. 
 The infusion of goodness through the non-moral or 
 natural— its victory over impulse and desire and its 
 manifestation in the world of interacting forces— this 
 is the problem that calls for so lofty a solution. The 
 two systems have to be connected externally because 
 
 S. G. L. 
 
 22 
 
338 
 
 The Moral Argunient 
 
 they have no common terms. One of them is concerned 
 solely with the causal connexions of phenomena. The 
 other is compelled to seek out their final significance in 
 relation to the ideals which practical reason discloses. 
 Self-consciousness is indeed the fundamental conception 
 in both systems. But in the one it is merely the most 
 general condition of synthesis through whose forms 
 phenomena are apprehended in definite and constant 
 connexions: in the apprehension of these relations the 
 work of knowledge is completed. I n the other or moral 
 system the self is contemplated as a will which manifests 
 itself in character and acts under the conception of a 
 moral law which is the law of its own reason. 
 
 Thus the peculiarity of Kant's view is that the two 
 systems— the realm of nature and the moral realm- 
 are at first regarded as independent ; they are subject 
 to different laws and their manifestations are of diver- 
 o-ent character. Yet the moral order claims unlimited 
 sovereignty, even over the realm of nature, while nature 
 proceeds on its way regardless of the claim. Recon- 
 ciliation can only be effected by an external power, 
 and God is the Great Reconciler. It would seem as if 
 neither system— neither nature nor morality— by itself 
 stood in need of God ; and as if, if they had happened 
 to be in better agreement with one another, God would 
 have been equally superfluous. It is only because they 
 differ, and because there is nevertheless an imperious 
 rational demand for their harmony, that a being is 
 necessary to bring them together sometime ; and in 
 this being infinite power must be united with infinite 
 goodness! Goodness is found wherever there is a will 
 in harmony with moral law ; but goodness alone does 
 
 Causation and Morality 339 
 
 not make God. Power is found in nature ; but power 
 alone does not make God. Now, for Kant, nature is 
 a closed and self-consistent system ; so is morality. 
 Neither, therefore, proves God ; but he is needed to 
 weld them together ; and the moral reason demands 
 their ultimate harmony. Hence God is a postulate of 
 the moral or practical reason. 
 
 The special form taken by Kant's moral proof is 
 accordingly a result of the distinction which he draws 
 between the two worlds — the sensible or phenomenal 
 world and the intelligible world. The former of these 
 is ruled by mechanical causation, and is the world of 
 natural law ; the latter is the realm of freedom and \xv 
 it moral ideas rule. But each is a closed system, com- 
 plete in itself. Kant's own thought, however, points 
 beyond this distinction. His practical postulates are a 
 demand for harmony between the two realms of physical 
 causation and of moral ideas, while his third Critique 
 exhibits a way in which this harmony can be brought 
 about through the conception of purpose. And here it 
 may be taken for granted that the first distinction on 
 which he founds is not absolute. The order of inter- 
 acting forces may be a self-consistent system ; but it is 
 not a complete account even of the things which form 
 the objects of science, and it is not a closed system. 
 Moral values also — though their system may be self- 
 consistent — do not form a closed system. They are 
 manifested in selves or persons ; and persons live in 
 and interact with the world of nature. The causal 
 system may be considered by itself; but the abstrac- 
 tion is made for the purposes of science, and is in this 
 
 22 — 2 
 
340 
 
 The Moral Avf^unicnt 
 
 respect arbitrary : it is only one aspect of the world. 
 And moral values, as we have found, are another aspect 
 of reality, dominatincr or claiming to dominate the lives 
 of persons. We must regard the two systems, there- 
 fore, not as the orders of two entirely different worlds, 
 but rather as different aspects of the same reality. 
 
 From this point of view the moral argument will 
 require to be formulated in a different way from that 
 in which it is set forth by Kant. It will be necessary 
 to have regard not to a connexion between two worlds, 
 but to relations within the one system of reality ; and 
 we shall have to enquire what kind of general view is 
 justified when both moral ideas and our experience of 
 nature are taken into account. Two things will be 
 necessary to vindicate the position that the world is a 
 moral system, or that goodness belongs to the cause or 
 ground of the world. We must be satisfied, in the first 
 place, that the moral order is an objectively valid order, 
 that moral values belong to the nature of reality ; and, 
 in the second place, that eictual experience, the history 
 of the world process, is fitted to realise this order. 
 The first of these positions has been already argued at 
 length and may now be assumed in this general form 
 of the objectivity of moral values. The other position 
 involves an estimate of the detailed features of experi- 
 ence which we can hardly expect to be complete or 
 conclusive, but upon which we must venture. 
 
 It is possible to regard the power behind nature, in 
 the way Hume regarded it, as a teeming source of life 
 which is careless of the fate of its offspring. Or, to use 
 another metaphor, if we look at life as a composition 
 which (if it have any design at all) must be designed 
 
 Imperfect Solutions 
 
 341 
 
 to produce happiness in every part, we shall be likely 
 enough to say that the picture must have come from 
 the hands of an imperfect workman — one of nature's 
 journeymen — if from any mind at all. But behind this 
 argument lies an important assumption — the assump- 
 tion that happiness is the chief or sole end of creation ; 
 and have we any right to make the assumption .^ Can 
 we even assert that happiness alone would be an end 
 worthy of the artist.-^ If we recognise the supreme 
 worth of goodness, can anything short of goodness be 
 the purpose of conscious life.'^ And goodness has this 
 peculiarity that it needs persons and their free activity 
 for its realisation. 
 
 It is not necessary to accept Hume's idea of the 
 vital impulse ; but certain views of the world's purpose 
 seem put out of court on any impartial judgment of 
 the facts. The world cannot exist simply for the pur- 
 pose of producing happiness or pleasure among sentient 
 beings : else every sufferer might have given hints to 
 the Creator for the improvement of his handiwork. 
 Nor can we rest in the old-time conventional theory 
 that pleasure and pain are distributed according to the 
 merit or demerit of the persons to whose lot they fall. 
 The wicked often flourish, and misfortunes befall the 
 righteous. That the course of the world shows some 
 relation between sin and suffering may be very true ; 
 but the relation is not a proportion that can be calcu- 
 lated by the rule of three. True, only a brief span of 
 life is open to our observation ; and, after the death of 
 the body, it is possible that the individual life may be 
 continued indefinitely, while it is also conceivable that 
 it had a history before its present incarnation. The 
 
342 The Moral Argument 
 
 hypothesis is therefore open that a future Hfe will 
 rectify the inequalities of the present, or that we now 
 suffer in the flesh for the misdeeds of a previous 
 career. In this way it might be possible to vindicate 
 the required proportion between virtue and happiness, 
 vice and suffering. But are we justified in relying on 
 a hypothesis according to which the unknown larger 
 life, which surrounds the present, is contemplated as 
 depending on a principle which the present life, alone 
 open to our observation, does so little to verify ? 
 
 Let us suppose that the present life is only a frag- 
 ment of a larger scheme. The hypothesis is at least 
 permissible. For our life bears many marks of in- 
 completeness. We bring — if not character — at least 
 characteristic tendencies with us into the world, and 
 our life breaks off with our purposes unachieved and 
 mind and will still imperfect. But we may reasonably 
 expect that the present fragment should bear some 
 resemblance in its order to the laws or purpose of its 
 neighbouring fragments and of the whole. If the pro- 
 portion of rewards and punishments to desert can be 
 so imperfectly verified in the rule of this life, have we 
 good reason to suppose that it will be fully verified in 
 another ? It may be said that the rewards and punish- 
 ments of a future life are intended for the guidance of 
 our earthly career. But if reward and punishment in 
 prospect are to be regarded in this way as a means for 
 controlling conduct or training character, do they not 
 lose their effectiveness by being left uncertain, and even 
 by being postponed ? 
 
 There is, however, one point in this life where 
 nature and morality meet. Every individual life has 
 
 Opportunities and Obstacles 
 
 343 
 
 before it the possibility of good. Other values and the 
 opportunity for them may be distributed more un- 
 equally. The enjoyment of art and the cultivation of 
 knowledge stand in need of material instruments which 
 are not, in any abundant measure, at every man's 
 service. But opportunities of realising moral values 
 are not thus limited. They are offered in every sphere 
 of life and in all kinds of material and historical con- 
 ditions ; for their realisation needs the good will only 
 and is not dependent upon circumstances. I do not say 
 that the opportunities are equal, but they are always 
 there : whatever the circumstances, there is an attitude 
 to them in w^hich goodness can be realised and the sum 
 of realised values in the world increased \ 
 
 The obstacles to the realisation of i^foodness in the 
 individual proceed mainly from other w^ills — from the 
 example or influence of other persons. And this fact 
 reminds us that we must not take a merely individual 
 view of things and expect the world to be suited to the 
 interests of each man considered alone. It is not only 
 our joys and sorrows that we share with others. In 
 good and evil also we are members of the family, the 
 nation, and the race. No man lives to himself alone. 
 The evil that he does lives after him, the good is never 
 interred with his bones. Men are bound together, 
 working out their ow^n and their neighbours' salvation 
 — or the reverse. The influence of wills that choose 
 the evil in preference to the good cannot fail to affect 
 others in a world of free wills freely interacting. The 
 
 ' '' It is fiever in principle impossible for an adequate solution to 
 be found by will for any situation whatever."— Bosanquet, lvalue and 
 
 Destiny of the Individual {i()i2>)j V' ^^o. 
 
344 
 
 The Moral Argnmcut 
 
 same reality of influence of one man upon another, but 
 in an opposite direction, is an earnest of the reah'sation 
 of goodness not only in selected individuals but through- 
 out the human family, and an indication of the true 
 purpose of social order. 
 
 These considerations seem to point to a solution of 
 the question before us. The question is whether the 
 facts of our experience, and the course of nature as 
 shown in this experience, can be brought into consistent 
 relation with our ideas of good and evil, so that nature 
 may be regarded as a fitting field for the realisation of 
 goodness. In other words, do the facts of experience 
 agree with and support the doctrine of the moral 
 government of the world — an ethical conception of 
 ultimate reality, that is to say — or do they oppose such 
 a conception .^ The answer to this question depends 
 on the kind of ethical view of the world which we put 
 forward. If bv an ethical view of the world we mean 
 the doctrine that the creative purpose must have been 
 to provide the maximum of happiness for conscious 
 beings, or to distribute that happiness equally among 
 them, then it is impossible to regard the world-order 
 as a moral order. Hedonism and theism, once their 
 consequences are worked out, prove to be in funda- 
 mental opposition. If pleasure is the sole constituent 
 of value, then this value has been largely disregarded 
 in creation. Nature has been very imperfectly adapted 
 to the desires of man, and human passions have been 
 allowed to poison the wells of happiness. We may 
 try to get out of the difficulty by imagining a creator 
 of limited power and perhaps of defective foresight. 
 But even human intelligence might have foreseen and 
 
 Ethical View of the IVorld 345 
 
 avoided many of the ills which flesh is heir to ; and no 
 one would attribute a higher degree of understanding 
 to man than to his Maker. If mind is really the master 
 of things, then that mind cannot have framed the order 
 of the world with a view to happiness alone'. 
 
 If we take the other and common view that happi- 
 ness is distributed in proportion to merit, and that the 
 moral government of the world consists in this just dis- 
 tribution, then also it must be said that experience does 
 not support this view, and that it can be brought into 
 agreement with the facts only by the somewhat violent 
 device of postulating another life which differs radically 
 from the present in the method of its government. This 
 view admits a value beyond and higher than pleasure; 
 but it looks upon a due proportion between merit and 
 happiness as the sole and sufficient criterion of the moral 
 government of the world. And therein it displays a 
 narrow and partial view of ethical values. The notion 
 which it follows, and which for it may be said to be the 
 whole of ethics, is the notion of justice ; it treats all 
 individuals as simply the doers of acts o-ood or evil 
 and deserving therefor suitable reward or punishment; 
 it leaves out of account the consideration that indi- 
 viduals or selves, and the communities of individuals 
 which make up the human race, are all of them in the 
 making, and that in some sense they are their own 
 makers— fashioners of their own characters. An ethical 
 view of the world, in which these points are recognised, 
 will not be open to the same objections as before. The 
 
 As Hume recognised, Dialogues concerning Natural Religion, 
 part X, ed. M'-'Ewen, p. 133. {Human Nature, ed. Green and Grose, 
 vol. n, p. 440.) . . ' 
 
346 
 
 The Moral Argimient 
 
 world will be contemplated as providing a medium for 
 the realisation of goodness, and not simply as a court 
 of justice distributing rewards and penalties. 
 
 I do not assert that this more completely ethical 
 view gets rid of all difficulties. But it does avoid that 
 special difficulty, arising from the unequal distribution 
 of happiness relatively to goodness, which forms an 
 almost conclusive objection to the acceptance of the 
 former doctrine. And that difficulty has been more 
 than any other, or than all others combined, the burden 
 of lament and the ground of pessimism. The struggle 
 and pain of the world are the lot of the good as well as 
 of the evil. But if they can be turned to the increase 
 and refinement of goodness, to the lessening and con- 
 quest of evil, then their existence is not an insuperable 
 obstacle to the ethical view of reality ; it may even be 
 regarded as an essential condition of such a view. 
 Account for it how we may, the fact remains that the 
 heroes and saints of history have passed through 
 much tribulation, and that man is made perfect only 
 by suffering ; 
 
 But he that creeps from cradle on to grave, 
 Unskill'd save in the velvet course of fortune. 
 Hath miss'd the discipline of noble hearts. 
 
 The character of a free agent is made by facing and 
 fighting with obstacles ; it is not formed along the line of 
 easy successful reaction to stimulus. Facile adaptation to 
 familiar environment is no test of character nor training 
 in character. The personal life cannot grow into the 
 values of which it is capable without facing the hardness 
 of circumstance and the strain of conflict, or without 
 
 One View of Perfection 347 
 
 experience of failure. Herbert Spencer, in his own way, 
 has preached adaptation to environment as the essence 
 of goodness. Only in a world where all surrounding 
 circumstances correspond exactly with human desire 
 will it be possible for a truly good man to exist. '' The 
 co-existence of a perfect man and an imperfect society 
 is impossible," he thinks'. But the question at present 
 is not the kind of world in which perfect goodness can 
 exist, but the kind of world in which goodness can 
 begin to grow and make progress towards perfection. 
 Perfect adaptation would mean automatism ; it is not 
 and cannot be a school of morality. It is even incon- 
 sistent with morality as 1 have conceived it, which 
 implies freedom and the personal discovery and pro- 
 duction of values. And I will hazard the statement 
 that an imperfect world is necessary for the growth 
 and training of moral beings, ii ihere were no possi- 
 bility of missing the mark there would be no value in 
 taking a true aim. A world of completely unerring 
 finite beings, created and maintained so by the con- 
 ditions of their life, would be a world of marionettes. 
 They might exhibit perfect propriety of behaviour. 
 They might dance through their span of existence to 
 the amusement of a casual spectator (if such may be 
 imagined) ; but their movements would be all pre- 
 determined by their Maker ; they would have neither 
 goodness nor the consciousness of good, nor any point 
 of sympathy with the mind of a free spirit. Not such 
 are the beings whom God is conceived as having created 
 for communion with himself: 
 
 ^ Principles of Ethics^ vol. i, p. 279. 
 
348 The Moral A rgimient 
 
 Freundlos war der grosse Weltenmeister ; 
 Fuhlte Mangel : darum schuf er (ieister, 
 Selige Spiegel seiner Seligkeit'. 
 
 These spirits have had their beginnings at the lowest 
 levels of organic life. They must fight their way up- 
 wards through the long stages of man's development. 
 In this progress they have to attain reason and freedom, 
 so that the good may be known and chosen: until, tried 
 by every kind of circumstance, they find and assimilate 
 the values which can transform, the world and make 
 themselves fit for the higher spiritual life. 
 
 On this upward way man has to pass through many 
 fiery trials. No facile optimism can mitigate the pain 
 of his wounds when the body is racked by disease or 
 the heart is torn with orief or when he listens to the 
 agony of the world in one of the great crises of its 
 history. Yet, in refiecting upon these things, our judg- 
 ment is apt to outrun our experience. As it is forced 
 upon our view, we seem to bear the whole burden of 
 the pain of the world ; all the suffering of creation 
 weighs upon our minds, and the pain seems purposeless 
 and cruel because we observe its effects and cannot 
 divine its meaning. But this great mass of human 
 pain is distributed amongst a countless multitude of 
 souls. Each bears his own burden and every heart 
 knows its own bitterness ; but each knows also, better 
 than any other can, v/hat he is able to suffer and to do, 
 and in the darkest hour he may descry a promise of 
 
 ^ Friendless was the great world-master, 
 Lonely in his realms above : 
 Called to life an empire vaster — 
 
 Kindred souls to share his love. 
 
 A Fit Medittm for Morality 349 
 
 dawn unseen by the onlooker. The spectator who sees 
 the causes of suffering often lacks insight into the way 
 in which it is faced by the soul that is on trial, and fails 
 to allow for the faith that frees the spirit. To estimate 
 the true inwardness of suffering we must not go to the 
 professional pessimist who counts up the grievances of 
 humanity, as often as not from the vantage-ground of a 
 position of personal comfort. The sufferer himself has 
 often a deeper sense of the significance of his experience. 
 "That which we suffer ourselves has no longer the same 
 air of monstrous injustice and wanton cruelty that suf- 
 fering wears when we see it in the case of others \" This 
 was the verdict of a man of letters whose whole life was 
 a battle with disease and suffering, but who did his life's 
 work with high courage and in serenity of soul. Such 
 a judgment cannot lightly be set aside. 
 
 Are we justified in saying that the imperfect and 
 puzzling world that surrounds us is an unfit medium 
 for the moral life— if by the moral life we mean the 
 triumph of the spirit— or that it makes impossible the 
 adoption of an ethical point of view in interpreting 
 reality .^ I do not say that experience of the relation 
 of natural forces to moral ideas and moral volitions 
 justifies of itself the inference to divine goodness at 
 the heart of all things. The mere fragment of life 
 
 ' R. L. Stevenson, Letters (1899), vol. i, p. 370. Alongside of 
 Stevenson's reflexion, I may venture to quote the words used by an 
 officer-friend of my own in a letter to his mother written after the 
 death in action of his sole remaining brother : *' We can never under- 
 stand it yet, but it is this same swift bright stroke that seems to summon 
 away the bravest and most precious spirits. I have seen it with my 
 own eyps, and I cannot believe it is cruelty." (June 191 7.) 
 
350 The Moral Argument 
 
 with which we are acquainted is too scanty to bear so 
 weighty a superstructure. All I have argued is that it 
 is not inconsistent with such a conclusion. And, if there 
 are other reasons for saying that goodness belongs to 
 the ground of reality, and that the realisation of good- 
 ness is the purpose and explanation of finite minds, 
 then the structure of the world as we know it is not 
 such as to make us relinquish this view ; on the con- 
 trary a view of the kind is supported by the general 
 lines of what we know about the world and its history. 
 
 ) 
 
 The result so far is that the events of the world as 
 a causal system are not inconsistent with the view that 
 this same world is a moral order, that its purpose is a 
 moral purpose. The empirical discrepancies between 
 the two orders, and the obstacles which the world puts 
 in the way of morality, are capable of explanation when 
 we allow that ideals of goodness have not only to be 
 discovered by finite minds, but that for their realisation 
 they need to be freely accepted by individual wills and 
 gradually organised in individual characters. If this 
 principle still leaves many particular difficulties unre- 
 solved, it may at least be claimed that it provides the 
 general lines of an explanation of the relation of moral 
 value to experience, and that a larger knowledge of 
 the issues of life than is open to us might be expected 
 to show that the particular difficulties also are not 
 incapable of solution. 
 
 This means that it is possible to regard God as the 
 author and ruler of the world, as it appears in space 
 and time, and at the same time to hold that the moral 
 values of which we are conscious and the moral ideal 
 
 The Moral Ideal as in Mind 35 1 
 
 which we come to apprehend with increasing clearness 
 express his nature. But the question remains, Are we 
 to regard morality— its values, laws, and ideal— as 
 belonging to a Supreme Mind, that is, to God ? It is 
 as an answer to this question that the specific Moral 
 Argument enters. And here I cannot do better than 
 give the argument in the words of Dr Rashdall : 
 
 "An absolute Moral Law or moral ideal cannot 
 exist in material things. And it does not exist in the 
 mind of this or that individual. Only if we believe in 
 the existence of a Mind for which the true moral ideal 
 is already in some sense real, a Mind which is the 
 source of whatever is true in our own moral judgments, 
 can we rationally think of the moral ideal as no less 
 real than the world itself. Only so can we believe in 
 an absolute standard of right and wrong, which is as 
 independent of this or that man's actual ideas and actual 
 desires as the facts of material nature. The belief in 
 God, though not (like the belief in a real and an active 
 self) a postulate of there being any such thing as 
 Morality at all, is the logical presupposition of an 
 'objective' or absolute Morality. A moral ideal can 
 exist nowhere and nohow but in a mind ; an absolute 
 moral ideal can exist only in a Mind from which all 
 Reality is derived \ Our moral ideal can only claim 
 objective validity in so far as it can rationally be re- 
 garded as the revelation of a moral ideal eternally 
 existing in the mind of God'." 
 
 The argument as thus put may be looked upon as 
 
 ' ''Or at least a mind by which all Reality is controlled."— Dr 
 Rashdall's footnote. 
 
 ' H. Rashdall, The Theory of Good and Evii {igo-j)^ vol. ii, p. 212. 
 
 m 
 
352 The Moral Argument 
 
 a special and striking extension of the cosmological 
 argument. In its first and most elementary form the 
 cosmological argument seeks a cause for the bare ex- 
 istence of the world and man : to account for them 
 there must be something able to bring them into being: 
 God is the First Cause. Then the order of nature 
 impresses us by its regularity, and we come by degrees 
 to understand the principles of its working and the laws 
 under which the material whole maintains its equilibrium 
 and the ordered procession of its changes : these laws 
 and this order call for explanation, and we conceive 
 God as the Great Lawgiver. But beyond this material 
 world, we understand relations and principles of a still 
 more general kind ; and the intellect of man recognises 
 abstract truths so evident that, once understood, they 
 cannot be questioned, while inferences are drawn from 
 these which only the more expert minds can appreciate 
 and yet which they recognise as eternally valid. To 
 what' order do these belong and what was their home 
 when man as yet was unconscious of them ? Surely if 
 their validity is eternal they must have had existence 
 somewhere, and we can only suppose them to have 
 existed in the one eternal mind : God is therefore the 
 God of Truth. Further, persons are conscious of values 
 and of an ideal of goodness, which they recognise as 
 having undoubted authority for the direction of their 
 activity ; the validity of these values or laws and of this 
 ideal, however, does not depend upon their recognition : 
 it is objective and eternal ; and how could this eternal 
 validity stand alone, not embodied in matter and neither 
 seen nor realised by finite minds, unless there were an 
 eternal mind whose thought and will were therein ex- 
 
 The Force of the Argument 353 
 
 pressed .? God must therefore exist and his nature be 
 goodness. 
 
 The argument in this its latest phase has a new 
 feature which distinguishes it from the preceding phases. 
 The laws or relations of interacting phenomena which 
 we discover in nature are already embodied in the pro- 
 cesses of nature. It may be argued that they have 
 their reality therein : that in cognising them we are 
 simply cognising an aspect of the actual world in space 
 and time, and consequently that, if the mere existence 
 of things does not require God to account for it (on the 
 ground urged by Hume that the world, being a singular 
 event, justifies no inference as to its cause), then, equally, 
 we are not justified in seeking a cause for those laws or 
 relations which are, after all, but one aspect of the 
 existing world. It may be urged that the same holds 
 of mathematical relations : that they are merely an 
 abstract of the actual order, when considered solely 
 in its formal aspect. It is more diflicult to treat the 
 still more general logical relations in the same fashion; 
 but they too receive verification in reality and in our 
 thought so far as it dees not end in confusion. But it 
 is different with ethical values. Their validity could 
 not be verified in external phenomena ; they cannot 
 be established by observation of the course of nature. 
 They hold good for persons only : and their peculiarity 
 consists in the fact that their validity is not in any way 
 -dependent upon their being manifested in the character 
 or conduct of persons, or even on their being recognised 
 in the thoughts of persons. We acknowledge the good 
 and Its objective claim upon us even when we are con- 
 scious that our will has not yielded to the claim ; 
 
 S. G. L. 
 
 23 
 
354 The Moral Argument 
 
 and we admit that its validity existed before we recog- 
 nised it. 
 
 This leading characteristic makes the theistic argu- 
 ment founded upon moral values or the moral law both 
 stronger in one respect and weaker in another respect 
 than the corresponding argument from natural law and 
 intelligible relations. It is weaker because it is easier 
 to deny the premiss from which it starts— that is, the 
 objective validity of moral law— than it is to deny the 
 objective validity of natural or mathematical or logical 
 relations. But I am here assuming the objective validity 
 of morality as already established by our previous en- 
 quiries ; and it is unnecessary to go back upon the 
 question. And, granted this premiss, the argument 
 adds an important point. Other relations and laws 
 (it may be said, and the statement is true of laws of 
 nature at any rate) are embodied in actually existing 
 objects. But the same cannot be said of the moral law 
 or moral ideal. We acknowledge that there are objec 
 tive values, although men may not recognise them, that 
 the moral law is not abrogated by being ignored, and 
 that our consciousness is striving towards the appre- 
 hension of an ideal which no finite mind has clearly 
 grasped, but which is none the less valid although it is 
 not realised and is not even apprehended by us in its 
 truth and fullness. Where then is this ideal ? It cannot 
 be valid at one time and not at another. It must be 
 eternal as well as objective. As Dr Rashdall urges, it 
 is not in material things, and it is not in the mind of 
 this or that individual ; but '' it can exist nowhere and 
 nohow but in a mind " ; it requires therefore the mind 
 of God. 
 
 The Existence of the Ideal 355 
 
 Against this argument, however, It may be con- 
 tended that it disregards the distinction between validity 
 and existence. Why is it assumed that the moral ideal 
 must exist somehow and somewhere .^ Vah'dity, it may 
 be said, is a unique concept, as unique as existence, 
 and different from it. And this is true. At the same 
 time it is also true that the validity of the moral ideal, 
 like all validity, is a validity for existents. Without 
 this reference to existence there seems no meaning in 
 asserting validity. At any rate it is clear that it is^'for 
 existents— namely, for the realm of persons— that the 
 moral ideal is valid. It is also true that the perfect 
 moral ideal does not exist in the volitional, or even in 
 the intellectual, consciousness of these persons : they 
 have not achieved agreement with it in their lives, and 
 even their understanding of it is incomplete. Seeing 
 then that it is not manifested by finite existents, how are 
 we to conceive its validity.^ Other truths are displayed 
 in the order of the existing world; but it is not so with 
 moral values. And yet the system of moral values has 
 been acknowledged to be an aspect of the real universe 
 to which existing things belong. How are we to con- 
 ceive its relation to them '> A particular instance of 
 goodness can exist only in the character of an indi- 
 vidual person or group of persons ; an idea of goodness 
 such as we have is found only in minds such as ours. 
 But the ideal of goodness does not exist in finite minds 
 or in their material environment. What then is its status 
 in the system of reality ? 
 
 The question is answered if we regard the moral 
 order as the order of a Supreme Mind and the ideal 
 of goodness as belonging to this Mind. The difficulty 
 
 23—2 
 
The Moral Argument 
 
 356 
 
 for this view is to show that the Mind which is the 
 home of goodness may also be regarded as the ground 
 of the existing world. That reahty as a whole both m 
 its actual events and in its moral order, can be con 
 sistently regarded as the express.on of a ^"P'"'^"- j^^\'f 
 has been the argument of the present lecture But th.s 
 is not the only solution of the problem that has been 
 offered We are here at the parting of the ways where 
 different synoptic views diverge. On the one hand ,s 
 the theistic v^w, which is suggested by the h.ghest 
 form of reality known to us in experience, and wh.ch 
 finds the ground of all reality-nature and persons 
 laws and values-in a mind whose purpose .s being 
 gradually unfolded in the history of the world. On 
 fhe other hand are the non-theistic theories, and they 
 also must attempt to reach a consistent v.ew of the 
 relation of the moral order to the realm of existents^ 
 They may admit an order of values and may look to 
 the active and rational processes of persons for he 
 more complete realisation of these values and the fulle 
 apprehension of goodness. To this system of moral 
 values they may even be willing, with Fichte to gi^ve 
 the name of God ; but, if so, they will mean by God 
 nothing more than the moral order of the universe, and 
 this moral order will be allowed to have a c aim to 
 validity only, not to existence. It will exist only in so 
 far as manifested in the thought or character o fin. e 
 beings, and no other consciousne.ss than that of finite 
 persLs will be postulated. A view of this sort may 
 > " Tene lebendige und wirkende moralische Ordnung ist selbst 
 Gott ; IrbedUrfe/ keines anderen GoUes, und konnen ke.nen 
 anderen fassen."-Fichte, Werk {^%^i^ vol. v, p. .86. 
 
 Divergent Synopses 
 
 357 
 
 be pluralistic, postulating a realm of finite minds or 
 monads of some sort as the only existing realities, but 
 beyond them and independent of them truths and values 
 that have somehow being and are valid for existents 
 without themselves existing. Or, if we can envisage a 
 harmony between the moral order and the orders of 
 nature and of truth, and so see all reality as one, the 
 view will take the form of monism or pantheism. The 
 solutions offered by both these views need examination. 
 
XIV 
 
 PLURALISM 
 
 1 UK preceding argument has not solved our pro- 
 blem ; but it has brought us nearer a solution. We 
 have seen that a complete view of reality must find a 
 place for two things : on the one hand for the realm of 
 persons and events, and on the other hand for the 
 moral order or more generally for the realm of values. 
 If our universe is to be a universe, these two things 
 must be brought into relation so that both together 
 may be regarded as belonging to the same whole. We 
 have found, moreover, that prima facie, or in the 
 world as it appears, these two things do not harmonise 
 — that the causal order, which determines the way in 
 which things happen and the actual conduct of persons, 
 does not exhibit any exact correspondence with the 
 moral order, and is often in conflict with it. And we 
 saw that the two orders could only be brought into 
 harmony on the assumption that the agreement of fact 
 and goodness was a purpose which persons had to 
 achieve and which could be achieved only by their free 
 activity in some such world as this. On this hypothesis 
 the causal order will be contributory to the moral order 
 and the world as a whole will be regarded as a pur- 
 posive system. This is the solution to which the 
 argument points ; but it is not the only solution of the 
 problem that has been offered. 
 
 The Many and the One 359 
 
 Theories of the nature of reality may be distin- 
 guished by the place which they assign to consciousness 
 and purpose in the whole. Either consciousness and 
 purpose are ascribed to the ultimate ground or principle 
 of reality or they are not. If they are, then our theory 
 IS some form of theism ; if not, not. In the latter case 
 we shall hold that the only conscious and purposeful 
 beings are finite minds such as our own. But there 
 will still be room for difference in our theory according 
 to the place assigned to finite minds in the universe. 
 We may look upon them as the ultimate constituents 
 of reality, or we may hold that they are merely modes 
 or appearances of the one ultimate reality. In the for- 
 mer case our view will be a form of Pluralism : in the 
 latter it will be a monistic view which may be called 
 Pantheism. We have to consider how each view fares 
 in the effort to solve our problem ; and in this con- 
 sideration Pluralism will be taken first. 
 
 Pluralism corresponds to a permanent and justifi- 
 able attitude of thought, though it has often been 
 submerged by the success of scientific verifications of 
 uniformity or by the prevalence of a monistic philo- 
 sophy. It has, however, a way of re-appearing after 
 every temporary eclipse. It is the variety and not the 
 unity of the world that first strikes the observer, and 
 the effort to reach a unitary view of reality is constantly 
 faced by the discovery of new factors which seem to 
 break into the harmony of the existing conception. In 
 this secular controversy the Many appear as the enemy 
 of the One ; and the latter can compass victory only 
 by showing that it is able to include in its unity each 
 
360 
 
 Pluralism 
 
 new appearance of diversity. Monism may take many 
 forms, materialist or spiritual ; and the same holds of 
 pluralism. But the essential characteristic of pluralism 
 is the view that the final explanation of things is to be 
 sought in a great variety of distinct units and not in 
 some more fundamental principle or power which makes 
 them real and also in some sense one. 
 
 These ultimate units, however, may be conceived in 
 different ways, thus giving- rise to different types of 
 pluralism. In the first place, the ultimate units of all 
 reality may be held to be material atoms. This is the 
 most familiar type of the doctrine historically ; and, 
 although the traditional atoms of physics and chemistry 
 have been disintegrated by modern research, the elec- 
 trons of present theory may easily be utilised for another 
 doctrine of the same type. In the second place, the 
 ultimate units may be held to be of the nature of sensa- 
 tions or presentations, or other elements into which 
 mental states may be resolved by the psychologist. 
 This form of doctrine, familiar to us in Hume and 
 J. S. Mill, may be called psychological atomism. In 
 the third place, it may be said that the ultimate units 
 constitutive of reality are entities of the nature of 
 qualities or concepts which by their diverse combina- 
 tions appear as the world of persons and things ; and 
 this may be called a logical atomism. Finally, it may 
 be said that ultimate reality consists of a multiplicity of 
 spiritual entities, of which the human soul is the highest 
 known to us. This spiritual atomism is the leading 
 type of philosophical pluralism and has been worked 
 out by Leibniz and many others. 
 
 Further, it is possible for these various types of 
 
 Different Types of Pluralism 361 
 
 pluralism to be combined in different way%. Distinct 
 units of more than one, or of all, types may be postu- 
 lated. Atoms psychological as well as atoms material 
 may be held to be ultimate constituents of reality. Or 
 logical atoms may be assumed alongside of one or both 
 of these. Or again spiritual units also may be assumed 
 as well as some— or even all— of the foregoing. The 
 possible combinations are numerous. But one question 
 is of decisive interest for our special problem— the 
 question whether minds or spiritual units are recognised 
 as among the ultimate constituents of reality. If they 
 are not, then the primary difficulty for the theory lies 
 in the explanation of the origin and presence of mind 
 m experience. How are we to account for the subjec- 
 tive aspect of experience— for that by which alone 
 material things can be perceived or by which atoms 
 (whether regarded as physical or psychological or 
 logical) can be conceived ? These theories have to 
 encounter the familiar objections which have been 
 pressed against materialistic atomism and psychologi- 
 cal presentationism, and which have never been satis- 
 factorily met. But it is not necessary here to dwell 
 upon these objections. There is a sufficient reason 
 which excuses us from treading once more this well- 
 trodden ground. Values, as we have already seen, 
 belong to the structure of that reality which we are 
 called upon to interpret; and neither the psychological 
 nor the materialistic form of atomism recognises their 
 place. With the view called logical atomism it is 
 different. Values may be acknowledged among the 
 concepts or qualities to which reality (though not exist- 
 ence) is ascribed. But this view also must be held to 
 
36o 
 
 Pluralism 
 
 new appearance of diversity. Monism may take many 
 forms, materialist or spiritual ; and the same holds of 
 pluralism. But the essential characteristic of pluralism 
 is the view that the final explanation of things is to be 
 sought in a great variety of distinct units and not in 
 some more fundamental principle or power which makes 
 them real and also in some sense one. 
 
 These ultimate units, however, may be conceived in 
 different ways, thus giving rise to different types of 
 pluralism. In the first place, the ultimate units of all 
 reality may be held to be material atoms. This is the 
 most familiar type of the doctrine historically; and, 
 although the traditional atoms of physics and chemistry 
 have been disintegrated by modern research, the elec- 
 trons of present theory may easily be utilised for another 
 doctrine of the same type. In the second place, the 
 ultimate units may be held to be of the nature of sensa- 
 tions or presentations, or other elements into which 
 mental states may be resolved by the psychologist. 
 This form of doctrine, familiar to us in Hume and 
 J. S. Mill, may be called psychological atomism. In 
 the third place, it may be said that the ultimate units 
 constitutive of reality are entities of the nature of 
 qualities or concepts which by their diverse combina- 
 tions appear as the world of persons and things ; and 
 this may be called a logical atomism. Finally, it may 
 be said that ultimate reality consists of a multiplicity of 
 spiritual entities, of which the human soul is the highest 
 known to us. This spiritual atomism is the leading 
 type of philosophical pluralism and has been worked 
 out by Leibniz and many others. 
 
 Further, it is possible for these various types of 
 
 Different Types of Pluralism 36 1 
 
 pluralism to be combined in different way%. Distinct 
 units of more than one, or of all, types may be postu- 
 lated. Atoms psychological as well as atoms material 
 may be held to be ultimate constituents of reality. Or 
 logical atoms may be assumed alongside of one ox both 
 of these. Or again spiritual units also may be assumed 
 as well as some — or even all — of the foregoing. The 
 possible combinations are numerous. But one question 
 is of decisive interest for our special problem— the 
 question whether minds or spiritual units are recognised 
 as among the ultimate constituents of reality. If they 
 are not, then the primary difficulty for the theory lies 
 m the explanation of the origin and presence of mind 
 m experience. How are we to account for the subjec- 
 tive aspect of experience— for that by which alone 
 material things can be perceived or by which atoms 
 (whether regarded as physical or psychological or 
 logical) can be conceived } These theories have to 
 encounter the familiar objections which have been 
 pressed against materialistic atomism and psychologi- 
 cal presentationism, and which have never been satis- 
 factorily met. But it is not necessary here to dwell 
 upon these objections. There is a sufficient reason 
 which excuses us from treading once more this well- 
 trodden ground. Values, as we have already seen, 
 belong to the structure of that reality which we are 
 called upon to interpret; and neither the psychological 
 •nor the materialistic form of atomism recognises their 
 place. With the view called logical atomism it is 
 different. Values may be acknowledged among the 
 concepts or qualities to which reality (though not exist- 
 ence) is ascribed. But this view also must be held to 
 
362 
 
 Pluralism 
 
 be put out of court by the argument of an earlier 
 lecture. For we have found that values — intrinsic 
 values, that is— belong to persons only. Persons are 
 required for the realisation of the concept value ; and 
 it is only in connexion with the lives of selves or 
 persons that values belong to the structure of the 
 universe as the sum-total of existence. Consequently, 
 when our special problem is concerned with the relation 
 of the moral order to the order of nature, only one of the 
 types of pluralism can claim to give the solution desired. 
 Whatever else it may admit or refuse to admit as funda- 
 mental, it must at least assert the reality of minds or 
 selves. It will be a spiritual pluralism. 
 
 The pluralist, in this meaning of the term, will 
 envisage the world as consisting of a vast number of 
 spiritual units, which have been variously called monads, 
 subjects, souls, or selves. These monads may be re- 
 garded either as infinitely numerous or as stricdy 
 limited in number, and the view of the universe as a 
 whole will differ accordingly. Their nature also may 
 be differently conceived ; and divergeat views may be 
 held regarding the extent to which the nature of one 
 of them varies from that of others. Among them the 
 soul or mind of man will almost necessarily be reckoned : 
 for that is the only spiritual being of which we have 
 any direct knowledge; and from it indeed all our ideas 
 of spiritual existence are formed. But it is of course 
 possible that the line of monads may stretch far down- 
 wards to inferior grades of spiritual being ; and that 
 there may be many monads higher or more developed 
 in their characteristics than the human soul. How far 
 
 Spiritual Plnralisni 
 
 363 
 
 the line extends in either direction it is difficult to say ; 
 and genuine pluralists may well differ in opinion. At 
 the lower end of the scale the limit may only be set by 
 the feeblest kind of subjectivity that can render any 
 experience or reality possible. At the higher end the 
 question of a limit raises a more serious piublein. 
 Whatever constitutes the reality of the monad — be it 
 clearness or power or activity or perfection of whatever 
 kind — the degree of that perfection may stretch down- 
 wards indefinitely to the naked monad of Leibniz's 
 imagination. Does it also extend indefinitely upwards 
 and find its term only in a monad of infinite intelli- 
 gence, power, or perfection 1 If so our universe of 
 spirits includes one which is supreme and will be called 
 God. This indeed was Leibniz's own view. And if 
 the striving of the monad is always towards the higher 
 development or greater perfection of its nature, then 
 this one supreme being which realises all perfection 
 will also be regarded as the final cause of all reality. 
 It has even been maintained, as by Professor Howison, 
 that every possible degree of being is essential to the 
 whole and that therefore a supreme and infinite mind 
 is necessary in the universe. True, finite minds are 
 also as necessary as the infinite mind, so that the view 
 is not identical with the most common form of theism ; 
 but it is essentially theistic. In particular, and with 
 regard to our special problem, it provides, by its supreme 
 mind, a home for intrinsic values and a possible means 
 of reconciling them with the empirical order of natural 
 events. For this view, therefore, God is the solution. 
 On the other hand, it may be held by pluralists 
 that the monads or minds that make up reality are 
 
3^4 
 
 Pluralism 
 
 themselves -all of them— finite. However superior in 
 degree some may be to others, each is limited by all the 
 others, so that it is impossible for any one of them to 
 be infinite, or even supreme in any sense that would 
 justify us in calling it God. In another rendering of 
 the same view, spiritual units or monads may be said 
 to be ultimate differentiations of the Absolute. Bv the 
 term absolute, as used here, w ill be meant the whole of 
 reality. It will be infinite if its ultimate differentiations 
 are infinite in number, for it is their sum-total ; but 
 infinity cannot be predicated of any one of these 
 differentiations. Among the many minds which make 
 up the universe there can be none with infinite power, 
 else the others would be unessential, and pluralism 
 would be relinquished ; none with complete perfection, 
 for that could only be by borrowing the values belong- 
 ino- to all the others ; none with a universal reference, 
 for that would be to interfere with the inner life of the 
 others. In this sense, therefore, pluralism will exclude 
 theism ; and it is this interpretation of the theory whose 
 ability to meet our question has to be examined. 
 
 The universe then, it is assumed, consists of finite 
 spiritual units, among which the human mind alone is 
 direcdy known to us. There may be other spiritual 
 units of a higher grade than the human mind, as there 
 are almost certainly some of a lower grade, but none 
 among them is of so high a grade as to be infinite or 
 even supreme. The problem now Is. Does this theory 
 afford a satisfactory means of explaining the characteris- 
 tics of reality which have been already brought to light ? 
 and this problem may be resolved Into two questions : 
 first, does pluralism succeed in -explaining reality as a 
 
 Its Account of the Environment 365 
 
 whole (in which value is included) ? and secondly, is 
 its own postulate of a plurality of finite minds as con- 
 stitutive of reality a postulate which can be admitted 
 as in need of no further presupposition, or does it itself 
 rest upon a more fundamental though implicit condition 
 regarding the nature of reality .^ 
 
 The spiritual monads which are held by pluralists 
 to be the ultimate constituents of reality, and which 
 are best known to us in the form of finite minds, are 
 surrounded by an environment of an orderly kind, in 
 it we have already distinguished the natural, the logi- 
 cal, and the moral orders ; and the problem which 
 pluralism has been called in to solve arises from the 
 apparent conflict between the first and last of these 
 orders. But what account does the theory give of this 
 orderly environment as a whole } Either the environ- 
 ment is dependent upon and a product of finite minds, 
 or it is independent of them. Both possibilities must 
 be examined. 
 
 The former alternative is the solution offered by 
 idealism or spiritualism, when that theory is inter- 
 preted in harmony with pluralism. As mind is the 
 only reality, the environment of mind must itself be 
 mental, a product or mode of mind or In some way 
 dependent upon mind. The universe in its essential 
 nature is simply a community, perhaps only an aggre- 
 gate, of minds. The facts experienced or observed by 
 any mind, the spatial and temporal order in which they 
 are placed, their causal connexions, and the w^iole 
 order of truth and of value must be mental formations 
 — without any existence outside the minds that possess 
 
366 
 
 Pliiralisiii 
 
 them. This view is familiar enough. But it is necessary 
 to put a question about it which is often avoided. How 
 are we to regard the mind which determines or pro- 
 duces this orderly procession of fact under stable laws 
 and ideals, and thus makes a universe out of chaos or 
 out of nothing? It cannot be a universal mind from 
 which all individual minds receive the content and 
 form of their experience, for this would be a supreme 
 mind on which all the others would depend, as the 
 theist conceives them to do, and the theory would 
 cease to be pluralism in the sense in which pluralism 
 is opposed to theism. Nor can it be some all-embracing 
 spiritual reality, though not conceived as conscious ; 
 for, on such a hypothesis also, the theory would no 
 longer be pluralism, but would be a form of pantheism. 
 The mind which determines the facts and order of 
 the world must therefore be, in each case, the finite 
 spiritual unit which is the subject of that experience. 
 Each monad or mind must produce its own universe, 
 unrolling it from within. I, for instance, by means of 
 certain innate forms or modes of consciousness, give 
 spatial and temporal position, causal connexion, numeri- 
 cal distinctness and other relations, to some chaotic 
 impression, or more strictly, to nothing at all, and 
 thereby produce what I call the world. But you in 
 the same way make a world for yourself, and so does 
 everybody else. A radical pluralism would thus seem 
 to require a distinct universe for each distinct monad. 
 As each mind or monad makes its universe, each uni- 
 verse must be distinct: as many minds so many worlds. 
 Further, within the universe which is the construc- 
 tion or creation of that monad which I call myself, I 
 
 A Plurality of Universes 
 
 367 
 
 find that there are many other minds in addition to my 
 own, and these minds are known to me only through 
 their physical expressions— their bodies and the changes 
 in the environment that seem to be due to them— that 
 IS, through their connexion with the order of the 
 universe which is my construction or creation. They 
 are known as having a position in time and space, as 
 interacting, and generally as constitutive parts of my 
 universe, and in these respects must be regarded as 
 my construction or creation. And each of these minds, 
 I am obliged to admit, may retort upon me in similar 
 terms, and claim me as a part of its universe. And in 
 each case the universe cannot be the same as mine ; it 
 may be like it or unlike ; experience provides no means 
 of telling. Each self has his own universe because he 
 produces it ; and if he could only keep to the evidence 
 and to his own point of view, he would suppose his 
 own universe to be all. This thorough pluralism is 
 accordingly unable to avoid Solipsism ; and Leibniz 
 evaded the conclusion only because he assumed at the 
 outset that there was a single universe which each 
 monad mirrored with varying degrees of clearness, 
 while it was manifested with perfect clearness in the 
 consciousness of the One Supreme Mind. Unless he 
 had recognised the reality of the supreme mind or 
 monad, it would have been impossible for Leibniz to 
 reconcile with his monadism the doctrine that the 
 universal system is a single reality, and that it is 
 reflected by each monad from its own point of view. 
 
 It will have been observed that the preceding 
 argument has gone upon a certain assun^ption. It 
 has assumed, as Leibniz assumed, that the life and 
 
 V 
 
368 
 
 Phiralism 
 
 experience of each monad are unfolded entirely from 
 within, unaffected by the activity of any other monad. 
 But this assumption has been in general rejected by 
 modern pluralists. The monads or ultimate spiritual con- 
 stituents of reality are regarded by them as interacting. 
 The monads affect one another by their activity ; one 
 produces changes upon another and assists or hinders 
 the development of its life. May we not therefore 
 look upon the universal order in which all live not as 
 the creation of each and therefore different for each, 
 but as the co-operative product of all, and therefore 
 
 the same for all ? 
 
 It is clear that knowledge of nature and of the order 
 of nature is a co-operative product of this kind. When 
 we look at the history of science, we see that the 
 result is due to a long succession of minds working 
 both separately and together, testing the observations 
 and theories of their predecessors, and assimilatingeasily 
 the discoveries due to the strenuous labour of earlier 
 workers. One builds on another's foundation ; conclu- 
 sions are confirmed and corrected by new methods 
 and acquired skill; conceptions and theorems which 
 required infinite genius for their first elaboration become 
 in time an assured possession of the common intelli- 
 o-ence of the race. And all this conscious co-operation, 
 to which we owe the structure of modern science, has 
 at its base a more elementary but necessary sub-struc- 
 ture due to unconscious co-operation. It is by gradual 
 stages that the individual human being of the present 
 day acquires facility in using even the fundamental 
 conceptions of all knowledge. His ideas of space and 
 time, of the causal connexion of events, even of the 
 
 Knowledge as a Social Construction 369 
 
 distinction of thing from thing in the outer world, are 
 neither ready-made for him nor constructed by his 
 solitary intelligence. Their place in his consciousness 
 is due in part to his inherited mental dispositions and 
 mpart to intercourse with other minds. In language, 
 the use of which he acquires gradually under social 
 training, he enters into an inheritance of ideas whose 
 form and contents have been defined by the experience 
 of the race and fixed in words. In acquiring the use 
 of language and the common-sense knowledge of the 
 world, the individual of the present day retraces in his 
 early years a process which had already taken place by 
 slower stages and less direct routes in the history of 
 the race. What the child is deliberately taught was 
 learned by his ancestors by repeated trial and error, 
 but always in a community of individuals to whose 
 intercourse the result was due. The world as known, 
 therefore, has been built up by gradual and combined 
 efforts ; it is a social construction. 
 
 All this is familiar doctrine and beyond dispute. It 
 IS a commonplace also that our understanding of the 
 world is closely connected wn'th the uses to which we 
 put It, and at first almost entirely dependent upon 
 practical interests. These interests are shared by the 
 community in which a man lives, so that he learns to 
 use things and to esteem them at the same time and in 
 much the same way as he learns to know them. In 
 the course of time, as we have seen, new values are 
 discovered in life and new ways of realising them are 
 opened up. In this process also mind co-operates with 
 mind, and the common discovery becomes a common 
 inheritance. The co-operation is indeed even more 
 
 O. O. Li. ^ I 
 
370 
 
 Phiralisin 
 
 obvious in the region of values than it is in knowledge 
 In morality, art, and religion the communal or national 
 factor is more marked than it is in science, and the 
 mutual intercourse of minds can be more clearly traced 
 when it is restricted to the nation or some smaller 
 group than when it is world-wide. Of all human 
 interests science is the most cosmopolitan; under 
 modern conditions the influence of mind upon mmd 
 in all the operations of the scientific intelligence is 
 affected to a comparatively slight degree only by 
 national boundaries. Being so widespread and univer- 
 sal this influence may attract little attention. But 
 nations are much more distinguished from one another 
 by their attitudes to the ethical, aesthetic, and religious 
 values. In this region their special characteristics are 
 brought out, and we see the common mind of the 
 people manifested. The influences which make a 
 national character are pervasive and persistent within 
 the nation, but to a large extent arrested at its frontier. 
 In these influences we may observe the interaction of 
 minds which are closely connected with one another 
 by common history and conditions. Where similar 
 interaction has free play in spite of difterences in these 
 respects, the mutual influence may be less obvious, 
 but it is not less real : and this is often the case with 
 
 knowledge. 
 
 It is hardlv necessary to have said so much m 
 admittincr or defending the truth that our apprehen- 
 sion both of the order of nature and of the moral order 
 is due to a process which has taken place by slow 
 decrees and has been rendered possible only by the 
 mutual influence of mind upon mind. The truth is 
 
 Reality as a Social Construction 37 1 
 
 .•mportant : but. however true and important, it must 
 not be mistaken for something else. The apprehen- 
 sion of reality is a co-operative mental construction 
 but It does not follow that the reality apprehended is 
 constructed in the same way or by the same process. 
 Yet unless we confuse these two things-the appre- 
 hension of reality and the reality apprehended-or hold 
 hat one follows from the other, we have done nothing 
 to establish the pluralisfs thesis that the orders both 
 of nature and of morality are a creation of individual 
 minds acting in concert and competition. 
 
 Pluralism either holds that nature and morality are 
 the product of finite minds or it does not. The former 
 hypothesis, which is now under consideration, is neither 
 proved nor made more probable by showing that the 
 apprehension of nature and its laws and of moral values 
 IS a gradual attainment and the result of many minds 
 working together. Because knowledge grows from a 
 stage where once knowledge was not, it does not 
 follow that the thing known has been growing at the 
 same time out of nothingne.ss into its full nature 
 Because many minds unite in bringing the knowledge 
 about this IS no reason against there being a common 
 and objective reality for them to know. 
 
 In perception and at every stage of knowledae the 
 monad or mind is always in connexion with an environ- 
 ment. We have passed away from the view that objects 
 known are simply the mind's own content spread out so 
 as to give the illusion of objectivity : for this view as 
 we have found, can never get beyond solipsism. But 
 what is the environment into relation to which the 
 mind IS brought in knowledge ? The pluralist who is 
 
 24—2 
 
372 
 
 Pluralism 
 
 also an idealist will hold that it is constituted entirely 
 by other minds or at least by monads which are m 
 nature akin to minds, that is, unities with a life or sub- 
 jectivity at least resembling consciousness and con- 
 ceivably capable of development into consciousness. 
 On this view the whole world or every part of it is 
 alive. There is no such thing as dead or inert matter 
 Lnothing absolutely inorganic. That is only the limit 
 to which"" consciousness tends when its clearness is 
 gradually diminished, and the limit is never reached. 
 So far as anything exists it has a subjective aspect, 
 and in this subjectivity its true nature lies. 
 
 This view has its own difficulties. But they are 
 difficulties not peculiar to pluralism ; and it is not 
 necessary to urge them here. So far as the present 
 argument is concerned, we may admit the view that 
 alfexisting things are monads or spiritual units. 1 he 
 point which concerns us is the way in which pluralism 
 interprets the order or relations in which these units 
 stand to one another and to the universe which they 
 constitute. What we have to consider is the pluralist's 
 interpretation of order or law. One monad or mind 
 learns to understand the order of its environment. 
 This understanding is due to intersubjective inter- 
 course—to the help of other minds with which it is 
 able to communicate in part directly and in part 
 indirectly through tradition. No one mind can be said 
 to have created this order which now many minds 
 recognise. Is it possible to say, nevertheless, that it is 
 their^ collective creation— that it has been brought 
 about by their mutual intercourse and assistance? If 
 we answer this question in the affirmative, then the 
 
 The Postulate of Order 373 
 
 creation of this order must have consisted in or been 
 contemporaneous with its discovery ; until discovered 
 it was not real; and we shall be committed to the 
 conclusion that mathematical relations and the laws 
 of nature did not hold, or were not operative, until 
 found or apprehended by finite minds. But these 
 relations and laws as we now understand them are 
 conceived as valid independently of our apprehension, 
 and as having been valid through long stretches of 
 time when they were not understood by any intelli- 
 gences of which we have any knowledge. It is also 
 obvious that finite minds are frequently making dis- 
 covery of new relations and laws and adding them to 
 the common stock of knowledge, and it is assumed 
 that these new relations and laws were and are valid 
 before and independently of their apprehension : they 
 are discoveries not inventions. Is it conceivable that 
 this assumption made in all scientific enquiry is never- 
 theless unfounded and false .^ 
 
 There is one consideration which makes it impos- 
 sible for us to regard it as false. These discoveries, as 
 we have seen, are due, at least generally, not to one 
 mind only, but to many minds influencing each other 
 so that truth is handed on from mind to mind, and 
 one man lights the torch by which another sees and 
 advances. But this whole process of co-operative in- 
 vestigation and discovery, on which knowledge has 
 been built, has itself been made possible only through 
 the operation of a variety of physical, chemical, and 
 biological laws. Mind acts upon mind in certain 
 definite ways and through certain media only. A 
 slight change in physical conditions, or in chemical or 
 
374 
 
 Pluralism 
 
 biological processes, and sight, for example, or hearing 
 would have been impossible, so that the ways in which 
 mind has acted upon mind would have been closed. 
 But this interaction has been assumed in our account 
 of the growth of knowledge ; in assuming it we have 
 also assumed its conditions ; and these conditions are 
 formulated in and imply certain physical, chemical, and 
 bioloo-ical relations. These relations therefore must 
 have had being — the 'laws' expressing them must have 
 been valid — in order that the process of acquiring 
 knowledge might work, and accordingly before any 
 knowledge was acquired. They cannot have been pro- 
 duced or created by that which they themselves have 
 helped to render possible. 
 
 The pluralist resolves all reality into finite centres of 
 life— monads or minds. Our enquiry has shown that he 
 must also recognise something that is not itself a centre of 
 life, and has not been made by any finite mind or by any 
 finite monad belowthe rank of mind; and this is the order 
 which connects these minds, and in and through which 
 they live. This order, as has been often said already, 
 may be distinguished into two main kinds. There is 
 first of all the system of relations by which the monads 
 are connected with one another, so that intersubjective 
 intercourse is possible and an objective world is cog- 
 nised. These constitute the 'laws of nature' in the 
 widest sense of that term, including along with more 
 concrete connexions those abstract relations of concepts 
 which make up formal or logical truth. All these 
 to<^>-ether may be spoken of for the present as the 
 natural order. In addition to this system there is the 
 
 The Explanation of Order 375 
 
 realm of values which has been found to have validity 
 for personal life, and this for the present may be spoken 
 of under the name of its leading variety— the moral 
 order. The question for the pluralist concerns the 
 position which he is to give in his scheme of things to 
 the natural order and to the moral order. They are 
 not the product of the finite minds into which he has 
 resolved the whole of reality, and yet they are there, 
 essential in the universe and necessary for the func- 
 tioning, if not for the existence, of finite minds. 
 
 This complicated but orderly system remains with- 
 out any explanation on the pluralistic scheme ; it is 
 simply there. It can be understood by finite intelli- 
 gence, but it has not been produced by it. Yet its 
 nature is such that, were it less complete and universal, 
 we should not hesitate to infer that it was the product 
 of mind. We constantly infer meaning from order, and 
 mind from meaning, and we find the inference justified. 
 There is only one alternative to this inference, and 
 that is to refer the order simply to 'nature' or the 
 structure of the universe. Whether this too has a 
 meaning and also reveals a mind is just the question 
 which a non-theistic pluralism has to answer in the 
 negative. But in so doing it has also to admit that, 
 after all, finite minds and other monads are not the 
 sole reality : that an unexplained order enters into the 
 constitution of reality. This order controls minds, but 
 it is not itself the product of mind or in any way mental. 
 Minds or monads are said to be the ultimate consti- 
 tuents of reality— the only things ultimately real. Yet 
 surrounding them and controlling them there is an 
 eternal order or law or system of relations. They 
 
376 
 
 Pluralism 
 
 are the subjects of this system not its masters. It may 
 not have created them but neither have they created 
 it, and they are bound by its canons. And in nature 
 it is ahen to them— intelhgible certainty, but not intel- 
 Hgent or in any way akin to mind. Rather, it is a sort 
 of inexorable fate by which they are determined as by 
 an external and unsympathetic power. 
 
 The theory, therefore, ought not to be called an 
 idealistic or spiritualistic theory. It starts indeed with 
 a view of reality as of the nature of mind ; but it has 
 to add to this something else not of the nature of mind 
 and yet controlling it. That the view should neverthe- 
 less be put forward as an idealistic or spiritualistic 
 interpretation of reality may be explained by means 
 of the distinction between two forms of idealism to 
 which I have elsewhere drawn attention'. According 
 to one form of idealism, which may be called the 
 Platonic, the real consists of ideas ; and ideas are 
 intelligible realities which are not dependent on minds 
 for their being. It may be true to say of them that 
 they produce minds ; but it will not be true to say that 
 minds produce them. On the other form of idealism, 
 which may be called the Berkeleyan, all reality consists 
 of minds and the content of minds ; nature and the laws 
 of nature are part of this content, and the orderly 
 system which finite minds did not produce reveal the 
 content and the existence of the infinite mind. Now 
 both these views are able to give an account of reality 
 which, at least prima facie, is harmonious and unified. 
 For on both views mind and the structure of the 
 universe are homogeneous. According to Plato the 
 ^ Hibbert Journal^ vol. n (1904), pp. 703 ff. 
 
 The Explanatioji of Moral Order 377 
 
 finite mind is not alien in nature to the ideas which 
 it is able to comprehend ; according to Berkeley, the 
 order shown in what are called laws of nature is itself 
 a product of that one mind which is the source of all 
 others. But non-theistic pluralism cannot assert this 
 homogeneity between mind and the universal order. 
 It has been thinking along the lines of Berkeleyan 
 idealism in asserting that the ultimate constituents of 
 reality are minds ; it has been following out a Platonic 
 doctrine when it allowed or maintained as ultimate the 
 laws or relations which lie beyond and above the power 
 of all finite intelligences. Part of its theory is idealistic 
 in the Platonic sense, and part of it in the Berkeleyan 
 sense. But the whole theory is not idealistic in any 
 single and unambiguous meaning of the term. And 
 there is no means of making it so. It has set out from 
 the Berkeleyan standpoint. But, refusing to admit an 
 infinite mind, it is unable to interpret the order of 
 reality in terms of mind. 
 
 ^ The difficulty for pluralism becomes greater when 
 it is admitted that the moral order or order of values 
 is a feature which must be taken into account as having 
 objective validity. If it were merely (as it is often held 
 to be) an expression of the experiences or aspirations 
 of finite minds this difficulty would not arise. But we 
 have seen reason to hold, and pluralists often admit, 
 that its validity and objectivity are independent of its 
 apprehension or realisation by individuals, whether 
 alone or in society, so that the question presses of 
 giving an intelligible account of its position. Like the 
 natural order it is not the work of the finite minds 
 which alone are recognised as constituting the universe, 
 
378 
 
 Pluralism 
 
 and yet it is there — a law holding for these finite minds. 
 It does not even describe their interaction as the laws 
 of nature do ; it does not always direct their function- 
 in^j- ; but it is a standard for their conduct, and in their 
 correspondence with it they reach the highest end of 
 which their nature is capable. We admit its validity 
 for judgment and appreciation ; and its verdict is that 
 finite individuals — that is, the ultimate constituents of 
 realitv — have not vet attained their full or true nature 
 as long as their character falls short of the ethical 
 
 ideal. 
 
 We have therefore a new difficulty to face in addi- 
 tion to that arising from the necessity of recognising 
 the natural order as independent of finite minds and 
 yet as belonging to the universe of reality. This latter 
 difficulty compelled the pluralist to admit that his 
 ultimate constituents of reality — minds or monads of 
 whatever sort — were controlled by something else 
 which was not mental in structure and which therefore 
 was so far inexplicable on his theory. Now, in view of 
 the position of the moral order, he will have to admit 
 that his ultimate reals have not yet attained the reality 
 of which they are capable, and can only reach it through 
 correspondence with an order which is independent of 
 them and is not mental in structure. Here also it is 
 his refusal to admit the conception of an infinite or 
 perfect mind that lands his theory in incoherence. 
 
 There are types of pluralism which may be willing 
 to put up with incoherence, even to welcome it. This 
 acquiescence in a universe with ragged edges and im- 
 perfect connexion of its parts characterises much of the 
 
 Pluralism and Monism 
 
 319 
 
 writing of William James; and when his thinking passes 
 beyond this view it tends to a form of monism \ Per- 
 haps it is impossible to refute the idea that the world 
 consists of chance happenings and unstable relations— 
 a view to which the term pluralism might be less un- 
 suitable than any other. All we can do is to seek out 
 the conditions of what happens and trace the relations 
 of things and events, and when we do so our thou^rht 
 is always guided by the postulate that reality is a 
 cosmos or order, and that it is possible for us to under- 
 stand that order. To arrive at a conception of th it 
 order by a complete examination of all the data which 
 experience offers is obviously impossible ; and were it 
 possible it would be insufficient, for experience is a 
 process of growth never completed, li these data are 
 to be fused into a view of the whole, that can only be 
 done by an intellectual effort which involves imao-ina- 
 tion, since it passes beyond the scattered facts and 
 seeks to view them as a whole by insight into their 
 unifying principle, while, at the same time, it must 
 •submit to be judged by its inner harmony and by its 
 adequate comprehension of the empirical material. 
 
 The pluralism which has been examined in this 
 lecture is a synoptic view of this kind. It interprets 
 the universe by means of the most adequate concep- 
 tion it can reach, and thus endeavours to see all things 
 as modes or products of many minds. As all experience 
 has its being for us only in and through its reference 
 to the unity of the subject, which thus contains it and 
 
 ^ E.g., A Pluralistic Universe, p. 290 : "May not you and I be 
 confluent in a higher consciousness, and confluently active there, 
 though we know it not ?" 
 
38o 
 
 Pluralism 
 
 makes it possible, it interprets the whole choir of 
 heaven and furniture of the earth as owing their reality 
 to mind. And it has the further feature, which may 
 easily be regarded as an advantage, that the highest 
 mental life which it postulates is of a kind or degree 
 which our immediate experience reveals and compels 
 us to admit. Mind or self is the final word. But there 
 are many minds, many selves, all united somehow into 
 a universe : whose structure may thus be compared 
 with that of the social orders of college or church or 
 state, in which human minds have expressed them- 
 selves and in which they have found a form of unity 
 more comprehensive than that of the individual self. 
 
 The view is impressive ; but we have found that 
 it is met by one grave difficulty with which it is unable 
 to cope. The social order, it may be said, gives it a 
 cue for the interpretation of the wider reality which 
 surrounds the individual self, and the social order may 
 be regarded as a product of the finite minds of whom, 
 and of whom alone, reality is said to consist. But the 
 environment of finite minds is something more than the' 
 social order. There is the natural order and there is 
 the moral order ; and neither of these is due to the 
 activity of finite minds. It has been said' that the 
 atom of the materialistic philosophers is in every 
 respect the contrary of the monad of the pluralist, 
 having no spontaneity and being completely deter- 
 mined from without. It cannot therefore function as an 
 ultimate unit of reality in a genuine pluralism. What 
 holds true of the atom without qualification is also 
 true, with a qualification, of finite minds or spiritual 
 
 ^ J. Ward, The Realm of Ends (191 1), p. 51. 
 
 The Pluralist 's Dilemma 
 
 381 
 
 monads. They are incompletely spontaneous and par- 
 tially determined from without— dominated by the 
 order of nature and directed by the order of values. 
 How can we regard them as the ultimate constituents 
 of reality when they are under the power of something 
 other than themselves '> 
 
 Nature and morality may indeed be held to be the 
 expression of mind— but only of a creative mind. They 
 cannot be accounted for as the expressions of the finite 
 minds which come to recognise them. They are not 
 even the expression of the social mind— if the term 
 may be used. For the coauuunication of mind with 
 mind, and the growth of knowledge and of the social 
 order, imply that the laws of nature and moral values 
 were valid before and independently of their recogni- 
 tion. If these are interpreted as the expressions^ of 
 mmd, that mind cannot be limited in comprehension 
 or power as finite minds are limited. And the pluralist, 
 unwilling to postulate a mind that is supreme or 
 infinite, is forced to admit into his view of the world 
 two different and even discordant kinds of being— the 
 region of finite minds, and the realms of law and values 
 which these finite minds have not produced, but by 
 which they are nevertheless controlled. If he is not 
 troubled by the necessity of explaining this cosmic 
 order, he will remain a pluralist. If, on the contrary, 
 it comes to loom larger in his vision, so that in com- 
 parison with it finite minds seem dependent beings, 
 controlled and determined by the order which envebps 
 them, then his theory will be transformed into a species 
 of monism or pantheism. 
 
XV 
 
 MONISM' 
 
 \\ E mav recall once more the conclusion which was 
 reached in the examination of the Moral Argument. 
 A comparison was drawn between the order of nature 
 in accordance with which events occur and the mode 
 of action of individual minds on the one hand, and the 
 realm of moral values on the other hand ; and the com- 
 parison showed that goodness was not realised in the 
 existing world. The problem raised was how^ to inter- 
 pret a universe which contained both the order of nature 
 and the order of morality, but in which these two orders 
 were in conflict. It was argued that the problem would 
 be solved if we regarded the course of the world as 
 purposive and held that its purpose consisted in the 
 realisation of those values, the moral values, which can 
 be realised only by intelligent agents who are free 
 thouo-h finite. According: to this solution the universal 
 purpose is held to be the purpose of a Supreme Mind 
 upon whom nature and finite minds depend. The term 
 
 ' The term JVIonism is used here, as Lotze used it (Metaphysic, 
 % 69), for the theory that " there cannot be a tnultipHcity of indepen- 
 dent things, but all elements... must be regarded as parts of a single 
 and real being." For the same meaning Professor Ward prefers the 
 term Singularism, using Monism to signify only the qualitative same- 
 ness or similarity (spiritualistic, materialistic, or neutral) of everything 
 that is real. See his Realm of Ends, p. 24. 
 
 Monism and Pluralism 
 
 383 
 
 ' mmd ' thus used does not imply an exact similarity 
 with mmd as we are aware of it in our own life ; but it 
 does indicate that intelligence, will, and goodness are 
 a less inadequate expression for that which we wish to 
 name than any other expre.ssion. The doctrine that the 
 world depends on mind, thus understood, is what is 
 meant by Theism. 
 
 There are, however, many other theories about 
 reality; and luo of these seemed to call for examina- 
 tion, because they recognise, at least in some measure, 
 the problem which confronts us. According to one of 
 these theories what is alone ultimately real is a plurality 
 of monads or selves, all of them finite ; according to 
 the other theory, minds are only manifestations or 
 modes of a single reality which, as a unity or whole, 
 cannot be described as mind but, if any term fits it, may. 
 be better spoken of as law, order, or reason— provided 
 these terms are not supposed to imply consciousness. 
 The former is the theory of pluralism ; the latter may 
 be called monism or pantheism. In the last lecture it 
 was argued that pluralism has to admit an order of the 
 world beyond and above the finite monads or minds 
 that are said to be the ultimate constituents of reality, 
 and that in this way it tends to pass over into its opposite 
 —monism. The latter theory has now to be examined, 
 especially with regard to its explanation of the relation 
 between the realm of nature and the realm of goodness. 
 
 For Western thought Spinoza's system is the typical 
 example of monism or pantheism. It is almost an 
 accident that it is presented, and is commonly regarded 
 by the historians, as being, at the same tinTe, the 
 
384 
 
 Monism 
 
 typical example of rigid demonstration in philosophy. 
 In Spinoza twogreatqualities were combined : the logical 
 power which has command of abstract reasoning and 
 can weld arguments into system, and, along with this, 
 the vision of a seer. In respect of logic and system, 
 however, it is impossible to regard his work as a fault- 
 less specimen of demonstration. He did succeed in 
 developing with far greater consistency than Descartes 
 the conceptions which he found in the latter's philo- 
 sophy ; but his leading positions have only the appear- 
 ance of being demonstrated : they are already contained 
 in his definitions, especially the definition of substance. 
 His central idea of the All as One is not arrived at 
 by ratiocination but by what he himself calls intuition. 
 This is his vision, his point of view ; and the compact 
 body of propositions in which his thought is set forth 
 is his impressive endeavour to show how the facts of 
 material and mental existence can be seen from this 
 point of view and find their place and explanation as 
 modes of one eternal substance or reality. 
 
 Nature and God are one — merely different names 
 for describing the sole ultimate reality, as conceived 
 under different attributes or as seen from different points 
 of view; all particular things, whether bodies or minds, 
 can be nothing but modes of this one real being — if 
 indeed they are more than illusions. This is the general 
 thesis of pantheism, and it is not difficult to see that 
 it may be interpreted in different ways according to 
 the aspect from which it is regarded. Looked at from 
 the side of nature the universe may be held to be simply 
 the interconnected world of physical science. On the 
 other hand this diversity itself may be said to be only 
 
 Extension and Thotight 
 
 385 
 
 an appearance ; and reality may be interpreted as a 
 un.ty somewhat after the fashion of the spirit of man 
 so that .t may be possible for man to realise his being 
 m un.on with the whole. In taking over fron, Descartes 
 the doctrme that extension and thought have nothing 
 m common, and in regarding them as two attributes of 
 the One Substance, Spinoza brought into prominence 
 and attempted to bring into unity, these divergent inter- 
 pretations. His own thought, however, is in unstable 
 eqtuhbnum between them, and it oscillates uneasily 
 rom one mterpretation to the other. On the one hand 
 there ,s the tendency to lay stress on the aspect of .x- 
 tens.on and of the material bodies which are the modes of 
 substance as extended. This region forms a mechanical 
 system m which causal cohnexions can be traced and 
 venhed. And as the attribute of thought, and minds 
 which are its modes, correspond exactly with this 
 mechanical region, they also may be interpreted me- 
 chanically. Thus matter is given the primacy. This 
 primacy is still further brought out by the point-to-point 
 parallelism of matter and mind. For the ideas which 
 make up mind are-all of them-held to be ideas of the 
 body; so that, although they have their own causal 
 sequence, they are bound to body in a way in which 
 body cannot be shown to be bound to mind. In this 
 way ,t ,s not surprising that freedom should disappear 
 and that goodness should be regarded as merely a name 
 lor whatever is useful or the object of desire. 
 
 But alongside of this there is an entirely different 
 train of thought. Mind, which was first represented as 
 merely an idea of its own body, may yet have an adequate 
 knowledge of the attributes of God or substance • 
 
 S. G. L. ' 
 
386 
 
 Monism 
 
 in so far as it has this knowledge it partakes of 
 the eternity of its object : there is something in mind 
 which does not disappear with the body^— although 
 mind is only an idea of the body \ And its blessedness 
 is consummated in the intellectual love of God which is 
 a part of the love wherewith God loves himself 
 
 Since all is one, according to monism, it would seem 
 that the system must needs display unity or harmony. 
 But it is equally true for the theory that the One is all, 
 and thus discord lurks within the harmony. The theory 
 is put forward to show the unity behind and beneath all 
 the diversity of appearance in the world ; and thus, m 
 an ethical regard, it would seem to point to the moral 
 doctrine that the individual should seek his good in 
 union with the whole. This iias indeed been the burden 
 of the teaching of the great pantheistic thinkers of every 
 age and race. Yet there is another side to the doctrine 
 of which some have not been slow to catch hold, and 
 which appeals forcibly to the mass of men when such 
 a doctrine can reach them at all. It is equally part of 
 the theory that all the differentiations of the One are 
 necessary. Whether we call them modes or appearances 
 or even illusions, they cannot come by accident. Each 
 thing and person has its appointed place, and therein 
 
 whether as mode or appearance or illusion — is as 
 
 essential to the One as the One is to it. Degrees of 
 illusoriness, or— what comes to much the same thing- 
 degrees of reality, there may be. But all degrees are 
 necessary, and why should one mode of reality or bit 
 of illusion strive to alter its degree? Such striving 
 must be vain ; and if it were not vain, would it not be 
 ^ Spinoza, Ethica, v, 23. ^ Ibid., 11, 13. 
 
 71te Absolute One 
 
 387 
 
 'Trli ^/ ^'^^^^^^'"^ the harmony of the whole in 
 which all degrees are necessary and together make up 
 the perfect One and All ? ^ 
 
 Neither the philosophical elaboration of pantheism 
 as we find it in a writer like Spinoza, nor its workin.^ 
 as a religious view of the world, can be rightly estimated 
 If we neglect either of these sides of the doctrine-the 
 side which points to mysticism or that which allies 
 Itself with naturalism. The doctrine is a doctrine of 
 unity ; but it is a unity which contains in itself all diver- 
 sity and multiplicity. The absolute One is in strictness 
 ineffable ; determination of it implies negation and 
 therefore interferes with its positive perfection ; any 
 assertion with the absolute as subject brings the abso- 
 lute into relation to a predicate and thus destroys its 
 absoluteness. The absolute One should be treated as 
 strictly ineffable. But, if it is to be described at all it 
 cannot be described otherwise than by means of that 
 manifold world of appearance which is somehow its 
 manifestation. Consequently, the doctrine must be 
 understood by means of the way in which the concrete 
 world is regarded as manifesting the one reality. 
 
 • A^l'^ ?^ '^'^ '"^"^*'^' ^' ^^ tf^^ ^^^hole, must be 
 judged by the adequacy of the explanation which it is 
 able to give of the finite or of the parts. We may 
 therefore test it by its application to the different 
 divisions of reality as finite which have been distin 
 guished. In the first place, the realm of material things 
 living creatures, and persons will be regarded, on the 
 monistic theory, as modes of the being of that one 
 ultimate reality in which everything must have being. 
 
 25-2 
 
388 
 
 Monism 
 
 This is so far simple, as soon as we have granted that the 
 Absolute can have and has modes. How this is pos- 
 sible—how the absolute One can manifest itself in a 
 finite many— is not a whit easier to understand than the 
 doctrine of creation or any other substitute for it. But 
 particular things undoubtedly exist in some fashion ; 
 and when their existence is explained by the theory 
 that they are modes of a single absolute reality, what 
 we have to do is to enquire how this explanation ex- 
 plains their particularity, and their differences from one 
 another. The problem is therefore how to draw lines 
 of discrimination between the various modes. The 
 distinction between modes of extension, or bodies, and 
 modes of thought, or minds, goes a little way only in 
 this direction ; it entails difficulties of its own ; and it 
 applies chiefly to that special form of monistic doctrine 
 which arose out of the dualism of Descartes. 
 
 Different solutions have been offered of the problem 
 of differentiation. Sometimes a very formal test has been 
 offered: different things are discriminated from one 
 another by their degree of freedom from self-contradic- 
 tion. The Absolute alone is completely free from con- 
 tradiction, completely harmonious and self-consistent ; 
 particular things, all more or less affected by the vice 
 of contradiction, may yet be distinguished by their 
 measure of comparative freedom from it. Again, the 
 Absolute is the whole of reality: particular things may 
 be distinguished by the amount or degree of reality 
 which they manifest. Yet again, certain pantheistic 
 cosmologies have favoured the doctrine of emanation : 
 from the Absolute all things proceed ; those things 
 which are nearer the Absolute in this process of 
 
 The Absolute and its Modes 389 
 
 emanation are superior to or more perfect^ than those 
 things which are further off I cannot even pretend to 
 examine these different views. But their resemblance 
 to one another may be noted. Finite beings are dis- 
 tmguished according to the measure in which they 
 approach the Absolute conceived as harmonious, as 
 complete, or as first. What right the intellect of one 
 of Its finite modes can have to describe it thus" or to 
 describe it at all, I do not enquire ; for if I did enquire 
 there would be no answer to the query. But I do ask 
 why we should assume that the finite modes should 
 be distinguished from one another by any comparison 
 with the One or Absolute. Have we any right to 
 assume that any mode can in any way resemble, or 
 be compared with, the Absolute, which is properly 
 ineffable .^ And when we look closer, is the comparison 
 at all justified .?> As long as each thing keeps its place, 
 and does not pretend to be what it is not, is there any 
 contradiction in it .> Is any one thing less necessary to 
 the whole than any other .^ and if not, why should we 
 speak of it as less real or having a lower degree of 
 reality '> And is not the idea of emanation mere picture- 
 thinking -> Can anything be further off than another ■ 
 from that one reality which is in all and is all .> To say, 
 as Mr Bradley does\ that one thing is of a lower degree 
 of reality than another if it would require a greater 
 change to become the whole/ seems to me to treat the 
 whole as merely a sum of particulars and not as an 
 Absolute. The Absolute, however defined or however 
 indefinable, cannot be compared with particular things. 
 No conceivable change of any particular thing would 
 
 ' Appearance and Realiiy, p. 401. 
 
390 
 
 Monism 
 
 bring it nearer to or further from the Absolute. In 
 essence it just is the Absolute appearing in a certain 
 position and with certain determinations which some- 
 how are necessary to its manifestation. It could not be 
 other than it is ; and the idea of any change in it making 
 it nearer the Absolute seems to me an invasion of the 
 absoluteness of the Absolute. 
 
 The world-view of monism is thus disappointing in 
 the light it sheds on the particulars of experience. Each 
 particular, in its grade and place, is a manifestation of 
 the One which is also All. But no further light is 
 thrown on the interrelations of the finite. Every thing 
 is necessary in its place: mind and matter, man and 
 worm, saint and sinner. Of all these we can only say 
 what experience tells us, that there they are and that 
 they are interrelated according to certain natural laws. 
 Yet here, in w^hat we gather from experience regarding 
 the realm of law, we may find a manifestation of that 
 fixed order which the monistic view leads us to expect. 
 The view tightens the grip of law upon our conscious- 
 ness, whether the law be that of nature or of logic. The 
 doctrine that all is one can make no terms with con- 
 tingency. The order of nature must be as necessary as 
 the laws of logic ; the processes of mind and society 
 must have the same fixed order as mechanical necessity. 
 Spinoza professed to treat the actions and desires of 
 men just as if the question were of lines, planes, and 
 solids^ ; and, from his point of view, he was perfectly 
 justified ; the unity of reality will be interfered with 
 if necessary connexion is relaxed or room is left for 
 
 1 Ethica, iii, pref. 
 
 Monism and the Moral Order 39 1 
 
 individual initiative. If physical science aspires to be 
 a philosophy, and is not content with naturalism, it 
 may find in monism a fitting metaphysical refuge. 
 
 But when we pass from these relations to the diverse 
 order of moral values and moral law, difficulties begin 
 afresh. For in morality we have a discrimination of 
 higher and lower, of good and evil, which does not find 
 an easy explanation in a system where everything is 
 equally essential. Yet it is from the ethical point^ of 
 view that the system has to be approached here, as 
 offering a solution of the problem of reality which 
 might be accepted as an alternative to theism. God 
 (if the word is used at all) may be regarded as the 
 moral order of the universe : though we see now that 
 this can hardly be a complete definition. If the natural 
 order of the universe is real, then God must equally be 
 this natural order ; and, similarly, the logical order also. 
 If we do not admit this view, and if we distinguish one 
 of these orders from the others, then we must enquire 
 into their relation. If each order has a different ultimate 
 ground then we have no universe, only a multiverse ; 
 if they have the same ultimate ground and it transcends 
 each of them, then we are on the highway towards 
 theism. The doctrine of the All as One must in some 
 way harmonise the natural, logical, and moral orders, 
 and do so without going beyond them to the conception 
 of consciousness or personality. 
 
 But can we in this way identify the moral order and 
 the order of nature } " God or nature "—Spinoza's 
 favourite phrase— conveys a meaning; "God or the 
 
 moral order"— which might represent Fichte's view^ 
 
 also conveys a meaning ; but if by '* God " we mean at 
 
392 
 
 Monism 
 
 the same time both the natural and the moral order, 
 are we not using the name to cover a contradiction ? 
 
 It was because Kant was impressed by the discre- 
 pancy between the realm of nature with its strict causal 
 connexions and the moral order with its categorical 
 imperative, that he postulated a God transcending 
 the natural order and yet with the power required to 
 bring that order into harmony with morality. When 
 this view came before us in a previous lecture some- 
 thincT was said about the assumed opposition of the two 
 orders and in the direction of qualifying the complete- 
 ness of this opposition. It may perhaps appear, there- 
 fore, as if their unity had been already in principle 
 admitted. But this would be to misunderstand the drift 
 of the areument. The argument was not that the order 
 of nature and the moral order agree in their manifesta- 
 tions. On the contrary, it started from the fact that 
 there are values which have no actual existence in the 
 world, that the moral law is often broken, that the 
 moral ideal is something unrealised. The argument was 
 that the natural order might be shown to be adapted 
 to the moral order, but only upon two conditions: first, 
 if nature were interpreted as a purposive system, and 
 secondly, if it were recognised that morality required 
 for its realisation the free activity of individual persons. 
 The existing discrepancies between fact (or nature) and 
 morality were admitted. But, if morality is something 
 that needs to be achieved through freedom, then dis- 
 crepancy must be expected on the way to harmony, and 
 the existing world will need to be a fit medium for the 
 exercise of this freedom and the ultimate realisation of 
 goodness : that is to say, it must be held to be working 
 
 The Idea of Purpose 
 
 393 
 
 out a purpose. But these two ideas — purpose and 
 freedom — are just the ideas which are most alien to 
 any monistic scheme. How it deals with them, and 
 how it construes the moral universe without them, has 
 to be shown. 
 
 Let us take first the idea of purpose. The two ideas, 
 those of freedom and of purpose, are not dealt with in 
 quite the same way in the monistic scheme. For, while 
 freedom is rejected completely as altogether inconsis- 
 tent with the unity of the whole, it is difficult to deny 
 the existence of purpose somewhere within the whole, 
 namely, in human activity. At the same time, it is held 
 that to apply the conception of purpose to the world as 
 a whole is illegitimate, being a fashioning of the world 
 after the likeness of man, who is conscious of the end 
 he seeks before he attains it. Each individual thing, 
 Spinoza thinks, seeks to preserve its being — a truth 
 equally manifested by the stone which offers resistance 
 to the blows of the hammer and by the animal or man 
 that resists disease or death. But it is clear that mere 
 inertia does not express the whole truth about any 
 living being, as contrasted with the inorganic thing. 
 The living being seeks not merely preservation but 
 growth or expansion — greater fulness or excellence 
 of being. Here growth (though growth followed by 
 decay) is the law, as change of a regular kind is the 
 law in the inorganic realm ; and in the life of mind the 
 growth is mediated by an idea of value — a purpose. 
 But from our conception of the world as a whole the 
 idea of purpose is excluded. The world must be re- 
 garded as eternally complete and not as tending towards 
 a more perfect state. 
 
394 
 
 Monism 
 
 Purpose then is excluded. The world must not be 
 interpreted by means of the result which it is fitted to 
 bring forth in the fulness of time. Time cannot thus 
 be of its essence. We must view it as it is, and in this 
 view the moment of time at which we regard it is 
 indifferent. It is a whole and, as a whole, must be 
 perfect: for perfection means simply completeness of 
 reality ; and ail reality is here. As substance or essence, 
 reality is one ; as manifestation or appearance — what 
 Spinoza' calls fades tot ins luiiversi — it is seen as a 
 changing manifold, but a manifold to which nothing 
 can be added and from which nothing can be taken 
 away. It is the perfect manifestation of the One. The 
 whole world is essential to this perfect manifestation ; 
 we cannot dispense with any part. Sin and suffering 
 are there, constitutive fragments of the whole ; and as 
 such they must be accepted as belonging to it and con- 
 tributing to its perfection. From the point of view of 
 natural law this conclusion creates no difficulty. But it 
 is inconsistent with the conditions of moral law, which 
 requires the conquest of sin or evil and the realisation 
 of goodness. The moral order and the natural order 
 are therefore in conflict ; and no provision is made for 
 transcending their opposition. 
 
 A consistent monism, accordingly, cannot admit 
 the equal validity of the order of natural law and of 
 that of moral law. It must throw over one or the other. 
 It may conceivably adopt the heroic device of discarding 
 the whole realm of nature and the laws of nature as an 
 illusion ; but the illusion is too insistent in our experi- 
 ence to allow of this alternative being carried out fully. 
 
 ' Episi. 64, Opera, ed. Van Vloten and Land, vol. 11, p. 219. 
 
 Good and Evil 
 
 395 
 
 We cannot look upon the moral order as the only 
 reality. Even if we are willing to declare that pain is 
 no evil, it is harder to say that sin does not exist. Evil 
 of all kinds, sin among the rest, may indeed be held to 
 be mere negation, without any share in positive reality. 
 But, even as negation, evil is a failure to give actual 
 existence to those values which demand realisation ; it 
 is still an incompleteness, an imperfection, in the mani- 
 festation of the moral order : and as such is an obstacle 
 to consistent monism. And if the natural order is not 
 sacrificed to the moral, then the moral order must be 
 sacrificed to it, and morality must be allowed to lapse 
 into naturalism. This was the line taken by Spinoza 
 when he followed out the implications of his point of 
 view as a logical thinker. Good and evil become, in 
 this way, as they became for him\ mere fio-ments of 
 our way of thinking— shadows cast by our desires upon 
 the impenetrable barrier of natural law. To the order 
 of the universe as a whole these conceptions do not 
 belong. The claim of the moral order to a validity 
 independent of human feeling and desire is relinquished. 
 'Ought' and 'value' and 'good' involve distinctions 
 which unfit them as names for a universal objective 
 order. They must be given up when we speak of the 
 whole or of the order which constitutes the whole. 
 Here M's ' is the only word ; and our monistic view no 
 longer pretends to make morality an ultimate con- 
 stituent of reality. 
 
 Of course I am drawing out the consequences in a 
 way Spinoza did not do. But I am saying nothing 
 which is not implied in the statements of one portion 
 
 ^ Ethica, iv, pref. 
 
396 
 
 Monism 
 
 of his Ethics. And we may see a confirmation of the 
 soundness of his logical processes when we observe 
 the fate of monism on the wider field of the history of 
 human and popular creeds. When a pantheistic doctrine 
 has ceased to be a monopoly of the intellectual dlite, and 
 has become common and public property as the creed 
 of a race, it has not, I believe, been accompanied by a 
 specially strong hold on the importance of moral values 
 or the binding obligation of moral law. 
 
 The conclusion, accordingly, is that a monism such 
 as Spinoza's, or any similar doctrine, does not provide 
 the view of reality of which we are in search — a view 
 in which the moral order as well as the natural order 
 will be recognised as valid. And the reason for the 
 failure of the doctrine may be traced back to its denial 
 of any real purpose in the universe. We may therefore 
 look back and ask whether, after all, it may not be 
 possible to interpret the world as purposive and yet to 
 understand it as one, after the manner of the monist. 
 At first sight, at any rate, it does not appear impossible. 
 For it has to be admitted that purpose does enter into 
 the world in the actions of human beings. Why should 
 we limit its operation to them .^ This is not a question 
 of the evidence for its presence elsewhere, but only of 
 the loo-ical conceivability of that presence. Seeing that 
 the One Absolute Reality manifests itself as a tmie- 
 process, why should we say that purpose may appear in 
 one part of the time-process, namely, human activity, 
 but not in any other part of it ? There seems no good 
 reason. And if the notion may be extended to any 
 portion of the time-process, may it not also be applied 
 to the time-process as a whole ? 
 
 The Exclusion of Purpose 397 
 
 How time or change can enter at all into the 
 manifestation of the Absolute Reality is, of course, an 
 unsolved problem ; and as such may be allowed to 
 pass without further remark. But it is a fact that the 
 ''appearance of the whole universe" (to use Spinoza's 
 phrase) as known to us, is in process of change ; and 
 there does not seem to be any graver logical difficulty 
 in conceiving it under the conception of purpose than 
 in conceiving it (as we must) under the conception of 
 change. The fundamental notion in Spinoza's philo- 
 sophy — that of Substance — may be inconsistent with 
 purpose in the sum-total of the modes of Substance, but 
 it is also hard to reconcile with change within this sum- 
 total, or with purpose anywhere in it — both of which 
 he is obliged to admit. And, if we discard Substance 
 as the fundamental notion, and substitute for it the 
 notion of activity or that of subject, the Idea of purpose 
 may appear more in harmony with the general world- 
 view. 
 
 Let us suppose then that the idea of purpose is 
 relevant to the total manifestation of the world. This 
 will obviate the difficulty caused by the lack of harmony 
 between the existing phenomena of the world and the 
 moral order, seeing that the purpose and ultimate issue 
 of these phenomena may be the confirmation of that 
 moral order and its manifestation in the world. The 
 question then remains, is this idea of purpose consistent 
 with the world-view which we are examininof ? What 
 do we mean by purpose '^ In our experience it always 
 involves two things : first, that an idea of the end 
 precedes the activity or attainment, and secondly, that 
 the activity or attainment is determined by the idea. 
 
398 
 
 Monism 
 
 Can these characteristics be vaHd for the relation of 
 the time-process as a whole to its ground or to the 
 Absolute? It is clear that the first cannot. We cannot 
 conceive the time-process as a whole proceeding from 
 an idea— or from anything— that is antecedent to it in 
 time : for that would be to bring its antecedent ground 
 also within the time-process. But this temporal ante- 
 cedence of idea to end or manifestation is not the most 
 important characteristic of purpose ; it is a feature of 
 purpose only in so far as both idea and activity are 
 distinguishable factors within the time-process. The 
 characteristic which is essential, and without which 
 purpose would lose its meaning altogether, is that the 
 idea is the determining condition of the activity or 
 manifestation. To look upon the world as purposive 
 we must therefore postulate an idea of its final issue m 
 the ultimate ground of the world. That is to say, we 
 attribute to the Absolute an idea; and this idea is 
 of the world as in harmony with the moral order, or 
 as manifesting and realising goodness. Hence the 
 dilemma: If we do not interpret the world as pur- 
 posive, our view of it cannot find room for both the 
 natural order and the moral order. If we do interpret 
 it as purposive, we must attribute an idea and a purpose 
 of good to the ground of the world, that is, our theory 
 may still assert the unity of reality; but it recognises 
 mind as fundamental and as working towards an end ; 
 its unity is the unity of the good, and the theory will 
 be an ethical theism. 
 
 With regard to the second idea mentioned as 
 belonging to our conception of the moral order— the 
 
 The Idea of Freedom 399 
 
 idea of freedom — the monistic view of the world does 
 not admit of any doubt. The unity of the world 
 leaves no room for individual freedom. For my view 
 — as I think it does for any view— the question arose, 
 How comes it that the world as manifested, especially 
 in persons and their relations, shows so defective a 
 correspondence between its existing order and what 
 we have recognised as the moral order? How is it 
 that there is so large a mixture of evil with the good 
 in the world ? or indeed that there is any evil at all ? 
 My answer was that goodness is something that can be 
 realised by free beings only: that freedom is a con- 
 dition of the production of good, and that it involves 
 a possible choice of evil : while, on the other hand, the 
 order of the world must be such as to provide a medium 
 not for the activities of perfect beings, but for the train- 
 ing of persons towards the free choice and thus the 
 realisation of goodness. The world must be purposive 
 in order to fashion and confirm the value of human 
 souls ; men must be free in order to attain the highest 
 values. When freedom is shut off from the outset as 
 an impossibility, what is the effect upon our view of 
 morality ? 
 
 How are we to characterise the unfree world ? The 
 question is not really difficult; and yet there is a strange 
 reluctance to face the answer — or perhaps the reluctance 
 is not strange. At any rate almost as much ingenuity 
 has been spent in arguing that the absence of freedom 
 makes no difference, as in proving that freedom cannot 
 possibly be present. Thus we find it argued that, 
 although a man's actions are predetermined, it is his 
 own character that determines them, and that he can 
 
400 
 
 Monism 
 
 change or modify his character. The point is over- 
 looked that it is only by his actions that he can modify 
 his character, and that if these actions are all part of a 
 rigidly determined sequence, the modification of char- 
 acter is as much determined for him as any particular 
 action. The simple truth is that, on the determinist 
 view, both character and action in all cases proceed 
 from two co-operating causes and from no others. 
 These two are heredity and environment. Heredity 
 provides the characteristic disposition of the finite 
 person as it is when his individual life first begins ; 
 everything else results from the way in which the forces 
 of the environment play upon this plastic material. The 
 whole contents of mind and will are the result of the 
 primitive reactions of the individual organism or of 
 the individual mind to external stimuli. Given its initial 
 constitution and given all the circumstances in which 
 it is placed, then the future history of every individual 
 mind could be read like a finished book. Everything 
 is pre-determined from the beginning of the time- 
 process, if it had a beginning, or from eternity, if it 
 had none : a man's choice between good and evil, as 
 much as the fall of a stone or the orbit of a planet. The 
 point is too obvious to need further argument ; it might 
 have been too obvious for statement, were it not for a 
 prevailing unwillingness to admit it — an unwillingness, 
 however, which was not shown by a fearless thinker 
 like Spinoza. The question remains, what bearing the 
 denial of freedom has upon the validity of the moral 
 order and its relation to the causal order of phenomena. 
 In the first place, we must give up the idea that 
 value is in any way connected with personal freedom 
 
 The IVorld of Necessity 40 1 
 
 in its pursuit or attainment. The man who drifts before 
 each gust of passion or breeze of desire is neither less 
 nor more determined than the strong-willed man who 
 bends circumstances to his purpose. The environment 
 actmg upon different kinds of material produces diver- 
 gent results in the two cases by the same process of 
 unernng causal connexions. It is false to say that the 
 one man might have been strong or that the other 
 might have shown himself weak. Neither of them could 
 have been different from what he was ; and the values 
 which their lives showed or failed to show were due to 
 conditions over which there was no personal control 
 Goodness and value generally, must be unconnected 
 with the free effort or the free choice of the selves in 
 whom It may be realised. 
 
 The second point follows from the first. As value 
 does not depend upon personal freedom, the discrepancy 
 between the natural order and the moral order cannot 
 be explained or justified by appealing to the need for a 
 medium which will evoke, test, and confirm the free 
 efforts of individuals and societies to realise value Had 
 the order of the worid been such as to make it easy 
 mstead of difficult to restrain selfish and sensual desire 
 and to cherish only the things that are more excellent 
 the only value that would have been lost is freedom 
 (and that we are assuming not to be a value any more 
 than a reality), and many values would have been 
 gained. A universe without pain or evil, in which 
 there is no discord between desire and satisfaction or 
 between one man and his neighbour, is easy enough to 
 imagine. Spencer has provided us with a picture of an 
 ultimate social state in which everything and everyone 
 
 S. G. L. 
 
 26 
 
402 
 
 MonisiJi 
 
 will be perfectly adapted to everything else, and there 
 will be neither pain nor evil. The spirit of adventure 
 rebels against his complacent ideal of a future in which 
 automatism has supplanted life, as much as it does 
 against the soda-water paradise of Chautauqua satirised 
 by William James ^ But that is because we set store 
 upon the sense of freedom and the values which free- 
 dom alone can bring. And, at any rate, the picture does 
 not represent the world as we know it. Here almost all 
 degrees of value and lack of value are to be found ; the 
 interest lies in the struggle for the increase of values ; 
 and the struggle is supported by the hope of victory for 
 the best. 
 
 The monistic world-view does not deny the existence 
 of the conflict. That would be impossible. But it throws 
 over it an air of futility, of unreality. For the com- 
 batants are but modes of the one real being, blindly 
 imaeinino- themselves to be free, and he that strikes 
 and he that feels the blow are equally modes of the one 
 substance that knows neither discord nor change. For 
 these modes themselves there is no reason to expect 
 that the illusory turmoil in which their lives are spent 
 will lead to a better order of things, or to think that 
 now or in the future the world is or will be more in 
 harmony with the moral order than it was at any pre- 
 vious epoch. Freedom and purpose disappear together; 
 and we must either falsify experience by saying that 
 the existing world is perfect, or confess that the so-called 
 moral order has not a valid place in reality. 
 
 It is this sense of the inadequacy of the world to the 
 
 ^ Talks to Teachers and to Students (1899), p. 269. 
 
 The Religion of Monism 403 
 
 values on which the human mind sets greatest store that 
 has given strength to the mystical tendency found in 
 all the higher representatives of that spiritual form of 
 monism which we call pantheism. And this tendency 
 IS best illustrated by Spinoza himself Discardin^r the 
 imaginative picture of things which suffices for common 
 sense, looking beyond even the rational or scientific 
 view of phenomena in their causal connexions, he seeks 
 mtellectual satisfaction in his vision of the substance of 
 all things, a substance which is One and is by him called 
 God. Whatever happens, he will endeavour to under- 
 stand It as proceeding from one of the infinite attributes 
 of God, and thus understanding it his mind will be 
 filled with an intellectual satisfaction or intellectual 
 love ; and as this love is part of the love ivherewith 
 God loves himself, he will both be, and feel himself to 
 be, one with the infinite whole. Anything whatever— 
 whether we call it good or evil in our experience— can 
 be made contributory to this mystic union. We have 
 only to understand it as proceeding from God, and the 
 understanding moves us to joy and love. 
 
 This attitude, be it noted, is not a moral but a 
 religious attitude. Pantheism has always been much 
 stronger as a religious than as a moral theory. In it 
 everything leads to God, as everything comes from 
 God; the distinctions of our rational consciousness are 
 all submerged in the One Being. Other religions have 
 to proceed by selection. Not all things are equally on 
 the way to the divine life. And in the ethical religions 
 the problem is acute : for the selection has lu be made 
 within the region of human experience: good has to be 
 sifted out from evil, and to be recognised as the line of 
 
404 
 
 Monism 
 
 approach to the knowledge of God and to union with 
 God. The difficulty in them is to vindicate all reality 
 for God — a difficulty which, obviously, cannot arise for 
 the other view. 
 
 Reverence for the moral order may possibly lead 
 the pantheist into the mystic way ; but morality itself 
 is lost on the road. For all things point to the One: all 
 lofty things terminate there ; and there is no path so 
 foul but that, if we understand its essence, it will lead 
 to the same goal. And, when the goal is reached, we 
 are absorbed in a Being beyond good and evil ; and, 
 knowing that all things are in essence one, we may well 
 be indifferent to the claims of one event rather than 
 another in the illusion which we call the world. 
 
 XVI 
 
 PURPOSE 
 
 Monistic theories of the type examined in the last 
 lecture have, as has been already seen, some difficulty 
 to encounter in dealing with the facts described by the 
 terms purpose and freedom. It is hard for them to 
 interpret the world as through and through purposive 
 without at the same time giving a theistic colour to 
 their world-view, and yet it is impossible to deny that 
 purpose is manifested at least by human beings, and is 
 thus a factor in the course of the world as a whole. 
 Freedom is dealt with more ruthlessly. It implies a 
 certain spontaneity and independence on the part of 
 finite minds, and it is therefore dismissed as illusory. 
 With the theistic view, on the other hand, both con- 
 ceptions are closely connected ; for the theistic argu- 
 ment already suggested they are essential postulates ; 
 and it is desirable, before proceeding further, to eluci- 
 date the meaning and justify the use of both. The 
 two conceptions are intimately related to one another ; 
 but we must begin by considering them apart, and 
 purpose will be taken first. 
 
 Purpose is contrasted with mechanism. And yet 
 every machine is purposive. A machine, however, is 
 something constructed by intelligent art ; its purpose 
 lies outside it and is seen in the work which it performs. 
 What it does is a result simply of the structure and 
 
4o6 
 
 Purpose 
 
 relation of its parts and the motor power with which it 
 is suppHed ; and it is called purposive because it has 
 been put together with a view to this performance. 
 The purpose is outside the mechanism. When we 
 speak of certain processes in nature, or of nature as 
 a whole, as mechanical, we are looking upon the pro- 
 cesses as due to these same factors, namely, the struc- 
 ture and relation of the parts of the system and the 
 energy belonging to it ; but in this case we postulate 
 nothing regarding an intelligence, either outside or 
 inside the system, which determines its mode of opera- 
 tion. Given an isolated system of this sort, a knowledge 
 of its constituent factors at any moment, if it were 
 complete enough, wouldenablethe expert mathematician 
 to trace its past history and anticipate each stage of its 
 future condition. If the system is not isolated but 
 played upon by external forces, then knowledge of 
 these forces in addition would enable him to predict 
 the result. A purposive system cannot be described 
 completely in the same terms ; in this case something 
 else has to be taken into account — the end towards 
 which it strives, whether this end be present to that 
 system as a conscious design, as in the case of human 
 and deliberate purposes, or whether we have to gather 
 it from observation of the actual working of living 
 beings. 
 
 The mechanical explanation is attractive both by 
 its simplicity and by its power of describing and anti- 
 cipating events ; and, accordingly, attempts have often 
 been made to extend its application to the vital systems 
 commonly regarded as purposive, and to show that 
 they also, if thoroughly analysed, could be reduced to 
 
 The Mechanical Scheme 
 
 407 
 
 terms of mechanism. By treating consciousness as 
 an epiphenomenon, the same mode of explanation is 
 applied to the whole realm of existing things. As a 
 result we reach a view of reality which is throughout 
 open to mathematical calculation and from which pur- 
 pose is entirely excluded. 
 
 From the point of view of scientific and practical 
 manipulation the great advantages of such a scheme 
 are obvious. It gives a point of view from which the 
 whole may be regarded, and it puts into our hands an 
 instrument by which, if the system of things at any 
 time is known to us, we can tell what it has been or 
 will be at any other time, and can do so without refer- 
 ence to anything outside this system of interacting 
 forces. These advantages, however, are gained only 
 at a price. Strictly taken, the mechanical system is a 
 purely abstract system, and it deals with entities such 
 as mass-points which are not known to exist, but are 
 concepts formed in the interests of its descriptive 
 scheme. The scheme fits the existing universe so far, 
 but only so far. It provides an abstract formula to 
 which actual movements within the world are found to 
 conform within limits; it expresses quantitative aspects 
 only, and ignores the qualitative differences of things. 
 Now in the actual world, as experienced, different 
 things react differently to the same impressed force. 
 From the time of the Greek atomists many attempts 
 have been made to reduce these qualitative differences 
 to differences of quantity — to varying combinations of 
 elements all qualitatively alike. In making these 
 attempts, a new subsidiary hypothesis is added to a 
 construction already hypothetical ; and the attempted 
 
4o8 
 
 Purpose 
 
 reduction has always remained hypothetical. It has 
 been used for the purpose of a highly abstract theory 
 only. The chemist, for example, does not depend 
 upon it ; he is content to assume a large number of 
 distinct elements whose quantitative relations do not 
 exhaust their qualitative differences. 
 
 Thus it comes about that the term mechanical or 
 mechanistic is sometimes used to denominate some- 
 thing much less abstract than strict mechanism. It 
 is applied not merely to the description of the move- 
 ments of mass-points (or other hypothetical entities of 
 mechanics), but to the description of the behaviour of 
 the actual bodies or substances known to the physicist 
 and chemist. The mechanical or mechanistic theory 
 of life, for instance, does not profess to give an account 
 of vital processes in terms of pure mechanism. It 
 assumes the actual substances dealt with by the experi- 
 mental physicist and the chemist. It is a physico- 
 chemical and not a purely mechanical theory. It is 
 important to notice this change of meaning, as it brings 
 out both the abstract character of the mechanical 
 scheme and the limits to the power of calculation which 
 are introduced by the admission of quality. If two 
 forces meet at a point and their magnitude velocity and 
 direction are known, then the magnitude velocity and 
 direction of the resultant force can be calculated exactly. 
 But no amount of calculation, apart from direct experi- 
 ence, would enable a chemist to predict that the 
 synthesis of Ho with O would produce a substance 
 which would act as water acts. He must have had 
 previous knowledge of water and its properties, and 
 he must assume the logical postulate of the uniformity 
 
 Calculation and Prediction 400 
 
 of nature. Experimental tests, however, bring out 
 certain definite quantitative relations between the 
 elements and the compound, and they tend to confirm 
 the law of the conservation of energy. Thus mechani- 
 cal principles are not set aside by the result of the 
 experiment ; but they do not account for it or even 
 describe it completely. 
 
 Mechanism, strictly taken, has nothing to do with 
 the efficient causation assumed in the experimental 
 sciences. It is an a priori scheme, and it enables us 
 to predict consequences independently of experience. 
 But in the realm of efficient causes we are unable to pre- 
 dict effects unless we have had previous experience of 
 like causes and their effects. Hume was quite right 
 when he said that - if we reason a priori, anything 
 may appear able to produce anything. The falling of 
 a pebble may, for aught we know, extinguish the sun, 
 or the wish of a man control the planets in their 
 orbits \" It is only through experience that we learn 
 or can learn the tendency of one physical fact to be 
 followed by some other physical fact of a definite 
 nature. A priori or mathematical reasoning is power- 
 less to predict the nature of the effect. 
 
 The advantage of the mechanical theory lies in its 
 power of calculation and prediction ; but this power is 
 limited to the quantitative aspects of phenomena and ^ 
 does not extend to their qualities. Predictive power in 
 the latter respect does belong to the natural sciences, 
 but it is derived not from the logic of mechanics but 
 from experience, and depends both on the postulate of 
 
 ^ Enqui7y coficernm^ Human Understanding, sect, xii, part 3, ed. 
 Selby-Bigge, p. 164 ; Essays, ed. Green and Grose, vol. n, p. 135. 
 
4IO 
 
 Purpose 
 
 uniformity and also on the actual degree of similarity 
 which exists between past experience and present and 
 future experience. The so-called mechanical theory of 
 life is mechanical only in its quantitative aspects ; as 
 regards the qualitative aspect of vital phenomena, it is 
 empirical, as indeed physics and chemistry are. It is 
 only in a wider and somewhat loose sense that the 
 theory is called mechanical or (perhaps better) mecha- 
 nistic. 
 
 Even in this wider sense of the term, the mechanistic 
 theory encounters a new difficulty when applied to the 
 facts of life. It is not that any fundamental principles of 
 mechanism, or the axiom of the conservation of energy, 
 cease to be valid. There is no sufficient evidence 
 for the destruction or creation of energy in an organic 
 system any more than in an inorganic system. Nor is 
 the difference due to our inability to predict, except on 
 empirical grounds, the nature of the effect which a 
 given combination of factors will produce. It is true 
 that the nature of life could not be predicted by a 
 chemist from his knowledge of the elements combined 
 in protoplasm, but neither could the nature of water 
 have been predicted from a knowledge of the proper- 
 ties of hydrogen and of oxygen. The new difficulty lies 
 in the peculiarity of the behaviour of the living or- 
 ganism. Both the cell and the living body which con- 
 sists of many cells build up, maintain, and reproduce a 
 certain system, and do so by assimilating material from 
 their environment and by rejecting waste products. 
 The living system persists throughout the gradual 
 change of any or all of the material particles which 
 constitute it, and the characteristic activities by which 
 
 Vital Activities 
 
 411 
 
 it achieves this result can be understood only if we 
 look upon them as directed to this end. The biologist 
 —however mechanistic his theory may be— can never 
 dispense with this reference to an end in his descrip- 
 tions. He constandy employs a concept which is 
 irrelevant in physical and chemical descriptions. The 
 distinctive character of vital phenomena is brought out 
 by the familiar truth that, in spite of age-long^'efforts 
 in the laboratory, life proceeds only from life. A living 
 body or a living cell may be deprived of this peculia"^ 
 property we call life ; but the life once gone cannot be 
 restored out of the constituents. 
 
 As before, therefore, mechanism in the strict sense 
 IS limited here to the assertions regarding the quantities 
 of matter and of energy in the organic system. It is 
 verified by observations which go to show that the 
 organism cannot expend energy which it does not 
 possess. It says nothing as to the mode in which the 
 organic activities will be exercised. In the wider 
 meaning of mechanism, which includes physico-chemi- 
 cal concepts, further prediction is possible regarding 
 the material constituents of the organism and their 
 behaviour. The new fact, which distinguishes life and 
 which physico-chemical concepts do not describe, is the 
 direction of this behaviour towards the maintenance 
 and development of the vital system. Vital activities 
 are intelligible when viewed under this concept ; they 
 are not intelligible without it. Vital activities may 
 indeed be predicted by the observer, as chemical re- 
 actions may be predicted ; but in predicting them one 
 has to regard more than antecedent phenomena ; the 
 point of view is not that of efficient causation only. 
 
412 
 
 Purpose 
 
 One has to take account of the vital system which they 
 subserve and which they have to estabHsh and main- 
 tain. They are understood only by means of the con- 
 cept of end or purpose. 
 
 When we pass from the merely biological level to 
 that of the actions of conscious and intelligent beings, 
 a further fact meets us — not merely the end achieved, 
 but the idea of the end as it is present in consciousness. 
 The end is not merely a result towards which the 
 various reactions of the organism concentrate ; it is 
 the fulfilment of a purpose already present in the con- 
 sciousness of the subject. Here the sequence of events 
 is one step further removed from capability of being 
 adequately described in terms either of mechanism 
 proper or of physical causation. Mechanism applies 
 as before ; it can equate the energy in the consequent 
 with the energy in the antecedent ; but it goes no 
 further in enabling us to predict the mode or direction 
 of the conscious organism's behaviour. In conscious as 
 in other vital activities we must look to the end in 
 order to understand them ; and in the organisms which 
 are conscious, unlike other organisms, the activity may 
 be the realisation of an idea or purpose which as a 
 mental fact preceded and anticipated the result. Now, 
 this result cannot be predicted by the observer either 
 by application of physico-chemical generalisations, or on 
 the ground of a tendency to establish and maintain the 
 biological system. So far as prediction is possible, it 
 depends upon knowledge of the individual's mental or 
 subjective system — of his disposition, ruling ideas, and 
 dominant desires — a system which cannot be disclosed 
 by the instruments of the natural sciences. 
 
 The Ideal System 4 1 3 
 
 There is no need to enter here upon the efforts to 
 minimise the importance of this ideal system by treating 
 it either as an epiphenomenon— a mere otiose accom""- 
 paniment of neural changes— or as a series which 
 runs parallel with material changes. These speculative 
 hypotheses, even if better established, would not alter 
 the fact that in this region the ability to describe and 
 to predict fails the mechanical theory almost completely 
 —whether we take the mechanical theory in its stricter 
 or in its wider meaning. And it was only in virtue of 
 its ability to describe and to predict that the mechanical 
 theory claimed acceptance. As a theory of reality, 
 therefore— as a point of view for understanding the 
 world— it proves itself inadequate; and it loses nothing 
 of its real value by being confined to the quantitative 
 aspects of physical change, which are its own domain 
 and mark its proper limits. 
 
 The term purpose has been used in describing the 
 actions of a system when they cannot be understood 
 through their antecedents alone, and without reference 
 to the end which they tend to bring about. Activity of 
 this kind is exhibited by all living beings : the normal 
 vital processes tend to the maintenance and perpetua- 
 tion of the organism and cannot be understood without 
 regard to this end. The end in all cases seems to be 
 the object to the attainment of which the activity is 
 directed; but the mode of operation varies conspi- 
 cuously according as it is or is not accompanied by a 
 consciousness of the direction or the end. The vital 
 processes of the plant and the deliberate plans of man 
 are alike purposive; but in the former we have no 
 
414 
 
 Purpose 
 
 evidence of the presence of an Idea guiding the series 
 of movements which takes place, whereas in our own 
 experience we have an immediate consciousness of such 
 an idea These are therefore different types of process, 
 both of them purposive. It is possible to regard each 
 of them as valid for a different region of facts. It is 
 also possible, however, to regard one of them as more 
 fundamental than the other, so that the latter may be 
 reducible to or in some way accounted for by means of 
 the former ; and in this case the question which of the 
 two is fundamental will become the question w^hether 
 we are to explain the movement of things by con- 
 sciousness or by the unconscious. 
 
 The two views have certain points in common. 
 In both cases the mode of explanation is opposed to 
 the mechanical. In the mechanical theory, and in the 
 view of efficient causation also, the present and future 
 are explained solely by the past. In so far as action is 
 purposive, it cannot be explained without reference to 
 the future ; there may be no idea of what is about to 
 be in the subject whose activity is under investigation, 
 but there must be such an idea present in the mind of 
 the investigator ; his explanation involves it ; it is 
 through the future as well as the past that he under- 
 stands the present. The wider the system of things 
 which he conceives under the idea of purpose, the 
 more does he tend to bring the temporal process into 
 a unity in which past, present, and future are interrelated. 
 On the other hand, in mechanism and efficient causa- 
 tion, the explanation of each stage is sought simply in 
 its antecedent; and this antecedent depends in the 
 same way on a previous stage, and so on indefinitely. 
 
 An Inner Impulse 415 
 
 The mode of explanation is thus committed to an 
 mdefinite regress, unless it can establish a circular pro- 
 cess ; and the mechanical law of the degradation of 
 energy forbids this, for it shows the impossibility of 
 the recurrence of the same condition, apart from inter- 
 ference from without the system. On the other hand, 
 the attainment of purpose gives a certain unity to the 
 whole series of movements In time which co-operate 
 towards that attainment : the end is the realisation of 
 something somehow present from the beginning. 
 
 Further, it appears that this unity of the whole' 
 process is, in every organism, due to an internal source 
 —to the purpose, as we call It, which conceives the 
 end or at least directs action towards its attainment. 
 And this brings out another point in which unconscious 
 and conscious purpose agree and which distinguishes 
 them from mechanical and Inorganic movements. The 
 re-action of inorganic material to an external force 
 varies according to Its physical and chemical constitu- 
 tion; but In the case of an organism there Is something 
 more than this. The impressed force is a stimulus or 
 occasion for the release of an internal Impulse towards 
 maintaining the system or (as It may be with conscious 
 beings) the Ideal of Its life. The impulse has an Inner 
 origin, and, although surrounded by external forces, It 
 does not Itself admit of spatial determination. 
 
 Vital activity, however conceived, thus differs from 
 inorganic movements. But behind the similarities 
 which distinguish all Its forms, there lies the profound 
 difference marked by the presence or absence of con- 
 sciousness of the end. Of conscious purpose we have 
 immediate experience ; unconscious purpose is a con- 
 
4i6 
 
 Purpose 
 
 cept inferred from the mode of operation of other 
 organisms which display evidence of working towards 
 an end, but do not display any evidence of possessing 
 an idea of that end. It is therefore difficult to form a 
 clear concept of the nature of the latter process. It is 
 defined negatively — by the absence of the idea which 
 is always present in purpose as experienced. And it is 
 conceived as an intermediate stage between two better 
 known extremes. We can understand mechanism owine 
 to the simplicity of the ideas involved ; we have im- 
 mediate acquaintance with conscious purpose. Between 
 the two lies something hypothetical or at best obscure : 
 the purposive process which defies explanation as a 
 form of physical causation, but lacks a factor essential 
 to purpose as directly known. 
 
 Nevertheless, unconscious purpose has been taken 
 as fundamental in the explanation of the process in 
 the world, intelligence being given a subordinate and 
 dependent role. This view is one aspect of the anti- 
 intellectualist movement in philosophy that began with 
 Schopenhauer and finds its most distinguished present 
 exponent in M. Bergson. According to Schopenhauer, 
 will is the thing-in-itself, the reality which underlies 
 efficient causation' and for which the accompaniment 
 of intelligence is unessential". Similarly, M. Bergson 
 holds to the fundamental reality of a vital impetus, 
 which operates independently of any ideal factor. The 
 fact is differently named ; but what is in view seems in 
 both cases to be essentially the same as what I have 
 called purpose, when that term is not taken as implying 
 
 ' Die Welt als Wilh und Vorstellung, § 23. 
 - Ibid., § 19. 
 
 Purpose and Idea 4 1 n 
 
 consciousness. And the term may be retained. It is 
 also held by Schopenhauer and by Bergson that will 
 or vital mipulse is known intuitively and in a different 
 way from ordinary objects. Whatever is object, says 
 Schopenhauer, is thereby appearance not thing-in-itself- 
 and similarly M. Bergson thinks that our understand- 
 ing, owmg to the concepts with which it works, perverts 
 the true nature of reality, which intuition alone can 
 grasp. Difficulties are thus thrown in the way of 
 getting a clear view of this reality, for even our funda- 
 mental intuitions can only be expressed in terms which 
 are intellectual; and indeed conceptual descriptions 
 are not avoided by the writers who hold them to be 
 misleading. 
 
 In almost every region of life we can observe pro- 
 cesses which fulfil a purpose without there being any 
 evidence of the presence of an idea of the purpose ful- 
 filled. The growth of the plant, the working of animal 
 instinct, the normal vital processes of the human 
 organism, imply no volition, no idea even, of the end 
 as when the heart beats or food is digested ; the more 
 normal the process is, the less is its operation accom- 
 panied by any consciousness of it ; an idea of its end 
 or purpose is only superadded by reflexion. Further 
 in the world of mind and society we find results 
 achieved, institutions established, modes of conduct 
 and even of belief built up, without any of the minds 
 to whom they may be traced having had any clear 
 Idea of the end to which their efforts were tending 
 1 hus there would sdem to be no lack of facts which 
 may be pointed to in support of the view that uncon- 
 scious purpose is the power-or a power-which is 
 
 S. G. L. 
 
 27 
 
t 
 
 418 
 
 Purpose 
 
 driving on the world to an end which none can fore- 
 see. But a question remains concerning the interpreta- 
 tion of these facts. What is meant by speaking of the 
 process as a purpose although unconscious? It is not 
 easy to answer the question ; it is not often put ; and 
 different possible answers to it are often confused. 
 
 In the first place, the process may be regarded as 
 mere aimless striving — movements internally deter- 
 mined but pointing nowhere in particular. It would be 
 absurd to call this purpose, but it might be included 
 under the more elastic term 'will' as used by Scho- 
 penhauer, or the still more general term da7i vital. 
 Or, in the second place, the striving, though without 
 a definite aim, may be a tendency away from some- 
 thing that is definite — namely, the existing condition 
 felt as defective or unpleasant — and may issue in 
 random movements to escape the disagreeable pre- 
 sent. In both these kinds of process we cannot trace 
 any intrinsic tendency to a fuller or better or any other 
 definite- state of being. They are of the nature of 
 impulse, but we seek in vain in them for any charac- 
 teristic which would justify our description of them as 
 purposive. If, nevertheless, we find that such processes 
 do achieve a serviceable end oftener than ' can be 
 accounted for by chance, we must ascribe the direction 
 of the movements to the influence of external forces, 
 and if we do not attribute purpose to these external 
 forces, then the general character of the conception 
 will be mechanistic. 
 
 • A view of this sort derives support from the 
 Darwinian doctrine. For the operation of natural 
 selection will cut oft" those organisms which react to 
 
 Immanent M/ili ^jq 
 
 the environment in a way which does not suit the 
 conditions, and will leave to flourish and propagate 
 only those which chance to be so constituted as to 
 react in a serviceable manner. What the exact limits 
 of natural selection are is a question for biological 
 enquiry. But it has always one condition ; it postulates 
 an organic tendency to maintain and perpetuate life 
 Acting upon this tendency, the primitive impulses may 
 be turned in various difl^erent directions and lead to 
 modified structure ; but natural selection only begins 
 to operate when life with its characteristic selective 
 activities is already present. 
 
 If we admit these we have to adopt a corresponding 
 view even of primitive impulse : it is selective ; it 
 tends in one direction rather than another : it seeks an 
 end even although, neither in the organism nor outside 
 It IS there any idea of that end. This may be taken as 
 the view of unconscious purpose, or immanent will as 
 the determining force of the world's progress, which 
 has now in many quarters almost attained the rank of 
 a popular creed. But it is hard to understand. There 
 must be some ground or reason determining the life- 
 impulse to take one direction rather than another It 
 cannot be indifferent to its route, for then its course 
 would have to be determined externally, and we should 
 be back in the mechanical synopsis. What can the 
 .nternal ground be > To call it .self-preservation with 
 -the Stoics and Hobbes and Spinoza is not an explana- 
 tion ; and ,s besides inadequate, for it fails to account 
 for growth and development. Life never stands still ; 
 the life-force seeks an expression which cannot be 
 described by the status quo. Function, in other words. 
 
 27 — 2 
 
420 Purpose 
 
 does not depend simply upon the structure of the 
 organism ; the structure is the mechanism which the 
 life-force has made for itself in interaction with its 
 environment, and which becomes the instrument of 
 its activity and at the same time imposes limits 
 
 upon it. 
 
 How are we to describe that force, impulse, or will 
 which fills the world with its myriad forms ? Can we 
 identify its unconscious purpose with the direction 
 that it has taken ? To do so would be to ignore the 
 influence of the environment which, operating through 
 the process of natural selection, digs the channels 
 along which the river of life must flow and blocks its 
 course in other directions. The line of historical 
 development cannot be identified with the innate direc- 
 tion of the life-force. It is always a resultant of two 
 things — life and environment— and only in their syn- 
 thesis can an explanation of the result be found. Yet, 
 according to the view of the process now under con- 
 sideration, the unconscious will has some direction — 
 a determination towards life of one kind rather than 
 another. Whatever this direction may be, we do not 
 get a sufficient indication of it in the organisms which 
 are unconscious of it and do not show it in their struc- 
 ture. We may suppose that the tendency is towards 
 consciousness or idea. This is the supposition that has 
 been made by most exponents of the 'immanent will.' 
 But how are we to understand an unconscious deter- 
 mination towards consciousness ? It must be internal, 
 something belonging not to structure but to life. There 
 must therefore be some feature in the nature of life 
 itself which gives it this trend to consciousness. If we 
 
 Influence of the E?wironment 42 1 
 
 could interpret this feature by the old doctrine of 
 evolution— the unfolding of a nature already present 
 — then we should be able and obliged to say that 
 consciousness was already present in the primitive 
 organism, but only in a minor degree : every monad, 
 as Leibniz imagined, would have perceptive activity, 
 which gradually develops into the clear light of self- 
 consciousness. But if our view of evolution requires 
 us to acknowledge a discriminating influence on the 
 part of the environment and a capacity in the organism 
 to learn by experience through contact with the environ- 
 ment, we may yet be unable to distinguish the share 
 of each factor in the process, and thus we may have no 
 means at all for determining the nature of that trend 
 to fuller life which we describe as the immanent purpose 
 of the living being. In this latter case,. and in view of 
 the myriad lines of development which diverge from 
 the primal path of life, we shall probably be induced to 
 appeal to the environment for the explanation of the 
 preference of one line to another — of that which issues 
 in consciousness to that which terminates in vegeta- 
 tion. And in so doing we shall fall back on a quasi- 
 mechanical explanation of purpose itself. 
 
 The purpose of which alone we have immediate 
 experience arises in our own minds and is carried out 
 by our own actions. Evolutionary science is able to 
 trace, at any rate in broad outline, the successive steps 
 by which action of this sort has emerged from the 
 midst of vital processes in which there is no clear 
 evidence for the presence of consciousness, and these 
 again from processes which are, in the wider sense of 
 
422 
 
 Purpose 
 
 the term, mechanistic (that is, physico-chemical). It 
 cannot assert that the factors operative in the later 
 stage were present in the earlier, and it is not able to 
 show that they are due to some complexity in the 
 organisation of the more primitive factors, brought 
 about in the course of time. However firmly the 
 causal connectedness of successive stages may be 
 maintained by those who trace the historical process, it 
 has to be admitted that no plausible account has yet 
 been given of the causal transition from physico- 
 chemism to life, or from merely vital process to con- 
 sciousness. Two interpretations of the facts remain 
 possible : that which holds that the transition will yet 
 be made clear and will be seen to be due simply to the 
 growing complexity of physical and chemical processes 
 from which first life and afterwards consciousness arise ; 
 and, on the other hand, the view that the earlier stao^es 
 of cosmic development have not been fully stated by 
 the physicist and chemist, and that, hidden from their 
 analysis, life and mind have somehow been present 
 from the first. Between these two views the theory of 
 an unconscious purpose or immanent w^ill attempts to 
 mediate, and like many mediating theories it is beset 
 by the difficulties of both the views between which it 
 occupies an uncertain position. Like the mechanical 
 theory it has to face the most awkward of all problems, 
 the transition from the unconscious to consciousness ; 
 and it shares with the opposed view the assumption of 
 an internal factor of whose operation there is no direct 
 evidence in the early periods of cosmic history. 
 
 If we are content with a knowledge of parts or 
 factors only, then we may be satisfied with the distinc- 
 
 CoHscious Purpose 423 
 
 tion of material processes, of life, and of mind. In the 
 first there is no trace of the second or third, and in 
 plant life there is no evidence of mind, while on the 
 other hand, life is not due to chemical synthesis nori 
 consciousness to the development of merely vital pro- ' 
 cesses. But, if we seek a point of view from which we 
 may interpret the world as a whole, these different 
 forms of cosmic movement cannot be left in isolation. . 
 We have seen the inadequacy of the physico-chemical 
 and merely vitalistic conceptions to describe one part 
 of the world, namely, man's part in it. Is it possible 
 that the conception of purpose — no longer described as 
 unconscious— may have a wider application than to his 
 activity and be descriptive of the process of the whole .^ 
 Conscious purpose is known to us directly only as 
 / it exists in the mind of man ; and it is found there in 
 varying degrees and always in company with tenden- 
 cies which we hesitate to describe by the same term. 
 It is at its clearest when the idea of a future good 
 is connected with a definite plan for its attainment and 
 then realised in action ; but it is also present in the 
 vaguer regions of endeavour, when we seek something 
 less clearly defined or feel ourselves drawn to a course 
 of action whose value we recognise but dimly, looking 
 to future experience to reveal more fully both the way 
 to the end and the mode in which our nature will find 
 satisfaction in it. These vaguer impulses are not sepa- 
 rated from conscious life, though consciousness hardly 
 penetrates to their further issues, but thev mav function 
 without a clear idea of the end they subserve, almost in 
 the way in which the instincts work which protect and 
 preserve our organic life. 
 
424 
 
 Purpose 
 
 The close connexion of ideal or purposeful action 
 with merely impulsive action has been regarded as 
 supporting the view that the former is an effect of the 
 latter. It is supposed that certain impulses lead to a 
 result which is felt as favourable, that the idea of 
 pleasure or of success is in consequence associated 
 with them, and that, after repeated associations, the 
 idea of the pleasurable or favourable result revives that 
 train of conative tendencies which had been found in 
 the past to lead to a successful issue. In this associa- 
 tive sequence, the intelligent process, which forms an 
 idea of the end, is united to the conative process in a 
 purely external way ; and this is one way in which the 
 facts have been explained. But, even within the limits 
 of the individual mind, there is another way in which 
 impulse and idea are connected. The search for objects, 
 conceived and prompted by ideas, leads to increased 
 facility in the movement of the conative processes 
 until habit takes the place of deliberate planning. 
 Habitual activity recalls and expresses the stored-up 
 results of previous deliberate and purposeful actions. 
 In itself, regarded as an isolated process at any time, 
 it is a merely impulsive action leading to an e;id with- 
 out prior consciousness of that end. But, if we take a 
 longer view, we see it as the result of previous con- 
 scious actions in which the end was deliberately pur- 
 sued. The significance of this process is that in it we 
 find not the evolution of conscious purpose from mere 
 impulse or from the unconscious, but a development in 
 the opposite direction by which conscious purposes 
 pass into habit and impulse and use these as a mecha- 
 nism which relieves the mind from attention to many 
 
 Organic Memory 425 
 
 of the detailed needs of life and sets its independent 
 activities free for further ends. 
 
 In the region of instinct, we find a highly complex 
 organisation of impulses, related to different stimuli, 
 and adapted to the needs of individual and racial life.' 
 By a mode of explanation similar to the above, it is 
 possible to regard the instincts also as examples of 
 organic memory, in which are accumulated the results 
 of countless experiments in living on the part of the 
 far-away ancestors of the present generation. Many 
 varying degrees of intelligence may have prompted 
 these experiments, but perhaps all of them may be 
 regarded as selective processes, strivings towards an 
 object of desire or for the satisfaction of a felt want. 
 They leave their record in the racial structure, as 
 individual functioning is recorded in the habits of the 
 individual ; and the double record has its part to play 
 in the conative activity of the individual— as instinct 
 and as habit. 
 
 The tentative efforts of organic and conscious life ' 
 are, however, in all cases, limited and modified by the 
 mfluence of the environment which impedes action in 
 one direction and favours it in another. The purposive 
 activity exhibited by the organism is thus part of a 
 larger process which includes all individual lives within 
 It. Further, in the lower reaches of organic and sub- 
 conscious life, it is often difticult to determine exactly 
 the limits of the individual organism and to distinguish 
 It from a society of organisms. Merely vital indivi- 
 duality is not so well-marked as conscious individuality, 
 and the centre or source of purposive process in it is 
 sometimes uncertain. Even the line which separates 
 
426 
 
 Purpose 
 
 the organic from the inorganic purpose, which we have 
 been looking for in the individual centre, becomes 
 obscure. 
 
 One interpretation of these facts is that they show 
 the gradual disappearance of purpose as we descend in 
 the scale of being ; and it is certainly true that purpose 
 becomes more difficult to localise. And there are other 
 facts which make us hesitate to take the finite centre 
 of individual life as the only source of purpose. In 
 man, where it is clearest and most conscious, there are 
 also, as we have seen, many traces of an underlying 
 purpose in his activity which, being due to the behaviour 
 of past individuals, indicate a racial rather than an 
 individual purpose. And, in the interaction of life with 
 its environment, we cannot overlook the mass of facts 
 which point in the direction of adaptation. These have, 
 it is true, been overworked by so many generations of 
 enquirers in the search for marks of design that we are 
 now apt to pass them all by with a reference to natural 
 selection. At one point, however, the operation of 
 natural selection must stop short, and that is the point 
 before which life begins. Natural selection could not 
 favour the transition from the inorganic to the organic, 
 for it always presupposes vital processes in order that 
 it may work at all. If purpose be admitted as neces- 
 sary for the interpretation of organisms, and if orga- 
 nisms are held to have arisen out of inorganic material, 
 then there is good reason to postulate that the process 
 which led to organic and purposive life was itself 
 animated by purpose. And the via media of uncon- 
 scious purpose becomes more difficult than ever to 
 accept when it is applied to inorganic arrangements 
 
 Universal Purpose 427 
 
 and movements. The purpose which we are driven to 
 postulate in this case cannot be individual, and it cannot 
 be merely racial ; it must be universal. There is not 
 any longer an excuse for interpreting it after the 
 fashion of impulse, for impulse belongs only to living 
 bemgs witii an individual spontaneity. We can con"'- 
 ceive the universal purpose as acting only in the 
 manner of mind or consciousness. On this view, the 
 world as a whole will be regarded as animated by a 
 universal conscious purpose, which is expressed not 
 only in its arrangement and laws but also in the finite 
 purposes, conscious and unconscious, displaved by 
 mdividual living beings. This view, however! is not 
 put forward as a doctrine which can be rigidly demon- 
 strated. It is part of that more comprehensive synopsis 
 according to which we have been trying to understand 
 the world as instrumental towards the realisation of 
 values. 
 
 It is not altogether a smooth and easy way that leads 
 to the conclusion ; and the facts of dysteleology must be 
 regardedas the chief stumbling-blockonthe road. These 
 too may be said to show purpose ; but they also prove 
 that the purposes included within the universe are neither 
 entirely good nor entirely harmonious. Purpo.se is not 
 an adequate conception for the unification of experi- 
 ence until we know its end. It depends for its nature 
 as well as for its value on the interests which it sub- 
 Serves ; and these interests may vary and conflict in 
 different purposive centres. In the will of man and its 
 interests we have the clearest indications of this varia- 
 tion and conflict. From his consciousness also we 
 derive the conviction that the conflict can be reconciled 
 

 428 
 
 Purpose 
 
 only by the unity of different Interests in the harmonyi 
 of the good ; and that this harmony can be established 
 only gradually and by free activity. Freedom will 
 explain the divergence and conflict of purposes, and 
 also their slowly progressive moralisation ; and to 
 establish this harmony of goodness through the freedom 
 of man, an environment of ideal perfection would have 
 been unsuitable. This point has been already argued. 
 That even it accounts for the details of evil in the 
 world I do not pretend. Our knowledge of the details 
 and their issue is not adequate enough to establish such 
 a conclusion. Besides, there may be other purposes in 
 the world than that which concerns ourselves and lies 
 open to our own reflexion. Whether those purposes 
 imply or require something analogous to our freedom 
 in other portions of the universe than finite conscious 
 lives is a matter of speculation on which I do not 
 enter. 
 
 FREEDOM 
 
 The view set forth in these lectures implies that the 
 world as it appears in space and time is a purposive 
 system ; and of that postulate a defence has been offered 
 m the last lecture. But finite minds have each their own 
 purposes ; and the argument requires further that, in 
 forming and carrying out these purposes, they have a 
 certain spontaneity or freedom; and to this postulate 
 consideration must now be given. 
 
 The question of freedom is part of the question as to 
 the way in which we are to interpret the unity of reality. 
 To affirm freedom for finite persons is to limit the psy- 
 chical unity of the universe and to give a meaning to 
 its causal connectedness which is perhaps not the most 
 obvious meaning. Consequently, the assertion has been 
 always met with severe and even impatient criticism 
 both from monistic philosophers, whether they are in- 
 clined to materiah'sm or to idealism, and from numbers 
 of men of science who are anxious to do something in 
 defence of the law of universal causation. 
 
 We have already seen how the idea of freedom is 
 'dealt with in the monistic scheme. It is ruled out of 
 court at once as an interference with the unity of the 
 whole. The same scheme, as we have found, either 
 explains moral values as mere entia rationis or else is 
 led into a mystical attitude for which acquiescence in 
 
430 
 
 Freedom 
 
 the actual, whether called good or evil, becomes the 
 highest good. One or other of these conclusions we 
 should be obliged to adopt if the scheme itself were 
 well-grounded. It is unnecessary to repeat the criticism 
 of its grounds. And, if we admit the independent vali- 
 dity of the moral order, and its relation to the natural 
 order, then in that relation we shall find the significance 
 of individual freedom — if individual freedom is truly a 
 factor in the universe. 
 
 But to assert personal freedom as a factor in the 
 universal order brings us at once in face of the causal 
 law — a law which claims universal validity. In modern 
 controversy it is the causation-argument that has always 
 been the chief support of determinism. How can man 
 have any freedom in volition if each event follows in a 
 determinate manner from antecedent events? Causal 
 determinateness seems to leave no loop-hole for that 
 possibility of opposites with which human volition is 
 credited. This view has often been regarded as self- 
 evident; but before we accept it, it is well to be clear 
 as to the meaning of the principle of causation itself. . 
 
 The first and most general statement of the causal 
 law is that every event is the effect of something else 
 which we call its cause. Nothing is said here as to the 
 nature either of the cause or of the effect; it is merely 
 a heuristic principle which leads us to enquire into the 
 causal connexions of particular sets of phenomena. The 
 principle itself says nothing as to the nature of the 
 things connected. So far as it goes, the falling of a 
 pebble might extinguish the sun or the wish of a man 
 control the planets in their orbits. With this principle, 
 therefore, personal freedom is not inconsistent ; for the 
 
 Freedom and Causation 43 1 
 
 freedom asserted is that of the self to act as a cause, 
 not of anything to happen without a cause. 
 
 A second meaning of the causal principle was for- 
 mulated by Mill out of Hume's criticism. In it the 
 implication of power or efficiency which was commonly 
 associated with the first view is dropped, and the idea 
 of uniformity takes its place. The law may therefore 
 be stated in the form that the same antecedents are 
 followed by the same consequents : a cause is simply 
 an invariable or constant antecedent. This is still, 
 perhaps, the most common view of cause. But it names 
 something the presence of which in the world cannot 
 be verified. There are no invariable or constant ante- 
 cedents in nature ; the cosmic process never repeats 
 Itself. An exact statement of the law, applicable to the 
 actual order, would therefore have to take some modi- 
 fied form, such as this: so far as the antecedents are 
 the same, the consequents will be the same; or, more 
 precisely, any difference between two sets of conse- 
 quents must be accounted for (or preceded by) a 
 corresponding difference in their respective antecedents 
 If one sequence is a. b. and another a, /?, then the dif- 
 ference of /? from b is explained by a difference of a 
 from a. 
 
 Here we have what seems to be a clear statement, 
 and yet in one respect it is lacking in precision. The 
 consequents in any one sequence are always different 
 from the consequents in any other sequence. Even in 
 the experiments of the laboratory there is only an 
 approximation to complete similarity. So are the ante- 
 cedents always different. It is therefore only a state- 
 ment of the constant process of change in the world 
 
432 
 
 Freedom 
 
 to say that along with the difference in consequents 
 there is a difference in antecedents. And to describe 
 the difference in the latter as corresponding with that 
 in the former is to use a vague term which stands in 
 need of further definition. It is possible to give some 
 further definition such as is needed by a description 
 of the qualities exhibited by antecedents and conse- 
 quents respectively. But this qualitative description is 
 always lacking in exactness. Complete precision can 
 be got only by a quantitative expression, and that is 
 supplied by the law of conservation of energy, which 
 will enable us to orive a new statement to the causal 
 law, such as the following: In every sequence, so far 
 as the system under investigation does not receive 
 energy from, or part with it to, an outside system, the 
 quantity of energy in the consequent is the same as 
 the quantity of energy in the antecedent. Thus a third 
 point of view is reached from which the causal law 
 may be formulated, and here it receives a precise form, 
 in which it may be applied in scientific investigations. 
 When it is arofued that the doctrine of freedom is 
 inconsistent with the causal principle, the arguments 
 sometimes proceed on the second and sometimes on the 
 third way of regarding that principle. And it is when 
 the principle is conceived in the latter and exact form 
 that the argument can be brought home most distinctly. 
 Now, volition is manifested frequently, if not always, 
 by bodily movement; and if volition can be interpreted 
 as the free act of a self, then this freely-determined 
 action has an effect on the material world. And it is 
 here that the determinist intervenes with his objection. 
 The objection is shortly as follows: In reflex action it 
 
 Mental Causation 430 
 
 is admitted that the physical .stimulus gives ri.se to a 
 neural process, then to a redistribution of eneray in 
 some nerve centre, and thereafter through the efferent 
 nerves to muscular contraction and bodily movement 
 It IS admitted that the whole process from stimulus to 
 movement is on material lines and that it is carried 
 through in accordance with the principle of conservation 
 of energy. Now substitute voluntary action for reflex 
 action. To the physiologist the only difference between 
 the two cases is that in the latter it is in the nerve cells 
 of a certain portion of the brain, and not in some sub- 
 ordinate centre, that the redistribution of energy from 
 afferent to efferent nerves takes place. There is no 
 disappearance of energy into some psychical entity 
 called the mind or soul, and no appearance of new 
 energy from such a source. The sequence follows the 
 well-defined routes of the bodily organism and is nowhere 
 broken. Therefore, it is concluded, there is no place 
 for free will. 
 
 This argument, if it prove anything, proves too 
 much. It has no special reference to freedom It is 
 not some figment of free will that it disproves, but the 
 whole concept of mental causation or conscious activity 
 Yet conscious activity is a fact; and we are not pas- 
 sively conscious of what we call our actions as if they 
 were the moving pictures of a cinema show. If this 
 truth were really inconsistent with the doctrine of the 
 conservation of energy as manifested in the organic 
 body, we should have to examine more closely the 
 grounds for our acceptance of that doctrine. But the 
 doctrine of the conservation of energy in a material 
 system does not and cannot refute the fact of conscious 
 
 S. O. L. 
 
 28 
 
434 
 
 Freedom 
 
 activity in the domain of mind. It does imply that the 
 bodily expression of conscious activity is subject to 
 material laws ; but that has not been called in question. 
 And, with regard to the conscious activity itself, it can 
 only show that it belongs to a different order of facts 
 from the material. 
 
 The valid results of the argument are therefore 
 two: first, that life or mind, as distinguished from 
 the body which it animates, is not a storehouse of 
 energy, either receiving it or parting with it ; that 
 energy is always connected with the material system ; 
 and secondly, that the causality which we attribute to 
 mind is not a creation of this energy, while its bodily 
 expressions must take place in a manner consistent 
 with the doctrine that the amount of energy remains a 
 constant. According as we interpret the relation of 
 body and mind, the fact of mental causation will or 
 will not conflict with the doctrine of the conservation 
 of energy. If we look upon mind as a sort of little body 
 within the body, then we shall also look upon its acti- 
 vity as similar to bodily action, and contradiction will 
 be the result. On the other hand, if we hold that mind 
 or mental function is sui generis, no contradiction will 
 arise. But, whether there is contradiction or not, it is 
 mental causation in general that is concerned. To the 
 question of free will the argument has no special appli- 
 cation. 
 
 A living organism reacts to stimulus in a different 
 way from a dead body; a conscious being reacts differ- 
 ently from a being without consciousness. The relation 
 of organised structure to life and to mind is indeed so 
 
 The Measurement of Motives 435 
 
 close that an organism may continue for a time to react 
 m much the same way as before, after consciousness has 
 disappeared. The organism is, as it were, tuned up by 
 consciousness to respond in a certain manner, and a 
 httle time elapses before it gets out of tune. But the 
 t.me IS never long before the difference between con- 
 scious reaction and the reaction of the dead body 
 becomes apparent. Yet there has been no diminution 
 of physical energy with the disappearance of conscious- 
 ness. The quantitative law of the conservation of 
 energy does not explain in any way what is peculiar to 
 conscious activity even in its simplest manifestations 
 l^rom this, however, it does not follow that conscious 
 action ,s irregular or outside law in its manifestations 
 It may even be described by the causal law in that 
 wider unquantitative form in which it means a certain 
 uniformity. We do find in consciousness, as in material 
 processes, that like antecedents have commonly like 
 consequents, that the same kind of motive tends to 
 produce the same kind of response from persons of like 
 temperament and antecedents. 
 
 A school of psychologists has maintained more than 
 this. It has taken its cue from the quantitative methods 
 ot physical science, and it has striven to submit mental 
 process to quantitative measurement. In the re-ion of 
 volition it is held that the result depends upon the 
 strongest motive; but in what way the strength of the 
 motive IS to be measured is a question not easy to 
 answer. Sometimes it is said that the motive which 
 prevails is the strongest ; but this only repeats the 
 dogma without solving the difficulty. If it is the 
 strongest motive that prevails, then there must be some 
 
 28 — 2 
 
436 
 
 Freedom 
 
 common measure of strength by which the force of all 
 motives may be estimated, from sensuous impulse to 
 regard for the moral law. If there are any differences 
 of quality between motives, and these differences cannot 
 be reduced to different degrees of strength of the same 
 quality, something more than strength of motive is 
 required to explain both the triumph and the failure of 
 moral ideals when confronted with the temptations by 
 which they are beset. I f motives of whatever sort could 
 be reduced to terms of pleasure-pain, and if pleasures 
 and pains were capable of quantitative summation, then 
 indeed the difficulty would be solved, and we should 
 have a clear causal account of human action which would 
 exclude the notion of free will. But this is the only 
 supposition ever put forward that would achieve the 
 result. Strict causal determination of volition by motives 
 requires measurement of all motives by their strength ; 
 psychological hedonism is the only theory that makes 
 such measurement possible. This form of determinism, 
 
 therefore and it is the only form which admits of exact 
 
 statement— stands or falls with the doctrine of psycho- 
 logical hedonism— a doctrine which we have already 
 
 seen reason to reject. 
 
 The fundamental objection to the 'strongest motive' 
 explanation of volition is that it treats motives as if 
 they had an existence by themselves, and each a mea- 
 surable strength. The assumption overlooks the fact 
 that the motive exists only for the self-conscious being 
 whose motive it is. Apart from the self it is nothing : 
 there is only the physical stimulus. The treatment of 
 motives as existing forces is on a par with the treat- 
 ment of presentations, sensations, or feelings as separate 
 
 Causation as Unifonnity 437 
 
 existents, out of which mind is somehow compounded. 
 But presentation and motive alike are only elements 
 arrived at by analysing concrete states of mind; if we 
 think that the division into these elements is or can be 
 an exhaustive account of mind, we forget the unity 
 which binds them together and without which none of 
 them would be real. 
 
 Accordingly, if we speak of the relation between 
 successive mental states as a causal relation, causation 
 in this case will not mean quantitative equivalence in 
 respect of some form of energy resident in antecedent 
 and in consequent; but it may mean continuity, and it 
 may mean uniformity. Continuity hardly bears upon 
 the point in dispute. Neither in nature nor in human 
 action are the changes by which moment is linked to 
 moment strictly infinitesimal in amount. The con- 
 tinuity which we are at liberty to assert must allow for 
 the occurrence of changes of considerable and varying 
 amount. It is the law of these changes which we seekV 
 and there is no good reason for identifying the law of 
 succession in mind with the law which holds for nature. 
 It is therefore upon the conception of causation as uni- 
 formity that the doctrine of determinism will depend. 
 But strict uniformity of sequence cannot be verified 
 in any case. The same antecedents are never repeated, 
 nor the same consequents. We may say that a differ- 
 ence in the consequent is always connected with 
 some difference in the antecedent; but, as there are 
 always differences both in consequents and in ante- 
 cedents, this statement conveys little until we know to 
 what difference in the one a given difference in the 
 other is to be referred. 
 
438 
 
 Freedom 
 
 Uniformity in any strict sense is never verified. 
 We cannot take a particular sort of motive and say 
 that it will always produce action of a given kind ; the 
 variety of human nature refutes the assumption. We 
 cannot even say that it will always operate upon the 
 same man in the same way; he reveals his individuality 
 not only by confirming our expectations but also by 
 the surprises he gives us. Even statistical results are 
 far from exhibiting any precise uniformity of connexion ; 
 and even if they enable us to state a general law for the 
 average man, this does not decide our question, which 
 is concerned not with the average man but with the 
 individual. 
 
 Thus it appears that the determinist explanation is 
 driven from one view of causation to another. It is 
 driven from the law in its exact quantitative statement 
 as used in physical science, because it is discovered 
 that with this view it is no more difficult to reconcile 
 a will that is free than a will that is bound. It takes 
 refuge in the more general statement of uniformity; 
 but for this no adequate verification is discovered. And 
 in consequence there is a tendency for it to be driven 
 back upon the first and simplest meaning of cause as 
 the agent or producing power. Nor is it illegitimate to 
 adopt this meaning in describing mental process, for it 
 was from the experience of personal activity that the 
 notion of cause was originally derived. But here the 
 question remains whether, and if so in what sense, the 
 person who causes the action is himself determined in 
 its causation. 
 
 To this question the determinist has an answer 
 
 Conscious Activity 40Q 
 
 ready. The volition or action is in every case due to 
 the present mental state of the person acting, combined 
 with the effect of the environment on that mental state 
 And as his state of mind is due in part to previous 
 actions of his and in part to his original inheritance of 
 dispositions, all actions may be said to result from the 
 co-operation of the two factors, heredity and environ- 
 ment. As the environment acts upon him through a 
 physical medium, its contribution to the issue would 
 seem to be theoretically calculable; at any rate, its in- 
 fluence cannot be a proof of freedom. And although 
 heredity may be largely an unknown factor, it can 
 hardly be maintained that it is due to the free will of 
 the individual whose character it goes to form. The 
 idea of freedom would therefore seem to be excluded. 
 
 Now it is true that the self appears to come into 
 being in time, as it certainly grows to maturity in time; 
 and It is also true that the qualities of the self, or many 
 of them, can be connected with the qualities of ancestral 
 mdividuals and so traced to heredity. But the self is 
 not merely a set of qualities, tendencies, or dispositions ; 
 It IS a new centre of conscious life, a new source of 
 conscious activity; and no approach has been made to 
 a causal explanation of the core of self-hood which 
 marks it off as the centre of its own world and the 
 source of its own activity. None of the qualities, 
 ideas, or actions of the self have any real existence 
 except as qualities, ideas, or actions of the individual 
 subject. It is the centre to which they are all related 
 and without which they would not be. It is perfectly 
 legitimate for a science, or a branch of science, to 
 restrict itself to analysis and the elements which analysis 
 
440 
 
 Preedom 
 
 discloses. In this way, the psychologist, if it suits him, 
 may limit himself to mental presentations, ideas, and 
 the like, and study their rise and history. In so doing 
 the causal principle will be his guide, and he will 
 attempt to trace causal connexions between the factors 
 with w^hich he deals. But all enquiry of this sort is 
 abstract and incomplete, because it neglects the prin- 
 ciple of unity, the self or subject, through which ideas 
 live as facts of consciousness. If we could explain the 
 constitution and being of the self out of these fragments 
 of presentation or any other sort of elementary mind- 
 stuff, then indeed the claim might be put forward that 
 the working of mind itself had been explained and that 
 it could be reduced to the form of causal connexion 
 approved by the determinists. But if, as is the case, 
 this has never been done, nor any real approach to 
 doing it effected, then the appeal to heredity in ex- 
 plaining the character of the individual mind will not 
 decide the question of its mode of activity. The state- 
 ment I am making is not an appeal to the unknown ; 
 it is an appeal against prejudice in interpreting what 
 actually takes place. 
 
 There are two interpretations which are inadequate. 
 One of these is the psychological determinism referred 
 to, which, taking as its cue physical sequence, or physio- 
 logical reflex, or perhaps the process of unhampered 
 impulse, neglects the unity of mental process and leaves 
 out of account the subjective principle through which 
 mental facts are facts of mind. This is the error of 
 the merely analytic understanding. The other inade- 
 quate view is the unpsychological indeterminism which 
 regards free will as an incalculable force which somehow 
 
 The Pure Pgo 441 
 
 interferes with the orderly working of mind and turns 
 our actions out of their normal causal direction. It is 
 assigned perhaps to a self or pure ego which is regarded 
 as without qualities or content. Here we find the oppo- 
 site error. The unity of mental life is treated just as if 
 it were an extra element, over and above the elements 
 discovered by analysis, to which a separate function 
 should be assigned analogous to the functions of the 
 other elements. And this is to misinterpret the nature 
 of the principle of unity. It has no place and no func- 
 tion apart from the diversity of qualities which are 
 united in an individual consciousness. The pure ego 
 of the theory of knowledge and of the theory of activity 
 alike is a logical abstraction. It has no being separate 
 or separable from the being of the self with its cha- 
 racter. The reference of action to a characterless self 
 would be worthless for all purposes of ethics ; it is 
 besides unsupported by introspection and would be 
 equivalent to reference of actual changes to a logical 
 abstraction or to an unfilled moment of time. Any 
 adequate theory of the mode of mental activity must 
 recognise that the self is never without character, that 
 it is a diversity in unity, that subject without qualities 
 is empty just as qualities without subject are blind. 
 
 When we reflect upon the process of action as we 
 are conscious of it, we are aware of a number of ten- 
 dencies which may point in different directions; but it 
 is the whole self that acts, and every tendency con- 
 tributes to the result — even \{ it oppose it. Of these 
 tendencies some are of the nature of impulse, others 
 are due to reflexion and are of the nature of idea; and 
 
42 
 
 Freedom 
 
 among the latter is the idea of moral value, of duty, or 
 of goodness. It claims authority over volition, while 
 the others present inducements to it or exercise driving 
 —or drifting— force on it. The difference is funda- 
 mental for moral theory. It is also important for the 
 present purpose, as showing that the consciousness of 
 moral obligation is not something of the same order as 
 the attractions of sense or worldly desire, and that it 
 is not measurable on the same scale. The development 
 of moral character consists in the gradual organisation 
 of all active tendencies under this principle. In the 
 process of this organisation it often happens that the 
 idea of goodness is opposed to some impulse or desire. 
 It is the same self that is at once conscious of duty 
 and attracted by a conflicting desire. To what is the 
 resultant conduct due .^ If it is due to the struggle of 
 the conflicting motives (as they are called) in a cha- 
 racter of definite qualities, then the ' strongest ' motive 
 must win the day, and the motives must therefore have 
 each a degree of strength which can be measured on 
 the same scale. It has already been seen that this 
 method can only be carried out on the assumption of 
 psychological hedonism. And, if we decline to make 
 this assumption, only one course is open to us. We 
 must recognise that the self which is the origin of the 
 action, and in which we distinguish both the idea of 
 goodness and the desire for an object inconsistent with 
 the good, is the real cause of the action and exercises 
 a real choice. It is the nature of the self to act and 
 thus, in certain circumstances, to choose or select be- 
 tween possible alternatives. This is neither a freak of 
 unmotived willing nor an irruption of a pure ego into 
 
 The Formation of Character 443 
 
 the realm of time. It is simply the real choice of a 
 real self — a self which is not merely a diversity of ten- 
 dencies and qualities, but the unity of that diversity. 
 It is a continuous life which manifests itself by active 
 selection of its own course, often in circumstances when 
 factors in its own nature point in opposed directions. 
 Each act tends to fashion and modify its character, for 
 the act is its own act and its character persists and 
 may develop into greater and greater harmony with an 
 ideal. But in our experience this internal harmony in 
 the self is never so completely achieved that there is 
 no longer need for choice between competing alter- 
 natives of conduct. 
 
 What Kant calls freedom is on the negative side 
 freedom from the dominion of sensuous impulse and on 
 the positive side determination by moral law. The two 
 forms of determination have no common measure, and 
 Kant thinks it necessary to regard them as belonging 
 to different worlds, so that freedom is banished to a 
 transcendent region. But moral determination is ac- 
 tually experienced in every-day life. It is a factor in 
 the normal process of volition. Kant's ' sensible ' and 
 'intelligible' worlds are not two different worlds with 
 distinct modes of volition. They are combined in the 
 voluntary action of man, in whom sensuous motives 
 and the moral law strive together, and who himself is 
 arbiter of them and of his fate. 
 
 Again, Kant speaks of the free volition as an act 
 out of time, an act which forms the character which 
 functions in time. In this way he cuts it off from our 
 experience, which is in time ; his freedom is a non- 
 temporal act, and litde more can be said of it. On the 
 
444 
 
 Freedom 
 
 other hand, the view which I would put forward is that 
 in moral action — indeed in all action above mere im- 
 pulse — successive moments of time are brought into 
 unity through the purpose which runs through them 
 and which they realise. In some experiences we are 
 conscious of a process of which the beginning and the 
 end are present in the same span of time, as when I 
 will the purpose and forthwith perform the act. More 
 commonly the purpose can be fulfilled only at a more 
 or less distant period ; but even here, although the 
 successive moments are not present together to con- 
 sciousness, although a number of successive volitions 
 may be required to bring the purpose to fulfilment, yet 
 the idea of the end may be present throughout, guiding 
 the whole process. 
 
 As the freedom which we realise is never indeter- 
 minateness, so also it is never out of time. But the 
 time in which it functions is not the abstract time, 
 conceived by mathematicians, which consists of discrete 
 moments one of which disappears into the past (or into 
 nothingness) as the next arrives. Time as experienced 
 does not exhibit this feature with any exactness. Strictly 
 speaking, time itself is not experienced; what we expe- 
 rience is a continuous change of object which is also 
 a continuous change of activity. There are no such 
 things in our experience as absolutely discrete moments, 
 each with its minute content of presentation or motive. 
 The smallest distinguishable part of our experience 
 always covers an appreciable duration, which is not a 
 mere moment nor a certain number of moments. This 
 is its time-span' ; and the span may vary in length 
 
 ' Cp. Royce, The World and the Individual^ vol. i, pp. 420 ff. 
 
 Action and the Time-span 445 
 
 according to other conditions in our experience. One 
 of these conditions is the interest or purpose or meaning 
 which guides our effort. 
 
 Conscious action is thus in time, or determined by 
 time, in a very different way from that in which w^e are 
 apt to conceive, say, the successive ticks of a watch. 
 The latter approach disconnectedness and mere succes- 
 sion. But the successive stages in purposive activity 
 are united in our consciousness by the idea of the end 
 to be realised, in the same way as successive tones may 
 be felt or understood by us as a melody : so that the 
 first already means the last and is retained in the last. 
 The idea dominates the succession and gives unitv to 
 the whole: and yet such a unity as does not annul the 
 reality of the parts but gives them a place in the whole. 
 
 In a character completely in accordance with the 
 ideal of goodness the whole life would be regulated in 
 this way — unified by the moral ideal to which each 
 particular action would be contributory. We cannot 
 say that it would have the actual experienced unity of 
 a single time-span, far less that all one's life would be 
 before one as a totum siinuL The nature of our expe- 
 rience in which object is added to object, and the 
 limitation of our attention in grasp and range, make 
 this impossible for the finite consciousness. But yet 
 each object would be seen in the light of its place and 
 value for the whole, and each act would be a conscious 
 approximation towards the realisation of the ideal. The 
 mode of determination would in this case be deter- 
 mination by reference to an ideal whole — an ideal of 
 goodness which expressed for the agent the meaning 
 and. purpose of his life. His idea of the good to be 
 
446 
 
 Freedom 
 
 realised would determine its own realisation; the end 
 would bring forth its own means. Here final Causality 
 or purpose would find unqualified expression. 
 
 In this description of the good will which is fully 
 enlightened, freedom in the ordinary sense, the sense 
 in which the term has been used hitherto as involving 
 the choice between alternatives, is transcended. To 
 the mind that is altogether set in goodness and has 
 knowledge unlimited — for whom sense or desire has 
 no temptations and the world no surprises — for such a 
 mind there would be one clear purpose, one inevitable 
 line of activity: there would no longer be a question 
 between the higher and the meaner goal, the right 
 road and the wrong. For such a mind freedom would 
 consist simply in the absence of any opposition to its 
 purposive activity and the completeness of its self- 
 determination. If we form the conception of a Perfect 
 or Infinite Mind it is in this sense that we must speak 
 of such a mind as free. To speak of choice between 
 alternatives is to suggest that another course than the 
 best might be chosen, and this would be inconsistent 
 with the idea of perfection. 
 
 A finite mind, limited in knowledge and power and 
 distracted by desires other than the will to goodness, 
 may yet have a partial measure of that self-determina- 
 tion which is complete only in the infinite. It is incom- 
 pletely determined by forces external to itself. And if 
 it stand — as it does stand — between the realm of nature 
 and the realm of goodness, conscious of the good and 
 yet beset by many temptations to fall to a lower level, 
 then the relative independence or partial spontaneity 
 of such a mind may be exhibited in the power to direct 
 
 Self-conscious Activity 
 
 447 
 
 its own path towards the goal of goodness or to allow 
 It to lapse mto evil. Its freedom will be neither 
 comp ete mdependence of external determination nor 
 comp ete agreement with the ideal of goodness; but 
 It Will exclude total subordination to the forces beyond 
 Itself, and it will give opportunity for choosing and 
 servn.g the good. In spite of its restrictions human 
 activity will be recognised as possessing a core of 
 spontaneity. 
 
 If we acknowledge this spontaneity we shall ascribe 
 to^the action of self-conscious beings a mode of causation 
 which differs from that formulated to describe physical 
 sequences. In the latter we attempt to measure the 
 quantity of energy and show its constancy through the 
 change of form in successive events. Or, if we are 
 unable to reach an exact estimate, we Still proceed on 
 the postulate of uniformity and connect each difference 
 in the consequent with some difference in the ante 
 cedent; and the psychologist applies the same formula 
 to express the determination of mental events But in 
 connecting difference with difference in this way he is 
 really assuming the sufficiency of the analytic method ■ 
 for each difference is arrived at as the result of an 
 analysis. We see in it a determining factor or a deter- 
 mined result ; we treat it as something by itself with its 
 own distinct measure of causal efficiency : so that the 
 change in the result as a whole may be assigned to a 
 changed factor in the antecedent. The more nearly 
 correct it is to regard the whole experience under con- 
 sideration as equivalent to the sum of a number of 
 discrete parts, the nearer will such an account approach 
 to accuracy, as it does in physical sequences. On the 
 
448 
 
 Freedom 
 
 other hand, the more the parts owe their nature to 
 the whole to which they belong, the greater will be the 
 danger of inaccuracy in connecting one portion of the 
 consequent with a portion of the antecedent. The risk 
 of error will be at its maximum in the case of the highest 
 type of unity which we know — the unity of a spiritual 
 being or self. 
 
 Now, it has been a fundamental point in the argu- 
 ment of these lectures that a living whole cannot be 
 identified with the parts into which it is capable of 
 analysis, nor be regarded as the sum of these parts. 
 Even to sav that it is somethin^r more than the sum of 
 its parts is an inadequate expression of the truth. The 
 parts have no existence of their own, and therefore 
 cannot be summed. The whole is not an additive 
 whole; no true whole is. The living bond, or principle 
 of unity, moulds the nature of each part by incorpo- 
 ratinc*- it in the whole, so that neither the nature of the 
 part nor its mode of operation remains the same as it 
 would be did it exist in isolation. It is never the part 
 that acts, but life or mind that acts. And the way of 
 acting is life's way, or the mind's way, not_ simply the 
 way of the part. The result is made manifest in the 
 outer world by speech or movement; and these can be 
 measured or compared one with another, so that we 
 can identify the difference between two sets of results. 
 But to attribute this difference to a given difference in 
 the mental antecedents, and to regard this as settling 
 the question, is to overlook the unity of self-conscious- 
 ness which fuses stimuli or motives in its crucible, and 
 works through them by its own laws and under the 
 idea of freedom. 
 
 Uniqueness of the Self 449 
 
 It is not strange that we should postulate a special 
 mode of operation for self-consciousness. For it is a 
 kmd of being different from any which we can ascribe 
 to material things. What would be strange would be 
 for mental processes to have the same laws as the 
 succession of material events. We may trace the growth 
 and development of the individual mind. But what 
 makes it a mind-a finite centre of experience and 
 source of activity— we cannot tell. Neither the inherited 
 structure nor the influence of the environment reveals 
 this secret. What we know is that, as life always pro- 
 ceeds from life, so consciousness has always conscious- 
 ne.ss as its origin. But the entrance into space and time 
 of a new finite centre of con.scious life remains an event 
 which we are unable to connect with any special feature 
 of the cell from which its organism was developed or of 
 the medium which supplied it with nourishment And 
 m Its life as in its origin it is unique. The self is the 
 cause of its own actions; and each action although con- 
 nected with the past is yet a choice determined by itself 
 a true creation. 
 
 We hesitate to accept this view only because it 
 seems opposed to a scientific postulate, or because if 
 accepted, it would seem to disturb at every moment 
 the generalisation which science has established But 
 this result does not really follow. The self is thrown 
 mto an environment in which it can live and act only 
 in conformity with natural law. It brings with it mental 
 dispositions and it developes a character which tend 
 to give It a stability of its own. Thus its freedom is 
 limited in two ways. In the first place, it is limited by 
 the physical conditions in the midst of which it is set, 
 
 S. G. L. 
 
 29 
 
450 
 
 Freedom 
 
 Finite Freedom 
 
 451 
 
 and its own organism is subject in all respects to these 
 physical conditions. However the organism behaves, 
 and in whatever way we conceive the embodiment of 
 the self, mind does not create material out of nothing 
 nor does it produce or consume energy. The material 
 processes which are mentally determined are such and 
 such only as are consistent with physical laws. As 
 mind acts through body, it is in all its activity limited 
 by the laws to which its body is subject. Whatever 
 interpretation we give of the manner of volition this 
 holds. As already shown, the theory of freedom is not 
 in conflict with the axiom of the conservation of energy, 
 and is not affected by it, any more than is the theory 
 of psychological determinism. 
 
 Nor, in the second place, is freedom in human 
 nature divorced from its own past. It is the means by 
 which character is established, and in which we look to 
 the future to fulfil the promise and correct the errors 
 of the time that has gone before. Life is broken up 
 into periods by its contact with new and widening 
 experience; it is at the mercy of an environment seem- 
 ingly alien to it and full of surprises; and^ it grows to 
 maturity along with a physical organism in which it is 
 unable to stem the approach of decay. But yet it may 
 approximate to a unity, and in its continuous process 
 there is never a moment which is not reminiscent of 
 the past and prophetic of the future. As its unity is 
 always inclusive of diversity, so its freedom is a freedom 
 which contains causation. We cannot, with Kant, say 
 that there is only one free act, for that is to put freedom 
 outside time altogether. But the free act unites suc- 
 cessive moments of time into a unity of purpose. It 
 
 connects them into a single span. It exhibits within 
 Its degree the spiritual principle which makes the stages 
 of the process into members of a self-conscious whole. 
 Actions are systematised into the growing character 
 of the self, and thus contribute to the determination of 
 the acts which follow. At the same time the succeeding 
 acts proceed always from the self, not from the par""- 
 ticular features which we distinguish as making up its 
 character, nor even from all these features taken to- 
 gether. If, as I have urged, the self as a spiritual unity 
 IS always a much greater and deeper thing than the 
 sum of these distinguishable parts, and its action is 
 always more than their collective causation could have 
 been, then this will hold for the developed as well as 
 for the immature self. To the observer it will show a 
 higher degree of calculable uniformity-^for he knows 
 more about it than he did before. And indeed the self, 
 when character is fully formed, is less puzzled by sur- 
 prises from the environment; but it still selects its own 
 path freely, even when the variety of competing ways 
 is diminished. 
 
 The freedom of a finite being is most clearly ex- 
 hibited in selecting between alternatives of conduct ; 
 and it is in this respect that the ethical importance of 
 freedom makes its first appeal. Man is thrown into 
 the midst of competing interests and values or apparent 
 values, and he is left to make his own choice among 
 them. Yet he is not left entirely alone. From his race 
 and his surroundings he receives predispositions and 
 suggestions which set him on the road without com- 
 pelling him to follow it. From his own reason and 
 from social judgment he becomes aware of the dif- 
 
 39—2 
 
452 
 
 Freedom 
 
 ferences of value which make one way preferable to 
 another and authoritative for his will. No causal neces- 
 sity compels him to take the way he ought to take. 
 But, if he does so choose, and if he accustom himself 
 to will the higher values in spite of the attractions 
 of other interests, then he achieves in this process a 
 higher value than any other — that of the good w^ill of 
 a free man. 
 
 When, if ever, this character is firmly established, 
 the need for repeated conflict in order that the good 
 may be chosen disappears ; the w^arring elements in his 
 nature are brought into order, the hostile forces into 
 subjection, and the good will ceases to display the 
 struggle between higher and lower principles w^ith wdiich 
 we are familiar. Goodness achieved through freedom, 
 if completely realised, would exhibit to the observer 
 a uniformity similar to that of the necessarily connected 
 processes of nature ; but the principle of action would 
 remain different. It would be external in the one case 
 and internal in the other. The free man may achieve 
 uniformity through his freedom ; upon the unfree man 
 it would have to be imposed. 
 
 XVI IT 
 
 THEISM 
 
 As we have seen, neither pluralism nor monism is able 
 to give an interpretation of reality in which both the 
 moral order and the order of nature are adequately 
 recognised. The failure of the latter theory was mainly 
 due to its refusal to admit the ideas of purpose and of 
 freedom into its account. And its rejection of these 
 ideas was due to the requirements of its theory rather 
 than to an unprejudiced study of the facts. We have 
 found that, even if experience does not compel us to 
 admit the reality of purpose in nature and of individual 
 freedom, at least it does not exclude these ideas, and it 
 justifies our acceptance of them as postulates in the for- 
 mation of a comprehensive view of reality as a whole. 
 We must therefore return to the point which was 
 reached in examining the moral argument. The result 
 of that examination had about it — I am willing to admit 
 — a certain air of paradox. If we were asked to state 
 the strongest objection to the theistic view of the world 
 which is felt at the present time, we should reply with- 
 out hesitation that it lies in the existence and power of 
 evil in the world. The dilemma of Epicurus is still 
 with us: If God wishes to prevent evil but cannot, 
 then he is impotent ; if he could but will not, he is 
 malevolent; if he has both the power and the will, 
 whence then is evil? If the world had been so con- 
 
454 
 
 Thcisni 
 
 structed that only good appeared in it and no evil, then 
 (it is supposed) the theistic interpretation might hold ; 
 but it fails to account for a world like this of mingled 
 good and evil. The paradox of which 1 have been 
 guilty consists in taking this very fact of evil and 
 founding upon it a theistic argument. Had everything 
 in the world been harmonious, had there been no dis- 
 cord, pain, or evil, had all actual events brought forth 
 moral values and been examples of moral law, then it 
 might have seemed as if, in our explanation of the 
 universe, we need not go beyond this one universal 
 law, at once natural and moral, which w^ould be dis- 
 played by all things at all times. Now, such an expla- 
 nation will not fit our world, just because of the discord 
 between nature (including man) and morality. But the 
 moral order, as well as the order of nature, is of the 
 essence of reality ; and they can be harmoniously united 
 in one universe only when nature is understood not 
 merely in its present appearance but as working out a 
 purpose— that purpose being or including the making 
 of moral beings. To repeat what has been already said, 
 " If we do not interpret the w^orld as purposive, our 
 view of it cannot find room for both the natural order 
 and the moral order. If we do interpret it as purposive, 
 we must attribute an idea and purpose of good to the 
 ground of the world " : that is to say, our view will be 
 an ethical theism, ll the purpose be the production of 
 finite selves who will freely realise goodness, we have 
 a point of view from which it is possible to explain, in 
 general terms, both the slow stages and frequent lapses 
 in their moralisation, and also the nature of the medium 
 in which this moralisation has to be achieved. Epicurus's 
 
 The Unity of the PVorld 455 
 
 dilemma has made an assumption in formulating its 
 alternatives. It regards goodness as something that 
 can be produced by compulsion. It overlooks the pos- 
 sibility that the \s\\\ to goodness means the creation of 
 beings who will achieve goodness freely and whose 
 freedom needs the experience of all sorts of circum- 
 stances that it may develop into secure harmony with 
 the moral order. 
 
 If we look at the theistic interpretation of reality 
 from this point of view, we shall see that certain modi- 
 fications have to be made in that doctrine ui the unity 
 of the world which led to and was expressed in the 
 monistic theory. In the first place, the time-process 
 as a whole, that is to say, the course of the world or 
 system of nature, will have to be regarded as purposive. 
 Taking it at any moment, we cannot say that it is per- 
 fect or a complete expression of a divine meaning : that 
 divine meaning can only be gathered from its course 
 as a whole, or from insight into the purpose which 
 determines its course as a whole. And, in the second 
 place, the finite individuals, in whom the spiritual 
 nature of reality is manifested, must be acknowledged 
 as agents in the accomplishment of the world-purpose, 
 as possessing a real though limited power of initiative, 
 and therefore a certain measure of independence. The 
 time-process is the means whereby this freedom and 
 independence are made contributory to complete ethical 
 harmony or unity. 
 
 This ethical unity, be it noted, could not be arrived 
 at in any other way, if the view is correct that the 
 realisation of moral values requires freedom. At the 
 same time, the attainment of this ethical unity, just 
 
456 
 
 Theism 
 
 because it requires freedom, involves in its process a 
 certain modification of the doctrine of the actual unity 
 ot the universe. It is impossible to take any and every 
 particular situation or event, especially those involving 
 human factors, and to say '' here the divine is mani- 
 fested," or " the perfection of the universe required just 
 this act ; anything else would have been inconsistent 
 with the completeness of the whole." Yet in this way 
 the monist must interpret things. In practice, he may 
 be as ardent as any reformer in discussing the good and 
 evil of conduct in contemplation, and in preferring o-ood 
 to evil ; but, looking at the matter as a philosopher, he 
 must regard the event as inevitable : anything else 
 would have contradicted the nature of things, which is 
 also the nature of God : to regret it or wish it undone 
 Is to quarrel with that which alone is — to sin against 
 the holy ghost of logic. Now, unity of this sort is in- 
 consistent with a due appreciation of the moral aspect 
 of reality. The ethical unity of the universe is a unity 
 to be attained. It does not belong in its completeness 
 to any particular stage of the time-process, but only to 
 its realised purpose. In its working out ethical unity 
 requires a very real diversity, for it needs the co- 
 operation of free individuals. We cannot identify these 
 individuals with God or refer each action of theirs to 
 the divine nature as its cause. As possessing in himself 
 the purpose, or an idea of the purpose, of the whole 
 time-process, God must be regarded as transcendino- 
 the process itself; as communicating freedom to the 
 individual minds whose being depends upon his, he 
 must be regarded as transcending them also, for their 
 actual volitions may be alien to his nature ; and we 
 
 The Theory of Deis ni 457 
 
 may have to interpret this transcendence as self-limita- 
 tion. 
 
 The theistic view of the world is so familiar to us 
 that there is some difficulty in adopting an objective 
 attitude to it. We are accustomed to think of God as 
 the author and ruler of the world, and as giving reality 
 and power to our highest values ; but fully to describe 
 this attitude we have to think ourselves into a neutral 
 and outside point of view— to reflect and explain instead 
 of simply believing. At present we are seeking only 
 to understand the theory, and to understand it critically, 
 as was done in the case of pluralism and monism. The 
 latter theory presents us with certain points of contrast ; 
 and other points of contrast, of a different kind, may 
 also be obtained if we take into account another theory 
 — that known as deism, which may be regarded as the 
 direct contrary of pantheism. 
 
 With regard to deism, at any rate, we have no 
 difficulty in adopting the requisite objectivity of attitude. 
 For deism is scarcely more than a historical theory. 
 We do not any longer meet with philosophers or 
 theologians who profess themselves deists rather than 
 theists. The deists were indeed a famous school of 
 thinkers, especially in England in the eighteenth cen- 
 tury ; and yet it is not easy to give an exact definition 
 of their creed, so as to distinguish it from that of their 
 contemporary opponents. If we ask what deism means, 
 a perfecdy clear answer is not forthcoming either from 
 the deists themselves or from their critics. But the best 
 contemporary account known to me is that given by a 
 prominent critic of the school of thought. Samuel 
 
458 
 
 Theism 
 
 Clarke^ He distinguished four classes of deists : 
 (i) those who "pretend to believe the existence of an 
 eternal, infinite, independent, intelligent Being; and... 
 teach also that this Supreme Being made the world : 
 though at the same time... they fancy that God does not 
 at all concern himself in the government of the world, 
 nor has any regard to, or care of, what is done therein " ; 
 
 (2) those who also admit divine providence in nature ; 
 
 (3) those who, further, have some notion of the moral 
 perfections of God ; and (4) those who, in addition, 
 acknowledge man's duties to God, and see the need for 
 a future state of rewards and punishments — but all this 
 only "so far as 'tis discoverable by the light of nature." 
 
 If we look into this classification of the forms of 
 deism, we see that, for those of the first class, God is 
 simply an external Creator, who made the world, set 
 it under certain laws, and then left it alone. This is 
 indeed the essential principle of deism and is commonly 
 regarded as such by historians of philosophy and theo- 
 logy. But certain additions are made to the idea of God 
 in the other forms of deism enumerated by Clarke. To 
 God as creator must be attributed sufficient iatelligrence 
 and power to produce the world, and the intelligence 
 and power required may easily be regarded as so great 
 as to be described as infinite. But other qualities might 
 be added to this idea by different thinkers. God might 
 be regarded as having foresight and control over the 
 world as well as power to create it ; he might be credited 
 with moral attributes as well as with power and intelli- 
 gence ; and, when the world's course is run, he might 
 
 ^ A Discourse concerning the Being and Attributes of God, 9th ed. 
 (1738), pp. 159 ff- 
 
 Different Forms of Deism 459 
 
 intend a final judgment upon it and a just distribution 
 of rewards and punishments. 
 
 'All that is done in these secondary forms of deism 
 is to add a characteristic here and there to the idea of 
 God, without changing it in any essential way. God 
 remains for the deist an external Creator, as distinct 
 from ihe world that he has made as a mechanic is from 
 the machine that he turns out. God stands to the rest 
 of the universe in the relation of one part to another 
 part. He is a very unique part, certainly, for he has 
 brought the remaining parts into being, and has some 
 sort of control over them — a control which may be 
 exercised on rare occasions or never at all. Different 
 forms of deism are distinguished by the amount and 
 kind of the control which they attribute in this way to 
 God. And indeed the main distinction between the 
 deists and their orthodox opponents in the eighteenth 
 century lies just at this point. The latter attributed to 
 God a greater measure of control over the world and 
 more frequent manifestations of this control. In par- 
 ticular they found evidence of it in the Scri|)tures and 
 in the miracles and prophecy therein recorded. The 
 main topic of controversy concerned the credibility and 
 importance of these recorded manifestations of divine 
 activity : did they actually happen and were they re- 
 quired } Or was natural religion (as it was called) 
 adequate for the guidance of men ? The deists ques- 
 tioned these manifestations, and held them to be super- 
 riuous : the light of nature sufficed to show the being 
 of God and the obligation of morality. The ideal of 
 the strict deist was a God who did not interfere. He 
 had the power of a creator and the intelligence of a 
 
46o 
 
 Theism 
 
 designer; he might also have the moral quaHties of 
 a provider of good things and of a judge between right 
 and wrong ; and he might foresee and even intend the 
 course of the world ; but, for the rest, he held his hand 
 and he bided his time. 
 
 This idea of a non-interfering God is the conception 
 that brings out most clearly the essential features of 
 deism \ Its inadequacy is apparent. To begin with, 
 it establishes a very incomplete view of the unity of 
 the universe. Things are indeed all connected because 
 they have all been created by God and are all eoverned 
 by the laws which he ordained in creatin^r them. But 
 once created, they are left to their own fate, though 
 controlled by laws which were regarded as due to the 
 arbitrary fiat of the divine will. Men stand related to 
 one another in many ways, co-operating and competing, 
 but each working out his own destiny ; man and nature 
 stand over against one another in help and hindrance ; 
 but God stands aloof, infinitely above all, not mingling 
 in the strife of the beings he has made— at any rate, 
 not until that far-off divine event when the whole world 
 will come up for judgment. God's work is done, and 
 things now go on much the same— or altogether the 
 same — as they would do if there were no God. Since 
 the creation he has rested ; though it may be that, 
 when the created world has run its course and has to 
 
 ^ Though it docs not agree exactly with its historical usage. As 
 Mr C. C. J. Webb points out {Studies in the History of Natural 
 Theology, 1915, p. 348) the term 'deism' was commonly used to 
 signify belief in the sufficiency of natural religion independently of 
 revelation, and writers ordinarily called deists (e.g., Herbert of Cher- 
 bury) did not always deny the possibility of direct communion between 
 the soul and God. 
 
 A Non-mter/ering God 461 
 
 hand in its accounts, there will be a new period of 
 divine activity. 
 
 Let us ask what difference a doctrine of this sort 
 makes in our manner of interpreting the world as a 
 whole. God is necessary to account for the beginning 
 of the world : his presence may again be found at the 
 end of the world. But apart from origins and endings, 
 what difference does his being make to our view of the 
 actual world in its historical course } Suppose a deist 
 to change his mind on the question of origin. He is 
 aware that there are arguments which some have 
 accepted in favour of the eternity of matter and the 
 equal eternity of the laws which have in the fulness of 
 time given birth to man and his varied activity. But 
 he has held that the arguments in favour of a divine 
 creation of the world are of superior cogency, though he 
 admits that his view depends on balancing the strength 
 of opposed arguments. Suppose now that further re- 
 flexion convinces him that, on the whole, the balance 
 of argument is in favour of the theory of the eternity of 
 matter and law. How will his view of the world be 
 affected } He adopts a new theory as to the way in 
 which it originated ; he modifies or transforms his ex- 
 pectation of what is to happen in the end. But, as to 
 the actual world and the course of history, what dif- 
 ference does it make } Matter and law remain the 
 same ; of man's mind he may have held before the same 
 view that he holds now. Surely a God that does not 
 interfere will hardly be missed. 
 
 On this ground it appears to me that the idea of 
 God, as conceived by the deists, fails to give adequate 
 unity to our view of reality. Their theory gave an 
 
462 
 
 Theis7n 
 
 imperfect view of the whole ; and the imperfection was 
 due to the method which they shared with most of their 
 contemporary opponents. This method was the method 
 of R itionaHsm. Various attempts have been made to 
 define RationaHsm ; and the definition in favour with 
 some recent writers lays stress on its negative results: 
 rationalism is identified with a destructive criticism 
 onl) . Rationalism," says its historian \ '' is the mental 
 habit of usin^ reason for the destruction of religious 
 belief." The definition seems to me confused, li i.-. the 
 method which we wish to understand ; the results will 
 take care of themselves. It is besides historically unfair. 
 It implies that the so-called rationalists intended to 
 reach negative results before they set out, and were 
 therefore governed by prejudice. Further, it disregards 
 the large amount of agreement between the two sides 
 in the great controversy. Reason was appealed to by 
 the orthodox opponents of the deists as much as it was 
 by the most negative of their followers. Both sides 
 professed to follow reason, Clarke and Butler as much 
 as Collins and Tindal. The essential point in the 
 method called rationalism was the limited view taken 
 of reason ; and this feature was common to the writers 
 in both camps. I do not undervalue the immense service 
 which these writers, on both sides of the controversy, 
 and the whole century to which they belonged, rendered 
 to the cause of clear thinking. But their method, if clear, 
 was also somewhat narrowly restricted. By ' reason ' 
 they meant the passage from proposition to proposition 
 by the ordinary processes of deduction and induction. 
 
 ^ A. \V. Benn, The History of E?iglish Rationalism in the Nine- 
 teenth Century (1906), vol. i, p. 4. 
 
 The Age of Rationalism 
 
 463 
 
 They brought to light what could and what could not 
 be arrived at in this way ; but they sought to apply to 
 the interpretation of the universe as a whole the same 
 kind of intellectual process as that by which one passes 
 from part to part in the examination of finite things or 
 from proposition to proposition in a chain of reasoning. 
 They ignored what has been called the synoptic method 
 —the ' reason ' as distinguished from the ' understand- 
 ing ' of Plato and Kant and licgcl. Iliey distrusted 
 the intellectual insight wliich achieves a view of the 
 whole, even although it is willing lu test that view bv 
 its adequacy to comprehend the facts. By their more 
 pedestrian method they otight never to have reached 
 the idea of God at all, and never would have reached it, 
 had it not been provided for them by tradition. 
 
 Hence their difficulty in connecting their idea of 
 God with their idea of the world. Hence also the line 
 the controversy took, and the discussion as to whether 
 and how much God interfered in the order of nature. 
 On the one hand the non-interfering God of the deists 
 seemed a superfluous ii)pothesis for interpreting the 
 actual world. He was treated as a sort of absentee 
 landlord, who failed even to get m his rents. Dn the 
 other hand the God that interferes on occasions to set 
 things right seems an equally difficult idea: lor .^u lung 
 as he does not intervene, the world must be interpreted 
 as going on without him ; and when he does intervene, 
 it must be to upset his own laws : so that the doctrine 
 as a whole appears to be only an incomplete deism. 
 Thus it appears that deism, in its essential form, as 
 the theory of a God that does not interfere with the 
 world and is external to it, is at the opposite pole from 
 
464 
 
 Theism 
 
 pantheism, the theory which identii'ies the world and 
 God. Somewhere between these two the theistic world- 
 view must find its place. 
 
 How then are we to conceive the world in the light 
 of the idea of God ? We have discarded the pantheistic 
 answer to the question, which identifies the world with 
 God ; and we have equally rejected the deistic view 
 which regards God as a being external and aloof. But 
 the positive conception is more difficult to define. It 
 must be something intermediate between the two im- 
 possible extremes. Neither identity on the one hand, 
 nor complete distinction, on the other hand, will satisfy 
 our quest for a view of the relation of the world to God. 
 It would seem, therefore, that we are forced to adopt 
 a principle of selection amongst the facts of the world ; 
 and selection is an awkward business and hard to apply 
 without arbitrariness, still harder to apply without the 
 appearance of arbitrariness. Yet arbitrariness must be 
 avoided. We may not say ''I see God's hand here, in 
 the providence that saved my fall, when ruin encom- 
 passed others ; but I cannot see it there, wjiere mis- 
 fortune awaited myself." If there is to be selection it 
 must be in accordance with a definite principle, and 
 that principle must be well grounded. 
 
 Where can we find a guiding principle.^ Is there 
 anywhere in the world a standard for discriminating 
 the divine from that which is not divine, so that we 
 may lay hold of the standard and by means of it get a 
 point of view from which reality as a whole may be 
 seen as a revelation of God ? If there is any such, we 
 must find it in one or other of the realms into which 
 
 Values as Divine 
 
 465 
 
 we have found the real in our experience to divide 
 Itself— in the realm of nature and its laws, or in that of 
 finite selves and their wills, or in that of intrinsic values. 
 But the first will not serve, for we have seen that 
 imperfection clings to it. For the same reason the 
 second region— that of finite selves— is an insecure 
 guide ; and besides, we have attributed to these selves 
 a freedom which is inconsistent not indeed with their 
 dependence upon God, but vmiIi then- being regarded 
 as a true mirror of the divine nature. There remains 
 then the realm of values— an ideal realm, very imper- 
 fectly realised in our experience, and only incompletely 
 conceived in our consciousness. It is possible for us to 
 mistake the true meaning of these idea! values ; but the 
 possibility of error does not affect the validity of truth 
 when discovered. The values are there, and in onr 
 apprehension of them we have at least a guide uiiaii 
 gives us a principle for selecting between the worthy 
 and the unworthy, and enables us to attain a certain 
 insight into the purpose of the whole. 
 
 Is it a misleading instinct which has led men almost 
 uniformly to use the adjective ^divine' in speaking of 
 these higher values— of beauty and truth and goodness? 
 The poets and artists have used this language^n speak^ 
 ing of beauty ; and though they may not have meant 
 to convey a dogma by it, they intended it to express 
 their admiration of what was highest. The philosophers 
 have often employed similar language, when then- theory 
 allowed them to see more in the world than mechanical 
 law and to regard the quest for truth as something else 
 than dialectical dispute. And to the moralist it has 
 often been almost an axiom that goodness aiui God 
 
 o. (j. L. 
 
466 
 
 Theism 
 
 mean the same thing. Of the other values I will not 
 speak, for my topic is the moral values and their bearing 
 on our interpretation of reality. 
 
 Now of the moral order of the universe we have 
 discovered that it does belong to the order of reality, 
 and further that it cannot be fitted into a pantheistic 
 conception of that order. Its distinction from, and yet 
 intricate relation lu, the natural order, and its impli- 
 cation of freedom in the lives which it claims to rule, 
 forbid the easy solution that the All is simply One. 
 But if the moral order is not altogether sundered from 
 the natural order, if the universe is really a universe 
 and not a multiverse, then we must hold that the moral 
 order is the order of that one mind whose purpose nature 
 and man are slowly fulfilling. Here therefore we have 
 a key to the theistic interpretation of the world. The 
 moral order expresses the divine nature; and things 
 partake of this nature in so far as they conform to that 
 order or manifest goodness. 
 
 This gives us the principle of which we are in 
 search. The theistic universe is fundamentally ethical. 
 The central point in our idea of God is not the panthe- 
 istic conception of a substance of infinite attributes or 
 an Absolute free from all determinations ; nor is it the 
 deistic conception of an external Creator or First Cause. 
 Neither 'Own Cause' nor 'First Cause' will be our con- 
 ception, but — if we must speak of cause at all — then it 
 will be Final Cause. And Final Cause must mean the 
 purpose of realising goodness. The difficulty ui the 
 conception of Creation is mixed up with the difficulty 
 of the relation of the time-process as a whole to ultimate 
 reality ; and with that difficulty I am not making any 
 
 The Divine Purpose 
 
 467 
 
 attempt to deal. But the notion of Creation involves 
 a more essential point than the idea either of a begin- 
 ning in time or of a beginning ^/time. It involves the 
 idea of God as the ground or support of the world— not 
 merely its beginiung— for without him it could not at 
 any moment exist. For this reason, while we may not see 
 God in each natural event we must yet look through 
 nature to God and see his mind in its final purpose. 
 
 I have already spoken of nature as the medium for 
 the production and perfection of goodness in finite 
 minds. This interpretation we may give — indeed, we 
 must give, if we accept the moral and the natural orders 
 as belonging together. But it does not follow that it 
 will explain everything in nature. It wonld be too proud 
 an assumption to assert that the whole of nature, of 
 which we know only the barest fragrtient, has no other 
 purpose than this one which concerns ourselves. Omni- 
 science is a foible against which the modest philosopher 
 should be on his guard, \\niat other purposes than this 
 there may be in the wealth of worlds which people 
 space, or even la the small world known to ourselves, 
 we cannot tell ; and, except as a matter of speculative 
 interest, it does not concern u.^ lo know, i he compre- 
 hensive cosmologies of Plato and Aristotle, of Plotinus 
 and St Thomas, even of Schelling and Hegel, were 
 suited to a pre-Copernican nni verse, of which man was 
 the real centre and not merely the being most inter- 
 esting to himself. On such matters the only safe attitude 
 is one of provisional agnosticism. But these doubtful 
 issues do not interfere wiUi uui interpretation of our 
 own consciousness and the world which environs it. 
 The certainty of the moral law is not affected by any- 
 
 \o- 
 
468 
 
 Theism 
 
 thing that Hes hidden among the unexplored recesses 
 of the starry heavens. 
 
 The same conception of purpose, which guides the 
 theist in the explanation of the world of nature, must 
 serve him also in the interpretation of the realm of finite 
 spirits. They too must be interpreted through their 
 purpose, and this purpose will be, as before, the reali- 
 sation of s^oodness. But there is this difference. Nature 
 is a medium only ; through it the end is to be reached. 
 But minds are not a mere medium : it is m them that 
 values are to be realised. And they must themselves 
 attain these values, and not merely receive them. To 
 nature we can ascribe no power or freedom of its own ; 
 each of its operations must be regarded as prescribed 
 for it. But finite spirits themselves either contribute to 
 working out the world-purpose, or else oppose their 
 wills to it. 
 
 The question of freedom has been already discussed, 
 and the validity of the idea defended. And I may now 
 venture to express the opinion that it is essential to the 
 theistic interpretation of reality. So many theists are 
 convinced determinists, that this statement mav have 
 an appearance of arrogance. Yet no other view seems 
 to me really open. If there is no freedom in man's 
 volition, and each act is rigidly determined by his in- 
 herited disposition and his environment, then it is plain 
 that every act of man is really caused by that being who 
 is the author at once of his nature and of the world in 
 which he lives. To his Creator, and only to his Creator, 
 it ought to be imputed. And, if this is so, we are left 
 without any kind of hypothesis by which to explain the 
 preference of the worse to the better course, or to render 
 
 The Problem of Evil 
 
 469 
 
 that preference consistent with the goodness of God. 
 On the determinist theory, as on the assumption of 
 freedom, man and nature may be purposive, and in the 
 end harmony may be established and goodness triumph. 
 But, on the former theory, we can think of no reason 
 why goodness should not have been established from 
 the outset, or win mcii slKnild iiave been formed with 
 dispositions that led them to sin. The evil in the world 
 has to be referred to God as its author; and ethical 
 theism falls to the ground. 
 
 If ethical theism is to stand, the evil in the world 
 cannot be referred to God in the same way as the good 
 is referred to him; and the onlx \\.i\ to avoid this 
 reference is by the posLulate of iiumcLP, freedom. This 
 freedom must be a real freedom, so that it may account 
 for the actual choice of evil when good iiiignL have 
 been chosen. We have therefore to face the inference 
 that there is a limitation of the divine activity: that 
 things occur in the universe which are not due to God's 
 will, though they must have happened with his per- 
 mission, that is, through his self-limitation. Nor does 
 this view justify the objection that we are making the 
 divine nature finite ; lur, li ii i:. conceived as limited, it is 
 not limited by anything outside itself. Rather we may 
 say that a higher range of power and perfection is shown 
 in the creation of free beings than in the creation of 
 beings whose every thought and action are pre-deter- 
 mined by their Creator. 
 
 On the other hand, individual freedom is not, and 
 cannot be, unlimited: otherwise eacli free being wuuld 
 require a world of his own, and there would be no 
 universe. And clearly man's freedom is restricted by 
 
470 
 
 Theism 
 
 the conditions both of heredity and of environment. 
 The range of his selection is limited by the experience 
 which gives content to his life, as well as by the in- 
 herited tendencies which are his from the beginning- 
 of his career. These afford ample opportunity for 
 freedom in the development of his activity, but not 
 unrestricted openings for any and every kind of life. 
 A man cannot at will choose to be a mathematician, an 
 arUbL, a ^talcbiruui, ur even a milh'onaire. I^iii iliere is 
 one forni of activit}- whit h is never closed, and that is 
 the realisatiuii kA mural values; one choice before everv 
 inan. thr^ choicr of [i-ood or c-xW. 
 
 This is the liariiaiion of human freedom whadi 
 a|)piic^ lo man as a part of nature; aiiil it i^ such that 
 the line wliich nature restricts least, aiifl leaves most 
 open Lo Irce determiiiatiiui, is ihat concerned witli ihc 
 production :m(l Increase of moral values. But the more 
 important aspect of the linuicuiun remains. Man'b free- 
 dom must surely be limited from the side not of nature 
 ori]\\ as tho medium in which it is exercised, but also of 
 God. liow then are we to conceive this linn'tation 
 without man being altogether absorbed by C^od ? The 
 world as a inne process has a certain unii\ limoueh 
 natural law, l)ui tjils law fails to cover or to account 
 for the volitions of free minds; it has a further unity in 
 the moral order, but this imitv is still an ideal and never 
 in our experience completely realised. Its full unity 
 must therefore come from the fact that it is a purposive 
 system, in which nature is the medium of moralisation, 
 and finite minds are the agents who, in free alliance and 
 free struggle, work out this unity in achieving their own 
 perfection. The purpose exists eternally in the divine 
 
 An Ethical Unity 
 
 471 
 
 mind, and the time-process is the scene on which finite 
 minds bring it about. Their agency must therefore be 
 somehow directed— or, as the theologians say, over- 
 ruled — towards the attainment of this end. 
 
 But may not the time-process end, after all, simply 
 in confusion, perhaps in disaster, and 'ii>, purpose fail ? 
 This is indeed a suggestion that has found a place in 
 many theologies, which have imagined a hostile spirit 
 — a |)rinre of this world — who. altliouLrh of lower rank 
 and power, can yet frustrate the designs of the vSupreme 
 Mind !)y his implacable ennnitw This is onh" one e)t tlie 
 wa\ > in which the tmltv of nattire and morality is denied, 
 ll presents a \ i\ ad picture of the world struggle, but no 
 solution of the universal problem, beyond denying that 
 there is a true universe. .Short of this supposition, and 
 ori I lie hues of our owpi rellexion, ma\' it not be Imagined 
 that the world-plan meets only with partial success tem- 
 pered b) pariial tailina'. th.;u multuudes of tnn'te spirits 
 fail for ever to realise the good that is In their power? 
 Freedom is a dangerous gift, and is ihe danger uril) 
 to the recipient ? In conferring tin's gift o,n Unite beings, 
 may not the Supreme Mind have called into existence 
 a power which he can no longer control, in the onlv 
 way in which free spirits can be controlled '^ 
 
 This suggestion, again, cannot be refuted hy con- 
 clusive argument. It is less violent and imaginative 
 than the previous suggestion, but it is equally incon.^ib- 
 tent with any view of a complete unity of the universe. 
 My argument has been all along that, ultimately, the 
 unity of the universe must be conceived as ethical ; 
 and this conception would bring moral discord into the 
 heart of things. Can we regard the Supreme Mnid as 
 
472 
 
 Theism 
 
 having so little foresight as to be unable to see the result 
 of his own purpose ? I confess that the ancient argu- 
 ments about the inconsistency of freedom with fore- 
 knowledge do not appeal to me. If we remember that 
 the Infinite Mind is not limited to a finite span of the 
 time-process, we must allow that, notwithstanding the 
 free causation of finite minds, the actions which we call 
 futun^ an yet eternally present to his knowledge. To 
 a mind which transcends time there cannot be the 
 difference wliich exists for us between memorv and 
 foresight ; the past and the future must be equally 
 open Lu iii:^ view. Universal determination contradicts 
 freedom; universal knowledore does not. And 'S Go ] 
 foresaw, can we suppose that he would call into bcing 
 spirits who would frustrate his purpose.^ If nm, ^^■,' must 
 hold that he intended that his purpose should be thus 
 frustrated, amd again we lose sight of the unity of the 
 universe as an ethical system. 
 
 Apart, therefore, from fancy solutions which limit 
 either the power or the knowledge or the goodness of 
 God, the theistic world-view must maintain not unly 
 that the moral purpose of the universe is eternally 
 present in the mind of God, but also that it will attain 
 actual fulfilment in the finite minds throu^fh whom it is 
 being worked out. And for this reason God must be 
 regarded as not far off from each individual spirit. In 
 what way this divine providence, direction, or over- 
 ruling actually operates is a problem which philosophy 
 cannot undertake to solve without assistance from that 
 range of experience which I have not taken into account 
 in these lectures— the facts of the religious conscious- 
 ness. 
 
 God and the Moral Order 
 
 473 
 
 But one result emerges. I have said before, and 
 the assertion followed from the preceding argument, 
 that, in interpreting the world, theism has to proceed 
 by selection when it seeks in the world or in men traces 
 of the divine. The principle of selection cannot be any- 
 thing else than the moral order which has been taken 
 as the ground from which we must explain the course 
 of the w^orld. In ail goodness we must see the mani- 
 festation of the divine purpose, \\\ all evil a temporary 
 failnro in its realisation, in so far as men stri\'(' for its 
 realisation they are ethically at one with God ; in so far as 
 they lose sight of this end they are ethicalK it variance 
 with him. And this principle is not arbitrary; it follows 
 directly from ilic position given to the mora! order and 
 from the way in which the order of nature and finite 
 minds are related thereto. The old moralists \\ iio ex- 
 plained 'conscience' as meaning 'knowledge with God,' 
 may have given a fanciful derivation of the word. But 
 the idea which prompted the derivation was not far 
 wrong. In the moral consciousness we have some 
 apprehension of the value which gives meaning to the 
 world and which has been interpreted as a divine 
 purpose ; and in moral practice we co-operate towards 
 the fulfilment of this purpose. 
 
 The tli^nstic view of th^^ world which I have been 
 considering is definitely an ethical view. It was led up 
 to by an enquiry into the facts of value in lUl: world 
 and by the conception of a moral order of the world; 
 and it issues in a view which finds the moral purpose 
 of the world to be the purpose of a Supreme Mind and 
 which regards finite minds as attaining unity with this 
 
474 
 
 Theism 
 
 God and the Absolute 
 
 475 
 
 Supreme Mind not by the absorption of their indi- 
 viduahty but by the perfecting of their character in 
 co-operating with the divine purpose. Other values 
 than the ethical have dropped out of sight in the 
 course of the argument. Yet the general view which 
 has been reached might be extended so as to cover 
 them also. Wherever there is intrinsic worth in the 
 world, there also, as well as in moral goodness, we may 
 see a manifestation of the divine. God must therefore 
 be conceived as the final home of values, the Supreme 
 Worth— as possessing the fulness of knowledge and 
 beauty and goodness and whatever else is of value for 
 its own sake. 
 
 This view has not been put forward on account of 
 its religious importance. That is a side of things which 
 I have hardly ventured to touch. It is given as an 
 interpretation of reality which takes equal account of 
 existents and laws and moral values. And, as such, it 
 is neither inadequate to cover the facts of experience, 
 as any naturalistic theory is, nor does it betray the 
 hopeless incongruity on fundamental points which we 
 find both in pluralism and in monism. At' the same 
 time, it is not contended that the view solves all ques- 
 tions or that it does not raise problems of its own. The 
 solutions it gives are for the most part general ; they 
 offer a principle of explanation rather than an expla- 
 nation of each event in detail. If particulars can be 
 explained by it, a l^ mostly by the help of the religious 
 consciousness which claims a more intimate apprehen- 
 sion of God than morality can offer. And the conception 
 of a unity which is not yet but is to be realised, and 
 which when realised will be ethically complete, though 
 
 individualities remain distinct, raises speculative prob- 
 lems. Is God the Absolute ? it may be asked ; and if not, 
 is he not therefore finite, so that the universe is incom- 
 pletely unified by the idea of God } It may be answered 
 that, if by the Absolute is meant the sum-total of realitv, 
 then there are real events and real beings which do not 
 as we see them manifest the divine nature, so that God 
 and the Absolute will not be identical. Uul there is 
 nothing outside God in the sense of being fully inde- 
 pendent of his being and will. The independence of 
 finite beings is a restricted independence communicated 
 by the divine will. If we conceive God as unable to 
 limit himself in this way, then this conception also limits 
 his power. It appears to me that the idea of the self- 
 limitation of God involves no greater difficulty than the 
 idea of the manifestation or appearance of the Absolute 
 in things and persons. And, on the most rigid theory 
 of the Absolute, the diversity of its appearances must be 
 admitted — even if they are held to be only the appear- 
 ance of diversity. These questions, however, call for 
 further discussion. 
 
 'M 
 
XIX 
 
 THE IDEA OF GOD 
 
 \\ ^lEN Faust was faced with a straight question as to 
 his behef in God, he tried to put the question by 
 by asking- another question, "Who dare name him, 
 and who confess 'I beHeve in him'?" The terms in 
 which the answer, or the warning, is expressed are 
 reminiscent of an old behef which the intellect had long 
 discarded, the belief in the magical virtue of the name 
 — as if by naming God we were guilty of the blasphemy 
 of attempting to control him. But they have also a 
 more significant meaning; and we shall do well to 
 remember the warning they convey if we proceed, as 
 we must, to elucidate the idea of God which has been 
 reached. Can any idea be adequate for describing the 
 Infinite.^ May it not be that the categories by which 
 we convey knowledge of the world and liTe fail and 
 must fail to render to us the meaning of the whole ? 
 This seems to have been the thought in Goethe's mind. 
 Yet with the licence of a poet, he proceeds to dis- 
 regard his own caution— to put his belief into words 
 and to name the unnameable. His confession of faith 
 may perhaps be described as an emotional pantheism 
 —a worship of the All. and yet, in the same breath, of 
 that special manifestation of it, whatever it may be, 
 which masters us in moments of most intense feelino-. 
 The combination is not uncommon. Emotional intensiry 
 
 Experience and Theory ^^^j 
 
 is regarded as somehow revealing ultimate reality; and 
 yet all things are in essence one. But the two views 
 differ in origin and in result. On the one hand, there 
 is the conclusion at which philosophical theory has 
 arrived — the all-embracing unity, the God or reality 
 of pantheism. On the other hand, it is assumed that 
 we feel this reality when passion is high, and we are 
 encouraged to name it as we choose — bliss, heart, love, 
 God. In this manner are united ideas which have been 
 gathered along the two different ways which lead to 
 theological doctrine : the way of immediate experi- 
 ence which induces the poet to give the divine name 
 to the emotion in which, for the moment, his life is 
 concentrated, and the philosopher's way, which Goethe 
 also followed, and which led him, as it has led many 
 others, to see all reality as one. 
 
 The two ways are different in their inception and 
 in the direction which they take. One starts from an 
 immediate experience of the individual, the other 
 follows the course of philosophical reflexion. But they 
 meet in the mind of man, and their objects are fused 
 in the idea of a reality which is conceived as the hio-hest. 
 The experience may be emotional merely, after the 
 manner of Goethe's description; l>ut it is an emotion 
 which transfuses the whole personality and lifts it out 
 of its isolation into harmony with its environment ; 
 and he gives it the name of love because in love liie 
 individual finds in the life of another the complement 
 and completion of his own, and feels that, for liiis new- 
 found unity, nothing else matters and the world outside 
 is indifferent and of no account. In it-, more specifically 
 religious phase this experience has a fnrt 
 
 i(T mc'inm^i" 
 
.478 
 
 The Idea of God 
 
 or aim. It brings the individual who has it into relation 
 with a power or reality greater than himself, through 
 which he is reconciled to life and in which he finds 
 securityfor the ideals which appeal to him as of supreme 
 worth. When reflexion supervenes upon this experi- 
 ence, the dangerous process of describing and naming 
 begins. The power to which the individual trusts for 
 reconciliation and security— in a word, for salvation- 
 is conceived as beyond the reach of hostile or indif- 
 ferent forces, as willing the good which the worshipper 
 conceives, and as able to carry out what he wills. 
 Starting in this way from the facts of religious experi- 
 ence, the religious man becomes involved in the same 
 problems, concerning the relation of nature and values 
 to one another and of both to the ultimate ground of 
 reality, which meet the philosopher in his attempt to 
 arrive at an interpretation of the universe. 
 
 In these lectures the subject has been approached 
 exclusively from the latter point of view. The facts of 
 the religious consciousness have not been taken into 
 account because they lie beyond that special question 
 concfTninq- th^^ relation of the moral order to the order 
 of existence which we set out to determine. Hia anv 
 solution Mt the more general problem of realiix will 
 have its bearing on the content and attiuiJc of hnite 
 experience. The view uhnh u(> f>.rm of the universe 
 cannot remain a mere intellectual concept. Pliilosophy 
 is not a game which we play out and finish, leaving the 
 plavor^ refreshed perhaps or stimulated, but othinvise 
 unchanged. It affects our whole attitude, enioiional 
 and active as well as intellectual, to the worM m which 
 we have to pla\ our part. We cannot tinr.k of ilir 
 
 Philosophy and Religion 479 
 
 world as of one kind and feel towards it or adapt our 
 action towards it as if it were of an entirely different 
 sort. 
 
 Let us look for a moment upon the differences 
 produced upon our subjective attitude, and upon the 
 meaning we put upon individual and religious experi- 
 ence, by our interpretation of reality as a whole. It is 
 clear that man cannot be separated from the universe 
 of which he forms a part. If the world is without God, 
 the soul of man cannot be influenced by the divine 
 spirit or rely upon it for the security of his ideals of 
 value. The metaphysic of naturalism, for instance, 
 would inevuably force upon us a naturalistic interpre- 
 tation of religion as well as of other forms of experi- 
 ence. We may avoid philosophy altogether in order 
 that faith may have free course. But, if thought be let 
 in at any point, it will inevitabi) tend to leaven the 
 whole mass of experience. It has been said indeed by 
 a follower of Ritschl', that a makes no difference to 
 faith what the religious man's philosophy may be : 
 uliether he be materialist or idealist in philosophy, las 
 sense ol religious valnc^s. his faith, may remain the 
 same. But it will ne^t rcmaifi the same if he beo-ins to 
 think about n. Thought refuses to be confined hv 
 artificial boundaries. TXw Christian who thinks cannot 
 keep God in his soul and leave him out ol liis world. 
 The materialist who is convinced that matter and 
 motion are the only realities, and the naturahst 
 who repeats nnich the same thing in more modern 
 phraseology, must account for religious experience 1)\ 
 
 W. licirmann, Die Metaphysik in der Theologie (1876), p. r;. 
 
 1 \ 
 
48o 
 
 The Idea of God 
 
 the same factors, and no others, as those by which they 
 account for ordinary events, and they must explain the 
 illusion of God as they explain a will-o'-the-wisp. If 
 religion persists side by side with a materialistic world- 
 view, it is only because thinking has been blocked and 
 philosophy in any full sense does not exist. 
 
 Not every system of metaphysics can vihdicate, or 
 even can admit, the validity of the ideas involved in 
 religious experience. Naturalism, as has been said, 
 cannot do so ; and the consequence is important For, 
 in the minds of the last generation and even of our own 
 generation, the philosophical theory of naturalism has 
 been so closely connected with the achievements of 
 natural science that it has been regarded as one of the 
 results of these achievements or even as identical with 
 natural science itself. The negations of naturalism have 
 been mistaken for conclusions of science ; and this 
 confusion has had results of profound significance, li 
 has been taken as shutting out reasonable men from 
 participation in. the spiritual ideals on uliich mankind 
 has been nourished. Dunng many years and for 
 many minds, some of vvhom are still among-st us, the 
 teachings of science and its bearings upon life and 
 conduct were inter[)reted In' the essays and Ice aires 
 of Huxley. We may therefore turn for an elucidation 
 of this point to wiiat hu said in ;i f:nnons discourse on 
 'Ihe PhysicaJ Basis of Life'.' In. it he expressed the 
 view that in our conception of con.^ciou.s lilo, -'a^ oLse- 
 wiicrc. niatt(T and law lia\a- devoured spirit and spon- 
 taneity. And/' la went on to say, ''as surely as every 
 iuuire grows out (»f past and present, so will the 
 
 ' Lay Ser?nons (1893), p. 123. 
 
 Naturalisin and Religion 
 
 481 
 
 physiology of the future gradually extend the realm 
 of matter and law until it is co-extensive with know- 
 ledge, with feeling, and with action. The consciousness 
 of this great truth weighs like a nightmare, I believe, 
 upon many of the best minds of these days. They 
 watch what they conceive to be the pro(>-ress of 
 materialism, in such fear and powerless anger as a 
 savage feels, when, during an eclipse, the great shadow 
 creeps over the face of the sun. The advancing tide of 
 matter threatens to drown their souls ; the tightening 
 grasp of law impedes their freedom ; they are alarmed 
 lest man's moral nature be debased by the increase of 
 his wisdom." 
 
 I quote these sentences only as evidence of the 
 effect which the doctrines of naturalism,' and the scien- 
 tific hypotheses identified with naturalism, have had 
 upon the attitude of thinking men. The ^adxdncing 
 tide ' seemed to them to sweep away every vesticre of 
 human freedom and to discredit tlie whole realm of 
 spiritual ideals. A generation ago the 'best niir.ds' 
 of the day were not only possessed by the glories of 
 scientific progress, they were also obsessed by natural- 
 ism. Some eagerly welcomed its iittcTances as prophetic, 
 and as heralding an era of emancipation from outworn 
 creeds; many inore accepted them out of io\alt\- to 
 tru.th, but with reluctance, because they brouL^ht bitter 
 disillusionment ; yd others turned from the doctrines 
 in despair, if not in revolt, and sought to place the 
 values ol liie in a region which had no point of contact 
 wn.ii tliat disclosed by science. This last attitude 
 involves an assertion of the complete independence of 
 
 the realm of values. 1 
 
 I i^ tilt; note not onl\' of tl 
 
 ic 
 
 S. O. La 
 
 1I 
 
482 
 
 The Idea of God 
 
 Ritschlian school, who reacted from the naturalism into 
 which the Heo^elians of the Left had drifted, but also 
 of Others who have few points of sympathy with the 
 religious teaching of that school ; and its influence 
 may be traced in some of the later writings of Huxley 
 himself. From this point of view the teachings of 
 natural science will be regarded as summed up in 
 naturalism ; but, at the same time, a severe and lofty 
 standard of ethical value will be maintained, from 
 which the ways of the universe itself may be judged. 
 Science may teach us the painful road to the end in 
 which, after millennia of misery, conscious life is fated 
 to disappear. But the process may be looked at from 
 another point of view as well ; and man's consciousness 
 of the eternal validity of ethical values will vindicate 
 his superiority to that natural process of which he is, 
 nevertheless, simply an inexplicable product. For this 
 way of thinking there are really two worlds having 
 nothinof in common with one another — the actual world 
 of nature and the world of values. Yet these two 
 worlds meet in the mind of man. The idea of one of 
 them is framed to account for his experience 'in sense- 
 perception ; the idea of the other to systematise his 
 judgments of good and evil. But explanation fails of 
 the mind in which they are united. It is a product or 
 by-product of the world of nature, and ihat is a 
 mystery. It has also insight into the altogether diverse 
 realm ui values, and that is a greater mystery. 
 
 Were we reduced in principle to this way of looking 
 at life — were existence and value unrelated or related 
 onlv by opposition — there would be no philosophy of 
 reality as a whole; our thought would fall iiU" two 
 
 Idealism and Religion 
 
 483 
 
 disconnected and incongruous sections. Ideals and 
 values would be capable of being cherished only by 
 men turning their minds away from science ; for those 
 who held to science, only a naturalistic explanation 
 would be possible of the ideals which give dignity to 
 human life. The mind can be relieved of the obsession 
 of naturalism only by the discovery that it is not 
 involved in the principles or conclusions of natural 
 science : that the real world does not consist of an 
 aimless dance of electrons or corpuscles, and that mind 
 or spirit is a more fundamental realiix than they. A 
 formal refutation of naturalism has not been attempted 
 in these lectures. That has been done elsewhere and 
 by others'. But the assumed opposition between the 
 world of nature and the moral order has been already 
 dealt with ; and it has been shown to involve a twofold 
 defect. It rests on a view of nature from which the 
 conception of purpose is without adequate reason ex- 
 cluded, and its view of the moral order is apt to be 
 summed up in a narrow interpretation ol inoi\i! \ ahies. 
 The view of life which recognises the importance 
 of the moral values, and the experience which acknow- 
 ledges them and relies 011 iiirjr persistr^nre, are thus 
 bound up with a philosophy in which naturalism is 
 negated, and therefore with some lurni ol idealism. 
 But idealism is a word of many meanings, and in- 
 deed, in the history of speculation, idealistic theories 
 have not ni.iiiiiaiiKTl the ir iinitv of type tf^ the same 
 extent as materialism or naturalism has done. In the 
 origmal nieaiung of the teiin, ulealihtn i^ liic ihr^^xy 
 
 ' See especially J. Ward, Naturalism and Agnosticism, 4th ed. 
 (1915)- 
 
 31—2 
 
484 
 
 The Idea of God 
 
 that reality consists of ideas or universals, which are 
 not themselves thoughts but the objects of thought. 
 Among these ideas or universals, the great idealists 
 from Plato onwards have always recognised those 
 values on which our minds set store, and the nature of 
 which has been already investigated — such ideals as 
 those of goodness, truth, and beauty. These, it is held, 
 are the true realities and as such must persist eternally. 
 The eternal validity of the ideas may have nothing to 
 do with their realisation in consciousness. But at any 
 rate they are somehow present in our consciousness 
 here and now; and it is surely something to know that 
 the values which we cherish have a validity which is 
 independent of their inadequate realisation in the w^orld 
 or recognition by its inhabitants. The mind is com- 
 forted by the assurance that ''though 1 perish truth 
 
 IS so. 
 
 Further, in the great historical systems of this form 
 of idealism, beginning with Plato himself, mind is not 
 left out of account in the final view of things. By way 
 of the ideas a synthesis is reached which combines all 
 that is real and which can be best described by the 
 term consciousness or experience. This individual 
 whole which comprises all reality may therefore be 
 described ab Infinite Mind. Herein the ideals which 
 give dignity and worth to finite lives are eternally 
 real. 1 1 we live in the light of these ideals we shall 
 rise above the petty cares of our own, or other finite 
 selves ; we shall cease to grumble at the events of our 
 world -that curiously distorted appearance of reality — 
 and, by high acquiescence in the eternal order, we shall 
 attain that intellectual love of God' in which Spinoza 
 
 The World of Values 
 
 485 
 
 placed our blessedness and freedom. In this way this 
 first form of idealism frequently finds expression in a 
 pantheistic world-view. 
 
 On the other hand the second, or as it may be 
 called Berkeleyan. form of idealism starts from a plural- 
 istic point of view. It does not attem[)t to construct 
 reality out of universals ur ideas, li begins with the 
 certainty of individual or finite minds — different centres 
 of conscious life — as our first clue to the naiurc of 
 reality and of value, and proceeds to construct its system 
 of the universe on that basis. If it reaches a theistic 
 conclusion, its idea of God will not be the idea of 
 a system of universals but that of a conscious spirit 
 w^ho can be ui ^onie deg^ree understood tliroiiorh the 
 analogy of finite mind. The finite mind is thus of 
 vastly more significance in liiib form of idealism iiiaii 
 in the other — for which indeed it always remains a 
 puzzle. The theory maintains the reality of the finite 
 self in wliicli \'alues are progressively apprehended and 
 realised ; and its doctrine of God supports the faith 
 that values will be conserved in the worM of ^'in- 
 experience and in the consciousness of indixidual 
 minds, while, at the same linic, it show^ the unit) aiid 
 purpose that belong to the course of tlir world and to 
 the life of man. 
 
 The view at which the argument of this work has 
 arrived is an idealism of this latter t\-pe. It recognises 
 the real world of persons as charged with the dis- 
 covery and rralisatioM oi values, and it inter|)rcts the 
 apparatus of life and its environment as subordinated 
 to this supreme purpose. Its characteristic is that it 
 
486 
 
 The Idea of God 
 
 maintains the reality both of God and of man in its 
 conception of the universe ; and, just on this account, 
 the conception has its own difficulties. The reality of 
 the finite mind seems threatened by the assertion of 
 an infinite mind, and the truth of this assertion seems 
 shaken by any vestip^e of spontaneity being left to the 
 finite: so ii aid i:^ it (as has been said) to find room for 
 both God and man in the same universe. \)\\ ihe other 
 hand, the theor\ w hich identifies God with the universe 
 seems to engulf all difficulties — may we not say all 
 contradictions .>— in one all-inclusive reality. What 
 idea can \V( form of God which can be held without 
 contradiction an.i without denying the reality of the 
 individual life ui which we are conscious ? 
 
 To answer this question we must recall the way in 
 which the idea uf God has been reached, li ha:, been 
 arrived at by means of an enquiry into ethical values 
 and their relation to the realm of existence. Within 
 the content of realitv as a whole a distinction may be 
 drawn between liigher and lower, more or less com- 
 plete or perfect manifestations of reality. The distinc- 
 tion is expressed in the old t oncept of the scale of 
 being: dt present ii is nnore familiar lo us as the dis- 
 tinction I)ctween degrees of reality. \\ we attempt to 
 draw out a scale or degrees of this kind the moral 
 order or moral law may be placed at the summit, and 
 a direct inference may be made to God as the con- 
 ^>ciuu^. ground of this mora! order. The aro-ument in 
 this form is well known ; but I h<i\ e not relied upon 
 it. chielly tor one reason in particular. If th'- moral 
 order by itself is made to involve the idea of God, then 
 this idea is apt to have for its content simply the mural 
 
 Mind as the Ground of Reality 487 
 
 order ; and we find that all we have done is to give 
 the moral order a new name and not to have estab- 
 lished the reality of a living self-conscious being as the 
 ground of the universe. My argument accordingly 
 had a wider range, h was founded not on the moral 
 order by itself but on its relation to the order of exist- 
 ing things. Since existence and value belong to the 
 same universe they must liave the same ultimate 
 ground. The order of natu-re and of finite minds, as 
 we know them, do not, however, manifest ethical 
 values with any exactness or purity ; in their existing 
 nature they are out of harmony with the moral urdcr. 
 But harmoiiy may be reached if it is allowable to 
 assume purpose in the world and freedom in inan. 
 Nature can then be regarded as an appropriate medium 
 f ^r the realisation of value by minds finite but free. 
 The h< union) i^ a relation which stands in need of 
 realisation : and the purpose of realising it requires 
 consciousness in the ground of reality as a whole. 
 1 Ins ground or jirinciple of reality will therefore involve 
 the will to goodness as well as intelligence and puwer ; 
 and this is what we mean by God. 
 
 But the very reasons which require us to assume 
 conscious mind as the ultimate ground of realit\ lead 
 to c(a-tain difficulties of a metaphysical kind. The 
 harmony which the divine purpose slowl)- brings about 
 is not aclu'eved at any moment in our experience. In 
 any period of time such as the present and the past, the 
 world ol nature appears alien to this purpose, and its 
 characteristics cannot be regarded as simply a mani- 
 festation of the divine, while the actions of conscicxrs 
 beings include evil volitions for which we shall in vain 
 
 
488 
 
 The Idea of God 
 
 seek an explanation in the nature of the Divine Will 
 which is a will to goodness, and they are attributed to 
 finite beings who thus have somehow the power of 
 antagonising the infinite being. The realms of nature 
 and finite mind seem to limit the infinity and absolute- 
 ness of God, and the existence of evil seems incon- 
 sistent with his omnipotence. Is any solution possible 
 of this ancient problem ? 
 
 In the first place, as regards infinity. We have 
 reached the idea of the principle or ground of all 
 reality as spiritual, and this principle we call God. In 
 what meaning of the term shall we say that God is 
 mfinite .^ The theory of infinity has been elaborated 
 by mathematicians, rmd they have arrived at a defini- 
 tion which may be expressed as follows : A class or 
 group or assemblage ui elements is infinite if it has a 
 part to which the whole is equivalent in the sense that 
 between ihe elemeutb cuinposing that part and those 
 composing the whole there subsists a unique and re- 
 ciprocal (one-to-one) correspondence ^ This definition 
 IS derived from tin tlieory of cardinal numbers and~ is 
 best illustrated by them. Thus the class of all imite 
 
 numbers except o is a part <y 
 
 111*/ ( 
 
 lass of all finite 
 
 numbers (including o), and has this one-to-one corre- 
 spondence with it, seeing that it can be obtained by 
 adding- i to each of the terms nf tb.c latter. Tlie latter 
 class is infinite ; and in the same way the former class 
 
 also may be shown to be infniite. On the othei- hand, 
 
 ' This popular statement is taken, with a slight variation of 
 phrase, from C. J. Kcyser, The Human Worth of Rigorous Thinking 
 (1916), p. 148; it agrees with the statement in Russell, Principles of 
 Mathematics, vol. i, p. 121. 
 
 Infinity as applied to God 
 
 489 
 
 this correspondence will not hold between a finite 
 number and any of its parts, for example, between the 
 class of all finite numbers up to n {11 itself being finite) 
 and the class consisting of the same numbers except o. 
 There are two reasons wh^- we should hesitate to 
 apply the term infinite as thus defined to God. In the 
 first place, the definition iinplies the leo-jtimaxv nf the 
 conceptions of a least infinite and of greater infinites\ 
 and therefore cannot express what is distinAti\(/ of the 
 divine essence. And in the second place, it is founded 
 on the conception of a class or assemblage Avhicii con- 
 sists of parts, so that, aliliough it mav ])e valid for 
 number, space, and time, it does not follow thai it is 
 applicable to God, for we do not conceive him as 
 consisting of parts. God is indeed spoken of as omni- 
 present and everlasting— concepts which seem to inij)ly 
 infinity in space and m time. But if God is truly 
 spiritual, we shall not regard him as either in .^pace or 
 m tune. By his omnipresence we shall mean that there 
 is no part of space beyond his power; he is everlasting 
 because that power reaches tliroughout all titne. It is 
 illegitimate to extend to him as spirit the characteristics 
 which belong to space and time, any more than those 
 which belong to matter. 
 
 The term infinite, as applied to God, must there- 
 fore have a difierent meaning from the mathematical, 
 and yet not different in every respect. Beyond any 
 finite number in a series there lie other numbers of 
 the same class; a finite number ;/ has always another 
 number ;/-f t greater than it and yet of the same class. 
 But an nihnite number is a number concernino- which 
 
 ^ Russell, op. cit., p. 122. 
 
490 
 
 The Idea of God 
 
 this does not hold : there may be greater infinites, but 
 they do not belong to the same class — are not con- 
 stituted in the same way. Similar truths hold of spatial 
 and temporal infinites. With regard to these features 
 of the mathematical infinite, we may use Spinoza's 
 expression and say that a thing is finite after its kind 
 when it cwn be iiniited by another thing of ilie same 
 nature. When it cannot be so limited it is infinite after 
 its kind. Now. in this meaning of infinite, the term 
 will be applicable to God. There is nothing else of the 
 same nature Ij) whicli he is limited. And we may even 
 use the term absolutely infinite to describe his nature 
 — not necessaril) iri Spinoza's way as implying an 
 infinity of attributes each infinite in iis kind, but as 
 signifying that there is nothing else of whatever nature 
 by which he is limited. 
 
 This, we must remember, gives us only a negative 
 definition ^A infinite; but, although negative, the charac- 
 teristic of freedom from limitation is not therefore 
 insignificant. We may still ask, however, whether even 
 this negative characteristic can rightly be applied lu 
 God— wliether for instance his power is not limited by 
 intidcLcible material or b> the antagonisms of finite 
 beings. Both in popular religions and in the views of 
 some thinkers, there nidy be found the idea of a mind 
 or power which is the highest or supreme being in the 
 universe, at the same time that the power of this being 
 is conceived -is limited, either by a material world which 
 exists independendy or by other finite minds who hold 
 their existence by independent right and, although 
 inferior to the highest, have an indix idnalitv of tlie 
 same order. The former view has been rejected by us 
 
 God and Finite Minds 
 
 491 
 
 as failing to treat the universe as a universe, the latter 
 because, although the universal order is recognised, it 
 is not acknowledged as being based upon the reality of 
 the one supreme mind. We may accordingly, at the 
 present stage, pass these v^ews by, and ask whether, m 
 the meaning given to 'infinite,' infinite power can be 
 predicated of the one Sujireme Mind on whicii l)nt]i 
 the moral and the natural orders depend. 
 
 For the view which has been worked out concernino- 
 the relation of nature and finite minds to the moral 
 order, a solution of the question is possible, and it is a 
 solution which may be said to depend on the definition 
 of infinity. If by infinity we mean that what is so 
 called cannot be limited by anything even by its own 
 nature or volition, then it is not possible for us to 
 apply the term to God : for we liave aiknved the 
 possibility of finite minds acting counter to the divine 
 purpose, and nature in ii^ actual appearance has not 
 been regarded as a perfectly clear revelation of tlie 
 divine attributes. But on any view, however com- 
 pletely determinist, will not the same conclusion hold? 
 The infinite is somehow manifested iri finite beings. 
 Even if the finite be explained as illusion, it is an 
 illusion of a being which, being under illusion, must be 
 finite. The most coherent system of the unity of ail 
 iliings, such as Spinoza's, is never able to explain how 
 there comes to be a finite world at all. or liow its 
 recdiiy can be reconciled witli the reality of the One 
 Substance. I n i )roducing finite beings, or in manifesting 
 itself in such appearances, their source or originating 
 principle must be determined either by something 
 outside itself or else simply by its own nature. The 
 
492 The Idea of God 
 
 former alternative is impossible on any theory of the 
 unity of all reality ; the latter means self-limitation. 
 Appearance in finite form means limitation of the 
 infinite, and that limitation can only be due to the 
 infinite's own nature or agency. To deny the power of 
 the infinite thus to limit itself is to deny the infinity of 
 its power, and besides is to render the existence of the 
 finite impossible. Ami to allow thai tlic nifinite can by 
 self-limitation manifest itself in or produce fniite beings, 
 but at the same time to deny its power lu create free 
 minds as distinct from minds whose future is deter- 
 mined from the beginning, seems an arbitrary limita- 
 tion of the divine power. Omnipotence, it would seem, 
 is iiui inconsistent with human freedom ; on the con- 
 trarv to denv the possibility of creating beings who are 
 both finite and free is to restrict the power of the 
 infinite being anvi ilius to render it finite. 
 
 It we mean by infinite that which is not limited by 
 anvthine other than its uwn nature, then self-limitation 
 is within the power of the infinite. There is no incon- 
 sistency of thought in our conceiving finite beings as 
 created by the infinite being and endowed by h'm with 
 any powers not conflicting with their dependence on 
 hir.i. Ihe same view <4 infinity enables us lu answer 
 certain more or less frivolous puzzles, such as the 
 questions, Can. God make two and two equal to five ? 
 or virtuf the same thing as vice ? We may reply that 
 to dio these things is iioi in. accordance w iili tlic nature 
 of the omnipotent b(/ing. For irutli aPid goodness 
 belong to his nature, and his action cannot be con- 
 ceived as contrar\- to tiiai nature. His intiiiil)' con^^i^^ts 
 in. liis freedom from limitation 1)V anvtliinc;- othor than 
 
 God and the Absolute 
 
 493 
 
 himself; it does not consist in an inability to manifest 
 his own nature, or in some imagined power of acting 
 contrary to his nature \ 
 
 The explanation of the term absolute as applied to 
 God will follow similar lines to those on which the 
 term infinite and its application have been justified. 
 As already said, if by the absolute is meant the sum- 
 total of reality, then it must be allowed that there are 
 real events and real beings which do not in their 
 present state manifest the divine nature. But there is 
 nothing outside God in the sense of being independent 
 of his nature or will. W iihoLii liis concurrence, as it 
 used to be put, there would be no finite activity and no 
 finite beings to act. The independence of finite beings 
 is a communicated and limited independence, their 
 spontaneity a restricted spontaneity : they are due to 
 the divine will and do not exi^t in spite of it. li is to 
 limit the power of the divine nature, if we make this 
 con.nnunication of reality and power impossible for it. 
 And we must remember that, on the most rigid theory 
 of the Absolute, the diversity of its appearances must 
 be admitted — even by those who regard them as only 
 the appearances of diversity. 
 
 Taken literally, the term absolute implies freedom 
 from 1 clations ; and obviously the sum-total of all 
 reality cannot stand in rolition to other things, for 
 there are no other things to which it could be related. 
 But, while external relations are impossible, the same 
 
 ^ "The notion of a sort of antecedent logical fate determining all 
 subsequent existence is psychologically explicable as the result — not 
 of the supremacy of our reason — but of the limits of our imagina- 
 tion." — Ward, Realm of Ends, p. 227. 
 
494 
 
 The Idea of God 
 
 does not hold of internal relations. Reality as a whole 
 must include all relations within itself. Only by giving 
 up the reality of both things and relations can this pro- 
 position be denied. On the monistic scheme the one 
 and all may fitly be termed the Absolute, seeing that 
 all things and all relations belong to its nature. But 
 the application ui ilic Lcrin i.^ inure duubUui uii the 
 theistic \ lew of tlic world. It is of tlie essence of tlieisni 
 that God hcis, b) ilie process whicli we inadequately 
 term Cnvition, q^iven an f^xistonce to finite beings such 
 that thev mav be said to stand in relation to him — as 
 his crcatun^s. as (loin- iiis will, as alienated {roni or 
 reconciled to him. or in other ways. All these are 
 relations between Ciud aiui otiier being.^ wlio ha\e a 
 status such that thev must be re^rarded as other tlian 
 he. The staiiL^ is noi one of complete inde])endence, 
 because it is itself a manifestation of the di\ ine activity. 
 But it does involve a relation in which (lod is one 
 term ami finite being the oUkt term, so that 'absolute' 
 (at least in its literal meaning) would appear to l)e a 
 misleading adjective to .ipplv to God. The fujness ot 
 \\\> nature makes possible the existence of finite beings 
 v.lio are other than himself, and with whom he can 
 enter into relation. 
 
 The per[)lexities connected with the ideas of in- 
 finitv and absoluteness are inevitable for any explana- 
 tion ()f the relation between finite beings and the 
 ground of reality as a whole, though they appear in 
 their most pointed form in elucidating the doctrine of 
 ethical theism. Here they are part of the difficulty of 
 conceivincr the co-existence and co-activity of God and 
 
 Tlie Divine Attributes 
 
 495 
 
 man in the same universe. They are problems of form, 
 however, rather than of content, and their solution 
 does not supply us with a positive idea of God. This 
 positive idea has to be arrived at from the nature of 
 reality as known to us — the reality which is interpreted 
 through the idea of God. Reality, as we have found, 
 includes certain values of which we have a more ur 
 less adequate apprehension ; and the realm of nature, 
 or of causation, can be interpreted as belonging to the 
 same tniixerse as the realm of values onlv l)y regarding 
 it as instrumental towards the discovery and produc- 
 tion of values by finite minds. On this \-iew the idea 
 of the ground of reality, or God, is reached through 
 the idea of value. Here therefore the idea of value is 
 fundamental. Even tiie attributes of intelligence and 
 power (although postulated on other grounds also) 
 will, from this point of view, l)e held to belonof to the 
 divine nature because of their im})lication in the idea 
 of value cuid tlieir necessitv lor its realisation. The 
 term perfection., which means value or worth at its 
 highest point, is therefore more appropriate in speaking 
 of God. and more significant of his positive nattn-e, than 
 either the term infinite or the term absolute. 
 
 It we conceive God as simpK- infinite beine, then 
 our idea ot him is reached bv the denial of a charac- 
 teristic ot finite beings ; and we have only a negative 
 idea ot (lod. But if we conceive him as the perfect 
 being, our idea is positive, it means that certain quali- 
 ties known to us are present in him in their fulness. 
 \ o this line of argument also objections have been 
 taken. Just as the idea of God as infinite is a negative 
 idea got by denying the limitations of existing beings, 
 
4q6 
 
 TIic Idea oj Co 
 
 / 
 
 1 1 
 
 so it has been argued that the positive k1( a of God as 
 pcrtcct is fniinded upon the observation of certain 
 
 qualities actuaily belonging to linite persons ; so that 
 the whole procedure, in the first place, is anthropo- 
 morphic, an inference from man to ( lod, and m the 
 second place, so f^ir as it has any validitv at all, is on1v 
 analogical, while the difference between God and man 
 is so ^'-reat that the validity of any ;inalogy nni.^t be ot 
 
 the slightest. 
 
 A short consideration ni tiiese objections will bring 
 out the true nature of the idea. Our idea of God is 
 nroporlv called cunhropoinorphic when it is arrived at 
 by an inference from or modification of human quali- 
 ties, in this wax \\ the reasoner starts from the power, 
 goodness, and intelligence of man and argues that God 
 must therefore be powerful, good, and intelligent, only 
 in a higher perhaps an mfinite degree, then the pro- 
 cedure is anthropomorphic, and we may say that man 
 is makin- God after his own image. There may be 
 apologies tor tins procedure, for at least it i^ tnn- tnat 
 there is \\k} higher object immediately known to man 
 than the human min-l. and it i^ therefore more reason- 
 able to hold that God is like man than that he resembles 
 other created ilungs. Btit it i^. not th<- procedure 
 that has been adopted in this book. We have not 
 argued tliat God is good because we find goodness in 
 man. but tinit he is good because we find the idea f^f 
 o-oodnesr. Lo be valiil for tliat universal order which we 
 are trying to understand. Anil we speak ol his wisdom 
 and his power, not because man has some share ot 
 these quaaities. l)Ut Ix-CcUise they are implied in tliat 
 conception of the world as purposive which is neces- 
 
 rhc I lace of A iialogy 497 
 
 sar\ to rwjdain the relation of the order of nattire to 
 the moral order, ddiis method of argument is not 
 anthropomorphic, any more than are arguments con- 
 cerning cau.sal processes or mathematical relations. 
 The latter depend on onr apprehension of certain 
 o.bjective connexions just as the former proceed from 
 otir ideas of objective moral values. The knowled^'e in 
 both cases is due to our power of knowing, but this does 
 not make it anthrojjomorphic, for it is a knowled(>-e 
 of relations and of \alues whose validity is independent 
 of their manifestation in human beings. 
 
 ])Ut when we tr\- to understand the wav in which 
 goodness or wisdom or power is possessed by God, we 
 are dependent upon our knowledge of the manifesta- 
 tion of these qualities in finite persons. To this extent 
 our knowledge of the divine attributes rests upon our 
 knowledge of human qualities. From knowledo-e of 
 the latter we get some indication of the way in which 
 moral and other values belong to personalitv ; while 
 their connexion with the limitations of human ]3er- 
 sonality marks off the features which are |)eculi<u- to 
 their realisation in man. Alan is a spiritual being. l)Lit 
 he is a spirit immersed in matter, restricted in time 
 and space, and sensuous as 'well as spiritual. Unman 
 virtues are the excellences of a l)eing with this double 
 nature; sensuous in his impulses, spiritual in the ideals 
 which are open to him. The moral value which the 
 virtue expresses may have a more or less close con- 
 nexion with the sensuous basis of man's character, and 
 the virtue accordingly may be less or more akin to the 
 realisation ot the same value in a being who is purely 
 spiritual and therefore not subject to the restrictions of 
 
 s. c. L. 
 
 3~ 
 
498 
 
 The Idea of God 
 
 a sensuous and material nature. Courage, for instance, 
 and temperance are human virtues which we cannot 
 attribute in 'iiniliiiiL; like thiir liunKui lonu lo the 
 divine ii iture, for they postulate obstacles on the part 
 of sense or ot inii>uL^c lu moral performance. The 
 meaning- of ib.^'sc xirtiies lies mainly in thr- rontrol of 
 uiiriily Je:.Irc.^ or impulses. In other virtues the factor 
 \:S positive wortli is more prominent, and ilicy can be 
 
 unJur.^lood without reference to ilic rc-tnc 
 
 tions of their 
 
 human embodiment. This is most true in the case of 
 wisdom and of love, which express the fundamental 
 
 iluirncteristics of the values of iruili and of goodness. 
 
 Even liere the inference fmni the human n^ani- 
 festatiou to the divine is limited by the analogy of the 
 spirit of man to the spirit of God. W i dom regarded 
 as a divine attribute, does not imply the human method 
 of knowledge with its precarious adx.uuc Irom nI -i) to 
 step aiul it^. restricted range. But it does involve all 
 knowledge, though the method ui divine apprehension 
 will differ from tli< human. All truth must be God's, 
 as has been said, intuitively or without ilie discursive 
 process In which the human understandmi; ni^^ilv 
 works: su thut trutli nn.iy be said to belong to his 
 nature, whereas for man it i^ something to be attained. 
 Something similar holds true wlitii w( -peak of the 
 lovp of God. \\\ uionilists luvc ha.^ been regarded as 
 the crowning feature ol the virtuous life, and theo- 
 logians have reached no iiiure profound definition than 
 that God i:. love. Can it be said that tho two qualities 
 
 the liumaii love and the divine — are only connected 
 
 by an uncertain analogy 't li is true that love, as used 
 <A God, does nut connote all that it liabitually does in 
 
 The Love of God 499 
 
 its human manifestations, while on the other hand ;t 
 must at the same time connote much more. Ikit it does 
 in both cases mean the will to the good of others and 
 the will to communion witii them. The good which 
 love seeks is not ui either case mereh li ipiHiies.^, but 
 rather in the first place the realisation in each person 
 of the values of which he is capable. And th.e eum- 
 munion whirh ]ove sc^oks will bc^ facilitated by a;>Tee- 
 ment as to the values most cherished. Love is possible 
 as a one-sided relation only; but iiie communion in 
 which it finds satisfaction is a reciprocal relation. 
 Communion witii God i.^ therefore possible uiiK wiien 
 man's nature is purged frnni lower desires and his 
 affections set on the things that are mure excellent. 
 Only the pure in heart can see God and hold com- 
 munion with him. Thus the love of God is a will to 
 the good of men w liiuii has as its (myX tlie communion 
 of man with God, and it is manifested uu the secular 
 process whereby the soul i^ turned irum things of 
 sense to spiritual interests and is thus fitted for citizen- 
 ship in the kingdom of God. 
 
 It is in the light of the idea of God, as thus sketched, 
 that we mubt seek to understand the co-acti\ it\ ol" God 
 and man in. tlic world. The world has been spoken of 
 as revealing a divine purpose, and man, who is also 
 purposeful, has been regarded as working out or oppos- 
 ing that purpose. How fiir is 'purpose' used in tiie 
 same sense when we thus brino- th,,- di\'ine and the 
 human together? For an\ hmte nund, ami iu .i\\\ 
 limited system, the j)ur|)ose im|)lies an end which is 
 outside the actual process; the idea of tlie en^d deter- 
 
 32—3 
 
498 
 
 The Idea of God 
 
 The Love of God 
 
 
 a sensuous and material nature. Courage, for instance, 
 and temperance are human virtues which we cannot 
 
 attribute in ;L!i\thing Hke their hiimrin form to the 
 divine nature, for they postulate obstacles on the part 
 of sense or of iiri[)iil^e lo moral iK^riurmance. 'i he 
 meanini; of those virtio-s lies iiKiiiiK" in the control of 
 unrulv desires or impulses. In other \irtues the factor 
 of positive worth is more prominent, and tliry can be 
 understood without reference to the restrictions of their 
 human embodiment. Idiis is most true in the case of 
 wisdom and of love, which express the fundamental 
 characteristics of the vahies of truth and of goodness. 
 
 Even here the inference from the human mani- 
 festation to the divine is limited by the analogy of the 
 spirit of man to the spirit of God. Wisdom, regarded 
 as a divine attribute, does not imply the human method 
 of knowledge with its precarious advance from step to 
 step and its restricted range. But it does involve all 
 knowledge, though the method of divine apprehension 
 will differ from the human. All truth must be God's, 
 as has been said, intuitively or without the discursive 
 process by which the human understanding mostly 
 works : so that truth may be said to belong to his 
 nature, whereas for man it is something to be attained. 
 Something similar holds true when we speak of the 
 love of God. By moralists love has been regarded as 
 the crowning feature of the virtuous life, and theo- 
 logians have reached no more profound definition than 
 that God is love. Can it be said that the two qualities 
 — the human love and the divine — are only connected 
 bv an unceitain anaioo^v ? It is true that love, as used 
 of God, does not connote all that it habitually does in 
 
 
 % 
 
 r 
 
 ( 
 
 its human manifestations, while on the other liaii I it 
 must at the same time connote much more. IJui it does 
 in both cases mean the will to the eood of others and 
 the will to communion with them. The eood which 
 love seeks is not \\\ eitiier case mere]\- fiappiness, but 
 rather in the first place the realisation in each person 
 of the \alues ol which he is capable. And the com- 
 munion which love seeks will be facilitated by agree- 
 ment as to the values most cherished. Love is possible 
 as a one-sided relation only ; but the communion in 
 which it finds satisfaction is a reciprocal relation, 
 Conmumion with God is therefore possible only when 
 man's nature is purged from lower desires and his 
 aftections set on the thing's that are more excellent. 
 Onl)- the pure in heart can see God and hold com- 
 munion with him. Thus the love of God is a will to 
 the good of men which has as its end the communion 
 of man with God, and it is manifested in the secular 
 process wherebv the soul is turned from thino's of 
 sense to spiritual interests and is thus fitted for citizen- 
 ship in the kingdom of God. 
 
 It is in the light of the idea of God, as thus sketched, 
 that we must seek to understand the co-activity of God 
 and man in the world. The world has been spoken of 
 as revealing a divine purpose, and man, who is also 
 purposeful, has been regarded as working out or oppos- 
 ing that purpose. How far is 'purpose' used in the 
 same sense when we thus bring the divine and the 
 human together .^ Fc.* any finite mind, and in anv 
 limited system, the purpose implies an end which is 
 outside the actual process ; the idea of the end deter- 
 
 j^J 
 
I 
 
 500 
 
 The Idea of God 
 
 Divine and Hitman Agency 
 
 501 
 
 mines the conscious activity ; but the end itself Hes 
 beyond the action, at the close of the temporal process. 
 Now, reality as a whole can have nothing outside it, 
 its purpose must be within itself ; and of reality as 
 a whole God is the ground or reason, so that his pur- 
 pose and activity cannot be limited by time or space. 
 Thus conceived, the divine purpose must be held to be 
 free from that distinction between means and attain- 
 ment which characterises finite purposes. Two marks, 
 however, remain which are common to purpose in both 
 its kinds. The first of these is consciousness : the pur- 
 pose implies insight and determination by reason or 
 wisdom. The second is value ; the whole is somehow 
 good, either goodness realised or goodness sought. In 
 the practical life of morality this good has to be striven 
 for bv continuous effort and is achieved onlv bv succes- 
 sive approximations. In this respect, therefore, human 
 and divine purpose are differentiated. But even in 
 human life there are experiences in which this limita- 
 tion is less obtrusive than it is in morality. In contem- 
 plation and in artistic enjoyment the temporal element 
 may almost disappear from consciousness, so that these 
 kinds of life have often seemed to the philosopher or 
 to the artist to approach most nearly to the divined 
 Perhaps we can have no better analogue of the eternal 
 
 life. 
 
 In this way the human consciousness may be 
 regarded as in touch with the divine. On the other 
 hand the divine purpose, although conceived in this 
 
 ^ See a symposium on 'Pur[)ose and Mt-chanism,' JVchredi?igs of 
 the Aristotelian Society^ 191 2, especially pp. 251-5 : cp. also abovc^ 
 p. 398. 
 
 i 
 
 way as in itself free from time and change, cannot be 
 shut off from the process in which it receives temporal 
 fulfilment. This temporal process is in some way its 
 manifestation. Creation, emanation, reproduction, ap- 
 pearance are terms which have been used to indicate 
 the nature of this manifestation. None of them eives 
 any explanation of the origin of the finite from the 
 infinite, or can claim to be more than a metaphor. 
 Behind them, and unanswered by them, lies the ques- 
 tion of the way in which we are to conceive the divine 
 purpose as working. Do the decrees of God determine 
 from eternity all that each man does and attains.'^ Does 
 the divine nature draw after it as a necessary con- 
 sequence the whole history of the world ? Does it 
 reproduce itself by an inevitable process in each 
 temporal event ? The question is put in different 
 ways, but it has seemed to many thinkers that, how- 
 ever put, the answer must be the same. Whether they 
 have preferred to speak of creation, or of emanation, 
 or of appearance, the conce^pt of causation has ruled 
 their thought. No room has been left for the freedom 
 of the finite ; ultimately, all activity has been referred 
 to God, or to the fundamental reality, however named. 
 The relation of divine and human agency, therefore, 
 no longer presents any problem, for human activity is 
 explained as merely a necessary consequence of the 
 divine nature or divine decree. 
 
 A real problem arises when we recognise that 
 finite spirits are not merely reproductions of the divine 
 activity but themselves genuinely purposeful' and active. 
 God is contemplated as communicating freedom to 
 men that they may attain the values which only free 
 
502 
 
 TJie Idea of God 
 
 beings can realise and enjoy. Men are free to work 
 out their purposes, and, at the same time, there is 
 a divine purpose in the world which human history 
 fulfils and to which the environment of nature is sub- 
 ordinate. Here God and man meet. The divine purpose 
 is that values should be realised in man's nature, and 
 it can be attained only by man making" this purpose 
 his own. Hence the possibility of co-operation and 
 also of conflict ; and throuo^h the latter arise the sense 
 of estrangement and need of atonement that mark the 
 rehVious consciousness. How is the airencv of l}oth 
 God and man to be conceived without an arbitrary 
 dualism which treats God as if he were simply one 
 member in a finite interaction .^ 
 
 One way of dealing with the difficulty would be to 
 mark off' separate spheres for the divine activity and the 
 human. And this often seems to be the purport of 
 traditional distinctions, such as that between the natural 
 and the supernatural, or between the realms of nature 
 and of grace. The whole region of common life — our 
 dealinors with nature and our ordinarv social relations — 
 would in this way be assigned to the guidance of man's 
 freewill ; but, beyond these, a region would be recognised 
 in which the human soul is in contact with the hiizhest. 
 In the presence of God he will be powerless — clay in 
 the hands of the potter, W'ho makes one vessel to 
 honour and another to dishonour. This is the realm 
 of grace ; and in it the divine spirit acts upon man 
 irresistibly, choosing him for sonship and training him 
 for communion with God, or else passing him by and 
 leaving him " to the freedom of his own will." But it is 
 not possible thus to split up man's life into two separate 
 
 Irresistible Grace 
 
 503 
 
 \ 
 
 I 
 
 regions. The ordinary affairs of common life are affected 
 by the deepest things of the spirit : the soul of man 
 is a unity, though its divine flame may burn feebly 
 in the earthly air. Even the theological ethics, w^hich 
 enforces the distinction between supernatural grace 
 and natural virtue, holds that that grace influences the 
 whole nature of man. Nor can we be content to 
 explain the unequal distribution of grace by a simple 
 appeal to the divine good pleasure, without any regard 
 to man's response. To do so would annul man's 
 freedom at the centre of his being. In meeting and 
 welcoming the divine grace man's spirit is not passive 
 but responsive ; and the divine influence coipes as a 
 gift and not by compulsion. ''Behold, I stand at the 
 door and knock \" said the Master. Entry is craved, 
 not forced. And there is a secret shrine prepared for 
 his advent : 
 
 This sanctuary of my soul 
 Unwitting I keep white and whole, 
 Unlatched and lit, if Thou should'st care 
 To enter or to tarry there. 
 
 Here accordingly the theological doctrine of irre- 
 sistible grace is relinquished. The spirit of God is 
 conceived as working in and through the spirit of man, 
 but in such a way as not to destroy human freedom. 
 So long as we regard the divine influence as a quasi- 
 mechanical force such a conception is impossible. But 
 it is no longer so when we apply to the problem the 
 idea of God as love. Love works through freedom. 
 Compulsion or threats interfere with freedom ; but in 
 
 ^ Rev. iii. 20 — quoted in this connexion by Professor Pringle- 
 Pattison, The Idea of God, p. 292. 
 
 
504 
 
 The Idea of God 
 
 love spirit appeals to spirit in virtue of their funda- 
 mental affinity. The soul may be immersed in routine 
 without thinking of the deeper things in life, or it may 
 assert its lower interests and remain deaf to the call of 
 God. But that call is to its essential nature and spiri- 
 tual destiny ; and, if the call is answered, the soul finds 
 its freedom in fulfilling the divine purpose. 
 
 i 
 
 \ 
 
 XX 
 
 THE LIMITS OF MORALITY 
 
 1 HE question formulated at the outset of our enquiry 
 was whether the facts of morality and ethical principles 
 have any bearing — and if so what bearing — on the idea 
 which we are justified in forming of ultimate reality. Is 
 it possible, it was asked, that we may find in what shotild 
 be a guide towards that which truly is .^ This question 
 has now been answered. But the argument has been 
 long, and it has entailed certain ethical discussions 
 which were perhaps of secondary importance. It may 
 be worth while, therefore, to take this opportunity of 
 looking back upon the line of thought that has been 
 traversed and of distinguishing the critical points in 
 the advance. Only these critical points need be men- 
 tioned ; and I will attempt, in a series of propositions, 
 to make clear the logical consecutiveness of the steps 
 which have led to the conclusion. 
 
 I. I begin with the distinction between knowledge 
 of the individual and knowledge of the universal. 
 Science — in the sense in which the term is commonly, 
 though not very correctly, used— is of the universal or 
 general; it is interested in the individual existent or 
 individual case only as illustrating or helping to prove 
 the general principle ; it terminates in laws or formulae ; 
 and its ideal is a science like mathematical physics. On 
 the other hand, history is concerned with the individual ; 
 
5o6 
 
 The Limits of Morality 
 
 it requires general concepts and universal principles, 
 but only as ancillary to its purpose; its ultimate interest 
 is in the individual not in the universal. Whenever 
 our true interest is to understand the individual — 
 whether the individual be a man, or a nation, or an 
 institution, or the solar or stellar system in its evolution 
 — our studv differs from science commonly so called, 
 however much it may be aided by universal principles 
 and abstract reasoning. In certain subjects the interest 
 is divided between the individual and the universal. 
 Geology and biology, for instance, are on the border- 
 line and incline to one side or the other according as 
 the interest of the enquirer is in the history of the earth 
 or of living beings, or in the general principles which 
 have determined their course. 
 
 Now, not only is man himself an individual, but ulti- 
 mate reality is an individual. Indeed it may be said that 
 nothing else has complete individuality. Of it there is 
 and can be no other example. But persons also have 
 individuality, though of a less complete kind, owing to 
 their uniqueness and to the consciousness which gives 
 each a beino- for himself. Material things, on the other 
 hand, have an individuality much less clearly marked, 
 and their arrangement as distinct units is largely 
 determined by human interests. Accordingly, notwith- 
 standing the abstract arguments which enter into 
 philosophy, its ultimate interest is in the individual. 
 
 2. In studying the individual — any individual — we 
 begin with a first apprehension of it as a whole; next, 
 we proceed to discriminate the different elements or 
 factors of this object (and here is the region of analysis) ; 
 then, with clearer knowledge of each factor, we attempt 
 
 Moral and Natural Orders 
 
 507 
 
 a synthesis; and, finally, we seek once more to see the 
 object as a whole — to grasp its unity again, but with 
 fuller information about its diverse features. Further, 
 in the case of any individual, we distinguish two funda- 
 mental aspects — in respect of one of which we describe 
 its properties, and trace the connexion of its parts with 
 one another and of the object as a whole with other 
 objects; while, in respect of the other aspect, we appre- 
 ciate the value of the individual, and sav that it has a 
 certain worth. It is convenient to speak of these two 
 aspects as that of causes and that of values. And it is 
 to be noted that it is the investiration of causes that 
 has led to the chief generalisations of physical and 
 natural science, and that it has thus tended to direct 
 interest towards the universal or general rather than 
 towards the individual with which it begins, whereas, 
 on the other hand, value resides in the concrete existent : 
 it beloni^s to the individual not to the law or creneral 
 concept. 
 
 3. The laws which determine value are not of the 
 same order as the laws which determine the causal or 
 other connexions of things and persons. It is con- 
 ceivable that a thinor niav be without value altogether, 
 but it has always causal connexions and can always be 
 described. And, in general, the value which we are in 
 the habit of ascribincr to material things is never value 
 in the strict sense, but only a means to value: in techni- 
 cal lano-uao-e, it is instrumental, not intrinsic. Intrinsic 
 values — at" any rate, intrinsic moral values — belong to 
 persons only. 
 
 4. These intrinsic values, however, are not less 
 objective, not less a part or aspect of reality, than the 
 
:d 
 
 08 
 
 T/ie Limits of Morality 
 
 qualities or the causal connexions which we ascribe to 
 things and persons. There are only two alternatives. 
 Either they are objective, or else they have no reality 
 outside the mind of the subject who affirms them. And 
 every argument which is relevant in support of the 
 latter alternative would be equally relevant to prove 
 that neither things nor their relations nor other persons 
 exist outside the mind of the subject who asserts that 
 they exist. The grounds for denying the objectivity of 
 morality are equally grounds for denying the objectivity 
 of knowledge. And as any argument with another per- 
 son implies the latter's personal existence and implies 
 also that arguer and argued-with are ' up against ' the 
 same world, it is legitimate to assume the objectivity 
 of knowledge and consequently at the same time the 
 objectivity of morality. 
 
 5. The enquiry was narrowed down to the moral 
 values and their bearing on philosophy, to the exclusion 
 of other values — to goodness rather than to truth and 
 beauty. Of moral values it clearly holds that it is in 
 persons that they are realised, not in mere things, and 
 that they belong to persons in as truly objective a 
 sense as any other characteristics belong to them. But 
 something more than this is true. It is not merely the 
 value actually realised in some one's conscious life that 
 must be held to belong to objective reality. In bringing 
 value into existence the individual person is conscious 
 of a standard or ideal which has validity as a guide for 
 his personal endeavour, or of an obligation which rests 
 upon him. The attainment of value is recognised as a 
 value only because of its conformity with this standard 
 or law of value, or because of its approximation to this 
 
 Divei'sities in the IVhole 
 
 509 
 
 ideal of value. It follows therefore that the value or 
 goodness actually achieved in personal liftj implies as 
 its ixi'ound or condition a standard or ideal of iroodness. 
 Accordingly, we are compelled to form the conception 
 of an ideal good or of a moral order, which, as the con- 
 dition of actualised croodness, must also be rerarded as 
 in some sense having objective reality. 
 
 6. The whole burden of the later portion of the 
 argument lies upon the way in which we are to 
 understand and explain this objectivity of the moral 
 ideal or moral order. The starting-point is that it is 
 not merely subjective — a figment of the imagination 
 or the understanding^ — but that it belono^s somehow 
 to the real or objective order in virtue of which the 
 world is what it is. Ultimate reality must include it, 
 and our view of ultimate reality must show what its 
 place is. By ultimate reality is not meant material 
 existents, or even the realm of persons, but that which 
 is the ground of everything that is real. A compre- 
 hensive view of this ultimate reality must include an 
 account of things and persons, laws, and values. If we 
 are unable to reach a view of it as a whole, then we 
 have attained no philosophy ; if we can reach such a 
 view, then we must be able to see how existino: beini^s 
 and the laws or orders of their behaviour on the one 
 side, and the realm of moral values on the other side, 
 harmonise so as together to make a unity. 
 
 7. ' Reality as a whole includes within it many dis- 
 tinctions : all diversity, we should rather say, is within 
 this whole. If we would understand its organic or system- 
 atic unitv, we must see how these diversities can be 
 reconciled in one whole. This involves many and 
 
5IO 
 
 TJie Limits of Morality 
 
 various problems. But the most fundamental of all 
 the distinctions which thought discloses is that between 
 the two aspects of reality already discriminated — that 
 of the connectedness of its parts, which we may call 
 the natural order or the realm of causation, and that of 
 the values which It contains, which we may call the 
 moral order or the realm of ends. 
 
 The chief problem, therefore, for any synoptic or 
 philosophical view of reality is the attainment of a point 
 of view from which we can regard these two aspects as 
 aspects of a whole. And the difficulty before which we 
 came to a halt in working out this problem is just that 
 fact upon which the most serious reflexion of all ages 
 has concentrated — the lack of congruity between the 
 natural order and the moral order. Their laws are 
 entirely different : causal connectedness on the one 
 hand, ideal valuation on the other. Their phenomenal 
 appearances diverge: a law which is indifferent to 
 morality produces effects of one kind ; the inexorable 
 categorical imperative requires action of another. Man, 
 in whom the two meet, seems in the grip of conflicting 
 powers, and unable to reconcile his allegiance to 
 both. 
 
 8. This problem, accordini>lv. mav be used as a test 
 for deciding between dift'erent philosophical theories of 
 reality. Such theories have often originated simply 
 from the endeax'oar to explain the world and man as 
 existing" facts. The \'arious fjrms of naturalism and of 
 Idealism are sometimes presented In this way ; morality 
 and value generally are left over as something conse- 
 quential, whose explanation Is to be found In theories 
 derived from a different order of phenomena. But moral 
 
 Attempts at Harmony 
 
 511 
 
 experience, and the moral order of which we are con- 
 scious, are part of the material which we have to take 
 into account before we have a right to accept any philo- 
 sophical theory or to adopt It as an adequate point of 
 view for the Interpretation of reality as a whole. If the 
 customary examination of such theories does not give a 
 clear decision of the philosophical problem, one reason 
 at least for this indecision is that the theories have been 
 based too exclusively upon the facts of physical and 
 psychical existence and have taken too little account of 
 the other aspect of our experience, that which has to do 
 with values. 
 
 Naturalistic theories w^ere barely mentioned In my 
 argument owing to their Inability even to explain law 
 In nature and the facts of psychical existence, as well 
 as because they are obliged to deny the objectivity of 
 moral and other values. But not naturalism only, but 
 also certain theories In which spiritual reality is affirmed, 
 were found unable to satisfy our test. Pluralism was 
 compelled to acknowledge an order of law and an order 
 of values which were inexplicable in a universe where 
 finite monads or selves alone are real. And those forms 
 of idealistic theory which accentuate the unity of the 
 world after the manner of monism or pantheism, were 
 seen to be Inadequate, and that for the express reason 
 that they give no tenable explanation of the existing 
 incongruity between the natural order and the moral 
 order. It was found that monism — in spite of its 
 emphasis on unity, and in spite of the appearance of 
 rigid demonstration which has been o^Iven to it — tended 
 In two opposite directions. On the one hand, it leaned 
 to naturalism and gave purely naturalistic explanations 
 
512 
 
 TJie IJniifs of Morality 
 
 of good and evil : on the other hand, everything became 
 absorbed in One, and for this mystic vision the world 
 and individual men with the values which they cherish 
 disappeared in illusion. In neither way was the monistic 
 doctrine of the all as one able to comprehend in its 
 view both the order of nature and the moral order, and 
 to find an explanation of the discrepancy which they 
 present to our experience. 
 
 9. In analysing the positive conditions of the 
 reconciliation of this discrepancy it was found that 
 these conditions were two. In the first place we must 
 be able to explain how it is that the persons, in whom 
 moral values have to be realised, do as a matter of fact 
 realise them so imperfectly and make such slow pro- 
 gress in their efforts to realise them. And, in the 
 second place, we should be able to show how it is 
 that the order of the world as a causal system displays 
 such apparent indifference to the standard of good and 
 evil. 
 
 The explanation of the former difficulty relied on 
 the postulate of individual freedom; and a defence of 
 that postulate was oftered. Freedom is essential for the 
 explanation which I offer. Fhe question is, How is it 
 that persons do not realise the moral order of the 
 universe ? and the answer is, that moral values can 
 be realised by free beings only : that freedom is neces- 
 sarv for croodness; that mere correctness of behaviour 
 is not a realisation of that high value of which man is 
 capable, which requires its free choice and attainment; 
 and that the world would be a less noble and worthy 
 event than it is if it did not contain the values which 
 can be realised only by free beings, and therefore can- 
 
 T/ie Thcistic Conclusion 
 
 5^3 
 
 not be purchased except by the gift which makes evil 
 possible as well as orood. 
 
 The second difficulty can be explained only by the 
 mterpretation of the world as a purposive system, and 
 this interpretation also was defended. We must postu- 
 late purpose in the wairld as well as freedom in man. 
 The world with its order of natural law cannot be 
 explained from its present appearance only: not only 
 Its justification but also its explanation depends upon 
 the final issue; and we must have regard to the ends 
 which it is adapted to serve. Its purpose cannot be to 
 make the world a fit environment for perfect beings: 
 it is not such, and there are no perfect beings on its 
 surlace. Nor can it be to return to each man the just 
 rewards of his deeds, for it does not fulfil this purpose. 
 But, even in its incongruities with the unchancrin^r moral 
 order, the world of nature may be regarded as a fit 
 medium for the fashioning and training of moral belno-s. 
 \\ e are led to acknowledge this purpose by recognising 
 that the moral order belongs to the order of reality; and 
 the manner of Its achievement is made intelligible by 
 the postulate of freedom. 
 
 10. With the recognition of this mode of harmon- 
 ising the order of nature with the moral order, it Is not 
 any longer possible to regard both orders or either as 
 merely unconscious law. The order of nature intends 
 a result which is not found at any particular stage in 
 the process of existence. It requires an idea of the pro- 
 cess as a whole and of the moral order to which nature 
 is being made subservient. It means therefore intelli- 
 gence and the will to good as well as the ultimate source 
 of power. In this way, the recognition of the moral 
 
 S. G. L. 
 
 
514 ' Tlie Limits of Morality 
 
 order, and of its relation to nature and man. inv.>lver. tlie 
 acknowledi^ment of the Supreme Mind or God as the 
 
 oTOiind ot all realitx". 
 
 Thi^ i. tho conclusion of the central argument 
 of this i)or.k It gives a point of view from which 
 reality max be interpreted without the incongruities 
 into which other theories fall ; and it succeeds in making 
 intelligible just those features of experience which it is 
 most difficult to combine into a harmonious view of the 
 whole. At the same time, as I have repeatedly admitted, 
 it does not solve all problems or remove all difficulties. 
 It does not explain each particular situation, or the 
 unique character of any particular person. Our know- 
 ledge of the details and of the issues of life is far too 
 meagre to admit of our having more than a general 
 principle of explanation. So far as the individual prob- 
 lem gets a solution at all, it is usually through the 
 religious faith of the individual person ; and there are 
 few things more venturesome, or more offensive, than 
 the attempt of any one else to interpret for him the 
 'ways of providence.' And, even within the region of 
 general principles, there are questions left over, which 
 may not be entirely ignored, though some of them 
 carry us beyond the limits of the present enquiry. 
 
 It niav appear that the line of thought which has 
 been followed has tended to magnify morality over- 
 much, both in respect of the intellectual inferences 
 which it justifies and as regards its place in life as a 
 whole. On the other hand it may seem, in apparent 
 conflict with this view of the supremacy of morality, 
 that undue stress has been laid, at a critical turn of the 
 
 Moral Perfection 5 1 5 
 
 argunicnt, un the facts of moral failtire and on the 
 imperfection of the world. Concerning both these 
 i^^^^p^^' i -^^^ have sonielhino to ^ay ; and tiie latter. 
 which is the simpler, ma\- \n- t<ik(ai fn^st. 
 
 It was allowed— though onl) lor the sake vA argu- 
 ment—that if the world and man had presented a 
 picture of complete adaptation to one another, in which 
 there was no trace at all of imperfection, we might have 
 been content to find in the conception of law— a law 
 which might then have been regarded as at once natural 
 and moral— an adequate explanation of reality, and 
 that we should not have needed to go behind the law 
 and make the inference to conscious intelligence and 
 goodness. But it was argued that, since the facts do 
 not exhibit this perfection, another explanation must 
 be sought of the relation of nature to morality: an 
 imperfect world, it was said, was required for the 
 making of moral beings ; they had to be tried in, and 
 habituated to, all kinds of circumstances, in order that 
 they might grow into goodness. Hence the very im- 
 perfection of the world was used as an argument 
 pointing to the theistic conclusion. 
 
 But it was not said that free beings were necessarily 
 only imperfectly moral, or that it was impossible for 
 perfect moral goodness to exist in the midst of imper- 
 fect surroundings. Had man been morally perfect and 
 had it been possible for his will to be firm though free, 
 there would have been no need — no excuse, one may 
 say— for the imperfection of the world he lives in. Ikut, 
 as he is free and needs to grow into goodness, the 
 imperfection is an essential condition of the making of 
 the good man. The completion of this process would 
 
 * 33-2 
 
5i6 
 
 The Limits of Morality 
 
 ^\ 
 
 not make him unable to live in this world, as Herbert 
 Spencer imagined. The moral man, as ordinarily con- 
 ceived, is the man who is able to adopt and does adopt 
 the moral attitude in all the ordinary circumstances of 
 his life. The completely moral man or morally perfect 
 man is the man who would adopt this moral attitude 
 in any possible circumstances. 
 
 Morality is of such great importance among the 
 values because, as I have put it, it is not envious or 
 exclusive. It does not, like the other values, depend 
 upon certain special circumstances or some special 
 endowment of intellect or skill. It can be exhibited in 
 any circumstances whatever. In every situation there 
 is always a right or moral reaction ; and this reaction 
 is simply an attitude of will; so that goodness is realised 
 even when power is wanting to achieve the result which 
 will rhake the good will manifest to the eyes of men. 
 At the same time the will which adapts itself morally 
 to one set of circumstances may not be so firmly set 
 towards good as to achieve moral adaptation to circum- 
 stances in which the temptations are different or which 
 call for a greater effort. Thus the variety of natural 
 and social conditions offers a training ground for the 
 good will, which may pass from range to range of ex- 
 perience perfecting its own nature and contributing to 
 the improvement of its environment. The growth of 
 morality is always marked by firmer stability of char- 
 acter, diminished danger of straying from the right 
 way, increased ability to deal with new and unexpected 
 situations. Placed in the midst of an imperfect environ- 
 ment, a will trained to goodness in this way endeavours 
 to moralise the environment — to make it contributory 
 
 The Argimient from Morality =; i 7 
 
 to the realisation of value. And, when this has been 
 accomplished, the agent will have become qualified to 
 deal with new and more complicated conditions, and 
 to solve new practical problems offered by fresh situa- 
 tions. The right use of his talents in ordinary affairs 
 will have fitted him to be a wise ruler of ten cities. 
 
 Concerning the limits of the argument from morality 
 not much needs to be added. It has not been put for- 
 ward as, of itself and alone, constituting a rigidly 
 demonstrative proof; still less has it been suggested 
 that it excludes, instead of facilitating, other methods 
 ^""of approach to the theistic point of view. The way is 
 not from the categorical imperative alone. From nature 
 and art and knowledge men have risen to the contem- 
 plation of God and found in him the key to the problems 
 of life. Each in his own way, and each starting from 
 his own interest, has sought and often has found, in the 
 idea of the world as a revelation of God, a view which 
 has satisfied his desire to see beneath the appearances 
 of things and to grasp the meaning of life. \ vx this 
 much may be asserted, that, when such views neglect 
 altogether the moral aspect of reality or try to explain 
 it away, they are apt to be an erring guide to knowledge 
 and to confer a doubtful practical boon. 
 
 Much more important, however, are the considera- 
 tions which may force themselves upon us pointing to 
 the limits of morality itself. 
 ^ In the first place, morality has been regarded in my 
 argument as restricted to the will in its relation to the 
 moral ideal ; and the content of the moral ideal was not 
 found to be an easy thing to define. A final definition, 
 
5i8 
 
 The Limits of Morality 
 
 indeed, is not possible, for knowledge of the moral 
 ideal grows in clearness and fulness as character ap- 
 proximates to it. As we have seen, it can be expressed 
 best a'^ a spirit or tendency in which the higher human 
 capacities and the harmony of man with man triumph 
 over sensual and selfish impulses. This is the character- 
 istic of the good will, that it is guided by the highest 
 and by the spirit of unity with others. But what the 
 higher interests and capacities of man are — this ques- 
 tion may seem to have received a less distinct answer. 
 Indeed, an answer cannot be given without reference 
 to the other values — of knowledge and beauty, for 
 instance — which we recognise as having a superior 
 claim to that of the demands of comfortable living or the 
 satisfaction of appetite and impulse. In the widest sense 
 
 ^ of the word, therefore, ethics might be used to signify 
 the whole realm of values, while morality proper is re- 
 stricted to the virtuous attitude towards them. Morality 
 includes the will to these values, but the values them- 
 selves and their worth are independent. 
 
 J In the second place, morality seems to be limited 
 
 in another way. Suppose all values realised, what 
 would become of morality ? There would be no further 
 good to which to reach forward; attainment would put 
 an end to endeavour; and the moral ideal, thus reached, 
 would seem to destroy the moral life in the act of 
 perfecting it. Suppose the moral purpose of the world 
 to be achieved, and the time-process still to go on. 
 What is there for the fully moralised man to do in the 
 perfected environment? Herbert Spencer tried to de- 
 scribe his private life; and in his account it comes very 
 much to this, that he might still eat and sleep and beget 
 
 '> 
 
 Interdependence of Values 5 1 9 
 
 sons and daughters. There is not much aboui tiic 
 higher values in this picture of the heavenly life uik n 
 earth. But why should the perfect man even do the 
 things which Spencer leaves for him wiierewith to fill 
 up the inane blank of his existence? If he and his 
 surroundings are fully moralised, iiow can he desire 
 the change which action involves? and, if he does act, 
 is it not because there is still room for desire, ^u liiaL 
 the imagined future is better than the present, and, 
 after all, he " never is, but only to be blest"? 
 
 Thus morality seems to be limited in two ways : 
 first, by its dependence on other values ; and secondly, 
 by the conditions of the time-process, which entail 
 unending endeavour and the struggle for a better — a 
 struggle which seems capable of victorious termination 
 only with the disappearance of time itself. These two 
 limitations compel further reflexion. 
 
 The former is not a very serious or difficult matter. 
 A full view of the worth of life must take all values into 
 account, not merely those which, from their specific re- 
 ference to character and volition, are called moral values. 
 Yet it is significant that value does thus fall asunder 
 into different ideals — that the artist may be indifferent 
 to the ordinary moralities and to all kinds of science; 
 that the philosopher may be without the eye for beauty 
 or the will to goodness ; and that the good man may be 
 neither an artist nor a philosopher. There are, in most 
 cases and for most men, many and more pressing claims 
 upon moral conduct than the production of beauty or 
 the pursuit of truth. The man of science and the artist 
 have often been reproached for selfishness, even when 
 
 II 
 
520 
 
 The Limits of Morality 
 
 no other fault is found with them, while the interest in 
 truth for its own sake is often suspected by the practical 
 man, and sometimes explained away by the philosopher. 
 Yet, if we suppose the ordinary moralities perfected in 
 men generally, even to the degree in which they are 
 now perfected within some limited ranges of social 
 conditions, what better things would there be to live 
 for than just those ideals which science and art take 
 for their own ? And would we think any society worth 
 living in in which they were disregarded, or in which 
 specially gifted minds did not make them their chief 
 pursuit ? 
 
 The independence of the different values, moreover, 
 is only partial, and it is not entirely onesided. We have 
 seen how, in certain conditions, morality falls back upon 
 the other values, and takes them as its ideals, so that 
 the good will finds satisfaction in their pursuit and 
 attainment. And this may perhaps have suggested the 
 view that these latter values have complete indepen- 
 dence — that truth and beauty can stand alone, in no 
 way affected by the moral character of their exponents. 
 But the facts of life do not support this conclusion. The 
 pursuit of truth and of beauty are themselves modes 
 of moral activity. They may often indeed come into 
 conflict with the more elementary moralities; yet this 
 conflict is of the same nature as more familiar conflicts 
 of duties. An artist may prefer beauty to honesty as 
 another man may prefer generosity to justice, and 
 thereby follow^ a course which does not bring out the 
 highest value in his power. ' Art for art's sake,' 'truth 
 at any cost' may be excellent maxims; it is only when 
 art or truth, or anything else short of the highest good 
 
 The Final Question 
 
 521 
 
 
 in one's power, is treated as the sole value in life, that 
 the maxims become unethical. 
 
 Human nature is so imperfectly unified that a man 
 may show high devotion to one region of values and 
 treat all the others with neglect or contempt. But he 
 does so at his peril. He loses thereby his own chance 
 of developing a complete and harmonious character, 
 and he risks also his perfection in the art or science of 
 his choice. Morality cannot be isolated from any part 
 of life. The ideas of good and evil which direct the 
 lives of men are also formative influences upon their 
 artistic production in picture or poem or building. Nor 
 can knowledge claim to be completely independent of 
 character. Character determines interest, and interest 
 selects its objects and its method. U was not mere 
 fancy that led theosophist and alchemist to hold that 
 the mind that would find out the hidden things of the 
 world must be purged from bodily and selfish desire, 
 and that the philosopher's stone can be touched by none 
 but clean hands. Only the pure in heart can see God, 
 
 But, if we have this purity of heart, and if, in addition, 
 the eye is satisfied with seeing and the mind with 
 knowing — if all values are realised — does anything 
 further remain for men of good will or for the people 
 of God ? Or is there only, as the Scriptures say, ' n 
 rest ' ? 
 
 This is the final question, and it may be said that 
 it will find its answer in that realm of religious values 
 into which we have not entered. There, cerLainiy, if 
 anywhere. But even into this region difificulties press, 
 and we meet problems which it is hard to solve. How 
 are we to conceive this communion with God in which 
 
 \ 
 
,— o '■■> 
 
 The Limits of Morality 
 
 the whole ethical life attains its perfection and passes 
 into another form? The enterprise is over: goodness 
 has been achieved; all beauty is in our presence; know- 
 ledge is swallowed up in sight. But does the beatific 
 vision content us ? Who shall say — when his eyes are 
 not yet fit to behold it — in what manner his transfigured 
 spirit would receive this new experience? We can only 
 look forward from the far distance of our present point 
 of view, feeling always that our halting logic, with its 
 ' either — or,' may be put out of court by a view of 
 reality which we cannot now conceive. 
 
 If we let our anticipation confront the distant issue, 
 there would seem to be only two ways in which we can 
 regard it; and on either way difficulties emerge. 
 
 Can we assert that the training of the active life 
 has been of such a kind as to fit a man for the contem- 
 plative life, so that in the beatific vision he will really 
 find the satisfaction of his nature? If he has been bred 
 in the world's struggle, has learned to endure hardness 
 and to hold the right against all comers, finding in 
 each situation that opens a new adventure of goodness, 
 discovering and creating values in a world that seemed 
 reluctant to admit them — if this has been his experience 
 (and it is the good man's common lot), how will he 
 adapt himself to the restful contemplation of an ideal 
 that is fully realised, so that effort and enterprise are 
 no longer needed? Will he not rather beg that he may 
 be allowed to refresh himself for a moment in the 
 vision and then begin the quest anew? It will be the 
 same with others. The artist may be enchanted with 
 the perfection of beauty ; but will he be content to be 
 only a gazer? Will not the artist in him demand a 
 
 The Beatific Vision 
 
 523 
 
 material not yet beautiful to which he may convey the 
 new ideas he has received? Would he not willingly 
 forgo some of the fulness of that beauty that it might 
 be his lot to contribute something to the picture or to 
 transfer his own visions to a virgin canvas ? This is 
 what his career has fitted him to do, and life seems 
 worthless unless he can continue his work. It is the 
 thinker who is responsible for the ideal of the contem- 
 plative life; he shaped the conception of the beatific 
 vision. But would it suffice even for the thinker ? 
 After the toil of thought is truth bv itself sufficient? 
 Is not the impulse strong to seek new problems and 
 fresh fields of enquiry, so that knowledge may be 
 continually enlarged and insight deepened ? And, if 
 everything is disclosed to his view in a single vision, 
 is there not an arrest of the faculties that have been 
 trained by assiduous exercise? The wings are preened 
 for a new flight, but they beat in vain against the 
 , subtler air. The contemplative life which the thinker 
 I really prizes is, after all, not a single and eternal beatific 
 I vision, but a life in which truth after truth is discovered 
 , as the result of repeated intellectual effort. And time 
 and again the philosophers themselves have acknow- 
 ledcred that it is so. Witness the words of Malebranche : 
 " If I held truth captive in my hand, I should open my 
 hand and let it fly, in order that I might again pursue and 
 capture it." And Lessing's choice has become almost 
 proverbial. " Did the Almighty," he said, "holding in 
 his right hand Truth, and in his left Search after Truth, 
 deign to tender me the one I might prefer, in all 
 humility, but without hesitation, I should request Search 
 after Truth." '* It is not the goal but the course which 
 
524 
 
 The Limits of Morality 
 
 makes us happy," it has been said\ How can man's 
 nature, trained in the stress of mundane adventure, be 
 satisfied with a finished course, a goal from which there 
 is no further advance ? 
 
 MoraHty, as we know it, consists in a Hfe which 
 never rests satisfied in the present but is always pressing 
 onwards to fresh achievements. Experience does not 
 fit a man for motionless ease, but for new endeavour. 
 The beatific vision itself, unless it inspire him to higher 
 service, may seem to him a temptation to emotional 
 indulgence unworthy of the free man. One of tw^o 
 things he will be apt to demand of the future : either 
 that the call of service come to him anew, and that fresh 
 enterprises may be his, or else that his individual life 
 may lapse into the source of all beine. 
 
 Can we tell which is to be the issue .^ Must absorp- 
 tion in the one source of all life be the end, and must the 
 true goal of life's fitful fever be the surrender of that 
 separate individuality which has given its surpassing 
 interest to the moral drama of the world ? If the time- 
 process itself is but a transitory phase of reality, if 
 
 The Bird of Time has but a Httle way 
 To flutter — and the Bird is on the ^Ving, 
 
 then it may be that values will still persist ; but of what 
 lies beyond for the soul of man w^e can form no idea, 
 and in the realm of eternal values morality as we now 
 know it will have reached its limit. If this is to be the 
 end, a question remains — a question which the ethical 
 view of reality may not shirk. How is the end better 
 
 ^ The quotations are to be found in Hamilton, Lectures on 
 Me tap hy sic, vol. i, p. 13. 
 
 The New Adventure 
 
 D^D 
 
 than the beginning? does the goal justify the course.^ 
 For what purpose the infinite pain and effort of indi- 
 viduals, if their free consciousness must be relinquished, 
 perhaps just when it has proved itself worthy of free- 
 dom? All that remains of their efforts could surely 
 have been attained without their intervention. No 
 time-process would have been needed to realise it, and 
 the world would have been spared the evil and suffer- 
 ing of which it has been the scene. The one purpose 
 which, so far as I can see, justifies the field of havoc 
 through which the world passes to better things, is the 
 creation of those values which only free minds can 
 realise. And if free minds, when perfected, are to pass 
 away, even for absorption in God, then that value is 
 lost; and we must ask again the question, with less 
 confidence in the answer, whether the values which 
 the world's history offers are worth the price that has 
 been paid for them. 
 
 But if absorption is not the goal, and free minds 
 still endure, it is hardly possible to regard them as 
 passing their time in the restful bliss of some paradise 
 of the medieval pattern. For a life such as that — if life 
 it can be called — would do little or nothing to bring to 
 light the values and capacity for the creation of values 
 which are the ripe fruit of moral experience. Beautiful 
 souls are always something more than beautiful; they 
 have a moral energy which inactivity would not content. 
 Surely there has been much irrelevant suffering ni ihe 
 making of such souls if, after the struggle has given 
 them command of circumstances, all enterprise is shut 
 off from them. 
 
 What lies beyond we cannot tell, and it is vain to 
 
526 
 
 The Limits of Morality 
 
 imagine. " It doth not yet appear what we shall be." 
 But if free minds endure, it must surely be for a range 
 of activity suited to the capacities and values which 
 they have acquired in their mundane experience. And 
 if, here or elsewhere, they attain that complete harmony 
 between will and ideal in which moral perfection con- 
 sists, they will surely be fitted thereby for nobler enter- 
 prise. It is not true that it is impossible for a morally 
 perfect man to exist and work in an imperfect world. 
 The view is merely an echo of a harrow hedonistic 
 theory of what constitutes goodness and perfection. 
 On the contrary, the more perfect a man is, the greater 
 is the variety of conditions in which he will master 
 each situation and prove his goodness. As long as the 
 time-process continues we can conceive free minds as 
 working towards the goal of moral perfection; we can 
 even think of them as, themselves made perfect, still 
 pressing forward into new and untried ways, enhancing 
 the values of the world. It is not only evil (that is, 
 moral evil) that has to be mastered. The artist or the 
 man of science has not been fighting against moral evil 
 in his effort to produce things of beauty or to enlarge 
 the sphere of knowledge; and yet he has been pro- 
 4' ducing values. In this way it is conceivable that moral 
 evil might be overcome, and yet that adventure would 
 not cease. There would still be call and room for press- 
 ing further into the unknown and making all things 
 subservient to the values which it is the function of free 
 spirits to realise. 
 
 INDEX 
 
 Al)solute, Hegel's definition of the, i6 
 
 the, and God, 475, 493 ff. 
 
 the, in morality, 147 ff., 157 f. 
 
 the, and its modes, 388 ff. 
 
 Absorption, 524 f. 
 
 Acquaintance, knowledge by and know- 
 ing about, 195 
 
 Action, voluntary, as determined by 
 heredity and environment, 439 f. 
 
 Active and contemplative life, 522 f. 
 
 Adaptation, 347, 426 
 
 Analysis and synopsis, 252 ff. 
 
 and synthesis, 243 ff. 
 
 ethical and psychological, 41 
 
 limits of, 244 ff. 
 
 Animism, 266 
 
 Anselm, his ontological argument, 3 loff. 
 Anthropomorphism, 496 
 Appearance, 501 
 Aquinas, St Thomas, 467 
 Aristotle, 271, 467 
 
 on different views of the good life, 
 
 162 
 
 on external goods, 47 
 
 on knowledge as the true good, 
 
 162 f. 
 
 on the influence of pleasure on 
 
 moral judgment, 58 
 
 on the moral judgment as percep- 
 tive, 91 
 
 Artistic creation, method of, 254 f. 
 Asceticism in morals, 105 
 Assumptions, 82 ff. 
 Atomism, 360 
 
 logical, 360 ff. 
 
 psychological, 360 f 
 
 spiritual, 360 ff. 
 
 Attributes of the one substance, 385 
 
 Bacon, F., 289 
 
 on final causes, 168 f. 
 
 on man's relation to nature, 167 f. 
 
 on the scientific attitude, 237 f. 
 
 Bain, A., 48 //. 
 
 Beauty, as a value, 32 ff., 119 
 
 discovery of, 163 f. 
 
 Being and existence, 212 ff. 
 
 scale of, 486 
 
 Benn, A. W., on rationalism, 462 
 Bentham, J., on extent of values, 45 
 
 on measurement of value, 42 f. 
 
 on pleasant and good, 28 
 
 Bergson, H., 180 
 
 on the vital impetus, 416 ff. 
 
 on intellect and practice, 258 f. 
 
 on Intuition, 257 ff., 262, 2C7 
 
 Berkeley, G., loi, 262 
 
 his symbolism, 278 ff. 
 
 on truth, 163 
 
 Berkeleyan idealism, 376 ff., 485 
 Bismarck, O. v., lor 
 Bosanquet, B., 116;/., 243 n, 
 Bradley, F. H., 17, 253;;., 261, 289, 
 
 .389 
 Bridge water treatises, 327 
 Butler, J., 174, 462 
 
 ., 3 low. 
 
 Calculations, 409 
 
 Caldecott, A. 
 
 Cartesian idea of God, 303 f. 
 
 Cartesianism, 9 
 
 Categorical imperative, 89 
 
 Causal and moral judgments, 121 
 
 efficiency, 430 f. 
 
 law as uniformity, 431 ff. 
 
 differentstatementsof,43off. 
 
 quantitative statement of, 
 
 432 ff. 
 
 sequence, the question of the in- 
 finity of the, 321 f., 324 f. 
 
 Causation, efficient, and mechanism, 409 
 
 physical and self-conscious, 447 f. 
 
 Cause and change, 321 
 
 and ground, 322 
 
 and order, 323 
 
 and value, 507 
 
 as used in the cosmological argu- 
 ment, 316 ff. 
 
 first and final, 322 
 
 Hume's analysis of, 319 f. 
 
 idea of a first, 3 1 6 ff. 
 
 in history, 324 
 
 in physical science, 323 
 
 meanmg of, 275 f., 316 ff., 430 ff. 
 
 Character, relation of value to, 166 
 Choice, 442 ff. 
 
526 
 
 The Limits of Morality 
 
 imagine. ''It doth not yet appear what we shall be." 
 But if free minds endure, it must surely be for a range 
 of activity suited to the capacities and values which 
 they have acquired in their mundane experience. And 
 if, here or elsewhere, they attain that complete harmony 
 betwecii wiii and ideal iii which moral perfeciioii con- 
 sists, they wiil surely be fitted thereby for nobler enter- 
 prise, it i^. not iriK that it \^- impossible for a inorallv 
 perfect nuiii. to exist and work in an imporfr-ct world. 
 The MOW i.-, merely an echo of a narrr.\\ hedonistic 
 theory of what constitutor goodness and perlecticm. 
 On the contrary, the more perfect a man. is, the i^reater 
 is tho \'ariotv of condioiuis in which he wiii master 
 each situation and prove his goodness. As long as the 
 unio-process coniUiiuo.^ we can conceive free minds as 
 working towards the goal of moral perfection; we can 
 even think of them as, themselves made perfect, slid 
 pressing forward inito new and untried ways, enhancing 
 the \alues of the world. It Is not ornx evil (that is, 
 moral evil) that has to Ijo mastered. The arin^i or the 
 
 1 
 
 mra' 
 
 A 
 
 ('\a 
 
 man of science has not been fighting against 
 in his effort lo produce things of beauty or to enlarge 
 the sphere of knowledge ; and yet he has been pro- 
 ^ ducing values. In this way it is conceivable that moral 
 evil mieht be overcome, and yet that adventure would 
 not cease. There would still be call and room for press- 
 ing fiirther into the unknown and making all iliings 
 subservient to the values which it is the function of free 
 spirits Lo realise. 
 
 i| 
 
 INDEX 
 
 Absolute, Hegel's definition of the, i6 
 
 the, and God, 475, 493 ff. 
 
 the, in morality, 147 ff., 157 f. 
 
 the, and its modes, 388 ff. 
 
 Absorption, 524 f. 
 
 Acquaintance, knowledge by and know- 
 ing about, 195 
 
 Action, voluntary, as determined by 
 heredity and environment, 439 f. 
 
 Active and contemplative life, 522 f. 
 
 Adaptation, 347, 426 
 
 Analysis and synopsis, 252 ff. 
 
 and synthesis, 243 ff. 
 
 ethical and psychological, 41 
 
 limits of, 244 ff. 
 
 Animism, 266 
 
 Ansel m, his ontological argument, 3 loff. 
 Anthropomorphism, 496 
 Appearance, 501 
 Aquinas, St Thomas, 467 
 Aristotle, 271, 467 
 
 on different views of the good life, 
 
 162 
 
 on external goods, 47 
 
 on knowledge as the true good. 
 
 162 f. 
 
 on the influence of pleasure on 
 
 moral judgment, 58 
 
 on the moral judgment as percep- 
 tive, 91 
 
 Artistic creation, method of, 254 f. 
 Asceticism in morals, 105 
 Assumptions, 82 ff. 
 Atomism, 360 
 
 logical, 360 ff. 
 
 psychological, 360 f. 
 
 spiritual, 360 ff. 
 
 Attributes of the one substance, 385 
 
 Bacon, F., 289 
 
 on final causes, 168 f. 
 
 on man's relation to nature, 167 f. 
 
 on the scientific attitude, 237 f. 
 
 Bain, A., 48 ;/. 
 
 Beauty, as a value, 32 ff., 119 
 
 discovery of, 163 f. 
 
 Being and existence, 212 ff. 
 
 scale of, 486 
 
 Benn, A. W., on rationalism, 462 
 Bentham, J., on extent of values, 45 
 
 on measurement of value, 42 f. 
 
 on pleasant and good, 28 
 
 Bergson, H., 180 
 
 on the vital impetus, 416 ff. 
 
 on intellect and practice, 258 f, 
 
 on Intuition, 257 ff., 262, 2O7 
 
 Berkeley, G., 10 1, 262 
 
 his symbolism, 278 ff. 
 
 on truth, 163 
 
 Berkeleyan idealism, 376 ff., 485 
 Bismarck, O. v., ioi 
 Bosanquet, B., 116 n., 243 «. 
 Bradley, F. II., 17, 253;/., 261, 289, 
 
 Bridge water treatises, 327 
 Butler, J., 174, 462 
 
 Calculations, 409 
 Caldecott, A,, 310 w. 
 Cartesian idea of God, 303 f. 
 Cartesianism, 9 
 Categorical imperative, 89 
 Causal and moral judgments, 121 
 
 efficiency, 430 f. 
 
 law as uniformity, 431 ff. 
 
 different statements of, 430 ff. 
 
 quantitative statement of, 
 
 432 ff. 
 
 sequence, the question of the in- 
 
 finity of the, 32 1 f., 324 f. 
 Causation, efficient, and mechanism, 409 
 
 physical and self-conscious, 447 f. 
 
 Cause and change, 321 
 
 and ground, 322 
 
 and order, 323 
 
 and value, 507 
 
 as used in the cosmological argu- 
 ment, 316 ff. 
 
 first and final, 322 
 
 Hume's analysis of, 319 f. 
 
 idea of a first, 316 ff. 
 
 in history, 324 
 
 in physical science, 323 
 
 meanmg of, 275 f., 316 ff., 430 ff. 
 
 Character, relation of value to, 166 
 Choice, 442 ff. 
 
528 
 
 Index 
 
 Clarke, S., 120, 458, 462 
 
 Coherence as a criterion of moral juag- 
 
 ments, 96 ff. 
 Coleridge, S. T., ^57 
 Collins, A., 462 
 
 Communion with God, 499, 5^i '• 
 Community, ethical unity of the, 151 t. 
 Compensation, the law of, 172 f. 
 Comprehensiveness as a criterion ot 
 
 moral judgments, 102 ff. 
 
 Comte, A., 252 
 
 Concepts and experience, 18 t., 24 
 Concurrence, the divine, 493 
 Conscious and vital activity, 413"- 
 Consciousness as epiphenomenon, 413 
 
 as ground of distinction between 
 
 theories of reality, 359 
 
 . origin of, 449 
 
 the social, 227 
 
 Contemplative and active life, 522 f. 
 
 Continuity in mental process, 437 
 
 Continuum, the objective, 199 f. 
 
 Contradiction, freedom from, as a cri- 
 terion of moral judgments, 96 
 
 Conventional morality, 67 
 
 Copernicus, 138 
 
 Cosmological argument, the, 3100., 
 Hume's criticism of, 320 
 
 the, its fundamental im- 
 portance, 325 f., 331 
 
 Creation, the conception of, 400 1., 501 
 
 Creative resultants, principle of, 248 
 
 Custom, 65 ff. 
 
 Cycles, doctrine of, 114 
 
 Daniels, A., 3io«. 
 Darwin, C, 252, 297 
 Degrees of reality. 480 
 
 Deism, 457 ff-' 4^3 
 Deists, classes of, 458 f. 
 Democritus, 106 
 De Morgan, A., 209 
 De Quincey, T., 33 
 Descartes, R., 10, 388 
 
 . and Spinoza, 384 f. 
 
 his ontological argument, 310, 
 
 3i3ff- 
 on final causes, 169 
 
 on ideas as objects, 194 
 
 method of, 256 f. 
 
 on the method of knowledge, 10 1., 
 
 Description, meaning ot, 2^3 tt. 
 Desires, valuation of, 63 
 Determinism, 430 ff. 
 
 and psychological hedonism, 430 
 
 . statistical evidence for, 438 
 
 5idyoia, 257 
 
 Dilthey, W., 128 w., 225 «. 
 
 Discourse, universe of, 231 f. 
 
 Divine and human agency, distinction 
 
 of the spheres of, 502 f. 
 Dysteleology, 327, 329 f., 4^7 
 
 Economic value, 37 ^' 
 
 Ego. the pure, 441 
 
 Egoism in political ethics, 102 tt. 
 
 Ehrenfels, H. v., 55, 134 
 
 Elan vital ^ 418 
 
 Emanation, 388 f., 501 
 
 Environment and heredity as determin- 
 ing volition, 439 f. 
 
 Epicurus, the dilemma of, 334* 453"- 
 
 Epigenesis, 17 
 
 Epiphenomenon, consciousness as, 413 
 
 Ethical and mathematical propositions 
 contrasted, 140 
 
 ideas and personal lite, i89n. 
 
 as factors in existent reality, 
 
 185 ff. , .,, 
 their validity compared witn 
 
 that of physical principles, 191 f- 
 . unity of the world, 455 i-' 47° "•' 
 
 Ethics"^ and metaphysics, two views of 
 their relation, i 
 
 Evil, the problem of, 469 ff. 
 
 Existence, knowledge of, 1951. 
 
 -; meaning of, 207 ff. 
 
 Existents, division of, 227 f. 
 
 Experience and concepts, 19 
 
 - and theory, in religious phi- 
 losophy, 477 ff- 
 
 as test of theory, 298 1. 
 
 context of, 207 ff. 
 
 in general, 208 
 
 Explanation, meaning of, 275 f. 
 Extension as attribute of substance, 385 
 
 fades totius universi, 394* 397 
 Fechner, G. T., 265 
 Ferrier, J. F., on knowledge of self, 
 
 Ficht'e, ]'. G., on God as the moral order, 
 
 356, 391 ^ . 
 
 Final causes, 1091. 
 
 Finite wholes and the infinite, know- 
 ledge of, 270 ff. 
 
 Foreknowledge and freedom, 472 
 
 Freedom, 429 ff. 
 
 and causation, 430 n. 
 
 and character, 450 ff. 
 
 and choice between alternatives, 
 
 451 f. 
 
 Index 
 
 529 
 
 Freedom and foreknowledge, 472 
 and moral value, 345 ff., 
 
 392- 
 
 40off. 
 
 — and theism, 468 f. 
 
 — and the time-process, 471 f. 
 
 — and purpose, 450 f. 
 
 — and uniformity, 451 f. 
 
 — as dealt with by monism, 398 ff., 
 
 429 f. 
 
 — as essential to the reconciliation of 
 nature and morality, 512 
 
 — as outside time according to Kant, 
 
 450 
 
 — Kant's view of, 336 f., 443 '• 
 
 — limitations of finite, 449ff.,469ff. 
 modified meaning of, 446 
 
 Function and structure, 183 f., 419 f. 
 
 Galileo, G., 243 
 
 Galton, Sir F., 14 
 
 Gaunilo, 3ioff. 
 
 Geulincx, A., 13, 177 
 
 God and man, analogy of, 496 ff. 
 
 the relation of, 486, 499 ff. 
 
 a non-interfering, 459 ff. 
 
 — and the Absolute, 475, 493 ff- 
 
 — as immanent, 459, 463 
 
 — as infinite, 488 ff. 
 
 — as limited, 490 f. 
 
 — as the moral order, 356, 391 
 
 — as the natural order, 323, 391 
 
 — as transcendent, 456 f. 
 
 — communion with, 499, 521 f. 
 
 — or nature, 384, 391 
 
 — Kant's view of the postulate, 33 7 ff., 
 
 392 
 
 — origin of the idea of, in philosophy, 
 
 301 ff. 
 
 the idea of, as interpreting the 
 
 world, 464 ff 
 
 the positive idea of, 495 ft. 
 
 theory of a finite, 330 
 
 Goethe, J. W. v., 250, 252, 264, 476 f. 
 Good, chief or supreme, 89, 153, 156 
 Goodness and existence, 184 ff. 
 
 and reality, 86 f. 
 
 as implied by a quality, 87 
 
 development in ideas of, 165 
 
 discovery of, 163 f. 
 
 independent of external circum- 
 stances, 177 
 
 the mind's affinity with, 239 ff. 
 
 Grace, irresistible, 503 
 
 nature and, 502 
 
 Green, T. H., 123 «. 
 
 Grote, J ., on knowledge by acquaintance, 
 195 «., 206 n. 
 
 S. (_». L. 
 
 Habit, 424 f. 
 
 Hamilton, Sir W., 524 «. 
 
 Happiness as a value, 27 f. 
 
 how far dependent on instruments, 
 
 47 f. 
 
 Hedonism and theism, 344 
 
 psychological, and determinism, 
 
 436 
 
 quantitative, 29 
 
 Hegel, G. W. F., 257, 467 
 
 on reason as distinguished from 
 
 understanding, 462 
 
 on the derivation of the ethical 
 
 notion, i5ff. 
 
 Hegelians of the Left, 482 
 Herbart, J. F., on value, 133 f. 
 Herbert of Cherbury, 303, 460 «. 
 Heredity and environment as deter- 
 mining volition, 439 f. 
 Herrmann, W., 479 
 Heterogeneity in nature, 113 
 Hobbes, T., on desire and good, 55 
 
 on self-preservation, 419 
 
 Hoffding, H., on the conservation of 
 
 values, i59f., i73' 176, i79> 181 
 Howison, G. H., 363 
 Hume, D., 345 ''-, 353. 360 
 — r- his criticism of cause, 431 
 
 his criticism of theology, 301 f., 
 
 his definition of virtue, 55 
 
 his dissociation of knowledge from 
 
 reality, 192 ff. 
 
 on a priori causal reasoning, 409 
 
 on dy.steleology, 327;/. 
 
 on disingenuous disputants, 56 
 
 on distinct perceptions as distinct 
 
 existences, 193 f-, 198 f., 251 
 
 on moral relations, 120 
 
 on sympathy, 58 f. 
 
 on the equal relativity of value 
 
 and connexion in nature, 136 
 
 on the moral argument, 333 ff- 
 
 on the self, 251 
 
 on the vital impulse, 340 f. 
 
 on the world as a singular event, 
 
 308, 319 
 Hutcheson, F., on the pleasures of the 
 
 moral sense, 60 
 
 Huxley, T. H., 480, 482 
 
 Ideal and fact, discrepancy of, lySf. 
 
 good implied in personal life, 509 
 
 the moral, 518 
 
 Idealism as a religious philosophy, 483 ff. 
 
 Berkeleyan, 485 
 
 Platonic, 229 
 
 34. 
 
530 
 
 Index 
 
 Idealism, Platonic and Berkeleyan types 
 
 of, 376 ff-, 4^5 
 
 subjective, 225 
 
 Idealist ethics, 10 
 
 Ideas, as the direct object of knowledge, 
 194 
 
 the Platonic, 324 
 
 Imagination, its place in intellectual 
 
 construction, 293 ft'. 
 
 Immanent will, ^iQf- 
 
 Immortality, Kant's view of, 337 
 
 Imperfection of the world as an argu- 
 ment for theism, 515 
 
 Impersonality of the moral judgment, 94 
 
 Impetus, Bergson on the vital, 416 ff. 
 
 Implicit, 17 
 
 Impressions and ideas, 192 
 
 Indeterminism, 44of. 
 
 Individual and universal, knowledge of, 
 
 ^05 I. 
 1 the, as the object of historical m- 
 
 terest, 1 1 1 ff. 
 
 the problem of the, 474, 514 
 
 Individuality in material things, 228 
 in persons, 227, 242 
 
 in sub-human life, 226, 228 
 
 Inhnity as applied to God, 488 ff. 
 Instinct, 42=, • 
 
 Intellectualist ethics, 9 fi'. 
 Interpretation, meaning of, 276 ff. 
 Intuition and intellect, 417 
 
 of self, 262 ff. 
 
 the, of reality, 260 f. 
 
 Intuitional ethics, 12, 89 ff. 
 
 James, W., his type of pluralism, 378 f. 
 
 on Chautauqua, 402 
 
 on intellectual vision, 261 
 
 on ideational continuity, 199 
 
 on needs and facts, 6 
 
 on the personal factor in philo- 
 sophy, 180 
 Jevons, W. S., on utility, 38 
 
 Kant, I., 83, 331 
 
 and intuitionism, 90 f. 
 
 his criticism of the ontological 
 
 argument, 108, 185, 311 
 
 his criticism of theology, 301 f., 
 
 305 ^ • 
 his distinction of existence and 
 
 quality, 314 
 
 his distinction of reason and under- 
 standing, 257, 462 
 
 his 'hundred dollars' illustration, 
 
 311 f. 
 
 his postulate of God, 336 ff., 392 
 
 Kant, I., his solution of Hume's diffi- 
 culty, 193 f. 
 
 his view of freedom, 443 t. 
 
 his view of the universal element 
 
 in morality, 145 f. 
 
 his statement of the moral argu- 
 ment, 332ft. 
 
 on animals as things, 125 
 
 on freedom as outside time, 450 
 
 on self-consciousness, 205 
 
 on the independence of the good 
 
 will, 177 
 
 on the meaning of existence, 207 f. 
 
 on the postulates of the practical 
 
 reason, 336 ft". 
 
 on the primacy of the practical 
 
 reason, 2, 7 f. 
 
 on value as an achievement in the 
 
 future, 127 f. 
 Keats, J., 34 
 Keyser, C. J., 488 ;/. 
 Knowledge dissociated from reality by 
 
 Hume, 192 
 
 intrinsic value of, 162 
 
 Krueger, F., on absolute value, 148;/. 
 
 Lamb, C, 87 f. 
 
 Leibniz, G. W. v., 113, 367, 4^' 
 
 his pluralism, 363 
 
 on monads as not interacting, 220 
 
 on simple substances, 217 f. 
 
 Lessing, G. E., 523 
 
 Lewes, G. H., 265 «. 
 
 Life, subhuman, individuality in, 226 
 
 Limits of morality, 517 ft- 
 
 Locke, T., 120, 282 
 
 on demonstrative morality, 85 ;/. 
 
 onideas as distinct units, 198 f., 25 1 
 
 on ideas as objects, 194 
 
 Lotze, H., his definition of monism, 
 
 382 ;/. 
 
 on ethiycs as the beginning of meta- 
 physics, 3 ff. 
 
 on philosophy and life, 261 
 
 Love and freedom, 503 f. 
 
 as a divine attribute, 498 f. 
 
 Mackintosh, H. R., 310;/. 
 
 Malebranche, N., 523 
 
 Martineau, J • , his classification of springs 
 of action, 50 
 
 Material and mental existents, distinc- 
 tion of, 2iof. 
 
 Materialism in morals, 104 f. 
 
 Mathematical and philosophical method, 
 
 256 
 Meaning, 276 ii. 
 
 Index 
 
 531 
 
 ^\ 
 
 Meaning as expressing mind, 277, 285, 
 
 292 f. 
 in the world, how found and tested, 
 
 288 ff. 
 Mechanical and mechanistic, 408, 410, 
 
 422 
 Mechanism, 406 ff. 
 
 and conscious processes, 4 1 2 ff. 
 
 — — and efficient causation, 409 
 and purpose, 405 f. 
 
 and vital processes, 410 ff. 
 
 Meinong, A., 214 
 
 on assumptions, 83 n. 
 
 on valuation and pleasure, 55 
 
 on valuation and valuing, 150//. 
 
 on value as a quality, 77 
 
 on value as subjective, 134 
 
 Mental and material existents, distinc 
 tion of, 2iof. 
 
 forms, theory ot, 200 f . 
 
 modifications, i96f., 203^ 225 
 
 Merz, J. T., on synopsis, 252 
 Metaphysics and ethics, two views of 
 
 their relation, i 
 
 and religion, 479 fT. 
 
 Metaphysical ethics, 8 ft. 
 
 insufficiency of its data, 20 f. 
 
 Mill, J. S., 360 
 
 on a finite God, 330 
 
 on permanent possibilities, 2 1 1 f. 
 
 on the causal law, 431 
 
 on the immorality of nature, 122 f. 
 
 Mind, on the theory of monism, 38s, f. 
 
 unity of the, i93f. 
 
 Minds and nature, in relation to value, 
 
 468 f. 
 
 persistence of, 525 f. 
 
 Monads, as interacting, 368 ff. 
 
 as non-interacting, 365 ff. 
 
 Monism, 382 ff. 
 
 and freedom, 398 ff., 429 f. 
 
 and mysticism, 387, 403 f. 
 
 and naturalism, 387 
 
 its ethical consequences, 386 f., 
 
 391 ff. 
 
 its explanation of the world of 
 
 appearance, 387 ff. 
 
 its interpretation of purpose, 393 ff. 
 
 meaning of the term, 382 «. 
 
 the test of, 5 r 1 f. 
 
 Moore, G. E., 41 «., 119?/., 155 «• 
 Moral and causal judgments, 121 
 
 argument, the, 331 ff. 
 
 codes, the variety of, 65 
 
 consciousness, 5 7 ff. 
 
 diversity, 143 f. 
 
 emotions, 70 
 
 Moral experience a datum for meta- 
 physics, 7 
 
 experience and moral ideas, 161 f. 
 
 ideal, the, 518 
 
 impartiality of science, 168 f. 
 
 judgment, its objectivity, 93 ff-, 
 
 151 ff. 
 
 its universality, 96 
 
 the universal element in the 
 
 subject of the. 97 f. 
 validity of the, 68 f. 
 
 judgments, criteria of validity in, 
 
 93 ff- 
 
 conflict between systems of, 
 
 looff. 
 2 ft". 
 
 sources of their complexity 
 
 I 
 
 variety ot, 137ft 
 
 order implied in personal life, 509 
 
 the, and pluralism, 377 f. 
 
 perfection, 515 f., 526 
 
 unity, 1 45 ff. 
 
 universe, the, i.^of. 
 
 value — its object, 35 f. 
 
 its catholicity, 49 f. 
 
 Morality, limits of, 51 7 ft- 
 
 meaning of, 68 
 
 permanent factor in, 107, 145 ff. 
 
 social origin of, 65 
 
 the final issue of, 521 ft. 
 
 universal or permanent element in, 
 
 145 ff. 
 
 relativity of, 94 ft. 
 
 and adaptation, 347 
 
 and convention, 164 f. 
 
 and science, their relations 
 
 to 
 
 society compared, 70 ff. 
 
 and the time-process, 5r8ff. 
 
 Motive, the strongest, 435 f., 442 
 Motives, measurement of, 435 ff. 
 Mozart, W. A., 254. 
 Mysticism and monism, 387, 403 f. 
 
 and morality, 181 f. 
 
 Natural and supernatural, 502 
 
 religion, 459 
 
 Naturalism, as a basis for religion, 479 ff. 
 in ethics, 10, 14 f- 
 
 the test of, 5 1 1 
 
 Nature and God as names for the same 
 
 reality, 384, 391 
 and grace, 502 
 
 and minds, in relation to value, 
 
 468 f. 
 
 and morality, the problem of re- 
 
 conciling, 509 f. 
 — as a social construction, 371 ff^ 
 
532 
 
 Index 
 
 Index 
 
 533 
 
 Nietzsche, F., 107 
 j/ous, 257 
 
 Objectivity, claim to, in moral judg- 
 ments, 93 ff. 
 Ontological argument, the, 309 ff. 
 assumption of existence in, 
 
 314 f- 
 
 its significance, 315 f. 
 
 Order as interpreted by pluralism, 371 ft- 
 
 causal, 207 ff. 
 
 causal and moral, 350, 358, 507 
 
 the conception of, 323 
 
 spatio-temporal, 207 ff. 
 
 Organic wholes in morality, 155 «• 
 
 Paley, W., 327, 328, 330 
 Pantheism, 308 
 
 and pluralism, 359, 381, 383 
 
 as contrasted with deism, 457, 
 
 463 f. 
 
 Parallelism, 385, 413 
 Particular, the, in morality, 89 
 Perceptions, distinct, as distinct exist- 
 ences, 193 f. 
 Perfection, moral, 515 f-, 5^6 
 Permanence as criterion of existence, 2 i 2 
 Person, the, as bearer of value, 123, 507 
 Persons, the community of, as bearer of 
 
 value, 129 ff. 
 Plato, 467, 484 
 
 description of a philosopher, 235 ft. 
 
 distinction of vov^ and Stdi/ota, 
 
 idea of the Good, 2 
 
 on mind and the ideas, 376 f. 
 
 on reason as distinguished from 
 
 understanding, 462 
 Platonic idealism, 376 ff., 484 
 Pleasure as a value, 29 f. 
 Plotinus, 467 
 Pluralism, 308, 359 ff- 
 
 and pantheism, 359, 381, 383 
 
 and solipsism, 367 
 
 and theism, 363 f. 
 
 different types of, 360 ft". 
 
 — ■^ — its explanation of the environment, 
 365 ft". , 368 ff. 
 
 its interpretation of order, 372 ff. 
 
 spiritual, 362 ff. 
 
 the test of, 5 1 1 
 
 Position as criterion of existence, 208 n. 
 Practical reason, Kant's view of its pos- 
 tulates, 336 ff. 
 Prediction, 409 
 Preformation, 1 7 f. 
 Presumption of reality, 83 n. 
 
 Price, R. , 12 
 
 Pringle-Pattison, A. S., 503 n. 
 Providence, ways of, 514 
 Purpose, 359, 405 ff. 
 
 and idea, 4i5ff- 
 
 and ideal guidance, 413 ff- 
 
 and mechanism, 405 f. 
 
 as essential to the reconciliation of 
 
 nature and morality, 513 
 
 as interpreted by monism, 393 ff. 
 
 conscious, 423 ff. 
 
 in man and in the world, 169 f. 
 
 meaning of, 397 f. 
 
 the conception of a divine, 50x3 ff. 
 
 unconscious, 413 ff- 
 
 universal, 427 f. 
 
 Rashdall, H., his statement of the moral 
 
 argument, 351 ff. 
 Rationalism, meaning of, 462 f. 
 Rationalist ethics, 9 ff. 
 Reality as an order of minds, 380 f. 
 
 degrees of, 388 ff., 486 
 
 division of, 192, 219 ft'. 
 
 meaning of the term, 214 f. 
 
 presumption of, 83 ;/. 
 
 ultimate, as implying a harmony 
 
 of nature and morality, 509 
 
 as individual, 506 
 
 unity of, 242 ft". 
 
 Reason and understanding, 257 
 
 as distinguished from understand- 
 ing' 463 
 
 Reid, T., 12 
 
 criticism of the ideal theory, 194 
 
 on the order of the virtues, 50 
 
 Relations and things, interdependence 
 
 of, 230 f. 
 
 existential position of, 199 ff. 
 
 external, 201, 215 ff. 
 
 internal, 201 
 
 objective, 193 f. 
 
 their place in reality, 229 ff. 
 
 Relativity of morals, 94 ff. 
 
 of value — to the objective order, 
 
 1 39 ff. 
 
 to the valuing subject, 1 34 ff. 
 
 Religion and metaphysics, 479 ff. 
 
 natural, 459 
 
 views on the relation of its his- 
 tory to its philosophy, 306 f. 
 
 Reproduction, 501 
 
 Rickert, H.,34;/., iio«., i8o«., 200«. 
 
 Ritschl, A., 479 
 
 Ritschlian school, 482 
 
 Royce, J., on interpretation, 277 
 
 on the time-span, 444 «• 
 
 
 
 
 \ 
 
 Russell, B., 195 «., 488;/., 489 «. 
 
 on external relations, 2i6ff. 
 
 Satisfaction, intellectual, 289 
 Scale of being, 486 
 
 of values, 5 1 f. 
 
 Schelling, F. W. J. v., 257, 467 
 Scholastic ethics, 12, 89 f. 
 
 idea of God, 303 f. 
 
 Schopenhauer, A., on will as the real, 
 
 416 ff. 
 Science and values, 2 1 ff. 
 
 as a social construction, 368 ff. 
 
 moral impartiality of, 168 f. 
 
 Scientia intuitiva, 257 
 
 Selection, natural, as applied to the de- 
 velopment of ideal action, 418 ff. 
 Self and its character, 439 ff. 
 
 and person, 227 f. 
 
 consciousness of the, i96ff., 202ff., 
 
 219 ff., 262 ff. 
 
 immediate and analytic know- 
 
 ledge of, contrasted , 263 ff. 
 — individuality of the, 221 ff. 
 uniqueness of the self, 449 
 
 Self-evidence, 10 ff. 
 
 Self-limitation, 457, 492 
 
 Self-preservation, 393, 419 
 
 Selves, knowledge of other, 265 ft'. 
 
 Sensualist and philosopher, the contro- 
 versy between, 44 
 
 Sidgwick, H., his axioms of the prac- 
 tical reason, 233 f. 
 
 Sign and thing signified, their connexion, 
 281 ff. 
 
 Singularism, 382 n. 
 
 Smith, Adam, on happiness, 47 
 
 on sympathy, 59 
 
 on value, 38 
 
 Solipsism, 367 
 
 Spaulding, E. G., on analysis, 247 ff. 
 
 on external relations, 218 
 
 Spencer, H., 347, 516, 518 1". 
 
 his derivation of ethical proposi- 
 tions, 14 
 
 on the meaning of existence, 2 i 2 
 
 on the relation of authority among 
 
 feelings, 60 f. 
 
 ■ on the state of perfect adaptation, 
 
 347, 401 f. 
 Spinoza, B., 13, 271, 484, 490 f. 
 
 • his system of monism, 383 ff. 
 
 • on desire and good, 55 
 
 on final causes, 169 
 
 • on knowledge as the true good, 
 
 163 
 
 on self-preservation, 393, 419 
 
 Spinoza, B., on the distinction of scientia 
 
 intuitiva and ratio, 257 
 Spontaneity, 429, 446 f. 
 Stephen, Sir L., 163 
 Stevenson, R. L.,349;/. 
 Stewart, J. A., 34 
 
 Stoics, the, on self-preservation, 419 
 Subject-object relation, 192, 196 f., 
 
 225 f. 
 Subsistence, 81 
 Substance, the one, 385, 397 
 Suffering, the problem of, 346 ff. 
 Symbolic and intuitive knowledge, 
 
 232 
 Symbolism in nature, 279 ff. 
 
 in vision, 278 ft. 
 
 Symbols, 231 f. 
 
 artificial and natural, 277 ff. 
 
 Synopsis, 2.^2 ff. 
 
 differences of, 272 
 
 reccjgnition of, by philosophers, 
 
 25,7 f. 
 
 Synoptic views of reality as a whole, 
 
 divergent, ^^^d^- 
 Synthesis, its dependence on analysis, 
 
 243» 245 
 System, coherence in a, as criterion of 
 moral judgments, 96 ff. 
 
 Teleological argument, the, 326 ff. 
 
 the, its relation to the Cos- 
 
 mological, 325 
 Tertiary qualities, 75 ff. 
 Theism, 308, 453 ft". 
 
 ethical, 454 
 
 and hedonism, 344 
 
 and the unity of the world, 455 
 
 meaning of, 383 
 
 required for the reconciliation of 
 
 nature and morality, 513 f- 
 
 two ways of, 304, 477 
 
 Theistic arguments, method of the, 309 
 
 why disregarded, 301 ft. 
 
 Things and relations, interdependence 
 
 of, 230 f. 
 
 material, individuality in, 223 ft. 
 
 Thought as attribute of substance, 385 
 Thrasymachus, 107 
 Time-process, the, and freedom, 471 f. 
 Time-span, the, 444 f. 
 
 Tindal, M., 462 
 Trcitschke, H. v., loi 
 Truth as a value, 31 
 
 its affinity with the mind, 237 
 
 the search after, 523 
 
 Unconditional, the, in morality, 148 
 
 % 
 
 i 
 
534 
 
 Index 
 
 Unfree world, the, characterised, 399 ff. 
 Unique, the, and the individual, 114 
 Unity of the world, ethical, 455 f., 
 
 470 ff., 474 f. 
 Universal and individual, knowledire 
 
 of, 505 f. 
 the,' as the object of scientific 
 
 interest, i rof. 
 
 the, in morality, 89(1. 
 
 Universality of moral judgments, 96 
 Universe of discourse, 209 f . , 231 t. 
 
 the moral, i-;of. 
 
 Unreal, the, as non-moral, 87 f. 
 Urban, W. M., on the meaning of value, 
 
 77 «., 78 n., 84 n. 
 
 on the term reality, 21.^ 
 
 Utilitarian method of assessmg value, 
 
 154 f- 
 
 Validity and existence, 189, 355 
 
 of morality and knowledge, 59, 69 
 
 Valuation and implication, 81 ff. 
 
 and valuing, 149 «., \^on. 
 
 explained by desire, 54 ff., 61 ff. 
 
 explained by pleasure, 54 ff. 
 
 fundamental in experience, 25 f. 
 
 Value, absolute, 144 ff. 
 
 and cause, 507 
 
 and consciousness of value, i24ff. 
 
 and freedom, 345 ff., 39 -> 400 ff- 
 
 and reality, 161, 183 fl. 
 
 as an objective relation, 74, 139 ff. 
 
 as a quality, 75 ff. 
 
 as a subjective relation, 73, 134^- 
 
 as belonging to personality, 507 
 
 as belonging to reality, 507 f. 
 
 as used in economics, 37 ff. 
 
 conservation of, 1 59 ff. 
 
 conservation of, analogy with con- 
 servation of energy, i 79 f. 
 
 intrinsic, 36 ff., ii7ff. 
 
 objectivity of, 73 ff-, 5°^ 
 
 relative, 133 ff- 
 
 substitutes for the conservation of, 
 
 171 ff. 
 
 the individual as subject of, 109 f. 
 
 validity of, independent of per- 
 
 manence of its realisation, i74f. 
 Values and science, 21 f. 
 
 as independent of existing reality, 
 
 481 f. 
 
 as meanings, 286!. 
 
 Values as perfecting personal life, 240 f. 
 
 as revealing the purpose of the 
 
 world, 465 ff., 473 f. 
 
 aesthetic and moral, 31 'i'i. 
 
 catholic and exclusive, 45 ff. 
 
 compared with relations, 233 'i'^. 
 
 conservation of, 159^. 
 
 discovery of, 162 fl. 
 
 dominant, 50, 52 
 
 eternal, 44 f., 17,^ ff., 5-4 
 
 higher and lower, 50 
 
 increase of, 180 ft. 
 
 interdependence of the, 5i9ff- 
 
 instrumental and intrinsic, 36 ff. 
 
 intellectual, 30 f. 
 
 kinds of, discriminated, 27 ff. 
 
 permanent and transient, 42 ff. 
 
 production of, 167 
 
 scale of, 51 f. 
 
 status in reality of, 233 ff. 
 
 summation of, 41 f. 
 
 system of, 53 
 
 systematic connexion of momen- 
 tary or temporary, 128 
 
 Value-judgment, its reference to exist- 
 ence, 77, Si ff. , 1 16 ff. 
 
 Value-prop(xsitions and causal proposi- 
 tions, 85 
 
 Varisco, B., 125, 173//., 197 «•, ^21 «. 
 
 Verification, its application in philo- 
 sophy, 295 If. 
 
 Virtue and duty, 147 
 
 Vision, the beatific, 522 f., .^24 
 
 Vital and conscious activity, 413 ff. 
 
 Ward, J., 189//., 493 n. 
 
 his refutation of naturalism, 483 
 
 on monism and singularisni, 382 n. 
 
 on the atom and the monad, 380 
 
 on the objective continuum, 251 
 
 Webb, C. C. J., on the meaningof deism, 
 
 460 n. 
 Whole, specific properties of the, 249 f. 
 Will, immanent, 419 f. 
 
 the good, I 77 
 
 Schopenhauer's view of, 416 ff. 
 
 Windelband, W., 115 
 
 Wisdom as a divine attribute, 498 
 
 Wollaston, W., 120 
 
 World, the, as a moral system, 340 ft". 
 
 Worth, see Value 
 
 Wundt, W., 248 
 
 i 
 
 CAMBRIDGE: PRINTED BY J. B. PEACE, M.A., AT THE UNIVERSITY PRESS 
 
 CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS 
 
 Marlborough and Other 
 
 F^oems. 
 
 By Charles 
 
 Hamilton Sorley, sometime Captain in the Suffolk 
 Regiment. Third edition, with illustrations in prose. 
 Pp. xi -f 144. ^s. 6d. net. 
 
 "To the shrine of poetry he had indubitably pierced. There is much 
 more than promise in these poems. ...The most prominent qualities in the 
 poetry of this boy are just the qualities which poetry most needs now, and 
 will need yet more in the future. They are gaiety, courage, and modest 
 self-confidence. He loved Marlborough and writes of it beautifully. He 
 loved courage, and in 'Stones' gives his love of it a remarkable little turn. 
 He lo\ ed life ; and so, when he comes to write of war and death, he writes 
 not only with the strict honesty of one who has not been suddenly jolted 
 into thinking and feeling, but with clear sight and pregnant dignity. The 
 marching song ^All the hills and \ales along' is one of the bravest and 
 most universal of the war songs that this war has brought ; lightly gallant 
 though it is, it goes deep in thought and builds its carelessness on the 
 
 eternal And the three sonnets on death — all written during the four 
 
 months he spent in France — will be admired wherever they are known." 
 
 The Times 
 
 " These prose passages are nearly all taken from familiar letters, and 
 they are worth reading at least for two reasons, for they illustrate the 
 poems, in particular the author's passion for the ' Odyssey,' and they con- 
 tain, moreover, the last opinions of a young Englishman of culture and 
 much intellectual promise on Germany just before the war — These im- 
 pressions of Germany, boyish as they necessarily are in some respects, 
 have now an almost historic value." 
 
 The Tifnes (review of the third edition) 
 
 " The fate that often awaits youthful poems, even those of a Tennyson, 
 will not lay its de\astating hand upon this little volume... .It is very far 
 indeed from being tiie fact that the poems only exhibit the promise of 
 what might have been. Many of them strike a note of rare beauty and 
 sweetness, and cannot fail to make their appeal to minds of varying tem- 
 peraments.... When, for example, from any scene of conflict, has ever before 
 a letter been penned like that in verse which Captain Sorley, only three 
 months before his death, sent to a friend at home .^.. When brought face 
 to face with war and death, there is quiet dignity and courage in his 
 reflections..., The two sonnets on death, written shortly after his arrival 
 in France, show a calm reserve of strength and a hopefulness of outlook 
 that will win response from many anxious hearts. He does not say what 
 Nettleship said, that death 'does not count,' but he is convinced that it 
 counts not for any triumph over,. or any defeat, of life — It was a noble 
 confidence with which, on the stricken field, to greet the Unseen, and, on 
 its account alone, we are grateful that the work of a true poet has been 
 given to the world." — Hibbert Journal 
 
 " No competent judge will fail to see that young Sorley had more than 
 a touch of genius." — British llWA'/y ('Claudius Clear'). 
 
Press Notices 
 
 "Fresh minted in the open air by one who loved the Do-ns and on 
 th^m 'rired with the winds and hstened to the birds. ...No one could 
 
 Sv'S;nasC"=;-/;fS. 5^f J^f Si -^ 
 
 roundings, of the sands of Sparta and the trenches. -Count, y Itje. 
 
 "Soirit and form are alike disciplined. 'The Song of the IJngirt 
 Rnnners' is a poem likely to become well known-is poetry that has been 
 , „?„„ -iCt SodeVmieht have been at least as successful m prose 
 L"s he w"s^m verse, the fe "pages of ' Behind the Lines' are sufficent to 
 show At one point the fancy comes dangerously near to over-elabora- 
 tion ; but the effect aimed at by a difficult method >s achieved w,th aln.ost 
 perfect success."— /?(>^/i'«"<« 
 
 " Those [' All the hills and vales along '] are verses which W ebster 
 would not have disdained to \sx\\.it:' Spectator 
 
 " Charles Sorlev's profoundly significant poems."-5«/«rrf,,^ Review 
 
 " With him thought must be unadorned, spirituahty stark-naked • h.s 
 stvle has the"ad earnestness and vivid exactness wh,ch as Newman sa.d 
 ar'e chr^cteri'ic of Greek poetry....But it i-vhen wandenng on the fr.e 
 downs surely that he had the vast, joyless vision of the life, past, present, 
 and to cor^e, of this sublunary being ;-or, seen in a narrowing and n- 
 fenserd IV the secret shrine of 'the inner and eternal me.'.. .And here foi 
 1 last uulVance of his piercing mysticism, is a stanza from a marching 
 ^o\\<g:'— Morning Post 
 
 -The Doem ' Peer Gynt' must be quoted in full. There is a whole 
 .world of p'rchology in it^ coupled with! knowledge of human nature that 
 could only have been intuitive."— (9^J^rz'^r 
 
 " Reveal an unusuallv delicate spirit of place and at the same time a 
 
 restless search fm- fresh expression and adventure." -J/.../.../.r i^uarcUan 
 
 - When one considers the author's youth, one is struck by the maturity 
 
 of thought and easy mastery of technique displayed - ^^-^ P^^'^^ 
 
 " It is like some fragment of Greek statuary, perfect even in its incom- 
 pleteness."—^///^ ^^^z^^O' ^V^^ 
 
 " Poetry seems to have been the natural expression ^^ ^is mmd. It is 
 not possibL in a few words to do more than suggest the beaut >^of^^ 
 nnems of this collection : ' Two Sonnets,' ' To Poets, Rooks, and Le 
 Rev^Lnt' are among those that show his personal vision and the riches 
 of IchTi^cter that ifurried toward sacrifice and pain as a runner toward 
 a <faA\r— American Review oj Revietus 
 
 " Many of these poems deserve to be treasured with the most precious 
 Dossessions of our English tongue bequeathed by the great war 
 possessions oi ou s & ^^ston {U.S.A.) Evening Transcript 
 
 "Les vers suivants ['Expectans Expectavi']...traduisent la ferveur 
 lyrique du" ntiment miral et reUgieux avec lequel tant de ces jeunes 
 gens se sont ^mo\€s:'-L'Angleterre et la Guerre (A. Chevnllon). 
 
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