326 LOGIC 



thought and object were so separated that they could never be 

 brought together, and so long as logical processes were conceived 

 wholly in terms of ideas set over against objects, there was no hope 

 of escape from the realm of pure hypothesis and conjecture. Locke's 

 axiom that "the mind, in all its thoughts and reasonings, hath no 

 other immediate object but its own ideas," an axiom which Kant 

 did so much to sanctify, and which has been the basal principle of 

 the greater part of modern logic and metaphysics, is most certainly 

 subversive of logical theory. The transition from ideas to anything 

 else is rendered impossible by it. Now it is just this axiom which the 

 biological tendencies in logic have done so much to destroy. They 

 have insisted, with the greatest right, that logical processes are not 

 set over against their content as idea against object, as appearance 

 against reality, but are processes of reality itself. Just as reality 

 can and does function in a physical or a physiological way, so also 

 it functions in a logical way. The state we call knowledge becomes, 

 thus, as much a part of the system of things as the state we call 

 chemical combination. The problem how thought can know anything 

 becomes, therefore, as irrelevant as the problem how elements can 

 combine at all. The recognition of this is a great gain, and the 

 promise of it most fruitful for both logic and metaphysics. 



But, as I have tried to point out, all this surrendering of pure 

 thought as opposed to pure reality, does not at all necessitate our 

 regarding judgment as a process which makes reality different 

 from what it was before. Of course there is one difference, namely, 

 the logical one; for reality prior to logical processes is unknown. As 

 a result of these processes it becomes known. These processes are, 

 therefore, responsible for a known as distinct from an unknown 

 reality. But what is the transformation which reality undergoes in 

 becoming known? When it becomes known that water seeks its own 

 level, what change has taken place in the water? It would appear 

 that we must answer, none. The water which seeks its own level has 

 not been transformed into ideas or even into a human experience. 

 It appears to remain, as water, precisely what it was before. The 

 transformation which takes place, takes place in the one who knows, 

 a transformation from ignorance to knowledge. Psychology and bio- 

 logy can afford us the natural history of this transformation, but 

 they cannot inform us in the least as to why it should have its 

 specific character. That is given and not deduced. The attempts to 

 deduce it have, without exception, been futile. That is why we are 

 forced to take it as ultimate in the same way we take as ultimate 

 the specific character of any definite transformation. To my mind, 

 there is needed a fuller and more cordial recognition of this fact. The 

 conditions under which we, as individuals, know are certainly dis- 

 coverable, just as much as the conditions under which we breathe 



