336 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



site: a theory which, though it shrinks on its speculative side from no 

 severity of critical analysis, yet on its practical side finds the source of its 

 constructive energy in the deepest needs of man, and thus recognizes, alike 

 in science, in ethics, in beauty, in religion, the halting expression of a 

 reality beyond our reach, the half-seen vision of transcendent Truth." (p. 

 288-9.) 



On these passages my first criticism is that they exemplify the 

 process described at the outset the spearing of an effigy which is 

 alleged to be the reality. For when the doctrine represented as 

 mine is compared with the doctrine which is actually mine, it be- 

 comes manifest that Mr. Balfour's spear does not touch it at all. 

 Nowhere have I either directly or indirectly denied that out of the 

 "depths of unfathomable mystery there may . . . emerge the 

 certitudes of religion;" and it would be wholly inconsistent with 

 my expressed views were I to deny that there may. The conclu- 

 sion that by the nature of our intelligence, we are forever de- 

 barred from forming any conception of the Reality which lies 

 behind Appearance, has the inevitable corollary that we can assign 

 no limits to the possibilities within it. This I have not only 

 implied, but long ago asserted. Witness the following passage : 



" Though I have argued that, in ascribing to the Unknowable Cause of 

 things such human attributes as emotion, will, and intelligence, we are 

 using words which, when thus applied, have no correspending ideas; yet I 

 have also argued that we are just as much debarred from denying as we are 

 from affirming such attributes; since, as ultimate analysis brings us every- 

 where to alternative impossibilities of thought, we are shown that beyond 

 the phenomenal order of things, our ideas of possible and impossible are 

 irrelevant." Nineteenth Century, July, 1884. 



After thus showing that I am unharmed, because untouched, 

 by Mr. Balfour's thrust, I might leave the matter without further 

 remark. But remembering that, much more important than the 

 personal question is the impersonal question lying behind, it 

 seems proper that I should make a counter-attack; for, in oppo- 

 sition to my supposed negation, Mr. Balfour places not only an 

 affirmation but something more than an affirmation. Against my 

 wrongly-assumed assertion that there may not emerge, he does 

 not simply put the assertion that there may emerge, but he unob- 

 trusively puts the assertion that there does emerge. This sub- 

 stituted statement, which he tacitly makes, is a totally different 

 one ; and while I admit the may I demur to the does. Without 

 pausing to ask what is the evidence that there does, it will suffice 

 if I examine the proposition itself, and see whether it is a think- 

 able one whether the terms in which it is expressed have real 

 meanings, or are merely symbols having no meanings correspond- 

 ing to them. 



Thinking, truly so called, implies mental representation of the 



