I. 



The Foundations of Science. 



TT is most reasonable that a publication devoted to " Natural 

 ■'- Science " should accord some of its space to the consideration of 

 the foundation upon which the whole of that science necessarily 

 reposes. I therefore hail with pleasure Mr. Ryle's defence of 

 Professor Pearson's " Grammar," although I regard that defence as 

 mistaken and exaggerated, and the work it defends (which I have 

 carefully read) a singularly unreasonable one. 



Everyone knows that "Idealism " is a metaphysical system, and 

 Mr. Ryle tells us expressly that " Professor Pearson adopts a philo- 

 sophical position which may be fairly described as thoroughly 

 idealistic." This is true. I have elsewhere said' that "he is an 

 ideahst of a kind." Nevertheless, if there is one thing Professor 

 Pearson repudiates and blames again and again, it is philosophy. 

 Any defence must be a mistaken one which speaks eulogistically of an 

 author being that which the man himself emphatically denies that he is. 



My object, however, in this short paper, is not to engage in a 

 triangular duel, but simply to point out what is that basis upon which 

 all " Natural Science" necessarily reposes. 



Professors Ryle and Pearson, faithful to the traditions of their 

 school, declare that we can know nothing but feelings — "sense- 

 impressions and sense-impresses" — received, associated, remembered, 

 &c., and so issuing in " concepts." The ultimate appeal of this 

 school is to "the senses," and it is therefore justly spoken of as 

 " Sensism." 



To me it is clear that not only every conception, but also every 

 human perception, contains what is altogether beyond sense, ^ and 

 that our ultimate appeal is not to the senses but the intellect. 

 This system may, therefore, rightly be termed " Intellectualism." 



It is time that the real basis of science should be generally under- 

 stood ; that men should no longer be bound by the fetters of tradition 

 and called upon to bow down " lowly and reverently " to those who 

 are represented to them as "their betters" by the voice of "authority." 

 It is time for them to use freely their own reason, and while unflinch- 

 ingly and fearlessly recognising what they do not and cannot know, 



1 See Nature, July 21, 1892, p. 267. 



■^ See The Origin 0/ Human Reason, p. 280. 



2K 



