vii REALITY AND IDEALISM 119 



tion of the field of consciousness, in a word, its self- 

 sufficiency. It is because reality does not display this 

 character that thought has to be called in to interpret it. 

 If it did, there would be no distinction between real and 

 unreal, between what is really presented and merely 

 imagined, between the self and the world, and there 

 would be no such thing as thought. As Professor James 

 so well points out l a hallucinatory candle occupying the 

 whole field of consciousness would be equivalent to a real 

 one. But as a matter of fact the contents of consciousness 

 present no such permanence and self- evidence ; their 

 initial state is a fleeting succession of conflicting presenta 

 tions which supplant and contradict one another. Some 

 of these are frequently followed by painful, others by 

 pleasurable feelings, and the penalty of idle acquiescence 

 in the flux of phenomena is rapid death. So a dire 

 necessity is laid upon the subject to distinguish himself 

 from the world, and to set about thinking how phenomena 

 may be controlled. He naturally begins by ascribing to 

 the phenomena which are followed by pains or other 

 practically important consequences a reality not shared 

 by the rest. This first interpretation of the chaos of 

 presentations is probably the first for which we can have 

 direct testimony, and represents the view of reality taken 

 by savages and small children. It is merely an extension 

 of this view when the plain man, in the condition of 

 natural realism distinguishes hallucinations, fancies, and 

 dreams from true reality. 



To effect this he uses whatever tests seem most 

 practically useful among others those of coherence 

 and consistency. Thus, the plain man s view is simply 

 the first stage in the attempt to reach a harmony of the 

 real. The view of the physicists represents a second and 

 subsequent stage. And Mr. Ritchie s philosophy of the 

 ultimate nature of reality is possibly a third. Each leads 

 on to the other, because each is successively recognised 

 not to be a coherent and consistent account of the world 

 and not to eliminate the irrational and unsatisfactory 



1 Princ. of Psychology, ii. 287. 



