278 THE PROBLEM OF KNOWLEDGE 



out their peculiar problems with their own partic 

 ular tools. 



With Aristotle the attempted balance failed. 

 Social life is disintegrating beyond the point of 

 hope of a successful reorganization, and thinking 

 is becoming a fascinating pursuit for its own sake. 

 The world of practice is now the world of com 

 promise and of adjustment. It is relative to par 

 tial aims and finite agents. The sphere of abso 

 lute and enduring truth and value can be reached 

 only in and through thought. The one who acts 

 compromises himself with the animal desire that 

 inspires his action and with the alien material that 

 forms its stuff . In two short generations the 

 divorce of philosophy from life, the isolation of 

 reflective theory from practical conduct, has com 

 pleted itself. So great is the irony of history that 

 this sudden and effective outcome was the result 

 of the attempt to make thought the instrument of 

 action, and action the manifestation of truth 

 reached by thinking. 



But this statement must not be taken too liter 

 ally. It is impossible that men should really sepa 

 rate their ideas from their acts. If we look ahead 

 a few centuries we find that the philosophy of 

 Plato and Aristotle has accomplished, in an in 

 direct and unconscious way, what perhaps it could 

 never have effected by the more immediate and 

 practical method of Socrates. Philosophy became 



