ORIENTATION OF MENTAL IMAGERY 293 



checked and reoriented by observation and experiment; 

 this matching of the inevitable logic of growth and evo- 

 lution in the outer world with a logical sequence of self- 

 sustaining mental processes, is the very essence of 

 science and of spiritual freedom. It is the only means 

 we have of reconstructing the unwritten past, and anti- 

 cipating or prophesying the future. It is our only 

 escape from the narrow prison in which the physical 

 body is confined, to universal freedom and to larger 

 fields of profit. 



The chief purpose, therefore, of the imagination is 

 rightly to orient mental and bodily growth to world 

 growth ; rightly to picture the world as it was, and shall 

 be, in order to fit life more profitably to the world as 

 it is. 



Fantasy may create its own pictures, real enough 

 it is true, and true they may well be. But if these 

 mental creations have no corresponding realities in the 

 outer world, they cannot be used for constructive pur- 

 poses. Organic life cannot build itself up and preserve 

 itself by acting in accordance with them, because in that 

 way life cannot receive cooperative support, or service, 

 from the outer world. 



The free usage of both fantasy and the imagination 

 may be regarded as mental play, serving the same pur- 

 pose as physical play, in that it exercises important vital 

 functions, and leads to the discovery of the ways things 

 may or may not be done. 



VI. The Imagination as an Instrument of Conveyance 

 The New Freedom and The New World 



The lives of plants, animals, and man, are depen- 

 dent on three different orders of conveyance, each 



