OF THE GOOD. 231 



the earlier philosophies, both of Nature and of Mind, 

 admitting that research in both regions can neither find 

 a beginning nor define an end which is not subject to 

 doubt, that its correctness is merely a question of method ; 

 we may be able to lower the ideal of truth, from being a 

 definite axiom with which we start, or an end which we 

 reach, to that of being merely a correct process of 

 thought; but we cannot, without the risk of losing all 

 hold and support, give up the belief in the existence 

 of a supreme and unalterable moral standard, from 

 which we are able to judge the value of actions, the 

 motives as well as the aims of human conduct. It 

 seems contrary to human nature to rest content in the 

 region of practice with a fluctuating and merely tempo- 

 rary rule, however much modern science and modern 

 philosophy have combined in shaking our faith in the 

 capacities of the human intellect to arrive at any per- 

 manently truthful statement of ultimate facts. The 

 modern definition of scientific or philosophical truth, as 

 consisting merely in the correct method or in the logical 

 consistency of ideas, has in fact made science, in the 

 wider sense of the word, apparently incapable of afford- 

 ing a foundation for morality, of formulating a creed 

 that can deal adequately with the principles of action. 

 To express it in other words, we may say that science 

 in the larger sense of the term has gained, in the course 

 of the nineteenth century, very largely in ideas and 

 aspects, in canons and methods of thought, bub that it 

 has, in proportion, lost its older axioms as well as its 

 ideals : the fixed foundation on which to build and the 

 fixed end to be kept in view. But these two data form 



