22 LESSONS FEOM NATURE. [CHAP. I. 



we can not affirm that a demon could not deceive us as to the 

 existence of a passing thought. If however we cannot so 

 affirm, then the Agnostics are wrong (for they, the Agnostics, 

 say that to this extent there is certainty), and we are landed 

 in utter scepticism. If they choose the other horn of the 

 dilemma, and assert the necessary impotence of thought or 

 of language, then, as we have seen, they thereby assert that 

 everything which can be thought or said is necessarily uncer 

 tain ; and this, again, implies certainty ; so that the Agnostics 

 are inextricably inclosed in a vicious circle. They cannot 

 even speak interrogatively ; they cannot say, &quot; How do you 

 know that thought is not self-existent ?&quot; for the use or 

 implication of one personal pronoun ipso facto removes them 

 from their own chosen position, and lands them in that world 

 of objectivity and reality they would so insanely and so 

 inconsequently disown. 



We come now to the last matter which it is here suggested 

 Logical con- should be pressed upon Agnostics. It is the result 

 ces&amp;gt; and outcome of the foregoing observations namely, 

 that they (the Agnostics) are logically driven to admit and 

 accept the following affirmation, under pain of utter scep 

 ticism : 



That our persuasion and spontaneous belief as to the exist 

 ence of a continuously enduring self underlying the changing 

 series of phenomena we term &quot; states of consciousness &quot; are 

 valid, and the results of a true perception of our own ob 

 jective existence. We are forced to admit that the think 

 ing being I call myself at this moment is substantially 

 one and identical with the agent who carried on the long- 

 series of acts and endurances I call my past life. We are 

 driven to affirm that we have indeed a direct intuition of 

 passing , modifications, but that we have a no less clear, no 

 less certain intuition of a mysterious, substantial unity, which 

 reason tells us, if we can be certain of anything, is due to a 

 peculiar faculty of perceiving truth, which faculty we term 

 the intellect. I say &quot; of perceiving truth,&quot; for if what is per 

 ceived as necessarily true (not merely passively unthinkable) 



