HYPOTHESIS 143 



phies and divergent world-views that have at all times prevailed 

 among men. If we are to decide between these, to discern the 

 truth that is in them, and to eliminate the error, logic can merely 

 tell us that in this process we must be as unprejudiced, critical, 

 careful, and judicious as possible. 1 



A thoughtful analysis of the various fundamental judgments 

 which make up our general outlook on the inner nature and ulti 

 mate significance of the universe whether these judgments be 

 called assumptions, postulates, axioms, principles, or beliefs 

 may or may not have the effect of modifying some or all of 

 these latter ; but this effect it will undoubtedly have : it will show 

 us that in choosing between various alternative theories about the 

 remoter causes of things, in shaping our philosophical views 

 about the universe, we are all alike influenced more or less by 

 certain partly instinctive and implicit intellectual tendencies, which 

 are often not clearly realized in consciousness, and which, when 

 realized, are felt to be legitimate though they may not be capable 

 of logical justification by reference to any definite principles lying 

 beyond themselves. These tendencies or leanings have their 

 root in our &quot; belief that the universe is rational,&quot; 2 and in our con 

 ception or &quot; notion of what a rational universe should be &quot;. 3 This 

 conception, and this belief, Mr. Joseph considers to be &quot; not 

 derived from experience &quot; 4 inasmuch as they control our inter 

 pretation of experience. But it is not true that they are in our 

 possession prior to, and independently of, experience. Prior to 

 experience we have only our cognitive faculties senses and 

 intellect. These alone we bring to the interpretation of experi 

 ence. It is sense experience, as interpreted by intellect, that 

 gives us our &quot; notion of what a rational universe should be&quot;. If 

 that notion were prior to experience it should be the same in 

 all men ; but it is not : the agnostic, the monist, and the theist, 

 have different conceptions; and the conception which works 

 best, which proves most satisfactory, which fits in most harmoni 

 ously with human experience all round, is alone the true con 

 ception. Theism is the one which we believe to fulfil these 

 conditions. 



3 Cf. WELTON and MONAHAN, op. cit., p. 398. 



3 JOSEPH, op. cit., p. 469. ibid. 



4 ibid. The tendency to endow the mind with constitutive thought-principles 

 antecedent to all experience is very common among post-Kantian writers. It per 

 vades the otherwise excellent work of Professor Borden P. Bowne on the The Theory 

 of Thought and Knowledge (Harper Brothers, 1899). 



