EVOLUTION THE MASTER-KEY 



one can be said to know anything. And the term 

 epistemology, which connotes the study of the 

 nature of knowledge, is not, as in logic it should 

 be, the most familiar and the first to be learned of 

 all the many words with the same termination. 



In here attempting, not to recount in brief the 

 doctrines taught by the immortal author of the 

 critical philosophy, but rather to indicate the be- 

 liefs of psychology a century after the close of his 

 long and meritorious life, we must begin by ad- 

 mitting that our initial problem is not merely un- 

 solved, but insoluble. In front of me, as I believe, 

 is a table. Few readers outside of Oxford will 

 quarrel with me if I assume, as I do, that this table 

 has or, at any rate, indicates a real existence 

 which does not depend for its being upon my 

 perception of it. If, then, I may assume that the 

 external world, as represented by this table, exists 

 by virtue of itself and independently of my mind 

 or any other, we have first to admit that no one 

 has yet begun to offer us the scantiest explanation 

 of the manner in which we can have any knowl- 

 edge at all of the existence of the table. Such 

 explanations as have been offered are no more 

 than admirably contrived verbal exercises. The 

 prime fact that the ego can, in some fashion, be- 

 come aware of the non - ego must simply be ac- 

 cepted. But it is of the first importance to in- 

 quire in precisely what fashion and with precisely 

 what limitations, if any, this knowledge is at- 

 tained. 



34 



