38 THE UNFATHOMED UNIVERSE 



of ultimate Reality, is a problem which can only be dealt with by 

 the science which systematically analyses the meaning of reality, 

 i.e., by Metaphysics. We may perhaps follow the usage of some 

 recent writers in marking this difference of object by a difference 

 in terminology, and say that the goal of experimental science is 

 the description of facts, the goal of Metaphysics their interpretation. 

 The difference of aim is, however, not ultimate. Description of facts, 

 when once we cease to be content with such description as will sub- 

 serve the purpose of calculation, and call for the description of the 

 fact as it really is, of itself becomes metaphysical interpretation." 



Along with the sympathetic interest that many modern 

 philosophers (such as Ward, Koyce, Pringle-Pattison, Stout, 

 Taylor, Lovejoy, Bergson) have taken in the general results 

 of science, there is benefit accruing to science through their 

 expert criticism of scientific categories. For the mood 

 and training of the scientific investigator is rarely such 

 that it leads far in that direction. Some of the ablest 

 scientific minds the world has known have betrayed in 

 their would-be philosophical deliverances an extraordinary 

 naivete. 



In thinking of the empirical, scientific, and philosophical 

 orders as reconstructions of increasing completeness and, 

 it is hoped, of increasing nearness to reality, it must be re- 

 membered that they co-exist in our midst like outcrops of 

 strata of different epochs. Thus we have little more than 

 empirical knowledge in regard to the variability of living 

 creatures, or in regard to certain obscure diseases. In med- 

 ical practice, stock-breeding, and engineering, empirical 

 knowledge has often worked extraordinarily well. The ex- 

 planation is sometimes diagnostic genius, sometimes remark- 

 able development of perception in quite ordinary individuals. 

 A patiently accumulated working knowledge often leads a 

 shrewd man a long way without much science in the strict 



