42 THE MISUSE OF METAPHORS IN 



which is the characteristic feature of both of them. We 

 were left the choice between an Inductive and a Deductive 

 Logic, both of which are false, because they are abstract. 

 Psychology has been in a condition of utter confusion 

 from the same cause. In its theory of the "Association 

 of Ideas," for example, ideas were treated like objects in 

 space and time, mutually external, separate, isolated, await- 

 ing connection by means of relations. But no ideas could 

 be found without relations, nor relations without ideas. 

 Nor could ideas be resolved into relations, for relations 

 can only exist between ideas " they must have points on 

 which to hang." But there are no such "points" : if 

 there were, they would have no meaning ; and it is not 

 possible to relate the meaningless. The difficulties, in 

 short, are insoluble, and they arise from the application 

 of the metaphors of mechanism to mental facts. 1 



Perhaps, however, the best illustration of the confusion 

 which metaphors introduce into the theory of knowledge 

 is furnished in the common notion that a science or philo- 

 sophy, or any systematic body of truths, is a kind of 

 "edifice." Being an edifice, it must, of course, rest on 

 some " foundation." Hence, to find such a foundation is 

 the first and most important business of the investigator. 

 Unless // is sure, the whole body of doctrine is untrust- 

 worthy ; but once it is found, the erection of the super- 

 structure will go on apace, new facts being added to the 

 old by means of observation and logic. 



1 An even more instructive illustration is furnished by psychologists. 

 With great unanimity they reject the mechanical notion of a mind made 

 up of externally inter-acting faculties ; but they bring back as " elements," 

 or "factors," what they have rejected as "faculties," and they discuss 

 their relative priority, and expound their inter-action ! 



