66 THE METAPHYSICAL BASIS 



to the subject. But, owing to a timid, and, I believe, 

 treacherous care for the moral freedom of man, he would 

 fain not implicate the subject in the object in this also, 

 as might be shown, following Kant. He will not permit 

 the world to participate genuinely in the intrinsic activities 

 of the individual spirit. In the last resort the process by 

 which the individual shapes his world attends to this item 

 rather than that, breaks up the objective continuum, selects 

 certain elements and rejects others, binds them together 

 into objects is a purely private process. Every rational 

 being, at the inmost heart of him, appears in Dr. Ward's 

 theory as an isolated, monadic entity, spontaneously radiat- 

 ing out its own activities. Nay, every minutest thing has 

 its own secret, impermeable core, which sits lonely amidst 

 its qualities and operates outwards. 



Now, at first sight, this looks like breaking up the world 

 into fragments, and endowing each fragment with its own 

 separate as well as distinct soul. "The only things of 

 which we have positive knowledge are subjects with in- 

 trinsic qualities Again, the only causes of which 



we have positive knowledge are minds." 1 But Dr. Ward 

 gets these independent minds to interact. This ' ' inter- 

 action of mind with mind is," he believes, " what we know 

 best, and must be the basis of our interpretation if we are 

 to understand at all." 2 The result, or the manifestation, 

 of this interaction, is a relation between the individuals. 

 "The intercourse, the co-operation or conflict, actual or 

 possible, of the individuals themselves is their relation. 

 The passion and action of things must take the place of 

 relation. . . . There are no objective relations other than 

 this living action and passion." 3 



l Natura/ism and Agnosticism, ii. 279. * Ibid. *Ibid., pp. 279-280. 



