ULTIMATE SCIENTIFIC IDEAS. 69 



are beyond his grasp ; nay, even beyond his power to think 

 of as having existed or as existing in time to come. When, 

 again, he turns from the succession of phenomena, external 

 or internal, to their intrinsic nature, he is just as much at 

 fault. Supposing him in every case able to resolve the ap- 

 pearances, properties, and movements of things, into mani- 

 festations of Force in Space and Time; he still finds that 

 Force, Space, and Time pass all understanding. Similarly, 

 though the analysis of mental actions may finally bring him 

 down to sensations, as the original materials out of which 

 all thought is woven, yet he is little forwarder; for he can 

 give no account either of sensations themselves or of that 

 something which is conscious of sensations. Objective and 

 subjective things he thus ascertains to be alike inscrutable in 

 their substance and genesis. In all directions his investiga- 

 tions eventually bring him face to face with an insoluble 

 enigma; and he ever more clearly perceives it to be an in- 

 soluble enigma. He learns at once the greatness and the lit- 

 tleness of the human intellect — its power in dealing with all 

 that comes within the range of experience ; its impotence in 

 dealing with all that transcends experience. He realizes 

 with a special vividness the utter incomprehensibleness of 

 the simplest fact, considered in itself. He, more than any 

 other, truly knows that in its ultimate essence nothing can 

 be known. 



