144 THE DATA OF PHILOSOPHY. 



permanence of a consciousness of likeness or difference, 

 is our ultimate warrant for asserting the existence of like- 

 ness or difference ; and, in fact, we mean by the existence of 

 likeness or difference, nothing more than the permanent 

 consciousness of it. To say that a given congruity or incon- 

 gruity exists, is simply our way of saying that we invariably 

 have a consciousness of it along with a consciousness of the 

 compared things. We know nothing more of existence than 

 a continued manifestation. 



§ 42. But Philosophy requires for its datum some sub- 

 stantive proposition. To recognize as unquestionable a cer- 

 tain fundamental process of thought, is not enough: we 

 must recognize as unquestionable some fundamental prod- 

 uct of thought, reached by this process. If Philosophy is 

 completely-unified knowledge — if the unification of knowl- 

 edge is to be effected only by showing that some ultimate 

 proposition includes and consolidates all the results of expe- 

 rience ; then, clearly, this ultimate proposition which has to 

 be proved congruous with all others, must express a piece of 

 knowledge, and not the validity of an act of knowing. 

 Having assumed the trustworthiness of consciousness, we 

 have also to assume as trustworthy some deliverance of con- 

 sciousness. 



What must this be? Must it not be one affirming the 

 widest and most profound distinction which things present ? 

 Must it not be a statement of congruities and incongruities 

 more general than any other? An ultimate principle that 

 is to unify all experience, must be co-extensive with all ex- 

 perience — cannot be concerned with experience of one order 

 or several orders, but must be concerned with universal ex- 

 perience. That which Philosophy takes as its datum, must 

 be an assertion of some likeness and difference to which 

 all other likenesses and differences are secondary. If know- 

 ing is classifying, or grouping the like and separating the 

 unlike; and if the unification of knowledge proceeds by 



