THE STABILITY OF TRUTH. 



357 



zation becomes an engine of destruction. The freedom 

 of self-realization involves the freedom of self-perdition. 



Hence appears the often-discussed rela- 



Intellect points ^- c a j i. >> • • i 



J ^ tion of " progress and poverty in social 



forward. r o r j 



development. Hence it comes that civ- 

 ilization, of which the essence is mutual help or altru- 

 ism, seems to become one vast instrument for the kill- 

 ing of fools. In the specialization of life conditions are 

 constantly changing. Every age is an age of transi- 

 tion, and transition brings unrest because it impairs the 

 value of conventionality. With the lowest forms of life 

 there is no safety save in absolute obedience to the laws 

 of the world around them. This obedience becomes 

 automatic and hereditary, because the disobedient leave 

 no chain of descent. All instincts, appetites, impulses 

 to action, even certain forms of illusions, point toward 

 such obedience. Whether we regard these phenomena 

 as variations selected because useful, or as inherited 

 habits, their relation is the same. They survive as 

 guarantees of future obedience because they have en- 

 forced obedience in the past. With the most enlightened 

 man, the same necessity for obedience exists, and the 

 instincts, appetites, and impulses of the lower animals 

 remain in him, or disappear only as reason is adequate 

 to take their place. And, in any case, there is no alle- 

 viation for the woes of life " save the absolute veracity 

 of action, the resolute facing of the world as it is." 



The intense practicality of all this must be recog- 

 nised. The truths of science are approximate, not ab- 

 solute. They must be stated in terms 

 Practicality of ^ i • , ^, 



^ of human consciousness, and they can 



sensations. -^ 



never be dissociated from possible human 



action. Knowledge which can only accumulate, without 



being woven into conduct, has never been a boon to its 



possessor. As food must be formed into tissues, so must 

 25 



