10 PHILOSOPHICAL THOUGHT. 



into simpler elemental processes, by dealing with samples 

 or examples where the existing material was huge and 

 overwhelming, and by many similar devices. The 

 student of science has, in the course of the last hundred 

 years, learnt to apply these devices in numberless ways, 

 and to combine them with an astounding and ever-growing 

 ingenuity and resourcefulness which is the wonder of the 

 age. The scientific student has learnt to go from words 

 to things, from books to nature, and nature herself has 

 revealed to him her phenomena in ever-increasing wealth 

 and abundance. If nowadays any of the many prob- 

 lems of science have to be attacked, the foremost precept 

 will be: circumspice, look around you. The road of scien- 

 tific inquiry is the way that leads outside, 

 e. But starting, as we did, with language i.e., with 



Seen es- 

 pecially in words and terms we very soon find that language con- 

 language. 



tains a vast number of expressions for which no outer 

 * image can be readily found. Such words refer to what 

 are generally called abstract ideas or ideas par excellence. 

 If we try to define them i.e., to assign to them a def- 

 inite meaning we have, in many cases, not to look out- 

 side but to resort to contemplation, to retire into the 

 solitude of thought, to shut out as much as possible the 

 disturbing influence of things around us, and to concen- 

 trate our attention as much as ever we can upon the 

 images which arise within us. We have to look within, 

 not outside, if we wish to find and fix the exact mean- 

 ing of the words we employ. 



This difference which exists between the words in our 

 common speech has been noted by all philosophical 

 writers and urged with more or less clearness. To 



