AND ITS SELF-CONSERVATION. 119 



world. And modern science is but tracing out in more 

 precise details what the greatest " metaphysical " thinkers 

 of preceding ages have shown, each in his own way, to be 

 the one truly rational theory of the world. What is, per- 

 haps, wanting more than anything else in the work of 

 modern science, is the clear guidance of the universal 

 principles which these great thinkers have outlined with 

 such admirable consistency, and which modern investiga- 

 tors themselves are seeking after, through their so-called 

 inductive methods. In reality, the fundamental princi- 

 ples of all science are discovered rather by reflection than 

 by pursuit of details. And what are called discoveries are 

 commonly nothing else than the outward, conspicuous 

 verification of the accuracy with which the inward incon- 

 spicuous process of thought has traced out this or that 

 fundamental principle in nature. Thought anticipates 

 experiment. Experiment is the process of measuring 

 one's thought by applying it to the unvarying standard of 

 nature. 



Doubtless thought, to be successful, to be real as 

 thought, must in a certain sense be experimental, must 

 keep in view the " facts " of nature, though, again, these 

 " facts " could only be known as such by means of thought. 

 Similarly, on the other hand, no experiment or observa- 

 tion is worthy the name unless thought is present as the 

 very soul of the process so named. As we saw at the out- 

 set of our inquiry, it is absurd to suppose that theory and 

 fact are separable elements in human inquiry. No theory 

 is trustworthy that did not more or less have its origin in 

 " experiment," and that does not constantly find its con- 

 firmation in experiment. But, equally true is it that no 

 "experiment" is of any real significance unless it has 



