94 



CHAPTEli IV. ; x 



38. 



The special characteristic of tlie foregoing doctrine 'is its 

 insistence upon the co-ordinate Objectivity of many different 

 ' tyP es ^ experience and the paramount importance of respecting 

 this Objectivity and of regarding the particulars of experience 

 'in which it is prima facie present as the ultimate facts. These 

 may, indeed, be shown to be related to other elements of the 

 Objective, previously unknown, or not known to have a special 

 relation to those in question, but may never be thought of .as 

 "explained" (in the sense of'. being explained away) by the 

 discovery of these relations. At the. same time our doctrine 

 does not forbid the scientist to build upon the basis of these 

 primary facts secondary constructions in which elements from 

 other categories of experience are involved. The alien 

 elements thus introduced often serve the important function 

 of bringing to light relations between the primary facts which 

 could hardly have been discovered without their aid. This 

 truth has been illustrated sufficiently in the last chapter. 

 The secondary construction can, without difficulty, be conceived 

 to be extended so as to unify the primary facts both in the 

 province from which the interpretative elements are borrowed 

 and the province in which they are applied. In this way a 

 result may be achieved which, for the purposes of scientific 

 investigation and exposition, may be regarded as a reduction 

 of the facts of the latter province to facts of the former. 

 It is obvious that the extent to which unification of the 

 various provinces of scientific inquiry can thus be brought 

 about is identical with the range over which a concept, or a 

 group of concepts, drawn from a single experiential context, 

 can be applied to make facts intelligible. 



