130 DOGMATISM AND EVOLUTION 



of intellectual interests is lost sight of, is not to be attributed to 

 pragmatists generally. The consolidated formula is, however, 

 significant to this extent, that the various interests which may 

 be active summate themselves in the total effect. The acceptance 

 of a truth by no means implies either its perfect accordance with 

 other accepted truths or the unmixed satisfactoriness of its prac- 

 tical working-out. It is "eminently a matter of approximation." 

 And, as elsewhere in human life, the choice of the best involves a 

 compromise. To insist too rigidly on the theoretical criterion 

 is the part of mere visionaries; to slight it almost entirely for 

 the practical criterion is the part of short-sighted dolts. The 

 average man is content with truth that avoids explicit self-con- 

 tradiction and saves him from the ruder shocks. In the last 

 resort, however, all this is a matter of individual taste. "We 

 say this theory solves it on the whole more satisfactorily than 

 that theory; but that means more satisfactorily to ourselves, 

 and individuals will emphasize their points of satisfaction dif- 

 ferently." 1 



It is noteworthy that belief, rather than knowledge, is the 

 starting-point of the pragmatist epistemology. This has at least 

 the controversial advantage, that while the very possibility of 

 knowledge has-been questioned, no one has dreamed of question- 

 ing the possibility of belief. The theory is thus founded upon 

 patent matter of fact. It has, however, this difficulty. Truth 

 is defined as a property attributed to beliefs. It thus remains 

 undetermined whether any belief actually possesses this property ; 

 that is to say, is reasonably consistent with all other unquestioned 

 beliefs, and is incapable of serious failure in practice. But the 

 pragmatist, in a genuinely empirical spirit, does not hesitate to 

 take his stand upon the beliefs actually and commonly enter- 

 tained by men as true. Truths are for him, primarily at least, 

 the truths of actual practice that is to say, the beliefs that are 

 recognized as true. The distinction between knowledge and be- 

 lief is then interpreted as one of degree only. Our knowledge is 

 simply the body of our best attested beliefs. 



^Pragmatism, p. 61. 



