The 'What' and the 'How' of Mind 273 



each general feature of the ' what ' in nature has arisen 

 upon just such an interpretation of the salient aspects 

 presented in the career of individual things. But this 

 would be to write a large and most difficult chapter of 

 genetic philosophy. 



Our second point in regard to the ' what,' therefore, is 

 that any * what ' whatever is in large measure made up of 

 judgments based upon experiences of the ^ how.' The 

 fundamental concepts of philosophy reflect the catego- 

 ries of origin, both in their application to individuals — to 

 the 'mere thing' — and also in the interpretation which 

 they have a right to claim ; for they are our mental ways 

 of dealing with what is * mere ' on one hand and of the 

 final reading of reality which philosophy makes its method. 

 Of course the question may be asked : how far, origin } — 

 that is, how far back in the career of the thing is it nec- 

 essary to go to call the halting-place * origin ' } This we 

 may well return to lower down ; the point here is that 

 origin is always a reading of part of the very career which 

 is the content of the concept of the nature of the thing. 



§ 3. The 'What' and the 'How' of Mind 



Coming now closer to particular instances of the * what,' 

 and selecting the most refractory case that there is in the 

 world, let us ask these questions concerning the mind. 

 I select this case because, in the first place, it is the case 

 urgently pressing upon us ; and, second, because it is the 

 case in which there seems to be, if anywhere, a gaping dis- 

 tinction between the 'what' and the 'how.' Modern evo- 

 lution claims to discuss the 'how' only, not to concern 

 itself with the ' what ' ; or, again, it claims to solve the 



