144 RECONSTRUCTION. 



cutting of the Gordian knot. But It is the fact 

 alone that thouo^ht and feelinof are aUke activities of 

 the Self, the fact that all things are phenomena for a 

 conscious soul, which renders it even possible to 

 assign a higher authority to the Ideal, and to assert 

 that it will in the end be found to possess greater 

 reality. And this fact also legalizes what would 

 appear an arbitrary act of power, for in appealing 

 to the Self to compose the conflict between thought 

 and feeling, we are appealing to the legitimate 

 sovereign of both, to whom they both belong, and 

 who has a right to arrange the order of their merit. 



Thus the assertion of the reality of the Self affords 

 us the inestimable gain of enabling us to burst 

 through the fetters of Scepticism and to clear the 

 road for further progress. 



5i 6. And from the same principle follows a cor- 

 ollary hardly less important. We are now in a 

 position to protest against the ridiculous charge of 

 anthropomorphism which is so frequently brought 

 against our thought. The sceptic might indeed 

 have dispensed with a device which more [)roperly 

 belongs to the agnostic, but it was too handy not to 

 be utilized when thrown in his way. He used it 

 fairly and impartially against all knowledge, and not 

 like the agnostic, against a selected portion (ch. Hi. 

 ^ 4), but he could not raise it to the dignity of a vital 

 argument. But even though it benefited the sceptic 

 little, its refutation will benefit us much. We shall 

 rightly seize the opportunity of exposing a wide- 

 spread superstition, which should really by this time 

 have ceased to figure in any serious philosophic 

 argument. For what conceivable meaning can be 

 attached to the reproach that a conception is anthro- 

 pomorphic ? Anthropomorphic means partaking of 



