THE LIMITATIONS OF THE METHOD. 1 67 



over the emptiness of the higher life, is as though 

 one were to lament in. the ascent of a mountain that 

 the advance was pure loss, because the scenery at 

 the foot must be more and more obscured, oblivious 

 of the fact that the ascent would bring new features 

 into view of which we could not have dreamt be- 

 low. Or to illustrate by a mathematical parallel : 

 the higher can understand the lower just as we can 

 abstract one and two dimensions from three dimens- 

 ional space ; the lower cannot understand the higher, 

 just as we cannot add a fourth dimension to Space. 

 § 13. These defects in the concrete metaphysical 

 method are insurmountable ; and though they do 

 not impair its correctness, they sadly limit its 

 achievements. They render it impossible for 

 philosophy to solve all questions, to be more than 

 fragmentary, to be complete and final. Philosophy 

 must be content if it can make out the general 

 drift of life, if it can determine its main features, if 

 it can approximately decipher its chief enigmas, if 

 not with perfect certainty and in full detail, yet with 

 reasonable probability. Its function is to form a 

 temporary roofing- in of the pyramid of knowledge, 

 which anticipates the completion of the structure, 

 and enables the workers to work secured against the 

 inclemency of the skies, but which from time to time 

 must be renewed and modified and expanded, so as 

 to satisfy the requirements of its growing bulk. A 

 philosophical system will share the characteristics of 

 the sciences on which it is based. It will consist of 

 a series of happy, but not random, guesses, more or 

 less probable, and deriving a certain amount of 

 support from their connexion, able to explain the 

 broad outlines of the constitution of things to a 

 greater or less extent, but leaving much as yet 



