CHAPTER XVI. 



KNOWLEDGE AND BELIEF. 



The knowledge of the truth and its sources : the activity of the senses 

 and the association of presentations. Organs of sense and organs 

 of thought. Sense-organs and their specific energy. Their 

 evolution. The philosophy of sensibility. Inestimable value of 

 the senses. Limits of sensitive knowledge. Hypothesis and faith. 

 Theory and faith. Essential difference of scientific (natural) and 

 religious (supernatural) faith. Superstition of savage and of 

 civilised races. Confessions of faith. Unsectarian schools. The 

 faith of our fathers. Spiritism. Revelation. 



Every effort of genuine science makes for a know- 

 ledge of the truth. Our only real and valuable 

 knowledge is a knowledge of nature itself, and 

 consists of presentations which correspond to external 

 things. We are incompetent, it is true, to penetrate 

 into the innermost nature of this real world — the 

 " thing in itself " — but impartial critical observation 

 and comparison inform us that in the normal action 

 of the brain and the organs of sense the impressions 

 received by them from the outer world are the same 

 in all rational men, and that in the normal function 

 of the organs of thought certain presentations are 

 formed which are everywhere the same. These 

 presentations we call true, and we are convinced 

 that their content corresponds to the knowable 

 aspect of things. We know that these facts are not 

 imaginary, but real. 



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