SECTION 21. PRECISE NATURE OF PROBLEM TO BE INVESTIGA TED. 255 



bracing philosophy of life ? Here we are face to face with a new 

 problem, inasmuch as the various extant and extinct philosophies 

 of life have been parts of widely diverging systems of thought. 

 Yet one may be permitted to surmise that it cannot be a sheer 

 coincidence that in the conception of humanity as developed 

 in Conclusion 13, we are offered a philosophy of life intimately 

 corresponding in all its essential outlines with the older religious 

 conceptions. That is, in humanity embracing past, present, 

 and to come we discern a verifiable entity possessing virtually 

 all the attributes of the traditional deity practically infinite 

 goodness, wisdom, power, and omnipresence, and incorporating 

 a cheerful and bracing answer to the commanding questions 

 which lie at the heart of religions. 1 We learn, accordingly, 

 that religions have always been justified psychologically and 

 practically, and that modern science hints at a philosophy of 

 life closely corresponding in principle to the older religions, 

 but excelling them in geniality, helpfulness, and energising power. 



117. In the problems in this Sub-Conclusion we observe 

 that the interest of the social reformer centres as a rule in the 

 vanishing point of what is momentarily and locally felt and ex- 

 perienced, instead of in the multiple, massive, and enduring 

 fact of which the former is but a single and transitory mani- 

 festation. We have thus abundantly proved Bacon's fundamental 

 contention that what' is regarded as obvious does not disclose, 

 but masks, reality, and that the enlightened seeker after truth 

 and the alert social reformer will invariably endeavour to 

 pierce through the cloud of contemporary commonplaces and 

 crude surmises by applying the methods proposed in Con- 

 clusion 19/72. He is indefinite in his thought who, in doc- 

 trinaire fashion, blandly assumes that he need not go behind 

 superficial symptoms or beyond unexamined current hypotheses, 

 or who, in other words, capriciously regards a fraction of an or- 

 ganic whole as an independent entity. We repeat. The layman 

 cannot be expected to probe to the kernel the legions of 

 theories recommended to him; but of him who specifically 

 devotes himself to a cause or truth we have a right to demand 

 that he shall examine the whole ground on which he stands 

 and not only a fraction thereof. 



118. (D) DEFIN1TENESS IN STATEMENTS GENE- 

 RALLY. In present-day France, lucidity in expression has been 

 virtually carried to the stage of perfection. Other things being 

 equal, it will be agreed that the power of unequivocally 

 communicating our ideas in words, is not only of benefit to 

 him who hears or reads, but both prevents our thought from 

 being confused and our statements reacting disastrously on our 

 ideas. Methodological procedure, that is, demands that our 

 cogitations shall be clear as a crystal stream, and that our 



1 See G. Spiller, Outlines of a New World Religion. 



