406 PART VI.-CONCLUSION CONCERNING CONCLUSIONS. 



stantially treated. It was obviously inexpedient to crowd the 

 Sections with repetitions, and only slightly more marked appro- 

 priateness decided under which heading a Conclusion should 

 be scheduled, e.g., the Conclusion dealing with verification. 



218. (B) IMPROVING THE CONCLUSIONS. The series 

 of Conclusions submitted herewith make no pretence to forming 

 a self-contained and immutable system. Hence if they should 

 commend themselves as a whole, the methodologists of the 

 future will regard it as incumbent on them to improve the body 

 of Conclusions in wording and in substance, to supplement them 

 freely, to remove what is redundant, and to co-ordinate and fuse 

 them to the furthest degree. The Conclusions are the outcome 

 of over twenty-five years of conscientious examination and ex- 

 ploitation of the author's own experience and opportunities; 

 and there exists hence every reason for believing that others 

 who accept this volume as the point of departure for their life- 

 long methodological researches, will be able to improve thereon 

 substantially, apart from developing fresh sides the practical 

 and pedagogical sides, for instance of the general problem of 

 scientific methodology. 



219. (C) APPLICATION TO PRACTICAL LIFE. In the 

 economic life, in politics and city management, home and school 

 education, art, play, the organisation of associations and con- 

 ferences, in ordinary life and thought, in the world of feeling 

 and willing, everywhere in short, the performing of actions on 

 the most extensive scale and in agreement with scientific canons 

 should be the invariable endeavour. The foregoing Conclusions 

 apply, therefore, as repeatedly stated and especially in Conclu- 

 sion 2, to the whole realm of human activity and not exclusively to 

 what is styled pure science to-day, and their influence is likely 

 to prove beneficial in the wider sphere as in the narrower. 

 Most especially should they be made the foundation of all educa- 

 tion and of the urgently needed reform of the material and 

 moral life of man. In industrial enterprise this broad conception 

 is fast gaining adherents, and, indeed, internationalism in every 

 form stamps more and more the activities and purposes of this 

 age, as was dramatically illustrated by the late War and by 

 the ruinous economic crisis which followed it. The narrow in- 

 dividualist view of each man relying mainly on himself is being 

 superseded, and it is presumably only a question of a few years 

 when it will be acknowledged that a scientific methodology 

 should guide men's cogitations and that the many valuable 

 reflections and methods of individuals should be methodically 

 collected, systematised, and disseminated broadcast. 



220. A generation ago the application of scientific methods 

 to the problems of industrial and commercial efficiency appeared 

 Utopian. Routine, common sense, incidental improvements, ruled 

 supreme, save in so far as machinery and organisation were 

 concerned. The idea of analysing a task into its component 



