THE THREE CLASSES OF MIND 197 



profit. Its duty is not to judge or decide ; that is the duty 

 of the Comprehensive mind ; but to test the fabrics of know- 

 ledge submitted by Imagination and Comprehension, and see 

 that they will bear the strain in use. For Use is the judge 

 that has to pass sentence on the value of our mental or physical 

 abilities and work. Its duty is therefore to use, systematise 

 and cultivate the seeds that the minds of Comprehension and 

 Imagination have sown. It never investigates, creates or 

 beautifies. It is the conservative mind of man tenacious 

 of past customs and beliefs and principles, opposed to all new 

 advancement or innovations, reluctant to believe till convinced 

 against its will, but untiring in its energy to prove and perfect 

 what it undertakes, obstinate and unreasonable in its very 

 reason. Yet it is the mind that corrects many mistakes and 

 supplies what is wanting in the conceptions of the two previous 

 orders of mind. It is the mind that ultimately, after slow and 

 careful trial of good or evil, truth or error, improves upon 

 the first inventions of comprehension when put by it into ex- 

 periment to be turned to practical use. It is the mind of deep 

 study and thought, of reason and patient energy, and continu- 

 ally and ultimately perfects all permanent mental creations. 



But it is blind to its own shortcomings and loth above 

 all minds to admit its errors or change its opinions; for, 

 remember, with all its proofs, science is more prone to err 

 than logic. It is superabundant above all other minds in 

 pride and conceit, and so acts as a strong antidote to the multi- 

 tudinous errors that theory, knowledge and Imagination place 

 as evidence before the jury of comprehension, and were it not 

 for the legal advice in the rules of procedure submitted by the 

 mind of Understanding, the jury, that is, the mind of Com- 

 prehension, would often be at its wit's end to form a verdict 

 even of probability, let alone of truth, to present to the mental 

 judge, viz., practical utility. But do not forget that small 

 scientific mistakes often make big practical losses, so that if 

 science is not referred back to the minds of logic and compre- 

 hension for a verdict, it is nearly as often wrong as is the 

 evidence adduced by the contradictory witnesses of knowledge 

 and imagination. Both the minds of Understanding and of 

 Imagination must always be subject to the minds of logic or 

 comprehension which have to decide between the truths of the 

 knowledge they adduce ; yet, nevertheless, the mind of Under- 



