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SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XXXVII. No. 947 



attachment for his observed changes. For 

 reality is not made up of modern scientifie, 

 any more than of ancient philosophical, 

 abstractions. It is, the rather, a theater in 

 which real things are always actually doing 

 something to one another, and in which 

 each one is having something done to itself. 

 There is nothing which the student of phys- 

 ical science more needs to learn from the 

 study of man than that he himself is of 

 necessity a metaphysician, and can only 

 choose between some wisely and well 

 thought-out metaphysical views, and a 

 naive, crude and misleading metaphysics 

 of his own uninstructed self. 



But the final question respecting the 

 limitations of science as they are ex- 

 pounded by the study of man is this: Are 

 they limitations of ignorance or limitations 

 of knowledge? In other words, because 

 there are inherent and inescapable limita- 

 tions to the human intellect, are we to con- 

 clude that man as the measure of all things 

 can really know nothing, just that it is and 

 how it is, or are we to conclude that his 

 knowledge, although never complete and 

 all-comprehensive, is nevertheless knowl- 

 edge indeed? And by "knowledge in- 

 deed" we mean that the real world and its 

 actual happenings are in fact, progres- 

 sively being more largely and accurately 

 known by the combined achievements of 

 the race ? The proof of this faith, if there 

 be proof, belongs to a department of phi- 

 losophy which we are accustomed to call 

 epistemology or theory of knowledge. In 

 this connection I am only expressing my 

 faith when I say that it is the same as the 

 faith of the race. 



Finally, the study of man is entitled to 

 say what the true and worthy ideals of 

 science are. For the scientifie mind, the 

 tenets of modern pragmatism with respect 

 to the nature and meaning of truth can 

 never be permanently satisfying. For 



science, knowledge has more than a merely 

 practical value, and its tests are something 

 more, and different from the mere success 

 of its practical working. For science, 

 knowledge has an ideal value. We are 

 wont to express this by spealring of the 

 worth of science for science's own sake. 

 But the better, because the truer way to 

 express this ideal is to say that knowledge 

 as knowledge, and science as science, has 

 value for man's sake. And this is because 

 man's mind craves for, feeds upon, finds 

 its satisfaction, uplift and refinement in, 

 the growth of knowledge. To the human 

 mind, or spirit, when it awakens to a real- 

 ization of its call and its obligation to real- 

 ize its own higher forms of privilege, and 

 to improve its best opportunity, science 

 affords a satisfaction that has a value of its 

 own. 



This is not to say that science has not 

 contributed, and is not bound and glad to 

 contribute, to the so-called practical and 

 utilitarian in the life of man. Chemistry 

 is not pursued with eagerness and satisfac- 

 tion, and almost religious awe before the 

 mystery of material existence, as a purely 

 mercantile affair. But modern chemistry 

 is transforming almost every branch of 

 modern industry to the great practical 

 benefit of mankind. Modern physics is not 

 cultivated as the servant of the U. S. Steel 

 Corporation, or the General Electric, or 

 the Mercantile Marine monopolies. But the 

 founders and promoters of these corpora- 

 tions owe every dollar of their legitimate 

 earnings or of their graft, and the public 

 owe all the material benefits which have 

 fallen to them from these corporations, 

 chiefly to modern physics. 



The satisfaction of man's rational aspi- 

 ration for knowledge is not, however, the 

 only ideal which the study of man recom- 

 mends for confidence and intelligent pur- 

 suit, to the other sciences. Every science, 



