sm. That philosophy, however named, which proclaims that the experience of life is nothing more than a vain show, a pantomime of sensatio

, nor solve the speculative difficulties which its recognition raises up. The Real and the Ideal, essentially distinct yet mockingly similar, for ever blend and intermingle in the composite experience of life. Truly to discriminate and unravel these,-validly to separate the Ideal element which impregnates that Reality which we are for ever compelled to postulate and recognise, still remains the great problem of Philosophy-humbler perhaps and more practical, but not less pro

s; and, what is more important, it appears to react with inc

world are a mentally constructed system. But this doctrine has made but little impression upon the students of Natural Science. The objective origin of our sensations and the apparently objective reality also of the intelligible qualities and operative laws of the external world are too strongly impressed upon their minds.

ow as great a place in the physical sciences as the

e student of Metaphysics? We are convinced that it has not: and the reason he most frequently gives for this neglect is that, being a purely scientific doctrine, it does not come within his sphere. Scienc

hy analyses the conceptions involved not only in scientific reasoning, but in the most common and ordinary mental processes. It analyses them with special reference to the relations between the Phenomenal and the Rea

lation with Reality. Physics can speak of mass and weight and avoid all reference to Matter; but there always is, in scientific reasoning, an implicit reference to Reality, and it facilitates, therefore, the expression of scien

lf of this discovery, unifies its conception of Nature and gives expression to the doctrine of the inter-transmutability of the various classes of physical phenomena by postulating an entity called Energy, and regarding the various classes of phenomena as transmutations which this entity undergoes. But Science has

t of Energy supplies all her requirements; and that the employment of that conception obviates the very serious contradictions which are involved in any assumption of a real enti

s consideration of the place occup

n of consciousness, the student of Physics maintains the continued existence in posse, if not in esse, of the Energy which by appropriate action he can again reveal in an active or kinetic manifestation. Hence arises the conception of potential Energy. The Energy to which we attribute the force of cohesion which any particular body can on occasion manifest, we believe to exist potentially whilst that body continues unacted upon. Our belief is confirmed by our experience of the certainty with which, on the recurrence of the given conditions, the force always again manifests

and derived from, the conception of Energy; and that Science, if consistent, cannot postulate the reality of Matter a

studied the process by which we form our mental conceptions, and whilst the students of Physics deserve the honours of discovery, they cannot safely dispense with such assistance, for which the p

are gradually coming to claim for the conception of Matter little more than recognition as the vehicle of energetic transmutation. Let us then for the moment accept the position that Science-ridding itself of redundant theory-postul

atum of phenomena. I study, measure, and classify the different species of these transmutations; I associate particular sensations and classes of sensations with particular transmutations, and I thence infer the existence in posse or in esse of mo

ng by which I am led to believe that my own Presentment consists in the energetic transmutations proceeding in my organism, I explain the universality of the experience of all intelligent agents. In my own case, by that union of consciousness with physical energy which accompanies the manifestation of life, I am immediately related with that portion of the energetic system which i

that Energy underlying them, and still more of the whole energetic system extending far beyond my organism? How do I deduce from transmutations proceeding in the portion of the energetic system which constitutes the real substratum of my organi

stem not merely or primarily as an Intelligence percipient of the transmutations proceeding in it at a particular point, but also as a Will initiative to some extent of such transmutations and capable of influencing and directing the physical process. Life ne

on of Volition (or what appears in action as Volition) with some particular point in

extent a necessity of the vital union of the Will with the energetic system. It is not at all developed in the vegetal kingdom, hardly at all in some branches of the animal, and there may conceivably be an infinite number of other "kingdoms" in which it may be either undeveloped, or very differently developed, or superseded

han and beyond the energetic transmutations which constitute my Presentment that I discover the energetic system of Nature, as a real thing-beyond, underlying, and by its transmutations constitutive of my Presentment. Many of the transmutations which occur in my Presentment I recognise as attributable to my own volitional activity operating upon my ene

ntment. I learn from the transmutations to infer the agency and operation of the underlying energy, and thus g

system represented by my organism, including the portion thereof related to my intellig

ium or substratum underlies all phenomena is evident from the fact that I do not will directly the appearance of any given phenomenon. I may wish that. But when the Volition is reached and the wish transformed into overt exertion I find myself involved in the multifarious processes of an energetic system which I may so far i

ll part of which, namely the Energy of my organism, can be influenced directly by my Will, whilst, even in immediate relation with that part, transmutation

e puts in a new and clearer lig

the appearance of every phenomenon. We never postulate a causal relation between day and night-the most notable case of invariable sequence. When we say the fire warms the room, or the horse draws the cart, or the sun ripens the corn, it is the Energy which we rightly or wrongly associate with the visual sensatio

y power of doing work-a quantifiable and measurable thing, homogeneous with the Energy in respect of which Science states the relations and conditions of all physical phenomena. My most incessant mental act is that by which, on the analogy of my own active experience, I refer all phenomena to the underlying energetic s

ctrine affect the theor

ws, so to speak, of motion, not of position. The most absolutely still and motionless visual presentation is really a series of constant transmutations of Energy and the form of Space is constituted by the laws of transmutation, which are thus at once the necessary conditions of my perception and the universal conditions of all sense-perception. Space, therefore, does not contain the real thing which sustains th

mutations of which our sense-experience occurs, relieves an obvious difficulty which must always have been felt in accepting without qual

s our conception of Space as discovered in our activity amid resistant transmutation-processes not only establishes its ideality but at the same time explains the relation which its form nevertheless bears to the objective material laws of the sensible presentation. It liberates the mind from the oppressive necessity of re

by a process of mental construction that I associate these with the forms of my exertional activity, and thus frame my conceptions of real bodies in the world around me-those which I more directly associate with the Energy subject to my Volition being conceived as representing my body. For reasons of convenience, I refer those conceptions chiefly to the co-ordinated visual presentation, and thus build up my conception of the extended world of material things. Science is possible because all transmutations of Energy take place according to definite numerical laws and ratios. The whole work of Science is to explain every phenomenon in terms of its definite transmutation of Energy. These definite numerical laws and processes are characteristic of all Energy transmutation, and thus regulate the experience of every intelligent being. It is in virtue of these that our separate systems

better able than before to distinguish accurately between the

mages, ideas-in short, in all that is going on at the point where (I necessarily express myself in terms of s

deal. For me, my Presentment is the impression produced on, the condition established

eley and Hume, for instance, speak of ideas of sense, such as the colour blue, the heat of the fire, the pain of a blow. These, constituting the bulk of the Presentment, they distinguish from what Berkeley called ideas of the imagination-those stimulated or originated, or, as he said, "excited," by the intelligence itself. Whilst he contende

in which the Presentment is, if not

uted by the occurrence and depends upon the continuance of the transmutations or operations proceeding at the related point in the energetic system. Even pure i

d to exist without the mind in the form in which they make up my Presentment, but reserving five or six primary qualities-solidity, extension, figure, motion, rest-which they conceive to exist independently, just as they enter into my Presentment. In point of fact, however, these so-called primary qualities are not the names of intuitions, but are abstractions or generalisations of the most general and necessary elements of my active Experience by reference to which I mentally construct my w

delusive tendency to regard this quality as in some sense primarily and fundamentally real is due to the unconscious recognition of the fact that it is in virtue o

ncipally takes part is that represented by the operation of the forces of Gravitation and Cohesion; the system which influences my visual sensations is a quite different series. The changes in this latter series, by their greater rapidity, enable me to anticipate the other series, and for this and other reasons I employ these sensations to signalise and symbolise the transmutations proceeding in the series with which I am more immediately related as an active and "willing" agent. All transmutati

ore particularly do we illustrate the ideality of Space as a cognition precedent to experience. It is because general laws constantly operative regulate the transmutations which constitute the individual's Presentment that it is possible for him to abstract from and generalise the data of sense; and it is because the subjective process of Ideation, by which we me

of experience, and it is the possibility of transmutation upon an internal and subjective impulse which makes possible the formation of synthetical judgments a priori. It is as if the organ were not only responsive to impressions upon its keyboard from without, but were also automotive and could originate harmonies in its own notes; and as if, moreover, it were endowed with consciousness so as to receive an intuition of both classes of music. The former would correspond to sensations, the latter to ideas; and we might imagine such an instrument by presenting to itself its own system of notes, contriving thus to frame a priori a synthetical system of these general musical laws which

it be to us from our standpoint of more absolute knowledge that the whole orchestra of sounds, although actual and quite distinct from consciousness, was still merely phenomenal, and yet withal, in its every expression,

of particularity which every idea lacks is the reference to the transmitted transmutation to which the sensible phenomenon owes its origin. We derive such reference to the external solely from the obstructions which our free activity encounters and without which we could receive no suggestion of the non-ego, and in particular no suggestion of the dynamic element which fundamentally distinguishes things from thoughts. The empirical content of experience-the so-called secondary qualities of bodies-are often called in their subjective aspect "ideal" because the mental impression is obviously very different from the transmutation

rence of the content of the Presentment to a further existence outside of the subjective experience, has induced that wider use of the term idea which applies it to the whole actuality of experience in its subjective aspect. With the advance of Philosophy we must revert to that more ancient use of the term idea which confines its extension into the realm of the pe

throughout Space which is still more inconceivable and self-contradictory. Even apart from this implication, the assumption of the Reality of the phenomenal world destroys itself. To assume the reality of so-called material particles is to lay the foundation of an argument which surely leads to the conclusion that the whole world of my consciousness is produced by and consists in motions in that certain small group of these same molecules which is assumed to make up my brain. The solution is only reached when we discover that the error lies in forgetting that the Reality which is the seat of my Presentment is itself unperceived, and that what I commonly call a body and a brain

not deducting even a single primary quality. Allowing fully for the extent to which, little suspected by you, it is a mentally constructed system, its elements are still actual and objective; they are modes of Reality; extension and the other primary qualities are qualities of these modes. Moreover, the Ego, I, myself, as Will, as a continuously identic intelligent agent, am not given to myself immediately in

nstruct my world. I associate with some modification of the visual presentation the phenomena resultant upon the energetic activity of my own organism, and the other forces and potential Energies which that activity reveals and suggests. It is thus that I derive the compound idea of Body as consisting of Figure, Extension, and Solidity. The continued ap

is not really fundamental; and we must undo the inversion induced by its great convenience whereby we refer to it all the other elements of our sense-experience and conceive of our activity and our whole actual world by reference to the visible sign. It is in consequence of this reference to the visual tha

f mass which, if I were present, would occasion the subjective sensations of sound. But for the habitual tendency arising from the universal reference to the visible I would do the same in the case of the visual image. All I am necessitated to think is a real event-a real, physical, dynamical transmutation-proceeding quite independently of my perception or presence; and if I can only manage to realise that I must, for philosophical purposes, eliminate my reference to visual as well as to audible or other sensations, I will understand that all I am entitled to, and

presentation consisted exclusively of one continuous, unchanging phenomenon, Reason would never be stimulated, and Personality, Cause, Power would never have been postulated or conceived. But the transmutation is constantly "accelerated"-incessantly fluctuates and varies. Certain of these variations I recognise as related to my own volitional activity, and I am thus furnished with a key which enable

Space and Extension which we have seen to be merely another name for the necessity or inevitable universality of the general laws and conditions of

ur physical power, and this has led some thinkers to suppose that the indestructibility of Matter is an a priori datum of thought. But such a belief is quite unfounded. All it amounts to is a recognition that the destruction of Matter is beyond our power

e for metaphysicians to devote to this subject the deepest and most deliberate thought. The results cannot easily be grasped by a mere cursory perusal of memoranda, in which we have only sketched a few salient aspects of

ion as Actors with an Energy beyond that which is the seat of our Presentment. Such a view avoids the incurable difficulties and contradictions involved in the theory of the reality of extended material substance, or in any theory, indeed, which asserts the reality-as presented-of the sensible presentation. Physical Reality thus conceived is consistently thinkable as co-existent with the thing-in-itself-be it ultimately Intelligence or Volition-of which o

so at length furnished Philosophy with the key to that problem the solution of which has, in the words of Schopenhauer, been the main endeavour of philosophers for more than two centuries, namely, to separ

tily to the assistance which the thinker, trained to the study of the process of thought, can render in clarifying and restating in its metaphysical aspects a theory which, if profoundl

tations which constitute his world of ideas; that the mind can discover itself as Will influencing transmutations in the organism which are transmitted through a wider, larger portion of the system; and can recognise the transmutations at the related point as influenced sometimes by its own Volition and sometimes by other agents. We seek to bring the added light of scientific theory to reconcile the conflict between the law and the fact, between the objects of reflection and the objects of sense, between the world of thought and the world of phenomena,-t

"Our standard of Truth and Reality," says a recent writer, "moves us on towards an individual with laws of its own, and to laws which form the vital s

eally the rate at which Energy is, in certain cases, transformed. Dynamics, which investigates Force, is a study of the fundamental trans

vision, but the tide of speculation ebbed after his death, and its healing waters never inundated the deserts of medi?val thought. The discursive weakness in which the speculation of the transcendental Philosophy seems to dissipate itself makes us fear a similar decline. Metaphysics must receive the assistance of the great speculative achievement of Physics. It

t the Real Thing postulated by Physics is but one aspect of the whole, and may be, must be, merged in a higher Reality-of which phenomena, on the one hand, and Thought, Conation, Feeling on the other, are the appearances. That involves a further advance, the atta

ish in clarity and security the abolition of the intolerable contradictions which have hitherto involved the search for Reality amid its appearances. We think it suggests the most satisfying explanation of the distinction which separates, and the principle which relates

ity. Nor, again, is Energy, as a quality, a correct description of the Absolute, as such. The Absolute, as such, we cannot describe; but in studying, as Phy

d. Yet Metaphysics has hitherto thought itself the better of a little logic, and in the future it will have to grasp the scientific conception of Reality.

ulty by saying that these are the working conceptions of particular branches of Physical Science. But when you realise that physical phenomena, even the most permanent and rigid, are by scientific demonstration but transmutations of the real thing, you may then understand that Space, Body, and Extension ar

ys present at all times of our life. In recollecting a past event we are contemplating no mere image, but the actual past

ot the object of the present essay. We merely desire to indicate briefly some of the many aspects of the theory

ison & Gibb Lim

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SAME

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of our own activity suggests the existence of something behind phenomena. The reality which sustains experience is found to be, in essence, power-power conceived as an energy containing within itself the principle of its own evolution; an energy constantly t

me

of perception and the like, with much that is de

ss, and the writer reveals a most accurate acquaintance with

RENCH, TRüBNE

68-74 CARTER L