He considers whether the attribute alleged is really possessed by all members of the class-tries to think of some member of the class as not having the attribute. And he admits the proposition only on finding that there is a greater cohesion in thought between its elements, than between the elements of the counter-proposition. Thus testing each link in the argument, he at length reaches the conclusion, which he tests in the same way. If he accepts it, he does so because the argument has established in him an indirect cohesion between states of consciousness that were not directly coherent, or not so coherent directly as the argument makes them indirectly. But he accepts it only supposing that the .connexion between the two states of consciousness composing it, is not resisted by some stronger counter-connexion. If there happens to be an opposing argument, of which the component thoughts are felt, when tested, to be more coherent ; or if, in the absence of an opposing argument, there exists an opposing conclusion, of which the elements have some direct cohesion greater than that which the proffered argument indirectly gives; then the conclusion reached by this argument is not admitted.

Thus, a discussion in consciousness proves to be simply a trial of strength between different connexions in consciousness-a systematized struggle serving to determine which are the least coherent states of consciousness. And the result of the struggle is, that the least coherent states of consciousness separate, while the most coherent remain together: forming a proposition of which the predicate persists in the mind along with its subject.

§ 447. What corollary may the inquirer draw, or rather what corollary must he draw, on pushing the analysis to its limit? If there are any indissoluble connexions, he is compelled to accept them. If certain states of consciousness absolutely cohere in certain ways, he is obliged to think them in those ways. The proposition is an identical one.

To say that they are necessities of thought is merely another way of saying that their elements cannot be torn asunder. No reasoning can give to these absolute cohesions in thought any better warrant; since all reasoning, being a process of testing cohesions, is itself carried on by accepting the absolute cohesions; and can, in the last resort, do nothing more than present some absolute cohesions in justification of others -an act which unwarrantably assumes in the absolute cohesions it offers, a greater value than is allowed to the absolute cohesions it would justify. Here, then, the inquirer comes down to an ultimate mental uniformity—a universal law of his thinking. How completely his thought is subordinated to this law, is shown by the fact that he cannot even represent to himself the possibility of any other law. To suppose the connexions among his states of consciousness to be otherwise determined, is to suppose a smaller force overcoming a greater—a proposition which may be expressed in words but cannot be rendered into ideas.

These results the inquirer arrives at without assuming any other existence than that of what he calls states of consciousness. They postulate nothing about Mind or Matter, Subject or Object. They leave wholly untouched the questions-what does consciousness imply? and how is thought generated? There is not involved in the analysis any hypothesis respecting the origin of these relations between thoughts-how there come to be feeble cohesions, strong cohesions, and absolute cohesions. Whatever some of the terms used may have seemed to connote, it will be found, on examining each step, that nothing is essentially involved beyond mental states and the connexions among them.

Should the inquirer enter upon the explanation of these facts, he must consider how any further investigation is to be conducted, and what is the possible degree of validity of its conclusions. Every hypothesis he entertains in trying to explain himself to himself, being an bypothesis expressible only in terms of his mental states, it follows that any

process of explanation must itself be carried on by testing the cohesions among mental states, and accepting the absolute cohesions. His conclusion, therefore, reached through repeated recognitions of this test of absolute cohesion, can never have any higher validity than this test. It matters not what name he gives to his conclusion-whether he calls it a belief, a theory, a fact, or a truth. These words can be themselves only names for certain relations among his states of consciousness. Any secondary meanings which he ascribes to them must also be meanings expressed in terms of consciousness, and therefore subordinate to the laws of consciousness. Hence he has no appeal from this ultimate dictum.

§ 448. Here, then, is an all-sufficient warrant for the assertion of objective existence. Mysterious as seems the consciousness of something which is yet out of consciousness, the inquirer finds that he alleges the reality of this something in virtue of the ultimate law-he is obliged to think it. There is an indissoluble cohesion between each of those vivid and definite states of consciousness known as a sensation, and an indefinable consciousness which stands for a mode of being beyond sensation, and separate from himself. When grasping his fork and putting food into his mouth, he is wholly unable to expel from his mind the notion of something which resists the force he is using; and he cannot suppress the nascent thought of an independent existence keeping apart his tongue and palate, and giving him that sensation of taste which he is unable to generate in consciousness by his own activity. Though self-criticism shows him that he cannot know what this is which lies outside of him; and though he may infer that not being able to say what it is, it is a fiction; he discovers that such self-criticism utterly fails to extinguish the consciousness of it as a reality. So that even could no account of its genesis be given, this consciousness would still remain imperative. It

cannot even be imagined to be untrue without imagining the absence of that principle of cohesion whereby consciousness is held together.

§ 449. But while it is impossible by reasoning either to verify or to falsify this deliverance of consciousness, it is possible to account for it. Manifestly, if our conclusions are simply expressive of the ways in which our states of consciousness hang together, this imperative consciousness which we have of objective existence, must itself result from the way in which our states of consciousness hang together.

Here, then, rises before us a definite course of inquiry. Let us examine the cohesions among the elements of consciousness, taken as a whole; and let us observe whether there are any absolute cohesions by which its elements are aggregated into two antithetical halves, standing respectively for Subject and Object.

Though in the course of this inquiry we shall have to use words which connote both Subject and Object-though in every illustration taken we shall have tacitly to posit an external existence, and in every reference to states of consciousness we shall have to posit an internal existence which has these states; yet, as before, we must ignore these implications.

CHAPTER XVI.

PARTIAL DIFFERENTIATION OF SUBJECT AND OBJECT.*

§ 450. States of consciousness which I name touches and pressures, come to me as I sit on this bench with the sea-breeze blowing in my face. Sounds from the breakers, motions of the waves that stretch away to the horizon, are at the same time present; and I am also aware of the Sun's warmth and the odour of sea-weed. These states I call, according to their respective classes, loud, or bright, or strong. They seem to fill the whole area of consciousness; but a closer inspection proves that they do not.

After that whiff of sea-weed smell which the breeze just brought me, there come colours and forms such as another

In the chapter of First Principles entitled "The Data of Philosophy,' we found a needful preliminary to be the division of all manifestations of existence into two great aggregates, implying the two existences distinguished as ego and non-ego. As an indispensable link in the argument more fully set forth in this work, I am obliged here to enumerate afresh the several contrasts between these two great aggregates of manifestations. I re-state them, however, with new illustrations and in a form more or less different. Further, in pursuance of a better method, I exclude from this chapter certain classes of phenomena which accompany, or are due to, emotion and volition, and the muscular movements produced by them. The delineation of these phenomena, transferred to the next chapter, will there be joined with the delineation of certain allied classes not before dealt with-classes that are all-important as establishing the independence of objective existence. In this chapter the antitheses described, will be such only as are observable during absolute physical passivity.