be thought of it metaphysically, is hardly likely to give us a just standard of values. Open-mindedness is a quality which will always exist where desire for knowledge is genuine. It only fails where other desires have become entangled with the belief that we already know the truth. That is why it is so much commoner in youth than in later life. A man’s activities are almost necessarily bound up with some decision on an intellectually doubtful matter. A clergyman cannot be disinterested about theology, nor a soldier about war. A lawyer is bound to hold that criminals ought to be punished--unless they can afford a leading lawyer’s fee. A schoolmaster will favour the particular system of education for which he is fitted by his training and experience. A politician can hardly help believing in the principles of the party which is most likely to give him office. When once a man has chosen his career, he cannot be expected to be perpetually considering whether some other choice might not have been better. In later life, therefore, open-mindedness has its limitations, though they ought to be as few as possible. But in youth there are far fewer of what William James called “forced options”, and therefore there is less occasion for the “will to believe”. Young people ought to be encouraged to regard every question as open, and to be able to throw over any opinion as the result of an argument. It is implied in this freedom of thought that there should not be complete freedom of action. A boy must not be free to run off to sea under the influence of some story of adventure in the Spanish Main. But so long as his education continues, he should be free to _think_ that it is better to be a pirate than a professor.