“The involute of progression is the subconscious evolution of the particular function.” No close reasoner will deny this. It is the final summing up of all that is meant by Development. It is the root formula of the nineteenth century that is now, alas! drawing to a close under our very eyes. Now to such a fundamental proposition I add a second. “The sentiment of right is the inversion of the subconscious function in its relation to the indeterminate ego.” This also I take to be admitted by all European philosophers in Germany. Now I will not go so far as to say that a major premiss when it is absolutely sound, followed by a minor equally sound, leads to a sure conclusion. God fulfils himself in many ways, and there are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy. But I take this tentatively: that if these two propositions are true (and we have the word of Herr Waldteufel,[44] who lives in the Woodstock Road, that it is true) then it follows conclusively that no certainty can be arrived at in these matters. I would especially recommend you on this point (_here Mr. Lambkin changed his lecturing voice for a species of conversational, interested and familiar tone_) to read the essay by the late Dr. Barton in _Shots at the Probable_: you will also find the third chapter of Mr. Mendellsohn’s _History of the Soul_ very useful. Remember also, by the way, to consult the footnote on p. 343, of Renan’s _Anti-Christ_. The Master of St. Dives’ _Little Journeys in the Obvious_ is light and amusing, but instructive in its way. There is a kind of attitude (_this was Lambkin’s peroration, and he was justly proud of it_) which destroys nothing but creates much: which transforms without metamorphosis, and which says “look at this, I have found truth!” but which dares not say “look away from that--it is untrue.” Such is our aim. Let us make without unmaking and in this difficult question of the origin of _Right_, the grand old Anglo-Saxon sense of “Ought,” let us humbly adopt as logicians, but grimly pursue as practical men some such maxim as what follows: “Right came from nothing, it means nothing, it leads to nothing; with it we are nothing, but without it we are worse than nothing.”[45] Next Thursday I shall deal with morality in international relations. VIII. Lambkin’s Special Correspondence