I like those chapters of history that tell how the spirit of the experimenter sets out to conquer the realms that have so long been ruled by masters with whom he can have no sympathy--tradition, coming out of the vague mists of the past; superstition, born of human ignorance; mysticism, inarticulate, ecstatic, offering reasons for itself that are reasons only to those who ask for none. To win all this for objectivity, for the kingdom of the kind of truth that believes only because the experiment says so, the experiment that any unbeliever may repeat for himself and abide by the result--this is surely a brave adventure, and whether they meet victory or defeat one cannot refuse one’s enthusiasm to those who have had courage to make it. Of those who set forth in this way, I should call David Hume the father. Would you, for example, know what is right and what is wrong? Then turn not to inspired writings, but travel widely through the civilizations of different countries and different times and seek as you would seek any other historical fact, first, what people _called_ good and what they _called_ bad. Then, if underlying the vast contradictions of historic precept you find nevertheless an agreement in the purpose these precepts, set in their native settings, served, why, then, you will have arrived at the only meaning good and bad can have. Or, would you know whether this is God’s world or no? Turn not to reputed miracles, and indulge not in idle dreams of another world in which the faulty humanity and utter finiteness of this one will have found its supplement and correction; but, take just the order and purpose of this world as your best experience reveals it to you. It may be that this seeking will leave you dark, puzzled, uncertain; but better the unrest of judgment suspended than the dream-like peace of faith unfounded. It fortifies my soul to know That, though I perish, truth is so. wrote Arthur Clough. And, again, he has written: To spend uncounted years of pain, Again, again and yet again, In working out in heart and brain The problem of our being here; To gather facts from far and near, Upon the mind to hold them clear, And, knowing more may yet appear, Unto one’s latest breath to fear The premature result to draw-- Is this the object, end and law, And purpose of our being here? Over these verses Clough has written: “Perchè pensa? Pensando s’invecchia.” * * * * *