[309] We may quote, I think, the following passage from Professor Perry to show that the open-mindedness of James was not merely a temperamental and an American characteristic in his case, but a quality or attitude that rested upon an intellectual conviction in respect of the function of ideas. “Since it is their office [_i.e._ the office of ideas] to pave the way for direct knowledge, or to be temporarily substituted for it, then efficiency is conditioned by their _unobtrusiveness, by the readiness with which they subordinate themselves_. The commonest case of an idea in James’s sense is the word, and the most notable example of his pragmatic or empirical method is his own scrupulous avoidance of verbalism. It follows that since ideas are in and of themselves of no cognitive value, since they are essentially instrumental, they _are always on trial_, and ‘liable to modification in the course of future experience.’”--_Present Philosophical Tendencies_, p. 364 (italics mine). [310] It is known to all students that some of the more important writings of this prince of thinkers cannot be intelligibly approached without a long preliminary study of the peculiar “dressing up,” or transformation, to which he subjects the various facts of life and existence. And the same thing is true (to a more modified extent) of the writings of Kant. [311] See the wise remark, in this very connexion, of the possible service of philosophy to-day, of Dr. Bosanquet, reproduced upon p. 226. And then, again, we must remember that an unduly pragmatist view of life would tend to make people impervious to ideas that transcend the range and the level of their ordinary interests and activities. [312] Cf. the following from Professor Pace’s Preface to _Introduction to Philosophy_, by Charles A. Dubray. “In Catholic colleges, importance has always been attached to the study of philosophy both as a means of culture and as a source of information regarding the great truths which are influential in supporting Christian belief and in shaping character.” Of course these same words might be used as descriptive of what Professor Santayana calls the “older tradition” in _all_ American colleges. It is interesting, by the way, to note also the pragmatist touch in the same Preface to this Catholic manual. “But if this training is to be successful, philosophy must be presented, not as a complex of abstruse speculations on far-off inaccessible topics, but as a system of truths that enter with vital consequence into our ordinary thinking and our everyday conduct.” [313] See p. 136. [314] See above, p. 34 and p. 165. [315] It is not, however, “rest” that the pragmatists want, even in heaven, but renewed opportunities for achievement. “‘_There shall be news_,’ W. James was fond of saying with rapture, quoting from the unpublished poem of a new friend, ‘there shall be _news in heaven_.’”--Professor Santayana in _Winds of Doctrine_, p. 209.