Truth, too, grows from age to age, and is simply the formulated knowledge humanity has of itself and its environment. And errors disappear, not so much in consequence of their logical refutation, as in consequence of their inutility and of their inability to control the life and thought of the free man. Readers of Schopenhauer will remember his frequent insistence upon this point of the gradual dissidence and disappearance of error, in place of its summary refutation. Our “reactions” upon reality are certainly part of what we mean by “reality,” and our philosophy is only too truly “the history of our heart and life” as well as that of our intellectual activity. The historian of philosophy invariably acts upon a recognition of the personal and the national and the epochal influence in the evolution of every philosophical system. And even the new, or the fuller conception of life to which a given genius may attain at some stage or other of human civilization will still inevitably, in its turn, give place to a newer or a more perfect system. Now Pragmatism is doubtless at fault in seeking to create the impression that Rationalism would seek to deny any, or all, of those characteristic facts of human nature. Still, it is to some extent justified in insisting upon their importance in view of the sharp conflict (we shall later refer to it) that is often supposed to exist between the theoretical and the practical interests of mankind, and that Rationalism sometimes seems to accept with comparative equanimity.[128] What Pragmatism is itself most of all seeking after is a view of human nature, and of things generally, in which the fullest justice is done to the facts upon which this very real conflict[129] of modern times may be said to rest.