relations in which they stand to one another. The whole significance of this view lies in the doctrine that relations are external to the entities that are related--they do not enter into and form part of the nature of the entities. The difficulty of this view is just this externality of the relation. It seems difficult to conceive what nature is left in any entity deprived of all its relations. The relation of father and son in the judgment, John is the father of James, is so far part of the nature of the persons John and James, that if the judgment is false then to that extent John and James are not the actual persons John and James that they are thought to be. And this is the case even in so purely external a relation as is expressed, say, in the judgment, Edinburgh is East of Glasgow. It is difficult to discuss any relation which can be said to be entirely indifferent to the nature of its terms, and it is doubtful if anything whatever would be left of a term abstracted from all its relations. These difficulties have led to the formulation of an altogether different theory, namely, the theory that truth does not consist in correspondence between ideas and their real counterparts, but in the consistence and internal harmony of the ideas themselves. It is named the coherence theory. It will be recognised at once that there is very much in common experience to support it. It is by the test of consistency and coherence that we invariably judge the truth of evidence. {26} Also it seems a very essential part of our intellectual nature to reject as untrue and false any statement or any idea that is self-contradictory or irreconcilable with the world of living experience. But then, on the other hand, we by no means allow that that must be true which does not exhibit logical contradiction and inconsistency. It is a common enough experience that ideas prove false though they have exhibited no inherent failure to harmonise with surrounding circumstances nor any self-contradiction. The theory, therefore, requires more than a cursory examination.