Am I a humble man and a wanderer? Not a bit of it! There is more literary phantasy in the phrase than there is truth. Of humility I do not now, nor have I ever possessed more than a few rather Buddhistic fragments; nor am I a wanderer either, for making a few insignificant journeys does not authorize one to call oneself a wanderer. Just as I put myself down at that time as a humble man and a wanderer, so I might call myself today a proud and sedentary person. Perhaps both characterizations contain some degree of truth; and perhaps there is nothing in either. When a man scrutinizes himself very closely, he arrives at a point where he does not know what is face and what is mask. DOGMATOPHAGY If I am questioned concerning my ideas on religion, I reply that I am an agnostic--I always like to be a little pedantic with philistines--now I shall add that, more than this, I am a dogmatophagist. My first impulse in the presence of a dogma, whether it be political, moral, or religious, is to cast about for the best way to masticate, digest, and dispose of it. The peril in an inordinate appetite for dogma lies in the probability of making too severe a drain upon the gastric juices, and so becoming dyspeptic for the rest of one's life. In this respect, my inclination exceeds my prudence. I have an incurable dogmatophagy. Ignoramus, Ignorabimus Such are the words of the psychologist, DuBois-Reymond, in one of his well-known lectures. The agnostic attitude is the most seemly that it is possible to take. Nowadays, not only have all religious ideas been upset, but so too has everything which until now appeared most solid, most indivisible. Who has faith any longer in the atom? Who believes in the soul as a monad? Who believes in the objective validity of the senses? The atom, unity of the spirit and of consciousness, the validity of perception, all these are under suspicion today. _Ignoramus, ignorabimus_. NEVERTHELESS, WE CALL OURSELVES MATERIALISTS Nevertheless, we call ourselves materialists. Yes; not because we believe that matter exists as we see it, but because in this way we may contradict the vain imaginings and all those sacred mysteries which begin so modestly, and always end by extracting the money from our pockets. Materialism, as Lange has said, has proved itself the most fecund doctrine of science. Wilhelm Ostwald, in his _Victory of Scientific Materialism_, has defended the same thesis with respect to modern physics and chemistry. At the present time we are regaled with the sight of learned friars laying aside for a moment their ancient tomes, and turning to dip into some manual of popular science, after which they go about and astonish simpletons by giving lectures. The war horse of these gentlemen is the conception entertained by physicists at the present-day concerning matter, according to which it has substance in the precise degree that it is a manifestation of energy.