Page:Appearance and Reality (1916).djvu/548

 shall not find that it makes much difference to the Whole. And, again, for so taking it there appears to be almost no ground. Let us briefly consider these two points. That elements of experience should be unattached would (we saw) be a serious matter, if they were unattached altogether and absolutely. But since in any case all comes together and is fused in the Whole, and since this Whole in any case is a single experience, the main result appears to me to be quite unaffected. The fact that some experience-matter does not directly qualify any finite centre, is a fact from which I can draw no further conclusion. But for holding this fact, in the second place, there is surely no good reason. The number of finite centres and their diversity is (we know) very great, and we may fairly suppose it to extend much beyond our knowledge. Nor do the relations, which are “between” these centres, occasion difficulty. Relations of course cannot fall somewhere outside of reality; and, if they really were “between” the centres, we should have to assume some matter of experience external and additional to these. The conclusion would follow; and we have seen that, rightly understood, it is possible. But, as things are, it seems no less gratuitous. There is nothing, so far as I see, to suggest that any aspect of any relation lies outside the experience-matter contained in finite centres. The relations, as such, do not and cannot exist in the Absolute. And the question is whether that higher experience, which contains and transforms the relations, demands any element not experienced somehow within the centres. For assuming such an element I can myself perceive no ground. And since, even if we assume this, the main result seems to remain unaltered, the best course is, perhaps, to discard it as unreal. It is better, on the whole, to conclude that no element of Reality falls outside the experience of finite centres.