Page:Mind (New Series) Volume 12.djvu/82

 68 GEOEGE GALLOWAY: Then there .must be some reason in the series a, b, c, d why the abstract X should be evolved and not Y or Z. That is to say a, b, c and d must each be so qualified that it accepts the interpretation X but excludes Y or Z. Ex hypothesi the cause of the specially qualified percepts a, b, c, d cannot be found in the previous condition of A, B, C, D. Nor can the Abstract X give any common qualification to these- percepts. Consequently the sudden manifestation to different minds, the consistency, the inevitableness of the experience we call X becomes quite unintelligible. And the facts remain inexplicable unless we admit that X is more than an abstraction, and is significant of something (x) which has a reality for itself. We put the same point in a somewhat different light when we direct attention to the fact that a person refers various experiences which he has had at different times to one object A. He has seen A frequently, and believes that if he complies with the conditions he will see it again. For popular thought this is the common, if fallacious, argument for the independent existence of A as it stands. Plainly however A in its unique setting cannot be deduced from the universal side of experience : nor is there any constraining reason in the individual himself why he should refer various percepts to 'one and the same object A. That necessity comes from the side of the object, and A must stand for something which has had a determining, influence on percep- tion while it persists beyond it. Again, however inadequate the "laws of nature " may be as an explanation of concrete reality, yet they have validity in nature. They enable us to anticipate experience. An eclipse is predicted years before it happens, and it takes place exactly as predicted. Here we have a perceptual experience A furnishing the basis for a mathematical construction on which the forecast was made which was verified in perceptual experience B. Between A and B there is a process which need not come into conscious- ness at all, but must be real if B is to take place. The facts require us here to assume that the rational process by which B is deduced from A has for its counterpart an activity in things which thought interprets but does not create. These are somewhat obvious instances, but we must not ignore their significance on that account. They all unite in enforcing the one lesson. We admit that the objects of outer experience are ideal constructions, but the facts compel us to add that these constructions can only be valid interpreta- tions! of a [reality beyond. And in regard to the distinction between inner and outer experience we conclude that outer