Page:Moral Obligation to be Intelligent.djvu/132

 it comes and whither it goes; that the flood and the earthquake, once monsters of caprice, are now phenomena of obedience; that even chance has its law. If we look inward upon our reason, our emotions, our instincts, we are supposed to see that the mind, like other instruments, can be controlled, and that its relation to the outer world is so much the same in all men that we can speak of colors or of sounds, can frame a syllogism, express a desire, distinguish between the abstract and the concrete, and be understood. Finally, if our concern is with morals, we are supposed to conclude that since ideas and emotions are an established currency among men, personality must be something constant and reliable. Knowing a man's mind and his character, we can predict that in a given situation he will think thus and behave so and so; and conversely, from the opinions