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59 consciousness, which expresses itself in "the current language of unprejudiced thought," may also confirm the distinction, in spite of the fact that common parlance may still sanction the physician's usage of words when he says "'There ought to be altered light-reflexes,' or knee-jerks or heaven knows what, 'along with the symptoms of this patient'" (p. 53). It is difficult to refrain from mentioning that the quibbling involved in the argumentation at this point might be illustrated also from many other pages of the work. As far as the discussion in this context is of serious moment, it is obviously meant to establish the hypothetical character of moral obligation, and to show the "disastrous" effects of categorical imperatives. But the conditional nature of moral obligations can scarcely be demonstrated by pointing to the fact that in all fields of inquiry we demand of ourselves rational consistency. The same contention would be equally forcible in demonstrating the hypothetical and relative character of truth. The author, it would seem, would readily grant this conclusion, since he tells us on page 13 (and elsewhere) that "without committing ourselves to the paradox of solipsism, we can well afford to make the admission that the difference between truth and falsehood means ultimately for each individual the difference between an adequate and consistent, and an inadequate and inconsistent account of the contents of his own personal experience." But when we make that admission, the only thing that saves us from solipsism, it seems to the present reviewer, is the recognition of the fact that the demand for coherence and ultimate unity is a result of the inner constitution of rationality itself, of our rational nature which we must posit as universal and valid for all thinking beings—semper, ubique, omnibus, to adopt the offending "ecclesiastical catchword."

The third and longest chapter of the volume is called "The Roots of Ethics." In our attempts to find an appropriate starting-point for our science, we run the risk "of choosing our point of departure either too high or two low in the scale of psychical development." We must choose between two extremes. 'Obligation,' 'duty,' etc., are very complex concepts that appear only at a high level of development, while, on the other hand, our knowledge of animal psychology is in a very elementary condition. Hence, ethical investigators must regard it as their first task to accertainascertain [sic] what is the simplest and most rudimentary form in which the distinctively moral sentiments can be detected in specifically human experience " (p. 91). The phrase 'ethical sentiments' is chosen as a protest "against a popular view according to which the business of ethical psychology consists in the analysis of