Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 47.djvu/344

332 have here a certainty while denying to be certain that the sun gives light.

A considerable portion of The Foundations of Belief is occupied by a discussion of the relative claims of Reason and Authority. Certainly, in whatever other ways Mr. Balfour's argument tends to discredit Reason, it does not here discredit it by example; for in general and in detail it is in this case characterized by philosophic grasp, clear discrimination, and unusual lucidity of statement. But while agreeing with him in his estimate of the relative shares of Authority and Reason in determining our beliefs, and while holding as he does that life would be impossible if all our beliefs had to be formed by Reason without the aid of Authority, I would emphasize the fact of which he is himself conscious, that it is impossible to go completely behind Reason; for if any other ruler is raised to the throne, in part or for a time, it is by Reason that this is done. Reason can not be essentially discredited by Reason: the attempt ends in suicide. In one case only—that, namely, in which the question is between the verdicts of Reason and those of simple Perception, chiefly of objective existence—may Reason, estimating its own powers, voluntarily abdicate; since critical examination of its processes shows that it can not take even a first step toward discrediting the intuitions which yield the consciousness of external existence without tacitly positing these intuitions as data, and connoting the coexistence of subject and object by all the words it uses; and that, consequently, all it can do in this sphere is to explain incongruities so as to harmonize these intuitions with one another and with itself. But while this limitation holds where the opposition is between mediate and immediate knowledge, it does not hold where the opposition is between two kinds of mediate knowledge—the verdicts of Reason and those of Authority. Hence, in estimating the relative claims of Reason and Authority we have to bear in mind that the supremacy of Reason is exercised in the act of choosing the Authority. How, exercising this supremacy, does it make the choice? Clearly by comparing the degrees of trustworthiness of authorities as ascertained in experience. That we do this when the authorities are individual men is undeniable. We ask how often their respective statements have been verified, and how often the guidance they have severally yielded has proved good. If, looking back, we see that the statements made by the one have habitually corresponded with facts, and that the advice given by him has been shown by the result to be wise, while many statements of the other have been disproved at the