thought of a higher reality that should lead us to neglect the highest reality with which we are in contact, or that should lead us to suppose that the right principles of action in our world would be wholly abrogated in a higher. Once more we might appeal to the religious conceptions of "higher" worlds for confirmation. And psychologically also it does not seem true that we do not take our dream-worlds seriously while they last, or are more careless about our actions in them; the terrors of a nightmare are surely often among the most real and intense feelings of a lifetime.

(7) Lastly, a still more personal objection may be taken. If waking life may be as unreal as a “ dream," may not those for whom we have cared in it turn out to be as unreal as the personages of our dreams? And will not this atrocious, but inevitable, inference rob life of most of its personal interest?

This argument, in the first place, cuts both ways. Not all persons are pleasant, and it might be quite a relief to find that some of the bad characters in our experience were but the monsters of a dream. Secondly, it does not follow that because persons (and things) belong to a dream-life, they do not belong also to a world of higher reality. Our dreams, that is, may be veridical, and may refer to, or foreshadow, true reality,' even as already we may dream of the persons and events of our "waking" lives.

IV. All these objections, then, are capable of being met, and our doctrine cannot be shown to deprive our life of any element of value, while it opens out possibilities of an indefinite enhancement of that value. But we have still to ask how far Idealism has been established, and Realism confuted, beyond doubt.

Taking the latter question first, it would seem that unadulterated Realism, viz., the assertion that existence is quite independent of experience, is still tenable, though only at the cost of a paradox which most realists would shrink from. Inasmuch as it has been shown that a complete parallelism 1 Humanism, p. 284.

exists between "dream "-worlds and "real" worlds, the resolute realist must take the bull by the horns, and boldly allege that all experiences are cognitions of real worlds, and the dreamworlds are real too! He might explain further that the coexistence of an indefinite plurality of real worlds, of infinitely various kinds and degrees of completeness, complexity, extent, coherence, pleasantness, rationality, etc., was quite conceivable. Habitually, no doubt, we were confined to one of these, but occasionally, as in dreams, we (or our "souls") were enabled, we knew not by what magic, to make fleeting incursions into these other, equally real, worlds, and there to make new acquaintances or to meet old ones, to act and suffer, and finally to return and say (falsely) that “it was all a dream.' Such is the sole interpretation of the facts a consistent Realism could come to; and though it has not yet been advocated with full philosophic consciousness, it is not very far removed from some early speculations about dreams which are still entertained by savages.

And, like most consistent views, it would not be easy to refute in metaphysics. Personally, I should probably plead only that a more idealistic view seemed to me more pleasing. Apart from such a prejudice, one could, of course, refer to the general objection to all Realism, viz., the impossibility of proving the entire independence of experience which it alleges on behalf of the Real. For (1) the fact we start from, and must continue to start from, is not a reality which is "independent," but one which is experienced. The mutual implication of "experience" and "reality," in other words, forbids their divorce. And (2) the "independent reality" attributed to some of the objects of our experience does not mean what the metaphysical realist supposes. It does not assert an absolute independence, but is relative to, and rightly understood, means to be relative to the experiencing mind which asserts it. The reality we predicate, therefore, is never “extramental"; it has at its heart a reference to the experience which it serves to explain. If, therefore, Realism is taken to

mean a denial that experience and reality belong together, it becomes a metaphysical proposition for which there neither is, nor can be, any positive evidence.

But the same considerations also will confute any idealism which asserts existence to be merely mental, and, a fortiori, if mental is taken solipsistically. If, as we have seen, "reality" and "experience" are correlated terms, it is false in principle to reduce either to the other. This was why we were so cautious not to assert that reality was only "my" experience, or wholly psychic. Were this claim implied in the fundamental position of Idealism, Idealism would be false. But really this claim is as little involved in true Idealism as a complete separation between experience and reality is in true Realism.

Moreover, our illustration from dreams did not fail to bring out this point. The appeal to dreams showed the ideal character of the real only by referring to a higher reality, in which the unreality of the dream could be revealed. The notion of reality, therefore, was not abolished, but reaffirmed. For we were led to the thought of a higher reality, which, so far from being subjective appearance, was needed for its detection. Thus nothing could be condemned as a "dream until we had already reached a something more truly "real.

But at this point apprehension may be felt lest this series of realities embracing dreams should be infinite, so that nothing could be real enough to assure us that it could never turn out to have been a dream. This fear, however, would rest upon a misconception. Our procedure thoughout assumes that the reality of every experience is accepted, until grounds for doubting it arise. This, indeed, is why "dreams" at first deceive us. The grounds for doubt, moreover, are in the last resort intrinsic; they consist either in some breach with the continuity of the rest of experience, or in some disharmony which shocks us into a denial of its ultimate reality. Perhaps, indeed, the first case is really resolvable into the second; for a breach of continuity as such involves an unpleasant jar. And

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if our experience were always wholly pleasant, and its smooth flow never jarred with our ideals, should we not pay scant heed to any incoherencies it might involve? If life were one great glorious pageant, should we dream of questioning its incidents? Should we not accept them all in the spirit of little children watching the gorgeous transformations of a pantomime? Perhaps such a childlike attitude is feasible in Heaven, but on earth it is out of place. For we as yet experience discordant planes of reality, and so can conceive ideals of a more harmonious universe. We can doubt, too, the ultimateness of our present order; but we could not, and should not, doubt the absolute reality of an experience which had become intellectually transparent and emotionally harmonious. For then we should not need to postulate anything beyond our experience to account for it. Our immediate experience would cease to hint that it was the symbol of an unmanifest reality.

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Is such a situation better described in the language of Idealism or of Realism? To decide this would not be easy, but is fortunately unimportant. For, in such an experience everything would be absolutely real, and yet "I" should disown no part of it. The question therefore reduces to the verbal one of whether " Heaven" is better defined idealistically as a condition in which whatever is desired is realized, or realistically as one in which whatever is real is approved of. But perhaps it would be best to conclude that in Perfection the true Idealism coincides with the true Realism, and the antithesis between them is robbed of all its meaning.

CORPUS CHRISTI COLLEGE, OXFORD.

F. C. S. SCHILLER.

THE TEN COMMANDMENTS: A STUDY

IN PRACTICAL ETHICS.

CHARLES BICKERSTETH WHEELER.

MOST of us have a deep-rooted dislike to examining our beliefs; even the man who subjects himself to rigid self-scrutiny with regard to his conduct will shrink from investigating too closely what he believes and why he believes it. This is due no doubt in a great measure to the action of the Churches, which have been as loud in their recommendation of the one kind of self-examination as they have been in their denunciation of the other: and with reason; for when once a man begins that eager search for truth which drives him to examine sanely and unemotionally all that he holds most sacred, he soon finds he has passed beyond the pale of even the broadest Church. Accordingly, the people who do not care to examine their creeds will liken one who does so to the child who digs up its flowers to see how the roots are getting on: and one is bound to admit that the practice is not to be recommended for vegetables, or vegetable minds; though nothing but good can come of it to those in whom the love of truth has cast out all fear. For one who, in the words of Socrates, boldly trusts himself to the argument, allowing it to bear him whither it pleases, will find that, though some of his cherished convictions melt away as he draws near them, others only gain greater beauty and strength, so that he marvels at his own dulness of perception in the past.

It is in this spirit of reverent inquiry that I should like