INTELLECTUAL ANTECEDENTS OF SCIENCE 247

tirely inexplicable. Were they explicable they could not

"be ultimate.

The feeling of distrust which some persons experience

when they are told they can know with absolute certainty

certain truths to be both universal and necessary, seems

to be due to a habit of mind which has been brought about

by an unconsciously formed association between ideas.

Things which are very remote in space or which happened

ages ago are generally known to us as results of elaborate

mental processes, and some uncertainty about them is by

no means uncommon. On the other hand, we often feel very

confident about matters the circumstances and conditions

of which are within easy reach of our powers of observation.

Thus we have come to associate a feeling of uncertainty with

respect to statements concerning things which are very

remote in either time or space. It is not then surprising that

a feeling of vague distrust should arise when beginners in

philosophy hear it affirmed that the law of contradiction

applies equally to whatever concerns the Dog-star and our

portion of the universe, myriads of ages before the solar

system had its first origin.

It is, as we before said, very wonderful that we should have

this knowledge of necessary truths, but, as we before* pointed

out, it is most wonderful that we should know anything.

Yet if we deny or doubt " the law of contradiction " we fall,

as before said, into the most unutterable absurdity that of

absolute scepticism, which shows, by a reductio ad absurduni,

that our denial, or doubt, was itself absurd, and that we must

admit that law's universal validity.

But, once more, it is no mere law of our own minds, no

affair of mere logic, since, if we are to accept as absolutely

true what our reason declares to be self-evident, it is a

law which applies to all things from physical phenomena

* See ante, p. 56.

tirely inexplicable. Were they explicable they could not

"be ultimate.

The feeling of distrust which some persons experience

when they are told they can know with absolute certainty

certain truths to be both universal and necessary, seems

to be due to a habit of mind which has been brought about

by an unconsciously formed association between ideas.

Things which are very remote in space or which happened

ages ago are generally known to us as results of elaborate

mental processes, and some uncertainty about them is by

no means uncommon. On the other hand, we often feel very

confident about matters the circumstances and conditions

of which are within easy reach of our powers of observation.

Thus we have come to associate a feeling of uncertainty with

respect to statements concerning things which are very

remote in either time or space. It is not then surprising that

a feeling of vague distrust should arise when beginners in

philosophy hear it affirmed that the law of contradiction

applies equally to whatever concerns the Dog-star and our

portion of the universe, myriads of ages before the solar

system had its first origin.

It is, as we before said, very wonderful that we should have

this knowledge of necessary truths, but, as we before* pointed

out, it is most wonderful that we should know anything.

Yet if we deny or doubt " the law of contradiction " we fall,

as before said, into the most unutterable absurdity that of

absolute scepticism, which shows, by a reductio ad absurduni,

that our denial, or doubt, was itself absurd, and that we must

admit that law's universal validity.

But, once more, it is no mere law of our own minds, no

affair of mere logic, since, if we are to accept as absolutely

true what our reason declares to be self-evident, it is a

law which applies to all things from physical phenomena

* See ante, p. 56.