Is there an absolute criterion? This question, to my

mind, is answered by a second question: How otherwise

should we be able to say anything at all about

appearance? For through the last Book, the reader will

remember, we were for the most part criticising. We were

judging phenomena and were condemning them, and

throughout we proceeded as if the self-contradictory

could not be real. But this was surely to have and to

apply an absolute criterion. For consider: you can

scarcely propose to be quite passive when presented with

statements about reality. You can hardly take the

position of admitting any and every nonsense to be

truth, truth absolute and entire, at least so far as you

know. For, if you think at all so as to discriminate

between truth and falsehood, you will find that you

cannot accept open self-contradiction. Hence to think is

to judge, and to judge is to criticise, and to criticise

is to use a criterion of reality. And surely to doubt

this would be mere blindness or confused self-deception.

But, if so, it is clear that, in rejecting the

inconsistent as appearance, we are applying a positive

knowledge of the ultimate nature of things. Ultimate

reality is such that it does not contradict itself; here

is an absolute criterion. And it is proved absolute by

the fact that, either in endeavouring to deny

it, or even in attempting to doubt it, we tacitly assume

its validity.

One of these essays in delusion may be noticed

briefly in passing. We may be told that our criterion

has been developed by experience, and that therefore at

least it may not be absolute. But why anything should be

weaker for having been developed is, in the first place,

not obvious. And, in the second place, the whole doubt,

when understood, destroys itself. For the alleged origin

of our criterion is delivered to us by knowledge which

rests throughout on its application as an absolute test.

And what can be more irrational than to try to prove

that a principle is doubtful, when the proof through

every step rests on its unconditional truth? It would,

of course, not be irrational to take one's stand on this

criterion, to use it to produce a conclusion hostile to

itself, and to urge that therefore our whole knowledge

is self-destructive, since it essentially drives us to

what we cannot accept. But this is not the result which

our supposed objector has in view, or would welcome. He

makes no attempt to show in general that a psychological

growth is in any way hostile to metaphysical validity.

And he is not prepared to give up his own psychological

knowledge, which knowledge plainly is ruined if the

criterion is not absolute. The doubt is seen, when we

reflect, to be founded on that which it endeavours to

question. And it has but blindly borne witness to the

absolute certainty of our knowledge about reality.

Thus we possess a criterion, and our criterion is

supreme. I do not mean to deny that we might have

several standards, giving us sundry pieces of

information about the nature of things. But, be that as

it may, we still have an over-ruling test of truth, and

the various standards (if they exist) are certainly

subordinate. This at once becomes evident, for

we cannot refuse to bring such standards together, and

to ask if they agree. Or, at least, if a doubt is

suggested as to their consistency, each with itself and

with the rest, we are compelled, so to speak, to assume

jurisdiction. And if they were guilty of self-

contradiction, when examined or compared, we should

condemn them as appearance. But we could not do that if

they were not subject all to one tribunal. And hence, as

we find nothing not subordinate to the test of self-

consistency, we are forced to set that down as supreme

and absolute.

But it may be said that this supplies us with no real