II

First, as to the problems of philosophy when pragmatically approached,

Mr. James says: "The whole function of philosophy ought to be to find

out what definite difference it will make to you and me, at definite

instants of our life, if this world-formula or that world-formula be

true" (p. 50). Here the world-formula is assumed as already given; it

is there, defined and constituted, and the question is as to its

import if believed. But from the second standpoint, that of idea as

working hypothesis, the chief function of philosophy is not to find

out what difference ready-made formulae make, _if true_, but to

arrive at and to clarify their _meaning as programs of behavior for

modifying the existent world_. From this standpoint, the meaning of a

world-formula is practical and moral, not merely in the consequences

which flow from accepting a certain conceptual content as true, but as

regards that content itself. And thus at the very outset we are

compelled to face this question: Does Mr. James employ the pragmatic

method to discover the value in terms of consequences in life of some

formula which has its logical content already fixed; or does he employ

it to criticize and revise and, ultimately, to constitute the meaning

of that formula? If it is the first, there is danger that the

pragmatic method will be employed only to vivify, if not validate,

doctrines which in themselves are pieces of rationalistic metaphysics,

not inherently pragmatic. If the last, there is danger that some

readers will think old notions are being confirmed, when in truth they

are being translated into new and inconsistent notions.

Consider the case of design. Mr. James begins with accepting a

ready-made notion, to which he then applies the pragmatic criterion.

The traditional notion is that of a "seeing force that runs things."

This is rationalistically and retrospectively empty; its being there

makes no difference. (This seems to overlook the fact that the past

world may be just what it is in virtue of the difference which a blind

force or a seeing force has already made in it. A pragmatist as well

as a rationalist may reply that it makes no difference retrospectively

only because we leave out the most important retrospective

difference). But "returning with it into experience, we gain a more

confiding outlook on the future. If not a blind force, but a seeing

force, runs things, we may reasonably expect better issues. _This

vague confidence in the future is the sole pragmatic meaning at

present discernible in the terms design and designer_" (p. 115,

italics mine). Now is this meaning intended to _replace_ the meaning

of a "seeing force which runs things"? Or is it intended to superadd a

pragmatic value and validation to that concept of a seeing force? Or

does it mean that, irrespective of the existence of any such object, a

belief in it has that value? Strict pragmatism would seem to require

the first interpretation.

The same difficulties arise in the discussion of spiritualistic theism

_versus_ materialism. Compare the two following statements: "The

notion of God ... guarantees an ideal order that shall be permanently

preserved" (p. 106). "Here, then, in these different emotional and

practical appeals, in these adjustments of our attitudes of hope and

expectation, and all the delicate consequences which their differences

entail, _lie the real meanings of materialism and spiritualism_" (p.

107, italics mine). Does the latter method of determining the meaning

of, say, a spiritual God afford the substitute for the conception of

him as a "superhuman power" effecting the eternal preservation of

something; does it, that is, define God, supply the content for our

notion of God? Or does it merely superadd a value to a meaning already

fixed? And, if the latter, does the object, God as defined, or the

notion, or the belief (the acceptance of the notion) effect these

consequent values? In either of the latter alternatives, the good or

valuable consequences cannot clarify the meaning or conception of God;

for, by the argument, they proceed from a prior definition of God.

They cannot prove, or render more probable, the existence of such a

being, for, by the argument, these desirable consequences depend upon

accepting such an existence; and not even pragmatism can prove an

existence from desirable consequences which themselves exist only when

and if that other existence is there. On the other hand, if the

pragmatic method is not applied simply to tell the value of a belief

or controversy, but to fix the meaning of the terms involved in the

belief, resulting consequences would serve to constitute the entire

meaning, intellectual as well as practical, of the terms; and hence

the pragmatic method would simply abolish the meaning of an antecedent

power which will perpetuate eternally some existence. For that

consequence flows not from the belief or idea, but from the existence,

the power. It is not pragmatic at all.

Accordingly, when Mr. James says: "Other than this _practical_

significance, the words God, free will, design, _have none_. Yet dark

though they be in themselves, or intellectualistically taken, when we

bear them on to life's thicket with us, the darkness then grows light

about us" (p. 121, italics mine), what is meant? Is it meant that when

we take the intellectualistic notion and employ it, it gets value in

the way of results, and hence then has some value of its own; or is it

meant that the intellectual content itself must be determined in terms

of the changes effected in the ordering of life's thicket? An explicit

declaration on this point would settle, I think, not merely a point

interesting in itself, but one essential to the determination of what

is pragmatic method. For myself, I have no hesitation in saying that

it seems unpragmatic for pragmatism to content itself with finding out

the value of a conception whose own inherent significance pragmatism

has not first determined; a fact which entails that it be taken not as

a truth but simply as a working hypothesis. In the particular case in

question, moreover, it is difficult to see how the pragmatic method

could possibly be applied to a notion of "eternal perpetuation,"

which, by its nature, can never be empirically verified, or cashed in

any particular case.

This brings us to the question of truth. The problem here is also

ambiguous in advance of definition. Does the problem of what is truth

refer to discovering the "true meaning" of something; or to

discovering what an idea has to effect, and how, in order to be true;

or to discovering what the value of truth is when it is an existent

and accomplished fact? (1) We may, of course, find the "true meaning"

of a thing, as distinct from its incorrect interpretation, without

thereby establishing the truth of the "true meaning"--as we may

dispute about the "true meaning" of a passage in the classics

concerning Centaurs, without the determination of its true sense

establishing the truth of the notion that there are Centaurs.

Occasionally this "true meaning" seems to be what Mr. James has in

mind, as when, after the passage upon design already quoted, he goes

on: "But if cosmic confidence is right, not wrong, better, not worse,

that [vague confidence in the future] is a most important meaning.

That much at least of possible 'truth' the terms will then have in

them" (p. 115). "Truth" here seems to mean that design has a genuine,

not merely conventional or verbal, meaning: that something is at

stake. And there are frequently points where "truth" seems to mean

just meaning that is genuine as distinct from empty or verbal. (2) But

the problem of the meaning of truth may also refer to the meaning or

value of truths that already exist as truths. We have them; they

exist; now what do they mean? The answer is: "True ideas lead us into

useful verbal and conceptual quarters as well as directly up to useful

sensible termini. They lead to consistency, stability, and flowing

human intercourse" (p. 215). This, referring to things already true, I

do not suppose the most case-hardened rationalist would question; and

even if he questions the pragmatic contention that these consequences

define the meaning of truth, he should see that here is not given an

account of what it means for an idea to _become true_, but only of

what it means _after_ it has become true, truth as _fait accompli_. It

is the meaning of truth as _fait accompli_ which is here defined.

Bearing this in mind, I do not know why a mild-tempered rationalist

should object to the doctrine that truth is valuable not _per se_, but

because, when given, it leads to desirable consequences. "The true

thought is useful here because the home which is its object is useful.

The practical value of true ideas is thus primarily derived from the

practical importance of their objects to us" (p. 203). And many

besides confirmed pragmatists, any utilitarian, for example, would be

willing to say that our duty to pursue "truth" is conditioned upon its

leading to objects which upon the whole are valuable. "The concrete

benefits we gain are what we mean by calling the pursuit a duty" (p.

231, compare p. 76). (3) Difficulties have arisen chiefly because Mr.

James is charged with converting simply the foregoing proposition, and

arguing that since true ideas are good, any idea if good in any way is

true. Certainly transition from one of these conceptions to the other

is facilitated by the fact that ideas are tested as to their validity

by a certain goodness, viz., whether they are good for accomplishing

what they intend, for what they claim to be good for, that is,

certain modifications in prior given existences. In this case, it is

the idea which is practical, since it is essentially an intent and

plan of altering prior existences in a specific situation, which is

indicated to be unsatisfactory by the very fact that it needs or

suggests a specific modification. Then arises the theory that ideas as

ideas are always working hypotheses concerning the attaining of

particular empirical results, and are tentative programs (or sketches

of method) for attaining them. If we stick consistently to this notion

of ideas, only _consequences which are actually produced by the

working of the idea in co-operation with, or application to, prior

existences are good consequences in the specific sense of good which

is relevant to establishing the truth of an idea_. This is, at times,

unequivocally recognized by Mr. James. (See, for example, the

reference to veri-_fication_, on p. 201; the acceptance of the idea

that verification means the advent of the object intended, on p. 205.)

But at other times any good which flows from acceptance of a belief is

treated as if it were an evidence, _in so far_, of the truth of the

idea. This holds particularly when theological notions are under

consideration. Light would be thrown upon how Mr. James conceives this

matter by statements on such points as these: If ideas terminate in

good consequences, but yet the goodness of the consequences was no

part of the intention of an idea, does the goodness have any verifying

force? If the goodness of consequences arises from the context of the

idea in belief rather than from the idea itself, does it have any

verifying force?[74] If an idea leads to consequences which are good

in the _one_ respect only of fulfilling the intent of the idea (as

when one drinks a liquid to test the idea that it is a poison), does

the badness of the consequences in every other respect detract from

the verifying force of consequences?

Since Mr. James has referred to me as saying "truth is what gives

satisfaction" (p. 234), I may remark (apart from the fact that I do

not think I ever said that truth is what _gives_ satisfaction) that I

have never identified any satisfaction with the truth of an idea, save

_that_ satisfaction which arises when the idea as working hypothesis

or tentative method is applied to prior existences in such a way as to

fulfil what it intends.

My final impression (which I cannot adequately prove) is that upon the

whole Mr. James is most concerned to enforce, as against rationalism,

two conclusions about the character of truths as _faits accomplis_:

namely, that they are made, not a priori, or eternally in

existence,[75] and that their value or importance is not static, but

dynamic and practical. The special question of _how_ truths are made

is not particularly relevant to this anti-rationalistic crusade, while

it is the chief question of interest to many. Because of this conflict

of problems, what Mr. James says about the value of truth when

accomplished is likely to be interpreted by some as a criterion of the

truth of ideas; while, on the other hand, Mr. James himself is likely

to pass lightly from the consequences that determine the worth of a

belief to those which decide the worth of an idea. When Mr. James says

the function of giving "satisfaction in marrying previous parts of

experience with newer parts" is necessary in order to establish truth,

the doctrine is unambiguous. The satisfactory character of

consequences is itself measured and defined by the conditions which

led up to it; the inherently satisfactory quality of results is not

taken as validating the antecedent intellectual operations. But when

he says (not of his own position, but of an opponent's[76]) of the

idea of an absolute, "so far as it affords such comfort it surely is

not sterile, it has that amount of value; it performs a concrete

function. As a good pragmatist I myself ought to call the absolute

true _in so far forth_ then; and I unhesitatingly now do so" (p. 73),

the doctrine seems to be as unambiguous in the other direction: that

any good, consequent upon acceptance of a belief is, in so far

forth,[77] a warrant of truth. In such passages as the following

(which are of the common type) the two notions seem blended together:

"Ideas become true just in so far as they help us to get into

satisfactory relations with other parts of our experience" (p. 58);

and, again, on the same page: "Any idea that will carry us

_prosperously_ from any one part of our experience to any other part,

linking things _satisfactorily_, working securely, simplifying, saving

labor, is true for just so much" (italics mine). An explicit statement

as to whether the carrying function, the linking of things, is

satisfactory and prosperous and hence true in so far as it executes

the intent of an idea; or whether the satisfaction and prosperity

reside in the material consequences on their own account and in that

aspect make the idea true, would, I am sure, locate the point at issue

and economize and fructify future discussion. At present pragmatism is

accepted by those whose own notions are thoroughly rationalistic in

make-up as a means of refurbishing, galvanizing, and justifying those

very notions. It is rejected by non-rationalists (empiricists and

naturalistic idealists) because it seems to them identified with the

notion that pragmatism holds that the desirability of certain beliefs

overrides the question of the meaning of the ideas involved in them

and the existence of objects denoted by them. Others (like myself),

who believe thoroughly in pragmatism as a method of orientation, as

defined by Mr. James, and who would apply the method to the

determination of the meaning of objects, the intent and worth of ideas

as ideas, and to the human and moral value of beliefs, when these

various problems are carefully distinguished from one another, do not

know whether they are pragmatists in some other sense, because they

are not sure whether the practical, in the sense of desirable facts

which define the worth of a belief, is confused with the practical as

an attitude imposed by objects, and with the practical as a power and

function of ideas to effect changes in prior existences. Hence the

importance of knowing which one of the three senses of practical is

conveyed in any given passage.

It would do Mr. James an injustice, however, to stop here. His real

doctrine is that a belief is true when it satisfies both personal

needs and the requirements of objective things. Speaking of

pragmatism, he says, "Her only test of probable truth is what works

best in the way of _leading us_, what fits every part of life best and

_combines with the collectivity of experience's demands_, nothing

being omitted" (p. 80, italics mine). And again, "That new idea is

truest which performs most felicitously its function of satisfying

_our double urgency_" (p. 64). It does not appear certain from the

context that this "double urgency" is that of the personal and the

objective demands, respectively, but it is probable (see, also, p.

217, where "consistency with previous truth and novel fact" is said to

be "always the most imperious claimant"). On this basis, the "in so

far forth" of the truth of the absolute because of the comfort it

supplies, means that one of the two conditions which need to be

satisfied has been met, so that if the idea of the absolute met the

other one also, it would be quite true. I have no doubt this is Mr.

James's meaning, and it sufficiently safeguards him from the charge

that pragmatism means that anything which is agreeable is true. At the

same time, I do not think, in logical strictness, that satisfying one

of two tests, when satisfaction of both is required, can be said to

constitute a belief true even "in so far forth."