community is proverbial, as is also the comparative sterility of intellectual liberalism in provoking either religious enthusiasm or social betterment. Immediate practical action requires deep and fixed convictions, and these are all alike jeopardised by the effort of thinking, with what is (for most people) its whole-time demand and its long intervals of perplexity and suspense. This backwardness of the masses to combine thought and action affects their teachers also. The dogmas requisite to political action, to religion, etc., are most effectively impressed by those-be they politicians, priests, or scientists-who are convinced and not critical of them and this means that those whose duty it is to organise the masses for such ends have so far also a duty, unless they be persons of quite exceptional calibre, not to foster in themselves the habit of philosophic doubt but to smother it.* Nor is this self-abnegation of intellectual life necessary merely in the interests of religion or of what is distinguished from either as "practice," but also through these (paradoxical as it may sound) to the continued vigour of the intellectual life itself. Each activity draws from, as well as surrenders to, the other. A hypertrophy of either soon passes into an atrophy. A nation which so far gave itself up to thought or religion as to become politically insignificant would be in danger in the next generation of losing these as well, just as a nation which sacrifices all for practical efficiency soon becomes merely stupid and inefficient. (Witness the decline of Greek art and thought following on the decline of political life. * It is difficult to approve the double effort of thinking in one language and teaching in another, even in those who can both sustain and effectively conceal it. The Platonic guardian who teaches what he knows to be false, arouses little less dislike than a Blougram, and not a very great deal less than the Prussian who uses the press to work up the requisite furor Britannicus or Americanus. It is very doubtful whether a philosopher can be a fit person to undertake the religious education of young or stupid people, or to be a statesman in any existent state. German history since the 16th century illustrates a like decay, first at the one extreme and now at the other.) But this means that if thinking itself is to continue vigorous and healthy, it must be content to go slow, lest it outrun the general development of the nation's spiritual life.* § 27. In all these ways the "small coinage" (as Plato calls it) of human nature forces us to be imperfectly reflective, and so keeps us still unaware of the true nature of value and its varied forms. Personal inertia brings all, and duty even earlier brings some, to a halt at a point whence the vision of Good is still broken and filled in with imaginations of whose distorting influence we can from that point form no exact estimate. Nevertheless, if such be the obstacle, and only such, it is evidently an obstacle not fixed and irremovable in the nature of things, although its removal can be accomplished only by such a general outpouring, along all its channels, of spiritual activity as we have no reason to expect in any near future, and to which any individual can contribute (it may be) but little. At least no argument can be founded upon it against the faith of Socrates, firstly, that reflection can progressively remove that obstacle, and, secondly, that to the spirit of man, dependent as it is simply and solely upon communion with itself for direction in every step that it awarely takes, the goal which it seeks must already, though unawares, be known. If to this faith I have tried in this paper to lend any fresh support, it is this, that already reflection sounds in our ears a a constant warning against eating the lotus of the subjectivist. * Of individuals, too, those who develop in many directions not seldom develop most vigorously in each. Thinking (e.g.) ill flourishes apart from a reasonable domestic and social life, physical activity, and so forth. But this again obliges the thinker, for the sake of his thought in the long run, continually to give up time to exercise, or to social and domestic duties, which at the moment are mere obstructions to his thought. Plato's Republic reiterates warnings against such one-sided developments. At least we need not fall into the one illusion, which would finally be fatal to us, of supposing that what from our present vantage ground (whether of desire, of will, of enjoyment, or of judgment) may appear to us is the true measure and vision of the Good. At least we need not mistake our temporary, though it be our inevitable, halting-place for our final home. X.-SYMPOSIUM: ETHICAL PRINCIPLES OF SOCIAL RECONSTRUCTION. By L. P. JACKS, G. BERNARD SHAW, C. DELISLE BURNS, and H. D. OAKELEY. I.-By L. P. JACKS.* ETHICAL principles, which we are to discuss in relation to the reconstruction of society, appear to me, in the last analysis, to be our formulæ for certain types of personality. Whence it would follow that our question is not, by what should society be reconstructed, but by whom? I say this to indicate my point of view. To save myself as far as possible from wandering over the whole field of ethical controversy, which the title tempts me to do, I shall assume that the subject has an historical reference to actual conditions and circumstances-that, namely, we are discussing the ethical principles of social reconstruction, as this may take place after the war. By "after the war" I mean in direct sequence to the end of the war, and not at some undefined period, perhaps in the very distant future, when a totally different set of conditions may have arisen. The time-factor is especially important in this connexion, as, indeed, it seems to me to be important in every discussion of ethical problems. If "after the war" may mean a thousand years afterwards, our discussion will become an abstract treatment of general principles. Furthermore, are we discussing reconstruction as we ourselves would carry it out, if we were free to act upon I may say that the whole of this was written before I had read Mr. Bertrand Russell's Principles of Social Reconstruction, which I expected would influence me, as indeed it has. our philosophical convictions-a general question, or are we discussing the particular question of the reconstruction that will be possible when the war is over-reconstruction, that is, as limited by the circumstances by which we are then likely to be faced? I shall assume the latter alternative. The former question is one that might have been raised at any time. But the scope of our problem seems to be defined in large measure by the fact of its having been raised at the present time. I take this to mean that we are not invited to go over again the ground covered by Plato's Republic and by social philosophy in general, without any reference to actual, existing conditions. This being premised, it seems to me obvious that the ethical principles of social reconstruction after the war will be chiefly determined by the particular way in which the war ends. I mean that, whatever may be abstractly desirable, the actual reconstruction which we have to expect and prepare for will be mainly governed by an event whose precise nature we cannot at present foresee. I base this statement on the belief-which may be open to question that the war is in essence a conflict of ethical principles; or, if it is preferred-and it comes to the same thing-a conflict of a moral principle with an immoral. If the Central Powers, who represent one of these principles, win the war, not only will the victors be able to enforce the conquering principle and repress the action of its opposite, but they will do this with immense support from millions in all parts of the world who have not yet made up their minds between the two principles at issue, and are waiting for the end of the war to determine their moral allegiance. In the event of victory for the Allies, we may, of course, expect the same order of events on the other side. The point of importance in either event is that the possibilities of social reconstruction (in sequence to the war) are limited-and limited to one of two main forms, as these are indicated by the two ethical principles at stake. The conflict having been R |