hat absolutism is more congenial to our
natural prejudices. Accordingly it is the method tried first; but it
soon conducts dogmatism to an awkward series of dilemmas.

1. If there is absolute truth, who has it? and who can use the absolute
criterion of opinions it is supposed to form? Not, surely, everyone who
_thinks_ he has. It will never do to let every dogmatist vote for
himself and condemn all others. That way war and madness lie. Until
there is absolute agreement, there cannot be absolute truth.

2. But absolute truth may still be reverenced as an ideal, to save us
from the scepticism to which a complete relativity of truth would lead.
But would it save us? If it is admitted that no one can arrogate to
himself its possession, what use is it to believe that it is an ideal?
For if no one can assume that he has it, all _human_ truth is, in fact,
such as the relativist asserted, and scepticism is just as inevitable as
before. It makes no difference to the sceptical inference whether there
is no absolute truth, or whether it is unattained by man, and human
unattainable.

3. It was a mistake, therefore, to admit that opinions cannot be
compared together. Some are much more certain than others, and, indeed,
'self-evident' and 'intuitive.' Let us therefore take these to be
'truer.' If so, the thinker who feels most certain he is right is most
likely to be right.

4. This suggestion will be welcomed by all dogmatists--until they
discover that it does not help them to agree together, because they are
all as certain as can be. But a critically-minded man will urge against
it that _'certainty' is a subjective and psychological criterion_, and
that no one has been able to devise a method for distinguishing the
alleged logical from the undeniable psychological certainty. He will
hesitate to say, therefore, that because a belief seems certain it is
true, and to trust the formal claim to infallibility which is made in
every judgment. And when 'intuitions' are appealed to, he will ask how
'true' intuitions are to be discriminated from 'false,' sound from
insane, and inquire to what he is committing himself in admitting the
truth of intuitions. He will demand, therefore, the publication of a
list of the intuitions which are absolutely true. But he will not get
it, and if he did, it may be predicted that he would not find a single
one which has not been disputed by some eminent philosopher.

5. Intuitions, therefore, are an emb