with lightning
rods; and if they are caught by a storm in the open they neither run nor
hide under a tree; but when the storm is directly over their heads, they
put themselves in a position of minimum exposure by lying flat on the
ground until the storm has passed.

Such examples could be given without end, but there is another example of
sufficient vital importance to be given here, as it has to do with our
conception of the social and economic system, and the state. If our
institutions are considered "God-given"--sacred and therefore static--every
reformer or advocate of change should be treated as a criminal or "a
danger to the existing order" and hanged or at least put in jail for life.
But now, if our institutions are "man made," imperfect and often foolish,
and subject to change all the time steadily and dynamically in obedience
to some known or unknown law; then of course all reactionaries would be a
"danger to the natural order" and they should be treated the same way. The
importance of definitions can be seen in all other fields of practical
life; definitions create conditions. To know the world in which we live,
we have to analyse facts by help of such facts as we know in daily
practice and such facts as are established in scientific laboratories
where men do not jump to conclusions. In some places it will be necessary
to make statements that will have to await full justification at a later
stage of the discussion. This will be necessary to indicate the trend of
the analysis.

The aim of the analysis is to give us just conceptions, correct
definitions, and true propositions. The process is slow, progressive, and
endless. The problems are infinitely many, and it is necessary to select.
Fortunately the solution of a few leads automatically to the solution of
many others. Some of the greatest and most far-reaching scientific
discoveries have been nothing else than a few correct definitions, a few
just concepts and a few true propositions. Such, for example, was the work
of Euclid, Newton and Leibnitz--a few correct definitions, a few just
concepts, a few true propositions; but these have been extended and
multiplied, sometimes by men of creative genius, and often almost
automatically by men of merely good sense and fair talent.

The matter of definition, I have said, is very important. I am not now
speaking of _nominal_ definitions, which for convenience merely give names
to known objects. I am speaking of suc